The Heart of the Problem With Israel: The Mass Expulsion of the Palestinian People

[madokie]

Central to the achievement of the “Zionist dream” is the notion that Jewish lives matter more than Arab lives.

As Israeli government violence against the Palestinians in Gaza intensifies (the latest news being an aggressive ground invasion), I saw a discussion on-line about whether Israel has become more brutal or the brutality has simply become more visible to the public.

I remembered listening to Benjamin Netanyahu when he was at MIT in the 1970’s. He called himself Bibi Nitai and said he was in self-exile until the Labor Party, which he despised, was out of power. He spoke contemptuously about Arabs, and predicted he would be the leader of Israel someday and would protect the Jewish state in the way it deserved. The immediate response many of us had was: “Heaven help us all if he ever gets into power in Israel.”

I also remember the many Israeli leaders I met in the 1970’s from Labor and Mapam and from smaller parties on the “Zionist left” who seemed kind and caring and markedly different from Benjamin Netanyahu—and in many ways they were, not just in their political rhetoric (they all said they were socialists) but as human beings, or so it seemed. But when I finally dug a little deeper and read my history, I learned how they, too, were participants—in fact, often leaders—in the plan to drive the Palestinians out of their homes and off their land. Nothing very kind or caring about that, to say the least.

The bottom line: Israel was created based on the expulsion of over 700,000 Palestinians from their land and from their homes (what Palestinians call the Nakba, the catastrophe). This is the heart of the problem.

http://www.alternet.org/world/heart-problem-israel-mass-expulsion-palestinian-people

My question in all this is who made the decision to put the the nation of Isreal there to begin with. I admit that I really don't know the answers to this. I don't remember the rational for this in our history books DM

[orpupilofnature57]

1. The 6 Day War determined , and doubled Israels territory .

[BillZBubb]

79. Baloney.

The six day land grab allowed Israel to illegally occupy an area the size of Israel. The territory does not now and never will belong to Israel.

[orpupilofnature57]

117. Didn't say that, Pay attention .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-Day_War

[The Magistrate]

2. The Modern Beginning, Sir

Would probably be the Balfour Declaration of late 1917, in which England stated the intention of fostering a 'Jewish national home' in Palestine. There had been various Zionist attempts to establish settlements there prior to that, but it was the declaration that gave it heft. The language was incorporated in the League of Nations mandate under which England ruled Palestine from 1922 ( prior to that, England had occupied it as territory conquered from the Ottoman Empire in the Great War ). Passing over a good deal of intricate politicking and fighting continuing into WWII, the United Nations assumed the responsibilities of the old League with its foundation after WWII. It was the decision of the General Assembly that the Palestine Mandate be partitioned into two parts, a Jewish Zone and an Arab Zone. After a round of serious fighting, Israel, established on the Jewish Zone, held also a good portion of the designated Arab Zone; those parts of that it did not hold were occupied by Jordan or Egypt. What are generally understood to be the borders of Israel are the Armistice Line on which the fighting ended in 1949.

[malaise]

4. Precisely

and they've been stealing land from that day - Palestinians be damned.

And now there's that little problem called natural gas
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jul/09/israel-war-gaza-palestine-natural-gas-energy-crisis

[connecticut yankee]

38. I was only a little girl in 1948

but I remember seeing newsreels of Palestinians being driven out of their homes, in which they had lived for generations, by David ben-Gurion and his thugs. I thought it was unjust then, and I still do.

I come from a Jewish background (although I am an apostate), and my mother was very active in Hadassah, but I never approved of the Israeli land grab.

Israel was set up by the UN (which they had no right to do) out of sympathy with the Jews over the Nazi exterminations. If it weren't for that, there would probably be no Israel.

Harry Truman approved of it because he had many Jewish constituents and few (if any) Palestinians.

[malaise]

39. I wasn't born yet

but as I grew up I heard discomfort even among my Jewish relatives.
British imperialism was the driving force behind this mess from the 19th century but the balance of power shifted after WW2.

[orpupilofnature57]

44. And as I said it Doubled after 1967 .

[BillZBubb]

80. And you were wrong.

[orpupilofnature57]

118. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-Day_War

[orpupilofnature57]

43. You've Nailed it !!!!!!!!!!

[HooptieWagon]

9. That pretty much hits the nail on the head.

Of course modern Zionism started well before the Balfour Declaration, but that was the stamp of "legitimacy". Much of the ensuing immigration was from Eastern Europe, which had a particularly large Jewish population, and sent immigrants in particularly large numbers. This created a land crisis. Land title records among Palestinians was virtually non-existent... Mohammed's land was his father's, and his father's father's, etc going back many generations. It was family owned land, but without the concept of a paper title it became easy to steal. With military might ( courtesy of the US), it wasn't even necessary to create fraudulent titles, just take the land by force.
As the OP states, it is land theft that is the heart of the matter. Israel feels its entitled to all of it.

[tritsofme]

3. The Arab states invaded Israel almost immediately after UN Partition

Rejecting the right of the Jewish State to exist, and trying to drive them into the sea. Israel was born a nation under siege.

There was a general sorting out of populations during the ensuing decades as tens of thousands of Jews fled Arab lands where many had lived for generations, sometimes millennia, a fact that is not frequently mentioned in the "nabka" narrative.

The real difference is that those Jews were by and large accepted and incorporated into Israeli society, while Arabs keep Palestinians and their descendants as
perpetual refugees as opposed to integrating them into their societies.

[cpwm17]

7. That was in 1948

The Nakba was started in 1947 and much of it was accomplished before the neighboring nations came to the Palestinians' defense. The expelled Palestinians were streaming into the neighboring nations. The neighboring nations had good reason to believe that the Zionists were also a major threat to them. History has proven them right.

Bizarrely, supporters of Israel condemn the Palestinians for not supporting the Zionist's agenda, as if the Palestinians were suppose to support the Nakba that was committed against them.

Israeli leaders were pretty open about their goals to expel the natives to create a Jewish State.

[brentspeak]

54. Apparently, that Israel "right to exist"

also means the "right to steal" other people's personal property and homes -- which is precisely what happened when the Palestinian Arabs tried to return to their homes and businesses following the conclusion of the 1948 war, and were turned away at Israel's gunpoint.

