MARRAKECH, Morocco (AP) -- In the face of Arab criticism, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday moderated her praise for Israel's offer to restrain - but not stop - building settlements in Palestinian areas. While Israel was moving in the right direction, she said, its offer "falls far short" of U.S. expectations.

Clinton said her praise of Israel's offer to restrict Jewish settlement activity had been intended as "positive reinforcement."

Her remarks Saturday had drawn widespread criticism from Arab nations who interpreted it as a softening of the U.S. position on settlements, which stand in the way of a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

During a photo-taking session with her Moroccan counterpart, Clinton was asked by a reporter about the Arab reaction, and she responded by reading from a written statement that appeared designed to counter the skepticism about the Obama administration's views on settlements.

"Successive American administrations of both parties have opposed Israel's settlement policy," she said. "That is absolutely a fact, and the Obama administration's position on settlements is clear, unequivocal and it has not changed. As the president has said on many occasions, the United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements."

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One might wonder what Native American people in North America feel about the legitimacy of Euro-American settlements on what was once their continent?

If Israelis were to follow the Euro-American example, they would herd up all the Palestinians, put them on land that the Israelis didn't particularly want, and tell them they could build casisnos on it if they wished to. And if they did that, I would think that Euro -Americans would have little room for criticism.........

The problem is, Zam, there isn't any land that the Israelis don't want!

I'm sure they could be given a strip of barren desert. And later, if it's discovered that there is oil underneath it, the Israeli's could simply break the treaty, take the land, and relocate the Palestinians again. That's the Euro-American "manifest destiny" method........

True. But, relecting my own heritage, I have always identified with the poor Native American bastards who got pushed out of dry country into screaming desert by other (white) people who wanted their water.. and their few bits of really fertile land or good timber or fat grazing.

A desert rat understands that them as has guns owns the water.. and that water is for fighting over, while whiskey is good or nothing much but drinking. So I have always sympathised with the poor Falastina.

Never forget Herzog's vilest lie of all.. his slogan of "A land without people for a People without Land" .. a slogan that kick-started the Zionist movement.

Sounds eerily like the Manifest Destiny doctrine of "Best and Higher Use" ... that justified my white ancestors kicking out my red ancestors and screwing over my brown ancestors right here in Nu'o Mejico. This after the Hispanics, Pueblos, and more peacible Plains folk had forged a union that had worked fairly well for all for a hundred and fifty years.. Which in turn is reminiscent of the Ottoman policies toward Jews and Christians in the Holy Land before Zionism..

I hate Manifest Destiny.. although my folks were variously the engines and victims of it... and I hate Zionism, although many of my folks are Jews. Fair is (quite simply) fair. And anything unfair is a crime in G-d's eyes.

As Rabbi Hillel said: DO nothing unto another that you would find hateful if done unto you. (circa 40 BCE, mas o' menos)

SHepjack

For starts, and just asn aside, you do NOT 'heard up'.....but you do HERD up:-)

I am infamous for my own typos, etc., including my 'coded typing', which undoubtedly, has to be a challenge to the reader:-) So it always warms my heart, when I see somone, with so much more intelligence than my own, make a glaring boo-boo!

Perhaps, Israel needs a briefing, from this country on how it is done. I really wonder to 'whom' I should have made my payments for my land here where I live. Shocking to know that it went to someone who might not have had legal claim to it, isn't it?

For starts, and just asn aside, you do NOT 'heard up'.....but you do HERD up:-)

Isn't that what I said?:

If Israelis were to follow the Euro-American example, they would herd up all the Palestinians...........

I sincerely doubt that I have any more intelligence than you do, but thank you for the kind words......I do commit my share of 'tipos'.......:>)

My original point is that before we take a 'holier-than-thou' approach with the Israelis, we would do well to examine our own history.....

And it wasn't Kipling, or Service, or Banjo Paterson.. although it might weel ha'we been.

It was Henry Lawson.. an Aussie equivalent from the same style and period.

Herewith:

When I was King and Other Verses Those Foreign Engineers Henry Lawson

OLD Ivan McIvanovitch, with knitted brow of care,
Has climbed up from the engine-room to get a breath of air;
He slowly wipes the grease and sweat from hairy face and neck.
And from beneath his bushy brows he glowers around the deck.

The weirdest Russian in the fleet, whose words are strange to hear,
He seems to run the battleship, though but an engineer.
He is not great, he has no rank, and he is far from rich—
’Tis strange the admiral salutes old McIvanovitch.

