![\"\"](\"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Israel-HAMAS-300x158.jpg\")
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1\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Introduction. 1<\/a><\/p>\n 2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Ethical Equation \u2013 a Comparison with Ukraine. 1<\/a><\/p>\n 3\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Big Questions and Some Short Answers. 4<\/a><\/p>\n 3.1\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Is Modern Israel an adjunct of American Imperialism?. 4<\/a><\/p>\n 3.2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 What about the Palestinian \u2018Nakba\u2019?. 4<\/a><\/p>\n 3.3\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Is Israel an \u201cApartheid\u201d State?. 5<\/a><\/p>\n 4\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Question of the Legitimacy of a Jewish State. 7<\/a><\/p>\n 4.1\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Overview.. 7<\/a><\/p>\n 4.2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 America, The Jews, and the Emergence of Political Zionism.. 7<\/a><\/p>\n 4.3\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The UN-Resolution for the Partition of Palestine. 13<\/a><\/p>\n 5\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Existential Struggle of the Nation. 18<\/a><\/p>\n 6\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The International Response to HAMAS.. 21<\/a><\/p>\n 7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Deconstructing the Present-Day UN-Response. 22<\/a><\/p>\n 8\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 To The Present Day \u2013 Growing Peace with Israel 26<\/a><\/p>\n 9\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 To The Present Day – Destroying the Peace with Israel 27<\/a><\/p>\n 10\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Conclusion. 29<\/a><\/p>\n Further Reading and Watching. 31<\/a><\/p>\n Appendix – The Christian Ethical Complication. 32<\/a><\/p>\n Notes and References<\/a><\/p>\n (A PDF version of the original article (with footnotes rather than endnotes) is found here<\/a>.\u00a0 This will be of more use for scholars.)<\/p>\n In this essay we undertake the following tasks:<\/p>\n In short, we are trying to address the lack of in-depth knowledge of the conflict which has led to so much misinformed and misplaced support for HAMAS in the West.<\/p>\n The conflict that erupted when HAMAS attacked Israeli communities understandably grabbed our attention much as when Russia attacked Ukraine.\u00a0 It seemed unequivocal to those in the West that Ukraine was the victim of Russian aggression, and it was morally incumbent upon the West to support Ukraine.\u00a0 Decoding this into our modern parlance, Putin was the imperial aggressor and Zelensky was the saintly oppressed seeking liberty from the tyrant. This is the moral equation borrowed from the Marxist \u201cCritical Theorists\u201d of the West and is perspicuous in its simplicity and its application, whoever is conceived of as the \u201coppressor\u201d<\/em> may be resisted by \u201cany means necessary\u201d<\/em> by the \u201coppressed\u201d<\/em> \u2013 and as all<\/em> means are<\/em> necessary, they are therefore permissible; no<\/em> action of the oppressed is to be considered immoral because the moral scales are weighted irrevocably on the side of liberty and freedom. \u00a0This noble \u201cend\u201d justifies all \u201cmeans\u201d.<\/p>\n Thus, it is clear that for millions across the Western world, this equation is emphatically convincing, including to those in the finest educational institutions of Oxford, Cambridge, Berlin, Harvard, Stanford and Yale; intelligent and articulate examples of Western humanity who side with HAMAS as part of a wider assault against the West, its institutions, its imperial history (for which it must now be made to make reparations), and its capitalism.\u00a0 From \u201cQueers for Palestine\u201d<\/em> [1]<\/a> to The View<\/em>,[2]<\/a> it is every \u201cliberal\u2019s\u201d [3]<\/a> sacred duty to support HAMAS, with every question that might be asked answered by our simple piece of moral arithmetic, the actions of the oppressed are self-justifying as they seek liberty from the oppressor.<\/p>\n However, for the more circumspect there will be plenty of moral ambiguity [4]<\/a> that will creep into any analysis of the Ukraine-Russia conflict when one gets armed with the \u201cfacts\u201d which facilitate a better understanding of the conflict.\u00a0 Lest I be misunderstood, that most certainly does not<\/em> mean we should not help the displaced Ukrainian people in any way that we can but rather that Zelensky\u2019s saintly garments are seen to be not so saintly on close examination and we might even be shocked as to the inevitability of Putin attacking a country acknowledged to be one of the most corrupt in the world, facilitating espionage and other intelligence operations against Russia by its most aggressive enemies.\u00a0 The power dynasties of American politics laundered their millions through Ukraine, the CIA probably established rendition sites there and various other shadowy intelligence agencies built chemical and biological warfare facilities along the border with Russia, all protected by the most fanatical of neo-Nazis.[5]<\/a>\u00a0 That does not necessarily justify Russia\u2019s invasion or its actions (other than in the mind of the Russians), but it certainly makes the West and two \u201cincompetent\u201d Ukrainian presidents [6]<\/a> more responsible for the inevitability of them.<\/p>\n Similarly, what might seem so unequivocal with respect to Israel-HAMAS for those on either side of the barricade might be loosened by considering the \u201cfacts\u201d of the conflict and what brought about the conflict.