www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Demolition of Jerusalem buildings

I have a question for all the folks who rail against so called "Zionism".

Isn't this simply a movement that supports the existence of Israel as a Jewish state?

If so, how can you speak out against such a movement without being called an Jew hater.

It is like saying... I love Poles, but I want the state of Poland to be destroyed!

Just saying...

I certainly don't want the Jews dead - that would involve some of my favorite relatives. I certainly do hold the opinion that moving in to someone else's country, grabbing property that is already occupied by legitimate owners, encouraging the legitimate owners to leave their own country, and abusing those who have the courage and temerity to stay, is a course of action that is bound to be a source of trouble.

Fr. Serge

"I certainly don't want the Jews dead - that would involve some of my favorite relatives. I certainly do hold the opinion that moving in to someone else's country, grabbing property that is already occupied by legitimate owners, encouraging the legitimate owners to leave their own country, and abusing those who have the courage and temerity to stay, is a course of action that is bound to be a source of trouble."

Let me get this straight... Out of all the countries in the world which occupy a piece of land previously held by another people you somehow pick out Israel as being especially evil?

Would you want the USA to vacate Texas and New Mexico, or better yet all of the US citizens to leave to leave North America and go back to the country of their origin giving the land to its rightful Native American owners?

How about all the lands that Muslim armies have captured and converted by the fire and the sword? Would you want them to go back to Mecca and Medina which is where they came from originally? After all what is Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Egypt if not Christian land where Christians are systematically persecuted, discriminated against or worse?

Funny you should ask - my Mother was accustomed to ask defenders of Zionism when Americans were going to return the USA to the Indians.

One hopes (somewhat forlornly) that human standards of behavior improve with the passage of time. This is reflected in the criteria by which we evaluate past events. Thus, for example, much as I would love to have Agia Sophia restored to the Orthodox and Westminster Abbey restored to the Catholics, I don't stand much of a chance because by the standards operative at the time, Mehmet II and Henry VIII were acting within the law.

By the same token, Greek-Catholics do not demand the restoration of the church properties seized from us in 1839 by the government of Tsar Nicholas I. There is no one now alive who could possibly remember the churches when they were used for Greek-Catholic services.

But standards and criteria became sharper in the twentieth century (which is not to say that behavior improved!). The Balfour Declaration set out in so many words that efforts to establish a "Jewish National Home" in Palestine must be without prejudice to the rights of the indigenous population. There is no lack of people who were deprived of their homes by the failure to observe and implement this provision. Numbers of Palestinians have the dubious privilege of walking past their own homes without the right to pause and look, much less go inside.

This is not a pure concern of Islam. There were - and still are - substantial number of Palestinian Christians, but a great many defenders of Zionism in the West find that it suits them to ignore these Christians.

Do you wish to support the Christians in the Middle East? Most commendable - first and foremost, go and visit them and bring other Christians to do the same. Treating the Holy Places as some sort of theme park while ignoring the indigenous Christians is not helpful.

Fr. Serge

I agree with the fact that the government of Israel has taken some wrong and down right harmful positions against the Arabic Christian people who are a long suffering and lovely folk, however I will also say that some of these Christian groups show open support for Hamaz, Islamic Jihad and Hizbullah in Lebenon. This is not helpful and goes to antagonize the jews who live in constant fear and terror due to the actions of the aforementioned organizations.

Finally, I do submit that when Jerusalem was taken by the Muslims for the very first time in history thousands of Jews and Christians were killed, tortured and deprived of their homes. The ones that were allowed to stay were forced to pay intolerable Jizzya taxes and were singled out as Kufar (infidel) which led many to convert to Islam.

Israel is a land that often changed rulers and I find the fact that the Palestianian/Israeli conflict seems to only start with the creation of the state of Israel in the 1950's intellectually dishonest. The Jewish state was there long before there was Islam.

A fact is not as a rule capable of intellectual honesty or intellectual dishonesty.

The present Zionist state was created in the late nineteen-forties.

I am no supporter of Mohammedanism!

Fr. Serge

Shlomo Stuart,


I like you a lot, and see no need to argue. I think we can hold a resonable debate on this issue, as we can on any other.

