The biggest mistake in geopolitics - 20th century

[Arkaign]

This is not a flame thread, and I'm certainly not taking sides with either the Israeli, Arab, Palestinian, or otherwise.

That said, it seems fundamentally idiotic that Israel was formed as a country in this century, in that place. Hmm, of all the places in the world we could choose to settle, why not jump right into the cauldron? Let's displace a bunch of people (not getting into who had rights to what, fact is the land there is far older than any human beings, so personally I don't think anyone has a righteous claim to it), aggravate millions upon millions of diametrically opposed Islamic ideologues, and become a permanent burden to the global peace.

It seems downright selfish to me. Surely there was SOME place better than there, pretty much any place would do. Truman should have claimed Baja California and given it to them. Call it New Israel. Whatever.

The point is, if you throw religion out of the argument pro/con as a reasoning, there isn't any supportable logical reason to set Israel up, displace a bunch of already disagreeable locals, and start a shit-storm that exists to this day.

I have precious little patience for any of the so-called 'sides' in that exchange. I don't think Israel is an ally, I don't think they should have been there in the first place. For anyone who thinks that's 'God's land, it would be better off for everyone if we leveled the whole stretch with hundreds of megatons of H-bombs, and give it back to God.

/rant off

I'm only partly kidding here

 

[Lemon law]

While I can agree with some of the Arkaign reasoning, it still fails to yield any insights to day. At least in MHO, its was and still is possible to support that formation of the State of State of Israel in 1948, and at the same time say the experiment went tragically wrong, partly due to the faults on all sides, and as we look at all that has gone wrong today, its now impossible to support the State of Israel if its going to build its success on the robbery, misery, and the exploitation of others.

That does not mean the initial experiment was wrong, it merely means we must bring justice back into the equation because Israel will not.

 

[RichardE]

Arabs and Jews were already living there, the area had already been a source of Jewish/Islam violence, Islam people had been attacking/killing jews for decades there, so the two state solution was suppose to kill two birds with one stone, stop the bloodshed already taking place and keep the Jews safe from the Europeans and Russians.

If the Arabs/Islamic people had not tried to backstab Britain, the UN and Israel we would have a two state peacefull solution, instead the Arabs chose a "military solution to the Israel problem" after the UN proposed the two state solution.

It is not as simple as you make it, the history of the 3-4 decades before its creation are relevant, it wasn't just a bunch of farming arabs kicked off one day as a buncha jews moved in shooting as they came.

It could have easily become a two state solution or even an integrated state, but the Muslims had already been trying to kill off the Jews so the Jewish people were not safe there until they had there own home.

If Jerusalem had become an international zone a lot of this bloodshed would be avoided. I wonder how many people have died over the Milena for that one piece of land.

 

[Arkaign]

Thank you for your interesting response. My OP was based on sadness and frustration at the situation in the ME for so long now, and in the news again of course. I realize that it's a hindsight is 20-20 thing, and absolutely not helpful today.

If the Israelis would have been granted their little slice, the Palestinians theirs, and everyone governed themselves with peace, dignity, and honest trade, it would have been wonderful. Of course it was a bit ridiculous to expect much of anything different from the permanent crapfest things have been

 

[Craig234]

Originally posted by: Arkaign
This is not a flame thread, and I'm certainly not taking sides with either the Israeli, Arab, Palestinian, or otherwise.

That said, it seems fundamentally idiotic that Israel was formed as a country in this century, in that place. Hmm, of all the places in the world we could choose to settle, why not jump right into the cauldron? Let's displace a bunch of people (not getting into who had rights to what, fact is the land there is far older than any human beings, so personally I don't think anyone has a righteous claim to it), aggravate millions upon millions of diametrically opposed Islamic ideologues, and become a permanent burden to the global peace.

It seems downright selfish to me. Surely there was SOME place better than there, pretty much any place would do. Truman should have claimed Baja California and given it to them. Call it New Israel. Whatever.

The point is, if you throw religion out of the argument pro/con as a reasoning, there isn't any supportable logical reason to set Israel up, displace a bunch of already disagreeable locals, and start a shit-storm that exists to this day.

I have precious little patience for any of the so-called 'sides' in that exchange. I don't think Israel is an ally, I don't think they should have been there in the first place. For anyone who thinks that's 'God's land, it would be better off for everyone if we leveled the whole stretch with hundreds of megatons of H-bombs, and give it back to God.

/rant off

I'm only partly kidding here

Your post seems reasonable. People in the Middle East broadly view creating Israel as one group of Europeans making them pay for the wrongs by another group of Eruopeans.

I understand that the location for the Jews for their new nation had South American seriously considered. What a different history we'd have had that been done.

That's the underlying tension in all of this it seems to me: somehow reconciling the issue of the injustice of the creation of Israel as it was (with means of terrorism, no less), with the legitimate needs and desires of the current Israelis. If Mexicon suddenly announed half of California was theirs, we wouldn't 'compromise' and only take part back (put aside the actual history of our 'stealing' it to begin with). But it's hardly clear there's any way Israel's going to be 'relocated'. Sadly, few have any interest in the large balanced issue.

