naraburns nihil supernum
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #1
This is a megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
Should there be a “statute of limitations” for historical grievances?
As I read about the history of the Israel/Palestine conflict, I can’t help but feel sympathetic for the Palestinian view that they were unjustly deprived of their land in the “Nakba”. Nonetheless, the entire history of Israel involved the area being constantly passed between empires, and far enough back you have Jews being killed or forced into exile after the Jewish-Roman wars.
If you start the clock today and ignore all history, Israel’s current territory is legitimate (as is any territory, by default). If you start it in 1948, then they look like occupiers. If you start it in biblical times, Israel starts to look legitimate again. If you insist that time passing doesn’t matter at all, you’re forced into a hopeless task of trying to track the very first cases of early humans unjustly taking land in the area from other early humans.
An unbounded “statute of limitations” for grievances that go back thousands of years seems completely impractical. But very short time limits seem undesirable too. I’m opposed to Russia invading Ukraine and I think it is entirely legitimate for Ukraine to try to reclaim Russian-occupied territory now. But I would not, for example, endorse Germany trying to reclaim Kaliningrad today, even though it was annexed and had its German population expelled and replaced mostly with Russians after WWII.
There are many other historical examples. I think it was unjust that American former slaves were not given reparations in their lifetimes, but am much less enthusiastic about reparations for their descendants today. Here in New Zealand, the indigenous Maori population have legitimate historical grievances, and many Maori tribes have received compensation from the government in recent decades. Nonetheless, I would not support the strongest claims by Maori activists today.
I’m influenced a lot on this matter by a paper by Tyler Cowen called How Far Back Should We Go? Why Restitution Should Be Small. He argues that under any multiple different ethical theories, it is difficult to justify large restitution for wrongs committed in the distant past. It becomes impractical even in theory to identify who alive today is better or worse off, the original victims and beneficiaries have died, and intergenerational restitution claims are on much shakier ground.
In the case of territorial integrity, I think it’s a very good thing that we have a norm against expansionist wars, and pushing back against recent conquests (e.g. in the Russia-Ukraine war) should be part of that. But it would be completely impractical to try to correct all current borders that were the result of historical expansionism, even if we limited ourselves to just the past century or so. Even if you could pull it off, it would mostly end up just disrupting the lives of people quietly living their lives for the sins of their forefathers and probably wouldn’t do much to help anyone.
Bringing it back to Israel/Palestine, where does it leave me?
Well, if I’m to be consistent about being sceptical of long-ago restitution claims, anything along the lines of “Jews were exiled from ancient Israel thousands of years ago, so they deserve it back” has to be a non-starter. Consistently applying a similar standard to other groups would radically upend the world, from the descendants of Ghenghis Khan compensating the descendants of his victims, to Native Americans getting the USA back.
For the “Nakba”, we’re talking about claims that are now 75 years old. That puts it right in the marginal zone, in my view. There is a small but rapidly dwindling number of living victims, and more or less all the perpetrators are dead. But it’s far from a Ghenghis Khan-level distant past.
Finally, there are obviously very many recent grievances in the Israel/Palestine conflict, that this line of thought doesn’t apply for.
Personally I think a 50 year limitation seems fair.
However I do feel the need to push back against the view that the Nakba was a Jewish injustice against Arabs. Arabs started the 1948 war. The Jews wanted a peaceful partition of the land. If they had simply allowed the Jews to live in the homes they had peacefully purchased, they would not have lost their own homes.
If the Ukraine/Russia war were to resolve with Ukraine expanding its territory somewhat, I would be very unsympathetic to the claims that this was a terrible injustice to the Russians.
Personally I think a 50 year limitation seems fair.
Do you agree that Israel should stop accepting their annual "sorry" payments from the German government, pursuing old men who were Nazis, etc?
It strikes me that it's basically impossible to make proper restitution for millions murdered, but relatively easy to make whole someone that's had their land connived and stolen away from them. If anything, all the Israeli schmaltz and guilt about WW2 should stop well before the Palestinians give up on regaining their rightful homes.
Both are in restitution for evils that are older than the state of Israel, ie well past your 50 year rule. If the Paelstinian cause has exceeded some statute of limitation, it follows that WW2 and all its attendant evils has passed also.
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Notes -
Should there be a “statute of limitations” for historical grievances?
