BS: Palestine

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,Teribus
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 03:28 AM

"Why are we stuck on countries recognizing each other? If the majority of the world recognizes each and both, why impose that sticking point on the disputing countries? What is gained exactly? They are competitors..I just don't understand why anyone has to recognize anybody..business people are going to do business with each other; laws have to be just; there have to be security measures in place..so why make them swallow their pride? What is the point?

And don't bother telling me than if they don't recognize each other they will attack each other. One doesn't seem to have much to do with the other. You can have good security without imposed recognition..but the world has to watch." - mg

This is without doubt the most idiotic thing I think I have ever read in my life.

To answer the various points put:

1: "Why are we stuck on countries recognizing each other?"

Because that recognition allows countries to be governed, that recognition allows nations to be separate but yet allows them to co-operate and peacefully co-exist pursuing what are perceived to be their national interests and protecting their cultures and way of life. If there was no recognition of countries the world would be a massive lawless free for all.

2: "If the majority of the world recognizes each and both, why impose that sticking point on the disputing countries?"

Ah, but the majority of the world does not recognize "each" and "both". All member states of the UN recognize Israel and did so formally in 1949. All states that have subsequently been created on joining the UN have had to formally recognize the existing member states. In 1949 the Arabs of Palestine had the opportunity to create their own state and rejected the proposal, they did so for greed in the hope of personal gain from the anticipated destruction of Israel and the eradication of her people.

The UN cannot in all honesty, out of respect to its own founding charter, give official recognition to and welcome into its membership a state (Palestine) whose declared aim is the destruction and annihilation of a long standing member of the United Nations (Israel). You are basically inviting the fox into the hen house and hoping for eggs for breakfast tomorrow morning as usual - utterly idiotic.

3: "What is gained exactly?"

In recognizing Israel and settling their differences?? For Palestine?? Any hope at all of survival. As previously stated any Palestinian State and the people who live within it borders rely on Israel in order to survive. They rely on Israeli services, the rely on the Israeli economy. Why haven't Jordan and Egypt over the last 63 years taken up the slack and developed trade and industry with the people of the West Bank and Gaza to provide them with alternative markets for their produce and for their labour? Oh that's right they couldn't because both Egypt and Jordan were too busy feeding the Palestinians a load of bullshit about how everything would be perfect for them once they had killed off all the Jews and destroyed Israel.

4: "They are competitors..I just don't understand why anyone has to recognize anybody..business people are going to do business with each other; laws have to be just; there have to be security measures in place..so why make them swallow their pride? What is the point?"

As stated above - survival for Palestine. Israel can function and is economically viable as a state without having to rely upon a single Palestinian. Why make them swallow their pride?? Because for 63 years they have been wrong, for 63 years they have consistently chosen violence over peace, they have to admit to themselves that they have been wrong in order that they can move forwards.

5: "And don't bother telling me than if they don't recognize each other they will attack each other. One doesn't seem to have much to do with the other. You can have good security without imposed recognition..but the world has to watch."

A tale of two Palestines - Gaza and the West Bank:

What happened? The Israelis leave Gaza completely and for their gesture are rewarded with a constant stream of missiles, rockets and mortar bombs raining down on their citizens. From the West Bank, Iranian and Iraqi backers sponsor suicide bombers to cross the porous borders to kill indiscriminately in Israeli cities, snipers from inside the West Bank randomly kill Israelis going about their daily lives. As far as the West Bank goes all this stops when Israel closes the border and builds a wall - What has happened to the intent to attack from the Arab side of that Wall? There is no doubt at all that both regimes in Gaza and in the West Bank would attack Israel - they have said so, they have stated it in their founding charters.

The only thing is while things remain as they are (i.e. Palestine not being a "State") the leaders of those regimes in Gaza and in the West Bank can deny responsibility and claim that those carrying out the attacks are a renegade few. Once Palestine becomes a "State" the regimes in charge become responsible for controlling their renegades, they are responsible for either delivering or bringing them to justice. If they do not and the attacks continue (as they undoubtedly would) then Israel would be perfectly justified in declaring war and attacking the newly recognized state of Palestine.

By the bye we, the world, have been watching for 63 years - what good has that done?

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 09:29 AM

I took it that mg was talking about a process of formal recognition. I suspect that most countries may well never get round to formally recognising each other, any more than individual people formally recognise each other or families formally recognise one another.

