Jewish Mythbusters: Israeli Apartheid

I might also add that in an apartheid state, a minority group could not, say, have their own political parties, members of parliament, or justices in the supreme court. To label such a state as apartheid is such a slap in the face to Israelis (of all stripes, Jewish, Muslim, Xtian, Druze and the like), but also to those who actually suffered under the apartheid system. What's more, it also ends any discussion on those issues that certainly are real and up for debate. But on the bright side, it makes people feel better as they shout and otherwise act angry while wearing their Urban Outfitters branded kaffiyeh.

Good points Tamar, I will however continue to believe that Israel is an Apartheid State, but thats not a result of logic or facts, just simply my inherent anti-semetism.

I don't buy this argument. First, "democratic" and "racist" aren't mutually exclusive. So, proving an institution is democratic doesn't prove that it's not racist. (Not saying Jews are a race, just stating a logical fallacy in the argument.)

"Just as it is the right of Saudi Arabia and other Arab states not to
allow Christians as citizens, or the right of Ghana and other African
states to reject or restrict whites as citizens, or the right of South
Africa to have a non-racial citizenship policy."

But where does it end? Is it OK to revoke citizenship? Is it OK to deport people? At what point do you draw the line for justifying something as the product of democracy?

(Of course, I'm not arguing Israel is an apartheid state.)

I hope I needn't point out that the imbecile who posted under an approximation of my screen name above is not me, as the moronic sentiment and chimp-level spelling should demonstrate.

How desperate must this pathetic blockhead be? 

I shall return later with a lucid critique of Tamar's mistaken notions. First, I must beat my wife and bake the blood of Jewish children into my pita. 

I think that a serious discussion of whether Israel is, or even resembles, an apartheid state has to break the question down into (at least) two parts.  The first part is, is Israel proper an apartheid state?  There I would agree with you that the answer is an unequivocal "no," for the reasons you gave and others.  Instead, I would characterize Israel as a democratic state in which a minority experiences de jure and de facto discrimination and inequality at the hands of the majority.  Much like the United States.  Sure, Jews and Arabs in Israel go to the same hospitals, but they don't have the same infant mortality rates, or employment rates, or education statistics, or access to political power, or amount of running water and funding for their villages, etc.  (Not to speak of even less fortunate sub-minorities like the Bedouin in the Negev desert).

The second part of the question is whether the Israeli-occupied West Bank is, or operates like, an apartheid state.  Without answering the question or indulging in the rhetoric, I would point out that the analysis is a lot more complicated.  Israeli Jews who live in the West Bank vote in Israeli elections, Palestinian Arabs who live there don't.  Israeli Jews who live in the West Bank drive cars with regular Israeli yellow license plates, Palestinian Arabs who live there don't.  Israeli Jews who live in the West Bank can travel freely into Israel proper for work every day on their own roads, Palestinian Arabs who live there take separate roads in many cases and are subject to military checkpoints.  Obviously, the list goes on.  I don't think that the answers you gave above work the same way for these groups of people who live side by side but have different status.  I would be interested in hearing your analysis of this part of the question.

You should visit West Bank to get a better picture. Image U.S. with same rules. Immigration would be restricted Christians. Minorities would be treated like second class citizen

OK, I'm back.

Let's take Tamar's points in order:

1. She cites Jimmy Carter's book as evidence that Israel is construed as an apartheid state. In actual fact, Carter takes great pains to distinguish Israeli policy within its own borders from that in the West Bank. It is the latter which he terms apartheid.

This misattribution is quite common in Zionist precincts, so intense is the tropism to denounce any strong criticism of Israeli policy. Next time, I'd suggest reading the book itself rather than AIPAC's Cliff notes before proceeding.

2. Regarding the next two points (black South africans had it worse, Arabs can vote), I would take off from Ariela's post and make the following argument:

For forty years, Israel has controlled borders, sealanes, airspace, ports, water distribution, infrastructure (including basic functions such as issuing building permits) and the social management of the entire population between the Jordan river and the sea. It is, by any coherent and credible definition, the sovereign of that entire area. Once seen in this light, the differences between black South Africans under apartheid and Palestinians under Israeli hegemony don't seem so stark. In addition, we have the testimony of both white and black South Africans (e.g, Tutu, Dugard) that Israeli behavior towards Palestinians is quite reminiscent of, and sometimes worse than, South African apartheid.

