A Strange Peter King ReTweet

Boom_70 · May 9, 2011

Can anyone make any sense of this one:

SI_PeterKing Peter King
RT @NBA_GM: Hope u support Israel's target assassinations as u do US--unlike hypocritical UN ... 1 mass-murderer whacking at a time please.

Small Town Guy · May 9, 2011

Without knowing the whole Tweetory, I do know that Peter replies a bit different when he retweets. His responses come after the RT, instead of before, which is what most people do. So I think his line was probably, "1 mass murderer whacking at a time please," and he was responding to the guy who tweeted "Hope u support Israel's target assassinations as u do US-unlike hypocritical UN." Not that it makes things a lot clearer. And just based on that tweet, I have no desire to go investigate the complete story.

Boom_70 · May 9, 2011

I guess what struck me most was the title of original tweeter @NBA-GM.

YankeeFan · May 9, 2011

Remember when Israel had a Mossad team sneak into Dubai under false Visas, posing as tourists?

They wacked a Hamas big shot in his hotel room and snuck back out of town.

A lot of people criticized that operation, but is it that different than us wacking OBL?

BTW, I'm ok with both. But it seems to me a lot of people criticized that action and supported our killing of OBL.

Boom_70 · May 9, 2011

ok makes more sense now. I guess NBA GM was commenting on this from MMQB:

g. On one thing, though, I agree with Rashard Mendenhall: I am not taking to the streets to celebrate anyone's death. I support it, but I'm not hootin' and hollerin' over it. You're free to note the death however you wish; it's your personal choice, which I support.

The Big Ragu · May 10, 2011

YankeeFan said:

Remember when Israel had a Mossad team sneak into Dubai under false Visas, posing as tourists?

They wacked a Hamas big shot in his hotel room and snuck back out of town.

A lot of people criticized that operation, but is it that different than us wacking OBL?

BTW, I'm ok with both. But it seems to me a lot of people criticized that action and supported our killing of OBL.
Click to expand...

It was totally different. They were both assassinations. But there is no equivalency between the two, in my opinion, and judging by how each was received, in most people's opinions.

Osama Bin Laden was the most notorious man alive. You are really comparing his assassination--which the U.S. could admit to openly without little to no flack from the rest of the world--to the assassination of Manmoud Al-Mabhouh, which started an International shit storm?

Look at it in any way you want. Logistically, our operation with regard to Osama Bin Laden went exactly as we planned it -- including when a helicopter went down, us having a back-up in place to complete the operation successfully. We were not trying to hide our involvement, and in fact, we immediately took credit. We announced it to the world. The world had no problem with it and saw it as an act of justice, given the scope of 9/11.

The Israelis have never acknowledged any involvement in the assassination of Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh, and whatever happened, it was NOT the way the Israelis planned it, nor was it celebrated by the rest of the world the way Bin Laden was. Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was nowhere near as notorious as Osama Bin Laden.

Where to begin on that? The Mossad and our Navy Seals do not operate the same way. For years, the Israelis have pursued this policy of assassination, but it is controversial and is done in defiance of most of the world. In order to do it, they can never leave their fingerprints behind. Their targets fall well short of Osama Bin Laden.

Dubai was a giant screw up. When all goes well, the Israelis want everyone to know they did it, but they remain silent (unlike our president who went on TV to announce we had killed Bin Laden -- because the operation was NOT done in defiance of most of the world) and nothing can ever be traced back to Israel. They follow a "policy of ambiguity," because they know what they are doing is considered obscene by most of the international community.

In the assassination of Al-Mabhouh, they totally blew it. They got caught by surveillance cameras and their passports left a trail to five Western European countries, which led to those countries launching investigations that put Israel in the crosshairs and had Israeli diplomats being summoned to answer to those countries. The Poles also arrested a suspected Mossad agent who was supposedly involved with illegally obtaining a German passport for the operation and turned the agent over for prosecution in Germany.

