Michael, much of what you have written is plainly wrong. Your ideas reflect limited reading. For example:
1. Israel's illegal settlements in the occupied territories have made the occupation illegal. This is not disputed.
2. Occupied Palestinians can legally resist occupation. This is not disputed. No one but you tried to interpret this to mean that terrorism is legal resistance, it isn't.
Please provide a scholarly source that justifies Israel's settlements.
Have you read "Scars of War, Wounds of Peace" by Shlomo Ben Ami or "Lords of the Land" by Zertal and Eldar or "Knowing Too Much" by Norman Finkelstein? It's time to read serious history.
Don't just read the Jerusalem Post and Dershowitz.
With respect to rockets from Gaza, we should remember the following information from before Israel broke the June 2008 ceasefire: In a “document entitled ‘The Hamas terror war against Israel,’ The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs provides striking visual evidence of Hamas’s good faith during the lull. It reproduces two graphs drawn up by the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Israel Intelligence Heritage & Commemoration Center: [Graphs provided] The graphs show that the total number of rocket and mortar attacks shrank from 245 in June to 26 total for July through October, a reduction of 97 percent.” link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
Great post Juan! I'm glad I make an annual donation.
Just to add: Removing Arabs in some manner (land purchases, etc.) was at the heart of the Zionist project. Beginning in the 1930s Zionist leaders made preparations for a population transfer, setting up a special committee for the task. They addressed the question of whether the transfer would be forced or voluntary. In the words of Dr. Ruppin (head of the Zionists’ Land Settlement Department and the foremost land expert of the Jewish Agency), “I do not believe in the transfer of an individual. I believe in the transfer of entire villages.” link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
A fact I use to help explain the grotesque Occupation: When Israel "withdrew" from Gaza in August 2005, Jews constituted 0.6 per cent of the population (as approximately 8,000 Jewish settlers and 1.5 million Palestinians lived in Gaza); and, Israel and Jewish settlers controlled 25% of the territory, 40% of the arable land and a disproportionate share of the scarce water resources. link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
-For an example of the significance of norms and institutions to inequality, consider that Denmark’s Gini Index was 24.7 in 1992 and 24.8 in 2011(est.) while the US’s respective numbers were 43 and 47. (And, it is important to note, Denmark ranks highly on the Index of Economic Freedom.)
-In 2010, the Walton family (of Walmart fame) own more wealth ($89.5 billion) than the bottom 40 percent of America (49 million families).
-Essential reading on US inequality that Juan has posted in the past: link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
You may want to add the following to your understanding (which I have taken from an informative quiz on Saudi Arabia that Juan posted in the past):
“The ayatollahs’ [1979] revolution in Iran had been a dazzling assertion of Shia power and identity” that challenged the Saud family’s legitimacy. The Saudi royals did not want to suffer the fate of the Shah. The lesson they took away was: the solution to religious upheaval was more religion.
The Saudi rulers were naturally threatened by Khomeini’s doctrine of rule by the clerics (i.e. rule by Kings was unIslamic). Saudi rulers (along with most Muslims) disagree with Khomeini’s radical doctrine that the ulema (religious scholars) are qualified not simply to advise the ruler, but to exercise government in their own right. The executive power held by Iran’s clerics sets Iran apart from the Muslim world. Saudi leaders argue that from the first caliphs, the secular rulers have always been the executive rulers, while the job of the sheikhs and the mufti has been to give them advice.
The Iran-Iraq War of 1980-88 “was a…bloody business.…When Iran launched a successful counterassault in…[1983] against Saddam Hussein’s unprovoked invasion of September 1980, the Saudis financed the Iraqi leader as a Sunni Arab ‘brother.’ Saddam was the best available barrier to the scary prospect of the ayatollahs taking power in Baghdad, while the United States backed the Iraqi tyrant as part of Washington’s enduring attempt to gain some redress for the humiliation of the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979-81.” link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
Michael, much of what you have written is plainly wrong. Your ideas reflect limited reading. For example:
1. Israel's illegal settlements in the occupied territories have made the occupation illegal. This is not disputed.
2. Occupied Palestinians can legally resist occupation. This is not disputed. No one but you tried to interpret this to mean that terrorism is legal resistance, it isn't.
