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This makes no sense. Nobody told Israel they had to be in the desert, their barbaric and outdated religion told them to go there. Britain gave them the opportun

This makes no sense. Nobody told Israel they had to be in the desert, their barbaric and outdated religion told them to go there. Britain gave them the opportunity to establish Israel anywhere they wanted and it had to be "the holy land".

golergka 2y ago
> Nobody told Israel they had to be in the desert, their barbaric and outdated religion told them to go there. First of all, most of the new jewish settlements in the beginning of 20th centuries were in the coastal swamps, not in the desert. Second — how about a cultural and practical connection to a region which had a significant Jewish community continuously for the last few thousand years with close ties to the diaspora. And finally — most of Israeli Jews come from the Middle East. Why would they go into a completely different region instead of their homeland? > Britain gave them the opportunity to establish Israel anywhere they wanted This is false. Britan gave false promises and then actively worked against attempts to establish the country. They turn the blind eye to massacres of the jews, and actually turned back jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. Founders of Israel had to go to literal war with British authorities to achieve their gains.
- aguaviva 2y ago
  Why would they go into a completely different region instead of their homeland? Because they weren't invited by the folks living in the place they wished to settle (who in fact had been living there continuously, by and large, and in every metric were much more "native"). More specifically: the new migrants were more or less welcomed by the locals, from the Mamluk period onwards -- but once they started arriving in highly disproportionate numbers, post-1880, and signaling an intention not to assimilate, and pretending that they had a supremacist "right" to settle there based on what the region's temporary colonial occupier (the British) and the scribblings of some weird Austro-Hungarian ideologue told them -- that's when things started to get "complicated", and they began to find themselves not so welcome in their desired place of residence. As any group should naturally expect if they tried to settle somewhere where they could not trace reasonably close ancestry, and in very large numbers. Also "homeland" is nonsense of course as applies to post-1880 migrants. We need to have some kind of a reasonable definition for what constitutes an "ancestral right" to live somewhere. The simple fact the component of ancestry that this group does have with historic Palestine lies with groups that were expelled or otherwise left in successive waves, ending the Crusades (but for most of them, back to the Roman/Byzantine eras), and which mixed significantly with other groups (far removed from the region in their origins) along the way. I'm not saying this completely precludes any claim of "ancestral right"; it's a thorny question -- one which applies to countless groups all over the world, each equally deserving of consideration. We need to be human and forgiving and all, and in principle there should be a safe place for all of us in this world. But not a supremacist right. And it is precisely this claim of a supremacist right to settle in their desired place of residence (fully trouncing the rights of people who in fact been living their continuously for millenia -- give or take migrations within successive empires); along with the successive wavs of violence employed to enforce this "claim" -- which lay the grounds for the post-1917 conflict that we are now stuck with.
  - golergka 2y ago
    First of all — really enjoy this argument. > they weren't invited by the folks living in the place they wished to settle This is false for several reasons. Places that jewish settlers have chosen have mostly been uninhabited and the land bought by willing absentee landlords. There's plenty of arabic towns across Judea and Samaria, and in general farther from the coast. Can you find a single one on the coast from Jaffo to Haifa? May be you think that there's no way that plentiful rainfall on flat plains would cause malaria swamps to appear? And that all documentation about said malaria swamps, and numerous deaths from malaria is false, too? > the new migrants were more or less welcomed by the locals, from the Mamluk period onwards That's false. Native Jewish population across the whole Middle East have always been a second-class citizen persecuted minority in the Muslim Arab countries, as all other conquered people — if they had the fortune to survive and save their identity at all. Jews have been slaughtered and persecuted across the whole of Arab world, just as in Palestine, for centuries. So were other ethnical and religious groups. Can you find a single one which was not? Why, do you think, in modern Israel it's exactly the mizrahim, jews from Muslim Arab countries, are one of the mast hawkish, anti-Arab groups in Israel? If you take a look at the peace activists who wave Palestinian flags in Tel Aviv, they're almost universally ashkenazi. It's because their families remember. Now, it's important to notice that I'm not making a value judgement here. The fact that mizrahim have a grudge to hold doesn't mean that it's necessarily right; all I'm saying that they do have a huge grudge. Also, please don't think that my description of Arab Muslim world shows prejudice. Almost all other nations have always worked the same way. Arab Muslims, especially at the time, were not dissimilar from Chinese or English. Humans become more tolerant and humane as their level of living increases, but for most of history, humans across the whole world were equally horrible to one another. > once they started arriving in highly disproportionate numbers, post-1880, and signaling an intention not to assimilate I'm confused here. Is it supposed to be something bad? Are you implying that conserving a national and religious identity is something that immigrants should not be doing? > pretending that they had a supremacist "right" to settle there based on what the region's temporary