I have no problem with Amnesty International spending some time on quazi national groups. International law is for everyone.
What Amnesty International does not do is deal with the violation of internatonal law that is at the very heart of the issue: the rape/murder and expulsion of 750,000 Palestinians - now I understand over 7.5 million people. What Amnesty does is pick and choose which international laws to support and which to ignore.
So it does the "small" stuff - and talks about operation cast led and the use of civilians as human shields. It even further seeks to minimize these war crimes by careful setting up of "equivalence". Last time I looked there was no support for the right of refugees to return home in any of the year reviews on line. Hell - even operation cast led was designed to drive Palestinians off their land so that it could become Jewish land. I bet that wasn't talked about either.
Now if they had said something like: "After 60 years of living in refuge camps - their right to return being violated by Israel, ignored by human rights groups and the international community - used as human shields, tortured, imprisoned without trial, and murdered - again with minimal support at best from the international community they reached the point where they engaged in war crimes by launching rockets..."
So I don't have any problems at all with criticizing Hamas. I have a problem with what sure looks like a racist way of applying international law.
If Amnesty should focus on states why than they don't do so? Why they ignore the masacre of millions in Asia, Africa and America? Why they don't deal with the US occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan? Why ignoring Egypt, Sudan, Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Lybia, Algeria, Morrocow, Syria, Turkey, Sari Lanka, Lebanon, Nigeria, Liberia, Congo, Tanzania and most of all the Arabs in Palestine???
Amensty, for all its legion faults, is not susceptible to accusations of ignoring human rights issues in Egypt or Sudan, having released at least five reports on each in the last month alone.
Is that like sucking on a fisherman's friend?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fil...ph2002-
2007.svg
No matter what one thinks of the rockets or Hamas, it is important to insist on accuracy in numbers and years because this sloppiness in reporting leads to the same kind of slippage that gives us myths like, "Five Arab armies invaded Israel in 1948 and all the Palestinians fled," when in fact most Palestinians were expelled prior to the declaration of independence and the Arab armies, and many more were expelled/cleansed after independence, as late as 1950.
In short, this hasbara narrative is not only about scoring cheap political points today, it influences the way the story of the second intifada and the resistance is told.
Next thing you know, it will be that
Sharon visited the Temple Mount to illustrate Israeli steadfastness against the Qassam rockets.
Duh.
Abe Bird: What is included in "truth and reality" vary according to whom it is who uses such words to describe their thoughts.
Another word worth care-full thought: reciprocity.
Actions have consequences.
What is true here is that the extent of Hamas' human-rights violations pales before the IDF's. Hamas' rocket firing has been largely harmless, and Jewish tourists even flocked into Sderot to watch the destruction of Gaza live, not very much worried that a rocket would hit them (none did).
Mr. Bird, the report is not amateurish and is in line with what is very well known and documented about IDF behavior. For instance, its use of minors as human shields has been widely recorded on tape and is available for you to watch on YouTube.
Edwin - I don't have a problem with criticism of Hamas per se, my problem is with amnesty widening its brief to the extent that it waters down its work on the behaviour of states. i also don't entirely accept that international law is for non-state actors given that states have laws regulating the behaviour of non-state actors. i;m not very good at this so by all means, come back Edwin and wipe the floor with me in the argument!
Abe Bird - to suggest that the use of non-explosive rockets against the most militarily powerful state in the middle east was sufficient moral or legal ground to do what Israel did to Gaza is ludicrous at best. among other things, it implies that israel has given the Palestinians choices as to how they can establish their rights in their homeland.
Perhaps you will contradict Ariel Sharon and say that the disengagement from Gaza amounted to its liberation. Sharon said that the disengagement was a "punishment for the Palestinians and not a reward". how much punishment are they supposed to take without them trying to punish the punishers?
And what is Gaza supposed to do? How is Gaza a separate entity from its hinterland, Israel? And how can it continue to be a separate entity from its hinterland without its population, 75% of whom come from Israel, suffering hardship?
For Hamas firing non-explosive rockets, Gaza has been subjected to a savage assault by Israel where the stated aim was carnage and destruction, not of Hamas but of natives of what we now call Israel and the occupied territories. Now, consider, what should Hamas or any Palestinians do to establish their rights as human beings in the land of their birth?
i'll return to this, at least i intend to.
Hi gateway pundit
I see youve banned me from your site.: Gatewaypundit...Is this how you treat contrary opinions?..I presume truth and freedom are two things you dont handle very well. So i will write you from here.
On your site, youve posted a number of interesting if provocative articles:
against Cynthia McKinney (whom you call a moon bat) and the free gaza movement crew who were kidnapped in international ,water while delivering supplies to people of gaza currently being Holocausted by Israel; in support of alleged vote fraud and a colour revolution in Iran, in spite of no evidence of vote fraud. And finally your support of a real coup, complete with military repression of those who object to their elected govt being overthrown, their constitutional rights revoked (ironic), and media censorship
Posters on your site have been calling for assasinations against the legitimate head of state of Honduras (Zelaya) and even Obama.
All this ironic goven you claim to promote democracy and human rights...
SO let me ask you:
1. Is it right for a boat in international waters to be attacked and border by a navy, and its occupants carted off to jail?
2.. What is your opinion on the Holocaust being committed by Israel against the palestinians with US tax money?
3. US arms israel with US weapons...Israel uses them against lebanon (2006) and Gaza(2008) in violation of US law: the Arms Export Control Act. Dont you thinl Israel should be brought to task for this breach?
4. Why are you supporting a coup in Honduras, where the couip masters have squashed any media not backing the coup masters?
5. Why are you so keen to support the dissidents in Iran but not the dissidents in Honduras? The latter are opposing a real coup, the former are only opposing democractic elections there candidate lost?
6. You call former congress woman and Us presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney a : 'hateful nutjob'..while being oblivious to the real hatred israel and zionist jews have to both palestinians and americans...i allude to the attack on the US Liberty, american citizens and spying on US and selling of US secrets.
