Somebody please justify Israeli settlements to me

Great Debates
81

Dseid

While I have very strong opinions and personal feelings on this matter, I don’t think that my mind is completely closed. I made the claim, or at least I tried to make the claim that the state of Israel is following a fairly standard path of subjugation of the indigenous population. I tried to remove a certain amount of the emotional lack of reason that goes with this debate. I didn’t find your post that easy to read. I would like to try to list what I see as the points you are making. Please make clarifications, if I have misunderstood you.

  1. There has been a continuos Jewish presence in the Middle East, and repeated attempts at re-forming the state of Israel. This is part of the justification of current day Israel.
  2. The Arab population co-operated with Hitler in WWII, and do to this and other atrocities, the state of Israel is justified.
  3. Arabs and Israelis can not get along, further justifying the state of Israel.
  4. I believe that you are also implying that Israel exists to make sure that an event, like the holocaust does not happen to Jews again.

“And they (to the best of my knowledge) aren’t even Palestinian”

  1. Only certain religions or ethnicity have a right to comment on this topic, and grudgingly we will admit that Palestinians have this right.
  2. The Palestinians deserve what is happening to them.

7 There is at least the beginnings of an argument, I believe that not only must the state of Israel exist with those who are ethnically Jewish, it must exist as one which embodies the Jewish faith.

There seem to be a number of people who are saying that Arabs and Israelis (Jews?) can not get along. I would like to put forward something that I find interesting, namely the Palestinian/Jewish violence inside Israel is much smaller than the Palestinian/Jewish violence in the “occupied territories”. This is in spite of Israeli Palestinians having a second class citizenship. I believe that there has already been a petition by Israeli Palestinians opposed to living under PLO rule.

I don’t see much hope for diminished Palestinian terrorism in a two-state solution. It’s possible, but I think that the PLO would not be able to provide the Palestinian people with any hope, once the euphoria of having their own state started to wear off. I have no hope of any sort of economic leadership coming out of the PLO.

I would expect that any Palestinian state would have so may restrictions on it that the notion of independent would be questionable.

To a major extent, Israel has been able to reign in and control its terrorists after independence. I have no such confidence that the PLO would be able to do the same thing. Combined with what appears to be fairly severe corruption problems in the PLO, I find the two-state solution to be quite scary.

82

Okay, I’ll take your statement at face value, your mind is not completely closed.

Let’s go through the points. Be forwarned, this may take awhile.

Your first point is “that the state of Israel is following a fairly standard path of subjugation of the indigenous population.”

Israeli Arabs are full citizens, they have representation in the Knesset, they have more rights and power than do Arab citizens in most Arab countries. This is the standard path of subjugation of indigenous people? (Please note, I readily admit that they are a minority that suffers discrimination in acccess to services, etc … but that is more akin to the current situation for many minorities in America than “subjugation.” It needs to be improved upon.)

Or are you specifically referring to the occupied territories? In such a case you vastly oversimplify the causes of their current situation. Israel is not pure in this regard but she has been left with few options along the way. The Palestinian people have been used as a pawn by Arab governments and individual Arabs. It serves particular interests to have Israel to hold up as a common enemy; it prevents the populus from spending too much energy thinking about how maltreated they are by their own governments.

So now your understanding of my points. Who has “a right” to this land? Humans have lived there from the dawn of civilization. Who counts as indigenous and who as displaced?

The Hebrew Kingdom was there for almost two thousand years. In 587 BCE the Babylonians took over and kicked them out, but were allowed back in when Persia took over Babylonia. And remained for a while when the Greeks displaced the Persians. When the Greek representatives decided that the practice of Judaism must desist a revolt won autonomy The downfall of the Hebrew Kingdom really came because a few generations later internal squabbling led the invitation of the Romans to help settle things. Romans took over from there and, after failed rebellions, most of the Jews were sold into slavery or deported or killed. Most but not all. Some Jewish presence always remained and Israel was always central in Jewish prayers. Muslim Arabs took over in 600 AD and built a mosque on top of the site of the holiest site to Judaism. Turks took over in 1071, and then the Crusades came and expelled Jews from Jerusalem. Then Saladin, then the Marmelukes. Whenever Jews had a chance they came back in. Most often they were dhimmis, second class citizens by law. The Ottomans took over in 1517. Palestine was a province in their empire. There was no entity of a Palestinian people. Throughout these time the Arab population was fluid. By 1880, Jews numbered 24,000 out of 400,000 total. By 1914, the total population of Palestine was about 700,000. About 85,000 to 100,000 were Jews.