colonial occupier (the British) No, I'm pretty sure the only reason they had the right to settle is because they followed the legal procedures to move to another country, buy property or land and develop it. Religion has nothing to do with it. Religion was why the _wanted_ do it. You see, _right_ to do something and _desire_ to do something are different things. First, you get a _desire_. Then, you go about fulfilling it. If you break laws or human morality, then you don't have a right to it. Otherwise, you have. Nobody of local Arab population was forcefully expelled in late 1880 onwards. How do you even imagine this could have happened? Do you think that a small group of a persecuted ethnic minority can actually conquer some part of a small village, kill and expel a few local families, all in the middle of a hostile ethno-religious majority, and just... Survive? You make a point elsewhere that immigrants which are viewed as "others" are rarely tolerated. Do you think that immigrants who behave like that are more tolerated? Or, may be, you think that in 1880, around the time of Dreifus case in France an similar persecution across Europe, somehow landed with superior European arms and battleships, guns blazing? There were no armed Jews there until Jews started to get killed. What happened in 1880 onwards is, Jews started buying land from absentee Ottoman landlords, and, more importantly, local Arab leaders. Big part of local population was convicted not to register their property rights as to avoid Ottoman taxation by said Arab leaders — who then cheated their people and sold that land. Some people reply that there's no way that these Arab leaders were corrupt like that. But personally, I fail to see why these people think that said Arab leaders would be less corrupt than modern politicians. > the scribblings of some weird Austro-Hungarian ideologue told them All other points in your comment at least have arguments behind then. Good, bad, but it's a legitimate discussion. However, this right here is use of diminishing language and a personal attack without any justification. Why "scribblings"? Why "weird"? Why the accent on citizenship? Would his figure be more acceptable if he didn't have a huge beard? If he did speeches instead of publications? If he was an Ottoman citizen? Why? > that's when things started to get "complicated", and they began to find themselves not so welcome in their desired place of residence No. As I already said, almost any other ethnical and religious groups have found themselves just as "not so welcome" in Muslim Arab world. The only reason Jews got special attention is because they were actually successful in their resistance to this world. Let's recall what was happening in latter half of 19th and first half of 20th century. Muslims were fighting with Hindus in India/Pakistan. Muslim Turks were fighting with Greek Christians. Muslims were fighting with Christians in Lebanon. Christians were fighting against Muslim persecution in Serbia. Arabs were fighting with Ottomans in Egypt. Turk Muslims have been slaughtering Christian Armenians. Turks, Arabs, Alawites and Armenians were fighting in Syria. Assyrian Muslims were fighting with Kurds. Ottoman Muslims were fighting against Kurds. Druze Muslims were fighting against Ottoman Turks. There's probably even more conflicts that I don't know about. Just to be clear, all of these conflicts are abhorrent. I think that there were horrible atrocities on all sides. But do you honestly think that in this horrible world, where different people have constantly been massacring one another Jews were "welcomed" by Arab Muslims living around? > As any group should naturally expect if they tried to settle somewhere where they could not trace reasonably close ancestry, and in very large numbers. That's a fair description of reality. However, this argument is not about "what is", but also about "what ought to be" (yes, I like Hume). Are you implying that this, resistance to outsiders, is a good thing? Something that we should see in a bright light? > Also "homeland" is nonsense of course as applies to post-1880 migrants. We need to have some kind of a reasonable definition for what constitutes an "ancestral right" to live somewhere. The simple fact the component of ancestry that this group does have with historic Palestine lies with groups that were expelled or otherwise left in successive waves, ending the Crusades (but for most of them, back to the Roman/Byzantine eras), and which mixed significantly with other groups (far removed from the region in their origins) along the way. I'm afraid that once again, this paragraph confuses "desire" with "right". Why Jews wanted to settle there doesn't matter. I have good arguments on this point as well, but this can't make Jews right or wrong. The only thing that matters if they had the right to do this or not. There's nothing in this, or following text that touches on the matter, so it's irrelevant.
- the_gorilla 2y ago
  Amazing how quickly history was rewritten. Israel didn't have to go to "literal war" with Britain, because if they would have, they'd have lost immediately. They just went to war against their new neighbors and handily genocided them. Israel started as a terrorist state and remains one to this day.
  - golergka 2y ago
    > They just went to war against their new neighbors Arabs have been massacring Jews living in the region for hundreds of years. Arabs started widespread pogroms in 20s and 30s. Arabs have rejected partition plans. Arab states invaded Israel after it declared independence. Saying that Israel "went to war against their new neighbours" is a statement I have very hard time responding to without breaking the rules of Hacker News. I feel sorry for amount of misinformation someone must have been fed to sincerely believe something like this.
marcosdumay 2y ago
Ok, can we just accept that yes, they were told to go there? Because they were clearly offered the exact place, in no ambiguous terms, and got a clear message to go somewhere else, not very different from the one they are sending people right now. The situation is completely fucked-up from the beginning. They are to blame for doubling down on fucking it up more, but not for creating it.

