BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 06:24 PM

I don't have time to read everthing that's been posted since my last post right now. I'll post this now, and then, when I have time, I'll read and, if needed, respond. This is the information I've been busy gathering in the last few days:

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.

This is entirely misleading, and hardly faithful to historical fact.

According to one of the official Jordanian websites, during the period of Ottoman rule:

"The four centuries of Ottoman rule (1516-1918 CE) were a period of general stagnation in Jordan. The Ottomans were primarily interested in Jordan in terms of its importance to the pilgrimage route to Mecca al-Mukarrama. They built a series of square fortresses—at Qasr al-Dab'a, Qasr Qatraneh, and Qal'at Hasa—to protect pilgrims from the desert tribes and to provide them with sources of food and water. However, the Ottoman administration was weak and could not effectively control the Bedouin tribes. Over the course of Ottoman rule, many towns and villages were abandoned, agriculture declined, and families and tribes moved frequently from one village to another. The Bedouins, however, remained masters of the desert, continuing to live much as they had for hundreds of years.

Population continued to dwindle until the late 19th century, when Jordan received several waves of immigrants. Syrians and Palestinians migrated to Jordan to escape over-taxation and feuds, while Muslim Circassians and Chechens fled Russian persecution to settle in Jordan, Syria, Iraq and Turkey."

According to all of the documents I've been able to locate about the Mandate period, none of them suggest that the Arabs living in the area that is now Israel and the Occupied Territories should be moved from where they lived to Transjordan. In fact, most of them, including the Balfour declaration, say that the rights of non-Jewish residents should not be infringed:

Foreign Office
November 2nd, 1917
Dear Lord Rothschild,

I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty's Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet.

"His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."

I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.

Yours sincerely,

Arthur James Balfour

Some more sites with information about the Mandate period:

Wikipedia

Jordan website



Map of 1947 UN Partition plan

The following quotes are from declassified Israeli documents and personal diaries. Anyone who wants to, can verify them on their own:

Moshe Sharett , first Israeli foreign minister:

1914...

We have forgotten that we have not come to an empty land to inherit it, but we have come to conquer a country from people inhabiting it, that governs it by the virtue of its language and savage culture ..... Recently there has been appearing in our newspapers the clarification about "the mutual misunderstanding" between us and the Arabs, about "common interests" [and] about "the possibility of unity and peace between two fraternal peoples." ..... [But] we must not allow ourselves to be deluded by such illusive hopes ..... for if we cease to look upon our land, the Land of Israel, as ours alone and we allow a partner into our estate- all content and meaning will be lost to our enterprise.

1937:

"The proposed Jewish state (proposed 1937 Peel Commission partition plan) territory would not be continuous; its borders would be twisted and broken; the question of defending the frontier line would pose enormous difficulties .... the frontier line would separate villages from their fields .... Moreover the [Palestinian] Arab reaction would be negative because they would lose everything and gain almost nothing ..... in contrast to us they would lose totally that part of Palestine which they consider to be an Arab country and are fighting to keep it such ... They would lose the richest part of Palestine; they would lose major Arab assets, the orange plantations, the commercial and industrial centers and the most important sources of revenue for their government which would become impoverished; they would lose most of the coastal area, which would also be a loss to the hinterland Arab states..... It would mean that they would be driven back to the desert ('Zorkim Otam') .... A Jewish territory [state] with fewer Arab subjects would make it easy for us but it would also mean a procrustean bed for us while a plan based on expansion into larger territory would mean more [Palestinian] Arab subjects in the Jewish territory.

For the next 10 years the possibility of transferring the Arab population would not be 'practical'. As for the long-term future: I am prepared to see in this a vision, not a mystical way but in a realistic way, of a population exchange on a much more important scale and including larger territories. As for now, we must not forget who would have to exchange the land? those villages which live more than others on irrigation, on orange and fruit plantations, in houses built near water wells and pumping stations, on livestock and property and easy access to markets. Where would they go? What would they receive in return? ... This would be such an uprooting, such a shock, the likes of which had never occurred and could drown the whole thing in rivers of blood. At this stage let us not entertain ourselves with the analogy of population transfer between Turkey and Greece; there were different conditions there. Those Arabs who would remain would revolt; would the Jewish state be able to suppress the revolt without assistance from the British Army?"

1949

"the most spectacular event in the contemporary history of Palestine, in a way more spectacular than the creation of the Jewish state, is the wholesale evacuation of its (Palestinian) Arab population. . . . The opportunities opened up by the present reality for a lasting and radical solution of the most vexing problem of the Jewish state (referring to the Palestinian Arabs living in the portion of the 1947 UN Partition plan) are so far-reaching, as to take one's breath away. The reversion of the status quo ante is unthinkable."

Quotes from Ahad Ha'Am, a Russian Jewish intellectual

1891

"We abroad are used to believe the Eretz Yisrael is now almost totally desolate, a desert that is not sowed ..... But in truth that is not the case. Throughout the country it is difficult to find fields that are not sowed. Only sand dunes and stony mountains .... are not cultivated."

"If a time comes when our people in Palestine develop so that, in small or great measure, they push out the native inhabitants, these will not give up their place easily."

"....[the Zionist pioneers believed that] the only language the Arabs understand is that of force ..... [They] behave towards the Arabs with hostility and cruelty, trespass unjustly upon their boundaries, beat them shamefully without reason and even brag about it, and nobody stands to check this contemptible and dangerous tendency."

"[The Jewish settlers] treat the Arabs with hostility and cruelty, trespass unjustly, beat them shamelessly for no sufficient reason, and even take pride in doing so. The Jews were slaves in the land of their Exile, and suddenly they found themselves with unlimited freedom, wild freedom that ONLY exists in a land like Turkey. This sudden change has produced in their hearts an inclination towards repressive tyranny, as always happens when slave rules."

"We are used to thinking of the Arabs as primitive men of the desert, as a donkey-like nation that neither sees nor understands what is going around it. But this is a GREAT ERROR. The Arab, like all sons of Sham, has sharp and crafty mind . . . Should time come when life of our people in Palestine imposes to a smaller or greater extent on the natives, they WILL NOT easily step aside."

"Serfs they were in the lands of the Diaspora and suddenly they find themselves in unrestricted freedom and this change has awakened in them an inclination to despotism. They treat the Arabs with hostility and cruelty, deprive them of their rights, offend them without cause and even boast of these deeds; and nobody among us opposes this despicable and dangerous inclination ..."

On the subject of the boycott of Arab labor by Jewish labor...

"Apart from the political danger, I can't put up with the idea that our brethren are morally capable of behaving in such a way to humans of another people, and unwittingly the thought comes to my mind: if it is so now, what will be our relation to the others if in truth we shall achieve at the end of times power in Eretz Yisrael? And if this be the Messiah: I do not wish to see his coming."
1914...