So, 1) Jews are as much an indigenous population to this land as any Arab group. The claim goes back further, was never relinquished, and was never abandoned. They were a displaced people, a subjugated people, but they never entirely left. This right to this land does not abrogate any right that an Arab family may have to land that their family has settled for generations but it is also valid. The UN decided to settle these conflicting claims by a partition. The Jews could have an extremely small piece and the Arabs the rest. The Jews were willing to accept this.

  1. The Arabs, led by vicious anti-Semitic leaders, felt that Jews had no claim to any of the land. The actions taken by Arab countries from before Israel’s birth until their decisive defeat in the 6-Day War was that the Jewish state, and its inhabitants should be totally destroyed. So this is how Israel followed standard procedure to subjugate a people?

  2. Arabs and Jews can get along. But Arab leaders have long used Israel as scapegoat, and like many in the world, have fostered antisemitism for their own ends. Islam is a fine religion, but it has been abused by some for their own purposes.

  3. Yes, many of us believe that Israel helps reduce the risk of another Holocaust. During the Holocaust Jews were turned back to face certain death.

  4. No, you misunderstand. You, and others feel that Israel has no right to exist. Chupski has stated that settlers deserve to be targets of terrorism because they are occupiers, and he and you clearly support the view that Israel itself is an occupation of Arab land. If people like you still cling onto the concept that Israel doesn’t have a right to exist, then how are we to believe that Palestinians are willing to accept the existance of Israel proper?

  5. Again misunderstood. They deserve much better and have been led into this position by incompentent and greedy leadership from the time before Israel’s birth to the present day. Today’s leadership guides them to a path of increasingly desolute hopelessness and desperation.

  6. No, I’m no ultra right Orthodox. My sense is of a tribal identity. Israel needs to decide for itself what it is to be. A battle will eventually be fought between the secularists and those who have more of a theocracy in mind. It won’t be fought while Israel is under attack from without.

I have hope for a two state solution, and long term one that is interdependent between its parts. Both would benefit from each other. Is current Palestinian leadership capable of such? I understand your pessimism. I think they have the ability but not the will. I think that they are so resentful of their perceptions of the past that they fail to really consider the future.

A unified state is an Arab state (unless Israel really did become an apartheid nation). It is the death of a country with a Jewish identity. It will never be a solution acceptable to Israelis.

Any constructive discussion must begin with accepting that Israel will continue to exist and will not do anything without being assured that it provides for her security. It does not asssume good will from either side, it allows good will to slowly develop.

83

Sorry, but of all the arguments - some genuinely worthy - put up to support a state of Israel this one is a piece of crap. There are so many wiped out civilisations and displaced peoples over history - should we force the English back out of Wales and give it to the Celts? After all, they had it more recently.

There are lots of pro-Israeli arguments I can have sympathy with, but this one just inflames me.

84

Interesting. I wonder why? Despite the fact that “there are so many wiped out civilisations and displaced peoples over history” you have much sympathy for the plight of Arabs who were forced to share the area of historic Palestine 50 some years ago.

The point (in context) stands, the Jews have at least as much right to call themselves “indigenous” to the area as any Arabs who happened to be living in the area during the first half of the 20th century. Analogies to European colonism and “subjugation of indigenous populations” do not apply to this situation, on many levels.

BTW as to the question of who is indigenous, yeah, the Celts count. And if somehow the Celts who were living there were given a county as their own country, then the claim that they were displacing and subjugating an indigenous English people wouldn’t hold much water.

85

What I am objecting to is not the right of Israelis to live in part of that land now, but the continual argument that “Palestinians didn’t exist before XYZ”, or that just because there are clearer or more valid records of Israeli civilisation in that area that they have more of a claim on it.

Either you justify the Israeli presence there by the ancient Hebrew Kingdom thing, OR you justify it by the fact that they won/bought/were granted certain lands this century. You can’t have it both ways. If you go by the former argument then you have to equally support the indigenous Arab people’s case for staying there for aeons and self-determining, albeit at a later date.

By the second argument the Israelis in terms of “New Israel” were there later than the Palestinians so again the Palestinians have just as much right as the Israelis to be there.

I get a bit sick of people treating or talking about the Palestinians like native Australians, with all this Terra Nullius (sp?) bullshit, how they “weren’t a proper country” “weren’t called Palestinians” “weren’t called Palestine” previously. Well they fucking well are now.

