Cyprus-Forum.com

[Linichka]

Oh - disregard the final question. It makes little difference, really. I have visited Cyprus several times and love it, but do not presume that I understand enough of its history and its genuine state of affairs to pass judgment.

[Paphitis]

Again, you don't know what the hell you are talking about. "Ethnic cleansing"? That's what is happening in Sudan. What happened during the Nazi regime. The Pals are not being expelled from the State of Israel or denied rights. While I doubt most would weep if the ever-whining Pals elected to immigrate to other countries, such as Jordan (which, you doubtless do not realize, is 70% of British Mandate Palestine), no one is pushing them.

Again, they enjoy far more rights than they would in Arabic countries.

Again, you have been here how often? For how long?

How can you say you are not ethnically cleansing them to make way for new Israeli Settlements?

http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-upda ... g-20080311

So you say you don't deny them their rights and yet you demolish their homes!

I have been to Israel twice, but only for short stays.

My partner is also a journalist and has been to Israel a number of times, to file some stories. She was even a guest of the Israeli Government at one point, on an Israeli paid for junket. She is filed many stories depicting both the Israeli and Palestinian points of view, and has received some charming correspondence as a result of.

[Linichka]

I've never lived in a settlement, nor would I. Still, there is a major difference between expansion and "ethnic cleansing".

Ethnic cleansing is what happened in the present Hamastan. No Jews there since 2005. Damned few Christians, either. I think that even most Moslems are utterly wretched with their present lot, and I pity them.

[Paphitis]

I've never lived in a settlement, nor would I. Still, there is a major difference between expansion and "ethnic cleansing".

Ethnic cleansing is what happened in the present Hamastan. No Jews there since 2005. Damned few Christians, either. I think that even most Moslems are utterly wretched with their present lot, and I pity them.

You also made comment about the Nazi Holocaust as if to justify Israel's actions against the Palestinians. Whilst I acknowledge these atrocities, you can not use it to gain sympathy when your crimes committed against Palestinians only slightly fall short of the terrible crimes committed against you during WW2.

Furthermore, I don't use the ethnic cleansing term lightly. I feel as though the citizens of Israel have been systematically brainwashed to have your line of thinking.

It is a term used by Ilan Pappe an Israeli Historian and lecturer at Haifa University.



http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... a&aid=4715

The shameful result is that Palestinians then and today have almost no rights including being able to live in peace and security on their own land in their own state that no longer exists. Survivors then and their offspring either live in Israel as unwanted Arab citizens with few rights or in the Occupied Palestinians Territories (OPT) where their lives are suspended in limbo in an occupied country in which they're subjected to daily institutionalized and codified racism and persecution. They have no power over their daily lives and live in a constant state of fear with good reason. They face economic strangulation; collective punishment for any reason; loss of free movement; enclosures by separation walls, electric fences and border closings; regular curfews, roadblocks, checkpoints, loss of their homes by bulldozings and crops and orchards by wanton destruction and seizure; arrest without cause, and routine subjection to torture while in custody.

They're targeted for extra-judicial assassination and indiscriminate killing; taxed punitively and denied basic services essential to life and well-being including health care, education, employment and even enough food and water at the whim of Israeli authorities in a deliberate effort to destroy their will to resist and eliminate those who won't by expulsion or extermination. Palestinians have no power to end these appalling abuses and crimes against humanity or receive any redress for them in Israeli, the West or through the International Criminal Court Israel ignores when it rules against its interests.

[Linichka]

Just another massive turd from a notorious self-hating Jew.

Kindly regard my earlier post, to which you have not yet responded.

[joe]

Arab expansion



(Brown)Expansion under the Prophet Muhammad, 622-632
(Orange)Expansion during the Patriarchal Caliphate, 632-661
(Yellow)Expansion during the Umayyad Caliphate, 661-750

Conquest of Egypt and Cyrenaica
For more details on this topic, see Muslim conquest of Egypt.

Antioch temporarily remained under Byzantine control, but by the time Heraclius died, much of the Egypt had been lost, and by 637–638 the whole of Syria was in Muslim hands.d[›] With 3,500–4,000 troops under his command, 'Amr ibn al-A'as first crossed into Egypt from Palestine at the end of 639 or the beginning of 640. He was progressively joined by further reinforcements, notably 12,000 soldiers by Al-Zubayr. 'Amr first besieged and conquered Babylon, and then attacked Alexandria. The Byzantines, divided and shocked by the sudden loss of so much territory, agreed to give up the city by September 642.[16] The fall of Alexandria extinguished Byzantine rule in Egypt, and allowed the Muslims to continue their military activities in North Africa; between 643–644 'Amr completed the conquest of Cyrenaica.[17] During the same period, the Arabs took Cyprus, and Uthman succeeded Caliph Umar after his death.[18]

The Byzantine navy briefly won back Alexandria in 645, but recapitulated it in 646 shortly after the Battle of Nikiou.[19] The local Christian Copts welcomed the Arabs just as the Monophysites did in Jerusalem.[20] The loss of this lucrative province deprived the Byzantines of their valuable wheat supply, thereby causing bread shortages throughout the Byzantine Empire and in its soldiers' rations in the following decades.[21]

[edit] Conquest of the remaining Byzantine territories in North Africa
A Byzantine fresco showing a dromon. Byzantium was the dominant sea-power of the 7th century.

