Israel vows to pursue Syria operations until Iran leaves

The number of 'actual Iranians' in Syria is very low. At most, a few hundred and I suspect the real figure is even lower (more like 20-30). It has been like that for a while now, since 2018-2019. As I said in my message to Jeannette, the real worry for the Israelis is how to stop Syria from developing the kind of precision guided missiles Iran has in its arsenal. That, along with doing everything with the Russians, to make sure the Syrian armed forces never deploy Iranian air defense systems (such as the Bavar 373), and are instead reliant on Russian manned systems such as the export version of the S-300 (which, honestly, hasn't proved itself all that effective) is pretty much the main focus on Israel's activities against "Iran" in Syria.

 

No.
Iran is the evil

 

Maybe you should listen to people like Roger Cohen, who is also Jewish and who has actually been to Iran. A former Wall Street Journal and later New York Times correspondent. If you did listen carefully, you would know better. And you might be disabused of some of your notions.

First, you would realize that Iran is not a country that can be dealt with by bullies and bullying:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/08/opinion/trump-iran.html

Second, you would realize Iran is a far cry from the image that is presented of it in the Western media.
From the Wikipedia entry about him:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Cohen

Of course, he was attacked by people who haven't been to Iran in recent memory, but presume to know better.

But these attacks notwithstanding:

If you don't like reading, you can listen to his latest comments about Iran:

 

I make this guess - the Arabs wouldn't accept any compensation.
The bulk of these Palestinians refused to live under Israeli occupation
and it was believed they could pressure Israel to withdraw. This didn't
work. Taking compensation would have defeated what Arabs sought
to achieve.

 

You had to read the prior post to understand this one... the poster put forth a black vs white paradigm - I was trying to clarify which side was evil.

 

You had to read the post my comment was responding to understand my comment . the poster put forth a black vs white paradigm - I was trying to clarify which side was evil.

To your point - There is no "good side" in a blood feud - even if we like one side more than the other.

For example - I detest Most of Islam - for very specific reasons - ones I can support and could publish without being arrested or give the thought police an angle to attack

A close friend of mine lived and worked in Israel for a 2 or 3 years - was from Romania originally - loved the place - loved the people.
I play chess - 50% of all the world Champions have been Jewish - How is this possible given Jews make up a fraction of the world population. Jews are raised to Question - Unlike those of Islam and Christianity (albeit to a lesser degree) - they question everything - even God ..

If you are raised under the "Don't Question" regime - your brain gets wired differently. Jews - are Thinkers - logic and reason has value.

In Christianity/Islam - if you - "Question" or "Disbelieve" - certain tenets of said Holy book - you get roasted over the hot coals in the afterlife (and various other imaginative ways to cause suffering) - in some cases for eternity. Did ya ever question that one ? ..

Islamist's ( most but not all Muslims are Islamist) hate the founding principles - have no respect for essential liberty - and this is where we part ways (not you and me - but anyone - the line between good and fk you).

How can someone show up in a Nicab - full halloween costume - and claim not to be Islamist. I suppose such is possible but most people would not be capable of sustaining that ruse. If has "I have no respect for essential liberty" - aka the principle on which this nation was founded - why would I want to let you in to my society - one based on respect for essential liberty ?

So there you go - none of the above however - changes the fact that there are no good sides in a Blood Feud - I would like both sides to stop abusing each other (The latest land grab is way over the top x 5 - and Trump is a Puppet for going along - but.. we already knew that - and the name of the person who pulls the strings - care to guess ? - Clue - Father and Son have the same name !)

If it was a war situation - one where the enemy was a legitimate threat - of course I am going to favor Israel - but that is not this. This thing been going on for 80 years - both sides doing rotten things - to a point where the "one more than the other" conversation is meaningless to the Evil Equation.

 

See Post 206 por favor - The title of which is "There is no good side in a blood feud"

 

I am not Jewish.
You know Iranian monitor that there are millions of Non Jews that support the Israelis.
Iran's Ayatullas regime is the evil !

 

I like some of your posts: some more than others. But this one isn't one of them.

1- Please don't conflate "Jews", and whatever has been done by them, with "Israel". I doubt Bobby Fischer would have liked being called an Israeli! And anyone of them would like to be associated with Israel, didn't face any problems associating with them as such.

