outlaw,
I am not knocking Islamic theology, although I actually do have a few problems with it. I was responding to the people in this thread who were saying things like knocking down trees is inconsistent with the Jewish faith. Sure, this is accurate. Suicide bombing is inconsistent with Islam, as well. My point: Let's not pretend that the Israelis are the only people over there who act in ways that are incongruent with their supposed faith. Although while you mention it, what is your deal? You are one of the most defensive people on here when it comes to the topic of Islam. Recent convert or something?
I agree that the response to Zionism should be secular.
I'm not a recent convert, but I am Muslim and it's natural that I would respond the way I do when taking into account the disrespect people show towards and the bias against the religion.
Anyhow, my view is that no one should be using religious doctrine to shore up land claims. And yes, that means that I do have a problem with Israelis using this as the basis for statehood. My view of Israel is largely pragmatic. Its there, its not going anywhere, and everyone over there is going to have to learn to get along.
No one here is claiming that Israel shouldn't exist and that it has no right to any of the land. People are angry at the occupation post 1967, and the ongoing settlement building and blockade of Gaza..
Though let's not forget that this isn't just about the Israeli's and the Palestinians. This mess would have been sorted out years ago if the U.S hadn't spent the past 40 years blocking every attempt at a peaceful settlement while encouraging and financing Israel's campaign of racial ethnic cleansing.
In all honesty, if you guys want to call the Jews on religious hypocrisy, we'd all better have a go at Islam too.
if you think I have hypocrisy towards my religion you are dead wrong. I, a Muslim, am the first to say suicide bombers or bombings is flat out WRONG and 100% AGAINTS what Islam stands FOR.
Anyhow, my view is that no one should be using religious doctrine to shore up land claims. And yes, that means that I do have a problem with Israelis using this as the basis for statehood. My view of Israel is largely pragmatic. Its there, its not going anywhere, and everyone over there is going to have to learn to get along.
No one here is claiming that Israel shouldn't exist and that it has no right to any of the land. People are angry at the occupation post 1967, and the ongoing settlement building and blockade of Gaza..
Although I don't mean to open the huge discussion, I must say that I actually oppose a two-state solution and am only in favor of a binational solution. Before that happens though, I am in agreement with you that Israel must cease all settlement expansion and return to the '67 borders so that a true peace agreement can be reached.
I do feel that the least the Israelis can do is stick to the borders they were originally given.
Which is exactly what practically everyone here is saying.
exactly. rebornfixer, if this is truly what you feel then why do you bother arguing anything else? this is the crux of the conflict and until Israel adheres to this principle they can make no further demands of the Palestinians.
exactly. rebornfixer, if this is truly what you feel then why do you bother arguing anything else? this is the crux of the conflict and until Israel adheres to this principle they can make no further demands of the Palestinians.
i assume because he felt the need to add a dissenting opinion again. at least that's what he has said in the past.
exactly. rebornfixer, if this is truly what you feel then why do you bother arguing anything else? this is the crux of the conflict and until Israel adheres to this principle they can make no further demands of the Palestinians.
i assume because he felt the need to add a dissenting opinion again. at least that's what he has said in the past.
i have a memory like an elephant.
when it suits me of course
In this case, I am not adding a dissenting opinion for shits and giggles ... I really do feel that pretending that the Palestinians have no role to play in this (in terms of giving up political extremism) is a huge mistake.
I'm not a recent convert, but I am Muslim and it's natural that I would respond the way I do when taking into account the disrespect people show towards and the bias against the religion.
Fair enough. I am hoping you can now see that my comment was not intended to disrespect the faith per se, which is your business. I am inclined to ask you at least one further question, though ... Do you feel that the image of Islam could be improved, and if so, how? I have a few opinions, but I'd be interested in your view.
In all honesty, if you guys want to call the Jews on religious hypocrisy, we'd all better have a go at Islam too.
if you think I have hypocrisy towards my religion you are dead wrong. I, a Muslim, am the first to say suicide bombers or bombings is flat out WRONG and 100% AGAINTS what Islam stands FOR.
I don't think you're a hypocrite, at all. Its actually cool to hear the Muslim perspective directly.
So I've been following these Israel threads for a little bit now, and I'm gonna try to wade in. To put all my cards on the table up front, I'm Jewish, grew up religious, and have spent a lot of time in Israel. I've been to the West Bank, to Palestinian villages, met many Palestinians, and generally found them to be awesome people. I am currently fairly secular, and I strongly disagree with a lot of Israeli policy.
