This is about Israel’s elections.  Israel’s current leaders are all third-rate.  Ariel Sharon, a man I despise, would never have fallen for this.  The entire purpose of Hamas is to prevent a two-state solution.  Reoccupation of Gaza, brutal and deplorable as it will inevitably be, sets back the possibility of a two-state solution.  The point of the Gaza disengagement was, strategically speaking, a long term dream of fobbing Gaza off on Egypt.  Wasn’t gonna happen, and it’s even less likely now.  However, Barak and Livni may improve their electoral standings.

Anyway, my point about the Egyptians was only that, contrary to nearly all mainstream American discourse on the issue, it’s perfectly possible to blame Hamas while simultaneously deploring Israel’s actions in response.

Thank you for stating this!

Egypt should invade Gaza, take command, and occupy it.  That’s about the only insane solution that hasn’t been tried.  And it’s so crazy it just might work less poorly than all the others.

Jon—

They did that from 1948 to 1967.

Sad thing is, they could have if they wanted to (along with Jordan, who occupied the West Bank and Jerusalem) set up a Palestinian state in that time period with Jerusalem as its capital. The Palestinians have been screwed by everybody.

Egypt can’t take Gaza.  Arab dictators are precarious as it is.  Control over Gaza could topple Mubarak et al.  Dangerous. 

I chuckle whenever someone says that the Palestinians don’t have Arab support.  They have the support of the Arab so-called “street”.  It has turned out increasingly that this matters.

To piggyback on Ben D.‘s comments:
Jordan not only occupied the West Bank in 1948, Jordan officially annexed it in 1950, and then expelled most of the Palestinians in 1970, after a bloody battle between the Jordanian and PLO forces. It wasn’t until 1988 that Jordan renounced its territorial claim to the West Bank and endorsed the idea of a two-state solution.

Ben D.,

I know.  But it’s about the best thing that could happen right now.

I’m not going to spend much sweat defending that proposal, since I did use such terms as “crazy”, “insane”, and “work less poorly” when proposing the idea.  But if anyone can come up with a more viable dumb idea, this is certainly the place.

Okay, show of hands:  does anyone else feel like the world is burning to the fucking ground?

Jon—

My idea is to have Israel invade Gaza, destroy Hamas, and then give it back to Fatah. Yeah, that’s probably insane and unworkable too, isn’t it? Because then Fatah would be seen as “collaborators” or some such thing and would lose legitimacy and then couldn’t work towards a two-state solution.

Hamas controlling Gaza is a real fly in the ointment of the entire peace process, and there’s no easy way to fix it.

The whole insistence on holding immediate elections in Palestine as part of the “freedom agenda” sure worked out well, didn’t it? Thanks again, Dubya!

Okay, show of hands:  does anyone else feel like the world is burning to the fucking ground?
Seraph on 01/03 at 08:57 PM

I have felt this way from late 2001 onwards. This decade blows.

Then when were you supposed to hold elections?  The very idea of bringing Fatah in on the barrel of a gun is, well ...

Can we at least say “patronizing”?

Mandos—

I DID say it was a nutty idea.

You hold elections when there’s some economic growth, stability, etc., not when they are poor and under an Israeli gun and therefore prone towards extremism (understandably so I might add).

“Okay, show of hands:  does anyone else feel like the world is burning to the fucking ground?”

Actually, no. The world isn’t going to kill itself off anytime soon; it simply doesn’t advance very rapidly by human standards.

I remember an incident in one of my college classes the morning after the Six-Day War started in June 1967. (Yes, I’m that old.) We students were seated waiting for the professor to arrive, and one student went up to the blackboard and wrote in large letters, “GO JEWS!”

Another student got up and added the words, “TO HELL.”

The first student got back up, erased the “TO HELL” and wrote “TO CAIRO.”

The other student then added, “SO YOU CAN GET FUCKED.”

Then the teacher walked in and erased the board, and class proceeded peacefully.

That was 42 years ago, and apparently the prevailing attitudes have changed very little.

There’s something refreshing about us not fighting over which side is right and which is wrong.  And since we understand just how futile things are, I think a contest to come up with the most absurd peace proposal (unendorsed by its promoter) is about the most appropriate productive thing we can do.  And I know we’re up to the challenge.

I’m scrapping my earlier proposal and have a new one: make Gaza a Swiss Protectorate.  It’s got plenty of tunnels, an armed populace, and you just know there’s lots of money squirreled away in there.  There might be some problems with that neutrality thing, but the power of compounding interest just might overcome that.  And chocolate can’t hurt.

Somehow, that doesn’t make me feel any better, Dreidel.

And jon…it says something that that doesn’t sound half-bad, doesn’t it?

I’ve got a really insane proposal: for starters, how about we get Israel to follow international law and precedent (including the Nuremberg Principles) and withdraw unconditionally from all the Occupied Territories?  I know it’s batshit, but I subscribe to the outlandish notion that Palestinian Arabs are human beings and have valid claims to sovereignty over the land in which they are currently imprisoned.  That notion is otherwise referred to in our public discourse as “anti-Semitism.”

This decade blows.

Amen to that.

Church Secretary,

Your proposal fails the test in that it must not be endorsed by its promoter.  It’s definitely absurd, however.  There’s just no way such concepts as international law and the Israeli/Palestinian conflict can even be in the same sentence!  (The previous sentence?  Absurd!  It must lack some punctuation or something.)

Plus, it’s too easy to refute your “valid claims to sovereignty” stuff with Israeli claims of their own.  Waaaay too easy.  Doesn’t make their invasion any more or less right, but you’re barking up the wrong tree if you think land claims are a way to settle the nonsense between those two hardheaded foes, regardless of their humanity.

