Everyone is linking this Goldblog post:
I’m not actually suggesting that the White House is directly meddling in internal Israeli politics, but it’s clear to everyone — at the White House, at the State Department, at Goldblog — that no progress will be made on any front if Avigdor Lieberman’s far-right party, Yisrael Beiteinu, and Eli Yishai’s fundamentalist Shas Party, remain in Netanyahu’s surpassingly fragile coalition.
So what is the goal? The goal is force a rupture in the governing coalition that will make it necessary for Netanyahu to take into his government Livni’s centrist Kadima Party (he has already tried to do this, but too much on his terms) and form a broad, 68-seat majority in Knesset that does not have to rely on gangsters, messianists and medievalists for votes. It’s up to Livni, of course, to recognize that it is in Israel’s best interests to join a government with Netanyahu and Barak, and I, for one, hope she puts the interests of Israel ahead of her own ambitions.
Livni was the Israeli Foreign Minister who organized a propaganda campaign prior to and during the 2009 invasion of Gaza by Israel (I’m sure you all remember the facebook accounts, the Help Us Win website and the youtube videos that were dispersed virally) and then famously declared there was no humanitarian crisis in Gaza despite the fact that Israel had basically flattened and then blockaded the area, and of course we all know the final toll in Gaza.
Just keep that in mind when you hear about “moderate” leaders like Tzipi Livni, because moderate doesn’t mean that she likes to wax eloquent about bipartisanship and fiscal conservatism while sending pork back to her own state and cutting taxes on the rich. Moderate means that you eschew the genocidal rhetoric of folks like Avigdor Lieberman.
me
… but that’s exactly what he’s suggesting. Israel should have the government it’s people want, we should be able to tell them to fuck off when necessary.
eldorado
pork?
Leelee for Obama
Yeah, context is all, ain’t it? I wonder constantly about what the hard-right thinks would come of all out war in the Middle East. Leaving the messianists out of the equation, because they’re just batshit nuts, what the hell does anyone gain from escasating tensions and violence?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
The so called Kadima party was nothing more that a Sharon inspired offshoot Likud creation mostly because he decided to vacate Gaza. They likely aren’t as bugfuck nuts as elements of Likud, but hardly moderate. Though from what I can gather, most Israeli’s, even truly liberal or moderate ones have about given up on a two state peace agreement due to Hamas’s intractable belligerence. And just want to be kept safe. So in that light, maybe Kadima and Livini qualify now as moderate.
It’s a fucked up mess over there, as it’s always been, but when even liberal labor party Jews have given up hope for peace, then it is worse than ever, just waiting for the next round of killing. And unfortunately for Palestinians, Israel has much more lethal weaponery thanks to the USA.
Makewi
Just for clarity, this sort of thing is fine, but expressing an opinion regarding pro democracy protesters in Iran would be meddling.
Max
Richard Wolfe had a heck of time having an Israel conversation with Michelle (my weave’s too big) Bernard and Tweety on yesterday’s Hardball.
Towards the end, he was trying to explain the the old “centrist” in Israel is no longer and Israel has taken a hard right in the past few years/decades.
El Cid
This is a fairly specific argument to make about particular goals and methods in U.S. foreign policy, and it would seem like an author ought have some evidence to back it up.
Tim F.
@Leelee for Obama: Intolerant right-wing religious extremists feed off each other. Each one can point to the other and tell his followers, see! They hate us! They’re crazy!
The American right benefitted from inflaming and provoking the Muslim right, and the reverse was also true. The more chaotically violent we behaved the more justified Muslim right looked to ordinary Muslims. The more Muslims hated us the more Americans believed GOP rhetoric about evil crazy Muslims.
Netanyahu benefits the same way. As a Jew this hurts as much to say as it does to see happen, but Israel is committing suicide with this current idiot leadership. Even Ariel Sharon, of all people, understood.
In my view anyone who uncritically abets a suicide has little right to call himself a friend.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
All countries, and especially allies at times meddle indirectly in each others politics. Creating a US policy that influences the close and somewhat existential relationship for Israel is going to influence Israeli politics. The Aipac crew just doesn”t like how Obama’s policy influences Israel. And to call it “meddling” is the height of neocon jackassery imo.
