I remember when the UK banned firearms. A year later the stats came out. Everyone expected the murder rate to drop dramatically. In a way it did. Gun crimes dropped like a rock. The murder rated stayed the same the only differences was since people didn't have a gun handy they used spanners, kinves, strangulation and cricket bats. What they found out was people that want to kill people will used whatever is handy. So unless you are going to ban people, you will not save lives only change the cause of their deaths.

I had this argument with a liberal kid that I am helping get his first book published. he argued that the death penalty did not deter violent crimes. I tried to tell him that it was never designed to deter crime only to get rid of the people society could not trust. The same is true with guns, you can't ban guns and think that you are detering crime. Criminals are called that for a reason, they break the law. If you out law guns what makes you think that criminals will suddenly obey one law while breaking all the rest? Murder is illegal, robbery is illegal, rape is illegal,  yet they still happen daily around the world. I don't need a gun or a knife to rob, rape, or kill you. wait it just hit me! All crimes are committed with hands. We should ban hands! I works in the Arab countries, there are no three time losers. 

But there are still crimes commited by legitimate guns owners. Peoples who weren't criminals but become one. Having their guns registered could go a long way toward preventing these people from getting away.

In Canada, we had a gun registration act. Only policemen could access the database, and every database access was monitored. All policemen were very grateful to have access to it, so they would know what to expect when walking to a home, or they would know if they had to confiscate a gun if they arrested somebody.

There are similar laws in the US as well.  It is not like you can pick them up like a can of sardines.  There is the requisite registration and waiting period.  And police have access to the registration list.  But some areas are trying to go further and restrict the ownership (and that is what is being over turned in the courts).  You can be prohibited from owning a gun if you have been convicted of a crime, or are deemed mentally unstable (that is another kettle of fish that we can get into another time).

So it would seem that without the fanfair, Canada has laws similar to the US as far as the ease in which to own a gun?

Of course it is provocative. If you read what Arab leaders have to say, you can see that even the existence of Jews in the Middle-East is provocative. That's not a very good argument.

But I don't see anything immoral about it.

Annexing land was never "immoral" before Israel did it and Israel was attacked by Jordan, the country that annexed Jerusalem before. Was it "immoral" for Jordan to build homes in East-Jerusalem when they controlled it? What are you supposed to do with land you annexed?

Quite in contrast, building homes in the capital of a country that has both Jewish and Arab citizens is moral and is exactly what we need for peace to happen. Segregating Arabs and Jews and allowing the PLO to run a Jew-free territory does in no way help to create peace, it just rewards racism and promotes hatred.

No, it isn't, not if you insist that all people are equal. You can only be offended by the idea that Jews and Arabs live together in the same city if there is something wrong with that picture. And the fact that some terrorist group doesn't want Jews to live in East-Jerusalem because they think it will be harder for them to get control over the city if they do is simply not enough reason for you to be offended if Israel doesn't give in to the terrorists.

The PLO also don't want Jews to live in East-Jerusalem or for that matter anywhere else in Israel. "Throw the Jews into the sea" was their motto. When will you be offended by Jews living in West-Jerusalem or Haifa? Aren't you already offended that Jews have lived in Hevron for 3000 years? Isn't that an "illegal settlement" by some weird standard based on some "international law" that applies only to Israel?

Right.

And the US never built houses on land it annexed and which is claimed by others. Not in Texas, not in California, and not in Hawaii either. In fact, the US would happily hand over control over what is important to the US to somebody else's rule if an ally demanded it.

That's your standards to which you hold Israel.

One city, built by Jews, lived in by Jews unless they were forbidden to live there, with a Jewish majority since the 1840s and an eastern part that became "Arab" when all the Jews were thrown out in 1948, has to be divided and no Jews may live in the eastern part.

That's totally holding Israel to your own standards.

Just imagine having to give "back" to the Indians an American city that YOU (Americans, not Indians) actually founded and that YOU have lived in for thousands of years, long before the Indians even arrived, and that YOU think is holy, _AND_ that YOU have already offered to be without 60 years ago in exchange for peace, an offer which was refused. Can you even imagine such a scenario in the US? Can you imagine what it would mean for YOU if Israel, your friend and ally, DEMANDED from you to give up this holy city in exchange for nothing and for the simply reason that your friend and ally thinks it is provocative if you keep it?

So if that really is your standards, then, yes, please, hold Israel to them.

But in that case, clean up your own yard before cleaning up what isn't even your neighbourhood.

Jews cannot live anywhere else in the Middle-East. They were hunted down, their houses firebombed and destroyed, they were nearly exterminated in Israel as well so they will damn well live in Jerusalem, whether you like it or not.

