From Ali Abunimah's article "A Formal Funeral for the Two-State Solution" in Foreign Affairs:
Ultimately, any successful strategy should focus not on statehood but on rights. In its statement on the UN bid, the BNC emphasized that regardless of what happens in September, the global solidarity struggle must continue until Israel respects Palestinian rights and obeys international law in three specific ways: ending the occupation of Arab lands that began in 1967 and dismantling the West Bank wall that was ruled illegal in 2004 by the International Court of Justice; removing all forms of legal and social discrimination against Palestinian citizens of Israel and guaranteeing full equal rights; and offering full respect for Palestinian refugee rights, including the right of return. Palestinians and Israelis are not in a situation of equals negotiating an end to a dispute but are, respectively, colonized and colonizer, much as blacks and whites were in South Africa. This truth must be recognized, and pushing for such recognition would resonate far more with the Palestinian public than empty statehood talk.
Indeed, such a strategy has worried Israel enough that it has enlisted the U.S. in the fight against what Israeli leaders term "delegitimization." "Delegitimizers" are supposedly not seeking justice and full human and political rights for Palestinians, but rather seeking the collapse of Israel -- much like East Germany or apartheid South Africa -- through political and legal assaults. According to Israel and groups supporting it in the United States, virtually all Palestine solidarity activism, especially BDS, is "delegitimization." Some Israelis, including even former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, have warned that fighting a movement calling for universal civil and political rights would only make Israel look more, not less, like an apartheid state, worsening its situation. But Israeli elites have come up with no plausible response to the reality that within a few short years -- because of Palestinian population growth and Israeli settlement construction -- a Jewish minority will be ruling over a disenfranchised and subordinated Palestinian majority in a country that cannot be partitioned.
The plans for truncated and circumscribed Palestinian statehood, which successive American and Israeli governments have been prepared to discuss, fall far short of minimal Palestinian demands and have no hope of being implemented (as the dramatic failure of the Obama administration's peace effort in its first two years underscores). Even President Obama, in his speech to the Israeli lobbying group AIPAC last May, called the status quo "unsustainable." But he offered no
new answers.
These, then, are the lines along which the battle for the future of Palestine are going to be fought, no matter how many U.S. envoys head to Ramallah and Jerusalem to try to revive negotiations in which no one believes. Meanwhile, the UN bid should be seen not as the means to give birth to the Palestinian state but as the formal funeral of the two-state solution and the peace process that was supposed to bring it about.
the greatest supporters of the one-state solution are the people who live outside of Palestine. It is easy for Abunimeh to be a proponent of something so unattainable when he can continue to live his kush life in the US.
Abunimeh, What about the descendants of the refugees in this one state solution? what about their rights?
TBD, that’s what. Baby steps. The two state solution was always designed to fail from its initial inception from Arafat. Arafat openly admit this. Why? Because the Palestinians would accept two state but Israel never will. Ever. Two states causes the destruction of Israel from a symbolic stand point. No “Judea and Samaria” = no Israel. The road to 1947 borders is paved with two states. By 1947 I’m not talking about the UN partition either, I’m talking out from the River to the Sea.
Descandants of refugees are also refugees; they too get to return to the land your European brethern stole.
Unbelievable. You steal the land, and the people you steal it from are now willing to share it with you, but you refuse to, instead of thanking your lucky stars for their generosity.
Only in the upside-down world of the Palestine-Israel conflict does this happen!
Descandants of refugees are also refugees; they too get to return to the land your European brethern stole.
not true, there isn’t any International Law or UN resolution which talks about the descendants of refugees. It doesn’t even sound like the PA is willing to share the land w/ these descendants of refugees who live outside of the territories, why should the Sabras of Israel.
So let me get this straight: Jews get to enjoy refugee status for MILLENNIA but no one else does, according to you, DBG?
not true, there isn’t any International Law or UN resolution which talks about the descendants of refugees.
I’ve debunked that hasbara claim here at mw in the past. Under both customary and conventional international law the children of refugees ordinarily inherit the nationality of their parents. The 1951 Refugee Convention stipulated that the unity of the family was the natural and fundamental group unit of society and that maintaining family unity is an essential right of the refugee community. That convention will automatically apply to the Palestinian refugees on a de jure basis in accordance with the terms of the convention if the voluntary UNRWA system is ever terminated before the status of the refugees has been settled in accordance with the applicable resolutions of the General Assembly.
The Palestinian refugees have patiently explained that principle and the fact that it applies to their own children (and to every other refugee who has children born abroad). See for example the YNet article Don’t blame UNRWA
You can read more about the principles of international law here: link to mondoweiss.net
LOL, that is the first time i’ve heard Jews had refugee status in Israel, you are a funny guy Chaos.
Your argument isn’t that compelling Hostage. You did miss a couple points which negates the Palestinian refugee status (if in fact descendants were eligible for the same rights):
Refugees are required to respect the laws and regulations of their country of asylum. (think Black September in Jordan, the Lebanese civil war, and terror from the WB and Gaza)
A refugee is a civilian. Former soldiers may qualify, but a person who
continues to take part in military activities is not eligible for refugee status. (Once the Palestinians took up arms against Israel and their host countries, their refugee status was negated)
Who is not covered by the Convention?
A person who has committed a crime against peace, a war crime, a crime against humanity or a serious non-political crime outside the country of asylum. (Terrorism, suicide bombing, constant rocket attack, all war crimes/crimes against humanity)
Great, so then you reject the notion that Jews who came to Palestine were refugees? That means they were colonists and nothing else.
Even I don’t go quite that far. Watching you dance on the graves of your ancestors to score cheap political points is… disturbing, DBG.
…and DBG resorts to the “terrorist babies” argument again. “We set their babies on fire because we care!”
LOL, that is the first time i’ve heard Jews had refugee status in Israel, you are a funny guy Chaos.
General Assembly Resolution 302 (IV), which established UNRWA, referred to “Palestine refugees” [Jews, Arabs, & others] and not “Palestinian refugees.”
The Zionists allowed UNRWA and its predecessor to register, feed, and shelter at least 17,000 Jewish refugees from Palestine in Israel. link to books.google.com
B. Scott Custer Jr., chief of the international law division of UNRWA (Gaza), said that in 1950, 17,000 “internally displaced Jews coming from original mandate Palestine” who resided in Israel were provided support from the agency. In July 1952, Israel assumed responsibility for 19,000 “refugees,” which included 3,000 Jews, and UNRWA ceased its operations inside Israel.
link to azure.org.il
Always glad to help fill-in the considerable gaps in your knowledge of the subject.
Always glad to help fill-in the considerable gaps in your knowledge of the subject.
First, you have determine whether he can comprehend it. There hasn’t been too much evidence of capability so far, considering how many times you’ve broached the subject since March.
Your argument isn’t that compelling Hostage. You did miss a couple points which negates the Palestinian refugee status (if in fact descendants were eligible for the same rights):
Please provide a reliable UN source to support your claims about Palestinian refugee rights being “negated” for the reasons that you cited.
