The shame of the atrocity

[Classical_Liberal]

But Israel, under almost all of its governments, has given them the feeling that they will never get even this minuscule territory. In everyday life, the soldiers and officers of the Israel Defense Forces trample the honor of the Palestinian people (and also did so even when there was no intifada), expropriate its land and control its water, its roads, its daily routine and in fact every sphere of life.

In Israel the Palestinian question is viewed solely from the Jewish point of view - how important the land is for the settlers, Israeli security, unified Jerusalem the eternal capital of Israel, a unilateral solution. Why is no thought given to the ties of the Palestinian to his land and to his Jerusalem? Why don't they think about security for the Palestinians? Why don't they allow them to share in deciding their future? Why is only the Israeli narrative important?

When people say that there is no partner for peace on the Palestinian side, why don't they ask whether such a partner exists in the Israeli government? Everyone knows, after all, that the disengagement plan, like the plan of cabinet minister Avigdor Lieberman, like the plan the prime minister is trying to formulate now - all these plans aim to bypass the road map and undermine the Geneva initiative.

No side has the right to ignore the other side and infringe its rights, its sensitivities and its honor.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/427431.html

[Toronto Ron]

1. Yep, new leaders needed on both sides

Palestinians will not get much with Sharon in power. His days are numbered, but the Israeli Left will need motivation to come out and vote next time (they stayed home, both Sharon elections).

Similarly, not much will happen with Arafat still calling the shots. Statements like he made today, calling on his people to "terrorize the enemy" (http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/427699.html ) are unhelpful.

[Classical_Liberal]

2. Arafat's statements get misreported alot

and taken out of context. They do it to all Palestinian leaders actually. The PA Prime minister before this one was called a holocaust denier.

[Jim Sagle]

3. What makes you think he wasn't?

[Classical_Liberal]

4. Haaretz interview with Abbas

Holocaust denier?

The question about whether he denied the Holocaust in his Ph.D. angers Abbas. "I wrote in detail about the Holocaust and said I did not want to discuss numbers. I quoted an argument between historians in which various numbers of casualties were mentioned. One wrote there were 12 million victims and another wrote there were 800,000. I have no desire to argue with the figures. The Holocaust was a terrible, unforgiveable crime against the Jewish nation, a crime against humanity that cannot be accepted by humankind. The Holocaust was a terrible thing and nobody can claim I denied it."

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:TK4JwD9Ra80J:middl...

[Jim Sagle]

5. The universally-accepted range is between 5 and 6 million. Therefore even

the above snippet amounts to Holocaust denial.

[Classical_Liberal]

6. Whatever

I have heard people claim 12 million as well. I guess I am a holocaust denier.

[Jim Sagle]

7. Your heart-felt interest is truly touching.

[Classical_Liberal]

8. You're broad definitions breed cynism

.

[Liberal Classic]

36. Holocaust denial takes many forms

You don't hear the blatant kind as much, but it has been replaced these days by scholarly-sounding pooh-poohing. The truth is that myths such as Hitler did not target the Jews and that pictures of concentration camps were manufactered are prevalent among radical Islamic terrorists, and one should be careful not to accidentially parrot their lies while defending Palestinians.

[Jack Rabbit]

26. That is not Holocaust denial

Perhaps Mahmoud Abbas is a Holocaust denier, but one can't prove it by this statement:

I wrote in detail about the Holocaust and said I did not want to discuss numbers. I quoted an argument between historians in which various numbers of casualties were mentioned. One wrote there were 12 million victims and another wrote there were 800,000.

That is an accurate statement. I would agree, Jim, that those who put the figure at 800,000 are Holocaust deniers; however, if Abbas endorses such a figure, he doesn't say so here. He merely acknowledges that some people set the figure that low. I haven't read Abbas' doctoral dissertation and have no idea whether he actually takes such figures seriously. He may not take them any more seriously than your or I. If you have information that Abbas has stated categorically that the actual number is anything like 800,000, then please share it with us.

