A Wake-up Call: Celebrating Half a Century of Israeli Occupation

[Israeli]

At the end of 50 years, it will be clear what our revealed choice has been: We prefer the Land of Israel over the values of Israel.

Ari Shavit Apr 07, 2016

The coming calendar year should be a year of celebrations. The end of August will mark the 120th anniversary of the First Zionist Congress. The beginning of 2017 will mark the 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration. The end of November will mark the 70th anniversary of the United Nations' decision to establish a Jewish state in the Land of Israel.

However, Zionism will not be having a year of celebrations next year. On the contrary, the fact that early June 2017 will mark 50 years of the occupation will cast a dark shadow on the Herzl jubilee and the Balfour jubilee and the 29th of November jubilee. Half a century, the Palestinians will say. Half a century, the international community will say. And we too will have no alternative but to look at the calendar and look in the mirror and admit: half a century.

For the past half a century we have lived our lives from day to day and from week to week and from month to month. But at the end of 50 years it will be clear what our revealed choice has been: We prefer the Land of Israel over the State of Israel. We did not heed Yeshayahu Leibowitz’s accurate prophecy of doom. We did not listen to the profound warnings issued by Uri Avnery, Amos Oz and Aryeh "Lova" Eliav. Unwittingly, we let the modest young Israeli republic become an obese empire. Unthinkingly, we replaced the situation of a solid Jewish majority with a depleted Jewish majority. With our own hands we created a process that is ruining the quasi-biblical achievement we had in 1948. The addiction to the land caused us to melt away the sovereignty.

For the past half-century we have passed repeatedly from war to peace and back again from peace to war. But at the end of 50 years it will be clear what our revealed choice has been: We prefer the Land of Israel over the people of Israel. Most of the Jews in the world still live in the diaspora. The vast majority of them are committed to liberal democratic values. A significant part of the Jewish citizens of Israel is also still committed to those same values. This means that two-thirds of the Jews are not reconciled with a continuing situation of control over another people while denying their national, civil and human rights.

read more: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.713117

[Albertoo]

1. This article is complete mush

It wants to pretend there is a conscious, majority will to annex territories.
The reality is that many coalesce to the RW out of fear of the unabating hostility of the Muslim Brotherhood, and the extreme minority religious parties blackmail the other members of the RW coalition to let them annex territories or see the coalition splinter.

[Israeli]

2. Pretend ?????............

Israeli government votes to support annexing West Bank settlements

Whether or not the proposal becomes law, the vote itself broadcasts to the world that this government opposes a negotiated two-state solution.

Source : http://972mag.com/israeli-government-votes-to-support-annexing-west-bank-settlements/98604/

There's nothing static about the West Bank 'status quo'

Israel is already carrying out Bennett’s annexation plan, only without the formal annexation part. The West Bank is a very different place than it was 10 years ago. It will be even more different five or 10 years from now.

Source: http://972mag.com/theres-nothing-static-about-the-west-bank-status-quo/96770/

Shhhhhh, we’re annexing

A new position paper by human rights organization Yesh Din looks at steps being taken by the Israeli government toward the de facto annexation of the West Bank.

Source : http://972mag.com/shhhhhh-were-annexing/117421/

The Strategy for Erasing the 1967 Line

Nouveau settlers know they need to convince other Israelis that the line is purely imaginary, not an actual border, and gradually they’ll cross it.

Carolina Landsmann Mar 06, 2016

“Too many people write about the settlement movement without understanding its dimension of possibility,” wrote Yoaz Hendel in his new Hebrew-language book, “Be’eretz Lo Zerua.” “My parents crossed the Green Line on their own ... because it was possible.”

And then he explained: “Israel is small. The center, Gush Dan, is crowded and expensive. The moment the Alignment government, and afterward the Likud government, made it possible to build beyond the Green Line, a natural process of ‘demand versus supply’ began. Sometimes ideology spurred the move, and sometimes, the ideology developed only afterward.”

