After WWII people were transferred and borders redrawn so that the new states would be homogenous. Separation was in vogue. Then in the seventies unification was in vogue and the EU was born. The same push and pull has been going on in the ME including Israel. The separatists are now on the rise again because integration doesn’t work especially when groups have so many extreme differences in culture and religion.
People in the right and in the left are trying to force one big Jewish-Arab state on us. If it’s not working in the united continent, it definitely won’t work in the split Middle East.
Europe is not falling apart, and neither is the European Union. But something is happening there.
A majority of 55% in Scotland voted against splitting from Great Britain. The kingdom will remain united. But the growing national feelings, after hundreds of years of unity, point to the direction the continent is heading in.
Since World War II, and as a result of the lessons of that war, there have been two contradicting trends in Europe. On the one hand, a huge wave of population exchange, for the purpose of creating nation states that would be as homogenous as possible.
Winston Churchill declared towards the end of the war, “There will be no mixture of populations to cause endless trouble… A clean sweep will be made. I am not alarmed at the prospect of the disentanglement of population, nor am I alarmed by these large transferences.”
And that’s exactly what happened. Tens of millions of people went through the difficult experience of being uprooted before the war and during the war, and more than 20 million people experienced it in the five years after the war. It was another chapter in the fulfillment of the self-determination concept, which is a main part of the United Nations Charter.
The other, completely different direction, was the creation of a united Europe. The idea materialized. The European Union and the Schengen Agreement began the job of erasing borders. Nationality was regressing in favor of the post-national and multinational era and the opening of gates for immigration.
The idea of a “new Middle East” drew a significant part of its power from the processes taking place in Europe. If it works over there, why can’t it work between Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and Israel as well?
But the joy was premature. Decisions about an economic union and cancelling the need for visas did not lead to similar feelings among the tens of millions who also stuck to the national and self-determination and identity.
A democratic and multiethnic Yugoslavia could have fit in well with the European Union. That didn’t happen. Yugoslavia split into seven new national entities based on an ethnic majority – a process which was accompanied by extensive ethnical cleansings.
It happened earlier in Czechoslovakia, which split into two nation states, without a single drop of blood. And it happened, of course, in the Soviet Union, which split according to its ethnic and national components.
It’s not over, because there may soon be a referendum in Catalonia, where many want to split from Spain. Similar voices are being heard in Italy – from the rich and well-established north – and in Belgium as well, where two communities live, the Flemish and the Walloons.
It’s also happening on the eastern side of Europe. A visitor from another planet wouldn’t be able to understand the actual difference between Ukrainians and Russians. But there is a difference, and they are bleeding over it.
In the more western side, between Ukraine and Poland, there was a population exchange of 1.4 million people after World War II. That’s unpleasant. But things have been quiet there ever since. On the eastern that didn’t happen. The result is an uprising and a demand for independence.
Is there a lesson for the Middle East? Europe has a shared culture, shared values and usually the same religion. And nonetheless, the desire for self-determination is flourishing again. In the Middle East, the situation is worse. Syria and Iraq are falling apart, and no one is offering a referendum to communities seeking self-determination. Sunnis don’t get along with Shiites, and Kurds don’t get along with Arabs.
Despite all that, there are people in the right and in the left who are trying to force one big Jewish-Arab state on us. It’s not working in the united continent. It definitely won’t work in the split Middle East.
mar55 Said:
mar55 you are a New Yorker !!!!!!!!! Shana Tovah !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@ yamit82:
Tillich??? — that’s your answer???
First you tell Curio that he is letting his “theological dogmatic hopes override any common sense. We Jews operate on a different set of rules than you christians. Truth vs Lies and mythology.”
Then you turn right around and cite a Christian theologian (and a liberal one at that) in support of your brief. Yet he doesn’t support it.
In fact, NOTHING you have cited — in Tillich OR in scripture — offers ANY indication of the Almighty’s intentions in re the Palis. Remember, the subject of discourse was
your claim (whose certainty I challenged) that eventually the Palis will be expelled.
WTF has Tillich or Isaiah 41 got to do with THAT???
@ mar55:
Shana Tova Mar
dweller Said:
Pretty much explains it even for brain washed dogmatic heretic christians like you. 🙂
http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=384
Isaiah 41:21-29,
The God of History
by Paul Tillich
Isaiah 41:21-29,
Pretty much explains it even for brain washed dogmatic heretic christians like you. 🙂
dweller Said:
The God of History
by Paul Tillich
Now, the Eternal cries, bring your case forward,
now, Jacob’s King cries, state your proofs.
Let us hear what happened in the past, that we may
ponder it,
Or show me what is yet to be, that we may watch it
how it turns out;
Yes, let us hear what is coming, that we may be sure
you are gods;
Do something or other that we may marvel at the
sight!—
Why, you are things of naught, you can do nothing
at all!
Here is one I have raised from the north,
I have called him by the name from the east;
He shall trample rulers down like mortar,
like a potter treading clay.
Now, we predicted this beforehand,
Who foretold it that we might hail it true?
No one predicted it, now one announced it,
Not a word ever fell from you.
As for your idols, I see no more, not a prophet in
their midst,
To answer my inquiries!