[tritsofme]

60. There was no going back to normal after the 1948 War

It exposed the Arab states willingness to go to war to destroy Israel, and the Israeili need for defensible borders.

[brentspeak]

66. It also exposed the Israelis' proprensity to steal other people's homes and property

You're blabbing on about the "Arab states", but the Palestinian civilians were/are not the "the Arab states".

[treestar]

64. That's natural isn't it?

Never understood why the world expected the Palestinians to just accept it. There should have been a deal made at the beginning. It was expected they should just move out and be OK with it.

They are Arabs and should just move to the neighboring Arab countries, who of course would just accept that too, as they are all "Arabs" and "Muslims" and obviously that means they are exactly the same.

There is often a "how dare you question Israel's right to exist" and I have to wonder if that is intimidation. Obviously, Israel had no right to exist. If it did, it would have existed already. It was like any other colonization. The people there always fight back.

[tritsofme]

65. Jews had been living British Palestine for years.

They did not arrive for the first time in 1948, many communities were majority Jewish. With the British Mandate ending, the only other option besides partition between Jews and Arabs would be full Arab sovereignty over the area.

The Jews wanted self-determination and to live in their homeland in peace, they largely accepted the 1948 partition, but when facing enemies whose stated goal was their total annihilation, a people three years removed Auschwitz defended themselves and their nation admirably.

[LittleBlue]

72. Do you consider building settlements in the West Bank "living in peace"?

If, as you say, they only want peace, why do they continue to build settlements?

[tritsofme]

124. In recent years

Settlements have been built in heavily Jewish neighborhoods where there is little dispute they would remain part of Israel in any final status agreement.

[cali]

5. this is a simplified version of reality from an extremely partisan viewpoint

I always come back to what my old classics prof said: the influx of Jews in the post war era was akin to people jumping from a burning building and landing on the people below. Perhaps the U.N. was wrong to create Israel, but it happened and the Palestinians refused to form a country at that time. I'm all for stopping the occupation and I think at this point, a 2 state solution is impossible due to Israel's intractability, but I take exception to such one sided history- and to the pious generalization that Israelis think Jewish lives are more valuable than Palestinian ones. Nations as a whole, inevitably believe the lives of their citizens are more valuable than the lives of others. I see it here on DU re American lives.

[HooptieWagon]

10. I think the analysis is accurate, not one-sided.

The OP is correct, the Zionist movement created a huge need for land to settle new Jewish immigrants, mostly from eastern Europe. The solution was to take land from Palestinians, who had held it for many generations. The situation is not unlike the US settling European immigrants by taking land from Native Americans, and forcing them on to increasingly smaller reservations. Of course the people forced from their land are going to object, and resist by force if possible.

[cali]

49. The OP fails to mention that the U.N. proposal was for two states.

and yes, it quite unlike European colonialism in North America. First of all that region is the historical homeland of Jews. Secondly, Jews have had a continuous presence there despite being forcibly removed themselves. Thirdly, this was hardly a case of conquering armies- at least in the beginning. 60% of the Jewish population worldwide had been destroyed in a few short years. The refugees were welcome in very few countries. Of course, it's one sided.

[HooptieWagon]

59. No.

You have to look back to the beginnings of Zionism, in the mid-19th Century. It was not driven by the desires of European Jews to return to their homeland, which they had been driven off 1500 years earlier by the Emperor Hadrian. The European Jews were far more interested in emmigrating to the United States. Zionism was invented by British Imperialists. At the time, England held a virtual monopoly on far-east trade, through the British East India Company. Colonies in Gibralter and South Africa controlled sea lanes at the entrance to the Mediterranean and around the tip of Africa. Then the French cut a deal with the Egyptians to form a partnership to build the Suez Canal. This would provide southern European countries easy and cheap access to the Far East, pitting the East India Company out of business. England needed to control that canal. In a short period of time, England purchased the Egyptian's shares in the canal, taking it over. This was done by Disraeli side-stepping Parliment, and buying the interest in the canal for the govetnment, using funds from the Rothchilds. Also, England persueded the Ottoman Emperor to give them the Island of Cyprus, in exchange for a defense treaty. The third part of the plan was to establish a Jewish State in Palestine, under British rule of course, with the thought that grateful Jews would be loyal to England. So the plan was to control the canal with two strategic locations in the Eastern Med for its defense. The Jewish State part didn't work out... quite simply the European Jews weren't interested in emmigrating there at the time.
Over time, there was some Jewish emmigration to Palestine. Not so much to greatly upset the Palestinians. Until the aftermath of WW2. The UN carved out a Jewish State from Palestine. This forced Palestinians off their land in that State, and close to a million refugees poured into neighboring Arab countries. This caused the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. As a consequence of the war, Israel seized even more land. This was needed to settle the by now large numbers of Jews emmigrating there. There has been a nearly constant policy of land grabs since.
So the OP is not one-sided, it is a factual conclusion. The conflict is caused by a theft of land.

[cali]

74. No. The genesis of Zionism is rooted in

a Jewish Homeland in Israel. It's facile and patronizing to claim it was invented by British imperialists. It was abetted by them. Your history is shockingly... ahistorical. You seem not to know such basic facts. Zionism was conceived of by secular Jews. There is no real historical argument over that. You seem not to know such things as the fact that around 1900 , Jerusalem was majority Jewish. The seminal figure in early Zionism was Herzl and it was his book that jump started the movement. The Balfour Resolution came some 20 years later.

Your historical revisionism is extremely disturbing. Whether it was "just" or "wise" to establish Israel as the U.N. did can, I suppose, be argued, though it's rather pointless at this time. What shouldn't be done is what you're doing- presenting a distorted account of Zionism. And again, the U.N. proposed two states- the Arab states refused and launched a war.

