Peace Now?

Photo at left is of one of the thousands of Palestinian homes destroyed as mass punishment against Palestinian villagers. See http://www.interfaithpeaceinitiative.com/ProfitingFromOccupation.htm for more info

Nicholas Kristof has written some thoughtful columns recently on the situation in Israel and the occupied territories. I applaud him. Its refreshing to see a mainstream columnist finally shedding some needed light on the sorry mess that is Israel and Palestine. I (of course) have what in some quarters might be considered an extreme point of view but it certainly is degrees of magnitude less extreme than an Israeli colonist (I cannot call them "settlers") clubbing 4 innocent Palestinians. Where apartheid policies strangle freedom of movement so that women cannot get to hospitals to have their children and in some cases the babies have died. Or a Palestinian youth bereft of hope resorting to killing his or her hated oppressor by becoming a suicide bomber. I posted the following to Mr. Kristof's column.

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Its clear the Israeli government does not want peace. Although there are many peace loving people in Israel, alas there as in the United States they seem to be in the minority. Israel has its military-industrial complex too and its closely tied to America's. Conflate the untold billions made from the war trade with fanatic, fundamentalist Jews holding rational people hostage in their own country with the superstition that "Eretz" Israel was promised to them by God and you have a recipe for endless conflict.

America's financial support and security guarantees enable the Israeli government to act with impunity, which it does. The Palestinians, rightly or wrongly fight back with everything they have - one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.

Israel is not a democracy any more than the US would be if it forcefully expelled all non Christians and allowed only Christians to become citizens. America must recognize the travesty and tragedy of supporting these policies. Blindness and collaboration with some of the most egregious human rights violations on the planet has cost us our position as honest brokers, if we ever really had it, and we now, witness 9/11, have become a target of the Islamic fundamentalists. Everytime you go through the security at an airport just think; why? We aren't hated for our freedom we are hated because we oppress and support oppression.

One state? It's the *only* solution. One person, one vote, Israel must be secular, the Zionist dream must join the other failed ideologies of the 20th Century, communism and fascism, on the dust heap of history. Insisting on a Jewish majority is simply a racist ideology and will fall of its own accord because it is wrong. It cannot stand. Sorry, but thats the truth and if you think about it everything else is just an incremental step to the inevitable.