Quote:
Originally posted by swissmiss04
Actually...see UN Resolution 242...passed Nov. of 1967. It mandated the return of Palestinian lands acquired from the 1967 war (basically this would have restored the borders to the 1948 standard). So they indeed are obligated to return land seized in conflict, regardless if it was on the defense or not.
And Palestine DID exist as a British controlled colony as mandated by the Balfour Declaration of 1922. This partitioned off some of the Arab states that were previously under Ottoman control, not including Egypt, which had been under British "rule" (I put that in quotes because they had a king, but he was basically a puppet of the British gov't and interests). Lebanon and Syria (or what is now known as Lebanon and Syria) were given to the French and Jordan (then called Trans-Jordan) and Palestine were given to the UK.
When the Zionist mov't started back in the 1880s, the hopeful migrants were told that there was no one living in the area that was then called Palestine. In actuality there were around 800,000 Arabs (of varying religious groups) living there. However they were more than happy to sell their land to the incoming Jews from all over the world. For a while things were fairly calm. Conflicts of a small nature began to erupt in the post WWI years because Arabs realized that they had sold quite a bit of their land and were being pressured to sell more. However, they had already dug themselves a bit of a hole. Once the UN created the state of Israel, they then realized their predicament. They were disenfranchised of even more of their land, but in MY opinion they (the Palestinians) sort of brought it upon themselves. However, since the UN mandated it, the states of Israel *and* Palestine both deserve to exist, albeit within the 1948 borders. The wall is a pretty bad idea diplomatically speaking. It will cause more suffering among Palestinians, greater division between the Israelis and Palestinians, and it creates a nasty PR problem for Israel and its government.
Honestly, it's a huge mess and I'm so glad I'm not there. I am going to Egypt in a couple weeks and I am very interested in learning even more. I'll be on the Sinai Peninsula for a few days. It should be interesting.
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Just because Britain called something Palestine, does not make that a country or state nor does it make its people Palestinian. To create a Palestine you would be creating another Arab state - nothing more, nothing less. There is no common culture between gaza and ramallah.
There has also ALWAYS been a jewish presence in the region. Areas which are called settlements like Hebron have had an unbroken Jewish presence for a very long time. The zionist ideal did not start just suddenly. And when you claim everything was calm until a point, it was not. Jewish villages were being massacred, Jews were not allowed in certain areas.
Furthermore, that is not what resolution 242 says. If you're going to start bringing up things you've probably seen on fliers and news cites, read the actual resolution. According to the Economist:
"But what if, for the sake of argument, the main Security Council resolutions on the Arab-Israeli conflict had been Chapter Seven resolutions? The problem would then arise that Resolution 242 of 1967, passed after the six-day war and frequently cited in the double-standards argument, does not say what a lot of the people who quote it think it says (see - articlehttp://www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?story_ID=1378595).
It does not instruct Israel to withdraw unilaterally from the territories occupied in 1967. It does not condemn Israel's conquest, for the good reason that most western powers at that time thought it the result of a justifiable pre-emptive war. It calls for a negotiated settlement, based on the principle of exchanging land for peace. This is a very different matter."
-Rudey
--When you're in Egypt say hi to the "Palestinians"
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