Earlier today Dan Fleshler of Realistic Dove alerted us to an article by Hussein Ibish in the Daily Star (Lebanon). Ibish takes on Palestinian advocates for the one-state solution and poses a list of six questions that he claims they have not answered or considered. Fleshler thought it was a "devastating critique." I was a bit bored with it myself. I think Ibish’s questions are fine, although they’ve certainly been asked before. Also Ibish ignores that many of them have been addressed by one state advocates in creative and interesting ways.
And then serendipitously one of our favorite commenters Seham sent this along:
Hussein Ibish are you here? Are you reading this?
The Palestinians neither want nor need you as a spokesman for our cause, please dismiss yourself immediately. Also, please don’t delude yourself into thinking that the deep dislike most activists have for you is isolated around the Angry Arab someone who you seem to be fixated on. It goes much deeper, Ibish, even those friends and family who aren’t politically inclined scream: "CHANGE THE CHANNEL" when they see you pontificating your anti-Palestinian views under the rubric of being a champion of our cause.
Go far away, I am sure Saad Hariri can pay you to do something.
Excellent piece by Helena Cobban on Ibish here. Thank you Helena for this much needed piece!
Ibish is a Lebanese-American who gained serious credentials as a Palestinian-rights activist through the good work he did with Electronic Intifada. But for quite some time now he’s been working with the (Very) American Task Force on Palestine, an organization that just– by a hair– manages not to be a complete sock puppet for the US State Department. For example, both Ibish and VATFP president Ziad Asali, who spoke in the comments section at today’s event, stressed that there needs to be a complete freeze on Israeli settlement building if the plan to establish an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel is to succeed.
And that differs from the State Department position, how? Um, actually, I’m not entirely sure… because of course, the folks in the State Department do also say the same thing from time to time. But they don’t want to take the next step of imposing actual costs on Israel for its continued defiance of this request…
And no, neither do Ibish and the VATFP, it seems. Well anyway, Ibish was openly derisive this morning about the growing worldwide movement to impose some combination of boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) on Israel.
Cobban’s piece is a great compliment to the Ibish article. Read them together. There is an important conversation to be had here. The status quo is a disaster for Palestinians and many Israelis, as well the US whose international reputation is increasingly tied to Israeli expansionism. Given the importance of the issue, you’d think there would be a serious discussion of any and every solution? Unfortunately not.
Readers of this site may know that I am agnostic on the question of one state or two states. That being said, I think it is crucial to have a rigorous discussion about any idea that can end this conflict. Too often the one state possibility is dismissed out of hand as unrealistic, while the two state solution is assumed to be possible even though things on the ground have only gotten worse after nearly 20 years of pushing for two states – is it not time to start considering other ideas? Cobban’s post on Ibish was part of reporting on an event held today at the Woodrow Wilson Center called "The One-State Solution is a Fantasy….But What About Two?." It’s time for a more meaningful conversation.
The major issue is that Palestinian birthright and population statistics are extremely inflated, counting Jeruslem Arabs twice (once in Israeli census and once in Arab census). Add that to a net emigration of Arabs and the fact that Arab birthrate is at an alarming rate of decline while Jews can have up to 7 children per family! This means that one state solution would enable Jews to build anywhere in Israel and enjoy an increasingly healthy majority in the land between the Jordan and the Mediterrenean
So you’re in favor of it then?
In favor of a Greater Israel between the Jordan and the Med, but Arab-free.
Have you talked to any Jewish women about your “7 children per womb” plan?
Delenda est Carthago
ImTirtzu is stuck on autopilot like every Zionist is, he is just repeating word for word what he said elsewhere. A true spammer.
The only course that will swallow whole the Zionist atrocity is one state. This is why the Zionists fear it the most, and they squeal with such displeasure over its consideration. When one state becomes the goal it is the familiar refrain that has been defeated before, in civil rights movements and BDS – it is something the world will recognize and can grasp onto striving for a truly democratic whole. The two state solution is the disingenuous charade that keeps this Apartheid beast alive, it is safe as long as it can cover itself with a cloak of seeming “progress” while it consumes every last vestige of Palestinian life.
Cobban’s response is spot on. What a bizarre set of straw men, misinformation and excuses Ibish presents. Personally, I think that we should strive for one state, although I find the chance of any solution highly unlikely. The one state idea has the advantage of being ethically consistent and telling it like it is when it comes to the very concept of a Jewish state. The benefits that can be reaped now, from such truth-telling, far outweigh all of the political machinations surrounding the current two state idea. I am certainly interested in hearing other ideas though. We must keep in mind that any long-term ideas are damaging in the present if they ignore – completely or in part – Palestinians inside Israel, or the Palestinian refugees. Stating that the refugees will be able to “return” to the newly-created Palestinian state and that Israel, at its discretion, will allow a “token number” into Israel proper is not good enough. It is not good as a permanent solution, and it harms the refugees’ cause now.
