If you are anti-Zionist, what do you think Israel should do?

[Poudretteite]

Should Israel open its borders? Be given back to the Palestinian people? Where should the Jewish people go? What about the high risk of genocide?

Interested to hear as many people over the last few days have said they are anti-Zionist and that it's different to antisemitism.

This is one of the most wilfully manipulative elements of this entire thing.

Jews were forced out in much larger numbers from their home countries in surrounding areas and were stripped of their nationalities. This is what happened to both sets of people. Almost all those people are now dead.

The division of this land was based, from the very start, on a distinct state for JEWISH people and a distinct state for ARAB PALESTINIANS.

That was the entire point of it

Israel cannot "let back in" all the grandchildren of the people who left, because this is completely undoing to entire point of a JEWISH state.

This is a clear fact of which people are clearly aware but wilfully ignore because, well, they'd like there to not be a Jewish state anymore wouldn't they.

Well, keep whinging - it's not going to happen.

And in the meantime, until Jews, Indians, Bangladeshis, Sri Lankans, Kurds and everyone else has equal rights under law, freedom to stand in government, right of return for their grandparents homelands and are treated equal to citizens of that country then none of you lot have a bloody leg to stand on.

I can assure you if we sent you to live for a week as a Jew in Libya versus an Arab Palestinian in Israel you'd very quickly understand what Apartheid really is.

You're completely confused. Arab-Israeli citizens live in Israel, Palestinians in Gaza are not Israeli.

Sorry, but can I ask you to go back and read the post I made about apartheid in S Africa and how it was done very similar to the situation in Israel. Where territories were designated for different races and then they were forced to move to them. The S African government then stripped them of S African citizenship under the pretence that these territories would be sovereign states- only they weren’t at all. Just like Gaza and West Bank are not sovereign states.

This is completely false, Jews were discriminated at beyond belief in the Ottoman empire

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-treatment-of-jews-in-arab-islamic-countries

Yes, we're all living on land that wasn't ours. Half my family comes from Iraq, the other half Poland. We have personally suffered great loss in both property and lives lost because of our religion.

It would never occur to me to try and reclaim any of "our" land. It is what it is. We need to look forward and just accept that it happened. All sides of my family have had to start anew in the last couple of generations (on the Iraqi side we're actually the first generation born outside of Iraq, so we're not talking hundreds of years ago, more like a few decades).

You're right though, Hamas are not willing to negotiate. They're martyr's, they want to die. When they die, they'll be greatly rewarded in the afterlife. So Israel is fighting an enemy who actively wants to die, which is a difficult task to say the least!

Hopefully we can be rid of Hamas soon and we can start discussing a two state solution again. That's what I hope for anyway - Peace and two states side by side.

Not all of Gaza’s residents have been there since the nakba or are descendents of the nakba refugees. These account for 60% of the population.

The remainder are Israeli-Arabs citizens displaced by Israel since then.

I hope for a 2 state solution too @OhHelloTheres But I heard on the radio today one view that even if Hamas are obliterated, there will be new extremist/terrorist groups to replace them. I can’t see it ending 😢

Even if Hamas are obliterated, Israel will again fund another extremist party in Gaza as it feeds into their overarching plan to annex Gaza, as stated by Netanyahu

Benjamin Netanyahu took an approach that divided power between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank — bringing Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to his knees while making moves that propped up the Hamas terror group.
The idea was to prevent Abbas — or anyone else in the Palestinian Authority’s West Bank government — from advancing toward the establishment of a Palestinian state.

source timesofisrael

Just seen two different reports on the body retrieval in Israel, one Sky News, one CNN. Where the Hamas terrorists had time they tortured people, including children. Children tied back-to back and burned alive. No other country would be expected to live with the threat of this becoming the new normal.

I'm sorry, but this is nonsense. They were not done in a similar way, the separate Palestinian territories are primarily a result of wars they started, and refusing to recognise the Israeli state. How can they be stripped of citizenship they've rejected? And conversely, why are they not a sovereign state? Because they reject the terms of any agreements. Stop trying to equate entirely different situations.

This is exactly it. But the truth is, the difference between me (and child of a Jewish refugee) vs my Palestinian counterpart is that I was given opportunity, a safe place to live, infrastructure, education, access to employment and the means with which to build a meaningful life.

Those people were given none of that. And Israel is not to blame. Gaza could have / should have been turned into a beautiful place. It could have had a free port, airport, seaside resorts, luxury hotels and thriving agriculture and industry.

It's the extremist nutjobs running the place who turned it into a poverty stricken place with terrible conditions. the minute those people are given reasonable lives with hope, infrastructure, security and things to do and places to go, they will stop being interesting in where there grandparents once lived.

They were not done in a similar way, the separate Palestinian territories are primarily a result of wars they started, and refusing to recognise the Israeli state. How can they be stripped of citizenship they've rejected? And conversely, why are they not a sovereign state? Because they reject the terms of any agreements.

Palestine did not start the Six Day War.

What were the terms they were rejecting? We would need to know that before deciding whether they were wrong to do so.

I know very little about* *apartheid to won’t comment on that.

Please. Don't use antisemitic tropes like "puppet masters" to refer to Israel. These ones should be obvious.

Like many, I didn’t really know the history behind all of this. So I’ve been trying to do my research.
Palestine don’t even have their own currency since the ‘50s.

This is not at all what the sources I have posted say. Please link to your sources for this. Israel took Gaza and West Bank from Egypt and Jordan in a 1967 war Israel started. Who are you referring to when you say “they”?