I think many people on this thread suffer from a lack of any sort of understanding of where Israel is coming from. A lot of you write about Israel as if it is only interested in killing Palestinians and taking as much of their land as they can. I can tell you from first hand experience that Israelis see the situation much differently. There has been Arab terrorism against Israelis ever since the state was formed, well before the current occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. Most of the terrorism directed against Israel is directed at targets inside Israel's 1967 borders (as an aside, I remember Pepe Silva saying recently that Sderot is an illegal settlement. It isn't. It is inside Israel's recognized 1967 borders, and is not illegal or a "settlement" as the term is used to describe communities in the occupied West Bank). Israelis look at this history of pre-occupation terrorism, and the fact that terror is directed largely not at soldiers, or settlers, or Israeli government institutions, and that the groups responsible for this terror (Hamas mostly) don't talk primarily about ending the occupation, but about destroying Israel, and they come to the conclusion that they are faced with implaccable enemies who want to destroy them.
Now you may all see the situation differently, but I'm just trying to offer you guys the other perspective on what is happening.
Israel has given up land for peace. Sinai they gave back to Egypt, and for most of the 1990's Israel was engaged in the Oslo peace process with the Palestinians which was predicated on the idea of giving up land for peace. I get the sense that many of you think that Israel wasn't serious about this process. I can tell you Israelis were very serious about this process, and were truly hoping that the whole thing would result in peace. Most Israelis I know hate having to serve in the army, or worse, having to have their kids serve in the army. But they do it because they truly believe that Israel has enemies that want to kill them, not primarily because of the occupation, but because they have never accepted that Israel has a right to exist. When the second intifada started something like 98% of Palestinians were living in area A designated areas (this meant that they were living under Palestinian military and civil authority). Israel had for about a decade been slowly ceding territory to the PA as part of the Oslo process. True, settlement building did not stop, but I believe that it slowed somewhat during this time, and I'm pretty certain that Oslo did not call for a freeze on building in settlements, because it envisaged an eventual final status deal where Israel would retain some major settlements while compensating the Palestinians for the land. My point in saying all of this is that the Israelis feel they made an effort to make peace, but were rebuffed. They then suffered through the worst wave of terrorism I think any country has ever seen, at exactly the moment when they thought they were closest to making peace. I happened to have been living in Jerusalem at the time, and trust me, it was scary. There were bombings every week if not every day, people were afraid to go out or take buses. It was really terrifying. Finally after the passover bombing at the Park Hotel in Netanya (also not a settlement by the way), Israel decided to reinvade the areas of the West Bank they had given up to the PA during Oslo. This was in 2002, about a year and a half after the start of the second intifada. Israel had held off doing this because, Israelis felt, they were holding out hope that an agreement could still be reached. After they reinvaded the focus turned to security because Israelis, including many of my very left-wing friends who had devoted years to working for Palestinian rights, felt that there was no longer any partner for peace on the other side.
I know this was very long, but I'm just trying to make you guys understand that yes, Israel does some terrible things to the Palestinians, but the situation isn't as cut and dry as you make it seem. If Israel believed that they could just end the occupation and there would be peace I'm pretty certain that most Israelis would demand the occupation end immediately. Unfortunately, Israelis are convinced that if they ended the occupation tomorrow nothing would really change, that terrorism would continue, only the Israeli army would no longer be as able to protect Israelis as well.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
One more thing, Judaism does not say that Jews will not have a state in Israel until the messiah comes. Some very right wing (in the religious, not the political, sense) Jews believe this, but most religious Jews do not. Saying that a rabbi told you this, and that therefore it represents "true" Judaism is like saying that Osama bin Laden, or Pat Robertson told you something about Islam or Christianity, and that what they told you represents "true" Islam or Christianity.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
(as an aside, I remember Pepe Silva saying recently that Sderot is an illegal settlement. It isn't. It is inside Israel's recognized 1967 borders, and is not illegal or a "settlement" as the term is used to describe communities in the occupied West Bank).
my bad, is ethnically cleansed apartheid town better?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Najd,_Gaza
Najd (Arabic: نجد) was a Palestinian Arab village, located 14 kilometers (9 mi) northeast of Gaza City. During the British Mandate in Palestine, children from Najd attended school in the nearby village of Simsim. On 13 May, 1948, Najd was occupied by Jewish soldiers from the Negev Brigade as part of Operation Barak.[5] The inhabitants were expelled and fled to Gaza, and the village was then completely destroyed and leveled to the ground. In 1951, the town of Sderot was built over the village lands.
