Just to make sure that we're on the same page as to what we're talking about, I've never claimed that there weren't Jews in the area for aeons.
You mention that Jews ... can become citizens of Israel.
Don't forget to complete the sentence " . . .at the expense of people who lived there for centuries."
Um....
Anyone else want to present a cogent list of facts (thanks motown) so that Are can come back with some more talk about "white jews." He clearly has no desire to address the historical background, only to talk about what he sees as the "black and white" issue of the Arab land and the white jew invaders, as if theres no grey area here. Fact is, as an American, I am uncomfortable with the idea of a religious state, but nearly every major religion has been state sanctioned at one point, thats why, Are, you are coming off as anti-semetic.
Also, while I understand there is a significance to the land for Christians, can anyone speak on my earlier question about the religious significance within Islam of Israel, beyond Palestinian claims.
I also am still waiting for Are to respond to the central question here. I know you dont think Israel has any right to exist, but considering that it does and has for 50 years, how do you expect them to respond to people whose stated goal is their complete destruction. Should they just roll over? Should white americans (and black, latino, etc) all go back to there respective places of origin? Should we pack up and leave the US for the indians, south america for the indigenous, etc?
Oh and btw
Again, my fiancee's fam's history dates back there before 1948, certainly.
Someone get on the phone to the region and let them know that Are's thoughtful, reasoned anaylsis has solved this problem once and for all. Kudos...
Putting aside older history, here's the latest on current events. This situation is so fucking terrible on every level and all sides.
Can someone explain to me again how this current campaign is going to "succeed" for Israel?
July 30, 2006 Israeli Strike Is Deadliest in Fighting So Far[/b] By SABRINA TAVERNISE
QANA, Lebanon, July 30 ??? A series of Israeli airstrikes in this small mountain town today killed dozens of people in the deadliest single attack in the war here so far. At least 54 people were killed, with 37 of them children, news agencies reported.[/b]
Rescue workers and neighbors worked frantically to find survivors among the wreckage of a house, where two large extended families were hiding in a garage. Six small children, their mouths open and full of dirt, were brought out and laid on stretchers.
"I felt as if I was turning around, and the earth was going up, and I was going into the earth," said Mohamed Chaloub, a father of five who was thrown into a doorway and managed to escape. All five of his children, including a 2-year-old child, were killed. His wife, sister and aunt were also killed.
Neighbors said they ran to the house after the first strike, around 1 a.m., and that they heard screams and tried to reach people trapped inside, but the strikes persisted and they could not reach them. In the morning, rescue workers pulled bodies of 22 people out of the rubble, but neighbors said more bodies were inside.
The death toll climbed as rescue workers retrieved more people from the collapsed building, carrying limp bodies away on stretchers and in blankets.
The strike came as thousands protested in Beirut and a mob of young men started breaking windows and damaging buildings. Television footage showed crowds of men attacking a United Nations building in the capital.
The Israeli government said in a statement on its Foreign Ministry Web site that the Israeli army attacked missile launch sites in the area of Qana, from where it said hundreds of missiles were launched towards the Israeli city of Nahariya and the communities in the western Galilee.
It said that Hezbollah has ???turned the suburbs of Lebanon into a war front by firing missiles from within civilian areas.??? It said 18 Israeli civilians have been killed and over 400 have been wounded by Hezbollah rocket attacks which have disrupted the lives of tens of thousands of Israeli citizens.[/b]
The statement said that residents in Qana and the region had been warned several days in advance to leave the village.
The strikes on Qana came after Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice returned to Israel on Saturday evening to press for a substantive agreement that could lead to a more rapid cease-fire and the insertion of an international force along the Lebanese border with Israel.
Ms. Rice, on her way back from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, had praised the Lebanese government, which includes two Hezbollah ministers, for agreeing on the outlines of a possible cease-fire package.
But she cancelled a visit to Beirut today after the Qana strikes, according to news agencies.
While there has been a sense that President Bush, after his meeting in Washington with Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, had suddenly decided to give Israel a shorter period in which to hammer Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel said in a statement today that Israel was not ???rushing in??? to a ceasefire before Israel had achieved its goals.
Mr. Olmert said today that Israel regretted the death of civilians in Qana, where he said Hezbollah had fired rockets at Kiryat Shmona and Afula.
Ms. Rice is working to draft a United Nations Security Council resolution that would allow for the insertion of 15,000 to 20,000 international peacekeepers along the Lebanese border with Israel and along Lebanon???s border with Syria, to prevent the rearming of Hezbollah. The force would also work with the Lebanese Army to enable it to begin patrolling the border itself.
On Monday, there will be a meeting at the United Nations to discuss which nations might contribute to such a force. American officials said they might seek a Security Council resolution authorizing the force as early as Wednesday. The United States has been isolated in its refusal to call for an immediate cessation of hostilities between Israel and Lebanon, arguing that the conditions were not ripe for a sustainable cease-fire.
But the international cry for a halt to Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon has been growing, especially after Israel hit a United Nations post, killing four United Nations observers. Israel denied the accusation by Secretary General Kofi Annan that the post was deliberately hit, but with the death toll in Lebanon reported by officials there to be nearing 450 people, mostly civilians, pressure on the United States has been growing to give Mr. Olmert an earlier deadline.
Also, while I understand there is a significance to the land for Christians, can anyone speak on my earlier question about the religious significance within Islam of Israel, beyond Palestinian claims.
Dome of the Rock, located on the temple mount in Jersalem, third holiest site in Islam. Reverred as the spot where muhammads ascended to heaven.
Like Jews Arabs are an Abrahamic people and revere his tomb in Hebron.
Just to make sure that we're on the same page as to what we're talking about, I've never claimed that there weren't Jews in the area for aeons. That was neither my argument nor the crux thereof. My statement is that the people who have complete social agency in the area are not the group of people who have a geographic claim to the land dating back centuries. In other words, white Europeans. I'm well aware that there have been Arab Jews in the area for centuries.
The claim that the "people now known as Palestinians" didn't live in occupied territory until 1948 (if that's what you're stating) is innaccurate. Again, my fiancee's fam's history dates back there before 1948, certainly.
Also, the figures regarding Afghanistan seem a bit dubious to me, because I seem to recall respected human rights orgs citing the deathtoll as being in the thousands a couple/few months into the conflict.
I'm going to respond to Vitamin, I believe it was, in a minute. At work. Peace.
- Are
My point is that you're getting into a silly historical argument that will get you no where.
1) Jews have had a continus presence in the region since 1300 B.C. to 1948 A.D. and the founding of Israel. That's over 3200 years. Yet you say that Jews have a "mythical claim" to the land.
2) You said that Palestinians had claims to the land for "thousands of years." Arabs didn't even become the dominant group until the 7th century A.D.. That means Jews were there from 1300 B.C. to the 600s A.D., 1900 years before Arabs really took over. Not only that, but 100s of thousands of BOTH Jews and Arabs never even showed up to what would become Israel until after WWI which ended in 1918. So from 1918 to 1948, 30 years is when a lot of Jews and Arabs actually have "claim to the land."
3) You bring up the "white" "European tourist" Jews as taking over. What about the thousands of Middle Eastern Jews that were forced out of their homes and migrated to Israel?
4) You say that Palestinians have just as much right to return to their former homes, if not more than Jews. So your fiance's family had a farm before they were displaced and that they should be able to get it back. That basically means that if there were any Jews living there they would have to leave. Since you think they're all "white tourist Europeans" anyways, I guess they can go back home after their "vacation." What about the Middle Eastern Jews though? You think Saudia Arabia, Iraq, and other Arab countries are going to take them back?
5) Finally, the right of return claimed by Palestinians means that Israel basically can't exist. All the Jews have to get up and leave and give back the land to the Palestinians that claim it. Not going to happen. Which is my whole point. You're making a dead end argument.
Political comprimose rarely means both sides get what they want, especially if one side is more powerful than the other, and Israel is more powerful. However they are willing to make concessions and have. They let PLO fighters and leaders return to the Occupied Territories. They let out hundreds of Palestinians from jail, they pulled out of Gaza, they're making plans to pull out of most of the West Bank, and they compromised on Jerusalem. The Palestinians mostly have decided to go to war instead, and can't even govern the Gaza Strip themselves. After Hamas won the elections, they started gun battles with Fatah, so they really need to get their shit together, and going into arcane and useless arguments about who was on the land first, and who gets to take back that farm in Haifa or wherever, seem to be a complete waste of time to me.
