Following the model of my long-running GM foods thread, I’m putting up this post for anyone who wants to debate the issues regarding the Israel/Palestine dispute.
I request that debate in this thread be kept civilised with no coarse language or personal abuse – I will delete noncompliant comments and ban repeat offenders. I also request that commenters not raise general issues about the Israel/Palestine dispute when commenting on other posts. If there’s enough interest, and the general tone is constructive I’ll keep this post on the front page as long as discussion continues.
For what it’s worth, my view is that the Clinton/Barak plan was and is about right one and that both Arafat and Sharon are obstacles to peace.
John Quiggin 
Bush should be included with Sharon and Arafat as Road Blocks to Peace.
Israel’s Border-Protection scheme – the Wall – is right in principle, although one can dispute its placement in practice.
In the ME, it is best that zealots, jihadists and crusaders all keep their distance from each other.
The Barak ‘offer’ was not an offer but a throwaway line.
And its substance meant permament subjugation.
Labor or Likud in power – it makes no difference.
Go to gush-shalom.org for details, and for background read Tanya Reinhart, Israel/Palestine: HOw to end the war of 1948.
There is no hope for peace in this area.
Each Leader is an unapologetic murderer.In each nation most of the people do not recognise the humaity of the other nation and have no sympathy when someone is murdered.
finally how do you go about deciding land boudaries?
One significant minority has voted with their feet. In 1920 christians made up over 50% of the population in Jerusalem. now it is less than 5%
This is truly a place where Satan rules.
In 1920 christians made up over 50% of the population in Jerusalem. now it is less than 5%
I’d like source for this – when I was there in 1998 there semed to be a lot more than 5% Christians – mostly Armenian Orthodox (its where all the Armenians fled the Turks after 1918).
DD, its from a book by Gary burge called Whose Land Whose Promise.
having just reread the correct paragraph he says the Israel bureau of Stats had fewer than 10% in 1978m and it was estimated there was less than 55 now.
sorry for my poor memory but his book does reveal there are many more christians than the Armenians.
this is ironic since it is official Israeli poicy that the Armenian holocast never existed!
Homer
Some stats :
“Arab regime that prohibited Christians from acquiring property in East Jerusalem, compelled Christians to close schools and businesses on Muslim holidays, and to include Muslim teachings in Christian schools, and constructed mosques next to churches to prevent Christian expansion:
Jordan 1948 – 1967
Number of Christians in East Jerusalem in 1948 when Jordan seized control:
25,000
Number of Christians in East Jerusalem at the end of Jordanian rule in 1967:
10,800
Muslim population of Jerusalem in 1922:
13,413
In 1994:
145,000
Christian population of Jerusalem in 1922:
14,699
In 1994:
15,000
Jewish population of Jerusalem in 1922:
33,971
In 1994:
406,000 ”
So it appears to have been about 23% of the Jerusalem population in 1922 in 1922 and around 2.6% in 1994. Probably down to 1.5% now.
Is there a used by date on security council resolutions?
I think you’ll find that there has been an Armenian Quarter in Jerusalem since way before 1918. Go back to post-Roman times.
The Armo’s were (according to them) the first nation to adopt Christianity as a whole.
In recent decades the Judiafication of Jerusalem has forced a reasonable percentage of them out.
The Israeli beef with the Armenian Holocaust is not denialist. It’s just that certain historians like Yehuda Bauer take great exception to Armo’s using the term “Holocaust” as they feel it denigrates and lessens the uniqueness of what happened to the Jews.
Perhaps the best thing we can do, at this great distance from the Middle East, is to impress our parliament with the importance of the Anglo coalition retaining a cohesive presence in Iraq, until the UN can take over. It seems doubtful that the Americans can take the Iraqis up to self-government. Another Bush presidency will further inflame the apocalyptic fringes of Islam. Kerry may do something really stupid, like announcing a withdrawal.
Maybe, since we do not live under conditions of great antiquity and blood debt, and do not get into someone else’s face when we turn to one side, we are not qualified to make much comment.
So, since this thread is guaranteed to generate a lot more heat than light, the host should extinguish it with a naked flame.
Peter Rodgers latest book says enough.
The real season that Israel denies the Armenian Holocaust(or whatever one chooses to call the massacres of Armenians by the Turks during W.W.I)is simply because Israel has had close relations with Turkey(one of the few islamic states to do so),and there has long been co-operation between the Israeli and Turkish military.Indeed the detente was organised by the “Numero Uno” of US Zionism,Richard Pearle himself.Israel permits no mention of the Armenian massacre in official literature,in deference to the sensitivity of the Turks. So much for Holocaust denial by Israel. !!
