US Defunds UNESCO After Palestine Vote 735
gzipped_tar writes "The U.S. withdrew funding after the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's Palestine membership vote yesterday. The decision was triggered by a 1994 US law that requires financial ties to be cut with any UN agency that accords the Palestinians full membership. As Palestine actively pursues entrance to other UN agencies, the defunding list could grow. Interestingly, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) could also be among Palestine's next target, and U.S. is the big supporter of WIPO. A much more disturbing scenario is Palestine joining the International Atomic Energy Agency, cutting American funding to the organization that monitors nuclear proliferation in states like Iran."
USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
UNESCO is one of the most highly regarded and wide-spread agencies for cultural preservation in the World. There is a fundamental flaw in a law predicating U.S. contributions to the United Nations and U.N. affiliates on their members voting a certain way. UNESCO does not control its members and how they vote.
The fact that a majority of UNESCO members want to grant admission to a Palestinian state is no reason for the U.S. to "pick up its marbles and go home." UNESCO would be better with U.S. participation. The U.S. would be better off by participating in UNESCO.
This law should be repealed before the US has removed itself from every UN organization in the world.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:4, Interesting)
Pft.
The palestians have and regularly trashed historical artifacts belonging to other cultures in the region, they should have never been invited to join it. Canada is looking to defund from it as well, and with good cause.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
So has Israel, and they were even ejected from UNESCO over it for awhile. Either way, this article isn't about Palestine (or Israel, or anyone else in the middle east) it's about the US having a law that prevents funding for scientific and cultural pursuits for political reasons. Regardless of who the parties are, there's no good reason for such inane laws.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless, of course, you are running a democracy, and want your tax money spent in accordance with the people's wishes.
But you know, ignoring that reason there's no good reason.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
"tax money spent in accordance with the people's wishes"
Wow, has that happened anywhere in this country? For example, a large majority of Americans want us out of Afganistan, but don't let that bother you, just keep imagining that in this country we only spend money the people want spent.
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So your suggestion is that since things are bad in one area, we should make them as horrible as possible? How about instead we take every inch we can towards making things better?
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For example, a large majority of Americans want us out of Afganistan
Where did you get that idea? I've never seen any surveys showing that. Sure, there's plenty of people that do believe that, but not a majority. Most Americans seem to be happy to continue funding foreign wars. Otherwise, they would vote for anti-war politicians, and they aren't doing that.
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"tax money spent in accordance with the people's wishes."
bwhahahaha. haha.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:4, Interesting)
Are you sure that most Americans actually support that 1994 law? How many even know that it exists?
Personally, it sounds like an extremely silly law to me. I understand why U.S. would oppose recognition of specific Palestinian organizations that are terrorist in nature, like HAMAS. But why the mere recognition of Palestine as a separate and distinct entity from Israel (which it defacto is) such a big issue in U.S. politics, other than the major Israeli political lobby that it has?
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Because according to a large number of American Christians (the fundamentalist ones), if we allow the Palestinians to have their own country, this somehow equates to not giving Israel our full support no matter how much they abuse the Palestinians, and this will bring about the rise of The Beast, the four horsemen of the apocalypse, etc.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
Except it isn't. Would you like the UN meddling in US internal affairs? What if they 'recognized Puerto Rico as a full member? Not that we wouldn't kick em loose if they ever actually voted for independence but you see the point? The Territories are part of Israel and the UN has been hell bent on this project of erecting a new nation state inside their borders for decades now.
It's "meddling in internal affairs" if UN issues a demand to US to do something about Puerto Rico; but recognizing it? Besides, UNESCO recognition is not at all the same as UN recognition - in particular, not all UNESCO members are independent states.
I can understand the opposition to UN membership for Palestine, especially considering the extremist forces currently in power there. At least a vote in UN General Assembly bears some political weight. But UNESCO? It's an organization dedicated to education and culture. If Palestine as a member can do something useful there, why not let them in? It does not give them any real political weight where it matters.
