A Different View Point

I like to understand both sides of any conflict before I take a stance, even though my stance will end up opposing one or the other. I look forward to hearing her experience of it :)

Thank you for giving me the chance to speak up in your blog. I agree with you that believers in Christ can respectfully disagree with each other concerning some matters.

I read the book of Genesis so I can understand your position toward Israel and I also follow your media which I believe is clearly biased and always tries to hide what is REALLY going on in the region. You all in the US do not see what we see in the region and that is why it became difficult for you to understand us. Please check out the following link. It is a photo gallery of what Israel did in its latest offensive in Gaza just 3 months ago. I am deeply sorry for the cruelty of the photos but please I urge you to check them all and try to imagine how an Arab or a Muslim feels about them.

http://gazamassacre.wordpress.com/

ALL of these photos were taken in Gaza in the period between December 27, 2008 and January 18, 2009. During these days 1324 Gazans were killed including 437 children under the age of 16, 110 women, 123 elderly men according to the Palestinian health ministry. We wish someone out there cared for us and loved us. Even as much as they love a dog in the West. We see the burned and bloodied bodies of children and know that Americans would protest if this happened to a beloved dog or cat. Yet our children are not worth much. This makes all of us in the region feel we have no value at all just because we are Arabs. Please note that our Arab leaders do not represent us well! They are too concerned with their oil money, power and bribe money coming from the American taxpayers. They do not want to upset the ones making them rich so they treat their own people -- the common Arabs -- with little regard.

You may say that Hamas caused the war because it kept firing rockets at Israel. Clearly firing rockets at civilian territories is wrong and evil. However Israel was the one who caused it. Since Hamas won in elections, Israel decided to impose a blockade over Gaza just to punish the Palestinians for picking the "wrong choice" in their elections. Gaza became a very big prison because of the Israeli blockade. Back in June, 2008 Egypt brokered a six-month ceasefire between Hamas and Israel. Despite the so-called truce, Israel kept imposing a tight blockade over all of Gaza Strip although the Palestinians did not fire any rocket.

More than 200 Gazans died because of starvation and lack of medicine and that all happened before the war started. What in the world do you expect people who are starving to react? Iraq stayed under sanctions for 13 continues years and according to the UN itself more than 1 million children died because of these evil sanctions and no one in the world condemned that. Do you all expect the Palestinians to just sit and watch their children starving. Hamas and all of the groups in Gaza announced that they will stop firing rockets once the blockade is lifted. During the 6 months truce, Gazans could not find gas, oil, children milk, bread and medicine. How would you feel if your children asked you to buy them food and you simply could not find anything to buy them because your neighboring countries were imposing a blockade in your area. Despite all of that Hamas kept the truce and Israel was the one who broke it on November 4, 2008.

If you are interested in reading some references about the topic, you can check out these 2 articles both written by 2 Jewish professors during the war.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/07/gaza-israel-palestine

http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0102/p09s01-coop.html

I am sorry this was long. I look forward to hearing from you again. Thank you again for welcoming my comments.