"(the Zionists) wax angry towards those who remind them that there is still another people in Eretz Yisrael that has been living there and does not intend at all to leave its place. In a future when this illusion will have been torn from their hearts and they will look with open eyes upon the reality as it is, they will certainly understand how important this question is and how great our duty to work for its solution."

Israeli historian and military strategist, Martin Van Creveld, in his book The Sword and The Olive:

"In the Event of invading (Arab) forces were limited to approximately 30,000 men. The strongest single contingent was the Jordanian one, already described. Next came Egyptians with 5,500 men, then the Iraqis with 4,500 who ..... were joined by perhaps 3,000 local irregulars. The total was thus around eight rather under strength brigades, some of them definitely of second-and even third-rate quality. To these must be added approximately 2,000 Lebanese (one brigade) and 6,000 Syrians (three brigades). Thus, even though the Arabs countries outnumbered the Yishuv by better then forty-to-one, in terms of military manpower available for combat in Palestine the two sides were fairly evenly matched. As time went on and both sides sent reinforcements the balance changed in the Jews' favor; by October they had almost 90,000 men and women under arms, the Arabs only 68,000."

"As for Abdullah's Arab Legion, it had fought better than any other Arab force. Yet on scarcely any occasion had the Arab Legion attempted to conquer territories allotted to the Jews by the partition plan, preferring to stay on the defensive."

".... there was no common military headquarters, no attempts at coordinating the offenses of the Arab armies, and ... not even a regular liaison service for sharing enemy intelligence."
"Perhaps the most important [of Arab armies problems] was a crippled shortage of ammunition, owing to the international arms embargo ..., in the case of the Iraqis and Egyptians, long lines of communications. For example, after February 25, 1948, the Arab Legion received no new ammunition for its 20mm guns. Some of the ammunition used by the Iraqi artillery was more than thirty years old; the Syrians had no ammunition for their heavy 155mm guns. Whereas Jewish stockpiles were growing all the times [especially the big arms shipment from Czechoslovakia in May 1948], the enemies were so depleted they stole ammunition shipments for each other. In addition, they were ill-coordinated, technically incompetent, slow, ponderous, badly led, and unable to cope with night operations that willy-nilly, constituted the IDF's expertise."

Yigal Allon , commander of the Haganah's Palmach between 1945-1948

"The echo of the fall of (Palestinian)Arab Safad carried far . . . The confidence of thousands of (Palestinian) Arabs of the Hula was shaken . . . We had only five days left . . . until 15 May([1948). We regarded it as imperative to cleanse (Palestinian Arabs from) the interior of the Galilee and create Jewish territorial continuity in the whole of the Upper Galilee. The protracted battles reduced our forces, and we faced major tasks in blocking (prospective Syrian and Lebanese) invasion routes. We, therefore, looked for a means that would not oblige us to use force to drive out tens of thousands of hostile (Palestinian) Arabs left in the Galilee and who, in the event of an invasion, could strike at us from behind. We tried to utilize a stratagem that exploited the (Arab) defeat in Safad and in area cleared by (Operation) Broom - a stratagem that worked wonderfully.

I gathered the Jewish mukhtars, who had ties with the different (local Palestinian) Arab villages, and I asked them to whisper in the ears of several (Palestinian) Arabs that a giant Jewish reinforcement had reached the Galilee and were about to clean out the villages of Hula, to advise them as friends, to flee while they could. And rumour spread throughout Hula that the time had come to flee. The flight encompassed tens of thousands. The stratagem fully achieved its objective . . . and we were able to deploy ourselves in face of the [prospective] invaders along the borders, with out fear for our rear."

"We looked for means which would not obligate us to use force in order to get tens of thousands of sulky (Palestinian) Arabs who remained in Galilee to flee, for in case of an Arab invasion, they would attack us from rear."

In reference to the expulsion of the villages of Lydda and Ramle of their Palestinian inhabitants:

"clogged the routes of the advance of the (Transjordan Arab) Legion and had foisted upon the Arab economy the problem of "maintaining another 45,000 souls . . . Moreover, the phenomenon of the flight of tens of thousands will no doubt cause demoralsation in every Arab area (the refugees) reach . . . This victory will yet have great effect on other sectors."

Mapam party do-leader Meir Ya'ari, on the subject of Allon's strategy of using refugees to accomplish military goals:

"Many of us are losing their (human) image . . How easily they speak of how it is possible and permissible to take women, children, and old men and to fill the road with them because such is the imperative of strategy. And this we say, the members of Hashomer Hatzair, who remember who used this means against our people during the Second World] war. . . . I am appalled."

Yigal Allon, in justifying to Ben-Gurion a plan for military conquest of the West Bank:

"Our offensive has to leave the way open for the army and the refugees to retreat. We shall easily find the reason or, to be more accurate, the pretexts, to justify our offensive, as we did up to now."

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 02:49 PM

CC: Ther is nothing 'selective' about suicide bombing a bus full of kids. I don't mean to sound cold, but this wasn't an issue when it was just Israelis getting hit. Now it's an issue because people attacking them are getting hit. Now we know why Israelis--specifically Jews--need a country of their own.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Chief Chaos
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 02:14 PM

Okay, I understand a little better now.

Te only thing that I have a bone to pick with is how Israel chooses to enforce it's sovereignty (sovereignity?). Unfortunately it's true that far more Palestinians have died in the conflict than Israelis. Sort of makes it a moot point blowing ones'self up.
We (the U.S. military) are constrained from using force above and beyond "an appropriate response". This means if someone pulls a knife we are not allowed to respond with a bazooka. Israel has the right to defend herself by all means but their responses to shootings and suicide bombings include far too many "innocents" (one could argue that there is no such thing as an innocent Palestinian). Massad, the Israeli special forces unit, used to be able to get close enough to a suspect to plant explosives in their cell phones. That way only the suspect had their head blown off. Responding to an attack with air borne missiles, tanks, helicopter gun ships etc. is out of hand and only generates more attacks from the other side. We would never allow, nor would the British ever consider, blowing away an apartment building to get one or two "suspected" IRA members. Although the police did blow up a rowhouse in Philadelphia a couple decades ago and end up taking out the whole of the rowhouses in an "unforseen" fire.
If Massad used to be able to do in one target at a time, why are they generating so much "collateral damage" now?

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 01:51 PM

dianavan: You are correct about much of what you say, but in western history, NO group of people have been scapegoated as freguently as Jews. That's fact. I side with Israel. I alos think Palestinians need a homeland. However, I think the security of Israel has to come first. That's my last comment on it. Period.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 10:25 AM

I agree that borders are a mistake. We will be without them soon enough. The multinationals and NWO will see to that. This is just debate and statement of positions. It won't matter much in fifty years.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Frankham
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 10:12 AM

Martin Gibson, I've been giving it some thought and I really feel
that you have more to fear from the radical right than you do from
the left.

