To be honest, I'm really not in the mood. I'm getting pretty sick of arguing about what the Jews did to the Arabs, and what the Arabs have done to the Jews.
So you're 'not in the mood' to address the points I raised that relate to this thread you created? O.k.
why don't you answer my question in the Israeli thread please and try and do it without resorting to personal attacks or calling me anti semitic or anti american cos that's just lazy... besides I'm neither... it's just a simple question. Gimme a simple answer that makes sense and I'll leave it alone
Why don't address the points or admit you are wrong.
Keep on rockin in the free world!!!!
The economy has polarized to the point where the wealthiest 10% now own 85% of the nation’s wealth. Never before have the bottom 90% been so highly indebted, so dependent on the wealthy.
So since when does aljazeera have an unbiased opinion on this topic?
Show me some unbiased accounts of what started the 6 day war that supports their claim. There are many links to support what I posted.
In the link I provided Al Jazeera used direct quotes from Israeli politicians and Generals. Those quotes aren't biased one way or another. They're quotes from those who were directly involved in the outbreak of the 6 day war.
Anyway, again this is all pretty irrelevant. Can you explain why you support the illegal Israeli occupation and Zionist race war against the Palestinians?
I'm not wrong. Trying to debate someone who uses Al Jazeera as a source, says it all.
Hmm, i think you will find all kinds of different sources are used.
Keep on rockin in the free world!!!!
The economy has polarized to the point where the wealthiest 10% now own 85% of the nation’s wealth. Never before have the bottom 90% been so highly indebted, so dependent on the wealthy.
Who said I was trying to defend that? I've said both sides are right and wrong. It's just not one sided.
Both sides can trace their ancestry to the Middle East going back thousands of years so yes they both have the right to be there. I understand that the Palestinians were and are still upset that land was taken from them post WWII by the UN to put displaced European Jews. However the Jews needed a safe place and since their ancestry can be traced to the Middle East, especially Jerusalum is does make some sense. However it would have been better if they could have stayed in Europe.
I believe Israel had to take any threats seriously during the time that lead to the 6 day war because basically they feared about what happened in Europe during WWII. In hindsight it may seem unclear but for them back then it wasn't. Just as the Palestinians are desperate today to the point they feel they must use violence that is how the Israelis felt back then and unfortunately today because the violence has never ended. The continued overwhelming violence, force and control the Israelis are using on the Palestinians today are unjust and continues to harm the peace process. However the Palestinian violent retaliations also continue to harm the peace process.
The violence needs to stop on both sides in order for them to have peace. Israel needs to make a huge concession giving the Palestinians a good portion of their land back, which Israel must stay out of permanently. However the Palestinians and Arabs have to accept the fact they will not get all of their land back post WWII.
"...believe in lies...to get by...it's divine...whoa...oh, you know what its like..."
"The old lie that Palestine was dry desert waiting for a people is just that–a lie. This clip for all people to see the Beauty of the Palestinian People before they were ethnically cleansed and murdered and made into refugees by the State of Israel."
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
The one in the Israeli thread! It's in the first post, the last post and several in between but nobody's answered it
The Astoria??? Orgazmic!
Verona??? it's all surmountable
Dublin 23.08.06 "The beauty of Ireland, right there!"
Wembley? We all believe!
Copenhagen?? your light made us stars
Chicago 07? And love
What a different life
Had I not found this love with you
The Astoria??? Orgazmic!
Verona??? it's all surmountable
Dublin 23.08.06 "The beauty of Ireland, right there!"
Wembley? We all believe!
Copenhagen?? your light made us stars
Chicago 07? And love
What a different life
Had I not found this love with you
"Over the past few weeks, The Lobby and its Christian acolytes in government and the media have been forcing the world’s governments to celebrate 60 years of Israeli “statehood.” Even the three U.S. presidential [sic] nominees are falling over themselves to pay homage to their political master.
I said “forcing” because I find it impossible to believe that any law-abiding democratic government would of its own free will celebrate a geopolitical perversity founded on torture, theft, murder, gangsterism and blackmail. If that were not the case we should have seen official celebrations of:
• Nazi Germany (Jan. 30, 1933);
• Chile’s military dictatorship (Sept. 11, 1973); or
• Democratic Kampuchea (April 17, 1975).
These tyrannies, fortunately, have all wound up on the ash heap of history. The fact that the same fate has not befallen the Jewish tyranny in Palestine is entirely due to the coercive power of The Lobby and the corruption of President Harry Truman, who, 60 years ago, sold the U.S.’s political soul for the sake of re-election. "
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
Who said I was trying to defend that? I've said both sides are right and wrong. It's just not one sided.
Both sides can trace their ancestry to the Middle East going back thousands of years so yes they both have the right to be there. I understand that the Palestinians were and are still upset that land was taken from them post WWII by the UN to put displaced European Jews. However the Jews needed a safe place and since their ancestry can be traced to the Middle East, especially Jerusalum is does make some sense. However it would have been better if they could have stayed in Europe.
I believe Israel had to take any threats seriously during the time that lead to the 6 day war because basically they feared about what happened in Europe during WWII. In hindsight it may seem unclear but for them back then it wasn't. Just as the Palestinians are desperate today to the point they feel they must use violence that is how the Israelis felt back then and unfortunately today because the violence has never ended. The continued overwhelming violence, force and control the Israelis are using on the Palestinians today are unjust and continues to harm the peace process. However the Palestinian violent retaliations also continue to harm the peace process.
You keep saying that both sides are in the wrong. Sorry, but this just isn't good enough. It's the equivalent of saying that both the whites and blacks were at fault in Apartheid South Africa and therefore choosing to wash your hands of it. It's the equivalent of saying that the French resistance was in the wrong and equally at fault as the Nazis for having the audacity to defend themselves/retaliate against Nazi occupation and violence. Also, as far as 'the time that lead to the 6 day war' is concerned, maybe you need to look at exactly what did lead to it. Take a look at some maps and see how much of Palestinian lands had already been stolen by Israel at that point in time. I supplied you with quotes from Israeli politicians and generals who stated clearly that they started the 6 day war. Not that any of this is relevant, as I keep saying. It's actually completely irrelevant as regards the illegal occupation.
Also, as far as the Jews having a right to be there; they don't have a right to be there. No ethnic group has a right to live somewhere together at the exclusion of any other ethnic group.
