Quote:It's certainly not western actions by the United States going back to the middle ages. I assume you refer mostly about the crusades, but the crusades were a response to Islamic aggression. They went pretty far overboard, and I hate to say it, but that was a sign of the times. Muslims perpetuated the very same attrocities in another time.


Israel had to be armed. You are talking about like 10 million Jews dead center (not literally) of over a billion Muslims who want nothing more than to see the Jews extinguished... This immediately following the holocaust. There wouldn't be an Israel today and Jews would be an endangered species if we didn't intervene.

Yeah, I'm referring mostly to the Crusades. I think that their influence on the modern conflict is extremely, incredibly limited, but it does serve as historical context for the "west vs. Middle East" conflict that extends beyond religious lines over the span of centuries.

 

It seems like every time the Israel topic comes up, I find myself fighting a losing battle. Lately, it seems that harboring an unpopular opinion about Israel's effect on modern affairs makes me anti-semitic, so I'll just say that, imo, the modern Middle Eastern conflict dates back to the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire--which was primarily England's screw-up--with later events making the US into the poster child for unnecessary, one-sided intervention in the region.

 

*Edit: Maybe I should clarify Israel even further. My issue with Israel is that we chose a group of people and favored them over millions and millions of other people who were there first. I would hold that opinion regardless of the predominant faith of the people of Israel. I can't emphasize that enough: it's not about who we chose. It's that we chose someone.

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