[lbo-talk] a collage of lies

socialismorbarbarism socialismorbarbarism at gmail.com
Thu Jun 10 11:28:33 PDT 2010


CB: Does Israel claim to be sovereign over Gaza ?

1) There's sovereignty in the basic, traditional sense, that is, the sovereign is he who has the right to do anything he wants. (I'm paraphrasing somebody--Lord Acton? I can't remember and I haven't been able to find the source of the quote.) Well, maybe the sovereign was limited by God or gods, at least in those cases where the sovereign was not the living embodiment of said gods... At any rate, Israel certainly "claims" sovereignty in this meaning.

2) But the acting meaning of "sovereign" in contemporary political discourse is a shorthand reference to the *sovereign nation state,* which since the 20th century is technically no longer "sovereign" in the sense of my paragraph 1), as nation-states are expected to follow certain laws, at least vis a vis other nation-states; and, even if not themselves signatories to such laws, are expected to follow certain international norms as determined by a vote of a Security [sic] Council of the United [sic] Nations, who, in theory, have almost unlimited recourse to violent action against adjudged violators. (I am taking seriously the assertion--much clearer from the perspectives of 1919 and 1946--that the League of Nations and the more serious UN were something new, and were legitimate--yes, of course, and legitimating--attempts to move beyond, and where deemed necessary supersede, the traditional treaty system.)

Now, we can see that Israeli claims to sovereignty over Gaza are consistent: They claim to be the representative nation-state governing Gaza whenever it suits their interests, as determined solely by themselves; and they disclaim such authority whenever it suits their perceived interest, as determined solely by themselves.

That is, Israel embraces the pre-modern understanding of "sovereign," as in my paragraph 1), and shows nothing but contempt for the 20th century attempt at some form of progress, as defined in my paragraph 2). To be fair, in this they are following the lead of their benefactor, the United States. On the other hand, showing nothing but contempt for the institutional arrangements that were basic to the founding of one's own nation-state, not so very long ago, strikes me as fucking stupid. I might have written "lunatic," except I apparently need to show my clinical credentials before I'm allowed to do so on this list. ;)

On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 5:15 AM, c b <cb31450 at gmail.com> wrote:
>  Victor Friedlander wrote:
>
>
>> Gaza is not a sovereign state but only a
>> break-away district of the State of Israel.
>
> ^^^^^
> CB: Does Israel claim to be sovereign over Gaza ?
>
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaza_Strip
>
>
> Gaza Strip
>
> The Gaza Strip (Arabic: قطاع غزة‎ Qiṭāʿ Ġazza/Qita' Ghazzah, Arabic
> pronunciation: [qitˤaːʕ ɣazza]) lies on the Eastern coast of the
> Mediterranean Sea. The Strip borders Egypt on the southwest and Israel
> on the south, east and north. It is about 41 kilometers (25 mi) long,
> and between 6 and 12 kilometers (4–7.5 mi) wide, with a total area of
> 360 square kilometers (139 sq mi). The territory takes its name from
> Gaza, its main city.
>
> The territory has a population of about 1.5 million people, as of July
> 2009,[1] 1 million of whom were, as of March 2005, refugees[2] who
> fled to the territory as part of the 1948 Palestinian exodus following
> the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, from those parts of Mandate Palestine that
> became Israel, and their descendants. The population is predominantly
> Sunni Muslims and speaks a Western Egyptian dialect of Arabic.
>
> The Gaza Strip acquired its current boundaries at the cessation of
> fighting in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, which was confirmed in the
> Israel-Egypt Armistice Agreement on 24 February 1949.[3] Article V of
> the Agreement declared that the demarcation line was not to be an
> international border. The Gaza Strip continued to be occupied by
> Egypt. At first it administered the territory through the
> All-Palestine Government and then directly from 1959 until 1967, when
> Israel occupied it following the Six-Day War. Pursuant to the Oslo
> Accords signed between Israel and the Palestinian Liberation
> Organisation in 1993, the Palestinian Authority was set up as an
> interim administrative body to govern Palestinian population centres,
> with Israel maintaining control of Gaza Strip's airspace, some of its
> land borders and territorial waters, until a final agreement could be
> reached. As agreement remained elusive, Israel unilaterally disengaged
> from Gaza in 2005, saying it was no longer the occupying power there.
> The UN, Human Rights Watch and many other international bodies and
> NGOs still consider Israel to be the occupying power of the Gaza
> Strip,[4][5][6] which Israel disputes.[6]
>
> The Gaza Strip is one of the territorial units forming the Palestinian
> territories.[7][8][9][10] Actual control of the area within the Gaza
> Strip borders is in the hands of Hamas, an organization that won civil
> parliamentary Palestinian Authority elections in 2006 and took over de
> facto government in the Gaza Strip from the Palestinian Authority by
> way of its own political maneuvering and armed militia in July 2007,
> while consolidating power by violently removing the Palestinian
> Authority's security forces and civil servants
>
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