Subject:
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Re: A question of remembrance...
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Mon, 7 May 2001 17:32:50 GMT
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Viewed:
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1685 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Daniel Jassim writes:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Frank Filz writes:
> > Daniel Jassim wrote:
> > > The only way there will be peace in the Middle East is if the greedy
> > > Zionists PACK UP AND GO HOME, back to Poland, back to Russia, back to
> > > Germany, back to New York, and so on. Give the Arabs back their land and
> > > leave them in peace.
> >
> > Oh, now thats a solution. By that generalization, I belive almost NO ONE
> > in the world has any right to live where they live.
>
> Why make my statement sound so far fetched? Is it any more or less valid
> than the British finally pulling out of India?
Because after the British "left" India, there were still a lot
of Britons who elected to stay, and India still existed. Who
would leave if "the greedy Zionists" packed up and "went home"
to the places where they--pardon me, their grandparents or more--
came from? What if they wanted to stay and live in a truly
pluralistic vision of Israel-Palestine? Is there to be no
room for cohabitation? Are all Jews therefore Zionists?
One thing that's not pointed out is that there's been a Jewish
population in the region for a long time--and in fact, a large
Jewish population in most of the Arab states surrounding Israel,
which were forced out under threat of mob violence following
the creation of Israel. These people were firmly part of those
Arab states, yet they were ejected as unfairly as Israel ejected
Palestinians. Do we get them their families' birthrights back,
birthrights that stretch back beyond the foundation of Islam?
By the way, Palestine has never been an independent state; it's
also never been a part of an Arab state, save between the seventh
and fourteenth centuries. Much of the land was controlled by
Ottoman (meaning Turco-Circassian in this case) landowners until
the Mandate (and even then some still held their land).
I won't argue, however, that Britain effectively stole the
territory promised to Sharif Husayn in 1916, in what was one
of the most blatant diplomatic doublecrosses of all time.
Add to that US complicity in not standing up for the Arab
delegation at Versailles, and you have the basic injustice
upon which all these others have been compounded over the
years.
> With regard to Israel, I wouldn't call my statement a generalization. The
> specific fact remains that the European Jews ran the Arabs off the land,
> including fellow Jews. The Zionists are fraudulent in their claims of
> distant Semetic bloodlines. They are Europeans. The Arabs have been the
> ethnic majority for thousands of years and they were the first Jews,
> Christians and Moslems. They've remained there despite invaders like the
> Greeks, Romans, Mongols, Turks and so on.
Why would you say that they're fraudulent? They're somehow
non-Semitic Jews? Sometime in the last two thousand years,
being Jewish appealed to Europeans, in lands where being Jewish
was usually submitting yourself to things far worse than what
you yourself suffered as a child in the US? I don't get it.
Judaism requires family links as a general rule--I'm sorry,
but I just can't see it springing up among totally unrelated
populations, as an idea rather than a provenance. It's not
like Islam or Christianity in that regard.
> > I think the only way the world will ever come to peace is when every
> > person is able to lay down their claim to property because of who their
> > ancestors were.
>
> Exactly, and that's why the Zionists need to quit Israel and go home.
Dan, have you ever offered to a Native American (after much
research, to determine the proper nation to ask) to give them
your home and property and "go home," wherever that may be
for someone born and raised in this country and with a rich
and combined heritage? Do you believe that title to all of
the land in the United States (and North America in general)
should revert to the Native American Nations that peopled
them, with interest? It's the same thing, and I'd argue
even worse, because the world barely got to hear about this
particular genocide until its damage was virtually done.
There were no dum-dum bullets in this "police action."
You're asking of Israel the same sort of thing, so think
carefully about it. We're fed the same lies about freedom,
frontier wilderness, noble savages, and bloodthirsty warriors
in our past as you fault the "Zionist media" for. But none
of the Native American Nations I'm familiar with--and I'm
not talking about movements like NAN and NAIM--are suggesting
that Europeans and Africans should "go home." It's too late.
Generations have lived, worked, and built here, and that
must be recognised. My "own" nation, the Oneida, are for
example seeking claim on a large percentage of the State
of New York (inexplicably including Albany) as the basis
for a remuneration claim in kind--meaning, basically, a
perpetual Federal grant. But nobody is suggesting throwing
"those people" off the land--their rights must also be
respected.
The point of bringing this up is that they're not going
"home," there's no home to go to. They *are* home, and
that's one of the first points of argument that has to be
dealt with. First, the Palestinians need the right to live
without fear of harm and the right to determine their own
destinies. Second, the Israelis need to be recognised, for
better or for worse, as permanent residents. Those two
are absolutely givens. So long as forces try to deny
one of those two points, there will be no agreement and
people will continue to die. Inside that space there's
a lot of room for manoeuvre (although some points, like
Jerusalem, are natural sticks in the craw).
> > One reason I believe the US is relatively peaceful compared to the world
> > as a whole is that some 90% or more of americans have no ancestral claim
> > to the land they live on. On the flip side of this, I see a huge
> > tradgedy that the reason this is possible is that we essentially
> > eliminated the native population.
>
> Exactly what is happening in Israel right now. The pro-Zionist American
> media even goes so far as to use the word "settlers" to describe the Israeli
> occupiers, feeding on American imagery of the wagon trails and "Westward
> ho!" Ask a Native American about the "settlers."
There's one major difference, which is the joke behind
all of those "Go back to Europe!" cartoons and gags:
Native Americans would, a few young ideologues aside,
*never* demand people do that. It's not in the philosophy.
They're here, and that's now a given, a point that must
be accepted and worked around. Go look at the Oneida
Nation's website; it's rather enlightening because they
talk about their goals and purposes in pursuing court
action on their land claims in upstate New York (which
includes several large cities, Albany among them).
Contrast this to the combined vitriol and intolerance--
religious, ethnic, racial, and class, all rolled into one--
that we see around Israel. People are trying to change
a fait accompli, which is virtually impossible without
genocide (and I do mean genocide).
Think about the analogies: In South Africa, if the end
of apartheid had meant whites would be told to leave, do
you think it ever could have succeeded without horrific
bloodshed? In Kenya? In India? (Zimbabwe is an odd case,
because only now are whites becoming the target; for 20
years they were an integral part of the nation's populace,
a nation even more deeply riven by apartheid than South
Africa.) Even in Algeria, there was no *necessity* for
the colonists to leave; they did so of their own free will.
However, it's important to note that they also didn't
have the same sentimental purchase on the land of Algeria.
They still had France to go back to, where they would be
represented.
Land claims change, populations change, even ideas of
property change. Trying to toss people who have staked
their lives--more than their lives, their identities--on
being in a general location off of that location is going
to invite total intransigence. Allow people to move and
reside where they want, where they can--remunerate those
who have been dispossessed, and try to make some sort of
settlement. That's the first step to closing this book,
but somehow I don't think Israel's right wing and the
militant edges of the Palestinian movement will accept
that.
best
LFB
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: A question of remembrance...
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| Thank you for your input, Lindsay, and for presenting the "facts on the ground" point of view about the Israeli occupation. The Zionists would like nothing better than to hold up their children born in Israel as a further claim to the land they took (...) (24 years ago, 7-May-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: A question of remembrance...
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| (...) Why make my statement sound so far fetched? Is it any more or less valid than the British finally pulling out of India? With regard to Israel, I wouldn't call my statement a generalization. The specific fact remains that the European Jews ran (...) (24 years ago, 7-May-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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