The formation of Israel and the question of stealing land can be debated, but at this point it is history and cannot be changed. At some point a nation needed to arise out of the ashes of the Ottoman empire. The problem was, when one did it didn't encompass the entire area. Arab Palestinians didn't vote to accept the border, but neither did they declare war on Israel in 1948, how could they if they weren't even a state? The root of today's problems have to do with the taking of land by act of war. Palestinians are punished for the acts of the other arab nations.

I found it highly surprising the video didn't mention the countless UN resolutions condemning Israel's acts of land confiscation, usually with the USA and Israel the only ones opposing it. In war you can defend yourself, even invade the enemy's territory. But when it's over you have to go back your home, you can't keep a permanent army presence on the captured land and slowly allow your citizens to start living in the captured territory. The fact that the land wasn't part of Jordan made it easier for people to give Israel a pass since they weren't stealing land from a nation, just a nation-less people. That doesn't make it any more justifiable. Israel should have occupied the territory until the end of hostilities and then completely withdrawn.

The video mentions the land they grabbed from Egypt, the almost empty Sinai peninsula that was an incredible strategic value. They were plenty happy to hand it back for a peace treaty, mainly because the hardcore Zionists weren't determined to expand the state of Israel there as they are in the west bank, which has much more history for their people. Notice how they went out of their way to establish a salient to Jerusalem during the 1948 war.

The only reason at some point in the last 40 years Israel hasn't just put up a fence and closed the border permanently(surely the safest choice if you're really worried about suicide bombers) is they wouldn't be able to move beyond that border and capture more land, which is what the orthodox Jews demand. People living in the west bank live under different laws based on their religion. Israeli civil code if they're settlers, military rule if they're Palestinians. How ironic that Israel is lauded as the great democracy in the middle east, yet deny the right of representation to millions under their control.

Historically Islam didn't really engage in forced conversions, partly because under both the Caliphate and the Ottoman empire the tax break given to Muslims would've been problematic if given to the entire population (this tax break is the flip side of the "extort money" that you refer to).

Also speaking historically, Jews were much safer in Muslim lands than Christian since Christians tended to massacre them on a fairly regular basis until 1945 and despite what you've heard most Muslims are fairly tolerant. The same applies to minority Christian sects, the Nestorians for instance had to flee to Persia in 489 AD, and I seem to recall another minority group who fled England to Holland and then to the Americas (perhaps you've heard of them?).

I used to think that Buddhists and Hindus were more tolerant than the Abrahamic religions, but unfortunately I've since learned that I only thought so due to ignorance.

This situation is sad and ironic.

The area known as Judea was renamed Palestine during the time of Roman emperor Hadrian.
The residents of Judea/Palestine were forced to convert from Judaism to Christianity around 400 ad by the Romans, and later in the 700's ad were forced to convert to Islam.
They never left. They just changed religions. The children of the Jews of the new testament, are the Palestinians of today (now practicing Islam).

Many years passed, the Eastern Roman empire resided over much of the area, ruled out of Turkey, and the region was more or less all-right. Along the way it changed names to the Ottoman empire.

After WW1, the Ottoman empire shrank dramatically, and renamed itself to simply Turkey. However it still held some lands that were not actually Turkish (eg. ~Syria), and was still a mini-empire.
Around this general time period, Palestine became a British colony.

During WW2, there were many displaced Europeans of Jewish faith that had nowhere to go.
(*Britain didn't want them either, most places didn't. Anti-Semitism was rather common at the time. Even the Nazi eugenics policy wasn't much criticized at the time. re: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics#Supporters_and_critics. Actually, the Nazi's strong association with anti-semitism + all the anti-Nazi propaganda during WW2, helped cure a lot of anti-semitism in Europe.).
In the late 1940's Britain split occupied Palestine into smaller-Palestine+Israel, and assisted in relocating WW2 displaced Europeans of Jewish faith to Israel. Which at face value made sense, because "the bible says Jews are from Judea". However the area from which was established Israel was more or less ~devoid of followers of the Jewish faith in the 1940's.
And that's the irony! The British creation of Israel involved taking land from Palestinians (i.e. The children of the original Jews of Judea), and giving it to Europeans of Jewish faith (foreign immigrants).

