Israel-Palestine Historical Discussion

[Michael]

Maybe it meant that 95% of the people who support the siege support it 95% of the time?

C'mon, Daj, did you fail doublethink school or something?

If I remember correctly, the incumbency rate for the US Congress in 2004 was 96%, so, uhm, bananananer republic? They hate us for our freedoms. War is peace. LOL is lulz.

[Interloper]

http://www.timesofisrael.com/arab-docto ... -big-deal/

Arab doctor saves Jewish soldier hit by Arab bullets. No big deal?
Hadassah’s Prof. Ahmed Eid gets a little irritated when people ask him questions about being an Arab surgeon in Jewish Israel. ‘There’s no drama here,’ he insists. Oh, but there is…

BY DAVID HOROVITZ August 18, 2014, 5:16 pm

On Sunday August 4, a gunman on a motorbike opened fire on an Israeli soldier, Chen Schwartz, near Jerusalem’s Mount Scopus, hitting him twice at close range. Critically injured in what police said was almost certainly a Palestinian terror attack, Schwartz, 19, was rushed to the nearby Hadassah Hospital.

Professor Ahmed Eid, Hadassah’s head of surgery, was called to the operating theater and scrubbed in. “Without going into the specifics, it was clear there was major loss of blood,” Eid recalls in an interview. Eid called for another doctor with particular expertise to come from Hadassah’s other hospital across town at Ein Karem, and she was given a police motorcycle escort when she got stuck in traffic.


Understated about the extraordinary skills of the team that saved Schwartz’s life, Eid says simply: “He had what would have been fatal wounds, and would certainly have died without very careful surgery.”

Today, after another round of surgery once his condition was more stable, Schwartz is gradually recovering. Eid says his condition is moderate. His mother Miri, who joins us towards the end of our conversation in Eid’s office, is full of smiling relief and appreciation for the doctor who saved her son’s life. It all sounds like an uplifting hospital story, a minor positive drama in these largely unhappy times.

But it’s actually a little more than that, because of the identities of the drama’s key players. This isn’t just a story of gunman shoots victim and doctor saves him. This is Arab gunman shoots Jewish soldier and Arab doctor saves him.

Security personnel at the scene where a gunman on a motorcycle opened fire on soldier Chen Schwartz, near Jerusalem's Hebrew University on Mt. Scopus, August 4, 2014. (Photo credit: Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
Security personnel at the scene where a gunman on a motorcycle opened fire on soldier Chen Schwartz, near Jerusalem’s Hebrew University on Mt. Scopus, August 4, 2014. (Photo credit: Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Eid sighs with a mixture of mild irritation and indulgence at the interplay of conflict and surgery and religion. “Yes, an Arab shot him and an Arab saved him,” he says of Schwartz. “There’s an apparent contradiction. But really there isn’t. I was doing my job. That’s what I do.”

No big deal? Well, yes and no.

I had a good brain, and got a lot of support
Ahmed Eid was born 64 years ago in Daburiyya, east of Nazareth in northern Israel. He shows me a photograph of the village, which lies in the shadow of Mount Tabor.

He was one of ten kids, and none of the others had higher education. “But there was nothing stopping them,” he emphasizes. “I had a good brain, and I studied hard, and I got so much support,” he says of the rare educational journey he made.

The village of Daburiyya, where Ahmed Eid grew up (Photo credit: gugganij/Wikipedia)
The village of Daburiyya, where Ahmed Eid grew up (Photo credit: gugganij/Wikipedia)

Young Ahmed did well in his exams, and won a scholarship to a high school in Nazareth run by the municipality. From there, he came to Jerusalem in 1968, and did a degree in math and physics. Wondering what he was going to do with that, “I applied and was accepted for medicine. My father hoped I’d open a clinic in Daburiyya, but I disappointed him and stayed here,” he says with a smile.

“I told my father it would be years before I would earn properly. He said, ‘I’ll sell the house to make sure you can do this.’ He didn’t need to, because I got various scholarships and I worked as a nurse while I was training.”

Eid tells his career story rather like he lives his life: briskly and cheerfully, moving relentlessly forward.

“I worked in surgery — transplants — and I got addicted,” he continues. Hadassah, at the time, had “started to think about doing liver transplants,” he remembers, which no Israeli hospital was performing. So Eid went to the US from 1986 to 1990 to train, studying transplantation surgery at the Mayo Clinic. He points me to the certificate on the wall to the side of his desk which shows that he performed Israel’s first successful liver transplant in 1991. The recipient was a new immigrant from Russia, a boy. “He’s still alive. Unfortunately he lives in New York. We’re still in touch.”

The doctor’s features light up when he discusses transplant surgery, his specialty which saw him rise to run the Hadassah Transplant department for 10 years (until 2008, when he rose still higher to become Hadassah’s head of surgery). “I loved it,” he says with supreme enthusiasm. “Of course there’s always sorrow mixed with the joy, because a donor has died. But you are returning people to life.”

And nothing, says Eid, beats that.

Harmony amid the Israeli maelstrom
In a country riven by internal Jewish-Muslim tensions, a predominantly Jewish country still rejected by so many other Muslim states in this region, it would seem that Ahmed Eid has followed a path determinedly oblivious to the rifts and the extremism, refusing to be distracted by intolerance and hatred.

He says he grew up “in an atmosphere of interaction, of living together.” With whom? Well, for a start, kids his age on Kibbutz Ein Dor, a few minutes away from Daburiyya. “I spent time there, and they spent time with us,” he says. He didn’t serve in the army, he says, “because I wasn’t called. My son did national service though,” he says, and argues that most Israeli Arabs would want to do so if the right voluntary frameworks were available.

He grew up in a home “with a little religion. My father prayed. I’m a Muslim by heritage, he says, “but like 90 percent of Israeli Arabs, I’m not religious.”

Ninety percent of Israeli Arabs aren’t religious? “Absolutely,” he says.

