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Montecresto 
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Posted on: Feb. 12 2013, 10:09 pm |
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Why does Israel often get the mention in the SOTUA? Can we dispense with that country by now?
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Killing one person is murder, killing a 100,000 is foreign policy
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High_Sierra_Fan
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Posted on: Feb. 12 2013, 10:15 pm |
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Soon, The End Times grow close.
Or not.
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Montecresto
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Posted on: Feb. 12 2013, 11:21 pm |
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Why the US sucks Israel can't really be explained can it?
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Killing one person is murder, killing a 100,000 is foreign policy
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Franco
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 12:28 am |
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Take Israel out of that region and see what happens.
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JimInMD
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 7:11 am |
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(Drift Woody @ Feb. 13 2013, 7:01 am)
QUOTE Of course, Israel is there to stay.
The question is whether it will always be the "Jewish State." The quest for a Greater Israel encompassing all of the Promised Land entails encompassing a greater Arab population that reproduces at a faster rate. For Israel as we know it to survive there would have to be Apartheid with diminished rights based on ethnicity, or massive expulsion. Full citizenship in a democratic state would render the Jewish population a minority.
DW, I seperated your first sentence out of the rest, please forgive the editing.
I agree with everything you wrote but I do wonder whether a majority Muslim Israel would indeed continue to exist? I may be very wrong here, but I wonder if it's government wouldn't prefer to simply disolve the country into the already Muslim led nations surrounding it. I also expect that as we get closer to this tipping point, there may well be large scale emigration of the Jewish population. That is of course pure speculation on my part, but I can't imagine that many of them would want to live there as a minority.
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Checking out for a while, find me on FB.
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Drift Woody
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 8:16 am |
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Jim,
There were two parts to my post, so I don't mind you quoting only the part you are responding to.
Nation states don't voluntarily dissolve. If the Arabs living within its borders gained political control of Israel, my bet is they'd reconstitute the land into the nation of Palestine. And if that happened, there probably would be an exodus of Jews.
But I don't expect either of those developments any time soon after the Arab population becomes a majority. Israeli Jews will not give up control of their own nation-state; they will take measures against that eventuality. Expulsion and Apartheid are two possibilities, but it is the Two State solution that has been officially embraced by most of the international community.
The problem with the Two State solution is that Palestine is not a viable nation state while it is riddled with Israeli settlements and the roads connecting them. Settlement building is at odds with that solution and also steers a course towards the demographic shift we're discussing here.
Israeli leaders are smart enough to see all of this, so I wonder what they're thinking and what their plan is for the future. It's possible the hardliners are so intent on a greater Israel they are willing to deal with problem of an Arab majority further down the road.
I forsee things getting worse before they ever get better.
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We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children.
-- Native American proverb
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Montecresto
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 8:30 am |
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It was the nation of Palestine at the time of, and long before Jesus. And it got along just fine. It was stolen from them in 1948! The Jews are the interlopers and trespassers. A two state solution would be a huge compromise on the part of the Palestinians. But they can't even get that, can they?
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Killing one person is murder, killing a 100,000 is foreign policy
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george of the j
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 1:35 pm |
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The Jewish population in the United States doesn't seem large enough to account for the clout Israel holds with the U.S. government. I have heard---but never took the time to verify---that there are Evangelicals who believe having the Jewish people in control of the Holy Land will somehow help fulfill the prophecy of the second coming. I don't know if this adds to Israel's influence over the U.S. government, or just how many Evangelicals believe something like that.
---George
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Ben2World
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 2:11 pm |
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Second Coming part, I don't know, but many, many Christians here sympathize with Israel -- and not with the Palestinians (or Muslims in general).
Ironically, in Israel and Palestinian Territory, the local Christians sympathize more with the Palestinians. This is the impression I got staying at various hostels run by Christian religious organizations and talking to the managers. Some say flat out that they hire Palestinians over Israelis, because of the 'injustice' the latter inflict on the former...
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The world is a book and those who do not travel read only a page. -- St. Augustine
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Montecresto
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 2:32 pm |
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Yep. But Israel enjoys the support of American Christians largely unaware of that knowledge.
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Killing one person is murder, killing a 100,000 is foreign policy
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Three
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 3:02 pm |
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Israel, though it has flaws, is a functioning democracy with rule of law, though imperfect. That can't be said for any other country in that region.
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george of the j
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 3:41 pm |
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(Three @ Feb. 13 2013, 3:02 pm)
QUOTE Israel, though it has flaws, is a functioning democracy with rule of law, though imperfect. That can't be said for any other country in that region.
