Reply #22: I don't know that you are being singled out... [View All]

[newyorican]

however there is a separate forum for Israel/Palestine here. The topic has been singled out by those that run this site. It has a distilling effect that some on both sides of the issue find disturbing.

As to the old argument of discussing other nations troubles before discussing Israel, there 2 answers, one easy and the other more nuanced.

The easy answer is that this is the I/P forum, what else do you expect to be discussed here?

The more nuanced (and cynical) answer is something I have picked up through experience. The discussion of "other" nations problem, prior to uttering a single word about Israel always wound up being a diversion from the topic at hand. The discussion of the other nations issues was never completed to the satisfaction of advocates for Israel. Therefore discussion of Israel could never occur and the meeting/evening/discussion was over without addressing the conflict. That, I have learned, was the exact desired effect of this tactic.

Now on a more personal level, I know and correspond with many Israelis though my job. I am an engineer in a firm that produces defense related microwave components. We have a sister company in Israel (for almost 20 years now). I have had frank/heated discussions with about 20 to 30 of them face-to-face (probably more by now, but my memory fails me).

Their opinions run the gamut from strident support for Israeli actions to shock and disgust (often in the same family). This does not make me an expert by any stretch, but I have had and continue to have direct personal contact with those who are living in the zone everyday. These are people that have had me as a guest for Seder in their homes. The topic of my perceptions is always broached by them, not I (as a guest learning about Seder/Mitzvahs/etc., I thought it extremely bad form to bring it up myself).

To a man/woman they understand (while not always agreeing) that my own problem is one of culpability. I don't want something I've developed blowing innocents to smithereens. I don't want my tax dollars to do it either in Israel, the occupied territories or anywhere else.

Now I've probably rambled on long enough, but I felt you were genuinely interested in dialog so I have revealed to you more in this post about myself than I have since I joined DU in 2001. I am, personally, very bitter toward any that would mis-use the products I have designed or helped in designing. That is the source of my angst. Believe it or not my biggest problem is with the US government, and not over relations with Israel.