BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 03 Mar 04 - 04:31 PM

No, that's a goal brucie. The endgame involves who gets to live where and who can own land and vote in the Knesset, or have a government of their own and be self-determining, and things like that.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Martin Gibson
Date: 03 Mar 04 - 06:06 PM

Your revelations about what Jews and Arabs eat is not at all enlightening.

Hundres of miles from your trailer park are actually big supermarkets in Jewish neighborhoods that have aisles and aisles of Kosher food. Seeing that Israel is in the middle east why do you find it so necessary to point out to me that Jews in Israel eat traditional middle eastern foods. There aren't "Arab" foods, they are "middle eastern" foods. Falafal and couscous and the like are staples found in every Kosher restaurant and food store.

As for dianavan, I have worked with and known people like you who do not know squat about Jews and have asked me on Hanukah why I did not take the day off. I'm glad you ask questions. Keep asking. Oh by the way, I do not have horns or a big nose. Money, maybe.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 03 Mar 04 - 07:03 PM

I have horns and a big nose but, alas, no money.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Bobert
Date: 03 Mar 04 - 07:15 PM

Well danged, Nerd, I don't know what I'm gonna do with you?

But, ahhhh, remember the '67 June War, also called the 6 Day War? Well, the Arab countries discovered that when it comes to war the Isrealis are purdy danged good at it. You assertion that they wouldn't use one of their 200 or so nuclear weapons is not a given or elas, why the heck would they have them? Yeah given an unfortunate set of circumstances and.... BANG!

Same answer fir why the Arab world has not stuck its hand in the Palestinian *mousetrap*.... BANG!

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: dianavan
Date: 03 Mar 04 - 07:40 PM

Marty - You have never worked with anyone like me and stop putting words in my mouth. I never said anything about horns, a big nose or Hanukah. Do you think your God is impressed by your money?

d

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Bill D
Date: 03 Mar 04 - 08:35 PM

"BillD,
that's not a reasonable solution. It would make the Jews a tiny opressed minority in any state that would replace the current set-up. I think you know this."

*sigh*..nobody reads what I say...*wry grin*...I said 'reasonable' because it IS reasonable to share if 3 religions claim it as a Holy Land. I went on to say it would never work because no one would agree to share...all for different reasons. Maybe that's what YOU mean by 'not reasonable', I just call it 'unworkable'.

Martin Gibson...it matters little where Moses led the folks to- there were already people there. They didn't find empty space. Just as the first settlers to the US didn't find it empty. Perhaps Moses and the wanderers were better organized and kept better records.
Whether or not one believes it was "promised" by someone who had the authority to make the "promise" is a matter of what version of history and theology you suscribe to!

All this is just speculation...the Jews DO feel it is historically part of their right to be there...so do the Arabs.... and the Christians have a strong claim to muck about there if THEIR claim about a Messiah is valid.

Since, except for Egypt and China and India...etc, this is where almost everything was happening in "those days", they all do have a reason to claim 'some' rights...but no one wants to discuss much except their own.

   Substitute a few terms and dates and religions, and this whole discussion could be about Ireland, or the Baltic nations, or Korea, or "your state's name here".
...everyone is more important than everyone else...just ask 'em!

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 03 Mar 04 - 09:01 PM

Seeing that Israel is in the middle east why do you find it so necessary to point out to me that Jews in Israel eat traditional middle eastern foods.

The traditional foods of the Middle East are, to a sizable extent, the traditional foods of Arabs. I'm guessing you didn't read the article, which was by a woman who is an Arabic Jew. I am guessing you'd rather not think about or acknowledge the fact that some Jews are Arabs and that some Arabs are Jews.

However, I didn't post that article to discuss food. I found that article while I was searching for something else. I thought of your statement that you have to know something about a people to know what they think. I think you know little to nothing about Arabs, and possibly even about the present day Jews whose ancestors didn't take a side trip through Europe on their way from the Middle East to wherever they are now.

Hundres of miles from your trailer park are actually big supermarkets in Jewish neighborhoods that have aisles and aisles of Kosher food.

Yes. One of those would be the GIANT supermarket in Kemp Mill (Wheaton), Maryland, where my family and I used to do our grocery shopping when I was growing up there. It's located just about in the middle of this map:

Kemp Mill (and surrounding area)

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 03 Mar 04 - 09:10 PM

BTW Martin, I think you'd make a hell of a bad boxer. You seem to always lead with your chin.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Teribus
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 04:56 AM

Nerd - 03 Mar 04 - 12:44 PM

Very good post! Agree wholeheartedly.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 01:38 PM

Money, maybe.

Maybe, maybe not.

Your posts exude a certain shrill insecurity. My barking puupy analogy doesn't seem far off the mark for you. Calm down why don't ya. Kick off your shoes and relax. If you quit the 3rd grade insults you may even find a friend or two here.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 07:20 PM

BillD,

Now I get it. Sorry!

CarolC,

The Palestinians should have amended the covenant because it was part of the Oslo agreement to do so. You yourself were saying that the second intifadeh was called for because the Israelis did not comply. I pointed out that the Palestinians did not comply either. Then you say, well, why should the Palestinians comply if Israel won't do this, that and the other?

The Oslo agreement called for some things that were easy and could have been done in no time (like amending the Palestinian covenant) and some things that were hard and would take a long time (such as stopping thousands of people who have already begun to move house into new settlements). I think it was pretty reasonable for the Israelis to use the amendment of the covenant as a test case to see if Palestine would comply. Palestine could use, say, the amnesty, which logistically was very easy. Israel went ahead with the amnesty.

Israel has a perfectly good reason for not recognizing the right of the PLO to have their own state: the Palestinians already have their own state. It's called Jordan, and Israel recognizes Jordan. From Israel's point of view, that's what the British set aside Jordan for, and that's what Jordan was supposed to be. It's the Palestinians inside Jordan who shut the other Palestinians out. From the Israeli perspective, saying that the Palestinians deserve another state makes no sense.

Think of it this way: what if Israel makes an agreement with the PLO tomorrow and they set up a new Palestinian state called Bethlehem. The PLO kicks out or does not let in about half the currently stateless Palestinians. Those Palestinians then become terrorists, calling for yet another Palestinian State. Instead of attacking Bethlehem, they bomb Israeli civilians, saying their new state must come from what is left of Israel.

Fifty years later, people outside the region will have forgotten that there is already a Palestine--after all, it's called Bethlehem, not Palestine! They will angrily call for Israel to stop oppressing the poor Palestinians who have no homeland.

That's precisely what happened in 1948, with the "50 years later" part occurring today! When does it stop? When the Palestinian state(s) stretch from the river to the sea. That is, as you put it, the Palestinian endgame (as their own minister confirmed in the quote in my above post).

Despite this, Ehud Barak offered Arafat a proposal that would have not only recognized but established a Palestinian State, with everything Arafat had asked for. Arafat did not accept it, revealing that he, too, wants the Palestinians to remain stateless. What more can Isreal do?

Bobert,

I was talking about events that go back way before 1967 (which I don't actually remember, by the way, being too young at the time). It was 1948 when the Arab world turned their backs on the Palestinians. Israel had no nukes at the time.

