Why should I provide references to a claim I did not make? Are you denying that Israel claimed land that did not belong to them prior to 1973 (land which they still hold today)? I can show you a map if you don't believe me, but I assume you have this basic knowledge. As for hostility towards neighbors prior to 1973, you need only refer to the mainstream history of the 1967 war: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-Day_War Or the Suez Crisis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Crisis#Invasion Cite some of these Middle Easterners, and show me that they have not only the desire but an actual ability to make good on their threat. If you want to justify paranoid psychosis that has resulted in the deaths of thousands, you better have strong evidence at hand. Note, also, that Israel has added the most powerful country on the planet as its chief ally since the period you are talking about.
You're right, they should have waited and watched the imminent attack the other side has admitted they were planning and massing troops for if they really wanted to be justified. Your right. Even after putting up with daily Fedayeen raids into southern Israel which resulted in 800+ Israeli deaths, the $100 million dollar Egyptian purchase of offensive weapons from the Soviet Union violating the 1948 peace agreement which were built up on the border, and even in the face of Nasser's stated goal of starving the Israelis out as a preparation for invasion, there was no justification. I assume you hate France and England equally as much as you hate Israel, too. Right? I mean, since it was their plan and all. So unless they put themselves in a position where they are vulnerable to be destroyed, they have no justification for defending themselves from an attack which will prevent them from being destroyed. But once they get in that position and defend themselves, they are no longer justified in defending themselves. Very nice recursive logic. I tell you what, why don't we start with allowing people to own Cool Hand Luke or Slapshot (since leading man Paul Newman, the Zionist pig, was once in the evil Zionist film Exodus) in Lebanon without being charged with treason in support of the Zionist enemy and then the Israelis can reciprocate back a little bit. Again, you are wonderfully cavalier when it comes to other people's safety.
Israel defeated the Royal Jordanian military during the 6 Day War, but what preceeded that war has a bearing on how the war evolved. That's important, because everything that has occured since the 6 Day War springs from that conflict. Here's some interesting reading: The long border between Jordan and Israel was tense since the beginning of Fatah's guerrilla operations in January 1965. While Syria was the main supporter of such operations, Israel viewed the state from which the raids were perpetrated as responsible. King Hussein, the Hashemite ruler, was in a bind: he did not want to appear as cooperating with Israel in light of the delicate relationship of his government with the majority Palestinian population in his kingdom, and his success in preventing such raids was only partial. In the summer and autumn of 1966 several incidents occurred, involving Israeli civilians and military personnel. This culminated on 11 November 1966, when an Israeli border patrol hit a land mine, killing three soldiers and injuring six others. Israel believed the mine had been planted by militants from Es Samu, a village in the southern West Bank, close to where the incident took place, which was a Fatah stronghold.[36] This led the Israeli cabinet to approve a large scale operation called 'Shredder'. On November 12, King Hussein of Jordan, fearing Israeli retaliation, issued a condolence letter to Israel via the U.S. Embassy, but the U.S ambassador to Israel, Walworth Barbour, did not deliver it in a timely manner.[citation needed] On the morning of November 13, the Israel Defense Force mobilized, crossed the border into the West Bank and attacked Es Samu. The attacking force consisted of 3,000-4,000 soldiers backed by tanks and aircraft. They were divided into a reserve force, which remained on the Israeli side of the border, and two raiding parties, which crossed into the West Bank. The larger force of eight Centurion Tanks, followed by 400 paratroopers mounted in 40 open-topped half-tracks and 60 engineers in 10 more half-tracks, headed for Samu; while a smaller force of three tanks and 100 paratroopers and engineers in 10 half-tracks headed towards two smaller villages: Kirbet El-Markas and Kirbet Jimba. According to Terrence Prittie's Eshkol: The Man and the Nation, 50 houses were destroyed, but the inhabitants had been evacuated hours before. To Israel's surprise, the Jordanian military intervened. The 48th Infantry Battalion of the Jordanian Army ran into the Israeli forces northwest of Samu; and two companies approaching from the northeast were intercepted by the Israelis, while a platoon of Jordanians armed with two 106 mm recoilless guns entered Samu. The Jordanian Air Force intervened as well and a Jordanian Hunter fighter was shot down in the action. In the ensuing battles, three Jordanian civilians and 15 soldiers were killed; 54 other soldiers and 96 civilians were wounded. The commander of the Israeli paratroop battalion, Colonel Yoav Shaham, was killed and 10 other Israeli soldiers were wounded.