The New Thought Police, criticizing Isreal = antisemitism?

[Xenophobe3691]

Israel seems to have little trouble granting citizenship and full civil rights to Arabs born in Israel Proper. Even better, they don't have to serve!

Only as long as they remain a relatively powerless minority. Prevention of Arab demographic domination is, in fact, a major plank of Israel's state policy and controls much of their decision-making. Their absolute refusal to allow Palestinian refugees to return to their ancestral homes, for example, is caused by their fear that Arabs would become numerous enough to have real political power, and they consider that unacceptable in a "Jewish state".

You're correct about the issue of the control of the Arab Demographic, and it is a hideous policy. But the Palestinian right to return has very little to do with raising Israel's Arab Demographic. The places most would be returning to would be in Judea and Samaria, territory that still hasn't been annexed as part of Israel, and as such is still Jordanian territory under Israeli jurisdiction. Here lies another, unrelated question. These "Palestinians" were originally Jordanian citizens, with Jordanian passports. Why doesn't Jordan take them?

Besides, "Israel Proper" is just a code-word for "the part of Israel where they do not practice apartheid, unlike the Occupied Territories where Jews have a voice but Arabs don't".

As is stated before. The Occupied territories are NOT considered a proper part of Israel, just as Puerto Rico doesn't have voting rights on the Senate and House floors, neither do inhabitants here.

[Xenophobe3691]

Maybe if they treated them better, they wouldn't be so hostile. Is that so foreign a concept?

Even before Israel was a state, Arabs conducted nightly terror raids on LEGAL Jewish Settlements (This was when the British had banned Jews from owning guns, but not the Arab population.)

[Xenophobe3691]

Ah Shit, this is going into dangerous IvP territory. Could the mods please look closely and lock/HoS when it crosses the line please?

[Darth Wong]

Maybe if they treated them better, they wouldn't be so hostile. Is that so foreign a concept?

50 years ago they were ready to throw the Jews into the sea. Maltreatment by the Israelis has only worsened that hatred, but the point is that it was already there before the fact.

50 years ago they had been promised the land by the British in return for helping the British overthrow the Ottamans, as I recall. They were rather surprised to hear that the British had turned around and given it to the Jews instead, and their hostility was hardly unexpected, particularly when the matter of land acquisition was handled in a ruthless manner right from the start. Jews were buying up paper rights to land from absentee landlords that Palestinians had been living on for generations and then evicting them, despite legal precedents to the contrary.

[Darth Wong]

As is stated before. The Occupied territories are NOT considered a proper part of Israel, just as Puerto Rico doesn't have voting rights on the Senate and House floors, neither do inhabitants here.

If white people in Puerto Rico had a vote but dark-skinned people didn't, would you have a problem with that? Because that's the only way your analogy would be accurate.

[Saurencaerthai]

There is no "Jewish" ethnicity. Such misconceptions actually stem from common stereotypes first propagated during the Diaspora when Jewish communities stemmed up independant from the majority Christian population of Europe and were subsequently classified as entities unto themselves. The gist of Wong's statement still holds true however - Israel defines itself as a Jewish state for Jewish Israelis rather than a nation for all its citizens.

Considdering that there are genetic disorders which manifest themselves primarily in Jews (particularly Jews of eastern european descent) and there has been a genetic trait recognized to be common among cohens, the concept of a Jewish ethnicity is at least partially true.

[Saurencaerthai]

Maybe if they treated them better, they wouldn't be so hostile. Is that so foreign a concept?

50 years ago they were ready to throw the Jews into the sea. Maltreatment by the Israelis has only worsened that hatred, but the point is that it was already there before the fact.

50 years ago they had been promised the land by the British in return for helping the British overthrow the Ottamans, as I recall. They were rather surprised to hear that the British had turned around and given it to the Jews instead, .

And if I remember correctly, there was the initial offer to have both a Palestinian state, which was rejected. The break was pretty close to 50/50, judging by the maps that were drawn up, and the Palestinians would get the Golan Heights, a VERY strategic location.

[Peregrin Toker]

I don't get it. How does Religion = Race, besides both being cripplingly flawed?

Because "jewish" can refer to ethnicity as well as race.

Unfortunately, Race cannot be converted into, while Religion can. Therefore, Race is more of a caste system, while Religion is choice based.

Oops, I meant "ethnicity as well as religion." Silly me.

[Joe]

Maybe if they treated them better, they wouldn't be so hostile. Is that so foreign a concept?

50 years ago they were ready to throw the Jews into the sea. Maltreatment by the Israelis has only worsened that hatred, but the point is that it was already there before the fact.