In the words of Michael Neumann; 'Where self-determination has from the beginning a predominantly ethnic character, the results are often so bad that we do not call them by their true name. But the emergence of a truly Turkish state in the 1920's or the attempts to form a truly Hutu state in the 1990's, despite huge ethnic massacres, were as much an example of a people's self-determination as anything Wilson sponsored. These cases are not exceptions; they are the rule. At best, the self-determination of peoples has been a smokescreen for bitter religious or class warfare, as it was during the English and French revolutions. The world has long since progressed beyond a patchwork of isolated, "racially pure" enclaves. With this progression, the self-determination of peoples has not and cannot avoid it's share of horror. The propagation of an ideal with such a baleful influence on reality cannot be a bright idea...
...the world has not given us the luxury of separate playgrounds. We have to live together, and a division of culturally or ethnically distinct states could be sustained only by continued purification campaigns and the suppression of ethnic minorities. To this we certainly have no right. Peoples do not, for this reason, have the right even to decide whether or not to maintain their ethnic purity: It is only individuals who may decide to do this. Zionism can, therefore, not be justified according to some right of self-determination of peoples'.
I've said both sides are right and wrong. It's just not one sided.
I understand that the Palestinians were and are still upset that land was taken from them post WWII by the UN to put displaced European Jews. The continued overwhelming violence, force and control the Israelis are using on the Palestinians today are unjust and continues to harm the peace process. However the Palestinian violent retaliations also continue to harm the peace process.
What peace process? Seriously, what 'peace process' are you talking about?
However the Palestinians and Arabs have to accept the fact they will not get all of their land back post WWII.
They're not asking for all of their land back post WW11. Their asking that Israel withdraw to the 1967 borders in accordance with the wishes of the International community - excluding the U.S.
'...Israel, and the Zionist movement that created it, has consistently been in the wrong in it's conflict with the Palestinians. The Zionist movement took their land, that is, it deprived them of soveriegnty over that land. The Palestinians had done nothing to provoke this usurpation. Soveriegnty was the right of the Palestinians, of the inhabitants of Palestine, not of the settlers who came with the express purpose of establishing an ethnic state that could reasonably be seen as a mortal threat to the Palestinians and as a grievous assault on their rights. Given this threat, the Palestinians were right to make no concessions of soveriegnty to the Zionists and, given that the Zionists would not abandon their project, there was no room for compromise. However, a real opportunity for peace arose with the Israeli conquest of the Occupied territories in 1967, when the Palestinians made concessions they did not, as a matter of right, have to make. This opportunity was decisively abandoned by the Israelis, not so much by the occupation itself as by an extremist settler movement and the policies that supported, nurtured, and sustained it.
The settler movement constituted a new mortal threat to the Palestinians, worse than the previous one. The Palestinians were entitled - indeed rationally compelled - to resist this threat, and they were justified in supposing that violent resistance was required. Moreover, nothing in the character of that resistance supports the claims that the Palestinians are consumed by anything more than the entirely normal hatred that is born of warfare and that generally dissipates with peace. The claim that Palestinians are permanently bent on destroying Israel and consumed by inextinguishable hatred now shows itself to be baseless. The Palestinians' desperate attempts to defend themselves against catastrophic dispossession are no evidence whatever for that claim. What you say and feel when someone has trapped you and is progressively making your life intolerable is no evidence for how you will act when that person relents and departs. What makes the Israeli postion particularly indefensible is it's utter gratuitousness. There is no conceivable reason for Israel to promote the settlements that have been the cause of so much misery. The settler movement is built on psuedo-Biblical foolishness, bad history, greed, and - worse - a sort of racist messianism that deserves no tolerance, consideration, or respect. Israel could have not only peace but vastly increased security tomorrow if it chooses: It has all the options and the Palestinians none. The fussing about negotiations, trust, and hatred are nothing but self-deceiving excuses for more bloodshed.'
0
g under p
Surfing The far side of THE Sombrero Galaxy Posts: 18,200
* As Israelis Celebrate Independence and Palestinians Mark the "Nakba," a
Debate with Benny Morris, Saree Makdisi and Norman Finkelstein *
Sixty years since the creation of Israel and displacement of hundreds of
thousands of Palestinians, we host a debate on the legacy of 1948 and the
possibility of a just future for both Israelis and Palestinians with three
guests: Benny Morris, seen as one of the most important Israeli historians
of the 1948 war and after; Saree Makdisi, UCLA professor and author of
Palestine Inside Out; and Norman Finkelstein, author of several books,
including Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict and Beyond
Chutzpah.
*We CAN bomb the World to pieces, but we CAN'T bomb it into PEACE*...Michael Franti
*MUSIC IS the expression of EMOTION.....and that POLITICS IS merely the DECOY of PERCEPTION*
.....song_Music & Politics....Michael Franti
*The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite INSANE*....Nikola Tesla(a man who shaped our world of electricity with his futuristic inventions)
GAZA, (PIC)-- The agriculture ministry in the PA legitimate government in Gaza Strip asserted on Wednesday that the IOF troops had bulldozed vast agricultural areas in the eastern sector of the Gaza Strip which is considered the food basket of the 1.5 million Palestinians living there.
According to a report issued by the ministry and a copy of which was obtained by the PIC, the Israeli occupation army uprooted fruitful trees and destroyed greenhouses and artisan wells in Shokeh and Sofa villages, east of Khan Younis city over the past week in addition to ruining poultry farms estimated at 1.5 million dollars.
The report, furthermore, added that Palestinian farmers in Qarara and Al-Buraij areas, east of Deir Al-Balah city, weren’t able to reach and cultivate their farms for fear that the IOF troops stationed opposite to their farms could shoot and kill them "in cold blood" any time."
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
* As Israelis Celebrate Independence and Palestinians Mark the "Nakba," a
Debate with Benny Morris, Saree Makdisi and Norman Finkelstein *
Sixty years since the creation of Israel and displacement of hundreds of
thousands of Palestinians, we host a debate on the legacy of 1948 and the
possibility of a just future for both Israelis and Palestinians with three
guests: Benny Morris, seen as one of the most important Israeli historians
of the 1948 war and after; Saree Makdisi, UCLA professor and author of
Palestine Inside Out; and Norman Finkelstein, author of several books,
including Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict and Beyond
Chutzpah.
