Why the "Palestinians" Don't Deserve Sympathy...or Respect
Apr 11, 2014 16:59:33 #
Los-Angeles-Shooter
Loc: Los Angeles
Editorial by Norman Podhoretz:
---------------------------------------------
Pity the Palestinians? Count Me Out
Provoked by the predictable collapse of the farcical negotiations forced by Secretary of State John Kerry on the Palestinians and the Israelis, I wish to make a confession: I have no sympathynonefor the Palestinians. Furthermore, I do not believe they deserve any.
This, of course, puts me at daggers drawn with the enlightened opinion that goes forth from the familiar triumvirate of the universities, the mainstream media and the entertainment industry. For everyone in that world is so busy weeping over the allegedly incomparable sufferings of the Palestinians that hardly a tear is left for the tribulations of other peoples. And so all-consuming is the universal rage over the supposedly monumental injustice that has been done to the Palestinians that virtually no indignation is available for any other claimant to unwarranted mistreatment.
In my unenlightened opinion, this picture of the Palestinian plight is nothing short of grotesquely disproportionate. Let me leave aside the Palestinians who live in Israel as Israeli citizens and who enjoy the same political rights as Israeli Jews (which is far more than can be said of Palestinians who live in any Arab country), and let me concentrate on those living under Israeli occupation on the West Bank.
A Palestinian protester stands during clashes with Israeli troops in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh in March. (Reuters)
Well, to judge by the most significant measure and applying it only to two instances of what is going on at this very moment: In Syria, untold thousands of fellow Arabs are starving, while according to the United Nations official on the scene in South Sudan, 3.7 million people, amounting to one-third of the population, are now facing imminent death by starvation.
And the Palestinians? True, when they wish to go from the West Bank into Israel proper, they are forced to stop at checkpoints and subjected to searches for suicide vests or other weapons in the terrorist arsenal. Once, when she was secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice bemoaned the great inconvenience and humiliation inflicted by such things on the poor Palestinians. Yet she had nothing to say about Palestinians dying of starvation on the West Bank, for the simple reason that there were none to be found.
Nor did anyone starve to death in Gaza when it too was under Israeli occupation. And despite propaganda to the contrary, neither is anyone facing the same fate in Gaza today because of the blockade the Israelis have set up to prevent clandestine shipments of arms intended for use against them.
Speaking of Gaza, it can serve as a case study of the extent to which the plight of the Palestinians has been self-inflicted. Thus when every last Israeli was pulled out of Gaza in 2005, some well-wishers expected that the Palestinians, now in complete control, would dedicate themselves to turning it into a free and prosperous country. Instead, they turned it into a haven for terrorism and a base for firing rockets into Israel.
Meanwhile little or nothing of the billions in aid being poured into Gazasome of it from wealthy American Jewish donorswent to improving the living conditions of the general populace. Which did not prevent a majority of those ordinary Palestinians from supporting Hamas, under whose leadership this order of priorities was more faithfully followed than it was under Fatah, its slightly less militant rival.
As for the monumental injustice supposedly done to the Palestinians, it consists largely of losing territory in the war they themselves provoked in 1967, and the refusal of their demand that every inch of it be returned to them by the Israeli victors in that war. Such demands have always been known and universally denounced as revanchism or irredentism, most recently over the Russian seizure of Crimea. But where Israel is concerned, everything goes topsy-turvy, so that Palestinian irredentism is universally supported.
The accompanying and equally great injustice allegedly suffered by the Palestinians is that they have been denied a state of their own. But this hardly qualifies as unique, given that dozens of other ethnic groupsthe Kurds being the most prominentare in the same boat.
In any event, this injustice is also self-inflicted, since three times in the past 15 years the Palestinians have refused offers of a state on most of the territory taken by Israel in 1967 and with Jerusalem as its capital. They have justified these refusals by one pretext or another, but as anyone willing to look can see, what they truly want is not a state of their own living side by side with Israel but a state that replaces Israel altogether.
With this we come to the main reason I believe that the Palestinians do not deserve any sympathy, let alone the astonishing degree of it they do receive (and not least from many of my fellow Jews). It is that ever since the day of Israel's birth in 1948, they have never ceased declaring that their goal is to wipe it off the map. In all other contexts, this would be called by its rightful name of genocide and condemned by all decent people. Yethere we go topsy-turvy againfor any and every step Israel takes to defend itself against so shamelessly evil an intent, it is the Israelis who are obsessively condemned at the U.N. and by the increasingly strident propagators of what calls itself anti-Zionism but is also increasingly indistinguishable from anti-Semitism.
Nor, alas, is it only the leaders of the Palestinians who harbor this evil intent. As revealed by poll after poll, as well as by the elections that led the way for Hamas to take power in Gaza, a decisive majority of the Palestinian people does so as well. No doubt this is the fruit of relentless indoctrination from above, but the damage has been done, and the end result is what it is.
Indeed, the best that can be said of both Palestinian leaders and led is that many of them no longer imagineas did Gamal Abdel Nasser, the former president of Egyptthat they have the power to drive the Jews of Israel into the sea. Therefore they are now willing to give up pursuing the goal of genocide and to settle for the more modest objective of politicidethat is, to get rid of the Jewish state by transforming it, through various peaceful means like the right of return, into a state with a Palestinian majority.
I for one pray that a day will come when the Palestinians finally let go of the evil intent toward Israel that keeps me from having any sympathy for them, and that they will make their own inner peace with the existence of a Jewish state in their immediate neighborhood. But until that day arrives, the peace process will go on being as futile as it has been so many times before and as it has just proved once again to be. Another thing that never changes: When John Kerry testified on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, it was the Israelis he blamed for this latest diplomatic fiasco.
Mr. Podhoretz was the editor of Commentary magazine from 1960 to 1995. His most recent book is Why Are Jews Liberals? (Doubleday, 2009).
---------------------------------------------
Pity the Palestinians? Count Me Out
Provoked by the predictable collapse of the farcical negotiations forced by Secretary of State John Kerry on the Palestinians and the Israelis, I wish to make a confession: I have no sympathynonefor the Palestinians. Furthermore, I do not believe they deserve any.
This, of course, puts me at daggers drawn with the enlightened opinion that goes forth from the familiar triumvirate of the universities, the mainstream media and the entertainment industry. For everyone in that world is so busy weeping over the allegedly incomparable sufferings of the Palestinians that hardly a tear is left for the tribulations of other peoples. And so all-consuming is the universal rage over the supposedly monumental injustice that has been done to the Palestinians that virtually no indignation is available for any other claimant to unwarranted mistreatment.
In my unenlightened opinion, this picture of the Palestinian plight is nothing short of grotesquely disproportionate. Let me leave aside the Palestinians who live in Israel as Israeli citizens and who enjoy the same political rights as Israeli Jews (which is far more than can be said of Palestinians who live in any Arab country), and let me concentrate on those living under Israeli occupation on the West Bank.
A Palestinian protester stands during clashes with Israeli troops in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh in March. (Reuters)
Well, to judge by the most significant measure and applying it only to two instances of what is going on at this very moment: In Syria, untold thousands of fellow Arabs are starving, while according to the United Nations official on the scene in South Sudan, 3.7 million people, amounting to one-third of the population, are now facing imminent death by starvation.
And the Palestinians? True, when they wish to go from the West Bank into Israel proper, they are forced to stop at checkpoints and subjected to searches for suicide vests or other weapons in the terrorist arsenal. Once, when she was secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice bemoaned the great inconvenience and humiliation inflicted by such things on the poor Palestinians. Yet she had nothing to say about Palestinians dying of starvation on the West Bank, for the simple reason that there were none to be found.
Nor did anyone starve to death in Gaza when it too was under Israeli occupation. And despite propaganda to the contrary, neither is anyone facing the same fate in Gaza today because of the blockade the Israelis have set up to prevent clandestine shipments of arms intended for use against them.
Speaking of Gaza, it can serve as a case study of the extent to which the plight of the Palestinians has been self-inflicted. Thus when every last Israeli was pulled out of Gaza in 2005, some well-wishers expected that the Palestinians, now in complete control, would dedicate themselves to turning it into a free and prosperous country. Instead, they turned it into a haven for terrorism and a base for firing rockets into Israel.
