Sunday, April 21, 2019

AP's Old News

In this report, we read:

For the past 25 years, the international community has supported the establishment of a Palestinian state on the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip — lands captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war — as the best way to ensure peace in the region.

The logic is clear. With the number of Arabs living on lands controlled by Israel roughly equal to Jews, and the Arab population growing faster, two-state proponents say a partition of the land is the only way to guarantee Israel’s future as a democracy with a strong Jewish majority. The alternative, they say, is either a binational state in which a democratic Israel loses its Jewish character or an apartheid-like entity in which Jews have more rights than Arabs.

It also appeared in the NY Times. 

Let's clear this up, with facts.

The international community supported the establishment of an "Arab State" in the West Bank Judea and Samaria, note: not specifically "Palestine", in 1947 with the UN partition recommendation. The Arabs refused that, just as they refused the 1937 Peel Commission suggestion of partition and just as the first partition, when historic Palestine was truncated and its eastern regions were separated from the League of Nations original mandate plan and awarded to a recent arrival from Saudi Arabia. Moreover, Jewish settlements rights were disallowed in those areas while Arabs could continue to live in and come to the Jewish section of Palestine.

Furthermore, given the record of all lands yielded up or surrendered by Israel of the territories it gained in 1967 have been used as bases for hostile terror attacks, especially Gaza from which Israel supposedly "disengaged". To provide the Arabs with more such bases is quite the opposite of peace.

There is no logic in a two-state solution.

The so-called "demographic threat" is not as portrayed. The figures are actually in favor of the Jewish population.  But really. I detailed sources here. And you can search this blog going back over decade (using "demography", "demographic threat").

As for "democracy", if Arabs, or for that matter any non-Jewish minority, seek to de-Judaize the Jewish state, well, there are safeguards for that, or there will be. Otherwise, if all Jews need to exit the proposed state of "Palestine", why not all the Arabs exist Israel? Not that I am suggesting that but just pointing to the illogical thinking of some people who only care about Arabs.

The Jewish character need not be "lost" without a strong Jewish majority.  And, by the way, what is a "strong Jewish majority"? Is it 80%? 75%? 70%? 60%? What, indeed, is the cut-off? Or, what is Jewish? Do we have to regard all those who claim to be Jews as Jews? And what about the non-Jewish non-Arabs, the foreign migrant worker community? Are they a factor?

Of course, all this avoids the central issue: is the Arab conflict with Israel and Zionism one of territory or is it existential? That is, will the Arabs honestly and genuinely accept a Jewish state in any territory they consider Islamic? Do they recognize Jewish national identity?

Will Jews accept a state without Jerusalem in its entirety?

AP reporting still stuck in the past.

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1 comment:

Viator said...

You make some good points, I may have misunderstood you for a long time. To clarify, what do you see as the best solution regarding the West Bank? If it is annexed, should the Arabs living there be offered Israeli citizenship and equal rights to Jewish citizens?