Secular Anti-Zionism...
Hello everyone. :)
Today I would like to talk about another sensitive topic (yes, even more sensitive than religion, to some), and that is the State of Israel. It is still a very relevant topic today since the Middle-East is still the center of tons of controversy as well as media attention, but I won't go into that. What I would like to talk about is the principles behind the founding of the state of Israel in 1947, and why I have always been personally against it. Now, the last time I expressed my opinion on this issue (I would venture to say about 4 or 5 years ago), it caused some very... "strong" responses, shall I call it, so I would like to request that, should you wish to join the discussion of this matter, please try your best to remove your personal feelings on this matter and talk about your view rationally.
What suddenly brought this up, you might ask? Well, the reason is I have been studying the likes of Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Bill Maher (it's inevitable because these three hang out together a lot). Now Bill Maher, in particular, is an interesting case. He is an ardent advocate of rational thinking, and is strongly anti-religion, yet he is a Zionist (for reasons, he say, of Jewish survival/safety after World War II). The same story with Albert Einstein, one of the greatest rational thinkers in the world, was also for Zionism (I was actually very surprised to learn this).
I will begin with a brief summary of Israel's history (if you are interested in learning more, please visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel):
==================================
-The Kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrian Empire in 720 B.C., at which point the Israelite tribes were exiled. After that, that particular piece of land passed from one rule to another: Babylonian, Persian, Greek, Roman, Sassanian, Byzantine... some Jewish people moved in and out of the land during all this time, but not a significant amount of presence.
-Fast forwarding a bit, the last empire to rule the former Kingdom of Israel was the Ottoman Empire, from 1516-1917 (ignoring the brief Egyptian rule from 1831-1841 resulted from the Egyptian-Ottoman war); the majority of the residents in Palestine (as it was referred to by the Ottoman administration) were Arabs at this point, but there existed a wide variety of ethnic and religious groups within Palestine: The Moslem, Christian, and Jewish communities of Palestine were allowed to exercise jurisdiction over their own members according to charters granted to them. For centuries the Jews and Christians had enjoyed a large degree of communal autonomy in matters of worship, jurisdiction over personal status, taxes, and in managing their schools and charitable institutions. In the 19th century those rights were formally recognized as part of the Tanzimat reforms and when the communities were placed under the protection of European public law.
-World War I & World War II: Under the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916, it was envisioned that most of Palestine, when freed from Ottoman control, would become an international zone not under direct French or British colonial control. Shortly thereafter, British foreign minister Arthur Balfour issued the Balfour Declaration of 1917 (highly controversial in its day, and rightfully so), which promised to establish a Jewish national home in Palestine. As the result of the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in WWI, Palestine fell under British mandate, which lasted from 1920-1948. It was during this time a lot of Jewish people immigrated into Palestine (there were several waves of immigrations before, but this was the most rapid period - the population of Jewish rose to 33% of the total during this time).
-In 1947, the British government withdrew from the Mandate of Palestine, stating it was unable to arrive at a solution acceptable to both Arabs and Jews. The newly created United Nations approved the Partition Plan for Palestine (United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181) on November 29, 1947, which sought to divide the country into two states-one Arab and one Jewish. Jerusalem was to be designated an international city-a corpus separatum-administered by the UN. The Jewish community accepted the plan, but the Arab League and Arab Higher Committee rejected it.
-On May 14, 1948, the day before the expiration of the British Mandate, the Jewish Agency proclaimed independence, naming the country Israel. The following day, the armies of five Arab countries-Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq-attacked Israel, launching the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.
==================================
Okay, most educated people know the rough history following that, so I will stop here with the history stuffs, and turn my attention to my argument against the founding of Israel. Now, before anyone persecutes me, no I am NOT an antiseminist. I have nothing against the Jewish people (don't see why I would since I am Taiwanese are not even related to the Jewish folks in any historical or cultural way), and I do sympathize with the historical injustice they have had to suffer through the thousands of years of diaspora. My view on the subject is strictly of secular reasons.
First, the whole ideology of Zionism has a very strong religious notion behind it. I can understand that, since to a lot of Jewish people, their ethnicity and their religion is one and the same. Well, I don't disrespect that, and I know why that particular geographical location has both a religious and historical significance to the Jewish people, but that doesn't justify what the movement entails. You are talking about displacing the Palestinian Arabs who had been living there for hundreds of years - to them, that is their home now - and you can't simply take it away from them.