\u00a0 However, in this case, unlike in the Ukrainian conflict, the West more generally has a problem with which<\/em> side are the saints; there is no near homogeneous rubric for the lay people to follow and send in their charitable donations. \u00a0The narratives of either side are not difficult to discern though. In one case, the \u201coppressed\u201d are the Palestinians and the Israelis are the imperial aggressors (an agent of US-imperialism); thus, resistance by HAMAS is the righteous cause with anything and everything HAMAS has done to throw off their chains justified.<\/p>\n As we hop over the fence, October 7th<\/sup> was the darkest day for the Jewish nation since the Holocaust and the righteous cause is to fight the savagery and brutality of an unhinged enemy intent, in the words of its own charter, on global genocide of all<\/em> Jews.[7]<\/a>\u00a0 For Israel, we will obliterate HAMAS by killing every last one of them and then we can talk peace with Gaza.\u00a0 You cannot reason with savages.\u00a0 The Israelis also have the clear advantage that in the eyes of the biblically literate Christian premillennialists, they are the Israel of scripture and God is on their side.\u00a0 It is the sacred duty of every bible believing Christian to support our brothers and sisters in their struggle for the right to exist.[8]<\/a><\/p>\n In this section we ask those questions that have formed the basis of the Western Marxist critique of Israel that has led to the mass demonstrations of support for HAMAS.<\/p>\n We consider this issue more broadly at great length in the subsequent section on the relationship between America, the Jews and Zionism.[9]<\/a>\u00a0 However, our short answer is a little bit surprising, even if modern Israel is\/was<\/em> an outgrowth of American imperialist aspirations (however ridiculous or plausible that objectively might appear to be), you can take your pick amongst any number of Arab nations of the Arab League and the Russia\/Iran axis, as to which imperialist actor you would now like to follow and who would want to \u201ccolonise\u201d (economically at the very least) a \u201cfree\u201d Palestine and dominate the region.\u00a0 In other words, this is an enormous non-sequitur <\/em>\u2013 the \u201cMiddle East\u201d has always been and will always be for this age, an arena of competing imperialist interests be they Arab, American, Chinese, or Russian, allied with regional national interests.\u00a0 It is just too oil-rich an area to be otherwise and corrupt people and governments form nefarious alliances regardless of their speeches and declarations of intent at the UNSC.<\/p>\n We should also consider the founding myth [10]<\/a> of the Palestinian aspiration for their own state out of their own Nakba<\/em> (an Arabic word translated \u201ccatastrophe\u201d).\u00a0 It is true that around 700000 residents of what was to become Israel relocated or \u201cfled\u201d to what are now called the \u201crefugee\u201d camps of Gaza, leaving their properties, businesses, and farms.\u00a0 Was this in response to the \u201cethnic cleansing\u201d<\/em> of Palestine by the violence of the Jews after their declaration of independence?\u00a0 Did the Jews \u201cdrive out\u201d these communities with violence and aggression?<\/p>\n Again, our answer offers a strange symmetry, around 600000 Jews were<\/em> expelled from the surrounding Arab nations, leaving their<\/em> properties, businesses, and farms once Israel had declared independence; it was by the admission of the Arab nations themselves at the time most definitely and intentionally a text-book example of \u201cethnic cleansing\u201d<\/em>.[11]<\/a>\u00a0 It is further estimated that in total, 900000 Jews were evicted from the Arab nations to which they had emigrated after the pogroms of the 18th<\/sup> and 19th<\/sup> centuries in the period 1920-1970 simply because they were Jews. \u00a0Colonial powers and local police were complicit with the looting and violence, happy that the Jews could be expelled and plundered.[12]<\/a> \u00a0It was estimated that Jews expelled from the Arab world were disenfranchised of $250bn worth of property. \u00a0They were evicted simply because they were Jews, no other reason.\u00a0 Those communities had been in those nations for generations and became refugees to the new state of Israel.<\/p>\n There is also a specifically Arab dimension to that question \u2013 many Palestinians \u201cfled\u201d in response to the invasion of the Arab armies after the declaration of Independence on the understanding that those same armies would clear the land of the Jews and allow them to return.\u00a0 The Arab Higher Committee had ordered the \u201cevacuation\u201d of \u201cseveral dozen villages\u201d and the removal of dependents from \u201cdozens more\u201d so that the armies could advance unhindered.[13]<\/a> \u00a0Yet, those mature and seasoned armies could not defeat the fledgling IDF despite an arms embargo supported by most Western nations (including the US [14]<\/a> ) and after nearly two years of conflict, an armistice agreement was signed signalling a de facto<\/em> recognition of Israel by those same Arab nations.\u00a0 None of those Arab nations would (and still do not) open their borders to receive those refugees to whom they had promised liberation.[15]<\/a> \u00a0The Israeli position was, and remains, that final borders could only be the result of Peace negotiations.<\/p>\n Another question for us is the designation of Israel as an \u201capartheid\u201d state.\u00a0 We need only to consider the emotive content of that moniker [16]<\/a> and the contemptuous slur that attaches to such a designation.\u00a0 The native black Africans were bottom of the racial pile, lined up behind Indians, Coloureds, and the Whites.