Recognition of a Palestinian state by Sweden would violate the same clauses in the Oslo Accords as Israel building a new settlement in the West Bank.--Jerusalem Post
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Swedish Social Democratic anti-semitism
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4321lynx
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And Israel continues to build new settlements in the West Bank...
The article is a bit vague as to why, though. If Sweden feels that the best way to follow the Oslo accords is to recognise both states equally, then surely Israel isn't in a position to claim that individual states can not interpret the rules as they see fit?
Swedish Ambassador to Israel Carl Magnus Nesser released a statement saying there had been a misunderstanding and that recognition would only follow extensive talks, not a unilateral declaration of statehood.... Lofven clarified that he had meant future, rather than immediate, recognition of a Palestinian state. Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom said that recognition would depend on the circumstances, but added that recognition is an "important step toward a two-state solution.--"Sweden backtracks: Recognition of Palestinian state only after talks"
bilby
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Nevermind; the UK house of commons voted to recognise Palestine today/yesterday (13 Oct London time).
bilby
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Oh well. At least the Rev. Ian Paisley (DUrP) will be happy.
angelo
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They voted to recognise a terrorist state?
4321lynx
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laughing dog
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Are you under the impression that gov'ts do not recognize "terrorist" states?
angelo
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Well, the British, American and many EU countries keep stating over and over that they will not negotiate with a terrorist group.
It's a terrorist group who are the government in Gaza. I think it's hypocritical as well because countries such as Iran are also led by a terrorist group.
It's a terrorist group who are the government in Gaza. I think it's hypocritical as well because countries such as Iran are also led by a terrorist group.
They recognise Israel? Why Israel and not Palestine? Both countries shoot each other, both countries dispute the border, both contain racists that want to eradicate the other and both have the majority of the population being largely peaceful and embracing democracy.
You need a reason to recognise one and not the other beyond simply not liking one side.
So does Sweden.
angelo
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Democracy and Palestine don't compute. Hamas is NOT a democratic party such as the multi party system in Israel and the rest of the Western world. Israel does not have the destruction of Arabs in it's charter as Hamas has.
Then how did they get elected?
No, but it is actively engaged in settling it's citizens on Palestinian land. Given a choice between a country that talks about destroying its enemy, and a country that's actively doing it, what's wrong with treating them equally?
DrZoidberg
Contributor
I do live here, and do know why and can explain it. The Swedish right has been extremely pro-USA always. And since the political discourse operates in dichotomies the left here has to be against USA, in matching levels of extreme. If USA is pro-Israel, it means that the Swedish left has to be pro-Palestine. There really is no deeper thought behind it. Yes, I too find it silly. The media reporting on Israel/Palestine is so badly skewed toward Palestine it's not even funny. Fox News would come across as objective and balanced in comparison.
There's history to this. During the Vietnam war Sweden was one of the strongest supporters of North Vietnam in the world. We got internationally famous for it, and it became a thing of national pride. Especially when USA lost that war. What this did to our national identity cannot be understated. It was a feeling of David vs Goliath. During this time plenty of lefty Swedes travelled around the world to fight in various leftist guerilla wars against fascist dictators. They were considered national heroes. I see the Swedish support for Palestine as a continuation of this exact same movement.
Sweden up until that point had been very fascist-leaning. We didn't keep out of WW2 because we're peace loving. We stayed out of it because we couldn't decide which side to join. After the war the Swedish right switched from worshipping Germany, to worshipping USA. So then the left had to start hating USA. They hadn't prior to this.
This is the entire and comprehensive background story to this.
As far as I can tell there's not a shred of anti-Semitism to be found in the Swedish support for Palestine. The left is also the non-racist side. They take pride in NOT hating because of race. Swedish racists are right wing and focus their hate on Islam. Sure, we've got anti-Semites to. But those are remnants of the old Nazi movement. They're pathetically marginal. And most importantly are NOT a part of any of the political parties who voted for recognising Palestine. If anything the motivation for this is due to marking that they're NOT racists. As... like I said... our racists focus their hate on Muslims, ie people like the Palestinians.
