Why did Israeli settlers move into the Palestinian Territories?

[MaggieFS]

Firstly, please excuse my naivety and note that I don't support either side in the current conflict. I am appalled but the atrocities inflicted by both sides.

The media attention has caused me to read up on the complicated history.

One thing I can't understand. After 1967 Israeli settlers moved into what had been proposed as Palestinian Territories after 1947. Why? At an individual level, were people incentivised?

I don't agree. The Palestinians (both Muslim and Christians) I know think they have right to it because they owned the land/homes and lived there. There was nothing God given about it. The Jewish incomers are the ones that believe it is all their right because it says in the scriptures. It's an occupation, and I think it's very unfair to say they are both as bad as each other.

@squidnames "Oh pls! I take offense to that as a minority, and as a race that was subjected to colonization. It is a hard life in any country when you're a minority. This is not something that Jews only face and they can't keep using the Holocaust as a reason to say that they will only ever be safe in Israel.
As a minority race, and dark skinned being subjected to racism is part of my life no matter how unjust it is. Not something that is exclusive to Jews, not something that should be used to wage a war."

As a white person I would never tell you how you should feel about racism or colonisation. It is your lived experience, your generational history and it would be offensive of me to criticise your references or minimise your beliefs.

Jewish people do not claim exclusivity when it comes to racism nor do "Jewish people" 'use' the holocaust to start wars.

That I'm afraid is where anti-Israel sentiment begins to sound deeply antisemitic

Islam is the second-largest religion in Israel, constituting 1.707 million and around 18.1% of the country's population as of 2022. The ethnic Arab citizens of Israel make up the majority of its Muslim population, making them the largest minority group in Israel.

If it was recognised as Palestine and some Jews lived there in the West Bank would that be so bad- lots of British people live in Spain, etc, 250000 British people live in France.
The problem is it is more like Cashmeer, disputed land that needs a settlement solution but the Palestinians have been unwilling to recognise the Jews as having any claim over Israel at all.

They didn't turn up in Israel to live in tents made of goat skin and fetch water 10 miles away from their camps in their bare feet through the wilderness. Have you been to any settlements in the West Bank? There are luxury developments, condos with swimming pools. They are not 'fleeing' America for survival- many of them want to go back and forward. They still have homes there. They are going because they believe the land is holy and as religious Jews feel there is blessing in it.
@TheWayTheLightFalls I understand your point. But as a treif eating, non practising Jew you wouldn't be welcome in many communities though, your children would be considered a chillul Hashem and a bad influence (and I don't mean that in an attacking way BTW!). From what I saw communities are very much contingent on levels of religiosity, and there can be animosity between them. The Ethiopian Jews for example are treated terribly, and are considered a 'sub-set'.
I think that's what confuses me a bit about Judaism being simultaneously a religion, ethnicity and race, because from what I've seen religiosity is the main factor.
I fully support any oppressed people to have a home free from oppression, where they can self determine and flourish, but it should never be at the cost of another person's right to self determine and flourish, and ultimately that is what has happened with the state of Israel.
None of this is said in an attacking or aggressive way BTW, I left the other threads because discussion was not possible and I hope here it remains civil.

In that case, there is not one nation that provides citizenship based on relegion except Israel.

@Momr what???

My comment is in relation to this: "I only wish my home govt do not encourage this wih our local Jews."

What on earth are you talking about in this post?

I understand your point. But as a treif eating, non practising Jew you wouldn't be welcome in many communities though, your children would be considered a chillul Hashem and a bad influence (and I don't mean that in an attacking way BTW!). From what I saw communities are very much contingent on levels of religiosity, and there can be animosity between them. The Ethiopian Jews for example are treated terribly, and are considered a 'sub-set'.

Absolutely. My point was that despite everything I’m still Jewish enough for Hamas. However much I integrate (and I think I have, in the UK), I’m still a Jew and therefore a target.

And no, I don’t think our history means we can encroach on others’ space. I don’t endorse the settlements. Frankly I think the IDF has enough to be getting on with without needing to protect settlers.

100% this.

Honest question: Imagine you lived in a house on a farm that your family had owned for hundreds of years and was your livelihood. Your life. Your children's home. One day you had a knock on the door, and you are told that the government has decided with other states to give land to the Roma people, who have been persecuted for thousands of years. Your house and land is now going to be given to a Roma family arriving from America. It's now going to be their homeland.You refuse, so you and your family are forced to move at gun point. The Western world are telling you to "get over it and move on" and to "stop pining for mere land". Are you, the loser here, who now has NO home, ever going to accept this as a homeland for the Roma?
Then the government PAY people to come and more and more land and water and resources is needed, so it's taken, and you are told how you need to accept that it is their right. Your people are imprisoned, tortured, women raped, children abused, homes and farms destroyed. Your child is diagnosed with cancer but the permit system (because a wall has been built which restricts access to the road) has a backlog and there is a twelve week waiting list just to apply so your child is dying before your eyes. You are helpless, extremely angry, heartbroken. Are you going to accept your home as the homeland for these people?