[HooptieWagon]

92. No, it was not.

And Herzl was not the father of Zionism. The idea of a Jewish State began in the early part of the 19th Century, with proposals by such British conservative imperialists as Charles Henry Churchill, Lord Stanley, Lord Lindsay, and Lord Shaftesbury. Hint: they aren't Jews. Disraeli (a Jew converted to Christianity) hinted around the idea in his book Tancred, written in the 1840s. But the Jewish community was against Zionism, as too radical. The Conference of Rabbis in 1845 refused to allow it to be mentioned in discussion or prayer. Later Conferences discussed, but rejected Xionism in 1869 and 1885, of the latter they issued a statement "We consider oirselves no longer a nation, but a religious community".
In the 70s, Disraeli came full out for Zionism in an article titled "The Jewish Question As An Oriental Question". The article was largely suppressed as being like a match to a powder keg. Note this was in the same time period as Britain seizing control of the Suez Canal from the French, and gaining Cyprus from the Ottomans.
Zionism can't be examined in a vacuum, it has to be studied in the context of world history of the period. The British had defeated Napoleon earlier in the century. British imperialism was at its peak, with over 20% of the world's population under direct British rule, and a great many more indirectly (as like China). The only imperial threat at the time was Russia, and the only commercial threat was France's construction of the Suez Canal which was a significant threat to Britain's monopoly on sea trade. A Palestinian colony populated by Jews loyal to Britain would be a strategic defense from Russia and ensure Britain could control the canal.
Theodore Heizl was a lunatic and a fraud. He frequented the brothels and drinking edtablishments of Vienna, and often ranted about "intellectual" issues of the day, like racial superiority, etc. It is thought he obtained a translated copy of Disraeli's article there... the book for which he is credited as the father of Zionism Der Judenstatt (The Jewish State) is largely plagerized from Disraeli's article written 20 years earlier but not widely spread. Heizl's book was widely read at the time. Heizl died at the age of 44 of complications of gonnorhea. There's your "father" of Zionism.

[Bonobo]

94. You appear not to understand the reason

That rabbis rejected Zionism. It is not, as you say, because it was "too radical". Your ignorance on that basic subject undermines your credibility massively.

[Lithos]

104. This is a fair analysis

To extend, the Palestinians are also in denial of the value of Israeli lives. This results in a vicious cycle. Of course the common people lose every time.

L-

[Fred Sanders]

6. You say you do not understand the rational for placing the Jewish nation in a land far away from the

land they should have been given, a part of Germany.

You will need to read the Bible and the Torah for the answer.

Biblical lands belong to the Jews, Muslims, Christians, take your pick.

[HooptieWagon]

13. It was Babylonians, in the 6th Century BCE,

and the Romans, in the 2nd Century CE, that were the chief culprits behind dispersing Jews from Judea. Not the Palestinians. Nor were the Palestinians responsible for the anti-Semitism, pogroms, ghettos, and ultimately the Holocaust, that occured over centuries in Europe. That was the European's fault. So why should the Palestinians be forced off their land, which they owned for many generations, to create a state for Israel? And why should Israel take even more land? Why the hell WOULDN'T the Palestinians fight back against land theives?

[librechik]

51. except the Bible is a collection of ancient folktales, not a legal document

although it has some verifiable history in it, it wouldn't be fair to decide modern people's fate using the Bible as the authority.

[PDJane]

8. A bit more history.

This is the Balfour Declaration:

Foreign Office

November 2nd, 1917

Dear Lord Rothschild,

I have much pleasure in conveying to you on behalf of His Majesty’s government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved, by the Cabinet:

His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.

Yours,

Arthur James Balfour



Balfour declared his support for the establishment of a Jewish homeland in the area known as Palestine – though there had to be safeguards for the "rights of non-Jewish communities in Palestine". This communication was accepted by the Jewish community as Great Britain’s support for a Jewish homeland. The reason for the Partition was Zionist terrorism, including that at the King David Hotel.

The six day war was not started by Egypt. Egypt had kicked out the UN, and had put their own troops on the Sinai peninsula, but that was because Israel was doing training exercises and making incursions around the border there, and Egypt rightly figured that the Israelis would take any opportunity to Annex the territory. Israel did take the excuse for that war, and moved into the west bank, etc., in order to annex the territory; the generals saw it as an 'opportunity.'

Hamas is an excuse; from Dir Yassin to the present, the entire aim has been to remove Palestinians from Palestine; in other words, ethnic cleansing.

Please note that the original Zionist movement and discussions about a homeland were more wide ranging. The movement settled on Palestine because it would be easier to get the religious there; Uganda, where GB had empty acres, was rejected for that very reason.

Israel as Israel existed from about 163 BC to approximately 6 BC. After that, the Jews were placed under direct Roman Rule; they revolted in 66 AD, and the diaspora began.

By the way, the claim to have been a nation under King David from 1000 BC is not supported by the archaeological record; he simply is not there. (Neither, by the way, is Jesus, but that's a story for another time.)

A book of myth and legend is not a good reason to support the state of Israel in all of Palestine.

[rickyhall]

26. Excuse me but you seem to be wrong

"the archaeological evidence leaves no doubt that King David of Israel was a real historical figure"

From "David and Goliath - Archaeological Evidence"

http://news.bbc.co.uk/dna/place-lancashire/plain/A9914268

which I googled after reading what wrote

[PDJane]

32. That is the religious view. The truth is something else, as it often is.

We won't agree on this; however, modern arhaeologists have looked, and have not found proof for the existence of either person in the literature of the time or in the archaeological evidence.

It is, as is a great deal of the support for biblical events, more than open to interpretation.

[NaturalHigh]

40. That's a very interesting article.

Thanks for the link.

[malaise]

30. Do not forget the roles of one Benjamin Disraeli and Charles Henry Churchill

http://www.campaigner-unbound.0catch.com/how_britains_biggest_racists_created_zionism.htm
<snip>
There is one man who can properly be regarded as the father of Zionism and Nazism: Benjamin Disraeli. To omit Disraeli from a central place in the 19th century development of Zionism, agent historian Barbara Tuchman once said, "would be as absurd as to leave the ghost out of Hamlet." As prime minister under Victoria in the 1870s, Disraeli was the overseer of Britain's imperial design to secure a "homeland" for Jews as a British outpost in the Middle East, and a secret document authored by Disraeli became the manifesto for early Zionism in Europe. That much is admitted on the public record.

What's hidden are Disraeli's motivations. In the 40 novels he also authored, Disraeli called for an Aryan-Semitic alliance to form an organized superior "Caucasian race" that was destined to rule the world with British power and the Hebrew-centered "sacred mysteries of the East." This was the counter-cult to the rising demand for industrialization and progress throughout Europe, the United States, and the Arab world. As we shall show, Nazism and Zionism were the hideous twin offspring of the same Anglican racist mother.

