"New Israel" , a not so modest proposal

[wnylib]

124. Well, perhaps the word "terrorism" was not used in

the past regarding Native Americans fighting back, but in personal journals and in official records of the time periods, as well as in newspapers of the old "Wild West," the people on the receiving end of Native raids did speak of being terrorized.

And they called the Native people "savages." Even Thomas Jefferson referred to brutal methods of warfare by the Native people in the Declaration of Independence.

That's not a slur on Native people by me. I have Native ancestry (and colonial ancestry, too). The colonists and western frontier people were just as brutal, and worse in some cases.

I came across some interesting family letters that my husband's aunt had saved. They were correspondence between my husband's great grandmother and a missionary to Indians in the Kansas Territory. The missionary said that the Indians lived by verbal "laws" or social codes of behavior, but the White people who moved into the Kansas Indian Territory were lawless and far more savage in their behavior than any of the Indians that he dealt with. The frontiersmen in Kansas, away from the social norms of the East, without sheriffs and courts to restrain them, lived solely by brute strength, personal desires, and no social values.

But the I/P issues are not the same as the issues between Native Americans and colonists and settlers. If you learn about the history of Palestine, it was the Palestinians who, centuries ago, tried to take over lands from the Jewish descendants of ancient Israel. However, many of those Palestinians also descended from ancient people of the region. So both are indigenous to the land.

Israeli settlers in the West Bank today are indeed colonizing land that, in modern times, is considered Palestinian and outside of Israel's borders. But, Israelis are not outsiders in the region. Descendants of ancient Israel have always lived continuously in Palestine. Their numbers have increased and decreased at various periods in time, according to outside conquests and persecutions. But it has always been a homeland and cultural center for them.

That's why the only solution is a two state one, but Palestinians have always demanded the territory for themselves alone, excluding the right of Israel to exist. And many, though not all, Israelis under Netanyahu are increasingly opposing a two state solution.

Both sides need to recognize and accept the existence of the other in the region, but continuous terrorism attacks and counter fighting keep them polarized.

There is a very informative, but very lengthy Wikipedia article on the history of ancient Israel and its descendants in Palestine from ancient times to the present, under various conquests and rulers.