The PRO and CON statements below give a five minute introduction to the debate on the Israeli - Palestinian conflict.
PRO Israel and/or CON Palestine Statements
PRO Palestine and/or CON Israel Statements
1. Two-State Solution
PRO: "Well, there has emerged, over the course of the past ten years at least, a sense that the only way out of the situation in the Middle East is to establish a State of Palestine alongside Israel so that there will be an end of conflict. There is no other solution to end the conflict in reality. There is an international consensus about it as reflected by the so-called Road Map Quartet [the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations], which is after all the whole world. You have the United States, you have Europe, you have the Russians and the United Nations, which is the whole world, and then there is the Arab League, which is twenty-two different states, and there is the previous Palestinian administration, and the Israeli administration, all of them committed to the two-state solution."
-- Ziad J. Asali, MDPresident and Founder of the American Task Force on Palestine
Interview with Bernard Gwertzman of the Council on
Foreign Relations
June 2, 2006
CON: "The paradigm of the Two States will not bring about stability. No! . . . (The Two-State solution) is not relevant. Not relevant . . . (The Palestinian state) will undermine the State of Israel. From there, the confrontation will go on.
The State of Israel is ready to give the Palestinians an independent Palestinian state, but the Palestinians are not ready to give us an independent Jewish state . . . Every agreement you make will be the starting point of the next irredenta. The next conflict. The next war.
The establishment of a Palestinian state will lead at some stage to war. Such a war can be dangerous to the State of Israel. The idea that it is possible to set up a Palestinian state by 2008 and to achieve stability is disconnected from reality and dangerous."
-- Moshe YaalonLieutenant-General and former Chief-of-Staff of the Israel Defense Forces
Quoted by Uri Avnery in "The Bogyman"http://gush-shalom.org
May 3, 2005
2. Significance of Jerusalem to Jews and Muslims
PRO:"For the Jewish people, Jerusalem is not a city containing holy places or commemorating holy events. The city as such is holy and has, for at least two and a half millennia, served as the symbol of the historic existence of a people hunted, humiliated, massacred, but never despairing of the promise of its ultimate restoration. Jerusalem and Zion have, become 'the local habitation and the name' for the hope and meaning of Jewish existence, and of its continuity from the days when, according to the authors of the biblical books, God spoke of a certain place that he would choose, to the days of the return which -- however improbable it might seem -- was never in doubt for the Jew. Understanding the symbolic function of Jerusalem in Jewish tradition, we come to see that even the avowed secularist's use of this symbol has a measure of legitimacy about it, unparalleled in other traditions."
-- Zwi Werblowsky, Dès LProfessor of Comparative Religion at Hebrew University"Meaning of Jerusalem to Jews, Christians and Muslims,"
Israel Universities Study Group for Middle Eastern Affairs1978
CON: "According to Islamic tradition, it was the second caliph, 'Umar ibn al-Khattab, who recognized this location [Jerusalem] as marking the site of the Prophet's night journey. The caliph is supposed to have done so immediately after the conquest of Jerusalem, during a visit to the city whose historicity is in question, but which most scholars agree probably took place. The Muslim conquerors understood that this entire site had been the location of the temple first built by Solomon whose repeated destruction is described in the Qur'an, and what they found on their entry into the city was in fact the deserted platform on which the Herodian temple described by Josephus had stood until its demolition by Titus in 70 A.D., At the southern end of this platform the caliph 'Umar ordered the erection of the first of several structures to bear the name of al-Masjid al-Aqsa, the al-Aqsa Mosque, adjacent to which his successor 'Abd al-Malik was to build the Dome of the Rock a few decades later."
-- Rashid Khalidi, PhDEdward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University
Jerusalem in History2000
3. Refugee Populations
PRO: "During United Nations debates in 1947 over the partition of Palestine, Arab delegates warned that the formation of a Jewish state might lead to violent retaliation against Jews in their countries. 'The masses in the Arab world cannot be restrained,' an Iraqi diplomat said at the time.
The immediate outcomes ranged from anti-Jewish riots in Yemen and Syria to the revocation of citizenship for Jews in Libya to the confiscation of their property in Iraq. After the overthrow of King Farouk of Egypt in a military coup in 1952 and Israel's invasion of Sinai in 1956, Egypt declared Jews enemies of the state.