“I feel part of this state, and I get irritated with those who doubt it,” he says, though his tone remains mild. “I am Israeli and I don’t need to prove it. It’s presented as a dilemma: We’re Arabs, how do we feel? My loyalty to the state is in no doubt. It’s a little annoying to have to talk about it.”

But I press him anyway, notably in the context of this month’s surgery on Chen Schwartz. “Eighty percent of my patients [in the department of surgery] are Jewish,” he points out.

He may not want to talk about it but, I posit, his life and his work are an inspiration for better relations.

‘I am Israeli and I don’t need to prove it… My loyalty to the state is in no doubt. It’s a little annoying to have to talk about it’
Eid relents, and ventures just a few steps into the conflict zone. Jews and Arabs, “we live together,” he says. “An Arab shoots. An Arab saves. This needs to inspire the decision-makers: Guys, reach a solution already. It’s not working right now. Take extra measures to find a solution.”

Then he quickly retreats. He says “I’m not good at politics and I’ve never dealt with it.”

But he must have opinions. “Of course, I have my opinions, as everyone does.”

Which are? “You live and let live.”

Others say: kill and be killed.

“Most of the problems can be solved through discussion. People are indoctrinated. It’s an abuse of religion. They kidnapped and killed three kids,” he says of the June abduction and murder of three Israeli teenagers in the West Bank, allegedly by a Hamas cell. “They take a kid and kill him,” he says of the alleged revenge killing by Jews of a Palestinian teenager in Jerusalem. He shakes his head in sorrow. “My brothers and sisters feel the same about Israel. Most Israeli Arabs feel the same. Hanin Zoabi shouts a lot, but most Israeli Arabs want to be in the country in a partnership.”

So why does the Israeli Arab community elect extremists like Zoabi — an MK from the Balad party who espouses positions relentlessly hostile to Israel — to the Knesset?

“I don’t know. Most people [in the Israeli Arab community] want a quiet life. The situation of Israeli Arabs isn’t that good, economically. There are injustices. The Jews will tell you that. But there’s no uprising. People want to live. They don’t want trouble.”

I ask Eid how rare he is — a vaguely worded question that might refer to his professional success or his insistent optimism and tolerance. He winds up answering both parts. “I was an early professor, but there are many more today. It’s not rare. I am a product of Israel. We feel a humanity and an obligation to the state. No hesitation. I thank the country for enabling me to get to this situation. Yes, I worked hard, but I didn’t flourish in a vacuum. I don’t take it for granted.”

At this point Miriam Schwartz, Chen’s mother, comes in. She sits down next to me, facing Eid, and she too insists “there’s just no story” in the fact that the doctor who saved her Jewish soldier son from Arab gunshot wounds is an Arab. “I was born in Acre, a mixed city,” she says. “There are religious extremists at home and overseas, but most people want to live and raise their kids in quiet and peace.” At Hadassah, she notes, “lots of Palestinians are treated.”

Says Eid: “This hospital is a microcosm of Jewish Arab interaction. Fifty percent of our patients are Arabs.”

But, he says again, “there’s no drama here. The leaders should come here and learn from it.”

[Ian]

That, in and of itself, is the chief reason why Israel’s survival is critical to the Jewish people.

Is Israel’s existence in jeopardy at this point?

Who, in the Middle East Peace Process, is even debating Israel’s “survival”?

”But the Hamas Charter!”

A) Nobody doubts that the Hamas Charter is a piece of racist, violent, religious drivel.

But why not look at Hamas’ demands today, not from 1988?

Conditions for a 10 year truce with Israel

1. Withdrawal of Israeli tanks from the Gaza border.

2. Freeing all the prisoners that were arrested after the killing of the three youths.

3. Lifting the siege and opening the border crossings to commerce and people.

4. Establishing an international seaport and airport which would be under U.N. supervision.

5. Increasing the permitted fishing zone to 10 kilometers.

6. Internationalizing the Rafah Crossing and placing it under the supervision of the U.N. and some Arab nations.

7. International forces on the borders.

8. Easing conditions for permits to pray at the Al Aqsa Mosque.

9. Prohibition on Israeli interference in the reconciliation agreement.

10. Reestablishing an industrial zone and improvements in further economic development in the Gaza Strip.

Please tell me, which of these demands is unreasonable, especially in light of the blockade?

B) Hamas joined the Palestinian Unity Government in June 2014, which recognizes and wishes to negotiate with Israel.

Mahmoud Abbas, President of Palestine

I recognize Israel and it [the new government] will recognize Israel
…
I reject violence and terrorism and the government will also reject violence and terrorism, and I recognize international legality and international commitments and the government will be committed to what I am committed to.

Who else supports the Palestinian Unity Government?… The UN, EU, US, Russia, China, Turkey, and India.

Robert Serry, UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process

President Abbas emphasized that these commitments include recognition of Israel, nonviolence and adherence to previous agreements. [The UN continues to support Palestinian unity] on this basis as the only way to reunite the West Bank and Gaza under one legitimate Palestinian Authority.

It’s interesting to note that Netanyahu used to criticize Abbas for not representing all Palestinians…

But now that the West Bank (Fatah) and Gaza (Hamas) are united, Netanyahu says he won’t negotiate with Abbas because Abbas is working with Hamas -_____-“

Even though the Palestinian Unity Government is composed of independent technocrats, and doesn’t include any members of Hamas or even Abbas’ own Fatah party.

”But the rockets!”

Abba Eban, former Israeli Foreign Minister

Israel has as much to fear from a Palestinian state as the Soviet Union does from Luxembourg.

Theodore Postol, professor of Science, Technology, and International Security, MIT

Well, one has to realize—you know, one has to know some simple technical facts. First of all, most artillery rockets are carrying warheads in the 10-to-20-pound range. So if you’re sitting in a room and the rocket comes through the roof and explodes in the room, it will kill you, and it will kill everybody else in the room. If you have 10 seconds or 20 seconds of warning and you go into the shelter that’s, by law, built in your home, and the rocket happens to hit your home, you won’t be killed. It can even hit the shelter, and you won’t be killed. So, sheltering and early warning are extremely critical to keeping the death toll down. Now, the odds of an artillery rocket going through the roof and into your room are very low. They’re high enough that if I were in Israel, I would advise you, and I would do so myself: I would take shelter, because there’s—you know, the inconvenience is small relative to being killed or injured. But most of these rockets are landing in open areas, landing between buildings, landing outside buildings. And the real danger is that this relatively low-lethality warhead lands within 10 or 20 feet of you.

Now, if you just lie on the ground—let’s say you’re caught in the open, and you can’t go to a shelter—the Israeli government itself will tell you that your chances of being a casualty from a falling artillery rocket are reduced by 80 percent—80 percent—if you simply lie on the ground. And the reason for that is the lethal range of these low-weight warheads is not very large, and they are blowing fragments out sort of like a shotgun, and if you get close to the ground, unless you’re very unlucky and the thing lands on you or lands very close to you, you’re not going to be injured by the explosion. So, although these artillery rockets are fantastically disruptive, with regard to the functioning of Israeli society—and I think that that is true, and because of that, there’s a psychological and political leverage associated with these artillery rocket attacks—they are not killing people, as long as people are taking shelter and sheltering is available.

SIEGEL: By way of contrast, when the Israeli Air Force strikes at targets in Gaza, is the weaponry substantially more accurate than these rockets?

POSTOL: When you're talking about an airstrike from an aircraft, especially with the very, very highly trained pilots Israelis have and, of course, the very advanced equipment that they're using, you're talking about precisions of tens of meters - very, very high precision.

SIEGEL: On the other hand, tens of meters in, let's say a dense place like Gaza City - that could be three houses away.

POSTOL: You're going to kill a lot of innocent people.

As of today (August 19), approximately 16,800 houses have been destroyed, and 100+ UN buildings housing Palestinian refugees have been damaged.

”But the tunnels!”

Since Morsi was ousted, Egypt has been closing the tunnels so effectively that Hamas was almost bankrupt at the beginning of 2014. Hamas also lost the support of Syria, Iran, and Hezbollah.

And they did all this without hammering Gaza militarily AKA “mowing the grass”

”But Hamas is a terrorist organization!”

Too tired… to argue… at this point…

Yitzhak Shamir, 7thPM of Israel

Neither Jewish ethics nor Jewish tradition can disqualify terrorism as a means of combat.

Israel Koenig, The Koenig Memorandum (1976)

We must use terror, assassination, intimidation, land confiscation, and the cutting of all social services to rid the Galilee of its Arab population.

The Goldstone Report, UN fact finding mission, (2009)

3. Attacks by Israeli forces on government buildings and persons of the Gaza authorities, including police

Mission finds that the attacks on these buildings constituted deliberate attacks on civilian objects in violation of the rule of customary international humanitarian law
…
These facts further indicate the commission of the grave breach of extensive destruction of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly.

5. Obligation on Israel to take feasible precautions to protect the civilian population and civilian objects in Gaza

The Mission concludes that the Israeli armed forces violated the requirement under customary international law to take all feasible precautions in the choice of means and method of attack with a view to avoiding and in any event minimizing incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects.

6. Indiscriminate attacks by Israeli forces resulting in the loss of life and injury to civilians

The Mission thus considers the attack to have been indiscriminate, in violation of international law, and to have violated the right to life of the Palestinian civilians killed in these incidents.

7. Deliberate attacks against the civilian population

The Mission further examined an incident in which a mosque was targeted with a missile during early evening prayers, resulting in the death of 15 people, and an attack with flechette munitions on a crowd of family and neighbours at a condolence tent, killing five. The Mission finds that both attacks constitute intentional attacks against the civilian population and civilian objects.

From the facts ascertained in all the above cases, the Mission finds that the conduct of the Israeli armed forces constitutes grave breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention in respect of wilful killings and wilfully causing great suffering to protected persons and, as such, give rise to individual criminal responsibility. It also finds that the direct targeting and arbitrary killing of Palestinian civilians is a violation of the right to life.

9. Attacks on the foundations of civilian life in Gaza: destruction of industrial infrastructure, food production, water installations, sewage treatment plants and housing

The Mission also finds that the destruction of the mill was carried out to deny sustenance to the civilian population, which is a violation of customary international law and may constitute a war crime.

10. The use of Palestinian civilians as human shields

The Palestinian men used as human shields were questioned under threat of death or injury to extract information about Hamas, Palestinian combatants and tunnels. This constitutes a further violation of international humanitarian law.

11. Deprivation of liberty: Gazans detained during the Israeli military operations of 27 December 2008 to 18 January 2009

…continuous and systematic abuse, outrages on personal dignity, humiliating and degrading treatment contrary to fundamental principles of international humanitarian law and human rights law. The Mission concludes that this treatment constitutes the infliction of a collective penalty on these civilians and amounts to measures of intimidation and terror. Such acts are grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and constitute a war crime.

12. Objectives and strategy of Israel’s military operations in Gaza

Statements by Israeli political and military leaders prior to and during the military operations in Gaza indicate that the Israeli military conception of what was necessary in a war with Hamas viewed disproportionate destruction and creating maximum disruption in the lives of many people as a legitimate means to achieve not only military but also political goals. [The definition of terrorism].

13. The impact of the military operations and of the blockade on the people of Gaza and their human rights

Even before the military operations, 80% of the water supplied in Gaza did not meet the World Health Organization’s standards for drinking water.

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"What about Iraq, Nigeria, Syria, Ukraine?"

This is a distraction; the same logic could be applied any which way. Here, look:

“Why focus on Boko Haram, what about ISIS!”

Of course I want Boko Haram and ISIS to go straight to hell, but none of these discussions are mutually exclusive.

"Given all this global violence, why is everyone focusing on the Jews?"

I don’t respect these thinly veiled accusations of anti-Semetism. They reflect a fundamental lack of critical thinking.

Zionism is a political ideology.

