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Savopia wrote:
For the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David.
1O Lord, You have searched me and known me.
2You know my sitting down and my rising up;
You understand my thought afar off.
3You comprehend my path and my lying down,
And are acquainted with all my ways.
4For there is not a word on my tongue,
But behold, O Lord, You know it altogether.
5You have hedged me behind and before,
And laid Your hand upon me.
6Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
It is high, I cannot attain it.
7Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Or where can I flee from Your presence?
8If I ascend into heaven, You are there;
If I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there.
9If I take the wings of the morning,
And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
10Even there Your hand shall lead me,
And Your right hand shall hold me.
11If I say, “Surely the darkness shall fall on me,”
Even the night shall be light about me;
12Indeed, the darkness shall not hide from You,
But the night shines as the day;
The darkness and the light are both alike to You.
13For You formed my inward parts;
You covered me in my mother’s womb.
14I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Marvelous are Your works,
And that my soul knows very well.
15My frame was not hidden from You,
When I was made in secret,
And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
16Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.
And in Your book they all were written,
The days fashioned for me,
When as yet there were none of them.

17How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God!
How great is the sum of them!
18If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand;
When I awake, I am still with You.
19Oh, that You would slay the wicked, O God!
Depart from me, therefore, you bloodthirsty men.
20For they speak against You wickedly;
Your enemies take Your name in vain.
21Do I not hate them, O Lord, who hate You?
And do I not loathe those who rise up against You?
22I hate them with perfect hatred;
I count them my enemies.
23Search me, O God, and know my heart;
Try me, and know my anxieties;
24And see if there is any wicked way in me,
And lead me in the way everlasting.

My favorite verse on this issue and others like it does not have anything to do with children, but the fight itself. I did not stumble on it until fairly recently, but it resonates.

10 If you faint in the day of adversity,
your strength is small.

11 Rescue those who are being taken away to death;
hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.

12 If you say, “Behold, we did not know this,”
does not he who weighs the heart perceive it?

Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it,
and will he not repay man according to his work?

Culture of Life, Horatius Cocles, Savopia, Phydios, and 1 otherNew waldensia

Wooloo diplomat

HEEy Wooloos here thanks for building embassies

Roborian wrote:My favorite verse on this issue and others like it does not have anything to do with children, but the fight itself. I did not stumble on it until fairly recently, but it resonates.

10 If you faint in the day of adversity,
your strength is small.

11 Rescue those who are being taken away to death;
hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.

12 If you say, “Behold, we did not know this,”
does not he who weighs the heart perceive it?

Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it,
and will he not repay man according to his work?

Wow. All glory to the Most High!

Wooloo diplomat

Do you have a discord or anything?

Wooloo diplomat wrote:Do you have a discord or anything?

They do indeed have a discord channel; I believe the link's in the WFE.

Wooloo diplomat

Savopia wrote:They do indeed have a discord channel; I believe the link's in the WFE.

Thank you!

Savopia

For pro-life vs pro-choice debates out in the open, I'd encourage you all to check out Apologia Studios on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCK9RJwC7Er16-Y8dvIQ-3tw). A highlight of some of their works can be seen through here (https://youtu.be/RCJ9daoMSgg). May you who watch these be strengthened greatly by God to stand for righteousness in Christ no matter what the world brings against us.

Phydios and New waldensia

Wooloo diplomat

Savopia wrote:For pro-life vs pro-choice debates out in the open, I'd encourage you all to check out Apologia Studios on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCK9RJwC7Er16-Y8dvIQ-3tw). A highlight of some of their works can be seen through here (https://youtu.be/RCJ9daoMSgg). May you who watch these be strengthened greatly by God to stand for righteousness in Christ no matter what the world brings against us.

I will take a look at this

La france bonapartiste

Horatius Cocles wrote:My post showed that Israel is an ethnostate, therefore it is an apartheid state.

The two are not the same. You can quote a hundred different political figures, but that does not make what they say true, just because of who they are or the very fact that they said it. It is rhetorical, and not factual.

An ethnocracy is a state in which political power is held by a dominant ethnic group; an apartheid state is one in which segregation and racial discrimination are enshrined in law. The two are completely different.

Horatius Cocles wrote:You are unable to be full members of society when 20 percent of the people are disenfranchised, per the Nation-State Law.

They are not disenfranchised. They have the right to vote. You keep misappropriating words that have a real and definite meaning and using them as a rhetorical device. That is no basis for a rational discussion.

Horatius Cocles wrote:[. . .]Desmond Tutu flatly stated that the same thing was happening in Israel, which you failed to quote.

I did not fail to quote it, it is irrelevant. Just because someone says something out loud does not make it true. I have asked for facts and evidence, not opinions.

Horatius Cocles wrote:If Israeli Arabs were treated equally, there'd be no need for Arab members of parliament to submit a bill calling for Israel to treat its Arab and Jewish citizens equally.

You're putting a lot of unjustifiable weight in the face value of what people say in public. Just because someone proposes a bill or comments on something in the press, does not mean that any of the things they say are true. If I were a member of a legislature, and I put forward a bill demanding that the legislature verify that the sky was purple, does that make it fact? No.

Horatius Cocles wrote:I've previously linked to the non-equal treatment of non-Jews before.

You have linked to evidence that Israel maintains a border and immigration restrictions with a foreign country. You have not provided any evidence of oppression within its own borders towards its own citizens, other than the rhetorical statements of politicians and general declarations of law stating the obvious, that Israel is a Jewish state.

Papal knights

La france bonapartiste

Roborian wrote:True enough-but then, we don't still define the political right and left wings based on French Revolution alignments. Political terms tend to become generalized to some extent.

While the political factions during the French Revolution no longer exist, the left-right paradigm has not changed. The terms that emerged in further clarification, during the 1848 Revolutions, of radical, liberal, conservative, and reactionary, still remain as relevant today as 172 years ago.