The 12 million figure is the upper estimate of the total number of unarmed civilian victims of the Nazis, Jewish and otherwise. Few using that figure suggest that the number of Jews murdered was anything substantially less than 6 million.

Another group of scholars is trying to set the figure of Jews victims at about 4.5 million; they claim to be using more accurate accounting methods than were used after the War. While I continue to use the 6 million figure, I wouldn't characterize these scholars as Holocaust deniers. Even if their lower revised figure were to someday be universally accepted, it would still be characterized rightly as a Holocaust.

[Lithos]

27. To add more information -

http://www.wymaninstitute.org/articles/2003-03-denier.p...

If this is correct, it seems that while Abbas' scholarly focus seems to suffer some grievous citation errors, the gist of the problem seems to be that he emphasizes as small a figure as possible even to the point of trying to deny the use of gas chambers; then asserts the Zionists intentionally made themselves victims in order to speed both Zionism, but also gain more for themselves; then once everything was said and done, the Zionists then tried to inflate the number in a way as to draw sympathy.

Now, this also bears the mark of formulaic pablum common amongst 1970's Arab marxist groups, so how much of it was the result of trying to fit in amongst his peers in Moscow and how much of it were truly his personal beliefs are up in the air. I imagine the answer is somewhere in the middle.

[Jack Rabbit]

28. Thank you

This is much more specific and much more serious.

[Classical_Liberal]

29. It is more him quoting others and then the Wyman Center claiming

he believes what he quotes, based on the use of those quotes. I am sceptical, sorry. I think biases come in all forms.

The Wyman Institute accuses the Palestinians of genocide in 1948, just because they didn't want Israel created, without mentioning the successful ethnic cleansing against Arabs that went on then. More specifically he accuses the Mufti of shipping Jewish children to Aushwits

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:z86Hs2jp2pIJ:www.w...

n recent days, A group of Israeli Arabs HAS announced plans to visit Auschwitz. It remains to be seen whether the visit will include acknowledgment and repudiation of the Mufti's role in having 4,000 Jewish children shipped to Auschwitz and his plan for the mass murder of Palestinian Jewry

which Avri Shlaim repudated in this article I posted.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

The Mufti was the leader of the Palestinian national movement but he was an out-and- out rejectionist and in this he did not serve his people well. He rejected a long series of compromise proposals put forward by the British. He embarked upon a very risky strategy of all-or-nothing and he ended up with nothing.

Whichever way you look at the Palestinian struggle for independence under the British mandate, it is the story of how Mufti muffed it! Yasser Arafat is not a great statesman either. The Palestinians have been most unfortunate in having a good cause, but incompetent leaders.

As for the Mufti and Nazism, it is simply not true that he participated in the Nazi holocaust. He fell out with Britain, he went over to Germany, and he met with Hitler. Zionist writers, with the exception of Zvi Elpeleg, have been very harsh on the Mufti. But they have produced no hard evidence to prove that he participated actively in the Nazi destruction of European Jewry.

Like it or not there is an active attempt among certain Israeli nationalists to blur the line between Palestinians and Nazis, probably to raise hysteria in Israelis and American Jewish philanthropists.

Here is an article where the muft is accused of being personally responsible for planning the holocaust.

5. The Mufti and the Holocaust

It is a strange "coincidence" that the Germans decided the systematic destruction of European Jewry only two months after the Mufti's meeting with Hitler. Since 1939 the Nazi policy had been to use the Jews as slave labourers and isolate them in ghettos, but not to exterminate them. However, after his arrival the Nazi policy changed. I am certainly not saying the Mufti was participating to any major extent in the planning of the Final Solution. However, I want to point out that at this time he was having meetings with some of the top Nazi figures and might easily have taken some part in the planning. Still, whatever the part the Mufti played in the Holocaust, one thing is almost certain, he knew about it from the beginning and approved.
In 1941 the Mufti's delegate proposed a revised version of their former draft of an Axis-Arab treaty. According to captured documents the Mufti had just one thing in mind for the Yishuv Jewry:

Germany and Italy recognize the illegality of the Jewish National Home in Palestine. They recognize the right of Palestine and other Arab countries to solve the question of the Jewish elements in Palestine and in other Arab countries as required by national interests, and in the same way as the Jewish question in the Axis lands is being solved.

