Idiots guide to the westbank and Israel?

Just catching up watching louis Theroux in the westbank. Now I’ve seen various programmes about this and none of them put it in lamens terms. So can anyone explain it simply? Who was where first and who should be where now?

Apparently God divided it up the deeds have been misplaced and its been a problem ever since. Or thats my understanding of it, and I`m unlikely to find a solution.

On one side there is a vicious bunch of extremists who think the land belongs to them.

And vice versa.

the isrealis/zionists have a policy of never ending expansionism, until that ends there will be no peace.

On one side there is a vicious bunch of extremists who think the land belongs to them.

And vice versa.

mibbe so, but the facts on the ground there is only one side stealing the land while the other is slowly losing it piece by piece.

Israelis, Palestinians and Jews all claiming the same land? Israelis seem to support the Jews yeah?

Huge can of worms 🙄

Let the arguments commence…..

I’m on my side if that helps 😉

Mark Thomass latest show Extreme Rambling is worth seeing if you can, the extreme parts of the area are attracting people with the most extreme views it really doesnt help.

EDIT:

Israelis seem to support the Jews yeah

well the Isareali jews do but yes it is an Jewish state
ignoring the formation Of Israel and all that entails essentially Israel has occupied the land of the Palenstians by war and illegal land grabs. It then has built settlements on the land [plus a safety wall now] they have occupied. iirc the borders are not internationally recognised.The settlers live in houses with swimming pools the arabs live without running water. Access to the west bank is restricted by Israel and there are low provisons of essential goods to the people.
The arab countries do not accept israles right to exist and Israel seems hell bent on doing whatever it dam well pleases. The USA prop it up financially as it is pro western in an unstable Arab area.

Mark Thomass latest show Extreme Rambling is worth seeing if you can, the extreme parts of the area are attracting people with the most extreme views it really doesnt help.

see that’s the thing, you come and bulldoze my house and build you own where it stood, just watch how extreme i get, extremism is relative and not as black and white as most people think it generally has a root cause.

Israelis, Palestinians and Jews all claiming the same land? Israelis seem to support the Jews yeah?

Israelis supporting the Jews? Really?

junky…………….nail on the head….. 😀

Well Jews were the first if you think that they have been there for 5000 years, obviously they were not living there by themselves but that was a homeland to Jews from which they were exiled by the Egyptians and then the Romans.

So technically if the question is who was there first then Jews were but then what does that really mean?

Jews started coming back on parts of the land under agreement with the Ottoman empire but then when the Ottoman empire lost in the first world war even more Jews started settling back under the British mandate. After the second world war hundreds of thousands started returning due to the Holocaust.

The British left in 1947 and under UN plans the land was split into an Arab and a Jewish state. Jews were not happy with it but accepted it and declared independence.

Arabs were not happy with it either so the day after the declaration of independence every arab country declared war on the newly found state of Israel and they lost so Israel extended its borders after which as punishment the arab countries expelled all their jewish population – which sent another few hundrend thousand of Jews into Israel.

In 1967 Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon invaded Israel again and lost in 6 days resulting in Israel taking the West Bank including Jerusalem, Gaza and the Sinai Egypt (which they returned in 1979 to Egypt).

Disclaimer, I am not a historian and I side with neither part, just stating some of the facts.

….on second thoughts i will google that.

Yep there were people in Canaan before Moses and the Exodus.

Easy.

Immigrant Jews murdered British troops, then they stole the Palestinians land and called it Israel.

And we stood by and let it happen.

vrapan – quite a concise history, i think the whole thing needs a bit more reading than that you’ve glossed over a fair bit and all the ethnic cleansing in the formation of isreal(i’ll let the OP google nakba/irgun/balfour agreement etc etc to start there are articles that will explain the history far better than me on a single post ).

But anyhow, regarding the arguement of a right to return to the ancesteral home 2000 years later it’s ridiculous when you consider how many ancesters we have in that period, count them up, in 5 generations we all have 62 ancesters, go back further it increases exponentially..it’s an insane claim…and if it is to stand up, well i’m of to central europe to claim some nondescript bit of land that the celtic peoples used to live on 3000 years ago…

But anyhow that’s by the by and the current situation is that the israelis have complete control over the 2 palestinian enclaves and are continuing to grab all the resources and good land from them…it’s a slow ethnic cleansing i reckon and actually worse than apartiheid. it amazes me the world allows it to continue.