Besides, the French Revolution occurred 231 years ago, apartheid ended 26 years ago. Even if I were to accept that basic words of political consequence can radically change meaning gradually over time, it has not been nearly long enough for that one very specific word, with a very specific cultural context, to change already and mean any kind of discrimination. It's like when people throw the word "fascism" or "Nazi" around to describe people they don't like. People cheapen the words by using them in inapplicable situations.

Lagrodia wrote:It’s very specific, but a moderate improvement, I suppose.

Specificity and accuracy often go hand-in-hand. Nuclear weapons were not used in the Holocaust, so I don't know why I would include their use in my definition of the term "Holocaust".

Lagrodia wrote:Maybe it does, but then you can’t use international law to defend Israel!

I guess I wasn't clear in what I was referring to. I meant that it's debatable that it "doesn't justify them violating international law", because it's arguable they are not violating international law at all. As I said earlier, the application of Article 49 of the Geneva Convention to Israel seems to be a bit of a stretch, and that seems to be the only consistent allegation against them viz-a-viz international law. So it's actually me using international law that causes me to say that. If they are justified in violating international law, that would itself mean that they are not violating international law. Just like a policeman is technically "breaking the law" if he commandeers your car to pursue a suspect. But because he had a legal justification, its permissible.

Lagrodia wrote:There is no true Scotsman.

I'm not sure what this is supposed to mean, in context.

Lagrodia wrote:This is probably true but it’s also an extraordinarily weak defense... if it even counts as such.

Pointing out that something does not meet the definition of apartheid is just about the strongest, most straightforward defense against a country being an apartheid state. It literally isn't the thing it's accused of being. I don't know how it could be stronger.

Papal knights

Your argument is an example of the No True Scotsman fallacy. Define the example specifically out of the definition so that the definition doesn’t apply. Sure, Israel may not literally be an Apartheid State, because it isn’t South Africa - but come on, isn’t it obvious that HC is talking about Israel being segregationist?

While it may be a decent defense on a purely semantic standpoint, it doesn’t really defend Israeli governance. It’s like if you said “Paul committed fratricide.” and I object that Paul actually committed sororicide because he killed his sister. Might be technically true, but, uh, Paul is still just as much of a scumbag either way.

La france bonapartiste wrote:The two are not the same. You can quote a hundred different political figures, but that does not make what they say true, just because of who they are or the very fact that they said it. It is rhetorical, and not factual.

An ethnocracy is a state in which political power is held by a dominant ethnic group; an apartheid state is one in which segregation and racial discrimination are enshrined in law. The two are completely different.

They are not disenfranchised. They have the right to vote. You keep misappropriating words that have a real and definite meaning and using them as a rhetorical device. That is no basis for a rational discussion.

I did not fail to quote it, it is irrelevant. Just because someone says something out loud does not make it true. I have asked for facts and evidence, not opinions.

You're putting a lot of unjustifiable weight in the face value of what people say in public. Just because someone proposes a bill or comments on something in the press, does not mean that any of the things they say are true. If I were a member of a legislature, and I put forward a bill demanding that the legislature verify that the sky was purple, does that make it fact? No.

You have linked to evidence that Israel maintains a border and immigration restrictions with a foreign country. You have not provided any evidence of oppression within its own borders towards its own citizens, other than the rhetorical statements of politicians and general declarations of law stating the obvious, that Israel is a Jewish state.

Definition of apartheid according to article II of the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (1973):

"For the purpose of the present Convention, the term "the crime of apartheid", which shall include similar policies and practices of racial segregation and discrimination as practiced in southern Africa, shall apply to the following inhuman acts committed for the purpose of establishing and maintaining domination by one racial group of persons over any other racial group of persons and systematically oppressing them:..."

Further, I previously linked to another UN report, which states the following:

"Although the term “apartheid” was originally associated with the specific instance of South Africa, it now represents a species of crime against humanity under customary international law and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, according to which:

“The crime of apartheid” means inhumane acts… committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime. Against that background, this report reflects the expert consensus that the prohibition of apartheid is universally applicable and was not rendered moot by the collapse of apartheid in South Africa and South West Africa (Namibia).

The choice of evidence is guided by the Apartheid Convention, which sets forth that the crime of apartheid consists of discrete inhuman acts, but that such acts acquire the status of crimes against humanity only if they intentionally serve the core purpose of racial domination. The Rome Statute specifies in its definition the presence of an “institutionalized regime” serving the “intention” of racial domination. Since “purpose” and “intention” lie at the core of both definitions, this report examines factors ostensibly separate from the Palestinian dimension — especially, the doctrine of Jewish statehood as expressed in law and the design of Israeli State institutions — to establish beyond doubt the presence of such a core purpose."

(a) Denial to a member or members of a racial group or groups of the right to life and liberty of person:
(i) By murder of members of a racial group or groups;
(ii) By the infliction upon the members of a racial group or groups of serious bodily or mental harm, by the infringement of their freedom or dignity, or by subjecting them to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment;
(iii) By arbitrary arrest and illegal imprisonment of the members of a racial group or groups;
(b) Deliberate imposition on a racial group or groups of living conditions calculated to cause its or their physical destruction in whole or in part;
(c) Any legislative measures and other measures calculated to prevent a racial group or groups from participation in the political, social, economic and cultural life of the country and the deliberate creation of conditions preventing the full development of such a group or groups, in particular by denying to members of a racial group or groups basic human rights and freedoms, including the right to work, the right to form recognized trade unions, the right to education, the right to leave and to return to their country, the right to a nationality, the right to freedom of movement and residence, the right to freedom of opinion and expression, and the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association;
d) Any measures including legislative measures, designed to divide the population along racial lines by the creation of separate reserves and ghettos for the members of a racial group or groups, the prohibition of mixed marriages among members of various racial groups, the expropriation of landed property belonging to a racial group or groups or to members thereof;
(e) Exploitation of the labour of the members of a racial group or groups, in particular by submitting them to forced labour;
(f) Persecution of organizations and persons, by depriving them of fundamental rights and freedoms, because they oppose apartheid.

