• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

And we got what out of the embassy move in Israel?

OlNate said:
hehe...well, there would be slight bias, it is Al Jazeera, after all...hehe... But I was more looking at the historical record, which is what is it is, bias notwithstanding.

Given that I have never claimed that Israel is the sole party to blame, I have no problem acknowledging your rebuttals. I'm just not sure how they make the Jerusalem situation better. There is certainly bad behavior on both sides, and in this case I don't think they cancel each other out. These are UN designations, and international laws. Which, of course, are not binding, but also reduce the amount of sympathy you are given. If America didn't have such a love affair with Israel, they would have most certainly been wiped out - or, maybe, they would have found a compromise.
Click to expand...

From what I gather they were starting to reach that compromise in the 1990s. But by now, two decades after the Oslo Accords failed to deliver peace, it seems unlikely that bilateral negotiation is going to succeed in the foreseeable future. Jerusalem probably is and always would be the biggest sticking point in any such efforts, so perhaps clear backing for Israel taking Jerusalem entirely off the table could eventually - if the finality of it is ever accepted - mean one less thing to fight over. Wishful thinking perhaps, but in any case the move was unlikely to make the situation any worse in the long term than it's already been for decades.

I would guess that most Israelis would be happy with a two state solution, if their security from terror attacks could be assured, and I'd further guess that all but the most radical hard-liners would be happy to trade at least some if not most of their settlement activities for an unequivocal claim to Jerusalem as a whole. So perhaps, behind the scenes, there could be a unilateral offering in the making. Probably wishful thinking again. But if it were, I wonder how many and how long Palestinians would reject a solution granting even just a portion of what they'd like?

The cold reality is that if bilateral negotiations don't work and the conflict continues, despite some direct victims and fear generated by terror attacks against Israel it's mostly the Palestinians who will continue getting the shorter end of the stick. Both sides have done wrong and both sides have the greater grievances in their own eyes, so beyond pinpointing radicals on both sides trying to assign blame for why the bilateral approach failed is unlikely to be productive. But in the long run virtually any solution is better than perpetual conflict. So we can perhaps hope that, at its best, the embassy move might be a precursor intended as a cold dose of reality to warn Palestinians to grab what they can when it's offered lest more and more is permanently taken off the table. If so, and depending on how much of the West Bank were offered, it might even prove successful - who but the most radical extremists would want to keep going with decades of attrition in an obviously-futile hope of getting Jerusalem?
 
Mithrae said:
From what I gather they were starting to reach that compromise in the 1990s. But by now, two decades after the Oslo Accords failed to deliver peace, it seems unlikely that bilateral negotiation is going to succeed in the foreseeable future. Jerusalem probably is and always would be the biggest sticking point in any such efforts, so perhaps clear backing for Israel taking Jerusalem entirely off the table could eventually - if the finality of it is ever accepted - mean one less thing to fight over. Wishful thinking perhaps, but in any case the move was unlikely to make the situation any worse in the long term than it's already been for decades.

I would guess that most Israelis would be happy with a two state solution, if their security from terror attacks could be assured, and I'd further guess that all but the most radical hard-liners would be happy to trade at least some if not most of their settlement activities for an unequivocal claim to Jerusalem as a whole. So perhaps, behind the scenes, there could be a unilateral offering in the making. Probably wishful thinking again. But if it were, I wonder how many and how long Palestinians would reject a solution granting even just a portion of what they'd like?

The cold reality is that if bilateral negotiations don't work and the conflict continues, despite some direct victims and fear generated by terror attacks against Israel it's mostly the Palestinians who will continue getting the shorter end of the stick. Both sides have done wrong and both sides have the greater grievances in their own eyes, so beyond pinpointing radicals on both sides trying to assign blame for why the bilateral approach failed is unlikely to be productive. But in the long run virtually any solution is better than perpetual conflict. So we can perhaps hope that, at its best, the embassy move might be a precursor intended as a cold dose of reality to warn Palestinians to grab what they can when it's offered lest more and more is permanently taken off the table. If so, and depending on how much of the West Bank were offered, it might even prove successful - who but the most radical extremists would want to keep going with decades of attrition in an obviously-futile hope of getting Jerusalem?
Click to expand...

