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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JohnM who wrote (23516)	4/4/2002 8:15:49 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi JohnM; Re: "But I must say I find the concept that the Israelis must kill enough Palestinians to pacify them completely unacceptable. There was a discussion some time back on the use of the word "terrorism". You are presenting a case for the worst kind of state "terrorism" I've read about in some time." You are exactly correct. But I'm not trying to "present a case". What I am trying to do is show the logical consequence of the combination of the Israeli / Palestinian situation and the actions of the two parties. What I'm doing here is putting the Israeli actions in the context of the level of violence that they will have to execute in order to achieve their aim (i.e. pacifying the Palestinians by killing them). I don't think that the Israelis can do it. When they realize this, perhaps they will negotiate with the Palestinians from a position of equality instead of one that insists on their right to form a government that distinguishes between people based on religion. You will see an end to this conflict when the things being argued over begin to look similar to the stuff that the South Africans ended up negotiating. Until then, the Palestinians will revolt, as would pretty much any majority (a majority in terms of the region, not necessarily just Israel / Palestine) forced into second class citizenship. After that, it is at least conceivable that the Israelis will be able to form together with the Palestinians to make a government where everybody is equal before the law, without regard to their religion or ethnicity. Unless we look at the current situation with open eyes and see exactly what the situations and positions of the players are, we will not be able to fix it. The Palestinians are not looking for the "destruction of Israel" so much as the removal of its laws that differentiate between people based on their religion. For example, "right of return". This is more than just the right of return of refugees. If a Moslem leaves Israel for a few months he is not allowed to return. This prevents them from being able to obtain, for instance, college degrees or medical care in the US. Read what the Human Rights Watch has to say about this: Human Rights Watch, World Report 2001 Israel, The Occupied West Bank, Gaza Strip and Palestinian Authority Territories Discrimination in law and practice against ethnic and religious minorities and other societal groups, especially on issues of employment, social benefits, and personal status, remained a major problem. While court challenges to discrimination were sometimes successful, the process often took years, and court rulings frequently were not applicable to other cases or were not fully implemented by the government. For example, on March 8 the High Court of Justice ruled on an October 1995 petition brought by a Palestinian couple who, though Israeli citizens, were barred from purchasing a home in a Jewish neighborhood built on state-owned lands. More than 90 percent of land in Israel is state land, much of it expropriated from Palestinians. The court ruled that the authorities could not allocate land to citizens solely on the basis of their religion, though it noted that discrimination between Jews and non-Jews might be acceptable under unspecified "special circumstances." The ruling ordered the government to take such "special circumstances" into consideration when determining "with deliberate speed" whether it would allow the couple to settle in the neighborhood, and stated that its ruling in this case would not affect previous discriminatory land allocations. hrw.org It's possible to run a government that violates the rights of minorities. It happens all the time in every country in the world. The result is usually not particularly bloody. The minorities recognize that their situation cannot be improved through violence and they accept their lot. This happens everywhere and all the time. And it's probably completely unavoidable. For an example close to home, go to the local courthouse and try to marry two wives at the same time. Humans cannot stop themselves from forcing each other to live their lives in particular ways. *The reason that majority rule is so important is because it reduces the amount of bloodshed. The idea is that the majority gets their way, and the minorities knuckle under to overwhelming force.* This is not about morality. If it were, you should take a close look at how many Germans the allies had to kill in order to get them to knuckle under in WW2 (9.5% of the population). The Mormons are a minority in the United States, and laws in the US are (were) incompatible with their own religious laws. They tried to carve out a little territory where they could make their own rules but failed. The majority got their way with the rules on bigamy. The minority knuckled under. *This is true even though the Mormons were a majority in Utah.* They knuckled under and changed their state law to conform to US practice. To have lasting self rule it is not enough to simply have a territory where your ethnic / religious class has a majority. You must also have a large enough territory to the point that you are militarily defensible. This is why the Kurds do not have a homeland. The Kurds, like the Israelis, form local majorities in population, but their homelands are not sufficiently (respectively) peopled or extensive to be militarily defended from the hostile peoples around them. This is not a matter of morality, it's a matter of practicality. Having a tiny Jewish state in the midst of a solidly Moslem Holy Land is impractical. The Palestinians know this, and they know that eventually they will achieve dominion over that land. If the Israelis were smart they would recognize this too, and start negotiating to create a single democratic government, blind to religious differences. And it's not that I am blind to the human rights abuses by the Palestinians or Arabs. It's just that as a practical matter, this is what majorities do to minorities. It's not that I would prefer to live in Syria than Israel. Nor is it about where the Moslems citizens of these countries would prefer to live. *These kinds of morality and personal preference issues are a smoke screen for the real issue, which is how many people have to die before the local Moslem majority has its way.* Do we really want to help kill 5% of the Palestinian population? Since doing that would incite the local Moslem population (a couple hundred million or so) into even more intense hatred of Israel (and ourselves) would that even solve the problem? If it were the case that we had to dominate the entire Near East we have the weapons (nukes) to do it. But I don't see the necessity. What we need to be doing is getting the Israelis to recognize the intrinsic hopelessness of their situation. Then they'll begin realistically negotiating the form of a truly democratic and majority rule government in a combined country. For this I would support US peacemaking forces. -- Carl

To: JohnM who wrote (23516)	4/4/2002 8:19:47 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

John... It's a brutal fact of history that often the agressing nation will not surrender or seek a cease fire until they have suffered tremendous casualties... The threshold of social pain, some academics might call it. The Germans were pampered and not required to make nearly the sacrifices that British and American civilians were, until late in the war. Hitler knew that to maintain civilian support, he had to maintain a aura of normality. But British and American round the clock bombing slapped the German people with reality. But of course, the allies call for only unconditional surrender and promising not to enter into separate peace treaties, forced Germany to realize they had entered a war for survival, the end of which was not negotiable. I personally don't see the need for excessive civilian casualities being inflicted in this conflict.. Certainly nothing on the level of WWII.. But if the rest of the Arab world tries to widen the war, all bets are off and we'll Palestinians evicted into any nation that fights on their behalf. Hawk