Last week Jeffrey Goldberg interviewed Hussein Ibish on "the fantasy world of one-staters." One exchange that stood out to me was the following:
JG: But the one-staters are a very marginal group. I think one of the interesting things you do in your book is show very coolly, calmly, the essential ridiculousness of one-state advocacy based on the simple fact that in order to have a successful one-state plan, you need Israeli Jews to want it, and today, not even one percent of Israeli Jews want it.
HI: You could put all of them in a small auditorium.
When I read this my first question was – has there ever been a group of people that exercised domination over another people and has willfully given up that power without being pressured? Ibish seems to be saying that it doesn’t makes sense to demand an equal and democratic solution in Israel/Palestine because Jews will never go for it. It made me curious about how whites in South Africa viewed the idea of a non-racial democracy at the height of apartheid? And assuming they were not interested in giving up their exclusive power and privilege – was that a reason to not demand equality?
Well, Ali Abunimah has an important new piece up over at Electronic Intifada which I think helps answer some of these questions. Titled "Israeli Jews and the one-state solution," the article looks back at South Africa and reviews the attitudes and beliefs of whites during the 1980s when apartheid still looked to be an unstoppable political reality. He shows that white South Africans held similar views to Jewish Israelis today, and that this only changed as the legitimacy of the apartheid system was called into question.
Abunimah warns however that coercing Israeli Jews to give up their power through strategies like boycott, divestment and sanctions is not enough – it also important to acknowledge where Israeli Jewish fears are coming from without being held hostage by them. Finally, the challenge remains to make the case to Israeli Jews what they have to gain from a just and equitable society in Israel/Palestine. Abunimah:
Coercion is not enough, however; as I have long argued, and sought to do, Palestinians must also put forward a positive vision. Neither can Palestinians advocating a one-state solution simply disregard the views of Israeli Jews. We must recognize that the opposition of Israeli Jews to any solution that threatens their power and privilege stems from at least two sources. One is irrational, racist fears of black and brown hordes (in this case, Arab Muslims) stoked by decades of colonial, racist demonization. The other source — certainly heightened by the former — are normal human concerns about personal and family dislocation, loss of socioeconomic status and community security: change is scary.
But change will come. Without indulging Israeli racism or preserving undue privilege, the legitimate concerns of ordinary Israeli Jews can be addressed directly in any negotiated transition to ensure that the shift to democracy is orderly, and essential redistributive policies are carried out fairly. Inevitably, decolonization will cause some pain as Israeli Jews lose power and privilege, but there are few reasons to believe it cannot be a well-managed process, or that the vast majority of Israeli Jews, like white South Africans, would not be prepared to make the adjustment for the sake of a normality and legitimacy they cannot have any other way.
Please go read the entire piece and here is a longer excerpt after the jump:
During the 1980s, the white electorate in South Africa moved to the right, as Israel’s Jewish electorate is doing today. Support seeped from the National Party, which had established formal apartheid in 1948, to the even more extreme Conservative Party. Yet, "on the issue of majority rule," Hugo observed, "supporters of the National Party and the Conservative Party, as well as most white voters to the ‘left’ of these organizations, ha[d] little quarrel with each other."
The vast majority of whites, wracked with existential fears, were simply unable to contemplate relinquishing effective control, or at least a veto, over political decision-making in South Africa.
Yet, the African National Congress insisted firmly on a one person, one vote system with no white veto. As the township protests and strikes and international pressure mounted, The Economist observed in an extensive 1986 survey of South Africa published on 1 February of that year, that many "enlightened" whites "still fondly argue that a dramatic improvement in the quality of black life may take the revolutionary sting out of the black townships — and persuade ‘responsible’ blacks, led by the emergent black middle class, to accept some power-sharing formula."
Schemes to stabilize the apartheid system abounded, and bear a strong resemblance to the current Israeli government’s vision of "economic peace" in which a collaborationist Palestinian Authority leadership would manage a still-subjugated Palestinian population anesthetized by consumer goods and shopping malls.
Because of the staunch opposition of whites to a unitary democratic state, the ANC heard no shortage of advice from western liberals that it should seek a "realistic" political accommodation with the apartheid regime, and that no amount of pressure could force whites to succumb to the ANC’s political demands. The ANC was warned that insistence on majority rule would force Afrikaners into the "laager" — they would retreat into a militarized garrison state and siege economy, preferring death before surrender.
Even the late Helen Suzman, one of apartheid’s fiercest liberal critics, predicted in 1987, as quoted by Hugo, "The Zimbabwe conflict took 15 years … and cost 20,000 lives and I can assure you that the South African transfer of power will take a good deal more than that, both in time and I am afraid lives."
But as The Economist observed, the view that whites would prefer "collective suicide" was something of a caricature. The vast majority of Afrikaners were "no longer bible-thumping boers." They were "part of a spoilt, affluent suburban society, whose economic pain threshold may prove to be rather low."
The Economist concluded that if whites would only come so far voluntarily, then it was perfectly reasonable for the anti-apartheid movement to bring them the rest of the way through "coercion" in the form of sanctions and other forms of pressure. "The quicker the white tribe submits," the magazine wrote, "the better its chance of a bearable future in a black-ruled South Africa."
Ultimately, as we now know, the combination of internal resistance and international isolation did force whites to abandon political apartheid and accept majority rule. However, it is important to note that the combined strength of the anti-apartheid movement never seriously threatened the physical integrity of the white regime.
Even after the massive township uprisings of 1985-86, the South African regime was secure. "So far there is no real physical threat to white power," The Economist noted, "so far there is little threat to white lives. … The white state is mighty, and well-equipped. It has the capacity to repress the township revolts far more bloodily. The blacks have virtually no urban or rural guerrilla capacity, practically no guns, few safe havens within South Africa or without."
This balance never changed, and a similar equation could be written today about the relative power of a massively-armed — and much more ruthless — Israeli state, and lightly armed Palestinian resistance factions.
What did change for South Africa, and what all the weapons in the world were not able to prevent, was the complete loss of legitimacy of the apartheid regime and its practices. Once this legitimacy was gone, whites lost the will to maintain a system that relied on repression and violence and rendered them international pariahs; they negotiated a way out and lived to tell the tale. It all happened much more quickly and with considerably less violence than even the most optimistic predictions of the time. But this outcome could not have been predicted based on what whites said they were willing to accept, and it would not have occurred had the ANC been guided by opinion polls rather than the democratic principles of the Freedom Charter.
Zionism — as many Israelis openly worry — is suffering a similar, terminal loss of legitimacy as Israel is ever more isolated as a result of its actions. Israel’s self-image as a liberal "Jewish and democratic state" is proving impossible to maintain against the reality of a militarized, ultra-nationalist Jewish sectarian settler-colony that must carry out frequent and escalating massacres of "enemy" civilians (Lebanon and Gaza 2006, Gaza 2009) in a losing effort to check the resistance of the region’s indigenous people. Zionism cannot bomb, kidnap, assassinate, expel, demolish, settle and lie its way to legitimacy and acceptance.
Already difficult to disguise, the loss of legitimacy becomes impossible to conceal once Palestinians are a demographic majority ruled by a Jewish minority. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s demand that Palestinians recognize Israel’s "right to exist as a Jewish state" is in effect an acknowledgement of failure: without Palestinian consent, something which is unlikely ever to be granted, the Zionist project of a Jewish ethnocracy in Palestine has grim long-term prospects.
Similarly, South African whites typically attempted to justify their opposition to democracy, not in terms of a desire to preserve their privilege and power, but using liberal arguments about protecting distinctive cultural differences. Hendrik Verwoerd Jr., the son of assassinated Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd, apartheid’s founder, expressed the problem in these terms in 1986, as reported by The Toronto Star, stating that, "These two people, the Afrikaner and the black, are not capable of becoming one nation. Our differences are unique, cultural and deep. The only way a man can be happy, can live in peace, is really when he is among his own people, when he shares cultural values."
The younger Verwoerd was on the far-right of South African politics, leading a quixotic effort to carve out a whites-only homeland in the heart of South Africa. But his reasoning sounds remarkably similar to liberal Zionist defenses of the "two-state solution" today. The Economist clarified the use of such language at the time, stating that "One of the weirder products of apartheid is the crippling of language in a maw of hypocrisy, euphemism and sociologese. You talk about the Afrikaner ‘right to self-determination’ — meaning power over everybody else."
Zionism’s claim for "Jewish self-determination" amidst an intermixed population, is in effect a demand to preserve and legitimize a status quo in which Israeli Jews exercise power in perpetuity. But there’s little reason to expect that Israeli Jews would abandon this quest voluntarily any more than South African whites did. As in South Africa, coercion is necessary — and the growing boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement is one of the most powerful, nonviolent, legitimate and proven tools of coercion that Palestinians possess. Israel’s vulnerabilities may be different from those of apartheid South Africa, but Israel is not invulnerable to pressure.
Coercion is not enough, however; as I have long argued, and sought to do, Palestinians must also put forward a positive vision. Neither can Palestinians advocating a one-state solution simply disregard the views of Israeli Jews. We must recognize that the opposition of Israeli Jews to any solution that threatens their power and privilege stems from at least two sources. One is irrational, racist fears of black and brown hordes (in this case, Arab Muslims) stoked by decades of colonial, racist demonization. The other source — certainly heightened by the former — are normal human concerns about personal and family dislocation, loss of socioeconomic status and community security: change is scary.
But change will come. Without indulging Israeli racism or preserving undue privilege, the legitimate concerns of ordinary Israeli Jews can be addressed directly in any negotiated transition to ensure that the shift to democracy is orderly, and essential redistributive policies are carried out fairly. Inevitably, decolonization will cause some pain as Israeli Jews lose power and privilege, but there are few reasons to believe it cannot be a well-managed process, or that the vast majority of Israeli Jews, like white South Africans, would not be prepared to make the adjustment for the sake of a normality and legitimacy they cannot have any other way.
This is where the wealth of research and real-life experience about the successes, failures, difficulties and opportunities of managing such transitions at the level of national and local politics, neighborhoods, schools and universities, workplaces, state institutions and policing, emerging from South Africa and Northern Ireland, will be of enormous value.
Every situation has unique features, and although there are patterns in history, it never repeats itself exactly. But what we can conclude from studying the pasts and presents of others is that Palestinians and Israelis are no less capable of writing themselves a post-colonial future that gives everyone a chance at a life worth living in a single, democratic state.
Powerful stuff, and a thoughtful revisiting of SA apartheid history. The white South Africans I knew at the time (some were married into my family) were most affected by their trips abroad where they began passing themselves off as Australians to avoid the invective they got if they said they were South Africans….because, get this, if they said they enjoyed being in the US and Canada, it was pointed out to them in no uncertain terms that the power of the North American continent and its likeability factor was precisely because they didn’t countenance a South African POV or practices.
There is a lot to learn from South Africa and from Northern Ireland, but the parallel to a consented single state is not it.
There are again two FUNDAMENTAL differences that Abunimeh ignores:
1. Population parity in the region as a whole
2. Violent non-compromising minorities on both Israel AND Palestinian sides, that each have agendas for superiority
South Africa was an example of a distinct minority ruling a distinct majority in a jurisdiction that everyone regarded as permanently integrated (integrated as in one whole nation, not as in racially integrated).
The two prospective states have been separate for 60 years, and all historical precedent with the Arab portions of the state had been to seek to remove Israel and Israelis.
Hamas remains as powerful in Palestine and does not claim to seek to be part of a democratic society with one person – one vote, with any prospect that that would yeild a Zionist majority. Islamic Jihad, PFLP. And among Israelis, there are religious and nationalists that are utterly unwilling to live in a nation with ANY prospect of subordination in any regard.
Abunimeh has if anything ampified the animosities that might suggest acceptance of the other. WHEN he changes from that approach, then his appeal to humanism might be heard by some, if not all.
I’ve personally asked him to for months. His response was to “unfriend” me in the social networks that we both participate in.
In the setting in which there are two distinct peoples that truly do not identify as one, the MOST democratic option is partition (in particular, his criticism of Jewish segregationist attitudes is a fraud, when similar attitudes exist among Palestinians and widely).
To leave the question at essentially, “South Africa did it, we can too”, imagining that the factors that made it reasonable in South Africa, exist in Israel/Palestine, is dangerously naive.
The only difference between White South Africans and Israelis is that Israelis have a suicidal tendency due to their belief in the myth of Masada.
White South Africans were not drunk on religion and therefore were more likely to compromise.
Israelis want to die while drunk on religion and take as many innocents down with them as they possibly can.
We’re trying to stop them from doing just that and failing.
Focusing on S Africa as a liberation model has the virtue of it having ended relatively peaceably. There are other less optimistic models to consider. One is what happened to Rhodesia where a dictatorship arose and proceeded to destroy the economy. The other is French Algeria where the settlers vacated the place en mass when independence was granted. Somehow, I think if Israel is forced to accept the one-state solution with one man – one vote, we will see a mass emigration of Jews out of what would be renamed Palestine. I would prefer a different outcome, but my preferences do not matter. This is a decision that each Israeli Jewish family will have to make.
Abunimeh is actually extremely insulting, more than insightful.
He imagines that Israeli’s have a racist fear of dark-skinned, as the basis of fear of Palestinian integration.
Rather, fear is a rational result of 100 years of organized terror on Jewish residents. Its not fear of the “great dark horde”, but fear of the propagated hatred of Jews and Jews that seek to be Jews in community, and community of communities.
The two-state approach (if it were a real one), affords Palestinian self-governance to Abunimeh, and if civil a functionally bi-national continent like US and Canada, of which Canada consistently opposes any unification with the US, as similar culturally as they are.
In fact, Israelis’ prejudice against dark-skinned people has been repeatedly documented.
Once again, you are divorced from reality.
Insulting?
Abunimah makes you uncomfortable because he thoroughly understands, and coolly breaks down prejudices and fallacies that you are deeply invested in.
Or that you imagine.
There is an irony in Phil’s advocacy of civil democracy for Israel/Palestine, as so many of the locals don’t, both Israeli and Palestine, the urge for democracy in a parallel form to the US (European social institutions, Harvardish), is an imposition on those that have even slightly different approaches.
Abunimeh is Palestinian in political agenda and orientation, though I expect lived a large part of his life in the states.
A fixation on skin color, Robin, can also be described as a racism. You should be past that, pro and/or con.
Abunimah directly confronts Witty’s key core belief that Zionism is essentially about the right of Jews to have a state where they can “self-govern” and BDS as articulated
and implemented is antithetical to this right of self-governance:
Abunimah:
Zionism’s claim for “Jewish self-determination” amidst an intermixed population, is in effect a demand to preserve and legitimize a status quo in which Israeli Jews exercise power in perpetuity. But there’s little reason to expect that Israeli Jews would abandon this quest voluntarily any more than South African whites did. As in South Africa, coercion is necessary — and the growing boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement is one of the most powerful, nonviolent, legitimate and proven tools of coercion that Palestinians possess. Israel’s vulnerabilities may be different from those of apartheid South Africa, but Israel is not invulnerable to pressure.
Good post. I like the way he takes into account legitimate Israeli concerns as well as the clearly racist ones.
In the long run, whether there is a two state solution or a one state solution, the same hostilities (justified or not) on both sides are going to have to be overcome–I don’t think a two state solution would be much more stable than a one state solution if there are still large numbers of people on both sides who hate the other.
Do you think people get along better if they have space, or if they are forced into a marriage?
And, a single-state with unlimited right of return of descendants of Palestinian refugees?
What do you think the real carrying capacity of the land actually is? How many millions more do you think that small land can accommodate?
Yup. It’s just unnatural for Jews to live with anyone else. It is a slight against God.
“Space” or “forced marriage” can both work or fail, and I’m sure there are many positive examples at least in the case of “forced marriage”.
In this case, “space” is more what has been tried and shown a failure. Look at the different sets of social relations Israel has created, and decide for yourself what has been more peaceful and functional: the “forced marriage” of Israelis and Palestinians within Israel proper, or the “space” of a separate Israel and West Bank/Gaza, of Jewish-only roads and colonies in the West Bank, of Palestinian exiles forbidden to return. The clear trend it: the more equality and integration, the more peace and normality.
The “space” you want cannot work and is not acceptable, because for most Palestinians it means exile. They are not so hateful as to prefer that to the “evil” of being around Jews.
And let me clarify: what they prefer it to, in accepting a two-state solution, is apartheid and hostile military rule.
The space can’t be so small if Israel keeps trying to cram more Jews into it.
It’s only Arabs that there is somehow no room for.
Its unnatural after 150 years of horrendous suppression and persecution to drop self-governance trivially for an ideal (that is nearly impossible to realize).
You want to be that Soviet (in imposing a utopian social form on an unwilling population)?
Was the end of apartheid a “Soviet-style imposition”?
South Africa was the realization of the will of the majority. A single-state in Israel/Palestine will be a realization of western left fantasies, not of Palestinian liberation, not of justice, not of peace.
Weren’t “the Barbarians” a diverse group of individual tribes each intent on their own “self-governance?” Didn’t that narrative posited by reams of History of Western Civilization place/label such “self-governance” as antithetical to the progress of civilization itself? Wasn’t the Roman citizen a proposition rather than any particular tribal/ethnic class? ditto the USA’s current “citizen?” What does being “civilized” mean in the current I-P context?
A single-state in Israel/Palestine will be a realization of western left fantasies, not of Palestinian liberation, not of justice, not of peace.
and How many millions more do you think that small land can accommodate?
andSouth Africa was the realization of the will of the majority
How many millions more of non-humans do you think that land can accommodate?
Let me know when you think of Palestinians as human beings.
That small land is even smaller if the Palestinians are confined to 22 percent or less of what was originally theirs.
But anyway, Witty, if I ever see you engaged in a serious conversation where you reply directly to points that threaten your own position without resorting to your usual evasions and lies, you might be worth talking to. I am open to discussion on what the best solution is–not that it’s my decision anyway. But past experience suggests you are not.
What you consider evasions, are direct responses to your posts, a description of what I consider the important questions to ask.
In asking questions of democracy, the real question is to ask what political arrangement OPTIMIZES democracy, realizing optimal consent of the governed.
The single-state fails at that, unless the overwhelming majority regard themselves as primarily civil, as distinct from Zionist or Palestinian nationalist. Otherwise, its a utopian imposition.
“What you consider evasions, are direct responses to your posts, a description of what I consider the important questions to ask.”
Actually, I think they were good questions. And if I hadn’t seen your behavior in the past, I would have responded.
I think your point is essential, Donald. A separate Palestinian state does not in any way guarantee peace. Satisfying Palestinian claims for their rights (and safeguarding Jewish rights in the process) does.
And, you know well that I’ve never advocated for the political solution as any end-point. In fact, I consistently state that the need for reform is constantly necessary, to realize the dynamic dual characteristic of Jewish AND democratic, or the Palestinian flavor of that Palestinian AND democratic.
Again, rather than seek to impose a formula that very few fundamentally want, why not WORK to change hearts and minds by positive principles of mutual humanization. Acceptance of the other as THE most democratic sentiment.
