You really don’t understand this? Why shouldn’t I be able to live wherever I want to live? If I want to move into Bill gates’ house, why should he have a problem with that?
Well then, in light of all of the above stated, it seems to me that Israel is fucked no matter what it does. (I guess it was fucked from the very beginning, but then again it’s quite arguable that the Jewish people were fucked from the very beginning. Chosen people, my ass.)
I can’t see the Arabs giving up the fight against Israel, ever. I just don’t see it happening. I think even if Israel were to completely withdraw from the Gaza strip and the West Bank, completely dismantle all of the settlements, and completely declare peace with any Arab elements, terrorist groups would still try to destroy Israel. Why? Because that’s been their goal ever since the country was created. They said they were going to “push the Jews into the sea” - why would they give up? Like I said, the Arabs are a warrior people. They are nothing if not determined. The Jews only learned how to fight in a unified way in the last 50 years - they have arrived very, very late to this party, and without an invitation either.
Israel as a Jewish nation will probably cease to exist within the next half-century. An interesting, if ill-fated, experiment in politics. The Jews will go back to being the servant-class of the Gentile world, tolerated as long as they keep their mouths shut, don’t get uppity, and stay focused on building the bombs, planes and other technology of their host country, and making us laugh with their comedians. And if there is anti-Jewish violence, in Europe, in America, wherever, well, the Jews will just have to deal with it, because they won’t have a “Jewish” country to go to.
I just don’t see a positive outcome for this situation.
The problem is… not really. For instance, many still object to the population transfer (only the Arab, the Jewish expulsions from Arab nations don’t get mentioned very often) that went on around 1948. And yet, we had massive population transfers in Europe post-war and in India-Pakistan post-war, and they were generally embraced, or at least condoned. '67 is a bit different… a bit. But even now territorial shifts aren’t unheard of. Or totally prohibited.
Couple of points:
- Israel could annex parts of the WB and/or Gaza (although pretty much nobody wants Gaza), as indeed negotiations have thus far been aimed at and gotten close to.
- As long as the Law of Return is in effect and Jews cannot legally be discriminated against, Israel will remain the Jewish national home. Demographics aren’t required, a safe haven is.
I know that this is probably another one of your “it’s a lie to claim that continuously shooting rockets at civilians is an attack” sort of things, but the difference is that Bill Gates owns his house, and the vast majority of land in the West Bank was never privately owned, by anybody.
I don’t think so. If Israel annexes these areas, it will have no choice but to grant citizenship to the Arab residents. This will drastically change the politics of the state of Israel. It will change much of the dynamic of the place, since Jews won’t control Israel anymore. Unless there’s some sort of power-sharing agreement in place, but as previously said this would be extremely difficult given the distrust and hatred between both ethnic groups.
You quoted point two but disregarded point one. 
To be honest, it is never going to happen.
In my opinion, they should have never dispossessed the native born population to shoehorn in european genetic people. The Palistinians are the genetic inheritors of the land, not a bunch of people who had been so subsumed by the european population for so many centuries they had a tenuous relationship to anybody actually born in Palestine in the first place.
Not a popular opinion, but there it is.
It’s unclear to me why this matters. The majority of Arizona is not privately owned, but that doesn’t mean its up for grabs. Nor does it mean that the people of Arizona would be any less upset if they lost that land.
- They never did. The fact is that the Zionists actually improved the land and allowed a greater carrying capacity.
- Most of the Palestinians were not dispossessed, as I’ve pointed out a few times in this thread the vast majority were not land owners in the first place.
- Many were, in fact, immigrants themselves.
- Many Jews who settled in Israel were, in fact, citizens of Arab countries who were expelled from their countries and absorbed by Israel. In point of fact, the expelled/escaped Jews were roughly equal in number to the expelled/escaped Arabs in 1948.
The hunh what?
Noting that, of course, that there was a huge percentage of Arab immigrants into the territories. Territories which Muslim/Arab armies had won via conflict in the first place.
Jews were never subsumed into the European populace, which is why Jewish bloodlines are still genetically distinct from it and culturally why they always had the status of ‘other’. Furthermore, they’re actually somewhat genetically similar to the Arab population, so they’d have the same ‘genetic’ right, too. We can also add that the land was never rendered Judenrein, and Jews never gave up their centuries-old claims to several areas until they were ethnically cleansed/murdered, like Hebron.
Problem is that everybody is entitled to their own opinions, not their own facts. You’re subscribing to a fictional narrative that ignores the actual complexities of the situation and substitutes non-facts.
I don’t see what you mean. You’re saying demographics aren’t required, I say that they are: Israel won’t be the Jewish national home if Jews aren’t the majority there. I fail to see how your point one relates to this. Israel has tried to negotiate the annexation of “parts” of the West Bank and Gaza strip. What are these parts? Would they change the demographics of Israel if they were annexed? Would their departure leave the rest of the territories able to form a viable country eventually?
I’m a little more optimistic than that. Israel’s normalized relations with both Egypt and Jordan, for instance. You also have to remember two things:
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Most of the Arab world doesn’t give a fuck about the Palestinians, except in a general, “Oh, it’s a shame about the poor Palestinians” sort of way.
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The moderate Arab countries and the gulf states like having Israel around to be bad cop. There wasn’t really much mourning in Riyadh or Amman when the Israelis bombed Osirak, and everybody was really quiet when that Syrian nuclear reactor got destroyed in 2007. Israel’s big enemies right now are Syria and Iran, and they’re Saudi Arabia’s, Jordan’s, Egypt’s, etc. enemies too.
