Comments on: Israel Needs Turkey

By: mary

mary — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 11:19:10 +0000

Just received

*TURKEY-ISRAEL TRADE VOLUME RISES BY 135% UNDER AKP *
> (ANSAmed) – ANKARA, FEBRUARY 2 – The trade volume between Turkey and Israel has reached to 3.3 billion dollars in 2008 from 1.4 billion dollars in 2002 when the Islamist-rooted Justice and Development came to power, daily Hurriyet reports.

The official data showed that Turkey’s exports reached 1.9 billion dollars in 2008 from 1.6 billion dollars in 2007. Turkey’s imports from Israel rose 36% in 2008 to 1.4 billion dollars. One of the main trade items between two countries is the defense industry. Turkey had auctioned the modernization of the M-60 tanks to the Israel Military Industries (IMI) for 668 million dollars. The IMI also won the modernization of the 300 military helicopters for 57 million dollars. Turkey signed three other deals with Israel for the modernization of war jets. The financial amount of these agreements is 850 million dollars. The tension rose between Turkey and Israel after Ankara harshly criticized the Israel’s operations in the Gaza Strip which left more than 1,300 people killed. The Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s reaction to storm out of the Gaza session in Davos is unlikely to effect the mutual relations, experts say. (ANSAmed).

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In addition to the tanks, helicopters and fighter jets mentioned above, Israel are also supplying drones to Turkey, the pseudo supporters of the Palestinians. I wonder if they have thought about the possibility of Israel’s bugs being planted during maintenance and upgrading of their shopping basket of war weaponry. Wickedness.

By: Barry

Barry — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 19:07:01 +0000

Gideon -You are apparently under the mistaken impression that Gaza is an entity apart from the West Bank. Gaza is part and parcel of Palestine. Its economy will be part of the Palestinian national economy. Gaza has for the last 42 years been under Israeli occupation and siege. There is no point in discussing its economy except as one that is under Israeli control. Gaza of course imports goods, but it has to do so surreptitiously, as it is under the Israeli gun.
It should also be noted that because Gaza is under occupation, its people are forced to carry Israeli-issued ID cards. And Gazans are forced to pay taxes to Israel (which monies, of course, they never see again.) In short, while Israel strangles Gaza, it also rummages thru its pockets.

By: Hue Longer

Hue Longer — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 11:35:00 +0000

Well (hehe) Mary,

I suppose it would be if Gideon was relying on drinking from those same wells…but he is like an attorney from the Alan Dershowitz mold who relies on selling 12 TV weened thinkers into giving credit to his begged question–damned the logical implications. The guy is a pro or a hobbyist who loves the game more than the stated cause… His smirk shines through. He hasn’t done any wet work but preens over his lies like he’s one of the “brave” butchers. It’s a big circle and distraction, and as Bozh indicated is something which only needs to be addressed for tourists dropping by looking for perspective. I think the guy is laughing and doesn’t believe in any of the crap he’s peddling.

By: mary

mary — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 09:44:26 +0000

Hue – would this be one of the same wells that the Israelis destroyed in Gaza? This is a paragraph from a BBC website page (and the BBC are not particularly friendly towards the Palestinians – viz the blocking of the DEC appeal broadcast) which reports the aftermath of Vilnai’s ’shoah’ so ably visited on Gaza by Olmert, Barak and Livni.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7845428.stm

———————————
WATER AND SANITATION
Before the Israeli operation, Gaza’s water and sewage system was already in dire need of maintenance and spare parts.

The fighting damaged water wells and pipes, and led to shortages in the fuel that powers them, leaving half a million Gazans without running water. Two weeks after the ceasefire, 70% of Gaza’s water wells were functioning, but some localities and 10,000 people in Beit Hanoun were still without water.

Gaza’s sewage and water body estimates it will cost $6m to repair the water and sewage network.

Officials have confirmed that all two million litres of wastewater at Gaza City’s treatment plant, bombed on 10 January, leaked into surrounding agricultural land.

A pump that sends sewage from Beit Hanoun to the Beit Lahia wastewater treatment plant was also damaged, leaving sewage flowing onto the streets.
———————————

By: Gideon

Gideon — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 08:07:52 +0000

Who is feeding Gaza? Economic data on Gaza? Is Gaza a welfare state?
How can Gaza support itself?

Hue
you welcome to pitch in with the answers

By: Hue Longer

Hue Longer — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 06:54:09 +0000

Gideon,

Will you ever acknowledge? You poisoned the well with the welfare comment, got corrected and now move on to something new and will wait again before bringing up welfare again. Worse is that I don’t think you’re a fuckwit….you do this intentionally like it’s your job. Is this your job?

