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The founding of Israel was violent and criminal and the crimes go on today unabated, thanks largely to the blind support of "Christian" Zionists who have grossly misread the Bible. (It doesn't say what they sayt it says).
The entire exchange between me and an Israeli lady on Quora is available at the following link. It’s a long read but you may be interested: https://www.quora.com/What-does-decolonization-mean-in-the-context-of-Israel/answer/Gail-Ellis-2/comment/85339491?__nsrc__=4&__snid3__=3890413690 Vince on Quora debated against the censorship of non-Zionist Christians and others and the intimidating power of the Jewish lobby in America, which prevents candidates who do not support Israel’s crimes from getting elected to office. I have shown that it is mostly Evangelicals who support these crimes, including the shoot-to-kill policy targeting unarmed protesters, the aerial bombing of residential centres in Palestine, the illegal displacement of residents and the often violent seizing of their homes by Israeli settlers, the unprovoked missile attacks on Syria, the forced drafting of Israeli girls, including Orthodox girls whose faith prohibits their involvement in the military, and many others. Below is an abbreviated version of my arguments to an Israeli lady who uses the standard arguments to defend her country’s behaviour. For example, she contends that since the Canaanites were Semites related to the Hebrews, the Jews today (whose genetics, however, do not match those of the ancient Canaanites) have every right to go in and evict the Palestinians from homes they had occupied for centuries and to abuse them to such an extent that they will leave and go live in crowded refugee camps in Syria and Jordan. Their barbarous behaviour contradicts their own Sacred Old Testament, which, in Leviticus, for example, commands them to love God and their fellow men. People calling themselves “Christians” wholeheartedly support this ungodly behaviour and urge their lawmakers to support it with taxpayer funds, giving financial “aid” and deadly weapons to the Israeli government, but believers on both sides who take the scriptures seriously know that this is wrong. It is tragic that so-called “conservatives” support this evil while the few politicians who oppose it are Democrats, whom they accuse of being ungodly. But who is godly any more? Jesus once asked: when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth? Luke 18:8. BEGIN EXCERPT FRPOM QUORA TEXT As you note, the Canaanite lineage does survive to the present day. But, as you know, today’s Israelis are much less in the Canaanite blood line than the Lebanese. The Lebanese are their direct descendants with an amazingly complete DNA match-up for an ancient and a contemporary people. Now this raises a bit of a dilemma. Since the notion of the ancient Hebrews being culturally-linguistically and almost certainly genetically closely related – if not identical – to the Canaanites is an argument used to establish a claim to the land where the Canaanites/Hebrews once lived, and perhaps even derived their origins (going back about 10,000 yr), the relatively recent finding that the Lebanese – and not so much the Israelis – are genetic Canaanites would, by the Israeli Establishment’s own line of reasoning, be the rightful heirs of what is currently called Israel by most Western countries. (This is not intended as an argument against the famous issue of “Israel’s right to exist,” which is beyond the scope of this exchange). Here’s how confusing Israeli lineage is as seen from DNA studies: As far as their haplotype (a DNA aspect) goes, one research team found that at least the Ashkenazi Jews in one population have over 95% European maternal lineage, and only about 3% Middle Eastern maternal lineage. According to the Wikepedia entry “Archeogenetics of the Middle East”: Another “research has suggested that, in addition to Israelite male, significant female founder ancestry might also derive from the Middle East-with 40% of Ashkenazim descended from four women who lived about 2000–3000 years ago in the Middle East. In addition, Behar (2006) suggested that the rest of Ashkenazi mtDNA is originated from about 150 women; most of those were probably of Middle Eastern origin. A 2013 genetic study suggested that the four founding maternal lineages of Ashkenazi Jews originate in Europe and that only ~8% of Ashkenazi mtDNA can confidently be assigned a Near Eastern origin, while >80% of Ashkenazi maternal lineages have a likely European origin while the 2014 study carried out by Spanish geneticists suggested ancient Near Eastern origin of four founding maternal lineages of Ashkenazi Jews.” At any rate, it is clear that nothing is clear about Israeli lineage. But even so, if the Israeli/Zionist rationale is to be accepted universally, then the Amerindians must be given back their land and the white European descendants in America must leave. But there is no claim anywhere that is remotely analogous to the Israeli claim to essentially long-abandoned land. The main reason this claim could be asserted was the “Christian” Zionists in the US and Britain, whose lame and unconvincing Biblical argument (based, as I said, on a biased misreading of Ezekiel) would never be accepted if brought to bear by any other nation in the world. The US is in fact fighting religious wars. To clarify, Ezekiel prophesies in verse 24 of Ezekiel 37, his Israel resurrection prophecy, that this Israel will be obedient to God’s decrees. Yet a WIN/Gallup poll shows that 65% of modern Israelis are irreligious. Now my opponent points out that today’s Israelis by and large obey the old laws of the Torah. This may be so, but they are ignoring the ones that are universally accepted such as the prohibition on murder and the commandment to love one’s fellow man. A Torah scholar admitted to Jesus that the greatest of all commandments is the commandment (from Leviticus) to love the Lord your God and to love your fellow men as yourself. Yet, today, like then, these greatest laws are trashed by and large by Israel. The fact that 80% today’s so-called Evangelical “Christians” insist that modern secular Israel is Ezekiel’s Israel proves that these people do not care at all what the Bible actually says but rely 100% on what famous mega-church pastors and their fellow Evangelicals say. This is putting man ahead of God and the consequences are already evident: war throughout the world and a $21 trillion debt that economists agree will never be paid down. It is only a matter of time before the bill for our transgressions comes due. The other reason the irrational claim was accepted in 1948 is that