So where does this leave Israel, which acquired about a third of its territory by military conquest, and is occupying - through military force - a similar amount of territory in the West Bank, and is blockading Gaza?

As for the rest of what Singer says, doesn't the policy (charter?) of the Likud party "call for" the incorporation of Palestinian territory into Israel? Talk about the pot calling the kettle black!

Most of what Singer says about Palestinian liberation movements could have equally been said about the French or Czech resistance movements in WW2. Including that they were involved in some pretty nasty - and maybe unwise - incidents of violence. But their actions - in general - were justified by the rightness of the cause of freeing their land from foreign military occupation.

Legally speaking, David Singer is perfectly right. Nevertheless, it would be in Israel's advantage to have Palestine become a state and a recognized UN member - that will help it to get rid of its crippling occupation as well as make the Palestinians more accountable with more to lose if they attack Israel.

I think that even Netanyahu would secretly welcome such move, although of course he could not say that openly in his internal-political situation.

The Palestinians will be the losers - most ordinary Palestinians, the silenced majority, prefer to live under Israeli rule, bad as it is, because it's not as bad, cruel and corrupt, as their own.

The requisite conditions are five in number: to be admitted to membership in the United Nations, an applicant must (1) be a State; (2) be peace-loving; (3) accept the obligations of the Charter; (4) be able to carry out these obligations; and (5) be willing to do so

Condition 2 should rule out Israel for a start. Don't get so high and mighty David.

David T.

In my laptop's Free (medical) Dictionary by Farlex, projection is defined as:
An unconscious defense mechanism by which a person attributes to someone else unacknowledged ideas, thoughts, feelings, and impulses that they cannot accept as their own;
The attribution of one's own attitudes, feelings, or desires to someone or something as a naive or unconscious defense against anxiety or guilt;
In psychiatry, an unconscious defense mechanism whereby emotionally unacceptable traits are denied in oneself and are regarded (projected) as belonging to the external world or to someone else. It is often called the “blaming” mechanism because in using it the person seeks to place the blame for personal inadequacies upon someone else. In its extreme form projection can lead to hostility and physical attack upon others when one mistakenly perceives other persons as responsible for one's own mental anguish;
In psychology an unconscious defense mechanism by which an individual attributes his or her own unacceptable traits, ideas, or impulses to another. It is noted in some stages of schizophrenia

There are not many UN member countries that would survive the admission criteria test. That includes USA - a prominent war monger state. Remember the contrived story about the Weapons of Mass Destruction? That would also exclude them from membership.
Israel's surreptitious and secretly developed atomic bomb and other weapons Should exclude them from the membership of UN. Why were you not so loud in questioning Israel's war mongering attitude David?

Seems everyone here, but you David, wants to see Palestine admitted to the UN.

Why doesn't that overwhelming aversion to your view cause you to sit down and reconsider your position David?

That's the logical and reasonable course of action. We call it re-evaluation.

That's how we Wesrern Liberal Democrat's behave.

It's is behaviour apparently foreign to Israel and it's propagandists.

We are all watching Israel and it's propagandists trashing the way we Westerners act and the next step is for us to start askig whether Israel really is committed to Western Liberal values and behaviours.

It'ds seems also most of the countries of the mid east endorse and have adopted the Palestinian aims.

Do you want them all excluded from the UN as well David?

Ha so David is back seeing as how the last two or three propaganda articles were ignored,are you suffering for lime light derivation syndrome.
the last three I saw attracted no comments maybe I was hope full you would take the hint,or did the ministry for who you sub contract get upset,still pushing the old rubbish line.
Go away you petty BS artist

#Jeremy

Stick to the subject matter of my article if you require any reply from me about it.

#Yuyutsu

Thank you for pointing out to the brain dead mob who have rushed into print that my legal position is correct. It also happened to be the opinion of the majority of the 15 member Admissions Committee.

There is no alternative but direct negotiations.

# VK3AUU

Israel is not applying to join the UN. Palestine was. Aren't you prepared to argue that Palestine is a peace-loving State?

#halduell

If I need medical advice I will see a doctor. You obviously have nothing constructive to add.

#the collector

Totally irrelevant to the issue at hand. Palestine is the issue and you clearly don't want to discuss whether it is a peace-loving State or not.

#imajulianutter

Thank god all of you here didn't make the decision. The representatives of the 15 countries sitting as the Admissions Committee had that task - a decision which was reasonably foreseeable if you had been able to comprehend and understand many of my earlier articles.

I don't want anyone included or excluded. I want to see the law respected and followed.

#John Ryan

Rushing back into print with yet another inane, offensive and factually incorrect statement.

My last two or three articles were not ignored. Check again.

Expecting anything better from you is never going to happen.