In fact formal recognition feels like something you'd do because the process of informal recognition had broken down.
.........................
Mrrzy ~~ IMO your question has been dealt with adequately in the answers above wrote MtheGM. I can't see it myself. There've been people saying they are for or against recognition, and lots of stuff about events long ago - but I haven't seen much if anything directly about why recognition is something that should be opposed. I may have missed something - it's a long thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 09:34 AM

McG ~ Have a look at Teribus' answer, just before your last post. What else do you want by way of answer?

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,keith A
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 09:38 AM

" I suspect that most countries may well never get round to formally recognising each other, "

I am no expert but I think that is wrong.
WIthout recognition can you have diplomatic contact, consular representation, trade or even visitors with an unrecognised passport?

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: mg
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 10:57 AM

I am not talking about recognizing that a country exists and going through various protocols..I am talking about making them admit that the country that is occupying them (in general, theoretically speaking) has a right to exist. Why add that bit of humiliation and case for future bitterness? That is different than admitting that they do exist and we will grit out teeth and bear it and follow standard international practices. of course it does not mean as long as you refuse to admit of a "right to exist" you get to attack them, etc. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,keith A
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 11:15 AM

So you would admit that they exist, but deny that they had a right to exist?

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: mg
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 11:35 AM

Yes.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: mg
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 11:38 AM

No.to clarify...I would not deny anyone had a right to exist.. I just would not insist on an occupied people or people in any dispute having to state that the other entity had a right to exist. It is a hurdle of humiliation that they should not have to endure and brings out the stubbornness in everyone.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 11:58 AM

I think you are a bit confused, mg. If they were declared a state, in what sense would they be occupied, please?

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: mg
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 12:48 PM

well gee...guess I am a bit confused. We need to concentrate on security measures and water and hopefully reducing the population pressure on Palestine through immigration etc. I think steps have to be taken obviously before the Good Fairy declares any place a state. And there will have to be martial law I presume for some time...no one is going to be happy with any decisions. Other countries that are discriminating against Jews need to be watched carefully and pressure put on them, so the need to immigrate is not as strong. This all needs to be tied into foreign aid.

We also need to look carefully at campaign money in US..where it has gone, what pressure has been applied etc. What has been done out of a feeling that this is absolutely the right thing to do and what has been done out of oh dear I won't win election if I don't vote certain ways. And people do realize that our lives are at stake here, do they not? This is a flash point. The more we can do to ensure security for all, and justice where we can..the safer we are. I am sure that for a while it will be through walls and checkpoint charlies and martial law and boring courts settling water disputes and poring ?? over old treaties and maps but it ahs to be done. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 12:55 PM

Those are two different things, occupation and recognition - Kuwait did not cease to be a recognised state, and a member of the United Nations while it was occupied.

Moreover, while Palestine does not have United Nations membership at present, it is recognised as a state by a large majority of countries, despite the occupation.

As for the repeated claims that a refusal of the Palestine Authority to recognise the state of Israelis a barrier to statehood for Palestine, it's worth pointing out that in 1983 the PLO did recognise "the right of the state of Israel to exist in peace and security", and in his speech to the UN Mahmoud Abbas reiterated a commitment to "cooperative relations based on parity and equity between two neighbouring states - Palestine and Israel."

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 01:01 PM

THat 1983 should have been 1993...

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 01:36 PM

MG:   well gee...***guess I am a bit confused***. We need to concentrate on security measures and water and hopefully reducing the population pressure on Palestine through immigration etc. I think steps have to be taken obviously before the Good Fairy declares any place a state. And there will have to be martial law I presume for some time...no one is going to be happy with any decisions. Other countries that are discriminating against Jews need to be watched carefully and pressure put on them, so the need to immigrate is not as strong~~~
.,.,
*** Yay; I guess you are. Don't really know where to begin ~~

I mean, do you really think that Israel still exists solely as a refuge for Jews who are being persecuted in other countries? And, I mean, martial law policed by whom? and is Israel, a sovereign state, to be subject to it? ··· And I mean···

Oh, the hell with it> Teribus, maybe you can return and take over to try and make some sort of concord of this discord.

It's way beyond me!

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 01:57 PM

Yes, the basic idea is they should be able to travel on Palestinian passports, which right now aren't "recognized" so you might be able to get OUT of Palestein on one but you wouldn't be able to ARRIVE anywhere. Like that guy whose country dissolved before he cleared customs and suddenly he's stuck in the transit lounge.
Which, funny story now decades later, happened to a friend of mine's mom who died in transit and the country she'd left wouldn't let her back in as she was dead and the airline certainly wasn't going to put her on the plane...