For its part, Israel mounted operations to transport tens of thousands of Jews from Iraq and Yemen. While 856,000 Jews lived in Arab nations in 1948, only 7,800 were there in 2001, the American Sephardi Federation reports. About 600,000 went to Israel, the remainder to the United States and Western Europe."
-- Samuel G. FreedmanProfessor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
"Are Jews Who Fled Arab Lands to Israel Refugees, Too?"
New York Times
Oct. 11, 2003
CON: "At the end of hostilities early in 1949, the United Nations estimated that there were 726,000 Arab refugees from Israeli-controlled territories, about 70 percent of the Arab population of Palestine. The exact number is difficult to determine because it is impossible to know the true number of Arab illegals living in Palestine when the war broke out and the number of Bedouin who had become refugees. A figure of about 600,000 to 760,000 is probably more accurate...
Exact figures are not possible, but according to Benny Morris, in his study of the Palestinian refugees, the British estimated in February 1949 that about 320,000 Palestinians moved into, or already resided in, the eastern portion of Palestine, which was controlled by the Arab Legion, and into Transjordan. Approximately 210,000 were in camps in the Gaza region, 100,000 went into Lebanon, and 75,000 to Syria. A few went to Egypt and others to Iraq. Some 150,000 remained within the Jewish state."
-- Ian J. Bickerton, PhDProfessor of Middle Eastern History at the University of New South Wales and
Carla L. Klausner, PhDProfessor of Modern Middle East at the University of Missouri-Kansas CityA Concise History of the Arab-Israeli Conflict2002
4. Palestinian Refugees' "Right of Return"
PRO: "Implementing the Palestinian 'right of return' amounts to abolishing the Jewish people's right to self determination. It will make the Jewish people a minor ethnic group at the mercy of Muslims, a 'protected minority', just as fundamentalist Islam would have it. It would mean eradicating Israel."
-- Amos OzFounder of the Peace Now movement"Doves Should Re-examine Their Perch," The Guardian
Jan. 5, 2001
CON: "Many people do not believe that any ethnic group has the right to guarantee an ethnic majority in a nation-state, and therefore do not believe that Israeli Jews have the right to demand a perpetual Jewish-majority state. However: even those who support a Jewish majority in Israel should be able to accept the Palestinian Right of Return, since acceptance of this right will not necessarily overturn the Jewish majority in Israel."
-- Palestine Solidarity Committee/SeattleJoint position statement with Palestine Information Project
Posted on their website http://www.palestineinformation.org/
Accessed on Apr. 10, 2007
5. Legality of Israeli Settlements in the West Bank
PRO: "Israel possesses legal rights with respect to the West Bank and Gaza Strip that appear to be ignored by those international observers who repeat the term 'occupied territories' without any awareness of Israeli territorial claims. Even if Israel only seeks 'secure boundaries' that cover part of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, there is a world of difference between a situation in which Israel approaches the international community as a 'foreign occupier' with no territorial rights, and one in which Israel has strong historical rights to the land that were recognized by the main bodies serving as the source of international legitimacy in the previous century."
-- Dore Gold, PhDFormer Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations"From 'Occupied Territories' to 'Disputed Territories'"
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs editorial
Jan. 16, 2002
CON: "Determines that all measures taken by Israel to change the physical character, demographic composition, institutional structure or status of the Palestinian and other Arab territories occupied since 1967, including Jerusalem, or any part thereof, have no legal validity and that Israel's policy and practices of settling parts of its population and new immigrants in those territories constitute a flagrant violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War and also constitute a serious obstruction to achieving a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East."
-- United NationsSecurity Council Resolution 465 (PDF) 14.3KB
Mar. 1, 1980
6. Terrorism
PRO:"If infidels conquer even an inch of the Muslims' land, as happened with the occupation of Palestine by the Jews, then Jihad becomes an individual duty, and therefore, suicide attacks are permissible."
-- Hamed Al-BitawiHead of the Palestinian Islamic Scholars Association
Quoted in Al-Hayat
Apr. 25, 2001
CON: "...the Zionist state remains the cause of more regional grievance and sheer terror than all the Muslim states combined. Read the melancholy Palestinian Monitor on the Internet; it chronicles the equivalent of Madrid's horror week after week, month after month, in occupied Palestine. No front pages in the West acknowledge this enduring bloodbath, let alone mourn its victims. Moreover, the Israeli army, a terrorist organisation by any reasonable measure, is protected and rewarded in the west."