Mark
Kadima was just Sharon’s attempt to to destroy Netanyahu’s 27th rise from the dead.
Israeli politicians are just as hemmed in by the need for hard-line rhetoric as the Democrats are. Wouldn’t the ideal thing for Obama be to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan and cut the $600B we spend every year on the military? And yet he has to burnish his hawk credentials lest he be portrayed as soft on national security.
The same holds true for Israelis, though they get more respect from the public if their personal kill total with their bare hands is greater than zero. If you think people spend too much time waxing nostalgic about Ronald Reagan in this country, imagine a country where people wax nostalgic about freeing hostages in the early 70s and only want to elect leaders who organized the raids on the hijacked jetliners. (Or were related to those who did.)
John Cole
@El Cid: In fairness, Goldberg is probably too busy calling Sullivan an anti-Semite.
Mnemosyne
@Makewi:
How much foreign aid does the US provide to Iran every year?
That was even weaker than your usual fare.
Prattlehorn
Israel means nothing to me.
And I’m sure I’m not the only American who feels this way.
Leelee for Obama
@Tim F.: I am sad to say, everything you wrote sounds correct.
a href=”#comment-1627830″>Makewi: Last time I checked, Iran was not an ally of the US, nor does it receive foreign aid, unless you count the oil money. So, yeah, we get some input in Israel, or we should. Iran, not so much.
Leelee for Obama
@Mnemosyne: BJ mind-meld, once again!
Mark S.
@Makewi:
Yeah, US relations with these two countries have been virtually the same.
El Cid
@John Cole: You could imagine the pearl-clutching rage which would be shown to a journalist who wrote a similar piece based on reckonin’ and figgerin’ about Israeli intents to alter the U.S. governing coalition.
Though in fairness, I’m not sure we have a governing coalition to interrupt.
Mark S.
@Leelee for Obama:
It’s like the Borg here!
ellaesther
I missed yesterday’s thread about (roughly) this same topic by about 5 minutes, but today I’m here right on time!
A) Livni is moderate by comparison. And y’all know who I am (Ms. Stop-the-Gaza-Blockade since it started in 2006, Ms. Anti-War-in-Gaza from day one, Ms. Two-States-With-Jerusalem-a-Shared-Capital since the first intifada [1987], etc, etc, etc), so you know I don’t say that lightly. But she was raised in a fanatically right wing (Betar, to those who may know what I mean) home and began her political career pretty fanatically right wing. She has, in fact, moved to the center, and she has called sincerely for a two-state solution and continues to stand by that. The war in Gaza was a horror and a disgrace, but I will work with anyone who is willing to work honestly toward a genuine two-state solution, and I personally believe that Livni is. (Also note the way that she reacted to J Street, with respect and openness, as opposed to almost everyone else in the Israeli political leadership).
B) Yesterday, in the second Open Thread of the day, someone said to me that they were wondering why this was flying so under the radar among progressives. Today, MJ Rosenberg wrote in Media Matters about how Progressives in Congress need to be backing Obama on this, and not Netanyahu (and remember, like me, Rosenberg is a self-professed Zionist who advocates for a two-state solution because, aside from anything else, it’s what Israel needs).
C) Having said all that, I don’t think that tinkering with the government will make much difference. As an Israeli who loves her home desperately I think that change will only come if this government fully implodes and the upset creates the opportunity for something new to happen. What, I don’t know, and I can’t say I’m overly optimistic that any of that will happen, but I do think it’s the only chance we have.
Makewi
@Mnemosyne:
It’s great that you think that line of reasoning strengthens your argument. By that line of reason should the government get to tell poor people who receive aid what to do?
Nellcote
@Leelee for Obama:
if only we could…
more here
John S.
Does “Makewi” mean pretzel-logic in some foreign tongue? Wingnutese? Teabaggish?
ellaesther
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: The thing is, Hamas has been saying that it would accept a long-term ceasefire for years at this point, and the entire Arab League has been calling for a two-state solution to end all Arab-Israeli conflicts permanently since 2002, when Hamas was most decidedly not in government yet. And Israel (and Bush) ignored the Arab League — full on ignored them — both times it came up as an initiative.
I have no love for Hamas — I lived through several of their bombing waves, which on more than one occasion came far closer to me and mine than you would ever want suicide bombers to get — but they’re who we got. And they have signaled for years that they are willing to reach some kind of compromise.