The tortured comparison to South Africa is a fantasy.
The Israeli position is not based on racial ideology; Jews in Israel/Palestine are more racially diverse than the Muslims. The Arabs do not believe in, or insist on, democracy or a one-man one-vote system.
The ANC in South Africa was integrationist, the Arabs, especially Hamas, are expulsionist.
Israeli governments have supported Land for Peace, and it happened with Egypt, but the Arabs in Palestine had a different plan.
We all know that the “One State” plan is a thin cover for Arab or Muslim supremacy and dhimmi status for Jews; You aren’t fooling anybody with the democracy talk.
I know that the word “Palestinian” can be difficult for certain speakers. The accents and letters just do not work well for those who are native speakers of some other languages. Still, it is good manners to give it a try. We will all be impressed by the effort you make.
Israeli governments have supported Land for Peace, and it happened with Egypt, but the **Palestinians** had a different plan.
Go on; try it out – even if you must spit while saying it.
And so tell us area man, who’s responsibil;ity is it then to prop up the Israeli State?
Israel can resist change as long as they are relieved of the cost of their intransigence by US largesse, and not a second longer.
So you are saying that the US must prop Israel up?
Why?
The Israeli position is not based on racial ideology
No, just a religious ideology. Where’s the roll eyes emoticon when you need it?
“Coercion is not enough, however; as I have long argued, and sought to do, Palestinians must also put forward a positive vision. Neither can Palestinians advocating a one-state solution simply disregard the views of Israeli Jews.”
At least Mister Abunimeh asserts the insufficiency of coercion and the necessity of putting forward a positive vision. This attitude is seldom found on this web site, whether in the posts by the authors of the web site or by the talkbackers.
There are differences between South Africa and Israel/Palestine. One is the ratio of nonwhite to whites when South Africa agreed to one man one vote was approximately seven or eight to one. The ratio of Israeli Jews to Israeli Arabs and Palestinian Arabs currently in Gaza and the West Bank is approximately one to one. This might make no difference whatsoever or it might indicate an entirely different dynamic. Also: the twenty or so years between the 1988 PLO declaration of independence until whatever time the PLO officially declares itself abandoning the two state solution creates a different dynamic. The ANC advocated one man one vote from the start and never wavered.
I tend to think that the Israeli Jewish readiness to accept one man one vote and the renaming of Israel as Palestine and choosing (or not) to leave en masse as in the case of Algeria is many years off. I think the choice of pursuing a two state solution will save much bloodshed.
Meanwhile it would be interesting and pleasing to read here a positive vision of the one state solution rather than the coercive rhetoric I am accustomed to reading here.
The coercive rhetoric here is mostly blowing off steam, I think, in response to the one-sided rhetoric we hear in most of the American MSM on this subject.
And anyway, the real world coercion is mostly inflicted by the Israelis, with wholehearted bipartisan support from most American politicians.
Donald- So if the real world coercion is inflicted by the Israelis, so then you reject Mister Abunimah’s call, I take it and you feel he is being too soft and cuddly, I guess.
No, I don’t think that, WJ. But if it makes you happy to win fights with strawmen, far be it from me to spoil your pleasure.
Well then, let me try another guess. Mister Abunimah believes in a one state solution and is working to see that it becomes a reality through imagination (imagine it and it may come true) and you don’t believe in a one state solution and therefore devote your rhetorical energies to attacking Israel.
Have fun, WJ. I’m not clear where you get this from, but it’s not about me anyway.
Mr. Abunimah’s words are mostly a rebuke to Israel supporters, but also contain a rebuke to Israel attackers.
Here is another one, the marvelous “wondering jew,” who starts out by skewing the terrain with “…you don’t believe in a one state solution and therefore devote your rhetorical energies to attacking Israel.” When clearly there is a defense taking place, not an offense – we have to hear none stop dribble 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, from the MSM and the Zionist chorus line, and when you object – it is attacking? So individuals like wj, whose real purpose is to shut down the effectiveness of the site, as small as its influence is, suddenly is interested in the “constructive” conversion of one state. Tell me wj, who is there of import from the rank and file of Zionist chorus line that wants to converse? Hell, we do not even have a serious conversation about two state from their majesties in Israel, shall we now begin a one state peace process? My recommendation is that we stay and course, be the contrary voice, and if we are going to discuss one state lets make sure everyone (or at least most who are sincere) is on the same page at least here.
Robin,
Blowing off steam in this case has led here and elsewhere (everywhere unloading rage is regarded as benign) to exagerating animosity, rather than resolving anything.
v- I am here to shut down the effectiveness of this site? Please. Grow up. You feel that this site is only effective when there’s an Amen chorus of Soviet unanimity? You’re being silly. If you feel your voice is needed to counter the MSM, go right ahead. I’m not stopping you.
Mister Abunimah though is suggesting that a portrait of the future is needed to make the one state solution attractive to Israeli Jews. You don’t want to help in his effort? Okay.
Why not name the place Caanan?
Or call it ‘The Holy Lands’ – the Democratic Republic of the Holy Lands.
No one objects to the name: Holy Lands.
What is coercive or non-positive about “a single democratic state with equal rights for all”? There are of course, many details to work out, but as a vision, I can’t think of anything more positive – for Israelis as well as Palestinians.
It’s coercive in the newspeak sense of the word because the Palestinians are viewed as inferior barbaric subhumans in the eyes of the benevolent European colonialists.
Perhaps WJ needs to do some more wondering.
Try this analogy, WJ: the rhetoric you are accustomed to reading here is the aggregated rhetoric of New York City policeman Frank Serpico, and you and your fellow travelers here represent the powerful status quo New York City machine.
What the Israelis have and the Afrikaaners did not is a rich, supportive external power base. The Afrikaaners found themselves alone. Diaspora Jewery is determined that Israelis will never be alone or unsupported.
I have seen this over and over. One group calls, for example, for a boycott on Lev Leviev’s diamonds; rich Jews go to Leviev’s store and come out proudly waving bags of jewelry for the camera.
Until this changes, BDS will be futile.
I think Abunimah’s piece implies that the answer to this problem is building a stronger and more principled movement. At some point, Israelis and their international allies have to come around to our side in order to resolve the problem. But the way to bring that about is precisely by not compromising principles in catering to those groups. Which does not imply a lack of empathy or fairness, but actually a focus on (universal) fairness.
This is a pretty unique challenge (although I’m sure there was ethnic affinity in international White support of apartheid), but already a lot of Jews are at the forefront of the Palestinian rights movement. A more assertive, principled, Palestinian-led movement ultimately changes more Jewish hearts and minds (as the ANC ended up doing with whites), I think, than any kind of appeasement (or as Abunimah says, “indulging” of racism and privilege).
“A more assertive, principled, Palestinian-led movement ultimately changes more Jewish hearts and minds”
First of all, that’s bullshit, and second the Jewish hearts and minds that matter, the Zionists, will only have their minds changed when Israel has to bear the cost of its policies.
When the ZIonists need money for Israeli arms, they don’t come argue with me, nor do they review the integrity of the Palestinians. They go straight to the US government.
The author never said anybody was going to change the Israeli’s minds, nor is it necessary, nor is it possible.
Of course, Israel has lots of atom bombs and the means to deliver them.
The man said the concerns of the Israelis should be addressed, he didn’t say they had to like it. After all, they have a pretty warped view of what their own concerns are, being convinced they include supremacy.
Me, I think the guy is much, much too generous to the Isralis.
A lot more Jews need to be converted to Palestinian rights.
Archimedes needed a lever and the right place to stand in order to move the world. The right place to apply the pressure has to be US Jewery: AIPAC, J Street and the whole “love Israel” movement.
Only until US Jews are made to feel profound shame and guilt for the actions of Israel will there be a chance for Palestine.
By “assertive”, I meant to imply “the ability to impose more real costs on Israel for its policies, as with strong BDS”.
You are right that the single-state movement doesn’t get off the ground with anyone with any sincere current ethical perspective, unless it morphs to a positively stated principled movement.
Abunimeh’s history is a liability in that respect. His political performance has vacililated from ideal to vicious.
Which “non-violence” should we remember? The non-violence of rock-throwers at tanks, or the “non-violence” of rock throwers as civilians?
The single-state though IS war on Israel, and will be related to that in that light. It will push those that you might hope would be potential allies to be enemies, literally, as the gauntlet is drawn.
BDS will push Israel back into its objective status of righteous David, relative to big bad Arab world, relative to big bad insensitive radical world, relative to fascist and anti-semitic world.
War, what is it good for, absolutely nothing.
So, why pursue it?
“Which “non-violence” should we remember? The non-violence of rock-throwers at tanks, or the “non-violence” of rock throwers as civilians?”
Which non-violence should we remember, the soldier that shoots the child at play, or the pilot that drops the one ton bomb on a densely populated apartment building to “get the terrorist?” Or the frothing colonial rabbi who tells us to kill infants? Or the leaders that all opt for merciless bombing of a mostly defenseless civilian population and also launch’s a medieval siege on a deprived and persecuted population? Oh, the legitimacy is blinding with such great choices, who shall we chose?
Oh, and lets not forget the 92% of the population that voted for the carnage of Operation Cast Lead, I am sure we can find some “non-violent” takers there.
The canard that the Palestinians started out with “peaceful” rock throwing is up there with Palin’s “I can see Russia from my house”.
Airplane hijacking? Check.
link to en.wikipedia.org
Massacring children on a bus? Check.
link to en.wikipedia.org
Massacring civilians at an airport? Check.
link to en.wikipedia.org
That was “rock-throwing at civilians”. You know non-violent “bottle-rockets”.
