In a First, Israel Responds To Hamas Hackers With an Air Strike (zdnet.com) 568
For the first time, Israel has used brute military force to respond to a Hamas cyberattack, three years after NATO proclaimed "cyber" an official battlefield in modern warfare. From a report: The "bomb-back" response took place on Saturday when Israel Defense Forces (IDF) launched an air strike against a building in the Gaza Strip. They claimed it housed Hamas cyber operatives, which had been engaging in a cyberattack against Israel's "cyberspace." "We were ahead of them all the time," said Brigadier General D., the head of the IDF's cyber defense division. "The moment they tried to do something, they failed." Israeli officials did not disclose any details about the Hamas cyberattack; however, they said they first stopped the attack online, and only then responded with an air strike. "After dealing with the cyber dimension, the Air Force dealt with it in the physical dimension," said IDF spokesperson, Brig. Gen. Ronen Manlis. "At this point in time, Hamas has no cyber operational capabilities."
A precedent has been set (Score:5, Insightful)
Now Iran can go ahead and bomb the Israelis who used Stuxnet against Iranian nuclear centrifuges.
Re: A precedent has been set (Score:3, Insightful)
As if Iran cares about faux precedent or would not have already attacked Israel years ago if they could? Who the fuck do you think supplied the rockets fired into Israel last week?
Jane, you are an ignorant slut.
Re: A precedent has been set (Score:4, Insightful)
And who supplied the puppet government in Iran that started this whole mess?
And who do you think carved up the entire region after WWI making it the powder keg it became? Then who persuaded the US to take part in the 1953 coup by convincing the secretary of state that the USSR was backing Mosaddegh?
Re: A precedent has been set (Score:5, Interesting)
You're right. Everything is America's fault. (eye roll)
Strange. I don't recall the US being involved in the Sykes-Picot agreement. Nor the Sazonv-Paleologue and Constantinople agreements. I'm pretty sure this was all UK, France, Russia and Italy had a small part as well.
The 1953 coup was at the UK's behest in order to protect their oil interests in Iran. When Mosaddegh was democratically elected he wanted to nationalize the oil business in Iran and wanted a 50/50 split with Britain. The US even sided with Iran on this. But the British refused to help Iran with oil production and used the royal navy to keep Iran from shipping any oil as they considered it stolen property. They also stopped buying anything else from Iran and froze their accounts that were almost entirely with British banks.
During all of the turmoil in Iran there was a communist party backed by the USSR. They suddenly appeared to start backing Mosaddegh which made it look like the nationalization of the oil was part of some soviet plot to take over Iran. This made it pretty easy for the British to convince the US that the Russians were plotting to take over Iran.
This was also the first time the US was involved in toppling another country's government in a covert manner.
But, yeah. Everything's America's fault.
Re: A precedent has been set (Score:4, Interesting)
Mosaddegh actually called a halt to the 1952 election before all of the electorates had been counted, because the remaining electorates were probably going to come out against his party.
Very true. But it's unlikely it would have come to that if the British hadn't spent two years strangling Iran with sanctions, using the navy to stop all oil exports, and seizing most of their money. While the people of Iran thought of him as some kind of hero, having no money to run the a country makes it kind of tough.
Yeah, the UK had some self-interest in this case: they didn't like their corporations' property being seized by the Iranian government.
True. But the British also purchased exclusive oil rights in 1916 for a 60 year term. They paid around $30K. While a lot of money at the time, it's akin to the purchase of Manhattan from the Delaware Indians for $24 worth of goods. So it's kind of hard to blame then for being a bit pissed off.
The entire history of how the British, French and later the US handled that part of the world is pretty shitty. But the entire "America caused all of the problems in the Middle East" line gets a little tiresome.
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Yep, all bets are off. This should get interesting as the spoofing is so trivial.
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they can certainly try
Re:A precedent has been set (Score:5, Insightful)
Now Iran can go ahead and bomb the Israelis who used Stuxnet against Iranian nuclear centrifuges.
Iran already does everything that it can to Israel.