And again, of course, there is the obvious difference between Osama Bin Laden and Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh. Bin Laden was behind the mass murder of more than 3,000 people in a single day and countless other murderous operations that killed thousands of other people. His name was known to everyone in the world. Al-Mabhouh, who the Mossad took out, was not a good guy, but he was not responsible for anything near what Bin Laden was, and I will bet with certainty few if any people on this board had any idea who he was until the assassination. The Israelis took him out essentially for killing two Israeli soldiers. Are you REALLY comparing that to us assassinating Osama Bin Laden?

Boom_70 · May 10, 2011

The Big Ragu said:

YankeeFan said:

Remember when Israel had a Mossad team sneak into Dubai under false Visas, posing as tourists?

They wacked a Hamas big shot in his hotel room and snuck back out of town.

A lot of people criticized that operation, but is it that different than us wacking OBL?

BTW, I'm ok with both. But it seems to me a lot of people criticized that action and supported our killing of OBL.
Click to expand...

It was totally different. They were both assassinations. But there is no equivalency between the two, in my opinion, and judging by how each was received, in most people's opinions.

Osama Bin Laden was the most notorious man alive. You are really comparing his assassination--which the U.S. could admit to openly without little to no flack from the rest of the world--to the assassination of Manmoud Al-Mabhouh, which started an International shit storm?

Look at it in any way you want. Logistically, our operation with regard to Osama Bin Laden went exactly as we planned it -- including when a helicopter went down, us having a back-up in place to complete the operation successfully. We were not trying to hide our involvement, and in fact, we immediately took credit. We announced it to the world. The world had no problem with it and saw it as an act of justice, given the scope of 9/11.

The Israelis have never acknowledged any involvement in the assassination of Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh, and whatever happened, it was NOT the way the Israelis planned it, nor was it celebrated by the rest of the world the way Bin Laden was. Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was nowhere near as notorious as Osama Bin Laden.

Where to begin on that? The Mossad and our Navy Seals do not operate the same way. For years, the Israelis have pursued this policy of assassination, but it is controversial and is done in defiance of most of the world. In order to do it, they can never leave their fingerprints behind. Their targets fall well short of Osama Bin Laden.

Dubai was a giant screw up. When all goes well, the Israelis want everyone to know they did it, but they remain silent (unlike our president who went on TV to announce we had killed Bin Laden -- because the operation was NOT done in defiance of most of the world) and nothing can ever be traced back to Israel. They follow a "policy of ambiguity," because they know what they are doing is considered obscene by most of the international community.

In the assassination of Al-Mabhouh, they totally blew it. They got caught by surveillance cameras and their passports left a trail to five Western European countries, which led to those countries launching investigations that put Israel in the crosshairs and had Israeli diplomats being summoned to answer to those countries. The Poles also arrested a suspected Mossad agent who was supposedly involved with illegally obtaining a German passport for the operation and turned the agent over for prosecution in Germany.

And again, of course, there is the obvious difference between Osama Bin Laden and Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh. Bin Laden was behind the mass murder of more than 3,000 people in a single day and countless other murderous operations that killed thousands of other people. His name was known to everyone in the world. Al-Mabhouh, who the Mossad took out, was not a good guy, but he was not responsible for anything near what Bin Laden was, and I will bet with certainty few if any people on this board had any idea who he was until the assassination. The Israelis took him out essentially for killing two Israeli soldiers. Are you REALLY comparing that to us assassinating Osama Bin Laden?
Click to expand...

Well said Ragu. Bin Laden was one of the few cases where the majority of the world would accept frontier justice.

I am not sure though if Eric Holder like the idea of you terming Bin Laden killing as "assassination," since it would be in violation of EO 12333.

I think Gadhafi makes that list and also Mullah Omar. I would be really happy to see Omar with a bullet in his eye next.

I've always admired the Russian system of political assassinations. They seem to just take care of business and move on with no fanfare.

YankeeFan · May 10, 2011

Ragu, you can argue that bin Laden is worse than Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh if you'd like, but that's not really the point.