Compared to Zionism, Witty? Seriously? Financier, heal thyself.
The canard that the Palestinians started out with “peaceful” rock throwing is up there with Palin’s “I can see Russia from my house”.
“Airplane hijacking? Check.”
After Israel stole their land and massacred Palestinians? Check.
“Massacring children on a bus? Check.”
After Israel stole their land and massacred Palestinians? Check.
Oh wait, that was less than the number of civlians Israle killed in Jenin and Israeli propagandists keep insisting that wasn’t a massacre.
“Massacring civilians at an airport? Check.”
After Israel stole their land and massacred Palestinians? Check.
Also less then those killed at Jenin.
I think any voluntary one state solution is a fantasy ignoring Israel’s option to probably avoid that by simply declaring its own boundaries and telling the rest of the world to go screw, but in any event there seems to me yet another difference here from the South Africa situation that’s important.
Indeed more than important, and that is the religious aspect: What do you say to Israelis to not justshare their land, but in essence to … consecreate the idea that they will never ever realize the core idea that has animated them—and indeed defined them even—for nearly 2000 years now?
After all without at least the *hope* of an Israel, even the most theoretical, distant one, would jewry have even survived over the last two centuries? What other ultimate hope binds them together? So far as I understand there is no jewish analog to a Christian heaven where, in the end, all the right people are reunited and live happily ever after in a right-people community, correct?
So in essence isn’t asking for a one-state solution even more than asking merely for a forsaking of Zion, but indeed asking for what is perceived as the end of jewry itself?
One can never overestimate the psychic aspect that permeates this conflict I think.
How would a one-state solution quash anything essential in the Jewish religion? Those who feel it essential to dwell in the promised land would be dwelling there. Those who feel it essential to pray in Jerusalem could pray there.
Where in the Jewish religion does it say that Jews have to excerise permanent repression of the Palestinian population who was descended from the same Jewish ancestors that they were?
The ultra-orthodox, that regard Zionism as skew to religious values (except in the protection of Jewish families and communities), will remain and likely seek to settle in the West Bank.
In a single democratic state, there will be no basis of exclusion of Jewish purchase of land and settlement en masse in the West Bank.
And, there will be no basis of dispossessing current owners of property. So, likely, given the economic dominance of the region by Israelis, the natural flow of land possession will be to decrease the range and contiguity of land that is Palestinian.
The land in the West Bank will also grow to be expensive, and out of reach of the fellahin, who will likely be then dispossessed, as land as a crowded economic good will not stand as honoring residence based exclusive land rights.
Unanticipated social changes, some for the better, some clearly not for the better, will accompany a single democratic state.
Please note that a much higher percentage of Palestinians, and particularly the ones that might return from refugee status in Lebanon, Gaza, are not as educated as Israelis, and also will not be able to compete for good jobs.
Maybe in a couple generations, if Palestinians value education (which certainly occurs among many), parity will be realized.
“if Palestinians value education”
You let slip some racism there, Richard. You should be more careful if you want to maintain that hip, deep-thinking liberal facade.
In Israel’s case “parity” of the Palestinians is measured in direct proportion to oppression they have had to endure.
Since property in E Jerusalem is now being repossessed by Jews on the basis of pre-1948 deeds, there certainly does seem to be a basis for Palestinians to repossess their property.
Objectively,
What are literacy rates in Israel (extremely high), Israeli Palestinians (very high), West Bank Palestinians (reasonably high), Gazan Palestinians (less than high), Lebanese Palestinians in camps (not very good).
What is valued? I promise you that education is critical in a community’s development (and not just Torah and/or Koran).
And, I promise you that Israel values education highly.
You want to call that concern racism, Robin? You are looking for something to blame, RATHER than work to attend to to actually help.
Your “concern” about whether Palestinians value education? Yep, I am 100% certain that is racism. Ugh, you are such a slimeball.
potsherd wrote:
“How would a one-state solution quash anything essential in the Jewish religion? ”
Well I don’t know exactly, that’s a very interesting question, and maybe someone can tell us. For instance I don’t know for sure but again my rough sense is that unlike in the Christian faith in the jewish there is no other-worldly after-life nirvana to aspire to, at least none like heaven, right? Therefore leaving us with whatever earthly paradise(s) we can muster. But regardless of my possibly mistaken musing about the precise source of the jewish theological attachment to an earthly Zion it certainly seems to be the opinion of the experts by which I mean many fundamentalist jews that a one-state solution would quash something essential in their religion, true? Note for instance that rabbi’s book that came out just the other day; *when* did he say it was okay to go about killing not just gentiles but gentile babies and children? When they threatened *Israel,* and I can hardly imagine him embracing any Israel that wasn’t overwhelmingly jewish in nature and character.
Moreover, I don’t think it’s much disputed but that at least over the last century or so there has been a big movement towards taking a more secular outlook amongst Western jews at least, not least illustrated by the huge Reform movement. And in a way it’s even easier to see that amongst such more secularized folks who still feel the need for a strong collective bond to latch onto *something* strong and tangible to identify with, such as a single, pure, tangible, secular place. And then indeed the striving for that pure place becoming in essence, in their mind at least, the very thing that defines their group.
And, you know, prodded by your very incisive question, the more I think I might be on to something here: That indeed to a large degree, subconscious maybe but still there, there is a sense amongst a large segment of the jewish population that the destruction or elimination of a jewish Israel would in essence somewhat mean the end of judaism too.
I sure wish we had a judaic scholar here to comment on this; maybe I’m way way off base. But I don’t think so. And I don’t mean to say that this is something that jews themselves, once examining it, would not agree isn’t faulty; of course jewry existed and even flourished for a long time without an Israel.
But, still, over all that time it seems it *did* have an Israel in its mind though at least, theoretically; a kind of peaceful, earthly, final destination to aspire to where, because it was a uniquely *jewish* aspiration, just naturally (and without malign thought) was indeed pretty exclusively jewish. And now, that that’s seemingly within reach, to have it destroyed—much less agree to see it destroyed—creates a terrible dissonance: Doesn’t that essentially mean the obliteration of all or at least most of what, above all, it has *meant* to be jewish for the last 2000 years or so?
Like I say I think I’m on to something here, and in any event if not would sure like to see myself disabused of it by someone who really knew more about jewish thought and emotional life over those 2000 years or so. But I do think my idea also explains the very visceralness of the jewish reaction that seems to exist when it comes to Israel and even the idea of a one-state solution: Especially coming after the Holocaust … “here, miraculously, at last, was our dream of 2000 years. The common dream that identified us and that defined us. Of *course* it must be jewish in character and nature, an ‘Israel’ that wasn’t wouldn’t *be* an Israel.”
Also should provide gentiles with some sensitivity to the jewish sensitivity about Israel. Easy for us now to talk blithely about seeing Israel become a no-longer jewish-in-nature state, they’ve been dreaming about it differently for 2000 years as their essential savior from endless persecution and distrust. And for anyone who pooh-poohs old historical claims of persecution and etc. as the basis for modern fears they have that Holocaust answer: It *was* only 60 or so years ago. And it *did* even take place in the supposedly civilized West. Indeed in what was often regarded as the *most* civilized state in the West.
Some very very primal things being dealt with here, explaining the bitter bitter nature of the debates we see today.
Racism.
YOU better observe nothing then, nothing that could ever possibly lead to any improvement of anything that is less than needed (as you will be accused of racism FOR the observation).
The shift from “Israel” as mythic remote goal (almost not even physically existent) to Israel as a physical reality has been very confusing and difficult for the Jewish religion.
There is a precedent that suggests an answer for Jewish consciousness prior to that confusion which is in the shabbat service, the honor to physically lift the Torah. To us intellectual Jews (dreamy), the principles are in books, abstractions, entirely in thought and hopefully applied, but still abstract.
The experience of lifting the Torah though is NOT intellectual, abstract. It is physical. The implication is that it takes “putting one’s weight into it”, to commit in a real way.
I personally had two experiences that have confused me in similar ways. When I went to Israel in 1986, I had been dedicated to quite disciplined meditation practice for a decade +, and put great stock in that I was going to the “holy land”. When I got there, the experience of being there wasn’t that much different than anywhere else. I was still the same me. The world was still the same world. Others were the same. What was holy? What was qualitatively different?
Similarly, in the next leg of my trip, I visited a guru that originated the meditation discipline that I was practicing, and was spoken of in glorious and mysterious language. When I got there, I did experience a “spiritual” lift, but the environment as a whole had the same character. “What is so special about this? What is “holy”"
Nothing, and everything. For Jews, Israel is home. Like Shabbat is home. Like my wife is home. Shabbat is another day.
Religiously, Israel can be home to Jews, and also the same feeling as home to Palestinians, IF accepted. If not, then the experience is of unnatural isolation from home. Seeing one’s wife, but kept from her by barbed wire.
The political agitation approach divides. It separates one from one’s home. When external solidarity demand a political approach, rather than an accepting approach, they divide Jews from home, AND Palestinians from home.
They think as if the lifted Torah is ONLY physical, or ONLY intellectual.
Not simultaneously association AND principles. Not simultaneiously Jewish AND democratic. Not simultaneously Palestinian and accepting.
Sin: what I think we’re seeing these days is a perversion of Judaism to the point where it has become the ultimate sin – idolatry. A lot of Jews have begun to worship the Israeli state itself as the center of their religion, instead of the Law.
Fact is, throughout the history of the Jews, not only were most of them not dwellers in the region, the Jewish state/s, when they did exist, were more often than not subsumed under some foreign empire, paying tribute to Assyrians, Persians, Romans, etc. If Judaism requires that Jews dwell within some Jewish-ruled state, then for most of its history, Jews haven’t been Jews.
