– denying the Palestinian right of self determinaties in historic Palestine, while at the same time supporting the Jewish right of self-determination in historic Palestine
The Palestinian people – the Jews – did self-determine in the 1940s. You’re conflating Arab nationalism with Palestinians. Those are not the same thing. Opposing the Labour Party is not “anti-British”. Opposing the white nationalist wing of the Republican Party is not “anti-American”. And opposing Arab nationalism can never be “anti-Palestinian”.
– denying the Palestinian refugees’ right of return to their or their ancestors’ original place of residence before they fled or were expelled in the conflict with Zionism
There are no Palestinian refugees. I think you mean Palestine refugees. What is an “ancestors’ original place of residence”. What if the residence no longer exists. What if the local authorities have sequestioned the property. What if it is longer than the Mejel’s statute of limitations.
Having a disagreement about real estate property law cannot possibly be anti-Palestinian.
– denying Palestinians citizens equal rights to other citizens of the same state
Citizens of every state should advocate for whatever policies they like. If a particular citizen doesn’t feel she has equal rights (say an American who feels disenfranchised by a 10 Commandments monument in a public park, or by abortion funding) they should have every right to lawfully advocate for a change of law. An especially important value in places like Palestine, Lebanon, the UK and Syria where advocacy rights around questions of Palestine are massively curtailed.
I think we can all agree with this proposal.
– structurally discriminatie against Palestinian citizens of a state by e.g. a discriminatory land policy, discriminatory housing and development plans or permits, or discriminatory budget assignments
I’m not sure what a “Palestinian citizens of a state” is. Citizens of foreign countries always face discrimination because the a country’s law apply only to itself. Citizens of Palestine should certainly not face discrimination in Palestine, and if they do they should vote for legislators who will change the law to their liking.
– denying a (possible, future) Palestinian state equal rights to any other state
The State of Palestine was created and recognized by almost the entire world in 1988. It is the most important country on earth by far; and has far more military, economic and military power than, say, the United States (just look at the recent vote by the State of Palestine condemning the United States). I don’t think you have to worry about the State of Palestine not getting a fair shake.
– demonizing Palestinians by making hostile generalisations that are not based on facts, e.g. by denying that Palestinian resistance to Zionism is chiefly motivated by resistance to its disposession by Zionism
Well, reasonable people can disagree on what motivates Islamic violence. We certainly cannot stop people debating the Koran and the sociology of Arab nationalist culture.
A good rule of thumb is that it is not racist to treat minorities the way Jews are treated in the State of Palestine. You can’t go wrong by playing the “what’s good for the goose is good for the gander”.
The Islamic Republic of Pakistan.
Oh, you said Palestine. The Arab nationalists started a war in 1948 and expelled the inhabitants who were not Arab nationalist. It’s a moral stain they live with still.
The Turkish Republic has occupied Cyprus for a half-century. Don’t worry, the State of Palestine provides Turkey political cover and, as was reported yesterday, Palestine is building massive illegal settlements throughout the occupied territory.
Of course, the State of Palestine could just end their war. That’s another option.
Israel is allied with the United States.
Israeli conservatives were anti-Soviet, won wars against Communist client states, sided with us against Saddam Hussein, against the Jihad, against the Islamic Republic and have been an almost singular stalwart in support of our President.
By contrast, the State of Palestine supported the Soviet Union’s war, sided with Saddam Hussein, support the Jihad, and are virulent opponents of President Trump.
Why would Americans give any aid to our enemy, the Arab nationalists living in Palestine?
And to the extent the United States leverages the military assistance it provides Israel, it is to stop Israel from building a competitor to the F-16 and protecting the Moslems from genocide.
That’s crazy talk.
Jewish law universally considers it a capital crime for a non-Jew to step anywhere on the Temple Mount. Even someone who tovels first and goes up would be subject to the death penalty for entering the Dome of the Rock. It’s one of the primary reason why observant Jews hate Moslems – because of the disrespect that Moslems have toward halacha.
You’re confusing the highly offensive and deeply ignorant Islamic version of history with reality. Moslems always report that the non-Moslems received the conquerers with open arms – it’s not true in Europe and it wasn’t true in Palestine during the Arab conquest and it wasn’t true in Palestine during the Turkish conquest. The Arab conquerors were never welcome in Palestine.
Once again, Mondoweiss strikes its readers with the blatantly obvious.
When has the State of Israel ever claimed to “represent millions Jews overseas”? All y’all keep confusing the anti-Zionist conception of what Israel is (and claims to be) with reality.
Yes, at the margins of Israeli politics, there is some rhetoric about it being the state of all Jews. Although far less than the rhetoric in domestic Lebanese, Greek, Arab nationalist or Cypriot politics about ethnic identity – just to name a few of her neighbors. Just as there is rhetoric in American politics about “Liberty” and “Justice” and about “Freedom as the future of all nations and the yerusha of all mankind”, as George W. Bush and the neocons liked to say.
It speaks volumes that it took until 2018 for the Mondoweiss swamp creatures to realize that the Israeli state is not some American klezmer hoedown, but a state which looks after its own interests and – marginal rhetoric aside – couldn’t give a flying fig about what people overseas, regardless of their identity, think about her.
You see of delusion in the context of British antisemitism, which Captain Underpants wrote about. British Leftists think that the antisemitism issue was ginned up in Tel Aviv and that the Israeli government cares about and is gunning for the crackpot leader of the opposition.
