nowt like liking war. well done! added points for cliched smugness.

get

Say that to their faces – not from behind a computer.

I will when I encounter them at the airport

Mark Dalt you truly are a…..

Poor old Iran! Such a nice pleasant bunch they are.

@reginalds tower, and what have they done to you or this country. Try and look at both sides of the argument good man and dont swallow everything the western media tells ye.

So glad budget cuts are on the way to snobs.

I think the reason why people raise Iran’s record is because it is in stark contrast to Israel’s. The latter is an expansionist state which has invaded and bombed its neighbours.

@Petr – you conveniently omit the fact that they have also been bombed and invaded. The Israeli government record in dealing with the Palestinians is far from good I admit. The problem is the Palestinians are leaderless and have been exploited by their Arab neighbours and Israel since 1948. There is a solution there with two states, if both sides would be realistic, and deal with the problems as they are now. It was so nearly achieved by the Oslo accords.

Apart from Yom Kippur, every war was started by Israel.

Petr- You fail to take into account the history of the Jewish people, and as Israel is a Jewish state, it adopts its foreign policy based on lessons learned in the past.

I think you would struggle to find a more hated race of people on this planet. The Jewish people know more painfully than any other race, what the result is if you just let things happen. This is why in a lot of their military operations, they work off the basis of a preemptive strike. Israel cannot afford to be hit first and survive when you consider the amount of enemies they have surrounding their nation.

Have you ever been there? If you took the conflict out of the picture, they live in a quite an amazing society. I don’t blame them for wanting to defend it so aggressively…especially if you consider their most likely adversary is the regions most powerful military force.

I’ve said it before, it is a naive person who would try sum up the situation in Israel and Middle East in a small comment box on a news site. It would take many years of study to come to an educated conclusion on the matter.

Iran isn’t a sponsor of international terrorism. It just sponsors a war against Israel. I don’t agree with the Muslim views but Iran is defending themselves against Israel, and war starting, nuclear armed, western backed country that is expanding onto territory that isn’t there’s. If Canada start expanding into US soil and they had the nukes and power, what would you do?

Israel was not created in order to disappear – Israel will endure and flourish. It is the child of hope and the home of the brave. It can neither be broken by adversity nor demoralized by success. It carries the shield of democracy and it honors the sword of freedom.
-John F. Kennedy

“The Jews point with pride to the fact that over 500,000 Arabs, in the 12 years between 1932-1944, came into Palestine to take advantage of living conditions existing in no other Arab state…” – Robert F. Kennedy

“If a Jewish state is formed it will be the only remaining stabilizing factor in the near and far East.” – Robert F. Kennedy

Petr – 1948 Arab failed invasion – Arab League told Palestinians to leave as they intended to annihilate the Jews.

@Mrknow no matter how you want to put it Iran is a sponsor of terrorism.

Indeed King O…sad individuals…

Incorrect. The IAWM opposes US intervention in Syria and opposed it in Libya.

Yes Petr the organisation IAWM might oppose US intervention in Syria and Libya. But get real here, a lot of their members are “professional” protesters who love to complain about anything that doesn’t live up to their largely socialist agenda….anything anti-israel…anti-US….anti-globalisation….anti-NWO…anti-capitalist….anti-government….and uncle occupy dame street.

So I can guarantee you that some of their members would have taken part in the outrage of the US and NATO not putting boots on the ground in Libya and they are appalled that nothing has been done in Syria. Yeah it would be massively hypocritical for someone who is a member of IAWN to demanded action in Syria but hey…that is the nature of the beast.

That is one big chip on your should you have about Dublin and its people…but I agree with the sentiment behind your comment.

So let’s say tomorrow the war ended(unlikely I know) the yanks go home and don’t have to use Shannon anymore. Would you be disappointed? And play the ball not the man.

So you can justify waiving our neutrality for a few dollars in your back pocket? Pathetic.

Kevin, what’s pathetic is thinking that closing Shannon will be anything other than a tiny minuscule inconvenience to the American military. Oh and what would you do, check every single flight passing through our airspace?

@Kevin – Leave it out. The chap is entitled to his opinion. We don’t have true neutrality in Ireland since our country can’t defend its neutrality. If anyone attacked us we would rely on NATO/UK to defend our nation. That isn’t what neutrality is.

Stephen is right, the flights into Shannon and through Irish airspace, keep the place in business. The soldier on the flights are not allowed carry weapons. There is no breach of regulations, so there is no harm in it.

No no, just lefties!

The right-wing nuts are always afraid to say those insults to their faces. Always keyboard warriors.

Really? That’s quite funny considering I’m using my real account and not a made up one unlike yourself.

William — You are a moral disgrace.

