Gaza has fields

One of the recurring themes in the complex discussion over the Israeli Palestine conflict, which resumed this week after some peace talks in Egypt, is the issue of whether Hamas is deliberately placing it’s rockets near to civilians in order to protect the launch crew and win a propaganda war by deliberately endangering civilians.

This is very serious claim from Israel, if true then it justifies the use of weapons to destroy the rockets, equipment and soldiers they say are in these areas. If false, then it suggests that Israel is in fact conducting deliberate attacks on civilians.

There are perhaps other possible truths but this is how the debate seems to go, and frankly I do not know better than the pundits on TV. The Israeli conflict is not something I could claim to have detailed knowledge of. Recognising I am not alone in having only a very rudimentary understanding of the situation I have even asked Paul Marks to come back to the meetup and explain some of the earlier history. Yet returning to today, it does seem as if the claims can be verified, if perhaps at great effort, by diligent and brave journalism or by UN investigations, or some action of that kind. I am, however, not the UN and I do not blog for a newspaper. I’m just me, and what fact checking can I do?

Well, some. In particular I keep hearing, from people apparently sympathetic to Palestinians, if not to Hamas, that the Gaza strip is so dense that it is inevitable that rockets must be launched from near civilians. Well it seems that might be true, but it depends what you mean by “near”. You might never be far from a dwelling or farm building in Gaza but looking at Google satellite images it is very obvious that Gaza has fields. Actually it has lots of fields, and orchards, and glass houses for crops, and they appear all around the country.

Take a look:

This seems to be a problem for the argument that Hamas has no choice but to launch from near to civilians. There are fields, so the option to launch from a field exists.

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August 21, 2014

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41 responses to “Gaza has fields”

Paul Marks

August 21, 2014 at 6:55 am

Yes – the Gaza firing strip (created by the army of Egypt and allied Islamic fighters in 1948) is 60% rural (even today). It used to be almost all rural (I know a Muslim man whose family were big landholders there) – with a population of about 30 thousand.

After 66 years of Israeli “genocide” the population of the firing strip has gone from 30 thousand to well over a million Muslims (one of the highest birth rates in the world – so it is not just a matter of the people who moved to Gaza in 1948 on the instructions of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem) – but most of the strip is still rural (even now).

Yes Hamas puts its rockets next to women and children on purpose (indeed some of the rockets are actually manned by children). But it does more than that – it also has a long record of killing fellow Muslims in the various towns and villages of the strip.

Hamas (like all Muslim Brotherhood offshoot organisations) cares about one thing and one thing only – Islam, the establishment of the Caliphate (the global Caliphate).

So those Westerners who think that Hamas can be appeased by killing six million Jews (and non Jews allied to the Jews) and giving the forces of Islam the land “between the river and the sea” (as the demonstrators in so many Western cities chant) are profoundly mistaken.

It is quite true that, in the eyes of Hamas, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem are rightfully Muslim – but (to the forces of Islam) so are Paris, London and New York (and so on).

It is actually an interesting question for anarcho capitalists (I am NOT interested in the opinions of Black Flag “anarchists” – but I am interested in the opinions of anarcho capitalists) as the forces of Islam are not a state, they are truly international (to be found in most nations now) – yet dedicated to created a world wide Islamic state (by whatever means necessary – with no moral limits on their actions at all, for example they are quite prepared to kill their own children and wave them at the cameras, in the “certain knowledge” that such children will go straight to paradise if they die to serve the cause of Islam) .

What does anarcho capitalist theory say about how to deal with such people? Remember that many of them are highly intelligent (and well educated) and that there are many millions of them – all round the world.

Finally – a sharp distinction must be kept in mind between nominal Muslims (those people just born into Muslim families and so on) and dedicated followers of Mohammed (a political and military leader of genius) who actually seek to follow the political-military example of Mohammed in the modern world (it is the latter NOT the former whom I call the “forces of Islam”).

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Lion

August 21, 2014 at 12:30 pm

To Paul marks reply:
“So those Westerners who think that Hamas can be appeased by killing six million Jews (and non Jews allied to the Jews) and giving the forces of Islam the land “between the river and the sea” (as the demonstrators in so many Western cities chant) are profoundly mistaken.”

