Right on, man, right on.

Especially liked the bit about people who have to relate everything back to themselves. In this vein, did you hear about the Muslim Council of Britian's decision not to attend the Auschwitz commemoration in Westminster because the event excluded 'ongoing genocide and human rights abuses around the world and in the occupied territories of Palestine'.

And the response of the Government was nice too: 'Home Office officials have told the council, which represents more than 350 Muslim organisations, that they are considering the request. But officials have no plans to broaden the remit of the occasion, because they fear it would infuriate the Jewish community.' So, MCB, your position is not wrong: it's right, but we're so afraid of the rabid, militant Jews that we have no choice but to limit the remembrance to the actual Holocaust itself. Shame, that.

To follow up on the previous comment, I have to say that my mind also boggles at how the sympathy everyone has for the suffering of the Jews in the Holocaust and their own memories of it can co-exist side by side with their aggressive expansion policy into Palestinian policy. Oh well.
Going back to Mary, Queen of Cheap Shots, though - Squandertwo has hit the nail right on the head. More than once. Impressive.
Northern Ireland is perhaps the least interesting country in the world if you follow the approach of the mass media. Everyone I know from there is either a member of the Orange Order or a foaming at the mouth Republican. It really is that simple when you demographic it.
And we all have to undergo a pledge of allegiance everyday at school, depending on which side we belong to. Its either - "I pledge allegiance to the chick on the banknotes" or "I pledge allegiance to the geezer wheezing in Italy".
And my dad used to beat us kids if we didn't say an offensive word at least once a day that was directly connected to the other side.
Oh I spent many a winter's evening being creative with my language. Mum and Dad often asked me and my sister to do it in front of their friends. They'd give us a potato as a reward.
Mary McAleese - go stick it up yer a** you ignorant witch.
Ignorance kills. Fight it at every turn.
Peace Out.

oops, I meant expansion into Palestinian territory not policy.
Smallville is so distracting.

It seems that you missed the irony in my comment. I do not believe there is any merit in the statements of either the MCB or the Government: I do not believe there can be any comparison or equivalence between the Holocaust (or any other act of genocide) and any act of the Israeli government. What is mind-boggling is that, so few years after the Holocaust, such comparisons are being made and, apparently, accepted. The Palestinian and Arab leadership have, since the formation of the State of Israel, pursued an avowed policy of the destruction of the Jewish state, and have been complicit in the worst acts of terrorism against innocent civilians that any state currently suffers. Yet it is Israel that is tarred with the Holocaust brush! I do not pretend that every action of the Israeli government is beyond reproach: no government never makes mistakes. But to equate those actions with the deliberate and systematic attempt to murder every member of a particular ethnic group is a despicable libel.

I didn't mean to tar the Israelis with the Holocaust brush - that would be sick - I meant that there seems to be a lack of perspective. On both sides.
Oh oh - now I'm turning into Mary McAleese.

Neil,

I think the point Stephen's trying to make is that the Israelis don't have an aggressive expansion policy into Palestinian territory. I don't think either side has a lack of perspective, either. Arafat wanted to destroy Israel and either drive out or kill every Jew in the Middle East; the Israelis want to defend themselves from that without resorting to genocide against the Palestinians. Both sides have showed, by and large, a great deal of perspective in their attempts to achieve those goals. The greatest lack of perspective lies with the Europeans and the international Left who refuse to acknowledge either side's true motives.

That's a pretty good summation, in my view. I would also add that, in the same way that a simplistic analysis of the situation in Northern Ireland ignores the views of the ordinary people, so any analysis of "Israel and the Palestinians", as the BBC labels it, tends to ignore the enormous diversity of political opinion in Israel, and also ignores the fact that few Palestinians have time for the terrorists either. But the Palestinian Authority so manages the perceptions of the news organisations (or in some cases, is identical with the news organisations: witness the AP and AFP correspondents on the PA payroll, or the AFP correspondent who ran for the presidency of the PA) that their views are never heard.

Nice one, Squander Two.

Although, I do wonder if statements coming from an official source such as those made don't add fuel to the paranoid fire that Protestants wouldn't "disappear" from Northern Ireland if there was ever a united Ireland, like they did from the Free State in the 1920s.

In a related vein, I attended my Grandfather's funeral last week in Stroke City and there were both Protestants and Catholics at it with neither saying a word about the other, and everyone speaking to everyone else. There was only one obvious "bigot" that I knew of, and even he had the decency to be civil to those from the other side of the aisle, and even have the odd laugh with them.

I only ever manage to get over every couple of years or so...Must go back soon. It was quite odd seeing the police driving normal police cars.

My sister was over a couple of years ago and thought the police Land Rovers were really scary. I had to explain to her that that was them with their new friendly approachable paint-jobs.

LOL!

It sure beats armoured personnel carriers, though, don't it? And they don't look that much different from some of those Land Rovers employed by the Sussex Police. It's a great, but ugly (butt ugly?) thing...