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At 8/6/06 09:21 PM, Anti_Noob wrote: .......

Riiiight. I'd love to continue this "discussion" but I've got a spaceship to catch. I'll be back from the Horsehead Nebula in a couple of aeons, in the meantime try to lay off the crack a little, fellow traveler.

Okay, I'll try to formulate this as clearly as possible.

Mackid/HI mentioned something that Reuters, a news service, had reported. You then started talking about "rumors and lies created by Zionists". Mynamewontfitin then pointed out that Reuters wasn't, in fact, a hate group. You then proceeded with claiming that Reuters is a Zionist organisation.

And as far as I know, Reuters is nowhere near being a politically affiliated organisation. You claimed that it was, so please back up your claim, you know, with things called SOURCES. Prove that Reuters has openly politically motivated goals, or stop making outlandish claims, simple as that.

At 8/6/06 08:19 PM, Anti_Noob wrote: Dude read wikipedia. THere are zionists in Israel.

Errm, you're not kidding? I said that the observation of "Reuters being a Zionist press agency"was ludicrous. The fact that Paul Julius Reuter was a German Jew in the 19th century says nothing about their political agenda, as a matter of fact.

Wikipedia actually has a surprisingly good article about the purges:

"When Zionist immigrants began settling in Palestine at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, they often avoided the area of Lydda and Ramlah because of its considerable Arab population. When the United Nations voted for the partition of Palestine, Lydda was allocated to the future Arab State. Nevertheless, following the invasion by five Arab armies into the nascent State of Israel in May 1948, the Jewish Army occupied Lydda and Ramlah in July 1948 and the place was the site of one of the darkest episodes of the War: scores of civilians were killed in the assault, 28 villages destroyed and at least 40,000 people evicted from their homes after an order issued personally by David Ben-Gurion and signed by the field commander in the area, the future prime minister Yitzhak Rabin (who would later express some regret about this episode in his memoirs). The "Lydda-Ramlah massacre" received extensive news coverage in the international press at the time, with at least two American reporters (from the Chicago Sun and the New York Herald Tribune) bearing witness to the facts. The name al-Lud was changed to Lod, and a number Jewish families moved into the vacated houses."

Okay, so let us now focus our attention towards the purge of Lydda and Ramleh. You forgot to give any specific sources in your post, so you won't mind me enrichening the discussion with biased sources like this one, or this one with a complete list of expelled towns to begin with. But you especially won't mind this article about the purge of Lydda and Ramleh, written by the Washington Report, completely backed by individual sources, of course. Just trying to provide people with a means of beginning the debate, instead on your one-sided antagonism.

At 8/6/06 07:11 PM, HighlyIllogical wrote: I'll make a new thread, and we can discuss this in depth.

Oh, FUCK.

By the way, I'm not going for a perfect speller/grammarian medal in this thread, people might have noticed.

Okay, I suddenly remembered that CNN was the only American TV channel that was being broadcasted here, so I did what I hadn't done after 9/11 and decided to sit down and watch what CNN (international) had to say about the conflict. When I tuned in they were broadcasting what seemed to be commercials, but when those ended they started with a section called "Crisis in the Middle East", exactly what I was looking for. When the actual reporting began they started by showing pictures of people being harmed in a Hezbollah missile raid on Haifa. After that they had a correspondent from Haifa comment on how the IDF thought their tactics were working. Then they switched to a reporter in Lebanon, who seemed to be unable to sufficiently stress the fact that Israel had dropped warning leaflets in the areas they were about to bomb. And after that they actually had an interview with the parents of one of the soldiers captured by Hezbollah, Ehud Goldwasser. After that I quit watching.

Now I might have coincidentally picked the exact moment at which CNN tried to show the Israeli side of the story, but I'm nevertheless going to follow my instincts here and believe that everyone who's even trying to suggest that CNN is purposely anti-Israeli is a complete, fucking, brainwashed drone who'll decry any piece of reporting that's not unconditioanlly ecstatic about the way Israel is handling this specific conflict. Just my opinion, of course.

Yeah, with all due respect, but people have created a myriad of topics about this issue (including one that's currently on the first page of the Politics forum) so I don't really think that making a new thread would add much to the discussion. Just my opinion, of course.

At 8/6/06 05:15 PM, mynamewontfitin wrote: Fine, I was just trying to say that CNN is viewed by many to be alot more liberal than Fox. You don't agree?

