Munich has opened a new front in the Israel-Palestine wars. There John Kerry warned Israel that his peace talks would be the last chance. If they failed, he predicted the rise of BDS and a looming one state solution:
For Israel, the stakes are also enormously high. Do they want a failure that then begs whatever may come in the form of a response from disappointed Palestinians and the Arab community? What happens to the Arab Peace Initiative if this fails? Does it disappear? What happens for Israel’s capacity to be the Israel it is today – a democratic state with the particular special Jewish character that is a central part of the narrative and of the future? What happens to that when you have a bi-national structure and people demanding rights on different terms?
So I think if you – and I’m only just scratching the surface in talking about the possibilities, and I’ve learned not to go too deep in them because it gets misinterpreted that I’m somehow suggesting, “Do this or else,” or something. I’m not. We all have a powerful, powerful interest in resolving this conflict…For Israel there’s an increasing delegitimization campaign that has been building up. People are very sensitive to it. There are [sic] talk of boycotts and other kinds of things. Are we all going to be better with all of that?
Israeli nationalists, who dominate Israel’s political landscape, have raised a great geschrei over this rhetoric. What? Even John Kerry must weary us with talk of boycotts, Intifadas and delegitimization? We don’t hear this enough from our enemies that we have to hear it from him as well.
The result has been shouts of “anti-Semite” and worse. As only these Israel apologists can muster.
But what did Kerry say but the truth? If Bibi digs in his heels and refuses to go the extra mile and the talks fail, then it won’t be just the peace activists behind BDS Israel will have to worry about. It will be entire nations. Wait until the first western country votes to sanction Israeli products. Then what? How long before that snowball picks up speed and comes crashing down the hill?
Even more importantly, the Israeli nationalist tumult over Kerry’s remarks is hypocritical because these are the very same statements being made by Israeli centrist politicians like Tzipi Livni and Yair Lapid. Are they anti-Semites too? Of course, to the Israeli far-right they are. They’re persona non grata in the crazy, topsy-turvy reality the ultra-nationalists inhabit. I’m reminded of the saying popularized by Holoaust survivor, Dr. Hajo Meyer:
Anti-Semites used to be those who hate Jews; now anti-Semites are those Jews hate.
In stretching the definition of “anti-Semite” beyond all reasonable proportion, the nationalists have destroyed the importance and value of the term. Now, whenever there’s a real anti-Semite, that person will be able to deny the charge pointing to the damage done by Israel’s political right.
During the same conference at which Kerry made his remarks, there was a heated exchange between Tzipi Livni and Saeb Erekat. The heat first rose when Livni told Erekat that the Palestinians’ refusal to stop calling Israeli cities like Jaffo and Haifa by their Arabic names was what posed an obstacle to achieving peace. In the meantime, Livni readily referred to the Territories as Judea and Samaria, indicating she was refusing to cede an Israeli claim to Palestinian lands based on a Biblical claim. This seemed a particularly incendiary, provocative and tone-deaf argument for Livni to pose in that context. Such a statement would score political points with the Likudist right-wing, but she was in Munich amidst an internationalist audience.
Erekat naturally took umbrage at an Israel Jew telling him he should give up the right to see Israel as part of his Palestinian heritage, since territory that is Israel was the birthplace of the Palestinian people. It launched this diatribe:
“Israel has to choose between three choices one of which is the two-state solution…
The second choice…if the Israelis want to call Jericho by their Hebrew names “Yeriho” and to call Nablus “Shkheim”, is one state for both peoples.
The third choice…is the use of security pretexts to justify “apartheid” in the West Bank. “Now in 2014, there are streets in the West Bank which I can’t use as a Palestinian,” he added.
Livni responded:
“When this happens, please Saeb, don’t use Arabic names to talk about places in Israel such as Jaffa and Haifa. Well, you can use Arab names, but don’t tell refugees who are waiting in Lebanon and other areas with the keys of their houses that they can return to live in these areas because that is against the two-state solution.”
