Are we bending over to appease Israel again ?

[Wildcat]

Yes but is that what was promised to them ? I have seen a map of the terrortory promiced and the amount of land thats been taken to date.

Alas if they stook to what was promised then no one would be in this mess.

 

If the british gave America to the americans (just an example, I know they didnt), then would that mean they could take Canada too and Mexico ?

 

My links were to broken promises made about the UK and France allowing self determination of people that included those in Palestine.

[callippo]

the 'promises' promises' myth based on the McMahon letters can basically be summarised as follows.

 

MYTH

 

the UK made a 'deal' with the Hashemites to help in the creation of an Arab kingdom on all Arab lands (including Palestine) in return of the Arabs’ support for the UK in the WWI. However, after the war UK did not fulfill their commitments.[/i

 

Henry McMahon, author of the famous “McMahon Letters” exchanged with Sharif Hussein, the Hashemite leader, is on record saying in 1937:

 

|| I feel it my duty to state, and I do so definitely and emphatically, that it was not intended by me in giving the pledge to King Hussein to include Palestine in the area in which Arab independence was promised.

 

Palestine and Lebanon were areas specifically excluded from the area of Arab independence in the letter dated 24 October 1915.

 

further note, and this is another myth widely believed principally because of a well known movie starring Peter O'Toole and Alec Guinness called 'Lawrence of Arabia', that the Arabs did not live up to their obligation to revolt against the Turks. Yes, some of the Bedouins in the desert did do so, but even “Colonel” Lawrence, in his more sober moments, wrote that the endeavor was a wasted effort. The Arabs primarily fought, not for the British, but for the Turks and against the British.

 

n his book “A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East”, David Fromkin writes (pp. 182-186):

 

|| On 24 October 1915 McMahon replied in quite different spirit to Hussein. …he reluctantly agree to enter into a discussion of specific territories and frontiers; but as he evidently was unwilling to assume personal responsibility for making definite commitments, he used language evasively. On the one hand, he agreed that after the war the Arabs should have their independence; but, on the other, he indicated that European advisers and officials would be needed to establish the administration of Arab countries, and insisted that these advisers and officials should be exclusively British. In other words, any “independent” Arab kingdom in the postwar Middle East would have to be a British protectorate.

 

|| What territories should be included in the British-protected independent Arab kingdom? McMahon replied by dividing the lands claimed by Hussein into four areas and explaining that Britain could not bind herself to support Hussein’s claims in any one of them.

 

|| McMahon began by remarking that Hussein must give up claim to territory west of the districts of Damascus, Aleppo, Homs and Hama….

 

|| In the eastern portion [iraq]… McMahon observed that the established position and interests of Britain were such that she would have to establish “special administrative arrangements” with respect to them; whether such arrangements would leave any room for an assertion of Arab sovereignty – and if so when and to what extent – was left unsaid.

 

|| In the western portion – Syria and Palestine – Britain could extend assurances to Hussein only in those territories “in which she can act without detriment to the interests of her ally France.” Since France at the time claimed those territories in their entirety… it followed that Britain could not pledge support for Arab claims with respect to them either – not even to Damascus, Aleppo, Homs, and Hama.

 

|| That left only Arabia, which at the time was divided among a number of leaders, of whom Hussein was one. Britain at that time enjoyed treaty relationships with other Arabian chiefs, including Hussein’s rival, Ibn Saud. In his letter, McMahon pointed out that he could not promise anything to Hussein that would prejudice Britain’s relationships with other Arab chiefs. By process of elimination, therefore, Britain did not bind herself to support Hussein’s claims anywhere at all….

 

|| McMahon, an experienced bureaucrat, had seen the need to be completely noncommittal….

 

|| Gilbert Clayton, who strongly opposed defining Britain’s relations with the Arabs until the war was over, believed that the McMahon letters had succeeded in putting the matter off and in avoiding the giving of any meaningful commitment. Months later Clayton summarized what McMahon had done by writing that “Luckily we have been very careful indeed to commit ourselves to nothing whatsoever.”

 

|| Hussein replied to McMahon that he could not accept the Aleppo-Homs-Hama-Damascus formula. …So he failed to reach agreement with McMahon, but felt compelled to support the Allies nonetheless: the Young Turks were going to depose him, so he had to rebel against them whether Britain met his terms or not.

 

|| In a conversation some years later…, Hussein indicated that with regard to Palestine and also with regard to Lebanon and the other lands in the Middle East, he did not regard matters as having been settled… [and] being subject to negotiation at the Peace Conference. According to Hogarth, “He compared ourselves and himself… to two persons about to inhabit one house, but not agreed which should take which floors or rooms.”

 

| …In early 1916 Aziz al-Masri, the Arab secret society leader, wrote… that Britain could not achieve her objectives in the Arabic-speaking Middle East unless she were willing to leave its peoples free to exercise full and genuine independence. …they did not want British domination or a British protectorate….

 

|| Al-Masri had spotted the falseness in the British position. Kitchener and his followers badly wanted to win Arab support but were unwilling to pay the price the Emir Hussein demanded for it; so instead they were attempting to cheat, by pretending to meet Hussein’s demands when in fact they were giving him the counterfeit coin of meaningless language.

 

|| Though Clayton and his colleagues did not know it, Al Masri, Al-Faruqi, and the Emir Hussein were offering Britain coin that was equally counterfeit. Hussein had no army, and the secret societies had no visible following. Their talk of rallying tens or hundreds of thousands of Arab troops to their cause, whether or not they believed it themselves, was sheer fantasy.

 

TEXT OF MCMAHON LETTERS

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/hussmac1.html

 

No.4, dated October 24, 1915 :

 

the two districts of Mersina and Alexandretta and portions of Syria lying to the west of the districts of Damascus, Homs, Hama and Aleppo cannot be said to be purely Arab, and should be excluded from the limits demanded.