I quoted the UN Convention which states that family unity is a refugee right. Here is an except from the YNET article by Chris Gunness of the UNRWA about passing refugee status through the generations:
link to ynetnews.com
Under the guidelines developed by the Palestine Conciliation Commission, in accordance with General Assembly Resolution 302 (IV), the UNRWA is responsible for making the legal determinations about refugee status. The Refugee Convention states that, when refugees no longer receive assistance from another UN organ, UNHCR will become responsible until their final status is resolved in accordance with the applicable resolutions of the General Assembly.
According to their website: “UNRWA (the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East) provides assistance, protection and advocacy for some 5 million registered Palestine refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and the occupied Palestinian territory, pending a solution to their plight.”
link to unrwa.org
But don’t Jews CLAIM 2000 year old Refugee Rights as their “justification” for their colonial Zionist Project called Israel???
How many generations are 2000 years??
Herodotus popularised the idea of ’3 generations to a century’, so by that standard the answer is 60. I understand that the current head of the family of Confucius, the oldest traceable in the world, is regarded as the 78th – or so – in succession to the patriarch of around 400 BCE.
I would think that to be a continuing refugee family you need to be able to show that your ancestors were forced out of the territory concerned, rather than migrated to better themselves, also that they never made their peace (say by accepting a compensation deal) with those who had forced them out or committed themselves to another place and another sovereign except on some explicit dual loyalty terms.
The English landowning families who were forced out of Normandy in ?1205 committed themselves wholly to the English kingdom and let their French cultural inheritance lapse, so I think it would not now be right for them (maybe some would still be identifiable) to claim French citizenship as of right.
I think that this would be the right way to apply the (?true) principle that sheer might never creates rights but that agreements made in the aftermath of conflict – even tacit agreements that take hold over the generations – can create new rights replacing the old ones.
Israelis say that allowing an actual and substantial “return” of 1948-refugees (and progeny) to Israel’s 1948-1966 territory will so dilute the Jewish majority that Israel will certainly lose its “Jewish character” and possibly also lose a Jewish majority (important principally if Israel remains, in that case, a democracy, adn the returnees become citizens and voters).
Now I, for one, favor allowing this sort of “return” as a matter of right. And it does not bother me that such return (if carried out to a sufficient degree) would thin out the Jewish majority in Israel: it does not bother me because he people who would return are EXACTLY the people who would have lived in Israel had they never been expelled or had they been allowed re-entry at the end of the war-fighting in 1950. If Israeli Jews object, then too bad for Israeli Jews, sez I. I am not a fan of ethnic cleansing, and the Jewish shenanigans of 1948 took place WHILE the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was being formulated. Ethnic cleansing was no longer “cool” internationally.
But one can understand — if not entirely sympathize — with the view that this sort of “return” would destroy Israel-as-we-know-it. In that sense, it would delegitimize Israel-as-home-nearly-exclusively-for-Jews (Palesetinian Arabs need not apply).
Exactly. If the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine required the expulsion of the Palestinian population, the Jewish state should not have been established.
If justice, even belated, results in the elimination of the Jewish state, this only proves it should never have been established in the first place.
Balfour expressly states that the promised Jewish homeland could not deprive the natives of any rights. UN recognition of Israel was expressly on ASAP condition subsequent that the dispossessed would be allowed to return, that is, their native rights would not be harmed by the newly authorized state of Israel. Truman expressly crossed out the adjective “Jewish” to describe the new state of Israel he was unilaterally recognizing as POTUS, in the name of the American people. So, yes, the current state of “Israel as Israel” was never authorized by the world community of nations.
And it was never envisaged as a Jewish state, because the Jews were also a slight minority within the partition borders. It was supposed to be a binational state.
“And it was never envisaged as a Jewish state, because the Jews were also a slight minority within the partition borders. It was supposed to be a binational state.”
Read UN Resolution 181. It was not supposed to be a binational state.
The UN Resolution made the ethnic cleansing of either Jewish immigrants or Arab natives explicitly prohibited, hophmi. Why don’t you actually read it.
Read UN Resolution 181. It was not supposed to be a binational state.
You need to re-read about the constitutions under Part B. Steps Preparatory to Independence and Part C. Declaration again. link to yale.edu
They were multinational states. The resolution only envisioned constitutional democracies with equal and proportional representation and constitutionally entrenched guarantees of equality and non-discrimination under law for the religious and national minority groups that inhabited both of the proposed states. The UN organs have stated that Israel has a continuing legal obligation to allow refugees to return or obtain compensation under those provisions (as affirmed by resolution 194/III).
The British mandatory administration took great exception to the majority UNSCOP committee’s careless use of statistics regarding so-called “nomads”. The UNSCOP members had deliberately chosen to exclude the impact of the entire Beersheba district Bedouin population and their assets on the plan of partition. They were responsible for the cultivation of over two million dunams of land devoted to cereal grain production alone. At the time, the Jews owned a grand total of about 4.2 million dunams.
On 1 November 1947 the British representative turned over the results of an RAF aerial survey they had commissioned to the UNSCOP committees. The resident Bedouin population data was revised upwards to 127,000. The RAF counted 3,389 houses and 8,722 tents. The British report explained that Bedouins had been settled on the land for generations and that they were known as Beersheba Bedouins due to the land rights they held in that district. The report said that 105, 000 Bedouins should be added to the number of Arabs who normally resided in the area of the proposed Jewish state. When that was done, the UNSCOP committees reported that
See paragraphs 62-64 on pdf file pages 40-42 of A/AC.14/32, 11 November 1947 @ link to un.org
The real demographic priority in the partition plan was ensuring that as few Jews as possible would be included in the territory of the “Arab state.” It would have been impossible to draw boundaries ensuring any kind of strong Jewish majority in the “Jewish state” because Palestine was an Arab land and Arabs were living everywhere in it. Only by gerrymandering all the Jews into the Jewish boundaries could they even come close.
That’s not the same thing as saying that it was meant to be a binational state. The map says “Jewish state” and “Arab state”.
That’s not the same thing as saying that it was meant to be a binational state. The map says “Jewish state” and “Arab state”.
It should be obvious to any sane intellect that a “Jewish” state with a democratic constitution and an Arab majority could have fixed that spelling error and stopped the wave of foreign immigration from Europe too. Ben Gurion explained that fact of life when Herut demanded the capture and annexation of West Bank.
Spelling error?
Why would Israel act like the rest of the world and limit Holocaust refugees from emigrating?
Spelling error? Why would Israel act like the rest of the world and limit Holocaust refugees from emigrating?
Yes spelling error. The UN intended to create a state with 509,780 Arabs and 499,020 Jews. You obviously didn’t read the constitutional protections contained in the UN “Plan For the Future Government of Palestine” -aka resolution 181(II). The Arab majority were guaranteed a majority in their own legislature and a hand in writing the constitution. That would have given them the legal right to limit Jewish immigration from abroad.
