I just wrote a multi-page response that took me a long time to write I'll summarize. MacBeth: Jews have been in Israel at least since the defeat of Canaan in 1200 BCE. Even after the Persians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Muslims, Crusaders, Salladin, Mongols, Mamluks, Ottomans and the British (I'm sure I'm forgetting someone), there were always descriptions to be found of how Jews were killed or forcibly converted or subjected to dhimmitude If you want to go back to Abraham (who lived and died in Hebron) that's 1800 BCE. Lil: When is the last time you saw a large demonstration of Palestinans demanding peace and a halt in hostilities? When is the last time you saw Israelis do it? Everyone in the world can draw up peace proposals and "roadmaps" but if the Palestinian leadership has no intention of complying with any of them, the least of which is stopping terror and indocrination of children, how can you blame Israelis for defending themselves? Every time peace gets negotiatied, the Israelis let down thier guard to comply, and terrorism spikes. Yes, the Israelis have killed innocent people. this happens in war. that's why all smart people know that war ultimately has no winners. But the terrorists purposely target concentrated groups of them, especially the young, like the Dolphinarium or school buses or pizza palors. If Apaches, and fences and snipers mean more lives saved, you do that. And you only do that because the other party isn't interested in peace, because you have to. The vast majority of Israelis could give a crap about the settlements, and have never been to one, and don't associate with the people who live on them. If all that stood in the way to peace is dismantling them, it would happen tomorrow. Also, I don't know if you have been paying attention, but Sharon is pushing to leave Gaza. Completely, and against the wishes of the right-wingers who brought him into power, who represent a political minority at this point in public consensus. FranchiseBlade: The Phillistines were Hellenic people. Linguistically, culturally and religously Greek, not semitic. And besides that, the Persians and Greeks came and destroyed them, either through assimiliation or war. And this was long before the Romans. Herodotus, the Greek historian, started calling the whole east of the Med "Phillistine Syria." Makes sense, from an ethnocentric point of view. It was called this from about 5th century BCE until the Bar Kochba revolt, of the Jews against Rome in 135 AD, and the Romans were awfully pissed about it. The Romans had previously called it "Provincia Judea" and decided to Latinize the Greek term. Thus was born "Provincia Syria Palaestinia" or Palestina for short, and anglicised: Palestine. They also renamed Jerusalem, but I can't remember what. Fortunately that name didn't stick like Palestina did. All things being equal, I probably saw more Roman ruins in Israel than probably any other civillization. Makes me think of Life of Brian... Palestinan statehood won't come until they have leaders who don't demand that the people blow themselves up to deliver the impossible. The PLO wants all of the former Mandate. That is "Palestine" for PLO cartographers. That includes all of Israel and Jordan. In the time shortly before Israel's statehood in '48, Ben-Gurion had a divided country that was still waxing romantic about more land and taking punitive raids against Arabs who attacked them and the British who undermined their attempts at sovereignity and bringing in immigrants from Europe. Ben-Gurion arrested them. He put national heros in jail, he outlawed all armies and militias except the one he controlled. there were even heated exchanges of gunfire. A political risk, maybe, but without it, no unified voice, no peace and no State of Israel, of any kind, whether the borders were to anyone's liking or not. There were plenty then (and a few now) that wanted nothing less than everything. But those guys were too fatalistic and were on the verge of ruining everything, no matter how much they rallied the people to their cause. Even if Ben-Gurion could get enough consensus from his own people to create a state, no one would recognize or respect it, and civil war would always be a constant threat. Maybe Dahlan can be that guy for the Palestinians. I don't know. But he isn't Arafat. Whoever he is, they are going to need him, because no Palestinian state is going to be made by the usual chorus of the clueless: America presidents, Baker-ite Arabists in the State Deprtment, The Arab League, the EU, the UN, so-called "expert" tenured professors with cultural blinders, international peacekeeping forces, or the staff of the New York Times. gifford1967: Don't bring Chomsky into a serious discussion of ME politics . Worn out anti-American 1960's class warfare rhetoric continues *not* to be the answer to every problem in the world. It has it's place and I'm not going to insult you by implying that you think that the PLO is some kind of reincaranation of the Beider-Meinhoff gang, but "experts" lost in their own fringe fantasies, like Chomsky, do. He should stick to linguistics. Peace will happen when Palestinians feel they have their dignity. That will come from a recognized state and a leader that will convince them to abandon their morbid fantasies of all-or-nothing martydom. This leader will only be able to survive when the people become too weary of killing, so that he has enough support to stand up to the competing powers of Palestinian politics who stand to lose everything from peace.