The right's religious agenda is something like this. Preserve Israel
but when the Second Coming happens (which Bush believes) the Jewish
people will be exterminated by God because they don't believe in
Jesus. That's really scary!

Armageddon is blown completely out of proportion due to a misinterpretation of Revelations.

Unless you are a Jew for Jesus, when the radical right is finished,
Jews will be at the least second class citizens and at the most
taken out. The left has no such agenda and many of the great spokespeople for the left were Jewish.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Sam L
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 10:03 AM

Dianavan, I think it's a bit of a lowball to characterize Jewish concerns as a feeling that they've been dumped on. Sure there are other reasons for the establishment of Israel than the most important ones. There are other reasons for everything, but it doesn't negate the good, it's just mixed.

   I've decided for myself that I really only support human rights to a limited extent. Driving cars results in human rights violations, in that accidents will undeniably happen, and individual human suffering will be caused, no matter what we do. I'd like it to improve, but for now I live with it. Our jury system results in human rights violations, and since this is known, I draw the line at the death penalty. But until I know a better way to do things without introducing a new set of flaws I guess I'm complicit and a good German in this ongoing abuse. Hitler would be proud of me. I'm a Nazi.

   I'm not Jewish, or especially religious, but if Jews don't mind, Jewish culture is also partly my culture, and Israel is also a democracy. I don't fully support the U.S. in it's current form, but that's the trouble with democracy. I'm still rooting for it to do better.

I don't have to worry about defending Israel and it would be pretty easy for me to criticize in an unbalanced idealistic manner, but who would it serve, but me? People without children are always better and more committed parents than us flawed cretins who have them. The obvious solution is that only childless people should have children.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: dianavan
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 03:44 AM

brucie - Everyone wants a place to live.

In my family, every generation seems to have found a new (different) place to live. I'm not sure if I have a homeland and I don't care. That hasn't stopped me from living my life. Pograms do not work but Jews are not the first (or the last) to live in countries with laws that do not protect them. There have been internment camps, apartheid, concentration camps, slavery, reservations and so on. What about those people? Should they not be given land that was historically theirs? The only reason Israel was given this special distinction was because the U.S. and Britain needed a strategic location to protect their oil interests.

Displacing one group to satisy the needs of another is not the answer. Two wrongs do not make a right. Just because you feel you have been "dumped on" does not give you the right to dump on others. Conflict is always reduced to us and them and whoever has the biggest guns wins. Thats the problem.

Do you ever think there may come a time when people will realize that nations are politically structured to separate people? Someday we may decide to stop fighting and realize that we are all born on this planet and therefore have a right to live here? Borders serve the power elite and their need to control the movement of goods and people. The conflict in the middle east isn't a religious conflict. Its economic.

d

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 01:52 AM

Gotcha. I was dredging what's left of my memory. Thanks, Nerd.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 01:49 AM

Brucie,

it's not quite true that we are all citizens of Israel. I can't vote for representatives there, because I am an American citizen. But Jews would automatically be granted citizenship if we wanted it and if we went to live there..

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 01:22 AM

Zionism was a necessity. Jews got tired of pograms. They wanted a place to live. I think today that anyone who is Jewish is automatically a citizen of Israel (although I stand to be corrected on that), and I do not think Jews have anything to apologize for with regard to Zionism. I personally don't give a rat's ass who likes my position or not. If I were Jewish, and given the history of persecution Jews have faced, I'd want a home I knew I'd be welcome in at anytime. And, given the sordidity of that history, I'd want a few nukes around just to have. Jews have depended on the various countries they lived in to protect them with law. Does anyone here need a list of countries in which that failed? No. Next time there's a pogram against Jews, it will be very expensive for all concerned. And it's about time.

Bruce M

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

Well, Chief Chaos, as you know there are people on the left who are very inflexible about certain things. The idea of a state religion rankles them, and they are too rigidly perfectionist to say, "well, if other states have religions then Israel should be allowed to as well." So they would be anti-Zionist on the grounds that it involved moving people into an area and setting up a government based on their religion. They would also advocate dropping state religions everywhere, and a lot of other pie-in-the-sky ideals that will not come to pass anytime soon.

I don't have a problem with the statement "in a reasonable world, Israel would not be necessary, and I advocate a reasonable world rather than a Jewish State in this world" which was essentially what BillD was saying above. And this is anti-Zionist from first principles. But it is not anti-Semitic.

You can also amend this position to not be anti-Zionist, simply by saying "but barring a more reasonable world, I'll support Israel," which is basically my position.

In practice, I agree with you, it is hard to tell whether anti-Semitism lurks behind anti-Zionism or not. But we can't just assume it does.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Wolfgang
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 03:17 PM

I consider it as important as the question of how I would feel if I were a Palestinian who was being disposessed of his or her ancestral land. I think it shows a lack of regard for real human issues and the tragedies that ensue, to not see it as anything other than a rhetorical question. (Carol)

I've hesitated very long whether I should give you a response to that question. The reason for my hesitation will become clear soon.
I'll give you the same response I have given in another thread, but considerably longer.

After the last big war, about 14 Million Germans (I have taken the number from one of the Evicted sites, so it surely is a bit of an exaggeration) have been dispossessed and evicted from their ancestral lands (some hundred thousands have been killed in that action). I don't tell you that to complain, for the reasons that have led to this development are known and Germany alone is responsible. (That's why I have hesitated for I am very far from any type of 'we too have suffered' argumentation which would be awfully wrong for many different reasons). I'll tell you that to show how the consequences of evictions can be dealt with in another way than in the Middle East.

These evictions usually had one day's notice and often only one suitcase of belongings was allowed to be taken. These evictions were not only from former parts of Germany to remaining parts of Germany (still the same land, you may say), but also evictions from the land of their birth of ethnic German minorities who had lived for centuries in for instance Czechoslovakia. For most of these people the evictions were for good, for the Iron Curtain prevented them to see their homes even as visitors. Imagine how it feels to be evicted from your home with one day notice and never to see it again for close to sixty years. Only a minority of the evicted has been able to travel now in the recent years (and in the best case made friends with the new residents, who called the same house 'home').

Perhaps it was a slowly dawning sense of guilt or the knowledge that Germany's crimes had led to this development, I don't know, for I was not yet born then. But the evicted were made welcome (my family of then 8 people had to make room for another family of 4 in a house that is now occupied by 2 persons), given rooms and, later, jobs. The feeling was that Germany had a responsibility for them and that they were our co-citizens for good.

If Germany had kept the refugees in camps close to the borders under inhumane conditions with vague promises of helping them to regain their ancestral homes, the development in Central Europe might have been considerably less peaceful than it was. To blame Israel alone for the very real suffering of the Palestinians in the West Bank (formerly a part of Jordan) and Gaza (formerly a part of Egypt) forgets some other players who have used the Palestinians as pawns in a power game.