Also, I'm not sure what you think the Israelis would do. If Jordan, Syria, and other countries offered Palestinians a place to settle, the Israelis would welcome it. The Arab nations don't do it because their real goal is to weaken Israel by whatever means they can, and keeping the Palestinians where they are meets that goal.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 07:26 PM

The figure of 200 nukes in Israel's arsenal sounds very high. Where is that figure from?

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Martin Gibson
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 09:19 PM

Carol C.

You always drool on your chin. You would make a fine boxer. You really know how to tap dance when you don't know what you are talking about. Isn't it hard for you to concentrate with that NASCAR race on so loud in the background.

dianavan:

I'm kind of glad I don't.

Jack the Sailor:

No, money really. Honestly hard earned money. Money that will be given to charities that support Israel. Your boat left without you, Jack.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,einstein
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 10:15 PM

mg, whenever you can't beat someone's argument, you make a personal attack instead.

pretty useless, I think.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 10:44 PM

Looks to me like he's overcompensating for something, einstein.

nerd, I don't have time to answer your post properly right now. But you're wrong about Jordan. Jordan is Jordan. The land that the Palestinians are on now is the land they have been living on for centuries. They were granted that land in the same agreement that granted the Israelis what was supposed to be Israel. And in that agreement, Israel was given quite a bit less land than it now has. Israel took, by force, land that was not granted to it in any agreement.

The terms of Barak's offer were in no way conducive to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. And it wasn't in the least bit generous. Barak offered the Palestinians a scattering of tiny bantustans, surrounded by Israeli controlled land. It offered the Palestinians pretty much exactly what the Blacks in South Africa had under apartheid.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: dianavan
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 02:30 AM

Marty -

You don't, what? Think?

d

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 03:51 AM

CarolC,

Too bad you didn't have time to reply properly. Instead you did so hysterically. Apartheid? Please.

What the heck does "Jordan is Jordan" mean? Jordan came out of trans-Jordan, which was the eastern part of the British Mandate (barring the Golan Heights, which went to French Syria). There was no such historical country, just a river. Trans-Jordan meant the part of British Palestine that was located on the other side of the Jordan River. It makes up 77 percent of Palestine. The British set this state up as a puppet regime so they would have access to Arab oil (sound familiar?) and equipped and trained a deadly army of Arabs, which they stationed on the borders of the Jewish areas just months before the mandate was to end. In other words, they set the Jews up.

It was the League of Nations, after the British had admitted they'd fucked the whole thing up, who came up with a plan to create another Palestinian state, whittling away at the Jewish borders. This was in the area currently known as "the West Bank." After the 1948 war, Jordan annexed the West Bank, which once again had originally been given to the Jews by the British, then to the Palestinian Arabs by the league of nations.

You well know that Israel "took" the land in question back after having been attacked by several nations in a coordinated assault. Far from being a land belonging by rights to Palestinian Arabs, it was in the part of the land Britain earmarked for the Jewish state. And it was not being used for a state for the Palestinian refugees anyway, so Jordan was no more an observer of the League of Nations' wishes than Israel was.

It is true, of course, that some Palestinian Arabs have been living for generations in what is now Israel. (Indeed, some are citizens with full rights--Apartheid indeed!) When countries with State religions are established, displacements of this kind often occur. India's borders with Pakistan and Bangladesh at exactly the same time spring to mind. But Pakistan did not immediately become a power-hungry auto

cracy bent on keeping some Muslims out, which is the route Jordan took. I'm the first to admit that colonialism sucked for the colonized, and that Jews and Arabs all got Screwed by the colonial powers, but how can you blame the Jews (later the Israelis) for this?   And how can you blame them for taking land won in a war where they were the ones attacked? As I said, neither the US nor any European nation would have given back the land, and if the Arabs had won they certainly would not have given back Israel.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Teribus
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 05:56 AM

Just a couple of points Nerd,

The area now known as the middle east was never colonised by any European power, formerly part of the Ottoman Empire, it was broken up under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, to be adminstered by the League of Nations. That particularly ineffectual talking shop then granted League of Nations Mandates to administer parts of that area to the United Kingdom and to France.

The proposed British solution, after two separate arab rebellions, both initiated by the arabs, based on complete downright lies formulated and disseminated by Yasser Arafat's Uncle was to grant 20% of the territory to the Jews and 80% to the arabs. The Jews were prepared to accept this, the Arabs under the guidance of Arafat's uncle were not. Some moderates on the Arab side saw the way this was going and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan was created. Under the rules of the British proposal the Jews could only have their 20%, they were specifically forbidden from settling in Arab areas, the Arabs on the other hand were perfectly entitled to buy land and settle in the Jewish area.

After the League of Nations Mandate expired and the British withdrew, the United Nations again came up with a similar proposal, which was again accepted by the Jews and rejected by the Arabs. They fought a war which created the State of Israel, this state being immediately recognised by the United Nations. In 1951, the Israeli Parliament offered right of return to all Palestinian refugees, this was rejected, the Arab states wanted to see the State of Israel eliminated.

I agree with you that having been offered something, which you then reject and put the dispute to force of arms and lose. It is totally unreasonable, and unrealistic, to expect that you can then demand that the original offer still stands, and that you will now accept it on the premise that it only represents an interim position, until you are ready to strike again.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 11:11 AM

The proposed British solution, after two separate arab rebellions, both initiated by the arabs, based on complete downright lies formulated and disseminated by Yasser Arafat's Uncle

Yes. The uncle of Arafat who was installed in power by the British against the wishes of the majority of Arabs, after they (the British) freed him from prison.

nerd, I'm still working on it, but I think it's you who is being hysterical, simply by using words like 'hysterical'.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 11:18 AM

Just one point though, before I go hunting up, for about the gazillionth time, the historical facts that I keep having to post over and over here: there were no Jewish borders in the region until the war of 1948. And the Arabs were the majority in the area that is now Israel, by a sizable percentage, until the early 1900s, when migrations of large numbers of European Jews began to change the demographics of the region.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 11:40 AM

the Arabs were the majority in the area that is now Israel, by a sizable percentage, until the early 1900s, when migrations of large numbers of European Jews began to change the demographics of the region.

Your Alabama trailer park, along with every other inch of the U.S.A. is on land that was stolen from Native Americans. Are you planning to give any of it back any time soon?

If you go back in history, you'll find that the first Arabs arrived in what is now Israel, as conquerors who, in effect, stole the land, in the 7th century AD. Jews were living there, often in the majority, more than 3,000 years earlier.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Chief Chaos
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 11:47 AM

I have often been labeled a liberal which I guess puts me on the "left". I am not anti-semitic just as I am not anti-muslim or anti-anything to do with religion.

I would like for a peaceful solution to be found to this situation which I don't think either side is willing to do.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 12:30 PM

Here you go, nerd:

This is from the website maintained by Jews for Justice in the Middle East:

The Origin of the Palesine-Israel conflict

As the periodic bloodshed continues in the Middle East, the search for an equitable solution must come to grips with the root cause of the conflict. The conventional wisdom is that, even if both sides are at fault, the Palestinians are irrational "terrorists" who have no point of view worth listening to. Our position, however, is that the Palestinians have a real grievance: their homeland for over a thousand years was taken, without their consent and mostly by force, during the creation of the state of Israel. And all subsequent crimes - on both sides - inevitably follow from this original injustice.

This paper outlines the history of Palestine to show how this process occurred and what a moral solution to the region's problems should consist of. If you care about the people of the Middle East, Jewish and Arab, you owe it to yourself to read this account of the other side of the historical record.

