:dubious:Yeah, it’s crazy, especially if you hang out on West Bank statehood FB pages (they’re sending sympathy messages to Connecticut while this lot are vilifying them as terrorists).
But being a South African, I have a ridiculously optimistic streak. It would be wildly wrong to trivialise the problems we have, but this is us at our frequent best:
If we could do it, why can’t Israel? Admitting you’re wrong is really not that hard once you get used to the idea.
Right now it seems that if moderates in Israel can grasp the nettle and shoulder the certifiables like Bibi and Lieberman out of the way, there’s the best chance for peace at the moment, with Abbas in power, that there has been since Rabin was shot. (Now that was a blunder.)
But maybe I’m wrong and it’s true that Jews like to suffer.
But Israel’s own Chicken Little will be that much closer to raining wormwood on its neighbours in order to re-assert its authority in what it deems its o so sacrosanct patch of barren, inarable desert
Don’t underestimate the propensity for the Jew to become terrorist-like. After all, Israel was acquired through terrorism - Irgun
As some anon said somewhere, 'The only difference between a hasidic Jew’s phylactery and an Islamist’s suicide vest is the respect land the West permits them to occupy. ’
That’s as useless as demonizing all Palestinians. Israel is terribly in the wrong at the moment and yes, they’re way, way down the path to being an isolated rogue apartheid state (you can fool an American but not a Saffer - we wrote that book).
But there’s still a lot of good will and reason around. B’tselem & many others like them, Courage to Refuse, Not In Our Name, a strong liberal Israeli press, a largely secular and moderate West Bank who want a state more than anything else.
Support those, refuse to tolerate the extremist propaganda on either side, and maybe there’s a chance. Not a big one, I admit, but a chance.
That said, congrats on claiming “the Jew” has “a propensity to be terrorist-like”.
Most anti-Semites try to camouflage their attitudes by referring to “the Israelis” or “the Zionists” and “the Jew” as opposed to “the Jew” is archaic in a nice way. Very Henry Ford.
Islamophobic and anti-Arab bigots usually don’t feel the need to camouflage their beliefs because they’re more acceptable in the West.
That said, you do give those of us critical of Israel a hard time by tarring us. Anti-Arab bigots by contrast don’t seem to have the same affect on Israel-supporters.
Incidentally, I’m not using term “anti-Semite” as an insult or as a moral judgement, but as a description of your beliefs.
People who believe that “the Jew has a propensity to be terrorist-like” are by definition anti-Semites but that doesn’t mean they’re stupid, evil, or even immoral.
A very odd reason to want keep an ‘illegitimately established’, ‘on-its-way-to-being-a-rogue’ state in existence. If the ME would be ‘a lot more peaceful without Israel’, why on Earth would your sentimentality matter?? Surely you can make a moral decision without succumbing to your emotions!
I don’t think you’ll be shocked to learn this comment looks a lot like hate speech and we don’t tolerate that kind of thing around here. If you want to continue posting here for any length of time, you won’t do this again.
Well if you want to put an end to Jewish Israel – like the Arabs do – then of course you will support the creation of a Palestinian State.
Well what’s the test to see whether land belongs to Group X?
If an outsider who is a member of Group X moves in and starts making use of uncultivated land in the Ottoman empire, does that land now belong to Group X?
If the Arabs successfully ethnically cleanse a Jewish neighborhood in Gaza City, Hebron, or Baghdad, does that land become Arab land?
The Jewish National Fund owns thousands of acres of land inside of what is now Syria. Does that land belong to the Jews as a group? Is it a problem that Syria is occupying Jewish Land?
Is Kiryas Joel on Jewish Land? Is Vermont White land?
I really would like to know how to determine if a piece of land belongs to a group of people. And whether that test is universal, or if it is rigged in favor of Arabs and against Jewish people.
I don’t know if caroza is just messing with us, but I think it’s worth keeping in mind that there are a lot of people out there who seriously believe, at least at some level, that Israel is the very worst country in the world; that Israel should not exist; that Israel will inevitably fall; and that everything should be done to hasten this process.
I would guess that this is a common attitude among nations which are involved in the UN Human Rights Commission. Why else would Israel be condemned more than all other nations combined?
Ok, would the creation of a Palestinian State satisfy people with such a mentality? Of course not, it will only give them encouragement.