To which Erekat replied:
“You are talking about historical narratives?…I am the son of Jericho. Last year I celebrated my city’s 10,000th birthday. I am proud to be a descendant of the Canaanites who lived in Jericho 5,500 years before Joshua who burnt Jericho and I will not alter my history.”
In Yisrael HaYom, a prominent Israeli rabbi and law professor, Haim Schein (Hebrew), took up the cudgel (Hebrew) on behalf of Biblical Judaism. He said that if Erekat wanted to be a Canaanite, very well then, we Israeli Jews should give him his wish; while remembering the Biblical command to exterminate those tribes which inhabited the land before the Israelites (among them, the Canaanites ‘natch):
How disturbing to hear, especially in the city of Munich, so near to Dachau, Kerry chose to threaten Israel and persuade its citizens that their sense of security was an illusion and that an economic boycott could be expected if they didn’t accede to international pressure.
John Kerry and the Obama administration has already proven they don’t understand the rules of the Arab world, which have turned lies and deceit into their own unique art form. This too is the reason for the prolonged bloodletting that continues in our region wherever America is involved.
…With his words, Kerry fatally damaged the very process he’s promoting. He encourages Abu Mazen and his friends to resist any possible progress in the path to peace…Under Kerry’s influence the Palestinians have changed their narrative. Instead of being cousins fighting for an inheritance from their common ancestor [Abraham], they’ve now become Canaanites. The meaning of the new narrative is: it’s either them or us. There can never be peace. How to confront the Canaanite legacy? We’ve already received very precise instruction in the Torah.
Schein alludes to this verse from Deuteronomy:
You will not allow a single soul to live. You will exterminate every Hittite, Emorite, Canaanite, and the Prizites, Hivites, and Jebusites as the Lord your God commanded.
Schein has in effect called upon his fellow Israelis (or shall I call them ‘Israelites?’) to harken back to the Bible’s tribal blood feuds and not just ethnically cleanse, but exterminate the Palestinians. He has called for genocide. With a wink and nod, perhaps. But it’s genocide nonetheless.
Will Schein face any legal consequences for advocating genocide in a State built upon the ashes of an earlier historic genocide? Not really. In fact, he’s liable to be added to the next Likud list just behind Moshe Feiglin! Oh, and while I’m on the subject–of which political party is Schein a proud member? You guessed it, Bibi’s Likud. ‘Nuff said.
In a passage from this article I didn’t translate Schein claimed that the Israeli people, in the face of Kerry’s anti-Semitism would become “titanium” in both their strength and their resistance to compromise. For him, this is highest praise. For me, it’s delusional.
Let no reader ever again talk to me of Palestinian incitement, when Israel has such Jewish genocidaires in its midst.
H/t to reader, Ami and 7th Eye.
Let’s pretend most jews won’t turn a blind eye to genocide if there was a plausible false flag. Most jews want to nuke iran, killing millions.
Why cover these values up by pretending jewish values are something they Clearly are not?
Probably because it ruins the perfect victimhood narrative of history’s Jews.
@ goose: Schein’s are not “Jewish” values. They are a perverted version of Jewish values just as Bin Laden’s are a twisted version of Islam.
I would say the goose comment wasn’t even worth publishing!
I would say the Goose comment is worth repeating.
goose, why do you have to turn to lies to make a point. Who said that most Israelis want to nuke Iran?? Other than you of course.
It i always sad when the Israeli?Arab conflict is riddled with hysteria and lies.
Truly a monster has been created by the U.S. administration’s blind support of the foreign nation of Israel. It has allowed Israel to get away with war crimes, with only the very brave able to stand up and be counted. Witness the personal attacks on the wonderful Helen Thomas. Now, as Israel liteally gets away with murder, it’s goal of total ethnic cleansing of Palestine by whatever means necessary is not something they can feel shame about. Really past time to call this terrorist state to the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.
” Really past time to call this terrorist state to the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.”
Uhh…the International Criminal Court doesn’t prosecute States. It prosecutes individuals (and doesn’t do that particularly well either).
BTW. Patricia. What country to you live in?
