Amazon touts anti-Israeli views,

[sheila19624]

On July 4, Amazon spammed its customers with advertisement of Norman Finkelstein's virulently anti-Semitic book, Image and Reality of the Israeli-Palestine Conflict. On May 30, Amazon similarly advertised Beyond Chutzpah: on the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History. I have never received any other ad from Amazon.

On April 4, in an unprecedented move, Amazon deleted all reviews of Obadiah Shoher's Samson Blinded: A Machiavellian Perspective on the Middle East Conflict. A few days later, Amazon forced its subsidiary Booksurge to terminate publishing contract with Shoher whose book is now available for download from [url removed] . Google earlier banned advertising of the Samson Blinded for "unacceptable content." Shoher, indeed, is pro-Israeli, yet realistic and critical of Israeli policies.

Obadiah Shoher, an anonymous politician, abandons myths and moralizing in favor of realpolitik. He argues for raw efficiency of antiterrorist operations and shedding liberal idealism. Shoher asks inconvenient questions and gives honest answers. Amazon does not like that. Anti-Semitic lampoons by Norman Finkelstein are more to Amazon's taste.

[Kizyr]

What the hell does this have to do with anime discussions?

And who are you, anyway? You don't even introduce yourself and the first thing you submit is an anti-something-or-other post. If I find that you're just spamming this forum along with several others (spamming with a purpose is still spamming), then I'll treat it as such.

Poll deleted, by the way, until I find out more. KF

EDIT:
As I suspected, you do the same at other forums, albeit changing the digits after your handle each time (once at a chicken farming forum, which incidentally got a similar response of "What the hell does this have to do with poultry?" -- I got a kick out of that).

I'm banning this username. If you joined this forum to join the discussions here, then send me an email (kizyr at lunar-net.com) and I'll remove the ban. If, however, your only purpose was to spam and leave, then don't bother returning. KF

[ilovemyguitar]

Chicken farming? How'd you figure out this person was posting on a chicken farming board? That's just bizarre.

Not that a video game board is any less bizarre... just sayin, it's a bit of a jump from video games to chicken farming...

[Imperial Knight]

Usually I see this sort of thing try to sell some product and/or get people to visit a commerical website (often something along the lines of "Great site. Come check out mine. [link])". This is the first time I can think of that I've seen it used in this way. Still, I was suspicious from the beginning because all the tell-tale signs were there. User has only one post, post has either a tenuous connection to the purpose of the board or even no connection at all, etc.

[Aaron]

A few days later, Amazon forced its subsidiary Booksurge to terminate publishing contract with Shoher whose book is now available for download from [url removed] .

Can you post the link again?

I wawnt to see if not then pm it ?

[GhaleonOne]

I imagine when Kiz removed the link, it's gone for good, and with that person banned, they won't be able to PM you. You could try Emailing the person (assuming the Email address wasn't removed in the banning).

The problem I see isn't the post itself, but, as Kiz pointed out, the fact that it was mere spamming. If it was brought to light on the Almost Anything Goes Board, and some discussion followed, and assuming the person posting it didn't just spam it and take off, that's a different story. In this case, the person warranted a banning.

BTW, if anyone wants to discuss the issues going on in the the Israel/Lebanon area, feel free to bring it up on the AAGB. It's within the realm of discussion, as long as people keep from being heated about it. (which may not be possible, as this is a pretty intense subject on other boards I've visited). Kinda surprised it hasn't been brought up already actually.

Also, topic locked, as there really isn't anything left to say.

[Kizyr]

Clarification if anyone is curious:
This same user has spammed anywhere between 100 and 10000 other forums (it's hard to give an upper-bound, considering changing digits and all) with the same message; most of them within the past 1-2 months. Never has she (it's a she, woman's name is "Shiela Rabin", as she claims, and she posts from the US, not Israel--although she apparently uses IP proxies now) actually stayed on a forum, just made this one post and left.

That is what qualifies as spamming. It's also why I removed the link. I wouldn't bother emailing, either, considering the email address is probably fake or a temporary one.

It is rather funny. Poultry-farming forums, heavy metal forums, several video game forums, and out of a few hundred you'll find maybe 20 or so that have anything to do with politics. Incidentally, I didn't find anything Middle-East related.

We don't mind political discussion at all. We do mind spamming. I'm only leaving this post up as-is (and appending information onto it) for the sake of admins of other forums who want a little double-checking. KF