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 02:05 PM

Can you arrive in Arab countries on an Israeli passport now?

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 02:15 PM

Whether you could or couldn't have any relation to whether the country involved recognised Israel.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 02:25 PM

Whether you could or couldn't use an Israeli passport wouldn't have any relation to whether the country involved recognised Israel.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 02:29 PM

Actually, there are places where if you have stamps from them in your passport you can't get into Israel on a US passport.

I'm pretty sure those places wouldn't let you in on an Israeli passport, is why.

But this part needs data. I'll ask Mom, she had to use her other passport for travel to Israel because of that.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: mg
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 03:48 PM

I do not think solely but I think persecution or discrimination is the strongest argument and certainly the strongest argument for inviting people in to stay, thus putting more population pressure on land and water. If there were no persecution and had been none in the recent past, what would be the justification for displacing indigenous..as in living there right now..people. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: ollaimh
Date: 02 Oct 11 - 09:58 PM

to correct some historical inaccuracies the name palestine was added y the romans after the philistines as a new name for the land after they had smashed the last jewish revolt and wanted all things jewish destroyed and forgotten. so the name and people of israel perdate any palestinians name. however a lot of modern palestinian people are the direct descendants of the "cannanites" who were the ancestors of many jews as well.   judaisim is a religious distinction not a racial one and many modern jews are descendants of converts.

or course none of this really settles the present issues and when people refer to their historical calims they are usually saying they have no legal or moral claim and all should recognize that.

i have major problems with the state of israel in its settlement program, however i equally find the leadership of the palestinians unsupportable. i do not understand the need for so many to take sides. if we all get out of the issue and let things take their course a solution is more probable. i am especially bothered by the new left getting on board to censure israel . as a long time socialist i see no reason to suport fascists of nay kind. the palestinian leadership has repeatedly shown fascist leanings. they have experienced violations of rights but i ain't fighting for them untill they stop such idiocy as electing people who support the protocols of the elders of zion as fact--as hamass does, and abbas wrote his phd thesis accepting those writings as fact(he apologized for being a holocoust denialist but sorry--no holocoust denialist will ever get my support--get democratic progressive leaders and principles and i will support you but not before)

i am also disturbed by the persecution of the christian minority in palestinian territopries. they once made up aproximately forty per cent of the population but after repeated abuse they are now half that. there is also open and violent persecutuion of gays and lesbians and women.

untill the palestinian people start to meet basic human and civil rights standards i am not taking sides. israel at least has human and civil rights protections. most palestinian homesexuals get refugee status in israel for instance.

i really would like to see the left stop taking sides. it servrs no constructive purpose and diverts energy from l;ocal pressing issues

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Ringer
Date: 03 Oct 11 - 12:54 PM

"... Palestine ... is recognised as a state by a large majority of countries, despite the occupation."

What occupation?

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Oct 11 - 02:26 PM

Palestine as a regional name predates the Romans, I'm pretty sure...

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Oct 11 - 02:30 PM

In fact, the name Palestine (Greek Παλαιστίνη Palaistinē) appears as far back as the 5th century BC in the famous historical writings of Herodotus, who says that its inhabitants were circumcised.

from a website somewhere. I think that the Romans were not around that long ago...

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 03 Oct 11 - 04:17 PM

Things can not take their course because the Palestinians will be compressed further and further and their reproduction is unfortunatley very high..there will be too much bloodshed.

The reason the mess has gotten as bad is because people have not spoken out enough. People were so overwhelmed after WWII and sickened by the Holocost that the whole issue is confused in their minds. Palestinians equals Nazis. I think they were just sort of sitting around minding their own business and got caught up in all of this..not all at once but it might have been tolerable up to a point. They have been grossly insulted and this has become almost the truth by now...that they did not exist, that they did not love their children, that others had to come and show them how to farm when they were famous farmers in the fertile areas at least. So it has to be untangled by each and every one of us. It does not mean giving anyone the right to terrorism or violence of any sort...our pen is the sword and our voice is the cannon. There need to be borders and treaties and water rights and eggress rights and a massive move of Palestinians to other countries ..I think to wine-growing and olive-growing regions which might need farm workers and families..(which I believe they refused in the past, and I do not think that was good).

