The Palestinians vision of Darkness

The Palestinian Vision Of Darkness Avi Davis 09 August 2002 Email this story Print this story

It should have been no surprise to anyone that among the victims in Sunday´s bus bombing in the Galilee were Arabs. The Galilee´s population is 52% Arab and it is inevitable that any attack on a bus in that region would have an impact on that population. So too the destruction in Hebrew University´s cafeteria last Wednesday. A university that proudly boasts a population 15% Arab should statistically have expected to find Arabs among the dead. It certainly shouldn´t have surprised most Israelis, who can now finally appreciate the true nature of the terrorist campaign they are facing: any Israeli institution, including the ones that service or care for Arabs, is a potential target. This would seem to include hospitals, day care centers, fire stations and welfare organizations. It goes a long way to answering the question posed by Alistair Goldrein, a British student studying at the Hebrew University when he asked: "Why would someone target this University - it is what was best about Israel."

Why, indeed. The good intentions of liberal institutions or service organizations are largely irrelevant to the master planners of Palestinian terrorism. For them the secular education offered by the Israelis is a trap, designed to goad Arabs from their culture and shatter Palestinian unity. So, too, are the hospitals where world class physicians often sweat to save Arab lives. So are the Israeli human rights groups who actively lobby for their interests and protection. All of these well-intentioned people are regarded as indistinguishable from other Zionists "occupying" Palestinian land – a land categorically defined by Hamas as stretching from the Mediterranean to the Jordan.

The spiral of self deception into which the Palestinians are rapidly spinning has, as its practical source, the acceptance by the international media and European governments that Palestinian terrorists are freedom fighters no different in nature than the French resistance during the Second World War. But a poorer analogy could not be imagined. The French resistance, which eventually unified communists, socialists and nationalists under the banner of the Forces Francaises de l´interiuer, not only had as its goals the liberation of German-occupied French territory, but the restoration of a French democratic republic and the reinstitution of French law. Furious debate was entered into by members of the resistance on the nature of that renewed French republic, giving rise to the ideological rifts that characterize French society to this day. But the important point is that debate ensued and the unifying theme of that debate was that only a vigorous democracy could save France from a descent into renewed authoritarianism or even civil war.

The Palestinians have no such mechanism vouchsafing the progress and prosperity of their inchoate state. There is no visible debate on the nature of such a state (although there is considerable tension between the religious and secular in that society); there are no intellectuals nor statesmen who feel free to talk openly about the challenges of democracy; there is no room for moderates, whose voices are silenced in the popular call for jihad. No, the Palestinian state-in-the-making speaks only in the language of hatred. Today, the target is Israel, but with the increasingly apparent failure to achieve any concrete political objective, the rancor and hatred unleashed by their venomous campaign is likely to turn inward. The most probable outcome is therefore not victory, but civil war.

Yet, an even graver malady afflicts the Palestinian people. Their cause has been hi-jacked, not by a resistance front, but by revolutionaries. Hamas, which has stepped into the vacuum left by Yasser Arafat´s corrupt Palestinian Authority does not merely seek to eject what it perceives as foreign occupation of its land, it seeks no less than the total transformation of Palestinian society. Its militant Islamist message resonates as prescriptive change reminiscent of many other historical revolutionary movements - conceived in high ideals, reverting to violence and ending in butchery.

Therefore, those looking for historical analogies should not waste time examining France of the 1940s. They should recall France of the 1790s when another revolution, conceived with noble aspirations reverted to carnage and destroyed itself in a frenzy of blood letting. That cynical Frenchman Albert Camus, once commented that "every revolutionary ends either as an oppressor or as a heretic." He might have also added that most die at the hands of their own people. The leaders of the Palestinian Revolution, wading knee deep in blood and accustomed only to the language of hate, should now be put on notice that history is unlikely to make an exception for any of them. Born in blood, they will likely die in blood.

No one should be surprised when this revolution begins to devour its own children. ---------------------------------- Avi Davis is the senior fellow of the Freeman Center for Strategic Studies in Los Angeles and senior editorial columnist for Jewsweek.com.

Palestine has always been inhabited by Jews, and at various times, Arabs depending on when their Islamic Jihad is winning or loosing.

Your minimize-Arab/maximize-Jew emphasis is really slimy rhetoric; they're all Semites and both have been there since before ANY Semites called themselves Jews. BTW the Romans removed Israelite claims to Caanan, etc by knocking their silly little countries over like a popsicle stands and re-naming it all Palistine. Did you hear that? Were you paying attention? That's right- claims of unbroken "Jewish" sovereignty over Jerusalem are pure poppycock and historical revisionism!

