39 Israeli soldiers "break the silence" on what goes on in Palestine

Amazing - I guess we can't even begin to get our heads around what it must be like to live in a war-torn country and to have grown up there. Great to see a different perspective.

This won't be a part of NBC's "The More You Know" campaign, I'll bet.

Good information is the only way to live in reality.
"Breaking the Silence" is necessary. Not only on what goes on in Palestine, but on everything that's going wrong in our world.

Its sad when you have to kill a 11 year old kid

No surprises. It's disgusting.

And yes, keeshii768, it is good we get to her another side of the story.

I don't know why I just said that, but I felt I needed to.

Finally we get to hear another side of this story..

That was a joke, you know, like I had a premonition that you were going to say that. LOL

Indeed, no surprises...
...though I do wish we had more coverage of this sort of thing int he states, straight from the mouths of the Israeli soldiers, so that people might draw a more well-informed opinion of the subject.
But or course, we can't even get the testimonies from our own soldiers [Winter Soldier] aired on mainstream media, so I guess I'm pissing into the wind.

an 11 year old who was trying to kill you. sorry 11 year old, i have a gun. because he's on the other side you feel sorry for him? he was trying to commit murder, how is it any better than the isreali he was trying to kill, shooting at him and killing him instead.

diode, probably you did not read the original post.
the child was shot AFTER (40 min) trowing Molotov, he wasn't a threat anymore.
That tastes more like vengeance than self-defense ...

you still go after a murderer or attempted murderer after he's committed a crime don't you?

it's strange to think that the american media didn't cover this, because everyone thought the war had died down meanwhile it was still going on, it seems to me that people just don't care anymore . My boyfriend was an Israeli soldier but he got out on an injury and came here to the US, he has told me so many stories some that are much worse, it breaks my heart to hear these things

from the entry above, "you still go after a murderer or attempted murderer after he's committed a crime don't you?"

allow me to break this down..

to "go after" someone means to identify and shoot dead on the spot? forget the notion that maybe just maybe the israelis identified the wrong child.. because if that were to happen, then they would have basically shot dead an innocent 11 year old boy in his own occupied homeland.. who says palestinians have a right to defend themselves.. right?

and you are equating a murderer with one who attempts murder.. some would agree.. im not going to argue that point.. but if you are rolling through a neighborhood as a group of soldiers in tanks and you happen to snipe off an 11 year old child on the spot who you think threw something at you, then that is justice, not murder.. right?

and when an 11 year old child has witnessed countless acts of aggression and injustice committed all his life by the same "soldiers" who execute their own twisted version of justice on his family and friends, then he is not defending his freedom, family, or home.. he is committing a crime.. because palestinians are incapable of defending themselves and are only capable of committing crimes and being terrorists.. right?

at least that person involved appears to feel remorse.. it is more pathetic that there are others who defend such behavior with twisted logic..

the biggest losers are those who think they are doing good.. but are in fact committing wrong..

Bravo!!!! Good for theme! For these soldiers to come out and tell the world what's actually happening between Israel in Palestine is a big deal.

The war has been going on for far too long between those two countries and i truly believe that it's going to be this generation of Isrealis and Palestinians that try to fix the wrongs of their predecessors.

Actually, there is NO war going on. You see - that is a GROSS exaggeration on the part of Israel.

You take a small ragtag group of individuals poorly funded and organized who exercise resistance against an oppressive and obviously cruel occupier who seldom if ever exhibit restraint, compassion or humility, who have for years been illegally taking land and lives, who have billions of dollars in weaponry and a world class military - and WHO of you call it a war? Was that a run on sentence?

Are you serious? Are you completely brainwashed? Ignorant? Joking? Stupid? Serious? Pulling my leg?

That would be like me going up against the local police department (of my small town no less) with a sling shot and water gun. Give me a break.

I'll say - what a society it must be that exists in Israel to have such a lowly opinion of the rest of mankind that they could and do justify taking "others" lives so mercilessly and rationalize it so.

Nothing like a society of murders - but they all couldn't be that way, could they. It's too bad Hitler's mentality seems to have infected them - truly.

So, diode, you say the young Israeli's have the right to be judge, jury and executioner - all by themselves? Gee - it's no wonder they've been fighting the world for soo long. It isn't their fault - no, blame it on everybody but themselves - right?

Such a policy and barbarism is abhorrent to civilized people.

I'm sorry, Israel is not a civilized country, in fact, it is worse than the United States - but there are those here that are trying to be like Israel.

Although I find this story very interesting and the violence in Palestine saddening and unnecessary, I find it sort of hard to feel bad for a kid that threw a goddamn molotov at soldiers. What was he expecting? Don't throw a weapon at a bunch of trained and armed men.