50 years ago they had been promised the land by the British in return for helping the British overthrow the Ottamans, as I recall. They were rather surprised to hear that the British had turned around and given it to the Jews instead, and their hostility was hardly unexpected, particularly when the matter of land acquisition was handled in a ruthless manner right from the start. Jews were buying up paper rights to land from absentee landlords that Palestinians had been living on for generations and then evicting them, despite legal precedents to the contrary.

The British's fuck up, not the Israelis. The Balfour Declaration of 1917 promised the Jews British support with regards to a homeland in Palestine, directly contradicting prior commitments to the Palestinians.

And you know that the hatred of the Jews did not begin with the British betrayal of the Palestinians. The "religion of peace" is the culprit here, as usual.

[Axis Kast]

Considdering that there are genetic disorders which manifest themselves primarily in Jews (particularly Jews of eastern european descent) and there has been a genetic trait recognized to be common among cohens, the concept of a Jewish ethnicity is at least partially true.

A result of centuries of life within isolated communities. It does now however approach the level of commonality necessary to declare Judaism as a whole anything more than a religious institution. Please don’t tell me you put this statement forth as anything more than conjecture, either.

[weemadando]

Whats new about all this, Israel feels that it has held an un-impeachable moral authority for decades now and knows that it can still hold the Holocaust over everyone's heads in order to make sure noone gets in their face about this kind of thing. Criticism /= Anti-semitism, but be damned if I can ever get any of my Jewish friends to understand that.

[Axis Kast]

It's ironic. Undercurrents of anti-Semetism run strong in this country. And where they don't exactly hit all that hard, many are still convinced of their presence. For that group of people, challenging criticisms of Israel proper is the only actual means of fighting any opponents at all. Said critics then become targets in their own right - fair or not.

[Coyote]

Well, it is understandable, when one looks at history, why so many Jews do not feel that the land of Israel proper can be shared peaceably with another large population. Jews tried for over 2,000 years to live in other nations but ended up being subject to myriad abuses. Over generations, Jews have come to feel that unless they have a nation of their own, they are simply unsafe.

Inviting in a large Arab population with known and demonstrated hostility would turn the area into something akin to Somalia, despite all the best wishes and talk of getting along and one world without ethnic or religious differences. Even if one side was willing to do that, the fact that the other side refuses puts even the most open minded persons back to square one.

Now recently a survey was taken just a couple weeks ago, of refugees living outside of Israel. About 90% of Palestinian refugees surveyed said they'd rather have resettlement to a new Palestinian nation accompanied by a fat payoff check than go to live in Israel itself. It angered Palestinian hard-liners who insist that the Arabs get the whole thing and use the refugees as a political card to back up their claim.

To me it seems like a perfect arrangement to remove the two biggest thorns from each side: if there are to be no Arabs forcibly settled into Israel, then concurrently there are to be no Jews forcibly settled in Palestine.

As to states that identify themselves by race, well-- actually France is named after the tribe of Franks, who pushed out or dominated weaker tribes, the Czech Republic and Slovakia are made of these ethnic groups, and Bosnia, Slovenia and Croatia follow this pattern as well. We tend not to think about this because these countries are not under contention and have relatively stable homogenous populations. But even the most peaceful of European countries have ethnic and nationalist tension-- Spain and FRance share the situation with the Basque, and there is a vocal Flemish minority in Belgium.

I may be affected by my own bias being Jewish and having lived there myself but there is adequate historical proof that Jews, either as race or religion, tend to get the short end of the stick in the countries that have played host before. If modern Israel could reign in its hard liners-- and the Arabs the same-- the two nations could live peaceably and there would truly be a safe haven for those Jews that feel as though they are not allowed to live in peace elsewhere.

And, I think this is being handled well and there is no need for a HoS or lock yet, unless Mike feels that it is just too tempting to play with fire.

[Ace Pace]

just feel a need to add something. a new study (I.E compleatly useless), says by 2010 arabs will hold 48% in "proper israel" and a 60+% in the full areas.

[Xenophobe3691]

just feel a need to add something. a new study (I.E compleatly useless), says by 2010 arabs will hold 48% in "proper israel" and a 60+% in the full areas.

Gah! Thread Necromancy! Away with thee! Yallah!

Whats new about all this, Israel feels that it has held an un-impeachable moral authority for decades now and knows that it can still hold the Holocaust over everyone's heads in order to make sure noone gets in their face about this kind of thing. Criticism /= Anti-semitism, but be damned if I can ever get any of my Jewish friends to understand that.

Ahem. Haganah. Etzel. Look them up.