I'll wait until you actually discuss the issues. unless, of course, I'm asking too much of you... you know, to discuss the israel-palestine conflict in an israel-palestine thread.
sure what do you want to discuss? Israel needs to stop expanding settlements and hamas needs to renounce violence and recognize Israel.
this comes down to the 1967 borders. there needs to be a compromise instead of hamas' charter to destroy Israel and Israels insistence to continue building in disputed land.
sure what do you want to discuss? Israel needs to stop expanding settlements and hamas needs to renounce violence and recognize Israel.
this comes down to the 1967 borders. there needs to be a compromise instead of hamas' charter to destroy Israel and Israels insistence to continue building in disputed land.
Hamas already said they are willing to talk once Israel goes back to the '67 borders. And yet, Israel refuses to do so.
And another thing I don't appreciate - why do people always say that Hamas has to renounce violence, but never talk about Israel renouncing violence as well?
Hamas already said they are willing to talk once Israel goes back to the '67 borders. And yet, Israel refuses to do so.
And another thing I don't appreciate - why do people always say that Hamas has to renounce violence, but never talk about Israel renouncing violence as well?
I didnt say hamas wouldnt talk to them, I said recognize them......you are absolutely right both should renounce violence. but Israel doesnt have a stated charter calling for the destruction of Palestine. secondly, the 1967 borders will probably never happen again. compromises need to be made on both sides for there to be peace. sadly, Hamas says peace will not happen unless those borders happen.
I didnt say hamas wouldnt talk to them, I said recognize them......
uhh, recognizing them can come after they TALK.
but Israel doesnt have a stated charter calling for the destruction of Palestine.
according to Israel, there is no Palestine. and I love how people just keep talking about how Hamas wants to destroy Israel. Look, that's a cute argument and all, but have you guys been fucking sleeping or something? Israel is the one who has been doing the destruction. forget about charters and shit, and just look at facts.
secondly, the 1967 borders will probably never happen again. compromises need to be made on both sides for there to be peace.
the 67 borders ARE a compromise. they are a compromise that the international community agrees on (all except Israel and the U.S.).
sadly, Hamas says peace will not happen unless those borders happen.
according to Israel, there is no Palestine. and I love how people just keep talking about how Hamas wants to destroy Israel. Look, that's a cute argument and all, but have you guys been fucking sleeping or something? Israel is the one who has been doing the destruction. forget about charters and shit, and just look at facts.
the 67 borders ARE a compromise. they are a compromise that the international community agrees on (all except Israel and the U.S.).
it is Israel who must come forward for peace.
I'm not going to anally break down your every sentence here, but you are completely failing to see both sides. all this crap you typed sounds nice. I dont necessarily disagree with it. but you say Israel needs to step forward with peace..ok....so does hamas. and yes Israel has destroyed parts of palastine..but the fact remains that Hamas' stated goal is the destruction of Israel. you are just so blinded with rage and hate you think anyone who speaks of Israel in an unhateful way is automatically a huge supporter of them.
I'm not going to anally break down your every sentence here, but you are completely failing to see both sides. all this crap you typed sounds nice. I dont necessarily disagree with it. but you say Israel needs to step forward with peace..ok....so does hamas. and yes Israel has destroyed parts of palastine..but the fact remains that Hamas' stated goal is the destruction of Israel. you are just so blinded with rage and hate you think anyone who speaks of Israel in an unhateful way is automatically a huge supporter of them.
I love how even HAMAS admits that one of its goals is to destroy Israel, but there's people on here who think its crazy to argue such.
Leader of Hamas: "We condone attacks on civilian targets, because Israel is a militarized society".
_outlaw: "No, you don't, remember? You're just misunderstood, a victim of oppression. Say it with with me now ..."
Leader of Hamas: "But, we hate the Zionists. We DO want to kill them, and who cares if they wear a uniform or not?"
_outlaw: "Nice try, you're doin' good ... Let's try again, K? You are NOT a terrorist. You're just reacting to the horrible, awful Zionist attacks on your way of life. You're a good guy ... If people in the West don't get you, that's because their racists and they love the dirty, dirty Je ... I mean, Zionists!"
Leader of Hamas: "But ... I don't feel that oppressed. My people are more economically well off than, say, the average Lebanese or Jordanian ... Really, I just want to get the damn Jews out of this desert."
_outlaw: "Hmmm ... We have work ahead of us, young Jedi."
I'm not going to anally break down your every sentence here, but you are completely failing to see both sides. all this crap you typed sounds nice. I dont necessarily disagree with it. but you say Israel needs to step forward with peace..ok....so does hamas. and yes Israel has destroyed parts of palastine..but the fact remains that Hamas' stated goal is the destruction of Israel. you are just so blinded with rage and hate you think anyone who speaks of Israel in an unhateful way is automatically a huge supporter of them.
I completely fail to see both sides, but you won't point to where or what I said that shows this. You simply just criticize arguments and try to show that people here are biased, and therefore wrong, but you won't ever supply any information, any proof, or anything.
You argue about the goal of Hamas, fine, I'll bite. The goal of Hamas is Israel's destruction in its current state. They do NOT want to push every Jew into the sea. They want the destruction of the occupation and oppression. You will probably respond with "you're wrong, you're blind" whatever, but answer this: IF Hamas wanted to push every Jew into the sea and bomb every Israeli alive, WHY would they say that once Israel moves back to the '67 borders, they'll talk to them??
any other insult by you is really you just trying to score some points and sidetracking the discussion.
Leader of Hamas: "We condone attacks on civilian targets, because Israel is a militarized society".
_outlaw: "No, you don't, remember? You're just misunderstood, a victim of oppression. Say it with with me now ..."
Leader of Hamas: "But, we hate the Zionists. We DO want to kill them, and who cares if they wear a uniform or not?"
_outlaw: "Nice try, you're doin' good ... Let's try again, K? You are NOT a terrorist. You're just reacting to the horrible, awful Zionist attacks on your way of life. You're a good guy ... If people in the West don't get you, that's because their racists and they love the dirty, dirty Je ... I mean, Zionists!"
Leader of Hamas: "But ... I don't feel that oppressed. My people are more economically well off than, say, the average Lebanese or Jordanian ... Really, I just want to get the damn Jews out of this desert."
_outlaw: "Hmmm ... We have work ahead of us, young Jedi."
I'd appreciate you not to use my name with fake quotes, but I must say the part that says "My people are more economically well off than, say, the average Lebanese or Jordanian" shows the ignorance that it took to write such a thing.
I'd appreciate you not to use my name with fake quotes, but I must say the part that says "My people are more economically well off than, say, the average Lebanese or Jordanian" shows the ignorance that it took to write such a thing.
It was a joke. Obviously no one things that's really you.
fair enough, but the comment was an ignorant one. I'd post links and statistics and stuff, but you'd probably just ignore them anyway.
Maybe I should threaten to post a link everytime you make an ignorant comment ... What's the bandwith of this site again?
Anyhow ... We've done the dance, nothing changes. You'll believe want to want to believe about Hamas while dodging's peoples' questions, and the world will keep turning.
Maybe I should threaten to post a link everytime you make an ignorant comment ... What's the bandwith of this site again?
Anyhow ... We've done the dance, nothing changes. You'll believe want to want to believe about Hamas while dodging's peoples' questions, and the world will keep turning.
this entire post is simply not true. if you'd like to point to where I made ignorant comments in this thread, go ahead. also, I don't dodge people's questions. if it's relevant, I'll answer. if he wanted to PM me, he could have. he didn't, which means he was never interested in my answer.
this entire post is simply not true. if you'd like to point to where I made ignorant comments in this thread, go ahead. also, I don't dodge people's questions. if it's relevant, I'll answer. if he wanted to PM me, he could have. he didn't, which means he was never interested in my answer.
I was more referring to the comments we made about Hamas, but OK, that too.
And no, my goal is not to go on some sort of ignorance crusade. For the record, I've never thought you to be an idiot. But your statements about Hamas are misinformed. Their own charter (I think that's the term they use) contradicts your (seeming) view that Hamas is nothing but an innocent victim.
I was more referring to the comments we made about Hamas, but OK, that too.
I ignored comments? please, show me where.
But your statements about Hamas are misinformed. Their own charter (I think that's the term they use) contradicts your (seeming) view that Hamas is nothing but an innocent victim.
how are my comments misinformed? did Hamas not say they would talk to Israel once they withdrew to the '67 borders?
You guys' whole idea of 'recognition' of Israel is quite ambiguous, as well.
'First, the formal diplomatic language of "recognition" is traditionally used by one state with respect to another state. It is literally meaningless for a non-state to "recognize" a state. Moreover, in diplomacy, such recognition is supposed to be mutual. In order to earn its own recognition, Israel would have to simultaneously recognize the state of Palestine. This it steadfastly refuses to do (and for some reason, there are no high-minded newspaper editorials demanding that it do so).
Second, which Israel, precisely, are the Palestinians being asked to "recognize?" Israel has stubbornly refused to declare its own borders. So, territorially speaking, "Israel" is an open-ended concept. Are the Palestinians to recognize the Israel that ends at the lines proposed by the 1947 U.N. Partition Plan? Or the one that extends to the 1949 Armistice Line (the de facto border that resulted from the 1948 war)? Or does Israel include the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which it has occupied in violation of international law for 40 years — and which maps in its school textbooks show as part of "Israel"?
For that matter, why should the Palestinians recognize an Israel that refuses to accept international law, submit to U.N. resolutions or readmit the Palestinians wrongfully expelled from their homes in 1948 and barred from returning ever since?
If none of these questions are easy to answer, why are such demands being made of the Palestinians? And why is nothing demanded of Israel in turn?'
Hi Outlaw.
I literally dont have the time to respond to every point in your many walls of text and links, so I will have to make a few general points regarding where I think your misunderstandings lie. You said that you are interested in facts and history but you did not seem to know that mandatory Palestine included modern day Jordan. This is a vital fact as it shows that the Arabs of Palestine were VERY fairly treated. The mandate called for the ‘close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes.’ and was restricted to the area west of the Jordan when Jordan was given statehood, however this still included both the west bank and Gaza as the Jewish area of the mandate. This has never been revoked, certainly not by resolution 242. For a simple presentation of the maps over the various periods:
The British mandate expired on May 15th 1948. The previous night Ben Gurion had read out the scroll of Independence, saying ‘By virtue of our National and intrinsic right…..and on the strength of the resolution of the United Nations General Assembly, we hereby declare the establishment of a Jewish State in Palestine, which shall be known as the State of Israel.’ The first Egyptian air raids began the same night, and as the last British troops left the next day, the armies of Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and Transjordan invaded. Azzam Pasha, Secretary General of the Arab League announced that: ‘This will be a war of extermination, and a momentous massacre’ Despite being vastly outnumbered in weapons and man-power, by the end of 1948 the Jews had succeeded in defending their new State. However King Abdullah’s Arab Legion had taken the Old City of Jerusalem and the territory now known as the West Bank, and the Egyptians had taken the Gaza strip, both of which were illegal occupations, not recognised by the UN.
Although many Arabs chose to remain in Jewish territory, and became Israeli citizens, approximately 656,000 Arabs fled into the areas occupied by Egypt and Jordan, as well as the Arab States. The reasons for this exodus are among the most hotly contested areas in Middle Eastern history. Pro-Palestinian commentators hold that the flight of the Arabs was a result of ‘Israeli terror’ and ‘direct expulsion.’ Whilst supporters of Israel contest that they fled due to instructions from the Arab leaders via radio broadcasts. It is likely that both of these factors contributed to the flight of the Palestinian Arabs, as did the [false] reports of a massacre at Deir Yassin, but it is difficult to prove which was the primary cause. Benny Morris, who is widely regarded as the leading authority on the refugees, concludes that ‘the Palestinian refugee problem was born of war, not by design.’ In addition, it must also be remembered that the war produced a similar number of Jewish refugees, who fled, or were forcibly expelled from the Islamic world, a total of 567,654 from 1948 to 1967.
For a visual presentation on the movement of refugees:
In seeking to paint a picture of Israel as the agressor, you ignore the unwillingness of the Arabs to make peace with Israel. Although the Egyptians signed peace accords with Israel in 1979 in exchange for the Sinai, the Arab States issued the ‘3 No’s of Khartoum’ (No recognition, No negotiation, No peace) in 1967, and most remain in a state of war with the Jewish State. Regarding the Barak-Arafat affair at camp david, virtually everyone who had anything to do with it places the blame entirely on Arafat for turning down Barak's offer. In fact, even the Saudi prince Bandar was furious with Arafat, calling his rejection a 'crime'. Israel was willing to make huge sacrifices to give the Palestinians a State but this cannot happen without both sides being willing. This is why resolution 242 calls on both sides, not Israeli unilateral withdrawal:
‘Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict.
Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force’
I do not need to quote the Hamas and PLO charters, we all know that both call for Israel's complete destruction. Your suggestion that they only refer to the west bank and Gaza is ridiculous. There will not be peace unless the Arabs give up there dream of destroying the hated 'Zionist Entity.
Lastly regarding my comments about the Jewish need to survive in the face of persecution. You said that this was not the case because the Zionist movement began before the holocaust. This clearly demonstrates your complete lack of knowledge of Jewish history. The holocaust was the climax of a long history of pogroms, ghettoiation, and massacres. The first major movement of jews to Israel was in 1881 as a direct response to persecution, the Zionist movement itself was born of the need to survive in the face of widespread unrelenting antisemitism.
I literally dont have the time to respond to every point in your many walls of text and links, so I will have to make a few general points regarding where I think your misunderstandings lie.
mandatory Palestine included modern day Jordan. This is a vital fact as it shows that the Arabs of Palestine were VERY fairly treated.
The first sentence is a lie. Secondly, how is it that the 'Arabs' were treated fairly?
http://www.danielpipes.org/article/298
'The Jordan-is-Palestine argument rests on four main premises: that Palestine historically included Jordan; that the British-governed Mandate of Palestine included the entire territory of today's Israel and Jordan; that the two regions are geographically indistinguishable; and that Palestinian and Jordanian leaders themselves believe Jordan and Palestine identical. The trouble is, neither the historical record nor the map unambiguously supports any of these propositions. Rather, they are based on a selective knowledge of history and geography, a narrow and eccentric reading of the British Mandate, and a distortion of inter-Arab political dynamics...
the historical record shows that the Palestine did not always include the east bank, and that the Jordan River has often served as a military and political division. The history of the area, ancient, medieval, and modern, does not entitle one to assert, as do advocates of Jordan-is-Palestine, that "the Balfour Declaration of 1917 was understood as British recognition of a Jewish National Homeland in all of historic Palestine"-meaning today's Jordan and Israel. The territory promised by the Balfour Declaration can justifiably be interpreted as ending at the Jordan River or as extending further.'
hahahaha, you think the 'Christian Friends of Israel' is a credible source?!
The British mandate expired on May 15th 1948. The previous night Ben Gurion had read out the scroll of Independence, saying ‘By virtue of our National and intrinsic right…..and on the strength of the resolution of the United Nations General Assembly, we hereby declare the establishment of a Jewish State in Palestine, which shall be known as the State of Israel.’ The first Egyptian air raids began the same night, and as the last British troops left the next day, the armies of Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and Transjordan invaded. Azzam Pasha, Secretary General of the Arab League announced that: ‘This will be a war of extermination, and a momentous massacre’ However King Abdullah’s Arab Legion had taken the Old City of Jerusalem and the territory now known as the West Bank, and the Egyptians had taken the Gaza strip, both of which were illegal occupations, not recognised by the UN.
'The truth is that by May 1948 Zionist forces had already invaded and occupied large parts of the land which had been allocated to the Palestinians by the UN Partition Plan.
..it is not true that the Arabs "invaded Israel" in 1948. First, Israel did not exist at the time of the alleged invasion as an established state with recognised bounderies. When the Zionist leaders established Israel on 15 May 1948 they purposely declined to declare the bounderies of the new state in order to allow for future expansion.
Secondly, the only territory to which the new state of Israel had even a remote claim was that alloted to the Jewish state by the UN Partition Plan. But the Zionists had already attacked areas that were alloted to the Palestinian Arab state.
Thirdly, those areas which the Arab states purportedly "invaded" were, in fact, exclusively areas alloted to the Palestinian Arab state proposed by the UN Partition Plan. The so-called Arab invasion was a defensive attempt to hold on to the areas alloted by the Partition Plan for the Palestinian state.
Finally, the commander of Jordan's Arab Legion, was under orders not to enter the areas alloted to the Jewish state (Sir John Bagot Glubb, "The Battle for Jerusalem", Middle East International, May 1973).'
Despite being vastly outnumbered in weapons and man-power, by the end of 1948 the Jews had succeeded in defending their new State.
'..on 15 May 1948, the Arab states publicly proclaimed their aim of creating a "United State of Palestine" in place of the Jewish and Arab, two-state, UN Plan. They claimed the latter was invalid, as it was opposed by Palestine's Arab majority, and maintained that the absence of legal authority made it necessary to intervene to protect Arab lives and property...
By July 1948, the IDF was fielding 63,000 troops; by early spring 1949, 115,000. The Arab armies had an estimated 40,000 troops in July 1948, rising to 55,000 in October 1948, and slightly more by the spring of 1949.'
Although many Arabs chose to remain in Jewish territory, and became Israeli citizens, approximately 656,000 Arabs fled into the areas occupied by Egypt and Jordan, as well as the Arab States. The reasons for this exodus are among the most hotly contested areas in Middle Eastern history. Pro-Palestinian commentators hold that the flight of the Arabs was a result of ‘Israeli terror’ and ‘direct expulsion.’ Whilst supporters of Israel contest that they fled due to instructions from the Arab leaders via radio broadcasts. It is likely that both of these factors contributed to the flight of the Palestinian Arabs, as did the [false] reports of a massacre at Deir Yassin, but it is difficult to prove which was the primary cause. Benny Morris, who is widely regarded as the leading authority on the refugees, concludes that ‘the Palestinian refugee problem was born of war, not by design.’
First of all, it was over 656,000 Arab refugees. In fact, many leaders have estimated it to be closer to 1 million.
Next, the radio broadcast myth has been exposed as just that, a myth. Even mainstream Israeli historians now admit that ethnic cleansing took place in 1948. As for the massacre at Deir Yassin being false, can you provide ANY evidence whatsoever? There were MANY massacres in 1948, such as Tantura. Well over 400 villages were destroyed, FORCING the Palestinians to be expelled. These are all documented facts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre
Benny Morris: 'Combatants and noncombatants were gunned down in the course of the house-to-house fighting, and, subsequently, after the battle, groups of prisoners and noncombatants were killed in separate, sporadic acts of frenzy and revenge in different parts of the village and outside of Deir Yassin. The remaining villagers were then expelled...'
Eliahu Arbel arrived at the scene April 10. He was an Operations Officer B of the Haganah's Etzioni Brigade. He reported:-
"I saw the horrors that the fighters had created. I saw bodies of women and children, who were murdered in their houses in cold blood by gunfire, with no signs of battle and not as the result of blowing up the houses. From my experience I know well, that there is no war without killing, and that not only combatants get killed. I have seen a great deal of war, but I never saw a sight like Deir Yassin."
'Ben Zion-Cohen (an Irgun commander) reported to the Jabotinsky archives that at some point in Deir Yassin:-
"We eliminated every Arab that came our way."
Mordechai Gihon was a Haganah intelligence officer in Jerusalem. He was in the village at the afternoon of April 9. He reported:-
"Before we got to the village we saw people carrying bodies to the quarry east of Deir Yassin. We entered the village around 3:00 in the afternoon . . . In the village there were tens of bodies. The dissidents got them out of the roads. I told them not to throw the bodies into cisterns and caves, because that was the first place that would be checked..."
"I didn't count the dead. I estimated that there were four pits full of bodies, and in each pit there were 20 bodies, and several tens more in the quarry. I throw out a number, 150.'
1948 ethnic cleansing and Deir Yassin:
http://www.mideastweb.org/pland.htm
'The main Jewish underground army in Palestine (Hagannah) had begun working on a contingency plan for defending a Jewish state from invasion even before the partition plan was approved in November 1947.
Plan Daleth (Plan D):
'..Mounting operations against enemy population centers located inside or near our defensive system in order to prevent them from being used as bases by an active armed force. These operations can be divided into the following categories:
Destruction of villages (setting fire to, blowing up, and planting mines in the debris), especially those population centers which are difficult to control continuously.
Mounting search and control operations according to the following guidelines: encirclement of the village and conducting a search inside it. In the event of resistance, the. armed force must be destroyed and the population must be expelled outside the borders of the state...'
In 1969, the Israeli Foreign Ministry published a pamphlet “Background Notes on Current Themes: Deir Yassin” in English denying that there had been a massacre at Deir Yassin, and calling the story "part of a package of fairy tales, for export and home consumption". The pamphlet led to a series of derivative articles giving the same message, especially in America. Menachem Begin's Herut party disseminated a Hebrew translation in Israel, causing a widespread but largely non-public debate within the Israeli establishment. Several former leaders of the Hagannah demanded that the pamphlet be withdrawn on account of its inaccuracy, but the Foreign Ministry explained that "While our intention and desire is to maintain accuracy in our information, we sometimes are forced to deviate from this principle when we have no choice or alternative means to rebuff a propaganda assault or Arab psychological warfare." Yitzhak Levi, the 1948 leader of Hagannah Intelligence, wrote to Begin: "On behalf of the truth and the purity of arms of the Jewish soldier in the War of Independence, I see it as my duty to warn you against continuing to spread this untrue version about what happened in Deir Yassin to the Israeli public. Otherwise there will be no avoiding raising the matter publicly and you will be responsible." Eventually, the Foreign Ministry agreed to stop distributing the pamphlet, but it remains the source of many popular accounts.'
In addition, it must also be remembered that the war produced a similar number of Jewish refugees, who fled, or were forcibly expelled from the Islamic world, a total of 567,654 from 1948 to 1967.
'The concept that Jewish emigrants from Arab lands should be considered refugees has been met with opposition from both Zionist and Non-Zionist circles. Zionist opposition, coming mainly from Israeli Zionist politicians of the Mizrachi Jewish community, contends that it is Zionist ideals that were the driving force behind their emigration to Israel. Anti-Zionist opposition contends that the majority of Arab Jews were not Zionists, but were rather forced to leave by direct and indirect actions of Zionist emissaries.
From the Zionist perspective, for instance, Iraqi-born Ran Cohen, a member of the Knesset (Parliament), said: "I have this to say: I am not a refugee. I came at the behest of Zionism, due to the pull that this land exerts, and due to the idea of redemption. Nobody is going to define me as a refugee;" Yemeni-born Yisrael Yeshayahu, former Knesset speaker, Labor Party, stated: "We are not refugees. [Some of us] came to this country before the state was born. We had messianic aspirations;" and Iraqi-born Shlomo Hillel, also a former speaker of the Knesset, Labor Party, claimed: "I don't regard the departure of Jews from Arab lands as that of refugees. They came here because they wanted to, as Zionists."[77]
On the Anti-Zionist perspective, Iraqi-Born activist Naeim Giladi alleges that Zionist emissaries used violence to engineer the exodus and disrupt coexistence in Iraq. Further support for this claim has been made by Professors Yehouda Shenhav[77] and Ella Shohat.
The type and extent of linkage between the Jewish exodus from Arab lands and the Palestinian Exodus has also been the source of controversy. Advocacy groups have suggested that there are strong ties between the two processes and some of them even claim that decoupling the two issues is unjust.[78][79] Other scholars such as Phillip mendes and David Cesarani reject the comparison and coupling as superficial and is used as an excuse to withhold justice from Palestinians.[80][6]'
In seeking to paint a picture of Israel as the agressor, you ignore the unwillingness of the Arabs to make peace with Israel. Although the Egyptians signed peace accords with Israel in 1979 in exchange for the Sinai, the Arab States issued the ‘3 No’s of Khartoum’ (No recognition, No negotiation, No peace) in 1967, and most remain in a state of war with the Jewish State.
Funny that it took the Arab states 20 years of terrorizing by the Israelis to finally release these '3 No's of Khatoum'. You seem content to leave out all that happened between 1948-1967. You fail to mention what's happened since 1967, such as the Israeli occupation of Lebanon, MANY massacres that took place - some in REFUGEE CAMPS. It's quite ridiculous because you have been trying to paint a picture of Israel being the defendant, and the Arab states being the aggressors. Unfortunately for you, however, you've provided no evidence. Just baseless claims.
Regarding the Barak-Arafat affair at camp david, virtually everyone who had anything to do with it places the blame entirely on Arafat for turning down Barak's offer. In fact, even the Saudi prince Bandar was furious with Arafat, calling his rejection a 'crime'. Israel was willing to make huge sacrifices to give the Palestinians a State but this cannot happen without both sides being willing.
This is pure bullshit. Why don't you explain what was on offer and what 'huge sacrifices' Israel was prepared to make? The only concessions/sacrifices Israel was prepared to make at Camp David were concessions relating to what it wanted, and had nothing whatsoever to do with what Israel was entitled to under International law. Israel offered the Palestinians nothing but an Apartheid system of Bantustans.