\u00a0 They had no representation in parliament and the land, historically theirs was taken by force.\u00a0 The accusation clearly is that Israel is guilty of those very same sins.\u00a0 Of all the accusations, this is objectively the most unsupportable.<\/p>\n Israel is a multicultural and a multiracial nation by constitution, ethnicity, and the rule of law.\u00a0 Internal to Israel, Arabs serve in the judiciary and the IDF and some of the most heroic resistance against the Oct 7th<\/sup> incursion was by Arab soldiers in the IDF who fooled the HAMAS insurgents that they were comrades and managed to kill them before they massacred civilians.\u00a0 It was an Arab judge who sentenced the disgraced 8th<\/sup> President of Israel to 7 years in prison. \u00a0The Arab population of Israel has increased from 12% in 1950 to over 21% today; with Israel granting citizenship to Arabs from other nations that had married Israeli Arabs and to Jordanian Arabs of East Jerusalem.\u00a0 So, prima facie<\/em>, it would seem impossible to sustain the accusation that Israel is an \u201capartheid\u201d state.\u00a0 Arab Muslim Sophia Salma Khalifa who grew up in Israel argues this<\/a> particularly powerfully in an interview.<\/p>\n However, it absolutely should<\/em> be acknowledged that Netanyahu in the last decade with extreme controversy had sought to declare Israel more formally as a \u201cJewish\u201d state, which was considered by some Arabic Knesset members as apartheid in character and intent. \u00a0The Israeli parliament passed a law in July 2018 (62-55, with 2 abstentions) that might be considered to its advocates as formalising Israel as a \u201cJewish\u201d state and elevating Jewish identity within Israel as apartheid era laws had done in South Africa.\u00a0 However, this seemed more akin to Netanyahu\u2019s struggle against corruption allegations and his struggling to form a working coalition with extreme religious Jewish political parties who would probably concur with some idea of Jewish racial superiority,[17]<\/a> than a fundamental shift to a proto-apartheid State.\u00a0 The narrowness of the vote also indicates the unpalatability of the law for many citizens of Israel.<\/p>\n It also met with a vigorous riposte from Israeli President Reuven Rivlin who reiterated on Twitter that Israel “has complete equality of rights for all its citizens,”<\/em> adding, “There are no first-class citizens, and there are no second-class voters. We are all equal in the voting booth. We are all represented at the Knesset.”<\/em>\u00a0 Rivlin did not refer to Netanyahu directly but certainly had him in mind, saying in a tweet, “Recently, when political thinking is turning all reason on its head, we hear entirely unacceptable remarks about the Arab citizens of Israel.”<\/em>\u00a0 It should also be noted Arabic has remained an official language and Arab members of parliament have not been politically disadvantaged; each Israeli has full voting rights and equal rights before the law.\u00a0 There is no homogeneous \u201cJewish\u201d identity, the politics and tensions of Israel are famous for their contention and diversity.<\/p>\n Perhaps most significantly, functionally, Israel is the only<\/em> democracy of the Middle East which is known for its autocratic familial dynasties that were often established in their modern form with Western imperialist help.\u00a0 It is not difficult to find the testimony [18]<\/a> of Arabs living in Israel who are glad they are living in Israel or who grew up in Israel.<\/p>\n One of the basic objections to the modern State of Israel is that it has no legitimacy.\u00a0 However, by considering the \u201cJewish problem\u201d in its historical context and the eventual solution to the \u201cproblem\u201d that Zionism offered, we can understand the claim for the reformation of a state of Israel as equally as legitimate as the reformation of other states in the region and equivalent to the other political changes in the relations of states in the Middle East in the opening half of the 20th<\/sup> century.\u00a0 In other words, we seek to establish the de jure<\/em> basis for the nation of Israel in light of the de facto <\/em>emigration to the Holy Land of Jews after the pogroms of the 19th<\/sup> century and the Holocaust of WWII.<\/p>\n We want to explore in the next two sections the pivotal role that the \u201cNew World\u201d of the American republic played in the emergence and the support of political Zionism, considering both its theological and political background.\u00a0 This should reinforce our conclusion that Zionism is not an expression or outworking of American imperialism, though we do consider that the wider global imperialisms of the European nations and the world wars certainly affected the political processes of the region; but rather we argue the Zionist vision persisted and was strengthened because of the work of influential Jewish Americans and the ethical force that originated in the Christian principles undergirding the civic practice of the American republic and the moral and theological sense of some important American presidents.\u00a0 It was the uniqueness of the American republic borne out of the quest for liberty, that allowed the Zionist vision to incubate in the League of Nations era. \u00a0This was then combined with the political and moral imperatives flowing in the wake of the Holocaust of WWII, which eventually led to pressure within the newly formed United Nations to formulate a resolution creating a Jewish homeland.<\/p>\n The relationship between America and the Jews is almost as old as the country itself.\u00a0 Jews had arrived in New Amsterdam in 1654 (which became New York in 1674) [19]<\/a> from a Dutch East Indies base of Recife in South America after the Portuguese had recaptured it from the Dutch.