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Oct 11 - 11:58 AM

Quit picking on Mary. Teribus is an Israel apologist who will hear no wrong spoken against the country. We all know that Israel has colonized and occupied large areas of Palestinian territory for decades and has created sub-classes of people who may (at times) enter Israel for work. Who are held virtually hostage when Israel closes the borders.

The colonizer/colonized positions are not aided by the way Israel approaches "peace talks" - they get close to an agreement, then Israeli zealots start moving in to Palestinian territory and putting up more settlements. Or something comparable, such as the building of a wall that encroaches on Palestinian communities, inconveniences them by blocking access roads in their own territory, and by simply being where it is, takes in more prime land. Much as the stupid border fence in the US at the border with Mexico is doing. The Wikipedia article is a starting point for more info.

The fighting is nasty, but Israel is largely responsible for whether there is peace in the region or not, and it seems to suit them to not have peace in the region. As long as they are the "victims" they get more support from the US government and from bleeding heart fundamentalist christian groups in the US who have literal readings of their preferred version of the Bible and who think that Israel must be situated just so before xtian end times can proceed. I think American Jews are beginning to catch on to the nonsense and are watching and waiting.

There is fighting and bad blood from anti-Israel states in the region, but Israel is, at this point, it's own worst enemy.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Oct 11 - 02:57 PM

Pedantically, its worst enemy, might as well throw a lit match on this fuel... (OK, is everybody more relaxed now?)

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Oct 11 - 11:52 AM

No, not "it's", "its"...

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: C. Ham
Date: 05 Oct 11 - 04:41 PM

Here is an excellent article by UCLA Professor Judea Pearl.

You may remember the story of his son, journalist Daniel Pearl, who was kidnapped and decapitated by Islamic terrorists in Pakistan for the crime of being Jewish.

Moral dimension of Palestinian statehood by Judea Pearl

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,mgI
Date: 05 Oct 11 - 05:24 PM

I was reading I think in Adrew Sullivan that the US was withholding funds for Palestine because they had asked the UN for statehood. Now, that seems crazy to me. I can see withholding for violent acts, but going to the UN in a legalistic, stateswomanshipway seems totally the opposite and what you would want disputed countries to do. I don't know all the facts but perhaps when I know them I will be ashamed of my country. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: ollaimh
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 11:24 AM

again the name was allpied as the legal name by the romans, they based it on the philistines, the greeks knew of the philistines as well, but only a millenium after there were jewish cultures in "palestine". the name israel predates any name of palestine.but this is just trying to claim we were here first. if that was the arguement then the english should give their land back to the welsh and north americans should give it back to natives--not bad ideas but impracticle.

i remind people that there have always been jews in "palestine" from the beginning of history, to deny this is falling into an ideolocial and racist trap. settlement isn't going to come by demonizing any side. palestinians are baddly treated and should have a recognized state. however that doen't mean any right thinking socialist or other progressive should support the policies of that state if they ignore the most basis human rights. this is a part of the world ethniclly cleansed many times, including by palestinians in the past, and they are now doing it to their own bedouin and christian population.

to leave things alone means to me for america to stop funding israel and every body else stop funding palestine and they would then stop being a political football and would probablyb reach accomidations with each other. i believe that process starts with progressives geting off the palestinian band wagon. they shouldn't support israel either.

and really stop the dumb arguements about who was nere first. no one is leaving because they weren't there irst no matter who you think was there first, however they do have to live together in war or peace. if you support peace then demonizing one side with "historical" arguements is supporting fascists thinking

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 11:37 AM

There can't have been Jews in Palestine from the beginning of history for the very simple reason that they only invented themselves *after* being freed from bondage and deciding to dedicate their lives to the god that they thought freed them, around 3000 years ago. *While* they were in bondage, they were Hebrews. And before *that* even *they* don't know where they were from but assume, quite reasonably, that they were from the same part of the world where the other semites are from - those we now think of as Arabs. So yes, there were semites in Palestine forever, and one tribe, or something, probably called itself Hebrew; but basically, some semites grew up to be Arabs and some of them grew up to be Jews. But to claim the jews were anywhere, let alone in Palestine, more than 3000 years ago is not to know very much about history.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: pdq
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 12:15 PM

We are in year 5772 of the Jewish Calendar.

That should tell people something about the length of time that Jews have been in the Holy Land.