By: Gideon

Gideon — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 05:05:10 +0000

Can Palestinian politicians deal with the art of the possible or will they cling to the wish list? Probably depends who will be in charge when the smoke clears.

Barry
We are not really negotiating. I do not have any authority. Do you?
I understand you may have a wish list, we all do. The wish list should not stop Palestinians to make a deal and start building their own country. I believe the goal should the well-being of the people: economic development, education, health, arts, leisure, women emancipation – quality of life.
Jerusalem will be there forever. They can always come and visit Jerusalem in peace.

Gaza is a welfare state.
Maybe you can offer us some different economic data?

By: Barry

Barry — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 02:14:18 +0000

Gideon – Sarcasm? I think you were just being silly.

The numbers for Res.181 are simple. 30%(Jewish population) X 7% (Jewish land ownership) = 210. 210-181(UN res) = 29. 29×2 (’cause Jews are worth double) = 58. 58-3(for internationalized Jerusalem) = 55% (the amount of land to be turned over to the Jews. Almost as silly as your dunam counts.

Of course a state of Palestine. In all of the WB&G with E Jerusalem as its capital. With ALL the rights and responsibilities of all nation-states. Settlers and troops return to Israel. A decent sized corridor connecting the West Bank and Gaza. Israel acknowledges the right of return and works out a return and compensation system for refugees. Leave economic development to the Palestinians. They have been businessmen for centuries – back when Jews were Hebrews in some other desert. They just want the Israeli jackboot off their necks. As far as welfare goes, Israel has been on Palestinian welfare for decades – in confiscated taxes. That can go for refugee compensation. The real question is: can Israel function without US welfare and American Jewish donations? I don’t suppose we’ll ever have to know.

By: Gideon

Gideon — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 01:29:54 +0000

Hamas and Fatah are BOTH Israeli puppets! The coming Palestinian civil war will be only because of Israel! Even more Israel controls the Arab League and the UN, that’s how it was able to pass 131 resolutions against itself. It also made deals with the corrupt leadership of all neighboring Arab countries (plus Iraq) to wage wars against itself so it can subjugate Palestinian Arabs.
Should I continue, or was it enough sarcasm?

Are we done with all the unsubstantiated claims about the land theft leading to 1947 UN 181 or are you too struck by the numbers?

Barry
Yes to Palestinian state.
Yes to economic development.
Let’s start with Gaza.
Palestinians, with Arab economic investment stimulus, can show the whole world what they can build in Gaza. How about Abu Dabi model or Gaza Riviera? How quickly do you think Gaza can get off world’s welfare?

By: Barry

Barry — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 01:02:22 +0000

I think Arafat enjoyed the limelight, enjoyed running around with the big boys in foreign capitals, found a niche for himself and many dozens of fat cat Fatahmen. These are the guys that the average Palestinian would see riding around in limos. They are the ones who got contracts from Israelis to distribute goods in the WB&G, and they are the wielders of patronage. At least since Oslo, the transformation of the PLO into the PA has largely meant that this organization functions as an extension of Israeli policy – their enforcers. Not that its as simple as that. Arafat would like to have been the liberator of Palestine, and certainly, Fatah/PA did not always cooperate with Israel. But too often it did. So we see the rise of a group with the discipline of Islam – religion being something people often turn to when the other -isms fail them. Hamas, as might be expected as it became a more important player, modified its stance. The call for a 10 year or 50 year Hudna (truce) is a way of saving face. In other words, Hamas accepts Israel because it realizes it has no choice – but to say that is to lick the feet of Israel, it is to admit that Israel was right to commit genocide against the Palestinians – so recognition ain’t gonna happen. Besides, Israel implored Arafat for many years to recognize Israel. Even beginning in the 70s Arafat made peace overtures. These got more explicit as time went by and eventually he recognized Israel in writing – in Arabic, Hebrew, and English. Israel ignored it and the occupation tightened just a bit more.
Arafat did not reject Clinton’s offer – or diktat as you more correctly put it. They agreed to meet again. Arafat, Clinton, and Ehud Barak then took the party to Taba. One fine day, Barak walked out of Taba, went back home to campaign against Netanyahu and said that Arafat rejected peace. So it was not Arafat who quit – but Barak, because he was afraid that he was not being tough enough for a rabid Israeli populace.