The side that has been intransigent, the said that has adopted the infamous policy of The Three No’s (no peace, no recognition, no negotiation) is Israel.
ellaesther
@Tim F.:
In keeping with the finest of internet traditions, I say: This.
Bruce (formerly Steve S.)
Heaven forfend the U.S. should meddle in a country it has sent $110 billion, including hundreds of advanced fighter jets, attack helicopters, and missiles, and has cast dozens of U.N. vetoes on the behalf of.
SiubhanDuinne
@John Cole #11:
Goldberg and Sullivan. Love their operettas.
Comrade Dread
Welcome to America in about 20 years.
John S.
I agree with you there, which is sometimes a hard pill to swallow as an American Jew (even harder for an Israeli Jew I’m sure). But it’s impossible to even broach this subject with some people, who think that Israel is perfect and the Palestinians are sub-human animals.
I have a very good friend of this stripe, and I avoid the topic like the plague with him. It’s bad enough that I have to see his endless Facebook stream of Likudnik cheerleading every day.
Redshift
@Makewi: And who exactly was it who said that we shouldn’t put the force of the U.S. government behind the Iranian protesters because it would be “meddling”? Care to cite a link for your straw man?
The argument was that based on our considerable past history of undermining Iranian democracy for our own interests, it would be counterproductive for our government to pull a John McCain “we are all Iranians,” not just because it was “meddling.”
Tim F.
@Comrade Dread: um…
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@ellaesther: You are closer to what Hamas is about than I am. But everything I have learned about them is that they are fanatical about destroying the state of Israel. Albeit at times willing to cease fire, but any kind of two state solution is against their primal belief that the land of Palestine is theirs, all of it, and that Jews can live there so long as they accept Arab rule.
I agree that Israel is just as belligerent about keeping what it wants in land and all of Jerusalem and the land grabbing settlement expansion and no right of return. But I still believe that if Hamas and other militant Palestinians stop the violence and provocation that US and the world would sway Israel’s better nature to truly compromise and work this out. But so long as the Hamas provocation and refusal to recognize Israel’s existence exists, then Israeli’s will continue to vote in their extremists that are willing to use violence in kind. Or, that nothing is ever going to change there until the violence stops, not the other way around. Just my opinion from a distance.
kay
Religious zealots won’t compromise, even a little bit?
There’s a shocker. They’re usually so reasonable.
mai naem
I’ll admit I haven’t followed the Israeli/Palestinian situation since the late 90s because our own domestic situation has been so goddamned awful. Also too, it seems like it’s just the longest civil war in the freaking world. However, even I get that what Israel pulled last week was just downright stupid, nasty and biting the hand that feeds it. And ofcourse, Joe Lieberdick was there to apologize for Israel.
Bobzim
This is the attitude that pisses me off:
“Washington ought to remember one thing…”?!/1
Or what? Ungrateful pricks. Israel ought to remember who keeps them alive.
Tim F.
@John S.:
Iranians protesters did. They argued, accurately, that any direct move by America would discredit the green movement and rally most Iranians behind their government. Conservatives who can still spell “counterproductive” (Larison and Sullivan among others) agreed.
ellaesther
…and just because
this is my area of obsessionit’s my area, generally, I’m going to repost a link I posted in that Open Thread yesterday, mere moments before a much more appropriate thread for it was opened:There’s something happening here. – In which I tie together the fact that CENTCOM asked for US pushback on Israel for reasons of US security interests, the Clinton comments from last Friday, and the fact that Congressional Democrats were literally asking for a call from Mitchell yesterday, to put them in the loop — and then provide you with links and a sample script to LET YOUR CONGRESS CHRITTERS KNOW (+ the White House and the State Dept) if you think that the US should respond like the senior partner it is. ESPECIALLY IF YOU’RE A JEW WHO THINKS THIS!
Makewi
@Redshift:
You want me to provide a link to something that you freely concede occurred, only you quibble over the use of the word meddled. Fine, choose a word that works for you in both cases, it’s all the same.
This one’s a real winner. I think you should run with this one. Maybe you could shorten it to something more like ‘Ungrateful Jews!’
Bobzim
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
If they did stop, someone like Sharon would pull a stunt like his little trip to the Dome of the Rock to stir shit up again.
