--- Gordon Fitch <gcf at panix.com> wrote: > Forstater, Mathew:
> > > ... And to my mind, Ashkenazi Jews had the same 'right' to
> > Palestine
> > > that the Boer had to South Africa--none.
> > > ...
>
> Gordon:
> > In general, what right does a person have to be anywhere?
>
> Forstater, Mathew:
> > a farmer or pastoralist whose family has tilled the soil or herded
> > livestock for generations as a basic mode of subsistence has a right to
> > continue that way of life in the face of an invasion by outsiders
> > carrying bibles and/or guns. no?
>
> I don't know. I don't think too many of us would have a
> right to be anywhere under that sort of rule.
Indeed. Many of the inhabitants of the land area currently occupied by South Africa at the time when the Boers arrived certainly wouldn't, as they were there as the result of the expansionist adventurism of Shaka/Chaka a mere generation or two previously.
A significant proportion of the black inhabitants of modern South Africa have a worse claim to be there than the Boers by this criterion, given that they are descended from tribes brought into the region by the British to help out with colonisation during the mid 19th century.
The Boers themselves have a rather decent claim to remain in South Africa these days; they have very little in common culturally with the English, Dutch or any other Europeans. Their position is rather like the loyalist Ulstermen, who are Irish, not British (repatriation to Scotland would be no solution whatever to them).
It is extremely rare for historical processes to throw up clear right/wrong distinctions of the kind that Matt seems to need for his strong anti-Zionist case to go through.
dd
===== ... in countries which do not enjoy Mediterranean sunshine idleness is more difficult, and a great public propaganda will be required to inaugurate it. -- Bertrand Russell
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