Meanwhile little or nothing of the billions in aid being poured into Gazasome of it from wealthy American Jewish donorswent to improving the living conditions of the general populace. Which did not prevent a majority of those ordinary Palestinians from supporting Hamas, under whose leadership this order of priorities was more faithfully followed than it was under Fatah, its slightly less militant rival.
As for the monumental injustice supposedly done to the Palestinians, it consists largely of losing territory in the war they themselves provoked in 1967, and the refusal of their demand that every inch of it be returned to them by the Israeli victors in that war. Such demands have always been known and universally denounced as revanchism or irredentism, most recently over the Russian seizure of Crimea. But where Israel is concerned, everything goes topsy-turvy, so that Palestinian irredentism is universally supported.
The accompanying and equally great injustice allegedly suffered by the Palestinians is that they have been denied a state of their own. But this hardly qualifies as unique, given that dozens of other ethnic groupsthe Kurds being the most prominentare in the same boat.
In any event, this injustice is also self-inflicted, since three times in the past 15 years the Palestinians have refused offers of a state on most of the territory taken by Israel in 1967 and with Jerusalem as its capital. They have justified these refusals by one pretext or another, but as anyone willing to look can see, what they truly want is not a state of their own living side by side with Israel but a state that replaces Israel altogether.
With this we come to the main reason I believe that the Palestinians do not deserve any sympathy, let alone the astonishing degree of it they do receive (and not least from many of my fellow Jews). It is that ever since the day of Israel's birth in 1948, they have never ceased declaring that their goal is to wipe it off the map. In all other contexts, this would be called by its rightful name of genocide and condemned by all decent people. Yethere we go topsy-turvy againfor any and every step Israel takes to defend itself against so shamelessly evil an intent, it is the Israelis who are obsessively condemned at the U.N. and by the increasingly strident propagators of what calls itself anti-Zionism but is also increasingly indistinguishable from anti-Semitism.
Nor, alas, is it only the leaders of the Palestinians who harbor this evil intent. As revealed by poll after poll, as well as by the elections that led the way for Hamas to take power in Gaza, a decisive majority of the Palestinian people does so as well. No doubt this is the fruit of relentless indoctrination from above, but the damage has been done, and the end result is what it is.
Indeed, the best that can be said of both Palestinian leaders and led is that many of them no longer imagineas did Gamal Abdel Nasser, the former president of Egyptthat they have the power to drive the Jews of Israel into the sea. Therefore they are now willing to give up pursuing the goal of genocide and to settle for the more modest objective of politicidethat is, to get rid of the Jewish state by transforming it, through various peaceful means like the right of return, into a state with a Palestinian majority.
I for one pray that a day will come when the Palestinians finally let go of the evil intent toward Israel that keeps me from having any sympathy for them, and that they will make their own inner peace with the existence of a Jewish state in their immediate neighborhood. But until that day arrives, the peace process will go on being as futile as it has been so many times before and as it has just proved once again to be. Another thing that never changes: When John Kerry testified on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, it was the Israelis he blamed for this latest diplomatic fiasco.
Mr. Podhoretz was the editor of Commentary magazine from 1960 to 1995. His most recent book is Why Are Jews Liberals? (Doubleday, 2009).
Apr 12, 2014 05:51:49 #
Apr 12, 2014 10:04:22 #
ole sarg
Loc: south florida
Although I agree with most of Mr. Podhoretz's essay I do not agree that most media, entertainers and academics are sympathetic to the Palestinean cause.
What is happening is a very effective PR campaign on behalf of the Palestineans. Something that did not happen in the past.
Additionally, Europe - which is captive to Arab Oil - and which never recanted for the Holocaust is once again on an anti semetic crusade. Especially France and England - both of which have deep rooted anti semetic traditions.
I believe it was Ewer who said and I paraphrase:
How Odd of God To Choose the Jews
But, odder still for man to choose a Jewish God and not the Jews.
What is happening is a very effective PR campaign on behalf of the Palestineans. Something that did not happen in the past.
Additionally, Europe - which is captive to Arab Oil - and which never recanted for the Holocaust is once again on an anti semetic crusade. Especially France and England - both of which have deep rooted anti semetic traditions.
