T_M wrote: Uh John, why would you reward the Arabs for launching wars they lose?
That seems like a self-explanatory question but I’ll indulge you anyway. Obviously, I am placing more value onto peace and prosperity than onto living in a constant conflict and holding onto grudges for decades.
Furthermore Arabs didn’t start ’48, ’56 or ’67.
And if you believe so strongly in not “rewarding Arabs for launching wars they lose” then are you in favor of dropping the free trade zone and going back to war with Egypt based on principle?
T_M continued: “Why would you undermine the premise of 242?”
Exactly how does Israel retreating to the green line and gaining universal recognition ‘undermine’ 242 which calls for:
“Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict;
Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force;”
T_M continued: Why would you agree to any deal that establishes UNGAR 194
Another self-explanatory question.. because I believe in the right of return for war refugees and I’m against ethnic cleansing
T_M continued: [UNGAR 194] currently does not enjoy the force of international law behind it (as does 242)
Got a source on that?
T_M continued: …and which these same Arabs rejected in 1948 as the basis of any agreement when their interpretation of 194 is that the Palestinians may “return” to Israel?
Why should what they asked for in 1948 matter? Are you against the Arab League taking less extreme positions, or are you arguing in favor of an Arab ultra hard-line ? It’s hard to tell ?
T_M wrote: “Why aren’t you reporting on the courage of King Abdullah of Jordan who tried mightily to change the paradigm by seeking to have the Arabs improve relations with Israel now?”
I don’t think that’s a realistic goal. Consider the words of Ben Gurion:
“Why should the Arabs make peace? If I was an Arab leader, I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure, God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs, We come from Israel, it’s true, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been anti-Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we came here and stole their country. Why should they accept that?” David Ben-Gurion, quoted in “The Jewish Paradox” by Nathan Goldman, former president of the World Jewish Congress.
T_M wrote: “Why aren’t you discussing the fact that what they have set out here is nothing more than a suggestion that they know will not be acceptable to the Israelis under any circumstances”
I have to call bullshit on this point .. If it ‘will not be acceptable…under any circimstances’ then why did Raanan Gissin call it “a very interesting development, something that should be pursued.” in 2002 ?
T_M continued: “…and that by doing so have proven themselves to be the same intractable Arab countries as in the past. “
T_M are you blind? Didn’t you read the first two paragraphs I wrote? Making peace with Israel was once extremely frowned upon.. now all that has changed and the entire Arab League is making peace offerings. How is that intractable?
T_M continued: “This one doesn’t even meet the criteria Yahad/Meretz believe in and goes even further than the Geneva Accords. Can you imagine a peace plan too far to the Arab side and to the Left that even Beilin would reject it?”
How can you prove that Beilin would reject it ? What exactly do you think are the major differences between the Saudi Plan and Beilin’s Geneva Accord
If Israelis won’t accept it, I guess that’s too bad and it sucks for them and it sucks for the rest of the world’s Jews because the graffitti and temple arsons are rising thanks to Sharon. They’d be shooting themselves in the foot (and us) and choosing to harm themselves out of fear or spite or worship of the land as a false idol or some other unreasonable basis. They will continue to see busses blown up and missiles rain down, and live in a conflict for the forseeable future, because this is the best offer ever offered currently on the table. And all of this for what, to hang on to some 3rd world shithole like Hebron?