Best thing for peace in the ME would be if Iran got the bomb. Israel will never make peace until it has to. Only the threat of MAD would force Israel to make peace.

Israel is a completely illegitimate state. Even the Bible says God fulfilled his prophesy by leading Jews back to the promised land. It was Jewish sin which led to the fall of the second temple and the diaspora. The whole state is built on a lie.

Eventually Israel will incorporate the Gaza and the West Bank. The Arabs will eventually form a numerical majority and achieve better living conditions. Jews will continue to form the 'colonial class' of wealthy landowners.

So here's hoping:
- Iran gets the bomb.
- One Israel in our lifetimes.
- the David Singer's of this world consigned to the historical dustbin where they belong (with the other 19 century racial-based ideologies).

"Israel is a completely illegitimate state"

- That goes without saying because no state is legitimate.

But according to you, Dane, which state(s) ARE legitimate?

Australia?
Saudi Arabia?
Iran?
Syria?
Singapore?
China?

Do you know of a state that is not built on a lie?

Each state is an imposition on the people who live in a certain area, most often against their will - some states impose harsher restrictions on their people, some less, but all do. So is, for example, a state that forces women to cover their faces and forbids them to drive a legitimate one?

And BTW, no other state that I know of was sanctioned by the bible!

Yuyutsu. "And BTW, no other state that I know of was sanctioned by the bible!"

Guess who wrote Bible? The Jews wouldn't have had anything to do with it, would they? Get real.

David T

"Guess who wrote Bible? The Jews wouldn't have had anything to do with it"

Yes, it was indeed the Jews who wrote the bible, but are you aware of the fact that they only wrote it in retaliation, because every time they went to the river to have a bath, the Palestinians would steal their shoes?

I am continually amazed by the looking-glass world of this debate.
Now, apparently, the Jews wrote the bible because the Palestinians stole their shoes while they were bathing in the river.
This is a truly priceless take on history!
Please don't stop with Palestine. There is a whole world out there waiting explanation.

As usual David you avoid the real issue.

Is Israel behaviour the behaviour of Western Liberal Democrats?

No sadly we didn't get to vote on the decision and it is amazing that you put such faith in the UN an organisation you and you ilk have criticised ad nausum for passing resoilutions highly critical of Israeli aggression and oppression.

Our Governments haven't yet seen the major shift that has occurred and is ongoing in our society. Sadly for Israel it's attitudes will only force more and more Western Liberal Democrats to assess Israel's need for support ... without substantial change in behaviour towards the Palestinians. Time and growing populations, besides themselves are Israeli's three real enemys.

'I want to see the law respected and followed.'

You should have qualified that with the phrase : unless the laws are at odds with Israeli land stealing and the illegal occupation and oppression in Palestinian territory.

"Is Israel behaviour the behaviour of Western Liberal Democrats?"

Why should it - Israel is in the middle-EAST!

Yuyutsu,

Now you're being silly..."Western" is the generic term for modern hegemonic capitalist developed countries - don't you know.

yuyutsu,

the next you see any of the Israeli propagandists call for the Western Liberal Democracies to show solidarity with Israel because Israel is a Western Liberal Democracy you will point out the differences ...won't you?

Poirot

You wouldn't want to include your precious European socialist countries, because they are currently becoming bankrupt, nor the collapsed former Socialist Eastern European regimes ... would you?

imajulianutter,

I agree. I also hope that the next you see any of the Arab/Iranian propagandists call to destroy Israel because Israel is a Western Liberal Democracy you will point out the differences ...won't you?

imajulianuttter,

You mean would I include Western European countries under the heading "modern, hegemonic, capitalist and developed"? - Yep!

Here's another one...

Oh look - 99.8 percent debt ratio to annual GDP

http://www.usdebtclock.org

Yuyutsu

They don't do anything of the sort.

They objected to the formation of Israel because of it'sJudean religious basis in the midst of an Islam realm.
They've had lots of other, now proven legitimate complaints, over the years about Israeli expansionism.

Can you please point me to where the existence of Israel as a Liberal Western Democracy has been hfghlighted as a Palestinian or Arab world condemnation?

Poirot,

The US debt isn't caused by stupidly excessive spending on socialist social policies as it was in Greece, Italy and Spain. It's impossible for those economies to become hegemonic or be regarded as Capitalistic. They will soon become 'developing' and historically socialistic without major support from 'the modern, hegemonic, capitalist and developed' European economies of France and Germany.

The US economy has the means to turn their economy around. The Socialist economies of Europe don't have those means. They will go the same way as the stupidities of the former socialist economies of Eastern Europe.

imajulianutter,

What's the cause of U.S. debt then...apart from its stupidly excessive forays into the Middle-East to secure resources and influence and the funnelling of government money into the coffers of private contractors? Not to mention its stupid and excessive love affair with credit. Those countries you mentioned, as members of the European Union and in concert with other Western countries like the U.S., are part of the dominant hegemony - the one that's probably not too far from becoming the "once" dominant hegemony.