But something is impeding this natural process of supply and demand: Construction freezes in the settlements reduce supply, while the political and ideological distinction created by the Green Line reduces demand. This is the root of the fraternal alliance forged by Habayit Hayehudi chairman Naftali Bennett and Yesh Atid chairman Yair Lapid in the 2013 election. Habayit Hayehudi’s ideological assets don’t have a big enough electorate, while Yesh Atid’s electorate doesn’t have enough real estate. To borrow Hendel’s terminology, we could say that Bennett seeks to teach Lapid the settlement movement’s dimension of possibility. To get him to “cross the Green Line” – that is, to erase it – without any need to embrace a nationalist or religious ideology. To get the Israeli political center to expand the purchasing power in the settlements, which, “naturally,” will create an upsurge of construction that will translate back into an ideological achievement for the settlement movement.

How can this be done? The same way the Hendel family did it: “Amid the morning fog, we crossed the line that separates what was conquered during the War of Independence from what was conquered during the Six-Day War.” If nouveau settlers like Hendel and Bennett have any single purpose, it’s exactly that: to help Yesh Atid’s electorate cross the Green Line, to convince it that this line is purely imaginary, not an actual border.

Who knows as well as Bennett that it’s possible to be a settler without living over the Green Line? And in the same way, it’s possible to live over the Green Line without being a settler.
In their refusal to distinguish between 1948 and 1967, the nouveau settlers apply the following logic: There’s no difference from the standpoint of legitimacy between what was conquered in each of those two wars; anyone who accepts the legitimacy of Israeli sovereignty over the territory captured in 1948 must accept the legitimacy of an Israeli annexation of the territory captured in 1967.

Lapid is seeking cheap real estate for his electorate. After all, he’s the leader who emerged from the social justice protests of 2011. And during a visit to the settlement of Ma’aleh Adumim four weeks ago, he discussed the construction freeze.
“What would I do tomorrow with the U.S. president?” he asked. “I’d tell him, ‘Listen, we’re going to officially freeze construction outside the blocs, but I want to build like a madman within the blocs ... The reason they aren’t building here today is that the Israeli government doesn’t want to say, ‘I’m freezing there and building here.’” Ma’aleh Adumim, Lapid explained, is paying the price for the fact that Israel refuses to distinguish between the settlement blocs and the settlements outside the blocs.

But what’s the meaning of Lapid’s statement that Ma’aleh Adumim is in the heart of the Israeli consensus and will remain part of the State of Israel under any future agreement? Bennett explained it to Lapid: “No campaign will help as long as you run around the world saying ‘We need to divide the land.’” In other words, it’s impossible to talk only about building without also talking about annexation; without Israeli sovereignty, what will ensure the value of the property?

Bennett opened his faction’s weekly meeting by saying, “The time has come to apply law to Ma’aleh Adumim, the Etzion bloc and the Ariel bloc first.” That’s exactly what the “natural process” looks like: Occupy, settle, build and annex.

Source: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.706953

[Albertoo]

3. You're trying to drown what I said under piles of trivia

[Israeli]

4. Trivia ????.........

Bills Granting Tax Breaks to Israeli Settlers Pass First Knesset Readings

Zionist Union MK Merav Michaeli: This is creeping annexation and encouragement of investment in settlements.

Jonathan Lis Mar 29, 2016

Two bills that would grant economic benefits to settlement residents passed their first readings in the Knesset Tuesday morning. The first would introduce a new tax payment mechanism for purchasers of homes in settlements, enabling them to avoid dual payment to the Civil Administration and the Income Tax Authority. The second bill enables settlers to obtain the same tax breaks given within the Green Line for profits earned in the territories.

The first bill is meant to ease the bureaucracy currently involved in home purchases in settlements and prevent settlers from paying a double tax to the state and to the Civil Administration. Currently, Israeli citizens who wish to purchase assets over the Green Line must pay a mandatory fee to the Civil Administration as well as a purchase tax to the state.

