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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]In reply to the poster who said Zionism as expressed originally is an ideology that says 1) Jews are a nation; 2) Jews cannot integrate, whether for their own reasons or widespread anti-semitism, into other societies; 3) therefore a homeland is necessary; and 4) all Jews should emigrate to that homeland.  Certainly, assimilation helps Jews avoid antisemitism for a while, but eventually not so much.  And Zionism does not require moving to the homeland.  Zionism does require supporting the existence of that homeland so it'll be there when push comes to shove, as it inevitably does.
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Fair point on emmigration.  I just don't see anything unique about Judaism or anti-Semitism that makes integration impossible and discrimination inevitable.  But, I'm an American and that's a very American mentality.

The Babylonians, Romans, Persians and Russians exiled lots of different people throughout history.  Genocide has also sadly happened on more than one occassion.  Heck, it wasn't even new for the Germans who did it to the Herero first. [/quote]

For whatever reason, Jews keep getting persecuted everywhere they go.  We even created a few words for it: Holocaust, pogrom, and antisemitism.  We can speculate on why it keeps happening, but Jews have a long history of it.  The desire to have their own [b]land where Jews are in control [/b]is not a surprise.[/quote]

Do you understand the problem with applying this mindset to a land where another people currently happens to live?

What are you planning to do with the natives to put and keep Jews in control?

What HAVE you done with the natives?

Israel has successfully promulgated a series of myths to explain why there are now Jews where there used to be Arabs.  Including:

- they attacked us so we had to expel them

- they fled at their leaders' request to come back after the Arab victory but we won so they never came back

- little brave Israel fought and won the unwashed hateful Arab hordes so here we are.

All of this mythmaking was necessary to cover the ugly truth.  Israel's downfall is that it was formed in the time where it was no longer acceptable to voice it.  Here is the truth: a Jewish state must have a Jewish majority and a Jewish rule.  We had to create both in a place that didn't have it originally.  It doesn't matter how we created it. What matters is that it had to be created, and it was. The end.

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Anyone living on US soil is guilty of the same.  The land belonged to the Native Americans, and we pushed them into reservations.  Along the way we broke all sorts of promises and committed all sorts of atrocities like the Trail of Tears and slaughtering most of the buffalo.  Essentially, we are just as guilty as the Israelis.  Probably even more so.

I don't like what the Israelis are doing to the Palestinians, but can you imagine what would happen if the Native Americans were responsible for 9/11, the Oklahoma City bombing, and a bunch of other attacks on US soil?  Damn right, we would lock them down hard on the reservations.  We would control everything going in and out and try to neutralize them as much as possible.

But the Native Americans would be just as justified as the Palestinians in continuing their violence.  We took their lands and really destroyed their way of life.  Would you be condoning continued Native American attacks on US soil?  What if a number of close friends or relatives died to a series of Native American attacks.  Would you grant them control of the US government?  That's the pressure Israel is essentially facing.

I'm not saying Israel is innocent, but we are hypocrites.[/quote]

What a pile of horseshit. Every descendent of the native population alive today and living within America's current borders has full citizenship rights like everyone else in the 336M population of America (along with some services and perks that non-native populations DON"T have access to). Moreover, the U.S. government could gift 75 acres tomorrow to EACH and EVERY descendent of the native groups tomorrow, from the current inventory of federal land, and still leave the BLM with around 200,000,000 acres. And that would be separate from the massive reservation properties that have been established, and the distinct, favorable tax rules, etc.

We can't resurrect the millions of natives who died before their time, the vast, vast majority of whom actually died of inadvertent transference of disease. They weren't indiscriminately cut down my F35 aircraft and other assorted armaments provided by Uncle Sam. And yet we still made efforts to atone for our sins. Maybe insufficient efforts, but something.

So cut the shit. The sins of slavery and the treatment of native populations here in the U.S. are awful enough, but none of that history has been deemed acceptable for at least the past 150 years. Trying to equate Israel's actions today to sins committed in the past is frankly disgusting, and a prime example of why Zionists are reviled so often by others. It's not Jesus killer nonsense. It's not paranoia. It's not scapegoating or jealousy or any of the fantasies you've concocted to explain why others have despised you at points throughout history.