Toss in a further corrupting influence of Israel's role a a proxy nation for the US and the role oil plays, and you can nearly forget about the issue being dealt with by 'fair' standards.

Most are pursuing the interests of one side or the other, which leaves little room for common ground; even cease fires tend to 'favor' advantage for one side or the other.

You titled the thread 'biggest geopolitical mistake of the 20th century'. I've noted how it's also one of the greatest ironies. Insofar as the creatoin of Israel occured directly because of the Holocaust, the ongoing violence and problems are a way that Hitler - despite the universal renunciation of his actions - continues to kill yet more people today, as much as people want to stop any violence caused by him.

 

[cyclohexane]

this was done intentionally by the war profiteers.

 

[RichardE]

Originally posted by: cyclohexane
this was done intentionally by the war profiteers.

Ideologies lead politicians back than moreso than money. No one was selling arms to Israel at the time, so I doubt the "war profiteers" had anything to do with it.

 

[JS80]

The real mistake was letting there be any remnants of Islam after Israel won in 1948. They should have completely expelled the palestinians and destroyed the Dome of the Rock and built the new temple there. The Israelis were too optimistic in co-existence.

 

[Fear No Evil]

Modern Islam needs a scapegoat - And the Israeli's are a perfect one for them to focus on. If Israel didn't exist they would have found another scapegoat to blame for their problems on.

 

[palehorse]

Originally posted by: Arkaign
I don't think Israel is an ally

I only wish to comment on that single phrase...

If you truly believe that, then you obviously have no idea just how much they are doing to aid us in the global war against terrorism... everywhere... every day.

Their reasons for doing so may include self-interest, but that is certainly understandable for any nation.

They are fighting the war alongside our own forces on thousands of "fronts."

That, my friend, makes them my ally.

 

[Lemon law]

Originally posted by: Fear No Evil
Modern Islam needs a scapegoat - And the Israeli's are a perfect one for them to focus on. If Israel didn't exist they would have found another scapegoat to blame for their problems on.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And Israel needs to scapegoat the Palestinian people to justify its theft of land. So it has been for 60 years, and so the injustices on both sides continue,
the only myth present is that injustice plus injustice will ever lead to peace.

 

[Lemon law]

Originally posted by: palehorse

Originally posted by: Arkaign
I don't think Israel is an ally

I only wish to comment on that single phrase...

If you truly believe that, then you obviously have no idea just how much they are doing to aid us in the global war against terrorism... everywhere... every day.

Their reasons for doing so may include self-interest, but that is certainly understandable for any nation.

They are fighting the war alongside our own forces on thousands of "fronts."

That, my friend, makes them my ally.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thank you clueless palehorse, with friends like you, we don't need enemies.

After all the bucks we have spent on the so called war on terrorism, we have motivated far more terrorist than we can kill.

I could ask you what wrong with that picture, but you would only ask permission to motivate more terrorists than you could possibly kill, once again promising to do what you have totally failed to do for six years running.

 

[sandorski]

What pisses me off is that we even care. There are conflicts all around the world that we ignore, I just wished we'd ignore this one as well. Over the holidays I was at my brothers place and while there ended up watching the Local News out of Seattle. They went through the usual US Local News stories, then did "International" News which was dominated by the Israel/Palestinian situation. They spent more time covering that than any other news story. It just pisses me off! :|

 

[Ozoned]

The biggest mistake?

No, just the bi-product of the biggest mistake

 

[ProfJohn]

I wonder... what would have happened if the Muslims had 'won' the wars and it was the Jews living in small territories and fighting for their lives.

And there really wasn't any place else for them, Israel is their natural homeland.

 

[Ozoned]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
I wonder... what would have happened if the Muslims had 'won' the wars and it was the Jews living in small territories and fighting for their lives.

And there really wasn't any place else for them, Israel is their natural homeland.

The muslims would have gave them a choice.

 

[ProfJohn]

Actually... the biggest mistake was the refusal of the Palestinians to accept a two nation solution.

Think of how much better off they would be if they had the 1948 boarders and their own country instead of being involved in this endless war that has caused nothing but thousands of wasted lives.

 

[kylebisme]

Originally posted by: Arkaign
If the Israelis would have been granted their little slice, the Palestinians theirs, and everyone governed themselves with peace, dignity, and honest trade, it would have been wonderful.(

Put simply, at the time of the U.N. partition plan, Jews in the region owned under 10% of the land, and yet were allocated over 50%. Then, the militant faction of that Jewish population depopulated nearly 200 Palestinian localities over both sides of the U.N. partition plan in the weeks before it went into effect, displacing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians before declaring statehood. Only after all that did the Arab nations send their armies against Israel.

