|
Source: (consider it)
|
Thread: If you could travel back in time to 1948....
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
I know the importance of having a Jewish homeland, but wasn't the real and true underlying element the elephant in the room we are skating around - nobody in the West wanted them in their country or on their doorstep?
Well indeed; it seems to me that everything about this controversy is founded upon antiSemitism. There are a lot of people in this world who would still like the Jews to sit in a corner and die off. Why the hell send them to Alaska!?
The Jews were/are a nation in exile, not a religious denomination.
They have every right to the land of Israel - in any case, it's not as if they invaded a sovereign country and took over!
From memory in the early 1920s there were only 300,000 people living in Palestine. By 1948 there were 2 million(?) and a lot of the growth was from Arabs moving into the area to take the increasing job opportunities created by Jewish business ventures.
And not an insignificant number were illegal Arab immigrants.
So, this myth that the Jews took over someone else's country is far from the truth. Had Israel not been created it may still have been a sparsely populated are with a few historical ruins.
If the Arabs were so keen on the land in that area it makes you wonder why it was so undeveloped when Israel was given the land - and look at the success they've made of it!
The only democracy in the Middle East. Compare it to Syria, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan... What do you want, for these guys to take over and replicate those dreadful places??
Ah. Accusations of antisemitism. I don't discuss Israel/Palestine with people who throw that accusation around.
Bye now.
[ 12. November 2014, 09:11: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Anyway, a year or so ago I attended a barmitzvah on the Sabbath and a wedding (same family) on the Sunday. This was a liberal synagogue in the north of England, so nowhere near a Jewish 'community' that might be strong and confident.
I... what? The largest Yeshiva in Europe is about 3 miles away from where you live.
--------------------
Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Anyway, a year or so ago I attended a barmitzvah on the Sabbath and a wedding (same family) on the Sunday. This was a liberal synagogue in the north of England, so nowhere near a Jewish 'community' that might be strong and confident.
I... what? The largest Yeshiva in Europe is about 3 miles away from where you live.
Well yes, I know that - I've been there and even shopped there. I was thinking of a liberal-type community.
--------------------
"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Anyway, a year or so ago I attended a barmitzvah on the Sabbath and a wedding (same family) on the Sunday. This was a liberal synagogue in the north of England, so nowhere near a Jewish 'community' that might be strong and confident.
I... what? The largest Yeshiva in Europe is about 3 miles away from where you live.
Well yes, I know that - I've been there and even shopped there. I was thinking of a liberal-type community.
You've shopped at a religious school? I'm interested to know what you might have bought there.
--------------------
Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
|
Posted
posted by Prester John quote:
Would you consider Siberia to fulfill your requirements? That is an interesting what-if. A secular Jewish homeland smack dab in the middle of Asia.
Are you for real?
This was the Soviet version of the Pale of Settlement and its inhabitants were subject to the same injustice and persecution in the Oblast as they had been in the Pale.
What you think of as an 'interesting what-if' was just a vast ghetto which was permitted partly to promote a rigorously secular jewish identity since the religion was anathema to the Soviet authorities.
--------------------
Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Prester John
Shipmate
# 5502
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
posted by Prester John quote:
Would you consider Siberia to fulfill your requirements? That is an interesting what-if. A secular Jewish homeland smack dab in the middle of Asia.
Are you for real?
This was the Soviet version of the Pale of Settlement and its inhabitants were subject to the same injustice and persecution in the Oblast as they had been in the Pale.
What you think of as an 'interesting what-if' was just a vast ghetto which was permitted partly to promote a rigorously secular jewish identity since the religion was anathema to the Soviet authorities.
Yes I know. I stated almost as much in my post, which you quote. I'm not making a value judgment. I don't see how that makes it any less interesting in the world of counterfactuals. World history would definitely have been different if all of those future Israelis settled along the Amur River instead.
Posts: 884 | From: SF Bay Area | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Prester John:
World history would definitely have been different if all of those future Israelis settled along the Amur River instead.
True. Instead of being threatened by Arab nations and Iran, Israel would be stuck between China, Mongolia and the USSR/Russia.
On the basis that Jews were split between North America and Europe, but were more secure and less unwelcome in North America, would a Jewish national homeland in the Catskills have been such a bad idea?
--------------------
"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Prester John
Shipmate
# 5502
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
]True. Instead of being threatened by Arab nations and Iran, Israel would be stuck between China, Mongolia and the USSR/Russia.
