The following video is a little over 6 minutes but worth watching. It is a montage of two videos and my own minor additions. I am not a religious person but since Israel’s foundation is on Judaism, I thought that bringing in the 10 commandments would be very relevant.
A gentleman has been coming on my blog and leaving extensive comments, reasonably polite, but insisting that Israel is right and Palestinians and other Arabs are wrong and the whole world is wrong and only Israel is on the right path. It is this gentleman who motivated me to do this video because I watched with horror what Israel did in 2008 and 2009 and the whole world sat on the sidelines.
In Ten Commandments what Judaism teaches is peace and Israel is doing quite the opposite. Israel carried out mass killing in 2008/2009 in Gaza and Lebanon. It carried out killings before this, and it continues to do so to this day. Gaza is like a concentration camp as some world leaders put it. Rev. Desmond Tutu called the treatment of Palestinians apartheid and a Jewish British MP said that Israel was behaving like Nazis see my earlier post
Israel is building settlements on land which belongs to Palestinians. That is definitely not the way to peaceful co-existence. When you take other people’s land and homes there will be reaction. Just think of it this way, if your neighbour plants a bush a few inches on your property how would you react? Now think of that neighbour taking over your home and pushing you into the shed. And then build a huge fence around that shed to keep you imprisoned in there. It is this kind of injustice that the Israeli government is perpetuating on the Palestinian people. As long as that goes on there is a very little chance for peace. Israel must obey UN resolutions and pull back to pre-war 1967 boundaries. This is essential for peaceful co-existence. The two state solution will be the solution and even leaders in Gaza have said, including Hamas, that they will fully recognize the existence of Israel if this happens. Those actions are needed for the sake of Israel, for the sake of Palestinians, and for the sake of peace.
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Thanks for doings this post and I'm glad I trigger you to think more about the situation in the Middle East. If I can make your view even slightly more sympathetic to the Israeli perspective it would make a difference.
ReplyDelete"The two state solution will be the solution and even leaders in Gaza have said, including Hamas, that they will fully recognize the existence of Israel if this happens."
Can you give any reference to this? This is news to me. What's the meaning of "recognizing Israel"? This is just a word laundry, (i.e. thanks for "recognizing us"). Even if they did say that, why can't they say that they will live in peace alongside Israel?
But let's move to the more practical stuff.
What shall Israel do in case it pulls back to pre-1967 war border and it still suffers attacks from Palestinian extremists, which is probably will be the case? Should it occupy them again and history will repeat all over again? (because this had already happened in 2005).
Another question you should think about...
If pre-1967 borders are acceptable what was the excuse for Arab terror before 1967 ???
In the years 1936-1939 there was a huge Arab revolt on the Jews in Palestine under the British mandate. The death toll was high, and they killed mercilessly babies, they used swords to pull out their eyes.
What was the justification back then? This was before the state of Israel was established, before the "occupation", and before the refugee problem emerged.
Arab leaders are great at reversing the cause and the effect: they point at Israel actions and justify their terror based on that. They never mention that Israel's actions are reactions to past Palestinian violence.
Arab terror did not start in 1967, and not in 1948.
You sound like a person who is drowning and trying to hang on to straws.:)
ReplyDeleteIf you google you will find hundreds of references where Hamas leaders said that all hostilities would end after Israel pulls back to 1967 boundaries. What does that mean? A road to peace and for such recognition. Moreover, it was said on CNN last Sunday, I believe on Fareed Zakaria’s program. I believe reference was to this.
“Aziz Dwaik,the most senior representative for Hamas in the West Bank said on Wednesday that Hamas is ready to accept Israel's right to exist. Dwaik also said that Hamas would also potentially be prepared to nullify its decades-old charter which states that the organization would never recognize that the state of Israel has a right to exist.”
I saw a reference on HuffPost also and that is where I got this quote.
So should Israel just trust the Palestinians who say that and pull back? This time Israel has to have a signed agreement with a Palestinian government to pull back farther.
ReplyDeleteIsrael evacuated all the settlements in Gaza strip in 2005 and ended its occupation there to show its readiness for peace. In return, it just got more rocket launched at it. This is why the Israeli people will never agree to do any farther evacuations without agreement from the Palestinian side. You don't have to agree that, but you have to recognize that that view point is very rational (Israel have been attacked after they gave up territories back, whether rightfully or not).
By the way, the Palestinians had countless opportunities to establish their own state (look up "Peel Commission" by the Brits on 1936-37). They always rejected all plans to divide Israel to two states, since their leaders prefer war over peace. They could have a Palestinian state on 1937 much larger than they will ever have, but they chose war (see the map on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peel_Commission)
Do you realize that how ridiculous you sound. It is Israel who is occupying Palestinian land and not the other way around. So who has to make first move.
ReplyDeleteAlso totally absurd argument that Israel feels threatened by Palestinians from Gaza. How so? Because there are so many destroyed (bombed out by Israel) buildings and as a result there are a lot of stones and bricks lying around which can pose grave danger to Israeli security.
Israel is a nuclear state with over 200 nuclear warheads, tanks, state of the art weapons and the most modern jet/warplanes and it is threatened by 1.5 million Gazans who live in dire straights.
