I won't be watching and don't really care that much about what's legal unless it's also fair and leads to a better outcome. As Jefferson said, "Tyranny is defined as that which is legal for the government but illegal for the citizenry [or occupied persons in this case]."

Ultimately there is no legitimate objective basis for the ownership of land, but I guess that's another thread.

TY.

I add that I'm sympathetic to the position people like Yuv and rafiki (not that they are agreeing on everything) are in here. It's hard for them not to be defensive and wary. I've tried to make this point to some of the people from the UK/Britain/Ireland/whatever itt who I think have been unfair at times to various degrees by pointing out some of the atrocities that have happened in their countries and pretty much every time they have lost their minds. And still they didn't get the point.

I think the use of the term "occupation" has been misused from the word go. That we got to this version of Gaza simply stems from a level of violence inside Israeli cities that was considered unacceptable to just about everyone that lives there. I don't know how much sleep you lost when the fence didn't exist and thousands of Israelis would be murdered in their public spaces. But effectively that was the trade. And as the deaths on the Israeli side have dropped accordingly, here we are. Btw Egypt is quite free to not enforce the blockade. I don't see many calling them an apartheid state. Funny, that.

As I've also explained in rather plain English, the blockades can absolutely end when an elected government comes to the table with something concrete on how they can prevent the lifting of the blockade from turning into another excuse to move the missiles up. Because every single piece of land returned that's not been to the Egyptians, has been used to launch more attacks from. Where do you see the win in this for Israel?

Btw it's just the depth of historical knowledge you miss by not watching those videos. The history of the mandate and how it was executed from decade to decade is fascinating. The original territory that extended west was actually very interesting. It's also easy to forget that the Arabs were given all the rest. This is the part that was given to be self-determined by Jews. And the legal documents are quite clear.

This guy must've loved reading the torture-justifying legal memos that came out of the bush administration.

'This is really deep diving, but this guy actually explains why waterboarding detainees is far from illegal, from a legal perspective. This is done at a forensic level, and is really impressive."

Answer me this please. I may be wrong here is some ways. Egypt has its own border with Gaza. Egypt regulates traffic through that border. Sure it could allow traffic, but not allowing it is not a blockade. Gaza has border with the Mediterranean Sea. Isreal blockades that border. Israel also destroyed the airport and I assume won't let in or out sea planes or helicopters. That's a blockade. Egypt doesn't do this do they?

Depends when. The Rafah crossing has opened and closed so many times you'd need a graph to track it.

Since 2009, the Egyptians have mostly kept the Rafah border crossing with Gaza closed. That year the terminal was open for a total of 35 days. 2014 the terminal open for 125 days. In 2015, it was open for only 32 days. In 2016, it was open for only 41 days. Last year just 29 days. Most of the time it's locked up tight.

If the Rafah crossing didn't have a blockade, effectively the one the Israelis run would be nearly pointless in terms of blocking weapons etc... The Egyptians "do their part".

Btw before 2000, something like 26k Palestinians left Gaza daily to work just at the Erez crossing (I dont know the sum of all the others). After Arafat launched the second Intifada, that dropped dramatically. It's almost like we could have prevented this... The count in 2004 was back up to well over 43k per day which is huge just for Erez. But when Hamas took over Gaza, the number fell off a cliff again. So are we better off than 2004? Looks like we aren't. Looks like Hamas has brought nothing but suffering.

That doesn't answer the question. Perhaps Egypt doesn't subvert Israel's blockade, but it's not an Egyptian blockade if they are just closing their own border. Who blocks air and sea travel to and from Gaza?

This is the wall between Gaza and Egypt Micro:



Each country blocks their own side Micro (air, sea, land). The Egyptians have destroyed/blown up/flooded every tunnel they get their hands on, and nobody crosses in outside of Rafah. And to cross Rafah you still need very specialized paperwork, and catch one of those 20-40 days a year.

I'll start the Egyptian apartheid thread now.

rafiki,

You're really not answering my questions at all. So Egypt has a closed border. They may not let Israelis cross the Egypt-Israeli border either and Israelis may not let Egyptians cross. Neither of those things are a blockade.

Gaza has a border with the sea. It also has a border with the atmosphere. Even locked in the heart of East Germany in the cold war the West Berliners could use the atmosphere to get themselves out and get stuff in. West Berlin was not blockaded.

