ok the middle east has been a spot of warfare for thousands of years, and lets face it, i have read the quran extensively, and that religion as a whole cant live with other religons. You can see this in the religious demographics in countries, almost all states with a considerable muslim population are almost 100% muslim, and the ones that arent, mostly subsaharaian africa and the southeast asia, have a massive religous problems.

Originally Posted by Bacara

ok the middle east has been a spot of warfare for thousands of years, and lets face it, i have read the quran extensively, and that religion as a whole cant live with other religons. You can see this in the religious demographics in countries, almost all states with a considerable muslim population are almost 100% muslim, and the ones that arent, mostly subsaharaian africa and the southeast asia, have a massive religous problems.

You sure about that?
If you take the crusades out of the picture I would suggest that the region has been no more violent than any other region until the last 60 years and when you consider that the area has formed the borders and was fought over by multiple empires (Egyptian through British) you would have to draw the conclusion that the locals were not in fact all that warlike.

Originally Posted by MontyB

You sure about that?
If you take the crusades out of the picture I would suggest that the region has been no more violent than any other region until the last 60 years and when you consider that the area has formed the borders and was fought over by multiple empires (Egyptian through British) you would have to draw the conclusion that the locals were not in fact all that warlike.

really look at areas of religous conflict, the most prominate are the northern parts of subsaharan africa and south east asia.

Originally Posted by Bacara

really look at areas of religous conflict, the most prominate are the northern parts of subsaharan africa and south east asia.

The world is in tumoil almost solely because of the US support for Israels colonial adventures, this got the local Arabs off side and consequently this blew up into a Muslims vs. The Rest, and has ultimately led to the formation of AlQuaeda and other affiliated Muslim terrorist groups.

Nothing that has happened in SE Asia or Sub Saharan Africa can even hold a candle to it.

While I agree with you Seno that the creation of Israel should never have happened where it did, I am surprised at your arguments. Putting them into effect in Australia would see you and me kicked out and the land given back to the Aborigine.

Originally Posted by Wallabies

While I agree with you Seno that the creation of Israel should never have happened where it did, I am surprised at your arguments. Putting them into effect in Australia would see you and me kicked out and the land given back to the Aborigine.

You obviously havent been following all of the threads and don't know my arguments.

(1) We stopped colonising 200 years ago when it was still an accepted practice everywhere in the world. We also introduced laws that made the unjustified killing of Aboriginals a hanging offence in 1830, the first man was hung in 1838 in WA. (It took nearly six years to catch him)

(2) The Australian Aboriginals for all their griping know that if it wasn't for the Brits colonising Australia, they would probably now be a Chinese or Indonesian minority, and they are certainly smart enough to know what that would mean for them.

(3)The Australian taxpayers pay an average of 2.6 times as much per capita, into Aboriginal Health as is spent on the remainder of the population.

(4)We have admitted that the concept of Terra Nullius was not valid, and we are at least making some effort to correct injustices of the past, officially recognising that the Aboriginals were the owners of the land.

I could go on,... and I know it ain't perfect, but to equate the colonisation of Australia in 1770 with what the Israelis are doing today to the Palestinians, is somewhat less than realistic.

I've been looking at the various peace agreement maps. Someone might know the answers to the following questions?

What is meant to happen to Area C. in the event of a peace treaty, who keeps it?
The areas A & B look swiss cheesed, lots of blobs not connected with each other, is that because of the israeli roads? if so how do you connect them up.

Also what happens with the water, the settlers use the same amount of water as the palestinians, who are five times as numerious. I also understand that water goes back to israel, who controls the water and its distribution (equitable or otherwise)

There are the land borders, sea borders and airspace, who controls these?

Which parts of Israel are swopped for the west bank settlements?

That is quite a few questions. I personally don't believe its possible to disentangle the west bank from Israel, crucially because of the water, but also because the restrictions that israel wants to require, seem very onerous. Where that leads, I don't know, to a binational state, to UN administered territory or a pseudo state I can't say.

If I was Israel I would make deals now, but bind them with strong covenants which require foreign troops in the west bank and gaza. the arabs won't always be economically and militarily weak ( or militarily incompetent). treaties aren't worth paper, the UK guaranteed cyprus independence, but did they stop the turks invading?

If in 30 years time, Israel is faced by large eygptian or syrian or jordanian armies, I don't think the world will step in, unless, they have troops on the ground that would get hurt.