How about tacnukes at forty paces?  I’m sure some respected world figure can be the observer to see that no one cheats or is otherwise ungentlemanly.  Is Idi Amin still alive?  How about that Baby Doc guy from Haiti?

Sounds great, Church Secretary.  What’s the next step?  You know, when the Palestinians and the surrounding Arab countries continue to follow through on their vow to destroy Israel?

jon, I think the reason that we’re not playing “who’s right” in here is that it’s obvious to all of us that between Hamas and Olmert we’re seeing a contest between two of the stupidest plans in the history of mankind. I mean, between the Hamas’s brilliant “if we annoy the Israelis with light weapons for long enough, they’ll get fed up and abandon Palestine” and Israel’s equally clever “if we drive them into a corner, they’ll get really scared and start being nicer to us,” we’re dealing with concepts that make the usual Bush plans look like smooth competence.

BTW, my question is in earnest, not a rhetorical sting.  The Arab countries surrounding Israel have been trying to destroy it since its inception.  The “Occupied Territories” are Occupied because Israel took them in earlier wars.  After Israel unconditionally surrenders those territories, nothing will actually have changed.

If Iraq was next door, Bush might look somewhat competent in comparison.  But alas, no.  Even Ms. South Carolina knew “The Iraq” wasn’t next to Kansas.

Seraph, the relatively peaceful Israeli/Egyptian border does tend to imply that it isn’t completely impossible; it’ll just take a hellish amount of diplomacy first. If you’re just trying to say that it isn’t as simple as “the Israelis return to 1948 borders and then everything is sunshine and roses,” then you’re absolutely right. That’s not the same as “it’s hopeless.”

If you’re just trying to say that it isn’t as simple as “the Israelis return to 1948 borders and then everything is sunshine and roses,” then you’re absolutely right.

That is what I’m trying to say.  Thank you.

Fair enough. Still, these are not good plans, by any means.

My idea is to have Israel invade Gaza, destroy Hamas, and then give it back to Fatah.

Since about 2000, when Ariel Sharon decided it was a fabulous idea to visit Temple Mount when tensions were already high, I have believed that the only possible solution is to have UN forces take over the running of the Palestinian territories.  The Israelis can retreat back to their own territory and take care of any suicide bombers who manage to get through and the UN peacekeepers can take care to minimizing the number of missiles that get lobbed at Israel.

Of course, this would require evicting the batshit insane “settlers” that Israel prefers to have in the West Bank so they don’t have to deal with them and lead to massive security problems for Israel since the batshit insane right-wingers have already shown they’re more than willing to kill Israelis to get their way, but maybe the Israeli government shouldn’t have coddled them all these years.

Here’s the plan. We take the $3B a year we’ve been giving to Israel since 1972 and we give it to Bill Gates as a tax credit in exchange for relocating Redmond assets to Gaza.

Maybe the ground invasion will actually improve the lot of the Palestinians in Gaza, again [obviously] in the short term.

And maybe the monkeys flying out of my butt will tear down the “security wall”.

Here’s my plan for the conflict - we initiate a straight swap program.  For every rocket Hamas hands in, which are so inaccurate they can only be used as terror weapons, we give them an anti-tank missile instead.

BTW, my question is in earnest, not a rhetorical sting.  The Arab countries surrounding Israel have been trying to destroy it since its inception.

Funny how Israel has decided that it itself is totally immune to the rules of the very organization to which it owes its existance.

What next? A final solution to the palestinian problem, fully justified by “the enemy hates us all”?  Hitler would be proud.

Why not spend the billions we now spend arming Israel and buy a land where the Palestinians can move to? Perhaps Egypt could be persuaded to sell some of its land, or somewhere in South America or even Canada could sell some land for New Palestine. Beats the heck out of what we are doing now which isn’t working very well.

Well, speaking of ridiculous plans that could never work, I’m all in favor of culling the idiots in Gaza who think that lobbing bombs at Israel is an effective way to get what they want, and all the idiots in Israel who think that starving and bombing the Palestinians is an effective way to get what they want.  Take allll the idiots, stuff ‘em on a rocket ship packed with weapons, and send them on the first manned mission to Mars.  Let the idiots blow themselves up, and let those who are sick of the never-ending violence try to work out an actual solution.

And pardon my ignorance, but wouldn’t an actual solution be to have one state for both Israel and Palestine, but to have alladults be full citizens, regardless of religion or ethnicity?  Or do one or both sides have strong objections to such an idea?

I would be in favor of that-say a secular overstate where there would be two cantons, one Palestinian and one Israeli, each with local autonomy. The Israeli side can be as Jewish as they want, the Palestinian one (btw, there are Christian Palestinians)ruled the way the Palestinians like). The overstate would be secular, with a common assembly, currency and foreign policy.

Unfortunately, that ship has sailed. The minute you even mention something like this, the rhetoric on the Jewish side says that the Palestinians would overwhelm and destroy them once there are more Palestinians than Jews. Now one could argue that it’s the fault of diaspora Jews for not actually voting with their feet and coming back to live and raise kids-there are far more Jews in the diaspora than in Israel, but still that is supposed to stop the argument in its tracks.

Personally, I think a one-religion state is unviable in the long run for the simple reason that every religion eventually has its Reformation, and when that happens the common agreement goes.  Think Catholic/Protestant, Sunni/Shia, the divisions in Buddhism, and so much more. The Founding Fathers had it right: basic rules regarding liberty and the consent of the governed, leaving the ultimate questions outside of governance. If America became Buddhist, the Bill of Rights still applies.