Israelis look at this history of pre-occupation terrorism, and the fact that terror is directed largely not at soldiers, or settlers, or Israeli government institutions, and that the groups responsible for this terror (Hamas mostly) don't talk primarily about ending the occupation, but about destroying Israel, and they come to the conclusion that they are faced with implaccable enemies who want to destroy them.
how do they look on jewish terrorism against the british like the king david hotel bombing? didn't they think the terrorism and support by the jews there was because of the repressive actions of the british which punished everyone?
don't compete; coexist
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
One more thing, Judaism does not say that Jews will not have a state in Israel until the messiah comes. Some very right wing (in the religious, not the political, sense) Jews believe this, but most religious Jews do not. Saying that a rabbi told you this, and that therefore it represents "true" Judaism is like saying that Osama bin Laden, or Pat Robertson told you something about Islam or Christianity, and that what they told you represents "true" Islam or Christianity.
what does the torah say?
don't compete; coexist
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
You're right that there was a Palestinian village where Sderot now is, but when you say, in the context of this conflict, that something is an "illegal settlement" you are referring to communities built in Gaza and the West Bank after 1967. Sderot is inside Israel proper, not on occupied land. It is not considered by anyone to be illegal. If you believe that Sderot is illegal, what you are saying is that Israel has no right to exist, in which case we are no longer talking about the occupation, and quite frankly I'm not sure that there would be anything to talk about since Israel is a practical fact and isn't going anywhere.
There certainly was Jewish terrorism before the state of Israel was created. But there were sharp distinctions between groups. The main group, the Haganah, which was the arm of the pre-state Jewish institutional leadership, I wouldn't consider a terrorist group. It only resorted to non-defensive violence very late in the day, and even then only targeted military targets. The Irgun and the Lehi are another story. I would consider them terrorists, but you have to understand that they did not represent the mainstream, and the Haganah even cooperated at times with the British to hunt down and arrest members of these organizations. Once the state of Israel was established the Irgun and the Lehi did not want to give up their autonomy, but they were forced, at gunpoint, too disarm and disband by Ben-Gurion.
I think Palestinian terror is counter-productive, and unjustifyiable in moral terms when it targets civilians. If they restricted themselves to attacking soldiers, or targets with military value, I would still think that their actions would be counter-productive, but I could accept that they would be morally justifiable.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
One more thing, Judaism does not say that Jews will not have a state in Israel until the messiah comes. Some very right wing (in the religious, not the political, sense) Jews believe this, but most religious Jews do not. Saying that a rabbi told you this, and that therefore it represents "true" Judaism is like saying that Osama bin Laden, or Pat Robertson told you something about Islam or Christianity, and that what they told you represents "true" Islam or Christianity.
what does the torah say?
The Torah says a lot of stuff. Look, religion, any religion, is what its adherants say it is. You can read Jewish texts to say pretty much anything. The same, I'm sure, is true of all other religions. I'm sure that Osama bin Laden thinks that he represents "true" Islam, while many of us think that he distorts Islam entirely. Both he and we can point to texts to support our arguments. My point is that it's stupid to talk about what a religion "truly" is or says. Religions are whatever we want them to be.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
how do they look on jewish terrorism against the british like the king david hotel bombing? didn't they think the terrorism and support by the jews there was because of the repressive actions of the british which punished everyone?[/quote]
To more precisely answer your question, I think most Israelis at the time and now would have supported the Haganah, but not the Irgun and the Lehi, specifically because they would have thought that the Haganah, by only targeting military and not civilian targets, were freedom fighters and not terrorists.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
You're right that there was a Palestinian village where Sderot now is, but when you say, in the context of this conflict, that something is an "illegal settlement" you are referring to communities built in Gaza and the West Bank after 1967. Sderot is inside Israel proper, not on occupied land. It is not considered by anyone to be illegal. If you believe that Sderot is illegal, what you are saying is that Israel has no right to exist, in which case we are no longer talking about the occupation, and quite frankly I'm not sure that there would be anything to talk about since Israel is a practical fact and isn't going anywhere.
There certainly was Jewish terrorism before the state of Israel was created. But there were sharp distinctions between groups. The main group, the Haganah, which was the arm of the pre-state Jewish institutional leadership, I wouldn't consider a terrorist group. It only resorted to non-defensive violence very late in the day, and even then only targeted military targets. The Irgun and the Lehi are another story. I would consider them terrorists, but you have to understand that they did not represent the mainstream, and the Haganah even cooperated at times with the British to hunt down and arrest members of these organizations. Once the state of Israel was established the Irgun and the Lehi did not want to give up their autonomy, but they were forced, at gunpoint, too disarm and disband by Ben-Gurion.
I think Palestinian terror is counter-productive, and unjustifyiable in moral terms when it targets civilians. If they restricted themselves to attacking soldiers, or targets with military value, I would still think that their actions would be counter-productive, but I could accept that they would be morally justifiable.
weren't the irgun incorporated into the IDF and the ones who didn't want to join were ordered to turn over all their weapons, they said no so the IDF fought them over it?
and as for the lehi doesn't israel have a lehi ribbon given for "for military service towards the establishment of the State of Israel" and weren't the lehi given full amnesty by israel...and they even assassinated someone from the UN!
so, it is somewhat unbelievable to say they had little support when the irgun were given a choice to join the military or give up their weapons and the lehi were granted full amnesty and even won a seat in the government afterwards.
