you can but YOU can't
Yes, military dictatorship really does make a difference, doesn't it?
Israel passed fewer than 6% of building requests by Palestinians
in the occupied West Bank in 2000-07, an Israeli anti-settlement group
says.
Peace Now says 91 permits were granted from 1,624 requests, in contrast to the 18,472 homes built for Jewish settlers.
The group says the data show "clear discrimination" against Palestinians in West Bank areas under Israeli control.
Military officials accused Peace Now of distorting the figures, which were taken from official Israeli statistics.
Peace
Now also said, in the case of illegal buildings, the Israeli army
demolished 33% of structures erected by Palestinians and 7% of the
unauthorised structures built by Jewish settlers.
The Israeli army
is in full control of about 60% of the West Bank. Israel occupied the
area, as well as East Jerusalem and Gaza, in the 1967 war.
It has allowed limited Palestinian autonomy in some areas, while settling more than 400,000 Jewish Israelis on occupied land.
These settlements are considered illegal under international law, though Israel disputes this.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7256576.stm
Comments
When you take territory against overwhelming odds, and then hold it through repeated attacks, you get to make the rules. Pretty simple dynamic that's gone on throughout the ages.
I wonder how many applications for new Palestinian construction in Jordan were approved...considering it is comprised of the other 78% of the land that was once called Palestine.
It's the process- government is a process, right? The Arab governments should adopt the Palestinians and the oil rich Islamic countries should have a moral obligation to build them homes in Saudi Arabia and give them employment. But they need them to die so they can continue to make war on the Jews of Israel. This is what I have observed since the 1967 Arab- Israeli war.
A, your "dynamic" is not one of civilization. It is the same dynamic that has resulted in barbaric actions by the powerful, as you say, throughout the ages. It is the logic of pogrom, of holocaust, of terrorism, of ethnic cleansing.
I propose that a more constructive and civilizing dynamic could be expected from people in the mideast.
I would also propose it would be smart to keep people accountable to their commitments to the rule of law and democracy. Those who say they value democracy and tolerance would do well to practice it. When they don't, it is fair to point out the hypocrisy.
Does Israel expect nations of the world to treat it like a nation? Does that expectation have any corrolary responsibilities? If Israel is - as described above - a nation that takes territory and makes its own rules, wouldn't it be a good idea for other nations to recognize what kind of behavior that is?
Should the USA be giving somewhere between 5 and 10 billion dollars a year to maintain that kind of nation?
Not a very good investment, is it? How is it going to pay off? When is that investment going to pay off?
Zak. Why do you suggest that other Arab nations "adopt" the Palestinians? Does it all come down to ethnicity/language/religion? Does it come down to tribalism?
Or, would it make just as much sense to suggest that the Jewish government of Israel should "adopt" the Palestinians. That way, it might have the result that folks who live in the same land could get together and cooperate in running their own country. Based on commonality, not based on a culture of us-versus-them.
To choose the Arab solution over the cooperative, civilized, democratic solution would seem to be a choice that would continue to be a serious problem, a serious drain on resources and a serious deviation from the ideas of rule of law and self-determination.
I myself think rule of law and self determination work better in the long run than conquest, better than building a big concrete wall to create ghettos and keep the bad guys in their ghettos.
Because the Arabs run from any responsibility for their actions, after they lost in 1967 they should have actually looked to the betterment of the region. The last 40- 50 years have been lost to bloodshed. The Palestinians live in ghettos because they are used as pawns by the Islamic world. This is my opinion from my observations; to be objective the Israelis aren't entirely to blame for the plight of the Palestinians.
Would you consider it more, or less barbaric than sending mentally retarded women with explosives trapped to their vests to kill civilians? How about lobbing dozens of rockets into civilian neighborhoods? Sending teenagers to blow themselves up in pizza parlors?
The Israelis were attacked. The responded with an overwhelming counter-attack and ended up taking the West Bank and Gaza. They then defended themselves and that land against multiple attacks from multiple neighboring nations. By all rights that land is theirs to administer as they see fit.
Why is it that Israel is responsible for the plight of the Palestinians? They hold less than 20% of the land that was Palestine. The also didn't instigate any of the wars against them. The Palestinians haven't had self determinate rule since before the common era. Why is it that the Israelis must give it to them?
And why, with a 47 year track record of terror against Israelis, should they be forced to trust that by letting them live among them, they will have peace and security? Especially with Arab countries, principally Syria and Iran, keep using the Palestinians as proxy fighters for the war they know they can't win in a straight up fight?
What would make sense would be for the Jordanians to admit that they're sitting on 80% of the land that was originally called Palestine, and shoulder at least 80% of the burden of integrating the Palestinians into their society. In addition, the Syrians and Lebonese need to dismantle the refugee camps so that the inhabitants will be forced to integrate into society, rather than continue to remain apart in a festering breeding ground for more proxy fighters for other Arab states.
The fact of the matter is, the Palestinians are about as well liked by their Arab peers as the Kurds are by their neighbors. Nobody wants them among them, and nobody is willing to take responsibility for the fact that they've used and abused them as a people in their rage against Israel for so soundly, and embarassingly, defeating them time and time again on the battlefield.
No...instead it's just easier to lay all the blame at the feet of Israel, and ask them why they haven't complied.
A, you said, "Nobody wants them among them, and nobody is willing to take responsibility for the fact that they've used and abused them" ... What other oppressed people does that sound like? Is that a valid justification for taking their property and rights? I don't think so. Wasn't valid when bullies took Jewish property and rights. And it is not valid when bullies take Arab property and rights.
