71–80 of 84 posts
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Your posts which highlight LGBT rights while completely ignoring the elephant in the room (the 40+ year occupation affecting millions) fits well with what is described in this New York Times editorial as Pinkwashing: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/23/opinion/pinkwashing-and-is...
I replied to you above. Lets keep the discussion in one place.
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That seems like a digression. The tourists in question were presumably unarmed, both literally and figuratively. Yet they had the metaphorical gun pointed at them anyway. I'm guessing that an implied part of your point is that because they had arab names, they might have had metaphorical guns? Yeah. That's the part that drew the downvotes.
I'm not sure asking for email credentials is a "metaphorical gun". 99% of the violence committed against Israelis is done by Arabs. You suggest that profiling is wrong (and it is! Don't we all wish we lived in a world where it wasn't necessary!), but it works. It's stopped countless terror attacks.
If I understand your view rightly, I think you are in favor of having the Israelis out of the West Bank, as that would reduce the overall amount of attacks. Is that correct?
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I'm not sure asking for email credentials is a "metaphorical gun". 99% of the violence committed against Israelis is done by Arabs. You suggest that profiling is wrong (and it is! Don't we all wish we lived in a world where it wasn't necessary!), but it works. It's stopped countless terror attacks.
Not sure I want to get involved, but I'm curious - given that you separated "Israeli" from "Arab" (are there not Israelis who are also Arab? Why are you mixing citizenship with ethnicity?), using the same scale, what is the percentage of violence committed against Arabs by Israelis? Don't some of those fall into the category of "terror attack"? Isn't there a power imbalance which prevents Arabs from profiling and bei…
"Why are you mixing citizenship with ethnicity?" It's the ethnicity that they use to profile.
"using the same scale, what is the percentage of violence committed against Arabs by Israelis?" I don't know. More Arabs are killed by other Arabs than by Israelis. If you're talking about just Palestinians, yes, it would be by Israelis.
"Don't some of those fall into the category of "terror attack"?" No. No. No. That's the biggest problem with education about the conflict. How do you define a "terror attack"? I define it as violent acts towards civilians with the intent of causing mass psychological damage. Israel does not commit such acts. They attack military targets in the Gaza Strip, and sometimes kill civilians, as any army in the world has had the difficult issue of doing. A British soldier stood up in the UN and proclaimed that during the last Israeli/Gaza offensive (operation cast lead), Israel did more to protect Gazan civilians than any nation has ever done previously (http://www.unwatch.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=bdKKI...). He was referring to the Goldstone report, which was later rescinded and apologized for.
"Isn't there a power imbalance which prevents Arabs from profiling and being able to restrict what Israelis can do?" No, not at all. Try getting into Egypt with an Israeli passport. Multiple acquaintances that have were harassed by Egyptian police. In actuality, it is much more difficult for Israelis in Arab countries than it is for Arabs in Israel.
"If Arabs were able to profile and exclude certain classes of people, wouldn't that help stop further "countless terror attacks" against them?" What terrorist attacks?
"If I understand your view rightly, I think you are in favor of having the Israelis out of the West Bank, as that would reduce the overall amount of attacks. Is that correct?" I am 100% for a two-state solution with two people living side by side peacefully. Settlements in the West Bank are an issue that needs to be figured out. You have to realize that these "settlements" are sometimes small, and sometimes (like Ariel) are large cities with thousands of residents. It's not simple to just get them to up and move. Remember, Israel did that (The unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip) and all they have gotten in return is more than 9000 rockets and mortars fired on Israeli citizens.
(edit) Ah yes, downvoted for the inconvenient truth.
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Not sure I want to get involved, but I'm curious - given that you separated "Israeli" from "Arab" (are there not Israelis who are also Arab? Why are you mixing citizenship with ethnicity?), using the same scale, what is the percentage of violence committed against Arabs by Israelis? Don't some of those fall into the category of "terror attack"? Isn't there a power imbalance which prevents Arabs from profiling and bei…
"are there not Israelis who are also Arab?" Yes. And in fact, many serve in the Knesset, and the army. "Why are you mixing citizenship with ethnicity?" It's the ethnicity that they use to profile. "using the same scale, what is the percentage of violence committed against Arabs by Israelis?" I don't know. More Arabs are killed by other Arabs than by Israelis. If you're talking about just Palestinians, yes, it would b…
For me, that number does not seem believable. For example, in 2007 there were 2,796 calls to the Rape Crisis Hotline concerning "Rape, attempted rape, Statutory rape", 386 for "Gang rape and sexual attacks", and 1,630 for incest. I suspect the same is true today, but I have not found more recent numbers.
It's very unlikely that incest is caused by an Israeli vs. a non-Israeli, but perhaps you don't regard that as violent. Do you regard rape as violent? I certainly do. Are 99% of those rape reports caused by non-Israelis? Or are they made up for by very large amounts of violence elsewhere?
I looked also for domestic violence reports, but that was hard to come by. From what I gather, it is poorly and infrequently reported, and criminal proceedings can take years to prosecute which discourages women from doing so. The UNHCR says "11 percent of the 688 women admitted to battered women's shelters in 2005 were Ethiopian (Haaretz 23 Aug. 2006). In addition, approximately one quarter of Israeli women murdered by their husbands in recent years have been Ethiopian."
688*0.11% = 75, so there must be at least another 7500 cases of Arab violence towards Israelis for your 99% number to be true.
More realistically, I think this sort of violence isn't something you think much about. http://columbiacurrent.org/2010/04/conspiracies-of-silence-v... writes pretty clearly on how this is talked about even less in Israel than in the US.
For Palestinian women, it's even worse, but my goal here was to question how you determined the 99% number.
