From coast to coast, as Progressive American rabbis continue to call for peace, they are inadvertently revealing their tragic inability to acknowledge that the world in which they once formulated their positions on Israel has changed almost beyond recognition. The gaping disconnect between the world that these rabbis pretend exists and the one that actually exists renders their message both irrelevant and myopically dangerous. For the goal of religious leadership ought to be to get people to do something. Yet, acting while denying reality can lead only to grievous, and, perhaps, irredeemable mistakes.
Jews do not easily surrender our hopes for peace. But increasingly, beginning with the Second Intifada, Israelis have come to doubt the possibility of a “land for peace” deal. That doubt increased when Gazans voted Hamas into power after Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005. In recent years, as more Israelis have come to understand that there is no placating Gazans, who see themselves as descendants of 1948 refugees from the Negev and the coastal plain (precisely the places that Gazans shelled during the recent conflict), Israeli despair has only hardened.
That the situation is both dangerous and depressing is undeniable. But responsible leadership does not deny reality, no matter how sad it may be. It first acknowledges what exists, and only then tries to imagine what we can do to create a better world.
Yet that is precisely too many American Progressive Jewish leaders refuse to do. As Operation Pillar of Defense was raging, the rabbi of Ikar in Los Angeles wrote to that community saying that what Israel needed to do was “engage earnestly and immediately in peace negotiations with the Palestinian Authority,” demonstrating an utter lack of understanding of the power balance between Hamas and Fatah, or of the hatred of Israel that is now systemic in Palestinian life. When the UN General Assembly voted to upgrade the Palestinians’ status to that of non-member observers, the rabbis of Bnai Jeshurun in New York wrote their community saying that “The vote at the UN [was] a great moment for us as citizens of the world. … This is an opportunity to celebrate the process that allows a nation to come forward and ask for recognition.”
Do these rabbis imagine in their wildest dreams that any parallel sentiment will emerge from the other side? The ink was hardly dry on that letter when Hamas’ political chief Khaled Meshal said that “Palestine is ours from the river to the sea and from the south to the north. There will be no concession on any inch of the land… there is no legitimacy for Israel.” Meshal continued: “We will free Jerusalem inch by inch, stone by stone. Israel has no right to be in Jerusalem.” Does anyone really imagine that Israeli concessions in the West Bank can curb this sort of hatred? Would an Israeli willingness to deny Meshal’s view and his popularity strengthen Israel or weaken it? Shortly after that, it was reported that PA forces in the West Bank have ceased all operations designed to curtail Hamas’ influence in the West Bank. Can anyone doubt what that means?
Some responsible American Jewish voices are coming to terms with this new reality. Leon Wieseltier recently wrote in The New Republic that “I no longer believe that peace between Israelis and Palestinians will occur in my lifetime. I have not changed my views; I have merely lost my hopes.
Wieseltier is, sadly, where most Israelis are. Progressive American voices, tragically, are in a very different place. “We are deeply entrenched in our narratives of good and evil, victim and perpetrator,” Ikar’s rabbi wrote, unwilling to take a stand on whether Hamas was good or evil, victim or perpetrator, while Bnai Jeshurun’s followed with that note that the UN vote was a great moment for them “as citizens of the world.”Jews have always seen ourselves as citizens of the world. But key to Judaism’s survival has been an ability to couple that universal concern to a clear-eyed assessment of the challenges and dangers facing the Jewish world. The mark of great religious leadership is not simply its ability to imagine a better world, but to imagine how we might get to that world from the one that actually exists. We will know great Progressive religious leadership is emerging when we see the world that they describe bears at least some resemblance to the one in which Israel has to try to survive.
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Dr. Daniel Gordis is Senior Vice President of the Shalem Center, where he is also a senior fellow. The author of numerous books on Jewish thought and currents in Israel...
The Jewish State must end, say its enemies, from intellectuals like Tony Judt to hate-filled demagogues like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Even average Israelis are wondering if they wouldn't be better off somewhere else. 
After traveling to Israel in 2007, I came back to the safety of the U.S. with a sense of pride and awe at the achievements of Israelis in only 60+ years – all of this while constantly fighting for survival against sworn enemies. We drove around the Golan Heights and witnessed Israel’s vulnerabilities in the north. We saw the large Arab presence in Acca, next to Haifa, on the road to Tzfat, and in Jaffa – a now suburb of modern, vibrant Tel Aviv. But it was in Jerusalem where I felt a sense of danger and foreboding.
A visit to the Old City was disconcerting. In many Arab shops maps were displayed that showed Israel and the West Bank as one entity called “Palestine.” It made me feel uncomfortable, and uneasy, to know that those Arabs might turn on me or some fellow Jews simply because of our Jewish heritage. And then I saw the walls that the Israeli government had built to protect its citizens from suicide bombers and other murderers. I walked by the site of the former “Sparro” pizza restaurant, near the big Jerusalem market. And I began to look more carefully at other pedestrians, hoping that I wouldn’t be in the wrong place at the time.