Wolfgang

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Chief Chaos
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 02:42 PM

Nerd, What's the differnce? (I mean that sincerely). How do you really separate one from the other?

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 03:15 AM

Anti-Zionism a radical idea? Nice try. Most Americans and most of the world have been Anti-Zionist from the get-go.

Alex, one of the reasons you have not encountered anti-Semitism may simply be because it is socially frowned upon. As anti-Zionism becomes more and more permissible, anti-Semites will inevitably begin to express anti-Zionist ideas while keeping quiet about their deeper anti-Semitism. So it's very possible you've encountered real anti-semites, if not open anti-semitism. This does not mean that most anti-Zionists are also anti-Semites, but certainly most anti-semites are anti-Zionist.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: dianavan
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 02:40 AM

Alex Statman,

I'm glad you made the distinction between anti-semitism and anti-zionism. I believe in the ideal of Zionism but reject the current material state. I am not anti-semitic. I have believed this since 1965. For me it is not a new idea. Its interesting that the intelligentsia is beginning to see the whole picture. I hope they can explain it better than me. I was always afraid to express my views for fear of being labelled anti-semitic.

Just goes to show you that radical ideas, given time, may eventually become mainstream.

d

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Alex.S
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 12:28 AM

Well, I am Jewish (I know this is often a tough concept to the unititiated, but I mean this more culturally/thnically than religiously). Here in LA, most of the people I meet are what one might call members of the "liberal intelligentsia" and many are, in fact, Jewish.

Not once in my life have I encountered any real anti-semitism. We must draw a careful distinction between anti-semitism and anti-zionism, the latter being far more common, and then only in the far left (socialist types).

It's too bad, because several decades ago Jews and socialism mixed nicely (and here, at least, they still do). But, I hear from friends at UC Berkeley (That university bastion of academic liberalism)that anti-zionism is now widespread.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Nerd
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 12:07 AM

BTW, carolC, I was not referring to your comments to Fred, but the one you made directly to me. After I attempted to be inclusive and to respect your point of view by saying

"I trust that both of us support Human Rights"

You responded with.

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

This was a bit snippy, to say the least.

It's like when someone says "now, now, we're all adults," and the rsponse is "well, I'M and adult, but I don't know about YOU!"

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Sam L
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 12:05 AM

Chief, that's just Martin, who thinks he's funny (no offense Martin but I think you aren't a great humorist)and he has apparently never seen a photo of CarolC, to judge from what he imagines. He replies to stereotypes that she never suggested, then applies whatever he can think of to her. It's just dumb, and people have been ignoring it.

The article at the top of this thread is one of the worst you could find by it's author.

Thanks for permission to think what I want of you CarolC, really--I know I can anyway but it really does matter to me that you don't begrudge it. I don't have any bad feelings either but honestly I'm fascinated by your persistence in foolishness. I think you're being sophomoric on purpose. You could say what you mean without mentioning Hitler, but you prefer to, then to back away from the implications. You like to pretend you are tone-deaf, and then argue about which dictionary definition you're using. You go, Vulcan girl. It's sophomoric. It's silly. You could drive tonight to instances of slavery in south Florida, but you argue that individual suffering of Palestinians is equal to individual suffering of Jews in the holocaust. You know what? It isn't, because every single thing is different, despite Locke, or Mill, or blah blah blah, or Chomsky. You're baiting and switching, to attract attention to your opinions. It does more harm than good, but you don't care. Did you read in Chomsky somewhere how to formulate dramatic opinions that serve to call attention to yourself? Good for you. You aren't tone-deaf, and you aren't special because people call you anti-semitic when you aren't. You're just being a kid.

It's poshlost, that sort of sentimental narcissistic self-importance that Russians considerately thought to name. As if I came back with a greater-good argument like, um, screw Palestinians. What have they ever contributed to world culture, compared to Jews? They exist just a little bit more than, say, Symbonians. I mean really. fuck them anyway. And also. What Christian that anyone could name goes into a court with the idea of "turning the other cheek"? Screw Christians too, they're just pretending to have actual beliefs, right up until anything matters to them. See? It's pretty easy to come up with flashy stupid stuff, but of course, I didn't actually say any of it. What I actually said was blah blah blah....

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Nerd, cookie musta got tossed
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 10:47 PM

Hi everyone,

been away from the computer all day.

CarolC, I was not misquoting you, I was stating what you suggested about me by saying "I really couldn't say." You were stating that from my posts, for all you knew, I COULD be "against Human Rights." This then suggests that my posts and my online demeanor are such that one could come away with this impression.

It would be like someone saying, "well from Carol's attitude, she MIGHT be a (fill in expletive here); I just don't know. You'll have to ask her." The stong SUGGESTION is that the speaker thinks you ARE said expletive.

And as for the person you compared to Hitler, when you say "are you saying that X applies, because if so Hitler would be proud of you," rhetorically you are suggesting a comparison to Hitler. You are trying to back someone away from a statement he has made by saying "the way I understand it, that statement suggests a Hitler-like attitude," which in itself SUGGESTS you think he is like Hitler.

Technicalities aside, it's a little offensive.

So far C-Watch and others are doing a pretty good job pointing your inaccuracies.

And you're right. I will never have the degree of indoctrination that you have recieved about the "history" of Israel.

This crap about indoctrination is pretty offensive too. There, you are misquoting me rather severely. I never said anything about indoctrination. What I said was that Jews wish Israel to exist, and that all things being equal, and given that there will be the same amount of suffering in the world (a premise I know you don't share, but one which we honestly believe to be true), we would prefer the option that keeps Israel in existence. As they say, "so sue us." But don't slander us!

I won't post new stuff because I know you haven't had time to respond to my old stuff yet.

Chief, you'll notice I haven't mentioned NASCAR or trailers once. I think that stuff is irrelevant to this discussion.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,C-Watch
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 08:31 PM

Your information about Arab citizenship rights in Israel is incorrect.

You can find the breakdown of parties represented in the Knesset at this link. You will note that there are two parties that are specifically Arab. Several of the leftist Israeli parties also include Arab members.

Arab members of the Knesset have eqaul voting rights within the Knesset as do the Jewish members. The votes of Israel's Arab citizens count as much as the votes of Jewish citizens in determining the makeup of the Knesset, which as I've previously noted, is based on proportional representation.

Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza are not Israeli citizens and thus do not vote in Knesset election.

Arabic, by the way, is an official language of the State of Israel along with Hebrew.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Chief Chaos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 07:50 PM

Uhhh, 'scuse me but ya'll keep on attacking CarolC with nonsense about her trailer park and Nascar screaming in the background.

Aren't they the folks that the Democrats are out to get the votes from? The Nascar Dads?

Most of 'em that I know vote Republican. I thought this was about anti-semitism and the left?