"Also, I don't know if you have been paying attention, but Sharon is pushing to leave Gaza. Completely, and against the wishes of the right-wingers who brought him into power, who represent a political minority at this point in public consensus." weren't the settlers just being removed because it would interfere with the building of the wall? I honestly have no idea where this wall is/was being contstructed so I may be wrong. =========== but your dhimmitude theory, or whatever that is, Its war, remmember, the Muslims gave the people they conquerd 3 choices, Leave, convert(in the earllier days it was stay and pay the tax, which was used for their own defense from others.), or death... Pretty clean and clear there. Your own choice. Now if your going to be stubborn and not pick, well they make the choice for you. It isnt because of a hatret towards the Jews, its because the prophet let the Jews stay in Yathrib(Medinah) after the takeover, and well they backstabbed him... so after that it was declared that them as a peole were not allowed to stay unless they showed some sort of allegiance.
wtf? this does NOT go back to ancient times, people. try the balfour declaration as a start, then go from there. zionism hardly existed before the turn of the century. dont make this more complicated than it is.
Deji, please show me something factually inaccurate in what I wrote. Your comments about Chomsky are extremely typical, not clever, and without substance.
"Always Look on the Bright Side..." Seriously though, you just described the heritage of the Palestinians who had been there. They do have their own culture, contrary to what Bamma was saying. I didn't realize that there were two different groups there both called Philistines. Thank you for straightening me out on that one. Ben Gurion himself though talked about some of the victories of the Zionists against Arab villages prior to statehood. I agree that at that time not all Israelis felt they had to have the whole thing. The same is true of the Palestinians today. And I'd be willing to bet if the number that do want that would dwindle if allowed to live peacefully in their own state without fear of their houses being destroyed and their children being killed. I agree that Arafat is a horrible leader for the Palestinians, but it's not for the outside to choose the Palestinians leader. They chose him, in one fair election, and one questionable election. Perhpas they could have another election monitored just prior to a date for statehood. But either way a state for Palestinians with the 1967 borders, shared Jeruselem, and limited to no right of return seems only just. It will also happen once Sharon is gone and an Israeli leader who wants peace comes into power. Everytime there is a major deadline, for something to happen approaching, Sharon starts a major offensive. Civilians are killed and the whole process is put on hold. This side of the cycle happens at least as much as Israel letting their guard down and suicide bombing sprees. The period following the end of the last anti-fada, until the Oslo accords broke off were relatively peaceful. I think both sides were willing to wait and see what could be made of things. It may be much worse now, but at least at that time it seemed that each side was capable of waiting.