The violence is the only way for the Israelis who want it all to get what they want. They want and need the violence.
Leelee for Obama
@SiubhanDuinne: For the f’in win! I am not worthy!
Redshift
@Tim F.: (Er, that was me.)
But that’s my point. The argument against “meddling” wasn’t “we shouldn’t meddle because meddling is wrong” it was “we shouldn’t meddle because it will likely produce the exact opposite of what we and the protesters want.” And that’s what makes Makewi’s equating the relationships with Israel and Iran a straw man — the false equivalence presumes the objection is solely over “meddling” in general, without regard to the effectiveness.
John S.
I disagree.
First off, I don’t think that anyone should be relying on a terrorist organization who happens to be in the current business of governing to take the high road. Israel is supposed to be taking the high road and setting the example because they are supposed to be “better” than a fucking terrorist organization.
Second, I don’t think that it is even remotely possible that Israel would stop demonizing Palestinians – even if they ceased all terrorist activities. I honestly believe that if such a thing occurred, Israel would send in a team to stage an attack to start the whole thing over again. They have no interest in peace, recognition or negotiation whereas Palestinians are concerned, and they won’t let a little thing like an unlikely ceasefire get in the way.
EDIT: What Bobzim said.
Makewi
@Tim F.:
Look how well it all turned out. Protest movement crushed, protesters killed and locked up. Iranian government still ruling with an iron fist.
ellaesther
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: But here’s the thing I constantly wish I could tell my fellow Israelis. If we take this sentence
and change the nouns around
it’s just as true. The difference is that Israel is the side with the actual destructive power. But Israel refuses to allow itself to see that. Or, as Uri Savir (former aide to Rabin, former peace negotiator at Oslo) once wrote, Israelis “may have been the first conquerors in history who felt themselves conquered.”
Also (and I’ve already done on too long I’m sorry!), not for nothing, but Israel has a long history of declaring this Palestinian or that too extremist to talk to, and doing its best to destroy them, only to see a more virulent form extremism arise. The PLO was once bent on the destruction of Israel, too.
ellaesther
@SiubhanDuinne: Dude. That is… that is brilliant, that’s what that is!
Leelee for Obama
@ellaesther: I read that and meant to tell you I thought it was a great piece. I think my dinner was burning and then I never got back to it. I hope that there can be some kind of peace there. It just seems so wrong that the birthplace of the three monotheistic faiths is so wrought with violence. I know, religion has led to violence throughout history. But, I can hope it stops.
Makewi
Dude, you are on fire with this stuff. I can feel your love for the Juden oozing from you.
Bobzim
@Makewi:
Bullshit. The Israelis who agree with the quote I cited aren’t ungrateful assholes because they’re Jewish, they’re just ungrateful assholes who happen to be Jewish.
But you run with the “criticism of Israel=anti-Semitism” meme because we know that’s a winner. Well, used to be.
Leelee for Obama
Guess he doesn’t pay much attention to American politics, eh?
Redshift
@Makewi: I’m not quibbling over the use of a word, I’m calling you out for the straw man claim that the word completely describes both actions, and therefore that anyone who approves of one and disapproves of the other is a hypocrite.
I’m not asking for a link to someone using the word “meddling,” I’m asking for a link to someone saying that being opposed to meddling itself was the reason for not intervening in Iran, rather than that meddling would likely produce the opposite of our desired outcome.
In response, you repeated your straw man, only louder, which pretty much says it all.
John S.
Wow, concern trolling about Israel while using a loaded term for Jews. Awesome!
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bobzim: Some of them do want and need the violence, but not the majority, and that goes for most Palestinians also, who just want to live in peace and raise their families. Right now the extremists on both side conduct the violence to remain relevant and have the general populace keep them in power to keep them safe from the other sides attacks. It’s a sad situation, but historically the nature of violence.
My point is that Israel is a democracy, and one with close ties to the US, and thusly can be brought to sane behavior when there is no longer a need to be insane, which Hamas fuels with continual provocation with violence that keeps fear on the minds of reasonable Jews so they elect just as violent leaders to keep them safe. Vicious cycle.
Chyron HR
@Makewi:
No, that would be the view espoused by approximately 100% of Republicans.
