vendredi 2 janvier 2009

Israel and the future

"At the Shifa hospital, a dentist told the New York Times that his friend, Ehab Madhoud, has just died. Madhoud, a doctor, had been responding to an emergency in the Jabalya refugee camp when his ambulance was hit by a missile. "I can't understand why Israel would hit an ambulance. . . " "

Israel has no right to self-defence in the current context. The reasons for the murder are not, therefore, self-defence, but have some other motivation. Internally, every Palestinian corpse is good electorally. Externally, it says "We, the consumers of the world the US and the western capitalists, will not tolerate any objection let alone resistance, to our world order. This is how we deal with offenders. Be warned." It is a message to the Iranians aswell. "We may have been humiliated in 2006, but we can hit hard and fast. Be warned." To the rest of us, this is how the powers will deal with problems in the future. The economic breakdown is going to be so disorientating, prolonged and deep that it will, eventually, lead to urban areas that will be near no go zones and where the civilian population will have to be regarded as enemy combatants to be contained, processed and ultimately destroyed. With ruthless barbaric and indiscriminate brutality. Be warned.

And as for wondering why they would hit ambulances...one has to wonder whether Madhoud's words above are in some sense dissembling. For he cannot think that somehow the Forces' troops are in any way concerned about the collateral damage they are enjoying inflicting? GIve him the benefit of the doubt, though, at least. After all, the west is giving them nothing else.