Palestinians barred from Dead Sea beaches

[Nasturtium 500]

Dont know if this was an isolated incident or not.

However, fwiw, an Israeli guy did write me back on this and he had this to say.

"Jews for Jesus are not actually Jewish. The organization was created by Christians as a ploy to drag Jews from Judaism into Christianity. The state of Israel bases a person's Judaism on a person's parents. If either of a person's parents are Jewish, according to Israel, that person is Jewish. This is not so according to Judaism though. According to Judaism, a person's mother must be Jewish for them to be considered Jewish."

It's not an isolated incedent. And what that person fails to expound upon is according to TORAH, only if your FATHER is Jewish can you be considered Jewish. That rule of inheritence was changed by Rabbis in response to persecution including rape. Jews for Jesus though is exactly that-- it seeks to try to trick Jews out of being Torah-observant by giving the trappings of Judaism but nothing more. It's very sad that Christians are on the whole, so entirely misled and have fallen into the prophecy of Daniel 100%.

You got that wrong. You're Jewish only if your mother, not father, is Jewish.

"They sought their genealogical records, but they were no longer available, and so they were banished from the priesthood. Those immigrants could not state which was their father's house or whether they were of the seed of Yisrael. (Ezra 2:62)"

There are nearly 3,000 genealogies in the Torah. ALL are traced through the male line. If a woman's genealogy needs to be traced, then instead of using the definate article in front of the closet male's name-- either her father or husband-- it is left out, and then they continue to trace the male line of her decent. This is how you have two genealogies for Yeshua-- as definate artilces are done in Greek as well- Matthew (Matatyahu) gives Yosef with its definate article and Luke gives Mariam with her indefinate article.

In practice, modern (post 33 AD) Jews do use Jewish mum (rather than Jewish dad) as proof of Jewishness--the example of Timothy (his mum Eunice, and grandma Lois were Jewesses; his father a Gentile--rendered as "Greek" in most translations).

Yes, I know-- which is why I said Torah (according to the first 5 books of the Bible/Tanakh) was patrilieal and that modern/new rules are matrilineal. He said I was wrong and that Torah is also through the mother.

[sereia 0]

i was at the dead sea last weekend and saw plenty of palestinians there hanging out, swimming, and such... *shrug*

Edited June 23, 2008 by sereia

[mawilson 2,133]

i was at the dead sea last weekend and saw plenty of palestinians there... *shrug*

[Nagishkaw 510]

[sereia 0]

ps. not sure if it matters but i was at ein gedi and at kalia beach (which is in the west bank as far as i know...) but if they are getting barred (maybe some get through, some don't? who knows how this crazy system works here) it seemed like everyone was bathing in peace. baruch hashem/hamdulilah

Edited June 23, 2008 by sereia

[mawilson 2,133]

ps. not sure if it matters but i was at ein gedi and at kalia beach (which is in the west bank as far as i know...) but if they are getting barred (maybe some get through, some don't? who knows how this crazy system works here) it seemed like everyone was bathing in peace. baruch hashem/hamdulilah

Impossible! The whole thing was staged by Zionist settlers.

[Ban Hammer 13,206]

ps. not sure if it matters but i was at ein gedi and at kalia beach (which is in the west bank as far as i know...) but if they are getting barred (maybe some get through, some don't? who knows how this crazy system works here) it seemed like everyone was bathing in peace. baruch hashem/hamdulilah

Impossible! The whole thing was staged by Zionist settlers.

i've already said, this thread is a zionist plot!

[PalestineMyHeart 1,897]

Wow it's like a mob of villagers with pitchforks has arrived

It seems that some of you are clamoring for my immediate responses – as if I’m sitting here waiting for you to hit the send button

Be on notice that I am answering in order of appearance (which is my usual habit.) Also, I often post rather detailed responses which include dates, quotes, references, photos, maps, etc., as I like to be specific and precise. Finally, try to realize that I have an actual job which requires my actual attention, not to mention an actual off-line life and marriage that I actually enjoy immensely, and which also takes up a good bit of my time. All this means that I don’t serve at your beck and call. There are many of you, and just one of me (there, now you have something to rejoice over.) But it means there’s a line, and you’ll just have to wait your turn.

Now Julianna (who is not only one of the brightest and most well-informed participants in this thread, but who is also quite capable of taking the time to post intelligent, detailed, well-reasoned responses) is next.