I am not happy to see Hussein Ibish being published in the Daily Star or anywhere for that matter and glad to see he already had been exposed by the time I read this. Both he and odious Asali who is the leading Palestinian Uncle Tom used to be with the ADC until they left to become open collaborators with Washington and the Israel lobby. I recall that during the Iraq war, Palestinian and Arab-American ADC members in San Francisco were outraged upon learning that Colin Powell had been invited as a guest speaker at the ADC national convention and they let Asali know it. It was, as I recall, Ibish who curtly responded with the threat that if they didn’t behave,the San Francisco chapter would be expelled from the organization.
Its very sad that the “disciplined” left here is coming out in unison to also quash discussion.
Disagree all you want with his theses, the content support for them, the weight of relevance, and the applicability of them.
But, to only state functionally “he is an Uncle Tom”, is to use an overused word of mine, petulant.
He describes the one-state solution as utopian, which to my mind it is. Palestinians don’t need hard-headed realists on their affirmation of identity, then fantasists on the means to achieve that.
He describes the likud annexation/suppression/then BDS strategy as NOT good for Palestinian aspirations, preferring the sober institution building of Fayyad, as Fayyad is also accused of being an Uncle Tom.
Just for note, in the civil rights movement, there were people that called the NAACP and the legal rights work of Phillip Randolph and others, to be Uncle Toms. And, similar accusations were even made of Tutu.
“Resistance”. He’s calling your “resistance” approach, suicide. That serious.
The only thing Palestinians are trying to “quash” is the notion that Hussein Ibish speaks for them.
All of his questions would maybe have some merit if the two-state-solution (a real, just two-state solution resulting in a viable and fully sovereign Palestinian state) was just now being finalized and someone, dissatisfied with it, clamored for a one-state-solution instead.
However, that is not what is happening. Ibish is blind if he does not see that the recently growing support for one state is not connected to the increasing perception that the time has run out for two states (or, more precisely, that Israel has destroyed the necessary fundamentals for a two states.)
The idea of the two state solution was that Israel could be stopped from annexing/colonizing the West Bank and Gaza and that these areas could then become the territory of a Palestinian state. This idea is obsolete.
What Ibish fails to understand (or understands damn well, but tries to obfuscate) is that “one state” is not something its proponents want to forge against the realities on the ground. “One state” is the reality on the ground. When maps in Israeli classrooms show all of Gaza and the West Bank as one with Israel, they are actually correct. Israel, for all relevant purposes, has complete and sovereign control over all this territory, including everything ostensibly ruled by the PA. Borders, air space, electromagnetic sphere, natural ressources, security – you name it, Israel controls it. As I’ve written before, it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck.
The question is not for one-state advocates how to forge two distinct entities into one state. The question is for two-state advocates how to split off a second state from the single one which by now has not only exclusive governmental control of the West Bank (and of Gaza, by other means), but has also penetrated this area with a network of settlements which have intermingled populations beyond any hope of clearly delineated territory.
I know, this sounds a lot like right-wing Israeli politicians. “It’s all ours, why should we cede anything.” The problem is, from the viewpoint of power and control – and that is the only viewpoint they have – they are right.
Let me answer the questions:
1. This question is not really valid, since Israel won’t be asked to dissolve itself. South Africa did not dissolve itself, and it finally enfranchised a far larger share of the population. But let me answer a slightly modified question: How can Israel be motivated to grant civil rights to all the Palestinians living under its control?
By international pressure. The same method which is now being used, albeit in homeopathic doses, to make Israel accept the two state solution. Does anybody believe Netanyahu would ever have uttered even his poisoned acceptance of two states without prodding from the US?
2. Well, for one thing, what everybody claims they want: Peace. For a second thing: The right to live and settle anywhere in the “Land of Israel”, including “Judea and Samaria” – provided they legally and honestly purchase whatever land they want to build on. No more armored buses and separate highways – a lot of Arab neighbours who might want to go shopping in your settlement’s mall, though.
3. Well, I can’t answer this, since I am not (yet) a convinced one-state supporter. I am just making an argument hre.
4. Those are two questions. The first one can be answered: By allowing them to keep their national customs and identity alive in a multi-ethnic state including a strong federalist element. Yes, everyone always cites Yugoslavia as how it wouldn’t work. Nobody ever cites Switzerland. Second question: Because they are invested in two states. Nobody likes having the goal which you put decades of work and energy into just evaporate.
5. Well, the first practical step is to get Palestinian leadership, and the rest of the world to accept the current, one-state reality. Ideally, the major UN members would say (maybe not in public) something to the effect: “Okay, enough with the doublethink. In two years, Israel will either have completely – and we mean completely – relinquished governmental control of everything – and we also mean everything – it conquered in 1967 and put it into the hands of the PA and the UN or we will consider all of it to have been annexed by Israel. We will then proceed from whatever option Israel chose.”
6. They don’t reject it. They think it’s pointless. Big difference. The other question can be answered with a question, which harks back to my very first sentence in this post: What else do two-states advocates offer them? A time table? Like the Oslo one? “Compromises”? Like Netanyahu’s? Yeah, right.
There is no shortage of Zionist-puppets likes Abish in the Arab and the non-Arab world. We, too, have lesbian “Muslim reformer” Irshad Manji, and “moderate Muslim scholar” Tarek Fateh, who want to reform Islam, but consider criticism of Zionism or Israel – as “political stuff which has nothing to do with Islam”!!