This is the reality that our Israeli cousins must live with daily. And this certainly doesn’t include the horror that residents of Sderot, Ashkelon, and other towns closer to Gaza must face as they pray that Gazan rockets down’t hit their homes or injure their children.
So I think it is easy for American Jews, and even some American rabbis to criticize the Israeli government from a distance. But we don’t face the constant dangers and realities of Israeli life. We have forgotten what happened during World War II, when Jews had no refuge to escape to. And we ignore the virulent resurgence of antisemitism that is sweeping Europe and is even occurring on American college campuses. Without Israel, where would we go?
Not all American rabbis take the position attributed to them in this article. I, who am extremely liberal on most political issues, never have felt that peace, as conceived by most political pundits, is possible for Israel. I have an alternative land for peace deal which I believe will produce peace. “Give me peace or I will take your land, piece by piece.”
It is high time we stop talking about the west bank or Palestinian territories & refer to this land as disputed Israeli territory. We should support those who wish to develop settlements in the disputed territories. There should be no negotiations regarding a division of Jerusalem whatsoever.
I might also point out that targeted assassinations of those who fire missiles at innocent civilians is hardly a proportional response. Considering the numbers of Israelis & the numbers of Israel’s enemy in the area, a proportional response to a few Israeli deaths would produce a staggering number of casualties. Israel should be applauded, not castigated, for its restraint.
Until the world learns that Jewish lives are as sacred (no more, no less) than any other life in the universe, we ought to give great consideration, as nature intends for all species, to protecting ourselves. The world’s inattention to the horror that goes on in Sederot is indefensible. There is little point in appeasing those who would wipe us out in the name of justice.
Shalom Howard Stevens
I read your comments to Daniel today. From the tome of your writing you seem quite upset with Daniel for addressing some of the Jews in the diaspora and with some of their leaders while not reaching directly to a minute minority of extreme Leftists in Israel (less than 3% of the Jewish population) who brought upon us the disaster of the Oslo Accords. This miserable agreement has permitted the arch terrorist Arafraud to enter the disputed territories together with 15,000 terrorist armed to the teeth. Since then thousands of Israelis have been murdered including so many women, children and tens of thousands of Israelis maimed forever some beyond recognition.
It is very easy to sit in the serene safe environment of Canada or USA and pass judgement on the Israeli Government while knowing close to nothing about the history of the Zionist movement and the conflicts in Palestine up to and after the establishment of the State of Israel.
Some of the terms used in your comments show how ignorant you are of the legal status concerning the disputed territories and the behavior of our government towards the Arabs living in Judea & Samaria.
I have posted some of my references regarding the legal status of these territories before on this article but I will do it again just for you.
I hope you take the time to read these documents so that next time you use comments like: occupation, arrogance, militarism and subjugation, you will also follow them up with some facts.
Hag Sameach to you and yours.
Here is some information for you to read:
During the course of recent history, the Jewish people have received documents and signed several agreements with prominent leaders, countries and international organizations.
Following documents:
1) Balfour Declaration. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration_of_1917
2) Agreement Between Emir Feisal Husseini and Dr. Weizman: http://www.nymei.org/arab-jewish-treaty.html
Watch the historical clip on developments in Palestine from 1917 to 1919 ending with the Agreement signed in France by Weizmann and Faisal.
http://www.youtube.com/watchfeature=player_embedded&v=pmXmFlp9eAs&mid=520
3) San Remo Resolution: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmMmJ46O-3Q&feature=player_embedded
4) League of Nations resolution and Mandate for Palestine: http://unispal.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/2FCA2C68106F11AB05256BCF007BF3CB
See Also: This is my Land: http://www.analystnetwork.com/articles/65/MandateForPalestineThelegalaspectsofJewishrightsbyEliHertzwithassistancebyDavidSinger.pdf
5) Charter of the United Nations; June 26, 1945: Article 80
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/un/unchart.htm#art77
1. Except as may be agreed upon in individual trusteeship agreements, made under Articles 77, 79, and 81, placing each territory under the trusteeship system, and until such agreements have been concluded, nothing in this Chapter shall be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or any peoples or the terms of existing international instruments to which Members of the United Nations may respectively be parties
2. Paragraph 1 of this Article shall not be interpreted as giving grounds for delay or postponement of the negotiation and conclusion of agreements for placing mandated and other territories under the trusteeship system as provided for in Article 77.
