03-06-2003, 08:44 PM
. . . existed in exile for nearly two millenia. By most definitions, the Jews are a nation in a way that many other peoples can only hope to aspire to. By a similar logic, such luminaries as Slobadan Milosevic pointed out that 'wherever there are Serbs, there is Serbia.' He was aiming that comment at the Balkan area, however, that sentiment goes to the very heart of what a nation is: a people whose common cultural assumptions, ethnicity, language and religion are how they define themselves.
Nation and race were once considered synonymous, and you could read such brilliant concepts as 18th century commentary about the 'French race.' Nowadays, I would suggest that only Japan, of the modern industrial nations, approaches that sort of fidelity to the old idea. Everyone else's pot has melted a bit too much for such a homogeneous structure to be in place.
Insofar as hypocrisy, as regards the existence of the state of Israel: for or against. THere is no middle ground, and not much bloody acreage in the first place. The West was for it, as The West recreated it after WW II via the U.N. To then support its dissolution is a profound hyprocisy, and a decision to ignore history, and the whole point of why the Jews were provided a homeland in the first place via a multinational decision to do so. The Palestinian question has been raised as a red herring within my lifetime. The Ottoman Turks hardly gave two hoots about either of them, so long as they obeyed the law and paid their taxes. Of course, The West aided substantiallyl in liberating the Arabs from under the Turkish boot in the course of WW II, a point all too often ignored in modern discourse altogether. (Drat, I forget the British Field Marshall who led the advance into Palestine, for some reason I think Allenby, who Lawrence's and Faisal's guerilla movement supported.)
To disagree with the current government's methods is a matter of the usual discourse of getting into someone else's sovereign affairs. Just as valid for me to poo poo Canadian public medicine policies, which I don't waste my time doing as that is an internal Canadian matter. Nor do I arrogate to myself the right to second guess Isreals measures for their own security when they are surrounded by enemies whose goal is their annihilation.
Try walking a mile in an Israeli's shoes.
Nation and race were once considered synonymous, and you could read such brilliant concepts as 18th century commentary about the 'French race.' Nowadays, I would suggest that only Japan, of the modern industrial nations, approaches that sort of fidelity to the old idea. Everyone else's pot has melted a bit too much for such a homogeneous structure to be in place.
Insofar as hypocrisy, as regards the existence of the state of Israel: for or against. THere is no middle ground, and not much bloody acreage in the first place. The West was for it, as The West recreated it after WW II via the U.N. To then support its dissolution is a profound hyprocisy, and a decision to ignore history, and the whole point of why the Jews were provided a homeland in the first place via a multinational decision to do so. The Palestinian question has been raised as a red herring within my lifetime. The Ottoman Turks hardly gave two hoots about either of them, so long as they obeyed the law and paid their taxes. Of course, The West aided substantiallyl in liberating the Arabs from under the Turkish boot in the course of WW II, a point all too often ignored in modern discourse altogether. (Drat, I forget the British Field Marshall who led the advance into Palestine, for some reason I think Allenby, who Lawrence's and Faisal's guerilla movement supported.)
To disagree with the current government's methods is a matter of the usual discourse of getting into someone else's sovereign affairs. Just as valid for me to poo poo Canadian public medicine policies, which I don't waste my time doing as that is an internal Canadian matter. Nor do I arrogate to myself the right to second guess Isreals measures for their own security when they are surrounded by enemies whose goal is their annihilation.
Try walking a mile in an Israeli's shoes.
Cry 'Havoc' and let slip the Men 'O War!
In War, the outcome is never final. --Carl von Clausewitz--
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum
John 11:35 - consider why.
In Memory of Pete
In War, the outcome is never final. --Carl von Clausewitz--
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum
John 11:35 - consider why.
In Memory of Pete