Second, the issue of Jewish survival. After enduring centuries of persecution, which finally resulted in the Holocaust, it was very easy to sympathize with the idea of creating a national state for the Jewish people where they can live freely and safely. Well, let me ask you this: Do you think the land of Palestine would be the ideal choice for this goal? Looking at the amount of war and violence that's occured since the establishment of the nation, I have reason to think otherwise. Yes, Jewish survival is a very important issue - so why couldn't America or one of its European allies offer up a piece of their own land for the Jewish people to call home? Well, for one, I doubt any nation would be generous enough to do so, even when it concerns the survival of a whole race of people. And two, even if, say, the United States offered a piece of land to the Jewish people to form their national state: The Zionists wouldn't have wanted it anyway. They want their old Kingdom of Israel back for religious reasons (and for those of you who say "Well, Israel belonged to the Jewish a long time ago", hmm, perhaps the USA should return Texas and California to Mexico... or altogether give America back to Native Americans, and the state of Hawaii back to the Hawaiians).
Third, the method by which the creation of Israel was carried out. I actually might have supported something like the Sykes-Picot Agreement which would establish Palestine as a free, international zone where people of all ethnicities and religions could come and go as they please. What is this obsession with ownership? Can't we learn to share? The British pulled out of the mandate because they couldn't find a satisfiable solution to both the Jews and the Arabs when it comes to spliting the land into two separate states - would you really expect any other outcome? And of course, the moment the British ended the mandate, the Jewish people claimed the land as their own. Almost all the Arab countries refused to recognize the state of Israel in the UN, but the global powers (which has influence over third-world countries) voted it through anyway. Same with the very definition of Zionism: In 1975 the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 3379, which declared that "Zionism is a form of racism." The decision was revoked on December 16, 1991, when the General Assembly passed Resolution 4686, repealing resolution 3379. I am sure none of the Arab countries voted for this one...
If you cannot see the amount of injustice behind this whole series of events, then I don't know what else to say. Remember when 9/11 happened, people were all wondering why the Arab world hates us; can you really expect them not to? To make matters worse, the Jewish people of Israel are just as guilty as the Arabs when it comes to perpetrating violence... I am sorry, I don't mean to offend, but anyone who actually reads about the history of the region will know this is true. Israel is positively one of the most militant nations in the world. It doesn't just "repel" invasions by Arab nations, it has many times actively invaded other nations (for those of you who don't know, East Jerusalem was annexed by Israel in 1967, and to this day the UN still don't recognize Israel's claim to it. In fact the UN repeatedly criticized Israel for it). I think the important question facing everyone today is... what do we do now? How should we deal with the situation today, when the region is so wrapped in sheer hatred? You certainly can't just change the status of Israel again, tell the Jewish people to move off; no that would be just as politically incorrect now. But is it more politically correct to tell the Palestinians to yield?
I don't have an answer. I hope, perhaps far into the future, the situation will resolve itself with the fading of religion and the union of mankind... It's a distant dream, but just perhaps. But, I will gladly hear about your opinion on the matter.
I will end with two quotes I really like on this issue...
"In England, where there has been no social, political or economic discrimination against the Jews for several generations, there is a growing irritation at the killing and wounding of British soldiers and Arabs in pitched battles fought because of this Zionist idea. It seems to our common people an irrelevance, before the formidable issues they have to face on their own account. They are beginning to feel that if they are to be history ridden to the extent of restoring a Jewish state that was extinguished nearly two thousand years ago, they might just as well go back another thousand years and sacrifice their sons to restore the Canaanites and Philistines who possessed the land before the original Jewish conquest." - H.G. Wells, 1938
"Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French. It is wrong and in-human to impose the Jews on the Arabs....But if they must look to the Palestine of geography as their national home, it is wrong to enter it under the shadow of the British gun. A religious act cannot be performed with the aid of the bayonet or the bomb. They can settle in Palestine only by the goodwill of the Arabs. They should seek to convert the Arab heart." - Mahatma Gandhi, 1938
Thank you for reading... :3
Today I would like to talk about another sensitive topic (yes, even more sensitive than religion, to some), and that is the State of Israel. It is still a very relevant topic today since the Middle-East is still the center of tons of controversy as well as media attention, but I won't go into that. What I would like to talk about is the principles behind the founding of the state of Israel in 1947, and why I have always been personally against it. Now, the last time I expressed my opinion on this issue (I would venture to say about 4 or 5 years ago), it caused some very... "strong" responses, shall I call it, so I would like to request that, should you wish to join the discussion of this matter, please try your best to remove your personal feelings on this matter and talk about your view rationally.
