Article

2005-05-17 Israel-Palestine

MEMRI: This Week's Palestinian Authority Sermon

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Posted by ed 2005-05-17 02:52|| || Front Page|| [11142 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Please move to Page 2: Israel-Palestine. Thanks.

Posted by ed 2005-05-17 02:59|| 2005-05-17 02:59|| Front Page Top

#2 Pardon my ignorance of Middle East/Israel history and I don't want to sound facetious, but can anyone answer me this question: why did the Jews move into this bad neighborhood after WWII? What did they expect would be the ongoing reaction from the Arabs countries? Why did the Jewish Europeans not just start their lives over again in their former "home" countries pre-WWII? Europe was literally shell shocked after the war. Millions upon millions of non Jewish Europeans had their lives, homes, families devasted, many were completely displaced. But everyone else in Europe just started over again. Why did the European Jews migrate to the Middle East to start a new country in known hostile territory. I don't understand what the Jews hoped they would gain by building Israel in the midst of Arab/Muslim countries.

Posted by naivesoul 2005-05-17 03:58|| 2005-05-17 03:58|| Front Page Top

#3 Sheesh. A polite and sincere troll. Lucky us.

Posted by .com 2005-05-17 04:10|| 2005-05-17 04:10|| Front Page Top

#4 I think you will find the answers to that in the old testament.

Posted by Sock Puppet 0â Doom 2005-05-17 04:13|| 2005-05-17 04:13|| Front Page Top

#5 I recognize that there is a biblical association for siting Israel where it is. But the European Jews in 1945 were not biblical aged Jews. They had established themselves in various countries over time. After the horrors of WWII, after suffering through the hatred of the Naziis, who were now vanquished, why not go back to their old lives? Why start anew in a hostile part of the world? Did they think the Arabs would change their attitudes over time? It's not like the Arabs were more progressive or welcoming to the Jews in 1945. The Arabs were as hostile in 1945 as they are today. My point is that if I had been a European Jew in 1945, who had just survived the Naziis, the last thing I'd do is move to the Middle East next door to Arabs.

Basically, all I'm saying is I agree with the sarcasm of #1 - peace will not be around the corner - but that's no change from 1945.

Posted by naivesoul 2005-05-17 04:25|| 2005-05-17 04:25|| Front Page Top

#6 That wasn't sarcasm, that was the poster of the article realizing this should've been placed on Page 2 - Wot Background. Look a tad closer. Another example of where the nym has some relevance.

Posted by .com 2005-05-17 04:28|| 2005-05-17 04:28|| Front Page Top

#7 Part of the answer is that the move for Jews to return to Israel began well before WWII. After the Nazis, that movement grew rapidly, for obvious reasons.

Another part of the answer is that Jerusalem and its surroundings was a nearly rural area with virtually no economy or political action when the return began.

Posted by too true 2005-05-17 06:19|| 2005-05-17 06:19|| Front Page Top

#8 I should add that I'm not Jewish nor am I an automatic defender of the Israeli state. But I've been there and I've seen photos of the area from the 20s and 30s. There were some towns and small cities along the coast, but much of what is now part of Israel was undeveloped and the local Arabs - some of whom were Christian at the time, now converted to Islam under threats or moved awsay - had little in the way of political or economic organization.

Posted by too true 2005-05-17 06:21|| 2005-05-17 06:21|| Front Page Top

#9 What did they expect would be the ongoing reaction from the Arabs countries? Err, what neighbouring Arab countries? At the end of WW2, Jordan didn't exist, Lebanon and Syria were French colonies and Egypt while nominally independant was a British protectorate and the Sinai was not part of its contiguous territory since it was separated from Egypt by the British/French controlled Canal Zone (at the time not legally part of Egypt).

Posted by phil_b 2005-05-17 07:58|| 2005-05-17 07:58|| Front Page Top

#10 I am Jewish. To enable naivesoul to understand the meaningfullness of my answer to him, I share the following: my German-Jewish mother (the family has records of residence in Germany dating back centuries) lived through the war in hiding in Holland; my Latvian-Jewish father escaped to Palestine in 1934, but almost all of his family was wiped out by antisemites -- whether Nazis, Latvians or Soviets, we don't know, nor does it really matter. Some of my mother's relatives did choose to remain in Europe after the war.

First of all, find a copy of Mark Twain's Innocents Abroad, and read the chapter on the Holy Land. Twain wrote this near the end of the 19th century. He writes of the emptiness of what is now Israel, of not seeing a single person outside the members of their touring party for days, as they rode around the countryside. He also writes of the wreck of the land itself, alternating between arid, rocky waste and swampland. Next, check out the history links at Little Green Footballs (look on the left side for "resources" as you scroll down). This will give you a good feel for the history of the region, including population changes over the last two centuries.

OK. Now that you've cleared your mind of misconceptions, naivesoul, you are ready for some answers.

