3 hours ago, GammaGlobulin said:

Does Israel Have a ‘Right to Exist’?

NO.

Israel now has no rights, whatsoever.

Israel has intentionally given up its rights, after repeated military campaigns of GENOCIDE.

This should be clear as day.

And WHO should they blame?

Guys like This:

Guys like this make the Nazis look like Girl Scouts.

These guys have been brainwashed from a very early age.

They are no longer able to see reality, unfortunately.

More cerebral rot...

Are you suggesting 10 Million Israelis are forced to flee their homeland ?

Which ones would you have flee ???

- The 73% Jewish population.

- The 21% Arab (mostly Palestinian citizens of Israel - Nazareth, Haifa, Acre, Lod, Ramle, and other Arab-Majoritiy towns inside Israel)

- The ~6% others (Druze, Christians, and other minorities) ???

So - when you say Israel should not exist - where should the 21% Israel Arabs move to ??? or are you suggesting they can stay, but the Jews and Druze and Christians have to flee to other nations ?

23 hours ago, JBChiangRai said:

I think Israel has a right to exist but it MUST share the land with Palestinians as per the original Balfour Declaration.

Palestinians have rejected every effort to share the land.
Palestinians want ALL of the land!

5 hours ago, WDSmart said:

Israel, as a Jewish state, does have the right to exist. The current problem is just what Israel thinks "exist" means.

I believe Israel has the right to exist as a state in the portions of Palestine they were given in 1947 by the United Kingdom (which then “owned” the land) and the United Nations. I do not believe they have the right to exist as a state occupying all of Palestine, or any more territory than they were given in 1947.

Here is a map of how Israel has expanded its “right to exist" since then, and continues to do so today.

Source FourMaps.jpg (1800×1200)

Did history start in 1947 ??? Care to go back a little further...

Those maps always start in 1947 as if history began there - it didn’t.

Jewish presence in the region goes back thousands of years. The kingdoms of King David and King Solomon were early Israelite states - the foundation of Jewish identity - and later the Hasmonean Kingdom was a fully recognised Jewish kingdom in historical terms. Jews remained in the region continuously, even as a minority, through successive empires.

By the late Ottoman and British Mandate for Palestine period, the area was not an independent Palestinian state but a territory with mixed populations, where Jewish immigration increased significantly - especially due to persecution in Europe. That immigration created tensions, but it wasn’t a case of a fully sovereign Palestinian country being taken over. The situation was already complex long before 1947.

The 1947 United Nations partition plan proposed two states - one Jewish and one Arab. That plan was accepted by Jewish leadership and rejected by Arab leadership, and the 1948 war followed. So the map changes after that aren’t the result of a one-sided process starting in 1947, but of a conflict rooted in competing claims, population shifts, and war.

https://preview.redd.it/people-seem-to-have-forgotten-history-israel-didnt-exist-v0-nk3t4e562ctb1.jpg?width=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=176bc233b920e73ec8af8de9b8806fb886fa230d

6 hours ago, WDSmart said:

ISource FourMaps.jpg (1800×1200)

That picture has been posted and debunked about 6 times already on this forum

7 hours ago, Bruce Aussie said:

Israel is a small country. Maybe problem could be solved easy America is huge. Make a state for the Inside the USA. The 51st state. Ben could be the VP and America will be able to leave the middle east 100% saving billions dollars every minute. Ask the muslins to go back to the middle east. Maybe give them the current Israel land as a carrot on a string. With this arrangement maybe Iran will give up nuclear weapon desires if Israel nuclear weapons moved to USA.

MAGA

Brilliant idea like the mormons have Utah. They could update the Old Testament with a nww chapter of how the Philistines ejected them from Caanan and God told them to cross the sea to the New World where he would build a new Jerusalem. Where though ? They already own most of New York.

17 hours ago, Hummin said:

Your version starts the story too late and turns Palestinian rejection into the cause of everything. The problem begins earlier, with British imperial betrayal. Britain encouraged Arab hopes of independence in return for helping crush the Ottoman Empire, then backed a Jewish national home in Palestine anyway, even though the Arab population was still the overwhelming majority. So this was never just a dispute between two equal sides over the same land. It was a colonial project advanced under imperial protection.

By 1947, partition was not experienced by Palestinians as some fair and generous compromise, but as the partition of their own country without their consent. Saying “the Arabs rejected partition” explains nothing unless you also admit why: they were being asked to accept the loss of land and sovereignty in a country where they were the majority.

And the refugee crisis was not simply an unfortunate byproduct of war. It was also shaped by expulsions, fear, massacres, and organized militia violence.

