Israel dragging USA down

[Jayhawker Soule]

The alternative to constructing settlements is to not construct them .... Israel did precisely that for several months, then ended the experiment by resuming construction. What am I missing?

Settlement freeze has barely slowed construction

Therefore ... ?

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Claim: The only obstacle to continued peace negotiations, as opposed to Abbas' UN bid, was continued Israeli settlement expansion.

Evidence:

"Nabil Abu Rdainah, spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, said a return to U.S.-backed peace talks required a freeze on settlement building by Israel." -Haaretz​

"Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on Saturday set two conditions for abandoning his plan to ask the United Nations to recognize a Palestinian state in September: acceptance of the 1967 lines as the basis for a two-state solution and a cessation of settlement construction.

"Without this we will continue going to the UN," Abbas said." -JPost​

(Okay, the other obstacle was accepting the 1967 lines as a basis, according to JPost. Again that's a policy decision, not an impossible quandary. Other sources quoted Abbas as only demanding a settlement freeze.)

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Claim: the existential threat posed to Israel by the recognition of Palestinian statehood has been exaggerated in the West.

Evidence:

"The danger of a hasty agreement or a unilateral arrangement is missiles on the whole of Israel,"​

-Netanyahu, quoted in YNet

"...the deadly serious implications of Abbas’ U.N. campaign ..."-Chicago Sun Times

"The U.S. and Israel say a U.N. vote would itself threaten peace." -Wall Street Journal
"Netanyahu opposes negotiations based on 1967 lines, saying a return to those frontiers would expose Israel's heartland to rocket fire from the West Bank."-Forbes
​

Evidence of why, it seems to me, these claims are exaggerated, are to follow.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Jay,

Yes the settlement freeze did not slow construction much for a number of reasons, particularly since it was really a freeze on new permits. It was an inaccurate simplification for me to say Israel did not construct settlements during the freeze. But the substantive claim I made is still valid: The PA went the UN route because Israel ended the freeze. That was a policy decision by Israel (at the insistence of the Israeli Right of course) which could have been remedied at any time leading up to the UN bid. This is not the impossible impasse depicted by Kathryn but a choice.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Mine was a foolish retort and I stand corrected. There are, indeed, always those to will exaggerate the threat against Israel much as there are those who blithely underestimate them. Let's try not to align ourselves with either camp.

 

[Alceste]

As someone who strongly believes that the road to a just peace requires vetoing Netanyahu rather than Abbas, let me nevertheless suggest that your statement is poorly considered and seriously flawed.

No one, absolutely no one, believes that "Palestine is going to wipe out the Jews simply because it is recognized as a state." What many do believe and fear, however, is that an imposed Palestinian state will rapidly devolve into an Hamas/Hezbollah stronghold posing an existential threat to Israel. To dismiss this as "paranoid fantasy" is thoughtless at best.

When I ponder (or, more often, anguish over) the Israel-Palestine issue, an old Buck Owens song comes to mind. One can make all manner of facile statements about the wisdom and ethics of having a "Tiger By The Tail," but ...

You don't suspect that the popularity of Hamas / Hezbollah in the region is a reactionary response to the injustice and brutality of the occupation and the expansion of settlements? Being a generally optimistic person when it comes to human nature, I believe that when an oppressor relieves the pressure of injustice and increases feelings of political autonomy among the oppressed, the popularity of political moderation and diplomacy increases.

The sense I've gotten from the interviews I've seen and discussions I've had with Palestinians is that they feel they have no alternative to violence. The repressed conditions they live in are utterly intolerable, as anyone familiar with them would agree, so doing nothing is not an option. Diplomacy doesn't work because Likud believes the whole region ought belongs to the Jews and thus won't give up their illegal Jewish settlements. If a Palestinian state were created today, excluding the settlements, it would look like Swiss cheese.

I honestly don't understand why Israel can't give the settlers the option of either living in a Palestinian state or relocating to Israel with compensation and new housing, then sign off on an agreement giving complete autonomy to the Palestinian people. Can you explain?

 

[Kathryn]

Call me really naive, but why can't Palestinians living in Israel just be given citizenship and equal rights?

 

[Alceste]

Call me really naive, but why can't Palestinians living in Israel just be given citizenship and equal rights?

Because that would jeopardize the Jewish character of Israel. The Jews would lose their majority.

 

[Alceste]

Just want to share this:

Palestine: The Vatican Option | Gwynne Dyer

I tend to agree with this guy on just about everything, but I'd like to hear feedback from Israelis / Jewish people if possible. (That's you, Jay and Caledan).

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Mine was a foolish retort and I stand corrected. There are, indeed, always those to will exaggerate the threat against Israel much as there are those who blithely underestimate them. Let's try not to align ourselves with either camp.

Fair enough! Point taken.

 

[IsmailaGodHasHeard]

What post?

And who has denied Israels right to exist? No one so far.

Never mind then. I thought that people were denying Israel the right to exist.

 

[YmirGF]

Never mind then. I thought that people were denying Israel the right to exist.

Many here do seem to have issues with the Israeli state being a distinctly Jewish State - as it should be.

 

[kai]

Call me really naive, but why can't Palestinians living in Israel just be given citizenship and equal rights?

This may be of interest;

Arab citizens of Israel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Call me really naive, but why can't Palestinians living in Israel just be given citizenship and equal rights?