The bill says that the fee paid to the regional authority will be deducted from the tax to the state. But in most cases, the purchase tax is paid to the state before the fee is paid, and so the refund is only given after the citizen has first made the two payments out of pocket. Only after he has paid twice can he request the refund from the state tax authorities. The bill proposes an upgraded payment mechanism in which the Land Tax Authority will relay the payments to the Civil Administration so that double taxation is prevented.

During the Knesset session, Meretz MK Esawi Freige criticized the decision. “The purpose of the bill is to make it easier for purchasers of land in the West Bank and Gaza. To put it bluntly, this is creeping annexation and they’re all collaborating with this annexation, each in his own way.”

The second bill says that settlers who are eligible for a grant promoting capital investment due to profits earned in the territories will now also be entitled to the tax breaks given within the Green Line according to Israeli law. Currently, an Income Tax Authority rule says that income produced in the territories is subject to the same taxation as within the Green Line.

But the laws to encourage capital investment and capital investment in agriculture do not grant authority to give benefits and grants to residents of the settlements, in accordance with an administrative arrangement set by government decisions. Freige also protested this bill. “Instead of promoting Bnei Brak, they’re promoting Elon Moreh,” he said.

“At a time when the world is ostracizing and boycotting the settlements and their products, the State of Israel is encouraging investment in the settlements,” Zionist Union chairperson Merav Michaeli said. “The Netanyahu government is putting [Habayit Hayehudi leader Naftali] Bennett’s ideology into action and applying creeping annexation in the territories. The damage Netanyahu is doing to Israel in the world will take years to repair.”

Source : http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.711530

[Albertoo]

5. Your copy&pastes bring little to what I was saying

Could you make a statement discussing what I said?
I did state there were extreme religious small parties which led the RW coalition.
The majority of voters wouldn't have moved so mmuch to the RW were it not for the continuous thread of the Muslim Brotherhood which is not ready to look for peace.

[Israeli]

6. Nope ........but I can give you the rest of the " mush " ....

This silent and well-behaved Jewish majority is not shouting and it is not upending tables. Israel is dear to it and it does not want to turn its back to Israel. But very gradually, very quietly, the democratic majority of the Jewish people is being eroded, is becoming fatigued. The insistence on the land is tearing apart, weakening and distancing the nation.

For the past half-century we have known ups and downs in the moral dimension as well. There were decades when despite the occupation, awareness of human rights and the rights of the stranger who lives among us was ascendant. However the moral depravity and the brutalization of recent years prove the extent to which the control of others has corrupted us. At the end of 50 years it will be clear what our revealed choice has been: We prefer the Land of Israel over the values of Israel.

Clinging to the places where the prophets walked has caused us to lose touch with the prophets’ vision. The fanatical zeal for mountains, hills and land of Israel has caused us to abandon the precious breastplate of the Jewish heritage. The idolatry of the land cult and the idolatry of power and the idolatry of the tribe have worn away the commitment to universality, which was the foundation stone of our culture. The land has blinded us and has dulled our senses and has caused us to betray what we are.

Half a century is a milestone. Half a century is also a wake-up call. There are no more excuses and justifications and there is no more "tomorrow." The permanency of the occupation is becoming an integral part of our life and our identity. Thus it is endangering the State of Israel, the Jewish people and the Jewish heritage. Before the Palestinians embark on the 50th-year intifada and before the international community imposes the 50th-year sanctions on us, it is incumbent upon us to find the courage to end the 50-year curse by ourselves, for ourselves.

Ari Shavit
Haaretz Correspondent

Source: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.713117

[Albertoo]

7. Inoperative words as long as people like you do not go to the root of the problem

which, as I already mentioned, is extreme religious partes highjacking the defensive Right, RW which is in the majority only because of the relentless hostility of the Muslim Brotherhood.
To be fair, the US RW Christian nuts gicing support to the Israeli no matter what are not helping. But the basis of the problem is the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, etc.