\u00a0 The Dutch had adopted a relatively enlightened attitude to the Jews in contrast to the pogroms and persecution common throughout the rest of Europe, they advocated religious tolerance and worked with the Jewish merchants.<\/p>\n This was principally because the Dutch were enduring their own struggle for independence, suffering at the hands of the Spanish Inquisition in standing for religious freedom against the Papists and their Spanish allies.[20]<\/a> \u00a0Such was the appreciation of the Dutch for the five Jews that were their partners in commerce in Recife that when Peter Stuyvesant, the Dutch colonial governor of New Amsterdam, sought to turn these refugees away (because they were<\/em> Jewish) he was overruled by the directors of the Dutch West India Company in Amsterdam.\u00a0 Two other Jews had previously come directly from Amsterdam in association with the trading company which was quite possibly how there was such an intervention.<\/p>\n The first synagogue incorporated in North America was in 1763 (Recife still has the first synagogue of the Americas) and in 1790 they asked the first president of the United States, General George Washington, to address them as \u201cto what it means to be an American\u201d<\/em>.\u00a0 Washington was famous for his advocation of pluralism in the matters of religion as well as most aspects of civic life and he emphasised to them the idea of one nation coming together, and that people should be loyal and patriotic defenders of the new republic without denying their own ethnic uniqueness.<\/p>\n The Jewish presence in the United States increased enormously during the 1880s when Russia and Eastern Europe engaged in a systematic and brutal campaign that led to the expulsion and fleeing of 1.8 million Jews, around 1.3 million of those arrived in the US with others going to South Africa, Australia, and South America.\u00a0 This fleeing was of necessity<\/em>, this was a struggle for the very existence of the Jews<\/em> as an ethnic group [21]<\/a> for the Tsarist policies explicitly aimed at the eradication of a distinctively Jewish consciousness.[22]<\/a> \u00a0Thus, this was also the time of the first major migration back to the historic homeland but it must be noted that there was already<\/em> a substantial Jewish presence, estimated at about 10000 because of the previous migration of prominent Rabbis since the 11th century and their founding of religious communities in anticipation of the return of the Messiah.[23]<\/a>\u00a0 This is recognised even by Aljazeera today in their otherwise revisionist account of the Palestinian Nakba.\u00a0 Here the writer referred to them in the following way:<\/p>\n \u201cthe community of Palestinian Jews, known as the Yishuv, amounted to three percent of the total population. In contrast to the Zionist Jews who would arrive in Palestine later, the original Yishuv did not aspire to build a modern Jewish state in Palestine.\u201d [24]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n If nothing else, this demonstrates the continuing presence of Jews in the Holy Land contrary to the common perception that the sacking of Rome in AD70 had dispersed the Jews in their entirety and \u201cthen, 1,800 years later, suddenly returned to Palestine demanding their country back\u201d<\/em>.[25]<\/a> \u00a0Importantly, Aljazeera also confirms just how few people there were living in the land, with estimates of around 250000 prior to the first major migration of this period.<\/p>\n Further, what was significant with this new wave of emigration was that Zionism was becoming a political, rather than a religious movement.\u00a0 For example, one of the most significant developments in modern Zionism was to occur in 1891 when 400 US political officials, including mayors [26]<\/a> and a future president called on Europe to address the persecution of the Jews particularly in Russia and Eastern Europe by making provision for a Jewish homeland.\u00a0 This, although motivated by a strong religious commitment in one of its principal organisers (see below), was a signed political <\/em>declaration, which although it was largely ignored in Europe, seems to have influenced the predominantly secular Jew Theodor Herzl in framing his proposal for a Jewish State in Der Judenstaat<\/em> published in 1896 which is generally acknowledged as the beginning of the modern Zionist movement, at least as far as the Jewish State itself is concerned.[27]<\/a>\u00a0 There is not a formal acknowledgment of this link by Herzl but it seems to be a reasonable and plausible inference because Herzl used identical language to that declaration.<\/p>\n As indicated, it was of major significance that it was made as a political declaration, but the theological background nevertheless remains important.\u00a0 It is arguable that the Reverend William E Blackstone (W.E.B) with his dispensational premillennialism was more significant with regards to the birth of modern Zionism as his work predated Herzl but as a Christian minister, was not acceptable to either the secular or the religious Jews.[28]<\/a>\u00a0 Louis D. Brandeis, the first Jew to serve in the United States Supreme Court (1917) and arguably the single most important figure in establishing the Zionist vision in the US, was allegedly [29]<\/a> of that opinion:<\/p>\n \u201cMr. Brandeis is perfectly infatuated with the work that you have done along the lines of Zionism. It would have done your heart good to have heard him assert what a valuable contribution to the cause your document is. In fact, he agrees with me that you are the Father of Zionism, as your work antedates Herzl\u201d.