On 1/27/23 10:49, The Horny Goat wrote:

On 1/27/23 10:49, The Horny Goat wrote:
> On Fri, 27 Jan 2023 06:23:24 -0800, a425couple
> <a425couple@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> How you think that the invasion by Putin's Russia into the
>> independent and recognized state of Ukraine is in any way
>> the equivilant of the problems in the Levant is quite beyond
>> my comprehension.
>
> I was kind of scratching my head on that one too.
>
>> In 1947 both the Jews and the Palestinians were offered a
>> United Nations approved plan of each getting about half of
>> the rather empty area. The Jews accepted it. The Palestinians
>> refused to acceept that compromise, and every compromise since.
>> The Palestinians were sure they could kill all the Jews and
>> dump their bodies in the sea, especially since they had the
>> help of 5 Arab armies.
>> They were wrong.
>> They still refuse to accept any offered compromise.
>> They continue to choose violence.
>> 74 years of dreadfully bad leadership.
>> Even Vlad Putin is not that bad a leader.
>
> Fact is in 1947-48 Stalin was more of a friend to Israel than Truman
> or Attlee. A >LOT< of Czech military production (which was under
> Stalin's control at the time) went directly to Israel while the US and
> Britain dragged their heels. (No question the US + UK were on Israel's
> side in 1956 and 1967 but in 1947-48 the British were on the Arab
> side)
>
And one version of that story is:

from
https://www.rbth.com/history/327040-ussr-and-israel-from-friends-to-foes

Why did the USSR help to create Israel, but then became its foe
HISTORY DEC 15 2017OLEG YEGOROV
June 1948: Israeli soldiers travel on route 7 to Jerusalem during the
War of Independence

Getty Images
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Joseph Stalin strongly supported the creation of Israel in 1947 because
he hoped the Jewish state would be a Soviet ally in the Middle East. But
when things didn’t work out between Moscow and Tel Aviv, the Soviet
Union became hostile and turned into a staunch Arab ally.
In 1947, the situation in the Middle East was very tense, with bombs and
violent clashes every week. Great Britain, which had been administrating
Palestine since 1920, wanted to terminate the mandate and let the
ex-colony go free. Still, it was clear that independence would lead to
more bloodshed and war.

Tensions were rising between Palestine Arabs (1.2 million people, or 65
percent of the population) and Jewish settlers (608,000 people, or 35
percent of the total). Arabs didn’t want a Jewish state in Palestine and
threatened to “throw it into the sea,” if one was created. But the Jews,
who had just suffered the horrors of the Holocaust, were ready to fight
to establish their homeland.

Still, they needed diplomatic and economic support, and one of their
main allies in the Independence War of 1948-1949 (Arabs know it as The
Catastrophe) would be unexpected. Desiring to expand the Soviet sphere
of influence after victory in World War II, Stalin was ready to offer
support to the Jews.

A common goal
Stalin, however, was not keen on promoting Jewish interests in
Palestine. He had already launched several projects to give Soviet Jews
national autonomy within the borders of the USSR, but these initiatives
failed. As for Israel, Stalin was not going to let Soviet Jewish
citizens emigrate there.

Joseph Stalin didn't care much about Jewish people but, pursuing his own
goals, helped them to win their statehood.

Global Look Press
As Leonid Mlechin, a Russian historian and journalist told Ekho Moskvy
radio, “creating a Jewish state in Palestine was a way for Stalin to
push a weakened Great Britain, which he hated, out of the Middle East.”
Since Arab regimes were often pro-British, Stalin preferred to work with
the Zionists.

Previously a Soviet ally in World War II and now a geopolitical rival,
Great Britain was also hated by Jewish settlers. In 1946, Zionist
militants bombed Jerusalem’s King David Hotel, where the British
administration was housed, killing 91 people. Driving out the British
was a goal shared by the Zionists and the USSR, though for different
reasons.

Diplomatic wars
After Great Britain’s mandate was terminated, the Palestinian issue
passed to the United Nations, which had to find a solution. While Great
Britain didn’t support the idea of creating an independent Jewish state,
the two main powers in the post-war order, the USSR and the U.S., opted
for a two-state solution, which in turn was strongly opposed by Arab
states. In November 1947, the issue was voted on during the UN General
Assembly plenary meeting.

Andrei Gromyko, the Permanent Representative of the Soviet Union to the
United Nations, showed strong support for Israel's case.

