TIL (thanks to @AriLamm ) that the casual use of "Arab" in contrast to "Jewish" is probably a mistake, since ~40-50% of Jews in Israel are Mizrahi, and genetic evidence suggests Mizrahi Jews are nearly as close of kin to former Arab neighbors as to Ashkenazim.
Guess that makes the "Palestinian" component of the "Arab Palestinian" argument the chief operator, but then that gets complicated with Hamas' 2017 charter that tries to redefine their ambitions in nationalist rather than religious terms.
Obviously, any "Look, half of you are Arabs anyways!" argument about Israeli Jews would be absurd.

But it's an important marker that the conflict ***is primarily religious***, not primarily race-ethnic.
This distinction of course seems very odd to me since trying to separate ethnicity and religion in a sociological sense is, uh, not easy, but it was recently brought to my attention by some folks that "Is it a religious conflict or not?" is an important question in some circles.
Specifically, apparently, "The conflict is not about religion but race or ethnicity" is apparently an argument against portraying the conflict as basically about "Should a large population of Jews be permitted to live permanently and with security in the land?"
Of course the complicating factor in interpretation of the conflict as primarily religious is the Palestinian Christian community.
Relatedly, here's plausible estimates of the Jewish share of the population of Israel, Israel + Palestinian territories, and Israel + Palestinian territories + Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon.
So basically, "right of return" is the difference between a hypothetical one-state solution being "there is no religious majority group" (after accounting for Druze, Christians, nonrelig, etc) and "Muslim majority."
As an aside for why that might be significant, go Google population trends for Jewish people in Muslim majority countries.
And it seems like a decent explanation for the rightward turn in Jewish politics is simply the declining Jewish share of the population.
Alas, the Arab Barometer surveys in Palestine don't ask many questions at all about relations with Israel. But it's worth mentioning that in 2018, self rated dislike of neighbors of other religions in Palestine was 22%, only beaten in the Arab world by Yemen, Libya, and Egypt.
In fairness Yemen and Libya were a *lot* higher than Palestine. But Egypt was comparable. I'm not sure any of the three offer encouraging examples of what happens to minority groups and the odds of intercommunity violence or functional democracy.
Though in September 2020, a poll found that a plurality of Palestinians thought the best response to Israeli occupation was armed resistance, and majorities oppose a two-state solution.
Which is to say, the modal opinion is "establish a unitary state through violent action."

Furthermore, a third of respondents rejected the idea of peace with Israel *even if* refugee issues were resolved.
Oh man, a January 2020 poll found that the share of Palestinians who say the top priority should be ending the occupation fell from 40s to 30s 2017 to 2020, while the share saying reclaim all territory, river to the sea rose from 30s to 60s.
So it seems an awful lot like what we're seeing is a big increase in support for violent armed action aimed at establishing a single state which is Palestinian (and not necessarily democratic according to questions on that!).

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Lyman Stone 石來民 🦬🦬🦬

Lyman Stone 石來民 🦬🦬🦬 Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @lymanstoneky

20 May
been reading up on the chain of events in Israel 1940-1950 and ever-more-confused how "settler-colonial" is supposed to describe it
the settlement was actively opposed by the actual colonial power, to the point of actually arming their military rivals

they had no metropole from which to base a colonial effort

they were actively fleeing the Holocaust and *ongoing* pogroms in Poland
neither side disputes that the reason for the small Jewish population pre-1850 was due to ethnic cleansing of the Jews from the 1st century onwards by Roman, Byzantine, and Islamic states
Read 17 tweets
20 May
I have a piece out today on childcare policy. I'll review it in a moment but I want to start on a less policy, more personal note. ifstudies.org/blog/more-choi…
Over the course of writing about this issue, there's been a lot of misunderstanding about the debate on childcare, and indeed people have a lot of different ideas about what the debate "is about."
For many people, childcare is really "about" work, and especially maternal labor force participation. I have a very hard time on a personal level accepting this thesis because it doesn't match my experience.
Read 99 tweets
19 May
Listening to a presentation right now that shows that in 2016 there was ZERO wage premium for an MA or PhD in Canada vs. a BA. The author finds a steadily declining wage premium associated with a degree.
The paper is published here I have now discovered: researchgate.net/publication/34…
Oh nvm. This paper has a similar title and one of the same authors but is doing a different analysis.
Read 4 tweets
19 May
So one of the lines that the PRC gives about Xinjiang is that what is REALLY happening is exceptionally rapid modernization of the economy, and that the internment camps are actually EDUCATIONAL FACILITIES.
A cool thing about this story is that if it is true that China is making massive investments in education in Xinjiang from 2010-2020, then it should show up as a very large increase in educational attainment in Xinjiang between the 2010 and 2020 censuses.
So, here's the change in average years of education in the population aged 15+ according to the official press release for the 2020 census.

I have highlighted the ethnic autonomous regions.

Source: stats.gov.cn/english/PressR…
Read 12 tweets
19 May
This Bloomberg article about falling female support for Korea's progressive government, female conscription, and workplace inequality is one of the most interesting representations of the Korean gender-and-population discourse I've read recently. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
The story is literally: fertility rates are so low that military recruitment is collapsing, creating a security problem even as female support for the progressive party is collapsing, so the progressive leader kills two birds with one stone: gender equality for conscription!
The result is the minister for gender issues complains that Korean women should not be subjected to the same *disadvantages* as men (i.e. conscription), that this isn't a good kind of equality.
Read 5 tweets
18 May
Here's the global distribution of lightning strikes.

Absolutely insane amount of lightning in the DRC. Half the country averages >45 lightning flashes per square km per year.
That's an average of 2-3 times as much lightning as we get in America and 5-20x as much as in Europe!
Googled this image because I was watching @LucaMPesando present a paper that used this data as an instrument for "how much of a pain is it to maintain a cell phone network" which has to be one of the cooler instrumental variables.
Read 4 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!

:(