Israel/Gaza

[chrisj1948]

I hope the prohibition remains. It is a topic which normally generates great heat and no light whatsoever.

Regards
Chris J.

[admin]

Yes, this policy is going to remain in place, at least in the short term. Discussions on this issue are rarely conducive to creating the atmosphere of seasonal goodwill and cheer that we want to promote

We'd be happy to listen to a case for changing it if you want to make one.

Admin

[chrisj1948]

It all feels a little defeatist. We might make a breakthrough, you never know.

A tag line I am rather fond of goes "It used to be said that a million monkeys pounding a million typewriters would eventually write out the complete works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know that this is not the case"

I fear your breakthrough would be similarly elusive.

Regards
Chris

[Robin Orton]

Nevertheless, it's interesting to speculate about why this topic raises such strong passions that it cannot apparently be discussed rationally in this sort of forum. See Rod Taylor's comment here. My view is that it inspires in English people who, like me, are neither Jewish nor Arab a double sense of guilt that we find intolerable. We feel guilty towards the Jews because, we, or our ancestors, have persecuted them over the centuries; we feel guilty towards the Palestinians because we suspect that we, or our ancestors, may have betrayed them. We feel, rightly or wrongly, that we can resolve this unbearable dissonance only by seeking certainty in a fierce and often unnuanced commitment to one side or the other, which almost inevitably lapses into racism or, at best, unhelpful ethnic stereotyping.