Israel and UAE announce normalisation of relations. Bahrain follows suit, as does Sudan.

[sumskilz]

In Hebrew, neither Armenia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Serbia, South Korea, nor Turkey would be a "state for all its citizens", because all have leges sanguinis laws. Neither would any of the multitude of predominately Muslim countries which have a star and crescent on their flag be considered a "state for all its citizens". Neither would Denmark, Norway, nor Sweden be considered a "state for all its citizens" because of the crosses on their flags. In fact, very few countries in the world would be, because the term has a specific meaning beyond the literal meaning of the words strung together. Just like nobody literally lives on an "ass of a bag" even if they're French, despite that being a word for word translation of "cul de sac".

In Hebrew, the only countries that are considered a "state for all its citizens" are those states that are specifically not nation-states, as in they are explicitly not associated with any ethic, ethno-religious, or ethno-linguistic group in any way. So to be clear, there is an issue of contention about the nature of the state, but it shouldn't be misunderstood as applying to the individual rights of citizens, since it does not.

[PointOfViewGun]

In Hebrew, neither Armenia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Serbia, South Korea, nor Turkey would be a "state for all its citizens", because all have leges sanguinis laws. Neither would any of the multitude of predominately Muslim countries which have a star and crescent on their flag be considered a "state for all its citizens". Neither would Denmark, Norway, nor Sweden be considered a "state for all its citizens" because of the crosses on their flags. In fact, very few countries in the world would be, because the term has a specific meaning beyond the literal meaning of the words strung together. Just like nobody literally lives on an "ass of a bag" even if they're French, despite that being a word for word translation of "cul de sac".

In Hebrew, the only countries that are considered a "state for all its citizens" are those states that are specifically not nation-states, as in they are explicitly not associated with any ethic, ethno-religious, or ethno-linguistic group in any way. So to be clear, there is an issue of contention about the nature of the state, but it shouldn't be misunderstood as applying to the individual rights of citizens, since it does not.

Except in this case there is a clear effort to apply it to the individual rights of citizens. You also seem to be confusing countries providing citizenship to descendants of past citizens with providing citizenship to an ethnic group. Being Turkic doesn't grant you automatic citizenship in Turkey, being the son or daughter of a Turkish citizen does.

[Cyclops]

Its bizarre to see otherwise sensible posters write utter nonsense about Israel. I mean I think I know why there's this level of hysteria but it still spins me out.

...
In Hebrew, the only countries that are considered a "state for all its citizens" are those states that are specifically not nation-states, as in they are explicitly not associated with any ethic, ethno-religious, or ethno-linguistic group in any way. So to be clear, there is an issue of contention about the nature of the state, but it shouldn't be misunderstood as applying to the individual rights of citizens, since it does not.

In Australia we are subjects of HM the Queen, who rules by divine right. Sure there's a convention she has to accept the advice of her Prime Ministers in some of her realms (never diss the Queen in the Isle of Man), but legally she owns the lot. Our constitution is the creation of the UK Parliament, so that doesn't belong to us either and in any case it was granted by Royal Assent: the Lord giveth, and she sure as **** can taketh away. You can't buy land, you purchase a title to it (which can be compulsorily acquired by the Parliament) yet remains real (=royal) estate.

So yeah we have a state for literally none of our citizens. We also have four different crosses on our flag to make sure the non-Christians know it.

[Gromovnik]

Yeah, ius sanguinis means granting citizenship to the children of citizens. Ius soli is granting it by virtue of being born in the country. Most countries allow citizenship if either one of those conditions are fulfilled.

[nhytgbvfeco2]

Yeah, I have:

So exactly as I've said. You're misrepresenting his words and refusing to accept that "state of all its citizens" is a specific term.

Pretty much. I'm complaining about a bill that was supported by the Israeli prime minister, cabinet, and only failed to clear the Knesset by a few votes. People complain about such things all the time. It seems to be a problem only when its against Israel.