What matters is did he cross the threshold that would justify an extrajudicial killing.

So, then it all becomes about where you draw the line. Is bin Laden the only person who was beyond this line? And, who gets to decide?

If we can go into a country, with whom we are not at war, not kill someone, where do we have the moral high ground to criticize Israel.

Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was a military commander. Israel did not have an option to capture & try him, so they killed him.

What really surprises me is people who can come down on opposite sides in these two cases and see no room for debate.

I think people need to at least realize their are two sides to these questions.

Dershowitz, who has also written about bin Laden's killing, explored Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh's killing:

Not all extrajudicial killings are unlawful. Every soldier who kills an enemy combatant engages in an extrajudicial killing, as does every policeman who shoots a fleeing felon. There are several complex legal questions involved in assessing these situations.

First, was the person who was killed a combatant, in relation to those killed him? If Israel killed Mabhouh, there can be absolutely no doubt that he was a combatant. He was actively participating in an ongoing war by Hamas against Israeli civilians. Indeed, it is likely that he was killed while on a military mission to Iran in order to secure unlawful, anti-personnel rockets that target Israeli civilians. Both the United States and Great Britain routinely killed such combatants during the Second World War, whether they were in uniform or not. Moreover, Hamas combatants deliberately remove their uniforms while engaged in combat.

So if the Israeli Air Force had killed Mabhouh while he was in Gaza, there would be absolutely no doubt that their action would be lawful. It does not violate international law to kill a combatant, regardless of where the combatant is found, whether he is awake or asleep and whether or not he is engaged in active combat at the moment of his demise.

But Mabhouh was not killed in Gaza. He was killed in Dubai. It is against the law of Dubai for an Israeli agent to kill a combatant against Israel while he is in Dubai. So the people who engaged in the killing presumptively violated the domestic law of Dubai, unless there is a defense to such a killing based on international principles regarding enemy combatants. It is unlikely that any defense would be available to an Israeli or someone working on behalf of Israel, since Dubai does not recognize Israel's right to kill enemy combatants on its territory.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-dershowitz/if-israel-killed-mahmoud_b_467506.html
Click to expand...

Boom_70 · May 10, 2011

YankeeFan said:

Ragu, you can argue that bin Laden is worse than Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh if you'd like, but that's not really the point.

What matters is did he cross the threshold that would justify an extrajudicial killing.

So, then it all becomes about where you draw the line. Is bin Laden the only person who was beyond this line? And, who gets to decide?

If we can go into a country, with whom we are not at war, not kill someone, where do we have the moral high ground to criticize Israel.

Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was a military commander. Israel did not have an option to capture & try him, so they killed him.

What really surprises me is people who can come down on opposite sides in these two cases and see no room for debate.

I think people need to at least realize their are two sides to these questions.

Dershowitz, who has also written about bin Laden's killing, explored Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh's killing:

Not all extrajudicial killings are unlawful. Every soldier who kills an enemy combatant engages in an extrajudicial killing, as does every policeman who shoots a fleeing felon. There are several complex legal questions involved in assessing these situations.

First, was the person who was killed a combatant, in relation to those killed him? If Israel killed Mabhouh, there can be absolutely no doubt that he was a combatant. He was actively participating in an ongoing war by Hamas against Israeli civilians. Indeed, it is likely that he was killed while on a military mission to Iran in order to secure unlawful, anti-personnel rockets that target Israeli civilians. Both the United States and Great Britain routinely killed such combatants during the Second World War, whether they were in uniform or not. Moreover, Hamas combatants deliberately remove their uniforms while engaged in combat.

So if the Israeli Air Force had killed Mabhouh while he was in Gaza, there would be absolutely no doubt that their action would be lawful. It does not violate international law to kill a combatant, regardless of where the combatant is found, whether he is awake or asleep and whether or not he is engaged in active combat at the moment of his demise.