The Arab majority in Palestine had the right to demanded that other countries deal with their own problems. European theater countries with a vested interested in the “displaced persons” issue should have joined the UK and abstained from voting on the partition plan.
Again, none of this is a surprise. One-staters are going to be against anything that smacks of the two-state solution.
Bogus analogies lead to bogus reasoning. Palestine is not like South Africa. In South Africa, Blacks and Whites always shared the same country, and no one spoke of a partition because the Afrikaners had no claim whatever to the country.
Solutions to the conflict have always been based around the two-state solution. Jews have been in Israel, their ancestral homeland, for thousands of years. Palestinian nationalism is of recent vintage.
Jews have been in Israel, their ancestral homeland, for thousands of years. Palestinian nationalism is of recent vintage.
palestinians have been on the land, their ancestral homeland, for thousands of years. Jewish nationalism is of recent vintage.
Palestinian nationalism is also of recent vintage, much more recent than Jewish nationalism in the region.
DBG,
Reference Map of Palestine showing Political Divisions at time of Christ
link to culturalresources.com
The Century Atlas of the World
Prepared under the Superintendence of Benjamin E. Smith, A.M.,
Managing Editor of the Century Dictionary, Editor of the Century Cyclopedia of Names,
Fellow of the American Geographic Society, Etc.
Published by The Century Co., New York, 1900.
Map of Boundaries of Districts in Roman Times
link to lib.utexas.edu
Map of The Assyrian Empire and the Region about the Eastern Mediterranean, 750-625 B.C. – PALESTINE
link to lib.utexas.edu
Map of Ancient Palestine 1851. Drawn and Engraved by Rupkin, Published by Tallis & Co. London.
link to gilai.com
1862 Johnson Map of Palestine
link to geographicus.com
Detail Map Of Palestine Before al-Nakba
signed by Moshe Dyan
link to palestineremembered.com
Map of Palestine 1917
link to thinkpress.files.wordpress.com
Map of First Jewish Colony in Palestine 1878
link to passia.org
So what? Nationalism is a trap anyways intended to make us believe we are different so we are easier to put against each other during war time, it is an illusion.
I strongly disagree with your ‘much more recent’ because it isn’t true. Jewish nationalism started after the French Revolution but didn’t catch on until the late 19th century when Zionism was born and the largest Jewish population living in the second German empire caught wind of it. Palestinian nationalism occurred in the early part of the 20th century around the fall of the Ottoman Empire when all of the providences in the ME started wishing for independence. A few decades earlier is not “much more recent” and historically speaking it is practically the same time period.
Arguing about Palestinian nationalism or repeating the false ‘there never was a Palestine’ Hasbara rhetoric is a straw man argument. Because prior to Palestinian nationalism there were still Levantine Arabs LIVING IN PALESTINE. The people just didn’t show up one day, they always lived there and despite all of the Zionist attempts to erase their identity, they have not forgotten what you have done to them or what it used to be like.
PS, Palestinian nationalism wasn’t just an Arab thing. The Zionists were in on it too because they considered themselves Palestinians. The Jerusalem Post used to be called the Palestinian Post. Quite ironic considering their racist and bigoted anti-Palestinian narrative.
Neat MRW, I’m saving those.
Why do you care about Israel more than you care about the United States? Seriously, DBG. You will say anything and everything to defend the quasi-Aryan “Jewish” state.
How far will you go? If things turn against Israel in the US?
Neat MRW, I’m saving those.
Here’s one from the UK National Archives which debunks the myths that there was no such place as Palestine, that Transjordan is Palestine, and etc. It is the proposed post-war distribution of territory (1918).
link to nationalarchives.gov.uk
Here is a pdf of the images in their Maps in Time collection. There is an annex with online resource links and descriptions.
link to nationalarchives.gov.uk
Palestine was also a US Consular jurisdiction (Consular Court for a territory). There is a (dead tree) map available from the US National Archives and Records Administration RG59 471/11 [Figure 2477] 29 June 1910 page 201
where do you come up w/ this nonsense Chaos, I didn’t mention the US at all.
That would be the problem. Keep wiping your feet on the US flag while you raise your white and blue one proudly. You don’t know the meaning of the word “backlash” yet.
“That would be the problem. Keep wiping your feet on the US flag while you raise your white and blue one proudly. You don’t know the meaning of the word “backlash” yet.”
That’s ok, since you don’t know the meaning of “American” or “patriot.” I don’t worry. Most people are NOT like you, Chaos.
Many one-staters would also be happy with two states providing that the Palestine state would have full sovereignty based on ’67 borders.
“Many one-staters would also be happy with two states providing that the Palestine state would have full sovereignty based on ’67 borders”
I’d go farther than. I would go back to ’47 and 181 and begin at the beginning to sort it all.
I would not be happy with legitimation of the wicked 48 borders, which is what the 2ss, as normally understood, requires. This may be the solution that takes hold over the next few decades, though I doubt the Israelis will ever offer even that much. But it is far too wretchedly unfair to be the final settlement.
I think we all need to quit thinking or suggesting that Israel has a right to ‘allow” anything or has any ‘authority’ to do so.
Let’s start our own hasbara crusade to change all the phrasing around I/P.
’67 borders don’t exist, they are armistice lines; the ’48 borders that Israel acknowledged then are actual and, supposedly, legal.
Even ’47 and 181 are not the beginning, at least not an honorable or democratic or just one. They were effectively an imposition by the outside powers in collusion with Zionists, which ignored the clear wishes of the majority of the population, the people whose land Palestine had been for over a thousand years.
Some brave new world, it’s the one we’ve had ever since.
I agree, American, change needs to happen, and that much more than phrasing, but I guess it has to start somewhere.
’67 borders don’t exist, they are armistice lines
Clarification:
*Security Council resolution 62 and 73 established “permanent armistices demarcation lines” under the auspices of Chapter VII of the UN Charter and required the parties to apply and observe the terms pending a final agreement. They are still legally recognized and binding on all UN member states. The provisional settlement established by the Armistice Agreements is unchallengeable until a new process of negotiation and agreement has been successfully consummated.
link to en.wikisource.org
link to en.wikisource.org
link to soas.ac.uk
(pdf page 73-74)
*After the Arabs and Israelis refused to negotiate any changes at the Lausanne Conference (1949), the Western Powers issued a”Tripartite Declaration Regarding the Armistice Borders: Statement by the Governments of the United States, The United Kingdom, and France”, May 25, 1950 which announced their intention to enforce those boundaries. link to unispal.un.org
*General Assembly resolution 2625 (XXV) “Declaration On Principles Of International Law Friendly Relations And Co-Operation Among States In Accordance With The Charter Of The United Nations” reflects principles of customary and conventional international law:
*UN Security Council resolution 242 and 338 demanded of Israel to withdraw no further than the 1949 Armistice line, not the lines of the Partition Resolution.