Cat Lady
I wish someone could explain to me, like I’m 5 years old, as a non-Jew and non-rapturist why I should support Israel, at all. I don’t care about Israel, or any other country, and object to the military and economic might of this country wielded on behalf of a foreign country. We’ve got a stinking mess on our own plate in that area right now. We’ve armed Israel to the teeth, including nukes, so they can defend themselves from every possible military threat. I wish them good luck with all that, but enough is enough.
Times like these I wish George Washington would appear in the sky, read his farewell speech, and give us all a big fat I told you so.
John S.
Isn’t this the wingnut wet dream?
Martin
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Then why continue with the settlements? The settlements continue because there are factions in Israel that believe they are entitled to expand further. That won’t end just because the Palestinians back down. Both parties are instigators here, and until Israel stops their acts – as a government sanctioned activity, no less, I don’t see how anyone can realistically expect Palestinians to back down.
John S.
Sorry Stuck, but if that were the case then Bibi wouldn’t be back in power. The majority of Israeli voters made a conscious choice to make a HARD turn to the right. That is the government they want. Elections have consequences and all that.
But you are correct about one thing – it is a vicious cycle. But one that only Israel has the power to end.
Litlebritdifrnt
How is it meddling when the US sends billions of dollars of aid to Israel each year? Should the country sending the aid not at least have a say on how it is spent? If Israel wants to piss off the US then it should be happy to give up the billions in aid. Yes?
Midnight Marauder
@Makewi:
Right. Because everyone knows the Green Movement in Iran was supposed to be wrapped up by March 16, 2010.
Wow, you are especially weak today.
ellaesther
@Leelee for Obama: Oh noes, I made you burn the dinner! (And me, a Jewish mom!) Never let the dinner burn. And always save some for me, please.
Thank you, that is very kind! And I have to say that yes, religion has caused a shit-ton of trouble over the years, but it is also the source of much that is good within us. Could we have achieved that good without religion? Some will probably argue yes (some right here, on this board!), but we can’t know.
I think the bad stuff that religion leads to would have happened anyway, what with us being human and all, and the good stuff is because we tried to organize around a common, higher purpose in spite of ourselves. We have not done very well (being human and all), and over the years, the forms of that organization have changed and evolved, and but the point was to appeal to our higher angels.
AhabTRuler
No.
SATSQ, Jerusalem edition.
Bobzim
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
I understand what you’re saying, but I’m helping to fund the ongoing “Weisglass Diet” and I’m fucking sick of it.
It’s genocide by attrition and more Israelis and american Jews should be sick of it, too.
And then to have some (many?) Israelis get the attitude that we need to straighten up is completely fucking galling.
ellaesther
And speaking of dinner, Leelee for Obama, I have to go make some for my family!
So, because I am this way, and the study of and advocacy around this conflict is the thing to which I have dedicated my life (for good or ill…), I leave you with a little more information, if you want it.
Background on the conflict.
Recommended reading on the conflict.
ellaesther
@ellaesther: And, because the filter wouldn’t have allowed three links through:
Israeli-Palestinian and American advocacy groups.
Litlebritdifrnt
@AhabTRuler:
Okay, speaking as a non American alien who has no clue. What the fuck is the hold that Israel has over the US? I mean come on, it appears that they are the nasty little brother who can do no wrong, no matter how many toads he fries and how many cats he tortures. What the fuck is the hold? Are the Jews that powerful of a lobby in the US?
El Cid
The U.S. is purportedly a democracy, but I sure as hell wish that one or more foreign governments could have meddled in our internal politics to stop our own destructive hawk militarists in possession of a governing majority from launching military actions they believed entirely justified and necessary.
srv
There are moderates in Israel just like we have here. For example, President McCain and VP Lieberman have drafted a bill to indefinitely detain, without trial, US citizens on the presidents say-so.
I wonder if Joe’s cousin could get away with that.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Martin:
Yes, they both are instigators, but when one side refuses to entertain the notion that the other has a right to exist and has pledged to drive all Israeli’s into the sea, then you have an obvious problem toward reaching a settlement. I am not taking sides on who is more to blame, but seems to me the only solution first has to be recognition that Israel can exist and if not there is no hope that peace can ever be made.
If you believe Hamas’s belligerence to destroy the state of Israel has something to do with Israeli settlement expansion and the laundry list of Israel’s other excesses, and they are many, then you have a point. I don’t believe personally it does, and I doubt many Israeli’s believe it does at this point.
About the only thing we can hope for is keeping the killing to a minimum as best we can, but I don’t believe the situation is solvable, and they’ve been working on it several thousands of years.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bobzim: I agree that the AIPAC crowd is a sorry bunch of fuckers. And their arrogance pisses me off to no end, as do the Likudite pricks like Netanyahoo, who I despise with a passion. So we agree on these things anyways.
Leelee for Obama
@ellaesther: Thanks, will read them shortly, I have tea to make!!!
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@John S.:
Well then we just disagree on this point.
Cat Lady
@Litlebritdifrnt:
That’s the question that has launched a thousand flaming threads. Just so you know.
MikeJ
The book of Revelations says Israel has to be around so Jesus can throw all the Jews into a fiery pit.
joes527
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: So …. What is Israel’s position on Hamas’s right to exist?
Before we go down a false equivalence rathole, I am not saying Israel == Hamas. I am saying that *the position* that Hamas’s unwillingness to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist means that Hamas should not be allowed to exist swallows its own tail.
Don’t bother enumerating other ways that Hamas is bad. Stipiulated.
lamh31
deleted, gonna post in in open thread
Joseph Nobles
Will this be as successful as getting the centrist Democrats and Republicans to punch the hippies and the birthers and form a ruling coalition on Capitol Hill?
John S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Fair enough, but you forgot to call me an asshole or something for daring to disagree with you (wouldn’t want the community to think you’re going soft).
I just look at who has the power. Israel has almost ALL of the power in their struggle with the Palestinians. Putting the onus to settle the dispute on the weak party seems a bit silly to me. It’s like expecting a kid getting bullied to be the one to make peace with the bully.
El Cid
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: There is no Palestinian force of violence which could threaten the existence of Israel. That is a different question than existing without any attacks, which clearly is deserved (outside direct military resistance to illegal occupation, for which of course Palestinians have lawful resort).
To suggest the acceptance by various governing and non-governing groups of an abstract right for a state to exist (no nation has a “right” to exist) is a barrier to negotiations to end illegal occupation and war is the creation of a standard not recognized in international law.
Should a negotiated settlement achieve 2 states, I rather doubt the Israeli government would be expected to recognize the “right” of a Palestinian inhabited nation of Palestine to exist, nor would they agree to do so.
For that matter, without any defined borders and no apparent push to do so, I’m not entirely sure how one could formally recognize the “right to exist” of a particular state of Israel, given its as yet undefined geographical nature.
arguingwithsignposts
@Makewi:
Thank you, cleek. you rock
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@John S.: Asshole:)
Got to keep up appearances.
The only onus I put on the weaker party, that if they really want their own country and to live in peace, then they will need to rise above the Israeli’s in the spirit of Gandhi and put down the violence.. And I believe the Jewish state of Israel would respond accordingly and American politicians would no longer have a reason to keep massively arming Israel.
It’s not fair maybe, that they should do this, as they have plenty of reason to keep fighting and avenge Israeli excesses and atrocities of killing and oppressing them. But it is the only way this will end IMHO.
MikeJ
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: I’m always fascinated that it’s the side without the tanks and F16s and nukes that should try non violence.
joes527
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Yeah … well … except for the fact that settlement has become both a means and an end.
Passive palistinians won’t change that.
El Cid
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: I think this is largely true, unfair as it may be, which is one reason the various Israeli governments were mirrored by Palestinian militants in destroying the viability of Palestinian ‘partners’. It wasn’t by naivete that Israel helped establish and promote Hamas.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@MikeJ: Counterintuitive, ain’t it. Gandhi proved them wrong, as did MLK.
Bob S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
“…I don’t believe the situation is solvable, and they’ve been working on it several thousands of years.”
No, they haven’t. The statement reflects typical American ignorance of the subject by placing it in a biblical context. Juan Cole has a post today that explains the modern roots of “the situation”.
joes527
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: So by your examples (Gandhi and MLK) … you are saying that it is the palistinians destiny to be assassinated?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
I have been in too many flame wars on the Israeli/Palestinian issue, and swore them off a while back. My only purpose in this thread is to address what the solution might be, not taking sides on the eternal tit for tat between the two sides.
