Middle East Peace Act of 2009 (On the President's Desk)

[Lief 🗽]

I'm strongly opposed to passing bills unilaterally ordering other countries to do this and that or else we'll stop financially supporting them. If we care about peace, then we should work with the Palestinians and the Israelis, not dictate terms to them.

And section 5 is horrible.

[Lief 🗽]

Franzl,

To a degree, yes, and there's certainly room for condemnations and the like on both sides. But essentially ordering them to redraw their territory at our whim, and basically immediately at that, without even consulting them, first, much less negotiating with the two countries, is way too much.

This bill is not going to build lasting peace; you don't build lasting peace through threats and blackmail. What it will build is resentment, both at Atlasia and further between the two countries.

[Lief 🗽]

Israel doesn't currently have soldiers in Gaza, as of January 21st: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7841902.stm I have no idea what the Israeli military presence in the West Bank is.

Also, a military withdrawal is pointless without the end of the naval and land blockade of Gaza by Israel.

[Lief 🗽]

Franzl has an amendment currently on the floor, I think.

[Lief 🗽]

Aye, I suppose. I plan to vote against this, but without Franzl's amendment, Israel won't have any incentive to follow through with our blackmail and so the bill won't even do anything.

[Lief 🗽]

Israel has already withdrawn from Gaza. There are something like 300,000 or so (don't remember the number, but it's about that, give or take a 100,000) Israelis currently living in the West Bank territory. What happens to them?

[Lief 🗽]

Nay to cloture. This bill is still awful.

[Lief 🗽]

Israel has already withdrawn from Gaza. There are something like 300,000 or so (don't remember the number, but it's about that, give or take a 100,000) Israelis currently living in the West Bank territory. What happens to them?

Well, since most of that land was stolen from their original occupants, that should be transfered back to their original owners, if possible.

"Transferred"? I think what would end up happening, in real life instead of wonderful fantasy where Israel and Palestine happily give in to our demands, is that lots and lots of people would end up killing each other. Getting 8,000 settlers out of Gaza a few years ago was hard enough, but half a million out of the West Bank? Good luck with that.

I know a lot of you want to stop spending money aiding the people of Israel and Palestine, but I'd have a lot more respect for that position if you actually presented a simple "All aid is cut off to both countries forever" bill. It would never pass, of course, but at least you wouldn't be hiding your true intentions. As is, neither Palestine nor Israel will agree to any of this, and this bill will merely back-door your anti-aid/anti-support policies into Atlasian foreign policy.

[Lief 🗽]

The reason why I kept blocking this obsessive idiocy of yours is because you are an anti-semite using this fantasyland bill to get a nasty little thrill. And I don't approve of that.

I don't see how not supporting Israel is antisemitic.

Israel has already withdrawn from Gaza. There are something like 300,000 or so (don't remember the number, but it's about that, give or take a 100,000) Israelis currently living in the West Bank territory. What happens to them?

Well, since most of that land was stolen from their original occupants, that should be transfered back to their original owners, if possible.

"Transferred"? I think what would end up happening, in real life instead of wonderful fantasy where Israel and Palestine happily give in to our demands, is that lots and lots of people would end up killing each other. Getting 8,000 settlers out of Gaza a few years ago was hard enough, but half a million out of the West Bank? Good luck with that.

I know a lot of you want to stop spending money aiding the people of Israel and Palestine, but I'd have a lot more respect for that position if you actually presented a simple "All aid is cut off to both countries forever" bill. It would never pass, of course, but at least you wouldn't be hiding your true intentions. As is, neither Palestine nor Israel will agree to any of this, and this bill will merely back-door your anti-aid/anti-support policies into Atlasian foreign policy.

One could say the same thing about the impossibility of emapcipating 3,000,000 slaves, but that is no reason to not seek abolitionism.

Are you comparing emancipating slaves to kicking Israeli settlers out of their homes?

[Lief 🗽]

The Israeli military isn't going to pull out of the West Bank and leave those settlements to defend themselves.

[Lief 🗽]

I second the concerns of Afleitch. Of course, I'm not entirely sure how to deal with them, as again, this is understandably a prickly issue.

Moreover, I feel that the bill should not suspend aid first, and then reinstate it later, especially as much of the aid (and to the Palestinians I would think all of it) is humanitarian aid meant for the people, rather than for the military. A better solution, I think, would be to only suspend aid after some set amount of period, or perhaps to suspend military aid immediately and suspend other forms of financial assistance after some amount of period. I'll draft an amendment in a bit that does this, and we can see if it has any support.

[Lief 🗽]

I propose two amendments, to be on voted on separately:

Amendment 1:

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Amendment 2:

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The first amendment addresses the concern I raised earlier. The second, because I don't see the point in further increasing aid to Israel. We already give them more than enough, and it's not as if they're hurting from lack of aid.

[Lief 🗽]

Don't Senators have 24 hours to object before my amendments actually apply as friendly amendments?

[Lief 🗽]

If DWTL accepts it as friendly, that's fine with me. I'm just saying as much in case any Senators want to object to it. Otherwise there's no need to have a vote.

I'd like to offer another amendment, just to make the bill sound a little more diplomatic:

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Sounds better this way, I think. DWTL can accept this as friendly if he'd like.

[Lief 🗽]

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This should be the final draft, with my demands -> conditions amendment applied. I also added in some missing periods.

[Lief 🗽]

Aye

[Lief 🗽]

Yes