Zionism is Wrong

[Rex Rgis Verum]

It's fucked up how the UN basically kicked the Palestinians out of the land they occupied in order to creation a Jewish state. Yes, I know the Palestinians were offered territory as well as the Jews during the 1947 UN Partition Plan, but the Palestinians got offered the equivalent of shit compared to what the Jews were offered. And I don't understand why some people claim pro-Palestine is anti-Semitic. Those people need to get their heads out of their asses; Arabs are also Semitic people. This isn't about religion for me; it's about human rights. Israel is no better than the United States during its westward expansion, Nazi Germany, or any other nation that has committed genocide. The oppressed has become the oppressor.

[youtube:d8e5qowf]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GO5Cay6GUkM[/youtube:d8e5qowf]

[Nonsensei]

You have restated the issue (as you see it) but suggested no course of action.

[Jason78]

As I've said before: when people start to claim that they are superior to other races or special in some way, it's the start of a whole mess of trouble.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Somebody please show me a piece of the Middle East that wasn't taken from its former owner by its present owners?

[stromboli]

Well gee, awhile back I would probably rally to defend the Jews, but when they keep doing shit that is indefensible, it just gets to be a waste of time. Seriously, I don't fucking care anymore.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

There are ZERO good guys here. Nothing changes in the Middle East.

[Shiranu]

It's fucked up how the UN basically kicked the Palestinians out of the land they occupied in order to creation a Jewish state.

If by "basically kicked the Palestinians out" you mean gave the Jews parts of the inhospitable (at the time) Negev desert and marsh that wasn't being lived on, then yeah that does sound terrible. Of course the Arab land owners didn't have any problem selling alot more land to Jews as well...

Yes, I know the Palestinians were offered territory as well as the Jews during the 1947 UN Partition Plan, but the Palestinians got offered the equivalent of shit compared to what the Jews were offered.

Over half of the land given to the Israeli's was the Negev desert, which again was nearly uninhabited because it is... a desert. When you take that into account, the Palestinians got more arable land than the Israelis, though it does look like the Israelis got most of the land around the Golan heights which I don't think is necessarily fair.

But to claim they were given shit is just dead wrong. The Jews were given unused desert and marsh that they irrigated and drained and for the most part land they bought of Arabs. I would say the deal was about equal since they did get the Golan heights area (not sure if their bit was a fertile, because they really nice bits of it are in Syria).

And I don't understand why some people claim pro-Palestine is anti-Semitic. Those people need to get their heads out of their asses; Arabs are also Semitic people.

Agreed, though not necessarily because of them both being Semitic. I consider myself Pro-Israel and Pro-Palestine; both have just as much right to that land as the other.

Israel is no better than the United States during its westward expansion, Nazi Germany, or any other nation that has committed genocide. The oppressed has become the oppressor.

Israel is still better on human rights than Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and all their neighbours though, so they at least have that going for them. And personally, when you have spent 70-some-years hearing all your neighbours say, "We will drive you back into the ocean, you sub-human Jews. We will not rest till your cities lie in ruins and dead Jews litter the street of Jerusalem!"... and not just from the normal people but the heads of political parties of your neighbours... as well as having war after war after war declared on you... yeah, I can see how Israel can be harsh on their neighbours.

Also, the numbers aren't even remotely genocidal. Nice emotion porn there though.

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/douglas-an ... 46096.html

THE TOTAL NUMBER of Israelis and Palestinians killed, in over half a century of conflict, is approximately 15,000. This includes all of the fatalities on both sides. The great majority of these have been armed enemy combatants.

'

Edit: It also says in the article that, even though it was an Israeli study, it has been criticized as being biased towards the Palestinians cause from neutral groups. So that doesn't help it look too genocidal...

