saad

03.27.07 @ 10:14 pm

Qaddafi doesn’t really get along with the King. He tried to have him assassinated after they had a falling out during the summit in 2003. I can’t find the video of that argument between Qaddafi and King Abdullah. So instead here’s an entertaining fight between Mubarak and Qaddafi: http://youtube.com/watch?v=P5B_PAk1rmc

gal shalev

03.27.07 @ 10:59 pm

Lets try to deconstruct this post.
Basically you are saying all Israel need to do is what you dictate. I don’t know what “Arab lands” mean. What constitutes “Arab land”. Should we rewind time and somehow undo Arabian influence in Iran because it was Persian land. Borders and populations have changed throughout history we do not rewind time and recreate for example the Austro-Hungarian empire. Jews do not go with bombs hiding in gatorade bottles to demand “Jewish land” in Germany and Poland.

” If israel truly wants peace & stability in the region, it will accept the aforementioned”

The above sentence is in the language of ultimatum - again not an attractive way of promoting peace.

As a sidenote the escalation of violence has ironically come after territorial concessions. After leaving Lebanon and Gaza violence escalated because in the Middle East this is interpreted as weakness - compromise and pragmatism are complete non-factors in this style of diplomacy.

The Arabs are not in a position to force ultimatums. The power parity between Israel and the rest of the Arab world has never been larger - it is unbelievably huge.

Hamzeh N.

03.28.07 @ 7:26 am

I don’t know what “Arab lands” mean.

I believe it was clearly written as “Arab lands occupied in the 1967 warpretty, but a little silly. We don’t go telling people they will never get their stolen property back from thieves even if the thieves are apprehended with the stolen property in hand. This is the case with Israel. The land is well known and there is clear international law that tells Israel what it must do. Yet Israel refuses the authority of the international community, with the protection of the US. Was it not the international community that gave the Kuwaities their occupied land back in the early 90’s? We did not hear this “can’t rewind time” argument from Israel then. I believe all we heard was cheers from the Israeli side.

The above sentence is in the language of ultimatum - again not an attractive way of promoting peace.

I think it’s more a language of simplicity because the situation doesn’t warrant anything more than a simple solution which is for Israel to simply return the land it stole in 1967 and fulfill its duty in solving the refugee problem. Plus, if we are to judge either side’s will of promoting piece by measuring their level of use of ultimatums then, I think Israel and the US will come out as the losing side.

Regarding the withdrawal from Lebanon (done in 2000), violence actually went down until Israel’s war last summer (2006). First, the escalation came from Israel in Gaza when Israel reacted to one of its illegal occupation’s soldiers being captured by the people of the land it was occupying. Hizbullah’s capturing of the soldiers in the north came as a response, and Israel’s escalation to full scale war followed. In both cases: Gaza and Lebanon, it was Israel who escalated the violence because Israel knows that at that level of fighting it has the advantage. Regarding Gaza itself, Israel never fully withdrew its army, only fully relocated the illegal settlers. Israel’s incursions continued, and the rockets came in response, and in most cases when rockets were fired at Israel from Gaza, Israel retaliated by killing and injuring innocent civilians in the West Bank!!!!! Why? There is only one possible answer: to provoke more retaliatory attacks from Gaza and therefore justify more of its violence.

Arabs might not be in a position to enforce ultimatums, but they are definitely in the right position to state their demands and make clear the point beyond which they will never compromise.

Hamzeh N.

03.28.07 @ 7:27 am

some html formatting screw up in the above comment.

gal shalev

03.28.07 @ 12:58 pm

There are some blatant inaccuracies in your post:
First of all, the Israeli army did withdraw from Gaza. Even Palestinian politicians acknowledge this. Palestinian advocates claim that despite the withdrawal Israel has control over borders and other components. But as to an actual withdrawal there is no ambiguity here.
Second, this statement:
“Hizbullah’s capturing of the soldiers in the north came as a response, and Israel’s escalation to full scale war followed.”
Is wrong = the Hizbullah attack is a separate dimension from the Hamas attack. You are jumping to conclusions.
Your argument as to stolen property is laughable. If you claim that there is no statute of limitations on greivances than Israel can use the same logic and demand the land based on the Jewish people’s sovereignty 2000 years ago. You can’t have it both ways - if there is a statute of limitations than the land belongs currently to Israel, if there is no statute of limitations than the land still belongs to Israel since they reclaiming land from 2000 years ago. I challenge you to refute this logical fallacy of yours.

Hamzeh N.

03.28.07 @ 1:32 pm

Thanks for the responce. It’s actually very interesting that you treat the withdrawal of troops as a completely separate issue from controlling the borders especially when you use the withdrawal as proof of Israel doing its part in maintaining the peace! Hmm, I wonder if Israel would not suddenly feel the urge to “defend itself” if its borders came under siege by another country. Do you honestly assume that an Israeli siege of Gaza while maintaining no troops inside is a satisfactory answer to the demand to end occupation in Gaza? There is no justice in the open air prison that Israel has created in Gaza with its unilateral withdrawal. Sorry, but Israel’s hands are still not clean from what’s happening in Gaza today.