Arabs started an organized effort to send their people, by then followers of Islam, into the traditional Jewish homeland about 1000 years ago.

Jordan, Lebanon and part of Syria are Arab states built partly or entirely from land that was traditionally owned by Jews. The Romans called it Palestine as an affront to the Jews who consider it Isarel, The Promised Land, Canaan or the Holy Land.

Gaza was traditionally part of Israel as were Judea and Jerusalem. Gaza is now about 99% Muslim and almost entirely of Arab extraction. It was conquest largely by out reproducing the original residents. Albanians did the same thing in their Islamic conquest of Albania, which is being cleansed of all its minority groups including the very productive Macedonians.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 01:42 PM

If we're talking ancient history, Abraham came from Iraq, and he's supposed to the ancestors of both Arabs and Jews. Any "biblical covenant promise" of the Holy Land would apply just as much to Palestinians as to non-Palestinian Jews.

None of which is relevant. Let's talk modern history instead.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,livelylass
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 02:08 PM

"PARIS — Palestine has won a first diplomatic victory in its quest for statehood as UNESCO's executive committee backed its bid to become a member, a move deemed "inexplicable" by the United States.
Palestine's Arab allies braved intense US and French diplomatic pressure to bring the motion before the committee's member states, which passed it by 40 votes in favour to four against, with 14 abstentions.
The Palestinian bid will now be submitted to the general assembly of the UN cultural body at the end of the month for final approval."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5grZVT4cJapJ7wf9Nb2Bl46gzyUbA?docId=CNG.9bb330c01b7c10539cb08e6138de44ea.11

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 03:55 PM

Dig it! Thanks for the fact!

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 04:19 PM

Interesting. The USA doesn't have a veto in the UNESCO General Assembly.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 06:19 PM

How can something be inexplicable if the vote is 40 to 4. Even a 50/50 vote would indicate lots of countries found the request reasonable. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,999
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 02:14 AM

"But to claim the jews were anywhere, let alone in Palestine, more than 3000 years ago is not to know very much about history."

That should read 3500 years. Posted without comment.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,livelylass
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 03:12 AM

"Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Oct 11 - 04:19 PM

Interesting. The USA doesn't have a veto in the UNESCO General Assembly."


Quite so..
No doubt that fact led to poor Hilary's umm expressed 'confusion' let's say.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 04:11 AM

What is meant by 'the UNESCO General Assembly', pray?

Unesco is merely one of the agencies of the United Nations, {UN}, which is the body which has a 'General Assembly'. Surely referring to the 'General Assembly of UNESCO' is merely ill-informed & confusing ~~ perhaps pointing to some such attributes & woolly-mindedness of those who are urging so nonsensical a proviso.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 04:34 AM

There is an automatic Arab majority in both UNESCO and the General Assembly.
No vote ever goes in Israel's favour in either.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,livelylass
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 05:05 AM

Evidently Palestine is attempting to circumvent US blocks to the main goal, by going around them in small ways. Also, this is nothing new, Palestine has been seeking recognition at UNESCO for two years now.

Anyway further to the Palestinian strategy of approaching smaller subsidiary bodies, this news just in:

http://newsthump.com/2011/10/06/us-attacks-palestine-bid-to-join-eurovision-song-contest/

"US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton today described as 'inexplicable' Eurovision's decision to allow Palestine to put forward an entry for the qualifying stages of next year's Song Contest. "This is an outrageous attempt to derail the peace process," claimed Clinton this morning. "How can we expect Israel to return to the negotiating table when the Palestinians continue this campaign of musical aggression?"

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 05:12 AM

Oh dear, not everyone will see the joke livelylass.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,Don Wise
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 07:10 AM

A sideline for starters: if I am living in an area under the military occupation of a foreign state am I justified in trying to resist this, and how far can I go. And does it not follow that any foreign occupying power which, in contrary to the Geneva Conventions, actively condones and supports land-grabbing on the part of its own citizens is provoking any violent resistance that may come its way?