The Isrealites fought the Romans in their own Jewish Jihad (jihad means "holy war" but sounds scarier and otherly) and they LOST (so much for "the choosen ones"). That was 2000 years ago - the statute of limitations for grievance has expired, and metaphysical fantasies are not legally binding!

I'll grant that the desire for genociding the other side is mostly on the Arab Islamist side. But look at post #22 for an example of why Israel banned the lunatic fundamentalist Kach party. Most Isrealis see the irony in advocating Palli genocide, but not all.

No sane person is calling for the mass murder of Palestinains.
To the best of my knowledge Rabbi Kahane and the Kach party advocated the resettlement of both Palestinians and Israeli Arabs to Jordan, the 2/3 of Palestine given to the Arabs in 1923.
Israeli Arabs are citizens with full rights (although they are becomming more militant and many terrorist acts have bveen commited by or with the help iof these Arab citizens). I would note that Moledet (the party of the recently martyred Rehavim Zevi) supports the expulsion of the Arabs of YESHA.

And none of the Neocons' herds of red heifer cultist abandonment theology lunatics have much of a threshold for detecting hyprocrisy much less irony.

1. Most neo-cons tend to be fairly secular. The fundamentalist Jews are not really part of the Neo-con movement.
2. What is "abandonment theology?"
Speaking of theology, are you a subscriber of replacement theology?<
3. Relocation is not Genocide. Teh Poles and Czechs did not slaughter teh Germans after WW2. They expelled them to Germany. Many of these Sudeten and East Prussian Germans are still alive.

Tribes has squat to do with it. There are many real tribes in California that operate casino's. Are they Palestinians?

Glad you agree that tribal status has squat to do with geographical status. Members of real tribes in California are Californians. Any resident of California is a Californian (duh.)

Israelis and Arabs and Druze and Zoroastrians residing in the Palistine are Palistinians. The idea that Israelis are not Palestinians is Orwellian.

The diversity of non-Israeli Palestinians is not an arguement against them. They don't need to be a Recognized Choosen People of the One True Great White Father's Unbroken Bloodline Tribe to have human rights. Californians aren't a tribe, but still have rights equal to particular tribes of California.

"Palestinians" are not a people, they are a political movement

It's time to put this often used, silly, strawman argument to bed. 1. The Palistine has always been inhabited by many tribes.

Palestine is a political name for the land, essentially dating from 1919.

2. Some of the tribes are Semetic. Some Semetic tribes are Jewish, some Arab.

Arabs did not live in the land of Israel untill the Muslim armies invaded the Byzantine province around 640 CE.

3. Also a lot of Bedoin and Druze and Christians and Zoroastrians, etc, etc.
Bedouins are Arabs. Unlike the Syrians Jordanian, and Egyptians who settled Palestine between 1890 and 1946, these Arabs had been in the land for 1300 years.
Teh christians are the remanents of the Byzantine Greeks and Syrians colonists who made up a bare majority of the population in 620. (Jews and Samaritans still were a majority in most of the occupied land).
Zoroastrians are Persian. The Druze belong to a religion that broke of from Islam.

4. How stupid of you it is to expect all different, non-Jewish peoples residing in the Palistine to consider themselves "a people!"
And they didn't until the 1960's.

5. "Palistinian" is therefore describing a person's geographic, not nationalistic, origin.
Palestine is not Pakistan, although boith are essentially the results of British mismanagement of Israel and Isndia respectvely. I do, however, admire your honesty in positing that there is no Palestinian nationality. You are conceding the point your answered.
Obviously if there is no distinct Palestinian nationality, language, or culture, there is no distinct Palestinian people.

6. Zionism is a nationalist political movement. Any political aspect of "palistinianism" is a reaction to Zionism.
Quite true.

7. Atzlan is a separatist political movement of Hispanic people. "Californians" are people that live in California. "Zionism" describes the political like Atzlan, "Palistinian" is geographical like Californian. If the UN told Californians to give Atzlan (perhaps as Reparations for the Indian Holocaust), one's status as Californian would not supervene on thier reaction. Because only some Californians are Atzlanists or anti-Atzlanists.
After the formation of the PLO in 1964 it is hard to claim that "Palestine" is purely geographica. Besides, what wer the borders? Those of 1919, which included what is now Israel and Jordan? Are we talking about teh post 1923 borders, after 2/3 were lopped off to become the Arab country, Tranjordan? Are we talking about the further 1/2 of the land given to the Arabs in the 1947 UN Partition, which the Arabs rejected? Or are we talking about the land Israel won from Egypt (minus the Sinai) and Jordan in 1967?