[37][38] According to the Israeli government, 50 Jordanians were killed, but the true number was never disclosed by the Jordanians, in order to keep up morale and confidence in King Hussein's regime.[39] The whole battle was short: the Israeli forces crossed the border at 6:00 A.M. and returned by 10:00 A.M. Hussein felt betrayed by the operation. He had been having secret meetings with Israeli foreign ministers Abba Eban and Golda Meir for three years. According to him he was doing everything he could to stop guerrilla attacks from the West Bank and Jordan. "I told them I could not absorb a serious retaliatory raid, and they accepted the logic of this and promised there would never be one".[40] Two days later, in a memo to U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson, his Special Assistant Walt Rostow wrote: "retaliation is not the point in this case. This 3000-man raid with tanks and planes was out of all proportion to the provocation and was aimed at the wrong target," and went on to describe the damage done to US and Israeli interests: "They've wrecked a good system of tacit cooperation between Hussein and the Israelis... They've undercut Hussein. We've spent $500 million to shore him up as a stabilizing factor on Israel's longest border and vis-à-vis Syria and Iraq. Israel's attack increases the pressure on him to counterattack not only from the more radical Arab governments and from the Palestinians in Jordan but also from the Army, which is his main source of support and may now press for a chance to recoup its Sunday losses... They've set back progress toward a long term accommodation with the Arabs... They may have persuaded the Syrians that Israel didn't dare attack Soviet-protected Syria but could attack US-backed Jordan with impunity."[41] The United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 228 unanimously deploring "the loss of life and heavy damage to property resulting from the action of the Government of Israel on 13 November 1966", censuring "Israel for this large-scale military action in violation of the United Nations Charter and of the General Armistice Agreement between Israel and Jordan" and emphasizing "to Israel that actions of military reprisal cannot be tolerated and that, if they are repeated, the Security Council will have to consider further and more effective steps as envisaged in the Charter to ensure against the repetition of such acts." [42] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-Day_War Some comments... by what right did Israel cross the Jordanian border and launch a "reprisal" all out of proportion to the original incident? They invaded a sovereign country and were "surprised' that the Jordanian military fought back? The American government was not pleased at all about the Israeli action. The Security Council condemned it. Yet an argument could be made that the 6 Day War, and all its consequences, sprung from it, at least where the Kingdom of Jordan was concerned. Here's another quote from the same source: The operation was the largest scale one that Israel was involved with since the Suez Crisis. While the diplomatic and political developments were not as Israel expected, following the operation Hussein worked hard to avoid any further clashes by preventing guerrilla operations from being launched from within Jordan.[44] Some view the Samu raid as the beginning of the escalation in tensions that led to the war.[45] According to Moshe Shemesh, a historian and former senior intelligence officer in the IDF, Jordan's military and civilian leaders estimated that Israel's main objective was conquest of the West Bank. They felt that Israel was striving to drag all of the Arab countries into a war. After the Samu raid, these apprehensions became the deciding factor in Jordan's decision to participate in the war. King Hussein was convinced Israel would try to occupy the West Bank whether Jordan went to war, or not.[46] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-Day_War Yes, it is Wikipedia, but I've read the same things elsewhere. So as far back as 1966, Israel took it upon itself to cross their border in great force and attack another nation because of, for lack of a better term, a terrorist attack involving 9 casualties of the Israeli military, not civilians. That was reasonable? That was an act of government that made sense? I think not.