Shoshanna, you seem to aim at being able to say something nasty about the country that Patricia lives in or comes from. Do you assume that her loyalty will be with her country? Some people have loyalties that are a bit more profound. Has it occurred to you that many of the best people are not discomforted or hurt by criticism of their county because they themselves criticize its bad aspects?
@Eiizabeth
Why not let Patricia speak for herself? Why are you so ‘controlling’?
As many people have/are pointing out, there are many implications to a Jewish state that are detrimental to Palestinians and Israeli Jews alike. In calling recently for the extermination of Palestinians and quoting the following verse from Deuteronomy, Haim Schein brought to my mind an article Sari Nusseibeh, President of Al-Quds University, wrote in Al Jazeera in Sept 2011, in which he points out the danger expressed by Schein’s allusion:
“You will not allow a single soul to live. You will exterminate every Hittite, Emorite, Canaanite, and the Prizites, Hivites, and Jebusites as the Lord your God commanded.”
Sari Nusseibeh writes:
“There is another reason, more serious than all of the seven mentioned above, why Palestinian leaders – and indeed no responsible person – can morally recognise Israel as a “Jewish State” as such. It has to do with the very Covenant of God in the Bible with Ancient Israelites of the promise of a homeland for Jews. God says to Abraham in the Bible:
On the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying:
“To your descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the River Euphrates – the Kenites, the Kenezzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.” (Genesis, 15:18-21; NKJ)
The ancient Israelites then go on to possess this land in the time of Moses, upon God’s command, as follows:
“When the LORD your God brings you into the land which you go to possess, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you, and when the LORD your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them nor show mercy to them. (Deuteronomy, 7:1-2; NKJ)
“Hear, O Israel: You are to cross over the Jordan today, and go in to dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourself, cities great and fortified up to heaven, a people great and tall, the descendants of the Anakim, whom you know, and of whom you heard it said: ‘Who can stand before the descendants of Anak?’ Therefore understand today that the LORD your God is He who goes over before you as a consuming fire. He will destroy them and bring them down before you; so you shall drive them out and destroy them quickly, as the LORD has said to you.” (Deuteronomy, 9:1-4; NKJ)
The fate of many of the original inhabitants is then as follows:
And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, ox and sheep and donkey, with the edge of the sword. (Joshua, 6:21; NKJ)
And this continues even later on in time, as follows:
Samuel also said to Saul: “The LORD sent me to anoint you king over His people, over Israel. Now therefore, heed the voice of the words of the LORD. Thus says the LORD of hosts: ‘I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way when he came up from Egypt. Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them. But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.'” (1 Samuel, 15:1-3; NKJ)
Now it is very easy to cherry-pick quotes from scripture permitting or enjoining violence. One could cite, out of context, verses such as the “sword verse” in the Holy Qur’an:
Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them, and confine them, and lie in wait for them at every place of ambush. But if they repent, and establish prayer and pay the alms, then leave their way free. God is Forgiving, Merciful. (Al-Tawbah, 9:5)
One could even cite verses – again out of context – from Jesus Christ’s own words in the Gospel, as follows:
“But bring here those enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, and slay them before me.'” (Luke, 19:27; NKJ)
“Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword.” (Matthew, 10:34; NKJ)”
Why Israel can’t be a ‘Jewish State’
The Israeli demand to be recognised as a “Jewish state” by the Palestinians is an inherently problematic concept
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2011/09/201192614417586774.html
— with Sari Nusseibeh.
It being the case that
a. “Palestinians” are non-entities in the zionist vision; and
b. Canaanites ARE the original inhabitants of the land; and
c. Unlike Palestinians who “never had a state,” the land of Canaan WAS developed by the most sophisticated ‘state’ of its time, Jericho, which
d. Hebrews destroyed after first suborning its people to betray their own state (ie. Hillary Clinton — er, um Rahab) and a series of spies and agents of subversion;
THEREFORE,
‘Palestinians’ would do well to concede to Israeli Jews that they are right, they are NOT Palestinians.
They are Canaanites, and they have come to reclaim their land and culture and the ancient town of Jericho that they established a gazillion years ago.
