Yeah, I don’t know how to solve the issues of two separate families feeling ownership for the same location (fifty years ago, a Palestinian family including several living members was evicted from a home, and an Israeli couple moved in and then died, leaving their property to their children who played no role in taking the property from the Palestinians), but the solution is not to deport all of the Israelis from the region.
My first instinct would be that the government would need to build a LOT of desirable housing and offer a cash incentive to all current and former residents to cede ownership claims to other properties in exchange for the deed to one of the newer properties, but it immediately occurs to me that the wealth difference between the average Palestinian family and the average Israeli family is probably large enough that there would essentially be a self-selection bias. Especially given the fact that poverty and food insecurity reduce our ability to make good financial decisions.
I can’t think of a resolution for that situation that doesn’t involve someone feeling resentful. I’m not saying they have equal claim- but I know that the descendants of settlers are also people, who don’t want to be evicted from the (stolen) houses in which they were raised, and sowing resentment has not helped the region in the past.
I mean, eminent domain exists for this reason, but generally, compensation for stolen property is the norm because of the difficulty of dealing with inheritances and the like several steps removed from the original crime.
Recognizing the validity of residency is not the same as recognizing privilege. “You can stay under the same criteria as anyone else, because we aren’t here to engage in ethnic cleansing” and “Your property is sacrosanct and cannot be touched under any circumstances” are two different concepts, after all.
Oh, there are a thousand ways they could improve their current way of handling it. I just don’t know what the best way would be, though it would definitely involve eminent domain. I guess a lottery system for determining which families get the ancestral home?
I used to take solace in the fact that people smarter than I were in charge of this, so they could do better than that as a solution, but I’m increasingly skeptical that they actually will.
By this logic Germans would not have had to give back the property that the Nazis robbed from the Jews. This is complete nonsense.
You cannot inherit legally, what was robbed from someone else. The legal ownership belongs to the original owners or their inheritors.
Any Israeli living in a house or on land they robbed, must either leave or buy it from the legitimate owners at a fair price. Irrespective of that the legitimate owners must also be fully compensated for the inability to use their land for all the years it was kept from them.
This is the legal and just way. Any other way invites more crimes and crimes against humanity as it rewards the criminals including by rewarding their descendants.
Yeah, I don’t know how to solve the issues of two separate families feeling ownership for the same location (fifty years ago, a Palestinian family including several living members was evicted from a home, and an Israeli couple moved in and then died, leaving their property to their children who played no role in taking the property from the Palestinians), but the solution is not to deport all of the Israelis from the region.
My first instinct would be that the government would need to build a LOT of desirable housing and offer a cash incentive to all current and former residents to cede ownership claims to other properties in exchange for the deed to one of the newer properties, but it immediately occurs to me that the wealth difference between the average Palestinian family and the average Israeli family is probably large enough that there would essentially be a self-selection bias. Especially given the fact that poverty and food insecurity reduce our ability to make good financial decisions.
I can’t think of a resolution for that situation that doesn’t involve someone feeling resentful. I’m not saying they have equal claim- but I know that the descendants of settlers are also people, who don’t want to be evicted from the (stolen) houses in which they were raised, and sowing resentment has not helped the region in the past.
I mean, eminent domain exists for this reason, but generally, compensation for stolen property is the norm because of the difficulty of dealing with inheritances and the like several steps removed from the original crime.
Recognizing the validity of residency is not the same as recognizing privilege. “You can stay under the same criteria as anyone else, because we aren’t here to engage in ethnic cleansing” and “Your property is sacrosanct and cannot be touched under any circumstances” are two different concepts, after all.
Oh, there are a thousand ways they could improve their current way of handling it. I just don’t know what the best way would be, though it would definitely involve eminent domain. I guess a lottery system for determining which families get the ancestral home?
I used to take solace in the fact that people smarter than I were in charge of this, so they could do better than that as a solution, but I’m increasingly skeptical that they actually will.
One of the most horrific things to learn in life is that not only are people in power often shitheads, they’re often stupid shitheads as well.
It’s… frustrating when examining policy discussions on an academic level.
By this logic Germans would not have had to give back the property that the Nazis robbed from the Jews. This is complete nonsense.
You cannot inherit legally, what was robbed from someone else. The legal ownership belongs to the original owners or their inheritors.
Any Israeli living in a house or on land they robbed, must either leave or buy it from the legitimate owners at a fair price. Irrespective of that the legitimate owners must also be fully compensated for the inability to use their land for all the years it was kept from them.
This is the legal and just way. Any other way invites more crimes and crimes against humanity as it rewards the criminals including by rewarding their descendants.
I’m sure the Israelis expelled from other countries where land was stolen from them will be pleased to hear this.
Of course. People who had their land stolen from them should have it restituted to them no matter their ethnicity or citizenship.
So Palestinians must pay for the crimes of others?
I think that’s about the polar opposite of where we’re going with this.
I’m sure that instances like these far outweigh the exact opposite