Look, no one would expect the expression of apartheid to be identical in different social and historical milieus. Slavery didn't have the same appearance in every detail in all of its historical and cultural incarnations. But when two political policies embody similar methods to achieve similar goals-when they have the family resemblance that many of us note in both SA apartheid and Israeli policy-then using the same term is illuminating, notwithstanding the fact that, in some particulars, the two systems may diverge.

3. Israel is officially devoted to fairness? I understand that the Soviet Union promoted itself as a worker's paradise and a beacon of democracy to boot.

Anyway, I'd argue that JNF laws proscribing non-Jewish use of some state resources, marriage laws specifically designed to diminish the non-Jewish population, rank unfairness in distributing basic rights (like building a home) based on ethnicity, and the endless other regulations aimed at insuring Jewish hegemony give the lie to claims of fairness.

3. " If the Jews aren’t a “race,” then it’s hard to make the case that anything a Jewish government tries to carry out is racism. Claiming Jews are a race is a traditionally anti-Semitic move, and discredits anything that comes after it."

Not so fast. What constitutes Jewish identity is by no means so settled as your remark suggests. Seems to me that there are two categories to which one can belong simply by virtue of one's mother's being a member of that category: citizenship or race. Since there was no Jewish state for most of history, the historical claim that maternal lineage constitutes Jewishness has a distinctly racial overtone (I'm leaving aside the question of the utiltity of the concept of race at all.)

You will say that Ethiopian Jews and Ashkenazim seem to have no racial similarity and you'd be right. But this underscores part of the problem. Sometimes, Jewishness seems cultural (atheists of any ethnic persuasion may be Jewish), religious (in some quarters, rabbis are the arbiter of Jewishness) or racial (see above). I needn't remind you that the question of "Who is a Jew?" is alive and kicking in Jewish thought; matters are less settled than you indicate.

Furthermore, the UN's own definition of racism, adopted in 1965, describes it as "... any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life."

This seems to capture most people's intuitive sense of how the term "racism" operates and is as good a definition as any I've seen, given the problematics of the notion of race. And under this definition, it seems obvious that Israeli behavior, in both the West Bank and in Israel itself, has an explicitly racist complexion.

4. "Finally, Israel has a right to define its citizenship according to the wishes of the majority. That’s not a racist action, it’s democractic."

I don't think should require any commentary, but for those who don't reflexively recoil, as they should, from such an unvarnished apologia for discrimination, here goes:

Of course states have the right to regulate their notions of citizenship. This does not mean that anything goes, though. When states erect a warren of regulations to preserve ethnic hegemony, especially when this disadvantages an indigenous population, even the minimally refined nose will detect a whiff of mischief.

If the majority of Americans voted to restrict citizenship to whites or Christians, I wonder if Tamar would describe this as merely "maybe (maybe!) incompatible with a strict definition of the universality of humankind".

When you find yourself pointing to Saudi Arabia for support, or adopting the same construal of majority rule that nourished the fantasies of George Wallace and Bull Connor, Tamar, you've shown us how desperate defenders of Israel's worst tendencies have become. Sad.

With all due respect to Ismail...

Israel may be the de facto sovereign in the West Bank but it isn't the de jure sovereign. As such, Israel hasn't annexed the territory it conquered in 1967 (except for Jerusalem). Israel is proscribed by international law from offering citizenship to residents of the West Bank. That having been said Israel still allows Arab West Bank residents to make appeals directly to the Supreme Court and despite Israel's over riding security concerns, they occasionally win. I've spent lots of time in the West Bank. Comparing the situation there to South African Apartheid is not illuminating. It distorts reality for the sake of ideological brownie points. But please, keep talking about hegemony and apartheid all you like. I'm sure it makes you feel clever and sharp, but it doesn't help at all. The testimony of your non-objective South Africans is meaningless despite the fact that I am certain they have no ideological axe to grind. Nope. None.

As for your assertion that "it seems obvious that Israeli behavior, in both the West Bank and in Israel itself, has an explicitly racist complexion," well, sorry. Israel was founded as the Jewish State, as a place of refuge for Jewish people where people who are "Jewish" are given, by historical necessity, an advantage over anyone else. By your standard, is there nation that isn't racist? Is there any government that doesn't manifest some form of illuminating Apartheid? But there seems to be one acceptable standard for Israel and a totally different set of standards for the rest of the world.