1. The Israelites were expelled from the Land by the Babylonians around 700BCE and returned about 50 years later. Being defeated does not mean a loss of title to a group. They will fight to regain it. AS someone from a land that the British conquered but is now free of them, you must understand this.
2. Teh Jews won the land. doesn't that mean that we have the title again?
3. The Jews of occupied Israel/Judea fought 5 revolts agains the Romans and Byzantines between 67 and 622CE. The largest were in 67-71, 133-135, and 619-21. Each time the Jews alone or with the Samaritans freed most of the land for a time.

4. The Romans fell in the 5th century and Byzantines were conquered in 1453. Neither empire was reborn. Only the Jews regained their land and kept their nationhood. That is a real historical anamoli.

Fluff and stuff. Bedowin call themselves Bedoin, Druze call themselves Druze and Christians call themselves Christians, and Islamic Arabs from Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Lybia, Checknia and Afganistan call themselves "Palestinians" even if they have never been there.

Wrong again, my ex-patriot friend. Is their something in the dust over there that makes people into zealots only capable of seeing one side of complex issues? (;^)
You're mistake, again, is ignoring the need for both tribal and geographical designates.
Many physically located in country of America have a tribal/ethnic designate placed next to their geographical one.

EG: Irish-American, Jewish-American, Arab-American, Native American, Muslim-American, African American. (Please don't ask me for a rule regarding hyphenation.)

Being in Israel, surely you've noticed people referred with >1 designate? Even back in our country, I see mentioned "Arab Israelis," "Palestinian Christians," "Arab-Palestinians," "Arab-Muslim," etc.

I hate to play the Freud card, but wasn't it actually the Zionists that started calling themselves a new name (Israelites) for the political purpose of establishing a Jewish state in the Palistine? Careful with those rocks and glass houses, bro...

I said "How stupid of you it is to expect all different, non-Jewish peoples residing in the Palistine to consider themselves "a people!""
You said "And how brilliant of you to suck right up to the Palestine Liberation Organisation party line, created AFTER the 1948 invasion. If a "People" do not align by race, birth, religion, or geographical location but only by the Political aims of a terrorist organisation I kinda view them as a political terrorist movement, not a people. Doh...

Palestinians are a "People" in the sense New Yorkers are a "People." It's just where they live (not a fricking ideology like Zionism). The PLO arose after the UN-imposed undemocratic Israel creation mandate caused global chaos. Did the SovComs hijack anti-UN Mandate causes for Arafat or did Arafat matchmake and grow his support base like a any good cult leader? $$$? In any case, Fatty survived the power struggles and wins elections. I'm 100% sure you know why and would love to tell me!

Seems to me that the political aspect of Palestinianism is defined most crucially by the negative of Jewish Statism. That negative takes the form of Back-To-The-Caliphate-ism only because of the particular recent history of the area. Being anti-Zionism doesn't automatically make someone pro-extreme-Islam. That's the stuff of strawman agruments, and isn't worthy of freerepublic.

Fundamentalists, whether Islamis or Isrealis, are both equally anti-Palestine. They war over whether the Palestine will be a Jewish or Muslim caliphate. It's a family thing. Hatfield Vs McCoy. Irresolvable becaues they both can't have the Hill.

The Bedoin/Jewish/Muslim/Christian/Anamist/Gnostic Joe Boobtubes of Palestine probably just want a return to a multicultural society under agnostic administration. Who was running things when Syria and Lebanon were exotic flowers in full bloom? My and future generations will only see them as backward armpits of humanity, thanks to the results of U.N. actions circumventing the Consent of the Governed. (call the whaaambulance, right?)

Are you often reminded of that concept over there in Storybook Land?

<5. "Palistinian" is therefore describing a person's geographic, not nationalistic, origin.>
Even if they have never been there right? Like Arafat himself, born and raised in Egypt, was originated in Palestine? Don't forget that Egypt was never Part of "Palestine" but always has been just egypt.

I think you know better than this. Why are you obfuscating, Mr. Red Shield? I know better too, so this is for the benefit of lurkers.