Disraeli himself was the son of an early British cultist, Isaac D'Israeli, a dilettantish figure and literary critic associated with circles around the Edinburgh Review and Sir Walter Scott. Nominally a Jew by name, Isaac D'Israeli was involved in the Isis cult worship of these circles and encouraged his son to study Jesuit teachings and explore other pagan anti-Christian teachings. The Walter Scott clique was the originator of numerous myths and cults conduited into Europe, including the Odin cult in Germany that supplied a mythical history for Nazism.

The Zionist project, however, would have remained a harebrained scheme of Shaftesbury and his brother-in-law had it not been for the "in field" operations of Charles Henry Churchill, the progenitor of the British warmongering tradition of Lawrence of Arabia and Henry Kissinger.

Churchill was in the British army that defeated Mohammed Ali in 1840 and was one of the intelligence officers assigned in the late 1830s to foment anti-French tribal uprisings against the French and pro-French Maronite Christians in Mount Lebanon. Working primarily among the Druze tribes, Churchill was responsible for instigating bloodbaths in the regions matched only by the Lebanese civil war set off by Kissinger in 1975.

[cali]

76. that is insane crap. really insane. yikes.

and it edges very close to the line.

"Herzl was bred in Vienna, the intellectual swamp of the decomposing Hapsburg Empire. There the British intelligence service and allied House of Austria also recruited Adolf Hitler, for the Nazi variety of anti-Semitism. Like Hitler, Herzl was an extreme neurotic, a Bohemian playwright, who hated Jews. Laughed at, derided, denounced, and assured that he was insane by almost all Jews he came in contact with, Theodore Herzl was embraced by the racialist myth-makers of the British Empire, becoming a principal agent for their policy: a drive to "purify" the Aryan and Semitic "races" alike by ridding Europe of "the Jew."

Not to mention it's unbelievably stupid garble.

[cali]

75. You. No one should credit a word you say on this issue.

I've seen your deleted posts and they show what you are.

[PDJane]

93. Really? Would you like to show me those deleted posts? I think there's one.....

I don't think there are all that many.

And truthfully, even the ones that were deleted weren't that awful.

A historical viewpoint, as opposed to a religious viewpoint is a necessary thing sometimes; just because I don't believe in the religious viewpoint doesn't mean that I shuold be silenced. I have never said anything half so personal or as viciously hateful as you have just shown me.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

11. Christian Rapture Fans were all for it....

Part of their mythology is the Jewish people had to return and rebuild their temple so they were like, "Oh wow!!! It's finally happening!!!!" Meanwhile the Jewish people were like, "Naw man, we're just goin' home."

To this day Israel sends over someone to appear before these Rapture Cultists to give a speech and collect a buttload of cash.

And so it goes.

[LuvNewcastle]

15. Yes, and that weird interpretation of Revelation only started happening

in the last 100-200 years of Christianity. Before then, the book of Revelation had been considered 'prophecy' that had already been fulfilled. Christians believed that it was about the fall of the Roman Empire, not about the end of the world. In fact, a lot of important people in the history of Christianity didn't even believe that Revelation belonged in the canon of scripture. But these American Evangelicals started teaching this weird interpretation about the end of the world and started making piles of money by scaring people about the future.

So much of America's policy toward Israel is fucked up, but this Evangelical nonsense about the "End Times" has a lot to do with it. In fact, a lot of people who aren't even church-goers believe all that bullshit they've been preaching about the end of the world, and that has skewed our relations toward Israel. A lot of people believe that we have to support everything Israel does, or God will destroy America.

Such mindless nonsense is behind at least a third of the American public's views about Israel. I'm hoping that as America becomes more secular that these crazy ideas will be seen for what they are, but I'm not ready to bet that will happen just yet. The ignorance and indoctrination is deep.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

16. I have hope because the Millennials are asking fundamental questions. Like, "Why?"

[LuvNewcastle]

24. They seem to be a lot more savvy when it comes to spotting

bullshit propaganda in media. A lot of older people just suck in everything they see on tv, like Fox News viewers. I have hope, too, because the alternative is too awful to contemplate.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

34. Kinda like blind support of,...well,...ANYTHING. Including CAPITALISM.

[Roy Serohz]

12. DUly RECommended

[MohRokTah]

14. In answer to your question, The United Nations.

There is no more legitimate beginning for a nation than for a collective body of the world's nations to charter said nation.

Israel is 100% legitimate and has been since its inception in 1948.

From my perspective, it was the least bad solution to the problem of millions of displaced people who, as a people, had been persecuted literally for millennia.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

17. Someone needs to tell them that persecution shouldn't be passed on.

[MohRokTah]

18. A nation born under siege and surrounded will always be on a defensive footing. eom

[Spitfire of ATJ]

19. Jewish people used to be all over the Middle East living side by side with Arabs in peace...

It wasn't until they established a STATE that they came together in one place and then became lousy neighbors.

[MohRokTah]

21. You're free to believe that

I am free to hold that view to have a whiff of anti-semitism,

[Spitfire of ATJ]

27. Newsflash: Arabs are a semitic people too....

And that tactic you used is getting worn out by the body count.

[MohRokTah]

28. Anti-zionist is inherently anti-semitic. eom

[Spitfire of ATJ]

31. Wrong, Zionism is inherently Right Wing Authoritarian...

Good thing there are Liberal Jewish people too.

[MohRokTah]

33. .

Six million. How many more?

[Spitfire of ATJ]

36. Keep up the canned FALSE CHOICE...

It's NOT a choice between BLIND acceptance of EVERYTHING ISRAEL DOES or the mass extermination of the Jewish People.

That crap doesn't fly.

[U4ikLefty]

41. Did you just pull the Holocaust card?

lame

[WinkyDink]

50. And which history card do you think is relevant? Maybe the one which shows the assassination attempt

on Jordan's King Hussein, by the PLO?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September_in_Jordan

http://www.palestinefacts.org/pf_1967to1991_jordan_expel_plo.php

[cali]

81. No it's not. Some Zionism is and some isn't. It's a term that encapsulates

differing philosophies. And those aren't liberal Jews. They're a complete nutcase group called the Naturei Karta and they're about as liberal as Attila the Hun and damned hateful as well- mostly they're just batshit crazy.

http://972mag.com/anti-zionist-jews-are-no-friend-of-the-palestinian-national-struggle/61002/

The ignorance in this thread is pitiful- and you've made a hefty contribution to it.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

86. Typical. It's now time to accuse me of being "ignorant" and to tell me to go away....

The pattern repeats itself. Stuff gets said, everyone throws up their hands in frustration and NOTHING CHANGES.