Negotiations have to be based on trust on both sides. When one party to negotiations persistently moves the goalposts, reneges on what has already been agreed etc, in what way does this behaviour help to build mutual trust?
The Palestinians deserve their own state, and if applying for UNO membership helps drag all parties involved, kicking and screaming if necessary, into a realistic assessment of the situation, the advantages, the disadvantages, the concessions necessary on both sides, a general shedding of the ideological blinkers on both sides, then so be it.
We also need to remember that, as in many other problem regions, much of the rhetoric heard in this region in this context is intended primarily for domestic consumption and that, in private and off the record, other, less strident,pragmatic views are the order of the day.This also includes the US veto, although when it comes to foreign relations, US Administrations have never exactly been blessed with a delicate touch...............(and that's without recourse to Wikileaks)

Lights blue touch paper and retires.............

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 07:36 AM

No need to retire Don.
It is unlikely to go off.
All you have done is restate the Palestinaian case one more time, and not well enough to provoke a reply.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 09:45 AM

UNESCO (the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation) has a General Assembly, which is distinct from the UN General Assembly. For UNESCO's General Assembly to admit Palestine to membership would not mean that it had full U&N membership.

The same will apply when the UN General Assembly does the same - that won't happen until the Security Council votes for it, which the USA has said it will block with its veto, whatever the other members want, so long as Israel is opposed.

It's all very silly.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Oct 11 - 10:29 PM

Well, McGrath, I couldn't agree with you more.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: GUEST,livelylass
Date: 08 Oct 11 - 05:43 PM

Abbas continuing to chip away at gaining forms of recognition for Palestine, among other international bodies.

According to 'The Voice of Russia' (don't know anything much about this news source) the PA have now been granted 'partnership of democracy' status (which grants the right to attend meetings, but not to vote) by PACE, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

http://english.ruvr.ru/2011/10/08/58387041.html


Abbas speech at PACE here (scroll down):
http://assembly.coe.int/defaultE.asp

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Oct 11 - 08:21 PM

"" there has never been any question of the Israeli participation in the Sabra and Shatila massacres"
"Yes there has. It is disputed."
"And "thousands" of Arabs massacred?? Hardly."

Meant to post this before our trip to Seville (a fascinating city for anybody interested in Christian?Muslim/Jewish relations)
Jim Carroll

http://www.counterpunch.org/2001/11/28/at-last-the-truth-about-sabra-and-chatila-massacres/

November 28, 2001
37
At Last the Truth About Sabra and Chatila Massacres
by Robert Fisk The Independent

Sana Sersawi speaks carefully, loudly but slowly, as she recalls the chaotic, dangerous, desperately tragic events that overwhelmed her just over 19 years ago, on 18 September 1982. As one of the survivors prepared to testify against the Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon–who was then Israel's defence minister–she stops to search her memory when she confronts the most terrible moments of her life. "The Lebanese Forces militia [Phalangists] had taken us from our homes and marched us up to the entrance to the camp where a large hole had been dug in the earth. The men were told to get into it. Then the militiamen shot a Palestinian. The women and children had climbed over bodies to reach this spot, but we were truly shocked by seeing this man killed in front of us and there was a roar of shouting and screams from the women. That's when we heard the Israelis on loudspeakers shouting, 'Give us the men, give us the men.' We thought, 'Thank God, they will save us.'" It was to prove a cruelly false hope.

Mrs Sersawi, three months pregnant, saw her husband Hassan, 30, and her Egyptian brother-in-law Faraj el-Sayed Ahmed standing in the crowd of men. "We were told to walk up the road towards the Kuwaiti embassy, the women and children in front, the men behind. We had been separated. There were Phalangist militiamen and Israeli soldiers walking alongside us. I could still see Hassan and Faraj. It was like a parade. There were several hundred of us. When we got to the Cite Sportif, the Israelis put us women in a big concrete room and the men were taken to another side of the stadium. There were a lot of men from the camp and I could no longer see my husband. The Israelis went round saying 'Sit, sit.' It was 11am. An hour later, we were told to leave. But we stood around outside amid the Israeli soldiers, waiting for our men."

Sana Sersawi waited in the bright, sweltering sun for Hassan and Faraj to emerge. "Some men came out, none of them younger than 40, and they told us to be patient, that hundreds of men were still inside. Then about 4pm, an Israeli officer came out. He was wearing dark glasses and said in Arabic: 'What are you all waiting for?' He said there was nobody left, that everyone had gone. There were Israeli trucks moving out with tarpaulin over them. We couldn't see inside. And there were jeeps and tanks and a bulldozer making a lot of noise. We stayed there as it got dark and the Israelis appeared to be leaving and we were very nervous. But then when the Israelis had moved away, we went inside. And there was no one there. Nobody. I had been only three years married. I never saw my husband again."

