During the troubles in northern Ireland, the British Broadcasting Corporation faced a linguistic dilemma. Protestants called the area’s second city “Londonderry,” while Catholics simply said “Derry.” To choose one or the other would have violated the BBC’s policy of neutrality. So the organization simply compromised, alternating in its reports between the two names.
Efforts to provide balanced reporting on Israel/Palestine confront similar dilemmas. Let’s take just one example; Israel has moved several hundred thousand Israeli Jews into the occupied Palestinian West Bank, in violation of international law. Israel calls the new Jewish-only population centers “settlements” — and most of the world has adopted the same terminology.
But Palestinians and their supporters argue that the more appropriate word is “colonies.” So why should the BBC, the New York Times and the Washington Post be forced to decide? Why not just suggest they use the compound form, “settlements/colonies”? Anything else is bias, one way or another.
Are there other examples in Israel/Palestine where the prevailing vocabulary should be modified in the interest of fairness?
Israel/Ocupied Palestine &/or Israel/Zionist entity
Why not skip the euphemisms and call it Jewistan?
What a charming headline, James.
Millions of people around the world insist on referring to the holy lands as Occupied Palestine, so in effect you could reference the holy land as Israel/Occupied Palestine.
The name of Israel should be changed to: The Jewish supreme state in Arab Palestine.
>> The name of Israel should be changed to: The Jewish supreme state in Arab Palestine.
FWIW, I don’t think “Arab” should have any bearing on the nature of Palestine, so I would change that name to – and trademark it as – “The Supremacist ‘Jewish State’ of Israel in Palestine”.
And its motto could be (as if it weren’t unofficially so already): “Israel: Hey, we may not be as good as the best, but at least we’re not as bad as the worst!” (TM)
Mndwss says : ‘‘The name of Israel should be changed to: The Jewish supreme state in Arab Palestine.’
I’d delete the ‘Arab.’ Palestine is Palestine no matter how the occupants define themselves.
On the other hand, ‘Israel’ in modern usage definitely implies Jewish supremacy. It is an ideological term, and to use it inevitably confers legitimacy on that supremacy.
Actually, official Israel doesn’t like the term “settlements” either (because it implies a certain artificiality and foreignness, whereas Palestinians have “towns” and “villages”, but never “settlements”) and has taken to referring to them as “Jewish communities” or “neighbourhoods”, in English.
‘Actually, official Israel doesn’t like the term “settlements” either (because it implies a certain artificiality and foreignness, whereas Palestinians have “towns” and “villages”, but never “settlements”) and has taken to referring to them as “Jewish communities” or “neighbourhoods”, in English.’
‘Settlements’ would be valid. Both ideologically and practically, they are indistinguishable from the settlements the Nazis established in Poland, and no one ever called those ‘communities’ or ‘neighborhoods.’ They were ‘settlements’ — and they functioned about as Israeli settlements function.
Whatever euphemism the settlers try to introduce, what they’ve set up are ‘settlements.’ That’s the word for them. I suppose one could employ ‘plantations’ in the sense of the Protestant ‘plantations’ in Northern Ireland — but that would be pointlessly antiquarian.
I would add to James North’s example, that Jerusalem stop being used and replaced with either East Jerusalem or West Jerusalem. The use of Jerusalem without that distinction implies a single political entity, which at least in the US media, gives legitimacy to Israel’s occupation of East Jerusalem.
@Les: Or perhaps Al Quds?
Les says: “I would add to James North’s example, that Jerusalem stop being used and replaced with either East Jerusalem or West Jerusalem. The use of Jerusalem without that distinction implies a single political entity, which at least in the US media, gives legitimacy to Israel’s occupation of East Jerusalem.”
I’m not sure that gets us anywhere.
‘East’ and ‘West’ Jerusalem immediately implies that Palestinian sovereignty is legitimately confined to ‘East’ Jerusalem, while ‘Israel’s’ sovereignty over ‘West’ Jerusalem is legitimate.
I think ‘Jerusalem’ is like ”Palestine.’ The term has a somewhat rockier history than ‘Palestine,’ but generally, the Western term at least has been ‘Jerusalem’ regardless of who rules it. We called it ‘Jerusalem’ when it was in Byzantine hands, when it was in Arab hands, when it was in Turkish hands, etc.
