One sentence in the speech, President Obama delivered today at the United Nations General Assembly jumps off the page.
If an agreement is not reached, Palestinians will never know the pride and dignity that comes with their own state. Israelis will never know the certainty and security that comes with sovereign and stable neighbors who are committed to co-existence. The hard realities of demography will take hold.
On the surface, that prediction seems like a warning to both sides. But it isn't.
All is he telling Palestinians is that, with no agreement, the stateless status quo will continue. That is bad, but it's not catastrophic. After all, Palestinians have lived with the occupation for 43 years and, year by year, their numbers are growing and international support is skyrocketing. As bad as the status quo is, they can weather it.
For Israel, however, Obama warns that without a peace deal, it will never know security and that soon enough "the hard realities of demography will take hold."
The Palestinian, with the two-state solution dead, would petition the United Nations for "one man, one vote" rights in Israel. The United Nations, established on that concept, would endorse the Palestinian position. The United States would not use its veto (in opposition to one man, one vote!) and Israel would be in the position Apartheid South Africa was in -- on the road to replacement by a multinational state.
In the end, the Palestinians who would hold an overwhelming majority in Israel plus the occupied areas and, would transform the whole area into some kind of single state, Palestine/Israel. Jewish statehood would disappear because Israelis chose West Bank settlements over preserving the Jewish state within internationally-recognized borders.
Again, for Palestinians, Obama's idea of a possible future is bad but not "the end." For Jews, who recall what the price of statelessness is, Obama's warning is terrifying.
But he is absolutely right. Those are the choices.
My father-in-law who was a Holocaust survivor hated the occupation and West Bank settlements. He used to say that if Polish Jews like him had even a tiny Jewish state to flee to in 1939, it would have been "like heaven." All the Jews needed was a piece of Palestine, with borders controlled by Jews, which could have let them in.
He died in 1990, never understanding why any Jew would choose an unsustainable Greater Israel over the permanent security of an Israel within the pre-'67 borders, at peace with its neighbors. But then, he was of another time, another place. Growing up in eastern Poland, he could never be the Jewish ultra-nationalist whose worldview was created by the terrors of the New York, Boston, Chicago or L.A. suburbs.
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Why choose peace, security and international favour when you can steal ,rob and vilify in the name of your 'god'
Easy for you to say, sitting at your PC banging away on your keyboard. Ask a Palestinian child, a mother, the elderly if they can continue to wait longer, see what they say.
But they CAN REFUSE to cooperate. It isn't much, but it is all the leverage they have.
As a two-stater and a Zionist, I find it amazing that anyone who calls himself pro-Israel would allow the unraveling of a Jewish state it took 1900 years to bring back.
Israel's national rights of sovereignty takes precedence over Palestinian demands.
In what jurisdiction (other than Israel) does Israeli rights take precedence over that of the Palestinians?
At any rate, it is ISRAELI POLICY -- not the actions of the Palestinians (they don't have that kind of power, except in the fevered imaginings of the Israeli right) that will bring about a single state.
The fact that such a state would have a Palestinian demographic majority would do NOTHING to violate Israel's sovereignty.
Just as the fact that in the US European Americans are about to become a demographic minority.
That doesn't affect US sovereignty.
If Israel wishes to avoid this outcome, the solution is simple -- begin evacuation and dismantling of ALL the settlements.
Or if Israel wishes to have a two state solution, and keep some of the settlements (all of which are illegal) then throw open the doors on the borders --- 50/50 sounds a LOT fairer to me than 78/22.
(The latter of which the Palestinians are willing to take now -- If I were advising Israel, I'd tell them to take the deal while it is still on the table.)
And I wouldn't count on the US --- these words came from the President, after all.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_White_Paper
"'The objective of His Majesty's Government is the establishment within 10 years of an independent Palestine State in such treaty relations with the United Kingdom as will provide satisfactorily for the commercial and strategic requirements of both countries in the future. [..] The independent State should be one in which Arabs and Jews share government in such a way as to ensure that the essential interests of each community are safeguarded.' (content of the British White Paper)
"The Arab Higher Committee argued that the independence of a future Palestine Government would prove to be illusory, as the Jews could prevent its functioning by withholding participation, and in any case real authority would still be in the hands of British officials. The limitations on Jewish immigration were also held to be insufficient, as there was no guarantee immigration would not resume after five years. In place of the policy enunciated in the White Paper, the Arab Higher Committee called for 'a complete and final prohibition' of Jewish immigration and a repudiation of the Jewish national home policy altogether. [citation needed] Hajj Amin al-Husayni "astonished" the other members of the Arab Higher Committee by turning down the White Paper. Al-Husayni, according to Benny Morris, turned the advantageous proposel down for the entirely selfish reason that "it did not place him at the helm of the future Palestinian state."
The Palestinians were already offered a one state with protected rights for Jews and they rejected it. There's no indication their minds have changed.
The objective of the British government (back before 1940) was to give Jews a large chunk of land they had already promised the Arabs to earned that land during WWI.
The White Paper was worthless in 1939, and worth even less after the BRITISH ripped it up after WWII.
