Israel and Palestine

I'd say somewhere between 300 and 600 years. The claims are constantly, but slowly fading so there's no hard limit.

Have I ever given the impression of caring what they think? Has there ever, in all of history, been an evil that the perpetrators of wished to stop? I'd imagine that those evils never happen in the first place. If they were asking for help in managing the logistics and economics of a return rather than rather than appealing to some imaginary "right" to maintain political power with a certain ethnic group I, and I'm sure many others, would have a very deep supply of patience. Until they tell the Palestinians that they will find a way to make it happen if it can be done I have none.

Looks like the EU's shifting to a more aggressive diplomatic stance as well. Political accelerationists may be slightly psychotic as a rule, but it seems they might have a point here - a less-apologetic-than-usual hard-right Israeli government might be exactly what's needed to break the I/P deadlock.

Still haven't finished reading:

http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/03/is-it-time-for-the-jews-to-leave-europe/386279/

I confess I do not keep myself updated with what's happening in the Middle East, but damn... I still thought things were (slowly at turtle speed) improving, not getting worse (at rabbit pace).

No, you gave the impression that you don't believe that implementing the Palestinian right of return would be that much of a problem. However if you would ever actually be in the position to make it happen, I believe you would scrap the idea during the planning phase when more and more socio-logistical problems would pile up.

You are an idealistic person which is why your conscience make it hard for you to give up on the idea of perfect justice, but there is no such thing. If 50 years from now the Palestinian would have a prosperous, fully independent country in the west bank, nobody would care that they don't have a majority in mainstream Israel, regardless of what should have been.

edited 25th Mar '15 9:59:54 PM by nnokwoodeye1

It depends, Europe probably won't go back to killing the Jews for quite a while, they need time to make it so that slaughtering people somehow makes them morally superior to America,and even then I doubt anyone could ever do something like Hitler did,the internet alone would ensure that word would immediately get out. In the long term however, I don't think Judaism has any hope of survival as a worldwide religion, the demographics and political attitudes of the world are just to against them. On the other hand I would expect Anti Sematism to increase as the Holocaust begins to fade into memory, and the Europeans get more convinced that the Jews should just "get over it." This is by no means a unique phenomena mind you,many black people here in the states are frequently told that they should stop "nagging" the rest of us about slavery and segregation.

Edit: And in preemptive response to anyone offended by my quip about Europe having to figure out a way to turn genocide as a way to feel superior to America, that was a joke. And I feel some humor is required with this very dark topic, sorry if I offended anyone.

edited 26th Mar '15 1:07:46 AM by JackOLantern1337

I haven't formed an opinion at all about how difficult it would be to implement, as no one is discussing how it should be done, what the problems are, how they can be overcome, or how to decide who to extend the right to if allowing all to return is impossible. As long as the conversation stays on the topic of the supposed right of Israel to be rid of them none of that really matters.

I think imagining that the West Bank alone could provide a prosperous home for the entire Palestinian population is quite a bit more idyllic than imagining that the right of return is doable.

The top-rated comment for that article pointed out that the next leader of UK may be Jewish (and proud of it), and that the previous leader of France is also Jewish.

If true, then maybe that article was a tad too negative.

Though if the current Jewish population stat of Europe + Russia is really about 1.5 million, then yeah - that's sad. That's a lot lower than post-holocaust numbers. Unless most of the survivors migrated to USA and Israel.

Even with just 14 million Jews worldwide, hey - Judaism still birthed Christianity (which birthed Islam).

Like all births before the advent of modern medicine, it was painful, bloody, and traumatic.

They did, in enormous numbers. That's basically where most of the Holocaust survivors chose/were forced to settle after their communities were annihilated. There was also the post-Soviet aliyah, where another million-odd Jews jumped at the chance to escape the collapsing USSR and the lifting of emigration restrictions.

edited 26th Mar '15 3:36:52 AM by Achaemenid

Sarkozy was Jewish?

edited 26th Mar '15 3:29:14 AM by JackOLantern1337

Not by the matrilineal definition, but he was a quadroon:

Also, I apologize for yesterday's post. I was drunk and coming out of a very exciting poetry workshop. I'll abstain from posting here unless sober.

I am big old noob when it comes to European politics.

It's just that the top-rated comment of that article started with this:

edited 26th Mar '15 3:33:46 AM by probablyinsane

That Atlantic article identifies a genuine problem, but over-eggs its case, ignores context, and gets a few things flat-out wrong. For a start, the disproportionately high rate of anti-Semitic attacks seems to be isolated to France - contrary to Goldberg's assertion that 'the statistics in other countries, including Great Britain, are similarly dismal', it's our Asian population (Pakistanis and Indians) who get the shit end of the stick, and anti-Semitic attacks aren't even common enough to get their own statistical category. For another thing, he ignores the transparent divide-and-rule tactics being used by the far-right in France and other European countries to set Muslims and Jews at each other's throats. Consider this paragraph:

It implies that Islamophobic attacks are a thing of the past in Britain (and by extension, the core of the article, France - which is another big problem with the piece, forcing a host of radically different nations with radically different cultures into one great big European blob), when, as the stats above indicate, this is far from true. More to the point, it ignores how the British far-right has been courting Jews to set against Muslims as well, and often more overtly and enthusiastically. This is true of France as well, where the Front National has been recruiting directly from the Jewish population in order to advance its overtly Islamophobic agenda.

