>Z, come on........England annexed the land, I think, during the time of the crusades;
No, actually much later- the end of World War I. It wasn't really a colonial thing. Colonialism was crumbling then. It was thrust in England's lap after the Ottoman Empire fell.
>The fact is is that there already were Palestinians living on that land when the Zionists began to settle it in the twenties. Do you think the average Palestinian whose family has lived in what is now Israel for over 500 years gives a rat's ass what M. Twain's perception was of the Holy Lands or what England's illegal claims to the land are?
And despite the Palestinian myths, they weren't forced from their homes. There was plenty of space, and the Jews found places to live. Most of the Palestinians were told to leave by the Arab leaders in '47 to get them out for the inevitable war. They fully expected to return. Some others were actually expelled, but it was because they were hostile to their Jewish neighbors.
Besides, by that logic, it's time to start moving people off of Manhattan Island...
>And who was England to determine the destiny of this region? Can you not for a moment see the other side of this argument? I don't know where you live but say its Atlanta. Can you imagine the outrage if the US gov't stepped into Atlanta and gave the Buckhead neighborhood of Atlanta to Georgia's blacks as reparations for the slavery years? Atlanta whites would be up in arms.
Once again, no one said that the Palestinians had to go anywhere.
>Well, England stepped in and made these arbitrary divisions and expected everyone to be happy with them. Of course, the England of 1947 was still very much a colonial power and still very much practised a noblesse oblige form of diplomacy. And because of its guilt over the Holocaust gave a portion of this land to the Jews as some form of backhanded reparation. It was backhanded because at that time Israel was this mostly barren [except for the north]plot of dirt with no oil or other natural resources to speak of other than the Mediterranean Sea. So, in a sense, Israel was the equivalent of giving someone second clothing as a Xmas present. That's what England and the West felt was sufficient return for the loss of 6 million lives.
Oh, the England of 1947 didn't make the final decision- the United Nations did.
>Because according to US real estate law.........continuous occupation of the land allows for squatters' rights......rights that the Palestinians got screwed out of by England's arbitrary division of the land.
Again, they didn't have to leave their homes.
>As a consequence, Jordan is a speck of hope in an otherwise dark situation.
I disagree, but that's an argument for another time.
-Z |
