Philosophy Now Forum

They HAD a two-state solution!

(Gaza) – Israel’s sweeping restrictions on leaving Gaza deprive its more than two million residents of opportunities to better their lives, Human Rights Watch said today on the fifteenth anniversary of the 2007 closure. The closure has devastated the economy in Gaza, contributed to fragmentation of the Palestinian people, and forms part of Israeli authorities’ crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution against millions of Palestinians.

Israel’s closure policy blocks most Gaza residents from going to the West Bank, preventing professionals, artists, athletes, students, and others from pursuing opportunities within Palestine and from traveling abroad via Israel, restricting their rights to work and an education. Restrictive Egyptian policies at its Rafah crossing with Gaza, including unnecessary delays and mistreatment of travelers, have exacerbated the closure’s harm to human rights.

“Israel, with Egypt’s help, has turned Gaza into an open-air prison,” said Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch. “As many people around the world are once again traveling two years after the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, Gaza’s more than two million Palestinians remain under what amounts to a 15-year-old lockdown.”

Israel should end its generalized ban on travel for Gaza residents and permit free movement of people to and from Gaza, subject to, at most, individual screening and physical searches for security purposes.

Between February 2021 and March 2022, Human Rights Watch interviewed 20 Palestinians who sought to travel out of Gaza via either the Israeli-run Erez crossing or the Egyptian-administered Rafah crossing. Human Rights Watch wrote to Israeli and Egyptian authorities to solicit their perspectives on its findings, and separately to seek information about an Egyptian travel company that operates at the Rafah crossing but had received no responses at this writing.

Since 2007, Israeli authorities have, with narrow exceptions, banned Palestinians from leaving through Erez, the passenger crossing from Gaza into Israel, through which they can reach the West Bank and travel abroad via Jordan. Israel also prevents Palestinian authorities from operating an airport or seaport in Gaza. Israeli authorities also sharply restrict the entry and exit of goods.

They often justify the closure, which came after Hamas seized political control over Gaza from the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in June 2007, on security grounds. Israeli authorities have said they want to minimize travel between Gaza and the West Bank to prevent the export of “a human terrorist network” from Gaza to the West Bank, which has a porous border with Israel and where hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers live.

This policy has reduced travel to a fraction of what it was two decades ago, Human Rights Watch said. Israeli authorities have instituted a formal “policy of separation” between Gaza and the West Bank, despite international consensus that these two parts of the Occupied Palestinian Territory form a “single territorial unit.” Israel accepted that principle in the 1995 Oslo Accords, signed with the Palestine Liberation Organization. Israeli authorities restrict all travel between Gaza and the West Bank, even when the travel takes place via the circuitous route through Egypt and Jordan rather than through Israeli territory.
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phyllo wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 5:56 pm

They HAD a two-state solution!

They had/have an open-air prison.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:14 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 5:56 pm

They HAD a two-state solution!

They had/have an open-air prison.

I agree. Hamas were their jailers. Do you know that Hamas forbade it's own people even to drill for fresh water? And they stole all the aid sent by other countries, to convert into guns, bombs, rockets and terrorist tunnels, which they put under hospitals, schools and mosques...because they care nothing whatsoever for the lives of their own people. Electricity and water had to come from Israel because Hamas would not let them have it.

Still, it wasn't an "open-air prison." It was a seaside community...just one that might have been in much better shape, if not for Hamas.

phyllo wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:35 pm I'm familiar with your position on it:
Hamas 100% responsible for problems in Gaza.
Israel 0% responsible for problems in Gaza.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 5:10 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 12:54 pm I think the UN should press both sides for a permanent ceasefire. Then can negotiate about two states and other things.

They HAD a two-state solution! That's what Hamas violated when it came over and massacred the Israeli citizens. Hamas does not want that, and will not "negotiate" for it. Have you not heard them chant their slogan, "From the river to the sea"? Do you know what that means?

It means, "NO TWO-STATE SOLUTIONS."

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:44 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:35 pm I'm familiar with your position on it:
Hamas 100% responsible for problems in Gaza.
Israel 0% responsible for problems in Gaza.

You'll have to point me to where I said either thing...I'll wait.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:50 pm Can the ultra-moral voice here — the forum’s moral teacher — outline Israel’s responsibility?

I’d rather not wait but I don’t want to inconvenience you too much.

bahman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:58 pm Israel has had 60 years of occupation...

phyllo wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 7:05 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:44 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:35 pm I'm familiar with your position on it:
Hamas 100% responsible for problems in Gaza.
Israel 0% responsible for problems in Gaza.

You'll have to point me to where I said either thing...I'll wait.

You consistently point out that Hamas causes problems.

You have never, as far as I know, pointed to any problems caused by Israel.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 8:12 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 6:58 pm Israel has had 60 years of occupation...

No, there's been no "occupation." Historically, the Jews have had every right to that land for thousands of years. You're trying to win the debate by assuming your conclusion...and it's a false one.

We've already outlined even the recent history earlier. It's never been an "occupation." But nobody who's on the Hamas side seems to care about the facts, because they want to position them as "victims." That can't be helped. But they've collaborated in their own misfortune. As the old saying goes, they "never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity."

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sat Dec 23, 2023 7:31 pm Immanuel...