Palestinian leaders seek new cease-fire, which Israel may be asked to sign

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/332414.html

Palestinian leaders said on Saturday that they are
hoping to discuss with extremist factions a new
cease-fire to which Israel might also be asked to
sign on, and urged Israel to stop killing top
militants.

Heading into a Cabinet meeting in the West Bank town of
Ramallah on Saturday, Foreign Minister Nabil Sha’ath
said a cease-fire only among militant groups was not
enough.

"We want a hudna between all the Palestinian Authority and all
its organizations and Israel," Shaath said. "We
want a full stop to violence."

Another Cabinet minister, Ghassan Khatib, said
efforts were underway to reopen talks with
militants to try to rescue the truce.
................................................................

uh....yeah....right....

HUDNA-2 ??....What a joke. Anything but "dismantle" the terrorists.

The road-map is dead.
the hudna was a pathetic lie.

"hoping to discuss with extremist factions a new
cease-fire to which Israel might also be asked to
sign on, and urged Israel to stop killing top
militants."


Israel should agree and sign on just as soon as we get a cease-fire with Ossama and stop trying to kill him and top Iraqi leaders. Fair is fair.

Fuckers. Why is it that the US seems to have more than its fair share of utter morons who think that the only way capturing someone or putting an end to attacks in Israel can be achieved is by killing people? Sometimes it seems like they're scared their blood-lust inspired chubbies will wilt if things can be achieved without lots of killing going on...

Violet...

I don't believe any progress will be achieved without action taken against the terrorists.

What sort of action do you think should be taken that would realistically obtain a result that doesn't plunge the Occupied Territories into civil war or bring lots more death to Palestinian and Israeli civilians?

Violet...

If a Palestinian leader had enough street credibility to say, "No more." He or she could possibly cause a peaceful revolution to force out the terror groups. But I don't think that's likely.

I think the Magistrate said it well in another thread. The PA needs to be the only Palestinian group with the power to wage war. Right now it isn't. For that to change, they need to enforce their will on the terror groups. Israel did that 55 years ago and the terror groups stopped acting on their own. The PA looks unable to exert that kind of power.

And unless it will be able to do so, we will not be able to give them control over their territories.

The other solution is indeed the "Civil-war" (A wrong, misleading term. Would you call the fight between police and the criminals a "civil war"?) between the terrorists and the authorities.

BTW, I didn't answer your PM because I don't have enough posts to send PM's, how many do I need?

And what I think would have helped this time is for Abbas to have gotten some help in trying to disable those groups. While Hamas is helping out Palestinians who have nowhere else to go for money, food or clothing, they're going to get their support, which is what they count on. Remove that support from the public and Hamas would be totally marginalised. So instead of embarking on high-profile killing of Hamas leaders, Israel would have gained more by refraining from that and getting some direct aid to the Palestinian people and in doing so making Hamas irrelevent...

Personally, I think a peaceful uprising now by the Palestinian people would achieve a fair bit. If Israel uses violence against peaceful demonstrators, even the US would have to start taking notice and make some real demands that things change...

Violet...

What peaceful demonstrators are you talking about?

I was talking about the possibility of a peaceful revolution, though now I reread what Muddle said, it looks like he was only talking about a revolution against groups like Hamas. Given that Israel hasn't stopped killing Palestinians and continued to expand settlements and that wall that's going well into Palestinian territory, I think it'd be realistic that any peaceful revolution wouldn't just be aimed at Hamas, but also at the Israeli government and what it's doing...

btw, just in case you haven't got to it yet, I asked you a question a few posts back that I'd be really interested in seeing yr answer to...

Violet...

haven't I?

I did ask for a realistic solution, but Muddle did point out that what he came up with wasn't likely to happen. It's like me being asked what a realistic solution for the Palestinian refugees would be and me replying by saying that they should all be allowed to return to their homes, but adding that it's not likely to happen...

Violet...

I believe it is the solution, I see no other solution...

What is your "Realistic" solution?

That both parties abide by the conditions of an peace agreement, something that hasn't been done yet, and that instead of focusing solely on killing members of Hamas with any civilian deaths being minimised by being labelled as collateral damage, Israel actually get in there and offer direct aid to the Palestinians so that Hamas isn't the only group they get offers of help from...

Violet...

