Israeli Government Ads Warn Against Marrying Non-Jews

[Kulindahr]

Iran is a threat to Israel but less so because of the weapons they may attack them with than what the security of having those weapons will allow them to so as far as arming hezbollah is concerned. I'm confident that Israel can more than defend itself from any overt threat from Iran and focusing on Iran allows the right in Israel to ignore its real long term problem which is demographics.
. . . .
There is no easy answer to that problem which is why its easier to ignore than solve but the reality remains that the real threat to Israel does not come from countries which border it or countries that wish it harm....it comes from within the territory Israel controls.

There would be no threat from within the territory Israel controls were it not for the enemies which surround them.
And they are surrounded: that doesn't mean that every country contiguous to them is officially hostile; it means that in every direction, within easy military striking range, there are those who would see them slaughtered.

Those who threaten from within are those who threaten from without: Hamas is Iran, Iran is Hamas; behind them and other destructionist groups are Syria, Saudi Arabia, and more.

 

[Kulindahr]

I just want to say that sometimes people get lost in hate.

they think that the answer to someone hating them or someone that they care about is to hate them back.

the only thing that wins in that scenario is hatred. Look no further than the Israeli pallestinian conflict for the reality of that.

If you want to conquer hate you can't participate.

no matter what.

In any way.

It worked for the Romans.

 

[Kulindahr]

Because Israelis took them from Arabs in the first place...

Many were properly bought by Israelis, or given them by the lawful government of the time -- the British.

which, I need to add, was caused by the fact that Israelis weren't natives in this land, weren't even born there, so it's no suprising their right to this land was questionable in the eyes of the Arabs.

Not being born there doesn't make it not their homeland. I know Irish, Scots, Germans, and others, whose family hasn't had a member in those countries in six or eight generations, yet they still talk wistfully of somehow managing to "go back home" for a visit.

Israel ... wants Jews to emmigrate to Israel, in order to change the ethnic balanse of this land.

To the contrary: Israel needs Jews to emigrate merely to maintain the Jewish percentage -- thus the concern.

It wouldn't be a bad thing for Israel to increase its Jewish population. However it realizes the presence of an enormous Palestinian one and eventually they will be independent of Israel. How they will survive without Israeli aid (money, gasoline, electricity, food, building supplies) I do not know.

They won't try -- if they manage to get an independent state, they'll claim that Israel "owes" them all that aid... and if they don't get it, they'll whip up their friends in the U.N. to get the other authoritarian countries in the world to pass yet another GA resolution condemning people who just want to live in their onw land, in peace.

 

[Kulindahr]

No, why do you have a right to return there, if the population that lives there for hundreds of years doesn't wish so? Can the English claim Denmark as their ancestral homeland, because Anlo-saxons came from there? Can WASPs from USA take back the UK if they wished so?

Those people weren't driven out at sword point.
And the ones left behind didn't forswear their heritage.

Studies have shown that it's difficult to find people who have lived in the Palestine region for a thousand years who aren't significantly Jewish, genetically. Most are descended from Jews who claimed not to be Jews, in order to not have to pack up and leave.

Other middleeastern states apparently survive without Israel, so Palestine probably would as well. If palestinian autonomy is currently dependant on Israel, it probably is much due to the 42 yo israeli occupation. They weren't yet given a chance to prosper separately.

Many Palestinians have in fact prospered -- which shows that they have had a chance.

Obviously, the memory of Palestine was important part of jewish heritage. I've heard about the "let us meet next year in Jerusalem" stuff. But if Jews really wanted to live in Palestine, they could. They did not, because they were better off where they actually lived. How many of the milions of Jews that lived between the I and late XIX centuries actually tried to settle there? Zionism was a modern national movement, and while it obviously based on old traditions, it was something new.

I recently read a book about Jews in the Christian Middle Ages.
In many times and places, it was illegal for a Jew to move to a new place without permission from the local bishop. It was not rare for Jews who expressed an actual intent to move to Israel to be killed. Often, Jews were forbidden to speak of the Temple; if they did, it was punished as blasphemy -- in fact, a major function of the infamous Spanish Inquisition was to ferret out hidden Jews, extracting confessions from them (thus proving they were Jews) or torturing them to death (thus proving they were Devil-possessed Jews). When the Crusades came, in many lands Jews were forbidden from participating.

It wasn't until the rise of secular nations, and then of the possibility of travel, that most Jews ever had a hope of "next year in Jerusalem", let alone going and remaining. And their homeland didn't become secular until....

Oh, wait -- it never did, except arguably under the British.

Palestinian Territories used to be entire Palestine. Zionism and creation of Israel reduced it to 29% of it, and even that doesn't satisfy Israel. You can not deny that emergance of zionism ment tragedy to Palestinians.

That first statement is a tautology: all you did was give the definition of what "Palestinian" was -- it meant, "someone who lives inside the borders of Palestine". That meant Arabs, Persians, Jews, and anyone else who'd settled.

If you mean it as "Palestinian people", there never was such a thing; indeed, it was the birthing of Israel which sparked the birthing of such a people -- and then it meant, "everyone who was a Palestinian already, except not the Jews". Thus, the term "Palestinian" denoting a people didn't exist before WW II, and it was born as a racist term, one used to divide "us" from "them" on the basis of a person's blood -- specifically, Jewish blood.

So the tragedy of Zionism, in your context, is that its enemies conceived a racist hatred and defined themselves around it -- and that racism remains a deep part of their self-definition today.

But Palestinians are not the only ones to blame for intifada, because these were the conditions created by Israel that made it probable.

Blaming the victims, now....

It is the very existence of Israel that sparked the violence! The heritage of the Arab Legion endures....