Kidding aside, if you look at the situation in the most cold, self-interested way ...

Israel may have been an important strategic ally during the Cold War. Since then, not so much. Because we have forward operating bases throughout the ME as well as other allies in the region, it’s especially hard to understand why our policy hasn’t evolved more than it has.

I can’t seem to log on to The Exile to read War Nerd’s take on this but I am sure he has predicted a Hamas victory. The War Nerd is almost always right.

It is so very tiresome to try to find a path to speak out against the suffering of the Palestians without locking arms with some extremely vile people, as this pro-Palestinian activist discusses. This is why the crazies control the discourse. Moderate Palestinians are afraid of being labeled collaborators, and moderate Jews don’t want to ally themselves with actual anti-Semites. So the loudest voices are the hard-liners who want to wipe each other out.

And of course, moderation doesn’t make for good copy. Peaceful protests by Palestinians (one of which got the Israeli government to change the route of its “security wall”) aren’t as exciting as rocket attacks so don’t make headlines.

Ms. Kate, thank you for your attempted Godwinization but we’ll just go ahead and talk amongst ourselves anyway.

And pardon my ignorance, but wouldn’t an actual solution be to have one state for both Israel and Palestine, but to have alladults be full citizens, regardless of religion or ethnicity?  Or do one or both sides have strong objections to such an idea?

This would make Jews an ethnic minority in your new country, which would defeat the original purpose of the state of Israel. This is why the “Palestinian right of return” is such a deadly issue in negotiations.

A two-state solution might work, if you could somehow finesse Jerusalem, remove most or all of the settlers (not impossible—it was done in Gaza, remember), and control the equivalent Palestinian extremists who will inevitably interpret the formation of a Palestinian state as either an Israeli trick or an initial victory that will inevitably lead to the recapture of Israel proper.

More generally, the mess is yet one more disaster caused by the insane notion of self-determination—that every ethnic group should return to and control their homeland. That would work brilliantly if people could actually be sorted in this way, but they can’t. Not all ethnic groups have homelands, homelands typically overlap badly, and not all people have ethnic groups. It’s a great shame that the United States—originally founded by Englishmen who were the children of several ethnic groups, and since a home to many, many more—should have become the greatest proponent of an idea that goes against everything that we are.

Karinna, it’s been my thought for a long time that all assholes who want to kill other people should be stuck on Greenland, with permission of the Danes, and Madagascar, and give its population a fantastic new country somewhere else.  Shooting them all into space sounds like even more fun.  I just want them gone so the rest of us can get on with evolving.

all the idiots in Israel who think that starving and bombing the Palestinians is an effective way to get what they want.

I’m sorry to say, it has been incredibly effective. It’s just that peace is not the goal.

Hamas and Likud need each other.

Sounds great, Church Secretary.  What’s the next step?  You know, when the Palestinians and the surrounding Arab countries continue to follow through on their vow to destroy Israel?

“The Palestinians” have not vowed to destroy Israel. That sort of generalization is what allows Hamas to present themselves as a legitimate proxy for all of Palestine, rather than just their voters.

Anyway, if Israel would finally comply with UNSCR 242, they would have the support of much of Europe, and would not have to rely on the US alone for backup.

In the short term, let us note, an Israeli ground invasion means that human beings with guns, being the only instruments of war capable of discriminating between civilians and combatants, are at least *in* the equation.  This is, at least, an improvement on the status quo ante, that being random rockets answered by aerial bombardment.

The only straightforward path to peace in Israel/Palestine would require the genocide of at least two peoples.  Since there is noone sane to whom that is a palatable solution, I suggest we all lay off glibly suggesting the Israelis- or the Palestinians-of-whatever-stripe cede a goddamn thing.

remove most or all of the settlers (not impossible—it was done in Gaza, remember)

Orders of magnitude different, though.

There were 8,000 settlers in Gaza, who were mainly there as a symbolic thing, given that Gaza is basically part ghetto, part rez. (Gaza’s about the size of Manhattan and Brooklyn combined; the West Bank is a bit smaller than Delaware.) There are about 280,000 in the West Bank, plus 200,000 more in the North Joisey-style sprawl of East Jerusalem.

Now, some of those would gladly leave in exchange for being rehoused comfortably, but most are basically batshit types who most Israelis wouldn’t want living next door. They have big families, claim exemptions from IDF service, and stock up on arms in a way that makes the Waco compound look like a kindergarten. Those Kahanist fuckers will do a Masada—against Israeli soldiers from Tel Aviv and Haifa—if pressed.

Israelis already have the gut sense that this is a more significant demographic timebomb than the Arab birthrate. You’ve got an ever-increasing number of settlers who, frankly, don’t want to live the way Israelis do in Tel Aviv. Lots of them are Russian immigrants who have their own batshit party. Plenty are from the US, and have big backers at home—the Hebron standoff drew a Brooklyn fundraiser.

Wow, I think it’s a sign of the degeneration of the left that this thread includes support for the violent overthrow of an elected government (Hamas), the liquidation (“culling”, how quaint) of its leadership, and military invasion of the most densely populated city on earth. Racism, much?

It also includes a misunderstanding of the “right to self-determination” (which is not about peoples returning to their homeland, but regaining control of their homeland), and a rather disappointing dismissal of the basic tenets of the geneva convention (soooo unworkable).

