Conflict between Palestine and Israel escalates

[Trunkage]

Arguably, Israel is a colony.

1) The original term comes from the ancient Greeks. They migrated out to other places and set up independent cities where they effectively imposed rule over the locals. Obvious examples were city states like Syracuse, Tarentum, Byzantium, Ephesus, etc. Likewise did the Phoenecians form similar colonies (Carthage, most famously). When the Romans conquered areas, they would usually dot them with bits of Roman population: and indeed if you look at the names on maps of the Roman empire, you will see places called "Colonia ...", indicating such a town/city

2) In the colonial era, it more represents the far-flung possessions of European empires: although these were not independent in the way that colonies in the ancient world were. Hence the USA stops being thought of as a group of colonies the minute it gained independence.

3) If we think about the term "colonisation", this generally means the substantial movement of a people to somewhere, usually also with the implication they take it over.

So Israel is not technically a colony under point (2) as it is an independent country. However, in just about all other ways imaginable, it either is a colony or is so indistinguishable from what goes on in colonisation that it's not worth disputing.

Yeah, that point 2... the US may have stopped being a colony but they turned into colonizers. They then colonized what is now the US. The the being that it wasn't really 'far flung'. It's always been funny to me how all those territories were never seen as colonies to me

 

[Trunkage]

Surrender.

Would you say this to Israel?

 

[Agema]

Israel is only getting away with this because the US uses it as a strategic base to attack a bunch of other countries. Nothing will change unless that fact changes

Sort of: the US actually avoids running military ops directly out of Israel. It's more that all that military aid and political protection reliably buys one hell of a lot of local complicity and assistance. Israel is very plugged into the region in intel, plus the option of carrying out strikes the US wants without it having to get its own hands dirty, etc.

Although I think that a lot of it is that ignoring the victimisation of Palestinians costs US politicians almost nothing in lost votes and election funding, whereas opposing Israel does. As we saw with Netanyahu and Obama, whoever runs Israel knows he can disrespect the US president with almost total impunity, because the US president's hands are tied by US domestic politics.

 

[Agema]

Yeah, that point 2... the US may have stopped being a colony but they turned into colonizers. They then colonized what is now the US. The the being that it wasn't really 'far flung'. It's always been funny to me how all those territories were never seen as colonies to me

The US definitely had colonies, and not just territories prior to being granted official statehood. Phillipines, Cuba, Panama, etc. Still has colonies, e.g. Puerto Rico. Although we don't like to use the term "colony" any more for that sort of thing. It's bad press.

 

[Trunkage]

The US definitely had colonies, and not just territories prior to being granted official statehood. Phillipines, Cuba, Panama, etc. Still has colonies, e.g. Puerto Rico. Although we don't like to use the term "colony" any more for that sort of thing. It's bad press.

I find it funny that the territories in the Western Expansion were not called colonies because that’s when it was cool to have colonies. I get it for the Phillipines, as it was a bit late to be popularly called a Colony

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

If I took in a person who needed help and they proceeded to claim half of my apartment for themselves, how am I in the wrong for trying to kick them out?

That's not really what happened though.

The Palestinians didn't willingly take in Jewish refugees who then claimed half the land for themselves. Israel was established by the UN and the territory was controlled by the British at the time.

It's more like if your landlord took in a homeless person and gave them half your apartment. I'm sure you'd be pretty pissed at the arrangement but stabbing the homeless guy isn't the answer, the answer is negotiating with your landlord. Instead the Palestinians completely rejected any two-state solution outright and threatened to attack the Israelis the moment that the UN passed the resolution, which they did.

Of course that's an incredible over-simplification of the events that transpired, and there could be a whole different thread about whether the UN had the right to establish Israel at all.

 

[tstorm823]

Would you say this to Israel?

No. Their positions aren't the same. I suggest concession to people in a fight they can't win, not to the side that almost can't lose. That's just a practical assessment, not a moral judgment.