But then I'm not sure how Israel manages to overcome the inherent problems of identity in itself. A state for jews, which has a large arab minority, aliya for Jews only, limits on who can become israeli citizens (and not just arabs, what about all the non arabs who are doing the menial work that the palestinians used to do, if they live in israel for 30 years, can they become israeli citizens, if they are muslim, hindu or christian or none of the above). to be british you don't have to be certain religion or race, or french or american (although in germany there are large numbers of turkish "guestworkers" who have been in germany for decades)

No parts of Israel can be swapped for the west bank, because no part of Israel or the West Bank ever belonged to Israel. Read some of the international agreements on Occupied Territories.

Israel can't "Make" deals, as they have nothing to deal with, they are occupiers not owners just as Germany occupied France. They will eventually be forced to return it all by world pressure just as they expelled the "settlers" from the Gaza Strip.

They think that by continually ignoring world opinion and just taking what they want by force of arms and then killing the rightful owners, the world will turn a blind eye.

Not So, I'm afraid. Even the more astute Israelis are well aware of their problems. Denial of the facts may make them feel good, but they realise that it will not work in the end. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/711997.html


I will pose MontyB's argument to all of you persons who start these debates. No one as yet has attempted to answer it as they only realise the truth of the matter once their country is involved.

What would you do if Australia was to divide off all of the most productive land in your country and just give it to the starving Somalis. Then we would support them with virtually limitless money and arms to oppress the original population allowing the Somalis to use British resistance as an excuse to steal the remainder of the British Isles as a "security measure"

Everybody conveniently ignores the one significant point in these arguments. They forget who actually owns the land. They conveniently confuse occupancy with ownership.

Nations are born, grow, expand and collapse. Entire peoples move from place to place.
Israel for better or worse won its war of independence, thus allowing it control far more of the land than it would have been given in partition. That is what happens in war. Strong nations take, there are no points for second place.

Are the hungarians colonisers for being where they are, they only moved there 1000 years ago? how about the anglo saxons in England. Or the entire US population?
Israel's validity to make treaties is based on its military strength which gives it legitimacy.

World pressure won't force millions of people to move.

Brutally, the palestinians aren't willing to sacrifice enough to get the country they want. If they want more than the west bank and the gaza strip, they will have to fight for it. 3000 dead since the last intifada? They might need to lose 30,000 or 100,000. I'm not convinced the palestinians are willing to pay high enough a blood price.

Originally Posted by johnmacadam

Nations are born, grow, expand and collapse. Entire peoples move from place to place.
Israel for better or worse won its war of independence, thus allowing it control far more of the land than it would have been given in partition. That is what happens in war. Strong nations take, there are no points for second place.

Yes, I noticed how the Brits agreed with your philosophy over Poland, France and other countries in 1939. How come you didn't sit back as they are in this case? Political expediency perhaps? Ohhhh,... I forgot, it was Lord Balfour that started all this crap wasn't it. Did it ever occur to you that virtually all of today's wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and the bringing about of world wide terror is all as a result of those stupidly naive and hastily made decisions. Decisions that people like yourself are too proud to admit to, and start doing something about it.

Are the hungarians colonisers for being where they are, they only moved there 1000 years ago? how about the anglo saxons in England. Or the entire US population?

You hit the nail on the head in your first sentence. The days of colonising other peoples land went out of fashion a hundred and fifty years ago and virtually all of the colonising countries have restored the land owners to their proper place.

Israel's validity to make treaties is based on its military strength which gives it legitimacy.

I guess you have not read any history since the days of gun boat diplomacy.

You are sadly 150+ years behind the times. I notice that you did not answer the question that I posed regarding the gift of your country to the Somalis.

World pressure won't force millions of people to move.

Only ten years ago the Israelis would have never conceded to vacating Gaza or the Indonesians Timor, and as many years before that, no one would ever have thought the South Africans would hand over power to the Blacks either. Either you are incredibly stupid or you don't have the vaguest idea of what is going on in the world or how the world works, do you read any world news at all?

Brutally, the palestinians aren't willing to sacrifice enough to get the country they want. If they want more than the west bank and the gaza strip, they will have to fight for it. 3000 dead since the last intifada? They might need to lose 30,000 or 100,000. I'm not convinced the palestinians are willing to pay high enough a blood price.

Just like the Jews would not sacrifice that which was needed to keep them out of the Nazi death camps????

All of your reasoning is childishly simplistic, you need to open both eyes and get up to speed with today's world. Especially seeing that you come from a country that built it's empire by colonising the lands of others 200-300 years ago. Where has your empire gone, or are you just proposing that we return to the practices of the past?

The days of thinking such as you do, are long lonnnnggg gone, and the sooner people like you wake up to it, the sooner we will stop killing our collective nations youth trying to defend it.