I think all my previous posts have sufficiently established the above italicized points, whether through UN reports, the national security studies report from Tel Aviv, testimony of former Israeli FM Ben-Ami, third-party journalism etc. You have yet to give a counter-refutation, aside from dismissing all of the above as mere "rhetoric." When Desmond Tutu, who has given his life to anti-apartheid activism, states that Israel is practicing apartheid, are we to seriously believe that the man cannot believe his own eyes and is saying a falsehood? Of all men, he would know what apartheid practices look like, and he's called out Israel for it.

What seems so "obvious" that Israel is a "Jewish State" is the crux of the issue. As I pointed out earlier, when trying to balance democracy and Jewishness, Jewishness has always won at the Supreme Court. If the State of Israel (it's registered name at the UN) is only the state of and for Jews (as Netanyahu says), then it is inherently discriminatory, at minimum, towards all non-Jews (Arab, Christian, Druze, etc.) To be forever a "Jewish State" means you must permanently establish and maintain a Jewish majority. The establishing part happened prior to 1948, when the Zionists lobbied for extensive Jewish immigration to historic Palestine, as Jews were decidedly in the minority. This was followed up with forced expulsion, land seizure, and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, which is how the "Jewish majority" was established. To maintain the dominance of one group at the expense of others, Jews over all groups of people, is to enshrine in national law the privilege of one group over all others. And this is what the Nation-State Law has done. If you can explain how this doesn't meet the above definition of apartheid, I'm all ears.

As Prof. Oren Yiftachel states, "a hegemonic myth cultivated since the rise of Zionism that the land (ha’aretz) belongs solely to the Jewish people. An exclusive form of territorial ethnonationalism developed in order to quickly “indigenize” immigrant Jews and to conceal, trivialize or marginalize the existence of a Palestinian people on the land prior to the arrival of Zionist Jews."

This is not to mention the range of discriminatory policies imposed against the state’s Palestinian citizens, including imposition of military rule, lack of economic or social development, political surveillance and under-representation, and — most relevant to this discussion — large-scale confiscation of Palestinian land. (Citations can be provided, if requested).

La france bonapartiste

Horatius Cocles wrote:Definition of apartheid according to article II of the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (1973)[. . .]

The ICSPCA is not customary international law, due to its lack of widespread acceptance by the international community (most Western countries, the US, and Japan never ratified nor signed it), nor is Israel a signatory.

Horatius Cocles wrote:I think all my previous posts have sufficiently established the above italicized points, whether through UN reports, the national security studies report from Tel Aviv, testimony of former Israeli FM Ben-Ami, third-party journalism etc. You have yet to give a counter-refutation, aside from dismissing all of the above as mere "rhetoric."

I'm sorry, but my counter-argument is an extremely strong one. I don't need to discount any of your "evidence" because it is not evidence. It is obviously not evidence. You have not shown me one clear-cut example of Arab Israelis being discriminated against inside Israel, you have only given me rhetoric by politicians and laws which effect foreigners.

Horatius Cocles wrote:When Desmond Tutu, who has given his life to anti-apartheid activism, states that Israel is practicing apartheid, are we to seriously believe that the man cannot believe his own eyes and is saying a falsehood? Of all men, he would know what apartheid practices look like, and he's called out Israel for it.

He's a politician. Politicians have political agendas. They are perfectly willing to smudge, stretch, or ignore the truth in order to push that agenda. Israel maintained close relations with South Africa before the end of apartheid, so I'm sure that may come into play. Besides that basis for possible bias, he could merely be driven by emotion and not reason. If he is so convinced of it, let him cite the evidence which you apparently cannot or will not find.

Horatius Cocles wrote:What seems so "obvious" that Israel is a "Jewish State" is the crux of the issue.

Why is it that only the Jews have no right to a homeland? Isn't Palestine supposed to be the homeland of the Palestinians? Is that not discriminatory? Is Ireland not the nation of the Irish? Is Poland not the nation of the Polish? Is Greece not the nation of the Greeks? All over the world, nations exist, resting on the shoulders of a particular people. But yet, strangely, only in Israel are the Jews' desire for just such a homeland "discriminatory". It's nonsense.

Horatius Cocles wrote:[. . .]then it is inherently discriminatory, at minimum, towards all non-Jews (Arab, Christian, Druze, etc.)

Words cannot be inherently discriminatory. Discrimination is manifested by actions. I have asked for a law that, in its effect, prevents people from being able to be full-fledged members of society. I have no idea how recognizing Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people prevents anyone from carrying out their normal day-to-day lives.

Horatius Cocles wrote:And this is what the Nation-State Law has done. If you can explain how this doesn't meet the above definition of apartheid, I'm all ears.

I have not disputed that it could be fairly described as an ethnocracy. But that was never an issue, it's one you introduced later as proof of apartheid. But as I have plainly explained, apartheid and ethnocracy are not synonyms.

Horatius Cocles wrote:This is not to mention the range of discriminatory policies imposed against the state’s Palestinian citizens, including imposition of military rule, lack of economic or social development, political surveillance and under-representation, and — most relevant to this discussion — large-scale confiscation of Palestinian land. (Citations can be provided, if requested).

No need to provide citations since, as I have said repeatedly, Israel's policies towards Palestine are not, and never have been, at issue. We were discussing, again, the status of Arab Israelis in Israeli democratic society, and the alleged existence of an apartheid state.

Judah, Papal knights, and Phydios

La france bonapartiste

Lagrodia wrote:Your argument is an example of the No True Scotsman fallacy. Define the example specifically out of the definition so that the definition doesn’t apply. Sure, Israel may not literally be an Apartheid State, because it isn’t South Africa - but come on, isn’t it obvious that HC is talking about Israel being segregationist?

I didn't do that at all. I never said apartheid can only exist in South Africa. Merely that it has to look like the system that actually existed in South Africa. South Africa was a clearly delineated, brutal system. Unambiguous. I keep being presented with nebulous anecdotes by politicians about how Israel is "the bad guy", but no actual evidence of segregationism.

