Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

[Winner]

Even though they are Arabs, the Arabs hate them and only use them to antagonise Israel.

Which is exactly why it should be up to them to take care of them.

As it seems now, the Palestinians want:

• 100% of their 1967 territory
• full Israeli withdrawal
• full sovereignty
• full access to Israel's market
• freedom of travel from/to Israel
• right of return for all "refugees" (~80% of whom were born outside Israel)
• East Jerusalem as their capital
• no Jewish settlers inside their 1967 borders

In exchange for... a promise by an unelected bunch of ex-terrorists made on behalf of people who don't recognize their authority that there will be no attacks against Israel in the future.

Uhm...

... I wonder what they're smoking, because I want some of that - must be very good stuff.

 

[Lone Wolf]

I'm fine with 1967 borders, I don't understand why everyone squabbles so much about Eastern Jerusalem. Personally, I think that both sides are in the wrong for creating such a hulabaloo about it. I don't mind some Jews bwing deported away, provided they are given acceptable compensation back home.

If Israel annexes the whole thingy and grants citizenship rights to everyone there, that'd be OK too, though yeah, now it's as probable as pigs flying. I don't think that Innonimatu's description of the situation is 100% correct, but it's nearer to the truth of the situation then many would like...

The 1947 variant is pretty loony, though. And I have no problems with Hamas rotting in hell.

 

[Gangor]

How about this:

*A single democratic country with full sufferage for Jews and Muslims.
*A constitution which amongst other things bans the county from maintaining a military
*Sovereignty and security to be guaranteed by UN (ie a permanent military presence)
*Independent judiciary appointed by the UN with the ability to strike down laws which contravene the constitution.

 

[Winner]

I'm fine with 1967 borders, I don't understand why everyone squabbles so much about Eastern Jerusalem.

Well, over 40% of East Jerusalem's inhabitants are Jews. Furthermore, it's surrounded by large suburbs which are mostly Jewish. Also, it has been annexed by Israel so it's officially a part of its territory, unlike the rest of the West Bank.

Personally, I think that both sides are in the wrong for creating such a hulabaloo about it. I don't mind some Jews bwing deported away, provided they are given acceptable compensation back home.

There are currently about 500,000 "settlers" in East Jerusalem+West Bank. Evacuating them all would be politically suicidal. Though Israel could give up some smaller settlements, it's highly unlikely it will abandon the major settlements. These will have to be annexed to Israel. Israelis offered compensations, Palies have so far refused to hear about it.

Here's how the mess looks like on map:

Spoiler :

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How about this:

*A single democratic country with full sufferage for Jews and Muslims.

It would only stay democratic until the Muslims would gain majority. Then they'd elect some crackpot government (like Hamás - also democratically elected) and gas the Jews.

*A constitution which amongst other things bans the county from maintaining a military

Which would ensure that Egypt, Jordan, Syria an Lebanon would invade without delay.

*Sovereignty and security to be guaranteed by UN (ie a permanent military presence)

*Independent judiciary appointed by the UN with the ability to strike down laws which contravene the constitution.

No comment.

 

[Lone Wolf]

*A single democratic country with full sufferage for Jews and Muslims.

Sufferage indeed

Oh, and the UN governing a country would make a fine TV comedy.

Well, over 40% of East Jerusalem's inhabitants are Jews.

Of course, it also means that about 60% are still Arabs

Also, it has been annexed by Israel so it's officially a part of its territory, unlike the rest of the West Bank.

If Israel offered citizenship to all Arabs there, then I haven't got much problems with it in that regard. Did it, though?

 

[Winner]

Of course, it also means that about 60% are still Arabs

No, actually. Muslims do have a majority, but only a narrow one - 53%. There are also Christians.

Of course, the number of Jews is steadily growing (which is why the Israelis are building new homes in the suburbs), so the percentage may be different today.

In any case, dividing the city would be crazy - you'd basically have to carve out the eastern half of the city centre and then somehow connect it with the rest of Palestinian territories.

If Israel offered citizenship to all Arabs there, then I haven't got much problems with it in that regard. Did it, though?