As I read about the history of the Israel/Palestine conflict, I can’t help but feel sympathetic for the Palestinian view that they were unjustly deprived of their land in the “Nakba”. Nonetheless, the entire history of Israel involved the area being constantly passed between empires, and far enough back you have Jews being killed or forced into exile after the Jewish-Roman wars.
If you start the clock today and ignore all history, Israel’s current territory is legitimate (as is any territory, by default). If you start it in 1948, then they look like occupiers. If you start it in biblical times, Israel starts to look legitimate again. If you insist that time passing doesn’t matter at all, you’re forced into a hopeless task of trying to track the very first cases of early humans unjustly taking land in the area from other early humans.
An unbounded “statute of limitations” for grievances that go back thousands of years seems completely impractical. But very short time limits seem undesirable too. I’m opposed to Russia invading Ukraine and I think it is entirely legitimate for Ukraine to try to reclaim Russian-occupied territory now. But I would not, for example, endorse Germany trying to reclaim Kaliningrad today, even though it was annexed and had its German population expelled and replaced mostly with Russians after WWII.
There are many other historical examples. I think it was unjust that American former slaves were not given reparations in their lifetimes, but am much less enthusiastic about reparations for their descendants today. Here in New Zealand, the indigenous Maori population have legitimate historical grievances, and many Maori tribes have received compensation from the government in recent decades. Nonetheless, I would not support the strongest claims by Maori activists today.
I’m influenced a lot on this matter by a paper by Tyler Cowen called How Far Back Should We Go? Why Restitution Should Be Small. He argues that under any multiple different ethical theories, it is difficult to justify large restitution for wrongs committed in the distant past. It becomes impractical even in theory to identify who alive today is better or worse off, the original victims and beneficiaries have died, and intergenerational restitution claims are on much shakier ground.
In the case of territorial integrity, I think it’s a very good thing that we have a norm against expansionist wars, and pushing back against recent conquests (e.g. in the Russia-Ukraine war) should be part of that. But it would be completely impractical to try to correct all current borders that were the result of historical expansionism, even if we limited ourselves to just the past century or so. Even if you could pull it off, it would mostly end up just disrupting the lives of people quietly living their lives for the sins of their forefathers and probably wouldn’t do much to help anyone.
Bringing it back to Israel/Palestine, where does it leave me?
Well, if I’m to be consistent about being sceptical of long-ago restitution claims, anything along the lines of “Jews were exiled from ancient Israel thousands of years ago, so they deserve it back” has to be a non-starter. Consistently applying a similar standard to other groups would radically upend the world, from the descendants of Ghenghis Khan compensating the descendants of his victims, to Native Americans getting the USA back.
For the “Nakba”, we’re talking about claims that are now 75 years old. That puts it right in the marginal zone, in my view. There is a small but rapidly dwindling number of living victims, and more or less all the perpetrators are dead. But it’s far from a Ghenghis Khan-level distant past.
Finally, there are obviously very many recent grievances in the Israel/Palestine conflict, that this line of thought doesn’t apply for.
Personally I think a 50 year limitation seems fair.
However I do feel the need to push back against the view that the Nakba was a Jewish injustice against Arabs. Arabs started the 1948 war. The Jews wanted a peaceful partition of the land. If they had simply allowed the Jews to live in the homes they had peacefully purchased, they would not have lost their own homes.
If the Ukraine/Russia war were to resolve with Ukraine expanding its territory somewhat, I would be very unsympathetic to the claims that this was a terrible injustice to the Russians.
Do you agree that Israel should stop accepting their annual "sorry" payments from the German government, pursuing old men who were Nazis, etc?
It strikes me that it's basically impossible to make proper restitution for millions murdered, but relatively easy to make whole someone that's had their land connived and stolen away from them. If anything, all the Israeli schmaltz and guilt about WW2 should stop well before the Palestinians give up on regaining their rightful homes.
I agree that Germany does not today owe Israel (or the Jewish community more generally) any sort of reparations or apologies for the Holocaust. It's an awful history, but it's history.
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Why are you tying these two things together?
Both are in restitution for evils that are older than the state of Israel, ie well past your 50 year rule. If the Paelstinian cause has exceeded some statute of limitation, it follows that WW2 and all its attendant evils has passed also.
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Yes, it accomplishes literally nothing.
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