angelo
Deleted
Palestinians both Israelis and Arabs have equality in Israel, not in Gaza. Make no mistake, both these people were called Palestinians for centuries. Further..................So let us see if we have this straight. The British parliament decides to “recognize” the “state” of “Palestine.” It thus reverts to exactly the same displays of courage and integrity that it showed back when Britain recognized the right to self-determination of the Sudeten Germans in 1938. All this from Britain, the occupier of Gibraltar, the Falklands, Wales, Scotland, Ulster, and the Channel Islands. The Brits are joined by Sweden in a similar belch of “recognition.” You remember Sweden, the country that was too cowardly to choose a side in either World War and that provided iron ore to feed Hitler’s war machine. Yes, Sweden, which refuses to recognize the rights to self-determination of its own Samis, and whose journalists recycle medieval blood libels about Jews murdering gentiles and selling their body parts. Other European countries are expected to follow. Why “Palestine” is any more worthy of being “recognized” than ISIS, another terrorist gang claiming to be a state seeking “recognition,” is never explained.
Now an interesting twist to the story is the demonstration of the Israeli Radical Left of its contempt for democracy and for Israeli sovereignty. The Israeli Left, led by the tenured leftists, is willing to endorse pretty much anything that is harmful to its own country. It has been urging European countries to “recognize the state of Palestine.” A petition was signed by dozens of Israel’s most anti-Israel academics, plus some non-academic members of the Hamas Lobby. It was organized by Amiram Goldblum from the Hebrew University, a founder of the extremist anti-Israel “Peace Now” organization, and Alon Liel, an ex-diplomat who now teaches for some reason at Tel Aviv University. These two were earlier among the initiators and organizers of a notorious pseudo-poll that claimed falsely to show that Israeli Jews favor “apartheid.” That “poll” last year was an exercise in distortion and tendentious manipulation, designed to generate misleading “statistics.” It was thoroughly discredited by serious social scientists.
Source Front Page Mag.
Source?
My understanding was that the issues are similar on either side of the border. In Gaza sale of property to Jews, particularly Israeli Jews (i.e. almost all of them) is prevented, for fear that it will be used as a legal pretext for another illegal settlement. Meanwhile, in Israel Arabs get regularly discriminated against in property and building reg disputes, as part of the settlement program, and in contentious areas, such as East Jerusalem, and along the border. Arab property rights in Israel are not given the same legal protection in Israel as Jewish property rights. If you have a source that says something different, I'd be interested to see it.
What is undeniable is that the Israeli government does not treat Settler and Palestinian populations equally in the West Bank, where it exercises control. Palestinians are regularly discriminated against. Whether that is 'in Israel' is obviously a point of contention, but is it certainly the Israeli government doing it, and they claim to be acting within the law.
More to the point, unequal treatment of populations is not usually a reason for not recognising a state. Israel recognises several Middle Eastern Countries, such as Saudi Arabia, that don't treat all their citizens equally, as do most other countries.
So again, you've still not given any reason to recognise Israel, but not Palestine. Is there one?
Ok, so it's not just a particular Swedish city councillor that you are maintaining is Anti-Semitic, but all of Sweden AND all of the UK, AND the Israeli left? If we have a position that's adopted by most of the world, including nearly 50% of Israelis, maybe it's worth considering that it's not Anti-Semitism after all?
DrZoidberg
Contributor
There are all together 20 000 Samis in Sweden spread over a vast area. They are thoroughly mixed in with ethnic Swedes. I doubt anybody, even hypothetically, has any clue how any kind of Sami self-rule or self-determination would work? They do have their own parliament, Sametinget. And they do get disproportionately more attention from the government than their tiny numbers should otherwise warrant. It's a miniscule minority. All together there exists 80 000 Sami all over the world. Their numbers can barely populate a minor town. Let alone rule a country. I think it's safe to say that their greatest challenge for Same self-rule is to convince the Samis that they want it at all.
Are you talking about the neo-nazi sites? In the last election their political party (Svenskarnas Parti) got 528 votes, all together, in the entire country. That's the sum total of nazis in Sweden. I mean... nazis who aren't like twelve years old writing inflammatory posts from their bedroom instead of taking out the trash, like their mom told them to. They make a lot of noise, but nobody cares.
We do have quite a few nationalistic sites that are racist in the general sense. But they're not particularly anti-Semitic. I mean, they hate all foreigners equally. They're all for equality in that sense. Jews seem to get as much (or little) love as any other group.
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They already have some degree of autonomy. They've got their own local government structures and are exempt from some national laws...