I am cross-posting a letter from Stand With Us expressing outrage at the murders of five members of the Fogel family in Itimar. It also provides a link to anyone wishing to send a letter to the family's surviving members through SWU.
http://www.standwithus.com/app/iNews/view_n.asp?ID=1803
I would also like to echo SWU in protesting US aid going to the Palestinian Authority as long as they keep promoting anti-Jew hatred. An act as barbarous as this could not have been carried out without the constant hateful indoctrination against Jews that spills out of the mosques, the schools and the media of the PA.
While you are on the SWU site, I encourage you to take the survey about hate speech located in the right-hand margin.
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In Herman Wouk's historical fiction, War and Remembrance, there is an episode concerning good Aryan German farming families moved into the lebensraum created by the occupation of Poland. Polish nationalist, Jewish, and communist resistance groups targeted such settlements. They slaughtered the families, wholesale, whenever they were in a position to strike. The point was to make clear that the Aryan Master Race would not be left to enjoy their ill-gotten gains in peace.
The notion off innocent blonde little boys and girls, and their parents who just want to get in a good crop, being shot down or hand-grenaded or burned to death in their homes is not a pleasant one. But, the reader can sympathize with the motivations of the resistance organizations, particularly after all that Germany had done to their families and communities. It was war after all. War has consequences.
One can also, at some decades of safe distance, sympathize with the Shawnee chief Logan, always a friend to British Americans, who went on the warpath after a band of thugs wantonly murdered his entire family, because they were "Injuns."
None of these situations were perfectly analagous to the Fogel family in their illegal west bank settlement. I can probably recite the differences in more depth and detail than Gary, because I go into depth and detail, while Gary prefers one-liners and resents being reminded of inconvenient complexities.
A short version: the first Jews to settle in what later became the British Mandate of Palestine did not arrive by conquest, nor as a result of any displacement - they arrived by permission of the (Ottoman Turkish) government, and purchased vacant land on which to built their socialist kibbutzim. Nor did Israel set out to expropriate Arabic-speaking Christian and Muslim families in 1948 -- those families were ordered out by the armies of King Abdullah of Jordan, King Farouk of Egypt, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, and various adventurers from Iraq and elsewhere.
But the Fogels are not simply a happy little family living on a quiet cul de sac in the suburbs. They are a self-conscious part of a political movement that intends to take as much land as possible. They are an extreme provocation. They should be legally removed, but their government hasn't the spinal fortitude to do that. It is no surprise that some impatient souls would think the way to go is to teach these outlaws that to remain runs fatal risks.
That's unlikely to be effective. It hasn't worked against Palestinians trying to remain in their olive groves, and it won't deter ideologically motivated settlers who are gripped by a messianic fervor telling them any property they choose to take is theirs by right. This was a tragedy, but it was not a simple home invasion robbery either. I may mourn the deaths, but I certainly won't "stand with" the Fogels and all they represented by being where they were.
The worst atrocities against German families by Poles occurred once the German army was driven out.
Do you really want to make a comparsion with what the Germans did to Poland in WW2?
Amazing how your "Analysis' of this atrocity has to go so far back in history.
Yet, as you say, you want depth and detail when I use "one-liners" to describe how someone could slaughter a family of five including three children, one a 3 month old baby.
As the French might say, "we must discuss the philosophical complexities of this situation".
Musn't we, Siarlys? Maybe
DesCartes has the answer.
I agree with most of Jenkins wrote. I don’t like settlements and consider them a significant obstacle for peace.
But it should be noted that we don’t know who carried out the attack yet. If the attack was from a terrorist group that calls for the destruction of Israel, they really see no difference between settlements on the West Bank and Israel proper. The do not recognize any borders.
Former Anteaters for Israel president Isaac Yerushalmi shares his thoughts on BDS and this attack in his latest blog. His link to the Hamas website I found interesting. Dumb move politically. I give credit to Abbas for denouncing this attack. Hamas saying that all measures are acceptable is just a dumb move politically.
http://israelforliberals.com/
Anonymous,
Isaac's article is good and I urge readers to check it out.
