Israeli Palestinian 'key to the city' and the conflict (Wissam Nassar/Maan)
No, Larry, the Right of Return is not “wrong.” That’s a catchy phrase that unfortunately does a dishonor to the suffering of nearly 1-million Israeli victims of the Nakba. And yes, I take the “radical” step of calling those expelled from Israel, Israelis because that’s what they were and are. In this day and age, you simply cannot expel one million inhabitants of your country and write it down as a company does as a bad loan.
And lest any reader here seek to claim that I’m upholding the Right of Return out of allegiance to Arabs or out of betraying my allegiance to my own people–on the contrary: Israel must be a nation based in justice. Israel right now is a nation bathed in original sin just as America was until we began to redeem those sins in 1956 with the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision.
For Israel to take its place of honor as a member of the world community it must right this wrong, otherwise it will be an eternal stain on its national record.
And Larry, I want you to read this passage again and see if you detect the horrible irony it contains:
I feel comfortable agreeing with Netanyahu on the right of return, I’d say I feel just as comfortable as I do agreeing with Hitler about Stalinism or agreeing with Stalin about Nazism. No problem at all.
You liken the Right of Return to both Stalinism and Nazism. Even if you reply that you didn’t mean the comparison literally, the fact that you compared ROR in even the most peripheral way, to two of the most noxious political ideologies of the 20th century speaks volumes. It says that you view ROR as at the least an attempt to destroy Israel and at worst an act of genocide against Israel. This is so profoundly wrong-headed I almost don’t know where to start.
For me, ROR is a matter of morality and justice–and yes, Jewish morality and justice. For you, it’s a killer. This leaves me profoundly depressed. As does this:
…The Jews didn’t do anything to the Palestinians in the 47-48 war that the Palestinians didn’t do the Jews; the Jews just did it “better…”
Two wrongs don’t make a right, they make two wrongs. Besides, the existence of Israel as a moral nation cannot be based on the fact that it outdid the Arabs at their own game of violence and brutality.
…The truth about the “birth of nations” tends to be brutal.
The Bible recounts a number of nations that the Israelites exterminated in acts of genocide. Among them the Jebusites, Moabites and Amalekites. Do I hear you correctly saying that if the birth of the Israelite nation was dependent (i.e. could not have happened any other way than) on these acts of extermination, that you feel this was a price worth paying? Because if this is what you are saying then I can’t think of a more profound difference between us.
I also think you’ve fundamentally misunderstood the Nakba and War of Independence. And the terminology you use here betrays historical amnesia:
…The Palestinians ethnically cleansed Gush Etzion [and] the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City…
Gush Etzion was a massacre of a village, but it was not “ethnic cleansing.” Ethnic cleansing is forcibly expelling 1-million from their homeland. There are a few very salient facts that you’ve neglected in your narrative. The massacre at Gush Etzion in May, 1948 had been preceded by the massacre at Deir Yassin a month earlier. Do not attempt to argue that Arabs harbored hate and the Jews merely responded in kind. We’re way past that argument, Larry. You know too much about this conflict to attempt to argue there was no hate in Palestine till Arabs created it.
You also argue incompletely about the elimination of Jews from the Jewish Quarter. Even the Haganah concedes that it used the Hurva synagogue in the Old City as a fortress and armory from which to attack Jordanian forces. While I do not countenance what the Arab Legion did in its expulsion of the Jews, it did it for a reason (from their perspective). And if Arabs had been using a mosque for the same purpose (to attack Jews) the Haganah would’ve done the same in a heartbeat if it could’ve.
Another important point is that the war was started by the Palestinians.
This is another convenient act of omission. The war happened because of a deliberate decision on Ben Gurion’s part to pre-empt any effort at negotiation of differences between the two communities by declaring an independent state. Judah Magnes begged him to negotiate before declaring independence to see if an agreement could be worked out that averted war. Ben Gurion knew what he was doing meant war. He did it anyway because he thought it gave him maximum military and territorial advantage over the other side.
I don’t think the Palestinians can claim that they have the right to return to their land and homes; after all, they never thought to offer that right to the Jews they drove out.
Another argument in bad faith, I’m afraid. Jews expelled 1-million Israeli Palestinians. How many Jews were expelled by Arabs? 10,000? I detect a slight lack of proportion in your argument.
And yes, I think that as part of a resolution of the conflict that all Jews driven out of their ancestral homes, whether they be in Gush Etzion or Cairo or Damascus deserve the right to return if they wish. If Palestinians deserve this right then Jews deserve it too.
…So long as it was spelled out that from Israel’s point of view, this was not a matter of Palestinian right but rather a decision by Israel to allow them to immigrate.
Now you’re being too cute by half. I don’t care what Israel calls this. But if Israel thinks that the Palestinians and the rest of the world is going to call this anything but recognition of the Right of Return, then what we have is a failure to communicate on a massive scale. I can’t think of anything more depressing than Palestinians finally given recognition of the injustice done to them; while Israeli Jews take the position that they’re only allowing them to return out of the goodness of their hearts.
Right of Return is a fundamental right; not an act of noblesse oblige on the part of Israel’s Jews. Larry, this is their country as much as it is yours. If you deny this, then you set up a situation in which the returnees will be second-class citizens before they even arrive on your shores. They must be equal to you in every way. If you deign to allow them to return, then they are not.
As for their land and property, those were irretrievable war losses in a war which their side started; let the new State of Palestine compensate them for that.
Larry, this is precisely the way some of the most right-wing readers speak of the Arab losses in 1948. They started the war, tough luck. You’re playing right into their hands. The war was a two-way street. Arguing it was all their fault or more their fault than ours is a lose-lose proposition. It just keeps us mired in the he said-she said mode of historical grievance.
The plain fact of the matter is that these people were expelled from Israel. They, for the most part, did not leave voluntarily. Not to mention they were never allowed to return despite the fact that Israel claimed that it intended to allow them to do so after the War ended. You simply cannot let your country off the hook with such a cheap, unworthy argument. Besides, international law disagrees with you on this. The Geneva Accords, which I believe will end up serving as a template for a final resolution of the conflict, also disagree with you.
They provide for the creation of an international fund to which nations will contribute. Some will contribute more and some less. Among them will be Israel and Palestine. I don’t know how much Israel will contribute. But it will contribute, because it must do so to resolve the crime it committed against its own inhabitants in 1948.
…If the Palestinians and Jews can live together in a state of all its citizens, without borders separating them, why should borders separate any two nations in the world?
I’m not sure what your argument is here. But Palestinians and Jews have always lived together in what was once Mandatory Palestine and then Israel. They will continue to do so. Your statements seem to imply that they are two separate peoples like the French and the Germans, when this is not the case. French and Germans never lived together in one state as Jews and Palestinians have.
Finally, perhaps in some distant future, the new state of Palestine will integrate in some unforeseeable way with Israel just as the European states have come together in the European Union.
…They’re created as instruments of power.
Not true. Do you think the Pilgrims came to the New World to create an instrument of power? Were the founding documents of this country, the Bill of Rights and U.S. constitution created as instruments of power? Was the Magna Carta, the founding document of modern Britain? I think not. Not to mention the phrase “instruments of power” harbors for me an echo of Nietzsche’s Superman and his “will to power.”
There is no one way in which nations or states are created. Some are created through sheer muscle, blood, and brutality. Some are created out of principle. I know which one I prefer.
Nations create states for themselves so they can have power…
This sounds to me like Darwinism, with the difference being you claim not the survival of the fittest, but survival of the most powerful. Evolution governs the development of species, not nations. Evolution and human civilization are two different things. As I wrote above, some nations are created by brute force and impose themselves on their neighbors (much like Israel unfortunately). But that isn’t universally the case, I’m glad to say.
White European settlers created the USA because they wanted the power…
That’s not the way Roger Williams or William Penn would describe their mission. For them, settling the New World was not an expression of power, but rather an expression of values. Yes, we argue till the cows come home about what came after, about the acts of genocide against Native Americans and our responsibility for that. But I disagree that the earliest settlers and those who formulated the underlying ideas behind the New World experiment thought about power in the same way you do. Manifest destiny was not an underlying foundational element of America. It came later, in the late 19th century. And it is a concept that America is still trying to live down, not celebrate.
The Jews created Israel firstly because they wanted the power to protect themselves
That’s not the underlying values of Ahad Ha-Am’s cultural Zionism, which I prefer to base my own Zionist vision upon. A Zionism based solely on survival and power is the Zionism of Jabotinsky. It is a Zionism I reject. The human species has bullied its way through the evolutionary maze decimating countless species in the process. Does this mean that we are the best species? Or even that we will survive in the long run? No. Is survival without values worth it?
Of course, there is a need to protect Jews, and a Jewish homeland was supposed to do that. But if all you seek is power then you will end up with none, because power will never gain Israel acceptance in the Middle East. That’s part of the irony about latter-day Israel. Jews there are in far more danger than Jews in almost any other place in the world.
The Israel I envision is based on values. That’s why peace is so important, and justice too. Only an accord that respects Israel’s neighbors and provides justice to its Palestinian citizens and inhabitants (including the Nakba refugess) is one that allow Israel to survive in the long-term.
I definitely don’t think it has to undo its birth by recognizing the so-called right of return.
This is an absolutely false red-herring argument. You’ve conceded that the Right of Return as laid out in the Geneva Accords would not destroy Israel and yet here you return to the same tired old notion that it will. I’m disappointed, Larry. You seek to set up a bogeyman that exists only in your imagination. Is this what Zionism has come to? An ideology based on bogeymen?
The Right of Return will not undo Israel’s birth, it will, in the long run, guarantee it.
Larry Derfner
Dimi
I posted this in the other thread, but I’ll put it here, too:
The irony of an American from New York who immigrated in 1985 (under the “Law of Return”) pontificating about how my father-in-law didn’t have the right to return to Haifa — his ancestral village from where he was forced to flee in 1948 when he was 15 and for which we still have property deeds — or even be buried there two years ago when he died is absolutely mind-blowing.
No, Larry, chances are, it isn’t your ancestral homeland, but just for the sake of argument, let’s say it is, and you never forgot it (by the by, what village did you say your family was from 1800 years ago?) after nearly two millennia, yet you expect Palestinians to get over it after 63 years.
Talk about chutzpah.
My urgent political goal is for the Palestinians to have a sovereign state that includes Hebron, Jericho, Shechem (Nablus), Bethlehem and God knows how many other places in the West Bank that are holy to Jews. My goal is for Palestine to have sole discretion over who lives in these holy places and who so much as vsits there. I fully expect that the Jewish settlers will be gone from Hebron and from around Nablus – it’ll be a great improvement for Israel. Now if I can say that – and not just me, but masses of Israelis – why can’t Palestinians ever accept the idea of having a sovereign state on part of, but not all of, their ancestral homeland? And I don’t challenge their ancient claim to the land, I have no use for books and theories that deny the Palestinians’ history – but you do about Jewish history. And I’m the one with chutzpah. Whatever.
And that’s where we differ yet again. I want Jews to have a full right to live in Palestine as long as they accept Palestinian soveriegnty. I want my friend Rabbi Menachem Froman to be Palestine’s 2nd honorary Jewish citizen (after D. Barenboim). Menachem wants to live in Palestine, not Israel because for him that is holy ground. And I respect that because he doesn’t really care who his temporal master is whether it be Israel or Palestine. For his the Land is important but not who controls it. Similarly, if Palestinian refugees see Israel as their “holy ground” then they should have every right to live in Israel esp. since they were expelled fr. the place unlawfully & unjustly. BTW, for a refugee from Jaffa or Akko or Tiberias or whereever, Nablus or Hebron or Jericho is not necessarily their “ancestral home.”
Richard: First you write, “And yes, I take the “radical” step of calling those expelled from Israel, Israelis because that’s what they were and are.” And then you write, “I want Jews to have a full right to live in Palestine as long as they accept Palestinian sovereignty.” WELL, congratulations for taking the FIRST POSITION, and you said it better than I have ever dared (or even imagined) to express it. Israeli citizens, indeed!
But as to Jews having a “right”, well of course I cannot deny what you WANT. You want it, fine.
But I’d like the Palestinians to have a say in it, for those Jews (today’s settlers) are there illegally, and at e3normous cost in money, in psychic pain, in humiliation, etc., to Palestinians treated by Israel and by many settlers as non-entities without rights or protection by international humanitarian law — whereas the Palestinian refugees of 1948 (and again of 1967) were proper residents (for all I know) and therefore illegally denied re-admittance in 1950 and 1968 (and in many cases, illegally expelled).
I agree. There should be a statute of limitations on the right of displaced people to return to their land. It shouldn’t apply to anyone who was driven out before, let’s say, well, maybe, I don’t know, hmm – how about 1948?
How magnanimous of you, Larry. My wife and I are starting a family soon and don’t want to raise our children in Ramallah or Nablus any more than we want to live in Beirut or Kuwait or Amman. The Palestinian connection to the land is a concrete and historical one to actual villages. My wife has property, and probably still family, in Haifa — even if the former has been unjustly appropriated by the state in the name of Jewish self-determination. With the exception of Jewish Israelis actually from Palestine, the Zionist connection was not to a real place but to a mythic Eretz Ysrael, a traditional religious connection, which, while obviously very powerful, is not at all the same thing as a physical connection to actual places. To set up such a false equivalency is frankly offensive.
My father-in-law didn’t want to be buried in Haifa because he thought it was holy land. And that’s the point here: we’re not talking about religious stories but rather real people and real places. He wanted to be buried in Haifa because that’s where he was born, as was his his mother, father, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles.
Now you can go live in Haifa any time you want. And so long as he can prove he’s Jewish, some guy form Toledo or Moscow or Addis Ababa can too. But my wife and her family can’t.
I honestly can’t understand how you can not see a system that does that as fundamentally wrong and unjust.
If Palestinian refugees and their descendants have the right to return to their land, then all descendants of all displaced people in history – such as the American Indians – have the same right. And since any practical compromise I support is treated sarcastically by you as “magnanimity,” what’s the use of my discussing them with you?.
The rights of people such as today’s Palestinians are not only theoretical or nicey-nice but also a result of changes in legal understandings that DO NOT APPLY TO AMERICAN INDIANS (for instance). The universal declaration of human rights is recent. The UN Charter (and the illegality of acquiring territory by use or threat of force) is recent. The Fourth Geneva convention (making settlement illegal) is recent. The ICJ’s July-2004 advisory opinion on the WALL is recent (and largely based on recently-made legal norms).
When I read the Kroeber books on ISHI, the last of his tribe of Californian indians, after systematic destruction by “civilized” Americans, I cannot but imagine that the world, and my native California, would be in far better shape today that they are, had the Indians remainwed in charge (and — unlikely idea — remained culturally as they were in 1900). So I sympathize with well-felt empathy with the American indians. But not on a legal basis.
Israel, by contrast, is unconcerned with the law, and would presumably have no objection to being over-run by Palestinians or anyone else who managed to acquire military superiority — because it would exactly mirror the law-of-the-sword that Israel lived by in 1945-67 and again lives by in 1967-today.
Ahhhh, I see, so only Jews have a right to “return”? You’re right, there is no point in discussing with you. In fact, I prefer the revisionist right-wing realpolitik Israelis who are at least consistent and more intellectually honest. You so-called liberal Israelis want to have your cake and eat it too; you want to espouse progressive worldviews but not their logical conclusions when applied to Palestinians. You want to parrot liberalism, which is universalist, while reflexively falling back on Israeli (or Jewish, as you would have it) exceptionalism. That, I’m afraid, makes you a hypocrite.
Right, Sean, I’m a liberal hypocrite and you’re the true secular, democratic humanist. In your view, the early Zionists who left Russia and East Europe should have been happy to live under the secular, democratic, humanist leadership of the mufti of Jerusalem and his crowd. Later on, they would have had no problem living under the secular, democratic leadership that Arafat set up in 1994, or that Hamas set up in Gaza in 2007. Where the hell is this secular, democratic Palestine you’re talking about? Outside your laboratory, where is this state of all its citizens where Jews will be free and have nothing to worry about?
Typical: settlers who don’t like the natives whose land they’ve stolen and then use that as an excuse for having stolen their land in the first place and not letting them have any of it back.
As you might suspect, it’s kind of hard to build anything, much less a secular democratic society, with an Israeli boot on your neck.
Sean you are right. it’s kind of hard to build anything, much less a secular democratic society, with an Israeli boot on your neck.
Now show me one Arab state (The Palestinian declare they are part of the Arab world) that is a secular democratic state.
don’t try that hard there are none. there used to be turkey, but that is rapidly changing.
Sean, their connection to the land is as concrete as my connection to the property in Poland and Russia my family owned before ww2, and will never get back.
Again, the difference between me and ur wife, is that in my family members have realised (actually its happened long time ago) its time to move on, and they are not dreaming the good old days of pre-ww2 will somehow return, and will return to live in Poland, Ukraine, Belorussia, etc among other nations whom we have very little in common with, and who are not really interested in having us in their countries (Ukraine, for example, seems like one of the most anti-semitism driven conutries in europe to me).
Was ur wife born in palestine? Even if she knows her family used to live in Haifa – how her connection is more powerfull than a religious one? How can she physically feel connected to a place shes never lived at? If she was born there – then my question can be asked about your children, or their children.
Theres nothing more mythical in a religious connection to land than in a claim of the Palestinians, who were never even here, or werent born here, they feel connected to this land they’ve never seen.
One of my family members has conducted a research, and found out our faimly used to live in modern Belgium area, before they were forced to move to Russian Empire. By your logic if i find the name of specific village in Flanders my family used to live at – ive proven my physicall connection to Belgium, and supposed to get EU citizenship on the spot.
Larry is not a “hypocrite”, as you call him. Like many other Israelis on the left, hes interested in a PRACTICAL solution, which will allow both the nations to live here with no wars. He’s not interested in throwing the palestinians into the sea, unlike those right wingers you mention, but he’s also not interested in taking a part in an expiriment which might end up with us,. the local jews, being thrown into the sea ourselfs.
I dont know u nor ur wife, i dont know what YOU are interested in. I know that those Palestinian protesters on the Syrian border yell they want to RELEASE palestine. Releasing Palestine is not an equal of LIVE in Palestine TOGETHER with the Jews. Its not mine nor Larrys fault those Palestinians have been convinced during the last 60 years everything can get back to the way it used to be.
As a matter of fact:
http://www.forward.com/articles/2913/
This week in Strasbourg, France, the New York Legal Assistance Group, a nonprofit organization that provides free civil legal services to Holocaust survivors and other at-risk populations, was expected to file an unprecedented claim against Poland in the European Court of Human Rights on behalf of a French Holocaust survivor, Henryk Pikielny, who is challenging Poland’s refusal to return his father’s factory in Lodz. Depending on how the court rules, the case could lead to Poland being ordered to compensate Holocaust survivors and the heirs of many of the 3.2 million Polish victims of the Nazi killing machine.
The case represents the first time the human rights court is being asked to address Poland’s failure to pass a private property restitution law, and an example of Holocaust survivors depending on European institutions rather than the United States to secure justice.
“There are literally thousands of cases like the Pikielny family who have been unable to receive fair treatment within the Polish legal system,” said Phyllis Brochstein, an attorney for NYLAG. “For many of these survivors, bringing this case before the ECHR is a last chance for urgently needed resolution.”
Poland is the only Eastern European country — outside of the former Soviet Union countries — that has failed to adopt a private property restitution law.
Also, just off the top of my head, countries that recognize the Jewish right of return to places they were forced out of include Germany, Hungary, Spain (due to the Inquisition in 1492). Pretty much any descendant of a Holocaust survivor who wants EU citizenship can get it and return to live anywhere in the EU, which helps explain why around 100,000 Israelis have German citizenship these days: http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/fear-is-driving-israelis-to-obtain-foreign-passports-1.365454
Sean, i read the article you’ve provided.
As far as i can understand Mr Piekelny is likely to receive a compensation, which is what people like myself believe the palestinians should get as well. Notice its nowehere to be read/seen millions of ex-polish / soviet jews are looking forward to return to those european countries.
Also notice that Polish defenders, as they called in the article say the following: “The cost of fully compensating property owners would be in the billions of dollars — and would cause severe economic problems for the country.”. I dont think the’re lying about this. I dont know how many people like Mr Piekelny we have ouyt there, but most of us, ex-eastern europe jews, realised a long time ago we wont get to restore all of our pre-ww2 property, especially if u consider how many of our houses were ruined during those yeas, and re-settled by completly different people in new buildings – which is also the story of many palesitnian villages/suburbs from the pre-1948 times.
BTW the vast majority of the jewish holocaust victims are either from poland or former USSR,
so even this article shows we got very little from what we used to have there, and again – most of us are not even trying to get it back.
Sean, your second response brings me to the last paragraph of what i wrote ealier today:
Many israelis might be getting German or generally EU passports, but no ones talking about hunderds of thousands or millions of us moving to europe, and most certnaly no one is talking about RELEASING the lands there – the way palestinians are talking about Israel. (not to mention 400,000 immigrant of jewish origin is not the same number wise as 400,000 palestinians in israel, as germany is a way bigger country)
IF i knew those palestinians are interested in integrating here with us, in one state – i’d welcome them, but judging by their leaders from the occupied territories, syria, lebanon, etc – this is not the case.
Again, it might be not just, but i dont think ruining my life or the lifes of thousands of other israeli jews,by forcing us to live in an arab state now ,would have been more just.
There wont be one secular state from the sea to the river here, like deir yassin dreams of, because both nations are simply not interested in this concept.
Sorry, sean, I forgot – Palestine was a secular, democratic, humanistic country until the Xionists came and changed everything.
“For Israel to take its place of honor as a member of the world community it must right this wrong, otherwise it will be an eternal stain on its national record.”
Right to a day before color-blind law is the way to accomplish that, not the political formula of “right of return”.
There is a great dilemma with the legal aspects of the right of return, illustrated even by keys. That is that there is a legal disconnect between the status of squatter’s rights (a respected form of leasehold under Ottoman rule) and the status of property/title rights under European rule.
If I am a renter, or a squatter in the US, and the title holder determines that they are selling land to someone that will use it for a purpose in the US, I have to leave. I don’t have any “right of return”. If I leave Vermont to move across the river to New Hampshire, I am no longer a Vermont resident/citizen. I do not have the right of return no matter what basis of law I resided in Vermont under. (In my case, I did live in a cabin for an extended period for free with the permission of the title owner, who later asserted his right to sell the property and evict me.)
If that were Ottoman law, the title holder would have to compensate me to sell the property and force me to leave, and I believe that I would still have the right to appeal.
That period is PAST in Israel/Palestine. The European definition of property is the law now, and the Jewish Agency and Jewish National Fund hold title to land. The Israeli Supreme Court has ruled that those organizations cannot legally restrict the sale of land on ethnic basis, but I think can restrict the use of land on an ethnic basis.
Those that held title, should get their day in court, denied by virtue of the 49-51 laws prohibiting return, day in court, and then state annexation of “abandoned” lands. But, some significant minority or majority of those even with keys, were not title holders but squatters. Squatters should have some relative rights, but not likely extended to more than single generation of descendants.
Palestinian residents (for three generations now) of Lebanon and Syria should have the rights of citizenship of those countries, where they LIVE. Jordan offers it. Palestine offers it. Egypt offers it.
Israel offers it in more ways than Syria or Lebanon.
You are not able to separate the nice and controlled application of right of return, that in effect does preserve a Jewish majority and Jewish character to the state of Israel, and the maximalist interpretation of right of return that declares that any descendant of any Palestinian wherever they were born, or wherever they live has the right to displace current Israeli residents, by virtue of the right of return.
Liberal Zionists are accused of being not in control, that “sure your proposal sounds acceptable, but can you implement it”. The same applies to your nice limited right of return, Richard.
Is that what would transpire? And kindly?
The way to argue for a legal interpretation versus a nationalist interpretation is electorally. If the population adopts the merits of the rule of law as you interpret, then wonderful.
If you don’t bother to campaign, and solicit majority consent, then you are proposing something different than what you imagine.
Why is it acceptable for Jews to return to their declared ‘homeland’ 2000 years (80 generations) after they were expelled by another people, the Romans (now Italians),
but NOT acceptable for Palestinians to return to their ancestral homeland just 63 years (2.5 generations) after they were ethnically cleansed by the very Israeli colonists who dispossessed them and who forcibly deny them the right of return (in violation of UN resolutions, international law and human rights conventions)?
“While I do not countenance what the Arab Legion did in its expulsion of the Jews, it did it for a reason (from their perspective). And if Arabs had been using a mosque for the same purpose (to attack Jews) the Haganah would’ve done the same in a heartbeat if it could’ve.”
Your claim above is pure propaganda BS, Have you ever heard about the Hassan Bek Mosque ? The mosque minaret tower was used by snipers who used it to shoot on Jews in Tel-Aviv (during the same war) despite that fact no harm was done to the Mosque. There are many other such places. The Mosque still stands to date and was recently renovated, during the renovation the height of the minaret tower was doubled.
Larry, it’s pointless to debate Mr. Silverstein, he envisions a different Israel, one that will never exist, and in the process he bends all the facts claiming his fabrications as truths.
I don’t know what harm was or wasn’t done to the mosque, but plenty of harm was done to the Palestinian residents of the neighborhoods surrounding it. They were expelled just as Jews were expelled from the Jewish Quarter. But only about 100 times more Palestinians were expelled than Jews overall.
And if you accuse me one more time of fabrications or any word even close to lying you’ll be gone just as banned you from my other blog.
But only about 100 times more Palestinians were expelled than Jews overall.
i am so sorry we were able to defeat the Arabs.
just to remind you that the war started a day after (November 30 1947) the UN passed the partition plan (181) with local Arabs assisted by a force of volunteers Arab Liberation Army which operated in the north (composed of Syrian and Iraqis) The Army of the Holy War that operated in the center (Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni and Hasan Salama.) and volunteers of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood who operated in the south. Fist fire was the attack on a bus number 2094 in which they killed 5.
Fighting was fierce, and the combined Arab forces tried to conquer many Jewish settlements, they failed.
after the regular Arab armies invaded Israel, they were able to conquer few places: Gush-Etzion, Old city in Jerusalem, Kfar Draom, Nitzanim, Yad Mordechai and an attempt was made to conquer other place which failed.
I do apologize that my grandfather who lost all of it’s family in the holocaust didn’t feel like loosing again, just to satisfy your twisted mind.
Defeating a people does not give you the right to expel them. Was your grandfather involved in that? Then that is truly a sad thing.