So no, this is not just a story of one side accepting peace and the other choosing war. It is also a story of colonial sponsorship, demographic transformation, dispossession, and state-building at another people’s expense.

Jewish suffering in Europe, including the Holocaust, was real and immense, but that does not erase the fact that Palestinians were the ones made to pay the price for Europe’s crimes.

Jewish history under Muslim and Ottoman rule was often very different from the European history of exterminatory antisemitism, even if it was not free of persecution. That matters, because it undermines the idea that Palestine simply had to be turned into the answer to Europe’s crimes. Ukraine is defending itself within its own borders. Palestinians were asked to accept the loss of their homeland under a colonial framework they never agreed to. That is why the comparison does not rescue Israel’s history — it exposes the difference.

Your analysis is good. A few points to add:

1) European Jews began acquiring land from absentee Turkish landowners at the end of the 19th C. This land was being farmed by Palestian tenants. After purchase, the new owners expelled the tenants. This same practice continued in the 1920s when Jewish immigration accelerated. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1936-1939_Arab_revolt_in_Palestine (see section "Economic background") The whole article is worth reading for understanding how the Balfour Declaration and the promises to the Arabs during World War 1 evolved into a one-sided policy favoring the Zionist cause.

2) From 1947 there was a violent campaign to ethnically cleanse Palestinians by murder and intimidation. Search term "role of Haganah in 1947 ethnic cleansing of Palestinians" AI Overview: "The Haganah, the largest paramilitary organization of the Jewish community (Yishuv) in Palestine and forerunner to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), played the central role in the 1947–1948 military campaigns that led to the displacement of over 700,000 Palestinians—an event known as the Nakba (Catastrophe). From late 1947 through 1948, the Haganah transitioned from a defensive militia to an offensive force, implementing systematic plans to capture territory and expel, or cause the flight of, the Palestinian population." The AI overview continues with interesting detail.

3) Orde Wingate, a British army officer and a Christian Zionist played a role during the Mandate in suppressing Palestinian resistance to the settlers and disarming the Palestinian population, including by organizing an running the notorious Special Night Squads. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Night_Squads

In this fascinating history of Wingate, the paragraph beginning with "Three years later, in September, 1936" recounts the very significant three years that Wingate played in training the Haganah militia. https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/orde-wingate-always-audacious/

This is a quote from the above link, just at the end of the history of Wingate's three years in Palestine. Through comments by important Israelis who knew him and by a later historian, this text shows his enduring, important legacy in Israel's military:

"Wingate could console himself with the thought that he had left an indelible mark on the future Jewish state, including on its military leaders. Moshe Dayan, the future head of Israel Defence Forces (IDF), was one of his disciples.

‘Wingate was the father of the IDF,’ says Michael Oren, the Israeli historian and former ambassador to the US. ‘The IDF today remains Wingatean in terms of its tactics.’

David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first president, thought that his English friend, who he met when then-Captain Wingate was posted to Palestine in 1936, might even have become the IDF’s first chief of staff had he lived, an extraordinary prospect for a Christian, no less a Briton. Edwin Samuel, who went on to become the last director of the Palestine Broadcasting Service after the Second World War, goes further. Wingate’s death, he wrote, ‘materially affected the course of Jewish history’, for had he lived, ‘I doubt if the boundary lines of modern day Israel would be those now in existence.’

Wingate took his passion for the Jewish people and the Zionist cause back with him to England, where he bombarded his superiors with proposals for a Jewish army that would rule over Palestine for the Crown, further ensuring that he would be forgotten."

53 minutes ago, richard_smith237 said:

More cerebral rot...

Are you suggesting 10 Million Israelis are forced to flee their homeland ?

Which ones would you have flee ???

- The 73% Jewish population.

- The 21% Arab (mostly Palestinian citizens of Israel - Nazareth, Haifa, Acre, Lod, Ramle, and other Arab-Majoritiy towns inside Israel)

- The ~6% others (Druze, Christians, and other minorities) ???

So - when you say Israel should not exist - where should the 21% Israel Arabs move to ??? or are you suggesting they can stay, but the Jews and Druze and Christians have to flee to other nations ?

No they get to havea choice to live in a democratic one state solution and if the nut jobs keep wanging on about the promised land and such they get deported to this new state we are plnning in the US - see above.