In this regard, please note that there isn't a single Israeli in the list of the top 20 chess players. Not among senior men. Not among senior women. Not among junior men. Not among junior women.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIDE_world_rankings

On the other hand, I do see several young Iranians who are in the list of the top 20 in both men (junior) and even women (junior), as follows:
#1 (junior men) Alireza Firouzja (admittedly, he in his case, he apparently doesn't want to play for Iran anymore, since Iran bans him from facing Israeli chess players and that ends up hurting his rankings and ability to compete as he sees fit).
#3 (junior men) Parham Maghsoodloo

#20 (junior women) Parham Maghsoodloo

Now, I admit, for a small country, Israel (#15) ranks highly in senior men chess, but so does Azerbaijan (a Shia Muslim country, which ranks #7) above Israel. Iran is barely outside the list of top 20 (being 22nd in the world rankings last I checked), but since Iran ranks #20 in the world in women's senior chess rankings, does that somehow say something about Iranian culture and women?

2- Chess is a game. Since you play the game you seem to fixate on it too much. There are better things to look at to see how kids are being trained to think. These videos should put the point on some of them, looking at the top 20 in the world in mathematics, physics and chemistry.





Does the fact that Iran have so many kids, compared to all the countries in the rest of the world (outside the eastern European bloc and the Far East countries, and excepting the US), have anything to do with religion? I doubt it. Especially since Iran (unlike Israel which has earned far fewer gold medals than Iran in all these competitions) only started competing in these competitions relatively recently (post 1990 period) and has earned all of its medals during that time. Meaning after the Iranian revolution.

And don't think Iran's performance isn't much to tout: if you take all of the Gold medals in math (and the same is even more true in the other subjects but I have done the math for math) from all of the countries in the ME (SW Asia+N.Africa) to include both Turkey and Israel, and if you even added the gold medals from India and the entire Indian subcontinent to the list, you still would find they have together earned a total 45 gold medals all combined (representing more than 2 billion people and more) against the same number by Iran standing alone with 85 million. Even among the countries in western Europe, despite many years of competing in these competitions before Iran and many other advantages, only the UK and Germany have a few more gold medals. All the rest of them in western Europe combined don't have 45 Gold medals Iranian kids have earned, even counting the 24 gold medals from France which represents the bulk of the gold me

3- Agnosticism has a much longer, more philosophically mature, history and tradition in Iran than almost anywhere else. But what accounts for intellectual achievement isn't about being agnostic per se. You do need to question things. Being dogmatic (whether in any secular ideology or a religious one) isn't something that will produce vibrant thinkers. But the real issue is promoting critical thinking.

 

Yikes. I thought you were Jewish. It is much easier for Iran, and Persian culture generally, to deal with the Jewish people, except those whose thoughts and agendas have become mired and mixed with the whole "Christian Zionist"/evangelical types (along with imperialist/military industrial complex affiliated groups) that fuel much of the policies of the state of Israel. These latter groups represent what I consider to be like oil and water: they don't mix with anything that Iran is about. And it doesn't matter if some deranged Iranians representing nothing but their own alienation have latched on to them either.

 

I didn't

 

The subject you were addressing was about Israel. Not Jews.

 

There are people in every nation - race and so on that achieve. Everyone starts with a different set of potentials. Sometimes - such as in the case of language - if this potential is not realized/actualized/exercised in the first 5 years of life - it is lost - or much of that potential.

For example - if you are kept in a closet until the age of 5 - with little or no exposure to language - one can never lean complex language skills. Unfortunately there are a number of case studies - extreme child neglect.

Especially in the early years - your interaction with the environment creates physical connections in the brain. In a nutshell - your culture affects you - in ways far greater than most folks realize.

Agnosticism has little to do with the issue. Just because one believes in God - does not mean that one must believe in some horrible fate in the afterlife - should one "Question" or " not Believe" the daily prognostications of the local IMAM (and Yes I realize I am exaggerating here - but you get the point) - There is an innate belief in some horrible fate as a punishment for apostasy - inherent in religious upbringing of a large percentage of Muslims and Christians.