Israel has rights to 70% of the water from the Jordan river, the Sea of Galilee, and then their own sources. Jordan has rights to 30% of the river Jordan. I think that is actually a crappy deal myself, and I totally disagree with the fact that Israel drains up at the headway and is causing the Dead Sea to shrink at an alarming rate, which seems ot be of little concern to the average Jordanian who can't seem to grasp that their entire economy is based on tourism and that the Dead Sea is fast dissappearing (an obvious pet peeve of mine). They are talking about and beginning that stupid canal from the Red Sea to the DS. I think that is a totally horrid idea from an environmental standpoint.

I think both Israelis AND Jordanians (and the US southwest, Dubai, etc) need to grow up and learn that they live in an arid climate and cannot continue to believe that they don't-- irrigating crops, like you said, which do not belong there... in Jordan it's the Ghor valley which is the huge water-sucker along with the resorts. Around Dh's village they can grow watermelons without irrigation which means they could around Jerusalem as well (and pretty much most of Israel)... if they so chose to do that-- of course with reduced yields. They also need to stop trying to look like they live in a tropical paradise. This was always a huge deal to me at home as well (Las Vegas)-- it takes so much water to do tropical landscaping when you could do desert-tropicals and have blooms year-round and use a fraction of the water. Resorts, businesses, and public works suck so much water it is unbelievable.

I know you know how I feel about all of this, but even from my POV there are extreme fallicies from the government (I dislike them, BTW) and the public attitudes and perceptions of things as well as their environmental policies. They are not following the Torah land-use rules either, although as a secular government, why would they? Sigh.

I had heard Monsanto was going to contract out seeds for the Iraqis (nearly as bad as bombing them all up in the first place!) and I had also heard they are getting a foothold in Israel and Lebanon. That's awful. I wonder if the Orthodox Jews know about this yet or even realize they should be against it? Because I'm fairly sure most Americans don't know about it who follow those laws. I haven't seen it be an issue much. That will only further not only damage the ag businesses and people's personal farms, but it will also destroy the land and really end up damaging the Palestineans as well who would have nothing to do with it (the seeds are both GMO which makes them non-kosher, but also sterile and easily cross -- they would contaminate the surrounding farms as they are doing here, and some are bred with their own resistence to insects and weed-killer which is great for a huge commercial farm but it poisons the soil and only that specific type of corn or bean or whatever will grow. They also have patented their DNA so you cannot save seed without fines and lawsuits, and they are very agressive about this. If they were doing this out in the large farming tracts anywhere near small-time farmers, it will cross-contaminate. Not a big deal for the farmer as long as he is buying seed from Monsanto, but a huge deal for anyone attempting to save seed and farm their own food. It's like a genetic blockade.).

Heh, we're running a record. Two agreements in an Israel-Palestinean thread

Oh I think we agree on a lot of things

Water has been a crucial issue in this conflict – it’s one of the main points to be negotiated along with the status of Jerusalem, final borders, the settlements and the refugees. Control of water was at the root of the 1967 war.

As you well know, water resources are limited in this land, much of which is arid or semi-arid. Surface water comes from the Jordan River and the Sea of Galilee (also known as Lake Kinneret or Lake Tiberius.) And there are 3 main aquifers in the area that supply ground water.

According to international law, most of the water sources in the area are considered international resources -- they’re supposed to be shared by Israelis and Palestinians according to the principles of “equitable and reasonable use.”

However, in practice, what happens is neither equitable nor reasonable.

The Jordan River

The Jordan River is the only permanent river in the area which provides surface water. 80% of its basin is located in Jordan, Israel and Palestine, the rest is in Lebanon and Syria. Jordan gets about half its water from the Jordan River, while Lebanon and Syria each use a small amount -- it provides about 5% of each of their total water usage. Since 1967, Israel has been taking the rest – water that had historically supplied Palestinians. Currently, about 1/4 of the water consumed in Israel comes from this source.

Immediately after the 1967 war, Israel seized the Jordan River headwaters, destroyed 140 Palestinian water pumps in the Jordan Valley, and diverted the water to its National Water Carrier. It has denied Palestinians usage of this water ever since.

The diversion of that water has had a huge impact. Back in 1953, the Jordan River had an average flow of 1,250 million cubic meters per year at King Hussein Bridge. By 1998, that flow was down to 200 million cubic meters, and the water quality was poor. This is one of the main factors drying up the Dead Sea.

