General Israel/Palestine discussion thread

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WildCat said:
Yes, that is true. If the Palestinians had rejected Arab offers to help exterminate the Jews they'd have had their own state, and Israel would be much smaller.


It means they'd have their own country, just like the other countries created by the UN at the time. Jordan, Iraq, Syria, Israel, Palestine.

Except the Palestinians and other Arabs couldn't bear to live next to a Jewish state so they went to war instead to externinate the Jews and take all the land for themselves. But a funny thing happend on the way to their glorious extermination of the Jews, damn bastards fought back, and won! And can you believe there are consequences for failure when your genocide plans fail?

It still astonishes me that people like you think Israel should just pull out and let the Palestinians arm themselves to give another go at an attempt at Jewish genocide.


Yes, that is in fact the only reason. Extreme militant anti-semitism. Note no one is compaining about the creation of other countries at the time, like Jordan and Iraq. And the reason is they're not Jewish.
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That is absurd. The Palestinians wanted what everyone else in the region was assumed to have a right to, their own state. Not that the process of creating the other states was done without complaint. The lines on the maps that were drawn for the occupants of those areas was done for them, once again, without any consultation. Iraq was created to be be a replica of the African states, inherently unstable because three separate ethnic groups were deliberately lumped into the one state. It should have been three states. Jordan was created to satisfy the desires of a self proclaimed royal family that was recognised only by those drawing up the borders.

The whole process of creating the borders in the area at that time was a mess, no consultation, and we are still living with the consequences today. To say it is purely anti-semitism in the case of israel is absurd, but it is necessary, because then it simplifies the issue for many to one that can brook no argument, that does not need to consider other basic rights.
 
Oh their poor rights, they would have to share the land with other people who had been there. Of course they got some 90% of all the land which went on to become other countries which now reject and abuse them, but it's the Jews that violated their rights...

No complaints about the other parts of land, just the Israel part.
 
a_unique_person said:
What was the UN process? Were they consulted at all, were they asked at all to vote on their own future?

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

There was an historical force at work that overwhelmed the rights of the Palestinians, the horror of Europe and the rest of the world at what had done to the Jews living there. Were the rights of the Palestinians overlooked in the rush to deal with rights of the Jews to their own state?
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Exactly what rights would have been lost to the Arabs if they had agreed to the UN partition plan?
 
That is absurd. The Palestinians wanted what everyone else in the region was assumed to have a right to, their own state.
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...and they got to have their own state, so what's the problem:confused:?
 
Has Israel stated a response as to their reasoning for expanding the settlements? I know that the whole UN thing is a bit of a slap in the face, but the Palestinians haven't even tried to use it yet to strong arm them so now it makes them look like the bad guys. It doesn't seem like a smart move, but I haven't yet seen their point of view which might explain it.
 
a_unique_person said:
That is absurd. The Palestinians wanted what everyone else in the region was assumed to have a right to, their own state.
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And they were offered their own state, and they rejected it because Jews also had a state and that was unacceptable because of their raging anti-semitism.

It really is that simple.
 
a_unique_person said:
That is absurd. The Palestinians wanted what everyone else in the region was assumed to have a right to, their own state. Not that the process of creating the other states was done without complaint. The lines on the maps that were drawn for the occupants of those areas was done for them, once again, without any consultation. Iraq was created to be be a replica of the African states, inherently unstable because three separate ethnic groups were deliberately lumped into the one state. It should have been three states. Jordan was created to satisfy the desires of a self proclaimed royal family that was recognised only by those drawing up the borders.

The whole process of creating the borders in the area at that time was a mess, no consultation, and we are still living with the consequences today. To say it is purely anti-semitism in the case of israel is absurd, but it is necessary, because then it simplifies the issue for many to one that can brook no argument, that does not need to consider other basic rights.
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Rightly or wrongly, the controlling power of the time determined who was to be given the land that was under its control. The British Empire took it from the Ottoman Empire and as such was the governing power of the reign. We accept, even currently, that land with no title is under the control and ownership of the governing body, and from 1918 until 1947 that governing body was the British Government. They passed on the land to the UN to be divided up between the people living there creating two states, one for each.