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:59 PM

Well, Guest, C-Watch, the description in your link is not one that I was aware of when I made that post. If it is the correct definition of the term, then the suicide bombers would probably fit the description. But then so would Ariel Sharon, with the exception that he did not take his own life after massacring innocent Palestinians (and I'm not refering to Sabra and Shatilla). There are a number of other Israelis who fit that description as well with the exception that they have not taken their own lives after committing the murders. Personally, I think I'll still refrain from using the term "mass murderer" for both of these groups of people.

There is one, and only one difference. Israeli Arab citizens are exempt from military service. The Israeli Knesset operates in a sytem of proportional representation. The percentage of Arab Knesset members is almost identical to the proportion of Arabs within Israel.

This is incorrect. There are different laws pertaining to property ownership, and there are different laws about who can serve in the Knesset. I also don't think that the Palestinian representitives to the Knesset are allowed to vote in the Knesset, but I'll have to double check that one. Also, I heard that there is a new law about Israeli Palestinians not being allowed to marry Palestinians in the Occupied Territories. But I'll need to double check that one as well.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:54 PM

Just stopped in to see how everyone's doin'.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,C-Watch
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 03:12 PM

I don't consider what the suicide bombers are doing to be "mass murder".

Suicide bombings that result in multiple murders are, without question, mass murders. Since you are so find of providing links, here's a site that defines mass murder. You'll note that while suicide bombers are not specifically mentioned, the suicide bombings fit almost every criteria to a T.

What I "know" is that the Palestinians in Israel do not enjoy the same rights of citizenship as the Israeli Jews. There are a whole differen set of laws that apply to people who are not Jewish, and the laws governing representation in the Knesset is different for non-Jews than it is for Jews.

There is one, and only one difference. Israeli Arab citizens are exempt from military service. The Israeli Knesset operates in a sytem of proportional representation. The percentage of Arab Knesset members is almost identical to the proportion of Arabs within Israel.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 02:56 PM

No Guest, C-Watch. I said:

Although if you want to use the term "mass murder" to describe what the suicide bombers do to innocent Israeli children, then by comparison, what the Israeli soldiers and settlers are doing to innocent Palestinians must be described as GENOCIDE.

I don't consider what the suicide bombers are doing to be "mass murder". So, conversely, I don't consider what the Israelis are doing as genocide. This distinction may be too subtle for you to see, but it is an important distinction nevertheless. I do not consider what the Israelis are doing to the Palestinians to be genocide.

Despite the occasional statements of a few Isreali extremists, with little popular support, Israel has never attempted to remove the Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza.

This is something that only time will tell.

Furthermore, as you probably well know, Israel has a substantial population of Arabs whose families stayed in 1948. They have full rights of citizenship and are proportionatly represented in the Israeli Knesset. Your statement is a lie meant to inflame and cause hatred.

What I "know" is that the Palestinians in Israel do not enjoy the same rights of citizenship as the Israeli Jews. There are a whole differen set of laws that apply to people who are not Jewish, and the laws governing representation in the Knesset is different for non-Jews than it is for Jews.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Martin Gibson
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 02:53 PM

Great post C-Watch.

Say does the C in C-Watch stand for Carol C. or for a vulgar name for female genitalia? Either way, I appreciate your post.

Carol C. maybe you should have stayed with your Jewish boyfriend. I'm sure you were treated well.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,C-Watch
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 02:35 PM

I don't know what dictionary you use

American Heritgae Dictionary -online edition

you very cleverly linked to a different post of mine in that thread, maybe so people wouldn't see the entire context in which that statement of mine was made

At any rate, it is not my opinion that the government of Israel or any other Israelis are committing genocide against the Palestinians.

If the link I provided to that thread led to a different post, there was nothing "clever" about it. It was just inexperience with the "make a link ("blue clicky") feature. In any case, if I'd been trying to keep anyone from seeing the context of your message, I would not have provided the exact reference as to date and time.

You are the one who has, in fact, said the Israelis are committing genocide. As noted, you've capitalized, in Internet convention, screamed "GENOCIDE."

what the Israeli soldiers and settlers are doing to innocent Palestinians must be described as GENOCIDE.

-CarolC, 23 Jul 03 - 11:17 AM

If they do succeed in removing all of the Palestinians from Israel and the Occupied Territories, then they will be guilty of ethnic cleansing.

Despite the occasional statements of a few Isreali extremists, with little popular support, Israel has never attempted to remove the Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza. Furthermore, as you probably well know, Israel has a substantial population of Arabs whose families stayed in 1948. They have full rights of citizenship and are proportionatly represented in the Israeli Knesset. Your statement is a lie meant to inflame and cause hatred.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 02:03 PM

Guest, C-watch, nerd and I were talking about my behavior in this thread. And my behavior toward other posters to this thread.

Re: the rest of your post, I have not ever said that the two situation are quantitatively similar. But qualitatively, there are similarities.

I don't know what dictionary you use, but my dictionary (Webster's) defines "genocide" as follows:

the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group

The difference of that one word, destruction rather than extermination is important for understanding my use of the word in any context.

What I said in that other thread, and which you not only took out of context, you very cleverly linked to a different post of mine in that thread, maybe so people wouldn't see the entire context in which that statement of mine was made, was this (and it was in response to someone else's use of the term "mass murder" to describe what suicide bombers are doing to children in Israel):

Although if you want to use the term "mass murder" to describe what the suicide bombers do to innocent Israeli children, then by comparison, what the Israeli soldiers and settlers are doing to innocent Palestinians must be described as GENOCIDE.

It would be useful to keep in mind that the numbers of Israelis killed by Palestinians is approximately one third of the number of Palestinians killed by Israelis.

Numbers of Israelis killed by Palestinians since 2000:

846

134 of these were minors under the age of 18


Numbers of Palestinians killed by Israelis since 2000:

2,434

846 of these were minors under the age of 18

At any rate, it is not my opinion that the government of Israel or any other Israelis are committing genocide against the Palestinians. If they do succeed in removing all of the Palestinians from Israel and the Occupied Territories, then they will be guilty of ethnic cleansing.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,C-watch
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 11:12 AM

I have not said that what is happening to the Palestinians is like the holocaust. But it is causing suffering in individuals that is as great as the suffering in individuals who experienced the holocaust.

-CarolC, 09 Mar 04 - 02:46 AM

what the Israeli soldiers and settlers are doing to innocent Palestinians must be described as GENOCIDE.

-CarolC, 23 Jul 03 - 11:17 AM, in this thread.

Clearly, CarolC has, indeed, equated the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza to the Holocaust.

My dictionary defines "genocide" as: The systematic and planned extermination of an entire national, racial, political, or ethnic group.

In 1939, there were 15 million Jews in the entire world. In 1945, that number had been reduced to 9 million. Most of the Jews of Europe had been systematically exterminated.

