Kurdistan Rising?

[Earlam]

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/20/international/middleeast/20KURD.html?pagewanted=1&th

What do you think?

Are the Kurds merely taking back lands that are rightfully theirs, or is a new state being carved out in the aftermath of the Iraq war?
If so, is it a bad thing?

[offguard96]

Before worrying about creating a Kurdistan, perhaps the world would do well to bring back Palestine. Heck, maybe this time we could even invite the Palestinians to have a say. Wouldn't that be novel?

[Juice]

Before worrying about creating a Kurdistan, perhaps the world would do well to bring back Palestine. Heck, maybe this time we could even invite the Palestinians to have a say. Wouldn't that be novel?

What a concept!

[Logan]

you can't bring back palestine because it never exsisted. israel was creared from parts of egypt, syria and jordan palestine as a state didn't exsist until after israel was created

[jhunter]

Palistine was a state. Here's the short history:

The region of Israel and Palestine, historically, is occupied by the Jewish people for a good stint of human history, up until it was taken over by arabs and others. Good christians (arguable) launch the crusades to rid the holy land of arabs which have taken over the Jewish (and by extension) and Christian lands. Kingdoms such as Acre and Jerusalem pop up after being won back. Eventually, they are lost again.

As a part of WWI, "Palistine" was a joint british and france owned, while further north was controlled by the french and the east was ruled by britain. Eventually, a zionist moment popped up which would create a Jewish state in either Argentina or Palestine. Since a large number of jewish people lived there before, Palestine was chosen and endorsed by the british government in the Balfour Declaration.

Well, the arabs, who conquered the lands in the past, and had become quite cozy there decided to riot. That lead to the Peel Commission which basically said "these two sides will never find peace". The plan was to make three areas in the old Palistine: a jewish part, an arab part, and a sacred zone that would be looked after by britain...but then came WWII...

In 1947, britain ducks out and sends in the UN. They get the job done of splitting the country into two areas...for a while. The basic arab plan was to drive the jewish out of Palestine. This eventually led to all out war. Despite Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon and Palestine teamed up to rid their lands of the jewish, Israel is born and they take a fair share of the area before the UN hammers out 4 seperate amstrices. In fact, Palestine was officially smashed away. The Gaza Strip was given to Egypt, and the West Bank was given to Jordan. Officially, "Palistine" is no longer a state, but sperately located and similarly named regions of control of the two above named countries.

Well, then Egypt had a bit of a problem with the idea of democracy, and fell under the rule of a dictator who nationalized the Suez Canal, and stopped Isael's access to the Red Sea. This was taken as a act of war by Israel, and they invaded. Since both Britain and France had interests in the Canal, they two join in the fray. The UN was called in again to maintain the peace and remove the invaders. This is one of the first times when the Russians and US co-operated through the UN.

The problems with Egypt never really go away however, and spawn a Ba'ath leadership in Syria. Yemen also joins them. The kingdoms of Jordan and Iraq oppose the mounting arab alignments, but sometime after the King Saud was removed in Arabia, and civil war broke out in Lebanon, the leadership of Iraq was killed. Which results in everyone vs. Iraq, except Jordan which is a little neutral.

Sometime after that, the PLO was established. They are all for the "liberation" of Palestine. Well, by that time the Egyptians think they have it all. So, they close up the Straights of Tiran, which was a peacemaking deal back in the days of the last Israel invasion, and mass troops near the border about to liberate their PLO friends. 6 days later, Israel has captured the Gaza Strip and Sinai Penisula from Egypt, East Jerusalem and the West Bank from Jordan to quell the PLO, the Golan Heights from Syria, and effectively captured about 1.5 million arabs.

This is where relevant history ends. Jordan "gives" the West Bank to the PLO, even though they lost the area in war and is completely controlled by Israel, so it is basically ignored. Egypt doesn't bother with giving up the Gaza Strip, since they are more aware of the fact they don't own it anymore. There are a few treaties of "understanding" which would, in time, create a Palistinian State, but the conditions where never met.

Conclusion: there was a state called Palistine, but it was conquered. Some people hope that a state called Palistine will be created again, but seems unlikely.