Returning to my initial point, Israel has to commit itself, somehow, to winning the hearts and minds of its neighbors. Its not going to be easy, but I think Israel/US has the leverage to improve relations if only the will is there. I see no other way for a stable and just solution being reached. I do not view this path as analogous to tacit approval of slavery or "dhimmitude". I'll respond to the rest of your comments, but these are the sort of arguments that will go on forever. You can take the last word. Both sides were "planning" attacks. There is disagreement amongst historians on whether an attack was actually imminent. I dispute your account that Israel was pursuing peace with its neighbors and not claiming land that did not belong to it prior to 1973. There was a cycle of retaliatory raids between Israel, the refugees, and its neighbors from the very beginning. There was a ton of unjustified killing perpetrated on both sides (see Benny Morris's Israel's Border Wars). 1957 and 1967 are both clear-cut instances of Israel claiming land that did not belong to it, but of course the excuse that it was for defense purposes was there much like today. There were other reasons for Israel wanting that land. Acknowledging this does not mean I hate Israel, whatever that means. Britian, France, the US, the USSR and many others all played a big role in the giant f-up that is the situation in that region. My hope is that sanity will ultimately prevail in current times. Every state is allowed to defend itself. That does not give it license to act like a "psycho", steal land, and deny basic rights to people. The severity of any "defensive" actions should be in proportion to the threat faced. I might as well ask: do you care about the safety of everyone in the region, or only the safety of Israel? I care about the security of everyone in the region, which is why I do not condone any state behaving in the manner Israel does towards its neighbors (e.g., the Gaza raid last year). Your accusation that this means I don't think Israel should defend itself is only valid if I agree that Israel has no way to defend itself except in the manner it has. I do not accept that notion at all.
It doesn't take a genius to tell you that Israel has ****ed us over all around the world. They are like the smelly ugly friend that makes constant vulgar jokes and alienates you. Its always the same bull****. Some guerilla attacks a soldier. They show up with 2000 tanks and airplanes and take a whole city or country under seige just like in Lebanon and Gaza. Anyone who thinks otherwise must be in some serious type of denial syndrome. To look beyond that is just ignorance. The real question of the matter, which is fundamental to the whole situation that I would like to present to the folk that defend such heinous actions is..... Do you consider Israeli Lives more precious, and more important than palestenian lives? If one is to abide by that sort of logic, and approach the issue, then yes Ottomaton, everything you said would be correct. Israeli people would have more of a claim to land someone has already built their house on, they would be right in killing 2000 palest. for 1 Israeli soldier and so forth. Palestenians are not human and do not deserve to be dealt with as such. Lets leave it at that. With this assertion, you are 100% correct dude.
Normally I would ignore this, but you lead by example by showing a lot of respect so I retract the offensive comparison. I was just angry at how much they get away with and i shouldn't have added it in there.
One of the biggest problems that countries friendly and unfriendly to Israel (and those sitting on the fence) face is dealing with an Israeli government composed of a coalition of numerous small parties that often don't reflect the genuine feelings of the majority of the Israeli public. This is caused, in large part, by there being a "threshold" of 2% for a political party to hold a seat in the Knesset. This requires most of the post-independence governments to cater to the whims of political minorities, often extreme (right and left), in order to have a governing majority. It is a huge flaw in their political system, in my opinion, and one of the main causes of the right wing nationalist extremism we continue to see in their government, extremism far too often at odds with Israel's friends and allies. I've talked to far too many American Jews and Israelis to believe that the current government's policies truly reflects the majority sentiment of the people of Israel. Those I have had the pleasure to meet are usually far more moderate than one would suppose, given the (in my opinion) frequently mad acts of their government, acts designed to appeal to those small parties that desire more and more of the West Bank and Jerusalem, with little or no regard for those who have lived there for generations. I've sometimes thought that an angry American response to some of these actions, with real consequences to the state of Israel, might "wake up" the Israeli public enough to get a more moderate government in place, one with the moral courage to negotiate a peace that had a real chance of lasting, one based on mutual respect and national boundaries that mean something. A government that could even alter their political system to do away with this influence of the radicals that have influence all out of proportion to their numbers. The conventional wisdom that it would be suicide for an American political party to take that stance makes it unlikely to happen. So the cycle of violence continues.
