Peace Talks - Will Israel Really Withdraw?

Everyone that is a permanent resident of a territory is ultimately a citizen of that territory. This is specifically true for anyone born within a territory as they have a natural Right of Citizenship based upon Jus Soli. All of the Jews, Arabs, Christians and others that lived in Palestine 1947 when UNGA Resolution 181 was approved were citizens first and foremost citizens of the towns, villages, and territory where they lived. They all had a "homeland" and that was where they lived.

The fact that the Arabs rejected the establishment of two aparthied States as called for in UNGA Resolution 181 was actually a valid rejection of the proposal. UNGA Resolution 181 would have violated the civil Rights of the minority population of both States because it was a dsicriminatory ethnic/sectarian division of the overall territory.

According to Mosha Dayan, who was the commander on the Syrian border, and other leaders of Israel at the time Israel was intentionally being provocative with the intent of starting the 1967 War for the acquisition of territory. As we also know historically Egypt had absolutely no intention of invading Israel. Even the withdrawal of UN security forces from the Sinai was done because of the potential invasion by Israel of Egypt where Egypt was unable to offer protection for them. Jordan and Syria were militarily incapable of attacking Israel and the alliance between Egypt, Syria and Jordan at the time was purely defensive based upon the mutual defense of these nations should Israel decide to invade. Israel was at no time threatened in 1967 by an invasion from Egypt, Jordan or Syria.

It was not a "pre-emptive" strike but instead an intentional war started by Israel with the sole purpose of territorial acquisition.

Whether I would be a good leader or not is irrelevant. The fact is that I can read a history book and all of the wars related to Israel are based upon the violation of the unalienable Rights of the non-Jewish population in Palestine by Israel.

It is true that just removing Israeli settlements will not resolve the conflict. Israel must also address it's prior violations of the Rights of the non-Jewish population. For example the Rights of Property and the Rights of Citizenship for the non-Jewish population which was denied to those that fled "Israel" as refugees between 1947-49 to avoid being caught up in the Arab-Israeli War must also be addressed either directly with those individuals that are still alive or with their decendants. From what I understand from pro-Israeli members on this forum is that 18% of the territory of Israel was confiscated from individuals that were not living in Israel at the conclusion of the Arab-Israeli War and the Property Rights of those individuals was violated. Those individuals, or their heirs, have a Right to Compensation. Those Arabs that fled "Israel" prior to or during the Arab-Israeli War have a Right of Citizenship and their children have a Right of Citizenship based upon Jus Sanguinis.

If Israel addresses it's past violations of the Rights of the Arab population then peace is truly possible but I agree that just the elimination of illegal Jewish settlements is not enough. Israel will need to do more than that to secure the respect of their nation by the Arabs.

Of note I do not support the forced eviction of the Jews from Palestinian territories. They should be given the choice of staying or leaving assuming that they land they are living on wasn't acquired by a violation of another person's Right of Property. If the property they live on is rightfully theirs and they choose to leave they should be compensated for it. I don't believe in discrimination whether it is Israelis discriminating against Arabs or Arabs discriminating against Jews.

I've mentioned this before when I've condemned the eviction of Jews from Jordan where their property was siezed. It was wrong and they should be allowed to return and/or to be compensated for the property they lost because of the eviction if they choose to return and their property is not returned to them. I've also supported the compensation for Jews and others in Europe where property was wrongfully taken from them during WW II.

It is the violation of the Rights of the Individual that is of key importance whether we address the Israelis or the Palestinians.

 

Do the Germans expelled from Eastern Europe at the end of WWII have a right of return?

 

DOh only Palestinians have such rights.

Anyway there is no need to even argue, Israel refuses to kill itself with your black and white thinking, it also ignores the extreme hate of the Arabs towards the Jews ( for century's mind you )

 

If the "Germans" were citizens and not merely military forces occupying Eastern Europe then yes they do have a right of return.

The Right of Citizenship is a natural Right for all individuals. I believe that I recall there have been lawsuits brought in Europe related to civilians that were citizens of towns and that were evicted during WWII. I know lawsuits exist related to lost property that was confiscated during WWII.

 

So what happens when the law as you claim it to be is followed and that leads to a widespread humanitarian disaster and a second Jewish diaspora from Israel? That is acceptable to you?