So if I am to afford respect to the Israelis’ right to stay in part of that land - which I do - then likewise the Palestinians should be afforded equal respect.

Also - I am not talking about “Jews” - ie those indigenous to the area. I am talking about “Israelis” - which also includes Jewish people newly resident in the area.

86

Um why not? (I hate those either/or rhetorical fallacies.)

There is a historical claim as an indigenous people for a long period of time. A claim never abandoned. An indigenous people that never entirely left. Throughout all the dogs stealing this bone from each other since, the Jews always were the pup standing there saying that “Uh guys it’s really mine.”

And they "won/bought/were granted’ the right to have part of it back as their own this century.

Certainly I support that Arabs have a claim to the areas as well - “This right to this land does not abrogate any right that an Arab family may have to land that their family has settled for generations but it is also valid. The UN decided to settle these conflicting claims …”

And that brings to 1948. If the Arab nations had decided to accept this arbitration of two valid claims, then all would have been well and good. But they didn’t. And they can’t undo what they did then or the consequences. The Palestinian people now, as you say, “fucking well” exist. (I do not know if Kinsey data exist to specifically address how well they do that, actually, but they have kids, so things must work out okay.)

At many steps the Arab leaders could have accepted solutions that afforded the now extant Palestinians their own country if only they accepted that Israel had a right to be there as well. They could have accepted the original partition intead of annexing Palestine into their own countries (that was the Arab view of a Palestinian people.) They could have accepted the armistice borders that resulted from that failed attempt to destroy Israel. They could have built a country in the West Bank called Palestine instead of keeping it annexed as part of Jordan, using it a staging ground to attack Israel and keeping the Palestinians there as pawns in refugee camps. Arafat could have come to CD2 willing to deal in good faith. At each step the leadership says no, it is not enough, even though it by now is obvious that they are leading their people to a nothingness but desperation.

Also, I’m not talking about individuals, I’m talking about a group, a people. Who is not “newly resident in the area.”

87

BTW kea, if you really want “to remove a certain amount of the emotional lack of reason that goes with this debate” then you may start with refraining from statements like “The choice of Israel as a home land is religious bigotry, racism …”

88

There are minor areas where we agree, it is possible that there are even major areas though so far it doesn’t sound like it. It is clear that our approach to being Jewish, and the experience of the Holocaust has lead us in dramatically different ways. Just two words, never again, takes on totally different meanings between the two of us. My choice to challenge you first definitely comes out of the effect the Holocaust has had on me. I am not tribal. I can not accept the tribe. Your reply to me can be answered on a point by point basis. There is no reason – you have defined our differences, our view of the world. I reject nationalism as evil – well I like the way Einstein said it – “Nationalism is an infantile disease, it is the measles of mankind.”

I find that there is a time problem that I was not aware of when I made my first post (wow did it come up quick). I don’t have the time to research and document my answers, and I suspect that you don’t either. Unfortunately that documentation is required. For example,

“By 1914, the total population of Palestine was about 700,000. About 85,000 to 100,000 were Jews.”

Terms need to be defined and referenced. Based on the number of current refugees “Some 3,6 million Palestinian refugees” http://www.mondediplo.com/focus/mideast/question-3-3-1-en the number of 700,000 just doesn’t sound right. Of course we are now moving into a scholarly debate about the accuracy of various sources, and if we don’t have time to carefully research and document our answers, we don’t have time to research and justify our sources.

I wish to make it clear that I do not support killing of settlers. I believe that the suicide bombings makes clear the lie that settlers are military targets. This is a justification to an attempt at mass terror, and the settlers are a far more convenient target. These people are guilty of war crimes. Just so that there is no mis-understanding – I think that Israel has acted in ways which are as bad and worse.

There is something that bothers me, outside the obvious course of this debate. That is the use of such justifications like “they have more rights and power than do Arab citizens in most Arab countries” and But “Arab leaders have long used Israel as scapegoat”. Each one of these statements is true, though the first one is becoming less and less true as the uprising continues. My feeling is that these quotes have no real place in the discussion about the Palestinians as you have used them. The manner in which Syria treats its population in no way excuses the manner in which Israel treats its population. This is true, even if Syria is worse. The fact that Egypt searches out every grisly picture it can on the uprising, and displays it as prominently as it can (at least from what I have heard) in order to try to control it’s own internal unrest does not provide justification for the treatment of Palestinians. Children throwing stones at soldiers provides justifications, no matter how sick and twisted these justifications become. Palestinian actions in aiding and abetting an enemy provide justifications, but the actions of surrounding countries do not. The actions of surrounding countries provide justifications for Israel’s actions with those surrounding countries.

racism n.