On the basis that Jews were split between North America and Europe, but were more secure and less unwelcome in North America, would a Jewish national homeland in the Catskills have been such a bad idea?
There is a joke about the Borscht Belt somewhere in there, dying to get out. On a more serious note I think it is a good question but based upon the experiences of the Native Americans who were often forcibly moved to their own "national homeland" I don't think we can automatically assume it would have been a pleasant experience.
Posts: 884 | From: SF Bay Area | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
How about Khazaria, with core lands north of the Caucasus and a capital Atil in the Volga delta?
Er...no: that area has quite enough ethnic tensions and violence presently as is, without throwing an extra lot in.
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
From memory in the early 1920s there were only 300,000 people living in Palestine. By 1948 there were 2 million(?) and a lot of the growth was from Arabs moving into the area to take the increasing job opportunities created by Jewish business ventures.
And not an insignificant number were illegal Arab immigrants.
So, this myth that the Jews took over someone else's country is far from the truth. Had Israel not been created it may still have been a sparsely populated are with a few historical ruins.
Here are some actual statistics. Compare and contrast the Muslim population between 1915, 1945 and 1967 ...
--------------------
Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
Posts: 7247 | From: Liverpool, UK | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
|
Posted
so not substantially different to what I said
--------------------
"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Anyway, a year or so ago I attended a barmitzvah on the Sabbath and a wedding (same family) on the Sunday. This was a liberal synagogue in the north of England, so nowhere near a Jewish 'community' that might be strong and confident.
I... what? The largest Yeshiva in Europe is about 3 miles away from where you live.
Well yes, I know that - I've been there and even shopped there. I was thinking of a liberal-type community.
You've shopped at a religious school? I'm interested to know what you might have bought there.
LOL, no I didn't mean there, I meant in the shops in the community in the surrounding streets ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
--------------------
"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
From memory in the early 1920s there were only 300,000 people living in Palestine. By 1948 there were 2 million(?) and a lot of the growth was from Arabs moving into the area to take the increasing job opportunities created by Jewish business ventures.
And not an insignificant number were illegal Arab immigrants.
So, this myth that the Jews took over someone else's country is far from the truth. Had Israel not been created it may still have been a sparsely populated are with a few historical ruins.
Here are some actual statistics. Compare and contrast the Muslim population between 1915, 1945 and 1967 ...
So, Mudfrog. Given that the Palestinian Mandate was roughly 26,625km^2, and had a population of in 1947 of 1,970,000, that gives an average population density of about 74 people per km^2.
Would you consider Bosnia and Herzegovina (at 75 per km^2) "a sparsely populated area with a few historical ruins"? Because I wouldn't, and I'm reasonably certain the Bosnians wouldn't either.
I think you're buying into some myths all of your own.
--------------------
Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
|
Posted
Well the UK today has a population density of 265 people per square km, so what's your point?
74 per square km sounds pretty sparse to me!
--------------------
"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
Try selling your point to the Bosnians and come back to us when you've successfully done so.
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Well the UK today has a population density of 265 people per square km, so what's your point?
74 per square km sounds pretty sparse to me!
When a sizeable portion of the land is little better than desert, (eg, the Negev) it can't support many people and Palestine was dirt-poor back then.
The UK may be densely populated, compared to say France, but it has plenty of natural resources.
--------------------
"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Well the UK today has a population density of 265 people per square km, so what's your point?
74 per square km sounds pretty sparse to me!
Population density of Scotland is 67.5 per km^2. Again, does that qualify for your "a sparsely populated area with a few historical ruins" test? Glasgow? Edinburgh? Would you empty those cities and have their populations head south?
No. No you wouldn't.
--------------------
Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
|
Posted
Oh come on, it wasn't supposed to be a demographically correct remark!
What I was saying was that the area of the British Mandate in Palestine was hardly a fully developed, densely populated area. It was not a Sovereign state that the Israelis marched into like the Germans invading Poland!
The land was promised by the Balfour declaration and wasn't handled very well, I grant you. But please, let's get rid of the popular myth that Israel has taken over someone else's country.
--------------------
"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
|
Posted
And did the Balfour declaration-makers consult the Arab population of this land?
--------------------
I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
|
Posted
Arthur Balfour didn't consult any of the local landowners, neither jewish nor muslim.
More than half the resident arabs didn't own the land on which they lived and worked, it was still owned by absentee Ottoman landlords, most of whom decamped to Cairo or Istanbul after WWI.