3,500 Civilians Killed in Afghanistan by U.S. Bombs
Durham, NH - More than 3,500 civilians have been killed in Afghanistan by U.S. bombs, according to a study to be released December 10 by Marc W. Herold, Professor of Economics, International Relations, and Women's Studies at the University of New Hampshire. Professor Herold will announce his findings on Monday, December 10 in a discussion with award-winning journalist, Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! in Exile's War and Peace Report (http://www.democracynow.org).
Professor Herold has been gathering data on civilian casualties since October 7 by culling information from news agencies, major newspapers, and first-hand accounts. "I decided to do the study because I suspected that the modern weaponry was not what it was advertised to be. I was concerned that there would be significant civilian casualties caused by the bombing, and I was able to find some mention of casualties in the foreign press but almost nothing in the U.S. press," said Herold. Herold's data will be available at http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mwherold/.
Here's a study done by the Project On Defense Alternatives, they give the civilian death toll as 1000-1300[/b].
Appendix 1. Estimation of Civilian Bombing Casualties: Method and Sources The estimate of civilian bombing casualties used in this report -- 1000-1300 -- draws on media sources much as the Herold study does, but it applies a stricter criteria to screen these sources and correct for likely reporting errors and distortions. In deriving the 1000-1300 estimate only Western press sources were used for hard numbers -- principally wire services (Reuters, Associated Press, and Agence France-Presse) and the British press (BBC News, the Independent, The Times, and the Guardian). These sources seemed more attuned to the issue of civilian casualties than were US newspapers, while also being disinclined to accept on face value official Taliban reports or accounts from the Pakistani press.[/b]
Within the large body of press accounts reviewed for this study, the estimates were anchored to a subset: (i) journalist eyewitness accounts of damage, injury, and burial and (ii) journalist interviews with medical personnel, aid workers on the scene, and individuals who lost family members. These well-investigated cases cover less than 25 percent of the reported incidents and they provide strong evidence of more than 300 deaths. These cases provided a yardstick for evaluating other reports.
Also important in deriving the 1000-1300 estimate were journalist interviews with refugees, although numerical estimates given by refugees of civilian deaths outside their own families were not taken at face value. In three cases where refugee reports of non-related casualties could be checked against journalist or other investigations on the scene of a reported bombing, the refugee recollections disagreed with the scene reports by a factor of more than three, on average. Similarly, official Taliban tallies of casualties (which were often broadcast via the Pakistan press) seem to disagree with journalist scene reports by a factor of more than four, on average. (The discount factor for Taliban reports is based on cases in Kabul that were investigated by reporters for the Agence France Presse.)
One need not assume duplicity as the explanation for exaggeration. In fact, mis-perception and exaggeration should be expected in the recollection of traumatic events by frightened or injured people. As for the quality of official reports: even assuming honest intent, this depends on the investigative capabilities, carefulness, and good-functioning of bureaucracies. In the best of times, the Taliban might be expected to under-perform. And, of course, they had little incentive to "err on the conservative side" in estimating civilian casualties for the press during the war.
For the purposes of the present study, when Afghan refugee or government reports were expressed in vague terms, the following reduction factors were used to derive an estimate: "some or a few" deaths was interpreted as 1, "a dozen or more" was interpreted as 3-4, "dozens" was interpreted as 8-10, "scores" was interpreted as 10-15, "hundreds" was interpreted as "40-60". When accounts explicitly mixed "dead" and "wounded" or gave a combined total for "casualties", only 25 percent of the estimate was treated as "dead".
If all Taliban government and Afghan refugee accounts of the numbers of civilians killed or wounded in the bombing campaign are taken at face value they would suggest a total of more than 5000 killed and 10,000 wounded. As noted above, it is likely that the actual toll is less than one-quarter as many. This discrepancy, although large, is not particularly surprising. In the United States, official estimates of the number of people killed on 11 September were initially twice as high as where they sit today. It took more than a month for the figures to be adjusted downward and more than two months before they came close to the present official estimate. As of 22 December, the official toll of those killed on 11 September still disagrees with other authoritative accounts (by the media and charities) and probably will be revised downward by another 15 percent before stabilizing. The final accounting of the deaths suffered on 11 September will probably be 50 percent below the estimates that prevailed during the first month after the attack.
1) Jews have had a continus presence in the region since 1300 B.C. to 1948 A.D. and the founding of Israel. That's over 3200 years. Yet you say that Jews have a "mythical claim" to the land.
2) You said that Palestinians had claims to the land for "thusands f years" Arabs didn't ven bec2me the 1ominantgroup until the 7th century A.D.. That means Jews were there from 1300 B.C. to the 600s A.D., 1900 years before Arabs really took over. Not only that, but 100s of thousands of BOTH Jews and Arabs never even showed up to what would become Israel until after WWI which ended in 1918. So from 1918 to 1948, 30 years is when a lot of Jews and Arabs actually have "claim to the land."
Is there a concensus among historians that the land was uninhabited when Jews came? Not according to the books I've read. Some say that Palestinians descend from Caanaanites who were there already 2000 A.D. There's also a theory that Palestinians descend from Filisteans who came, possibly, from Crete 1300 A.C., around the same time as Jews.
Bottom line: arguing over who was there first leads nowhere, since there is not a correct answer to that.
5) Finally, the right of return claimed by Palestinians means that Israel basically can't exist.
Is this really so? Please elaborate.
However they are willing to make concessions and have.
I have to disagree here. "There is no Palestine." IMO the only ones who really tried to be equal were Ehud Barak and Yitzhak Rabin. Because of that, Barak was forced to retire by conservatives in the Gnesset and pressure from ultra-rightists, Rabin was murdered. Sharon was as dirty as Arafat, and it looks like Olmert is following in Sharon's footsteps.
Israel halts attacks for 48 hours[/b] Airstrike killing dozens of civilians called a 'mistake'
QANA, Lebanon (CNN) -- Israel has agreed to suspend airstrikes on southern Lebanon for 48 hours to investigate a Sunday airstrike that killed more than 60 people in Qana, Lebanon, a U.S. State Department spokesman said.
Let's see where this leads. I don't have high hopes, unfortunately.
Is there a concensus among historians that the land was uninhabited when Jews came? Not according to the books I've read. Some say that Palestinians descend from Caanaanites who were there already 2000 A.D. There's also a theory that Palestinians descend from Filisteans who came, possibly, from Crete 1300 A.C., around the same time as Jews.
I never brought up whether there were people in Israel before the Jews arrived. I was just talking about the two major groups that are there now, the Jews and Arabs.
If Palestinians claim that they are Arabs, and they do, and if the hundreds of thousands of Arabs that migrated to the British controlled Palestinian Mandate after WWI became Palestinian-Arabs, which they did, then Arabs didn't even move into the area in large numbers until the 7th Century when Arabic became the dominant language. Arabs are people that migrated out of the Arabian peninsula. I don't think they really started doing that in large numbers until after the Prophet Muhammad when Muslims were trying to conquer the surrounding territories. The claim that Palestinians were descended from the Caanaanites was only postulated very recently in historical times, pretty sure, post-1967 War.
5) Finally, the right of return claimed by Palestinians means that Israel basically can't exist.
Is this really so? Please elaborate.
I've gone over this several times. The Right Of Return means that Palestinians should get back all of their historical land within the state of Israel. That means the Jews would have to move out of any home, farm, land, city, etc. that Palestinians claim. That basically means no Israel.
However they are willing to make concessions and have.
I have to disagree here. "There is no Palestine." IMO the only ones who really tried to be equal were Ehud Barak and Yitzhak Rabin. Because of that, Barak was forced to retire by conservatives in the Gnesset and pressure from ultra-rightists, Rabin was murdered. Sharon was as dirty as Arafat, and it looks like Olmert is following in Sharon's footsteps.
The claim that there was no Palestine were made by Israeli politicians from the 1960s to the 1980s. That is not the mainstream political view today amongst Israeli poltiicians. Look at the Oslo and Camp David Peace Process that happened in the 1990s. I already outlined the major steps Israel took.
Israel allowed Palestinian fighters and leaders to return to the Occupied Territories that had been banned. Israel gave weapons to the PLO to police the area. Israel released hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. In return Arafat was suppose to crack down on terrorists. He never did.
The Oslo Accords was going to give the Palestinians, all of Gaza, most of the West Bank and Jerusalem. Arafat nixed it at the last minute and said that he wanted the right of return for all Palestinian refugees, which basically means Israel can't exist. He then started the 2nd Intifadah. The Palestinians were offered a 2 state solution and turned it down for armed struggle instead.