Absolutely. My point was that despite everything I’m still Jewish enough for Hamas. However much I integrate (and I think I have, in the UK), I’m still a Jew and therefore a target.

This is how I feel and know I'm a target, even in the UK. At the end of the day, the fact I'm not practising or even part of a Jewish community is irrelevant to groups or individuals who want to harm Jews. My ethnicity - and that of my half-Jewish kids - would be enough for them.

Genuine question: why are Jewish people the only legitimate target? In the UK the most persecuted religious group (by far) is Muslims. They have no 'homeland' where they can turn up to, get paid and get citizenship. There are so many persecuted groups in the UK alone. On a racial issue, the Travellers are the most discriminated against. Why does no one speak about them getting a homeland?

This!!! Ultimately this is the fault of the English and US governments post WW2, it assuaged their guilt for allowing Germany to perpetuate such horrors against the Jewish people and also establish a pro western state in the Middle East. The settlements are an illegal occupation under any version of history or whatever map you care to refer to. Here is ireland we refer to to them as the occupied territories. But we are rather pro Palestine to start with, veering into anti Israel v easily. My small rural town is awash with Palestinian flags.....one previously oppressed nation to another currently being oppressed

I think this is pivotal. I've spent years travelling around. And always when you backpack you meet Israeli kids just out of the army. Most of the Israelis we travelled with were great. But in SE Asia we got stuck with a group who were awful off the beaten track. Rude, entitled, doing everything you aren't supposed to do in local communities (I'm sure you can guess what kinds of things in SE Asia). And talking about killing people for shock value. The locals HATED them and were rude about Israeli travellers generally. We were with a couple of Jewish Americans who spoke Hebrew and they thought they could produce a kind of entente cordiale between the locals and the two groups of travellers. They couldn't, and spent the rest of the trip with us and the locals, avoiding them. And really sad about it. There was only one bloke who was passably OK, an officer. I did try to chat to him, and him me.

I assumed it was mostly typical, that kids just out of the military would likely have been a PITA. I mean a group of British squaddies might not have been fabulous!

When we got back to the city they were all "LET'S GO CLUBBING TOGETHER". We were stunned. Basically why on earth would we want to hang out with them, they treated us and the locals horribly. But travelling is about making sense of the world and understanding things you don't, so we went. The officer and I ended up having a long conversation about it and I asked, "why the fuck were you so unpleasant, shitty to the locals, deliberately trying to piss everyone off?". I've never forgotten his reply, "everyone hates us anyway". He clearly firmly believed it. An intelligent, well-travelled, seemingly decent man believed that everyone in the world, except for his fellow Israelis, hated them. Actively wished them ill. TBF history is full of that shit.

It's stuck with me. I wish I could talk to him now.

Palestine was mostly Jewish back then. That was the only reason. Europe ignored the Arabs calling for it not to happen (that they were creating a warzone). When it became obvious the settlers were beginning to destabilise the region Europe / USA did try to half-heartedly stop migration into Israel but by then it was too late. The UN got involved told the Israelis to set up half the land (including Jeruselum ) as Palestinian & the Israeli government ignored them completely because they needed somewhere to house all the settlers they’d called over. Israel’s formation and self-proclamation as a ‘Zionist state’ caused mass conversions of Arab Jews to Islam - it was the single biggest reduction in the Jewish population in the region.

So yes the original war was about colonialism. It was white Jewish settlers vs Arab Jewish settlers - religion didn’t come into play until the Palestinian population turned to Islam.

What?!? Nope, this up here is mostly a pile of shite

Palestinians and the Palestine region was mostly Jewish back then. So this didn’t apply. It started off as a racist war - white Jews vs Arab Jews. The mass conversions of Palestinian Jews to Islam (and the mass migration of Arab Muslims into the area happened after Israel).

Please don't mix up. Cashmeer is not disputed land. It belong to Cashmeer people. India is moving settlers into Cashmeer for the same wrong intentions , to steal the precious resources it has . like Israel probably to grab land and power , thats why PP thought so. ( I am Indian and responded only in that context)

I raised the same question but have received an email from MN threatening to suspend my account. I am from an ethnic minority group.

Millions of people have emigrated to the US over the years, virtually none of them with any indigenous connection to that country, and they do not get labelled as settlers. Same goes for lots of countries. Jewish people are at least indigenous to Palestine and those from the diaspora were only a diaspora because of slavery, expulsion and refugeeing from persecution and pogroms.

Emigrating to a land is legal. The settlements are illegal, contravening international law.

This is my family, married out Jews, not religious at all, now culturally Christian. I look on our Jewish heritage in the same way I would if we were 1/4 or 1/2 French or something. We do have some (not many) relatives who are 'proper' Jews though. We also have a tiny bit of black African slave heritage even though I have blond hair and blue eyes.

I'm really sorry to hear this. It's really sad that discussion is closed down in this way.