--------------------
Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Oh come on, it wasn't supposed to be a demographically correct remark!
You could have chosen not to make it. But you did. You happened to be proved wrong. Okay?
quote:
What I was saying was that the area of the British Mandate in Palestine was hardly a fully developed, densely populated area. It was not a Sovereign state that the Israelis marched into like the Germans invading Poland!
The land was promised by the Balfour declaration and wasn't handled very well, I grant you. But please, let's get rid of the popular myth that Israel has taken over someone else's country.
This is now a different argument, regarding immigration and sovereignty. Palestine under the British Mandate contained several large cities and towns, as well as agricultural land, as well as unproductive desert. The Jewish immigrants didn't move to the desert. They moved into the cities and towns and the agricultural land which, as you full well know, already had businesses and farmers who were not predominantly Jewish.
How would you now attempt to describe what happened, given that you've rowed back on the "sparsely populated with ruins" bit?
--------------------
Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
malik3000
Shipmate
# 11437
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Whatever right the Jewish people have in the area, the Israelis do not have the same.
Then you have very little idea what being Jewish actually entails.
I don't see how anyone's understanding of themselves entitles them to take someone else's land off of them. That's the bottom line here; people living in Palestine at the time should have had a prior claim; I'd not react well to anyone telling me that their God told them they could take the land my house stands on, and I'm not surprised the Palestinian residents at the time didn't either. What of self determination for them?
Thank you Karl. It took long enough in this thread for someone to finally point out what is, morally speaking, the bottom line.
--------------------
God = love.
Otherwise, things are not just black or white.
Posts: 3149 | From: North America | Registered: May 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
|
Posted
quote:
malik3000: It took long enough in this thread for someone to finally point out what is, morally speaking, the bottom line.
Indeed. "Thou shalt not give land to someone else without consulting the people who liveth there" is obvious. The rest are side issues.
--------------------
I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
|
Posted
There is so much rubbish in the arguments here.
"The people who lived there were not properly using it, they hadn't even bothered to establish a proper country." Well, at least there is precedent for that argument.
The Jews were not a "Nation in Exile". They are a disparate group connected by a religion. Some can trace ancestors back to the historic Israel, some cannot. But if we look at historic land rights, get packing.
And do we treat everyone's religious text as mandate?
The British Mandate for Palestine was established to protect the interests of a foreign power against other foreign powers. One occupier displacing another and fuck the current residents.
I am not saying Jewish people have no right to settle in the area.
I am saying they do not have an established right to that area over everyone else, the way it was handled was fucked up and Isreal is currently handling the situation in a fucked up manner.
Much of the argument here is because Christianity arose from Judaism and shares much.
The Holocaust. This is the true trump card. Hard to argue against that and I'm not.
Or, well, only in as far as saying is that the handling of the aftermath was fucked up. And that current misbehaviour is not justified by past atrocity.
--------------------
I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
|
Posted
I always wonder if the religious text says that God grants the right to ethnically cleanse?
--------------------
I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I always wonder if the religious text says that God grants the right to ethnically cleanse?
Well, read Joshua and other parts of the OT, and yes, it goes beyond just "giving the right" to commanding it. So it's not surprising that some of the loudest proponents of Israel-no-questions-asked are American fundamentalists who tend to read these texts literally and woodenly.
Myself, as an evangelical with a high (but not fundamentalist) view of Scripture, I have a love/hate relationship with Joshua and struggle to understand what the heck the conquest passages are all about (Greg Boyd has a new commentary coming out on it I'm eagerly awaiting). If anything would cause me to adopt a "lower" view of inspiration, it would be this. But the bottom line is the principle that any one text needs to be read in light of the whole text. And the apparent message of the conquest passages-- that God not only condones but commands ethnic cleansing-- is completely at odds with the whole witness of Scripture-- the NT in particular, but significant parts of the OT (e.g. Jonah) as well.
So, while it's certainly not my place to tell Jews how to interpret their text, as an American evangelical I can tell my fundamentalist brethren that they are building a very problematic house-on-sand in using the conquest passages as justification for unquestioning, unreflective support for Israel.
--------------------
"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
|
Posted
Partly it boils down to Western guilt at not having done more (anything, really) for European jewry before 1939 deciding to salve their consciences by declaring land 'left-over' after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire to be available.