 

[Hawki]

If we're really doing the house analogy, this is it. I'm going to use "my family" for the Jews, but disclaimer, not Jewish or Muslim:

Spoiler

-My family lives in a house since the start of our history. We call our house Judaea.

-Another family called the Romans invades my house, and scatters members of my family.

-Another family later on called the Arabs comes into my house, scatters more of my family, and puts members of their family in my house. They call the house Palestine.

-The house comes under the ownership of the Ottomans. By this point, the Arab family has been living in my house for over a millennium, but some of my family is still in the house, while most of it has been scattered to houses around the world.

-In the 19th century, members of my family start moving back into the house. At around about the same time, the other family gets more of their family in the house.

-In the 20th century, because of a war, the Ottoman Empire collapses, and my house comes under the ownership of the British Empire, who's given a mandate from the League of Nations to make my house a nation-state house. Unfortunately, the British promised the deed to both my family and the other family.

-Decades of violence occur as my family and the other family fight for ownership of the house. The other family gets more pissed as more of my family starts moving into my house. Some people in my family say that because it was my house first, and we've never not been in the house in some capacity, the house is mine. The other family says that because we've been living here in great numbers while your family was mostly out of the house, it's their house.

-WWII occurs, as does the Holocaust, so even more of my family comes into the house, pissing off the other family. Violence continues as we continue to fight over the house.

-Britain turns over ownership of the house to the UN, who partitions the house between my family and the other family, with the Jerusalem Room being looked after by another tenant as three main faiths have claims to the city. My family accepts the deal, the other family refuses. What's worse is that members of my family are living in rooms belonging to the other family, and vice versa.

-Relatives of the other family attack the house, wanting to drive my family out of the house. My family fights back, and in the process, not only expels members of the other family from our rooms, but takes some of their rooms. At the same time, relatives of the other family take control of the Jerusalem room, and expel members of my family who were living there. Simultaniously, other relatives of the other family take over part of their part of the house.

-The relatives of the other family are pissed off, and force my relatives to move into my part of the house, while denying residency to the members of the other family that my family turned out. Furthermore, for the other family, their sections of the house are cut off from each other.

-Another war occurs where my family defends itself (the other family says we attacked) and we take over all of the house.

-Lots of people point out that we're occuping parts of the house that were never meant for my family. Decades of violence follow. My family is able to strike a deal with the Egyptian family that has the SInai returned to them and the Gaza room remains under occupation, as does the West Bank room. We offer the people in the West Bank room full ownership of this room five times, but they refuse. Simultaniously, members of my family are moving into the rooms meant for the other family, displacing the other family.

-The Iran Family has a revolution which really triggers hatred against my family, to the extent that all of my extended family on the street is now living in the house because they've been kicked out of their houses.

-My family and the other family keep fighting each other.

-The other family has an ideological split between Fatah and Hamas. Hamas takes control of the Gaza Room. We pull out every member of our family that was living in the Gaza Room, and the Gaza family makes it clear that they want all of the house for their family, despite members of their family being okay to share the house. Only I can't claim innocence, because while members of my family want to share the house, other members want all of the house for themselves as well.

-And we keep fighting. My family has the support of powers like the US, while the other family has support of powers like Iran and Qatar.

And we keep fighting.

And fighting.

And fighting.

And fighting.

No doubt you can look at the above and say "you left out X," and fine, sure - I don't have the time or inclination to do two millennia of history, let alone even a century of history. But if you want to understand Israel/Palestine, it's basically two groups of people living in the same land that want the land. If you want to make the colonization argument, then you have to extend that to Arab colonization as well (again, why do you think Islamic holy sites are literally built atop the ruins of Jewish holy sites?)

What's the solution? I dunno. I can see this ending in a number of ways:

-Hamas gets their goal of an Islamic state, which means the expulsion of most, if not all Jews in the country. Basically, a repeat of history, only worse, as the Jews wouldn't be able to find sanctuary in the ME anymore.

-Israel annexes all of Mandate Palestine as a Jewish state, which means dispossession for Palestinians except for Arab-Israelis.

