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The War of Ideas in the Middle East
Uhh. Where was the hate again? I think I missed something.
Is there an echo in here?
American.The anthrax attacks?
It’s got a huge ramp going down with all these people crammed on it. It’s completely different from when I was here last. I found it disturbing.”
Bill was still agitated. “Did you see when we were going out there was a sign saying 'Israel,' with an arrow? Israel! As if they don’t know. Why can’t it just say Exit?”
Phil. You spent ten days with this guy?
Oy.
“One has to ask why Morris Talansky waited 15 years before deciding that his financial contributions to Olmert were “unkosher,” and who made certain that the police would know about them at this particular time.” . . .
"..while Morris visited his apartment in Jerusalem, the Israeli police pounded on his door one Sunday at 6 a.m. They took him to the station. They confiscated his passport, interrogated him nine times, and, before their corruption investigation was even complete, rushed him onto the witness stand."
"Morris took the stand about a month later and, under questioning by the prosecutor, told an explosive story. Morris estimated that over the past fifteen years, he’d given his friend Olmert $150,000."
link to nymag.com
Talansky didn't 'wait 15 years". He gave his friend Olmert money over a 15 year period and made this confession under fairly extreme duress.
Maybe this is one conspiracy theory you ought not spend too much of your time on.
Hostage. Please.
According to Olmert's memoirs, his peace offer was sunk by
Abbas, the Gaza War and Olmert's legal troubles.
link to nytimes.com
So now Olmert is peddling 'Jewish money' conspiracy theories?
Hostage said: "He has poured tens of millions into that venture and says that he would be happy to lose even $150 or $200 million dollars.
Hostage. I quote the Salon piece you linked, "A much-repeated rumor, impossible to verify, has it that Adelson has told Israeli friends he is happy to lose even $150 or $200 million dollars on the venture."
So now Hostage is peddling rumors?
Phil. You say Adelson. What's your proof?
It's easy to point a finger and a lot harder to pull a trigger.
What are you saying here, Mooser? George Zimmerman is Jewish? Huh.
Mooser says:
"You should see them out on the Temple grounds, practicing close-order drill, simulating bayonet charges, and practicing with machine guns and hand-grenades. "
What are saying here Mooser? Jews practicing close order drill, etc. on the Temple Mount? Near Al-aksa? Huh?
The thread was not stale and I don't beat dead horses. It's more likely that you ran out of steam.
BTW. I'm now reading Barbara Smith's book. H.M.G.'s mismanagement of the Mandate of Palestine WAS appalling.
Hey Hostage. Are you going to reply to my comment yesterday on the 'Ben Gurion expulsion' thread?
Hey American. Who WAS responsible for the anthrax attacks? You said you'd tell us.
Zero. How many Jews live in Um al-Fahm?
"The road is designated for Jewish travelers only."
Oh please. The road is designated for Israeli travelers only.
I find it really hard to believe Ira Glunts doesn't know the distinction by now.
Steve's relies on a 5 year old propaganda video and no first-hand knowledge.
I rarely comment on places I haven't been. I don't believe I've ever commented on living conditions in Iran.
If Steve's had actually visited the WB and seen the 'inhumane' conditions, rather than simply watched an agitprop video, than he'd be more credible.
So Steve's visited East Jerusalem, but nowhere else on the West Bank.
Got it!
Thanks!
I've watched all the videos and opened all the links, including the one Annie just sent.
I still can't find where it says that Steve's has been to the West Bank.
Where?
What did I miss? Where does it say Steve's visited the West Bank?
I read Steve's HuffPo article and I opened all the links. Somebody please show me where it says that Steve's has visited the West Bank.
Which link?
Let me get this straight.
Rick Steves is a globetrotter who's visited Israel, but hasn't actually visited the West Bank, but declares that the Palestinians are living there 'under inhuman conditions' (because he saw that in a documentary).
Wow.
And I'm sure nobody from Mondoweiss would ever listen to bootlegged recordings.
I have a valid driver's license, yet I violate the local vehicle and traffic code daily.
Am I a Nazi?
How is the occupation illegal?
Tell us, American. Who do you think was behind the anthrax attacks?
Who?
I read something about a rural Gazan family being burned to death when a WP shell hit their home. Of course, firing WP in a rural setting is legal and the WP shells used by the IDF in Cast Lead would detonate in mid air, and therefore wouldn't land on a house unless the shell was a dud (which isn't Israel's fault).
