WSJ: Gaza: Where People Are Puppets on a String - It would be simpler if clear titles were private

...The U.N. took on the Mideast as one of its first big projects after World War II and, unfortunately, has never left. After granting Israel statehood in 1948, the U.N. turned to the Arabs the Israelis had defeated in battle. Under Resolution 302, the General Assembly in 1949 created the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). Today, it is the largest U.N. bureaucracy, with 25,000 employees providing health care, schooling and social services to some 4 million Palestinians in 59 refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and Gaza.

The concrete hovels in these camps long ago became breeding grounds for Arab radicalism. The militant Arab socialist states that gained ascendancy under Soviet tutelage in the 1960s and 1970s wanted it that way....

The early Zionists, who like many central European Jews saw socialism as a means of escaping the pogroms of Europe's class systems, also gravitated toward collectives. Indeed, it can be argued that the Israeli kibbutzim were the only form of communism that ever achieved economic success for any sustained period.

So when the Jewish state was established, it was heavily socialist. The level of central planning was such that immigrants were guided to suitable communities and assigned economic roles to play. Almost all land was state owned. Israelis have built a vigorous private-enterprise economy on top of this inhospitable edifice. But many artifacts of the old system remain.... Over 54% of the country's gross domestic product is accounted for by government expenditures....

The Israelis are bulldozing the settlements, ostensibly to prevent their use by terrorists. Most of the land they occupied, as with... all land in Gaza, will be owned by the PA. About 5% will revert to private hands, but that will be a dodgy process....

First the Nazi's dislocated the Jews. Now the Israeli government dislocates the Jews. Then the Nazi's sent in troops and tanks. I have not been following these events closely enough, but I have heard mention of bull dozers. Is the Israeli government going to flatten the buildings and other improvements before turning over the land to the Palestinians? How is it that governments can lose complete contact with reality? What do they put in the water of politicians? What or who is the "they"? Is it simply that power drives men mad?

It is more bizarre than you realize. In part, the Israelis are bulldozing the settlements at the covert request of the Palestinian Authority because they recognize that their own crooks and gunmen would grab them for themselves and discredit the PA and that the quality of the housing would be a dispiriting revelation to many Palestinians. The Israelis probably also regard the bulldozing as a way to demonstrate that the Palestinians cannot expect to take Israel intact, which is a fantasy peddled by many Palestinian leaders.

Interesting points. The early Israel was heavily Socialist in nature because early European Zionists came out of a bizarre nationalist/Marxist background. Other "nationalist" movements, such as the Basque and Irish movements, which were originally conservative and traditional in nature (basically nostalgic and anti-industrial fantasies), also turned social and Marxist in nature.

There are probably two things that made Israel able to overcome this: for one thing, while many ZIonists were more political than religious, there was no way of eliminating the religious aspect of Judaism; and, secondly, the Jews who went to Israel as colonists came from all over Europe, including from countries that had already experienced the glories of Marxism, and they were probably less entranced by the five year plan than many in the original Zionist movement.

But it's interesting to consider the effect that this residual Socialism may have had on Israel, both then and now.

Where to start. There is so much wrong with this article. I am surprised at the Journal.

First there are religious reasons for the way land ownership is structured in Israel - as leases not privately ownership. Mr Melloan should check the Bible for further information on Shmittah and Jubilee (Yovel). This is not socialism but the Jewish State adhering to the Bible.

http://www.ou.org/Chagim/shmitah.htm

“But many artifacts of the old system remain. The three major banks are state controlled -- although Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched an effort to break them up before he resigned to protest the Gaza pullout."

You need a new fact checker Melloan. The bank monopoly was broken by Mr Netanyahu and approved by the Knesset in early August.

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/31273fac-044f-11da-a775-00000e2511c8.html

“Over 54% of the country's gross domestic product is accounted for by government expenditures.’

Now that’s just sloppy. Did you break that down into Military expenditures which are a huge expense and percentage of Israel’s GDP?

“Under Resolution 302, the General Assembly in 1949 created the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). Today, it is the largest U.N. bureaucracy, with 25,000 employees providing health care, schooling and social services to some 4 million Palestinians in 59 refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and Gaza.”

No mention of UNRWA is meaningful without mentioning that it is unique, a one of a kind UN agency. No other relief group in the UN has existed for anywhere near that long nor gotten even close to that much money. The boondoggle that is UNRWA, replete with monetary amounts and corruption that would make Oil for Food look like an honest operation, has gone on for 56 years. This agency has been a lifetime career for many a UN employee. And for what? Refugee camps are cesspools of terror and bomb factories. Mr Bolton are you listening?

‘The Israelis are bulldozing the settlements, ostensibly to prevent their use by terrorists.”

No. the Palestinians requested the destruction because they want high intensity housing not the small private homes the Israelis lived in.

“But there can be little doubt that many Gazans had mixed feelings about the withdrawal as they observed the glee of the masked, armed Hamas terrorists who may soon be their new masters.”

Dream on. Have you any idea of the popularity of the Intifada and of suicide bombings among Palestinians? Further Hamas is better liked in Gaza than the corrupt PA and Fatah.

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