香港獨立媒體 - Comments for "停止濫殺，反對戰爭！stop the war machine！（不斷更新）"

本周評論：為何教會不譴責以色列暴力濫殺 ?

2006/8/4

胡志偉牧師

　　近期，以色列與黎巴嫩真主黨之間的軍事衝突不斷升級，以色列強硬的「以牙還牙」手段，不理會各國勸諭繼續轟炸，其中誤炸，造成不少平民傷亡，包括中國派往聯合國執行任務的杜照宇，也不幸遇難。

　　倘若我們肯定「全球倫理價值」，其中人的生存權為首要，我們就要堅決地反對任何暴力對人的生命踐踏與殺戮。聯合國安理會基於美國偏幫以色列，拒絕向以色列作出譴責，已使聯合國維持全球和平的使命蕩然無存，而美國本身的偽善與不義更赤裸裸地向全世界暴露。所謂高舉「人權與民主」的美國，很多時只把「人權」、「民主」、「宗教自由」作為外交政治手段；基督徒或教會若不認清真相，照搬北美福音派的政治立場，只會使我們的信仰抬不起頭，把「信仰效忠」淪為「效忠美國」，這是筆者不認同的。

　　黎巴嫩真主黨的行為，偷襲別人，又擄走以色列士兵，不值得同情；然而以色列屠殺無辜平民的野蠻行徑，也同樣不能得著肯定。無論以色列與黎巴嫩真主黨誰是誰非，任何殘害生命的暴力行為，均需受到全球有良知人士的嚴正譴責。

　　自美國在全球推行反恐戰爭，以愛國主義情緒掩蓋理性思考，主張以暴易暴。美國向伊拉克動武，正是典型「不義之戰」；所謂「先發制人式」的反恐戰爭，正是現今以色列師承美國霸權主義，只要猜疑對方有所威脅，就要先下手為強，誓要把對方消滅，結果是更多的暴力濫殺。

　　以色列在黎巴嫩南部迦拿的空襲，造成28人死亡，當中有16名兒童。按照基督教信仰傳統，迦拿是耶穌公開施行神蹟的首個場所，耶穌把水變為酒，使當地婚宴主家倍增歡樂。世事無常，諷刺的是今天的迦拿成為悲哀與怨恨的戰場 !

　　華人教會，深受時代論終末論影響，信仰與政治皆認同以色列人，更有部分認為以色列人是上帝的選民，而以色列的命定是與普世教會復興息息相關的；因此教會只能為以色列求平安，凡以色列作的，皆要支持，不能反對。在此偏差的神學前設下，所有以色列的軍事行動美化為「自衛式」，是為勢所逼的；打擊敵人是不能手軟的，一切事件發生皆朝向聖經對終末的預言。

　　筆者不能認同此種論述，上帝從不偏待任何族裔，所有人皆要為其所行的不義，面對終極的審判。列國面對審判，也是基於公義的原則；當任何國家公然違反人權，不肯透過談判協商，堅決要用武力解決問題，造成平民傷亡，這種違反國際道義的惡行，該受全球各國人士的譴責，而教會更要本著真理予以譴責。假若我們對此等暴行沉默不語，只會助長暴力發展，看誰的武力強，誰就可以出手打人，即或打錯別人，要怪責的不是打人者，反是受其連累的第三者。為何你不是生下來就是美國人或以色列人，倒是黎巴嫩人、伊拉克人或阿富汗人 ? 因此，你命定活該如此，某些教會領袖豈不是說 :「凡以色列的對頭人，不也是沒有好的結果 ? 」聖經沒有偏幫猶太人，乃是美國教會偏袒以色列，傾斜的外交造成今天的以色列；耶穌向動武者說：「收刀入鞘吧！凡動刀的，必死於刀下。」（太廿六52）任何暴力濫殺，否定生命，普世教會皆要發出譴責 !

Sample letter from Amnesty International to Lebanese Prime Minis

Urge Lebanese Prime Minister, Fouad Siniora to take measures to ensure that Hizbullah immediately ends its targeting of Israeli civilians, notably its firing of Katyusha rockets and other projectiles into Israeli towns and villages, and that Hizbullah fighters do not initiate armed attacks from residential civilian areas and avoid locating military objectives within civilian areas. Call on him to ensure that Hizbullah treats the two captured Israeli soldiers humanely and allows them immediate access to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

Please send appeals to:

Fouad Siniora
Prime Minister Office of the Prime Minister
Grand Sérail
Rue des Arts et Métiersil
Sanayeh, Beirut
Lebanon

