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The long term narrative has been all because of the holocaust in Nazi Germany, so if you dare criticize one single thing about Israel, the anti-Semite card gets played
I’m not anti-anyone but I still don’t see why I should support them.
I'm sure you'll repeat that one-sentence lie no matter how often you're presented with examples of members of Congress, newspapers, Israeli and other Jews, etc. criticizing Israel and there's not a peep about anti-Semitism.
Can you provide some representative, prominent examples? PLEASE!
Though I am heartened when it seems maybe someone like Bernie Sanders might get away with objective criticism without getting called an antiSemite, even he can be wrongly accused as such, and is!
The Democrats’ Real Antisemitism Problem: Bernie Sanders
"This recent history shows a vicious cycle: as antisemitic violence on the right gets ever more dangerous, false accusations of antisemitism are weaponized by the right as political cover. And as this slander is repeated more and more, it comes to take over our popular definition of antisemitism, therefore making it harder to recognize, call out and stop the real thing."
Really, if one wants to consider the full extent of this problem as it seems you do, you must really consider what truth there is in the fact that "exceptions do not make the rule" (and/or that exceptions PROVE the rule). The false accusations of antiSemitism are all too easily found in this forum too and just about anywhere you go where this topic is critically considered. Then too there are all those to consider that do not express criticism out of the mere fear of being called an antiSemite, all to easily, commonly and shamelessly perpetuated.
Or again, do please offer something of substance or quantitative that demonstrates otherwise...
I’m not anti-anyone but I still don’t see why I should support them.
There are valid reasons to support Israel, so to speak, although what is meant by support is open to interpretation.
I’ll say that in my line of thinking, Israel has a right to defend itself, make its own laws, and establish its own social standards and way of life. Israel also has every right to improve its standing in the world economically or militarily. They have a right to define their borders and to make a determination of who gets to live within them as long as they don’t violate anyone’s personal sovereignty.
What Israel or Israel’s supporters don’t have a right to do is demand fealty from American citizens or that we place Israel’s interests on par with our own...let alone allow Israel’s interests to supersede our own.
In 1948, following the Holocaust, it was considered by many, including US President Harry Truman, that a Jewish state was needed as a haven. The Jewish people had been stateless for 1900 years.
The UN came up with an partition plan that gave them 50% of the area known as Palestine. It excluded important areas including Judea, Samaria, and the West Bank. Jews reluctantly accepted the plan. Jews were used to negotiating from a position of weakness. Arabs were a people of conquest, and so they, summarily rejected the plan. Instead they went to war against the Jews in 1948. The war ended in Nov. 1948, leaving the Jews now with 80% of Palestine.
In 1949, Jews offered negotiation, including return of some of the territory in exchange for final resolution of the borders. The Arabs refused to talk directly with them. They worked through the UN to demand a return to the UN partition boundaries, which they had never recognized.
Two issues with this narrative: (1) What the "Arab" nation-states chose doesn't necessarily correlate to the Palestinian farmers, most of whom did not join into the fighting. Post-Ottoman era, there was a land grab for Palestine that heightened after the British left. Not all "Arabs" acted in concert and there were multiple motivations. For example, the Jordanian annexation of the West Bank was rejected by its fellow Arab neighbors. In other words, the term "Arab" cannot be used as a catch-all for all the region players.
(2) The events of 1948 (and earlier) are not necessarily justifications for Israel continuing to expand geographically today into "Judah" and "Samaria." Security is one matter but that's far from the sole reason for many Israeli actions.
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Originally Posted by LearnMe
Now, what is the right way to address what happened to the Jews in Nazis, Germany? Would be nice to think there might be a shared satisfaction about beating the Axis powers, so the rest of the world could go back to living without such a threat. Right? I have little doubt Jewish people would be doing just as well all over the world today if Zionism had not emerged, just as they are generally doing all over the world outside of Israel despite antiSemitism. No matter of course, because that's a lot of "water under the bridge" that can't be turned back. (Lots of unnecessary blood too).
Per the above, the "Arabs" invaded in 1948. That's done and should not be used as a justification for various actions decades later. The State of Israel exists, and I'm not sure what's to be gained by rehashing its formation. That Palestinians do is perfectly understandable. That there will be ongoing hatred is inevitable.
But that Jews might be doing well in the world today absent Israel is largely irrelevant. Jews fled Europe because in the East they were still being murdered and few could stomach staying in the West where neighbors (not only the Germans) often persecuted and in many ways abetted the Holocaust. For that era, Europe represented death and the US had not yet opened its doors. That this happened was not primarily a result of "Zionism" but the war.
This is, of course, disastrous to the Palestinians but there are situations in time where actions taken with reasonably "good" intentions lead to negative consequences for some. This strikes me as one of them. The Palestinians were but pawns to about every entity, including other Arab nations. That they might share a religion is irrelevant when it comes to world geopolitical considerations.
