Gosh Dee, muslims in Auburn have a high birth rate. Catholics in Ireland and Italy used to have high birth rates and my own grandfather sired 11 children from two brood mares here in good old OZ. And? Your point?

When I contribute to these forums all I usually get is abuse so it is nice to have a couple of people agree with me for a change.

I forgot Palestine, because of course the Israeli government is collectively punishing three sets of people aren't they? Do Israeli mums and dads really want Palestinian kids murdered by their government or Lebanese kids? I don't think so - kids are kids everywhere.

Now look at the mess these three nations are in today and imagine we are in Iraq. In Iraq we didn't even have the vapid excuse of soldiers being taken during the course of their duties did we?

The high moral ground for the coalition of the killing is buried in Fallujah, Haditha, Najaf, Kabul, Baghdad, Kandahar and even in Woomera, Baxter, Nauru and Manus Island where we locked up Iraqis and Afghans fleeing the butcher of Bahgdad that the AWB were paying to stay in action and the Taliban who were supported by the US.

Yep, I reckon the three great war criminals can babble until the cows come home but answer me this.

Who the hell on earth will listen to them while the people are slaughtered?

Hey Marilyn.....YOU abuse me on a daily basis :)

What I find suprising, is how vehemently you rail against the US, the '3 war criminals' who are seeking to control murderous regimes, who produced large numbers of refugees, yet.. you are remakably silent in your condemnation of Sadaam, Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas.

Is there a reason for this ?

At least in the UK, US and AUSTRALIA, you are free to gather sufficient support and .. wait for it.. you.. yes YOU.. have the legal and political right and potential to CHANGE the government.

If your arguments had sufficient merit and were persuasive enough, your own support would be growing. No one is going to kill you, send you to a 're-education' camp, nor torture your family because of your political ideas. They won't even slowly carve off your head and video tape the whole ghastly event, because of your skin color or religion, or nationality, doing humanitarian work on behalf of the people.

Although, if you start making plans to assassinate the Prime Minister, or align yourself with the Socialist Alliance or 'Resistance' among others who have in the fine print of some of their web site material the idea that the 'capitalist borgoise' must finally be overthrown by 'any means',....then don't be surprise if Asio knocks on..or knocks down your door one day.

Here is the picture

1/ Sadaam and his ilk produce the refugees.
2/ You condemn your own country for not accepting more. While paying lip service to the 'evil' in those regimes.
2/ The Coalition seek to destroy the 'root cause' OF the refugees.
3/ You condemn them for doing so.

Do you see the philosophical problems with this view ? I think everyone else CAN.

It appears you are either politically naive (as I've suggested elsewhere) or regard us as simple minded political and social bimbo's who cannot see things as they really are.

BoAZ,
You’re right - up to a point.

However it was the West that created “Saddam and his ilk” and allow them to flourish.

It’s also a fact that the USA and UK share the policy that the Middle East must always be kept destabilised and it’s their actions (or inaction) in this arena that feed the fires of terrorism.

If we help create the problem, perhaps we should shoulder some responsibility for the consequences.

The IDF responds to the commands of a democratically elected government, who’s first responsibility is to protect its own national security.

How many Lebanese voted Hezbollah to a position of authority and responsible for national security?

How many Lebanese asked the Syrians into their country and how many demonstrated just last year for them to leave Lebanon?

Some might suggest the Israeli response to Hezbollah is “disproportionate”. All I would say is, the Israeli government is not only defending its national territory but is defending its right to exist against the salivating demands of a bunch of terrorists who have deliberately embedded their militarily offensive units in residential neighbourhoods.

If it were Australia under attack, I would demand nothing short of what the Israeli government and IDF are doing by our government and ADF to in the protection of our national interest.

Oh and the pleadings and faux outrage of those who suggest the Israeli response is inappropriate, keep up the rhetoric but change the name of the antagonist to Hezbollah and Hamas who both believe that Israel should be erased off the face of the globe and who both care less about their citizenry than the Israelis care for their citizenry.

If someone was hell bent on removing me from the face of the globe, I am damn sure I would put up a disproportionate and inappropriate fight to survive too.

Pierre, You put the cart before the horse. Hizbollah & Hamas are merely epiphenomena, products of what's been going on in this area for over a century now. Context is everything. You picked up the ball with your reference to the "sheer madness" of what Israel is up to in Lebanon (& Gaza incidentally), but then dropped it. That madness didn't just appear out of thin air in 2006. It is as old as and derives from the madness of the political Zionist project itself, essentially the idea that you can forcibly impose a foreign, 'Jewish' sovereignty on an indigenous population and, sans any attempt at acknowledgment, reconciliation and accomodation of that population's rights, get away with it. Madness! The ethnic cleansing of 78% of Palestine in 48-49 - madness. The 56 agression against Egypt - madness. The brutal and unending occupation of the Palestinian territories since 67 - madness. The stab at regime change in Lebonon in 82 - madness. And now the madness of the carpet bombing of Gaza & Lebanon. What we're seeing now is the madness of an Imperial Israel mindlessly brutalising a subject people and their neighbours - a sort of Narcissistic Personality Disorder writ large.

Spot on, Strewth. A bit of historical context. Narcissist/Zionist and the usual collection of Christian loony-tunes, take note. The creation of the state of Israel was a piece of UN folly from the 1940s that was born partly out of a sense of collective guilt about the holcaust and the failure of WW2 allies to have seen it coming and do more to prevent it. It is and has always been a flawed approach and no end to conflict is in sight. The 'war on terror' especially as taken to Iraq has done nothing but inflame hatred of Israel and its perceived protectors among western nations.

I say it again, the whole world should not be hostage to Israel's security.