John, I had to take a look three times to make sure you actually wrote that the Arabs didn’t start 1948 or 1967. I can see how you might be ignorant about the fedayeen attacks driven by the Egyptians in the ’50s that forced Israel to initiate the ’56 War but I’m sure since it was only terrorists, you would blame the war on Israel and not the fedayeen.
I had a lot of difficulty reading anything you wrote after that because if you are this clueless about those wars, what is the point?
242 does not compel removal from all the territories. This was a choice made by its formulators for a reason. The reason is that you don’t reward belligerents and allow them the same access as before.
As for the difference between General Assembly resolutions and Security Council resolutions, it seems to me that for somebody who holds such strong opinions and is able to quote Ben Gurion, you may wish to research the difference between the applicability of these resolutions according to international law. The Arabs are trying mightily to create an agreement that would bind Israel to 194. When it wasn’t convenient for them, they rejected it. Today, they see it as an advantage so they’re pressing for it. You are in agreement with both of their strategies. Please stay away from Israel, thanks.
You talk about improving relations if Israel capitulates, but then you reject an Arab leader who wants rapprochement first. Could your position be any more twisted? You actually advocate the Arab rejection of any discussions with Israel unless it capitulates completely rather than begin discussions and develop ties first. Incredible.
Gissin called it an interesting development because previously, the Arabs had not expressed an interest in comprehensive peace. He was being accurate, if not forthcoming.
It is intractable because the offer has to be somewhat rooted in reality. If it’s extreme, it isn’t realistic and isn’t a genuine offer, merely window dressing. You bought it lock stock and barrel.
Beilin would have rejected it because he understands that Israel will not go back to ’67 borders. The Geneva Accords, stupidly generous as they are, provide for an exchange of lands between the parties.
Your last paragraph is the funniest thing I’ve read, well, since you wrote that the Arabs didn’t start the 1948 War. Then again, on the basis of the versions of history you believe, the last paragraph makes perfect sense. I realize that “Sharon’s policies” are causing the antisemitism around the world, and not the intractability of the Arabs who didn’t start the ’48 or ’56 or ’67 Wars and truly want peace with all their hearts, but I wonder, was there antisemitism in Europe and Arab lands before Sharon?

How many of these wars would’ve been fought without Zionists trying to establish Israel, and later, since it conveniently has no borders, deciding to expand it? But then it was Arabs who inspired Zionism (part of a secret deal with the Mongolians), so it is ultimately still their fault.

yeah man if like the Jews woulnt exist there would be no antisemitism.Its totally their fault.

“Judaism” is a circumstance of birth or belief; Zionism –real Zionism, not the bumper-sticker variety– is, as with the Kurds or the American Colonies, the activity or at very least the attempt to take someone else’s land (of course it’s really “yours” but they don’t accept that, the silly gooses) by force (“terrorism” until you get your own press organs up and running). They are not comparable. One is an activity that is at best offensive or actionable (certainly it is insane to expect acceptance of this, as Ben-Gurion or Jabotinsky obcserved), the other is a religion and therefore a dying canon of wrong explanations.

Sausage wrote: “…i defy you to show me how Israel started ’48 or ’67.”
“In internal discussion in 1938 [David Ben-Gurion] stated that ‘after we become a strong force, as a result of the creation of a state, we shall abolish partition and expand into the whole of Palestine’…In 1948, Menachem Begin declared that: ‘The partition of the Homeland is illegal. It will never be recognized. The signature of institutions and individuals of the partition agreement is invalid. It will not bind the Jewish people. Jerusalem was and will forever be our capital. Eretz Israel (the land of Israel) will be restored to the people of Israel, All of it. And forever.”
-Noam Chomsky, “The Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel and the Palestinains.”
“Before the end of the mandate and, therefore before any possible intervention by Arab states, the Jews, taking advantage of their superior military preparation and organization, had occupied…most of the Arab cities in Palestine before May 15, 1948. Tiberias was occupied on April 19, 1948, Haifa on April 22, Jaffa on April 28, the Arab quarters in the New City of Jerusalem on April 30, Beisan on May 8, Safad on May 10 and Acre on May 14, 1948…In contrast, the Palestine Arabs did not seize any of the territories reserved for the Jewish state under the partition resolution.”
-British author, Henry Cattan, “Palestine, The Arabs and Israel.”
“Menahem Begin, the Leader of the Irgun, tells how ‘in Jerusalem, as elsewhere, we were the first to pass from the defensive to the offensive…Arabs began to flee in terror…Hagana was carrying out successful attacks on other fronts, while all the Jewish forces proceeded to advance through Haifa like a knife through butter’…The Israelis now allege that the Palestine war began with the entry of the Arab armies into Palestine after 15 May 1948. But that was the second phase of the war; they overlook the massacres, expulsions and dispossessions which took place prior to that date and which necessitated Arab states’ intervention.”
-Sami Hadawi, “Bitter Harvest.”
“The former Commander of the Air Force, General Ezer Weitzman, regarded as a hawk, stated that there was ‘no threat of destruction’ but that the attack on Egypt, Jordan and Syria was nevertheless justified so that Israel could ‘exist according the scale, spirit, and quality she now embodies.’…Menahem Begin had the following remarks to make: ‘In June 1967, we again had a choice. The Egyptian Army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.’
-Noam Chomsky, “The Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel and the Palestinains.”
“I do not think Nasser wanted war. The two divisions he sent to The Sinai would not have been sufficient to launch an offensive war. He knew it and we knew it.”
-Yitzhak Rabin, Israel’s Chief of Staff in 1967, in Le Monde, 2/28/68
“Moshe Dayan, the celebrated commander who, as Defense Minister in 1967, gave the order to conquer the Golan…[said] many of the firefights with the Syrians were deliberately provoked by Israel, and the kibbutz residents who pressed the Government to take the Golan Heights did so less for security than for the farmland…[Dayan stated] ‘They didn’t even try to hide their greed for the land…We would send a tractor to plow some area where it wasn’t possible to do anything, in the demilitarized area, and knew in advance that the Syrians would start to shoot. If they didn’t shoot, we would tell the tractor to advance further, until in the end the Syrians would get annoyed and shoot.
And then we would use artillery and later the air force also, and that’s how it was…The Syrians, on the fourth day of the war, were not a threat to us.'”
-The New York Times, May 11, 1997

