Tuesday, May 31, 2005

Why Not Arab "Settlements"?

Nasser al-Kidwa, the Palestinian foreign minister, was quoted saying that a top concern of Palestinians is the halt of Israeli settlement activity after the meeting between President George W. Bush and the new head of the Palestinian Authority who he insists upon calling a "president" like in this remark Bush made:-

"I know the president is committed to democracy. After all, he ran on a platform that said, 'Vote for me, I'm for peace, and I believe in democracy.' "


I will refrain, for the moment, of relating to the inanity of Bush's words.

Let me get back to the questions of the communities in the disputed territories where Jewish civilian revenants live, as is their right recognized by international law already in 1922 and by the United States Congress in 1924.

A possible solution to al-Kidwa's intimation may be to begin refering to Arab towns and villages within the Israel of the 1949 borders as "settlements", thereby awarding a semantic equilibrium to the issue.

Just like Arabs live in Israel, the state of the Jewish people, the moral balance is that Jews should be able to live in the state planned for the Palestinian people.

Jews have lived throughout the area, in greater and lesser numbers, for the past three millennia, even after loss of their political independence. Why is Jewish "settlement activity" any more problematic than Arab settlement activity?

Why must Jews be solely slated, as a result of Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan, for deportation?

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