*The General Assembly adopted resolution ES-10/13 which:”Demands that Israel stop and reverse the construction of the wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including in and around East Jerusalem, which is in departure of the Armistice Line of 1949 and is in contradiction to relevant provisions of international law; link to unispal.un.org
*The ICJ affirmed that the Construction of the wall was illegal wherever it departed from the 1949 armistice line into Palestinian territory
*The General Assembly adopted resolution ES-10/14: “Affirming the necessity of ending the conflict on the basis of the two-State solution of Israel and Palestine living side by side in peace and security based on the Armistice Line of 1949, in accordance with relevant Security Council and General Assembly resolutions,
link to unispal.un.org
Hostage, really appreciate that clarification, thanks.
It shows that the powers have made the Israeli theft associated with 1947-49 into a fait accompli, which is surely contrary to international law. Not only that, in their 1950 statement the US, UK and France “announced their intention to enforce those boundaries”.
I had not realized that, and find it absolutely disgusting.
It just confirms what I said above, “Some brave new world; it’s the one we’ve had ever since.”
Prior to invasion by mostly European Jews under the Zionist plan, the Jews and Arabs always shared the same land amicably and no one spoke of a partition because they both had natural claim to the land; the Arabs far outnumbered the Jews. The Afrikaners believed they had God’s blessing to live and thrive in S Africa, and all humans originated in Africa, hence S Africa was in these senses Afrikaner ancestral home too.
that is a lie Citizen, the fall of the Ottoman Empire, not the “Zionist plan” led to anti-Jewish sentiment in the Arab and Muslim world.
DBG, wrong again. (Don’t you read? Don’t you do basic research?)
From the Zionism Israel Information Center “TimeLine: History of Zionism, Israel and the Jews Before the State 1897 to 1947″
link to zionism-israel.com
…………………………..
Fall (final) of the Ottoman Empire: 1923
…………………………..
First Arabic newspaper in Haifa, al-Karmil, popularizes opposition to selling land to Zionists: 1908
Aref el Aref, later the historian of Palestine, mandate Southern District officer and mayor of East Jerusalem, warns in Filastin that the Jews want to take over the country: 1912
Zionist commission arrives in Palestine: 1918
First Muslim-Christian association formed in Jaffa to oppose the creation of a Jewish homeland. Another was formed in Jerusalem soon after: 1918
Jewish settlements of Tel Hai and Metullah in N. Palestine attacked (Feb 20): 1920
Arab riots in Jaffa against Jewish population: 1921
And on and on and on
Geez, DBG read some history. The Ottoman Empire did it’s best to curtail the increasing number of Jews coming to the land in question. The Ottoman Empire ceased to exist in 1918. At that time Arabs were already saying, “Enough Jews is enough; they compete for jobs, but keep us out of their own ventures–these new Jews are not like those Jewish neighbors we’ve known who share our multi-religious values, celebrate both our peoples’ holidays. We still far outnumber them but at the rate they are streaming in soon there will be more of them than us. And, like I said, these new Jews are not neighborly at all. ” The Balfour Declaration promise was signed in 1917. It states that the proposed new Jewish homeland should not come at the expense of the native non-Jews.
A promise/statement that was never meant by its Christian Zionist authors and has continually been broken. Not our finest British hour.
Add to that, MRW & DBG, the map of the ‘Jewish state’ outlined by zionists in 1919 at the Paris Peace Conference, figure right here.
Israel as envisioned included all of Palestine, and parts of Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. The “zionist plan” was pretty damn clear.
The Jews who lived in Palestine prior to the rise of Zionism were a
just one of many groups living there. Palestine was not the ancestral home of the European Jews who later emigrated there. They were colonists just like the Europeans in South Africa.
Palestinian Jews used to fight alongside their Muslim and Christian brothers and sisters against the European Zionist colonists. Look it up. Arafat even considered Palestinian Jews as Palestinians who could live in the hypothetical Palestine state. Genetically, many Palestinians (the non-Bedouins) are the descendants of the ‘ancestral’ Jews you speak of. The culture of Palestine has been nearly eliminated by Zionists, but there was a time prior to the ‘first aliyah’ that the indigenous groups living in the holy land were religiously unidentifiable because the Christians, Muslims, and even Jews all celebrated the same holidays, practiced the same customs, and prayed at the same churches. The only exception was Jerusalem and this was more noticeable among the foreign ‘tourists’ on a pilgrimage. This is also why Palestinians swear the Muslims and Christians used to pray at the wailing wall before the Zionists hijacked it and distorted its history.
Christians still pray at the Herodian wall, whenever they go on pilgrimage to the “holy land.”
Jews have been in Israel for thousands of years? You mean Arabs who practiced Judaism had been there for thousand(s) of years; just like Arabs who practiced Islam and Christianity. Conclusion: ARABS have been there for thousands of years.
The Palestine confict is exactly like South Africa; it is a colonial-settler conflict. Europeans who happen to be converted to Judaism throughout the years, decided to come and colonize the land and expell the native Arabs. Anyway you slice it, or try to spin/twist the truth….we all know what happened.
…and so do you!
“Jews have been in Israel for thousands of years? You mean Arabs who practiced Judaism had been there for thousand(s) of years; just like Arabs who practiced Islam and Christianity. Conclusion: ARABS have been there for thousands of years.”
Important point. I’m sick and tired of the fabricated ‘threatened and very separate minority’ myth the zios try so fervently to spin up, like they never lived together, worked for each other, spoke to each other and even converted to each other’s religions for centuries upon centuries. As if they hadn’t shared common culture and folk tales. And as if none of this could be verified today. (It can)
On a side note, next to nothing the zionists try to make the world believe is in any way factually sound, yet they present their spin to be a plausible alternate theory. It’s as if you claimed something, then presented a lot of solid proof in your favour, and I pull a contrary theory out of my ass with flimsy, or next to no proof to support it, and a lot of evidence going against it, yet demanded that anyone who wishes to make up their minds on this issue best “consider both theories equally for sakes of balance”. It’s ludicrous to an extreme degree.
Large part of Palestinians are descendants of Samaritans who were not participating in Jewish rebellions and were not expelled by Romans. Byzantines tried to convert them forcibly, I guess with partial success, and over centuries, vast majority of Samaritans converted to Islam. According to their own myths/histories, Jews do not represent all descendants of Israel, but only of two tribes. The other tribes got “lost” and Samaritans were fake descendants of the lost tribes. Samaritan version is of course different.
Moreover, many Arabic tribes converted to a form of Judaism, so at least some Jews of Israel have more “Arabic” ancestry than Palestinians, meaning, that their ancestors are indigenous to the Arab Peninsula. From what I read, Yemeni Jews are purer Arabs, in terms of DNA, than other Arabs of the Peninsula because they were under-privileged and did not participate in importing black slaves. On the other hand, Jews in Slavic lands had relatively privileged position and were attracting Slavic brides, so they are not all “halachic”.
All of that should not matter much, but it is religious Zionists who dwell on their own fake history.
Sounds very similar to mentality of Christian fundies except they believe in a personal relationship with God/Jesus as individuals, not as a member of any tribe, not as a cog in a mostly biological collective who made a contract with God.