Except that you've said: "Aside from constant political siege they're enduring like the Jewish oath"
You can't endure something that doesn't exist. You clearly thought that it exists already.

Nope. Why are you lying about something so simple?

Legal battle over an abandoned Palestinian village

It takes a fairly minimal amount of research to find out that I'm not lying, one need only venture as far as wikipedia:
"Lifta was used for Jewish refugee housing during the war, and following the war the Jewish Agency and the state of Israel settled Jewish immigrants from Yemen and Kurdistan in the village, totaling 300 families. However ownership of the houses was not registered in their name. Living conditions in Lifta were difficult, the buildings were in poor repair, poor roads and transport, and lack of electricity, water, and sanitation infrastructure.^{[8][7][33][34]} In 1969-71 most of the Jewish inhabitants of Lifta chose to leave as part of a compensation program by Amidar. Holes were drilled in the roofs of the evacuated buildings to make them less inhabitable, so that squatters wouldn't take up residence. 13 families, who lived in the portion of the village close to Highway 1 and didn't suffer from transportation issues chose to remain."
"In June 2017 the last Jewish residents left the village following a settlement with the government who acknowledged they were not squatters but rather resettled in Lifta by the appropriate authorities."
The plans to turn it into luxury housing btw, mentioned in two of the quotes you provide, were rejected by courts in 2012.

Money. They have been forcefully confined to underdeveloped villages but you expect them to have the money to move to an expensive city like Tel Aviv? This is a shameful conversation to have with absolutely no regard for human beings and human rights.

Who confined them to underdeveloped villages? There are Arabs in many of Israel's largest cities, including Haifa for example. I assure you that houses in Tel-Aviv are as absurdly expensive for Jews as they are for Arabs.

Let me know when your link actually works. Till then I'll stick to your admission that Arab students are not receiving the same amount of funding as Jewish students.

You're defending practices here that you wouldn't stand for if you were subjected to them.

My link seems to be working just fine to me, just takes a bit of time to load. Is Turkey blocking the OECD website now?

[PointOfViewGun]

So exactly as I've said. You're misrepresenting his words and refusing to accept that "state of all its citizens" is a specific term.

Not really. Natenyahu is clearly expressing that Israel is for Jews and Jews only.

Except that you've said: "Aside from constant political siege they're enduring like the Jewish oath"
You can't endure something that doesn't exist. You clearly thought that it exists already.

Funny how you use that argument now and not the first I made that objection. The efforts by Natenyahu and his friends is constant. I knew it didn't go through but that doesn't mean it almost became law. In any case, it reflects the attitude of the state.

It takes a fairly minimal amount of research to find out that I'm not lying, one need only venture as far as wikipedia:
"Lifta was used for Jewish refugee housing during the war, and following the war the Jewish Agency and the state of Israel settled Jewish immigrants from Yemen and Kurdistan in the village, totaling 300 families. However ownership of the houses was not registered in their name. Living conditions in Lifta were difficult, the buildings were in poor repair, poor roads and transport, and lack of electricity, water, and sanitation infrastructure.^{[8][7][33][34]} In 1969-71 most of the Jewish inhabitants of Lifta chose to leave as part of a compensation program by Amidar. Holes were drilled in the roofs of the evacuated buildings to make them less inhabitable, so that squatters wouldn't take up residence. 13 families, who lived in the portion of the village close to Highway 1 and didn't suffer from transportation issues chose to remain."
"In June 2017 the last Jewish residents left the village following a settlement with the government who acknowledged they were not squatters but rather resettled in Lifta by the appropriate authorities."
The plans to turn it into luxury housing btw, mentioned in two of the quotes you provide, were rejected by courts in 2012.

So, you're saying the village was returned to its rightful owners?

Who confined them to underdeveloped villages? There are Arabs in many of Israel's largest cities, including Haifa for example. I assure you that houses in Tel-Aviv are as absurdly expensive for Jews as they are for Arabs.

