Slumberjack, your attempts to understand Jewish political, cultural and religious history are laudable.
Gaza, Israel, Hamas, etc
Fri, 2009-01-02 15:10
#102
Fri, 2009-01-02 15:15
#103
Makwa
It was said that the land that first nations peoples resided upon was 'unproductive', i.e. not profitable to white folks, and was thus improved by being liberated to the forces of white western capitalism. Shame about all the useless unproductive folk that had to be removed one way or another to make way for progress. Same old, different day. Genocide has a smiley face.Contrary to popular belief, the region upon which Israel sits, is not wasteland.
Fri, 2009-01-02 15:18
#104
Makwa, the similarities between the Zionist settler views of the indigenous Arab population's relationship with the land, and that of the European settlers here, are truly chilling.
Fri, 2009-01-02 15:20
#105
Cueball
It is said that "Israel made the deserts bloom." I read a recent survey which showed that 90% of all Israeli agricultural production is not on newly cultivated land, but in fact land previously cultivated by Arabs.
Fri, 2009-01-02 15:22
#106
Cueball
Contrary to popular belief, the region upon which Israel sits, is not wasteland. It is in fact, some of the most fertile land in the region. Taking possession of it has direct material rewards. Furthermore, when established, and recognized, settlements can depend on substantial direct financial aid from the Israeli government. The challenge is to establish a claim for long enough that the facts on the ground require Israeli support and protection for the settlement.
Race hate born of fear, and other existential factors such as "man's search for meaning" may very well play some role in the motivational psychology of many settlers, but that is really ancilliary to the power dynamic and ideology that enable whatever personal fantasies that are being expressed by individual settlers. If you are really interested in that topic I suggest you read, Zygmund Bauman's excelent work, "Modernity and the Holocaust."
The burried treasure comes in the form of US banknotes, filtered in to support the Israeli war economy, which depends on a constant state of crisis for its justification. Israel's main benefactor, the US, is rewarded in turn by having a stable and dependent client in the region so that it can exert control over the middle east oil supply.
It is no accident that Israel sits athwart the main commercial routes that joined together the economy of the Arab peoples for centuries.
As for archaeology. The distortion of scientific inquirey to bend its findings conform to an superior ideological goal is totally par for the course.
Fri, 2009-01-02 15:50
#107
Makwa
Makwa, the similarities between the Zionist settler views of the indigenous Arab population's relationship with the land, and that of the European settlers here, are truly chilling.I think that is a very powerful statement Unionist, thank you.
Even now / We are not lost: If you look out at the night / You'll see the colours and the lights seem to say / People are not far away, at least in distance, / And it's only our own dumb resistance / That's making us stay.
Fri, 2009-01-02 16:00
#108
The bombing raids by the IAF are unquestionably a gross reaction to this situation. There is never an excuse for the killing of innocent civilians, never!
I do however with the same passionate fervour totally reject any progressive activist that would link Israel to White Supremacists. It wins us no friends and makes a laughing stock of real anti-racism. As much as I deplore O'hara's characterization of Israel's position I do agree with her that using the comparisions to white supremacy is pretty contemptible.
.
Fri, 2009-01-02 16:13
#109
It wins us no friends and makes a laughing stock of real anti-racism.
Who's "us"?
As much as I deplore O'hara's characterization of Israel's position I do agree with her that using the comparisions to white supremacy is pretty contemptible.
Yeah, I would agree with you that "mass murderers" is a more apt characterization of the current situation. The bombers are certainly not stopping to inquire into the racial complexion of the children they slaughter. Thanks for that clarification.
Fri, 2009-01-02 16:30
#110
Frustrated Mess
I do however with the same passionate fervour totally reject any
progressive activist that would link Israel to White Supremacists. It
wins us no friends and makes a laughing stock of real anti-racism. As
much as I deplore O'hara's characterization of Israel's position I do
agree with her that using the comparisions to white supremacy is
pretty contemptible.
Well, first, you put forward a false argument. I have not linked Zionism to white supremacism and so far as I know they are not in any way linked. What I have done is argued that they share, essentially, a similar philosophy.
Your argument goes to the Zionist pretext that we can't accuse Zionism of what it is - a political framework for a racist and supremacist state. Until and unless we acknowlege that Zionism is a form of supremacist politcs no different than South Africa's Apartheid, then Palestinains are forever denied the recognition of their struggle as liberation struggle for basic human rights as was South Africa's movement against Apartheid.
Until that time, folks like OHara and other apologists for Zionism will attempt to present Israelis as just regular folk wanting to live in peace who are inflicted by this monstrous people who engage in violence as though it was their nature. I mean, if you read OHara's talking points, and the official Isra eli talking points, poor Israel is being forced to launch missiles against stupid Palestinians who insist on tossing rockets against Israelis who deserve something that Palestinians do not - security. Why not?