i think targeting civilians is wrong, too, no matter who is doing it but the fact remains who is violating UN resolutions, Geneva Conventions and international law by violently occupying land that isn't theirs and displacing people living there by force?
and speaking of ben-gurion, here are his thoughts on jewish terrorism and its support after the king david hotel bombing:
"250,00 Jews of Tel Aviv and suburbs, core of country's social and industrial life, and 30,000 Jews in Jerusalem, mostly working-class quarters, isolated from all normal contact with outside world, facing complete breakdown of mechanism civilized life apart from food supplies and skeleton medical service. Industry crippled, trade paralyzed, unemployment threatening to become catastrophic. Industrial raw materials cannot enter, goods manufactured with available stock cannot be marketed outside. Workers cut off from places of work, children from schools. These restrictions have not affected terrorists nor stopped their outrages but instead have increased resentment of hard-hit population, created fertile soil for terrorist propaganda, frustrating community's attempt to combat terrorism by itself. Martial Law absolutely futile and senseless unless really meant to punish whole community, ruin its economy and destroy the foundation of the Jewish National Home."
isn't this how they are treating the Palestinians??
i also found this interesting in the jerusalem post http://www.jposttravel.com/jerusalem_to ... em_bt.html
Although the Hagana had sanctioned the King David bombing, world-wide condemnation caused the organization to distance itself from the attack.
don't compete; coexist
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
The Irgun and the Lehi were incorporated into the IDF, but again this was at a time when the state was being invaded by all of its neighbors and every man capable of fighting was needed. The IDF was taking holocaust survivors off boats and throwing them straight into the front lines for God's sake. So saying that the fact that they joined the IDF means that their terrorism was supported is a bit of a leap. If the Palestinians get a state, by the way, I would have no problem with former terrorists joining their military or police, so long, of course, as they no longer commit terrorist acts.
And I'm not saying that the Jewish terrorists didn't have support. Of course they did. What I'm saying is that they were outside the mainstream.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
I also wouldn't have a problem with the Palestinians granting amnesty to terrorists once they have a state. And didn't South Africa grant amnesty to people involved in Apartheid? And Germany didn't go after every last person who had been in the Nazi party. I think you're picking at very minute details here.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Look I'd like to see the occupation ended also, but you don't seem to realize that Israelis are looking out for themselves. From where they are sitting they tried to end the occupation, and would still like to, but until they are convinced that doing so isn't going to put them in mortal danger they aren't going to do it. Palestinian terrorism only makes them dig in even harder.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Pepe Silva said: "my bad, is ethnically cleansed apartheid town better?"
How is this productive? Is it terrible that people were kicked out of their town? Yeah, of course. But this was in the middle of a war, and as I understand it the IDF was trying to make sure that there wouldn't be hostile towns in their rear when they were fighting the Egyptian army. That is they drove out the Palestinians for tactical reasons, not racist ones.
Seriously, fighting over history and who was the greater victim is pretty pointless. We should be concerned with what can bring about the best solution for everyone now, not with a pissing match about who did what to whom 60 years ago.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
With regard to that JPost article you linked to, if you read it you'll see that the article also says that the wing of the hotel targeted was of military value, and that the intention of the attack was to destroy British intelligence documents and not to take life. So I'm not sure how this contradicts what I've said.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Pepe Silva said: "my bad, is ethnically cleansed apartheid town better?"
How is this productive? Is it terrible that people were kicked out of their town? Yeah, of course. But this was in the middle of a war, and as I understand it the IDF was trying to make sure that there wouldn't be hostile towns in their rear when they were fighting the Egyptian army. That is they drove out the Palestinians for tactical reasons, not racist ones.
Seriously, fighting over history and who was the greater victim is pretty pointless. We should be concerned with what can bring about the best solution for everyone now, not with a pissing match about who did what to whom 60 years ago.
it's not a pissing match. the best solution is for Isreal to stop expanding it's illegal settlements, pull back to it's accepted borders, stop stealing most of the water, end the blockades....
i know it's not racist, per se, they want the land, that has always been the intention of people like ben-gurion
don't compete; coexist
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
It's funny how the progressive types get so up in arms about fighting anti-semetism but when it comes to them, you know, protecting their homeland from terrorist psychos they are told to fuck themselves.
So this life is sacrifice...
6/30/98 Minneapolis, 10/8/00 East Troy (Brrrr!), 6/16/03 St. Paul, 6/27/06 St. Paul
Pepe Silva said: "my bad, is ethnically cleansed apartheid town better?"
How is this productive? Is it terrible that people were kicked out of their town? Yeah, of course. But this was in the middle of a war, and as I understand it the IDF was trying to make sure that there wouldn't be hostile towns in their rear when they were fighting the Egyptian army. That is they drove out the Palestinians for tactical reasons, not racist ones.