If you claim that the ruling power of the time did not have that right, then we suddenly end up in a really hot kettle of fish, because that means no Government has rights to and ability to regulate the untitled lands under its control. The logical result of this line of thinking is that all lands should be returned to the first peoples to settle them, and everyone else has to leave. Let's start with the US, and South America.
 
WildCat said:
And they were offered their own state, and they rejected it because Jews also had a state and that was unacceptable because of their raging anti-semitism.

It really is that simple.
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They rejected it because they wanted their state as they defined it. It could have Japanese wanting a state there as well, the reaction would have been identical. It was not anti-semitism.
 
Jonnyclueless said:
Has Israel stated a response as to their reasoning for expanding the settlements? I know that the whole UN thing is a bit of a slap in the face, but the Palestinians haven't even tried to use it yet to strong arm them so now it makes them look like the bad guys. It doesn't seem like a smart move, but I haven't yet seen their point of view which might explain it.
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I am not sure, but I think I can make an educated guess. It is a combination of how Israel sees the recent UN decision, and of some internal politics.

Israel see the UN approach as an attempt i) circumvent negotiations, and ii) determine the resulting borders unilaterally. (By the way, when I say Israel, I mean that this is also the view of most, but not all, opposition leaders.) To understand why, consider first that the Oslo accords between the PA and Israel explicitly state that issues such as borders should be resolved by negotiations, not by third parties. The UN decision explicitly cites borders. I think that Abbas inserted this language to either leverage future negotiations, or as a prelude to a legal appeal to the ICC. Abbas may have told some world leaders that he does not have plans to appeal to the ICC, but other Palestinian politicians were definitely saying that this is something they are planning to do, and this was covered in the Israeli media.

Regarding internal politics, Israeli elections are not far away. (A fact which was clear to Abbas which he decided when to go to the UN.) Bibi was fairly restrained in the last round of hostilities with Hamas, and was put under some pressure for that. And now the PA is making a move that breaks the accords between Israel and the PA. His political base, which in any case is less inclined to trust the Palestinians, puts him under pressure to respond. At this point it seems that he does not wish to formally annul the Oslo accords or bring the collapse of the Palestinian Authority.

So this response is meant to i) show his base that he is doing something, ii) show that PA that their tactics is not going to affect future negotiations, namely, that Israel is going to ignore the part of UN decision regarding borders.

By the way, I also suspect that this response is measured to annoy several EU countries that either supported or abstained at the UN. Their UN vote is seen as breaking commitments they made to support previous agreements between Israel and the PA (which require settling final status questions by direct negotiations).
 
PhantomWolf said:
Rightly or wrongly, the controlling power of the time determined who was to be given the land that was under its control. The British Empire took it from the Ottoman Empire and as such was the governing power of the reign. We accept, even currently, that land with no title is under the control and ownership of the governing body, and from 1918 until 1947 that governing body was the British Government. They passed on the land to the UN to be divided up between the people living there creating two states, one for each.

If you claim that the ruling power of the time did not have that right, then we suddenly end up in a really hot kettle of fish, because that means no Government has rights to and ability to regulate the untitled lands under its control. The logical result of this line of thinking is that all lands should be returned to the first peoples to settle them, and everyone else has to leave. Let's start with the US, and South America.
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One problem with that, neither side wanted what the UN proposed.

As for now, I have always been in favour of a a two state solution.
 
