Israel/Palestine
In reply to the discussion: The Crazy Lie of "Pinkwashing" and the Liberal Case for Israel [View all]Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)And don't keep calling me things that you know are untrue...like accusing me of being a bigot.
The IDF wouldn't leave if Palestine was fully democratic...because a fully democratic Palestine(which I do support)would not accept less than Palestine's current demands. None would accept, for example the survival of the Ariel settlement or any of the other large settlement blocs, because there isn't any land that Israel could possibly swap that could make up for the fact that Palestinians would have to spend the rest of eternity having to go through IDF checkpoints just to get from one part of Palestine to another part of Palestine.
Of course the political choices are limited in Palestine right now, but it's not as if the Occupation reduces the limits. In fact, the Occupation has helped impose those limits, because it's been used, among other things, to attack secular movements in Palestine(there was a belief at one point that it was in Israel's interest to strengthen Hamas against the secular groups).
The Occupation doesn't give anybody in Palestine any more room to maneuver than they'd have if the IDF weren't there...any more than apartheid protected internal black democracy within South Africa.
I said I admired people who are trying to work for change within Palestinian political culture. There work is difficult and I'm not sure possible, especially while the Occupation is in place. You have no reason to be fixated on the distinction between difficult and impossible...demanding that I say one or the other is childish and pointless, and it's ridiculous for you to think that what I say is going to make a huge difference. No matter what I say or do, Israel is secure and will always exist. I can't do the place any harm.
You keep acting like I'm a heretic and you're some sort of latter-day Torquemada, who cannot let up until you get me to recant. Why? Why are you so obsessed with getting me to abandon all disagreement with you? It's not as if YOUR view is the only possible legitimate one. A lot of your fellow soldiers don't even agree with you. Some refuse to serve in the Territories anymore as a result.
As to Palestinians in Jerusalem, if they don't want to give up their Israeli citizenship, that's up to them. But the fact that they don't doesn't justify the evictions of Palestinians in East Jerusalem and the expansion of Israeli settlements there. The fact that those Palestinians wish to be Israeli citizens does NOT mean that they accept the argument that the Occupation is somehow a lesser-evil for Palestinians in the West Bank OR that they back the siege of Gaza. They haven't disowned their countrymen.
And you have never pointed to any possible way that the presence of the IDF could ever, possibly, in any way, lead to Palestine getting democratized. Perhaps because you know that it CAN'T lead to that.
If you want to defend the Occupation because you buy into the fascist "Judea and Samaria" canard, fine. If you just hate Arabs, fine. But don't insult everyone's intelligent by trying to pretend that the Occupation is beneficial to the occupied. Just don't go there. You have to reason to. And it would make no difference to anything were I to become a total conservative and agree with you.