You can respect and admire the Israeli national identity, the Jewish culture, the religion of Judaism (as I do)… while being critical of a relatively recent political ideology, surely?

In the OP I made the analogy that you can disagree with the Chinese Communist Party, without being anti-Chinese. I think that covers 90% of people here.

A more apt analogy would be you can, and should, have been against apartheid in South Africa.

Would being anti-apartheid have made you anti-Dutch?

Come on…

Self-hating Jews

Sometimes you see this on Chinese message boards:

Any Chinese who has anything critical to say about China…  is a “self-hating traitor”.

IMO it’s a good idea to be wary of people and organizations who claim to be infallible and above reproach…

Evidence of Anti-Semitism

For every instance, there’s an equal case on the opposite side of the fence.

http://news.yahoo.com/israeli-wedding-jew-muslim-draws-protesters-amid-war-000304290.html

Racism, bigotry, nationalism, stupidity… ****it’s everywhere**** :O

[Ian]

Jews settled in Europe not out of choice, but because they were kicked from land to land and settled wherever they could find a modicum of tolerance. Like the Roma and Sinti, they became a stateless people, and as such were constantly persecuted. The underlying theme of existence became the hope of returning to Samaria and Judea, someday. That's what kept the Sephardim and Ashkenazis going.

Raison D’être

The “underlying theme of existence” since when?

Let’s be clear - it was an early 19th Century project, in response to anti-Semitism in Europe. From a couple thousand years BCE to the present, that’s a blip on the timeline.

Also, I don’t think you can say that Zionism was an ideology that “they all held sacred”.

I’m not sure it was the raison d’être of the Mizrahim to leave all their possessions behind, only to arrive in Israel and live in tents.

There were about 11,000,000 Jews worldwide in 1946, and only about 1,200,000 settled in Palestine by 1949.

Then there are the Orthodox Jews who still oppose Zionism for religious reasons.

Persecution

You make it sound like everything since the Kingdom of Judah until the Anti-Jewish pogroms in Russia and the Holocaust…has been one long string of persecution

Which period are we talking about? Roman, Ottoman, Mongol…?

E.g.
Jewish communities thrived in all major Byzantine cities since Constantine I. They weren’t obliged to live in distinct ghettos, were allowed to build synagogues… yes Jews were persecuted under Emperor Herakleios and Leo III, but in general they enjoyed a high standard of living, and were an integral part of Byzantine society. The Egyptian Rabbi Solomon was the emperor’s physician.

And in Persia, I’m sure you’re aware that the Second Temple in Jerusalem was rebuilt according to the decree of Cyrus, Darius and Ataxerxes.

…

Also, any persecution from living under a theocratic state and following the “wrong” religion, has to be adjusted to the period.

Christians were persecuted for hundreds of years until Theodosius I, as well as during the French Revolution, the Ottoman Empire, the DPRK etc.

Muslims were persecuted during the Crusades, under the Mongol Empire, the Sikh Empire, the Russian Empire, during the Bosnian genocide etc.

We don’t know how Christians and Arabs would’ve fared under Jewish rule, as the Kingdom of Judah and Kingdom of Israel were gone hundreds of years before Christ.

Although based on biblical accounts of how the Israelites disposed of the Hittites, Girgashites, Canaanites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, Jebusites, Amalekites, Midianites, and based on current events, we can make an educated guess.

…

My point is, you can easily find evidence for and against at any point in history.

The balance sheet of Jewish persecution isn’t definitely black or red; you have to look at these things case by case.

----------------------------------------------

A Jewish remnant has existed in the region of Samaria/Judea unbroken from after the final Roman conquest to now, and has always maintained a presence in the region. Though numerically fewer than other Semitic people (the Arabs), they have a historic foothold there.

The chronology of inhabitation goes:

-Canaanites
-Egyptians
-Philistines
-Israelites
-Phoenicians
-Assyrians
-Babylonians
-Persians
-Macedonians
-Romans
-Arabs
-Crusaders
-Ayubiyyin
-Memluks
-Ottomans
-British Mandate

I don’t know enough about archaeology and genetic research to comment on your claim of unbroken inhabitation… but it’s obvious that the Israelites can’t claim exclusivity.

Hardly an “inheritance”.

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Large swatches of land possessed by Arabs, were also legitimately purchased by Jews prior to the Partition, from warlords and tribal leaders who snickered because they were selling malarial swampland of no value to them. Then the Jews drained the swamps and created thriving farms.

Zionist historians like to describe pre-independence Palestine as a “wilderness” which they “saved”

In actual fact, it was already intensely cultivated.

Moshe Shertok, 2nd PM of Israel

The proposed Jewish state would not be continuous. The frontier line would separate villages from their fields…the Arab reaction [to the partition idea] would be negative because they would lose everything and gain almost nothing…they would lose the richest part of Palestine…the orange plantations, the commercial and industrial centres…most of the coastal areas…and [they] would be driven out into the desert.

As for now, we must not forget who would have to exchange the land? Those villagers who live more than others on irrigation, on orange and fruit plantations, in houses built near water wells and pumping stations, on livestock and property and easy access to markets. Where would they go? What would they receive in return? This would be such an uprooting, such a shock the likes of which had never occurred before and could drown the whole thing in rivers of blood.

They also like to play up the legitimacy of purchasing land.

Well, only 5.5% of Palestine was purchased through the Jewish National Fund ahead of the Partition.

The Zionists received 40% through the Partition.

And after the general armistice in 1948, they had captured 78% of Palestine, including 95% of its arable land (that the Mandatory authority had classified as “good”).

They had also expropriated 80% of privately-owned Palestinian land, and 40% of private property of the Arabs who remained within Partition borders.

Which ties into:

Israel rightfully won the land when Syria, Jordan, Egypt and the Arabs armies tried to destroy Israel i.e. the spoils of War

In that case, you’d also have to be in favour of:

-The Iraq invasion of Kuwait
-The Japanese occupation of Eastern China
-The PRC invasion of Tibet
-The Indonesian occupation of East Timor

UN General Assembly resolution 2625 (XXV)

The territory of a State shall not be the object of acquisition by another State resulting from the threat or use of force. No territorial acquisition resulting from the threat or use of force shall be recognized as legal.

