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General Israel/Palestine discussion thread

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mortimer said:
How does the size of the state interfere with their "right to self determination"? Are you suggesting they should have got everything they asked for in the name of "self determination"? No compromise? Where would you have sent the Jews?
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Was a single state solution, comprised of Jews and Palestinians not an option? That is what Herzel had proposed many years before.

The Holocaust, of course, made the whole historical dynamic vastly different. Until then, I doubt that the Zionist cause would have worked. Most Jews had homes, lives and a culture. The Holocaust pretty well made the creation of Israel inevitable. How do you resolve the 'self determination' of two cultures in one place? I don't know, and after 60 years or so, no one else has been able to work it out. I don't know that it gets resolved by demonising one side or the other. Israel is here to stay, the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza aren't going anywhere either. Imposing by force a solution by one side or the other is no solution either.
 
a_unique_person said:
Was a single state solution, comprised of Jews and Palestinians not an option? That is what Herzel had proposed many years before.
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Sure, it was an option, if you wanted all the Jews dead. Maybe you haven't noticed, but the Muslims in the area have pretty much always wanted the Jews gone.

a_unique_person said:
The Holocaust, of course, made the whole historical dynamic vastly different. Until then, I doubt that the Zionist cause would have worked. Most Jews had homes, lives and a culture. The Holocaust pretty well made the creation of Israel inevitable. How do you resolve the 'self determination' of two cultures in one place? I don't know, and after 60 years or so, no one else has been able to work it out. I don't know that it gets resolved by demonising one side or the other. Israel is here to stay, the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza aren't going anywhere either. Imposing by force a solution by one side or the other is no solution either.
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Well, you could split the place basically in two, one area for each. The Jews accepted that proposal. The Palestinians turned it down in favor of trying to take it all for themselves.

Nobody's demonizing one side or the other. But at some point, both sides are going to need to make some concessions. Based on the survey Mycroft posted a week or two ago, the Palestinians are in no mood to make concessions. They want it all. And they want the Jews gone.

So what to do when the party with the least bargaining power wants all their demands met? What do you suggest?
 
a_unique_person said:
What great oppression did the Americans suffer that made them go to war to free themselves from the British? IIRC, one was the tax on tea.
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The tax on tea wasn't a great oppression. Tea was dirt cheap. Being a member of the British Empire had its benefits.

Besides, what's that got to do with Palestinians? You seem to be saying that there were Palestinian nationalist aspirations under the Ottomans because it should be true.
 
Virus said:
The tax on tea wasn't a great oppression. Tea was dirt cheap. Being a member of the British Empire had its benefits.

Besides, what's that got to do with Palestinians? You seem to be saying that there were Palestinian nationalist aspirations under the Ottomans because it should be true.
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Because they are human. It is such a fundamental desire it is called a right. Like the Americans asserted under the British Empire. People naturally want self determination. The call went out for a Jihad by the Ottomans against the British, the exact opposite happened.
 
a_unique_person said:
Indeed they did.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September_in_Jordan
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Black September was not a protest for losing the Transjordan. It was a reaction to the terrorist organization, the PLO and Fatah mainly, extorting, murdering, and kidnapping of both Palestinian refugees and Jordanians alike, the attempt of Arafat to create a state within a state in the Hashemite kingdom, sending of fedayeen into Israel to commit terrorist acts, and who can forget, the assassination attempts on King Abdullah by the Palestinian terrorist organizations.

Include this with the other Arab military/paramilitary units (ie Iraqis) still stationed in Jordan who sympathized with the Palestinians and those that moved in from Syria who supported, financed, and trained Palestinian fedayeen.

So again, another utter misunderstanding of a set of historical events. At least make an attempt to read the links you post....
 
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a_unique_person said:
Because they are human. It is such a fundamental desire it is called a right. Like the Americans asserted under the British Empire. People naturally want self determination. The call went out for a Jihad by the Ottomans against the British, the exact opposite happened.
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You have done nothing but support Virus in his statement:

Virus said:
You seem to be saying that there were Palestinian nationalist aspirations under the Ottomans because it should be true.
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You've provided no evidence and continue to do so.
 
