note: I used the timeline and quotes on the website cactus48.com as reference.
The first question is not what is zionism, but what led to zionism. Thousands of years of opression in the christian dominated west(and to a lesser extent in the Islamic east) led to the desire of European Jews to form thier own state in Palestine, hence zionism. More on the flipside.
Zionism partly stems from the colonial mindset that gripped
Europe in the 19th and 20th century. The land of palestine was part of the Ottoman Empire until thier defeat in world war one. Zionist leaders attempted to settle the land in cohorts with the Turks, with minimal sucess. With the Ottoman defeat in World War 1, the spoils of victory went to the British, who took over much land of palestine as the "protectorate".
The original colinization of Palestine by Jews, while understandable, is without moral justification. It was an old maxim that Palestine was a "land without people for a people without a land". Of course the land was not a land without people, except in the racist viewpoint that Arabs/Blacks/Asians are less human then Europeans. The land was populated by Muslim and Christian Arabs, and a small amount of native Jews. Another often given justification for the colonilization of Palestine was that the land was sparsley populated. This was not true. "Britain's high commissioner for Palestine, John Chancellor... said all cultivatible land was occupied" John Quigley, "Palestine and Israel: A Challenge to Justice." Theodre Herzl, the father of zionism, advocated a discreet form of ethnic cleansing. "We must expropriate gently the private property on the state assigned to us.
"We shall try to spirit the penniless population across the border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it employment in our country. The property owners will come over to our side. Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out discretely and circumspectly." (America And The Founding Of Israel, p. 49, Righteous Victims, p. 21-22)
In 1917, the British government officially announced it would Colonize the land of Palestine, thus giving Eureopan Jews a homeland, without any consulutation of the natives. The period of the British mandate started around 1920. Jews backed with the military might of the British army began colonizing the territority. At the time the US government the jewish poplulation of Palestine was 10%."The Israel-Arab Reader" ed. Laquer and Rubin.
It is important to note that at the time of the partition of palestine, Jews legally*(according to the law of the illegal british occupation) owned 6 percent of the land, yet were given 50 percent. The palestinians are usually demonized in the American media for not accepting this compromise. What is often left is that the Israel's were to be made the ruling body, meaning they would get complete control over the government. To criticise the Arabs for no accepting this comprimise is to dehumanize them.
One of the claims that is used to justify the Israeli takeover of palestine is that there never was an arab state of palestine. True, there was not. This reveals the ethnocentric nature of the zionist philosophy. are people to be deprived of there land, acess to natural resources, and dignity because they did not have a state of their own, since they had instead had the fortune of living under empires or Kingdoms? Another claim is that the palestinian's did not have national aspirations. The answer to this question is irrelevant, but the fact that the question is being asked is illuminating. What is so grand about nationalism? Do those who don't desire a nation state not have a right to be free from colonialism? Do they not have the right to the land they have occupied for thousands of years? Should we as westerner's demand at the barrell of a gun that all people adopt the form of society we call a nation-state? Zionism was a philosophy of the Jews having a thier own state, not a state where they would share political power. A comprimise was impossible.
Back to the partition. At the time Arab's were 2/3's of the popluaton, given a little less then half the land, and given the right to be nothing more then second class citizens, like the african's in south africa. Furthremore, before the partition was announced, the Israeli's were already occupying most of the major arab towns, before any of the arab neighboors got involved in the war. While publically the Zionist's agreed to the comprimise, they had planned to eventually take over the whole of the land. Gurion and Begin, two future Prime Minister's of Israel, were both strongly against the partition.
"In internal discussion in 1938 [David Ben-Gurion] stated that 'after we become a strong force, as a result of the creation of a state, we shall abolish partition and expand into the whole of Palestine'...In 1948, Menachem Begin declared that: 'The partition of the Homeland is illegal. It will never be recognized. The signature of institutions and individuals of the partition agreement is invalid. It will not bind the Jewish people. Jerusalem was and will forever be our capital. Eretz Israel (the land of Israel) will be restored to the people of Israel, All of it. And forever." Noam Chomsky, "The Fateful Triangle."