The ill-feeling in the surrounding arab states had already been fuelled by pre 1939 jewish settlers buying land from absentee owners/landlords, and little was done by the Mandate authorities (in other words the UK) to stop the tit-for-tat small-scale atrocities that became a feature of daily life in Palestine from the late 1920s onwards.
Add to the mix the incredibly pro-arab mandarins at the FO (in some contrast to the politicos feelings), the shenanigans of the likes of Glubb, Lash, etc, and a total failure to even reign in, never mind arrest and prosecute, Haj Amin al-Husseini (not only Mufti of Jerusalem but wanted for war crimes by the Yugoslav government) and the resultant toxic stew is only going one way.
Granted, the jews could not be described as a 'nation in exile' since the diaspora began before the static notion of nation states held much sway, but that doesn't mean that, once you took Poland, Germany or wherever out of the equation, the land where they are now was such a bizarre choice.
Where else were the few remaining European jews meant to go? Sure, the US took a few, as did the UK: Australia put up the barriers, South Africa made it very difficult for jews to get visas; countries in South America were very anti. Those seeking to regain family houses and land in Eastern Europe were not welcome - in Poland there were riots as early as August 1945 and a full-scale pogrom at Kielce the following year, and the situation in Hungary was little better. Jews seeking to return to France were not greeted with open arms - small surprise since during the war the round-up of most French jews was not carried out by the Germans but by the French Milice. The only country to welcome back its jews with open arms (having previously got them to safety across the Kattegat) was Denmark.
What has made the situation a thousand times worse is the abject cowardice exhibited by sovereign states - especially those permanent members of the Security Council - in their failure to take action against those countries which have as part of their constitution the destruction of the state of Israel. The massive influx into Israel of jews from Iraq, Syria, Yemen, etc, didn't happen because they wanted to go and live in a tent in a desert but because they were driven out.
Sure, condemn the huge number of arab refugees from what is now Israel if you like, but do acknowledge the nigh on a million jewish refugees from arab countries going the other way - thats more than the total from post-war Europe.
If ethnic-cleansing happens to a particular tribe it is usually confined to a fairly precise geographic area where people can be re-settled if/as/when the situation has improved. In the case of the jews, they were spread out all over the world, in many cases there was no chance of a return to their place of origin, and even more were then driven from their homes: they had to go somewhere and some kind of link between them all had to be found. There were jews in Palestine, they were prepared to take the huge number of almost feral orphaned teenagers, and there was an historic link to the area: not perfect, but the best that could be achieved.
As for Israel jumping the gun by declaring nationhood, if they'd waited for consensus at the UN they'd still be sitting behind barbed wire.
--------------------
Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Saul the Apostle
Shipmate
# 13808
|
Posted
Tons of ideas were explored for a Jewish homeland.
One of the most interesting was actually Uganda.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_a_Jewish_state
Saul
--------------------
"I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest."
Posts: 1772 | From: unsure | Registered: Jun 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
|
Posted
The attempt to settle the land in what is now Kenya was never serious: quite apart from anything else, the height above sea-level would have caused all sorts of difficulties until people became acclimatised, not to mention its extreme isolation - its still pretty isolated now.
At the same time as supposedly promoting the idea of a jewish homeland, Chamberlain was giving discreet support to the antics of the BBL and, of course, the immigration controls brought in by a Conservative government in 1905 came into being to a large extent through intensive lobbying, protest and rioting in working class areas, especially the East End but also in places like Birmingham.
Chamberlain's feelings about jews in his own words (to Baron Sonnino, then Italian Finance Minister): There is in fact only one race I despise - the Jews, sir. They are physical cowards.
You would take seriously something proposed by a holder of those views? Particularly in relation to putting them onto a plateau with wildlife including predatory big cats, etc?
--------------------
Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Augustine the Aleut
Shipmate
# 1472
|
Posted
While L'Organist's comment that: quote:
You would take seriously something proposed by a holder of those views? Particularly in relation to putting them onto a plateau with wildlife including predatory big cats, etc?
is sensible on the face of it, I fear that years of experience of public life means that my answer will not be the one he thinks might be obvious.
Posts: 6236 | From: Ottawa, Canada | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Saul the Apostle
Shipmate
# 13808
|
Posted
Much of this debate depends on who is defining it.
The post 1945 (post holocaust etc) scenario was that Jewish people said to themselves, never again would they allow their destiny to be controlled by non Jews.