To cut a long story short; there was no such entity as Palestine before the British Mandate and nationalism is a European concept introduced to the Arabs from outside.
 
Mycroft said:
I got a better idea. Let's start with the assumption that there is no default position and that if you want to make assertions of any kind, you need to provide evidence for it.
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ok...there is no default position. So where is your evidence that there was no desire for self determination? Oh ....hang on. Despite the overwhelming fact that a desire for self determination in people under foreign rule is so common.....the Palestinians should be assumed to not be interested.

so if we were to look at....say.....the population of a prison. We should not automatically assume that they want to be free.


so far the only evidence for palestinians being abnormal in the area of self-determination is that there were no "calls for self determination"....I have asked the people that state this what sort of "call"s they expect to see....in what forum? Silence.....
 
a_unique_person said:
Was a single state solution, comprised of Jews and Palestinians not an option? That is what Herzel had proposed many years before.
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Yes, he did.

I think it's astounding that you're aware of that yet fail to take it into consideration when describing how threatened the Arabs were by the Jewish immigrants. It's as though your awareness of any particular historical fact is not only selective but intermittent.
 
Virus said:
To cut a long story short; there was no such entity as Palestine before the British Mandate and nationalism is a European concept introduced to the Arabs from outside.
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Then why did the Jews revolt against Roman Rule? Self determination had not been invented yet by Europeans.

The American constitution claims not to invent human rights, but merely to list them.
 
bigjelmapro said:
Never said it doesn't exist. But the issue of whether there's legal precedent that discrimination exist, as you do poorly with yet another bout of cut-and-paste job below, is another discussion altogether.

Neither am I claiming that racism doesn't exist in Israeli society if you want to go down that road as well.


'Facts' based on hapless arguments by NGO's with political agendas. I don't know why this argument constantly boils down to an issue of the 'far right' either since this supposed discrimination has taken places throughout different Israeli governments of opposing political alignments.


No provision as there's no constitution and no Bill of Rights. I would love to see where this argument of no 'constitutional equality' comes from...


'Not allowed' and 'choose not to' are not interchangeable. I've personally served with Druze and under Druze commanders and they receive exactly the same benefits as I do.

There's preferential treatment to those who serve in the military as well in the US, Canada, UK, and other developed nations. This is perfectly justifiable under national service. Or do you not agree?


There's a distinction between 'state secular, state religious, ultra orthodox, communal settlement schools, and Arab schools' in the 1953 law. There's also separate curriculums for the Arab/Druze communities and Jewish communities with their own emphasis on what should be taught. In E. J'lem and the WB, the Arab communities follow a Jordanian-styled curriculum, a remnant of the Jordanian occupation between 1948-67.

As for Israel's history, I don't see how this is different from teaching American history. Whether one is patriotic is another thing. Is this discrimination against say the Irish immigrants or the native Americans? I guess one can strech the argument their way.


There are Arab schools with their own curriculum that don't require religious texts such as torah studies. Instead, these are replaced by Islamic or Christian studies depending on where one is located, from Christian Druze to Muslim Arab. Where do you think this whole drivel about teaching the 'nakba' at Arab schools came from?

So I call BS on this above claim.


And yet there's the affirmative action policy that goes beyond that of the proportion of Israeli Arabs that exist in Israel. Fancy that.

Also cuts into the generalization that there would be schools for semi-nomadic peoples available.

There's no doubt that there's a disparity between funding in W. and E. J'lem, but the first thing that can be done to close this gap is for Arabs in E. J'lem to run for office in order to have a say in budgetary issues and to train teachers who have an interest to teach in places like Silwan, which at present, don't really exist. On top of this is the issue of those parents who don't have a valid permanent residency card in E. J'lem and hence are not entitled to state funding for an education.

As for higher education, more often than not nowadays, E. J'lem, Galilee and WB residents go outside Israel to places like Jordan since Universities are taught there in Arabic rather than most Israeli universities, which are predominantly in Hebrew.