[30]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Thus, the strong and enduring connection between \u201cChristian Zionism\u201d and its support for the Jewish state grew from the 1860s onwards, as Blackstone employed the dispensational premillennialism of John Nelson Darby and D L Moody [31]<\/a> which had as one of its distinctives a restorationist moniker at its centre.\u00a0 As in early Jewish Messianism, the restoration of a Jewish state in the Holy Land was seen to be a precondition for and a sign of the Messiah\u2019s return.\u00a0 With their pessimistic cultural perspective and their characteristic newspaper exegesis heralding \u201cthe signs of the times\u201d<\/em> (with Darwinism seen as evidence of the \u201cGreat Apostasy\u201d<\/em> [32]<\/a>), this brand of evangelicalism rapidly solidified in the Fundamentalist movement that emerged directly from these Niagara Prophecy conferences in the two decades following the inaugural 1878 meeting. As part of the process of the consolidation of this new evangelicalism, it was to be the publication of the Scofield reference bible in 1909 popularising the restorationist position that ensured that by the early 1920s, Christian Zionism was the default position of the Pentecostal and Fundamentalist movements and has remained so in the successor movements.[33]<\/a><\/p>\n However, there was a political awareness and a corresponding commitment to political change amongst the early restorationist thinkers which was in stark contrast to the later Fundamentalists and Pentecostals who became their putative successors.\u00a0 The 1878 conference had discussed the Berlin Treaty, where the Balkan countries had been returned to their original owners after the occupation by an empire power.\u00a0 The Ottoman empire was collapsing in Europe and the end of its rule over the Holy Land was imminent and this was seen as an opportunity for the reformation of a Jewish state in their ancient homeland as a final solution to antisemitism and the \u201cJewish problem\u201d.\u00a0 Blackstone\u2019s 1891 memorial was re-presented to two different presidents in Woodrow Wilson and Roosevelt, but the Zionist cause had lost its potential for political advantage by Roosevelt [34]<\/a> and it was to be Wilson\u2019s appointee to the Supreme Court, the Jew prodigy Brandeis that radically changed the Zionist consciousness within American Jewry; he toured and lectured, making it possible for a Jew to be considered both a loyal American but standing in support of Zionist goals.<\/p>\n The British dimension was also significant in this early period of the growth of Zionism.\u00a0 With tacit American agreement,[35]<\/a> the British, poised to become the major imperialist power in the Middle East, had made the Balfour declaration in 1917 whose stated purpose was a homeland for the Jewish people in what was now becoming known politically as Palestine.[36]<\/a>\u00a0 Thus, following WWI and the establishment of the League of Nations by Woodrow Wilson, the British were in tight control of Palestine, Transjordan and Iraq, France the controlling power in Syria and Lebanon.\u00a0 However, the same declaration also contained the clause, \u201cNothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine\u201d<\/em> and with tensions beginning to emerge between the different regional powers and parties to the discussions, very little was done concretely to advance the resolution until after WWII.[37]<\/a><\/p>\n Notwithstanding, what was particularly significant and relevant for us was that throughout the 1920s, the League of Nations was recognising the statehood of the Arab nations (Saudi Arabia was established with imperialist agreement in 1932) and this gave Woodrow Wilson the moral authority to push for equity for the Jews after more than a decade of no progress with moving a possible state forward.\u00a0 Blackstone had been advised by Brandeis \u201cthat the time was not right\u201d<\/em> to push Wilson but after a series of delays, Blackstone had approached Wilson directly via another close aide and had presented to Wilson.\u00a0 However, Brandeis\u2019 reading of the politics did seem more astute than Blackstone\u2019s, as Wilson explained to Blackstone that he was deferring to the strategy of Brandeis to achieve the Zionist goals.[38]<\/a><\/p>\n The consensus seems to have been that Wilson was morally and spiritually committed to statehood for the Jews but did not see a pragmatic utility in pushing it politically during his presidency, not believing it would be successful in the current climate of the League of Nations.\u00a0 This became all the more the case when Wilson was replaced by Roosevelt in 1933, who was sympathetic to national socialism and held antipathy towards the Jews, and it was only Brandeis\u2019 aforementioned work in the background that strengthened American commitment to Zionism in the succeeding decades owing to Brandeis\u2019 position and esteem.<\/p>\n Following the Jewish experience during WWII in which 1\/3rd<\/sup> of world Jewry was destroyed and the massive displacement that resulted at the end of the war of European Jewry (who either could not or did not want [39]<\/a> to return to the nations from which they were deported to the Concentration camps), there was created amongst the Jews a strong desire to return to their historic homeland. \u00a0The refusal of the British to allow anything more than minimal immigration to Palestine meant that immigrants were being intercepted on an enormous scale and kept in what amounted to similar conditions to the prison camps from which they had just escaped.\u00a0 Surveys by the British asked the immigrants in the camps where would they like to go if their historic homeland was unavailable, and they were frequently met with the answer \u201cthe graveyard\u201d<\/em> or \u201cthe crematorium\u201d<\/em>.