-The Two State Solution occurs, only this cuts off Gaza from the West Bank, and people on both sides would still want all the land.

-The One State Solution occurs, only this presents problem. There isn't a single country in the region where the rights of minorities have been adequately safeguarded, so this means Jews become the minority.

-A Power Sharing State akin to Lebanon. Again, this could work, but in Lebanon, it didn't, so...

-The Three State Solution, where Jordan annexes the West Bank, and Egypt annexes Gaza. This would work geo-politically, but it removes any hope of a Palestinian state.

 

[Eacaraxe]

That Israel keeps going down the route of murdering hundreds of civilians in anger whenever Hamas is at their ineffectual rocket attacks and thus keeps proving that they really are the nasty, genocidal bully that Hamas wants to paint them as is what is really baffling here.

You see, Netanyahu really, really doesn't want to go to prison, and he really needs that polling boost he'll get from another Gazan war to compensate for Likud hemorrhaging Knesset seats in the face of the least organized, disunited, oppositional non-coalition of all countries today that could be feasibly called liberal democracies.

It's not like he's so catastrophically fucked right now that even center and right-wing Zionist parties were trying to negotiate with left-wing Arab and Islamist parties, in hopes of forming an anti-Netanyahu coalition to oust him from power, or anything.

 

[Gordon_4]

That's not really what happened though.

The Palestinians didn't willingly take in Jewish refugees who then claimed half the land for themselves. Israel was established by the UN and the territory was controlled by the British at the time.

Of course that's an incredible over-simplification of the events that transpired, and there could be a whole different thread about whether the UN had the right to establish Israel at all.

The establishment of Israel has always seemed to me to be a massive overreaction to the Allied Nations guilt complex that came when the full extent of Nazi Germany's Holocaust was uncovered. I mean The English and the Americans of the 1940s didn't exactly like the Jewish either - and one could argue they still don't but that's another vat of toxic waste - but what the Nazis dead was.....well, we know what they did. So the UN with Britain's complete assistance and acting in a way that would have every tin foil hatted sovereign citizen nut job reaching for his M16 now, established Israel mainly it seems as a way of saying they were super sorry about the whole targeted extermination thing that Germany got up to. Like for reals sorry. So they settle a famously displaced people in a land settled by their functional mortal enemies and divided one of the most holy sites to three major religions in half and told the inhabitants of Palestine to 'Just deal, bro'. I am decidedly un-surprised that they're pissed off and have remained pissed off for this long.


However. The fact remains that Israel is there. It has successfully defended itself from incursions and invasions. Its existence is now closer than not to a century and I think the Palestinians need to really sit and fucking get square with that. Israel isn't going anywhere. But given the animosity that's been festering for the past, eighty odd years, short of the UN marching the largest expeditionary force since Korea into the region and pushing them both back, going door to door in Palestine and executing Hamas in the streets and dismantling the Iron Dome and making the IDF party to the same military restrictions as the Japanese, and presumably occupying both nations for at least two decades to ensure they get their shit together, I don't see many alternatives. Not ones that don't get multitudes of their citizens killed anyway.

 

[Hawki]

The establishment of Israel has always seemed to me to be a massive overreaction to the Allied Nations guilt complex that came when the full extent of Nazi Germany's Holocaust was uncovered. I mean The English and the Americans of the 1940s didn't exactly like the Jewish either - and one could argue they still don't but that's another vat of toxic waste - but what the Nazis dead was.....well, we know what they did. So the UN with Britain's complete assistance and acting in a way that would have every tin foil hatted sovereign citizen nut job reaching for his M16 now, established Israel mainly it seems as a way of saying they were super sorry about the whole targeted extermination thing that Germany got up to. Like for reals sorry. So they settle a famously displaced people in a land settled by their functional mortal enemies and divided one of the most holy sites to three major religions in half and told the inhabitants of Palestine to 'Just deal, bro'. I am decidedly un-surprised that they're pissed off and have remained pissed off for this long.