Being reality-based is not just sensible, it also would help you accomplish your far-right Arab nationalist goals more effectively! Imagine if the BDS movement had not spent the past decade promoting antisemitism in the United States on some delusional belief that doing so would change Israeli policy. Imagine if the British Left tackled racism in the Labour Party instead of fantasizing about some Zio plot. And imagine if the State of Palestine and its supporters actually studied their Israeli enemy in order to fight it better, instead of obsessing with what elderly Ashkenazi Socialists living in their dads’ apartments in Coney Island think.
An overriding obsession with race purity. A foreign and domestic policy dictated solely by military and economic power. Strict, patriarchal hierarchies enforced by a police state. Convergence of religion and state. A political ideology developed in the fascist heyday and explicitly modeled on 1940’s-era Nazi Arabia.
What aspect of Arab nationalism – at least as it is practiced in the United States and Palestine – is *not* far-right?
“You talk about democracy” – when have I talked about democracy? That’s what left-wing supporters of Israel in the United States present as a selling-point for pro-Israel folks in the Democrat Party. Our treaty ally Turkey, our military coalition with Saudi Arabia, our economic relationship with the People’s Republic – all of that hums along just fine on a realpolitik basis. Just ask Tsipras about his relationship with Netanyahu. Democracy is a non-issue in international relations.
Of course, some versions of Democracy are cute. But on the whole has been a severe liability for Israel and the hardcore civil libertarian attitudes prevalent now in Israel are unlikely to survive the coming wars. Kal v’chomer, Israel doesn’t care about the form of government the Arab Republic chooses for herself; this writer is delusional if she thinks anyone in Israel gives a hoot.
“every Nonjew who is killed by Zionists is called a “terrorist” or a ‘soldier’ post mortem to justify his/her killing. But as usual they fail to justify why it was necessary to kill them. ”
Exactly. And because of Captain Underpant’s delusions about the Southern Command, 160 irregulars died for absolutely no good reason. If all y’all had bothered to understand your enemy, those soldiers would still be alive to fight another day.
That’s why it is so important to understand material reality.
If folks listened to this author – who yearns for an unprecedented civilian coup against the Arab Republican army, and seems to favor some sort of anarcho-syndicalist future for Egypt – millions will die. The Arab Republic faces mass starvation because of the unnecessary wars and lunatic economic policies that the State of Palestine imposed on Egypt. Hasn’t the State of Palestine destroyed enough? Does Palestine really need to kill millions of Egyptians in order to get even more undeserved attention on the international stage? Don’t you far-right Arab nationalists ever think about the human costs of your policies?
I haven’t commented in a while (been busy) but figured I’d pop up here. Hopefully the moderators will let this comment through, as a dissenting voice.
As I’ve mentioned, the far-right commentators on this blog have delusional ideas about Israel. This summer alone, these delusions resulted in 160 dead soldiers in Gaza, because the military command completely misunderstood their enemy. Reading this article, the delusions seem to include a complete lack of understanding about the Arab Republic.
Firstly – when has the State of Israel expressed any opinion about what the Arab Republic should be? Does it make any difference to the Israeli state whether Egypt is run as a Khedivate or as a colonial possession of the French or English Monarchy (all of which have been tried with varying levels of success)? Would it matter to Israel if Egypt became an anarcho-socialist commune or a Völkische Führerprinzip (all of which have been given serious consideration in the past Century)? Whatever political structure Egypt chooses does not matter in the slightest to the Israeli state.
The Egyptian population surpassed an unsustainable hundred million population this year as it becomes an increasingly poorer Arab Republic that (other than a half-century peaceful no-man’s land between them) shares virtually no financial, military, cultural, economic, political, historical or religious ties with the State of Israel.
To Israel, the Arab Republic is an irrelevancy.
At the margins, it’s in the interest of the Israeli state that the Arab Republican military remain under unified command – which, by the way, it did under the Arab Republicans, then under the Ikhwan and again under the Arab Republicans when they retook the government.
What this commentator seems to want for Egypt – as she teeters on the brink of mass starvation – is that it convulse with an unprecedented coup *against* the army (which has never happened in world history) and then the Ikhwan or anarcho-socialist or some imagined group of radicals will mobilize their captured army and the starving nation to launch a massive war overseas. So we’re going to launch a policy that will surely result in the death of millions Egyptians. All so that the upper-middle class Arab nationalists in Palestine (who are much much wealthier than Egyptians and also share virtually nothing in common with them) feel empowered.
Might as well harness NASA to make the Muslims feel good about themselves. How did that work out for NASA? #ObamaStrategy
The delusion that underlies the writing here on Mondoweiss, and the truly awful, awful, awful advice that’s promoted speaks volumes about the far-right Arab nationalist cause.
Mooser – Fair enough.
But Arab nationalists are hardly in a position to make the “human rights” case against Israel.
Just look at the mess that you Arab nationalists made of the world (and note in particular the putrid alliances, military adventures, hegemonic overreach, and suffering inflicted by the State of Palestine) which negates any claim by an Arab nationalist to complain about what Israelis or Zionists did or did not do.
You do know that from the mid-1920s and onward, the Arab nationalists have ruled the most violent European political movements, right? I don’t think opening that pandora’s box of “I know what you did in the 1940s” is a wise idea for you Arab nationalists on the far-right.