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They…were given a piece of the original land back, and they want to keep it.

You make it sound so innocuous

You know, I’m sure, that the British killed about 5,000 Palestinians in the 1936-39 Arab Revolt.

This was not a series of “happenings” or “disturbances”, as Zionist scholars put it.

This was an anti-colonial struggle for independence, and a protest against Jewish immigration, especially the Peel Commission, which stipulated an increase of Jewish land from 5.5% to 40%, with a provision for the “forcible transfer of Arabs”.

1936-39 Arab Revolt, Wikipedia

The main form of collective punishment employed by the British forces was destruction of property. Sometimes entire villages were reduced to rubble, as happened to Mi'ar in October 1938; more often several prominent houses were blown up and others were trashed inside.[1][56] The biggest single act of destruction occurred in Jaffa on 16 June 1936, when large gelignite charges were used to cut long pathways through the old city, destroying 220–240 buildings and rendering up to 6,000 Arabs homeless.

Desmond Woods, an officer of the Royal Ulster Rifles, described the massacre at al-Bassa:

Now I will never forget this incident ... We were at al-Malikiyya, the other frontier base and word came through about 6 o'clock in the morning that one of our patrols had been blown up and Millie Law [the dead officer] had been killed. Now Gerald Whitfeld [Lieutenant-Colonel G.H.P. Whitfeld, the battalion commander] had told these mukhtars that if any of this sort of thing happened he would take punitive measures against the nearest village to the scene of the mine. Well the nearest village to the scene of the mine was a place called al-Bassa and our Company C were ordered to take part in punitive measures. And I will never forget arriving at al-Bassa and seeing the Rolls Royce armoured cars of the 11th Hussars peppering Bassa with machine gun fire and this went on for about 20 minutes and then we went in and I remembered we had lighted braziers and we set the houses on fire and we burnt the village to the ground ... Monty had him [the battalion commander] up and he asked him all about it and Gerald Whitfeld explained to him. He said "Sir, I have warned the mukhtars in these villages that if this happened to any of my officers or men, I would take punitive measures against them and I did this and I would've lost control of the frontier if I hadn't." Monty said "All right but just go a wee bit easier in the future.”

I’m sure you’re also aware that Dr. Selig Soskin, Director of the Land Settlement Department of the Jewish National Fund, estimated 250,000 Palestinians would have to be expelled. Although the final number was around 700,000

And for the British to gift a chunk of Ottoman South Syria to a bunch of Eastern Europeans?

That required some of that renowned British colonial arrogance:

Arthur Balfour, PM of the UK, 1902-05, author of the Balfour Declaration

[I]n Palestine, we do not propose even to go through the form of consulting the wishes of the present inhabitants of the country. The four great powers are committed to Zionism and Zionism, be it right or wrong, good or bad, is rooted in age-long tradition, in present needs, in future hopes, of far profounder impact than the desires of the 700,000 Arabs who now inhabit this ancient land.

Ah well, history’s full of it.

[Interloper]

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4151/ ... ish-state#

Why the Palestinians Refuse to Recognize Israel as a Jewish State

by Ali Salim
February 3, 2014 at 5:00 am
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4151/ ... wish-state

The core of the problem is that Palestinian recognition of Israel as the state of the Jewish People would not only end the dream of the return to Palestine, but also of the destruction of Israel currently being implemented through the incitement and terrorist campaign waged by the Palestinian People in their institutions, mosques, schools, terrorist organizations and foreign propaganda centers. Their strategic intention is to perpetuate the conflict, not end it.

The real reason Mahmoud Abbas wants control of the bridges and crossings, and refuses to leave them in Israeli hands, is to duplicate the terrorism of the Gaza Strip -- to smuggle in arms and establish terrorist squads. Crossings left in Israel's hands would mean greater security for Jordan as well.

The world watches while the Palestinian Authority is actively promoting a campaign for an academic boycott and economic sanctions to be imposed on Israel, evidently backed by veiled threats from U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.

First, every Muslim knows that the Jews in Israel are the descendants of the ancient Hebrew nation known as the Israelites, we also recognize the fact that the Jews have been connected to the blessed land of Palestine for thousands of years, even before the Romans conquered Judea and changed its name to Palestina, as attested to by history. The ties of the Jews to the Holy Land have been documented by all the sacred books, including the Holy Qur'an.

Now, while the Jews are determined that the Palestinians recognize the State of Israel as the national homeland of the Jewish People, the Palestinian Authority [PA] unfortunately rejects this demand. High-ranking PA figures claim that the Jews do not have religious or historical claims to the Holy Land. The Jews took the land by force, they say, and therefore want to reinforce their tenuous link to it by having the Palestinians recognize the State of Israel as the Jewish national state.

The real reason for their refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish country, however, is that the rais [chief], President Mahmoud Abbas, the man who claims to be the leader of the Palestinian people, has never abandoned the demand for the return of the Palestinians to "Palestine," that is, the entire State of Israel, so that it might be destroyed.

The Palestinian rais also interferes personally in the affairs of the sovereign State of Israel, especially in matters concerning Israeli Arabs. As part of the negotiations brokered by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Abbas demanded the release of Palestinian terrorist operatives holding Israeli citizenship. He claimed he refused to recognize the State of Israel as a Jewish state because he felt responsible for the rights of the 20% of Israeli citizens who were Palestinian Arabs.

He uses that claim, however, to hide his true intentions. If Mahmoud Abbas really wanted to found a Palestinian state bordering on the State of Israel, he would have been only too happy to accept the suggestion made by Israel's Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, and rushed to absorb Israel's Arab citizens along with their lands and assets as part of the exchange of territories and population demanded by the peace agreement. In that way he could have increased the size of Palestine, liberated the Israeli Arabs from the Israeli regime that Palestinians call "the rule of occupation and apartheid," and brought more territory and citizens to his new country.