Even if Israel was never established, you'd still have similar problems, since Jews began moving back into the area in the 19th century, and the violence that we see now began decades before the establishment of Israel.

If Israel wasn't established, I imagine that what would have happened is that Palestine would have been created and the Jews eventually driven out by virtue of sheer weight of numbers. Assuming there was no Arab invasion of the land in 1947, you'd probably have decades and decades of low level violence with an Arab majority and Jewish minority, before the Arab majority eventually prevailed. Alternatively, you'd still have Jewish displacement across the ME as they come to Israel to fight for it, but then, you'd also have Arabs wanting to remove any Jewish power base.

Basically, the alternate timeline probably wouldn't be that alternate, just low-level constant violence rather than spectacular outbreaks of high-level violence.

 

[Trunkage]

No. Their positions aren't the same. I suggest concession to people in a fight they can't win, not to the side that almost can't lose. That's just a practical assessment, not a moral judgment.

So, as long as you have power, you can do whatever you want. Yes, I'm very aware of that practicality

 

[tstorm823]

So, as long as you have power, you can do whatever you want. Yes, I'm very aware of that practicality

No practical solution is going to put either party in a worse position than they started. They aren't going to accept that, and if they did accept that, the leaders would swiftly be reminded where their power derives from.

 

[Thaluikhain]

I find it funny that the territories in the Western Expansion were not called colonies because that’s when it was cool to have colonies. I get it for the Phillipines, as it was a bit late to be popularly called a Colony

The US went into the war with Spain on the basis that they were evil colonisers, and promised not to make Cuba a colony. They didn't promise anything about the Phillipines (possibly simply because they didn't expect to take it), so they didn't have to give that back to the natives that helped them get it. An interesting period, one that doesn't get much interest nowdays.

 

[Seanchaidh]

If Israel wasn't established, I imagine that what would have happened is that Palestine would have been created and the Jews eventually driven out by virtue of sheer weight of numbers. Assuming there was no Arab invasion of the land in 1947, you'd probably have decades and decades of low level violence with an Arab majority and Jewish minority, before the Arab majority eventually prevailed. Alternatively, you'd still have Jewish displacement across the ME as they come to Israel to fight for it, but then, you'd also have Arabs wanting to remove any Jewish power base.

That depends, doesn't it? Zionism was always violent, even before the invention of modern Israel. Palestine, however, only became significantly more violent than other, similar places as a result of the violent expulsion of its people, the burning of its villages and orchards, and the active settlement by a colonial aggressor of its land with the blessing of foreign powers. So if the idea is that Zionists would have been similarly violent though not similarly powerful, perhaps your idea of how history would go on makes sense. But if not? Why, particularly, do you think that Jewish people buying land in Palestine and acting as reasonably good neighbors would necessarily have been treated any worse than other immigrants to other places (which is admittedly not a high bar)?

There was some lingering antisemitism before 1948, in part due to the propagation of Nazi propaganda in the Middle East as well as the Protocols of the Elders of Zion hoax, but it is notable that the massive decrease in Jewish population among Arab countries only comes about as a result of the establishment of Israel, Palestinian exodus, and the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. For comparison, in the United States before the famous attack on Pearl Harbor, there was anti-Japanese racism; it massively increased as a result of the war. Now imagine if Hawaii was the whole West Coast and rather than pushing back and eventually winning, the United States was forced to capitulate and endure an ever-expanding colonization of the lower 48 by the Empire of Japan, starting with California, Oregon, and Washington, but continuing across the continent with violent enforcement and ethnic cleansing despite popular resistance. Imagine if Seattle and Los Angeles were razed during this time. Do you think there might just be a bit more anti-Japanese racism in that case? Could people of Japanese ancestry feel safe anywhere that identified with the American struggle in such a case? No, and we would correctly attribute the animosity not entirely but mostly to the legitimate grievance. And not just in the United States, but Mexico and Canada and other members of the Commonwealth would have similar anti-Japanese resentments based on the situation of American colonists as well as what remained of its indigenous population and their treatment by Imperial Japanese colonizers.