Introduction

The standard Zionist position is that they showed up in Palestine in the late 19th century to reclaim their ancestral homeland. Jews bought land and started building up the Jewish community there. They were met with increasingly violent opposition from the Palestinian Arabs, presumably stemming from the Arabs' inherent anti-Semitism. The Zionists were then forced to defend themselves and, in one form or another, this same situation continues up to today.

The problem with this explanation is that it is simply not true, as the documentary evidence in this booklet will show. What really happened was that the Zionist movement, from the beginning, looked forward to a practically complete dispossession of the indigenous Arab population so that Israel could be a wholly Jewish state, or as much as was possible. Land bought by the Jewish National Fund was held in the name of the Jewish people and could never be sold or even leased back to Arabs (a situation which continues to the present).
The Arab community, as it became increasingly aware of the Zionists' intentions, strenuously opposed further Jewish immigration and land buying because it posed a real and imminent danger to the very existence of Arab society in Palestine. Because of this opposition, the entire Zionist project never could have been realized without the military backing of the British. The vast majority of the population of Palestine, by the way, had been Arabic since the seventh century A.D. (Over 1200 years)

In short, Zionism was based on a faulty, colonialist world view that the rights of the indigenous inhabitants didn't matter. The Arabs' opposition to Zionism wasn't based on anti-Semitism but rather on a totally reasonable fear of the dispossession of their people.
One further point: being Jewish ourselves, the position we present here is critical of Zionism but is in no way anti-Semitic. We do not believe that the Jews acted worse than any other group might have acted in their situation. The Zionists (who were a distinct minority of the Jewish people until after WWII) had an understandable desire to establish a place where Jews could be masters of their own fate, given the bleak history of Jewish oppression. Especially as the danger to European Jewry crystalized in the late 1930's and after, the actions of the Zionists were propelled by real desperation.
But so were the actions of the Arabs. The mythic "land without people for a people without land" was already home to 700,000 Palestinians in 1919. This is the root of the problem, as we shall see.

Early History of the Region

The British Mandate Period 1920 -1948

Ghandi on the Palestine conflict - 1938

"Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French...What is going on in Palestine today cannot be justified by any moral code of conduct...If they [the Jews] must look to the Palestine of geography as their national home, it is wrong to enter it under the shadow of the British gun. A religious act cannot be performed with the aid of the bayonet or the bomb. They can settle in Palestine only by the goodwill of the Arabs... As it is, they are co-sharers with the British in despoiling a people who have done no wrong to them. I am not defending the Arab excesses. I wish they had chosen the way of non-violence in resisting what they rightly regard as an unacceptable encroachment upon their country. But according to the accepted canons of right and wrong, nothing can be said against the Arab resistance in the face of overwhelming odds." Mahatma Gandhi, quoted in "A Land of Two Peoples" ed. Mendes-Flohr.

Statehood and Expulsion 1948 http://www.cactus48.com/statehood.html

The 1967 War and the Israeli Occupation of the West Bank and Gaza

Views of the Future

Jewish Criticism of Zionism

Conclusion 1 For Jewish Readers

Conclusion 2

This is no generous offer. It is a humiliating demand for surrender! (Jewish human rights organization, Gush Shalom, on "Barak's Generous Offer")

Your Alabama trailer park, along with every other inch of the U.S.A. is on land that was stolen from Native Americans. Are you planning to give any of it back any time soon?

I abhor what was done to the indegenous people of the Americas by the Europeans. As it happens, if native peoples came to where I live and said they wanted their land back, it wouldn't really be any skin off my nose, since I don't own any land, and since it wouldn't be too much trouble to move my little "wee hoose" on wheels to another location. Or, if they took ownership of this trailer park, I could just continue to rent it, and give them my rent payments.

However, I'm not calling for any Jews to be removed from where they are except for the ones in the settlements in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem. What I am calling for (beyond the removal of the settlements) is for the government of Israel to STOP the continuing removal of Palestinians from the land they now occupy, and for the government of Israel to END THE OCCUPATION of the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem, and to leave the Palestinians alone while they go about the business of setting up their independent state.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 12:36 PM

I can't get the Statehood and Expulsion link to work in this thread, so here's what's in that link:

Statehood and Expulsion 1948

What was the Arab reaction to the announcement of the creation of the state of Israel?

"The armies of the Arab states entered the war immediately after the State of Israel was founded in May. Fighting continued, almost all of it within the territory assigned to the Palestinian state...About 700,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled in the 1948 conflict." Noam Chomsky, "The Fateful Triangle."

Was the part of Palestine assigned to a Jewish state in mortal danger from the Arab armies?

"The Arab League hastily called for its member countries to send regular army troops into Palestine. They were ordered to secure only the sections of Palestine given to the Arabs under the partition plan. But these regular armies were ill equipped and lacked any central command to coordinate their efforts...[Jordan's King Abdullah] promised [the Israelis and the British] that his troops, the Arab Legion, the only real fighting force among the Arab armies, would avoid fighting with Jewish settlements...Yet Western historians record this as the moment when the young state of Israel fought off "the overwhelming hordes' of five Arab countries. In reality, the Israeli offensive against the Palestinians intensified." "Our Roots Are Still Alive," by the Peoples Press Palestine Book Project.

Ethnic cleansing of the Arab population of Palestine

"Joseph Weitz was the director of the Jewish National Land Fund...On December 19, 1940, he wrote: 'It must be clear that there is no room for both peoples in this country...The Zionist enterprise so far...has been fine and good in its own time, and could do with 'land buying' - but this will not bring about the State of Israel; that must come all at once, in the manner of a Salvation (this is the secret of the Messianic idea); and there is no way besides transferring the Arabs from here to the neighboring countries, to transfer them all; except maybe for Bethlehem, Nazareth and Old Jerusalem, we must not leave a single village, not a single tribe'...There were literally hundreds of such statements made by Zionists." Edward Said, "The Question of Palestine."

Ethnic cleansing - continued

"Following the outbreak of 1936, no mainstream (Zionist) leader was able to conceive of future coexistence without a clear physical separation between the two peoples - achievable only by transfer and expulsion. Publicly they all continued to speak of coexistence and to attribute the violence to a small minority of zealots and agitators. But this was merely a public pose..Ben Gurion summed up: 'With compulsory transfer we (would) have a vast area (for settlement)...I support compulsory transfer. I don't see anything immoral in it,'" Israel historian, Benny Morris, "Righteous Victims."

Ethnic cleansing - continued

"Ben-Gurion clearly wanted as few Arabs as possible to remain in the Jewish state. He hoped to see them flee. He said as much to his colleagues and aides in meetings in August, September and October [1948]. But no [general] expulsion policy was ever enunciated and Ben-Gurion always refrained from issuing clear or written expulsion orders; he preferred that his generals 'understand' what he wanted done. He wished to avoid going down in history as the 'great expeller' and he did not want the Israeli government to be implicated in a morally questionable policy...But while there was no 'expulsion policy', the July and October [1948] offensives were characterized by far more expulsions and, indeed, brutality towards Arab civilians than the first half of the war." Benny Morris, "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-1949"

Didn't the Palestinians leave their homes voluntarily during the 1948 war?

