"Just another day in the West Bank."The U.N. map (thanks to Detain This) shows areas of the West Bank which are still more or less controlled by the Palestinians (in white) and the areas of the West Bank which are now under Israeli settlement or Israeli control (in orange). It seems that more than 40% of the West Bank has been illegally taken by the imperialist Israelis using military force during the last 40 years!
The dark lines along the western boarder show the apartheid wall which is being constructed to further cage the Palestinians. Notice also that the Palestinians have been deprived of access to the Jordan River and the Dead Sea. As well, many roads in the white regions are Israeli-only roads. If you click on the map, the enlargement will also show myriad Israeli checkpoints as small circles.
Like me, I think you will be staggered by the extent of the illegal Israeli land grab and perhaps understand why the occupied Palestinians sometimes resort to violence as they lose more and more of what little land they have left.
Indeed they live in a big, impoverished concentration camp, one broken into many small parts which means families are separated, farmland is lost, and access is difficult. Women have died at checkpoints and babies have been born there because they weren't allowed through by their cruel Jewish masters!
If 40% of the West Bank no longer belongs to the rightful owners, in another decade, how much will they have? And will it be worth having? Project yourself into their situation for a few moments if you can. How would you like to live in fear and poverty everyday of your life?
How can the world sit idly by and allow this monumental injustice to happen?
Quite easily it seems!
N.B.
1. The Jewish people had no legal rights to a homeland based upon their ancient history!
2. Imagine if everyone in the world traced their ancestry back more than 2,000 years then demanded ownership of ancient lands? The world would be in total chaos. It is a preposterous idea!
3. And if those fools who allowed this injustice to occur thought the Jews should have a homeland then they should've given them some land: eg. Wales or California.
4. Relocating the imperialist Israelis to a less contentious location is not too late!
5. It's the Palestinians who are the dispossessed, occupied, suffering people!
20 comments:
The illegal settlements and the Wall have all been subject to all sorts of UN Resolutions and comdemned under International Laws but still they carry on doing what they like and running an apartheid system against the Palestinians. Can't see that changing anytime soon and any final agreement will not push Israel back to the pre-1967 boundaries so once again, the Palestinians are going to get screwed and nobody will do anything to stop it. It is a very sad state of affairs unless you are Israeli.
I've often pondered any and all agreements in situations such as this.
A bunch of suits and ties, making decisions for those they never interact with or care for. ; (
These thoughts continue in these times also......
what has hit me primarily about this issue is that both sides are raising another generation or two of haters.
The thing that amazes me about this issue, Lucy, Coffee, and Weezielou is the fact that a group of people pushed the world to give them a homeland based upon what used to be 2,000 years ago!
The Jewish people have no rights to a homeland based upon nothing more than their ancient history!
And if those who allowed this injustice thought they should then they could've given them the land: ie Wales or California.
Imagine if everyone in the world traced their ancestry back then demanded ownership of ancient lands? It is a preposterous idea!
...should've given them some land: eg. Wales or California.
Nuh-uh! Well...OK. They can have Los Angeles, but they'll have to kick the Scientologists out.
Okay, then. All White Australians need to leave and go back to their homelands because Australia belonged to the Aboriginals.
All White US Citizens need to go back to their homelands of origin, having stolen the land from the Native People - blah, blah blah.
Oh, but Daniel, your argument is clear - the Aboriginals have no claim to their ancient lands because you live there now. And who gives a rats ass about Native Americans either? Primitive drunks. They can't have their land back either.
You preach hate, rather than co-exisitence. You hate Jews, and you disguise it under the guise of I am not sure what. But your "solutions" are the solutions of hate.
Israel exists. The ONLY solution is for the government of Israel to give Palestinians the same Right of Return that Jewish people have. Full citizenship. And that is the solution that will eventually come into being.
"1. The Jewish people had no legal rights to a homeland based upon their ancient history!"
Perhaps not.
However the state of Israel has a legal basis under international law.
"2. Imagine if everyone in the world traced their ancestry back then demanded ownership of ancient lands? The world would be in total chaos. It is a preposterous idea!"
My thoughts went to the Indigenous Australian example, too. Daniel: are you arguing that land rights for the Aboriginal people are preposterous?
"3. And if those fools who allowed this injustice to occur thought the Jews should have a homeland then they should've given them some land: eg. Wales or California."
The world allowed the Holocaust to happen and the world - through the UN - legitimised the state of Israel.
"4. Relocating the imperialist Israelis to a less contentious location is not too late!"