That then resulted in middle-eastern resentment and backlash over western invasion/occupation/seisure-of-land. This resentment against immigrating European Jews caused 'Jews at large' to be discriminated against throughout the middle-east, and that in turn led to a migration wave of regional-Jews from the surrounding areas into Israel.
This resulted in a concentration of Jewish-faithed immigrants of European and middle-eastern ethnicity, all in Israel - further displacing the original residents.

Basically, in the end, the original people of Judea were kicked out of their homes and their lands given to immigrants... and they really resent it. While in the mean time the immigrants acclaim to have a god given right to be there because there is some old paper that says that people of their faith are from the area.

Ta-da.

Britain could have just sent Europeans of Jewish faith to Palestine, and made it an integrated nation.
But nope, they had to displace people and create a bunch more problems.
Gee, thanks Britain.
I pretty much face-palm when I hear "this conflict is thousands of years old" (when it's only been ~66 years).


Note :
I make the distinction between ethnically Jewish and religiously Jewish.
I use the phrase "Europeans of Jewish faith" to clarify that these were displaced Europeans, who may have had an ancestor or two way way way up the family tree that was from Judea - but were otherwise European and of Jewish faith - who may have lived in an area with little mingling with outsiders, and hence a visually distinct appearance (i.e. what made it possible to make visual caricatures of their people, such as : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eternal_Jew_%281940_film%29)
You can also play semantics with "what is ethnically Jewish, when the ethnicity is labelled after the faith", etc.

There's also the geopolitical aspect. Israel is the only "Western" nation in the middle-east. Given that the area is globally significant in terms of resources, that makes Israel a critically important ally. So the rhetoric will always lean.

Personally, I wonder if the things that European Jews suffered during WW2, didn't create some mental/emotional baggage that today plays itself out with how they treat Palestinians. Sort of a "I don't care about your suffering, because I've been through worse" kind of situation.

However, I understand how Israel does not want an open integrated society with Palestinians. The Jewish population is rather small, and in an integrated society they would be such a small proportion that they would essentially be bred out of existence within a few generations. For those who wish to preserve their culture, that's 'kind of a big deal'.

-scheherazade

Who is he talking about? Does he know anything at all about the Ottoman Empire? Other than being predominantly Muslim, the Middle East today doesn't resemble the Ottoman Empire in any way. Not even at all. Least of all the former Ottomans themselves, the Turks.

Troll-o-lo-lo-lo.

>> ^obscenesimian:

Yes yes. Kurds, hmmmmmm let me think
oh yes they were abused by turks throughout history but most notably during the the 1890's 1920's 1930's and on up to the 70's and 80's. Ironically, Kurds also were one of the primary agents used by the Turks in the deportations and massacre Armenians before and during world war 1.
Those Kurds.
Who were also abused by Saddam. All part of a long chain of ethnic cleansing, genocide and nationalist violence caused in a large part by religion and creed as well as tribal identity throughout the balkans and the ottoman empire and what became the palestinian mandate.
Which Hitchens thought we should wade into because science and atheism will put right through warfare that which religion and warfare could not put right.
Hitchens got so much so wrong so many times, but he sounded soooo good doing it.
>> ^bcglorf:
>> ^spoco2:
>> ^kceaton1:
Goodbye Chris. Some of his most profound moments for me came when he actually screwed up and was wrong! It would often lead to other talks and dialogs between the people he had erred against and himself and in some occasions Christopher would merely present them and allow the other person to put the matter straight. He could be friends with these people and often was.
It showed me that he had within himself the ability to be very humble and that to him the truth WAS paramount! For that and much more I will remember him always.
He had it within himself to be the best of us all.

His about face on waterboarding after being waterboarded was the point that I started paying attention to him.

His about face on Saddam era Iraq stood out more in my mind. After being a champion of the anti-war movement in the first Gulf war he went and spent time with the Iraqi Kurds. He came back vehement in his conviction that America's worst crime in Iraq was in essence listening to him in the first place and not pushing into Baghdad and removing Saddam the first time.



Or more simply, Saddam was so horrific and brutal a monster that Iraqis and the region as a whole are better off for his removal.

Yes yes. Kurds, hmmmmmm let me think

oh yes they were abused by turks throughout history but most notably during the the 1890's 1920's 1930's and on up to the 70's and 80's. Ironically, Kurds also were one of the primary agents used by the Turks in the deportations and massacre Armenians before and during world war 1.

Those Kurds.

Who were also abused by Saddam. All part of a long chain of ethnic cleansing, genocide and nationalist violence caused in a large part by religion and creed as well as tribal identity throughout the balkans and the ottoman empire and what became the palestinian mandate.

Which Hitchens thought we should wade into because science and atheism will put right through warfare that which religion and warfare could not put right.

Hitchens got so much so wrong so many times, but he sounded soooo good doing it.

>> ^bcglorf:

>> ^spoco2:
>> ^kceaton1:
Goodbye Chris. Some of his most profound moments for me came when he actually screwed up and was wrong! It would often lead to other talks and dialogs between the people he had erred against and himself and in some occasions Christopher would merely present them and allow the other person to put the matter straight. He could be friends with these people and often was.
It showed me that he had within himself the ability to be very humble and that to him the truth WAS paramount! For that and much more I will remember him always.
He had it within himself to be the best of us all.

His about face on waterboarding after being waterboarded was the point that I started paying attention to him.

His about face on Saddam era Iraq stood out more in my mind. After being a champion of the anti-war movement in the first Gulf war he went and spent time with the Iraqi Kurds. He came back vehement in his conviction that America's worst crime in Iraq was in essence listening to him in the first place and not pushing into Baghdad and removing Saddam the first time.

i was surprised to see how long the ottoman empire hung around.

^^...an atom maybe orbiting an implied nucleus?? ☪ Long live the Ottoman Empire-
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The settlers are using ottoman-empire-timed documents to claim ownership of the land the house is built on, it seems. I'm not entirely certain how those documents are valid in court yet.

The way the Ottoman Empire was split was one of the worst mistakes in human history.

>> ^rougy:
>> ^Raaagh:
I think the increased severity due to increasing commonality of hatred directed at the USA, and the fact that the people who are planning and carrying out the attacks are hardened warriors with dehumanising religious motivations.

What do you think is causing that hatred?


this is an interesting question. i asked a good friend of mine who studies islam and the middle east and has spent alot of time in the region..
"what do they want?"
his answer was about how at one time there was the persian empire, the ottoman empire, the arab world was rich in trade, philosophy, intellect, cultural and a serious world power. now, they live in caves and squalor. his answer was they just dont want to be poor anymore. most of them are illiterate, desperate and highly religious. so.. they cant actually read the qaran, but someone who can comes to the village and tells them what it says. or what his interpretation would be. and basically tells an entire village of otherwise ignorant people that they once were kings and now they live in squalor and they live in squalor because of oppression and the perversion of the western world. the exports of western culture to the middle east are brittany spears and lindsay lohan which is highly offensive in its own right, but especially offensive if youre highly religious and live in poverty. you cant blame anyone for seeing that and thinking we are all pigs. you add what they see of our culture and what they see from our leaders. they see we side with israel and most of us are completely ignorant to the details of the conflict, they see we side with india, another conflict we are ignorant of... they also have an excellent propaganda machine and we give them plenty to hate. but basically they just dont want to be poor anymore, blame the us, and are told the qaran demands jihad and that jihad will restore their people to glory.

also, another aspect that makes these ideas spread like wild fire through islamic cultures is that islam has no religous hierarchy. there is no one authority that says "this is what we think about this" or "no, blowing ourselves up wont solve anything"

>> ^wjolson:
yeah i dont think this should make it. if you are showing this as a social commentary rather than entertainment then well.... but even still, to even recognize what these kids did by exploiting peoples sicknesses and misfortunes while displaying an obvious disdain for an entire social class seems frighteningly like something nazis would do to jews for laughs.
the lack of compassion which is required to treat humans as animals is the same lack of compassion that allows ethnic cleansing and genocide to occur. seriously; the nazis, the Rawandan government in 1994, and the ottoman empire used propaganda designed to strip the jews, tutsis and armenians of their humanity, in order to be able to systematically murder them in the millions with the complacency of the rest of the populations.
so at the very least, no upvote from me. in my opinion, i think you should remove this or atleast explain your reason for posting this to avoid fellow sifters thinking less of you.


Terrible!?

yeah i dont think this should make it. if you are showing this as a social commentary rather than entertainment then well.... but even still, to even recognize what these kids did by exploiting peoples sicknesses and misfortunes while displaying an obvious disdain for an entire social class seems frighteningly like something nazis would do to jews for laughs.

the lack of compassion which is required to treat humans as animals is the same lack of compassion that allows ethnic cleansing and genocide to occur. seriously; the nazis, the Rawandan government in 1994, and the ottoman empire used propaganda designed to strip the jews, tutsis and armenians of their humanity, in order to be able to systematically murder them in the millions with the complacency of the rest of the populations.

so at the very least, no upvote from me. in my opinion, i think you should remove this or atleast explain your reason for posting this to avoid fellow sifters thinking less of you.

Seems he just misspoke there, he's correct on the rest.

Also don't make Turks angry, remember the Ottoman Empire? Yeah.

@snoozedoctor & arsenault (if you really care to learn why sending missionaries to Iraq stirs up so much trouble)

While I think you have made a somewhat valid point... I ask you not to forget that our great and wonderful nation of 'free-peoples' was only gained via the slaughter and removal of an indigenous population. The rationale for this removal often was that it was completely legit due to the fact that Native Americans were 'heathens' and 'pagans' and therefore not children of God blessed with all the divine rights that the good people of America were inherently imbued with... and don't forget our 'Manifest Destiny, which was essentially God's will that America stretch from coast to coast and become the leading power in this hemisphere. Historically, American armies may not have been have entered battle under the banner of a crucifix, but the justifications for their deployment have often been laced with the rhetoric of spreading 'Christian values' and thereby civilizing the heathen peoples of the world... so, even though this country is not technically a 'theocracy', which is a nation governed by a religious body who forcibly imposes one faith upon all of its citizens (which the Ottoman empire was NOT, by the way- political and ruling powers lay in the hands of the Sultan and his heirs, the Caliphate only established to give their dynasty legitimacy, and by and large the Empire was comprised of peoples of MANY faiths- it was no more a theocracy than was the Holy Roman Empire, or any of the Medieval European States, in fact, in a lot of ways, it was probably much less of one. That corsairs or an envoy operating under its aegis chose to justify their actions by using the Koran is no different than the thousands of other actions carried out by European kings, and conquistadors who chose the Bible as their umbrella), the justifications for the actions of the American military have in the past often been aligned with 'Christian' motivations or agendas (once again, see the conquest and 'taming' of North America)... and given the discourse in American politics today, I think it is hard to deny that there is a great portion of this population that would very much like to see it formally defined as a 'Christian Nation', with Bibles in the classroom and Commandments at the Court House, so the perception abroad that Iraq is a 'Christian War' is not unsurprising, its like to spring up anytime a predominantly Christian country sets foot in the Middle East.

But back to history and the motivations of international shenanigans of the more recent past.... Its not only America that is guilty of working in tandem with the motivations of religious institutions and their rhetoric... throughout the Golden Age of Imperialism foreign missionaries more often than not preceded the armies of Western nations throughout Africa, Asia and the Pacific, establishing churches and converting portions of the population. Attacks on these outposts of Western thought and culture would often then be used as an excuse for a Western nation to move in and establish a military presence before moving on to full blown colonization (see the French takeover of Indochina/Vietnam if you don't believe me).

In regards to this situation then that pattern is important to keep in mind, because I think it helps explain some of the anger that is being raised by missionary activities in the region. Given the prevailing attitude against Western influence in Iraq and other Middle Eastern countries (due mostly to the experience of having been subjugated by Western Imperialist powers in the past), it should not be so surprising that these FOREIGN AMERICAN missionaries would be viewed by Iraqis as a threat to the sovereign identity they are trying to create for themselves. It is not that the Iraqis who might strike out at these people are doing so entirely because they are averse to Christianity, after all, there has been a long standing population of Chaldean Christians within Iraq that has gotten by just fine for centuries- it maybe hasn't been on top and they were pretty fairly discriminated against under Saddam but they certainly have never been outrightly persecuted for not being Muslim. Even today, despite all the turmoil in the country, those who have remained are pretty much just hanging in there and riding things out while the various Muslim factions around them blow one another up.

So, a large component of the problem is that many Iraqis ultimately feel that they are being 'invaded' by Imperialist Western influence, on many fronts, militarily, politically, and via these missionaries, religiously. So, therefore, this conflict of interest goes beyond simply just religion and it is important, I think, that Christians (missionaries and otherwise) realize this, the situation is not just Christian vs. Muslim- Iraqi Muslims are not just angry or striking out because the people of Jesus have dared tread on their sand to convert their neighbors. There are many many other factors involved in this that explain why they would not want missionaries from America to be active within their country... especially at a sensitive moment in history such as this.