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drosophilist's avatar

Welll.... Crimea is a bit of a special case, because, afaik, it used to be part of Russia until Khrushchev gave it to Ukraine (when Ukraine was part of the USSR, of course).

That said, Russia is freaking HUGE and yet they're still trying to grab more land for themselves, because Putin is a bloodthirsty scumbag. Israel is a TINY sliver of land that is literally the only homeland of the Jewish people. Everywhere else that Jews live, they live surrounded by a Gentile majority, with a very strong cultural memory of "yes, things are cool now, but the majority could turn on us (see: 1000 years of pogroms, expulsions, witch hunts, topped off with the f**king Holocaust)." To paraphrase something Steven Pinker wrote, given the history of the Jewish people, their tenacity in holding onto their land can hardly be held against them.

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Travis's avatar

Crimea is important because it's the only warm water port that Russia currently owns (it leases some out of Syria, which is why that civil war was so important to them). Without a warm water port, they can't import/export year round in an efficient manner (they have to use ice breakers in the north several months a year to inefficiently make up the difference, and even then can't power project their military into the med or atlantic nearly as easily).

Satanists and gypsies don't have their own country, shall we start carving off parts of other people's territory to accommodate them and give them a country of their own? Where's the Theodore Hertzel of the Uighurs or Sufi Islamists at? They don't have a country of their own either. Even the African slaves we brought to the US stuck around after the civil war despite the pogroms they endured. They didn't just carve off a chunk of Liberia for themselves and "go back to Africa" as was often suggested back then--including from Lincoln at one point if I recall correctly.

It's not that I'm against Israel holding onto land, it's that I'm against Israel holding onto its war conquests while denying statehood for some other groups of peoples. Why do the Jews deserve self-determination and statehood while the Palestinians don't? (I ask this as an American Jew btw)

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Eric Foley's avatar

The Palestinians themselves are largely choosing not to. When Israel was formed, they rejected the partition in hopes of their Arab neighbors destroying Israel and just getting it all anyway. That... didn’t work out for them.

And even today, even the most peaceful Palestinian leaders still annually commemorate Israel’s founding as a disaster, and will not accept any peace terms that do not include a “right of return.” Whereas Hamas overtly calls for Israel’s destruction, even Fatah still demands that all descendants of 1948 refugees be permitted to return to Israel, which would still end Israel as a Jewish state even in the unlikely event that it did not involve actual ethnic cleansing.

Not surprisingly, Israel will never peacefully allow this. But the Palestinians are, in effect, unwilling to accept just the occupied territories. And so, they are stateless.

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drosophilist's avatar

I never said Palestinians don't deserve statehood. I would be happy with a two-state solution, a Palestinian state and Israel, side by side, both peaceful and prosperous and, perhaps not friendly toward each other, but at least recognizing each other's right to exist. But I can't want it more than they do.

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Travis's avatar

"But I can't want it more than they do." Exactly. Until Palestinians reject Hamas, they will never be in a position to "want it." The same could be said of Israeli citizens voting in politicians who refuse to end West Bank settlements. Israel should be preserving the West Bank as a bargaining chip for Palestinian statehood should the Palestinians ever come to a place where they're willing to get rid of Hamas. But neither side is doing what it needs to do, so this never really ends until they do.

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