So what else is new?

In all this talk about anguished settlers and Palestinian terrorists/government officials (not that there’s much difference) self-importantly bloated with undeserved pride all scrambling to take responsibility for disengagement, I think we may have forgotten the little people of Gaza, the Achmed Q. Falastins and their 87 extended family members.

But don’t fret. Your typical Gazan Arabs are treating the disengagement like Christmas Eid al-Fitr in August. Just look at precious little 11-year-old Hanadi Abd al-Daim:

Eleven-year-old Hanadi Abd al-Daim danced and laughed in the family living room as she watched IDF soldiers drag settlers out of their homes only a few kilometers away.

For over six hours on Wednesday, Hanadi and her older sister Mediha flipped between the Palestinian TV station, Al-Jazeera Arab satellite network, and Israeli channels 1 and 2 on their television set to follow the live action from the settlements.

“I wanted to see how they are taking out the settlers from their villages,” Hanadi said sitting on a mattress on the floor of the TV room still wearing her orange-striped pajamas. “It makes me very happy.”

Like most Palestinians in Gaza, the elementary school girl from Beit Hanun has been glued to her TV set since the withdrawal began on Monday. And like most Palestinians, the scenes of grief she saw on her screen were a dream come true for her.

Her sister Madiha enjoyed watching a Jewish settler who was crying very hard. “He’s crying because he left his home,” she said. “We are happy we are getting our land back.”

Another scene that stood out for the 12-year-old was the burning of a house after its owner lit it on fire. “I was happy,” she said. “We don’t want his house on our land.”

When I was 11 and sitting in front of the TV in the morning in my jammies, I think the only thing bringing me joy was Saturday morning cartoons. But I’m glad to see that something can bring a happy smile to the face of the poor children of Palestine: abject human grief, especially of the Jewish variety.

But the girls’ aunt, who is 19 and already a mother, has her own observation, which I’m sure has come to her through the accumulated wisdom of many years and motherhood:

Hiba, 19, agreed. “I don’t want them to leave a single brick behind,” said the young mother with dark eyes and a head covering. “We want this land clean so we can sow it and develop it as is our tradition.”

Hiba, by sow and develop according to your tradition, do you mean leaving it a barren, fruitless wasteland, waiting until somebody else comes and reclaims it from the swamp/sand/sea, sowing and developing it and coaxing it into producing yields in defiance of all conventional agricultural wisdom, then claiming that it was your cherished holy soil all along? That is what you mean, right Hiba?

Oh, but look, here I am spoiling this joyous holiday for Palestine with my typical Jewish cynicism. Just call me ibn-Scrooge.

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  • The expulsion is not over yet, there is still much more work to be done.

  • right on michael. i am sick of hearing jews take the palestinians’ side, talking about their “oppression,” as if the palestinians are their best friends in the whole fucking world. a friend of mine suggested that once the wall is firmly in place around gaza, we should just nuke that shit back to the stone age. when i read about little kids (and their little-kid parents) indoctrinated to hate jews, i am inclined to agree with him (though, to be fair, a neutron bomb would be much cleaner)…

  • i’m 100% anti-disengagement. this all breaks my heart. having said that…

    can you blame palestinians rejoicing in us being uprooted if that is what has been happening to them for about 60 years or so? whether forcably removed, or coerced militarily or with terror, palestinians have had to leave their homes in the past.

    i’m not saying the land is theirs. let’s face it; it’s ours.

    but, were i in their position, i’d have one thing going through my mind:

    How do you like it? Here’s a tatse of your own medicine. How’s that for a bit of Karma? First we lost out homes, and now you are losing yours. How does it feel!?

    they’re an oppressed, empoverished, desperate-ass people. so what is they laugh at our defeat? they’ll never get their state. this is one small step for Sharon and the White House… one giant leap for Zionist-kind.

    look at how difficult it was to remove 8500 people? i guess we’ll *never* be able to do that again…right? i guess we’re just going to have to spend more money on the West Bank, now. terrorism and chaos in GAZA!? oh my… we better re-occupy.

    what’s this? the Hezbollah-controlled Lebanon and Syria are declaring war on us!? Egypt is lending them economic aid!? Alright, boys, let’s re-occupy Gaza. and while we’re at it, let’s rebirth Katif.

    it all comes around… this is one misleading detour in Zion coming to full-circle.

    sure, it sucks now… and they feel like they’ve won, like they’ve made gains. but, in the end, it’ll end up being our land one way or another. the White House won’t reign over Israeli policy forever.