Is this a straw man? Can you identify a single sane Westerner advocating the killing of 6 million Jews? You obviously know a bit about Hamas and Israelis, why waste your knowledge on the few dozen rabid anti-Semites who are calling for the Holocaust part 2?

Talk about about any significant number of Westerners advocating a genocide or global caliphates just doesn’t seem like rational discussion to me.

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Lion

August 21, 2014 at 12:59 pm

A-symmetrical warfare doesn’t work like that, Simon. Snipers, assassins guerillas, special forces, etc. don’t array themselves in a field to do battle especially when facing overwhelming 21st century military might. Unlike Defensive Shield and several other targeted and successful engagements, the current Israeli campaign is lazy, indiscriminate and quite frankly, genocidal. Urban warfare works for Hamas and it works for the IDF, so why then answer urban warfare with indiscriminate bombing?

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1. Simon Gibbs
  
  August 21, 2014 at 11:11 pm
  
  One needn’t array oneself in a field like a phalanx in order to use a weapon and run away again. One might sneak behind hedges, or maybe break a hole in the top of those many glass houses in order to set up a weapon unobserved.
  
  Your characterisation of my argument is incorrect.
  
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Julie near Chicago

August 22, 2014 at 5:01 am

From NDTV. (New Delhi TV?) Note that this report is not exactly slanted pro-Israel; indeed the Indian reporters’ sympathies seem to be with Hamas. The 5-minute video at source is worth seeing in full; toward the end of it, the reporter sounds to me almost surprised. The boldfaced type is mine.

–J.

http://www.ndtv.com/article/world/ndtv-exclusive-how-hamas-assembles-and-fires-rockets-571033

NDTV Exclusive: How Hamas Assembles and Fires Rockets

World | Sreenivasan Jain | Updated: August 05, 2014 14:06 IST

Gaza: In the minutes before the ceasefire kicked in at Gaza this morning, Hamas fired a flurry of rockets towards Israel – 30 according to some counts.

Israel has argued that that these rockets are fired from civilian areas, and this is why its retaliatory strikes can result in civilian casualties.

But this morning, NDTV witnessed one such rocket silo being created under a tent right next to the hotel where our team was staying. Minutes later, we saw the rocket being fired, just before the 72-hour ceasefire came into effect.

It began with a mysterious tent with a blue canopy that bobbed up yesterday (August 4) at 6:30 am in an open patch of land next to our window. We saw three men making a multitude of journeys in and out of the tent, sometimes with wires.

An hour later, they emerged, dismantled the tent, changed their clothes and walked away.

The next morning – today – we woke to news of the 72-hour ceasefire but just before it was to take effect, the rocket next to our hotel was fired. There was a loud explosion and a whooshing sound. The cloud of smoke that rose was captured by our cameraperson.

This report is being aired on NDTV and published on ndtv.com after our team left the Gaza strip – Hamas has not taken very kindly to any reporting of its rockets being fired. But just as we reported the devastating consequences of Israel’s offensive on Gaza’s civilians, it is equally important to report on how Hamas places those very civilians at risk by firing rockets deep from the heart of civilian zones.

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1. Julie near Chicago
  
  August 22, 2014 at 5:02 am
  
  H/T to Perry at Samizdata:
  
  http://www.samizdata.net/2014/08/the-murder-of-journalist-james-foley-a-spectacular-own-goal/
  
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2. Simon Gibbs
  
  August 22, 2014 at 6:04 am
  
  Right, so barely more cover than that available in an orchard or glasshouse.
  
  Also, depending on the crops and what is used to enclose the field, you could have similar options in farm land.
  
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Nico Metten

August 22, 2014 at 11:54 am

It is not deliberately endangering civilians when all the cover you have is civilian infrastructure. They either place their rockets there or they might as well fully surrender to the Israelis. So this narrative of evil Hamas, willing to kill its own people is nonsense. I am not in favour of these rockets, although they really do not seem to cause a lot of damage. But there is a very small risk that they hit civilians in Israel and I think killing civilians cannot be justified. But that is also true for the Israelis. And they are killing a whole lot more civilians then Hamas, despite the fact, that they have far more advanced weapons technology.

However, if killing civilians in self defence is allowed, well then one must be on the side of Hamas. After all, it is Gaza that is under siege. They are literally imprisoned and collectively punished by the Israelis. So the moral argument of self defence is clearly on their side.

