Browing around the blogosphere recently, I've noticed that critics of Israel consistently repeat various versions of the following talking point (promoting by false propaganda emanating from sources such as this one): "what do you expect from the Palestinians? Israeli occupation impoverished them, and desperate, hungry people can only be expected to take desperate measures."
The idea that "occupation," per se, impoverished the Palestinians is simply wrong. In fact, it has been Palestinian violence since the first intifada broke out in 1987 that has impoverished the Palestinians, forcing Israel to gradually close its borders to Palestinian workers to prevent terrorist infiltration, creating the need for checkpoints and fences cutting the West Bank and Israel off from Gaza (Palestinians used to be basically free to enter and exit Israel, and Israelis used to shop and tour in the territories), and stifling foreign investment post-Oslo. (Not to mention that Palestinian support for Saddam Hussein in the first Gulf War led to the expulsion of Palestinians from the Gulf, and the loss of their remittances.) Meanwhile, billions of dollars of post-Oslo aid were wasted by the corrupt and incompetent Arafat admninistration. I've read that post-Oslo, not a single significant public works project (hospital, road, etc.) was completed in the West Bank or Gaza. In an effort to buy political support, the PA ignored the private economy in favor of employing tens of thousands of employees in do-nothing bureaucratic jobs.
Anyway, here are some facts (source here--this is only one footnoted source, but it comports with numerous paper sources I've read over the years) about the economic consequences of the Israeli administration of the territories following the Six Day War:
--"Private consumption per capita [and per capita includes population growth, which was among the highest in the world in the territories] rose during 1969-1986 at an overall rate of 5% per annum."
-- Outside of regugee camps in Gaza (which Israel wanted to replace with permanent housing, but was prevented so as not to help solve the "refugee crisis" that provided the PLO's reason for existence), "in 1986, 95% of the Households in Gaza had running water and 100% had electricity (compared with 3 percent for water and 14% for electricity in 1974)."
--The percentage individual "with at least 9 years of education has risen from 22% in 1970 to 46% in 1986 in the West Bank, and from 32% to 54% in the Gaza Strip during the same period." Not noted in the paper I'm citing, all of the universities in the West Bank and Gaza were opened during the Israeli administration of the territories. There were none before that.
--As this source (hostile to Israel) acknowledges, as of 1993, per capita income in the Palestinian territories was higher than in Egypt (MUCH!) or Jordan, the countries that previously occupied Gaza and the West Bank, respectively. The logical conclusion from this is that if Israel had not won these territories in the Six Day War, the Arab population would have been much poorer.
And all this despite the fact that the Arab nations boycotting products made in the territories, cutting off local industry from its previous and natural export markets.
As the paper I cite above also points out, Israel made significant errors in its economic administration of the territories. This isn't surprising given that the residents of these territories had no voice in the Israeli government, and that the Israeli government severely mismanaged the Israeli economy itself during this period, resulting in, among other things, 400% inflation in the early 1980s. Also, economic growth slowed down in the territories considerably in the '80s, making it much more plausible to argue that the first intifada was in part the result of a "revolution of rising expectations," than a reaction to gradual impoverishment.
Way back when I was a college student, I took a class on the Arab-Israel conflict. My Israeli T.A., like most Israeli intellectuals, was highly sympathetic with the Palestinian cause, going so far as to justify PLO terrorism. I pointed out the huge rise in the Palestinian standard of living since 1967, and he responded along the lines of "do you think you can buy off nationalist sentiment with refrigerators and t.v.s? The Palestinians want their own country, and don't want to be occupied."
Fair enough. Man does not live by bread alone. But let's get our facts straight. The current wave of violence started in 1987, and has ebbed and flowed ever since, not because the Israelis impoverished the Palestinians, but despite the fact that the Palestinians became much wealthier under Israeli occupation, and despite the fact that it has been Fatah and Hamas violence, and Fatah corruption, that has impoverished the Palestinians since then.
http://www.btselem.org/English/index.asp
Furthermore, if you visit the West Bank and Gaza (instead of just learning about it in a class), you would understand the situation better and the meaning of desperation.
