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Trying to stay centered has been a challenge since the Mexican girl kidnapped is the nice of my best friend.

We have to start with History.

Hadriano Relandi’s Palaestina Ilustrata, 1695, has a census and description of the places. Guess what, inhabited by Jews, Christians and few Bedouin nomads ( no Arabs) . All the places bored names of Greek, Roman or Hebrew linguistics. Felix Bonfils’ 9000 pictures from 1835- 1885 show exactly the same. Arabs started immigration to the land because of the Economy developed by the European Jews as stated on the Royal Commission Report from pages 241-271. That also stated that the Arab population grew 75% from 1922-1929 and that there was ILLEGAL Arab immigration. So some Jews were immigrants but most of the Arabs too. Most of the Gaza’s Arabs are from Egypt as you can probe from their last names and from the statements made by their own leaders. Why Egypt doesn’t accept them back? Only 16.9% of the land own by the State of Israel was owned by the displaced Arabs in 1948. They have tried to erase all Jewish heritage. They even changed the name Judea and Samaria for the West Bank after 1948. The supposed Holly Place, the Dome of the Rock, was “abandoned” as shown in the pictures of Bonfils. No Arabs in Jerusalem , that by the way, is never mentioned in the Coran. Arabs pray with their back to the Dome of the Rock.

If you want to understand whom you are dealing with you should research who the Mufti of Jerusalem is because all the ideology of both the PLO and HAMAS and most of the radical islamists derived from him. Life of any human being is precious. But you cannot understand with your occidental way of thinking their reasoning. Would you send your own son to blow himself killing innocent people? First you will have a martyr in your family so your social prestige will grow and secondly you will receive a monthly pension for the rest of your life. If the Palestinians receive millions of dollars from international aid (starting with the Israelíes), why they have to depend on Israel? Instead of spending their money in constructing tunnels, paying the martyrs’ families and the people in jail (3,000- 4,000 usd a month) and stealing the money by their corrupted leaders, they could construct infrastructure. Israel is not their only border so why do they accuse Israel of not letting them out? They can leave from Egypt, no?

And the most important thing is that HAMAS doesn’t care for their people. Most of their leaders are living in Qatar in luxury hotels while the gazians are dying. You should also read the Coran, and research what Al taqyya is. Hope you will not be deceived in the future. And I am not denying there isn’t something fishy with the Israelis not knowing of the invasion. Still what they did as taking the fetus out of a pregnant woman and beheading it, is unthinkable. They claim that the Israelis kill their people. Israel left Gaza in 2005 and they only interfere when thy are attacked usually with thousand of rockets. Thing that you usually never hear. You only hear in the media that Israel is firing missiles but you will never hear it is defending itself because it was attacked in the first place. In their last incursion to Gaza (think 2014) they even found people chained to the buildings that were going to be taken down. How do they knew it? Because Israel threw pamphlets announcing where they will fired, they made phone calls to the Arabs and they send a non explosive rocket that announces the imminent missile in around 10 more seconds. Always trying to avoid as much the deaths of civilians. In this case the ones that tortured, raped and humiliated the kidnapped people were the civilians as shown in their own videos. Appalling. You should really research what radical Islam is. Unfortunately this people were raised and indoctrinated in hate. And don’t misunderstand me, I really pity all those young men that did those atrocities. You can also google Pallywood, although you cannot find as much info as before you will get a hint.

It has nothing to be bias or unbiased. It has everything on stating the truth.

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The Palestinians have been oppressed for decades by Israel. It is still not justifiable for a freedom fighter to cross a line and become a terrorist.

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Detailed. Unbiased. Enjoyed the read.

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Thanks, Joe, especially for inserting this particular sequence of videos in your article. Taken as a whole, they make up a revealing picture -- one that can be perceived through the usual polarization that exists in a conflict where huge loss of life is involved -- and i'm not intending to write about the right vs wrong of this, nor about it being unconscionable.

The truth is that Israel considers Gaza a de-facto foreign land and justifies its actions against the people of Gaza as being towards "foreign terrorists" -- exactly in line with what the US did in Iraq and Afghanistan -- bombing the people with no (real) consideration of casualties. Israel's current situation is like what Varda the Israeli in the 2nd video said regarding the Hamas attack -- that Israel got caught with its pants down -- which is equivalent to 9-11 -- the justification for bombing Iraq and Afghanistan (not considering that 9-11 was an inside job, and also here we're just talking about the "perception" of people in western countries).

This is also exactly what Hanan Ashrawi the Palestinian politician in the 1st video said -- that catching Israel by surprise was unprecedented. Never in its existence has Israel been caught unawares this way; it's always been forewarned of attacks or if they weren't, like in the Yom Kippur War, then the army was able to effect a swift and decisive victory anyway -- and this has been the pattern in all its wars -- with the Arab states or even with the British. This apparent blunder now is having a huge effect on the Israeli people, especially being such a small and close knit country.

The Mossad is reputed to be highly skilled in espionage and the Jews have made many movies about the Mossad's cleverness in outsmarting terrorists. i believe there could be more to the Mossad's successes than human resourcefulness however, and that higher powers could even be involved (not necessarily "God" but higher anyway) that covertly inspire certain Israelis to make critical moves, so that they wind up always winning against their enemies.

