Israel pulling out of Gaza and parts of West Bank

[TCBF]

"Personally, when I look at a map of Israel/Palestine, I see no hope - you have a Palestine that is made up of two little globs, with Israeli settlers still in half of the bigger glob.  How the heck can you call that a nation-state?"

Hey, it worked for East and West Pakistan! ....  uh..... until East Pakistan became Bangladesh, anyway...

Tom

 

[I_am_John_Galt]

I'm going to set a parameter here that we are arguing about an sovereign Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza (and making a bigger assumption that the PA will sort itself out).  Are West Bank settlers willing to acede to the authority of a legitimate Palestinian government, or is their ultimate sovereignty going to continue to stem from the IDF?

There's a disconnect in the logic at a fundamental level here: the Palestinian Authority will not grant the "settlers" right to EXIST in "Palestine" (let alone allow them to stay in their homes or afford them any level of protection), unlike, say, the citizenship rights enjoyed Palestinians in Israel.

 

[48Highlander]

All well and good, but when we look at these things, we can't overlook the fact that the Israelis are FAR from blameless in starting this mess.

Yeah, you're right.  They should have just let themselves be anhiliated.  Would have saved us all a lot of trouble.  Bastards.

I'm going to set a parameter here that we are arguing about an sovereign Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza (and making a bigger assumption that the PA will sort itself out).   Are West Bank settlers willing to acede to the authority of a legitimate Palestinian government, or is their ultimate sovereignty going to continue to stem from the IDF?   If the Americans put "settlements" in Canada, would we assume that they would willingly become loyal to the Canadian government?

Actually, if you'll remember, the French did that a while back.  We had a bit of a scuffle, and then we allowed their settlers to join us as a province.  They've been loyal....sorta.

 

[Shec]

In a now declassifed June 29 1967 memo from the US Joint Chiefs of Staff to the US Secretary of Defence (JCSM-373-67) the JCS observed that Israel "would require the retention of some captured territory in order to provide militarily defensible borders based upon tactical principles such as control of commanding terrain, use of natural obstacles, elimination of enemy-held salients, and provision of defense in-depth for important facilities and installations."  

Gaza, as an essentially flat relief-less piece of sand, is not strategic ground.    However the re: West Bank the memo reads "Control of the prominent high ground running north-south through the middle of West Jordan generally east of the main north-south highway along the axis Jennin-Nablus-Bira-Jerusalem and then southeast to a junction with the Dead Sea at the Wadi el Daraja would provide Israel with a militarily defensible border. The envisioned defensive line would run just east of Jerusalem...."

Israeli settlement patterns in the West Bank follow this line.   Self sustaining economically viable outposts is the history of Israeli defensive fortification,   that's why the "fighting farmers" of the IDF's Nahal corps was created when the IDF was created and why it exists to this day.  

Media hyperbole aside,   defensible borders   is the real issue.   And therefore the reason why   Sharon is prepared to give up Gaza and parts of the West Bank.   I trust that those with an appreciation of the use of ground would agree that any soldier would be a fool to give up the high ground.

 

[Infanteer]

There's a disconnect in the logic at a fundamental level here: the Palestinian Authority will not grant the "settlers" right to EXIST in "Palestine" (let alone allow them to stay in their homes or afford them any level of protection), unlike, say, the citizenship rights enjoyed Palestinians in Israel.

Well, that is what I was getting at with the "PA will sort itself out clause".  As long as a movement with genuine issues and claims continues to be dominated by terrorists, thugs, and gangsters, then there is no real hope at all.

 

[Infanteer]

Yeah, you're right.   They should have just let themselves be anhiliated.   Would have saved us all a lot of trouble.   Bastards.

Saying that the Jews are blameless is like saying the Palestinians are mere freedom fighters.  I know you are not that foolish, so ease up on the rhetoric.

 

[48Highlander]

Saying that the Jews are blameless is like saying the Palestinians are mere freedom fighters.   I know you are not that foolish, so ease up on the rhetoric.

No they're not blameless.  Neither is a rape victim who kills his/her assailant.  In both cases you can blame the victim for all sorts of things. 

