Are you now saying that British Jews are anti-semitic?

Britain has had Jews living here for hundreds of years and continues to do so.

You have chosen two lines out of context for the quote you gave me from its full story.

Whatever the reason for the formation of Israel, I, like many of your American country people, have long thought the reason was because of the holocaust.

If we get back to the beginning, before you began all your accusations, there was a question whether the 60th Anniversary of Israel had been covered in the USA and if not why. It appeared it had not. I believed the why was because of what is in that letter from British Jews.

Further discussion on this matter has made me understand that the issue is because Israel is an ally to the US.

and I need to again ask you whether you are saying that the reason why British Jews felt a need to publish this Letters: We're not celebrating Israel's anniversary | World news | The Guardian is, in your opinion, because they are anti semitic.

I have no guilt. I have done nothing. Israel is not my ally. I can be more objective as can the British Jews.

I'm saying that there are many including Jews who are against Israel but, it was accepted and endorsed. Europe and in particular England has an obligation to Israel, its actions are about on par to the relocation of many Native American tribes that the US and European nations were guilty of earlier. Choosing not to support Israel would now make Europe look that more repugnant. Relocate them and then abandoned them. Nice.


We must stop the extremists on both sides and get it to an amicable position that works for everyone.

Just because some people don't like Israel. Israel isn't going to wish itself away.

Many don't celebrate Israel including far left Jews, I'm trying to show why they are morally wrong. Even they have a obligation to see peace through.

Holocaust gave them even more imperative to enact some sort of Jewish state.

I get the feeling you are just trying to bait me into calling them racist, but I guess I have no feelings on what they said. Whats done is done we must try to resolve this with a 2 state solution or a unified parliamentary solution (good luck).

What we have here is a group of very intelligent Jews who feel they can no longer stay quiet about the situation of the Palestinian people. There stance is not founded on an argument against the State of Israel but rather on the actions of the Israel Government.
Now you are blaming Europe for the Native American problem.

The relocation of more and more Jews to Israel was not what the British were wanting but rather a deliberate move by David Ben-Gurion though he was not involved in the terrorist acts which were going on. Israel itself has been encouraging more Jews to emigrate there since.

You are going to extremes. I have never suggested this and very few people would.

What people are complaining about is the situation of the Palestinian people and US support for whatever Israel does
It is difficult to imagine any other country in the world which could get away with the way Israel has treated the Palestinian people.

I guess you could include in these Jews you believe have a thing against Israel, Ben-Gurion. He like many Jews I met when I was in Israel in the 70's wanted a just solution with the Palestinian people

'Mr Ben-Gurion was a life-long socialist, partly responsible for the Israeli kibbutz settlements.

He led Israel through two of its wars, including the 1956 Suez canal crisis which saw the country capture Sinai.

But he remained politically controversial until his death often criticising the state for not returning land captured from neighbouring states during the 1967 war. '
BBC ON THIS DAY | 1 | 1973: Israel's founding father dies


Things happened when Israel was created which caused many Palastinian people to become stateless. When a people have no State and no army and are not allowed to return to their own homes they arguably have a right to engage in terrorist activity. They are left with no other recourse to take.

Now suicide bombings began after this

'Mr Sharon masterminded Israel's disastrous invasion of Lebanon in 1982.

As defence minister, and without explicitly telling Prime Minister Menachem Begin, he sent the Israeli army all the way to Beirut, a strike which ended in the expulsion of Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) from Lebanon.

The move stopped the PLO using Lebanon to launch attacks against Israel, but also resulted in the massacre of hundreds of Palestinians by Lebanese Christian militiamen in two Beirut refugee camps under Israeli control.'
BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Profile: Ariel Sharon

This was what allowed Palestinian people to become so discouraged and angry that they were open to more radical groups who began training camps.



Why do you need to take a criticism of the USA's allowing Israel to get away with Israel doing whatever it likes and exaggerate it into people wanting to 'do away' with the Israeli state.


I was not trying to bait you at all.

I said 'And why if the situation in Israel is so good would British Jews feel the need to publish this Letters: We're not celebrating Israel's anniversary | World news | The Guardian' to which you responded

and I asked you if you were now accusing British Jews of being anti-semetic. You have been throwing accusations about like there was no tomorrow. I just thought this might be the next. The idea of you calling them racist never entered my head, but how you wrote it seemed to be suggesting you believed they were anti-semitic.

I am sorry though that you have no interest in what they have to say. People who like to have a balanced view of things generally like to look at both sides.
If this is you saying that you now believe the US should be encouraging a just solution then that is indeed a step forward. Your adding on 'good luck' looks like that is saying something else.

Well if you have more feel free. So far I don't think these reasons outweigh the cost, but at least now I know there are reasons other than guilt.

No anya I think you keep just grazing over the part where I stress that extremists on both sides need to be stopped. . .

I never got the feeling the US supported Israel's settlement expansions, if all you are talking about is reigning in some bad apples then we are in complete agreement. Prolly just been talking right past each other. As in the "good luck" part was about a unified parliamentary type state, you could imagine the breakdowns a coalition government would show with these 2 groups. A two state solution seems like the only option atm.

I'm defending the state of Israel because its the one being bashed atm here, there is no shortage of bashing of Israel here recently and I though I'd point out that the Zionist policy was one most of what is now NATO backed. I think its an important fact all to many here just choose to over look.