I think no one would dare argue the opposite. But you made two statements: "Secondly, [1]CNN is alot more liberal than Fox is. [2]The majority of their news coverage on this issue can definately be considered anti-Israel." The latter one was being disputed, since saying "thing A can definitely be considered to be B" implies that you think that there's substantial evidence to support the notion that A is B, but if you yield that specific statement then I'm perfectly happy with that fragment of your post.

At 8/6/06 03:34 PM, Anti_Noob wrote:

At 8/6/06 03:31 PM, mynamewontfitin wrote:
Last time I checked, Reuters isn't a major hate group.

No, but they are zionists.

Dude, just ... no. I'm fairly critical of Israel myself but that doesn't hinder me from recognising this statement as being completely derisory.

At 8/6/06 03:36 PM, mynamewontfitin wrote: What is there to prove? I said their coverage CAN be CONSIDERED anti-Israel.

Pathetic. And Dranigus CAN CONSIDER Reuters to be Zionist press agency, that doesn't make it true. That interview was with a Hezbollah press officer, they mentioned that specific fact in a pretty conspicuous manner in the second image here so every individual viewer could have decided for himself what he wanted to believe. A quick Google search tought me this:

"In modern warfare, unfortunately, you're seeing here a state, a modern liberalized democratic state, confronting a terrorist organization, which operates from within civilian communities and doesn't have any rules to abide by," Cabinet minister Isaac Herzog said in a CNN interview.

Oh my God, CNN interviewed a senior Israeli government official. That must totally mean they're biased towards the Israeli side. Or maybe they're trying to interview people from both sides of the conflict, you know, to give viewers a more complete look on the issue. Nah, they must just be biased.

Hey Fab, maybe you could relocate me and mackid to a plastic desk? This wooden one could give us splinters.

At 8/4/06 06:51 PM, MortifiedPenguins wrote: "Balseros" (high end of estimated range)[2]
77,833

It's a highball estimate, but is it in any case fair to blame the deaths of these refugees on Castro as a person? "Between 1998 and 2004, an estimated 1,954 people have died in attempts to cross the US-Mexico border." Are these about 2,000 people non-combat victims of the regimes of Zedillo and Fox, making both of them murderers?

At 8/4/06 10:45 AM, Lidov wrote: Yeah... I didn't want to bring it up, but yes, he is charged in sexual harassment, but I think it is probably just a stupid girl who wants to get some publicity for nothing. It certainly doesn't match his personality, but who knows?

He wouldn't be the first politician who couldn't keep his hands to himself. And by the way, I noticed a gross misspelling in one of your other posts:

At 8/4/06 10:40 AM, Lidov wrote: Also, when we find a rocket issle here or there, we destroy it too.

It be spelled "rocketizzle", homie. Word.

At 8/4/06 10:21 AM, Lidov wrote: Haim Ramon says a lot of things,

I bet he does, and I also bet that a lot of those things aren't intended for young listeners since he's being charged with sexual harassment. He allegedly harassed an officer from Olmert's military secretariat, giving me an excuse to throw this link around one more time. Hwof hwof hwof.

At 8/3/06 05:29 AM, Hydra9 wrote: users are equal

Maybe on the forums but not in the flash portal. I have a higher voting power than you, seeing as I've earned more experience and B/P points. Therefore we're not perfect equals, and if Newgrounds had a Communist leadership the level 20+ users would have the same voting power as the newbie proletariat. The portal is mainly meritocratic, your standing increases when you spend more and more hours judging the work of others.

At 8/2/06 12:10 AM, WolvenBear wrote: That feeling has existed in the Arab world for decades.

Then why did the most prominent Arab nations like Egypt and Saudi Arabia initially denounce Hezbollah's actions? That feeling was apparently not that prevalent if they thought they could get away with criticising the Hezbollah. Arabs are naturally very prone to blame Israel instead of other Arabs but when the sole aggression comes from the Hezbollah they correctly identify Hezbollah as the aggressors, Israel's current reaction gives enough reasons for criticism, however.

One can only hope.

If they lose support they'll be forced to give in. They'd have nothing to gain by holding the hostages if their popularity were falling.

Israel would still get massive criticism if they waited 3 years. Stop pretending that all Israel had to do was show restraint. The world won't back Israel no matter what.