So that's why I asked.
Proof of WP deaths please.
Really funny.
Have a great holiday.
Friedman's book is on Google books. He's ninety one years old so you can tell him yourself.
According to the H.M.G.'s de Bunsen Committee, (1915), the Ayelet (province) of Palestine covered the whole territory from the Mediterranean in the west, to deep into the Syrian Desert in the east. Freedman, Isaiah, "British Pan-Arab Policy 1915-1922: A Critical Appraisal" (2009 by Transaction Publishers, Pg. 316.
“Transjordan had been included by the League of Nations in the territory of Palestine which the League was offering Britain as a Mandate–A Peace to End All Peace, David Fromkin, pg. 505. ”
Annie. Shingo. What part of the sentence don't you understand?
Annie. Your need to project truly baffles me.
I've never said that the Zionists were swindled. I know that Great Britain swindled the local Arabs as well as the Zionists and swindled France, the Arab States and the Ottomans as well.
And BTW Annie. I don't dream of land. I dream of peace.
"Transjordan had been included by the League of Nations in the territory of Palestine which the League was offering Britain as a Mandate–A Peace to End All Peace, David Fromkin, pg. 505. "
My point is that Jabotinsky was not alone in visioning Palestine as straddling both sides of the Jordan river. The League of Nations originally thought the same thing and it seems that Mr. Sullivan wasn't aware of that.
Transjordan had been included by the Lesgue of Nations in the territory of Palestine which the League was offering Britain as a Mandate--A Peace to End All Peace, David Fromkin, pg. 505.
The arbitrary creation by Britain of an Arab Emirate of Transjordan required a previously nonexisting legal framework to be concocted in order to allow this new entity to be formally recognized. Colonel Meinertzhagen noted this in his diary on June 21, 1921. “The Colonial Office and the Palestine Administration have now declared that the articles of the mandate relating to the Jewish Home are not applicable to Transjordan and that the severance of Transjordan from Palestine is in accordance with the terms of the McMahon pledge. This discovery was not made until it became necessary to appease an Arab Emir...
Balfour submitted the first draft of the Palestine Mandate to the Council of the League of Nations on December 6, 1920. There was nothing in that document that would provide the basis for distinguishing Trans-Jordan from the rest of Palestine. Of course, this was before Abdullah’s appearance on the scene in the territory and Churchill’s decision to strike a bargain with him. To deal with the new political reality, a revised draft of the mandate was released in August 1921, which incorporated the change in British policy. In this revised final draft of the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine, a device was included that provided the “after the fact” basis for Britain’s separation of Trans-Jordan from Palestine. On July 24, 1922, the League of Nations approved the terms of the British mandate covering Palestine and Transjordan.
Notwithstanding the new version of the mandate, the Zionist leaders at the time were unwilling to consider the exclusion of Trans-Jordan from the Jewish homeland as an accomplished fact. They viewed it as a clear and cynical betrayal of commitments made to them by Britain in collusion with the major powers, and something they could not accept without a struggle. There was a sense that the effect of the partition could be undone by creating facts on the ground that negated it. Thus, at the Twelfth Zionist Congress held that same year, Weizmann stated, while discussing the question of Palestine’s eastern frontier: “The question will be still better answered when Cisjordania is so full of Jews that a way is forced into Transjordania.
Jabotinsky's vision of a Jewish State on both sides of the Jordan river?
That wasn't Jabo's vision. The original Mandate of Palestine did include both sides of the river and all the way to Iraq.
History is not Sullivan's strong suit.
No. I believe Omar Rahman @ 972magazine.
link to 972mag.com
Cliff.
Apparently, Mr. Bargouti was beaten by fellow Palestinian protestors and not shot with a tear gas canister. Nor was he beaten by IDF provocateurs.
Hostage said:
“The non-mitigating factors that you mention do not alter the fact that Zionists deliberately caused the territorial displacement of the Arab cultivators and employed Hebrew laborers to take their place.”
-and-
“In fact the declassified documents in the UK archives establish that British government officials, like Balfour, Curzon, Devonshire, Ormsby-Gore, and Passfield, knew all along that support and preferential treatment for the Zionists was contrary to the well being of the non-Jewish communities”.
But in 1931 Labor Zionism was endorsed by the H.M.G. in Prime Minister Ramsey McDonald’s letter to Chaim Weizman, i.e. ‘The Black Letter”.
