Tibet & Palestine: a Reply from a Friend in Iraq

A friend of mine who is serving in Iraq sent me this fine note in response to my last post on the attitude of the international left on Tibet and Palestine. 

Happy Good Friday to you.

I really enjoyed your post about Tibet and the Left
(I&II), but I think you could've gone even farther
than you did (with due respect, sir).

Now, that's not to say that it wasn't a good post.  It
most definitely was.

However, the post itself could've - to my mind -
brought the distinction not only that the Left doesn't
want to condemn Tibet the same way that it does
Israel, but that the distinctions made between the two
are far more drastic and different, and these should
be pointed out as well.

I know you know this, sir, I'm just reiterating it for
folks such as DakotaWomen, Cory, etc.

(1) China did colonize Tibet, and just incorporated it
into China.  Israel (originally, and again and again
and again) has tried to have, essentially a
"two-state" solution.

(2) China has never offered a UN
Resolution/Treaty/whatever passes for "legislation" in
the Communist country, to take care of the "Tibetan
Problem" (let's call it that).   Israel has negotiated
with groups that have called for its destruction,
essentially.

(3) China is really decimating the Tibetan population,
and is actively doing so.  Israel worries about the
Palestinian population (in Israel) outstripping the
Jewish one, largely because of demography.  But, that
fact alone shows that Israel is NOT engaging in
decimation of ANY kind.  Consequently, ethnic
Palestinian ISRAELIS enjoy the fruits of this
democracy.  Contrast this with Tibet.

(4) Israel largely responds to terrorism by
Palestinian radical groups.  China, fearing no
terrorism by a decimated Tibet, nevertheless continues
to FOIST state-sponsored totalitarian terror against
the peaceful Tibetan peoples.

(5) The colonialist heritage in the Middle East is of
European origin (Israel and a Palestinian state were
to be the direct by-product of an END to that true
colonialism); that in Tibet is absolutely Chinas
colonialism, and China's alone.

A person could go on-and-on.  I thought that Alan
Dershowitz's "A Case for Israel" and "A Case for
Peace" were pretty good, though he's very liberal on
other areas where I disagree with him.  There are
actually CASES there.

There's no "case" for China in Tibet, other than
outright brutality and right of conquest.  Now, if the
Left believes in attacking a defensive ally of the
west, let alone the US, while remaining silent on a
Totalitarian power doing ACTUAL colonization on an
unarmed people, well,........they come from a long
line there.

Again, great blog and take care.  I have to get back
to work.

I agree with pretty much all of this.  I would add only that I am a strong supporter of Israel (which is not to say that I always agree with her policies) and I did not mean to suggest in my posts that the left's criticisms of Israel is sound.  I argued, rather, that precisely if the anti-Israeli position were sound, the disproportionate concern with Israel and the Palestinians, at the expense of China and Tibet, is perverse.  I avoided the question of how to judge Israeli policy in order to focus on the latter point.

I thank my friend for his comments, and I am honored that he considers this blog worth reading.