Seems to me that the Isralies learned the lesson only too well. Their Gestapo tactics will only perpetuate the retaliation of the oppressed.
What choice do they have, and that applies to both sides.
Until a common ground can be found look out for more of the same, and with the current administration dont hold your breath.
tipper the figure I have is in 1922 there were 28,607 residents of which 14,699 were christians. the percentage is 51%.
I might add christians can migrate more easily than muslims as it is usually christians who are both educated and have businesses.
So the Barak ‘offer’ was not an offer but a throwaway line. Well tell that to the pro-Palestinian Saudi’s at the Clinton talks. Prince Bander was so shocked by the generosity of Barak’s offer (which given the history of Palestinian violence and anti-Semitism in the Middle in general was extremely generous) that he told Arafat that to reject it would be a crime against the Palestinian people- Arafat rejected it, when on a mad bombing campaign, continued to use aid money for his own purposes and got Sharon elected. Sorry to inject some facts into this anti-Semite dribble.
I would suggest that if the pragmatic Saudis thought Barak’s offer was shockingly generous, then that increases the chance it was not a realistic offer. The chance of it being implemented was lower than even the Oslo Accords.
I’ll throw in my 2ø with saying Arafat and Sharon are obstacles to peace – but who is going to replace either of them. Arafat’s legacy will be a power vaccumm left after he’s gone, filled by extremists (who basically have the Palestinians following them now). As for Israel, the far-right there seems to perpetually hold the balance of power, knobbling any progressive voice.
Michael, you seem to know a bit about Israeli politics. Suppose that Arafat has accepted Barak’s offer. Do you think that Sharon and the Likud Party, then in opposition, would have supported Barak, or done everything in their power to stop it from ever being implemented?
Given Likud’s unrelenting opposition to the Oslo process from the beginning, and Likud’s opposition today of their own leader’s plan to withdraw from Gaza, I suspect the latter, but if not, I’d be interested to hear why.
Also, there seems to be some confusion as to the precise nature of Barak’s offer. In today’s AFR, Colin Rubinstein says that Barak offered the Palestinans a “contiguous” state. Yet other accounts have it that what Barak offered was a series of disconnected South African-style bantustans, with Israel keeping control over water and other key resources.
Are you aware of any map that has been published which shows precisely what Barak offered?
Spiros,
Alan Dershowitz’s (a left American lawyers) book The case for Israel goes into this in some detail. My understanding is they were offered a “contiguous” state (with a bridge to cover two sections that were not connected). However, critically they were also offered a contiguous state in the past on, at least, two occasions but rejected it and instead chose to seek to destroy Israel.
On Sharon, I don’t think he would have been elected if the Barak offer had been accepted. Furthermore, while I don’t like him one bit, he is the kind of leader one would expect to get elected given the appalling history of Palestinian violence and the fact (ignored by many in the press) that when Arafat talks peace in English to the western world he then speaks to his own constituency in Arabic and essentially tells them to ignore what he says. The fact that violence is generally deeply regretted on the Israel side and celebrated on Palestinian/Arab side are also factors often neglected – as is the fact that the most anti-Semitic bilge is taught in Palestinians schools and throughout the middle east.
Michael, “contiguous” as two separate pieces connected by a bridge, which presumably could be closed or destroyed by the Israeli military, doesn’t seem all that contiguous to me, but let’s leave that to one side. You haven’t answered my question about Likud.
We know that Likud has many people within it who are adherents of the Greater Israel view and who are against settling with the Palestinians, at any time, under any circumstances. This is not in dispute. Their opnions can be read nearly every day in the Israeli media. They are possibly a minority but they exert disproportionate influence. What makes you so sure that Barak would have prevailed against this kind of opposition?
Barak did not offer a “contiguous” state. There were a number of settlements inside the Palestinian areas. The important part which always gets fudged by the pro-Israel supporters are the Israel only roads that connected the settlements with each other and with Israel proper. In theory the Palestinians had the right to cross these whenever they needed and provisions for this were included in the agreement. The problem was that the roads would remain Israel soveriegn territory and in practice could be shut down to Palestinian access whenever they felt the need, (which would probably been about five minutes after the next Likud government was elected). Once the roads were shut down to Palestinians, Palestine would be very effectively divided in seperate bantustans which is basically the situation on the ground now. Add to that the continued Israeli control over borders and water etc and the Palestinian state would be unviable and completely dependendant on Israel as well as not being contiguous.