Doctor Evil said:
By the way, I also suspect that this response is measured to annoy several EU countries that either supported or abstained at the UN. Their UN vote is seen as breaking commitments they made to support previous agreements between Israel and the PA (which require settling final status questions by direct negotiations).
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Perhaps this is their way of saying "the negotiations aren't proceeding at a pace we like". The longer they stall, the more settlements that are built/expanded.
 
a_unique_person said:
Perhaps this is their way of saying "the negotiations aren't proceeding at a pace we like". The longer they stall, the more settlements that are built/expanded.
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If this is what they thought then they are stupid. The reason that there are no negotiations is that both sides do not think that there is a chance for an agreement. This results from the offer that Olmert gave to Abbas in 2008, which Abbas never replied too. Netaniahu will never match that offer, and Abbas could have accepted it then if he wanted too. What we saw in recent years was maneuvering by both sides so that the other side will be blamed for the lack of progress.

What EU countries did with the UN vote was to give support to a side which has stalled negotiations for the last few years. (Same goes for the Israeli government, but the EU does not seem to want to reward them for that. Weird.) Not to mention that the UN vote is a breach of the agreements between the PA and Israel, which the EU supposedly support. This step made negotiations less likely, and also less likely to succeed. By the way, before anyone makes that remark, the same can be said about the plan to construct a neighborhood connecting Jerusalem and Maale Adumim.
 
Doctor Evil said:
If this is what they thought then they are stupid. The reason that there are no negotiations is that both sides do not think that there is a chance for an agreement. This results from the offer that Olmert gave to Abbas in 2008, which Abbas never replied too.
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You mentioned that recently, so I looked it up. It seems like it was a far more reasonable than what is on offer now. Half the problem with it seemed to be that no sooner was it made, than Olmert was disposed of by way of trumped up charges, and the offer died with him disappearing. Abbas denies turning it down, saying he never really got the chance to respond before it vanished.

The impression I have is that Sharon, Livni and Olmert had planned to implement this with their new party. The Gaza withdrawal was the first step. The Sharon had his stroke, Olmert was removed, Livni merged back into the crowd.
 
a_unique_person said:
You mentioned that recently, so I looked it up. It seems like it was a far more reasonable than what is on offer now. Half the problem with it seemed to be that no sooner was it made, than Olmert was disposed of by way of trumped up charges, and the offer died with him disappearing. Abbas denies turning it down, saying he never really got the chance to respond before it vanished.

The impression I have is that Sharon, Livni and Olmert had planned to implement this with their new party. The Gaza withdrawal was the first step. The Sharon had his stroke, Olmert was removed, Livni merged back into the crowd.
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Lets start from the end of your post. Sharon was not interested in negotiations since he did not trust the Palestinians to keep their end of their bargain. His approach was to make unilateral withdrawals. He did this in Gaza, but then had his stroke, and Olmert replaced him.

Initially, Olmert planned to support the unilateral approach, but has then shifted towards negotiation with Abbas. Those were very serious until Olmert felt that the time has come to close a deal, and he proposed one to Abbas.

Abbas' claim that he never turned the deal down is technically true, but misleading. He simply never responded. Initially Olmert expected Abbas to give some kind of answer on the spot. However, Abbas said that he needs to consider the offer and promised an answer on the next day. The Palestinians then asked to postpone the meeting scheduled for the next day, and never responded for the offer.

Regrading the charges against Olmert, some are still discussed in court, so we will have to wait. It is true that he was acquitted of quite a few charges already, and only convicted in relatively minor ones. However I am not convinced that this is relevant, for two reasons. 1. when Olmert gave his offer to Abbas he was already indited. If the Palestinians saw this as a problem they should not have been negotiating. 2. If the offer was good enough Abbas should have simple accepted it. This would ensure that this would be the only offer on the table in future negotiations. Even if Olmert would have been replaced, any future Israeli leader would have the option to either accept or reject the deal. Negotiating a new deal will not be seen as a realistic option.

Finally, as someone who watches closely Israeli politics, Olmert description of the talks changed with time. His story after he stepped down is fairly similar to what I have described here. He changed his version later, implying that a deal was possible. To a cynic like me it looks like he is trying to improve his image because he wishes to return to Israeli politics.
 
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