The only solid belief I have is that Israel has a right to exist. The rest is debatable but mostly irrelevant when focused only on what to do now to solve this mess. All I have to say about it at this time.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bob S.: They’ve been fighting over this land for eons. That is all I was saying.
Bob S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: What you’re saying is wrong.
Joseph Nobles
I just saw this at Democratic Underground:
Foreign Policy: The Petreaus Briefing
Much more at the link. My eyes are popping.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bob S.: Wrong That the land of Palestine has been fought over for a very long time. I don’t think so, but you will have to provide more than just your say so that this statement is false.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@El Cid: Thank you!
Bob S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: Yes, there’s been fighting in Palestine, like just about everywhere else, for a very long time. However Jews and Palestinians, who I believe are the subjects of this thread, have not been fighting “for several thousands of years”.
PTirebiter
@lamh31:
Prior to his being adopted by FDL, my only impressions of him have come from the opening tv coverage of the last ten or so State of the Union Addresses. He seems to always get there early for an aisle seat, then jumps and waves trying to get the attention of whichever president, who then invariably goes to some lengths to not make eye contact. It’s kind of sad. Ever since I first noticed him during the Clinton years, and now I can’t look away. He’s like the only boy at a Twilight book signing.
Leelee for Obama
@Joseph Nobles: That is some piece! It is not surprising that someone has finally said it-what is surprising is that it was Petreaus, but he is a student of history, and knows that powerful nations can be drawn into massive clusterfuck wars by alliances with small nations that are attacked. Bad enough when that happens through no fault of the smaller ally. But when there is provocation on their part, it is a military and national security issue that must take precedence over most everything else.
Wow, just wow. Looks like the General took the news cycle today, at least among those of us who are paying attention.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bob S.: If I gave the impression that the two sides lined up fighting one another in the same way for thousands of years, then I apologize for giving that impression. The land has been fought over and occupied by many different actors over the millenia. My point is both sides have a similar ancestry from all of that and can lay claim to this land as a historical homeland.
Bob S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: The Jews who presently populate Israel are much more likely to have their historical homelands in Germany, Poland, or Russia. You’re correct about the Palestinians, however.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bob S.: I though that’s what you were getting at. Nope, they have a longer history than that, and have just as much historical right to have a country on that land as the Palestinians. You are wrong.
JWW
Hey Look,
I’m just a Protestant New Yorker. When was the last time any of you happened to spend time in Israel… It is very nice and very friendly. The funny thing is that every beach, every street corner and every shopping area has one thing in common. A manned and armed gun jeep. It doesn’t really matter who the current leader of Israel is. My first assignment in “82” was no different than “06”. The people are the same the leaders have changed and they are still alone in an area filled with hate. You can cry all you want, but think of something better than pissant tears. Imagine if somehow Cuba was located in the place Kansas currently resides. If you were a Cuban you would retract everything you have said, if you were a US citizen you would continue to write BS as above.
Bob S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
from Wikipedia:
According to Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics, as of 2009, of Israel’s 7 million people, 75.4% were Jews of any background[13] Among them, 68% were Sabras (Israeli-born), mostly second- or third-generation Israelis, and the rest are olim (Jewish immigrants to Israel) — 22% from Europe and the Americas, and 10% from Asia and Africa, including the Arab countries.[14] Nearly half of all Israeli Jews are descended from Jews who immigrated from Europe, while around the same number are descended from Jews who immigrated from Arab countries, Iran, Turkey and Central Asia. Over two hundred thousand are, or are descended from, Ethiopian and Indian Jews.[15]
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bob S.: I don’t care where recent and living Jews came from. I am glad they now have a home their ancestors came from, despite the trouble it’s caused us. Might make it harder for the next monster to try and exterminate them. I do realize you and others disagree. So be it.
Bob S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
“they now have a home their ancestors came from”
Apparently you didn’t understand the part that explained it isn’t Palestine their ancestors came from.
scav
And they don’t get an automatic “We can do whatever the hell we want to whoever the hell we want without criticism” card card because of past history.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bob S.: You apparently don’t understand the full breath of ancestry.
Bruce (formerly Steve S.)