MacDonald said that, “The principle of preferential and, indeed, exclusive employment of Jewish labour by Jewish organizations is a principle which the Jewish Agency are entitled to affirm”. Hansard, Parlimentary Debates, House of Commons, Fifth ser., vol 248, MacDonald to Kenworthy. 13 Feb. 1931, 757.
Barbara Smith commented, “In essence, the letter put H.M.G.’s seal of approval on economic separatism”. ‘Roots” pg. 16.
Hostage. What's a Zionist to do?
My point was, that as late as 1930, the largest Zionist landowner employed Arab laborers. Right or wrong?
Didn't Hope Simpson, 1930, at p. 50, say that the majority of Jewish owned land was P.I.C.A. and that P.I.C.A. was less ideological in it's hiring practices than the Labor Zionists?
If that's the case, than the majority Zionist landowner was employing Arabs.
What Stein says on pages 143- 144 is that the destitute fellaheen were driven insolvent by low wheat prices and moneylenders, described as "greedy Arab merchants who by their (fellaheen) crops".
If there was any chicanary involved in the sale of the Wadi Hawarith tracts, that had nothing to do with the fact that the High Court of Palestine certified the evictions as legal. The tenants had accepted compensation from the Zionist buyers ahead of their eviction but refused to vacate after a paternal High Commissioner's office interceded on their behalf.
"In fact the declassified documents in the UK archives establish that British government officials, like Balfour, Curzon, Devonshire, Ormsby-Gore, and Passfield, knew all along that support and preferential treatment for the Zionists was contrary to the well being of the non-Jewish communities. Entire volumes have been devoted to those archival sources, e.g. Doreen Ingrams, Palestine Papers 1917-1922: Seeds of Conflict, George Brazziler, 1972."
I own a copy of Ingram's book. Passfield does not appear in the book's index, and neither Devonshire nor Ormsby-Gore says anything in the book about preferential treatment of Zionism being contrary to the well being of the non-Jewish communities.
I suggest you tighten up your cites.
What my source said is that:
"In the Arab community, total factor productivity may have accounted for 50 percent(and possibly more) of output growth. This suggests that the mainly traditional Arab economy was able to to gain from exogenous factors (such as the expanding world market for Palestine's citrus, the demand and demonstration effects of the fast- growing modern Jewish economy, and government-provided economic services and infrastructure) and mobilize it resources-primarily land and labor-largely in response to these factors, so as to facilitate speedy economic growth."
First. The Arab economy benefited from other exogenous sources besides the citrus industry. The other exogenous sources include H.M.G. and the thriving Jewish economy of Palestine.
Are you discounting Professor Metzer's own published estimates?
If so, than why?
Hostage says:
"Hope Simpson similarly characterized the Zionist desire for land devoid of its Arab cultivators as “the prophylactic of the Jewish disease”.
To quote Stein at 104-105, "He [Hope Simpson] characterized the Jewish desire of land as the "prophylactic of the Jewish disease."
Did Hope Simpson say 'land devoid of it's Arab cultivators' or did you?
"i supposed anything could be argued"
"The [Palestinian] Arab record of economic growth...was very impressive indeed, even if it was overshadowed by the extraordinary economic performance of the Jews."-- The Divided Economy of Mandatory Palestine By Jacob Metzer (Cambridge University Press) Pg. 17.
Annie. I suppose you're right.
Hostage says:
"The British granted exclusive long-term concessions, banking charters, and many other key economic privileges to the Zionists. "
Sure they did. But why? Because H.M.G. believed, for better or worse, that Zionism served the economic well being of the Arab Community.
And I quote your cite above, "As long as it was assumed that the [Zionist] settler movement brought unequivocal gains to the local population, the problem of a dual obligation would virtually be dismissed; the welfare of non-Jewish population was assured, it could be argued, simply by facilitating the establishment of the Jewish National Home." (p7). --Barbara J. Smith, The Roots of Separatism in Palestine: British Economic Policy, 1920-1929
I'd assumed you'd have read that.
And BTW. Was HMG wrong in that believing that Zionism helped the local Arabs? Didn't Palestine undergo an economic 'boomlet' in the mid 1930's while the rest of the world suffered with the Great Depression?
