[quote=""columbus""]
cnorman18;250133 wrote:columbus;250110 wrote:Let me present a hypothical.
There are three characters....
Sorry, but I'm not going to play -- unless I can introduce an equally self-serving and carefully constructed hypothetical that favors my side.
Wouldn't be hard; a Jewish family that had lived in Hebron, near the Tomb of the Patriarchs, since Old Testament times; half of them are slaughtered in the Hebron Massacre of 1929, which was ordered by the Mufti, the Muslim leader of the Palestinian Arabs. The survivors are driven from their family home at gunpoint 20 years later, after Partition, and are compelled to leave all their possessions, everything but the clothes on their backs, behind...
See how easy it is to stack the deck? The difference, of course, is that I can prove that the Jewish family above actually existed and that those things actually took place.
I don't think either of us wants to play this; it's a propaganda game.
I obviously failed in what I was trying to illustrate. When cultures come into conflict, and the two sides don't have the same understanding, there is a likelihood of violent resentments even though nobody did anything illegal or immoral by their lights. Especially when one is a primitive culture, like the Palestinians, and the other a wealthy and sophisticated one like the European immigrants.
[/quote]
Lets stop there just a minute.
Youre assuming that the Jews who immigrated to Palestine were wealthy and sophisticated. Sorry, but thats a stereotype. The wealthy and sophisticated Jews fled to England and the US before the war began. The ones who were left after the war were DPs, Displaced Persons, and much of the land they bought was with money from the Jewish National Fund -- the Zionist organization -- not their own personal money. Remember the
Exodus 1947? Those people were returned to DP camps in Germany, not to their townhomes in Berlin or Prague. They had been residents of poor shtetls and impoverished ghettos in Eastern Europe and Russia, and after the war those ghettos and shtetls no longer existed.
Further, they came to Israel to
work the land with their own hands, not to live in condos with swimming pools. The early Zionists, those who were not independent farmers, were
kibbutzniks, young socialists who lived on communal farms and, again, did all the work themselves. You want to talk about an agrarian economy? These were the early Israelis.
If youd care to take a run at proving that most of them were wealthy and sophisticated, go for it. Otherwise, its another assumption and another unexamined buy-in of the Palestinian propaganda narrative.
....Peace will require justice, justice according to the Palestinians....
AND the Israelis.
The Zionists have their sovereign Jewish dominated state. They already have justice and then some. But they are unhappy with the current situation, because the other people involved do not have justice and continue fighting.
Once again, I call your attention to
the Israeli point of view, which was, as I recall, supposed to be the point of this thread: The Israelis are unhappy not because the other people involved continue fighting: they are unhappy because they
continue to plan and carry out daily attempts at the mass murder of Israeli civilian noncombatants as primary targets, often successfully.
Call that justice if you like, but if there is ONE perspective on this conflict that is
absolutely essential to understanding the Israeli point of view, thats the one; and you keep discounting it or downplaying it or mischaracterizing it, as you do here.
Fighting makes the Palestinians sound like noble, brave patriots gallantly defending their people from attacks; the OBJECTIVE FACT is that they set out to murder --
not Israeli troops, mind -- not their
actual avowed enemies -- but women and children at bus stops, pizzerias, synagogue services, weddings, family meals, and on city buses. Now you can say that those are the people the Palestinians regard as their enemies, and so JUSTIFY those murderous attacks on innocents -- people who
had not yet been born when the Palestinians land was NOT stolen -- but lets look at this conflict with a clear eye, and not pretend that one side is fat and happy and perfectly safe and content, and the other side is miserably oppressed and fighting valiantly against injustice.
Fighting is fighting; MASS MURDER is MASS MURDER. Failing to distinguish between deliberate and calculated attacks on innocent civilians and the efforts to STOP such attacks, as if they were morally equivalent, is hypocrisy of the highest order. That is PROPAGANDA, Tom, and I wont stand by and let you speak of a bucket of shit and call it building material.
Honestly, my friend, if you cant stop returning to slinging around this grossly slanted and one-sided polemic that totally dismisses and discards the Israeli point of view and totally endorses and cheerleads the Palestinian narrative and perspective, we have nothing more to talk about. You WILL acknowledge terrorism as a CENTRAL ISSUE in this conflict, a LEGITIMATE CONCERN of the Israelis, and that its fucking WRONG, or we can talk about books and movies.
That will be a tough row to hoe. But the only other alternative is perpetual war.
With the addendum above, I agree.
One of the reasons I care about this is because I see the "perpetual war" as the likeliest flash point of WWIII. I expect that to be the most spectacularly violent event in human history. The human race could well render the planet uninhabitable, especially given the precarious state of the biosphere due to global climate change.