That’s basically what Tsvi Misinai is saying, Palestinians are largely a lost tribe. Take it or leave the religious explanation, fact remains both groups were tied in with one another in more ways than certain groups of people like to admit nowadays.
Nationalism means zilch. Palestinians have been living on that land for thousands of years.
Your Jewish State only exists such as it is, Zionism in practice, through ethnic cleansing and occupation.
There is no Jewish claim to that land. Land is not divided to religions. It belongs to people of a land.
Zionism says, being Jewish means your right to that piece of land supercedes that of the people who were already there – the Palestinian majority.
Zionism has no moral ground. Your statement about ‘Jews’ living on that land for however many years, has no moral ground.
“. In South Africa, Blacks and Whites always shared the same country, and no one spoke of a partition because the Afrikaners had no claim whatever to the country.
Solutions to the conflict have always been based around the two-state solution. Jews have been in Israel, their ancestral homeland, for thousands of years. Palestinian nationalism is of recent vintage.”
This is all nonsense. The Boers were in South Africa since the 1600′s, so those living there in the 20th century had a claim to be there–it had been their homeland for centuries. What they did not have was a claim to lord it over the black South Africans.
Then when you get to the Palestinians and the Jews you get even sillier. Yes, some Jews had been there all along, but the vast majority are relative newcomers. The Palestinians (apart from the Jewish Palestinians) have been there for centuries and some might well be descendants of the Biblical Jews converted to Christianity or Islam. Palestinian nationalism is of recent vintage –so what? Nationalism in general is a recent development (and a rather harmful one on the whole, whether Jewish or Palestinian or any other variety, but we’re stuck with it.)
“Solutions to the conflict have always been based around the two-state solution. ”
Most proposed solutions to the conflict have been based around the two-state solution.
And they have got nowhere.
Time to try a new approach, maybe?
“Solutions to the conflict have always been based around the two-state solution. ”
Except for the King-Crane Commission, Grady-Morrison/Anglo-American Inquiry, and the UNSCOP second sub-committee;-)
Solutions to the conflict from Arabs were always based around the one-state solution.
They were the people of the land of Palestine, and therefore it was their solution that was the only just one.
But as we know they have always been shafted. That is how they are reduced to going for the unjust 1967 lines that give them a measly 22% of their homeland. Daylight robbery that Nutcase rejects because he wants even more for his insatiable impossible dream.
And the world has sat on its heels, lulled to sleep by pretty lies, and supported this evil expression of humanity. It is a world that is itself evil, without heart, without conscience, without vision, without sanity.
That is the darkness of the status-quo, but have no doubt, it is unsustainable. Cracks are appearing, the light is getting in, people are waking up, the lies are being exposed. It is the beginning of the end of Zionist Israel.
So we must never give up, never lose hope; justice will triumph. The Zionist nightmare will soon be washed away by the coming tsunami! And that can’t come soon enough.
But no-one (except for total ME-history/international-law geeks*) remembers those. And solutions to conflict from Arabs** aren’t worth thinking about. They’re from Arabs, dammit.
*And me.
**Though the Palestinians have been suggesting a two-state solution since the 1970s, and the Saudi plan is a two-state solution.
That’s because they’ve been forced by the powers to buy into the fait accompli of the illegal and unjust armistice lines. Just a further shafting of Palestinians.
The 2ss, Oslo, the peace process, are dead. Israel and their lackeys have painted themselves into a corner, leaving only the 1ss. It’s panic stations, so they’re frantically trying to bring life to the dead.
>> Jews have been in Israel, their ancestral homeland, for thousands of years.
Not possible. Israel was created in 1948 – it hasn’t existed for “thousands of years”. Jews and non-Jews (the ones that weren’t ethnically cleansed) have lived in Israel since 1948. Prior to that, Jews and non-Jews did not live in Israel.
The homeland of Israeli Jews and non-Jews is Israel. The homelands of American, French, Russian and Australian Jews and non-Jews are America, France, Russia and Australia.
Eljay,
5 million Israeli Jews say Israel is the Jewish state and the ancestral homeland of the Jews. What are you going to do about it? Keep telling us we are wrong when we are clearly right and every year that passes makes it even clearer that we are right?
Yes genius…you are completely wrong.
Outside of your little zionist-constructed bubble, we, in the civilized world, do not construct fantasy biblical stories that we all know are NOT true (grow up please) and steal others’ property based on such stupidity.
I mean, what freakin’ century is this? Yes, 5 million Israelis are wrong! But hey, Nazi brainwashed germans, and Zionists brainwash Jews; what is new I guess?!
>> 5 million Israeli Jews say Israel is the Jewish state and the ancestral homeland of the Jews. What are you going to do about it? Keep telling us we are wrong when we are clearly right and every year that passes makes it even clearer that we are right?
There’s nothing I need to do. Passing years and endless repetition don’t make your assertions any more accurate.
Israel is the nation state of, and the homeland of, Jewish and non-Jewish Israelis. Israel cannot be the “ancestral homeland” of anyone prior to 1948 because, prior to 1948, it did not exist.
If 5 million flat-earthers say the Earth is shaped like a pancake, does this make them right?
The Earth is flat and so should be our taxes! (I would object to pancake theory, it is more like a crepe.)
I would object to pancake theory, it is more like a crepe.
A crepe? French propaganda. Everyone knows the Earth is a blintz, floating in the primordial smetana.
U mean floating in the primordial smegma?
“5 million Israeli Jews say Israel is the Jewish state and the ancestral homeland of the Jews. What are you going to do about it?”
eee,eee,eee,……some day hopefully you are going to learn the virtue and wisdom having some humility.
There are 7 billion people in the world, 1.2 billion are Arabs.
The fastest growing populations are 39 countries in Africa (42% Muslims, then Christians & others), nine in Asia, six in Oceania and four in Latin America. …none of which have any significant number of Jews.
And more and more Europeans and Americans, the majority now, think Israel needs to be busted for it’s criminal behavior.
So what are 5 million Israeli Jews going to do about it?
Besides keep running to Uncle Sam for protection?
In the great scheme of the world Israelis and even America are punching way above their weight today.
America can get humbled and probably should and likely will sooner or later, but can still survive ultimately.
Can Israel?
smart american.
Small correction: the number you cited for Arabs refers to Muslim.
O.K. but too late for me to edit it now.
“Can Israel?”
Not to mention, “Can the USA under the values contained in Declaration of Independence”? Or, can “the USA as USA?” Or, can USA survive at all if it keeps rubber-stamping Israel right or wrong and funding it?”
Ok, keep peddling the same BS we have been hearing for 60 years about the future. Meanwhile, Israel keeps growing stronger.
Meanwhile, Israel keeps growing stronger.
Then please tell the poor widdle Iswaelis to quit shaking in their boots and shreying about being more isolated and delegitimized than ever.
Still hungering for your lebensraum, huh, eee?
“5 million Israeli Jews say Israel is the Jewish state and the ancestral homeland of the Jews.”
The ancestral homeland of everyone seems to be in East Africa, but so what?