How can you expect Palestinians to keep quiet, if definite sollution to the Israeli-Palestinian problem was not yet found? Why do you expect responsible governance from Palestinians, if, due to Israel (and their own mistakes, as well of their arab brothers) they were living under foreign hostile occupation for decades, and couldn't get acquainted with how to gouvern? It's like complaining that the black people of RPA don't know how to gouvern as well as the white ones: perhaps it's true, but it is so not without a reason.

People in the freed Eastern Bloc in Europe, out from under the thumb of the [STRIKE]Russian Empire[/STRIKE] Soviet Union, figured it out quickly enough.

The Palestinian governments are either corrupt or terrorist. Always have been. Arafat fucked his own people over with his corrupt Fatah. They would have never been able to effectively govern themselves. That being said, the two Palestinian governments have all the opportunity now to show they will be responsible and they are pissing all over it.

Arafat taught the Palestinians two things: to lie, and deal in violence.
They've followed him well.

 

[Kulindahr]

One loses track what this thread is about....

S E X​

 

[irydion]

You did not take into consideration that the modern era has made it much easier for people to move about the world.

It's made communication easier, but it's also made borders between countries much harder to cross.

The modern Zionist movement is simply a manifestation of the long held Jewish desire to return to Israel.

Yup, all the other modern nationalisms started in XIX century, but the jewish one existed since Abraham...

In the Middle Ages, the rich Jews certainly would not have given up their positions in society just to move to Israel. Money talks over all else. The poor simply would not have been able to afford such a move which would have cost an exorbitant sum before the advent of steam power. That being said, there actually were emigrations of Jews from European and Arab countries to Israel throughout to ages, including many prominent Rabbis and their followers.

Not significant ones, it seems. The poor could go to Palestine as well. They did get to western and eastern Europe in the first place after all. If Jews could get as far as China, if they could move en masse to Poland-Lithuania, they could also move to Palestine.

You're wrong. "Palestinian Territories" used to be under occupation by empires going back to the Romans. It's never actually been a Palestinian country. The last time there actually was an independent country within the bounds of modern Israel, it was the Jewish Hasmonean Kingdom.

Uh, no, there were certain semi-independant arabic emirates in Palestine since then, as well as the Kingdom of Jerusalem.
But it's not what I've ment. "Palestinian territories" does not imply "palestinian state", but territories inhabited by Palestinians.

Without Zionism and Israel, the land wouldn't be what it is today, the 24th most developed country in the world.

I doubt Palestinians living in Hayfa or Acre 100 years ago would be happy that their cities are so prosperous, taking into account they are settled with another people, and their own offspring lives in exile.

Thanks for apologizing for terrorism, I'll remember that from now on. I think you should now apologize to its victims.

I am not a terrorist. I am not an Arab. I am not a Palestinian. I don't see a reason why I should apologise for anything.
Anyway, shouldn't Israel apologise to the victims of its policies as well?

The Palestinian governments are either corrupt or terrorist. Always have been. Arafat fucked his own people over with his corrupt Fatah. They would have never been able to effectively govern themselves. That being said, the two Palestinian governments have all the opportunity now to show they will be responsible and they are pissing all over it.

Palestinians are a traumatised society. Mass expulsions, decades of occupation, people dieing everyday. You can not expect them to start being a well-functioning society all of the sudden, especially since their problems - the question of refugees, the borders, the independance - weren't settled yet.

Many were properly bought by Israelis, or given them by the lawful government of the time -- the British.

1) Israelis did buy land from the great land owners, evicting the palestinian tenants and replacing them with Jews. Of course, that was not always the case, but it made jewish presence unwelcome.
The British weren't the lawful gouverment: Arabs were promised indpendance in greater Syria for support against the ottomans. They were deceived and partaged between France and UK.
Also, Palestine was not british territory, it was not a british colony. It was a british mandate. UK was supposed to prepare Palestinians for independance, not to create a jewish colony there.
jewish immigration was, to a large extent, illegal and not welcome by the Palestinians.
Once again, Palestinians made a big mistake not being willing to negotiate with UK. But that makes their politics dumb, not their stance wrong.

Not being born there doesn't make it not their homeland. I know Irish, Scots, Germans, and others, whose family hasn't had a member in those countries in six or eight generations, yet they still talk wistfully of somehow managing to "go back home" for a visit.

Well, there's a difference between 6-8 and 91 generations.

To the contrary: Israel needs Jews to emigrate merely to maintain the Jewish percentage -- thus the concern.

It depends what you treat as the starting point. Nearly all Jews in Palestine are immigrants or children/grandchildren of immigrants.

They won't try -- if they manage to get an independent state, they'll claim that Israel "owes" them all that aid... and if they don't get it, they'll whip up their friends in the U.N. to get the other authoritarian countries in the world to pass yet another GA resolution condemning people who just want to live in their onw land, in peace.

Their own land, in peace? lol. They've taken this land from another nation and they act suprised that this nation is not happy with that. Turks also wanted to live in their own land, in peace - in western Armenia. Serbs also wanted to live in their own land, in peace - in Bosnia.
Again, I am not suprised many Americans do not understand what's the problem. After all, Americans also wanted to live in their own land, in peace - and that this land belonged to some Indians or Mexicans was a minor problem.

Those people weren't driven out at sword point.

yes, they were. Don't you think it's a strange coincidence? Israel needs land for its settlers. A war between it and Arab starts - hundreds of thousands of Arabs find themselves expulsed/fled. They want to come back - they are denied that possibility, and Israel settles their land with its colonists. What a lucky coincidence to Israel that they decided to flee. Surely Israel didn't want them to do that. And what a consistence of opinions: the emmigrants from Palestine can return to it after 1900 years if they are jewish, but if they are palestinian, they can not return to if even if they were born in Palestine, and were expulsed from it a month ago because of the war.

Lets face it: Israel is a chauvinistic, nationalistic state.

Studies have shown that it's difficult to find people who have lived in the Palestine region for a thousand years who aren't significantly Jewish, genetically. Most are descended from Jews who claimed not to be Jews, in order to not have to pack up and leave.