This is an extremely important question. I know this is a long post but please bear with me. To answer this question one must understand the most basic facts on the ground, which are only vaguely alluded to in mainstream American media.

The fact is that Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza, taken together, are composed of about 5.8 million Jews and 5.8 million Arabs. In a democracy, such demographics would result in a bi-national state of Arabs and Jews and the land would belong equally to all citizens. This would therefore result in "the destruction of Israel" as an explicitly Jewish state (e.g. the Star of David on the flag, or Israeli laws which privilege Jewish but not Arab immigration and citizenship, etc. would likely be voted down if half the voters were not Jewish). It would also go directly against the official platform of ruling Israeli political parties (see below) that ALL the land belongs to God's chosen ethnic group.

That is why many mainstream Israeli political parties (notably excluding conscientious objections from the Left) have something like this as part of their official platform:

The Israeli nation has a national and historic right to the whole of Israel [read: including Gaza and West Bank]. However, in order to maintain a Jewish majority, part of the Land of Israel must be given up to maintain a Jewish and democratic state. Israel shall remain a Jewish state and homeland. Jewish majority in Israel will be preserved by territorial concessions to Palestinians. -Kadima Party of Ariel Sharon and Tzipi Livni. Largest party in the Knesset in 2009 and primary opposition to the current Likud govt.​

Furthermore, how could Israeli settlers "fulfill their Zionist values" and conquer the West Bank (historic Judea and Samaria) if the non-Jewish residents of the West Bank were Israeli citizens with equal rights? This is another reason Palestinians cannot simply be given equal citizenship and rights. You may think I am using rhetorical language to misrepresent Israeli policy, but read for yourself the official platform of the Likud Party (the leader of the current Israeli govt.):

The Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza are the realization of Zionist values. Settlement of the land is a clear expression of the unassailable right of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel and constitutes an important asset in the defense of the vital interests of the State of Israel. The Likud will continue to strengthen and develop these communities and will prevent their uprooting.-Likud Party platform​

This is one reason why Netanyahu et al. want Palestinians to do more than recognizing Israel's existence and taking actions which respect its right to exist. They always ask the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state and its right to exist as a Jewish state. Palestinians are understandably reluctant to do so because this is the principle which is used to justify everything that is done unfairly to them -- the denial of their rights and the taking of their land. (Where is "Israel"? According to the parties in power in the Israeli govt. "Israel" apparently includes the West Bank and Gaza and all of Jerusalem.)

 

[Kathryn]

Please note that I am not blindly "pro Israel." I think a person would have to be deaf, dumb and blind not to realize that Israel treats Palestinians unfairly and provocatively.

My biggest problem with the whole issue (or issues) is that I'll be DAMNED if I'll let the Arab League dictate human rights principles to me. I find their moral posturing on the rights of Palestinians to be, not only hypocritical, but downright offensive to reason.

By and large, their goals seem obvious to me. Not one member of the Arab League even acknowledges Israel's right to exist.

Maan News Agency: Arab League refuses to recognize Israel as Jewish state

By the way, the Arab League consists of:

Algeria
Bahrain
Comoros
Djibouti
Egypt
Iraq
Jordan
Kuwait
Lebanon
Libya
Mauritania
Morocco
Oman
Palestine
Qatar
Saudi Arabia
Somalia
Sudan
Syria
Tunisia
United Arab Emirates
Yemen



Wow, some real paragons of human rights in that list!



In fact, Egypt was ousted from the Arab League when it signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979 and wasn't readmitted for TEN YEARS.
The Arab League - The League of Arab States

 

[Mr Spinkles]

I don't have the article, but when the Israeli govt. ended the freeze on illegal settlement expansion, and negotiations between Israel and the PA ended, Ha'aretz and the Jerusalem Post reported Abbas was considering several options. One option was to go directly to the UN. Another option was to start a new Intifadah. Then there was a third option. This option was considered by far the most threatening, from the perspective of the Israeli govt. Do you know what that option was?

That option was for Abbas to give up Palestine's quest for its own state, and simply take the position of an ethnicity oppressed by its own government, and ask to be included as equal citizens of Israel with equal rights. This was an *unthinkable* scenario in U.S./Israeli circles (excluding the Left, I mean) and it was greatly feared Abbas would do this. The drumbeat in American media about Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state (read: Jewish majority) is meant to head-off sympathies which might cause Americans to support democracy.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

I know you're not blindly pro-Israel Kathryn I just thought your question goes straight to a fundamental part of this conflict. I am not blindly pro-Palestine, either. I called attention to these facts simply because they are so neglected in the U.S., and yet so necessary to understand the conflict. (But by no means sufficient to understand the conflict.)

 

[HiddenDjinn]

If Abu Mazen did what Mr. Spinkles suggested as the "most terrifying" option, Israel could simply deport all non-citizens. There'd be millions of noncitizens on their way out of Israel.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

If Abu Mazen did what Mr. Spinkles suggested as the "most terrifying" option, Israel could simply deport all non-citizens. There'd be millions of noncitizens on their way out of Israel.

This is an astoundingly flippant remark, given the repeated mass expulsions which plagued your own people's history.

 

[HiddenDjinn]

This is an astoundingly flippant remark, given the repeated mass expulsions which plagued your own people's history.

Given the hostile nature of the "Palestinian" population, I see no other solution.(What? You think I'd advocate death camps?)