Devil’s advocate here:

If the area that is currently known as Israel was ‘handed back’ to the Palestinians/Arabians, where would the Jewish people go?

In other words, how much of it is American-backed expansioneering in order to carve out a space in Arabia, and how much of it is simply one people’s desire to have a place to call home?

Out of the courtroom I am an idealist who wishes religion would just bugger off and allow humans to get one step closer to realising that we’re all, well, human, and equal.

If the area that is currently known as Israel was ‘handed back’ to the Palestinians/Arabians, where would the Jewish people go?

imo it’s too late to hand back the land to anybody. there needs to be a solution where both peoples can live together with human rights and democratic representation for all.

maps and stuff show the region as three separate areas, israel, gaza and the west bank, that’s a fallacy, israel controls the destiny of all the land, and i reckon when a state contols the destiny of other lands it should be made to give those people with it it democratic representation within in it’s own government.

Seosamh77 I gave some facts that is all I didn’t try to gloss over anything, the OP can go and read on it if he so wishes, I knew someone would find my post objectionable despite trying to just present a series of events as opposed a full history of the place.

vrapan – fair enough, i just disagree with the summary and was also letting the OP know there’s more to it.

……that was a homeland to Jews from which they were exiled by the Egyptians and then the Romans.

I’m confused ……..exiled by the Egyptians and then the Romans ? 😕

I thought it was God who banished the Jews in the diaspora for their wickedness, condemning them to wander the world until He (not the UN) delivered them to the Promised Land ? At least I think that’s what the Old Testament says………and also some Orthodox Jews.

BTW, Palestinians are simply Jews who stayed behind, some of which converted to Christianity, and some others later on to Islam. In fact the Palestinians are purer descendants of the Semitic people who lived in Palestine at the time of the Romans, than Jews from Brooklyn New York – who seem to think that Palestine belongs to them.

Also worth noting that something like a third of Israelis also have US nationality, and I iirc, the overwhelming majority of Israelis have dual-nationality of some description. All Palestinians are Palestinians .

Well maybe they should all give the land back to the Canaanites…

And yes the Egyptians enslaved them for a very long time and Moses returned them to the promised land from which they had originated and from which they were driven off by the Romans again.

I knew I should have stayed away from this thread….

Cannaanites ? Who the **** are they ? ………….Cockney Palestinians ? 💡

If you are planning on proving your knowledge on the subject by mocking a spelling mistake of mine then I can’t be bothered.

Canaanites were established in the region before Jews were Jews or Palestinians were Palestinians.

If the area that is currently known as Israel was ‘handed back’ to the Palestinians/Arabians, where would the Jewish people go?

They’d go back home to Germany and America.

tbf the ancient history of the region has no relevance today, it only confuses the discussion..

mocking a spelling mistake of mine

I didn’t even know that I had done that ………..HTF would I know how to spell Canaanites ?

Still, nice to know that I’ve managed to take the piss without even knowing/trying 8)

the ancient history of the region has no relevance today

So Jews have no reason other than the Bible for claiming a right to their “holy land”?

(Apologies for basic questions: I saw the title proclaiming that this was an Idiot’s Guide and thought, “That’s for me!)

So Jews have no reason other than the Bible for claiming a right to their “holy land”?

It’s not the only reason. They also claim the right to Palestine on the grounds of what the Germans did to them.

Which seems a little unfair on the Palestinians.

Are Cannanites from Canning Tahyn?

Bear in mind that not all Jews support the concept of Zionism, and that Zionism itself has several forms…

dandelionandmurdoch – the whole history is messed up and the zionist plan should never have been implemented there, it has no basis in morality whatsoever, btw that’s a big massive distinction that has to be made, zionism and judaism are not one and the same. there are jews within israel and plenty outwith who also oppose zionist expansionism.

basically from my understanding (which i’ll admit is limited) the current chaos is becasue of the zionist idea of a jewish state in the holy land without limit (the idea dates from the late 1800’s if i remember right) which has been implemented over the last century at the expense of the native inhabitants, this continues to this day.

Now we have a situation today where one people is massively oppressed, in my mind any right thinking individual cannot condone this, we can’t change history, and i’m no fan of repatriation of the israeli peoples who moved there, but it’s well within the power of the world to turn round and say wait a minute this is not right, these people desire better…it’s apartheid pure and simple and worse than what we saw in south africa, the palestinian people need us to speak up or in 50 years times they will all be expelled to the refugee camps in the surrounding countries or worse..western governments are complict in this, that’s why we need to speak up.