As you said, Abish’s “questions” have been answered already – but repeating and repeating the same idiotic stuff – is something the Hasbara idiots have learned from the Nazi propaganda machine. Native Palestinians, Muslim, Christian, and Jews are the only one who have the moral, historical, and international codes to live and rule that God’s forgotten land. Similarly, the alien Jews have the rights to live in their native western motherlands – as equal citizen, free to practice their religion and free of ‘anti-Semitism’.
Eretz Israel and the “Two-State” solution
link to rehmat1.wordpress.com
Sorry to do the progressive knee-jerk thing, Rehmat, but Irshad Manji’s sexual preference is relevant to your argument how?
Irshad Manji’s sexual preferance is her own business. But she is a sell out to Israeli interests and that’s why I don’t like her.
Its not islam that need reforming. Rehmat is correct. Its mUslims who need to go through reformation. Things can be changed through other means instead of armed jihad. So far ppl claiming to do jihad have only brought more sorrow to their people. Time to think in other ways.
“the alien Jews have the rights to live in their native western motherlands – as equal citizen, free to practice their religion and free of ‘anti-Semitism’.”
Most of Israel’s Jews were born in Israel. And of those who weren’t, a majority were born in Arab-speaking countries.
And your reference to Manji’s sexual orientation? Not surprising, to say the least.
All in all, I’d say your an apt representation of what’s wrong with Palestinian advocacy: ignorance.
Then Israel’s Jews should stay in Israel, not move into Palestine.
Adam – Israel and their defenders are very good at leading the discussion, partly by hi-jacking the langauge that they want us to use. Critics of Israel consistently fail to learn and use this highly effective tactic – even when elements of it are within very easy grasp. The “Two-state” solution would better be called a proposal for “a second apartheid state alongside the existing one” – let’s keep reminding everyone of that. Palestinians (and even Israelis) can’t talk like that without being accused of treason, but the rest of us can.
Meanwhile, the “One-state” solution would better be called a “State for all of its people”. Palestinians (and even Israelis) can’t talk like that without being accused of treason, but the rest of us can.
And what is treason among liars, murderers and thieves? It is no treason at all, but coming into the light of what a normal course of what a democratic country is supposed to be. In the meantime you have an apartheid and genocidal course, and this is what has been practiced in the two-state mantra while the condition of one (the Palestinians) grows dim, and the enrichment of the other (Israel). Let treason reign.
Ibish tries to play a pacifist role so he can stay in the limelight. Let’s face it, he is still one of the few spokesmen that the Western media still calls on when they think the need to show they are even handed and want to present the other point of view. Love him or hate him, there are far more other so called Palestinian spokesmen who do more harm to the cause than Ibish. At least the media likes this guy enough to let him speak.
For years we heard the West supporting the two state solution, even the EU came out for it. No more, we now hear whimpers from everywhere and support for the old solutions are being overshadowed by new realities, the realities that Israel and many Arab countries have created on the ground.
Can you have two states, Israel, pre 1967 and Palestine, West Bank and Gaza. Independent, friendly relations, economic cooperation, respect, no military borders, and pigs will fly, or will they.
Before I try to explain this phenomena, I think you need to understand, most if not all Arab states are tired of this conflict and will take anything that puts it behind them so they can move into the new world. Survival in the new world needs realities not nationalism, religious extremism or weak hearts.
So, why will pigs never fly. Here’s my very simplistic analysis of 4 very simple realities;
First, Geography. How do you support a Palestine with two separate geographies that need a road link within Israel that remains always open no matter what travels through it. The Arabs, namely Eqgypt and Jordan had that capability pre 1967 but never moved to implement, why should it work now. The Gaza experience should provide enough history why this is a no go.
2) Realities on the Ground. What about the Palestinians who live inside Israel, pre 1967. Do they get to stay or will Israel ask them to leave. Of course an even tougher reality, what about the Israelis inside the West Bank, do you offer them Palestinian citizenship and they’ll be, what, happy. Don’t forget these are the extremists. And, what about the millions of refugees living in the neighbouring countries, do they get to go home to the new Palestine, with Israel’s blessings…Do you really believe these two people will find a friendly solution to this question after all these years of conflicts and hatred.
3) How sustainable will either the Israel and the new Palestine states become even if peace is established. In this area where you will now have about 14 Million people living, prior to that at the best time you had about 7 Million. Water issues, natural resources, and all you need to sustain a viable economy apart from relying on world donations.
4)The Zionist dream… does it fly away when you wake up in the morning and you thought it was just a nightmare…or did you see pigs fly.
Ibish may not be everybody’s idea of realism, but he doesn’t believe pigs can fly and i think we all need to wake up to the new reality. One country, several states, federalist system with equal representation. Oh look up in the sky …it’s a biurd …not it’s a plane…no it’s……..
“At least the media likes this guy enough to let him speak.” No, he is a chosen mouthpiece, just like generals who are “experts” speak on a given war in the media.
Look at the reality, the reality on the ground speaks of a single state solution, period. The fantasy is the two-state solution which never will come to fruition.
The reality is unfortunately a single, segregated state with half of its residents disenfranchised.