Israel is a small country. Maybe problem could be solved easy America is huge. Make a state for the Inside the USA. The 51st state. Ben could be the VP and America will be able to leave the middle east 100% saving billions dollars every minute. Ask the muslins to go back to the middle east. Maybe give them the current Israel land as a carrot on a string. With this arrangement maybe Iran will give up nuclear weapon desires if Israel nuclear weapons moved to USA.

MAGA

1 hour ago, richard_smith237 said:

More cerebral rot...

Are you suggesting 10 Million Israelis are forced to flee their homeland ?

Which ones would you have flee ???

- The 73% Jewish population.

- The 21% Arab (mostly Palestinian citizens of Israel - Nazareth, Haifa, Acre, Lod, Ramle, and other Arab-Majoritiy towns inside Israel)

- The ~6% others (Druze, Christians, and other minorities) ???

So - when you say Israel should not exist - where should the 21% Israel Arabs move to ??? or are you suggesting they can stay, but the Jews and Druze and Christians have to flee to other nations ?

4 minutes ago, beautifulthailand99 said:

No they get to havea choice to live in a democratic one state solution and if the nut jobs keep wanging on about the promised land and such they get deported to this new state we are plnning in the US - see above.

That is a cunning plan to end Israels existance , but I doubt the Jews would fall for it

USA could take them, more illegals going to deported than the Israel population. That way Trump and Netanyaha can share an office. Remove all US military troops and base back to USA.

The terrible trillions of America debt will decrease quicky if the billionaires in charge don't steal it.

8 hours ago, Bruce Aussie said:

Israel is a small country. Maybe problem could be solved easy America is huge. Make a state for the Inside the USA. The 51st state. Ben could be the VP and America will be able to leave the middle east 100% saving billions dollars every minute. Ask the muslins to go back to the middle east. Maybe give them the current Israel land as a carrot on a string. With this arrangement maybe Iran will give up nuclear weapon desires if Israel nuclear weapons moved to USA.

MAGA

Sorry, could you repeat that , I didnt quite hear what you said

11 minutes ago, Bruce Aussie said:

Israel is a small country. Maybe problem could be solved easy America is huge. Make a state for the Inside the USA. The 51st state. Ben could be the VP and America will be able to leave the middle east 100% saving billions dollars every minute. Ask the muslins to go back to the middle east. Maybe give them the current Israel land as a carrot on a string. With this arrangement maybe Iran will give up nuclear weapon desires if Israel nuclear weapons moved to USA.

MAGA

Thanks

This needs to be read by all concerned.

Political History of Palestine under British Administration – UK memorandum

https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-185776/

5 minutes ago, Jeff the Chef said:

This needs to be read by all concerned.

Political History of Palestine under British Administration – UK memorandum

https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-185776/

Australia is just 47 years older than Israel

37 minutes ago, richard_smith237 said:

Did history start in 1947 ??? Care to go back a little further...

Those maps always start in 1947 as if history began there - it didn’t.

Jewish presence in the region goes back thousands of years. The kingdoms of King David and King Solomon were early Israelite states - the foundation of Jewish identity - and later the Hasmonean Kingdom was a fully recognised Jewish kingdom in historical terms. Jews remained in the region continuously, even as a minority, through successive empires.

By the late Ottoman and British Mandate for Palestine period, the area was not an independent Palestinian state but a territory with mixed populations, where Jewish immigration increased significantly - especially due to persecution in Europe. That immigration created tensions, but it wasn’t a case of a fully sovereign Palestinian country being taken over. The situation was already complex long before 1947.

The 1947 United Nations partition plan proposed two states - one Jewish and one Arab. That plan was accepted by Jewish leadership and rejected by Arab leadership, and the 1948 war followed. So the map changes after that aren’t the result of a one-sided process starting in 1947, but of a conflict rooted in competing claims, population shifts, and war.

https://preview.redd.it/people-seem-to-have-forgotten-history-israel-didnt-exist-v0-nk3t4e562ctb1.jpg?width=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=176bc233b920e73ec8af8de9b8806fb886fa230d

The background of the UN decision is interesting. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-state_solution#Establishment_of_Israel See the last paragraph in the section "Ottoman and later British control" The Arabs were willing to have a one-state solution, not involving expulsion of the Jewish immigrants.

The preceding Ottoman Empire was divided between the French and British. There was neither a Palestinian nor a Jewish state. Some Zionists favored a one-state solution prior to 1947.