I believe that the killing of Hamas Operatives should be stopped because of the collateral damage (I already said I oppose to these dumbass actions), but I *do* believe the Hamas Should be fought against or dismantled to create a long standing agreement, and this act could not be done by the IDF. (It'll be foreign interference and the Palestinians are likely to object, also, the army will have to keep an eye on the area...)

I support the idea of humanitarian aid to the Palestinians, but this will have to be given directly to the Palestinian population, we tried to do that through the PA before, but the money never reached the Palestinian people (Mysteriously, Arafat's Swiss account gained a few digits instead...).

When I was talking about direct aid, I was meaning that it should go directly to the Palestinian people, not to the PA or a middle-man. PR-wise, I'd think people would much rather to see Israel giving direct aid rather than seeing more footage of strikes on Hamas members by the IDF...

Violet...

If the PA can't be the only Palestinian Authority to wage war against the Israelis (or anybody else), then just how legitimate is their leadership?

that there is little chance for the Palestinians if they aren't the ones assuming a moral position. Israel under Sharon is simply not able to do that.

Stand up and apologize for a suicide attack. I know it sounds unfair and idiosyncartic since it should be other way around; Israel apologizing for the land theft and the oppression.

But change begins with change in heart. If Abu Mazen goes to Jerusalem and apologizes to the Israeli people for the killing, many Israeli hearts would change.

Maybe we would be one step closer to compasssion instead of ultimatiums, incursions, distrust, hate and anger.

Fact is that nothing that has happened so far has worked. It is time for another approach.

...Palestinian land, and that doesn't count the original terrorism that the Zionists used to drive the Palestinians off their land in the early '40's.

That's indeed a problem, I agree.

But is mostly Sharon's fault (AFAIK), and may be solved next elections...

The radicals have the popular vote.

Sharon is hated these days, regardless of the Israeli palestinian conflict, he is corrupted and doesn't bother hiding it.
Also, we are in an economical disaster, and all of his solutions hurt the poor and enrich the already rich people. Moreover, his "solutions" not only hurt the poor, but also didn't help our economy a tiny bit...

These reasons are likely to make the people of Israeli think twice before reelcting him...

Got enough food, water, and electricity have you? Got a gun in your face every time you leave your house? Don't blame Sharon. He is "Israel". He was elected to do exactly what he is doing.

And it's getting worse...

Sharon may well have been elected to do what he is doing v. Arab Palestine: he was not elected to do what he is doing to Israel's economic and fiscal policies. Many Israelis who cast votes for a "strong man" at war find that his party does at home things inimicable to their own prosperity, and may well think again before repeating their votes. Further, the coalition structure of Israeli politics means that the number of people voting for Sharon and Likud was well short of a mahority. Many of the smaller rightist partries have no particular economic policies, except perhaps subsidies for their leadership.

Show me a country that had, a military "strong man" who is suppressing a large population and at the same time had a prosperous economy? During the construction of that "fence" I just wonder who in Europe would knowingly buy Israeli goods.

Sharon is an Arab hating thug. His only goal is the elimination or total sujugation of the Palestinians. It is a bit greedy of Israelis to expect him to do that and maintain a high standard of living. Sharon is financing the stealing of Palestinian land by "settlers". He is sacrificing the short term prosperity to that end. He dare not openly say so, but it is obvious. The Israelis are dependant on American subsidies. I'm not sure how increasing that subsidy would be supported by American taxpayers.

Bush came to office with "well short of a majority", but there he is.

The matter has little to do with the things you mention. Israel, founded essentially by a Social-Democrat party, has a rather Socialist ethos to its polity: Likud is a gang of privatizing "free-marketeers" out to dismantle much of this. The needs of security are there, as here, being used as cover for domestic initiatives that would never have sufficed to win an election or sustain a government absent the foreign crisis.

The major effect of the current hostilities on the Israeli economy is the reduction in tourism, and the costs associated with many reservists being on duty instead of at gainful employment. There is no appreciable boycott of Israeli exports, nor will there be one: difficult as it is for those consumed by the question to comprehend, most people do not give a rap about it, nor inquire too closely into the origins of oranges and phosphates. A country which does much trade in cut gems and small arms will seldom lack for customers in any case.

