Deeper understanding of why Israel was created

[NameChangedUnderstandingGained]

I have recently visited Poland. Did a lot of reading. Visited a lot of historic sites and museums.

Oh My Gosh - I now REALLY understand why the British Mandate in Palestine created Israel. Even after the war ended Jews were still ostracised, blamed, killed, turned out of lands, unwelcome in many, many nations in Europe. The number of Jews were decimated, many survivors had to use assumed fake identification to survive, some fled to America, to Australia and Europe still wasn't safe or friendly for them hence Israel. One little bit of land where Jewish people originated, where the religion was first founded thousands of years before. A 2 state solution would have been good if both agreed and both wanted to live in peace and prosper. Israel never felt safe so built up a massive defence, built up a country and industry and wanted to prosper.

There is much harm that has been done to many peoples in history. However, the holocaust was unique. I have visited places where Jews no longer exist, they have all gone, millions died, the liquidation of Jews throughout lands, nothing Israel has done in a war is the same as this. The gas chambers, the extermination camps, the work until to drop then we kill you camps. It really is on another scale.

I am now totally pro keeping a land for Jewish people. I don't agree with settler violence but I do agree and understand why Israel needs to defend itself from terrorists who wish to wipe Jewish people from the earth just like the Nazi did.

Why isnt the same true of Palestinians?

I find it shocking that people feel its ok to say out loud that Israel had no right to be formed where it is. Its such an extreme view. Its ahistorical and deeply inhumane. And puts you in some really unpleasant company.

The truth is both peoples are indigenous to the land, and both have a legitimate claim.

The difficulty is finding a way for them to share.

People on here denying the right of the other is the narrative that backs up perpetual war.

@dairydebris this thread is a new low, for sure.

I'm genuinely concerned that people feel its ok to say things like these out loud. Perhaps they are not thinking deeply about what what they are saying really means?

Saying Israel has no right to be where it is is precisely the narrative of Iran, Hamas, the most radical of Islamists. Its absolutely the gateway thought to extremity. When did it become mainstream?

Sounds like you’re coming round to my way of thinking. Imagine what a fantastic country it would be if they did manage to share and imagine what it would do for peace in the Middle East. Iraqi, Egyptian, etc., Jews would be able to return to their lands, if they so chose to, to help rebuild the countries into something wonderful. Just look at what Sassoon Eskell did for Iraq. Israel should always be a safe haven and homeland for Jews but this time, with the additional protection of the Arabs, not just fighting them.

I think they sort of do understand and don't care because they have completely bought the propaganda narrative as we've seen throughout this thread.

You're calling for the eradication of Israel in polite terms. I absolutely don't agree with your way of thinking and in fact find you deeply sinister. Please don't tag me again.

And what happened to the Jews of Iraq? Do tell.

Present day
Tiny population: Today, the Jewish population in Iraq is believed to be fewer than five individuals.
End of an era: The disappearance of the community marks the end of a nearly 3,000-year history.

Awful how Jewish people have been gradually eliminated or moved from various countries in the middle east and yet still some/many? would also deny them Israel. Some won't be happy until there are no Jewish people 😢

I am not trying to rewrite a well established definition. I’m merely applying logic. Individual Jewish communities in different countries could certainly be described as separate ethnic groups within that country. The Ethiopean Jews would certainly have been a separate ethnic group in Ethiopia. I would even concede that Jews in Europe could be classed as an ethnic group but I think that gets stretched when looking at Western and Eastern Europe. There is no way though that you could say that Chinese and Ethiopean Jews are a single ethnic group.

They were driven out because of European Zionism and the persecution of Palestinians. Who helped to drive them out? If you want to do some research look up Yosef Ibrahim Basri.

I don't think anyone has appointed you special rapporteur on redefining Jewishness and your posts have indicated significant hostility and bad faith so I am not intetested in having this conversation with you. Others can explore the ways ethno religions work and the ways in which Jewish culture binds the Jewish people across its rich diaspora.

That's the bottom line.

So to understand your point- if Isreal hadn’t been created, there would be extensive Jewish population in all Middle Eastern countries? They would have roles in government and there would be no issues and everyone would be peaceful?

'Imagine what a fantastic country it would be if they did manage to share'

Its code for a Greater Palestine and no Jewish state at all.
Coming from someone with a deep hatred of Jewish people, who believes the correct view is that Palestinians hate Jews.
Its radical language curated for middle class mums.
Its sinister.

Perfectly put.

Further, this repetition of Israel being born of European terrorism is a meaningful part of a really clear wider narrative.

'Israel wasn't born of the Jewish desire for self determination in the land of their history, rather its a violent European construct- colonisation- and as such is not legitimate.'

I read a lot of Palestinian literature, more and less extreme, and this absolutely falls in with the most extreme of them all. Jewish history and identity delegitimized. Palestinians victims of a colonial European project. Resistance justified. Then, resistance by any means justified.

@SharonEllis

Of course I don’t think the West are the source of all things bad - but the West did do some incredibly bad things which are definitely glossed over - as much as incredibly bad things that have happened to us.
In fact, I’d say it’s animalistic behaviour. To be territorial - and the victors to be seen as ‘superior’. It’s also very male driven behaviour.
As humans - what sets us apart from other animals, is hopefully - our ability to empathise, be civilised and sympathise. To have ‘manners’ (as noted by Brett Easton-Ellis). Otherwise it is all-out war and survival of the fittest.
As you are so educated - what is your opinion of the Sykes/Picot agreement? All fair? Did it have no impact? Do you think that the West were right to take control of oil and trade routes with no consideration of the communities that were living there?

They both need a State. They both deserve a homeland where they are not treated as second class citizens. But neither of those can come from delegitimizing the other claim.

Goes for both sides.

I have no interest in debating sykes-picot at the moment I'm afraid. Im intrigued by 'the west' taking control of oil and trade routes though. 'The west' was quite divided at that point (WWI and all).

So Jews are responsible for their own massacre, not the people who carried them out. What else do you blame them for? The Russian pogroms? October 7th? The Holocaust?

Wow, there’s delusion and there’s complete delusion or perhaps it’s not?

A safe haven for Jews with the protection of the Arabs…….

To indulge this magical thinking for a moment, when we return to our lands that so eagerly stripped us of citizenship and rights, would this involve acknowledgement and reparations from their governments for the many billions of pounds worth of property, assets, livelihoods (and in some cases, lives) that were taken from us? In the interests of additional protection and the wonderful sharing and rebuilding that Jews would be helping with as we're welcomed back to all these lands with open arms, hearts and minds?

As the mass expulsion and dispossession of Jews from their MENA homelands was less than 80 years ago, everything should be returned to them similar to that being advocated for Palestinians within the same time frame, right?

So much for the "it's all rainbows and unicorns for Jews in Iran" story.
https://thejewishindependent.com.au/life-for-jews-in-iran-is-now-even-more-precarious