If you want a breakdown of the current Israeli government's policy towards the Occupied Territories and Palestinians I posted some abstracts from an article in Foreign Affaris on Page 9 of this thread.
And Sharon changed his views, I mean really changed.
And P.S. the whole argument that the Palestinians might have derived from the Caanaanites or Filistines is part of this whole stupid pissing contest about who was there first, which means absolutely nothing for what's actually happening with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict today in 2006.
My statement is that the people who have complete social agency in the area are not the group of people who have a geographic claim to the land dating back centuries. In other words, white Europeans. I'm well aware that there have been Arab Jews in the area for centuries.
This statement is either ignorant or willfully deceptive. These "white Europeans" as you refer to them are neither wholly "white" (whatever the hell that means) and certainly not "European". Rather they are products of the diaspora(s) to which Motown refers in his earlier post. They have as much of a geographic claim to the land in question as anyone does. Their time in exile, during which they were persecuted by ignorant Jew-hating people such as yourself, and forced to interbreed with the local populations for their survival (thus increasing their so-called "white" and "European" physical features) does nothing to diminish their claim to land that was historically theirs.
First, slow your roll. "Jew-hating?" No. Unwilling to write a blank check to yet another form of imperialism? Absolutely. One of the most lamentable effects of Zionism's moral house of cards justifcation is that it has opened up so many doors for avowed (and not so avowed) anti-Semites to grab the podium and say "See. We told you. The Jews do have a flagrant disregard for humanity." You apparently see little wrong with Zionism as a movement so you equate opposition to it with anti-Semitism. I'll explain what's wrong with your argument as succintly as I can, but first, let me offer this olive branch that may resolve your objections to what I've thus far posted: Change the hastily worded passage you've quoted above to "My statement is that the people who have complete social agency in the region do not have it because their ancestors have lived in the region for centuries, but because they are white/European." I think there is more than a small chance that this will still be contentious, so here we go. . .
Let's take a look at the following: "forced to interbreed with the local populations for their survival (thus increasing their so-called "white" and "European" physical features)" What you've written here is almost a textbook definition of assimilation. Rarely does it ever occur in a context other than social coercion. The ugly histories behind assimilation do not alone[/b] (let me again emphasize alone[/b]) grant an individual the right to appropriate land on which people are currently living. And make no mistake, the formation of Israel as we know it required appropriating land on which people were living at the time.
Further, I take issue with your statement "These "white Europeans" as you refer to them are neither wholly "white" (whatever the hell that means) and certainly not "European"." As a counterexample to your assertion, let's momentarily consider the family of philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein (and I know that I'm opening myself up for attack right here by citing someone who, it would seem could accurately have been called a "self-hating Jew"). Wittgenstein's family were Vienese aristocracy and, by most accounts, would certainly have referred to themselves as European. They were also of Jewish descent and were thus targeted for destruction. The Jewish members of the family who escaped the concentration camps did so narrowly. If your statement is that Jews throughout Europe's history were routinely denied a social standing afforded gentiles, I agree with you wholeheartedly. If your assertion is that resentment of Jews was pervasive and it spared none, including the most upwardly mobile members of society, I agree with you completely as well. If your assertion is that the victims of these atrocious policies and this grotesque sentiment are due compensation, I agree with you wholeheartedly. If your argument is that a person could not be Jewish and simultaneously of vastly European descent, I disagree with you wholeheartedly. Plenty of Jewish people are and identify as white. Saying that these individuals are entitled to land in the Middle East strikes me as being like me saying "I'm Coptic. I get a house in Eritrea."
As a personal example of the effects that the diaspora has on muddling the idea of a Jew's ethnic identity, my father's family traces the bulk of its post-diaspora heritage to the Middle East and we bear distinctive Sephardic features. However, before immigrating to the US and Israel, the family spent some time in Russia and accquired a European last name. This is a very common situation This fact, however does not serve as justification for the existence of Israel as we know it. As a Black person, if American political bigwigs said "All Black Americans can emigrate to and appropriate land in the following West African countries with US military support," those who took the US up on that offer would be colonizers. The fact that, in this case, virtually every potential colonizer could illustrate direct and comparitively recent ties to the region wouldn't legitimate the resulting colony. In comparing the two examples, compare "Black American" to "White/European Jew."
Much of your argument against what I'm saying seems predicated on the assumption that I'm trying to reify race or that I don't recognize it as a social construction. I've never asserted that race isn't a social contruction, isn't amorphous, or that it is static.
You continue . . .
and demonstrates the hollowness of your argument: to categorize a diasporic people by the last place that they laid their heads before reclaiming their homeland is to ignore the history of how they got to Europe and where they came from. Your argument belies the fact that all people are diasporic and all, ultimately, are of the African diaspora. It couldn't be morally/correctly argued, however, that for this reason the Spanish were exercising an equal claim to what we now know as South America when they conquered the people living on the land at the time. (Related: Nor could it ethically be argued that the Spanish claim to the land is strengthened by the fact that ethnic groups were warring with each other when they got there.)
That Arab Jews whose families have lived in the area for centuries undisplaced are not on equal footing with Jews primarily of European heredity (read: white people) is a fact that has not been refuted by those on this board. In point of fact, said Arab Jews enjoy what may be described as a sort of second-class citizenship. This has been acknowledged by even the most hardnosed of the Zionist camp, but the response so far has been to sidestep this issue by reasserting the already conceded fact that Jews have lived in the region for centuries. Imagine an advocate of Apartheid saying, ad nauseum, "Africans have lived in South Africa for centuries." Again, this isn't a defeater to my argument, and more importantly, it doesn't reconcile how a land whose initial proposal was to be a homeland where Jews could escape persecution justifies the non or underenfranchisement of a group of Jews who have lived in the area for centuries.
Early Zionists were at odds with where Israel should be. European states were proposed; Uganda was proposed, etc. I've already stated that I believe the better course of action in an effort to make reparation to victims of the Holocaust and sytematic anti-Semetism in Europe would have been to create a Jewish state in Europe.
Moreover, the manner in which the Jews were treated throughout the countries in Europe in which we took refuge proves once again that they were not truly Europeans and were certainly not treated as "white" (again, what a hollow, loaded term to throw around, its very use is an attempt to set up a dichotomy in which "white Jews" are the oppressor) If it's so hollow, explain why it is exactly that only people who would fall
into that census categorization can have complete social agency as Israeli citizens. Are you going to argue that the country's Jim Crow policies aren't merely an extension of its prioritizing of one race of people over all others?
insofar as at the convenience of every society in which they took refuge, the Jews were persectuted whenever a scapegoat was needed (pogroms, holocaust, dreyfus affair, vichy government, inqusition, blah blah blah) and served as precisely the sort of "other" that is the opposite in your silly "white"/"non-white" dichotomy of what a "white" person is. The historical othering of Jews in countries where they faced persecution isn't in question. What is in question is what seems to be your (disingenuous) claim that "By virtue of being a Jew, a Jew is not white." I'm reminded of a story related to me several years ago about a young lady, Asian, who was taken aback to find out that her boyfriend at the time had dated a chain of Asian women before her. Struck by what she suspected might be a white person's fetishizing of her, she confronted him about it. He desperately tried to compare his history as a Russian Jew and thus, he asserted, non-white, to hers an an Asian person living in America. The argument was full of holes and even were one to accept its premise, in what way would that lessen the possible offense? And to preempt: No, I'm not suggesting only white people can fetishize. My point is that certainly people's perceptions of themselves have bearing on their racial classifications, but a whole host of factors, not the least of which are social perception, geography, and heredity also play a role.
The only difference between a "white Jew" and an "Arab Jew" is the divergence of the twisted path down which the diaspora took them. Not so. As most have acknowledged, there are serious differences in social agency.
We all come from the same place and that place is Israel. The history of the area now comprising Israel as the home of the Jews has a history that far, FAR predates of any concept of Palestine as a distinct state. Please provide evidence to the contrary. You can repeat that mantra as much as you want. The real burden of proof is on you.
. . . So many holes in your argument, and that's scarcely addressing the no less important issue of Israel's treatment of non-Jewish Arabs in the region.
Just to make sure that we're on the same page as to what we're talking about, I've never claimed that there weren't Jews in the area for aeons.
You mention that Jews ... can become citizens of Israel.