"She shouldn't have been wearing such a revealing dress"
"You see all that lipstick?  she was just asking for it!"
"Well, sure she was being raped, but that doesn't give her the right to kill him!"
"Eh, he wasn't really trying to rape her.  If she had gone along, everything would have been fine!"

See how that works?  You can blame the Israelis for lots of stuff, but when you come right down to it, all they've been doing since the first official date of their state has been done to protect their nation, their lives, and their way of life.

 

[Cdn Blackshirt]

1) The PLO and the PA are seperate entities.

No.  The PA is the direct evolution of the PLO as dictated by the Oslo Accords.  In essence, the objective was that the Israelis and mediating bodies hoped that if they could turn a terrorist organization into a political organization, it would be bound by their informal statehood to behave.  Sadly, the optimists were wrong and Arafat and cronies (all from the PLO) continued to run the PA.  The only significant change to the PLO was that it was legitimized, now had a small standing army and was funded by EU.  Most of the chores of statehood were taken up by Hamas who with funding from Middle Eastern Arab Nations began providing much of the key infrastructure and primary services in the territories including schools and hospitals.  That is why to this day Hamas is far more trusted than the Palestinian Authority".

2) Straight from the horses mouth.... (quote didn't carry forward properly)

Short Version is what the Palestinian Authority says in English to Western Newspapers and what they do in reality are two very different things.  Check the number of suicide bombers that the Palestinian Authority Charter apparently doesn't support that were members of the Fatah Party or Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade of Arafat/Abbas.

3) You're citing a work dated 1969 to reflect current Palestinian attitudes.  

Yep, because although symbolically repealed to the rest of the world in order to obtain funding for the PA/PLO, it is still treated as a living document within the territories.  This is little different that the hypocritical way they use the term "peace" in English and "truce" in Arab.  Bottom Line is again actions speak louder than words....The term "Hudna" is defined in Islam as a TEMPORARY truce with a long-term enemy.  In essence, it allows a 10-year time frame in which while the enemy is strong and Muslims are weak, to rebuild and reconstitute forces in order to gain advantage.  Once those forces are rebuilt, they are obligated under Jihad to return to war and destroy that enemy.  This definition was created by none other than Muhammed himself when he called a 2-year "hudna" with the Quraysh prior to defeating them to take Mecca. [/quote]

So, tell me, should we just go back to ignoring each other? I'm leaning towards it.   :

Brittany, you can ignore me all you like.  My objective is merely to point out to people who take your "statements of fact" at face value that the confidence in your convictions do not necessarily equate to your accuracy.


Matthew.  ;D

 

[Britney Spears]

Cdn Blackshirt's water muddling and doubletalk not withstanding, Israel, at the Oslo Accords of 1993, recognized the PA as the legitimate representatives of the Palestinian people. In turn, the PLO, The PA, and Yasser Arrafat himself have acknowledged  Israel's right to exist. This was a big deal at the time, they even got a Nobel prize for it. Hell I was even old enough to remember it (vaguely). Neither the PLO nor the PA has disputed this conclusions and it has been the basis for all subsequent PA/Israeli negotiations. Now one can debate to what degree each side was responsible for the subsequent violence, but no serious observer of these events, neither moderate Israelis or moderate Palestinians, could claim that either side was completely or even mostly blameless. Saying "the Palestinians was to drive the Israelis into the sea" is the same as saying "The Israelis consider Palestinians to be lice and a cancer". Some of them(both Israelis and Palestinians) probably do, but you'll just have to get over that if you want any meaningful discussion.

 

[a_majoor]

I will reluctantly wade in once more:

Although the PLO/PA has indeed signed the Oslo accords and sent Arafat on a performing bear tour including the Clinton white house and a Nobel Peaceprize, inside Palestine children are still taught that Israel does not have a right to exist, the PLO and HAMAS struggle to gain ascendancy inside Palestine, often by sponsoring more violence and more suicide attacks against Israeli civilians, and other violations of the provisions of the Oslo accords happen on a regular basis. To my knowledge, no Jews live in Palestine, none would be welcomed and certainly any person of Jewish decent who tried to claim ancestral land in Palestine (i.e. their family lived and worked on the land prior to 1948) would be roughly dealt with, to say the least.

