"We're not going to have 500 years"

[winterbadger]

Thanks to selki for pointing out this article. There are some thigns I don't like about this guy, but I think he's about 99% correct in the observations he makes.

Comments

[winterbadger]

[Morocco, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt]
It's all very well to point out the mote in the eye of the Arab states, but it's no justification for the beam in the Israelis'. Israel doesn't have any control over what the Arabs do, but it has responsibility for its own actions, and its actions in the West Bank and Gaza have been nothing short of horrific.

Last week it was the Guardian comparing Israel to apartheid. Well, Israeli policies are wrong but that doesn't make them the same (and there's the little issue of the Arab citizens of Israel--who do suffer discrimination in fact if not in law, but then so do Arabs in France.)

I didn't see the article, but if they were talking about the Occupied Territories rather than the state of Arabs in Israel, I think that analogy is pretty apt.

And it's so damn condescending, Europeans who don't face suicide bombers telling Israel to act like some European human rights ideal.

Not on the same scale as in Israel, but it's kind of hard after Madrid and 7/7 to say that Europeans don't face the threat of suicide bombers.

And I always get a lump in my throat when I hear Israel comdening terrorists, because without guerilla terrorism in the 20th century and state terrorism in the 20th and 21st, Israel would not have been created or survived. Many of Israel's prime ministers have been former terrorists. Is terrorism unconscionable, morally indefensible, and repugnant? Yes. No matter who uses it.

[arosoff.livejournal.com]

no, it doesn't justify all of Israel's actions, but it makes the Arab nations' complaints and actions deeply hypocritical at best.

The articles argued that Israel is fundamentally based on apartheid, which is false. The fence and a few petty laws passed recently (for example on immigration of Palestinian spouses) make it seem like a reasonable comparison, but the reality is much more complex. Again, within Israel proper, legal equality has gradually developed over the years. Education is a problem but arose from a reasonable basis--Arabs wanted schools that taught in Arabic. They can send their kids to Jewish schools (which teach in Hebrew, and have Bible classes--there are separate religious schools) and some do. Arab schools receive equal funding from the national government, but Arab municipalities are poor (and often very corrupt--a few are notorious for it) so don't have money to top it up. And the parents are poor too, so don't have money for the "extras" that schools offer and which parents have to pay for. SO overall, there's less money, and fewer kids getting their bagrut (matriculation certificate required for university).

The restrictions only apply to Palestinian Arabs--and unlike South Africa, Israel doesn't lay legal claim to the West Bank and Gaza. It does lay claim to East Jerusalem and offered the Arabs there citizenship, which they declined (leading to the various complexities of the recent election). (They do hold permanent resident cards, and unlike Arabs in the West Bank, have full access to things like the health funds, National Insurance, etc.)

Furthermore, there are legitimate security considerations involved, even though the actions are not always proportionate.

It's kind of funny, within the Jewish context I'm fairly liberal and within the religious-Zionist context I'm nothing short of a kofer (heretic) - I'm anti-settler and I believe in the two state solution. (We can't rule them, we can't kick them out and a binational state is ludicrous. Hello, Lebanon anyone?) But the constant grinding down of Israel in the liberal press gets me down. Israel is the fount of all evil, the Palestinians are poor and oppressed...

And I'll admit it, Jews like me who grew up in the Zionist context just don't understand the Palestinians. We grew up with blue boxes and Hadassah and the image of the chalutzim. Our self-image was of building the country. If we weren't there, we were raising money for hospitals, for schools, for planting trees. We were voting for the World Zionist Congress. And we just don't understand why the Palestinians don't and didn't do the same.

[winterbadger]

Arab municipalities are poor (and often very corrupt--a few are notorious for it)
Corruption is no respecter of sectarian differences; there's plenty of corruption in the Jewish parts of Israel too. The real question is why the Arab towns are uniformly poorer.

The restrictions only apply to Palestinian Arabs--and unlike South Africa, Israel doesn't lay legal claim to the West Bank and Gaza.
Well, it occupies all of the West Bank, so it hardly needs to make a claim that wouldn't be recognized anywhere outside of Israel anyway.

Furthermore, there are legitimate security considerations involved, even though the actions are not always proportionate.
Security considerations do not explain the destruction of Palestinian agriculture, homes, businesses, and government offices.

(We can't rule them, we can't kick them out and a binational state is ludicrous.)
Not to mention that the Palestinians, like everyone else, have an inherent right to self-determination.

But the constant grinding down of Israel in the liberal press gets me down. Israel is the fount of all evil, the Palestinians are poor and oppressed...
Well, this is what happens when Jews have a state of their own; they get held to account when they are repressive, violent, and unjust. Israel is not the fount of all evil, but they *are* acting in an evil way, and, yes, the Palestinians *are* poor and oppressed.

It makes me very sad to think it, but sometimes it's occured to me that the founding of Israel was a test for Jews from HaShem, to see if we could be just and fair rulers, or if we would just do as others had done to us. And it seems to me that the latter is predominating over the former.

And we just don't understand why the Palestinians don't and didn't do the same.
Well, give them several thousand years of statelessness and they may develop the same traits and behaviours that the Jews have done.

But it's hard to convince someone there's a point in planting a tree or building a wall when the next day settlers or the IDF may come along and bulldoze it.