In 1948, had the Arabs accepted the UN plan for a 2 state solution (as the Jews in fact did) , they'd have had the lions share of Palestine, they did not accept it, and as they say the rest is history.
To understand the region and Israel specifically, is to see things from the point of view that Jews do not (in any way shape or form) trust non Jews to shape their welfare and destiny. The Jewish state idea was founded by Theodor Herzel and he saw the intrinsic prejudice of French anti semitism in the infamous Dreyfuss case; modern Zionism was born.
With few exceptions, Arab leadership has rested on hyperbole, extremism and vitriolic attacks upon Israel. The Muslim Brotherhood and all the other Islamic extremists do not present solutions - just more of the same - continual conflict.
1948 could have been so different.
Saul the Apostle.
--------------------
"I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest."
Posts: 1772 | From: unsure | Registered: Jun 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Byron
Shipmate
# 15532
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Saul the Apostle:
Much of this debate depends on who is defining it.
The post 1945 (post holocaust etc) scenario was that Jewish people said to themselves, never again would they allow their destiny to be controlled by non Jews.
In 1948, had the Arabs accepted the UN plan for a 2 state solution (as the Jews in fact did) , they'd have had the lions share of Palestine, they did not accept it, and as they say the rest is history.
To understand the region and Israel specifically, is to see things from the point of view that Jews do not (in any way shape or form) trust non Jews to shape their welfare and destiny. The Jewish state idea was founded by Theodor Herzel and he saw the intrinsic prejudice of French anti semitism in the infamous Dreyfuss case; modern Zionism was born.
With few exceptions, Arab leadership has rested on hyperbole, extremism and vitriolic attacks upon Israel. The Muslim Brotherhood and all the other Islamic extremists do not present solutions - just more of the same - continual conflict.
1948 could have been so different.
Saul the Apostle.
Exactly this.
It baffles me how, after the Holocaust, anyone could expect the majority of the Jewish people to trust their safety to non-Jews. I don't for a second buy the "we didn't know how bad it'd get" line used to excuse closing borders. The Nazi Party's genocidal intent was plain from the beginning. There's a good word for people who knowingly leave people in lethal danger. Accessories.
It also baffles me why Israel is subjected to such disproportionate scrutiny. Arab treatment of Palestinian "refugees" (the vast majority of whom are born and raised in Arab countries, and kept stateless and destitute as a propaganda tool) is barely known, let alone condemned, while Israel is subjected to rhetoric about apartheid and, unbelievably, Nazism.
I'm willing to accept that antisemitism isn't to blame, but if so, what is?
Posts: 1112 | Registered: Mar 2010
| IP: Logged
|
|
Philip Charles
Ship's cutler
# 618
|
Posted
No matter what has happened to the Jews in Europe and there is no question they suffered one of the greatest evils in all of human history. No matter how much Jerusalem and Palestine were seen as being central to their culture and perceived as theirs by right, it remains that the creation of the state of Israel is one of worst cases of Western colonialism of the twentieth century. An injustice should not be resolved by creating another injustice.
Unlike the tribes of the Americas (and other places) the indigenous people of Palestine have powerful supporters in the Arab world.
We cannot undo the mistakes of the past. The problem we face is in the here and now.
--------------------
There are 10 kinds of people. Those who understand binary and those who don't.
Posts: 89 | From: Dunedin, NZ | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
ldjjd
Shipmate
# 17390
|
Posted
Perhaps as part of the Yalta agreements, I'd have given all of Germany to the Jews. The German people, having created the problem, become the solution.
The Russians would send the Germans in the Soviet occupation zone to Siberia.
Likewise, the French, their Germans to Tunisia;
the British, their Germans to Burma; and
the Americans, their Germans to Alaska.
I would allow to remain in Germany only those Germans who actively resisted the Nazis and/or directly aided the Jews.
I would have no qualms about displacing the rest, giving them uninhabited land and providing basic survival needs.
Palestine would become a UN protectorate.
Posts: 294 | Registered: Oct 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
Nothing like a bit of vindictiveness to stock up problems for the next generation; cf. Treaty of Versailles.
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Byron
Shipmate
# 15532
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Philip Charles:
No matter what has happened to the Jews in Europe and there is no question they suffered one of the greatest evils in all of human history. No matter how much Jerusalem and Palestine were seen as being central to their culture and perceived as theirs by right, it remains that the creation of the state of Israel is one of worst cases of Western colonialism of the twentieth century. An injustice should not be resolved by creating another injustice.