It might be enlightening to dig up some Palestinian Christian and Jewish burials from around 800 AD to do DNA testing to see what are the differences, if any, between the two populations. For the Palestinian sampling, the bodies displaced from a 1000-year old cemetery might be useful since the geneologies of some families were well-established, so local Palestinians might be distinguished from descendants of the armies that arrived in 636 AD. As for Jews, presumably by 800 some would have been buried around Jerusalem, since it was the Muslims who allowed Jews again to live in Jerusalem after 638. Excavating ancient burials would probably be controversial not only for religious reasons; genetic closeness might imply that today's Palestinian Muslims are descended from both Christians and Jews.

On 4/6/2026 at 4:52 PM, JBChiangRai said:

I think Israel has a right to exist but it MUST share the land with Palestinians as per the original Balfour Declaration.

Whether it's one or two states, Israel must be obliged to end apartheid completely. A written constitution with minority safeguards would be prudent.

1 minute ago, placnx said:

Whether it's one or two states, Israel must be obliged to end apartheid completely. A written constitution with minority safeguards would be prudent.

Who is going to oblige them or the Palestinians to do anything? You?

1 hour ago, Bruce Aussie said:

USA could take them, more illegals going to deported than the Israel population. That way Trump and Netanyaha can share an office. Remove all US military troops and base back to USA.

The terrible trillions of America debt will decrease quicky if the billionaires in charge don't steal it.

That idea is INSANE.

21 hours ago, richard_smith237 said:

If only someone suggested someting such as a 'two state solution' that both sides would accept.

Netanyahu has ruled out a two-state solution for years, and the people kept electing him. The Saudis proposed a two-state solution in 2002, and Babybush and the Israeli government ignored it.

4 minutes ago, placnx said:

Netanyahu has ruled out a two-state solution for years, and the people kept electing him. The Saudis proposed a two-state solution in 2002, and Babybush and the Israeli government ignored it.

That’s a bit of a mixed bag - there are some truths in what you’re saying, but also a few oversimplifications.

It’s fair to say that in recent years Benjamin Netanyahu has been opposed to a two-state solution, especially with his current and recent governments. But it’s not accurate to say he’s ruled it out consistently “for years” without exception.

Back in 2009 he actually endorsed the idea of a demilitarised Palestinian state (with a lot of conditions), and since then his position has shifted depending on politics and coalition pressures.

Yes, he’s been repeatedly elected or remained in power, but that’s not quite the same as people directly voting for him personally. Israel uses a proportional system, so governments are built through coalitions. His longevity is as much about political alliances as it is about public support.

Your comment on the Saudi proposal is basically correct. The 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, led by Saudi Arabia, did propose a two-state solution based on roughly 1967 borders in exchange for full normalisation with the Arab world.

Where it gets a bit off is saying George W. Bush “ignored it”. The US didn’t adopt the Saudi plan, but it wasn’t ignored either. Bush publicly supported the idea of a two-state solution and pushed his own “Roadmap for Peace” around the same time. So it’s more accurate to say the US acknowledged the Saudi initiative but chose a different route.

Thus: in short:

- Saudi plan - real and broadly as your described

- Israel - didn’t accept it, but they didn't just “ignore" it either.

- Netanyahu - currently anti two-state, but historically more nuanced (on this later)**

- Bush - didn’t ignore it, just didn’t prioritise it

It’s a more complicated picture than the one-liner version - and thats why these debates keep on going - people seem not to have the patience to assimilate and track the detailed nuance... its easier to paste memes and one liners.

**On the Two State solution in the current cliamate: It would be dangerous, not because of the idea itself but because of the current reality on the ground and thats easy for anyone to recognises.

You’d likely create a security vacuum in the West Bank where groups like Hamas could expand, especially given how weak and unpopular the Palestinian Authority currently is.

Israel would also face major internal unrest over settlements, and any deal would almost certainly trigger attempts by extremists on both sides to derail it with violence. On top of that, the core issues - borders, Jerusalem, refugees - are nowhere near resolved. In this environment, pushing ahead now risks creating another unstable, hostile entity rather than a peaceful neighbour, which makes it a high-risk move in the short term even if people argue it could have long-term benefits.

Again - more nuance than the one liners and memes allow for.

1 hour ago, placnx said:

Whether it's one or two states, Israel must be obliged to end apartheid completely. A written constitution with minority safeguards would be prudent.

Would needs to be done to put an end to apartheid ?

What does Israel need to do ?

8 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

We don't want the extremist orthodox in the US. No extremists from any faith. They are all liabilities.

Extremist Orthodox don't go around blowing up kids at music concerts, or driving cars through crowds at Christmas markets.

There are different levels of 'liabilities'.

11 hours ago, Chomper Higgot said:

I’m not sure what that’s about, nor I expect are you.