I do not care enough about Zionists to enable them to start such a war.
The very fact that you lay the blame for STARTING this
potential war -- which has been hanging fire since 1948, MUCH longer than the Cold War between the US and the Soviet Union -- at the feet of the Israelis alone, and apparently "starting" the war
by nothing more than their very existence, rather betrays the fact that you are not at all interested in the Israeli point of view.
Lets take a minute to talk about that word Zionist which is suddenly very prominent in your posts. You use it as an insult or a pejorative; you would not dare say I do not care enough about Jews
A Zionist is one who believes that Israel has a right to exist as a nation and defend itself. Thats all. It does NOT mean one who is bent on conquering the entire Middle East, or murdering or expelling all Palestinians, or any other nefarious or evil scheme; it means one who wishes to see Israel survive as a nation. By that definition -- and, barring propaganda, it is the only actual definition -- virtually all Jews are Zionists. The overwhelming majority of Americans are Zionists (which, by the way, explains US support for Israel; the overwhelming majority of Americans think that its a good idea).
Let me make sure I understand what you just posted. You are perfectly OK with allowing every Jew in the Mideast to be either exterminated or expelled from Palestine in order to prevent a war from happening that has not yet happened after 63 years of conflict. Wipe out the nation of Israel; that would be justice. Is that about right?
I am not OK with that. I am particularly angry that my tax dollars are supporting Israel while the government is telling me that the USA can't afford basic needs for US citizens. I am being told that health-care is too expensive, but no[quotebody talks about Israel. Taxes are "job-killers", except when they are funding Israel. Where did anyone in the last few years consider cutting my tax dollars to Israel? Never.
Of course, US tax dollars are going to the Palestinians too -- and to Egypt, and to many other Arab nations -- and of course the US enjoys a mutually beneficial trade, IT-technical, economic, strategic and educational relationship with Israel as well, while virtually none of those apply to the Arab nations that get US dollars. US aid also goes to many other nations around the world NOT involved in this conflict at all. And then there are the subsidies and tax breaks given to huge industries that don't need it; and don't forget the under-the-table payments to corrupt officials in MANY nations, huge Congressional pensions and health plans beyond anything that is ever seen in the private sector, and...
I find your outrage curiously selective.
There is a huge difference between the USA spending $500 per capita in military hardware on Israel and spending 25 cents per capita on humanitarian aid. One third of all US foreign aid is sending military hardware to Israel. AIDS victims in Africa, for example, get about 15 cents per capita.
One of the things that pisses me off about the Tea Party Right is that they want to reduce government spending, but they won't mention Israel.
Sure about that? This is from the Daily Paul, the website of Ron Paul, who came in SECOND in the Iowa GOP straw poll the other day:
Rand Paul, the newly elected Tea Party-backed senator from Kentucky, bluntly told the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, an influential pro-Israel lobbying group, that they were going to disagree about the need for foreign aid and suggested that they move on to other topics, according to a person briefed on the meeting."
And from the father, Ron Paul himself:
We should be friends with Israel, and I dont think we do a very good job at it. But I dont think giving money to our friends is the right thing to do. Im against all foreign aid, and if we cut out all the foreign aid today, we would cut out 7 times more foreign aid from the enemies of Israel. But I wouldnt give foreign aid to Israel. I want Israel to have their own national sovereignty, I dont want them to depend on us either for the money which socializes their economy and theyre in financial trouble as well, and I dont want them to depend on us to tell them how to draw up their peace treaties or what to do with their borders. So yes, we should have friendship with them, we should trade with them, but total dependence on United States and on our money is a bad risk for them because were in bankruptcy, were not going to be there forever, we are going to come home and I think their dependency on us is very, very harmful to them.
The Israelis are rather worried about Mr. Paul, and the Tea Party in general. From
The Daily Forward:
Growing Tea Party Movement Is Still a Great Unknown on Israel
WASHINGTON The Tea Party movement, a loose conglomeration of conservatives angry over government spending, is considered one of the most influential groups on todays American political scene.
For liberals and conservatives the Tea Party movement is a politically polarizing topic, but for the pro-Israel community it is a great unknown. With Tea Party activists focusing on domestic issues more than on foreign policy, and with views on Israel running the gamut from staunch support for right-wing Israeli positions to calls for a total reversal of American support for the Jewish state, pro-Israel activists are left guessing as to how the new movement could affect their cause
Gee, maybe you should be a Teabagger.
We could cut the deficit by 50 billions over ten years if the USA left Israel to their own devices. We could not only save the money, but also save the interest we are paying because we are borrowing the money we send Israel. Israel can sell their own damn bonds to the Chinese.