But Mabhouh was not killed in Gaza. He was killed in Dubai. It is against the law of Dubai for an Israeli agent to kill a combatant against Israel while he is in Dubai. So the people who engaged in the killing presumptively violated the domestic law of Dubai, unless there is a defense to such a killing based on international principles regarding enemy combatants. It is unlikely that any defense would be available to an Israeli or someone working on behalf of Israel, since Dubai does not recognize Israel's right to kill enemy combatants on its territory.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-dershowitz/if-israel-killed-mahmoud_b_467506.html
Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Based on problems and questions that Gitmo created, Extrajudicial killings certainly are a solution worth considering.

Perhaps the majority acceptance of Bin Laden killing marks a paradigm shift.

Guy_Incognito · May 10, 2011

The Big Ragu said:

YankeeFan said:

Remember when Israel had a Mossad team sneak into Dubai under false Visas, posing as tourists?

They wacked a Hamas big shot in his hotel room and snuck back out of town.

A lot of people criticized that operation, but is it that different than us wacking OBL?

BTW, I'm ok with both. But it seems to me a lot of people criticized that action and supported our killing of OBL.
Click to expand...

It was totally different. They were both assassinations. But there is no equivalency between the two, in my opinion, and judging by how each was received, in most people's opinions.

Osama Bin Laden was the most notorious man alive. You are really comparing his assassination--which the U.S. could admit to openly without little to no flack from the rest of the world--to the assassination of Manmoud Al-Mabhouh, which started an International shit storm?

Look at it in any way you want. Logistically, our operation with regard to Osama Bin Laden went exactly as we planned it -- including when a helicopter went down, us having a back-up in place to complete the operation successfully. We were not trying to hide our involvement, and in fact, we immediately took credit. We announced it to the world. The world had no problem with it and saw it as an act of justice, given the scope of 9/11.

The Israelis have never acknowledged any involvement in the assassination of Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh, and whatever happened, it was NOT the way the Israelis planned it, nor was it celebrated by the rest of the world the way Bin Laden was. Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was nowhere near as notorious as Osama Bin Laden.

Where to begin on that? The Mossad and our Navy Seals do not operate the same way. For years, the Israelis have pursued this policy of assassination, but it is controversial and is done in defiance of most of the world. In order to do it, they can never leave their fingerprints behind. Their targets fall well short of Osama Bin Laden.

Dubai was a giant screw up. When all goes well, the Israelis want everyone to know they did it, but they remain silent (unlike our president who went on TV to announce we had killed Bin Laden -- because the operation was NOT done in defiance of most of the world) and nothing can ever be traced back to Israel. They follow a "policy of ambiguity," because they know what they are doing is considered obscene by most of the international community.

In the assassination of Al-Mabhouh, they totally blew it. They got caught by surveillance cameras and their passports left a trail to five Western European countries, which led to those countries launching investigations that put Israel in the crosshairs and had Israeli diplomats being summoned to answer to those countries. The Poles also arrested a suspected Mossad agent who was supposedly involved with illegally obtaining a German passport for the operation and turned the agent over for prosecution in Germany.

And again, of course, there is the obvious difference between Osama Bin Laden and Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh. Bin Laden was behind the mass murder of more than 3,000 people in a single day and countless other murderous operations that killed thousands of other people. His name was known to everyone in the world. Al-Mabhouh, who the Mossad took out, was not a good guy, but he was not responsible for anything near what Bin Laden was, and I will bet with certainty few if any people on this board had any idea who he was until the assassination. The Israelis took him out essentially for killing two Israeli soldiers. Are you REALLY comparing that to us assassinating Osama Bin Laden?
Click to expand...

I try to avoid these conversations, but much of your argument boils down to it's worse because people perceive one as good and one as bad. Aren't we discussing how one should view it? PK's argument is that there is an inconsistency - you're defending it by pointing out the same inconsistency.

Another argument you make is that the Seals executed their plan more effectively / efficiently - that's not really an argument about the relative morality of the plan to begin with.