Yeah, the world just hates Israel for no specific reason because they're all a bunch of anti-Semites. Wait, are they? The world is disagreeing with Israel's actions because these actions barely give any reason for support. It's that obvious.

And from past experiences with Hezbollah and Hamas, Israel knows diplomacy doesn't work. This was an act of war.

And Israel should know from previous experiences, like 1967 and their last intervention in Lebanon that responding by instantly throwing bombs around also doesn't solve problems. The ensuing infuriation simply makes new conflicts inevitable.

Nor will ignoring the blatantly obvious fact that a major part of Hezbollah's platform IS the destruction of Israel. As is Hamas's. PC claptrap helps no one.

Then explain why Hezbollah started with assaults only after the Cedar Revolution. This attack was not started simply because they hate Israel, like the insurgency in Iraq wasn't started out of simple dislike for America. In the words of Sun Tzu, you don't have to fear (a hundred) battles if you know yourself and your enemy. If you simplify your opponent's entire ideology into "well, they must just hate us for no reason" and try to explain all their actions from that oversimplification then you'll never permanently win a conflict. Although Nasrallah would love to see Israel wiped off the planet he knows as well as we do that this conflict won't bring him one step closer to the destruction of Israel.

And Hamas agrees to coexistence with Israel, that's what the Hudna was all about. In the words of the late al-Rantissi: "It is forbidden in our religion to give up a part of our land, so we can't recognise Israel at all. But we can accept a truce with them, and we can live side by side and refer all the issues to the coming generations." Haniya is or was at least as moderate.

If that's where the Hezbollah monsters are hiding...shrugs. It sucks that Hezbollah feels the need to use human shields. The blood is on THEIR hands. The pamphlets that Israel is dropping on the vallages prior to bombings prove they're trying to reduce civilian casualities.

This has been mentioned a thousand times already, those pamphlets serve no purpose if fleeing is just as dangerous as staying. If Israel was not at the same time targeting roads I could have sympathised, but dropping flyers that basically say "if you stay you might die and if you flee you might die" doesn't give Israel carte blanche to shell urban areas.

As opposed to Hezbollah which is deliberately targeting exclusively civilian areas. Civilian deaths are sad, but when Hezbollah fights this way, unavoidable. At least Israel's hitting their targets.

The way the other guy is fighting is irrelevant, Israel should be on a moral high ground and refrain from these tactics. If you fire shells knowing that you'll hit civilians you're killing delibaretely, and deliberate killing is almost never justified, maybe in a WW2-like Total War situation but not when you completely overshadow the other party in military might.

Yea, we saw what a great job UN troops did in Rwanda....what a joke.

It worked in Kosovo, didn't it? Lebanon had a decent economy, earlier experiences with international soldiers and it was a relatively Westernised country. It's ludicrous to point out a situation like sending soldiers to a hellhole such as Rwanda and say "if it didn't work THERE, then it can't possibly work anywhere else".

At 8/1/06 07:36 PM, lapis wrote: Irréversible

Sorry for the double post (damn alcohol), but I just found out that the main character from that movie is in fact the Jewish guy from La Haine, like I suspected all throughout the movie, and he even does the voice of Monsieur Hood from Shrek, far out. And the raped chick from Irréversible is frickin' Monica Bellucci, damn she's hot. I don't care what some of you might say, France is awesome for providing the world with such actors and I haven't even mentioned Jean Reno from Léon. Yay.

At 8/1/06 03:50 PM, Proteas wrote: You have the added advantage of being from Europe, though, I bet there's a lot of kickass music over there we don't know about here in the States.

Heh, not really. I had the "advantage" of being aware of Dragostea Din Tei before Numa Numa became a hit on Newgrounds, other than that a lot of European music isn't that spectacular.

And you linked to thatvideosite anyway. :-\

Yeah, I had to :P
After linking to that site I was looking for what it was featuring about Alizée and then I found that video, she's a great dancer but I'll admit her performance there doesn't do her singing career justice. Shake, shake, shake.

...

On the subject of French women, did anyone else see the movie "Irréversible"? I wachted it this evening, a friend recommended it, he said it was about rape and that a guy had his head smashed in brutally by a fire extinguisher. So I watched it, the beating part passed by and I thought: "well, it was somewhat brutal but not at the level of Saw, for example". And then the rape followed. Holy shit. Saw is funny because it's unrealistic, but damn, Irréversible makes you think twice about letting your girlfriend walk alone at night in deserted tunnels. At least it was the rapist who got his head pulverised, that sort of makes up for the rest of the movie. I'd still recommend seeing it, though.

At 8/1/06 02:11 PM, Grammer wrote:

At 8/1/06 02:03 PM, lapis wrote: This had better be a tribute to this topic posted by an alt account or the Newgrounds Politics forum is doomed forever.

Your response to that topic is pure gold :)

Haha, thanks, unfortunately the entire thread was deleted. Pity, really.

This had better be a tribute to this topic posted by an alt account or the Newgrounds Politics forum is doomed forever.

At 7/31/06 10:24 PM, Proteas wrote: You've got to go to google to really appreciate her.

That song is oooooooooold. I remember seeing it on TV in early high school, must have been at least five years ago. But I've seen tons of gifs on the internet of her shaking her ass and I never realised it was Alizée. Funny that you mention it.

And yeah, she's hot.

Spot on, JMHX, but a list of guidelines is not complete without a worthy example, since the best way to learn is to see it being done by masters. So let me point out this utter sapphire. To emphasise the fact that his topic is THE one topic that will render all other Politics topics useless he misspells two words in his topic title, out of two. Then he begins his post by not once pressing the shift button and by writing down words such as "deffinion", "comunisum" and "buisness". He then copies a source which he never mentions, in compliance with point 2.3 of your handbook. It's a shame he screws up by capitalising the first "a" in his final paragraph, but corrects his mistake by finishing with the following sentence: "i will not respond to dumb posts." Also note that he at one point misspells "anarchy" as "Anarcy" and at another point as "anacry", and we all know that consistence is a sign of weakness as long as the crux of the post keeps on being reiterated.

In conclusion, I hope this topic will inspire a whole new generation of posters so they can finally pull the Politics forum out of the gutter.

At 7/31/06 11:29 PM, HighlyIllogical wrote: I'm leavingg for Israel on Auiggust 13 of this year.

Have fun or whatever. I'm leaving for Spain on the eleventh so as long as nobody blows up the railway system I won't have any security issues.

At 7/31/06 11:41 PM, troubles1 wrote: they have been known to destroy mosks the shiats and sunnies

Yeah, that would've a been a sound piece of advice if he were going to IRAQ instead of Israel. Unfortunately, he's not suicidal.

just kidding, we all love you equally mackid

At 7/31/06 11:06 PM, Roth_Productions wrote: Many have stated how the Lebanese government has no control over Hezbollah. The option of putting diplomatic pressure on the Lebanese government would not have worked because Lebanon probably could not have done anything.

I already elaborated on this in later parts of my post, which you didn't quote. International forces could have supported the Lebanese if they wouldn't have been fully capable of suppressing Hezbollah. The main advantage here is that Hezbollah would be isolated instead of driving moderate elements like Siniora into the arms of Hezbollah. Hezbollah wins if a feeling of "We vs. Israel" feeling arises in the Arab world and Israel is well on its way of creating such a feeling.

If Hezbollah is seen as the ones who started this conflict in the Arab world and if they're forced to fight their own people then their popularity in the region will plummet, they'll eventually be forced to hand over the hostages.

There is value in using diplomacy, and I’ll concede that there is a remote chance something would have resulted from a diplomatic route. I believe that it would, in reality, only mean that the timetable of the war would be pushed forward by a few days. Israel decided, correctly as I see it, that diplomacy would have no effect.

Your logic here is fallacious: you admit that diplomacy could have been effective, you don't give any specific reasons as to why trying it at first would be harmful in the end and yet you commend Israel for instantly going to war. The Hezbollah had staged similar attacks in the past so we can safely assume that they were already entrenched, so waiting a few weeks wouldn't have significantly aided Hezbollah and it would at the very least have averted a lot of future international criticism.

The main objectives of Hezbollah are to destroy Israel.

Pfft, what a great way to oversimplify a faceted problem like this one. And the insurgency in Iraq wasn't started for a number of reasons including the fact that a lot of former Baathists had lost their jobs and their power after Saddam was removed but because they just simply hate America, right? Thinking like that might make international affairs a lot more comprehendable to you but a mindset like this won't bring you any closer to achieving a long term solution for the problem.

Actually, although I disseagree with bombing power plants, its not collective punishment if there are military objectives in destroying them.