Israel responds by closing its borders to Palestinians who seek to work in Israeli companies, and uses military force to target terrorist cells and leaders wherever they happen to be. Arabs are Israeli citizens who live, work, vote and voice opinions inside the State of Israel and have the rights and obligations of other citizens. Certainly many people in Israel have negative views towards Palestinians and wish them ill, but not to the extent of recruiting Jewish suicide bombers to sow fear in Palestine by randomly killing civilians, or teaching children in public schools that Palestine has no legitimate existence (including textbooks which have maps depicting a Middle East without Palestine).

In essence the argument of "moral equivalence" cannot be used in the Israel/Palestine conflict, just as it could not be used between the United States and the USSR during the cold war. People who attempt to do so should think very carefully; is a liberal-democratric state under the rule of law really the same as an opaque thugocracy? Please read the current issue of the Atlantic Monthly;  How Yasir Arafat destroyed Palestine by David Samuels to see just how far the Palestinians fell, and how far they have to climb before they can reconstitute a civil society.

 

[Infanteer]

No they're not blameless.  Neither is a rape victim who kills his/her assailant.  In both cases you can blame the victim for all sorts of things.  

"She shouldn't have been wearing such a revealing dress"
"You see all that lipstick?  she was just asking for it!"
"Well, sure she was being raped, but that doesn't give her the right to kill him!"
"Eh, he wasn't really trying to rape her.  If she had gone along, everything would have been fine!"

See how that works?  You can blame the Israelis for lots of stuff, but when you come right down to it, all they've been doing since the first official date of their state has been done to protect their nation, their lives, and their way of life.

Okay, you are being foolish then - and your refusal to see any blame in the Israeli camp puts you on equal footing with Palestinian extremists; your insistence on seeing things in black and white offers nothing towards a solution...and this isn't just me saying this, everyone from diplomat Dennis Ross to insurgency expert Col. Thomas Hammes have been quite explicit in pointing out the same thing.  

"Who's to blame" is a tricky thing, as it goes back and forth through time.  Go back to the 40's and look at a map - can you blame the Arabs for being slightly torqued?  I don't know how a group of people, who formed the majority in only 1 sub-district of Palestine (Jaffa) could declare "independence" (see map at bottom).  But, irregardless, demographics have changed (just like here in the Americas) and their is a new reality on the ground.  As well, the history of the Jewish movement isn't the cleanest one either - the Irgun would probably make the US State Department's Terrorist List today.

Flash forward ahead - where do you think the impetus for the first Intifada stemmed from?  Do you claim that many policies of the Likud haven't been inflammatory?  Yitzhak Rabin (the guy who won the Nobel, remember?) was killed by whom?

We must never fall into the anti-Israeli stance of the UN, the left-wing establishment (eff you, Chomsky), and the media in general, and we must always remember the illegitimacy of a cause that holds the fundamental strategy of pushing the Jews into the sea.  But on the same token, we musn't forget that it takes two to tango.

 

[Britney Spears]

In essence the argument of "moral equivalence" cannot be used in the Israel/Palestine conflict, just as it could not be used between the United States and the USSR during the cold war. People who attempt to do so should think very carefully; is a liberal-democratric state under the rule of law really the same as an opaque thugocracy?

It seems we run into this fundamental difference in perceptions everywhere I turn. I don't condone suicide bombings, but I also realize that suicide bombers and their supporters are not doing it because they're bored or crazy, but because they do have legitimate grievances and because they are supported by the majority of the population. Popular movements, be it Bolshevism or Al Qaida or the Palestinian resistance movements, are not created in a vacuum and are not spun out of thin air.  I'm not sure why this concept is so difficult for the die hard right wing to grasp. 