  • chazarmaveth, that’s not cool. they’re taught to hate, and this warrants their death? they won’t hate forever. imagine a “palestine” that we control ENTIRELY, right down to the education and media. terrorist indoctrination will fail, and the hate pushed on them won’t last forever.

  • Well said Michael.
    However, chazar, I’m pretty sure Michael was merely being cynical. The kind of vitriolic speech you used makes us sound no better than them. I’m not a foolish pacifist; I’m a realist and don’t believe the Arabs will ever love us. But as long as you talk of nuking them, how could you be infuriated that their kids are indoctrinated to hate us? If we are to hope for a change in Palestinian attitude towards peaceful – if realistically not loving- coexistence, you must stop fueling the fires of hatred. Hate breeds hate.

  • Yeah. Nuking is not cool.. I mean I am sure you’re pissed and all but remember these are kids that grew up on their leaders’ lies. If I believed a 10th of the shit that these kids were told by the likes of Arafat et al I’d hate us too and rejoice at our suffering gleefully. All I can think is poor, poor suckers. They really have no cohesive government, no dominant authority and Yasser, Sulha and their cronies stole all the people’s money. The optimist in me looks forward to peace while the realist in me isn’t about to bet the farm on it. Ya allah …

  • um, hello? try having your home, or your friends’ homes, demolished, with no compensation whatsoever. i think over time, you might have your “objective” perspective a little blurred also.

  • “they won’t hate forever,” David? i disagree. this is so much deeper than a 30-year dispute over turf. they have hated us for much longer than that, and if it wasn’t them, it was someone else — and you can count on it being someone else after that.

    obviously i don’t think really think that we should bomb anyone with nuclear weapons. (come on, people! i laughed my ass off when my friend made that recommendation!) i just don’t see why we should feel sorry for, or give much of a shit about the fate of the palestinian people, because i think we should (officially, institutionally) despair of them ever coming around to embracing the type of peaceable statehood that would create a lasting stability.

  • dede: So fucking what? Almost a million Jews were expelled from Muslim countries in the wake of the War of Independence without compensation. Millions of European Jews were robbed of their assets, homes and lives without compensation. Yet if the Tunisian government or the Polish government decided for some reason to transfer their citizens and demolish their homes, I wouldn’t be shooting an AK-47 into the air and holding a celebratory barbecue. I’ve, so to speak, accepted the reality on the ground and moved on. And also don’t have a festering, societally-sponsored hatred of Tunisians or Poles.

    I’m not going to defend a sick society who derives pleasure from suffering. We’ve been harassed and exiled in almost every country we’ve been in, yet most Jews do not take special pleasure in the suffering of non-Jews. Why should I expect less of the Palestinians?

    I’m pro-disengagement, but does that mean I have to agree with Palestinians who view this as a) a victory for terror and b) funny?

    And no, chazarmaveth, while I certainly have my issues with a society essentially built around the worship of Jew-murder, I don’t think we should nuke them. Maybe it’s my Jewish heart.

    Most Palestinians hate us as a people. I’m no great fan of them as a people. And what I want is two separate states so we can just leave each other alone. And hopefully, the Palestinians will give up their goal of “total liberation of Palestinian lands” and come to want the same thing. I don’t want love, I want peace and separation.

  • Michael said:

    Yet if the Tunisian government or the Polish government decided for some reason to transfer their citizens and demolish their homes, I wouldn’t be shooting an AK-47 into the air and holding a celebratory barbecue.

    You might well do so if you thought that it was a result of your efforts that the transfer happened, and if you benefited from the transfer. This analogy seems rather off to muffti, Michael.

  • No need to drag the Poles into this one. Strictly speaking, Michael, there was no Polish government during the referenced period, unless you’re referring to the German-installed occupation regime of Hans Frank (the ‘General Govt. of Poland’), or portions of N-NW Poland incorporated into Germany and governed under marshall law by the SS (the ‘Warthegau’, i.a.).

  • Yes, Arafat’s wife stole the money. But what can we do? —Suha??

    (Yitz apologizes for the pun. Despite his lack of children, apparently the dad-humor genes are starting to kick in.)

  • Here’s what gets to me:

    Earlier, Hamas leaders in the Gaza Strip vowed to retain their weapons until the restoration of Palestinian rights from Israeli hands.
    Israel and the United States have been demanding that the PA dismantle and disarm resistance groups such as Hamas.
    However, the PA has favoured consensus politics, arguing that hounding Hamas and other resistance groups would lead to civil war.