Those wars fought against Israel again and again by the same people that are now being "provoked" by Israel building homes in Jerusalem could have resulted in the extermination of middle-eastern Jews, if Israel had lost. You think I'm kidding? Look at what happened to the Dinka, the Fur, the Kurds, the Nubians, the Massalith, any of the peoples who fought the same war machine and lost. Look at what happened to Jews who lived in Iraq or Egypt. You think building homes in Jerusalem is provocative? Read about what happened to Jewish homes in Yemen just last year!

And it does.

Decent and democratic countries build houses in their capital, whenever they want, without informing the Americans or asking for their permission.

They enjoy these diplomatic privileges because they are less likely to call on people to fight a Jihad against the US. They are not "better", they are just your friends.

And they will remain your friends, even if you try to sell off their holiest place to people who want to destroy it. (I am not kidding. When Jordan ruled over East-Jerusalem it DID destroy Jewish holy sites.)

If Israel is "better", Israel should AT LEAST enjoy the same privileges as the Arab states, INCLUDING an undivided capital city and a holy place, just like Saudi-Arabia has Mecca.

But I am totally for treating everyone equally, Arab states and Israel. Diplomatic privileges for any Arab country that actually helps the US and doesn't hate you? Check. All for it. And Israel can only dream of the diplomatic support from the US that Saudi-Arabia enjoys. Stone women, murder homosexuals, finance wars in Somalia and Sudan, even fund terrorists that attack US soil and they are still excellent friends. Obama wouldn't dream of flying to Saudi-Arabia and demand that they stop building houses in Mecca because Al-Qaeda claim it as theirs. That's the kind of diplomatic privilege I would like to see Israel enjoy.

But do ask Syria to stop occupying Kurdish land, while you are at it.

It's provocative.

Have you ever been in Jerusalem?

Those Jewish "settlements" are simply houses in the same streets where you will also find Arab homes. They indeed mingle on the street. Walking through streets in the east I usually didn't even know who was Arab and who was Jew.

I think you picked up some sad propaganda there and believed it. But that doesn't make it right and that doesn't make it an argument either.

The only reason Jewish "settlements" are heavily guarded outside Jerusalem is because terrorists keep attacking them. But within Jerusalem people do live together, as they did in Hevron before the "Intifada".

Arabs' movement in Jerusalem is not impeded, except during times of conflict, which isn't as often as you might think. Usually Arabs and Jews can move freely in Jerusalem.

Don't call something bullshit if you know nothing about it except what one side told you. If you visited Jerusalem and simply walked through a street with Jewish homes, you would see how fantastically wrong you are.

What do you want? Pictures?

Anyone can show you pictures of a burning house and claim that it was "annexed" and burned down by Jews to drive out an Arab family. And for some reason you will believe it. But would you still believe that those Jewish "settlements" in Jerusalem are "heavily guarded" and that "Palestinians cannot mingle" if you walked down the main street in French Hill and wouldn't even know if the person you just asked for directions was a Jew or an Arab?

The European Union considers French Hill to be an illegal settlement in East Jerusalem.

...

French Hill has a population of 6,631. Giv'at Shapira has a population density of 10.9 persons per dunam (10,900 people/km²), while Tzameret HaBira is less crowded, with 4.7 persons per dunam (4,700 people/km²). The population is mostly Jewish, including a large number of immigrants from South America and the former Soviet Union. In recent years, an increasing number of Arabs have been buying apartments in the neighborhood. The ethnic mix is much more diverse than in most other Jewish areas in the city, partly due to the proximity of the Hebrew University and Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Hill

So, really? Heavily guarded? "Palestinians" cannot mingle? Where are you getting this stuff?

My guess is that you never knew what such a "Jewish settlement" even looks like.

What I think is more likely is that somebody told you that Israel did something evil and you BELIEVED it, with no proof needed. Isn't that true?

Again, you believed stupid propaganda. Jews have lived in Jerusalem FOR 3000 years, not merely "3000 years ago". As I said Jerusalem has had a Jewish majority since the 1840s. It was a majority-Jewish town in the Ottoman Empire. There was absolutely no reason to declare it "Arab". It was not part of an Arab state and it was not an Arab city. The only thing that made it "Arab" was Jordan's invasion in 1948. But if that makes it Arab, then surely the Israeli invasion of 1967 would make it Israeli, wouldn't it?

How much land do they need?

Feel free to deduct for terror attacks, if Cherokees do that (which they don't).

Jerusalem has been conquered by lots of peoples, some of the Muslim, one of them Arab. But that was over a thousand years ago. For the last few hundred years, Jerusalem was Turkish-ruled and for the last 200 years it was a majority-Jewish city. Why the heck do you insist that the Arabs have a claim to it?

And yes, it is the third-most holiest site for Muslims, which is another reason why it is important that both Jews and Arabs should have access to it. But when those holy sites were under Arab rule, Jews were not allowed to visit them.

That's another lie.

