Progressives (Liberals)

The Jewish people are entitled to have their own homeland!

Not at the expense of another people!

It is well known by historians and archaeologists that the first Zionists to Palestine were indigenous to Europe.

A two state solution is incompatible with the Palestinians' Right of Return.

The Zionists need to dismantle their ethnocentrically oppressive state and allow a truly democratic, egalitarian and pluralistic state to take its place.

You're also a champion for genocide,

InfraBlue wrote:

Not at the expense of another people!

The two-state solution would not harm the Palestinians. They would have their own state based on 1967 borders.

InfraBlue wrote:

It is well known by historians and archaeologists that the first Zionists to Palestine were indigenous to Europe.

That is incorrect. Archaeologists and historians are very clear on the fact that the ancestors of the Israeli Jews were the original inhabitants of the West Bank area.

InfraBlue wrote:

You're also a champion for genocide,

That was a spontaneous expression of outrage over the atrocity that Italy was then committing. I was hardly championing it.

I've since calmed down and now merely advocate that the US military massacre Italy's judiciary.

Israel will never see the peace that it claims to seek by denying the Palestinians their Right of Return.

A two state solution harms the Palestinians in that it denies them their Right of Return.

InfraBlue wrote:

Israel will never see the peace that it claims to seek by denying the Palestinians their Right of Return.

No peace means that Israel is under no obligation to give up any land, and is free to keep whatever land they can seize through force of arms.

Wrong. Archaeologists and historians are very clear on the fact that the ancestors of the Israeli Jews were from the areas where they originated, mostly Europe. Latter Israeli Jews originated in areas such as Iraq, Iran and North Africa.

I think they comprehend it. They just don't agree with it. There are simply too many cases of ethnic groups being displaced over time to allow exiled people to simply return and reclaim the land as their own. There's a statute of limitations to going back where you came from.

over the years, sometimes rightly, sometimes wrongly, Israel was perceived as a colonial power which subjugated its native population. Whatever the complexity of the background story, many people simply saw invading white Europeans oppressing the Palestinians.

As the government of Israel moved steadily to the right -- which was obviously a natural reaction to perceived hostility -- it became easier and easier for progressives to criticize the country. The West's growing dependence on Mideast oil also affected the equation. The emergence of Jewish neo-conservatives in the US further cemented the idea in the mind of many leftists that Jews were shunning progressive values and that Israel, once seen as secular and liberal, was turning into some sort of oppressive religious state. Jumping ahead to the present we see conservative Republicans linked arm-in-arm with the Likudniks and Israel the darling of the religious right -- who just can't wait for Armageddon.

It's all very sad. But human history doesn't play out strictly in accord with revealed Scripture. Personally I don't think the hardcore Jewish right (like the hardcore Republicans here) represents the sentiments of the majority of Israeli Jews but (like the Republicans here) it's figured out how to be very effective at the ballot box. I don't know how it will end.

No matter what excuse you use to deny facts, those facts are not going to go away.

InfraBlue wrote:

A two state solution harms the Palestinians in that it denies them their Right of Return.

That wouldn't harm the Palestinians. They would be able to live in their new Palestinian state.