Last week unarmed people from Gaza tried to get to Cyprus by boat and they were stopped by the Israeli Navy. Coming up pretty soon unarmed people are coming from Denmark to try to get to Gaza and the Israeli Navy is going to do what?

Who blocks these natural open borders to and from Gaza?

Micro, I don't get the lawyering over Egypt's role in the blockade. It's not even debatable that they are participating actively in the blockade. That's a really strange point you keep trying to emphasize even tho it's wrong and also why go to bat for Egypt?

The whole colonial force and ethinc cleansing is strangely never followed by the obvious conclusion, that Israel doesn't have a right to exist. For some reason you guys always fail on that point. You keep talking about settlements as if the green line is some actual border that Palestinian feel is theirs and the rest isn't.

It's hardly going to bat for Egypt. It's really simple. Gaza has a port and Israel blockades it. Egypt blocks their border, but it's their border too, not just Gaza's. Unless Egypt is blocking air and sea travel it is 100% Israel blockading Gaza.

"Lawyering" is just extremely lol. "It's not an Israeli blockade. It's an Israeli AND EGYPTIAN blockade" is an insane take, you're just really used to it.

This is because the standard (American anyway) lefty dovish take is not that the Palestinians are 100% right and automatically should get everything they claim.

I just don't get the debate. Israel and Egypt are collaborating together to control what goes in and out of Gaza. It's not really debatable, the only possible debate is whether Israel and Egypt's reasoning for doing so is justified or not.

I don't get it either. The question of whether or not Egypt has a right to close their mutual border is fundamentally different than whether Israel has a right to control Gazan borders which do not border Israel.

As microbet said, your denial of Israel's blockade would suggest that you consider the boundary between Gaza and the sea to be Israel's boundary. So, who exactly is questioning whose right to exist, again?

Also a practical question that Yuv or microbet can answer. When we in the west hear about palestinian homes being bulldozed to make way for Israeli settlements, does that mean the state department of Israel updates its national map right away? Like, how often are the boundaries of the country redrawn (textbooks, google earth, etc.)?

I guess English is neither of your first language so maybe you don't know exactly what 'blockade' means.

This is like the first sentece. I really don't get the patronizing tone.

Shallow, I did not deny Israel is blockading Gaza. They are.

Yuv,

It's hard to believe you can't see the difference between closing a mutual border and closing border between Gaza and the sea and air travel to Gaza. Really hard. Like SMP said it means you think Gaza's air and sea boundaries border Israel, which means you think Gaza belongs to Israel.

The US does not allow travel between Cuba and the US (for the most part), but we don't blockade Cuba. We did blockade them for a while during the Cuban missile crisis. We allowed no shipping or air travel in or out at all. That was a blockade.

If Gaza were a real country and had a functioning sea port and airport and they freely came and went and traded goods with other countries and Egypt and Israel closed their borders with Gaza, no one would say Gaza was blockaded.

Israel is bombing Iranian bases in Syria and their supply convoys to Hezbollah in Lebanon and some of you people expect Israel to allow Hamas to have an airport and open shipping lanes. What a bunch of imbeciles.

If Egypt opened its border (to some extent) with Gaza, Israel's blockade would be useless and no longer exist. So any other person that ever dealt with this subject would say Egypt is taking an active part in the blockade. There is no argument that Israel is blockading Gaza. They aren't denying it. No one is, as far as I know, but I haven't read every one of rafiki's posts.

I can't actually understand the point of this argument, but once you go to ESL as an argument it's obvious that the discussion isn't going anywhere.

FYI, the airport you are mentioning isn't active since 2000.

Israel is questioning Palestine right to exist. In some short period in history you might argue it didn't, but obviously it questions its right to exist as a country now. Why do you think I'll disagree with that or that it contradicts something I said?

See, here's the thing. They Question Our Right To Exist is routinely presented as *the* justification by supporters of the occupation to pursue hardline military options in the case of, say, Iran, and to continue the status quo of oppression for Palestinians. 'How can we even negotiate with them if they even question our right to exist? Sorry, a military occupation is the only option to protect us against these irrational people' is a familiar trope.

It's just funny is all, that what is a routine, matter-of-fact stand held by the state of Israel towards its Other, becomes such a grave problem when held by some random mullah with no power in a speech meant for home consumption.