If Iran thought direct bombing was a good idea they'd be doing it already.
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Now Iran can go ahead and bomb the Israelis who used Stuxnet against Iranian nuclear centrifuges.
Iran already does everything that it can to Israel.
If Iran thought direct bombing was a good idea they'd be doing it already.
Iran is quite busy propping up the Assad regime in Syria. The last thing they are interested in is a skirmish with the Israelis. When the Syria mess is stabilised? ... Who knows? ... but for the moment they are quite content building Hezbollah into an even more effective army with even higher tech weapons than they hitherto had in preparation for the next time the Israelis decide to go for an excursion into S-Lebanon. The last time the IDF got a proper nosebleed and the next time it will be worse.
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Iran is fully engaged in the larger Sunni/Shia war. Not just Syria.
America's job is to maintain the stalemate (80s Iran/Iraq style) until they beat the fight out of each other. ETA...another 5 centuries.
The only group they hate more than the Jooos is 'Heretics', chumps are blinded by superstition.
Imagine if the baptists owned 50% of the world, the southerns would be at war with the regulars.
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Now Iran can go ahead and bomb the Israelis who used Stuxnet against Iranian nuclear centrifuges.
Something tells me if Iran could bomb Israel with impunity they'd be doing it already. It's not that they lack the capability to bomb Israel; it's that they know Israeli forces will obliterate them if they try. Israel has engaged -- or been engaged -- in several wars with its Arab neighbors. They've come out on top every time, and most of that was before they got the nuclear option.
So to sum it up, if Iran wants to pick a fight, the Israeli's are more than ready to engage in one. That they haven't speak
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Well no, they bombed the cyber-attack location they had in addition to the missile attack locations. That's what it says, if you learn how to read.
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As far as I have been able to determine, there never was one.
The land hasn't moved. 3,000 years, then 1964 Araf (Score:4, Informative)
How "Palestinian" the land is hasn't changed. Palestine is the area east of Jordan, to the Medditerrean. It's still east of Jordan, it's still Palestine.
The Palestine region been home to many different peoples over the course of known history, with borders between nations in the region shifting regularly, different kingdoms controlling different parts of Palestine and surrounding areas, such as the peninsula.
The region has been known as Palestine (and Canaan) for thousands of years. It has never been part of any "Palestinian" state, if that's what you're thinking, because Palestine has never been the name of a state or a people.
The word "Palestinian" was first used regularly in the 1940s as part of the phrase "Palestinian Jews", meaning Jewish people who lived east of Jordan. The Jews had lived there for at least 3,000 years. In the 1940s the UN saw fit to draw official borders of Israel.
Twenty years later, around 1964, a man named Arafat took up the leadership of the militant anti-Jewish people in the area. In the 1960s, Arafat essentially claimed to represent all of the non-Jewish (Arab) people in the region. The phrase "Palestinian Arab" was used to describe anyone who had roots in the Palestine region. Arafat took to calling Palestinian Arabs "Palestinians" for short. That term encompasses anyone from any tribe or nation anywhere in the region, excluding Jews. So kinda like "Aryan", but a bit more inclusive.
Different groups have controlled different parts of Palestine at different times in the last 3,000-5,000 years, most notably Egypt, who took control of various parts many times throughout history. Any Egyptian in the region is a Palestinian, as is anyone descended from Sashu or any of a hundred different peoples. They are all "not Jews", and therefore "Palestinian Arabs". Few of them would agree that Arafat and his successors ever represented them.
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East of Jordan?
Lol. I realized that too late. (Score:2)
Yeah I realized after submitting that I had said east instead of west. Lol
Re:The land hasn't moved. 3,000 years, then 1964 A (Score:4, Insightful)
You said it, brother! Rock on!
Now, just substitute any other region in the world, cherry-pick your history, toss around a few minorities, and you get the SAME THING.
I, for one, welcome the Native American Overlords back to controlling their sovereign lands. No, wait. That would be the Mexican Nation. Hold it, the South will rise again. No, Rue Britania? Yay Spain?