Unlike the tribes of the Americas (and other places) the indigenous people of Palestine have powerful supporters in the Arab world.
We cannot undo the mistakes of the past. The problem we face is in the here and now.
How is Israel "Western colonialism"?
Zionists started arriving in numbers in the 19th century, when the Ottoman Empire ruled Palestine. They legally bought land and settled. When the Ottomans finally imploded, the League of Nations set up a mandate, administered by Britain, which was, at best, cool about Jewish immigration, and all but closed the borders in the late 30s.
At no point did a Western country attempt to colonize Palestine. Israel was a ground-up movement by Zionists, often in the face of Western hostility. Yes, there was the Balfour Declaration, but that was soon rolled back on, and in any case, it was about self-determination, not imperialism.
Posts: 1112 | Registered: Mar 2010
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Byron:
How is Israel "Western colonialism"?
I have to assume you've never heard of the Sykes-Picot Agreement, which was, after the division of Africa, one of the most egregious acts of European hubris.
--------------------
Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Philip Charles
Ship's cutler
# 618
|
Posted
quote:
How is Israel "Western colonialism"?
The indigenous Jews of Palestine were Mizrahi Jews who remained after the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70, plus those of the Old testament diaspora, Egypt, Babylon etc, the Sephardic Jews from Spain who migrated across North Africa and merged with the Mizrahi. These were Jews with an arab cultural background. The migrants of the late 19th and 20th centuries were Ashkenazi Jews from Europe who had a western cultural background which was very different from the culture of the indigenous Jews. They brought their western culture with them and colonised Palestine. This western-Jewish culture was also imposed on the Mizrahi.
quote:
Zionists started arriving in numbers in the 19th century, when the Ottoman Empire ruled Palestine. They legally bought land and settled.
The new colonialists bought land off the old colonialists. Both the Ottomans and Ashkenazi were colonialists.
quote:
When the Ottomans finally imploded, the League of Nations set up a mandate, administered by Britain, which was, at best, cool about Jewish immigration, and all but closed the borders in the late 30s.
Naturally they were cool about Ashkenazi migration as they were overwhelming the local population. The Ashkenazi Stern Gang started a campaign of terrorism when they were not getting their own way.
quote:
At no point did a Western country attempt to colonize Palestine. Israel was a ground-up movement by Zionists, often in the face of Western hostility.
The Zionists were a religious and cultural group from Europe and were citizens of European nations and imbued with their host nations' cultures. They decided to migrate. A persecuted religious group in England decided to migrate on the Mayflower and colonised North America. Both the Pilgrim Fathers and the Ashkenazi were colonialists even though they had "issues" with their home country.
quote:
and in any case, it was about self-determination, not imperialism.
When the Brits tried to give the indigenous people the right to self-determination they were bombed for their efforts.
--------------------
There are 10 kinds of people. Those who understand binary and those who don't.
Posts: 89 | From: Dunedin, NZ | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
|
Posted
My (late) aunt Sarah would have just loved to be described as being of "an arab cultural background"! Yes, she was born in Gaza, brought up in Hebron, moved back to Gaza; yes, her family had moved between Gaza, Hebron and points in between for at least 500 years, but in no way did she consider herself, or her ancestors, "culturally arab" - she was Jewish! She knew she wasn't culturally accepted by her neighbours - with family coming from Hebron who better to know? She may not have been able to remember, but the Hebron massacres of 1517 and 1834 killed family members, not to mention the 1929 massacre which destroyed the jewish sommunity of Hebron.
For most of her life she experienced incidents of physical danger - first from her fellow subjects of the Ottoman empire, then from the Mandate's British squaddies and policemen, lastly from her own when she ended up marrying a Brit (a goy!) over there to administer the mandate.
Don't try to create some mythical paradise for the jews of Palestine before the arrival of zionist settlers because it didn't exist.
--------------------
Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
|
Posted
See, this is why there is no moment in time when things could be changed significantly for the better.
There are fingers pointed in various direction to fix blame. Problem is, most of them are right. Plenty of fuck ups, arrogance and disregard on all sides.
With history, you can occasionally pin down who pulled the trigger. But the majority of the time you find a joint manufacture of the gun, ammunition and setting for use.
--------------------
I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Byron
Shipmate
# 15532
|
Posted
Doc Tor, 'course I've heard of it, but it doesn't set up Israel. Zionists did that off their own bat, long before the decadent Ottoman Empire disintegrated.