This is why resolution 242 calls on both sides, not Israeli unilateral withdrawal:
‘Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict.
Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force’
what's your point here? Hamas has already said that once Israel withdraws, talks can begin. It is Israel who is choosing not to do this because they do not want peace - they want ultimate surrender by the Palestinians.
I do not need to quote the Hamas and PLO charters, we all know that both call for Israel's complete destruction. Your suggestion that they only refer to the west bank and Gaza is ridiculous.
prove me otherwise. I know I'm asking so much of you, but really, just saying osmething is ridiculous but not proving otherwise shows that you don't know what you're talking about. I've already asked - If Hamas only wants ultimate destruction of Israel and to throw every Jew into the sea, then why did they say that once Israel withdraws to the '67 borders (something the international community agrees on) talks can begin?
There will not be peace unless the Arabs give up there dream of destroying the hated 'Zionist Entity.
This is not true. Hamas has given terms - terms which the international community agrees on. Israel, however, only wants the unconditional surrender of the Palestinians.
Lastly regarding my comments about the Jewish need to survive in the face of persecution. You said that this was not the case because the Zionist movement began before the holocaust. This clearly demonstrates your complete lack of knowledge of Jewish history. The holocaust was the climax of a long history of pogroms, ghettoiation, and massacres. The first major movement of jews to Israel was in 1881 as a direct response to persecution, the Zionist movement itself was born of the need to survive in the face of widespread unrelenting antisemitism.
don't get carried away here. It was not simply the need to survive. you guys seem to love to quote Hamas and PLO charters, but you ignore the charter for the Zionist movement which was to create a Jewish homeland from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea - this was ever since the 1880s, and the Zionist leaders knew that this charter involved an ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. Zionist underground movements began massacres and bombings since the early 1900s.
Trying to victimize the Jewish people to justify the terrible oppression, the occupation, the human rights violations, etc of Israel is simply ridiculous. Not that the Jewish people have not gone through the same things, but you'd think they'd be more sympathetic; not wanting to do the same thing to another people.
Hi.
Your attempt to wriggle out of the FACT that Jordan is the Arab Palestinian State that the Palestinians have ALREADY been given is rather weak. You laugh at my map link because it was from a christian website, hmmm. Ok find me a map of mandatory Palestine that does not include Jordan. Here is another site, but I expect you will find a reason not to believe it since it contradicts your 'Israel the great oppressor' belief.
I see you are willing to drop your rather dubious sources and quote Benny Morris when it suits you. If you are willing to accept him as a reliable source, why not accept his reports on Dier Yassin. Your friend Noam Chomsky claims that ‘250 defenceless people were slaughtered’ , whilst Morris affirms that the Jews encountered stiff resistance at Deir Yassin, in which five Jews were killed and more than thirty were wounded. Morris concludes that the Arab death toll was exaggerated, and puts the number of casualties, including combatants at 100-110. Furthermore, as I said before, Morris concludes that the Palestinian refugee problem was 'born of war, not by design', which you have ignored.
Regarding the PLO charter; if I really need to spell it out for you: here is a link to the charter that highlights the articles that explicitly call for Israel’s destruction:
Regarding Hamas, here is a link that shows that their charter calls for the ‘obliteration’ of Israel. It also shows that Hamas fervently believes in the authenticity of the anti-semitic document ‘the protocols of the wise men of Zion’, hence, as was also true of Hitler, Hamas sees the destruction of all Jews as vital for the future of humanity.
The tone and inaccuracy of your posts about Israel point to your having been heavily influenced by either Noam Chomsky or Edward Said. I suggest that you also read the other side of the story, such as ‘The case for Israel’ by Alan Dershowitz before perpetuating Chomsky’s misleading and often inaccurate accusations. Reading Benny Morris’s books is also vital for a balanced view, not just utilizing Chomsky’s highly selective Morris quotes. An unbiased investigation of History reveals that their has never been, as Chomsky claims, an ‘independent Palestinian Nation’, rather records show that prior to the arrival of the Jewish pioneers, the Arab residents saw themselves as inhabitants of ‘southern Syria’, as the Arab Higher Committee stated at the UN in 1947: ‘Palestine was part of the Province of Syria…politically, the Arabs of Palestine were not independent in the sense of forming a separate political identity.’
It also must be remembered that most of the Arab residents present in 1948 were as new to the land as the Jews. In fact many went to Palestine to work for the Jewish pioneers. The anti-Zionist British administration also turned a blind eye to illegal Arab immigration in order to undermine the Zionist project. This led Churchill to comment in 1939 that:
‘Far from being persecuted, the Arabs have crowded into the country and multiplied until their population has increased more than even all world Jewry could lift up the Jewish population.’
The truth is that, prior to Zionism, Palestine was largely empty. In 1857 the British Consul reported that “The country is, in a considerable degree, empty of Inhabitants and therefore its greatest need is a body of population”. 10 years later Mark Twain visited the land and commented: ‘It is a hopeless, dreary, heart-broken land … Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes…Renowned Jerusalem itself, the stateliest name in history, has lost all its ancient grandeur, and is become a pauper village’. However there were small ancient communities of both Jews and Arabs, like the oldest Jewish community in the world at Hebron, which was annihilated by the Arabs in 1947, and the Yemenite Jewish community in East Jerusalem that the Arabs destroyed in 1948. the difference is that the Jews have a historical claim to Statehood due to two past commonwealths, whilst the Arabs have no such history in the land and had no nationalist movement until AFTER Zionism. Despite this the Arabs were given 73% of Palestine as an Arab Palestinian homeland called Jordan. Peace.
P.S. Your allegation that the Rabbinical prohibition of intermarriage of Arabs and Jews is discriminatory against Arabs is absurd. If anything it is the JEWS that are discriminated against since the restriction is only upon them. You should also remember that the restriction is upon Jews marrying any kind of Gentile (non Jew), not just Arabs, and that if a Jewish and Arab Israeli couple choose to marry abroad, the State recognises their marriage.
You laugh at my map link because it was from a christian website, hmmm.
"Christian friends of Israel" being called a 'christian website' is an understatement. It's simply not a credible source. if that's the only source you can find to back you up, then that should already show that you're mistaken.
From their own website:
Christian Friends of Israel (CFI) is a ministry that exists to:
* Comfort and support the People of Israel through practical means
* Inform Christians around the world of God's plan for Israel and the Church's responsibility towards the Jewish people
* Make the Jewish people aware of our solidarity with them
Ok find me a map of mandatory Palestine that does not include Jordan.
Why the obsession with the British mandated Palestine? You're simply trying to convince people that Palestine and Jordan are the same. You simply want to try and justify the Palestinians dispossession with this blatant lie.
..the [false] reports of a massacre at Deir Yassin"
Seems you don't mind contradicting yourself. All mainstream historians now admit there was deliberate ethnic cleansing in 1948. Why can't you also admit it?
Norman Finkelstein: 'Shlomo Ben-Ami..former Israeli foreign minister..[and] a respected historian...provides this capsule summary of the "reality on the ground" during the 1948 war: :an Arab community in a state of terror facing a ruthless Israeli army whose path to victory was paved not only by it's exploits against the regular Arab armies, but also by the intimidation, and at times atrocities and massacres, it perpetrated against the civilian Arab community." Sifting the evidence, he concludes that in fact Israel premeditatedly expelled Palestinians in accordance with the Zionist "philosophy of transfer", which "had a long pedigree in Zionist thought," framed Zionist leader David be Gurion's strategic-ideological" vision, and it provided a legitimate environment for commanders in the field actively to encourage the eviction of the local population."
To put it simply, you thought Benny Morris was a reliable source, so I used his own quotes to contradict what you claimed to be true. However, it is no secret that he has an incredible bias towards Israel:
Benny Morris:
"In Acre four soldiers raped a girl and murdered her and her father. In Jaffa, soldiers of the Kiryati Brigade raped one girl and tried to rape several more. At Hunin, which is in the Galilee, two girls were raped and then murdered. There were one or two cases of rape at Tantura, south of Haifa. There was one case of rape at Qula, in the center of the country...In a large proportion of the cases the event ended with murder. Because neither the victims nor the rapists liked to report these events, we have to assume that the dozen cases of rape that were reported, which I found, are not the whole story. They are just the tip of the iceberg."
According to your findings, how many acts of Israeli massacre were perpetrated in 1948?
"Twenty-four. In some cases four or five people were executed, in others the numbers were 70, 80, 100...
..The worst cases were Saliha (70-80 killed), Deir Yassin (100-110), Lod (250), Dawayima (hundreds) and perhaps Abu Shusha (70). There is no unequivocal proof of a large-scale massacre at Tantura, but war crimes were perpetrated there. At Jaffa there was a massacre about which nothing had been known until now. The same at Arab al Muwassi, in the north. About half of the acts of massacre were part of Operation Hiram [in the north, in October 1948]: at Safsaf, Saliha, Jish, Eilaboun, Arab al Muwasi, Deir al Asad, Majdal Krum, Sasa. In Operation Hiram there was a unusually high concentration of executions of people against a wall or next to a well in an orderly fashion.
"That can't be chance. It's a pattern. Apparently, various officers who took part in the operation understood that the expulsion order they received permitted them to do these deeds in order to encourage the population to take to the roads. The fact is that no one was punished for these acts of murder. Ben-Gurion silenced the matter. He covered up for the officers who did the massacres...
...Ben-Gurion was right. If he had not done what he did, a state would not have come into being. That has to be clear. It is impossible to evade it. Without the uprooting of the Palestinians, a Jewish state would not have arisen here."
Furthermore, as I said before, Morris concludes that the Palestinian refugee problem was 'born of war, not by design', which you have ignored.
oh, really?
Benny Morris:
"There is no justification for acts of rape. There is no justification for acts of massacre. Those are war crimes. But in certain conditions, expulsion is not a war crime. I don't think that the expulsions of 1948 were war crimes. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. You have to dirty your hands."
Interviewer: We are talking about the killing of thousands of people, the destruction of an entire society.
"A society that aims to kill you forces you to destroy it. When the choice is between destroying or being destroyed, it's better to destroy."
Interviewer: There is something chilling about the quiet way in which you say that.
"If you expected me to burst into tears, I'm sorry to disappoint you. I will not do that...
..There are circumstances in history that justify ethnic cleansing. I know that this term is completely negative in the discourse of the 21st century, but when the choice is between ethnic cleansing and genocide - the annihilation of your people - I prefer ethnic cleansing."
I do not identify with Ben-Gurion. I think he made a serious historical mistake in 1948. Even though he understood the demographic issue and the need to establish a Jewish state without a large Arab minority, he got cold feet during the war. In the end, he faltered."
I'm not sure I understand. Are you saying that Ben-Gurion erred in expelling too few Arabs?
"If he was already engaged in expulsion, maybe he should have done a complete job. I know that this stuns the Arabs and the liberals and the politically correct types. But my feeling is that this place would be quieter and know less suffering if the matter had been resolved once and for all. If Ben-Gurion had carried out a large expulsion and cleansed the whole country - the whole Land of Israel, as far as the Jordan River. It may yet turn out that this was his fatal mistake. If he had carried out a full expulsion - rather than a partial one - he would have stabilized the State of Israel for generations."
Interviewer: A large part of the responsibility for the hatred of the Palestinians rests with us. After all, you yourself showed us that the Palestinians experienced a historical catastrophe.
"True. But when one has to deal with a serial killer, it's not so important to discover why he became a serial killer. What's important is to imprison the murderer or to execute him."
Interviewer: Explain the image: Who is the serial killer in the analogy?
"The barbarians who want to take our lives. The people the Palestinian society sends to carry out the terrorist attacks, and in some way the Palestinian society itself as well. At the moment, that society is in the state of being a serial killer. It is a very sick society. It should be treated the way we treat individuals who are serial killers."
Interviewer: What does that mean? What should we do tomorrow morning?
"We have to try to heal the Palestinians. Maybe over the years the establishment of a Palestinian state will help in the healing process. But in the meantime, until the medicine is found, they have to be contained so that they will not succeed in murdering us."
Interviewer: To fence them in? To place them under closure?
"Something like a cage has to be built for them. I know that sounds terrible. It is really cruel. But there is no choice. There is a wild animal there that has to be locked up in one way or another."
Regarding Hamas, here is a link that shows that their charter calls for the ‘obliteration’ of Israel. It also shows that Hamas fervently believes in the authenticity of the anti-semitic document ‘the protocols of the wise men of Zion’, hence, as was also true of Hitler, Hamas sees the destruction of all Jews as vital for the future of humanity.
more bullshit. why don't you answer my question? I've asked it many times: If Hamas is so bent on pushing every Jew into the sea, THEN WHY HAVE THEY SAID ONCE ISRAEL WITHDRAWS TO THE '67 BORDERS, THEY'LL BEGIN TALKING?? do I have to put it in bold? do I have to make the font a little bigger? why is Hamas calling for the SAME thing the international community is calling for - to end the occupation of oppression of Palestine - while Israel ignores all of this?