Don't forget to complete the sentence " . . .at the expense of people who lived there for centuries."
Um....
Anyone else want to present a cogent list of facts (thanks motown) so that Are can come back with some more talk about "white jews." He clearly has no desire to address the historical background, only to talk about what he sees as the "black and white" issue of the Arab land and the white jew invaders, as if theres no grey area here. Fact is, as an American, I am uncomfortable with the idea of a religious state, but nearly every major religion has been state sanctioned at one point, thats why, Are, you are coming off as anti-semetic.
And the equation of "Israel" with "Jew" wasn't at all by design, right? Thanks for your historically accurate analysis as well, my friend.
I also am still waiting for Are to respond to the central question here. I know you dont think Israel has any right to exist, but considering that it does and has for 50 years, how do you expect them to respond to people whose stated goal is their complete destruction.
Is this question what I think Israel (and further the global community) should do or what I think Israel will do?
Should they just roll over? Should white americans (and black, latino, etc) all go back to there respective places of origin? Should we pack up and leave the US for the indians, south america for the indigenous, etc?
Touchy subject, and sadly, the fallout of that would be far more pronounced and harder to absorb for all groups of people involved. You may have posed this as a rhetorical, but it's actually a question I have thought about frequently. I get the impression that you want me to come out as an advocate of universal repatriation-- Which I'm not, as that is a dog chasing its tail, onion, whatever, etc., etc.
As far as Black people go-- Captive population, so the response would be even more difficult. There's no good answer to this, but you should also recognize the limitations of the comparison you're making and the points of divergence.
Oh and btw
Again, my fiancee's fam's history dates back there before 1948, certainly.
Someone get on the phone to the region and let them know that Are's thoughtful, reasoned anaylsis has solved this problem once and for all. Kudos...
Beautifully taken out of context my, friend. (It was a response to a specific statement)
AreDouble:[/b] Your not-so-subtle anti-semitic outlook of Jews in Israel is sadly twisted with historical falsehoods that you seem to have accepted as truth.
Jews throughout most of their European history and specifically the 19th and 20th century were hardly if ever seen as "White" they were seperated and persecuted in various European countries culminating the ultimate vacation period known as the holocast.
Events such as the Dreyfus Affair Showed just how Jews were viewed by "white Europeans" .
Incidents of violence and hate were fairly common throughout Europe during this time. My grandmothers family was forced form Russia due to the Pogroms.
How you assume that all of a sudden Jews went from being one of the, if not the most persecuted people of europe during that 100 year period to elevated European citizens is beyond reality. I feel that perhaps you are, once again confusing American class structure with the reality of Jewish European persecution.
This thread should be locked up. You're just eating yourself up about this shit, D. It's fucked up. There are dead children everywhere, on all sides. Hezbollah and extremists kill innocent Israelis. Israeli troops kill innocent Lebanese and Palestinians. Keep on looking at those images and you're going to make yourself sick. The fact of the matter is you have some real sick people on both sides, and they keep on perpetuating the violence at a cost that's too great for this world to bear.
And the fact of the matter is that this shit ain't nothing new. It's a fucked up situation, and it's going to STAY a fucked up situation. Too much hate, too much hate. So many people hate jews. They want to see them all dead, wiped from the planet. That's the same story for thousands of years. And the hate that some people over there have for jews is unfathomable to me. At the same time, the actions/reactions and the policies of Israel just makes me sick again and again, and has for years. It's like the abused becoming the abuser. They just won't allow themselves to live in the "shades of grey" and when they do, here comes another extremist group to provoke yet ANOTHER reaction, a reaction that goes far and beyond what it's called for, like what we're watching right now. It's the cyclical path to horror and destruction that I just don't see any way off. It has broken my heart again and again, to the point where all the scar tissue has actuallly hardened it, and made me desensitized.
Will either side ever learn? I don't know. I would hope to believe that within this lifetime they will, but I cannot.
This thread should be locked up. You're just eating yourself up about this shit, D. It's fucked up. There are dead children everywhere, on all sides. Hezbollah and extremists kill innocent Israelis. Israeli troops kill innocent Lebanese and Palestinians. Keep on looking at those images and you're going to make yourself sick. The fact of the matter is you have some real sick people on both sides, and they keep on perpetuating the violence at a cost that's too great for this world to bear.
And the fact of the matter is that this shit ain't nothing new. It's a fucked up situation, and it's going to STAY a fucked up situation. Too much hate, too much hate. So many people hate jews. They want to see them all dead, wiped from the planet. That's the same story for thousands of years. And the hate that some people over there have for jews is unfathomable to me. At the same time, the actions/reactions and the policies of Israel just makes me sick again and again, and has for years. It's like the abused becoming the abuser. They just won't allow themselves to live in the "shades of grey" and when they do, here comes another extremist group to provoke yet ANOTHER reaction, a reaction that goes far and beyond what it's called for, like what we're watching right now. It's the cyclical path to horror and destruction that I just don't see any way off. It has broken my heart again and again, to the point where all the scar tissue has actuallly hardened it, and made me desensitized.
Will either side ever learn? I don't know. I would hope to believe that within this lifetime they will, but I cannot.
And let's not forget that this is pretty much a war that's going on over there, and that the state of Israel has perpetually been at war with any number of its neighbors for so many years now it has woven its way into the psyche and identity of itself as a nation. Now I ask this - WHO IS TO BLAME FOR THAT? There is not one culprit that I think can lay claim. It goes more towards the speading of hate, greed and ignorance.
Condoleezza Rice was working to arrange the conditions for a "sustainable" halt to the violence as soon as possible.
"This is a horrible event, a terrible event, and we certainly want to make it clear that not only do we feel sorrow for what happened, but determination that it really is important to end the conditions that led to that," Snow told a group of reporters by telephone.
President George W. Bush is under pressure from Arab leaders as well as many in Europe who want an immediate ceasefire.
Despite Sunday's events, he still insists on a resolution that aims to end Hizbollah's military control of southern Lebanon, officials said.
Snow repeated that "Israel does have a right to defend itself" but said it should show restraint and remember that in the end it will need to have positive relations with Lebanon and work for a two-state solution for the Palestinians.
Chris Matthews, who is usually a GOP ass-kisser, made some great points on Imus's radio show about how Bush's foreign policy has killed the white house's chances of acting as a negotiater.
"Yeah, I think we've lost one big thing in this administration, and it's not going to surprise you to hear it. You know, every great American president since '48, when Israel was created, re-established, whatever, after a couple of thousand years, was to wear two hats, and to do a pretty good job with them. Some presidents did better than others. Clinton did a pretty good job especially. You've got to be a friend of the Israel Yiddish Star. That's American policy, it's American morale. We're friends of Israel. It's politics, it's policy, whatever you want to call it, we're a friend of Israel. Number two, and you've got to wear this second hat. The power broker in the region, the big power broker that can come in and say all right, boys and girls, stop the fighting. We're going to do this, we're going to the peace deal, we're going to cut the final deal, and you're going to listen to us.
I think we've completely lost our ability to be a power broker. I think Condi Rice went over there yesterday with the Israeli demands. She didn't have the American demands. They're exactly the same as the Israeli demands. It's like we don't have an independent role in the world now. We're not the power broker like Eisenhower was, or Clinton tried to be, or Carter was, where you can step aside and say yeah, I know, everybody knows we're friends with Israel, but let's...now, we're going to play referee. And we could always do that. This administration is absolutely unwilling to play that role of power broker. It's incapable at this point. There's Condi Rice. I'm watching her. It's a joke. They know we're just there as a friend of Israel, and that's how we're seen. And even Malaki, the head of Iraq, is dumping on us. And we put him in there. I think it's a real failure of an administration not to have an independent power role in that region, and it's going to hurt like mad in the next couple of weeks, because we can't play referee now. Everybody knows whose side we're on, 100%."
This thread should be locked up. You're just eating yourself up about this shit, D. It's fucked up. There are dead children everywhere, on all sides. Hezbollah and extremists kill innocent Israelis. Israeli troops kill innocent Lebanese and Palestinians. Keep on looking at those images and you're going to make yourself sick. The fact of the matter is you have some real sick people on both sides, and they keep on perpetuating the violence at a cost that's too great for this world to bear.