The main problems with a one-state scenario are two -
Assuring the Arabs living in Greater Israel their civil rights in a state that explicitly declares them 2nd-class, even when citizens. If “international pressure” has not been sufficient to make Israel obey international law when it comes to settling its population on occupied land, how is it supposed to be able to force Israel to grant citizenship and civil rights to non-Jews – a purely internal matter?
The refugee problem will be exacerbated if the state to which the refugees have the right to return is Israel, not Palestine.
The real problem is assuming there are only two possible solutions: two-state and one-state. The actual Israeli solution is Greater Israel without Arabs; it has been the plan from the beginning and they have not deviated from this course, all the time duping the rest of the world by paying lip service to a “peace process” that will never materialize a real peace.
Israel has made the 2 state virtually impossible. It is interesting that the PLO wants only a return to the pre 67 borders but Hamas is interested in land swaps. Maybe that is part of the reason that Israel refused to talk to them . There is a great oped in todays Ha’aretz titled “AN INFRASTRUCTURE OF JEWISH TERROR”. It show rather clearly the intention of the Jewish state. here is a portion, I recommend reading the whole post:
”
In view of the intense discussion underway, both locally and internationally, it is important to remember that the question of a settlement’s “legality” is not merely a fluid technicality that can be resolved with a stroke of the pen. For one, according to international law all settlements and outposts in the West Bank are illegal. But even Israeli law, in its most basic understanding, prohibits some of the actions that are taken to “legalize” these communities. The seizure of Palestinian lands is a crucial issue, one that reflects poorly on Israel’s claims to be a state that operates according to the rule of law, respects individual rights and protects the weak from violent exploitation.
Since the very beginning of the settlement enterprise, more than four decades ago, Israel has seized West Bank lands via an orchestrated, systematic and violent system. The victims of this process lose their agricultural fields, and thus their ability to lead a normal life. Their source of income is impaired, often leading to the spread of poverty and hardship.
For example, ongoing operations over the past decade, by which the settlers of Eli, north of Ramallah, have taken possession of a number of hills around the original settlement nucleus, have seriously impaired the ability of Palestinians from the nearby villages of Qaryut, Luban al-Sharqiyah and Al-Sawiyah to reach thousands of dunams that they own and depend on for their livelihoods. Even where they still have some minimal access (usually for two or three days a year, during the olive harvest), their produce is damaged and farmers are physically attacked and are simply unable to tend to their crops properly. ”
link to haaretz.com
Here’s the rest:
Contrary to the impression created by media reports in Israel, these are not isolated, unrelated incidents that happen only around settlements with particularly radical or extremist reputations. Rather, this is a well-coordinated campaign that is unfolding simultaneously throughout the West Bank, from Hebron in the south to Nablus in the north. If one looks at a map of all the locations where such incidents have taken place, the overall strategy emerges: removing the remaining Palestinians from Area C (as defined by the Oslo Accords), which constitutes the 60 percent of the West Bank that is under Israel’s full responsibility.
In recent years, Yesh Din volunteers have collected testimony from dozens of Palestinians who have been prevented from reaching their plots near various settlements and outposts by means other than just the separation barrier. Their reports show that on many occasions Palestinian farmers are driven away by force. In other cases they may manage to reach their plots unharmed, only to discover that their crops have been burned, uprooted or otherwise damaged by settlers.
This harassment may not be Israel’s official policy, but the state does little to prevent it. In the vast majority of cases in which victims of violence have filed complaints, the police – who, after all, are in most cases Jewish Israelis who are themselves sometimes residents of settlements – close the cases without issuing indictments and, in many cases, without even conducting thorough and comprehensive investigations. This leads to an obvious conclusion: The systematic land seizures and violations of the law happen because the legal authorities look the other way and allow such incidents to take place.
The problem begins with soldiers in the field, who do not detain violent offenders, and ends with the failure of the police and the state prosecution to bring the full force of the law to bear against the offenders.
An infrastructure of Jewish terror is being created in the West Bank. Through a policy they have dubbed “Price Tag,” the settlers have the declared aim of attacking innocent Palestinians in response to any perceived threat to a settlement or outpost, verbal or physical. This is merely the anecdotal and the blunt, extreme end of this infrastructure. Through intimidation and systematic violations of the law, the supreme goal of the settlers who exercise this policy is to seize more and more land. This, in turn, causes harm to the livelihood, property and welfare of tens of thousands of Palestinians.
Those defenders of the settlement movement who argue that in a democracy it should be possible for Jews to live anywhere in the Land of Israel fail to acknowledge that the state is allowing basic tenets of democracy to crumble at the hands of violent extremists. Defense of individual property should be implemented as an absolute and not a relative standard, without bending it to accommodate land seizure by gangsters.
Roi Maor is general manager of Yesh Din: Volunteers for Human Rights, and Dror Etkes is director of its Lands Project.
Can someone tell me how much land the Arabs have since the British Mandate borders of 1917 and how much land Israel has?
Anyone know the percentages?
Before israel declared itself a state, they had bought 6% of the land from mainly absentee owners. Then the resst they just took as they killed and plundered. This is in a nutshell. I can go home and look at the book I just finished reading and give you a little more detail.