The present homeland of Australian Jews is the country in which they were born and brought up, in which they have their homes and of which they are citizens. And that is Australia.
If members of many groups look on a place as their ancestral homeland and are in fact descended from people who lived in that place 2 or 3 millennia ago why should this fact give one group a claim to that place stronger than that of all others?
It doesn’t, and that is why a compromise is needed or wars are fought. There is a Jewish state in Palestine because Israel won the war of 1947-48. If the Arabs would have won, there would be an Arab state in Palestine.
There is a Jewish state in Palestine because Israel won the war of 1947-48. If the Arabs would have won, there would be an Arab state in Palestine.
So, in your view, there is nothing then morally wrong with “driving the jews into the sea”?
Because that is what you are saying, you know…. -N49.
“So, in your view, there is nothing then morally wrong with “driving the jews into the sea”?”
If it had happened, would you care today?
n49,
How am I making any moral statement? I am stating historical facts and counterfactuals. The moral side is in your imagination.
But since you ask, many on this site would not find sending the “colonizers” into the sea immoral. Would they?
“So, in your view, there is nothing then morally wrong with “driving the jews into the sea”?”
If it had happened, would you care today?
I asked eee a simple question: If it is morally alright that Jews violently drove Palestinians from their homes in 47/48, is it now morally alright that Palestinians do likewise to Jews?
That’s where eee’s brand of moral relativism gets you. Want some? -N49.
I think that you and I, N49, would not accept the idea that ‘between two rights, force decides’ and we would not accept either the idea that significant rights are created, for some rather than for others, by claims that ‘this is my ancestral homeland’ at least when the same claims can be made by almost everyone concerned.
Arabs are being driven into the sea today, and you don’t care, hophmi.
How am I making any moral statement? I am stating historical facts and counterfactuals.
Fer god’s sake, it is a simple question: You have in the past said it was, while unfortunate, morally acceptable that Palestinians were driven from their homes in ’47/’48 because, in your view, the price paid was more than offset by the creation of a “jewish state.” Fine. By this logic you would have to agree that what is good for the goose is also good for the gander and that it is no more nor no less acceptable that jews be driven from their homes if that is the price to be paid for the creation of the Palestinian state.
Yet you evade the question. Telling. -N49.
Re: “The moral side is in your imagination.” So, eee, you’re channeling Goering at Nuremberg? Figures.
Kant’s moral categorical imperative is not part of eee’s thinking unless you are talking about Jews being victims.
hophmi, first you have to answer N49′s initial question. Re your non-responsive question to him, would you care if the USA was destroyed today as a condition to Israel’s survival as Israel?
“Arabs are being driven into the sea today, and you don’t care, hophmi.”
They are? Which one?
“hophmi, first you have to answer N49′s initial question.”
I don’t accept N49′s premise. The Jews did not drive out the Arabs in 1948. Therefore, I can’t answer the question.
I can speculate that if they had, it would have been in order to avoid almost certain civil war that would have been initiated either by the Palestinians or by Arab agitators who were never going to accept a Jewish state or any organized Jewish presence in the region, as they made clear through their public positions on the issue.
Expelling Jews today would simply be an immoral attempt to make the Middle East Judenrein in service of Arab ethnocentrism.
Exactly N49. The Palestinian cleansing by which I mean Israel’s refusal to let Palestinian refugees return to their homes after the war, was necessary to stop a civil war and to create a viable Jewish state.
Now, if Palestinians think that a Jewish state is not important and a Palestinian state is much more important and therefore justifies expelling Israelis, why would I agree to that? We have a fundamental disagreement about the good coming from having a Jewish state. In the same way, I do not expect Palestinians to agree with me. We have an impasse on the issue of the relative good of having each kind of state. The solution to these impasses our compromise or war.
hophmi, The Jews did drive the Arabs out in 1947-1948. Therefore, you can answer the question but simply won’t. The Zionist myth that the Arabs left of their own free will or following instructions from Arab leaders has long been shown to be hoax. Proof of this has been given on this website many times over the years, yet you act as if you don’t know this. Typical lying hasbara chutzpah. That Arabs were driven out by the Jews in 1947-’48 has been detailed by, e.g., Ilan Pappé, Benny Morris, Zeev Sternhall, Avi Shlaim, Simha Flapan, and Tom Segev, among credible others. In case you forgot, this even is known as The Nakba (catastrophe) everywhere objective history is not muzzled. The Nakba is the Palestinian Shoah; it continues to this day, for example in Israel refusing to let Palestinians, who’ve been stuck in refugee camps since 1947-48 back into their homeland, and by Palestinians being put on “a diet,” and harassed daily, by OP Cast Lead, etc.
“hophmi, The Jews did drive the Arabs out in 1947-1948. ”
I didn’t realize hophmi was a Nakba denier. Very strange. That would explain his hostile attitude towards the site–if I didn’t know that Israeli forces had driven out hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and kept them out by force I’d probably take a very different view of the conflict.
“I didn’t realize hophmi was a Nakba denier.”
Yeah, Donald, you know what? I don’t accept the premise the way people here present it, shorn of context and nuance. If that gives you a convenient label to attach to me, so be it. Is it true that some Jews drove out some Arabs in the ’47-’48? Yes. It’s also true that some Arabs drove out some Jews, that many left because of the war itself, and that following the war, hundreds of thousands of Jews in the Arab world were forced out, a fact which most people here excuse or deny.
hophmi, the tenor of your denial of the Nakba “premise the way the people here present it, shorn of context and nuance,” parrots those who are Holocaust deniers. I bet you never scoffed at the claims that Germans made lampshades out of Jewish skin or that there were gas chambers at Buchenwald, or that Zyklon B canisters did the job, or that 6 million was the magic number, or that every German was an anti-semite at heart, etc. My point is that, no matter the truth on these typical items long taken as truth, the Shoah happened to the extent it should have been, and has been seen as something never again to be repeated on any group of humans. Yet Israel Firsters in the USA and Israel repeated it to a close enough degree, and still drag it out, and this catastrophe is called “The Nakba,” the piece of history and lingering current reality you deny by overlooking the macro incident, by biting on its ankles feebly while it lumbers on like the Golem, crushing Palestinians by the score, impoverishing America, wasting its young men and women, and dragging down its formerly good reputation, and its headed blindly towards the self-destruction of Israel. You are pushing it along.
“hophmi, the tenor of your denial of the Nakba ‘premise the way the people here present it, shorn of context and nuance,’ parrots those who are Holocaust deniers.”
You’re right, Citizen, his answer proves that hophmi is no different than a holocaust denier.
Comparing my position on the Palestinian narrative to Holocaust denial, as well as your long list of shows where you stand as well.
Holocaust deniers are antisemites who simply hate the Jews. People who don’t accept the Palestinian narrative wholesale are not anti-Palestinian.
“I don’t accept the premise the way people here present it, shorn of context and nuance”
There’s not that much nuance needed. The Israelis forced many Palestinians out and then for decades lied about the circumstances. Some fled because of the war and then weren’t allowed to return to their homes.