In 647, an Arab army led by Abdallah ibn al-Sa’ad moved into the Byzantine Exarchate of Africa. Tripolitania was taken, followed by Sufetula, 150 miles (240 km) south of Carthage, and the governor and self-proclaimed Emperor of Africa Gregory was killed. Abdallah's booty-laden force returned to Egypt in 648 after Gregory's successor, Gennadius, promised them an annual tribute of some 300,000 nomismata.[22]

Following a civil war in the Arab Empire the Umayyads came to power under Muawiyah I. Under the Umayyads the conquest of the remaining Byzantine territories in North Africa was completed and the Arabs were able to move across large parts of Maghreb, entering into Visigothic Spain through the Strait of Gibraltar,[20] under the command of the Berber general Tariq ibn-Ziyad. But this happened only after they developed a naval power of their own,e[›] and they conquered and dismantled the Byzantine stronghold of Carthage between 695–698.[23] The loss of Africa meant that soon, Byzantine control of the Western Mediterranean was challenged by a new Arab fleet operating from Tunisia.[24]

Muawiyah began consolidating the Arab territory from the Aral Sea to the western border of Egypt. He put a governor in place in Egypt at al-Fustat, and launched raids into Sicily in 652 and Anatolia in 663. Then from 665 to 689 a new North African campaign was carried out to protect Egypt "from flank attack by Byzantine Cyrene". An Arab army of 40,000 took Barca, defeating 30,000 Byzantine.[25]

A vanguard of 10,000 Arabs under Uqba ibn Nafi followed from Damascus. In 670, Kairouan in modern Tunisia was established as a base for further operations; Kairouan would become the capital of the Islamic province of Ifriqiya, and one of the main Arabo-Islamic cultural centers in the Middle Ages.[26] Then ibn Nafi "plunged into the heart of the country, traversed the wilderness in which his successors erected the splendid capitals of Fes and Morocco, and at length penetrated to the verge of the Atlantic and the great desert.[27] In his conquest of the Maghreb, he took the coastal cities of Bugia and Tingi, overwhelming what had once been the Roman province of Mauretania Tingitana where here he was finally halted.[28] As the historian Luis Garcia de Valdeavellano explains:
“ In their struggle against the Byzantines and the Berbers, the Arab chieftains had greatly extended their African dominions, and as early as the year 682 Uqba had reached the shores of the Atlantic, but he was unable to occupy Tangier, for he was forced to turn back toward the Atlas Mountains by a man who became known to history and legend as Count Julian.[29] ”
In spite of the turbulent reign of Justinian II, last emperor of the Heraclian dynasty, his coinage still bore the traditional "PAX", peace.

Moreover, as Gibbon writes, "this Mahometan Alexander, who sighed for new worlds, was unable to preserve his recent conquests. By the universal defection of the Greeks and Africans he was recalled from the shores of the Atlantic." His forces were directed at putting down rebellions, and in one such battle he was surrounded by insurgents and killed. Then, the third governor of Africa, Zuheir, was overthrown by a powerful army, sent from Constantinople by Constantine IV for the relief of Carthage.[28] Meanwhile, a second Arab civil war was raging in Arabia and Syria resulting in a series of four caliphs between the death of Muawiyah in 680 and the ascension of Abd al-Malik in 685, and was ongoing until 692 with the death of the rebel leader.[30]

The Saracen Wars of Justinian II, last Emperor of the Heraclian Dynasty, "reflected the general chaos of the age".[31] After a successful campaign he made a truce with the Arabs, agreeing on joint possession of Armenia, Iberia and Cyprus; however, by removing 12,000 Christian Mardaites from their native Lebanon, he removed a major obstacle for the Arabs in Syria, and in 692, after the disastrous Battle of Sebastopolis, the Muslims conquered all Armenia.[32] Deposed in 695, with Carthage lost in 698, Justinian returned to power from 705-711.[31] His second reign was marked by Arab victories in Asia Minor and civil unrest.[32] Reportedy, he ordered his guards to execute the only unit that had not deserted him after one battle, to prevent their desertion in the next.[31]

Arab sieges of Constantinople
“ All roads lead to Rome. ”

—Common Arab saying[33]
Main articles: Siege of Constantinople (674–678) and Siege of Constantinople (717–718)