May I suggest two books? ]laming the victims, edited by esward said and christopher hitchens. And Radicals, Rabbis, and Peacemakers by Seth Farber.
A two-state solution is clearly possible, and is the more just of the alternatives, in that it results in the maximum proportion of the communities’ regarding themselves as self-governed.
The single Palestinian state does not accomplish that. The single Zionist state does not accomplish that. The single civilist state (with still majorities insisting on nationalist association) does not accomplish that.
Each oppress a super-minority. (more than 20%)
The only solution that accomplishes true confident majority self-governance is the two-state approach.
The truth of the matter seems that Israel has held the solution at bay that there may no longer be a solution. Israel seems determined to self destruct. I hope someone takes their bombs away first before they hurt themselves.
Actually what it means is that it woul kill Witty to see pAlestinians living in a single state along with Jews because then that would mean the painful reality of Palestinians demanding equal right as citizens.
Wait, so in a state where there is a majority of one ethnic group and a 20+% minority of another ethnic group, this means oppression for the minority?
So, Arabs are currently oppressed in Israel? ‘Cause, you know, they make up 20+% of the population?
Perhaps what you say is true, but an absolute prerequisite for a physically viable two-state solution is the withdrawal of Jewish colonies from the West Bank. This is not going to happen. No legitimate state, either in the eyes of its own people or those of the world, is going to be cobbled together from thinly connected bantustans, or constructed with colonies embedded within it. Do you think Palestinians can have even a pathetic veneer of sovereignty with a couple of million virulently racist gun-toting lunatics riding herd over their unarmed people? Also, mere removal of the colonies does not even begin to address the other fundamental aspect of sovereignty which current Zionist political leadership, both in Israel and America, will simply not allow: the right to manage their own governance without Israeli interference. This includes the right to make treaties with foreign states, provide for their own defense (yes, against Israel, who else has been killing Palestinians? Switzerland? China?), manage their own natural resources especially water and the electromagnetic spectrum, etc.
I have no doubt that Israel could (if a miracle occurred and they withdrew their colonies, probably would) play the international community and a compliant Palestinian collaborationist government for a physically viable puppet state, but this will not assuage Palestinian grievances in the long term. Sure, they would be grateful to be able to work their farms without being shot, gassed or beaten, and delighted to be able to visit family 5 kilometers away without a 10 hour circuitous journey through degrading Israeli checkpoints, but eventually they would see that level of rights as the bottom rung of a ladder which they are entitled to climb.
It is paradoxical given their current quasi-prisoner status, but I think that Palestinians will have much higher expectations than Arabs in neighboring countries. Speaking generally, in much the same way as lower-economic-class World War 2 British soldiers were surprised by the widespread relative high standard of living in conquered Germany, too many Palestinians have seen with their own eyes how Israelis live and know that there there would be little stopping them from having their own version of such success, expect for their own bumbling, corrupt, collaborationist, and extremist leadership. Note that much of the latter type, e.g. Hamas, has been deliberately fostered by Israel in successful attempts to prevent consolidation of a reasonable and representative Palestinian ‘partner’ for peace talks. An Israeli-dominated puppet state will not stay compliant, and Israeli attempts to keep it so against increased Palestinian expectations would further and righteously inflame their ire against Israel.
Fear of this scenario is yet another reason that the autocratic leadership of Egypt, well-bribed by Lobby-facilitated U.S. handouts, is less than thrilled with the idea of a Palestinian state. The last thing they want are successful Palestinians giving their impoverished serfs any ideas about alternate governance. A successful two-state solution would also be an undesirable outcome from their perspective, because it would erode the notion that successful alternatives would only work for the Israeli/foreign ‘other’, and not for Arabs. One of many sad things about this conflict is that Israelis really do have a lot to offer the region. Despite the present obscenity of claims that Israel ‘is a light unto nations’, I think it really could be in many ways a light unto neighboring Arab nations if Israelis would just stop being such pr-cks.
An article in Ha’aretz quoted one of its senior generals as telling the government that the IDF could not possibly evacuate the settlers from the WB.
The one state solution, to be really frank, is the ultimate test of legitimacy of Israel. If there were legitimacy in the current Palestinian/Israeli relationship and their treatment of the Palestinians, and no ulterior motives of final routing for an Eretz Yisrael , one state would not be as repugnant to the Israelis. However, since they want to wipe them out or off the land – both their “citizen” population (over 50% in polls say they do) and the Palestinian population in the occupied territories, they refuse to contemplate a single state solution (however contrived). They merely want a two state solution not for merely benign ideological purposes, but because they have a racist and genocidal agenda – this is why they constantly verbally caress only a two-state solution.
ALSO…And why the two-state “solution” is always an illusory dead end.
Ofcourse the Arabs want a 1 state solution.
They figure since they failed by warfare, this is the best way to end Israel.
We should understand the 1 state solution was part of Arafat’s stages policy and what Faisal Husseini called the Oslo trogan war.