You keep saying that both sides are in the wrong. Sorry, but this just isn't good enough. It's the equivalent of saying that both the whites and blacks were at fault in Apartheid South Africa and therefore choosing to wash your hands of it. It's the equivalent of saying that the French resistance was in the wrong and equally at fault as the Nazis for having the audacity to defend themselves/retaliate against Nazi occupation and violence. Also, as far as 'the time that lead to the 6 day war' is concerned, maybe you need to look at exactly what did lead to it. Take a look at some maps and see how much of Palestinian lands had already been stolen by Israel at that point in time. I supplied you with quotes from Israeli politicians and generals who stated clearly that they started the 6 day war. Not that any of this is relevant, as I keep saying. It's actually completely irrelevant as regards the illegal occupation.
Also, as far as the Jews having a right to be there; they don't have a right to be there. No ethnic group has a right to live somewhere together at the exclusion of any other ethnic group.
In the words of Michael Neumann; 'Where self-determination has from the beginning a predominantly ethnic character, the results are often so bad that we do not call them by their true name. But the emergence of a truly Turkish state in the 1920's or the attempts to form a truly Hutu state in the 1990's, despite huge ethnic massacres, were as much an example of a people's self-determination as anything Wilson sponsored. These cases are not exceptions; they are the rule. At best, the self-determination of peoples has been a smokescreen for bitter religious or class warfare, as it was during the English and French revolutions. The world has long since progressed beyond a patchwork of isolated, "racially pure" enclaves. With this progression, the self-determination of peoples has not and cannot avoid it's share of horror. The propagation of an ideal with such a baleful influence on reality cannot be a bright idea...
...the world has not given us the luxury of separate playgrounds. We have to live together, and a division of culturally or ethnically distinct states could be sustained only by continued purification campaigns and the suppression of ethnic minorities. To this we certainly have no right. Peoples do not, for this reason, have the right even to decide whether or not to maintain their ethnic purity: It is only individuals who may decide to do this. Zionism can, therefore, not be justified according to some right of self-determination of peoples'.
What it's not good enough for you? It's my opinion and I'm entitled to it just like you are entitled to yours.
It's not like apartheid in South Africa nor the French and the Nazi because there are two victims here the Jews and the Palestinians. Again it's not one sided!
To be honest I questioned your support for the continuation of violence towards the Israelis as I am not only against the violence towards the Palestinians but also the Israelis.
In Noam Chomsky's book Peace in the Middle East he stated at the time of the Six Day War he believed that the threat of genocide was real and reacted with uncritical support for Israel at what appeared to be a desperate moment.
"...believe in lies...to get by...it's divine...whoa...oh, you know what its like..."
What it's not good enough for you? It's my opinion and I'm entitled to it just like you are entitled to yours.
It's not like apartheid in South Africa nor the French and the Nazi because there are two victims here the Jews and the Palestinians. Again it's not one sided!
To be honest I questioned your support for the continuation of violence towards the Israelis as I am not only against the violence towards the Palestinians but also the Israelis.
In Noam Chomsky's book Peace in the Middle East he stated at the time of the Six Day War he believed that the threat of genocide was real and reacted with uncritical support for Israel at what appeared to be a desperate moment.
Please explain how Israel are the victims. The Palestinians have every right to defend themselves from the illegitimate Zionist race war. As Michael Neumann stated - and I quoted him above - if Israel wanted peace and security it could have them tomorrow.
What peace process? Seriously, what 'peace process' are you talking about?
They're not asking for all of their land back post WW11. Their asking that Israel withdraw to the 1967 borders in accordance with the wishes of the International community - excluding the U.S.
Yes in past months they agreed to accept the 1967 borders but still refuse to recognize the State of Israel. So what's in it for the Israelis? What do they get?
"...believe in lies...to get by...it's divine...whoa...oh, you know what its like..."
Yes in past months they agreed to accept the 1967 borders but still refuse to recognize the State of Israel. So what's in it for the Israelis? What do they get?
Why should they 'recognize' the state of Israel? Again, this is irrelevant, and merely a distraction.
'AS SOON AS certain topics are raised," George Orwell once wrote, "the concrete melts into the abstract and no one seems able to think of turns of speech that are not hackneyed: Prose consists less and less of words chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of phrases tacked together like the sections of a prefabricated henhouse." Such a combination of vagueness and sheer incompetence in language, Orwell warned, leads to political conformity.
No issue better illustrates Orwell's point than coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the United States. Consider, for example, the editorial in The Times on Feb. 9 demanding that the Palestinians "recognize Israel" and its "right to exist." This is a common enough sentiment — even a cliche. Yet many observers (most recently the international lawyer John Whitbeck) have pointed out that this proposition, assiduously propagated by Israel's advocates and uncritically reiterated by American politicians and journalists, is — at best — utterly nonsensical.
'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?
Orwell was right. It is much easier to recycle meaningless phrases than to ask — let alone to answer — difficult questions. But recycling these empty phrases serves a purpose. Endlessly repeating the mantra that the Palestinians don't recognize Israel helps paint Israel as an innocent victim, politely asking to be recognized but being rebuffed by its cruel enemies.
Actually, it asks even more. Israel wants the Palestinians, half of whom were driven from their homeland so that a Jewish state could be created in 1948, to recognize not merely that it exists (which is undeniable) but that it is "right" that it exists — that it was right for them to have been dispossessed of their homes, their property and their livelihoods so that a Jewish state could be created on their land. The Palestinians are not the world's first dispossessed people, but they are the first to be asked to legitimize what happened to them.
A just peace will require Israelis and Palestinians to reconcile and recognize each other's rights. It will not require that Palestinians give their moral seal of approval to the catastrophe that befell them. Meaningless at best, cynical and manipulative at worst, such a demand may suit Israel's purposes, but it does not serve The Times or its readers.
Please explain how Israel are the victims. The Palestinians have every right to defend themselves from the illegitimate Zionist race war. As Michael Neumann stated - and I quoted him above - if Israel wanted peace and security it could have them tomorrow.
They've never had peace, not Europe and not in the Middle East. They faced annihilation in Europe and continue to face threats of the same in the Middle East by many countries and have since they returned after WWII. I cannot understand that you have no sympathies towards them at all. Put yourself in their shoes. What if your family was moved from Poland to a Nazi concentration camp and somehow survives, even though WWII has ended you are not welcome in Europe so you are sent to a British camp, then on a ship to finally seek safety in Israel but the surrounding neighbors make treats and attempts the overcome you again. How can they trust them if they won't recognize them? Why do they not deserve that respect? BOTH the Israelis and Palestinians deserve that right.
