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Brian wrote:

see the debates in the UN over the "Zionism as racism" declaration



I don't think anyone here would try to defend the infallibility or morality of United Nations proclamations, given some of the causes the UN has championed over the years. But if I remember correctly, wasn't the American veto the only reason that that particular resolution (Zionism=racism) wasn't passed?

I did hear something last week about a recent seminar in Canada on Israel as an Apartheid State. What concerned me there was all the demands to limit freedom of speech.

Stojgniev

Dear Stoygniev,

Thank you for your comprehensive response to my posting.

When I mentioned Poland, I was simply saying what you have admitted about the fact that all nations have their dark side.

What I will continue to take issue with you is over your definition of "free speech."

No, we are NOT free to cast slurs on others and other nations.

And the conference you allude to was certainly NOT open to free speech in terms of saying anything positive about Israel, as I've heard myself.

You also made mention of the multicultural composition of Islam - something no one denies.

There are also Jews from various countries and cultures, including Ethiopia - and?

Have not Christians been oppressed in Islamic republics and states? Are you saying otherwise?

On this forum, we do not cast slurs, as you have done, on Israel or on others.

When that happens, and it can in the heat of debate, no doubt, we have a rule that we withdraw such unparliamentary language and apologise.

When we don't, the Administrator/Moderators then step in without being prodded (usually ) to ask that this occur.

If you see me as a defender of Israel, in truth, I am.

But the slur of "racist" is something that is unparliamentary.

And I work for a parliament .

Alex

Brian, I am not familiar with that Lemko commemoration you mentioned. In general the Austro-Hungarian monarchy was much more tolerant.

That is a big reason why the Old Rite hierarchy established itself in Bila Krinitsia in Bukovyna in the mid-1800s, as that location was within the A-H Empire and they were well "out of range" of the Tsars and the mainstream Moscow church which at that time was still persecuting the Old Believers.

Brian

Would you please provide your source for Israel being designated as a safe haven for the Jewish people after the horrors of the holocaust.

Considering that the Jewish colonization of Palestine began in 1882 and then began multiplying after Theodore Herzl's call for a Zionist state in 1897, it would appear to be an unusual claim.

Dear Brian,

It depends on what one considers 'racist'. Now the true meaning of the word, meant the feeling of cultural or racial superiority over another. In that sense, only the Northern Europeans had that, and the Jews, according to the great historian Arnold Toynbee. Frankly, I don't know! Maybe I recall wrong and he never said it.

I do know that the Japanese considered themselves superior to others, and because of that, committed many attrocities on the Philipines people during WWII. But again, all that superiority stuff, might have been due to the European colonial influence. It could also be an Arian trait. Let's not forget the. caste system in India?

When I said that Israel is racist, I should have said an apartheid state. Either way, it is merely an excuse by the Palestinians to condemn her, so that they can acquire the right of return.

Palestine never really existed. That land was part of Trans-Jordan. The majority of the Jordanians are Palestinians, and frankly I don't know what makes them different from the Jordanians, unless they originally belonged to a different tribe.

Israel was designated as a haven for the Jewish people. It might have been unfair that the land was occupied at the time by certain people that now call themselves Palestinians, and it might have been unfair that the English drew lines in the sand so that some Arab states are filthy rich and others not....but then again, life is not fair.

Everyone is entitled to a piece of land where they can live and defend themselves. Looking at the map of Europe at the end of WWI, and WWII, we would notice an amazing transfer of people from one area to another. Borders changed, and with it people either remained or left...but they did not remain in refugee camps for 40 plus years.

As for the Jews, they are definitely entitled to their share of real estate. If they had it, the holocaust would never have happened, and it is exactly for this reason, they will never give up their country. To give the Palestinians the right of return, would mean the majority rule would go back to them, and it would cease to be a Jewish state.

What is troublesome, is that all these European people that transferred from area to another because of wars, accepted it. The Arabs won't. When the Palestinians ran out of their land into other Arab nations, they were not allowed to settle. This is unheard of. Yet they have managed to make it appear, that it is not their own people persecuting them, but the Israelis.

If we also look at what had occured and is occuring in other parts of the world, such as Kosovo, parts of Africa, etc. we would notice a pattern. The Muslims condemn terrorism, yet it keeps occuring. Eventually, all the Christians, Buddhists, Hindu's etc. leave, until the area becomes totally Muslum.

Zenovia

Dear Lawrence,

I believe that mass immigration began in Israel, when the U.N. accepted Israel as a nation. I believe that was in 1948, after the holocaust.

Actually, it was only because of the holocaust, that the State of Israel was accepted by the U.N.

I would assume that every border that's accepted and recognized by a world body, automatically makes that land a safe haven for the people within it.

Zenovia

Let me tell you a true story: When I first met Mar Ignatius Samuel (Syrian Archbishop in America for many years...and a great spiritual father and a monk with many of the gifts of the Holy Spirit), he told us (the priests who met with him) a story. He said that on his first trip back to Jerusalem since he was made Archbishop of the Syrian Orthodox Church in America, he was seated in the plane next to a young woman. Being a warm and friendly sort of person, he asked the young woman where she was going. She responded that she was going to her ancestral homeland, Israel. Then to be polite, she asked the Archbishop where he was going...and he told her that he too was traveling to his ancestral homeland. She then said, I'm going to Jerusalem, where my family lives. Then the Archbishop Samuel asked her, "That's very wonderful...and how long have your people been in Jerusalem?" She responded, that her family had lived in Jerusalem for three generations now...and then asked His Eminence, "And where is your homeland Father?" The Archbishop then told her that he too was going to Jerusalem where he was born...and then added, "...and my family has lived in the same house in Jerusalem now for 14 generations." The young woman then became very quiet...but finally said, "I had no idea...I'd never even thought of anyone else having lived there for so long."