I liken the Zionist takeover of Israel to the white man taking America from the Indians. The Indians did not have the rule of law white man-style, but this did not justify killing them to seize their land.
After WWI, there was a sparse Arab population in what is now Israel. As more and more Jews moved in, some Arabs welcomed them and lived side-by-side with them, some Arabs sold their land to Jews, and others had their land seized by force.
---George
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Montecresto
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 8:20 pm |
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(Three @ Feb. 13 2013, 2:59 pm)
QUOTE
(Montecresto @ Feb. 13 2013, 8:30 am)
QUOTE It was the nation of Palestine at the time of, and long before Jesus. And it got along just fine. It was stolen from them in 1948! The Jews are the interlopers and trespassers. A two state solution would be a huge compromise on the part of the Palestinians. But they can't even get that, can they? Huh? How do you define nation?
Well, how would you define nation? It was the land of Palestine, occupied by, Palestinians, until 1948 when the newly created UN, with the full support of the US and Britain, took it from the Palestinians and gave it to the Jews. How in the world would anybody really expect the Palestinians or the Arab nations be happy with this?
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Killing one person is murder, killing a 100,000 is foreign policy
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Ben2World
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 8:35 pm |
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My understanding is that area was initially populated by people we call "Canaanites" -- divided into numerous 'kingdoms' -- most of which were really just glorified chiefdoms. The Israelites were relative latecomers -- but achieved regional 'top dog' status around 3,000 years ago -- but their heyday only lasted two reigns (kings David and Solomon).
The Hebrew 'empire' was more a blip than anything else. That whole region of petty kingdoms were much more often pawns of other empires: Egyptian, Babylonian, Hittite, Assyrian, then Persian.
The Greeks (Selecids and Ptolemies) held ascendancy for two hundred years or so before Christ -- after defeating the Persians. But when Christ walked the Earth, the Romans were the undisputed master. It was also the Romans who dispersed the Jews for the second time.
When Rome divided itself into East and West, the eastern (Byzantine) empire held sway -- until it lost everything to the Arab Muslims.
The Arabs became master -- until they themselves were vanquished by the Turks (Ottomans) -- who then ruled the place until the early 20th century. The weakening Turkish rule provided an opportunity for Jews to resettle. The Machiavellian and unprincipled Brits took over after WWI and "promised" the land to both Arabs and Jews -- classic 'divide and conquer'.
Collective European and American guilt toward the Jews after WWII motivated them to settle surviving European Jews to that area -- to the chagrin of folks who were already living there for generations -- today's Palestinians.
Was it right to "return" the Jews to their 'homeland' after 2,000 years' absence?
My question to fellow Americans: Would it be right for anyone to force us into returning "our" lands back to Native Americans? Remember, they were kicked off just a few hundred years ago.
The real answer, IMO, is that folks who frame the question as "right vs. wrong" are both simplistic and wrong.
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The world is a book and those who do not travel read only a page. -- St. Augustine
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| Post Number: 19
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Montecresto
Group: Members
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 9:00 pm |
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That's a perfect question. And nobody would agree that North America should be returned to the natives. However, we take pretty good care of our Indians now, in contrast the Palestinians are still horribly oppressed. And the Jews are doing it. The Jews took the land the first time, after exiting Egyptian bondage, which is hard to prove historically, and they took it again in 1948.
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Killing one person is murder, killing a 100,000 is foreign policy
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High_Sierra_Fan
Group: Members
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Posted on: Feb. 13 2013, 10:01 pm |
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(Montecresto @ Feb. 13 2013, 5:20 pm)
QUOTE
(Three @ Feb. 13 2013, 2:59 pm)
QUOTE
(Montecresto @ Feb. 13 2013, 8:30 am)
QUOTE It was the nation of Palestine at the time of, and long before Jesus. And it got along just fine. It was stolen from them in 1948! The Jews are the interlopers and trespassers. A two state solution would be a huge compromise on the part of the Palestinians. But they can't even get that, can they? Huh? How do you define nation? Well, how would you define nation? It was the land of Palestine, occupied by, Palestinians, until 1948 when the newly created UN, with the full support of the US and Britain, took it from the Palestinians and gave it to the Jews. How in the world would anybody really expect the Palestinians or the Arab nations be happy with this?
Controlled by one empire or another until Great Britain, in control since 1922 when they got it from the Ottomans who'd picked the losing side in WWI, decided to dump it and the United Nations decided to split the territory.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Palestine
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