US State Dept: Israel Treats Arabs like 2nd Class Citizens

The BBQ Pit
81

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
Aww, is the poor widdle guy a little bitter? c’mon, say what you really think - you know you want to … go on, call me The Name.
[/QUOTE]

I’m not bitter, nor am I interested in calling you “The Name”. I’m pointing out that rather than assuming the most likely cause for my using the 6M number (it’s readily available and I didn’t know what the full number was) you assumed some wild-ass theory that I think Jewish lives are more important than non-Jewish lives. But that’s about on par with the wild-ass hypothesis you are hocking in this thread.

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[QUOTE=Sal Ammoniac]
**Alessan **can weigh in on whether there are Jewish-only beaches (I suspect there are, in practice). There are certainly Jewish-only occupations – army (with minor exceptions), intelligence, positions deemed sensitive – as well as Jewish-only settlements, Jewish-only roads to reach those settlements, etc.
[/QUOTE]

Beaches - absolutely not. Frankly, that’s the most insulting thing I’ve read in this thread.

Army etc. - yes, Arab-Israelis don’t serve, although Bedouins, Druze and other groupd certainly do. This is for obvious security reasons (whic, IMO, outweigh issues of fairness), and also because the state can’t ask someone to fight against his own people. Anyway, I don’t know whether to consider not being drafted deiscrimination, or privilege. Regardless, there are plenty of Arab cops.

Jewish-only settlements - in the West Bank, yes, although Israeli Arabs are free to live wnywhere they want elsewhere in the territories (something you can’t say about Jews). You won’t hear me supporting the settlement movement.

Jewish-only roads - for security reasons, certain roads in the territories were designated for use by Israeli citizens only, Arab or Jew. I object to those, too, if only because they were a massive waste of funds.

Etc. - etc what? Hospitals? No. Universities? No. Shopping malls? No. Restaurants? No. What other indignities do you imagine we impose upon Arabs? Because the answer is… no.

83

[QUOTE=Alessan]
Wow.

<snippage>

The fact that something is strange and unusual to you doesn’t mean that it is strange and unusual to the people living there, nor should it be treated that way just because you don’t understand it.
[/QUOTE]

The fact that it was neither strange nor unusual to the people living there was exactly what I found most strange, unusual, and hard to understand.

So what exactly were the large barbed wire fenced compounds full of tightly packed residential dwellings with a minereted mosques at the high point and amplified imams calling the faithful to prayer if not as I discribed? I was working, so I didn’t travel extensivly, yet I must have seen ten (give or take) of these.

84

[QUOTE=Kevbo]
The fact that it was neither strange nor unusual to the people living there was exactly what I found most strange, unusual, and hard to understand.

So what exactly were the large barbed wire fenced compounds full of tightly packed residential dwellings with a minereted mosques at the high point and amplified imams calling the faithful to prayer if not as I discribed? I was working, so I didn’t travel extensivly, yet I must have seen ten (give or take) of these.
[/QUOTE]

I could be totally wrong, but depending on how big those fenced off areas were, you may be describing what I’ve heard called a madrassa, which is a combination bazzaar/living area/relgious school that tends to crop up around a Mosque.

The next step is going to be proving that the fences were erected by the IDF/Isreali gov’t, vs. being put up by the PA or whatever Cleric is teaching out of that particular Mosque.

85

[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers]
Okay, but you haven’t presented nearly enough evidence to make such a determination convincing. Are there Jew-only beaches in Israel, for example?
[/QUOTE]

If you think superficialities like Whites-only beaches were where the horror of apartheid lay, that indicates a certain something about why you give Israel a pass. Apartheid wasn’t about such petty things, they were a sideshow. The core of apartheid was about a system that brutalised the Other out of fear, a system designed to do nothing but keep a people down because of their bloodlines. Segregated railcars and cinemas were just icing on the cake to the architects of apartheid. The real evil was always in the Group Areas Act, the Immorality Act and the Pass laws, and I see analogues of those very systems in Israel - segregated living, segregated families (or can Arab-Israelis bring their Palestinian spouses home now?) and internal passes.

Plus the OTs are nothing but glorified bantustans. You can have a system like that without segregated beaches or overt any “Jews Only” signs, because the people at the bottom would know better than to show up at the wrong nightclub or wrong street.