golergka 2y ago

> Nobody told Israel they had to be in the desert, their barbaric and outdated religion told them to go there. First of all, most of the new jewish settlements in the beginning of 20th centuries were in the coastal swamps, not in the desert. Second — how about a cultural and practical connection to a region which had a significant Jewish community continuously for the last few thousand years with close ties to the diaspora. And finally — most of Israeli Jews come from the Middle East. Why would they go into a completely different region instead of their homeland? > Britain gave them the opportunity to establish Israel anywhere they wanted This is false. Britan gave false promises and then actively worked against attempts to establish the country. They turn the blind eye to massacres of the jews, and actually turned back jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. Founders of Israel had to go to literal war with British authorities to achieve their gains.

aguaviva 2y ago
Why would they go into a completely different region instead of their homeland? Because they weren't invited by the folks living in the place they wished to settle (who in fact had been living there continuously, by and large, and in every metric were much more "native"). More specifically: the new migrants were more or less welcomed by the locals, from the Mamluk period onwards -- but once they started arriving in highly disproportionate numbers, post-1880, and signaling an intention not to assimilate, and pretending that they had a supremacist "right" to settle there based on what the region's temporary colonial occupier (the British) and the scribblings of some weird Austro-Hungarian ideologue told them -- that's when things started to get "complicated", and they began to find themselves not so welcome in their desired place of residence. As any group should naturally expect if they tried to settle somewhere where they could not trace reasonably close ancestry, and in very large numbers. Also "homeland" is nonsense of course as applies to post-1880 migrants. We need to have some kind of a reasonable definition for what constitutes an "ancestral right" to live somewhere. The simple fact the component of ancestry that this group does have with historic Palestine lies with groups that were expelled or otherwise left in successive waves, ending the Crusades (but for most of them, back to the Roman/Byzantine eras), and which mixed significantly with other groups (far removed from the region in their origins) along the way. I'm not saying this completely precludes any claim of "ancestral right"; it's a thorny question -- one which applies to countless groups all over the world, each equally deserving of consideration. We need to be human and forgiving and all, and in principle there should be a safe place for all of us in this world. But not a supremacist right. And it is precisely this claim of a supremacist right to settle in their desired place of residence (fully trouncing the rights of people who in fact been living their continuously for millenia -- give or take migrations within successive empires); along with the successive wavs of violence employed to enforce this "claim" -- which lay the grounds for the post-1917 conflict that we are now stuck with.
- golergka 2y ago
  First of all — really enjoy this argument. > they weren't invited by the folks living in the place they wished to settle This is false for several reasons. Places that jewish settlers have chosen have mostly been uninhabited and the land bought by willing absentee landlords. There's plenty of arabic towns across Judea and Samaria, and in general farther from the coast. Can you find a single one on the coast from Jaffo to Haifa? May be you think that there's no way that plentiful rainfall on flat plains would cause malaria swamps to appear? And that all documentation about said malaria swamps, and numerous deaths from malaria is false, too? > the new migrants were more or less welcomed by the locals, from the Mamluk period onwards That's false. Native Jewish population across the whole Middle East have always been a second-class citizen persecuted minority in the Muslim Arab countries, as all other conquered people — if they had the fortune to survive and save their identity at all. Jews have been slaughtered and persecuted across the whole of Arab world, just as in Palestine, for centuries. So were other ethnical and religious groups. Can you find a single one which was not? Why, do you think, in modern Israel it's exactly the mizrahim, jews from Muslim Arab countries, are one of the mast hawkish, anti-Arab groups in Israel? If you take a look at the peace activists who wave Palestinian flags in Tel Aviv, they're almost universally ashkenazi. It's because their families remember. Now, it's important to notice that I'm not making a value judgement here. The fact that mizrahim have a grudge to hold doesn't mean that it's necessarily right; all I'm saying that they do have a huge grudge. Also, please don't think that my description of Arab Muslim world shows prejudice. Almost all other nations have always worked the same way. Arab Muslims, especially at the time, were not dissimilar from Chinese or English. Humans become more tolerant and humane as their level of living increases, but for most of history, humans across the whole world were equally horrible to one another. > once they started arriving in highly disproportionate numbers, post-1880, and signaling an intention not to assimilate I'm confused here. Is it supposed to be something bad? Are you implying that conserving a national and religious identity is something that immigrants should not be doing? > pretending that they had a supremacist "right" to settle there based on what the region's temporary colonial occupier (the British) No, I'm pretty sure the only reason they had the right to settle is because they followed the legal procedures to move to another country, buy property or land and develop it. Religion has