I put "terror attack" in quotes for precisely the reason you described - it is ill-defined. One definition says "the use of violent acts to frighten the people in an area as a way of trying to achieve a political goal." Another definition says that attacks on military cannot be considered terrorists. Yet another says that if the main goal is to get money then it is likely not terrorism.
This is why I would rather use the term "violence" than the term "terror attack" and when you ask "What terrorist attacks?" I would rather refer to settler attacks like the one I found in Haaretz titled "Settlers attack Palestinians to avenge West Bank outpost demolition", which seems to fit your definition of "mass psychological damage", if only to a single town.
I found these http://old.btselem.org/statistics/english/Casualties.asp statistics. Various source question what "civilian" means, but it's enough basis for this discussion. It lists that 53 Palestinians were killed by Israeli civilians in Israel and the Occupied Territories, while 254 Israeli civilians were killed by Palestinians (over a 12 year period). This is not 99%.
I noticed that you switched from talking about Israelis to talking about "Israel". Why is that? I easily found cases where a Palestinian was "shot and killed by settlers while harvesting his olives", and "killed by settlers who rioted in Hebron"; isn't that the topic we were on, and not state policy? But it is not hard to find other cases of Israelis instigating an attack even while Israel protects the Palestinians.
I see that you then switched the topic to "Egypt"; I thought you were using "Arab" as the term for non-Israeli people living either in Israel or the Occupied Territories, and that is how I meant to use it. If you want to include Egyptians in this category then surely this category is getting rather nebulous. How many Egyptians have served in the Knesset? What percentage of violence is committed against Israelis by Egyptians?
With your new definition, then certainly it's true that more Arabs are killed by other Arabs than Arabs by Israelis because there are some 300+ million Arabs in the world and only some 7.6 million Israelis. Would you clarify what you mean by "Arab" in this context?
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"and most liberals in the US have an anti-Israeli view." So you're trying to preemptively stop generalizations based on your generalizations? Honestly, who's paying you for your Israeli propaganda?
Yep that pretty much sums it up. I guess I am, since I'm taking time from work to write this stuff.
This way you'd avoid being classified early as a(n overreacting) shill, as that can only hamper your educational efforts.
I have no idea what did they do with the phone, did they read my emails? check my photos? installed some spyware? I have no idea, but I'm sure if I rejected to unlock it, I would be missed my flight. I felt like crap after that.
Interestingly, they didn't care about my second phone, an old Nokia, probably iPhone is more popular.
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It would be equally wrong to allow everyone to settle the West Bank but Jews. The situation is difficult and the property laws effect everyone who tries to build without permission, which is almost everyone: The Jewish settlement of Ulpana is going to be demolished next month because it was built on illegally acquired land. http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gdxs_Qb4k...
The issue is that there is a dual system of rights in place depending on whether you are Jewish or whether you are a Palestinian Arab and that is deeply wrong. I am not in favor of barring Jews from living in the West Bank (which seems to be the topic of your reply) but rather against different rights for different ethnic groups (which is what people mean when they bring up the spectre of Apartheid.)
I say this as an American with no connection to either side.
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It appears that even giving them your real email account will get you refused from the country. As a US citizen, I'm disappointed in Israel, and would prefer even less of my tax dollars are used to support them after this.
Israel has an excellent Supreme Court which has stopped behavior like this in the past. From wikipedia: The Court has ruled on numerous issues relating to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the rights of Arab citizens of Israel, and on discrimination between Jewish groups in Israel. It is unique in that its rulings can intervene in Israel Defense Forces military operations. Most Israelis are equally ashamed of this. T…
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The issue is that there is a dual system of rights in place depending on whether you are Jewish or whether you are a Palestinian Arab and that is deeply wrong. I am not in favor of barring Jews from living in the West Bank (which seems to be the topic of your reply) but rather against different rights for different ethnic groups (which is what people mean when they bring up the spectre of Apartheid.)
Let's stop pretending that the terms "Israeli" and "Jew" are interchangable, because they're not. While it may have at the beginning, I don't think Jewishness or lack thereof has anything to do with the West Bank. At this point it's a dispute over citizenship, property, and human rights. I say this as an American with no connection to either side.
There even used to be vast swathes of land within Israel proper that could only be leased to Jews, because the founders of the country had given it to a trust tasked with ensuring it remained in Jewish hands, though I think the supreme court finally put a stop to that a few years ago.
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"are there not Israelis who are also Arab?" Yes. And in fact, many serve in the Knesset, and the army. "Why are you mixing citizenship with ethnicity?" It's the ethnicity that they use to profile. "using the same scale, what is the percentage of violence committed against Arabs by Israelis?" I don't know. More Arabs are killed by other Arabs than by Israelis. If you're talking about just Palestinians, yes, it would b…
At this point I need to ask for clarification of your numbers. Where do you get the "99% of the violence" number? Is it a real number, or one that you believe is correct but have not verified? For me, that number does not seem believable. For example, in 2007 there were 2,796 calls to the Rape Crisis Hotline concerning "Rape, attempted rape, Statutory rape", 386 for "Gang rape and sexual attacks", and 1,630 for inces…
Yes, there are Palestinians civilians killed by Israeli civilians. However, they are not state sponsored. When an Israeli civilian is killed in a terror attack, it is state sponsored. Palestinians democratically elected Hamas, a globally recognized terrorist organization. Fatah, in charge of the West Bank, also has a terrorist arm, called the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades.
Arabs are an ethnicity. Egypt was an example of an Arab dominant culture that does not treat Israel well (even though they have a peace agreement!).
You're really grasping at straws. If you want to defend the actions of terrorist organizations like Hamas, go ahead, but I'm not going to pay attention to it.