Israel flourishes despite onerous obstacles

[King_David]

Sixty-five years ago today, on Nov. 29, 1947, the then recently created United Nations General Assembly passed resolution 181, which was to partition the former British mandate in Palestine into two states, one Arab and one Jewish.

This two-state formula was not a radically new idea. It had been recommended by the Peel Commission in 1937 and had likewise been applied by the UN just months earlier in the former colony of India, which was similarly divided into two states, one Muslim (Pakistan) and one Hindu (India). In response, Jews declared the state of Israel on May 14, 1948 and five neighbouring Arab nations declared war and attacked the new nation.

That war, as with many since, resulted in an Israeli victory. There was never a formal peace agreement, but merely a cessation of hostilities leading to an armistice. Between that time and 1967, the Palestinian area comprising the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza were annexed to Jordan and Egypt respectively, but at any time could have unilaterally been declared as a Palestinian state without any concession or recognition of Israel.


http://www.therecord.com/opinion/columns/article/844627--israel-flourishes-despite-onerous-obstacles

[Purveyor]

1. Then they shouldn't need USA taxpayer dollars to support them, eh? eom

[King_David]

2. Support them? nt

[kayecy]

4. US Taxpayers dollars?.......Doesn't Israel deserve to be the largest recipient of US aid?........

U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel: 2012 Congressional Report:

Israel is currently the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. Although aid to Israel began in 1949 with a $100 million bank loan, large-scale U.S. assistance for Israel increased dramatically throughout the several Arab-Israeli wars in the 1960s and 1970s.

A 2012 report by the Congressional Research Service, “U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel,” characterizes the historical financial relationship, types of military spending and current trends.

Among the highlights of the report are:
•To date, the United States has provided Israel $115 billion in bilateral assistance. It is currently the second largest recipient of aid worldwide, with Afghanistan now first.
•The fiscal year 2013 budget request “includes $3.1 billion in Foreign Military Financing [FMF] for Israel and $15 million for refugee resettlement. Within the U.S. Department of Defense, the U.S. Missile Defense Agency’s FY2013 budget request includes $99.8 million in joint U.S.-Israeli co-development for missile defense.”
•“The United States has helped defray the cost of Israel’s domestically-developed short-range anti-rocket system, dubbed ‘Iron Dome.’ Iron Dome is designed to intercept very short-range threats between 2.5 and 45 miles in all weather situations…. It was developed by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems. Development of Iron Dome began in February 2007. In response to Palestinian rocket attacks from Gaza, Israel deployed Iron Dome batteries for the first time in April, August, and October 2011 to protect the cities of Ashdod, Beersheba, and Ashkelon. Each battery costs approximately $50 million….”

More at http://journalistsresource.org/studies/international/conflicts/u-s-foreign-aid-to-israel-2012-congressional-report

[Recursion]

3. Stealing land has its advantages. Look at the US; where would we be without California?

And that was stolen even more brazenly...