Jews have lived in Palestine for 3500 years.
But you're right, it's not about money. It's about Islam's illogical hate of the Jews.
Name any current Islamic country where a Jewish population has flourished inside their borders (increased).
Jews cannot live anywhere in Palestine (however, Muslims can live in Israel). When Israel pulled out of the West Bank, they had to remove their cemeteries (that's right, can't even have dead Jews in the land).
http://www.fmep.org/
http://www.alternativenews.org/
http://www.merip.org/
I concur with your assessment about the facts. Well stated.
But your argument is dangerously close to the argument made in the last few years by Alan Dershowitz, who has gone all the way to say that the occupation has been good for Palestinians, because they have enjoyed a better life under Israeli occupation than they would have if they had been given self-rule.
To me, that argument is too much like the 19th century pro-slavery men who argued that blacks were better off enslaved here than free in Africa. As a libertarian, I cannot accept any of these arguments as legitimate. No amount of money or material comfort can replace the basic human diginity of liberty and self-government.
I don't think you were making the above argument, but your post certainly alluded, at least implicitly, to these types of thinking. I would hope that you would distance yourself from such ideas.
You refer to "The land allocated to Israel by U.N. partition". How is that different from the "Western powers" carving out a portion of someone else's land for Israel? Didn't the Western powers (e.g. France, the UK and US) essentially control the UN?
One; lively's comments about Islam having an "illogic hate" is off in my view - remember, Jews and Muslims got well along for the most part for close to 1000 years. The "religious" feud is of mainly recent origin, though like any other religion, you can find pieces of hatred going back - still, compare that to Jews and Christians, the latter of whose hatred has lasted millenia.
Two: DB is being dangerously deceptive in his simplification of Israeli independance - the movement, though well intentioned, had elements of violence and terrorism, and much of the land that was "bought" was actually stolen or intimidated away by the more extreme elements of the independance movement.
So you're using the most basic definition of a state - recognition by the larger community. So I could only assume that if the Arabs were to defeat Israel via war, claim the land as theirs, and get it recognized by the U.N., then THEY would "legitimately" have a state there?
It seems to me that you are trying to use legitimacy as both a legal term and a moral term. Israel is certainly, in the legal sense, the state that exists right now. But in a moral sense? I see their claim on the land as no better than anyone else's, except they have bigger guns right now. Please don't confuse the two.
Non-expert, your name is apt. Jews who were not already born in the area, worked the land, purchased huge amounts of property and have ALWAYS been a living population group in the area. The U.N. sought to partition the area between the Jews and Arabs. The Jews accepted it and the Arabs rejected it and warred.
A useful site to learn from is:
<http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/myths/mf1.html>
"All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?"
Ref., Big Lies (small pdf).
Check the UN plan. Note: two states, one Arab and one Jewish. UN administration for Jerusalem, with all admitted. Jewish state allocated Negev desert, where VERY few people lived, plus areas where they were the majority.
i am not familiar with the politics of the region and have no dog in this fight, but this particular argument strikes me as very shoddy reasoning. according to the sentence i've quoted, the direct cause of palestinian poverty is israeli security measures. you seem to be saying that the responsibility for israel's adoption of
those security measures belongs solely to the palestinians, because isreal was "forced" to adopt them. i find it extremely implausible that israel had no alternatives to adopting these particular policies, or that there were no options someone could have reasonably supported that would have imposed less of a burden on those palestinians who are innocent.
israel's particular response may well have been justified (i don't know, mostly because partisans on both sides give wildly different versions of the facts, making it difficult for third parties to figure out what the hell is going on) but if A's aggression forces B to adopt security measures, and there are reasonable alternatives X, Y, Z, it seems to me that B must bear at least some of the responsibility for the consequences of choosing Z rather than X or Y.