@ Hala ya Hala
“After the regular Arab armies invaded Israel, they were able to conquer few places: Gush-Etzion etcetc”
This is simply BS !
Gush Etzion, in the West Bank, Kfar Darom in Gaza, Nitzanim between Isdûd (Ashdod) and Asqalân (Ashkelon), Yad Mordechai, a kibbutz south of Asqalân were ALL places that were attributed to the future Arab state.by the Resolution 181. And it’s not necessary that you post some of you revisionnist shit, Efraïm Karsh or whatever you can come up with. Just look at a map ! And I have verified before posting, so please tell me if I’m wrong. It is maybe time that you read Avi Shlaim, THE specialist on the ’48 War.
If you had some decency, you would let your grandfather’s dead family members rest instead of dragging them out of their graves to suit your Hasbara. May God have mercy upon their souls.
@ Deir Yassin
I don’t think you lie about stuff i think you are just ignorant, so let me help you expending your knowledge base just a bit.
Your pretense that the Egyptian army (or the Syrian or the Jordanian) didn’t invade Israeli territory is astonishing, and it may fly with some world Jews, but not with me.
The Egyptian didn’t act alone, they formed a coalition with Joran, Iraq, Syria and others there intent was to divide the land between those 3 states. This intent was reveled by Egyptian war plans, the Egyptian role was to advance its columns all the way to Yavne, draw mass of Israel forces that will rush to defend Tel-Aviv allowing the Syrian and the Jordanians to conquer the northern part of the country including the city of Haifa. Furthermore, the invasion started with Egyptian airplanes attacking Tel-Aviv located in the heart of the Jewish state. One of the attacking Egyptian spitfires was shot down and crashed landed in the beach at herztelia, another on tel-aviv and imagine that there are still picture, so even an historical facts twister as yourself can see (http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%A7%D7%95%D7%91%D7%A5:Egyptian_Spitfier,Herzlia_1948.jpg)
Due to the greedy of king Farouk, who was unwilling to let the Jordanian control the west bank alone, split his forces 2 battalions advanced along the beach, until they were stopped 3 miles north of Ashdod by 2 things:
1. The destruction of the bridge – the retreating israeli forces blew out.
2. the first attack of the Israeli newly born air-force.
3. 3 of the first 5 artillery cannons that were brought to the area.
the second column was taking the eastern route and it’s mission was to reach Jerusalem and closed the line with the Jordanian legion.
The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood officer Kamal Ismail ash-Sharif said :”according to the general war plan constructed by the Arab countries,the Egyptian army had to reach Yavne, when the front column reached ashdod, the enemy gathered it’s forces in the city of Rechovot and attacked the Egyptian column. The enemy didn’t succeed in his attack, but the enemy was able to gain one of its objectives, and that was stopping the advance of the Egyptian army, this was a turning point in our war campaign, instead of chasing the Jewish gangs, the Egyptian command settled for disconnecting the Negav from the rest of the country”
hope you were able to learn something.
@ Hala
No need to answer by a doctoral thesis in order to ‘drown the fish’ as we say where I live.
I clearly quoted the part of your comment that I addressed. As usual you just jump to another point when you’re contradicted.
YOU write: “After the Arab armies invaded Israel, they were able to conquer a few places: Gush Etzion, Kfar Draom, Nitzarim, Yad Mordechai”
I answer to that quote: “Gush Etzion in the West Bank, Kfar Darom in Gaza, Nitzarim between Isdûd and Asqalân, the kibbutz Yad Mordechai south of Asqalân were NOT in Israel. Those four places that you mention – and I ONLY talk about them – were ALL situated within what was supposed to be the Arab State according to the 181, and can thus NOT exemplify whatever you want to exemplify. The Arab armies did not invade Israel when they conquered those places: they were in within the Arab state. I can’t write it clearer.
No use to jump to something else: I know your technique. By the way, my English is maybe shitty, but you should work a little on yours too. And I don’t need your wikipedia-entries to educate myself, thanks.
@ Deir Yassin
excuse my English you got me upset.
you are such a manipulative person, the Arabs rejected 181, no Palestinian state was created as a result, and the Arab armies had no business being in the territory they were at.
don’t you see the Irony that You who demand the ROR, and claim that we ethnically cleansed the Arabs from Palestine, sees nothing wrong with the fact that the Egyptian armies expelled Jews from land they bought (such as kfar darom) ?
and the only reason the arab armies didn’t get into what resolution 181 defined as jewish land was that they were brought to a halt. they didn’t decide to stop because that wasn’t their territory. This is what you are trying to imply, and that’s an outright lie.
(between you should read the next post from larry, Richard decided to leave this blog)
@ Hala
The manipulative around here is you. Everytime you’re put in front of your contradictions and plain lies as when you pretend readin Arabic, you just jump to something else.
Ask someone to translate your own statement and my answer:
“After the Arab armies invaded Israel they were able to conquer a few placer: Gush Etzion, Draom, Nitzarim, Yad Mordechai”
Yes, Richard left, and so do I, “Israelleft” what a joke…
The phony Palestinian “refugee” problem is the result of the perverse decision by the Arab world to artificially maintain “refugee” status for over 60 (!!!) years for a group of people and their children and grandchildren , apparently forever. This is unheard of. The Palestinians speak Arabic, and are Muslim; they should simply be integrated into Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, etc., where a large number of them originally come from anyway, just as the Jewish refugees from Muslim lands were integrated into Israel, where they originally come from. There is only one indigenous people in Israel, the Jews, who have been there for 3500 years. The Arabs are imperialist conquerers, who came much later, massacred the local Jews, forcibly converted them, and then cried wolf when we came and peacefully tried to buy it back. When they attack us, we are fighting a defensive war, which was what we did in ’48 and ’67. The Arabs have only themselves to blame for the “refugee” problem, and should fix it already, enough with this phony Purim shpiel of suffering “refugees”. The Arabs should be settled in Arab, not Jewish, lands. Any attempt to force Israel to take them in is a racist attempt to deny the Jewish people the right to self-determination in their ancestral home.
I find this deeply objectionable and I’m going to moderate you. If you decide that you must spout racist nonsense here you won’t be here long. This is not a place that’s meant to be a nice cozy place for right wing Israeli denialists. If that’s what you’re seeking please go elsewhere.
I find this offensive, a historical lie and racist. So you’re going to be moderated. And if you decide you must continue spouting this nonsense, then you won’t continue posting here. This is not a discussion forum for Israeli denialists. This is meant as a blog to discuss a progressive vision of Israeli Zionism. If that’s not yr interest or yr goal then you’re in the wrong place.
Haqq al-Awda: the Right of Return.
UNGA, Resolution 194, passed on Dec 11th 1948 (article 11):
> “Resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live in peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensations should be paid for the property of those CHOOSING not to return and for loss of or damage to property …”
In front of the UN, Abba Eban stated that Israel would implement the Resolution 194 in order to get Israel admitted to the UN on May 5th 1949 (the Resolution 272). His speech as well as the minutes of the Ad Hoc Commission are available on the net.
The UN General Assembly, Resolution 3236 passed in Nov 1974 declared the Right of Return (ROR) to be an INALIENABLE right.
The.ROR is defined as the “foremost of Palestinians Rights” in the PLO’s trinity of inalienable rights: right of return, right of self-determination and right to an independent state.
SALT OF THIS SEA by Annemarie Jacir: Cannes Festival 2008
Soraya (Suheir Hammad) goes back to Palestine for the first time in her life. She starts out to find her grandfather’s house in Jaffa. She rings the bell, and is well received – not always the case – by the young Jewish woman living there. From minute 1:30 (English)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4r3eytvNks
The whole film, unfortunately only in Arabic, for the time being:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmOFgsCPkK4
Juliano Mer-Khamis had his last role in this film. He’a an Israeli Jewish teacher, taking his students to the ruins of Dawayimeh, a Palestinian village from where Emad’s (Saleh Bakri, son of Mumammad Bakri) family was expelled. The film is dedicated to the memory of the Dawayimeh massacre.
The teacher says to Soraya, thinking she is Jewish: “This is my students. I teach them history. They can climb here in this ancient ruins, learn about their roots. How we turned the biblical land into life again …” min 1:16:30 min (English).
Sorry. I mixed up the two scenes.
The scene in the ruins with Juliano Mer-Khamis are at 1:33:15.
Regarding Juliano, it seems many of his beloved Palestinians don’t want his murder solved and had no use for his “Freedom Theater”:
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/jenin-camp-residents-stymie-juliano-mer-murder-probe-1.366673
I don’t like your snark. The next time you disrespect the dead you’ll be moderated. And the next time you write something obnoxious you’ll lose yr comment privileges.
You really addressed the central point of my comment, didn’t you ? Well, I guess we don’t have to ask you what you think about the Palestinian ROR. When did you say you immigrated ?
Deir Yassin,
UN General Assembly resolutions do not have the authority of law, yet. They require ratification by the security council to be law. And, similarly to be functional law, rather than ignored, they need to be funded, consent renewed.