"The mandate required the British government to facilitate close Jewish settlement on – wait for it – “state land” and waste land. "
Okay, and Hope Simpson and Passfield determined that there were no miri lands to give to the Zionists, which begs the question. How many Arabs were dispossessed of miri lands by HMG on behalf of the Zionists?
"The other authorities that I cited above point out that Hope Simpson was doing his job and warning about a "worst case" scenario, not engaging in "academic questions".
According to Stein, Hope Simpson was an ambitious political hack (p. 93) who wasn't above cooking the books( p.105-106) to further the Colonial Office's anti-Zionist agenda (p. 93). Hope Simpson seems to have been an anti-Semite as well (p. 104-105).
"I notice that you failed to mention the portions of the report which addressed the fact that 29.4 percent of the families of Arab villages were landless.."
Ha!
Says Stein," Hope Simpson used statistical evidence, but its accuracy was very questionable"."..Hope Simpson did some dubious extrapolation".
"Hope Simpson conveniently chose figures to fit his philosophy."
"Clearly , he wanted to ascribe to Jewish land purchase and settlement the responsibility for the creation of a landless rural Arab class."
"He mistakenly or deliberately assumed that it was not customary practice in Palestine to have laborers work without owning land."
Stein, Land Question. pp 108-111.
What does miri lands have to do with Zionist land purchases? Miri lands were Ottoman State property not private lands.
"For example, the Zionists had complained that the Arabs were obtaining agricultural loans for seed from banks in Egypt. At their insistence, those foreign loans were prohibited by the government and the cultivators were required to do business with Palestinian banks, including the Zionist’s chartered Colonial Trust Bank, on much less favorable terms."
Not according to Stein.
"Weizman and the Zionist Commission were not opposed to loans to the fellahin".
Yes, the Zionists initially opposed the Anglo-Egypt Bank loans to the fellahin but that was because they feared that defaulting mortgages would be sold to banks or syndicates and not to the Zionists. After a short delay Weizman consented to the 'seed loans' to the fellahin.
"The loans were discontinued in 1924 primarily because of the inability of the fellaheen population to recover fully from the grave economic disruptions that occurred prior to and during World War I".
"Agricultural loans were discontinued because more than half of the loans were not repaid". Stein, Land Question. Page 40-43.
Also. A large number of these 'seed loans' were used to pay off the Arab moneylenders. Land Question, page 19.
So much for blaming the Zionists.
"Nonetheless, by 1930 the Hope Simpson Report blamed the Jewish labor policy for the serious unemployment in the Arab sector"
Here is the Hope Simpson Report on the subject of immigration and unemployment. It makes Simcha Flapan appear quite foolish in his assertions. Didn't you read Hope Simpson yourself?
Immigration and Unemployment.—It is widely believed and commonly alleged among the Arabs that unemployment among them is due to Jewish immigration and the competition of Jewish labour. In so far as Jewish labour is employed on works which are being carried out solely with imported Jewish capital, there is no basis for the belief. It is however impossible to ascertain whether labour has been imported in excess of what is necessary for these purposes. Indeed from the fact of the increased employment of Jewish Labour on other enterprises, as for instance in the Public Works Department, on the railways, in building enterprises such as Hotel, Y.M.C.A. buildings and other edifices not paid for by purely Jewish capital, it might be argued that more Jewish labourers have been imported than are necessary for purely Jewish requirements, and that, to this extent, the Arab labour market has been adversely affected by Jewish immigration. On the other hand, there is no doubt that the development which has followed on Jewish immigration during the last nine years, has provided additional openings for Arab labour. The expansion of the orange trade alone requires the services of a large number of Arab porters and boatmen at the ports. The same may be said of the large imports of machinery and material in connection with the Jordan Concession, with the Dead Sea Concession, and with the construction and working of the " Nesher " Cement Company. All of these have provided a certain amount of work for Arabs, chiefly on the heavier and more menial tasks. In many directions Jewish development has meant more work for the Arabs, and it is a fair conclusion that the competition of imported Jewish labour is equalized by those increased opportunities.
Hope Simpson Report at 8008 • B 2
Hostage said that, "..Zionist immigrants displaced the tenured Arab cultivators and took their place."
Hostage also said that, ".. The British were obliged to respect the existing rights enjoyed by Arab cultivators under the Ottoman Land Code in accordance with the terms of the San Remo resolution and the LoN mandate."
Tenured? Says who?