I believe it was Ewer who said and I paraphrase:
How Odd of God To Choose the Jews
But, odder still for man to choose a Jewish God and not the Jews.
Apr 12, 2014 10:22:50 #
Apr 12, 2014 10:41:59 #
Apr 12, 2014 11:52:40 #
"Norman Podhoretz's new book, "World War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism," is a hate-filled, anti-American book of the first order. Podhoretz hates every American who does not support the neoconservatives' views, the foreign policy they have devised, and the military and national security disasters to which they are leading America. Patrick Buchanan, Andrew J. Bacevich, Sir John Keegan, Brent Scowcroft, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Samuel Huntington, Francis Fukuyama, and many others are all targets of Podhoretz. These men are variously characterized as anti-Semites, isolationists, recanters from the true creed, or simply as small men who fear the neoconservative utopia is about to arrive, discredit their views, and cost them their jobs or prestige. Podhoretz is particularly vicious toward Buchanan because he knows that Buchanan sees through the neoconservative fantasy with the most unrelenting acuity. Buchanan's frank voice and non-interventionism not isolationism are genuinely American characteristics, so Podhoretz must go all out to discredit Buchanan as an anti-Semite, lest Americans listen to Buchanan's advice not to get their children killed fighting other peoples' wars, be they wars for Israelis or Muslims or anyone else. http://www.antiwar.com/scheuer/?articleid=11670
Podhoretz writes propaganda in support of Israel's apartheid regime. If you want to read another Jew's accurate account of what is going on in Israel, read Alan Weisman's "Countdown: Our Last, Best Hope for a Future on Earth?" http://www.amazon.com/Countdown-Last-Best-Future-Earth/product-reviews/0316097748/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?showViewpoints=1
Podhoretz writes propaganda in support of Israel's apartheid regime. If you want to read another Jew's accurate account of what is going on in Israel, read Alan Weisman's "Countdown: Our Last, Best Hope for a Future on Earth?" http://www.amazon.com/Countdown-Last-Best-Future-Earth/product-reviews/0316097748/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?showViewpoints=1
Apr 12, 2014 12:26:28 #
sueyeisert
Loc: New Jersey
I'm very much for the State of Israel. However, I'm against all the building in the occupied territories. The Palistinians had multiple opportunities to have peace. President Clinton worked very hard to get a peace treaty. All parties should continue to work for peace. It takes two parties to make peace. Let's begin by recognizing the state of Israel . It's about time.
Apr 12, 2014 13:12:47 #
sueyeisert wrote:
I'm very much for the State of Israel. However, I'm against all the building in the occupied territories. The Palistinians had multiple opportunities to have peace. President Clinton worked very hard to get a peace treaty. All parties should continue to work for peace. It takes two parties to make peace. Let's begin by recognizing the state of Israel . It's about time.
Who can blame the Palestinians from refusing the "peace treaties" offered them. Not one of the bogus treaties returned the land the Zionists had stolen from the Palestinians. Not one of the treaties allowed over a million Palestinians who were forced to flee in 1948 by Zionist terrorists to return to their land.
white represents the land stolen from the Palestinians
Apr 12, 2014 13:34:01 #
ole sarg wrote:
Although I agree with most of Mr. Podhoretz's essa... (show quote)
This is all about "My imaginary friend is better than your imaginary friend."
Apr 12, 2014 14:54:14 #
One difference between the US and Israel, is that in Israel, news media can criticize Israel. If Podhoretz erroneously believes that the plight of people living under the jackboots of Jewish extremists gets too much attention here, it's because we are involved. It is shameful to see our politicians scramble to appease the Israeli lobby. As long as we rush to send fresh supplies of cluster-bombs and and long as we supply the armored bulldozers that destroy olive groves and homes, we are implicated in the crimes of the Jewish state. We give billions in military aid to a corrupt regime in Egypt as baksheesh for keeping the peace: that's a lot of money we don't have, spent for no good result. Even
Apr 12, 2014 15:11:13 #
Cat stepped on my keyboard, sent message before I was finished.