86

[QUOTE=John Mace]
I’m not bitter, nor am I interested in calling you “The Name”.
[/QUOTE]
Stepping back from it now, I see, because I called you on it before you could draw the namecalling trumpcard. Aah well, better luck next time. I could see where the “Jew Lover” thing was going. Well, wimp out if you must.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
I’m pointing out that rather than assuming the most likely cause for my using the 6M number (it’s readily available and I didn’t know what the full number was)
[/QUOTE]
Telling that you know the 6 million figure off by heart, but not the grand total - do your research before tossing the Nazis into the mix, next time.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
you assumed some wild-ass theory that I think Jewish lives are more important than non-Jewish lives. But that’s about on par with the wild-ass hypothesis you are hocking in this thread.
[/QUOTE]

Naah, I was just baiting you. Think of it as fair payback for you starting the shit with the “dribble” remark, fuckstain. I’m sure you can’t help it if the 6-million figure is the first that comes to mind, it’s common enough.

87

You know, I may be confusing John and Bryan somewhere in all this…

88

…sorry for the misattribution there, John.

89

…The fuckstain thing can stand, though.

90

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
Just a little gem from
So at least the US govt. now recognizes how Israel treats Arabs. Anyone here still in denial about Israelis practicing apartheid?
[/QUOTE]

Apartheid?

I got nothing from your link to suggest it.

If you’re looking for evidence of apartheid I suggest you look close to home. All over North America there a little homelands reserved for a “special” ethnic people. When is the last time you really interacted with a bona fide native American. Now about Israeli arabs…

91

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
Stepping back from it now, I see, because I called you on it before you could draw the namecalling trumpcard. Aah well, better luck next time. I could see where the “Jew Lover” thing was going. Well, wimp out if you must.
[/quote]

Your mind reading abilities are substantially weaker than you seem to think they are, dude.

Uhm… it was you who brought them up, not me. Jesus H. Christ, man, you can’t even read your own mind, and yet you think you know what other people are thinking???

Talk about wimping out. You know, you’re a cool enough guy when I encounter you in GQ, but you’re just being an idiot here.

92

[QUOTE=Sal Ammoniac]
Israel has made them citizens of nothing.
[/QUOTE]

Is this an accurate statement? Isn’t the case that Israel is refusing to make them citizens of Israel and that the surrounding Arab countries are the ones who have made them citizens of nowhere?

93

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
If you think superficialities like Whites-only beaches were where the horror of apartheid lay, that indicates a certain something about why you give Israel a pass.
[/QUOTE]
I take it that’s a “no” to the Jew-only beach thing, then.

94

…mutter…stupid board..mutter mutter…

[QUOTE=John Mace]
Your mind reading abilities are substantially weaker than you seem to think they are, dude.

[/QUOTE]

Sour grapes at not being able to use the “A-bomb”…

[QUOTE=John Mace]

Uhm… it was you who brought them up, not me. Jesus H. Christ, man, you can’t even read your own mind, and yet you think you know what other people are thinking???

[/QUOTE]

Nope, it was Bryan, in his scale of apartheidness. Then you chose to chime in about how a little state oppression isn’t as bad as the ovens. So in my convo with you, you brought them up first.

[QUOTE=John Mace]

Talk about wimping out. You know, you’re a cool enough guy when I encounter you in GQ, but you’re just being an idiot here.
[/QUOTE]

It wasn’t me who got personal first - look to your own side of this double-teaming. Side with an ass like Bryan and get what’s coming to you.

[QUOTE=Monty]
Is this an accurate statement? Isn’t the case that Israel is refusing to make them citizens of Israel and that the surrounding Arab countries are the ones who have made them citizens of nowhere?
[/QUOTE]

I’d say the blame is shared equally between Israel and the neigbouring states - so that Israel shares…ermm, 1/5 of the blame, is it? While Israel is better than its neighbours by a long chalk (although I had some hopes for Lebanon), this doesn’t give it a pass on the shit it does do.

[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers]
I take it that’s a “no” to the Jew-only beach thing, then.
[/QUOTE]

sigh
OK, stay superficial, see if I care.

95

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
Nope, it was Bryan, in his scale of apartheidness. Then you chose to chime in about how a little state oppression isn’t as bad as the ovens. So in my convo with you, you brought them up first.

[/quote]

That’s not what he said. I proposed the idea of a scale and your response was to put Israel very close to what I assume we can all agree represents the pinnacle of the modern bloodthirsty dictatorship (well, it might be a tossup between Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia, with Mao-era China in there somewhere). It was later that you threw in the “logarithmic” qualifier, by which I assume the difference between a 5-6 (Sweden) and an 8-9 (Israel) is actually less, and quite a lot less, than that between an 8-9 and a 10. Hence my request for a linear evaluation. You didn’t give a number, but said Israel is wherever 1970s South Africa was. That equation, as far as I can tell, remains unsupported. More anon.