[azurnoir]

8. Likud is not a religious party

[Albertoo]

9. Likud gives in to the extreme religious parties

Quite a few Likud leaders had a modicum of pragmatism.
The dead set ideologues are the religious. From the Muslim Brotherhood to Lehava.

[Israeli]

10. Sure it does Albertoo...........

......

The Judeo-Nazis in the Israel's Legislature

Racism is always offensive and it is important to fight it. But even racism has its shades, too. Knesset Member Bezalel Smotrich’s vocabulary is that of the master race.

Uri Misgav Apr 12, 2016

Many true and informative things have been said and written, even on these pages, about the racist show of MK Bezalel Smotrich (Habayit Heyehudi) and his wife. But one point has not been clarified enough, and it is important that it be clarified, despite the discomfort in dealing with its implications. This point overshadows all the political and social arguments by which the Smotriches and their comments were examined. It is impossible to continue running away from what's before us.

The Smotriches spoke of the holy and pure moment of the birth of a Jewish child. Of the demand that Arab hands not interfere and pollute this holiness and purity. Of the refusal to share the physical space with Arabs, because Arabs are by necessity enemies. Of the baby that is born to an Arab mother and in another 20 years will murder the baby of the Jewish mother.

This is not just ordinary racism. Racism is always offensive and it is important to fight it. But racism has its degrees, too. This is the vocabulary of the master race. Of racial purity and its holiness. Of inferior races that could pollute the master race. Of the lebensraum cleansed of the enemy’s impurity. Of infants who will grow up to be murderous enemies because they belong to the enemy race. This is a Nazi way of thinking. The Smotriches and their followers are Judeo-Nazis.

A Judeo-Nazi movement exists on the margins of Israeli society. It is hard to estimate its size. It is not very broad in scope, but it exists. It makes various appearances in public in Israel. For example, the Lehava organization run by Benzion Gopstein (“Don’t even think about going out with a Jewish girl”); part of the activities of the La Familia soccer fan club (“Beitar Jerusalem will be pure forever”); the burning to death of Mohammed Abu Khdeir; the fatal arson attack on the home of the Dawabsheh family, and the celebration of the death of their 18-month-old son Ali at a wedding.

The time has come to recognize this phenomenon. Neo-Nazis exist in almost every Western nation. For some Israelis, the Holocaust was only a regrettable mistake in the address. At neo-Nazi rallies in Germany against Muslims, Jews waving Israeli flags participate. In last year's elections, the Judeo-Nazi denomination also won the right to enter the Knesset. It fell just short of winning more than one seat. Statistically that is logical. Representative democracy reflects the segments of its society.

What is not understandable, and what is unforgiveable is the attitude towards Smotrich. This is the true mirror he set up for Israeli society this week: Not everyone is like him, but everyone accepts his existence as something legitimate. The only thing that needed to be done was to boycott him. To ignore his existence. Not to share a word with him. Certainly not a smile or handshake. Even the media did not stop interviewing Smotrich and his wife with chilly politeness. In the previous century Likud tried to prevent Meir Kahane from running for Knesset, and after he was elected most MKs boycotted him. After that his movement was outlawed.

Look at what happened in Israel over the past year. The Tekuma faction chose Smotrich in second place on its slate in its primaries. The party that calls itself Habayit Hayehudi (Jewish Home) recognized the results and adopted him. After that, along came Benjamin Netanyahu and promised voters they were a natural partner. Promised and kept his promise. The result is that the Judeo-Nazi faction is represented in a party that received the justice and education portfolios.

But it does not end here. Netanyahu has a coalition of 61 Knesset members. Smotrich’s vote keeps it alive. He was also appointed a deputy Knesset speaker and runs some of its sessions. The Judeo-Nazi faction sustains the government of Israel and serves as a deputy head of its parliament. It would be interesting to see what we would have said if this had happened in a different civilized country, shall we say Germany.

Uri Misgav
Haaretz Contributor

Source: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.713924

[Israeli]

11. People like me go to what we consider ...

...to be " the root of the problem " constantly Albertoo.

