Netanyahu: "We'll surround Israel with a Fence!"

[Gil Hamilton]

Sorry to get pedantic, but while I agree that it is inherently exclusive and bigoted, "racist" isn't the right word here. Judaism is a religion, not a race.

If you believe the Israelis, it's a religion, race, AND nationality.

[The Grim Squeaker]

Sorry to get pedantic, but while I agree that it is inherently exclusive and bigoted, "racist" isn't the right word here. Judaism is a religion, not a race.

If you believe the Israelis, it's a religion, race, AND nationality.

The third is trickier than the others .
But still, when it comes to ethnicity, you have to admit that these two don't have much in common:
Jews from Ethiopia:

Jews from Yemen:

Americano Jew:


Yup. Totally racially identical. Pure as snow. Not even a difference in the noses there!

[eyl]

It may or may not have been justified.
That said, to this somewhat average American who really doesn't know much of Turkish/Israeli relations beyond the fact that historically Turkey is one of the few muslim countries to even talk to them and that Turkey is a NATO member, it comes off as frankly fucking childish.

Does Sarah Palin run the Foreign Ministry of Israel?
IOW while I woudn't have been surprised in the least to read about some shithole like North Korea pulling such an immature stunt, I was both surprised and disappointed that Israel would lower itself to that level.

I'd point out that diplomatic snubs of this sort aren't exactly unknown even in the First World. For example, there was a time when Netanyahu visited France and met with Chirac (I think it was during Netanyahu's first term as PM) when it came time to offer refreshments, a tray was brought in with a glass for only the latter There have been all sorts of other such things as well in Wurope (In an historical irony, the "snub the ambassador by placing him lower" trick was possibly invented by the Byzantines.)
The idiocy here is that when you make such a snub, you should let your actions speak for themselves - here, Ayalon pointed out how he was humiliating the ambassador (e.g. explicitly telling the photographers to show how he was on a lower chair).

What did Erdogan say? AFAIK he critizised the Gaza killings, something that is not objectionable IMO.

It's not just the criticism in itself - it seems he's been going out of his way to make the criticism at every occasion and in very harsh and undiplomatic (I especially have problems taking seriously the Turks' complaints of undiplomatic behavior towards their representatives given that last example). Note that I only gave a few examples - there are quite a few more, besides some very anti-Israeli TV shows which have been aired there lately, and then the Turks are offended that Israel doesn't want them as mediators with Syria.

[eyl]

Oh, yeah, and the first thing on the Israeli agenda was the conquer Jerusalem by force and make it a Jewish city, even though it wasn't part of the original state.

Gil, I don't have time to address your entire post right now, but I'd like to address this point specifically. It's a bit disengenous to depict Israel's "grabbing" Jerusalem as a demonstration of a land grab, given that:

A) Jerusalem wasn't supposed to be a part of the Palestinian state either - the area for the international zone was conquered by both sides.
B) The Western half of Jerusalem had been largely built and inhabited by Jews over the last several decades (and IINM Jerusalem as a whole had a Jewish majority)
C) Palestinian and Jordainian forces had the Jewish sections of Jerusalem under siege - by the end of the war, West Jerusalem was under Israeli control, but all of the Jews had been evicted from the eastern half (and as I assume you know, the Jewish Quarter is not a 20th-century invention).

[Simon_Jester]

Wouldn't a real Jewish state be one where the government was based on Judaism---in other words, a theocracy? If so, Israel in its current form doesn't really qualify as "Jewish" any more than America qualifies as "Christian", since Israel professes to be a representative democracy rather than a theocracy.

There's no single tradition of how to run a government according to the principles of Judaism. Back in pre-Diaspora times when they ruled themselves, the Israelites wobbled around between being ruled by kings, being a disorganized blob of vaguely related tribes, and uniting under the leadership of charismatic prophets. They don't get new prophets these days, no one in the country has a reasonable claim to the throne of David and Solomon, and being a blob of vaguely related tribes would be suicide.

So there's no good guide to what a real Jewish theocracy with actual government (as opposed to just rabbis you go to for private matters) would look like.