Should I uses crayons to dumb it down for you?

57 minutes ago, Nick Carter icp said:

Would needs to be done to put an end to apartheid ?

What does Israel need to do ?

A secular government would be a start.

I can’t think of any country that’s non-secular that doesn’t have problems.

There should always be an impenetrable wall between church and state.

9 hours ago, Thingamabob said:

United Nations General Assembly, Resolution181, adopted on November 29, 1947, provided for the creation of Israel, and formally recognized Israel's legitimacy and independence.

It provided for two states. The violent campaign of ethnic cleansing, called the Nakba in Arabic, did not promote acceptance of Israel's independence declaration, so a war resolved the border issue, which ended up taking 60% of the territory envisaged for the state of Palestine. Jerusalem would have been shared under the UN plan, but Israel could not take on the Jordanian army, so it let the Jordanians have the West Bank and East Jerusalem (until 1967, when King Hussein dumbly believed Egyptian propaganda that Nasser was winning, and joined the conflict. The rest is history).

6 hours ago, Purdey said:

Israel's borders have not been fully and officially defined or internationally recognized in their entirety, representing a 75-year-old issue marked by "strategic ambiguity," wars, and temporary armistice lines. While Israel has formal, treaty-based borders with two neighboring countries (Egypt and Jordan), its borders with Syria and Lebanon, as well as the borders of the Palestinian territories, remain contested or unfinalized.

There's a whole Wikipedia page about this.

The borders were defined in 1947 under the UN Partition Plan, but that area was significantly less than the pre-1967 borders. In Israel's Declaration of Independence an earlier draft referred to the 1947 plan, but that was dropped in the final text.

5 hours ago, Thingamabob said:

Israel has good working relationships with both the USA, and with it's Arab neighbours.

Are you JOKING?

Talk about a fantastical hallucination.

It is incredible just how OUT OF TOUCH one must be to actually even slightly believe the statement: "Israel has good working relationships with both the USA, and with it's Arab neighbors."

Israel has been bombing their neighbors for decades.

They have been exterminating their Arab neighbors.

This is the most FANTASTICAL STATEMENT I have heard this year.....that Israel has a good working relationship with ANYBODY, these days.

5 hours ago, richard_smith237 said:

More cerebral rot...

Are you suggesting 10 Million Israelis are forced to flee their homeland ?

Which ones would you have flee ???

- The 73% Jewish population.

- The 21% Arab (mostly Palestinian citizens of Israel - Nazareth, Haifa, Acre, Lod, Ramle, and other Arab-Majoritiy towns inside Israel)

- The ~6% others (Druze, Christians, and other minorities) ???

So - when you say Israel should not exist - where should the 21% Israel Arabs move to ??? or are you suggesting they can stay, but the Jews and Druze and Christians have to flee to other nations ?

10 Million is fine.

The USA can easily accommodate that tiny number.

All will be welcome in Michigan.

Or, if they prefer Miami and Florida...then that is FINE BY ME....for sure.....

Just get them out of the ME, so that the world can feel a heck of a lot safer, and happier....PDQ....

9 hours ago, Hanaguma said:

You need to remember that Israel 'exists' on all of 1-2% of the land area of the Middle East. The other 98% are Muslim lands, many of which expelled their Jewish populations in the 1940s-60s. So to be fair, the Jews expelled should ALSO have the "right to return" to their former homes, reclaim the property and wealth that was stolen from them, etc.

It is a deliberately loaded question. And even worse are the tools who start their diatribes with, "of course Israel has a right to exist...." Well, how magnanimous of you! Now ask that of Bangladesh, Pakistan, Serbia, and any of the other myriad countries created in the aftermath of WW2.

It's not that simple. Many of these countries were colonized, and any Jews who settled there in the colonial vanguard should have no more right than any other colonial to remain.

5 hours ago, Thingamabob said:

We shall see. Israel has good working relationships with both the USA, and with it's Arab neighbours. It views the regime in Iran as it's main threat, with people such as yourself as a remote annoyances. I suspect Israel will survive long into the distant future.

Israel is fast losing it's relationships in the Middle East. This special military operation in Iran has predictably brought huge damage to the GCC, and it's not over yet.

There's a Jew enclave is Eastern Russia that was established in the 1930s. Send the Jewry that don't want to stay to there, and have the UN remap the area as Palestine without interference from any vermin. 🙂 Such a pity that wasn't done in 1947.

The way the future of Israel may well playout, that might be the Jew's best option. They may be begging for a cattle train to Russia's far East within the next 2 decades.