When Israel was created out of Palestine, the expectation was that Jerusalem would be an international and undivided city. When that does actually happen it would make sense to stop distinguishing between East Jerusalem and West Jerusalem. Until that happens it is misleading to pretend that there is a single Jerusalem political entity.
“Jewish state” vs “Mixed Jewish/Palestinian state”
Jerusalem when they mean West Jerusalem . Eg “Jerusalem said”. No, it didn’t. West Jerusalem may have but East Jerusalem didn’t.
“Democracy” instead of “ethnocracy”
IDF instead of “colonial police force”
“Peace process” instead of “waste of time”
“Ancient homeland” instead of “colonised land”
“Jewish democracy” instead of “a total fucking mess”
Actually, in many countries it is “Tel-Aviv said”, although cities do not truly speak. (But compare with Roma locuta, causa finita.)
Language cannot always be precise. For example, Ahmedinejad said that American political candidates are kissing the feet of the Zionist regime. This is far from accurate. However, under a theocracy Ahmedinejad could not really correctly identify the body parts that are kissed, and perhaps we also should not, given all-family type of audience.
In English it tends to be “Jerusalem said”
I always think of Jerusalem weeping and unable to speak through the pain of what the bots have done to it.
@ Seafoid
Correction: ‘Peace process’ instead of ‘Ethnic cleansing’. Supporting the first is in fact supporting the latter.
“Peace process” instead of “systematic dispossession and pauperisation”
“Evil” instead of “tikkun olam”
A lot of my Arab friends always put “Israel” in quotes, to indicate its artificiality. I do as well.
I also refer to “Israelis” as colons. Where formatting permits, I use it with italics, to make clearer I’m using it as was done in pre-independence Algeria. And I then explain I use colons rather than settlers to indicate that Jews in ALL of Palestine, not just the “occupied territories,” should be considered colonists.
Of course Maxime Rodinson in his wonderful book “Israel: A Colonial-Settler State?” combined the terms — and was himself referring to ALL of Palestine.
“I also refer to “Israelis” as colons.”
I used to do that too thinking that it’s the same in English as in French but people were laughing. Little did I know that they were thinking of something else (intestin) until it was explained to me and that it should be better written colonists. I now prefer the use of squatters or colonists/squatters to settlers which wrongly imply settling an unoccupied, uninhabited land. Palestine IS* inhabited.
“… I use colons rather than settlers to indicate that Jews in ALL of Palestine, not just the “occupied territories,” should be considered colonists.”
Can’t say that about ALL Jews, Andrew, Palestinian Jews have been on the land as long as Palestinian Arabs, if not longer, unless you want to go all the way back to the days of the Canaanites and Hebrews.
A few decades back, a few Arab Jews went to Palestine for their religious aliyah but most were coerced by the Zionists into leaving their homes in Arab states to move there to fill the void created by the expelled Palestinian Arabs. Those in good part are not guilty of being there because they were tricked by the Zionists. There were others like those of Egypt that were expelled. The guilty ones are the Zionists and these include the thieving settlers that are really squatters. What to say about the born-in-Israel descendants of the legitimate Palestinian Jews or of those of other Arab Jews that had been coerced into going to Palestine for the Zionists’ nefarious motives?
yes, Walid, you’re entirely right, thanks for the correction
What are “colons”? The only meaning I know are serfs in late Roman empire.
These are colons.
: : : : : :
These are semi-colons.
; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;
You don’t want to know about these colons.
link to catalog.nucleusinc.com
“Are there other examples in Israel/Palestine where the prevailing vocabulary should be modified in the interest of fairness?”
‘Israel/Palestine’ would be one, for starters. ‘Israel’ is essentially a theological term, often but not always anchored in the physical fact of Palestine. Western culture and literature abound with references to ‘Israel’ that in no way refer to the specific piece of land.
‘Palestine,’ on the other hand, refers to that portion of the Levant bounded by the Levant, the Jordan River and Dead Sea, and Sinai. That’s been the case since Assyrian times. It has no necessary theological or ideological implications. It’s been ‘Palestine’ without regard to whether it was ruled by Persians, Hellenes, Romans, Crusaders, Mameluks, Turks, or Englishmen. It is ‘Palestine’ just like ‘South America’ is ‘South America’ no matter how it’s chopped up.
So ‘Israel’ is a term with ideological implications. ‘Palestine’ isn’t — except in the sense that it acquires them once an attempt is made to replace the name with ‘Israel.’