Your banning people like me, indictes you dont like contrary opinions.
Your comments?
regards
Brian
For me, what is ultimately important is the idea of freedom of conscience and equality for everyone. Humanism is the best known philosophy that incorporates this. International law is a 2nd philosophy. Various bills of rights would be a 3rd philosophy. There are other less known ones as well. Either we agree to true freedom for everyone or we have agreed to true freedom for no one.
Now that you are no longer a member of the labour reserve, watch that you don't burn the candle at both ends too much.
There is nothing in your text to support such a strong assertion.
Also, what's the difference between this claim:
"After all that Gaza suffered, I'm not sure it's appropriate for Amnesty to be criticising Hamas."
and this claim:
"We find it both questionable and objectionable that [...] Amnesty could produce a report on Operation Cast Lead without properly recognizing the unbearable reality of nine years of incessant and indiscriminate rocket fire on the citizens of Israel,"
That is, what's the difference BESIDES partisanship?
Seems to me you're making the same fallacious argument as Israel - only in reverse.
The reason Amnesty has no business criticising ‘non state actors’ is that only states ratify and agree to be bound by ‘International Law’. Even the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is not a binding treaty and doesn’t really address conduct of parties to military conflict, was promulgated by an organisation of states. Resistance groups had no say in drafting or adopting its provisions. Finally, ‘International Law’ is ultimately an instrument that strong countries deploy against weaker countries, as there is no mechanism for enforcing it equitably.
I hope that answers your questions.
"We have decided to make Sderot a ghost town," said a spokesman for Hamas who gave his name as Abu Ubeideh. "We are not going to stop launching our rockets until they leave."
http://www.ynetnews.com/
articles...3261205,00.html
I'm assuming you know better than Hamas what they're targeting.
Hamas is certainly not above reproach, but that's not the same as being subject to 'International Law'. It's true that Hamas is permitted to exercise certain kinds of state like functions within the Gaza Strip. But these do not extend as far as a recognised right to use military force to defend the population under its 'control', for instance, so I'm not sure it incurs many of the obligations of a state. Certainly, it is not party to any of the relevant instruments, so technically, they don’t apply any more than, say the NNPT applies to Israel, probably less. Accordingly, to couch reproaches of Hamas in terms of ‘International Law’ is vacuous. In fact, I think there are far more cogent criticisms one could make in terms of strategic issues and the like.
taxsyn - ernie's answer addressed the question of the relevance of international law and resistance groups. not only that, perhaps we were supposed to not notice that the ynet report you have linked to predates the ceasefire that Israel broke by two years. Further, the Hamas spokesperson doesn't explain how rockets without explosives on them are going to turn a town in the most militarily powerful state in the middle east into a ghost town.
can you do your patriotic duty somewhere else? thanks
Ernie characterises the offensive Israeli attack on Gaza recently as a pogrom.
It was also a premeditated planned attempt to exterminate the entire democratically elected government of the Palestinian National Authority.
Imagine the howls of outrage from the West if the Hamas Party had tried to do the same towards the Zionist Party!
I don't doubt for a minute that Hamas is entirely without blame - in a similar parallel, holed up in their ghettoes, I'm sure the Jewish Resistence of Warsaw and Lodz would also have come under criticism by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch!
The Jewish Resistence is of course, as far as I'm concerned, a beacon of humanity.
Levi - I gather Hamas is to be believed in certain matters (i.e., those that fit your perception of them), but not others. How convenient.
You don't have to kill many residents of a place to make them not want to live there anymore. If you make every day of theirs a nightmare, they'll move. It's not rocket science.
"In March 2008, the mayor said the population had declined by 10%-15% as families left the city in desperation (aid organizations say the figure is closer to 25%). Many of the families that remain cannot afford to move out or are unable to sell their homes."
"Studies done in recent years show that the continued rocket fire and the large number of shock victims have led to post traumatic stress disorder among many of Sderot's residents (close to 30%)"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sderot
Belittling the suffering of the residents of Sderot does not aid the Palestinian cause.
terrorism is wrong, but if those who don't appreciate what the Palestinian Resistence Movement (or the South Lebanese Resistence Movement) get up to, then they can always do something about it which will bring it to an end almost overnight - stop illegaly occupying and ethnically cleansing Palestine (West Bank and Gaza).
Go back home to Israel, behind the Green Line, and stop committing war crimes which are the cause of the much lesser crime of terrorism.
We all know what causes terrorism - western war crimes.
If you want to criticize Palestinian rocketry, go ahead. But provide an alternative. In this case, there're precisely two. One is removal of the occupation that engenders it. Two is non-violent resistance. The former is for the Israelis to carry out. They don't wish to, so the Palestinians must resist. That leaves two. You want to tell them to be a bunch of fucking Ghandis, by all means, do so. And go be brave enough to stand by them while the Israeli army mows them down, until the world makes it stop.
If you're not willing to do that, here's a suggestion: shut up.
Curiously, while everyone knows about the 7500 Qassams that have purportedly landed in Sderot since 2001, the number of projectiles Israel has fired at Gaza over that or any other period, to which the Qassam launches are misguided retaliation, doesn’t appear to be as well documented. It must be classified, like the locations of Israeli military installations. It just so happens that I once enjoyed the privilege of five days’ hospitality of the Israeli government for trespassing on a secret base not far from there. So, no, I can’t rule out the possibility that the intention is to hit military targets, whatever rhetoric Yediot Acharanot may have attributed to a nameless Hamas spokesman.
Furthermore, as Joe points out, Israel’s stated objective in Operation Cast Lead was to eradicate everyone and everything associated with the Hamas ‘administration’ – government offices, hospitals, schools, universities, the police academy, water and sewage treatment facilities... If those were legitimate military objectives for Israel, by what tortured reasoning would it be illegitimate for Hamas to target such facilities in Israel? Not to mention the private residences, shops, factories, and farms inadvertently demolished by Israel’s state of the art precision guided munitions, nor the dangerous grandmothers and schoolchildren Israeli sharpshooters slaughtered by mistake.