The point is, however, that this was not just a dumb act politically. The larger point is that this was another in a long line of barbaric acts that should stir the world's outrage. As yet, the outrage seems to be limited to Israel and her supporters. Is there not a teaching point here? How can you demand that Israel negotiate with these people? For that matter, how can the Olive Tree Initiative argue that is worthwhile for Jewish American students to go to the West Bank and "dialogue" with them? (In fairness, the latter is MY statement and does not necessarilty reflect the view of SWU.)
Not the PHILOSOPHICAL complexities Gary. I leave that to intellectuals such as yourself. We need to discuss the complexities of DAILY LIVING for all the people concerned, the things that really motivate INDIVIDUAL PERSONS, and the myriad of ways that individual persons interact with each other. Leave philosophy to the philosophers, who don't have to worry about such mundane details.
Do I want to make a comparison? Both a comparison and a distinction, exactly as I said, no more, and no less.
The fallacy in your response to Anonymous, Gary, is your use of the term, concept, and reference, "These People." Although I have often expressed doubts that analogy proves anything, it can illustrate and illuminate if it is well chosen.
To refer to the murderers of the Fogel family, the Palestinian Authority, and all non-Jewish residents of the West Bank as "those people" and ask how Israel can negotiate with "them" is very much like:
A) Referring to a Ku Klux Klan murder as the act of "white people" and asking how any self-respecting American of African descent can give any credence to "them."
B) Referring to five black thugs gang raping a woman in Central Park as an act by "Negro thugs" and asking how any university could hire "one of them" (a black Ph.D for instance).
C) Identifying the worst atroctities at Abu Ghraib as the work of "The Americans" and asking how any Iraqi could place any faith in "those people."
D) Asserting that because an Israeli tank crew blasted the wall of an inhabited civilian home, killing four little girls, therefore their second cousin is justified in blowing up a cafe in Tel Aviv because "The Jews" killed his little cousins so "those people" have to pay for it.
Israel cannot secure peace for itself, by refusing to negotiate with anyone of the Palestinian persuasion, on the ground that "they" killed the Fogels.
Siarlys,
Who exactly should they negotiate with? The whole PA, while saying they will negotiate with Israel continues to stoke anti-Jewish hate in the mosques, the media and schools.
How about the folks who started the ISM? They are peace activists, right?
Hamas? Read their charter.
Think in terms of Nixon going to China.
How could the Chinese Communist Party received this war-mongering imperialist who cheered on the fascist invasion of Korea and the puppet regime in Saigon?
How could a revered anti-communist president make a disgusting pilgrimage to meet the butcher who slaughtered millions of his own people and denied freedom of speech while making himself a god?
Etc.
In the real world, effective leadership knows that you get real work done by talking to people about what you might both be able to live with, considering what is and is not in your reach.
Making all the Palestinians go away is not within reach. Driving the Jews into the sea is not within reach. Drawing a line, splitting the difference, and getting on with having a life is within reach. The charters are pieces of paper. According to the charter of the African National Congress, all the land and the mines should have been nationalized people's property. That didn't stop Mandela and DeKlerk from sitting down and talking about what's real and what's achievable.
Either one of them could have walked off in a huff because "some of your people" committed another atrocity. Either one had plenty of atrocities to point to. It would have been very sad if they had been so childish.
P.S. Hey Miggie, read my first post, the paragraph beginning with "A short version:"
Anything in there that indicates I've never read anything about the middle east? Any facts you care to dispute?
Siarlys,
One fact you and many others ignore is the religious aspect. They can't accept a Jewish presence in the ME. Read the Hamas Charter. That is a worthwhile bibliographical item.
Too bad they can't accept a Jewish presence in the Middle East. It's there. The Afrikaners thought they couldn't accept full voting rights for the native African majority, but they couldn't stop it forever. (Yes, I'm perfectly willing to compare Hamas to the former South African government). On the other hand, most of the jihadist Jews filling up the settlements think they can't accept a non-Jewish presence anywhere west of the Jordan River. Too bad, the other people are there. Everyone is going to have to deal with that, whether they like it or not.
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