Sorry but that is a massively naive oversimplification of having given up the embassy move for absolutely nothing in return from Bibi that actually moves the peace process forward. Of course, Trump might have traded it for Bibi's utterly meaningless report on Iran and its nuclear program which would actually make the whole affair even more distasteful. Trump would have traded the embassy move to sate his base in two ways, the embassy move itself and to support his ripping up the Iran deal. The so called apolitical President does not do a single thing that does not benefit him in some way either politically or financially.
 
jnug said:
Sorry but that is a massively naive oversimplification of having given up the embassy move for absolutely nothing in return from Bibi that actually moves the peace process forward. Of course, Trump might have traded it for Bibi's utterly meaningless report on Iran and its nuclear program which would actually make the whole affair even more distasteful. Trump would have traded the embassy move to sate his base in two ways, the embassy move itself and to support his ripping up the Iran deal. The so called apolitical President does not do a single thing that does not benefit him in some way either politically or financially.
Click to expand...

From what I've read and seen of him, I have virtually no respect for Trump as a leader and even less as a person, but if there's one reliable thing about the man it would be his ego. As I said to disgruntled Hillary fans after the election (in the rare event that anyone asked my opinion :lol: ), upsetting as Trump's election may be what we should all be hoping for is that this ego makes him want to go down in history as a great president, rather than just using it as an opportunity to line his own and cronies' pockets. Being instrumental in a solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict would be a pretty big feather in his cap, even if the Palestinians weren't entirely happy about their share. And as I've tried to suggest, if that were the intention - which admittedly is a pretty big if - there could be a sound reason why unequivocal support for Israeli Jerusalem has not been accompanied by any other visible moves: In the hopes that it might serve as a cold dose of reality compelling the underdogs to accept what they can while they can, if and when a unilateral path towards a two-state solution is eventually offered.

Bilateralism has failed, so what else is there? And even if something along these lines were intended by Trump's team, and even if it failed, they'd still have gained the domestic political capital you're describing, so it's not like there's any downside. Imperfect though such a unilateral solution would be, it's got to be better than ongoing decades of attrition, so we can at least hope that something like this is indeed in the cards.
 
Mithrae said:
From what I gather they were starting to reach that compromise in the 1990s. But by now, two decades after the Oslo Accords failed to deliver peace, it seems unlikely that bilateral negotiation is going to succeed in the foreseeable future. Jerusalem probably is and always would be the biggest sticking point in any such efforts, so perhaps clear backing for Israel taking Jerusalem entirely off the table could eventually - if the finality of it is ever accepted - mean one less thing to fight over. Wishful thinking perhaps, but in any case the move was unlikely to make the situation any worse in the long term than it's already been for decades.

I would guess that most Israelis would be happy with a two state solution, if their security from terror attacks could be assured, and I'd further guess that all but the most radical hard-liners would be happy to trade at least some if not most of their settlement activities for an unequivocal claim to Jerusalem as a whole. So perhaps, behind the scenes, there could be a unilateral offering in the making. Probably wishful thinking again. But if it were, I wonder how many and how long Palestinians would reject a solution granting even just a portion of what they'd like?

The cold reality is that if bilateral negotiations don't work and the conflict continues, despite some direct victims and fear generated by terror attacks against Israel it's mostly the Palestinians who will continue getting the shorter end of the stick. Both sides have done wrong and both sides have the greater grievances in their own eyes, so beyond pinpointing radicals on both sides trying to assign blame for why the bilateral approach failed is unlikely to be productive. But in the long run virtually any solution is better than perpetual conflict. So we can perhaps hope that, at its best, the embassy move might be a precursor intended as a cold dose of reality to warn Palestinians to grab what they can when it's offered lest more and more is permanently taken off the table. If so, and depending on how much of the West Bank were offered, it might even prove successful - who but the most radical extremists would want to keep going with decades of attrition in an obviously-futile hope of getting Jerusalem?
Click to expand...

I agree with pretty much all of this...except for Jerusalem to be "taken off the table" (which it would never be if one side or the other gets exclusive ownership), it needs to be made into the international city it was intended to be, with no Jewish or Muslim ownership (putting it that way because it's a religious contention). This shouldn't be about warning Palestinians, this should be about the fact that the three Abrahamic religions, which encompass over 50% of the world's population, have Jerusalem at the heart of their faith, and they should be able to travel there without worrying that territorial disputes over the city could put them in danger...or worse, they shouldn't have to feel like they have to engage in a holy war to gain access.

Other than that, I agree...it's a mess, and yes, it's the Palestinians that most often get the short end of the stick...though given their methods, I don't think the Israelis have any less reason to be pissed off. The only reason, in my mind, that the Israelis get held to a higher level of accountability is because they are the ruling demographic, and look at what is happening under their leadership... But that's really all the separates the two in my mind. Both have killed children, both have refused to listen to reason. Neither deserves exclusive rights to Jerusalem.