The land is ‘Palestine.’ To call it ‘Israel’ — or even ‘Israel/Palestine’ — is to make a polemical assertion.
“Arab” instead of Palestinian.
Because they don’t recognise that it was ever
Palestinian.
Military edge instead of permanence
It is going to crash .
link to youtube.com
“But Palestinians and their supporters argue that the more appropriate word is “colonies.”
‘Colonies’ isn’t particularly useful. For one, it’s a hopelessly vague term. ‘Colonies’ refers to everything from Spaniards imposing their culture and rule on masses of Indians to Englishmen settling in largely unpopulated places and shortly making them completely unpopulated.
For another, it clearly implies rule by a mother country. Whatever the US relationship with Israel may be, we clearly don’t hold the whip hand (or aren’t willing to use it, which comes to much the same thing).
Finally, it is distinctly polemical. It’s a polemic I largely agree with, but that’s beside the point. ‘Colonies,’ in modern usage, are necessarily wrong. To refer to the settlements as ‘colonies’ is to insert an ideological argument under cover of a descriptive term.
“Zionist suicide machine” is a far more elegant term than “settlement”
Since the 1980s the Isreli government has made it mandatory to refer to the West Bank as “Judea and Samaria” in all official publications of the state.
That’s an important ideological change of terminology
Klaus Bloemker says: “Since the 1980s the Isreli government has made it mandatory to refer to the West Bank as “Judea and Samaria” in all official publications of the state.
That’s an important ideological change of terminology”
One of the oddities of all this that I’ve never commented on is that there’s little evidence of the Jews ever having dominated all of Palestine even in Biblical times.
However, to the extent that they were dominant, it seems to have actually been about in what the Israeli government is pleased to call ‘Judea and Samaria.’
If the Zionist argument holds up anywhere, it is indeed in ‘Judea and Samaria.’
But not elsewhere. For example, the ancient Israelites were never a coastal people that I know of.
So if anything, the Jews should indeed get ‘Judea and Samaria.’
Maybe a trade. Israel can have those areas she’s allotted to the Palestinians. The Palestinians get everything else.
But we can compromise. The Jews can have their settlements. And East Jerusalem. How much of the 22% would be fair?
Thank you James North for initiating this valuable thread. Confucius said the first thing any government should do is “rectify the names.” Nowhere is this more badly needed than in Israel/Occupied Palestine.
The Washington-sponsored “peace process” is more accurately described as a “war process.” Given that Washington is giving an unconditional $3bn a year to Israel in armaments and other aid, there is no push towards peace there.
I would like to see the term “ethnic cleansing” used more freely to describe what Israel is doing in East Jerusalem and in the West Bank, and as a term for what happened in ’48. One of the virtues of this term is that it has no legal meaning, and therefore has not been commandeered by Washington’s and Israel’s lawyers.
Also, any group or individual that calls for Washington’s unconditional aid to Israel really cannot be credibly described as a “peace” group. Americans for Peace Now, J Street, Peter Beinart, all support massive and unconditional US military aid to Israel even as they raise their faint voices for an end to the colonization. I think they are all therefore more accurately labeled pro-war.
Phew, rectifying the names is hard work. Here’s a splendid antipoem by the venerable Nicanor Parra about this important task: link to rincondepoesia.bligoo.com
Chespirito says: “…I would like to see the term “ethnic cleansing” used more freely to describe what Israel is doing in East Jerusalem and in the West Bank, and as a term for what happened in ’48. “
‘Ethnic cleansing’ is itself obviously a euphemism.
I don’t see what’s wrong with ‘expulsion.’ It’s more descriptive. It doesn’t connote any moral judgement. The Czechs will freely admit that they ‘expelled’ the Sudeten Germans after World War Two, for example. I don’t see how the Zionists can deny that either what they did in 1948 or what they’re doing now isn’t ‘expulsion.’
Maybe they could be called “expropriation projects” or “Judiazation projects”.
The hell with it just call it Isratin make everybody equally unhappy.