There will be no real change for at least a generation after changing texts.
You say:
"The U.N. simply gave international legitimacy to their right of self-government ..."
With all due respect, I think you need to acknowledge the full history here. As my pseudonym indicated, I'm not an expert. But I do recall a bit about the history of European colonialism in the region. I think you need to stop referring to the "U.N." taking these actions, and recognize that the UK and France were the colonial powers who controlled the land, and ultimately it was their decision as to what would be done with it (that is, who would govern it). The U.N. is nothing but its member states. It was the UK/France/US that made the decisions that allowed Israel to come into existence as its own state.
(A side note. Imagine if the UN "partitioned" the U.S. to give big chunks of it back to Native Americans. What would the U.S government do? Invade and take it back, no doubt.)
My point here is not to take one side or the other. I think both sides have a number of moderates, plenty of violent extremists, and legitimate grievances. Rather, what I wanted to convey is that the situation is a direct result of stupid decisions by the UK/France/US, who should have known the result would be years and years of warfare in the region. It was completely predictable, and they did nothing to prepare for it.
Briefly:
European Roots of Antisemitism in Current Islamic Thinking
At more length:
National Socialism and Anti-Semitism in the Arab World
Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots
Not germane in an absolutely imminent sense, but it is now a long standing, inter-generational problem of enormous magnitude and it does reflect the mindsets prevalent in Hamas and Syria, Hezbollah and Iran, and the region as a whole.
Right. And now there's one jewish state and no arab state. And as best I can tell, there never will be. Might makes right, as far as the Israelis are concerned, and it has served them well for the last 50 years. Unfortunately, I think it is this very mindset which is going to contribute to the ultimate settlement of the area: 0 jewish states, 0 arab states, and 1 big wasteland.
I'm sure at that point, David will still be arguing about who's fault it was, but i also assume people will have stopped listening.
That's like saying that a skinny kid surrounded by five large bullies, but who pulls out a few karate moves when they attack him, believes that "might makes right." And pacifism results in pain and death.
Please. If we're going to have a fact based discussion here, we at least have to agree that Israel has an army vastly superior to the combined forces of the rest of the middle east, and complete willingness to use it. To use your analogy, it's like a kid with nuclear weapons and the most advanced military/intelligence in the middle east being surrounded by 6 bullies using antiquated soviet technology.
The Arabs were offered a state in the U.N. partition plan which divided the area into two states: A Jewish State &an Arab State. THE ARABS REJECTED THE PARTITION PLAN, AND WENT TO WAR AGAINST THE JEWISH STATE. If the Arabs do get a state in the future it will put them where they would have been in 1948 had they not warred against the Jewish State!
Trite but true: it's hardly that simple. (For one, if Israel was simply operating on a "might makes right" theme, they wouldn't be a democracy which allwed all manner of highly divisive dissent, Arab representation, etc. in their democratic processes. This list, especially so a comparative list - as compared against the practices of the Arab/Muslim states in the region - could be vastly extended.)
Again, Big Lies (pdf), also the fact that the long incubated "refugee" centers around Palestine (encubated by the U.N. and other orgs) are the only long-term, inter-generational "refugee" centers in the world. And why? Because the Arab states and their proxies in the region have long used "Palestine" (aka Arafatistan) as a tactical/strategic pawn in the military, political and jihadist campaigns in the region - and the Western Left has served this same set of strategic motifs.
Or, beyond the U.N., example E.U. styled statements, then and now. And given the current problems can be attributed to pullbacks in Lebanon and Gaza, certainly so in large part, yet other critical motifs along these same lines can be developed.
Long standing historic incidents and trends cannot simply be elided, occluded, refused, etc. from the discussion - though all those elisions, occlusions, etc. are precisely what is being done in very large measure, in the MSM and other venues.
Um, Israel accepted the plan. The Arabs did not. They lost the ensuing war.
Wars have consequences. Look up "East Prussia," for instance.
Not in 1948 they didn't, genius.