The Jewish State (pop. 2,000,000) has for 50 years illegally occupied not only Jerusalem and the Palestine (pop. 5,000,000), but the Gaza Strip as well. The occupied Gaza Strip (pop 2,000,000 + 2000 settlers) is part of Egypt.

As the decades wore on, sleepy, hypnotized Americans' media LUMPED the occupied Egyptians together with Palestinians. Also, the Palestinian Liberation Organization includes Gaza in its list of places to liberate and draws support from there. Not suprisingly, thousands of refugees are warehoused there in an Israeli Gulag Archipelago.

Like Arafat himself, born and raised in Egypt, was originated in Palestine?

A cursory pull of Fatty's bio shows he's been involved with ending Isreali occupation for decades, and won the Nobel Peace Prize. You try to make Fatty look like some 3rd party interloper. The UN, Brititsh and British Zionists actually are foriegners responsible for the current mess, but you won't blame them for one single thing, will you?

Egypt is occupied by Israel. So is Palestine. It's not really that big a jump considering they're right next to each other, now is it? Yes, Arafat went to university in Cairo, but it's not like his kind are accepted to Ben Gurion. Here's something from CNN.com establishing Arafat's credentials:

Arafat was born Mohammed Abdel-Raouf Arafat al Qudwa al-Hussein in Cairo, Egypt, on August 24, 1929, the son of a successful merchant. His mother died when he was 4, and he went to live with an uncle in Jerusalem, a city that was a British protectorate. It was during those years that Arafat was first exposed to the clash between Arabs and Jews, including many who immigrated to build a Jewish homeland in Palestine. A student of Jewish life When he attended college in Cairo, he undertook a study of Jewish life there, associating with Jews and reading the works of Zionists such as Theodor Herzl. But by 1946 he had become a Palestinian nationalist and was procuring weapons in Egypt to be smuggled into Palestine in the Arab cause.

Like Arafat himself, born and raised in Egypt, was originated in Palestine?

Arafat was born Mohammed Abdel-Raouf Arafat al Qudwa al-Hussein in Cairo, Egypt, on August 24, 1929, the son of a successful merchant. His mother died when he was 4, and he went to live with an uncle in Jerusalem, a city that was a British protectorate. It was during those years that Arafat was first exposed to the clash between Arabs and Jews, including many who immigrated to build a Jewish homeland in Palestine.

A student of Jewish life When he attended college in Cairo, he undertook a study of Jewish life there, associating with Jews and reading the works of Zionists such as Theodor Herzl. But by 1946 he had become a Palestinian nationalist and was procuring weapons in Egypt to be smuggled into Palestine in the Arab cause.

<<<6. Zionism is a nationalist political movement. Any political aspect of "palistinianism" is a reaction to Zionism.>>>
Therefore "Palestinianism" is a political movement and not a people. You just circular-logic argued yourself right around to arguing my position. Always put a liberal on a short leash or they will end up biting their own butt as they chase their tail.

The political movement of Zionism created opposition in the form of the PLO, etc. Human beings in Palestine don't need to be a proper (or THE CHOOSEN) People to have the rights of self defense and freedom.

And so you are wrong and illogical in your above claim. Just because one particular aspect of the experience of being Palestinian has been politicized by the invasion of UN-backed Zionists, it does not follow that being Palestinian automaticly gives anyone a political disposition.

This is also seen on the Israeli side of the wall; great difference of opinion exists among Arab/Jewish Isrealis, Zionists, Orthodox, and athiestic Russian emigres.
Advocating illegal, extreme Final Solutions, the Russians and Zealots make strange bedfellows, don't they?

However Americans would just tell the UN to go stuff itself, as the Israeli's are when the UN demands that Israel give the land that was captured from Jordan to the Arabs who live in Israel.

Yes, Americans would do that. And now you've fallen into my trap. :^))

Why is it OK for America and Isreal to pick-and-choose when to tell the UN to stuff itself, but not OK for Palestinians to do the same?

The Palestine isn't UN property to be deeded over to a Jewish state as a belated "I'm sorry" present to make up for genocides and pogroms commited by Europeans.
Not anymore than East L.A. should be deeded to Mexico City for past wartime unpleasantries.

The Palestinians have been telling the UN and Zionists to go stuff themselves (just like patriots should) for 50 years, but $6,000,000,000.00 a year buys a lot of AIPAC Washington Lobbyists, CAMERA thought police, ADL secret police, JDL hitmen, DEA moles, and "friends" in control mechanisms like the oligopoly media.