It also includes a couple of people making the rather absurd and racist claim that all the arab countries and Hamas want to exterminate Israel. I can’t help thinking that empirical evidence works rather in the opposite direction.

.... and can I just add: a few weeks ago there was uproar on this blog after someone threw a shoe at your precious leader, who murdered 600000 Iraqis. To the best of my knowledge hamas haven’t even killed 6000 Israelis, but here we have, relatively unopposed, cool-headed support for the murder of their leaders and the overthrow of their government.

Is this racism? Or “just” American exceptionalism?

Be careful, flashheart; that’s the same point Ms. Kate was trying to make, and she was dismissed with the tired old “Godwin” dodge.  But the degeneration of the left was already well under way, and it is evidenced in the pro-corporate quislings they keep sending to represent them (as Democrats).  But to the issue at hand, remember the first thing Barack Obama did after winning the Dem nomination?  He went and sucked up to right-wing assholes at AIPAC.  Even Mr. Hope and Change himself can be counted on to kick the Palestinians when they’re down (then piss on them).

To be fair, the U.S. ‘left’ can’t be expected to behave much differently toward the Palestinians; it’s in our national DNA.  This great nation of freedom and opportunity was brought to you in part by the genocide and brutal oppression of darker-hued non-Judeo-Christians.  Who are we to hate on the Israelis for trying to get their own colonial shwerve on?  (Besides, Judaism took a real beating in the Holocaust; can’t we cut the self-defined Jewish state a little slack for turning a little of that behavior back at someone else?)

Funny you should say that in your second paragraph Church Secretary, I believe there’s an essay on exactly that topic at Sadly,No! at the moment.

War is Hell.  This series of battles will be over in a few weeks.  I guess Israel will block off the rocket-smuggling tunnels permanently, and Gaza will then get supplies overland.  Then, perhaps, the conflict will simmer at a lower level.

But either side could surprise us, as history often does.

For example, if Israel ends up with a blocking force on the border between Gaza and Egypt, that situation could be unstable.  It could fail politically, legally, or militarily.  It could also work brilliantly.  We’ll see.

Idea: If Hamas doesn’t have the ability to wage war (to launch rockets) then it might change it’s culture.  The military leaders will, in effect, be retired.

I don’t think that Hamas can be negotiated with as a political force. They’re official position is that there have been no rocket attacks and that its a Jewish conspiracy (or that collaborators are the ones launching these supposed rockets). The position that Israel has no right to exist is not just rhetoric, it is a fundamental goal of the organization. The ironic thing is that Hamas WAS democratically elected into office primarily in response to the corruption and ineptitude at the local level of the ruling party still in control of the West Bank. People made a rational choice because they’re everyday lives were made more difficult (in their very difficult position) of having to pay bribes and seek employment through corrupt channels. Hamas promised to stop the corruption, but they also brought in their radical anti-two state solution mind-set (and they’re unbelievable ability to keep to a batshit story line in the press, like when the Hamas spokesman on NPR Friday insisted that there were NO ROCKET ATTACKS AND ITS ALL A JEWISH CONSPIRACY).

I think that the ground invasion (with the Egyptian border closed) will involve a building to building brutal use of force to kill/arrest every member of Hamas the Israelis can identify or suspect, followed by a declaration by the West Bank political party that they are now in charge of Gaza (talk about collaborators), the PLO President will be weak politically, but backed-up by the Israelis (he’s already blaming Hamas, against the “Arab Street” for the bombing/invasion); I think that another party will probably form in a few months or Hamas will resurrect and there will be civil battles for power before any political entity can be identified to negotiate with. I think that the Israelis will try to finish their house by house invasion before Obama is in office, so that there can be a fresh start, but mostly I think this is going to be bad.

Oh, and its all a proxy war with Iran.

Bad stuff.

No one is a civilian in Gaza, or even Israel really.

OFFS.  Yes, “culling,” of both sides’ bloodthirsty bomb throwers, if you’d read the whole thing, and then (and this is reeeeally practical!) sending them on a rocket ride!

I frankly don’t care anymore which side is “right.”  In my vastly undereducated opinion, too much has happened on both sides, continues to happen, for anyone to be right.  Given its situation of power over the Palestinians, Israel, IMO, does bear the greater responsibility for acting justly, and bears the most responsibility for conceding things in any peace deal.  I mean, what do the Palestinians have to give up?

I made my bad joke because I don’t see peace happening there in the near future.  Any efforts and suggestions are futile.  You can’t will someone to put down their guns, ignore and move beyond the past wrongs (and the wrongs in the moment committed by those who don’t want peace, who attempt to spoil the negotiations).  An internationally imposed peace would be prohibitively expensive, and assuming that either US or European troops were used to enforce it, one or the other side would declare it to be biased towards the other side and thus invalid, and things would go predictably from there.

I’m a born pessimist.  I don’t see things ending unless there is a radical attitude change in Israel and in the greater Middle East, or unless Israel (on purpose or not) manages to drive out or kill the Palestinians in Gaza. 

And the standard disclaimer:  I don’t give a tinker’s damn about the religions of the parties involved.  I care about the secular actions of their governments (and citizens, in the case of the rockets being launched from Gaza).  I’m done exposing my ignorance to the world, and am off to bake bread.

Whoever said “Hamas and Likud need eaxhother” hit the nail on the head.

I hope to God Likud doesn’t win the next election, their leader is borderline insane. This may be what the current government is trying to prevent.

A serious plan (and one this poster endorses, so I’m breaking the rule in two places) is the Saudi Peace Plan. Its entirely reasonable but will go nowhere so long as the nuts have power.