Additionally, you will find the rather small sums provided by the U.S. government make little difference to taxpayers here. They are little more than rounding errors in the context of the Federal budget, and a majority of U.S. citizens still consider themselves more supporters of Israel than otherwise, largely because of a variety of cultural affinities, and the inertia of old habits.

using the kind of tactics now being piously condemned. You are right about tourism, but I can't remember the last time I saw a Jaffa orange. And I certainly wouldn't buy one.

Four billion dollars a year doesn't seem "a rather small" sum to me. If the Palestinians were getting that kind of military financing Sharon could not behave the way he does.

If by "the majority of U.S. citizens" you mean Florida, and the Christian Right you are probably correct. Of course if Israelis understood the true nature of that "support" they might not be so happy about it. Actually it is very doubtful that most have a clue about how much of their money goes to Israel, or much of anything else really. I wouldn't think five-percent know why the Palestinians are called Palestinians.

It ought to be possible on some occassions, at least, to confine discussion within the ambit of the present day. The foundation of Israel owed very little to violent attacks against enemy civilians: the most important factor was cooperation with the English authorities in the first decades of the Mandate, during which time the embryo of a state apparatus was built up, supervising immigration of Jews, conducting elections of Zionist officials, and collecting what were effectively taxes and managing budgets. This preliminary work enabled the Zionists to move quickly and effectively to establish themselves as a state when the chance was had.

In a yearly expenditure of two trillions, Sir, four billions amounts to one fifth of one percent: a mere trifle.

It is a very poor reading of politics in the United States to imagine support for Israel resides only among the reactionary religious right, and Jewish retirees in Miami. It is widespread among the people of the country: if that were not so, major political figures would spend a good deal of time denouncing Israel, and no lobby could stop them from it, for there would be votes to be got by doing it. The fact is, there are damned few votes to be got that way, hence both major parties have made support for Israel their policy.

"English Authorities" I didn't know Palestine was in Britain. "little violent attacks". I'm not sure those people in that bombed hotel would agree. Or the British soldiers killed by Israeli terrorists. "Moved effectively to establish themselves as a state". Wagons West! "Immigration of Jews". Where did the visas come from? "When the chance was had". I take it the Palestinians were consulted?

"Major Political Figures" prefer "denouncing" Cuba. A much safer target. The acts of politicians have much more to do with lobbies and money than the voting population. Or did you miss the last election?

If you are unaware that England ruled Palestine from about the middle of 1918 to early 1948, and did so from 1922 under the auspices of the League of Nations, continued after World War Two by authority of the United Nations, it is hard to conceive why you consider yourself fit to comment on the matter at all.

Your attempted riposte here engages nothing: the statement was not "little violent attacks", but that the establishment of the state of Israel by the Zionist parties owed little to violent attacks against civilians, and far, far more to the cultivation by the Zionist parties of embryonic state organs during the period of the Mandate. Raising yet one more weary time the shibbolleth of the demolition of England's military headquarters in Jerusalem, established in requisitioned portions of a substantial hotel, hardly rebuts that primacy, nor does it adequately support your earlier assertion that attacks aimed at enemy civilians were responsible for the establishment of Israel.

The English authorities of Mandatory Palestine essentially took over the Ottoman practice of "millet" organization, wherein subject peoples were to largely administer their own affairs, and recognized Prof. Wiezman's Zionist Commission as the Jewish authority. Visas for immigration, to a number stated as a quota by the English authorites, were granted in bulk to this group, which was responsible for selecting, sponsoring, and to some degree getting on their feet after their arrival, the individuals who would receive these visas. It was a sizeable bureaucratic undertaking, and greatly assisted the formation of a practiced civil service.

The English intended there be a corresponding administration for Arab affairs, but the Arab Nationalist Congress rejected any participation in such an administration. They also rejected any participation in various English schemes of councils for limited self-rule, on both national and local levels, generally citing as their objection to the latter the participation of any Jew in such a body, though in all cases the Jewish representation suggested was proportionate to their actual numbers in the populace, roughly ten per cent at the start of the Mandate, and for that matter for several decades prior to it.

The United Nations partition, it ought not to be necessary to tell you, divided Mandatory Palestine in two, intending there to be a Jewish state established in one and an Arab state in the other. This was certainly a chance for the establishment of a state of Arab Palestine. Among the many reasons this chance was not brought to fruition was the decades long refusal of the Arab Nationalist leadership to do the work of establishing administrative bodies and an experienced bureaucracy. They had prefered aggrandizement of personal and clan power, and felt the only necessity for success was to use sufficient violence to drive out Jews. That is the plan they attempted to put into operation at the declaration of the Partition, essentially staking a double or nothing wager. They lost. There are consequences for such folly, and in this case they reverbrate into the present day.