And yes, they are part of Israel. They were ATTACKED and they won that territory fair and square in war from their enemies who had to accept that in the cease fire agreements they all signed onto and in the cases of Egypt and Jordan they have actually signed full peace treaties and ended the war on those borders. If they eventually get a deal both sides would actually live with they, and they alone, have the power to grant the territories independence. Not anyone else. Of course just today the so called 'moderate' terrorist Abbas redeclared his only acceptable borders to be the entirety of Israel so even he doesn't want to see a new nation state created as anything other than a very temporary political gambit.
Acquiring territory by conquering it has not been considered legitimate in world politics for a long time. After all, by the same token, you could claim that e.g. France was legitimately won by Nazi Germany, or that Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia was legitimately won by USSR. But U.S. has never recognized either case as legit, and for a good reason. There's this thing called "self-determination", and especially in the case where territory in question was forcibly incorporated into the state it is currently in, it is considered a good enough reason for a nation to seek independent statehood (see also: Kosovo).
Palestinians for whom the only solution is no Israel are a different story, but that is not the only faction there, and there is a far stretch from recognizing that they deserve a right to their own nation-state on at least some of their historical lands (like those where they are the majority today and have been for the last millenia or so), to "wipe Israel off the map". You - and many other Americans who are similarly radical on this matter - are doing everyone a great disservice by conflating these two points. It only serves to "prove" to less radical Palestinians that there's absolutely no hope for a peaceful resolution that can work for both sides, swinging their votes towards radicals.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:4, Insightful)
Except it isn't. Would you like the UN meddling in US internal affairs? What if they 'recognized Puerto Rico as a full member? Not that we wouldn't kick em loose if they ever actually voted for independence but you see the point? The Territories are part of Israel and the UN has been hell bent on this project of erecting a new nation state inside their borders for decades now.
So the Palestinians are Israeli nationals then? You can't make an entire population stateless at the same time you control their territory. If they aren't Israeli, Egyptian, Jordanian. or Palestinian, what right of citizenship do they have? It is interesting that you picked Puerto Rico because they have been given many chances to vote on their status. You can bet that if the Puerto Ricans wanted their own country, they would have it.
And yes, they are part of Israel. They were ATTACKED and they won that territory fair and square in war from their enemies who had to accept that in the cease fire agreements they all signed onto and in the cases of Egypt and Jordan they have actually signed full peace treaties and ended the war on those borders.
So now we have the following situation:
1) Israel controls territory it can't legally annex (for several reasons, all of which are complicated), and won't annex (for reasons which are equally complicated, one of which is mentioned below)
2) Regardless of their original status, Jordan and Egypt have renounced claims to the territory
3) Every people has the right to self-determination
I take it you would prefer to see the West Bank and Gaza simply annexed into Israel proper and their residents given full Israeli citizenship? The Fourth Geneva convention places strict limits on what rights can be denied to people living in annexed territory. Israel has no incentive to take an action which would instantly make the Jews into a political and demographic minority.
These are the two arguments I continually hear from Israel supporters and I don't think either stands to scrutiny. I'd really like a rational response to this because every time I bring this up with someone who supports Israel as much as you obviously do all I get is vitriolic and inane responses. I look forward to your reply.
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Making his point, methinks.
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So has Israel, and they were even ejected from UNESCO over it for awhile. Either way, this article isn't about Palestine (or Israel, or anyone else in the middle east) it's about the US having a law that prevents funding for scientific and cultural pursuits for political reasons. Regardless of who the parties are, there's no good reason for such inane laws.
You do realize that the US government "funding" is nothing more then money taken from its legal citizens that lawfully pay taxes (and don't get it all returned at the end of the tax year). I personally have a problem in spending any sort of money on this extra-curricular activity while in a national debt and especially while people in our own country are in crisis financially. However, I adamantly object to spending for any sort of endeavor where a terrorist lead disputed territory gets a vote on how some n
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So you agree that killing innocent Palestinians is an act of terror and the US should stop funding Israel. Good for you!
Israel lost their status as an under dog in need of protection long ago (20+ years). They should succeed or fail without special privilege. The Palestinian nation has as much right to form a state as the displaced Israelis. More right to the land they've been kicked off of. Crimes should be punished on both sides by their own governments, rather than celebrated. Each group protects murdere
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Really? I guess a group of people that are using something and have done something for political reasons isn't obvious to various people. The law is fine.
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So has Israel, and they were even ejected from UNESCO over it for awhile.