Israeli government. The HRW report details that quite nicely. While Jewish villages get good investment and room to grow, the Arab villages are confined to small places with little investment. The result is a growing Jewish class that can afford a house in a city like Tel Aviv while poor Arabs can hardly dream of a house in such a city.

My link seems to be working just fine to me, just takes a bit of time to load. Is Turkey blocking the OECD website now?

Nope. At the time the OECD website displayed an error message saying that the page could not be reached. Its working now.

From the report:

Schools in the Arab education stream tend to be underfunded, as they are often located in less affluent areas. According to national data, more affluent local governments can provide up to 10-20 times higher funding per student for schools than less affluent local governments.

Coupled with how Israeli government basically tries to suffocate Arab communities they're forcing much less funding on Arab schools.

[sumskilz]

You also seem to be confusing countries providing citizenship to descendants of past citizens with providing citizenship to an ethnic group.

I'm not, the link provides information on countries in which citizenship is acquired via jus sanguinis and those with leges sanguinis laws. Leges sanguinis states provide citizenship on preferential terms to individuals with ethnic ties to the country, which is apparently the case for Turkey according to this (see section 3.2 Policies towards historic Turkish groups abroad).

In Australia we are subjects of HM the Queen, who rules by divine right. Sure there's a convention she has to accept the advice of her Prime Ministers in some of her realms (never diss the Queen in the Isle of Man), but legally she owns the lot. Our constitution is the creation of the UK Parliament, so that doesn't belong to us either and in any case it was granted by Royal Assent: the Lord giveth, and she sure as **** can taketh away. You can't buy land, you purchase a title to it (which can be compulsorily acquired by the Parliament) yet remains real (=royal) estate.

That's ridiculous, although completely inconsequential in practice I imagine.

[PointOfViewGun]

I'm not, the link provides information on countries in which citizenship is acquired via jus sanguinis and those with leges sanguinis laws. Leges sanguinis states provide citizenship on preferential terms to individuals with ethnic ties to the country, which is apparently the case for Turkey according to this (see section 3.2 Policies towards historic Turkish groups abroad).

The word "Turkic" doesn't appear on that report. If they're referring to Turkish people than they're referring to people with relatives that have Turkish citizenship. The report also uses the word "preferential" only once and only within the context of Northern Cypriot nationals which is obviously a political move to ease the burden they're experiencing due to lack of recognition. The Azeris are not even mentioned beyond the concept of attempts avoid naturalizing Shia Azeris back in 1930s. That document you linked to seems to disprove you suggestion.

[nhytgbvfeco2]

Not really. Natenyahu is clearly expressing that Israel is for Jews and Jews only.

Only if you willfully ignore the meaning of the term he used, which you are.

Funny how you use that argument now and not the first I made that objection. The efforts by Natenyahu and his friends is constant. I knew it didn't go through but that doesn't mean it almost became law. In any case, it reflects the attitude of the state.

Because frankly I didn't know what you were talking about. The oath was something proposed years ago by Avigdor Lieberman and wasn't at the time supported by anyone else, I'm somewhat surprised to see Netanyahu attempt to bring it back since he designated Lieberman a left-wing traitor (Lieberman is many things but left-wing is not one of those), but that's Netanyahu.
It reflects the attitude of some members of the governing coalition, not the state.

So, you're saying the village was returned to its rightful owners?

Interesting way of admitting that I wasn't lying.
I suppose that is a question of who the rightful owner is. But as I've stated multiple times now, this isn't relevant to Israeli-Arabs.

Israeli government. The HRW report details that quite nicely. While Jewish villages get good investment and room to grow, the Arab villages are confined to small places with little investment. The result is a growing Jewish class that can afford a house in a city like Tel Aviv while poor Arabs can hardly dream of a house in such a city.

And yet the article you linked in the last post complains that because the state decided to invest in the neighbourhood the local Arabs now can't afford to live there because said investment raised the price. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

From the report:


Coupled with how Israeli government basically tries to suffocate Arab communities they're forcing much less funding on Arab schools.