I don't understand how you can believe the Palestinians have the right to defend themselves but the Israelis didn't years ago and still don't today?
"...believe in lies...to get by...it's divine...whoa...oh, you know what its like..."
They've never had peace, not Europe and not in the Middle East. They faced annihilation in Europe and continue to face threats of the same in the Middle East by many countries and have since they returned after WWII. I cannot understand that you have no sympathies towards them at all. Put yourself in their shoes. What if your family was moved from Poland to a Nazi concentration camp and somehow survives, even though WWII has ended you are not welcome in Europe so you are sent to a British camp, then on a ship to finally seek safety in Israel but the surrounding neighbors make treats and attempts the overcome you again. How can they trust them if they won't recognize them? Why do they not deserve that respect? BOTH the Israelis and Palestinians deserve that right.
I don't understand how you can believe the Palestinians have the right to defend themselves but the Israelis didn't years ago and still don't today?
Threy were given their own country. They were given 55% of Palestine in 1947 despite the fact that they only comprised 30% of the population. But this wasn't good enough for them. I suggest that you read something about Zionism and of it's intentions.
Like I said above, they can have peace and security tomorrow if they want it. But instead they insist on propagating the illegal settlements. They have all the options. The talk about 'recognition' is irrelevant.
Maybe you should ponder this map for a while whilst you're at it...
'AS SOON AS certain topics are raised," George Orwell once wrote, "the concrete melts into the abstract and no one seems able to think of turns of speech that are not hackneyed: Prose consists less and less of words chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of phrases tacked together like the sections of a prefabricated henhouse." Such a combination of vagueness and sheer incompetence in language, Orwell warned, leads to political conformity.
No issue better illustrates Orwell's point than coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the United States. Consider, for example, the editorial in The Times on Feb. 9 demanding that the Palestinians "recognize Israel" and its "right to exist." This is a common enough sentiment — even a cliche. Yet many observers (most recently the international lawyer John Whitbeck) have pointed out that this proposition, assiduously propagated by Israel's advocates and uncritically reiterated by American politicians and journalists, is — at best — utterly nonsensical.
UPDATED ON:
MONDAY, APRIL 21, 2008
20:37 MECCA TIME, 17:37 GMT
Hamas ready to accept 1967 borders
Hamas has said it is ready to accept a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders but "will not recognise Israel".
Speaking at a news conference on Monday, Khaled Meshaal, the exiled Hamas political leader, reaffirmed Hamas's stance towards Israel and clarified his comments as relayed earlier by Jimmy Carter, the former US president.
"We accept a state on the June 4 line with Jerusalem as capital, real sovereignty and full right of return for refugees but without recognising Israel," Meshaal said.
The Hamas leader was making his first public comments following two meetings with Carter in Damascus last week.
Carter, speaking in Jerusalem earlier on Monday, said that Hamas had told him it would accept the right of Israel "to live as a neighbour" if a peace deal was approved by a Palestinian referendum.
Carter said Hamas leaders had told him they would "accept a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders if approved by Palestinians".
But Carter also said Meshaal turned down his appeal for a unilateral ceasefire with Israel to end violence threatening peace efforts.
"I did the best I could on that," Carter said of his failure to persuade Hamas to halt rocket fire for one month from the Gaza Strip it has controlled since June when it ousted the Fatah movement of Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president.
The United States brushed off Carter's report on Hamas on Monday, saying the group's basic stance had not changed.
"What is clear to us ... is that nothing has changed in terms of Hamas's basic views about Israel and about peace in the region," Tom Casey, the state department spokesman, said.
"They still refuse to acknowledge or recognise any of the basic quartet principles, including recognising Israel's right to exist; renouncing terrorism; and acknowledging all the previous agreements that have been made between the Palestinian Authority and Israel," he added.
Dana Perino, the White House press secretary, said the Hamas position should be taken "with a grain of salt".
"We have to look at the public comments and we also have to look at actions, and actions speak louder than words."
Carter said his understandings with Hamas called for a referendum to be preceded by reconciliation between the group and Abbas's Fatah faction.
In his news conference, Meshaal said Hamas would "respect Palestinian national will, even if it was against our convictions".
Sami Abu Zuhri, a Gaza-based Hamas official, said Palestinian refugees living in exile must take part in a referendum - a condition that could dim the chances of approval since Israel opposes their mass return, which could skew the state's ethnic make up.
Ghazi Hamad, a former Palestinian government spokesman, told Al Jazeera that Hamas would be willing to accept a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders (leaving a reduced Israeli state inside its 1948 borders) but insisted that Hamas would not recognise Israel.
Carter, in his news conference, said excluding
Hamas was 'just not working'
"Hamas says frankly - we will not recognise the right of Israel," he said.
"Israel until now has no clear position on recognising the rights of the Palestinian people within the 1967 borders or the right of return or the rights in Jerusalem."
He also said that a ceasefire with Israel was possible.
"Many times Hamas has stopped firing missiles from Gaza but Israel continues its aggression against our people, especially in Gaza," he told Al Jazeera.
"If Israel stops all military aggression against our people, I think Hamas will have no problem in reaching a compromise."
Carter's meeting with Hamas has drawn criticism from both the Israeli and US administrations.
Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, has refused to see Carter, who has for years been critical of Israeli policy towards the Palestinians.
Carter, who helped negotiate a 1979 peace treaty between Israel and Egypt, said excluding Hamas is "just not working".
"The problem is that Israel and the United States refuse to meet with these people, who must be involved," he said.
"...believe in lies...to get by...it's divine...whoa...oh, you know what its like..."
Threy were given their own country. They were given 55% of Palestine in 1947 despite the fact that they only comprised 30% of the population. But this wasn't good enough for them. I suggest that you read something about Zionism and of it's intentions.
Like I said above, they can have peace and security tomorrow if they want it. But instead they insist on propagating the illegal settlements. They have all the options. The talk about 'recognition' is irrelevant.
Maybe you should ponder this map for a while whilst you're at it...