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1. Simon Gibbs
  
  August 22, 2014 at 1:09 pm
  
  Your argument seems to hinge on a narrative of the events following the Israeli pull-out from Gaza – a unilateral stab at bringing peace to the region – that places responsibility for the resumption of conflict on Israel. What would that narrative be?
  
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  1. Nico Metten
    
    August 22, 2014 at 1:28 pm
    
    I doubt that Israel pulled out of Gaza to bring peace to the region. I think it was just to expensive to protect those settlers. They since have massively increased their settlements in the West Bank. But after they pulled out they put a siege on Gaza. Everything that is going in and out of Gaza is controlled by the Israel, including people. So if you are a Palestinian in Gaza, you cannot just move somewhere else. They won’t let you out. This siege does not just include the control of weapons, but pretty much everything, including food. As Israeli officials said, they have put people in Gaza on a diet. That is what a lot of these tunnels are there for. Sure they also smuggling weapons. But they mostly smuggle necessities for their daily lives. So it is a big open air prison, a collective punishment of people. How can that be justified? But if they then rebel against that, they are just crazy anti-semites who love killing Jews. These rockets btw started after Israel randomly searched and rampaged randomly hundreds of Palestinian homes in the West Bank, killing at least 6 civilians in the process. All this to find teenagers, which they already new at the time where almost certainly dead. But they did it anyway and it very much looks like to provoke exactly this reaction.
    
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Paul Marks

August 22, 2014 at 9:21 pm

“Free Palestine from the river to the sea” is a standard chant of demonstrators in the West – both of Islamists and their leftist allies (an odd alliance – as the Islamists wish to crush women, wipe out homosexuals, and so on). It is logical to assume that people who chant this message understand what it means – i.e. the extermination of six million Jews and any non Jews who stand with the Jews (or is thought might stand with them).

The latter point is important – for example both Hamas and its rival the P.A. (formally in alliance at the moment – but still killing each other) have long been better at killing Muslims than at killing Jews. Sometimes they kill each other, sometimes they kill Muslim civilians and blame the Jews (the reasoning being that women and children who die for use in propaganda for Islam go straight to paradise – so they are actually being nice by killing them), and sometimes they grab Muslim men (and women), essentially at random, and kill them as “spies of the Jews”.

As for “Jewish settlements” in the “West Bank” – not even the Emperor Hadrian (the inventor of the name “Palestine”) managed to utterly wipe out Jews in the area (although, like so many others, he tried very hard). Nor did the Ottomans manage to wipe out Zionist “settlements” in the First World War.

People who use the term “West Bank” seem unaware that much of this land is actually closer to the sea than to the Jordan river. The cease fire lines of 1948 were arbitrary – just where the various armies happened to be at the time.

Westerners should really examine the geographical reality in physical terms (personally) before rushing to comment on the suitability (or otherwise) of the 1948 cease fire lines for a long term defendable military border with the forces of Islam. Of course there really was not a “cease fire” in 1948 anyway – raiding never stopped, and shelling from Syria never stopped (anyone who would hand back the hill area captured in 1967 to Syria, is inviting the situation of 1948 to 1967 – i.e. endless shelling from these hills).

Pacts of peace and friendship never worked with Mohammed himself – indeed his favourite tactic was to promise peace, agree to a pact, and then attack. I see no reason to believe that people who openly admit (indeed boast) of being followers of Mohammed would act any better than Mohammed did himself.

A situation where an Islamic attack could reach the sea (cutting Israel in two) in a matter of hours, would not be sensible. Nor would Islamic control of hills (such as those overlooking Jerusalem) be sensible.

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1. Nico Metten
  
  August 22, 2014 at 10:01 pm
  
  Yeah, that is what support for Israel always seems to end in. It is all about racism. Those Palestinians just have the wrong ideas and culture and therefore deserve to be cleansed out of that area. As Ayn Rand I believe put it, it is a fight of civilisation against savages. All principals of natural rights and liberty go out of the window. Quit disgusting. I am glad that less and less people are falling for this.
  
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Paul Marks

August 22, 2014 at 10:14 pm

Nico – Jews (like Muslims and Christians) are of all races. From black to pale.