Exactly. The 1948 resolution means NOTHING. Every post that references that as some sort of authority on this matter is just garbage. The Isarelis won a war, built up their army, and now control the area. Thus THEY are the legitimate state. End of discussion. If the Arabs conquer them in a war, no U.N. resolution from 1948 will mean a damn then, either. It will be an Arab state.
But like I said, the only state that is going to exist in the middle east, unless all parties change their tune quickly, is the state of barren wasteland. It doesn't matter who's right or wrong here, unless you're a historian. Real people aren't going to care, because there aren't going to be many real people left.
Thus the use of "has", not "had", genius.
I believe Anon 252 is referring to 1948 when the first war broke out when the Arabs rejected the partition plan. Examining the Palestinian-Israeli dispute through the lens of current military strength positions is misleading at best.
In 1948, Israel had little strength relative to the Arab forces and everyone expected the Arab to rout them. Israel managed through luck and skill to overcome superior strength and even managed to acquire additional land beyond the 1948 boundaries. Then Jordan grabbed the remaining West Bank and Egypt the Gaza Strip.
Also, no Arab nation clamored for Palestinian statehood before 1967 coincidentally, until Israel grabbed both in the 6 day war. The Arab nations have cynically used the Palestinians numerous times over the years.
Note that my original post said "over the past 50 years." As soon as Israel got control of the area, they did the most sensible thing possible - they built a massive, powerful military and adopted an ideology that they would never be overwhelmed simiply because their opponents had a better military. That's a GOOD policy. But it also is a "might makes right" policy - Israel doesn't apologize for its security actions, and it shouldn't have to. But don't pretend that it takes them based on luck or the help of god or anything else. It's current position in the middle east - and the current position of the palestinians - is easily reducible to relative military strength.
My simple point being that once the nuclear bomb is introduced to the arab world, this advantage is going to be gone, and current Isreal policy may come to be seen as a bad move, retrospectively. That is if anyone is left.
Israel left Gaza to the Palestinians to do what they wished. The Option Give the Palestinians what they ask for. No Jews, full Palestinian control. What did the Palestinians do? Attacked Israel with rockets! Tunneled under the border and attacked Israel.
You could hardly have less of a burden then total control of your own area. But the Palestinians just used it as a staging area for attacks. No matter WHAT Israel does the Palestinians will just keep attacking. Why should Israel do anything but Kill those who attack it. Would YOU do anything else? If someone says they want to kill you. Then they keep trying to kill you no matter what you do. Why not believe them. You can't have peace with someone who is trying to kill you. So you kill them. As long as they attack you you kill them. There is nothing else you can do except let them kill you.
Anyway, as others have noted, I think this all comes down to who's got the bigger guns. Seems like it will be a long time before it gets solved. Look how long it took for the Europeans to stop killing each other.
I guess that makes sense, but your premise is off: Israel pulled out of Gaza for what, all of a few months, with massive economic and military restrictions left on the palestianians, and then Israel and the world rejected the elected leaders of the Palestinians and started a boycott. It's not like they are giving the palenstinians a whole lot of help here.
I mean, true or false, the Israeli position relative to Gaza is the equivalent of a blockade, no? That itself is an act of war in any other international dispute, right?
That statement is just silly. Even an ardent pro-isaraeli like me has to laugh at it. Full control? It will be a cold day in hell when Israel lets the Palestinians enagage in free arms trade with other nations.
It may be that Palestinians have lost economic opportunity by the increasing security measures Israel has taken. But why don't/can't the Palestinians look to their friendly Arab neighbors for economic opportunity.
I sometimes get the feeling that the despots in the surrounding countries like to keep the Palestinians under Israels heel. This gives them a twofer: they get to show their own oppressed population that things could be worse; and they get to blame all of the region's woes on Israel.
