"Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter." -- Thomas Jefferson, 1787.
I like this statement and wholeheartedly agree with it. Of course, you can find this quote voiced by Thomas Jefferson over 200 years ago printed daily at the top of every editorial page of the Times and Democrat newspaper.
Long ago, as a child I became addicted to the written word. Over the years, that addiction hasn't weakened, but intensified. A book, newspaper, or document, or just a poem or even a few lines of written script can be read and reread, or studied at length over and over with no need for electricity or device. So much information-- wisdom, instruction, fact, or just a entertaining tale-- can be contained in a book small enough to be carried in one's pocket or handbag.
Receiving a newspaper is like opening a small gift each day. I hate throwing a newspaper in the trash, fearful that there's something therein that I might want to re-read. Lately, there have been many news items like this. And, unfortunately, not all news is good news.
There have been a lot of articles concerning the leaders of nations who have been "demanding" that the small, beleaguered nation of Israel do this or do that. It's so ridiculous that it seems comical - except they're dead serious! I've been pondering their full meaning, intent and implication. One headline read that they were calling for an "end to Israeli occupation of Palestinian Land." This was mainly referring to the "West Bank" -- land that was captured by Israel from the Arab country of Jordan during the Six Day War in June of 1967.
Well, shoot! Where do they get off? Their countries obtained their own land by beatin' up other countries and peoples!
Here's a little history: In 1947, the United Nations approved the partition of a Middle Eastern land area into two states, one Jewish and one Arab. Ostensibly, Palestine and Israel. This land area was the historical and Biblical land of Israel, which, in 135 A.D., the Roman emperor Hadrian had re-named "Palestine." The Israelis accepted the United Nations' plan and on May 14, 1948, Israel declared its independence.
The Arab League counties rejected the plan and five Arab countries - Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq - attacked the tiny, new nation of Israel, launching the 1948 Arab-Israeli War in which Israel was victorious. For 19 years after the 1948 war, Jordan occupied and ruled the entire area called the "West Bank." Several wars broke out over the ensuing years, all being won by Israel, and in the Six Day War, Israel captured and annexed the area called the West Bank, which included Jerusalem, the ancestral capitol of Israel.
The main problem is that the Arab countries, including the Arab people called "Palestinians," still reject the United Nations plan of partitioning that area into two states, one Arab and one Israeli. They believe that the whole land area should belong to them alone. In the Palestinian National Covenant, the founding charter of the Palestine Liberation Organization, almost all of the articles in the Covenant explicitly or implicitly deny Israel's right to exist and reject any peaceful solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict.
I bothers me when the leaders of countries that gained their own lands by conquering and seizing those lands from the original inhabitants presume to go to another sovereign nation and demand that it give back land that it gained in a like manner!
Oh, well. I sure am glad that our country would never be a party to such outrageous activity!
T&D Columnist Rush Button can be reached by e-mail at buttonrl@aol.com or by phone at 803-534-3724. His column appears every Tuesday. Discuss this and other stories online at TheTandD.com.