… a supply route into Gaza controlled by Egypt, not Israel? So how can this have been Israel’s ‘brutal siege’? Hasn’t Egypt equally been laying ‘brutal siege’ to the Gazans, also enforcing upon them ‘collective punishment’ and also forcing them to live in an ‘open prison’? Or is it only the Jews who can ever be guilty of such heinous acts?
So according to ET Abraham was a gardener or was that Ezra was a gardener. After all one or both founded modern day Judaism. Jesus was a merchant or maybe Paul was a merchant and Mohammed was a camel jockey sheep herder. Isn’t it funny how none of that matches historical accounts? Maybe anthropology has greater insight than history.
I’m getting a bit of a chuckle here with all the “solutions” being thrown around. Realistically there is no solution and any speculation we throw out is just a bit of nonsense.
The fact remains that there can be no peace unless the people want peace. People will not want peace so long as there is no commonality between the people. Even in our own society we have lost the public discourse because we have no common basis upon which we relate. I just disparaged ET’s posting because I see her lack of religious experience and in her intransience I think she discards what I view as the very glue that holds a society together. Fortunately ET and I grew up in a society that has a common value that prohibits us from killing each other over a difference of opinion but ours is a rare exception in history and not common.
History shows us that mankind belittles another’s thoughts or beliefs then proceeds to de-humanize the other and eventually go to work to eradicate the “aberrant ones”. At the same time, speaking as a Christian here, I see God constantly stirring the pot as if to keep His children at the top of their form.
Someone earlier posted that Islam was almost an accident. I would say that it is a fulfillment of a prophecy of St. Paul. Paul spoke of the son of the promise (Israel and by extension Christianity) and the son of the law (Islam). He also said that the son of the promise was life and the son of the law was death.
In other words there is no final solution. (Sarcasm intended). Israel will remain Israel. Palestine will remain Palestine. Judaism will remain Judaism, Christianity will remain Christianity and Islam will remain Islam. What we need to do is figure out how to handle the situation. If I pick up a snake and it bites me it’s not the snake’s fault. The snake has done nothing that snakes haven’t done since we were kicked out of the Garden. I was the stupid one for mishandling it. I don’t expect my dog to critique Thomas Aquinas but it is wonderful to play fetch with. Each is acting according to his kind.
All religions and I include secular humanism/atheism as a religion have different world views and are guided in these world views by the spirit of that to which they belong. Counter anyone and you will soon find out the spirit beneath. Each acts according to their kind and there is nothing in this world that will ever remove that fact. The best we can do is prepare ourselves for the time when someone in the camp opposite challenges us with nothing more than a leather sling and five smooth stones.
ET, I think you know very well that this IS about Jews living in West Bank. Every other day it seems I hear on the CBC that “settlements are expanding” and that Palestinians and their supporters are calling for the dismantlement of these Jewish settlements. This is discriminatory and morally reprehensible, yet many Palestinians and their supporters in the West have decided that there should be no Jewish presence in the West Bank. Why?
I agree with or am at least neutral with much of what you say after your first two paragraphs, Joe, yet I am reminded that this is not a zero-sum game. I think it is completely reasonable to argue, and I would argue that it is inevitable, that modulo the ups and downs of history, the net overall human situation will continue to improve on balance, as it has for the last 10,000 years, for the same reasons that it has so far.
In other words, though there is no, as you so cleverly put it, final solution, it remains the case that the evolution of the species has slowly, falteringly, and yet inexorably been heading asymptotically toward a better direction, pace the arbitrary philosophical sillyness of any sort of utopian final solution.
All we have to do is keep batting down the ideologists, one after another, forever.
And on that note I bid y’all good evening, have a great weekend, I must now go and
listen to Stan Getz & Astrud Gilberto performing The Girl From Ipanema in 1964:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpmGKbXxaOk
Posted by: Vitruvius at January 25, 2008 9:50 PM
“She will let us know if our analytical discussion of the situation has gotten out of hand. Not you.”
I refered to one of Kate’s very own requests, Virtuvius, and I asked ET a question regarding that request. Nothing I said even implied that I was speaking for Kate. It was presumptuous and silly of you to suggest that I was.
Point taken, sorry if my rhetoric was stronger than necessary. Still, though the concept of limiting comments to a few posts per person per thread has been discussed here over the years, you will notice that it is not included in the cyan rules above the comment box below. And this certainly isn’t a flame war. So the alternative is the extended debate rule, which is arguably worthy of consideration; I was simply trying to express my opinion that this not (at least yet) such a case, though I’ve been wrong before.
Have a great weekend Vitruvius. In response to your post, you see human progress and I acknowledge what you say yet at the same time other wise men have commented that humanity is degenerating and that too I acknowledge.
Personally I see neither progress nor degeneration. I see what St Augustine called “changing direction without changing course”.