I never thought I'd see someone so wrapped up in unenforceable and ridiculously outdated legal theory that the actual facts on the ground mean nothing to them.

 

No, as my post indicated all individuals have the same basic Rights. As I mentioned Jordan violated the Rights of Jordanian Jews in a very similar manner to the violations of the Rights of Israeli born non-Jewish citizens that fled to avoid being caught up in the Arab-Israeli war.

While I'm not a history expert on the Middle East I have read a little on the history in Palestine during the 19th Century. There were a few isolated instances of clashed between Arabs and Jews but it didn't appear to be prevasive and generally they got along relatively well. It wasn't until the 20th Century when the Zionists began to migrate to Palestine with the expressed goal of taking the homeland away from the resident non-Jewish population that already lived there that hostilities became more than just isolated instances.

Even today I don't actually find evidence of Arabs generally hating Jews but I do find evidence of Arabs hating Zionist Israeli Jews that are intent on violating the Rights of the Palestinian Arabs in an attempt to create an apartheid State of Israel that encompases all of Palestine.

 

Of course they were citizens of places like East Prussia, the Sudetenland, Silesia, Danzig, and a host of other places. But they won't be allowed to return home because the winners of WWII won't let them.

Your approach is purely legalistic in substance. What you aren't able to accept is that the world of international law based on Western concepts of justice is ending. And you won't address that fact. Reiteration of jus soli leads no where in the new era.

The civilization that gave birth to these concepts is in retreat and decay. International institutions founded on these concepts are going to wane. There are greater forces at work that the left just doesn't want to acknowledge. Refusing to acknowledge the full measure of reality is not a virtue.

 

What happened to the Sephardic Jews of Iraq, Iran, Egypt, the Maghreb, etc.? They were expelled in mass. Do they have the right of return? If your response is in the affirmative, the returning Sephardic Jews would probably be slaughtered.

 

Most of those people are no longer alive, would the descendent's of those people be allowed back or do the Palestinians have special rights being Arab Ubermenschen?

 

So far the Palestinians do not distinguish between the folks originally displaced and their successors.

 

Ah..but is that not down to the actions of pre and post-Israel Zionists against the Palestinians and the reaction of the UN to those actions.

After all, it wasn't the Palestinians who gave themselves the refugee status they have..it was the UN.

 

With the exception of Jordan, the Palestinians outside of Palestine haven't been allowed to integrate into the nations in which they reside. They are kept in permanent camps like the two camps in Lebanon that were the site of atrocities in 1982.

The UN is an interesting organization. It isn't capable of adapting to the new world. The UN is frozen in time. That's because the UN Security Council will not change to reflect new realities. In time it will lose legitimacy.

 

If a person's parents were wrongfully denied their citizenship then there is a valid argument for citizenship based upon jus sanguinis (the Right of Blood) for the child. If the parents left voluntarily and were never denied their Rights of Citizenship, such as the Right of Return, then the jus sanguinis isn't applicable.

Of note if the parents owned property that was confiscated from them without compensation by a government then the heirs do have a Right of Property and compensation for that which was wrongfully take from their parents.

This is universally true whether we're addressing Jordanian Jews where their Rights were violated by the government of Jordan or Palestinian Arabs where their Rights were violated by the Israeli government.

 

Shiva,

There is no one who will enforce these rights. That makes the rights theoretical. These rights aren't even inchoate.

 

But at what stage are countries outside Israel obliged to encourage Israel in their excesses?

As soon as any of them accept chucked out Palestinians, then Israel can wash its hands of them....and as Israel continues to eject Palestinians other countries are liable to be as reluctant to accept them as Israel is to accept anyone but Jews, almost jews and non-jews with a smidgeon of Jewish blood from one of their four grandparents.......are they not? So why would Israel expect Jordan, Egypt, Iraq etc to accept Palestinians if Israel won't accept them in Israel?

The UN is the one chance the world has to become a decent place to live...but first it has to kick the veto into touch.

I listen to and read conspiracy theories daily re "The New World Order" and "Bilderberg" and "The Jews" and even "the Freemasons", which seem to accept that a small coterie of ********s are going to be ruling the world..........and I think that if we are going to hqave ********s ruling the world, we kinda need 194 ********s who don't particularly get on together..because then we might get something most of us can live with.