the Jews could claim victimhood thanks to the extremely powerful Holocaust narrative (the basic tenets of which I do not deny, in case you were wondering). First the Zionists and then the Israel lobby used both “Christian” Zionism and the Holocaust victim idea to bolster their shaky claim to legitimacy. And it worked well thanks to the unquestioning nature of American “Christian” conservatives, who do not think for themselves but look over their shoulders to see what their fellows are doing, never daring to step out of line – they literally think hell awaits dissidents from the “righteous” narrative of Israel. It is quite plainly sick. But since US Evangelicals are the largest voting bloc, they are your main source of support. Thus, your country is perched precariously on the edge of a vulnerable narrative that could crumble at any moment should someone present a Christian-based challenge to their ideology based on verse 24 of Ezekiel 37. Of course, they’ve got John Hagee and his mega-church and stentorian voice on their side. For now. You are perhaps right to say that AIPAC itself doesn’t do all the effective intimidating by accusing its opponents of anti-Semitism. However, the Israel lobby is a many-headed hydra with other branches – which are also PACs of like effect – supporting it. In all, this composite Israel lobby spends about $50 million/yr to influence candidates with the carrot and stick of donations to obedient lapdogs and withholding of donations to candidates who refuse to bow, such as pro-Palestine candidates. Cunterpunch writes of AIPAC: “Republican candidate wannabe Senator Ted Cruz, the obnoxious junior senator from Texas, who received $100,354 from various Israeli lobbies between 2009 and 2015, proclaimed, in response to Mr. Trump’s remarks, the amazing statement that the nation of Palestine doesn’t exist, and hasn’t since 1948! Well, aren’t we all enlightened by such a geography lesson from Mr. Cruz? Never mind that Palestine is recognized by at least 193 member states of the United Nations, and the United Nations itself.” Alaraby.co.uk wrote an article titled: Legislators rush to please AIPAC “This year's lineup at AIPAC featured high level administration officials including Vice President Mike Pence, Ambassador Nikki Haley, Ambassador David Friedman, Ambassador Mark Green of USAID, and Brian Hook from US State Department. On the legislative side, at least 35 members of the US Congress flocked in from both sides of the aisle, to show their unwavering support for Israel.” [But it is not just support for Israel any more. It is support for open outright crimes.--Vince] “Legislators present and speaking at AIPAC did not let facts stand in the way of their political agenda. Prominent Democrats competed with the Trump Administration over support for Israel's far right policies and agenda, perpetuating falsehoods and hawkish rhetoric.” Haaretz wrote: AIPAC is destroying Israel, not safeguarding it By Gideon Levy “The American Israel Public Affairs Committee may be the organization that has caused the greatest damage to Israel. It corrupted Israel, taught it that everything is permissible to it. It made sure America would cover up and restrain itself over everything. That it would never demand anything in exchange.” According to Opensecrets, Israel lobbies make huge donations to pro-Israel politicians (open the link to see the amounts and the recipients). According to another report by Opensecrets, a very large percentage of congress people got money from Israel lobby, not just AIPAC (none of them were even remotely supportive of Palestine, of course, which is why US elected officials support genocide). Open the link and check it out. This lobby seeks to control the Congress and Senate, and they have been succeeding. Mondoweiss reports: “A just-released Midterm Elections Scoreboard shows that Israel partisans have dominated Congress over the past 10 years, despite the preference of American voters, who consistently wish even-handed policies and feel the U.S. gives Israel too much money. [Well, it is money earned by ordinary Americans but their elected officials steal it and give it to a foreign power that is sowing chaos in the Middle East!] The detailed scoreboard on candidates for the Senate and House of Representatives shows that 28 pro-Israel PACs and numerous pro-Israel individuals have given candidates millions of dollars in campaign contributions.” There is also ADL (Anti-Defamation League), of course, which is not exactly a lobby, but it attacks prominent people or candidates who are less than enthusiastic about Israel and show even the least support for the Palestinian victims of the Israeli regime. Now, you will recall that I said you had no right to discredit my faith and you responded that Jewish groups do not attack Christianity. Actually, the ADL did attack Mel Gibson mercilessly over his movie The Passion of Christ, even though the film did not deviate significantly from the New Testament narrative of how Christ was murdered. Thus the ADL was in fact audaciously attacking the right of a Christian to dramatically portray the Easter story as it appears in the New Testament, much as it has been portrayed, for example, since 1634 in the famous Oberammergau Passionspiele (passion play). Thus for 400 years no Jewish group had ever dared to condemn Christians for portraying their Lord’s final days. Until, that is, US “Christians” stepped up and decided to “stand with Israel” instead of with Jesus, who died for his stand against the Pharisees. The attack on Gibson was an example of US-supported Jewish power bullying not just one Christian, but Christianity itself – with the blessing of Evangelical mega-churches. The ADL asserted the childish claim that this film could cause people to murder Jews because it shows what the Jews did to Jesus, just as recorded in the NT! Well, gee, maybe we should stop talking about the Holocaust because that could cause people to murder Germans, do ya think? There is now a rise in so-called anti-Semitism across the West and Jewish groups are concerned about it. Nota bene: this kind of bullying by the ADL and other groups is not the solution to the rising anti-Semitism throughout the Western world. It is part of the problem. Finally, let me warn you not to even broach this subject on Twitter or Facebook. Your post will probably be pulled. Right in the land of the Free. Relevant: https://www.counterpunch.org/2016/03/25/aipac-israel-and-the-u-s-an-unholy-alliance/ https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-aipac-is-destroying-israel-1.5419857 https://mondoweiss.net/2018/11/congresspeople-palestine-scoreboard/
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