Wiki says:

Following the 1967 war, Israel conducted a census in East Jerusalem and granted permanent Israeli residency to those Arab Jerusalemites present at the time of the census. Those not present lost the right to reside in Jerusalem. Jerusalem Palestinians were permitted to apply for Israeli citizenship, provided they met the requirements for naturalization—such as swearing allegiance to Israel and renouncing all other citizenships—which most of them refused to do. At the end of 2005, 93% of the Arab population of East Jerusalem had permanent residency and 5% had Israeli citizenship.

So they basically refused the offer of citizenship.

 

[YonatanBlum]

How about this:

*A single democratic country with full sufferage for Jews and Muslims.
*A constitution which amongst other things bans the county from maintaining a military
*Sovereignty and security to be guaranteed by UN (ie a permanent military presence)
*Independent judiciary appointed by the UN with the ability to strike down laws which contravene the constitution.

This is hilarious. You think ANY Israeli at all would accept anything like this? Not to mention any Palestinian? The UN is incompetent and out of touch with reality... And I believe that the idea of a single "democratic" state has already been refuted. The reality is, once the Arabs have a majority in such an imaginary state, there will be no real democracy at all... Just look at current Palestinian "democracy."

As for equating a one-state solution with the South African solution... Even if the situations were similar, which in truth they are not, I would NOT wish for Israel to become something akin to modern South Africa. It has nothing to do with races, and much more to do with prosperity... The South African position is not at all an envious one.

 

[BurnEmDown]

Winner makes some good points so I would like to change my view and add that for the two-state split there will be a condition where if the Palestinian state attacks Israel without a "casus belli" Israel won't be criticized by the UN and others for attacking back (like what happened in the 2008-9 Gaza war).

 

[Tee Kay]

Also, do they distinguish Jews from Israel? Do they want to boot Israel, and keep all the Jews, or do want to kick both out?

They do distinguish between Jews and Israel, at least officially. There are anti-Semetic factions within Hamas, and their propaganda often uses Jews, Isreal and Zionism interchangably. To my knowledge, though, they haven't gone as far as to suggest deporting all Jews from Palestine.

And, a true Palestinian nationalist should not support it either, since Jews have been living in Palestine since forever.

That's basically the current state of things.

Not in all of the "Palestinian territories", it's not.

What powers? Even if a Palestinian state is formed, it will be fully dependent on Israel's goodwill.

Israel has no real motivation to do compromises with the Palestinian Authority which doesn't even control its own territory and citizens.

Palestinians can't get statehood because they're utterly unable to handle even a limited autonomy. They've already had a civil war and split into two warring factions after the first freaking elections they held. I dread to imagine what would happen if Israel gave them free hand.

Yeah, because no country has ever had violent civil conflicts in their history.

their inherent inability to achieve social/economic progress (shared by most Arab states)

Now you're just being silly.

Even though they are Arabs, the Arabs hate them and only use them to antagonise Israel.

Knight: How do we sort out the good Palestinians from the bad Palestinians?
Bishop: Expel them all. Let God sort them out.

Winner makes some good points so I would like to change my view and add that for the two-state split there will be a condition where if the Palestinian state attacks Israel without a "casus belli" Israel won't be criticized by the UN and others for attacking back (like what happened in the 2008-9 Gaza war).

The imaginary Palestinian state won't ever attack Israel on the account of general military superiority and nuclear weapons.

Most likely it'd be something similar to the Lebanon War where militant groups like Hamas uses Palestinian territories to launch cross-border raids into Israel.

 

[Ajidica]

Knight: How do we sort out the good Palestinians from the bad Palestinians?
Bishop: Expel them all. Let God sort them out.

Just for the records of others, the historical line is: "Kill them all, God will save his own."

I could see a one state solution working if Palestine was given greater autonomy. I couldn't see a two state working as we get another round of Balkanization.

 

[SchoolzSoKewl]

Here are a few problems with your poll:

• 
  
  That's basically the current state of things.
  
  
  
  Formal declaration of war against whom? They're not a state. And if you meant it as in the future, what would be the point of formally declaring war on someone you've just let become independent? Besides, nobody's doing formal declarations of war in this day and age.
  
  
  
  And how exactly would you enforce it? So you'd give the Palestinians sovereignty, but take away Israel's sovereignty in turn?
  
  
  
  What powers? Even if a Palestinian state is formed, it will be fully dependent on Israel's goodwill.
  
  
  
  Yeah, right.