If the nuts have to lose power, it’s not a serious plan.  See how fun this is?  Futility now, futulity forever!

And misspellings of futility on occasion!

It’s just silly to claim that Hamas are “nuts”. They were elected in Gaza by a population that is living in a ghetto, and which has seen their land and rights sold down the river by the non-“nuts” alternative (fatah, who were once themselves seen as “nuts”). Hamas are also famous for their non-military activities (keeping the civilians of the occupied territories alive and educated).

It’s no coincidence that the majority of the targets in this latest Israeli attack are policemen (who incidentally are civilians). Just as they did to fatah, the IDF want to destroy the ability of the main political party in power to control other factions, thus ensuring internal instability and a continued state of war. This continued state of war ensures that the IDF retain their privileged position in Israeli society.

If Hamas had any hope of a real concession from Israel they would undoubtedly negotiate; or they would be replaced in democratic elections by an organisation which is willing to negotiate. But the Palestinian people have seen what their concessions bring them - ghettoisation and murder - and they have seen what happens to the people they elect, who are deposed in US backed coups. So what are they to do? Might as well fire rockets.

They’re at least as nutty as the Likud/settler wing in Israel, flashheart.

Have you read what they say in their charter? They’re a right wing religious fundamentalist party that has many members who are jonesing for an apocalyptic showdown with Israel.

Also, Fatah was NEVER as nuts even in their most extreme days as Hamas is now.

Fatah always stood for a secular, social-democratic Palestinian state (even when they refused to recognize Israel.

No Ben D, Fatah was never as nuts as hamas and they had a nice one-state solution, but at the time that they were in charge of Gaza they were portrayed as nuts, and when Israel invaded the West Bank they targeted Fatah security forces because they said they were “extremist”. Having killed off the security forces, they then demanded that Fatah control hamas. Which Fatah couldn’t do.

Thus, Hamas became the popular voice of resistance, Palestinian society took a lurch to the religious right and Israel gets to portray the Palestinians as extremist loonies. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy and it’s no surprise to me that Palestinians voted for Hamas under these circumstances. What else can anyone do?

It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy and it’s no surprise to me that Palestinians voted for Hamas under these circumstances. What else can anyone do?
flashheart on 01/04 at 11:23 AM

I’m not surprised, either, which is why I think it was a huge mistake to hold elections under those conditions, in which religious extremists thrived.

Flashheart, “regaining control of homelands” ended up requiring returning, since said homelands were in practice badly overlapping. In the big multiethnic empires of the late 19th century, people moved about, intermarried, and generally made the idea of ethnic homelands untenable. The idea that you could neatly break up the world into little ethnic nation-states led to most of the rest of the wars of the twentieth century.

If you’re working for self-determination, what exactly do you do with peoples who don’t have a homeland? They can live comfortably in multi-ethnic states, but if nation-states are to be ethnic homelands, where can Jews or Gypsies live in safety? It’s a short jump from “people can control their homelands” to “and expel anyone else who happens to live there too.”

It sounds really pretty: “People have a right to control their homelands.” It also led to the extermination of millions. It was the original impetus for Zionism: “If Jews are to be safe, then we too must have an ethnic homeland, so let’s all move to where it used to be.”

used to be being the operative word, Lielldorin. But “move to where it used to be” is only pretty until you replace it with “move to where people are living and expel them by force” which is what happened. The notion of a Jewish homeland is neither uniformly supported by Jews, nor historically very valid, and we don’t construct modern nation-states on the basis of biblical fables. The creation of the Jewish state was a response to a political movement and terrorist pressure, not to a sudden British/UN desire to restore the Jews to their biblical land. It’s no surprise it has all ended in (99% Palestinian) tears.

“People have aright to control their homelands” did not lead to the extermination of millions either. National Self Determination and Nazism are only related in that the latter claimed they had to exterminate millions to achieve the former. One shouldn’t conflate the two!

Whether it was right or not to have a Jewish homeland in Palestine, it now does exist in reality, and people have to deal with that reality as a basis for peace.

and it’s a completely distracting blog flamewar 101 to even discuss it…

and it’s a completely distracting blog flamewar 101 to even discuss it…
flashheart on 01/04 at 12:11 PM

Absolutely correct.

I mean at this point, sixty years on, it is beginning to become like discussing whether the Protestants were within their rights to settle and occupy Northern Ireland. Probably not, but that doesn’t mean their descendants are going to pack up and go home.

Discussing difficult issues is anti-Semitic. Flashheart is very anti-Semitic for proposing a nuanced approach to Hamas.  NEVER AGAIN!

There are also a lot of people now born in Israel who have nowhere else to go, so it’s a fait accompli. But that doesn’t mean the expelled and the oppressed don’t deserve recompense or some kind of (preferably not “final”) solution to their problems. It was achieved in Northern Ireland, and it can be achieved in Palestine if people try. But there are two nations (the US and Israel) who have stymied that at every turn.

But that doesn’t mean the expelled and the oppressed don’t deserve recompense or some kind of (preferably not “final”) solution to their problems.

They need to be compensated with money for property losses by Israel, and given the option to settle either in the Palestinian territories or other Arab countries (preferably the Gulf ones since they are wealthy enough to handle that kind of influx). Those who have family members in Israeli proper should be allowed Israeli citizenship if they wish.

But a full right of return for all refugees will never, ever be agreed to be Israel. It’s just a non-starter.