There's no concept of an oath in other countries? Do you actually have an interest into going into another bout of the inclusion of the term 'Jewish' argument? This adds to the argument that taking an oath that accepts Israel as a democratic and Jewish state somehow negates equality, automatically discriminates against non-Jews and somehow takes away from one's identity.

Welcome to this bit of the thread as well.


Ever seen these villages and how they from time to time, change location? Welcome to the Negev. I don't know about you, but hooking these villages up to an electricity grid, sewage systems, or have a school teacher follow a semi-nomadic people around the desert doesn't seem that functional. Again, there was a period where Israel tried to set up stationary towns. This only worked to a certain degree and not much success. Then again, it wasn't as intrusive as say the American or Canadian versions over a couple hundred years of forced integration, ethnocide, genocide, etc. But hey, that's passe eh?

One of the few Israeli policies that was a success was raising the literacy levels of bedoins. But that's setting that bar too low.

There was a thread about this not too long ago as well....


Quite a stretch to go from a knesset law to that of claiming exclusive Jewish settlements. See where this whole bit of an NGO with a political agenda comes into play? Issues like these occur predominantly in the Negev with bedoins (attempts to change that status, which is more than I can say with those residing in say, the Sinai whom enjoy limited rights to land) and I would dare say that this is still an issue to be resolved and won't go tripping over myself to make this assertion of 'Jewish settlements'.

But I can see the need to obfuscate Palestinian and Israeli Arab here when discussing issues in Israel proper and the disputed territories, as WC already mentioned.


A lot of it is the concept of state land (aka crown land in other developed nations albeit with subtle differences). Residing on state land (which also carried over from the Ottoman period) does not automatically imply that one owns it. Its a difficult concept to fathom, I know.


These are some of the issues already discussed ad naseum on this board, so welcome to this forum and thanks for another cut-and-paste job.


And yet you're quoting supposed laws that supposedly discriminate from a variety of governments throughout Israel's history, from the left, to the right, to coalition combinations of the two.

Did I miss anything or you going to reply to any of this? Otherwise I feel that this cut-and-paste jobs might just be a trend. I hope not...
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Ugh...I disagree with you on so many points, but at least we agree that discrimination exists.

Although I would consider all of the 20+ laws in the article that I listed that result in more discrimination to occur to be supporting that discrimination while you do not.

Fair enough, moving on.
 
The Fool said:
The Queen of Australia is the Queen of Australia. Did you not know this? who do you think is the queen of australia?
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a_unique_person said:
Then why did the Jews revolt against Roman Rule? Self determination had not been invented yet by Europeans.

The American constitution claims not to invent human rights, but merely to list them.
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Whatever happened to talking about actual solutions to this problem?

If you think the treatment of the Palestinians are bad, and if others think that the stated goal of Hamas and other Palestinians to destroy Israel is bad, than what should be done to improve this situation?

I think that setting up a Palestinian State that is supported by Jordan, while Israel keeps some settlements in the WB and the Golan Heights, is maybe the best option. What do you think is the best option?

It seems like the biggest impediment to the Palestinians getting a State is that Hamas and other Palestinian groups are unwilling to live next to living Jewish people.

Do you think there is anything that can be done or should be done to address this problem?
 
HoverBoarder said:
Whatever happened to talking about actual solutions to this problem?

If you think the treatment of the Palestinians are bad, and if others think that the stated goal of Hamas and other Palestinians to destroy Israel is bad, than what should be done to improve this situation?

I think that setting up a Palestinian State that is supported by Jordan, while Israel keeps some settlements in the WB and the Golan Heights, is maybe the best option. What do you think is the best option?

It seems like the biggest impediment to the Palestinians getting a State is that Hamas and other Palestinian groups are unwilling to live next to living Jewish people.

Do you think there is anything that can be done or should be done to address this problem?
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actual solutions are not difficult to put together, everyone has a solution to proclaim. Mine is not all that much different to yours. At the moment I am attempting to lead people away from some bizzare concept that unlike all other humans in the world Palestinians have some diminished desire for self determination.
 
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