Which only makes palestinian claim to Palestine even stronger.

I recently read a book about Jews in the Christian Middle Ages.
In many times and places, it was illegal for a Jew to move to a new place without permission from the local bishop. It was not rare for Jews who expressed an actual intent to move to Israel to be killed. Often, Jews were forbidden to speak of the Temple; if they did, it was punished as blasphemy -- in fact, a major function of the infamous Spanish Inquisition was to ferret out hidden Jews, extracting confessions from them (thus proving they were Jews) or torturing them to death (thus proving they were Devil-possessed Jews). When the Crusades came, in many lands Jews were forbidden from participating.

Who's the author?
Jews participating in crusade? lol. The folk crusaders could barely distinguish between a Jew and a Saracen, which resulted in massacres of Jews in Rhineland.
And when it comes to serious crusades, there were no jewish knights...
Anyway, I doubt Jews would be discouraged to leave for Jerusalem. Medieval european states tended to rather force Jews to leave them, not to force them to stay. Also, I don't think any of these restrictions applied to Poland, which, since late Middle Ages, was the biggest centre of world Jewry.

That first statement is a tautology: all you did was give the definition of what "Palestinian" was -- it meant, "someone who lives inside the borders of Palestine". That meant Arabs, Persians, Jews, and anyone else who'd settled.

Definite most of citizens of Palestine were arabophone muslims and christians, some druzes. There were small communities of Circassians, Armenians and Jews.
By "palestinians" I mean non-jewish arabophones.

If you mean it as "Palestinian people", there never was such a thing; indeed, it was the birthing of Israel which sparked the birthing of such a people -- and then it meant, "everyone who was a Palestinian already, except not the Jews". Thus, the term "Palestinian" denoting a people didn't exist before WW II, and it was born as a racist term, one used to divide "us" from "them" on the basis of a person's blood -- specifically, Jewish blood.

And? Even if they had little or no self-conscience, that doesn't mean they should not be granted self-determination in their own land.

So the tragedy of Zionism, in your context, is that its enemies conceived a racist hatred and defined themselves around it -- and that racism remains a deep part of their self-definition today.

While some Palestinians, and Arabs in general, are racists towards Jews, their opposition to zionism is not result of this racism. This racism is rather result of the opposition towards zionism. You don't need to be racist to hate someone who's expulsing, killing and occupying you. But if it goes for decades, it's hard to stop racism from appearing.

Blaming the victims, now....

victims? 10x more Palestinians die during intifada than Israelis

It is the very existence of Israel that sparked the violence!

of course it did. If moroccan immigrants in Spain would take over Sevilla and announce establishment of independant Gumhuriyyat al-Andalus, would you blame these Moroccans for the conflict, or Spaniards?

 

[palemale]

There is much to criticize Israel about, and doing so does not make one an anti-semite. However, much of the criticism of Israel, particularly in Europe and among the American left (and left in general) comes close to the line, and often veers strongly over it, into anti-semitism. Harsh criticism of Israel becomes little more than a proxy for anti-semitism.

Comparing Israel to the Nazi's is ridiculous and offensive. Israel has not sought to systematically exterminate anyone.

It is legitimate to criticize Israel for its policy on settlements. It ought to cease building them and dismantle most of them. Certain settlements, such as those surrounding Jerusalem or the Tel Aviv suburbs, should be subject to a final settlement with the Palestinians. Israel's dealings with the Palestinians in general, their conduct of the war in Gaza and their conduct of peace talks with the Palestinians are all worthy of severe criticism and, frankly, are counterproductive to their own interests.

Anyone who questions Israel's right to exist is off base and, frankly, is the type of rhetoric that crosses the line to anti-semitism.

Human history is replete with the movement of people from one geographic area to another, often accompanied by the displacement of some people. This is probably where the greatest double standard involving Israel occurs. Throughout the 20th Century, Jews suffered oppression at the hands of non-Jewish governments. They fled pograms in Russia and other Eastern Eropean countries and moved to other countries, including to Palestine, then under British occupation. After WWII, they were displaced and had no homes to return to. There were also pograms in Poland after WWII. Many went to Palestine. Why would anyone blame them for doing so. After the founding of the state of Israel, millions of Jews were expelled from Arab countries. Where were they expected to settle? It is ironic, but had the Arab countries not expelled their Jewish citizens, and had they not gone to war against Israel, Israel today would be a much smaller and weaker country.

Also, don't forget that Arab leaders in World War II, especially the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, supported Nazi Germany. I suspect this fact was not lost on the victors in WWII, who voted in the United Nations to recognize Israel.

No one can legitimately deny the suffering of the Palestinian people, and any resolution of the Middle East question has to bring justice and fairness to them. However, there exists a very hypocritical double standard when it comes to Israel. Those who are so concerned about Israeli treatment of Palestinians rarely work up the same anger over the mistreatment of others. For example, China annexed Tibet and has brutally oppressed the Tibetan people. Where is the outcry, the calls to boycott China? After WWII, Poland and Czechoslovakia expelled Germans from their ancestral homes. I don't blame them for doing so, but are we to give that land back to the Germans. The Soviet Union took land from Poland after WWII, and Poland got land from Germany. Turkey expelled thousands of Greeks from their ancestral homes, and Greece did the same to Turks. Where does it end? Why the outrage about Israel in comparison to other evils that countries inflict on their people?

 

[naked gent]

It wants Jews to emmigrate to Israel, in order to change the ethnic balanse of this land.

I agree with you irydion. Israel needs a larger jewish population to prevent itself from becoming a minority in the land that they control which could make for a dicey situation given that they are a democracy.