I think its urgent that Jews on here reject these plans.
link to geocities.com
Yasser Arafat, January 30, 1996, (Speech) “The Impending Total Collapse of Israel,” Stockholm, Sweden (1,2)
We Palestinians will take over everything, including all of Jerusalem . . . All the rich Jews who will get compensation will travel to America . . . We of the PLO will now concentrate all our efforts on splitting Israel psychologically into two camps. Within five years we will have six to seven million Arabs living in the West Bank and in Jerusalem….You understand that we plan to eliminate the state of Israel and establish a purely Palestinian State . . . I have no use for Jews; they are and remain Jews. We now need all the help we can get from you in our battle for a united Palestine under total Arab-Muslim domination!”
link to bridgesforpeace.com
The Late Faisal Husseini: Oslo Is A Trojan Horse In Husseini’s last interview with the the popular Egyptian newspaper el Arav in 2001.
Husseini said, it is the obligation of all the Palestinian forces and factions to see the Oslo Accords as “temporary” steps or “gradual” goals, because in this way, “We are setting an ambush for the Israelis and cheating them.”
He also differentiated between, “strategic,” long term, “higher” goals, and “political,” short term goals dependent on “the current international establishment, balance of power, capabilities, and variable considerations that change from time to time.” Nevertheless, the Palestinians have been forced to temporarily concentrate on “gradual diplomatic goals.” However, the main goal is the “liberation of all Palestine from the river (Jordan) to the sea (Mediterranean),” even if this requires a struggle that will continue “1,000 years, or generations upon generations.”
Until the Palestinian corrupt terror leadership is removed, their terror groups dismantled and disarmed, and incitement to hate among their population ended, there really is no point in considering the folly of “pressuring” Israel to accede in the creation of a terror state right on its doorstep.
Most children of the world are not used as human shields for terrorist camps or encouraged to be suicide bombers so their pictures can be put up in grocery stores as “martyrs”. Welcome to Palestinian society.
Or what is called child abuse in normal countries.
The great irony is that the Security Fence is not really an effective solution to Palestinian barbarism and attacks on Israeli civilians at all. What exactly does Netanyahu think the PLO will do once it is behind the fence, take up quilting?
The only way to suppress the carnage, is to erect security cages and not a security wall. Security cages would be rings of fences and walls around the large Palestinian cities. These would fence the Palestinians in, rather than fencing the Jews out. When the world bellyaches, Israel should simply respond: Look, people who behave like animals must be treated like animals and put behind cages until they learn to behave like humans. If the Palestinians ever abandon Islamofascism and nazi-like atrocities, then Israel may no longer need any fence.
Have you ever seen the Haredim spitting all over people and throwing shit, just like monkeys in the zoo? How about caging them, too, until they learn to behave?
“Yasser Arafat, who had agreed to a two-state solution”, one dead (israel),
one alive (Arab Palestine)??
The leftist establishment in Israel including Gideon Levy and Akiva Eldar announced that “we have a partner in the PLO in the wake of the recent PLO congress. Yet there is no connection between this declaration and the text of the decisions taken in the congress. The talk about the armed struggle, Arafat’s poisoning, and all the other arrogant statements is one thing.
The statement by Abu Ala glorifiying the most murderous Palestinian terror attack in Israel`s history. The terror attack on March 11, 1978, involved a bus hijacking that left 37 Israeli civilians dead. This is who the left want a 1 state solution with. Are these people insane? Learn fron Saladin the Kurd what happens when you want a 1 state solution.
Saladin won the wars and opposed a Kurdish state cause he wanted a 1 state solution with the Arabs. How did that work out for the Kurds? Maybe you should ask the gassed Kurds in Iraqi Kurdistan, or the Kurds in Syria who cant vote, own land or be citizens.
Yet the most important thing is that the political plan approved by the PLO blocks any possibility of a deal, even if Yossi Beilin becomes our prime minister.
The decisions reject the very existence of the Jewish State and resolutely insist on sending 5 million Palestinians to Israel. For the sake of those unable to connect the two issues, the congress made it clear: We must see complete resistance, that cannot be renounced, to the recognition of Israel as a “Jewish State,” in order to safeguard the rights of the refugees and of our people on the other side of the Green Line (that is, the Arabs living in Israel.)
For the benefit of anyone who tried to convince us that UN Resolution 194 can be interpreted as a solution to the refugee problem without resettling them in Israel, the Fatah congress made clear: Refugee camps must not be dismantled under any circumstances, and that 5 million Arabs must be sent to Israel.
They know Israel will not agree to accept such suicidal plan. Hence, the congress made clear to movement activists that in the absence of an agreement they will “make do” with something else: Aspiring for one democratic state between the Jordan River and Mediterranean Sea, with an Arab majority.
This is why the Palestinians rejected Barak and Olmerts peace plan.
They want 2 states. There own state and to make Israel the 2nd Palestinian state.
ed, bubala, youre spraying foam all over. dont exhaust yourself. let Witty be your mentor.
Thanks, Jacqueline. Big chuckle from me.
Why do bigots like Ed think their “arguments” about the inferiority of certain groups of people will convince anyone else not so blinded by bigotry of the righteousness of their hatred?
Go ahead, Ed, continue spilling your bile. You are influencing people, but not in the way you desire.
