I recently had an email exchange with a friend of a friend who sent out a mass email saying that she was angry with Israel because Hizbollah had attacked them. She agreed that Hizbollah was bad, and "something had to be done about them", BUT when I twice asked "what should Israel do about the rockets being fired from civilian areas) and the two kidnapped Israelis?", she never had a direct answer. Now she's not a bad person, but she's been gulled into believing one arguement based on misplaced ideals and false assumptions. Usually these good hearted, but naive "do-gooder" liberals are being used into becoming tools of Communists and their fellow fifth columnists. However, when someone throws logic at them, they don't know what to do. This is the point at which liberals usually raise their voice and try to shout you down with repeated platitudes like "Israel is evil." Over email, it's easier to duck the question.
The following is part of one of my emails. My goal wasn't to try to immediate persuade her, but to get her thinking about other things:
I feel bad for the average Palestinian, but when formulating your thoughts on a solution, consider these other points:
- Israelis neighbors attacked them in 1948 and lost.If I took $100 to a casino and lost it on the roulette wheel, I couldn't demand my money back. If Israel had lost in 1948 do we even want to consider that the Arabs would be half as nice to the Jews?
- Palestinians are actually pawns used by the surrounding Arab countries. While Jewish refugees kicked out of Arab lands were always welcome in Israel, Palestinian refugees were always kept in refugee camps. They could be allowed to settle, but aren't allowed to by their "host" country. So the Arab countries get to show off the suffering Palestinians to the world media as an example of the evils of Israel.
- Israel has given back the Gaza Strip. The Israelis left them greenhouses to grow roses to sell in Europe, but the Palestinians sacked and looted the greenhouses. Then they kidnapped an Israeli soldier and fired rockets into Israel proper. Is Israel responsible for this?
- Keeping the current strife keeps foriegn aid dollars rolling in to the leaders of PLO. Forbes reported that Arafat, before he croaked, was worth $200 million, and his wife Sura lived high on the hog in Paris... all the while the average Palestinian lived in squalor. Perpetual victim-hoom is quite profitable. Do you really think that they would get the aid and the attention they get now if there was real sustained peace?
- Scores of Palestianians that try to work peacefully with Israelis are called "collaborators" and killed by the Palestinians gangs or after sham trials. Even Amnesty Intl reported on this (http://web.amnesty.org/report2003/pse-summary-eng)
- Palestinian Christians have not resorted to terrorism even though they are just as occupied as Muslims. If fact, they are persecuted by the Muslim neighbors. Even worse, in 1995 the control of Bethelhem was switched from being under Jerusalem to the Palestinian "Authority." Since the Oslo Accords, (when most control of West Bank and Gaza was transferred to the PLO), Palestinians Christians have since been abused by marauding bands of Muslim gangs. They, have had their land seized from them, and many have emmigrated. When I was in Bethlehem in 1997, there were still a lot of Christians, selling goods, etc, but I hear almost all are gone.
So Palestinians are tools but they are mainly tools of the surrounding countries and the Palestinian "leadership." A democracy is allowed to work only when its people are educated in what a democracy is, and really allowed to campaign and vote on the issues. The Palestinians had sham elections, where they could choose between the devil and the deep blue sea. Do you think an outspoken free thinker calling for sustainable peace with Israel would be allowed to speak or shot?
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