Can you honestly say that the Palestinians, Egyptians, Jordanians, Syrians and Iranians greeted the Israelis with open arms in 1947 and never threatened them prior to 1967?
Before 1947 wasn't Palestine under British control? After 1947 and before 1967 wasn't Gaza under Egyptian rule and Judea and Samaria under Jordanian rule which both of those countries now have peace treaties with Israel?
"...believe in lies...to get by...it's divine...whoa...oh, you know what its like..."
I cant stand all this anti-Israeli propaganda you guys are spreading around here.
It truly makes me sick to my stomach. Stop spewing out articles by anti-Israel authors and automatically assume it is fact.
Theres a difference between disagreeing with Israel's policies and actions, and actually comparing them to Nazis and South African Apartheid.
Israel isn't ethnically cleaning anyone, there is no genocide, there is no massmurder.
Clearly innocent lives on both sides have been killed, and this makes me sick. But you will NEVER see an Israeli strap a bomb onto his/her chest and blowup a civilian bus containing Palestinian people.
Yes, IDF attacks have gone wrong, but not only at the expense of innocent palestinian lives, but at the expense of some Israeli soldiers lives. Its never the intention of the IDF to go out and brutally murder a group of innocent people. They intend to kill Hamas militants.
From a historical point of view, the area known as Palestine before Israel was controlled by numerous empires (look it up) with Britain controlling it last. NEVER was there a country called Palestine. Britain spit the area known as Palestine into 2 parts. The larger part known as TransJordan, which then became Jordan. In a sense, "Palestinian" people live in Jordan...
As for the people who lived in the Israeli portion of the former British owned 'Palestine': many of them stayed, and that is why 20 percent of Israel is made up of Arab Israeli. Many were exiled, yet some left by choice.
Now clearly not all left on their own accord, after believing false promises, but certainly many did.
If Israel forced out all Arabs by gunpoint in 1948, why were so many left within the country? Why didn't they expel them all?
As we all know, when Israel accepted the borders and the Arabs didn't, the surrounding Arab nations felt it was appropriate to attack Israel from all sides, but not to take in all of the Palestinian refugees!
If you think these refugees were mistreated by Israel, then surely you'd they were grossly mistreated by surrounding Arab nations.
Palestinian civilians have been treated terribly. Of course they have seen aggression from the IDF, but their own government is what is really bringing down their potential. Led by the corrupt PLO and Yasser Arafat for so long, their nation has gone nowhere. It is a shame that he and his government could not lead the people in the right direction.
Peace was available after the signing of the Oslo Accords in the early 90s, but the Palestinian side was far from holding up their end of the bargain. Israel wasnt perfect either, but the Palestinian authority truly screwed up. Then the Intifada broke out, and suicide bombings happened in large numbers.
Even though radical Islam might take up a tiny percentage of the Palestinian people, it still makes a powerful effect on the entire situation. Yes, Hamas was recently elected, but their is no denying they are a terrorist organization that wishes to destroy Israel. How can you make peace with a group like that?
Israel might be too aggressive, or flat out wrong in this whole conflict. However, their overall goal is certainly not to destroy another group of people. Hamas does have this intention.
I just wish the Palestinians had moderate authority figures, who could usher in peace with their neighbours, not corrupt or terrorist government organizations.
Another difference I've noticed during this conflict is the reaction to killings and attacks. While this may be a tiny portion of the population, there were still ACTUAL PARADES in the streets of Gaza when the 8 Yeshiva students were killed in Israel recently by a Palestinian terrorist. When the IDF kills Palestinians, Israelis don't parade in the streets.
Can you see a difference between the two cultures. (most palestinians arent like this of course, thats not what im trying to say).
Now, I know a few of you are going to reply to this message by copying and pasting anti-Isaeli author's words about the situation. I'd really like you guys to respond in your words.
Explain to me how you actually think Israel acts like Nazis, how Palestinians are always right and never wrong, what Israel should have done in '48 and 67 and 73 besides defend itself, as well as why you think Israel gave up the Sinai region back to Egypt for a peace treaty and how this reflects Israel's intentions for peace.
Comments
So you're 'not in the mood' to address the points I raised that relate to this thread you created? O.k.
Which question was that?
www.wm3.org
Ron Paul 2012
So since when does aljazeera have an unbiased opinion on this topic?
Show me some unbiased accounts of what started the 6 day war that supports their claim. There are many links to support what I posted.
It's fairly pointless.
www.wm3.org
Ron Paul 2012
Why don't address the points or admit you are wrong.
The economy has polarized to the point where the wealthiest 10% now own 85% of the nation’s wealth. Never before have the bottom 90% been so highly indebted, so dependent on the wealthy.
I'm not wrong. Trying to debate someone who uses Al Jazeera as a source, says it all.
www.wm3.org
Ron Paul 2012
In the link I provided Al Jazeera used direct quotes from Israeli politicians and Generals. Those quotes aren't biased one way or another. They're quotes from those who were directly involved in the outbreak of the 6 day war.
Anyway, again this is all pretty irrelevant. Can you explain why you support the illegal Israeli occupation and Zionist race war against the Palestinians?
Oh believe me I haven't even begun to take my gloves off yet
Then why are you trying to defend it?
Hmm, i think you will find all kinds of different sources are used.
The economy has polarized to the point where the wealthiest 10% now own 85% of the nation’s wealth. Never before have the bottom 90% been so highly indebted, so dependent on the wealthy.
Who said I was trying to defend that? I've said both sides are right and wrong. It's just not one sided.
Both sides can trace their ancestry to the Middle East going back thousands of years so yes they both have the right to be there. I understand that the Palestinians were and are still upset that land was taken from them post WWII by the UN to put displaced European Jews. However the Jews needed a safe place and since their ancestry can be traced to the Middle East, especially Jerusalum is does make some sense. However it would have been better if they could have stayed in Europe.
I believe Israel had to take any threats seriously during the time that lead to the 6 day war because basically they feared about what happened in Europe during WWII. In hindsight it may seem unclear but for them back then it wasn't. Just as the Palestinians are desperate today to the point they feel they must use violence that is how the Israelis felt back then and unfortunately today because the violence has never ended. The continued overwhelming violence, force and control the Israelis are using on the Palestinians today are unjust and continues to harm the peace process. However the Palestinian violent retaliations also continue to harm the peace process.