Petr, Why? Would you have left the Nazis in control of Europe? Accepted the elimination of Jews, Gypsies, Gays etc. Maybe your attitude to the Communist invasion of South Korean was sod them? Would that have been moral? Do you support Totalitarianism? What’s your solution to the Iranian problem? Let them have nuclear weapons? Easy to say, you probably don’t live in Tel Aviv.

When is the last time Iran has ever invaded a country? I know Iranian government are gowls but can you tell me?

I hope you were being sarcastic in your post, because if not you are delusional thinking this is a good vs evil thing.

Erfantastico, that point is irrelevant. They’ve only had a Fascist government for a few decades. After they or one of the terrorist groups they back, nuke Israel that will be once. Once too many. That reminds me of the judge that gave a suspended sentence recently to a paedophile because he hadn’t a record – he had he had raped two young girls.

@Erfantastico – Iran invaded southern Kurdistan in 1946. The Iranian government has also been involved in several proxy conflicts, such as supporting Hamas in Lebanon. Also getting involved in a few skirmishes with the Taliban. Operation Praying Manits in 1988…during the Iran-Iraq war, Iranian naval vessels started laying mines outside of their waters in the Persian Gulf in order to stop Iraq exporting oil. This resulted in the damage of a US naval vessel and was perceived as an act of aggression and resulted in a small battle between the US and Iranian navy.

nobody in this lobby supports terrorist or organisations that do, but William it works both ways. You talk about all this killings that take place in the middleeast and by terrorist. What about the killing nato do? ask Pakistan how many families are wiped out each day by drone strikes! ask north Korea why they have to route all the money into military defence because the US arm there foe with advanced weapons, ask Iraq why there country was tore up by war because they were threat to the dollar because there leader refused to deal in dollars when in came to oil! did you every study the ‘petrodollar’ William? Google and take a read, it will open your eyes. And you also left out the part, 9/11 was funded by a Saudi with connections to Pakistan, the only reason afgan was invaded because unlike Saudi Arabia, America didn’t control the oil and what currency it was traded in coming from country. You should look at the facts before you cast your ideals on Iran, unless your a zoinist, Iran has every right to defend itself! America is killing its currency for one reason, so the dollar will be the sole currency in which black gold is dealt in, keeping it the world currency for the next 50 years.

@MrKnow – I don’t think I have seen any evidence that drones are killing entire families every day in Pakistan. Sure, I acknowledge that there has been collateral damage due to the drones but the Pakistani insurgent militia is a responsible for far more civilian deaths and what is worse is that they actually intend to kill these unarmed people.

You have lost your argument the moment you try justify the North Korean regime and its nuclear policy. North Korea like any communist state, is putting most of its resources into protection of the state over the welfare of the people. Don’t kid yourself in trying to justify there reasoning for spending on weaponry rather than narrowly avoiding famine each year.

The Iraq war was a mistake. I can agree with you on that. One of the most progressive(and thats not saying a lot) Middle Eastern states is now fast turning into a religious quagmire, with various factions engage in a power struggle to be top dog. The reasons why the war happened cannot be legitimately decided upon. We all know the various conspiracy theories.

Regarding the invasion of Afghanistan…it was invaded because it was/is the main base of operations of al -Qaeda. It is where they trained, it is where the made gained most of there money through the opium trade, and it is where Bin Laden retreated into hiding. Yes, Saudi Arabian money had a part to play in it…but the point is the Saudi government didn’t know anything about it.

I am not a zionist, I am a rationalist. Anything that is a threat to further destabilise the current state of affairs should be dealt with swiftly. If Iran obtains a nuclear weapon, it literally is just a ticking time bomb until the wrong person gets into power and uses it.

http://markhumphrys.com/pakistan.html

He never said wipe Israel off the map he said wipe Zionism off the map there is a vast difference . The people who supposedly committed the ny attacks were Saudis .

John, On 26 October 2005, IRIB News, an English-language subsidiary of the state-controlled Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), filed a story on Ahmadinejad’s speech to the “World Without Zionism” conference in Tehran, entitled: Ahmadinejad: ****Israel must be wiped off the map.**** “Our dear Imam (referring to Ayatollah Khomeini) said that the occupying regime must be wiped off the map and this was a very wise statement. …… will eliminate this disgraceful stain from the Islamic world. Ahmadinejad has also questioned the existence of the Holocaust.

Wikipedia has a whole page devoted to the translation but whatever way you look at it, Iran is determined to remove the existance of Israel from the middle east. He obviously didn’t mean dig out the moutains and remove all the soil. He was clearly referring to the state of Israel.