I did read what they had to say anya but even the way its worded is massively one sided and yes some could see their view on Israel as bigoted. Note the "WE are not celebrating" line at the end of most of the paragraphs?. . . That cheapens the whole thing as well, it sounds more like a lib crying about reality and not doing anything about it.

When the state of palestine is formally made and recognized will its birthdays be so smidgen with smears an jeers from people worldwide, or is all the killing of Jews justified if done by one of them?

Here was Iran's perspective for the event. . .

Ahmadinejad: Israel to be 'swept away soon' : Middle East World

Talk like that and the secret nuclear program is begging to be attacked from many people's PoVs.

Ok look my problem with you lies right here, you justify terrorism against the state of Israel and then turn around and say you are not for abolishing Israel.

I don't know how you rectify that.

Here's a general overview of Arab-Israeli history. Neither side is innocent.

History of the Arab-Israeli conflict - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I'm in no denial about the political realities of the area but many Arabs seem to be in denial about Jewish politics over the area.

I can not speak for others, but I choose my freinds from freindship not guilt.

If a person is my freind it is not because I feel guilty,otherwise they would not be a freind only an aqaintence.

I have no problem with this at all. Understanding something is not the same as thinking it is good. You cannot have 760,000 people who belong to no state and not expect them to want to do something about it.

Likewise the situation in Lebanon with the massacre of the Palestinian people did provide the framework to let more zealot people in and the Palestinians to start suicide bombing which I hate.

I also hate Israel retaliating by bombing people's homes and killing people indiscriminately....and many, many more lives are lost by this method.

'WE are not celebrating' does not cheapen it. Their stance is a worthy one. Noticing that another people have come to harm for a nation for Jews to come into being is showing human empathy.

This would rather indicate to me that they are probably people more of my mind, that is not wanting anyone to be harmed....wanting the best justice that can be achieved by everyone and that is not the case at the moment as has been discussed on the 'free Palestine' thread. If Jews cannot criticize what Israel is doing, then who can?

They end with

'We will celebrate when Arab and Jew live as equals in a peaceful Middle East.'

Do you have a problem with this? Surely what they are saying is right. To be celebrating while the Palestinians lives become worse by the day....what is there to celebrate?

This is only what I understand as empathy. We must live in very different worlds.

When you have these sort of statistics taken from the middle Eastern Israel thread

U.S. Vetoes of UN Resolutions Critical of Israel

If Americans Knew - what every American needs to know about Israel/Palestine

It is abundantly clear who are the people suffering the most.

and when you have Israeli Politicians this keen on peace


(1915- ) Israeli politician and prime minister (1983- 84, 1986- 92).
Shamir is the most conservative prime minister Israel has seen, and challenges even Ariel Sharon. He opposed the peace initiatives of both the Camp David Accords, even if his own party supported this. He pretended to be willing to negotiate for peace with the Arab states in the early 1990's, but he admitted later on that all he wanted was to drag the talks out for years.
......
Shamir has a background as a terrorist in the 1940's, a Mossad agent in the 1950's and 60's. As a prime minister he has been active in promoting the construction and enlargement of the Jewish-only settlements in occupied territory (Palestine and Syria), declared illegal by the United Nations.

lost link but

1978: Shamir opposes the Camp David Accords, even if it was negotiated by Menachim Begin.
Yitzhak Shamir

In this world and certainly in the UK we are still allowed our own opinion. We are still allowed to look at things, question and try to understand them without having to agree with the position of Israel.

Yes and this is fine, my only point is that you can not abandon the state of Israel just because its actions have been disastrous at times.

If the writers of that article still support the idea of Zionism in principle but are against the methods used that would be one thing, but they seem just anti Israel.

As for Israel's current administration I think that is a reaction to the second Intifada. I understand that the second intifada had its root causes as well. Unfortunately with the electing of Hamas nothing seems like its going to get better anytime soon. Basically Palestinians have put Iran's proxy power in the area into direct power.

Not even one of you attempted to explain why a small number of European colonists should have rights over a larger number of the indigenous population and be given the larger percentage of the available land?

You're touching concern for the other indigenous populations of the globe and their suffering under colonisation is made to look pretty sad when it becomes clear that this does not apply if they happen to be ethnically Arabic.

Israel is a colonial country, the majority of the Zionist population who moved there had no connection to the area. They moved there and displaced the local population and then demanded their own nation despite holding less land than the local population and having a minority of the population. The local population were not that keen on this, huge shock to you but not to anyone else in the world apparently it is normative behaviour to you for the local population to go along with this.

The local population displaced took up arms in order to fight back (after a period of decades when they lacked any leadership and did nothing) as they oppose the most powerful military state in the region and have very little access to weapons they use what are commonly referred to as terrorist means and live among the refugee camps with the rest of the displaced population. This according to you means that they have a different mindset to the Jewish population who only resort to terrorism when they are building their military up and once they possess uniforms, overwhelming military strength and nuclear weapons no loner engage in this practice but kill far larger numbers of innocent civilians with this overwhelming strength than the terrorists do.

I assume you guys all know this. But it's much easier to keep finger-pointing and keep doing what you're doing, because fixing the real issues would actually require sacrifices on the israelis part.

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