Too much for me. I guess whoever won the last war (by killing the most people) gets to decide who lives there. Thank God we're all past that tribal stuff, eh?
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It depends on the timing of when you look. From the mid-19th century until about 1930, much of the emigration to the area was by europeans and voluntary. They had been buying land, often with an artifice, so that the buyer wasn't known. By the '30s, the Jerushalmi were outnumbered by Ashkenazim 3:1.
It was in 1948, when the state of Israel was founded, when countries in the middle east began to expel jews. (Europe, quite famously, had a drastically different reaction than expulsion.) By 1949, the popula
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What's the net worth of the Arafat family? Where did it come from?
Re:Lost cause (Score:5, Insightful)
The Middle East is a lost cause.
The US should just pull out, stop this carte blanche support of Israel.
I don't agree with giving Israel to the wolves. Helping Israel survive was a just and important move; however, I think supporting Israel, no matter what it does, and not calling it out for blatant human rights abuses and being the only state living with apathaid in the 21st Century, is being as much the devil as Israel itself can be at times.
Help protect Israel, yes, and offer assistance if other states try to impose their will over Israel... but let's not give them free reign to be just as evil as the states that would see Israel destroyed. The US are often massive hypocrites regarding their turning a blind-eye to the atrocities committed by Israel.
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I don't agree with giving Israel to the wolves.
They should've thought of that in '48.
Two wrongs don't make a right and "Affirmative Action for Jews of Central-Asian Decent at the Expense of Palestinians Because of the Holocaust and Because They Claim to be Israelites" is one of the more sickening themes of modern history.
Re:Lost cause (Score:5, Insightful)
The majority of support for Israel from the US these days seems to be coming from the Christian evangelicals on the right (not all of them), who treat the formation of the state of Israel as a predecessor for the end times. They see this as a good thing even though as described in the Book of Revelations as a very terrible things for humanity, but they won't mind since the terrible stuff happens after the rapture and they won't be around. It's very much a "good for us, the rest can go to hell" viewpoint, and seems to show an underlying contempt for the world which is at odds with the entire message of the Christian New Testament.
US Jews seem to support Israel as an entity but they don't seem in favor of the current government and their provocations (settlements) that keep the hostilities simmering.
Even in Israel you can see from the last election that things were very much split politically, there was only a minor win by the coalition. A significant chunk of the coalition comes from ultra-Orthodox parties whose main aims are to have an explicitly Jewish state and to exempt themselves from the otherwise compulsary military service. This is sort of like the strange bedfellows situation in the US where the conservative coalition would lose power if it weren't for the religious right.
In any case, there's not logical reason for the US to support Israel at the expense of the rest of the middle-east. Peace should be the logical goal and yet it seems to be off of the political table at the moment.
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And yet, politics is still highly rooted in religion in most countries. It's difficult to understand why so many governments act irrationally or how to try and reform them without understanding religion.
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And yet, politics is still highly rooted in religion in most countries.
Most? Look at the countries where religion has a legitimate part in government. Shitholes.
The USA (the West) has missed a number of opportunities to promote secular governments in places we've stepped in to sort things out. Israel should have been a secular state, where a constitution protected the rights and safety of any minority. Muslims, Christians, Atheists and Jews. And later on, in Iraq after Saddam, the new government insisted that tribal membership be included on national IDs. We should have told
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...and turning a blind eye to the atrocities committed by Saudi Arabia and Egypt. And it appears the U.S. is on the verge of turning the Kurds over to that Turkish nutjob, Erdogan. And the U.S. will again look away from the atrocities of another ally. Best thing the U.S. can do is start moving men and material out of Turkey and into Kurdistan and then kick Turkey out of NATO. Then tell Erdogan his life is forfeit if he gets any ideas about attacking them.
Re:Lost cause (Score:5, Informative)
Apartheid? How do you figure that?
What? How do you not? [wikipedia.org] Unless, of course, you are the ADL [adl.org], which claims that "There is no Israeli ideology, policy or plan to segregate, persecute or mistreat the Arab population." This is an obvious falsehood, however, especially since they put up a wall specifically for the purpose of segregation, and they restrict the movement of Palestinians.