[Bonobo]

95. Again, ignorance about why Orthodox Jews

Are against Zionism. Hint: it has to do with crazy fundamentalist religious ideas. In other words, you are being a hypocrite by using their crazy ass reasons for opposing Zionism to bolster your arguments while, at the same time, showing your lack of knowledge on the subject.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

96. Anyone who claims they are the chosen ones loses the argument.

[Bonobo]

97. Huh?

You going for non-sequitor of the day or something?

You didn't understand why ultra Orthodox Jews oppose Zionism and now you're just tossing around antisemitic remarks willy nilly?

[Spitfire of ATJ]

98. No matter WHAT I post at this point it's going to written off....

It's not the first time It's happened around here.

We have people here who consider ANY criticism of Israel to be an attack on the Jewish people as if they are one and the SAME when they're NOT. ESPECIALLY when you have a BIG chunk of peace loving Israelis who HATE what their government is doing.

Funny how the media never seeks them out for ideas of how to end this. They ask the folks with the guns.

BTW: I know it doesn't even COMPUTE with a lot of Americans but there are people living in the Middle East who are turning against the very IDEA of religion just like here. They just want to get up in the morning and go to work and earn a living and love their wife and kids and occasionally wax their car. Our media presents the Middle East as though EVERYONE is devout.

It's like here when they make like EVERYONE goes to church on Sunday when most Americans can't even point to the nearest church from their house. They certainly can't tell you the NAME of the Pastor.

The Ba'ath Party is a SECULAR party. Saddam didn't give a shit about religion. He had a Christian on his cabinet. The reason the Bush Administration HATED IT was because they're SOCIALISTS. Saddam took that oil money and distributed it amongst the people instead of making a handful of obscenely wealthy assholes,....like the Saudis.

[Bonobo]

100. That's why it is hilarious

to see you using ultra orthodox to defend your positions!

[Spitfire of ATJ]

105. What's funny is the claim that being against Israeli aggression means you MUST hate the Jews.

[Bonobo]

107. Then don't make anti-semitic statements like:

"Anyone that claims to be the Chosen People automatically lose".

Jews DO call themselves the chosen people, so it sounds an awful lot like anti-semitism. I mean, that statement is ALL about Judaism and nothing about Israel. Right? You do see that, don't you?

[Spitfire of ATJ]

109. Absolutely NOT. I DON'T see that when it comes to anyone beating the shit out of someone else....

History is filled with people who claimed a deity granted them dominion over others.

Consider "Manifest Destiny".

[Bonobo]

110. Repeat. Your insulting statement was about JUDAISM, not ISRAEL.

Do you get that? If not, I don't know what to say really.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

113. I never posted ANYTHING against the actual Jewish People....

There are right wing religious zealots amongst them though just like there are right wing religious zealots here that claim God gave them power.

The sad thing is there are political figures over there that have learned the best way to get elected to to pander to people that make our Tea Party look like hippies.

[Arugula Latte]

68. It might be with some people, but there are plenty of people

who are not at all anti-semitic (including many Jews themselves) who think the expulsion and repression of the Palestinian people over decades has been a terrible wrong. There's a difference between being against specific policies and being against an entire group of people.

[cali]

82. That is certainly true, but some posts in this thread are nothing but demonization

and some are straying close to the line. And I can hardly be called an apologist for Israel.

[cali]

77. Anti-semitism is term coined to make hatred of jews more palatable and more scientific sounding

it denotes such and always has. Now words and terms can change as far as meaning goes over time, and you're free to try to extend the term to Arabs but that's not how its been used historically and still is used, by historians, sociologists, linguists, reporters, governments, etc. As of now, it means what it has always meant.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

85. the term "Anti-semitism" is used as a club to cut off criticism of Israel.

[sabbat hunter]

103. anti-semetic

means anti-jew. That is the definition you will find in websters, Oxford, etc.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

106. Pssst....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semitic_people

[sabbat hunter]

108. psst

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anti-semitism


hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious, ethnic, or racial group


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism

Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is prejudice, hatred of, or discrimination against Jews as a national, ethnic, religious or racial group.[1] A person who holds such positions is called an "antisemite". As Jews are an ethnoreligious group, antisemitism is generally considered a form of racism.

While the term's etymology might suggest that antisemitism is directed against all Semitic people, the term was coined in the late 19th century in Germany as a more scientific-sounding term for Judenhass ("Jew-hatred&quot ,[2] and that has been its normal use since then.[3] For the purposes of a 2005 U.S. governmental report, antisemitism was considered "hatred toward Jews—individually and as a group—that can be attributed to the Jewish religion and/or ethnicity

I am having a lot of trouble understanding why people on a progressive forum are suddenly espousing a far right idea about the term anti-semetic.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

111. Oh, you mean when I was accused of being anti-Semitic because I say Israel is run by Right Wingers?

[Bonobo]

112. No, when you denigrate Jews for calling themselves "the Chosen People"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J

You may not like it, or agree with it, but to many Jews, they are the people that had a special covenant with God.

Bashing them as whack jobs (like you did) for having this belief is indeed anti-semitic.

I myself do not have any of these religious beliefs but I would not denigrate an entire religion as you did and that includes ANY religion.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

115. "Bashing them as whack jobs (like you did) for having this belief is indeed anti-semitic."

No. I meant anyone who claims that being "The Chosen Ones" as their entire argument and acts like it gives them a license to KILL has lost the argument as far as I'm concerned.

[MFM008]

90. so sick of

"whiffs of anti-semetism" garbage. Israel deserves all the spleen they get when they start acting like they have manifest destiny, and no one is supposed to call them on it and they are using our tax dollars to finance these little excursions. Lets see how many new settlement areas they approve after this as well. Likud has no intention of peace----ever.

[LTX]

119. I agree that "whiff" is the wrong term.

The stench of antisemitism in these threads goes well beyond a ""whiff."

[WinkyDink]

48. Link?

[Spitfire of ATJ]

63. There was no internet in 1948.

[WinkyDink]

114. So historical information began with the Internet? Sure, I could Google, but I didn't post

your post.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

116. No, you posted that post....

Someone else posted another post with a map showing the percentages of Palestinians to Jews prior to the huge influx of Jews from all over the PLANET into Israel.

