relda, I applaud your balanced views on the Palestinian issue.I am glad you have escaped the temptation of falling into the same cynical rant and rave that our friend sharkfin seems to revel in.

I well and truly feel sorry for the plight of the true victims, the Palestinians who have been robbed of their land since 1948.. They are the de jure owners of much of the real estate that Israel has swallowed up. Ok.That said I have to admit that more than half a century has passed and history now tells us that all that land that Israel now occupies has become the de facto right of the occupying power, Israel. Yes.By virtue of conquest even though it abrogates the conventions of the UN Charter of Human Rights.It sets a very bad and dangerous precedent.I realise that. BUT that is the very basis of every country in the world that has done the very same thing over the millenia. You just have to accept it and move on. Most of those living in Israel have come from all parts of the world and you cant expect them to get out and go ....where? They havent been part of the dispossessing acts of piracy.They are innocent of it.
But,relda.The constant creation of new settlements that's going on even today because of the visions of some half-brain rabbi with a name like Kook!! This is impossible to defend no matter how you look at it.

How can you set up a two nation solution to the problem when you have the West Bank on one side of Israel and Gaza on the other? How wiil that help the administration and communication of Gaza and the West Bank? Who is going to pacify Hamas and get them to accept their future?Abbas certainly cannot.
socratease

sharkfin,
I agree, the illegal settlements are a blight on Israel’s credibility, but, and as Al Jazeera reported last November, "...the Israeli government has announced it will cut off all support for more than 100 "illegal" Jewish settler outposts in the occupied West Bank." The outgoing Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, branded the settlers as acting illegally, "There is a not insignificant group of outlaws that are behaving in a manner that is threatening the rule of law." The illegal Jewish settlement does impede peace in the region but is not the underlying obstruction. To reinforce the point a little further. During the period the Gaza Strip was held by Egypt there were no "occupied territories" or "settlements" or any of the other apologia used today to attack Israel – neither was there a peace. Palestinians and the neighboring Arab countries have continuously attacked Israel and worked for the destruction of the Israeli state.

Undoubtedly, there is a polarisation of views on this, and attached to some of those views there’s a mantra based on pure mythology. Believing the presence of a Mahatma Gandhi ‘look-alike’(or perhaps his total ‘re-incarnation’) in the Middle East might rescue the world from an escalation of violence in this region is something of pure myth, “...Surely it would be a crime against humanity to reduce the proud Arabs so that Palestine can be restored to the Jews partly or wholly as their national home." - Mahatma Gandhi, “The Jews in Palestine 1938," published Nov. 26, 1938 in Harijan. This seems to correspond very closely with Achmad Cassiem’s (National Chairperson of the South African Islamic Unity Convention) statement in 2002, "Our position is that even if the Zionist State [Israel] is the size of a postage stamp it has no right to exist. Occupied Palestine must be decolonized, deracialised and restored to the Palestinian people as a single sovereign state.”

A certain hypocrisy is revealed when ‘humanitarians’ fail in their principle for the ‘right self-determination’ of a people, whose symbolic but now also real embodiment rests in their statehood.

Relda wrote: A certain hypocrisy is revealed when ‘humanitarians’ fail in their principle for the ‘right self-determination’ of a people, whose symbolic but now also real embodiment rests in their statehood.

Dear Relda,

I wrote "Self-determination and Human Rights" which was published by the Indian Ocean Peace Institute of the University of Western Australia. It makes the case that self-determination conflicts with other human rights. When a state is established on the basis of an ethnic or religious paradigm those who do not share the basis on which the state is founded are almost always destined to become second-class citizens. I feel ethnic nationalism breeds oppression and that nations should not discriminate on the basis of race, religion or ethnicity. Self-determination which means drawing a national boundary around people based on their ethnicity or religion almost always ensures that discrimination.

I believe that self-determination may be a stopgap to relieve discrimination but should only be used as a stopgap. I oppose Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Marxist or any other state which promotes discrimination among its citizens. In electing Obama the US has shown that one need not be a member of the majority race to be president. That's great! One should not need to be a member of the majority religion or ethnicity either.

david f,
I have a similar understanding and would agree, “…ethnic nationalism breeds oppression and that nations should not discriminate on the basis of race, religion or ethnicity”. The events of world war II, I’d imagine, led to the ‘stop-gap’ measure to which you refer and the subsequent formation of Israel. Inherent in the original human rights declaration of 1948 was the idea of a culture requiring political protection and the strong prima facie case for recognizing the right of a ‘culture group’ to govern themselves. The charter and other resolutions did not insist on full independence as the best way of obtaining self-government, nor include an enforcement mechanism. Despite its universal aspiration, the declaration’s originating motive and spirit was prompted by a ‘need’ to preserve and protect the Jewish ‘people’.

Whilst the definitions for “people” often offered are based on the self-evident ethnicity, language, or history, etc., or defined by "ties of mutual affection or sentiment”, there is not yet a recognised legal definition of "peoples" in international law – and there is not likely for there to be one. Obama has arisen from a ‘people’ from within the nearest we have to a homogeneous nation-state. However, Very few (if any) nation-states in the world have a population reflecting an entirely homogeneous ethnic, cultural community to the exclusion of all others. The search for homogeneity may, in fact, be more likely to lead to repression and human rights violations than to promote the tolerance and plurality which many would claim to be essential values in the twenty first century and beyond.

There are no simple solutions to problems of self-determination, either in theory or in practice, as undoubtedly you also recognise. Those who do seek to simplify it to either an oppressive and exclusionary Nationalism or individual autonomy are likely to be bound to ‘certain hypocrisy’.

socratease,
Sorry, I meant to address my previous to you rather than sharkfin.

Dear Relda,

The term, self-determination, has never had a legal definition. It was first applied in the Versailles treaty dictated by the victorious Allies after WW1. Woodrow Wilson who was the prime exponent of self-determination was an appalling racist. Under the previous administration a black man had no barriers to promotion in the US civil service. Since few had a good education it made little difference. However, it gave some hope and opportunity. Wilson ordered that they could rise no higher than clerk and segregated black civil servants from non-blacks.

The defeated Central Powers were treated differently. Territories were taken from the borders of defeated Germany. Self-determination was applied only to the Austro-Hungarian Empire that was broken up into nations organised on an ethnic basis. With the exception of Czechoslovakia they all went fascist between WW1 and WW2. I suspect Wilson’s motivation was, at least in part, that self-determination would make the Hungarians, assorted Slavs and Jews less likely to want to come to the US. I suspect that was part of the motive for the Balfour Declaration – fewer Yids in England. The Turkish Empire was also broken up, but there was no thought of self-determination for the former Turkish subjects. British and French mandates were good enough for them.

The differing treatments of Germany, Austro-Hungary and Turkey reflected the racist views of many of the academics and educated classes in northern Europe and the US.

Somehow, self-determination has been included in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Considering its origins and the way it has been applied I don’t think it should be.

I have already admitted the awful mistakes of Balfour,the UNO in 1948 and other pro-Zionistas. Should never have happened but history proves me wrong.There is an inevitable factor that has to be taken into acciount and accepted however tragic,distasteful and painful it may be to others. The de facto reality of Israel.It isnt going away.Every attempt to erdicate it as anti-Zionists of every color and shape want will fail in the most awful bloodbath abd even in a nuclear obliteration of millions and that's not a wild exaggeration.Isnt that why Hamas is concentrating on sending its DIY Gards is that the name of their long-range and more sophisticated rockets? sorry.) into southern Israel hoping one may strike Dimona? If everyone sits down and works out a political compromise it can only mean a good life for the victims and for everyone else.There's so much to gain from it. I hope they vote for a good life and security and a denial of violence death and glorification of victimhood where there are NO winners.

Look at the historical examples in Australia and the USA where the indigenous people would like their land back as well.Look at Kashmir.Do Kashmiris really think that the Indians will go away and hand over Kashmir to them? There are many other examples around the world but how far back do you want to go into the historical past? Ancient Britain etc??

socratease