"Israeli propaganda has largely relinquished the claim that the Palestinian exodus of 1948 was 'self-inspired'. Official circles implicitly concede that the Arab population fled as a result of Israeli action - whether directly, as in the case of Lydda and Ramleh, or indirectly, due to the panic that and similar actions (the Deir Yassin massacre) inspired in Arab population centers throughout Palestine. However, even though the historical record has been grudgingly set straight, the Israeli establishment still refused to accept moral or political responsibility for the refugee problem it- or its predecessors - actively created." Peretz Kidron, quoted in "Blaming the Victims," ed. Said and Hitchens.

Arab orders to evacuate non-existent

"The BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) monitored all Middle Eastern broadcasts throughout 1948. The records, and companion ones by a United States monitoring unit, can be seen at the British Museum. There was not a single order or appeal, or suggestion about evacuation from Palestine, from any Arab radio station, inside or outside Palestine, in 1948. There is a repeated monitored record of Arab appeals, even flat orders, to the civilians of Palestine to stay put." Erskine Childers, British researcher, quoted in Sami Hadawi, "Bitter Harvest."

Ethnic cleansing- continued

"That Ben-Gurion's ultimate aim was to evacuate as much of the Arab population as possible from the Jewish state can hardly be doubted, if only from the variety of means he employed to achieve his purpose...most decisively, the destruction of whole villages and the eviction of their inhabitants...even [if] they had not participated in the war and had stayed in Israel hoping to live in peace and equality, as promised in the Declaration of Independence." Israeli author, Simha Flapan, "The Birth of Israel."

The deliberate destruction of Arab villages to prevent return of Palestinians

"During May [1948] ideas about how to consolidate and give permanence to the Palestinian exile began to crystallize, and the destruction of villages was immediately perceived as a primary means of achieving this aim...[Even earlier,] On 10 April, Haganah units took Abu Shusha... The village was destroyed that night... Khulda was leveled by Jewish bulldozers on 20 April... Abu Zureiq was completely demolished... Al Mansi and An Naghnaghiya, to the southeast, were also leveled. . .By mid-1949, the majority of [the 350 depopulated Arab villages] were either completely or partly in ruins and uninhabitable." Benny Morris, "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-1949.

After the fighting was over, why didn't the Palestinians return to their homes?

"The first UN General Assembly resolution--Number 194- affirming the right of Palestinians to return to their homes and property, was passed on December 11, 1948. It has been repassed no less than twenty-eight times since that first date. Whereas the moral and political right of a person to return to his place of uninterrupted residence is acknowledged everywhere, Israel has negated the possibility of return... [and] systematically and juridically made it impossible, on any grounds whatever, for the Arab Palestinian to return, be compensated for his property, or live in Israel as a citizen equal before the law with a Jewish Israeli." Edward Said, "The Question of Palestine."

Is there any justification for this expropriation of land?

"The fact that the Arabs fled in terror, because of real fear of a repetition of the 1948 Zionist massacres, is no reason for denying them their homes, fields and livelihoods. Civilians caught in an area of military activity generally panic. But they have always been able to return to their homes when the danger subsides. Military conquest does not abolish private rights to property; nor does it entitle the victor to confiscate the homes, property and personal belongings of the noncombatant civilian population. The seizure of Arab property by the Israelis was an outrage." Sami Hadawi, "Bitter Harvest."

How about the negotiations after the 1948-1949 wars?

"[At Lausanne,] Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and the Palestinians were trying to save by negotiations what they had lost in the war--a Palestinian state alongside Israel. Israel, however... [preferred] tenuous armistice agreements to a definite peace that would involve territorial concessions and the repatriation of even a token number of refugees. The refusal to recognize the Palestinians' right to self-determination and statehood proved over the years to be the main source of the turbulence, violence, and bloodshed that came to pass." Israeli author, Simha Flapan, "The Birth Of Israel."

Israel admitted to UN but then reneged on the conditions under which it was admitted

"The [Lausanne] conference officially opened on 27 April 1949. On 12 May the [UN's] Palestine Conciliation ,Committee reaped its only success when it induced the parties to sign a joint protocol on the framework for a comprehensive peace. . Israel for the first time accepted the principle of repatriation [of the Arab refugees] and the internationalization of Jerusalem. . .[but] they did so as a mere exercise in public relations aimed at strengthening Israel's international image...Walter Eytan, the head of the Israeli delegation, [stated]..'My main purpose was to begin to undermine the protocol of 12 May, which we had signed only under duress of our struggle for admission to the U.N. Refusal to sign would...have immediately been reported to the Secretary-General and the various governments.'" Israeli historian, Ilan Pappe, "The Making of the Arab-Israel Conflict, 1947-1951."

Israeli admission to the U.N.- continued

"The Preamble of this resolution of admission included a safeguarding clause as follows: 'Recalling its resolution of 29 November 1947 (on partition) and 11 December 1948 (on reparation and compensation), and taking note of the declarations and explanations made by the representative of the Government of Israel before the ad hoc Political Committee in respect of the implementation of the said resolutions, the General Assembly...decides to admit Israel into membership in the United Nations.'

"Here, it must be observed, is a condition and an undertaking to implement the resolutions mentioned. There was no question of such implementation being conditioned on the conclusion of peace on Israeli terms as the Israelis later claimed to justify their non-compliance." Sami Hadawi, "Bitter Harvest."

What was the fate of the Palestinians who had now become refugees?

"The winter of 1949, the first winter of exile for more than seven hundred fifty thousand Palestinians, was cold and hard...Families huddled in caves, abandoned huts, or makeshift tents...Many of the starving were only miles away from their own vegetable gardens and orchards in occupied Palestine - the new state of Israel...At the end of 1949 the United Nations finally acted. It set up the United Nations Relief and Works Administration (UNRWA) to take over sixty refugee camps from voluntary agencies. It managed to keep people alive, but only barely." "Our Roots Are Still Alive" by The Peoples Press Palestine Book Project.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 02:07 PM

Teribus is right: the colonial power occupying Palestine was in fact the Ottoman Empire, with the Brits acting as the victorious conquerors at the behest of the League of Nations after WWI, so my saying "British Palestine" may have been unwarranted shorthand. Nevertheless, the British were the power in the area for about thirty years, and established such things as a bureaucracy and currency and other marks of colonial rule. Whether you choose to call this colonialism or not is up to you; the Jews at the time certainly did. In any case, the Ottoman occupation was colonialism, albeit not strictly European.

CarolC, I could go to other websites and provide the "facts" from the opposite perspective. But it is neither useful nor within the purpose of even below-the-line mudcat to do this; instead I suggest visiting www.palestinefacts.org; if the blickymaker isn't working I won't post all the contents of the site here.

It is true, as I said, that some Arabs were bound to be displaced by the establishment of Israel. But the original plan created by the Brits provided for them by creating the state of TransJordan (now Jordan), which once again comprises 77 percent of Palestine. That Jordan was and is Palestine was never in dispute; the currency of transjordan, for example, was the same "Palestine mandate currency" that was used in what is now Israel. The British simply unilaterally gave Jordan independence in 1946, essentially ending its inclusion in the rest of Palestine. But it was Palestine, and it still is. If the Palestinians had gone into that part of Palestine, and the Jordanians had let them in, there would have been no "Palestinian refugee problem."