[Threedifferentones]

52. So it should not have been created.

Yes, it was predictable that TAKING that land in order to form Israel would lead to decades, maybe centuries, of anger and bloody conflict. But they did it anyway. Why?

Western Europe was quite accustomed to carving up the ME in the middle of the twentieth century. Many Muslim's have attitudes towards Israel that are also colored by the memory of colonialism as a whole. Seeing the Americans decimate Iraq only enhances that.

Pointing out that colonialism always involves the TAKING of land is not antisemitism. And I don't see how it is controversial to say that the belief that God wants the Bible to be reign supreme in all corners of the globe was once quite common in the U.S. and western Europe, even into the 1950s. In fact, among more conservative groups that is still a popular point of view.

It is not a biased opinion to remind people that Christian and Jewish people who agreed to disregard the wishes of a bunch of Muslims valued their religions more than the one of their victims.

Of course if the Muslims had the upper hand, militarily and technologically speaking, they would have brutalized Europe in basically the same way, but that only goes to show that all three religions are equally horrible.

[cpwm17]

23. The UN has no legal or moral authority to create a nation for one people

on land heavily occupied by another people. Just because President Truman arm twisted a bunch of nations that are nowhere near Palestine to create a Jewish state in Palestine, doesn't make it legitimate at all – that's naked imperialism. That should be common sense to any liberal.

You are also making the claim that a Jewish life is more valuable than an Arab life. Arabs disagree with you.

[MohRokTah]

29. IT has world authority to do so. eom

[PDJane]

35. It's another form of collective punishment; Truman agreed because

He had Jewish and Zionist constituents and no Arab constituents.

That doesn't make what anyone did in this mess right. In fact, It was a way to export the Jewish problem to people who had nothing to do with the collective punishment of the Jewish people. It was wrong, and it remains wrong.

[fujiyama]

123. What is this "Jewish Problem" you speak of?

[PDJane]

126. Read history.

Jews were confined to certain traditional occupations, were educated, and were envied and hated because of it. Being bankers to kings and nations is not a comfortable place...and yes, there have been Jewish bankers, doctors, lawyers, and professionals since the occupations existed. Isabella of Spain used them.

The hatred engendered for Jews around the holocaust was part of the 'problem,' and that propaganda made things worse. It's easy to get people who feel badly done by to react with hatred. Russian Jews had been subjected to pogroms for decades by that time; the fact that the czars treated their own people as disposable made not one white of difference. Naturally, Jews wanted someplace to be safe; that was part of the emerging problem. Just as naturally, Europe was out of the question. That left parts of Ethiopia, under the control of the British at the time, a few other places in Africa.....the Zionists wanted Palestine.

The narrative is necessarily short; but there are a number of books to fill out the gaps.

[fujiyama]

128. I was just wondering what your context was for using the word "problem".

I have heard that word being used for minority groups before and it just made me wonder what you were getting at. Never mind, I am familiar with the history.

[PDJane]

129. I am simply referring to the history, nothing vile.

[tiny elvis]

20. do the common israelis control their own government?

usa puts more money in israel's elections than israelis do

http://www.npr.org/2012/10/17/163098137/israeli-politicians-look-to-u-s-for-campaign-funds

[stupidicus]

22. All the past history aside

and contrary to what Israeli apologists would have you think, here is the unvarnished/incontrovertible truth about its formation, making it as a legal and moral matter a tad dubious to say the least.

Zionism’s assertion that Israel was given its birth certificate and thus legitimacy by the UN General Assembly partition resolution of 29 November 1947 is pure propaganda nonsense, as demonstrated by an honest examination of the record of what actually happened.

In the first place the UN without the consent of the majority of the people of Palestine did not have the right to decide to partition Palestine or assign any part of its territory to a minority of alien immigrants in order for them to establish a state of their own.

Despite that, by the narrowest of margins, and only after a rigged vote, the UN General Assembly did pass a resolution to partition Palestine and create two states, one Arab, one Jewish, with Jerusalem not part of either. But the General Assembly resolution was only a non-binding proposal - meaning that it could have no effect, would not become binding, until and unless it was approved by the Security Council.

The truth is that the General Assembly’s partition proposal never went to the Security Council for consideration. Why not? Because the US knew that, if approved, and because of Arab and other Muslim opposition, it could only be implemented by force; and President Truman was not prepared to use force to partition Palestine.

http://www.countercurrents.org/hart050410.htm

The real problem is the pitfalls associated with either the one or two state solutions. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-state_solution
http://ri.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0LEV0cFwslTLRgABhRXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTEzN3Bic2hhBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDNARjb2xvA2JmMQR2dGlkA1ZJUDQ2NF8x/RV=2/RE=1405760135/RO=10/RU=http%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fTwo-state_solution/RK=0/RS=H_ceGbiI2CV9oMVy.huLTtGoDi8-

and that "right to exist" garbage http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0202/p09s02-coop.html

They certainly have no "right to exist" as an apartheid state with second class citizenry imo.

[LuvNewcastle]

37. Exactly. What if the UN decided to take your house and give it to someone else?

How would you feel about that? It was all a big crime, but the way I feel about it now is what's done is done. You can't reverse time and redress all wrongs.

I believe now that Israel is legitimate only because it's been so long since it was formed and now there are all the people living there who would be disturbed if we tried to reverse time. So the Jewish homeland is legitimate now, but so is a Palestinian homeland.

I don't know exactly how it needs to be divided up, but some redistribution is in order, like giving back the land that's been taken by the "settlers." Maybe they should go back to the original division of the land in the UN decision. It's not fair to everyone, but I believe that would be the easiest and most legitimate way to solve the conflict.

Something needs to be done post haste. I think it's time the world stepped in again and made the decision for them, because it will never be resolved by the Israelis and Palestinians. Maybe they could have a de-militarized zone like they have in Korea. It wouldn't be an ideal solution, but it could work.

[HooptieWagon]

42. Nazi loot is still being returned to rightful owners.

Ironically, some of it to Jews. So it's not too late to return stolen land to Palestinians.

[stupidicus]

45. we share that pov

I didn't mean to leave the impression that I feel otherwise. Israel is there to stay as a "Jewish state" until such time that birth rates, etc, and democracy changes that.