Interesting no?

May PEACE be upon Jerusalem!

In His great mercy,
+Fr. Gregory

Here's an article that provides a pretty good answer regarding whether Israel's laws are discriminatory or not http://www.quotes2u.com/archives/080801.htm

Zenovia

Though WW2 obviously created a great deal of world wide sympathy for a Jewish state in Palestine, nearly half a million Jews had already immigrated to Palestine prior to the War.

It seems that the terms �people� and �race� are somewhat interchangeable.

From the American Heritage Dictionary:

Semite n, adj,
1. A member of a group of Semitic-speaking peoples of the Near East and northern Africa, including the Arabs, Arameans, Babylonians, Carthaginians, Ethiopians, Hebrews, and Phoenicians.
2. A Jew.
3. Bible. A descendant of Shem.

Race n
1. A local geographic or global human population distinguished as a more or less distinct group by genetically transmitted physical characteristics.
2. A group of people united or classified together on the basis of common history, nationality, or geographic distribution: the German race.
3. A genealogical line; a lineage.


From the Oxford English Dictionary:

Semite � n adj, (member) of any of the races supposed to be descended from Shem, son of Noah (Genesis 10:21ff) including esp. the Jews, Phoenicians, Arabs, and Assyrians.

Racist �n, belief in the superiority of a particular race: antagonism between races. (Racialist)

It appears that English-speaking people outside North America do use the term �racist� to describe Jewish antagonism towards Arabs or Arab antagonism towards Jews. I would be tempted to consider Jews a people belonging to a particular faith, but since the Jews determine who is a Jew according to lineage through the mother and not through a test a faith (one can be an atheist and still be a Jew) it is difficult to say that the term �racist� cannot be grammatically acceptable when applied to Jewish antagonism towards non-Jews.

Perhaps the horror of our American experience of slavery and the racism which we tend to understand as being against just people with a particular skin color causes us to think that the whole English-speaking world use the term in the same way?

I know that the ancient Greeks referred to people that spoke different languages, as 'phili'. This has always been interpreted as 'race'

For example, Herodotus the historian, said that one island in the Aegean, had so many different 'races' and languages, that they were too numerous to mention.

As for racism, it seems to have been something that came about through a clash of cultures. Whenever people of Northern Europe, whether the Hellenes, Romans, and later the Germans, Franks and English, conquered people that lived in the South, the differences in values, etc. caused a great deal of misunderstanding and that led to intolerance. With that intolerance came arrogance and that led to what we would consider today as 'racist'. Frankly, it has nothing to do with color.

As an example, the accusations against the crusaders by the Byzantines, were that they were arrogant, and looked down on their more subtle ways. I believe in the Middle East, one of the reasons for the excessive hatred of Israel, is that they are perceived as arrogant, for the Arabs complain continuously as being intentionally humiliated. It seems to be that East/West cultural thing.

Zenovia

What were the causes for the development of Zionism??? The pogroms especially in the Russian EMpire of the mid-to-late 19th Century especially with the reaction under Alexander III. Herzl came to believe that Jews would never be accepted as equals in Europe or that acceptance which had been given could be could be withdrawn at any time. Considering what happened in GErmany and in occupied France among other countries in the period, a good case could be made for this.The Holocaust was stated as one of the justifying reasons for the fight for the State of Israel in the late 40's. It's horrors certainly accelerated the movement for a Jewish State where such a thing could never happen again.

Not limited to Muslims. Look at the so-called Republika Srpska or the short-lived Bosnian Serb occupation of Krajina in Croatia.

Dear Administrator,

Thank you for your comprehensive, sensitive and learned ruling on the matter!

I don't agree with it, but thank you anyway!

Alex

From the greatest moral voice in the world:

Pope John Paul II Criticizes Israel's West Bank Barrier

Pope John Paul II criticized Israel for building a barrier in the West Bank, saying the Middle East "does not need walls but bridges."
It was the first time that the pontiff had criticized Israel's construction of the 430-kilometer (270-mile) barrier and the comments made during Sunday prayers came on the eve of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's arrival for a visit to Italy.

"The construction of the wall between the Israeli people and the Palestinian people is seen by many as a new obstacle on the road leading to peaceful cohabitation," the pope said.

"In fact, the Holy Land does not need walls but bridges," he said.

Branded by the Palestinians as the "Apartheid Wall", the barrier effectively cuts off large swathes of fertile land and scores of villages from the rest of the Palestinian territory.

The Palestinians see the barrier as an attempt to draw the boundaries of their future state by seizing some of their most fertile land but Israel insists it is merely designed to prevent infiltrations by would-be attackers.

Israel is moving ahead on construction of a new section of the barrier after the latest project was approved by the cabinet last month.

Leading prayers from the balcony of his residence, the pope also lamented the loss of momentum in the Middle East peace process and called for reconciliation.

"Unfortunately, the momentum for peace seems to have stopped," he said.

"Without reconciliation, there cannot be peace."