The problem is that unless and until peace comes to the area they will have trouble attracting jews to emigrate there......especially those jews who live in a country like the U.S. where they can travel freely and without fear and from whose vantage point the state of Israel is just a larger ghetto. (no offense JB)

There would be no threat from within the territory Israel controls were it not for the enemies which surround them.
And they are surrounded: that doesn't mean that every country contiguous to them is officially hostile; it means that in every direction, within easy military striking range, there are those who would see them slaughtered.

Sorry Kul but I see a bit of shifting going on here. The post of yours that I responded to claimed that Israel was surrounded by nations technically at war with them and clearly that is not the case. Had you said they exist in a sea of unfriendly people I would not have disputed that fact.

As to those who threaten Israel from within its borders as I said above I think they are the greatest threat to Israel and one its military will have the most trouble with but they wanted the land and now must find a way to deal with the consequences of that desire.

 

[irydion]

There is much to criticize Israel about, and doing so does not make one an anti-semite. However, much of the criticism of Israel, particularly in Europe and among the American left (and left in general) comes close to the line, and often veers strongly over it, into anti-semitism. Harsh criticism of Israel becomes little more than a proxy for anti-semitism.

please support your opinion by some examples.

Comparing Israel to the Nazi's is ridiculous and offensive. Israel has not sought to systematically exterminate anyone.

did anyone do it in this thread? Am I missing something?

Anyone who questions Israel's right to exist is off base and, frankly, is the type of rhetoric that crosses the line to anti-semitism.

I believe Israel has a right to exist - now. It didn't have a right to exist 60 years ago, simply because Israelis weren't born in this land. If I could draw borders then, I'd create Israel, but certainly smaller: 1/3 of the population, almost all being immigrants, should not get over a half of the territory.

Human history is replete with the movement of people from one geographic area to another, often accompanied by the displacement of some people. This
is probably where the greatest double standard involving Israel occurs.

Exactly: Israel is not condemned enough for doing that.

Throughout the 20th Century, Jews suffered oppression at the hands of non-Jewish governments. They fled pograms in Russia and other Eastern Eropean countries and moved to other countries, including to Palestine, then under British occupation. After WWII, they were displaced and had no homes to return to. There were also pograms in Poland after WWII. Many went to Palestine. Why would anyone blame them for doing so.

I would: they didn't have a permission from the local british mandate administration for doing so, nor from the people inhabiting these lands. They should've emmigrated to South America, USA, or elsewhere, where their presence wouldn't result in a 60 year old armed conflict. I also blaim them for terrorism they engaged in (Begin for example) and other behaviour, for example jewish labour union, Histadrut, calling for employment of Jews only in jewish companies. I blame them for all the ideology of "a land without a nation for a nation without a land".

After the founding of the state of Israel, millions of Jews were expelled from Arab countries. Where were they expected to settle? It is ironic, but had the Arab countries not expelled their Jewish citizens, and had they not gone to war against Israel, Israel today would be a much smaller and weaker country.

Here, I agree with you.

Also, don't forget that Arab leaders in World War II, especially the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, supported Nazi Germany. I suspect this fact was not lost on the victors in WWII, who voted in the United Nations to recognize Israel.

Not all arab leaders. Don't be too harsh to them. They didn't know about the Holocaust, and the simple reality was that the enemy of our enemy is our friend: being under british or french domination, they were turning towards the only power that could help them - the Germans.

However, there exists a very hypocritical double standard when it comes to Israel. Those who are so concerned about Israeli treatment of Palestinians rarely work up the same anger over the mistreatment of others. For example, China annexed Tibet and has brutally oppressed the Tibetan people. Where is the outcry, the calls to boycott China?

The support for Tibet is widespread among the population of the West. Not amongst the gouverments, obviously, simply because China is stronger than Israel and because it is a huge market.

After WWII, Poland and Czechoslovakia expelled Germans from their ancestral homes. I don't blame them for doing so, but are we to give that land back to the Germans. The Soviet Union took land from Poland after WWII, and Poland got land from Germany. Turkey expelled thousands of Greeks from their ancestral homes, and Greece did the same to Turks. Where does it end? Why the outrage about Israel in comparison to other evils that countries inflict on their people?

The expulsion of Greeks and Turks was, at least in theory, an exchange of population, accepted by both gouverments. The expulsion of Germans from Poland was settled by UK-USSR-USA, not by Poland itself, and both in case of Czechoslovakia and Poland was result of horrible attrocities commited by Germans during the war; if you don't want to compare Israel to nazi Germany, you certainly don't want to compare Palestinians to nazi Germans. Also, in case of Poland, milions of Poles were expelled from formerly polish territories in the east, so it's not a simple gain for Poland. Poland actually shrank by 1/4 of territory due to the war.

Also, the problem is that Israel always claims a moral higher ground. The treatment of Palestinians contradicts that. Israel sucks milions of dolars from USA, its treatment of Palestinians is an argument to make it stop; Israeli-palestinian conflict is still alive, for over 60 years not (in reality for 100 years or more), so obviously it gets more attention than relations between Poland and Germany, or Greece and Turkey.

 

[HenryReardon]

They're turning into a paranoid group of people.

There's an honest broker in the White House and that has them a little nervous.

They should well be paranoid - a tiny nation surrounded by nations full of millions of savages who want nothing more than to wipe them from the face of the earth.

Obama an 'honest broker?' Of all the lies and nonsense spouted in here, that has to be the whopper of the century. LMAO

 

[Kulindahr]

Yup, all the other modern nationalisms started in XIX century, but the jewish one existed since Abraham...

Your timeline is 'way off, but your comment is correct: Israel/Jewry was the first nation tied to a specific piece of land, who identified with it. Since the Romans under Titus demolished Jerusalem and captured Masada, and Jews fled to all points of the Mediterranean, there has been a desire to return.
If that is nationalism, then yes, Jewish nationalism is older by far than most any.

