Rum wrote: ↑Mon May 14, 2018 6:24 pm
Forty Two wrote: ↑Mon May 14, 2018 4:41 pm
Why do Arabs care if there is an embassy in Jerusalem?
The US has had a US Consulate in Jerusalem for some time. We can have a consulate, but not an embassy? The Jerusalem consulate provided services to Palestinians, too. Was that wrong?
What do you mean 'what do the Arabs care'? It is a simple fact that they do -
The reasons people have for caring is relevant. If they care because they're prejudiced against Jews, then I think that's very relevant. You can't have an embassy in Jerusalem because we don't want Israel to be Jewish doesn't seem like a valid reason coming from theocrats. If they were Enlightenment secularist liberals, I'd grant them some slack, because they wouldn't want their country or Israel to be Muslim either. But, since they're not against theocracy, but rather are against Jews, I don't give their reasons much weight.
Rum wrote: ↑Mon May 14, 2018 6:24 pm
and that America as Israel's primary ally is hated by much of the Arab world.
Several Muslim countries have the US as their primary ally too. Again, they aren't against countries being primary allies. They're against Jewish countries having the US as a primary ally. The US can be Jordan and Saudi Arabia's primary allies too. No problem there. Obviously, some factions don't want their own Muslim countries as primary allies. But, most of the Arab world is either allied with the US, or with Russia. Turkey is focused on the US and the EU, Syria with Russia, Lebanon is cloe to the EU/France, Saudi Arabi is close to the US, Egypt used to be US-focused and they still get billions, etc.
Rum wrote: ↑Mon May 14, 2018 6:24 pm
The establishment of the embassy is seen as a provocation - and it is of course. I have no idea if Trump is doing this just because he can and he thinks it is a rational and good tactical step or if he is an idiot responding to people shouting loudly around him.
The law moving the embassy to Jerusalem was passed 20 years ago, and called for the embassy to move by some time in 1999. That was square in the middle of a very educated, and competent, President - Bill Clinton. Obviously, the move was considered a negotiating piece, and was kept as a threat for 20 years.
Rum wrote: ↑Mon May 14, 2018 6:24 pm
Either way it is an idiotic move. Both he and Netanyahu have then gone on to proclaim what a great move towards peace this is. The reverse is the case. Trump is managing to inflame passions - ones that are already high, whatever the rights and wrongs of the conflict.
By not taking strong moves, one condemns the country there to neverending strife. Sure, you can avoid some conflagrations, but for 50 years trying to keep passions from being inflamed as a policy has simply not worked. What trump did by moving the embassy to Jerusalem is send a message that enough is enough, and it's been 20 years since we said we'd begin moving it. Each President from Clinton, to Bush, to Obama to Trump has had to sign six month holds on it to keep its terms from going into effect.
What it does is move the negotiations forward, and its designed to put the Palestinian authority in a position where they have to make a real, concrete proposal for a two state solution, or be willing to accept one. They know that if they don't, they are not going to get much of anything. They aren't getting Jerusalem. That ship has sailed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem_Embassy_Act
Rum wrote: ↑Mon May 14, 2018 6:24 pm
I tend to side with Israel in my views - and give it a lot of leeway - not that it matters a gnat's piss worth, but this has been handled very badly and the killings today seem to me to be a terrible overreaction.
They are a terrible overreaction, by the WestBankians and the Gazaians. The US moves an embassy to Jerusalem and Muslims flip out? Jerusalem is not the place to which Muslims pray. It is not directly connected to any events in Muhammad's (piss be upon him) life. And it is not even mentioned by name in the Koo-Ran. The city never became a cultural center or served as capital of a sovereign Muslim state. Jerusalem has mattered to Muslims only intermittently over the past thirteen centuries, and when it has mattered, as it does today, it has been because of politics.
“When I was in college, I took a terrorism class. ... The thing that was interesting in the class was every time the professor said ‘Al Qaeda’ his shoulders went up, But you know, it is that you don’t say ‘America’ with an intensity, you don’t say ‘England’ with the intensity. You don’t say ‘the army’ with the intensity,” she continued. “... But you say these names [Al Qaeda] because you want that word to carry weight. You want it to be something.” - Ilhan Omar