Like I said; the reason the US supports Israel is that the overwhelming majority of Americans think its a good idea.
This is from a guest column by a Democratic congressman, Steve Rothman, in the
Star-Ledger, reprinted on
NJ.com:
Under the 2010 U.S. budget, about $75 billion, $65 billion and $3.25 billion will be spent on military operations and aid in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan, respectively. Israel will receive $3 billion, in military aid only. There is no economic aid to Israel, other than loan guarantees that continue to be repaid in full and on time
.
There isnt enough space here to discuss the relative merits of the expenditures in these other countries, but we already know the critically important return the United States gets for helping its oldest, most trusted ally in the strategically important Middle East the most powerful military force in that region, the pro-U.S., pro-West and democratic Jewish state of Israel. Heres how.
First, its important to remember that about 70 percent of the $3 billion aid must be used by Israel to purchase American military equipment. This provides real support for U.S. high-tech defense jobs and contributes to maintaining our industrial base. This helps the United States stay at the very top in the manufacturing of our own cutting-edge military munitions, aircraft, vehicles, missiles and virtually every defensive and offensive weapon in the U.S. arsenal with the added contribution of Israels renowned technical know-how.
Second, the United States and Israel are jointly developing state-of-the-art missile defense capabilities in the Davids Sling and Arrow 3 systems. These two technologies build on the already successful Arrow 2, jointly developed by our two countries, which is already providing missile defense security to Israel and U.S. civilians and ground troops throughout the region. The knowledge the United States gains from these efforts also has a positive multiplier effect on applications to other U.S. military and non-military uses and U.S. jobs.
Third, given Israels strategic location on the Mediterranean, with access to the Red Sea and other vital international shipping and military lanes of commerce and traffic, it is critically important to the United States that Israel continues to serve as a port of call for our troops, ships, aircraft and intelligence operations.
Israel also has permitted the United States to stockpile arms, fuel, munitions and other supplies on its soil to be accessed whenever America needs them in the region.
Fourth, Americas special relationship with Israel provides the United States with real-time, minute-to-minute access to one of the best intelligence services in the world: Israels. With Israeli agents gathering intelligence and taking action throughout the Middle East and, literally, around the world, regarding al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Iran and Hamas, among others, the United States receives invaluable information about anti-U.S. and terrorist organizations and regimes
.
For about 2 percent of what the United States spends in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan this year, Americans can take pride in the return on our investment in aid to Israel. And with Israels truly invaluable assistance to Americas vital national security, we can take comfort that in actions seen in Tehran and Damascus and noticed by al Qaeda and other anti-U.S. terrorists everywhere the United States is safer and made more secure because of the mutually dependent and beneficial relationship between the United States and Israel.
You can oppose aid to Israel if you want to; Ron Paul does, and he's the Tea Party frontrunner next to Michelle Bachmann. The Democrats overwhelmingly support it. But in any case, lets not pretend its a one-sided free gift with no benefits to the US. Thats propaganda, too.
Let's get back to the book. If you have no comments or responses to my previous posts, Chapter 3 is next.
Sure. Once again D changes his chapter title to a strawman argument in "the accusation." "WAS THE ZIONIST MOVEMENT A PLOT TO COLONIZE ALL OF PALESTINE?' is the title, but the accusation is "Even if the First Aliyah can be characterized as an immigration of refugees merely seeking a home in Palestine, the Second Aliyah was the beginning of a Zionist imperialist plot to colonize all of Palestine."
I doubt that all Jewish immigrants thought that taking over all of Palestine was a feasible goal, or even a good thing. But if you think that nobody Jewish thought that taking over all of Palestine was possible and Godly, you can't be serious. Of course some did. So once again the answer to D's strawman argument is "Yes, but No".
Like I said, this book wasnt written to counter only sensible and rational opposition to Israel, but to counter wildly partisan propaganda too. Sure, a FEW of the original settlers, and even a FEW of the original founders of the Zionist movement, dreamed of colonizing all of Palestine; but that was pretty quickly dropped.
I think we can agree on Chapter 3; the accusation is hugely overstated, and therefore essentially false.
Chapter Four awaits us; you said you thought it was important. I agree with Dershowitz's remarks, but I dont think it is. Lets see where we go
.
I gotta go, be back later. When are you and your sweety running off?
Bout two weeks now. Wedding is September 4, and a week in New Orleans pigging out on
cuisine francais, jazz, and each other follows.
I am sorry about that. I'll be back.
There are a couple of organizations in this town that bring some fun stuff.