In 674 the Umayyad Caliph Muawiyah I besieged Constantinople under Constantine IV. In this battle, the Umayyads were unable to breach the Theodosian Walls and blockaded the city along the River Bosporus. The approach of winter however forced the besiegers to withdraw to an island 80 miles (130 km) away.[34]

However, prior to the siege a Christian refugee from Syria named Kallinikos (Callinicus) of Heliopolis had recently invented for the Byzantine Empire a devastating new weapon that came to be known as "Greek fire".[35][34] In 677, the Byzantine navy used the weapon to decisively defeat the Umayyad navy in the Sea of Marmara, resulting in the lifting of the siege in 678. Among those killed in the siege was Eyup, the standard bearer of Muhammed and the last of his companions; to Muslims today, his tomb is considered one of the holiest sites in Istanbul.[34] The Byzantine victory halted the Umayyad expansion into Europe for almost thirty years.
The Theodosian Walls of Constantinople

The initial conflict came to a close during the reigns of the Byzantine Emperor Leo III the Isaurian and the Umayyad Caliph Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz, after the Second Arab siege of Constantinople in (717-718), where the Arab ground forces, led by Maslama,[34] were defeated by Constantinople's walls and the timely arrival of allied Bulgar forces even as the Umayyad naval fleet was defeated by Greek fire:

"Maslama had drawn up the Muslims in a line (I had never seen one longer) with the many squadrons. Leo, the autocrat of Rûm, sat on the tower of the gate of Constantinople with its towers. He drew up the foot soldiers in a long line between the wall and the sea opposite the Muslim shore. We showed arms in a thousand ships, light ships, big ships in which there were stores of Egyptian clothing, etc, and galleys with the fighting men… 'Umar and some of those from the ships were afraid to advance against the harbour mouth, fearing for their lives. When the Rum saw this, galleys and light ships came out of the harbour mouth against use and one of them went to the nearest Muslim ship, threw on it grapnels with chains and towed it with its crew into Constantinople. We lost heart."[36][34]

Later conflicts
Main articles: Byzantine–Arab Wars

[joe]

The Arab World (Arabic: al-ʻarabi) refers to Arabic-speaking countries stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Arabian Sea in the east, and from the Mediterranean Sea in the north to the Horn of Africa and the Indian Ocean in the southeast. It consists of 25 countries and territories with a combined population of 325 million people straddling two continents.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_World

[joe]

Arab States and territories



25 Arab countries and i need a microscope to see Israel. Where is it?

[joe]

Arab (which make up 25 Arab countries and territories), Israeli Conflict:

[zan]

TALISKER WROTE:
""""but some of us try to consider the situations that have lead these individuals to take such drastic decisions and actions. """

I would have responded at length but seeing that you posted the above nonsense I shall ignore you.

What exactly mate are the situations that have demanded these "individuals " commit cold blooded murder . Killing them selves and taking along with them innocent men women and children. Individuals you say ??
Are you mad , these are savages of the worst kind , only sick minds could possibly interpret these barbaric acts as anything other than the acts of savages .
As for the shades of gray that you see I suggest you examine your views , we are not talking about suicide killers targeting the enemy we are seeing these savages target their own people , open your eyes and see what in reality these barbarians are achieving. I detest each and every one of them and I can not comprehend how any one can possibly justify , and you do justify , such horrendous barbaric massacres.

LISTEN PEOPLE - THERE IS ONE VIEW, AND ONLY ONE VIEW, THAT IS CORRECT. WHOSE VIEW WOULD THAT BE? WELL, MILTIADES, OF COURSE.

Even attempts at civilised, gentle, logical, and rational discussion, such as I posted earlier, result in instant dismissal and abuse. Apparently I am a 'plonker' because I disagree with him! (I feel like I've finally 'made it' on CF now!).

Bloody hell Miltiades, you really are like a broken record with the same rants trotted out time after time. Clearly you are only interested in western domination and suppression of the 'poorer' parts of the world whether it is by military or other means. Stop and think for a minute! Most of this political, military, financial suppression is for the maintenance of Western-type societies (and essentially a tiny elite within this), and an essential part of this is control of land with access to vital resources (oil, gas, water, minerals, etc). In terms of total world population The West is a small fraction, and what right do we have to keep The Rest in poverty, sickness, oppression, and state of war? Sometimes desperate people fight back - hence the suicide bomber atrocities.

I've been incredibly fortunate - always had food on the table, good medical help, live in sanitary conditions - most of the world population don't have those vital 'basics'. I'm guessing that suits you fine if that means you maintain your current lifestyle, and explains your dismissive attitude of those who are oppressed, in particular by the US and Israel, and those who disagree with your attitude.

Who's the 'plonker' now?

Was Grivas a barbarian or a freedom fighter when he was killing British soldiers????? I suppose it changes as to what he is wearing on his head.....A Beret or a Pakol.