Uh, no, there were certain semi-independant arabic emirates in Palestine since then, as well as the Kingdom of Jerusalem.
But it's not what I've ment. "Palestinian territories" does not imply "palestinian state", but territories inhabited by Palestinians.

The Kingdom of Jerusalem occurred to me -- good call.
But again you go with the tautology: there was no such thing as Palestinians until the British Mandate, and none in the sense of being a people until after the foundation of Israel.

Anyway, shouldn't Israel apologise to the victims of its policies as well?

That depends on whether you think people ought to apologize for self-defense as a policy.

Palestinians are a traumatised society. Mass expulsions, decades of occupation, people dieing everyday. You can not expect them to start being a well-functioning society all of the sudden, especially since their problems - the question of refugees, the borders, the independance - weren't settled yet.

If the Arab nations who went to war with Israel to slaughter all the Jews had lived up to their responsibilities, there wouldn't be a refugee problem: those people would be living, welcomed, in the lands from which Jews had been expelled, indeed on the lands stolen from the Jews.
But those nations violated their own peoples' laws of hospitality, prefer to make war with Israel by secondary means, forcing the refugees to become just what they have: a source of cannon fodder for exterminating Israel.

As far as "refugees, the borders, and independance (sic)", the Jews have done quite well.

1) Israelis did buy land from the great land owners, evicting the palestinian tenants and replacing them with Jews. Of course, that was not always the case, but it made jewish presence unwelcome.

So they were unhappy when the Jews came and used the customs of the area? Those tenants had always lived on the land at the sufferance of the landowners. So the resentment wasn't against the evictions; that was the local system operating under its own terms: the resentment was because the new owners were Jews.

Also, Palestine was not british territory, it was not a british colony. It was a british mandate. UK was supposed to prepare Palestinians for independance, not to create a jewish colony there.
jewish immigration was, to a large extent, illegal and not welcome by the Palestinians.

The British were the only lawful government the place had. And if anything, they failed in the Mandate given by the League of Nations, because their job was to prepare for "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people". By limiting Jewish immigration, the British violated their duty.
Yet they did their duty fairly well in many ways; they did prepare for most of the area "to stand on its own": the Palestinians who now call themselves Jordanian are doing tolerably well, after all.

Their own land, in peace? lol. They've taken this land from another nation and they act suprised that this nation is not happy with that. Turks also wanted to live in their own land, in peace - in western Armenia. Serbs also wanted to live in their own land, in peace - in Bosnia.
Again, I am not suprised many Americans do not understand what's the problem. After all, Americans also wanted to live in their own land, in peace - and that this land belonged to some Indians or Mexicans was a minor problem.

What nation did they take the land from? The Ottoman Empire was gone; the British Mandate was all there was. Transjordan was made a nation, but it had never held any part of traditional Israel. In other words, there was no nation there until Israel was declared.

yes, they were. . . . the emmigrants from Palestine can return to it after 1900 years if they are jewish, but if they are palestinian, they can not return to if even if they were born in Palestine, and were expulsed from it a month ago because of the war.

Really?
The Irish were expelled at swordpoint, and forced to settle in America?
The Angles' and Saxons' forebears were driven out of Denmark at swordpoint?
All the WASPS in the U.S. came here at swordpoint?

It's a strange version of history you have...

And BTW, did they have a tie to that specific land as promised them by God, a tie that involved their very identity?

Oh -- and don't forget that many of those who "fled" when the Arabs launched their attack to exterminate the Jews were complicit in that conspiracy: they fled to get out of the way, with promises that if they cooperated, they'd get chunks of Jewish property once the aggressors had eliminated all the owners.

Jews participating in crusade? lol. The folk crusaders could barely distinguish between a Jew and a Saracen, which resulted in massacres of Jews in Rhineland.
And when it comes to serious crusades, there were no jewish knights...
Anyway, I doubt Jews would be discouraged to leave for Jerusalem. Medieval european states tended to rather force Jews to leave them, not to force them to stay. Also, I don't think any of these restrictions applied to Poland, which, since late Middle Ages, was the biggest centre of world Jewry.

The inability to distinguish may have been part of the reason for forbidding participation. Greater, though, was that the Romanistic kingdoms of Europe didn't want any Jews in "their" Holy Land.
And no, of course there were no Jewish knights; in most places, being Jewish prohibited being so much as a candidate for knighthood' in many, Jews were forbidden the owning of arms.
Medieval European states tended to treat Jews arbitrarily -- neither keeping them in place nor moving them was set policy; keeping track of them was. They were the "sex offenders" of Roman Christendom: labeled, stigmatized, despised, heaped upon with restrictions, considered unfit for polite company.

Poland -- there's a special situation; the place was so fluid that its putative owners were far more interested in remaining in that status than in bothering with the lower elements of society. That made it a good place to stay under the... well, the medieval equivalent of radar.

Definite most of citizens of Palestine were arabophone muslims and christians, some druzes. There were small communities of Circassians, Armenians and Jews.
By "palestinians" I mean non-jewish arabophones.

So you've chosen the racist definition. But you use it interchangeably with the territorial definition prior to it, and project it back in time before there was anyone at all who could be designated "Palestinian". That's fallacious reasoning, BTW.

And? Even if they had little or no self-conscience, that doesn't mean they should not be granted self-determination in their own land.

So what's the proper punishment for those who are part of a conspiracy to commit genocide?
Personally, if we had the technology, I'd favor packing up every last person who wants to "drive Israel into the sea" (or its equivalent) and ship them to Mars.
And if there are any out there who think the way to deal with "the Palestinian issue" is to nuke Gaza and mustard-gas the West Bank (saw that one in a merc mag, in a barber shop), ship them to the other side of Mars.

While some Palestinians, and Arabs in general, are racists towards Jews, their opposition to zionism is not result of this racism. This racism is rather result of the opposition towards zionism. You don't need to be racist to hate someone who's expulsing, killing and occupying you. But if it goes for decades, it's hard to stop racism from appearing.