THe 48 war is when the major Israeli land grab occured. contrary to popular belief, it was'nt the arabs who started to the war. Palestinian cities as I noted above were under Israeli occupation before and during the announcement of the partition. It is true that The arab nations that got involved the war did start hostilities with Israel.
One of the most vicious lines of propoganda is that The palestinians voluntary left there land during the 48 war and immigrated to other arab lands, thus leaving the land unoccupied, and there for the taking.
"The BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) monitored all Middle Eastern broadcasts throughout 1948. The records, and companion ones by a United States monitoring unit, can be seen at the British Museum. There was not a single order or appeal, or suggestion about evacuation from Palestine, from any Arab radio station, inside or outside Palestine, in 1948. There is a repeated monitored record of Arab appeals, even flat orders, to the civilians of Palestine to stay put." Erskine Childers, British researcher, quoted in Sami Hadawi, "Bitter Harvest"
The Arabs fleed because other towns were massacared. It was clear that It was either flee or die. Civilians who fleed because of the fear of a massacre should have the right to return. The right to return in today's media is instantly dismissed a nonstarter, a ridicolous demand from palestinians. How dare these victims of ethnic cleansing with no where to go outside of thier refugee camps think they have a right to return to thier land? We hear all the time that the state of Israel can't let the refugees return because then Israel would eventually no longer be a jewish state. This shows the terrible moral connondrum that progressive Zionist's find themselves in. The fact that refugees returning would destroy the jewish nature of israel proves that it would not have a jewish nature had it not been for the refugee crisis which it caused during the 48 and later wars.
The expansion of Israel into the golan heights had to do with conquering more territory, according to Moshe Dayan, the defense minister during the 67 war, admitted that Israel deliberately provoked conflict with the Syrians.(NY Times, may 11th 1997)
Another claim made for the occpuation of the coming occupation of the west bank and Gaza strip would be that the Arabs have so many more countries, so much more land then the Jews, so what if they keep expanding they're nation a little, it is still a tiny amount of land compared to the land owned by the arabs. From my progressive viewpoint, this is silly. A human being is a human being, whether arab, Jew, or african, ect. All should have the right to not be under the occpuation of an opressive government, and to not be ruled by a nation that considers it a second class citizen.
after the war, the Israeli's occupied half of the west bank and some of Gaza . Is this really want something people can take pride in? building settlements on others lands, creating yet another refugee crisis, further impovershing a poor people? What would lead otherwise kind and polite people to support this? The philosophy of Zionism called for a state in the land of palestine, in the biblical homeland of the Jews. This is what occurs when people become too wrapped on in idealogy, they support injustice. It is a war crime to make terrotorial gains from war as we all know. How can we justify Israel(which started a new settlement in early july of 2006) but deny the rest of the world this right?
Zionism portends the right of Israeli's to control thier nation, including natural resources. But is it really necessary to give settler's 10 times per person the water a palestinian gets, who often live for days without running water. Palestinians still live without the right to build homes, even on they're own property. They are forced to build without permits, and that watched them arbitrarily be demolished because they did not have a permit.
What is the hope for the future? The Palestinians were in 2000 willing to accept as a settlement 33 percent of what was there's before the european colonialists arrived, which was rejected. Both sides desire the same land. Both Palestinian and Israeli leaders are forced to be prove they are tough before the public will comprimise. Israeli and palestinian extremists have been quite effective in stopping comprimises between the two sides. The United States is wholly on the side of Israel, no matter which party presides in the white house. Extremism gripping Iran makes it more difficult for the Israeli public to accept a comprimise.
What I would like to see happen is a pipe dream. Everyone living in Israel, Gaza, the West Bank, and the returning refugees all have an equal vote and equal rights. Of course this will not happen any time soon, because of the power the philosophy of zionism has over Israelis. Zionism cannot coexist without equality, for zionism is a jewish homeland, and youn can't have a jewish homeland without a large majority of Jews in a nation. I can't see peace happening until zionism as a philosophy is defeated, and I don't see that happening this century.
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