By Simon Fischler
Today there is a movement aiming to delegitimize the state of Israel, brand her an apartheid nation, boycott her and force upon her a one-state solution.
The people behind this movement are sophisticated in their propaganda and malicious in their intent.
Israel is both the Jewish nation and a democratic state at the same time (the only democracy in the entire Middle East).
All of her citizens have the right to vote -- Israeli Arabs, Bedouin, Druze and Circassians included.
The Arab Muslim population of Israel has far more rights than in any other country in the entire Arab/Muslim world, an indisputable fact. There are thirteen Arab and five Druze members in the Knesset. In Apartheid South Africa black Africans were not allowed to vote at all.
The Arab Israeli population is free to live, work and play where they want in Israel.
The fact that most Israeli Arabs elect to live in discreetly separate villages is a matter more of historical, cultural, tribal and/or religious choice, but under Israeli law, they are legally free to live anywhere.
Israeli Arabs can marry Jewish Israelis.
In Apartheid South Africa black Africans were not allowed to go to white beaches, were not allowed to use white public bathrooms, were not allowed to marry whites, were not allowed to drink from white water fountains, etc.
The black South Africans were totally segregated from the white community by law.
There is nothing like this in Israel.
The Occupied Territories-
In the occupied territories the Palestinian population has the right to vote for their government, and have twice. However, much to the vocal dismay of some misled, left-leaning activists the Palestinian population cannot move about and live their lives as freely as they had in the past.
Why is that?
In the year Two Thousand, at the Taba negotiations Yasser Arafat was offered full peace, including a Palestinian State on 95-97% of the land of Judea and Shomron (or the West-bank as it is wrongfully called by many today), Arab sections of East Jerusalem, the Muslim and Christian quarters of the Old City and all of Gaza.
Yassar Arafat turned this offer of peace down; Arafat turned down the formation of the Palestinian State. He did this because he wanted everything, not just Palestine: he wanted Israel too.
He insisted that Israel accept the unacceptable: the right of return for millions of Palestinian refugees to Israel.
The idea of Israel taking responsibility for a war started by the Arab population of Mandate Palestine and the neighboring Arab states is totally insane. The “refugees” created by this war can be attributed mostly to the Arab nations that started it. It is a known fact, admitted by many Arabs of the time, that they urged the Arab population of Palestine to flee. Here are some quotes.
ON SEPTEMBER 6, 1948, the Beirut Daily Telegraph quoted Emil Ghory, secretary of the Arab Higher Committee (AHC), as saying: "The fact that there are those refugees is the direct consequence of the action of the Arab states in opposing partition and the Jewish state. The Arab states agreed upon this policy unanimously..."
ON APRIL 23, 1948 Jamal Husseini, acting chairman of the Palestine AHC told the UN Security Council, "The Arabs did not want to submit to a truce ... They preferred to abandon their homes, belongings and everything they possessed."
IN THE MARCH 1976 issue of Falastin a-Thaura, then the official journal of the Beirut-based PLO, Mahmud Abbas ("Abu Mazen", now Prime Minister of the West Bank PA), then a PLO spokesman, wrote: "The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny but, instead, they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate and to leave their homeland, and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live."
ON APRIL 9, 1953, the Jordanian daily al-Urdun quoted a refugee, Yunes Ahmed Assad, formerly of Deir Yassin, as saying: "For the flight and fall of the other villages, it is our leaders who are responsible, because of the dissemination of rumours exaggerating Jewish crimes and describing them as atrocities in order to inflame the Arabs ... they instilled fear and terror into the hearts of the Arabs of Palestine until they fled, leaving their homes and property to the enemy."
These are but a few examples of Arab and Palestinians who attested to the fact that the majority of the Arabs fled the new state of Israel because they were told to by their leaders.
There were definitely situations where the newly formed IDF entered and pushed out Arab communities, but in most cases this was a small proportion. With few exceptions, most of these situations were caused by local Arab populations giving refuge to Arab fighters who were attacking Jewish communities, rendering them viable military targets. What you also do not hear about are the atrocities committed by the arabs against Jewish communities during the Israeli War of Independence. There were far more of these!