Now how did the Muft send 4000 children to Aucshwits if the holocaust didn't happen until he personally planned it with Hitler two months earlier?

[Classical_Liberal]

30. more

Oh I see the article states

The number of Jews who had obtained visa for Palestine, but were cancelled because of the Mufti's protests were:

13 May, 1943 : 4,000 children and 500 adults. (Bulgaria)
28 June, 1943 : 1,800 children and 200 adults. (Rumania)
28 June, 1943 : 900 children and 100 adults. (Hungary)

So the mufti denies Jewish immigration and this turns into "he personally shipped Jews to Aucshwitz and is a Nazi." Why don't we condemn Roosevelt and Churchill on the same grounds? Many Jews died because they were refused the right to immigrate to England, and America. There was more demand for immigration to England and American than Palestine. I think alot of stuff gets exagerrated, particularly when it comes to Palestinian leaders, sorry.

Look at how the papers translated Arafat's non-english Koran quote into the word "terrorize" creating the assocation with terrorism, in Gimel's post.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

Palestinians really need a PR outfit to debunk this stuff, but until they get one, I will have a critical eye toward claims that are made about them.

[Gimel]

9. I wonder why

there is no sense of the need for the security fence among the Palestinians. After all, the atrocities and mutilation of 900 Israelis did not come from outer space. It came from their own territory. Time to think, like the man said.

Despite all claims, even the government has thinking capacity. No peace will result when all offers are rejected and violent actions take their place.

[Classical_Liberal]

10. If the security fence were on the green line

maybe that would make sense.

[Gimel]

11. Like

if all attacks were in the territories maybe it would make sense? I'm sure you've seen many of the arguments I've posted against this persistent attitude which is itself simplistic and ignores reality.

[Classical_Liberal]

12. If the settlements(squatters towns) were dismantled they could

put the fence where it belongs, on the green line.

[Gimel]

13. The urgency

of the fence to stop the infiltration of bomb-carrying terrorists precluded the advancement of talks on the issues of settlements. It is not a pragmatic solution. The defensive nature of the barrier as a temporary structure is allowable under international law.

To take the steps you have recommended would have cost another thousand or more Israeli lives.

The label of "apartheid" does not have any relevance to location. So if they think it would be at least bearable (The Palestinians totally lack understanding on this, as was my point. I see the propaganda such as that published on the Internet and no mention of GreenLine location is made when calling it an Apartheid fence.) It would still be separating one land area from the other, Jews from Arabs even more so, so the Apartheid label would be more fitting. It is a poorly devised label for propaganda.

[Classical_Liberal]

14. If they were concerned with Israeli lives they wouldn't have

built the settlements at all. When you consider that the settler only roads, and Jew only settlements, it completely applies. These are Bantustands. Israelis and Americans are the only ones who don't understand this. Though the settlers understand it very well. Many of them have actually called for a 3/5 humans clause to the constitution for Palestinians in the Greater Israel state.

[Gimel]

16. Arguments like these

are very narrow minded.

[Violet_Crumble]

15. Bullshit...

The defensive nature of the barrier as a temporary structure is allowable under international law.

There is nothing at all that allows the building of a structure like that in OCCUPIED TERRITORY. If there is, point me to the bit of international law that says it's allowed....

How on earth would dismantling the illegal settlements in the West Bank cost another thousand or more Israeli lives?

Violet...

[Gimel]

17. Bullshit

Laws are not made to allow occupation and war activity. Laws are made to forbid or restrict activity such as genocide. There is no law against a structure, so it is de facto allowed.