I don't recall Jordan, Egypt, Syria, et al... ever doing anything to help out the Palestinians, except providing them with money and/or weapons for attacking Israel. In the aftermath of the '48 war, Isreal absorbed about 600,000 Jewish refugees into its population. By contrast, the Arab countries let the Palestinian refugees rot in their camps, while pointing the blame at Israel.
Jabotinsky anticipated what this conflict would look like, yet saw no need to attempt deception as to land ownership to justify Israel's existence. It's perhaps a bit painful, but I think a lot more honest, to take a page from his book. The wave of violence has ebbed and flowed for a lot longer than the past 19 years, however its manner has evolved.
Duffy - that's not just a feeling. The abuse of this conflict by Arab states is disgraceful, and has played an enormous role in the perpetuation (and exacerbation) of the conflict.
What if the United States invaded but lost? The Native Americans won, both in the UN and in actual warfare. Accepting the fact that there was no existing state to be partitioned as already noted, I still have something bugging me.
Native Americans may not be the best analogy. Let's take Mexico, and say Mexico took back California. It was a nasty bit of a war, and the government of the US said there would be total victory, so get out of the state while you can during this fierce war. Only the US lost, and so the promises of returning to a Mexican free California were dashed.
Would the US set up refugee camps in Oregon, Nevada, and Arizona to house all the Californians who had fled Mexican rule? Would Congress make rules to enforce the fact Californians could have little to no rights in other states, insisting that the only home for Californians is California?
What would we think of the US government if it did this? Certainly those in Oregon and other states would be repulsed by having the state of California emptied into their cities, and could justify their decisions for refugee camps. Would we blame Mexico for the conditions of these refugee camps?
Finally, and I honestly don't know the answer to this question, is there a distinctive Palestinian culture separate from the Arab cultures in the region? Or is it very much like California which has some distinctives but is essentially America in every way, represented on yet another bit of land.
Better than that, Middle East non-expert, President Truman fully acted to recognize Israel at the earliest possible moment, knowing full well that Israel was outgunned, outmanned, and outallied (world wide). In 1948, you have a land substantially owned by Jews which Britain no longer wishes to rule. You are coming out of World War II, where it is clear that Jews could not rely on the "responsible" people in Europe to protect their lives. Finally, you have a passionate Jewish minority clamoring to protect themselves, by making their own state if necessary.
Your argument is that responsible people should never permit actions which would lead to war if an alternative exists. Taking your argument at its word, what alternative would have worked in 1948 as Britain withdrew and the Jewish/Arab infighting began?
Leaving the land 100% Arab really worked out for the Armenians. The Palestinians in Jordan are another great example.
Or perhaps the U.N. could have set up peacekeepers in "Palestine" to prevent violence. As we all know, when the peacekeepers go into a place, such as Bosnia, the issue gets resolved quickly and with little bloodletting.
I'm running out of responsible ideas as an alternative to letting people who own the land decide the form of governance over that land.
As to the complaint that "well might makes right is wrong because it leads to nuclear war", all I can say to that is umm, ok. Then Israel should turn its swords into plowshares, hold out its hand to Iran, and sing koombaya. I'm sure that Amadeyajad (appologies to the lunatic "President" for my bad spelling) will reciprocate with doves and flowers. If you are right that Israel's military policy is unsustainable because of nuclear proliferation, then it behooves you to identify a better approach, because an approach that works short to medium term is better than no approach at all.
"Eleven months ago, Israel withdrew from every last inch of the Gaza Strip. They dismantled all military bases, turned over functioning greenhouses that could employ 4,000 people, expelled all 7,500 Israeli settlers at a huge financial and political cost and declared the lines that divide Israel from Gaza to be an international frontier, making Gaza the first independent Palestinian territory ever.
"Everyone's expectation was that the Palestinians, so treated, would show the world what they could achieve with freedom. Alas, they have shown all too well. Not one day of peace has followed." emphases added, h/t Solomonia
After fifty years what do the Palestinians have from listening to Arab advice? They have a cause and constant sorrow.