Fax: +961 1 785 014 +961 1 869 630 +961 1 746 085

E-mail: rhoffice@cyberia.net.lb

Dear Prime Minister,
I am writing to express my concern about the killing of civilians both in Lebanon and Israel. Since 12 July, some 300 Lebanese civilians, including dozens of children have been killed by Israeli air strikes against Lebanon and hundreds more have been injured. Amnesty International condemns unreservedly the massive attacks carried out by the Israeli army against civilians and civilian infrastructure throughout Lebanon, and is calling on Israel to immediately cease such attacks and to respect international humanitarian law.
We are also concerned about Hizbullah attacks against Israeli civilians, some 15 of whom have been killed by rocket launched by Hizbullah. Such attacks have also caused substantial damage to homes and other civilian properties.
I urge you to take measures to ensure that Hizbullah immediately ends its targeting of Israeli civilians, notably its firing of Katyusha rockets and other projectiles into Israeli towns and villages, and that Hizbullah fighters do not initiate armed attacks from residential civilian areas and avoid locating military objectives within civilian areas. I also call on you to ensure that Hizbullah treats the two captured Israeli soldiers humanely and allow them immediate access to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

Sincerely,

Sample letter from Amnesty International to Secretary General of

Urge The Secretary General of Hizbullah, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah to ensure that Hizbullah’s armed wing put an immediate end to the targeting of Israeli civilians, notably the launch of rockets into Israeli towns and villages and that Hizbullah fighters do not initiate armed attacks from residential civilian areas and avoid locating military objectives within civilian areas.

Please send appeals to:

Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah
Secretary General Hizbullah
POB 13585, Beirut
Lebanon
+961 1 270 819
hizbollah@hizbollah.org

E-mail: info@moqawama.net

Dear Sir,

I am writing to express my concern about the killing of civilians in both Lebanon and Israel. In the week since 12 July, more than 300 Lebanese civilians, including dozens of children have been killed by the Israeli air strikes against Lebanon and hundreds more have been injured. Amnesty International condemns unreservedly the massive attacks carried out by the Israeli military against civilians and civilian infrastructure throughout Lebanon, and is calling on Israel to immediately cease such attacks and to respect international humanitarian law.

We are also concerned about Hizbullah attacks against Israeli civilians, some 15 of whom have been killed by rockets launched by Hizbullah. Such attacks have also caused substantial damage to homes and other civilian property.

I urge you to ensure that Hizbullah’s armed wing put an immediate end to the targeting of Israeli civilians, notably the launch of rockets into Israeli towns and villages and that Hizbullah fighters do not initiate armed attacks from residential civilian areas and avoid locating military objectives within civilian areas. I also call on you not to harm the two Israeli soldiers whom Hizbullah captured and to grant them access to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

Sincerely,

Sample letters from Amnesty International to Israeli Prime Minis

Urge Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert to take urgent steps to put an immediate end to deliberate attacks by Israeli forces against civilian and civilian property and infrastructure in Lebanon

Please send appeals to:

Ehud Olmert
Prime Minister and Minister for Social Welfare and Science and Technology Office of the Prime Minister
3 Kaplan Street
P O Box 187
Kiryat Ben-Gurion
Jerusalem 91919
Israel

Fax: +972 2 566 4838 +972 2 670 5475

E-mail: rohm@pmo.gov.il
pm_eng@pmo.gov.il
eulmert@knesset.gov.il

Dear Prime Minister,

I am writing to express my deepest concern about the killing of more than 300 civilian Lebanese, including dozens of children, by Israeli air strikes in Lebanon in the week since 12 July. Hundreds of other civilians have been injured during those attacks as well.

During their air strikes, the Israeli forces have also damaged civilian infrastructure throughout Lebanon. They have deliberately targeted and destroyed dozens of bridges, roads, powers stations, the international airport and ports, grain silos and other facilities. Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been forced to flee their homes, notably in South Lebanon and in the suburbs of the capital, Beirut. Such attacks are a blatant breach of international humanitarian law and some amount to war crimes.

Amnesty International condemns unreservedly attacks by Hizbullah against Israeli civilians and continues to campaign against such attacks, including the launching of “katyusha” rockets into Israel. The organization is campaigning to put pressure on Hizbullah to immediately end such attacks, which have killed 15 Israeli civilians since 12 Julyl. Since the capture by Hizbullah of two Israeli soldiers, on 12 July, Amnesty International has been calling for them not to be harmed and to be allowed immediate access to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

I urge you to take urgent steps to put an immediate end to deliberate attacks by Israeli forces against civilian and civilian property and infrastructure in Lebanon. These attacks constitute collective punishment. I call on you to end the use of excessive and disproportionate force, and to ensure that Israeli forces respect the principle of proportionality when targeting any military objective or civilian objective that may be used for military purposes.