Wow that Qaddafi was ahead of his time…
“Wow that Qaddafi was ahead of his time…”
Speaking of Qaddafi, it should interest those here that were rooting for the freedom fighters in Libya that this week these freedom-loving fighters started destroying vestiges of Libya’s historical Muslim artifacts, museums and religious shrines dating back to the 15th century and the authorities are sort of just standing back and watching them do it. It takes us back to 2001 and what the Taliban did to the 2 giant Buddha statues at Bamiyan. Like it was done in Saudia, the Salafists are out to destroy any religious site in Libya that is being venerated.
Except there is no unified freedom fighters. The militias are pretty much independently operational and due to disbanding the army, the government has limited means to put them down.
Secondly, it’s not a zero sum game- the militias are bad so Qaddafi was good, or I don’t trust Morsy, so let’s bring back Mubarak. People have the right to pick to pick their leaders or kick their leaders out, regardless of whether we outside analysists like it or not. Don’t we argue that Hamas’ victory in the 2006 elections were legitimate, despit the fact that we aren’t Hamas supporters? It’s really easy for people to look into an unknown future and wonder if they were better off with the devil they knew.
Really, you seem like a contrariest in your postings- if the main stream media reports on it with a positive spin, than its bad, and if they report negatively than it must be good in reality.
It’s much simpler than that, MLE, I didn’t like Qaddafi but I liked even less what the West, the Zionists and the Gulf States were doing to him and to Libya. I disliked the fundamentalists’ involvement in Libya even more than all of them and I don’t make up my mind based on any msm spin. I’m aware of Qaddafi’s successes in his social programs in Libya and Africa. There were dozens of separate fighting units in Libya, but the lead groups were made up of Brothers and Salafists and so are the ones calling the shots in Libya today.
Let’s just get rid of it and make everyone happy.
“The hell with it just call it Isratin make everybody equally unhappy.”
Gosh, what a sacrifice you’re willing to make OlegR. You’ll actually give them the “tin” out of “Palestine”? You’re a regular liberal Zionist.
Of course, anybody can click your comment archive and see that your preferred solution is annexation of the occupied areas and “transfer” of the Palestinians. The ones that are in a “war” with Israel and trying to “wipe us out”.
You know, OlegR, you might try and get around that nasty ziocaine amnesia by checking your own comment archive before you start commenting each day, instead of making a fool of yourself by pretending you are somebody you aren’t, and expecting us not to notice.
Please show me Mooser where i said that i prefer annexation
and “transfer” of the Palestinians.
Have you become senile or are you just bluntly lying?
Okay Oleg – Mooser is the good Jew and you are the bad one.
He assumes something the bad Jew/Israeli must have said.
But tell me, what term do you use or HAVE TO use in the military:
“West Bank”, “occupied territories”, or “Judea and Samaria”.
- The annexation starts in the Biblical mind, then spreads to the secular one.
BTW, I don’t understand why Mooser’s pure Judaist mind doesn’t approve of Judea and Samaria being pure Biblical, Jewish land.
“Have you become senile or are you just bluntly lying?”
I don’t know, if it wasn’t you, it was one of the others. You’re all the same.
And as far as being lied about? Get used to it pal, people lie about Jews all the time. We got to lie about how wonderful we are for so many years, now the tide may turn. Really, I thought you were Jewish, you should know this.
So please explain, OlegR, if I was in fact mistaken about what you said (anybody can check your archive) how does that make the slightest bit of difference in what Israel does, and what you do for Israel. Altho it looks like your next (and very sensible move) is to rat out your comrades to try and ensure your own safety.
Oleg, I’ve already told you many times how much I revile and fear Zionists, let alone Israelis. Of course I would lie about you if I thought it was effective in hurting you. Believe me pal, it’s not the worst thing anybody will be willing to do to you before it’s over.
Are you sure it isn’t time to rethink all that hoo-haw about what you wouldn’t do so you won’t have to “break the silence”?
“BTW, I don’t understand why Mooser’s pure Judaist mind doesn’t approve of Judea and Samaria being pure Biblical, Jewish land.”
Nope, you sure as hell don’t, do you?
Of course, it might help if you explained what a “pure Judaist mind” is, and how it differs from ordinary human minds.
Other terms whose definition needs to be considered:
‘terrorist,’ ‘anti-semitic,’ ‘human shield,’ ‘kidnapping,’ ‘investigation,’ ‘existential threat.’
…what others?