It started with racism: the only reason for the initial war to drive the Jews out of the part of the land they'd been promised, the part they'd claimed, was to get rid of Jews. If it wasn't racism, why did they steal everything from the Jews in their own lands and drive them out?
The Jews were willing to abide by the rules originally given the British Mandate, that no one should be deprived or prejudiced against in their rights for any religious or other cause; the other side -- who made themselves the other side, by their own free choice -- was not. The Jews favored fairness and harmony; their self-appointed enemies did not. The Jews welcomed and accepted all the other Palestinians -- because at that time, the Jews were Palestinians -- who stayed, but their enemies only welcomed people they could use or benefit from.

And what's amazing is that while their enemies have been, for longer than Israel has been a state, seeking to expel, kill, and occupy them, the nation of Israel has been generous even to its enemies.

victims? 10x more Palestinians die during intifada than Israelis

If Bob starts a war, and more of Bob's friend's die than Fred's, you don't blame Fred, you blame Bob.
Israel didn't start any intifada; its enemies did. The blame for ALL those who died lies in the bloody hands of the barbarians such as Hamas, Arafat, and their ilk.

of course it did. If moroccan immigrants in Spain would take over Sevilla and announce establishment of independant Gumhuriyyat al-Andalus, would you blame these Moroccans for the conflict, or Spaniards?

If those Moroccans had been promised they could have a homeland there, and had begun by buying up tracts of land for themselves, and the government of Sevilla had moved others aside so they could have the promised homeland, but then the Spanish who had promised them a homeland betrayed them and started telling they had to stop coming, and many of their neighbors began violence against them because they didn't want them there, and if the moment there was an election in Spain their neighbors ganged up on them and attacked with intent to slaughter them all -- I'd support the Moroccans, and blame the barbarian neighbors, Spanish or otherwise.

 

[Kulindahr]

Exactly: Israel is not condemned enough for doing that.

Ah.

So in your view, people in the U.S. should be allowed to bomb neighborhoods with illegal immigrants, kill those immigrants' children and destroy their property at random....

and the immigrants should be condemned if they fight back.


Gotcha.

 

[Kulindahr]

They should well be paranoid - a tiny nation surrounded by nations full of millions of savages who want nothing more than to wipe them from the face of the earth.

Obama an 'honest broker?' Of all the lies and nonsense spouted in here, that has to be the whopper of the century. LMAO

Well, he was honest enough to admit to U.S. mistakes when he spoke in Cairo -- an admirable action.

But he doesn't seem capable of doing anything -- it's just words. Honesty is awesome, but when it isn't the start for action, it's more like "awwww" than "awe".

 

[HenryReardon]

Well, he was honest enough to admit to U.S. mistakes when he spoke in Cairo -- an admirable action.

".

There is nothing admirable about the POTUS trashing his own country when speaking in a foreign venue.

Shame on him for having done so.

 

[Kulindahr]

There is nothing admirable about the POTUS trashing his own country when speaking in a foreign venue.

Shame on him for having done so.

He didn't "trash" it, he was merely (and quite moderately) honest.

That's admirable in anyone, and essential in a statesman.


The alternative is to commit all the atrocities you want, and pretend always to be righteous.

 

[HenryReardon]

He didn't "trash" it, he was merely (and quite moderately) honest.

That's admirable in anyone, and essential in a statesman.


.

Of course he did. Was that on his first 'apology' tour or his second or third.

No matter what he says at home, the POTUS, when abroad, should be the country's #1 cheerleader.

 

[Kulindahr]

Of course he did. Was that on his first 'apology' tour or his second or third.

No matter what he says at home, the POTUS, when abroad, should be the country's #1 cheerleader.

So the Navy could be dropping napalm on villages in Somalia to cut off some illicit arms flow, and the president should be all smiling and say how wonderful America is?

That's an infantile attitude. What's needed in a president is maturity, and mature people admit mistakes.

 

[palemale]

Irydion, Chalchalero compared Israel to the Nazis and to neo-Nazis. Sadly, his view is emblematic of much of the views of the Europeans, especially the European left. His views are also common among the American left. As someone who has been involved with left politics for many years, I have heard these views quite frequently.

The examples I gave of displaced groups in 20th Century wars was not for the purpose of ascribing blame, but merely to point out that the Jews and Palestinian Arabs were only two of many groups who were displaced to make way for others. The Soviet Union displaced Poles from their ancestral homes. Who raises a peep about it now? The Poles were not aggressors against anyone in WWII. Are they not as equally entitled to have their land back as the Palestinians? What difference does it make that Greeks and Turks were expelled from homes their predecessors had been in for millenia because it was an exchange of populations? Were they not as entitled to have their lands back as the Palestinians?

Wars have consequences, and when one chooses sides, if they are on the loosing side, they're out of luck.

 

[irydion]

Your timeline is 'way off, but your comment is correct: Israel/Jewry was the first nation tied to a specific piece of land, who identified with it. Since the Romans under Titus demolished Jerusalem and captured Masada, and Jews fled to all points of the Mediterranean, there has been a desire to return.
If that is nationalism, then yes, Jewish nationalism is older by far than most any.

I certainly doubt other tribes and ethnic groups didn't feel attachement to the land they came from / they lived. I may accept that Jews were more advanced in their national feelings than many other groups, but still I say that there was not a modern nationalism among them before zionism. And even if there was, what would it change? It doesn't make their will to rule Palestine any more right.

The Kingdom of Jerusalem occurred to me -- good call.
But again you go with the tautology: there was no such thing as Palestinians until the British Mandate, and none in the sense of being a people until after the foundation of Israel.