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
There have been massive amounts of nonviolent resistance in Palestine. Funny how you never hear about it in the U.S. media.
ellaesther
Also, I’m just going to throw out there that as an American-Israeli Jew (and just how sick are you all of hearing me describe myself that way? But I digress), I would like to see my people and my nation live to a standard of which I can be proud. I have a stake in this, and the reason I left — and I mean, THE reason I left — was because I could no longer look my country in the eye.
The occupation is wrong. Full stop.
Perpetuating the settlement project is wrong. Full stop.
The war in Gaza was wrong. Full stop.
And not for nothing, but all are/were also damaging to Israel. Full stop.
Whether or not a country at war has a “right” to do this or a “right” to do that, whether or not the world condemns us as harshly as it does others who pursue morally bankrupt policies, whether (indeed) the Palestinians hate us or not — honestly, I don’t care. I care about what we do, and how we do it.
We’re the ones with the tanks, and the backing of a superpower that all but dances to our tune. And what we’re doing is wrong.
We need to own up to that and stop it. Full stop.
El Cid
@Bruce (formerly Steve S.): That’s very true and I didn’t mean to suggest there hadn’t been when agreeing that overall that might have been the better strategy.
Hell, Palestinians are nonviolently resisting just by not fucking dying.
Bob S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Perhaps not.
Or maybe I just have an appreciation for the depth (and breadth) of real history, as opposed to the mythological variety you seem to favor.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bob S.:
You should have stopped right there.
Bob S.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Yeah, sometimes end-zone celebrations can be over-the-top.
Sorry to rub it in.
Leelee for Obama
@ellaesther: See, this is why we have so much in common. I love my Country, but it pisses me off and when it does, I say so. Because it’s about what we do, not what others do. Having to courage to tell the leaders of your country when they’re wrong is a moral imperative. Silence is complicity. Was it Rabbi Heschel who said in a democracy, some are accountable, but all are responsible? If we don’t call them out when they screw up, we do deserve the government we get.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bob S.: LOL. carry on.
Svensker
@Litlebritdifrnt:
The “Jews” are not. The right wing Likudniks are. See Walt, Finkelstein, et al.
ellaesther
@Leelee for Obama: Oh, Heschel. Heschel! I love Heschel.
I looked it up and the quote is close to what you said but a little different: “In a free society where terrible wrongs exist some are guilty but all are responsible.” Where terrible wrongs exist….
He also said about marching in Selma that he had been praying with his feet — advocating for justice in Israel/Palestine is, to me, also about praying with our feet.
Leelee for Obama
@ellaesther: The real quote is better, more evocative of what it means to know even a purportedly “good” government can be guilty of terrible wrongs. It’s in the expiation that a nation finds its way.
I think he was so much the teacher, like King and Gandhi, and now, perhaps, the Imam who wrote the fatwa against violence. I saw him this morning and he was so fierce in his stand against the violence.
Praying with our feet, I like that, too. Gives the idea of a peace march a lyrical quality, doesn’t it.
Viva BrisVegas
The worm continues to eat its own tail and will continue to do so when all of these opportunistic bastards are dead.
It’s demographics that will eventually tell. The non-Jewish proportion of Israel is about 25%, but they contribute about 33% of births. In the 1960s Israel was about 90% Jewish, it is now about 75% and falling slowly.
Inevitably Israel’s status as a Jewish state is going to come under question when the Jewish population becomes a minority. At that stage the choice will be whether the state of Israel will continue as a democracy and accept change, or turn on its own.
Israel wants the West Bank, just not its inhabitants. I expect that the descendants of those Palestinians who manage to stay during the annexation will almost certainly end up in some kind of Israel that includes the West Bank. Of course most won’t have any land, and it will be interesting to see how they are to be kept from the same citizenship as their Israeli arab cousins.
In short the current actions of Israel and the pressure of demographics both conspire to ensure a one state solution.
But then again we’ll all be dead or senile by then, so why worry.
Svensker
@ellaesther:
That is beautiful.
ellaesther
@Leelee for Obama: Wait! Who was that? Twitter did not tell me about that, and I’ve been away from the internet for most of the day!
I would be very grateful indeed for a link.
ellaesther
@Svensker: I want to say thank you, but it’s Heschel! I just love him — acting for justice is an act of worship. It really is that simple.