  1. The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.
  2. Discrimination or prejudice based on race.

http://www.dictionary.com/search?q=racism

I think that by definition a Jewish state fits item #2. I believe that is what tribal is all about; the tribe comes first.

In the course of all of this I came across something that surprised me. I came across a person I would call evil. I don’t think that too many people are truly evil, but I this man is. This man is a war criminal, and head of the state of Israel. What surprised me was how he spoke. Perhaps he doesn’t always speak in this way, but there was a bluntness and clarity of vision that I am not use to in this debate.

“In 1998, Sharon as Foreign Minister negotiated with Benjamin Netanyahu at the Wye River talks. That year Sharon stated, “Everyone has to move, run and grab as many hilltops as they can to enlarge the settlements because everything we take now will stay ours. Everything we don’t grab will go to them.” “

http://www.coastalpost.com/02/05/06.htm

In a rather belated attempt to stay on topic, the settlements are, just as Sharon stated, an attempt to expand the size of Israel.

89

Again, I’ll address point by point.

I do have a source for my figures- http://www.mideastweb.org/briefhistory.htm .

Figures for the population of the Palestinians year by year are easily accessible too if you search a little. If you are going to participate in GD I humbly suggest that you either come prepared to answer the unavoidable “Cite, please” or be prepared to say that you pulled something out of your ass. And to defend your source.

As to the comparisons between the rights of Arabs under Israeli control and the rights of Arabs under Arab control, it has every place in these debates. Just not for as you believe they are being used.

It is pertinent to the charge that Israel is “subjugating” a people. If they have more rights than they would have if they had gone the way of being annexed into other Arab countries, it is hard to state that Israel has come along and “subjugated” them.

It is pertinent to the bias that permeates these discussions - I can only wonder about what motivates such a bias - but biased is the view that Israel is a racist oppressor for providing people with many more rights than they get in most of the rest of the Mid East, while spending little sound and fury on the maltreatment of Arabs by other Arabs.

Now let me be clear. This does not excuse human rights abuses and civil rights abuses of Arabs by Israelis when they occur. But it places such within a context. Arabs are better off in terms of civil rights as Israeli citizens than as citizens in most Arab countries. Than in most of the world. And I’d really like to see your documentation for the “subjugation” of Arab Israeli citizens. Mind you, such is a word that implies a lot more than disparate funding for school districts and public works projects. The conditions in the occupied territories are another matter … I do not excuse all that has been done there. One Israeli justice put it well, and I paraphrase: You cannot fight terrorism as if human rights do not exist and you cannot fight for human rights as if terrorism does not exist. The balance is a difficult one to strike.

Racism? What race is discriminating against which race?

Jews are not a race. There are white Jews, Black Jews, Chinese Jews, Peruvian Jews, Indian Jews … my adopted daughter (from China) will be a Jew (once we get around to having the conversion done) and once converted she’ll be as Jewish as I am.

The Arabs are not a race. Pan-Arab nationalism aside they are an amalgam of different cultures, peoples, and religious denominations.

Tribalist? Maybe. But if you are going to fight against the “infantile disease of nationalism” then you have a lot of work to do in this world. Why does the world only seem to disparage it so when it is the Jews being nationalistic? I can only wonder.

As to Sharon- What crime are you referring to? He certainly failed in Lebanon in not preventing a massacre by the Christian militias. He didn’t commit or organize a massacre, but he was responsible for not preventing it. He was disciplined accordingly at the time. Or do you refer to the operations in the West Bank? We could argue for days over what options Israel realistically has and what is excessive force versus unavoidable consequences. But I wouldn’t accede “war crimes” there. Truly evil? Nah. A hard-liner politician who plays to the far right of the Israeli spectrum. Sure. And when your political base are those who believe in a greater Israel you’ll play to that crowd with those kinds of statements. But the justification of those extremists for the settlements is not that of the mainstream. Why is he in office? Because the mainstream tried negotiation farther than anyone thought it could go, only to have it rejected. Because the failure at CD2 and Taba and subsequent terror attacks shut the peace movement down.

Why will he stay in office. Because no one is offering a realistic alternate path. I hope that Labour comes up with a vision.