    (from al jazeera)

    So I have a great idea! Let’s pull our Jews out of their homes WITHOUT demanding that the PA enforce stricter means to control Hamas and other resistance groups! It’s a great idea, really, because if we DO demand that they enforce rules, disengagement would never happen. And we all know that it’s more important for Palestinians to run their own land and make it hostile to Jews even though Arabs are able to live in Israel proper than for us to stop being apologetically pathetic in everything.

    what? I don’t know…

  • It’s interesting we “stole there land” 18% of Gaza is actually owned… you know… paid for… with money. So in this instance we are deporting Jews and confiscating their property so we can give it to arabs. Arabs who will use it to set up some more morter factories accept now they wont be illegal, after all it’s their land they can do what they want with it

  • The fatal flaw in all this is assuming it was their (Palestinian) land to begin with. The last time the land was controled by anything close to a “Palestinian” government was the Phillistines. We know what happened there too. “Palestine” (read: Judea, West Bank, Gaza) have been controlled by the Roman Empire, Eastern Roman Empire, Byzantine Empire, Crusaders, Ottomon Empire, British Empire…but never by “Palestinians”. Even in recent times when the British left, Gaza was Egyptian, not Palestinian. This leads me to the question, why are they asking for land they never had?

    I wish this would bring peace, but unfortunately when you appease a society born and bred on hate, nothing brings peace except the sword.

  • There is only one type of phrase I want to hear with

    regard to what just happened in Gaza, Eretz Yisroel:

    Let us pray for the Jews of Ashqelon, Sederot and
    other places of victims of the latest round of tragic events that just occured.

    What may likely happen, G-d forbid, Lo Alaynu, is
    that Jews wont be dragged out of the big buildings of Ashqelon Kicking , crying, screaming and praying….

    They may, Chas Vesholom, be very queit….
    like silent, just carried out one way or another….

    I agree with whom ever said this isn’t over….

  • Whatever hate those Palestinian children expressed, i see equal hate here in the comments. The implication that Palestinians don’t have a right to the land of Gaza because their people lived under successive colonial/imperial regimes and there was no formal Palestinian government is ludicrous. There is sympathy for settlers who were temporary residents but not for people who lived there for generations upon generations? Refugees from 48 still have the keys to their houses, houses in villages whose very existence has been ethnically cleansed off Israeli maps.

  • PS: I am a newcomer to this site and think in general it is great. I am just having trouble with the blanket dehumanization of Arabs going on.

    Call me naive.

  • Yes. This is what they deserve. FÇ“CK ISRAEL.

    Also, the Palestinians should get back the entirety of Israel, and the world should neglect to recognize Israel as a country, until they move out. Then it will become as before. Jerusalem.

    Israel, Kul khara we moot!

  • leila, i completely agree with you. chazarmaveth: you laughed your ass off at the “joke” of nuclear strike? it’s not even CLOSE to funny. it’s not funny at all. it’s stupid humour, somewhere in the lowest possible denominations around toilet-jokes.

    we need to be the better people

    too much hate in these comments. the articles and posts seem objective, critisizing both sides… but these comments are full of hate. people hate on both sides for VALID reasons. they have a reason to hate us, and we have a reason to hate them.

    those able to overcome their hate overcome themselves in the war against our instincts and our personal evils.

    be the better people. we are the better people in so many areas, why can’t we all just prove it in our comments here? why can’t we all just dominate in one more region: let us be the side that does not hate.

    Joel, you completely missed the era of history that places Islam in Israel anyway. the period of the caliphate, in which Israel was conquered by islam.

    it’s not palestinian land, i agree with you Joel, 100%. but… you just can’t leave out the caliph period.

    “I wish this would bring peace, but unfortunately when you appease a society born and bred on hate, nothing brings peace except the sword.” -well said, i agree. people often put two fingers in the air and say “peace” or “shalom.”

    i reverse the hand, first. make a V, then two-fingers of peace. why? Victory… then Shalom. we must reign over ALL the “palestinian” territory FIRST, and then we will make peace. we will be benevolent. we will not drive them out. we will feed them, cloth them, and educate them. over time, they will be Israeli muslims. i don’t have a problem with that, they’ll be a minority, and with more aliyah and more of our pro-creation, we will take the land back with time, patience, and peace tactics. we just gotta chill, take control, and make things right.

    victory; then peace.

    michael: why are u pro-disengagement? just curious…

  • I don’t think they care whether or not the Jews are suffering (and really, it’s not that much suffering). The Palestinians are happy to get land back and possibly have progress. That’s all.

    As Jews, we know what suffering REALLY is, and the disengagement is certainly not remotely comparable.

  • Thank you for pointing out that period of time I missed David. Even still, it wasn’t Palestinian land.