The line you quoted clearly states that this is due to the local governments, not the national one. Poorer Jewish localities suffer from the same issues.

[PointOfViewGun]

Only if you willfully ignore the meaning of the term he used, which you are.

I can say the same for you.

Because frankly I didn't know what you were talking about. The oath was something proposed years ago by Avigdor Lieberman and wasn't at the time supported by anyone else, I'm somewhat surprised to see Netanyahu attempt to bring it back since he designated Lieberman a left-wing traitor (Lieberman is many things but left-wing is not one of those), but that's Netanyahu.
It reflects the attitude of some members of the governing coalition, not the state.

The oath was supported by the prime minister and approved by the cabinet. Thats as much of a state support as one can get. You can try to downplay it all you want.

Interesting way of admitting that I wasn't lying.
I suppose that is a question of who the rightful owner is. But as I've stated multiple times now, this isn't relevant to Israeli-Arabs.

Oh, I wasn't implying that you didn't lie. You did lie. Thats for certain. Clearly, the village remains off limits to Israeli Arab owners.

And yet the article you linked in the last post complains that because the state decided to invest in the neighbourhood the local Arabs now can't afford to live there because said investment raised the price. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Except it doesn't really say that. Once again, you're lying. It highlights how the government tries to extort money out of tenants which means that the poor locals can not afford and are forced to move out.

The line you quoted clearly states that this is due to the local governments, not the national one. Poorer Jewish localities suffer from the same issues.

Sigh... It's really so damn tedious to argue like this when you keep on ignoring what you respond to. Local governments are not existing in a vacuum. Israel is keeping them poor by intention.

[sumskilz]

The word "Turkic" doesn't appear on that report. If they're referring to Turkish people than they're referring to people with relatives that have Turkish citizenship. The report also uses the word "preferential" only once and only within the context of Northern Cypriot nationals which is obviously a political move to ease the burden they're experiencing due to lack of recognition. The Azeris are not even mentioned beyond the concept of attempts avoid naturalizing Shia Azeris back in 1930s. That document you linked to seems to disprove you suggestion.

I'm confident that anyone who feels inclined to read section 3.2 of the source for themselves will understand it exactly as I presented it.

[PointOfViewGun]

I'm confident that anyone who feels inclined to read section 3.2 of the source for themselves will understand it exactly as I presented it.

It outlines how Turkey dealt with immigration on a case by case basis. if it was written today it would also need to highlight how Syrians were given preferential treatment over the last few years. Its quite different from what Israel does.

[Cyclops]

...

That's ridiculous, although completely inconsequential in practice I imagine.

Yes, but.

If she rocked up and started ruling by fiat we'd "We The People" her arse back to Westminster. Our system is founded on having a monarch who is either too smart or too scared to use their powers, so they only exist in potentis but serve to balance excesses like the Whitlam government (which was too smart to follow the rules and got carried away, then sacked). The last two Kings who were not wise enough to sit back respectively lost Thirteen Colonies and a head.

The problem for us is her son is an activist, reasonably smart but very unwise. He will be an unpopular king at best. However when we remove the monarchy we get an Australian Head of State, most likely someone up to their neck in local politics and lacking the Olympian detachment need to wield potentially absolute power. If we change the HoS powers we unbalance a well balanced system...God save the Queen.

This is a long way around of saying most political systems are based on unfairness and lies. EG the US uses a lot of Common Law, being a system (pace Whig liars) granted by a King who ruled by divine right (Freedom!). The Basic Law is more honest and fair than most, combining compromise and clarity (I put this down to it being the work of pragmatic Left Wingers with a plan and no patience for personal grooming in defiance of The Rest of The World interfering).