Moral authority is in the eye of the beholder. Unilaterally assuming moral authority is generally not a basis for any kind of reasonable negotiation. This kind of attitude sounds nice for the polls but gets you nowhere in the real world.  Pretend I'm an average moderate Palestinian and present me a reasonable argument why the Israeli army, which has killed far more Palestinian civillians in the first and second Intifadas than vice versa, are my moral superiors. Unless you can reasonably convince the majority of your OPPONENTS of your moral superiority, as we did to the German people after World War 2, then your moral authority is worth as much as the paper it's printed on. The bottom line is that the Palestinians are still here, and you'd better be prepared to either address their grievances or kill/deport the lot of them. Treating them like wayward children will not result in any peace for either side.

 

[Infanteer]

Britney, excellent post.

"Is a liberal-democratric state under the rule of law really the same as an opaque thugocracy?" makes sense to us in the West, but we are not the ones with the grievence/issues/hard on that is resorting to violence, are we?

 

[paracowboy]

'moderate Palestinian' sorry guys, but there ain't no such animal anymore. I've seen the textbooks, I've watched the videos and movies. The indoctrination begins at birth and has for 30 years. Children are taught that all Jews must be exterminated. This starts at infancy.
How you gonna to find a moderate? You'll find men who will claim to be moderates for personal/political gain, and you'll find some folks who just want the endless cycle of violence to end. But you won't find a true moderate.
We can go back in history to the creation of Israel, and it's very questionable legalities. We can go back to the conquering by Rome, or back to Biblical myth. It's all equally irrelevent.

I know who teaches their children to commit murder while committing suicide. I've seen the murderous propaganda taught to infants, and I've wept while watching it. I've witnessed the cult of death. I know who's wrong.

 

[48Highlander]

Okay, you are being foolish then - and your refusal to see any blame in the Israeli camp puts you on equal footing with Palestinian extremists; your insistence on seeing things in black and white offers nothing towards a solution...

"Who's to blame" is a tricky thing, as it goes back and forth through time.  Go back to the 40's and look at a map - can you blame the Arabs for being slightly torqued?  I don't know how a group of people, who formed the majority in only 1 sub-district of Palestine (Jaffa) could declare "independence" (see map at bottom).

They didn't declare "independence", and Palestine didn't exist.  At least, not as a state.  Jews dominated the land around Jerusalem starting roughly 1300 BC.  They were eventually defeated by the Romans, the Jews were displaced, and since then the land has been ruled variously by the Romans, Islamic and Christian crusaders, The Ottoman Empire, and finally, the British Empire.  At no point throughout history did a nation known as "Palestine", with the borders claimed by today's "Palestinians" exist.  It was only after the creation of Israel, and the defeat of it's Arab neighbors, that the notion of "Palestine" as a state began.  There is no distinct Palestinian language. no Palestinian history, and no Palestinian culture - the only distinctly Palestinian custom is the killing of Jews through suicide bombings.  In fact, the word Palestine was originally employed to describe a land-mass including Israel, Palestine, and Jordan, and was turned over to British control by Turkey in 1923.  Britain took 80% of that land and allocated it to a state named Jordan.  Then in 1947, the UN partitioned the remaining land into two states.  Therefore the Jews didn't declare independence.  Jordan was created by the Brits, Israel and Palestine were created by the UN.

  So can I blame the Arabs for being slightly torque?  Hell yes!  The Arab's already had 80% of the region ceded to them in the form of Jordan.  They were being offered roughly half of the remaining 20% so they could create another smaller state, or merge it with Jordan, or do whatever they wished.  Instead, they refused all the terms of the agreement, much of the population of "Palestine" as well as many Arabs living in the newly created state of Israel, all packed up and left at the urging of the Arab states who were about to team up to destroy Israel.  At the same time, close to a million Jews were forced to move out of various Arab countries, and moved into Israel.  Everyone knows the outcome of that war.  The Arabs got their asses handed to them, the Jews used the opportunity to grab some more land, and the "Palestinians" became refugees.  Now what exactly am I supposed to blame the Jews for there?

Flash forward ahead - where do you think the impetus for the first Intifada stemmed from?  Do you claim that many policies of the Likud haven't been inflammatory?  Yitzhak Rabin (the guy who won the Nobel, remember?) was killed by whom?

