Tuesday, April 20, 2010

The "Judenrein" canard

The word "Judenrein" was invented by the Nazis. Its most fervent users, however, are the Zionists. Their logic goes as follows: if a Jew takes over Arab property, and the Arab owners want him to get the hell out of there, then the Arabs are Nazis because they want to make the property Judenrein. Quod erat demonstrandum!

A recent example was provided by Israel's Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon. In an interview with the Jerusalem Post, he made the following remarkable statements:

If we are talking about coexistence and peace, why the [Palestinian] insistence that the territory they receive be ethnically cleansed of Jews? Why do those areas have to be Judenrein? Don’t Arabs live here, in the Negev and the Galilee? Why isn’t that part of our public discussion? Why doesn’t that scream to the heavens?

There's no equivalence, and Ya'alon knows it well, between the Arabs who were already living in the Negev in the Galilee when Ya'alon's ancestors roamed the Pale of Settlement and the Jews who have illegally moved into the West Bank, in many cases stealing private Palestinian land, be it to erect the homes, as "security zones" or to build the roads to the settlements. The idea that the Arab citizens of Israel have a legitimacy issue that somehow cancels out with the very concrete illegality of the Jewish settlers in the West Bank is both immoral and absurd.

That aside, no Palestinian negotiator has ever asked to receive a territory ethnically cleansed of Jews. Unfortunately some people are living where they're not authorized to and they'll have to leave the place to comply with international law, not to satisfy the antisemitic designs of anyone. No ethnic cleansing there: thieves are thieves, not an ethnic group. What is being demanded is not a Judenrein territory; it's a squatter-rein one.

But not only that; the Palestinians are even prepared to allow the settlers to remain in the West Bank, provided that they accept Palestinian sovereignty. Prime Minister Salam Fayyad has declared: “Jews to the extent they choose to stay and live in the state of Palestine will enjoy those [democratic] rights and certainly will not enjoy any less rights than Israeli Arabs enjoy now in the state of Israel.”

This is not precisely Ya'alon's idea. As the JPost goes on to report:

Ya’alon said that if Israel and the Palestinians were truly headed down the path of peace and coexistence, “Jews living in Judea and Samaria under Israeli sovereignty and citizenship” should be possible.

Under Israeli sovereignty? What is to be negotiated, then? The two-state solution means a state for the Jews and a state for the Palestinians, not a state for the Jews and another state also for the Jews. If the settlers want to remain in the West Bank, it is the Palestinians who will dictate the terms, not the State of Israel.

It is not through the free use of Nazi analogies to demonize the Palestinians that peace will be achieved. The "Judenrein" canard must be dropped immediately, and the fact that Ya'alon is not called out over his using it speaks volumes about the Israeli government's true commitment to peace.

12 comments:

  1. "Das Ziel der Kunst ist es, einfach eine Stimmung zu erzeugen."
    Oscar Wilde

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  2. Anon
    "Hey Alberto, how does it feel to side against the few million Jews"

    in my "dreams" it turns Alberto into a valiant and fearless knight, a wannabe Rodolfo Valentino look-alike Sheikh or if he prefers a younger version Omar Sharif on his camel joining Peter O'Toole on another camel
    Come to think of it - could they have gotten rid of the Turks without the help of a British imperialist nut?
    Silke

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  3. "Jeder kann für die Leiden eines Freundes Mitgefühl aufbringen. Es bedarf aber eines wirklich edlen Charakters, um sich über die Erfolge eines Freundes zu freuen."
    Oscar Wilde

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  4. No population transfer. No ethnic cleansing. What Ya'alon is arguing for is exchanges of land. In other words, the new Palestinian state takes sovereignty over heavily populated areas inside the Green Line and Jews take control of parts of the West Bank. We have as much right to live in Bethlehem and Schem than Arabs do in Jaffa and Jerusalem. This will evict no one from their homes and will surely be part of any final status agreement.

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  5. I think you're all deeply embarrassed by the simple fact that you are siding with the people who are vastly more numerous and already have dozens of states, and against the smaller people with just one state.

    Yours is the bluster of cowards.

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  6. Do you ever get the feeling you're banging your head against the wall? The obtuse, it stings.

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  7. The way Levi put it is one of the most elegant I've heard in a while: way to debunk the deeply racist 'Arabs have 22 states'!

    I want to add though that there are also several million Palestinians who aren't just stateless but essentially also homeless. This cannot be said of a single Jew in this world, Zionist or other.

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  8. The so called "occupied" "west bank" is part of the same geographical entity. The 1948 cease fire line was never the border of any state, but simply a temporary situation in the eyes of the Palestinians and Arab nations, who have rejected the division of the land, crossed it repeatedly to murder Israelis, and made plans for the "second round"...
    That was 1967 - orchestrated by Egyptian Nasser, joined by Hussein and Assad. They have completely failed - the second round was Israel's victory, thanks to a pre-emptive strike - the vision and courage of a small nation who still lacked resources and had a much smaller army - much smaller, but fighting for survival. The endless attacks and plans for the destruction of the state of Israel - The Arab's "Final Solution" to the "Jewish Problem" in the Middle-East is equivalent to the Nazi's ambitions about the Jews in Europe. As for the fake "moderates" in the Muslim world and their blind supporters in Europe - the demand to receive a "Free of Jews" Palestinian state fits indeed the definition of a demand for a Juderein!!
    The Jews came to this land for a good reason - this reason still prevails - every time the Israeli-Arab conflict is on the news, Jews in Arab countries and Islami-Europe are being attacked. Anti-Semitism beliefs still gain new supporters and the countries from which the Jews fled will never welcome them back
    Eventually people will realize that Arab false propaganda is simply that - False Propaganda!
    LONG LIVE ISRAEL!!!

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  9. lawrence of arabia is not an imperalist.
    how do you figure?

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  10. As a jew, to accept to live under Palestine authority is suicidal. Palestinians, unfortunately, have clearly shown deep contempt for jews and for human rights too.

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  11. The Palestinian Ambassador to the United States Maen Rashid Areikat said on Tuesday in Washington that the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO)opposes the immediate presence of Jews and gays in an independent Palestinian state

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