    Liela, I’m stating a historical fact. There has never been a Palestinian state or people. Most Palestinians come from Bedouin tribes and other tribes of the Arab culture. Likewise they weren’t “forced” off their land per se, at least not by the Jews. They were welcome to come back and if you look at the Citizenship Law of 1950 (or is it ’52?) Arabs and non-Jews are allowed to live in Israel so long as they pledge loyalty to the state of Israel (all nations do this). The reason the Arab/Palestinians (for the most part) haven’t done this is it would require them to be under a primarily Jewish government, something they cannot bring themselves to do. It’s arrogance. Notice that they didn’t complain when Jordan and Egypt ran their lands. Whilst they had a problem with British control, it wasn’t with so much hatred as they have now. Why is that? Because none of the governments that controled them were run by Jews. Do all “palestinian” people feel this way? Absolutely not. The community I live in has one of the biggest Arab populations in the United States and suprisingly enough, a good majority of them are pro-Israel (one which owns a chain of fast food joints actually donates money to Israeli causes). Likewise there are Arabs living as Israeli citizens now. So I think it’s unfair to draw the conclusions you did without an adequate overview of the conflict, laws, and history. Is Israel perfect? No, it has made mistakes and I’m sure some Arabs were kicked off their land by over zealous Zionist. Was this a governmental move to kick them off their lands and strip them of their rights? No. The only time we see Israel removing Arabs from their homes is when there has been increased terrorism in that area.
    As for hate, I do not hate them at all. Most Palestinian Arabs do hate Israel because they have been conditioned to hate Jews. Doesn’t mean I hate them back, just that we need to take this into consideration when attempting to look at peace. Some of the best friends I have are Arabs.
    Finally, powerlloyd you bring up a good point. While what they are going through isn’t easy, getting $200,000-$300,000 to relocate isn’t suffering. I remember looking at my uncle’s arm when he was alive and seeing numbers imprinted on his skin, as a reminder of what he endured. We have been through much, much worse.

  • Also, if you want to talk about giving people back their homes and refugees, don’t forget about the 800,000 Sephardic Jews who were kicked out of Arab lands in the 40’s and 50’s, had their assests stolen and many of whom arrived in Israel with just the clothing on their backs. Israel accepted these refugees who were forced off their land. The Arab nations turned back their 500,000 “refugees” (who practically left on their own will) and put them in camps (reason there are Arabs in Gaza and the West Bank is that Jordan and Egypt wouldn’t let them [Palestinians] into their [Egypt and Jordan] countries. Now why do you think that is?

  • Joel, you def. know your stuff. never was a palestine, never will there be a palestine. =)

    i can only hope that when we finally get our act together and fully annex the “palestinian territory,” 1 of 2 things happens:

    1) the arabs pledge to Israel, follow the laws, benefit from our economy and social programming
    2) they leave. they get the f*** out of our nation and one of the 19 arab republics breathing down our necks takes them in

    either way, the land is already ours on paper, it’s just a matter of occupation, reconstruction, and TONNES of money being poured into the decay of Gaza and West Bank.

    that’s why we need the future generation to get political, like myself, and be prepared to say “listen up, people, Israel is unified. Arabs are Israelis. both sides better f***in deal with it.”

    that is why we cannot hate arabs, soon enough, they will be our fellow citizens.

  • Exactly, and honestly what Arab wouldn’t want to live under a free Israeli government? Would they rather go to Iran where they can barely take a piss without some religious official looking down on them…or to a land where they are free to do as they wish? I wish that the people in Gaza and the West Bank would get over their hatred. They have actually been treated amazingly well by the Israeli government during the “occupation”, so well that the UN placed an order against Israel to stop delivering aid to the “occupied territories”. Oh well though, what can you do? Truth isn’t enough for the world. One side blows up civilians and threatens the destruction of an entire nation and are called victims, refugees, and heroes. Another side builds hospitals, schools, gives health care, and fights terrorism against its people when it needs to and it’s called the villian. I don’t know how you guys see it in Israel, but the world is against us (Jews) period. Even America is slowly turning against Israel. No ammount of truth or logic can cure the evil that has caused such perceptions.

  • am I supposed to feel sad for the many many tenths of thousands of Germans who persished during the Allied bombimng campaign?

  • Joel, it seems that you and i see eye to eye here, and i like i said you definitely know your sh*t.

    they’re either going to stay and know freedom, or they can take their pride and f*ck off to some oppressive islamic republic… or maybe they’ll just flood into Eurasia, Western Europe, or America.

    doesn’t matter to me, as long as our nation is whole in my lifetime =D

  • Terrorists fired three shells on Israel Saturday night. Abu Mazen said expulsion is “due to the martyrs” and vowed a “larger Jihad.” Hamas challenged PA authority and tried to attack Kfar Darom. What a surprise!

    Palestinian Authority (PA) chairman Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas) told Arabs in Gaza City that the expulsion was a “small Jihad” [holy war against Israel] and that further expulsions, a “larger Jihad,” would lead to an Arab state with Jerusalem as its capital.

    Was this a good idea? hmmm let me think.

  • Where’s the compassion, people? Do you feel nothing in your heart for non-Jews? There’s a certain point where the sarcasm and the jokes become repulsive, and you’re way past that point. I’m disappointed. I’ve been visiting this blog for quite a while now, and I’m becoming quite disgusted with some of the posts and the comments. Is this behaviour reflective of the Jewish community as a whole? I know the pullout was more about Jewish politics than about movement towards peace, but I somehow – and perhaps I shouldn’t have – expected better from you. Anyway, this will be my last comment here, so go ahead and attack. Goodbye.

  • Safiyyah, you’re missing the bigger picture. It’s not that we don’t have compassion for non-Jews, in fact, they are more than welcome in Israel (at least by non-zealots). What is hard is we are giving our land away to people sworn to destroy us. It would be like the world asking Israel to give land to neo-Nazis so they could form their own nation and subsequently live in peace with Israel. It is simply an impossible dream at this point.

  • you know, no one thinks aboute the intrests of the palastinian goverment, but i can tell you’ as a solider in the idf, that this strategic movment is nesosery. i have seen too mach blood
    it is time that we and this uslese setellment in gaza. it redicules that there are 5 families gured by 100 soliders in each satellment

  • Digital Orange, I agree it is silly to have 100 soldiers protect 5 settler families. This could be solved very very easiliy. Leave the settlers alone! The settlers did not want the army protection. They wanted to defend themselves but the government took away thier weapons and said, “no”.

    Just pull out the troops and let the settlers have thier weapons back.

  • it is ridiculous to allow them uninhibited control of their own people, if they will soon be pushed into the hands of radicalism and HAMAS. Katif was an outpost of our authority, the only authority that’s preventing rampant terrorism or the conception of an oppressive islamic regime in “palestine.”

    never was a palestine, never will be.

    palestinians will make great israeli citizens, benifiting from our social programming an economy. trust it.

  • pezglutton, you really think that’s what the gush katif settlers wanted? to be left alone by the military amidst 1.5 million arabs? that’s 187 arabs to every one jew… think they’d last long facing those odds? it’s not like the settlers had their own fleet of apache helicopters, son.

    and david aaliyah, i don’t know if you were in israel for the last intifada, but making palestinians into israeli citizens and giving them all the benefits (school, healthcare, voting, jobs, etc) is just not going to happen. ever. there isn’t an israeli in existence who would tell you that that’s what they want. you don’t give your childrens’ murderers healthcare, citizenship or any of that other shit that sounds so good on paper. if someone blew your son or daughter up on a public bus (G-d forbid), how forgiving, charitable or “better” do you think you could be?

    like i said, your ideas sound good on paper, but you’ve got to quit kidding yourself — israelis are not going to stand for it. and neither will the “palestinians.”

  • Palestinian terrorists/government officials (not that there’s much difference)

    HOW DARE U COMPARE THE 2 YOU FUCKING MORON.

  • the thing is, chazarmaveth, that it doesn’t require public support. all it requires is a compliant knesset.

    once you promise the people that their land will be complete, have a full military occuptation and ever-presence in the “palestinian” territory, and start educating these hate-mongers… over time the threat is eliminated.

    imagine a complete disarmament of the “palestinian” territory… every suspected home raided, every weapon siezed. industrial production of weapons ceased. smuggling from egypt (among ther places) stopped by walls and secure borders.

    it’s going to be expensive, and it’s going to piss a lot of people off. but in the end, the Promised Land will be complete, as Promised, and they’re going to take citizenship whether they want it or not.

  • my deepest and more sincere of grievances to anyone who fell victim to the intifida you’ve mentiioned, upon them all be peace.

    but there will only be peace with a full annexation of the land and a military siezure of palestinian powers (terrorists) a two state solution with a sealed border and really tall walls. i prefer the former, because i’m not really excited about giving up land to terrorists

  • Chazarmaveth, there are plenty of settlers who want exactly that. When have the odds ever been in our favor. Based on your argument the State of Israel was a bad idea in the first place.

  • Chazarmaveth, there are plenty of settlers who want exactly that. When have the odds ever been in our favor. Based on your argument the State of Israel was a bad idea in the first place.