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You mean the West Bank which Jordan stole from Israel [wikipedia.org]? That West Bank? The same on that Jordan relinquished their claim to in 1988? I guess if I come and "annex" half your house, then all is fair and proper and if you later force me out then you're the oppressor, not me. Right?
And since when does "Aparthied" allow the supposed repressed group to hold Government positions (in the Knesset), practice free and open business, and such? There are several mosques in Israel [wikipedia.org]; how many synagogues are in Jordan
Re:Lost cause (Score:5, Insightful)
The scariest thing about the Israeli change in attitude towards peace is how quickly it's happened.
The Israeli right is now talking about annexing the entire west bank, but the Arab's who live in those lands would not be citizens of Israel. The plans call for them to be citizens of their towns with no voting rights or other constitutional rights including equal protection under the law. They couldn't petition Israeli courts, the Israeli government could banish them, take their land and kill them without any protection under the constitution. The plans are nothing more than modern day apartheid where the majority of the population is prevented from voting, are not citizens of the country they reside in and have no rights within the country they live in. In almost every way this is what apartheid South Africa did to the Zulu and other black citizenry.
The reason the Israeli attitude has changed is that they no longer have any repercussions for these actions. The US protects them at the international level no matter how bad and rights destroying their legislation is. Because of this international protection the occupation and apartheid like treatment of Arabs Christians and Muslims results in almost no negatives for the Jewish states and electorate now sees no reason to make peace. They get everything they want with the occupation and experience none of the consequences of apartheid policy.
America needs to stand up and recognize that the Israel of today is not the one that sought peace in the 70's and 80's. This new Israel seeks to create an unequal apartheid state, and they are building towards that goal every single year.
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Or maybe we could criticise all 58 of them. What, you want one country to get a special pass because you think it's only populated by one race?
Out of curiousity though, what are those 57 islamic apartheid states? Just that I don't think I could name any. Shit, I don't think I could name 57 islamic states, irrespective of whether they have an official policy of apartheid.
Are you in favor of the two state solution? (Score:3)
The widespread currently Israel apart
Re:Lost cause (Score:4, Informative)
Apartheid? How do you figure that?
This might be informative. [wikipedia.org]
To be sure, the Apartheid analogy has been challenged. However, it has some eminent supporters, including (per the Wikipedia article) "the Congress of South African Trade Unions, Jimmy Carter, archbishop Desmond Tutu, and Israel Attorney-General Michael Ben-Yair."
Re:Lost cause (Score:4, Insightful)
Give your lands back to the indians, American. (If you are european, I'm pretty sure that with some work I can find out who you took lands from as well)
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So you're saying that Israel took the land from the indiginous peoples of the Middle East?
Give back your Israeli citizenship. You failed your dogma class.
"I can find out who you took lands from" (Score:2)
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There are no international parties calling for the US to give land back to the native Americans, which isn't the case for the Israeli occupation of Palestine. International law developed in the 20th century rescinds the right of conquest, preventing the destruction of all of humanity in the modern age, and Israel flouts this law with its illegal occupation of Palestine.
As an American, I'm not proud of some of America's past. Also as an American, I'm disgusted with our complicity in the occupation of Palesti
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An interesting idea. I have to admit that the US government in the pat was most definitely misguided or even outright evil in its relations with the native residents of America. The population of native Americans is very tiny these days, much from disease or other causes. I have generally been in favor of allowing autonomy in reservations. However the idea that just because people in the past did bad things should never excuse bad things that happen in the present.
For these reasons also, every piece of pri
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FWIW, I've been told that there are more full-blooded (how would they know?) Indians alive now than there were when Columbus reached San Salvador. (Again, how would they know, but at least this time there are reasonable grounds to make an estimate.)
This is not to claim that entire tribes weren't wiped out, or that there weren't many extremely vile historical events. But do note that Kentucky is a transcription of an Indian word (phrase?) meaning "The dark and bloody ground" and that warfare was endemic am
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That population is larger than is was in 1492. Bronze age hunter gatherer societies don't support large populations.