Joe’s comparison with the Jewish resistance is also apropos, or perhaps a little closer to home, the courageous freedom fighters of the Haganah et al who would never, ever harm a civilian in pursuit of their noble aim of a racist ethnocracy free of Arabs.
Ultimately, there is no justification for Operation Cast Lead, or indeed the establishment of Israel, that doesn’t involve adopting racist double standards so transparent they’d embarrass a child.
Not to mention the fact that Sderot was founded in 1951, when Gaza was under Egyptian occupation. Convenient not to know the facts, huh?
Who is getting facts garbled here?
- my comments are like Qassam rockets really, diffuse inaccurate and not really effective except to register my own disapproval now and again when provoked.
That said,
...that Hamas is bent on killing and destruction of Israel in any way possible
- Hence the reason Israel invaded and occupied the West Bank and Gaza in 1967 was because Israel wanted peace was it?
Hence the reason Israel rejects the offers of peace, not just by Hamas but by all states in the region as well as the rest of the world international community, except America.
Israel will reject peace until such times as Palestinians either stop resisting Israeli international war crimes - or are completely ethnically cleansed from former Mandate Palestine.
Here is an English translation of the most recent re-formulation of the 'international consensus' -
Text: Arab peace plan of 2002
The above peace offer has even been advertised in Israeli newspapers -
Arab plan explained in Hebrew ads
BBC
20 Nov 2008
So why does the Israeli government through its ongoing racist war crimes and rejection of international peace (ie refuses to stop its illegal occupation of the West Bank and Gaza) deliberately put its own people in harms way of terrorism and resistence?
Why does the Israel government deliberately put Jewish-Israeli children in harms way, for instance, by allowing their parents to live on illegaly occupied West Bank whose citizens are perfectly entitled to the right of resistence and self-defence against their illegal war criminal occupiers?
The Israeli state and its rejection of peace puts both Jewish-Israelis and Palestinians in harms way.
I'm not sure he wanted answers to his questions.
Don't assume things not in evidence.
I am very much a non-Zionist (well, my dog's name is Zion - named in an attempt to bridge my disillusionment with the Zionist concept and the country I live in and love - but that's as far as that goes).
I was simply irked by what appears to be a very badly formed argument.
I expect a higher form of intellectual honesty from those on 'my side of the fence'. And this post simply falls short. I wasn't even debating the merits - just the rhetoric. It was no different than Israel's rhetoric. Partisan at its core.
@Ernie:
(On to the merits...)
A. Your answer was not part of your post - nor was it implied in your post. So just because you have an answer ready, that still doesn't make your presentation any better.
B. The answer itself leaves much to be desired (which, I'll assume, is why you left it out of your original post in the first place).
Amnesty International works to protect human rights world-wide.
It's Amnesty's implied assertion that they are just that - rights. Not a set of rules thrust upon weaker nations and organizations to give them a hard time.
So you've still not given any good moral argument why Amnesty should only focus on one side (or perhaps you would change Amnesty's charter?)
You've mentioned technical problems with the application of "international law", as if Amnesty should turn a blind eye just because Hamas can't afford a battery of advocates - the way Israel can.
That's not Amnesty's business - and SHOULDN'T be.
That's the business of blogs such as this one.
As for the difference you site between your assertion and Israel's assertion - there is no difference.
Not morally and not intellectually.
You're both basically saying 'Don't look at us. Look at them'.
Neither of you backing up your claim with compelling reasons to do so.
I'd still like to hear some reasons, if you have them.
However, the part about soldiers hiding in buses and Sapir College is pure intellectual dishonesty.
I took a bus today. There were a few soldiers on it. On their way home from their base (or vice versa).
Are you somehow implying that Hamas would have been right in bombing my bus just because there were soldiers "hiding" on it?
And that Amnesty should STFU about such a thing?
Excuse me?
What do you base THAT assertion on? (and no, more what-aboutery -"look at Israel! look at Israel!" - isn't gonna cut it). I'd really love to hear your reasoning on that one.
As for Sapir College - I used to work there in 2004 when shells started hitting it. Not a good place to hide, let me tell you.
But even so - would Hamas be justified in bombing me and my class just because a few soldiers at the bus station heard the alarm and rushed in? Or because two of my students happened to be active-duty soldiers (in a class of 30)?
I'm well aware that Israel does some horrendous shit in Gaza - way more horrible than what Hamas accomplishes.
And there's quite a few GOOD and IMPORTANT arguments to be made about this imbalance of power. You've not attempted any.
The answers you've given me have just made matters worse.
They are, in my opinion, both morally and intellectually bankrupt.
Somehow, I expected more...
Joe, thanks, I thought you didn’t like my comments.
allow me to jump in. Before engaging, let me provide an overview of my ethical judgments. Let me know which one you find fault with.
Do you have a right not to be killed?
Yes.
Should Palestinians seek to respect that right?
Yes.
Must they respect that right?
No.
Does Israel have an equal right to not respect the equivalent Palestinian rights while protecting you?
No.
would Amnesty be moraly at fault if it ignored the violation of your rights by Palestinians?
No.
Should it ignore these violation?
Yes if it can.
http://sadredearth.com/more-mond...-anti-semitism/
(yes, it's a joke)
- Not at all Ernie.
I don't recall saying that.
There's nothing much to dislike about sound arguments based on facts unless one isn't interested in rationality much.
saying that Amnesty should focus on states is not the same as what Israel was doing. Israel was lying by pretending that it was responding appropriately and justly to what it had "suffered".