For us it is the occupation .....for you its " mush ".

We prefer 'The State of Israel' over 'The Land of Israel'......we reject the dream of a ' Greater Israel ' ....we reject Judea and Samaria ....want no part of it .

Not saying Hamas is not a problem and yes the " US RW Christian nuts " dont help .

But I seriously dont think you have any idea what you are talking about when it comes to our Right wing :....

The Israeli Right’s Monstrous Naiveté on the Occupation

Dani Dayan, who was recently appointed Israel's consul general in New York, believes the Palestinians have accepted the presence of settlers throughout the West Bank.

Rogel Alpher Apr 09, 2016

The grand obsession of the Israeli right is hasbara, public diplomacy. Benjamin Netanyahu, Naftali Bennett and Avigdor Lieberman are all convinced that if they could only explain the situation with logic and vigor, the world would understand. If the world would only listen, it would open its eyes. The criticism of the occupation, and the foolish insistence on the two-state solution, would end.

This obsession reveals the right’s innocence. The right, of course, tends to accuse the left of naivete. But the truth is that the extent of right-wing naivete is monstrous. The right-wing government’s new minister of hasbara is the former chairman of the Yesha Council of settlements, Dani Dayan, who was recently appointed Israel’s consul general in New York. He has declared that his main job is hasbara. He knows how to do it right, he said. He’ll tell them.

From time to time, Dayan publishes an opinion piece in The New York Times. He always uses the dateline “Maale Shomron, West Bank.” In July 2012, while boasting of the “realpolitik” that characterizes his approach and explaining that “Israel’s moral claim to [Judea and Samaria] and the right of Israelis to call them home today, is ... unassailable. Israel’s moral claim to Judea and Samara” and “the right of Israelis to call them home today, is therefore unassailable” and that “our presence in all of Judea and Samaria — not just in the so-called settlement blocs — is an irreversible fact,” Dayan was happy to report on an idyll: “Today, security ... prevails. ... “the economies are thriving; a new Palestinian city, Rawabi, is being built north of Ramallah; Jewish communities are growing; checkpoints are being removed; and tourists of all nationalities are again visiting Bethlehem and Shiloh.” He quotes the left-wing former cabinet minister Yossi Beilin as saying that a senior U.S. diplomat who toured the area told him “he found everyone ... Israel, the Palestinian Authority ... content with the current situation.” Dayan concludes: “The settlements of Judea and Samaria are not the problem — they are part of the solution.”

In his monstrous, blinding, fantasizing naivete, Dayan thought, in the summer of 2012, that the Palestinians in effect accepted as an irreversible fact the presence of settlers throughout Judea and Samara. He thought these people, disinherited and without civil rights, were happy with their lot. Such was the view out his window in “Maale Shomron, West Bank.”
Writing on June 8, 2014, “Dani Dayan, Maale Shomron, West Bank,” was even more optimistic. His monstrous naivete had taken on the proportions of caricature: “Israelis must let go of the trauma of the Second Intifada,” he said, based on his realpolitik analyses, the ultimate in realpolitik. He called for introducing drastic and immediate improvement in the everyday lives of the Palestinians, dismantling the separation barrier to restore complete freedom of movement and allow them to re-enter the Israeli job market — as a kind of prize for their submissive willingness to accept his eternal presence in “Maale Shomron, West Bank.”

He went so far in his utopia as to say that “Palestinians need to return to Israeli cities, and not only as blue-collar workers. Palestinian academics should be included in Israel’s advanced industries: An engineer from Ramallah should be able to work in Tel Aviv, and a Palestinian doctor treating patients in an Israeli hospital should not be a rare sight.” He called for rehabilitating the refugee camps out of recognition that a two-state solution is obsolete. We can only conclude that this naive man is simply detached from reality, deluded. He doesn’t know any settlers like Habayit Hayehudi MK Bezalel Smotrich. And he doesn’t know any 15-year-old Palestinian boys.