Uh, John, you wouldn’t happen to have, uh, you know, some primary sources? I mean, thanks for the Cactus48 cut and paste and the Noam Chomsky cut and paste. Really, much appreciated. But so far, you come off not knowing the first thing about UN resolutions, the first thing about the ’48 war, the first thing about the ’56 war, the first thing about the ’67 war, the first thing about the Geneva Accords, the first thing about your sources and their deep bias.
Are you aware that not even the staunchest revisionist historians claim that the ’48 War was launched by Israel? I mean, if you want to give credence to the Left of the Left and their bullshit sites, I’ll be happy to post their counterparts here. But even the revisionist historians, like Avi Shlaim and Benny Morris, reject your claims about who launched the war. Do you realize how far to the left you have to be that your history rejects that of Avi Shlaim?!
Really John,

JB
1) As I recall, the sticking point – which you did not mention – with the Saudi initiative was that the final verfsion of it (i.e. after it had gone throught the Arab League) required (at Syrian insistence, IIRC), the right of return for the refugees – a position Israel cannot accept. Is the situation different this time?
2) I’d like to address a few of your quotes on 1967. First of all, regarding Begin’s quote, if you read the speech, you’ll see that in the next paragraph, he states “this was a war of self-defense in the noblest sense of the term”.
Regarding the Rabin quote, well, if Rabin said that two divisions in the Sinai were not enough to launch an offensive war, I can’t argue. However, this refers to the situation in the middle of May. By the end of the month, there were six Egyptian divisions in the Sinai, plus several additional brigades, and Israel had intelligence that another 3 brigades had been pulled from Yemen.
Finally, two points regarding Dayan’s quote. first of all, I find it strange that the ones who usually present it are the ones who tend to criticize Israel for harming civilians in ambiguous circumstances, but seem to have no problem with opening fire on tractors. Second, if Dayan’s claim is accurate, why were so many Israelis kileld inside the kibbutzim?

Joe Schmo wrote: “Why don’t you, John Brown, first carefully read web pages that you link to. “The Egyptian government says it is the first step towards a full free trade deal with the United States…””
I could easily ask the same of you.. why didn’t you continue past the section you just quoted to where it says:
“It goes far beyond the … business and the trade. This is another statement by two major forces in the Middle East that they are looking forward to greater cooperation,” said Israeli Trade and Industry Minister Ehud Olmert.
“Economic interests are not the only goals… It is our deep belief that the Qualified Industrial Zones protocol will contribute to a just and comprehensive peace,” added Egyptian Foreign Trade and Industry Minister Rachid Mohamed Rachid.
[…]
The United States has been promoting QIZs in the Middle East to help Israel break out of its economic isolation.”
This is exactly what I was talking about in terms of how through trade interdependence war can be made less likely
How can anyone reading this site not realize that Egypt is only doing it for their own economic survival and to have trade with the US??!! Look how foolish we are to try to convince ourselves that our enemies love us!
I never said it was anything but economic interest. Again go back and look at the overall focus of my post. The thesis is that as economic interdependence increases, the chance of war becomes less likely. Does that claim Egypt “loves” Israel? No it doesn’t. Your argument is a ‘straw man’ argument.
Joe Schmo continued: “There is no precedent in world history for an agressor not to agress because they were given land.”
Ah, but there IS a precedent for my thesis that economic interdependence lessens the chance of war.