Seriously, fighting over history and who was the greater victim is pretty pointless. We should be concerned with what can bring about the best solution for everyone now, not with a pissing match about who did what to whom 60 years ago.
it's not a pissing match. the best solution is for Isreal to stop expanding it's illegal settlements, pull back to it's accepted borders, stop stealing most of the water, end the blockades....
i know it's not racist, per se, they want the land, that has always been the intention of people like ben-gurion
I disagree that they want the land, or rather yes, Israel would love to have as much land as possible, but would prefer peace. I would love to see Israel do all the things you say, but my problem is that you don't seem to realize or you refuse to accept that Israel has legitimate concerns about what could happen if they do this outside the context of a peace settlement. You seem to think that Israel will do anything to get as much land as possible. The question you have to answer then is why has Israel ever given back land, and why haven't they simply conquered as much land as they want since they are the strongest military in the region?
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
It's funny how the progressive types get so up in arms about fighting anti-semetism but when it comes to them, you know, protecting their homeland from terrorist psychos they are told to fuck themselves.
I assume you mean that Jews protecting Israel from terrorist psychos are told to fuck themselves, right? Yeah, I've often thought there is a little bit of a double standard in a lot of the discussions on Israel.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Pepe Silva said: "my bad, is ethnically cleansed apartheid town better?"
How is this productive? Is it terrible that people were kicked out of their town? Yeah, of course. But this was in the middle of a war, and as I understand it the IDF was trying to make sure that there wouldn't be hostile towns in their rear when they were fighting the Egyptian army. That is they drove out the Palestinians for tactical reasons, not racist ones.
Seriously, fighting over history and who was the greater victim is pretty pointless. We should be concerned with what can bring about the best solution for everyone now, not with a pissing match about who did what to whom 60 years ago.
it's not a pissing match. the best solution is for Isreal to stop expanding it's illegal settlements, pull back to it's accepted borders, stop stealing most of the water, end the blockades....
i know it's not racist, per se, they want the land, that has always been the intention of people like ben-gurion
I disagree that they want the land, or rather yes, Israel would love to have as much land as possible, but would prefer peace. I would love to see Israel do all the things you say, but my problem is that you don't seem to realize or you refuse to accept that Israel has legitimate concerns about what could happen if they do this outside the context of a peace settlement. You seem to think that Israel will do anything to get as much land as possible. The question you have to answer then is why has Israel ever given back land, and why haven't they simply conquered as much land as they want since they are the strongest military in the region?
when they 'give land back' they take more from a different area at the same time.
let's take now for example, why does Israel refuse to stop expanding their illegal settlements in order to start peace talks? you say they want peace, not land...well, the Palestinians are saying we'll talk if you stop expanding settlements which are illegal according to the UN, international law and the Geneva Conventions and yet for some reason Israel will not do this.
don't compete; coexist
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
it's not a pissing match. the best solution is for Isreal to stop expanding it's illegal settlements, pull back to it's accepted borders, stop stealing most of the water, end the blockades....
i know it's not racist, per se, they want the land, that has always been the intention of people like ben-gurion[/quote]
I disagree that they want the land, or rather yes, Israel would love to have as much land as possible, but would prefer peace. I would love to see Israel do all the things you say, but my problem is that you don't seem to realize or you refuse to accept that Israel has legitimate concerns about what could happen if they do this outside the context of a peace settlement. You seem to think that Israel will do anything to get as much land as possible. The question you have to answer then is why has Israel ever given back land, and why haven't they simply conquered as much land as they want since they are the strongest military in the region?[/quote]
when they 'give land back' they take more from a different area at the same time.
let's take now for example, why does Israel refuse to stop expanding their illegal settlements in order to start peace talks? you say they want peace, not land...well, the Palestinians are saying we'll talk if you stop expanding settlements which are illegal according to the UN, international law and the Geneva Conventions and yet for some reason Israel will not do this.[/quote]
Well they just put in place a partial freeze on building in the settlements, and a total freeze on new building. That is more than Israel has ever done before, and is not an insignificant gensture. So you could turn it around and ask why the Palestinians refuse to come to the table?
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Well they just put in place a partial freeze on building in the settlements, and a total freeze on new building. That is more than Israel has ever done before, and is not an insignificant gensture. So you could turn it around and ask why the Palestinians refuse to come to the table?
maybe they won't come to the table because while this 'freeze' is going on Israel is in reality still building 3,000 homes and because Netanyahu recently said "The message is clear: we are here and will remain here. The settlement blocs are an indisputable part of Israel forever. This is acceptable to the great majority of Israel's citizens and is gradually being instilled in international consciousness.We will build here as part of greater Jerusalem."
Mr Netanyahu recently announced a 10-month freeze on new construction in the settlements, which he said was a show of goodwill to convince Palestinians to resume peace negotiations. But both the US and Palestinians had called for a complete and permanent freeze on building in Jewish settlements in the West Bank to help the resumption of peace talks.
