>>>>>>Why do you think the Americans supported the forming of the country Israel in 1947? They wanted to get them as far away from USA as possible. :-)
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>>>>>>Being Jewish myself, I find this remark stupid, offensive, highly insulting and not at all funny even if you meant it as a joke. Unless you are Jewish, making Jewish jokes is a form of anti-semitism.
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>>>>>I am rally sorry if I offended anyone, it was not intended at all. I accept and respect everyone regardless of religion, race, sexual preference or anything else. I never wanted to hurt anyone, please accept my apology. I agree that it was indeed a silly joke.
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>>>>>That said, I mean that the forming of the country Israel should not have happened as it did. It should have been much more carefully planned, and the Palestinians should have been heard and given a fair compensation. Instead their land was simply taken from them, with little or no compensation. This is why people have been fighting in the middle east ever since. There will never be any peace there before the Israelies withdraw from the west banks, and the Palestinians are given a fair chance to live independent, peaceful lives. No matter how much people twist an bend the history, the Palestinians owned and populated the land in 1947, and had done so for many, many generations.
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>>>>For what it's worth, Tore (I'm Jewish too, btw) I agree with you about the creation of Israel. This gets me into a lot of hot water with my relatives. The Jews had a right to a homeland as much as anyone else, but I think what happened in 1947 was poorly handled, and I hope none of my uncles, aunts or cousins is reading this.
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>>>You are welcome to answer the same question that I am asking Mr.Bleken.
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>>I didn't care for the process is all. As I said, Jews have as much right to a homeland as anyone else, but if somebody came to my street and told me parts of it were being turned over to some other group of people because people I don't know had a vote, I'd be a bit cheesed off. Especially if my house was one of those parts. Now, I wouldn't start throwing bombs, mind you, but I would certainly be unhappy.
>
>Sure, but it was not your street. I would even imagine that you never got to the level of owning streets, not even mentioning countries. If you mean legal standpoint then no one had title to the land, and emotional standpoint is too often interpreted in the way: it is mine and it is mine too.

Wars are rarely fought on legal grounds. They are fought on emotions. I can feel proprietary toward my neighbourhood without actually owning it.

>As long as it was divided equally, it was divided equally, i.e. hard fact. Also, you better know about some numbers (i.e. population, percentages, etc) thrown in by others. For example, around 1M Jews were exiled from surrounding Arab countries, at gunpoint (i.e. all properties were lost) in 1947-48 and arrived to Israel, i.e. they are not counted in a map supplied by Nicholas. Did they (true refugees) have right to some compensation? I don't even mention a right to defend themselves against physical extermination. Curiously, these events are totally ignored now for the sake of general 'unfairness' doctrine. Good must have fists, or it will be no good.

As I said, Jews have a right to a homeland. I just feel that all the countries that voted to get rid of the issue onto somebody else, could have acted differently. They each turned the Jews away themselves before shunting the issue off with the vote. They refused to have anything to do with the Jews and then they voted, and slapped themselves on the back for a job well done.

Should those Arabs who were displaced have been happy about it? I know you aren't going to contend that no Arabs were displaced in this re-apportioning.