What would it sound like if you talked in the language of law, civilization?
What would it sound like if instead of blame and claim, there was a discussion on how to create cooperating, multicultural, open societies?
The same bully talk is used constantly around the world in places other than Palestine. One important difference, however, is that the USA is propping up the Israeli racial-based military dictatorship with the false rhetoric that it is a democracy. As an American, I have to observe that that has been a crappy policy for decades, and that it flies in the face of both law and civilization.
Sure, some people like to talk the talk of gangsters. Drug dealers and gangs took over the neighborhood and have been defending it for years, so get off their turf.
Where does that get you?
It's not really relevant whether the "Palestinians" are well liked, or Jews are well liked or Slovaks are for that matter.
I don't think that Israel is a "military dictatorship" but as an American I am tired of US Taxpayers' money flowing to every government on the face of the earth. It's a big waste nothing personal against anyone living in other lands.
Islam is dying and it my take another 100 years and millions of innocent lives before the end or before those who practice Islam to change. Any society, which sends their young people to commit suicide, can survive and prosper in the long term. It's a human tragedy and all the pretty words and shuttle diplomacy can't bring peace. Only those involved in the violence can decide for themselves. I prefer trade and capitalism to war and destruction.
Yes, Zak. So do the Palesinians.
It's called LAW. The law that is encumbent upon all the nations who are participating members in the international legal system, including UN resolutions. And the law that is accepted as binding by nations making treaties.
Maybe Israel is an exception, though. Maybe Israel is the only nation in the world that can expect "respect" without ever following through on any legal obligations.
Does law apply? Or not? Is law a better way of international behavior, or is violence? Is Israel a bully, or a nation?
The trouble with the Israelis is that they have been in a wartime situation since the UN recognized the nation. I don’t think that is so unreasonable to think that if you were from a small country surrounded by nations and groups of people that plan on killing your family and all your neighbors that your defenses would be strengthened, that your neighbors would join together in self defense. I think that there were terrible wrongs committed by all parties and I agree and understand the situation which you have brought up on your blog regarding the building permit process, how it’s discriminatory against the Arabs. I do think that your essay here is one-sided and that consideration must be taken to the acts of terrorism against the Israelis as well.
Historians, both Jewish and nonJewish - have documented the relative amounts of violence between Palestinian and Arab. Just in terms of deaths - not counting occupation, prison, creeping settlements, travel restrictions, labor restrictions, and forced lack of self-government - there is about a 7 to 1 ratio.
For every one Israeli killed by those resisting occupation, about seven Palenstinians are killed in punishment.
Ask yourself. Why has Israel been in a state of war all these years? Is there a rational answer to that? Is is connected to the racist underpinnings of the state? Jews only. Right?
It may be chalked up to the moral integrity of the Arabs that they seem to be the only group in the world ready to stand up against the apartheid of Israel and say this is immoral, barbaric, tribal, unlawful and uncivilized.
Americans just go along. And even pay for it all.
Israel has been under attack constantly since 1948. Let the Islamic-radicals lay down their arms and show the world that they want peace.
Which Islamic radicals are you talking about? Name one.
What about all the Palestinians who are not Islamic, or not muslim, or not religious, or not radical?
And what about all the Palestinians who have no arms, who have been trying to live in Israel? Is their experience relevant?
It sounds really strange for people to look at the Occupation in the Holy Land, see that one group has billions of dollars of arms and the other group has almost none. But then people tell the second group to give up arms. Is there not some strange assymetry here?
Lets tell the raped girl to not talk so nasty about her rapist. Then we know she is rational and we can investigate the crime. That kind of one-sided demand should not be prerequisite to application of law, treaties, and human rights.
Name one Jewish or Christian suicide bomber. Human history is one man-made tragedy after another. The Holy Land is indeed one of the least peaceful spots on the globe.
We may have to agree to disagree.
Zak, How was Israel established? By the efforts of terrorists.
Want a name?
Menachim Begin of the Irgun, for example.
If you go back far enough you can blame the Brits for killing people in the Holy Land and before that the Ottoman Turks. But at least I know your motive for this post- it's anti-Israel. My point is that the Arabs and the Islamic world shoulder more of the responsibility for the suffering of the so-called Palestinians than the Israelis. The Israelis have a right to defend themselves.
What is more constuctive is to constantly point out that the TRIBAL approach to the mideast problems will not only fail but push along a spiral of hate and violence.
Instead, what Americans and civilized Jews and Arabs should appreciate is that problems are better approached in the framework of law, negotiation, uniform universal human rights, treaties, self-determination, multiculturalism and respect for other people's property.
I am only ANTI-ISRAEL in the sense that it is mostly Israel's institutionalized racism and violence that is putting fuel to the fire.
I am also completetly baffled at the willingness of people who OTHERWISE say they value the rule of law to excuse Israel for its illegal occupation, its illegal expansionism, its illegal invasions, and its constant refuting of international law and treaties.
Do we believe in rule of law, or not? Saying "well lots of governments flaunt the law and are liars and thugs and racists" is not a principled statement.
If the Israelis have a "right" to defend themselves, then who else does? Palestinians? Kurds? Shiites? Tamils? The IRA?
How about Criminals? Gangsters and gang members? Do they too have the right to defend themselves? They say they do. Law says there are limits.