Given this, I think your assessment of the prospects of Jewish immigration into Israel is a bit silly. Why assume that, without the constant inflaming of tensions that Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestine causes, racial conflict would get worse rather than improve somewhat, or at least not get much worse, as has happened elsewhere that there isn't such an incredibly brutal and ongoing mistreatment of one population by another? Like, it managed to improve a bit even in the United States, despite lynchings and a legacy of slavery and ongoing police brutality that actually still exists. And yet we're not looking at the extinguishing of one or another race from existence here.

Hamas only started in 1987 during the first intifada, a time of enormous anger, and there is reasonable question over whether its formation and popularization was favored to some extent by Israel (like the Mujahideen in Afghanistan by the United States) as a foil to the more secular and leftist Fatah/PLO. And it retains its popularity not because of Islam so much but because it uncompromisingly resists Israel. It is capable of negotiation. And it is capable of keeping to a bargain. It typically fires rockets after some violent Israeli provocation and breaking of truce (such as attacking Al-Aqsa Mosque with tear gas, skunk water, and flash grenades, or the planned expulsion of residents from Sheikh Jarrah); it's not like it hasn't a plethora of justifications lying around for retaliation. Often, the justifications for the launching of rockets aren't heard in American media for some reason. It just happens for no reason we are to think. Out of the blue.

If the Palestinians were to somehow win the conflict, even if it were accomplished mostly under the leadership of Hamas, it is unlikely that the result would be anywhere near as bad for Jewish people in Israel as the last several decades have been for Palestinians. I think anyone can be confident of this if for no other reason than that Hamas would certainly not enjoy the same relationship with the United States as has Israel. And it is not as if Hamas's original (since revised) charter is particularly more odious than the original charter of the Likud Party except perhaps from the perspective of a Jewish Supremacist... or one who favors brevity.

 

[Agema]

The US went into the war with Spain on the basis that they were evil colonisers, and promised not to make Cuba a colony.

Which they promptly broke, given that Cuba was effectively a US vassal until 1959.

Cuba was granted independence on the grounds it signed into law provisions that effectively gave the USA control over its foreign policy and de facto freedom to interfere in Cuba's domestic governance as it saw fit. In other words, Cuba got "independence" by agreeing to sign away its independence.

 

[davidmc1158]

The US went into the war with Spain on the basis that they were evil colonisers, and promised not to make Cuba a colony. They didn't promise anything about the Phillipines (possibly simply because they didn't expect to take it), so they didn't have to give that back to the natives that helped them get it. An interesting period, one that doesn't get much interest nowdays.

I think Trunkage means why wasn't the Louisiana Purchase called a colony, or the territory seized from Mexico after the war in 1848? At the time, getting colonies was the "in thing" to do for nations that considered themselves powers. We (the U.S.A. certainly treated the Amerindian nations as badly as the British/Spanish/Portuguese did in the lands they took over. Not much difference, really.

 

[Hawki]

Why, particularly, do you think that Jewish people buying land in Palestine and acting as reasonably good neighbors would necessarily have been treated any worse than other immigrants to other places (which is admittedly not a high bar)?

Because the violence started almost immediately, and minorities aren't treated well anywhere in the Middle East, especially Jews, which even before being expelled from Arab countries, had been whittled away to a minority (similarly to Christians and Zoroastrians).