 

Let me shoot from the hip.

Nature is based on predation. Human beings are part of nature.

You speak to a higher state of consciousness. But that higher state of consciousness requires a world that is accepting of it and willing to abide by its norms and mores. The UN was created based on that consciousness. But the wheels came off the bus.

At least half of Americans are hostile to the UN because they perceive it to be the haven of anti-Americanism. It doesn't matter whether that is true in whole or even in part. The UN can't function as it was intended. During the Cold War it was locked in paralysis. Now it can't adapt to the rise of new powers and will become illegitimate. It can't adapt because China and America will not allow the elimination of the veto. Ain't gonna happen.

A higher plane can't be reached until each and every nationalism and poison is eliminated from every group on the planet. Imo that's just the truth.

The Jews think they are in the right based on the pogroms, etc. of the past. That shapes their consciousness. Considering the hostility of the world to the Jews their consciousness is reinforced. Look at the Israeli left. It is now a mere shadow of itself.

Should the Palestinians and Jews live together in peace in a country Israel or Palestine or Palrael or Israstine? Yeah. But each side has poison coursing through its veins.

What should have been done is that the Israelis should have been magnanimous in victory after the Six Day War or the Yom Kippur War or after the Camp David Treaty and made a deal with the PLO. AND the deal should have been guaranteed by NATO by allowing Israel to join NATO. NATO troops could have been stationed right on the border. But that possibility passed, and now we're in a new era of history.

The saddest words in the English language are "what might have been."

The Palestinians and Israelis can't reconcile the Right of Return with the Jewish fear of a repeat of two thousand years of bad experiences. It was those experiences that are behind the idea of a Jewish State.

No combination of legalisms and morality are going to change this.

The best thing America can do is to get out of the line of fire because some bad (*)(*)(*)(*) is going to happen. Once things start they are going to spin out of control.

John Kennedy gave world leaders copies of Barbara Tuchman's book The Guns Of August about WWI. Not one of the European leaders of the pre-WWI era could even imagine what was about to happen. That's why you don't go to war unless your life depends on it.

So life isn't fair. Look at how history has treated the Kurds and the Tibetans.

 

Can't really quibble with any of that, though I can and do hope that your conclusions are wrong.

I kinda like to think that, apart from politicians who are complete power-mad, self-serving ********s, most of the rest of the world just wants to live in peace and get a life...but politicians won't let them.

Back in the days when Maggie Thatcher was making the UK into little America, I was posting on forums promising that if I ever found out I had a terminal illness that the one thing I would do before I died was make my way down south, shoot her and maybe save the UK from becoming America-lite!

Now I am older, and even less healthy, I have expanded my ambitions.....if I am ever diagnosed with a terminal illness, I intend to get my very first passport...and cross the world shooting politicians...any and every one I can reach!

I haven't quite worked out the logistics of getting a machine gun in the current paranoid climate in the various countries....but I'm sure I can get help on the internet! Unless things in the world change drastically in the meantime, I will start at the House of Commons......then hit the USA..travel back and decimate the EU Parliament and travel on to Israel........and from there it will be whichever regime hacks me off the most..having already sorted out the main troublemakers destabilising the world.

As an aside.....given that the US Government appears to check everything on the internet, even including my Silver Surfers forum (average age a good ten years older than me), I wonder how long it will take their rampant paranoia to demand my extradition from the UK to face charges of planning terrorist activities?

 

I love the Maggie Thatcher part. haha. If you want guns America is the place for you.

America isn't going to request your extradition. I've been calling for dissolution of the federal govt. for awhile now and they haven't bothered me. They even let me continue to purchase guns. hahahahaha.

 

The United Nations has the authority to enforce these Rights and has made efforts to do so with numerous UN Security Council and General Assembly Resolutions.

As someone pointed out though the UN is corrupted predominately by the "veto power" of the permanent members of the Security Council with the United States being the greatest offender related to Israel.

For example in 1967 the UNSC passed Resolution 242 that required Israel to withdraw from the territories occupied during the 6-Day War. The US voted for this Resolution but then failed to lead in any attempt to enforce it and blocked any attempts to enforce it. Ecomonic sanctions should have been imposed on Israel when it refused to comply with the Security Council Resolution that it is mandated to comply with as a treaty member of the United Nations.