So have the Palestinians, but UNESCO didn't get involved... Do they not care about Jewish artifacts?
Either way, this article isn't about Palestine (or Israel, or anyone else in the middle east) it's about the US having a law that prevents funding for scientific and cultural pursuits for political reasons.
Funny. I see it as the Palestinians using a scientific & cultural organization (UNESCO) to obtain political gains (recognized statehood), bringing about political ramifications (de-funding of UNESCO).
a law that prevents funding for scientific and cultural pursuits for political reasons. Regardless of who the parties are, there's no good reason for such inane laws.
So, we shouldn't care that the Japanese were using POWs as guinea pigs to further their scientific research? We should just fund them and say "morals be damned."
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Have you ever read anything by Chomsky? The bibliographies are enormous. Opinion it may be, but uninformed it is not.
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He lives in an echo chamber. When a person persists in only looking at one side of an issue he is not only uninformed, he is a propagandist.
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>>Have you ever read anything by Chomsky? The bibliographies are enormous. Opinion it may be, but uninformed it is not.
Voluminous it may be, intelligent it is not.
Chomsky is a ranting loon who thinks Cambodia was better off under Pol Pot than under the government that the US backed with airpower.
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Canada just announced they decided to defund UNESCO as well, following USA on this one.
There is no reason to accept Palestine as a member of UNESCO without knowing the actual borders of the state. A state cannot exist without a known territory and this is exactly the case with Palestine. This is not something against Palestinians themselves, it is about the whole process of what constitute a nation and a country which is a prerequisite for the membership into an organization built around the concept of cou
Re:USA against the World? (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem with "borders" is entirely Israel. The more I have looked at the history of the region, the more Israel is dead wrong and should not be supported. The Palistinians are the NATIVE residents of the region, with a claim in the real world that goes back just as far as the Jewish Bible.
What's going on is just like Apartid in South Africa or the white takeover PC Native Americans or Saddam Hussain gassing Kurds and has no place in modern society. Palistinians are native inhabitants of the land the Jews want. Many were displaced by Jewish militants, guilty of nothing more than the color of their skin and wanting to run from a war, and have been refused return to their rightful family homes. They are not part of some other Arab nation, they are residents of the political borders of Israel removed from their RIGHTFUL PROPERTY because of their race...
Just like the "Indian wars" in the USA, Settlers from Israel are building homesteads and businesses on land already under international treaty to Palistinians, then claim "terrorism" when that land is contested back. The gig is up if Palistine gets declared a "State" because then Israel gets properly accused of "invasion" rather than just run of the mill domestic oppression.
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>There's no apartheid beyond what the media is telling you there is.
So there is apartheid, and only what the media is telling us? There isn't any further apartheid than what the media has already exposed?
Apartheid, according to the Rome statute is
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Actually no. Back in 1948 the people today known as Palestinians were citizens of British Mandate Palestine. Go read the Sykes-Picot agreement for more info. If I were to accept your supposition as true, then Israelis themselves would not be Israeli either. The UN called for creating both countries, but only one materialized. The problem is that the British promised the same land to both the Jews (via the Balfour declaration) and the Arabs (via the McMahon–Hussein letters). It was a historic screwup,
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't you think this is exactly the purpose they had in mind when they passed this law? To make it as costly as possible to do something the United States does not want them to do?
And since this is blocking future funding and not current funding, this is less like picking up your marbles and going home and more like simply refusing to come to any more marble games.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Interesting)
So if certain countries want to have the U.S. removed from certain U.N. affliates, all they have to do is vote the Palestinians as members and the U.S. will defund their contributions. Consequently the U.S will have no vote, and no influence as it's no longer providing any funding.
Thus the U.S. has given countries who don't like the U.S. some power over the U.S. ability to influence U.N. organizations. The law of unintended consequences.
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One small problem with your great plan; most UN actions require US funding or participation to be affective. Seeing the US currently funds almost 1/4 of all UN activities, if they simply stopped paying how much do you think the UN would manage to accomplish (as if they accomplish much now).
The resolutions may continue flying off the desks of UN diplomats but they will be even more worthless that the ones currently filling their books.
If the US just decided to give their UN dues to charity instead the world
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Consequently the U.S will have no vote, and no influence as it's no longer providing any funding.