To throw in the word “racism” is to “play the race card” – the mark of an ignorant leftist.

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Paul Marks

August 22, 2014 at 10:19 pm

By the way Nico – you might find Ayn Rand’s position on the subject of “race” illuminating (particularly that cultural behaviour has nothing to do with biological “race”), it you could try and open your mind. Particularly her point that no “race” should be blamed for the ravings of its leaders – as no group has good leadership today.

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1. Nico Metten
  
  August 22, 2014 at 10:46 pm
  
  I am not playing any race card in the sense that I am attacking a straw man. I mean this very literally. Your rant about Palestinians is a total caricature and has very little to do with reality. But even if it were accurate, so what? This is a conflict about land ownership. You see I don’t care what ideas or culture people have. I think people have rights and all I care about is whether these rights were violated or not. But this is not very convenient for the Israel supporters, because when it comes to rights and morality, the fact are mostly not on their side. So they are trying to push the narrative of brave little peace loving Israel being attacked by these savages for no reason other than evil anti-semitism. That is BS, the facts are in the way of this narrative.
  
  And for Ayn Rand. I find very little of what she said enlightening. The problem with Rand is that on the surface it looks like she is about classical liberalism and individual rights. But then you look behind that and you realise that what this is really about is the exact opposite. I know she said that racism is one of the worst forms of collectivism. But then she goes out and supports zionism not on the grounds of any natural rights principal, but because Palestinians to her were savages. And this is not a co incidence. Her successors at the Ayn Rand institute follow the same funny logic and totalitarianism, while preaching classical liberalism on the surface.
  
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  1. Simon Gibbs
    
    August 23, 2014 at 8:41 pm
    
    Randian foreign policy is indeed a bit of an oddity, not especially consistent with the rest. However, the foreign policy should not be “behind” the rest of the philosophy, as you put it, but should be a consequence of it. That it does not follow from the rest of the philosophy is a problem only for the ARI, who cannot reasonably depart from Objectivism and still call themselves the Ayn Rand anything. Others, such as those inspired by Rand to whatever degree, are free to make their own mind up. I am in the process of doing so, but as I say in the OP I am starting from behind especially on the Palestinian question.
    
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  2. Nico Metten
    
    August 23, 2014 at 10:18 pm
    
    Ayn Rand was not just wrong on foreign policy. She declared everything objectively right what she liked and wrong what she didn’t, from smoking to music. Given that she claimed to be all about reason that is really a remarkable contradiction. She really created a cult that was not at all very freedom oriented.
    
    But yes, you can get a lot of classical liberalism in her writings. That is why I like Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead. So I would say one should take the classical liberalism and stay out of the cult. But then again you don’t necessarily need Rand for classical liberalism. The only thing I would give Rand real credit for is that she stressed like no one else I know that capitalism is moral. That is the best thing about Atlas Shrugged and the reason why I would still recommend people to read it.
    
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  3. Tim Carpenter
    
    August 24, 2014 at 1:07 pm
    
    IIRC the dispute did not begin due to land ownership, but land access, use and, eventually, sovereignty.
    
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  4. Paul Marks
    
    August 25, 2014 at 8:47 am
    
    Tim – the first thing the British Mandate authorities should have done was to get all state owned land and sell it (to the highest bidders – regardless of religion). This was not done because it was feared that wealthy Jews (such as the Rothschilds) would buy it all. Today (with so many wealthy Muslims) the outcome would be rather different.
    
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Paul Marks

August 22, 2014 at 10:27 pm

Lastly Nico – there are plenty of Muslims in Israel (including in the Israeli Parliament), but virtually no Jews in the Islamic nations in the Middle East (so who has been doing the “cleansing”?). Jews lived in these countries for hundreds of years before Muslims even existed, they live in these lands no longer (the Christians are being forced out also).

And do not use the Emperor Hadrian term “Palestinian” – the Emperor did not mean Muslims, there were no Muslims at the time (they did not exist till centuries later). Even in the war of 1948 hardly anyone used the term “Palestinian”.

Are not Arab Jews Arabic by “race”?

They have brown skin and dark eyes – they are physically IDENTICAL to the Muslim Arabs who are trying to exterminate them.

Whatever this conflict is about it is not about “race” and “racism”.

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1. Nico Metten
  
  August 22, 2014 at 10:50 pm
  
  Yes, but the remaining arabs are second class citizens in Israel, because Israel is very openly a racist state, in which only Jews have full rights. And of course there are all the refugees that they do not want to let back for exactly that reason.
  
  There were many jews in the arab world before Israel was founded. And there were even some Jews living peacefully in Palestine with the locals. The trouble started when they decided to create a Jewish state there and steal the land from the locals.
  
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  1. Paul Marks
    
    August 25, 2014 at 8:44 am
    
    Arabs (Jewish, Christian or Muslim) are not “second class citizens” in Israel. And Israel is not “racist”.
    
    As for the idea that Jews were well treated by Muslims before the foundation of Israel – as I am not allowed to use the “l word” Nico – I will just point out that you are guilty of a false statement.
    
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  2. Nico Metten
    
    August 25, 2014 at 10:57 am
    
    I am not arguing about words with you, that is silly. Racism is wildly understood to mean the political discrimination of an ethnic group and that is how I use it. That is why antisemitism is called racist. And that is why I call Israel a racist state. Everyone who is not Jewish is a second class citizen. The agenda of Israel is very openly to be a jewish state. So there is the racism right in their agenda. It is like someone saying the UK has to be a white christian state. That would be clearly racist.
    
    As a result, the arabs in the country are excluded from any real political power. Formerly they can vote, but most of their parties are prohibited from running in elections. They are also not allowed to be part of the military. So they are tolerated, but as soon as they speak out politically they can get into real trouble. Normally I don’t care about voting rights as long as people have real rights. But here it is used to keep a group of people in society powerless to fight back against real discrimination. If you talk to any arab Israeli they will tell you that they are facing a lot of discrimination in everyday life and they are essentially powerless to do anything about that. There are also lots of arabs outside of Israel who have legal property claims inside of Israel and are not allowed back with the argument that Israel is a jewish state. In contrast to that any jew from anywhere in the world has a right to full citizenship, even if he or she has no ties to the region. The whole zionist project is a very collectivist ideology with no roots in classical liberalism whatsoever. And at the beginning no one thought of Israel to be part of the west. Ben Gurion looked to the Soviet Union as a model and the earliest supporter of the state was Stalin.
    
    And jews, christians and Muslims did get along fine for many centuries in the region before Israel was founded.
    
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  3. Paul Marks
    
    August 25, 2014 at 8:14 pm
    
    Nico you are guilty of more false statements. Islam is a religion and political philosophy – not a race, and Muslims have more rights in Israel than in other nations in the Middle East. As for your claim that Muslims treated Jews well before the creation of modern Israel, your claims are incompatible with the actual history of robbery, rape and murder.
    
    As for Zionism – Zionists included people of many different political points of view (including liberals). As for Israel not being part of the West – that would have come as news to Winston Churchill and Harry Truman. As for Stalin – he ruthlessly persecuted Zionists (even socialist ones).
    
    Nico – you have yet to write a single comment on this thread without blatantly false statements. Are you more truthful about other topics of discussion – or are you dishonest about everything?
    
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  4. Nico Metten
    
    August 25, 2014 at 8:43 pm
    
    “Nico you are guilty of more false statements. Islam is a religion and political philosophy – not a race,”
    Where did I say it was a race? I said it was an ethnic group and that racism today is largely excepted to mean the discrimination of an ethnic group. You are playing word games here.
    
    “and Muslims have more rights in Israel than in other nations in the Middle East.”
    And pot is legal in the Netherlands. But, what does that have to do with this debate?
    
    “As for your claim that Muslims treated Jews well before the creation of modern Israel, your claims are incompatible with the actual history of robbery, rape and murder.”
    Jews were living in the arab world for a very long time, just like christians. There were some exceptions, but most of the time they got along with the locals just fine. Arabs are not all crazy jew haters.
    
    “As for Zionism – Zionists included people of many different political points of view (including liberals).”
    Zionism is an inherently nationalistic and therefore collectivist movement. It is incompatible with classical liberalism. Most zionists looked to socialism as the way to organise an economy. The west was very sceptical of the zionist project and Stalin was an early supporter once the state was founded. He then changed his mind, when a lot of Jews fled the soviet union. But yes Churchill and Truman did mildly support it, which tells you how illiberal it is.
    