\u00a0 This offended the moral sensibility of the new American president Harry S Truman, who was far more concerned with the welfare of the Jews than his predecessor Roosevelt and he was concerned to ensure what was just and proper for the Jewish people in light of the privileges granted to and the agreements with [40]<\/a> the surrounding Arab nations by the retiring imperial powers of the Middle East.<\/p>\n Pressure was brought in the newly formed United Nations which culminated in a tripartite resolution on the 29th <\/sup>November 1947 which was a detailed, comprehensive and complex resolution [41]<\/a> which mandated the creation of independent Jewish and Arab states.[42]<\/a>\u00a0 This was despite the opposition that coalesced in the surrounding (and competing amongst themselves) Arab nations about granting the Jews any homeland at all and the direct subterfuge of the British to prevent it happening in actuality even though it had been mandated by the UN. In particular, the Jordanian forces were British officered and armed against the Jews whilst the British simultaneously denied to the interim Jewish government the right to purchase arms and other military equipment for securing their borders after the handover.\u00a0 The Jordanian Hashemite Kingdom had been allowed to annexe and blockade Jerusalem in the closing weeks of British rule, effectively isolating the city in the weeks before the handover.<\/p>\n The British were being very shrewd in their politicking, they understood that \u201cwithout Jerusalem, there was no state of Israel\u201d<\/em>,[43]<\/a> it was the symbolic and religious heart of Israel; without a Jerusalem to fight for, they believed the Jewish people would abandon their hopes of and struggle for statehood.[44]<\/a>\u00a0 The unofficial Jewish militia aided by US Colonel Michael Marcus,[45]<\/a> a veteran of clearing out the death camps at the end of WWII and responsible for the legal proceedings regarding the Nuremburg trials, broke the blockade to preserve the Jewish presence and right to West Jerusalem \u2013 the partition lines were to be frozen according to the status quo on the ground on the day of the termination of the British mandate.<\/p>\n The imperial powers were far more concerned with military alliances with the Arab nations previously under their control than with honouring the resolution, which resulted in an attempted walk back in the general assembly of the substance of the resolution.[46]<\/a> \u00a0However, with the blockade of Jerusalem broken, it ensured that Israel could declare independence at the termination of the British mandate under the terms of the original resolution and maintain they had a defensible right to do so. \u00a0It was on this basis that the proto government of the Jewish community declared their statehood on the day of the termination of the British mandate:<\/p>\n \u201cThe United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution calling for the establishment of a Jewish State in Eretz-Israel; the General Assembly required the inhabitants of Eretz-Israel to take such steps as were necessary on their part for the implementation of that resolution. This recognition by the United Nations of the right of the Jewish people to establish their State is irrevocable.<\/p>\n This right is the natural right of the Jewish people to be masters of their own fate, like all other nations, in their own sovereign State.<\/p>\n ACCORDINGLY WE, MEMBERS OF THE PEOPLE’S COUNCIL, REPRESENTATIVES OF THE JEWISH COMMUNITY OF ERETZ-ISRAEL AND OF THE ZIONIST MOVEMENT, ARE HERE ASSEMBLED ON THE DAY OF THE TERMINATION OF THE BRITISH MANDATE OVER ERETZ-ISRAEL AND, BY VIRTUE OF OUR NATURAL AND HISTORIC RIGHT AND ON THE STRENGTH OF THE RESOLUTION OF THE UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY, HEREBY DECLARE THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A JEWISH STATE IN ERETZ-ISRAEL, TO BE KNOWN AS THE STATE OF Israel\u2026\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n There then occurred the most significant event in the history of the nation.\u00a0 Within a few minutes, the United States had recognised the new State of Israel.\u00a0 This was followed by the USSR within three days which basically ensured the de facto<\/em> survival of the State despite the political opposition which has continued right up to the present day.\u00a0 It also gained full UN membership on May 11, 1949, cementing its de jure<\/em> legitimacy, and is currently recognised by 165 of the 193 UN member countries.\u00a0 It is of note that a significant number of countries once recognised Israel but no longer do so and that some Arab nations that initially refused to recognise Israel now do so.\u00a0 In some of the former, this is to do with communist type insurgencies, there is a peculiar affinity between violent communist revolutionaries and violent Islamic revolutionaries deriving from Lenin\u2019s original analysis of the Islamic prerogative.[47]<\/a><\/p>\n Continued support for Israel by the US is equally permeated by myth and reality.\u00a0 It is true that the US has prevented the anti-Israel movement within the UN of achieving their goals.\u00a0 It is truly remarkable that over half of all UN resolutions (under the auspices of the United Nations Human Rights Council<\/a>\u00a0(UNHRC) and the United Nations Security Counci<\/a>l (UNSC) have condemned Israel.\u00a0 As Chuck Missler once noted, \u201cthere are other problems in the world other than Israel\u201d<\/em>; the amount of time spent passing resolutions against Israel is totally disproportionate indicating a deep and systemic bias against Israel.