krishnapremi wrote
Why on earth should we worry about Israel's problems?Yes we have *some*convergent interests,but ultimately their problems are theirs and our problems ours.
No I was not worrying about Israel's problems. I clearly stated that the Indian non-Muslim military successes made us less paranoid compared to the Israelites in our reaction to Islamic Jihad. I was merely saying that understanding Jewish reaction and response can help us in realizing what we did not do right in allowing the Partition to happen, and the Kashmir Valley to retain its separatist core based on religion.
Israel is a western creation as is Pakistan.Israel was created by an inhuman act against palestinians.That is why MKG was against Zionism.The Western barbarians should atone for their evil.
MKG suggested lots of things to lots of people. The myth of totally peaceful non-violent methods onlee behind the removal of the British from India overlooks the facts that many others had to really fight violence with violence to survive. If you read all the logic given by MKG aginst "Zionism", I am not sure whether you will be able to decide to laugh or cry - his main proposition was not to resist the "atrocities" on the Jews and not to defend themselves. MKG suggested similar stuff to the British to give up everything to the Germans. I have always wondered why he did not suggest giving up India to the Japanese, to Congress and Nehru when the Japanese advance was taking pkace.
I agree that "western barbarians" should atone for their evil, but why should the middle-eastern barbarians not atone for their evils - which they perpetrated on the Jews from the time of the founding fathers of Islam?
Both Mohammedans and Christists have committed atrocities against Jews.The Christist atrocities were worse because they had some intellectual equipment which made them more sinister and evil because they could not tolerate the jews rejecting their cult and godman which they considered 'universal' and the consummation of human civilisation.
The same is also true of Islamic scholarship - in their condemnation and repression of Jews. There is a termendous amount of statements in early Islamic literature justifying violence and genocide against the Jews. And in fact the same accusation is more openly hurled against the Jews - that they rejected their "cult" - Islam, and their "godman", - Muhammad, as swearing personal loyalty to Muhammad is part of the first "pillar" of accepting Islam.
In the 20th century,Europe and the intellectual West has little use for Christism in their socities.They know how hollow the claims of Christism are and it is just a derivative faith of Judaism.Hence the talk of Judeo-Christism as a superior value system,even though Jews themselves see little to connect the Jesus faith to their ancestral religion.
But they have the same problem as that of Islamists, that they have to acknowledge that their faith is ultimately derived from Judaism.
The creation of Israel is to absolve the West of its guilt and be rid of the Jewish problem.The Biblical constituency in US supports Israel because every superpower has its own pet cults which bolsters the 'uniqueness' of the superpower.
Yes, but why should that love showered by any superpower be a fault of the Jews?
It is also a fact that indvidual jews(coming from a deep tradition of learning, discipline, piety, reverence, adoration and mystery) when exposed to enlightenment values and the quest of exploration and truth have produced remarkable achievements in modern life.The powerbrokers in West have tried to cash in on these achievements as 'proof' of the superiority of 'western' values.
Judaic scholars flourished also before whenever they were allowed the opportunity and freedom. Achievement of Judaic scholars at the same time remains a thorn against the arguments that you are giving - for it shows that the very same western technique that produces an Einstein or Freud (or Marx) could not produce similar brains after all from within the western ethnic pool itself
surinder wrote
Trying to compare the treatment of J's at the hands of Christist Europeans vs. the ME M's is like trying to compare the king cobra with the rattlesnake: it is like comparing one bad thing against another and trying to figure out which is worse. Many cannot see anything redeeming in M's and hence automatically assume that J's got it worse from the M's, not the europeans. I am not so convinced. I can give argument and rest my case: Nazis sloaghtered 4-5 million of J's, there is no comparable event in contemporary Arabs/Iszlaam.
S, I simply said that there is no great historical proof to favour one against the other in atrocity. As Johann points out, ME Jewish populations were smaller compared to Europe, so in my opinion any atrocity or repression has to be compared in proportion to the populations. The early indications in the biography of Muhammad by Ishaq or the Shahi Hadith, indicates planned genocide of entire settlements and clans of Jews in a very similar manner as to what the Nazis did. The slaughter of Banu Quaraizah Jews and enslavement of their women should be a good case study - it comes from Muslim pens.
I could go on further, but it merely derails the thread. But I cannot resist the temptation to write a few more things. The Ashkenazi problem with the Palistinans is not just with the Musliems only. About 10% of Palis are Chritstian, and they have been very much in solidarity with their Muslims. In fact, one of PLO's main negotiator & spokesperson a decade ago was Hanan Ashravi, a Christian Palistinian. The J's eviction of tribal bedouins with pagan-like religion is also well known. (their name escapes me.) It is not a mere religious hatred of M's against the J's that explains it all.
If the Christians have mistreated them in Europe we cannot expect any great love for them from the hardliners among the Jews. However here what they started out doing was to secure the sea-front and expand their territory, which obviously displaced the small proportion of Christian Palestinians. But, my point was that Islamic faith was the fundamental motivation to prevent the Jews from gaining any toe-hold in Palestine as at the time this Arabic-Islamic reaction started, there was no possibility or vision of a free Jewish state. The historical presence of the Jews in the land is attested to by archaeology, as well as Islamic texts which gloat over how many Jews they killed, or dispossesed and forced to leave, or how many women they sold or enslaved. Historically it was the Arabs who displaced the Jews under Islam from the Levant in the 7th and 8th centuries.
Regarding References to grand Mufti of Jerusalem: it is mainly Psy ops. What do you expect the Mufti to do? Support immigration into his lands of the Europeans so that his community can be reduced to a pitiable minority? Anyone who wants to do a psy-ops on a group will try to connect them with the Nazis. Dalai Lamas have been connected with Nazis. Subhash Chandra Bose & other Indian nationalists have been painted to have been connected with the nazis.
I am not going into the denate whether connection with Nazis was bad or good. I merely stated this to show that the Jews have no reason to trust the intentions of Islamic groups or parties in the region, especially the PLO, whose roots are linked to such characters.
Simply counting the number of J's in Europe is no indication of their relative worth. Many other factors play into their decision to stay in Europe. Economic prospects being one of them. As a matter of public arguments, South Africa's Apartheid was called not that bad because a lot of Blacks had 'chosen" to stayin SA, even immigrate from the neighboring. Americans have often claimed that Jim Crow laws were not that bad because Africans want to sitll immigrate to the US. Muslaims in India/TSP have often argued that M rule in India could not have been that bad because in the end majority of kaafirs were neither converted nor killed. Such number games are usually deceptive.
Well Indian non-Muslims really had no choice. Jews in Europe on the other hand did have the choice - they could have gone back to Palestine or the Levant. In fact there were small groups in Baghdad and Jerusalem, but why did not the European Jews choose to migrate back to this land and faith of tolerance in ME? They crossed and settled in Kerala, but not in between - why?
Indian non-Muslims also have a past which is suppressed, they fought back and had sufficient pockets of strength and resources from which they could revive militarily. This is the main reason behind the survival of a large majority of Hindus. Jews were too small in number to sustain such military campaigns aginst the powers they came up ahgainst in their diaspora.
All in all, my point was to draw attention to the possibility that a little more paranoia and military independence as well as determination like the Jews in 1948, on the eve of the Partition might just have been able to prevent the slaughter and even dissolved Pakistan - saving us all the subsequent pain.