One of the rising choruses from the pro-Israel crowd is that the U.S. is no better because it too is based on an ethnic cleansing (though the U.S. got its ethnic cleansing in before the age of decolonization). David Harris at the American Jewish Committee is taking that line one step further in a post railing at the boycotters. It’s amazing that HuffingtonPost publishes this kind of stuff.
No other country has faced such a constant challenge to its very right to exist, even though the age-old biblical, spiritual, and physical connection between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel is unique in the annals of history.Indeed, that connection is of a totally different character from the basis on which, say, the United States, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, or the bulk of Latin American countries were established, that is, by Europeans with no legitimate claim to those lands who decimated indigenous populations and proclaimed their own authority. Or, for that matter, North African countries that were conquered and occupied by Arab-Islamic invaders and totally redefined in their national character.
This is religious language, by the way. That’s why I insist that the lobby is a rightwing religious movement. H/t Scott McConell.
How many Jews lived in Palestine in 1800? 1700? 1600? 1500? 1400?
In 1900?
How many non-Jews lived in Palestine during that time?
“though the U.S. got its ethnic cleansing in before the age of decolonization”
So? I can never understand this line of reasoning Phil. The fact of the matter is that you’re an American, and you are the beneficiary of that ethnic cleansing. So why does it matter that it took place before the age of decolonization?
And by the way, how is 1948 the age of decolonization? Most of the Africa was still colonized at that time. And what was happening in the Holy Land? The people whom you accuse of doing this ethnic cleansing were in the process of decolonizing it, not colonizing it. They were fighting a war with others in the region who wanted to control it, people who were not whom you dub the natives. You’re showing exactly how arbitrary and simplistic this argument is.
‘One of the rising choruses from the pro-Israel crowd is that the U.S. is no better because it too is based on an ethnic cleansing (though the U.S. got its ethnic cleansing in before the age of decolonization). ”
Who cares.
The majority of the world today is opposed to Israel….thats all there is for them to understand….thats what matters ‘today’……1600 is long gone…the nazis are long gone…..burning witches is long gone……..Palestine is here and now.
How stupid can these people be..seriously?….using an ethnic cleansing to justify an ethnic cleansing?….really moronic.
I think he’s right.
The difference is that the (few) Jews who started the Israel-project had a book, which they called their Bible, and a long-time religion, which (one or both) they interpreted to grant them [1] historical DESIRE for homeland in Palestine (which DESIRE was contradicted to my satisfaction by Shlomo Sand) and [2] some mysterious “right” over and above the wrongly-asserted DESIRE to capture and possess The Land.
The English and Spanish had opportunity, guns, and gall. In those days that was all it took. (The Pope of the day seems to have “given” lands to the Spanish and perhaps Portuguese, and the English King “gave” lands to the English settlers.
So, There was a difference. Maybe. Did age-old DESIRE (even if present, but see caveat above) create RIGHT? And without right, what precisely is the importance of the difference?
So: a distinction (maybe) but without a difference (as to right).
It’s different in that the Jews are descendants of emigres from Palestine, as the Roma are descendants of emigres from Rajasthan. The cultural or religious aspect is closer the the Serbian relation to Kosovo, with the caveat that unlike the Albanian Kosovars, the Palestinians are the descendants of Jews who never left. Every European caricature of a Jewish face has Arafat’s nose.
That’s no excuse for conquest.