The truth, however, is that what President Mahmoud Abbas is really planning to establish is a Palestinian state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, by flooding the State of Israel with Muslim Palestinians as part of the so-called "return" of the Palestinian refugees. He does not want an Israel next door to the Palestinian state, and therefore refuses to recognize it as the national homeland of the Jews.

In reality, the Jews of Israel do not need recognition from the Palestinians; the Palestinian people itself is new, having been created only recently, and barely meets international criteria for the definition of "a people." Very few Palestinians have been there for many generations. Most of them are from various isolated families, tribes and groups with no common history. Either they came with invading armies, or were imported as cheap labor by the Turks and British, or wanted to profit from the economic advances made by the Jews who had returned to rebuild their homeland. Others fled to Palestine from neighboring Arab countries because they were involved in blood feuds and feared for their lives.

The random collection of people who arrived from around the Arab-Muslim world and gathered in the Land of Israel, especially during the past two centuries, was ruled by different occupiers, primarily the Ottoman Turks. The population was divided and riven by disagreement, and came to look upon itself as a national group only at the beginning of the 20th century. The Jews have had a common identity for nearly three thousand years. Unlike the Jews, the Palestinians are not documented in the Holy Qur'an or the Old and New Testaments. There is no documentation of their presence in Palestine, in the history books of the ancient or modern world or in books written by travelers who came from overseas over the centuries, such as Mark Twain's Innocents Abroad.

The Jews in Israel have a number of reasons for demanding their country be recognized as their national homeland. For the Jews, Palestinian recognition of the State of Israel as the national homeland of the Jews means the end of the conflict. They want to be sure that a Palestinian state bordering on Israel is the Palestinians' final demand and that they accept the fact of Israel's existence. They want to be sure the Palestinians will not try to use force or subterfuge to change the Jewish majority in Israel. They want to be sure no attempt will be made to force Israel to accept the return of the grandchildren and great grandchildren of Palestinian refugees who have already been settled in the neighboring countries and should remain there with their Arab brothers even after the regimes have stabilized in the wake of the Arab Spring. The end of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict basically means mutual recognition.

The Palestinians, on the other hand, find it difficult to recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish nation in Palestine. They claim that the demand was never made of the Egyptians or Jordanians before they made peace (treaties with those two countries dealt mainly with territory). As far as they are concerned, as soon as the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state, their claims and the demand for all of the land of Palestine, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea will no longer be considered legitimate. The Palestinians demand a state for themselves, and also demand to settle their citizens in Israel, the neighboring Jewish state. This hypocrisy increases exponentially when the Palestinians claim Israel is a country of discrimination, occupation, apartheid and oppression. If this is so, why do they insist so strongly on the "right of return" and not rush to welcome their refugees with open arms into the newly liberated state of Palestine?

The core of the problem is that Palestinian recognition of Israel as the state of the Jewish People would not only end the dream of the return to Palestine, but also of the destruction of Israel currently being implemented through the incitement and terrorist campaign waged by the Palestinians in their institutions, mosques, schools, terrorist organizations and foreign propaganda centers -- one facet of the myth being constructed of the existence of the "Palestinian People." Recognition would also give Israel Islamic legitimacy.

Since the Nakba in 1948, the "expulsion" from Palestine, the Palestinians have been constructing their legacy. Their strategic intention is to perpetuate the conflict, not end it. That is also the strategic intention of the Israeli Arabs, who insist on preserving their "national Palestinian identity" while living in Jewish Israel, enjoying the rights and privileges of people in a democratic society, and at the same time hoping for its destruction, and sometimes actively participating in terrorist activity against it.

The real reason Mahmoud Abbas wants control of the Jordan River bridges and crossings, and refuses to leave them in Israeli hands, is that the Palestinians in the West Bank want to duplicate the terrorism of the Gaza Strip -- smuggle in arms and establish terrorist squads as they did during the 1970s. They want to pave the way for waves of mujahideen to flood the West Bank and blow up Israeli civilians along the country's eastern border in the vain hope that Israel will finally be destroyed and a Palestinian state will be established "from the River to the Sea." Crossings left in Israel's hands would incidentally mean not only greater security for Israel, but for Jordan as well.


Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas with European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, in January 2012. Ali Salim writes that boycotting Israel is a strategy backed by many "bogus-moralists" in Europe, even though it causes increased joblessness among Palestinians. (Image source: European Union)
During the first and second intifidas [uprisings], when the Palestinians boycotted Israeli-manufactured goods and refused to work for Israelis, we thought the boycott would destroy Israel's economy, but the result was that we hurt only ourselves. Goods made in Israel were smuggled into the occupied territories and sold at exorbitant prices, many times what they cost in Israel; and when Palestinian construction workers stayed home, the Israelis began using industrial building methods, so now the workers are still at home.

I worry that the Palestinians are irresponsible and gambling with their fate and with their children's future. Instead of recognizing Israel as the Jewish state as part of a package deal of mutual recognition leading to a life a peace, they are trying to force the world unilaterally to recognize a Palestinian state.

The danger is that when the Israelis realize that the Palestinians manipulators do not have any real intention of forging a peace agreement, Israel will withdraw from territories it does not want to rule, as it did in the Gaza Strip. The Palestinians will receive far less from Israel than they could have achieved through dialogue, and will spend the rest of their days living as bad neighbors in a state of hopeless, eternal conflict.

A boycott of Israeli universities -- with laboratories responsible for so many Nobel Prizes and the creation of such stunning advances for the good of all humanity -- will not reduce Israeli academic excellence. The people who will suffer the most again are the thousands of Palestinian breadwinners who currently work in Israel's factories and fields, both in Israel itself and in the West Bank -- yet another example of the West's duplicitous crocodile tears in pretending to care about the Palestinians but in reality, not a jot. The resulting joblessness can only breed even greater unrest, moving both parties farther away from peace -- a strategy doubtless backed by many of these bogus-moralists in Europe from the outset.