Sure, as soon as the Indians give back the land (Score:2)
People have been awful for centuries. The solution isn't looking back to the past. The solution is to say that a good life well lived is a basic and inalienable human right and work to make that happen. I don't give two shits who "owns" the land so long as I've got what I need. Nobody but Rent Seekers does. Push back on those people and the ruling elite in general and the
Too late. We've intermarried (Score:2)
Give your lands back to the indians, American.
Too late. We've been intermarrying for centuries now. If everyone of "pure" European (or other non-American Indian descent) were deported to whatever country their ancestors were from, the remaining population would look about the same, and wouldn't be much smaller.
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And if you're Asian, the same. What, you thought that the Chinese/Vietnamese/Koreans/Japanese evolved where they currently live???
That said, the Amerinds were NOT the first wave of immigrants into the Americas. Second, or possibly third. So they'd have to give the land back to whatever survivors of that first wave still exist.
Hell, the Eskimos aren't ev
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(If you are european, I'm pretty sure that with some work I can find out who you took lands from as well)
The brutally oppressed and displaced Cro-Magnons
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So what you are saying is we should kill them all off? As you said the population isn't high enough to justify them getting their land back in the case of Native Americans.
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This all depends on which tribe you're considering. Some of the tribes are doing quite well, thank you, except that so many of their kids leave for the city. Other tribes....well, people should be ashamed to treat other people that way.
FWIW, the local tribe has a monopoly on running gambling operations, and their Casino is quite profitable. And their population, even with so many kids leaving, is higher than it was a century ago. But traditional occupations are falling by the way-side, so the elders are
Re:Lost cause (Score:4, Insightful)
Don't let bastards take words.
If you are born in America, you are native.
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Everybody knows nuclear weapons can never be used as any nation which does will be bombed back into the stone age by the other 8 nuclear states. So thats an empty threat.
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Israel's nuclear weapons program is quite advanced.
Those who know whether that statement is factually correct or not will most definitely not be appraising the world of the fact... certainly not anonymously on Slashdot...
That having been said, it's generally understood that while Israel developed the bomb in collaboration with South Africa in the 70's [wikipedia.org], the sheer amount of influence the Zionists have in the Pentagon virtually dictates that they've got cart blanch to the latest stuff out of Los Alamos... so yeah, probably.
FFS, why is anti-Semitic "dual loyalty" bullshit lifted straight from 1930's REAL Nazi propaganda so fucking acceptable to "progressives"?
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the sheer amount of influence the Zionists have in the Pentagon virtually dictates that they've got cart blanch to the latest stuff out of Los Alamos... so yeah, probably.
FFS, why is anti-Semitic "dual loyalty" bullshit lifted straight from 1930's REAL Nazi propaganda so fucking acceptable to "progressives"?
Not all semites are zionists, so anti-zionism is not the same as anti-semitism. Further, the commenter didn't even say anything anti-zionist, they only used the characterization "zionist". It's a useful distinction, since not all Jews believe that Israel is moral.
Re: A precedent has been set (Score:2, Informative)
You just used the "It is okay to say 'It is okay to be white'" defense. "Zionist" is a term largely used by bigots, and should be avoided in polite conversation. You may know what it really means, but for the sake of others, you should refrain. It's like calling the black member of a group who is always late to meetings a niggard (physically slow person). You'd be correct, but you'd be fired so fast he'd get caught in your wake and never be slow again.
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And you don't have to be a Jew to hate Nazis.
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You have to be a bigot to hate all Jews, like Nazis. To hate an entire race, no matter which, is racism.
That's not bigotry. Bigotry is rejecting other ideas without fair consideration simply because they are not your own ideas.
You can be hateful and mean without being a bigot.