The Arabic names for Jaffa and Haifa are very similar to Hebrew ones. Livni’s statement looks simply pathetic — as if some member of the French government was requiring his foreign colleagues to drop the final sibilant in the name of the city of Paris in order to pronounce it the French way.
For goodness’ sake, when one can focus on something that unites Israeli Jews and Arabs (the fact that they speak Semitic languages, for example), why make a special effort to be divisive?
“The heat first rose when Livni told Erekat that the Palestinians’ refusal to stop calling Israeli cities like Jaffo and Haifa by their Arabic names was what posed an obstacle to achieving peace.”
Can someone explain to me why Abbas and the PA staunchly refuse to acknowledge Israel as a Jewish State?
I don’t get it.
@ Shoshana: I’ve written about it here as have many others in many other venues. Do a Google search here or elsewhere, then go and learn, as the Talmud says. We don’t need to go into it again.
Shoshana, do you believe that all human beings, regardless of race, colour and religion are equal? What are your veiws on international law, specifically the Geneva Conventions? The creation of a state for one religious club only at the expense of the indigenous people already living there was the cause, and remains so, of thiz tragedy, not what names are used for towns that were taken by the occupiers.
@Patricia
I believe that humans are equal to the extent that we are all mortal.
I believe that International Law is probably the least substantial of the ‘laws’.
International Law is an infringement on State’s sovereignty, which lacks both enforcement and uniformity of interpretation.
States recognize International Law only so far as it’s in their perceived self interests.
“It is, however, hard to find any principle of due process, the several Geneva Conventions, or the Nuremberg trials that has not been systematically violated in the Holy Land. Examples of criminal conduct include mass murder, extra-judicial killing, torture, detention without charge, the denial of medical care, the annexation and colonization of occupied territory, the illegal expropriation of land, ethnic cleansing and the collective punishment of civilians, including the demolition of their homes, the systematic reduction of their infrastructure and the de-development and impoverishment of entire regions. These crimes have been linked to a concerted effort to rewrite international law to permit actions that it traditionally prohibited, in effect enshrining the principle that might makes right.
As the former head of the Israeli Defense Forces’ (IDF) Legal Department has argued:
“If you do something for long enough the world will accept it. The whole of international law is now based on the notion that an act that is forbidden today becomes permissible if executed by enough countries . . . . International law progresses through violations.”
A colleague of his has extended this notion by pointing out that:
“The more often Western states apply principles that originated in Israel to their own non-traditional conflicts in places like Afghanistan and Iraq, then the greater the chance these principles have of becoming a valuable part of international law.”” — Chas Freeman May 2011 http://www.thejerusalemfund.org/ht/display/ContentDetails/i/29130/pid/897
it is a in a way hilarious how the Israeli media is writing about news like this. Canada: Telling Jews ‘Get Out Or You’re Dead’ Isn’t A Hate Crime. On the same time countless events in Israel which would be hate crimes in most civilized world are under the category “free speech” and at worst as “price tags” (= no inspection of the crime). Free speech for them, but when somebody suggests or does the exactly same things against them there is no room for free speech or “price tags”.
When thousands Jews in Israel shout “let your village burn” ,“death to Mohammad” and “death to all leftists” to Arabs living there on Jerusalem Day marches, that is not seen as a hate crime in Israeli Jewish “moral”, but when somebody in Canada says to pro-Israeli Jews in a demonstration “get out of Israel or be shot” that is a hate crime by the same people. Strange people have a strange moral.
Does Israel have any hate crime laws? If it has there must a clause in those laws – doesn’t apply Jewish citizens. So wild, racist and absurd are many views expressed publicly in the Israeli media.
[This is off-topic & therefore deleted]
It is important to keep in mind that far too many Jews participated in genocide long before the Holocaust started and that plans to genocide the Palestinians can be traced back to Zionist circles in the 1880s.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3342999,00.html
@ Joachim Martillo: Your comment, which is debatable, has nothing to do with the link you offered. You come across as a propagandist rather than someone who has interesting or useful information to impart.
Joachim.
You are a fool and a liar. Find a life.