If I were an Israeli, I would insist on Palestinian recognition of the State of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish People. This Palestinian recognition would make it accepted as a religious duty for the entire Islamic nation to make peace with Israel, and make it possible for an independent, flourishing Palestinian state to be established on Israel's eastern border.

[Interloper]

index.php

"No friendships, dammit! Stop it now!"

[Michael]

http://rumsoakedfist.org/index.php

"No friendships, dammit! Stop it now!"

Say wot?

[Dajenarit]

Thats what I was gonna ask but decided not to bother. She might just be talking to herself again...

[Dajenarit]

By the whole logic of the right of return. What are people gonna say if Native Americans or First Americans as some like to be called to accentuate the point, decide to organize, maybe get some foreign aid, and pick up arms to toss out anyone who can't trace their lineage to an original native tribe? Lol How well would that go over with Israel first Americans? Native Americans were displaced much much less than 1800 years ago, and I'm sure if you survey enough tribes you'll find a religious belief in one of them that claims their creator god handed them the lands they resided on. You know something to justify ethnic cleansing. There were some pretty warlike tribes that given the chance...... That is if they weren't all near extinction.

Then again that's why Leonard Peltier and the rest of the A.I.M. movement got the hammer dropped on them so hard by CoIntelPro. Revolutionary War worshipping Americans seem to hate any revolutionaries in their own backyard or living abroad fighting against one of their petty interests.

[Michael]

Of course, just a joke, but yeah.

[Steve James]

The thing about Amerindians (i.e., the pre-Columbian peoples of the US) is that they'll never be able to get the lands back that were taken. In the east and southeast, the natives were relocated to the southwest. When you drive through Oklahoma, every turnpike goes through Indian land. Otoh, many eastern nations have gone into the casino business. In the Dakotas, the Lakota want their sacred lands back. But there, as in Alaska, there's oil in them thar lands.

However, there's no reason why people can't share the land. Well, actually, they have to; the issue is who controls and benefits from it.

[Interloper]

Interesting:
http://www.timesofisrael.com/chloe-vald ... -activism/

Growing up in New Orleans, Chloe Valdary kept kosher, studied the Jewish Bible and celebrated Jewish holidays with festive meals. In recent years she has become an outspoken pro-Israel campus activist, contributing regularly to the Jewish press, and speaking and posting widely about the merits of the Jewish state on social media.

But the senior at the University of New Orleans is not Jewish. She is Christian — a member of the Intercontinental Church of God, whose adherents revere the Hebrew Bible and follow the Jewish calendar — and she is black.

In July, Valdary, 21, garnered widespread attention for a Tablet piece in which she accused pro-Palestinian activists of misappropriating the rhetoric of the black civil rights movement. In the piece, titled “To the Students for Justice in Palestine, a Letter From an Angry Black Woman,” Valdary addressed the campus group.

“You do not have the right to invoke my people’s struggle for your shoddy purposes, and you do not get to feign victimhood in our name,” she wrote.

Valdary, who has blogged for The Times of Israel for the past two years, also listed prominent black civil rights-era Zionists, telling Israel’s college-age critics, “You do not get to pretend as though you and Rosa Parks would have been great buddies in the 1960s. Rosa Parks was a real Freedom Fighter. Rosa Parks was a Zionist.” (Parks signed a 1975 letter by the Black Americans to Support Israel Committee, backing Israel’s right to exist.)

Her outspoken support for Israel in the name of civil rights not only cuts against the arguments of Students for Justice in Palestine and other critics of Israel, but also against the drift of much black civil rights rhetoric over the past few decades.

While a number of early civil rights leaders, including the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., were supportive of Israel, subsequent black leaders — particularly starting with the black power movement in the late 1960s — often have been sharply critical of the Jewish state. Black power leader Stokely Carmichael described Israel as a “settler colony,” while more recently, professor and activist Cornel West endorsed the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement and called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “war criminal.”

Against that backdrop, Valdary’s stance and identity make her a uniquely compelling voice in the world of Israel advocacy.

“Because so many prominent black leaders are hostile to Israel, it makes it even more powerful to have someone who’s black supporting Israel,” said Morton Klein, president of the Zionist Organization of America, a hardline Israel advocacy group.

Indeed, a number of pro-Israel organizations, including AIPAC and Christians United for Israel, have made concerted efforts in recent years to develop ties with African-American supporters.

According to recent public opinion surveys by Pew Research Center focused on the conflict in Gaza, black Americans have tended to be somewhat less sympathetic toward Israel (64 percent expressing “a lot” or “some” sympathy for Israel, versus 70 percent for whites), and somewhat more critical of its response to Hamas, with 36 percent saying Israel’s response had gone too far, compared to 22 percent of white Americans.

Valdary, who grew up attending grade school with a number of Jewish friends, said that despite their common religious practices, she didn’t feel a particular sense of personal connection to Jews. That changed in her freshman year of high school, when Valdary saw the 2007 film “Freedom Writers,” in which a high school teacher uses the Holocaust to teach her minority students about facing discrimination in their own lives.

Inspired by the movie, Valdary began to read voraciously about the Holocaust and Jewish history, as well as novels such as “Exodus” by Leon Uris and “The Town Beyond the Wall” by Elie Wiesel.

The themes raised in her reading, combined with hearing news about anti-Semitic incidents around the world, sparked Valdary’s passion for Zionism. “Exodus,” a fictional and highly sympathetic account of the founding of the State of Israel, was particularly influential.

“The importance of Jewish pride as a theme throughout the book really inspired me to take action and do something about the rising anti-Semitism,” Valdary told JTA.

Once she arrived at the University of New Orleans, Valdary threw herself into campus activity, both at her school and nearby Tulane University, which unlike UNO has a substantial Jewish population. Her work caught the attention of the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America, or Camera, which has funded Valdary’s own campus organization, Allies of Israel, at UNO.