But when the religious communities such as the Lithuanians settled in Ottoman Palestine, they had no intention of founding a state, only of dwelling in Jerusalem. In fact, these communities traditionally were the strongest opponents of Zionism and regarded the founding of the state as contrary to Jewish law. Many of these Haredim still refuse to acknowledge the authority of the state. What they are waiting for, the fulfillment of Judaism, is not Binjamin Netanyahu, but the Messiah.
Besides which, I’m not sure how many of today’s Jews really want to see their religious life centered around a combination slaughterhouse and barbecue, with the revival of the Temple and priests and all that paraphernalia.
SN, you really are onto something. Both you and potsherd touch on a lot of important points – the bottom line being that Zionism has transformed Judaism to such an extent, that much of what passes for Judaism today would have to be reformed (not necessarily in the sense of 19th-century Reform), were Israel to become a secular democratic state. I think the way out may lie in multi-faceted cultural Zionism – a non-violent, non-idolatrous way of finding a cultural and spiritual focus for religious and national feeling.
potsherd wrote:
“If Judaism requires that Jews dwell within some Jewish-ruled state, then for most of its history, Jews haven’t been Jews.”
Well assuming you understand that all I’m saying is that (to a large but not total degree mind you, and maybe even subconsciously) modern jewry has come to *effectively* equate Israel with judaism itself, as to your observation I’d say that’s obviously true. But it’s also pre-Holocaust, isn’t it? And pre-even the remotest possibility of the establishment of a Zion, right?
So I guess to modify my theory I would have to emphasize that the jewry/Israel identification it posits is definitely is a very modern thing. But I don’t think this necessarily weakens my theory though because, after all, there *have* been those two big modern developments of the Holocaust and the establishment of Israel and it would after all be surprising if big big developments like that *didn’t* cause some profound psychological shifts, right?
And indeed your citing those haredim who reject Israel; doesn’t thatalso just kind of support my theory? I.e., showing that if there is anything the the vast majority of jews *do* share it *is* in fact an identification of jewry with Israel?
As to your point about idolatry I guess I just don’t know: Would even classical (i.e. non-modern) judaism regard worship of a Zion as “idolatry”? Isn’t like most “idols” it can seem. But even if you are right and technically it *would* be idolatry the question is still whether it is in fact seen as such by the majority of jews, and again I’d just cite the fact that your Israel-rejecting haredim are so small in number.
Like I say I wish we had a real judaic scholar here, because I’d also love to hear him or her talk about Shmuel’s keenly observed idea about a more “multi-faceted” idea of judaism and zionism. It is possible? Indeed is it even avoidable? And if not does it have to come with such pain?
Like you said postherd, one can hardly believe that the dream of zionists is to live in a “slaughterhouse/barbecue.” And indeed logic would seem to suggest the more it remains one the more it means that what conflation of judaism with zionism *has* existed as per my theory gets progressively weaker and weaker. So maybe that’s exactly what we are seeing when we hear the moaning of so many hard-core zionists when they talk about how especially young Diaspora jews are “falling away”; it’s not just that they are falling away from Israel, they are falling away from jewry too in the zionists view. And after all even if you think my theory wrong you can’t deny I don’t think that it *has* been the zionists project to make it right, true? To conflate in the jewish mind jewishness with a love of Israel, right?
Ironic too if my theory is right; if indeed to a substantial extent modern jewry equates jewishness with the existence of Israel, the real threat then to modern jewry is then an “ugly” Israel that can never seem to find peace and room to behave placidly. Nobody wants to identify with anything ugly. And so the longer Israel finds itself having to behave ugly, quite contrary to its stated and even apparent reason that it is doing so *for* jewry, what it will be doing if some peace isn’t found at some point at least is instead dynamiting away at jewry, worse than any assimilationist or anti-zionist or anti-semite could ever do.
Sin – this is all part of what I mean by “Israel is bad for the Jews” and bad for Judaism, as well. It’s a profoundly corrupting influence, and it’s a meme that the Zionists have deliberately spread, to the point that they often claim a Jew can’t really be Jewish anywhere else.
I definitely consider it an idolatry because the state (or land) of Israel has supplanted the Messiah (huh? who he?) as a thing not waited-for but actualized. Whereas it was always that a state or whatever was secondary to the Messiah, to be actualized only after the Messiah appeared.
But the world’s Jews are displaying an exceptional capacity for denial of all this, and of the ugliness that is the reality of Israel, as opposed to the idealized image they cling to. And a lot of this is the false belief that Judaism is somehow tied to the so-called Jewish State.
Sin nombre- If we are trying to understand the Jewish connection to Israel, I think the primary text is not religious, but the “Hatikva”- “We have not lost the hope of 2000 years to be a free nation in our land, in the land of Zion, Jerusalem.”
Although Israel’s dependence on America’s financial and military support might be considered a significant limitation on Israel’s independence and although a humanistic interpretation of freedom might preclude the possibility of being free whenever anyone is being oppressed, the concept of a Jewish free nation is widely seen as one where Jews decide the destiny of their nation: and this requires a Jewish majority as long as a Knesset rather than some other institution is the one which sets the rules.
I think the impracticality of the one state solution- the belief that the Arabs or Palestinians will send the Jews back where they came from or will seek vengeance for the years of exile or oppression is a primary objection. Very little has been done in the direction of assuring the Jews of Israel or of the Diaspora of the peaceful intent of the one state solution. For many years the charter of the PLO proclaimed the need to send the Jews (those whose roots weren’t pre Zionist, as in those whose roots did not precede 1917) back where they came from and today that same rhetoric is common and even worse rhetoric is contained in the Hamas charter.
(Anecdote: My brother is a Haredi who lives in Jerusalem and has zero stake in the national religious rhetoric that sees the state as a fulfillment of the beginning of the redemption. Yet he objects to the two state solution more than I do because he sees from the headlines little proof of the good will of the Palestinians.)
Religious Jews pray three times a day for the rebuilding of Jerusalem. (And if they eat three meals a day with bread, they pray an additional three times a day for that rebuilding.) Although what you and I might call an advanced person might interpret the rebuilt Jerusalem as a shared peaceful Jerusalem, I don’t think that is the only feasible interpretation and many Jews dream of a Jerusalem empty of all but submissive Arabs.
I agree that the black hole of the Holocaust followed a few years later by the rebirth of Jewish sovereignty in Israel is another key to the Jewish connection. The reconstitution of Israel into a binational state offers little assurance of anything other than the dissolution of Israel and thus the black hole of the Holocaust will have nothing to fill its blackness.
Your question deserves a deep response and this is rather superficial.
I would suggest that the dissolution of the Israeli state would be liberating Judaism from the burden of justifying it, rationalizing it, from the burden of repressing the Palestinians. This was often said of slave-holding societies, that slavery was as much a burden to the owners as it was to the slaves, that they held each other in mutual bonds.
wondering jew/potsherd:
Well first of all wj I don’t think your comments were superficial at all. And I was especially struck by your notation of that line from the Hatikva and feel that it points exactly the way you put it that my original thinking here concentrated too much on a religious aspect.
I don’t think I’ve quite got it right yet then, and again would love to hear some scholar of judaism on this, but I don’t know this lessens my ultimate conclusion that however the mechanics work, there is a substantial sense amongst many many jews, conscious or subconscious, that the destruction or disappearance of Israel now as a jewish state would indeed almost equate to the destruction or disappearance of jewry itself.
Given same—given how absolutely *profound* it means for Israel as a jewish state to exist for them—and given how deeply rooted this is so that, as you jw observe, it’s implanted with perfect articulation in the national anthem itself which as I understand it was written and far predates Israel’s fouding, this seems to me to have equally profound consequences for what is and what is not possible in the future.
You jw for instance talk about “little being done” to try to … acclimate Israelis or jews to the idea of a one-state solution, and potsherd of course, quite logically argues that hey, maybe a jewish Israel is a *constraining* thing for jews. But my goodness, given that profoundness, and that depth of roots … no way it seems to me is anyone ever going to persuade jewry to agree to a non-jewish Israel. No way. It would be like asking them to commit a sort of … identity suicide. And these are folks who have kept their identity for 2000 years despite having no already existing Israel and despite being fragmented and torn and then having the very core of their people exterminated. No way.
As I’ve said before the other aspect of this as regards any one-state solution is the relative ease with which Israel can trump that just simply by declaring on any day that it wants that its border is here and here and excluding whomever it wants thereby and thereby also essentially closing the book on any idea that it owes those excluded folks any rights or etc. within the borders it has declared. And it won’t be much harder I don’t think for Israel to figure out other ways to deal with those non-jews who it could not so exclude if and when they do present a demographic threat.
Combined then with my view that a two-state solution really is already out of reach and to me at least you’ve just got a recipe for a chronic cancer there in the region, and, happily for me, I think the U.S. has an easy answer too in the form of the observation that it really has no damned vital interest in any of this and it should just get out, period.
But otherwise I just don’t think any of this is going away at *any* time in *any* foreseeable future, meaning at least ten-twenty or thirty years or so at a minimum. So that in 2020 there will still be conflict over there, with maybe some ridiculous little broken-up collection of areas that calls itself the State of Palestine, but with a continuing war between a significant number of Palestinians and Israel still on-going. And the U.N. may even rule that the State of Palestine includes all those post-’67 lands Israel has by then claimed as its own, which however will essentially mean nothing whatsoever, to the Israelis at least, and to the U.S. as well.