Of this I am convinced. We humans have a date with destiny that far surpasses anything our eyes can see, ears can hear, minds can comprehend or bodies can stand. Yet even as I strive I am compelled to love He who created us and by extension all that He created.
Apology accepted, Vitruvius. I do not visit SDA regularly, and seldom leave comments. And, I do not know what Kate would consider an “extended debate”. I was simply referring to a comment Kate left in a post awhile ago about limiting the number of comments per post.
penny, no, I don’t think that an ideology can exist for long without an economic infrastructure to support it. Oil money is ‘feeding’ by topdown govt redistribution, the population, such that they aren’t ‘hungry enough’ to demand more power. Plus, the severe repressions of a Wahhabi fundamentalist Islam prevents even thinking about freedom. It’s an entangled mixture of ideology and economics and it is indeed difficult to sort out primacy.
ex-liberal, you are ignoring my point, which is that it isn’t about “Jewish presence in the West Bank”. It is about the political ownership of the lands and governance of the West Bank. This land is set aside for a Palestinian State. Therefore, I’ve twice commented, and you haven’t replied, that the situation is about whether or not the Jewish settlers would accept that they are, in the West Bank, Palestinian citizens living under the national authority of a Palestinian state.
If they refuse this infrastructure, then they have no business moving to the West Bank. As for your insertion of ‘discriminatory and morally reprehensible’, I’ll ask: ‘Do you think it discriminatory and morally reprehensible that Palestinians are denied the right to settle in and become citizens of Israel?’
By the way, just wondering, since your comment was about me, it wasn’t simply the number of posts you objected to, but your evaluation (despite your infrequent visits) that most readers do not appreciate my posts. Ah well.
Another inconvenient truth for the Left, the supremacist Islamists the MSM, you name the anti-Semites…
Whenever something’s inconveniently true for the Left and their buddies, they deny, attack, defame, and haul before the Liberal Fascist Commission of Inquisition to intimidate people into quitting the spreading of inconvenient truth.
What’s the inconvenient truth here? Smart folks already understand, but the Left doesn’t, so I’ll say it for them: Hey, Leftists: You are bigots, period. You like the Arabs and Muslims but hate the Israelis and the Jews. So go screw yourselves until you renounce your comforting fascist ways. Shoo, moonbats!
ET, if it is about “political ownership of the lands and governance of the West Bank”, then why is there the insistence that the Jewish presence be removed before the “state of Palestine” exists? Jews have always lived in Hebron and Bethleham and near Rachel’s Tomb and in Shechem/Nablus/near Joseph’s Tomb etc, no matter who had the political ownership of the land (Byzintines, Mamaluks, Turks, British, etc).
No one has answered the question: why must the Jewish presence be removed from the West Bank for “Palestine” to exist? It is always in their list of requirements: “dismantle settlements”. How do approx. 250,000 Jews ruin their ability to have a state? Why do they insist that Jews living there be removed?
Also you know that Israel is 20% Arab/Palestinian with full citizenship, equal rights before the law, voting, members of parliament, etc. Israel did not annex the West Bank after the 6 day war – would you rather that they had done that? This would make the Arabs living there Israeli citizens. Maybe they should have just annexed it – then anyone who did not want to be an Israeli citizen could have kept their Jordanian citizenship and move an hour away.
ex-liberal, you still aren’t answering my question. This is the fourth time I’m asking it!
Would the Israeli settlers in the West Bank accept living there as Palestinian citizens and under a Palestinian government? If yes, fine – I see no problem with their being there. If not, then – they have to leave. That’s the key question and you are continuing to ignore it.
As for “Jews have always lived there’, I’m not into First Footprint arguments as having any relevance not only to the above question but also to any ‘rights to land’. Arabs have always living in the Israeli area too. So?
You seem to be implying some moral ‘right’ for Jewish people to live in the West bank. I’m not aware of any ‘moral right’ for people to live anywhere. These are political decisions.
And the fact that 20% of Arabs in Israel are Israeli citizens ignores my other question. Is it legal for the current non-Israeli Palestinians, who live in the West Bank and Gaza, to move to Israel and/or, to obtain Israeli citizenship? You know that it is illegal to do so.
Therefore, you haven’t answered, my second question, which uses exactly your words but substitutes ‘Palestinian’ for ‘Jews’: ‘Do you think it discriminatory and morally reprehensible that Palestinians are denied the right to settle in and become citizens of Israel?’
Your comment about ‘annexing the West Bank’ is not relevant. That land was set aside for a Palestinian state.
By the way, the situation in the ME is more complex than our much simpler focus on CIVIC identity. In the ME, and even in Israel which is primarily a civic system, tribal or national identity is still definitive. So, citizenship and nationality, which we consider equivalent terms, are not equivalent in the ME and Israel. I quote P. Bennis
“All Israeli citizens, including Palestinians, have the right to vote in elections for members of the Knesset (parliament) and for the prime minister. But not all rights are citizenship rights. Other rights are defined as nationality rights, and are reserved for Jews only. If you are a Jew, you have exclusive use of land, privileged access to private and public employment, special educational loans, home mortgages, preferences for admission to universities, and many other things.”