The tone and inaccuracy of your posts about Israel point to your having been heavily influenced by either Noam Chomsky or Edward Said. I suggest that you also read the other side of the story, such as ‘The case for Israel’ by Alan Dershowitz before perpetuating Chomsky’s misleading and often inaccurate accusations.
WHAT?! Did you just honestly and sincerely compare scholars like Noam Chomsky and Edward Said to the likes of Alan Dershowitz????
This comment sums you up perfectly. Alan Dershowitz's 'The Case For Israel' has been successfully exposed as nothing but plagiarism and a fraud in Norman Finkelstein's book 'Beyond Chutzpah'. I suggest you read it.
Reading Benny Morris’s books is also vital for a balanced view, not just utilizing Chomsky’s highly selective Morris quotes.
ah yes, as you can see above, Benny Morris clearly has a BALANCED view...
It also must be remembered that most of the Arab residents present in 1948 were as new to the land as the Jews. In fact many went to Palestine to work for the Jewish pioneers.
Another lie. I can see that you've read Dershowitz's book and base all of your lies on that. It's interesting that these lies concerning Palestine being virtually uninhabited until the arrival of the Jews were plagiarized by Dershowitz from another exposed fraud: Joan Peter's 'From Time Immemorial'.
The anti-Zionist British administration also turned a blind eye to illegal Arab immigration in order to undermine the Zionist project.
anti-Zionist British administration? are you fucking kidding me? The British are the ones who forced the Arabs to accept Jewish and Zionist mass immigration against their will. Just because the British (although late) saw what was coming out of it and was trying to slow the process down means absolutely nothing. and you're trying to talk about illegal ARAB immigration?! what about illegal JEWISH immigration??
the difference is that the Jews have a historical claim to Statehood due to two past commonwealths, whilst the Arabs have no such history in the land and had no nationalist movement until AFTER Zionism.
you're naive if that's what you think... I mean, seriously... no one even tries to argue the fact that the Arabs have a strong historical presence in Palestine.
Despite this the Arabs were given 73% of Palestine as an Arab Palestinian homeland called Jordan.
'...the historical record shows that the Palestine did not always include the east bank, and that the Jordan River has often served as a military and political division. The history of the area, ancient, medieval, and modern, does not entitle one to assert, as do advocates of Jordan-is-Palestine, that "the Balfour Declaration of 1917 was understood as British recognition of a Jewish National Homeland in all of historic Palestine"-meaning today's Jordan and Israel. The territory promised by the Balfour Declaration can justifiably be interpreted as ending at the Jordan River or as extending further.
A few months of rule that was neither de facto nor de jure is hardly reason, seventy years later, to call Jordan a part of Palestine. Besides, it is preposterous to base today's major decisions of war and peace on the transient interests of the British Empire after World War I. That Jordan was briefly part of the Palestine Mandate does not establish a vital link; it merely recalls a historical curiosity. As L. Dean Brown observes, "Jordan is Palestine only in the sense that Nebraska, which was part of the Louisiana Purchase, is still Louisiana.
The purpose of this change in nomenclature is to undercut any Arab claim to sovereignty over territory Israel now holds. It also makes the Palestinians look greedy; they already have a whole loaf and they want another. It implies that while Palestinians should leave Israel alone, they should feel free to make changes in the Hashemite Kingdom. It also suggests that, because Israel has at least as valid a claim to the east bank as the Palestinians do to the west, the granting of the eastern part of Palestine to Arabs represents a form of Zionist generosity. Finally, it implies that the Israelis may be justified in expelling Arabs to Jordan, their true Palestinian patrimony. In this way, the kindred notions of Jordan-is-Palestine and Greater Israel join the demographic and political issues facing Israel today to create the political agenda of the Israeli right.
The Jordan-is-Palestine idea is not only historically wrong, legally superficial, geographically ignorant, and politically procrustean, but its implementation would be extremely dangerous.'
Peace.
why do you end every post with the word 'peace', when clearly you have no such good intentions? You support Israeli crimes and Israeli expansionism. What does this have to do with 'Peace'?
P.S. Your allegation that the Rabbinical prohibition of intermarriage of Arabs and Jews is discriminatory against Arabs is absurd. If anything it is the JEWS that are discriminated against since the restriction is only upon them. You should also remember that the restriction is upon Jews marrying any kind of Gentile (non Jew), not just Arabs, and that if a Jewish and Arab Israeli couple choose to marry abroad, the State recognises their marriage.
the fact that you actually justify blatant discrimination proves nothing in your favor. thanks for trying, though.
http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/3041
Ilan Pappe - 'The ethnic cleansing of Palestine':
'...in 1948, the Zionist movement waged a war against the Palestinain people in order to implement its long term plans of ethnic cleansing (whereas Israeli historians, including 'new historians', claimed that the war was waged by the Arab world against the state of Israel in order to eliminate it and it resulted in expulsions of Palestinians). The Arab world tried to prevent this cleansing, but was too fragmented, self-centered and ineffective to stop the uprooting of half of Palestine's native population, the destruction of half of its villages and towns and the killing of thousands of its people.
And since that ethnic cleansing was successfully implemented in almost 80% of Palestine without any global or regional repercussions - the ethnic cleansing policy continues ever since 1967 in the remaining 20% of the country. Creating a Jewish state in historical Palestine cleansed of Palestinians is still the ideolgoical infrastructure on which the state of Israel is based. How to achieve this goal is a divisive issue between Left Zionists - hoping to negotiate a settlement that would leave a small number of Palestinains in a greater Israel and the Right Zionsts willing to implement a more direct cleasning policy from the same area even today.
The book uses the accepted scholarly definition of Ethnic Cleansing to show its academic as well legal applicability to the case of Palestine and argues that since in the eyes of the world - including the State Department and the UN - ethnic cleansing is a crime against humanity, this how we should view the Israeli actions in the past and Israel's policies in the present.
..The book is based on three major sources. First it uses new material from the Israeli military archives that was released in the late 1990s. Secondly, it is based on a re-reading of the older archival material through the prism of the ethnic cleansing paradigm. Thirdly, it uses extensively the Palestinian oral history archives.'
why do you end every post with the word 'peace', when clearly you have no such good intentions? You support Israeli crimes and Israeli expansionism. What does this have to do with 'Peace'?
I say 'peace' because I believe in peace but equally in truth. Many are willing to give up on truth for the sake of peace but I believe that true peace can only be gained through upholding truth.
The Jordan-is-Palestine idea is not only historically wrong, legally superficial, geographically ignorant, and politically procrustean, but its implementation would be extremely dangerous.'
The FACT that Jordan is Palestine is a vital truth, not so that Arabs can be driven out of Israel, but so that the lie that the Jews were not willing to share Palestine can be exposed. You clearly are still unwilling to accept this fact of history and showing me a map of Palestine AFTER Jordan was carved out of Palestine illustrates this. When Britain recieved the mandate in 1920, it included Jordan, this is a fact. Winston Churchill decided to split Palestine in 1922 and the Arabs were given all the territory east of the Jordan as the Arab State of Trans-Jordan in 1923. You know this is true so stop trying to dodge it.
Regarding Dier Yassin. You are incorrect, I do accept Benny Morris's description of the horrors and injustices there. Many Arab civilians there were shot by the Jews. However, although some of the Jewish fighters lost control, Dier Yassin was NOT a pre-meditated massacre. In the build up to the war, the Arabs began ambushing supply convoys en route to Jerusalem and attempted to cut off the highway between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. On the 6th of April the Irgun launched Operation Nachshon to re-open the road and occupy the overlooking Arab villages. Deir Yassin was one such village. There is evidence that some of the Arab prisoners were killed in custody and this is wrong, but that does not make the whole thing a massacre. Your 'great scholar' Noam Chomsky is simply wrong when he says that '250 defencless people were slaughtered', there was a battle at Dier Yassin and only 100-110 Arabs were killed (as you have now admitted) and this INCLUDED combatants.
Regarding the land being empty before Zionism. Look, if you view everything through the prism of Edwards Said's 'Orientalism' then the whole enterprise of History is false since, as Said says in 'Orientalism':‘It is therefore correct that every European, in what he could say about the Orient, was consequentially a racist, an imperialist, and almost totally ethnocentric.’ However Said's thesis is WRONG, it was only accepted in the first place place because it fed the west's post-colonial guilt. The falsehood of Said's thesis is shown by Ibn Warraq's observation that although German Orientalists were ‘the greatest of all scholars of the orient’ they had no empire, a fact that may explain why Said restricts his study to France and England. Furthermore, Said’s analysis seems only to define Muslims as Orientals, at the expense of non-Muslims:
‘For Said, the non-Muslims, and even non-Arabs hardly exist, are occasionally mentioned, are never discussed or acknowledged as Orientals with a history and presence: there are no Copts, no Maronites, no Mandaeans, no Samaritans, no Assyrians, no Greek Orthodox Christians, No Chaldeans, no Berbers, and of course no Jews’
You completely ignore the fact that numerous Jewish communities existed in Palestine at the turn of the century that had existed there for many centuries. The oldest of these, in Hebron, was massacred by the Arabs. This was a true massacre, in which the Arabs went from house to house murdering the innocent, the whole community was annihilated. This was carried out at the orders of the grand mufti of Jerusalem, who was a close ally of Hitler during WW2. The British military administration in Palestine WAS staunchly anti-Zionist during this period, which is another reason that the massacre was allowed to take place. Most of the British soldiers in Palestine had a copy of 'The Protocols of the Wise Men of Zion', hence they were reading from the same manual as Hamas.
Regarding Hamas and the PLO, the fact that they have said they will talk to Israel if they withdraw to the green line means something only to the gullible. If you understand something about Islam, you will be aware of the doctrine taquiyya, deception for the sake of Jihad, Arafat was a master at this, he told the west that he just wanted a state in the west bank and Gaza and peace with Israel whilst all the time telling his own people that it was just a tactic in the war to destroy Israel. Before he died, all western leaders realised that Arafat had decieved them, they hope that Abbas will not do the same but they are not naive enough to believe Hamas. You shouldn't be either.
Your debate tactic to NOT quote me is not as clever as you think it is. I understand you don't want to show that you're ignoring 75% of my post, but it doesn't help your case at all. Moving on:
I say 'peace' because I believe in peace but equally in truth. Many are willing to give up on truth for the sake of peace but I believe that true peace can only be gained through upholding truth.
I suggest you don't read books written by people like Alan Dershowitz if you're interested in truth.
The FACT that Jordan is Palestine is a vital truth, not so that Arabs can be driven out of Israel, but so that the lie that the Jews were not willing to share Palestine can be exposed. You clearly are still unwilling to accept this fact of history and showing me a map of Palestine AFTER Jordan was carved out of Palestine illustrates this. When Britain recieved the mandate in 1920, it included Jordan, this is a fact. Winston Churchill decided to split Palestine in 1922 and the Arabs were given all the territory east of the Jordan as the Arab State of Trans-Jordan in 1923. You know this is true so stop trying to dodge it.
Actually, many Arabs had gone and claimed independence in Jordan, which was, SURPRISE- INDEPENDENT of Palestine. These Jordanians wanted a separate, independent nation and technically took over the land. Churchill didn't simply 'decide' to give it to them, he basically just didn't retaliate against them.
However, you still ignore all the quotes and sources that have been provided that explain why Jordan is NOT Palestine- you, however, choose to ignore it, providing no sources.
Regarding Dier Yassin. You are incorrect, I do accept Benny Morris's description of the horrors and injustices there. Many Arab civilians there were shot by the Jews. However, although some of the Jewish fighters lost control, Dier Yassin was NOT a pre-meditated massacre.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plan_Dalet
'In his book 'The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine' [Ilan Pappe] quotes Ben Gurion writing the commanders of the Haganah Brigades on 11 May 1948 that 'the cleansing of Palestine remains the prime objective of Plan Dalet'.
Benny Morris:
'[Plan Dalet] constituted a strategic-doctrinal and carte blanche for expulsions [from villages that resisted or might threaten the Yishuv] by front, brigade, district and battalion commanders (who in each case argued military necessity) and it gave commanders, post facto, formal, persuasive cover for their actions.'
Preventing the enemy from using frontline positions within his territory which can easily be used for launching attacks. This will be effected by occupying and controlling them.
Mounting operations against enemy population centers located inside or near our defensive system in order to prevent them from being used as bases by an active armed force. These operations can be divided into the following categories:
Destruction of villages (setting fire to, blowing up, and planting mines in the debris), especially those population centers which are difficult to control continuously.