Then the UN came up with another plan, and if the Palestinians had accepted that they would now have a state on the West Bank. Having rejected offer after offer from the Brits acting for the League of Nations, the League of Nations itself, the UN, and Israel, and having helped initiate several wars in the region, they STILL claim they are being prevented from establishing a state.

I actually agree with you, CarolC, that ultimately Israel should give up the West Bank and allow a Palestinian state there. I do NOT think they are somehow required to do it, because you and I have very different views of the past. But it would be both generous and logical to do so and it would prevent any kind of onerous apartheid system from coming into play in Israel. There obviously has to be a negotiated settlement to achieve this, and there has not been the proper combination of a progressive Israeli government and someone on the Palestinian side with both the power and the good faith to negotiate on behalf of the Palestinians. I suspect it will never happen until Arafat is dead, and maybe not for a long time after that. In the meantime, there is no use blaming a succession of quite different Israeli governments when the more obvious problem all along has been Arafat.

You're right, I was probably hysterical before. It's one of those weeks at work. Plus I was egged on by my ol' friend and sparring partner mg and his drool remark!

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 02:12 PM

All we're missing here is "Paul's Epistle to the Romans."

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Frankham
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 04:41 PM

There are a lot of historical "facts" being displayed. The
idea that the Left is somehow anti-Semitic is laughable. The Leftr has never been able to agree on anything including who was involved
in Bolshevism.

This is true with Jewish folks as well. There's an old saying,
whenever you have two Jews in the same room, there are twelve
different opinions. I respect the willingness of Jews to analyze
and argue different positions. I think that this is healthy
and there are no monolithic Jews that represent how they think.
No one Jew can claim to represent his country or administration
policies as there is no American that can claim to be more
American than any other citizen.

George Wills is an enemy poser. He lumps all Lefties into one
category.

Here's what I think is going on. There is a Jewish reaction and
a Palestinian reaction and each can claim a litany of historical
facts to support their adversarial positions. This doesn't help
solve their problems.

In Israel, Palestinians are dehumanized. Amoung Palestinians,
Israelis are dehumanized. This solves nothing.

The solution is for each side to stop reacting and become proactive
in solving the problems by listening carefully to one another. A real attempt must be made to understand fully the contentions made by each
side. This has not been done. It's as if each entrenched side
has purposely put on ear plugs to the opposite point of view.

Name-calling and scapegoating by saying that all Lefties or Righties
are anti-Semitic just muddies the waters. And it's not true.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Martin Gibson
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 05:27 PM

Carol C.

Did anyone tell you that you spend way too much time on your computer, on this forum, posting the most unreadable, unfactual crap I have ever read, or better yet, ignore?

Good God, do you work? Have a family? Have any other kind of life but just banging out crap you find on the Internet to a relatively small readership? Do you ever get influenced by real life experience?

Frank, a good post, but I have been in a room with hundreds of Jews who all have the same opinion, think like a community, and feel that they are all family. So I don't know where that old saying comes from.

And I think George Will is quite a fine, literate, and thoughtful commentator.

As I have said before, I don't know why all the solutions that are presented here by the pseudo so very informed are not ever really enacted in the real world. It must be that everyone else just must be wrong, or worse yet, an enemy poser.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 06:58 PM

Martin... I'd be interested to know how you arrive at your figures on how much time I spend on the internet, and why you think it's any of your business. I'll make a deal with you. You stop making threads like this one, and I'll stop posting to them.

nerd, you tell me you think it's unproductive for you to read the information I've posted, and then you try to steer me to information that you want me to see. This seems a bit inconsistant, and difficult for me to understand.

As it happens, I'm very familiar with the site, www.palestinefacts.org, and have been for a couple of years. It's pretty obvious to me that it is an organization with a political agenda and not a human rights agenda. I would put it in the same category as this site: Palestine Remembered. If you accept what the Palestine Remembered site has to say about the Middle East, I'll consider accepting what your site has to say. But I don't think you'll even read what's in their site. I suspect you haven't even read what's in the links I posted earlier.

There is one thing from the Palestinefacts.org site that I'm willing to use in a quote. That's the part where the British appointed al Husseini (sp?) against the wishes of the Arabs. That part could only serve the purpose of making the British look bad, and considering all of the damage that's been done as a result of their meddling in the region, I don't have a particular problem with that.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 07:03 PM

BTW, nerd, you're wrong about the idea that Israel was waging defensive wars against the Arabs. There were all offensive wars (attacks by Israel against other countries) with the exception of '73. That one was Arabs taking back land that Israel took from them by force. The experts I'm using as my sources on this one are former Israeli prime ministers and high level military people.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 07:51 PM

CarolC,

I think it's amusing that you consider a pro-Palestinian website to have "A Human Rights Agenda" but a pro Israeli one to have "not a human rights agenda." What does this even mean? Cactus 48 is like the anti-palestinefacts. They both have a political agenda, nothing more and nothing less. You and I are having a political argument, not a "I support Human Rights and you don't" argument. I trust that both of us support Human Rights.

I did read what you posted, but it didn't contain any Israeli prime ministers admitting that Israel attacked anyone. I didn't say it was unproductive for me to read it but that posting long articles to mudcat is generally frownd upon by Joe and the Clones.

I also didn't say that Israel was fighting purely defensive wars; I only said they were attacked first. The US was attacked by Japan first, but that was one of the only really defensive actions we fought in World War II (not counting defending our allies, I mean). Most of the rest of the war against Japan was an offensive war, or a war for islands that neither side had real claim to. This does not change the fact that most people quite reasonably blame Japan and not the US, and most people have admitted US right to have bases on various of the islands, etc. So I'm not sure what the alleged former Prime Ministers of Israel are alleged to have said, since you managed to mention neither their identities nor their actual claims. I trust you'll respond with specifics anon...

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 08:32 PM

I'm a dumbass. I didn't mean that defending ourselves against Japan was one of the only defensive actions we fought, so let me rephrase that a third time. It was one of the only times we were defending our own territory from attack, as Israel was at the beginning of their various and sundry wars.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 09:43 PM

I think it's amusing that you consider a pro-Palestinian website to have "A Human Rights Agenda" but a pro Israeli one to have "not a human rights agenda." What does this even mean? Cactus 48 is like the anti-palestinefacts. They both have a political agenda, nothing more and nothing less. You and I are having a political argument, not a "I support Human Rights and you don't" argument.

This is incorrect. The Jewish human rights organizations are just that... human rights organizations. They are neither pro-Palestinian nor pro-Israel. They are neither anti-Palestinian nor anti-Israel. The Palestinian website I posted a link to in my second to last post is a pro-Palestinian website. It is not a human rights website. www.palistinefacts.org is a political website and not a human rights website. If you support human rights, getting your information from political websites will not serve your purpose.

I trust that both of us support Human Rights.

I can't speak for you. I can only speak for myself. I am in support of human rights. For everybody

I did read what you posted, but it didn't contain any Israeli prime ministers admitting that Israel attacked anyone. I didn't say it was unproductive for me to read it but that posting long articles to mudcat is generally frownd upon by Joe and the Clones.

I said I couldn't get the link to work for that particular page, so I posted the contents. You apparantly didn't read the contents of the links, or you would have seen these quotes (btw, I said former Prime Ministers and high level military people):

"Did the Egyptians actually start the 1967 war, as Israel originally claimed?

