Balkingpoints.com / Balkers

9 Responses to “ Netanyahu under new pressure from EU and US ”

1. USA / Roy G says:

   20 March, 2010 at 12:20 AM

   Thanks for formatting these vids Jeff. We’ve only broached the Israel/Palestine issue once as yet on B/P (within a Balk of a quasi-related topic, Iran). Though a world issues site is destined to sooner or later.

   Most troubling is the decades the conflict has protracted over, and the horrific loss of life the failures to resolve it have caused. In the American political realm it took arriving into the mid-1990′s, and Hillary Clinton voicing as First Lady the rights of Palestinians to a state.

   (American) Media Inc., cast it at the time as a crackpot position. Prior to Bill’s election in 1992, Yasir Arafat could not even travel to the U.S. for any attempts at conflict resolution. He had led the resistance and was branded a terrorist by previous presidents.

   However by the time Bush Jr. stole the 2000 election from Al Gore, even
   his right-wing administration had accepted the principal of Palestinian Statehood. (Not that they did a thing about it). My point is that the Palestinian cause for independence is air tight and the West is finally onboard with it. Reversals of that fact are no longer possible.

   Most important to factor in: at least half of Israelis agree. They favor the elusive land-for-peace deal sought at various times by Yitzhak Rabin, Ehud Barak and Bill Clinton. Israel has a sharply divided electorate with a vocal, ultra-right & militaristic faction in play. As is true also in the United States.

   Social justice will eventually prevail, as our own history bears out.
2. Sammy from Sicily says:

   20 March, 2010 at 3:59 AM

   It is a big mess! Yes this Israel Palestine affair is a discgrace for all humanity..

   In the first place the State of Israel was erected on stolen Palestinian land. Without the permission of the Palestine people.

   In this case it is the United Nations fault, that in 1948 took this land from the Palestine people, and gave it to the Jewish people so that they could have their own state..That is a Jewish State on other people’s land.

   Gradually, with one excuse or another, the people of the state of Israel have extended their borders, with hook, or by crook. And they have made the Palestine people slaves in their own land…

   All this has been facilitated with the help of the United States, that supports the state of Israel, economically, as well as militariraly..And in some case even morarly..

   In which in my opinion, I consider it to be an illegal state, established on other people’s land.

   But then according to legend, the Jewish people claim that all the land in Palestine was originally theirs…So this brings up the old concept; “Which came first, the chicken or the egg”.

   And this endless battle will go on, and on for Centuries to come..It would be wise if the United States would not support the State of Israel all together…And at the same time let the United Nations solve this problem…Since they were the ones that instigated it in the first place, in 1948. By taking the land from the Palestine people and establishing this illegal state of Israel.

   Probably in the Middle East, a solution can be achieved, after dismantling this illegal Jewish state, and establish a state free of religious dominance, accepting all those that want to live in a free state, where modern laws will be established, respecting, freedom of choice, human rights, separation between religion and state, no death penalty, free elections. But this new state must not be influenced by religious fanatics…Which in synthesis it will be impossible to achieve….So I believe that the United States should stay out of this mess, and let the United Nations resolve it…

   Sammy from Sicily.
3. USA / kansan says:

   29 March, 2010 at 2:21 AM

   Land for peace. In reality a take it or leave it offering by the primary aggressor in the region post WW II. Do any of the world’s leaders seriously believe that can result even in short term peace, much something that can last past one generation? Jews where victims in Nazi Germany. The modern State of Israel has never been a victim. Yes they where attacked, but only because they where the first aggressor.
4. Sammy from Sicily says:

   29 March, 2010 at 3:05 AM

   Give the Palestine people all of their land back..And then there will be peace. An agressor cannot offer his stolen land for a peaceful settlement…Because the land that he offers is not his to give in the first place.