I wasn't lying, I was saying that there is a need for an organisation that focuses on the behaviours and structures of states and not be pretending that non-state actors behaviours equate with the behaviours of states. That was what Amnesty used to do, focus on states. It started criticising resistance groups when told to, I believe, by Thatcher and Reagan. They used to refuse to take up cases of people that supported armed struggle which is why they never adopted Nelson Mandela when he was in prison.
The expression "non-zionist" has become meaningless if it ever meant anything. David Hirsh at Engage claims to be "non-zionist" and yet he claims that demanding the abolition of Jewish supremacy, even using the expression "Jewish supremacy" is antisemitic. David Aaronovitch, a serial smear merchant against critics and opponents of Israel, also describes himself as "non-zionist" whilst suggesting that Palestinians should abandon their legal right of return in return for Israel abandoning its illegal occupation. I have even seen David Toube of Harrys Place and Linda Grant describe themselves as "anti-zionist". That was too preposterous to cast any shadow over the meaning of the word "anti-zionist". But non-zionist? What can that mean in the context of zionism meaning that Jews from anywhere should have more right to Palestine than the native non-Jewish population?
Accusing me of intellectual dishonesty for openly expressing the opinion that Amnesty International should focus only on states is either plain silly or dishonest in itself. The expression of an opinion cannot be dishonest. It's my honest opinion. Maybe you honestly disagree but you haven't expressed yourself honestly: au contraire.
First of all, where do you find an assumption in Mark’s assertion that he’s not sure you wanted answers?
Second, if you want a moral argument, talk to your rebbe. That’s not my department.
Third, you appear to be assuming that the violence of the oppressor and the response of the oppressed are equivalent. ‘Bogus notions of equivalance', as Mark so eloquently expressed it, are the central point that I should have emphasised in my initial reply. It wasn’t the last time in this thread that I made the mistake of assuming that the glaringly obvious went without saying. My bad. Of course it’s partisan. A lot of the people who frequent JsF proudly take the side of the oppressed and eschew the bankrupt pretense of assuming some abstract ‘moral’ principles that apply in a vacuum.
When you write of ‘rights. Not a set of rules thrust upon weaker nations and organizations to give them a hard time’ you evidence just such an assumption, along with a decidedly naive understanding of what a right is. Meaningful rights are not secured and enforced by moral argument, but by struggle against those who would deny them, ‘by any means necessary’, as even the UDHR acknowledges.
Amnesty, which makes the same untenable assumption, no longer seems to have a charter. It has certainly expanded the scope of its concerns since the decade I squandered writing thousands of letters to government officials explaining how their actions conflicted with the obligations they had incurred in ratifying human rights treaties. As I said, Hamas is not a state party to any of those instruments, or any kind of state at all. Amnesty and you may say that they should comply with them anyway. I say, should, schmould. It’s got nothing to do with batteries of advocates, it’s got to do with who makes the rules and who agrees to them. Of course, The International Community could make a more convincing case for non parties applying their rules, if they did so themselves.
Now my view on human shields is that the presence of ‘legitimate’ military targets among non combatants does not justify endangering the non combatants by attacking those targets. Exactly the opposite of the Fourth Geneva Convention, ‘The presence of a protected person may not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations’, as I read it. The point I was making is that Israel claims that a Hamas ‘militant’ remains a legitimate target even when off duty and it’s ok to bomb his house and family if he’s thought to be there, complaining all the while that he is hiding behind civilians. Any non combatant sent an SMS or a ‘knock on the roof’ who does not evacuate immediately is magically transformed into a legitimate military target. An Israeli soldier, in contrast, is never a legitimate target, even in the heat of battle. Killing a Jew is always murder; capturing a Jew is always kidnapping. As I said, transparently racist double standards. Somebody as concerned with consistency as you ought to have been able to figure that out.
That's just it - I don't disagree with your opinion. Yet I'm intellectually honest enough not to assert Amnesty shouldn't criticize my side without backing that up.
I wouldn't make such an assertion - even if I wished it were so.
If I were to make that assertion I'd try to back it up with something in the body of the post - the Thatcher/Reagan pressure angle is an interesting one.
Yet even you couldn't bother researching whether it's true or not - adding "I believe" as an escape route.
Either you have a moral/intellectual reason for your belief that Amnesty shouldn't criticize non-state actors like Hamas, or you don't.
And if it's the later, you'd do well not to assert such positions, or at least add an "I believe" in the body of the post too.
As for the non-Zionist/anti-Zionist part. I am a non-Zionist. I actually live here so I can't fully move myself to the anti-Zionist camp.
I've no intention of immigrating anywhere if I can help it. And I'd not like to see 3rd and 4th generation refugees come to live here - but I'm well accepting of the idea that point can and SHOULD be debated. THAT'S a matter of opinion and I state it as such. I might even change it given a really persuasive argument.
I don't believe Jews should have more rights to Palestine than non-Jews. I do believe EVERYONE should have full rights wherever they live. I just happen to live here. If anything, I'd like to see the concept of Aliya abolished alongside the right of return.
I'd still love to hear the moral logic behind the "soldiers hiding in buses" argument though. By that logic any assortment of Israeli civilians, anywhere in the world, is a legitimate above-reproach target because statistically there's bound to be some soldier in it.
I find that morally-questionable, at best.
Just substitute "soldiers" with "Hamas fighters" and see where that statement gets you - it gets you a line right out of some IDF spokesperson's press-release.
@evidoer:
I was right with you up until that last question. Your answer - "Yes, if it can" begs another question - 'why?'
Why should it ignore these violations?
You've not supplied any clue to that answer either way. And it doesn't follow from any of your other questions/answers.
Not only is your answer unconvincing - it doesn't even attempt to be.
(Also, your second-to-last question is still debatable. Though I'd probably give similar answers, albeit with some caveats or ambiguities. It's not a cut-and-dried yes/no)
(Also also, the part about Israel having the right to not respect Palestinians' rights doesn't play into this at all. I'm very much against this form of what-aboutery. NO matter which side uses it. But I still concur with your answer)
I love Israel because I've lived here most my life. I know the people, I know the language, I love my city.