""The former Commander of the Air Force, General Ezer Weitzman, regarded as a hawk, stated that there was 'no threat of destruction' but that the attack on Egypt, Jordan and Syria was nevertheless justified so that Israel could 'exist according the scale, spirit, and quality she now embodies.'...Menahem Begin had the following remarks to make: 'In June 1967, we again had a choice. The Egyptian Army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.' "Noam Chomsky, "The Fateful Triangle.""

Was the 1967 war defenisve? - continued

""I do not think Nasser wanted war. The two divisions he sent to The Sinai would not have been sufficient to launch an offensive war. He knew it and we knew it."" Yitzhak Rabin, Israel's Chief of Staff in 1967, in Le Monde, 2/28/68

Moshe Dayan posthumously speaks out on the Golan Heights

""Moshe Dayan, the celebrated commander who, as Defense Minister in 1967, gave the order to conquer the Golan...[said] many of the firefights with the Syrians were deliberately provoked by Israel, and the kibbutz residents who pressed the Government to take the Golan Heights did so less for security than for the farmland...[Dayan stated] 'They didn't even try to hide their greed for the land...We would send a tractor to plow some area where it wasn't possible to do anything, in the demilitarized area, and knew in advance that the Syrians would start to shoot. If they didn't shoot, we would tell the tractor to advance further, until in the end the Syrians would get annoyed and shoot.

And then we would use artillery and later the air force also, and that's how it was...The Syrians, on the fourth day of the war, were not a threat to us.'" The New York Times, May 11, 1997"

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 10:17 PM

P.S. the tactics the current Israeli government is using on the Palestinians are pretty much exactly the same as the ones Israel used on the Syrians in the Golan Heights, as described by Moshe Dayan. So that makes it a violation of the human rights of Israeli Jews also, because these tactics are causing the deaths of many innocent Israeli Jews. And then of course there's the matter of imprisoning conscientious objectors instead of allowing them alternative service. That's also a violation of the human rights of Israeli Jews.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Mar 04 - 11:01 PM

Attention advocates of Israel!

Give it up. You cannot possibly argue a pto-Israel POV on Mudcat with CarolC. She will wear you down, just as she has worn down so many before you.

No matter what you know, she will find a contradictory web site to reference. She'll Chomsky and Finkelstein you until your brain is mush.

She has the stamina. Count up the posts in this thread. You'll see that plurality are from CarolC. Do the same on any other thread on the Middle East and you'll see the same thing.

Give it up. No one, not even the combined efforts of every advocate of Israel in the history of Mudcat, is a match for CarolC and her version of the truth.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Sam L
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 12:02 AM

Yawn. Martin, all I can ever think to say to you anymore is ...dude.

   Nerd, incidental to this discussion, I like your style, including your embarrassing admissions, apologies, revisions, your claim to be a dumbass. It seems you have a decent perspective on being involved in a dispute.

Carolc I think your response about American lands sounds both flippantly pat, and desperately logical. It belittles the question of human rights for you to deny that the question means more to you than a material piece of rented land that you could somehow give back. Nobody can. Those people are dead. Everyone's just renting the land. There wouldn't be any trailer on wheels. Anyway, the question means more to me, and I have to try to figure how to properly understand in myself the evils that were and are part of the deal, if I hope for anything better. I guess you're above history, somewhere, looking down at Israel.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 03:00 AM

If Israel isn't supposed to be a country, why is it there?

Why isn't there a Palestine?

Where is Arafat with the 300 million dollars?

Why did Martha not say, "And that's a good thing!" ?

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 01:33 PM

I don't think I quite understand your point, Fred. Maybe you don't understand what I was saying. I was asked how I would feel if I had to give back the land on which I'm living to native peoples. Since I don't have any land, the question is not terribly relevent to me. I've only been living on this particular piece of land for a few months. I've never lived in any one place for more than about ten years, with the average being a little under five years. And my family has only been here in the US for a couple of generations, so I don't have much family history here. I don't know how else to answer a question about how I would feel about something other than to say that this is how I think I would feel.

Certainly, the wrongs that have been done to the Indians cannot be undone. But what if, for instance, as a remedy for this injustice, the land that is now the US were to be given back to native nations to govern, but that the people who are now here could remain. I don't think I would have a problem with this. In fact, I might even prefer it.

If you're asking how would I feel if things could be put back the way they were before the Europeans came, how can I say? How can anyone say? I probably wouldn't be here.

Anyway, the question means more to me, and I have to try to figure how to properly understand in myself the evils that were and are part of the deal, if I hope for anything better. I guess you're above history, somewhere, looking down at Israel.

I'm not looking down on anybody. The way I properly understand in myself the evils that were and are a part of the deal from the past, is to try to prevent, or at least speak up about, the evils that are being done to people now. In the present. I can't change the past, but I can work to correct the injustices of today. And so can you. The situation in Israel is ongoing. My tax dollars are being used to make it possible. That makes me complicit. It's my responsibility to speak up about it, and not be a "good German".

brucie, I don't have time to worry about Arafat's 300 million. I'm too busy worrying about the several billions of taxpayer dollars that the US Pentagon has misplaced and can't account for.

If the Palestinians aren't supposed to live on the land they currently occupy, why are they there?

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 01:58 PM

Carol, what's a few billions. But a few billion here and a few billion there, pretty soon it'll add up to real money.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 02:13 PM

Certainly, the wrongs that have been done to the Indians cannot be undone. But what if, for instance, as a remedy for this injustice, the land that is now the US were to be given back to native nations to govern, but that the people who are now here could remain. I don't think I would have a problem with this. In fact, I might even prefer it.

In other words, you're saying that the large majority of the population should be under the control of a small minority. A system that is in direct opposition to any definition of democracy and human rights predicated on the notion of equality.

This latest missive of yours also contradicts your countless posts that all Jewish settlements in Palestinian territories must be evacuated. You reserve for yourself the right to remain on Native American land while denying a similar right to others.

You are a classic example of Phil Ochs' definition of a liberal. "Ten degrees to the left of center in good times, ten degrees to the right of center if it effects them personally."

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Nerd
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 05:45 PM

CarolC,

way to change the subject again! Arafat's 300 Million doesn't concern you, even though if he spent that on bettering the lot of the Palestinian refugees he could probably buy them enough land to live on. Even though he claims to be their leader while he bleeds them dry. Even thought he is the one theoretically negotiating with Israel--even though if the negotiations were successful he'd be worse off financially. Why can't you see it's a clear conflict of interest (and downright unseemly) for him to be so damn wealthy?

Also, I didn't see quotes from Israeli prime ministers saying what youclaimed. I saw Chomsky saying what you claimed, peppered with brief and doctored bits of quotes from Israelis. We all know Chomsky has no axe to grind, right?

The quotes you gave are clearly doctored. for example,

General Ezer Weitzman, regarded as a hawk, stated that there was 'no threat of destruction' but that the attack on Egypt, Jordan and Syria was nevertheless justified so that Israel could 'exist according the scale, spirit, and quality she now embodies.'

Clearly there was no threat of destruction, as Israel kicked everyone's asses. That does not mean Israel was not attacked. The rest is not a quote, until that vague bit at the end. In fact, there is no evidence that Weitzman said what the spin-doctor claims. When I see a quotation broken up by many ellipses, during which the author fills in his or her own spin, I don't trust the result.

