tharkûn wrote:What exactly happened to them that doesn't happen when a first world government, like say Canada, exercises right of emminent domain? In virtually every civilized country in the world the government can and does seize property returning only monetary compensation.
The difference is that when your property is siezed through iminent domain, your citizenship rights are not revoked, and you can still buy property somewhere within your country.
And of course, usually there is some utilitarian justification for the confiscation of your property - the city needs a new motorway, something that will be economically beneficial to all in the long run, for example. Being of the wrong ethnicity as justification for removal is fairly uncommon in the west, and in any case, completely unacceptable.
frigidmagi wrote:Hey, how about the Greeks toss around by the Turks? Or if that's to far back, we could always talk about when the Cherokee will get right of return to East Georgria, not like the US ever made anything out of that area...
Right, the further back you go, the less compelling a land claim or historical grievance becomes. But where do we draw the line? I agree there has to be one, but we cannot just pull a number out of a hat and say that's how many years a claim is valid for. We need a number that has some justification behind it.
I friend of mine is a New Zealander of German descent. Her family owned a fancy estate that was on land given to Poland, demolished - now new people live there. She does not feel that she has a right to that land, because that would force its current inhabitants to move, and she does not even feel entitled to compensation, because she looks at her life and sees ways in which she is alternatively compensated. She may not get to live on a fancy German estate, but she did get to sail around the world with her family and eventually settle in New Zealand, make friends she otherwise wouldnt have known, and so forth.
On the other hand, if she'd lived in a squalid refugee camp harshly administered by the group that took her family home, knowing that had they not done so she could be living a far more decent life, she might feel differently.
The situation a family finds itself in can change radically from generation to generation. There is always random chance that can lead to fortune or ruin. When a person suffers a great injustice, there's a chance that because of that, they or their children will happen to end up in a better situation than they'd otherwise have been in. There's a greater likelyhood however that they and their children will simply have suffered, or lived less prosperous lives.
It is undeniable that the Palestinians who once tilled the soil and lived in the homes they built are now, living in near warzone like conditions in ghettos, living lives less prosperous and secure than they would have been had they been left alone. There is an injustice here that needs to be rectified.
"Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger." Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials
