In all sincerity I don't believe anyone is making light of their situation. I do believe it is a matter of perspective. The haters are gonna hate and the lovers are gonna love. But the REALITY is that life is generally hard for most people. So saying that they have it tough when that is the norm doesn't really say much. Are they having trouble making ends meet? Me too, but it isn't because I'm a Beta Israeli living in the jewish state. They having trouble getting jobs? So are lots of my friends. The question is are they faring worse than is reasonable and my answer would be no. They are a group of people who came to israel with zero marketable skills for the new society into which they were placed and had to adapt almost instantly. Their children are faring better but are still lagging. The next generation will do better and will likely approach the Israeli norm. Does his suck? Sure it does. The problem is that this is more demonstrative of how far they've come than how much they are being held back. And yes, some Israelis are bigoted assholes, and some of these bigots have power. This is unfortunate but I feel confident that the proportion of those people are smaller in israel thn most places.

Anyway, I don't mean to be confrontational as I don't think you meant to be in the least. I just think that perspective is really the key here. I think we can look at the info and come to different conclusions but, in the end, the reality is closer to the positive narrative of success than the negative one.

Whoever heard of lead being dangerous? :)

Okay, here is what I dont get about the whole Weiner thing: why would a married adult--with a beautufil wife i might add-- feel the need to send lewd messages and essentially PG-13 (maybe R) rate pics to misc women? Seriously! I mean, he isn't getting laid, he is sucessful, he has connections and a reasonable amount of money I think. So what is the attraction? If he is bored why not take up a hobby that has a modicum of social acceptability? Or at least more acceptable than his choice. You know, things like model building, skiing, skeet shooting, poker, snorting cocaine, or even writing children's books. Take your pic, but just about anything would have been better than repeated sexual harassment (except maybe child molestation and murder).

I just do not get it... Seems like a twit to me.

I suppose i just can't wrap my mind around Weiner's actions.... Heh heh

Well, seeing as the Saudis like cutting things off, why limit him to chemical castration? OTOH, no doubt this loser has already bred, much to the loss of humanity, so we are probably too late to have any useful effect. Owell....

Lol! I definitely think it could be either. Quintessential Freudian slip.

BTW, anyone creeped out by this whole deranged rant? He is supposedly offended by this lewd airport design but keeps harping on penises, vaginas, and penises coming out of vaginas. Seems to me he likes talking bout this an awful lot.

"This is a vagina from which a penis comes out."

Hmmm, i think that either this dude is into some funky stuff or he has never seen a penis or a vagina. Or both. Or maybe he is self conscious about beng a hermaphrodite. Take your pick.

Gotta second Jim here. This wall would not exist if not for terrorism. Moreover, Coldplay, like so many others, fail to mention/notice the success of the wall in saving lives as wells the use of said walls around the world. In fact, there is a famous wall in northern Ireland, and the locals have protested the attempted removal of this wall. So why bemoan the barrier built by Israel? The mere fact that it has been singled out is itself an act of prejudice or ignorance, but the failure to realize that this wall has saved lives--Israeli and Palestinian--just makes the whole argument against the barrier suspect as best.

Chayma, I take issue with some of your list. Tony Judt claimed to be a disillusioned Zionist; so I think he'd be a might be example. I have a difficult time accepting Vanunu as a Zionist, Jew, or anything else. For that matter, anyone with Marxist convictions is not a Zionist, even if they say they are. Marxism is strongly anti-Nationalist. Consequently, any Marxist that claims to endorse Jewish nationalism and Marxism is a liar, confused, or rather hypocritical (note there is a difference between Marxism and many other streams of socialism).

My point here is that if you want to put together a list of disillusioned Zionists, I think that it is disingenuous to include people who are Zionists in only the most tenuous sense, or simple not at all. This is why I find myself questioning people like Tony Judt for instance, although he has always insisted he was sincere. Still, saying that you were sincere costs nothing and proves nothing. Hence the problem with these lists.

Chayma, I think that you're missing a few key points. First of all, it is quite possible for a major new source in a democratic/open press society to have an agenda against said society. News organizations here in the USA often have an agenda and it often is critical of the US unless there is a public outcry for national support, in which case the press has recently taken an unquestioning position of support for government policy. The reality is that neither extreme is what a free press is supposed to offer.

Second, this article that you are pointing to is NOT a first person citation. In other words, this is one source citing another source that was supposedly at this conference. That is bad research and bad journalism. Either they should have attended this conference themselves, and apparently they did not, or they should corroborate with multiple sources, and apparently they did not. So this is simple one news source reprinting information from another news source.

This brings me to my third point.... If you haven't properly corroborated your sources and you do something like the article in haaratez, then you put yourself at the mercy of the quality, or lack thereof, or the original writers. If they did their job then great. But since this article writer was obviously too lazy to do his job correctly why assume that the original writer I'd any better? And if the original is flawed, then the entire foundation of the article is built on a cloud. BTW, my wife was a television news producer for years and finally left the field for these very reasons.

None of what I've said even touches on translation, context, etc. All of these things, taken into account, make the interpretation that you are putting forward very difficult to accept. Even if one believes the things you are imparting to his words, you also have to believe that an accomplished statesmen such as him would be dumb enough to say something like that. Frankly, isn't it much more plausible that he meant something closer to what other folks here are proposing?

I'll leave you with one last point. My wife is always quick to make a point whenever she and I discuss the news. What she says is that editing can make anyone say almost anything. Keep this in mind. Not only is this article that you're citing not a reprint of the entire press conference, in is highly edited.... And translated to boot. If there is an agenda here, and there is always an agenda, then this information will be presented in a certain way.

Aha, but soon the Arabs will have a new conspiracy theory:

Toddlers of Zion: The Next Generation

Yup, don't give'em any sh*t or they'll give you a diaper full!

Boy, I could really roll with this..... but seriously, I hate conspiracy theories. Ugh!