Mr Obama and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had called for a complete freeze, but when Israel rejected this and announced the 10-month freeze, Mrs Clinton said Israel's moratorium was "unprecedented".
Palestinian officials point to the fact that during the moratorium, 3000 houses already approved were still being built.
Palestinian officials last night responded to Mr Netanyahu's comments by saying they were undermining efforts to resume the peace process.
An aide to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbass, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, told Haaretz newspaper: "This is an unacceptable act that destroys all the efforts being exerted by Senator Mitchell in order to bring the parties back to the negotiating table."
don't compete; coexist
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
There's nothing new about this though. You're just throwing this out there without any sort of historical context. He isn't talking about all the settlements. He's talking about certain blocks of settlements that Israel hopes to retain in a final peace deal, and which many people have argued Israel has a legitimate security concern in maintaining control of. He isn't going to concede that Israel has no right to these settlements because that would undermine his ability to negotiate a future deal. And I still don't understand why a total freeze is necessary. I mean I think there should be a total freeze on settlement building, but you still haven't explained to me why the building means that the Palestinians can't negotiate. Aren't we the one's who were pissed that no one would negotiate with Iran? Why should negotiations have any preconditions?
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Comments
I'm not a recent convert, but I am Muslim and it's natural that I would respond the way I do when taking into account the disrespect people show towards and the bias against the religion.
No one here is claiming that Israel shouldn't exist and that it has no right to any of the land. People are angry at the occupation post 1967, and the ongoing settlement building and blockade of Gaza..
Which is exactly what practically everyone here is saying.
if you think I have hypocrisy towards my religion you are dead wrong. I, a Muslim, am the first to say suicide bombers or bombings is flat out WRONG and 100% AGAINTS what Islam stands FOR.
exactly. rebornfixer, if this is truly what you feel then why do you bother arguing anything else? this is the crux of the conflict and until Israel adheres to this principle they can make no further demands of the Palestinians.
i have a memory like an elephant.
when it suits me of course
In this case, I am not adding a dissenting opinion for shits and giggles ... I really do feel that pretending that the Palestinians have no role to play in this (in terms of giving up political extremism) is a huge mistake.
Fair enough. I am hoping you can now see that my comment was not intended to disrespect the faith per se, which is your business. I am inclined to ask you at least one further question, though ... Do you feel that the image of Islam could be improved, and if so, how? I have a few opinions, but I'd be interested in your view.
I don't think you're a hypocrite, at all. Its actually cool to hear the Muslim perspective directly.
I think many people on this thread suffer from a lack of any sort of understanding of where Israel is coming from. A lot of you write about Israel as if it is only interested in killing Palestinians and taking as much of their land as they can. I can tell you from first hand experience that Israelis see the situation much differently. There has been Arab terrorism against Israelis ever since the state was formed, well before the current occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. Most of the terrorism directed against Israel is directed at targets inside Israel's 1967 borders (as an aside, I remember Pepe Silva saying recently that Sderot is an illegal settlement. It isn't. It is inside Israel's recognized 1967 borders, and is not illegal or a "settlement" as the term is used to describe communities in the occupied West Bank). Israelis look at this history of pre-occupation terrorism, and the fact that terror is directed largely not at soldiers, or settlers, or Israeli government institutions, and that the groups responsible for this terror (Hamas mostly) don't talk primarily about ending the occupation, but about destroying Israel, and they come to the conclusion that they are faced with implaccable enemies who want to destroy them.
Now you may all see the situation differently, but I'm just trying to offer you guys the other perspective on what is happening.
Israel has given up land for peace. Sinai they gave back to Egypt, and for most of the 1990's Israel was engaged in the Oslo peace process with the Palestinians which was predicated on the idea of giving up land for peace. I get the sense that many of you think that Israel wasn't serious about this process. I can tell you Israelis were very serious about this process, and were truly hoping that the whole thing would result in peace. Most Israelis I know hate having to serve in the army, or worse, having to have their kids serve in the army. But they do it because they truly believe that Israel has enemies that want to kill them, not primarily because of the occupation, but because they have never accepted that Israel has a right to exist. When the second intifada started something like 98% of Palestinians were living in area A designated areas (this meant that they were living under Palestinian military and civil authority). Israel had for about a decade been slowly ceding territory to the PA as part of the Oslo process. True, settlement building did not stop, but I believe that it slowed somewhat during this time, and I'm pretty certain that Oslo did not call for a freeze on building in settlements, because it envisaged an eventual final status deal where Israel would retain some major settlements while compensating the Palestinians for the land. My point in saying all of this is that the Israelis feel they made an effort to make peace, but were rebuffed. They then suffered through the worst wave of terrorism I think any country has ever seen, at exactly the moment when they thought they were closest to making peace. I happened to have been living in Jerusalem at the time, and trust me, it was scary. There were bombings every week if not every day, people were afraid to go out or take buses. It was really terrifying. Finally after the passover bombing at the Park Hotel in Netanya (also not a settlement by the way), Israel decided to reinvade the areas of the West Bank they had given up to the PA during Oslo. This was in 2002, about a year and a half after the start of the second intifada. Israel had held off doing this because, Israelis felt, they were holding out hope that an agreement could still be reached. After they reinvaded the focus turned to security because Israelis, including many of my very left-wing friends who had devoted years to working for Palestinian rights, felt that there was no longer any partner for peace on the other side.