All this manual copying and pasting is still too labor intensive. With a good spambot and a well structured database of text snippets you’d need fewer people indeed.
We’ll be needing tests soon.. link to xkcd.com
. (nobody cares for me like my spambot friend)
So Ed, have you taken your pills today? lol Like I said else where they spew their screeds and lies, for whom? I don’t know – Green Footballs is calling Ed.
Perhaps they are trying to convince themselves…
I note a sudden influx of the more trollish sort of Zionist. I suspect that this site has been noticed by the denizens of some Hebrew school, who have rushed in with their canned hasbara talking points to defend the honor of Israel.
“I think it is crucial to have a rigorous discussion about any idea that can end this conflict.”
I would request a “rigorous discussion” of the following idea.
I have long argued that the first great change needed in the I/P conflict is for the US/EU/UN to impose on Israel the duty to conduct its occupation(s) lawfully.
This would mean, at least, the removal of the wall and of the settlers (leaving the settlement buildings and highways, etc., either to be destroyed by Israel or turned over to the PA for unrestricted use by Palestinians).
This should be required of Israel because the law of occupation must be respected (“Pacta sunt servanda”).
If people also want to work for “peace”, let them do so in parallel as a separate project, but not instead of working for a lawful occupation, [1] because the occupation may last indefinitely, so a lawful occupation is intrinsically important from legal and human rights aspects, and [2] because the effort of imposition required to achieve this very definite and well-defined “end” is so much less than the effort required to determine the terms of and then to impose a full peace treaty, indefinite and ill-defined in advance.
To this one might add [3] because if a (let us say 1-year) withdrawal of settlers had been got under way (under US/EU/UN duress), Israel might well reassess its refusal to make peace in order, for example, to get a deal which would allow some few of the 500,000 settlers to remain, perhaps in the near precincts of Jerusalem.
People have been so urgent to secure peace (but often seeing peace differently) that they have forgotten that Israel has refused peace for 40 years and is likely (unless moved by a greater force) to make peace within the next 40 years. The occupation will therefore remain adn should be dealt with as a primary problem, and not swept away in the interest of securing an illusory “peace” even if securing a lawful occupation is also illusory.
The “occupation” is a facade, it is really a form of slow genocide, which is beginning to accelerate. There is NOTHING lawful, hence my question of legitimacy. Israel is an army with a nation, not a nation with an army.
A false assertion.
Israel is clearly a nation, and with a popular army. Loved, and for good reason, in need of reforms.
Good comments. What is lawfully in fact in this case though?
Certainly annexation of lands would be.
I’ve read Palestinian analyses that suggest that putting up a wall on the green line would not have been a violation.
One State or Two state, one thing for sure, people like this Ed_Frias would need to be excluded from any solution since they will always be the fly in the ointment. Those people can move to Miami and enjoy a long happy life and who knows start another Israel there and see if it will work with whatever lies and hatred they can spread.
If they were excluded from any state, it would be more helpful.
BradAllen, i wonder where you have been.
Why dont you protest the hate infested Palestinian media?
link to israelnationalnews.com
Norway Funding PA Hate Media
Maayana Miskin
10/31/08
Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) has issued a report on the state of the Palestinian Authority (PA) media in the wake of the Annapolis conference, which was held in late 2007. The report focuses on Norway’s funding of the PA in light of recent statements made by Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store. Gahr Store defended Norway’s decision to fund the PA directly, including PA media, saying TV programs glorifying terrorists are not common and assuring reporters that “Fatah and the PA are prepared to find a peaceful solution to the conflict with Israel.” In fact, however, PA TV programs and newspapers continue to incite Arabs to hate and broadcast messages rejecting Israel’s existence and glorifying terrorists, PMW researchers said. Not only did incitement continue after the Annapolis conference – it intensified, they said. “During the 11 years of PMW’s existence, there has never been a period with such intense demonization of Israel, continuous hate promotion and denial of Israel’s existence by the PA (Fatah) and the media [PA Chairman] Abbas controls, as during the period since the Annapolis conference,” the report stated.
Contrary to Gahr Store’s assurances, PA programs glorifying terrorists are very common, PMW researchers said. Every terrorist who murdered Israelis in 2008 was termed a martyr (shahid) by PA newspapers, including PA organ Al-Hayyat al-Jadida.
“Norwegian aid is being being allocated directly to Abbas. Abbas directly controls PA media. Thus Norwegian money is funding PA TV and newspapers and all the hate material,” PMW announced.
The group cited dozens of reports broadcast in 2008 in which PA media broadcasters denied Israel’s existence, particularly on children’s shows. Hosts told children that “Palestine” includes the port cities of Haifa, Ashkelon, Ashdod, and Eilat—all cities in pre-1967 Israel; that the size of “Palestine” is 27,000 square kilometers, which corresponds to borders including all of pre-1967 Israel; and that Be’er Sheva, Haifa, Tzfat, and other Israeli cities are “occupied.” Israeli Arab children who called a PA TV show in July 2008 listed their hometowns as “occupied Tzfat,” “occupied Akko” and “occupied Haifa,” and were told by the host, “I’m very happy that our children from the occupied areas in Palestine are calling, those [areas] which Israel occupies.”