-----------------

If you go back far enough, if the posts are still there, to a year or two ago... I was a huge proponent of the Palestinians and thought the Israelis were monsters as well. But the facts simply don't support that. Do the Israelis do some fucked up shit? Yeah, and that shit needs to stop. But have the Israelis been committing genocide? Fuck no. Have the Israeli's gained most of their land either legally or through the Arab States declaring war after war on them and getting their asses handed to them? Yeah. To say Israel is a monster state on par the United States, Nazi Germany, North Korea or wherever is, going by evidence to the contrary, pure propaganda emotional porn.

If you consider Israel to have committed anything that looks remotely like genocide, you are embracing an ignorance that is inseparable from the most vulgar forms of prejudice. It is so patently counterfactual that you cannot even call it bad history: It is simply slander.

[zarus tathra]

Define "good guys."

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Define "good guys."

Me, for starters.

[Thumpalumpacus]

"Genocide", as a word, has a meaning.  That meaning is not satisfied by the events in the Levant.

[stromboli]

It is this kind of ridiculous hyperbole that throws any discussion into idiocy. Regardless of how you feel about whatever the Israelis are doing, you have to understand that they have been fighting for survival since 1948. They number about 6.5 million, just counting the Jewish populace. They are surrounded by millions of people who have long ago declared that they should be eradicated. I fail to see how one can accuse the Jewish Israelis of pursuing genocide.

I don't agree with what they are doing. I'm not defending their actions. But every time we have similar topics on the forum, it always degenerates into these evil, nasty Jews are so bad to the helpless Palestinians which is if anything a PR trick. Palestinians are backed by any number of factions like Hezbollah that want the Jews destroyed. Jews do not strap bombs on their women and send them into public places to wreak destruction. figure it the fuck out, for hell's sake. You are siding with a huge majority of Muslims that have sworn the destruction of Israel for decades. Palestine is just the focal point. If you're looking for genocide, try that.

[The Skeletal Atheist]

Lol people having rights to land because of race and religion.

In all seriousness while Israel has done a lot of horrible things nothing they have done has come close to genocide.

Have they mistreated the Palestinian people? Yes. Have the Palestinians contributed to the cycle of violence? Also yes.

Acting like there is a "good guy" in this is misinformed at best. What we have here is one muscle bound idiot and one small but crafty idiot fighting over a sandbox.

[Rex Rgis Verum]

Over half of the land given to the Israeli's was the Negev desert, which again was nearly uninhabited because it is... a desert. When you take that into account, the Palestinians got more arable land than the Israelis, though it does look like the Israelis got most of the land around the Golan heights which I don't think is necessarily fair.

But to claim they were given shit is just dead wrong. The Jews were given unused desert and marsh that they irrigated and drained and for the most part land they bought of Arabs. I would say the deal was about equal since they did get the Golan heights area (not sure if their bit was a fertile, because they really nice bits of it are in Syria).

I didn't mean shit in terms of quality of land. I meant that the Palestinians were already inhabitants of about 94% of the land that is currently Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank, yet the UN basically divided that land up and said both of you can have it 50-50. It was a one-sided deal. Israelis gained a massive increase in land and Palestinians lost a significant portion of the land they inhabited. It would be like a mortgage company going to someone's house and telling the owner that a renter of a single room gets to own half the house just because the mortgage company's CEO's rival CEO banged the renter's girlfriend and wants to make it up to him. That's fucked up.

If you go back far enough, if the posts are still there, to a year or two ago... I was a huge proponent of the Palestinians and thought the Israelis were monsters as well. But the facts simply don't support that. Do the Israelis do some fucked up shit? Yeah, and that shit needs to stop. But have the Israelis been committing genocide? Fuck no. Have the Israeli's gained most of their land either legally or through the Arab States declaring war after war on them and getting their asses handed to them? Yeah. To say Israel is a monster state on par the United States, Nazi Germany, North Korea or wherever is, going by evidence to the contrary, pure propaganda emotional porn.

