Arguments for Israeli Settlements

[whichphilosophy]

The Palestinian population is rapidly increasing.

There's good evidence that those figures are inflated for political reasons by the PLO to boost their morale (and collect more money from UNRWA), and picked up all to happily by the Israeli Right to whip up fears of a "Demographic Time Bomb".

Meanwhile, in reality:

The difference between the likely actual Palestinian population and the results of the two Palestinian censuses (1997 and 2007) is probably around one million people, <snip>

From DellaPergola's statement, it seems that the gap of one million persons could be closed in ten years, making necessary an additional annual yearly increase of 100,000 Arabs, more than double the current numbers. But, far from doubling, Arab fertility and natural increase are decreasing following the demographic transition rules.
<snip>
Careful demographic analysis, however, should lead to a conclusion in stark contrast to the demographic time bomb thesis. The natural increase of the Jewish population in Israel—that is, its yearly birth rate less its yearly death rate—stabilized thirty years ago and, since 2002, has even begun to grow. The natural increase of the total Arab population, comprising both Israeli Arabs and the Arabs of the West Bank and Gaza, continues to descend toward convergence with the Jewish population, probably in the latter half of this century.

source: http://www.meforum.org/2124/the-politics-of-palestinian-demography

What has the rise in the Arab population got to do with countering the fact that Palestinians are losing their homes and territories?

 

[Axulus]

The argument for the settlements is that it expands and cements the territorial claims of Israel.

And that they cement the support for the party in power.

 

[fromderinside]

OK. Is there any more bullshit 'justifying' Israel being entitled to locate on land outside the agreements of 1948, expanded in 1971, and changed again in in the early eighties?

If not. I've got to order a truck big enough and plot a safe route to carry this crap to the gates of hell where it belongs.

 

[Sarpedon]

They assassinated the last prime minister who wanted to curb the settlements. So now no one will.

 

[Axulus]

They assassinated the last prime minister who wanted to curb the settlements. So now no one will.

Why didn't Israel do some airstrikes against those settlements when that happened?

 

[Jayjay]

No. The aim of ethnic cleansing is not genocide, but to reduce the target population to a state where it is easier to control and subject to the new majority population. The presence of an assimilated minority population within the group carrying out the cleansing is not an issue, because they're not a threat to the aim, which is to extend majority control.

For example, in African examples of ethnic cleansing, woman are often raped to ensure that they won't be marriageable. They aren't just killed. The idea is to reduce the population to something manageable, and to gain power over those who remain. They not just trying to kill them all.

But it is _not_ based on ethnicity of religion, but rather status as non-citizen and non-resident. Your definition has no relationship to the commonly understood definition of removal of a population from a territory based on religion or ethnicity by any means (I never said it had to be genocide, just that it was one of the many options).

What Israel is engaging in is land expansion and expulsion of non-citizens.

Your definition is so loose that we'd have to conclude that Russia is currently engaging in ethnic cleansing of the Ukrainians (though their expansionist policies).

Actually, Russia is engaging in ethnic cleansing of Ukrainians in eastern Ukraine. Many ethnic Ukrainians have fled the area and thereby flipped the demographic balance so that right now the ethnic Russians are probably majority.

 

[laughing dog]

They assassinated the last prime minister who wanted to curb the settlements. So now no one will.

Why didn't Israel do some airstrikes against those settlements when that happened?

Because the IDF does not engage in mass punishment of Israelis.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The Palestinian population is rapidly increasing.

Not in the areas from which they have been displaced (i.e. the relevant areas).

The Palestinian population is also rapidly increasing even in Israel.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

[Citation needed]

Where are these displacements happening? And don't cite Palestinian propaganda.

The West Bank, East Jerusalem, the Golan Heights and at one time Gaza.

The question was not where Jews are moving to, but where displacement is happening. You are simply assuming movement = displacement.

I will agree there is some displacement in East Jerusalem--that is an area that was ethnically cleansed by the Arabs in 1948, there have been a number of cases of Jews reclaiming their property and evicting the current occupants. That's a civil matter, not ethnic cleansing.

Recent weeks have seen an acceleration of Jewish settlers under armed guard moving into Silwan, an Arab neighbourhood on the southern slopes of the old city below al-Aqsa, where local residents have responded with angry protests. All this is incendiary.

Lets look at what Wikipedia says:

Silwan (Arabic: سلوان‎,[1] Hebrew: כְּפַר הַשִּׁילוֹחַ‎ Kefar ha-Shiloaḥ) has been a farming village near the natural spring outside southeast of the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem since the medieval period. It lies in East Jerusalem and was an exclusively Palestinian neighborhood after 1948.[2]

You'll have to read between the lines to see that it was one of the areas ethnically cleansed in 1948.

