Counting the dead
Israel Hayom | Counting the dead.
( I almost didn’t post this because it’s so obvious that it’s not “news.” Tell me something I don’t already know! But the extreme nature of this contrast gave me pause. Does anyone not Israeli or interested in Israel know how grotesque the world communities’ double standard is? Find me a reason… Oil, sure. But I’m sorry. It’s pure antisemitism. – JW )
The count of 60,000 people killed in Syria over the past 22 months is double the estimated casualty count of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict over the past 45 years.
Lakhdar Brahimi, the so-called U.N. and Arab League peace envoy to Syria, said this past weekend that 50,000 Syrians have been killed in the 22-month-old civil war in that country. U.N. Human Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay said on Wednesday that an “exhaustive” U.N. study showed that at least 60,000 people had died. Tens of thousands of others have been wounded in that gory, war-crime-filled civil war, and millions have been forced to flee their homes.
Brahimi said that “if the war stays another year, we will not have 25,000 more, we will have 100,000 more killed.” This is because since last February, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has steadily unleashed ever-greater military firepower against his opponents, including tanks, heavy artillery, attack helicopters, fighter jets and Scud missiles. Chemical weapons could be next.
Opposition groups monitoring the death toll say that this past Saturday alone, as many as 400 people were killed — more than double what they call the “typical daily death toll.” About half of them were civilians slain in an alleged mass killing carried out by government troops at a petrochemical university in central Syria.
This is obviously sad, scary, strategically dangerous and upsetting.
The figure of 60,000 dead is also a historic marker. Because 60,000 dead is double the estimated casualty count of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict over the past 45 years.
Add them all up over all the years of the “occupation”: combatants, civilians, and indirect casualties of conflict, on both sides of the Palestinian-Israeli divide. Add in all Palestinians killed by intra-Palestinian violence or executed by Hamas and Fatah as “collaborators.” Add in Israeli victims of Palestinian terror. Add them all up. And still, the total casualty count in Israeli-Palestinian conflict doesn’t hit half the number of Syrians slaughtered by other Syrians over the past two years.
Of course, the world is much more distraught about Palestinians in conflict than Syrians in conflict — because the Jews are involved in the first equation. The world is outraged when an Israeli soldier takes a swipe at a Palestinian protester with his rifle butt, but is not so incensed when Syrian troops rape, massacre and torture tens of thousands of their own. The world knows that Jewish housing construction is a threat to world peace requiring the Security Council’s immediate attention, but feels no such sense of urgency when the slaughter in Syria threatens to spill over into Turkey, Jordan and Israel, or engulf the region in non-conventional warfare.
I’m just saying.
WarSclerotic 
January 3, 2013 at 6:30 PM
Jeeze…this article reads like a perverted Book of Numbers.
January 3, 2013 at 7:13 PM
Operation Persian Hammer: The 2014 US-Iranian war
January 3, 2013 at 10:47 PM
Iran Express sounds better.
January 3, 2013 at 10:52 PM
True 🙂 Operation Persian Hammer: The 2014 US-Iranian war was a wargame I was part of
January 5, 2013 at 8:46 PM
it did not play out well due to a lack of creative thinkers,you should of hired me
January 4, 2013 at 3:55 AM
Operation Cyrus Virus.
January 3, 2013 at 7:59 PM
It is antisemitism but it is more than that.
It is nothing new and it’s not only related to Israel.
Sadly this phenomenon exists because there are “good” victims and “bad” victims.
Who is talking about the Cristians butchered in Nigeria everyday?
Who is talking about the victims of the Darfour genocide?
Who is talking about the Muslims killed by Muslims?
Who is talking about the women murdered in Muslim countries?
Who was talking about the victims of Communism?
Who is talking about Tibet?
What makes a victim a good victim is, that it is a victim of my opponent or that it is somehow opportune for me to emphasize its victimhood to advance my agenda.