So why didn't Israel know and act to prevent Hamas' attack ? It could be that the attack was allowed to proceed, in order to throw the Israeli people into an uncommon state of fear -- also like 9-11, which enabled massive, completely unjustifiable war, as well as the enactment of the draconian Patriot Act. Israel's attacks on Gaza have been horrendous, but with the US's recent shipments of arms to Israel that Josh Paul talks about, this is likely not the end of Israel's intentions either.

Paul definitely knows more than he is revealing, since if he did reveal the full truth behind the shipments, he would risk being charged under the secrets act. i don't for a minute buy his claim that he suddenly he had an attack of conscience about whether sending all these weapons to Israel "is getting us where we need to be." He took this decisive act of resigning because he knows Israel's specific plan, and thus this plan must be something unconscionable !)

Of course driving the Palestinians out of Gaza, or even out of Israel entirely, would be a massive personal victory for Netanyahu whose support by the Israeli people since Hamas's attack, is now at a low. Alternately, the attack could have been allowed to proceed, in order to break the Israeli's sense of security for other reasons, like effecting a regime change in Israel.

It's also interesting to consider that there could be hidden factions w/in the Israeli government. Trump's presidency was meant to support Israel, yet whomever the Biden administration supports in regards to Israel now, would likely be different from Trump's beneficiary, and if there is some huge action planned by the Israeli's that caused Paul to resign, it's likely not being supported by the faction Trump was aligned with.

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In one of Teal Swan's podcasts she said (not in relation to the Israeli-Hamas conflic; she was talking about something else unrelated, but I think her commet is also fitting in this case), "we all recognize where we are being injured, but not where we are injuring others ..."

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It's easy to get overwhelmed by many layers of nuance of complexity you describe which is why we need to expand our awareness to embrace what science and tech has now shown empirically -- we live in such an immense and infinitely complex universe that we what we need to explore is our obvious deep connection to it on levels beyond the logical mind -- the one with easy answers. Only a bodily and whole recognition of the actual not imagined scale of Existence can point the way.

It may also be that like Life this is not a puzzle that can be "solved" but rather a transformative experience that needs to be lived with all of its messiness. I won't be around but you will.

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As always I love the opportunity to come out of the whirlwind of social media posts and other channels and into this grounded space. Watching the videos in succession made me think about many things, including why world leaders are taking such thoughtless approaches. I liked hearing from that former State Dept. official on that note. You're right... it's easy to forget about humans during all of this.

Thanks for what you do, don't stop, and I hope more support you guys financially to grow this. The world needs it!

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Thanks for the words and feedback. Thanks for your support as well, we'll keep at it as long as we can, it has become a tough time for indie media.

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Thanks for sharing your personal process at the head of this post - it thoroughly resonates with what has been my own lifelong growth - we ALL benefit from the vista of the 'big picture' as we find our way up the mountain. From this chair, the big picture outlook consistently reveals the same single issue at the root of every problem - IMO it cannot be said too often:

“The most important point to be made here is that as long as we remain egocentric beings, there shall always be sociopaths and psychopaths among us, who inevitably rise to authority driven by selfishness, greed, and apathy – who then capsize their entire sphere of influence despite the best intentions of all the rest of us. This perpetual cycle can only continue its descent until we undergo the spiritual and cultural transformation available by transmuting the egocentricity at its root.” – The Everyone Project

“The egocentricity experiment with human Design has run its course – its climax is our confluence of crises. It is now imperative that we develop metamorphic catalysts immediately – means and methods to efficiently transmute egocentricity and profoundly evoke our innate senses of interdependence and compassion.” – Care To Evolve?

peace love

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Thanks for reading! And ya it does reveal the same sort of root doesn't it? Yet I sometimes ask myself if I am naïve to always come back to the root. I mean, it seems so obvious that this is the way forward, yet when so little of our culture approaches it in this manner you wonder if it isn't the way. Nonetheless it feels it is.

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Thanks so much for engaging, Joe! Truly, if one takes the time to follow the scent down the rabbit hole - every one of our problems can be traced to the same single issue. Here is a succinct summary by an astute, well read journalist who has seen this first hand around the world:

“There is one human story. Dressed in new clothing and using new tools, we endlessly relive it. If we read philosophy, literature, history, poetry, and theology – we see greed, hedonism, and hubris easily defeat empathy and reason.” – The Last Act of the Human Comedy – Chris Hedges

We don't see it because the root issue is fundamental to what it is that we believe we are. For more details - and perspective on a way forward:

https://bohobeau.net/2021/01/29/woke-world/

your thoughts?

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Indeed, this goes all the way back to the worldview aspect.. we are taught that we are bad. And in many ways we are so desensitized to destructive behavior we accept it as a normal part of life. Limited science and perspectives on history often reinforce the worldview that we already believe, further feeding into the cycle. This is where I get intrigued by spiritual and mystical experience that goes beyond the faith of religion and into direct experience. It often has the power people people to attune to a oneness, an elevated level of consciousness that often has people looking back on others and situations saying "why are we doing this? I want everyone to just have peace." I believe we can get there, but creating space for those elevated experiences of consciousness and then integrating what comes from it into everyday life is important. But this is a low priority in people's minds when our systems have pushed people to the brink of survival.

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Thanks for this balanced humanistic look at things. Best from Oregon

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Thanks for taking the time to read :)

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