crumbbum

Every factual statement I have said I can produce sources for. I am afraid that you have been misinformed about some things. Your post seemed sincere, and not as angry as previous ones, so I will respond civilly. You seem to believe what you are saying, but you may have learned some of these things wrong. I will go through.


1) The dwellers of those camps are mainly villagers and agricultural workers whos land was taken away from them. On many occasions, they themselves have refused to be moved to more permanent locations. This is because they refuse to give up their right of return and do not look favourably on what would look like a permanent relocation to a host country. Go to a Palestinian refugee camp and ask someone there what they think. They'll explain their attachment to their land. As for the monies you claim to have been poured into the camps. Please know that Israel has not committed one cent to UNRWA despite the fact they took over all the moveable and immoveable possessions of the refugees (lands, houses, furniture, livestock, bank accounts etc). You mention the EU but you don't seem to realize that the EU is a relatively young group that hasn't existed during the bulk of this conflict. I believe you over estimate their contribution. Also, with respect to the UN, much of the UNRWA's budget is contributed to by Arab countries.

It must be noted that 67% of the Palestinians left the area before the 1948 war, without ever seeing an Israeli soldier. This was for different reasons- most fled at the urging of Arab leaders, who told them that they could return to their homes after the Jews had been "pushed into the sea". There was also pressure on them to leave, as it was implied that those who didn't leave would be "personas non grata". In addition, rumors were spread, especially by the Mufti of Jerusalem and his gangs(more on him later), that in the villages where battles had taken place, that the Jews had raped arab women, etc, which terrified them and led them to fled. This had never happened, but the rumours were spread by those who wanted the Palestinian arabs to flee. I don't doubt that if I were to ask Palestinians today, that they would tell me how attached they are to their land. The rest were expelled in the course of the war, from villages that served as forward bases for the Arab armies, centers of the Fedayeen, or when the residents were hostile to the Jews, and the village was in a militarily crucial area.
The UN definiton of a Palestinian is any Arab who lived in the area of Palestine and owned some property, for 2 years or more. That is all. If you look at the population and immigration numbers, it becomes clear that the vast majority of Palestinians were only fairly recent immigrants to the land- they had come seeking employment. Before Jewish immigration picked up (there was always a Jewish presence in the land, albeit a small minority, except in Jerusalem), there were approximately 250,000 arabs in the entire area of Palestine. The region was very underpopulated, and the land was barren. There were isolated Arab villages, as well as Bedouins. Primarily though, the land was nearly empty, and almost entire barren and undeveloped. Arabs from surrounding countries came seeking employment as the Jews came. The Jewish immigrants drained the swamps, established infrastructure and created many employment opportunities. The benefits Jewish immigration brought to the area were appreciated by many of the Arabs, and many were openly friendly and appreciative of Jewish settlement, seeing the benefits it brought to all. There has been a great mythology built up, but in reality, only a small minority of the Palestinians today have a legitimate case for reimbursement from Israel. The Palestinians who willingly fled their homes are owed nothing by Israel, it wasn't Israel's fault they fled. They were invited to stay, and become Israeli citizens. 20% of Israelis today are Arab, and they are the descendants of those who stayed. Among the remaining 33%, those who in fact had a family history in the land and were not recent immigrants or migrant workers do deserve reimbursement, or possibly Israeli citizenship, if they were not hostile to the State of Israel. But the vast majority of Palestinians do not come under this category.

"2) The Palestinians have been seeking an independant, autonomous, entity since the early 20th Century. To become more knowledgeable, look at all the Palestinian conferences held since the 1920's concerning the subject."

Palestinian nationalism developed as a reaction to, and out of fears of Jewish immigration. In the 800 years that Palestine was under Arab control (the Ottomans), it was never more than a barren, underpopulated backwater territory. There was never any state, or aspiration to statehood, by it's inhabitants during this time period, at any point.


"3) The Palestinians had continuously called for a united democratic bi-national Palestinian Jewish state in Palestine. This position was continuously rejected by the Israeli state which defines itself in exclusivist racial terms as a Jewish state. It remained until the conference in Algiers when the Palestinians, at the request of Arab countries and the international powers, adopted the 2 state concept for the Palestinian Israeli conflict. The idea of a unified democratic bi-national state is far superior and far more humane than the notion of a religiously based political entity."

Israel, as a Jewish state, was founded as such because of the horrific treatment of Jews throughout history whenever they lived under the power of any other people. As you know, 20% of Israelis are arab- the state is obviously not racially exclusivist. It retains, however, its Jewish character as a homeland for the Jewish people. A unified, bi-national state would destroy Israel, because the Arab birthrates are higher, and because it would result in the same situation Jews were always in under Arab rule- dhimmihood, or 2nd class citizenship. Granted, the experience of the Jewish people in Muslim countries was better than the genocide they experienced in Christian lands, but it was still terrible- there were frequent pogroms, and the tide between coexistence and hatred changed suddenly. Many Jews were killed by Arab mobs. Arab rulership, for the Jews, was in no way Benign, it was simply a lesser evil than that of the Europeans.