Re:A precedent has been set (Score:4, Insightful)
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That's not really how the threat of nukes works though, you can look at North Korea and the US. No doubt the US has the world's most advanced nuclear program but all North Korea has to do is play chicken and that superiority fades to nothing. If Iran had nukes all they'd have to do is draw a line in the sand and say if you cross it we nuke Jerusalem. And Israel could bluster all the want like Trump about how much more advanced they are and that they'd level half the country but I very much doubt they'd cros
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In an actual all-out war Israel would definitely be destroyed. It's not very big, and much of it is essentially uninhabitable. (I.e. any habitation requires either a very low technology level and a very sparse population, or a large technical support base that's easily destroyed. Desalinization plants, electric generators, water pipes, electric lines, etc.)
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That having been said, it's generally understood that while Israel developed the bomb in collaboration with South Africa in the 70's, the sheer amount of influence the Zionists have in the Pentagon virtually dictates that they've got cart blanch to the latest stuff out of Los Alamos... so yeah, probably.
You do understand that only anti-Semites use the term "Zionist" for real people, right? And that asserting secret Jewish influence on the levers of power is something straight out of Nazi propaganda?
Flamebait (Score:5, Funny)
This is what happens when -1 flamebait is taken literally.
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"I am invincible!"
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What's wrong with you?
They won 'the stupid prize'. You know the saying.
There are many examples of funny 'people are dead stories'. Tell me that the weather underground blowing up their parents brownstone (and themselves) isn't a hilarious bit of history.
This is a horrible idea (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm starting to wonder if the Israeli gov't isn't trying to goad Palestine into something drastic. Admittedly I don't know a lot about the politics of the region, but this is too much.
Re:This is a horrible idea (Score:4, Insightful)
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600 rockets fired over the course of 2 days isn't drastic enough for you?
I've spent several months of my life working/living in the various FOBs throughout Iraq and Afghanistan. We were getting rocketed and/or mortared on a nearly daily basis. It's not that big of a deal, the insurgents firing these weapons can't aim with any reliability, and the probability of you biting it is far less than the probability of getting hit by a truck.
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Oh that's rich. Tell us about the Quaran next. The difference is Christians won't decapitate you for criticizing their holy book.
No, that would primarily be our allies in the region spreading wahhabism -the Saudis. You know, the ones that actually populated those planes that hit us in 2001? I don't recall any Iranians onboard.
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Trust me when I say if the US or European governments provided even tacit support for some of these far right Christians we would see blasphemy murders skyrocket and people would fall in line with them to avoid being the next victim.
No people wouldn't and that's exactly the problem. Western Europe was swept with religious war repeatedly and the Founding Fathers correctly diagnosed the problem as insufficient religious freedom, which is why that clause is in the First Amendment. When the blasphemy murders start, they beget more blasphemy murders. At its root, that's what Israel vs. the Arabs is all about, and why it has never stopped. People don't fall in line. People get wrapped up in Hatfields and McCoys until no one's left. All
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Christian war history is true. But even out poorest, most backward 'drunk as fuck' area (Ireland) has finally settled into peace.
When will the Sunni/Shia war end? Not until oil is worthless again, at soonest. That's good and should continue to be encouraged.
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Seems a very appropriate response to me. Hacking is just aother kind of weapon. Israel and Hamas are at war, and surely the Israelis are free to used any weapon in their arsenal to counter the enemy, excepting nukes. They don't have to respond with the same kind of weapon (counter-hacking in this case). It was a targeted attack against the builidng housing the hackers, so not disproportionate.
Re:This is a horrible idea (Score:5, Insightful)
The counterstrikes are just going to make it worse (Score:3)
The solution is to build Palestine into it's own country with it's own security and police. Ask yourself, if these cyber attacks originated in the US would you be OK with Israel launching missiles into a US apartment c
Re:This is a horrible idea (Score:5, Interesting)
Like it or not the reality is that cyberspace (a really outdated term but the military has decided to stick with cyber, so points for consistency) is a very real and active dimension of modern warfare. This kind of thing is frowned upon in the civilian IT world. For obvious reasons, if someone hacks a bank the bank cant just hack them back just like the bank cant send armed men to the house of a bank robber and gun him down. But for the military it is very different. We rely a lot on IT infrastructure, /. users know that but laymen probably don't realize just how much they do. The militaries of the world rightly see that as a national security risk like any other. The only thing that has changed is the method of war.