What suddenly brought this up, you might ask? Well, the reason is I have been studying the likes of Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Bill Maher (it's inevitable because these three hang out together a lot). Now Bill Maher, in particular, is an interesting case. He is an ardent advocate of rational thinking, and is strongly anti-religion, yet he is a Zionist (for reasons, he say, of Jewish survival/safety after World War II). The same story with Albert Einstein, one of the greatest rational thinkers in the world, was also for Zionism (I was actually very surprised to learn this).
I will begin with a brief summary of Israel's history (if you are interested in learning more, please visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel):
==================================
-The Kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrian Empire in 720 B.C., at which point the Israelite tribes were exiled. After that, that particular piece of land passed from one rule to another: Babylonian, Persian, Greek, Roman, Sassanian, Byzantine... some Jewish people moved in and out of the land during all this time, but not a significant amount of presence.
-Fast forwarding a bit, the last empire to rule the former Kingdom of Israel was the Ottoman Empire, from 1516-1917 (ignoring the brief Egyptian rule from 1831-1841 resulted from the Egyptian-Ottoman war); the majority of the residents in Palestine (as it was referred to by the Ottoman administration) were Arabs at this point, but there existed a wide variety of ethnic and religious groups within Palestine: The Moslem, Christian, and Jewish communities of Palestine were allowed to exercise jurisdiction over their own members according to charters granted to them. For centuries the Jews and Christians had enjoyed a large degree of communal autonomy in matters of worship, jurisdiction over personal status, taxes, and in managing their schools and charitable institutions. In the 19th century those rights were formally recognized as part of the Tanzimat reforms and when the communities were placed under the protection of European public law.
-World War I & World War II: Under the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916, it was envisioned that most of Palestine, when freed from Ottoman control, would become an international zone not under direct French or British colonial control. Shortly thereafter, British foreign minister Arthur Balfour issued the Balfour Declaration of 1917 (highly controversial in its day, and rightfully so), which promised to establish a Jewish national home in Palestine. As the result of the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in WWI, Palestine fell under British mandate, which lasted from 1920-1948. It was during this time a lot of Jewish people immigrated into Palestine (there were several waves of immigrations before, but this was the most rapid period - the population of Jewish rose to 33% of the total during this time).
-In 1947, the British government withdrew from the Mandate of Palestine, stating it was unable to arrive at a solution acceptable to both Arabs and Jews. The newly created United Nations approved the Partition Plan for Palestine (United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181) on November 29, 1947, which sought to divide the country into two states-one Arab and one Jewish. Jerusalem was to be designated an international city-a corpus separatum-administered by the UN. The Jewish community accepted the plan, but the Arab League and Arab Higher Committee rejected it.
-On May 14, 1948, the day before the expiration of the British Mandate, the Jewish Agency proclaimed independence, naming the country Israel. The following day, the armies of five Arab countries-Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq-attacked Israel, launching the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.
==================================
Okay, most educated people know the rough history following that, so I will stop here with the history stuffs, and turn my attention to my argument against the founding of Israel. Now, before anyone persecutes me, no I am NOT an antiseminist. I have nothing against the Jewish people (don't see why I would since I am Taiwanese are not even related to the Jewish folks in any historical or cultural way), and I do sympathize with the historical injustice they have had to suffer through the thousands of years of diaspora. My view on the subject is strictly of secular reasons.
First, the whole ideology of Zionism has a very strong religious notion behind it. I can understand that, since to a lot of Jewish people, their ethnicity and their religion is one and the same. Well, I don't disrespect that, and I know why that particular geographical location has both a religious and historical significance to the Jewish people, but that doesn't justify what the movement entails. You are talking about displacing the Palestinian Arabs who had been living there for hundreds of years - to them, that is their home now - and you can't simply take it away from them.