[Gromovnik]

So, from the Wikipedia:
"The Whitlam Government, while highly controversial during its short tenure, is credited with the implementation of major reforms. Formal relations with China were established, the conscription laws were repealed, all remaining Australian forces were withdrawn from the Vietnam War, universal health insurance was introduced, remaining discriminatory provisions of the White Australia policy ended, and tertiary education fees were abolished. The Whitlam Government was re-elected at the 1974 double-dissolution election."
Such monsters, such ultra-radicals...

[Cyclops]

So, from the Wikipedia:
"The Whitlam Government, while highly controversial during its short tenure, is credited with the implementation of major reforms. Formal relations with China were established, the conscription laws were repealed, all remaining Australian forces were withdrawn from the Vietnam War, universal health insurance was introduced, remaining discriminatory provisions of the White Australia policy ended, and tertiary education fees were abolished. The Whitlam Government was re-elected at the 1974 double-dissolution election."
Such monsters, such ultra-radicals...

Good for you, reading Wikipedia. Next you'll be reading actual history.

Monsters no, radicals yes. Whitlam was bloody fantastic, a breath of fresh air after decades of second rate conservative rule (because the commos and catholics both tried to take over the Labor party and failed, but split the vote).

In his first month in office Gough (his actual name) didn't bother appointing a cabinet, him and Lionel Bowen shared every portfolio and started their program on warp speed. Every week there was something new, probably the land rights for aboriginal Australians and equal pay for women were the two biggest but there was a flood of sensible reforms. He was an arrogant Rhodes scholar lawyer who was nearly a genius, but he lacked patience with anyone stupider than him (which was most people, but he thought it was all people).

Second term things went to shite, his factions ran rampant, he lost the upper house and refused to negotiate, and misled parliament about some loans. They were trying to nationalise the mines, and thats the most powerful private interest in Australia, and he was got. However he made it easy to be got by disregarding protocol and legality in favour of His Own Way. The way he lost the upper house was immoral if technically correct, when the loans affair came to light the opposition blocked supply, Whitlam refused to dissolve Parliament and it was left to the Governor General to sack him, which (after gutlessly avoiding the issue for some time) he did.

In the matter it emerged the Governor General actually enjoys [edit] more freedom to exercise their powers than the Monarch does: the Crown is bound by more precedent and protocol than their representative.

[Gromovnik]

Yeah, I don't feel like posting all 81 references and 10 bibliography sources for that article. What was false in the paragraph that I posted?

[Cyclops]

Yeah, I don't feel like posting all 81 references and 10 bibliography sources for that article.

Not sure why you posted anything, you didn't address my post in any way.

What was false in the paragraph that I posted?

Maybe the feeling you'd made a point?

I didn't mention monsters anywhere, if you think the Whitlam government did not represent a truly radical shift in the course of Australian politics, or that Gough adhered to Parliamentary norms I'd suggest further reading. Its actually a fascinating subject and one that (as is emerging ITT) is not generally well understood.

[Papay]

Jerusalem was annexed quite a while ago.
Most would be fine with losing most of Judea&Samaria after some land swaps.

I have serious doubts about what you say. Any Israeli that claims that, lets say, 90% of the west bank must be given to the Palestinians is considered "lefty traitor". This is of course the result of 15 years of propaganda by Netanyahu who has managed to convince that leftists are traitors and conspire with the Arabs which, i find it ironic, since Israel was created by leftist politicians and the labor party. For Netanyahu supporters anything their hero does is considered an amazing achievement. For example: Israeli commandos killed Turkish citizens in 2010 in the botched raid in Mavi Marmara. This was the begining of the deterioration of Turkish-Israeli relations. For Netanyahu supporters the fact that they angered the most powerful country in the region is...ingenious policy(?)

[nhytgbvfeco2]

This isn't an Australia thread guys.

I can say the same for you.

How so?

The oath was supported by the prime minister and approved by the cabinet. Thats as much of a state support as one can get. You can try to downplay it all you want.

Surely being approved by parliament, rather than rejected, is as much state support as it could get.