Therein lies the true perniciousness of the Israel/Apartheid canard. We see Israel held to an impossible standard, one that no other nation is held to. Furthermore, the existence of this painfully obvious double standard is deemed to be acceptable and is even defended by otherwise intelligent individuals.

Apartheid? Racism? Indigenous? Where do you get your painfully lame talking points? It's the same moldy crap I've been hearing for decades.

Zzzzzzzz ...

---------------------------------

I blog at Jewlicious.com

"Israel may be the de facto sovereign in the West Bank but it isn't the de jure sovereign."

Good for you for remembering your Latin! My point, of course, is that if something looks, walks and quacks like a duck, it's a duck. Israel rules the whole of historic Palestine. It treats those under its sovereignty differently depending upon their heritage. This is a big no-no for those wishing to enjoy the respectability of being a "democratic" nation.

"Israel is proscribed by international law from offering citizenship to residents of the West Bank."

Israel is also proscribed by international law from settling its citizens on occupied land, from transferring populations from occupied land, and so on. Israel never met an international law it respected. Why start now?  

"But please, keep talking about hegemony and apartheid all you like. I'm sure it makes you feel clever and sharp, but it doesn't help at all."

I've noticed a very bedrock American suspicion of a decent vocabulary, politically or philosophically informed allusions, even something as innocent as the occasional embedded clause, can be found even here among the generally brainy denizens of Jewcy. Perhaps you feel threatened or insecure, I don't know, but can I please request that folks stop speculating about my narcissism, healthy as it may be, and stick to the argument?

Actually, despite your conviction to the contrary, talking about hegemony (big word, I know, but I have confidence in you) or apartheid can be very helpful. It's always helpful to reveal reality clearly. 

"Is there any government that doesn't manifest some form of illuminating Apartheid?"

The phrase "illuminating Apartheid" means nothing in English. Is this perhaps a clumsy translation from some other tongue? 

"We see Israel held to an impossible standard, one that no other nation is held to."

Which standard is that? Don't knock down the homes of the innocent in the middle of the night? Don't hold people for years without charges? Don't displace 6 or 7 hundred thousand people to establish your exclusivist state?Don't call yourself a modern democracy when you have a two-tiered model of citizenship, with privilege tied to ethnicity?

Seems to me as though these standards have been applied to lots of nations. Too bad for you if plucky little Israel is found wanting according to these altogether unremarkable benchmarks.

 "Apartheid? Racism? Indigenous? Where do you get your painfully lame talking points? It's the same moldy crap I've been hearing for decades."

Gee, I can see why you'd be discomfitted when confronted with Israel's shortcomings in the race department, but what in heaven's name is the problem with "indigenous"?

 "Zzzzzzzz ..."

Now you're talking. Better for all of us if you remain asleep. You seem to have done OK up 'til now in full slumber mode, anyway, so why change?

Ariela makes some good points. For the sake of argument, let's extend them; calling Israel an apartheid state runs the risk that the US will be demonstrated to be an apartheid state under the same criteria. There are de facto inequalities experienced by people of color in the US, and arguably some de jure inequalities as well since some laws are created or applied unequally--the stiffer penalties for drugs used mostly by black people as opposed to drugs used mostly by white people, for instance, or the fact that deportation is rarely applied to stem the scary tide of illegal immigration across our virtually undefended northern border. And in our "occupied territories," such as Guantanamo, the differences are even more stark.

"Muslim" is not a race any more than "Jew" is (if the simple "to be" verb can be applied to a social fabrication such as "race"), but it's plain to see how in the US "Muslim" is now racialized in a way that "Jew" used to be but is now only seldom. John Q. Wasp is as likely to call a Sikh a Muslim if he looks vaguely middle-eastern. Arab and Muslim mean virtually the same thing in US pop culture, despite all the Muslims from Malaysia, Indonesia, and Singapore and the Arab Jews, Christians, and atheists (not to mention Buddhists and pagans). At the same time, except among exceptional individuals, Jews are largely considered just another variety of white person, unless they are Jews of color, in which case their race is more visible than their Jewishness. I'm pretty sure Jews became "white" in the last 40 years, but wouldn't know exactly where to put that or how it relates to the rest of 20th c. Jewish history. So can something be called "racism" if it targets something that is not really a race but is strongly racialized, and springs out of an impulse of racial prejudice? I am thinking at the moment that the distinctions are too fine to be considered practically significant. But this applies best in the US; I doubt people in Israel are so easily confused.

