oh please
Don’t see an issue with pointing this out. Benny is talking about what the current, distracting headline is. All that should matter, that should be the focus of the world’s media, is that Trump not only said it but the idiot did it. Previous presidents have had the wisdom or the advisers reining them in to not kick the ■■■■ out of a hornet nest. An incisive but largely buried report on how it eventually benefits him and the crony community coming soon.
Well, I for one, actually applaud him. For me, and I assume a couple of others in the minority on here, it is the right and long overdue decision.
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So if its Israeli territory, does that mean the Palestinians in East Jerusalem who have lived there for decades can vote in the Israel elections?
I think only municipal elections.
Although it is never as simple as a single statement, East Jerusalem residents, and their offspring, who were present in East Jerusalem after Israel captured the area from Jordan in 1967, can apply for full Israeli citizenship, vote, and receive all benefits of Israeli citizenship.
However, most choose not to do so, and remain with Permanent Residency status, allowing participation in municipal elections, and access to state social and health care benefits.
Personally I reckon most of those residents would be loathe to give this up and be citizens of a future Palestinian state, but that’s not from deep knowledge.
Will you applaud the very likely increase in violence and death that ensues as a direct and indirect result of this flaccid sack of ■■■■ trying to massage a great legacy into being while re-greasing palms that gladhanded him into office?
And do you feel good about applauding a unilateral decision by an unhinged man that runs against international thought and agreement and will set negotiations back decades? Will it be a slow clap?
This has little to do with whether you or anyone thinks Israel owns Jerusalem.
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Sometimes you can be a citizen with voting rights but not enjoy the benefits that some other citizens benefit from like more cut-offs in essential services, more blockaded roads to get to work, to meet up with families in other areas not covered by citizenship. There are a few tales to be told there, including from a few Jewish Israeli citizens who don’t like the two tier citizenship status injustices.
I always find it ironic that many South African Jews were in the forefront of the fight against apartheid, yet are more than happy to practise it extensively in Israel.
My first solution would be to remove the ultra-orthodox Jews from having a say in matters, disproportionate to their numbers.
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Jerusalem is on the fringes of my frustration here. I actually had no specific knowledge of this particular issue until this week. My position generally is that Israel has intentionally made the peace process almost impossible to resolve. (The map of Israeli settlements in Palestinian territory is comically tragic.)
My point, which you have missed completely, is that there is now a trend to legitimise a position just because someone else already did something vaguely similar. Even if the person you are comparing yourself with is as wrong as you are.
I want people to be held accountable for their ■■■■ ups. Just because someone else ■■■■■■ up a similar way doesn’t clear you. You should be held accountable for your own actions in isolation.
Otherwise where does it stop? The GOP voters are backing a probable child molester in Moore over a clean alternative candidate. All because the Dems didn’t sack a random guy in Washington who probably harassed women. That’s a messed up logic and it is toxic if it becomes the norm.
Moore should receive no support from the GOP. The Dems should disown the creep that messed with women. One should not be used to justify the other.
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Why do you believe it’s the right decision?
How do you think it will improve the situation or impact the peace process in a positive way?
I’m genuinely interested.
Well people can choose to protest and people can choose to do so in a non-violent way. The fact they don’t is not the responsibility of Trump or anyone who supports anything to do with Israel. You can lay the blame of violence at Trump’s feet if you so wish but the reality is, they don’t NEED to be violent to be heard or have a voice on the issue. The reality is though, they choose to do so and always have and always will.
Peace will come eventually. It will last as long as peace in Gaza lasted (it will last a little over 3 years imo), I think that lasted until Hamas bulldozed democracy (what little of it that was actually being offered).
I won;t go into detail on the main board, it is a pointless exercise in the main.
You may wish to study a little deeper on this issue. All that the PLO (PA) wanted was offered to them at one stage, all of it. Arafat rejected it.
There are differing accounts of what happened and what was offered at Camp David. Arafat did no favours in his negotiation style. I agree with you there. However, Sharon and Binyamin Netanyahu are also responsible for the suspension of the peace process. It is not accurate to place the fault of this entirely at the Palestinian feet which is the sense I get from you.
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I live in hope that Netanyahu and wife will get done for bribery and corruption under the Israel justice system - including with benefit of the AFP evidence collected from James Packer - who was reportedly seeking Israeli citizenship.