The status of current state begins in 1967, before Israel started the war and stole the land it holds now. Israel has to stop with the going back to Moses propaganda they oh so like to spew.
That's not what the White Paper said, and if you actually read the history, you'll see the British were opposed to partition and the only reason they turned the issue over to the UN is because they expected the UN to oppose partition as well. The British were more than willing to give all the land to the Arabs as long as the rights of the Jews were respected, but even that pittance was too much to ask.
" The status of current state begins in 1967, before Israel started the war and stole the land it holds now. Israel has to stop with the going back to Moses propaganda they oh so like to spew."
I know you'd like history to begin then, so you can pretend the Palestinians are defenseless innocents who never hurt a fly, but unfortunately there are key facts from that time that must be considered today. Tough luck.
I know I have said this many times before, but you do not seem to understand how things work in a colonial imperialist system. (and the British were masters of this).
In such a system the native population is NEVER ASKED FOR THEIR ACCEPTANCE OR REJECTION OF POLICY. THEY ARE TOLD WHAT WILL HAPPEN, AND WILL BE EXPECTED TO BE GRATEFUL FOR IT!!!
I have asked over and over, by what means did the Palestinians accept or reject ANYTHING?
They had no government -- or even a quasi-governmental organization like the Jewish Agency.
There was never any plebiscite held -- anywhere at anytime.
The Palestinians had no MEANS of accepting or rejecting ANYTHING -- and they WERE NEVER ASKED THEIR OPINION.
Trust me on this, I am of Irish descent, and it was no different for my ancestors than it was for the Palestinians.
They weren't ASKED, they were TOLD, and expected to be GRATEFUL for it.
Arrogance is part of the system.
From the safety and comfort of his suburban home, Rosenberg is telling the Palestinians to remain intransigent, put up with their misery for just a little while longer, and the hated Israelis will cave in. This scam has been played out for years, where the refugees of the Arab's wars against the Jews have been "temporarily" confined to squalid refugee camps for 6 decades and told that paradise (and the destruction of Israel) is just around the corner. I think that Obama is telling the Palestinians to give it up, take what you can get from the Israelis (I know; colonialism, occupation, apartheid, blah blah blah) and get on with your lives. Don't listen to the Rosenbergs of the world, this is your best chance to get a state, don't blow it.
This is what "the one-staters" (which would apparently include the Israeli Defense Ministeer, because he WARNED OF THIS OUTCOME months ago) are talking about.
Israel claims to be a democracy. All citizens get to vote.
Israel has a vigorous settler movement which seems to want ALL (or most) of the West Bank land to continue building their illegal settlements.
This movement, though a minority, controls the current government, and the rest of the country seems unable or unwilling to stand up to them.
The settler movement has as their stated goal to establish so many "facts on the ground" that having enough land for a SEPARATE Palestinian state would be impossible.
I heard one former Israeli MK state that things were close to this point NOW.
But Israel cannot have its cake and eat it too.
If it takes the LAND, it MUST take the Palestinians who also happen to live there.
Now the Palestinian population is growing at at much faster rate than the Israeli Jewish population.
You ought to know what numbers mean in a democracy -- those who have the most votes wins. And if the settlers get their way and a single state is all that is possible, then the Palestinians will simply win at the voting booth.
See the problem?
The only other option is to deny the Palestinians citizenship. That would create an apartheid system de jure and not just de facto.
And even the US would not be able to support such a system.
The Palestinians, once they get their little state will run it like the 22 other Arab countries; as a corrupt dictatorship. And like the 22 other Arab countries, they will blame their shortcomings on Israel and the US.
Easy for you to say, sitting at your PC banging away on your keyboard. Ask a Palestinian child, a mother, the elderly if they can continue to wait longer, see what they say.
They have waiting for over sixty years. I do not think they will need to wait much longer. Israel lives on its exports. The boycott will gain speed. If the Israelis do not settle for peace, war will break out again. Israel will not be able to sweep its atrocities under the rug as they did in the 50's and as they did in 1967.
The world will be watching.
Well done.
Some of the same people who now submit that time is on the Palestinian-Arabs side also say that the Arabs are the starving, plagued, waterless, downtrodden people. This can not be correct both ways around.
Israel has virtually been begging the Arabs to have their new state since 1948. Shimon Perez is quoted as having personally urged the Grand Mufti to accept the two states solution in 1948. But there is one caveat. This must not be a launching pad for attacks against Israel. Which is why the Gaza withdrawal and its aftermath was so critical. It was a 'solo flight' for the Palestinian-Arabs and a chance for them to show that unilateral withdrawal by Israel (in the absence of a peace agreement) would not end badly. Israel is not doing that anymore. I agree.
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E.g., he didn't issue an ultimatum, he delivered a prediction. Next, he has delivered quite a bit by most standards, and when people say he hasn't it is usually based on an unreasonable yardstick, and never one used to measure predecessors (after all, what did GWB deliver by way of mideast peace? Bubkes.)
Like the lady on TV said the other evening, I'm tired of defending the President. I voted for him and supported him early on in the primary and I was just about the only one I knew who gave him a 1% chance (at that time) of winning the primary let alone the general election. In fact, funnily, all my Black friends were for Hillary . . ! Can you imagine, a white Hebrew (me) trying to convince black people to vote for Obama? As a you-tube, it would get a million hits.