For example, I could write:

CarolC doesn't care at all about the Palestinian situation; Arafat's behavior does not concern her because she's "too busy worrying about the several billions of taxpayer dollars that the US Pentagon has misplaced and can't account for." She does think that the Jews can all stay where they are, however: "I'm not calling for any Jews to be removed from where they are," she says.

Now in that passage the quotes are all accurate but in context they did not mean what I claimed they did. The only way you can be really sure is with what appears to be full, long quotations in full sentences, without paraphrasing by the so-called experts.

Begin's quote relates to Egypt but not Jordan or Syria. It still does not suggest Israel could have avoided war. Same for Rabin. And Dayan's quote basically states that the Syrians were so greedy for even useless land that they would shoot Israelis on bulldozers. Granted this doesn't make Israel look good, but don't both sides look equally bad? In fact, weren't the Syrians the ones who shot at unarmed bulldozer operators? So granted Dayan was a tough, coldhearted bastard, but Israel was STILL fired on first.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Sam L
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 06:42 PM

Carolc my point IS that you don't see my point. Which sounds like a smartass remark, but I'm afraid it's what I mean.
Maybe a better way to say it is that I don't have to factor my material situation or my German or my Cherokee ancestry to say that I do know how I feel--that I'm glad of some things despite the horror and hypocrisy that went into achieving them. I don't need to use a calculator or a ledger.
I don't object to criticism of Israel or think you ought to be a "good German" (which seems a slightly misplaced remark) and be silent but I think you may be unfairly comparing it's history to an abstract ideal of National Security in Neverland instead of to how anything of any value has ever actually been achieved in the world. Perhaps feeling that you "shouldn't" be critical of Israel makes you argue stridently, but in any case, it seems strident, and unweighed by comparison with everywhere else.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Frankham
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 06:54 PM

There is no information here that suggests that both sides
are not culpable. Who cares who fired on who for what reason?
If Israel decides to "kick ass", it will find the fire returned.
What good does that do? I don't think that quotes or elispses
mean too much anyway because the issue is that this problem is
not going to go away until there is a cessation on both sides
of violence and enemy posing. Each side has it's "justification"
for continuning the madness. Does any one really believe the wall will have any effect in ceasing hostilities? Does anyone really
believe the Bush Administration is up to helping to make peace
in the Middle East? They didn't even know the difference between
a Sunni and a Shi'ite.

Noam Chomsky has the right idea. The UN should step in and declare
that Israel have parity with the Palestinians in the running of
the state and allow for diversity of religious freedom. The state might be a socialist one but it needs to be shared between the
Jewish people and the Palestinians who lived there when it was being settled. Otherwise, we will be talking about this for years to
come and more bodies are strewn over the Middle East.

It's futile to declare that the suicide bombers are just crazy
people without an ideology or reason for their heinous acts.
As to Arafat, he does not represent the Palestinian people any
more. To blame him for the atrocities doesn't do anything.

The UN needs to be promoted by the US and Israel and not shunted
aside when nationalistic considerations are given so that the respective countries act unilaterally. The UN may not be perfect
but it's the only hope for the solution to this conflict.

The way Israel is going by way of Sharon will lead to a self-destructive conclusion. It will lead to less democracy and more repression. The Palestinians must be understood in terms of their needs and not ignored by Israel or the other Arab countries. Some
assistance must be given to Palestinians to alleviate their
poverty and reliance on hostile teachings from madrasas or other
rigid fundamentalism. Both Israel and Palestinians need to be
re-educated by learning how to build bridges. This is being
promoted by small groups now.

So it's futile to promote reasons why each side should continue
it's hostility and war. Information about how to build that
bridge is more important.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Mar 04 - 11:50 PM

Ok. This is what I have to say to nerd, and Fred at this time. I'm a little cramped for time on the computer, so I can't answer with the care and depth that I would like, but it's the best I can do at this time.

Here it is:

I don't feel a need to blame Israel for anything. I have never started one of these threads. I do not start any discussions on this subject. But people keep using (over and over and over and over and over and over, ad nauseum) both here in the Mudcat as well as in the US generally, a lot of lies and distortions of history in order to justify the continuing subjugation, dehumanization, and oppression of a whole people. When I encounter this, I speak up about it. A perfect example of that sort of thing is this from nerd (please interpret my use of caps in my response as frustration, and not stridency):

way to change the subject again! Arafat's 300 Million doesn't concern you, even though if he spent that on bettering the lot of the Palestinian refugees he could probably buy them enough land to live on.

WHAT THE HELL GOOD WOULD IT DO FOR ARAFAT TO BUY THEM LAND IF THE GOVERNMENT OF ISRAEL IS JUST GOING TO KICK THEM OFF OF IT AND THEN BULLDOZE THEIR HOMES!!!?????????

You answer me that one nerd!

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 01:56 AM

The following from the Jewish human rights organization, B'Tselem (click on "Siege Policy"), describes what, more than anything Arafat could do or has done, has brought the Palestinian economy to its knees:

Since September 2000, the IDF has erected an extensive network of checkpoints, road blocks, trenches and other obstacles - a virtual siege around every Palestinian community in the West Bank. Most West Bank roads are now reserved exclusively for Jewish travel.

Most checkpoints and physical obstacles do not prevent entry into Israel; they prevent travel between Palestinian cities and villages within the West Bank. They disrupt every aspect of Palestinian daily life. Children cannot get to schools, adults cannot reach jobs, and patients cannot get medical treatment. The restrictions on movement have contributed to a collapse of the Palestinian economy.

The checkpoints do not target only those who pose a security threat to Israel; they target everyone. In fact, those most harmed are people physically unable to bypass the obstacles: families with small children, pregnant women, the sick and the elderly.

When over two million people cannot travel even a few miles down the road, cannot conduct any aspect of their daily lives without encountering innumerable obstacles, such restrictions are no longer legitimate security measures - they are collective punishments.

Here are links to some other Jewish human rights and peace organizations.

Jewish Unity for a Just Peace

Gush Shalom

Refuser Solidarity Network

Jews for Peace in Palestine and Israel (JPPI)

Shalom Achshav

Jewish Voice for Peace http://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/ (I can't get this link to work, but copy-pasting the URL has worked for me)

Jews Against the Occupation

Bat Shalom

B'Tselem

European Jews for a Just Peace

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 02:56 AM

CarolC:

Please don't scream at me with bold capitals, three exclamation points and nine question marks. That's the internet equivalent of what we in Philly call a shit fit. And you know what they say, "if the shit fits, somebody's gonna end up wearin' it!"

I wasn't referring to buying land in Israel. The Palestinian refugees could, for example, buy land in Jordan, which is (have I mentioned this before?) a real nice Palestinian Arab state!

You talk of the "the continuing subjugation, dehumanization, and oppression of a whole people." This is wrong. Not all (or even most) Palestinian Arabs are refugees. They are Jordanian citizens and/or the citizens of many other countries, including Israel, Egypt, Syria and the US. What we have is a specific refugee problem, NOT a question of a "people with no homeland." It is part of the terrific PR job the PLO has accomplished that people like you think the refugees are "a whole people."