Note that I am not commenting on the morality or justness of this differentiation between citizenship and nationality – one which you seem to ignore. I’m commenting that it makes a difference in your ability to participate in the society.
“Islam has been the pinnacle of civilization in the western world following the fall of Rome in the 5th C, particularly with respect to science, mathematics, philosophy and a host of other disciplines. From the turn of the millenium to the end of the 15th C the most highly educated society in Europe was islamic Granada.”
This is historical revisionist rubbish. The ideology of Islam is repressive and violently antagonistic towards knowledge. Especially non-Quran based, infidel knowledge.
It was the Muslim Caliph Omar who burned the library of Alexandria. His reason for this: “they will either contradict the Koran, in which case they are heresy, or they will agree with it, so they are superfluous.”
Crediting Islam as an impetus for higher education and civilization is false. However, there were intelligent men who happened to have been Muslim, typically nominal Muslims, however. And in fact, many were not Muslim at all, but hidden apostates, having rejected the irrational ideology.
As one scholar put it, “They claim to have invented zero and they’ve been contributing as much ever since.”
Of course, zero is a Hindu concept.
ET
Jews have lived there when the land was politically controlled in a variety of ways and those who wanted to live in say Hebron would continue to do so no matter who was politically in control. That is not the issue. It doesn’t matter if YOU would be okay with it, it doesn’t matter if “settlers” would be okay with it, the Arabs themselves call for the removal of a Jewish presence in the West Bank in order for the state of Palestine to exist. Why?
Anyone can become a citizen of Israel after a period of naturalization.
Quoting from Phyllis Bennis, an anti-war peace advocate, does not advance your position. “Bennis is an employee of the Institute for Policy Studies, an organization that over the last forty years has shilled for the Kremlin, for Castro, for Ho Chi Minh and Pol Pot, for the Sandinista and Salvadorean Communists, for Palestinian terrorists, for the Ayatollah Khomeini and now evidently for Saddam Hussein. IPS is the quintessential think tank of the American Fifth Column.”
When you/Bennis say that Jews have special rights because of nationality, isn’t this like saying that Canadians have special rights because of nationality (non-Canadians do not have the same rights; landed Canadians work and pay tax but can not vote for example.) Jews are a nation not only a religion.
ex-liberal, you are yet again, slithering from the issue.
I asked you specifically if the Israeli settlers would refuse to live in the West Bank if they were defined as Palestinian citizens and under a Palestinian govt. You still haven’t answered, and it DOES matter what the settlers would agree to because they currently consider themselves Israeli citizens under Israeli govt.
The fact that the Palestinians want the settlers removed is because the settlers consider that land to belong to them, as Jews, and does not belong to Palestine.
Again, the issue is not First Footprint which is both a legally and morally unacceptable criterion. After all, both Jews and Muslims, and even their ‘pagan’ ancestors lived in all those regions before. That is not relevant.
It is quite untrue that ‘anyone can become a citizen of Israel after a period of naturalization’. First, you have to be admitted, and as you know, but are slithering out of accepting, this acceptance is denied to Palestinians. How’s that for ‘morality and discrimination’ (your terms)?
The first step of ‘acceptance to eventually become a citizen’ is important for Israel to control, since its stated doctrine is to maintain a Jewish majority.
I very much doubt if Israel would accept the 4 million Palestinians as citizens (even if they wanted)..that is why most, but not all, in Israel, reject a ‘one-state’ solution.
No, special rights given to ‘nationality’ as differentiated from those given to ‘citizenship’ are NOT the same. I pointed out to you that in Canada and the West, nationality and citizenship are identical. Your list of various other types of residency (non-Canadian, permanent resident, etc) has NOTHING to do with nationality but with types of residency and citizenship.
Nationality, or tribalism or ethnicity, as found in the ME, is completely different from citizenship. And, the FACT that in Israel there are certain ‘rights’ given to ‘ethnicity’ or ‘tribe’ (Jewish vs Arab)even though both peoples are citizens, is, in my view, discriminatory.
I disagree with you; I consider Jewish to be a religion, not a nationality or ethnicity or tribe. But, even if you do consider Jewish to be both a religion and a nationality, that still leaves the fact that in Israel, citizenship is not equal. Your ‘tribe’ or religion or nationality or ethnicity whatever you want to call it, also defines your powers in the society.
As for Bennis, I focus on the facts, not on filiations. After all, I worked all my life in departments devoted to furthering leftism, postmodernism and other such agendas. That didn’t define me.
