Israel Unilaterally Draws West Bank Boundaries

[Frodo]

Olmert Says Israel Will Keep 3 Large West Bank Settlement Blocs

By GREG MYRE
Published: February 8, 2006

JERUSALEM, Feb. 7 — Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in a television interview broadcast on Tuesday that he wanted to set the country's permanent borders, with Israel giving up significant parts of the West Bank but keeping the largest Jewish settlement blocs.

Opinion polls indicate that Mr. Olmert and his centrist Kadima Party are favored in the Israeli national elections on March 28, and he says a top priority would be establishing Israel's frontiers, with or without an agreement with the Palestinians.

"The direction is clear: we are headed toward a separation from the Palestinians," Mr. Olmert told Channel 2 in his first major interview since he became acting prime minister a month ago. "We will hold on to the main settlement blocs. But the borders we have in mind are not those Israel has today."

link

[angus]

Olmert Says Israel Will Keep 3 Large West Bank Settlement Blocs

note the spin.  I'm not picking on Myre.  I actually know Greg Myre, and he's a stand up guy.  A little short on humor, but a nice enough fellow.  I'm just saying the title could just have easily been:

Israel giving up significant parts of the West Bank

it'll be interesting to see how other papers around the US and around the world spin this story.  Not sure how I'd spin it either, to tell the truth, I just enjoy the amateur social psychology.

[Beet]

It should have been:

Israel annexing significant parts of the West Bank

The byline should have been something like: "Large Palestinian populations and international reaction in the case of any mass expulsions prevent Israel from annexing entire territory."

As for 'Greg Myre', it's just another name to me, and I won't pretend to like him (or dislike him). It might as well be 'Elvis Presley'.

[MODU]

I don't see the issue with this.  Israel controls those areas ever since the war.  The fact that Israel is giving back portions of the region for the Palestinian state to be established is a good thing.  It clearly defines what the borders are.  If Israel really wanted to, they could boot all the Palestinians out of the area and force them into Syria or some other neighboring nation.  For a nation that's taken nothing but hits over the years, they are being quite generous.

[Beet]

I don't see the issue with this.  Israel controls those areas ever since the war.  The fact that Israel is giving back portions of the region for the Palestinian state to be established is a good thing.  It clearly defines what the borders are.  If Israel really wanted to, they could boot all the Palestinians out of the area and force them into Syria or some other neighboring nation.  For a nation that's taken nothing but hits over the years, they are being quite generous.

The only reason Israel is allowing the Palestinians to remain the West Bank and the Gaza strip is because it cannot magically make them disappear. If the Israeli right could make that happen, I have a hard time believing you can convince me they wouldn't do it. However, the Israeli right realizes that if this policy were enacted, the political consensus among governmental elites that keeps Israel at peace with Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia would evaporate. At the same time, Israel would come under intense international attack, both figuratively and literally. Even if the United States would not be able to support the policy of the creation of 1.3 million refugees, a mass explusion that might be compared to the German expulsion of Jews prior to the holocaust. Such an act would delight the likes of Osama bin Laden, but be a disaster to the strategic interest of Israel.

At the same time the Israeli right realizes it cannot annex these territories into Israel proper without expulsion, for the Palestinians, like most impoverished populations, have such high birth rates that they would soon gain significant representation in the Knesset. Obviously this is unable to the racist fascists that make up the Israeli right, and their dream of a Jewish-only state. However, to deny the Palestinians franchise would undermine Israel's claim to be a democracy, which brings it substantial benefits in terms of overseas image, especially among many U.S. politicians.

The Israeli right therefore, sees the best option as a page from the playbook of South Africa prior to the dismantlement of apartheid: that is, create "bantustans", nominally independent "nations" without viable territory, wholly contained with the borders of the existing state, while annexing other parts with large Israeli populations. Israel can then say they have given the Palestinians "independence" without relinquishing its current Jordanian border, and without giving Palestinians the franchise. In effect, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank have been turned into giant concentration camps, or perhaps for better comparison the Warsaw Ghetto in the third reich. The concentrated, walled-in minority populations retain no rights nor a serious viable state, yet their nominal independence provides excuse to deny citizenship.

Quite a generous policy indeed.