Regardless, this has been an interesting line of conversation even if it doesn’t seem to lead to any helpful ideas. Sometimes though that’s the best you can hope for; mere understanding, or at least mere better understanding. And I think I’ve gained some more here so thank you to all who batted this issue around with me. I can see better now, for instance, why in the face of the obvious knowledge that what some U.S. jews are doing that just screams “dual loyalty” they keep doing it regardless: in a very real sense the issue to them shouldn’t be seen in that light, instead it is that to them *not* “saving” Israel means not saving themselves or their identity. It means not just he displacement of fellow jews but a step towards the evaporation of jewry and their own identity itself. Suicide, in essence, not only of their culture but of their own selves too.
Thanks again everyone.
potsherd:
I would tend to agree. Zionism has done immeasurable damage to Judaism, and there can be no real Jewish future without tackling it head on – practically of course, but also spiritually and philosophically. This is a fascinating and important subject, and I will try to find the time to respond in detail to Sin Nombre, later today. I don’t know if I am the “Judaic scholar” he’s looking for, but I do have a considerable background in the field of Jewish Studies.
Just read the Ibish interview. Compared to Abunimah, he is so irrational. Looking into a crystal ball and envisioning war and catastrophe in the future, due to one-staters and/or BDS. While Abunimah soberly assesses relevant history.
Ibish’s problem is that he is telling the Palestinians to play realpolitik, when they have no real tangible power. Their power is overwhelmingly in their ideas, which Ibish wants them to compromise. Goldberg is just totally disconnected from reality–we’ve reached the “Promised Land” because some members of the House went to the ATFP gala. With both of them, it’s a misplaced obsession with a corrupt and disingenuous process, and the lack of any attention to principle.
I had an entirely oppossite opinion. My assessment of Ibish is that he is uniquely sober and effective, without fundamentally compromising, while Abunimeh is confused, confusing and grasping at idealistic straws that he betrays in the majority of his actual work.
You don’t know what the majority of his work is, nor have you read it Witty, so stop the bullshit. Stop it up pompous ass, before you get verbally whacked again. You have no idea what he wrote in his volume, just like you have little inkling of history in the areas you act like you excel.
I read One Country over a year ago.
I was hopeful after reading it, but in reading his commentary on newsfeeds over a six month period, and the trashing he did of those that sought inter-cultural contact and reconciliation, sickened me.
I thought of him as a fraud, in his advocacy of single democratic state, by the method of vague and punitive BDS.
He’s got a long way to walk, to formulate his effort in principled positive terms.
Well than Witty, we will just have to chalk it up to your reading retention challenges, seeing that you even have difficulty following a short post here. You can spare us what you learned, no doubt as much as you learned from reading the Israel Lobby.
Denial as a response.
I conclude differently from the same surface of facts.
I contest that if you read more, from other than only “politically correct” sanctioned sources, you’d have different questions that you’d have to grapple with than only the ones that lead to condemnation of Israel.
“I conclude differently from the same surface of facts.”
They have a term for that, Witty.
Insight, reflection.
Reading contrary views Witty is a perfunctory matter, the issue being that you read critically – even volumes for which you have an affinity. The breadth which you have prior to reading is important, however within the womb of Zionism there is such ideological blinders that people come up with the types of conclusions like you post – it is really nothing new. If there is no honesty it is all for naught.
Good rationalization for not encountering any thinking that could possibly counter or even slightly adjust your prejudice.
MUTUAL humanization is a pre-requisite to functioning democracy. Mutual recrimmination is usually a gross deterrent to it.
You’re a fine one for talking about prejudice, Witty. There’s no accusation against the Palestinians you don’t embrace without questions, and there is no recriminiation against Israelis that you don’t rationalize as actually being blamed on the Palestinians.
Thats utterly false, Chaos.
I don’t regard the Palestinians as monolithic and do not speak of them as a generalization (I’m sure there are exceptions, but they are few).
I am very critical of Hamas, and of all militant, non-compromising approaches.
…unless those approaches originate from Israel. How many times have we seen you try to frame Operation Cast Lead as Hamas’ fault?
“We must recognize that the opposition of Israeli Jews to any solution that threatens their power and privilege stems from at least two sources. One is irrational, racist fears of black and brown hordes (in this case, Arab Muslims) stoked by decades of colonial, racist demonization. The other source — certainly heightened by the former — are normal human concerns about personal and family dislocation, loss of socioeconomic status and community security: change is scary.”
How about a rational fear developed over the past 100 years by Arab unwillingness to accept Jewish presence among them insofar as the Jews are not subordinates (i.e., dhimmis)? How about 80 years of violence, violence that started long before any Jewish state or occupation? How about the sight of Palestinians strapping on explosives and detonating themselves among groups of women and children because their religion supposedly justifies such mass murder? How about the horrendous history of treatment of non-Arab minorities in Arab or Muslim countries (e.g., the Kurds, the Copts, the Bahais in Iran)?
Palestinians will have to settle for whatever power they can get amongst themselves, i.e., in a Palestinian state. One state would be suicide, at least for generations.
Oh, we get a double dose of bullshit with loud mouth carnass who also know dick. In one paragraph he thinks he rewrites history both ancient and contemporary – what is your major malfunction, is your motto “lie at any cost.” This gets so irritating, why do you feel the need to post such tripe?
v, since you’re about as coherent as Paris Hilton after a night at her favorite bar, I think I’ll take advice from others. But thanks for the offer.
Why don’t you go ask Sharon for advice carnass, perhaps he will move his toe left or right and give you some advice, since he currently is your equal.
Making fun of someone in a vegetative state, how appropriate. Too bad you have to deal with people who can actually talk back to you. We know you’re not used to that (discounting the little voices in your warped brain).
Making fun of a alleged war criminal in a vegetative state. Let’s be equivocal here. Considering the racist crap that comes out of your mouth, V talking about Sharon that way is pretty mild salsa.
“Making fun of someone in a vegetative state, how appropriate.” Just in case you did not get the punchline carnass, it was you.
You can always tell the wingnuts when they start talking about “dhimmis”.
Oh how I love it when zionuts just make up history.
How I love it when they conveniently forget to mention that European colonists ethnically cleansed the indigenous people of Palestine, as if that detail is somehow meaningless…
To them, it is meaningless.
I always find this viewpoint rather projective. The reality of the past 100 years has been the opposite, in that it has been Zionist Jews who were unwilling to accept non-Jewish Arab(and sometimes even Jewish Arab) presence among them except as a subordinate minority. The dhimma system, for all its faults and limitations, was a more just system than Israeli apartheid in the occupied territories, for which there is really no rational excuse in the early 21st century.
Nor was dhimma the system that even the earliest Zionist Jews were governed by in late nineteenth and early twentieth century Palestine.
I also find it rather projective that those who criticize the Palestinians of the past for not being more open to the Zionist colonial enterprise, with its great influx of Zionist Jews intending to overwhelm the number of indigenous inhabitants, are also the ones who are aghast at the idea that the ROR might lead to a great influx of Palestinians, overwhelming the number of Jews. They are also the ones who fear a one state solution with equal rights for all. Again, they are unwilling to see Palestinians as their equals rather than as hated subordinates. A classic double standard and projection.
Is it just me, or is this proliferating more Zionist ass magicians? “Oh, look at this (reaching for his rear)! Am I not clever? lol
Any talk of the one state solution brings out the worst Zionut trolls imaginable.
Its because they know that talk of the 1 state solution is the end of their ethnic superiority in Palestine.
The concept of equal rights is the most powerful to all peoples around the globe; hearts of the most diverse stripe and culture cherish it more than any other. It appeals to the core of the human heart.
It seems that witty, area man and wondering jew find this discussion uncomfortable. As they should if it is their goal to maintain a Jewish state in the heart of Palestine. Quite frankly, I have supported the state of Israel and was thrilled when, in 1992, it appeared that a two state solution to the problem was possible. What I didn’t know then, but finally realized in the past 6 years, is that Israel was not serious about allowing a real Palestinian state to arise in the West Bank. No not at all. Israel’s goal was to annex more and more West Bank real estate. That was a decision made by Israel. I was not consulted. But it was a decision that has made the two state solution impossible. This is not something that I desire, but is the logical conclusion of Israeli policy. Basically, they leave as the only option a one state solution.
So I am not an advocate of the one-state solution, but recognize that Ari Sharon’s policy of establishing facts on the ground has in fact been successful. Given that success the only option for the Palestinians is to demand equal rights within the current state of Israel. If they are successful then it only follows that Israel cannot be a Jewish state, it must become a state of its people.
I will repeat– this is not something that I desire, rather it is a recognition of the facts on the ground that the Zionists have succeeded in establishing. It is so ironic that Sharon’s success in building West Bank settlements is going to inevitably result in elimination of Israel as a Jewish state. So Witty and Wondering Jew, is this what you thought would happen while you continued to give your uncritical support to Israel over the last 3o years. For sure you have left as the only option a one-state solution.
“What I didn’t know then, but finally realized in the past 6 years, is that Israel was not serious about allowing a real Palestinian state to arise in the West Bank.”
This we agree about, and I personally seek to change.
Your statement of “uncritical support over the last 30 years” is false. A correct description for me, and I expect WJ, is very critical support over a life (more within the last 15 years than prior, as I experienced the misrepresentations and malevolence of many on the left towards Israel intimately during that time, and in the form of functional boycott.)
There is an irony of leftist agitation, similar to your description of the irony of annexation leading to lessening of the viability of Israel (a truth in my mind).
That is that the current most motivating factor in Jews becoming more defensive of Israel, is the exagerations of the left.
Show of hands. If Witty were a US Senator, would he be more like: A) Joe Lieberman, or B) Joe McCarthy. I honestly can’t tell.