What makes a victim a bad victim is that it is a victim of myself, my friend, my ideology or that emphasizing its victimhood would go against my agenda.
This can only change if we try not to think along these lines and recognize when we ourselves turn people into victims.
January 3, 2013 at 8:22 PM
For this cruel double standard, yes antisemitism is the main reason. But the flow of petro-dollars towards western medias and corrupt politicians too should be taken into account.
PS: Aljazeera has acquired Current TV(owned by Al Gore)
January 3, 2013 at 9:40 PM
Some 1.8 million people got killed in traffic around the world in the past 22 months, that’s 30 times the number of dead in Syria.
I am just saying.
January 3, 2013 at 9:54 PM
Renbe…
” I’m just saying…” NOTHING AT ALL !
How many died from cancer? Heart attack? etc.
Disgusting, non relevant comparison…
The proper question is how many died in Syria from car crashes, not in the whole world.
And it sure as hell is less than 60,000 !
This is making me rethink my decision to allow your comments here. Your desperation to justify the unjustifiable is beginning to make me literally sick to my stomach.
I’m going to sleep on it, but you are now on notice.
Joseph Wouk
January 5, 2013 at 8:56 PM
I wonder just who it is when it comes to renbe i have give up abusing him as you dont like it,you have the patience of a saint JW work,from looking at what he posts i would say its more than one person and someone pulls there strings,why dont we trace him you have enough incidences of him login on,
January 3, 2013 at 10:03 PM
Some 0 people got raped by a car In the past 22 months.
I am just saying.
January 4, 2013 at 4:58 AM
Regarding the double standard, JW, here’s a little article that brings out some interesting points, but no real answers as to why the double standard exists. Is it just a manifestation of evil or does it have roots in history? For what it’s worth, here’s the link:
http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/carol-hunt-why-we-must-challenge-double-standards-on-israel-3175286.html
January 4, 2013 at 8:07 AM
Its roots are deep in history, from the dawn of the civilisation. We are talking here about a certain group of people who were very different from the others around the ”Mediterranean Lake”; they didn’t pray to idols, they eat different and they didn’t married others from the tribes surrounding them. The israelites were different from the start and that was a big social and psychological problem when you leave next to other people. Add to this the ”chosen people” idea – while others weren’t chosen – and you got in front of you the roots of the later antisemitic phenomenon which is with us till today. Of course, much more tragic events occurred in between like the occupation of Palestine (Israel) by the Romans who worshiped a whole plethora of gods and treated with disrespect The Temple; the romans were not big jews fans. And we have finally The Crucification of Jesus – Yehoshua- by the romans with the assistance of the Sanhedrin – the highest jewish priests council. The people – the simple jewish men and women- loved Jesus, but the highest jewish establishment feared from him. In history that was like ”the jews killed Jesus” and that was murderous lie. We’ll stop here our little dissertation asking for forgiveness if it was too long but sometimes some things must to be told.
January 4, 2013 at 4:56 PM
Well said Luis. But what could be more ‘different’ than the muslim faith? I guess if you add the violence sanctioned by the Koran, then that certainly makes them even more ‘different’ and threatening. Could it be they were actually ‘founded’ as opposition to the Jewish faith?
January 5, 2013 at 9:03 PM
I think historically the romans pushed the Sanhedrin,they really had no choice,only ignorant people think it was the jews,and now the Israelis,but your people are just westerners the same as us,i love my yid friends
January 4, 2013 at 8:12 PM
Hi Steve, how are you? The Koran is ambiguous when is referring to the violence. The word ” jihad ”, which means ”struggle” is permitted in certain situations and the barbarian islamic fanatics are using that permission because their prophet also did ”jihad” against rebel tribes around Mecca and Medina. But the problem lies in the fact that is ”easier” – and more ”fun” – to fight wars and kill people instead of building schools, the economy, building a state and respecting women. Killing is more easy than all the other ”stuff”.
Is for this reason that the jihadists enjoy to murder other people instead of building their own life.