I’m sorry Lemony but Israel strangled Gaza with their sea, air and land blockade since 2007 in the name of self defence. Israel destroyed the airport they built and opened in 1998. Israel will not let any ships through directly, they have to go via Israel for approval first and Gaza fishermen were denied access to 85% of the fishing waters they had been guarenteed access to- so there goes the free port or even fishery idea. NGOs tried three flotillas of humanitarian aid to break through the blockade- all failed.

This blockade includes construction materials, food, medicine. Everything. Israel tried to destroy the one power plant in 2014 by bombing it and refuses them permission to expand or build a new power plant- the current power plant only produces some 15% of their power needs- this was specifically so Israel could control their electricity supply. They have desalination plants for water but these require electricity to work, so Gaza again depends on Israel for water.

Gaza tried growing vegetables to export- the greenhouse project but that failed when Israel closed the exit out of Gaza.

“The World Bank estimated in 2015 that the GDP losses caused by the blockade since 2007 was above 50%, and entailed large welfare losses. Gaza's manufacturing sector, once significant, shrunk by as much as 60% in real terms, due to the wars in the past 20 years and the blockade. Gaza's exports virtually disappeared since the imposition of the 2007 blockade. It stated that "solutions have to be found to enable faster inflow of construction materials into Gaza", while taking into account "legitimate security concerns of neighboring countries."[142]

In May 2015, the World Bank reported that the Gaza economy was on the "verge of collapse". 40% of Gaza's population lived in poverty, even though around 80% received some sort of aid. It said the restrictions had to be eased to allow construction materials "to enter in sufficient quantities" and to allow exports. "The economy cannot survive without being connected to the outside world", The World Bank said the tightened restrictions meant the construction sector's output was reduced by 83%.[143]

Israel withdrew from Gaza leaving hospitals, schools and infrastructure including greenhouses intact with opportunity for Gazans to build something lovely.

Within literally 3 days they launched rockets at Israel, smashed everything up and looted the greenhouses within two days

https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna9331863

They announced immediately that their intention was to kill all Jews and wipe Israel off the planet. Stop painting them as victims. They are terrorists. They just video taped themselves raping women, parading their bloodied underwear, torturing people, laughing as they did it with cries of victory.

There is a blockade because there needs to be. they use materials and power for terrorism. Stop trying to blame the victims of their depravity for the security measures they take to keep their citizens alive.

I find it hard to believe you are accidentally posting this much misleading, pro Hamas garbage

Your link is to an event of looting that affected 30% of greenhouses in 2005.

I wrote about Israel’s blockade which started in 2007 and said it was in the name of self defence. This blockade has prevented Gaza from achieving the picture you painted : you said I was given opportunity, a safe place to live, infrastructure, education, access to employment and the means with which to build a meaningful life. Those people were given none of that. And Israel is not to blame. Gaza could have / should have been turned into a beautiful place. It could have had a free port, airport, seaside resorts, luxury hotels and thriving agriculture and industry. It's the extremist nutjobs running the place who turned it into a poverty stricken place with terrible conditions.

The poverty in Gaza is due to the blockade that started in 2007 and continues today in the stepped up form of a siege, it is not due to a single occasion of looting several greenhouses in 2005.

https://www.un.org/unispal/document/gaza-strip-the-humanitarian-impact-of-15-years-of-the-blockade-june-2022-ocha-factsheet/

https://www.unicef.org/mena/documents/gaza-strip-humanitarian-impact-15-years-blockade-june-2022

And as I said they made the blockade necessary
And I'd they cared remotely about greenhouses or food or anything else they focus on that instead of terrorism.

It seems to me that Israel has collectively punished Gaza for the actions of extremist terrorists- PLO and Hamas for years. Yes these terrorists have sent rockets, suicide bombed and killed innocent civilians in the thousands.

But is there a point to be made that collective punishment of an entire occupied territory that has become the dumping ground for all Palestinians has not only not worked, but the ensuing poverty, loss of life of innocent civilians and destruction of infrastructure has only created more desperation and support for Hamas.

Things might have gone differently if instead of blockading the entire strip, engaging in retaliatory bombing and dare I say it, 8,700 Palestinian child fatalities by IDF shootings alone recorded by the UN of which only 2 cases were deemed justified, what if Israel had instead operated much like a European country has by using police powers to seek out and apprehend the terrorists individually. It’s territory Israel took from Egypt and Jordan- as the UN has said this comes with responsibilities to ensure the safety and security of the populace captured with it, and the additional displaced Palestinians sent there from Israel.

They deserve to be protected from the Hamas as much as anyone in Israel is, not to be lumped together with Hamas on the basis of religion and residency in an area.

Kind of hard to grow food in a desert with no water…..
“Soon after Israel occupied the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, in June 1967, the Israeli military authorities consolidated complete power over all water resources and water-related infrastructure in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT). 50 years on, Israel continues to control and restrict Palestinian access to water in the OPT to a level which neither meets their needs nor constitutes a fair distribution of shared water resources.”
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2017/11/the-occupation-of-water/

Once again, wrong. Northern Gaza had rich agriculture, the infrastructure of which was left in tact by Israel during the Unilateral Disengagement only to be burnt down by Hamas. They also killed the families who ran the farms who had the expertise, as they were viewed as sympathetic to the Jewish people.

Please stop citing the overtly anti-semitic Amnesty International. I feel as though you don't want to be anti-semitic, but this is how these posts come across when they cite these types of sources and draw incorrect conclusions.

The blockade was the choice of Hamas. Just look up the Quartet's negotiations post-disengagement and elections in 2006. Hamas declined to commit to peace. Again in 2021, they were offered the same deal, and again said no. Hamas are to blame for the blockade, and the subsequent suffering of the Palestinian people who had every opportunity for success thanks to the Israeli decision in 2004 but squandered their chance electing a genocidal group and choosing hate over wealth and health.