   Sammy from Sicily
5. UK / Martin says:

   29 March, 2010 at 1:03 PM

   Of course there also is the Jewish ancestral claim to the same territory.
   http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/The_Jewish_Claim_To_The_Land_Of_Israel.html

   Wherever one may side on that very major sticking point (or, perhaps not side at all), the eventual solution is likely to be based in the present reality on the ground. I.E.; both peoples are in fact there. Recall as well that the 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine ;

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Partition_Plan_for_Palestine

   reworked the British Mandate of Palestine, a transitional governing instrument approved by the UN predecessor League of Nations. Which did so after the World War I defeat of the Ottoman Empire, the region’s previous ruler ;

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Mandate_of_Palestine

   As I indicated within my “Iran Roils West Again” Balk, the 1947 plan attempted to create autonomous, co-existing Jewish and Palestinian states. And failed utterly.
6. Sammy from Sicily says:

   30 March, 2010 at 1:55 AM

   “Of course there also is the Jewish ancestral claim to the same territory.”

   This ancestral territorial claim, is the moving force that has pushed the Jewish people to try to obtain all the Palestine by hook or by crook.

   And if these concepts are put into act world-wide..We will encounter chaos in many nations that their land has been stollen by illegal occupiers, and it will be an ever ending game that will destabilize many societies.

   Such, as giving America back to the Indians, or Australia back to the Aborigines, etc. etc.

   For this reason, I believe that we must live in the real world of the present, and not in the world of the past..

   If the Jewish people had that ancestoral land..Why did they leave it.. For others to occupy it..So it is useless to cry over spilled milk…Centuries later..

   Sammy from Sicily
7. UK / Helianthus says:

   2 April, 2010 at 7:28 PM

   300? BCE Migration and conquest of Canaan by the Philistines and Israelite tribes. Map of Canaan.

   1000? BCE Jewish conquest of Jerusalem; reign of David (maps); After the death of David’s son, Solomon, the kingdom split into two: Israel in the north, Judea in Jerusalem and the south (maps). Brief History of Early Palestine in maps.

   721 BCE Fall of Israel (Northern Kingdom) to Assyria

   586 BCE Fall of Judea (Southern Kingdom) to Babylon and destruction of the first temple

   About 539 BCE Fall of Babylon. Jews allowed to return to Judea. Tradition has it that Ezra and Nehemia led this return, and later rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem, but the walls were apparently not built until 100 years later.

   About 519 BCE Rebuilding of the Second Temple under Persian rule.

   331 BCE Alexander the Great conquers Persia. The land was subject to Egyptian rule after his death, followed by Seleucid Syrian rule.

   166 BCE Revolt of Judah Maccabee against Syrian Hellenic dynasty; Simon. 164 – Liberation of Jerusalem. Judah is named Friend of the Roman Senate and People; Rule of the Maccabees: 166 – Judah 160 -Jonathan 143

   66-73 AD First Jewish revolt. Fall of the Jewish Second Temple to Romans in 70 AD.
   133-135 Second Jewish revolt under Bar Kochba crushed. Judea renamed Palestina. Jews are banned from Jerusalem by Hadrianus Caesar.

   614 Persians conquer Judea and Jerusalem..

   628 Emperor Heraclius defeats Sassanid Persians, reconquers Jerusalem..

   About 638 Arab conquest of Jerusalem (slightly earlier or later according to different sources). Caliph Omar provides the Christians of Jerusalem with a Covenant guaranteeing their protection. Land divided into the Jund of filastin, in the south (capital in Al-Lod and later in Ramlah), and the Jund of Urdunn in the north, with capital in Tiberias (Tabariyeh).

   The time line continues at the website.

   It seems that people either believe the historical record or they don’t.

   Helianthus
8. UK / Helianthus says:

   2 April, 2010 at 8:04 PM

   link for the above:

   http://www.zionism-israel.com/zionism_timeline.htm
9. USA / theotherjimmyolson says:

   19 April, 2010 at 2:02 PM

   Yes.