[MODU]

That's one way to look at it.  The other way to look at it is through history.  Brits control "Palestine" following WWI when the Ottoman Empire was broken up under the Sykes-Picot Agreement.  Palestine at that time was the combination of Jordan and Israel.  Within a decade, Palestine was broken in two, creating a Jewish Palestine (Israel) and an Arab Palestine (Jordan).  With the Jews now isolated into a small section of the Middle East, it was easier for Arab states to attack the nation, with attacks escalating until 1948, when Jewish Palestine became Israel. 

For 2 years, an Arab coalition attacked the new nation, only to have Israel "win" by gaining Arab lands under their control, resulting in the first refugee camps.  All these camps did was create more problems, which added to the regional tensions until 1967, when Israel was attacked again (and again, they won, capturing even more land).  It was at this time that the last of the Arab refugees should have been expelled, but Israel thought they could integrate them into their society . . . which has led us to the modern day issues within the country. 

So when I say that dividing their country up and giving lands to these "Palestinians" to create their own (and second) Palestinian state is generous, I mean it.  They don't have to give them anything.  They should have sent all of them out of their country in 1967 to their already established Palestinian state.

[Jake]

I think angus has the right idea.

[Beet]

That's one way to look at it.  The other way to look at it is through history.  Brits control "Palestine" following WWI when the Ottoman Empire was broken up under the Sykes-Picot Agreement.  Palestine at that time was the combination of Jordan and Israel.  Within a decade, Palestine was broken in two, creating a Jewish Palestine (Israel) and an Arab Palestine (Jordan).  With the Jews now isolated into a small section of the Middle East, it was easier for Arab states to attack the nation, with attacks escalating until 1948, when Jewish Palestine became Israel. 

For 2 years, an Arab coalition attacked the new nation, only to have Israel "win" by gaining Arab lands under their control, resulting in the first refugee camps.  All these camps did was create more problems, which added to the regional tensions until 1967, when Israel was attacked again (and again, they won, capturing even more land).  It was at this time that the last of the Arab refugees should have been expelled, but Israel thought they could integrate them into their society . . . which has led us to the modern day issues within the country. 

So when I say that dividing their country up and giving lands to these "Palestinians" to create their own (and second) Palestinian state is generous, I mean it.  They don't have to give them anything.  They should have sent all of them out of their country in 1967 to their already established Palestinian state.

It's not a question of you meaning it or not meaning it. I was hardly impugning on your sincerity, I was merely making a reasoned set of deductions and inferences that together, suggest your interpretation, in particular, the part about the Israeli right's plan of action being an act of "giving", is incorrect. I would also dispute your assertion that Palestinians were to be integrated into Israeli society; rather, some Arabs, the Israeli Arabs, do, at least from a legal POV, participate within Israeli society, which represent about 13% of Israel proper. The rest of the occupied territories, however, were never formally annexed.

Going backward further and jumping into the war issue, the Jews were, much like Hispanics in Texas, California, and Arizona today, always guests on the land invited in by the Ottomans and subsequently the British, who had appropriated the land through imperialism, to the detriment of the native Arabs. But since their immigration was a consequence of imperialism, the Jews' claim to land in the territory was founded in violation of the right to national self-determination. They were forced to resort to terrorism, robbery, and mass murder to seize the land forcibly from both the British plan and the majority Arab population.

Of course, the Israeli right's present course of action's nature and the justification of the existence of the Israeli state in the first place are two entirely separable issues, and it is not necessary to discuss the other to understand either.

Unfortunately your post suggests you didn't fully comprehend my first reply, so I don't necessary expect you to comprehend this one.

[MODU]

hehehe . . . I'm old, what do you expect?  Brain gets a little slow sometimes.    I understood what you were trying to get at.  I was just offering a different perspective on the issue.  For discussion purposes:

I don't think anyone is ever forced into terrorism.  The Arabs in Israel that did not already live on the land primarily came there on their own as laborers when Jewish Palestine was first established.  The region was not very habittable (plagued with marshes and disease) initially, and was only populated with a few small towns scattered along both coasts.  And when the division of Palestine came along, a good portion of the Arabs that stayed behind did in fact choose to do so out of cooperation and coexistence. 

Now I will vouche for the fact that it must have sucked to have land divided up into new states (and many of the problems in Africa and the Middle East stem from colonial Europe redrawing the map), but no one was forcing these Arabs to move nor conform with Jewish law.  It had open borders with the neighboring states to allow people to come and go until the formal government was established. 