Not by choice - I was brought here when I was 1yr old by my parents.
This is where I grew up.
This is where I pay my taxes.
I do not have the means to relocate to another country at my age - even if such a country would have me.
Nor, as I've stated do I want to.
Since when is morality a religious thing? (I know religious people claim morality stems from God, but who knew you do too?)
Maybe you should talk to your Rebbe.
I don't have one. I'm an atheist. You're the one referring to yourself a Jew in the title of this blog.
onwards,
I DO NOT assume the violence of the oppressor is equivalent to that of the oppressed. Quite the contrary.
I was simply referring to you assertion that Amnesty should be as partisan as you.
You, as levi9099 stated, are partisan on a partisan blog. Amnesty isn't.
Your last few paragraphs actually go quite some length towards answering my initial question. It does put your statement in some context for me and for that I thank you.
I'm not sure if UDHR asserting that people have a right to rise up 'by any means neccessery' also precludes them from Amnesty's reporting of human-rights violations.
As for your human shield paragraph, I agree completely. Having read that I'm still not sure how you can make the "soldiers in buses" statement though. It sounds like applying the same double standard, only in reverse.
I thought the problem was the existence of a double standard. It doesn't sound like the sort of thing that would be righted by applying a different double standard.
There is no need for me to look up who it was that pressured Amnesty into turning its attention to resistance groups because I do clearly remember (and assume that others remember) that they did only champion the cause of prisoners of conscience who were imprisoned by states and people threatened with the death penalty again, by states and then only if the victims were non-violent in their behaviour and their advocacy.
According to your logic Amnesty should be championing the cause of any innocent people incarcerated or killed by anybody. This would make a nonsense of their work altogether and would suit the State of Israel et al down to the ground.
Your chit-chat about zionism too is dishonest. Where you live has got nothing to do with whether or not Jews from anywhere should have more right to live there than native non-Jews. Loving the land you live in has nothing to do with the zionist structure of the state or indeed of any structure of any state. Unless when you say you love your country you mean that you're glad that the Arab majority were expelled and kept out but that is loving your state, not your country. That would be another conflation to render debate meaningless.
I prefer living in the country I was born and raised in, it doesn't make me a royalist and I certainly don't think that we should have Jewish supremacy here just because I live here and I'm Jewish.
The idea that the essence of anti-zionism is about the relocation of Jews or you away from Palestine is just plain silly. It's about the abolition of Jewish supremacy as embodied in the existence of the State of Israel. Of course there are anti-zionists that want Jews to leave Palestine but that is not the essence of anti-zionism. Anti-zionism, logically, is simply opposition to zionism. It comes in many forms and has no bearing on whether or not Israelis or Jews love this or that country.
Armand, There is nothing inherently dishonest about expressing an opinion and not backing it up. Rules of what is self-evident and what requires evidence are context dependent, and it is a bit arrogant to come here for the first time and maintain that people are dishonest for not expressing themselves according to your expectations. Perhaps you need to question your sense of entitlement and automatic assumption that you are the reference audience for what Mark wrote. If you want a longer explanation you can ask for it politely.
But Mark, lots of people are honestly in the wrong. Tis better to err on the side of excessive credit.
Armand, Hopefully, I'll reply to your question in a separate post. I am well aware I didn't make any argument. Stay tuned.
No - it should not be debated. Refuges have a right to return home. There is no debate at all. To debate the point is to declare oneself a racist.
Morality has always been a religious thing. There’s nothing about Jews in the title of my blog. This is Mark’s blog and he’s been kind enough to let my comments through. As for being a Jew, you should try and tease out the distinction between ethnicity and religion – the Nazis managed it, the Zionists managed it, it shouldn’t be beyond you. As far as I’m concerned, an atheist is someone who thinks the existence of supernatural beings is worth discussing.
I have no opinion on whether Amnesty should be partisan or not and certainly haven’t expressed one. All I’ve said is that treaties only apply to states party to them and the actions of groups that are not bound by the human rights instruments Amnesty rely on are out of scope of their concerns.
Let’s see if I can explain this again. One of the commonplaces of the Hasbara establishment is that Israel should not be held to a different standard to anyone else and that in fact it is anti-Semitic to criticise Israel for anything without in first criticising every other country that has done anything similar. Then they justify the slaughter of noncombatants in Gaza because ‘militants’ hide among them and at the same time they cite ‘indiscriminate’ attacks on civilian areas in Israel, where soldiers are always hiding. The point is that there is a consistent hasbara theme of demanding that Israel be held to the same standards as everybody else out of one side of their face and that it be held to totally different standards out of the other. I think the reason they can get away with this is that Palestinian resistance groups launch Qassams, real human beings get PTSD, but when Israel bombs the shit out of Gaza, the victims are just Arabs. That’s why I say it’s a transparently racist double standard. Get it? My own view is that different standards apply to the oppressor and the oppressed, and that standards imposed by the oppressor don’t apply to the oppressed, especially when the oppressors themselves don’t actually observe them.
By that logic any assortment of Israeli civilians, anywhere in the world, is a legitimate above-reproach target because statistically there's bound to be some soldier in it.
- Well, I know for a fact there are well-known Israeli military mastermind war criminals using British airports to get around, but don't worry, they're nice and safe.
Whenever PC Plod goes to Heathrow Airport to feel their collar they've already done a runner. Such is their eagerness to put on a display for the British public of the true meaning of the much fabled Israeli military doctrine of 'purity of arms' -
Israel general 'avoids UK arrest'
BBC
12 Sept 2005
Israel slams general arrest bid
BBC
14 Sept 2005
It's getting these days that Israeli military personnel are only safe in their racially hygenic utopia of Israel.
As for the legitimacy of terrorist bombings in the hope of plugging some Israeli soldier. Of course it's immoral, but any subsequent investigation of the causes of these awful crimes won't go any deeper than pinning the blame on convenient enemies.