In 1967, at the beginning of the occupation, there were slightly less than 1 million Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza. Today, there are almost 3.5 million Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza.

Clearly, any reference to the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza as "genocide" is a lie. A population suffering from genocide does not triple.

I agree that the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is oppressive to the Palestinians and long for a peaceful conclusion to it. However, to equate life anywhere in the West Bank and Gaza with the death and slavery of Aushwitz, or Treblinka, or Dachau or any other Nazi extermination or slave labor camp, is a despicable lie.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 02:46 AM

(Hint: you compared one of us to Hitler, and suggested that I was not "for human rights.")

No, I did not compare one of you to Hitler. I compared a behavior to Hitler. And I posed it as a question. I asked the other person if he/she advocated a certain behavior that I connected to Hitler. I did not accuse that person of this behavior.

I did not suggest that you aren't for human rights. What I said, and what I've been criticized by Fred Miller for saying, is that I can't speak for you about weather or not you are for human rights, that only you can say whether or not you are for human rights. *Please* stop mis-quoting me.

I have not said that what is happening to the Palestinians is like the holocaust. But it is causing suffering in individuals that is as great as the suffering in individuals who experienced the holocaust.
And when I think about what we are saying when we say, never again, I'm not thinking about all of the particular details of how that suffering is/was caused. I'm thinking about the suffering.

The reason the Palestinians are reacting differently in their circumstance than the Jews did in theirs, is because there are vastly different causitive factors for what causes suffering in the two groups. For Jews, separation from their religion and ethnic identity is often a source of some of the greatest suffering for them. In other words, it's the loss of a way of life. But because of the nature of the diaspora, this way of life is of a fairly portable nature, and, until the creation of the State of Israel, was not tied to any particular location in which they found themselves.

For the Palestinians, the destruction of their way of life, the thing that causes them some of their greatest suffering, is the loss of their land. The loss of their beloved orchards and farmland. Their culture is inextricably tied to their relationship to the land. And despite what you have tried to assert, their relationship to the land that is now within the borders of Israel and the Occupied Territories is the land they have been occupying for more than a thousand years. Maybe not calling themselves Palestinians, but living in that place nonetheless.

And finally, the reason the Jews in Israel will continue the occupation until a workable settlement is reached is because they truly believe the survival of Israel is at stake. I happen to agree with them. I wonder if you do?

I am convinced that the occupation is causing great harm to Israel as well as to the Palestinians. I'm also convinced that the government of Israel has no interest in making any settlements with the Palestinians, but is working toward their eventual removal.

If we were not complicit in the military occupation of the West Bank by Jewish forces, we would be complicit in our own occupation by Arab forces.

This, I disagree with. The premise is based on faulty information and faulty assumptions. You have been taught that these are the only choices. But you don't see what the others see. Palestinians have a saying. They say that one of the biggest problems with the government of Israel is that they just don't know how to take "yes" for an answer.

And you're right. I will never have the degree of indoctrination that you have recieved about the "history" of Israel. (Although I have certainly had enough of it to know what it is.) But some Jews do look beyond that indoctrination and see that the thing they have been taught to fear most is not the thing that is doing them the most harm.

And believe it or not, I do know what it feels like to know that there are many, many people in my daily environment who want to kill me or do other bad things to me. As a woman living in the US, I know that everywhere I go, there are men who want to kill and/or rape me just because I am a woman. I am never without that fear (or at least that realization). I never leave my home without a canister of pepper spray. But I can't go around treating all men like I think they want to kill, and/or rape me. Even though all of the facts point to the reality than many of them do. I have to deal with each one individually, and not perpetuate and injustice by treating all of them as rapists and killers.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 01:15 AM

Thanks, CarolC. I was pretty clear about why I thought you were being hostile. (Hint: you compared one of us to Hitler, and suggested that I was not "for human rights.") But I understand that things sound differently when "re-voiced" in our heads from the writings of another person. It's why the internet will never replace talking!

Now to the argument. There are two ways to apprehend the major differences between the Jewish situation during the Holocaust and the Palestinian situation now. During the Holocaust, Jews did not stay in Europe for political reasons. Many Palestinians have decided to stay in the occupied territories for political reasons.

Secondly, During the Holocaust, Jews all over the world encouraged European Jews to come to them. Now, Arabs in other countries say "stay where you are," to the Palestinians. From these two differences we can see that the situation for Jews in the holocaust was much much worse; there was simply no political statement that was worth staying for. There are no death camps in Palestine, no gassing of innocents, no slavery.

So Arabs like to SAY it's just like the holocaust, but if it were, the Palestinians would be fleeing for their lives, and the Arabs in other countries would be giving them free passage and granting them citizenship. The fact that neither is happening should tell you something. Palestine is more like Allied-occupied Germany or US-occupied Baghdad than Nazi-occupied Poland was for the Jews. It's still not a picnic, I grant you, but Hitler's Europe it ain't. Therefore Never Again does not apply.

And to your statement that

I cannot be silent while I see Palestinians being treated by the government of Israel in ways that would horrify Jews if they saw other Jews being treated in that way by any government.

I say, when Jews see something truly horrific, first of all they encourage the other Jews to leave, then if necessary they airlift the other Jews out! Why don't the other Arabs react this way? Because the situation in Palestine is NOT currently as horrific as, say, 1942 Poland or 1987 Ethiopia. It's a military occupation such as most of the world has endured at one time or another.

And finally, the reason the Jews in Israel will continue the occupation until a workable settlement is reached is because they truly believe the survival of Israel is at stake. I happen to agree with them. I wonder if you do?

You say "we must never allow ourselves to be complicit."

Israelis say, "the question is not whether to be complicit in the abstract, but which option of complicity we choose. If we were not complicit in the military occupation of the West Bank by Jewish forces, we would be complicit in our own occupation by Arab forces. Either way, everybody suffers. So if the suffering is to be a constant, why go out of your way to be the one who suffers most? And in the process become a religion without state support anywhere in the world?"

And I say, if I have to be complicit in someone's suffering (which I unfortunately do, and so do you, at least to the extent of not rushing to Palestine ourselves to see what we can do), I'd rather do it in a world in which Israel exists. Because somewhere in the back of the Jewish mind, there is always the question: What if I have to go to Israel? Will it be there for me?

That is something, I think, that can never be engrained in your psyche because you live in a Jewish neighborhood.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 10:59 PM

nerd, I can hardly keep up with the ever increasing demands that you are placing on my time. Maybe you can give me an opportunity to respond to your earlier points before you start introducing any new ones.