Yours sincerely,

:P

if there's a test to justify beauty/ugly. So it will be the same for taste :)

??

so how abt 榴槤?

does it taste good?

to: Frostig, Re: cute

If everyone has his own definition of pretty, ugly and cute, then those words are meaningless. When we say someone is pretty, ugly or cute, is the same as we say someone is *(&@, &^@_ or &^!(.

to: Cliff, Re: religious extremism

Hey, I don't know you are living in Toronto. My parents lives in Toronto too. Next time when I go home, how about come out for a drink?

Now, back to the topic. I think your solution is not very feasible. Yes, if the terrorist is within the country, we can let the police deal with them. However, in the case of Israel vs Hezbollah. There is no world police. We all know UN is toothless. The Lebanon police is unless and unwilling to help Isreal, to some extent they even colude with the Hezbollah. Can Isreal dial 911 and let an non-exist police to solve the problem? Maybe my solution putting all the land in Lebanon and Palenstian under Isreal control fits your vision. If Isreal rules the whole area, they can deal with the terrorists using police instead of army.

I know a few Muslim friends at work and in school, and I even lived with one for 4 months. Those Muslim we know are hardly any extremists. They are just normal people like you and me, happen to believe a different religion. However, the extermists don't seem to care living a normal life, instead they are more interesting in carry out whatever Jihad their Allah gave them.

I don't think love alone will solve the problem. If it works, God should be able to make Satan become a saint just by loving him. Mind you that no one has the right to ask others to sacrifice for whatever reason. He can choose to sacrifice himself if he doesn't value his life. Loving them would not get rid all of them, but it would make those on edge feel less anger and dry up sources of the extermists. However for the dedicated few, violence (whether police or army, they all involve the use of violence) is the only solution. There is a very good Catholic teaching. We loves sinners, but we cannot tolerate the act of sin. We can love extermist as a person, but we cannot tolerate their exterme religous thoughts. Love and violence, are just means to archive the end, elimination of extermists. That sounds paradox, but it's true. We love them because we want to change them, which is also a form of elimination of extremist in some sense. BTW, violence sometimes works, just look at the Native Americans. Or a better example, 康熙 literally wiped out 葛爾丹蒙古部落 who oppose him after all methods of 招降 fails.

I really admire your unrealistic ideal. I already passed the age that still believes in idealistic dreams. Wake up and face the brutal fact is not an pleasent experience. Living in reality is less happy than living in dream. Sometimes, I wish I could be a happy dreamer. The question is do we really need to wake up afterall?

Interesting talks about war when you drag religion into it

The thing is, Hevangel, like many church-going Bush supporting warmongers in the US are siding with Israel too.

Why? There may be a lot of reasons. But the most obvious one is that the Conservative-Christian-Churches have been teaching their members to be religious fanatics and bigots who would blindly support Israel based on their "religious-brain-washing" programs recieved from these hatred-filled-churches.

And please do not use the church-going-warmongers-bible to debate this, as I wouldn't really careless how you interpreted this old book. Many people have used this old book to support their hatred against women, Blacks, Muslims, gays and I really don't really care anymore.

The bottom line. These conservative Christians Church-goers have already have extreme prejudice against the Muslims. It is hard for them to feel any sympathy or empathy for people who are being killed everyday by the action of the Israel government.

Nations of the world should react against the action (bombing of Lebanon) of Israel. They killing should stop now.

And when you talked about war, this is obviously NOT a war between two nations. As Israel bombing of Lebanon is a military action by the Israel government, but the terrorists action were not direct action from the government.

to : hevangel on religious extremism

HA ha ! hevangel, you must have thought you got the perfect counter-punch on asking me how i'd live, or co-exist, with religious extremism ...

good point and good try ... i don't want to just brush this aside but there is no easy answer to this situation ...

in a sense, i am already living with some sort of exremism here in toronto ... don't you know that toronto busted a terrorist cell not long ago ?!

talk is cheap so instead of theorizing everything and, like you said, "reasoning" myself to co-exist with religious extremism, we should walk the talk ...

here is what i'd do :

1. if they break the law, call the police ... if they fire rockets on you, call the police ... if they kidnap your loved ones, call the police ... i just used 'call the police', instead of 'call the army', 3 times for the following reasons :

a. there are already laws out there to prosecute these criminal acts ...

b. calling the police reduces the chance of the use of disproportionate force, hence protecting innocent by-standers ...

c. calling the police means the case will be tried in court and the trial, in most advanced countries, will be an open process subject to public scrutiny ...