"4) To my knowledge, we don’t have a Lebanese language, a Syrian language, an Egyptian language, a Moroccan language, or a Sudanese language. People are not necessarily defined by their language. The Palestinians are the decendants of the Canaanites, Hebrews, Philistine, and Arab residents of Palestine and they assumed their distinct Arab character after the 7th century. The Palestinians have some idiosyncratic cultural traits and other traits that they share with people from the region. Alas, a large portion of the Jewish Israelis have no cultural traits that they share with the region. They are alien and they brought their Russian, Ukranian, Polish, German, and other traits with them to a land that they have no affinity, no history, to. Unlike the Palestinian Jew, who shares everything with the Palestinian people. As for Arafat, you show great ignorance. He is from the Husayni family of Jerusalem, a family that traces its roots through Jerusalem for many centuries. "

First, the Palestinians are NOT descended from the Canaanites. That is a myth. The canaanites were not Arab.
"The Palestinians are the decendants of the Canaanites, Hebrews, Philistine, and Arab residents of Palestine and they assumed their distinct Arab character after the 7th century. The Palestinians have some idiosyncratic cultural traits and other traits that they share with people from the region."- exactly. They are arabs from the surrounding areas in the region, and are culturally indistinguishable as such.

To say the Jews have no history or affinity to the land of Israel is an extremely ignorant statement. The only sovereign political entities that ever existed in the land, until recent times, were Jewish kingdoms. Religious Jews have prayed, for thousands of years, facing Jerusalem, 3 times a day, and the return to Zion is begged for in Jewish prayers. The Jewish people and the Land of Israel are inseparable in any way- the Jews have been in exile for nearly 2000 years, but Israel is their home, and it has always been regarded as such. This needs no further clarification.
Also, Arafat IS Egyptian- his uncle was Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, who was allied with the Nazis, and was responsible for numerous terror attacks and pogroms against the Jewish settlers. It was him, largly, who destroyed the coexistence that the Arabs and Jews had lived in before his coming to power. Arafat was born in Egypt, but came to Jerusalem as a boy to live with his uncle.

"5) The Palestinians do not want to be absorbed. They want Israel to recognize their right of return. I don’t know what your background is, but wherever your country is, then that’s where you belong and the Palestinians belong in Palestine. Israel did not absorb refugees; they took Jews from inside and outside the Arab world and told them to immigrate to Palestine. They tells Jews that they must not continue to live in countries outside Palestine because humanity will never come to accept them despite the fact that Jews have lived and survived within Arab societies throughout history."

First, Jews have lived and survived through the most persecution any people has ever faced in history. This has nothing to do with the benevolence of their hosts. The refugees from Arab countries were expelled from those countries after the war. There were pogroms and angry mobs, who vented their frustrations about the Arab loss against them. I talked before about the experience of Jews living in Arab countries. The "right of return", which as I said before only a tiny minority of Palestinian could legitimately claim, is now claimed by millions of Palestinians. Their "return" would destroy the State of Israel, and is unrealistic. It is inhuman that they have been left in camps for 55 years- no other refugees in history have been left in camps like that. There has always been a population transfer when territory changed hands in a war.


"6) That proves my point. They were because they were part and parcel of Palestinian society. Jews in Palestine, prior to the rise of Zionism (1897), were an integral part of the Palestinian society and the land continued to be named Palestine until 1948 when a major portion of it was forcibly transformed into an exclusivist Jewish state"

The land was named Palestine, after the name the Romans gave it, Palaestina. This name was given after the Philistines, the ancient enemies of the Israelites, as an insult to the Jews who had been driven from their homeland.


"7) The 20% Arabs in Israel are remnants of Arabs of Palestinian society. They are a small portion. Today, the Palestinians count over 7 million people. 1 million in Israel, 3 million in the occupied territories and 3 million waiting to return to Palestine. If some Palestinians in the occupied territories depend on employment in Israel for their income, it is because they have been deprived of their businesses and lands. Israel is hardly giving back."

The Palestinians have had 55 years to build their own economy and society. It has never happened, due to corrupt leadership. There is no reason camps still exist- more humane living conditions should surely have been established by now, there has certainly been enough money donated for it. The only reason Palestinians depend on Israel for employment is because they do not have their own economy. Palestinian identity and society has been shaped around the idea of their having been robbed, and one day taking it back. This has led them to stagnate instead of building where they are. It has been 55 years, and if Palestinians, and their leaders who have so cruelly misled them for political ends, were working towards life, and not destruction, and had been working to build, and to live, instead of wallowing in victimhood, there would be no humanitarian crisis now, and no economic dependence. The Palestinians could be living in thriving, vibrant and succesful communities, under autonomy. The Palestinians are the best educated of all arabs, and certainly are capable of creating an open, progressive and succesful society. This, sadly, will never happen until they accept the truth that they have been misled, and move on and choose life.

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Truth is peace. We are all souls in bodies.