It may seem tactless to go 'what about the Muslims?' in response to an article on anti-Semitism in Europe, but Goldberg's chief assertion is that it's Muslims who present the biggest threat to European Jews. When they're being pitted against each other by literal Nazis, and when a literal Nazi party is well on its way to becoming the second party in France, that just isn't true.

Conversely, if you look up President Sarkozy Jew, you'll find a lot of the first results along the lines of "Sarkozy's disliked because he's a Jew", as opposed to, say, because he's a slimy jerkass with the taste of porn star.

Holy shit, I didn't know that.

edited 26th Mar '15 3:53:42 AM by TheHandle

It was the graphic with Jewish populations over time, that gave me that impression. It showed a steady migration from the east to the west, showing migration to, not from, the western european states like France that were primarily criticized.

Wasn't there a case a while back where french neo-nazis commited attacks on muslims and tried to frame the jews? I think I rembember something like that.

Edit: Found it, but a while back was an understatement. It was in the 70s and 80s.

edited 26th Mar '15 3:59:11 AM by Kzickas

On the next British PM, keep in mind that Miliband may be Jewish culturally but he's an atheist religiously,

Also the "Anti-Semitism on the rise" thing runs into the problem that it often mistakes Anti-Semitism for lacking the right to oppress others (largely Muslims).

Push come to shove the far-right in Europe are far from openly Anti-Semitic, because to do so would be political suicide due to how toxic Anti-Semitism is, instead they often ally with certain exstream Jewish groups to together be Islamaphobic, something that is very much welcomed in parts of Europe.

Then again, the European Left isn't exactly clean of anti-Semitism, either.

O very true, especially when it runs into certain exstreamist Islamist groups, whose reaction to Islamaphobia is Anti-Semitism.

It is, of course, unlikely that things will end well for France's Jewish population under President Le Pen, even if the majority of the FN's energy is devoted towards bashing Muslims (literally and metaphorically).

edited 26th Mar '15 5:17:07 AM by Iaculus

@ Lacolus, I believe the article actually does mention that the national front is trying to recruit Jews,or at least get them to stamp the National Front's "were not Nazi's card."

Edit: Here it is

Le Pen, who inherited the National Front from her father, Jean-Marie, has worked diligently to bring her party closer to the French mainstream: no more thugs in leather jackets; no more public expressions of longing for Vichy; certainly no more Holocaust obsessiveness. (In 1987, Jean-Marie Le Pen famously said, “I ask myself several questions. I’m not saying the gas chambers didn’t exist. I haven’t seen them myself … But I believe it’s just a detail in the history of World War II.”)

Marine Le Pen is positioning herself as something of a philo-Semite. She is not under the illusion that she will sway large numbers of Jews to her side; in any case, the Jewish vote in France is minuscule. But people who follow her rise say she understands that one pathway to mainstream acceptance runs through the Jews: if she could neutralize the perception that the National Front is a fascist party by winning some measure of Jewish acceptance, she could help smooth her way to the presidency.

It also has several paragraphs reminding people that no it is not 1938 again, it being difficult to get that bad. He also notes that Jews in the US have it pretty good, one guy in the comment section said something along the lines of the US majored in race hatred and only minored in Anti Semetism, and Europe got it's PHD in Jew hating.

edited 26th Mar '15 6:28:36 AM by JackOLantern1337

He does dance around the why, though - the FN isn't just trying to keep its image clean, but is specifically recruiting Jews to help them attack Muslims. That's rather more sinister, and an important data-point in any 'who are the real enemies of Judaism in France?' article.

Amnesty International says Hamas rocket attacks amount to war crimes They also accuse Hamas of storing munitions in civilian buildings. Also Hamas rockets killed more Palestinian civilians than Israeli's. I really respect Amnesty, you know their doing their job when literally everyone is pissed at them. Hamas of course denies all allegations, proclaiming them to be pushing an "Israeli narrative."

Also this statement

violations by one side in a conflict can never justify violations by their opponents.

Finally some recognition for that. Been sick of people trying to justify complete disregard for civilian casualties. Say what you will be at least the IDF tries to avoid them.

That's no real surprise - a Qassam rocket is basically a home-made explosive you detonate in your back yard which may theoretically send a large chunk of metal in a vaguely north-easterly direction. Predictably, the lethality scales up as you get closer to the launch site.

You missed how Amnesty's also pointed out that the IDF makes more active and enthusiastic use of human shields, then? The way it usually goes during a Gaza campaign is that both sides store weapons in and launch attacks from civilian buildings, but the IDF specifically imprisons civilians in those buildings to make them less inviting targets, and brings along hostages when assaulting Hamas positions. Both sides commit war crimes, and saying 'at least the IDF try to protect civilians' is just factually untrue.

edited 26th Mar '15 10:46:13 AM by Iaculus

Also today is the 36th anniversary of the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel