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5th December 2017, 01:28 PM | #1 |
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Three Orthodox Jews and a Coptic Christian walk into a Levantine Bar
The three orthodox jews are Jared Kushner, Jason Greenblatt and David Friedman, the coptic christian is Dina Powell. They make up the team Trump assigned to the task of making the "ultimate deal" in the Palestine/Israel issue, and Kushner joked about that himself at the Haim Saban Forum a few days ago.
Now it's rumoured for a few days that Trump will announce to recognize Jerusalem as capital of Israel, which is against conventions the UN and the international community have established since the late 60s. Tel Aviv is the capital of Israel. This has been met with warnings and loud protests from almost every capital in the region (except Tel Aviv of course), with hothead Erdogan saying that such a decision would be "a catastrophe for all mankind" and all hell would break loose. Yesterday Trump had telephone calls with some regional leaders including Netanyahoo and Abbas, and today it is reported that Abbas said that he was told Trump will move the US embassy to Jerusalem and announce it this week. Which is by far not as extreme a measure as recognizing the city as capital. So this shall be a thread about the efforts of the Trump administration to solve the Israel/Palestine issue and the effects caused by them. |
5th December 2017, 01:34 PM | #2 |
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5th December 2017, 01:39 PM | #3 |
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5th December 2017, 01:43 PM | #4 |
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I read it. It's typical Trump talk (via Jared, this time) on any issue. "I have the best plan, but I can't tell you anything about it but believe me it is the best plan ever and I will get it done because I am the best negotiator in the history of the planet."
As I said there's nothing there yet. |
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5th December 2017, 01:47 PM | #5 |
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5th December 2017, 01:51 PM | #6 |
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Sorry, my bad. When you said you wanted to discuss the efforts of the Trump administration, I didn't know you wanted guessing on what they are GOING to do.
Don't worry, it won't be dominating the news for at least a few days. There's a female entertainer being accused of sexual harassment, that's good for a few more days, even though I've never heard of her. |
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5th December 2017, 01:55 PM | #7 |
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5th December 2017, 01:59 PM | #8 |
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Who is General Failure? And why is he reading my hard drive? ...love and buttercakes... |
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5th December 2017, 02:12 PM | #9 |
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Well, there's this: Jared Kushner Failed to Disclose He Led a Foundation Funding Illegal Israeli Settlements Before U.N. Vote
Originally Posted by Newsweek
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5th December 2017, 02:17 PM | #10 |
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5th December 2017, 02:27 PM | #11 |
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5th December 2017, 02:37 PM | #12 |
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My guess is that some Fundamentalist nutjob in the administration has suggested that they should just rebuild Solomon's Temple so that Jesus will come back and solve everything...
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5th December 2017, 02:46 PM | #13 |
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5th December 2017, 03:04 PM | #14 |
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5th December 2017, 03:33 PM | #15 |
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Trump risks backlash as he prepares to recognise Jerusalem as Israel's capital
Quote:
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5th December 2017, 03:34 PM | #16 |
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5th December 2017, 03:45 PM | #17 |
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Who is General Failure? And why is he reading my hard drive? ...love and buttercakes... |
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5th December 2017, 04:47 PM | #18 |
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5th December 2017, 05:49 PM | #19 |
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Last time I checked, you didn't get people on your side by pissing them off first.
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5th December 2017, 06:58 PM | #20 |
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That would certainly explain my lack of sympathy for the Palestinians.
But it doesn't really explain Japan. We interfered in their empire building and slapped them with punishing sanctions. We nuked them--twice!--invaded and occupied, imposed martial law... And somehow this all transformed them into one of America's closest allies. |
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6th December 2017, 12:40 AM | #21 |
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And?
Yes, the Israelis have housed the Knesset and most of the ministries in Jerusalem; but who could stop them? That is quite another matter than that other states recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. And the USA moving their embassy to Jerusalem comes very, very close to a formal recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital. (of course, to put a fine line on it, the capital is not necessarily the government's seat). Walking roughshod over the Jerusalem question, as well as, in case of the UN resolution, the settlements question, makes that Trump has pissed off the Palestinians in two of the three stumbling blocks (the third being the right of return) in previous peace talks. |
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6th December 2017, 04:02 AM | #22 |
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6th December 2017, 04:08 AM | #23 |
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Why is it even up to Trump to have a preference? Isn't that an Israeli issue?
ETA: I know it's sensitive. I'm not a fan of Israeli overreach. But IMO the Palestinians are not very far along in the process of forming a state. They are fixated on injustices of which there have been many, but it doesn't seem to help them get their act together politically. Israeli Jews knew how to go about forming a nation. I don't think Arabs in the area had much experience of that. |
6th December 2017, 04:30 AM | #24 |
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Yea it is almost as if the decades it has been since they had things like function infrastructure matter. Kudos on Isreal though they have managed to get to the point where fewer and fewer people can remember the last day that they had power for 24 continuous hours.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed...820-story.html And we can forget about closing the settlements those are here to stay forever, to large a percentage of the Israeli population lives in them. So we can finally accept that this two state solution is never going to happen and it is political fiction. As I see it the only solutions are ethnic cleansing or formal apartheid. |
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6th December 2017, 05:47 AM | #25 |
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6th December 2017, 06:40 AM | #26 |
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If this whole affair goes bad, how long will it be before Trump denies involvement and blames it all on Jared?