I dare to disagree partly: I am pretty sure at least palestinian christians felt separate from the ones more to the north or the south, due to the existance of the patriarchate of Jerusalem, and its major differences to the neighbouring patriarchates, which had a big monophysite minority / majority.
But it is not really important. Even if there had been no palestinian identity before the creation of zionism, that doesn't make the rights of palestinian Arabs to Palestine any less. They were a definite majority of the population, and the minorities: Circassians, Armenians and local Jews didn't have plans of secession. Just because most of them weren't nationally self-conscious doesn't mean european Jews had right to establish a state in their land.

That depends on whether you think people ought to apologize for self-defense as a policy.

Imagine I am a young student, looking for a room. I find a room for a rent, but I try to make it my own property, because 200 years ago, my grandfather used to own part of this building, but moved elsewhere. The landlord doesn't like it, so I throw him into the basement and keep him there for 60 years. From time to time he tries to get out, so I hit him with a club in "self-defence".

If the Arab nations who went to war with Israel to slaughter all the Jews had lived up to their responsibilities, there wouldn't be a refugee problem: those people would be living, welcomed, in the lands from which Jews had been expelled, indeed on the lands stolen from the Jews.

Oh c-mon. Lets take Syria for example. It didn't want to let Jews out, and when it finally agreed to do it, it was only due to american pressure. There were, allegedly, 30.000 Jews in Syria in 1948. How can their posession recompensate for over 0,5 mln of Palestinians in Syria currently?

As far as "refugees, the borders, and independance (sic)", the Jews have done quite well.

what?

So they were unhappy when the Jews came and used the customs of the area? Those tenants had always lived on the land at the sufferance of the landowners. So the resentment wasn't against the evictions; that was the local system operating under its own terms: the resentment was because the new owners were Jews.

Uh, you missed the point. I think probably they didn't like that the owners were Jews, but I guess being EVICTED was more annoying than that. The jewish objective wasn't to buy land only. But to buy land for jewish settlers. And they could only do it by forcing the Arabs out. And so they did.

The British were the only lawful government the place had. And if anything, they failed in the Mandate given by the League of Nations, because their job was to prepare for "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people". By limiting Jewish immigration, the British violated their duty.
Yet they did their duty fairly well in many ways; they did prepare for most of the area "to stand on its own": the Palestinians who now call themselves Jordanian are doing tolerably well, after all.

The problem is that UK gave contradictory promesses to the Jews and the Arabs.
Transjordan was a distinct part of the mandate from the start, and it was not sure if it'd be part of the mandate in the beginning.

What nation did they take the land from? The Ottoman Empire was gone; the British Mandate was all there was. Transjordan was made a nation, but it had never held any part of traditional Israel. In other words, there was no nation there until Israel was declared.

there was no STATE. A nation means people. There was an autochtonous population of the land, which the Jews prefered to ignore, or get rid of.

Really?
The Irish were expelled at swordpoint, and forced to settle in America?
The Angles' and Saxons' forebears were driven out of Denmark at swordpoint?
All the WASPS in the U.S. came here at swordpoint?

I don't know about Anglo-Saxons, but it's probable they were under pressure from other tribes. When it comes to WASPS, actually, many were persecuted for their religion, as well as the Irish, who lost their independance too...
Also, not all Jews left Judea after the fall of the jewish state and of Jerusalem. Many stayed, but assimilated (which, on the other hand, means that the jewish presence there was longer, but it also means that modern Jews are not the only heirs to this tradition). jewish diaspora was large before already, too.

That's hardly important, anyway. The important part is that zionists were the Jews that didn't live in Palestine for almost 1900 years in some cases, and more in the others. Claiming a land your ancestors lived in almost 2000 years ago is absurd, and ignoring the fact that there are other people living in this land is egoistic and morally wrong.

And BTW, did they have a tie to that specific land as promised them by God, a tie that involved their very identity?

oh, Boers for example believed indeed they have a divine mission to conquer the lands of the black tribes. Does that make them right?
No. It's a reason which is important for Jews themselves, but is hardly any explenation to the people they wanted to take the land from.

Oh -- and don't forget that many of those who "fled" when the Arabs launched their attack to exterminate the Jews were complicit in that conspiracy: they fled to get out of the way, with promises that if they cooperated, they'd get chunks of Jewish property once the aggressors had eliminated all the owners.

Yeah, that's really probable. A conspiracy involving hundreds of thousands of people

A silly, naive israeli propaganda. The facts are that they fled or were expelled during the war. That Israelis didn't let them back in, and that Jews took their property.
Not to mention they were not "getting out of the way". They were a nuissance to the arab armies and societies, their presence was making this war harder for Arabs.

The inability to distinguish may have been part of the reason for forbidding participation.

Horrible indeed. Did the zionist allow christian participation in zionist movement? Did they hand the land to the christians as well?
Your complains about the lack of jewish participation in the crusades are simply absurd.

So you've chosen the racist definition. But you use it interchangeably with the territorial definition prior to it, and project it back in time before there was anyone at all who could be designated "Palestinian". That's fallacious reasoning, BTW.

OK: lets call "Palestinians" everyone living there prior to zionist immigration. Then, Jews make 3% of the Palestinians. But then, assigning part of Palestinie to non-palestinians seem even more strange.

So what's the proper punishment for those who are part of a conspiracy to commit genocide?

What? When did the Palestinians conspire to commit a genocide?
Anyway, do you think all the people of Palestinians were in conspiration? Isn't it absurd?

Personally, if we had the technology, I'd favor packing up every last person who wants to "drive Israel into the sea" (or its equivalent) and ship them to Mars.
And if there are any out there who think the way to deal with "the Palestinian issue" is to nuke Gaza and mustard-gas the West Bank (saw that one in a merc mag, in a barber shop), ship them to the other side of Mars.

Now, that's very humane and reasonable.

It started with racism: the only reason for the initial war to drive the Jews out of the part of the land they'd been promised, the part they'd claimed, was to get rid of Jews. If it wasn't racism, why did they steal everything from the Jews in their own lands and drive them out?