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  5. Paul Marks
    
    August 25, 2014 at 10:17 pm
    
    Stalin always hated Zionism – even socialist Zionists were the enemies of Orthodox Marxists (and as for anti socialist Zionists….).
    
    Winston Churchill was a Zionist all his adult life – so much for “mild” support.
    
    Gaza is certainly not an Israeli prison – Prime Minister Sharon (yes that one) gave up the security strip between Gaza and Egypt (if the government of Egypt want the people of Gaza – no Jew is going to force them to stay against their will).
    
    The plundering, rape and murder of Jews in Islamic lands in the late 19th century and early 20th century is a matter of record – and your attitude towards it is obvious.
    
    I am ashamed (deeply ashamed) to be member of the same species as you. For we are members of the same species (the human species) Nico.
    
    You have had many chances to say that you want the Muslims to live in peace in Gaza – and that is exactly what you have NOT said. Your desire to utterly exterminate Israel (six million Jews) is obvious. Indeed your hatred reminds of the sort of anti-Semite who turns out to be of Jewish origin themselves (like the Founder of the Spanish Inquisition – or the German S.D.) always trying to “kill the Jew in themselves” – but perhaps I am mistaken.
    
    Well go ahead and try Nico, try to kill the Jews of Israel – pick up a rifle and try. What is stopping you?
    
    Surely you can not be worried by the fact that Jews today (unlike in Europe in the early 1940s) are armed?
    
    And you could still say (even now) that you want the Muslims of Gaza to live in peace – to stop attacking Israel. To just stay where they are.
    
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  6. Nico Metten
    
    August 25, 2014 at 10:45 pm
    
    “Gaza is certainly not an Israeli prison – Prime Minister Sharon (yes that one) gave up the security strip between Gaza and Egypt (if the government of Egypt want the people of Gaza – no Jew is going to force them to stay against their will).”
    
    The military government of Egypt is controlled by Israel and the US, just like the old Mubarak regime. The very first thing they did after their coup last year was to close the border to Gaza. But no matter who is closing it, Gaza is a prison. People cannot leave there. A few years ago, they did not even let out students who wanted to study abroad. And right now they do not let out refugees who might want to flee the fightings. They are stuck there and when they are hit then Hamas is blamed for using them as shield. This cynicism cannot be topped. Nothing is allowed to leave Gaza and everything that goes in, needs to be approved by Israel.
    
    “The plundering, rape and murder of Jews in Islamic lands in the late 19th century and early 20th century is a matter of record – and your attitude towards it is obvious.”
    
    Ah, see that is when zionism already started.
    
    “You have had many chances to say that you want the Muslims to live in peace in Gaza – and that is exactly what you have NOT said.”
    
    What??? My whole argument here is to help these people.
    
    “Your desire to utterly exterminate Israel (six million Jews) is obvious.”
    
    Listen, I have argued with many zionist and I am used to there name calling, lying and attacking straw mans. But this is really a new dimension playing dirty. I explicitly said that I have nothing against these jews. You making your stuff up as you go along. And I have to say this is really not worth my time.
    
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Zach Cope

August 22, 2014 at 10:52 pm

It seems to me this piece is more about the methods of war rather than the moral justification each side claims. There are incentives for both sides to use the tactics they have chosen. Of course the methods used in war are related to the justification and cause, yet the arbiter of whether a war was fought ‘fairly’ is usually one of the prizes the eventual victor receives.
My own concern is that scarcity of land or resources is often a source of conflict, and that no political system has fully answered the tensions created by this in a way that incentivises peace over force.
The answers must involve markets, but in a way that encourages those who don’t yet believe or understand their value, as much as it involves those who understand this already.

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Paul Marks

August 22, 2014 at 11:23 pm

Nico “Israel is a racist state” – Nico you are a LIAR. No good beating about the bush concerning the matter – you might have been making a honest mistake when you started talking about “race” before, but you have carried on (after been corrected) and so are clearly just a liar (not someone making an honest mistake).

I do not intend to waste what little time I have left of my life with liars – so, to be blunt my dear, you can jump in the nearest lava pit.

Zach – you make an interesting point.