If ***** were a US Senator, would he be more like: A) Joe Lieberman, or B) Joe McCarthy.
The answer to that question is, “yes”.
There have been two major two state proposals in the last nine or so years that have been publicized: the Clinton parameters and the Geneva “Accords” signed by Yossi Beilin and Yaser Abed Rabbo. I have not done sufficient research: but the question is: how many settlers are in the territory that the Clinton parameters or the Beilin-Rabbo accords attribute to the proposed Palestinian state (and also how many settlers were there at the time of said proposals.) It is only on the basis of those figures that one can maintain the impossibility of the two state proposal.
Here you go wj, why don’t you catch up on things –
THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TWO STATE SOLUTION
Ahem. Funny, you seem to be forgetting the Arab Peace Plan.
The two-state solution for I/P is the democraticly principled conclusion to the conflict. Implementing and finalizing a singular national entity from the “river to the sea” constitutes an invasion. Let say one democratic country takes over another country, even if that country offers all rights of a citizen to the new annexed people, that does not give the right of the former to “swallow” up a nation with out its permission. That is, if the US annexed Iraq, gives all Iraqis rights to a US passport and a vote, does that make it right if the Iraqis don’t want to become part of the US? Now imagine that country with the sort of politics currently exercised by the current Palestinian factions – Palestinians in Palestinian jails with no trial, just because they belong to the other faction. The 1949 borders were artificial anyway, and since a large portion of the settlers are non-nationalistic/Zionist haredim, there will be minimal uprooting of Jewish settlers.
Does anyone even know what percentage of Palestinians want the one state solution?
The invasion already happened. The annexation of the land already happened. The issue now is the citizenship of the people.
Palestinians just want their human rights to be respected.
Clearly the 2 state solution is not working.
I’ve also been to the West Bank, and almost every Palestinian I talked to said they’d have ZERO problems living with Jews as equal citizens.
The Israeli Jews can’t even live with with each other on an equal basis.
Annexation is wrong when it’s imposed on the conquered population. But in this case, it would only happen in response to the demand of the conquered people. It’s true that they are not, in one voice, demanding it now, but that’s what people like Abunimah are working on–a revolution (of ideas) within the Palestinian movement.
Abunimah’s analysis is excellent, principled and compassionate. A point he does not go into however, which I believe is very relevant to the situation in I/P is the alternative to democraticisation. I think that a crucial part of the changing of white South African minds was the recognition that Apartheid was, in the long run, untenable. White South Africans were afraid of change, but they realised that it was inevitable and that they would have to, somehow, cut their losses. ANC violence, international sanctions, and even “racist fears of black and brown hordes” all contributed to the realisation that time was not on their side and that the white regime would be overthrown eventually, at great cost. The Rhodesian experience certainly helped drive home this message. As others here have pointed out, the demographic situation in I/P is quite different, but in the long-run, forced control of an equal or even slightly larger population is not sustainable, and if not defused (in a way that two states does not do), it will end in disaster. The unrealistic view of the future that leads Israelis to fear full democracy more than perpetual forced control is rooted in the belief that they are a part of the western world and enjoy its support (especially that of the United States), that they may be a forward position, a bastion, but that they are not alone. Diminishing that support, if only on the level of public opinion (as opposed to government action) in the West, would probably bring about a shift in the way Israelis see reality.
With regard to qualms about coercing Israelis, we must not forget that the status quo and even the two-state solutions that have been proposed so far are coercive in the extreme to Palestinians.
What you call “full democracy”, I describe as “less democracy”.
So is America not a “full democracy” because Zionists don’t — oh wait. Bad example.
Now that’s a perverse twist on the concept of equal rights for all citizens. That’s what full democracy means. Witty, explain yourself. Two referents you might wish to look at are the US’s Declaration of Independence, and Lincoln’s speech at Gettysburg.
That is the point.
The single state would less than full civil rights for a much larger percentage of each population than a skillful, mutually respectful and viable two-state.
Witty? By your logic, the United States should have been split up into how many different bantustans in order to “preserve civil rights?”
Actually, we had something like that twisted mockery you ascribe to, Witty. It was called segregation.
I’m away for two days.
Feel free to misrepresent me, others, Israel, justice, peace, freedom, democracy.
Are you sure you’re not a female in real life? Because you have the Jewish mother passive aggressive thing down like a real pro. My Catholic mother doesn’t hold a candle to your arm-twisting.
Now you are denigrating women, what next!!!
just kidding Chaos
You don’t need the “just kidding” appellation. We’re all fully aware that everything you post is a joke.
Ah, the master of “mutual humanization” speaks! Do as you say, not as you do, right, Richard? You still aren’t applying your bromides to your self, are you?
♫ ♫ ♫ his Hungarian violin.
Using Israel along with justice, peace, freedom, democracy is a contradiction in terms.
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ON THE ONE STATE SOLUTION
“the challenge remains to make the case to Israeli Jews what they have to gain from a just and equitable society”
OK which Arab Muslim society would use as an example of Arabs or Muslims having created “just and equitable” society for Israeli Jews (or others ) to reassure them of the possibility?
Do I need to delineate the candidates?
Egypt, ask the Christian Copts and the Jews that are already all long gone.
Syria? Ask the Christians and Druze, or what’s left of the Muslim Kurds.
Saudi Arabia, just ask their Arab Muslim women and Christian Philippine workers.
Or you could try Sudan.
The Palestinians are different you say?
How’s about the living example of the Gaza (Palestinian) for non Hamas Arab Muslims or the Christians or even the Jews who were cleansed in 1929, as were the Jews from the Palestinian cities of Hebron and Nablus, also in 1929. And they did not have a gun between all the Jews in the four cities.
If you think there is something to gain from living in a “just and equitable” Arab Muslim society, why do you not try it yourself.
CAUSION your wife or daughters might not want to join you. But if they do join you, rest assured they will be faithful.
Yoram
One thing that the opposition to the one-state solution always seem to overlook is the fact that not all the Palestinians are Muslim. The Christian Palestinians are not likely to vote for a Muslim state, and the majority of the Christians are now refugees. Upon their return, Muslim voters might not be a majority, even though Arabs would be.
“having created “just and equitable” society for Israeli Jews (or others )”
Very telling, that you relegate all the non-Jews to the parentheticals.
“If you think there is something to gain from living in a “just and equitable” Arab Muslim society, why do you not try it yourself.”
What short memories you have. When the muslims left andalusian Spain, the Jews followed them, having enjoyed protection under Moslem rule and (rightly) fearing severe persecution from the Christians.
This is an argument in defense of your own racism. It has nothing to do with the proposal for a single democratic state in Palestine.
Several responses in one, if I may.
Mr./Ms/ ? Potsherd
1) On the subject of Christians in the ME. TRUE, Christians once constituted a large influential minority with in the Arab states. And if you remember your history, Christianity preceded Islam in the world and the Middle East by more than five hundred years. There were Christians in Arabia and Mecca before and during the life of Mohammed the Prophet. As a matter of fact it was the Christian community that first raised the flag of Arab independence from Turkish Ottoman rule. It was called the Arab Awakening.
But all that was before the intense influence of Arab nationalism in the 50’s & 60’s. Now after the further narrowing of consciousness here, exemplified by the various Islamic movements the Christian segment of the population has been severely reduced. With the exception of Israel, all the Middle-Eastern states have significantly smaller Christian populations than in the past.
What your thoughts really expose is another fundamental reason for the rejection by the Jewish and Israeli people of a “one-state-solution” .
The simple history of minorities in the Arab Muslim world has been a disaster for all concerned, including the Muslims, for the past half century. By minorities I include; Christians, Jews, Bah’ is, Zoroastrians, Druze, and others.
Your second posting:
Of course the best remedy for eliminating the problems of life, for the individual or nation, is to quit!
It is interesting that it is the Jews you volunteer to relive of the burden of complex existence. What could be so wonderful about adding a twenty first Arab, Muslim majority state to the community of nations? What exactly is the nature of their contribution to the pressing issues facing the community of living beings on this planet at this time; that you would sacrifice a unique community that has contributed so much to human welfare in the past sixty years?
Wandering Jew:
YES it has to do with “Hatikva” (the hope) as well as a unique stew of religion/spirituality/ethnicity/nationality/cultural uniqueness AND tikva, (hope) for the opportunity to contribute to better world for all living beings.
And we have the receipts for some great successes in that endeavor.
Yoram
Moshav Aminadav
Jerusalem
You do realize that the converse is true.
The simple history of minorities in Israel has been a disaster for all concerned, including the Jews, for the past half century.
Until Israel can clean up its act, its really just the pot calling the kettle black for Israelis to be complaining about a lack of concern for religious minorities. The treatment of Palestinians in the occupied territories is worse than some of the worst periods of ancient Muslim rule. Most of historical Muslim rule was far better than that accorded by Israel to its Palestinian subjects in the West Bank and Gaza. If you think that history precludes majority Muslim rule from ever being just, then you must likewise agree that majority Jewish rule, with a horrendous track record in Israel, is similarly precluded from attaining any justness. Or perhaps they are both capable of the proper treatment of minorities, given the proper incentives and encouragement.
Yoram – your argument for the continued existence of a purely Jewish state (which Israel has never been) rests on a vast falsehood – “that has contributed so much to human welfare in the past sixty years?” Israel’s contribution to the world in the pasta sixty years has been one of war, repression, torture, intolerance, racism, hate and corruption. It has contributed to making the world a worse, not a better place.
On such grounds as you present, Israel can only be condemned. The Jews of Israel should consider themselves lucky to be able to continue as citizens of a binational state in the land they stole from others, to whom they were not so kind.