AFP
Soviet ambassador to the UN, Andrei Gromyko, said during his speech:
“The Jewish people have been connected with Palestine throughout a long
historical period.” This contravened the Arab viewpoint that the
creation of Israel was unjust. The USSR was the first country to
officially recognize Israel, two days after it declared independence on
May 14, 1948.

Socialist guns for Zionists
The U.S., which also supported the creation of Israel, officially banned
weapon supplies to the Middle East. Unlike the Americans, however,
Moscow sent arms to the Zionists, though unofficially and through other
countries, such as Czechoslovakia. The USSR used German weapons captured
at the end of the war.

Israeli infantry making a full assault on Egyptian forces in the Negev
area of Israel during the War of Independence.

Getty Images
Israel got rifles, mortars and even several Messerschmitt fighter planes
from Czechoslovakia, of course, with Soviet permission and consent. This
wasn’t the only source of weapons for the Jewish state. Basically, they
were getting arms from around the world any way possible, but the USSR
definitely played a major role in Israel’s victory in 1948.

End of honeymoon
Stalin’s support for the Israeli cause didn’t last long. As Julius
Kosharovsky, a Russian-born Israeli historian, said in his book on the
Zionist movement in the USSR, bilateral relations deteriorated soon
after Golda Meir, Israel’s envoy to Russia, raised the issue of the
emigration of Soviet Jews to Israel.

Golda Meir takes up her appointment as the first Israel Envoy to the
Soviet Union

AP
The answer was a strict “No.” The official Soviet position was that all
Soviet Jews, like all Soviet people in general, were extremely happy and
didn’t need any Promised Land. Israeli politicians couldn’t accept this,
and they soon turned to the U.S. as their main ally.

Israel’s new alliance with the U.S. had severe consequences in the
coming years and decades. For example, in 1952, 13 members of the
Soviet-based Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee were arrested and executed.
Also, starting in the early 1950s and until the Cold War’s end, the USSR
supported the Arabs in their conflict with Israel.

If using any of Russia Beyond's content, partly or in full, always
provide an active hyperlink to the original material.

JOSEPH STALIN MIDDLE EASTJEWSARAB
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> One MAJOR victory of the Palestinians was to entrench the idea that
> the Arab world had no responsibility to resettle them - while Israel
> DID absorb Jews expelled from their Arab neighbors - in fact a very
> similar number to the Palestinians who went to camps in the West Bank
> and Gaza.
>
> No other ethnic group on Earth has maintained "refugee status" for
> anything like the 75+ years they have - and there have been lots of
> refugee situations since 1947-48. For instance who talks about the
> need to resettle the Boat people or Syrians these days? Or the
> Hungarians of 1956? Both groups were important in their day (and there
> were plenty of others)
>
> (Though I am STILL angry about the case of the Syrian refugee to
> Canada who railed against the Canadian government's refusal to admit
> her brother's family and that his son had drowned at sea leaving
> Syria. The public outrage turned the 2015 Canadian federal election.
>
> Meanwhile further digging by reporters showed that while the father
> had picked up the refugee application forms HE HADN'T EVER ACTUALLY
> APPLIED TO COME TO CANADA so while I remain sorry his son drowned at
> sea, how can the Canadian government of the day be castigated by the
> usual suspects for it's "ill treatment" of somebody who had not even
> applied? By what reasonable standards is a country responsible for
> fair treatment of NON-APPLICANTS?
>
> In short - the Canadian 2015 election was turned by a fraudulent
> issue)
>
> At the same time roughly 25% of the Israeli population is Arab.
>
>> I believe Harry Truman was right in being a Friend of Zion.
>> I believe Winston Churchill was right in being a Friend of Zion.
>> I believe the UN vote was correct.
>> I also believe Jimmy Carter was right with the Camp David Accords
>> creating peace between Israel, Egypt, and Jordan.
>> And lately, more and more Islamic governments are finding the
>> Palestinian leaders impossible and are looking to form better
>> relations with Israel.
>> IMHO, the Trump brokered Abraham Accords are a move to the future.
>> read:
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Accords
>>
>> In 2022 I was in the Levant, and I talked to some Palestinians
>> who are also very unhappy at their 'leaders' who keep fomenting
>> trouble and disagreements just to keep themselves in power.
>
> Again - everywhere else in the world refugees are resettled within 5
> years at most. The ONLY reason the Palestinians continue to claim
> refugee status is that they are NOT interested in resettlement
> elsewhere but only in Israel and their numbers are such that the only
> way to achieve that is destruction of the State of Israel which
> understandably Israelis of all political stripes are loathe to give.