I know this was very long, but I'm just trying to make you guys understand that yes, Israel does some terrible things to the Palestinians, but the situation isn't as cut and dry as you make it seem. If Israel believed that they could just end the occupation and there would be peace I'm pretty certain that most Israelis would demand the occupation end immediately. Unfortunately, Israelis are convinced that if they ended the occupation tomorrow nothing would really change, that terrorism would continue, only the Israeli army would no longer be as able to protect Israelis as well.
my bad, is ethnically cleansed apartheid town better?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sderot#History
Sderot was founded in 1951 next to the Gevim-Dorot transit camp, on the land of the former Palestinian village of Najd.[8]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Najd,_Gaza
Najd (Arabic: نجد) was a Palestinian Arab village, located 14 kilometers (9 mi) northeast of Gaza City. During the British Mandate in Palestine, children from Najd attended school in the nearby village of Simsim. On 13 May, 1948, Najd was occupied by Jewish soldiers from the Negev Brigade as part of Operation Barak.[5] The inhabitants were expelled and fled to Gaza, and the village was then completely destroyed and leveled to the ground. In 1951, the town of Sderot was built over the village lands.
how do they look on jewish terrorism against the british like the king david hotel bombing? didn't they think the terrorism and support by the jews there was because of the repressive actions of the british which punished everyone?
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
what does the torah say?
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
There certainly was Jewish terrorism before the state of Israel was created. But there were sharp distinctions between groups. The main group, the Haganah, which was the arm of the pre-state Jewish institutional leadership, I wouldn't consider a terrorist group. It only resorted to non-defensive violence very late in the day, and even then only targeted military targets. The Irgun and the Lehi are another story. I would consider them terrorists, but you have to understand that they did not represent the mainstream, and the Haganah even cooperated at times with the British to hunt down and arrest members of these organizations. Once the state of Israel was established the Irgun and the Lehi did not want to give up their autonomy, but they were forced, at gunpoint, too disarm and disband by Ben-Gurion.
I think Palestinian terror is counter-productive, and unjustifyiable in moral terms when it targets civilians. If they restricted themselves to attacking soldiers, or targets with military value, I would still think that their actions would be counter-productive, but I could accept that they would be morally justifiable.
The Torah says a lot of stuff. Look, religion, any religion, is what its adherants say it is. You can read Jewish texts to say pretty much anything. The same, I'm sure, is true of all other religions. I'm sure that Osama bin Laden thinks that he represents "true" Islam, while many of us think that he distorts Islam entirely. Both he and we can point to texts to support our arguments. My point is that it's stupid to talk about what a religion "truly" is or says. Religions are whatever we want them to be.
To more precisely answer your question, I think most Israelis at the time and now would have supported the Haganah, but not the Irgun and the Lehi, specifically because they would have thought that the Haganah, by only targeting military and not civilian targets, were freedom fighters and not terrorists.
weren't the irgun incorporated into the IDF and the ones who didn't want to join were ordered to turn over all their weapons, they said no so the IDF fought them over it?
and as for the lehi doesn't israel have a lehi ribbon given for "for military service towards the establishment of the State of Israel" and weren't the lehi given full amnesty by israel...and they even assassinated someone from the UN!
so, it is somewhat unbelievable to say they had little support when the irgun were given a choice to join the military or give up their weapons and the lehi were granted full amnesty and even won a seat in the government afterwards.
i think targeting civilians is wrong, too, no matter who is doing it but the fact remains who is violating UN resolutions, Geneva Conventions and international law by violently occupying land that isn't theirs and displacing people living there by force?
and speaking of ben-gurion, here are his thoughts on jewish terrorism and its support after the king david hotel bombing:
"250,00 Jews of Tel Aviv and suburbs, core of country's social and industrial life, and 30,000 Jews in Jerusalem, mostly working-class quarters, isolated from all normal contact with outside world, facing complete breakdown of mechanism civilized life apart from food supplies and skeleton medical service. Industry crippled, trade paralyzed, unemployment threatening to become catastrophic. Industrial raw materials cannot enter, goods manufactured with available stock cannot be marketed outside. Workers cut off from places of work, children from schools. These restrictions have not affected terrorists nor stopped their outrages but instead have increased resentment of hard-hit population, created fertile soil for terrorist propaganda, frustrating community's attempt to combat terrorism by itself. Martial Law absolutely futile and senseless unless really meant to punish whole community, ruin its economy and destroy the foundation of the Jewish National Home."
isn't this how they are treating the Palestinians??
i also found this interesting in the jerusalem post
http://www.jposttravel.com/jerusalem_to ... em_bt.html
Although the Hagana had sanctioned the King David bombing, world-wide condemnation caused the organization to distance itself from the attack.
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
And I'm not saying that the Jewish terrorists didn't have support. Of course they did. What I'm saying is that they were outside the mainstream.
How is this productive? Is it terrible that people were kicked out of their town? Yeah, of course. But this was in the middle of a war, and as I understand it the IDF was trying to make sure that there wouldn't be hostile towns in their rear when they were fighting the Egyptian army. That is they drove out the Palestinians for tactical reasons, not racist ones.
Seriously, fighting over history and who was the greater victim is pretty pointless. We should be concerned with what can bring about the best solution for everyone now, not with a pissing match about who did what to whom 60 years ago.
it's not a pissing match. the best solution is for Isreal to stop expanding it's illegal settlements, pull back to it's accepted borders, stop stealing most of the water, end the blockades....
i know it's not racist, per se, they want the land, that has always been the intention of people like ben-gurion
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
6/30/98 Minneapolis, 10/8/00 East Troy (Brrrr!), 6/16/03 St. Paul, 6/27/06 St. Paul
I disagree that they want the land, or rather yes, Israel would love to have as much land as possible, but would prefer peace. I would love to see Israel do all the things you say, but my problem is that you don't seem to realize or you refuse to accept that Israel has legitimate concerns about what could happen if they do this outside the context of a peace settlement. You seem to think that Israel will do anything to get as much land as possible. The question you have to answer then is why has Israel ever given back land, and why haven't they simply conquered as much land as they want since they are the strongest military in the region?
I assume you mean that Jews protecting Israel from terrorist psychos are told to fuck themselves, right? Yeah, I've often thought there is a little bit of a double standard in a lot of the discussions on Israel.
when they 'give land back' they take more from a different area at the same time.
let's take now for example, why does Israel refuse to stop expanding their illegal settlements in order to start peace talks? you say they want peace, not land...well, the Palestinians are saying we'll talk if you stop expanding settlements which are illegal according to the UN, international law and the Geneva Conventions and yet for some reason Israel will not do this.
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
i know it's not racist, per se, they want the land, that has always been the intention of people like ben-gurion[/quote]
I disagree that they want the land, or rather yes, Israel would love to have as much land as possible, but would prefer peace. I would love to see Israel do all the things you say, but my problem is that you don't seem to realize or you refuse to accept that Israel has legitimate concerns about what could happen if they do this outside the context of a peace settlement. You seem to think that Israel will do anything to get as much land as possible. The question you have to answer then is why has Israel ever given back land, and why haven't they simply conquered as much land as they want since they are the strongest military in the region?[/quote]
when they 'give land back' they take more from a different area at the same time.
let's take now for example, why does Israel refuse to stop expanding their illegal settlements in order to start peace talks? you say they want peace, not land...well, the Palestinians are saying we'll talk if you stop expanding settlements which are illegal according to the UN, international law and the Geneva Conventions and yet for some reason Israel will not do this.[/quote]
Well they just put in place a partial freeze on building in the settlements, and a total freeze on new building. That is more than Israel has ever done before, and is not an insignificant gensture. So you could turn it around and ask why the Palestinians refuse to come to the table?
maybe they won't come to the table because while this 'freeze' is going on Israel is in reality still building 3,000 homes and because Netanyahu recently said "The message is clear: we are here and will remain here. The settlement blocs are an indisputable part of Israel forever. This is acceptable to the great majority of Israel's citizens and is gradually being instilled in international consciousness.We will build here as part of greater Jerusalem."
this was published 7 hours ago:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/wo ... 5823426136
Benjamin Netanyahu rejects freeze on settlements
Mr Netanyahu recently announced a 10-month freeze on new construction in the settlements, which he said was a show of goodwill to convince Palestinians to resume peace negotiations. But both the US and Palestinians had called for a complete and permanent freeze on building in Jewish settlements in the West Bank to help the resumption of peace talks.
Mr Obama and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had called for a complete freeze, but when Israel rejected this and announced the 10-month freeze, Mrs Clinton said Israel's moratorium was "unprecedented".
Palestinian officials point to the fact that during the moratorium, 3000 houses already approved were still being built.
Palestinian officials last night responded to Mr Netanyahu's comments by saying they were undermining efforts to resume the peace process.
An aide to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbass, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, told Haaretz newspaper: "This is an unacceptable act that destroys all the efforts being exerted by Senator Mitchell in order to bring the parties back to the negotiating table."
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'