They did not. There were pogroms of Jews in arabic lands. It's wrong, but sort of usual to retaliate against fellows of enemies that one has at home. When USA was at war with Japan, it did mistreat the USA citizens of Japaneese heritage. When Arabs were at war with christians in middle ages, they often retaliated against local christians. blah blah. It was the creation of Israel, its victories over the Arabs and its treatment of the palestinian Arabs that made Arabs hostile towards local Jews and attack them. That doesn't make it right, of course.
But the initial war was not caused by hatred towards the Jews. It was caused by disagreement to abandoning of part of the Arab territory to european Jews.
These were not Arabs that promessed this land to the Jews: it was UK, and, later, UN (which was a very new organisation, so it couldn't count on much respect yet). Arabs, rightly, saw it as an obvious injury, and didn't agree with that.

The Jews favored fairness and harmony; their self-appointed enemies did not.

do you really believe in such black& white image? It weren't Arabs that have chosen Jews as their enemies. These were european Jews that settled in foreign land, tried to establish their own state there. Fairness and harmony? Is this why they were kicking out arab tenants? didn't allow arab workers in jewish companies? engaged in terrorist attacks against the UK and Arabs?

The Jews welcomed and accepted all the other Palestinians -- because at that time, the Jews were Palestinians

No they were not. They were immigrants.

-- who stayed, but their enemies only welcomed people they could use or benefit from.

Uh, zionists were soooo good that they "welcomed and accepted" the people living in the land they decided to come too. Very nice. These are european Jews who were the (unwanted) guests in this land. They've had the precise goal of establishing their own state, of getting the Jewry settle there and dominate the local Arabs by number. Would you want some foreigners to come to your country, become a majority and rule it?

And what's amazing is that while their enemies have been, for longer than Israel has been a state, seeking to expel, kill, and occupy them, the nation of Israel has been generous even to its enemies.

huh? man... expelling them, colonising, occupying them, evicting them, killing them you call generous?

If Bob starts a war, and more of Bob's friend's die than Fred's, you don't blame Fred, you blame Bob.
Israel didn't start any intifada; its enemies did. The blame for ALL those who died lies in the bloody hands of the barbarians such as Hamas, Arafat, and their ilk.

It's not Hamas nor Fatah that started the conflict. The conflict was started by the emergance of zionism, settling of european Jews in Palestine and conquering it by them.
It's Israel that occupies Palestine, not the other way round. Would you call Chineese the victims of the conflict if there was an uprising in Tibet? Would you say that the conflict was started by the Tibetans?

If those Moroccans had been promised they could have a homeland there,

by who?

the government of Sevilla had moved others aside so they could have the promised homeland,

moved other aside? what do you mean by that?

but then the Spanish who had promised them a homeland betrayed them and started telling they had to stop coming,

Did Palestinian Arabs ever promise Jews a homeland in Palestine? No.

ganged up on them and attacked with intent to slaughter them all

Jews live in the shadow of the Holocause, so they imagine a probable Holocaust even when there was no intention of it whatsoever. The claim that Palestinians wanted to exterminate all the Jews is result of the trauma of the actual Holocaust, not a serious one.

Ah.

So in your view, people in the U.S. should be allowed to bomb neighborhoods with illegal immigrants, kill those immigrants' children and destroy their property at random....

and the immigrants should be condemned if they fight back.

Gotcha.

No, they simply should not be allowed to create their own state. Israeli independance was not "fighting back". It was the initial objective.

The Kingdom of Jerusalem was Christian

what difference does that make?

For excusing terrorism? Yes, you should apologize.

I do not excuse terrorism, I merely understand the causes of it.

You still keep calling the Palestinians a "nation." There was no such thing back then. There was no palestinian state, never was. There is now a desire for one among Palestinians, which is something to deal with yet.

Lets call them "people", then. What difference does that make? None. Still, they deserved autodetermination, and not being colonised by zionists.

When Palestine is independent, they will get to decide who returns.

Most of them fled from the current territory of Israel. So it's in the hands of Israel, not of the future palestinian state.

Don't hold anything back there irydion! Your bias just laid bare for everyone to see... thanks

It's not a bias. It's a sad reality. If Israel was not a nationalistic, chauvinistic state:
- it wouldn't support jewish immigration from around the world for the benefit of one part of its citizens
- it wouldn't bow to fringy jewish parties in many matters
- it wouldn't deny Palestinians the right to return
- it wouldn't occupy West Bank for 62 years
- it wouldn't colonise the occupied territories
etc

Funny that never would have happened if the Palestinian terrorists didn't start the fights.

True, but the fights wouldn't be started if Israel didn't occupy Palestine. That's true too.

 

[irydion]

Who raises a peep about it now?

Actually, my family does, because my family never received money for the properties they've lost due to the expulsion from USSR (USSR forced Poland to pay it, but it never did. Recently there were discussions of paying the money, but only 15% of it... but it failed too
But it's easier for Poles, I guess, because we got something in return. My grandparents lived in a house owned by Germans before the war.

And there actually are german organisations demanding return of pre-ww2 german property. Although the expelled actually were paid by Germany.

The Poles were not aggressors against anyone in WWII. Are they not as equally entitled to have their land back as the Palestinians? What difference does it make that Greeks and Turks were expelled from homes their predecessors had been in for millenia because it was an exchange of populations? Were they not as entitled to have their lands back as the Palestinians?

In general, I agree with you. That's why I've said I do believe that Israel had no right to exist 60 years ago, but does now.
If the matter of the refugees is still alive it's because the conflict that caused their expulsion hasn't ended, and, being so, they still have hope to return.

Wars have consequences, and when one chooses sides, if they are on the loosing side, they're out of luck.

It was not a real war, there was not a palestinian state that could be held responsible for it.