And the fact of the matter is that this shit ain't nothing new. It's a fucked up situation, and it's going to STAY a fucked up situation. Too much hate, too much hate. So many people hate jews. They want to see them all dead, wiped from the planet. That's the same story for thousands of years. And the hate that some people over there have for jews is unfathomable to me. At the same time, the actions/reactions and the policies of Israel just makes me sick again and again, and has for years. It's like the abused becoming the abuser. They just won't allow themselves to live in the "shades of grey" and when they do, here comes another extremist group to provoke yet ANOTHER reaction, a reaction that goes far and beyond what it's called for, like what we're watching right now. It's the cyclical path to horror and destruction that I just don't see any way off. It has broken my heart again and again, to the point where all the scar tissue has actuallly hardened it, and made me desensitized.
Will either side ever learn? I don't know. I would hope to believe that within this lifetime they will, but I cannot.
And as far as being astoundingly offended by my envisioning Israel a resort for white people, sadly, my friend, the fact that it offended you doesn't make my characterization any less astoundingly accurate. A white person can buy a ticket to this resort merely by saying "I am a Jew," while people indigenous to the area are all too often relegated to looking in through the gates. The retort to this observation is often that I'm being racist or culturally insensitive.
My response is not to accuse of you racism or cultural insensitivity. Instead, I think you're extremely condescending and very likely wilfully blind. Despite your continuous characterisation of Israel as a resort for white people, my family in Israel, of various skin colours (which is apparently of utmost relevance to your analysis of the place), do not go about their lives as if they are on vacation, enjoying their stay in Club Med Israel. Israel is their home. To describe their home as a resort may be appropriate within your understanding of the world, but it does not change the fact that it's just that.
You continue to hold that Israel exists only for white people. Like rootless, I'll dispute this vehemently. Ultimately, however, I care only that a country exists for me and mine, Jews. I'm loathe to allow anti-Semitism to define my Jewish identity, but I cannot ignore that my grandmother, who's still alive and kicking, spent her late teens in Auschwitz. Little more than sixty years separate me from the gas chamber. The next time the goosesteppers come for me, I'll have somewhere to go. I doubt very much that you can imagine the difference this makes in my life. To me, it's a simple pragmatism--or realpolitik, if you prefer--that trumps any post-colonial, anti-imperialist screed: Israel means I have a measure of security that my people haven't had for much of recorded history and so, at a fundamental level, I avowedly support and rely on this particular "white resort's" existance, dubious military strategy notwithstanding.
No, not simply respect, actively support its resolutions and play a part in enforcing them.
Enforce how? The US has certainly supported U.N. resolutions that have not only called for Hezbollah to disband and disarm, but also for Israel to withdraw it's troops from Lebanon (1559) so I'm not exactly sure what you're referring to.
The US's recent history with the UN is not encouaging. Think back even to the UN resolutions about going to war in Iraq and how the US chose to ignore them, the naked hostility of Ambassador Bolton towards the organisation, the demands of the US to have exceptional and unique powers to veto UN resolutions in the face of democratic votes, the fact that the US don't contribute peacekeeping troops to UN missions
Again, the US participates in U.N. missions all the time, but I think we can both agree here that in this instance, the presence of troops from the US in Lebanon would not sit well with either the Lebanese or those in the US who remember what happened to us the last time we were there.
- all in all, it adds up to disregard for the only mandated global organisation dedicated to maintaining world peace . When the US, the most powerful member of a 191 state coalition effectively tears up the UN constitution and says it will not be bound by its own rules, why should any other member play ball?
"Dedicated to maintaining world peace"?! Wow. Exactly when and where have they ever succeeded in doing that? Lebanon? Darfur? Sudan? Rwanda? Bosnia? All triumphs in global peacekeeping efforts no doubt. But of course all blame for any failure / incompetence on behalf of the United Nations lay squarely at the feet of the US. I suppose Oil-For-Food was all our fault as well.
The UN never turned a blind eye to Hezbollah
They certainly never did anything to stop them from moving 13,000+ missiles across Lebanon from Syria and then lobbing them over the border into Israel either.
which is clearly deemed by them to be a terrorist organisation and not a nation state on whom they can bring pressure to bear.
EDIT: (Please show me ONE instance in any U.N. resolution where the security council collectively refers to Hezbollah as a "terrorist" organization.)
Does Hezbollah not legitimately hold power in the Lebanese government, voted in by the Lebanese people? The screws have in fact been turned on the equally impotent "good" government of Lebanon many times in order to pressure Hezbollah but sadly they've proven to be either too shook or simply unwilling to follow through. Perhaps understandably so. At this point, outside military force must be used to remove Hezbollah. Period. I mean as far as I can tell, they have no intention of altering their charter any time soon to include a "live and let live" byline with Israel.
So, no economic or trade sanctions available to them, only the moral weight of the world as represented by the UN member states. Minus the support of Israel and the US, of course, which pretty much negates any chance of the UN making progress.
Sorry, but you will not convince me in a million years that any further support of the U.N. by Israel (whom Hezbollah clearly wishes to see wiped off the map) and/or the US would translate into any kind of real progress towards peace. For one thing, Hezbollah's goal (again, by their own admission) is to see the complete elimination of Israel no if, ands or maybes, so how pray tell, do you "play ball" with that?
No one (including the U.N., the Lebanese government or anyone now conveniently protesting Israel's "disproportionate" use of force) gave a shit, marched for "peace" or made a sound during the last year when Hezbollah was raining rockets into Israel. Please to convince me how any of these people are truly interested in peace.
Personally I think the world is a better place for having the UN but you obviously have a much bleaker view and it would be unquestionably be a stronger and more effective organisation with US support than it is without it. Israel's actions are indefensible. I'm out.
NPR's Fresh Air interview show continues to come through with some excellent guests. Today they had Christopher Dickey from Newsweek. He thinks Israel has gotten itself into a futile war with Hezbollah that it might not come out of successfully. Here's the link to the interview which can be heard on RealAudio.
Israel won't find any measure of success in this. All they've done so far is convince a new generation of Arabs that they are, indeed, baby killers. And they've strengthened Hezbollah.
This thread should be locked up. You're just eating yourself up about this shit, D. It's fucked up. There are dead children everywhere, on all sides. Hezbollah and extremists kill innocent Israelis. Israeli troops kill innocent Lebanese and Palestinians. Keep on looking at those images and you're going to make yourself sick. The fact of the matter is you have some real sick people on both sides, and they keep on perpetuating the violence at a cost that's too great for this world to bear.
And the fact of the matter is that this shit ain't nothing new. It's a fucked up situation, and it's going to STAY a fucked up situation. Too much hate, too much hate. So many people hate jews. They want to see them all dead, wiped from the planet. That's the same story for thousands of years. And the hate that some people over there have for jews is unfathomable to me. At the same time, the actions/reactions and the policies of Israel just makes me sick again and again, and has for years. It's like the abused becoming the abuser. They just won't allow themselves to live in the "shades of grey" and when they do, here comes another extremist group to provoke yet ANOTHER reaction, a reaction that goes far and beyond what it's called for, like what we're watching right now. It's the cyclical path to horror and destruction that I just don't see any way off. It has broken my heart again and again, to the point where all the scar tissue has actuallly hardened it, and made me desensitized.
Will either side ever learn? I don't know. I would hope to believe that within this lifetime they will, but I cannot.
I totally agree with you, Cosmo. Perfectly stated...but I don't agree that this thread should be locked up.
Comments
Um....
Anyone else want to present a cogent list of facts (thanks motown) so that Are can come back with some more talk about "white jews." He clearly has no desire to address the historical background, only to talk about what he sees as the "black and white" issue of the Arab land and the white jew invaders, as if theres no grey area here. Fact is, as an American, I am uncomfortable with the idea of a religious state, but nearly every major religion has been state sanctioned at one point, thats why, Are, you are coming off as anti-semetic.
Also, while I understand there is a significance to the land for Christians, can anyone speak on my earlier question about the religious significance within Islam of Israel, beyond Palestinian claims.
I also am still waiting for Are to respond to the central question here. I know you dont think Israel has any right to exist, but considering that it does and has for 50 years, how do you expect them to respond to people whose stated goal is their complete destruction. Should they just roll over? Should white americans (and black, latino, etc) all go back to there respective places of origin? Should we pack up and leave the US for the indians, south america for the indigenous, etc?
Oh and btw
Someone get on the phone to the region and let them know that Are's thoughtful, reasoned anaylsis has solved this problem once and for all. Kudos...
Can someone explain to me again how this current campaign is going to "succeed" for Israel?