BTW, I don't know why you think I'm being hostile to others. As far as I can see, most of the hostility on this thread is directed at me. But I'm a big girl, and I'm handling it ok. I don't feel any hostility toward you (except maybe some exasperation at the amount of work you're giving me to do), I don't feel any hostility toward Fred, and I don't even feel any hostility toward Mr. Gibson. I don't feel any hostility towards the govenment of Israel even. A lot of mistrust, but not hostility. It's just that I see an entirely different reality than you do (as far as I can tell from your posts). And the reality I see compels me to respond to certain kinds of things in certain kinds of ways. It's how I am able to live with myself in the midst of a rather insane world.

Both the Israelis and the Palestinians have violated people's Human Rights--they have, for example, killed people. I think both you and I have to accept this or we would be in deep denial. So supporters of either side can be "for Human Rights" in general, and can understand or justify the violation of human rights in specific cases. (If not, both sides should just burn in hell and we can stop talking.) So our argument comes down to: which of those cases are justifiable? This is a gray area, not a black-and-white either-or, and I don't feel the need to impugn anyone as a Nazi or cast aspersions on their morality because they see things another way.

This is how I see it. My boyfriend when I was in high school and for a few years after I graduated, was Jewish. His grandmother was a holocaust victim. She had survived imprisonment in a concentration camp. I was living in an area that was quite Jewish, culturally. Most of my friends were Jewish. My mother was a civil rights worker when I was a child. She marched with Martin Luther King. I grew up in environments that were saturated with conscience. 'Conscience' is something that is deeply engrained in my psyche. I don't see that ever changing.

Now, I was taught, very thoroughly, by the Jewish environment in which I was growing up, that we must never allow ourselves to become complicit. And that we must never allow another situation in which people could be made to suffer as the Jews did during the holocaust. The thing that stuns me about discussions like this one, is that it looks to me like some people think "never again" should only apply to Jews. I can't see it that way. To me, "never again" means all human beings. So that is why I cannot be silent while I see Palestinians being treated by the government of Israel in ways that would horrify Jews if they saw other Jews being treated in that way by any government.

I don't feel any hostility towards Jews who are behaving in this way. I feel deep sorrow. Because even though I'm not Jewish, these people feel like my family. And the Palestinians feel like my family, too. And I feel my family being broken apart by these things. And it breaks my heart. And no matter how much it pisses off people for whom the subject of Israel and the Palestinians is a highly charged subject, I cannot be silent, and I will not allow myself to become complicit with my silence.

I'll get to your assertion that Jordan is Palestine fairly soon, but not right away.

Fred, you're welcome to whatever perception of me works for you. And you as well, Martin.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Peace
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 10:09 PM

Why not Uganda. Wasn't that offered to Jews as a potential homeland in 1947? (?) Arab world thought that was fine at the time.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 09:41 PM

mary,

we've gone over the history ad nausaeum above.

There was not originally a tri-state or anything like it, just a region of the ottoman empire given to British administration as the "Palestine Mandate" by the League of Nations.   The Brits subdivided the Mandate into Jewish Palestine and Arab Transjordan. Transjordan let in some of the Arabs from Jewish Palestine but not all of them. Given that the main purpose of Transjordan was to accomodate those people, it's more than just popular opinion that the Arabs didn't do enough.   

When they realized their solution was not working, the Brits referred the matter to the UN, but first unilaterally granted Transjordan independence.

Transjordan, originally set up for the purpose of being a homeland of Palestinian Arabs, became a state which was eventually renamed Jordan.

THEN the UN decided there should be another subdivision of what remained of Palestine after Transjordan was taken out. That was the divsion into Israel and a Palestinian Arab state in the west bank and Gaza strip. The Jews accepted this proposal, creating Israel. The Arab nations, including the Palestinians in the West Bank, rejected the UN's proposal, wanting all of Israel for their state. They started a war with Israel, which Israel won.

Jordan annexed the land the UN had set aside for the Arabs on the West Bank. In a later war, in which Jordan once again attacked Israel, Israel took that territory from Jordan, creating the occupied territories of today.

The occupied territories have never been a separate state, because their occupants rejected the terms of statehood offered by the UN.

Indeed, there are many who argue, as CarolC notes above in disagreement, that "Palestinian" is neither an ethnic nor a religious nor a political designation, so much as a regional one. The Palestinians, according to this argument, are not a "people" or a "nation" at all, they're just the Arabs living in a given region. As such, they are in a sense interchangeable with other Arabs and thus have no claim on Palestine particularly.

Like CarolC, I don't like or agree with this argument, but probably for different reasons. I personally can accept all of the premises, that they are not a "people" or a "nation," etc. But if they have a regional identity, that to me is significant; "southerners" in the US is an example of the same phenomenon, and some of them feel pretty strongly about it. But there are some foolish Israeli hard-liners who argue that they're all just Arabs, so why can't they live in any of the Arab countries?

Anyway, the short answer to your intial question is "no," there was no Palestinian "tri-state area."

I like the proposal you suggest, however. If the Palestinians would be willing to emigrate it would be an elegant solution.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Martin Gibson
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 09:09 PM

Yep Carol C. You are right. I started this thread for you.

I kind of like what Fred said so I will re-quote his post above:

"After much consideration of what you've said I find you partisan, self-contradictory, and rather abstractly argumentative, but I have no firm idea why. I'm only guessing that you must like being that way"

As for what others here think, I certazinly don't take all of thisd as dangerously silly as yourself. Besides, I also like to post somewhat seriously in the music section besides yanking a few chains such as yours south of the line.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Sam L
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 08:56 PM

Sigh. CarolC I'm not projecting any attitudes or motives on you, but think so if that's what you enjoy. I'm only trying to discover what they are from what you say. After much consideration of what you've said I find you partisan, self-contradictory, and rather abstractly argumentative, but I have no firm idea why. I'm only guessing that you must like being that way.

Earlier the question of Indian rights was something you could do nothing about, but speak presently for Palestinians, now it's a real question which I'm ignoring the reality of. I've already said why it's substantially rhetorical--because the people most affected are dead. Instead of going around in perfectly rhetorical circles with you I believe I'll have that chill pill, thanks.

Write a book, if you're as serious as you think you are, posting history on the net is like... posting history on the net.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: mg
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 08:29 PM

was there not a tri-state originally? Jordan, Palestine and Israel? And are not many of the Palestinians in Jordan originally refugees who were given (contrary to popular opinion that Arab states did nothing..if it is indeed an Arab state..I don't know..) Jordanian citizenship? I think part of the solution is that the former British colonies, who bungled this up pretty well, and America (however defined) should take in many refugees, and the refugees who want to immigrate should not be held back by their fellows for political reasons. There has been great social pressure on them not to give in to offers of immigration etc....but they need to...they have held out long enough and it is not helping them at all. Quick offer them immigration while there are still those among them who know how to farm....mg

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Nerd
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 07:05 PM

CarolC,

Re your post of 07 Mar 04 - 08:57 PM

Once again, your quote does not demonstrate what you said it did. Your quote was:

"Many Palestinians, while holding Jordanian citizenship, consider themselves Palestinians first, resenting being called Jordanians (Culturgrams)."