Perhaps you live in Florida, in which case your perceptions may differ, but my experience is that month upon month passes without the least mention of Cuba. You may comfort yourself with imagining there is some great swell of pro-Arab Palestinian and anti-Israeli sentiment among the people of the United States, choked off by conspiritorial lobbyings, just as some comfort themselves with a variety of delusions about the world and themselves. That is a matter between yourself, dear, and your busy little hands.

And even less, I imagine, to the Arabs. The English were just trying to salvage their conscience at someone elses expense. Nor can I see why Arabs should recognize visas issued by the British. Do you? Are you seriously contending that the killing and "using sufficient violence to drive out" Arabs from Palestine had nothing to do with the "establishment of an Israeli state"?

I'd have been more impressed if the English had "intended" to leave some elses country alone. As to Arab preference for "personal and clan power", that is their business, and not that of the English, or European Jews, or mine.

Did this "practiced civil service" that controlled the visas consist of Arabs? It is after all their country we are talking about. The legal basis for an Israeli state is that one set of armed thugs gave a country to another set of armed thugs. Not much different to Mafia "territory" agreements in Chicago really.

I don't imagine there is a "groundswell" of pro-Arab sentiment "among the people of United States". After all they have been on the wrong side consistently for the last fifty years! I was just making the point that if I was an Israeli I sure wouldn't rely on their support.

Anyone who doesn't see the power of the Israeli lobby in the United States, is simply choosing not to look.

As to "representation" should be "proportionate numbers in the populace". Isn't that the precise Israeli objection to the Palestinian right of return? Another double standard?

I don't at all understand your reference to my "busy hands".

beg to differ. You are talking about a very well educated people. Do you know where the word came from. Do you know there has never been a Palestine?

But people do live in those countries don't they?

No "educated people" would tolerate an unelected president; a health system that is a national disgrace; television and radio programs that would insult a moron; and a totally corrupt political system.

For nigh on half a millenium, with approximately its present boundaries, and effective central rule from a capital. Certainly there has always been a good deal of regional irridentism within it, that has on some occassions fractured this briefly, and there was a period of empire when rule of Spain's monarchy extended far beyond the Iberian peninsula in Europe and other parts of the world.

It is true a unitary German state is much more recent: prior to that there were a great number of German states existing independently, such as Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Thuringia, among the largest. These were brought into a unitary empire late in the nineteenth century, and persist today as states within the Federated German Republic.

The term Palestine is a Roman coinage, imposed on the former province of Judea after the quashing of revolt there by Jews against Roman power: they were thorough fellows, the Romans, and would not leave even the name of a defeated rebel in existence. It derives from the Latin of Phillistine, who were of Greek origin by most scholarship, and it suited the Roman taste to name the place after a traditional foe of the defeated rebels. Because Latin was the model for learning in Europe through the Medieval period and beyond, the name passed into common geographical parlance. It was certainly not in its origin intended to indicate a particular people. Nor did it indicate in any post Roman or Byzantine polity a governing jurisdiction. This is not to say there is no nationality of Arab Palestine: this took form, as most concepts of nationality did in the region, during the early portion of the twentieth century.

The "Germans" don't call their country "Germany". All names of countries are somebody's "coinages". Usually the most military powerfull.

The poster seemed to be on the verge of saying since "Palestine doesn't exist", nor do the people.

The "Philistines", as you carefully avoid mentioning, were merely the first people the invading Israelis drove from the land. If there was a "nationality of Arab-Palestine" in the "early portion of the twentieth century", it was certainly earlier than 1948.

The "Germans" call their country by its German name. What did you expect, English? Spain is Espana. Give this one a sweet goodbye.

Palestine, as a country never did exist, neither did "Arab Palestinians" until the 1970s.

"Philistine", is the Arabic word for Palestinians. The Philistines were a sea faring people who invaded Israel in the early iron age. The Philistines, who seemed to be of Aegean origin, settled on the southern coastal plain of Canaan/Land of Israel, in the area that later became known as Philistia.
http://faculty.biu.ac.il/~maeira/word_files/philistines.htm

Palestine, as a country never did exist, neither did "Arab Palestinians" until the 1970s.