sara : Do you know the difference between quoting Chomsky and citing Chomsky’s quote from Ben Gurion. or citing Chomsky’s quote from General Ezer Weitzman ?
Do you deny the veracity of the Ben Gurion and Weitzman quotes? Or are you grasping at straws now?

sara : Do you know the difference between quoting Chomsky and citing Chomsky’s quote from Ben Gurion. or citing Chomsky’s quote from General Ezer Weitzman ?
Do you deny the veracity of the Ben Gurion and Weitzman quotes? Or are you grasping at straws now?
Speaking for myself here, I deny application of quotes selected and placed out of context as proof of anything. If you call that “grasping at straws” then I sir am guilty as charged. It doesn’t make your statements any more accurate though.

Joe Schmo wrote: “Both [Egypt and Jordan] don’t allow Jews to live there.”
That’s not true
Egypt does not deny Jews the right to live there
and I never mentioned Jordan

Hilarious. It’s up to me “to disprove the veracity of Chomsky’s Ben Gurion quote” of an “internal discussion”? How about, since you quoted the quote of the quote, show us where Chomsky got his record of this “internal discussion”. Otherwise it’s just another “chit-chat around the table at intermission” antisemitic or not (that was my only point). I’m even willing to believe Ben-Gurion said this (though the context may be quite important in understanding the meaning of the quote.). However it’s up to you, the individual who is quoting a quote of a quote, to convince readers why we should beieve that Chomsky’s record of this “internal chit-chat” (around a table or not) is accurate. How can I prove that it’s false? Try to prove that there are no invisble gremlins controlling your thoughts currently. (I dare you.)
“owned”
Is this some sort of juvenile (and unearned) attempt at trash-talk? Why are over-zealous extremists such as yourself always so overly-confident? You really think your incomplete response to my goading gives you “ownership” of the truth? That is exremism Mr. Brown. Wake-up from your dogmatic slumber.

