Dan Hartung, over at lake effect: a weblog, has a good post on the number of European refugees who were resettled in WW’s I and II.
Take a look, and decide for yourself how to fit the current issues into history…and whether it is ‘racism’ that we are dealing with.
(link thanks to War Liberal)
Date: 09/03/2002 00:00:00 AM
I’d argue that a bigger problem might be the refusal of the Palestinian de facto leaders and their regional Arab supporters to actually accept the state that’s been offered (again and again), as long as Israel continues to exist next door. My two cents and all that.A.L. – thanks for linking that, it was most interesting.
Date: 09/03/2002 00:00:00 AM
The big difference between what happened after previous wars and the current I/P conflict is that Israel failed to take the land they “conquered” and instead “occupied” them instead. If they had simply made it theirs a long time ago, the matter would have been settled then and there. You can not expect to come into my house, occupy a few rooms and then expect me to be happy about the situation. Not that I would be happy if you kick me out of the house completely, but it would be a hell of a lot harder for me to make your life difficult by hotwiring your bedside lamps etc.Not taking sides but Israel made a poor choice a few decades ago and are paying the price to do so. I do agree that probably the best approach is to come in with an international commission and just split the land. The problem here is that many Israelis do not support this themselves and it is partly due to Israel’s internal reluctance to compromise that no progress can be made.