As far as nationalism goes, I tend to find this to be a weak argument by the Palestinians.  If nationalism truly was their driving force, all of the states under the Ottoman Empire would have been brought back together once the English had left.  As it is, these states do not all get along with each other, so the notion of nationalism has already lost some of its legitimecy.  Secondly, Jews can also claim nationalism for reclaiming a nation once lost to them.  Of course, this too is a weak argument since the nation was long lost centuries before WWI.  The whole exercise has been just a series of power-grabs by Israel's neighbors, resulting them in losing land each time they attacked the nation (oddly enough pushing the borders of modern day Israel to about where historical Israel use to extend).

[Beet]

hehehe . . . I'm old, what do you expect?  Brain gets a little slow sometimes.    I understood what you were trying to get at.  I was just offering a different perspective on the issue.

Well, you were offering a perspective that was different because it wasn't quite addressing the same issue, which is the nature of present planned actions. You didn't show how the analysis of these actions vary according to the historical subject that you presented.

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I'm not sure what any of this has to do with anything. To the extent the borders were open (and they were not wholly), it was not out of the acquiesence of the majority population living in the territory but rather a decision of the British occupying forces. 

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Well, there is a strong argument that all of the Arab states ought to in fact belong to a single state. However, that this hasn't happened doesn't invalidate the right to national self-determination in general, for the nation-states that did come into existence and the people that make them up retain a right to national self-determination. I believe this was also the justification of the international coalition's intervention to protect Kuwait in 1991. If one chooses to look at the deeper Arab level however, the Arab language, ethnicity, and common sense of destiny has not disappeared, nor of course, have the common religion. But that is yet another digression. The Palestinians had their land stolen, and no amount of historicism or diversions evaporates that fact. Therefore, they have the right to fight to take it back, and other nations have the right to fight to take it back for them.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The Palestinians had their land stolen, and no amount of historicism or diversions evaporates that fact.

Yes; but what isn't usually pointed out is that other Arab countries were quite happy to steal (as this is the word being used in this discussion) land from them as well; there was never any chance of there being an independent Palestine in 1948.

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Like most people in the U.K some of my ancestors lost land due to the Enclosures. Do I (or we for that matter) have the right to "fight to take it back"?
(That's an extreme example o/c, but that's not the point).

[Beet]

The Palestinians had their land stolen, and no amount of historicism or diversions evaporates that fact.

Yes; but what isn't usually pointed out is that other Arab countries were quite happy to steal (as this is the word being used in this discussion) land from them as well; there was never any chance of there being an independent Palestine in 1948.

Well, if you don't think it's stealing, then explain why. Regarding other Arab countries, the Arab League did not decide to intervene for at least six months after the U.N. partition decision, even as military confrontations began immediately, and did not actually intervene until Israel declared its independence. Even if they would have been willing to annex land, however, that's a moot point as they currently do not own Palestinian land.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Like most people in the U.K some of my ancestors lost land due to the Enclosures. Do I (or we for that matter) have the right to "fight to take it back"?
(That's an extreme example o/c, but that's not the point).
[/quote]

Well it depends on whether the loss of land was accepted by the sovereign authority at the time. If it was not accepted, they certainly have the right to enlist the sovereign authority for return of the land, and that authority may fight on their behalf if the new occupiers are unwilling to return it. The problem with the Palestinian question is that there was no sovereign authority governing both the Jews and the Palestinians which could have justified the forcible appropriation of property from one group to another. It was a conflict not between individuals but between nations.

[MODU]

Therefore, they have the right to fight to take it back, and other nations have the right to fight to take it back for them.

So you wouldn't mind if Israel pushed out all of the Arab Palestinians from the occupied territories?  Israel would be justified in their claim that they have the right to take back their land which was taken from them as well, right?

[Beet]

Therefore, they have the right to fight to take it back, and other nations have the right to fight to take it back for them.

So you wouldn't mind if Israel pushed out all of the Arab Palestinians from the occupied territories?  Israel would be justified in their claim that they have the right to take back their land which was taken from them as well, right?