So yeah, if you choose to ignore such facts, then Arabs are to blame and Israel has done no wrong. Then of course Hamas and such choose to ignore a whole host of other facts to argue the exact the opposite. Many people on both sides were raised to belive just that, as their parents were before them, without ever looking at what wrongs have been done to the other side of the conflict. The truth is; more wrong has been done by both sides than anyone could be ever be reasonably expected to fully recount.

However, if you can respect the context of the conflict, it becomes obvious that Israel's ongoing colonization of Palestinian territory in the West Bank has been perpetuating this madness for decades. Here is a list of news articles about those settlements which go rarely mentioned in our media:

http://kibush.co.il/datapage.asp?lang=1%20§ion=6

If you dig back though that you will see everyone from Bush to Clinton, Blair, Palestinian as well as Israeli leaders, along with leaders and people all over the world saying that Israel's colonization of the West Bank must end. Unfortunately, no one has ever bothered to actually make that happen, and the conflict continues unabated, driven by those who still insist on expanding the borders of Israel.

 

[Lemon law]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
I wonder... what would have happened if the Muslims had 'won' the wars and it was the Jews living in small territories and fighting for their lives.

And there really wasn't any place else for them, Israel is their natural homeland.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Maybe the tribes of Israel took Israel away from their original inhabitants, but their claim of Israel as a Jewish homeland was ended by the Romans some 1800 years ago, when the Romans concluded that Jews were totally unreasonable, could not play well with others, and hence they sent all the Jews packing in exile.

Its not the first time this has happened to the Jews, while Jews may have delighted in brutalizing those weaker than themselves, they came out on the short end of the stick when they messed with the Babylonians and Egyptians.
And suddenly found human compassion for the victim, only themselves, most notably lacking when they were on the long end of the stick. Read your old Testament of the Bible, the history is all there.

I do not believe in hereditary guilt, but the politics of pigs never works.

Wise religions reach out with compassion and grow, Israel now sadly cannot extend the same rights to others that it wants for itself.

I still believe that the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 was the right decision, the decision of Arab nations to invade was wrong, but still, the Nation of Israel could have proved it was better and belonged in the mid-east, and has instead fallen way short.

When we are dealing with a holy land,sacred to three religions, pigging it all will not work. Sharing can work, all else will never be acceptable.

 

[Aimster]

Originally posted by: JS80
The real mistake was letting there be any remnants of Islam after Israel won in 1948. They should have completely expelled the palestinians and destroyed the Dome of the Rock and built the new temple there. The Israelis were too optimistic in co-existence.

Israel would not exist today if it did that

 

[Aimster]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
I wonder... what would have happened if the Muslims had 'won' the wars and it was the Jews living in small territories and fighting for their lives.

And there really wasn't any place else for them, Israel is their natural homeland.

It wasn't a war of Muslims versus Jews first off.

and 2nd if the Arabs won the war they would be fighting each other for control of Jerusalem.

 

[kylebisme]

Originally posted by: Lemon lawI still believe that the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 was the right decision...

I don't at all, though I do belive Israel has the right to exist now simply because displacing a nation of Israelis born and raised in the land would be just as much of an atrocity as the displacement of the Palestinian before them.

Originally posted by: Lemon law
...the decision of Arab nations to invade was wrong, but still, the Nation of Israel could have proved it was better and belonged in the mid-east, and has instead fallen way short.

What do you suppose they should have done instead of sending in their armies on May 15, 1948, just after Israelis had depopulated nearly 200 Palestinian localities over both sides of the U.N. partition plan and had shown no signs of stopping?

I'm not one to recommend entering a war unless there is no other way to stop it, I'm at a loss as to what other option they could have reasonably considered at the point they finally launched their attack on Israel.

 

[Aimster]

Israel should have been created.

Control of Jerusalem should belong to the UN.

 

[palehorse]

Originally posted by: Lemon law

Originally posted by: palehorse

Originally posted by: Arkaign
I don't think Israel is an ally

I only wish to comment on that single phrase...

If you truly believe that, then you obviously have no idea just how much they are doing to aid us in the global war against terrorism... everywhere... every day.

Their reasons for doing so may include self-interest, but that is certainly understandable for any nation.

They are fighting the war alongside our own forces on thousands of "fronts."

That, my friend, makes them my ally.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thank you clueless palehorse, with friends like you, we don't need enemies.

After all the bucks we have spent on the so called war on terrorism, we have motivated far more terrorist than we can kill.

I could ask you what wrong with that picture, but you would only ask permission to motivate more terrorists than you could possibly kill, once again promising to do what you have totally failed to do for six years running.

lol... I appreciate the special attention and adulation you give me around here, but nothing you said there takes away from my point that Israel is a fine ally to the U.S. in our global war against terrorists -- and by "our," I mean the entire civilized world.

There are probably more than 50 countries playing an active role in the fight, and Israel easily ranks in the top five.

please stop it with the worship thing, it's embarrassing...

 

[Aimster]

Israel is not our strongest Ally in the M.E.