I don’t believe in a One-state solution. For one, the Israeli mindset is a pretty sick one. There’s a lot of pent up race hatred – I mean, we see them trying to evict their own Palestinian citizens 60 years after statehood. While in 48-49 liberal Zionism triumphed in theory, Revisionist Zionism is what really won the day for Israel. And Revisionist Zionism is race based, it believes in the essentialism of race. It uses this and the Holocaust to keep Israeli Jews in a perpetual state of paranoia. So I would not wish living with Israelis on anyone. The Palestinians are kind of a collective Jesus. They are dying for the sins of others. Who would trade positions with Palestinians? I think no one.
Secondly, surveys over the years have shown that most Palestinians believe in a 2-state solution. Granted, many espouse in anger for the annihilation of Israel, but who wouldn’t after someone has stolen your home and killed your brother or sister. Still, larger majorities of Palestinians favor a two-state solution than do Israelis – in many surveys. I ask myself – can I be more radical than the Palestinians themselves? I think not.

By: bozh

bozh — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 00:21:00 +0000

barry,
another reason for palestinian split may be that fatah ‘knows’ [ or strongly believes] that the peace is not available for decades+ no matter what pals do or don’t do..
how about hamas? is it just tactics with no strategic goal in mind?
or does religion play a role for hamas? and if so (it seems so) to what extent?
of course, hatred/vengeance is always present.
i do not evaluate that abbas et al are traitors. it shld be recalled that fatah with arafat had rejected clinton’s offer.
now obama offers even less. had fatah ‘ known’ or believed that by rejecting the insulting offer, palestinians wld lose more land. probably, i deduce.
but still cldn’t accept a diktat or even an insult?
however, US policy does change. world plutos may get tired of that cult.
and decide to force israel into a just peace; perhaps one state?!
to me, this appears as an optimum deal. thnx

By: Barry

Barry — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 00:18:24 +0000

Zionistische Vereinigung fur Deutschland (ZVfD) the Zionist Party of Germany began soliciting the patronage of Adolf Hitler repeatedly beginning in 1933. Here’s a bit of a letter sent by the ZVfD to the Nazis on 6/21/33. “On the foundation of the new state, which has established the principle of race, we wish to fit our community into the total structure so that for us too, in the sphere assigned to us, fruitful activity for the Fatherland is possible…. We too, are against mixed marriage and are for maintaining the purity of the Jewish group…. Thus a self-conscious Jewry here described, in whose name we speak, can find a place in the structure of the German state….We believe in the possibility of group-conscious Jewry and the German state.” It goes on in a similar vein. The document remained under wraps until 1962 when it was published in Israel – in the original German. (See Lucy Dawidowicz (ed.) ‘A Holocaust Reader’ Pages 150 – 155) In short, the German Zionists did not fight Hitler before he came to power when there was still the possibility of his defeat. Given this failure to resist during the Weimar Republic, and given their race theories, it was inevitable that they would end up as the ideological twins of Nazism.

By: Barry

Barry — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 23:35:12 +0000

Gideon – The reason there are two rival groups vying for power in Palestine is because Israel refused to make peace with the Palestinians when the PLO was the only game in town (save for a few radical groups). If Israel had done what it was supposed to do and withdraw from the remainder of Palestine and come to a just settlement of the refugee issue, there would be no Hamas today to deal with. Israel never misses a chance to screw itself. Not one dunam of land was gained by Fatah/PLO in those several decades. Instead, the PLO became the PA and functioned as Israel’s puppet forces. So many Palestinians looked elsewhere. And of course, as is well understood now, Israel encouraged the rise of Hamas as a counterweight to the PLO. Like I said, Israel never misses a chance to screw itself. If only they did not take others down in doing so.

By: Barry

Barry — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 23:26:50 +0000

Bozh – That would be the refugee ship Patria. Haganah dynamite killed 200++ Jews. Of course, Hagana says that was not their intention – but who plants dynamite on ships thinking it will not kill anyone?

By: bozh

bozh — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:56:35 +0000

barry, yes,
even UK considered some immigration illegal according to martin gilbert who writes as a friend of some israelis.
he, in his book, Israel, a history cites at least a few cases of UK sending ‘jews’ back to cyprus and europe.
on one occ’n, ‘jewish’ terrorists in order to cripple a ship with immigrants on board, have planted dinamite in it so as to prevent it from leaving the port.
however, the blast was too damaging and ship sunk with most people drowning.

By: Barry

Barry — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 19:49:36 +0000

Bozh – And even prior to the Balfour note, the Hussein-McMahon correspondence promised a Middle East free of outside rule. The promise was betrayed by colonizing the region and bringing in European colonists. And in the final analysis – it was even by the Brits own rules that the vast majority of Jewish immigration was illegal.