And what of value will have been lost?
Do you think the US wouldn't be allowed to talk to other countries or make deals?
You'd have the UN passing a bunch of BS that the US typically vetoes at the last moment, like the Muslim countries' "human rights" initiatives that include stuff like "the right to have your religion protected from insult on penalty of death."
Honestly the idea of all the countries in the world being under one organization was rather boneheaded to begin with. Some countries are just too diff
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From what I've read elsewhere, the US is denying I think $60 of the $80 million dollars for this year.
To me, that's pretty current
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Yeah it's like a doomsday machine but looks like it wasn't frightening enough.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:4)
It seems UNESCO and the US can get along fine without each other, as they did during the 20 years between Reagan's withdrawal from the group and Bush Jr.'s re-entry.
It will be interesting to see what happens with the WHO/WIPO/WTO/IAEA, etc. but Congress can make exceptions if they feel like it.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
Christian Zionists Say: Forget It? (Score:3)
Polling suggests Americans as a whole could give a rip about Palestinian issues, and support Israel if they think about it at all. Thus, the tune is increasingly called by Christian Zionists, to the point where Jewish Zionists have become the tail wagged by the dog. So it goes in Congress.
If/when the Palestinian Authority is admitted to the WIPO and WTO, it'll get really interesting. P.L. 101-246, Title IV (1990) and P.L. 103-236, Title IV (1994) can be amended, and a wide range of large contributors to Con
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How the US sees it:
1) US pulls funding.
2) UNESCO cries.
3) UNESCO kicks Palestine out.
How China could easily play it:
1) US pulls funding.
2) China offers to fund it.
3) China gains global influence.
The world isn't the same as it was 20 years ago. Regardless what people think about Israel/Palestine, it's a dangerous game, economically.
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China loans money. They do not give it away. They are smarter than the US in this.
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China loans money. They do not give it away. They are smarter than the US in this.
Well their loans are often what are called 'soft loans'. China will effectively give developing countries a lot of money in exchange for their UN vote on the Taiwan issue, and for as long as that nation maintains its 'One China' policy, they won't ask for repayment. But on the day that country's diplomats say the words 'Republic of China', all those loans become due in full.
In practice, therefore, their policy doesn't look a lot different from what the US is doing here. The main distinction is that China en
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Unesco would be better with US only if the US would have a very different type of government...
With the two current "incumbents", all the additional money the US bring to the Unesco only serve the goals of a few US corporations that nobody needs.
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One questions such apparent insanity upon our behalf, as to why we offer up such resistance to Palestinian progressives. Here we have a golden opportunity to support peaceful elements in the Palestinians who wish to just peacefully exist, and hold them accountable for their groups like Hamas. Hamas can thus be isolated with world pressure, as they run counter to the established, supported leadership which has Statehood. It's a golden opportunity for real progress in the region, but instead, we are adamant o
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You know, I get regularly robocalled by Mike Huckabee trying to work me into a redstate lather over one utterly stupid idea or another. (Which is pathetic, because I live in a blue state and have never given any indication of ever being interested in anything Republican to anyone.)
This is one of the ideas he was trying to milk money out of the gullible with. If he really wanted it, maybe he should go on a campaign to get Palestine into the UN. Now that would create some amusing fireworks.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:4, Informative)
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No, the land was given in perpetuity to the UN. However, the US federal and state laws apply, as per to the agreement under which the land was given.
The US could take it back, but it would be equivalent to declaring war on the entire planet at once, which would be pointless.
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>but it would be equivalent to declaring war on the entire planet at once, which would be pointless.
You must not be familiar with the way the US government works. If they accept your challenge they'll spend the next 3 months trying to see which party can be most pointless and constantly accusing each other of having a valid point. And they won't even notice all of us shaking our heads and thinking "how did we elect these people"?
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Pointless? Not really. If we are going to do it, we should do it and get it over with. Think of it as a big game of Risk, someone has to go after the game eventually.
Alaska to Kamchatka, I am rolling with 3 Dice, defend.
We've been attacking for some rounds now, do we have enough cards to turn in? What's a set worth at the moment? We want to turn in.
