Israel Perspectives: Feeling 'Right' at Home: This Date in Jewish History...

Tuesday, November 29, 2005

This Date in Jewish History...

58 years ago today, on November 29th 1947, at Lake Success, New York, the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine, a plan meant to resolve the Arab-Jewish conflict in the British Mandate of Palestine, was approved by the United Nations General Assembly.

Is there any doubt, that were this resolution to have been brought before the United Nations General Assembly today, that it would be soundly rejected, with the very idea of a Jewish State being deemed as racist?

(More likely, we would have seen a resolution calling for the establishment of an Arab State in Palestine being brought to the table and passed, with only Micronesia voting against).

This being the reality, is one to assume, at least through the eyes of the world, that the right of the Jewish People to a Jewish State in Israel (Palestine), as understood by the United Nations in 1947, no longer applies today?

Israel
Zionism
Judaism

4 Comments:

Ze'ev,

I think you and I would both agree that the factor which has contributed most to the undermining of the assumption that the Jews deserve their own state is the refusal of supposed "Jews" of North America to move here once they had the chance. Why should the world buy our line that we are a people, not a religion, when we can't even convince our own Brethren of Brooklyn?
Would we not have been able to dismiss the demographic threat of a return of refugees if the Jews had made aliyah? How can we claim that we do still need the state when Jewish leaders are claiming that America is in fact paradise for the Jews: see this misguided website:

www.towardtradition.org

So yes - the world would claim that:
Jews are not a people.
They do not need or deserve a state.
Israel should be Palestine.

Why, because by their actions, that is the message that Jews of the western Galut have passed on.

No offence is meant to any of my own dear family or that of the blogger. Just simply - you are wrong. Sorry.

H

By Anonymous, at Tue Nov 29, 04:46:00 PM GMT+2

Haim, I agree wholeheartedly with your assesment.

However, i would be remiss if I left it at that.

A large reason why the world does not regard our claim to a Jewish State i nthe Land of Israel as legitimate is because we don't view our claim as legitimate.

When we refer to areas within the Land of Israel, where so much of our history took place ,and where we were shaped as a nation, as occupied territories - meaning that they do not belong to us - so why should the world think otherwise?

When we allow our holiest site to be over run by Muslims who destroy it, and yet we do not say a word, why should the world take our claims to the land seriously?

By Ze'ev, at Tue Nov 29, 07:14:00 PM GMT+2

So according to your logic - Britain has no right to London, because it does not press its claim to Calais, which historically belongs to it. I am sure the entire world agrees with you (or not).

I do not believe that the rest of the world cares how Israel calls Yehuda v'shomron - though I agree with you that there is nothing wrong with using hebrew terms, except that we should try to be exact, because that is another problem with ideology - it distorts, because of course Yehuda and Shomron is a very confusing term as I actually live in Yehuda but not in the shtachim, in fact most of west Jerusalem is located in Yehuda. And half of the places which claim to be in the Shomron are in Binyamin. So the problem is Yehuda v'shomron is not a very exact and therefore deliberately misleading title.

As for whether we should call them occupied - we do have their a military occupation - you may not like this but it is true. If we weren't occupying them and instead annexed them then we would have to call the country an apartheid regime, where we ruled over the Palestinians without giving them their basic human rights (your ger toshav model - very progressive for its day, that is to say 3000 years ago). So the occupied territories is essentially the only word for them if we want to be exact. And I do not believe that is the core of why the world doesn't believe we have a right to it. Violent enforcing of our own rights at the expence of others' will not bring greater recognition. Perhaps an understanding that the other side's rights, while historically less well founded, must be fulfilled will bring us greater world recognition. but I am sticking with my first answer - the only way to show the world that we are serious is if those Jews who reject Israel embrace her and make aliyah.

By Anonymous, at Tue Nov 29, 07:50:00 PM GMT+2

this is all fascinating and all, but have you guys ever considered what the Palestinians thought when we gained Israel? So many families lost thei homes to us. In reality, we are the ones who are wrong. All of us who believe that we should keep this state as our own.

By Anonymous, at Tue Jun 05, 08:47:00 AM GMT+3