ET,
It is hypocritical of you to accuse others of ad hominem attacks, when you continually attempt to belittle ex-Liberal with the smear, “slithering.”
As well, your entire argument is moot. Do you really think that a Shariah based Palestinian government would accept Jews as equal citizens? If so, what proof do you have?
There’s mounds of proof to the contrary. All one needs to do is consider the depopulation of Arab Christians in Palestinian territory.
ET, I find it quite amusing that you would choose Bennis as a source, when in everything that does not pertain to Jews/Arabs, I think you would probably be diametrically opposed to her positions. Is it a case of the broken clock that has the correct time once a day?
When Jews (could they be called settlers?) lived in Hebron etc during the Byzintine or Mamaluk or Ottoman periods, they probably thought that the land belonged to them because they are Jews. So what?
I am not slithering away from your question. I think I answered. Jews who would not want to be citizens of Palestine (or were afraid for their safety) would leave. Some for sure would stay (there has been a continued Jewish presence there for thousands of years) because of the meaning to them of Hebron, Rachel’s Tomb, the Judean hills, Bethleham, etc.
As I said above, it doesn’t really matter if you or Jewish settlers would be okay with it, as long as Arabs are calling for the removal of Jewish presence in the West Bank for their state to exist. Why does the existence of a state of Palestine require the removal of Jews?
ET, Jews/Israelis are not perfect. They are trying to survive in a very hostile neighbourhood. Are you trying to say that Israel should accept even people who have waged war against them as citizens? Who does that?
irwin daisy – critiquing a mode of debate, where one person continuously inserts deviations from the topic and doesn’t answer direct questions and comments as ‘slithering’ is not ad hominem. It’s a criticism of their style of argumentation (not their person). That’s exactly what ex-liberal was doing, slithering away from the question.
That’s my point, irwin, that a Palestinian state would NOT accept Jews as citizens. I’m answering ex-liberal’s repeated assertions that there is nothing wrong with Jewish families settling in the West bank – by asking him/her why he/she approves of such settlements – when the land is assigned to the Palestinians for their state!
And when, most certainly, the Jewish settlers wouldn’t put up with being defined as Palestinian citizens within a Palestinian state – never mind that Palestine wouldn’t want them either! Are you deliberately missing the point????
My question is why does ex-liberal repeatedly claim that it is ‘discriminatory and morally reprehensible’ to take the view that Jews should not settle in the West Bank. Do they have any inherent right to do so? No, there’s no such thing as ‘inherent rights’ to land. Any moral right? No. Any other right? No.
ET,
So you are arguing on behalf of an Islamofascist state that in your words, “would NOT accept Jews as citizens.” yet you are antagonistic towards Israel, a democratic state that does accept Muslims as citizens.
Just so we’re perfectly clear.
I see no way that this situation can be resolved until the question of political Islam and shariah are resolved. Political Islam is incompatible with modern civilization, democracy and universal human rights.
Let alone getting along with your neighbours.
ex-liberal, the reason the Palestinians are calling for the removal of the settlements is because they doubt that the settlers would accept being defined as citizens of Palestine, and, furthermore, would accept that non-Jews could live in those same settlements, with them – even be in the majority in those settlements!
Why does the existence of a state of Israel require that non-Jews be in the minority? Why does the existence of a state of Israel mean that non-Jews cannot be admitted as citizens (eg, spouses of Israelis who live in the West Bank)?
You aren’t giving the Palestinians the same rights in defining their nation, as you give to the Israelis.
As for admitting people who warred against you, that happens all the time. Lots of Germans and Italians and Russians now live in the US and the UK. As citizens.Japanese live in the US – as citizens. Wars don’t end interaction forever and ever!
Nobody is perfect – and nobody is all bad. That holds true for both Israelis and Palestinians.
Wow, that’s odd, in all of my following of this situation, I have never heard any Arab say: “the reason the Palestinians are calling for the removal of the settlements is because they doubt that the settlers would accept being defined as citizens of Palestine”
ET I think you know that there have been plenty of family reunifications with people in the West Bank. Recently there has been some cases of spouses coming over and then plotting/accomplishing nefarious terrorist deeds. Wouldn’t you want your government to protect its citizens from such a thing?
Israel is the only Jewish state on the planet. Non-Jews are allowed to live there, but just like we in Canada do not want to live under Sharia, Jews in Israel prefer not to live as dhimmis. They prefer to stay in the majority to avoid living in a place similar to the other Middle Eastern countries. They have offered reparations to Arabs and have allowed many to return after wars of aggression started by their neighbours. The Japenese, Germans, Italians, etc. do not deny the right of the United States to exist and do not have terrorist organizations like Hamas whose charter calls for the destruction of Israel.
I agree that nobody is perfect and nobody is all bad.
Aye, nobody is perfect and nobody is all bad.
That’s not sayin’ much, still, it’s a place to start.