The UN general assembly has voted overwhelmingly to back the Palestinian bid for full UN membership, in a move that signalled Israel’s growing isolation on the world stage amid global alarm over the war in Gaza and the extent of the humanitarian crisis in the strip. The move drew an immediate rebuke from Israel. Its envoy to the UN, Gilad Erdan, delivered a fiery denunciation of the resolution and its backers before the vote, and fed pages of the UN charter into a shredder. The Palestinian envoy, Riyad Mansour, highlighted that the vote was being held at a time when Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city that is the last haven for many people, faced attack from Israeli forces
While I support Palestine, I do not think the solution is to violently overthrow Israel and return Palestine to its historical borders.
In those 75 years, many Israeli people were born on this land, and it really is their home. Palestine returning those lands threatens their safety and rights, especially after all that Israel the state had done to the people of Palestine. It would be foolish to assume Hamas will be civil and respectful to the people of Israel in return.
Most citizens of Israel have not brought it upon themselves.
Palestine, though, should retain every bit of its territory before the latest war, and Israel should pay huge reparations to Gaza and open free passage for any goods, services and people to and from Gaza.
Palestinians only have one method of resistance left, and that’s violence. Telling them to not use it because Israelis might get hurt is, and I’m sorry to say this, frankly ridiculous. If Israelis don’t want to get hurt maybe they should give Palestinians the state they’ve been asking for for forty years. I understand your concern, but the onus to prevent this outcome is squarely on Israel; as colonized people Palestinians have the right to use all means necessary to obtain their freedom.
That said, you’re most likely worrying over nothing. Hamas doesn’t have the capability to overthrow Israel; their operations mostly serve to lose Israel face on the international stage. The only scenario in which Israel falls is if America completely leaves it out to the wolves and the middle east tears it apart, which is extremely unlikely.
Okay I understand the reflex to explain how governments don’t represent their people, but look at this and you might wanna reconsider. Netanyahu didn’t come out of nowhere; he came in when the only man in Israeli history who had the potential to actually end the conflict was assassinated (after Netanyahu and his ilk went in parades calling for his assassination) and since then it’s all been genocidal maniacs (save for one guy in 2008 who still didn’t have the guts to actually do something worthwhile), mostly Netanyahu himself. Now I don’t believe in “push the Zionists into the sea” rhetoric, and the only time it was realistic was in 49’ anyway, but the conduct of the Israeli public these past few months in particular and in the past 30 years in general has been nothing short of fucking disgusting. If Israel does fall and they’re persecuted by the new regime, anyone who wasn’t explicitly pushing for peace (and children and the like of course) is getting nothing but Schafenfreude from me.
All of this is excluding foreign-born citizens of Israel; anyone who willingly went to that place and isn’t explicitly calling for peace is a piece of shit.
I see your point (might not necessarily agree), thanks!
Wait so this concept is only valid for Israelis?
Nope, relates to everyone, Palestinians included.
So you’re saying that Israel has no right to exist?
-Israeli government when they hear that, probably
Lol yea, but do you see the contradiction between
and a state being established through the ethnic cleansing of Palestine? Israel spends a lot of money on PR to whitewash that.
I recognize this fact, just as I recognize the US being built on the genocide of native Americans, or China going through genocides to expand westward, or Russia being built on conquering entire damn Siberia (with quite some bloodshed), or, idk, Roman Empire being built on enslaving just about everyone everywhere.
But those new people are not the ones who did that; Israel is now dominated by people who were just born there, holding no direct relation to the events back then. I have no sorrow for those of them who cry for the continued genocide in Palestine; but we’ve seen many voices from within Israel calling for de-escalation of the conflict, for ceasefire, for peace. And they do not deserve to suffer the same fate as it falls on the shoulders of current Palestinians. Neither do Palestinians, of course.
True, except the difference Israel is still taking occupied land and building settlements, and excluding the people born there from them.
The government at least needs to pick one of the two options to move forward (as well as acknowledging and making reparations for those with traditional connections to the land who were affected by past injustices):
The problem is the current right-wing extremists in power in Israel do not want either solution; they want to have it both ways - when it comes to ownership and control, they want to deny the existence of a Palestinian state. But when it comes to citizenship, they want to claim everyone born on the land they occupy is not Israeli so they can deny them rights and exploit them. Their life is substantially controlled by the Israeli state, but they get no say in the leadership of the state - undermining claims it is a democracy. They don’t have equal protection under the law - Israeli authorities protect settlers taking land against people with generational connections to the land.
None of this is new in history, as you point out. Most of the Roman Empire, most of the former British Commonwealth, etc… had similar things in the past, with massacres of the native people, lands confiscated, native people been treated as having fewer rights than the colonialists, etc…
What is different is that those are all past atrocities (although fair reparations have still not been paid in many cases, at least further atrocities are generally not continuing to anything like the same extent), while Israel continues to commit the same atrocities to this very day.
I agree with you. To me, a two-state solution seems much more plausible, and even if there should be one state, it shouldn’t be Israel or Palestine but something of a new name with equal representation of both sides. Because otherwise Israeli leaders will do everything in their power to erode the power of Palestinians and then there will be a scenario you describe further.