Absolutely not. "Israel"'s land was taken from it thousands and thousands of years ago. The current inhabitants of the land have lost all substantive contact with the original conquerers of classical Israel. The Palestinians' land, on the other hand, has been under the process of being appropriated for the past 80 years, and still is being so today. Therefore, they (technically) have the right to fight back and destroy all of Israel.

[WMS]

The Palestinians had their land stolen, and no amount of historicism or diversions evaporates that fact. Therefore, they have the right to fight to take it back, and other nations have the right to fight to take it back for them.

Wasn't it bought before 1948? You know, legally, from Arab owners?

[Beet]

The Palestinians had their land stolen, and no amount of historicism or diversions evaporates that fact. Therefore, they have the right to fight to take it back, and other nations have the right to fight to take it back for them.

Wasn't it bought before 1948? You know, legally, from Arab owners?

Some land was, yes, but at the time of the UN partition they owned only 6.5% of the Palestine Mandate; the UN plan would have given them 55%, which was one reason why it was opposed by the Arabs.

[WMS]

The Palestinians had their land stolen, and no amount of historicism or diversions evaporates that fact. Therefore, they have the right to fight to take it back, and other nations have the right to fight to take it back for them.

Wasn't it bought before 1948? You know, legally, from Arab owners?

Some land was, yes, but at the time of the UN partition they owned only 6.5% of the Palestine Mandate; the UN plan would have given them 55%, which was one reason why it was opposed by the Arabs.

Who owned the rest? I seem to recall that it wasn't the *also-immigrant* Palestinians, but absentee landlords. I've run into tons of debate over this, and historically under the Ottomans 'Palestine' was really underpopulated by all accounts. Then the Zionists arrived, their economic growth attracted the Palestinians as laborers, and it got crowded.

[Beet]

In either case, the Zionists did not own it. Before the Zionists arrived, the population was overwhelmingly Arab. The Zionists' arrival was not approved by the local population but rather the Ottomans and subsequently the British. The core issue of land appropriation is that the Zionists considered themselves a separate nation and the British conquest of the region "gave" to them 55% of the land in the form of the UN partition, which the majority Palestinian population (counting both Arabs and Jews) were never asked to approve and in all likelihood would have been rejected by referendum (given that Jews were only 33% of the population). In a sentence, the British gave away land that they conquered and did not own themselves, to a minority of settlers. One analogy, however absurd, would be perhaps if China conquered the western United States, opened the border with Mexico, allowed 50 million heavily armed Mexicans to move across the Rio Grande, and then "gave" 55% of the US territory as a new "Mexican state". Of course there would be resistance, and it would be justified. This is not to say I do not think Israel does not have a right to exist today, because one has to balance out the right to national property with the livelihoods of the current Israeli population. However, the Israeli right has also been perpetrating ongoing settlement expansion ever since the 1960s, and resistance to that is justified.

[dazzleman]

Israel is doing the only thing they can.  The reality is that the Palestinians are terrorists who don't want peace. 

Even if they wiped Israel off the map, those people wouldn't have peace; they'd turn and start killing each other.

Israel can never expect to have peace with them, or be able to live safely with them in their midst.  Therefore, the only thing that makes sense is to draw the boundaries unilaterally, withdraw from most the West Bank, and then institute complete separation from the Palestinians.  The Palestinians have proven over and over that there's really no other way.

[Frodo]

Israel is doing the only thing they can.  The reality is that the Palestinians are terrorists who don't want peace. 

Even if they wiped Israel off the map, those people wouldn't have peace; they'd turn and start killing each other.

Israel can never expect to have peace with them, or be able to live safely with them in their midst.  Therefore, the only thing that makes sense is to draw the boundaries unilaterally, withdraw from most the West Bank, and then institute complete separation from the Palestinians.  The Palestinians have proven over and over that there's really no other way.

^^^^^^^^

My sentiments exactly. 

[dazzleman]

Israel is doing the only thing they can.  The reality is that the Palestinians are terrorists who don't want peace. 

Even if they wiped Israel off the map, those people wouldn't have peace; they'd turn and start killing each other.

Israel can never expect to have peace with them, or be able to live safely with them in their midst.  Therefore, the only thing that makes sense is to draw the boundaries unilaterally, withdraw from most the West Bank, and then institute complete separation from the Palestinians.  The Palestinians have proven over and over that there's really no other way.