7) Montevideo Convention on the Rights and Duties of States [*] http://www.jus.uio.no/english/services/library/treaties/01/1-02/rights-duties-states.xml
Article 6 The recognition of a state merely signifies that the state which recognizes it accepts the personality of the other with all the rights and duties determined by international law. Recognition is unconditional and irrevocable.
Are Settlements Illegal?
http://emetnews.org/analysis/are_settlements_illegal.php#.TrFMb94dF50
An opinion was held by Eugene Rostow, a former Dean of the Yale Law School and undersecretary of state for political affairs in the administration of U.S. President Lyndon Johnson and a drafter of UN Resolution 242:
The heated question of Israel’s settlements in the West Bank during the occupation period should be viewed in this perspective. The British Mandate recognized the right of the Jewish people to “close settlement” in the whole of the Mandated territory. It was provided that local conditions might require Great Britain to “postpone” or “withhold” Jewish settlement in what is now Jordan. This was done in 1922. But the Jewish right of settlement in Palestine west of the Jordan river, that is, in Israel, the West Bank, Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, was made unassailable. That right has never been terminated and cannot be terminated except by a recognized peace between Israel and its neighbors. And perhaps not even then, in view of Article 80 of the U.N. Charter, “the Palestine article”, which provides that “nothing in the Charter shall be construed … to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or any peoples or the terms of existing international instruments….”
http://www.tzemachdovid.org/Facts/islegal1.shtml
Jews have these rights according to International law, based on the above documents and agreements to settle wherever they wish in Jerusalem,Judea and Samaria, because it was given exclusively to the Jews for their sovereignty, to reconstitute the Jewish homeland, in the same way that Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Trans-Jordan were given for Arab sovereignty and self determination. These agreements remain binding today, and Arab determination and foreign interests to deny these truths in no way alter the legal status of Palestine.
In 1967 Israel had come into control of the said territories following a legitimately fought defensive war. Another very significant historical and legal viewpoint regards Israel’s presence in the West Bank areas of Judea and Samaria as emanating from the historical rights granted in Palestine to the Jewish people by the Balfour Declaration and affirmed by resolution of the League of Nations in 1922, granting to the Jewish people a national home in all parts of Mandatory Palestine and enabling “close settlement on the land.” The continued validity of this resolution, beyond the days of the League of Nations, was in fact maintained by Article 80 of the UN Charter, according to which rights granted to peoples by international instruments remain unaltered, and hence still valid.
I think the root cause is the left’s view that people are inherently good and benevolent, and that given free choice, people will seek peace. Hence, it cannot be that an Arabic culture, a population, can hold such an apparent and deep seated, irrational hatred for the relatively few Jews in their midst. Unfortunately, it’s true to the clear minded, and unfortunately, peace is not on the horizon nor can be attained through a land swap.
To the R. Koppelmans of the dialog:
First, and importantly, thanks to the nature of our community that we can openly dicuss and (dis)agree with one another while still maintaining our love of Israel and the Jewish people.
But you and many others with similar posts just don’t get it. It’s the OCCUPATION. The corrosive, debilitating, dangerous, expensive and (let’s hope for the short term) necessary act of militarily controling almost 2 million people. When you say that it’s “high time” we start talking about the West Bank as “Disputed Israel Territory” you’re either delusional or waiting for this problem to be solved by the Moshiach. (Maybe that’s the same thing.)
What, you think the residents of Ramallah and Jenin and East Jerusalem are just going to get up and walk to Jordan? You think that King Abdullah will decide to call his Hashemite Kingdom a Palestinian State and invite them there? You think either the Israeli government or someone else will forcibly deport them over the border?
Get real.
The longer we allow the Occupation (any one calling other than what it is is blind or lying) to continue, and the longer the Israelis let the nationalist Zionist movement there dictate Israeli policy, the farther away from a two state solution we get. Pure and simple.
Shalom, Ben Dor A
The Israeli commentators I cited are not living in a “serene safe environment” but are right there under the rockets. And what makes you believe they are “a minute minority” of Israel opinion? Do you have any facts to support this?
You cite many of the international treaties and agreements that gave birth to Medinat Israel. But we need to mindful that by similar legislation the world could decide Israel is no longer worthy of existence and new documents could be created to the grave prejudice of the Jewish state.
All of the legal justifications advanced to support the Occupation are countered by other legal analyses which hold the occupation to be a violation of international law. You can hire a lawyer to justify or condemn any and every part of the Occupation. It would be perfectly “legal” for you to embark on a diet of ground glass and Coca Cola – but very bad for your survival.
Rabbi Gordis notes that Israel’s survival depends on “clear-eyed assessment of the challenges and dangers” it faces. Thus the question should not be whether the Occupation – and other actions of the present government – are technically legal, but whether they are they smart, beneficial and will ensure survival of the Jewish state.