[WinkyDink]

47. Oh, FGS. Do you know nothing of what happens after wars? Lands are re-arranged. Ask the Germans.

[PCIntern]

62. YES...and BTW, do you think that any of these folk who

think the Jews do not belong in Israel since "obviously" the Palestinians were there "first"., would think that the Jews who were displaced from Germany should get their houses and property and factories back? Because:

THEY WERE THERE FIRST!

[LuvNewcastle]

91. Yes, I know what happens after wars,

and there should be consequences for the war that Israel has waged against the Palestinians. They've gradually encroached further and further onto their lands and destroyed their property in the areas where they're still living. There should be consequences for that, too. The way I look at it is, if the UN can create a state at one time, it can also do the same thing later. What goes around comes around. As I said, I believe the Israelis should be able to have a Jewish state there, but I also believe that the Palestinians deserve one. I think that would be a lot closer to justice than the way things are now.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

25. How is it that some Arabs were incorporated into Israel and some weren't?

I believe that I've seen figures that suggest that up to one-fourth of Israeli citizens are non-Jewish Arabs. That's a sizable Arab population and doesn't include the millions living in Gaza and the West Bank, the Palestinian areas. In fact, it's become a worry because it's estimated that by mid-century, Arabs (who have double the birth rate of Jews) will outnumber Jews as official citizens of the Jewish State, possibly changing the very nature of Israel. Anyone know how it is that many Arabs were incorporated into Israel and many were not?

[WinkyDink]

46. I think you need to read some history. The FACTS are more complex, and less Arab-friendly, than

this thread would allow.

[brentspeak]

53. Seems like the Israelis stole a lot of private/personal property

Following the 1948 war. I've read all kinds of self-serving rationale from right-wing Israel supporters concerning the matter, and it's all bull$hit: they stole people's homes, land property, personal belongings, and businesses.

[Calista241]

55. Never mind that the Jews were attacked in 1948.

What would today look like if the Arabs hadn't tried to expel and exterminate the Jews back then.

[brentspeak]

56. It wasn't the Palestinian civilians who attacked the Jews in 1948

It was foreign Arab armies. But in the minds of right-wing Israel supporters, all Arabs are the same -- and Palestinian non-combatants' private property can therefore be appropriated as spoils-of-war.

[orpupilofnature57]

57. +1000 !!!!

[workinclasszero]

58. What about the genocide and ethic cleansing of the Native American people?

I find it funny as hell (not) that American citizens living on land stolen from the Indian tribes that were here long before any white man can sit high and mighty in judgment over Israel for doing on a tiny scale what we did on a massive scale!

The largest ethic cleansing/genocide ever according to some. Trail of tears anyone? Massacre at Wounded Knee? Indian Removal Act?

Yeah we are so freakin holy! smh

In 1830, it was called “The Indian Removal Act.” Today it’s called “ethnic cleansing,” which is considered a crime against humanity by the International Criminal Court. But for nearly 100 years it was the stated policy of every U.S. presidents from Washington to Grant – including Lincoln.


http://www.crimemagazine.com/ethnic-cleansing-native-americans

The Trail of Tears, An American Form of Ethnic Cleansing?

http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/139003/

Picture of american soldiers shoveling dead indians into a mass grave at this wiki link. Looks remarkably like the pictures of Hitlers death squads shooting jewish men women and children and burying them in mass graves.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wounded_Knee_Massacre

But hey that was a long time ago right? Nobody cares...at all.

[PDJane]

61. The difference is the Geneva convention and international law,

To which Israel is a signatory. International law is in effect all the time, not just when convenient. Israel is committing war crimes.

[LittleBlue]

67. No one in this thread is suggesting all Jews be cleansed from Israel

Last edited Sat Jul 19, 2014, 02:50 PM - Edit history (1)

to remedy Israel's prior ethnic cleansing of Arabs.

Native Americans have citizenship today. That's what the Palestinians need: either citizenship in Israel or a nation of their own. But Israel is unwilling to give either. They are deprived of citizenship and thrown into modern bantustans.

[tritsofme]

69. Hamas, ahem, makes that suggestion.

[LittleBlue]

71. I should have made it more obvious that I was referring to

this thread.

Did you want to address my point or...?

[dfgrbac]

70. This is a great thread with comments by very intelligent people.

It feels good to see so many thinking about serious problems.

Can we also think about coming up with the means to implement solutions. Our government (USA) is out of control, but if we reign it in, our country is in a unique position to solve a lot of things.

[cali]

83. I couldn't disagree more. This is a disturbing thread with a lot of

crap that isn't historically accurate.

[fujiyama]

73. It's easy to blame this on Zionism but that's not a solution to this conflict

The modern conflict in the region is in part due to the Zionist movement, but it's difficult for me not to empathize with some of their early goals to an extent though the theft of others' land is difficult to reconcile.

Considering the history of antisemitism throughout the world and particularly in Europe, it was clear by the end of the 19th century, to many Jews that a homeland free of persecution was needed. As the Ottoman Empire fell, more Jews began migrating to the region under the British mandate. Obviously this need was felt greater than ever with the holocaust.

Most people would say - and rightly so - that a homeland for the Jews should have been paid not by the indigenous Arabs living there for generations - but by Europeans themselves. A Jewish homeland in the heart of Europe would have made more sense in many ways, as most Jews that founded Israel were European in culture and recent residence. But I think to most Jews, Europe was not the center of their religious culture and the myths they were raised on for the thousand-plus years they were scattered about. The isolation forced upon them throughout the continent never made them part of the countries they resided in. I remember hearing that during the early part of the movement, a state in the African continent was considered - somewhere in Uganda I think.

But of course, the "real homeland" - Israel, or Palestine as it had come to be known - had people residing there for many centuries. To kick them off their land was wrong - and bloody. These were innocent people, whose land was ultimately stolen from them.

But so much of history is about land being taken from others. What the Palestinians have endured is wrong, but after more than three major wars, all of which ended in defeat and more land being lost, the Arab nations should have realized that forging a lasting peace with the goal of a second state for the Palestinians was the only real solution. Instead the Palestinian movement became taken over by radical Islamic groups - not with the goal of establishing a thriving and independent state of Palestine, but "driving the Jews to the sea". And of course, most subsequent Israeli governments since '67 have only made half-hearted attempts build a lasting peace. Instead more land in the West Bank has been occupied by a radical religious settler movement with harsher and more humiliating conditions for the people living there.