In my opinion...
 
jnug said:
You mean the billions of their own dollars that had been frozen by sanctions. Its not like we opened the treasury and gave them our money. It was their money. While you can question the decision to unfreeze the assets people keep pushing this fantasy that it was not Iran's money as does Donald.

We unfroze $100b, not $150b and about $55b of that was caught up in past debts so $55b went to paying the past debts. There was $1.7b in disputed funds that was released as part of the deal plus $400m of funds paid by the former Shah of Iran for arms that had never been delivered that we just sat on for about 35 years. That is it. That is all the money. So we can stop with the "we gave money to Iran" nonsense. It was their money.
Click to expand...

Yes, that is what I mean.

How did that action benefit the US?
 
OlNate said:
Ok, well, then yes. But the reason the concern is there isn't because I didn't get my way... That would be Israel, if America hadn't shown their support. My concern is what the cost will be for pandering to Israel.

The reality is Israel has no business being in Jerusalem to begin with.

https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/05/jerusalem-capital-israel-170524091310050.html
Click to expand...

LOL, the Jewish people have no business being in Jerusalem? C'mon, that's incredibly silly on an epic scale.
 
Mithrae said:
Jerusalem probably is and always would be the biggest sticking point in any such efforts, so perhaps clear backing for Israel taking Jerusalem entirely off the table could eventually - if the finality of it is ever accepted - mean one less thing to fight over.
Click to expand...

It also means that as the U.S. we have it's something we no longer have to offer to Israel in exchange for a compromise.

It's more likely that the Palestinians will lose hope that a peaceful resolution is possible. The moderate Palestinians will lose power and the conflict will escalate pulling in even our Muslim allies.

Then when another terrorist attacks us we'll pretend like we didn't do anything.

The Middle East is a mess. We need to step away from the mess not get more deeply involved. We don't need to take sides.
 
OpportunityCost said:
LOL, the Jewish people have no business being in Jerusalem? C'mon, that's incredibly silly on an epic scale.
Click to expand...

Why? Because the Bible? lol... I'm talking legally. As in international law. Sorry, is that "incredibly silly on an epic scale"?

Careful, I assume you are American, you sure you want to start talking about right to land, based on historic residence? hehe... ;)

Besides, Christians, Muslims, and Jews all claim Jerusalem, and they have all fought over her. Good luck proving that one more than the others "deserves" her on any historic or religious basis...
 
OlNate said:
Why? Because the Bible? lol... I'm talking legally. As in international law. Sorry, is that "incredibly silly on an epic scale"?

Careful, I assume you are American, you sure you want to start talking about right to land, based on historic residence? hehe... ;)

Besides, Christians, Muslims, and Jews all claim Jerusalem, and they have all fought over her. Good luck proving that one more than the others "deserves" her on any historic or religious basis...
Click to expand...

That's means they have some business being there, not that they have no business being there. You are disproving your own statement.
 
OpportunityCost said:
That's means they have some business being there, not that they have no business being there. You are disproving your own statement.
Click to expand...

Am I really being that bad at communicating today, or are you simply being that deliberately obtuse? According to International law, they have no right to settle there, nor call it their capital. End of story.
 
I'd say we got the same thing Truman got when he was the first to recognize the Israeli state. Nothing. Sometimes you do the right thing without expecting anything in return.
 
OlNate said:
Am I really being that bad at communicating today, or are you simply being that deliberately obtuse? According to International law, they have no right to settle there, nor call it their capital. End of story.
Click to expand...

An international law that doesn't allow a country to self determine its capital is breaching that country's sovereignty and forfeiting the court's authority by overreaching.
 
Casper said:
What have they done in your opinion to considered to be one of our "greatest allies"?
Click to expand...

One of the best intelligence providers for the middle east for one.

A more intelligent question would relate to what the US and Europe has done for them after 1948 in regards to a "checkerboard" called borders.
 
RetiredUSN said:
One of the best intelligence providers for the middle east for one.

A more intelligent question would relate to what the US and Europe has done for them after 1948 in regards to a "checkerboard" called borders.
Click to expand...

They cherry pick what they pass on to us, and other than that they do nothing for us except take Billions in aide.
 
humbolt said:
I'd say we got the same thing Truman got when he was the first to recognize the Israeli state. Nothing. Sometimes you do the right thing without expecting anything in return.
Click to expand...

Are you quoting "The Art of the Deal?"

Surely, it would have been smarter if Israel gave something to the Palestinians so it could look like both sides benefited.
 