We have three cannons. We have these territories so lets get armies on each of them. Do we have something for makers? I need to turn in some towers or something
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Where UN sits is not US territory. To attempt to take it back would be like US troops marching across the Ambassador Bridge and seizing Windsor, Ontario. The US cannot "re-establish" jurisdiction over the UN anymore than it could any foreign nation's embassy. In both cases it would be an act of war.
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Or he's just a loud-mouthed moron. There are plenty of that type around.
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Having jurisdiction is not the same as being on US soil, dolt. The UN has accepted US jurisdiction over its land.
Re:We don't support terror organizations (Score:5, Insightful)
That's because you're using the wrong definition of "terror organizations". You're probably thinking it means "people who target and kill large numbers of civilians, typically in order to push a geopolitical agenda".
But the definition of "terror organizations" used by major news outlets, including the New York Times, is "People who use violence to oppose the United States and/or Israel". That, by definition, means the US can't support terror organizations. Also, note that the same organization that were "freedom fighters" becomes a "terror organization" as soon as they switch from fighting the USSR to fighting the US.
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Those are membership dues that are being withheld. UNESCO will probably let them go unpaid for awhile, but not forever.
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The elected government of Gaza routinely fires mortars indiscriminately into civilian population centers. That may not be terrorism (though it is certainly terrifying to the victims), but it is illegal according to international law. Funny how no one ever takes them to task for it in the media.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
It is as hilarious as illegal settlements.
Now for just a moment, imagine this:
- China has created a settlement near your town/city and has claimed all of the fertile land as its own.
- In order to provide security for their settlement, they routinely patrol your town in military vehicles and set up checkpoints.
- They build fences around their settlements and the local water supply. The water pipes that used to go from said water supply to your house have been destroyed.
- Some gun nut in your region shoots off a mortar at this Chinese settlement.
- Nothing was damaged but that mortar gave the Chinese quite a fright!
- The Chinese settlement responds with an invasion of troops and they destroy buildings and vital infrastructure.
- While you evacuated, they entered your home and decorated the walls with literal bags of human feces even though your toilet works just fine.
- New settlements are created in order to provide security for the old settlement.
- Rinse and repeat this same damned pattern over 50 years.
Now tell me, which do you sympathize with? The Chinese who are protecting their illegal settlements, or your fellow countrymen who have to deal with bullshit?
Right now we, the citizens of the United States of America, are paying aid to Israel while they continue their occupation of Palestinian lands. The amount varies from year to year but right now it is basically eight defaulted Solyndra loans, four days of our military actions against nations that couldn't even harm us if they wanted to, or 20% of NASA's yearly budget. All so Israeli can use their armored bulldozers to knock down houses of people who couldn't get building permits from the Israeli government.
In a time where politicians are calling for austerity measures, we should fix the budget with the knowledge that even if the Palestinians will still be screwed over by the Israelis, we won't be going further into debt with China because of it.
Re:USA against the World? (Score:5, Insightful)
The United Nations is not an organization that has the best interests of the United States at its core.
And nor should it be, it should have the best interests of all it's members at it's core, which means that it is inevitable no member will get all their own way all the time, regardless of the size of their dick or their wallet.
It includes many members would would love to damage the USA in anyway possible.
It also includes many members that the USA has, or would like to, damage. That's the whole point; "war is the failure of politics", the cold war shows that it is essential to keep talking to your political enemies, even if it is through gritted teeth with nukes pointed at each others heads.
WIPO (Score:2)
Discrimination is good for the peace process (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Discrimination is good for the peace process (Score:5, Insightful)
AFAICT, the peace process is the least of the issues involved here. UNESCO handles world heritage sites - y'know, like Pompeii which suffered two major collapses in the last week or so due to incompetent maintenance and a lack of funds. The money the Palestinians want is, according to them, going to go to a 5th century church (which is properly World Heritage) that is suffering from horrific maintenance issues and may well collapse without proper backing.
From the NERD perspective, 30% loss of money = 30% loss of World Heritage. That's a damn lot of history that had been, well, damned.
What happens between Israel and the Palestinians is, in historical terms and geographical terms, insignificant. Even if you consider the entire history of the entire region plus the rest of the Fertile Crescent, it is a pathetic 3,500 years and a trivial geographical space. It's NOTHING. The US' action has put into danger historical sites that are 70,000 years old - 20 TIMES as old as the entire recorded history for the Middle East - across an entire planet!