July 30, 2006
Israeli Strike Is Deadliest in Fighting So Far[/b]
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
QANA, Lebanon, July 30 ??? A series of Israeli airstrikes in this small mountain town today killed dozens of people in the deadliest single attack in the war here so far. At least 54 people were killed, with 37 of them children, news agencies reported.[/b]
Rescue workers and neighbors worked frantically to find survivors among the wreckage of a house, where two large extended families were hiding in a garage. Six small children, their mouths open and full of dirt, were brought out and laid on stretchers.
"I felt as if I was turning around, and the earth was going up, and I was going into the earth," said Mohamed Chaloub, a father of five who was thrown into a doorway and managed to escape. All five of his children, including a 2-year-old child, were killed. His wife, sister and aunt were also killed.
Neighbors said they ran to the house after the first strike, around 1 a.m., and that they heard screams and tried to reach people trapped inside, but the strikes persisted and they could not reach them. In the morning, rescue workers pulled bodies of 22 people out of the rubble, but neighbors said more bodies were inside.
The death toll climbed as rescue workers retrieved more people from the collapsed building, carrying limp bodies away on stretchers and in blankets.
The strike came as thousands protested in Beirut and a mob of young men started breaking windows and damaging buildings. Television footage showed crowds of men attacking a United Nations building in the capital.
The Israeli government said in a statement on its Foreign Ministry Web site that the Israeli army attacked missile launch sites in the area of Qana, from where it said hundreds of missiles were launched towards the Israeli city of Nahariya and the communities in the western Galilee.
It said that Hezbollah has ???turned the suburbs of Lebanon into a war front by firing missiles from within civilian areas.??? It said 18 Israeli civilians have been killed and over 400 have been wounded by Hezbollah rocket attacks which have disrupted the lives of tens of thousands of Israeli citizens.[/b]
The statement said that residents in Qana and the region had been warned several days in advance to leave the village.
The strikes on Qana came after Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice returned to Israel on Saturday evening to press for a substantive agreement that could lead to a more rapid cease-fire and the insertion of an international force along the Lebanese border with Israel.
Ms. Rice, on her way back from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, had praised the Lebanese government, which includes two Hezbollah ministers, for agreeing on the outlines of a possible cease-fire package.
But she cancelled a visit to Beirut today after the Qana strikes, according to news agencies.
While there has been a sense that President Bush, after his meeting in Washington with Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, had suddenly decided to give Israel a shorter period in which to hammer Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel said in a statement today that Israel was not ???rushing in??? to a ceasefire before Israel had achieved its goals.
Mr. Olmert said today that Israel regretted the death of civilians in Qana, where he said Hezbollah had fired rockets at Kiryat Shmona and Afula.
Ms. Rice is working to draft a United Nations Security Council resolution that would allow for the insertion of 15,000 to 20,000 international peacekeepers along the Lebanese border with Israel and along Lebanon???s border with Syria, to prevent the rearming of Hezbollah. The force would also work with the Lebanese Army to enable it to begin patrolling the border itself.
On Monday, there will be a meeting at the United Nations to discuss which nations might contribute to such a force. American officials said they might seek a Security Council resolution authorizing the force as early as Wednesday. The United States has been isolated in its refusal to call for an immediate cessation of hostilities between Israel and Lebanon, arguing that the conditions were not ripe for a sustainable cease-fire.
But the international cry for a halt to Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon has been growing, especially after Israel hit a United Nations post, killing four United Nations observers. Israel denied the accusation by Secretary General Kofi Annan that the post was deliberately hit, but with the death toll in Lebanon reported by officials there to be nearing 450 people, mostly civilians, pressure on the United States has been growing to give Mr. Olmert an earlier deadline.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/30/world/...agewanted=print
Dome of the Rock, located on the temple mount in Jersalem, third holiest site in Islam. Reverred as the spot where muhammads ascended to heaven.
Like Jews Arabs are an Abrahamic people and revere his tomb in Hebron.
The list could go on for a while
I can't even fathom that.
Yes.
I'm so sick of this shit.
This is nothing compared to people getting killed, but still...very, very bad.
My point is that you're getting into a silly historical argument that will get you no where.
1) Jews have had a continus presence in the region since 1300 B.C. to 1948 A.D. and the founding of Israel. That's over 3200 years. Yet you say that Jews have a "mythical claim" to the land.
2) You said that Palestinians had claims to the land for "thousands of years." Arabs didn't even become the dominant group until the 7th century A.D.. That means Jews were there from 1300 B.C. to the 600s A.D., 1900 years before Arabs really took over. Not only that, but 100s of thousands of BOTH Jews and Arabs never even showed up to what would become Israel until after WWI which ended in 1918. So from 1918 to 1948, 30 years is when a lot of Jews and Arabs actually have "claim to the land."
3) You bring up the "white" "European tourist" Jews as taking over. What about the thousands of Middle Eastern Jews that were forced out of their homes and migrated to Israel?
4) You say that Palestinians have just as much right to return to their former homes, if not more than Jews. So your fiance's family had a farm before they were displaced and that they should be able to get it back. That basically means that if there were any Jews living there they would have to leave. Since you think they're all "white tourist Europeans" anyways, I guess they can go back home after their "vacation." What about the Middle Eastern Jews though? You think Saudia Arabia, Iraq, and other Arab countries are going to take them back?
5) Finally, the right of return claimed by Palestinians means that Israel basically can't exist. All the Jews have to get up and leave and give back the land to the Palestinians that claim it. Not going to happen. Which is my whole point. You're making a dead end argument.
Political comprimose rarely means both sides get what they want, especially if one side is more powerful than the other, and Israel is more powerful. However they are willing to make concessions and have. They let PLO fighters and leaders return to the Occupied Territories. They let out hundreds of Palestinians from jail, they pulled out of Gaza, they're making plans to pull out of most of the West Bank, and they compromised on Jerusalem. The Palestinians mostly have decided to go to war instead, and can't even govern the Gaza Strip themselves. After Hamas won the elections, they started gun battles with Fatah, so they really need to get their shit together, and going into arcane and useless arguments about who was on the land first, and who gets to take back that farm in Haifa or wherever, seem to be a complete waste of time to me.
Here's a study done by the Project On Defense Alternatives, they give the civilian death toll as 1000-1300[/b].
Appendix 1. Estimation of Civilian Bombing Casualties: Method and Sources
The estimate of civilian bombing casualties used in this report -- 1000-1300 -- draws on media sources much as the Herold study does, but it applies a stricter criteria to screen these sources and correct for likely reporting errors and distortions. In deriving the 1000-1300 estimate only Western press sources were used for hard numbers -- principally wire services (Reuters, Associated Press, and Agence France-Presse) and the British press (BBC News, the Independent, The Times, and the Guardian). These sources seemed more attuned to the issue of civilian casualties than were US newspapers, while also being disinclined to accept on face value official Taliban reports or accounts from the Pakistani press.[/b]
Within the large body of press accounts reviewed for this study, the estimates were anchored to a subset: (i) journalist eyewitness accounts of damage, injury, and burial and (ii) journalist interviews with medical personnel, aid workers on the scene, and individuals who lost family members. These well-investigated cases cover less than 25 percent of the reported incidents and they provide strong evidence of more than 300 deaths. These cases provided a yardstick for evaluating other reports.
Also important in deriving the 1000-1300 estimate were journalist interviews with refugees, although numerical estimates given by refugees of civilian deaths outside their own families were not taken at face value. In three cases where refugee reports of non-related casualties could be checked against journalist or other investigations on the scene of a reported bombing, the refugee recollections disagreed with the scene reports by a factor of more than three, on average. Similarly, official Taliban tallies of casualties (which were often broadcast via the Pakistan press) seem to disagree with journalist scene reports by a factor of more than four, on average. (The discount factor for Taliban reports is based on cases in Kabul that were investigated by reporters for the Agence France Presse.)
One need not assume duplicity as the explanation for exaggeration. In fact, mis-perception and exaggeration should be expected in the recollection of traumatic events by frightened or injured people. As for the quality of official reports: even assuming honest intent, this depends on the investigative capabilities, carefulness, and good-functioning of bureaucracies. In the best of times, the Taliban might be expected to under-perform. And, of course, they had little incentive to "err on the conservative side" in estimating civilian casualties for the press during the war.