The US has exercised its Security Council veto 42 times to protect Israel from condemnation for its actions, mostly in the occupied Palestinian territories. On the last occasion, in 2011, it vetoed a resolution calling the settlements illegal, not long after President Obama had said they were illegitimate. If there was any tactical merit in that semantic sophistry, it has long since evaporated in the drastic increase in Israel’s land-grabbing ever since. It is high time Mr Obama shows he means what he says – not just in America’s national interest but in the interest of future generations of Israelis.

Yeah, the UN goes on about Israel about like the Tea Party goes on about Obamacare.

The Jerusalem Post
http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/EU-Peace-Now-condemn-Catan-settlement-construction
In addition, according to Oppenheimer, the settlement’s existence makes it impossible for the Kfar Magic residents to get sufficient resources.

“The settlers of Catan are trying to gain a monopoly on sheep,” Oppenheimer said at a press conference Friday. “Not only have they gathered ore and wheat to turn their illegal settlement into a city, we have found that they have enough wood, bricks and sheep to build an outpost on more grazing lands. This is Palestinian land, and they have a right to sheep!” Oppenheimer unveiled a “point system” at the press conference, which he said measures “illegal settlement activity.”

“The settlers of Catan have already reached nine points,” he explained. “That means the game is almost over.”

Here's the settlement they're referring to: http://www.catan.com/

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Your definition is so loose that we'd have to conclude that Russia is currently engaging in ethnic cleansing of the Ukrainians (though their expansionist policies).

They very well might be.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

There is no expansion.

This sums up the whole pro settlement position right here.


There is no expansion. There is no settlement activity. There is no confiscation of land.


Anything which the state of Israel declares is part of Israel, is part of Israel.



End of discussion.

Seems to be the case from what I am reading here.

 

[Jokodo]

There's good evidence that those figures are inflated for political reasons by the PLO to boost their morale (and collect more money from UNRWA), and picked up all to happily by the Israeli Right to whip up fears of a "Demographic Time Bomb".

Meanwhile, in reality:

The difference between the likely actual Palestinian population and the results of the two Palestinian censuses (1997 and 2007) is probably around one million people, <snip>

From DellaPergola's statement, it seems that the gap of one million persons could be closed in ten years, making necessary an additional annual yearly increase of 100,000 Arabs, more than double the current numbers. But, far from doubling, Arab fertility and natural increase are decreasing following the demographic transition rules.
<snip>
Careful demographic analysis, however, should lead to a conclusion in stark contrast to the demographic time bomb thesis. The natural increase of the Jewish population in Israel—that is, its yearly birth rate less its yearly death rate—stabilized thirty years ago and, since 2002, has even begun to grow. The natural increase of the total Arab population, comprising both Israeli Arabs and the Arabs of the West Bank and Gaza, continues to descend toward convergence with the Jewish population, probably in the latter half of this century.

source: http://www.meforum.org/2124/the-politics-of-palestinian-demography

What has the rise in the Arab population got to do with countering the fact that Palestinians are losing their homes and territories?

Nothing in particular. I was just countering Loren's specific claim that "[t]he Palestinian population is rapidly increasing." -- which happens to be untrue, for any reasonable definition of "rapidly".

 

[laughing dog]

Not in the areas from which they have been displaced (i.e. the relevant areas).

The Palestinian population is also rapidly increasing even in Israel.

You appear to a font of irrelevancy.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The Palestinian population is also rapidly increasing even in Israel.

You appear to a font of irrelevancy.

It's pretty hard to claim they are being ethnically cleansed when the population is going up.

 

[Arctish]

You appear to a font of irrelevancy.

It's pretty hard to claim they are being ethnically cleansed when the population is going up.

Only if you misunderstand what ethnic cleansing means. If you think the ethnic cleansing of East Jerusalem means the birth rate among East Jerusalem residents is going down or the death rate is going up, then pointing to stable or slightly increasing population figures looks like you're refuting the claim. But if you understand that it means displacing members of an ethnic group so that a more favored ethnic group can take their place, then the destruction of Palestinian residences and their replacement with Jews-Only housing in East Jerusalem is clearly an example of it.

BTW, I think laughing dog is right about the argument in favor of the settlements:

The argument for the settlements is that it expands and cements the territorial claims of Israel.

 

[whichphilosophy]

You appear to a font of irrelevancy.