And it seems Obama likes the Saudi (or Arab) Peace Plan, which is a good sign.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article5162537.ece

This is why Israel insists on painting all Palestinians as terrorists - so it can continue to deny the right of return to even those with family inside Israel, and so maintain its racial purity (along with the IDF wanting to maintain a state of war, of course). While that happens, no peace will be reached and the Palestinians will have no choice but to resort to terrorism.

This would make Jews an ethnic minority in your new country, which would defeat the original purpose of the state of Israel. This is why the “Palestinian right of return” is such a deadly issue in negotiations.

Mmm.  I keep seeing the wingnuts quoting factoids about the Jews in Israel being outnumbered by the Arabs in Israel in 40 years or so even without Palestinian assimilation or the right to return.  I don’t know the accuracy of such a projection, but left unspoken is the smug assumption that it won’t be allowed to happen.

Every time I see this shit, I keep wondering if the ethnic cleansing of Israel proper will start soon. ‘You like the Palestinians so much, go live among them”.

Forty year demographic projections are worthless. You may as well ask the Magic 8-Ball what will happen.

I wonder that too. It’s not like the far right crazies care whether the projections are true or not…

Plus if they did that, they’d no longer be a western democracy which is a large part of their claim to legitimacy. They’d transform themselves into 1990s Yugoslavia.

Plus if they did that, they’d no longer be a western democracy which is a large part of their claim to legitimacy. They’d transform themselves into 1990s Yugoslavia.

Riiiiiiight.  Just like the war of aggression against Iraq forced the downfall of the US Government, and the rededication of a new American Republic to the rule of law.

Riiiiiiight.  Just like the war of aggression against Iraq forced the downfall of the US Government, and the rededication of a new American Republic to the rule of law.
Phoenician in a time of Romans on 01/04 at 01:35 PM

The equivalent of Israel ethnically clensing the Israeli Arabs would be the United States forcibly expelling all hispanics in the Southwest to Mexico, not the invasion of Iraq.

What do you think would happen to New Zealand if they elected a fascist government that revoked the citizenship of Maoris and put them into camps and/or expelled them from New Zealand?

The equivalent of Israel ethnically clensing the Israeli Arabs would be the United States forcibly expelling all hispanics in the Southwest to Mexico, not the invasion of Iraq.

True.  My comment was expressing cynicism about any meaningful application of the same sort of criticisms the West levels against African and Balkan atrocities involving Western “incidents”.  I predict that if Israel starts engaging in ethnic cleansing of its Arab citizens, it will be ignored for as long as possible, and then defended as a totally reasonable, democratic and necessary step.

What do you think would happen to New Zealand if they elected a fascist government that revoked the citizenship of Maoris and put them into camps and/or expelled them from New Zealand?

Actually, this has been speculated on already. The Reagan years were a good period for leftist paranoia fiction among those who drew parallels between South America and nations elsewhere.

Being a patriot, I’d like to claim that NZ is somehow different, more democratic and tolerant than the other benighted nations.  I’d be lying if I tried, though, and please feel free to call me on it.

Well the likelihood of either happening is about the same. The Arabs in Israel are full citizens and by far the vast majority of Jews in Israel want to keep it that way.

Now, some of the far-right stateside (and mosty non-Jewish) “supporters” of Israel like Little Green Footballs and the like? They might be a different story. They also will never be making Israeli domestic policy.

Ben D - if NZ did that they would become a crap rugby team, and all the Maori would move to Australia and make the Australian team better.

Therefore it will never happen. Some countries judge their racial policies on important principles, you know.

Um, you say that the Egyptians blame Hamas while simultaneously deploring Israel’s actions in response’. I don’t think that’s true. I think the Egyptian government blames Hamas, and most Egyptian people blame Israel and/or support Hamas.

The article you link to offers lots of Hamas-blaming by people associated with the government, which is to be expected because their principal opposition in Egypt comes from the Muslim Brotherhood, who are basically Hamas’ sister organisation. But it doesn’t seem to give much to back up its claim that this attitude is shared by the wider public.

It may well be true that many people in Egypt are critical of Hamas. But I think it’s a mistake to see them as some sort of paragon of neutrality, with a “both/and” position. As far as I can tell from the reports I’ve seen, they are on Hamas’ side against Israel. Which is a reasonable position to hold.

I think the Palestinians should declare a unilateral ceasefire and wait for J Street and Obama to save them.

If I were a Palestinian, I might find Hamas to be far too moderate.

For the record, there’s a difference between blaming Hamas “for existing” and blaming Hamas “for actions which are counter-productive or even disastrous.”

Sub “Israel” for “Hamas” and it still applies. Funny, that.
Auguste on 01/04 at 09:27 PM

Fucking awesome statement.

For the record, there’s a difference between blaming Hamas “for existing” and blaming Hamas “for actions which are counter-productive or even disastrous.”

Allow me to edit this slightly:

For the record there’s a difference between blaming Hamas “for existing” and blaming Israel for being instrumental in Hamas “existing.”

The hard-liners who have been allowed to dictate Israeli policy aren’t interested in a “just peace.”  They want the kind of peace where their enemies (real and perceived) are either dead or driven out.  We could say the same about Hamas, but it bears mentioning that Hamas isn’t subjecting Israel to the daily horrors and depradations of an illegal occupation.

Furthermore, when we see Hamas do something “counter-productive or even disastrous,” don’t forget that that was the reason they were originally elevated by factions of the Israeli government.  The insistence by Israelis and their supporters that Hamas ‘renounce terror’ (both rhetorically and tactically) and ‘recognize Israel’ is an incredibly disingenuous starting point.

