The difference is that NO blacks were ever allowed to be SA citizens. In Israel, some Arabs are. So it’s not a simple equality.
Shit, I can’t believe I’m defending Israel. Look what you make me do!
It ain’t the same, since all parties (especially the Palestinians and Israelis) accept that the Palestinains living in the WB and Gaza ought, once peace negotiations are concluded and they obtain a real government, become their own state. In fact, jumping the gun, the PA has applied for UN membership (I assume you follow the news).
In contrast, the use of scare-quotes around “independent” “homelands” is exactly right - in SA, these were completely artificial creations that, once democracy came to SA, ceased to have any purpose. Is anyone arguing that Palestinains do not want their own state, or that it is merely a creation of the Israelis for their convenience?
Moreover, in Israel, contra SA, the Arabs actually living withing the borders of Israel are Israeli citizens who vote - unlike Blacks living within the borders of SA.
This is why the comparison quite comprehensively fails and is indeed only invoked by those either ignorant of the history, or deliberately employing it as a smear.
It seems to me that the OP is asking the wrong question. For any given country, the relevant question is “why shouldn’t we be friendly with this country?”. Israel does not particularly offend our sensibilities, so we’re on good terms with them. Would you ever ask what we get out of our alliance with Australia, or Japan, or France?
12 out of 128 seats in parliament and 2 of 30 cabinet positions does not a ruling party make. Pay more attention to the regions news and try again. Some statement of theirs since even this small success in the government calling for driving the Israelis into the sea would be nice as well.
Even if I were to be nice, throw logic to the wind and give Lebanon to you, you referred to Israel’s neighbors, plural. Of Syria, Jordan, and Egypt, which of these has called for driving Israel into the sea since 1967?
I’m no fan of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, but comparing their status to South African Blacks shows extreme ignorance of South Africa, Israel/Palestine or both.
Palestinians in the West Bank have vastly higher standards of living than Black South Africans do even today much less under Apartheid. They have access to far superior medical care and education. Huge numbers of Palestinians go to college whereas most South African Blacks were completely illiterate.
That’s why the first democratic election in SA had pictures of all the candidates and their parties on the ballots to make sure that people knew who they were voting for.
The idea of an election like that on the West Bank would have been ridiculous.
Secondly, South African blacks were demanding their rights as South African citizens not for their own homeland. By contrast Palestinians want their own state, not equal rights as Israeli citizens and Palestinians within Jerusalem who’ve been offered Israeli citizenship have, almost without exception, rejected it.
Finally you have to look at how the West Bank Papestinians came under Israeli control. They came under Israeli control because Jordan invaded Israel in 1967 and lost the war. Had Jordan not invaded and tried to destroy Israel the Palestinians wouldn’t be in the situation they’re in.
Furthermore, it needs to be remembered that Israel tried to negotiate control of the West Bank back to Jordan following the war, but Jordan refused.
As Abba Eban said, the Six Day War was the first war where the victors sued for peace while the losers demanded unconditional surrender.
Until the 90s there was no Palestinian political entity willing to negotiate with the Israelis so the Israelis had no one to give the West Bank back to.
Since then, the Israelis have twice offered statehood to the Palestinians and each time been rebuffed.
Sorry, but anyone who compares Apartheid South Africa to Israel either doesn’t know what they are talking about or they’re more interested in scoring rhetorical points then honest analysis of the situation.
You’ve never heard of Nasser.
Also, Egyptian battle plans in the 70s referred to their enemies who needed to be crushed and destroyed as “the Jews”.
Does that count or does it not count because they didn’t refer to “Israel” or use the phrase “throw them into the sea”.
Obviously things have changed in Egypt since Sadat’s peace treaty with Israel, but Syria still regularly makes impotent threats that no one takes seriously though they’re more concerned with conquering Lebanon than the Palestinians or their cause.
See post #14.
How? I mean, what’s their economy based on?
Which part of “Hizbullah is part of the ruling coalition in Lebanon” is unclear?
Egypt - I gave you the news article. As those “private citizens” were rampaging, the army/police were given stand down orders, thus it was with the army’s sanction.