They are all an empty nothing, all they do is utterly
inane, their metal images are futile, vanity.
—Isaiah 41:21-29, End Part 1
@ mar55:
lol. Shana tova!
@ CuriousAmerican:
Curio, you are totally delusional. Please get professional help.
In any case:
SHANA TOVA.
Happy New Year and, GET LOST.
@ yamit82:
You correctly note that events will dictate what will be done, but you assume you know the direction this will take.
You assume you know His intent vis-à-vis the Palis — and you make that assumption based on
A. your notion that removing the non-Jews is a command unto all generations; viz., in perpetuity; and
B. your expectation — as a matter of your simply playing the odds — that the Jews are bound to, at SOME point, seize upon one (or more) of the many opportunities which the Arabs will indeed give them to expel them.
But that doesn’t follow. You don’t know what He’s got planned. Nobody does except He.
For all we know, it may well be (and have been, all along) His intent to foil any moves to remove them — for reasons over which we can, at this juncture, only speculate.
@ yamit82:
I could as easily ask YOU to ‘prove’ otherwise — and be just as absurd in the asking as you were just now.
If you really think such things are actually subject to ‘proof,’ you’re crazy as a loon.
dweller Said:
prove it
@ CuriousAmerican:
How would such expulsion not constitute a “one-state solution” — which you say Israel does not want?
Barak doesn’t say this because he’s an Israeli
— he says it because he’s a lefty.
In a sauce reduction, not all excess fluid is evaporated.
Sometimes it is absorbed into the substrate.
Took a thousand yrs to absorb the Philistines — but it happened.
Those who have (unwittingly) adopted their name will also be absorbed
— and it won’t take that long this time.
In any case, 1967 was just this morning.
“The Eternal People do not fear a long road…”
dweller Said:
Not true. Show me where?
@ yamit82:
You’re right; he IS.
But so are you.
CuriousAmerican Said:
We already are accused of apartheid and even much worse. Your threat is amusing and says much about you. But we already know that.
@ CuriousAmerican:
It would be indeed WONDERFUL, american, if that were so, unfortunately, that is not the case. It is pretty much the opposite, on steroids.
GOI, is bending backwards NOT to upset your musloid darlings, it is turning a blind eye to their rioting and murder.
This, american, is the complete opposite of what you say.
The ones whose lives ARE made miserable are those of the Jews.
CuriousAmerican Said:
Expulsion is the only way but it need not be all at one time.
Depopulation of the Arabs can be a slow form of attrition.
Arabs will always provide the necessary reasons and give Israel every opportunity to force them out over time.
It might take another 50 years or longer but in the end they will be out of here. No doubt in my mind of that truth. Events will dictate the how and the timing. Even if Israeli policy is opposed it will be forced on us and the Arabs one way or another.
You make long term assumptions like with Egypt and Jordan proving you have learned nothing and forgot nothing. Nothing especially in the ME stays the same and for the better for long. Basing assumptions on the past or prsent is not only foolish it’s stupid and shows at least to me that you are letting your theological dogmatic hopes override any common sense. We Jews operate on a different set of rules than you christians. Truth vs Lies and mythology. Your view of Jews is highly stereotypical.
Poor Curious. 😛
Europe as a percentage has less Muslims than Israel, so do not be cocky.
Israel does not want a two-state solution.
Israel obviously do not want a one-state solution.
So why doesn’t Israel say what it really wants? To expel the Arabs. This is what amazes me. Israel never says what it really wants. Everyone knows it, but Israel never states the obvious.
Since Israel does not want a one-state solution, and since Israel will not allow a two-state solution, Israel must either expel the Arabs or face the increasingly common criticism of Apartheid, whether than criticism be valid or not.
Don’t blame me, blame Barak for noting that:
The problem is finding a place for them to go.
Egypt is at peace with you. So is Jordan.
Y’see, I have no problem with a more Jewish, Jewish state, but Israel is going all the wrong way about it.
I look at Israeli government policy and I see two policies:
1) Make the Arab’s lives miserable and maybe they will leave
2) If that does not work hopefully the Arabs will evaporate.
Has not worked since 1967, and yet Israel will not change any of its policies.
Israel is not going about its goals rightly.
Be honest.
You know my recommendation – and how unpopular it is on this site.
This post gets it absolutely wrong, because the continent’s demographics clearly show that Europe IS headed for a one-state solution:
The Great Caliphate of Eurabia.
woolymammoth Said:
That would go a long to in depopulating Israel. 🙁
@ Max:
What happened to your cockamamie belief that in democracy people will always choose freedom and independence over slavery, tyranny and subservience?????
Another one bites the dust 😛
I’m disappointed in the Scottish outcome. I had hoped that an increase in Scottish Nationalism and a split might help expel the immigrants who are conquering the kingdom.
“…Despite all that, there are people in the right and in the left who are trying to force one big Jewish-Arab state on us….”
Only an independant greater Israel, with defensible borders and the ability to defend itself, as necessary, without interference from any enemy or “friend,” will survive.
Israel should not share it’s intelligence with a two faced “friend”. Give them what they deserve.
Organizations within Israel whose agenda is Israel’s demise should be put out of business for good.