Oh, I wasn't implying that you didn't lie. You did lie. Thats for certain. Clearly, the village remains off limits to Israeli Arab owners.

Sigh. Can you prove that the owners are Israeli Arabs? Because the man in the video wasn't.

Except it doesn't really say that. Once again, you're lying. It highlights how the government tries to extort money out of tenants which means that the poor locals can not afford and are forced to move out.

"“If the state wanted us here, they would build some affordable housing,” she said. “Instead, they built a park. What are we going to do with a park? We need houses.”
The local government is investing, which in turn raises value.

Sigh... It's really so damn tedious to argue like this when you keep on ignoring what you respond to. Local governments are not existing in a vacuum. Israel is keeping them poor by intention.

Are poor Jewish majority local governments also kept poor on purpose?

I have serious doubts about what you say. Any Israeli that claims that, lets say, 90% of the west bank must be given to the Palestinians is considered "lefty traitor". This is of course the result of 15 years of propaganda by Netanyahu who has managed to convince that leftists are traitors and conspire with the Arabs which, i find it ironic, since Israel was created by leftist politicians and the labor party. For Netanyahu supporters anything their hero does is considered an amazing achievement. For example: Israeli commandos killed Turkish citizens in 2010 in the botched raid in Mavi Marmara. This was the begining of the deterioration of Turkish-Israeli relations. For Netanyahu supporters the fact that they angered the most powerful country in the region is...ingenious policy(?)

Then I guess that I'm a lefty traitor.
Did you just call Turkey the region's most peaceful country? Are you having a giraffe mate? The only thing Netanyahu did wrong in regards to the mavi marmara is apologize. Meanwhile erdogan met with Ismail Haniyyah, I wonder how hed react if Netanyahu met with PKK leaders. Netanyahu needs to grow a pair and start doing instead of only barking.

[sumskilz]

Most Israelis don't care much either way about annexing the West Bank:

Asked explicitly whether they preferred the normalization deal with the United Arab Emirates to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s promised annexation in the West Bank (the Emiratis conditioned the deal on stopping the annexation), fully 77% of Israelis preferred the peace agreement with the UAE. Just 16.5% favored the annexation.

Even among self-described right-wingers, Netanyahu’s constituency, the Emirati deal won handily, with a whopping 64% to 28%.

If a May poll found a plurality of Israelis — 45% — in support of annexation (with 32% opposed), the Sunday poll revealed how weak that support really was. Just 16.5% of Israelis continued to favor annexation when it meant losing a normalization deal, even if it was with a distant Arab state that has never threatened them.

Israelis did not resist Netanyahu’s push for annexation, but neither did they back it. It was a proposal born on the ideological right, but which managed to gain traction mainly because Israelis do not perceive any real hope on the Palestinian front.

Their indifference comes from the fact that they don't really see any likelihood of peace with the Palestinians:

Israelis — forgive the generalization, there are many kinds of Israelis with all kinds of views, but the term serves for the moment to describe the very large majority of them — do not actually believe that Palestinian politics are capable of offering them peace. That’s not just a convenient conceit, it’s a real, driving assumption for most Israelis when they come to think about the conflict with the Palestinians.

And it’s rooted in long and painful experience. Israeli withdrawals in recent decades have nearly all ended in waves of terrorism and violence so intense that they fundamentally altered Israeli voting patterns. After the Second Intifada began in 2000, Israel experienced the lowest voter turnout in its history. The left hasn’t won an election since 1999 because of the hundreds of terror attacks that struck Israeli cities in that intifada. The debate overseas about Israelis and Palestinians tends to forget the bloodletting; Israelis have not forgotten.

The point here isn’t just that Palestinians seem to Israelis to reciprocate territorial withdrawals — whether those of the Oslo agreements in the 1990s or from Gaza in 2005 — with massive violence. It is that Israelis no longer believe a withdrawal could possibly produce any other outcome except massive violence.