-- John PilgerAustralian journalist and documentary filmmaker
"The Unmentionable Source of Terrorism," AntiWar.com
Mar. 20, 2004
7. Israeli Wall / Security Fence
PRO: "Some argue that the fence is a barrier to peace. Wrong. It is the very lack of a fence that has made it possible for Hamas and Islamic Jihad to hold the peace process hostage, since they initiate attacks every time progress seems possible. By taking the strategic threat of suicide bombings off the table, both sides would have more latitude for serious negotiations."
-- Mortimer B. ZuckermanEditor in Chief of U.S. News and World Report
"The Price of Intransigence," U.S. News and World Report
Dec. 15, 2003
CON: "This wall is not about security. It is about entrenching the occupation and the de facto annexation of large areas of the Palestinian land."
-- Nasser Al-Kidwa, DDSPalestinian Ambassador to the U.N.
"Palestinians Open Case Against Barrier,"Associated Press
Feb. 23, 2004
8. Arab State Relations with Israel
PRO: "It must be a peace that makes Israel a part of the neighborhood, a neighborhood that extends from the shores of the Atlantic Ocean, across the breadth of the southern Mediterranean, to the coast of the Indian Ocean...
On behalf of all those who seek and strive for peace in my part of the world, I ask you now to exert that leadership once again. We ask you to join with us in an historic effort of courage and vision. We ask you to hear our call, to honor the spirit of King Hussein and Yitzhak Rabin, and help fulfill the aspirations of Palestinians and Israelis to live in peace today."
-- Abdullah bin Al Hussein, IIKing of JordanSpeech before a joint session of the U.S. Congress
Mar. 7, 2007
CON: "Israel is our enemy and does not want peace. Peace would mean that Israel would have to return the occupied territories again. Israel was built on aggression and the rejection of peace, and nothing changes."
--Bashar Al-Assad President of the Syrian Arab RepublicQuote from meeting with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier in Damascus, Syria
Apr. 2006
9. Hamas and the Peace Process
PRO: "We should give Hamas time. I'm sure that Hamas will develop, will evolve. We should not prejudge the issue. We object to whatever policies on the part of the Israeli Government right now that are cutting the right of the Palestinians to receive their dues. So it's only a matter of time on that. We are sure that the Palestinians will recognize the requirements of the situation as they stand today: the roadmap; the need for a political peaceful settlement amongst the Israelis and the Palestinians; they need to see the two states living side by side in secure and recognized boundaries for both. So these are issues that the Palestinians and the government of Hamas, when composed, will have to face such requirements."
-- Ahmed Ali Aboul GheitEgyptian Foreign Minister
Quoted from meeting with U.S. Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice in Cairo, Egypt
Feb. 21, 2006
CON: "It is clear that in light of the Hamas majority in the PLC [Palestinian Legislative Council] and the instructions to form a new government that were given to the head of Hamas, the PA [Palestinian Authority] is - in practice - becoming a terrorist authority. The State of Israel will not agree to this. Israel will not compromise with terrorism and will continue to fight it with full force. However, there is no intention of harming the humanitarian needs of the Palestinian population. Israel will not hold contacts with the administration in which Hamas plays any part - small, large, or permanent."
-- Ehud Olmert, LLBIsraeli Prime MinisterRemarks to the Israeli Cabinet
Feb. 19, 2006
10. United States as an "Honest Broker"
PRO: "It is critical that the United States take an active role in helping to find a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by playing the role of the honest broker at the negotiating table - with the trust of both sides and ability to facilitate direct talks between the parties. The U.S. is the only country that can be successful in this role because of its longstanding and special relationship with the State of Israel."
-- Howard Dean, MDChairman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC)
Remarks at the Arab American Institute (AAI)
Oct. 18, 2003
CON: "To say that the United States is an even-handed broker is a preposterous mischaracterization. The United States is very much in Israel's camp. All the information we have on the negotiations during the last seven years of the peace process has shown that the United States has presented the Israeli point of view in the discussions and remains a partisan of Israel."
-- Edward Said, PhDThe late Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University
Culture and Resistance: Conversations with Edward W. Said
2003
PRO Israel and/or CON Palestine Statements
PRO Palestine and/or CON Israel Statements
Posted in: Politics
0 komentar:
Post a Comment