For the purposes of the present study, when Afghan refugee or government reports were expressed in vague terms, the following reduction factors were used to derive an estimate: "some or a few" deaths was interpreted as 1, "a dozen or more" was interpreted as 3-4, "dozens" was interpreted as 8-10, "scores" was interpreted as 10-15, "hundreds" was interpreted as "40-60". When accounts explicitly mixed "dead" and "wounded" or gave a combined total for "casualties", only 25 percent of the estimate was treated as "dead".
If all Taliban government and Afghan refugee accounts of the numbers of civilians killed or wounded in the bombing campaign are taken at face value they would suggest a total of more than 5000 killed and 10,000 wounded. As noted above, it is likely that the actual toll is less than one-quarter as many. This discrepancy, although large, is not particularly surprising. In the United States, official estimates of the number of people killed on 11 September were initially twice as high as where they sit today. It took more than a month for the figures to be adjusted downward and more than two months before they came close to the present official estimate. As of 22 December, the official toll of those killed on 11 September still disagrees with other authoritative accounts (by the media and charities) and probably will be revised downward by another 15 percent before stabilizing. The final accounting of the deaths suffered on 11 September will probably be 50 percent below the estimates that prevailed during the first month after the attack.
Is there a concensus among historians that the land was uninhabited when Jews came? Not according to the books I've read. Some say that Palestinians descend from Caanaanites who were there already 2000 A.D. There's also a theory that Palestinians descend from Filisteans who came, possibly, from Crete 1300 A.C., around the same time as Jews.
Bottom line: arguing over who was there first leads nowhere, since there is not a correct answer to that.
Is this really so? Please elaborate.
I have to disagree here. "There is no Palestine." IMO the only ones who really tried to be equal were Ehud Barak and Yitzhak Rabin. Because of that, Barak was forced to retire by conservatives in the Gnesset and pressure from ultra-rightists, Rabin was murdered. Sharon was as dirty as Arafat, and it looks like Olmert is following in Sharon's footsteps.
Airstrike killing dozens of civilians called a 'mistake'
QANA, Lebanon (CNN) -- Israel has agreed to suspend airstrikes on southern Lebanon for 48 hours to investigate a Sunday airstrike that killed more than 60 people in Qana, Lebanon, a U.S. State Department spokesman said.
Let's see where this leads. I don't have high hopes, unfortunately.
I never brought up whether there were people in Israel before the Jews arrived. I was just talking about the two major groups that are there now, the Jews and Arabs.
If Palestinians claim that they are Arabs, and they do, and if the hundreds of thousands of Arabs that migrated to the British controlled Palestinian Mandate after WWI became Palestinian-Arabs, which they did, then Arabs didn't even move into the area in large numbers until the 7th Century when Arabic became the dominant language. Arabs are people that migrated out of the Arabian peninsula. I don't think they really started doing that in large numbers until after the Prophet Muhammad when Muslims were trying to conquer the surrounding territories. The claim that Palestinians were descended from the Caanaanites was only postulated very recently in historical times, pretty sure, post-1967 War.
I've gone over this several times. The Right Of Return means that Palestinians should get back all of their historical land within the state of Israel. That means the Jews would have to move out of any home, farm, land, city, etc. that Palestinians claim. That basically means no Israel.
The claim that there was no Palestine were made by Israeli politicians from the 1960s to the 1980s. That is not the mainstream political view today amongst Israeli poltiicians. Look at the Oslo and Camp David Peace Process that happened in the 1990s. I already outlined the major steps Israel took.
Israel allowed Palestinian fighters and leaders to return to the Occupied Territories that had been banned. Israel gave weapons to the PLO to police the area. Israel released hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. In return Arafat was suppose to crack down on terrorists. He never did.
The Oslo Accords was going to give the Palestinians, all of Gaza, most of the West Bank and Jerusalem. Arafat nixed it at the last minute and said that he wanted the right of return for all Palestinian refugees, which basically means Israel can't exist. He then started the 2nd Intifadah. The Palestinians were offered a 2 state solution and turned it down for armed struggle instead.
If you want a breakdown of the current Israeli government's policy towards the Occupied Territories and Palestinians I posted some abstracts from an article in Foreign Affaris on Page 9 of this thread.
And Sharon changed his views, I mean really changed.
First, slow your roll. "Jew-hating?" No. Unwilling to write a blank check to yet another form of imperialism? Absolutely. One of the most lamentable effects of Zionism's moral house of cards justifcation is that it has opened up so many doors for avowed (and not so avowed) anti-Semites to grab the podium and say "See. We told you. The Jews do have a flagrant disregard for humanity." You apparently see little wrong with Zionism as a movement so you equate opposition to it with anti-Semitism. I'll explain what's wrong with your argument as succintly as I can, but first, let me offer this olive branch that may resolve your objections to what I've thus far posted: Change the hastily worded passage you've quoted above to "My statement is that the people who have complete social agency in the region do not have it because their ancestors have lived in the region for centuries, but because they are white/European." I think there is more than a small chance that this will still be contentious, so here we go. . .
Let's take a look at the following: "forced to interbreed with the local populations for their survival (thus increasing their so-called "white" and "European" physical features)" What you've written here is almost a textbook definition of assimilation. Rarely does it ever occur in a context other than social coercion. The ugly histories behind assimilation do not alone[/b] (let me again emphasize alone[/b]) grant an individual the right to appropriate land on which people are currently living. And make no mistake, the formation of Israel as we know it required appropriating land on which people were living at the time.
Further, I take issue with your statement "These "white Europeans" as you refer to them are neither wholly "white" (whatever the hell that means) and certainly not "European"." As a counterexample to your assertion, let's momentarily consider the family of philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein (and I know that I'm opening myself up for attack right here by citing someone who, it would seem could accurately have been called a "self-hating Jew"). Wittgenstein's family were Vienese aristocracy and, by most accounts, would certainly have referred to themselves as European. They were also of Jewish descent and were thus targeted for destruction. The Jewish members of the family who escaped the concentration camps did so narrowly. If your statement is that Jews throughout Europe's history were routinely denied a social standing afforded gentiles, I agree with you wholeheartedly. If your assertion is that resentment of Jews was pervasive and it spared none, including the most upwardly mobile members of society, I agree with you completely as well. If your assertion is that the victims of these atrocious policies and this grotesque sentiment are due compensation, I agree with you wholeheartedly. If your argument is that a person could not be Jewish and simultaneously of vastly European descent, I disagree with you wholeheartedly. Plenty of Jewish people are and identify as white. Saying that these individuals are entitled to land in the Middle East strikes me as being like me saying "I'm Coptic. I get a house in Eritrea."
As a personal example of the effects that the diaspora has on muddling the idea of a Jew's ethnic identity, my father's family traces the bulk of its post-diaspora heritage to the Middle East and we bear distinctive Sephardic features. However, before immigrating to the US and Israel, the family spent some time in Russia and accquired a European last name. This is a very common situation
This fact, however does not serve as justification for the existence of Israel as we know it. As a Black person, if American political bigwigs said "All Black Americans can emigrate to and appropriate land in the following West African countries with US military support," those who took the US up on that offer would be colonizers. The fact that, in this case, virtually every potential colonizer could illustrate direct and comparitively recent ties to the region wouldn't legitimate the resulting colony. In comparing the two examples, compare "Black American" to "White/European Jew."
Much of your argument against what I'm saying seems predicated on the assumption that I'm trying to reify race or that I don't recognize it as a social construction. I've never asserted that race isn't a social contruction, isn't amorphous, or that it is static.
You continue . . .
and demonstrates the hollowness of your argument: to categorize a diasporic people by the last place that they laid their heads before reclaiming their homeland is to ignore the history of how they got to Europe and where they came from.
Your argument belies the fact that all people are diasporic and all, ultimately, are of the African diaspora. It couldn't be morally/correctly argued, however, that for this reason the Spanish were exercising an equal claim to what we now know as South America when they conquered the people living on the land at the time. (Related: Nor could it ethically be argued that the Spanish claim to the land is strengthened by the fact that ethnic groups were warring with each other when they got there.)
That Arab Jews whose families have lived in the area for centuries undisplaced are not on equal footing with Jews primarily of European heredity (read: white people) is a fact that has not been refuted by those on this board. In point of fact, said Arab Jews enjoy what may be described as a sort of second-class citizenship. This has been acknowledged by even the most hardnosed of the Zionist camp, but the response so far has been to sidestep this issue by reasserting the already conceded fact that Jews have lived in the region for centuries. Imagine an advocate of Apartheid saying, ad nauseum, "Africans have lived in South Africa for centuries." Again, this isn't a defeater to my argument, and more importantly, it doesn't reconcile how a land whose initial proposal was to be a homeland where Jews could escape persecution justifies the non or underenfranchisement of a group of Jews who have lived in the area for centuries.