Very true, you point to something that rarely gets discussed: after the deluge, then what? More Robespierre, more "Justification of the use of Terror"? You bet; a different form with different rationales and motifs and facades and dissimulations, but essentially more of the same. Very similar to withdrawing from Lebanon or withdrawing from Gaza: to the jihadists and other power players, it simply is read as one more victory and one more opportunity for revanchist and yet still other initiatives. And that's why some Arab states, strictly on the level of balance of power politics, are concerned with Iran.
Good day.
Wow. It took Israel less than a year to get into another war with an independent nation. Please. Gaza was independent only if they elected the leaders that Israel and the U.S. wanted. I.E. - they were not actually independent. It's a catch-22: Palestine is not allowed to import that arms that could be used to put down its extremists because Israel fears, not irrationally, that those arms will be used against them. Wash, rinse, repeat.
This is going to end in nuclear war, be it next year or in 20 years, unless there are serious changes made on both sides.
Don't forget that Espana is part of the Caliphate.
Of course, back then, the Moors were actually learned and moderate. Even let the Jews (and Christians) live in relative peace with them.
The problem is they don't know what to do about it. They see advances in China, Taiwan, India, South Korea, and South America, but they don't see the same level of progress in Arab lands. Even with the huge revenues from oil, the Saudis still have failed to develop their economy much beyond oil.
So, what is the escape hatch? Israel. As long as their leaders can harp on the Zionist menace in their midst, they can pretend Israel (rather than literacy, nutrition, health care, and an modern economy) is the priority. This works for everybody. A lack of progress by the Arabs can always be excused by their number one prioty.
If every Jew in Israel were beamed up to the starship Enterprise, the Arabs would be desperate; they would finally have nobody to blame for their plight but themselves.
Did the Arabs of Palestine have that dignity before the Jews started returning in the 1880's? No, the area was ruled from afar by the Turkish Sultanate - a tyrannical and quite corrupt government, run by men who were Muslim but generally not Arabs. Between Mohammed and the Turkish Empire, the area was sometimes ruled from afar by Arabs in Bagdad or Egypt, sometimes by "Franks" from western Europe, and once by the Kurdish-Egyptian Saladin. After the defeat of Turkey in world war I, the area was ruled by the British.
The UN partition plan was the first time there actually was a Palestininian Arab nation - but instead of establishing dignity and self-government, the local Arabs joined with invaders from several other Arab nations to try to destroy Israel. They started that war, and they lost. One traditional consequence of losing a war is losing your land... The Israelis could neither give back land that they needed for minimally defensible borders nor let Arabs that had left their land in order to join up with the invaders return within their borders. They did for the most part leave those Arabs that stayed on their land and were willing to live in peace with Jewish neighbors unmolested on their land, and those Arabs became Israeli citizens.
It is true that in some ways the Israelis do not have clean hands. During the period of British rule, some of the Arabs began surreptitious attacks on the Jews who had bought land near them, and made this marginal land produce better crops than the Arabs grew on the best land. The British authorities didn't do much to stop these attacks; most of them favored the Arabs. The Jews gradually learned to defend themselves, but a few Jewish groups went way beyond self-defense to responding to terrorism with terrorism. There's no excuse for that - but still, remember who started it.
1)Israel will not be secure under the current conditions of the occupation/resistance.
2)Israel will never give up enough autonomy to the Palestinians such that the Palestinians would become satisfied.
Honestly, the only solution with any chance - and I know a lot of jews,zionists, and others are not going to want to hear it - is for Israel to incorporate gaza and the west bank into their nation, and give the Palestinians full voting rights.
This, after all, is the crux of the issue here. No one (thinking clearly) doubts Israel's right to exist. The problem lies in their inability to give the Palestinians either a voice or a nation. Since they will never give them a nation - and I don't care who you blame that on, it is not going to happen - they ultimately will have to give them a voice.
Now, I know we will soon see the argument that there is a right to a jewish state. Maybe so. But if Israel is to survive as ANY state in the 21st century, it may have to accept that the least-worst-alternative is to become a multi-ethnic one.