I suppose those bricks, stones and few sticks are weapons of mass destruction.
"Also totally absurd argument that Israel feels threatened by Palestinians from Gaza. How so?"
ReplyDeleteFrom things like this perhaps:
http://www.cbsnews.com/2300-100_162-1502012-2.html?tag=page
Yes, bus explosions are harmless. Jews like exploding. You make it sound like they are innocent people. These are the thing you NEVER mention in your blog:
http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/terrorism/terrisrael.html
http://bit.ly/aj9P62
http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/MFAArchive/2000_2009/2001/6/Palestinian%20Terrorism-%20Photos%20-%20Tel-Aviv%20suicide%20b
Israel will not retreat without an agreement because it had already tried and got more terror in return (which you NEVER mention).
Until the Palestinian government realize that, and as long they continue with the way of terror, Israel will protect itself with this blockade, as imperfect as it maybe.
Blockade? Call it what it is and what world thinks of it including the Vatican.
ReplyDelete"I say, look at the conditions of the people who live there. Surrounded by a wall that is difficult to cross -- in conditions (that are) contrary to human dignity. What has been happening recently there is horrifying. It's looking more and more like a big concentration camp," VATICAN, Cardinal Renato Martino, head of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace.
My favourite writer, philosopher had this to say about exodus of Palestinians:
“No people anywhere in the world would accept being expelled en masse from their own country; how can anyone require the people of Palestine to accept a punishment which nobody else would tolerate?”
Bertrand Russell
Even far right conservatives like Ron Paul has called Gaza a concentration camp. These conservatives who otherwise overlook atrocities could not overlook Gaza.
After we built the wall around them, they find it much harder to explode themselves inside Israel. So it looks like a concentration camp. I don't care as long as it stops their terror attacks. You would do the same.
ReplyDeleteAnd even if it is a concentration camp, if they don't like the things the way they are, why don't they negotiate a peace agreement with Israel?
Could it be that their leaders would like things to stay the way they are?
“Aziz Dwaik,the most senior representative for Hamas in the West Bank said on Wednesday that Hamas is ready to accept Israel's right to exist. Dwaik also said that Hamas would also potentially be prepared to nullify its decades-old charter which states that the organization would never recognize that the state of Israel has a right to exist.”
ReplyDeleteWhat does the above mean? You're becoming irrational and instead of convincing me or anyone else for that matter your deep biases and prejudices are becoming blatantly obvious. It is that kind of intransigence of Israel which has led to so much tragedy. It is because of that intransigence that the staunch supporters of Israel are turning away from Israel.
".....not only did Joe Biden tell Prime Minister Netanyahu that Israel's actions are endangering U.S. troops in the region, but -- more important -- as Foreign Policy's Mark Perry reports, both Adm. Mike Mullen and Gen. David Petraeus within the last couple of months stressed the same causal connection to Obama officials: "Israel's intransigence could cost American lives."
That's great that voices like his are heard from the Palestinian side. So what are they waiting for? Why not starting peace talks today?
ReplyDeleteYou either are not serious or sanity and you have parted company. Guess who is not coming to the table - Netanyahu and his foreign Minister Liebermann. They continue to build new settlements on Palestinian land. Give your head a shake.
ReplyDeleteJoe Biden, Adm. Mike Mullen, Hillary Clinton and Gen. David Petraeus all are saying that it is Israel who is intransigent.
That's not true. You might have heard the Palestinians saying something like they would negotiate with Israel only under the prerequisite that Israel will allow the Palestinian refuges and their descendants from 1948 to return to Israel. Even if you think this would be justified (I don't) this would mean the end of Israel just because they will outnumber the Jews in Israel.
ReplyDeleteThis is just one reference that is a basis from what I saying (so I don't sound like I'm inventing facts):
ReplyDeletehttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article3791655.ece
"They continue to build new settlements on Palestinian land. Give your head a shake. "
ReplyDeleteI used to believe in that one myself when I was more naive. As much as I dislike the fact that Israel builds in disputed territories this should not be a concern. Building there and then returning it is a waste of Israel's money and nothing more.
When Israel evacuated its settlements in Gaza, it returned the territory WITH the homes we built on it. We even offered them to destroy them if they do not like our building style.
The first thing those barbarians did when they got the land was to set the synagogues on fire.
They are barbarian for you and you're barbarian/savage for them.
ReplyDeleteIt is not only important what your self-image is but also what world thinks of you. Otherwise you are totally delusional.
World thinks that Israel has savaged Palestinians and other neighbours for the last 60+ years.
I know that "the world" thinks that. And behind closed doors people will tell you that the UN decision to establish the state of Israel was a big mistake and was only due to guilt. You probably think so too. If you do, then it doesn't really matter what I say.
ReplyDeleteIf not, then you should see who started 1948 war, 1967 war, 1973 war, and virtually all other wars. When the Arabs started the wars in 1948 and 1967 (in an attempt to kill all jews) they should have taken into account that the end results will not be in a favor. When you initiate a war you take the risk of losing territories. This is one reason the willingness of Israel to return to pre-1967 borders should not be taken lightly -- check out what this strategically means on a map.