  • How dare I compare Palestinian terrorists and Palestinian governmental officials? Well, um, I dare because they have similar goals and are both a bunch of assholes.

    At least I can use complete words. I think only Prince is allowed to use “2” and “U.” You fucking moron.

  • In all seriousness guys… We’ve really got to take it upon ourselves to watch our language, and stray from making personal attacks. I’m not going to call anyone out, but it’s something we all need to work on. I’ve tried to share this forum with several individuals now who are imediatly turned off by the language and negativity commonly displayed. It’s important for us to be able to express our views, but there are proper ways to do it.

  • with all due respect, PurimHero (and i very much appreciated your reportage elsewhere about what’s been happening at the Kotel, the mi k’amcha yisrael sentiments, etc. — they are valuable and much appreciated, and i agree that personal attacks are never conducive to intelligent discourse), but if ya can’t take the heat… you know the rest. that’s how people write on this blog, and on many blogs. that’s (fortunately or not) the vernacular of modern web culture. one of the headlines that ck (one of jewlicious’ founders) put up was entitled “asshole.” if you are really concerned, i would take this issue up with the webmasters of this site… good luck with that. i think everyone would agree that respect is the most important component of dialogue, but this is how the comments sections on large blogs usually work; a few intelligent posters, and more than a few idiots. i recommend ignoring what you don’t want to read and focusing on the posters who have intelligent things to debate.

  • p.s. pezglutton — perhaps you are right, i don’t know that many people from gush katif. but i think even the most hardened, anti-Zionist, anti-religious israeli would find that pretty frikkin’ cold — to leave them out there without any military protection besides their own M-16s and uzis. i think the people of gush katif might say that they would want to try that sort of solution, but it would be so unbelievably petrifying, and they just would not last. the palestinians would just obliterate them. that is what’s commonly known as suicide. and i don’t see too many of the yishuvnikim committing suicide over their lost homes and farms.

    would leaving them without military protection be colder than ripping them out of their homes and plopping them in the middle of nowhere without shelter/lodging/jobs? i dunno, maybe not. but obviously the government doesn’t give two shits what the settlers want anymore. perhaps they never did. in any event, you might say that based on the very existence of the disengagement, the State of Israel was a bad idea in the first place. it seems like the “majority” that sanctioned the disengagement must feel this way, no?

  • I can’t believe the arguments I see here!

    Can nobody think clearly and in a logical manner anymore?!

    I am talking to the ‘good guys’ the ones who are defending Israel and the Jewish people.

    This is what you have to argue- exactly as Rabbi Kahane argued.

    Listen carefully to my argument:

    I understand the arabs and I even sympathize with them in a sense. After all they feel that it is their land and the Jews were not there before. They try their best to deny that our Holy Temple stood in Jerusalem and they would rather not be reminded of King David.

    Notwithstanding the truth they feel that we are robbers and therefore are happy when bad happens to us and indeed feel correct in doing bad to us.

    So you see that I am in a sense agreeing with those posting comments against us. Yes I do sympathize.

    You ‘good guys’ are wrong to argue against that point. But its rather that very point that you would use in your arguments IF you would think clearly.

    Its precisely because I understand the arabs national aspirations and their belief that Israel is theirs – that I understand that
    -THEY MUST GO!

    One country cannot have two distinct peoples living in it when both claim it as their own. Clearly that is a recipe for strife and war! There can never be peace like that.

    The fact is that the land is ours given to us by the creator of all the universe. In addition these arabs are latecomers they were wandering nomad who wandered onto our land while many of us were driven away due to our many sins. Now we are back.

    I DON’T want the arabs to feel oppressed or killed and that is precisely why I want them moved out. It is good for them and good for us.

    THEY MUST GO – in the end there is no choice.

  • yitz: You’re right about one thing the Arabs will never love you. But if you think that by loving them will somehow mitigate their hatred, you’re terribly naive. Most arabs hate first, then find a convinent excuse for their hatred. Their feelings are mostly irrational. Arab civilisation stagnated centuries ago, and they’ve failed to adapt to changed realities. They feel disenfranchised because rather that adapt, they’d like to take the whole world back to 16th century. I speak not specifically of palestinians but of Arabs as a whole. Do you suppose that palestinians would cease to hate israel if all their demands were acceeded to? No, they’d simply find another reason to hate y’all. They just may decide they want all Israeli territory as well. Wasn’t that what all the wars were about. It’s necessary to keep a clear perspective. I don’t hate arabs, but they seem to hate everybody, including the anti-zionist british government and bbc. Believe it or not, the muslim council of Britain recently accused the bbc of a pro israel bais. Now i listen to the bbc daily and am convinced that it’s anti Israel. Am sick of the attitude that if somebody hates you, it must be your fault and you must make amends. Has anybody considered the possibility that the “aggreived” party could be mistaken, or stupid. Isn’t it possible that it might even be aggrieved’s fault?
    Am fucking sick of all blame being heaped on Israel. Does it make everybody feel better when they say that Israel is a selfish aggressor? Every country has the right to defend its citizens!! Am rambling coz am too fucking sick of stupidity being excused to craft my opinions clearly. Hopefully y’all get they drift. Sometimes you must fight fire with fire!!