Philip Charles, what I took issue with was the claim of Western colonization, as if Zionism were some European imperial project, instead of a diverse movement amongst Jews.
I note an underlying hostility to immigration here. Is this specific to Palestine, or general? If it's not general, but specific to Jewish immigration to Palestine, why single that out?
Posts: 1112 | Registered: Mar 2010
| IP: Logged
|
|
cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Byron:
It also baffles me why Israel is subjected to such disproportionate scrutiny. Arab treatment of Palestinian "refugees" (the vast majority of whom are born and raised in Arab countries, and kept stateless and destitute as a propaganda tool) is barely known, let alone condemned, while Israel is subjected to rhetoric about apartheid and, unbelievably, Nazism.
Perhaps this is true in Europe. It certainly is not in the US. Rather, the default political position is that Israel is given a free pass to create what, despite the ironic historical allusions, really cannot be called anything other than a ghetto. This side of the pond the rhetoric is very much the other way 'round.
quote:
Originally posted by Byron:
I'm willing to accept that antisemitism isn't to blame, but if so, what is?
justice?
--------------------
"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Xifer
Apprentice
# 17819
|
Posted
The other day, i was listening to a prominent Jewish negotiator with the Palestinians who among other things stated that Sovereignty was in the Demographic. Now i had been reading Keanu Sai's look at international law and he suggests that the sovereignty of a nation is in the land. If it were in the demographic, than where they live is not so important as they live together as a community.
When i lived in Eastern California in Inyo county, i had noticed certain similarities to the land of Palestine such as a river that ended in a salt sea and Hollywood filming sites for religious films. One of the thought fantasies i had at the time was to take one of the sides of the conflict, probably the Jews and build them a new Jerusalem in the Sierras and give by treaty five hundred miles of eastern California to include San Diego. Or we could give them Los Angeles and give San Diego to Arizona.
Posts: 7 | From: Missoula | Registered: Sep 2013
| IP: Logged
|
|
Saul the Apostle
Shipmate
# 13808
|
Posted
To see Israel as some sort of imperialist colonial era ''mistake'', is in itself quite offensive.
The whole thrust of nineteenth century yearning by the Jewish people (zionist movement) to have their own national home, was kick started by (pre holocaust) anti semitism in Europe e.g. the violent Russian pogroms and the Dreyfuss affair in France etc.
To see Israel simply as a colonial aberration would be to insult the Jewish people en masse. Every other nation has it's own home, why oh why cannot the Jewish people have a Jewish homeland?
Saul
--------------------
"I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest."
Posts: 1772 | From: unsure | Registered: Jun 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
And for the people already living there who did not want the land where they live to be someone else's homeland - what of them?
That's the issue here.
[ 13. November 2014, 16:13: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
And also, this whole 'national homeland' thing is 19th century bollocks - no-one has a 'national home', certainly not in the sense of exclusive possession of that home for one specific ethnicity (define and determine!) eg: England has been and certainly is now home to people of many national and ethnic origins; conversely there are people who are descended from inhabitants of England who are widely-distributed round the world.
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
|
Posted
I know plenty of peoples who don't have a homeland.
--------------------
I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
|
LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
|
Posted
quote:
Gwai: Hell, my grandmother was sold from England to America. Do I have a right to go back to Yorkshire? It's my ancestral homeland.
You have the right to own England.
--------------------
I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
JoannaP
Shipmate
# 4493
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by Byron:
It also baffles me why Israel is subjected to such disproportionate scrutiny. Arab treatment of Palestinian "refugees" (the vast majority of whom are born and raised in Arab countries, and kept stateless and destitute as a propaganda tool) is barely known, let alone condemned, while Israel is subjected to rhetoric about apartheid and, unbelievably, Nazism.
Perhaps this is true in Europe. It certainly is not in the US. Rather, the default political position is that Israel is given a free pass to create what, despite the ironic historical allusions, really cannot be called anything other than a ghetto. This side of the pond the rhetoric is very much the other way 'round.
I think it is true in Europe. My explanation is that Israel claims to be a liberal democracy and is judged accordingly. None of the Arab countries make that claim and so they are not judged by the same standards.
--------------------
"Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow." R. H. Tawney (quoted by Isaiah Berlin)
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
Posts: 1877 | From: England | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
Printer-friendly view