“Dribbling”, as in incoherent mumbling accompanied by drooling, is an assessment I cheerfully stand by given the weakness of your original position and your failure to improve upon it.

Isn’t the nature of an Apartheid state institutionalized oppression of some of the citizens of that state? However one defines oppression, Palestinians are not Israeli citizens and though there is some “glass ceiling” treatment of Israeli Arabs who are citizens, there is nothing approaching Apartheid-era South Africa with, yes, whites-only beaches, neighborhoods, restrooms, drinking fountains etc. Or at least nothing that I’m aware of, which is why I’d like to see an actual Israeli Arab chime in. Is there systematic reservation of services and facilities for Jews only in Israel, supported by law? Can a restaurant owner legally serve Jews only? It is not “superficial” to ask about the day-to-day oppression that “coloureds” routinely suffered in South Africa and which you imply is matched by the suffering of modern Israeli Arabs. Seriously, I’m asking for examples. If you can’t provide them, then the whole use of the word “Apartheid” is unsupported, or at least is defined so broadly as to be useless. There are any number of valid arguments that can be made against Israel’s policies regarding the Palestinians. Slapping on an “Apartheid” label isn’t proven to be one of them.

96

My mistake; you did give a linear-scale number for Israel and 1970s South Africa, an 8. Of course now I’m curious what constitutes a 9 (halfway between Israel and Nazi Germany).

97

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
Sour grapes at not being able to use the “A-bomb”…
[/quote]

Look, dickbrain, I’ll say it right here: I don’t know if you’re an anti-semite or not. I doubt you are. I’m not one of those types who think that anti-Israel = anti-Semite. You’re an idiot, but not an anti-Semite. OK?

Whatever. I mentioned Hitler first, but not in relation to Israel. You’re the one that in our “convo” made the comparison to Israel via BE’s quote in your post. Then you pulled that ridiculous goalpost move of a logarithmic scale as if everyone would have automatically assumed that. Yeah, right.

I’m only siding with who is correct, which in this case is most definitely not you.

98

emphasis added
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers]
You didn’t give a number, but said Israel is wherever 1970s South Africa was.
[/quote]

Check again

[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers]

“Dribbling”, as in incoherent mumbling accompanied by drooling, is an assessment I cheerfully stand by given the weakness of your original position and your failure to improve upon it.

[/quote]

Still haven’t been proved wrong re. my OP

[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers]

Isn’t the nature of an Apartheid state institutionalized oppression of some of the citizens of that state? However one defines oppression, Palestinians are not Israeli citizens […]
[/QUOTE]

…and that’s where you lose me - see “bantustan”.

99

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
Still haven’t been proved wrong re. my OP
[/QUOTE]

That is just plain stupid. It’s you’re responsibility to prove that the assertion is correct, which you have failed to do. You offer one interpretation that might be correct but which certainly needn’t be correct and isn’t even likely to be so. Then you extrapolate one unnamed State Dept. official’s comment to mean “the State Dept.” and then you extrapolate what you claim to be a recognition of second class citizens to apartheid. You have proven nothing other than that you think Israel = bad.

100

[QUOTE=John Mace]
Look, dickbrain, I’ll say it right here: I don’t know if you’re an anti-semite or not. I doubt you are. I’m not one of those types who think that anti-Israel = anti-Semite. You’re an idiot, but not an anti-Semite. OK?

[/QUOTE]

So what the fuck was all that “Jew-lover” sarcasm about, then, if you were’nt perceiving me as anti-semitic?

[QUOTE=John Mace]

Whatever. I mentioned Hitler first, but not in relation to Israel. You’re the one that in our “convo” made the comparison to Israel via BE’s quote in your post. Then you pulled that ridiculous goalpost move of a logarithmic scale as if everyone would have automatically assumed that. Yeah, right.

[/QUOTE]

Leaving aside the log scale (and since I was asked where* I’d *rank them, I can use any scale I damn well please. But keep picking at the side issue I already addressed anyway(linearly) ), I was answering Bryan. You jumped in with a response to my answer. That means you brought it up between you and me, not me.

[QUOTE=John Mace]

I’m only siding with who is correct, which in this case is most definitely not you.
[/QUOTE]

Still no proof I’m wrong - Israel oppresses people based on their ethnicity. Even the State Department acknowledges this. This is all it takes to make them an apartheid state.

Which wasn’t even the thrust of my OP. The point in the OP was that someone slipped up and admitted it. All the handwaving about “Arab Tourists” hasn’t disproved the OP.