This would all be ok if this was some interim state of affairs that would lead to a final settlement that resulted in a realistic Palestinian state but as was made abundantly clear at the time by Barak, certianly Likud, the general state of Israeli politics and the Americans this was the FINAL SETTLEMENT. This was all the Palestinians were EVER going to get. I don’t think it was a smart move by Arafat to reject it, but I can certainly understand the sentiment behind it.
The Barak offer was nothing more than a demand for Palestinian acceptance and International legitamacy for the status quo. The reason that the Israeli right was so against it was not because of what it gave up, but the fact it would be an obstacle to their dream of an ethnically cleansed greater Israel.
People in the west just do not seem to realise just how far to the right Israel politics is. This a country with cabinet ministers that openly advocate ethnic cleansing (aka “transfer”).
Spiros, in relation to Likud’s extreme views and influence, the reality is that the vast majority of Israel’s want peace and are and have been willing to trade land for peace. That said, the response of the Palestinians to the Clinton talks has basically destroyed any trust in Arafat as a peace partner that even many members of Israel peace movement had – another factor is the growing recognition that what Arafat says in English and what he says in Arabic are two different things. Remember Israel only has to lose one war and it is wiped out (and the Palestinians and their Arab supporters have made it clear what they will do to any Jew they come across).
Your comments on Israel’s press are simply wrong – there is a great variety of opinion expressed in this country’s press unlike is the case anywhere else in the Middle East. For this and other reasons (the way gays and women etc are treated in Israel relative to elsewhere in the region) I find it bizarre that so many so-called left/liberals are so quick to condemn Israel. In regard to some of the constraints placed on the Palestinians – well tough. Their behaviour has been so appalling in the past that one would have to be a very suicidal Jew indeed (or one of the many Arabs who prefer to live under Israeli rule) not to take precautions such as building the wall. If Australia or France or the UK was in the same situation their citizens would demand the same.
Michael, you keep asserting that the majority of Israelis would be willing to settle with the Palestinians but you never provide any evidence. You then fly off onto lengthy tangents about Arafat. I didn’t ask you about Arafat. I asked you about the politics in Israel.
Your implicit premise that if only Arafat had accepted Barak’s offer it would have sailed through the Israeli political process, because “the vast majority of Israel’s want peace and are and have been willing to trade land for peace” , as stated, is just an assumption.
Let me ask the question again. How do you know this to be true? Or if you can’t prove it, what evidence is there that suggests it might be true?
As for the Israeli press, I didn’t say that there wasn’t a variety of opinion in it. I said that the the extremist Likud view is very prominent and influential, and anyone who cares to can read this prominent and influential view in the Israeli media.
Spiros,
Israeli’s have always been willing to trade land for peace this is an historical fact. Early on in the process they would, if their offer had been accepted, have been left with a relatively small amount of land (of what remained after 4/5 had become Transjordon later Jordon. Much of land which would have formed Israel would have been the relatively barren land they had purchased from Arab landowners. Rather than accept this the Palestinians and their allies attacked Israel with the support of Arabic radio stations blaring out encouragement to kill any Jews they came across. The same Palestinian leadership had sided with Hitler in the second world war and sought his help to do to the Jews in Palestine what he was doing to Jews in Germany and elsewhere (again some inconvenient facts coming in to the discussion). Given these and other factors, for commentators to equate Sharon with Hitler and current Israeli policy with Nazi Germany or Apartheid South Africa is sick in the extreme. Although, Arab leaders have often done a good impersonation of Hitler.
For further information, I refer you to an article by ALAN DERSHOWITZ at
http://www.aijac.org.au/resources/speeches/dershowitz_speech.html
It is rather unfortunate when a lawyer talks more sense on politics than academics but such is the nonsense that often passes for supposedly left wing discourse these days.
Michael, we all know the history. I was asking about Israeli politics in the late 1990s, and beyond, not the late 1940s. You’ve had three goes at it and still haven’t answered my question, so I guess you either can’t or won’t.
Thanks for the Dershowitz reference, which I will read. He certainly is a very skilled advocate although it is ironic that you describe Dershowitz as a lawyer not an academic, when he is a Professor of Law at Harvard. It also beats me why you keep returning to the subject of left wing academics. For better or for worse, they’re not the ones who decide the fate of Israelis or Palestinians. (Although, ironically again, among the most eloquent voices in Israel for a just settlement with the Palestinians have been left wing academics – but what would they know?)