To investigate terrorism any deeper than the terrorists who cause such bombings would mean that the real causes of terrorism are addressed, and that is something Israel, the US and the UK won't do. In fact, they even tip-off war criminals sitting on planes at Heathrow airport that they're about to be arrested, and held to account for any war crimes they committed against Gaza and its people.
Personally speaking
I'm all in favour of the UN being partisan in the Israeli-Palestine conflict and for it to start enforcing international law. That way Jewish-Israelis around the world won't have anything to worry about when it comes to either terrorist bombings or being arrested as war criminals.
Unfortunately though, the Israeli government isn't interested in the UN or international law or the safety of its own citizens, who are just as much human fodder to the racist state as Palestinians are.
A. I don't believe in Jewish supremacy. I don't think Jews should have mrore rights than non-Jews anywhere in the world.
B. I do see a difference between state and non-state actors. I was simply challenging the idea that Amnesty International should too. As far as I can see they're supposed to report human rights violations and leave the sorting out to the other actors in the field.
I may be a bit too young to know Amnesty has undergone such massive changes since the 80's - as some here have said. I'll definitely look that up in the future.
I'll also admit my understanding of Amnesty's role might be a bit superficial - which probably brought about my initial comment.
I'll look it up and form my own opinions. Thanks for the pointers.
@levi9099:
I hope the above puts to rest most of the questions you've raised.
As far as I can tell your definition of anti-Zionism is not significantly different than my definition of myself as a non-Zionist.
I'll leave the "anti-" bit for others to work out though.
@edwin:
I agree about refugees being allowed to return. I don't think children and grand-childern of refugees are refugees. Nor should they be kept in limbo.
@Ernie:
Morality is NOT a religious thing. One can be moral without falling back on religion.
By your statement to the contrary, I can surmise that you are either (a) religious or (b) immoral.
And you've pretty much ruled out the former (and given credence to the later with your 'soldiers in buses' nonsense).
Nice.
Either way, if you mean Jewish in the ethnic sense, then what the hell was that crack about a Rebbe?
A Rebbe is a RELIGIOUS cleric.
Seems you need to tease out some of the distinctions yourself.
At least you've put yourself in good company to boot - Nazis and Zionists.
Double-nice.
As for all who still equate my love of country to my love of state, good luck to you all.
You're arguing with a straw man - not me.
I was raised in this country. I don't speak the language, nor know the culture, of the country I was born in.
Nor would I hearken to anyone suggesting I would need to go there (and telling me it's easy - HA! Believe me I've pondered it and have realized I'd better make do with what I have).
That's not me being Zionist. That's me wanting to live where my mother and my lifelong friends live.
I'm simply not Zionist myself - even if I was brought here by an establishment that used me for Zionist purposes.
@evildoer:
As for me jumping into the fray and espousing a certain sort of entitlement - that's probably true and not particularly edifying on my part.
And I did think Ernie was one of the JfS at first. My bad.
I my defense though, the scope of my original comment was very succinct. But I did allow myself a bit much as comments piled on accusing me of beliefs I don't hold.
Live and learn.
Armand, feel free to continue tying yourself in knots, but if you believe in denying the Palestinians the right to return so that you, your mother your lifelong friends and anyone else you choose to involve in your sentimental love of 'your country' can continue to live in Israel without treating non-Jews as equals, then you've internalised the most basic and fundamental precepts of Zionism. The 2nd,3rd and 4th generations of Palestinians are refugees precisely because their parents were made refugees by Israel. Had the right to return been implemented in 1949, they would now be inhabitants of Palestine. You state that the Palestinian refugees should not be kept in limbo, but the state which is keeping them 'in limbo' is Israel by refusing to allow them to return to their homeland.
Armand. That is an important and welcome statement, and given how uncommon it is in Israel it rebounds to your credit. But it is like the first drop on the way of filling the ocean.
You live in a state/society built on Jewish privilege. Whether you want it or not, you HAVE Jewish privilege and you benefit from it. This is not a matter of belief. It is a social fact.
Unless you take concrete actions to move toward divestment from your Jewish privilege, stating that you don't believe in it is like Bernie Madoff declaring he doesn't believe in Ponzi schemes.
So what does that mean? As a lot of people here have hinted, the denial of the Right of Return, a basic human right, condemning millions to multi-generational misery, is the foundation, historically, legally and economically, of Jewish privilege in Israel.
The "mobilized" nature of Israeli society and institutions, which is THE major way Jewish privilege is maintained and enjoyed, clusters around the goal of maintaining "the Jewish majority," generally, as well as within geographic subdivisions (Judaization of the Galillee, settlements, etc.). The denial of the right of return is at the heart of that mobilization. The elevation of the right to dominate demographically and geographically over the human rights and emotional, historical and biographic ties of Palestinians to their homeland is the ideological core that justifies all the institutional expressions of privilege.
Therefore, one cannot reject Jewish privilege in Israel without supporting the right of return. This point in in addition to the simple point made by James above that supporting the RoR is simply supporting a just claim. As a Jewish Israeli wanting a society without Jewish privilege you have to support the RoR because the recognition of that right is the condition of possibility of achieving your stated goal of full equality. Furthermore, you cannot divest from your privilege without empowering the victims of that privilege, and you cannot do that by maintaining the right to determine the political agenda of that empowerment. Equality can only be brought about by the struggle of those who equal less, not by the generosity of those who equal more. Understanding that means that, in simple terms, you cannot divest from that privilege on your own. You have to support the Palestinian struggle against it in order to rid of it. As long as you are "debating" the RoR instead of supporting it, you are therefore defending Jewish privilege rather than working to dismantle it.
Stop reading out your backside.
Your thirst for a straw man is really getting the better of you.
I oppose racial supremacy - and that includes Zionism.
I'm all for abolishing Alyia and all concepts engineered to oppress and drive away non-Jews. I'd like to live in a state that is non-Jewish by definition - even if its to be inhabited by a majority of Jews.