What polls are these? The Israeli middle is just simply apathetic with moderate parties that arent even sure what they stand for. Labor and Kadima are like the democratic party after Bush won in 2000, completely confused as to what they should be standing for anymore. On top of that, The Israeli political system is downright broken. Israel's political system is simply labor (and I guess Kadima since they've tended to go more towards the left lately) and whatever flavor of the month conservative party (nowadays Likud) wins a majority. So you have Labor/Kadima on the left and Likud and a bunch of small right wing parties on the right. Hell Kadima won the most seats in the last election, got labor to form a coalition and still didnt have enough because they couldnt get any right wing parties to join the coalition and moderate its stance on any issues with the Palestinians. There's a sheer lack of political diversity among parliament parties. The Arab parties that win are always locked out by both sides. (and Arab parties make up something like 15 seats, they're a huge number of seats that just simply dont matter to either side) And whats left are ultra religious parties like Shas or ultra nationalist parties like Yisrael Beiteinu that just wont align with any center left party. Even the current governing coalition is a disaster. That whole fiasco with the government announcing settlement construction while Biden was in Israel was the Minister of Housing (who's from Shas, a fairly conservative party) just going over Netanyahu's head and making an announcement without telling everyone. That whole government is a god damn mess. These small religious parties make or break coalition governments so they just take it upon themselves to do what they want. It's complicated even more because Israel technically doesnt even have a constitution. There is no real defined seperation of powers so essentially the Knesset does what it wants, when it wants. For example a few years back, the Israeli Supreme Court (which is generally more liberal than the Knesset) voted to ban discrimination against Israeli Arabs trying to move into Jewish neighbors. In the US, that would be the end of the discussion, but in israel the Knesset just tells the court to **** itself and bans it again anyway. I do agree that American pressure at this point has to happen. America has too much influence to just sit in the corner anymore. We've constantly injected ourselves in this and its gotten to the point where our words dont mean anything anymore to anyone. Hamas has never cared and now the Israeli government has decided that its ok to build settlements with impunity. Ultimately the situation is as bad as its ever been and looks like it'll only get worse.
If you are stating that such a thing is possible, then I don't see why anyone would argue with you. But if you are saying that this is the case here, please show what leads you to believe it other than your own suspicions. It is highly insulting that you would assume this about anyone btw. Also, I'm not sure if you are suggesting that Finkelstein's position on Israel is similar to believing slavery is ok?
Btw, the position of "they deserve it because they are assholes" is one I see coming up in this thread. That is a laughable position to take on either side. It's a matter of right, wrong and justice.
You mean, beyond the posts like this one which start out by defining him as American Jew opposing Israel? I find it interesting that people go out of their way to make every excuse possible for the Palestinians to act like petulant children, but seem to think the Israelis have no excuses for anything. From my position, I see that the Israelis are becoming more and more like the Palestinians.
But that's exactly what he is, so what's the problem? I honestly may not be understanding your point. I agree with you that they are behaving as children and am disgusted by the actions of the different people in charge in Palestine. The point is though that Palestine is a child and Israel is not. This doesn't mean children shouldn't learn a lesson when doing something wrong. It just means, for example, judging a child for murder is different that judging an adult for murder. Once upon a time, they were both children.
So we could only kill 3000 Japs in World War II? I know they aren't the same thing, but if Israel believes that the Palestinians are being a threat bu their kidnappings, then Israel can wipe them out. Whether they should is another story, as personally I'm sick of both sides and am generally convinced that peace is only going to occur when they're all dead or if the West decides to forcibly impose a peace, which obviously isn't going to happen.