In fact there were more Jewish refugees created after the Israeli War of Independence when they were robbed of all their lands and possessions and thrown out of Arab countries. There were a total of 900,000 Jewish refugees from Arab countries, compared to 700,000 Arab refugees.
We do not hear about the Jewish refugees today because Israel, unlike surrounding Arab nations and North African Muslim countries, opted to follow the UN partition and managed to win its independence. Israel also then settled these refugees instead of keeping them in refugee camps as the Arabs have done.
One must also remember that neither Jordan nor Egypt allowed the Palestinians, whose areas they were occupying, their independence. Jordan occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem (razing the entire Jewish quarter of the Old City during the War of Independence); Egypt the Gaza strip. They easily could have given the Palestinians their independence. In both cases it was easier to keep these supposed Arab brethren locked up in refugee camps, fomenting hate and creating another generation to fight and kill Jews.
Why would the Palestinian leadership want to have their refugees settle in a state that is not theirs?
Why wouldn’t they want to settle their refugees in their newly formed state?
The only reason for this policy is the unquestionably bigoted and monomaniacal intent to destroy the state of Israel; to wipe out the Jews.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Friday, November 18, 2011
TEAR OFF THE BLINDFOLD
By Simon Fischler
Many people believe Zionism is a 19th century European creation. In reality Zionism has existed since the destruction of the Second Temple.
Since the mass expulsion of the Jewish nation at the hands of the Romans, we have been praying for our return to Jerusalem and Israel.
That yearning has brought Jews back to their native land on several occasions throughout history. These returning Jews integrated with Jews who were able to remain in the land of Israel.
This yearning and praying for our return to the land of our ancestors is one major factor that kept us as a nation, together and alive.
Jews throughout the world sit down to the first seder of Passover, at the end of the feast commemorating the first trek of the Jews to the “land of milk and honey,” we will finish by echoing that ancient longing: “Next year in Jerusalem.”
Zionism as the world knows it today is derived from roots that have always tied the children of Israel to their land.
The most intrinsic part of modern Zionism is that it is a nationalistic movement based on creation.
The movement wasn’t just about creating the nation we know as Israel today; it was also about improving the land, replanting forests, building reservoirs, and making that land bloom.
What many people do not know is that Zionism, even the modern form of it, was around before there was Palestinian Arab nationalism. Modern Zionism was also around before generic Arab Nationalism.
Palestinian Arab nationalism came into being after Zionism had gained many important goals in the land of Israel. Unfortunately (for all of us in the Middle East), Arab nationalism not only was created in response to Zionism, but it has been a nationalistic movement bent solely on the destruction of Israel instead of creation.
This is as relevant today as it was one hundred years ago.
The Zionists and their pre-state government, the Yishuv, lived along the lines of compromise, whereas Palestinian Arab nationalists lived along the lines of complete destruction of any Jewish hope for self-determination.
For instance, it was the Yishuv that agreed to the UN partition of Palestine Mandate into two states: one for the Jews and one for the Arabs. It was Palestinian Arab nationalists who rejected the U.N partition and promised the destruction of any Jewish State.
Today we see much of the same dialogue that we saw back at the birth of Israel more than six decades ago. The only difference is that Israel exists today, and Palestine does not.
Israel, likes the Yishuv is actively attempting to create a Palestinian State. That is right; read it loud and clear: ISRAEL IS attempting to create Palestine; while the Palestinians are still trying to rob the Jewish Nation of its political freedom.
This is why anti-Israel behavior is anti-Semitic. No other country in the world or in history has tried harder to create freedom, self-determination and a country for its enemy.
It is almost as if Israelis want a Palestinian state more than the Palestinians do!
At the opposite end the Palestinians -- and Arabs in general -- have continually fought to destroy the state of Israel.
Today it is as if Israel under Prime Minister Ehud Barak did not offer the Palestinians a state on almost all of the West Bank, all of Gaza and East Jerusalem. This unbelievable offer was rejected by the Palestinian leadership.
When will the world demand the Palestinians take responsibility for their actions?
Why does the Obama Administration play games and waste time with fruitless almost-negotiations? Will they finally demand that the Palestinians relinquish the Right of Return? If not, then there truly is no point in talking.