RonenA - "... a bunch of trained and armed men"? You mean armed 'ignorants' who know not what they do!

Voyager - it was still ridiculously stupid.

as stupid as patrick swayze in red dawn when he and his high school buddies put up a futile fight against the cubans and russians?

im guessing those characters were between 15 and 18 years old.. would you care to debate that and miss the point entirely?

those kids were celebrated as heroes and dramatized by just about every red blooded american teen who watched the film.. were they "ridiculously stupid" too?

WOLVERINES!!!!!

oh but wait.. unfortunately, this isnt a movie.. and there is an 11 year old boy buried in hebron to prove it..

your paradigm is severely jaded..

I haven't seen red dawn but from the summary i just read, it seems as though the characters you are referring to were in danger. The palestinian boys were not in danger, they were the aggressors.

yea, you obviously read the article..

a former israeli soldier is feeling guilty about killing an 11 year old boy and goes on to recount many other acts of gross injustice and all you can say is that the 11 year old boy who got shot in his own neighborhood was an aggressor..

no point in arguing with an ignorant person.. people may not be able to tell who is the ignorant one..

peace

Voyager, you should really go to israel and at least talk to israelis before generalizing and slandering their entire society. armchair critics are the worst.

Thats not all I can say, I just made my point and you tried to justify initiating violence. You argue with me and when you cannot rebut any longer you say thats "all I can say".
I never said I support the horrors, I only expressed that I feel little remorse for the one that is fully responsible for his own death.

Anyways.. cya.

It's pretty simple: Israel is an occupier who stole land from Palestinians and continue to do so as they kill innocent people, children as well. Israel is conducting a genocide 100 times worse than the one their ancestors faced in the 20th century.
The simple solution: Cut off their billions of US Dollars aid they've been getting every year, pressure your representatives to make Israel accountable for their illegal activities, stop buying anything made in Israel. Most of all, keep the flow coming of genuine information about Israels illegal and inhumane treatment of human beings and publish it in every place you can think of on the Internet and in your local papers.

WorldPeaceTV, I don't believe it's that simple. don't get me wrong, I do agree with the spirit of your point and your simple solution. The US should not be supporting Israel or any other nation for that matter. but history is a complex beast.

this goes so far back its hard to imagine. I mean, Arab nationalism arose when the Ottoman Empire in its later days decided to highlight its Turkish ancestry. this lead to widespread discrimination against Arabs.

the truth is, the League of Nations should have just stayed out of it. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire in WWI, it should have been up to the indigenous peoples to create nations and resolve conflict as they so chose.

In approving the British Mandate of Palestine, Jewish immigration to area slowly but steadily increased, creating tension between the Jews and native Arabs. The League of Nations forever altered what would have been a natural course of events and set the stage for perpetual war. When the Mandate of Palestine was split in 1947, to the objection of the Arab League, Israel just jumped ahead and declared independence, leading to the Arab-Isreali War and eventually to Israel occupying more land than the UN Mandate even authorized. obviously this is where Israel went wrong. but we should understand history. Why did the Arab League reject the split of the Mandate of Palestine? Would they have ever approved of a Jewish State? Did they simply not like the idea of a Jewish State being created within their sphere of influence? Why did the League of Nations decide to create a Jewish state in an area where tensions were already high?

furthermore, we must note that the British were the ones who proposed the creation of an Arab League, in 1942. they sought to win over Arabs as allies against the Nazis. (many of today's problems in the region are direct results of policies of the British Empire)

now, when the Arabs finally did decide to create the League in 1945, with Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, North Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and Transjordan as its members, its first official act was to declare a boycott of Jewish businesses in Palestine (then part of Transjordan). even before Israel existed, the Arab League didn't want any Jews in their lands (today we would've called that xenophobia).

from there, I can understand Israel declaring independence and defending herself, but I disagree with them expanding into Gaza and the West Bank, which was not land they initially claimed. that act was indeed imperialistic and you are right to claim Israel as occupiers.

but they should have a right to exist as a nation. if not in the Middle East, then where? it's the birthplace of their civilization and religion just as much as the Arabs. after WWII they had the right to desire a safe place to live. so why did the Arab League boycott Jewish businesses in 1945, three years prior to the Arab-Israeli war? And why did Israel decide to take more land than the League of Nations agreed to?

if we do not understand history then we cannot understand the present. if we cannot understand the present than we will never understand our place in the future.

Cool Jew Fro's, I still wish I could grow mine

It is beautiful we can have this "fluid" discussion on Al Gore's Current.com. It is a road to understanding each other and to Peace. This back and forth communication is key to solving the world's problems.