I assume yr meaning to say Palestine as a state, not a country, has never existed. So what? East Timor didn't either till about 2000.

Yr wrong about Arab Palestinians not existing till the 1970s. What do you think they were during the British Mandate??

Violet...

judging by some things I've seen from him before, they're probably thought of as "immigrants".

But the Phillistines, as you doubtless were aware from your evident erudition in these matters, invaded that littoral themselves, and from Europe to boot: they are generally considered related to the "Peoples of the Sea" in Egyptian records, and show great affinities with Mycean Greeks.

If it isn't, what is it?

Is it "Religious": God? Abraham? Moses? Burning Bushes? Promised Land? Exodus?

Is it "Political": Balfour? UN mandates? American money?

Is it "Conquest": Missiles? Tanks? Bulldozers? Terrorism? Assassination?

Is it "Ethnic": "Settlements"? "Security" Walls? Apartheid?

I'm not interested in your selective use of history, UN mandates, legalisms, encyclopedic quotations, inebriated language, or sophistry. What do YOU think??

As with most questions, the correct reply is "all of the above", in a variety of mixtures.

The historical attachment of Jews to the area is beyond peradventure. It is clearly recorded by Classical observers of Greek and Roman times. Although the Romans in suppressing a series of revolts near the start of the current era killed, exported as slaves, and put to flight from the place great numbers of Jews, there has been a continual presence of Jews there in appreciable numbers. Indeed, a large portion of what are today called Arab Palestinians are in likely fact descendants of Jews who in later Roman times converted to Christianity, and who's descendants later still converted to Islam. Another portion of them are descended certainly from various Roman settlers, as the area hosted several legionaires' retirement colonies in the latter imperial period. Nor is there any honest room for doubt that the Jews of Europe are descended from ancestors who departed the area in the Roman era, whether voluntarily in the time of late Republic, when colonies of Jews were already well established in Italy, Gaul, and Spain, or descended from exported slaves: while there was some conversion, particularly in the late Republican period, it was hardly the predominant constituent of these communities.

The Jewish religion contains several specific attachments to the area in question. Tales of a promise to Abraham and flight from Egypt to redeem that promise are taken quite seriously by many persons involved in the current dispute, though they carry little weight for me personally: the first is beyond any material proof, and there does not seem any archeological warrant for the second. There is, in fact, no particular reason to believe there was ever an irruption of this people into the area from anywhere, but rather that they were part of a cultural complex emerging four or five thousand years ago amid the hills around the Dead Sea and the Jordan valley, distinguished mostly by an absence of pig bones among the remains of its settlements. More important are the well attested facts that in the Classical period, Jerusalem was the center of the national cult of Judaism, revolving around the temple complex there, and that it remained so until this was broken by Roman power, as well as that throughout the current the current era, an eventual return to Jerusalem has been an item of Jewish dogma and faith wherever Jews were found. In its purely religious form, this envisioned the return as requiring the direct intervention of the diety through the medium of the Messiah, rather than through purely human effort, and for this reason, among others, many rabbis at the commencement of Zionist enterprise late in the 19th century denounced it as impious, and those of some Orthodox strains still do so today.

At its commencement, the Zionist enterprise was a wholly legal one, and used wholly legal means' namely, the purchase of land, Ottoman regulations on this subject having been altered in the late 19th century to permit ownership of land by title on something near the Western model, and allowing same to be held not only by Believers but by Un-believers as well. England's control of the region, gained by defeating the earlier conquerors of it, the Ottoman Turks, was wholly legal by the standards of time. Its ratification by a League of Nations Mandate in 1922 was in fact the final word of law on the subject, and the incorporation of the Balfour declaration into the Mandate made the establishment of a Jewish "National Home" in the region a requirment of international law. As a single dissenting vote would have blocked this, it may be taken as the considered expression of the community of nations throughout the world at that time. During the period of the Mandate, the means used by the Zionists remained the wholly legal ones of purchasing land, and disposing of it as the owner saw fit. There were no instances of expropriation whatever during the Mandate.