The violence needs to stop on both sides in order for them to have peace. Israel needs to make a huge concession giving the Palestinians a good portion of their land back, which Israel must stay out of permanently. However the Palestinians and Arabs have to accept the fact they will not get all of their land back post WWII.
http://desertpeace.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/palestine-the-land-that-never-was/
"The old lie that Palestine was dry desert waiting for a people is just that–a lie. This clip for all people to see the Beauty of the Palestinian People before they were ethnically cleansed and murdered and made into refugees by the State of Israel."
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
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( o.O)
(")_(")
Verona??? it's all surmountable
Dublin 23.08.06 "The beauty of Ireland, right there!"
Wembley? We all believe!
Copenhagen?? your light made us stars
Chicago 07? And love
What a different life
Had I not found this love with you
http://forums.pearljam.com/showpost.php?p=5474413&postcount=259
Verona??? it's all surmountable
Dublin 23.08.06 "The beauty of Ireland, right there!"
Wembley? We all believe!
Copenhagen?? your light made us stars
Chicago 07? And love
What a different life
Had I not found this love with you
The world marks 60 years of zionist terror made possible by a corrupt U.S. president
http://www.gregfelton.com/int_politics/2008_05_13.htm
"Over the past few weeks, The Lobby and its Christian acolytes in government and the media have been forcing the world’s governments to celebrate 60 years of Israeli “statehood.” Even the three U.S. presidential [sic] nominees are falling over themselves to pay homage to their political master.
I said “forcing” because I find it impossible to believe that any law-abiding democratic government would of its own free will celebrate a geopolitical perversity founded on torture, theft, murder, gangsterism and blackmail. If that were not the case we should have seen official celebrations of:
• Nazi Germany (Jan. 30, 1933);
• Chile’s military dictatorship (Sept. 11, 1973); or
• Democratic Kampuchea (April 17, 1975).
These tyrannies, fortunately, have all wound up on the ash heap of history. The fact that the same fate has not befallen the Jewish tyranny in Palestine is entirely due to the coercive power of The Lobby and the corruption of President Harry Truman, who, 60 years ago, sold the U.S.’s political soul for the sake of re-election. "
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")
You keep saying that both sides are in the wrong. Sorry, but this just isn't good enough. It's the equivalent of saying that both the whites and blacks were at fault in Apartheid South Africa and therefore choosing to wash your hands of it. It's the equivalent of saying that the French resistance was in the wrong and equally at fault as the Nazis for having the audacity to defend themselves/retaliate against Nazi occupation and violence. Also, as far as 'the time that lead to the 6 day war' is concerned, maybe you need to look at exactly what did lead to it. Take a look at some maps and see how much of Palestinian lands had already been stolen by Israel at that point in time. I supplied you with quotes from Israeli politicians and generals who stated clearly that they started the 6 day war. Not that any of this is relevant, as I keep saying. It's actually completely irrelevant as regards the illegal occupation.
Also, as far as the Jews having a right to be there; they don't have a right to be there. No ethnic group has a right to live somewhere together at the exclusion of any other ethnic group.
In the words of Michael Neumann;
'Where self-determination has from the beginning a predominantly ethnic character, the results are often so bad that we do not call them by their true name. But the emergence of a truly Turkish state in the 1920's or the attempts to form a truly Hutu state in the 1990's, despite huge ethnic massacres, were as much an example of a people's self-determination as anything Wilson sponsored. These cases are not exceptions; they are the rule. At best, the self-determination of peoples has been a smokescreen for bitter religious or class warfare, as it was during the English and French revolutions. The world has long since progressed beyond a patchwork of isolated, "racially pure" enclaves. With this progression, the self-determination of peoples has not and cannot avoid it's share of horror. The propagation of an ideal with such a baleful influence on reality cannot be a bright idea...
...the world has not given us the luxury of separate playgrounds. We have to live together, and a division of culturally or ethnically distinct states could be sustained only by continued purification campaigns and the suppression of ethnic minorities. To this we certainly have no right. Peoples do not, for this reason, have the right even to decide whether or not to maintain their ethnic purity: It is only individuals who may decide to do this. Zionism can, therefore, not be justified according to some right of self-determination of peoples'.
What peace process? Seriously, what 'peace process' are you talking about?
They're not asking for all of their land back post WW11. Their asking that Israel withdraw to the 1967 borders in accordance with the wishes of the International community - excluding the U.S.
The settler movement constituted a new mortal threat to the Palestinians, worse than the previous one. The Palestinians were entitled - indeed rationally compelled - to resist this threat, and they were justified in supposing that violent resistance was required. Moreover, nothing in the character of that resistance supports the claims that the Palestinians are consumed by anything more than the entirely normal hatred that is born of warfare and that generally dissipates with peace. The claim that Palestinians are permanently bent on destroying Israel and consumed by inextinguishable hatred now shows itself to be baseless. The Palestinians' desperate attempts to defend themselves against catastrophic dispossession are no evidence whatever for that claim. What you say and feel when someone has trapped you and is progressively making your life intolerable is no evidence for how you will act when that person relents and departs.
What makes the Israeli postion particularly indefensible is it's utter gratuitousness. There is no conceivable reason for Israel to promote the settlements that have been the cause of so much misery. The settler movement is built on psuedo-Biblical foolishness, bad history, greed, and - worse - a sort of racist messianism that deserves no tolerance, consideration, or respect. Israel could have not only peace but vastly increased security tomorrow if it chooses: It has all the options and the Palestinians none. The fussing about negotiations, trust, and hatred are nothing but self-deceiving excuses for more bloodshed.'
Debate with Benny Morris, Saree Makdisi and Norman Finkelstein *
Sixty years since the creation of Israel and displacement of hundreds of
thousands of Palestinians, we host a debate on the legacy of 1948 and the
possibility of a just future for both Israelis and Palestinians with three
guests: Benny Morris, seen as one of the most important Israeli historians
of the 1948 war and after; Saree Makdisi, UCLA professor and author of
Palestine Inside Out; and Norman Finkelstein, author of several books,
including Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict and Beyond
Chutzpah.