I called bombing sewage plants and public utilities collective punishment as they serve no other goal than to harm the common Lebanese. I was specifically trying to seek the middle ground here so I said that bombing power plants causes a disproportionate amount of grief to the civilians, debunk that instead of your strawman.

As for the roads being bombed as they were being told to escape, they now have a 48 hour time in which to escape.

They have time, sure. The points that a) they still don't have the means to flee and that b) they're too scared to flee since infrastructure is still being targeted still stand.

There is no way to fight terrorists militarily without killing civilians, Israel can only attempt to reduce the casualties.

Well, then they're not attempting hard enough, are they? Firing missiles and artillery shells into urban areas is not what I call "trying to avoid civilian casualties".

No, the civilians are not purposely murdered. If you don’t believe the evidence against it, I have another point for you. What could Israel’s motive be in the alleged targeting of civilians?

Trying to scare civilians into not supporting Hezbollah? Act of frustration? I can think of a few reasons. They knew that the city was bound to be inhabited, they knew that Hezbollah uses mobile rocket launchers and that they aren't going to stay in the same location for a very long time, so they knew that this would only kill civilians. They're either deliberately killing civilians or they're incompetent, and I've never heard anyone make a case for the latter option.

Yes, well both civilians dying or Israel not retaliating helps the terrorists. If you are so critical, can you think of a better way? I haven’t heard a good answer to this question. (Although your idea of calling in international forces from the beginning is not bad, but the U.N. et all has never rushed to the aid of Israel before so I’m not sure how realistic an idea it is.)

UN forces have been sent to Lebanon in the past, this doesn't even have to be in full "support of Israel" but simply with the intent of maintaining stability in the region. If a UN force could not be formed then a NATO force could have bent sent out, in compliance with the General Assembly. France, the former coloniser of Lebanon, and Turkey, which has also expressed willingness to send soldiers, are both NATO members.

At 7/31/06 04:22 PM, Lidov wrote: Not the refugees, the people who are at the place which is to be bombed. This should be about 5 helicopters max.

I'm sure the Lebanese were unaware of which exact building was going to be shelled or they would have left that specific building. They knew the city was being targeted but 5 helicopters aren't enough, by far, to fly out the entire city's population within one or a few days' notice, even if the bigger part of the Lebanese helicopter squadrons were still operational. Their helicopters aren't that sizeable either.

At 7/31/06 03:59 PM, Lidov wrote: This is one of the lamest excuses ever. A rescuing helicopter doesn't cost a lot, and even if it does, I believe that a democratic country ows at least this to their citizens.

A few days ago the number of Lebanese refugees was already at 500,000. How many helicopters do you think they would need to fly all these people out of the region within a couple of weeks?

At 7/31/06 03:47 PM, troubles1 wrote: lol we all know muslims ar fags muhamid can suck my dick !!! islam is the infidal... isreal is helping to get rid of the terrorust crap that that would be you.. i hope they drop a bomb on your house...

You're hilarious, really.

At 7/31/06 02:35 PM, lapis wrote: one could be say about the conflict

Why do I always fuck up the grammar in the first sentence?

At 7/31/06 02:42 PM, Lidov wrote: Using my favorite movies against me?! And the Israelis are evil?! You have no soul!
I will change my favorite movies right away...

Yeah, I'm a heartless bitch like that.

Most that one could be say about the conflict has already been said but since I don't have anything better to do this evening I'll try to summarise some of it into one big post. I'm also trying to gauge the position of Hezbollah in Lebanon before the incursion so if I'm wrong I hope Visual or DiabloCloud will correct me.

The standpoint of the pro-war side seems to remain unchanged: the Hezbollah movement provoked Israel by kidnapping the two soldiers and since the Lebanese government didn't do enough to stop the Hezbollah 1) a full-scale war was justified, 2) a full-scale war was the best solution to the hostage crisis, 3) the way it is being carried out is justified and 4) the way it is being carried out is the best long-term solution to the problem.

The main problem about 1) is that Hezbollah does not represent the whole of the Lebanese government or the people in particular. But in the end the latter two parties carry responsibility over what happens in their territory and if militant groups use that territory to harm Israel then Israel at some point has the moral authority to intervene. Point 2) is a lot more debatable however. The option of putting diplomatic pressure on the Lebanese government and Hezbollah was hardly ever seriously considered before the IDF took military action against Lebanon, it took them less than a day if I remember correctly.