If you want to talk peace processes, then the Irish "Troubles" are recorded as having spanned 5,000 years and involved much of Europe and the US - twice the time the Middle East has even had issues and again many times the area. That was NOT solved by defunding the UN but WAS solved by all parties accepting that peaceful settlements were the way to go. The Basque issue, a mere 30 times older than modern Israel though younger than there have been conflicts in the region, was ALSO recently solved by an increase in mutual understanding and mutual efforts to end the futility cycle. Do you seriously think that either would have be settled today if there had been a blockade on assistance or tolerance of any kind? ESPECIALLY if that blockade had been on people completely unrelated to the parties involved?
(Would the IRA really have stopped shooting if Britain had decided to bomb the Colosseum in Rome in retaliation for the US sending a senator to Ireland? No? That's the practical upshot of what is taking place, so if the logic of such a move is inherently flawed then substituting in the current participants won't make the logic any better.)
Look, I fully understand Israel's insecurity and fears, and I respect that it has those for good reason, but nowhere in the history of humanity has anyone solved such issues by taking revenge on innocent third parties. I can't even recall any time in the history of humanity where anyone has solved such issued by taking revenge on those actually involved. If you want peace, you are going to have to do something that works. The definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing, expecting different results. Insanity won't help Israel be safer.
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Pah you and your facts and common sense. What are ya? Some kinda commie?
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Well no, of course not. No more Israel, no more war! Yeah, that's certainly one solution to the problem.
And AFAIK Obama said nothing about the peace process. What he did was follow the law. Good for him. If you want the law changed, protest to Congress. Or Bill Clinton/ previous Congresses, the law passed under his/ their purview (not that complaining now would do much good.) DO NOT complain when a President actually follows the law.
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Why is the "peace process" between Palestine and Israel any of the U.S.'s damn business in the first place?
Because Eschatologists have votes and you can't have Armageddon if there's peace in the Middle East.
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Bullshit. These are the folks that elected the butcher of Beirut. One side is as guilty as the other.
Excellent news for Unesco (Score:4, Insightful)
This is an excellent news for Unesco, It did leave it alone from 1984 till 2002/3 and this was mutch better than the years between 2003 and Now.
First it will remove a large cadre of US employees from Unesco staff, and since there is a total disconnect between the US point of view on education and culture and the rest of the world it will enable the Unesco to work more efficiently without having to focus on making large american corporations and large US private universities happy.
It also shows how spitefull the current administration is (well the other party would probably do the same), influence at the unesco is largelly dependent on the size of each state contribution, so the US with 22% would have buried the palestinian, in practice maybe one or two managers and at most half a dozen palestinian employees will be hired, and probably mostly active in some cultural history preservation task in the middle east.
The US could have said publicly that the vote of Unesco is not binding for them, and that the officially "protest" the cooptation of a non state as a full member, but that they would go on working with Unesco to further cultural, etc....
But no, they have to "punish" the UN, well certainly there are a lot of undemocratic and unsavory regime who have influence there, but remember many are "allies" of the US, and there is no easy way to get people of the world represented.
To those who think that the US should "remove itself from the UN", just remember that this would in practice mean that "big countries" would unilaterally govern by "divide and conquer", so in the "best (from US point of view) case" you would have an "imperial republic" leading the world by having a small minority (only about 5% of the world population are US citizens) vote for everybody else, in the more likely case you would have the Communist Party of China ruling the world... (US waste of money in the financial system created the crisis which now pushes the European to borrow money from the PRC, how long do you think it will take till you have to pay the interests ?).
So meanwhile thank you very much leaving the Unesco alone...
Timeline problems: (Score:3)
"The law was passed in 1994. It sounds like the administration of George H W Bush was the cause."
?
Clinton was elected in 1992 and sworn in in early 1993.
At first I thought maybe you were meaning the changeover in congressional majority. But the Republican majority in the house was elected in Novemeber 1994, but didn't take office until early 1995.
Links to the House version: (Score:3)
"Also - can someone post a link to this supposed 1994 law?