Arab Nationalist leadership chose to resist not by legal or political means, but by violence, directed against Jews, commencing in its fullest form with the Nebi Musa riots of 1920 at Jerusalem. A series of such attacks continued periodically into the 1930s, by which times there were armed wings of the vatious Zionist parties in existence. During the Arab Revolt begun 1935, the English authorities turned to enrolling Jews as policemen, and raising several military units of Jews as native levy under English officers. When the English authorities, having only with great difficulty suppressed this rebellion of the Arab Nationalists, adopted towards the latter a more conciliatory course, some splinters of these various armed Jewish contingents turned to attacks on Arabs, and on English police, military, and administrative officials. Once the Second World War commenced, these petered out almost completely, and the English authorities and the mainstream Zionist organizations made common cause against the Nazis. Toward the end of that war, various splinter elements commenced attacks on English authorities once more, and after the end of World War Two, relations between the English authorities and the mainstream Zionists fractured, mostly over the question of immigration, which the English were determined to hold to pre-war levels, and the Zionist meant to greatly expand.

The attempt by the United Nations to settle the matter by partitioning Mandatory Palestine into a Jewish zone and an Arab zone dissolved into warfare. This warfare the Jews won. This victory was ratified by widespread recognition of the government of Israel, and its admission to the U.N. as the government of all lands enclosed by the Armistice line worked out at the close of 1948. This certainly is a recognition of the classic right of conquest, as roughly a third of that land was origionally allotted to the Arab Zone. Fashions have changed somewhat, and few, myself included, are much inclined to invoke that right in regards to the lands overurun in the '67 war. As regards ethnic concerns, the state of Israel was founded to ensure there was at least one place where state persecution of Jews was a practical impossiblity. Given the sorry history of same in this world, that does not seem unreasonable to me, and the solution, though certainly imperfect, seems the only one practicable. You will discover that it endures throughout your lifetime, whatever your view of the question may be.

:thumbsup:

but I believe that many archeoligists have found evidence that the ancient Hebrews didn't originate around the area, but rather immigrated from somewhere else.

The religion of a displaced people and a vengeful god that haven't learned anything new in four thousand years.

Laws written by two "empires" contending over tax revenue? And when the "winners" found the income was not worth the expenditure, they turned the country into a Zionist parking lot.

The politics of WW11 victorious powers who were confronted with the aftermath of an horrendous crime which they did little to prevent. So they decide to deposit the evidence in someone elses backyard. A backyard the Zionists "meant to greatly expand" against the clear intentions of the very power under whose aegis the Zionists "immigrated".

An ethnic argument that simple puts the Palestinians in exactly the same position as pre-WW11 Jews. Persecution of Jews replaced by persecution of Arabs! Very "practical" for the Israelis. But very "imperfect" for the Palestinians. Remember them? The people who actually lived there, and who were never consulted at any stage.

Your simplicities in response convey no understanding whatever of its actualities, only what might be most kindly described as a resolve not to think deeply on complex questions.

The political leadership of the people of Arab Palestine misplayed its hand in every way conceivable during the course of the twentieth century. If a negative example were sought for a textbook of political and military strategy, there is none known to me so apt for instruction on what to avoid doing. In every instance where compromise, erection of political institutions, and national unity were called for, the choice instead was headstrong violence, self-aggrandizement, and murder of rivals. In this world there are consequences for fecklessness and folly: it is unfortunate, but rather in the nature of things, that the worst of these forfeits generally are paid by persons other than the leaders who signed the chits. Sensible men playing the cards these were dealt by the end of the Great War could have easily prevented the fruition of the Zionist enterprise long before the commencement of World War Two.

I would concede that, but most of the last part of the twentieth century I can't say I agree. Arab intransigence after that was mostly manufactured by incredibly effective hasbara excersises and a US press that takes patently false Israeli statements to them seriously.

A lot of this, even today, is really just playing out the string from the colossal earlier failures. Even to take for a moment for argument's sake your own position above as true, it was memory of those things which made the Israeli actions and statements seem credible to many on-lookers. Beyond that, the choice of Arab Nationalist leadership throughout the region to side with the Soviet Union in the sixties, however understandable it may have been in pure anti-colonialist terms, certainly drew into the fray against them a powerful influence, and placed them on the losing side of a great world struggle once more. Similarly, the "export" of the struggle during the seventies, with its attacks on persons who had themselves no real relation to it whatever, alienated a great deal of popular opinion, and fixed in many minds a stereotype still deeply held, that many present events can hardly have done much to change. Even the current style of accusation against against Israeli forces by many supporters of Arab Palestine boils down to: "They are just as bad as our side, really!"

I don't disagree at all but I didn't want to let that statement sit as being able to be misread as "Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity" because the PLO position, the Egyptian position, the Saudi Arabian position, etc.. throughout the latter half of the twentieth century is to this day misunderstood as can be evidenced in this forum.

While even the dovish Israeli of the period would understand that their position was for some degree of autonomy for Palestinians in some area of the West Bank (not independence) mainstream PLO opinion was for a solution based on the West Bank and Gaza but it seems to be understood here that Israeli society wanted nothing but peace and would love to do this but the PLO was bent on "destroying Israel".

Egypt offered peace outside the Palestinian problem pre-1973 was denied by Israel and went to war and returned with a longer list of demands conceded by Israel but here Israel "won the war" and proved that "Arabs only understand force".

:shrug:

the Israelis won he 1973 war from a military standpoint, but from a political one, they lost.

There seems to have been a sort of intoxication set in after the spectaculat successes of '67, in which military power came to be overvalued relative to the political and diplomatic spheres. It will be recalled the old fox Mr. Ben-Gurion advised a speedy retirement from the conquests at the time, and like him or not, it must be acknowledged he was an extraordinarily skilled and pragmatic political strategist. President Sadat's efforts pre-'73 do not stand so well with me as with you, but certainly his efforts after that war deserved much better issue than Begin would allow. Begin's invasion of Lebanon was perhaps the greatest disaster ever inflicted on Israel, and it was wholly self-inflicted. To my view, the sustained bombardment of Beruit ranks as a higher crime than than the Falangist massacres in the camps, as it was a direct act of the Israeli military.

for what reasons do you think Sadat wasn't serious about accepting a settlement on the Sinai during 71?

You are correct about the bombing of Beirut also in comparison to the Phalangist Massacres but of course humans walking raping and killing makes a worse visual than trying to imagine vaporized populations and to me it's a mirror image of Kishenev but ten times worse with the Israeli's acting as the police. Viewed in this light, Kishenev is still remembered and reviled to this day while it's mirror image from Lebanon is just an embarassing detail and doesn't serve as an example of why Palestinians hate Israeli's outside irrational anti-semitism.

Is that it included a provision for Soviet troops to join in the monitoring of a demilitarized zone. This was unlikely to be accepted, either by the U.S., which took as its leading policy goal the exclusion of Soviet power from the region, or by the Israelis, due to the great enmity between them and the Soviets at the time. This is not to say the proposal was necessarily not of a serious nature, only, at the very least, that was in a form easily rejected by those to whom it was made. It is not my contention Israel was particularly eager to negotiate at that time. Israel seems to have felt that, being in possession of Sinai and other tracts, it was in a position to press for formal recognition before returning any land, and was prepared to wait as long as it took for that term to be met, after which negotiations, and return of territories, could begin. That is not a position which gives me much difficulty: where something concrete is to be exchanged for a word, my own inclination is to hear the latter before leaving go the former, but such things are susceptible to differing views and attitudes.

It is all due to their "fecklessness and folly"! Here was "simple" me thinking this had to do with the "actualities" of superior firepower. These dumb Palestinians lost their land in a poker game to smart Zionists. Do you also think those European Jews landed up in concentration camps because they didn't play their cards right? Were the Germans just smarter than them? Or was it, perhaps, because they didn't have the weaponry to resist?

If this was just a case of "thinking deeply on complex questions" why the need of all that crude violence and force? It is "rather in the nature of things" that taking someone's territory at the point of a gun is quite easy if you have a lot more guns than they do.
Al Capone did it every day.

What you wrote wasn't "history" or "complex". Much less the result of any "deep thought". It was pedantic, self-serving, re-cycled garbage.

Superior firepower was not a factor until well into the sixties.

The circumstances behind the Hirlerite crimes are so hugely different from the matter you are attempting to wrestle with that there is no need to address that matter here, except to say that you clearly are extremely ignorant of developments in Europe between the wars, and during the Nazi ascendancy.

It is interesting that you are unwilling to examine the manifold failures of Arab Nationalist leadership in Palestine during the Mandatory period, and cling rather to belief in some form or other of inferiority afflicting the people of Arab Palestine as the cause of their defeat. Firepower is by no means the decisive element in these matters: Mao in China began with a few dozen home-made spears, and ended up Red Emperor. He was much better at political strategy than his foes.