Listen/Watch/Read
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/5/16/as_israelis_celebrate_independence
Peace...Shalom
*MUSIC IS the expression of EMOTION.....and that POLITICS IS merely the DECOY of PERCEPTION*
.....song_Music & Politics....Michael Franti
*The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite INSANE*....Nikola Tesla(a man who shaped our world of electricity with his futuristic inventions)
IOF troops destroy agriculture sector in Gaza; kill Palestinian farmers
http://www.uruknet.de/?p=m44244&hd=&size=1&l=e
"May 21, 2008
GAZA, (PIC)-- The agriculture ministry in the PA legitimate government in Gaza Strip asserted on Wednesday that the IOF troops had bulldozed vast agricultural areas in the eastern sector of the Gaza Strip which is considered the food basket of the 1.5 million Palestinians living there.
According to a report issued by the ministry and a copy of which was obtained by the PIC, the Israeli occupation army uprooted fruitful trees and destroyed greenhouses and artisan wells in Shokeh and Sofa villages, east of Khan Younis city over the past week in addition to ruining poultry farms estimated at 1.5 million dollars.
The report, furthermore, added that Palestinian farmers in Qarara and Al-Buraij areas, east of Deir Al-Balah city, weren’t able to reach and cultivate their farms for fear that the IOF troops stationed opposite to their farms could shoot and kill them "in cold blood" any time."
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")
Thanks.
What it's not good enough for you? It's my opinion and I'm entitled to it just like you are entitled to yours.
It's not like apartheid in South Africa nor the French and the Nazi because there are two victims here the Jews and the Palestinians. Again it's not one sided!
To be honest I questioned your support for the continuation of violence towards the Israelis as I am not only against the violence towards the Palestinians but also the Israelis.
In Noam Chomsky's book Peace in the Middle East he stated at the time of the Six Day War he believed that the threat of genocide was real and reacted with uncritical support for Israel at what appeared to be a desperate moment.
Please explain how Israel are the victims. The Palestinians have every right to defend themselves from the illegitimate Zionist race war. As Michael Neumann stated - and I quoted him above - if Israel wanted peace and security it could have them tomorrow.
Yes in past months they agreed to accept the 1967 borders but still refuse to recognize the State of Israel. So what's in it for the Israelis? What do they get?
Why should they 'recognize' the state of Israel? Again, this is irrelevant, and merely a distraction.
http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0311-26.htm
'AS SOON AS certain topics are raised," George Orwell once wrote, "the concrete melts into the abstract and no one seems able to think of turns of speech that are not hackneyed: Prose consists less and less of words chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of phrases tacked together like the sections of a prefabricated henhouse." Such a combination of vagueness and sheer incompetence in language, Orwell warned, leads to political conformity.
No issue better illustrates Orwell's point than coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the United States. Consider, for example, the editorial in The Times on Feb. 9 demanding that the Palestinians "recognize Israel" and its "right to exist." This is a common enough sentiment — even a cliche. Yet many observers (most recently the international lawyer John Whitbeck) have pointed out that this proposition, assiduously propagated by Israel's advocates and uncritically reiterated by American politicians and journalists, is — at best — utterly nonsensical.
'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?
Orwell was right. It is much easier to recycle meaningless phrases than to ask — let alone to answer — difficult questions. But recycling these empty phrases serves a purpose. Endlessly repeating the mantra that the Palestinians don't recognize Israel helps paint Israel as an innocent victim, politely asking to be recognized but being rebuffed by its cruel enemies.
Actually, it asks even more. Israel wants the Palestinians, half of whom were driven from their homeland so that a Jewish state could be created in 1948, to recognize not merely that it exists (which is undeniable) but that it is "right" that it exists — that it was right for them to have been dispossessed of their homes, their property and their livelihoods so that a Jewish state could be created on their land. The Palestinians are not the world's first dispossessed people, but they are the first to be asked to legitimize what happened to them.
A just peace will require Israelis and Palestinians to reconcile and recognize each other's rights. It will not require that Palestinians give their moral seal of approval to the catastrophe that befell them. Meaningless at best, cynical and manipulative at worst, such a demand may suit Israel's purposes, but it does not serve The Times or its readers.
They've never had peace, not Europe and not in the Middle East. They faced annihilation in Europe and continue to face threats of the same in the Middle East by many countries and have since they returned after WWII. I cannot understand that you have no sympathies towards them at all. Put yourself in their shoes. What if your family was moved from Poland to a Nazi concentration camp and somehow survives, even though WWII has ended you are not welcome in Europe so you are sent to a British camp, then on a ship to finally seek safety in Israel but the surrounding neighbors make treats and attempts the overcome you again. How can they trust them if they won't recognize them? Why do they not deserve that respect? BOTH the Israelis and Palestinians deserve that right.
I don't understand how you can believe the Palestinians have the right to defend themselves but the Israelis didn't years ago and still don't today?
Threy were given their own country. They were given 55% of Palestine in 1947 despite the fact that they only comprised 30% of the population. But this wasn't good enough for them. I suggest that you read something about Zionism and of it's intentions.
Like I said above, they can have peace and security tomorrow if they want it. But instead they insist on propagating the illegal settlements. They have all the options. The talk about 'recognition' is irrelevant.
Maybe you should ponder this map for a while whilst you're at it...
http://www.friendsofpalestine.org.au/images/Palestine%20Map%20Big.jpg
Since you quoted Al Jazeera:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/361C0AF7-D0E7-4E34-99BC-5BEF9FD094AC.htm
UPDATED ON:
MONDAY, APRIL 21, 2008
20:37 MECCA TIME, 17:37 GMT
Hamas ready to accept 1967 borders
Hamas has said it is ready to accept a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders but "will not recognise Israel".
Speaking at a news conference on Monday, Khaled Meshaal, the exiled Hamas political leader, reaffirmed Hamas's stance towards Israel and clarified his comments as relayed earlier by Jimmy Carter, the former US president.
"We accept a state on the June 4 line with Jerusalem as capital, real sovereignty and full right of return for refugees but without recognising Israel," Meshaal said.
The Hamas leader was making his first public comments following two meetings with Carter in Damascus last week.
Carter, speaking in Jerusalem earlier on Monday, said that Hamas had told him it would accept the right of Israel "to live as a neighbour" if a peace deal was approved by a Palestinian referendum.
Carter said Hamas leaders had told him they would "accept a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders if approved by Palestinians".
But Carter also said Meshaal turned down his appeal for a unilateral ceasefire with Israel to end violence threatening peace efforts.
"I did the best I could on that," Carter said of his failure to persuade Hamas to halt rocket fire for one month from the Gaza Strip it has controlled since June when it ousted the Fatah movement of Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president.
