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> > > a reply to the "Left" Zionist who disagrees with Eno http://davidbyrne.com/gaza-and-the-loss-of-civilization Peter’s reply is typical “left” Zionist horseshit. Just a few points – Returning to the “biblical homeland” to escape pogroms of the late 19th century was seen as absurd by the *overwhelming majority* of Eastern European Jews who instead followed one of three paths - 1 - retreating into religion and trusting that god would protect them; 2 – joining the revolutionary movement to overthrow Czarism and create a better society; 3 – by far the most popular – getting the hell out and coming to America. Eastern European Jews had *no desire* to come to Palestine to work as farmers. They were mostly city people and if they had an uncle or a second cousin on the Lower East Side of Manhattan or the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn - THAT is where they went. Even five decades later, fleeing Nazism, European Jews wanted to come to the US, but because of anti-Jewish quotas, only about 100,000 got in. The rest were forced to come to Palestine to survive. They thus unintentionally bolstered the Zionist community which was losing more Jews than “ingathering” until the Nazis came to power. He mentions the UN Partition Plan of 1947 but neglects to tell his readers that the UN had *no business* in partitioning another people’s homeland! The Palestinians were certainly not consulted in a “plan” that called for *54% *of their country being given to the Jewish *31%* of the population. That’s why the Palestinians rejected this monstrosity, and this has been used by pro-Zionist historians ever since as a justification for what happened to them – al-Naqba – “the catastrophe.” He tells us that the Arab states declared war and “urged the Palestinians to flee.” Where is the evidence for this claim? Zionists used to claim that “Arabs went on the radio to urge the Palestinians to leave, and that after the Arab armies drove the Jews into the sea, they could return to their land.” Since the BBC monitored all radio broadcasts throughout the region in 1947-48, this should be easy to verify by citing the dates of these radio broadcasts, the names of the radio stations, and the texts of these messages. They never have – why? Because there are documented broadcasts urging the Palestinians – in the face of massacres like Deir Yassin on April 9, 1948 – *to stay*! The Palestinians fled for the same reason that civilians throughout human history flee their homes during war – to avoid violence. They had every intention of returning after the fighting was over, to resume their lives. Peter tells us that “after defeating the Arab armies Israel made it very hard for them return.” A slight understatement – Israel made it *impossible* to return. The Palestinians had all their land, homes, and property – their society - confiscated and they were declared “Absentee Landlords” and if they insisted upon returning, they were demonized as “terrorists.” In order to gain membership in the UN, Israel promised to take back these refugees – they never did. He proceeds to rewrite history by claiming that the 1967 war was “a large scale Arab attack on Israel” whereas it was an *illegal* pre-emptive attack upon Egypt, Syria, and Jordan. Israel claimed the situation to be existential, but Israeli leaders later scoffed at that notion. He assigns responsibility for the illegal West Bank settlements to the right wing governments of the 1980s, whitewashing the fact that it was the Labor Zionists right after 1967 that got the ball rolling. He calls the monarchy of Jordan an example of “good Arab leadership” – but it was King Abdullah of (then) Trans-Jordan who secretly collaborated with the new Israeli state to carve up that part of Palestine that the Zionists had not yet glommed onto. Thus Jordan took over the West Bank and east Jerusalem. The “good” Abdullah was rewarded for his perfidy by being assassinated in 1953 by a Palestinian. Should we shed any tears for him? Peter claims to “have no support for the Israeli position”, but that’s exactly what his reply is all about. He castigates those who oppose Israel for what he implies to be a double standard, their allegedly not being outraged by other moral horrors. Must people take a stand on many issues before they can establish their moral credentials? Does he criticize activists risking their lives to fight Jim Crow in the 1950s and 60s for not endorsing the Ban-the-Bomb movement? Does he criticize 1970s Jewish activists who opposed Soviet anti-Semitism because they did not take a stand against South African apartheid or the Pinochet regime in Chile? To ask the question is to answer it. Only when everyone protests everything will he “join the demonstration.” Can there be any stronger evidence of the political, intellectual, and moral bankruptcy of such “progressivism”? He assures us that “given the opportunity, the Arabs would drive the Jews into the sea” even though several Arab peace proposals over the years have been proffered, only to be ignored by the Israelis and their American protectors, the latest of which was a Saudi offer for full diplomatic and commercial relations if the Palestinians could have a state (almost completely controlled by Israel) on 22% of their nation. “So Israel, once committed to a nation state in that location and *granted that right by other nations*” have had no choice but to fight. *No nation or group of nations had the right to give away Palestine as reparation for German Nazi crimes!* “Israel has lost its way” we are told. If only Begin and Shamir – former terrorists – had not come to power in the 1980s and pushed settlements down Israel’s throat! The original sin of Zionism was not what happened in the 1980s or 1967 or even 1948 – by then, the die was cast. In the 1890s, the movement, inspired by the rampant racist colonialism of Europe’s empire-builders declared Palestine to be “a land *without people* for a people without land”, knowing that there were some *650,000 dark-skinned people*, 6% of whom were Jews. They nevertheless persisted in their effort to lay the foundations for a Jewish state where Jews would get the benefits and privileges – that’s why it’s called a *Jewish* state. In order for this to happen, the demographics had to be reversed. As Herzl himself said, “We will spirit the penniless population across the border while those that remained be denied employment in our country.” *“Our country”!* The “Socialist” Zionists sought to implement this plan in the 1930s with their “Hire Jewish/Buy Jewish” campaign, but that wasn’t sufficient. Even the flood of desperate European refugees from Nazism was only able to bring the Jewish population of Palestine up to 31% by late 1947. Stronger measures were required – Plan Dalet - ethnic cleansing by way of a few massacres and the threat of more. (See Ilan Pappe – *The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine*). “Israel will not leave” – an implication that this what the Palestinians are calling for and not either a Palestinian state alongside Israel or a single state for ALL its inhabitants. This entire reply is a combination of lies of commission and omission. They are nothing new to someone who has done battle with Zionists for over four decades, but after each battle, I feel like taking a long, hot shower to wash away the filth of their disinformation. ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
