My main point, I think, was that many Americans smugly think that the US has "clean hands" in its historical past, and therefore can moralize over who is wrong or right in the mideast conflict.
Gotcha.
Can you imagine what the reaction would be if Arapaho suicide bombers blew up McDonald's restaurants in Cheyenne and Laramie?
I do believe that "disproportionate" would be too mild a word.
I do oppose the settlements in the west bank area as colonizing, and severely weakening Israel's moral arguments.
As a practical political matter, I agree with you. But you should understand that religious ideology drives a large section of the Israeli population, and if historical claims to the land mean anything, then they apply to Judea and Samaria (aka the West Bank). For example, Jews lived in Hebron from 4000 BCE, the time of the Patriarch Abraham (who is buried there) until 1929, when all Jewish residents of Hebron were massacred. Hebron is the home turf of the House of David. There is a very deep Jewish attachment to Hebron.
All this is not to say that I support the settler movement, but I understand it, and I'm a little sensitive to calling it "colonizing", as if Israel inside the Green Line was clearly one country, and the West Bank were another country.
The Palestinian Authority has been saying this for years of course, and saying that everything would be okay if only Israel withdrew to the Green Line. But it wasn't okay before 1967, and there's little reason to believe it would be different now. Why give the Arabs a do-over on their aggresive war? If the West Bank was all they wanted, why did Arafat turn down Barak's offer for 95% of it without even making a counteroffer, and then start shooting?
Incidentally, since historical claims do matter in the Mideast, the Palestinian Authority has been claiming for several years that the Jews have no historical connection to the land of Israel whatsoever. There was never a Jewish Temple on Temple Mount, the events in the Bible took place in Yemen, etc, etc. They say this seriously and with a straight face, and other Arab governments now echo the claim. I'm not sure if you're aware of this because they have been given a free pass on this absurd propaganda by the western media. memri.org is a good site for seeing quotes from Arab media if you're interested.
Israel/Palestine, from the river to the sea, is all one country with two incompatible peoples currently occupying it. The question for the Jews is, how to divvy it up? Unfortunately the current question for the Arabs seems to be, how do we succeed this time in driving the Jews into the sea? Israel's security needs are not imaginary, and the Green Line is an indefensible border. |