Okay, maybe genocide is too strong a term to use in this situation. Not once did I say that Israel was committing genocide; I merely stated that Israel was no better than nations that have committed genocide. But the fact remains that the Israeli military is murdering a lot more Palestinians than are Palestinians murdering Israelis. Yes, I understand both sides are guilty of murdering innocent civilians, but most of the killing appears to be in Gaza by the Israelis. I will say that both the Israeli military and Hamas are fucked up entities, but then again, so is every military force in the world. I'm not giving a pass to either side.

[Rex Rgis Verum]

It is this kind of ridiculous hyperbole that throws any discussion into idiocy. Regardless of how you feel about whatever the Israelis are doing, you have to understand that they have been fighting for survival since 1948. They number about 6.5 million, just counting the Jewish populace. They are surrounded by millions of people who have long ago declared that they should be eradicated. I fail to see how one can accuse the Jewish Israelis of pursuing genocide.

I don't agree with what they are doing. I'm not defending their actions. But every time we have similar topics on the forum, it always degenerates into these evil, nasty Jews are so bad to the helpless Palestinians which is if anything a PR trick. Palestinians are backed by any number of factions like Hezbollah that want the Jews destroyed. Jews do not strap bombs on their women and send them into public places to wreak destruction. figure it the fuck out, for hell's sake. You are siding with a huge majority of Muslims that have sworn the destruction of Israel for decades. Palestine is just the focal point. If you're looking for genocide, try that.

Like I've stated, this isn't about religion for me, so you can disregard the entire Judaism verses Islam thing. I'd be pissed too if the land I'd lived on--as well as my ancestors for the past how ever many centuries--was effectively taken from me, and I would fight to get it back. If me being anti-Zionist equates to siding with Muslims in your mind, so be it. Like I've said, it's not about religion for me. I'm against any ideology that believes a certain group of people has a divine right to a particular piece of land and all other people can fuck right off. I wouldn't have a problem had the UN said that the Jews can go live in what is present day Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank, and the UN would protect Jews from any Muslim threat, but for the Jews to get an entire country, many of them not being fond of non-Jews inhabiting Israel, and wanting Israel to be a homogeneous nation doesn't sit well with me.

You have restated the issue (as you see it) but suggested no course of action.

The only viable course of action for the foreseeable future would be war, but as someone who opposes war and the atrocities it brings, I'm not going to be the one advocating it. In a perfect world, diplomacy would solve this issue and Palestine would become a sovereign state, but the United States and Israel will do everything in their power to make sure that doesn't occur in the foreseeable future. In the meantime, the U.S. needs to push its political weight and order a ceasefire then maybe diplomatic relations can s l o w l y be formed between Israel and Palestine.

[VladK]

It's fucked up how the UN basically kicked the Palestinians out of the land they occupied in order to creation a Jewish state.

Only there was never such a thing as an independent Palestinian state, there was no country to "occupy" called "Palestine". Israel was carved out of the defunct Ottoman Empire by western powers like a lot of its neighbors (unless you think the Ottoman Empire was a great thing that should be recreated, you have nothing to argue here and if you do, you're basically supporting Islamic supremacism). Also there are still Palestinians living in Israel today as citizens, so they weren't all "kicked out" and about the ones kicked out, there's a lot of dispute about what happened. The problem is as soon as Israel was created, its neighbors launched a war to destroy the newly created state and lost. Many Palestinians became refugees this way. Those who stayed however became citizens of Israel. In fact they're 20% of the Israeli population.

The oppressed has become the oppressor.

It's like people who say this don't consider the alternative which is far worse. Israel, with all the faults you can possibly find, is actually a decent place to live and a technological giant. If there was no Israel, all you'd have is a Palestinian state governed by Sharia where basic human rights westerners take for granted are regularly denied. Don't you know anything about how Hamas or Fatah govern there? There have been reports of sexism, homophobia, summary executions for enemies of the regime without trial. Coming out as atheist in Gaza would probably be suicidal. What is your appeal to the Palestinian side which is ultimately about jihad?

Omar Bakri pretty much explained it in Islamic terms. They fight Israel because it is located on former Muslim land (Ottoman), so in a way it is "defensive" jihad but not in a good way. It's not just Palestinian Muslims, devout Muslims all around the world routinely prove themselves to be hostile to Israel's existence, the more devout the more hostile. It is ultimately about reclaiming Islamic hegemony over the land and less about "oppression" of Palestinians (which Palestinian leaders themselves often engage in). You know who else they said this about: Spain (also former Muslim land), Balkans (previous Muslim domination in the region through tribute tax, jizya). Should Spain give back the land to Muslim Andalus? Should Romania pay jizya to the Muslim world? It's madness. Then of course there is offensive jihad as commanded in the infamous verse Surah 9:29, although that's a bit harder to successfully carry out since the Islamic world is weak militarily and the last caliphate was abolished in 1924.

http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article ... -countries

Spain, for instance, is a Muslim territory. Eastern Europe as well. Romania, Albania, Macedonia, Serbia, Kosovo, Bosnia... but due to its decision to send troops to Afghanistan and Iraq and its military cooperation with Israel, Bulgaria is also a legitimate target

A manual of Islamic law, Reliance of the Traveler says:

o9.3 Jihad is also (O: personally) obligatory for everyone (O: able to perform it, male or female, old or
young) when the enemy has surrounded the Muslims (O: on every side, having entered our territory,
even if the land consists of ruins, wilderness, or mountains, for non-Muslim forces entering Muslim lands
is a weighty matter that cannot be ignored, but must be met with effort and struggle to repel them by
every possible means.

I can't support insane supremacist ambitions to wipe Israel off the map just because Islamic supremacists don't like the fact that the region is no longer governed by Sharia. Both Hamas and Fatah are guilty of this to various degrees, both their charters call for the abolition of Israel, not for a two-state solution, both have demonstrated in word and deed that they cannot be trusted. Peace will only happen when they stop being radical. Why should Israel be expected to negotiate with people who want to destroy it? Any viable Palestinian state alongside Israel would have to be either demilitarized or secularized or both as there are very legitimate concerns to the security of Israel. A country run by terrorists will only server as a platform to advance the jihad against Israel.

Even now the damage they have done to their young children's minds through jihad propaganda on Palestinian television (they demonize Jews as apes and pigs, they glorify martyrdom and suicide bombings) would take at least 20 years to reverse since you'd have to educate an entire new generation without this mindset.

as well as my ancestors for the past how ever many centuries--was effectively taken from me, and I would fight to get it back.

Do you know that many Jews were expelled from Muslims majority countries following the creation of Israel?

Do you know that Turkey expelled Greeks and Greece expelled Turks in a sort of population exchange?

Should USA be given back to Native Americans?

Are you aware of the damage the USSR did to Eastern European countries between 1945 and 1990? How many of its population now form terror cells calling for the destruction of Russia or blowing Russian civilians up? None.

Life isn't fair all the time, but you can't make unrealistic demands or blow civilians up because of what happened X number of decades ago (which in this case isn't even accurate). Israel is there to stay whether you like it or not.

I'm against any ideology that believes a certain group of people has a divine right to a particular piece of land and all other people can fuck right off.

You do you realize that a lot of Jews including Zionist Jews are basically Jews culturally and not really religious? I guess it becomes a bit confusing since it's both religion and a sort of quasi-national identity. So in that sense, how is it different from French who believe that France is French land? Is nationalism in general wrong? If so what is the practical alternative cause I don't see one?

Also I don't think that any sensible Israeli Jew (religious or otherwise) would like to see a regime change where they're basically ruled by some version of Sharia law. Do you realize that when you say Zionism is wrong you are effectively saying what Hamas is saying, that Israel should be dismantled?