Today, a Belgian appeals court will begin a hearing to decide if Prime Minister Sharon should be prosecuted for the massacre of Palestinian civilians at the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps in Beirut in 1982. (Belgian laws allow courts to try foreigners for war crimes committed on foreign soil.) In working on this case, the prosecution believes that it has discovered shocking new evidence of Israel's involvement.

The evidence centres on the Camille Chamoun Sports Stadium– the "Cite Sportif". Only two miles from Beirut airport, the damaged stadium was a natural holding centre for prisoners. It had been an ammunition dump for Yasser Arafat's PLO and repeatedly bombed by Israeli jets during the 1982 siege of Beirut so that its giant, smashed exterior looked like a nightmare denture. The Palestinians had earlier mined its cavernous interior, but its vast, underground storage space and athletics changing-rooms remained intact. It was a familiar landmark to all of us who lived in Beirut. At mid-morning on 18 September 1982–about the time Sana Sersawi says she was brought to the stadium–I saw hundreds of Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners, probably well over 1,000, sitting in its gloomy, dark interior, squatting in the dust, watched over by Israeli soldiers and plain-clothes Shin Beth (Israeli secret service) agents and men who I suspected were Lebanese collaborators. The men sat in silence, obviously in fear. From time to time, I noted, a few were taken away. They were put into Israeli army trucks or jeeps or Phalangist vehicles–for further "interrogation".

Nor did I doubt this. A few hundred metres away, inside the Sabra and Chatila Palestinian refugee camps, up to 600 massacre victims rotted in the sun, the stench of decomposition drifting over the prisoners and their captors alike. It was suffocatingly hot. Loren Jenkins of The Washington Post, Paul Eedle of Reuters and I had only got into the cells because the Israelis assumed–given our Western appearance–that we must have been members of Shin Beth. Many of the prisoners had their heads bowed. But Israel's Phalangist militiamen–still raging at the murder of their leader and president elect Bashir Gemayel–had been withdrawn from the camps, their slaughter over, and at least the Israeli army was now in charge. So what did these men have to fear?

Looking back–and listening to Sana Sersawi today–I shudder now at our innocence. My notes of the time, subsequently written into a book about Israel's 1982 invasion and its war with the PLO, contain some ominous clues. We found a Lebanese employee of Reuters, Abdullah Mattar, among the prisoners and obtained his release, Paul leading him away with his arm around the man's shoulders. "They take us away, one by one, for interrogation," one of the prisoners muttered to me. "They are Haddad [Christian militia] men. Usually they bring the people back after interrogation, but not always. Sometimes the people do not return them." Then an Israeli officer ordered me to leave. Why couldn't the prisoners talk to me, I asked? "They can talk if they want," he replied. "But they have nothing to say."

All the Israelis knew what had happened inside the camps. The smell of the corpses was now overpowering. Outside, a Phalangist jeep with the words "Military Police" painted on it–if so exotic an institution could be associated with this gang of murderers–drove by. A few television crews had turned up. One filmed the Lebanese Christian militiamen outside the Cite Sportif. He also filmed a woman pleading to an Israeli army colonel called "Yahya" for the release of her husband. (The colonel has now been positively identified by The Independent. Today, he is a general in the Israeli army.)

Along the main road opposite the stadium there was a line of Israeli Merkava tanks, their crews sitting on the turrets, smoking, watching the men being led from the stadium in ones or twos, some being set free, others being led away by Shin Beth men or by Lebanese men in drab khaki overalls. All these soldiers knew what had happened inside the camps. One of the members of the tank crews, Lt Avi Grabovsky–he was later to testify to the Israeli Kahan commission–had even witnessed the murder of several civilians the previous day and had been told not to "interfere".

And in the days that followed, strange reports reached us. A girl had been dragged from a car in Damour by Phalangist militiamen and taken away, despite her appeals to a nearby Israeli soldier. Then the cleaning lady of a Lebanese woman who worked for a US television chain complained bitterly that Israelis had arrested her husband. He was never seen again. There were other vague rumours of "disappeared" people.

I wrote in my notes at the time that "even after Chatila, Israel's 'terrorist' enemies were being liquidated in West Beirut". But I had not directly associated this dark conviction with the Cite Sportif. I had not even reflected on the fearful precedents of a sports stadium in time of war. Hadn't there been a sports stadium in Santiago a few years before, packed with prisoners after Pinochet's coup d'etat, a stadium from which many prisoners never returned?