It was part of a spending bill covering foreing relations for 1994 and 1995:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h103-2333 [govtrack.us]
Section 410 is the part in question. It's described in the legislative summary at:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h103-2333&tab=summary [govtrack.us]
Text:
Section 410 -
Prohibits U.S. contributions to any affiliated organization of the United Nations or to the United Nations if they grant full membership as a state to a
How about not admitting terrorist groups (Score:4, Insightful)
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The problem is that we're picking sides between two states that each engage in racism, murder, breaking of international laws and treaties, and other assorted evil. To single out one over is stupid and unconscionable.
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But enough about Palestine and Iran...
Re:How about not admitting terrorist groups (Score:4, Informative)
There's an argument to be made for creating an organization with high moral standards that does not let those with low standards in. I've heard of the "League of Democracies" and so forth for decades.
The United Nations, however, is NOT such an organization. Membership does not recognize that you are moral or democratic, or anything else. It recognizes that certain entities must be dealt with as the government of a certain area/people because the only other way to deal with that area/people is to have a war with said "government" that would be able to muster a fair number of those people to come out and fight you. (Iraq simultaneously was this horrible dictatorship AND had "the worlds fourth-largest army") And the U.N. was chartered to avoid war itself.
It's not so much a "club" you pass a test to join, it's a meeting ground where you go to meet with people you have to meet with, however many showers you want to take afterwards. The only sense it's a "club" is they exclude organizations (insurgents in the hills, typically) that may call themselves the "government in exile", but have no real power to control an area/people. We don't like the antidemocratic government of China that bumps off far more human beings every year than Palestinian fighters could dream of doing to Israel, but we gotta.
So don't take this as an affront; it's merely an acknowledgment that Palestinians elected them, that they have vastly more control over Palestinian behaviour and opinion and organization than Israel does, and that the opinions and needs of a couple of million people are - to put it mildly - not, in their own opinion, represented well at the UN by the Israeli delegation.
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Maybe they aren't "terrorizing" you?
Now, regarding UN vs antisemitism, and all the bashing on your post is biased and has no actual valid source of reference. Your point is moot.
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Just to be fair we the US should also pull funding for Israel. Israeli rockets and machine guns have killed far to many innocent civilians for my tastes. I'll also criticize the US for too much "collateral" damage.
Hamas is not Palestine. You want Hamas out of Palestine, stop stealing land, killing bystanders and destroying schools and the Palestinians will kick Hamas out themselves. Violence begets violence.
Please (Score:4, Insightful)
Please grant Palestine full membership in WIPO, preferably yesterday.
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Apparently, they already did, according to this article [aljazeera.net]:
Moreover, membership in UNESCO normally translates into automatic membership in several other UN agencies, including the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the UN Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO), as a result of reciprocity agreements between them.
Also, this:
Given the margin of Monday's vote, moreover, it looks almost certain that the Palestinians will be admitted to other specialised agencies, including some, such as the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), that are important for US national security, according to Wirth and other analysts.
Changes (Score:2)
That is beside the point that we didn't need to be funding UNESCO in the first place, but to leave over something like this is just stupid. If you are going to leave, leave on principle, and leave all these unconstitutional organizations while you are at it. Withdraw from all the countries where we are not bound by treaty to be, and renegotiate the treaties binding our forces to those remaining nations as soon as possible. We can tr
Sound strategy (Score:5, Interesting)
The Palestinians are hoisting the U.S by it's own petard. The U.S. government passed the 1994 law as a "do what we say or else" measure, under the false belief that this would force the UN to follow U.S. policy. Instead, the Palestinians are being admitted to UN agencies anway, and we're cutting our own throat automatically.
It's not the Palestinians who should be worried.
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Personally I disagree with your assertion that America is isolated. But in any case why would we want to make friends with people who don't want to make friends with us? Where's the compromise?
It's Illegal to Give Aide to Israel Too (Score:4, Interesting)
Under the Symington Amendment, we're not allowed to give aide to nuclear nations who won't sign onto the NTP. They get around the legality of it, with a don't ask, don't tell policy. But everyone knows Israel has nukes, so it really is a flagrant violation of US law.
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And now the power has shifted, and the other side is showing what they've learned. (Hint: Nothing about how to be good people, lots about how to sell oppression.)
I fail to see progress.