He now wants nuclear weapons. What for except to carry out his treat? Once they have them it would be next to impossible to take tham back. Much better a quick conventional war ro nutraise this threat than face a very uncertain future for decades while we wait for a nuclear bomb to go off in Israel or some other city in the world.

Do you doubt for one second that those luatics would have any moral problem with destroying an American or European city, maybe the next time someone publishes a cartoon of their holy prophet?

*neutralise*

:( *lunatics”

..too early

Keep drinking your kool-aid and delude yourself into thinking there is a false economy to be gained from breaking the Irish constitution.

Mark, the Irish constitution isn’t worth the paper its printed on. So much has changed in Irish society and there are a lot of citizens in our county not being treat properly.

They need to do a complete overhaul of the thing. It is stretched to allow equal rights for all…not allowing for marriage equality for all Irish citizens….forcing Irish women to make a trip abroad and be vilified by some at home in order to secure an abortion…. The Irish constitution in its truest sense should not allow for us to be in a union with Europe because it was drafted at a time where we wanted our own full sovereign control….now with Europe calling the shots here it has to be against the constitution….

@Mark pull out the Irish Constitution and show me the section that deals with neutrality. You won’t find it because it is not in the Constitution. Inform yourself properly before making smug childish comments on the forum.

Not as strange as the people that ridicule them for standing up for their views.

Is it better for them to lie low, take their beating and being pi55ed upon like the rest of the Irish than actually standing up for themselves or what they believe to be right.

Cause that approach has worked out so well for the country over the last 70 years.

I know that there isn’t any backbone in the Irish anymore but knocking people for being pacifists just seems too much of a joke.

People like Belly Up, Ruairi O’Mahoney and Mick Daly rely on their smugness to mask the fact that they haven’t got the resolve to stand up for their beliefs.

No I’m quite happy with my lot and just get on with things. I’m actually doing things with my life so I don’t have time for this nonsense. Even if I did have time I’d realise it was futile and I’d focus my efforts on something more productive.

Yeah all those jobs going right.

Come out and say that to their faces. You are very silent…

Most anti war protestors I know do have jobs In fact many are academics who have seen the effect of the military industrial complex through out the world. Ireland is meant to be a neutral country not a US Airbase. If our navy can search ships entering Irish waters why can the guards not search US war planes for weapons and people who have been kidnapped?

@Niall and what would that achieve?

How are they costing the taxpayers money? How do you know they are unemployed? Do you support the wars?

“get a job and contribute to the real problems” hahaha

Tosser of a statement man…get real

read your own statement and post something useful if you are able to .
someone who is incapable of making an intelligent argument and so resorts to abuse telling folk to ” get real ” while hiding behing a coat of arms relating to the surname of another family is more likely in my opinion to be a tosser.
# superiority complex

Neutral country on paper but not really in practice. For a start we produce the Intel chips that are used in many NATO missiles. So by that alone, we have a part to play in enabling the ability to go to war.

I don’t support sanctions on Iran because I feel it only impacts on the common man and woman in the country. I do however dislike and fear any overtly religious government. Any country which uses a an ancient, outdated text to determine the actions a nation should take, should be feared if they are trying to obtain nuclear power / weapons. So something needs to be done…but punishing its citizens is not the route to take. It only forms an us and them attitude.

The countries that have access to nuclear weapons are largely secular, and as a result of this, should an incident arise it would be possible to negotiate and reason with. However if the wrong person is in charge in theocracy, well then God is the one who decides what happens, and negotiation will be much more difficult. Imagine if a suicide bomber was given access to a nuke they could easily carry…who can’t reason with someone who wants to die because a book tells them its the right thing to do.

Pakistan is a very worrying situation and I wish they did not have access to nuclear weapons. It is a situation that will have to be dealt with soon, as the Islamic militants are taking ground and actually beating back government troops.

You have to realise that there is a pecking order in this world. Even though the US is a relatively young country, it has achieved a lot of good things and done some bad things in its short history. The US and Japan are the only countries to truly understand the results of a nuclear attack. I don’t think any country which is strongly religious should be allowed access to weapons of mass destruction. The US preventing them gaining access is similar to an adult stopping a child running with scissors.

@King Olaf well said. These protesters would be better served protesting against the atrocities in Syria where a vicious civil war is in progress. That said,though we profess neutrality we are not viewed externally as a true neutral country. Our neutrality is a hangover from WW2 and in 1949 the government made tentative enquiries about joining the new european defence alliance NATO hoping that this would allow the country access to some of the Marshall Plan funding for the reconstruction of Europe. The US and UK nipped this idea in the bud on the grounds that we had not been a belligerent in the conflict. The government has kept the policy of neutrality ever since and it is only a policy, we do not have military capacity to defend our neutrality. We have relied on the NATO umbrella for our defence since the 1950s and we are therefore pro NATO, that is why NATO/US military flights can use the Irish facilities in Shannon and overfly the country. In foreign affairs the policy of neutrality has been a positive thing for the country, and has allowed our small country to be viewes as an honest broker on matters of foreign policy.