As for Jews in the Arab world, many were forced out. Not all–some left voluntarily, to go to Israel and I don’t know what the percentages are–but obviously some were forced or fled because they feared persecution.
I don’t really see how the expulsions in one case are supposed to balance out the expulsions in the other. As for denying one thing because someone denies the other, that doesn’t make sense either. You won’t find me endorsing or denying the reality of Palestinian terror attacks on civilians just because the Israel defenders here (with a couple of exceptions I can think of) generally deny Israeli war crimes.
Holocaust deniers are antisemites who simply hate the Jews. People who don’t accept the Palestinian narrative wholesale are not anti-Palestinian.
what’s the difference between your claim nakba deniers are not anti-Palestinian and a holocaust denier claiming they are not anti jewish?
nothing
Well, I’m on record as supporting a Palestinian state, recognizing that Palestinian history has had its ups and downs, recognizing that as of now Israeli policy toward the Palestinians is not great, and I’ve made all of these points to members of my community. I doubt any of you have had serious conversations with members of your community about antisemitism in the Middle East, the importance of renouncing the antisemitic provisions of the Hamas Charter, and so on.
You guys support the holocaust deniers in the Palestinian world and you don’t renounce them, so why should I defend myself to you?
2 things.
First:
hophmi said:
The issue of the Jewish exodus from the Arab countries is irrelevant.
There is no parallel between the ethnic cleansing of ‘some Jews’ and the ethnic cleansing of 800K Palestinians by Jewish terrorists and militias.
There is no premise here that isn’t rooted in the documentary record.
The only argument you can produce is to talk about Jews in Arab countries as if Palestinians ethnically cleansed by Zionist terror had ANYTHING to do with that.
There is no justification for the Nakba. There is a propaganda line, parroted here by people like you. You’ve also said that ‘Palestinians supported Hitler’ and when you ultimately elaborated (like 3 week later almost), you said it was based on ‘perceptions’ in ‘the West’.
Even YOU don’t have a damn clue what you’re talking about.
Your arguments are stale memes.
That’s not true at all.
And BTW, you ARE anti-Palestinian. You’ve already accused Palestinian of supporting Hitler.
And anyways, a Holocaust denier is a slippery slope. Zionists have invented terms like ‘Holocaust minimizer’ and foam at the mouth when people draw parallels to aspects of Jewish suffering from that time period.
The entire Holocaust industry is rife with intellectual dishonesty.
Someone who denies the Holocaust in it’s entirety, could be said to be motivated by antisemitism.
I think someone like you, who claims all Palestinians at the 1948 period or a majority of them, or enough to matter within your later-elaborated context supported Hitler AND who denies the Nakba – is certainly motivated by anti-Palestinian HATE.
I’ve seen people who questioned the six million figure for the Holocaust called “Holocaust deniers”, even though Raul Hilberg gave the figure of five million, and Michael Burleigh, in his recent book Moral Combat, seems skeptical of the six million figure, saying it was the figure cited right after the war. I would have thought it’s more accurate to say that such people don’t accept the orthodox narrative of the Holocaust wholesale. They don’t deny that the Holocaust happened.
Similarly, it’s one thing to quibble about details of the Nakba, and it’s another thing entirely to deny that the Nakba happened at all.
Holocaust deniers are antisemites who simply hate the Jews. People who don’t accept the Palestinian narrative wholesale are not anti-Palestinian.
good answer. They are special haters of the Jews.
And obviously an anti-semites hatred is greater than that of any
other people in the world.
Did your rabbi tell you that or did you make
this assumption on your own?
Arabs are being driven into the sea by other Arabs Chaos, the population in Gaza and the WB has only increased since ’67. I thought you only cared about Palestinians, thank you for bringing up the plight of all Arabs.
“Holocaust deniers are antisemites who simply hate the Jews. People who don’t accept the Palestinian narrative wholesale are not anti-Palestinian.”
Given your statement the other day, the comparison seems apt.
link to mondoweiss.net
Yea magically Arab populations grow in I-P! They should be grateful for the Israeli occupation. Clearly, there is a correlation between Arab population growth and Zionism!
Denier, there are people like you who discount the Holocaust on the EXACT SAME LOGIC.
you don’t need to defend yourself to me hophmi but you didn’t address my question.
what’s the difference between your claim nakba deniers are not anti-Palestinian and a holocaust denier claiming they are not anti jewish?
the equivalence of your answer, about being on record supporting a palestinians state, would be defending holocaust denial and the charge of anti semitism by saying one supports a jewish state.
supporting a jewish state is not ‘proof’ one is not an anti semite.
I don’t accept N49′s premise. The Jews did not drive out the Arabs in 1948. Therefore, I can’t answer the question.
Well you’re half right about that. You can’t answer the question.
Really Chaos? please explain?
See also: Glenn Beck
Screw you. I don’t need to explain your own racism and lack of integrity, it’s on display for everyone to see. You just choose which shoahs you want to deny.
I would have thought it’s more accurate to say that such people don’t accept the orthodox narrative of the Holocaust wholesale. They don’t deny that the Holocaust happened.
Of course. The international community recently signaled that it no longer supports that sort of absurdity or laws that have been adopted in many countries dealing with denial of historical events like the Holocaust and the Armenian genocide.
The UN Human Rights Committee on freedom of expression reported that:
Footnote 116 said
See General Comment 34 of the Human Rights Committee on freedom of expression. link to www2.ohchr.org
The Committee had previously upheld the conviction of the French pseudo-historian in 1996 for denying the Holocaust. So it appears that its views on the subject have dramatically shifted.
“what’s the difference between your claim nakba deniers are not anti-Palestinian and a holocaust denier claiming they are not anti jewish?”
I think I answered it quite clearly. You may not like my answer, which is another thing entirely.
The idea that all that happened in 1948 was that the good Palestinians were expelled by the bad Jews is a distortion of the history, not a universally accepted idea in the academy (the way, say, gas chambers are) and is basically a partisan narrative. The main historian on this issue, Benny Morris, has made clear that the ethnic cleansing that did take place took place on both sides, was not anything particularly unusual in a time of war, and was not, as others have argued, some well thought-out plan by the Zionists.
Denying the Palestinian version, which is that the bad Jews drove out the good Palestinians in an evil premeditated plan, is not the same thing as saying, as Holocaust deniers do, that there were no gas chambers or that the real number of dead Jews was in the hundreds of thousands, and not the millions.
“Screw you.”
Again, is there a moderator around here?
“Of course. The international community recently signaled that it no longer supports that sort of absurdity or laws that have been adopted in many countries dealing with denial of historical events like the Holocaust and the Armenian genocide.”
I agree that these laws are absurd, always have. Europe does not have the same free speech tradition of the United States. You can’t tell who the haters are if they’re not permitted to express their hatred.
That said, the UNHCR opining on freedom of speech issues like this is a little rich.
“The idea that all that happened in 1948 was that the good Palestinians were expelled by the bad Jews is a distortion of the history, not a universally accepted idea in the academy (the way, say, gas chambers are) and is basically a partisan narrative.”