You seem to somewhat selectively hold the people you like to a lower standard under similar pronouncements. We've had similar discussions the emirs of the UAE shouldn't be held to the same standard as the rest of the world because they are dictators, or something along those lines. (I know that isn't exactly right, but IIRC that was the general be the gist.) It looks like a rationalization to me. The Israelis and Palestinians are inextricably linked as two brothers. Abel and Cain. To declare one an adult and the other a child makes no sense. If an American made similar pronouncements, it would be borderline racist. There was a similar process that used to occur in the USA where black men were viewed as wayward children, and when they couldn't hold down a job or acted like a child, people said, "Well, they're only black men, what can you expect?" Do you really want to be saying, "Well they're only Palestinians. What can you expect?"
I think you genuinely don't remember but the point about the Emirs was not as you stated. The point was that the citizens of a dictatorship should not be held accountable for things they do not and can not control. This doesn't mean the state shouldn't be held as responsible as any other state in the same position and under the same circumstances. I know it is highly convenient to you that I am holding "Palestine" to a lesser responsibility. However, in this case it is fact. Palestine is not a sovereign state, it is a bunch of refugees. Israel is a sovereign state. Palestine is starving, Israel is not. Palestine is seemingly bunch by a bunch of gang members. Israel is the 4th or 5th largest military power in the world. I am not saying this is an evil function of Israel. This is reality. Israel, as a state recognized by major powers, is sovereign and therefore holds the responsibilities of a sovereign state. I'll just say now that if you wish to leverage off my being a Muslim in stating your opinions, then I'll just stay away from this. I'm not interested in these games. So for the sake of this discussion, let's make you happy and assume I'm admittedly a horrible and biased person who hates Israel and all Jews. Now that that's out of the way, let's focus on the topic, ok?
There is a reason that non Israeli/Palestinian Muslims and Jews have very different views about the Palestine/Israel situation. I'm not trying to make value judgments about good or bad. People are inextricably linked to their identity and viewpoint. The observer and the observed are integrally linked and incapable of separation. So I can't pretend you aren't what you are, any more than I can pretend to not be what I am.
I can tell you I am neither palest/jew or w.e but its no surprise that I have been more sympathetic towards the palestenians lately which has only been the case up to recently. I think you make an excellent point, the palest. people can not be excused for acting like children. That is true, but you have to understand the Israelis aren't helping the situation, by oppressing everyone in gaza they give way to the cardinal devil in the whole situation, Hamaas who as far as I am concerned don't give a rat's ass about their own people. Thats what frustrates me about the situation. Israel must do what It must, but they are the only ones keeping hamaas in power and favorable to the people. When ever there is an airstrike in response to w.e, some Hamaas person vows to take revenge. Due to human nature the enemy is going to seem like the one who commited the crime rather than the one who probably caused it. Then there is a suicide bombing, and the cycle repeats itself.
One more thing. These threads tend to be all about assigning blame. It's Israels fault the Palestinians hate them since they attacked Gaza. It's the Palestinian's fault for the occupation since they set off all those suicide bombs. Fine. You really have two options. If you want to go for an all or nothing zero-sum game, you can sit around and assign fault. And then when one side wipes out the other they can be triumphant and list the reasons the other side failed. I do know there are quite a few Palestinians and Israelis who are working for that sort of outcome, and blaming someone helps dig the trenches a bit deeper on the Western Front. Alternately, you can look at both sides and see that they've both done and continue to do ****ty things. They both do them for more or less equally valid or invalid reasons. Everybody comes equipped with lots of baggage. Everybody/nobody is to blame. You can have justice for everybody, peace for everybody, or justice and peace for one side only. In Northern Ireland, the Irish didn't get justice for British colonialism. The Brits didn't get justice for all the people who were attacked by IRA bombers. They both decided that blame was counterproductive, and peace was more important.