The tragedy of the left, especially the Israeli left, is that it has no counterpart on the other side, and cannot possibly have one with the generations-old hate factory run by not only Palestinians but many of their co-religionists. It is precisely because Israelis have not been taught to hate the Palestinians that there is a conscientious “left.” The Israelis I know do not hate the Palestinians, but I do regard them as culturally inferior because of their culture of hatred. As do I, a North American Jew with strong Israeli connections.
Against such an enemy there cannot be a survival which is suitable for prime-time viewing. You do what’s necessary, and the moment you lose your stomach, it’s over. Many Jews of conscience, even some Israeli Jews, have lost the stomach for this survival battle and, I believe, have made an unconscious decision not to survive if the price is the continual spilling of Palestinian blood.
Typical of this sad state of affairs is a recent notice on the website of PNN, a relatively moderate Palestinian information service. At an upcoming event, an Israeli Jewish professor was speaking on the methods used by the Israeli education system to subtly inculcate a mindset of entitlement among Israeli children with respect to ownership of “disputed” lands. Completely missing from her outline was the fact that Palestinian education materials, which are easy to obtain, do not need professorial analysis. They continue to sow outright hatred. There is no recognition of Israel and a constant reference to the “Nakba.” For instance, phrases such as “Zionist gangsters,” are used to describe Israel in the new (2006) high-school texts used in the PA, and the history of WWII completely ignores the Holocaust. Add this, of course, to the messaging in mosques and in the media–yet this professor is dissecting Israeli education materials for possible compromises on objectivity. Of course, it is her own objectivity which has been seriously compromised. She is gazing inward at her own conscience, and is in complete denial about the systematic, multi-generational erasure of conscience on the other side. It cannot possibly be so. But it is so, and people bred on such hatred see no closure in a negotiated peace.
Incidentally, I wonder how many readers here are aware of Abu Mazen’s own education, and the fact that his PhD thesis (subsequently published as a book) not only denied the Holocaust, but alleged that those Jews who did perish were the victims of a Zionist-Nazi deal to buy emigration to Palestine with European Jewish blood. His public record was sanitized after Oslo I. So our “moderate” Palestinian leader turns out to be just another product and proponent of the hatred factory.
With the perfect storm of left-wing antisemitism, right-wing antisemitism and petro-funded Islamic antisemitism already raging, the Jewish conscience cannot become an accessory to another genocide. If your knees are weak, butt out. This is deadly serious business.
Shalom Howard Stevens
These commentators mentioned and their ilk usually belong to the far Left of the political arena here in Israel and in the last several elections have not succeeded to convince more than 3% of the Jewish population. Mind you they are also funded anti-Semitic organizations, mainly in Eurabia.
As for you insistence with the term “occupation”, no mater how many times you repeat a lie, it will always be a lie. I have sent you enough information to prove my point but if you are still not convinced, then I suggest you read the Bible if you are a Jew or a Christian.
I also suggest you read the comments of others on this issue.
To Michael Breslauer
You keep on using the term “occupation” without giving reference to 1 single legal document to prove your point.
I have posted plenty of information for all to read why our life here in Israel, and I mean all of Israel, is covered not only by the Bible but also by decisions made and ratified by all countries under the League of Nations from the 12, of August 1922.
Charter 80 of the United Nations clearly states that: placing each territory under the trusteeship system, and until such agreements have been concluded, nothing in this Chapter shall be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or any peoples or the terms of existing international instruments to which Members of the United Nations may respectively be parties.
It cannot get any clearer than that.
GA Resolution 181 on 29.11.1947 was an illegal decision and contrary to the above Charter.
The Jewish people yearned and prayed for 2,000 years to return to the Holy Land and now YOU are claiming that we are “occupiers?”
Give me one single legal document proving that we are occupiers in our land!!!
If you can prove that, then you can also prove that USA, Canada, Mexico, Central America, S. America, Australia, New Zealand, North Ireland and the Malvinas are all under OCCUPATION.
So wake up my friend and start learning a bit of history.
To Ben Dor A.
My friend, you sound to me like the engineers that say they’ve proven that aerodynamically, a bumblebee cannot fly. They have documents and formulae proving their point. Yet we all know the “fact” of bumblebee flight.
If you insist on arguing that the UN resolution of 29.11.1947 was a sham and that the bible gives us all of “the Land of Israel”, that the IDF is not controlling the movement (and the security) of the 1.5 million Arabs living in what most of us call the West Bank, you’re nothing other than a crank engineer telling us all that bumblebees can’t fly. We don’t take you seriously.
Shalom Dor Ben A
You have sent no information justifying the occupation in any moral or political sense, just a bunch of self-serving legalism which the other side can refute point by point.