Bama: This is something of a retreat from your original claim that the land was theirs for thousands of years, no?3 "Quote: The Jews have been a homogenous people long before Muhammed was even born and that land was theirs for thousands of years." 1406 is much earlier than most estimates, which state that the Hebrews settled in Canaan ( note, not all of the southern Levant or present day Israel...simply Canaan; and they were not in exclusive control) between 1220 and 1100 B.C. Philistia was already established surrounding Gaza at this point, and other peoples in the region were concentrated in lands such as Ammon, Moab and Edom. The origins of the Hebrew monarchy are established at 1020 B.C under Saul, and run throughthe expansion of David and consolidation of Solomon until their division in 928 ( rebellion against Rehoboam.) into 2 states; Israel and Judah. Assyrian defeated a Levantine alliance in 854, and the entire region was a subject state until 721, when Shalamaneser actually takes over the region. Their follows a period when the region is under various state controls, Assyria, Egypt, and finally Babaylon, and in 587 the Jews are deported to Babylon, where they remained until the Persians allowed them to return in 539. The area was a Persian state until the conquest of Alexander the Great in 332, and is incorporated into a Diadocci ( or Diadochi) state ( Ptolemeic and Seleucid) except for the brief Maccabean revolt and control between 166-135 B.C. In 63 BC the area comes under Roman control, ( and the Diasporra of Jews takes place) and stays as such intil 324 Ad, when it is assumed into the Byzantine Empire. The area is briefly taken by the Persians, between 614 and 629, and later conquered by the Islamic movement and becomes incoprporated into a Caliphate until 1099, when Crusaders take control of the region, on and off, until 1244. In 1244 the Mameluk Turks gained control of the region and kept it until the pseudo-peaceful transfer of power to the Ottoman Turks in 1517, who rule until 1917. The Brits controled the region until 1948, at which point the modern state of Israel was formed. So I don't see any veracity to the claim that the region was "theirs" for thousads of years. At all. If by theirs you mean under their control, then you are looking at two very brief periods, 1020-824 ( and not linear during this period) and 166-135. That totals out to about 230 years, and much of that was contested and fractured. The Jews as rightfull heirs to the region under this justification would fall well back in line, after the Romans, Islamic Caliphate, Ottomans, Byzantines, Macedonians, Mameluks and Persians. Hell, the Hyksos, if you can find any, have about the same claim. If you are establishing your claim on continuous habitation as a people, the Phillistines c*m Palestinians, or even the generalized Arabic/Levantine locals have a much longer claim, having begun at least as early as the Hebrews, and not undergoing either of the dispersals. Either way, your claim is false in the extreme.
No. Gaza already has a security fence. That's why there's rarely ever a terror attack from Gaza. Most are from the West Bank. I think that's the main reason Sharon is concentrating on Gaza first to evacuate, because its easier to secure, as well as having less Jewish settlements to uproot. Israelis call it a fence, Palestinians call it a wall. The only parts that have concrete are where there have been shootings at Israelis. There's plenty of contraversy about where the wall runs (some settlements in the Jerusalem area are on west side of the barrier) but they said that where it is is subject to be changed, like Lebanon. When the Israelis left Lebanon and the UN specified where the border was, they moved the security fence they built there to comply. Dhimmitude was abolished during British colonialism, but it was a "privledge" something only for Christians and Jews. If you were Bahai or Zooastrian or Hindu, you were just a pagan (convert or die). Saladdin and dhimmitude was better for the Jews of Jersusalem compared to the reign of the Crusaders, but it was still second-class citizenship. Punishing Jews in Jerusalem five hundred years after Mohammed was unsuccessful getting them to follow him and convert in Medina is a poor excuse for condoning the practice. FranchiseBlade: Ben-Gurion was also the same guy that when told of the victories in the '67 war, and East Jerusalem in particular said "Who cares about some old wall?" Not a popular opinion at the time, and he was long gone from power by then. But his realpolitik was consistent. He was all about creating and keeping a stable state together, often at the expense of the demands of sentimentality, religion, politics, war or even public opinion. That's the reason why Israel came into being and why he died quietly in Kibbutz Sde Boker and not in office. MacBeth: So...even though Jews settled in the area and survived as a people and a culture over a period of over three thousand years, maintaining a presence there (albeit except for a generation in Babylon) enduring the ebb and flow of whatever world empire swept over them, maintaining the graves and holy sites of their ancestors back to Abraham , and refusing to assimilate , you still believe that Palestinians have a greater claim to the land, based on the assumption that they are descendants of Greek Islanders who disappeared off the map 300-500 years before the birth of Christ? It wasn't until the Church of the Sepulcher and Al-Aqsa that the region became anything more than an adminstered province, and Christians and Muslims tried to remake Jerusalem in their own image, but no matter who controlled it, or how many Jews fled to the diaspora, there were always Jews there, and it remained the center of the Jewish cultural world. And the