Once again, Jordan is a Palestinian Arab state occupying 77 percent of British Mandate Palestine. It is entirely a creation of the partition of Palestine into Jewish and Arab segments. Its name derives from the British designation transjordan, meaning "that part of Palestine on the East of the river Jordan."   It was the part of Palestine the Arabs got. It is the much bigger part, and the much better part, with all the oil and other natural resources. You never seem to respond to or even acknowledge this in your posts, and you perpetuate the myth that the Palestinian refugees in Israel are the whole of the Palestinian Arab community.   

You said before "Jordan is Jordan." I could equally well say "Israel is Israel." Neither makes any sense in this context. Both countries are just about equally old (Jordan a few years older), and both are in Palestine. Once there was Palestine, now there are two countries, one Arab, one Hebrew. Jordan is Arab Palestine. How many ways do we have to say it?

The Palestinian Arabs claim they have no homeland. What it comes down to is this: some of the Arabs did not want to move about fifty miles away to enter the country the Arabs got out of the deal. They did not accept the terms offered by the British or the UN. Furthermore, some of the Palestinians in Jordan wanted to keep them out. It's a tough situation but it's not Israel's fault.

Frank, indeed I agree with you about many things here. I was not using "kick ass" in an approving way, simply as a description of the outcome of the wars in question. I simply meant to say that it is obvious from the way the wars played out that Israel was not in danger in destruction, and that a General saying so is not the same thing as saying that the war was unjustified. They were attacked and WOULD have been destroyed if they had not fought back.

In much the same way, we are not in danger of destruction by the Canadian military, but if we offered no resistance they could still take over the US (if they wanted to , that is!) Therefore if they attacked us we would fight back. I daresay we might even kick ass (not that I would approve of such an action!) Luckily the Canadians are very polite neighbors.

The main problem with the UN on this issue is structural: there are many Arab countries, many more Muslim countries in Asia and Africa that vote with the Arab countries, and other historically anti-Jewish countries (for a time, the USSR) that have a ball making Israel defend its right to exist annually. These nations have found that by voting in a bloc they isolate Israel so that only US support keeps Israel afloat. I agree that in theory the UN should work out this problem, but they have failed to do so many times and I'm not sure it's realistic to think they can achieve it. I hope that they can.

As I've said, I am in favor of a two-state solution, with hostilities ending on both sides. I think the West Bank is more trouble than it's worth for Israel, and it would be fitting and logical to give it over to another Palestinian Arab state, or else to give it to Jordan with the understanding that the Palestinian Arabs currently stateless could become Jordanian citizens.

I also agree that Sharon's government is a big step backwards. I think there are younger people in both communities who are frustrated with Arafat and Sharon and the whole lot of Dinosaurs running both groups. Unfortunately, there are also young people in both countries who are religious fanatics and wish to kill everyone on the other side.

The only thing I don't agree with is that the Jews should give up or share sovereignty in Israel. I want to see it partitioned for the time being, not shared. The problem with a sharing scenario is that one group will inevitably become a minority, and that will likely lead to injustice again. Remember, though, that we are not talking about vast distances. For Palestinians to move from their ancestral spot to the west bank, while a disruption, is not really that big a move. I moved further than that for grad school.

I'm in favor of a world with no state religion and no religious intolerance. Sadly, that isn't the world we live in yet. It is the world we need to work toward, and solving this thorny problem would be a big step.

Fred, thanks for your kind comments. I too often come across as overly strident on Mudcat, so I'm making an effort to embrace my inner dumbass!

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 03:29 AM

CarolC,

You're changing the subject again. Sure the roadblocks suck and need to go. But why is it relevant to Arafat being so damn rich and yet supposedly a dispossessed refugee who cares deeply for his people? You'd rather not contemplate this, so you bring up irrelevancies like the Pentagon budget and roadblocks in the West Bank. We can all agree on the roadblocks being a bad thing without it having the slightest bearing on the historical questions we've been discussing, or on the fact that the Palestinian refugees have by and large been screwed by other Palestinians, including Arafat, Hamas, and the entire country of Jordan.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Galbraith
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 10:19 AM

brucie, I don't have time to worry about Arafat's 300 million. I'm too busy worrying about the several billions of taxpayer dollars that the US Pentagon has misplaced and can't account for.

To get an idea of the proportion of Arafat's corruption and the difference that it's made to Palestinian society, look at the $300 million as a per capita expense of the Plaestinian people. It works out to approximately $100 per Palestinian man, woman and child that Arafat has stolen.

That same per capita expense in America would mean that George W. Bush had put more than $22 billion dollars of taxpayer money into his own bank account.

Now, add in the fact that per capita income for Americans is about 10 times that of Palestinians. Then, and only then, can you begin to get an idea of the magnitude of Arafat's corruption and the harm that he's done to his people in stealing directly from them and in keeping them on a path away from peace.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 11:03 AM

GUEST, Galbraith. Great analogy.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 12:17 PM

I'll yell at you if I want to nerd. Don't tell me what to do.

When I say Palestinians, I am referring to the people who live in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem. These people may be Muslim, and they may be Christian, and in some cases they may be Jewish. They mostly have Arabic ancestry. But in all cases, I'm talking about the people whose families have lived in and farmed those areas for hundreds of years. Your practice of constantly referring to Jordan is misleading, and shows your true intentions, which have nothing to do with making peace between two peoples. It looks to me like what you favor is the removal of the remaining Palestinians from their homes in the Occupied Territories. One of the reasons Jordan hasn't absorbed the refugees that currently live within its borders as they appear on maps today is because they just don't have the resources to absorb that many refugees, and because of unrest between the people from whom the Palestinians would take away jobs (if they could find any jobs). And if they were to have to absorb two million Palestinians from the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem, it would cause massive disruption of their own social fabric.

Once again, Jordan is a Palestinian Arab state occupying 77 percent of British Mandate Palestine. It is entirely a creation of the partition of Palestine into Jewish and Arab segments. Its name derives from the British designation transjordan, meaning "that part of Palestine on the East of the river Jordan."   It was the part of Palestine the Arabs got. It is the much bigger part, and the much better part, with all the oil and other natural resources. You never seem to respond to or even acknowledge this in your posts, and you perpetuate the myth that the Palestinian refugees in Israel are the whole of the Palestinian Arab community.

The Palestinians in Israel aren't all refugees. Many of them are living where they and their families have been living for centuries. The ones who are refugees are mostly ones who were chased off of land that had been granted to the Arabs by the British in the partition plan, and who were chased off of their land by the Israelis at the point of a gun in the period just before, during, and after 1948. That is, the ones who weren't outright massacrred.

Ok, Galbraith. Arafat is a bad man. He is a crook and he stole some money. Are you saying that these things justify the massive human rights abuses that Israel is perpetrating against the Palestinians? Because if you are, you would be advocating collective punishment, and I'm sure Hitler would be proud of you for that. People keep using Arafat to justify Israel treating the Palestinians worse than they would treat their livestock.

I've said it before and I'll say it again... a Palestinian once said that Arafat would be long gone by now if Israel didn't make such a big issue about him. Arafat is exactly where the government of Israel wants him to be. Look how effective having him to use as a whipping boy has been to get people like you to ignore the horrible things the government if Israel is doing to the Palestinians while you complain about Arafat. Plus, having him remaain in power gives them an excuse to do whatever they want to the Palestinians. The government of Israel doesn't want him gone. He's too useful to them.

I suggest that if they want Arafat gone, they should end the occupation, and forget about him. He would quickly fade away into the mists of history if they would do that.