Why did the Jews choose to settle in what is now Israel, and declare independent Statehood as a secular Jewish State? Very simply, because the world reaction to the Holocaust -- essentially, "So the Nazis are killing Jews wholesale? Somebody ought perhaps to do something, but don't let those dirty Jews into my country!" -- proved to those who had hoped for safety in universal suffrage and national citizenship (my German grandfather earned an Iron Cross fighting for the Kaiser in WWI, as did several of his brothers and cousins, my Latvian grandmother and her friends did the work to make Latvian a proper language -- defining grammar and vocabulary, writing poetry and literature -- which enabled Latvia to establish nationhood after WWI in the way that the peasant dialect it had been up to that point could not have) that in the end no matter how thoroughly they assimilated -- and of my mother's family half had converted to Christianity long before the rise of the Nazis-- they would still be rejected as alien, with all the risks that was demonstrated to entail.

The world proved conclusively Theodor Herzl's contention, that without a Nation of their own to flee to, the Jews of the Diaspora would never be truly safe at the hands of other nations. In other words, in this post-Holocaust world, Zionism is the only sane and moral response.

For naivesoul's separate question, why a Jewish State in the midst of the Muslim Arabs? First of all, the Jews never completely left Israel. There have been Jewish communities in continuous existence in Hebron, Tiberius, Jerusalem, among others, since long before the Roman Conquest. Second, it is certainly no less safe to live as a Jew in Israel than in, say, France, and considerably safer than in any of the Arab countries, from which Jewish communities that in some cases dated back to the time of King Solomon, or to the destruction of the First Temple in 586 B.C.E., were ejected with pogroms and plunder in the years following Israel's establishment in 1948. Of Israel's approximately 4 million Jews today, over half came from the Muslim world -- now happily Judenfrei -- not from post-Holocaust Europe. And finally, where else would you suggest an independent Jewish homeland be established?

I hope Rantburgers will excuse the longwinded yet necessarily incomplete answer. But naivesoul did ask politely, and I have tried to answer in kind.

Posted by trailing wife 2005-05-17 08:28|| 2005-05-17 08:28|| Front Page Top

#11 TW,
Thanks for responding much more eloquently than I could. The bottom line is that Jewish integration into European nation states did not work. They learned the hard way that they could only rely upon themselves to fulfill the most basic of state functions, the protection of their lives. The Germans had a lot of help in sending the Jews of continental Europe to the extermination camps.

Posted by ed 2005-05-17 09:31|| 2005-05-17 09:31|| Front Page Top

#12 The Germans had a lot of help in sending the Jews of continental Europe to the extermination camps.

France, for example. Vichy rounded them up on their own.

Posted by Laurence of the Rats 2005-05-17 9:36:12 AM|| [http://www.punictreachery.com/] 2005-05-17 9:36:12 AM|| Front Page Top

#13 Excellent response, TW!

I'd like to point out that the Persian Empire legitimately returned the Jewish people to their land, and other than the incident with Haman (which was recitifed in accordance to their customs and manner) had excellent relations with them. The Jews, in their own land, suffered worse under the hands of the proto-EUROS, the Greeks and the Romans. it appears to me that the current day Europeans and the new roman empire, the EU (complete with civil servants acting just like Roman Empire Era bureaucrats), somehow has decided that it is mandatory for them to enforce ancient Roman Empire edicts vis-a-vis the Jews. However, keep in mind that the Jews were tossed out of their own land by the Romans because they were under subjugation and were acting to free themselves.

I issue a challenge to the supposed spiritual heirs of Ghandi and Martin Luther King: YOU challenge the Palestinians to engage in NONVIOLENT and peaceful, non-inflammatory, civil disobedience and protest. 100% STOP suicide bombings. NO MORE Kassam rockets. NO MORE sniping at cars on the freeways. NO MORE bus bombings. CHALLENGE the Palestinians to challenge the Israelis to show themselves the betters of the Colonial British or Old South americans, or prepare to demonstrate that they are WORSE.

Surely the adherents to the RELIGION OF PEACE can show Black Christians and Hindu Indians how to really do it, hmmmm?

Posted by Ptah">Ptah 2005-05-17 10:27|| http://www.crusaderwarcollege.org]">[http://www.crusaderwarcollege.org] 2005-05-17 10:27|| Front Page Top

#14 ptah...well said!!

Posted by 2b 2005-05-17 10:30|| 2005-05-17 10:30|| Front Page Top

#15 why did the Jews move into this bad neighborhood after WWII?

Because Rhode Island wasn't available...

Posted by Raj 2005-05-17 10:45|| 2005-05-17 10:45|| Front Page Top

#16 Thank you trailing wife and others for your mini history lesson. I will do further reading of the history of the ME.