Jewish socialization - whether it is a Jew in Israel or one in Russia - does not scare the heck out of their children to get them to believe in God - like in Christianity/Islam.

This fear gets lodged deep in one's subconscious - one will try to avoid "bad thoughts" thoughts that conflict with critical dogma - as that might lead one towards the terrible place.

When the adherent comes across information that conflicts with dogma - the fear response is triggered - obviously this varies greatly from individual to individual - the mind control works better on some than others - but - the idea that this is not mind control - of a rather sophisticated variety - is simply false.

 

Yes but there was a part of my discussion where that was not the subject. I was pointing out why I like Jewish Culture in General - which happens to also be Israeli Culture ... so there is nothing to conflate - this is just a fact.

 

If Israel represented "Jewish culture", and not what it actually represents in the political arena, all would be fine eventually. Israel, as a political entity, represents something else. And I would not conflate them with either Jewish culture, much less things done by Jews who aren't even Israelis.

 

No that is neither what I am advocating or what the Palestinians have been wanting. There was an area called Palestine from time to time where people had lived for over 5000 years with people coming in and leaving and new religions coming in and so on. In the 18th and 19thC Europe got interested in Nation States - that is states where they believed the people who lived there were related to them. During this time Christian Jew hatred became less due to people both Jews and Christians giving up their religion. This left a problem to some people who wanted to keep the Jew hatred going so they changed it from hatred of someone for being a Jew, for having a different religion to a Jew being a person who did not belong because they came from another place - the Middle East. They believed this because their religion came from the middle east completely forgetting so did Christianity. Most Jews did not go for this at all. Yes, there is something in one of their ceremonies about returning to Jerusalem but this was a spiritual ideal not a physical one. The first people to want to move Jews to the Holy Land were Jew Hating Christians. When they got their printed bible they believed God wanted them to put all Jews into the Holy land. This was obviously during the time of colonisation and a feeling of strong white superiority. The Church of Scotland who were in on this said that the reason they talked of a land without a people for a people without a land was because they believed that land which was not run by white people was in reality a land without people.

Most Jews did not want anything of the sort. Many visited and discovered that contrary to what they had been told there were people living their involved in business and so on. That is where the phrase 'the woman is beautiful but she is married' came from. It seems in the main to have been Jews who believed in the racist belief that they were a distinct race - now of course called people or nation or ethnicity as well. I understand as some people living in Eastern Europe who used to have their political things set up on an ethnicity basis - for example Jews would vote for a Jewish Representative.

Most Jews who had suffered so much themselves did not want to do this to another people and they had a hard time getting them there. They were absolutely against a Jewish State believing that that would create dual loyalty among Jews and possibly result in them being sent to live their against their wishes.

Time is short - a lot changed with the holocaust and the displaced persons camps and 67 which eventually resulted in most Jews supporting a racist State in Israel - though how this came to be for most of them is questionable. Most in the displaced persons camp who had endured the holocaust most definitely did not want to go to the ME. Most of them wanted first and foremost to go to the US. Prior to 67 most American Jews and British as well I think, never mentioned Israel. I do not remember Jews in my country, the UK ,going on about Israel until some time after 2000 but in the States after the 67 war they apparently thought it was something which if they supported got them a good position in the US as the US was now supporting Israel. The extent to which most people in the US and the UK actually support what Israel has been doing and continues to do is problematic. I understand what Israel does undermines Jewish values and the values which young Jews are brought up with.

The Zionists got their way because they played victim of the holocaust and refused to allow Jews to go to other countries where they would have been given refuges but made them remain in displacement camps until the UN gave the Yes on two states - which only happened after the was a break in the UN with massive pressure through blackmail and bribery to get countries to vote yes. What Israel wanted went against what the US was set up to do. It would appear the US support came from a desire of Truman to become President and financial backing he needed. Your State Department knew from the beginning what it would result in. It knew it would destroy the US relations with the countries there which at the time were very cordial - the US had promised to help people to get their freedom from colonialism - agreeing to yet another would obviously make this an illusion. The US also knew that the only way the Zionists would be able to keep their position would be with war and that it would be a place of continual war with Israel crying all the time that she needed to do that for her own safety and Israel would do this always taking more land. This of course she has done.