Also, I think you’re misunderstanding the Palestinian mood. Most Palestinians realize that the elimination of Israel isn’t an attainable goal, and most Palestinians are residents of the West Bank and Gaza anyway. That’s true of the PNA too. Of it’s members, only Abbas and Shaath were born in what’s now Israel.
I think what the average Palestinian now wants is an independent Palestinian state and economic well being. If that ever happens…if there’s an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza that can draw in foreign investment and have a functioning economy, then the vast majority of Palestinian support for anti-Israeli terrorist groups will disappear.
Re-read my first point. You’re ignoring it.
No, I am not. I’ve pointed out that difference between annexing the entire territory and negotiating for some of those areas that are currently settled.
Check the history of negotiations.
No.
Sure looked like negotiations had led to that point before the Second Intifada was planned and launched, yes.
Israel has repeatedly tried to find peace with Palestinians and with Arabs in general. Israel didn’t kick the Palestinians out in the first place - they left voluntarily because their Arab neighbors told them to get out of the way while they eliminated Israel, then they’d get to move in and take over. It just didn’t work out that way for them. The Israelis turned out to be harder to kill than they thought. Since then, Israel has been repeatedly attacked by various Arab nations. After each attack, it has tried to make peace with its neighbors. It gave the Golan Heights back - and the enemy used it to shell Israel.
Today, the ‘solution’ is said to be to return Israel to its 1967 borders. But what happened in 1967 to change those borders? Were the Palestinians happy with them then? No, Israel almost lost a war because those borders were indefensible and the Arab nations were still trying to wipe it off the map.
Bill Clinton tried to negotiate a peace with the Israelis and the Palestinians. Israel agreed to almost every condition and gave Arafat more than anyone expected Israel would ever offer. Arafat’s response was to break off all further negotiations and launch the second intifada.
More recently, Israel completely withdrew from the Gaza Strip, ceding to Palestinian demands that they rule their own land. The world pitched in with tremendous amounts of aid. The result was that Hamas started launching rockets into Israel from Gaza.
How has Israel behaved when the other side has been reasonable? Have they stabbed anyone in the back like they’ve been repeatedly stabbed in the back? No. They made peace with Egypt, and that peace has held to both side’s satisfaction. They have opened up trade with Arab nations that have ceased to call for their destruction. Israel would like to be a good neighbor and live in peace with everyone. The Palestinians in the West Bank have moderated their tone, and as a result Israel is dealing with them in a much more constructive manner.
And the history of violence against Israel isn’t old. It doesn’t end with the Holocaust, or even with the 1973 Arab-Israeli war. Today, there is widespread anti-semitism throughout the Arab world and still depressing amounts of it in Europe. Hamas refused to recognize the right of Israel to exist. Iran is building a nuclear bomb and constantly threatening to wipe Israel off the map, despite the fact that Israel has never been a threat to Iran or affected Iran in any real way. It’s pure religious hatred.
From the Israeli’s perspective, the world is an extremely hostile place. They’re just trying to survive and maintain their own identity - something that people in every nation strive for. Israel is not expansionist. It does not threaten its neighbors. It is the only real democracy in a region of the world filled with dictatorships. It has a better human rights record than any nation in the region. And yet, it is subject to more UN resolutions, more hatred, and more demands than any other country.
If you want real peace in the Middle East, how about turning some pressure towards the other Arab nations? How about holding the Palestinians accountable, instead of showing them with aid? How about actually doing something about Iran other than issuing toothless resolution after toothless resolution?
Few problems Sam.
The causes of the refugee problem were multifaceted. Yes, some left in advance of the fighting. Some left because the war that the Arabs started was getting close to their homes. Some left because the fighting was going on in/around their villages. Some were expelled by proto-Israeli forces. There’s no simple answer on that count.
Not really. After '48 it was a DMZ but the Syrians were using it to snipe Israeli civilians and launch raids from it, and Israel took it in '67. During the Yom Kipper War Israel lost ground but pushed back and established a narrow DMZ after the war. Your point stands about Gaza though.
Well, the Arab nations weren’t the Palestinians at that point. In fact, the notion of Palestinian nationalism was somewhat aborted, as Jordan and Egypt had prevented the formation of any Palestinian nation, by force.
The PLO, however, was founded before '67 with the goal of exterminating the Israeli nation within in '48 borders.
And then lie about the offer and claim that the phased withdrawal plan was a permanent plan of “bantustans”.
One side did go first - have you forgotten the Gaza expulsion? And what happened to all the farms that were left, all the thousands of greenhouses that were left when the Israelis left Gaza? Destroyed by the Palestinians.
Ditto the houses of worship that were left standing. Burned to the ground.
Don’t lecture about one side “being the bigger man.” Been there, done that.
It’s not a factually correct opinion.
One annoying theme in these debates tends to be the recurrent statement that the only Israelis are the Ashkenazic Israelis - i.e., European Jews who migrated to Israel.
This comprehensively ignores the fact that half the population of Israel today consists of Mizrahim - that is, Jews of middle eastern origin. Many of them have lived in the land of Israel since, well, forever; others are refugees, expelled from other bits of the ME.
On the other side of the equation, many Palestinians were themselves relatively recent immigrants at the time of Israel’s formation; others had family histories stretching back centuries in the area - just like their Jewish neighbours.
I don’t think that anyone is a “genetic inheritor” of anywhere, but insofar as the term is used, it applies to some on both sides. The situation is much more complex than your post indicates.
The difference between a house and a country is that a person privately owns a house.