Even the mildest criticism is prefaced with a disclaimer, so here's mine: I wish to see Israel continue to exist, but not as a belligerent, racist society in a state of constant war with it's neighbors. If a man is digging his own grave, is it an act of friendship to make sure he has a fresh shovel?
Even the mildest criticism is prefaced with a disclaimer, so here's mine: I wish to see Israel continue to exist, but not as a belligerent, racist society in a state of constant war with it's neighbors. If a man is digging his own grave, is it an act of friendship to make sure he has a fresh shovel?
Apr 12, 2014 15:21:09 #
clarke wrote:
One difference between the US and Israel, is that ... (show quote)
I haven't noticed mainstream media in the U.S. giving any coverage of the plight of the Palestinians. These 6 internet sites give good coverage:
http://www.wrmea.org/
http://mondoweiss.net/
http://www.ifamericansknew.org/
http://www.globalresearch.ca/
http://www.truthjihad.com/
http://www.truetorahjews.org/
Apr 12, 2014 15:23:37 #
clarke wrote:
Cat stepped on my keyboard, sent message before I was finished.
Even the mildest criticism is prefaced with a disclaimer, so here's mine: I wish to see Israel continue to exist, but not as a belligerent, racist society in a state of constant war with it's neighbors. If a man is digging his own grave, is it an act of friendship to make sure he has a fresh shovel?
Even the mildest criticism is prefaced with a disclaimer, so here's mine: I wish to see Israel continue to exist, but not as a belligerent, racist society in a state of constant war with it's neighbors. If a man is digging his own grave, is it an act of friendship to make sure he has a fresh shovel?
Israel has been digging that grave for 66 years. They're not likely to stop until they take the rest of the world down with them.
Apr 12, 2014 17:17:28 #
sueyeisert
Loc: New Jersey
Racist are you kidding-no one in this country should call Israel racist. What I've read and seen since we have a black president gives pause. Also it seems to be okay to 'stand you ground' and murder blacks in this country. In fact There al all colors and nationalities of people living in Israel. Please let's not forget about Syrian Jews, Iraq Jews and Egyptian Jews what compensation have they gotten when they were forced to leave their countries or be murdered.. Or maybe you didn't know about their treatment, but Israel took them in and didn't put them in refugee camps. Ask the Coptic Christians in Egypt about the Arabs. How many Christians and churches were destroyed in the Arab Spring. Let's not forget then.BTW- in Saudia Arabia they wouldn't allow a Jewish journalist in the country and don't allow christians to pray. I lived in jerusalem and every Friday I heard Muslims being called to prayer. I've been to the Holy Sepulchre where all the various Christian sects are leading prayers. Where in the Arab world is there freedom of religion.
Israel must try to make peace,but it's quite difficult when they won't recognize your existence.
Israel must try to make peace,but it's quite difficult when they won't recognize your existence.
clarke wrote:
Cat stepped on my keyboard, sent message before I was finished.
Even the mildest criticism is prefaced with a disclaimer, so here's mine: I wish to see Israel continue to exist, but not as a belligerent, racist society in a state of constant war with it's neighbors. If a man is digging his own grave, is it an act of friendship to make sure he has a fresh shovel?
Even the mildest criticism is prefaced with a disclaimer, so here's mine: I wish to see Israel continue to exist, but not as a belligerent, racist society in a state of constant war with it's neighbors. If a man is digging his own grave, is it an act of friendship to make sure he has a fresh shovel?
Apr 12, 2014 17:32:04 #
Los-Angeles-Shooter
Loc: Los Angeles
clarke wrote:
...I wish to see Israel continue to exist, but not as a belligerent, racist society in a state of constant war with it's neighbors....
The accusations are unfair. Israel is remarkably fair to the Arabs, despite outrageous provocation. Especially compared to the behavior of the Muslims in their own countries and their profound racism and abuse toward Christians and Jews. Why is it that everyone is willing to jump on Israel over the slightest real or imaged wrongs, but ignores the far worse situation in Arab countries?
As to the "constant war," that is due to the Muslims incessant attempts to wipe out Israel, which at the moment is mainly composed of constant terrorism, attempts at economic isolation and boycott, and of course, the looming threat of a nuclear Iran.
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