Aquifers

There are 4 main ground water aquifers in the area – the first three (along with their recharge zones) are the largest, and are situated mostly in the West Bank:

* The Mountain Aquifer System, also known as the Yarkon-Tanninim Aquifer (1)-- Israel takes 340 million cubic meters annually; Palestinians are limited to 20 million cubic meters a year.

* The Nablus-Gilboa Aquifer System (2) -- Israel pumps an average of 115 million cubic meters a year, while Palestinians are restricted to 25 million cubic meters -- even though it supplies a densely populated Palestinian area, including the cities of Nablus and Jenin.

* The Eastern Aquifer System (3) -- this lies entirely within the West Bank and was used exclusively by Palestinians until 1967 when Israel began to tap it, mostly to supply illegal Israeli settlements. Israel takes about 40% of this water – 40 million cubic meters a year, while Palestinians take 60 million cubic meters.

* The Coastal Aquifer (not included on the map below, but shown in purple on the first map titled "Where the Water is") – this is a smaller and more shallow aquifer which is located in and around Gaza and supplies its 1.5 million residents. This aquifer used to be partly recharged by the Wadi Gaza which flowed from Hebron down to the coast in the winter, but Israel stopped its flow.

Israel gets 1/4 of its water from these West Bank aquifers -- taking more than 80% of this water, which had traditionally supplied West Bank Palestinians.

Controlling the water

After the 1967 occupation began, Israel moved to limit Palestinian water consumption -- putting caps on how much water could be pumped from existing Palestinian wells, and prohibiting the digging of new wells or the rehabilitation of old ones. Israel then began to exploit two new water resources which it had not controlled before 1967 -- the Eastern Aquifer in the West Bank and the Coastal Aquifer in Gaza -- diverting water from these sources to its illegal settlements (which of course are still being built and expanded in the West Bank.)

Overall, per capita, Israelis receive about 5 times more water than Palestinians -- Israelis get an average of 92.5 gallons per person per day, while Palestinians in the West Bank get an average of 18.5 gallons per person per day. (According to the U.S. Agency for International Development and the World Health Organization, the minimum quantity of water recommended for household and urban use is 26.4 gallons per person per day.)

Not all Palestinian communities are connected to the municipal water network – some rely on wells. But during times of drought, Israel often shuts off water to Palestinian towns so that Israeli supplies remain unaffected, and Palestinians must either turn to nearby wells or have it trucked in by water tankers. (Many of the water sellers are actually illegal Israeli settlers – essentially they take the Palestinians’ own water and then sell it back to them at inflated prices.) And the frequent military closures impede or prevent the flow of people and traffic, making it difficult to get water from neighboring towns.

Gaining control of West Bank water sources is one of the strategic reasons that Israel has continued its attempts to expand its borders in that direction.

Here is a map of the West Bank. Israel is marked in yellow; the West Bank is in white. The illegal Israeli settlements and other areas in the West Bank that the Israeli army has seized or ordered off-limits to Palestinians are marked in orange. Remember – all of the white and orange areas are in the West Bank – the land that Israelis are not supposed to be occupying or settling.

And here another map that shows the major settlements and the path of The Wall (what Israel calls its "security fence"):

Note the large concentration of settlements in the areas of the Mountain Aquifer and the Eastern Aquifer. Israel continues to expand these settlements and their satellites. Note the path of The Wall, jutting deep into Palestinian land at strategic points along the Mountain Aquifer area. This settlements and The Wall are parts of Israel’s calculated move to try to retain control of those aquifers even if there is a peace agreement – Israel wants to “change facts on the ground” so it might permanently annex much of these areas into Israel’s territory.

Now take a look at population. Upwards of a million Palestinians were forced from their homes before and during the creation of the State of Israel, which currently has a population just under 7.3 million, a large number of them immigrants. Under present Israeli policy, any Jew from any country in the world may immigrate and settle in Israel -- this is an additional 12 to 14 million people who are being strongly urged to move to Israel. The Israeli government realizes that with its current water policies, its land simply will not sustain this level of population.

So a number of different strategies are being considered – including the forcible appropriation of more water resources from Israel’s neighbors. Many observers have said that this is the real motive behind Israel’s repeated invasions into Lebanon, especially its drive into Southern Lebanon to the Litani River, and its continuing occupation of the Golan Heights.

Here are a couple of maps of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, which belongs to Syria. The first map shows the Israeli settlements, and the second shows how rich this area is with water resources.