As American jurist Oliver Wendel Holmes once noted in another context, “the life of the Law is not logic, but experience.” It is not a “lie” to point out the experience of how Israel’s maintenance of sovereignty in the West Bank has sapped its economic strength, defeated the morale of its people and aroused the ire of most of the rest of the world, including former supporters. The recent vote in the U.N. is a vivid demonstration of this.
As for your views on the ‘far left,” I am not aware that any party campaigned on the specific issue of ending the occupation.
And using the Bible as a guide to political action is just as useful as the Salafists using the Koran to support their brand of self-destructive action.
So wake up my friend and start learning a bit of reality.
Shalom Howard Stevens & Michael Breslauer
When the Arab hordes conquered the Holy Land, the Jews had 3 options: Run for their lives, convert to Islam or be slaughtered.
These same options stood intact in 1919, 1920, 1929, 1936-9 1948, 1956, 1967 and 1973 and they are still intact with the PLO and Hamas Charters so please wake up and don’t lecture me about realities.
Israel has done so much in its short comeback history to make peace with its’ Arab neighbors including relinquish of territories for the sake of peace and see where that got us. (Lebanon, Egypt, Gaza and part of Samaria.)
The only reason for the “aroused ire of most of the rest of the world, including former supporters. The recent vote in the U.N. is a vivid demonstration of this” derives from the weak side of our nation that prefers the pot of meat I/O FREEDOM!
Have a great day.
Shalom Ben Dor A.
Where did it get us? Israel’s international trade has never been stonger. Israel’s dvelopment of tech industries has never been greater. Israel’s revenues have never been higher. The concords relieved much pressure on the IDF and raised Israel’s standing in world affairs. The benefits have been IMMENSE!
And what benefits do you think Israel obtains by the Occupation. Or if your prefer, ruling Samaria and Judea? How is Israel made stronger by this?
Palestinians do not want peace, they want the destruction of Israel.
I don’t say this as some ignorant Right-winger/pro-settler, or whatever. I say this as someone who deeply yearns for peace between Israel and her neighbors, but also as someone who has studied the dynamics of this conflict.
Once I had hope that maybe, just maybe, Palestinians would do that which is in the best interest of their children, and would compromise for a peace settlement with Israel. Now I see that this is simply not going to happen. Not any time soon, and probably not in the next 50 years (unless Western powers make it manifestly clear to Arab and Palestinians leaders that their aggressive and destructive behavior toward Israel will not be tolerated).
When I say that Palestinians want the destruction of Israel, I say this because it is a fact – the vast majority of Palestinians (at least 82%) say that they prefer to not have peace with Israel, and to continue living under occupation if the alternative is that millions of Palestinian refugees do not return INTO ISRAEL. That is what the polls show, and that is a very unfortunate situation – but still one that we have to learn to live with.
Shalom Howard Stevens
I don’t understand you. How can the State of Israel be occupying their own land?
If there is any occupation today in the world it is the Brits who occupy the Malvinas Islands, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, former Brits occupying North America and the Spanish occupying South America.
Just go back to your history lesson and read how many millions of Native Indians were massacred in the Americas by the Brits, the French and the Spanish. How many millions of Aborigines the Brits slaughtered in Australia and Maoris in New Zealand, How many Indonesians, the Dutch murdered in Indonesia, the Portuguese in the Americas and Asia, the Belgians in Congo, the French in North Africa, the Turks in the ME and the list is endless.
So please, don’t you flaunt at me the word occupation.
If there was any occupation in the Holy Land, it was by the Babylonians, the Assyrians, the Persians, the Greek, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Arabs, the Crusaders, the Ayubs, the Mamlukes, the Ottomans and the Brits.
We the Jews are living in our land, Israel, which includes Judea and Samaria.
I’m not overlooking the fact that there were Arabs living here since the Arab occupation, as of 638 CE and we cannot just get rid of them today.
Israel has suggested and offered its Arab neighbors so many peace plans but all were rejected and what we got was terror, wars and further terror. The more we gave in the more terror we received.
When the Arabs decide that they had enough and that they are ready to sit down and discuss peace with Israel, that will be the moment we can begin to contemplate some kind of compromise. Till then, there is nothing to talk about.
The last thing we need is for our Jewish brothers to tell us that we are occupiers in our own land.
It is time for you to come and see things on the ground for yourself and not get your information from corrupt politicians and biased antisemitic media.
To Ben Dor A:
Why not annex the territories?
Are you willing to admit that in doing so, that Israel will either (i) cease to be democratic or (ii) cease to be ( shortly) a Jewish State?
Are either of those results acceptable?
Shalom Ben Dor A.
If it’s “our land,” why have successive Israel governments agreed to return it to the Palestinians? Even Mr. Netanyahu favors the so-called “Two State Solution!”
Self-serving rhetoric about other historic injustices does not justify this one.