The suicide attacks did not stop of themselves. Israeli defensive actions stopped them, and the barrier (wall) was the primary line of defense. Dismantling settlements will require movement and activity. This always puts lives at risk, not to mention the risk to Israelis from infiltration. Moving 14,000 people causes chaos. It isn't done in a fortnight. The families have as much right as the Palestinians to appeal the decisions. The legal process has already begun, so that is a separate issue. It can not be undertaken in the midst of rampant terrorism.

The occupation of Japan, for instance, did not begin until after the defeat of the Axis powers. While the Palestinian revolt is one under occupation, the issues have to be dealt with separately.

How did the US occupy Japan? With force, and by restructuring education, government, economy, etc.

In an occupation that lasted from 1945 to 1952, there was not one instance of Japanese terror against the occupation forces.

Much of the success of the Japanese occupation derived from the fact that Japan surrendered "unconditionally," thereby ceding absolute and nonnegotiable authority to the victors. The exercise of this authority, moreover, was vested in an unusually charismatic supreme commander, Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who, in effect, was authorized to rule by fiat. It is not conceivable to think of the United States military or any single American commander wielding comparable civil authority in a foreign land today.

http://middleeastinfo.org/article1629.html

The amount of cooperation that the US received in Japan, is not by any means the situation in Palestinian territories.

[Classical_Liberal]

18. The occupation is not related in anyway to violence

It has been going since 67 with long periods of no suicide or terrorist attacks. Indeed it was going on long before this intifada started. So were the settlements. Most people aren't amnesiacs.

[Gimel]

19. Violence against settlers

It has been pretty much on-going since the founding of the state.

[Classical_Liberal]

20. I accept the Israeli border pre1967

as a haven for holocaust survivors. That's it. There is no doubt that Israel has been deliberately making Palestinians homeless from the beginning. The Palestinians need their state too. I would be much more empathetic with Israelis when they are victims of terrorist attacks, if they stop the settling the west bank. So would the rest of the world.

[Gimel]

21. What you accept is not reality

It is up to the parties involved to agree on a just solution. Imposing outside willful ideas, and supporting death of civilians to further a state which includes Jerusalem and large portions of Israel is not helpful for peace either.

[Classical_Liberal]

24. I send my tax dollars to support it so I am involved.

. My tax dollars give the party in the wrong an unfair military advantage over the Palestinians and it scandalizes my country in the eyes of the Arab world. I don't believe that 9/11 would have happened were in not for this rage.

[Violet_Crumble]

22. Read the Geneva Conventions...

Israel has a clear obligation to the people in territory it occupies, much of which it totally ignores. Building walls deep inside occupied territories and carrying out defacto annexations of part of the territory is NOT acceptable under international law...

No, Gimel. Israelis living in illegal settlements do not and should not have as much right as Palestinians to appeal any decision to move them to Israel where they belong. They're there illegally, unlike the Palestinians...


Violet...

[Gimel]

23. Read the latest, Violet

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/428091.html

Yes, they have the right to appeal, but they pay the costs.

[Violet_Crumble]

31. Here's a big fact for you, Gimel...

The settlements are illegal under international law. They shouldn't be there, and the settlers do NOT have as much right to be there as Palestinians. Last time I checked, international law trumps civil law when it comes to occupied territory....

This has been posted many times before, but a few more times won't hurt...

"International humanitarian law prohibits the occupying power to transfer citizens from its own territory to the occupied territory (Fourth Geneva Convention, article 49). The Hague Regulations prohibit the occupying power to undertake permanent changes in the occupied area, unless these are due to military needs in the narrow sense of the term, or unless they are undertaken for the benefit of the local population."

http://www.btselem.org/english/Publications/Summaries/L...

Do you disagree with the Fourth Geneva Convention? Do you think it shouldn't apply to Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories? Do you oppose the settlements being dismantled?

Violet...

[Gimel]

32. Big Answer

Although we have dealt with this before, I will refresh your mind, and give as clear an answer as possible.

Fist of all, not all settlements have the same status. Some, such as Hebron settlements, I feel are very much justified by the historical presence, and continuous presence of Jews for about three millennium.