Hullo all posters

In the case of your ramblings which have nothing at all to do with my article I take it that you have no disagreement with the thrust of what I have written.

I do not intend to respond to anything that does not bear on my article.

I have a gathering understanding of the toll Israel's belligerency and brutal occupation has exacted on Jewish people in and out of Israel. For a race that has contributed so much to the historical tapestry on human rights and social justice it is indeed a deep tragedy that so many are forced to accept a standard of right and wrong that I believe would otherwise be foreign to them.

Some like Joe Halper, Noam Chomsky and our own Antony Loewenstein have been able to rise above what surely must be a very seductive narrative. But for many their weakness continues to be the story of Israel.

It is not hard for one to see both sides as victims, locked into mindsets that seem only too willing to stymie any attempts at reconciliation.

To me the rest of the world is the only hope of resolving what the two parties are incapable of doing so themselves, achieve a lasting, peaceful two state solution. It should be our want and our duty and in the past Australia has played its part condemning both the occupation, and the terrorism exhibited by both sides. Our voting habit in the UN on resolutions condemning Israel's human rights violations was to either support them or abstain. We slipped under John Howard most notably when we voted with the US and a couple of tiny pacific nations entirely dependent on US aid against a UN resolution calling on Israel to comply with a ruling previously issued by the International Court of Justice (ICJ), that found that the wall violated international law. However to this day I recognise how powerful the experience of being in New York on 9/11 must have been for him yet thankfully we seem to find our way again under Rudd. Not so now.

Cont'

Cont'

While I understand the preparedness to suspend recognition of what is so innately right and wrong by the players in the conflict I am becoming increasingly resentful the Australia has been pressured to do the same. We have been asking that the Palestinians find a diplomatic rather than an armed solution yet when they attempt to do so by the simple act of asking to join UNESCO we vote with a few other nations to deny them.

I am proud of Australia's history of taking a decidedly principled stand on issues before the UN. Indeed the DFAT website argues “that Australia may be the first nation state to have personnel on the ground in any modern peacekeeping operation”.

Australia is one of the few countries to have made a continuous contribution to United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO) established in 1948 to monitor truces between Israel and its neighbours.

Australia has taken many other quite principled stances on UN issues and it has been part of our view of ourselves as a fair nation. How quickly is our current Prime minister pissing this up against the wall in the name of expediency.

She devalues our history, our standing, our morality and our sense of what it means to be Australian. It serves also to dramatically impact our ability to ever play the 'even handed broker' assisting the Palestinians, Israelis and the Americans to find a resolution. If our ties to the US were to have meant anything constructive then this was one area we could have played a tempering role.

A poisoned chalice regrettably too tempting for Julia.

David Singer,

"I do not intend to respond to anything that does not bear on my article."

You must have heard the story about the lamb and and the wolf:

The wolf told the lamb: "I will eat you because you muddy my water".
The lamb answered: "How can it be? you live upstream and I live downstream, so the waters of the river pass first by you, only then by me".
The wolf said: "never mind all this talking - I will eat you anyway!".

Such is the overwhelming [dis]regard for your pet, the international law, ESPECIALLY when it comes to Israel (and it goes both ways).

When Jews want to expel the Arabs they use the bible as pretext, but when the Arabs and Iranians want to destroy Israel (not just mildly "object to its formation", Imajulianutter - destroy it, killing every man woman and child), they would invent any pretext, such as "Israel is an imperialist branch of the west andthreatens to the U.S.A", or "Israel's liberal democracy can tempt our daughters to go on the loose".

- The truth of course, is that those people would never allow anyone different to live peacefully amongst them, not even Muslims of a different sect (and on Israel's side, reform Jews), how much more so "western liberal democrats".

But you, David, continue to babble about legalities and explain in full detail why it is illegal for more than 3 angels to simultaneously sit on the same needle's tip because that would breach the needle's license, as if anyone cares - meanwhile 3000 new angels already sit on the needle without asking for your legal advice.

If you care about Israel, come down from your ivory tower and defend it with real, practical and moral arguments - we are sick and tired of this legalistic onanism. Legalities never helped Israel anyway. In fact, the only thing that ever saved Israel from extinction is its superior army and weapons.

To Yuyutsu

Ignore the law at your peril.

The PLO application to join the UN did not comply with article 4(1) of the UN Charter as you yourself acknowledged.

That is the issue I addressed in my article in explaining why it failed.

The time and place for "real, practical and moral arguments" is at the negotiating table to which the Palestinian Arabs refuse to return. That is their prerogative but it is not serving their interests