And persistence in the delusion that ruling over an unwilling, hostile population somehow benefits Israel will just build up more world wide opposition, internal demoralization and economic disaster, threatening to destroy Israel.
Shalom Howard Stevens & Michael Breslauer
Caving in to international pressure by ceding additional land to the Arabs won’t bring peace to the ME and will not make the issue right. That’s what happened to Czechoslovakia in 1938 and look where it got us.
The 2 state solution can be also interpreted as the state of Jordan for the Arabs and the State of Israel for the Jews. That was the intention of the Brits in 1922: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Churchill_White_Paper
Any further ceding of land to the Arabs is suicide. (See the results of the redeployment in Lebanon, Sinai and Gaza)
As for why didn’t Israel annex the territories after 1967? Big historical mistake in my opinion. We are reaping the results of this mistake till today.
Maybe we can offer Reservations in the territories for these so called “Palestinian Arabs” same as the North American Indians are living? What say you?
Please don’t lecture me about injustice after more than 24,000 Israelis gave their lives to protect our ancestral home from the Arab hordes. Where would the Jews be today without Israel?
Maybe it is time for all those hypocrites to first undo the historical injustices and atrocities to others before they come to us and lecture us about injustice.
Who are you to pass judgment on Israel?
As of 1993 (Oslo Accords) we have stopped controlling the so called “Palestinian Arabs”
They have their own Governments who control them: i.e. the PA in area A and the Hamas in Gaza. The problem is they want control of all the former land called Palestine from the river Jordan to the sea and throw all the Jews to the sea.
Why don’t you read the PLO Charter and Hamas Charter? Just look at their emblems, their flags, their maps and listen to their speeches. Where are you living? on Mars?
As for world wide opposition, what hypocrisy, when was there any tolerance for the Jews? You are like all of those Jews who think that when others spit in your face, you think its raining.
Israel is the only true Democracy today in the ME. We do not control the Arabs, they have their own Democratically chosen Governments both in Gaza and the PA Territories.
Wake up people and learn your history!!!!
To Ben Dor
You dodged my question. Should the West Bank be annexed and declared a part of Israel?
Please answer
Your responses are getting rather hysterical, too.
Ben Dor a
You dodged my question. Should Israel annex the West Bank?
Please respond.
Your responses are getting a bit hysterical.
Shalom Ben Dor A.
Some of your misconceptions:
“ceding additional land…happened to Czechoslovakia in 1938…”
No one is asking Israel to cede its internationally recognized borders, those accepted in 1947 and augmented by the 1949 concord.
“The 2 state solution can be also interpreted as the state of Jordan…”
Such an interpretation is NOT accepted by the people whom it would affect – the Palestinians themselves.
“Any further ceding of land to the Arabs is suicide. (See the results of the redeployment in Lebanon, Sinai and Gaza)”
Israel is more powerful and economically secure since then. With modern warfare technology proximity means little.
“Maybe we can offer Reservations in the territories…”
Like the Bantustans offered by South Africa? Look where that got them!
“Maybe it is time for all those hypocrites to first undo the historical injustices and atrocities to others before they come to us and lecture us about injustice.”
Do you suggest the victim of injustice has a license to inflict injustice on others? Such a concept is found nowhere in Jewish Tradition and is expressly rejected in Israel’s foundational document, the Megillat Ha’atzmaut
“Who are you to pass judgment on Israel?”
I make no judgments but agree with views of those Israelis who I have cited before but you erroneously dismiss as 3% of public opinion.
“As of 1993 (Oslo Accords) we have stopped controlling the so called “Palestinian Arabs”“
Palestinians cannot travel freely; have their imports and exports strictly regulated; have no say in construction activities; cannot determining who can immigrate into their land – the list of Israel’s controls goes on and on.
“As for world wide opposition, what hypocrisy, when was there any tolerance for the Jews? You are like all of those Jews who think that when others spit in your face, you think its raining.”
You adopt the same rhetorical hate tactics of Israel’s enemies. Anyone who disagrees with you must be condemned – intolerance is the key motivator. not exactly a Hillel-Shammai moment.
“Wake up people and learn your history!!!!”
The lessons of history shows that attempts to govern an unwilling population have always had bad results. Perhaps you need to “learn history.”
Shalom Howard Stevens
Here are your misconceptions:
“No one is asking Israel to cede its internationally recognized borders, those accepted in 1947 and augmented by the 1949 concord.”