While the world’s attention focuses on Mahmoud Abbas and his commitment to security cooperation with Israel, Israelis are more liable to notice that Abbas is in the 14th year of a four-year term — and won’t call elections because he knows he will lose them to Hamas. That is, while Abbas sounds his moderate tone, Hamas is the future. Any political vacuum Israel leaves behind in a new withdrawal will be filled by the terror group that has already transformed Gaza into the beleaguered battleground of its ideological war.

It hardly helps that Abbas’s Fatah movement has responded to the fading of the Palestinian cause by trying to cleave closer to Hamas. Fatah invited Hamas to a special leadership summit on Wednesday. That’s no accident. When the chips are down, Hamas is the only one of the two major Palestinian factions with a meaningful story to tell about the Palestinian condition.

Hamas views the conflict with Israel not as ethnic strife between two peoples, but as a version of the Algerian war against French colonialists in the 1950s and 60s. That was a bloody war, Hamas teaches in its sermons and schoolrooms, and the more the French bled, the faster they withdrew. It’s a powerful narrative that counsels patience and encourages especially cruel forms of terrorism against Israelis.

But it’s a blind narrative nonetheless. In clinging to the colonialist interpretation of the conflict, Hamas has ignored a few pertinent facts about Israeli Jews that should have made it question the wisdom of its policy of permanent belligerence. For example, unlike those French Algerians, Israeli Jews have nowhere to go. That’s not a minor point. When you kill the children of someone who believes they can leave, they tend to leave. The anti-colonial wars of the 20th century were by and large successful. But when you target the children of someone who believes they have nowhere to go, the response tends to be the opposite. They become ever more determined to suppress the violence, and less willing to offer concessions not backed up by force of arms.

Haniyeh turned down billions in aid for Gaza and rejected a lifting of the blockade, all in the service of a strategy that still insists — as he explained explicitly — that Israel can be dismantled, that Israeli Jews, as though they were French, have somewhere else to go. He does not stop to consider the possibility that his opponent is not French, has nowhere to go, and therefore that his strategy of permanent war is more likely to decimate Palestine than to hurt Israel.

Referring to:

In a July 26 interview with Qatar’s Lusail News, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh revealed something important about the interaction between Palestinian political factions and the broader Arab world.

“Parties, who we know are on the payroll of certain superpowers” — an apparent reference to wealthy Gulf states — “came to us, and offered to establish new projects in the Gaza Strip to the tune of perhaps $15 billion,” he said, according to a translation by MEMRI.

Those projects included a lifting of the Israeli-Egyptian blockade on the beleaguered territory, an airport and a seaport.

“We said to them: ‘That’s great. We want an airport and a seaport, and we want to break the siege on the Gaza Strip. This is a Palestinian demand, but what are we supposed to give in return?’” The answer: “They want us to disband the military wings of the factions, and incorporate them into the police force.

“Naturally, we completely rejected that offer….We want these things because we are entitled to them and not in exchange for relinquishing our political principles, our resistance, or our weapons.”

The interviewer asked, “What are your political principles?”

Haniyeh’s reply: “We will not recognize Israel, Palestine must stretch from the river to the sea, the right of return [must be fulfilled], the prisoners must be set free, and a fully sovereign Palestinian state must be established with Jerusalem as its capital.”

Haniyeh did not seem to reflect seriously on what he was acknowledging. It makes sense that the wealthy parts of the Arab world would try to buy their way free of the Palestinian issue, since it no longer resonates as a question of identity. Those who now seek to ally with Israel against Iran or to partner with the Jewish state on commerce and technology are willing to shower the Palestinians with cash not for the Palestinians’ welfare, but to make the political problem they represent go away.

Haniyeh’s response to that desire was a simple demand for Israel’s complete disappearance, a response that probably sounded to his would-be benefactors like a demand that all the benefits that may accrue to Arab states from a relationship with Israel must be subordinated to a Palestinian narrative they no longer really identify with, and to the needs of Palestinian factions they no longer respect.