2. when no foul act is commited, be open, talk to them, understand them, ensure a 2-way communication, help them ... hopefully, this will help nip religious extremism in the bud ...

a. i did talk to a palestinian before and now i understand how tough it is to have a living even in their own homeland ...

b. i also did talk to a muslin before and questioned him why one would want to carry out a suicide bombing mission ...

the lesson i learnt from talking to these people is that at the end of the day, when their survival is not threatened, they are just normal people, like you and me, who want to have a living, a family, seeing their kids grow up, go to school, seeing themselves grow old ...

3. when nothing works out, shower forgiveness and be ok to sacrifice ... haha, this is the toughest part for you to swallow, right ??? ... but :

a. this is the spirit of Rabin's words that i quoted in my previous post ...

b. this is also expressed succinctly in 馬太福音 18:21 - 22 :

18:21 [hb5] 那時彼得進前來、對耶穌說、主阿、我弟兄得罪我、我當饒恕他幾次呢。到七次可以麼。

18:22 [hb5] 耶穌說、我對你說、不是到七次、乃是到七十個七次。

lastly, let me tell you a story ...

a neo-nazi asked a guy how can he get rid of all the jews, killing them all ??? ... the response :

no way, can't do it ... see what the jews or the romans did to an enlightened jew, jesus ... christianity flourishes ... see what hitler did in the concentration camp ... we now have israel, a country ...

killing won't work; instead, we should love them, yes, love them ALL !!!

see the paradox but the wisdom in this story ...

and this applies to the other side of the world too ... want to get rid of all the arabians ??? ... love them, love them ALL !!!

at the end of the day, we are just the same people co-habiting (or co-existing) on this planet earth so it won't be that hard to love your fellow neighbours ...

is this just an unrealistic ideal ??? ... am i a dreamer ???

maybe ... hmm, am listening to john lennon's song imagine :) ...

Differences

Different people have different interpretation on Bible and different understandings, I have no doubt.

Different people have different tastes and different judgments on what is 'pretty, ugly or cute'.

to: Cliff, re: violence

In the case of when 2 people fight, who is the more courageous one, the one who keeps fighting till both are badly hurt or even dead, or the one who first puts down his weapon and seeks a resolution or reconciliation. Don't know. All I know is the first one to put down this weapon is very likely to be killed if his opponent doesn't think like him. In fact, Israel had put down the weapon many times, but each time the terrorist keep fighting. What else can Israel do other than fight back?

Have you able to reason yourself to co-exist with extermist muslim yet? I am really interested to see the solution if there is one. I don't think there is a solution other than violence in this case, but I am happy to accept one if there is real alternative, not just empty talks.

To: frostig, Re: cutness

Your qeustion falls into the same catagory on beauty and ugly. First, we have to agree whether there is a criteria of being cute, then agree on what is the criteria and the last step to examine do dolphins match those criteria is quite straigh forward. BTW, even an old dolphin, old whale is very cute, don't you think so?

Actually, in the Bible, God didn't say all animals are equally good, some of them are unclean. :)

to : frostig

i know your question was to hevangel ... i did it on purpose to use your post to sidetrack the discussion :) to add a bit of fun and twist to the conversation ...

hevangel said 鯨魚海豚真的很可愛 and if you read the 1st paragraph of this post

http://www.inmediahk.net/comments/view-comment?comment%5fid=137296&retur...

i bet you will see that your God argument won't work ...

it is all in hevangel's eyes that 鯨魚海豚真的很可愛 ... problem is what happens when they are not 真的很可愛 any more, say, when they are old ???

Sorry, Cliff, thanks but...

I was trying to ask hevangel, in fact, for he thought those 'lovable animals' meant more than the others (i.e. for him, the 'lovely' dolphins mean more the old cows).

Anyway, Bible is only for those who believe in it, who believe in it. Just it is what we think, but some people could ignore the validity of it. God told us to govern the land, but not to kill the others as we like......

香港獨立媒體 - Comments for "停止濫殺，反對戰爭！stop the war machine！ （不斷更新）"

本周評論：為何教會不譴責以色列暴力濫殺 ?

Sample letter from Amnesty International to Lebanese Prime Minis

Sample letter from Amnesty International to Secretary General of

Sample letters from Amnesty International to Israeli Prime Minis

:P

??

to: Frostig, Re: cute

to: Cliff, Re: religious extremism

Interesting talks about war when you drag religion into it

to : hevangel on religious extremism

Differences

to: Cliff, re: violence

To: frostig, Re: cutness

to : frostig

Sorry, Cliff, thanks but...

香港獨立媒體 - Comments for "停止濫殺，反對戰爭！stop the war machine！（不斷更新）"