Early Zionists were at odds with where Israel should be. European states were proposed; Uganda was proposed, etc. I've already stated that I believe the better course of action in an effort to make reparation to victims of the Holocaust and sytematic anti-Semetism in Europe would have been to create a Jewish state in Europe.
Moreover, the manner in which the Jews were treated throughout the countries in Europe in which we took refuge proves once again that they were not truly Europeans and were certainly not treated as "white" (again, what a hollow, loaded term to throw around, its very use is an attempt to set up a dichotomy in which "white Jews" are the oppressor)
If it's so hollow, explain why it is exactly that only people who would fall into that census categorization can have complete social agency as Israeli citizens. Are you going to argue that the country's Jim Crow policies aren't merely an extension of its prioritizing of one race of people over all others?
insofar as at the convenience of every society in which they took refuge, the Jews were persectuted whenever a scapegoat was needed (pogroms, holocaust, dreyfus affair, vichy government, inqusition, blah blah blah) and served as precisely the sort of "other" that is the opposite in your silly "white"/"non-white" dichotomy of what a "white" person is.
The historical othering of Jews in countries where they faced persecution isn't in question. What is in question is what seems to be your (disingenuous) claim that "By virtue of being a Jew, a Jew is not white." I'm reminded of a story related to me several years ago about a young lady, Asian, who was taken aback to find out that her boyfriend at the time had dated a chain of Asian women before her. Struck by what she suspected might be a white person's fetishizing of her, she confronted him about it. He desperately tried to compare his history as a Russian Jew and thus, he asserted, non-white, to hers an an Asian person living in America. The argument was full of holes and even were one to accept its premise, in what way would that lessen the possible offense? And to preempt: No, I'm not suggesting only white people can fetishize. My point is that certainly people's perceptions of themselves have bearing on their racial classifications, but a whole host of factors, not the least of which are social perception, geography, and heredity also play a role.
The only difference between a "white Jew" and an "Arab Jew" is the divergence of the twisted path down which the diaspora took them.
Not so. As most have acknowledged, there are serious differences in social agency.
We all come from the same place and that place is Israel. The history of the area now comprising Israel as the home of the Jews has a history that far, FAR predates of any concept of Palestine as a distinct state. Please provide evidence to the contrary.
You can repeat that mantra as much as you want. The real burden of proof is on you.
. . . So many holes in your argument, and that's scarcely addressing the no less important issue of Israel's treatment of non-Jewish Arabs in the region.
And the equation of "Israel" with "Jew" wasn't at all by design, right? Thanks for your historically accurate analysis as well, my friend.
Is this question what I think Israel (and further the global community) should do or what I think Israel will do?
Touchy subject, and sadly, the fallout of that would be far more pronounced and harder to absorb for all groups of people involved. You may have posed this as a rhetorical, but it's actually a question I have thought about frequently. I get the impression that you want me to come out as an advocate of universal repatriation-- Which I'm not, as that is a dog chasing its tail, onion, whatever, etc., etc.
As far as Black people go-- Captive population, so the response would be even more difficult. There's no good answer to this, but you should also recognize the limitations of the comparison you're making and the points of divergence.
Beautifully taken out of context my, friend. (It was a response to a specific statement)
Jews throughout most of their European history and specifically the 19th and 20th century were hardly if ever seen as "White" they were seperated and persecuted in various European countries culminating the ultimate vacation period known as the holocast.
Events such as the Dreyfus Affair Showed just how Jews were viewed by "white Europeans" .
Incidents of violence and hate were fairly common throughout Europe during this time. My grandmothers family was forced form Russia due to the Pogroms.
How you assume that all of a sudden Jews went from being one of the, if not the most persecuted people of europe during that 100 year period to elevated European citizens is beyond reality. I feel that perhaps you are, once again confusing American class structure with the reality of Jewish European persecution.
no more
And the fact of the matter is that this shit ain't nothing new. It's a fucked up situation, and it's going to STAY a fucked up situation. Too much hate, too much hate. So many people hate jews. They want to see them all dead, wiped from the planet. That's the same story for thousands of years. And the hate that some people over there have for jews is unfathomable to me. At the same time, the actions/reactions and the policies of Israel just makes me sick again and again, and has for years. It's like the abused becoming the abuser. They just won't allow themselves to live in the "shades of grey" and when they do, here comes another extremist group to provoke yet ANOTHER reaction, a reaction that goes far and beyond what it's called for, like what we're watching right now. It's the cyclical path to horror and destruction that I just don't see any way off. It has broken my heart again and again, to the point where all the scar tissue has actuallly hardened it, and made me desensitized.
Will either side ever learn? I don't know. I would hope to believe that within this lifetime they will, but I cannot.
And let's not forget that this is pretty much a war that's going on over there, and that the state of Israel has perpetually been at war with any number of its neighbors for so many years now it has woven its way into the psyche and identity of itself as a nation. Now I ask this - WHO IS TO BLAME FOR THAT? There is not one culprit that I think can lay claim. It goes more towards the speading of hate, greed and ignorance.
Chris Matthews, who is usually a GOP ass-kisser, made some great points on Imus's radio show about how Bush's foreign policy has killed the white house's chances of acting as a negotiater.
"Yeah, I think we've lost one big thing in this administration, and it's not going to surprise you to hear it. You know, every great American president since '48, when Israel was created, re-established, whatever, after a couple of thousand years, was to wear two hats, and to do a pretty good job with them. Some presidents did better than others. Clinton did a pretty good job especially. You've got to be a friend of the Israel Yiddish Star. That's American policy, it's American morale. We're friends of Israel. It's politics, it's policy, whatever you want to call it, we're a friend of Israel. Number two, and you've got to wear this second hat. The power broker in the region, the big power broker that can come in and say all right, boys and girls, stop the fighting. We're going to do this, we're going to the peace deal, we're going to cut the final deal, and you're going to listen to us.
I think we've completely lost our ability to be a power broker. I think Condi Rice went over there yesterday with the Israeli demands. She didn't have the American demands. They're exactly the same as the Israeli demands. It's like we don't have an independent role in the world now. We're not the power broker like Eisenhower was, or Clinton tried to be, or Carter was, where you can step aside and say yeah, I know, everybody knows we're friends with Israel, but let's...now, we're going to play referee. And we could always do that. This administration is absolutely unwilling to play that role of power broker. It's incapable at this point. There's Condi Rice. I'm watching her. It's a joke. They know we're just there as a friend of Israel, and that's how we're seen. And even Malaki, the head of Iraq, is dumping on us. And we put him in there. I think it's a real failure of an administration not to have an independent power role in that region, and it's going to hurt like mad in the next couple of weeks, because we can't play referee now. Everybody knows whose side we're on, 100%."
you are right.
My response is not to accuse of you racism or cultural insensitivity. Instead, I think you're extremely condescending and very likely wilfully blind. Despite your continuous characterisation of Israel as a resort for white people, my family in Israel, of various skin colours (which is apparently of utmost relevance to your analysis of the place), do not go about their lives as if they are on vacation, enjoying their stay in Club Med Israel. Israel is their home. To describe their home as a resort may be appropriate within your understanding of the world, but it does not change the fact that it's just that.
You continue to hold that Israel exists only for white people. Like rootless, I'll dispute this vehemently. Ultimately, however, I care only that a country exists for me and mine, Jews. I'm loathe to allow anti-Semitism to define my Jewish identity, but I cannot ignore that my grandmother, who's still alive and kicking, spent her late teens in Auschwitz. Little more than sixty years separate me from the gas chamber. The next time the goosesteppers come for me, I'll have somewhere to go. I doubt very much that you can imagine the difference this makes in my life. To me, it's a simple pragmatism--or realpolitik, if you prefer--that trumps any post-colonial, anti-imperialist screed: Israel means I have a measure of security that my people haven't had for much of recorded history and so, at a fundamental level, I avowedly support and rely on this particular "white resort's" existance, dubious military strategy notwithstanding.
Personally I think the world is a better place for having the UN but you obviously have a much bleaker view and it would be unquestionably be a stronger and more effective organisation with US support than it is without it. Israel's actions are indefensible. I'm out.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5594614
I totally agree with you, Cosmo. Perfectly stated...but I don't agree that this thread should be locked up.
ps-why don't WE start by unignoring each other?