kerkko.fi

Haaretz columnist Gideon Levy wrote, "It is time to raise the white flag, to admit publicly that the two-state solution has been foiled." It was doomed, he says, by "the plundering settlers, the establishment that embraces them and the majority of Israelis, who do not lift a finger to stop them." In Levy's view, this leaves only one long-term option -- the "one-state solution," as the boundaries of Israel are officially expanded to encompass the occupied territory.

There are two versions of the one-state solution. In the left-wing version, Palestinians are given the vote and full citizenship, and Jews and Arabs live in a greater Israel that, given demographic trends, would presumably feature a majority Arab population before long. In the far-right version, the boundaries of Israel are officially expanded but Palestinians who live beyond the 1967 "green line" are never given the vote, so you wind up with an apartheid state.

Iran can never be threatened in its very existencence. Israel can. Indeed, such a threat could even grow out of the current intifada. That, at least, is the pessimistic opinion of Martin van Creveld, professor of military history at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

"If it went on much longer," he said, "the Israeli government [would] lose control of the people. In campaigns like this, the anti-terror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing. I regard a total Israeli defeat as unavoidable. That will mean the collapse of the Israeli state and society. We'll destroy ourselves."

In this situation, he went on, more and more Israelis were coming to regard the "transfer" of the Palestinians as the only salvation; resort to it was growing "more probable" with each passing day. Sharon "wants to escalate the conflict and knows that nothing else will succeed." But would the world permit such ethnic cleansing?

"That depends on who does it and how quickly it happens. We possess several hundred atomic warheads and rockets and can launch them at targets in all directions, perhaps even at Rome. Most European capitals are targets for our air force. Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."

I consider it all hopeless at this point. We shall have to try to prevent things from coming to that, if at all possible. Our armed forces, however, are not the thirtieth strongest in the world, but rather the second or third. We have the capability to take the world down with us. And I can assure you that that will happen before Israel goes under."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/sep/21/israelandthepalestinians.bookextracts/print

YOU

Take my water.
Burn my olive trees.
Destroy my house.
Take my job.
Steal my land.
Imprison my father.
Kill my mother.
Bomb my country.
Starve us all.
Humiliate us all.

BUT

I am to blame:
I shot a rocket back.

The "Gaza Youth Breaks Out" manifesto does not put forth any clear analysis of the current historical situation, or outline a response to it. It does not invite anyone to join anything. Its tone is denunciatory rather than analytical. Its language is apolitical: the terminology of resistance common to Palestinian manifestos is replaced here by use of the f-word. It lacks any mobilisational dimension.

Without being rooted in any particular or collective vision of change, the demands articulated in the manifesto are meaningless. Perhaps this is why it is so attractive to those who have read it on Facebook, and the European and American media who have taken it up. It caters to western tastes and desires, especially to the fantasy of a digitally connected youth emerging from cyberspace as agents of transformative change in the real world.

In the case of Palestine, this fantasy does a number of things besides soothing guilty consciences. It reframes the issue of justice for Palestine in vacuous and unthreatening terms, casts the method by which change may occur into virtual space, and empties the Palestinian body politic of the thoughtfully articulated demands of its millions of citizens.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2011/01/10/karma-nabulsi/facebook-in-gaza/

Source: Israeli television Channel 2 comedy show "Eretz Nehederet" ("Wonderful Country"), Season 8, Episode 1, skit "Kindergarten Hope".

We, the youth in Gaza, are fed up with Israel, Hamas, the occupation, the violations of human rights, and the indifference of the international community. We want to scream and break this wall of silence, injustice, and indifference; scream with all the power in our souls in order to release this immense frustration that consumes us because of the situation we live in.

We are like lice between two nails living a nightmare inside a nightmare, no room for hope, no space for freedom. We are sick of being caught in this political struggle; sick of coal dark nights with airplanes circling above our homes; sick of innocent farmers getting shot in the buffer zone; sick of bearded guys walking around with their guns abusing their power, beating up or incarcerating young people demonstrating for what they believe in.

We are sick of the wall of shame that separates us from the rest of our country and keeps us imprisoned in a stamp-sized piece of land; sick of being portrayed as terrorists, homemade fanatics with explosives in our pockets and evil in our eyes; sick of the indifference we meet from the international community, the so-called experts in expressing concerns and drafting resolutions but cowards in enforcing anything they agree on.

We are sick and tired of living a shitty life, being kept in jail by Israel, beaten up by Hamas, and completely ignored by the rest of the world.

Meanwhile, French President Nicolas Sarkozy had told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Paris that "there was a single door [in the peace process] and that it was imperative to move through it now." French diplomats said Sarkozy had three things to say to Netanyahu: "you think you have time, but you do not"; "you think you have an alternative solution, but you do not"; and "you think you are stronger than the Palestinians, but you are not".

http://wikileaks.fi/cable/2009/06/09PARIS827.html

The left's thinking is governed by the "Standard Left Explanatory System" -- an intellectual construct that gained popularity in Europe and the US in the 1960s after the demise of European colonialism. The basic principle is simple: Always support the underdog, particularly when non-Western, and always accuse Western powers, preferably the US and its allies, for what the underdog does. Anything aggressive or destructive a non-Western group says or does must be explained by Western dominance or oppression.

The system assumes that if you are nice to people, all conflicts will disappear. It disregards the human desire for dominance, power, and a belief system that gives them self-respect. The system, under the guise of humanitarianism, assumes that non-Western groups do not have a will of their own; that all they do, feel, or want is reactive to the West. It is devoid of respect for non-Western groups: It assumes that they are not responsible for their deeds, and that all they do must be explained by Western victimization.

One of the last remaining Auschwitz survivors has launched a blistering attack on Israel over its occupation of Palestine, The Herald reports. Dr Hajo Meyer, 86, sparked a furious reaction from hardline Jewish lobby groups, with Dr Meyer branded an "anti-Semite" and accused of abusing his position as a Holocaust survivor.

Dr Meyer said there were parallels between the treatment of Jews by the Nazis and the treatment of Palestinians by Israelis. "The Israelis tried to dehumanise the Palestinians, just like the Nazis tried to dehumanise me. Nobody should dehumanise any other and those who try to dehumanise another are not human," he said.

Dr Meyer also insisted the definition of "antisemitic" had now changed. "Formerly an antisemite was somebody who hated Jews because they were Jews and had a Jewish soul. But nowadays an antisemite is somebody who is hated by Jews," the 86-year-old death camp survivor said as he began a lecture tour of Scotland.

"Maybe we should start calling "real anti-semitism" by another name," one internet commentator suggested. "Maybe something that does not suggest that the plight of this one group of people is completely unconnected to the plight of others? This may sound crazy, but I suggest the term racism."