The Likud's policies are about as inflammatory to the Palestinians as the US Republicans are to the Arab world in general.  Are you going to blame the 9/11 attacks on Bush now?   Yes there have been Jewish terrorist organizations as well.  Just like the US has had it's share of Christian terrorists.  There are extremists in every group.  The difference is that in Palestine, the extremists were the government, and pretty much the entire population wanted the destruction of Israel.  The word "extremist" when applied to Palestinians simply refers to wanting the death of all Israelis as well as the destruction of their state.  So no, you don't have much of a case if you're going to try to blame the Likud party, or any Israeli terrorist groups.

We must never fall into the anti-Israeli stance of the UN, the left-wing establishment (eff you, Chomsky), and the media in general, and we must always remember the illegitimacy of a cause that holds the fundamental strategy of pushing the Jews into the sea.  But on the same token, we musn't forget that it takes two to tango.

It takes two to fuck too, but only one has to be a willing participant.  Once again - if you're going to blame Israel for the mess that the Middle East is in, you may as well blame the US for 9/11, the Brits for their subway bombing, Spain for the bombings in Madrid, and the Aussies for the Bali bombing.  No group can ever be entirely blameless, but trying to claim that Israel and Palestine have the same moral standing is just silly.

 

[Andyboy]

Whether the grievances are legitimate or not is irrelevant In my mind. I had a guy cut me off on the road the other day, certainly I have a legitimate grievance, it doesn't mean I should slash his tires no matter how much I would like to or how many people would support me if I did. I think Germany in the 30s had plenty of legitimate grievances as well but that did not mean that it was wise to concede anything to them while Hitler was running the place. As far as I'm concerned until the Pals show themselves to be reasonable as a people there is no reason for Israel to concede anything to them. The first step in becoming a reasonable people is for them to decide what their grievances are is and how they can be resolved. I'm not sure that the grievance is so much that someone is occupying their territory as it is that specifically Jews that are occupying it. As such I'm not really convinced that returning the occupied territories will resolve anything if the UN sponsored "Gaza Today. The West Bank and Jerusalem Tomorrow." campaign is any sign, nor am I sure returning them while Hamas et al have the power that they do is wise. These are not my original thoughts by the way. A visiting American politcian was taken to the top of a high rise hotel in Israel where from the roof you could see three sides of the Israeli border. HE was quoted as saying " When you can see three sides of your country from a high hotel you have to be pretty careful about who your neighbors are,and what you concede to who." I'm paraphrasing of course becasue I don't have the book in front of me (Colin Powell's autobiography) but the point is valid I think. Wretchard at Belmont Club had an interesting post about it here:

"Memory Lane

When  Hitler's troops reoccupied the Rhineland in violation of its treaty obligations to restore German dignity, stormtroopers parading before the Reichschancellery sang "for today we own Germany and tomorrow the entire world". The echo of that refrain reverberates in the United Nations. The Jerusalem Post has this Associated Press story:

The United Nations is embroiled in a dispute with American Jewish organizations over the funding of Palestinian banners in Gaza, and US Ambassador John Bolton on Wednesday protested the "unacceptable" payments.

The dispute centers on the UN Development Program's payment for materials produced by the Palestinian Authority for Israel's disengagement from Gaza which include banners saying: "Gaza Today. The West Bank and Jerusalem Tomorrow."

The irony is exact. The French Left remained passive in what Churchill called the last moment in which Second World War could have been prevented. Instead it allowed that Hitler had a legitimate grievance and met him with renunciations of militarism and expressions of understanding. For what, they asked, could be more German than the Rhineland? One could have rhetorically asked whether a Nazi Rhineland was the same thing. But then:

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose."


Infanteer,

Thanks for the reply, I just wasn't sure which you thought it was. As some others have pointed out there are plenty of nations that have oddly shaped or discontinuous territories, some even with non-citizens occupying a sizeable chunk. The physical aspects aside, what is it that is keeping the Pals from being a nation, themselves or someone else?

 

[Jed]

To 48th Highlander: You said  "So can I blame the Arabs for being slightly torque?  heck yes!  The Arab's already had 80% of the region ceded to them in the form of Jordan.  They were being offered roughly half of the remaining 20% so they could create another smaller state, or merge it with Jordan, or do whatever they wished. "

Surely you can see that there are two sides to this issue. The Arab peoples of the PA have a legitimate concern just as the Jewish people in Isreal have a legit concern. If my father or grandfather owned the land that I was forced from and was expected to be content that my good arid land along the Jordan was gone and I was to be content with the desert sands in Jordan,and that I should consider my self lucky ... I don't think this would cut it. I might just be mad enough to do something about the unjust and unfair actions.

 

[48Highlander]

Surely you can see that there are two sides to this issue. The Arab peoples of the PA have a legitimate concern just as the Jewish people in Isreal have a legit concern. If my father or grandfather owned the land that I was forced from and was expected to be content that my good arid land along the Jordan was gone and I was to be content with the desert sands in Jordan,and that I should consider my self lucky ... I don't think this would cut it. I might just be mad enough to do something about the unjust and unfair actions.

So according to that logic, the Jewish settlers who are now being forced out of the Gaza should turn terrorist and start killing other Israelis?

Besides which, Arabs were never forced off their land by Jews.  At the time of Israels founding, they implored the local Arabs to stay.  From Israel's proclamation of independance:

"In the midst of wanton aggression, we yet call upon the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve the ways of peace and play their part in the development of the State, on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its bodies and institutions....We extend our hand in peace and neighborliness to all the neighboring states and their peoples, and invite them to cooperate with the independent Jewish nation for the common good of all."

Granted, that was in 1948.  In 1947. "The Assembly of Palestine Jewry" issued this statement:

"We will do everything in our power to maintain peace, and establish a cooperation gainful to both [Jews and Arabs]. It is now, here and now, from Jerusalem itself, that a call must go out to the Arab nations to join forces with Jewry and the destined Jewish State and work shoulder to shoulder for our common good, for the peace and progress of sovereign equals."

Now, yeah, I could understand Arabs being pissed when they see an exodus of refugees being forced out by Jews.  BUT THAT NEVER HAPPENED.  The Israelis implored the Arabs to stay and work together.  Everyone who left did so at the urging of other Arab states, and of their own accord.

"The Arab people of the PA" had a "legit concern" back in 1947, however, they decided to piss away their chance to negotiate and create a state of their own, and instead chose to abandon their land in order to allow other Arabs to come in and anhilliate Israel.  If they had won, the world would have muttered and shook it's collective head for a while, and then we would all have promptly forgotten about it.  Meanwhile, there'd be millions more dead Jews to add to the pile that Hitler started.  Fortiunately, the Arabs lost, and I'm sorry but no matter how you look at it, losers have to make concessions.  Israel would have been well within it's rights to have annexed all of "Palestine".  Instead they've spent the last half a century fighting wars against various states, seizing land, and then giving it back in the hope that showing their goodwill might lead to a permanent peace.  All in all, they've been the only reasonable party in the entire region.

 

[Andyboy]

I might just be mad enough to do something about the unjust and unfair actions.

Something like murdering women and children? Think about what you are saying for a second, please. People have been thrown off of their land fairly regularly throughout the history of Canada and yet we don't have terrorism here. Why do you suppose that is?

 

[paracowboy]

in my eyes, the entire disagreement became irrelevent once the Palestinians started to teach their children to surround gunmen in order to a) shield them from Israeli return fire
b) get shot by Israeli return fire and become media fodder;
when they exported terror to the cities and airports of uninvolved nations;
when they began to deliberately target innocent civilians;
when they used UN money intended to purchase food, medicine, and other humanitarian supplies to buy arms and explosives;
when they invaded another country;
when they used UN offices and funds to create hate posters;
when they used Ambulances to ferry arms, ordnance, and fighters;
when they started to teach their pre-school children to kill;
and
when they started to teach their children to want to die.  
By indoctrinating their children into a cult of death, to me, they completely invalidated any legitimate complaints they had.