The problem is that his illusion, his utterly false picture of the world, is shared by everyone on the right. This hallucinatory, impossible vision is its vision. That’s what the right has to offer. That’s their explanation. And they call John Kerry messianic.

Source: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.713582

[Albertoo]

12. You're just not listening to one word I'm saying

Over and out

[Israeli]

13. I heard you with your first post .....

........." mush " .

Here is a follow up to that " mush " : ........

The Israeli Democratic Party

From Likud's Yaalon to Meretz's Galon: The State of Israel has just one weapon left in its struggle against the State of Judea – establishing a new movement based on the American Democratic Party model.

Uri Misgav Apr 13, 2016

A cold civil war is brewing in Israel, igniting from time to time. It will not disappear.

The State of Judea and the State of Israel face off on either side of the barricades. Except that the State of Israel avoids showing up in full force on the battlefield. It has a variety of reasons: Fear, hesitation, blindness, apathy, weakness and despair.

Add to those the fact that many politicians refuse to pick a side and try to maneuver between the raindrops. They cry out for the nation’s love, without recognizing the fact that there no longer is just one nation. There are at least two.

Benjamin Netanyahu chose a side this past year. He sold his soul to the State of Judea. The continuum was stretched between “The Arabs are coming out in droves on buses” and the frightened, flattering phone call to the home of the soldier who shot dead a Palestinian at Tel Rumeida.

The lot has been cast. The message has been sent. Naftali Bennett and “the shadow” are doing the rest of the work. Under Netanyahu’s leadership, the State of Judea continuously subdues the State of Israel. It is not clear at all if the tables can ever be turned back. One thing is for sure. We will never know, as long as the State of Israel doesn’t unify and fight back.

Fascism always achieves its goals gradually and thrives in the face of weakness and division on the opposing side. Fascism can be stopped, but only through struggle and forcefulness. There is no compromising with fascism. You don’t form unity governments with it.

The mathematician and Rothschild Prize winner Nati Linial summarized this beautifully in his speech to the Knesset last week, when he said, “Fascism succeeded precisely in those places where decent people didn’t find in themselves the emotional strength to stand up against it due to laziness, weakness or just plain fear.”

The State of Israel has just one weapon left in its struggle against the State of Judea – establishing a public-political movement under the name “The Israeli Democratic Party.” Its borders are broad but clear, from Moshe Ya’alon to Zehava Galon; from Shaul Mofaz to Zouheir Bahloul; from Dan Meridor to Ayman Odeh.

There is no need to be alarmed by this variety. It must be this way. The model is the American Democratic Party, as Franklin Delano Roosevelt reconstituted it in the 1930s.
It will find its dominant center of gravity over time – the bloc of parties of the Zionist Union, Yesh Atid and Kulanu which spend their time fighting over the same electorate and competing for the dubious right to bolster the changing governments of Judea.

A prime ministerial candidate who can garner a consensus must be parachuted onto to this platform; someone like Benny Ganz or Reuven Rivlin. Stef Wertheimer and Aharon Barak can serve as honorary presidents.

I published this detailed proposal (in Hebrew) on the Haaretz Internet website at the beginning of the week. I was flooded with reactions of all kinds – support and opposition, admiration and scorn, belief and skepticism, excitement and cynicism. All of them, to the very last, strengthened my feeling that this is the only solution. It arouses fear and loathing in the State of Judea and a similar revulsion among the fringe streams, like the Mizrahi ethnic professionals and the Jewish supporters of Balad. That’s a good sign.

I am at heart an optimist. I would like to live in peace in a world without nationalities, religions and countries, but there is a difference between dreams and hallucinations. And there is reality.

Plans for uniting forces are always based on compromise and pragmatism. They seem full of holes and are complicated to implement.

Their time arrives only when facing an existential threat, when the sword is held to your throat. The Joint Arab List is an excellent, real-time example to learn from. The sword is being held to our throat. We can’t go on this way.

Source: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.714147