ones that are there now write and speak a language remarkably undifferent than the one spoken 3 milllenia ago. But none of that is really that important. Jerusalem also has had an Armenian and Greek Orthodox presence for a longer period than most nations have existed, and none of those people make any claim to the other than their respective quarters in the Old City. There were always Jews (relgious mystics and stuff) returning back to Israel since the Middle Ages, especially from Spain, post Ferdinand and Isabella. The modern zionists who were the ancestors to today's Israel made its deals with the Ottomans, who controlled the land for 4 centuries. That's who they bought the land from and that's how they came repopulate the region with more Jews. By the time the British were in the picture, Tel-Aviv was already ten years old. This is before Balfour. Palestinians I think have a right to call themselves whatever they want, since the nationalistic identity of most of the Arab states were the creation of colonial cartographers, not the people themselves. But make no mistake that the designation is anything but a 20th century one. A late 20th century one at that. But in all fairness, there were no "Jordanians" or "Saudi Arabians" a hundred years ago either. They were all arabs, divided by tradfitional loyalties (just like they are today). Palestinian nationalism and identity was born in the 60's in the arab student unions in universities in Germany and Austria. Palestine never existed as a state. The British tried to create it from their mandate, and split it in half to share with the Jews living there, and the Arabs invaded to prevent it. And the pieces that were left were swallowed up by Jordan and Egypt. Why wasn't there an organized resistance or nationalistic movement then? Because it didn't exist. Palestinian political identity incubated in the 60's and was defined by the '67 war. I'm not taking about their cultural identity as Arabs, or as Sunnis (or Christians) or anything else. An 8th generation Palestinian in Nablus today is an Arab in the same way that an 8th generation Bavarian in Munich was a German 150 years ago. There's nothing disparraging about that. There also wasn't an Italy or alot of other European states 150 years ago. It's too bad the common ground for Arabs has been the destruction of Israel, or Nasser might have been a Garibaldi in his own right, and maybe pan-Arab nationalism would still be alive, instead of being devoured by Islamic fantacism. Druze and Bedouin and Ciracassians inside Israel don't identify themselves as Palestinian. They also serve in the military, and have represented Israel in the Olympics. Druze and Bedouin are Arab, and Bedouin and Circassians are Muslim, but their individual cultural identity predates the Otttomans (and have been there longer), and they identify themselves as seperate from each other and from Palestinians. The borders of much of the ME are the result of post WW1 British political needs. The rest has been decided by war. None of it was decided by the cultural indentities of the people who lived there, and that's the genesis, I think of most of the problems in the ME (shiites seperated in Iran/Iraq, Kurds in Turkey/Iraq, Yemen, etc). I was one of the few that liked a three state solution in Iraq to help correct the original sin of British mapmakers... As long as you are Yasser Arafat, the Arab world is funding you to keep fighting the jihad, and you and your people are heros. In the meantime you, are making big bucks and you get to be a bigshot, always on international TV and newspapers, and the whole world knows who you are and supportsd your cause. Stop the war, and you lose financial support from the Arab world, and the press disappears because there is no more story to cover. Moderate countries like Morocco and Jordan and Tunisia, probably would still support you but that's not enough to make a difference, you would have to rely much more on Israel (and probably the US) to create an economy and infrastructure through trade and exchange of resources. I'd be willing to bet the financial support Palestine receives to continue the war is at least an order of magnitude higher than what her friends would give her to rebuild for peace. That will be the job of American (and Israeli) taxpayers, because no one else will want to. So who cares about a small middle eastern country at peace with its neighbors? I tell you who, the idealogical jihadists, the same ones trying to take over Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Egypt. The same ones who murdered Sadat. Hamas and PFLP and the rest will do their best to make sure the jihad rolls on, no matter what. So, while the *people* have plenty to benefit from peace, Palestinian leadership, does not. The current leaders will never agree to peace with Israel under any conditions unless it suits their immediate needs and there will never be an end to the indoctrination of their people until Palestinians themsleves decide on their own who they are and what sort of people they want thier leaders defining themselves as, as something distinct from the identity as heroic maryrs fighting to "liberate the Holy Land" from the "zionist crusaders." Arafat likes to think of himself as a modern-day Saladdin. It's safe to say that's a neverending path to nowhere. And as long as there as terrorism, there will be security fences, Apache helicopters, and a cumpulsory draft to keep the place safe. Israelis not only are no roadblock to Palestinian nationalistic aspiration or peace, they want it more than most Arab countries do. It delegitimizes the ****ty system they have to live under, as well taking away the biggest strike against them in the court of world opinion and even some of Israel's biggest hawks have figured that out.