I'd like to hear from people who know better than I do how this compares with the racialization of Muslim and Jew, or Arab and Israeli, in Israel and environs. As far as I understand, historically speaking, we're talking about two branches of semitic people who are distinguished by cultural practices, the cultural practices and ethnic background no longer mapping onto one another simply. And I suspect that people who grew up in the middle of this have a better handle on that than I, or 90% of USAmericans, do.

Of the many fallacies this argument kicks up this one has to be my favorite, because it rests on layer upon layer of untruths. Here are the two big ones: the Palestinians who came under Jewish occupation in 1967 do not have any of the rights you throw up. None. The Palestinians who live within Israel's 1948 borders and have not yet been stripped of their IDs (known in the Orwellian world of the MSM as Israeli Arabs) do have some of the rights above - on paper only. No political party in Israel is legally allowed to operate unless it supports the continued existence of the Jewish state, so members of Israel's Arab minority are allowed, as you put it, to "have their own political parties and members of parliamen," but only as long as they are willing to support the continued primacy of the Jewish minority. Sort of like if blacks in SA were allowed to form parties, as long as they accepted apartheid as the cornerstone of democracy.

Oh, and supreme court justices are appointed, not elected...

can dance on the head of a pin?

If you claim with disdain that Israel is apartheid, does that mean you would like a full integration of all institutions into one--no separation? And does that mean that you, holder of such opinions, would want those living in the West Bank to dismantle Fatah, dismantle the court system, relinquish their representative to the UN, kick out the UNRWA, stop taking 'emergency' payments from the EU or other Arab nations? You want the West Bankers to dismantle their 'state funded' (Fatah funded) media, police force, their own legislature, their own executives recognized by the rest of the world? Because I've never heard anyone claiming with disdain that Israel is apartheid also wish for the West Bank society to dismantle all of the institutions that those on the West Bank wanted in the first place.

Instead, they who hold Israel to be apartheid usually couple this sentiment with the desire that Israel itself should be dismantled. How odd that is. It's almost as if the apartheid claim is just a smokescreen for the desire that there be no Jewish state, just a hop, skip, and a jump from an attack on all Jews, no matter where they live.

Or perhaps instead of the West Bankers merging into Israel, perhaps they can reattach to Jordan? Or can't that happen? I wonder why not? What could have happened that Jordan relinquished any claims to that land? Egypt never relinquished claims on the Sinai, and Israel eventually returned that. And then Israel relinquished Gaza. What happened to Gaza after that? It seems the situation there is so bad that even Egypt doesn't want it anymore.

Or perhaps folks would just like to have the West Bankers have their own state. But they were offered their own state in 1937, 1948, 1967, and in 2000. They turned it down each time, opting for war.

So what is it those claiming with disdain that Israel is apartheid, what do they really want?

The problems that the Palestinians find themselves in is because the Palestinians chose war. They have the right to do so, but then they have to suffer inconveniences such as traffic jams, checkpoints, etc. The definition of the Palestinian people is a nation devoted to the destruction of Israel. Israel has the right to exlcude enemy aliens, just as the US was correct in not allowing unlimited Japanese immigration to the US in 1943. The Palestinians lost in 1948 because they initiated war against the Jews. They lost again in 1967 because they had their Arab brothers initiate war on their behalf. Now, the remaining Palestinians are enlisting Iran for their latest jihad. Palestinian identity is based upon conflict with Israel. That is why it is unrealistic for the Palestinians to accept any kind of peace treaty, based upon the 1967 lines or any lines other than the Mediterranean shoreline. Please have the honesty to admit that 56 Muslim states are ok, but one Jewish state is too many

Naftali, I've noticed that you can handle superficial differences of opinion with some wit and lucidity, but the closer to illuminating the structural problems of Zionism a criticism may be, the less comprehensible your reply. Please resubmit in intelligible form and I will do my best to respond.

I can, however, address your final question,

"So what is it those claiming with disdain that Israel is apartheid, what do they really want?"

We want Israel to join the community of modern democracies and cease distinguishing among its citizens on the basis of nationality. We want it refrain from disbursing civic wealth on the basis of anything besides citizenship. We want it to treat all those over whom it enjoys sovereignty equally. We want it to quit being an apartheid state.  

Replying to Herbert Kaine's disgusting and tiresome "blame the victims" talking points isn't worth my time, but the screaming stupidity of his last remark cries out for response. 