I don't think this addresses the main point of the original commenter. Blacks weren't living in democracies in Africa either, and they certainly received arguably better lives (particularly in the border states) in America in terms of life expectatncy, health, and material comforts as slaves. But that in no way can be the basis of an argument in favor of the slave system.
Regardless of what came before them, Israeli occupation cannot be justified as better than independence, no matter how much material gain it accomplishes. This isn't an issue of what came before or after, it is an issue of basic human liberty.
Much of eastern Europe fared better under the Soviets than during the 90's, and much of western Europe was materially better off during the German occupation 1940-44. Neither of these are sufficient conditions to justify such occupation. It's just apples and oranges.
I read the first paper you cited, which you labeled as false propaganda--it is dated July 2000 (6 years ago). Can't you find a more recent example, or is all of the "false propaganda" that old?
Also, you fail to rebut any of the author's main points, which are that Israel's use of Palestinian's natural resources and Israel's system of taxation of the Palestinian Authority's economy are preventing the Palestinians from sharing in Israel's prosperity.
It also seems to me you are making somewhat of a strawman argument by pointing out standards of living in other Arab countries. The Palestinians who are complaining don't live there. They live in Israel and the terrorities it has been occupying since 1967. They thus compare themselves with Israelis, not with Arabs in other countries. While Fatah and its corruption may be responsible for some of the poverty, Fatah didn't put the Palestinians in their camps in the first place, and Fatah isn't responsible for Israel's system of taxation, permitting, licensing fees, and Israel's use of water and other resources found in the occupied territories. Since you cite no data on Fatah's "corruption" impact on the Palestinians, it is hard to know who is right, you or the author.
David Bernstein makes a post that leads to a simple conclusion . The Palestinian War is mainly an ideological War that is driven by propaganda(i am not putting an ethical weight in this word) be it for Independence, Racism of Arab supremacy(after all there is an Arab league but i dont know of an Arian or Caucasian league) or Allah or all of them.
Since this is too much confusion/unconvinient for Palestinian supporters in the west lets play the simple economic card.
Now the "strange discussion" is that without Israel there will not be any "Palestinians".
Anon1298,
This is what Israel has been doing all along. Today, there are 9 Arabs that are members of the Israeli Knesset. There is one Arab Judge on the Supreme Court of Israel. There are many other Arab elected officials throughout Israel. 15% of Israel population is Arab. Arabs do have full voting rights and full rights of due process. Arabic is one of Israel's official languages.
We approach this problem and engage in "western" thinking (i.e. the Palestinians want to be treated the way you and I would want to be treated). And this is where we error greatly.
Palestinians want to be governed only by Shar'ia or Islamic Law. They have no desire to be on equal footing with Jews, they want them dead (sorry to be blunt/barbaric)...this is what the Quran prescribes.
What is Israel's Indepedence Day translated in Arabic? "The Catastrophe."
Muslims all over the world have been trying to rectify this situation that came about in 1948....and it's not through peace.
Don't kid yourself. Arabs in Israel proper can vote. Palestinians in the west bank and gaza cannot. For if they could, Israel would not have 9 arabs in the legislature, they would have a majority or close to it.
Trust me, the Palestinians would be perfectly happy with this solution.
Israel collects duties on foreign imports headed for the Palestinian territories and charges value added tax (VAT) on Israeli goods and services headed for those areas.
An independent Palestinian state would be absurdly small too, and it would have to develop much better relations to the outside world if it meant to survive. So, the ultimate question is whether the Palestinians as a people are willing to start behaving reasonably in their internal affairs... and to help thwart the individuals who refuse to go along. That seems to be the basic precondition for independence, at least for a small state in that neighborhood. It's also the precondition for becoming part of another state, if that's what the Palestinians would prefer.
I don't envy any Palestinian leader who runs on that platform, though. It sounds like a recipe for being shot by the loonies.