Uhh. Jooos don't have Caliphs. That is a Turkish muslim thing. New Yorkers are a culture formed over several centuries: Dutch, English, American rule but New York is a state of mind. The PLO and its Egyptian leader were supported by the Arab states since they could divert the attention of their semi educated population away from their despotic and greedy dictatorial control over their countries. The name Hama mean anything to you? 25,000 Syrians lived there until Assad and his bully boys killed them all and bulldozed the town. Kurdistan? Thank Saddam Hussein for that.

And the Joooooos are evil in your tiny closed little mind for the crime of: a democratic state, attempts to live with their Arab neighbors (Arabs that stayed in their villages are citizens with full rights); taking in 880,000 Jews who were thrown out of every Arab country (except the Judenrein Saudi Arabia) and not keeping these impoverished folks in "refugee camps" for the next 50 years as a propaganda device. The Arabs and the Palis had the chance to crawl out of the 7th century they are terminally mired in as recently as a year ago. Please account for the millions of dollars the US, UN, EU and Arab states gave the PA over the last several years. How much went to starting and improving small businesses, funding education, industry and improving the living conditions of the vast majority of the Arabs on the West Bank & in Gaza? Can you answer that without sounding like a bad video game?

What part of Palestinian is a political movement not a people do you not understand? A people have a language, culture, a history. The "Palestinians" speak Arabic, are Arabic, and their history is Islam, which is from Arabia where they invaded from. Uh, perhaps they are ARABS!

The majority of Palestinians are Arabs. This highlights the unworkable, undemocratic, colonialist aparthied nature of Isreal.

The Arab Palestinians are a People as you see it: language, history, culture. This is the predominant Palestinian sub-category. Next in number are the Palestinan Jews, some of whom are Zionists. Then you have the Christ/Zoroaster/Istar/Ashtar/StarCamel minorities.

Arab Palestinians are a People. Jewish Palestinians are a People. Coptic Christian Palestianians are a People.
But "Palestinians", as a mass noun, denotes the people and Peoples of the Palestine. Nothing more, unless you still chafe at the Roman's victory 2000 years ago. But the Second Temple lacked the proper building permits and was being used to harbor anti-Government terrorists, so the Romans just had to raze it.

I reject your reduction of Palestinians into two camps, Good Israel and Bad non-Israel. I know looking at it that way makes it easier to rationalize the statue quo.

Three European museums protect the remaining codex. None in Mexico City; were you partying too much there to notice little details like that? I make that guess based on your ditzy, superficial regurgitation of public school S. American history. Let's play school, Caligirl. I'll be the huffy Prof. and you'll be the naughty trollop who has to stay after class. Mayan Codices

HISTORY -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MAYAN CODICES The Maya employed ideograms to create an incalculable number of books, or codices. Only three are known to have survived. Their documented history began with an act of barbarism, continued under risky circumstances, and the effort to decipher them has yet to end. By Beatriz Martí The theme of a codex (pik hu'un, in Maya), could be linked to religion, astronomy, the agricultural cycles, history or prophecies. However, in every case, much of the content and the design of the codex itself were related to the spiritual world. In order to write, one had to be in touch with the gods, and the products were considered sacred. This necessitated that the books be kept in special rooms inside of temples and important civic buildings. The ritualized process of codex production involved specialists. The codex, its contents and the finished book were all considered linked to the heavens. Priests had to undergo purification and renovation rites in preparation for readings that they gave the populace during festivals and special ceremonies. Each priest read and gave interpretations that varied in accordance with his specialty. WHAT IS A CODEX? Just as with modern books, paper was the most common material out of which codices were made. The Maya made paper from the inner bark of fig trees (Ficus), called kopó in Maya and today commonly known as amate paper. Although they also used deer skin, cotton cloth and maguey paper, apparently the Maya preferred kopó. The paper measured several meters long and, as in the case of the three known Maya codices, measured about 20 centimeters wide. The large codices were folded like screens, covered with layer of starch, and then with a thin, white, calcium carbonate paste.

Learning something yet? That's good, you go girl!