Lagrodia wrote:While it may be a decent defense on a purely semantic standpoint, it doesn’t really defend Israeli governance. It’s like if you said “Paul committed fratricide.” and I object that Paul actually committed sororicide because he killed his sister. Might be technically true, but, uh, Paul is still just as much of a scumbag either way.

Then adjust your accusations and I will defend against those. I cannot retort to arguments that have not been made. The weakness of the initial argument is not my responsibility, I can deal only with what is put before me. If someone is accused of a crime in a court of law, you merely need show that the evidence does not support the specific elements of that crime. You do not need to prove innocence, only refute evidence of guilt. It is the prosecutor, not the defense, who must prove his argument.

Papal knights

I'm not getting into the Israel debate, except to say that the idea of Israel as "a huge ghetto" is grossly inaccurate. MAD applies for Israel as much as for anyone, and God will not let His chosen people vanish from the earth. They've been oppressed, scattered, and even threatened with extinction many times throughout history- yet look at them now. God still isn't going to give up on them.

Judah, The Rouge Christmas State, and New waldensia

American antartica

Lagrodia wrote: No True Scotsman fallacy

Aye no TRUE Scotsman would dislike haggis, charge into battle with anything more than a sword a shield and atleast five thousand bagpipes playing as loud as possible and yell, "SCOTLAND FOREVER!" and be born already wearing a kilt!

If someone calls themselves a Scotsman but they do not do these things then they are not a TRUE Scotsman!

(This is a joke. Scottish people aren't this crazy. However I did try haggis once...)

La france bonapartiste

Because the forums seem very inactive, I'd like to ask a few questions about the Citizens' Assembly, directed towards anyone who is qualified to answer them:

1) Can assemblymen propose amendments to legislation originated in the Senate?
2) What kind of motions can be made in the Assembly? Have those rules been set up yet?
3) How many assemblymen are needed to reach quorum?

La france bonapartiste wrote:The ICSPCA is not customary international law, due to its lack of widespread acceptance by the international community (most Western countries, the US, and Japan never ratified nor signed it), nor is Israel a signatory.

I'm sorry, but my counter-argument is an extremely strong one. I don't need to discount any of your "evidence" because it is not evidence. It is obviously not evidence. You have not shown me one clear-cut example of Arab Israelis being discriminated against inside Israel, you have only given me rhetoric by politicians and laws which effect foreigners.

He's a politician. Politicians have political agendas. They are perfectly willing to smudge, stretch, or ignore the truth in order to push that agenda. Israel maintained close relations with South Africa before the end of apartheid, so I'm sure that may come into play. Besides that basis for possible bias, he could merely be driven by emotion and not reason. If he is so convinced of it, let him cite the evidence which you apparently cannot or will not find.

Why is it that only the Jews have no right to a homeland? Isn't Palestine supposed to be the homeland of the Palestinians? Is that not discriminatory? Is Ireland not the nation of the Irish? Is Poland not the nation of the Polish? Is Greece not the nation of the Greeks? All over the world, nations exist, resting on the shoulders of a particular people. But yet, strangely, only in Israel are the Jews' desire for just such a homeland "discriminatory". It's nonsense.

Words cannot be inherently discriminatory. Discrimination is manifested by actions. I have asked for a law that, in its effect, prevents people from being able to be full-fledged members of society. I have no idea how recognizing Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people prevents anyone from carrying out their normal day-to-day lives.

I have not disputed that it could be fairly described as an ethnocracy. But that was never an issue, it's one you introduced later as proof of apartheid. But as I have plainly explained, apartheid and ethnocracy are not synonyms.

No need to provide citations since, as I have said repeatedly, Israel's policies towards Palestine are not, and never have been, at issue. We were discussing, again, the status of Arab Israelis in Israeli democratic society, and the alleged existence of an apartheid state.

You say international community but then point to the Western countries. There are many UN documents that the US hasn't ratified, that doesn't make them not international law. As for Israel not being a signatory, that in way means that what the document defines and describes isn't what's happening on the ground. Israel isn't a signatory to the NPT, would you say that means it isn't "customary international law?" I stand by this definition, unless you can produce another one that has more "universal" acceptance. The Convention has 31 signatories and 107 parties.

I didn't say the Jews couldn't have a homeland at any point. I'm saying that unlike Poland, Ireland, and the other countries you mention, Israel is not the state of all it's citizens, only Jews. And therein lies the fundamental issue. Not that Jews don't deserve a home, but that they cannot continue regarding non-Jews as those with lesser privilege and rights in society. Poland does not say that Poland is only for the ethnic Poles and doesn't serve its other citizens, Israel does. If Israel treated all its citizens equally, Jew and non-Jew alike (there's even discrimination between the different kinds of Jews, for that matter), then I wouldn't have as much of a problem with Israel. But when you state that Israel is for Jews alone, that is like saying that America is for Christians alone and we don't have as much or any obligation to our other citizens. That's the fundamental problem. If Israel is exclusively for one class of people, as the PM said, then where does that leave the non-Jew? The definition of Israel as “the Jewish State” makes inequality a practical, political and ideological reality for Palestinian citizens of Israel, who are marginalized and discriminated against by the state on the basis of their national belonging and religious affiliation as non-Jews. The right to equality and freedom from discrimination is not explicitly enshrined in Israeli law as a constitutional right, nor is it protected by statute. The pairing of “Jewish” and “democratic” both codifies discrimination against non-Jewish citizens and impedes the realization of full equality. Israel downgraded the Arabic language from an official state language, promoted the creation of Jewish-only settlements as a national value funded by the state and defined national self-determination as “the unique right of the Jewish people”. It was passed with little more than a whimper outside of Israel.

During the dialogue, Committee Experts welcomed the efforts to include minorities in the civil service and action plans to close the gaps between minority and majority groups. At the same time, Israel was swiping away core citizen and fundamental rights of non-Jews who made up a large part of the population. Each such move seemed to be a part of a strategic plan to fragment the non-Jewish population, including through their strategic transfer, in violation of international law.

A Committee Expert said Israel continued to deny its responsibilities under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination for everyone under its jurisdiction, including non-Jews in Israel and the people in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem."