Fush BaShlomo,
Yuhannon

Shlomo Subdeacon Borislav,


One can disagree with an idea without hateing a people. Not all Jews support the establishment nor the continued existance of the State of Israel. Please visit the sites of Neturei Karta [nkusa.org] True Torah Jews Against Zionism [jewsagainstzionism.com] and Jews Not Zionists [jewsnotzionists.org] to get a flavor of Jews who are anti-Zionist.


The difference is that the Poles in not in great instances come and steal peoples homes and land and expelled them (with the exception of the Germans).

Fush BaShlomo,
Yuhannon

Shlomo Subdeacon Borislav,


I understand your point, but this support comes about because of the actions of Israeli Jews. Here is a perfect example:

Upper Nazareth to build orthodox ne...to counter number of Arabs - IMEMC News [orthodoxnews.com] June 25, 2009

The mayor of Upper Nazareth is planning to build 3,050 housing units in an ultra-Orthodox neighborhood out of concern for the growing Palestinian-Arab population in his town. The initiative has received the support of Interior Minister Eli Yishai, who publicly urged ultra-orthodox haredim to settle in the new neighborhood.

The new neighborhood will be conjoined with neighborhoods that were built on land that was expropriated from the Arab villages of Mashhad, Kfar Kana and Ein Mahil in 1967 - a move that led to events that killed six Palestinian citizens and is marked annually by Palestinians as Land Day. The new neighborhood itself will also be built on land that was taken from Palestinians.

The mayor of Upper Nazareth told Israeli media,"The matter of Jewish settlement in the Galilee in general, and in Upper Nazareth in particular, is of national importance today. As a man of Greater Israel, I think it is more important to settle in the Galilee than in Judea and Samaria, where natural growth is already high and enough Jews already live. I urge the settlers there to come here."

Upper Nazareth itself was founded in the 1950's as a settler town, to counter the pre-dominantly Palestinian population in Nazareth and in the wider Galilee. The town was built on land that was expropriated under dubious circumstances. Laws stated that expropriations were only allowed for public purposes. The government claimed it expropriated the land to erect government facilities. At the same time it had already been decided that only 109 dunums would be used for that that and the planning to build residential neighborhoods continued. The case was taken to the Supreme Court, but the court accepted the government's argument.

It was planned to have a Jewish population in Upper Nazareth. Israeli army Planning Department Director Yuval Ne'eman said that Upper Nazareth would "emphasize and safeguard the Jewish character of the Galilee as a whole, and ... demonstrate state sovereignty to the Arab population more than any other settlement operation."

Northern Military Governor Colonel Mikhael Mikhael stated that the final aim of the settlement was to "swallow up" the Arab city of Nazareth through "growth of the Jewish population around a hard-core group" and "the transfer of the center of gravity of life from Nazareth to the Jewish neighborhood."

However in recent years the Jewish population is migrating away from Upper Nazareth and the Palestinian population is growing 14 per cent annually.


I hate to say this but you are mistaking the actions of the Crusaders for that of the Muslims. With the Arab conquest, Jews were allowed back into the city. (Gil, Moshe (February 1997). A History of Palestine, 634-1099. Cambridge University Press. pp. 70–71. ISBN 0521599849.)


Please explain how you find it intellectually dishonest?

Palestinians as a people are the ones that where living on the land. By what right does someone because of their faith have the right to throw others off of their land. I say faith, because many of the present day Palestinians are the children of the Israelites of old, and their blood ties are way stronger to a "Biblical" claim that European Jews can not match.

Fush BaShlomo,
Yuhannon

"I hate to say this but you are mistaking the actions of the Crusaders for that of the Muslims. With the Arab conquest, Jews were allowed back into the city. (Gil, Moshe (February 1997). A History of Palestine, 634-1099. Cambridge University Press. pp. 70–71. ISBN 0521599849.)"

Sorry that is revisionist history.

The Crusaders came to FREE Jerusalem.

The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades)

http://www.amazon.com/Politically-I...mp;s=books&qid=1247357779&sr=8-1

I find that this book is well researched.

It is written by Fr. Dn. Robert Spencer ( Malkite Catholic )