The United States brushed off Carter's report on Hamas on Monday, saying the group's basic stance had not changed.
"What is clear to us ... is that nothing has changed in terms of Hamas's basic views about Israel and about peace in the region," Tom Casey, the state department spokesman, said.
"They still refuse to acknowledge or recognise any of the basic quartet principles, including recognising Israel's right to exist; renouncing terrorism; and acknowledging all the previous agreements that have been made between the Palestinian Authority and Israel," he added.
Dana Perino, the White House press secretary, said the Hamas position should be taken "with a grain of salt".
"We have to look at the public comments and we also have to look at actions, and actions speak louder than words."
Carter said his understandings with Hamas called for a referendum to be preceded by reconciliation between the group and Abbas's Fatah faction.
In his news conference, Meshaal said Hamas would "respect Palestinian national will, even if it was against our convictions".
Sami Abu Zuhri, a Gaza-based Hamas official, said Palestinian refugees living in exile must take part in a referendum - a condition that could dim the chances of approval since Israel opposes their mass return, which could skew the state's ethnic make up.
Ghazi Hamad, a former Palestinian government spokesman, told Al Jazeera that Hamas would be willing to accept a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders (leaving a reduced Israeli state inside its 1948 borders) but insisted that Hamas would not recognise Israel.
Carter, in his news conference, said excluding
Hamas was 'just not working'
"Hamas says frankly - we will not recognise the right of Israel," he said.
"Israel until now has no clear position on recognising the rights of the Palestinian people within the 1967 borders or the right of return or the rights in Jerusalem."
He also said that a ceasefire with Israel was possible.
"Many times Hamas has stopped firing missiles from Gaza but Israel continues its aggression against our people, especially in Gaza," he told Al Jazeera.
"If Israel stops all military aggression against our people, I think Hamas will have no problem in reaching a compromise."
Carter's meeting with Hamas has drawn criticism from both the Israeli and US administrations.
Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, has refused to see Carter, who has for years been critical of Israeli policy towards the Palestinians.
Carter, who helped negotiate a 1979 peace treaty between Israel and Egypt, said excluding Hamas is "just not working".
"The problem is that Israel and the United States refuse to meet with these people, who must be involved," he said.
Can you honestly say that the Palestinians, Egyptians, Jordanians, Syrians and Iranians greeted the Israelis with open arms in 1947 and never threatened them prior to 1967?
Before 1947 wasn't Palestine under British control? After 1947 and before 1967 wasn't Gaza under Egyptian rule and Judea and Samaria under Jordanian rule which both of those countries now have peace treaties with Israel?
It truly makes me sick to my stomach. Stop spewing out articles by anti-Israel authors and automatically assume it is fact.
Theres a difference between disagreeing with Israel's policies and actions, and actually comparing them to Nazis and South African Apartheid.
Israel isn't ethnically cleaning anyone, there is no genocide, there is no massmurder.
Clearly innocent lives on both sides have been killed, and this makes me sick. But you will NEVER see an Israeli strap a bomb onto his/her chest and blowup a civilian bus containing Palestinian people.
Yes, IDF attacks have gone wrong, but not only at the expense of innocent palestinian lives, but at the expense of some Israeli soldiers lives. Its never the intention of the IDF to go out and brutally murder a group of innocent people. They intend to kill Hamas militants.
From a historical point of view, the area known as Palestine before Israel was controlled by numerous empires (look it up) with Britain controlling it last. NEVER was there a country called Palestine. Britain spit the area known as Palestine into 2 parts. The larger part known as TransJordan, which then became Jordan. In a sense, "Palestinian" people live in Jordan...
As for the people who lived in the Israeli portion of the former British owned 'Palestine': many of them stayed, and that is why 20 percent of Israel is made up of Arab Israeli. Many were exiled, yet some left by choice.
Here are some articles to read:
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/021103.php
http://www.eretzyisroel.org/~peters/refugees.html
Now clearly not all left on their own accord, after believing false promises, but certainly many did.
If Israel forced out all Arabs by gunpoint in 1948, why were so many left within the country? Why didn't they expel them all?
As we all know, when Israel accepted the borders and the Arabs didn't, the surrounding Arab nations felt it was appropriate to attack Israel from all sides, but not to take in all of the Palestinian refugees!
If you think these refugees were mistreated by Israel, then surely you'd they were grossly mistreated by surrounding Arab nations.
Palestinian civilians have been treated terribly. Of course they have seen aggression from the IDF, but their own government is what is really bringing down their potential. Led by the corrupt PLO and Yasser Arafat for so long, their nation has gone nowhere. It is a shame that he and his government could not lead the people in the right direction.
Peace was available after the signing of the Oslo Accords in the early 90s, but the Palestinian side was far from holding up their end of the bargain. Israel wasnt perfect either, but the Palestinian authority truly screwed up. Then the Intifada broke out, and suicide bombings happened in large numbers.
Even though radical Islam might take up a tiny percentage of the Palestinian people, it still makes a powerful effect on the entire situation. Yes, Hamas was recently elected, but their is no denying they are a terrorist organization that wishes to destroy Israel. How can you make peace with a group like that?
Israel might be too aggressive, or flat out wrong in this whole conflict. However, their overall goal is certainly not to destroy another group of people. Hamas does have this intention.
I just wish the Palestinians had moderate authority figures, who could usher in peace with their neighbours, not corrupt or terrorist government organizations.
Another difference I've noticed during this conflict is the reaction to killings and attacks. While this may be a tiny portion of the population, there were still ACTUAL PARADES in the streets of Gaza when the 8 Yeshiva students were killed in Israel recently by a Palestinian terrorist. When the IDF kills Palestinians, Israelis don't parade in the streets.
Can you see a difference between the two cultures. (most palestinians arent like this of course, thats not what im trying to say).
Here are the news articles
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3515985,00.html
and this: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/03/07/1204780065631.html
Now, I know a few of you are going to reply to this message by copying and pasting anti-Isaeli author's words about the situation. I'd really like you guys to respond in your words.
Explain to me how you actually think Israel acts like Nazis, how Palestinians are always right and never wrong, what Israel should have done in '48 and 67 and 73 besides defend itself, as well as why you think Israel gave up the Sinai region back to Egypt for a peace treaty and how this reflects Israel's intentions for peace.