Second, the issue of Jewish survival. After enduring centuries of persecution, which finally resulted in the Holocaust, it was very easy to sympathize with the idea of creating a national state for the Jewish people where they can live freely and safely. Well, let me ask you this: Do you think the land of Palestine would be the ideal choice for this goal? Looking at the amount of war and violence that's occured since the establishment of the nation, I have reason to think otherwise. Yes, Jewish survival is a very important issue - so why couldn't America or one of its European allies offer up a piece of their own land for the Jewish people to call home? Well, for one, I doubt any nation would be generous enough to do so, even when it concerns the survival of a whole race of people. And two, even if, say, the United States offered a piece of land to the Jewish people to form their national state: The Zionists wouldn't have wanted it anyway. They want their old Kingdom of Israel back for religious reasons (and for those of you who say "Well, Israel belonged to the Jewish a long time ago", hmm, perhaps the USA should return Texas and California to Mexico... or altogether give America back to Native Americans, and the state of Hawaii back to the Hawaiians).
Third, the method by which the creation of Israel was carried out. I actually might have supported something like the Sykes-Picot Agreement which would establish Palestine as a free, international zone where people of all ethnicities and religions could come and go as they please. What is this obsession with ownership? Can't we learn to share? The British pulled out of the mandate because they couldn't find a satisfiable solution to both the Jews and the Arabs when it comes to spliting the land into two separate states - would you really expect any other outcome? And of course, the moment the British ended the mandate, the Jewish people claimed the land as their own. Almost all the Arab countries refused to recognize the state of Israel in the UN, but the global powers (which has influence over third-world countries) voted it through anyway. Same with the very definition of Zionism: In 1975 the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 3379, which declared that "Zionism is a form of racism." The decision was revoked on December 16, 1991, when the General Assembly passed Resolution 4686, repealing resolution 3379. I am sure none of the Arab countries voted for this one...
If you cannot see the amount of injustice behind this whole series of events, then I don't know what else to say. Remember when 9/11 happened, people were all wondering why the Arab world hates us; can you really expect them not to? To make matters worse, the Jewish people of Israel are just as guilty as the Arabs when it comes to perpetrating violence... I am sorry, I don't mean to offend, but anyone who actually reads about the history of the region will know this is true. Israel is positively one of the most militant nations in the world. It doesn't just "repel" invasions by Arab nations, it has many times actively invaded other nations (for those of you who don't know, East Jerusalem was annexed by Israel in 1967, and to this day the UN still don't recognize Israel's claim to it. In fact the UN repeatedly criticized Israel for it). I think the important question facing everyone today is... what do we do now? How should we deal with the situation today, when the region is so wrapped in sheer hatred? You certainly can't just change the status of Israel again, tell the Jewish people to move off; no that would be just as politically incorrect now. But is it more politically correct to tell the Palestinians to yield?
I don't have an answer. I hope, perhaps far into the future, the situation will resolve itself with the fading of religion and the union of mankind... It's a distant dream, but just perhaps. But, I will gladly hear about your opinion on the matter.
I will end with two quotes I really like on this issue...
"In England, where there has been no social, political or economic discrimination against the Jews for several generations, there is a growing irritation at the killing and wounding of British soldiers and Arabs in pitched battles fought because of this Zionist idea. It seems to our common people an irrelevance, before the formidable issues they have to face on their own account. They are beginning to feel that if they are to be history ridden to the extent of restoring a Jewish state that was extinguished nearly two thousand years ago, they might just as well go back another thousand years and sacrifice their sons to restore the Canaanites and Philistines who possessed the land before the original Jewish conquest." - H.G. Wells, 1938
"Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French. It is wrong and in-human to impose the Jews on the Arabs....But if they must look to the Palestine of geography as their national home, it is wrong to enter it under the shadow of the British gun. A religious act cannot be performed with the aid of the bayonet or the bomb. They can settle in Palestine only by the goodwill of the Arabs. They should seek to convert the Arab heart." - Mahatma Gandhi, 1938
Thank you for reading... :3