The US Congress is an example. A bill that passes the House of Representatives is not yet law. It must pass the Senate, then usually a reconciled bill (resolving differences between House and Senate bills), then signed by the President. It then becomes law, but is still subject to appeal if conflicts with the constitution, the law may be heard before the Supreme Court.
And, then the Congress can fail to fund the administration of the law, or the president can neglect to enforce the law, even if on the books.
But, a UNGA resolution is not yet even on the books. Its still in a state of proposal.
I don’t know the specifics as to ratification of a state’s charter. Israel’s was approved only by the general assembly, but was never referred to the Security Council. (Not accepted nor rejected).
I DON’T believe that it is clear that the right of Palestinian return, three generations after 1949, is in fact a “right” as you assert.
I DO believe that the right of Palestinians to participate in the governance of the countries that they do reside is a right, a right denied in Lebanon and Syria (not denied in Jordan and Egypt).
“Palestinians must give up their idea of a right of physical return for those refugees who fled or were expelled in 1948″
This was your position (and those your exact words) when you first started your blog (“You” being Richard Silverstein).
I am curious to know what changed for you since then with respect to this issue.
I wrote that in 2003. Only 8 yrs & 4,000 blog posts & 50,000 comments & 2 major wars, & God knows how many massacres, and how many thousands of dead civilians later. What a surprise, I changed my mind! Imagine that. I guess it never happened to you. Because you’re perfect. If you’re truly curious to know what happened in those 8 yrs. you can start reading the posts I’ve written since then. They’ll give you a pretty good idea.
I wrote that in 2003. 8 yrs ago. What happened in the interval? Oh I don’t know. 2 major wars, scores of military operations, thousands of civilian dead on both side. A lot can happen in 8 yrs. As for why I changed, you might try reading the 4,000 blog posts I wrote since that one. They’ll tell you a lot. Oh & by the way, I do change my mind about things. Perhaps you don’t because you’re clairvoyant. Me, I’m not.
Its perfectlly normal for people to change their minds.
Its abit less normal to treat ur position at all the times as the only absoulte truth of the world.
Wheres the guaranatee you wont change ur mind again in another 8 years, and start supporting liberman, or the 180 degrees opposite – decide jews do not belong to palestine?
And what then? youll again be convinced u represent the absoulte perfect morals of humanity, and israel will get its place among the nations of the world only if we listen to you?
In 2003, you wrote that you had been “intellectually and politically absorbed by the issue of Middle East peace” for 35 years.
Over the course of those 35 years there had been major wars, military operations, civilian deaths, and two intifadas.
After considering these several decades of conflict which commanded your intellectual and political absorption, you concluded that “Palestinians must give up their idea of a right of physical return” as one of several components necessary to achieve “real and lasting peace” between the parties.
Now, eight years later, you are asserting that the idea of a right of physical return for Palestinians is a “fundamental right” arguing fervently that it must be implemented, making no mention of the fact that you yourself reached this position only relatively recently.
I am a pretty avid reader of your blog, and I realize that people change their mind about things, especially as circumstances change or as more information is acquired. That being said, I do not believe that you have posted an explanation of how and why your opinion has changed so dramatically on this issue (If I am mistaken, I would greatly appreciate a link to the blog entry where you have done so).
In any case, I would think that you would be more understanding of people who believe that Palestinians ought to give up their idea of a right of return in the name of peace since you yourself reached that very conclusion in 2003, after thirty-five years of careful observation and consideration of what would be necessary to achieve peace in the region.
Maybe the 2003 version of Richard Silverstein really did know what he was talking about.
It’s good to know that change can still be a factor in how we decide to approach these matters.
And what sort of change should be imparted to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict?
I would compare it to an immensely powerful locomotive hurtling along the tracks at break-neck speed, all the while bursting through a series of buffers that have been placed in its path. The buffers are never sufficient to slow the train down but they do cause considerable damage as each one impacts with it. That damage can often result in the loss of many lives, the destruction of much property and the expenditure of quite vast sums of money. Not only that, the constant failure of such ineffectual measures gives rise to feelings of mounting impotence and despair on all sides. Yet the barriers continue to be erected, only to be ploughed under with monotonous regularity every time.
Why does it never occur to anyone to shunt the whole crazy affair off onto a loop line and leave it circle
around until it finally stops? Once out of fuel, all its passengers should then be able to disembark with relative ease.
And there will always be other trains; just a question of making sure to catch the right one when it eventually comes along.
after reading the above i goggled your 2003 views.
I can identify with each of them, and like me most Israelis.
http://www.richardsilverstein.com/tikun_olam/2003/05/31/peace-in-the-mi/
it’s seems that your views turned to the extreme left.
so can you please go back to the list, you wrote, and maybe write a similar list outlining your today’s view ?
I do not think such views are ‘extreme’. (And why ‘left’? What does ‘left’ or ‘right’ have to do with this matter really?).
It is just that as you learn more about what happened and happens to the Palestinians your view shifts: It is condescending to tell them that they should accept that they lost the right to return to their homeland just because that is convenient (to Israel, to the world, whatever). And it is against international law too. I am glad Richard changed his views.
So he learned, by own admission, for 35 years about the events and suddenly had a revelation ?
I can’t go back to Poland, where my grandfather grew up, where is family owned a homes, i can’t go back to Iraq where my other grandfather grew up where his family had lots of property.
how is their ROR any different then mine ?
you should look at the definition of a refugee, and then compare it to the definition of a Palestinian refugee and explain yourself and them to me (please) why such a different exist.
Elisabeth,
I’ve been following Tikkun Olam for a while now, to learn about Richards style. If 8 years ago someone would have written to him a ROR physical implemntation is a must – he’d be treated as someone who tells nonsense, knows nothing about the conflict, and sooner or later (sooner is better) should be banned from Richards site.
It’s perfectly normal for people to change their opinions. The question is why Richard is so aggresive towards anyone who disagrees with him. What made him reach a point in his life where he started considering himself a prophet (and this comparison between him and the biblic prophets appears quite alot in his posts, even here). The answer is simple: he developed a huge hubris, because of his blog populairty, but people werent/arent coming to tikkun olam because of him. They come there to learn from other readers, and sometimes to read about stories which are not yet posted in Israel due to cenzorship limitations. Thats all.
If a few years ago Richard thought it’d be a disaster if hamas takes over, and clearly considered them a dangerous organization – its ok if he changed his mind. I dont know if we have a choise but to talk to them in the long run either. Question is how he chooses to treat people who still believe hamas is a radical muslim organization, which is interested in only more bloodsheding.
He cant just dismiss/call names/classifiy as a racist anyone who holds the SAME opionion he had untill not so long ago. If anyone who thinks this way is stupid – does that mean richard himself was stupid few years ago?
If I read his post Hala linked to, and i agree wit hevery statement there – then how can Richard constantly tell me im not really a left winger, and in fact are a kahanist? Do you think richard looks back to 2003 and thinks to himself “oh my, i was a kahanist right winger back then”? i think not. I think hes convinced that he was and still is the speaker of the absoulte demoratic humane truth of the world, and this is a hypocricy (which is also EXACTLY what got me banned from his original blog)
Richard-
This is what you said:
——————————————————————————————————————-
Again, that is why an agreement will be imposed on Israel. Israelis don’t seem to have the sense to settle this before they suffer extreme pain in the form of international sanctions and war crimes trials. So let us have them if that’s what it will take to get Israel to see reason. In the end Israel will come to understand that no matter how much power it may have it doesn not have enough to defy the entire international community when it sets its mind to it. Or if you like Israel can go down in flames and turn itself into a glorious corpse much like they did on Masada.
————————————————————————————————————————
This is the point the “Right” has been making for years. The Arabs (and you, apparently) believe that the “world” is going to impose an Israeli withdrawal and ROR by way of punitive sanctions and if this doesn’t work, the “world” will then support a full-scale Arab war against Israel that will end the ZIonist problem once and for all.
Thus, all the Arabs have to do is sit back and everyone else will do the job for them. They certainly have NO incentive to make an agreement now that will involve compromises that will expose their leaders to the charge of being traitors who betrayed the Arab cause. This is the situation today. The only reasons the Arab go through the motions of saying they want negotiations is that the US and EU condition the billions of dollars in handouts they give them on their saying they want ‘peace”.
As I said, this is indeed the way the Palestinian leadership and the rest of the Arab world view the situation. They view this as being “the tide of history”, an idea Progressives seem to like. This is just like how an earlier generation of Progressives said the Soviet Union and Marxism-Leninism were the “wave of the future”. We see how all that turned out. It will be the same with the Arabs. This is because they are wrong. Why?
(1) When you refer to the “world”, you mean Progressives who think like you. But are they really representative of “world opinion”? After all, British Government has always said they they represent “world opinion”, but that is obviously not the case. In fact, the real world out there overwhelmingly coulnd’t care less about the Palestinians, the settlements and the ROR. There are tens of millions of refugees out there, not to mention territorial disputes, and their problems haven’t necessarily been settled, the Palestians are a drop in the bucket. While I do agree that there is some international pressure for Israel to withdraw from the West Bank, mostly fueled by Arab money greasing the palms of various world leaders, there is no pressure at all for a ROR, because if countries started demanding that, it would open a real can of worms for many others.
(2) I am baffled why you seem to think the ROR has some sort of legal or moral standing. None of the other refugees in the world have such a thing, why should they? Resolution 194 has no legal standing whatsoever, but if the Arabs do insist that it does, by what right did they reject 181-the Partition resolution? The Arab countries that invaded Israel in violation of 181 in 1948 did not face any international sanctions for doing so, so Israel doesn’t face any sanctions for not implementing 194.
(3) You say :”The Israel I envision is based on values. That’s why peace is so important, and justice too. Only an accord that respects Israel’s neighbors and provides justice to its Palestinian citizens and inhabitants (including the Nakba refugess) is one that allow Israel to survive in the long-term.”
This really floored me. By what “values” is Israel supposed to be nice to Palestnian refugees who declared a genocidal jihad against Israel and lost entitled to anything from Israel? If they were to admit they were wrong, then I could see some value in talking with them about it, but they don’t.
(4) The number 400,000 thown around as referring to the number of refugees who will have to be allowed back in to Israel is pure guesswork and speculation. The Palestinians HAVE to insist on unlimited ROR. If the situation ever really came up, fatwas from Islamic scholars would be promulgated saying that any refugee who refused to go back and claim his land is simply abandoning it to the Jews and this betrayal of the Muslim umma, and that person risks burining in hell for eternity How many refugees are going to want to risk that? The refugee situation is not a “humanitarian” problem. It is a political weapon. If Canada or Argentina were to agree to accept millions of Palestinian refugees, this would be rejected by the Palestinians as an attempt to destroy the Palestinian umma-nation. They HAVE to insist on full right of return to Israel. Nothing less. That, more than the territorial issue is the reason the Palestinians will not agree to any peace agreement with Israel. As I said, they will simply sit back, wait for the scenario you outlined above, and as a consequence, Israel will continue building and getting stronger, and the Palestinians will continue falling behind.
You’re simply out of your mind. And listen, buddy, I just don’t have the time or inclination to listen to your weird, twisted fantasy projections about what may happen if Israel continues down the road of rejectionism. No one’s planning a full-scale war against Israel except in your fevered imagination. So here’s the deal. You deal with facts. You deal with substance. You don’t create scenarios out of whole cloth or put words into my mouth or the mouths of any Palestinian or Arab opponent of Israeli policy. If you do, you’ll pay the piper.
BTW, there also won’t have to be a war because pressure fr the world community & sanctions will do the trick. There may be some crazy ideologues among Israelis but there are some deKlerks as well I believe. One or perhaps thousands will come forward to end this thing before it comes to war. Israel cannot defeat the world when it demands justice.
No, it’s the Arabs who’ve said all along they’re willing to negotiate on the basis of 67 borders & it’s the Israelis who’ve balked. The world wants 67 borders. If you don’t then yes, you’ve got a big problem because that’s the only settlement that’s on the cards.
This makes me want to throw up. I detest this analogy and it is despicable and ahistorical. I don’t like you, I don’t like your arguments. And if you continue on this path of comparing me to such people & movements I’ll be more than happy to send you back to the JPost talkbacks or wherever you came from.
You mean YOU couldn’t care less about them. But actually the world gives quite a damn about them as you’re about to find out when 100 countries vote in the General Assembly in favor of Palestinian statehood.
You’re baffled as well by international law and the laws of war because they don’t accord to your sense of reality. But they exist & Israel has violated them & Israel will pay the price for it.
That’s really funny because the General Assembly, the same body which passed Resolution you refer to with no legal standing, passed a resolution recognizing the partition which led to Israeli statehood. I presume you don’t have any problem with conceding that this GA resolution had some legal standing. So why is it that a resolution you like has standing but one by the same body which you don’t like has none?
Perhaps in yr dreams it doesn’t. But yr dreams aren’t necessarily reality as BDS makes clear.
Would you care to tell me which Israeli Palestinian expelled during the Nakba engaged in any act of violence against Israel, let alone a genocidal jihad (please, spare us the purple hasbarist prose)? You’re confusing the Arab armies which attacked Israel with Israeli Palestinians who with a few exceptions did not attack Israeli Jews. There is a difference. But I realize for you the Arabs are all the same, seen one seen ‘em all.
Who is this “the Palestinians” that you’ve conjured out of whole cloth. The Palestinians don’t have to do anything. And I’ve never heard of the term “unlimited ROR.” You appear to have made it up or perhaps read it at Debka Files. There is no one approach among Palestinians to ROR just as there is no one approach among Jews or Israelis to Zionism. To falsely claim that there is is a lie & shows yr ignorance of Palestinians. They are not bogeymen. They are real people.
You’re makin’ it up as you go along. Look, I don’t go in for fantasies, delusions or prejudices replacing facts & accuracy. If you want to comment here on the basis of facts, credible sources you’re welcome. But if you’re hear to spin fantasies then you won’t be here long. I simply don’t have the patience for this nonsense.
And do please stop using faux Arabic words. You wouldn’t know a sentence in Arabic if it jumped up & bit ‘ya.
“”The Palestinians HAVE to insist on unlimited ROR.”
I agree 100%. If Israel opened the door to the “refugees,” their Arab host countries would promptly expell them.
I suppose it makes me right wing for saying so, but Israel needs to accept the practical realities of Arab politics.
Recognized by the world?? Which world are you talking about? Because it ain’t any world I live in. I think you mean that YOU recognize your right to return to Israel & you’re confusing that with what the entire world allegedly wants.
Really. You’re conveniently omitting a few Roman emperors, Babylonians, Christian crusaders and a British monarch who also played significant roles in frustrating Jewish return at various points in history.
Jews have suffered violence throughout their history. But I won’t allow you to continue to do violence to our history. What you write is garbage in, garbage out.
Which world would that be? Not the only in which I’m living. It never recognized a Jewish right to return. What you mean to say is that YOU recognize a Jewish right to return. But don’t confuse your own personal views with those of the entire world or universe.
Really. Aren’t you conveniently forgetting a few Roman emperors, a Babylonian king, Christian Crusaders and a British monarch?? I believe they played a small hand in frustrating Jewish dreams to return as well.
Jewish have suffered violence thoughtout their history. I will not allow you to continue doing violence to Jewish history.
Silverstein is absolutely right to mention the Roman, Babylonian, Crusader, etc. conquerers of the Jewish people’s homeland – right, but irrelevant. He leaves out the relevant ones – the Muslims. The Muslim presence in Israel is solely the result of waves of various imperialist conquests, the last of course being the Ottoman Turks. The current Arab/Muslim claim to Israel is based on those conquests. Get it straight, Silverstein, the Jews are the Indians here, the Muslims are the settlers. We, not the Arabs or Muslims, are indigenous to this land. Study a little history. You must know when the Muslims first conquered Israel, and which subsequent Arab/Muslim empires kept on, in waves of attacks, to fight over its control: the Umayyads, the Abbasids, etc. If you support the ongoing Muslim colonialist project, fine, but I will continue to fight colonialism and support the Jewish effort to achieve freedom in their homeland – Zionism.
Shimon,
To anyone with some knowledge of history, your claim of Jews being indigenous to this land will sound ridiculous at best. Ever heard of ancient Canaanites who have been wiped out by the invading Israelites?
It’s not about an Arab/Muslim claim on Palestine, it’s about human beings like you and me, who had to flee from their homes and long to come back. Can you not feel at least a little bit of their pain?
Stay human!
I can feel their pain, but facts are facts – the Palestinians who left did so because Israel won a defensive war, defending itself against a genocidal plan to drive the Jews into the sea. Sorry, but there are no do-overs in history. The descendants of these Palestinians should move on, and become citizens of the countries they have lived in for decades – which, by the way, many of them come from in the first place.
About the Canaanites – if there were any around, they might have a claim, but, as the Talmud says, and historians confirm, they were dispersed by the Assyrians in the 7th century BC.
Basically, what you say is that if Israel is defeated in a war, you’d just pack your stuff and leave for a refugee camp somewhere in Eastern Europe or America. You and your decendants would then gladly move on and become citizens of other countries, where most of your ancestors come from in the first place.
And if descendants of a Canaanite tribe come back and present some DNA evidence, you’d be more than willing to give them half of the Israeli territory.
You know, there is no compassion in what you write and I don’t see how you can feel anybody else’s pain.
I’m disappointed that Richard has resorted to personal insults here.
The promise of the discussion was that it would remain at a higher standard of content and tone than the hundreds of other left and right-wing blogs in the sphere.
More specifically, even in the heightened tone of response, I don’t really get the gist of the basis of what you do actually regard as important, mapped out why personally.
When someone asks you why you changed, that is an opportunity to convey, not just an opportunity to ridicule.
Look at what Ratko Mladic is about to stand trial for doing. Ask yourselves whether you are defending equivalent or morally identical actions. If you are prepared to defend those actions, would you commit them, and would you therefore be prepared to stand where General Mladic will have to stand?
Richard, although I largely agree with your position, I think it’s important to address the concerns voiced by Larry and other Israelis with regard to the right of return. My present understanding is that they are concerned about the following:
1. By recognizing the RoR, Israel will somehow lose face, and by admitting its war crimes of 1948, Israel will lose its credibility, which is probably what Larry means by “undoing its birth”.
2. By admitting hundreds of thousands of refugees, Israel will face a demographic challenge, whereby in so many years Arab population will exceed the Jewish one.
3. Israel will lose its Jewish character, whatever that means,
4. Although Larry does not mention it, compensation to the refugees and their descendants may become a severe burden for Israel. Let’s say we are talking about 1 million people, each compensated something like 50.000 dollars. This amounts to the total of 50 billion dollars.
I think some of these are tough issues that need to be addressed before the Israeli left, not to mention the rest of the Israelis, can come to terms with the Right of Return. Of course, RoR can be imposed on Israel by the International Community by means of sanctions, but wouldn’t it be infinitely better if both Israelis and Palestinians could talk to each other (as equals), understand each other’s concerns and work out a practical solution acceptable to all sides?
Richard, although I basically agree with your position, I think it’s important to address the concerns voiced by Larry and other Israelis with regard to the right of return. My present understanding is that they are concerned about the following:
1. By recognizing the RoR, Israel will somehow lose face, and by admitting its war crimes of 1948, Israel will lose its credibility, which is probably what Larry means by “undoing its birth”.
2. By admitting hundreds of thousands of refugees, Israel will face a demographic challenge, whereby in so many years Arab population will exceed the Jewish one.
3. Israel will lose its Jewish character, whatever that means,
4. Although Larry does not mention it, compensation to the refugees and their descendants may become a severe burden for Israel. Let’s say we are talking about 1 million people, each compensated something like 50.000 dollars. This amounts to the total of 50 billion dollars.
I think some of these are tough issues that need to be addressed before the Israeli left, not to mention the rest of the Israelis, can come to terms with the Right of Return. Of course, RoR can be imposed on Israel by the International Community by means of sanctions, but wouldn’t it be infinitely better if both Israelis and Palestinians could talk to each other (as equals), understand each other’s concerns and work out a practical solution acceptable to all sides?
You’re completly right, Leonid
As of the jewish character – ISrael law system and courts are heavily influenced by Judaism, starting with the official non working day (saturday) , going through Yom Kippur, and ending with manty court decisions reffering to the bible.
Every possible poll in Israel shows a vast majority of its jewish citizens are interested in having Jewish tradition and holy books as one of the main influences on the law system of the state. The country wont become more democratic if theres a muslim majority here, and they turn the official non working day to friday. It’ll become an Islam – oriented Arab state, and this is what people like Larry, if i understand him correctly, and myself dont want to happen.
The local major religion plays an imkportant role in most of the countries around the globe. Even in western europe or the usa it seems like christianity is affecting the everyday life (like with the holidays) more than other religions, and there are also enough known social theories which explain how the modern economy in those countries was developed as an outcome / side effect of the religious thinking. Having one dominating religion in a state doesnt nessesarily mean its not a democratic state, but in Israel is either Judaism or Islam, which in any case will leave the minority group discontent and it seems to many of us the rational solution is separation, and not an attempt to force even more mix up between us and the Palestinians.
The thing is that there is no one Judaism. There are many currents of thought in Judaism, which although they may share some basics, are as different from each other as, in the words of Erich Fromm: “The God of Abraham and the God of Isaiah share the essential qualities of the One, yet they are as different from each other as are an uneducated, primitive, nomadic tribal chief and a universalistic thinker living in one of the centers of world culture a millennium later.”
It matters a lot what you take as your guiding principle: a tribalist religion or a universalist, compassionate, essentially humanistic attitude.
I actually came to this blog site because I happened to read Mr. Derfner articles that was posted at Jpost.com concerning Glenn Beck and I feel that I have a unique voice to add to this discussion. I am half Palestinian and half Jewish. Nearly everyone on my father’s side of the family was born in Baghdad but they were forced to flee from their ancestral homelands due to persecution directed to Jews. My father arrived into Israel with little more than the clothes on his back in 1965. 1975 he married my mother. Over the years I have lost family and friends to both the IDF and to militant Palestinians.
The purpose of this post is to address my view points of the ROR and the legality of the UN. For the record I am a law student currently studying in America but vacationing in Thailand.
I personally find this concept of ROR quite silly and detrimental to any peace settlement between our two peoples. It simply will never happen just like my father will never be able to claim anything in Iraq. All that they have to cling upon memories as to how things once were. Sadly, this is the case for the 900,000 Jews who fled the Arab world for safety and security in Israel. It would be a foolish for any of them to demand a ROR in their former native homelands.
The second point that I would like to bring up for discussion is the UN. Any GA resolution that is adopted by the general assembly has no legal weight whatsoever. I would refer to you article 10 and article 14 of the UN Charter. Only when a case is brought before the UN security council does it begin to have any legal bearing. Even then there are two types of resolutions that the security council can pass…. a chapter 6 resolution and a chapter 7 resolution. Legal theorists.have argued that only a chapter 7 resolution has any legal bindings since the use of force can be authorized against another nation. Saddam Hussein could not comprehend this. He reasoned that the UN would never attack him in the first Gulf War since the UN had pass hundreds of resolutions against Israel.
Non of the resolutions, including 242 and 338, were pass under Chapter 7. Since no mandatory UN Resolution exists pertaining to the Arab-Israeli conflict, we are left with the San Remo Conference decision that governs land ownership in Palestine. That means that not a single enforceable internationally valid document exists that prevents or prohibits the Jews from settling anywhere in Judea, Samaria, Gaza and all the rest of Eretz Yisrael. You many know this better as the Mandate of Palestine.
With the disbanding of the League of Nations, the rights of the Jews to settle the territories of Palestine, including Yesha, were not hurt. When in 1946 the United Nations was created in place of the League of Nations, its Charter included Article 80 specifically to allow the continuation of existing Mandates (including the British Mandate). Article 80 stated that “nothing … shall be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any peoples or the terms of existing international instruments to which Members of the United Nations may respectively be parties.” The borders that define Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia were established by similar Mandates with the downfall of the Ottoman Empire at the conclusion of WW1.
My heart yearns for peace. Every shooting fatality that i read about I wonder how they are connected to me and to my family. I cannot begin to articulate in English the emotions that I feel. The Palestinians that I know have been generally supportive of Israel. Many who consider themselves Palestinians are pigs and are as strange to the land as my father. Arafat, was the worse. He somehow anointed himself as the leader of the Palestinian movement even though he was an Egyptian! Il’an babour illi jabak!
It is only through Israel’s protection that Palestinians of my ilk can survive peacefully. Whist living in Israel I constantly walked through the shadows of confusions. I have encountered the good, the bad, and the downright ugly of my society and my people. The only way that there will ever be true peace, an everlasting peace, is if the malcontents among my kin are dealt with. Make no mistakes about it we are at war. Politics aside we need people like Bibi and Beck.
I know that I probably come across as a crazy right ring nut but I felt like I needed to unload what’s been tugging at my heart. I sincerely ask for your forgiveness if I have offended anyone here since that was never my intent. I’ve been a faithful reader of LD for a very long time and I have always struggled to understand his worldview.
All the best to everyone,
Yazan
Yazan,
Please, explain in more detail why you find Right of Return to be silly and detrimental to peace.
Arafat’s father was half Egyptian and half Gazan, his mother was from Jerusalem.
I honestly do not understand how anyone should need Glenn Beck. Beck is a conservative Evangelical Christian fundamentalist. He cares about Jews and Muslims in as much as they conform to his limited, dogmatic world view. Not so long ago, Christian fundamentalists persecuted Jews and accused them of murdering Jesus. Now they “love” the Jews of Israel because they believe that the return of Jews to Israel will hasten the second coming of Christ. They consider Christians of other denominations, such as Catholics and Orthodox, as heretics. And they find Muslims to be their natural enemies in this day and age, someone that they can direct their righteous fury against.
I don’t find your post offensive and wish you too all the best!
Mr. Levin
My answer to your question will be three fold: Historical, personal, and legal.
A: Historical
One of the sad trademarks of human history has been our tendency to make war upon one another. There have been countless of wars all over the world and the forceful displacement of a weaker population in favor of a stronger is common. I am not aware of any incidence in history where a displaced people were ever allowed to return in mass. Are you able to?
Lets look at a couple of historical of examples in the 20th century shall we? At the conclusion of the Greek and Turkey war in 1923 saw a huge repatriation on both sides. Two million Greeks who lived in Turkey had to move Greece. Likewise 500k Turks who lived Greece were repatriated into Trukey. The property that these population left behind were used to absorb new population.
Have you ever heard of the Potsdam declaration? At the conclusion of ww2 15 million Germans who had lived in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Austria were relocated to Germany. They lost all of their property and all of their money. Such is the law of war.
B: Personal
My father made Aliyah from Baghdad in 1950. Iraq was once a mecca for Jews. Our heritage in Iraq goes back 2500 years. Baghdad, in the 1940′s, was 1/3 Jewish. Hostilities towards Jews across the Arab lands increased significantly with the formation of Israel in 1948. My father had received several threats and many of his friends were murdered and he saw that that Israel as his only hope. After he fled the Iraqi government confiscated all of his assets. Does he and the 150,000 Jews who fled from Iraq have a ROR? What about the 850,000 Jews who were forced to flee from across the Middle East? Do they have a ROR?
C: Legal
I know that somewhere in our discussion that UN resolution 194 will pop up. This was a GA resolution essentially telling Israel that they had to accept the Palestinian refugees. As I pointed out in my previous post a GA resolution has no legal bearing whatsoever. At best they are recommendation which can be accepted or rejected by each individual nation. Only a Chapter 7 Security Council resolution has any bearing. I would love to see the debates between legal theorists had 194 been a Chapter 7 resolution because it would had gone against the very charter of the UN.
D: Conclusion
What I have wrote I have spent considerable amount of time formulating over the years. It has not been an easy process since I do have relatives who live in the refugee camps. Ideally the host country should open their doors to their refugees and allow them to become citizens just as Israel was forced to do with their refugees. Another option is to have the Palestinians refugees move into the houses that the Jews were forced to abandoned and give the Palestinians their assets that were taken from them.
I will try to squeeze some more time in to write my opinions on Beck and Christian fundamentalism.
All the best
Yazan
Yazan,
Thanks for your detailed response. I am not a lawyer so I’ll skip the legal part of your argument.
I do believe that your father and the Jews who left the countries of the Middle East should have the right of return. It’s very sad and unfortunate that rich Jewish life and culture that existed in those parts for thousands of years should virtually disapper in a matter of a few years. The return of the Jews could benefit both Jews and the countries involved and contribute to better understanding between Israel and the Muslim and Arab world. This may sound unrealistic and naive, but who knows.
From historical perspective, you’re probably right. Few displaced people have ever returned to their homes. There are many reasons for that. The unwillingness of the new rulers to accept them, the unwillingness of the people themselves to go back to their homes because of pain and suffering associated with it, the fact that they started building their lives elsewhere, etc. Probably, many Palestinians will never even want to go back. Yet the tragedy of the refugees is that many of them still live in the camps, in squalid conditions, with not only their homes, but their basic human dignity taken away from them. I can imagine that their dreams and aspirations to go back to their ancestral homes is something they hold on to, to preserve their sanity and dignity. Why not let these (probably not more than a few hundred of thousands of) refugees come back?
Yes, for thousands of years the conquered ones have been enslaved, expelled, brutalized by the conquerers. But isn’t it time to start building a new world in which all human beings can live in happiness and friendship side by side, resolving their disputes in a peaceful and respectful manner?
Thanks once again! Looking forward to your thoughts on the Christian right.
If you take the legal aspect from the ROR than you have nothing. By it’s very nature the “right of return” implies some sort of legal right or precedent.
I thank you for your kind words to my father we both can agree that it will never happen. There’s currently 100 Jews left in Baghdad. A whole culture lost but everyone on my father’s side of the family has accepted that Israel is their home.
The fatal flaw in the progressive/liberal ideology I feel is that it’s not founded in reality. I would love to see a world where people could peacefully resolve their conflicts without resorting to war or genocide. The League of Nations and the United Nations were created for that sole purpose. As we all know the League of Nations was destroyed by ww2 and the UN is morally bankrupted. the UN would be financially broke were it not for America.
In my previous post I focused on my father side of the family but in reality I am far closer to my mother. I’ve have lost friends to both the IDF and to the random acts of terrorism perpetrated by Palestinians. For most of my youth I was indoctrinated to hate Israel and on more than one occasion I had participated in rock throwing against the IDF and against settlers….all of which went against my mother wishes. Through events which I cannot disclose I slowly changed. One of my biggest role models is Mosab Hassan Yousef who has had a profound impact on my life.
Everyone who lives in Israel must wear masks to survive. Only when we are behind closed doors in presence of friends do we being to remove those masks. My mask however, must always remain on. With my two ears I have heard our leaders promise in English peace but behind close doors preach destruction in Arabic. I have witnessed firsthand what some of my brethren say and what they would like to do with Israel.
At my university in America Progressives chant “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free”. Do you share that viewpoint Mr. Levin? Does anyone on this blog share this viewpoints? It is becoming increasingly hard for me to differentiate between the progressives/liberals and my fellow Palestinians who have been indoctrinated to hate Israel from infancy. In my humble opinion (and I know that this will undoubtedly upset many people here) the biggest problem that peace loving Palestinians such as myself are progressives who adopt the narratives of the radicals.
People like Glenn Beck have become my voice. He has the means and the audacity to expose the hypocrisy in Islam. Were I to remove my mask and make a similar stand that he has my life and that of my family would be forfeit. That does not mean that I agree with him on every issue since I am not a Christian. My opinion of him however would be different if he were a Crusader trying to convert me. I typically do not have a problem with the Christian right just like I do not have a problems with the Jewish religion.
If you have made it this far without your head exploding than I thank you. I would encourage you to read this blog post from Mr. Yousef concerning peace in the Holy Land.
http://sonofhamas.wordpress.com/2010/04/
I look forward to how you will respond.
All the best
Yazan
Yazan, thanks for your response.
I will not go into arguing about the UN, etc. I will just remark that if not for the UN and other human rights organisations, the plight of the Palestinian Refugees might have been much worse.
You say you heard your people preach peace in English and war in Arabic. I can only tell you that I heard my Jewish relatives in Israel say just as much about the Palestinians. Many of them would want them to be expelled as far as possible from israeli borders, including Israeli Arabs.
If by saying “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free”, he meant that Jews need to be eliminated or expelled from Palestine, of course I don’t share this viewpoint. If he meant that Jews and Arabs should live in peace, freedom, mutual respect, as equal partners in Palestine, then I’d support him.
If Glenn Beck talsk about the hypocricy of Islam, he could just as well talk about the hypocricy of his brand of Christianity. The thing is that in every religion you’d find hypocrites and sincere, peace-loving believers.
Mr. Yousef’s point is that there will never be peace because there will always be Islam. I will not go into much detail and will only say this. Militant radical Islamic movements have influence largely because of what many Muslims all over the world feel as injustices perpetrated against them by the West, by Israel and by their own dictators. If the people of Muslim world are given an oportunity and help to develop into prosperous, viable, independent nations for all their people and treated with respect, I’m sure the radical Muslim organisation will be marginalized because people will not be intersted in joining and supporting them. The same happened to the Chrisitan religion in the free world, except for some parts of the US.
You too all the best!
@ Deir Yassin
I don’t think you lie about stuff i think you are just ignorant, so let me help you expending your knowledge base just a bit.
Your pretense that the Egyptian army (or the Syrian or the Jordanian) didn’t invade Israeli territory is astonishing, and it may fly with some world Jews, but not with me.
The Egyptian didn’t act alone, they formed a coalition with Joran, Iraq, Syria and others there intent was to divide the land between those 3 states. This intent was reveled by Egyptian war plans, the Egyptian role was to advance its columns all the way to Yavne, draw mass of Israel forces that will rush to defend Tel-Aviv allowing the Syrian and the Jordanians to conquer the northern part of the country including the city of Haifa. Furthermore, the invasion started with Egyptian airplanes attacking Tel-Aviv located in the heart of the Jewish state. One of the attacking Egyptian spitfires was shot down and crashed landed in the beach at herztelia, another on tel-aviv and imagine that there are still picture, so even an historical facts twister as yourself can see (http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%A7%D7%95%D7%91%D7%A5:Egyptian_Spitfier,Herzlia_1948.jpg)
Due to the greedy of king Farouk, who was unwilling to let the Jordanian control the west bank alone, split his forces 2 battalions advanced along the beach, until they were stopped 3 miles north of Ashdod by 2 things:
1. The destruction of the bridge – the retreating israeli forces blew out.
2. the first attack of the Israeli newly born air-force.
3. 3 of the first 5 artillery cannons that were brought to the area.
the second column was taking the eastern route and it’s mission was to reach Jerusalem and closed the line with the Jordanian legion.
The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood officer Kamal Ismail ash-Sharif said :”according to the general war plan constructed by the Arab countries,the Egyptian army had to reach Yavne, when the front column reached ashdod, the enemy gathered it’s forces in the city of Rechovot and attacked the Egyptian column. The enemy didn’t succeed in his attack, but the enemy was able to gain one of its objectives, and that was stopping the advance of the Egyptian army, this was a turning point in our war campaign, instead of chasing the Jewish gangs, the Egyptian command settled for disconnecting the Negav from the rest of the country”
hope you were able to learn something.