Hey John, I found some excellent secondary sources! 😆
The 1948 War
by Mitchell Bard
———————– ———————– ———————– ———–
Violence in the Holy Land broke out almost immediately after the UN announced partition on November 29, 1947. Jamal Husseini, the Arab Higher Committee’s spokesman, had told the UN prior to the partition vote the Arabs would drench “the soil of our beloved country with the last drop of our blood . . . .”1
Husseini’s prediction began to come true after the UN announcement. The Arabs declared a protest strike and instigated riots that claimed the lives of 62 Jews and 32 Arabs. By the end of the second week, 93 Arabs, 84 Jews and 7 Englishmen had been killed and scores injured. From November 30­February 1, 427 Arabs, 381 Jews and 46 British were killed and 1,035 Arabs, 725 Jews and 135 British were wounded. In March alone, 271 Jews and 257 Arabs died in Arab attacks and Jewish counter­attacks.2
The chairman of the Arab Higher Committee said the Arabs would “fight for every inch of their country.”3 Two days later, the holy men of Al-Azhar University in Cairo called on the Muslim world to proclaim a jihad (holy war) against the Jews.4
The first large-scale assaults began on January 9, 1948, when approximately 1,000 Arabs attacked Jewish communities in northern Palestine. By February, the British said so many Arabs had infiltrated they lacked the forces to run them back.5 In fact, the British turned over bases and arms to Arab irregulars and the Arab Legion.
In the first phase of the war, lasting from November 29, 1947 until April 1, 1948, the Palestinian Arabs took the offensive, with help from volunteers from neighboring countries. The Jews suffered severe casualties and passage along most of their major roadways was disrupted.
On April 26, 1948, Transjordan’s King Abdullah said:
[A]ll our efforts to find a peaceful solution to the Palestine problem have failed. The only way left for us is war. I will have the pleasure and honor to save Palestine.7
Arabs Take Responsibility
The UN blamed the Arabs for the violence. The UN Palestine Commission was never permitted by the Arabs or British to go to Palestine to implement the resolution. On February 16, 1948, the Commission reported to the Security Council:
Powerful Arab interests, both inside and outside Palestine, are defying the resolution of the General Assembly and are engaged in a deliberate effort to alter by force the settlement envisaged therein.8
The Arabs were blunt in taking responsibility for starting the war. Jamal Husseini told the Security Council on April 16, 1948:
The representative of the Jewish Agency told us yesterday that they were not the attackers, that the Arabs had begun the fighting. We did not deny this. We told the whole world that we were going to fight.9
The British commander of Jordan’s Arab Legion, John Bagot Glubb admitted:
Early in January, the first detachments of the Arab Liberation Army began to infiltrate into Palestine from Syria. Some came through Jordan and even through Amman . . . They were in reality to strike the first blow in the ruin of the Arabs of Palestine.10
Despite the disadvantages in numbers, organization and weapons, the Jews began to take the initiative in the weeks from April 1 until the declaration of independence on May 14. The Haganah captured several major towns including Tiberias and Haifa, and temporarily opened the road to Jerusalem.
The partition resolution was never suspended or rescinded. Thus, Israel, the Jewish State in Palestine, was born on May 14, as the British finally left the country. Five Arab armies (Egypt, Syria, Transjordan, Lebanon and Iraq) immediately invaded Israel. Their intentions were declared by Azzam Pasha, Secretary-General of the Arab League: “This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades.”11
Superpowers Recognize Israel
The United States, the Soviet Union and most other states immediately recognized Israel and indicted the Arabs. The United States urged a resolution charging the Arabs with breach of the peace.
Soviet delegate Andrei Gromyko told the Security Council, May 29, 1948:
This is not the first time that the Arab states, which organized the invasion of Palestine, have ignored a decision of the Security Council or of the General Assembly. The USSR delegation deems it essential that the council should state its opinion more clearly and more firmly with regard to this attitude of the Arab states toward decisions of the Security Council.12
The initial phase of the fighting ended after the Security Council threatened July 15 to cite the Arab governments for aggression under the Charter. By this time, the Haganah had been renamed the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and succeeded in stopping the Arab offensive.
The Bernadotte Plan