Mounting search and control operations according to the following guidelines: encirclement of the village and conducting a search inside it. In the event of resistance, the. armed force must be destroyed and the population must be expelled outside the borders of the state...'
There is evidence that some of the Arab prisoners were killed in custody and this is wrong, but that does not make the whole thing a massacre.
It cannot be argued that Deir Yassin was not a massacre. It was. All the credible historians agree, and you trying to prove otherwise only hurts whatever the hell it is you're actually trying to show here.
Your 'great scholar' Noam Chomsky is simply wrong when he says that '250 defencless people were slaughtered',
yes, it was reported in the New York Times that 250 were killed.
there was a battle at Dier Yassin and only 100-110 Arabs were killed (as you have now admitted) and this INCLUDED combatants.
You fail the mention that half the people killed were women and children. You fail to mention the orphans left after the Zionist gangs killed and drove out all 750 people from the village. You fail to mention any of these, and your pathetic attempt to label the Deir Yassin massacre as a 'battle' is ridiculous. And I, for one, think it's incredibly despicable to write something like 'only 100-110 Arabs were killed'.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/arabs-and-jews-unite-to-commemorate-massacre-687405.html
'The facts of the slaughter were never denied at the time. The Arab village of Deir Yassin was attacked by Jewish commandos of the Stern Gang and Irgun, then led by Menachem Begin, on 9 April 1948; after its capture, they murdered more than 100 - perhaps as many as 254 - men, women and children. Some women were butchered with knives, others were shot with their children.
Official Zionist leaders of the Haganah denounced the killings. Several victims lived an hour longer than their families as they were taken by truck through the streets of Jeru-salem, then returned to the quarry outside Deir Yassin where they were killed and their bodies burnt by Jewish gang members.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre
'Deir Yassin was different from the village of al-Qastal that had recently been attacked by the Haganah, in that it did not participate directly in the conflict. The villagers reportedly wanted to remain neutral in the war and they had repeatedly resisted help and alliances with the Palestinian irregulars. Instead they had made a pact with Haganah to not help the irregulars as long as they were not the target of military operations.[11]
The inhabitants had even remained cooperative while the Haganah took the strategic Sharafa ridge between Deir Yassin and the nearby ALA base Ein Karem. Haganah intelligence confirmed after the village had been captured that it in fact had stayed "faithful allies of the western Jerusalem sector".[12]
Yoma Ben-Sasson, Haganah commander in Givat Shaul, later recalled that "there was not even one incident between Deir Yassin and the Jews".'
Honestly, I highly suggest you stop arguing the massacre of Deir Yassin. It's not open for discussion on whether or not it was a massacre.
Regarding the land being empty before Zionism. Look, if you view everything through the prism of Edwards Said's 'Orientalism' then the whole enterprise of History is false since, as Said says in 'Orientalism':‘It is therefore correct that every European, in what he could say about the Orient, was consequentially a racist, an imperialist, and almost totally ethnocentric.’ However Said's thesis is WRONG, it was only accepted in the first place place because it fed the west's post-colonial guilt. The falsehood of Said's thesis is shown by Ibn Warraq's observation that although German Orientalists were ‘the greatest of all scholars of the orient’ they had no empire, a fact that may explain why Said restricts his study to France and England. Furthermore, Said’s analysis seems only to define Muslims as Orientals, at the expense of non-Muslims:
‘For Said, the non-Muslims, and even non-Arabs hardly exist, are occasionally mentioned, are never discussed or acknowledged as Orientals with a history and presence: there are no Copts, no Maronites, no Mandaeans, no Samaritans, no Assyrians, no Greek Orthodox Christians, No Chaldeans, no Berbers, and of course no Jews’
Congratulations on having read 'Orientalism'... actually, you may not have even read it, just looked up criticisms of it online to support your crazy theology. Also, do you mind providing a link to the where you are getting your quotes from? I have never had the opportunity to read Said's 'Orientalism', however, either way, I fail to see the relevance in this.
You completely ignore the fact that numerous Jewish communities existed in Palestine at the turn of the century that had existed there for many centuries.
This is completely irrelevant. Before the Zionist movement began, Arabs (both Muslim and Christian) and Jews had lived in peace in the region for hundreds of years.
The oldest of these, in Hebron, was massacred by the Arabs. This was a true massacre, in which the Arabs went from house to house murdering the innocent, the whole community was annihilated.
The British military administration in Palestine WAS staunchly anti-Zionist during this period, which is another reason that the massacre was allowed to take place. Most of the British soldiers in Palestine had a copy of 'The Protocols of the Wise Men of Zion', hence they were reading from the same manual as Hamas.
Again, you make claims without providing any sources. Show me how the British mandate of Palestine was anti-Zionist.
Regarding Hamas and the PLO, the fact that they have said they will talk to Israel if they withdraw to the green line means something only to the gullible. If you understand something about Islam, you will be aware of the doctrine taquiyya, deception for the sake of Jihad, Arafat was a master at this, he told the west that he just wanted a state in the west bank and Gaza and peace with Israel whilst all the time telling his own people that it was just a tactic in the war to destroy Israel. Before he died, all western leaders realised that Arafat had decieved them, they hope that Abbas will not do the same but they are not naive enough to believe Hamas. You shouldn't be either.
First of all, bringing up taqiyya - especially in your pathetic attempt to accurately define what it is - is just plain irrelevant. Other than the fact that you clearly have no actual knowledge of Islam, you should know that taqiyya is more common among Shiite Muslims, and most Sunnis condemn its use except for very extreme cases. Either way, it's completely irrelevant.
Your entire point in this quote is basically saying 'we shouldn't trust the Muslims' but giving no reason other than the lie that something in their religion preaches deceiving people (I'm guessing to kill every Jew on Earth)... really, it only hurts whatever credibility you may think you have.
Now, let's move back to reality, shall we:
David Ben-Gurion: I am unwilling to forego even one percent of Zionism for 'peace' (1925)
Moshe Dayan: Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab villages. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I do not blame you because geography books no longer exist, not only do the books not exist, the Arab villages are not there either. Nahlal arose in the place of Mahlul; Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibta; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of Huneifis; and Kefar Yehushu'a in the place of Tal al-Shuman. There is not one single place built in this country that did not have a former Arab population. (1969)
David Ben-Gurion: We must EXPEL ARABS and take their places .... and, if we have to use force-not to dispossess the Arabs of the Negev and Transjordan, but to guarantee our own right to settle in those places-then we have force at our disposal. (1937)
It is a FACT that the Zionist movement has been lying to and deceiving the world for years.
I'd also like to point out a hilarious contradiction in your post. You claim that:
"Dier Yassin was NOT a pre-meditated massacre."
however you then try to argue that Deir Yassin was a 'battle' and NOT a massacre...
so... which is it? in the above quote, you claim it was a massacre, just not 'pre-mediated'... but then you claim it wasn't a massacre, just a 'battle'...
..supporters of Israel contest that they fled due to instructions from the Arab leaders via radio broadcasts. It is likely that both of these factors contributed to the flight of the Palestinian Arabs, as did the [false] reports of a massacre at Deir Yassin
There is evidence that some of the Arab prisoners were killed in custody and this is wrong, but that does not make the whole thing a massacre.
Actually, all of the Arabs that survived the initial massacre were shot later that same day.
"Pro-Palestinian commentators hold that the flight of the Arabs was a result of ‘Israeli terror’ and ‘direct expulsion.’ Whilst supporters of Israel contest that they fled due to instructions from the Arab leaders via radio broadcasts. It is likely that both of these factors contributed to the flight of the Palestinian Arabs"
Actually the radio broadcasts never happened. This has been documented and even mainstream Jewish historians confirm that the report of Arab radio broadcasts was an Israeli hoax.
The BBC monitored all Middle Eastern broadcasts throughout 1948, and those records, and companion ones by a U.S. monitoring unit, could be seen at the British Museum. Dr. Childers decided to go through the lot. His conclusion was:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaming_the_Victims
"There was not a single order, or appeal, or suggestion about evacuation from Palestine from any Arab radio station, inside or outside Palestine, in 1948. There is repeated monitored record of Arab appeals, even flat orders, to the civilians of Palestine to stay put".
Comments
even better material. this is what I mean about you. anytime something gets posted that is against arabs you immediately dismiss it.
sure what do you want to discuss? Israel needs to stop expanding settlements and hamas needs to renounce violence and recognize Israel.
this comes down to the 1967 borders. there needs to be a compromise instead of hamas' charter to destroy Israel and Israels insistence to continue building in disputed land.
And another thing I don't appreciate - why do people always say that Hamas has to renounce violence, but never talk about Israel renouncing violence as well?
I didnt say hamas wouldnt talk to them, I said recognize them......you are absolutely right both should renounce violence. but Israel doesnt have a stated charter calling for the destruction of Palestine. secondly, the 1967 borders will probably never happen again. compromises need to be made on both sides for there to be peace. sadly, Hamas says peace will not happen unless those borders happen.
I'm not going to anally break down your every sentence here, but you are completely failing to see both sides. all this crap you typed sounds nice. I dont necessarily disagree with it. but you say Israel needs to step forward with peace..ok....so does hamas. and yes Israel has destroyed parts of palastine..but the fact remains that Hamas' stated goal is the destruction of Israel. you are just so blinded with rage and hate you think anyone who speaks of Israel in an unhateful way is automatically a huge supporter of them.
I love how even HAMAS admits that one of its goals is to destroy Israel, but there's people on here who think its crazy to argue such.
_outlaw: "No, you don't, remember? You're just misunderstood, a victim of oppression. Say it with with me now ..."
Leader of Hamas: "But, we hate the Zionists. We DO want to kill them, and who cares if they wear a uniform or not?"
_outlaw: "Nice try, you're doin' good ... Let's try again, K? You are NOT a terrorist. You're just reacting to the horrible, awful Zionist attacks on your way of life. You're a good guy ... If people in the West don't get you, that's because their racists and they love the dirty, dirty Je ... I mean, Zionists!"
Leader of Hamas: "But ... I don't feel that oppressed. My people are more economically well off than, say, the average Lebanese or Jordanian ... Really, I just want to get the damn Jews out of this desert."
_outlaw: "Hmmm ... We have work ahead of us, young Jedi."
You argue about the goal of Hamas, fine, I'll bite. The goal of Hamas is Israel's destruction in its current state. They do NOT want to push every Jew into the sea. They want the destruction of the occupation and oppression. You will probably respond with "you're wrong, you're blind" whatever, but answer this: IF Hamas wanted to push every Jew into the sea and bomb every Israeli alive, WHY would they say that once Israel moves back to the '67 borders, they'll talk to them??
any other insult by you is really you just trying to score some points and sidetracking the discussion.
It was a joke. Obviously no one things that's really you.
Seriously, though. I am no more ignorant than you are.
Maybe I should threaten to post a link everytime you make an ignorant comment ... What's the bandwith of this site again?
Anyhow ... We've done the dance, nothing changes. You'll believe want to want to believe about Hamas while dodging's peoples' questions, and the world will keep turning.
I was more referring to the comments we made about Hamas, but OK, that too.
And no, my goal is not to go on some sort of ignorance crusade. For the record, I've never thought you to be an idiot. But your statements about Hamas are misinformed. Their own charter (I think that's the term they use) contradicts your (seeming) view that Hamas is nothing but an innocent victim.
You guys' whole idea of 'recognition' of Israel is quite ambiguous, as well.
http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0311-26.htm
'First, the formal diplomatic language of "recognition" is traditionally used by one state with respect to another state. It is literally meaningless for a non-state to "recognize" a state. Moreover, in diplomacy, such recognition is supposed to be mutual. In order to earn its own recognition, Israel would have to simultaneously recognize the state of Palestine. This it steadfastly refuses to do (and for some reason, there are no high-minded newspaper editorials demanding that it do so).
Second, which Israel, precisely, are the Palestinians being asked to "recognize?" Israel has stubbornly refused to declare its own borders. So, territorially speaking, "Israel" is an open-ended concept. Are the Palestinians to recognize the Israel that ends at the lines proposed by the 1947 U.N. Partition Plan? Or the one that extends to the 1949 Armistice Line (the de facto border that resulted from the 1948 war)? Or does Israel include the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which it has occupied in violation of international law for 40 years — and which maps in its school textbooks show as part of "Israel"?
For that matter, why should the Palestinians recognize an Israel that refuses to accept international law, submit to U.N. resolutions or readmit the Palestinians wrongfully expelled from their homes in 1948 and barred from returning ever since?
If none of these questions are easy to answer, why are such demands being made of the Palestinians? And why is nothing demanded of Israel in turn?'