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Originally Posted by desertdetroiter
To me, Jews and Israel have little to do with each other. I don’t even see Israel as a “Jewish State” per se. Seems to me that the intention of many early Zionists was to have a secular pluralist state where Jews would be safe among many other groups of people, and there’d be strong and robust debates about affairs of state and domestic politics. That at least SEEMS to embody the spirit of many of the Jewish philosophers and social scientists that I’ve read about. People like Hannah Arendt.
Some of the early Zionists had this vision, others were more aggressive. Some of the Palestinians were accepting of the Jews, others like some of their Jewish neighbors were more aggressive with the large numbers of Jews fleeing the worsening situation in Europe finally sparking riots. The key words here are "some" and "others."
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Originally Posted by travis t
Evidence? There were tons of terrorists attacks and murders of Jews by Arabs from the beginning. You also forget that, between 1948 and 1967 over 500,000 Jews were expelled from Islamic nations like Morocco, Iraq, Yemen etc., where in some cases Jews had been living for several thousand years.
Show me where the Jews caused 500,000 Arabs to become refugees.
By 1948, Palestinian expulsion absolutely was part of the Israeli hoped-for scenario. If there was to be a State Palestinians could not remain in their currently existing numbers given recent events. An Arab-free (or Jewish dominant) Palestine may have the vision of some Zionists from the beginning but it was "reality" by 1948. Ben-Gurion could do the math as well during the 1948 war as he could afterwards when no return was allowed. Make no mistake this has always been Israeli policy with historians now writing of multiple actions that led to that result (for example, early shelling of Jaffa).
Quote:
Originally Posted by LearnMe
First answer is as I tried to suggest, perhaps not in strong or obvious enough terms?
That Travis T (and others who want to argue in similar one-sided fashion) consider more than just that one side from only those select points in time of history. Otherwise, call it all whatever you wish, what can't be undone can't be undone regardless. All we can do now is to try to make matters better not worse, and I believe this country can only move in that direction if we are fair, reasonable and objective about all there is to consider, including what you add as well.
Matters have already been made worse in recent decades with the settlements. It's probably too late to keep the situation from worsening further for another expulsion of the Palestinians will lead to Israel becoming a pariah state. Conflict between the settlers and the Palestinians will continue. Still, one can always try and there the US has abdicated any role except to push the Israeli far right forward.
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Originally Posted by travis t
This war frightened Israel, and led to the resignation of Golda Meir. It also led to the Camp David Accords engineered by President Jimmy Carter. Sadat, unlike Nasser, was a realist and willing to negotiate. This was the first real enduring agreement since the 1948 creation of Israel. Sadat, for his troubles, was assassinated in 1981. A fatwa for this was issued by Omar Abdel-Rahman, a cleric later convicted in the US in connection with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
The Camp David Accords were intended to cover both the Israeli-Egyptian situation and the Israeli-Palestinian situation with Begin finally "agreeing" to stop further settlements permanently in a binding letter to accompany the signed Accords. Pressed for time with the Accords to be signed in a WH ceremony, Carter foolishly agreed the Letter could be delivered the next morning. Israel did not deliver. Begin either reneged - or best case, exhausted didn't understand. Settlement building continued.
Location: Live:Downtown Phoenix, AZ/Work:Greater Los Angeles, CA
27,606 posts, read 14,604,784 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jazzarama
I'm sure you'll repeat that one-sentence lie no matter how often you're presented with examples of members of Congress, newspapers, Israeli and other Jews, etc. criticizing Israel and there's not a peep about anti-Semitism.
Not sure what the Palestinians, Jordanians, Egyptians, Iranians, Saudis, etc contributed (My guess, not much)
Of course the Palestinians aren't going to contribute much when the Israeli government herds them into the equivalent of open air prisons (Gaza,West Bank, Golan)
Of course the Palestinians aren't going to contribute much when the Israeli government herds them into the equivalent of open air prisons (Gaza,West Bank, Golan)
Many medical, military, communication, GPS (WAZE), etc discoveries that help everyone of us every day.. ; either personally of through our government
Not sure what the Palestinians, Jordanians, Egyptians, Iranians, Saudis, etc contributed (My guess, not much)
Yeah, so because they have WAZE.....as if Google and many others didn't have similar, we should support them.
Given this, we should surely support Russia since we can't send rockets into Space without buying their Rocket Enginers. Yay Russia!
As it is with oil......we can buy it. If Isrealis have good stuff, we'll buy it. We can buy oil if we need it. We don't have to invade countries for the stuff of kill people or send our sons or daughters to do the same.
We certainly don't have to finance Israel.
The Saudis could buy Israel many times over. And, as Trump as noted, money is everything (Arms deals with Saudis).
Mission Accomplished. It's foolish to think that the modern USA supports Worldwide Democracy any longer. That ship has definitely sailed. Heck, many Americans don't support it HERE...they prefer Authoritarianism.
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