Make of this what you will but this is the same argument offered by Ahmadinejad the other day.
Dear Jackie and Diva, you both seem to miss the point completely.
The current state of Australian Aboriginals and American Red Indians have absolutely nothing to do with the creation of Israel, one that involved throwing the Palestinian inhabitants out on their ears in 1945 without recompense or an alternative place to live. I have strong sympathies for both dispossessed groups.
And I don't hate Jews but I do hate what the imperialist Jewish State is doing to the Palestinians (along with many other concerned people) just as I hate what imperialist America under the Bush Administration is doing in the Middle East to Muslim people.
Don't misrepresent my position completely and then attack me for it! That is grossly unfair!
The Jews are doing to the Palestinians exactly what the white folk did to the Red Indians and the Aboriginals. You both laud the former but condemn the latter. It makes no sense!
With all due respect, Daniel, you tend to simplify the issue with blame laid solely upon Israel. That is preposterous.
And, in truth, there have been Jews living in the Israel for as long as Palestinians. So the Jewish People have as much "right" to be there as the Palestinians.
Jackie's point about international law holds true. Israel exists, and the Jewish people do not need to be relocated - although it has happened countless times throughout history.
THAT SAID: Israel's present government is terrible, and ignores the wishes and will of its people, much like John Howard's government, and the government of George W. Bush. Israeli Citizens want peace - one nation, two people, with equal rights for all. Instead, the Olmert regime builds a wall, which is an absolute travesty of justice and human rights. That MUST come down.
I have said countless times that at this point it is pointless to lay blame; there have been horrible acts committed by both Israelis and Palestinians, and trying to determine who is more wrong than the other one solves absolutely nothing.
I have also said, countless times, that BOTH Israel and Palestine must lay down arms, and sit down and talk to each other. And they need to listen to their people - they need to SOLVE this, and drop the "eye-for-eye" mentality which is savage and cruel.
Look at the map again, Diva. Examine it closely. It is the Israelis who are taking the Palestinians land, not visa versa (forty percent of it thus far!).
How then can the Palestinians be blamed for fighting against both a brutal forty-year occupation and the further stealing of their land?
There will never be a sovereign two-state solution because Israel, with its nukes combined with America's unbalanced support for its regional proxy, will never allow it!
I fight for the underdog, Diva. The Israelis are the oppressors.
Daniel, you miss my point on the Aboriginal land rights issue.
It was simply a response to your claim that people tracing their ancestry back thousands of years in order to claim land today is preposterous. Assuming you are correct, then it stands to reason that lands need not be ceded to Aboriginal Australians. After all, the basis for their claims on land today rest squarely on their being able to do exactly what you hold to be preposterous.
All I was doing was suggesting that if you do really hold this opinion and if you want to see it consistently applied then you would reject both Jewish and Aboriginal Australian claims on land because of ancestry.
And it seemed to me to be a strange position for one who would be nominally on the left to hold.
Jackie, the Australian Aboriginals and the American Red Indians and the Palestinians were pushed off their land either by conquerors or via the efforts of stronger nations (Britain and America). In the three situations the indigenous people have been badly treated and marginalized.
The Israelis were living all over the world and had done so for millenia. They emigrated to what was Palestine when Israel was created after WW2. Not content with the Israel they were given (and have subsequently turned into a wealthy, militarily powerful nation) they have, since 1967, taken more and more Palestinian land while brutally oppressing those whom they occupy.
Can you not see the difference?
But what was the reason for Jews leaving what is today Israel millenia ago?
Who gives a damn, Jackie? And what difference does it make except perhaps to historians who study ancient civilizations?
We have enough serious problems to solve in our current world without us entering into long, futile speculation or discussion about what happened or didn't happen to Jews millenia ago.
Cheers.
Fair enough, Daniel.
I wonder sometimes whether the Israel/Palestine problem is one of the big problems in the world or whether we make it so with the non-stop coverage we afford it.
Surely there are more extensive and devastating human rights abuses elsewhere.
(Note: that doesn't mean the people negatively affacted by the problems in Israel/Palestine are less worthy of attention)
Pete, my patience with you is at an end. You are banned from my blog.
There are 70 million blogs in the world. Go and annoy them with your stupid, unbalanced comments.
I've had to delete a couple of comments on this thread because they were insulting and malicious.
A few people just can't seem to work out the difference between presenting a different view to mine in a calm, reasoned manner and resorting to ad hominem attacks on me and my blog because I present a viewpoint that they don't agree with or because I didn't mention this aspect or that.
It's such a shame!
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