My earliest memory is sitting in a cupboard during the London blitz. I certainly don't need lessons from the likes of you about that particular period in history. I lived it!

Forty years of superior firepower is a very long time to be a "factor"!

Amen.

Do you have a date for it? It seems to be a Victorian product.

if its the same that I recall seeing before..

(on edit:--indeed is 1892, just looked on the main page of the maps..I should've done that before guessing but ended up lucky anyway)

http://www.ntcsites.com/palestine/maps/

It is described as a map from 1892.

Navigating from the page shown had proved impossible to me, these machines are not my strong suit. Do you know what its origional purpose was? It seems an odd mix of Roman and Biblical nomenclature.

Jordan makes up 80% of the Palestinian mandate territory.

A couple stories that may shed light on the financial situation:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/1750900.stm
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/jan2003/isra-j04.shtml

It appears US aid/guarantees etc. are something over 10% of the (Israeli)
budget, and given the economic contraction, this must be getting worse,
not better.

You are correct that it is pocket change for the US, although its
hard to see how the US can continue as it is either.

One may hope as said above for a change in government.

The interesting point, as always, is trying to figure out how exactly
chaos will set it ...

Regards.

what we say here doesn't matter in the least. It is merely an exchange of ideas. It's what we do that counts.

I was replying to The Magistrate about the economic
situation in the US and Israel. He made some comments
about that.

You are correct that our discussion here is not important
to the outcome in the real World, although some do take it
quite seriously.

That the money is trivial from the point of view of the United States does not affect the fact that it is of great importance to Israel. The economic mis-management of the Likud privatizers makes it of ever-incrasing imprtance. It is indeed a lever the United States should wield to force concessions to sense by the Israeli government, particularly in the matter of settlement expansion, which costs the Israeli a good deal directly.

As for the rest, my friend, we must indeed hope for, and to the degree we can, work for, a change in government here in our own country, for the fiscal nonesense we are now subjected to cannot long endure with severe crisis.

the economic situation does offer hope of political
change, in both nations.

As I recall, the main exodus took place as 5 Arab armies were moving in to crush to Jews-- Arabs voluntary fleeing from battle--partly forced by Israeli militants, many of whom were survivors of the holocaust, and thus very determined. Also 600,000 Jews were forced off their land and their homes in Arab countries.

The fact that it's a bunch of garbage to tell Israeli grade schoolers (an adult Israeli would laugh at this narrative) and that it passes for serious thought in America is quite remarkable.

Main Entry: theft
Pronunciation: 'theft
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English thiefthe, from Old English thIefth; akin to Old English thEof thief
Date: before 12th century
1 a : the act of stealing; specifically : the felonious taking and removing of personal property with intent to deprive the rightful owner of it b : an unlawful taking (as by embezzlement or burglary) of property
2 obsolete : something stolen
3 : a stolen base in baseball

It's not like IDF's constant raids to dismantle the groups is working.

when youre in charge of israel, feel free to sacrifice
innocent people then.

Are not the unfortunate passers-by in Gaza who happen to be near a Hamas fellow stuck in a traffic jam not innocent people, sacrificed for an end the state deems worthy enough to warrant it? We may even agree with the judgement of the state in the particular instance, but it does not lessen that innocent people have been sacrificed by it. States sacrifice innocent people all the time, to achieve ends, whether concrete or nebulous, a state deems worth that sacrifice: it is, indeed, the principal activity of a state to do such things. It might well be, in some situations, a sound and statesmanly judgement that some political gain is worth the death of some of a state's own citizens, whether military personnel or civilians.

but in this particular siuation itself, I don't think that killing the man was warranted. They could have waited for a better time with less innocent byustanders around.

It's about taking what used to be innocent people and turning them into soldiers to "sacrifice" themselves for the Israeli occupation. Before they die, they "sacrifice" innocent people in the West Bank and the Gaza strip (a lot of innocent Palestinian civilians including children are worth one Hamas leader, right?).

Think about it another way, Hamas and the other groups never even considered a ceasefire until Abbas tried using verbal and social persuasion in placement of violence. They might have kept their ceasefire if Israel had been willing to have one themselves.