Secondly, even if Hizbullah’s attack was separate from the Israeli incursion into Gaza, which you and I both know is not correct, Israel’s response to Hizbullah’s action was an escalation of disasterous proportions that plunged both Israel and Lebanon into war. While Hizbullah’s targets were Israeli soldiers, Israel’s targets were civilian infrastructure in the heart of Beirut, while Hizbullah is mainly in the south. The point remains, that after the withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, even though scirmishes continued for a while, they were a significant decrease in hostilities, and the major escalation came from Israel when it decided to respond with a war on all of Lebanon.

Regarding your last paragraph. Bear in mind it expands the discussion beyond 1967 and well into the full land of Arabs pre-1948. The gest of your argument is simple: any person can come and steal another’s land, and then it is left for the grandchildren of the displaced to come back and kick out the grandchildren of the original oppressor even though the latter bears no responsibility and (according to you) doesn’t necessarily deserve any compensation. This is the classic definition of a cycle of violence, for those who are reading your words and would like to know who is really interested in peace between the two sides. There is however a huge difference between any claim that Jewish people would have today over Palestinian land based on what happened 2000 years ago, and the claims that Palestinians today have over the land that they lived in not even 60 years ago. A lot of those Palestinians are still living today and there are well maintained records of their names and the towns in which they were born. On the other hand, the Jewish people’s claim is merely historical and based on stories from 2000 years ago with no way of proving strong links between individuals and the land upon which they settled in the last century. No one knows which person was truely wronged and expelled 2000 years ago, or which person living today truely is the decendant of that person who was expelled 2000 years ago. No one knows who simply sold his land 2000 years ago, or whether he or she sold it out of fear or out of their own free well. No one knows who of the children of those who lived 2000 years ago remained Jewish and who became Christian and/or later became Muslim. No one knows who stayed in the holy land and converted and then eventually got kicked out in the last century. On the other hand, the conflict that started not even 60 years ago, its victims are still alive, and it is they who are asking for compensation, today, and we are talking about them today, not 2000 years from now in the future.

So in the end, your argument is not only representative of the spirit of continuing violence, and not only missing the needed compensation for people who were evected from land for no crime they committed, but it also simply offers no end or solution. While the Arab peace initiative gives the Jewish people the chance to declare a state of their own, gives the Arabs of Palestine the chance to declare a state of their own too, and gives the 1948 refugees a just solution, probably in the form of compensation.

Hamzeh N.

03.28.07 @ 1:43 pm

But regardless of all the mentioned above, the important fact is that today, Israel maintains an occupation in breech of international law. This is simply enough to end the discussion regarding the occupied terretories and the occupations illegitimacy because it is the same international community that gives Israel the recognition as a legitimate state that put the laws it’s supposed to follow in place.

gal shalev

03.29.07 @ 3:56 am

You cannot quote the UN when it helps your argument and discard it when its a liability. If UN pronouncements are binding why did the Arabs reject the UN partition plan and more currently the UN call for disarming Hizbullah - Nevermind the fact that the Arab countries are among the biggest human rights violators in the world - there are many publications on this. Whatever Israeli democratic flaws you find will be amplified in the neighboring countries.

As to your comments in regards to the statute of limitations:
You point out the difference being that the refugees now are alive as opposed to Jewish claims from thousands of years ago. Ironically this hurts your argument because it means that in 2-3 generations according to your line of reasoning (that the refugees are alive right now) the Palestinain refugees will not have a right to return since they will be descendants rather than the actual refugees themselves.So the concept you presented as far as refugee timelines are concernedhurts rather than helps your arguments and would barr claims of refugees in another few decades or so.
As far as the refugee issue your simplification is shocking but I do not have energy to go in depth so here are a few pointers:
1. The Arabs initiated the war of 1948
2. A large portion of the land was purchased from absentee landlords
3. There were also indigenous Jews
4. According to prominent scholars such as Efraim Karsh the number evicted was only about 10 percent

The real reason behind the conflict is the premium Arab culture places on honor/shame - The Arabs cannot psychologically accept a successful non-Arab country in that region - This has always been the real truth not the tiny strip of land - land being something in abundance in the Middle East. The confluence of lack of modernity and perceived loss of dignity has led to this irrational obsession.
As far as peace is concerned it depends under what circumstances - there will not be peace in the near future and there will not be a Palestinan state either (the last thing the Palestinians want is a state because then they will have no one else to blame). The peace process is dead.

Hamzeh N.

03.29.07 @ 8:33 am

First, I never discarded any UN resolution. Please show me when I did that. Regarding human rights violations in Arab countries, one country’s violations don’t justify another’s. Supposedly, and this is what Isareli apologists keep repeating although not true, Israel is a model nation in the Middle East. Well what kind of model nation produces the argument that because its failing neighbors continue to violate human rights it can violate human rights as well. Just refer to all the human rights organizations operating in Israel and the occupied terretories and you’ll find a big body of documented violations by Israel. So again, the bottom line is that Israel is sitting over an illegal occupation, and the Arab peace initiative asks it nothing more than to abide by the international law. Lets see what this model nation does.