We've seen numerous cases of hypocracy in the actions of the United States as a permanent member of the United Nations where the use of "veto" power has prevented the enforcement of UNSC Resolutions that the US either allowed to pass or actively supported by it's vote. Security Council Resolutions are mandatory for all member's of the United Nations and yet Israel, that is a treaty member of the United Nation, continues to ignore these Resolutions and is protected from forced compliance by the veto power of the United States.

So the authority exists and these issues where the Rights of People have violated have been addressed but what is lacking is the enforcement of the authority of the United Nations. The enforcement has been blocked by the United States which, as a permanent member, should be doing that which is necessary to enforce UN Resolutions which have been passed.

If the UN Security Council and the member states of the United Nations took those steps necessary to enforce previously passed Resolutions we would not have a conflict between Israel and the Palestinians today. It has the authority but has failed in it's responsibilities related to the enforcement of that authority. United States political hypocracy and it's failure to fulfill it's responsibilities as a permanent member of the Security Council is a major contributing factor in why the conflict continues.

 

Exactly as we've been trying to say. The USA is the only nation capable of enforcing international law in any meaningful way and the American People generally support Israel and apparently are perfectly willing to accept whatever hypocrisy you claim they are endorsing in their collective will.

You don't honestly expect our Politicians to go against the will of their Constituents do you? There are too many Americans who simply don't care how the Palestinians are treated and see the Jews as victims of an ongoing war of aggression against them that had no justification and continues to this day.

 

I would disagree. It isn't that the United States is the only nation capable of enforcing UN Security Council Resolutions but it is one of the pemanent members of the Security Council with veto power that can prevent enforcement. It is veto power that in the most influential factor in preventing the United Nations from being an effective political entity. This has been previously mentioned.

If there was no veto power then effective enforcement of Security Council Resolutions would be attainable. The most effective enforcement power of the United Nations is economic sanctions and they should be used whenever a nation refuses to comply with a Security Council Resolution. If we apply this to Israel then economic sanctions in 1968 when it became evident that Israel was not going to comply with UNSC Resolution 242 would have literally brought Israel to it's knees. No oil for example. Israel has no oil and sanctions that prevented it's importation would have crippled the Israeli economy. No importing or exporting of goods. Once again Israel would have been devastated had such sanctions been imposed. No arms imports would have threatened the very ability of Israel to defend itself and would have been a major motivating factor in Israel deciding to comply with UNSC Resolution 242.

Instead nothing happened so Israel had no motivation to honor it's treaty obligations with member states of the United Nations. It has existed with impunity related to any of it's international treaty obligations because the US would veto any measure intended to enforce UNSC Resolutions.

Bottom line it isn't that the US is the only nation that can enforce UNSC Resolutions but it does stand in the way of those Resolutions being enforced.

 

What you have described is called authority without power. Authority without power is meaningless.

In order for the UN to acquire the power it would be necessary to reform the UN Security Council. That will never happen. Neither China nor America will permit their veto power to be stripped from them, and they will not allow the addition to the UNSC of new permanent member states with veto power. Why? Such reforms would reduce their power.

The American people will never be persuaded to pressure the United States not to exercise its veto power in favor of Israel. Why? Because the majority of the American people identify with Israel.

Returning to my point, there is no one who will enforce international law concerning Israel and the Palestinians. The Palestinians have a right without a remedy.

 

Do you have a way of changing this state of affairs? No you don't. That means there will be war.

 

In which case the majority of American people need educating, in the same way that the Plastic Paddies who financed the terrorist IRA needed educating. They were sold the same 'poor, oppressed little Ireland, suffering under the jackboot of the evil British' crap that the Israelis have been selling America for decades vis a vis their Palestinian neighbours.
Fortunately the rest of the world has finally wised-up to the truth. It only needs America to catch-up.

 

Plastic Paddies could be persuaded because they thought America had a special relationship with Great Britain. I know because I'm a Plastic Paddy on my Donegal side.

Palestine doesn't have a special relationship with America. On this subject you are making an intellectual appeal. Good luck with that. Americans think of Palestine and imagine bin Laden. I'm starting to think that Sisyphus was from the UK.