Did you hear that 'conservatives' within Sharron's own government have rejected his 'peace plan'...the one the world is decrying...because of it's being too permissive? As long as there are security fences, Apache helicopters, a compulsory draft with an exclusionary electorate, etc. there will be terrorists. [QUOTE}Israelis not only are no roadblock to Palestinian nationalistic aspiration or peace, they want it more than most Arab countries do. It delegitimizes the ****ty system they have to live under, as well taking away the biggest strike against them in the court of world opinion and even some of Israel's biggest hawks have figured that out. [/QUOTE] Are we talking about the people, or the government? I disagree with your assesment of both, but in different extremes, for different reasons.
LOOOOOOOOOL!! bamaslammer, you are hilarious. Why didn't Kuwaitis just move into other countries when Iraq was planning on occupying them? That would've been a better solution right? You are absolutely clueless about Arab culture as well. What makes you think Palestinians have anything to do with other Arabs anyway? Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria are the closest things to Palestinians, and they are overpopulated anyway. Saudis and such are of a different bloodline anyway - different language, different people, different culture, different traditions and they generally don't like each other. I guess the best comparison would be Egyptians and Sudanese - what the hell do they have to do with each other? Bot hspeak Arabic though. So why not give Sudan to Ethiopia, and have the Sudanese move into Egypt? You know what, almost the whole Middle East speaks Arabic. What do you say we all move to Saudi Arabia, and hand over the rest of the land to Americans or Israelis? On a side note, Ender's comparison with Native Americans was absolutely brilliant, never thought of that before.
So in other words, you'd rather see the "Palestinians" occupy that land and what.......send all the Jews to Miami, eh? I'm just so damned sick of Israel, the only damned democratic state, getting dogged upon for simply defending itself. Put yourself in their position. You have radical nuts who repeatedly blow themselves up in the midst of your families. Would you not want them gone from your country? Would you not put them down under martial law? They don't belong there and need to leave. Peace will only happen when the Arabs leave Israel, period. A "Palestinian" state will be yet another cesspool breeding more bombers. Do you think the violence would stop if they gave them a state? You're out of what little mind you have if you think that. Their goal is not the establishment of a state, because they had one under the Clinton deal. As Arafat says constantly, their goal is the complete and utter destruction of Israel and its replacement by a "Palestinian" state. If don't believe that, you're an Arab apologist or at the worst, simply ignorant. Open your eyes. Read the quotes from the PLO head honchos and tell me that they desire peace. It's all a means to end for Arafat and his goons and that end is the destruction of Israel and the genocide of the Jewish people. link link link
Again, lets use the natives and America analogy. IF the Natives did use extreme meaasures to get back what they had been living on for hundreds of years and if they did rebel at every chance that they got in the Hope of getting back some land for themselves, even though at one point the whole place belonged to them. Would you feel bad for the natives or would you just say nuke em and send em to Mexico because theay all look the same anyways?(no harm meant to anyone, just critisizing bama's way of stereotyping people) I still don't justify the suicidal massacres, but You cant blame a person to get angry and out of control when he is kicked out of HIS country by another, and then his family is later killed in some random search for an imaginary weapnons tunnel. These arab people aren't some alieans from mars that have no feelings or soem idiots that like the idea of living as second hand citizens in their own country. I dont think you would like it if you are staying in your city say Houston, and the government decides to take in all buddist citizens from some country where they were oppressed, and since at one time long long ago these buddhists great grandpa had taken a dump in houston they were given back a good half of Houston including your house but also splitting up your family and making some of the family members shoved in shelters and other such positions. I for one would be furious, and would fight till I got my rights back, Isnt that the whole idea of a republic and democratic state anyways...