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Israel has no real motivation to do compromises with the Palestinian Authority which doesn't even control its own territory and citizens. Peace with it would be a worthless piece of paper and Israel would soon get attacked by terrorists using the new state as their base of operations.

I believe peace in the Mid. East isn't possible. Palestinians can't get statehood because they're utterly unable to handle even a limited autonomy. They've already had a civil war and split into two warring factions after the first freaking elections they held. I dread to imagine what would happen if Israel gave them free hand.

The very idea of a Palestinian state is thus laughable. Given the Palestinian birthrates and their inherent inability to achieve social/economic progress (shared by most Arab states), such a state would sooner or later collapse and Israel would have to deal with the consequences.

I'll vote for the first option, with one reservation:

The Palestinian territories should be fully part of Israel. (... and the Palestinians should be resettled in neighbouring Arab states.)

So why do you think moving millions of Palestinians is a more feasible solution than moving 500,000 settlers? And why do you think the neighboring Arab states would let the Palestinians into their countries?
Are the Palestinians that are Israeli citizens included in this forced migration?

 

[Winner]

Yeah, because no country has ever had violent civil conflicts in their history.

How's that relevant? Usually, the civil war erupts after a country gets independent. The Palestinians really set the bar high - they managed a civil war even before that. Lovely.

Now you're just being silly.

No, just observant. Unless an Arab country happens to have large reserves of oil beneath the sand, it remains backwards, undemocratic, poor, militaristic and often religiously fundamentalist. Wait, in fact it applies even for many of those who do have oil. Must be something about the culture, then.

How many members of a group must meet the criteria until you can safely generalize? 100%? I am content with 80-90%.


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So why do you think moving millions of Palestinians is a more feasible solution than moving 500,000 settlers? And why do you think the neighboring Arab states would let the Palestinians into their countries?

There is one picture I like to post in every discussion like this one:



Puts the whole situation in perspective.

Now to answer your question: Palestinians have one of the highest fertility rates in the world - on par with sub-Saharan countries, and way above most Arabs states in the region, not to mention Israel. This is partly a result of their national ethos of "outbreeding the Jews" (I am not making this up, google it). Their population is set to double in the next 30 years. There is no way, I repeat no way, the region of Palestine (Israel+Palestinian territories) can feed such a high population. Already the water availability is sharply dropping due to the global warming. Fighting for water has been a part of the Middle East conflict for decades and it's only going to get worse if there are more people.

Even if Israelies pulled out of Palestinian territories and somehow found room for the 500 thousand settlers in the already over-populated Israel-proper, the new Palestinian state would just continue exponentially increasing its population, until it would become unable to feed it. As the number of people would grow, it would become steadily poorer and poorer, because the economy wouldn't be able to keep up with the population.

Eventually, the new Palestinian state would collapse and millions of impoverished Palestinians would try to get to Israel and other countries to find bare essentials for survival. It would probably result in another war, this time with full complement of ethnic cleansing, genocide, famine and whatnot.

For this reason, it would have been better to simply resettle the Palestinians in other Arab states back in 1967. Unfortunately Israel foolishly chose to allow the population to stay and multiply, so it now faces a much bigger problem.

The most humane and lasting solution to the conflict is to expel the Palestinians and let the other Arabs take care of them. Eventually they would have to. Israel would get nice defensible borders and enough natural resources to survive in the long term.


Moderator Action: Advocating ethnic cleansing is hateful and racist and therefore against the terms of service of this forum.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

Are the Palestinians that are Israeli citizens included in this forced migration?

You mean the Israeli Arabs? That's an open question. If they finally recognize Israel and start being loyal, then no. If they continue to collude with the enemies of Israel, they should be stripped of citizenship and expelled too.

(And before someone says that population transfer doesn't solve anything: actually, it does. It may not be the nicest thing, but sometimes it ends chronic conflicts.)

 

[Cu Chulainn]

The Palestinian territories should be fully part of Israel. (... and the Palestinians should be resettled in neighbouring Arab states.)

... in Trail of Tears II: Electric Boogaloo.

 

[BurnEmDown]

Winner, I am interesting in your thoughts about Israel's alleged war crimes during the '06 Lebanon war and the recent Gaza war. I have been discussing these things with people of the.. let's say, "other side of the fence", and I'm quite interested what you might think about these things.

Also if you have the time, the blockade, the recent flotilla incident, etc.

 

[Tee Kay]

How's that relevant? Usually, the civil war erupts after a country gets independent. The Palestinians really set the bar high - they managed a civil war even before that. Lovely.

I thought it's quite common in countries where there are many ideologically-opposed factions fighting for independence.

it remains backwards, undemocratic, poor, militaristic and often religiously fundamentalist.

Or, you know, like your typical "developing countries".

There is one picture I like to post in every discussion like this one:



Puts the whole situation in perspective.

If it's true that all Muslims are the same and Palestinians are just like every other Muslims who have no ties of their own to the land of Israel then we wouldn't be having this discussion.

(And before someone says that population transfer doesn't solve anything: actually, it does. It may not be the nicest thing, but sometimes it ends chronic conflicts.)

Yes, keep pretending it's 1945.

 

[Tani Coyote]

One-state ideally since if those two can live in harmony, anybody else can. Cosmopolite thought will enjoy a resurgence!

Two-state may be the most practical, but also has a dilemma: forced population transfers and all the jollies that come with those. Indeed; a new war would probably just surface from the ashes of the old. Since in the end, both sides are greedy and want the whole pie. Whatever happened to sharing?

In terms of a one-state, they'd probably need to make it so in the Legislature, Palestinians and Israelis both had equal say regardless of population. This could be unicameral or more than one house, but if you want the big guy and little guy to live together, they're gonna wanna be equals. So, this is next to impossible, since, again, no one wants to share.

Then there's two Stars for Peace. As a shameless expansionist, I support this. We must tame the Holy Land. ...Plus it annoys the heck out of fundies who want Israel around simply to bring the apocalypse about, and that's just too much fun to resist.

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Basically: Just let 'em fight it out. Israel can hold its own; we have no need to tie ourselves to them apart from them being a launch base. Besides, they crap on us all the time I hear.

Translation: severe buddy-buddy ties. At the very least, it'd improve pro-American sentiment everywhere if we didn't give Israel a bias; we may protect their independence, but we'll protect the Arabs' just as much.

 

[civ2]

I somehow happen to quote this pretty often recently...
The real answer to this nonsensic stupidity.

For if the nations of the world should say to Israel, “You are robbers, for you conquered by force the lands of the seven nations [of Canaan],” they will reply, "The entire earth belongs to the Holy One, blessed be He; He created it (this we learn from the story of the Creation) and gave it to whomever He deemed proper. When He wished, He gave it to them, and when He wished, He took it away from them and gave it to us.

If the Israeli government stands firm on this - nobody would ever object.
Otherwise - it's an endless nonsense.
And I'm not joking.

Old story? I'd say - READ THE ABOVE!


This is NOT a joke.


Also NOT a joke - just remember 9/11.

AS CLEAR AS IT CAN BE:
Our heritage.
True defense.
Real security.
Over the years.
Lebanon 80s.
Camp David.

ואומר כי-דרש דמים אותם זכר
לא-שכח צעקת ענוים
ואומר ידין בגוים מלא גויות
מחץ ראש על-ארץ רבה
מנחל בדרך ישתה על-כן יךים ראש

 

[Tee Kay]

The One-State Solution is not as unachievable as it may seem.

http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=171559

Palestinians and Israelis were asked whether they preferred resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict through two states for two peoples, a bi-national Palestinian-Israeli state in which Palestinians and Israelis would have equal rights or a Palestinian-Israeli confederation, in which two states share joint political institutions, an arrangement somewhat akin to Belgium. 71 percent of Israelis and 57 percent of Palestinians were found to support a two-state solution, 24 percent of Israelis and 29 percent of Palestinians were found to support a bi-national state, and 30 percent of Israelis and 26 percent of Palestinians supported a confederation.

http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2010/07/201071913463759520.html

Recently, proposals to grant Israeli citizenship to Palestinians in the West Bank, including the right to vote for the knesset, have emerged from a surprising direction: Right-wing stalwarts such as knesset speaker Reuven Rivlin, and former defence minister Moshe Arens, both from the Likud party of Binyamin Netanyahu, the prime minister

 

[Masada]

The One-State Solution is not as unachievable as it may seem.

Anything to stop the Rapture!

 

[civ2]

In the shorter form:
When Pals stop TARGETING civilians - there will be what and whom to talk about.
Otherwise - BURN IN HELL.