Yoram,
If you thnk you can spin the usual Isreli revisionist garbage here, you’re in for a surprise.
What is interesting is your omission of the fact that the so called burden of complex existence was brougth on by Israel’s founders out of choice. It is the burden that goes with establishing one’s self by way of hostile means. Whether there are 20 other Arabs staes or 100 is irrelevant. Israel is not the only option for the world’s jews, as is demostrated by the fact that the marority of the world’s Jewish population choose not to live there.
Israel drove Palestinians from their land, stole their homes, massacred them and continnue to do so, but Israeli propagandists still pretend like they are blameless.
Sorry, but there is nothing particlartly unique about Israel, other than the fact that it is morally bankrupt, and immune from intenational law and consequences for it’s disasterous policies.
As for having contributed so much to human welfare in the past sixty years, I fail to see how ethnic cleasing, perpetual war, agression and mass murder are contributions we couldn’t have done without. If you are referring to the contributions made by brilliant Jewish artists, scolars and scientists, most of those individuals were nto Israeli and did so in spite of Israle, not because of it. In fact, one could name any achievement by an Israeli and not one of them depended on Israel’s existence.
What grown on a tree, at least on this site, seems to be just plain ignorance…the statement that Israel has ” has been a disaster for all concerned” could only be explained by willful ignorance combined with a strong dose of generic and very PC anti-Zionism.
The Arab, Druze, Bedouin and Ba’hai citizens of Israel, Muslim & Christian alike have the highest life expectancy of any Arabs in the Middle East, that’s how bad its been for them. But the real lives of Arabs may not concern you, so long as you can dump on Israel.
I am sure you are not impressed, but the flowering of Hebrew culture, which along with Chinese is one of the oldest expressions of human creativity, here has been remarkable and unequaled anywhere in the Diaspora.
Our contributions to humanity, include advances in Desert Agriculture being used all over the world where they benefit many people. And this should especially interest you, tree >Forestry; did you know that Israel is the only country in the world in which there were more trees at the end of the 20th century than at the beginning? The list of contributions is just too extensive to add here. If you know about science this is all in no small part due to the synergy of the collection of people who choose to live and work here from all over the world. The Russian with the Ethiopians, the Americans and Moroccans with Iranians.
As for “our” Arabs, their literacy rate is often in three languages, Arabic, Hebrew & English. They, like all other Israeli citizens are covered by our universal medical insurance system including admit ion to our fine hospitals. Where they also serve as physicians including in Afula Hospital the head of the Emergency Room, and heads of other department in the Jerusalem Hadassah Hospital.
During the period when Israel controlled the Gaza strip my friend Dr. Eli Lash was Chief Medical officer for the strip for twenty years, lowered the infant mortality rate by one third.
The Arabs in the West Bank enjoy one of the highest rates of availability electricity and clean running water of Arabs anywhere in the Middle East. BTW This was hardly the situation when Israel took control.
Arab Israelis are take advantage of eligibility to enter and graduate from our universities. They have more freedom of expression than anywhere else in the Arab world, as well as the freedom to read, write and publish what ever they want.
…and Shingo I was not challenging you to live in the ancient Muslim world, not even the one of 70 years ago, when the Middle Ease was again a rich cosmopolitan area of the world. But NOW, which is what I thought we were discussing. We all know that a thousand years ago a person who did not read and speak Arabic was ignorant of the culture of the world. Even you must know, having nothing to do with Israel or Jews, that things have changed. There is not even much tolerance for different ideas about Islam much less tolerance for other religions. In Saudi Arabia if no one is looking, they still behead people who preach Christianity.
For the record the only successful ethnic cleansing in this area was by the local Arabs in 1929, and again in 1948. You know, while tens of thousands of Arabs remained in the areas conquered by the Israeli army, in 1948 not one, ONE Jew remained in those conquered by the Arab armies.
All you need to do is travel the Jordan Valley and look (to the east) across into Jordan and see the replication of Israeli farming methods to know the blessing we have been.
And these is a reason that any Arab who can make the connections prefer treatment in Israeli hospitals.
In a survey conducted a few years by a Ramala survey company the country most admired by West Bank Arabs was….Israel.
It is so terrible to be an Arab in Israel that most Arabs in the west bank would accept Israeli citizenship in a flash.
Take up the White Man’s burden–
Send forth the best ye breed–
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives’ need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild–
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child.
Take up the White Man’s burden–
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain
To seek another’s profit,
And work another’s gain.
Take up the White Man’s burden–
The savage wars of peace–
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.
Take up the White Man’s burden–
No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper–
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go mark them with your living,
And mark them with your dead.
Take up the White Man’s burden–
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard–
The cry of hosts ye humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:–
“Why brought he us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?”
Take up the White Man’s burden–
Ye dare not stoop to less–
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloke your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your gods and you.
Take up the White Man’s burden–
Have done with childish days–
The lightly proferred laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years
Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!
~Rudyard Kipling
Oh yes, the trees. The new forests, the trees bought from the contributions of Jewish children in the Disaspora, all unaware that they were being planted to cover up the remains of Arab villages and prevent their inhabitants – those Israeli citizens you treat so very well, otherwise known as “internal refugees – from returning to their homes.
And when you are looking across the Jordan River, be sure to hold your nose, since it is now no more than a ditch for Israeli sewage, all the water having been diverted to grow oranges in the desert. Or haven’t you heard about the Israeli water crisis, the drought tax, the horrendous wastefulness of the Israeli water distribution system and the corruption that allows farmers to squander all the water they please, subsidized by the rest of the population? And on your way to the river, you might notice the villages and farms of the Palestinians in the West Bank, whose only water supply comes from tankers purchased from Israeli suppliers at exorbitant costs because they are forbidden to drill wells in their own country so the entire aquifer can be reserved for the use of Jews.
There is nothing so sad as a person who believes their own propaganda.
There is nothing so disgusting as a country who claims to be benefitting the world, when it is only benefitting its own kind at the expense of others.
Yoram: “It is so terrible to be an Arab in Israel that most Arabs in the west bank would accept Israeli citizenship in a flash. ”
In that case, why doesn’t Israel give it to them? They’ve annexed the land, why not welcome the people with it?
All the great wonderfulness that Yorman cites about Israel was only made possible by acts of masssive theft and expropriation of both the refugees and the minority grudgingly allowed to remain in the Israeli state on a fraction of their land. But Israel is selfish. Israel refuses to share its blessings with the people it has stolen from.
Yoram,
Like I suggested earlier, you won’t find any benefit to spreading the usual Israeli lies here, but predictably that hasn’t stoppped you from trying.
Yes, Israel has been a a disaster for all concerned, and that”s a fact. Zionism itself is a rascist belief that endireses the notion of ethnic superiotity and excusivity, which it’self is an anathema to democracy, justice and human rights.
Life expectancy is due to Isral’s socialized universal medical insurance system amd hopsitals, which is only made possible becasue Isral received the world’s biggest welfare chaques from the US.
The Hebrew culture could have taken place anywhere and in spite of Israel’s exitence, though there is nothing partiicualrly remarkable or unequaled about how it has trasnpired in Israel. Even if that were true, it benefits Israelis, not the world.
Israel’s claims to it’s advances in Desert Agriculture are hyped and could have taken place in spite fo Israel. To whom does Israel export it’s Desert Agricultur and wjho is benefitting?
Forestry is a pathetic claim. Palestine was hardly a rain forrest at the beginning of the 20th century, so tha’t hardly anything to boast about.
I suspect that the reason you didn’t bother to listthe extensive contributions is becasue you simply couldn’t think of anythign that wasn’t pathetic and lame, judging by the exmapes you did site.
As for scienece, it turns ou that Israel’s calims were all based on the efforts of foreing countries and multinational companies. I was lmost expcting you to citge the lie that Israel invented Microsoft windows and the mobile phone. The sad fact is that Israel’s skilled workers are leaving permanently to work overseas.
So you offer diverse language educsation? Big deal, so does most of the civlized world.
One reason why the mortality rate was lower when Israel controlled the Gaza strip, was becasue there was no blockade and you weren’t massaring cvilians. Not bombing Gaza last December woudl have saved 1,400 lives.
The Arabs in the West Bank enjoy the clean running water that Israle has tolen and taken from them.
It’s not surprising that you were not challenging me to to live in the Muslim world 70 years ago, becvasue that was before Isrle came along and made the place into a bastket case.
Isrsarel is itslef becomming much less tolerant for different ideas about Judaism with the Isrlei government now runnig adds warnign against the dangers and sins of mixed marriages.
Saudi Arabia is disfunctional socieity, but they never claimed to be a light unto the workd, much less a democracy.
As for the enthic cleasing that took place in 1948, Israle drove 750,00 Palestinian from their land. Liek I said, your lies won’t wash here. The Jewsish pooilation was but a tiny fraction, and were talking a few thousand at th most compared to nealy a million Palestinians that were enthncially cleansed by Israel.
As for the Jews that left the Arab states, well, regretable indeed, but it was AFTER Israel drove 750, Palestinians off their land and continue to do so to this day.
Why wouldn’t Palestinians prefer treatment in Israeli hospitals? Isralei hospotals aresn’t subkected to blockades, which deny them basic mediciines or at riosk of being flattened by Israeli bombs.
“It is so terrible to be an Arab in Israel that most Arabs in the west bank would accept Israeli citizenship in a flash. ”
There are polls that say otherwise. For exmple, in east Jerusalem, they largely reject it.
You see, your list of lies turned to be longer than Israel’slist of achievements and gifts to the world.
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