The Maya Explorer
Most historians claim the Mayas are decedents of the Olmeca, and that at some point close to the year 2000 BC a group of these Olmecas settled near what is now known as Yucatán. There they flourished until the year 1697 AD when the last of the Mayas where eliminated by the Spanish soldiers. In the interval of time between the two dates the Mayas filled the region with their stone built cities, their towering pyramids (sometimes reaching over 70 meters), and their sackbe paths, which intercommunicated many of their cities. They developed writing and numeric systems, they studied the stars and came up with an advanced calendar system that some consider superior to our own. The Mayas where without a doubt one of the most important cultures of pre-Hispanic America, their numerous cities stretched from the coasts of Yucatán down to Guatemala and Chiapas. At one point in time there where over 3 million Mayas living in this area, but by the time the Europeans came, their numbers had reduced drastically due to wars and calamities. Tragically there is much still unknown about the Mayas because most of their books and writings where burned by Fray Diego de Landa during the conquest. Most of what we now know about them has been extracted from the three codices that still remain.

You probably have never heard of the Great Law of Peace, either. The US Constitution is based on it. But just go on thinking that your culture SOOO superior.

The ancient Mayan were meticulous record keepers. Many of their ruins where used to observe the stars and were filled with volumes of books that contained astronomical knowledge that they learned. These books in Mayan lore are called codices. When the Spanish priests first saw the codices, they were thought to be the work of the devil and ordered all the books burned. The famous priest De Landa was one of them. Thousands of volumes were lost to the flames, but it is believed there are three ancient codices left in the modern world.

Care to concede the point about Catholics burning vast, irreplacable written libraries of ancient South America. That's what I thought. Now show me how much Caligirl really likes Bush and I'll let you pass with a C.

The majority of Palestinians are Arabs. This highlights the unworkable, undemocratic, colonialist aparthied nature of Isreal.

Funny, before Arafat those same Arabs were allowed citizenship, those that elected to join with Israel have social security, free medical and a standard of living unmatched in all of the Islamic Monarchies or Dictatorships.

However after Arafat, all Jews were forced out of their new "Lands for Peace" (think it's ethnic-cleansing? doh...), except those who live in self supporting compounds with security fences for survival. Jews are not allowed to enter Palestinians areas, or hold Jobs (uh, it is called apartheid), and of course in a dictatorship the shunned Jews are not allowed to vote, as the Arabs are not allowed to vote either.

However Arabs are still allowed to enter Jewish areas, and do hold Jobs there (it is called free), and those who have become citizens still are allowed to vote (it is a democracy). Their annual income has continued to increase through the years while the Arabs under Arafat have plummeted to less than a fifth of what they enjoyed under the democracy of Israel. (so what is the word workable mean in your language?)

It pretty clearly shows that the Islamic Dictatorship that you support is the "unworkable, undemocratic, colonialist apartheid nature" of Islam! You are blind as a bat, so predisposed to your bias that you have to make up your own language to support your position!

Please point out the culture of the "Palestinian People", as sociologists have failed to identify any sub-culture of the Islamic Arabs that they all come from (most in this generation in fact), your views might get you a paper and an honorable Masters degree somewhere.

. But "Palestinians", as a mass noun, denotes the people and Peoples of the Palestine. Nothing more...

No oh revisionist one, the word Palestinians denotes the members of the Palestinian Liberation Organization Party the PLO, who became the Palestinian Authority when they were recognized as a valid governmental entity by the Jews. At that point the "Palestinians" as the current usage of the word was born to describe the people under that dictatorship. Kinda like Americans mean the citizens of American. Now if you want to go back in History, Palestinian was before that used to describe the Jews, and Arabs was used to describe the Arabs living in Palestine.

My guess is you are describing Palestine as you want in t not studying any history about it. This is acceptable in children under five, but if you are older than that you are required to come out of the make believe world of childhood and join us adults.

unless you still chafe at the Roman's victory 2000 years ago. But the Second Temple lacked the proper building permits and was being used to harbor anti-Government terrorists, so the Romans just had to raze it.

Very punny, but hardly reality as the temple was build long before the Romans invaded, and the Jews did not harbor terrorists in the temple. Now tell me, if you build a house in central park in New York, demand you be given the land because you are being forced from it and begin to shoot at the cars driving by, how long will you last? A lot less than the Arabs I bet. Mine may not be punny, but it is accurate.

I reject your reduction of Palestinians into two camps, Good Israel and Bad non-Israel. I know looking at it that way makes it easier to rationalize the statue quo.

Well it is the status quo, at least until Arafat stops trying to divide Israel into Moslem/Jew. It is and has been the status quo as long as Arafat has been here. Your rejection of reality is common among liberals and people who live in mental wards. Not much I can do about it but continue to point out the truth in hopes that you begin to understand.

It would help if you would purchase a dictionary, religious cults tend to re-write the meanings of words in languages, you need to be on common ground.

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