Okay...but this does not mean they were originally living in what is now Israel or the occupied territories. As I said, Transjordan was created as a British client state. The regime which named it Jordan were (I think) Bedouins installed by the British. The majority of the population is Palestinian, and many of them already lived in what is now Jordan before partition. Your quote can refer to them.

As an analogy, many Newfoundlanders consider themselves Newfoundlanders first and resent being called Canadians. This doesn't mean they came to Newfoundland from anywhere else. On the contrary, they were there before it became part of Canada. Many Palestinians were in Jordan before it became Jordan. They may feel like the Newfoundlanders do.

One thing your link does provide is a breakdown of Jordan's ethnic makeup. Guess what? Palestinians are the largest single group, at 50% of the population. So let's see, we have a 98% Arab state, in Palestine, and more of its people are Palestinian than from any other subgroup of Arabs. In what sense then is it not a Palestinian Arab state?

So Far Wolfgang has responded well to your oil points; "Jordan has oil, but it has not yet been exploited" seems to be the Jordanian Government's position. Who am I (or you?) to argue with them? Certainly it's more Oil than Israel has!

Remember, I didn't say Jordan had a lot of natural resources, just that it had a lot of natural resources relative to Israel. North America it ain't--but we knew this.

By the way, CarolC, I think you're being unnecessarily hostile towards people who don't agree with you. Both the Israelis and the Palestinians have violated people's Human Rights--they have, for example, killed people. I think both you and I have to accept this or we would be in deep denial. So supporters of either side can be "for Human Rights" in general, and can understand or justify the violation of human rights in specific cases. (If not, both sides should just burn in hell and we can stop talking.) So our argument comes down to: which of those cases are justifiable? This is a gray area, not a black-and-white either-or, and I don't feel the need to impugn anyone as a Nazi or cast aspersions on their morality because they see things another way.   

In this context, to say that your opponents in an argument might not be "for human rights" or that "Hitler would be proud" of them amounts to mere insult-slinging, the latter especially in a thread about anti-Semitism where you know many of your interlocutors are Jews.   

Bobert, somehow I KNEW you didn't really mean to nuke 'em :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 06:53 PM

You presume a lot, Martin. But considering the kinds of responses you've been getting from others here in the Mudcat, as well as your puerile behavior here, I guess I'm not going to worry too much about what you think of me.

Keep coming back at me for more. I could give a rat's ass. I consider the source. So do others.

That's pretty laughable considering you said you started this thread just for me.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,Martin Gibson
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 05:05 PM

So nice to see at this point that others have been catching on to what I've noticed for a while.

Carol C. is the ultimate expert on bullshit, finding things on the Internet, all of which she holds as gospel, claims to not understand what others are talking about while she tapdances and looks for more bullshit links to shove down our throat that we are supposed to take as gospel.

Keep calling others trolls, Carol C. You do it obviously at your convenience. I would suggest that you get out of your trailer court that you are hunkered down in and go talk to some real people. Why don;t you go to a synagogue in perhaps Mobile or Birmingham. They probably have something of a Jewish population there. See how many "real" Jews feel about Israel and Palestine compare to the way you profess the few radicals who take the time to set up propaganda web-sites that you buy into do. The Jewish United Fund, despite these propaganda web sites, raise huge dollars for the defense of Israel. I know. I subscribe personally.

I don't really see many others agreeing with you at this point because everyone now has you pegged. You really the sound of your own voice. But really, you say nothing redeeming.

Keep coming back at me for more. I could give a rat's ass. I consider the source. So do others.

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

Fred, I think your posts don't make much sense to me because you're projecting onto me a lot of motives and attitudes that aren't mine. I don't consider the question of how I would feel if Indian lands were taken back to be a rhetorical one. I consider it as important as the question of how I would feel if I were a Palestinian who was being disposessed of his or her ancestral land. I think it shows a lack of regard for real human issues and the tragedies that ensue, to not see it as anything other than a rhetorical question. And I'm not just arguing my favorite bits. I don't know if you've noticed or not, but I have, several times, said that I haven't got enough time to answer these points and questions properly, as quickly as some people think I should. But I'm working on it. So how about taking a chill pill?

Wolfgang, I haven't really gotten to the crux of my big point yet. I posted the oil stuff as just one pillar in my whole premise. That particular pillar is that nobody knows just yet how much of a benefit Jordan's "oil resources" might have on the current population of Jordan (if any), much less on an influx of two million new refugees from Israel and the Occupied territories. But oil is just one factor that needs to be considered. I'm still working on the rest of my responses to nerd's questions and assertions. I suspect it's going to take a fair bit of time before you will be able to get any real sense of where I'm headed in my response, because it's very complicated, and can't be boiled down into simple sound bytes, and my time for doing this is, unfortunately, quite limited.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Sam L
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 03:42 PM

CarolC I can only imagine you don't understand these points because you are too busy with your ping pong and scorecard to even consider what they mean.

You can't really think anyone ever meant to ask you what you would, in fact, do, if Indian lands were taken back, and yet you choose to respond as if it were a practical question. It's what's called a rhetorical question, and I think it was probably posed to remind you that you're discussing human affairs on planet earth, where, as in the great tragedies, even our most positive values may sometimes come into conflict.

You can't really think I meant that you should actually tell Nerd or anyone what they think about human rights, or that he was asking you to, but you choose to sit on a high horse and respond with silly pseudo-logical stuff that is very dry, but not very funny. If you really don't get it, oh well, but I think you simply prefer arguing your favorite bits, and are marking these things out of bounds.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Wolfgang
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 02:49 PM

is the much bigger part, and the much better part, with all the oil and other natural resources. (Nerd)

All the oil and natural resources? (Carol)

Am I right that all your long post after this start can be summarised as follows:

"You are right, Nerd, about the oil resources though at the present prices actual production may not come for a long time."

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 02:20 PM

That's very amusing Guest, C-watch, because that's exactly what I've noticed you doing.

Wolfgang, I don't know if you posted those links in support of what I posted, or in order to refute it, but from what I saw, they most certainly do support what I posted, which is that the oil resources in Jordan are in the exploration phase, and not the production phase, and I have not seen any solid guesses as to when Jordan might be able to get some financial benefit from oil.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Wolfgang
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 02:04 PM

Another link from the horse's mouth

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: GUEST,C-watch
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 02:02 PM

Yes, you're very, very good at endless expressions of your position.
But, when someone says something that you can't argue with, you shut with them right down with innuendo and name-calling.

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Wolfgang
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 02:02 PM

More direct link

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: Wolfgang
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 01:58 PM

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan Natural Resources Authority Petroleum Directorate website

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Anti-Semitism & The Left
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 01:49 PM

...and you're a troll.