This idiotic trope- "56 Muslim states are ok, but one Jewish state is too many"-really needs to be retired, for the following reasons:

1. The states surrounding Israel, while predominantly Muslim, contain Druse, Christians of numerous varieties, et al.

2. More important, they differ on the basis of dialect, dress, cuisine, political system, music, history-that is, on all the social markers with reference to which we distinguish between cultures. Kaine's inability to tell them apart is an indicator of his ignorance and cultural myopia, not the objective realities of the Middle East. Let him intone this same foolishness about Europe and its mainly Christian culture in the same terms, let him call Portugal and Denmark two sides of the same Christian coin, in the service of effacing any difference between them, and let us see how far he gets persuading a Dane or Portuguese.

3. Finally, even if it were true that the Middle East constitutes a single Islamic hegemon, what bearing does this have on the question of Israel's legitimacy? If you want to discuss the issues, fine, but pointing out Israel's size is entirely unresponsive to any of the interesting objections to its policies. 

Now, notice that it's not at all in my interest to point out how limp and senseless your argument is. After all, the quicker you drop it, the tighter your case for Israel will be, lacking the fish in a barrel opportunity this blockhead argument provides to your opponents.

Nevertheless, in the spirit of brotherhood, I give you this gift, and look forward to being challenged by your making a more logically and empirically robust case for the indefensible.   

Okay, I'll write it more simply. If you object to the separation is Israeli society, isn't that separation exactly what the West Banker's want? Isn't that the goal of the UNRWA, didn't those living on the West Bank want their own government, led by Yasser? Didn't they want their own legislature, their own police force, their own seat at the UN? Don't they have representatives seeking their own separate funds from the EU and other Arab nations? Haven't they, in their own separate territory, which they want to be more separate, declared war on Israel? Haven't they planned on the murder of school children and most recently adults spending their time in school? Didn't they blow up people having pizza and a Seder--and weren't these innocent people the primary targets of their attacks?

Do you think it's reasonable for a society to try to protect it's citizens? The Israelis are distinguishing between citizens on the basis of potential danger. And I'll tell you the Israelis don't want to make this distinction, they didn't want to build a separating wall, but the attacks and murders of its citizens forced this to occur.

You have to be willfully blind to see Israeli politics outside of a continual war that has been waged on this country's existence starting from its inception. Blind or simply anti-semitic.

If you don't know the roots of Zionism, look them up, while you are looking up how the PA somehow managed to acquire sovereignty claims over and above Jordan--something you still haven't done.

It would be nice, if your interest in human rights is so deep, that you throw some concern towards Tibet or Darfur or Mugabe's destruction of Zimbabwe. It would be nice if you wouldn't simply be an echo chamber of the corrupt UN Human Rights whatever they call it this week. Because right now, the only emotion coming across from you is hatred and not concern. Your glibness is showing a lack of empathy.

Apartheid occurs when their are two distinct populations--one of which is, by law, blocked from participating in the majority institutions and social flow of a given society. The minority is not dead set on destroying the majority, as is the case in Israel. If the Arab world could, they would commit their own brand of genocide against the Jews. The reality of Israeli society is that it is and has always been at war.

Therefore,I'll add to your homework which you generally don't like to do. Not only do you still need to learn your Jordanian history, or understand the history of Zionism, but now just name 10 years when the Arab world was completely at peace with Israel, that is, when they weren't hatching any plots from either South Lebanon, Iran, the West Band, Gaza, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq that would result in the murder of Jews, whether those Jews live in Israel or Argentina, or the US.

So you wish for Israel to join modern democracies--but you don't wish for those living in the West Bank or Gaza, or Hezbollah to stop attacking Jews on a daily basis and on some days actually killing them? Fascinating mind you have there. Sounds so very civilized.

We want Israel to join the community of modern democracies and cease distinguishing among its citizens on the basis of nationality...like Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Indonesia, Lebanon, Kuwait, Sudan

The states surrounding Israel, while predominantly Muslim, contain Druse, Christians of numerous varieties, et al...like Egyptian Copts, Iraqi Chaldeans, Pakistani Christians, Iranian Bahais, all of whom are routinely harassed. Why do you think the population of Christians in the Middle East has decreased in every country except Israel.