Becuase Zionism rejects the rights and dignity of Palestinians - non-Jews - in their own land because they represent what has been termed, and by Zionists not by me, a demographic time bomb. And why? Because if Palestinians were integrated into Israel with full civil and political rights their presence, as Palestinians and non-Jews, would undermine the essential characteristics of the Jewish state.
So what are we describing here?
Fri, 2009-01-02 16:52
#111
Makwa
White supremacy was the founding ideology which enabled the violent genocidal development of the entire Americas, which entailed the decimation of millions of peoples of Africa and Turtle Island. I agree that the modern government of Israel is very new at this game, and needs some time to catch up. As far as `real`anti-racism goes, by and large `real`anti-racism is generally that which is defined by white folk, thus, I have very little interest in it.I do however with the same passionate fervour totally reject any progressive activist that would link Israel to White Supremacists. It wins us no friends and makes a laughing stock of real anti-racism. As much as I deplore O'hara's characterization of Israel's position I do agree with her that using the comparisions to white supremacy is pretty contemptible.
Fri, 2009-01-02 18:01
#112
That was then Makwa, this is now and we are supposed to have learned better.
I must admit I felt uncomfortable the first time I looked at Israeli talking points and substituted Indian for Palestinian because I'm a native British Columbian and the Gordon Campbell government has issued a statement that they are going to recognize aboriginal title to the pubicly owned lands of BC (90%). They're not doing it because they're all that warm and fuzzy about the First Nations but because they want to privatize all of that luscious land and mega billion dollar resources.
That said, the governments and peoples of Canada are not treating Indians the same way that the Palestinians are currently being treated by "the modern government" of Israel.
Fri, 2009-01-02 18:07
#113
A few days ago I showed a South African friend Google Earth for the first time and we had a look at the privileged white suburb of Johannesburg where he'd grown up. I noted the wide bungalow rooves, well maintained lawns and backyard swimming pools. Scrolling north a couple of k's brought us to a black shantytown, with 30 houses occupying the same space as one white home. The difference in lifestyles was....suggestive.
Then we scrolled to where I grew up in south western Ontario and I noted the wide bungalow rooves, well maintained lawns, backyard pools...and I realized, SHIT!...we're part of the same animal. The only reason my home turf didn't have a shantytown tucked handily by for cheap labour is because most of our First Nations people died from European diseases.
Otherwise, I realized with a shock, it would look the same.
Then I scrolled over to Gaza and noted the arable productive lands on one side of the fence...and the crowded tiny circumstances on the other side.
And I understood why the western press is all singing the same song. It is the song of colonial kin. It is the song of the colonialists.
Israel is a principally white European colonial project. It is a work-in-progress. Its EXPLICIT if unexpressed goal is to drive the Gazans from the land which will then be colonized by the Israeli state. They have similar ambitions for the West Bank.
They do not want peace. They want land. They will pay for it with their blood, if the rate of exchange is deemed good. That is the job of the IDF. 100:1 is the best deal their war machine has gotten yet.
I'll say it again.
THEY DO NOT WANT PEACE. THEY WANT LAND.
I mean, I think most people here get that. I get that. But still, I am shocked when I put it like that.
But really, that's it, isn't it? A colonialist state with a superior military force with the support and complicity of western nations is attempting to force an indigenous population from its land in order to have it for itself.
Seems pretty racist to me.
Fri, 2009-01-02 18:14
#114
Frustrated Mess
Excellent analysis, Merowe.
Fri, 2009-01-02 18:37
#115
Yeah..., it's a shame our "Opposition" parties seem to have a blind spot about it.
Fri, 2009-01-02 19:47
#116
Frustrated Mess
By any definition this is a humanitarian crisis and more," said Max
Gaylard, the UN humanitarian co-ordinator for the Palestinians. He said
there had been on average one air strike every 20 minutes since the
bombing began, intensifying at night and covering the whole Gaza Strip.The
death toll in Gaza climbed to more than 400 dead and at least 1,700
injured. The UN said it believed a quarter of the dead were civilians.
Palestinian militants in Gaza continued to fire rockets into southern
Israel, where four people have been killed in the week since Israel's
bombing began....
In Israel, the conflict has improved the political fortunes
of Ehud Barak, the defence minister, whose Labour party has climbed in
opinion polls this week to a stronger third position.The
foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, of the Kadima party, has now drawn level
in the polls with Binyamin Netanyahu, the Likud opposition leader, who
had been a clear favourite to win February's general elections.
Fri, 2009-01-02 20:06
#117
Closing for length.
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