Kesher Talk
Is Israel the bad guy?: Further on the debate with Bryan over Israeli history, Iain offers up some more facts from the Encyclopedia Britannica showing that Arabs were terrorizing the Jews in the thirties."[The period of the British mandate]When the mandatory government refused to take effective measures to forbid the sale of land to Jews and to stop the illegal Jewish immigration that increased with the persecution of the Jews in Germany after 1933, the Arab leaders announced a policy of noncooperation with the British and a boycott of British goods; at the same time, the existing restrictions on immigration, which were only partly effective, led to Jewish protests and riots. In April 1936 an Arab High Committee was formed to unite the Palestinian Arabs in opposition to the Jews; its formation was followed by a renewal of Arab attacks on the Jews, soon developing into open war. The revolt of the Arabs continued during the next three years. In November 1936 a new commission, under Lord Peel, arrived to study the situation. The Arab leaders boycotted the commission until just before its departure. The commission's report of July 1937 emphasized that cooperation between Arabs and Jews in a Palestinian state was impossible; to the dismay of the Arabs, it recommended the partition of Palestine. The report made it clear that the establishment of a Jewish state would involve radical movements of population to secure the necessary Jewish majority, even in the parts of Palestine where the Jewish population was largest. In September 1937 nonofficial representatives from the various Arab countries met at Bludan in Syria and announced the complete rejection of the Peel proposals. In Palestine the publication of the Peel report was followed by renewed Arab terrorism and violence. The British thereupon disbanded the Arab High Committee and deported its leading members. The mufti and a few others escaped arrest and fled to Lebanon, which became the headquarters of a continuing Palestinian Arab insurrection. Before long, however, the insurrection lost its singleness of purpose and degenerated into an Arab civil war as the leaders of the revolt turned their energies against their political rivals."
Then, after the UN decision to partition Palestine:
"Shocked and angry, the Arab leaders refused to recognize the validity of the UN decision and declared their determination to oppose it by force. By January 1948 volunteers were arriving from the Arab countries to help the Palestinian Arabs, but they were soon overwhelmed by the Zionist forces."
On the declaration of the state of Israel:
"On May 14 the State of Israel was proclaimed and was immediately recognized by the Soviet Union and the United States. On the following day, as the British announced the end of their mandate in Palestine, troops of the Transjordanian army, the Arab Legion, and their counterparts from Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq entered the country. The Arab forces, which at this point were vastly better equipped than the Israeli forces, occupied the areas in the south and east, which were not yet controlled by the Jews, and unsuccessfully laid siege to Jewish Jerusalem."
The resulting war led to a UN-brokered peace settlement:
"Between February and July 1949 the mediator secured separate armistice agreements between Israel and Egypt, Lebanon, Transjordan, and Syria. These agreements left Israel in possession of all the areas it had won by conquest: the whole of Galilee, the whole of the Palestinian coast minus a reduced Gaza Strip (occupied by Egypt), all of the Negev, and a strip of territory connecting the coastal region to the western section of Jerusalem. The remaining parts of Jerusalem (including the Old City), along with what remained of the Arab share of Palestine, were taken over by Transjordan, which then became the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. No entity remained that was officially called Palestine. The departure of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs had meanwhile left Israel with a substantial Jewish majority."
Iain asks,
In all of this it was Arab intransigence that directly caused the Arabic woes. Perhaps you might say that the Balfour declaration and the subsequent Jewish immigration to Palestine -- a thinly-settled, unwanted land at the time -- caused the problem. If so, then where would you let the Jews have their homeland if not in their ancestral land? Uganda? Or perhaps the Jews don't need a homeland. I'm sure you agree they do.
The original UN partition plan was accepted by the Jews. It was rejected by the the Arabs, who have NEVER recognized formally the right of the state to exist. Even school maps in the Palestinian authority do not include Israel, but the fictitious state of Palestine. Arab leaders regularly tease the concession of a right to exist, but they never follow through with it (Egypt might recognize Israel -- I'm not sure -- but they sure as hell don't act like it).
... Israel is beseiged by hostile powers, with an active fifth column who regularly blow up cafes. Any Palestinian leader who makes concessions to Israel is regarded as a traitor, which is why Hamas and its brothers have gained at Arafat's expense. I cannot accept that there is any moral equivalence between the bombers and Israel taking retaliatory action in self-defence. As the Jeruslaem Post wrote recently, "So long as the Israelis are condemned for defending themselves, the Palestinians have no diplomatic reason to end terrorism."
Israel is a functioning democracy that the world community came together to create in recognition of the unspeakable wrongs done to its people. But there still remain plenty who want those wrongs to happen again. Check out www.memri.org for Arabic praise of Hitler.
...In fact, such primitive lies boggle the mind. Does Mr. Al-Jalahma actually believe them? Certainly no small number of his readers do. Or want to, as a way of demonizing Jews. Funny, but such state-sanctioned propaganda doesn't seem like the best way to prepare the Saudi people for "accepting" the state of Israel — now or ever. Indeed, it makes you wonder whether harboring much in the way of expectations for such a people constitutes, if not a Big Lie exactly, then at least a Big Delusion."
Israel the bad guys? Give me a break!
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