One of her pro-Israel rallies at UNO also was noted by a coordinator for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which then sponsored her to come to an AIPAC policy conference and subsequently paid for her to take a 10-day trip to Israel — a trip Valdary described as “life changing.”

Since then, Valdary has worked with and spoken to a number of pro-Israel groups. She spent this summer in Boston employed as a paid consultant for Camera, which is still funding Allies for Israel, and will resume working for the group later this month.

Her mentor, Dumisani Washington, is a black minister who serves as the Diversity Outreach Coordinator for Christians United for Israel, an evangelical pro-Israel group led by Pastor John Hagee. Valdary also was a featured speaker at the ZOA’s national convention in March, and she has recorded videos for Americans for Peace and Tolerance, which was founded by conservative pro-Israel advocate Charles Jacobs.

‘Her rejection of the demonization of Israel is not based on being a talking head on the right or the left. It’s based on being a very articulate and thoughtful leader on campus’

But Valdary also has found a receptive audience beyond the more hardline groups. In August, she spoke at an event organized by The Alumni Community, a New York-area alumni group for Birthright Israel, which is less ideologically oriented. And not all of her fans consider themselves conservative.

“She’s a champion on campus of a Zionism that doesn’t apologize and also comes from a deep place of humanism,” said Rabbi Menachem Creditor of Congregation Netivot Shalom in Berkeley, Calif., who describes himself as a “progressive Zionist.”

“Her rejection of the demonization of Israel is not based on being a talking head on the right or the left. It’s based on being a very articulate and thoughtful leader on campus.”

Although her views on Israel tend to be aligned with more right-leaning pro-Israel groups, Valdary maintains that her opinions are based on liberal ideals. She argues that Israel’s sovereignty over Arab citizens “speaks to the concept of indigenous people” — the Jewish people, according to Valdary — thus is a liberal value. This places her at odds with a number of Israel critics, as well as black leaders such as Carmichael and Angela Davis, who have argued that the Palestinians are indigenous while Jewish-Israelis are colonizing interlopers.

Valdary says that “Israeli society, like any other society, has issues with discrimination, but in terms of systematic discrimination, like apartheid in Africa or Jim Crow, that does not exist in Israeli society.” She says that she opposes a two-state solution, favoring a “Jewish one-state solution” in which all citizens in Israel and its territories can vote, but “the culture, the personality” of Israel is Jewish.

‘A right-wing evangelical has been recruited to attack Jewish intellectuals and to tell them that they are bad Jews’

Valdary’s political views, and her invocation of civil rights history and rhetoric in the cause of Zionism, has made her a controversial figure and a lightning rod for criticism. Some of the criticism has been racially derogatory, as when blogger Richard Silverstein posted an article of Valdary’s on Facebook with the note, “They finally did it: found a Negro Zionist: Uncle Tom is dancin’ for joy!”

Other criticism has focused more on her aggressive attacks on critics of Israel. In a speech at Brandeis University, writer and filmmaker Max Blumenthal, a harsh critic of Israel, after describing a pair of Valdary critiques of Israel critics Judith Butler and Maya Wind, said, “This is a perfect example of where the Israel lobby is heading, of where Zionism itself is heading, is that a right-wing evangelical has been recruited to attack Jewish intellectuals and to tell them that they are bad Jews.” (Valdary does not consider herself an evangelical or right wing.)

Blumenethal added, “I find it peculiar that someone with no credentials is so outspoken, so heavily promoted on this issue.”

In a response to Blumenthal, Valdary herself invoked race, when she and co-author Daniel Mael accused Blumenthal of classifying critics like Valdary as “black people who obviously have no capability to think for themselves.” Blumenthal did not mention Valdary’s race in his comments at Brandeis.

After she graduates from the University of New Orleans, Valdary hopes to intern at The Wall Street Journal, on the opinion side, and to study at the Tikvah Advanced Institutes, a right-leaning series of political and economic seminars. She also wants to spend a year in Israel. Upon her return, Valdary hopes to start a “Zionist movement,” though her plans on that front are still hazy.

Whatever it turns out to be, though, Valdary will have fans eagerly awaiting her moves.

“Her heart is beautiful, her mind is beautiful, her words are powerful,” the ZOA’s Klein said. “She’s really the whole package.”

[Steve James]

According to recent public opinion surveys by Pew Research Center focused on the conflict in Gaza, black Americans have tended to be somewhat less sympathetic toward Israel (64 percent expressing “a lot” or “some” sympathy for Israel, versus 70 percent for whites), and somewhat more critical of its response to Hamas, with 36 percent saying Israel’s response had gone too far, compared to 22 percent of white Americans.

Imo, the issue revolves around the question "who is oppressing whom?" I don't think that the reason non-Jewish people support Israel's right to exist (which I don't think was part of the poll) is because they feel that Israeli's or Jews are being persecuted in Israel or the ME. I think many of them see that Palestinians are the ones suffering. So, even if they support Israel's right to exist as a state, they don't necessarily agree with the treatment of Palestinians. I wouldn't say that they are Zionists, in the political sense, though I think there are plenty of Black Christians who identify with Zion, from the religious perspective.

It's true about the rise of overt Black anti-Semitism against Jews after the second world-war. But, in my personal experience, Jews were singled out as part of the entire "White" race. For Black writers in the north, as in Harlem, Jews were singled out as the slumlords to whom rent was paid. But, that was an economic stereotype that had nothing to do with religion or Israel. However, the rhetoric of some elements of the Black Muslims had a purely racial-religious basis.

Maybe it's ironic, but today I know of more Black people who would argue that they were the "original" Jews than those who spout overt hate. I can understand how those who support Israel unreservedly see lack of support as an indication of enmity. But, I don't think that people today see the situation as a civil rights or human rights issue --with the Palestinians being the oppressors.

[Interloper]

http://www.jpost.com/Blogs/Enemies-of-Z ... war-374860

[Michael]

Otoh, many eastern nations have gone into the casino business.

Any idea if they prohibit Indians from gambling in their own casinos?