I literally dont have the time to respond to every point in your many walls of text and links, so I will have to make a few general points regarding where I think your misunderstandings lie. You said that you are interested in facts and history but you did not seem to know that mandatory Palestine included modern day Jordan. This is a vital fact as it shows that the Arabs of Palestine were VERY fairly treated. The mandate called for the ‘close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes.’ and was restricted to the area west of the Jordan when Jordan was given statehood, however this still included both the west bank and Gaza as the Jewish area of the mandate. This has never been revoked, certainly not by resolution 242. For a simple presentation of the maps over the various periods:
http://www.cfi-interactive.co.uk/flash/maps.html
The British mandate expired on May 15th 1948. The previous night Ben Gurion had read out the scroll of Independence, saying ‘By virtue of our National and intrinsic right…..and on the strength of the resolution of the United Nations General Assembly, we hereby declare the establishment of a Jewish State in Palestine, which shall be known as the State of Israel.’ The first Egyptian air raids began the same night, and as the last British troops left the next day, the armies of Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and Transjordan invaded. Azzam Pasha, Secretary General of the Arab League announced that: ‘This will be a war of extermination, and a momentous massacre’ Despite being vastly outnumbered in weapons and man-power, by the end of 1948 the Jews had succeeded in defending their new State. However King Abdullah’s Arab Legion had taken the Old City of Jerusalem and the territory now known as the West Bank, and the Egyptians had taken the Gaza strip, both of which were illegal occupations, not recognised by the UN.
Although many Arabs chose to remain in Jewish territory, and became Israeli citizens, approximately 656,000 Arabs fled into the areas occupied by Egypt and Jordan, as well as the Arab States. The reasons for this exodus are among the most hotly contested areas in Middle Eastern history. Pro-Palestinian commentators hold that the flight of the Arabs was a result of ‘Israeli terror’ and ‘direct expulsion.’ Whilst supporters of Israel contest that they fled due to instructions from the Arab leaders via radio broadcasts. It is likely that both of these factors contributed to the flight of the Palestinian Arabs, as did the [false] reports of a massacre at Deir Yassin, but it is difficult to prove which was the primary cause. Benny Morris, who is widely regarded as the leading authority on the refugees, concludes that ‘the Palestinian refugee problem was born of war, not by design.’ In addition, it must also be remembered that the war produced a similar number of Jewish refugees, who fled, or were forcibly expelled from the Islamic world, a total of 567,654 from 1948 to 1967.
For a visual presentation on the movement of refugees:
http://www.cfi-interactive.co.uk/cgibin/history.html
In seeking to paint a picture of Israel as the agressor, you ignore the unwillingness of the Arabs to make peace with Israel. Although the Egyptians signed peace accords with Israel in 1979 in exchange for the Sinai, the Arab States issued the ‘3 No’s of Khartoum’ (No recognition, No negotiation, No peace) in 1967, and most remain in a state of war with the Jewish State. Regarding the Barak-Arafat affair at camp david, virtually everyone who had anything to do with it places the blame entirely on Arafat for turning down Barak's offer. In fact, even the Saudi prince Bandar was furious with Arafat, calling his rejection a 'crime'. Israel was willing to make huge sacrifices to give the Palestinians a State but this cannot happen without both sides being willing. This is why resolution 242 calls on both sides, not Israeli unilateral withdrawal:
‘Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict.
Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force’
I do not need to quote the Hamas and PLO charters, we all know that both call for Israel's complete destruction. Your suggestion that they only refer to the west bank and Gaza is ridiculous. There will not be peace unless the Arabs give up there dream of destroying the hated 'Zionist Entity.
Lastly regarding my comments about the Jewish need to survive in the face of persecution. You said that this was not the case because the Zionist movement began before the holocaust. This clearly demonstrates your complete lack of knowledge of Jewish history. The holocaust was the climax of a long history of pogroms, ghettoiation, and massacres. The first major movement of jews to Israel was in 1881 as a direct response to persecution, the Zionist movement itself was born of the need to survive in the face of widespread unrelenting antisemitism.
Peace.
http://www.danielpipes.org/article/298
'The Jordan-is-Palestine argument rests on four main premises: that Palestine historically included Jordan; that the British-governed Mandate of Palestine included the entire territory of today's Israel and Jordan; that the two regions are geographically indistinguishable; and that Palestinian and Jordanian leaders themselves believe Jordan and Palestine identical. The trouble is, neither the historical record nor the map unambiguously supports any of these propositions. Rather, they are based on a selective knowledge of history and geography, a narrow and eccentric reading of the British Mandate, and a distortion of inter-Arab political dynamics...
the historical record shows that the Palestine did not always include the east bank, and that the Jordan River has often served as a military and political division. The history of the area, ancient, medieval, and modern, does not entitle one to assert, as do advocates of Jordan-is-Palestine, that "the Balfour Declaration of 1917 was understood as British recognition of a Jewish National Homeland in all of historic Palestine"-meaning today's Jordan and Israel. The territory promised by the Balfour Declaration can justifiably be interpreted as ending at the Jordan River or as extending further.' hahahaha, you think the 'Christian Friends of Israel' is a credible source?!
'The truth is that by May 1948 Zionist forces had already invaded and occupied large parts of the land which had been allocated to the Palestinians by the UN Partition Plan.
..it is not true that the Arabs "invaded Israel" in 1948. First, Israel did not exist at the time of the alleged invasion as an established state with recognised bounderies. When the Zionist leaders established Israel on 15 May 1948 they purposely declined to declare the bounderies of the new state in order to allow for future expansion.
Secondly, the only territory to which the new state of Israel had even a remote claim was that alloted to the Jewish state by the UN Partition Plan. But the Zionists had already attacked areas that were alloted to the Palestinian Arab state.
Thirdly, those areas which the Arab states purportedly "invaded" were, in fact, exclusively areas alloted to the Palestinian Arab state proposed by the UN Partition Plan. The so-called Arab invasion was a defensive attempt to hold on to the areas alloted by the Partition Plan for the Palestinian state.
Finally, the commander of Jordan's Arab Legion, was under orders not to enter the areas alloted to the Jewish state (Sir John Bagot Glubb, "The Battle for Jerusalem", Middle East International, May 1973).'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Arab-Israeli_War
'..on 15 May 1948, the Arab states publicly proclaimed their aim of creating a "United State of Palestine" in place of the Jewish and Arab, two-state, UN Plan. They claimed the latter was invalid, as it was opposed by Palestine's Arab majority, and maintained that the absence of legal authority made it necessary to intervene to protect Arab lives and property...
By July 1948, the IDF was fielding 63,000 troops; by early spring 1949, 115,000. The Arab armies had an estimated 40,000 troops in July 1948, rising to 55,000 in October 1948, and slightly more by the spring of 1949.'
First of all, it was over 656,000 Arab refugees. In fact, many leaders have estimated it to be closer to 1 million.
Next, the radio broadcast myth has been exposed as just that, a myth. Even mainstream Israeli historians now admit that ethnic cleansing took place in 1948. As for the massacre at Deir Yassin being false, can you provide ANY evidence whatsoever? There were MANY massacres in 1948, such as Tantura. Well over 400 villages were destroyed, FORCING the Palestinians to be expelled. These are all documented facts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre
Benny Morris: 'Combatants and noncombatants were gunned down in the course of the house-to-house fighting, and, subsequently, after the battle, groups of prisoners and noncombatants were killed in separate, sporadic acts of frenzy and revenge in different parts of the village and outside of Deir Yassin. The remaining villagers were then expelled...'
Eliahu Arbel arrived at the scene April 10. He was an Operations Officer B of the Haganah's Etzioni Brigade. He reported:-
"I saw the horrors that the fighters had created. I saw bodies of women and children, who were murdered in their houses in cold blood by gunfire, with no signs of battle and not as the result of blowing up the houses. From my experience I know well, that there is no war without killing, and that not only combatants get killed. I have seen a great deal of war, but I never saw a sight like Deir Yassin."
'Ben Zion-Cohen (an Irgun commander) reported to the Jabotinsky archives that at some point in Deir Yassin:-
"We eliminated every Arab that came our way."
Mordechai Gihon was a Haganah intelligence officer in Jerusalem. He was in the village at the afternoon of April 9. He reported:-
"Before we got to the village we saw people carrying bodies to the quarry east of Deir Yassin. We entered the village around 3:00 in the afternoon . . . In the village there were tens of bodies. The dissidents got them out of the roads. I told them not to throw the bodies into cisterns and caves, because that was the first place that would be checked..."
"I didn't count the dead. I estimated that there were four pits full of bodies, and in each pit there were 20 bodies, and several tens more in the quarry. I throw out a number, 150.'
1948 ethnic cleansing and Deir Yassin:
http://www.mideastweb.org/pland.htm
'The main Jewish underground army in Palestine (Hagannah) had begun working on a contingency plan for defending a Jewish state from invasion even before the partition plan was approved in November 1947.
Plan Daleth (Plan D):
'..Mounting operations against enemy population centers located inside or near our defensive system in order to prevent them from being used as bases by an active armed force. These operations can be divided into the following categories:
Destruction of villages (setting fire to, blowing up, and planting mines in the debris), especially those population centers which are difficult to control continuously.
Mounting search and control operations according to the following guidelines: encirclement of the village and conducting a search inside it. In the event of resistance, the. armed force must be destroyed and the population must be expelled outside the borders of the state...'
http://www.counterpunch.org/martin05132004.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre
'Denial by Israeli Foreign Ministry in 1969
In 1969, the Israeli Foreign Ministry published a pamphlet “Background Notes on Current Themes: Deir Yassin” in English denying that there had been a massacre at Deir Yassin, and calling the story "part of a package of fairy tales, for export and home consumption". The pamphlet led to a series of derivative articles giving the same message, especially in America. Menachem Begin's Herut party disseminated a Hebrew translation in Israel, causing a widespread but largely non-public debate within the Israeli establishment. Several former leaders of the Hagannah demanded that the pamphlet be withdrawn on account of its inaccuracy, but the Foreign Ministry explained that "While our intention and desire is to maintain accuracy in our information, we sometimes are forced to deviate from this principle when we have no choice or alternative means to rebuff a propaganda assault or Arab psychological warfare." Yitzhak Levi, the 1948 leader of Hagannah Intelligence, wrote to Begin: "On behalf of the truth and the purity of arms of the Jewish soldier in the War of Independence, I see it as my duty to warn you against continuing to spread this untrue version about what happened in Deir Yassin to the Israeli public. Otherwise there will be no avoiding raising the matter publicly and you will be responsible." Eventually, the Foreign Ministry agreed to stop distributing the pamphlet, but it remains the source of many popular accounts.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_exodus_from_Arab_lands
'The concept that Jewish emigrants from Arab lands should be considered refugees has been met with opposition from both Zionist and Non-Zionist circles. Zionist opposition, coming mainly from Israeli Zionist politicians of the Mizrachi Jewish community, contends that it is Zionist ideals that were the driving force behind their emigration to Israel. Anti-Zionist opposition contends that the majority of Arab Jews were not Zionists, but were rather forced to leave by direct and indirect actions of Zionist emissaries.
From the Zionist perspective, for instance, Iraqi-born Ran Cohen, a member of the Knesset (Parliament), said: "I have this to say: I am not a refugee. I came at the behest of Zionism, due to the pull that this land exerts, and due to the idea of redemption. Nobody is going to define me as a refugee;" Yemeni-born Yisrael Yeshayahu, former Knesset speaker, Labor Party, stated: "We are not refugees. [Some of us] came to this country before the state was born. We had messianic aspirations;" and Iraqi-born Shlomo Hillel, also a former speaker of the Knesset, Labor Party, claimed: "I don't regard the departure of Jews from Arab lands as that of refugees. They came here because they wanted to, as Zionists."[77]
On the Anti-Zionist perspective, Iraqi-Born activist Naeim Giladi alleges that Zionist emissaries used violence to engineer the exodus and disrupt coexistence in Iraq. Further support for this claim has been made by Professors Yehouda Shenhav[77] and Ella Shohat.
The type and extent of linkage between the Jewish exodus from Arab lands and the Palestinian Exodus has also been the source of controversy. Advocacy groups have suggested that there are strong ties between the two processes and some of them even claim that decoupling the two issues is unjust.[78][79] Other scholars such as Phillip mendes and David Cesarani reject the comparison and coupling as superficial and is used as an excuse to withhold justice from Palestinians.[80][6]' Funny that it took the Arab states 20 years of terrorizing by the Israelis to finally release these '3 No's of Khatoum'. You seem content to leave out all that happened between 1948-1967. You fail to mention what's happened since 1967, such as the Israeli occupation of Lebanon, MANY massacres that took place - some in REFUGEE CAMPS. It's quite ridiculous because you have been trying to paint a picture of Israel being the defendant, and the Arab states being the aggressors. Unfortunately for you, however, you've provided no evidence. Just baseless claims.