Agreed 100%.

Fine Gael is gone at the next election.

You couldn’t be more wrong Mark.
And btw, the irony and hypocrisy in your posts in this topic amaze me. How can you not see it?

ManOnTheStreet: another anonymouse!

@Petr
I won’t use my real name on the Internet. Petty name calling by you won’t change my mind.
I see no reason to reveal my name or that of my family to random strangers.
Nothing I said was wrong.i didn’t give my thoughts in the actual story.

Jill if Ireland is “neutral” then it should not go out of its way to send condolences to the German people over Hitler’s death. Letting the American military refuel in Shannon is neutral; the Irish military participating in the wars is not neutral. If John F. Kennedy was president today the far-leftists/Sinn Fein would be very anti-JFK by today’s standards. The irony however is that they worship JFK and treat him as if he is one of them; when he is nothing like them.

@Kevin “Ireland is “neutral” then it should not go out of its way to send condolences to the German people over Hitler’s death ” I am very suprised at you that has been debunked as an unsupported myth. DeValera never signed a book of condolence or signed any letter. He did call on the German representative Herr Hempel who was a personal friend and refused to speak on the matter. The press in the UK and the Anti FF press here decided to put their own slant on the story. Thus a personal call on a friend at his home not the embassy at a time of uncertainty was transformed into one of the modern myths of our time.

Thumbs down for busting a myth LOL.

@Kevin No it is not neutral to allow the planes to land there. especially since some planes landing contain prisoners who were flown out of the us to other countries where they could be torchered. I have a family member who just did a masters on the topic. I HIGHLY doubt you’ve done as much reshearch as her.

@MrKnow Al quieda did not exist in the 80s-the USA supplied advice and weapons to mujahadeen fighters and walked away . Iran funded Hizbollah with the aid of Syria in Lebanon to create a terrorist state within a sovreign Arab state a cynical method of control. Why does Iran want to attack Israel? They do not share a border? Have a look at the site suggested by Kevin http://markhumphrys.com/islamic.states.html Or do you prefer not to know.

MrKnow, that’s nonsnse. Saudi Arabia doesn’t “chop your head off for being any other religion, especially Jewish”. Nor do they “stone to death woman with views”. Are you drunk?

@MrKnow – I agree with you, and will go further to say that any non-combatant death is terrible and something that should never happen. However, it is a cruel fact of any war or conflict that the innocent will die, either directly or indirectly. Sure even on our own island more innocent civilians died than either of the belligerents “soldiers” I can also agree that any of the civilian deaths at fault of the US or NATO forces, does push many people who sit on the fence to join the insurgent militia. Pakistan is a failed state, as Kevin Niazi points out in the link above. Pakistan would have been far better off had it remained part of India.

My apologies for assuming you were talking about North Korea’s nuclear program. It is just what most people generally go on about. I don’t worry so much about NK doing anything stupid with it nuclear weapons….firstly they have no real way of delivering them and secondly China has NK on a very tight leash. I don’t think NK would be attacked if it didn’t have a nuclear weapon…the whole Korea conflict is mainly a result of proxy war between the US and Soviet Union. North Korea does threaten the South Korean state, and since it is a powerful US ally in the region, I can see why the US supports the sanctions against them.

Some Muslims are nuts…so are some Christians and significant numbers of plenty of other religions. Islam is just flavour of the month at the minute….the Qur’an is a very complicated book and its teaching can be interpreted in any number of ways. Because the religion has very little internal regulation, pretty much so anyone can say “this passage, says we must slaughter the jews and non believers”….where another person may interpret it to mean, ” we should show compassion and pray for the souls of the jews and non believers”

Iran is would be an alright place to live if it wasn’t ruled by such a religious government. Iranians themselves are fantastic people, any that I have met take religion with a pinch of salt and are fairly progressive in their way of thinking. Regarding Irans pursuit of nuclear power…it doesn’t need it. It really doesn’t. Even forgetting about the massive reserves of oil it has, Iran has the potential to be the worlds largest producer of solar energy. Besides there is actual evidence that the Iranian government has been trying to procure the equipment required to produce weapons grade material.

I know you were calling me a zionist, just generally anybody who doesn’t condemn Israel straight away is branded as one. I don’t think anyone really wants a war with Iran at the end of the day…most people even your average Israeli would rather see this situation resolved in a peaceful manner.

Sorry at the end there I meant I know you weren’t calling me a Zionist.