<\/p>\n It is also true that the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) has adopted a number of resolutions stating that Israel’s strategic relationship with the United States, a superpower and permanent member of the Security Council with veto power, encourages the former to pursue aggressive and expansionist policies and practices in the Israeli\u2013Palestinian conflict. \u00a0The 9th Emergency Session of the UNGA was convened at the request of the UNSC when the United States blocked all efforts to adopt sanctions against Israel. \u00a0The United States responded to the frequent criticism from United Nations organs by adopting the Negroponte doctrine of opposing any UNSC resolutions criticizing Israel that did not also denounce Palestinian militant activity.<\/p>\n It does seem beyond dispute that the US has remained the strongest ally of Israel and most importantly has prevented active military intervention against Israel by a UN-mandated force or the imposition of \u201csanctions\u201d for alleged abuses against the Palestinian people.\u00a0 It is of note that the EU block despite its official support for Israel in most cases sends at least \u20ac750m to the Palestinian Authority to \u201cprotect its interests\u201d.\u00a0 <\/em>As Aljazeera puts it:<\/p>\n \u201cMany now view Abbas\u2019s government as authoritarian, propped up by the likes of the EU and other deeply invested donors who have thrown billions of dollars into keeping his sinking ship afloat. The administration is viewed as irredeemably corrupt \u2013 PA bigwigs enjoy VIP status and lifestyles, with travel privileges not afforded to the rest of the population. Its reputation sunk to new lows when Abbas called off elections in 2021, fearing Fatah would be trounced in the poll. Protests erupted after Nizar Banat, an independent candidate, was arrested, and later died in police custody\u201d.[48]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n It should be expected that other countries do the same as the voting records of the UNSC and UNHCR demonstrate. \u00a0However, the US has also supported Israel in the six (and now the seventh) major conflict both on the wider world media stage and the UN.\u00a0 Most significantly, Trump strongly supported the Abraham accords of 2020 which led the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan to normalise relations with Israel.\u00a0 This was perhaps the most dramatic shift in relations since the foundation of Israel and recovered the momentum of the period which had first emerged when Jordan had normalised relations earlier in 1994 in response to the Oslo accords [49]<\/a> when Israel had agreed to the foundation of the Palestinian National Authority as a self-governing \u201cinterim administration\u201d in the West Bank and Gaza. \u00a0It also was the backdrop to the active discussion Israel was in with Saudi Arabia to normalise relations which would be a major turning point for the balance of power in the Middle East.<\/p>\n However, it is easy to overplay the US support, particularly in recent years when the US courted Iran, international groups of nations [50]<\/a> gave (and continue to give) large grants to the extreme Palestinian regimes and support for Israel is made \u201cconditional\u201d on certain undertakings regarding statehood for the \u201cPalestinians\u201d and unsettling \u201coccupied\u201d territories.\u00a0 The repeated pushing during previous conflicts of Israel into premature \u201ccease-fires\u201d for \u201chumanitarian purposes\u201d has prevented Israel from being anything but reactive to aggression over the last 20 years in addition to the major conflicts. \u00a0It should also be noted that the \u201cinterests\u201d of the EU we noted above might also be considered to coincide with the wider Western interests, including centrally the US (who under Clinton oversaw the Oslo accords), once viewing Abbas (also known as Abu Mazen) as relatively moderate and pragmatic.[51]<\/a>\u00a0 Those \u201cinterests\u201d were strong enough in the present conflict for the EU to rescind within hours the declaration they were to cease sending the financial support to the \u201cregion\u201d, which is slightly obfuscated reference to both their financial support for the PA and<\/em> HAMAS,[52]<\/a> the rival Palestinian faction in control of the Gaza strip.\u00a0 That is, with this in view, we should remind ourselves of our own naivety and culpability for the attack on Israel.<\/p>\n Hundreds of billions in \u201caid\u201d has been sent to Gaza which was appropriated by HAMAS over decades <\/em>to build a network of underground tunnels and to stockpile weapons.\u00a0 Over 10000 rockets were fired into Israel in a 24-hour period on Oct 7th<\/sup>.\u00a0 What should have reached the people to build schools, roads and power infrastructure has become part of the massive personal fortunes of the leadership of HAMAS.\u00a0 HAMAS intentionally destroyed the economic infrastructure that was left in Gaza when the Jewish settlers were evicted in 2006 as part of the agreement with the PA which would have guaranteed the Gazans an independent income; they intentionally kept their population impoverished for political advantage and to create within their own people a strong antipathy towards Israel.[53]<\/a>\u00a0 They were happy to use their own people as human shields and to sacrifice them as future suicide bombers and expendable soldiers.\u00a0 We will consider HAMAS in more detail shortly as we deal with the context of the current conflict.<\/p>\n Despite having the backing of the tripartite resolution of the UNGA of 29th<\/sup> November 1947 for the partition of Palestine, Israel within hours of its declaration of independence was attacked by Egypt, Syria, and Jordan supported by a broad Arab coalition known as the \u201cArab League\u201d.