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Charles Knapp's avatar

A small correction. You write, “Mainstream Zionism basically pussy footed around the question of Arab presence in Palestine. They just tried to pretend there was nobody living there. The official motto was “A land without people for a people without a land”.”

The mainstream Zionists are, I assume, those who agreed with Herzl’s vision of a mutually beneficial relationship with the Arabs who would see the advantages of developing the area’s economy. Everyone knew that the area was populated, even if sparsely so.

The “official motto” to which you refer is not a Zionist one but of Christian Restoration from the 1840s. It never became a slogan of Zionism as much as one often attributed to it.

As to the 2005 Gaza withdrawal, my recollection is that it was Sharon’s attempt to have the world see if the Palestinians could turn the enclave into a peaceful entity and, if not, he had secured a written pledge from President Bush that would recognize Israel’s “facts on the ground.” Israel thought it foolhardy to allow Hamas to run in the elections as it had never endorsed the Quartet conditions but had to accede to US demands on the issue.

And, of course, in one of his first acts, President Obama rejected President Bush’s written pledge as inconsistent with his Administration’s policies - which was as true a statement as he ever made.

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