Neither under the Ottoman Empire, the British mandate, or under the present Israeli government has most land been privately owned.

Only a small percentage of the land has been privately owned (about half the privately owned land in Israel is owned by Muslims, but the total amount of privately owned land is small, and always has been small, state ownership of land being one of the great curses of the Middle East – the various forms of security of tenure for state tenants have always proved to be weak reeds).

If most land was privately owned then nothing would stop (for example) a rich Saudi Prince going up to a Jewish property owner and saying “well how much gold would you like for this land?”

Presently (as with previous regimes in the area since the fall of the Roman Empire) he who controls the government controls most land – and that is not a good system.

There is also (to complicate the situation) various land holdings held by trusts (such as the land the Rothschild family bought from Muslim land holders in the late 19th and early 20th centuries), but much of the land in Israel is owned by the STATE – and it should NOT be.

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1. Zach Cope
  
  August 23, 2014 at 8:12 am
  
  It takes 2 sides for conflict to arise. Yet the rhetoric of possible answers perpetuates this – ‘two state solution’. Perhaps those inclined to this site might prefer the ’10 million self interested individuals solution’ combined with the ‘n<1 state solution'. This would leave the anarchists and minarchists to argue bitterly over whether n=0 or 1/2, without them resorting to violence as they are too self interested to resort to this!
  
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  1. Zach Cope
    
    August 23, 2014 at 8:13 am
    
    Of course n>much greater than 2 might diffuse things also ….
    
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2. Simon Gibbs
  
  August 23, 2014 at 8:54 pm
  
  “I do not intend to waste what little time I have left of my life with liars – so, to be blunt my dear, you can jump in the nearest lava pit.”
  
  Paul, I appreciate your situation, but please please be civil.
  
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Paul Marks

August 23, 2014 at 9:09 pm

On the contrary Simon – the ideas of Ayn Rand on foreign policy were consistent with her experience and the application of her reason to that experience (and I speak as someone who is not a follower of Ayn Rand in certain vital matters).

Rand understood that it is not “racist” to describe people (of any race or multiple races) as “savages” – if savages is what they are.

And Rand understood that one can not live in friendship with Marxists, Fascists, National Socialists OR Islamists.

One can either resist them (in this small interconnected world) or be exterminated or enslaved by them.

It is the Rothbardian view of these matters (not the Randian) that is a hall of mirrored illusions and delusions (false “history”, and poor “reasoning”).

Although one can be an anarcho capitalist without having a Rothbardian view of World War II or the Cold War – or a Lew Rockwell point of view about the conflict with Islam.

By the way Ludwig Von Mises had almost exactly the same view of these matters as Ayn Rand – born of the same experience with the Marxists and the National Socialists.

As for the conflict with Islam.

Should Israel cease to exist tomorrow (indeed all Jews, all over the world, drop dead this instant) the conflict with Islam would continue.

Peace would be fine thing – but it can not be based on the denial of reality.

Wiping out the Jews would NOT bring peace with Islam.

It would NOT prevent the coming conflicts in Europe and elsewhere.

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1. Simon Gibbs
  
  August 24, 2014 at 12:25 pm
  
  Insightful Paul, but there is a question about native Indians (if I recall correctly) and (returning to topic) the issue of collective punishment.
  
  I do not think 7/7, for example, was justified by the population electing Tony Blair. Rand would, I think, disagree. But, as I said, this is not my specialty.
  
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  1. Paul Marks
    
    August 25, 2014 at 8:38 am
    
    On the question of American Indians – United States policy was never OFFICIALLY racist. In theory (and sometimes in practice, after all many “white” Americans have Indian forefathers, including Governor Rick Perry – look hard at his face) an Indian could renounce his or her tribe and become an American. However, many Indians did not want to renounce their tribe – and therefore were treated as aliens (basically enemy aliens). Calvin Coolidge (yes as late as that) solved this problem by declaring that someone could be an American Citizen and a member of an Indian tribe AT THE SAME TIME. By the way – it was always complicated, for example the adopted son of Andrew Jackson (a ruthless Indian fighter) was Indian. And Jackson’s leading “Indian” enemy was white.
    
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  2. Tim Carpenter
    
    August 25, 2014 at 4:21 pm
    
    Ye, Simon, I also see this as, at the heart, the issue of collective punishment. Both sides.
    