That wasn't sarcasm, that was the poster of the article realizing this should've been placed on Page 2 - Wot Background. Look a tad closer. Another example of where the nym has some relevance.
What are you talking about? The original article poster said at the end of the sheik's long rant, "Peace is just around the corner." I took that to mean that the poster was making a grim understatement.

Posted by naivesoul 2005-05-17 11:04|| 2005-05-17 11:04|| Front Page Top

#17 Why did the European Jews migrate to the Middle East to start a new country in known hostile territory. I don't understand what the Jews hoped they would gain by building Israel in the midst of Arab/Muslim countries.

Because we like it here.

Posted by gromgoru 2005-05-17 11:23|| 2005-05-17 11:23|| Front Page Top

#18 naivesoul - Sheesh - are you for real? I have to ask: Are you being willfully dense, argumentative for the helluvit, or just not paying attention?

In comment #5 you referred to comment #1:
"Basically, all I'm saying is I agree with the sarcasm of #1 - peace will not be around the corner - but that's no change from 1945."

Comment #1 is the guy who posted the article, ed, requesting that the RB Editors move the story to Page 2. It was not directed to other commenters for their take or reaction.

Take note of the centered headers you find within the articles listed on the main page:
Page 1 - WoT Operations
Page 2 - Wot Background
Page 3 - Non Wot

Now, have you got it?

If you were referring to ed's inline comment, "Peace is just around the corner.", then why didn't you quote it (usually done in italics)?

Why did you refer to it as #1? "#1" is the comment I explained above.

Suggestion: STFU and lurk until you "get it" regards how a site works, its norms and conventions. If you just read RB for a few days, before dazzling us with you wit and wisdom, most all would be clear.

Posted by .com 2005-05-17 11:34|| 2005-05-17 11:34|| Front Page Top

#19 thanks to TW.

Other historical data - in some cases antisemitism continued in central and eastern europe even after WW2. There was a pogrom in Poland in 1946. Throughout the region Jewish homes and businesses were in the hands of gentiles, who didnt want the Jews back. In other cases homes and businesses had been destroyed, and peoples families had been destroyed. Often whole communities had been destroyed. Also Jews in eastern europe found themselves simultaneously persecuted by Communists (if they were religious) and blamed by the local gentile population FOR the Communists.

Basically returning to "normal" life wasnt real possible for most - prewar Jewish life in most of Eastern Europe was by no means normal, and it was less normal after the war.

Posted by Liberalhawk 2005-05-17 11:48|| 2005-05-17 11:48|| Front Page Top

#20 Laurence of the Rats

I am sorry to disappoint you about France. but France had one of the lowest WWII death rates for Jews in all of occupied countries. First of all, the real antisemites and pro-Germans were not at Vichy but in Paris working directly with the Germans. Second of all: Vichy set up discriminatory laws for the Jews like banning them from exercing certain professions but Vichy NEVER sent French Jews into occupied France. I am less sure about Jew immigrants from other countries, specially for the illegals. The one big sin of Vichy was allowing the Parisian police (who, despite being in occupied zone still responded to Vichy) to help the Germans for the "Rafle du VÃ©lodrome d'Hiver": the rounding of 13,000 Parisian Jews, 4,000 of them children, and their deporting to Germany. They ended at Auschwitz. However consider that even if massive murdering of Russian Jews had started from June,22th 1941 (with the help of locals) the final solution and the building of extermination camps were decided at the conference of WannSee January, 20th, 1942. Allow for a couple months until the camps and the infrastutcure (railroads) are built before they begin operating. In July 1942 when the roundings of the Parisian Jews took place, the truth about the camp system still has not leaked. Neither Allies, Vichy or the deported people knew about Auschwitz: they thought their destination were forced labor camps or concentration camps not extermination camps and gas chambers. After Torch, the invasion of Vichy France by the Germans ended the fiction of an autonomous French governemnt able to order police forces to not help Germans.

Now let's look at numbers: where Jews had better chance of surival? In Denmark. But Denmark was a special case: technically it had never been at war with Germany (Germany acted like its troops were stationned in, instead of occupying, Denmark) and since Nazis considered Scandinavs as purer Arians than Germans themselves, the Danish authorities had a LOT more autonomy than the French ones. Then it is Italy, but Italy was an ally not an occupied country and until the string of defeats forced Mussolini into subordination (ie until end 1942) Italy was able to say NO to the Germans (neither Italy's monarchist army or the civilian Fascist state were specially anti-semitic). And in third place and first in the "really occupied" countries we have... France with a survival rate nearly two times higher than in Belgium, four times than in the Neterlands, not to mention Poland where survival rate was near zero.

And while France sharing borders with two neutral countries was a factor the basic reason is that what Laval told Germans he would do was not necessarily was what he ordered the ministers to do and still less what ministers ordered to the chain of command and so on until the basic policeman or gendarme who decided the execution of the order could wait another day. And quite simply about your average Jean or Jaques who "forgot" that shopkeeper he saw every day was a Jew (many examples of Jews living in plain sight in the small cities of Southern France).

Now, if you want to give examples of anti-semitism how about Croatia, Poland or Czechoslovakia where survival rate was close to zero, populace eagerly helped the Germans , at times massacred Jews directly and where pogroms continued well after German's withdrawal?

Posted by JFM">JFM 2005-05-17 11:54|| 2005-05-17 11:54|| Front Page Top

#21 Well shit. The following is no longer true:

Take note of the centered headers you find within the articles listed on the main page:
Page 1 - WoT Operations
Page 2 - Wot Background
Page 3 - Non Wot

But this is the categorization methodology used on RB.

Posted by .com 2005-05-17 12:00|| 2005-05-17 12:00|| Front Page Top

#22 TW, great post.

Posted by Deacon Blues">Deacon Blues 2005-05-17 12:15|| 2005-05-17 12:15|| Front Page Top

#23 JFM - Thank you for providing more detailed information on the subject. I wonder if this is the source of what I thought I knew on the matter:

The one big sin of Vichy was allowing the Parisian police (who, despite being in occupied zone still responded to Vichy) to help the Germans for the "Rafle du VÃ©lodrome d'Hiver": the rounding of 13,000 Parisian Jews, 4,000 of them children, and their deporting to Germany. They ended at Auschwitz.

Posted by Laurence of the Rats 2005-05-17 12:24:51 PM|| [http://www.punictreachery.com/] 2005-05-17 12:24:51 PM|| Front Page Top

#24 I have to confess I don't know much of the activity of the Vichy "governement" after Torch and German's occupation of the Free Zone aka Vichy. From vague memories this led to the end of the "Resistant Vichy": the people who dreamed that Vichy could be the instrument of a revenge of the Germans and who while being loyal to the idol Petain had provided information to the Allies or hid weapons for the future (when occupying Germans were surprised as how many had escaped their missions of disarmament, problem is that most of the AT guns were 25 mm, marginally useful in 1940 and a liability in November 1942). We can also guess that the 1942 invasion allowed entry in the government of the true collaborationists and antisemitics who were previously in Paris instead of Vichy. I don't know what happenned with the "true" Vichists: ie the ones who were fundamentally traditionalists, anti-Republic and "return to peasantry".

The best books about Vichy are not from French authors (the subject still hurts here) but from an American historian: Robert Paxton. Google about him if you are interested in the subject.

Posted by JFM">JFM 2005-05-17 15:02|| 2005-05-17 15:02|| Front Page Top

#25 Summing up: the simplest argument seems to be, "we can live in our own country with our own law and our own military, surrounded by people who hate us, or we can stay in countires like France where we have no law, no military, and are surrounded by people who hate us." What a no brainer.

Posted by Weird Al 2005-05-17 16:48|| 2005-05-17 16:48|| Front Page Top

#26 interesting comments. Somehow missed tw's post earlier. great post!

Posted by 2b 2005-05-17 17:25|| 2005-05-17 17:25|| Front Page Top

#27 I thank you all for your more than generous praise. At Rantburg I have had the priviledge of sitting at the feet of masters (of many diverse and interesting things, and my vocabulary is greatly expanded as a result!), and I hope my posts reflect what I have learned here. But gromgoru speaks with the voice of a true Israeli -- succinct and backed by the weaponry to enforce it. ;-) Liberalhawk is more knowlegeable than I about many things Jewish, but his nym (is that term correct here, .com?) sometimes handicaps him here at Rantburg. And our darling .com seems to need a hug today.

Raj, Grand Island (in the middle of the Niagara River) was once -- truly! -- offered as a homeland for the Jews of America, but they weren't interested, being rather busy helping settle the rest of the continent at the time. And the Arabists of the British Foreign Office proffered Kenya as a substitute homeland, which would be less upsetting to their romantic Arab pets, but that offer was also not accepted. Part of the problem between the Arabs and the Jews with regard to Israel is that during WWII the British government promised the same land several times over, to the different groups that needed to be wooed to help... or at least not sabotage ... the war effort. And so the Jews accepted the promise, and sent troops and translators (my father, who was still too young to soldier, was sent off to the border between Persia and Russia as a translator), while the Arabs engaged not to openly support Hitler. Of course Yasir Arafat's uncle did broadcast propaganda from Berlin, and much of the antisemitic drivel coming out of the Muslim/Arab world clearly derives from Nazi memes and images, but what's a little blatant support between friends?

Posted by trailing wife 2005-05-17 22:52|| 2005-05-17 22:52|| Front Page Top

#28 A hug?

Baby, I'd eat you alive! Lol!

;->

Posted by .com 2005-05-17 23:14|| 2005-05-17 23:14|| Front Page Top

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