I recommend you read the following:
League of Nations resolution and Mandate for Palestine: http://unispal.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/2FCA2C68106F11AB05256BCF007BF3CB
See Also: This is my Land: http://www.analyst-network.com/articles/65/MandateForPalestineThelegalaspectsofJewishrightsbyEliHertzwithassistancebyDavidSinger.pdf
Charter of the United Nations; June 26, 1945 Article 80:
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/un/unchart.htm#art77 1. Except as may be agreed upon in individual trusteeship agreements, made under Articles 77, 79, and 81, placing each territory under the trusteeship system, and until such agreements have been concluded, nothing in this Chapter shall be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or any peoples or the terms of existing international instruments to which Members of the United Nations may respectively be parties.
“The 2 state solution can be also interpreted as the state of Jordan…”
“Such an interpretation is NOT accepted by the people whom it would affect – the Palestinians themselves.”
Jordan is today is only 20% Hashemite, the rest are the so called “Palestinian Arabs”
With the Arab Spring in full force, it is only time that they will take over Jordan. They tried it before but failed. Look for “Black September”
“Israel is more powerful and economically secure since then. With modern warfare technology proximity means little.”
How would you feel if your cities, towns and villages were bombarded on a daily basis by high explosive rockets for years from all sides? Would you cede anything to your enemies?
“Like the Bantustans offered by South Africa? Look where that got them!”
Like the Indian Reservations in USA and Canada.
“Do you suggest the victim of injustice has a license to inflict injustice on others?”
Since the inception of modern Israel, we have always been on the defense and not offence. Where do you get the notion that we have inflicted injustice on others? Your problem is that you are tuned to the Western Media which is biased towards Israel and publishes daily lies and false information on the daily life over here.
“I make no judgments but agree with views of those Israelis who I have cited before but you erroneously dismiss as 3% of public opinion.”
The local elections here are due on 22.Jan. 2013. Lets wait and see what the Lefties get here. Till now they were only 3%. I don’t expect them to get more than that. Even they claim today that the Oslo Accords were a mistake.
“Palestinians cannot travel freely; have their imports and exports strictly regulated; have no say in construction activities; cannot determining who can immigrate into their land – the list of Israel’s controls goes on and on.”
The only reason why the so called “Palestinian” Arabs cannot travel freely and have their imports regulated is because they have opened a campaign of homicidal attacks on Israeli civilians by exploding themselves in hotels, buses, restaurants, disco bars, pizza parlors and synagogues. They have also used your good taxes to purchase arms and rockets from Iran. I think you would have done the same and even worse. As for construction activities, just look at what they have built till now and are still building. You know nothing about what is going on here. Where do you get your information from?
“The lessons of history shows that attempts to govern an unwilling population have always had bad results. Perhaps you need to “learn history.”
We have no intentions to govern these people but they sure have intentions to annihilate us.
Again I reiterate. Wake up!!!
Shalom Howard Stevens and all Daniel Gordis followers.
Please watch this clip and pass it on:
I hope you have the patience to watch it till the last moment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=j3ucLoIBa-Y#!
You can download this pamphlet:
http://www.unmaskedthemovie.com/learn_more/activist-guide.pdf
Some more reality from Israel:
Bradley Burston, a columnist for Haaretz:
This year, for Hanukkah, I want one person running this country, this Israel, to show me one scrap of light. One move — any move — for freedom, for all the peoples who live here. One step — no matter how slight — in the direction of a better future. What makes this Hanukkah different from all others? It’s the dark. It’s the sense that this country — beset by enemies, beset by itself — has locked down every single door against the future, and sealed shut every last window against hope. … This country has begun to feel like a lamp whose body is cracked and whose light seems all but spent. On these long nights, we can make out little but an occupation growing ever more permanent, and a democracy growing ever more temporary.”
Howard
Haaretz is one of the most self hating media outlet of the Jewish world, run by so called “progressives” and extreme lefties.
It has published many lies, libels and misleading information. It has been taken to court countless times and was penalized by the judges.
This extreme Leftist, anti-Israeli establishment is funded by German Leftist: http://cafe.themarker.com/topic/2724826/
And last but not least you seem like one of those that according to Isaiah Chapter 49:17 Thy children make haste; thy destroyers and they that made thee waste shall go forth from thee.
In Hebrew it sounds much better:
.יז: מִהֲרוּ, בָּנָיִךְ; מְהָרְסַיִךְ וּמַחֲרִיבַיִךְ, מִמֵּךְ יֵצֵאוּ
It looks like you are pleased to publish and throw any garbage at the state of Israel. תמות נפשי עם פלישתים
My parents, myself and my children have fought for this country so that the Jewish people all over the world will have a free homeland without persecution.
My Grandchildren will soon join the IDF as did and will so many brave Jewish boys and girls to protect our ancestral homeland.
I have lost many relatives & friends over the years and my brother was seriously injured, maimed for life all this so that even Jews who do not serve in the IDF can live freely over here.
You seem more concerned about the rights of terrorists than the life of our people.
Watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NgCgTv7vDEQ
Shame on you.
Ben Dor A,
I agree with you completely. Without Israel we would be second class citizens wherever we live. As my beloved grandfather (a victim of the Shoah) would have said “gut gzukt”
This is directly from the horse’ mouth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=7I9amcTg_6I
How lucky we are that we have such eloquent friends:
This video is probably the most powerful and noted support for Israel that I have ever seen and heard. I feel it is imperative to watch it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMTpZaWpLPo&feature=player_embedded
Dror
It’s sad you cannaot engage in rational thought and civil discourse.
“Haaretz is one of the most self hating media outlet of the Jewish world…”
This absurd claim just shows you are blind to truth and reality. Haaretz has been in business since 1918. Its criticism, opposing your cherished ideology, is not dismissed by calling it “garbage.” You are the “self hating” one when you violate the Jewish tradition of open and candid debate.
“You seem more concerned about the rights of terrorists than the life of our people.”
That you can write this hateful, despicable accusation demonstrates your bigotry. Your emotional ranting and personal insults are no substitute for honest thought. The threats to Israel are grave and for you to act as if anyone who dares disagree with you is an enemy only makes things worse.
The Jewish people have not survived this long by being closed-minded and engaging in the kind of intolerant behavior you enjoy, so shame on YOU!
Ben Dor A,
So what exactly is your solution? You say:
that Palestinians should live in conditions “…Like the Indian Reservations in USA and Canada.”
But Indians still have full voting rights in the US. Do you suggest millions of Palestinians should be given full voting rights in Israel? If that’s what you’re offering it is national suicide.
Otherwise, if you don’t think Palestinians should be given voting rights in Israel, then there is no alternative to a two state solution.
Hello Jeorge Enoughie
I mentioned the Indian Reservations in North America as an example of the abuse and crimes against humanity that the Brits, French and Spanish committed against the Indians in North America.
There is nothing to compare the wars and terror campaigns that Israel suffered from the Arabs since it’s inception in 1948 and before.
The Arabs living in Judea’ Samaria and Gaza have full voting right to their own institutions as of 1993. What is the Hamas in Gaza and the PA in the territories if not their elected institutions?
Arabs who did not run away in 1948 and stayed as Israeli citizens have full voting rights and they comprise about 20% of the population today. They have members of Parliament, Ministers, Supreme Court Judges, University professors and full integration in Israeli institutions. Where did you get the notion that there is any discrimination in Israel?
As for Hamas and the PLO = Fatah = PA – they want to annihilate the State of Israel and massacre all the Jews. Just look at what they have been doing to each other all over the Arab world and still doing in Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Sudan, Eritrea, Yemen, Iran ect. ect.
Why would any nation in its right mind set up another terrorist entity right next door? Would you do it in North America?
I have posted so many documents and historical facts on this board, not including the Bibles, proving legally the fact that the Holy Land, the Land of Israel, belongs to the Jewish people like Britain belongs to the Brits, France belongs to the French and Germany belongs to the Germans.
Instead of reading these documents which are BTW posted on the UN records, all I received from some on this board was false accusations of “occupation” “bigotry” “ranting” and “violation of Jewish traditions” without any basic proof.
Let me ask those accusers: what exactly is Jewish tradition? Genocide committed by the Greeks and the Romans, executions under the sword by the Arab hordes, massacres of the Crusaders, Marching to the Death Camps of Europe and Russia?
After 2,000 years of persecution and mass murder, we finally have our sliver piece of land, which is smaller than NJ. and can protect ourselves from all Arab aggressors around us, there are people who come to us with some insane ideas to give up parts of our ancestral homeland.
The Arabs have their own enclaves in Gaza, Judea and Samaria, their own elected institutions. Once they stop terrorizing our people and decide to sit down with us for peace talks, I’m 100% sure we can reach some king of agreement which will be much better than the Indian Reservations or the other occupied territories still occupied by the Super Powers today.
Till date, all we had from them is wars and terror. Why give them any presents or appeasement for their actions?
FYI
European settlements and double standards
http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=3170
Additional information for our readers:
EUROPE´S HIDDEN HAND: EU FUNDING FOR POLITICAL NGOS IN THE ARAB ISRAELI CONFLICT: ANALYZING PROCESSES AND IMPACT
http://www.ngo-monitor.org/data/images/File/NGO_Monitor_EU_Funding_Europes_Hidden_Hand.pdf
“I am going to start an Intifada.”
For those who forgot and those blind to the facts:
http://cifwatch.com/2013/01/06/i-am-going-to-start-an-intifada/
Fatah’s Facebook:
Glorifying terror, inciting hatred,
and erasing Israel
Fatah’s heroes:
Saddam Hussein, Dalal Mughrabi and the rifle
http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=8319