Trying to victimize the Jewish people to justify the terrible oppression, the occupation, the human rights violations, etc of Israel is simply ridiculous. Not that the Jewish people have not gone through the same things, but you'd think they'd be more sympathetic; not wanting to do the same thing to another people.
Your attempt to wriggle out of the FACT that Jordan is the Arab Palestinian State that the Palestinians have ALREADY been given is rather weak. You laugh at my map link because it was from a christian website, hmmm. Ok find me a map of mandatory Palestine that does not include Jordan. Here is another site, but I expect you will find a reason not to believe it since it contradicts your 'Israel the great oppressor' belief.
http://palestinefacts.org/pf_maps.php
I see you are willing to drop your rather dubious sources and quote Benny Morris when it suits you. If you are willing to accept him as a reliable source, why not accept his reports on Dier Yassin. Your friend Noam Chomsky claims that ‘250 defenceless people were slaughtered’ , whilst Morris affirms that the Jews encountered stiff resistance at Deir Yassin, in which five Jews were killed and more than thirty were wounded. Morris concludes that the Arab death toll was exaggerated, and puts the number of casualties, including combatants at 100-110. Furthermore, as I said before, Morris concludes that the Palestinian refugee problem was 'born of war, not by design', which you have ignored.
Regarding the PLO charter; if I really need to spell it out for you: here is a link to the charter that highlights the articles that explicitly call for Israel’s destruction:
http://palestinefacts.org/pf_1991to_now_plo_charter_revise.php
Regarding Hamas, here is a link that shows that their charter calls for the ‘obliteration’ of Israel. It also shows that Hamas fervently believes in the authenticity of the anti-semitic document ‘the protocols of the wise men of Zion’, hence, as was also true of Hitler, Hamas sees the destruction of all Jews as vital for the future of humanity.
http://www.mideastweb.org/hamas.htm
The tone and inaccuracy of your posts about Israel point to your having been heavily influenced by either Noam Chomsky or Edward Said. I suggest that you also read the other side of the story, such as ‘The case for Israel’ by Alan Dershowitz before perpetuating Chomsky’s misleading and often inaccurate accusations. Reading Benny Morris’s books is also vital for a balanced view, not just utilizing Chomsky’s highly selective Morris quotes. An unbiased investigation of History reveals that their has never been, as Chomsky claims, an ‘independent Palestinian Nation’, rather records show that prior to the arrival of the Jewish pioneers, the Arab residents saw themselves as inhabitants of ‘southern Syria’, as the Arab Higher Committee stated at the UN in 1947: ‘Palestine was part of the Province of Syria…politically, the Arabs of Palestine were not independent in the sense of forming a separate political identity.’
It also must be remembered that most of the Arab residents present in 1948 were as new to the land as the Jews. In fact many went to Palestine to work for the Jewish pioneers. The anti-Zionist British administration also turned a blind eye to illegal Arab immigration in order to undermine the Zionist project. This led Churchill to comment in 1939 that:
‘Far from being persecuted, the Arabs have crowded into the country and multiplied until their population has increased more than even all world Jewry could lift up the Jewish population.’
The truth is that, prior to Zionism, Palestine was largely empty. In 1857 the British Consul reported that “The country is, in a considerable degree, empty of Inhabitants and therefore its greatest need is a body of population”. 10 years later Mark Twain visited the land and commented: ‘It is a hopeless, dreary, heart-broken land … Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes…Renowned Jerusalem itself, the stateliest name in history, has lost all its ancient grandeur, and is become a pauper village’. However there were small ancient communities of both Jews and Arabs, like the oldest Jewish community in the world at Hebron, which was annihilated by the Arabs in 1947, and the Yemenite Jewish community in East Jerusalem that the Arabs destroyed in 1948. the difference is that the Jews have a historical claim to Statehood due to two past commonwealths, whilst the Arabs have no such history in the land and had no nationalist movement until AFTER Zionism. Despite this the Arabs were given 73% of Palestine as an Arab Palestinian homeland called Jordan. Peace.
Peace.
From their own website: Why the obsession with the British mandated Palestine? You're simply trying to convince people that Palestine and Jordan are the same. You simply want to try and justify the Palestinians dispossession with this blatant lie.
Here's a map showing Palestine in 1946.
http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Maps/Story583.html
And another one showing the area in May 1948...
http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Maps/Story565.html Why don't you accept his reports on Deir Yassin?
Previously you claimed: Seems you don't mind contradicting yourself. All mainstream historians now admit there was deliberate ethnic cleansing in 1948. Why can't you also admit it?
Norman Finkelstein: 'Shlomo Ben-Ami..former Israeli foreign minister..[and] a respected historian...provides this capsule summary of the "reality on the ground" during the 1948 war: :an Arab community in a state of terror facing a ruthless Israeli army whose path to victory was paved not only by it's exploits against the regular Arab armies, but also by the intimidation, and at times atrocities and massacres, it perpetrated against the civilian Arab community." Sifting the evidence, he concludes that in fact Israel premeditatedly expelled Palestinians in accordance with the Zionist "philosophy of transfer", which "had a long pedigree in Zionist thought," framed Zionist leader David be Gurion's strategic-ideological" vision, and it provided a legitimate environment for commanders in the field actively to encourage the eviction of the local population."
To put it simply, you thought Benny Morris was a reliable source, so I used his own quotes to contradict what you claimed to be true. However, it is no secret that he has an incredible bias towards Israel:
Benny Morris:
"In Acre four soldiers raped a girl and murdered her and her father. In Jaffa, soldiers of the Kiryati Brigade raped one girl and tried to rape several more. At Hunin, which is in the Galilee, two girls were raped and then murdered. There were one or two cases of rape at Tantura, south of Haifa. There was one case of rape at Qula, in the center of the country...In a large proportion of the cases the event ended with murder. Because neither the victims nor the rapists liked to report these events, we have to assume that the dozen cases of rape that were reported, which I found, are not the whole story. They are just the tip of the iceberg."
According to your findings, how many acts of Israeli massacre were perpetrated in 1948?
"Twenty-four. In some cases four or five people were executed, in others the numbers were 70, 80, 100...
..The worst cases were Saliha (70-80 killed), Deir Yassin (100-110), Lod (250), Dawayima (hundreds) and perhaps Abu Shusha (70). There is no unequivocal proof of a large-scale massacre at Tantura, but war crimes were perpetrated there. At Jaffa there was a massacre about which nothing had been known until now. The same at Arab al Muwassi, in the north. About half of the acts of massacre were part of Operation Hiram [in the north, in October 1948]: at Safsaf, Saliha, Jish, Eilaboun, Arab al Muwasi, Deir al Asad, Majdal Krum, Sasa. In Operation Hiram there was a unusually high concentration of executions of people against a wall or next to a well in an orderly fashion.
"That can't be chance. It's a pattern. Apparently, various officers who took part in the operation understood that the expulsion order they received permitted them to do these deeds in order to encourage the population to take to the roads. The fact is that no one was punished for these acts of murder. Ben-Gurion silenced the matter. He covered up for the officers who did the massacres...
...Ben-Gurion was right. If he had not done what he did, a state would not have come into being. That has to be clear. It is impossible to evade it. Without the uprooting of the Palestinians, a Jewish state would not have arisen here." oh, really?
Benny Morris:
"There is no justification for acts of rape. There is no justification for acts of massacre. Those are war crimes. But in certain conditions, expulsion is not a war crime. I don't think that the expulsions of 1948 were war crimes. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. You have to dirty your hands."
Interviewer: We are talking about the killing of thousands of people, the destruction of an entire society.
"A society that aims to kill you forces you to destroy it. When the choice is between destroying or being destroyed, it's better to destroy."
Interviewer: There is something chilling about the quiet way in which you say that.
"If you expected me to burst into tears, I'm sorry to disappoint you. I will not do that...
..There are circumstances in history that justify ethnic cleansing. I know that this term is completely negative in the discourse of the 21st century, but when the choice is between ethnic cleansing and genocide - the annihilation of your people - I prefer ethnic cleansing."
I do not identify with Ben-Gurion. I think he made a serious historical mistake in 1948. Even though he understood the demographic issue and the need to establish a Jewish state without a large Arab minority, he got cold feet during the war. In the end, he faltered."
I'm not sure I understand. Are you saying that Ben-Gurion erred in expelling too few Arabs?
"If he was already engaged in expulsion, maybe he should have done a complete job. I know that this stuns the Arabs and the liberals and the politically correct types. But my feeling is that this place would be quieter and know less suffering if the matter had been resolved once and for all. If Ben-Gurion had carried out a large expulsion and cleansed the whole country - the whole Land of Israel, as far as the Jordan River. It may yet turn out that this was his fatal mistake. If he had carried out a full expulsion - rather than a partial one - he would have stabilized the State of Israel for generations."
Interviewer: A large part of the responsibility for the hatred of the Palestinians rests with us. After all, you yourself showed us that the Palestinians experienced a historical catastrophe.
"True. But when one has to deal with a serial killer, it's not so important to discover why he became a serial killer. What's important is to imprison the murderer or to execute him."
Interviewer: Explain the image: Who is the serial killer in the analogy?
"The barbarians who want to take our lives. The people the Palestinian society sends to carry out the terrorist attacks, and in some way the Palestinian society itself as well. At the moment, that society is in the state of being a serial killer. It is a very sick society. It should be treated the way we treat individuals who are serial killers."
Interviewer: What does that mean? What should we do tomorrow morning?
"We have to try to heal the Palestinians. Maybe over the years the establishment of a Palestinian state will help in the healing process. But in the meantime, until the medicine is found, they have to be contained so that they will not succeed in murdering us."
Interviewer: To fence them in? To place them under closure?
"Something like a cage has to be built for them. I know that sounds terrible. It is really cruel. But there is no choice. There is a wild animal there that has to be locked up in one way or another." more bullshit. why don't you answer my question? I've asked it many times: If Hamas is so bent on pushing every Jew into the sea, THEN WHY HAVE THEY SAID ONCE ISRAEL WITHDRAWS TO THE '67 BORDERS, THEY'LL BEGIN TALKING?? do I have to put it in bold? do I have to make the font a little bigger? why is Hamas calling for the SAME thing the international community is calling for - to end the occupation of oppression of Palestine - while Israel ignores all of this? WHAT?! Did you just honestly and sincerely compare scholars like Noam Chomsky and Edward Said to the likes of Alan Dershowitz????
This comment sums you up perfectly. Alan Dershowitz's 'The Case For Israel' has been successfully exposed as nothing but plagiarism and a fraud in Norman Finkelstein's book 'Beyond Chutzpah'. I suggest you read it. ah yes, as you can see above, Benny Morris clearly has a BALANCED view... Another lie. I can see that you've read Dershowitz's book and base all of your lies on that. It's interesting that these lies concerning Palestine being virtually uninhabited until the arrival of the Jews were plagiarized by Dershowitz from another exposed fraud: Joan Peter's 'From Time Immemorial'. anti-Zionist British administration? are you fucking kidding me? The British are the ones who forced the Arabs to accept Jewish and Zionist mass immigration against their will. Just because the British (although late) saw what was coming out of it and was trying to slow the process down means absolutely nothing. and you're trying to talk about illegal ARAB immigration?! what about illegal JEWISH immigration?? you're naive if that's what you think... I mean, seriously... no one even tries to argue the fact that the Arabs have a strong historical presence in Palestine. '...the historical record shows that the Palestine did not always include the east bank, and that the Jordan River has often served as a military and political division. The history of the area, ancient, medieval, and modern, does not entitle one to assert, as do advocates of Jordan-is-Palestine, that "the Balfour Declaration of 1917 was understood as British recognition of a Jewish National Homeland in all of historic Palestine"-meaning today's Jordan and Israel. The territory promised by the Balfour Declaration can justifiably be interpreted as ending at the Jordan River or as extending further.
A few months of rule that was neither de facto nor de jure is hardly reason, seventy years later, to call Jordan a part of Palestine. Besides, it is preposterous to base today's major decisions of war and peace on the transient interests of the British Empire after World War I. That Jordan was briefly part of the Palestine Mandate does not establish a vital link; it merely recalls a historical curiosity. As L. Dean Brown observes, "Jordan is Palestine only in the sense that Nebraska, which was part of the Louisiana Purchase, is still Louisiana.
The purpose of this change in nomenclature is to undercut any Arab claim to sovereignty over territory Israel now holds. It also makes the Palestinians look greedy; they already have a whole loaf and they want another. It implies that while Palestinians should leave Israel alone, they should feel free to make changes in the Hashemite Kingdom. It also suggests that, because Israel has at least as valid a claim to the east bank as the Palestinians do to the west, the granting of the eastern part of Palestine to Arabs represents a form of Zionist generosity. Finally, it implies that the Israelis may be justified in expelling Arabs to Jordan, their true Palestinian patrimony. In this way, the kindred notions of Jordan-is-Palestine and Greater Israel join the demographic and political issues facing Israel today to create the political agenda of the Israeli right.
The Jordan-is-Palestine idea is not only historically wrong, legally superficial, geographically ignorant, and politically procrustean, but its implementation would be extremely dangerous.' why do you end every post with the word 'peace', when clearly you have no such good intentions? You support Israeli crimes and Israeli expansionism. What does this have to do with 'Peace'?
http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/3041
Ilan Pappe - 'The ethnic cleansing of Palestine':
'...in 1948, the Zionist movement waged a war against the Palestinain people in order to implement its long term plans of ethnic cleansing (whereas Israeli historians, including 'new historians', claimed that the war was waged by the Arab world against the state of Israel in order to eliminate it and it resulted in expulsions of Palestinians). The Arab world tried to prevent this cleansing, but was too fragmented, self-centered and ineffective to stop the uprooting of half of Palestine's native population, the destruction of half of its villages and towns and the killing of thousands of its people.
And since that ethnic cleansing was successfully implemented in almost 80% of Palestine without any global or regional repercussions - the ethnic cleansing policy continues ever since 1967 in the remaining 20% of the country. Creating a Jewish state in historical Palestine cleansed of Palestinians is still the ideolgoical infrastructure on which the state of Israel is based. How to achieve this goal is a divisive issue between Left Zionists - hoping to negotiate a settlement that would leave a small number of Palestinains in a greater Israel and the Right Zionsts willing to implement a more direct cleasning policy from the same area even today.
The book uses the accepted scholarly definition of Ethnic Cleansing to show its academic as well legal applicability to the case of Palestine and argues that since in the eyes of the world - including the State Department and the UN - ethnic cleansing is a crime against humanity, this how we should view the Israeli actions in the past and Israel's policies in the present.
..The book is based on three major sources. First it uses new material from the Israeli military archives that was released in the late 1990s. Secondly, it is based on a re-reading of the older archival material through the prism of the ethnic cleansing paradigm. Thirdly, it uses extensively the Palestinian oral history archives.'
I say 'peace' because I believe in peace but equally in truth. Many are willing to give up on truth for the sake of peace but I believe that true peace can only be gained through upholding truth.
The FACT that Jordan is Palestine is a vital truth, not so that Arabs can be driven out of Israel, but so that the lie that the Jews were not willing to share Palestine can be exposed. You clearly are still unwilling to accept this fact of history and showing me a map of Palestine AFTER Jordan was carved out of Palestine illustrates this. When Britain recieved the mandate in 1920, it included Jordan, this is a fact. Winston Churchill decided to split Palestine in 1922 and the Arabs were given all the territory east of the Jordan as the Arab State of Trans-Jordan in 1923. You know this is true so stop trying to dodge it.
Regarding Dier Yassin. You are incorrect, I do accept Benny Morris's description of the horrors and injustices there. Many Arab civilians there were shot by the Jews. However, although some of the Jewish fighters lost control, Dier Yassin was NOT a pre-meditated massacre. In the build up to the war, the Arabs began ambushing supply convoys en route to Jerusalem and attempted to cut off the highway between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. On the 6th of April the Irgun launched Operation Nachshon to re-open the road and occupy the overlooking Arab villages. Deir Yassin was one such village. There is evidence that some of the Arab prisoners were killed in custody and this is wrong, but that does not make the whole thing a massacre. Your 'great scholar' Noam Chomsky is simply wrong when he says that '250 defencless people were slaughtered', there was a battle at Dier Yassin and only 100-110 Arabs were killed (as you have now admitted) and this INCLUDED combatants.
Regarding the land being empty before Zionism. Look, if you view everything through the prism of Edwards Said's 'Orientalism' then the whole enterprise of History is false since, as Said says in 'Orientalism':‘It is therefore correct that every European, in what he could say about the Orient, was consequentially a racist, an imperialist, and almost totally ethnocentric.’ However Said's thesis is WRONG, it was only accepted in the first place place because it fed the west's post-colonial guilt. The falsehood of Said's thesis is shown by Ibn Warraq's observation that although German Orientalists were ‘the greatest of all scholars of the orient’ they had no empire, a fact that may explain why Said restricts his study to France and England. Furthermore, Said’s analysis seems only to define Muslims as Orientals, at the expense of non-Muslims:
‘For Said, the non-Muslims, and even non-Arabs hardly exist, are occasionally mentioned, are never discussed or acknowledged as Orientals with a history and presence: there are no Copts, no Maronites, no Mandaeans, no Samaritans, no Assyrians, no Greek Orthodox Christians, No Chaldeans, no Berbers, and of course no Jews’
You completely ignore the fact that numerous Jewish communities existed in Palestine at the turn of the century that had existed there for many centuries. The oldest of these, in Hebron, was massacred by the Arabs. This was a true massacre, in which the Arabs went from house to house murdering the innocent, the whole community was annihilated. This was carried out at the orders of the grand mufti of Jerusalem, who was a close ally of Hitler during WW2. The British military administration in Palestine WAS staunchly anti-Zionist during this period, which is another reason that the massacre was allowed to take place. Most of the British soldiers in Palestine had a copy of 'The Protocols of the Wise Men of Zion', hence they were reading from the same manual as Hamas.
Regarding Hamas and the PLO, the fact that they have said they will talk to Israel if they withdraw to the green line means something only to the gullible. If you understand something about Islam, you will be aware of the doctrine taquiyya, deception for the sake of Jihad, Arafat was a master at this, he told the west that he just wanted a state in the west bank and Gaza and peace with Israel whilst all the time telling his own people that it was just a tactic in the war to destroy Israel. Before he died, all western leaders realised that Arafat had decieved them, they hope that Abbas will not do the same but they are not naive enough to believe Hamas. You shouldn't be either.
Peace.
However, you still ignore all the quotes and sources that have been provided that explain why Jordan is NOT Palestine- you, however, choose to ignore it, providing no sources. http://www.deiryassin.org/mas.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plan_Dalet
'In his book 'The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine' [Ilan Pappe] quotes Ben Gurion writing the commanders of the Haganah Brigades on 11 May 1948 that 'the cleansing of Palestine remains the prime objective of Plan Dalet'.
Benny Morris:
'[Plan Dalet] constituted a strategic-doctrinal and carte blanche for expulsions [from villages that resisted or might threaten the Yishuv] by front, brigade, district and battalion commanders (who in each case argued military necessity) and it gave commanders, post facto, formal, persuasive cover for their actions.'
Plan Dalet (Plan D)
http://electronicintifada.net/bytopic/historicaldocuments/31.shtml
'Launching pre-planned counter-attacks on enemy bases and supply lines in the heart of his territory. whether within the borders of the country [Palestine] or in neighboring countries...
Preventing the enemy from using frontline positions within his territory which can easily be used for launching attacks. This will be effected by occupying and controlling them.
Mounting operations against enemy population centers located inside or near our defensive system in order to prevent them from being used as bases by an active armed force. These operations can be divided into the following categories:
Destruction of villages (setting fire to, blowing up, and planting mines in the debris), especially those population centers which are difficult to control continuously.
Mounting search and control operations according to the following guidelines: encirclement of the village and conducting a search inside it. In the event of resistance, the. armed force must be destroyed and the population must be expelled outside the borders of the state...' It cannot be argued that Deir Yassin was not a massacre. It was. All the credible historians agree, and you trying to prove otherwise only hurts whatever the hell it is you're actually trying to show here. yes, it was reported in the New York Times that 250 were killed. You fail the mention that half the people killed were women and children. You fail to mention the orphans left after the Zionist gangs killed and drove out all 750 people from the village. You fail to mention any of these, and your pathetic attempt to label the Deir Yassin massacre as a 'battle' is ridiculous. And I, for one, think it's incredibly despicable to write something like 'only 100-110 Arabs were killed'.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/arabs-and-jews-unite-to-commemorate-massacre-687405.html
'The facts of the slaughter were never denied at the time. The Arab village of Deir Yassin was attacked by Jewish commandos of the Stern Gang and Irgun, then led by Menachem Begin, on 9 April 1948; after its capture, they murdered more than 100 - perhaps as many as 254 - men, women and children. Some women were butchered with knives, others were shot with their children.
Official Zionist leaders of the Haganah denounced the killings. Several victims lived an hour longer than their families as they were taken by truck through the streets of Jeru-salem, then returned to the quarry outside Deir Yassin where they were killed and their bodies burnt by Jewish gang members.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre
'Deir Yassin was different from the village of al-Qastal that had recently been attacked by the Haganah, in that it did not participate directly in the conflict. The villagers reportedly wanted to remain neutral in the war and they had repeatedly resisted help and alliances with the Palestinian irregulars. Instead they had made a pact with Haganah to not help the irregulars as long as they were not the target of military operations.[11]
The inhabitants had even remained cooperative while the Haganah took the strategic Sharafa ridge between Deir Yassin and the nearby ALA base Ein Karem. Haganah intelligence confirmed after the village had been captured that it in fact had stayed "faithful allies of the western Jerusalem sector".[12]
Yoma Ben-Sasson, Haganah commander in Givat Shaul, later recalled that "there was not even one incident between Deir Yassin and the Jews".'
Honestly, I highly suggest you stop arguing the massacre of Deir Yassin. It's not open for discussion on whether or not it was a massacre. Congratulations on having read 'Orientalism'... actually, you may not have even read it, just looked up criticisms of it online to support your crazy theology. Also, do you mind providing a link to the where you are getting your quotes from? I have never had the opportunity to read Said's 'Orientalism', however, either way, I fail to see the relevance in this. This is completely irrelevant. Before the Zionist movement began, Arabs (both Muslim and Christian) and Jews had lived in peace in the region for hundreds of years. I'd like to refer you to a more recent, relevant massacre in Hebron...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/685792.stm Again, you make claims without providing any sources. Show me how the British mandate of Palestine was anti-Zionist.
First of all, bringing up taqiyya - especially in your pathetic attempt to accurately define what it is - is just plain irrelevant. Other than the fact that you clearly have no actual knowledge of Islam, you should know that taqiyya is more common among Shiite Muslims, and most Sunnis condemn its use except for very extreme cases. Either way, it's completely irrelevant.
Your entire point in this quote is basically saying 'we shouldn't trust the Muslims' but giving no reason other than the lie that something in their religion preaches deceiving people (I'm guessing to kill every Jew on Earth)... really, it only hurts whatever credibility you may think you have.
Now, let's move back to reality, shall we:
David Ben-Gurion: I am unwilling to forego even one percent of Zionism for 'peace' (1925)
Moshe Dayan: Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab villages. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I do not blame you because geography books no longer exist, not only do the books not exist, the Arab villages are not there either. Nahlal arose in the place of Mahlul; Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibta; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of Huneifis; and Kefar Yehushu'a in the place of Tal al-Shuman. There is not one single place built in this country that did not have a former Arab population. (1969)
David Ben-Gurion: We must EXPEL ARABS and take their places .... and, if we have to use force-not to dispossess the Arabs of the Negev and Transjordan, but to guarantee our own right to settle in those places-then we have force at our disposal. (1937)
It is a FACT that the Zionist movement has been lying to and deceiving the world for years.
"Dier Yassin was NOT a pre-meditated massacre."
however you then try to argue that Deir Yassin was a 'battle' and NOT a massacre...
so... which is it? in the above quote, you claim it was a massacre, just not 'pre-mediated'... but then you claim it wasn't a massacre, just a 'battle'...
Actually, all of the Arabs that survived the initial massacre were shot later that same day.
"Pro-Palestinian commentators hold that the flight of the Arabs was a result of ‘Israeli terror’ and ‘direct expulsion.’ Whilst supporters of Israel contest that they fled due to instructions from the Arab leaders via radio broadcasts. It is likely that both of these factors contributed to the flight of the Palestinian Arabs"
Actually the radio broadcasts never happened. This has been documented and even mainstream Jewish historians confirm that the report of Arab radio broadcasts was an Israeli hoax.
The BBC monitored all Middle Eastern broadcasts throughout 1948, and those records, and companion ones by a U.S. monitoring unit, could be seen at the British Museum. Dr. Childers decided to go through the lot. His conclusion was:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaming_the_Victims
"There was not a single order, or appeal, or suggestion about evacuation from Palestine from any Arab radio station, inside or outside Palestine, in 1948. There is repeated monitored record of Arab appeals, even flat orders, to the civilians of Palestine to stay put".