The real reason behind the conflict is the premium Arab culture places on honor/shame - The Arabs cannot psychologically accept a successful non-Arab country in that region.

Keep living in denial. Keep telling yourself that and think that the “other side doesn’t want peace”. Well the problem is that people like you don’t understand the simple fact that there is something called justice that all people (not only Jewish people) deserve in the world, and Israel, even for most Israelies, is a country that is defined by denying others the right to their justice. Don’t ask me why I say that, ask the spokesperson of Israel’s Likud party who interpreted the “just solution to the refugee problem” which the Arab peace initiatve calls for as a call for the refugees to return, something which he and almost every Israel refuses rejects and continued to say “this is not why we created the state”.

Regarding 1948, keep repeating the myths about a land with no people, or making a heaven out of swamps. Why don’t you finish the story and read what Israeli historians like Benny Morris found out about the real reason Palestinians fled their lands. Lands were not purchased, they were simply occupied.

But you continue to create an argument when the other side is trying to settle it, which is classic Israeli tactic of guaranteeing that justice is never achieved for the other side. Nobody today is asking for the full right of return, though no one should deny that right, because people know it’s not practial, but people are talking about finding a just solution for the refugees, which is a problem created mostly by Israel, by the admission of Israeli and Jewish historians themselves. What remains, is the illegal occupation in Gaza and the West Bank, and the demand is simple, stop Israel’s illegal occupation. It’s a very simple and reasonable demand to anyone who appreciates the rule of law (a citizen of a model nation would).

Iman

03.29.07 @ 10:34 pm

gal shalev,

What would you classify what israel is doing in Palestine as? It is a known fact that israel is an occupier…the occupation of Palestine is the longest military occupation in modern history.

israelis need to be made aware of what is needed/expected from them in the peace process … and that is to accept the 2002 initiative. As Afif Safieh, Head of the PLO mission to the US, said: a land that was occupied in 1967 in less than six days can also be evacuated in six days so that we could all rest on the seventh.

Hamzeh N.

03.30.07 @ 7:42 am

Olmert calls the Arab Peace Initiative a “revolution”.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6509567.stm

Clearly just nice talk on his behalf since he was one of the people who simply rejected it when it first was proposed 5 years ago with the same items that were presented this week. Again, just as the Likud spokesperson, Olmert implied that the only just solution to the refugee problem was the return of refugees to the land Israel took in 1948, something which the Arab states launching this peace initiative themselves did NOT say.

By the way it should be said here that the Arab states essentially are putting forward a proposed solution in which both sides agree to UN resolutions. The Arabs agree to the creation of an Israeli states according to the UN partition plan and Israel agrees with the UN resolutions regarding the refugees and the land it occupied in 1967. The Arabs are willing to comply with the UN, is Israel willing to do the same regarding this conflict?

mo

03.30.07 @ 9:25 am

The real reason behind the conflict is the premium Arab culture places on honor/shame - The Arabs cannot psychologically accept a successful non-Arab country in that region - This has always been the real truth not the tiny strip of land - land being something in abundance in the Middle East. The confluence of lack of modernity and perceived loss of dignity has led to this irrational obsession.

HUH????
this is one argument i havent heard before and i have heard a lot of zionist bullshit in my life .. dude you cant be serious .. come on you don’t really believe that do you?
i mean ok you being a zionist whore i can understand that you would defend israel .. but you need to keep your argument reasonable if you expect us to take you seriously.

but just for the sake of argument i will play along .. so based on your theory .. if israel was unsuccessful and doing poorly like the rest of the countries in the region .. none of the arab countries would hate it and would embrace it.

Iman

03.31.07 @ 10:16 am

By the way it should be said here that the Arab states essentially are putting forward a proposed solution in which both sides agree to UN resolutions.

The Palestinians have respected their commitment to those UN resolutions and now it’s israel’s turn to do the same. Here is more on the Arab peace initiative from Dr. Azmi Bishara’s Initiative versus principle
“why not turn the tables a bit? If Israel were really afraid, then it must realise that Arab recognition and peace are the best guarantees for its safety and security. So let Israel come up with a peace initiative for the Arabs to have a look at and say, “bravo, but it will take some tweaking here and there and a few concrete steps to allay our fears.” By all means, there is plenty that Israel could do to demonstrate its good intentions. It could, for example, halt settlement construction and dismantle the settlements that it had promised to remove. It could cease its policy of “targeted” assassinations. It could abide by The Hague court ruling on the separating wall, could declare its intention to withdraw to pre-June 1967 borders, and could rescind laws pertaining to the annexation of Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. Such are the steps that need to be taken to reassure the Arabs that Israel wants peace.

Unless the occupying power recognises the right of the occupied people to self-determination and declares its intent to withdraw, what you have is not negotiations but another form of bullying, and calling the people sitting around the negotiating table “the two sides” doesn’t alter that fact. This
is why liberation movements resolve to sustain the resistance and not to negotiate with the occupying power and somehow manage to reconcile the
demands of resistance with the demands of day-to-day life until the occupying power declares its readiness to lift the occupation. Only then is there really something to negotiate over. What is more natural than a person returning to their home?”

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