{"id":2027,"date":"2019-02-20T09:06:14","date_gmt":"2019-02-20T14:06:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/?p=2027"},"modified":"2019-02-20T09:06:14","modified_gmt":"2019-02-20T14:06:14","slug":"the-gazan-nakba-crisis-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/2019\/02\/the-gazan-nakba-crisis-today\/","title":{"rendered":"The Gazan Nakba Crisis Today"},"content":{"rendered":"

THE GAZAN NAKABA CRISIS TODAY<\/strong><\/p>\n

In response to the moving of the American Embassy to Israel to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, and to the Nakba, the \u201ccatastrophe\u201d of having lost the war of aggression against Israel, Al Jazeera reports at https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/topics\/city\/gaza.html<\/a> that Israel is guilty of ethnic cleansing, killing Palestinians, and of winning its War of Independence in 1948.<\/p>\n

Haidar Eid reports that he marched against Israel \u201cfor three reasons. One, we want UN Resolution 194, which calls for the return of all Palestinian refugees to their lands, to be implemented. Two, we want the genocidal siege imposed on Gaza by apartheid Israel to be lifted. Three, we refuse to accept the decision to move the US embassy to occupied\u00a0Jerusalem<\/a>\u201d\u00a0[https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/indepth\/opinion\/march-return-14may-gaza-israeli-fence-180516124449284.html<\/a>].<\/p>\n

The return of all Palestinians to \u201ctheir\u201d lands will destroy Israel as a Jewish state. Israel is a small Jewish state and there are several Arab and Islamic nation states.\u00a0 There ought to a place for Jews in the Middle East, too. The Palestinians have to realize that a policy of warfare is not consistent with their own welfare.\u00a0 Jewry has a right to its real estate, too. At Bar Ilan University, Benjamin Netanyahu committed himself and Israel to a two-state solution. Hold him to his word.\u00a0 Just as there will be an Arab state of Palestine, there will be a permanent Jewish State of Israel. Neither Yasir Arafat nor Mahmoud Abbas were prepared to make peace with a Jewish state. There are conflicting eschatologies, narratives, and nationalist claims in this conflict. Both sides must realize that maximalist dreams will yield minimalist results.<\/p>\n

The demand that all Arab refugees, now four generations of offspring of those Arabs who left Israel at the order of the united anti-Israel army coalition in 1948 be allowed to return to their lands is an intentionally ambiguous formula.\u00a0 The world hears that the territory Israel conquered in the 1967 Six Day War be \u201creturned\u201d to Arab sovereignty, but what is really being demanded is the politically agreed liquidation of the \u201cZionist entity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Eid also demands that \u201cthe genocidal siege imposed on Gaza by apartheid Israel\u201d be lifted. First, this siege is defensive, and not genocidal. If Hamas will make peace, the siege will be lifted. Israel withdrew unilaterally from Gaza, whose leadership then declared war on Israel. When you shoot at people, expect them to defend themselves, sometimes successfully. There are no death camps in Israel, but Jews in Arab countries are made to feel much more unwelcome than Arabs feel in Israel. Calling Israel \u201capartheid\u201d needs to be addressed, even though its immoral claim is unworthy of address. In Israel, Arabs are allowed to be voting members of the country\u2019s free electorate; there is an Arab List party, and an Arab member of the Israeli Supreme Court. Israel is not perfect and can do even better. But given the treatment Israel affords its Arabs, and Mr. Abbas\u2019s regime\u2019s intransigence, corruption, exploitation of his impoverished constituency, and unwillingness to renew his electoral mandate, it is obscene to call multi-racial Israel an apartheid state. After all, Mr. Abbas tells us that he would not allow a Jew to reside in Palestine. In Dar al-Islam<\/em>, Jews are to be dhimmi<\/em>, \u201cprotected,\u201d tolerated, second class residents who must submit<\/em> and surrender to Islamic authority in order enjoy residency rights. Yet Mr. Abbas is even not prepared to allow Jews the \u201crights\u201d that orthodox Islam would accept. By calling Israel an \u201capartheid\u201d state when there are \u201cArab\u201d and \u201cIslamic\u201d states, and when Israeli Jewry is a multi-racial free<\/em> society, Mr. Eid testifies that his words are missiles and his adjectives are lies.<\/p>\n

When Hamas, the terrorist Gazan government, organizes a \u201cjail-break\u201d led by terrorists who goaded desperate Gazans to break through the border fence to attack Israeli kindergartens, what we have here are belligerents attempting to seize land its believers have been conditioned to believe is theirs, giving them the right to kill Israeli residents who are not military combatants.<\/p>\n

What is Israel to do?\u00a0 Gaza is at war with Israel for committing the \u201csin\u201d of coming into and remaining in existence. The Gazan government commands residents to penetrate the border fence and take the land that is rightfully theirs. Should these people be seen as enemies or friends? Warning was given by Israel to the Gazans not to breach the security fence, and I know of no sovereign nation that would not defend its border and population.\u00a0 Jewish ethics require that those who come to kill are themselves to be killed\u00a0 \u00a0[bBerachot 62a-b].<\/p>\n

It has been argued that the protesters are not violent and should not have been shot, and Israeli retaliation is excessive.\u00a0 Were that the case, there would have been calls for compromise. Shulhan Aruch Hoshen Mishpat 425:1 rules that the pursuer who acts with the intent to harm another person must be stopped, even at the cost of the pursuer\u2019s life. The force applied to arrest the pursuer is preventive and not punitive.\u00a0 If you choose to storm a border that you have declared enemy territory and have killed non-combatant civilians, don\u2019t be surprised if you meet with lethal resistance. Before criticizing the Israelis who shot in defense of their lives and their homeland, the world would do well to ask Hamas, \u201cby provoking this incident which killed or wounded so many for helpless headlines, what were you hoping to accomplish?\u201d<\/p>\n

Those who believe Israel does not have the right to self-defense believe that Israel\u2019s existence is indefensible.\u00a0 The world would be wise to realize Hamas\u2019s vision is not terribly welcoming, or tolerant.\u00a0 Before blaming Israel, Ask what you would do when confronted with the challenge that the Gazan leadership presents.<\/p>\n\n

<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Israel is a small Jewish state and there are several Arab and Islamic nation states.\u00a0 There ought to a place for Jews in the Middle East, too. The Palestinians have to realize that a policy of warfare is not consistent with their own welfare.\u00a0 Jewry has a right to its real estate, too. At Bar Ilan University, Benjamin Netanyahu committed himself and Israel to a two-state solution. Hold him to his word.\u00a0 Just as there will be an Arab state of Palestine, there will be a permanent Jewish State of Israel. Neither Yasir Arafat nor Mahmoud Abbas were prepared to make peace with a Jewish state.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":2028,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[93,78,127],"tags":[],"coauthors":[86],"class_list":["post-2027","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-israel","category-modern-judaism","category-politics"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2027","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2027"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2027\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2029,"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2027\/revisions\/2029"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2028"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2027"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2027"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2027"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=2027"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}