In other words, Hamas was built up by Israel as a tool for destabilizing legitimate political (even democratic) developments within the Palestinian community, and to serve as a convenient target for Israeli ‘defensive’ aggression.  They played that role like gangbusters.  But when Hamas finally decided to dip its toe into the ‘legitimate’ behaviors (participating in elections, agreeing to sit at the bargaining table) that Israel and the U.S. insisted they must in order to advance the peace process, their efforts were met with duplicity, double-talk, and more heavy-handed violence.  So it easy to point the finger of blame at Hamas for its actions, but to be fair it doesn’t much matter what they do.  Even if Hamas drops its guns and rockets and starts offering hugs and daisies to the snipers, checkpoint sadists, and home-demolishers of the IDF, the Israeli hard-liners will just find (or manufacture) another excuse to continue the brutal occupation.

In order for Israel to leave the occupied lands then Israel would have to leave itself.  The Arabs claim that Jews never lived in Israel or Jerusalem, that there never was a Solomon’s temple, that Muhammed said Jerusalem was holy to Arabs and nobody else.  Whenever an Arab spokesman is interviewed on TV, he complains that the U.S. favors Israel and instead should be more even-handed—i.e. side with the Arabs.  But I’ve noticed the interviewers never ask what siding with the Arabs really means, and the spokesmen usually just hint at what they really want, which is for all Jews to be gone and Israel to disappear.  Even now, if you watch the demonstrations, Jews are holding up signs supporting Israel’s right to exist while the Muslims hold up signs that say “Kill all the Jews.”  And then there are the complaints that Israel’s response is one-sided and disproportionate.  I read a blogger who thought that 25,000 Israelis under constant rocket attacks wasn’t a good-enough reason to go to war.  Only 25,000 people?  Actually with Hamas’s longer range rockets, it’s now 700,000 within range.  What is happening to the Gazans is a shame.  But I don’t see a solution until the majority of Palestinians who want peace and quiet get control over their own destiny and stop blaming Israel.  One last bitch: unlike other conflicts in the world, why is only Israel responsible for the well-being of their enemies?  If Hamas truly cared about their own people they’d be using all that aid money for food and medicine instead of armaments.

Now there’s the kind of even-handed, non-generalizing contribution to this debate we’ve been waiting for!

The Arabs claim that Jews never lived in Israel or Jerusalem, that there never was a Solomon’s temple, that Muhammed said Jerusalem was holy to Arabs and nobody else.

By the way, this means very little to me, and should mean very little to most people. Israel’s right to have a state means a lot to me, as does their right to have a state where they are now. That’s the hand the colonial powers dealt. But the location of Solomon’s temple should mean jack shit, geopolitically.

By the way, this means very little to me, and should mean very little to most people. Israel’s right to have a state means a lot to me, as does their right to have a state where they are now. That’s the hand the colonial powers dealt. But the location of Solomon’s temple should mean jack shit, geopolitically.

I think what Sharon means, Auguste, is that the claim that “Jews never lived in Israel or Jerusalem, that there never was a Solomon’s temple, [and] that Muhammed said Jerusalem was holy to Arabs and nobody else” represents one of the standard justifications offered for obliterating Israel from existence and either exterminating Jews in the Middle East or at least expelling them.  I agree that the location of Solomon’s temple “should mean jack shit, geopolitically”—just like whether today’s Jews are genetic descendants of Khazars, or Hittites, or Egyptians, or ancient Hebrews, and whether Palestinians have Philistine DNA should mean jack shit, geopolitically.  But alas, these are the kinds of non-issues that I often see brought up in arguments against Israel’s existence.

I would like to know how it is possible for the Muslim Brotherhood to be Hamas’ sister organisation.

Also I rather suspect all of sharonj’s little rant is straight from right-wing-talking-point-of-the-week, and as stripped bare of facts as a Gaza supermarket currently is of bottled water.

What’s happening in Gaza has little to do with morality, occupation, human rights, justice or a siege.  It doesn’t even have all that much to do with rockets, although they helped.

The Israeli government, the Arab governments, the Euros, the Americans, the Quartet and all of the rest have agreed on a 2-State solution with the P.A. representing the Arab side.  Hamas stands in the way, does not and will not agree to this, and so it must go.  Israel is willing to do the dirty work and the rockets provide the rationale.

The Israeli settler movement (the West Bankers) are not with the program, either, but they are ineffectual, and can be pushed aside when the time comes.  Likud is very skeptical but is not now a factor and they have changed before.  I don’t know if Syria is on board.  But aside from these 4, the 2-State solution including the PA has a lock.  In the Middle East, all but 4 is considered a lock.

It would not shock me to learn that Egypt let through to Hamas just enough rockets to justify Israel’s invasion.  I have no evidence to support this, but it makes sense.

Depending on the P.A. could be dumb, but that’s what they seem to have decided.  How long will Abbas live, anyway?  And who takes over when he’s gone?

Scholar Martin Kramer explains it all better than I can.

Flashheart says “I would like to know how it is possible for the Muslim Brotherhood to be Hamas’ sister organisation.”

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

For what it’s worth - I’m no expert, but I think it’s useful to break up the monolith of ‘Islamic Radicalism’ - so, a brief summary:

The Muslim Brotherhood is a trans-national movement with branches in almost every muslim-majority country. It is strongest in, and originated in, Egypt, as did Sayid Qutb, who some argue is one of the founders of Islamism. Its branches in various countries form political parties with a large degree of autonomy. The one in Egypt happens to simply be called ‘the Muslim Brotherhood’, as I think do some other branches. The branch in Palestine is called ‘Hamas’.