I agree with every you say in that post seosamh, but just to clarify on this :

“the palestinian people need us to speak up or in 50 years times they will all be expelled to the refugee camps in the surrounding countries or worse”

In fact according to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, 30% of Palestinians are living at the moment in refugee camps, mostly in neighbouring countries. And have been doing so since they were expelled from their lands well over 50 years ago when Israel was formed.

For example, the Gaza Strip which could fairly be described as the largest concentration camp the world has ever seen, saw its population grow by 1967, six times its 1948 size. The Gaza Strip is a tiny piece of land 25 miles long by 4–7.5 miles wide, and yet almost 1.5 million Palestinians have been crammed into it.

The plight of the Palestinians is the great untold story which the world conveniently chooses to ignore. I wonder how long the world would continue to ignore it, if the Palestinians started committing terrorist acts – specially against the US.

[/quote]Junkyard – Member

EDIT:

The settlers live in houses with swimming pools the arabs live without running water.

LOL @ the camel jockeys

ernie_lynch – Member

In fact according to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, 30% of Palestinians are living at the moment in refugee camps, mostly in neighbouring countries. And have been doing so since they were expelled from their lands well over 50 years ago when Israel was formed.

That’s bad. Really really bad … even their own “brothers/sisters” would not accept them into their society.

For example, the Gaza Strip which could fairly be described as the largest concentration camp the world has ever seen, saw its population grow by 1967, six times its 1948 size. The Gaza Strip is a tiny piece of land 25 miles long by 4–7.5 miles wide, and yet almost 1.5 million Palestinians have been crammed into it.

Is it me or they have increased their own hardship six times by reproducing even more? (same on the other side)

The plight of the Palestinians is the great untold story which the world conveniently chooses to ignore. I wonder how long the world would continue to ignore it, if the Palestinians started committing terrorist acts – specially against the US.

Yeah right, as if they are the most important people in the world because they scream loudest.

How about these people …

Karen, Hmong, West Papua, Penan, Aborigines of Peninsular Malaysia, Pygmy, Amazon Indians etc ….

I’ve worked in Palestine (Ramallah) and have worked with many palestinians on projects across the middle-east.

I may be wrong… but my general impression is that most of the palestinians would accept the terms of the Oslo Accord. Israel on the other hand have continually breeched and expanded beyond the borders drawn up in the Oslo Accord.

EDIT.. “All Palestinians are Palestinians .”

Again, i may be wrong.. but i thought that there’s no such thing as a ‘Palestinian’ passport. They are not formally recognized. Most have Jordanian passports or travel carnets..

I may be wrong… but my general impression is that most of the palestinians would accept the terms of the Oslo Accord. Israel on the other hand have continually breeched and expanded beyond the borders drawn up in the Oslo Accord.

The Israelis have absolutely no reason to accept the Oslo Accord – beyond morality and decency, of course. They can have anything they want, with the support of the superpower. They have no incentive whatsoever to come to any agreement. This story will end once the last Palestinian is killed and the word edited out of history books (along with the slave trade). To imagine otherwise is foolish optimism, IMO.

unfortunately i cannot remember the details, but iirc the wikileaks on the peace negotiations between palestineans and israel did not paint israel in a good light.

it was something along the lines of the palestinians ‘allowing’ israel to keep 70% of the illegaly occupied land, and only letting 10% of the palestinean refugees back to palestine. that was it, and the israelis still refused.

Palestineans might chuck a few fireworks at israel, the odd suicide bomber and a few stones at the occupying forces, but the overwhelming force/pressure/blockade by the israelis constitutes far more damamge to the palestineans than they could ever inflict on israel. israel hold the key to peace in the region, and yet they consistently refuse to allow it.

DrJ..

You’re right.. the point i was trying to make was that, in my experience, the Palestinian ‘on the street’ seems to be willing to compromise and accept the Oslo terms.. Israel are clearly not willing to compromise.

Is there a twitter feed I can follow ?

unfortunately i cannot remember the details, but iirc the wikileaks on the peace negotiations between palestineans and israel did not paint israel in a good light

hungry monkey – that stuff was in the Grauniad. Very interesting. And disgusting.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/palestine-papers