By: Barry

Barry — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 19:45:30 +0000

RHS – Certainly the continued arrival of Europeans in the Americas and in Palestine without the consent of the inhabitants was immoral. It was accomplished not because they should but because they could. It was about power in both circumstances. The Palestinians (and other Arabs) never recognized the re-occupation of their country by Europeans. The promise had been that the Middle East would be free of outsider rule. The Brits and French violated that promise. I think it is important to understand that European manipulations were not viewed as legitimate. And the Middle East was not a lawless fronteir. There were of course pre-existing laws – Ottoman and local law. Both the Brits and later the Israelis have used Ottoman and Jordanian law whichever best fit their nefarious goals. (The Israelis added their military law to the mix to control even Arab citizens of Israel before ‘67.)

Basically, the Palestinians are at the mercy (what mercy?, one might ask) of the US and Israel, the rest of the world – going by UN votes – wants Israel to follow 194, 242 and subsequent resolutions and Court decisions that demand Israel go back to pre 6/67 borders. There is of course a blanket of apathy brought on by the deadly stonewalling tactics of the US and Israel.

Follow what the world has deemed the law – that’s the practical solution.

By: Barry

Barry — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 19:19:34 +0000

Gideon – You are working double-overtime on the dunam numbers but there’s no need. The modus operandi and goal from the very beginning – as per Zionist founder Theodore Herzl, “We shall try to spirit the penniless population across the border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it any employment in our own country.” That’s a mouthful – deny Palestinians employment in Palestine and drive them into the desert. (This is how Zionists came up with the notion that Arabs wanted to drive them into the sea – they were projecting their own plans onto the Palestinians.) While that proved momentarily impossible, the Palestinians being a stubborn people, the Zionists eventually did get the UN to give the Jews the maximum amount of land that would still retain a Jewish majority – albeit a mere 1% majority. What’s ever is left will be for the Arabs. That was quite a feat on the part of the UN. After all, Jews were a distinct minority in EVERY district of Palestine, and in some districts virtually non-existent. So it meant giving the Jews the Negev (which the Zionists dearly wanted for its economic potential), and as much as possible of heavily-populated Arab areas without Arabs going over the 50% mark. In essence, the UN was intent on gerrymandering a Jewish state into existence. It is not surprising that the Zionists took the deal – they were going from 0% to 55% . It is not surprising the Palestinians rejected the deal – afterall it was their country. Yet had the Palestinians known that a Zionist plan was already in the works to ethnically cleanse the country of non-Jews maybe they would have signed on to 181. But then again, its pretty clear that accepting a ‘mere’ 55% was only a means to an end – to bring all of Palestine under Zionist rule – as Herzl wished.

As far as Palestinians prospering economically, all that means is that, under British colonization, Palestine was transitioning from largely pre-capitalist economic relations to a European capitalist economy. Thanks to the British colonization Jews in coastal cities lived better than they ever had in the shtetl. So too did urban Palestinians and fellahin in yet un-Zionized areas. It was in areas where Zionists were evicting tenant farmers that quality of life fell off drastically for Palestinians. Further, the rush for real estate drove up land rents drastically at prices that only western funded Zionists could afford. Rich Jewish families like the Rothschilds help foot the bill to put Palestinian lands into Jewish hands. And of course, the Jewish National Fund’s mandate was to buy land and put it under Jewish ownership ‘in perpetuity.’

By: bozh

bozh — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 18:20:51 +0000

in ‘22 with just a few thousands land stealers, even opposed by the 10,000 sitting judaists, cld not even dream of having a state at that time let alone estabilsh one.
thnx

By: bozh

bozh — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 18:10:12 +0000

HR2,
i think you are right about the word “illegal” being inaccurate to limn some euro immigration to americas. i’m not even sure that some immigration to also america wasn’t actually welcomed by at least some redpeople.
some canad’n indigenes even now say that immigrants to canada are elcome.
however, comparison btw immigration to americas and immigration to palestine reveals startling differences.

immigration of euros to palestine during even first aliyah in 18th century was vigouroulsy opposed by natives. second aliyah, lasting until ‘40 or so, was opposed even violently.
alas alack, ottoman empire had always welcomed ‘jews’ to their empire.

unfortunately for canaanites UK had also welcomed euros illegal immigration to palestine but in much greater numbers.
canaanitic protest against euro immigration fell on christian deaf ears.

i say that immigration into palestine was illegal and immoral because of the ‘promise’ of the balfour declaration of ‘17 that no harm shld come to natives resulting from establishing a home for euros in expalestine.
obviously the ‘promise’, even at a glance, reveals it was a sham.
so, i think, i’ll reassert that immigration into palestine had indeed been illegal, immoral, and even a criminal act. thnx