^^^^^^^^

My sentiments exactly. 

Great minds think alike, man.

In all seriousness, I have invariably found that people who always go around wearing their victim status on their sleeve are generally very good victimizers.  The Palestinians are surely no exception to this.

[Beet]

I have invariably found that people who always go around wearing their victim status on their sleeve are generally very good victimizers.  The Palestinians are surely no exception to this.

Neither are Jews...

[dazzleman]

I have invariably found that people who always go around wearing their victim status on their sleeve are generally very good victimizers.  The Palestinians are surely no exception to this.

Neither are Jews...

You should probably say Israelis, rather than Jews.  I think it's a mistake to mix up nationality with religion.

The way I see it is that the Israelis would jump at a chance for real peace, and would make significant concessions if that were achievable.  In fact, the Israelis have made significant concessions for peace, only to be kicked in the teeth again and again by murderous Palestinian terrorism.

The Palestinians don't want peace.  There are some people who are so full of hate that they would rather be miserable, and able to sustain that hate, than have the cause taken away.  They are so afraid that they won't survive in an environment in which they have to look to themselves to solve their problems, rather than blame other people.

While the Palestinians belong to this group that I described, IMO, the Israelis do not.  I recognize that it is fashionable among morally neutral liberals to equate the Israelis and the Palestinians, just as these same people equated American defense of Western Europe with Russian occupation of Eastern Europe.  It was wrong then, and it's wrong now.

[Beet]

I have invariably found that people who always go around wearing their victim status on their sleeve are generally very good victimizers.  The Palestinians are surely no exception to this.

Neither are Jews...

You should probably say Israelis, rather than Jews.  I think it's a mistake to mix up nationality with religion.

The way I see it is that the Israelis would jump at a chance for real peace, and would make significant concessions if that were achievable.  In fact, the Israelis have made significant concessions for peace, only to be kicked in the teeth again and again by murderous Palestinian terrorism.

The Palestinians don't want peace.  There are some people who are so full of hate that they would rather be miserable, and able to sustain that hate, than have the cause taken away.  They are so afraid that they won't survive in an environment in which they have to look to themselves to solve their problems, rather than blame other people.

While the Palestinians belong to this group that I described, IMO, the Israelis do not.  I recognize that it is fashionable among morally neutral liberals to equate the Israelis and the Palestinians, just as these same people equated American defense of Western Europe with Russian occupation of Eastern Europe.  It was wrong then, and it's wrong now.

Well since Israel was established as a Jewish state, I think it's impossible to entirely separate out nationality and religion in this case. Throughout this thread I have generally tried to use 'Israeli right' to describe backers of the current government policy. The thing is, your quote was about victims being victimizers and Jews were by far the biggest victims in modern history. The fact that a minority of them in Israel now practice neofascist lebenstraum policies themselves under the guise of hardline Zionism is a more perfect illustration than anything else of your quote, which I agree with immensely. Human nature generally can't be relied on. That's a piece of ancient wisdom that the writers of the Old and New testaments understood well. Given the chance to do evil, people very likely will do it. An ideology that tells people not to blame others misses the point-- does the thief blame the person he is stealing from? No, but he steals it anyway. The variable is not "good" or "bad" people but what people have the capability to do. The question to ask is what does this person or group of people have the ability to do?

As for the rest of your post, we are again moving onto new ground. The first discussion was an analysis of the Israeli right's current options. The second discussion was a discussion of how the Israeli state acquired the land that it now has. In this I do not equate Israelis and Palestinians; the Palestinians were clearly wronged. However I do balance out the Israelis' competing interests. Now you want to discuss who wants peace and how peace can be possible. This is not a discussion that we have the proper terminology for, IMHO. Nothing can be gained in this topic by thinking only in terms of Israelis and Palestinians, and that was the main mistake of politicians and individuals in the 1990s.

1) Peace must first to be conceived of as a concept to be constructed (for example, coexistence) rather than an anticoncept (of violence) of be destructed.
2) Then our conceptual and verbal groupings of individuals must be reorganized around the division created by this new constructed concept (for example, those who want coexistence, and those who do not).
3) Finally, those who want what we now call 'peace' must reorganize a new identity around coexistence that enables us to constrain and direct our emotional reactions to violence in a logical way consistent with our goals.