What rights did tenant farmers have under the Ottoman Land Code and how and when did HMG or the Zionists violate these 'rights'?
BTW. I'd said earlier that, “In the early 1930′s, Arab land sales and Jewish land purchase contributed to the evolution of an Arab landless class. But the principle factor influencing Arab landlessness was the fellaheen’s deteriorating economic condition.”
And I said as well that, " ..Arab merchants, moneylenders, landlords, and other professional who had liens on a segment of village population forced many to sell to them. In turn, the sales were made to Jewish purchasers.”Stein, page 142."
Lo and behold, Hostage. No comment from you regarding these cites to Stein.
"Nothing you wrote challenged the fact that the Zionists had a public policy in place of using only Hebrew labor, and of expelling the Arabs and taking their place in the areas they purchased for the establishment of their “national home”."
Wrong.
Capitalist Zionists like the Jewish landowners in the citrus industry I mentioned employed Arabs (because Arab would work for lower wages than Jews). Anti-capitalist, Labor Zionists believed in 'Jewish power through Jewish labor',i.e. self-reliance, and would not hire Arabs.
Labor Zionism was developed by two Eastern European Zionists, Borochov and Syrkin.
Borochov's views on the Arab question formed the basis of socialist Zionist ideology, and refute the charges that Zionists planned to expel the Arabs of Palestine. In his last recorded speech, Borochov said:
"Many point out the obstacles which we encounter in our colonization work. Some say that he Turkish law hinders our work, others contend that Palestine is insignificantly small, and still others charge us with the odious crime of wishing to oppress and expel the Arabs from Palestine...When the waste lands are prepared for colonization, when modern technique is introduced, and when the other obstacles are removed, there will be sufficient land to accommodate both the Jews and the Arabs. Normal relations between the Jews and Arabs will and must prevail."--(Eretz Yisrael in our Program and Tactics - Kiev, September 1917)
Syrkin was vague on the issue of transfer. His only statement on the subject was that he favored, 'friendly population transfers in mixed areas' [of Palestine].
Hostage.
You never responded to my follow up comment regarding how Professor Kenneth Stein's book Land Question in Palestine strongly disproves your 'transfer narrative'.
@Hostage. You said:
"I short, the Jews already had a public policy of using only Hebrew labor, and of expelling the Arabs and taking their place in the areas they purchased for the establishment of their “national home”.
To begin with, it was Arab landowners who evicted Arab tenants (as a precondition for land sales to the Zionists).
That said, H.M.G. saw to it that former Arab tenants and small landowning Arabs who'd sold their land to Zionists, were resettled.
By order of law, the now landless Arabs were well compensated by the Zionist land buyers for the inconvenience of being evicted (by their former Arab landlords).
Hostage. You may have additionally overlooked some of what Stein said.
For instance, he said that, "In the early 1930's, Arab land sales and Jewish land purchase contributed to the evolution of an Arab landless class. But the principle factor influencing Arab landlessness was the fellaheen's deteriorating economic condition."
As well, Stein said that, ..Arab merchants, moneylenders, landlords, and other professional who had liens on a segment of village population forced many to sell to them. In turn, the sales were made to Jewish purchasers."Stein, page 142.
Hostage said . " ..public policy of using only Hebrew labor".
Stein says, "Some owner-occupiers, tenants and laborers were forced to leave agricultural pursuits solely because of the worsening and untenable economic situation. In late 1933, more than 5,000 Arab laborers, not all of them landless, were employed by Jewish landowners in the orange growing districts."
Hostage said: "..expelling the Arabs and taking their place in the areas they purchased for the establishment of their “national home”.
But Stein concluded that, "The seed for eventual partition of Palestine had been planted. H.M.G.'s purpose was clear: resettle landless Palestinian Arabs away from existing Jewish settlements to avoid armed communal conflict". Stein, page 138.
Hostage. Are we on the same page?
"By 1937, the doctrine of Conquest through Hebrew Labor was notorious for having created a class of displaced Arab Cultivators, despite Zionist intervention in the Landless Arab Inquiries and a vigorous hasbara campaign."
C'mon Hostage. You read Professor Kenneth Stein's, "The Land Question in Palestine.--1939",University of North Carolina Press.
You know that Arab landowners, Arab moneylenders, market forces, natural agricultural failures and inefficient Mandatory regulations had plenty to do with the creation of landless Arabs.
C'mon.