However, I don't view the grandchildren of refugees to be refugees.
And I still love my country. I love the weather. I love the people (well, some of them anyway). I know the language and the culture. And I pay my taxes.
I'd love for my country to stop being under a racist regime.
I also know the city I grew up in was once a small Arab village.
That village's Arab population was driven away to Jordan. By Jews. At gunpoint.
That's inexcusable - and should be taught at schools. Maybe some of the atrocities currently done by my government wouldn't be so widely supported by the general Israeli population.
I also believe those refugees' descendants should get full citizenship rights - in Jordan.
They should not stay in limbo. They should have the same citizenship rights as I enjoy, and as all humans should.
So yes, I'm a non-Zionist.
I do benefit from Jewish privilege (well, that's not ENTIRELY true - but more on that later). I've been aware of that for some time and have not been very comfortable with that. That's how I reached this blog.
The mobilized nature of Israeli society is what keeps Zionism going and keeps anyone here from questioning it.
If I question any of these issues here - like the need for a Jewish majority - I am labeled an "Arab-lover" and a "bleeding heart". Yes, those are insults here...
Personally, I don't need a Jewish majority. I don't think it's a goal worth having.
However the RoR is not an answer to anything. Abolishing Aliya and removing the Jewish part from the "Jewish and Democratic state" is quite enough. I'd love to live in a truly democratic state that simply stops perpetuating atrocities. RoR needn't play into it.
As for the privileges I enjoy - let me tell you they're not that great.
Sure, I'm waaay better off than the average non-Jew - and that should stop being the case.
But the true beneficiaries of Israel are the Jews living abroad - not me. They get to have a "safe-haven" state if they only wish it. No naturalization process. Voting rights are given for any Jew living anywhere. And a hefty bonus package if they just sign the papers.
I, on the other hand, have to pay huge taxes to support Zionist missions abroad and an increasingly religious-oriented and immoral army, I have to serve 3 years in that army or face being ostracized (which I am in many circles), I have to live under increasingly-strict Jewish Sharia laws and every few years some Jews from other countries come here and tilt the vote towards right-winged nuts who just increase my taxes more.
I don't benefit from that. The Arabs suffer, but I don't benefit.
Only the "Jewish state" and non-Israeli Jews benefit from that.
So yeah, I'd love to see Jewish supremacy dismantled.
The idea of a "necessary Jewish majority in Israel" is a racist hoax.
Yet I still don't have to support RoR for Jordanian-born Arabs of Palestinian descent. Let Jordan naturalize them.
I got enough shit to deal with, in my own country, with the fucken' Jews.
I don't see some Jordanian refugee-descendant coming here, waving his grandfather's house key, solving anything. Not for me. And not for any oppressed Palestinian living and born in this country.
Like I said - I love my country. I'd love to see all its inhabitants (Jewish and non-Jewish) prosper.
I hold in high regard those who champion the rights of Palestinians.
I just don't tow the anti-Zionist line. And judging from the temperament of most comments here (you and levi9909 have been a welcome exception), I probably never will. It's all "our way or the highway, you closet Zionist"
I'm not going to trade the mobilized nature of my own countrymen for that of the anti-Zionist crowd.
I'd still love to debate the finer points though :P
You want an end to privilege for olim (no more aliyah) and sabras. Check.
No forced maintenance of the ethnic majority, which means all land is equally available to live and cultivate. Check.
Secular personal status, I'm assuming.
You don't specify one or two states. That is important, because one state alone will end the Jewish majority. And here implicit support for the ROR follows, because there are refugee camps in the occupied territories.
Let's say you support one state. That will likely lead to popular demand for ROR among the enfranchised Palestinians. Democracy means honoring that demand.
There are a few Zionists who argue for Israel to become a secular state for all its citizens and still two states (Uri Avnery a notable one). Is this closer to where you are?
I don't see a feasible one-state solution, nor any side accepting such.
Occupation means no RoR.
Two states would mean RoR only to the Palestinian state.
And honestly, I'm not sure the Palestinians would receive a massive influx of their estranged brethren with open arms. They're going to have quite a plateful as is.
The case of Moldova, which saw itself as part of Romania while under Soviet occupation, comes to mind. There was no reunification. They chose to go their separate ways - even developing separate nationalist sentiments.
RoR is a lame duck issue. Better start pushing for Jordan and Lebanon to start naturalizing these "refugees" - they've been there a while and they deserve better.
You mentioned an end to Jewish majority. I don't care about a Jewish majority. I think the numbers' game is finished. It's time to deal with what is, not with what is wished for.
RoR is just another round in this numbers' game. And hardly a game changer as that.
And either way, it does not follow from a one-state solution that RoR will rear its head. A one-state solution will be one thrust upon both sides by outside forces - and they'll be extra careful about preserving whatever passes for a status quo.
that means even less refugees granted RoR, if at all.
So I'm beginning to believe those who support RoR do it out of some anti-Zionist zeal. Not because they care about these refugees and their descendants living in limbo.
If people really cared about them, they would have fought to secure them citizenship rights where they live, so they could have a say in bettering their lives.
But the crux of it, for me, is that there can be no such thing as a third-generation refugee. That doesn't even make sense on its face value.
Heirloom key or not, you can't bequeath refugee status to your children - not when they were born in the same apartment you were.
That doesn't satisfy any definition of the word refugee.
I believe in democracy. And I don't believe in ethnic supremacy. RoR and generational refugee status is about perpetuating the later. People should be given democratic rights and let the chips fall where they may.
I think you’ll find that whatever moral precepts you purport to adhere to originally derived from somebody or other’s religious ideology. More to the point, if you were motivated by morality, it would probably trump your love of the weather, or whatever. If you object to the uses the Zionist state puts your taxes to, what morality impels you to take such pride in paying them?