One of Israel’s ideas has been to ask the U.S. to fund a desalinization plant at Caesaria – but not to serve Israelis. Instead, Israel’s idea is that this water be pumped up into the mountains of the West Bank to supply the Palestinian villages and towns that currently rely on the aquifers there, in return for a signed agreement that would allow Israel to continue taking the lion’s share of the West Bank's aquifer water. Now this desalinated water, which Palestinians would be obliged to buy from Israel, would cost them three times as much as much as the water from their own aquifers. The obvious question -- why Israel doesn't drink its own desalinated water and leave the Palestinians' water alone ?

Irrigation

As far as irrigating crops – actually Israel does quite a lot of it. But Palestinians don’t – they don’t have enough water to spare for that.

Palestinian agriculture in the West Bank is predominantly rain-fed -- 94% of the cultivated area is not irrigated. Gaza uses some irrigation, but all together Palestinians irrigate a total of only about 11% of their cultivated lands.

In contrast, Israel irrigates more than 50% of its cultivated land, and uses 8 times more water on irrigation than Palestinians do. Part of this, as mentioned, is due to Israel's inappropriate choices of crops. But even more shocking, Israel is using about 53% of its drinking-quality water for agriculture.

Water Conservation

In the 1960s, Israel was receiving worldwide acclaim for its advances in water-saving farming technologies. Unfortunately, this type of research ground to a halt after Israel gained control of the water in the occupied Palestinian lands.

Without any alternatives, Palestinians (especially those not connected to the water network) have adopted very water-efficient lifestyles. Look at any Palestinian town (or Jordanian town) and you will see the water tanks on the roofs to collect water during the winter rains – often enough to supply a water-thrifty family for months. And many Palestinian farmers are using a simple system of earth filters to recycle the water they use for cooking and cleaning – they filter the water through a series of ponds built on descending levels, and by the time the water gets to the bottom, it’s clean enough for agricultural use.

Israelis could adopt many of these simlple, cost-efficient techniques to save water without drastically changing their lifestyles. But they have yet to do so.

I've covered some of this in previous threads (this may have been before you were around.)

[Nasturtium 500]

WOM-- you're right, I may not have been around to see the other threads. I happen to like maps and sources and whatnot So! I think they should let the water go where it was intended to go, and stop diverting it all over the place. Around the Jordan river they are causing an artificial desertification around the banks. This diversion is causing the aforementioned Dead Sea dry-up. The funny part is I still cannot seem to get even my Dh to care about that-- it is likely some kind of American cultural thing then,this idea about caring about the natural resources and environment. The thing is, I see this land as being integral for no matter who is living there-- Jews, Arabs, or anyone else. Israel and all its territories are not living in such a precarious environment as the majority of Jordan. They (no matter who THEY are), would do well to leave the natural things alone. I know they think they can jsut ship in crops in case of failure, etc... but it is a BAD thing to ruin your land. I've always been an odd person who doesn't fight the nature I'm given though. I didn't irrigate in the desert, and I don't do it here either! Thanks for the excellent post about water-usage. FYI-- found my first female pumpkin flower-- not open yet, but it's there!

Jen-- Yay! Are you back? You have to share pics! The DS is soooooo hot this time of year. Hope you didn't get water in your face! I got it in my eye! That with my warning to you about other parts, was extremely painful!

[PalestineMyHeart 1,897]

What do you expect? Before the Iraq war, so many Americans thought Iraq was the number one exporter of oil. And they would just take all of their oil and make our gas prices cheaper.

1. Iraq was not the number one oil exporter. It was second to Saudi Arabia I believe.

2. gas prices are not cheaper by any means!!!

Iraq was the #7 exporter in the world -- after Saudi Arabia, Russia, Norway Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Venezuela.

[PalestineMyHeart 1,897]

Some 750,000 Palestinians expelled from their homes in 1947-1948, denied return and refused any compensation,

It’s incorrect. Around 250,000 palestinians were expelled from Israel versus close to

1 000 000 Jews expelled from the arab countries after the creation of Israel.

Another yarn from the Ever-Evolving Book of Zionist Fairy Tales. First they claimed no one was even there ("a land without people for a people without land;") next they said the Palestinians willingly chose to leave their perfectly safe homes and property behind and turn themselves into penniless refugees living in tents just because they wanted to make Israel look bad. Then about 15 years ago Zionists started to grudgingly admit that wellllll mayyyyybe all that shooting and killing and stuff *might* have perhaps induced a few dozen families or so to flee to a safe place away from the guns and bombs.

But Risto -- these days, Israeli historians and even the Israeli government have started to admit the truth. The 750,000 figure is in the mid-range of most estimates -- the actual figure may be well over 800,000.

According to the ground-breaking research of Israeli historian Benny Morris, based on newly unsealed Zionist archives, Jewish militias and terror gangs drove out 170,000 Palestinians even before the establishment of the State of Israel. Between April and June 1948, 250,000-300,000 more were expelled. Another 100,000 were driven out from July-October 1948 in the months immediately after Israel announced its statehood -- some 60,000 just from Lydda and Ramleh. And an estimated 200,000-230,000 more were forced out between October 1948 and March 1949.

The U.N. estimated 711,000 Palestinians refugees living outside Israel in 1951. Another 40,000 had been driven from their homes but remained as refugees inside what had become Israel.

And that doesn't even begin to count the second wave of Palestinian refugees -- expelled as Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem in 1967 and immediately began to annex it.

But Risto -- I have to say you're making some progress, too -- you actually used the "expelled" word instead of insisting that all the Palestinians just suddenly decided to leave everything they owned behind (or that Arab leaders somehow induced them to leave) in some diabolical plot to frame the Jews.

As far as your figure of 1 million Jews "expelled" from Arab countries -- actually a lot of these left voluntarily, thanks to Israel's ongoing offers to give them free transportation, free stolen Palestinian land to squat on, and free assistance to help them get started on wonderful new lives in someone else's home.

But I guess in the sociopathic reasoning of Zionists, this becomes some kind of "mutual population exchange" -- as if Jews who decided to leave *other* Muslim countries in order to hitch onto the hijacked gravy train in Israel (or even those who actually got kicked out of those countries as a response to Israel's expulsion of the Palestinians) -- as if this somehow retroactively justifies the separate crime of Zionists forcing Palestinians out of their homes in Palestine, and as if it exonerates Israel of its responsibility.

LOL Zio-logic: "Here, I'll kick you out of your property and keep it for myself and my family and friends, and then I'll let some of the neighbors who talk and pray like you have some of my friends' property that we don't even want any more now that we have yours, and we'll call it even -- you can be their problem now." I keep saying it's the logic of the criminally insane It's also incredibly racist to consider all Arabs as somehow interchangeable. I think it's based in Zionists' own view of themselves -- they see the Jewish people as all belonging to the same nation, so they perceive all Arabs as inherently the same nation, too.

[♥JP♥ 5]

MK, I must ask. What do you do for a living? You are very knowledgable, I hope your line of work is somehow involved in this cause because your knowledge and well thought out posts would be a great asset to the Palestinian people.

[almaty 19]

i agree

[ready4ONE 5,400]

Bearing in mind I am not anti-Palestinean but PLEASE!

"As far as your figure of 1 million Jews "expelled" from Arab countries -- actually a lot of these left voluntarily, thanks to Israel's ongoing offers to give them free transportation, free stolen Palestinian land to squat on, and free assistance to help them get started on wonderful new lives in someone else's home."

Many left 'voluntarily' after their synagogues were burned, their lives threatened etc. You do have a lot of knowledge, but it is very one sided. You are quick to call anything pro-Israel 'Zionist' fairy tales, yet weave them yourself regarding Palestine. No small number of such incoming Jews who 'voluntarily' went to Israel did so before Israel was created. To go way back to an earlier statement of mine, Palestineans have their Arab brothers to thank for no small portion of their suffering.

An interesting article, no doubt Zionist propaganda concludes in part:

Accounts of the late 1940s widely assume that the Arab exodus occurred first, followed by the Jewish expulsion. Kirkbride refers to "a decision of the Iraqi government to retaliate for the expulsion of Arab refugees from Palestine by forcing the majority of the Jewish population of Iraq to go to Israel."46 In Libya, too, there is a similar tendency to associate the uprooting of the Jewish community with the establishment of the State of Israel. "Jews," John Wright argues, "were forced out of Libya as a result of events leading up and following the foundation of the State of Israel in May 1948."47

But these accounts oversimplify the actual sequence of events: as we have seen, in a good many cases, Jews were forced out well before the Palestinian exodus. As 'Arif, Sirtawi, and Jiryis acknowledge, the Arab states contributed substantially to the Palestinians' present predicament. A recognition of the full wrong done to the Jews of the Arab countries should put to rest Palestinian claims for restitution by Israel. As Péroncel-Hugoz correctly points out, the Jews "left property and space [they] legitimately owned" in the Middle East.

http://www.meforum.org/article/263

Peace!

[HAL 9000 96]

Its called knee-jerkoism, r41.