Because, of course, condemnation of Israel’s actions can’t really be based on those actions. It has to be simple antisemitism, and therefore peremptorily dismissable, because IOKIAJ, right? Why the hell can’t the entire rest of the world realize that?
This is indeed true. I suspect that the reason for it is that anti-Arab/anti-Muslim bigotry is an issue that far transcends the Arab/Israeli debate - that is, it is very widespread and not of necessity linked to the concerns of the Arab-Israeli matter.
Now, anti-Jewish bigotry is of course not necessarily linked to the Arab-Israeli issue either, but the relative proportion of Jews in Israel to Jews worldwide is much higher that of Muslims directly impacted by the Arab/Israeli matter to Muslims worldwide.
Add to that the fact that, in the West, anti-Arab/anti-Muslim bigotry is for historical reasons more acceptable, and you get the observed reaction.
On the one hand, certainly one can believe that actual Israeli abuses occur and ought to be condemned.
On the other hand, IMO no it isn’t possible that Israel commits more human rights abuses than any other country, or indeed the rest of the world combined. That simply is not factually true. Again, IMO.
Both positions can be held simultaneously … hence my question (which has gone unanswered) - does caroza, or do you for that matter, seriously believe that Israel “… commit more human rights violations than the rest of the world combined”?
It’s Okay If A Jew.
Elvis is, simultaneously, claiming his camp’s being persecuted and referencing the common fiction that 'you can’t criticize Israel without being an anti-Semite", and also claiming that it’s an issue of Jewish privilege and we want the whole world to get on board with Jewish Exceptionalism.
It’s a tightrope to walk, but I’m sure Elvis can manage.
Agreed, but I think it’s interesting to note that the actual truth of the claim is irrelevant to the question of whether the supporters of a Palestinian State are hoping to eventually have peaceful co-existence with Jewish Israel or whether they are hoping that eventually Jewish Israel will cease to exist. Clearly a lot of people, including the Arab leadership as well as a lot of Western Leftists, are hoping for the latter.
So there is kind of a silver lining when people imply that Israel is the worst country in the world or that Israel violates human rights more than the rest of the world combined. It shows their true agenda. And it shows why a Palestinian State is a bad idea.
I disagree - whether or not a Palestinian state is a good idea isn’t dependant on the attitudes of commentators. Or even, one might add, on the attitudes of Palestinian leaders.
To my mind, and to get back to the topic of the OP, there are plusses and minuses of the proposal that are quite outside of these considerations.
Pros:
The UN proposal will, presumably, give the PA a popularity lift. While the PA has many problems (foremost, a distressing level of corruption), having it collapse isn’t in anyone’s best interests - as its likely replacement would be Hamas.
Statehood could have its own momentum regardless of what anyone wants - as the PA grow more of the apparatus of statehood, they may well develop more of the practical concerns of day-to-day statehood - leading them likelier to seek a realistic deal.
While the current Israeli government is annoyed by the whole process, it is possible that, when they get over that, they too will see the advantages of making a realistic deal - elevating the PA into “statehood” could help with that.
Cons:
The current UN proposal is unfortunately par for the course - it is a purely symbolic gesture. Giving the PA symbolic victories as opposed to real and tangible gains could feed the PA’s appetite for making grand symbolic gestures - in effect encouraging expending efforts on fantasy over hard and painful reality. The PA will always “win” in the UN Gen Assemb. - but those victories don’t mean much.
The PA only represents the WB, not Gaza. Above I asked (repeatedly) whether this statehood deal covers Gaza as well: seemingly, nobody is sure. How can some entity be a “state” if no-one knows what it consists of?
Each side may come out of this thinking that the way forward is unilateral moves rather than negotiation. The PA gets its “state” without negotiations so Israel carves out what it wants as its “borders” without negotiations.
Well then let’s suppose for the sake of argument that the Palestinian Arab leadership announces explicitly that they want a Palestinian State to serve as a base of operations for their campaign to destroy Israel.
You feel that’s irrelevant to the question of whether it’s a good idea to have a Palestinian State? Seriously?
It’s also possible that if you send me a thousand dollars, it will help me move 30 million dollars out of Nigeria and you can have 20 percent or 6 million dollars in return for your initial investment.