During the summer of 1948, Count Folke Bernadotte was sent by the UN to Palestine to mediate a truce and try to negotiate a settlement. Bernadotte’s plan called for the Jewish State to relinquish the Negev and Jerusalem to Transjordan and to receive the western Galilee. This was similar to the boundaries that had been proposed prior to the partition vote, and had been rejected by all sides. Now, the proposal was being offered after the Arabs had gone to war to prevent partition and a Jewish state had been declared. The Jews and Arabs both rejected the plan.
Ironically, Bernadotte found little enthusiasm among the Arabs for independence. He wrote in his diary:
The Palestinian Arabs had at present no will of their own. Neither have they ever developed any specifically Palestinian nationalism. The demand for a separate Arab state in Palestine is consequently relatively weak. It would seem as though in existing circumstances most of the Palestinian Arabs would be quite content to be incorporated in Transjordan.13
The failure of the Bernadotte scheme came as the Jews began to have greater success in repelling the invading Arab forces and expanding control over territory outside the partition boundaries.
The United States Holds Back Support
The Jews won their war of independence with minimal help from the West. In fact, they won despite efforts to undermine their military strength.
Although the United States vigorously supported the partition resolution, the State Department did not want to provide the Jews with the means to defend themselves. “Otherwise,” Undersecretary of State Robert Lovett argued, “the Arabs might use arms of U.S. origin against Jews, or Jews might use them against Arabs.”14 Consequently, on December 5, 1947, the U.S. imposed an arms embargo on the region.
Many in the State Department saw the embargo as yet another means of obstructing partition. President Truman nevertheless went along with it hoping it would be a means of averting bloodshed. This was naive given Britain’s rejection of Lovett’s request to suspend weapons shipments to the Arabs and subsequent agreements to provide additional arms to Iraq and Transjordan.15
The Arabs had no difficulty obtaining all the arms they needed. In fact, Jordan’s Arab Legion was armed and trained by the British, and led by a British officer. At the end of 1948 and beginning of 1949, British RAF planes flew with Egyptian squadrons over the Israel-Egypt border. On January 7, 1949, Israeli planes shot down four of the British aircraft.16
The Jews, on the other hand, were forced to smuggle weapons, principally from Czechoslovakia. When Israel declared its independence in May 1948, the army did not have a single cannon or tank. Its air force consisted of nine obsolete planes. Although the Haganah had 60,000 trained fighters, only 18,900 were fully mobilized, armed and prepared for war.17 On the eve of the war, chief of operations Yigael Yadin told David Ben-Gurion: “The best we can tell you is that we have a 50­50 chance.”18
The cost to Israel, however, was enormous. “Many of its most productive fields lay gutted and mined. Its citrus groves, for decades the basis of the Yishuv’s [Jewish community] economy, were largely destroyed.”19 Military expenditures totaled approximately $500 million. Worse yet, 6,373 Israelis were killed, nearly one percent of the Jewish population of 650,000.
NOTES
1J.C. Hurewitz, The Struggle For Palestine, (NY: Shocken Books, 1976), p. 308.
2Facts on File Yearbook, (NY: Facts on File, Inc., 1948), p. 231.
3New York Times, (December 1, 1947).
4Facts on File 1948, p. 48.
5Facts on File 1947, p. 231.
6Netanel Lorch, One Long War, (Jerusalem: Keter Books, 1976), p. 47; Ralph Patai, ed., Encyclopedia of Zionism and Israel, (NY: McGraw Hill, 1971), pp. 307­308.
7Howard Sachar, A History of Israel, (NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1979), p. 322.
8Security Council Official Records, Special Supplement, (1948), p. 20.
9Security Council Official Records, S/Agenda/58, (April 16, 1948), p. 19.
10John Bagot Glubb, A Soldier with the Arabs, (London: Staughton and Hodder, 1957), p. 79.
11Isi Leibler, The Case For Israel, (Australia: The Globe Press, 1972), p. 15.
12Security Council Official Records, SA/Agenda/77, (May 29, 1948), p. 2.
13Folke Bernadotte, To Jerusalem, (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1951), p. 113.
14Foreign Relations of the United States 1947, (DC: GPO, 1948), p. 1249. [Henceforth FRUS].
15Mitchell Bard, The Water’s Edge and Beyond, (NJ: Transaction Books, 1991), pp. 171­175; FRUS, pp. 537­39; Robert Silverberg, If I Forget Thee O Jerusalem: American Jews and the State of Israel, (NY: William Morrow and Co., Inc., 1970), pp. 366, 370; Shlomo Slonim, “The 1948 American Embargo on Arms to Palestine,” Political Science Quarterly, (Fall 1979), p. 500.
16Sachar, p. 345.
17Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre, O Jerusalem!, (NY: Simon and Schuster, 1972), p. 352.
18Golda Meir, My Life, (NY: Dell, 1975), pp. 213, 222, 224.
19Sachar, p. 452.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrar…