This paraphrase is an example of vested interest congealing into self-pity. Like “the good Africans were enslaved by the bad Portuguese” or “the good Indians were starved by the bad Britons” or “the good Ukrainians were collectivized by the bad Stalinists.” Crimes have victims and perpetrators, get over it.
Next, although there are arguments about the extent of how far back the Haganah planned the nakba and the extent of what they intended to accomplish, there is no argument about what actually happened. No one in “the academy” accepts the Palestinians fled en masse on orders from the Arab League or AHC. No one in “the academy” accepts Deir Yassin was not a masacre and so forth.
However, although it hasn’t been proven conclusively that Ben-Gurion planned decades in advance military operations to ethnically cleanse Palestine, it’s very simple to establish the motive among him and other Zionist leaders. Ruppin, who created the Palestine Office which became the governing body of the Yishuv, wrote a memorandum in Dec. 1907 laying out the steps to achieving statehood in Palestine: “1. The creation of a Jewish majority in Palestine; 2. The purchase of most of the land; 3. The unwavering ambition to achieve Jewish autonomy.” So he called for a Jewish majority on most of the land in Palestine and is on record proposing transfer of peasants evicted by JNF purchases. Since mass immigration did not accomplish a Jewish majority, it’d be disingenuous to argue his followers were not getting exactly what they wanted when the Palestinians fled.
To portray the expulsions and refusal to permit return as a reaction to Palestinian belligerence is to ignore the history of segregation mandated by various yishuv projects, especially the Kibbutzim, also created by Ruppin. Ben-Gurion consistently called for separate employment of Jews and Arabs and wanted all Jewish enterprises employing only Jews (His sole exception was the Directorate of Public Works, and even here Arabs would still have a separate sick fund and kitchen). Weizmann also made it known to the British that a Jewish majority in Palestine was the goal.
It would take some major gullibility to assume the Yishuv was going to live in peace with the Palestinians who need only have vacated their land when asked nicely and were only expelled because they tried to fight a foreign invasion. Only the fellow travelers of Zionism are that dumb.
“Holocaust deniers are antisemites who simply hate the Jews. People who don’t accept the Palestinian narrative wholesale are not anti-Palestinian.”
Given that Herman Rosenblatt has deliberately lied/falsified/DENIED the historical record of his experience in a concentration camp in order to profit off of a book which was proven to be a hoax, would it be safe to say that this literal “holocaust denier” is one of many “antisemites who simply hate the Jews” or is he one of those “People who don’t accept the Palestinian narrative wholesale [AND] are not anti-Palestinian.”? According to you, he would be, if it’s good for the goose, it’s good for the gander my little supremacist zionist friend.
That said, the UNHCR opining on freedom of speech issues like this is a little rich.
Like a Zionist blow-hard opining about the panel of experts committee for the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights? They are elected by the 169 state parties to the covenant on the basis of their qualifications. They are not appointed by the UN Human Rights Council.
I can sort of understand Abunimah’s reasoning.
But I think it’s wrong because neither Israel nor the US is going to respect or voluntarily give the Palestines any human rights under any law.
Unless the US is run over by some 8 ton tank so those rights can be applied by law and enforced it’s just a pipe dream.
And I can understand that Palestines are not crazy about a ‘truncated’ state. And that maybe in 60 years in a One State solution that Palestines would be such a majority that they could challenged the Jewish State idea.
But so far what does Palestine have a choice or concrete offer of ?…exactly nothing, neither one nor two states, that’s what. Just more of the same stall and yada,yada. So how long do you want to wait for some day ‘maybe’.
Palestine should use and keep using everything in the book to get something, anything that will get them somewhere, noticed or acknowledged by authoritative bodies. Why do you think they have to have just one strategy? Either human rights or statehood, why not pursue both so if one temporarily fails the other can keep going and if that fails you can pick up the other one again. One of strategies of Israel has been to ‘ wear the other side down’, to exhaust them—-Palestine needs to use the same tactic on Israel.
Why shouldn’t they go to the UN and keep going to the UN? What the hell do they have to lose any longer by trying any and everything.
Palestine should use and keep using everything in the book to get something, anything that will get them somewhere, noticed or acknowledged by authoritative bodies.
Exactly. The statehood bid is focused on attaining rights. There is an old maxim which holds that for every right, there is a remedy – and that where there is no remedy, there is no right. The US and Israel are employing the old imperial principle of constitutive recognition to virtually control the exercise of self-determination by another people and the existence of Palestine, e.g. a state is, and becomes an International Person through recognition only and exclusively. They implicitly hold that Israel has the right to treat Palestine in ways that would be legally prohibited in the case of any other “widely recognized” or “UN recognized” state.
I’ve said it before: Arab and Palestinian factionalism and ankle biting are a given – just like cosmic microwave background radiation. You sometimes have to tune it out when you’re looking for something more important. It’s a natural side effect of the colonial principle of divide and rule. Nationality is a constructed group indentity that results in a sense of “belonging” together. Many of the Palestinians have suffered from Zionism, but the Gaza and West Bank enclaves have been persecuted in much different ways than the diaspora or other refugee groups. The notion that there has to be a grand unified policy that assigns priority to obtaining equal rights for communities living in Israel or the diaspora may not appeal to members of enclaves who are laboring under more aggressive forms of alien persecution or neglect.
You explained that well Hostage.
Yes, Palestinians react to how they are treated by PTB, wherever they are living–what a surprise. Bottom Palestinian line: “I am not an orange.”
Re Hostage September 19, 2011 at 9:45 pm
“The notion that there has to be a grand unified policy that assigns [ added: the same] priority to obtaining equal rights for communities living in Israel or the diaspora may not appeal to members of enclaves who are laboring under more aggressive forms of alien persecution or neglect.” ”
In other words: The plea is that such “grand unified policy” of the PLO-lead struggle for self-determination has to have priorities; and these are in sequence of descending order:
1. -Palestinians in Gaza and the WestBank ; this includes the subjects of borders and minor border adjustments and Jerusalem;
2. Palestinians in the Diaspora – Right of return
3. Palestinians in Israel – end of discrimination + equal citizen rights
In such a prioritized scenario hardly any concessions can be made by the PLO for issues related to 1) above, whereas some reasonable practical concessions will have to be made wrt to 2), i.e. the numbers of actual returnees into the geography of Israel in its internationally to be recognized borders while upholding the principle of the Right of Return to be recognized as a demand by international law. The latter will largely have to be “traded “/negotiated for a satisfactory financial compensation regulation.
With regard to 3) All negotiating PLO representatives can and must do is the outright refusal to recognize Israel as a “Jewish State”, which is anyway a gross nonsense “demand” recently introduced by the NTY-government for domestic purposes. Israeli Palestinians must not fight entirely on their own, however, they do possess their own specific “theatre” for non-violently pressing for an end of discrimination within the framework of the State of Israel. Here they could be indeed much more determined if the disease of ” Arab and Palestinian factionalism” were less counterproductive.