Anyway, given ‘terror tunnels,’ ‘terror flotilla,’ and innumerable attacks on soldiers or even acts of self-defense described as ‘terrorism,’ I don’t think we can define ‘terrorism’ more closely than as ‘an act committed by or on behalf of some group opposed to the speaker.’ Indeed, even that may not do. We’ve probably had purely verbal statements described as ‘terrorism.’ I suppose eventually we’d be reduced to ‘terrorism: an action or statement the speaker disagrees with.’ As in ‘my wife practiced culinary terrorism when she served brussels sprouts yet again.’
‘antisemitic.’ Critical or unsupportive of Israel, of course. Also, simply a general term to indicate condemnatory disapproval. As in ‘brussels sprouts are anti-semitic.’ It does raise the question: is a specific term needed to describe bigotry or hostility towards Jews and/or Judaism, and if so, what should it be?
‘Human shield.’ Any civilian fatality caused by Israeli military action. Somewhat counter-intuitively, ‘he wasn’t a human shield’ refers to any Palestinian civilian used as a human shield by the IDF.
‘Kidnapping.’ The surrender of a soldier, if he’s in the IDF.
‘Investigation.’ A statement that Israel didn’t do anything wrong, made after a suitable delay. Related is one of the possible meanings of ‘anti-semitism’ : ‘an investigation of Israeli actions leading to a critical finding.’
‘Existential threat.’ An entity that Israel is about to attack, or would like to see attacked.
Colin
“Human shield” is the Anglo term. The Hebrew version is “the neighbor procedure”
Gruesome
link to btselem.org
I think too many people reference the ‘Israeli-Palestinian conflict’. It isn’t just a conflict between two sides. I find it more accurate to refer to the oppression of the Palestinians, or the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. For example, I say that I do activism in opposition to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. My radio show brings light to the oppression of the Palestinian people. Etc.
Even framing the conversation from the get-go can lead to an entirely different conversation.
Matthew Graber says: “I think too many people reference the ‘Israeli-Palestinian conflict’. It isn’t just a conflict between two sides. I find it more accurate to refer to the oppression of the Palestinians…”
That’s rhetorically interesting. If you refer to it as ‘the Israeli-Palestinian conflict’ then you are inviting the listener to take sides — and if he picks ‘Israel’ you’ve got an uphill fight. Now all the arguments justifying Israel come into play. They’re all B.S., of course — but you still have to overcome them. If you don’t, at best you wind up with your interlocutor being forced to agree, that yes, Israel could be nicer.
On the other hand, if you refer to it as ‘the oppression of the Palestinians,’ then your interlocutor can either (a) accept that the Palestinians are oppressed, and should be, or (b) deny that they are oppressed. The ball’s in his court, and neither proposition is very appetizing to argue.
Largely, that’s what goes on here. We collectively frame the conversation as not ‘Israel/Palestine — who is right’ so much as ‘the Palestinians are being oppressed.’ What Zionists show up and attempt to argue the contrary are promptly forced into absurdities. People like to denounce them as stupid, etc, but really — their essential problem is that they’re trying to argue an unwinnable case.
We framed it that way. And that’s good.
I think “the Zionist dispossession of the Palestinians” is a better fit than “I/P conflict”.
Framing the conversation is very important although it is easier now the hasbara is breaking down.
Interesting point. A few years ago I heard Ilan Pappe speak about the need to change the vocabulary when talking about Israel/Palestine. He said we should throw out the word ‘conflict’ as it implies a dispute between 2 more or less equal sides. A minute or so later he himself used the c word and had to apologise (nicely) saying it was hard to find another term to replace it with.
I’m reminded of the clip from “Valley of the Wolves: Palestine” (Turkish action flick) where the Rambo type is asked by an Israeli officer, ‘Why did you come to Israel?’
He answers, ‘I didn’t come to Israel. I came to Palestine.’
link to youtube.com (towards the end).
It’s probably not a good idea to try that at home.
Since Israel wants to be considered a nation but it is unwilling to let us know where its borders are so it is quite appropriate for those of us on the outside to defer calling what that confusing mess is as the nation of Israel. Many prefer the ‘Zionist Entity’ but that still implies a unit within defined borders. I mentioned this before, but until Israel is willing to let us know what it considers its real borders, the term ‘Zionist Experiment in Palestine’ is the most accurate. This captures the volatile nature of the imagined state that the Zionist desire without restricting them to any specific piece of real estate.
“The troubles” is a great term to cover social breakdown and civil war