Sharon, when presented with the Saudi “peace plan” said that although Israel could not accept it completely, he would be willing to discuss it at the Arab League conference. The Arabs turned it down.
The Saudi proposal was important because it signified that Arab countries will, under the right circumstances, grudgingly recognize that Israel exists and isn’t going away.
As a peace plan, it is largely word for word demands of the Palestinians, or “give us everything back that we lost because we went to war against you.”
Israel will have to give a lot back, but pre 1967 borders is a non-starter.

I’m sorry, but Merliner speaks the truth.
You know you wanted to say it, the whole lot of ya, but you didn’t have the balls.
BTW, my choice is blithering fool with a dash of self-hate.

One other thing.
The Arab establishment must maintain its rejectionist stance against Jewish national self-determination. Because if they don’t, then they lose the propaganda value of focusing their constituents’ rage upon the convenient Zionist bogeyman. Further, this has been a valuable lesson learned by American conservatives by focusing the resentment of their base against a monolithic and mythic “liberal elite.” Hence all the fun our friends shtreimel, Merliner and others have painting all liberals with the broad brush of Chomskyite lunacy.

Not only is there an economic correlation between interdependency and conflict resolution, there is also an economic correlation the other way: between depravity and fundamentalism. Economic factors serve as a very crucial aspect of geopolitical stability, but they are rarely the ONLY factor. I found this great summary about it here:
http://www.newzionist.com/?p=4…
and then here: http://www.newzionist.com/?p=4…

TM,
Been there, done that. You wanna debate him, go right ahead. Personally, after having one too many debates with Brown, and observing brighter folks than myself provide him with document, after document pointing out how silly (and I believe dangerous….our enemies love Jews like Brown, Finkelstein, etc) his ideas are, I sleep just fine makng Ad Hominem attacks.
Remember TM, this shit with Brown has been going on for a long time (Check out his site. Brown isn’t some misguided fool who needs some Jewlicioius sources to clarify his confusion.). Brown deserves nothing more and nothing less than the insults that fly his way.

I do agree that economic interdependence is good for peace. That’s one reason why we should lament that the recycled Saudi initiative replaced Kind Abdullah’s bold call for immediate recognition.
Apparently Chad will be re-establishing relations with Israel. Chad isn’t a member of the Arab League, and was not one of the original rejectors of Israel (they cut ties in the 1970s, when the Arab nations threatened anyone who didn’t fall in line with their policy of non-recognition). But it is a positive sign nonetheless.

Uh, your point was “the economic interdependency approach to peace?” Oh.
Yeah, when there’s peace and both sides rely upon each other for stability and growth, it’s good for the economy. Brilliant thesis.
Except when it’s not and you get a maniacal leader, like, say, Arafat, who prefers to lead by war than by peace. In the meantime, therefore, you must be sure that you don’t put the peace ahead of the economic benefits because you may hurt yourself in the long run.

Here’s a good article about the Arab League and their “offer.” It comes from one of Haaretz’s writers who leans heavily to the Left.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/s…

In response to TM and John Brown, I think those guys were arguing that economic interdepende can pave the way to peace, on both internal and external levels, regardless of the politics. I had to go reread the article becuase I’m not an econ person by any means (film school and all, you know). They seem to make sense to me… Does anybody know anything about them?

Raul, 3/4 of the argument for Oslo was predicated around the idea of economic interdependence. As they say, this ain’t brain surgery to figure out. The problem is that if getting there means going back to pre-’67 just because the Arabs feel like the Israelis should, it’s not a realistic expectation. Neither, for that matter is the expectation that Israel should acquiesce to 194, just because they want it to agree to it. 194 is all about the so-called “right of return.” That’s code for end to the Jewish state and everybody understands this.

Jared, the sunday school Zionist history version of the ’56 war doesn’t fly anymore. John Brown has it wrong on ’48 and ’67, but right here. This one was Israel’s bad. Even the tedious Mitch Bard gets it right in his blurb on that war.
Egypt was being led by Nasser who announced an aggressive development program in 1952 for which he was lobbying for funds from around the world. He started by raising funds mainly through the UN, World Bank and the Western Democratic nations but soon sought the assistance of Communist nations. When an arms deal with Czechoslovakia went through, US Secretary of State John Dulles announced withdrawal of US funds and assistance for Nasser’s development program. In response to the harsh treatment of Egypt by the United States, Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal on July 26, 1956.
The nationalization of the canal took the world by surprise, especially the British and French stockholders who owned the Suez Canal Company. Although Nasser promised that the company would be compensated for its loss, Britain, France, and Israel began plotting to take back the canal and overthrow Nasser as well. Britain, France and Israel united in secret in what was to become known as the tripartite collusion, something that they denied publicly for many years. Israel opted to participate in the plans against Egypt to gain favor in the sight of western nations because the small developing nation was in constant fear of being overrun by Arab nations.
Arrangements were made for Israel to make the initial invasion of Egypt and overtake one side of the Suez Canal. The British and French attempted to follow the Israeli invasion with diplomacy, but they were unsuccessful, so they were forced to send in troops to occupy the canal. However, the action on the part of the tripartite collusion was not viewed in favor by the US or the Soviet Union since their intervention signified their predominance in the area.

Mmm, yes, but it’s not that black and white. They never taught me about the Lavon affair in sunday school. I think ’56 was a bit more complex than ’67 and ’48, which is the point I was making. Somehow I missed the line about temple arsons and graffiti being Sharon’s fault. It’s funny because anti-Semitic graffiti (“Kill Jews” was a popular one) and vandalism popped up in Berkeley in early 2001, before Sharon was elected. I never cease to be amazed at those who assign responsibility for evil actions not to the ones who do them, but rather scapegoat the victims themselves. Call it self-loathing, self-hating, whatever. I just call it sad.