[54]<\/a>\u00a0 The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem declared an Islamic Holy War against the Jews, the holy men of Al-Azhar University in Cairo called on the Muslim world to proclaim a Jihad (Holy War) against the Jews and King Abdulaziz Al-Saud (the first king and absolute monarch of Saudi Arabi founded in 1932) declared \u201cthere are fifty million Arabs and one million Jews, what if we lose 10 million Arabs to destroy the Jews? [It would be worth it]\u201d<\/em>.\u00a0 This was to be the Israeli war of independence and the basis of the legend of the Palestinian \u201cNakba\u201d (catastrophe) which was the alleged \u201cethnic cleansing of Palestine\u201d.<\/em>\u00a0 Aljazeera paints a graphic picture for us of the Zionist brutality of this period:<\/p>\n \u201cEvery year on May 15, Palestinians around the world, numbering about 12.4 million, mark the Nakba, or \u201ccatastrophe\u201d, referring to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine and the near-total destruction of Palestinian society in 1948\u2026On that day, the State of Israel came into being. The creation of Israel was a violent process that entailed the forced expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homeland to establish a Jewish-majority state, as per the aspirations of the Zionist movement.\u201d [55]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n This account provided for us by Aljazeera is informative if not for the misinformation and misrepresentation which has rewritten history and created the false metanarrative around the \u201cPalestinian problem\u201d which is apparently entirely the responsibility of Israel, and, if we are to believe the political spokesman for HAMAS, Ghazi Hamad, would be solved<\/em> by obliterating<\/em> Israel.\u00a0 Ghazi makes this clear that this is by any and all means necessary:<\/p>\n \u201c\u2026We are a nation of martyrs and we\u2019re proud to sacrifice martyrs\u2026I am talking about all the Palestinian lands.\u00a0 Does that mean the annihilation of Israel? <\/em>\u2013 Yes, of course.\u00a0 The existence of Israel is illogical.\u00a0 We are the victims of the occupation.\u00a0 Period.\u00a0 Therefore, nobody should blame us for the things we do.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Now, to ensure there is no ambiguity as to what Ghazi means, he spells it out for us so that we know exactly what his logic entails.\u00a0 He wants to appeal to logic by calling the existence of Israel \u201cillogical\u201d<\/em> and \u201cthe existence of Israel is what causes all that pain, blood, and tears\u201d<\/em>.\u00a0 We must believe that he believes that removing Israel will usher in an era of peace where the Arab brotherhood welcomes Palestine into the fold; of course, that would entail a second civil war between Fatah, other PLO factions and HAMAS to decide who will rule this New Jerusalem but let us forget that little detail.\u00a0 Ghazi is prepared to spell out what he means by \u201cfor the things<\/em> we do\u201d:<\/p>\n \u201cOn October 7 [the day of the brutal attack on Israel], October 10, October 1000000 \u2013 everything<\/em> we do is justified\u201d.[56]<\/a> [Emphasis added]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n That is, if we manage to kill a million Jews to liberate the land, that is what we must do.\u00a0 So just what<\/em> does HAMAS believe is justifiable, just what is morally equivalent to the \u201cpain, blood, and tears\u201d<\/em> of the occupation.\u00a0 Well, let us enumerate:<\/p>\n So, what is the response of the educated and civilised West to the HAMAS manifesto and this practical exposition?\u00a0 Do we have some difficulties with the details of the execution of the programme or the logic of Ghazi that we have just enumerated above?<\/p>\n Well, surprisingly little.\u00a0 Most capitals and large cities around Europe and the US have seen demonstrations as large as 300000 (in Berlin), 100000 in London.\u00a0 Hezbollah has been on television congratulating the demonstrators in the West for endorsing the Islamic way of resistance through annihilation. \u00a0The streets of London have been ringing with the chant of \u201can Intifada from London to Gaza\u201d<\/em> [59]<\/a> which is a call to all Moslems to Islamic revolution across the West.\u00a0 The Ivy League campuses of Harvard generated condemnation of Israel and the holding of them responsible for the death of 1400 of their own citizens in one day and the kidnap of 265 others by no less than 35 student organisations. The declarations by the demonstrators are clear:<\/p>\n<\/a>1\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Introduction<\/h1>\n
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<\/a>2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Ethical Equation \u2013 a Comparison with Ukraine<\/h1>\n
<\/a>3\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Big Questions and Some Short Answers<\/h1>\n
<\/a>3.1\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Is Modern Israel an adjunct of American Imperialism?<\/h2>\n
<\/a>3.2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 What about the Palestinian \u2018Nakba\u2019?<\/h2>\n
<\/a>3.3\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Is Israel an \u201cApartheid\u201d State?<\/h2>\n
<\/a>4\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Question of the Legitimacy of a Jewish State<\/h1>\n
<\/a>4.1\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Overview<\/h2>\n
<\/a>4.2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 America, The Jews, and the Emergence of Political Zionism<\/h2>\n
<\/a>4.3\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The UN-Resolution for the Partition of Palestine<\/h2>\n
<\/a>5\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Existential Struggle of the Nation<\/h1>\n
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<\/a>6\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The International Response to HAMAS<\/h1>\n
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