nothing to do with it. Religion was why the _wanted_ do it. You see, _right_ to do something and _desire_ to do something are different things. First, you get a _desire_. Then, you go about fulfilling it. If you break laws or human morality, then you don't have a right to it. Otherwise, you have. Nobody of local Arab population was forcefully expelled in late 1880 onwards. How do you even imagine this could have happened? Do you think that a small group of a persecuted ethnic minority can actually conquer some part of a small village, kill and expel a few local families, all in the middle of a hostile ethno-religious majority, and just... Survive? You make a point elsewhere that immigrants which are viewed as "others" are rarely tolerated. Do you think that immigrants who behave like that are more tolerated? Or, may be, you think that in 1880, around the time of Dreifus case in France an similar persecution across Europe, somehow landed with superior European arms and battleships, guns blazing? There were no armed Jews there until Jews started to get killed. What happened in 1880 onwards is, Jews started buying land from absentee Ottoman landlords, and, more importantly, local Arab leaders. Big part of local population was convicted not to register their property rights as to avoid Ottoman taxation by said Arab leaders — who then cheated their people and sold that land. Some people reply that there's no way that these Arab leaders were corrupt like that. But personally, I fail to see why these people think that said Arab leaders would be less corrupt than modern politicians. > the scribblings of some weird Austro-Hungarian ideologue told them All other points in your comment at least have arguments behind then. Good, bad, but it's a legitimate discussion. However, this right here is use of diminishing language and a personal attack without any justification. Why "scribblings"? Why "weird"? Why the accent on citizenship? Would his figure be more acceptable if he didn't have a huge beard? If he did speeches instead of publications? If he was an Ottoman citizen? Why? > that's when things started to get "complicated", and they began to find themselves not so welcome in their desired place of residence No. As I already said, almost any other ethnical and religious groups have found themselves just as "not so welcome" in Muslim Arab world. The only reason Jews got special attention is because they were actually successful in their resistance to this world. Let's recall what was happening in latter half of 19th and first half of 20th century. Muslims were fighting with Hindus in India/Pakistan. Muslim Turks were fighting with Greek Christians. Muslims were fighting with Christians in Lebanon. Christians were fighting against Muslim persecution in Serbia. Arabs were fighting with Ottomans in Egypt. Turk Muslims have been slaughtering Christian Armenians. Turks, Arabs, Alawites and Armenians were fighting in Syria. Assyrian Muslims were fighting with Kurds. Ottoman Muslims were fighting against Kurds. Druze Muslims were fighting against Ottoman Turks. There's probably even more conflicts that I don't know about. Just to be clear, all of these conflicts are abhorrent. I think that there were horrible atrocities on all sides. But do you honestly think that in this horrible world, where different people have constantly been massacring one another Jews were "welcomed" by Arab Muslims living around? > As any group should naturally expect if they tried to settle somewhere where they could not trace reasonably close ancestry, and in very large numbers. That's a fair description of reality. However, this argument is not about "what is", but also about "what ought to be" (yes, I like Hume). Are you implying that this, resistance to outsiders, is a good thing? Something that we should see in a bright light? > Also "homeland" is nonsense of course as applies to post-1880 migrants. We need to have some kind of a reasonable definition for what constitutes an "ancestral right" to live somewhere. The simple fact the component of ancestry that this group does have with historic Palestine lies with groups that were expelled or otherwise left in successive waves, ending the Crusades (but for most of them, back to the Roman/Byzantine eras), and which mixed significantly with other groups (far removed from the region in their origins) along the way. I'm afraid that once again, this paragraph confuses "desire" with "right". Why Jews wanted to settle there doesn't matter. I have good arguments on this point as well, but this can't make Jews right or wrong. The only thing that matters if they had the right to do this or not. There's nothing in this, or following text that touches on the matter, so it's irrelevant.
the_gorilla 2y ago
Amazing how quickly history was rewritten. Israel didn't have to go to "literal war" with Britain, because if they would have, they'd have lost immediately. They just went to war against their new neighbors and handily genocided them. Israel started as a terrorist state and remains one to this day.
- golergka 2y ago
  > They just went to war against their new neighbors Arabs have been massacring Jews living in the region for hundreds of years. Arabs started widespread pogroms in 20s and 30s. Arabs have rejected partition plans. Arab states invaded Israel after it declared independence. Saying that Israel "went to war against their new neighbours" is a statement I have very hard time responding to without breaking the rules of Hacker News. I feel sorry for amount of misinformation someone must have been fed to sincerely believe something like this.

marcosdumay 2y ago

Ok, can we just accept that yes, they were told to go there? Because they were clearly offered the exact place, in no ambiguous terms, and got a clear message to go somewhere else, not very different from the one they are sending people right now. The situation is completely fucked-up from the beginning. They are to blame for doubling down on fucking it up more, but not for creating it.