What has Mr. Obama delivered? Especially what outside the USA? Please enlighten.
The health care plan is slowly kicking in and so it is neither delivered or proven to be beneficial.
The Federal Reserve basically conned the president into the tarp spending--as a counter-measure to deflation.
I'm sure he has accomplish a few things, I just can't think of any. Plus, I think you misunderstood my "ultimatum" reference by not giving any weight to the last part ("even if he meant it"). Maybe I should have said: " . . even if he meant that"
Cheers.
At what point, since Israeli statehood, have the Israelis had any reason to believe there would be "permanent security of an Israel within the pre-'67 borders"?
She's NOT going to be able to control all the land she wants with a hostile majority, without a "final solution" for the Arabs. The world would react to that, and NOT in Israel's favor.
Israel should have been happy with the gift she was given in '48.
An apology is in order to the readers of my comments. With the cutting and pasting I screwed up a little bit.
The first paragraph of part 2 is a repetition of the last paragraph of part 1.
It should be replaced by the next paragraph: (anyone still there ?)
The Geneva Initiative also has a plan how to divide Jerusalem again in a Israeli and Palestinian part. The Palestinian part can then become the capital of Palestine.
Furthermore the G.I. have developed a plan for the creation of a Multinational Force to guard the borders of the Palestinian state (including the Jordan border, so there is no need for the IDF there).
If a an agreement with the PA succeeds the road is also open for Fatah to reconcile with Hamas, provided Hamas gives up their armed struggle against Israel. The complete ending of the blockade and the opening of a corridor between the West bank and Gaza, could bring an economic revival for Gaza and greatly improve the living conditions for the people there.
If you don't agree, then explain EXACTLY how a greater number of Palestinians will somehow "force" Israel to grant them citizenship. Legally, there is no difference between occupying 10 million people and 100 million people.
That's not quite true. As the numbers increase, and the deaths caused by Israeli military and paramilitary forces increase, it moves from run-of-the-mill crimes against humanity to full-fledged genocide.
And there are three obvious ways that Palestinians can get citizenship in the country where they are living. (1) External pressure a la South Africa, where it becomes intollerable to bear the rightful condemnation of the entire world; (2) Internal pressure from Israeli citizens, where they finally come to terms with their role in oppression and racism to the point where they embrace the concept that all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain, inalienable rights; or, (3) revolution.
(2) Nothing like that on the horizon.
(3) Sounds a bit like what has been going on for the last 60 years, and look how that's turned out for them.
That doesn't make any sense.
Protecting Israeli civilians from terrorism isn't "crimes against humanity" in the minds of anyone except hardcore Palsbarists. Nor would an increase in the number of people change Israel's intentions from protecting their citizens toward wiping the Palestinians out.
If you were talking about any other occupation besides Israel's, would you come to the same conclusion?
There are about 4.3 million Palestinians in the occupied territories and this population is also increasing much faster than the Jewish population of Israel. While there would be no legal difference, occupying a territory with 43 million hostile people would require a much larger army. Israel already ranks third among nations in the percentage of its citizens on active duty in the military. Since Arabs (except for Druze men) are not conscripted and very few volunteer, it is doubtful that at the current growth rate Israel could maintain a large enough army to continue the occupation indefinitely.
There are predictions that with the Orthodox and the settlers having most of the power and most of the budget, many secular Israelis will "vote with their feet" and move to the US, or another agreeable country.
Those predictions didn't just come out of the president's head. He's been reading our intelligence reports.
The CIA has been telling him to back off on protecting Israel.
Also, when the one-state solution is talked about, there is never any mention of how we get from the current situation to the single-state. The path to the two-state solution is clear enough and most of it has been trodden before. Mr. Rosenberg says that a one-state solution would arise when the situation is ‘transformed’, as though it would just occur by itself. Yet, imagine a scene in which several million Israelis are told one day that they will no longer be able to fly the Star of David over Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. There’d only be one response, and you’d know what it was because It would probably arrive on the end of a laser-guided missile.
One person, one vote. Equal rights regardless of race, religion or sex.
Done and done.
Similarly, have you read the Likud Charter? I have, it isn't quite a colorful, but it also does not really indicate that such an accomodation would go down well at all.
Done and done? Not bloody likely. The bloody part being operative in this case, and not merely an intensifier.
The second reason is the rising influence and popularity of Iran in the Middle East, which is largely based on its uncompromising defence of the Palestinian right to have an independent state. Because Israel considers Iran its ultimate foe, one way to undercut Iran’s influence would be to come to an agreement with the PA about an independent Palestinian state, and in that way get the Arab states to join into an coalition to counter Iran’s influence. By the way the fact that Israel considers Iran a mortal enemy (distance 1.700 km’s) makes all the talk about the indefensible ’67 borders rather obsolete. Of course to fully succeed with this policy of peaceful coexistence, Israel will have to enter negotiations with Syria about a peace treaty in return for giving back the Golan.
Lets hope that Netanyahu is also able to change from a Saul into a Paul.