This idiotic trope- "56 Muslim states are ok, but one Jewish state is too many"-really needs to be retired, for the following reasons...It is a simple argument, but a huge chink in your armor. It exposes your hypocrisy

So Ismail, why are 56 Muslim countries OK and one Jewish state offensive to you?  Sure they have differences, but they define themselves as Muslim states. It doesnt bother me, but a Jewish state certainly bothers you, Is it because the traditions of dhimmitude have been interrupted? Is that unnatural

To H. Kaine:

"We want Israel to join the community of modern democracies and cease distinguishing among its citizens on the basis of nationality...like Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Indonesia, Lebanon, Kuwait, Sudan"

Thank you for making my case for me. I of course have no use for the racial/religious discrimination that exists in any of these countries, any more than I do for Israel's discriminatory policies. But it seems that you're saying, "Well, these guys do it, too". Friendly note: doesn't help your case to put your guys in the same boat as Egypt or Sudan.

"Why do you think the population of Christians in the Middle East has decreased in every country except Israel."

Good for you for asking a question about something you clearly know little about. Let me explain.

In most of these countries, Christians are disproportionately represented among managerial and professional classes. They're more likely to have marketable skills, education and a nest egg. This means that, when faced with, e.g., Israel's relentless brutality, they have the wherewithal to leave. The declining Christian population is an epiphenomenon of the altogether homely fact that privileged groups tend to be more mobile and have the option to relocate when necessary.

You seem to have drifted off to sleep at the end of your post, which I completely understand, given the unadorned boilerplate that you're trafficking in, but I'll just say that the theocracies in Saudi Arabia et al,do bother me quite a bit. In theory, a Jewish state bothers me for the same reasons, but this particular Jewish state-Israel-adds to the general problematics of religious states by having been imposed upon an indigenous population which had no voice in their fate, and by depending for its very existence upon a program of ethnic cleansing-a fact about which the early Zionist leaders were refreshingly candid. If the Zionist project had been incarnated in another fashion-by treaty among all the relevant parties, for example-I would be opposed to it for the same reasons that I oppose any state embracing premodern notions of civic participation, like religious states. Israel has the added disadvantage of being committed to an ongoing project of disenfranchising the people unlucky enough to have been living on the land the Zionists coveted, and this earns it added censure.  

To Naftali:

Nice job covering so many of the psalms straight from Zionism's catechism in one brief post. If only one or two were true.... 

Let's see; Arabs seek the destruction of innocents, Israelis weep when they inadvertently destroy a family or two...check.

Israelis reluctantly build their wall only to protect themselves...check.

Don't criticize Israel without denouncing all the world's predators...check. (This last one has a special place in my Pantheon of Inanities. A moment's thought will reveal that, if adopted as a general rule, this rubric would caponize any political movement imaginable, for it would forbid focussing on any particular bad actor. This is not how activism works, of course, but apologists for Zionism are so desperate that they are beyond shame and truck out this feckless ploy unabashedly.)

"Because right now, the only emotion coming across from you is hatred and not concern. Your glibness is showing a lack of empathy."

Well, I admit to a hatred for policies that kill, imprison and crush the hopes of innocents. I have concern for the welfare of the embattled Palestinian population and those righteous Israeli Jews who recognize and oppose their country's bad acts. With whom should I empathize? 

"...but you don't wish for those living in the West Bank or Gaza, or Hezbollah to stop attacking Jews on a daily basis and on some days actually killing them?"

When did I say this? I would like nothing more than for the killing on both sides to stop. But do I support the right of people to resist occupation? Yes I do, as does virtually every principle of international law related to the topic. This does not mean assassinating civilians in restaurants. But you'll have to do better than intone some bullshit about intentionality to excuse Israeli destruction of innocents as qualitatively different from a suicide bomber.

"The reality of Israeli society is that it is and has always been at war."

Well, what do you know? A glimmer of light twinkles from your otherwise dusky post. Of course, I read this differently from you, but, boy, you said a mouthful.

Didn't work out so well for Sparta, won't work out well for Israel, either.    

It is so easy to dismiss arguments because you've heard them before. Of course you don't actually address the arguments, you just dismiss them as cliche. I've heard that defense, or lack of defense before, so check right back at you. You call my arguments Zionist as a term of derision, but of course, I don't read that the same way that you do.