It is Government that is making these lethal decisions. We the People are in it for the ride, whether we like it or not. As are the Israeli and Palestinians. The Governments and Military/ Industrial Complex are using us and our anger at each other to fan the flames of hate and distrust. Hate and distrust are good for profits.

I am fairly ignorant on this topic and only speak with limited knowledge and Google searches.

Thanks WorldPeaceTV for clarifying that it is not the People of Israel, Palestine or the USA and that everyone deserves a place on Earth but not by killing and force. Some of your statements sound one sided at first.

We need to remember that people all over the world hate and loath people of the United States as well as Israel.

America is an imperialistic nation as Israel is when it is overreaching its boundaries such as the Iraqi Occupation. We are a nation that brutally ravaged the Native American population.. I don't see that point brought up. It was not me nor my family that did that since we moved here in 1904 from Russia I doubt that my family or yours would have forcibly displaced the Native Tribes through trickery. I can feel their pain also...and the silence that is in the USA. Our schools are still teaching that we were great friends to them and they welcomed us with open arms. This is wrong, also. Many people were good hearted but there were also very bad people who settled our country.

WordlPeaceTV do you think that the same methods should be held to the USA by the rest of the world?..I substituted USA for Israel in your suggestion:

"...who stole land from Native Americans and continue to do so as they killed innocent people, children as well. The simple solution: Pressure your representatives to make United States accountable for their illegal activities, stop buying anything made in USA. Most of all, keep the flow coming of genuine information about USA illegal and inhumane treatment of human beings and publish it in every place you can think of on the Internet and in your local papers.

Many of you seem to ignore the fact that throughout history, nearly every nation has at one point or another sought to subordinate weaker people. whether you like it or not, that is the nature of human beings. Borders and nations throughout history have been shaped by war. I always find the amount of outrage garnered by the US and Israel's actions to be completely excessive when compared to what else is going on in the world. Furthermore, I wouldn't exactly classify the land as stolen. Pushing aside the holocaust, the arab government of palestine supported the axis forces in WW2. When they lost the war, they lost their claim to the land.

Also, Worldpeacetv, it's quite easy to see that you are "new with Israel." It's quite easy to read a bunch of one sided articles and opinions and them jump right into an argument, and while you do make some valid points, I would encourage you to research the situation further, perhaps try to see things from a more impartial viewpoint.

for anyone who thinks that both sides of this situation are of equal blame..

true peace is not based on a lack of conflict.. true peace is based on justice.. if your understanding of the situation is unable to take into account the origins of where we are today, then you are putting a bandaid on a bullet hole..

the person who commits a transgression is not the same as the person who defends himself..

who is on who's land? who's rights are systematically violated on a daily basis? checkpoints, random searchings, house raids, second-class status..

israel will forever be justifying its behavior on the premise of defense.. those with short memories and biased opinions will agree.. but the only thing it really needs to defend itself from is its own transgressions..

chapter12 who's land are you standing on?

I don't stand up for a lot of Israeli or any other government's actions but Israeli People are not entirely at fault the way American People are not entirely at fault for occupying land that was the Native American's for thousands of years.

Are you giving up your home today? I doubt that you will. We are living within a system that most of us are trying our best to raise our families and work and stay healthy and go to school..If you are a US citizen does this mean that you need to leave your home right now and give it to the Native Americans? They certainly were better stewards than the rest of us are and I feel deeply for their past injustices.

dgold0101, your history is incorrect. from the end of WW1 until 1946, the area we call Palestine today was part of Transjordan, which was a region controlled by the British Government. So Palestine did not, in fact, support the axis during WW2. There was no separate Palestine during WW2. and its British government along with the Arab League, as you might have guessed, supported the allies and assisted in freeing Syria from the Vichy regime set up by the Nazis.

The Arabs had been against a creation of a Jewish State in the Mandate of Palestine all along. They obviously wanted all of Transjordan to become a fully independent Arab state after the British agreed to independence in 1946.

Now we can argue about why the Arab League was so against the creation of a Jewish State. we could argue over whether or not the Arabs were xenophobic and simply afraid of losing regional power. But what we cannot argue over is that fact that the nation of Israel declared independence before an agreement was reached between the British colonial government and the Arab league. and furthermore, we cannot argue about the fact that Israel occupied more land than the initial agreement drafted by the British would have given them.

Alas, with international sympathy firmly behind the Jews in the wake of the Holocaust, the British admitted thousands of displaced Jews into Transjordan. At the same time, underground Jewish groups such as Irgun and the Stern Gang initi