What the UN and mainly the UK and the US did wrong at the creation of Israel was simply make this absurd assumption that the Palestinians would just move off and integrate into other surrounding Arab nations...a laughably absurd, racist and entirely WASPish notion that was defunct from the start. They should have resolved the issue of the Palestinians as they were resolving the issue of Israel in an Israeli State...and now....here we are.

The Israeli lobbies in the UK and the US are in for some blame as well. But its not actually their fault that people in power did not tell them to hold onto their yarmulkas.
 
Last edited:
SonOfDaedalus said:
Are you quoting "The Art of the Deal?"
Click to expand...

I've never read The Art of the Deal. I don't intend to read it. I was quoting Humbolt.

Surely, it would have been smarter if Israel gave something to the Palestinians so it could look like both sides benefited.
Click to expand...

The Palestinian people would definitely benefit from leaders that don't embezzle public funds. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been stolen from the Palestinian people by thieves in the guise of leadership positions. Arrafat was offered everything he asked for, and he walked away from it because conflict was more profitable for him than peace.
 
Fletch said:
I was speaking of exclusively of Hamas in Gaza. Are you going to pretend they arent a terrorist, theocratic, totalitarian state? Or are you the one who is brainwashed.
Click to expand...

The one who is brainwashed is you. You are acting and sounding like nothing more than a useful idiot for the House of Saud and their Wahhabi-propelled extremist/ultranationalist agenda (exploiting Israel's relationship with the US of course, and leveraging the US to lift more funding and supplies for their terrorist networks across the Middle-East and elsehwere).
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
It also means that as the U.S. we have it's something we no longer have to offer to Israel in exchange for a compromise.
Click to expand...

As I said, there could be a sound reason why there is not - yet - any further public move accompanying this. If bilateralism fails, as it seems to have, the remaining option for a solution is unilateral and inevitably less favourable for the underdog than they would like. So probably the best hope of compelling them to accept such an offer would be to ensure that it's preceded by a cold dose of reality, a clear and unequivocal signal that if an agreement is not reached - even an unfavourable one - it'll just mean that more and more and more keeps being pulled off the table.

SonOfDaedalus said:
It's more likely that the Palestinians will lose hope that a peaceful resolution is possible. The moderate Palestinians will lose power and the conflict will escalate pulling in even our Muslim allies.
Click to expand...

You really think that two decades after the failure of the Oslo Accords to bring peace, there was much hope of a peaceful bilateral resolution to begin with? Historically the surrounding Arab countries don't care about the Palestinians any more than Europe does, arguably even less; if they did, Egypt and Jordan would have established a state of Palestine in the 1950s or 60s based on the original armistice line. Instead they kept the territory for themselves for almost two decades, and only since it was lost to Israel have the Palestinians become useful propaganda pieces. In fact from what I gather, while still not up to Israeli norms, quality of life for Palestinians in the West Bank improved dramatically in the decades after 1967 - they were worse off under Jordanian rule!

https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/palestinian-leadership-catastrophe-180515110228635.html
Meanwhile, we've marked the 70th anniversary of the Nakba (the catastrophe), as the US continues to push for the "deal of the century" that will strip Palestinians of any rights or claims to their land. All that with the support of Arab states talking about normalisation of relations with Israel. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman reportedly went as far as saying, during a meeting with Jewish leaders in New York, that: "It is about time the Palestinians take the proposals and agree to come to the negotiations table or shut up and stop complaining."​

The idea that the Arab states of the region will start sticking their necks out for the Palestinians after gradual decades of normalizing relations with Israel seems little more than a scare story, as far as I can tell. Some short-term conflict aside, it's unlikely that the embassy move could make the long-term situation any worse than it's already been. But it might, just might be a precursor to a unilateral offer which the underdogs can either grudgingly accept, or continue with even more decades of obviously-futile attrition.
 
OlNate said:
I agree with pretty much all of this...except for Jerusalem to be "taken off the table" (which it would never be if one side or the other gets exclusive ownership), it needs to be made into the international city it was intended to be, with no Jewish or Muslim ownership (putting it that way because it's a religious contention). This shouldn't be about warning Palestinians, this should be about the fact that the three Abrahamic religions, which encompass over 50% of the world's population, have Jerusalem at the heart of their faith, and they should be able to travel there without worrying that territorial disputes over the city could put them in danger...or worse, they shouldn't have to feel like they have to engage in a holy war to gain access.
Click to expand...

Sure it's a nice idea, with just the small problem that neither side wants it. The Palestinians and their Arab neighbours rejected it from the beginning, and after the initial decades of overt hostility and multiple annihilation attempts, Israel eventually withdrew their agreement too. So the external powers can talk all they like about a patrimonial imposition of a complicated 'solution' that nobody there really wants, but it's not exactly going to do much good :lol: Especially now that the US openly and officially supports Israeli Jerusalem; it's a done deal, and given that prior presidents both Republican and Democratic have said they support Israeli Jerusalem (per AlbqOwl's post #45) it's virtually impossible that any future administration will revoke Trump's action.