    The modern nation state is significantly responsible, AFAICT.
    
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  3. Paul Marks
    
    August 25, 2014 at 8:38 pm
    
    If Israel wanted to inflict “collective punishment” upon Gaza there would be no Gaza – and it would not take long (about a day). This operation is so prolonged (absurdly prolonged) because the government of Israel is desperately trying to avoid “collective punishment”. Given the opinions of the other side (people such as Nico – someone with whom no peaceful coexistence is possible) I would not bother – my argument being to remove the civilian population from Gaza (for example by cutting off the water supply – so they would have to relocate to Egypt) would actually SAVE Muslim lives (certainly compared with this endless fighting). However, the idea (in my view – the delusion) that it is possible to live in peace with Gaza continues. If it was just Gaza peaceful coexistence would NOT be a delusion – but it is clear (for example from Nico’s comments) that the Islamists (and their non Muslim Western allies) will not rest till Israel is utterly exterminated – all six Jews and any non Jews allied to them (that is clearly Nico’s objective – and the Islamists are no different [in this respect] from their allies, such as the German terrorists whom Israel first had experience in combatting in the 1970s).
    
    I repeat – if this was just Gaza there would not be a problem. But here (for once) Nico’s comments are instructive – notice that he does NOT say “the Muslims just want to be left to live in peace in Gaza” – on the contrary it is clear that his aim is the extermination of Israel (in total). All I am asking is for the government of Israel to wake up and to take people such as Nico seriously – for example for the Prime Minster of Israel to remember who his own brother died fighting.
    
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  4. Nico Metten
    
    August 25, 2014 at 9:03 pm
    
    You are so full of hatred of arabs, it is scary. Nowhere have I suggested to get rid of Israel, if that means getting rid of the Jews there. I want to get rid of discrimination and statism. So yes, I am happy to see the state go, just like I am happy to see every other state go. And I do not accept the violation of people’s rights, just because I might not like their culture.
    Hamas is not an organisation that I have a lot of sympathy for. But Hams officially excepts the existence of Israel. The main demand from these rockets is to end the blockade of gaze. Because gaza is a prison. That is collective punishment. People there cannot get out, even if they wanted to and they are prohibited from trading with the world.
    
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  5. Paul Marks
    
    August 25, 2014 at 9:50 pm
    
    Your false statements continue Nico.
    
    The ideology of Islam is not an ethnic group called “Arabs”. Indeed most Christians (and many Jews) in the area are clearly Arabic.
    
    As for your claim that Hamas accepts the continuation of Israel – this is just another of your false statements.
    
    Lastly your claim to oppose “discrimination” would be amusing if it was not so tragic – discrimination being (of course) part of the essence of Islam (and Islamic groups such as Hamas).
    
    It is quite true that a libertarian defends the right of private people and business enterprises to discriminate (that is part of freedom – which includes the freedom to make a commercial loss by such discrimination). But Islam goes rather further than that.
    
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  6. Nico Metten
    
    August 25, 2014 at 10:27 pm
    
    “The ideology of Islam is not an ethnic group called “Arabs”. Indeed most Christians (and many Jews) in the area are clearly Arabic.”
    
    Israeli law certainly sees jews and Palestinians as two ethnic groups and gives them different rights. Therefore it is racist. Racism is rarely based on facts but on perception.
    
    “As for your claim that Hamas accepts the continuation of Israel – this is just another of your false statements.”
    
    The only one who constantly makes false statements is you. Since 2006 Hamas has declared on numerous occasions that they would accept Israel in its 1967 borders if they let the refugees back in. Hamas has never said that its aim is to kill all jews.
    
    “Lastly your claim to oppose “discrimination” would be amusing if it was not so tragic – discrimination being (of course) part of the essence of Islam (and Islamic groups such as Hamas).
    It is quite true that a libertarian defends the right of private people and business enterprises to discriminate (that is part of freedom – which includes the freedom to make a commercial loss by such discrimination). But Islam goes rather further than that.”
    
    That is a straw-man. We are arguing here in the context of political discrimination.
    
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Paul Marks

August 23, 2014 at 9:39 pm

I was civil Simon – you did not see the first draft. The first draft was still accurate – but not civil.

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