He gives the order ‘Whusky!’ ere he goes below once more—
And ‘Whusky’ is a Russian word I never heard before;
Perhaps some Tartar dialect, because, you know, you’ll meet
Some very various Muscovites aboard the Baltic fleet.

And on another battleship that sailed out from Japan
The boss of all the engineers, you’ll find another man
With flaming hair and eyes like steel, and he is six-foot three—
His name is Jock McNogo, and a fearsome Jap is he.

He wears a beard upon his chest, his face you won’t forget,
His like was never found amongst the heathen idols yet;
His words are awesome words to hear, his lightest smile is grim,
And daily in the engine-room the heathen bow to him.

Now, if the fleets meet in the North and settle matters there,
Say, how will McIvanovitch and Jock McNogo fare?
But if you ken that Russian and that Jap, you needn’t fret,
They’ll hae a drap, or maybe twa, some nicht in Glesca yet.

Those foreigners will ship again aboard some foreign boat,
And do their best to drive her through and keep the tub afloat.
They’ll stir the foreign greasers up and prove from whence they came—
And all to win the bawbees for the wife and bairns at hame.

Thanks for that. I had a feeeling that it wasn't Kiplin. I was gonna look through my Burns collection, but hadn't got around to it. So, thanks again for saving me some time. Nice poem, I liked it. :)

My baD....i WOULD HAVE SWORN THAT WHEN i FIRST READ THE POST, THE TYPED WORD SAID 'HEARD' AND NOT 'HERD.'

Good grief! Based on that, I should really consider just giving up reading or replying either one.

I apologize.

It's kind of funny, when you think of it. It would be like the Attorney General praising the Mafia for offering to restrain, but not stop, its drug dealing. Illegal conduct is illegal conduct, and scaling back its scope might be an improvement, but certainly doesn't earn praise. ANY Israeli settlements of Palestinian land are crimes, under international law -- and a willful provocation of violence. It would be inappropriate for American officials to praise Israel merely for offering to scale back the scope of its land theft, just as it would be inappropriate to praise Hamas for offering to scale back, but not stop, rocket attacks.

As for the analogy to the seizure of Indian lands, it would make sense if we were having this discussion in the 19th century or before. At that point, Europeans and Americans were in no position to stand in judgment of another country that was using its relative military advantage to steal the land of a weaker people. But this generation of Americans and Europeans are, in fact, in a very good position to criticize, given our unusual restraint in using our military might.

Never before in history has there been a country with as much relative military might as America that has been as restrained in using that might to expand its territory. Our national might puts us on par with the Spanish empire of the 16th century, the British Empire of the 19th century, and Imperial Rome, and yet to the extent we are at all expansionistic, it is only very subtly, rather than through open absorption of other nations. Similarly, the nations of Europe could easily conquer a lot of weaker nations, if they wanted, but, for the most part, they don't, due to a moral rejection of expansionistic war. So, America and Europe are, in fact, in a position to stand in judgment of Israel for its evil behavior. If America seizes Northern Mexico and starts to settle Americans there, we'll lose that moral standing. But I don't see that happening, notwithstanding our military capacity to do so.

It's kind of funny, when you think of it. It would be like the Attorney General praising the Mafia for offering to restrain, but not stop, its drug dealing. Illegal conduct is illegal conduct, and scaling back its scope might be an improvement, but certainly doesn't earn praise.

Or kind of like giving Yasser Arafat a Nobel Peace Prize for ceasing to blow up busses full of children.....

There is another difference between the Israeli siezure of former Palestinian lands and Euro-Americans siezure of Native American lands: Israel had a historic claim to the land of Palestine. The Euro-Americans took land by force from the Native Americans for no other reason than they wanted it. That would put Euro-Americans in a pretty poor position to lecture to Israelis on the morals of forceful land procurement, no matter what century it is.

Of course, one could extrapolate even further, pointing out that many Native Americans took land from other Native Americans by force, leaving their own claims in some doubt........

If one believes that we are responsible for our ancestors, then I suppose Americans have forever lost the right to stand in any kind of moral judgment of anyone, given the twin crimes of genocide against the Native Americans and slavery against the Africans -- crimes that dwarf nearly all 20th and 21st century crimes around the world. But I don't believe we're responsible for our ancestors, and I doubt you do, either. If someone were to suggest that we lack standing to criticize Al Qaeda, for example, thanks to those crimes of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, I'm sure you'd reject that, even though the crimes of Al Qaeda don't come anywhere close to the magnitude of the crimes of earlier Americans.