The status of some of the "settlements" are in dispute, and also have been in Jewish hands for all but a brief period of history. They were taken over by Muslims and reinhabited by Jews following the 1967 war.

Muslims and Jews have lived in the area together for as long as recorded history. Before there were Muslims, Jews lived there.

Now if you believe that the territory is occupied by conquest, just remember there was a conquest before that conquest.

Some of the outpost should be removed immediately, but I disagree with murdering settlers and their families. That is an atrocity.

Now I have some questions for you:

Do you believe that there is a law against murdering settlers?

Do the Geneva accords apply to a situation that existed before the Geneva Accords were written? Is it retroactive, in your mind?

[Violet_Crumble]

33. All settlements in the Occupied Territories have the same status...

They're illegal under international law. Would you like a link to the Fourth Geneva Convention?

Yr argument that long historical presence of a few isolated settlements should entitle Israel to hold sovereignty over them doesn't appear an argument that holds any water. Do you feel that it would be justified for Palestinians who were expelled from their villages in what is now Israel to return and claim Palestinian sovereignty over large areas surrounding those villages?

Yes, I know there were some indigenous Jews living in Palestine. But that doesn't mean US citizens who decide they're moving to Israel and then plant themselves in the Occupied Territories are in any way indigenous....

Murdering any civilians is an atrocity. It doesn't matter whether they're Palestinians or Israelis....

Now to answer yr questions:

Do you believe that there is a law against murdering settlers?

If those settlers aren't combatants, they're considered to be civilians and it's a violation of international law to murder them, just the same as it is to murder any civilian...

Do the Geneva accords apply to a situation that existed before the Geneva Accords were written? Is it retroactive, in your mind?

No, I doubt they are retroactive. Though if they were, Israel could give the UK some pointers on how to thumb it's nose at them, as Britain was very big on planting settlers in far-flung places around the world...

Violet...

[Gimel]

34. All considered

If you were aware of the Camp David settlement that was offered to Arafat, and was rejected, included removal of most of the settlements. No, I don't think that all the settlements have the same status, and I doubt that few who have studied the issues really think that.

No, I doubt they are retroactive. Though if they were, Israel could give the UK some pointers on how to thumb it's nose at them, as Britain was very big on planting settlers in far-flung places around the world...

It is much the other way around, as the British were in a position to give pointers to the refugees from Europe on how to neglect humanitarian principles and human rights.

Oh, of course today they are perfect, without a moat in the eye, and can demand perfection from the Jewish state.

[Violet_Crumble]

35. Since when do offers made by Israel make the settlements legal?

Sorry, but Israel making an offer which is rejected doesn't change the status of Ariel, for example. They're still illegal under international law. btw, the offer that was made did not involve the removal of most of the settlements at all....

Huh? No-one's said the British are perfect, so that's a bit out of right-field there. And I haven't seen any other state demand perfection from Israel, just that it complies with international law and puts a stop to the human rights abuses it carries out in the Occupied Territories...

Violet...

[Gimel]

25. Obligations

such as the freedom of movement can be abrogated reasonably when life is endangered. For example, the setting up of a soldier's death as he opens a door, after he let the woman of the house he occupied go out for food. This only undermines trust, instead of building trust which is the only way to bring the conflict to a conclusion.

The soldiers were part of a unit stationed in a home of an elderly Palestinian woman in the Brazil refugee camp in the town.

On Friday afternoon, the woman asked to leave the house in order to buy food. When she returned, the soldier who opened the door for her was hit by Palestinian fire, and later died of his wounds.

Rescue forces who arrived at the scene in an APC were met with heavy gunfire, during which several other soldiers were hit.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/427657.html

Shooting Kassam missiles into residential areas to terrorize Israel's citizens, and sabotaging rescue operations all point to violations of the Geneva conventions and to the fair a balanced observer, speaks poorly for the prospects for peace. A just peace will be found when justice is deserved on both sides.