PA media have showed hundreds of maps on TV shows and in newspapers since the Annapolis conference, researchers said. The maps have consistently shown all of Israel as “Palestine.” A public service announcement broadcast during and after the Annapolis conference showed Israel in the colors of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) flag.
Hateful incitement against Israel continues as well. PA officials and others have been quoted in official Fatah-controlled media accusing Israel of deliberately infecting Arabs with AIDS, of spreading drugs within Arab areas, of murdering babies and planning to destroy the Al-Aksa mosque located on the Temple Mount. While Minister Gahr Store said the Norwegian government “disassociates itself from any use of TV programs as a direct [way] of spreading hate or inciting terrorism,” the 790 million NOK (roughly 118 million United States dollars) that Norway has given directly to the PA this year is likely to be spent funding exactly those kinds of programs, PMW said.
Not only have past libels against Israel been repeated, ugly new libels have been created as well, PMW warned. In July 2008, Al-Hayyat al-Jadida and Al-Ayyam, two papers controlled by Abbas, accused “Israeli settlers” of bringing cases full of rats to Jerusalem’s Old City and releasing them in Arab neighborhoods. The rats are unusually large and ferocious, and are “immune to poison,” the reports said. Both papers accused Israelis of using the rats to force Arabs from Jerusalem.
In March 2008, the PA held “Holocaust memorial ceremonies” in which Israel was accused of perpetrating a Holocaust against Arab children. Children took part in ceremonies that included a mock crematorium filled with Arab corpses. In May, PA TV broadcast a fake news clip in which an Israeli tank deliberately shot an Arab child.
In April and May of 2008, PA media aired new and particularly harsh slander accusing Israel of perpetrating a Holocaust on Arabs in 1948. The claims made against Israel mirrored reports of Nazi brutality in the Holocaust. Fatah MP Issa Karaka was quoted in Al-Hayyat al-Jadida, Al-Quds daily and PA TV accusing “Zionists” of lining Arabs up in front of death pits and shooting them, of burning Arabs alive, of forcing Arabs to work in labor camps and of running a Nazi death-camp type “selection” in which Arabs were chosen for death or deportation. No evidence was presented to support the charges.”
I have to assume you are one of those people hired to try and promote Israel’s message on the web by bombarding blogs, such as Mondoweiss with the type of babble you posted here.
All you have to do is read and think to understand that Israelis continuously torture, kill and destroy in the land of Palestine to continue the policy they started in 1948 under Plan Dalet :
” 1Destruction of villages (setting fire to, blowing up, and planting mines in the debris), especially those population centers which are difficult to control continuously.
Mounting search and control operations according to the following guidelines: encirclement of the village and conducting a search inside it. In the event of resistance, the armed force must be destroyed and the population must be expelled outside the borders of the state. ”
Israel was created by Colonialist and Imperial powers who were victorious after WW2 against another Colonial and Imperial country. Nothing is legitimate about the creation of this entity and both the Jews and the Arabs caught in this mess thanks to these countries have suffered enough. Unless both these people decide to step away from the Colonialist model imposed on them, death and misery will continue to reign in this part of the world.
No matter how much babble you insist on spreading, History has a way of piercing through the B.S. for those who look for peace and truths.
One state, two states? One potato, two potato? Some say “po-tay-toe” and some say “po-tah-toe”. Lotta pipe dreams here.
$140B to resettle all the settlers? Well, why should we [USers] care? Why should USA pay it? We’ve already paid $100B+ and the money was evidently mis-spent on settlements. (And UNRWA never paid $140B for housing for all those Palestinians in 1948, as if that mattered.)
Here’s another pipe-dream. ==> Three-state solution. <==
Gotta be imposed, just like the 1-State and 2-State, but its better than either of those. Involves equitable division of the land into three parcels. Each should have proportionate share of Negev, of hills, of arable land. Water initially to be shared per capita, but each state free to make water "deals" with Lebanon, Syria if there are deals there to be made.
[STATE-3] Initially make 45% of Israel/Palestine into a country/territory/state for Jews only.
Jews can govern immigration here. Maybe Jews keep the settlements but give up a lot of other territory. Who knows what "equitable" means anyhow?
[STATE-2] Initially make 45% of Israel/Palestine into a country/territory/state for Palestinians only. Palestinians can govern immigration here, and allow return of 1948 refugees from outside.
[STATE-1] Initially make 10% of Israel/Palestine into a country/territory/state for anyone who wants to live there (mixed). Jews and non-Jews. Like New York. It governs its own immigration.
Each 5 years take a census where each person says which state he wants to live in.
2 years later, adjust borders equitably. "Return" of Palestinians will presumably enlarge the State-2 and State-1 territories as percentages of the whole. But continuing immigration of Jews will enlarge the territory of State-3. No state ever gets less than 1%. Think Monaco, Vatican. After 50 years, freeze things where they are, subject to unsupervised subsequent voluntary agreements between the three states.
Gee, I guess state-3 gets the IDF and Dimona.
Thoughts? Anyone care to speculate who would wish to live where?
This is a fun game! Let’s keep playing it forever. Intellectual feast!
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