But then again, we know how well you read. I noticed that you completely misunderstood the basic English of Mr. Kaine's post about the Christians. They aren't leaving Israel to come to the oasis of Saudi Arabia or Lebanon. They have been DEcreasing in the Arab world, they are trying to escape those societies and come to Israel. It just happened last week with a gay West Bank man seeking asylum in Israel. That was his point. Speaking of reading, I keep noticing that you refuse to do any. Most of my post were questions to you. You refused to answer every single one. I'm not surprised. Glibness is so much easier.

Unfortunately, there is no dialogue now since you refuse to engage in the actual issues. So I take it that since my points are dismissed rather than challenged, they are true. History books will also show them to be true. The West Bankers have voluntarily separated themselves with all institutions of an independent entity. They are barely covered by Israeli law, and they ignore the laws that still apply to them, regarding their passion for murder. You still have no idea how Jordan lost claim to the West Bank, nor can you name ten years when the Arab world wasn't plotting the genocide of the Jews. I could have made it easier and asked for ten minutes, but those ten minutes of peace didn't exist either. The Arab world declared war on Israel as soon as Israel was recognized as an independent state. The West Bankers did turn down four opportunities for their own independent state. If they had such a state, how could there be any apartheid at all? You still don't know the roots of Zionism--as a response to European Apartheid, with laws regulating from what professions Jews were legally excluded, from owning land, from being in the military, being the object of Pogroms, and yes, the Holocaust.

Also unchallenged is the fact that Fatah and Al Aqsa, and any organization that had any association with Yasser Arafat deliberately targets for murder innocent civilians. It doesn't make it less wrong because you've heard it before. If you support the right to resist occupation, then what happens when Israel chooses not to occupy some land, say the Gaza strip, where the daily attempts at murder continue and even increase? Do you condemn what the Gazans are doing? No you do not. And we've spoken enough before for me to know that.

I've asked you before to define terrorism, you haven't done that either. In fact, you don't actually answer any question that I ask, you merely find some way to dismiss the question. These are not the actions of a man with any concern for truth or justice.

Like it or not, intention has everything to do with the legal charge of murder, as does sanity. You live in the US do you, are the laws regarding murder in the US also some form of bullshit? I don't ask you rhetorical questions.

And you'll have to explain very carefully, to quote Spencer Tracy in Judgment at Nuremberg, how aggressive people can be in 1947, fresh off the boats from Europe, still starving, how these people were immediately attacked, how Egypt, Jordan, and Syria's attack and Nasser's promise to drive every Jew into the sea in 1967--explain how that makes Israel the aggressor. Explain it again in 1973, explain it again in 2000--especially after the West Bank residents were offered a state of their own, explain it again how those riding a bus to work were the aggressors as a man with a bomb belt blows the bus they are riding to smithereens, explain it again as 8500 rockets rain down on Sderot, and explain it again as a man from the West Bank breaks into a house and machine guns a five year old to death.

I read how you tried to justify the killing of Yeshiva students, using the compassionate twists in your mind to turn the Yeshiva into a legitimate military target. I'm not being at all rhetorical, I want you to explain it so we are all clear that these murders are legitimate means of resisting occupation--of what? What areas in Israel are being occupied? Certainly not the West Bank, no longer Gaza, what areas are being occupied? And in your just mind, what is the penalty for building houses on land whose ownership is under dispute? The death penalty? Is that what you think?

I'm giving you a choice, you can either answer my questions and requests or dismiss them. If you dismiss them--let's just call it checkmate, your king is rolling around on the board.

But you'll have to do better than intone some bullshit about intentionality to excuse Israeli destruction of innocents as qualitatively different from a suicide bomber??.Is it different under Western law if a person gets killed from a car accident than from a suicide bomber? Western law says yes, Ismail says no. Thats why we dont want to live with you.

But do I support the right of people to resist occupation? Yes I do, as does virtually every principle of international law related to the topic. This does not mean assassinating civilians in restaurants??No Jew is a civilian. Thats why every Jerusalem restaurant and school is a legitimate military target

 In most of these countries, Christians are disproportionately represented among managerial and professional classes. They're more likely to have marketable skills, education and a nest egg. This means that, when faced with, e.g., Israel's relentless brutality??.Those Joos. Not only do they persecute Palestinians, but Lebanese Christians, Egyptian Copts, Pakistani Christians, Indonesian Christians, Iranian Bahais

In most of these countries, Christians are disproportionately represented among managerial and professional classes??Why is that? Surely they must have used illegitimate (Jewish) methods to obtain this wealth