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Ah frame things the way you do = tell the truth. There is nothing Israels supporters hate more than the truth about
the situation. Calling people names who dont beleive the lies is pathetic.
Re:It's the Palestinians who have the Nazi connect (Score:5, Interesting)
I actually spent several summers working in Israel, and regularly visited the West Bank. Couldn't get access to Gaza though.
As for your questions: The West Bank and (especially) Gaza are effectively light-duty concentration camps. (Not dedicated, but high-density with low access to food, water, sanitation, or jobs.) Mass graves tend to draw attention. (And direct killing isn't the system being used here.) The ~10% of the Knesset (none of whom are Palestinian: they have to be Israeli) aren't a major political force of their own. And the random police checks, and the requirement that every Palestinian who wants to enter Israel (which means any of them who want to leave their home town for any reason...) register for travel papers, in person, every year, would be similar in effect.
Of course, a closer parallel would be with aparthied-era South Africa.
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How many of the people who did that are still alive?
What happened then has nothing to do with what is happening now.
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That's because every Muslim country votes for any anti-Israel measure, then so do Russia and China just to take a jab at the US by opposing Israel.
Tell that to the prominent Muslims whose policy is that Israel should be wiped from the Earth.
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Re:Why are the Palenstines bad again? (Score:4, Insightful)
How about 8,000 rockets launched into Israel in the last 10 years?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_rocket_attacks_on_Israel [wikipedia.org]
Or blowing up a school bus full of kids:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avivim_school_bus_massacre [wikipedia.org]
Or hundreds of other attacks on unarmed civilians.
I'm not trying to establish moral equivalence or paint them as the sole bad guys or any other kind of oversimplification. I'm just trying to point out that if you're not aware of why the Palestinians are regarded with deep suspicion, then you really don't know anything at all about the nature of the conflict.
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The reality is BOTH SIDES of done some awful shit. Anyone who tries to blame one side or the other is just ignorant to the entirety of the situation.
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Most peoples in the world do not hate Americans on a personal level, they mostly hate your government and his vulgar display of power.
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Most peoples in the world do not hate Americans on a personal level, they mostly hate your government and his [sic] vulgar display of power.
So most people in the world have a lot in common with most Americans.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_charitable_countries [wikipedia.org] (US = 19th).
Breakdown of US foreign aid by country (Warning this makes for confronting reading):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_aid [wikipedia.org]
The top three recipients of US foreign aid: Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel. Remove the aid for these countries, and total US foreign aid contributions are easily outstripped by any number of OECD countries.
Notably, most reliable data does not include the
Re:Yee Hah! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Yee Hah! (Score:4, Insightful)
The one thing that pisses me off more than Jew haters are the people who consistently play the antisemitism card.
If I don't agree with one bonehead decision from Israel, it's because it's a bonehead decision.
If I think Avigdor Lieberman is an asshole, it really is because he's an asshole.
I couldn't care less about religion.
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"Less american influence, the better the world will be."
Agreed, and the less Americans will be blamed for outcomes.
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For definitions of 'Good customer' that mean 'eventually steal (expropriate) your plants and equipment'.
Not that Henry Ford, Joe Kennedy and Prescott Bush didn't agree with Hitler regarding the Hebrews. But that is another discussion.
That's a solution? (Score:3)
Palestinian statehood is only a temporary situation until they can destroy Israel. They admit this. It is a solution only if your end goal is a world without Israel.
The only obvious real solution is for the world to let Israel defend itself, for the Palestinians to know that attacks on Israel will be met with extreme retaliation, for Muslims to give up their third most holy site and allow Israel to have their one, and for all the other Muslim countries residing within the historical area of Palestine (prese
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The real solution is to make Palestine and Israel one secular democratic state. Let the factions fight it out in parliament instead of on the streets. Turn terrorism into a law-enforcement problem, enforced by both Palestinians and Israelis. Make border disputes a zoning issue.
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They have a homeland, it's called Jordan. Many got kicked out of it because they tried to overthrow the monarchy there. The rest bailed when the other arab countries tried to wipe Israel off the map and Israel won. Land gained in defensive wars is not illegal, and people who flee on the belief that the systematic genocide of another people will entitle them to that land don't deserve it either.