Finally you say that the targets are of differing magnitudes. OK, but that also doesn't speak much to the morality of the policy, unless you want to engage in the kind of line drawing that YF asked about.

I'll leave it there.

Boom_70 · May 10, 2011

Guy_Incognito said:

The Big Ragu said:

YankeeFan said:

Remember when Israel had a Mossad team sneak into Dubai under false Visas, posing as tourists?

They wacked a Hamas big shot in his hotel room and snuck back out of town.

A lot of people criticized that operation, but is it that different than us wacking OBL?

BTW, I'm ok with both. But it seems to me a lot of people criticized that action and supported our killing of OBL.
Click to expand...

It was totally different. They were both assassinations. But there is no equivalency between the two, in my opinion, and judging by how each was received, in most people's opinions.

Osama Bin Laden was the most notorious man alive. You are really comparing his assassination--which the U.S. could admit to openly without little to no flack from the rest of the world--to the assassination of Manmoud Al-Mabhouh, which started an International shit storm?

Look at it in any way you want. Logistically, our operation with regard to Osama Bin Laden went exactly as we planned it -- including when a helicopter went down, us having a back-up in place to complete the operation successfully. We were not trying to hide our involvement, and in fact, we immediately took credit. We announced it to the world. The world had no problem with it and saw it as an act of justice, given the scope of 9/11.

The Israelis have never acknowledged any involvement in the assassination of Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh, and whatever happened, it was NOT the way the Israelis planned it, nor was it celebrated by the rest of the world the way Bin Laden was. Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was nowhere near as notorious as Osama Bin Laden.

Where to begin on that? The Mossad and our Navy Seals do not operate the same way. For years, the Israelis have pursued this policy of assassination, but it is controversial and is done in defiance of most of the world. In order to do it, they can never leave their fingerprints behind. Their targets fall well short of Osama Bin Laden.

Dubai was a giant screw up. When all goes well, the Israelis want everyone to know they did it, but they remain silent (unlike our president who went on TV to announce we had killed Bin Laden -- because the operation was NOT done in defiance of most of the world) and nothing can ever be traced back to Israel. They follow a "policy of ambiguity," because they know what they are doing is considered obscene by most of the international community.

In the assassination of Al-Mabhouh, they totally blew it. They got caught by surveillance cameras and their passports left a trail to five Western European countries, which led to those countries launching investigations that put Israel in the crosshairs and had Israeli diplomats being summoned to answer to those countries. The Poles also arrested a suspected Mossad agent who was supposedly involved with illegally obtaining a German passport for the operation and turned the agent over for prosecution in Germany.

And again, of course, there is the obvious difference between Osama Bin Laden and Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh. Bin Laden was behind the mass murder of more than 3,000 people in a single day and countless other murderous operations that killed thousands of other people. His name was known to everyone in the world. Al-Mabhouh, who the Mossad took out, was not a good guy, but he was not responsible for anything near what Bin Laden was, and I will bet with certainty few if any people on this board had any idea who he was until the assassination. The Israelis took him out essentially for killing two Israeli soldiers. Are you REALLY comparing that to us assassinating Osama Bin Laden?
Click to expand...

I try to avoid these conversations, but much of your argument boils down to it's worse because people perceive one as good and one as bad. Aren't we discussing how one should view it? PK's argument is that there is an inconsistency - you're defending it by pointing out the same inconsistency.

Another argument you make is that the Seals executed their plan more effectively / efficiently - that's not really an argument about the relative morality of the plan to begin with.

Finally you say that the targets are of differing magnitudes. OK, but that also doesn't speak much to the morality of the policy, unless you want to engage in the kind of line drawing that YF asked about.

I'll leave it there.
Click to expand...

Certainly a slippery slope. Maybe it's like Potter Stewert's I know porn when I see it philosophy.

To Obama, killing Bin Laden was instinctively the right thing to do regardless of moral implications.

NickMordo · May 10, 2011

Monday Morning...Mass Murderer?

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