More on the Palestinian People

A comment by Modeh B'Miktzas

It doesn't matter whether the people who now currently inhabit the Gaza Strip, West Bank etc. are palestinians or "Palestinians" or Arabs or Transjordanians or what not. You're missing the crucial point. Wrongs were committed against people. Individuals. It doesn't matter what they call themselves or what property their relatives possess or what other Arabs in far-off lands did to Jews.

Fact: There were people living in the area known as Palestine.

Fact: They have been displaced.

That's it. All this quibbling over what we should call them and how old the name is and what the proper usage is is irrelevant. You're just doing it to make things abstract so you don't have to think about the individuals who were made to suffer.

And please, don't tell me about your Bubby and Zaidy who were kicked out of Syria or Iraq or Saudi Arabia. It doesn't matter. Just because the Saudis are schmucks doesn't give you the right to be a schmuck. If you have a beef with Saudi Arabia take it up with Saudi Arabia. Not the schlemazal who fled in terror from the Haganah, as if he was the mastermind behind your grandparents' expulsions.

It doesn't matter how nomadic they were, or whether Arabs practice genital mutilation or whatever. What bearing does this have on their inalienable rights? What of the cosmopolitan Jew? Does he have any less rights because his borders are ill defined? Because some of them throws stones at gay people?
Modeh B'Miktzas 05.04.08 - 10:36 pm #

DB: Perfectly said, and I couldn't agree more