MB,
If it is true that “Israeli’s have always been willing to trade land for peace this is an historical fact”, should we conclude that the settlement of Israelis on Palestinian land and enclosure of that land behind a wall constitute a provocation to continued conflict? Looks that way to me, and the Palestinians don’t seem too happy about it either. Maybe that’s why they keep bombing the Israelis.
Spiros,
Strange as it might seem- but while at work I don’t carry around statistics on just how many Israeli’s would swap land for peace etc. On left wing academics, they and others influenced by their views – liberal minded journalists and European leaders etc – do have a major influence on what type of policies are proposed and how the conflict is perceived. Also, as someone on the left of politics the fact that so many on the left have now joined with neo-Nazis and others in encouraging anti-Semiticism is a major source of shame and embarrassment to me.
Re my reference, Dershowitz as a lawyer not an academic, this was clearly a reference to a non-specialist in politics history etc offering a superior analysis in this area to so-called specialists whose brains are addled with ideology. So lets not nit pick.
Fyoder on the wall –stop being so hypocritical. If your relatives and friends were continually being blow up by members of a death obsessed culture you would be calling for a wall. Your comment regarding –Maybe that’s why they keep bombing the Israelis- is simply morally reprehensible in that it indicates support for this action.
MB,
I don’t suppose you have any Palestinian relatives who’ve been killed or dispossed by the IDF? I suppose they don’t count? “Well tough” is all the sympathy you can muster for the innocent Palestinians, and you call me morally reprehensible and hypocritical. Sheesh.
It’s pointless to argue that one side is more morally bankrupt than the other. I simply pointed out that the Palestinians have some good reasons to be angry with the Israelis, and they attack them in the only way possible. There’s no hypocrisy in that statement, and it’s not condoning their actions – just trying to explain them. If anything, it was a redundant statement because it should be bleeding [excuse the pun] obvious that the Palestinians bomb the Israelis because they’re angry.
Likewise, the Israelis have good reasons for building a formidable army and, now, a wall to keep the Palestinians out. That doesn’t mean it’s right, that it will stop the violence or end the injustice.
The question is, do you want to prove the Israelis are more moral than the Palestinians, or do you want an end to the violence? I don’t have any personal stake in the conflict, but I’m jack of it and the perverse repercussions for the rest of the world, so I’ll go for the latter.
Just what land are the Israelis going to trade Michael?
Some of the land they stole in the 1967 war?
Good one.
PS. Does not make sense to say Palestinians are anti-semitic. Just shows your irrational Israel can do not wrong stance.
Craigm,
In 1967 Israel was attacked by its enemies who had a stated aim of destroying the state of Israel and killing as many Jews as they could manage in the process. Consequently, Israel has every moral right to occupy land it deems necessary to protect itself. What is the best option strategically is another issue.
On my supposed irrational Israel can do not wrong stance, this is simply the nonsense of ideologues. Israel should be criticised but the criticism should be in perspective. Critics of Israel are generally like the character played by William Hurt in the Kiss of the Spider women who interpreted history to make the Nazis appear to be the real heroes. In fact, so one sided is this critism that I am no longer prepared to put it down to just ignorance and it seems clear to me that anti-semitism is often the root cause. Oh and Craig and other supporters of palestinian violence where would you prefer to live Israel or elsewhere in the middle east.
MB,
I believe Israel was the aggressor in the 1967 war, as it was in the 1956 Suez War. On both counts the Israelis argued they were striking pre-emptively/defensively. That didn’t stop them from keeping hold of the land they conquered.
Israel was attacked in 1973 (Yom Kippur), and I think was the military weaker (but ultimately victorious) party in the 1948 war that broke out after the UN partition.
BTW, the criticism = racism is a cliche that is best avoided. Not everyone who criticises Israel hates jews.
Fyoder,
Re 1967. In May 1967, Egypt and Syria took a number of steps which indicated a war was imminent. Nasser ordered a withdrawal of the United Nations Emergency Forces stationed on the Egyptian-Israeli border. A blockade of all goods bound to and from Israel through the Straits of Tiran was implemented. . Syria increased border clashes with Israel along the Golan Heights and mobilized its troops.
On May 23, U.S. President Lyndon Johnson publicly reaffirmed that the Gulf of Aqaba was an international waterway and declared that a blockade of Israeli shipping was illegal. In accordance with U.S. wishes, the Israeli cabinet voted five days later to withhold military action.
Instead Arab states began mobilizing their troops. Nasser and other Egyptian leaders intensified their anti-Israel rhetoric and repeatedly called for a war of total destruction against Israel.
Rather than absor an Arab first strike against its civilian population, many of whom lived within firingrange Israel decided to act first as Australia or any other country would have done in similar circumstances.
Israel did though appeal to Jordan to stay out of the conflict. Instead Jordan attacked Israel and lost control of the West Bank which servies it right-again inconvient facts intruding into the usual hate session against the only democracy in the middle east – Israel.
MB,
This isn’t a “hate-session”. I haven’t read a single post here which indicates the writer hates jews or even Israel for that matter.
Re: the Six-Day War, I acknowledge that the Israelis had good cause in their pre-emptive strike, but you were simply factually wrong when you wrote earlier that, “In 1967 Israel was attacked by its enemies who had a stated aim of destroying the state of Israel and killing as many Jews as they could manage in the process.”
Yes, there were some good reasons, but Israel attacked first, and kept hold of the land it conquered. It’s not a coincidence that it is precisely that land, i.e. Gaza and the West Bank, which excites the Palestinians so much. Land for peace, eh? How about giving the land back? Strangely enough, the UN had the same idea back in 1967, and called it Resolution 242. I notice that nobody’s too keen on enforcing that resolution…
The UN has no credibility on Israel if on anything anymore.
Re factually wrong –I suggest you read some of the history (not just the likes of Chomsky and Edward Said). Arab leaders and opinion makers have continually called for the extermination of Jews and spread anti-Semitic propaganda. The fact that Israel attacked first before waiting to be attacked does not invalidate their moral right to keep any land they deem necessary to protect themselves from future attack. Strategically though it is in their rational self-interest to get out of the occupied territories and they should do this as quickly as possible.
However, even when they do all the problems in the middle east and the wider Muslim world will still be bizarrely blamed on Israel and the US. Until Muslims around the world grow up and accept that their problems are largely of their own making, little positive change will occur.
MB,
I don’t get my history from Chomsky or Said – too lefty for my taste.
I don’t deny that Arab leaders have said some very nasty things about the jews and Israel, but you’re on very shaky ground when you assert that Israel has a “moral right” to keep any land it takes. There’s nothing particularly “moral” or “immoral” about naked power and realpolitik. The Israelis keep it because they are stronger and it gives them a tactical advantage.
However, as you point out it is in their rational self-interest to get out of these territories ASAP and to negotiate a peace with the other belligerents. Unfortunately, as other posters have been trying to get through to you, not everyone in Israel agrees. Hence the settlements in the West Bank, the Wall and all that other good stuff that keeps people pissed off and fighting.
And there’s nothing “bizarre” about the way in which Israel and the USA are blamed for the problems in the middle-east. Many Arabs see Israel as a western colony, protected and buttressed by the USA. They react very negatively to the oppressive rule of Israel over the Palestinians. The USA’s dithering ineptitude in solving the Israel/Palestine issue is interpreted by many as deceitful support for the zionists, and has provided a festering sore of resentment which has fuelled a number of the terrorist groups that now colour our lives in the West. Yes, most of the Arab states would probably be basket-cases anyway, but Israel/Palestine was not a problem of their making, and everyone would get along a damn sight better if the mess were sorted out.
So all the problems in Egypt, Sudan etc are caused by the Jews and their American supporters and the Islamic world would be a wonderful place for women and religious minorities and gays etc etc etc if it was not for these actors. I suggest you read some liberal minded Muslim writers such as Irshad Manji on this topic including on the thousands of Muslims who freely pray in public in Israel. As she rightly asks where else in the Middle East could religious minorities have such freedom. Imagine a thousand Jews praying in public in some Muslim country or gays going on a gay pride March etc. People who go ape shit about western countries backward views on gay marriage etc but play down the far far greater oppressiveness of Islamic regimes or blame it on external actors are just hypocrites and ideologues if not motivated by anti-Semitism..
To sort out the palestinian problem you first of all have to get a time machine and go back to 1945 and then suggest to the jews of europe “Look, do you really think that congregating en masse in the middle of another demented ideology that wants to kill the lot of you is a good idea? What’s wrong with America?”
Alternatively, you can use it to go about sixty years into the future and help them evacuate off the beaches.
The core text here is Runciman’s history of the crusades.
Actually you need to go further back to WW1 and the infamous Balfour declaration which showed to the the Arabs how deceitful the Western world was.
It was the breaking of TE Lawrence too it seems to me.
This brings us back to the real problem. Land. Whose land is it?