The Other Beautiful Game
Where's this then?
Some exculsive tennis club? Maybe the grounds of a nice hotel or sports club? Part of Bill Gates' garden?
Nope - it's a public tennis court in Christchurch Park, Ipswich at a little before 9:00AM this morning.
I think it's the most beautiful court I've ever seen - too bad my game doesn't do it justice.
Labels: Tennis
posted by roGER at 5:55 pm
3 Comments:
Roger,
I've tried asking a question on your friend Mark's blog but not had a reply in three or four days. In fact the question has not even appeared. It's this -
Look at the map at the bottom of this post and tell me where Haifa is.
http://gashx.blogspot.com/2006/07/even-more-voices-of-reason.html
According to the caption, Hezbollah has not attacked any areas that were in the jewish state proposed in 1947. To my eye, it very much looks like they have. Haifa is in the jewish part, isn't it?
David
The 1947 theft of Palestinian land, whereby the Zionists who legally owned 7% of Palestine and comprised about 1/3rd of the population were given 55% of the land is the basic injustice from which all others stem.
As the map shows, the Zionists have stolen even more land since then.
You reap what you sow, and the Zionists have sown plenty and continue to do so.
Well that doesn't directly answer the question. But anyway, here's the thing. If this really is the 'basic injustice', isn't it the UN's fault rather than the 'Zionists'? Who wouldn't accept statehood after what those people had been though?
The UN proposed the 45\55 split. The Arabs initiated a war, with a 100\0 split in mind. They rolled the dice and they lost. Doesn't there come a point where they just accept that it's over? And if you're the aggressor, what right do you have to complain once you've lost? It's not like the arab world is exactly short of land is it?
In 'Beyond Chutzpah', Finkelstein relates how the Zionists used 'telegrams, phone calls and letters' to press their case for the UN resolution. Those aren't exactly WMD are they? Meanwhile, the Saudis tell the US that they don't mind the Americans supporting the Zionist side provided that the US doesn't get involved in the forthcoming war, which is exactly what happens - so Saudis used the 'oil weapon' to buy america's neutrality and the arabs attacked in order to crush Israel at birth. (footnote nine, page 285)
I don't see how you can persist in being sympathetic after that.
My own view is that the 'basic injustice' is that none of the countries surrounding Israel have any democratic pedigree. And consequently their leaders promote hostility towards Israel, as it's the only thing they can do that gives them popularity. It diverts domestic discontent away from their corruption and misrule. They invest in the problem because the problem benefits them more than the solution ever would. They use the Palestinians as a pawn in a game and it's pretty sickening.
Since then, Iran has extended its influence and the whole thing has backfired on those arab countries that used the Palestinians for so long. Suddenly there is a fanatical death cult extremism that threatens everyone.
But if you want to find atrocities in the middle east, you can find far bigger ones than 'al nabka'. Read about Hama, 1982 for instance (10-25 thousand Syrians killed) or the Somalian civil war (300,000 killed), the Algerian civil war (100,000). Tragically nobody remembers the dead in those enormities, because the perpetrators were not jews or Americans.
DY
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