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Settlements vs. Incitement: Take Two
For some reason, only the intro to my last post made it to the site. (Was it too "controversial" or was it the lengthy block quotes from the NYT?) I'll try again.
A NYT front page article details the extraordinarily vile hate speech and incitement against Israel and Jews being pumped out by official agents of Hamas in Gaza. Eric Alterman suggests the piece is missing the “context of what is being done by the Israelis to inspire much of this hatred,” i.e., settlement expansion, roadblocks (intended, one should add, to block the suicide bombings that are the logical conclusion of the incitements), and the general misery of life in the territories. While those are correctly seen as obstacles to peace, they cannot in any way explain or justify the comparison of jews to pigs, the glorification of martyrdom and slaughter of innocents, the insistence on the extermination of Israel. The prevalence of similar propaganda in the state-run Arab media and Hezbollah, which are outside the territories, renders absurd any effort to “contextualize” what should properly be seen as incitement to genocide. In view of this, is it not reasonable to insist that Hamas recognize Israel’s right to exist as a precondition to talks?
Comments (1)
Both sides in the Israeli and Palestinian conflict have to give some. Israel holds much power over the Palestine's. In 1948 Palestine lost their country because the world thought it was a good idea to let Israel become a Jewish dominated state. This is land they have not held in over 2,000 years. The Palestine's have been living on this for those 2,000 years. Three quarter million people were displaced with no compensation. From then on everything has been downhill. Israel withholds power and money which rightfully belongs to the Palestinians. Egypt has agreed to start selling power to Palestine. Israel has build a wall to restrict movement in Gaza making living conditions like a prison. Israel refused to abide by three UN Resolutions to cease building settlements but they just announced they will be building more. When negotiations are to take place it is what the Palestinians must do and lately this has been for Hamas to accept Israel. Nixon and Kissinger negotiated with China before they would accept China. Egypt sat down with Israel before Egypt would accept Israel. The reason to negotiate is to find common ground and making demands before sitting down is counter-productive.
April 1, 2008 6:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
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