  • Joy, you lashed out at all kinds of inferences that were not even implied in my comment. I actually agree with much of what you said. Note though, your arguments would be more cogent if you didn’t write hot-headedly and jump to spurious conclusions. The Arabs are to blame themselves for most of their problems. And personally, I don’t believe they will ever be appeased. However, you’re the terribly naive one if you believe that spewing hatred won’t incite additional and more passionate aggression (with a resulting increase in violence) directed towards you in return.

  • I think it’s a bit far to say that “all” Arabs hate first (I know some wonderful Arab people who I would even consider brothers). We need to differentiate between “Arab” and “radical muslims”. While it is true a growing population of Arabs are becomming radical muslims, some Arabs are fighting hard against this struggle. Ironically enough (very, very, very ironic) one of the three mosque in my city recently held a “free Israel” ralley in which they said Israel should only have to give up land when the Palestinians are free from radical muslims. They believe in a two state solution but only when the Jews get rid of their radicals and the Arabs get rid of their radicals. Now, to be fair, the other two mosque were rabbidly against what this mosque did, but I merely say this to show that not all Arabs, or even Muslims, are unfair in their approach to the issue.

  • Joel look at my comment 50 above. Learn how to argue clearly. This has nothing to do with anybody being ‘bad.’ One thing though is certain:

    The arabs MUST be removed from Israel.

    Those who are against that and who stifle those who speak the truth are guilty for Jewish deaths and for the expulsion of Jews from their homes- make no mistake about it.

  • Argue clearly? You do realize you are saying this to the person who placed relatively high in the nation on debate in 2002 (National Forensics League, US), correct? 🙂

    Qualifications for debate aside, saying that all Arabs are bad is simply ignorant and would only breed hatred among allies. The Arabs I am friends with, some old enough to have fought for Israel in the 1983 war in Lebanon, would certainly lose their view of Israel if their relatives were kicked out of Israel. Whether you realize it or not, there are Arabs within Israel that are ardently pro-Israel. Why would you kick them out? If an Arab has willingly took a pledge of loyalty to Israel, and has lived up to that pledge, what reason or advocacy is there to kick them out of Israel? That is equivalent to saying all Catholics must be kicked out of Israel because their counter parts over the world are anti-semetic. Your logic, while built out of sympathy, would do nothing to solve the problem but only to alienate and isolate the few Arab individuals that consider themselves Israelis. Israel already disengaged from Lebanon (from external and internal pressure, no doubt) and by doing so has left many Arab people that were under “occupation” begging for their return and now trying to seek citizenship within Israel. Should they be denied citizenship simply because they are an Arab?

    No one, at least I’m not, is advocating that all Palestinians be made citizens. That, even in an ideal situation, would only spell trouble. What I am advocating is that Arabs that are willing to be allies of Israel be taken in as citizens if they wish to be citizens. I see no reason why they should be rejected.

  • I would also like to add that while some Arabs believe they have lived there all this time, they do not believe they have an exclusive right to the land and would rather live under the Israeli government. They are the “Rahabs” of our time, if you will.

  • They are always crying. Always crying.

    Bacon is great, by the way, you should try it sometime.

  • Damn it I suck, it’s David Duke, not David Jeremiah. Either way, I do find it ironic that the biggest anti-semite in America is named after the greatest Jewish king.

    Oh well…the whole joke is lost now that I screwed it up.

  • Joel,
    If an arab were to take an oath of loyalty and agreed that Israel belongs to the Jewish people then they should be able to remain in Israel but without voting rights.

    The fact is that almost all will be unwilling to agree to that.

  • According to the 1950 Citizenship law the Arabs that are citizens have done exactly that (taken an oath).

  • Then those arabs who took that oath in 1950 can stay WITHOUT VOTING RIGHTS.

    Also since I believe that 99% of those living today would not make such an oath now it should be revisited and they should take the oath again.

    Right now there are about 12 out of 120 arb knesset members making decision such as removing Jews from Gush Katif. indeed there are arab ministers. Such a thing cannot be and only Jews should be allowed to vote and make decisions for the Jewish people.