Abstract
Arabs in Israel are a heterogeneous but largely underprivileged minority with a history of disadvantage in several domains, including education and employment. In this paper, we document changes in their attainment of various educational levels across cohorts born from the mid-1920s to the 1970s. We make comparisons among different Arab religious groups, between men and women, and between Arabs and the majority Jewish populations in Israel. We find that over consecutive birth cohorts, substantial ethnic differences in educational attainment have narrowed at the lower levels of schooling, but have increased at higher levels. Moreover, the results indicate that the disadvantage of Muslim Arabs in terms of entry into and completion of high school can be accounted for only partially by differences in the social status of their parents and characteristics of their neighbourhoods. The findings suggest that long-term historical differences among groups and discriminatory practices towards Arabs are important factors in explanations of disparities in educational attainment.

La france bonapartiste

Horatius Cocles wrote:There are many UN documents that the US hasn't ratified, that doesn't make them not international law.

I didn't say that. I said that there has to be broad, near-unanimous practice of a particular custom before it can be part of customary international law. Otherwise, you have to ratify a treaty. Just because there is a treaty, somewhere, that exists, does not make it part of international law, that everyone, even non-signatories, have to abide by (for example, the Geneva Convention). The ICSPCA is not binding on nonsignatories. So it doesn't make any sense to use that as an example, when there is no broad international consensus. How can you have an international custom that is not practiced by most of Europe, the United States, and Japan? Some of the most important economies on the planet?

Horatius Cocles wrote:I stand by this definition, unless you can produce another one that has more "universal" acceptance.

Yes, the dictionary definition. Not a definition put forward by the Soviet Union, hardly a bastion of civil rights itself.

Horatius Cocles wrote:I didn't say the Jews couldn't have a homeland at any point. I'm saying that unlike Poland, Ireland, and the other countries you mention, Israel is not the state of all it's citizens, only Jews. And therein lies the fundamental issue. Not that Jews don't deserve a home, but that they cannot continue regarding non-Jews as those with lesser privilege and rights in society. Poland does not say that Poland is only for the ethnic Poles and doesn't serve its other citizens, Israel does. If Israel treated all its citizens equally, Jew and non-Jew alike (there's even discrimination between the different kinds of Jews, for that matter), then I wouldn't have as much of a problem with Israel.

The problem with this is that an aspirational proclamation has no direct bearing on anyone. When Poland was set up as a nation state for ethnic Poles, there surely were ethnic minorities (such as Ruthenians) who felt excluded and would prefer their own homeland. But that does not make Poland an apartheid state. I don't think it's fair or logical to say that "Israel must be a nation for all people" when most countries, including and especially its neighbors, do not practice this principle.

Horatius Cocles wrote:But when you state that Israel is for Jews alone, that is like saying that America is for Christians alone and we don't have as much or any obligation to our other citizens.

That is not an apt comparison. Christians are not an ethnic group, they are a religious group. Jews have both an ethnic and a religious component.

Horatius Cocles wrote:The right to equality and freedom from discrimination is not explicitly enshrined in Israeli law as a constitutional right, nor is it protected by statute.

You keep giving me negative examples; give me a positive example of substantive discrimination. Don't tell me what Israeli law doesn't do, tell me what it does.

Horatius Cocles wrote:Israel downgraded the Arabic language from an official state language, promoted the creation of Jewish-only settlements as a national value funded by the state and defined national self-determination as “the unique right of the Jewish people”.

France supports French as a national language and enforces strict cultural rules to prevent the proliferation of competing languages and communities, such as the Bretons in Brittany. It also manipulated the demography of its border regions with Germany to promote French identity over German. This is something that happens in most countries. An eclectic, acultural country like the United States, or other former British colonies, is unusual, and by no means the norm. Most other countries are actual nation-states.

Horatius Cocles wrote:At the same time, Israel was swiping away core citizen and fundamental rights of non-Jews who made up a large part of the population.

Any evidence to support this claim?

Horatius Cocles wrote:

Abstract
Arabs in Israel are a heterogeneous but largely underprivileged minority with a history of disadvantage in several domains, including education and employment. In this paper, we document changes in their attainment of various educational levels across cohorts born from the mid-1920s to the 1970s. We make comparisons among different Arab religious groups, between men and women, and between Arabs and the majority Jewish populations in Israel. We find that over consecutive birth cohorts, substantial ethnic differences in educational attainment have narrowed at the lower levels of schooling, but have increased at higher levels. Moreover, the results indicate that the disadvantage of Muslim Arabs in terms of entry into and completion of high school can be accounted for only partially by differences in the social status of their parents and characteristics of their neighbourhoods. The findings suggest that long-term historical differences among groups and discriminatory practices towards Arabs are important factors in explanations of disparities in educational attainment.

The same could be said of any country with sizable minorities. Nor is this "stratification" affected under color of law.

Papal knights and Phydios

https://babylonbee.com/news/security-footage-captures-unidentified-man-defacing-nyc-mural-to-read-orange-lives-matter

Ok, this made me laugh out loud.

I guess I got banned from the discord?

United massachusetts

The Legion of Mankind wrote:I guess I got banned from the discord?

You did? Telegram me your Discord ID and I will fix that. A government official went rogue and began to ban people without the authority to do so.

This post is a reply to La france bonapartiste. Disclaimer: It's a very long post. :P

The identification of Israel as a “Jewish State” does affect people’s day-to-day lives, and I will use Israel’s own laws to show this (as I have previously, with 3rd-party links which I’m not sure you’ve read.) I’ve limited the discussion to only Palestinians citizens within Israel proper (“Israeli Arabs”) w/o mentioning the OPT.

All Israeli citizens, including Palestinians, have the right to vote in elections for members of the Knesset and for the prime minister, that’s true. But not all rights are citizenship rights. Other rights are defined as nationality rights, and are reserved for Jews only. If you are a Jew, you have exclusive use of land, privileged access to private and public employment, special educational loans, home mortgages, preferences for admission to universities, and many other things. Many other special privileges are reserved for those who have served in the Israeli military. And military service is compulsory for all Jews (male and female), except for the ultra-Orthodox who get the same privileges as other Jews, but excludes Palestinians, who do not.

Almost every discrimination against the Palestinian citizens of Israel is justified by the fact that they do not serve in the army. If you are a Palestinian citizen and you did not serve in the army, your rights to government assistance as a worker, student, parent, or as part of a couple, are severely restricted. This affects housing in particular, as well as employment — where 70 percent of all Israeli industry is considered to be security-sensitive and therefore closed to these citizens as a place to find work.

Since 1948, Palestinian local councils and municipalities have received far less funding than their Jewish counterparts. The shortage of land, coupled with the scarcity of employment opportunities, creates an abnormal socioeconomic reality. For example, the most affluent Palestinian community, the village of Me’ilya in the upper Galilee, is still worse off than the poorest Jewish development town in the Negev. Today more than 90 percent of the land is owned by the Jewish National Fund (JNF). Landowners are not allowed to engage in transactions with non-Jewish citizens, and public land is prioritized for the use of national projects, which means that new Jewish settlements are being built while there are hardly any new Palestinian settlements. Thus, the biggest Palestinian city, Nazareth, despite the tripling of its population since 1948, has not expanded one square kilometer, whereas the development town built above it, Upper Nazareth, has tripled in size, on land expropriated from Palestinian landowners.

Elsewhere this has initiated full-blown attempts at “Judaization.” After 1967, the Israeli government became concerned about the lack of Jews living in the north and south of the state and so planned to increase the population in those areas. Such a demographic change necessitated the confiscation of Palestinian land for the building of Jewish settlements. Worse was the exclusion of Palestinian citizens from these settlements. This blunt violation of a citizen’s right to live wherever he or she wishes continues today, and all efforts by human rights NGOs in Israel to challenge this apartheid have so far ended in total failure.

The Supreme Court in Israel has only been able to question the legality of this policy in a few individual cases, but not in principle. Imagine if in the United Kingdom or the United States, Jewish citizens, or Catholics for that matter, were barred by law from living in certain villages, neighborhoods, or maybe whole towns? How can such a situation be reconciled with the notion of democracy?

The State of Israel’s self-definition as a “Jewish and democratic state” has been declared in two of the Basic Laws: The Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty (1992) and The Basic Law: Freedom of Occupation (1992) and its subsequent amendments. In addition, under Article 7A of The Basic Law: The Knesset (1958) and its subsequent amendments, a party list may be prevented from running for election to the Knesset if its objectives or actions negate the existence of the State of Israel as a “Jewish and democratic” state. This law obstructs the free exercise of political rights, including the rights to political speech and participation. It is often used to try to prevent Arab political parties and parliamentarians from seeking to alter the character of the state through democratic means, for example, to a state based on full civil and national equality that does not grant preference to one national group over the other, and even to block debate on such proposals.

Israel lacks a written constitution or a Basic Law that constitutionally guarantees the right to equality and prohibits discrimination, either direct or indirect. While several ordinary statutes provide protection for the right of equality for women and for people with disabilities, no statute relates to the right to equality for the Arab minority in particular. The Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, which is considered a mini-bill of rights by Israeli legal scholars, does not enumerate a right to equality; on the contrary, this Basic Law emphasizes the character of the state as a Jewish state. In July 2010, the United Nations Human Rights Committee (which monitors the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, or ICCPR) expressed its concern that Israel’s Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, “does not contain a general provision for equality and non-discrimination,” and called on Israel to “amend its Basic Laws and other legislation to include the principle of nondiscrimination and ensure that allegations of discrimination brought before its domestic courts are promptly addressed and implemented.”

While Supreme Court justices have interpreted The Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty as comprising the principle of equality, this fundamental right is currently protected by judicial interpretation alone. However, the fundamental importance of the principle of equality requires that it be explicitly guaranteed in the Basic Laws or a written constitution. The absence of an explicit guarantee of the right to equality in the Basic Laws or ordinary statutes diminishes the power of this right and leaves the Palestinian minority in Israel vulnerable to direct and indirect discrimination.

Various other laws such as The Chief Rabbinate of Israel Law (1980), The Flag and Emblem Law (1949), and The State Education Law (1953) and its 2000 amendment give recognition to Jewish educational, religious, and cultural practices and institutions, and define their aims and objectives strictly in Jewish terms, while no similar laws providing similar legal recognition to the religious and cultural rights of the Palestinian minority in Israel have been legislated.

Palestinian citizens of Israel are afforded differential and unequal treatment under Israeli law in the field of citizenship rights. The most important immigration and nationality laws—The Law of Return (1950) and The Citizenship Law (1952)—allow every Jew in the world to immigrate freely to Israel and to automatically become an Israeli citizen. However, the same laws that privilege Jews exclude Palestinians who were forced to flee their homes in 1947-1952, stripping them of their former status and denying the internationally-recognized Palestinian right of return. This rejection refuses to allow the Palestinian citizens of Israel to unite with their immediate families or with those who were expelled in 1948. Denying people the right of return to their homeland, and at the same time offering this right to others who have no connection to the land, is a model of undemocratic practice.

There were amendments to The Citizenship Law (1952) that sought to impose a pledge of loyalty to Israel as a Jewish and Zionist state on anyone receiving Israeli citizenship (by birth or naturalization) as well as any citizen or resident applying for a national identity card, which it is obligatory to carry. By compelling Palestinian citizens of the state to swear loyalty to the values of Zionism, the bills violate the right to equality, dignity and expression and turn the citizenship of Arab citizens from a right into a conditional privilege. On 10 October 2010, the Israeli government approved a further amendment to the Citizenship Law which, if enacted, would require all non-Jews seeking citizenship via naturalization to declare an oath of loyalty to Israel as a “Jewish and democratic state.” The loyalty oath bill was formulated to target Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel, whose “non-Jewish” spouses—Palestinians from the OPT and other Arab states—would be forced to swear an oath to Israel as a “Jewish and democratic State.” The loyalty oath imposes a political ideology based on Jewish and Zionist values, which in turn serves to negate the national and political identity of Palestinians and/ or Arabs.

Within Israel there are really four levels of citizenship, the first three being various levels of Jewish participation in Israeli society, which are thoroughly racialized. At the top of the pyramid are the Ashkenazi, the white European Jews. The next level down, which is now probably the largest component of the Jewish population, is the Mizrachi or Sephardic Jews, who are from the Arab countries. At the bottom of the Jewish pyramid are the Ethiopian Jews, who are black. You can go into the poorest parts of Jewish West Jerusalem and find that it’s predominantly Ethiopian. This social and economic stratification took shape throughout the last 50 years as different groups of Jews from different parts of the world came, for very different reasons, to Israel. So while the divisions reflected national origins, they play out in a profoundly racialized way.

Beneath all these layers of Jews come the Palestinian citizens. A rigid hierarchy, highly racialized both within and between religious or national groups, orchestrates Israeli social life. Much of it is legally enforced. The most significant difference between this scenario and other similar ones is in the world’s perception of the Israeli reality. For the overwhelming majority of the world’s population, South Africa was always considered a pariah state. But Israel is not in that position. Israel is given a pass, if you will, on the question of racism. Because Jews were victims of the Nazi Holocaust, there’s a way in which Israeli Jews are assumed to be either incapable of such terrible racialized policies, or that it’s somehow understandable because of what Jews went through.

La france bonapartiste

Horatius Cocles wrote:
This post is a reply to La france bonapartiste. Disclaimer: It's a very long post. :P

The identification of Israel as a “Jewish State” does affect people’s day-to-day lives, and I will use Israel’s own laws to show this (as I have previously, with 3rd-party links which I’m not sure you’ve read.) I’ve limited the discussion to only Palestinians citizens within Israel proper (“Israeli Arabs”) w/o mentioning the OPT.

All Israeli citizens, including Palestinians, have the right to vote in elections for members of the Knesset and for the prime minister, that’s true. But not all rights are citizenship rights. Other rights are defined as nationality rights, and are reserved for Jews only. If you are a Jew, you have exclusive use of land, privileged access to private and public employment, special educational loans, home mortgages, preferences for admission to universities, and many other things. Many other special privileges are reserved for those who have served in the Israeli military. And military service is compulsory for all Jews (male and female), except for the ultra-Orthodox who get the same privileges as other Jews, but excludes Palestinians, who do not.

Almost every discrimination against the Palestinian citizens of Israel is justified by the fact that they do not serve in the army. If you are a Palestinian citizen and you did not serve in the army, your rights to government assistance as a worker, student, parent, or as part of a couple, are severely restricted. This affects housing in particular, as well as employment — where 70 percent of all Israeli industry is considered to be security-sensitive and therefore closed to these citizens as a place to find work.

Since 1948, Palestinian local councils and municipalities have received far less funding than their Jewish counterparts. The shortage of land, coupled with the scarcity of employment opportunities, creates an abnormal socioeconomic reality. For example, the most affluent Palestinian community, the village of Me’ilya in the upper Galilee, is still worse off than the poorest Jewish development town in the Negev. Today more than 90 percent of the land is owned by the Jewish National Fund (JNF). Landowners are not allowed to engage in transactions with non-Jewish citizens, and public land is prioritized for the use of national projects, which means that new Jewish settlements are being built while there are hardly any new Palestinian settlements. Thus, the biggest Palestinian city, Nazareth, despite the tripling of its population since 1948, has not expanded one square kilometer, whereas the development town built above it, Upper Nazareth, has tripled in size, on land expropriated from Palestinian landowners.

Elsewhere this has initiated full-blown attempts at “Judaization.” After 1967, the Israeli government became concerned about the lack of Jews living in the north and south of the state and so planned to increase the population in those areas. Such a demographic change necessitated the confiscation of Palestinian land for the building of Jewish settlements. Worse was the exclusion of Palestinian citizens from these settlements. This blunt violation of a citizen’s right to live wherever he or she wishes continues today, and all efforts by human rights NGOs in Israel to challenge this apartheid have so far ended in total failure.

The Supreme Court in Israel has only been able to question the legality of this policy in a few individual cases, but not in principle. Imagine if in the United Kingdom or the United States, Jewish citizens, or Catholics for that matter, were barred by law from living in certain villages, neighborhoods, or maybe whole towns? How can such a situation be reconciled with the notion of democracy?

The State of Israel’s self-definition as a “Jewish and democratic state” has been declared in two of the Basic Laws: The Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty (1992) and The Basic Law: Freedom of Occupation (1992) and its subsequent amendments. In addition, under Article 7A of The Basic Law: The Knesset (1958) and its subsequent amendments, a party list may be prevented from running for election to the Knesset if its objectives or actions negate the existence of the State of Israel as a “Jewish and democratic” state. This law obstructs the free exercise of political rights, including the rights to political speech and participation. It is often used to try to prevent Arab political parties and parliamentarians from seeking to alter the character of the state through democratic means, for example, to a state based on full civil and national equality that does not grant preference to one national group over the other, and even to block debate on such proposals.

Israel lacks a written constitution or a Basic Law that constitutionally guarantees the right to equality and prohibits discrimination, either direct or indirect. While several ordinary statutes provide protection for the right of equality for women and for people with disabilities, no statute relates to the right to equality for the Arab minority in particular. The Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, which is considered a mini-bill of rights by Israeli legal scholars, does not enumerate a right to equality; on the contrary, this Basic Law emphasizes the character of the state as a Jewish state. In July 2010, the United Nations Human Rights Committee (which monitors the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, or ICCPR) expressed its concern that Israel’s Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, “does not contain a general provision for equality and non-discrimination,” and called on Israel to “amend its Basic Laws and other legislation to include the principle of nondiscrimination and ensure that allegations of discrimination brought before its domestic courts are promptly addressed and implemented.”

While Supreme Court justices have interpreted The Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty as comprising the principle of equality, this fundamental right is currently protected by judicial interpretation alone. However, the fundamental importance of the principle of equality requires that it be explicitly guaranteed in the Basic Laws or a written constitution. The absence of an explicit guarantee of the right to equality in the Basic Laws or ordinary statutes diminishes the power of this right and leaves the Palestinian minority in Israel vulnerable to direct and indirect discrimination.

Various other laws such as The Chief Rabbinate of Israel Law (1980), The Flag and Emblem Law (1949), and The State Education Law (1953) and its 2000 amendment give recognition to Jewish educational, religious, and cultural practices and institutions, and define their aims and objectives strictly in Jewish terms, while no similar laws providing similar legal recognition to the religious and cultural rights of the Palestinian minority in Israel have been legislated.

Palestinian citizens of Israel are afforded differential and unequal treatment under Israeli law in the field of citizenship rights. The most important immigration and nationality laws—The Law of Return (1950) and The Citizenship Law (1952)—allow every Jew in the world to immigrate freely to Israel and to automatically become an Israeli citizen. However, the same laws that privilege Jews exclude Palestinians who were forced to flee their homes in 1947-1952, stripping them of their former status and denying the internationally-recognized Palestinian right of return. This rejection refuses to allow the Palestinian citizens of Israel to unite with their immediate families or with those who were expelled in 1948. Denying people the right of return to their homeland, and at the same time offering this right to others who have no connection to the land, is a model of undemocratic practice.

There were amendments to The Citizenship Law (1952) that sought to impose a pledge of loyalty to Israel as a Jewish and Zionist state on anyone receiving Israeli citizenship (by birth or naturalization) as well as any citizen or resident applying for a national identity card, which it is obligatory to carry. By compelling Palestinian citizens of the state to swear loyalty to the values of Zionism, the bills violate the right to equality, dignity and expression and turn the citizenship of Arab citizens from a right into a conditional privilege. On 10 October 2010, the Israeli government approved a further amendment to the Citizenship Law which, if enacted, would require all non-Jews seeking citizenship via naturalization to declare an oath of loyalty to Israel as a “Jewish and democratic state.” The loyalty oath bill was formulated to target Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel, whose “non-Jewish” spouses—Palestinians from the OPT and other Arab states—would be forced to swear an oath to Israel as a “Jewish and democratic State.” The loyalty oath imposes a political ideology based on Jewish and Zionist values, which in turn serves to negate the national and political identity of Palestinians and/ or Arabs.

Within Israel there are really four levels of citizenship, the first three being various levels of Jewish participation in Israeli society, which are thoroughly racialized. At the top of the pyramid are the Ashkenazi, the white European Jews. The next level down, which is now probably the largest component of the Jewish population, is the Mizrachi or Sephardic Jews, who are from the Arab countries. At the bottom of the Jewish pyramid are the Ethiopian Jews, who are black. You can go into the poorest parts of Jewish West Jerusalem and find that it’s predominantly Ethiopian. This social and economic stratification took shape throughout the last 50 years as different groups of Jews from different parts of the world came, for very different reasons, to Israel. So while the divisions reflected national origins, they play out in a profoundly racialized way.

Beneath all these layers of Jews come the Palestinian citizens. A rigid hierarchy, highly racialized both within and between religious or national groups, orchestrates Israeli social life. Much of it is legally enforced. The most significant difference between this scenario and other similar ones is in the world’s perception of the Israeli reality. For the overwhelming majority of the world’s population, South Africa was always considered a pariah state. But Israel is not in that position. Israel is given a pass, if you will, on the question of racism. Because Jews were victims of the Nazi Holocaust, there’s a way in which Israeli Jews are assumed to be either incapable of such terrible racialized policies, or that it’s somehow understandable because of what Jews went through.

I'm confused by your now apparently intentional conflation of Palestinians with Arab Israelis. If we can't even use or agree on the same terminology I don't know if we can continue the discussion. Because it always seems like we're talking about two different things. And despite my attempt to clealry demarcate the two categories, you've now deliberately lumped them in together, which has the effect of making it impossible to know what we're discussing.

I would also appreciate it if you stop accusing me of not reading your links. I read all of them. The problem is that they either a) have nothing to do with what we're discussing (Palestinians =/= Arab Israelis), or b) were not concrete examples, but rhetoric from politicians.

Nevertheless, I will say that you've finally given what looks like a pretty concrete example of discrimination, re: land use and development/funding that does not have to do with the West Bank. Land issues seem to be a recurring issue. It doesn't sound like a civil problem on an individual basis, but a more complicated socioeconomic issue based on discretionary actions by the government. But you can see that to some extent in a lot of countries, especially former British countries with their native communities. None of that is good, of course, that should go without saying. But it shows it doesn't make Israel some sort of pariah, since some of the countries criticizing them haven't sorted out their own issues.

I also feel like your example of Arab Israelis being discriminated against because they are not conscripted is imperfect to say the least. First of all, I don't consider conscription to be a positive. It meets the basic definition of discrimination, but it's actually Jewish Israelis who are disadvantaged. Second, nothing prevents Arabs from volunteering if they want to access the finacial benefits you mentioned.

Papal knights and Phydios

What is condemning the actions of the LCN honestly going to accomplish? They've caused problems for some time now.

  • They've left PLI (Sure they have that right),

  • They've effectively become a dictatorship under Quebecshire, who has been a part of the government for as long as I can remember.

  • They've elected San carlos islands, a nation who in the past has caused problems here.

  • They're harboring renegade nations from our allies (RCN/FCN). Who very well could've had malicious intent leaving the FCN in the manner they did. (Gagium)

  • Arguably the most important point now is the fact that their founder, delegate, and many others within the region support "Access to Abortion," a resolution that goes against everything RTL stands for.

    If you stand against tyranny, people who have caused harm to our allies, and the support of on-demand abortion, please consider which option you've chosen in the poll. I wish things would improve with the LCN but they certainly haven't yet and probably won't.

    P.S. I tagged the nations so they have a right to defend themselves.

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