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Comment by tptacek | Hacker News Reader

No, they were not comparably provocative. Further, you're doing the motte-and-bailey thing again: since you can't make the case that the Arab states hands are clean with respect to Gaza and the West Bank, you've switched premises, so that all of Israel is now occupied territory. To do this, you have to ignore the comparable number of Jewish people chased out of Arab states in the same time period. It's an untenable argument.

We're deep into the thread and nobody is reading us anymore. We're not going to get anywhere with this, and certainly we're not going to resolve the Israeli-Palestine conflict here.

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I don't see any motte-and-bailey argument. You said that the First Arab-Israeli War was an Arab war of aggression. I responded.

> all of Israel is now occupied territory

This isn't the point I was trying to make. All of Israel was taken from the Arabs - unjustly so. However, I was simply responding to your claim about the First Arab-Israeli War, and when I speak about the "occupied territories," I'm referring to the territories that Israel conquered in 1967, not the 1948 territories.

> since you can't make the case that the Arab states hands are clean with respect to Gaza and the West Bank

Why am I supposed to make that case?

> To do this, you have to ignore the comparable number of Jewish people chased out of Arab states in the same time period.

Jewish people were chased out of Arab countries following the establishment of the state of Israel, and to a large extent, as a result of the establishment of Israel and the antisemitic reaction it caused in the Arab world. The expulsion of Jewish people from the Arab world in the 1950s onwards did not retroactively justify the expulsion of the Arab population from what became Israel in 1948.

> No, they were not comparably provocative.

Launching major raids into Jordan, invading Egypt in concert with France and Britain in 1956 - those are pretty provocative moves.

Egypt and Syria mobilized on Israel's borders in May of '67. You're citing something that happened 10 years earlier. And this appears to be the best argument you've got, since you keep making it. Let's disengage?

Egypt mobilized a defensive force that was incapable of launching an invasion. Meanwhile, Israel had been planning a first-strike, which it actually executed.

> You're citing something that happened 10 years earlier.

Israel's invasion of Egypt was 10 years prior, but dominated Egyptian security considerations. Israel's major incursion into Jordan was only 7 months prior. The Arabs had every reason to fear Israeli aggression.

Going back to the original comment about the 1967 war, OP implied that the Palestinians were somehow to blame for the fact that they live under military occupation. The story of Israel simply defending itself in 1967 is not true: Israel struck first, and its claims that it was acting in preemptive self-defense are highly questionable, at best.

Egyptians had no reason to fear Israeli aggression. Please cite the book that says otherwise. I don't think your takes here are at all historically grounded; this reads like stuff you'd get on TeachPalestine.

Israel invaded Egypt in 1956, and by 1967 was, in fact, planning a first strike on Egypt, which it subsequently executed. Of course Egypt had every reason to fear Israeli aggression.

This is the opposite of what happened.

What is "this"?

In 1967, the IDF was spoiling for a fight, and was extremely confident that it would defeat the Arab armies quickly and with low losses. It had planned and trained for a first strike on Egypt, which is what it ended up executing.

The opposite thing is true: we have documentary evidence that Egypt had a plan to preemptively invade. Again: cite a book where you're getting this stuff from. In addition to WP and AskHistorians, I'm citing Benny Morris (Righteous Victims), who is unsparing of Israel's complicity in the Six Day War and, most importantly, in its aftermath. I'm interested in where you could possibly have been getting the details you're confidently providing in this thread.

Having a plan on the shelf for how to invade is different from actually intending to invade. Israel not only had a plan to preemptively attack Egypt - it was very actively training for this plan and then carried it out. In contrast, it's fairly clear now that Egypt did not plan to invade Israel in June 1967, and was not in any position to do so. Like you, I've also read Benny Morris' Righteous Victims (which only has a relatively short section on the lead-up to the 1967 war).

The two points I've been making here are:

1. The traditional narrative that Israel fought a defensive war in 1967 is highly questionable, at best. It does not seem that the Egyptians were planning to attack, the Israelis themselves had a major hand in the escalation leading up to the war, and the Israeli military was extremely confident that it would quickly defeat the Arabs (an assessment that the Americans shared) and wanted a war.

2. This narrative that Israel gained the West Bank and Gaza through a defensive war is then used to justify Israel's more than half-century military rule over the Palestinians. Even if the Israeli narrative were 100% correct, it would not justify imposing military rule over millions of people for decades, while slowly robbing those people of their land and subjecting them to regular violence and humiliation.

Righteous Victims has 2 whole chapters on the leadup to the Six Days War, which is like the centerpiece of the book. You can't be citing Righteous Victims, because it strenuously disagrees with virtually everything you've said here. What are you citing?

to avoid duplicating this ‘style of argument’ is summarised here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38831687

The only thing I wish to add is that this kind of “selectiveness” of facts by those who argue with Israel existence is by itself one of the main reasons for Israel creation in the first place.

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