There was some lingering antisemitism before 1948, in part due to the propagation of Nazi propaganda in the Middle East as well as the Protocols of the Elders of Zion hoax, but it is notable that the massive decrease in Jewish population among Arab countries only comes about as a result of the establishment of Israel, Palestinian exodus, and the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. For comparison, in the United States before the famous attack on Pearl Harbor, there was anti-Japanese racism; it massively increased as a result of the war. Now imagine if Hawaii was the whole West Coast and rather than pushing back and eventually winning, the United States was forced to capitulate and endure an ever-expanding colonization of the lower 48 by the Empire of Japan, starting with California, Oregon, and Washington, but continuing across the continent with violent enforcement and ethnic cleansing despite popular resistance. Imagine if Seattle and Los Angeles were razed during this time. Do you think there might just be a bit more anti-Japanese racism in that case? Could people of Japanese ancestry feel safe anywhere that identified with the American struggle in such a case? No, and we would correctly attribute the animosity not entirely but mostly to the legitimate grievance. And not just in the United States, but Mexico and Canada and other members of the Commonwealth would have similar anti-Japanese resentments based on the situation of American colonists as well as what remained of its indigenous population and their treatment by Imperial Japanese colonizers.

In this analogy, the Jews would be the indigenous Americans, the Arabs the Euro-Americans, and the United States wouldn't exist, but simply be a territory that's belonged to numerous empires with numerous waves of people coming in and going out (usually by force).

Japan, here, is trying to conquer a land that was never theirs, and if Japan was expelled from the US, they'd have Japan itself to fall back on.

Also, not sure if Mexico would actually be against Japan here, but meh.

Given this, I think your assessment of the prospects of Jewish immigration into Israel is a bit silly. Why assume that, without the constant inflaming of tensions that Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestine causes, racial conflict would get worse rather than improve somewhat, or at least not get much worse, as has happened elsewhere that there isn't such an incredibly brutal and ongoing mistreatment of one population by another?

It would 'improve,' in as much that the Jews would be removed from the land. You can't have a problem if the problem doesn't exist, so to speak.

And yet we're not looking at the extinguishing of one or another race from existence here.

First, race isn't a thing, and doesn't apply to the context. Second, no-one's being extinguished from existence. We can (and should) deplore Israel's actions in the West Bank, but as a people, the Palestinians exist. They exist to the extent that the no. of Palestinian refugees has gone up over the decades because this is the only group on Earth where refugee status is passed onto children, in part because Arab countries refuse to give them citizenship.

If the Palestinians were to somehow win the conflict, even if it were accomplished mostly under the leadership of Hamas, it is unlikely that the result would be anywhere near as bad for Jewish people in Israel as the last several decades have been for Palestinians. I think anyone can be confident of this if for no other reason than that Hamas would certainly not enjoy the same relationship with the United States as has Israel. And it is not as if Hamas's original (since revised) charter is particularly more odious than the original charter of the Likud Party except perhaps from the perspective of a Jewish Supremacist... or one who favors brevity.

Then we disagree, a victory under Hamas would be worse for Jews than Palestinians under Israel. We know this because:

-Hamas's goal is an Islamic state, and you only need to look at the status of minorities in Islamic states to see what life is like for them. Its goals go even beyond the mandates of the 1947 partition (in that it wants Jerusalem as solely an Islamic city).

-This isn't excusing Israel's actions in the West Bank, but in Israel, Arab Israelis enjoy the same legal rights. Israel is a Jewish state, explicitly, and that does come with privilages, but on the other, Arab Israelis aren't given mandatory service in the IDF, and still operate under the premise of "one vote, one person." Hamas would hardly be so magnanimous.

-Even inside the borders of the area, we can see how Hamas has run Gaza, and what Jordan did to the West Bank for Jews (expulsion of all Jews into Israel, destruction of Jewish sites in Jerusalem and other areas).

-Hamas is supported by Iran and Qatar, and is part of a wider network with the Muslim Brotherhood. Iran, in particular, has everything to gain from an Islamic state in place of a Jewish one, because it helps in their cold war with Saudi Arabia.

I listed possible solutions to the conflict above. None of them are perfect, but Hamas easily lurks at or near the bottom of possible outcomes.

 

[Seanchaidh]

In this analogy, the Jews would be the indigenous Americans

Don't be ridiculous.

 

[Hawki]

Don't be ridiculous.

So the Jews aren't indigenous to the area, have never lived in the area, and were never displaced from the area.

Got it.