Please provide a scholarly source that justifies Israel's settlements.
Have you read "Scars of War, Wounds of Peace" by Shlomo Ben Ami or "Lords of the Land" by Zertal and Eldar or "Knowing Too Much" by Norman Finkelstein? It's time to read serious history.
Don't just read the Jerusalem Post and Dershowitz.
With respect to rockets from Gaza, we should remember the following information from before Israel broke the June 2008 ceasefire: In a “document entitled ‘The Hamas terror war against Israel,’ The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs provides striking visual evidence of Hamas’s good faith during the lull. It reproduces two graphs drawn up by the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Israel Intelligence Heritage & Commemoration Center: [Graphs provided] The graphs show that the total number of rocket and mortar attacks shrank from 245 in June to 26 total for July through October, a reduction of 97 percent.”
link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
Great post Juan! I'm glad I make an annual donation.
Just to add: Removing Arabs in some manner (land purchases, etc.) was at the heart of the Zionist project. Beginning in the 1930s Zionist leaders made preparations for a population transfer, setting up a special committee for the task. They addressed the question of whether the transfer would be forced or voluntary. In the words of Dr. Ruppin (head of the Zionists’ Land Settlement Department and the foremost land expert of the Jewish Agency), “I do not believe in the transfer of an individual. I believe in the transfer of entire villages.” link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
A fact I use to help explain the grotesque Occupation: When Israel "withdrew" from Gaza in August 2005, Jews constituted 0.6 per cent of the population (as approximately 8,000 Jewish settlers and 1.5 million Palestinians lived in Gaza); and, Israel and Jewish settlers controlled 25% of the territory, 40% of the arable land and a disproportionate share of the scarce water resources.
link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
I highly recommend this very informative quiz on Hezbollah that Juan posted in the past: link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
-For an example of the significance of norms and institutions to inequality, consider that Denmark’s Gini Index was 24.7 in 1992 and 24.8 in 2011(est.) while the US’s respective numbers were 43 and 47. (And, it is important to note, Denmark ranks highly on the Index of Economic Freedom.)
-In 2010, the Walton family (of Walmart fame) own more wealth ($89.5 billion) than the bottom 40 percent of America (49 million families).
-Essential reading on US inequality that Juan has posted in the past: link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com
You may want to add the following to your understanding (which I have taken from an informative quiz on Saudi Arabia that Juan posted in the past):
“The ayatollahs’ [1979] revolution in Iran had been a dazzling assertion of Shia power and identity” that challenged the Saud family’s legitimacy. The Saudi royals did not want to suffer the fate of the Shah. The lesson they took away was: the solution to religious upheaval was more religion.
The Saudi rulers were naturally threatened by Khomeini’s doctrine of rule by the clerics (i.e. rule by Kings was unIslamic). Saudi rulers (along with most Muslims) disagree with Khomeini’s radical doctrine that the ulema (religious scholars) are qualified not simply to advise the ruler, but to exercise government in their own right. The executive power held by Iran’s clerics sets Iran apart from the Muslim world. Saudi leaders argue that from the first caliphs, the secular rulers have always been the executive rulers, while the job of the sheikhs and the mufti has been to give them advice.
The Iran-Iraq War of 1980-88 “was a…bloody business.…When Iran launched a successful counterassault in…[1983] against Saddam Hussein’s unprovoked invasion of September 1980, the Saudis financed the Iraqi leader as a Sunni Arab ‘brother.’ Saddam was the best available barrier to the scary prospect of the ayatollahs taking power in Baghdad, while the United States backed the Iraqi tyrant as part of Washington’s enduring attempt to gain some redress for the humiliation of the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979-81.”
link to detailedpoliticalquizzes.wordpress.com