  • Again, the problem with your belief is that it works from a bias against all Arabs. The Arabs that live in Israel haven’t just been there since 1950. A good ammount came in after 1950 because Israel really is a safe haven for liberal Muslims or Arabs with no religious belief…or even Christian Arabs. Why should they not be allowed to vote for people they have sworn to? It makes no sense at all. If anything you are appearing as a racist against Arabs, and that is not the solution to the problem.

  • Joe Schmo, just to remind everyone, believes in a totalitarian Jewish state governed by religious law and where only Jews – that is, those considered Jews by people like him – may vote and participate in governing.

    Joe represents a fringe of the Israeli public, and of the general Jewish public for that matter, and while we should all listen to his comments in order to know where the danger lies and be prepared to crush it, let’s understand that he is simply a vocal member of a tiny minority.

  • Joel: I said most not “all” arabs hate first. I happen to know a few good Arabs and muslims. But you’ll forgive me if my attention is drawn more to the forest than the scattered trees.
    If you believe that saying that most arabs are bad is ignorant, then you’re willfully blind; why, there’s no shortage of proof! Just take an objective look around you.
    If Arabs are loyal to the state, then i see no reason why they shouldn’t enjoy the rights of every citizen.
    Yitz: Am not spewing hatred; am simply telling it like it is. I think it’s silly to tiptoe around the pink elephant that is the truth in the name of political correctness. Muslims are going around inciting hatred and blowing people up and yet civilised society is muffled. Is it wrong to call a spade a spade? Am all for toleration but it must go both ways. If christian or jewish leaders said half the inciteful things imams do, they’d be bigots. But the imams,no; they’re just the voice of “oppressed” muslims everywhere.
    Let’s, atleast, be consistent!

  • Joel what you are saying is the what makes no sense.

    What sense is there in letting a muslim or chrisian or otherwise decide whether or not Israel should remain Jewish?!

    To decide how the law of return works?

    To decide if the national anthem should say ‘the soul of the Jew yearning…’ ?!

    Explain Joel how you’re idea of letting non-Jews vote on the character of a Jewish state makes any sense at all.

    You see on the debating team you can just make arguments to the emotion of people here you have to contend with logic.

  • Joy – I understand your outrage and unfortunately radical muslims are on the rise. To the tune that I believe 15% of polled Muslims in Great Britian believed the terrorist attacks were justified. Very worrisome, however, that is only 15% outside of the Middle East. Unfortunately, how can you tell already anti-semetic governments to get rid of radical Islam because they hate Jews? Notice how France and Germany have been relatively free from terrorist attacks. Why is that? When 30% of your population denies the holocaust and even more are anti-semetic, what do you expect? The US is getting the same way. My point is, how do you fight a global problem when other governments don’t see the problem?
    Joe- What you are asserting is nothing less than racist and feeds into the stereotype people have about Israeli Jews. What is wrong with Arabs, who have pledged to Israel and the Jews cause, voting? I think you forget that these Arabs that are citizens and want to be citizens, love the Jewish people. Some of who I have talked to said they would gladly die in a Jews place because they feel the Jews have done so much for them (some, at least the Christian Arabs I know, believe we are chosen by God thus deserve an elevated place in their world). This is logical, not emotional, and all of my comments have fallen on the side of logic. It is the way I have been trained, and thankfully in this case, it is what supports me the most in my views. 🙂

  • Apparently Joel is in major denial.

    All I had to do is type into google “arab knesset member” to find ample evidence to debunk Joel’s ‘logic.’

    Joel you wrote: “I think you forget that these Arabs that are citizens and want to be citizens, love the Jewish people… This is logical…”

    –I wonder if a person in denial is logical or emotional…

    Where can we go to see the results of Arab voting and of Arabs who must have taken an oath when sworn in more then in the Knesset!

    Here are a few articles – Jews read and fear because you will understand the danger we are under:

    Arab Knesset members go to the Hague to testify against Israel:
    http://www.mererhetoric.com/archives/000476.html

    Sending letters to Egypt’s Mubarak not to negotiate with Israel until terrorists are freed from Israel.
    http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Politics/344.htm

    Arab knesset member called upon the Arab world to “unite against the warmongering Sharon government”
    http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/16290/edition_id/319/format/html/displaystory.html

    Sharon relies on Arab Knesset Member for passage of relocation bill
    http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Politics/5520.htm

    Meet with Arafat:
    http://www.p-p-o.com/Eng/2003/4/EE2-4-2003-2.htm

    …Finally for some uplifting sanity- this is what makes sense:
    http://www.masada2000.org/kahane.html