Somebody has argued this before here on JU. I asked him to provide proof and he gave me a BBC article about a PA police headquarter destroyed during a battle.

Don't believe the lies. People will tell you that Israel destroys Arab homes and replaces them with Jewish homes, but it's simply not true.

(But I do realise that it likely won't matter. You will simply believe the accusation. When the accused is a Jew, accusation is proof.)

Except that it didn't happen.

You took a piece of Arab propaganda and pretend it's fact. It's not.

Areas are NOT annexed by force to make room for more Jewish settlers. It's simply not true.

Exactly.

So why exactly does Israel have lots of bunkers and sirens and a huge (for its population) army? Why is there talk about "security guarantees"?

You totally underestimate Hizbullah and the Arab armies.

If Israel loses a war, the conflict is over. It is nation-threatening.

No. But I think you should realise that if Israel were to lose a war and its "peace partners" take power, THIS is what Israel will look like.

Do you? Or would you accept the annexation of those territories? For some reason I am under the impression that you have little moral problem with somebody keeping land they annexed if they aren't Israel.

Did you know you can buy stuff on Amazon, and not pay sales tax?  In almost all states, Amazon does not collect sales taxes, only in the states they have a physical presence.  (I picked Amazon because they are my favorite, but it applies to all on-line e-tailers).

BUT - did you know that by law, you are required to remit those taxes to your state authority?  Yep!  My state even went so far as to send out forms to all its citizens asking for them to voluntarily remit the taxes for on-line purchases.

So what does this have to do with the private sale of guns?  Same thing.  The law applies, but yes, enforcement is hard.  But then there is a tool the government can use.  if you sell a gun registered to you, and do not inform the authorities and it is used in a crime, guess who they are going to come looking for?

In America, the government does not prohibit free legal trade, but they do put qualifications on it.  And while they do not as of yet have enough of a police force to enforce all the laws (relying on honesty of the citizens), that does not mean you can break the laws with impunity.  There are still reprecussions.

No.

Yes

Some are stolen, some never got registered (there is a black market for guns - most of which originate from other countries).  But the reason that "most of the" is that America has the most guns!  Simple math, not lax laws.  You can live in the safest city in the world, and yet still be murdered.  NY is one of the safest today, yet there are still a few hundred murders a year.  But as a percent of the population, the number makes it relatively safe.

Canada has 10% of the population of the US.  Mexico about 50%, so we dwarf both countries.  And while canada is on par with the US (SOL wise), Mexico is way below and just does not have expendable income to worry about more than the necessities (except for the richest man in the world).

It ain't been stolen, it had been conquered and annexed from Spain.

Now Spain "stole" it to the natives. That is another story.

I am kinda tired of argumenting of Israel in a Gun-loving thread. My initial point was to challenge the claim that I am antisemitic and Israel-hating. I don't think anyone can think that I love it unconditionnally, but does that make me a Nazi who wants to enforce the "final solution"?

The original owner who was stupid ennough not to declare he sold his gun? I mean.. you effectively handed over a lethal weapon you lawfully acquired by passing investigation and checking to somebody that didn't, and could be a criminal.

So you are to blame to passing over weapon illegaly to anoyher party. You were responsible for that weapon, and you did not helped the government tracking the possession of the gun.

You should not to be held accountable for any crime committed to that gun, however. Only to the fact that you did not declared the sale.

My bad. I thought the NICS checks had to be destroyed within 24-hours after approval.

Aaaand most of the unregistered guns. Which means you should be the ones tackling the problem stronger about the spread of illegal guns, to stop their origin. Off course there will always be guns on the black market, you cannot prevent all gun theft or external country smuggling.

I mean, they have lots of problem in Mexico with the cartels recently. These cartels are using high-grade weaponry, like assault rifle. I am quite sure that the ban restriction that occured in 2004 on the sale of those weapon went a long way toward helping these cartels get their hands on assault guns.

So is annexation stealing or not?

Not every anti-Semite wants a final solution. In fact I believe such thoughts are as far from your mind as from mine.

I am worried about latent anti-Semitism which is very present in otherwise completely normal people.

The fact that you believe in lies told about Israel, for example about the demographics of Jerusalem (you completely ignored my point that it was a majority-Jewish city before 1948 for over a hundred years) or about the nature of Jewish "settlements", tells me that you are more likely to believe something evil about Jews than about other people.

And the fact that you see Israel annexing land as something completely different from other countries annexing land also tells me that.

You and I clearly see Jewish "settlements" in Jerusalem differently. But I see them as I have physically seen them, as streets with Jewish and Arab homes and a population where at least I cannot tell if a given person I see is a Jew or an Arab, whereas you see them as some sort of anti-Arab fortress. May I ask who told you that view and why did you believe it?

