Beer-Induced Middle-Eastern Enlightenment
Over 3 pints of Miller Light I have finally solved the Arab-Israeli conflict!!!
The first things the Israelis have got to do is ask the Arabs if its OK for them to stay there. I don't think they ever really did that, at least not right, certainly not the first time in 1948...nor have they found a way to effectively do it ever since.
In 1948 The UN issued a mandate establishing the State of Israel, A mandate doesn't sound much like a popularly or democratically determined process, does it? It isn't. It sounds like someone tells you what to do; in this case the British, who had control of Palestine (now Israel) having gotten control of it by defeating the Ottoman Empire in WW I (1918), the Ottomans having had previous control of it.
So in 1948, all local Palestine people (SOME of whom were Jews, most of whom were Arab) were told that they were now going to live under Israeli and Arab
(Palestinian) separate control (according to some ridiculous checkerboard pattern laid down by the UN); a lot of this came because the Jewish settlers of Palestine were bombing British local hotels with a lot of British in them and the British wanted to get out from under. (For those wanting to brush up on the Jewish terrorist groups, look up Irgun and Haggenah, in Wikipedia.)
Of course no one in the UN 1948 ever asked the local indigenous Arabs if the Jews could have Israel in the first place. The World was suffering under post WW II guilt over the Jewish Holocaust (I don't think the Local Arabs were involved in that Nazi action, by the way. Maybe the Jews should have been given Germany). So guilt was the determining factor in the handing over of part of the Palestine UN-checkerboard to the Jews.
After the UN mandate, a war between the unhappy local Arabs and Jews broke out. Arab land was confiscated. Arabs fled. the Jewish pieces of the checkerboard (some would say they were forced out) the Jews took over...and now it's sixty years later: and the Middle East is a cauldron of hatred-beleaguered Israel surrounded by a lot of displaced refugee Palestinians, and a lot of support for them in varying degrees by other Arab and non-Arab Muslim countries surrounding Israel.
Solution: Israel should do what they have never done before: ask the Arabs if its OK to have a religious nation in the Arab-Muslim midst.
I think Israel should stop looking West to the American Empire and look to the East, to the Arabs, Palestinians and their supporters, and ask: what would it take to be allowed to stay here peacefully in your midst as a Jewish country?
The Israeli's sould say: "Look, we've got this little identity thing about remaining purely Jewish. You Muslim nations should understand and empathize with that. Most of you around here are trying to do the same thing. Can we have our little sliver of heaven here, a nation with Jewish control and dominance?
"We can do much for you in return. We're very smart, capable people. We always economically and socially benefit others when we're included in a the group and asked to contribute. We could be of great help to the region. We're not such bad guys.
"Understand how we got a little paranoid after the Holocaust. But you can understand that. 6 million dead! Can't we start get along?"
The first things the Israelis have got to do is ask the Arabs if its OK for them to stay there. I don't think they ever really did that, at least not right, certainly not the first time in 1948...nor have they found a way to effectively do it ever since.
In 1948 The UN issued a mandate establishing the State of Israel, A mandate doesn't sound much like a popularly or democratically determined process, does it? It isn't. It sounds like someone tells you what to do; in this case the British, who had control of Palestine (now Israel) having gotten control of it by defeating the Ottoman Empire in WW I (1918), the Ottomans having had previous control of it.
So in 1948, all local Palestine people (SOME of whom were Jews, most of whom were Arab) were told that they were now going to live under Israeli and Arab
(Palestinian) separate control (according to some ridiculous checkerboard pattern laid down by the UN); a lot of this came because the Jewish settlers of Palestine were bombing British local hotels with a lot of British in them and the British wanted to get out from under. (For those wanting to brush up on the Jewish terrorist groups, look up Irgun and Haggenah, in Wikipedia.)
Of course no one in the UN 1948 ever asked the local indigenous Arabs if the Jews could have Israel in the first place. The World was suffering under post WW II guilt over the Jewish Holocaust (I don't think the Local Arabs were involved in that Nazi action, by the way. Maybe the Jews should have been given Germany). So guilt was the determining factor in the handing over of part of the Palestine UN-checkerboard to the Jews.
After the UN mandate, a war between the unhappy local Arabs and Jews broke out. Arab land was confiscated. Arabs fled. the Jewish pieces of the checkerboard (some would say they were forced out) the Jews took over...and now it's sixty years later: and the Middle East is a cauldron of hatred-beleaguered Israel surrounded by a lot of displaced refugee Palestinians, and a lot of support for them in varying degrees by other Arab and non-Arab Muslim countries surrounding Israel.
Solution: Israel should do what they have never done before: ask the Arabs if its OK to have a religious nation in the Arab-Muslim midst.
I think Israel should stop looking West to the American Empire and look to the East, to the Arabs, Palestinians and their supporters, and ask: what would it take to be allowed to stay here peacefully in your midst as a Jewish country?
The Israeli's sould say: "Look, we've got this little identity thing about remaining purely Jewish. You Muslim nations should understand and empathize with that. Most of you around here are trying to do the same thing. Can we have our little sliver of heaven here, a nation with Jewish control and dominance?
"We can do much for you in return. We're very smart, capable people. We always economically and socially benefit others when we're included in a the group and asked to contribute. We could be of great help to the region. We're not such bad guys.
"Understand how we got a little paranoid after the Holocaust. But you can understand that. 6 million dead! Can't we start get along?"
posted by Cliff Osmond at 5:53 PM
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