Colonialism is a barbaric racist practice which was the likely reason for both world wars and even the holocaust. It cost tens of millions of lives. The idea after WW2 was to stop this, to give all the people of the world rights, to consider each life was worth the same as the next. What Israel is doing is bringing thw world back to the disgusting lack of humanity and white ethnic supremacy it had prior to WW2, it had in the 30's.

The lack of humanity is so strong that American people do not mind what Israel does to the people of Palestine including the children. The American people see the Palestinians as non humans who they have the right to destroy. It disgusts but how we currently are is no better than in the 1930's and that Jeanette is what I oppose.

 

I am suggesting to you something very clear: the "Jewish culture" in Israel isn't producing much that is extraordinary at any level. Jewish culture elsewhere did.

Every theory should be 'falsifiable' (in the Popperian sense). The one you posit must explain how come, despite the enormous advantage of both the "Jewish culture" outside of Israel (producing so many great thinkers) AND the mathematical and scientific training of so many people of different backgrounds who were reared in the former eastern bloc/Soviet Union (disproportionately represented in most chess as well as academic Olympiad winners in the math and sciences), the state of Israel has been merely above average. Not that extraordinary at all. And how come, by contrast, a Muslim theocracy like Iran has produced so many medal winners in academic Olympiads, than all these 'secular' states in our region and elsewhere?

 

I was speaking of Jewish Culture in General - not just Israel. I have never done the math on "Just Israel" so no comment.

You then go on to support my case - The Soviet Bloc was officially atheist - not culturally encumbered by the aforementioned brain stunting religious beliefs.

 

The part that you aren't commenting about disproves the theory about Israeli culture (which - despite the advantage of being able to lean on the achievements of Jewish culture in the west AND the achievements of the Soviet bloc) has been nothing extraordinary. You can do the math. I have given you the sources.

A scientific theory that claims all sparrows are white isn't proved by finding a white sparrow, but not finding any black ones.

There are other things that better explain the achievements of the Soviet Union and eastern bloc than atheism. But, and to be sure, I do believe that anything that frees mankind of 'dogma' (and allows people to think freely) is important. The Soviet ideology freed its people of some forms of dogma (religious), while enslaving them in other forms.

Israel is NOT turning out to to be all that special in part because of its own dogmatic ideologies and lies.

 

@Giftedone
To help you with the "math" on Israel and Iran:

Lets focus on math, where the medal count is easily accessible from their official site.
https://www.imo-official.org/results_country.aspx
Total Gold Medals:
Islamic Republic of IRAN (Muslim "theocracy"): 45
France (the birthplace of secular ideology): 24
Turkey (secular Muslim state): 19
Israel (secular Jewish state): 14
India (secular Hindu majority state): 12
Brazil (secular Christian majority state): 10
...
Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria (secular), and every other state in the Middle East/N. Africa combined: 0

I have already covered 'chess" in my earlier post. To repeat what I said:

1- Please note that there isn't a single Israeli in the list of the top 20 chess players. Not among senior men. Not among senior women. Not among junior men. Not among junior women.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIDE_world_rankings

On the other hand, I do see several young Iranians who are in the list of the top 20 in both men (junior) and even women (junior), as follows:
#1 (junior men) Alireza Firouzja (admittedly, he in his case, he apparently doesn't want to play for Iran anymore, since Iran bans him from facing Israeli chess players and that ends up hurting his rankings and ability to compete as he sees fit).
#3 (junior men) Parham Maghsoodloo

#20 (junior women) Parham Maghsoodloo

2- While, for a small country, Israel (#15) ranks highly in senior men chess, so does Azerbaijan (a Shia Muslim majority country), ranking above Israel at #7. Iran is barely outside the list of top 20, but since Iran ranks #20 in the world in women's senior chess rankings, does that somehow say something about Iranian culture and women?

2- Chess is a game. Since you play the game you seem to fixate on it too much. There are better things to look at to see how kids are being trained to think. These videos should put the point on some of them, looking at the top 20 in the world in mathematics, physics and chemistry.

 

You have not given me any sources which do the math that I am speaking of- I gave you the math with respect to Chess. Some dude coming first in a Math Olympiad tells us nothing. You are abusing statistics - as that is a sample size of one.

The West does not lean on Jewish culture - unless the person living in the West is Jewish.

Also - math is not something that will test what I am talking about that well.

 

Talk about being dogmatic. Otherwise, how can "some dude" (not Israeli but merely Jewish) winning a chess championship be relevant, but the performance of the cream of the crop of students from different countries in mathematics Olympiads not be???

Just watch the videos: I didn't make them. They cover different Olympiads (Math, Physics, Chemistry) over many editions held throughout their history. It is actually quite a neat and telling collection of videos.

As for the Mathematics Olympiad, I will add the number of participants (it is not one dude and Israel has had more participants, over a longer period of time, than Iran) and the year of first participation among the data in that chart for purposes of the comparisons I made. The same story applies in ALL the other academic Olympiads, with Iran doing even better in Physics and Chemistry for instance. These "dudes" represent the cream of the crop of students produced by the cultures were are talking about. Much better than "chess winners" (even if I have already dealt with the chess issue too).

https://www.imo-official.org/results_country.aspx
Country..................................Year of First Participation...............Number of Participants.... Gold Medals..

I.R. Iran...........................................1985 .............199............................. 45
France.............................................1967............. 282 .............................24
Turkey ............................................ 1978..............218.............................19
Israel ..............................................1979 ..............226 ............................14
India ...............................................1989 .............186..............................12
Brazil...............................................1979..............237..............................10

The rest of the gang in the ME get a combined zero gold medals, including Syria (secular), Saudi Arabia (Wahhabi) Egypt, Iraq and the rest.

Brazil, with 10 Gold medals, is the best performer in Latin America. In Western Europe, Germany (51) and the UK (4 and, have more gold medals than Iran. All the rest don't and many don't have any gold medals at all.

Iran, being relevant to your example, not just because it is my country but because it is a "Muslim theocracy" in the way you classify and treat it. And that is relevant than to your main position and hypothesis.

 

I didn't say the "West" leans on Jewish culture. I said "Israeli culture (which - despite the advantage of being able to lean on the achievements of Jewish culture in the west AND the achievements of the Soviet bloc) has been nothing extraordinary." In other words, Israel, despite drawing from two 'cultures' that otherwise perform quite well in academic olympiads and in chess, itself does not do as well. Which requires you to then explore why?

Math is a lot more relevant than chess, although I have also given you the picture on chess as it relates to Israel. But chess is a game. Not everyone plays the game. Not everyone who plays the game, plays it professionally or seriously. But all kids go to school and the best of them are then sent to these academic Olympiads.

Besides, while I didn't break down the numbers, you will see the same story as in math (with greater emphasis) in the Physics and Chemistry (and other academic Olympiads). In all of them, Iran outranks every other country in the region, including Israel. Watch those videos. And then come and explain why a "Muslim theocracy" does better than all these other countries in light of what you had said.

 

I have shown the number of Gold medals won by Iran compared to others. But how about finishing first in the competition overall? Again, Iran is one of a very select number of countries (and the only one in its region no matter how widely defined) to have won the competition outright.

It is the same story in other academic Olympiads. For instance, the same story in Physics:



In terms of science production, here a video showing the top 15 countries in the world. You will again notice Iran being alone among the countries in the region in this list, even though we started much later and it took us a while to reach there.


The entire propaganda, fed by political agendas on the one hand, and the hostility of secular culture in the West to anything that smacks of a 'theocracy', that Iran is somehow scientifically or technologically behind others is nothing but fiction. In fact, while in the United States, teaching evolution is still somewhat controversial, an Iranian Shia theologian was the first (600 years before Darwin) to posit the theory of evolution. And, regardless, evolution is taught in Iranian schools freely and based on science, while the same cannot be said about many so-called secular states.

 

I am not being dogmatic - There are different kinds of intelligence - Math skills may not be affected by the brainwashing.
I use Chess because it involves thinking outside the box - going against current orthodoxy - it is a different set of skills.

In any population you will have some that excel in mathematics - the same is true in chess. Why are 50% of the World Chess Champions - not just for one year - but over that last 200 years - Jewish ? There are 14 million Jews in the entire world - there are 81 million Muslims in Iran - and that is just one nation.

You have not dealt with the "Chess issue" - comparing it to math does not deal with this issue.