Okay so Mel was hammered but the anti-Jewish tirade was totally wrong. Clearly Jews have not started all the wars in history and anyone who says that are not in their right mind. Obviously too he fosters ideas thrust upon him by his bizarrely anti-semitic father whom he refuses to criticize. Surely he can see what all the fuss is about?
But clearly Israel's actions in the Lebanon are obscene and disproportionate. When an Israeli dies then 10 Lebanese die in return. There is a similar kill ratio in the Palestinian Territories. The origins of the present conflict, which the world's media seem happy to avoid, stem from an Israeli incursion into Lebanon to capture Hezbollah officials. The next day Hezbollah went into the Israeli border area and killed several and captured two soldiers, and the rest of course is history. That history includes the wanton Israeli destruction of Lebanese infrastructure including roads, bridges, power stations and factories. It seems this isn't just about Hizbollah but about Lebanon's right to exist, its right to improve the lot of its people. Israel's war was clearly planned well in advance. In fact, Israel had informed the US about its plans months in advance.
Of course people always assume that the rockets and suicide bombs are just part of a worldwide terrorist network. The facts are unfortunate especially for Americans with their biased and sheep-like media who are prone to investigate nothing and to assume everything the White House says is true. The facts are in fact wildly different. Imagine if Mexico invaded the US and held on to New Mexico for 40 years despite all attempts (through countless UN resolutions) to get it back. Surely some Americans would take up a campaign against Mexico, and surely some of those protests would be violent. You're damn right they would be and you're damn right they would be justified. That, in effect, is what is happening in the Lebanon and in the Palestinian Territories. In the latter the Israeli's have occupied and brutalised a people for 40 years despite around 50 UN resolutions - would that be possible anywhere else? Absolutely not. So in the Palestinian Territories you have Israeli control of land, of people and crucially of water resources. There is a deliberate policy of extreme human rights violations, torture, land grab (notice that big wall that stretches through Palestinian territory? Imagine that in New Mexico? You'd protest right?), the bulldozing of Palestinian properties and the permanent mistreatment of Palestinians in their daily life. And the Israelis still wonder why the Palestinians are so mad and so many of them resort to violence. Well, for me that's easy to see because when you have your land, house, freedom, water and self respect taken from you what else is left?
In the case of the Lebanon it is also Israeli land grab that has caused the Hezbollah rocket attacks, plain and simple. Israel has seen the luxuriant Shebaa valley in Lebanon and wants it for itself. Now, imagine the world standing idly by whilst Mexico rampages across part of the US, then imagine that the world - or most of it anyway - sides with Mexico. What an outrage that would be. And what would be the result, if the world turned a blind eye? Yep, violence of course. With big guns. Seems obvious to me too.
This war in Lebanon, along with so much of terrorism has more to do with the injustices of foreign powers controlling people's land. Lebanon is an easy case in point, as is Iraq. People do not like being invaded - it's that simple.
In a recent book by Robert Pape about the origins of 460 suicide bombers around the world he found, staggering but true, that very few (6% I think) were Islamic fundamentalists and the rest were people who were basically outraged by foreign powers invading and controlling their land. Well, there's an answer to our problems in there somewhere, but whether or not the US and Israel see those answers, which for me are all lit up like a Christmas tree, remains to be seen. Again, if you were invaded by a foreign power one of the courses of action open to you is the violence, and in a world swamped with weapons, which largely orginate I might add in the US and UK, then the results are pitiful and predictable.
Going back to Mel, briefly, saying that his life was 'fucked', this idiotic man needs to get a grip. He is an alcoholic so he needs to get help for that, but if he sits back and looks over his life he will see 25 years at the top of the film business, a loving family and 7 children, and a bank account that cannot be much short of $400 million. Perhaps he ought to use some of that money in charitable enterprises if his life needs some meaning, because at the moment he looks to me like an overspoilt buffoon who clearly has a deluded brain and a warped sense of the world and its problems and his part in it. In this respect he is a poor man.