 

note that the word 'Palestine' isn't mentioned in a single one of the nine letters. Hardly surprising, at least on the Arab side, as 'Palestine' is simply the Roman/Latin word, which Arabs cannot even pronounce as there is no P sound in the Arabic language, for what most Jews believe to be their ancient, national homeland, Yeretz Yisrael, but which Arabs referred as being only part of southern and south western Syria.

[Wildcat]

It may or may not have been McMahon's intention, what is important is the words he used that formed the agreement with Hussein. "The districts of Mersin and Alexandretta, and portions of Syria lying to the west of the districts of Damascus, Homs, Hama and Aleppo" does not describe Palestine which was clearly a part of the negotiations and is to an area south of that described and was therefore promised self determination. It was certainly Lawrence of Arabia's that this was the case and he was well placed to know, it was only through his intervention that the Arabs upheld their side of the treaty after the uk broke it with the Sykes-Picot agreement.

Edited January 16, 2010 by Wildcat

[depoix]

this is all well and good as a history of the middle east thread but it detracts us away from the original post ,are we bending over to appease israel by altering our laws to oblige them ,should their leaders get away with not replying to court warrants issued in their name by our legal system ?

[callippo]

it just looks to the Israelis like they are being selected once again, basically because, a lot of Israelis believe, because they are Jews. I would be very surprised if an Arab, be they a Muslim or Christian, Israeli IDF senior officer, and yes they do exist in the IDF, would be targeted by the human rights and pro-Palestinian groups same way as the Jewish ones are should they visit the United Kingdom, even though they are part of the same IDF apparatus as their Jewish counterparts.

 

many Russian senior officers and politicians are also accused of war crimes in Chechnya, crimes which, if they were crimes, would have been overwhelmingly against Muslims. Yet we don't see these same human rights groups looking to slap civil writs against them.

 

ever wondered why?

[callippo]

"The districts of Mersin and Alexandretta, and portions of Syria lying to the west of the districts of Damascus, Homs, Hama and Aleppo" does not describe Palestine

 

that's the whole thing of it. 'Palestine' wasn't even mentioned. It was a total backwater for the Arabs in those days. Until Zionists showed that the land ould be productive once again, just as it was in the ancient world when it supported 10 million people like it does today, they just weren't interested in it.

 

The McMahon letters also make an objective observer also wonder just what is supposed to be so 'holy' about Jerusalem for Muslims too. Though other Muslim holy sites are mentioned in the letters, Jerusalem isn't - just like it isn't mentioned in the Qu'ran.

 

my case is that Jerusalem only, and very suddenly, became a 'holy site' for Muslims after the state Israel's creation, and in particular, after 1967, when the Arabs lost control of it. It became a symbol of Palestinian nationalism, as opposed to a true holy site for Muslims.

[hard2miss]

it just looks to the Israelis like they are being selected once again, basically because, a lot of Israelis believe, because they are Jews. I would be very surprised if an Arab, be they a Muslim or Christian, Israeli IDF senior officer, and yes they do exist in the IDF, would be targeted by the human rights and pro-Palestinian groups same way as the Jewish ones are should they visit the United Kingdom, even though they are part of the same IDF apparatus as their Jewish counterparts.

 

many Russian senior officers and politicians are also accused of war crimes in Chechnya, crimes which, if they were crimes, would have been overwhelmingly against Muslims. Yet we don't see these same human rights groups looking to slap civil writs against them.

 

ever wondered why?

Thats all well and good but its because the Isrealies stand accuesed that they are looking at amending the laws, hence the title 'Are we bending over to appease Isreal again ?'

 

Answer: Yes, it appears so.

 

 

Thanks for the history lessons tho

[donkey]

the 'promises' promises' myth based on the McMahon letters can basically be summarised as follows.

 

.

 

Wether that is true or not is immaterial. Under basic standards of what is universally considered as civilised behaviour, the Palestinians could have reasonably expected not to forcibly be made refugees from their own homeland to make room for colonists arriving from abroad, whether there had been agreement signed on this or not.

 

Right now, the Zionists are occupying yet more Palestinian lands in the West Bank, through their policy of ethnic cleansing on the drip.

 

How is anyone supposed to believe that Israel only wants security, when they are still moving in to Palestinian lands?

[Switchblade]

"The districts of Mersin and Alexandretta, and portions of Syria lying to the west of the districts of Damascus, Homs, Hama and Aleppo" does not describe Palestine

 

that's the whole thing of it. 'Palestine' wasn't even mentioned. It was a total backwater for the Arabs in those days. Until Zionists showed that the land ould be productive once again, just as it was in the ancient world when it supported 10 million people like it does today, they just weren't interested in it.

 

The McMahon letters also make an objective observer also wonder just what is supposed to be so 'holy' about Jerusalem for Muslims too. Though other Muslim holy sites are mentioned in the letters, Jerusalem isn't - just like it isn't mentioned in the Qu'ran.

 

my case is that Jerusalem only, and very suddenly, became a 'holy site' for Muslims after the state Israel's creation, and in particular, after 1967, when the Arabs lost control of it. It became a symbol of Palestinian nationalism, as opposed to a true holy site for Muslims.

 

That is a point I've often raised, also both sides have had $billions poured into them, one side (Israel) used their aid to become a developed country whilst the others (Arab states) just ranted and became havens for terrorist organisations.

[Switchblade]

How is anyone supposed to believe that Israel only wants security, when they are still moving in to Palestinian lands?

Why do you think they took the 'Golan Heights'? the answer is that they were repeatedly being shelled from them.