I don't think you are an Israel hater, in fact I see you more of an Israel-supporter. My problem is not with your opinion about Israel but with your reasoning for it. If you think that annexed land should be given up for peace, that's fine. More power to you. But if you think that _Israel_ should give annexed land up because it is immoral for _Israel_ to own annexed land, whereas with any other country these things are not an issue; and if you believes lies told about Israel or ignore the demographics of a city when assigning it to someone's rule, then we have a problem.

If you believe the stories about the "settlements" in Jerusalem and the legends about Israel destroying homes of Arabs to replace them with Jews and are still a supporter of Israel, then you are a worse fanatic than I.

I support Israel because I know those stories are lies. (I have personally seen that the first story is false and I have asked people who told the second to tell me their ultimate source and it was always a story that didn't even say anything about Israel destroying homes.)

You support Israel despite believing those stories. Don't you think that that is problematic?

There is an obvious easy "international law"-based solution.

Have Israel (or, I assume, any Jewish state) annex Los Angeles.

That annexation will legally make the territory of Los Angeles the just and moral property of whomever had annexed it last before the Jewish state.

Worked for Jerusalem. Invaded and annexed by Turks, occupied by Brits, annexed by Arabs, annexed by Israel. That's where it ends. The legal and moral owner has been established. Last one before the Jewish annexation is the legal  owner.

Again. Jerusalem was Jewish-majority before 1948 and since 1848.

Your claim about "ancestors" only seems to affect Israeli claims. But you regard the Arab claim valid on the same grounds for some reason.

Both had ancestors living in the city, the Jews were just there earlier and longer.

But an ancient Arab population makes the city Arab, whereas an ancient Jewish population doesn't make it Jewish.

Why is that?

The status quo is that Israel controls Jerusalem.

There is no need to bicker over Lorraine since both Germans and Frenchmen can live there if they like.

Except Jerusalem, apparently.

Again, Jerusalem was annexed in 1981. The local "Palestinian" population was never asked. But neither has anyone asked them now when it was apparently decided that Jerusalem is "Arab" and must become part of a "Palestinian" state.

The Jewish population of East-Jerusalem wasn't asked when Jordan annexed the territory in 1948. The people of Hawaii were not asked when the US annexed Hawaii either.

So you are saying that annexations in 2010 are not all right, but opreviously they could be. You are telling me that Jerusalem is Arab, which it is solely because an Arab state annexed it in 1948, but is not Jewish despite an Israeli annexation in 1981. And you claim that the local population (presumably only the Arab population) must agree to being annexed, yet you promote the idea of annexing East-Jerusalem to a new Arab state without asking Jerusalem's population, Arab or otherwise.

In mid-2000, when it appeared that some Arab-majority parts of Jerusalem would be transferred to Palestinian Authority control, Muslim Jerusalemites expressed less than delight at the prospect. Peering over at Arafat's PA, they saw power monopolized by domineering and corrupt autocrats, a thug-like police force, and a stagnant economy. Arafat's bloated, nonsensical claims ("We are the one true democratic oasis in the Arab region") only exacerbated their apprehensions.

‘Abd ar-Razzaq ‘Abid of Jerusalem's Silwan neighborhood pointed dubiously to "what's happening in Ramallah, Hebron, and the Gaza Strip" and asked if the residents there were well off. A doctor applying for Israeli papers explained:

"The whole world seems to be talking about the future of the Arabs of Jerusalem, but no one has bothered asking us. The international community and the Israeli Left seem to take it for granted that we want to live under Mr. Arafat's control. We don't. Most of us despise Mr. Arafat and the cronies around him, and we want to stay in Israel. At least here I can speak my mind freely without being dumped in prison, as well as having a chance to earn an honest day's wage."

http://www.danielpipes.org/2534/the-hell-of-israel-is-better-than-the-paradise-of-arafat

Best-case scenario is that you declare an Arab annexation in 1948 valid and an Israeli annexation in 1981 invalid. This alone I consider anti-Semitic. I can live with both annexations being invalid, both being valid, or the newer one being valid. But basing the validity of an annexation on whether Israel is the annexor is ridiculous.

Worst-case scenario is that you hand over a Jewish and Arab population who want to be part of Israel to a new Arab state run not by a real government like Jordan's but a terrorist group. And that is apparently the "moral" solution.

No, but lies about a country will destroy its image in the world. And especially for a Jewish country those lies are much more easily believed for some reason.

You didn't even take into account what I told you about the Jewish population of Jerusalem driven out in 1948. THAT really happened. But it doesn't, for some reason, invalidate the Arab claim to the city.

Now, if you only you would apply those same standards to Israel, a country that had abolished slavery 2500 years ago (when it was under Persian rule).

Yes they did.  they did not "declare" war, but they were shooting at us.  Kind of like the middle east.  The Mexican army did not cross the border, but they harbored the bandits that did (war by proxy).

I have been banned from this very thread for this.