If there is to be peace between Israel and her neighbors, Obama’s administration, needs to demand of the Arabs what no administration has ever done. It must demand that they own up to their end of the bargain and play ball fairly with Israel.
The American administration must make it clear to the Arabs that they need to show Israelis that it is worthwhile for them to agree to peace and two states.
It can no longer be about Israel just making gestures of good faith to the Palestinians. It is high time for the Palestinians to make gestures of good faith in return. Like recognizing Israel as the Jewish State.
If not, then the Obama administration is just trying to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes again. Let’s tear off this blindfold and expose the truth: Arabs do not want Israel to exist.
Many people believe Zionism is a 19th century European creation. In reality Zionism has existed since the destruction of the Second Temple.
Since the mass expulsion of the Jewish nation at the hands of the Romans, we have been praying for our return to Jerusalem and Israel.
That yearning has brought Jews back to their native land on several occasions throughout history. These returning Jews integrated with Jews who were able to remain in the land of Israel.
This yearning and praying for our return to the land of our ancestors is one major factor that kept us as a nation, together and alive.
Jews throughout the world sit down to the first seder of Passover, at the end of the feast commemorating the first trek of the Jews to the “land of milk and honey,” we will finish by echoing that ancient longing: “Next year in Jerusalem.”
Zionism as the world knows it today is derived from roots that have always tied the children of Israel to their land.
The most intrinsic part of modern Zionism is that it is a nationalistic movement based on creation.
The movement wasn’t just about creating the nation we know as Israel today; it was also about improving the land, replanting forests, building reservoirs, and making that land bloom.
What many people do not know is that Zionism, even the modern form of it, was around before there was Palestinian Arab nationalism. Modern Zionism was also around before generic Arab Nationalism.
Palestinian Arab nationalism came into being after Zionism had gained many important goals in the land of Israel. Unfortunately (for all of us in the Middle East), Arab nationalism not only was created in response to Zionism, but it has been a nationalistic movement bent solely on the destruction of Israel instead of creation.
This is as relevant today as it was one hundred years ago.
The Zionists and their pre-state government, the Yishuv, lived along the lines of compromise, whereas Palestinian Arab nationalists lived along the lines of complete destruction of any Jewish hope for self-determination.
For instance, it was the Yishuv that agreed to the UN partition of Palestine Mandate into two states: one for the Jews and one for the Arabs. It was Palestinian Arab nationalists who rejected the U.N partition and promised the destruction of any Jewish State.
Today we see much of the same dialogue that we saw back at the birth of Israel more than six decades ago. The only difference is that Israel exists today, and Palestine does not.
Israel, likes the Yishuv is actively attempting to create a Palestinian State. That is right; read it loud and clear: ISRAEL IS attempting to create Palestine; while the Palestinians are still trying to rob the Jewish Nation of its political freedom.
This is why anti-Israel behavior is anti-Semitic. No other country in the world or in history has tried harder to create freedom, self-determination and a country for its enemy.
It is almost as if Israelis want a Palestinian state more than the Palestinians do!
At the opposite end the Palestinians -- and Arabs in general -- have continually fought to destroy the state of Israel.
Today it is as if Israel under Prime Minister Ehud Barak did not offer the Palestinians a state on almost all of the West Bank, all of Gaza and East Jerusalem. This unbelievable offer was rejected by the Palestinian leadership.
When will the world demand the Palestinians take responsibility for their actions?
Why does the Obama Administration play games and waste time with fruitless almost-negotiations? Will they finally demand that the Palestinians relinquish the Right of Return? If not, then there truly is no point in talking.
If there is to be peace between Israel and her neighbors, Obama’s administration, needs to demand of the Arabs what no administration has ever done. It must demand that they own up to their end of the bargain and play ball fairly with Israel.
The American administration must make it clear to the Arabs that they need to show Israelis that it is worthwhile for them to agree to peace and two states.
It can no longer be about Israel just making gestures of good faith to the Palestinians. It is high time for the Palestinians to make gestures of good faith in return. Like recognizing Israel as the Jewish State.
If not, then the Obama administration is just trying to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes again. Let’s tear off this blindfold and expose the truth: Arabs do not want Israel to exist.
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