The original objectives of the Hezbollah are first to be considered: their demands concerning the release of (Palestinian) hostages were unspecific and completely disproportionate so it seems improbable that the Israeli soldiers were captured with the intent of a future prisoner exchange. A more obvious explanation would be the hope of being seen as having solidarity with the Palestinians, who were grossly punished after militant groups captured Shalit, by the Lebanese people and the Arab world in general. They needed a popularity boost, they had openly opposed the withdrawal of the Syrians in 2005 and by doing that they alienated a lot of Lebanese who held the Syrians responsible for the murder of Hariri. And while Lebanon was enjoying a temporary peace the necessity of supporting militant groups like Hezbollah was waning, their charitable wing not being enough to compensate for this loss.

They needed a war to once again be seen as the champions who would sacrifice everything to defend the Arab cause. In the best case scenario their allies, the Syrians, would even move back into the country as a stabilising force under international auspices. They had tried to provoke a violent reaction a few months earlier, they wanted a war and by invading the Israelis gave them exactly what they wanted, an invasion should have been the last resort this time more than ever.

Using the diplomatic alternative the Lebanese government would have been forced by US, UN and EU pressure to act against the Hezbollah and even if they would not have been able to fully quell Hezbollah resistance an international force, comprised of France and Turkey among others, could be sent in to aid the Lebanese army. In the end the Hezbollah would be forced to swap the hostages in return for a symbolic counteroffer. Israel should have laid as low as possible, they can do no good in the Arab world and any aggression would only make peace in the region less imminent.

Moving on to 3), bombing installations like sewage plants and public utilities are collective punishment and forbidden under international law. Bombing power stations causes a disproportionate amount of grief to the population in contrast to the Hezbollah who aren't exactly known for their state-of-the-art military equipment. Bombing infrastructure would inconvenience the Hezbollah but the problem is that this action negates the carte blanche that dropping warning flyers is supposed to give. Telling civilians to flee before a shelling is noble but if you just bombed the means for them to flee the message becomes void. Since roads were still being targeted the Lebanese civilians would be at risk of being killed whatever choice they made, stay or attempt to escape.

Cities in Southern Lebanon were bound to remain populated and I doubt that the IDF was incapable of following the same line of reasoning as the Lebanese civilians. They knew that there would be civilians in Qana for example and when civilians die unintentionally they can be counted as "casualties of war" but when the deaths of these civilians were entirely predictable you've crossed the line of deliberate killing and you've committed a war crime. It's irrelevant that Israel is not seeking to kill all Lebanese civilians, these civilians were purposely murdered.

4) is closely entwined with 2) but more specific. This bombing campaign and the high ensuing civilian death toll is exactly what Hezbollah was hoping for. The relatives of the casualties aren't going to blame Hezbollah for restarting the conflict but Israel for the disproportionate response. As long as there will be people who're willing to sacrifice all they have to fight Israel there'll be war and Israel is currently creating this kind of people. The common misconception is that enough violence can destroy militants but this is false; movements die out when the support locals have for them does. When the locals blame themselves for the original violence, like in post-WW2 Germany, violence can work in combination with sufficient aid and reconstruction works but it doesn't take a sage to predict who the common Arab will blame for this war.

Hezbollah is part of something greater, even if they are destroyed others will rise to stand up for the cause they fought for. Hezbollah thrives on the idea that the conflicts that we've see in the region in the past few decades are solely to blame on Israel. Mackid quoted 13 days in this thread: "The Soviet (Hezbollah in this situation) understands only one language: action. Respects only one word: force."

So let me now quote V for Vendetta:
"Behind this mask there is an idea, and ideas are bulletproof"

Remember that nations like Egypt and Saudi Arabia at first blamed Hezbollah and their backers but Israel is now wasting this asset with their indiscriminate bombing campaign. The conflict is only being prolonged, not being shredded out of existence.

At 7/30/06 10:44 PM, Dragon_Smaug wrote: I wish Israel could find a way to harm less innocents, but I don't see one. I think the ratio has been very good so far, actually.

Talking about ratios, 51 Israelis have died in the current conflict with about 19 of them being civilians. That's a 37.2% civilian casualty rate, that's lower than the about 50% rate that Israel managed to attain in their "targeted assassination" campaign against Palestinian militants and a lot lower than their current achievements in Lebanon. It's kind of sad when the side that's supposed to deliberately target civilians kills less innocents percentage-wise than the side that valiantly "wheels baby carriages out of the way".