I find it hard to believe that people on /., after talking about things like election meddling (which by the way has always happened, the only new part is that it happened to be on social media.) don't understand how seriously these kinds of things should be taken. Air strikes are the tip of the ice berg. As the public gets more and more familiar with just how crucial these systems are I expect to see in the not too distant future major wars to be started over hacks. The question of a "digital pearl harbor" isn't and if its a when. Bad actors have only been able to get away with this with little repercussions so far because the public doesn't understand it or take it seriously. If the OPM hack were to take place in the 2030's instead of the 2010's then it would almost certainly mean war with China.
Re:This is a horrible idea (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm starting to wonder if the Israeli gov't isn't trying to goad Palestine into something drastic.
If Palestinians were capable of doing something drastic, they would already have done so. No further provocation is required.
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That's the thing about war: you kill people on the other side. That's what a "war" is. Ideally all the warfighters on each side wear uniforms, so you can tell them apart from civilians, but if your side doesn't bother with uniforms you can hardly blame the other side for not being too picky. And in any case, civilians die. War sucks.
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That is clearly a false statement. Do you think that be repeating it frequently you make it true?
FWIW, the British Protectorate of Palestine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] was established under the League of Nations. Under the Romans there was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] which was a merger of Judea and Syria. It existed during the medieval period as referenced by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] etc.
They are at war though (Score:4, Insightful)
AFAIK Israeli forces are alrady fighting in the Gaza strip so this is more about taking out highly skilled operatives of an enemy than a retaliation.
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" Wars have rules. "
Sweet summer child.
War does not have rules (Score:5, Insightful)
They are not actually "at war" though. Wars have rules.
No wars don't have rules. Sometimes groups that are at war agree to not be completely savage with each other but nothing actually prevents parties at war from being as brutal as possible. Explain to me the "rules" that were being followed when the Allies firebombed civilian populations in Germany, or what "rules" were followed when Hiroshima was obliterated. Sure we have some stuff like the Geneva Conventions but the only thing enforcing those is the honor system and such "rules" get ignored routinely. Anyone who thinks war has rules has never actually been anywhere close to an actual war.
They are occupiers in an illegal military occupation trying to crush the elected government, Hamas, which they've declared and defacto forced into an insurgency.
"Illegal military occupation"? According to which laws? By that logic the entire United States is an illegal military occupation of lands that were previously settled before any white people showed up in boats. Furthermore the occupied territory only became occupied AFTER Israel was attacked by countries determined to wipe out Israel. They attacked, fought and lost and to the victors go the spoils. This isn't to excuse some of the brutal behavior of the Israelis since then over the conquered territory but to pretend that some sort of laws apply to conquered territory after war is absurdly naive. Brutalized a conquered people long enough and an insurgency is a predictable result.
When peace comes to Israel, it will not be with the government it currently has in place.
This is sadly true. Even more sadly I don't see peace coming to the region any time soon. When you have religious and ethnic wars that have been going on for centuries, logical and peaceful solutions become a good approximation of impossible.
Palestinine partition (Score:5, Insightful)
First the nation of Israel was created by the USA for the purpose of suppressing Islam.
You fail your history class. The US was involved along with the rest of the United Nations but the creation of the modern nation of Israel the reality is far more complicated [wikipedia.org]. Go study history before you spout off again.
There are no heroes anywhere in this story.
Sure there are. Just few/none in positions of substantial power unfortunately. The nation states and religious institutions involved have set up an essentially unresolveable conflict with no clear path to peace.
Re: (Score:2)
When have Islamacists ever played by any rules of warfare?
If there is one thing I have learned from watching the IDF at work it is this: "There is only one rule of warfare which is that warfare has no rules.", although there are a few things you might want to refrain from doing for PR reasons.
Re: (Score:2)
In reality the 600 rockets do not threaten the Israeli state.
