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PDF versionPalestinian Statehood? Not Tall Enough
by Michael Sean Winters on Sep. 20, 2011
If you ever go to an amusement park, at the beginning of the line to get on the roller coaster, there is a sign that reads, "You must be this tall to board this ride?"
As the United Nations get ready to decide on whether or not to recognize Palestine as an independent state, the same question should be applied. Are the Palestinians tall enough to ride this ride?
Of course, there is a prior question. Which Palestinians are being measured? In the West Bank, there is still a woefully corrupt government structure that, among other things, was unable to prevent terrorists from conducting attacks against Israel. The much maligned security wall the Israelis constructed has kept the terrorists from bombing pizza parlors and discoteques. In Gaza, the Palestinan government does not harbor terrorists, it employs them. Hamas runs Gaza and they are rightly considered a terrorist organization. So, the two territories that would constitute a putative Palestinan state are not even governed by one government. Should Hamas get a seat at the UN? Why not Hezbollah too?
Until the Palestinians put an end to a curriculum that spreads anti-Semitic lies to the next generation, they should not be granted international recognition. Until the Palestinians cease celebrating terrorists as martyrs, they should not be granted international recognition. Until the Palestinians recognize that as long as they insist on half of Jerusalem, their hold on Nablus will be unsecure, they are not tall enough to ride this ride. Facts are stubborn things and the fact that Jerusalem is not going to be divided in your lifetime or mine is a stubborn fact.
The UN should consider the light of the Palestinians to be sure. It could start by re-evaluating its own policies. In every quarter of the globe, refugees are encouraged to re-settle in their new lands and to integrate with the ambient culture, but not the Palestinians. They are kept in UN-sponsored refugee camps in squalid conditions for which Israel gets blamed. The UN should consider its history of anti-Semitic rants before it questions Israeli suspicion of international brotherhood. If it really wants to deal with the Palestinian issue, it should consider what to make of the one truly existing Palestinian state, Jordan, which is led by a Hashemite king. Why? Because the Brits liked kingdoms, Lawrence of Arabia prefered the Saudis to the Hasemties, the Brits needed a place to plunk down King Abdullah. Voila - Jordan was created. I do not recall any cries about the the dignity of the Palestinian people being trampled upon at the time but, of course, I was not alive.
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The United States will likely veto the Palestinian request for full membership at the UN. That suits me. I have no objection to rewarding the Palestinians for good behavior, but I should like to witness some of that good behavior first. Instead, seared into my memory, is the image of Palestinians dancing in the streets on the night of September 11, 2001. Whatever those people celebrating want out of life is not what I want out of life. And, I am happy to belong to a country that stands with Israel, where they wept on 9/11, they did not dance.
Michael, are the Palestinians
Michael, are the Palestinians the only terrorists? I would argue that Gaza is a 21st century Warsaw Ghetto. Did you bother to read the UN report regarding the last Israeli incursion into Gaza? Is it not terror when when an ambulance with a bleeding pregnant woman is stopped at the border and not allowed to proceed to a Jewish Hospital with the wherewithall to save her?
If corruption and state supported terror were a requirement for membership, then Libya would have been booted a long time ago.
I suggest you call up Fr. John Dear and invite yourself to go along with him the next time he visits that region and find out for yourself the indignities visited day in and day out upon the Arabs in the West Bank, Gaza, and even in Israel proper.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_apartheid
The demographic imbalance in
The demographic imbalance in Israel means either it must annex the territories and become secular (or treat the majority poorly) or create a Palestinian state which includes not only the West Bank, but also much of Arab Northern Israel. Gaza should go back to Egypt and Palestine should probably merge with a restored Hashemite Kingdom in Damascus. The other difficulty in this debate is that Evangelicals want a strong Israel to convert it.
Prior to Israel's
Prior to Israel's independence, the Israelis kicked out thousands of Palestinians because they did not want them in the territory allotted for Israel.
The American kicked out British supporters during their war of independence.
Why should either of these be rewarded for such behavior?
Unless, and until, the
Unless, and until, the Palestinians renounce violence to Israel and all Jews, they should have no place at the table. Israel has given up land in Gaza and the West Bank with the promise from the Palestinians that peace would be given to the Jews. It never happened.
Thank you, Mr. Winters, for taking a righteous stand for our older brethren.
This article demonstrates a
This article demonstrates a real lack of understanding of the issues in Israel-Palestine. Did someone wave a piece of Hasbara in your face? Read "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine" by Illan Pappe (Israeli national, historian at the university of Essex) then tell us who is a terrorist and who has been rewarded for good behavior. Have you heard of the settlements/Gush Emunim? Shameful article; I expect more from NCR.
Anyone tempted to accept
Anyone tempted to accept Illan Pappe's crude revisionism should reconsider.
Starting point:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilan_Papp%C3%A9#Critical_assessment
2 October 2011 Letter
2 October 2011
Letter regarding:
UN/ Palestinian Statehood? Not Tall Enough
Michael Sean Winters
I was angered on reading this article in reaction to its manifestly racist and anti-democratic biases.
After 44 years of often brutal military occupation; destruction of olive groves, homes and livelihoods, land confiscation and frequent attacks by wealthy armed settlers, to whom can impoverished West bank Palestinians turn for relief? Neither to the United States nor to Israel: the United States pays Israel billions of dollars to, in effect, further what (former US President) Jimmy Carter has called apartheid.
Do Palestinians not deserve basic human rights? Winters says not until they behave better! I wonder how Winters would behave if his property were confiscated to make way for Mexican settlers? Would he run to the negotiating table or to his gun? Yes, Palestinians are violent but so are the Israeli settlers. (Would Winters please print the violent death toll among Palestinian and Israeli children in the West Bank to illustrate this point?) The USA proposed democracy for violent Iraqis and Afghanistanis and now for most of the Arab world: quite rightly, but why not for Palestinians?
Winters criticizes Palestinians for teaching anti-Semitic lies in schools. He says nothing about what settlers teach their children regarding their third class neighbours.
Winters reference to Jordan is confusing. Is he suggesting that Palestinians should be deported there (this would be considered a war crime although supported by a small part of the Israeli population- what do these people teach their children)? Why can the Palestinians and Jordanians not vote for the States they want?
Winters writes that the Palestinian hold on Nablus will be ‘insecure’ if they insist on ‘half of Jerusalem’. Winters does not seem to realize that the Palestinian Authority (PA or Permanent Apartheid) does not in any case have a secure hold on Nablus which could be choked or, indeed confiscated, by Jewish settlements if Israel so desired. Many members of the US congress have recently said they would approve of any Israeli settlement in the West bank including, one presumes, the necessary land confiscation. As for the dozen or so Arab villages that make up greater East Jerusalem (distant from the ancient City of David) why could they not decide democratically what state to belong to?
Unless the colonization of the West Bank by Jewish-only settlements can, not only be stopped, but reversed, there will be no room for a Palestinian State except as a collection of disparate apartheid-style homelands.
Winters can rightly blame some Palestinians for rejoicing at 9/11 but does this justify collective punishment for decades for all Palestinians?
Finally Winters ignores the plight of Christian Palestinians, a source of peace, who continue to be driven out of the Holy land by the never-ending conflict.
Two democratic States based on 1967 borders with land swaps would eventually satisfy most Israelis and Palestinians. The USA has declined to help so who else can Palestinians turn to if not the UN?
Nicholas Newman
Montreal Canada
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