It's a mess and very few US presidents have had success building any peace. Carter did with Egypt (because he also was the most balanced in his treatment of both sides) - and Clinton was close. Of all the Presidents I've read about regarding Israel policy, Clinton seems the most informed. I've always enjoyed his interviews on the region. Republican presidents have merely treated Israel as a pawn for the religious right, as an outpost during the Cold War or simply within the lens of oil politics.

[snagglepuss]

78. Well said. For me the crux of the problem is the delusion that the

monothestic God of Abraham has an existence outside human imagination. However if Abraham's monothestic god does exist than it has blood on its hands for instillling in Jews the belief that Jews have a divine right to this land. Its absurb. This one idea has created hell on Earth. Abraham's god is a troublemaker.

[fujiyama]

122. For many of the founders of the modern state of Israel

and most of its current residents, I don't think the divine aspect plays too heavily into it. Contrary to what many believe, the Jewish state is fairly secular - at least many of its citizens are. There is a huge split between liberal, reformist, and orthodox Jews. Most of the founders were also socialist and may have even been considered atheist.

I place most of the blame on two millennium of European antisemitism and imperialism. We're living with the results today of the maps carved out and constantly remade, whether it was for Christ, Muhammad, power for power's sake (the Romans), or resources.... Judaism was for much of that time, a relatively minor player in the region once the Jews were disbursed.

But it's hard to dispute that the "Holy Land" did have special meaning to even Jews that weren't religious. For them, Israel was supposed to be a safe haven from persecution - a place to practice their religion without interference from the state, to raise their children without being surrounded by people that constantly accused them of blood libel - of killing the Christian messiah... There were very few places that could be done (the US was one of the few and even here it's not like antisemitism didn't exist here).

Either way, making peace means having leaders that will take extraordinary risks - Sadat, Begin...Rabin, and even those like Carter and Clinton that facilitated the process. The only thing Hamas risks is more civilian casualties. And Netanyahu may be one of the most disingenuous and cynical politicians on the world's stage. So the modern conflict will continue on.

[cali]

84. Suggesting that Jews should have had to live in a European "homeland"

surrounded by those that exterminated 60% of the worldwide Jewish population makes no sense to me at all . Talk about trauma.

The remainder of your post is spot on.

[fujiyama]

125. I agree, a European Jewish state wouldn't have been tenable

but the reality is that Europe was responsible for most antisemitism for the centuries preceding the founding of Israel and in an ideal world a state they would have given up land to the Jewish people. It was not the Palestinians responsible for killing six million Jews.

But a European Jewish State disregards any cultural and historical connection the Jews had to the Middle East. As I said in my other post, the founding of the state makes me uncomfortable and it's understandable why many Arabs felt Israel was nothing more than a colonial outpost, but the country didn't pop into existence out of nowhere...and it's not like there was no basis whatsoever for the Jews wanting a home there.

[libodem]

87. For a long time I have been

Feeling bad for those people. Human beings are not disposable collateral damage.

In this day and age with all the elaborate spying and tracking capabilities, it is well imaginable, that Mosad could be there standing behind the culprit under an hour.

This could be surgical but it's a butchery, instead. Someone wants this way. its no accident

The starting incidents were seized upon to continue plans, 30 years in the dreaming.

The UN should drop in some life rafts. And the humanitarian neutral ships can pick them up at sea.

Then they can go to Mexico and board the top of a freight train to get to the US border.They need bring nothing but their prayer rugs. They can start turning themselves into Customs. You can grasp the reality of all this when the first prayer rug washes up along the Rio Grande.

Heads would explode on Faux. Bill O'Liely, would wet himself before he stroked.

[Aerows]

99. I just wish

with all fervency in my heart, that people would quit killing each other. It does nothing to improve anyone's life, and only serves to destroy.

[libodem]

120. I know

[BainsBane]

88. Britain, through the Balfour Declaration

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration_of_1917

[Uncle Joe]

89. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, madokie.

[madokie]

101. Thank you for the thanks Uncle Joe

The world has a serious problem there and it needs to be dealt with on a humanitarian basis, not through force as it has been up to now. Innocent people are dying and there is no need for that.

In my infinite wisdom I think that we, the usa, needs to quit giving Israel money like we do. Without our money they'd be in a different position and possibly be more willing to negotiate with the Palestinians rather than Kill.

[sabbat hunter]

102. one big problem

is that 700,000 palestinians were not expelled. According to benny Morris and others, the number is about 1/3rd of that. Another 1/3rd fled at the behest of Arab generals. another 1/3rd left just to get out of the way of the fighting, either by one side or the other coming thru their towns.

[PCIntern]

121. ...and American lives are not perceived as more important to Americans?

Hell, when we were in Vietnam, they'd go on and on about the four Americans killed that day and then report that we had killed 168 NVA like we ran over an anthill or something. There were almost 300 passengers killed by whomever shot that plane down this week...not much has been written around here vis-a-vis the families who lost their innocents to some missile fired at an arbitrary plane. At least it appears that it was arbitrary so far.

So of course Israeli lives, Jewish, Muslim, and Christian are perceived as more important by Israelis than they are to anyone else. So I have what is left of my family from the Holocaust living over there - so I happen to think that their lives are critical. I certainly do not expect anyone else, particularly some around here, to give a crap about them, but I do. After all,. some here were complaining that the death toll was "disproportionate" and then had to do some scampering to explain what they 'really' meant by that. Lot of posturing and accusatory language, along with foul-mouthed comments do not make for rational discussion.

[elleng]

127. The western powers did,

with some reluctance.

'The Balfour Declaration (dated 2 November 1917) was a letter from the United Kingdom's Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour to Baron Rothschild (Walter Rothschild, 2nd Baron Rothschild), a leader of the British Jewish community, for transmission to the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland.

His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.[1]

The text of the letter was published in the press one week later, on 9 November 1917.[2] The "Balfour Declaration" was later incorporated into the Sèvres peace treaty with the Ottoman Empire and the Mandate for Palestine. The original document is kept at the British Library.'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration

It would be good, and should be mandatory, for U.S. (and other) 'power brokers' to learn or relearn this. We forced Palestinians out of their homes.