It's pretty hard to claim they are being ethnically cleansed when the population is going up.

Not at all. If you are displacing people from one part of the country and they are forced to go elsewhere, that doesn't stop them having sex in their new location.

- - - Updated - - -

The West Bank, East Jerusalem, the Golan Heights and at one time Gaza.

The question was not where Jews are moving to, but where displacement is happening. You are simply assuming movement = displacement.

I will agree there is some displacement in East Jerusalem--that is an area that was ethnically cleansed by the Arabs in 1948, there have been a number of cases of Jews reclaiming their property and evicting the current occupants. That's a civil matter, not ethnic cleansing.

Recent weeks have seen an acceleration of Jewish settlers under armed guard moving into Silwan, an Arab neighbourhood on the southern slopes of the old city below al-Aqsa, where local residents have responded with angry protests. All this is incendiary.

Lets look at what Wikipedia says:

Silwan (Arabic: سلوان‎,[1] Hebrew: כְּפַר הַשִּׁילוֹחַ‎ Kefar ha-Shiloaḥ) has been a farming village near the natural spring outside southeast of the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem since the medieval period. It lies in East Jerusalem and was an exclusively Palestinian neighborhood after 1948.[2]

You'll have to read between the lines to see that it was one of the areas ethnically cleansed in 1948.

The US has exercised its Security Council veto 42 times to protect Israel from condemnation for its actions, mostly in the occupied Palestinian territories. On the last occasion, in 2011, it vetoed a resolution calling the settlements illegal, not long after President Obama had said they were illegitimate. If there was any tactical merit in that semantic sophistry, it has long since evaporated in the drastic increase in Israel’s land-grabbing ever since. It is high time Mr Obama shows he means what he says – not just in America’s national interest but in the interest of future generations of Israelis.

Yeah, the UN goes on about Israel about like the Tea Party goes on about Obamacare.

The Jerusalem Post
http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/EU-Peace-Now-condemn-Catan-settlement-construction
In addition, according to Oppenheimer, the settlement’s existence makes it impossible for the Kfar Magic residents to get sufficient resources.

“The settlers of Catan are trying to gain a monopoly on sheep,” Oppenheimer said at a press conference Friday. “Not only have they gathered ore and wheat to turn their illegal settlement into a city, we have found that they have enough wood, bricks and sheep to build an outpost on more grazing lands. This is Palestinian land, and they have a right to sheep!” Oppenheimer unveiled a “point system” at the press conference, which he said measures “illegal settlement activity.”

“The settlers of Catan have already reached nine points,” he explained. “That means the game is almost over.”

Here's the settlement they're referring to: http://www.catan.com/

- - - Updated - - -

Your definition is so loose that we'd have to conclude that Russia is currently engaging in ethnic cleansing of the Ukrainians (though their expansionist policies).

They very well might be.

The article should have said goats, not sheep.

 

[laughing dog]

You appear to a font of irrelevancy.

It's pretty hard to claim they are being ethnically cleansed when the population is going up.

Genocide is eradication from the planet. Ethnic cleansing is eliminating the presence from a region. So, it is entirely possible that the population can increase in the areas that are not being ethnically cleansed. Once again, you appear to be a font of irrelevancy.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The article should have said goats, not sheep.

You apparently didn't follow my link.

The article was some sort of spoof, it's referring to a board game!

 

[whichphilosophy]

The article should have said goats, not sheep.

You apparently didn't follow my link.

The article was some sort of spoof, it's referring to a board game!

That's why I suggested goats.

 

[whichphilosophy]

It's pretty hard to claim they are being ethnically cleansed when the population is going up.

Genocide is eradication from the planet. Ethnic cleansing is eliminating the presence from a region. So, it is entirely possible that the population can increase in the areas that are not being ethnically cleansed. Once again, you appear to be a font of irrelevancy.

It can also but not always include genocide. This is quite a new word in the English Language, since the 1980s.

 

[Togo]

No. The aim of ethnic cleansing is not genocide, but to reduce the target population to a state where it is easier to control and subject to the new majority population. The presence of an assimilated minority population within the group carrying out the cleansing is not an issue, because they're not a threat to the aim, which is to extend majority control.

For example, in African examples of ethnic cleansing, woman are often raped to ensure that they won't be marriageable. They aren't just killed. The idea is to reduce the population to something manageable, and to gain power over those who remain. They not just trying to kill them all.

But it is _not_ based on ethnicity of religion, but rather status as non-citizen and non-resident.

And citizenship is based on ethnicity of religion.