It's the transparent narcissism and indefatigable defense of your own actions that callously harm others. That's why there's resentment. That's what angers people. And that's why we need to see serious reform in Israel. And it's coming, one way or another. Otherwise, this train is chugging down a path that is highly unlikely to result in an outcome that keeps those in the region, including and perhaps especially the Jewish population, safe and secure.[/quote]

Just to mention, it's less than 150 years. For one thing, the last massacre of Native Americans was 134 years ago. The forced removal to boarding schools went on much longer, along with continued efforts to eliminate reservations (e.g. the allotment system used with many Ojibwa tribes). Citizenship was only granted 100 years ago. It's only 70 years since dam building in ND completely wiped out a strong ag and ranching economy on one of the state's reservations (there is a fairly famous photo of George Gilette, the tribal chairman, weeping during the signing of the dam agreement). Growing up in a region of the country with many reservations (which include the poorest reservations in the US) as a child I heard people express attitudes towards Native Americans exactly how Israeli settlers speak of Palestinians (although they refuse to call them Palestinians, they are all Arab savages as far as some of those settlers are concerned). Some of the attitudes still linger, although most people with them keep their mouths shut (and have more targets these days given immigration and refugees).

As for Israel;

I am one of those people who are very conflicted about all this. I have a close Palestinian friend whose family was forced out of Palestine in 1948. I have a close friend who is Orthodox Jew--also left wing and despises Netanyahu but very very worried about anti-Semitism--and as a college professor is also face to face with the conflicts on campuses. (He hopes for a Jewish leader the likes of Rabbi Froman although he does not think such a think is likely or perhaps even possible).

NYT write put it as a battle of right vs right. And that is true.

Roma may be the only people as an ethnic group) who have been as universally persecuted for centuries as Jews. Many people have been oppressed and persecuted, but more often within specific geographical areas. I don't consider diaspora historically have been only because of oppression, especially before the Romans, and I have a very weak grasp on the long history of the region (including Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, etc) especially before the Ottomans. I know that waves of political and economic assimilation (as opposed to religious and ethnic assimilation) have been followed by waves of terror. Not just Germany by any means (going back to the early 1000s with England, for example). And when not terror, things like England and the US when it came to Jews trying to flee Nazism before and during WWII. I know that Palestinians and Jews share deep ancestry and many Palestinian Muslims and Christians are descended from Jews who converted. I do not believe in the story of Moses writ large or that God gave them Israel. I do think that history does compel a need for Jews to have a country.

I also think there is a component of colonialism in Zionism, particularly religious Zionism, and not limited to apartheid. Arendt and Einstein called it out (and even referred to it as a form of fascism). If we pay attention to the historical oppression of Jews, we also have to pay attention to the Zionists from the late 1800s and early 1900s who explicitly called for Palestinians to be forced out of the Israel to be. We have to acknowledge the settlers whose attitudes parallel the absolute worst of white attitudes to native Americans (no longer as explicit as "the only Indian is a dead Indian" but often still very, very negative). And we have to require Israeli leadership to not just take our money and weapons but to abide by standards of justice. There's a viewpoint in Israel that thinks any notions we should expect standards in how they use those means is ludicrous. That is not acceptable. I want to see American Jews (who constitute nearly half the world's Jewish population) to demand those standards.

As for Israel:

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I believe that the world owes Jews a place to live in peace.  I believe in Israel.  But I think that Israel has pushed the limits of this global obligation beyond reason.

Continued settlement and partitioning of WB cannot be seen as anything other than antagonistic to peace.  There is no other interpretation.  Settlements are their equivalent of the human shield.[/quote]

Why would the US or any country beside Germany owe Jews anything? We do not.[/quote]

NYT write put it as a battle of right vs right. And that is true.

Roma may be the only people as an ethnic group) who have been as universally persecuted for centuries as Jews. Many people have been oppressed and persecuted, but more often within specific geographical areas. I don't consider diaspora historically have been only because of oppression, especially before the Romans, and I have a very weak grasp on the long history of the region (including Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, etc) especially before the Ottomans. I know that waves of political and economic assimilation (as opposed to religious and ethnic assimilation) have been followed by waves of terror since Roman times. Not just Germany by any means and certainly not just in the last century (during which, US actions as well as Britain, refused sanctuary to Jews fleeing Nazism). I know that Palestinians and Jews share deep ancestry and many Palestinian Muslims and Christians are descended from Jews who converted. I do not believe in the story of Moses writ large or that God gave them Israel. I do think that history does compel a need for Jews to have a country.

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