Right, it just threatens the lives of ordinary Israelis, like the dozen or so who were killed in the latest volley of rocket fire. Unfortunately every time sympathy around the world starts building to a critical mass in favor of the Palestinians, someone on their behalf (Hamas, etc...) lashes out (impotently, as you point out) and causes just enough damage as to re-galvanize support for Israel.
Sure it was in response to a Hamas cyberattack (Score:5, Informative)
RTFA (Score:5, Interesting)
The attack was specifically in response to a cyberattack. If Israel wanted to respond to the Hamas rocket attacks they would go after different sites (e.g. the sites where those attacks were).
Also, as I've pointed out on other threads this is _not_ the way you fight terrorism. The point of Hamas' attacks is to prompt an over reaction [youtube.com]. The over reaction leads to more insurgents and the eventual goal is to get the rank and file citizens on your side. You fight terrorism with food, shelter, jobs and modernization. When folks have those the only terrorists you have is the occasional nut job, and you fight those with mental health services.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm sure the 250 rockets fired by Hamas into Israel had nothing to do with the airstrikes at all.
Those don't count! For some strange reason, that, um, wouldn't apply to anybody else on earth.
We are being bombed (Score:5, Informative)
Israel has been under constant bombing in the last 3-4 days. This is a response to the bombing.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Israel has been under constant bombing in the last 3-4 days. This is a response to the bombing.
Don't try to confuse us with facts!
Defending yourself is evil! Er, well, you defending yourself is evil. For some mysterious unspecified reason. Arrrr!
(Meanwhile, I have to go name call some Republicans "anti-semites". Because logic!)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Israel has been illegally occupying Palestine and committing various human rights abuses against Palestinians for decades. Once Israel retreats to the 1967 borders it can claim it's defending itself.
Re:We are being bombed (Score:4, Interesting)
Back in 2006, Israel left Gaza and went back to the 1967 borders there. Why is Hamas launching rockets from Gaza now?
Re:We are being bombed (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, home made rockets vs. drones and F-35s with JDAMs, this is going to be a close one, Israel is clearly the underdog here.
Ok, you can convinced me, Israel should not respond to the rockets. Also, if an untrained person attacks people with a gun, police should not attack him, because he is clearly a poor underdog.
Re: (Score:2)
> Also, if an untrained person attacks people with a gun, police should not attack him, because he is clearly a poor underdog.
You got the analogy wrong. It's more like a policeman broke into your house, killed your parents and your infant, and then decided to move in. Then, over 50 years later, when you try to punch the policeman, he shoots you in the face and claims he was defending himself.
Re:Lucasnate1 is the REAL victim, here, people. (Score:5, Insightful)
Palestine does not threaten Israel's sovereignty in a physical sense.
Imagine Silicon Valley being constantly bombed by home-made rockets. Israel has only one such "Silicon Valley", it is called Tel Aviv, and missiles CAN reach it, even today. Palestinians, have the capability of majorly distrubing Israeli economy even today.
Even this was not true, a country has the right to respond when a neighboring country attacks its civilians. I really don't understand what you expect us to do, just tell a whole bunch of our citizens that their lives are not worthy enough for us to retaliate?
Proxy? (Score:2)
This is totally reasonable response (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
HamaCyberHQ.exe has been removed (Score:2)
The IDF tweet that followed [twitter.com] was especially cringe-y/gore-y/meme-esque:
"CLEARED FOR RELEASE: We thwarted an attempted Hamas cyber offensive against Israeli targets. Following our successful cyber defensive operation, we targeted a building where the Hamas cyber operatives work.
HamasCyberHQ.exe has been removed."
nmap (Score:2)
This is not tech news (Score:2)
Hacking is just another method of attack
Re: (Score:2)
This is a non-story (Score:3)
Hamas has been launching hundreds of rockets at Israel for the last few days.
The IDF has been bombing Hamas buildings in retaliation.
Maybe tracing the cyber-attack to that building put it on the target list, maybe it was on it before based on preexisting intelligence, but I very much doubt it would have been bombed in outside this period of active fighting.