Turnbull’s Light Horse roadshow with Netanyahu in Israel - without a single Arab representative - did nothing for Australia’s foreign policy objectives. Turnbull claimed that the Light Horse contributed to the establishment of an Israel State.
There are an awful lot of decent Jewish Israeli citizens, including those who experienced apartheid in South Africa and who have stood in front of Israeli tanks making way for illegal settlements.
Being Jewish and being a Zionist are not necessarily the same. That would be the case in the US as well as here.
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That’s the ‘fire in a crowded theatre’ argument. Trump has done something that everyone knows is going to result in violence. He was warned by his advisors it was going to result in violence. He did it anyway. To pretend he bears no responsibility at all for the eminently predictable consequences is ridiculous. Incitement to riot is a crime for a reason, even when the ‘inciter’ doesn’t commit violence themselves…
Also - ‘always have and always will?’ That’s pretty seriously extreme, and it’s tarring a very large number of people with the same brush based on the actions of a minority among them. One could just as easily (and just as accurately) argue that Israel ‘always have and always will’ commit ethnic cleansing by demolishing palestinian residences and expel the people living there to build Jewish settlements. Or that Israeli soldiers ‘always have and always will’ display casual disregard for killing palestinian civilians and will be let off by Israeli courts for it. Because that stuff happens just as often and routinely as hamas etc murdering Israelis. And that’s not even counting stuff like the economic warfare waged against palestinians these days. It’s really, really, really hard to argue these days that Palestinians living in the Israeli-run territories live in anything other than an Apartheid state.
That’s the long-term dilemma for Israel. The fig-leaf of the ‘peace process’ (which has been dead in every meaningful sense since Netanyahu took power) has so far allowed them to treat the occupied territories in a ‘heads-i-win-tails-you-lose’ kinda way. Israel gets to run the place and use its resources but deny people living there the rights of being an Israeli citizen. Jerusalem is part of that. What trump’s recognition does is say ‘how it is is how it will stay’. Which is admittedly ONE way of resolving the problem, but Israel probably should think about whether it really WANTS a one-state solution. The fake-stalemate that exists now is probably the best balance they’re going to get. Because if Israel just stops pretending and annexes the occupied terrorities, then suddenly there a load of Palestinians living in what Israel itself claims is official Israeli territory, and they’ll outnumber the Jews and they’ll want to vote (and they’ll have a right to)
Which is where Jerusalem comes into it again. Jerusalem as capital is Trump taking the first step along the road to saying ‘look, you can keep the lot of it’, which is what Netanyahu has wanted since forever. But Trump won’t be president forever, and Netanyahu probably should be careful what he wishes for. If he gets drunk on Trump’s backing and upsets the status quo, and ties the interests of Israel tightly to the fortunes of Trump and his brand of republicanism, what happens to US Israeli policy when/if a Dem takes office who sees Israel as a dedicated ally of their domestic political enemies?
Israel needs AMERICA. It can’t afford to alienate the democratic side of US politics even if it means becoming the bestest bestest friends of the republican side. Cos the worm always turns.
I’ve said before that I don’t think there will be a long-term non-violent solution to the israel-palestine conflict. Maybe 20 years ago there could have been, but not now. The negotiators, the moderates on both sides have been murdered or betrayed or left powerless and there’s only extremists left - and that’s because extremists will do stuff to gain power that moderates will refuse to, because they’re extremists. The best that could have been oped for would have been a berlin-wall type situation and a long slow cold war with continual guerilla attacks and reprisals. Maybe after 50 more years of that one side and/or the other would have changed sufficiently that a negotiated peace might be possible. It worked in Northern Ireland after all. Let the kettle simmer down. Unfurtunately, Trump’s intervention here (as token as it might be, in concrete terms) is just putting more fuel on the fire.
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The peace talks have been set up to fail and that picture explains why.
I’m not sure how to embed images on a phone. The Israeli settlements in the West Bank are permanent and make a realistic resolution nearly impossible. They started as ideological territory claims by unauthorised Israelis. Now there is a University, hospital and full amenities, heavily funded from overseas contributions.
These developments were Israeli decisions and they make resolution of the issue nearly impossible. I see no hope for the area after looking at that map.
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Al Franken has resigned from the Senate.
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Interesting, here is the transcript
Not once used the word ‘Sorry’ - call himself a ‘Champion of women’ and tries to lay the boots into Donald
Never change
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