Obviously, given that you need to create an intellectual loophole for yourself to justify your refusal to countenance the Palestinian right of return whilst still claiming to be a non-Zionist. However, your personal view of the Palestinians is irrelevant. They are regarded as refugees by all relevant international law, and can be defined as refugees in the conceptual sense of being alienated from their homeland. There are also a number of precedents for conferring citizenship to 2nd,3rd or 4th generation descendants based on the country of origin of their parents - Germany after WW2 for example.
'I also believe those refugees' descendants should get full citizenship rights - in Jordan.
They should not stay in limbo'
Well, Palestinians do enjoy citizenship in Jordan (a fact repeatedly used by Zionists to claim that Jordan is the Palestinian state) but the Palestinian refugees have consistantly stated through every available medium that the majority of them desire to exercise their right to return to their homeland, as per their right and as international law warrants. The only state responsible for the Palestinians remaining 'in limbo' is Israel, and of course, Israelis like yourself who support it in that respect. For all your professed opposition to Jewish supremacy your 'solution' to the Palestinian problem (that they should become Jordanian) is in this respect no different than David Ben-Gurion or Menachem Begin, and originates in the same racist precepts of Zionist ideology.
'I'm a non-Zionist'
You continue to state this, but your comments are so wreathed in the fundamentals of Zionism that it's hard to take your claims seriously. You state that you support a non-Jewish state, but only insofar as it involves no personal consequences or sacrifices on your part.
The idea of a two state solution and Israel with equal rights isn't necessarily a bad thing, but there's an air of bad faith about accompanying this with the demand to drop the RoR. I don't think there's ever going to be a paper agreement that will nullify the RoR, basically the belligerent party will dance around it for generations to come, hoping it goes away. If the Zionist movement itself is any example, it probably won't.
I'm not against equal treatment for Palestinians in second countries. Only coming out with the demand for that and ruling out the RoR has the connotation of accepting Israel as a Jewish state. It's an untenable position if you believe in equality. As to the absurdity of inheriting refugee status, nevermind the Zionist movement itself (I won't copy this argument for the zillionth time), banning people from the country their ancestors came from is clearly an injustice. That goes for Jews from Arab countries as well.
You should know that Palestinians in Jordan are citizens already. It's a small footnote, but maybe you want to delay holding such strong opinions until you have listened to enough people and absorbed a certain amount of general knowledge about it.
They should not stay in limbo. They should have the same citizenship rights as I enjoy, and as all humans should.
- As evildoer points out,
Jordan was kind enough to 'absorb' such ethnically cleansed Palestinians that wound up inside its borders through no fault of their own in 1948 and also 1967.
In 1967 a further c.300,000 Palestinians were ethnically cleansed from their West Bank homes, unfortunately though, being the backward People that they are, they had learned the hard lessons of 1948 and most of them stayed where they were.
Palestinian Refugees
wikipedia
I'm with you on this one Armand Asante with regards to the rights of refugees from the same historical period of the 1940s.
I think I'm suffering from 'refugee fatigue' or 'compassion fatigue' I think is the politically correct term used by the western corporate news media.
I wish these Palestinian refugees and their descendants would stop their whinging and whining and get on with life already.
Same with these Holocaust Survivors and their refugee families. I wish they would give it a rest. Going on about compensation for the houses, communities and possessions they were ruthlessly despoiled of!
Serioulsy though, if it were possible, who wouldn't want to do the right thing for the victims who survived the Nazis, I don't know. Imagine arguing that because they're now into their 2nd or 3rd generation we really shouldn't give a shit about the rights of the descendants of the victims of Holocaust survivors - utter barbarity.
I read somewhere something like 80% of Palestinian refugees live within less than a few days walking distance from the land and houses stolen from them. In Gaza, refugees can see everyday of their lives the places where they used to live. What's so difficult about allowing these human cattle out of their gulags to return to their own land and properties, I've no idea.
If its so easy to give Palestinians citizenship in Jordan and Lebanon then it must be just as simple, more appropriate and just, to make them citizens of Israel. And after all, Israel claims an unlimited capacity to 'absorb' immigrants with the proper ethnic-racial profile. So living space isn't a problem.
You state that you support a non-Jewish state, but only insofar as it involves no personal consequences or sacrifices on your part.
Yes. That sounds about right.
That sounds awfully like zionism to me mate.
I mean, if Israel was just like any other country, as you say you want it to be, then it's going to have ordinary immigration rules and it's going to have to tow the line where international law and order are concerned, especially when it comes to the right of refugees.
Israel can't be an ordinary state when it is allowed to treat some people differently. This is just zionism.
This claim by Armand also seems like a justification and encouragement for committing ethnic cleansing, war crimes and the like. Armand is agreeing that in the end it will pay to carry out racist terrorism and war crimes against others. Again this is just zionism.
Armand, what about the 2nd and 3rd generation of descendants of the SS - do you think they, or their government, should provide acknowledgement of the crimes perpetrated against their unfortunate forebears and relatives and also be required to provide proper restitution and compensation for the looting and plunder (but not rape) suffered at the hands of the SS?
ps
As Gaza and the West Bank don't belong to Israel, I've never seen it as a big problem that Palestinians should be allowed to go back to them. Israel hasn't got the same grounds for objecting to the return of Palestinians to the West Bank and Gaza as it claims it has with regards to Israel proper.
I have to say that you're position on Zionism is original but you're objection to RoR is truly bizarre. Besides the reasons why RoR should be honoured that have been put forward by several others here, there is another solid reason why naturalisation of the refugees is a bad idea: it simply rewards the ethnic cleansers. What would in the future stop State A from invading this or that State or region and ethnically cleanse it, in the sound knowledge that the 'displaced' or 'transferred' people would sooner or later be absorbed into and naturalised by States B, C and D?
It's rewarding bad behaviour and setting a precedent. And already Zionist apologists invoke all kinds of colonial precedents to justify Zionism's past and present actions: 'They did it too!'
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