Are you seriously challenging the idea that Palestinians on the West Bank have a vastly higher standard of living than Black South Fricans under Apartheid.
As someone who’s spent time there I can assure you they do.
They’re certainly not living in shanty towns or anything remotely resembling life in Sub-Saharran Africa.
You have to look back to the Cold War days to find the benefit. Now there’s not so much benefit. Israel’s stature has been lowered so much since the days of 1967 and to a lesser degree 1973. It has lost wars in Lebanon and has shown it can’t fight the long distance.
But what did Great Britian gain by siding with France over Imperial (not Nazi) Germany? Sure Germany was trying to build up a navy, but France was already a third rate power before WWI.
What did the Taliban gain by helping Osma Bin Laden? Nothing.
Nonsense. According to Wikipedia:
“The first domesticated tomato may have been a little yellow fruit, similar in size to a cherry tomato, grown by the Aztecs of Central Mexico.”
Another widely grown cherry tomato dates to the early 19th century in Greece. It appears that some popular cherry tomato varieties were developed in Israel, but others (like Sweet 100) originated in the U.S.
You have to respect the Israelis for their work in cantaloupes, though.
I’d say you have the situation exactly opposite to reality. In '67 Israelis seriously worried that they would lose, and in '73 they almost did lose. Today, they are an unchallenged local power - none of their neigbours poses any sort of existential threat.
Israel did not exactly “lose” its 2006 war in Lebanon militarily - though from the Israeli POV it was a failure. Rather, its conflict proved so damaging to Israeli prestige because of the horrible casualties inflicted on Lebanese civilians that it discontinued battle after a month. Why? Because the fight wasn’t worth the cost - Hezbollah did not pose any sort of existential threat to Israel.
I really don’t see any evidence of us getting much of anything out of our formal or informal alliance with Israel. This does not mean that we should not be friendly with Israel. It is a democratic country, and has a decent military.
Maybe someday some of her soldiers will fight and die to help the USA like Canada’s, the UK’s, Germany’s etc. Israel is of course a very long way off from fulfilling that role in the types of military conflicts we face now and in the near future.
Due to this, due to the useless government of Israel, and due to the negative impact our association with Israel has in countries that are going to be real leaders in the ME, I just think we should be less supportive of the Israeli government’s conservative agenda.
We should wean them off the teat, and return to the policy of letting them make their own way in the world without its militancy and inability to make peace a way of affecting the USA. We shouldn’t veto in the UN and let them deal with their own problem.
Israel isn’t part of NATO. It kind of makes sense, really. ^^ And how well would Afghanis or Iraqis have tolerated IDF soldiers on their ground?
But what has Egypt done for us? Or Turkey? It’s a mater of diplomatic strategy and the world stage. The US likes to think of itself as The Godfather, I suppose.
Why would Israel grant Palestinians voting rights to a country they are not party to? They have the PLO and Hamas.
Voting rights are typically reserved for citizens. Unless you support a one-state solution – which I’m sure you don’t – you can’t possibly think that Israel should give Palestinians in, say, Hebron, Israeli privileges. It makes no sense…but if they did, it would further erode the Palestinian cause for UN recognition. <shrug>
I’m simply asking how they manage it. I thought unemployment was endemic in the WB. If not, then what is their economy based on? Farming? Light industry? What?
Because what the Knessit does affects Palestinians’ lives even more directly than what the PA does.
I do. But I despair of it ever happening. Two-state is the next best solution.
Farming, aid, handouts. Something like a third or some such of their GDP is aid. Blech. The Palestinian Authority is also corrupt. I hear Hamas’ militants get paid better, but both pay their imprisoned terrorists a salary. :rolleyes:
Knesset*
It doesn’t matter. What the U.S. does also has an impact on people in, say, Guatemala and Mexico, but the U.S. isn’t a global voting booth.
MAYBE the PLO should have elections! There’s an Arab Spring for ya.
A one-state solution = persecution of Jews. That should be rather obvious, but perhaps it’s not of any concern to you.