Comments on: Settlement of Sheikh Jarrah not ‘bad politics,’ it’s simply bad

By: richard Allen

richard Allen — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 20:38:37 +0000

And all those Arab rulers are concerned because THEY want to be the big man on campus, not because they’re afraid of the bomb. Which is probably our main reason as well.

By: richard Allen

richard Allen — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 20:32:03 +0000

First of all, you addressed none of the points I made, you simply addressed one little term I used, and then called the journalists and commenters on this site collaborators simply because they have different opinions than you. And then you made a completely ridiculous comparison. Suicide bombing, i.e. acts of terror by a stateless people, has nothing in common with a technologically developed, internationally-recognised, semi-Westernised country bombing another. Suicide bombing may be appalling, but it is rational in its on way. Iran bombing us makes absolutely no sense. Wow, you have really run out of arguments. And That’s all I know.

By: maayan

maayan — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 14:52:41 +0000

Arab mentality? I don’t even know what that means. Israel has enemies who tend to be Arabs and Muslims. They are in a war with Israel. They come from anti-democratic and illiberal societies. That’s all I know. I don’t pretend to be a mind-reader and understand “Arab mentality.” I understand there’s a war going on and they are doing everything they can to win it. People on this site are helping them.

As for using the bomb despite its irrationality, I have to point you to the irrationality of suicide bombings. However, don’t listen to me. Read all the Wikileaks data on what ARAB rulers are saying about Iran. They are quite afraid.

By: richard Allen

richard Allen — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 13:16:21 +0000

Against my better judgment, I’ll respond, and I am going to make this my F7: Iran will not bomb us. Let’s say they get one bomb. What will they do with it? Presumably bomb Tel Aviv. How will we respond? Bomb the fuck out of their entire country. Let’s say they get 3. What will they do with those? Still, only bomb Tel Aviv, because Jerusalem and Haifa have too large of Arab populations to bomb. Let’s say they say fuck it, we’ll bomb the Arab Israelis too. Israel still will be able to destroy their entire country from remote controls in a scorched earth policy. Of course, destroying every major city in Israel will also destroy the Palestinians, due to nuclear fall-out. What will the Iranians do then? Their major rallying cry to assume power is the Palestinians, and once they’ve killed them off, what else is left? And that doesn’t even take into account the nuclear fall-out for every Arab country surrounding Israel, possibly even Iran itself if they had enough bombs to wipe Israel off the map. It is all simply obnoxious, bombastic rhetoric with the goal of rallying the other Arab states around them, but it ultimately means nothing. You act like you understand the Arab mentality so much better than all the rest of us, but apparently you don’t understand that most Middle-Eastern leaders, including our own, are a bunch of blowhards.

By: maayan

maayan — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 19:22:54 +0000

Right. Earlier tonight Ha’aretz reported that according to Wikileaks, Iran is working together with 30 countries to get the Bomb, is planning to have 3 in operation by 2013 and one of them is intended to be given to Hizbullah. Yup, I sure am exaggerating the existential threat.

As for taking the “extra step” that holds Israel responsible for exacerbating the situation, perhaps that’s because I know what happened in 1920, 1929, 1936-1939, 1947, 1948, 1950-1956, the early ’60s, the mid-’60s, 1968-1970 and 1973. I am also well versed in Palestinian terrorism over the past 40 years. It’s easy to blame Israel, but it’s easier to just read the history and understand that Israel is just one party among many. Right now, for example, I can count Iran, Hizbullah, Hamas, Fatah, Syria and Iraq as outspoken enemies of Israel. Egypt, as Wikileaks shows, trains their army for war with Israel. I’m not imagining things. They are there and Israel’s strength, while making for compelling anti-Israel diatribes, is actually dependent upon severe losses among its civilians. A quick glance at the pain caused by such losses in 1973 should explain to anybody who understands the situation why these threats are so compelling for those of us who aren’t pretending the Palestinians are always the victims.

By: Richard Allen

Richard Allen — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 11:19:39 +0000

Okay fine, you recognise that these were mistakes that Israel has made, but you don’t then take that extra step to see that the anger they arouse exacerbates Israel’s “insane security situation.” Anger and aggression towards Israel do not exist in the vacuum of pure anti-semitism that you paint. You use the “security justifies everything” argument while not seeming to realise that all these measures had that same logic.
As for Israel’s security situation, it is a valid concern, but not nearly under the existential threat that you make out.

By: maayan

maayan — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 10:42:32 +0000

Actually, I don’t proofread enough and always find typos after I post.

My basic grasp and my not basic grasp on the facts is pretty strong or I wouldn’t engage in debates with the people on this site. They tend to know their stuff.

And I didn’t say for one minute that Israel was completely in the right. It is a flawed country, like any other. The fact that it has been engaged in war for so many decades has meant that its society has become a “militarized” one that keeps electing former generals and soldiers to lead it. I don’t see that as a positive at all. The country has also made mistakes along the way, among them, in my opinion, is permitting settlements deep into Judea and Samaria, when it should have stuck to the areas near the Green Line and in the critical-for-defensive-reasons Jordan Valley. I think Israel should have been less violent at the beginning of the Palestinian war in 2000. I think Israel should never have gone into Lebanon in 1982 past the initial drive, and should have exited immediately thereafter. I think Netanyahu killed the opportunity for us to ever really know whether Oslo could have worked as Rabin envisioned, even if he did ultimately sign Hebron and Wye.
However, your final comment is misleading. “Do you get the disconnect of portraying the most powerful military force in the region, with the wealthiest backers, as the perpetual victim?”
Israel is the most powerful military force in the region because it has been threatened severely, not because it is a bully or seeks to be a bully. The fact is the Egyptian army continues to train against Israel, now with American weapons, the Saudis have a huge air force and systems that are comparable to Israel’s, Syria continues to hint at war, Hizbullah and Hamas can hit Tel Aviv with rockets, the total population of the countries surrounding Israel is dozens and dozens of times greater than Israel’s, and that’s not even getting into the political and diplomatic wars Israel faces against a 57-country Muslim bloc (and its allies) at the UN, or the nature of proxy armies like Hizbullah and Hamas or opposing regimes like Iran that continuously declare that Israel is at risk of permanent destruction.
There is no disconnect on my part. Israel faces a lot of hostility from many corners and its military strength as well as backing from the US are, at best, an imperfect counter-weight to an insane security situation.

By: Richard Allen

Richard Allen — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 10:26:34 +0000

Maayan, you seem like an articulate person who blessedly proof-reads her entries for spelling and punctuation before hitting submit, and your grasp of the basic facts is mostly not wrong, but you are engaging in the most extreme mental calisthenics I’ve ever seen to always portray Israel as the victim who only does what it must. Has there ever been a conflict between two nations in the history of the world where one side was completely wrong and one was completely right? I seriously doubt it, but in your worldview, it seems thats yes, Israel has made history by never having done anything wrong. Do you get the disconnect of portraying the most powerful military force in the region, with the wealthiest backers, as the perpetual victim?

By: maayan

maayan — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 09:58:14 +0000

Jerry, please stop with the hysterics of your first paragraph, as they are causing me shortness of breath from laughing so hard. In response to your absurd comment about not forcing abortions on Palestinians or killing their first-born, I will merely point out that the other fast-growing population in Jerusalem is Haredi. Both of these groups can apparently afford to have many more kids than I can, while using your non-Arab, non-Haredi taxes to help pay for the pleasure.
The residence issue is one which has a very obvious solution, apparently one that is taking place right now with great frequency despite your concerns, and that is that the Palestinian residents of eastern Jerusalem can apply for and receive Israeli citizenship. Oops, there goes another of your claims.
Perhaps you are right that the Palestinians won’t receive permits to build, but before we know that, they need to apply. They rarely do, just like the residents of Sheikh Jarrah who were evicted were advised BY THEIR LAWYER not to pay rent on their rental units. It’s hard for Israelis, too, to get building permits, but I wouldn’t dream of building a house without one. Would you? The fact is that Jerusalem has about 13% of its open land available to Palestinian construction and approximately 34% of its land open to Jewish construction. In these areas, people get permits. As to why only 13%? This is a matter of the division of the city, but you will note that the Palestinian Arab population of Jerusalem is about a third of the Jewish population, so in actuality their 13% of the available land is representative of their percentage of the population.
But, Jerry, you will be pleased to know that we agree that Jerusalem should become an international city. Not all of it, in my opinion, because I do think the Arabs should control their neighborhoods (yes, Sheich Jarrah included) but the key contested areas should be internationalized. I’m pleased to hear you support Olmert’s peace offer and recommend you dedicate all of your future writing and demonstration efforts to convincing the lay Palestinians as well as their leadership to accept this wise peace offer.

By: Jerry Haber

Jerry Haber — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 00:39:17 +0000

Maayan, you are right to point out that Israel has not taken to throwing the first born of the Palestinians born in Jerusalem into the sea, or forcing abortions on Palestinian women. Perhaps we should be grateful for that.

But by imposing stringent residency requirements on Jerusalem Palestinians, they are indeed doing what they can to reduce the number of legal Palestinian residents in the city — in an effort to offset the population of Eastern Jerusalem through natural growth. And by not building flats or subsidizing flats for the Palestinian residents, unlike the Jewish residents, they force the Palestinians to build illegally — or, again, to leave. Ditto for erasing the historical sites of Palestinians, such as the Palace Hotel, where George Antonius wrote the Arab Awakening, I am told, or the various parks that have been proposed to limit Palestinian growth.

Palestinians are de facto not allowed to live in areas over the Green Line, while whole Jewish communities have been built over the Green Line. And when Palestinians live in some of those Jewish communities — the ones over the Green Line — this is trumpeted as a sign of “open housing”.

The answer to both sides destroying the others side’s historical sites, is to internationalize the city so that it is under neither Jewish nor Palestinian sovereignty. That was, and remains, the best solution to the mess. Israel accepted it in 1947; the Palestinians rejected it. Maybe it is time for both sides to reconsider it, or better, for the world to impose it upon the parties.