I'm not stereotyping. When you have as many homicide bombers come from one people, whipped into a fury by butchers like Arafat and "religious" leaders, you can characterize these "Palestinians" as being violent as a whole. No one there dare speak out against it lest they be construed as Israeli collaborators. So by their silence they give preceived approval to the actions of inhuman savages. Did you read my post? There is no such country, no such people as "Palestine." Their "struggle" is nothing more than an Arab attempt to destroy the Jewish state. Don't believe me, ask Arafat. He says as much in the links I provided above. Unfortunately, it is sad that their fellow Arabs are using the "Palestinians" as a rock upon which to break Israel, at the cost of thousands of lives. That's about as close to sympathy as I can come for these folks who make a living of savage, cowardly killing of defenseless innocents and who reveled in our tragedy on 9/11 as if it were the greatest thing ever.
If the Palastinians want their own country, tell them they can have it as soon as they stop killing innocent Israelis. I love how all the Arab countries convienently lament the poor palastians, meanwhile will not even ALLOW any Palastinian to be a full fledged citizen in their country. Israel has a right to the land, it won it in a war it did not start, and is gracious enough to offer portions of it to the Palastinians. The last time Jordan opened it's doors to the Palastinian people they immediatly tried to overthrow the King, and he brutaly murdered thousands of them. Murder and terrorism does not equal statehood. DD
Bamma, No, that is stereotyping. The people who attack innocent civilians are a minority among the Palestinians. Even the most recent poll I've seen shows that for the first time a minority of Palestinians support the suicide bombings. So to characterize them as a whole is stereotyping. These are an oppressed people, and as I've pointed out before with things such as water rights, freedom to dig wells, etc. The Israelis aren't just oppressing as a means of self defense. Water allotment and wells have nothing to do with the self defense of the nation of Israel, and everything to do with oppressing a people just because of their nationality. It's wrong, it's oppressive, and unjust. I don't see why it's so hard for some people to stand against that as well as the suicide bombings. DaDakota, Saying that the Palestinians started the wars isn't historically accurate. Conflicts were going on prior to ISrael's creation. That included Zionist incursions into Palestinian territory prior to Israel's creation in 1948. So the myth that on the day of Israel's creation they were attacked out of nowhere isn't true. The land the Palestinians want are on, isn't part of Israel. Even Sharon has said they were occupiers. I do think that the Palestinians who take part in suicide bombings against civilians are terrorists and deserve to be punished, but the idea that the oppressed people who are occupied and oppressed should police themselves and try and protect the occupiers and oppressors is ludicrous. Yet those are the conditions being set upon them and then maybe they will get some sort of statehood? That's just not realistic.
You are talking **** DaDa. I live in the U.A.E., where many many palestinians are granted the Emarati passport due to their situation. So you're saying anyone who can win a war should take over a country? So you're saying China should crush Taiwanese resistance? Don't, for a minute, think more innocent Israelis than Palestinians have died in this war.
bama, So you're not stereotyping, but you think the Palestinians as a whole are a violent people? Well, when you put it that way... I don't blame you bama, because you are the victim.
I've said it before, I'll say it again. This conflict won't end unless there's all-out war. Israel doesn't want Palestine to exist, and Palestine doesn't want Israel to exist. The jewish religion states that the land belongs to Jews, and the Muslim religion states that the land belongs to Muslims. How will you change what each religion says?