Among the testimonies gathered by lawyers seeking to indict Ariel Sharon for war crimes is that of Wadha al-Sabeq. On Friday, 17 September 1982, she said, while the massacre was still (unknown to her) underway inside Sabra and Chatila, she was in her home with her family in Bir Hassan, just opposite the camps. "Neighbours came and said the Israelis wanted to stamp our ID cards, so we went downstairs and we saw both Israelis and Lebanese Forces [Phalangists] on the road. The men were separated from the women." This separation–with its awful shadow of similar separations at Srebrenica during the Bosnian war–were a common feature of these mass arrests. "We were told to go to the Cite Sportif. The men stayed put." Among the men were Wadha's two sons, 19-year-old Mohamed and 16-year-old Ali and her brother Mohamed. "We went to the Cite Sportif, as the Israelis told us," she says. "I never saw my sons or brother again."

The survivors tell distressingly similar stories. Bahija Zrein says she was ordered by an Israeli patrol to go to the Cite Sportif and the men with her, including her 22-year-old brother, were taken away. Some militiamen–watched by the Israelis–loaded him into a car, blindfolded, she claims. "That's how he disappeared," she says in her official testimony, "and I have never seen him again since."

It was only a few days afterwards that we journalists began to notice a discrepancy in the figures of dead. While up to 600 bodies had been found inside Sabra and Chatila, 1,800 civilians had been reported as "missing". We assumed–how easy assumptions are in war–that they had been killed in the three days between 16 September 1982 and the withdrawal of the Phalangist killers on the 18th, that their corpses had been secretly buried outside the camp. Beneath the golf course, we suspected. The idea that many of these young people had been murdered outside the camps or after the 18th, that the killings were still going on while we walked through the camps, never occurred to us.

Why did we not think of this at the time? The following year, the Israeli Kahan commission published its report, condemning Sharon but ending its own inquiry of the atrocity on 18 September, with just a one-line hint–unexplained– that several hundred people may have "disappeared" at about the same time. The commission interviewed no Palestinian survivors but it was allowed to become the narrative of history. The idea that the Israelis went on handing over prisoners to their bloodthirsty militia allies never occurred to us. The Palestinians of Sabra and Chatila are now giving evidence that this is exactly what happened. One man, Abdel Nasser Alameh, believes his brother Ali was handed to the Phalange on the morning of the 18th. A Palestinian Christian woman called Milaneh Boutros has recorded how, in a truck-load of women and children, she was taken from the camps to the Christian town of Bikfaya, the home of the newly assassinated Christian president-elect Bashir Gemayel, where a grief-stricken Christian woman ordered the execution of a 13-year-old boy in the truck. He was shot. The truck must have passed at least four Israeli checkpoints on its way to Bikfaya. And heaven spare me, I realise now that I had even met the woman who ordered the boy's execution.

Even before the slaughter inside the camps had ended, Shahira Abu Rudeina says she was taken to the Cite Sportif where, in one of the underground "holding centres", she saw a retarded man, watched by Israeli soldiers, burying bodies in a pit. Her evidence might be rejected were it not for the fact that she also expressed her gratitude for an Israeli soldier–inside the Chatila camp, against all the evidence given by the Israelis–who prevented the murder of her daughters by the Phalange.

Long after the war, the ruins of the Cite Sportif were torn down and a brand new marble stadium was built in its place, partly by the British. Pavarotti has sung there. But the testimony of what may lie beneath its foundations–and its frightful implications–might give Ariel Sharon further reason to fear an indictment.

Subject: RE: BS: Palestine
From: Sawzaw
Date: 10 Oct 11 - 12:54 AM

"My message to the loathed Jews is that there is no god but Allah, we will chase you everywhere! We are a nation that drinks blood, and we know that there is no blood better than the blood of Jews. We will not leave you alone until we have quenched our thirst with your blood, and our children's thirst with your blood. We will not leave until you leave the Muslim countries. In the name of Allah, we will destroy you, blow you up, take revenge against you, and purify the land of you, pigs that have defiled our country"

"Sons of monkeys and pigs." Cf. Qur'an 2:62-65, 5:59-60, and 7:166.

Our Country?

It is worthwhile to note that Jews existed before Muslims.

Muslims are the descendants of Jews.

Islam is an offshoot of Judaism.