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6th December 2017, 07:37 AM | #27 |
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6th December 2017, 09:38 AM | #28 |
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A collection of statements: World unites to condemn Trump over Jerusalem/Al-Quds scandal
Trump statement expected for 1 pm EST today. |
6th December 2017, 10:11 AM | #29 |
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6th December 2017, 10:42 AM | #30 |
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Netenyahu has repeatedly sworn on his mother's grave and evey other Jewish mother's grave that he will never accept a two-state solution, and he was one of those who called for Rabiln to be killed as a race-traitor for doing so. It's a founding principle of Likud and defines the Revisionists (who tried to kill ben Gurion for pretending to accept it).
Quote:
Another intifada would provide a welcome distraction for Netenyahu and Trump in difiicult times for them both. Just saying. |
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6th December 2017, 10:43 AM | #31 |
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Let's not forget that Trump is going to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. That is, the whole of Jerusalem, not "West Jerusalem". The eastern half of Jerusalem is occupied territory. Israel has annexed it as Israeli territory, but that's not recognized by anyone in the world. Moreover, since 1967 Israel has been expanding the city limits of Jerusalem. Israel has been building Jewish settlements (i.e., settlements for Jewish Israelis) in East Jerusalem, and they've been pulling all kind of tricks on the inhabitants of East Jerusalem to drive them out. These are all so-called "facts on the ground" that Israel creates in order to let the Palestinians have even less than the 22% of former Mandate Palestine that the West Bank and Gaza constitute.
When Trump recognizes Jerusalem as Israel's capital, he de facto also recognizes the annexation of East Jerusalem and endorses these policies. |
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6th December 2017, 10:47 AM | #32 |
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The Israelis declared Jerusalem as their capital decades ago. West Jerusalem is their official seat of government. However, East Jerusalem is not officially recognized by the international community as Israeli territory. Trump's preference breaks with international convention, but agrees with the official Israeli position on Jerusalem.
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6th December 2017, 10:55 AM | #33 |
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The matter is that
I heard today on the radio that apparently, Congress had already passed a law that the USA should move its embassy to Jerusalem, during the Clinton years. However, the law had a loophole, and Clinton, Bush the Lesser and Obama all dutifully signed a waiver each six month to postpone implementing the law. The only upside to this, as I can see it, is that never again any Arab nation or the Palestinians will view the USA as a honest peace broker. Of course, it never was. |
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6th December 2017, 11:05 AM | #34 |
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Not quite the only country. Israel also recognizes Jerusalem as their capital.
Quote:
Quote:
But maybe that's an oversimplification. The US goes through a rolling regime change on a 4-8 year cycle. Each previous president has declined to recognize Jerusalem, and waived the legislature's requirement to put the embassy there. Each President has taken their own approach to brokering peace. I think that it's more reasonable and accurate to say that each successive US president may or may not be seen as an honest peace broker, depending on how they act towards the peace process. It's not really correct to refer to the US as a whole in this context, as if it were a monolithic entity with a consistent long-term executive branch policy. Things vary greatly from president to president. I know it's fashionable to blame Trump for everything, and prophesy the direst possible consequences for every little thing he does. But it's probably not correct to say that because of this, other stakeholders will never see the US as an honest broker in the peace process. I think that the leaders in the region probably understand that each president must be dealt with on his own terms. |
6th December 2017, 11:06 AM | #35 |
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That word implies there was a Temple of Solomon in the first place. There's not a shred of evidence for that; in fact, all archaeological evidence points to Jerusalem only being a small village in "Solomon"'s times.
Would it really be beneficial to Israel or its leaders if five million US Jews would immigrate to Israel? In the 1940s and 1950s, the Mizrahim provided cheap labour that the Zionist founders found themselves too good for (and the Mossad helped a hand with that migration with bombing campaigns in Iraq and Egypt). Ditto the Russian Jews that migrated in the 1990s. But well-educated, good earning US Jews? They'd only be competition. |
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6th December 2017, 11:14 AM | #36 |
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Really? No, they don't recognize Jerusalem as their capital, they designate it. Recognition is for other countries.
You seem to have a problem with simple English words. A peace broker is a third party that helps to get a peace treaty. So obviously, the Palestinians cannot be a broker because they're one of the warring parties. Ditto for Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and a few other Arab states that are still at war with Israel from 1948 on. I bet that for many years, moving the embassy back to Tel Aviv (or any other place) will be a precondition for the Arab side to even try the USA as a broker. |
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6th December 2017, 11:19 AM | #37 | |||
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He did it. He unilaterally recognized Jerusalem as capital of Israel and announced to build a ("magnificent") US embassy there.
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6th December 2017, 12:14 PM | #38 |
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The new
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6th December 2017, 12:18 PM | #39 |
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6th December 2017, 12:33 PM | #40 |
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At least he explicitly mentioned the fact that there is a border dispute down the middle of Jerusalem and said the decision to recognize Jerusalem does not imply any position on how that dispute is to be resoved - i.e. he accepts the status quo that East Jerusalem is Palestinian.
Still wishy-washy and short on detail about future peace, except that Saudi Arabia looms large. |
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