The Muslim Brotherhood is a radical Islamist organisation seeking a political system based on the sole authority of Islamic scripture. However, it is distinct from, and more moderate than, Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda. Notably, al-Qaeda believes in the legitimacy of killing any non-muslims anywhere, and define ‘muslim’ in a way that excludes the vast majority of self-identified muslims.

The Muslim Brotherhood in general claims to endorse violence only in war zones - which includes Israel, Iraq, Afghanistan, and I think at one point Syria (the secular Syrian govt. killed a lot of them). They thus claim to be opposed to things like the Madrid bombings, the London bombings, or 9/11. This is subject to some dispute by people who accuse them of all sorts of stuff.

The Brotherhood are a Sunni organisation (like al-Qaeda, but unlike Hezbollah and the Iranian govt.). However, it seems to have a record of co-operating with Shia groups (esp. Hezbollah and the Iranian govt.) whereas al-Qaeda, and the Sunni muslim governments of Saudi arabia and many Gulf states, have a record of bigotry against them.

Hope that helps. I say they’re sister organisations because both are members of the international Muslim Brotherhood movement.

It is a tenet of fascism that the state has the right to exist. Individuals have rights. States do not have rights, not even the right to exist. A state is, at best, a means to an end. But those ends should be in service of people, and if the state does not properly serve people, then the state is illegitimate.

There is probably a pragmatic solution that allows Jews and Arabs to live in the area called Israel-Palestine. That solution will probably have to involve repayment for the lands stolen by some individuals from others. And that solution will probably involve the continuation of the Israeli state along with the formation of a Palestinian state.

But that is very different from saying that either Israel or Palestine, as states, have a right to exist. They do not. A state for a state’s sake is the most dangerous thing.

No militant casualties were seen Monday by an Associated Press reporter at Shifa Hospital, the Gaza Strip’s largest. Instead, the hospital was overwhelmed with civilians. Bodies were two to a morgue drawer, and the wounded were being treated in hallways because beds were full.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/01/05/world/main4697948.shtml

You know, I’m a left-wing Israeli. The kind who get called “delusional” by my brethren and sistern here and abroad. I deplore the attack on Gaza: I think it’s needless, pointless, won’t do any good, AND IN THE NAME OF GOD CHILDREN ARE DYING STOP IT.

But (and there’s always a “but,” isn’t there?) what’s a sovereign country supposed to do when, over the period of 8 years, 12,000 rockets have been launched at it’s citizenry? directly at population centers, not even any pretense that they’re aiming at military targets? I’m not in any way, shape, or form justifying the Gazan War (that’s what it’s called on Israeli TV now. yay us. or something), I went out to demonstrate against it, and I speak out against it whenever I can. But I also understand the frustration and terror of the people who have been living under constant missile barrages for a long, long, time.

Of course, there’s always the “just open the border passages, start trucks driving into the Territories carrying food & drugs” etc. option (which I always say when some right-wing idiot yells at me “so what else can we do????”), but I have to admit that deep down in my heart I’m not really sure that’ll help. There have been times (for example, immediately after the Oslo agreement) when things were better for the Palestinian population, progress was made…hell, I was in the IDF at the time, and I remember joint patrols with Palestinian police in mixed cities. And then the bombings started, and the rockets intensified, and Israel reacted, and so on and so forth, worlds without end.

I understand that the Palestinian population was and is frustrated, feeling that they weren’t getting what they deserved, and things were moving too slowly - but how can you negotiate with an opponent who turns to terrorism whenever he doesn’t get exactly what he wanted? it kinda reminds me of my now defunct marriage, where my poor hubby was just so goddamn weak and I was so much stronger that whenever he wanted something and I wanted something else, there was no room for compromise, because I’m strong and he’s </i> weak</i> and therefore I can give up more and if I didn’t - he got depressed, and wouldn’t talk to me, and lay around the house looking at me mournfully until I caved in and gave him exactly what he wanted.

And sure, you can say that it’s only parts of the population, and that most of them want peace etc. - but that’s the deal about living in a democratic country: you have a collective responsibility for what your elected government does (for example, I fully share the guilt of all my countrymen and women for the atrocities committed on the Palestinian population, even though I always vote for the most raidcal left-wing, peacenik party I can find).

And that’s why I will continue to demonstrate for peace, and walk around with signs reminding everyone that there are real human beings, most of them innocent civilians, and object to the war in every personal, political, and financial way available to me - but I really don’t think there will ever be a solution.

A plague on both our houses.

And that’s why I will continue to demonstrate for peace, and walk around with signs reminding everyone that there are real human beings, most of them innocent civilians, and object to the war in every personal, political, and financial way available to me - but I really don’t think there will ever be a solution.

I’m sure there will be a solution during my lifetime. If I had to place a bet on Intrade, it would be this:

The ultra-right will build extermination camps for the Palestinians, the mainstream Israelis will ignore them, and the so-called left will march around the barbed wire carrying strongly-worded signs.

The ultra-right will build extermination camps for the Palestinians, the mainstream Israelis will ignore them, and the so-called left will march around the barbed wire carrying strongly-worded signs.

And that, my dear, is why there will never be peace. Because whenever goodwill and an effort is shown on either side, those who support the other side explain how it’s not enough, really pathetic, and also rockets are stll flying at Isreali cities/bombers are still trying to get into Tel Aviv/Palestinians are still dying/the IDF habitually harasses and humiliates Palestinians.

But it’s good to know this attitude isn’t popular only here, but that you wonderful, sensitive, humanitarian Americans also share it. It expands my hope for the region to the entire world.