Other than that, I agree...it's a mess, and yes, it's the Palestinians that most often get the short end of the stick...though given their methods, I don't think the Israelis have any less reason to be pissed off. The only reason, in my mind, that the Israelis get held to a higher level of accountability is because they are the ruling demographic, and look at what is happening under their leadership...
Click to expand...

In fairness, as far as life under occupying powers goes, both Native Americans and Australian Aborigines are more or less on par with Palestinians (on average) for most quality of life indicators that I could research - probably better off than those in Gaza, but generally worse off than those in the West Bank.

Life expectancy: Palestinians 70.8m, 73.6f | Native Americans 70.9m, 74.6f | Australian Aborigines 69.1m, 73.7f
Low birth weight: Palestinians 6.4% | Native Americans 7.3% | Australian Aborigines 12%
Under 5 mortality: Palestinians ~52.7/100k population | Native Americans ~70/100k | Australian Aborigines 67/100k
Unemployment: Palestinians 25.9% | Native Americans 12.3% | Australian Aborigines 21%
(Unemployment rates for Palestinians and Aborigines are a percentage of active labour force, while this is not clear in the case of Native Americans. As a percentage of total population, the Palestinian figure would be 11.9%.)
Poverty: Palestinians 12.9% | Native Americans 22.7% | Australian Aborigines 19.3%
(For Palestinians, this is the percentage in "deep poverty.")
Secondary or higher education: Palestinians 39.4% | Native Americans 82.4% | Australian Aborigines ~47%
College or higher education: Palestinians 18.2% | Native Americans 11.5%
(For Palestinians, this is "intermediate diploma" or higher; the figure is 13% for Bachelor degrees and above)

1 - WHO, Health conditions in the occupied Palestinian territory... (2011)
http://apps.who.int/gb/ebwha/pdf_files/WHA64/A64_ID2-en.pdf
2 - Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Palestine in Figures (2015)
http://www.pcbs.gov.ps/Downloads/book2188.pdf
3 - Dankovchik et al 2015, Disparities in Life Expectancy of Pacific Northwest American Indians and Alaska Natives
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4245288/
4 - Castor et al 2006, A Nationwide Population-Based Study Identifying Health Disparities Between American Indians/Alaska Natives and the General Populations Living in Select Urban Counties
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1522100/
5 - Aust. Inst. of Health and Welfare, The health and welfare of Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (2015)
https://www.aihw.gov.au/getmedia/584073f7-041e-4818-9419-39f5a060b1aa/18175.pdf.aspx?inline=true
6 - Australian Council of Social Service, Poverty in Australia 2015
http://www.acoss.org.au/images/uploads/ACOSS_Poverty_in_Australia_2014.pdf
7 - Child Health USA (2011)
https://mchb.hrsa.gov/chusa11/hstat/hsi/pages/201lbw.html
8 - Wong et al 2014, American Indian and Alaska Native Infant and Pediatric Mortality, United States, 1999–2009
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4035880/
 
Last edited:
Mithrae said:
Sure it's a nice idea, with just the small problem that neither side wants it.

{snip}
Click to expand...

Heya, Mith.

Given that Israel, in it's modern manifestation, was essentially created by the UN, anything would have been possible - clearly the intention was there, as well as the understanding that if either side controlled Jerusalem, there would be a problem. I mean, it's all spilt milk now, but there's so much blame to go around on this one, and one direction it should go is the insensitive way the Jewish / Arab relationship was managed when redrawing maps. If nothing else, Britain should have kept it. Not that I'm for colonialism, but it probably would have helped, as it's unclear if the Jews and the Muslims are more pissed off if they don't have Jerusalem, or if the other side does.

Now, I get that it would take an act of war to make Israel give up control of Jerusalem at this point, and that's not gonna happen. But failing that, no other countries should validate Israel's claim to Jerusalem by putting embassies there, in my opinion, because it's in violation of international law, and it drives escalation of conflict...and for what? For someone to say "Mine"?

As for the comparison to indigenous folks...hehe...the treatment of indigenous peoples around the world is highly problematic to say the least, and plain shameful to be more accurate, I am not sure that those statistics tell a good story. Many nations have begun to address their treatment of indigenous people, and are taking responsibility. Also, I'm not aware of any other country where there is support from other countries to further marginalize or antagonize their indigenous people.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom