Friday, February 7, 2025

Trump’s Gaza proposal is gravely immoral

Today my critique of Trump’s Gaza proposal appears at the National Catholic Register.  Friends, whether you agree or disagree, I urge you to allow your opinions on this grave matter to be molded only by dispassionate reason and moral principle rather than anger and partisanship.

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145 comments:

  1. AnonymousFebruary 7, 2025 at 5:24 PM

    Is it possible to work with Arab nations to get people in Gaza to willingly move?

    The what do you do about the small minority who refuse to leave? Can you force them out? Rights to land are not absolute. If the majority were able to be moved willingly, and only a few radicals were preventing the land from being rebuilt, it would seem possible to force them out morally as long as there is appropriate compensation.

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    1. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 5:58 AM

      Is it possible to realize that this whole conflict was started when European Jews colonized Palestine and then violently attacked and pushed out 750,000 Palestinians in the Nakba of 1948?

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    2. John ghostleyFebruary 19, 2025 at 9:57 PM

      Israel has a right to exist.

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  2. Miguel CervantesFebruary 7, 2025 at 5:30 PM

    Great article. It seems that the most extreme narratives on the Palestine question (now espoused by Trump and endorsed by many of the most important figures in the U.S.) assume that Palestinians are just "Arabs" who can very well go off and integrate into any other Arab-speaking nation. This is rubbish. The Palestinians are descended from the original inhabitants of Palestine (always very mixed ethnically - during the O.T. too), just like the modern Egyptians, Moroccans, Algerians, Sudanese, Omanis and Iraqis. Their racial, cultural and linguistic differences dwarf those between Italians, Spanish and French (let alone the much lesser differences between Canadians, Irish and Australians). Could one suggest that Italy cease to exist and the population march off to France forever because they share a Latin linguistic origin and Catholic culture? What a joke. It's willful ignorance to insist otherwise.

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    1. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 4:33 AM

      Seventy percent of the population of Jordan is Palestinian, and the ethnicity itself arose out of an opposition to Zionism (which does not, I’ll note, delegitimate it; “American” had its origin in the Revolutionary period).

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    2. Miguel CervantesFebruary 8, 2025 at 6:53 PM

      25% of Jordan's population is of Palestinian origin and, although Jordan has been more generous than other Arab countries in offering citizenship, it does not want any more because even this number seriously compromised its existence as a nation, so different are even these neighbouring peoples.



      Palestine has been a historical entity since the Roman crushing of the Jewish revolt. It became the Roman and Byzantine provinces of Palestine, then Filastin under the Abassin Islamic Caliphate, then the Sanjuk of Jerusalem under the Ottomans (who names their provinces after cities), then Palestine under the Mandate. France, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Germany have even more tortuous modifications in their history. That a country must be an ethnicity is a nineteenth-century European idea which the Zionists picked up.

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    3. MizéFebruary 10, 2025 at 6:56 AM

      Could you please name a work of (specifically) Palestinian literature, history, theatre, etc. before, say, 1970?

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    4. AnonymousFebruary 10, 2025 at 1:38 PM

      Khayr al-Din al-Ramli's collection of fatwas would probably count as the type of work you're looking for.

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    5. JordanFebruary 10, 2025 at 2:11 PM

      To Mize:
      Khayr al-Din al-Ramli's collection of fatwas stands as one such work. Written by a guy from Ramla (whose toponymic refers to this), the work specifically refers to Palestine/Filistin in a few areas.

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    6. MizéFebruary 10, 2025 at 4:50 PM

      Could you please explain in which way are those (or any other works) specifically Palestinian, as opposed to Arab/Muslim in general, showing that there is an actual (specifically) Palestinian nation before, say, 1970?

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    7. Miguel CervantesFebruary 10, 2025 at 6:48 PM

      Easy. Anything produced in the Roman or Byzantine province of Palestine, the Omeya province of Filastin, the Ottoman Sanjak of Jesrusalem, the Mandate of Palestine, and occupied Palestine today. Yes. Those weren't nineteenth-century ethno-states. But nor can eight-century English, Spanish, French or German literature as they are understood in modernity.We have to think outside the Enlightenment box.

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    8. MizéFebruary 11, 2025 at 4:24 AM

      So, what you're saying is basically, no, I can't explain how they are specifically Palestinian, because they aren't. They were written/produced by people who happened to live in that territory, but who had no specifically national connection with it or with each other (whereas the Jews, besides being a nation with a language, a body of legislation, a religion, a literature, a tradition, etc., have all of that connected to that land).
      I rest my case.
      It was nice talking to you.
      Thanks for answering my questions.

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    9. JordanFebruary 11, 2025 at 11:29 AM

      Great talking to you too!

      >no specifically national connection with it.

      Your poorly formulated references to 'national connections' don't really cut the mustard here without more specificity. The nisbah al-Ramli refers to the author's patrilineal origin, which is directly tied to Ramla, a city of what was contemporaneously recognized as a part of Arz-i Filistin.

      The author himself refers to Palestine in the work and produced the book in Ramla. You're going to have difficulty constructing an idea of a 'national connection' that excludes Arabs living in Palestine for generations without special pleading, unless you are more precise with your terminology.

      For instance, you say that the Jews have, as proof of their national identity:
      >a language, a body of legislation, a religion, a literature, a tradition

      So the work was 1) written in a language 'tied to the land' (Arabic, spoken there for thousands of years) 2) a body of legislation produced in the land, and dealing with local cases 3) a religious work detailing Islamic tenets, tenets of a religion which has very specific connections to Gaza and Jerusalem

      Al-Ramli didn't just "happen to live" in Palestine, and the work he produced came from a religion tied to the land, land which he and his family resided on, which was held to be a distinct geographic locale, and who came from a culture for which regional affiliation was a marker of ethnic identity.

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    10. IanFebruary 11, 2025 at 3:14 PM

      "That a country must be an ethnicity is a nineteenth-century European idea which the Zionists picked up."

      Indeed, this is a good point, and one those on the right who advocate for 'ethnostates' as some sort of organic ideal ought to bear in mind.

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    11. Miguel CervantesFebruary 11, 2025 at 6:02 PM

      Hello Mize. I know you can hear me. And during the existence of Roman, Byzantine, Islamic provinces of Palestine, the Sanjak of Jerusalem, until the Mandate, Judaism was a tiny minority of the population. Do you think all those Christians (and later, Muslim) Palestinians had no idea what they were or what their native region was?

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    12. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 8:30 AM

      Thanks Miguel for your excellent point.

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  3. CosmicCatFebruary 7, 2025 at 7:06 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  4. NormFebruary 7, 2025 at 8:31 PM

    Prof, you keep making a point about borders.

    So is there a scenario in your mind where plausibly a bordering nation could take control of a neighbouring nation either temporarily or permanently on grounds of national security after facing an attack?

    Not saying this applies here or anything, but in principle

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    1. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 4:18 AM

      Yes, since that’s a longstanding principle of international law. It’s in Grotius.

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    2. NormFebruary 9, 2025 at 9:48 PM

      Anon
      Thanks for the reply, I shall check that out.

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  5. AnonymousFebruary 7, 2025 at 9:09 PM

    I'm very sorry that we have come to the stage where such an article had to be written. A few years ago -- no a week ago! -- I think almost all Americans would have agreed with you.

    It is awful that so many have bound their identity to a political party to such a degree that they would willingly follow it to the mouth of hell.

    I tentatively think this is Trump's idea of "negotiation," but I think you are very right to anticipate that an honor culture will respond with defiance to such heavy handed and cruel tactics.

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  6. SMackFebruary 7, 2025 at 11:30 PM

    Certainly 100% true (even without reading your article, which I'll go do now), and very obviously so. Anybody who says otherwise should be an object of great concern (in both senses).

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    1. SMackFebruary 9, 2025 at 8:41 PM

      It was a good article. Especially that you addressed the all too common "But it's just a negotiating position!" "defense."

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  7. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 3:10 AM

    WCB

    Donald Trump and Trail Of Tears 2.0. As reported on Reuters, this cockamamie idea has now been rejected by numerous nations. I predict in 6 months time, this will be a dead plan and Trump will be lying "I never said that!"

    WCB

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  8. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 4:31 AM

    Honestly Ed, your response seems a little slapdash. It also doesn’t seem accurate: if any nation has sovereignty over the land, it’s the State of Israel, which would be within its rights to grant concessions.

    Apropos of deportations: the current law of nations militates against this, but perhaps the late Cardinal Dulles might disagree that this constitutes an absolute prohibition (in Development or Reversal?):

    “According to the logic of Noonan’s argument, whatever holds for slavery would have to be said for deportations, subhuman living conditions, and degrading conditions of work. But could not degrading or subhuman conditions be inevitable, for example, after some great natural disaster in which mere survival is an achievement? Individual deportations of undesirable aliens occur continually as a matter of national policy today; mass deportations could perhaps be necessary for the sake of peace and security.“

    None of this is to say that such actions would be morally justified in this case, and certainly none of it is to suggest that they’d be prudent (although subjecting the disputed territories to military or neocolonial rule is probably the only way to take them in hand for the foreseeable future). But I would have appreciated an analysis that drew substantially on classical international law. Hence my earlier remark on the perceived slapdash nature of the work: usually your articles are very thoroughly researched; this one seemed written in haste: there were scarcely any citations (if any at all; forgive me if I overlooked them), unlike your typical style.

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  9. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 5:12 AM

    Good to see conservatives arguing against this.

    To gain an even better understanding of the problems in the Levant, some recommended reading:

    1.“A former head of the Mossad intelligence agency has said Israel is imposing a form of apartheid on the Palestinians, joining a growing number of prominent Israelis to compare the occupation of the West Bank to South Africa’s defunct system of racial oppression.“ (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/06/israel-imposing-apartheid-on-palestinians-says-former-mossad-chief)

    2.“Amnesty International’s new investigation shows that Israel imposes a system of oppression and domination against Palestinians across all areas under its control: in Israel and the OPT, and against Palestinian refugees, in order to benefit Jewish Israelis. This amounts to apartheid as prohibited in international law.“ (https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2022/02/israels-system-of-apartheid/)

    3.State of Terror: How Terrorism Created Modern Israel by Thomas Suárez

    “A tour de force, based on diligent archival research that looks boldly at the impact of Zionism on Palestine and its people in the first part of the 20th century. The book is the first comprehensive and structured analysis of the violence and terror employed by the Zionist movement, and later the state of Israel, against the people of Palestine. Much of the suffering we witness today can be explained by, and connected to, this formative period covered thoroughly in this book.” - Ilan Pappé, Israeli historisn and author

    4.Rise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel's Targeted Assassinations is a 2018 book by Israeli investigative journalist and author Ronen Bergman about the history of targeted assassinations by Israel's intelligence services. Its author writes that Israel has assassinated more people than any western country since World War II.

    5.“The Lavon affair was a failed Israeli covert operation, codenamed Operation Susannah, conducted in Egypt in the summer of 1954. As part of a false flag operation, a group of Egyptian Jews were recruited by Israeli military intelligence to plant bombs inside Egyptian-, American-, and British-owned civilian targets: cinemas, libraries, and American educational centers.“ (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavon_Affair)

    6.“Simha Flapan's “The Palestinian Exodus of 1948” bolsters the findings of Walid Khalidi in proving how Palestinians were not only driven out as part of a coordinated plan but also prevented from ever returning to their homes in order to minimize as much as possible the Arab presence in the new state of Israel. Flapan carefully navigates the gap between statements of Zionist leaders and their plans for expulsion, ultimately determining that Israeli forces were indeed responsible for driving Palestinians from their homes, and in fact encouraged their displacement.“ (https://www.palestine-studies.org/en/node/1650138)

    7.‘“Amnesty International’s report demonstrates that Israel has carried out acts prohibited under the Genocide Convention, with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza. These acts include killings, causing serious bodily or mental harm and deliberately inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction. Month after month, Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as a subhuman group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to physically destroy them,” said Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International.‘ (https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2024/12/amnesty-international-concludes-israel-is-committing-genocide-against-palestinians-in-gaza/)

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    1. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 8:32 AM

      Thanks. These are just some of many more incidents that the media does not like for us to know.

      Does anyone know why?

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  10. Michael CopasFebruary 8, 2025 at 7:07 AM

    Dr. Feser,

    I am reading the NCR article and I have a response and a question.

    First, a response to a point that is not central to your argument, but would be important if your argument were problematic or could be nuanced in a way that would permit the Trump Gaza proposal in some form. You mentioned the impracticality of the proposal. The proposal was developed by an economics professor at GWU. He is an expert in both international relations in the Middle East and Economics and the plan is *not* impractical in his view (if you mean by that not feasible). Trump also knows quite a bit more about real estate development than you or I and he also judges it to be feasible. So, granted that the plan is radical, it is still feasible. It would be a radical solution to a radical problem (endless conflict that includes the constant bombardment of rockets into Israel from Hamas who is supported by the broader populace living in Gaza--which in less than 30 miles from Jerusalem).

    The fundamental point of the article however is that Gaza is not ours and we have no right to take ownership of it. Granted that it it not ours and that we don't have rights to it, I have a few questions.

    First, are there conditions under which a people might forfeit rights to their own lands? If property ownership as a right is not absolute but subservient to the common good, could there be wrongs that are committed by property owners by which they lose rights to their land? Might housing terrorists that constantly fire rockets at your neighbors be an example of such a wrong? If so, and if this were enforced on a case by case basis, what authority would enforce this as Hamas is the authority that was selected to govern by the people as a whole?

    Second, if this were the case, do you think that the land could be evacuated in the service of the common good? I don't share your assessment that this would necessarily lead to broader conflict. Nor does the expert in foreign policy that made this proposal. This is possible, but I think it could be prevented.

    In terms of how the common good would be preserved. First, those that live in an area of conflict wherein their leadership hate and are seeking to destroy their neighbors would be able to go to an area wherein they neither hate their neighbors nor are led by a group that wishes to destroy their neighbors. In this way, they would not be living in constant conflict. Would this not be a good for them? Second, the good for Israel is obvious. They no longer are constantly bombarded with Rockets and have to worry about their daughters being kidnapped and raped. I think that this would also contribute to stability in the middle east. Hamas can no longer serve as a proxy for Iran and they no longer serve as the tip of the spear of those in the middle east that have contempt for the people of Israel. Third, such peace for the people of Gaza, Israel, and the broader middle east would be good for the world in general.

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    1. TonyFebruary 8, 2025 at 3:11 PM

      First, are there conditions under which a people might forfeit rights to their own lands? If property ownership as a right is not absolute but subservient to the common good, could there be wrongs that are committed by property owners by which they lose rights to their land?

      There are many groups of people who deny the idea that a group might (morally) be forced to give up their land, but the 20th century is replete with examples where a people (or a portion of them) got forcibly removed to some other region and the world not only didn't object, the world (including the League of Nations and the UN) looked on with approval, or actually contrived it. It is two-faced for the politicians and theorists to argue it must never happen while they (or their fathers) did just that repeatedly. However, that doesn't mean it should happen here.

      First, those that live in an area of conflict wherein their leadership hate and are seeking to destroy their neighbors would be able to go to an area wherein they neither hate their neighbors nor are led by a group that wishes to destroy their neighbors.

      All of the surrounding nations have repeatedly and vociferously repudiated taking still more Palestinians, and not without cause. E.G. the Palestinian refugees in Jordan ended up as insurrectionists who tried to bring down the state. Maybe in some pristine world it would be possible to winnow out of the 2.5M Gaza refugees the ones that (a) are terrorists, (b) have helped terrorists, (c) lean toward violence as a viable solution for problems with Israel; or (d) have been politically radicalized by the terrorists' propaganda, and only send out as asylum seekers those who really will be peaceful residents of a new country, and teach their kids to be the same. But this isn't that world, and what if the number of people in (a) through (d) is a million: where do you send them? Guantanamo Bay?

      Leave it to Trump to push an idea that would appeal to a real estate developer and a casino owner. In the past, there was a similar-scale solution to the problem of millenia-long fighting over the territory: Nuke it. Make it a radioactive wasteland that cannot be settled for 50,000 years. Neither proposal is moral, and perhaps we can see that it is so for the "casino" option more easily by seeing it clearly with the nuclear option.

      If Trump had said something less offensive to Muslim ears than "we'll build you casinos", instead said "we'll build you homes, schools, hospitals, farms and businesses", maybe there would be something to discuss. It would still have problems if done forcibly, though.

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    2. David MarcoeFebruary 8, 2025 at 5:22 PM

      'we'll build you homes, schools, hospitals, farms and businesses'

      If you listen to his original comments, he actually did say something to that effect, though in the context of relocation.

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    3. Michael CopasFebruary 9, 2025 at 3:21 AM

      Tony,

      I saw the original speech and I don't recall a word about casinos (I was on a flight and didn't get to see it all). I think that might be a cynical twisting of his words.Even if it weren't and he mentioned casinos, his focus on development is a good thing as their unemployment BEFORE the conflict was around 50 percent. The area needs economic development and it isn't crass of Trump to propose it; rather it's humane of him to do so. The problem is that no business wants to operate in an area led by Hamas.

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    4. Michael CopasFebruary 10, 2025 at 5:02 AM

      Tony,

      "All of the surrounding nations have repeatedly and vociferously repudiated taking still more Palestinians, and not without cause. E.G. the Palestinian refugees in Jordan ended up as insurrectionists who tried to bring down the state. Maybe in some pristine world it would be possible to winnow out of the 2.5M Gaza refugees the ones that (a) are terrorists, (b) have helped terrorists, (c) lean toward violence as a viable solution for problems with Israel; or (d) have been politically radicalized by the terrorists' propaganda, and only send out as asylum seekers those who really will be peaceful residents of a new country, and teach their kids to be the same. But this isn't that world, and what if the number of people in (a) through (d) is a million: where do you send them? Guantanamo Bay?"

      That is well said and I take this to be the most difficult point. However, I don't think it is insurmountable. If such folks were placed in country whose population is Muslim but who do not call for the destruction of Israel, some of the folks under categories a-d under Hamas leadership would move out of that category under new leadership. Their living situation and the leadership of Hamas contributed significantly to their taking Israel's destruction as such a central part of their purpose. If they are incorporated into a society that does not have this as central to their Muslim identity, then this could be shaken off by many of these folks (certainly by their children after a generation). Those that did not shake it off would find ways to contribute to international terror, but would be easier to identify and isolate.

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    5. bmillerFebruary 10, 2025 at 7:29 AM

      Here is the original press conference with a transcript to ensure everyone has access to what was actually said:
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kfUBXUrGzo

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  11. Michael CopasFebruary 8, 2025 at 7:09 AM

    Dear Dr. Feser (continued),

    Where I think that proposal would potentially cost the most is in the US contribution to assisting with such an proposal if we did *not* own the land. Granted that we had no rights to the land, but that we were to assist in moving forward a proposal of evacuating, reconstructing, and developing the land, I not only think that such a plan would be moral, I think it would be an act of sacrifice on the part of the US for the common good. With some such sacrifce, I think we could morally ask other countries to contribute to resolving the conflict by resettling refugees. After all we are not asking countries to receive those that are set on harming their country and people (as is occurring with illegal immigration and the movement of drugs across our border-- I recognize that this does argument does not suffice as a rationale for broader deportations and that more would need to be said for that).

    In such a proposal, the ownership of the land would not be by the US, but the US could help to administer such a plan as a sacrifice for the common good. I don't think that it would be immoral for the US to require some means of recompense for efforts to implement such a plan (assuming the plan itself were moral, feasible, etc.). Setting that aside and assuming that the US simply aided in this out of the goodness of its heart, this would eliminate the fundamental criticism you have offered: The land doesn't belong to us and we can't take it.

    As one other point, I think that the media may spin this as a "real estate grab", but I don't think any fair minded person would be convinced of this. This proposal was given to Trump by others and Trump wants us to own it for the land to become secure and for us to be recompensed for our efforts. Granting that assumption of ownership is immoral for the reason that you mentioned, expecting some recompense for our efforts is not. Expecting the Palestinians to willingly move may be unreasonable as you have said, but it also might be feasible as the expert in middle eastern affairs who offered the proposal seems to think.

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    1. David MarcoeFebruary 8, 2025 at 2:40 PM

      You gave much the same critique I would've given.

      It should also be noted that Trump was originally ambiguous on any US military role and then clarified (or walked back, if you're cynical) the idea that American soldiers would be in any fighting, saying that America would only be involved after the cessation of hostilities.

      That said, I don't know whether I side with Ed's argument or not. I'll have to give it some thought.

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    2. TonyFebruary 9, 2025 at 11:44 AM

      I don't object to the idea of a neutral third-party caretaker being the authority in charge of repairing and resettling Palestinians on a fixed-up Gaza strip. I do think that the practical problems are vastly too hard to overcome for the US to be that party.
      1. The US would not be viewed as neutral, as we have given or sold so much to Israel defense, and we are (at least, we used to be) a Judeo-Christian nation, not an Islamic-friendly one. (Britain before the UN tried it, and failed abjectly.)
      2. No promise by non-Arab countries to Palestinians that they will be allowed to move back in after repairs will be believed.
      3. No country will take them, even temporarily. The US can't and shouldn't.
      4. After resettlement back in a repaired and commercially well-supported Gaza, many of the Palestinians will return to their anti-Israel position, because their position was never principally based on not having good jobs, grocery stores, schools and hospitals. It's an ethnic-religious-cultural position (at the least) in addition to the politics. The US isn't in any better position than were the British to oversee that and achieve a peaceful outcome.
      5. Iran and Hezbollah will continue to propagandize and foment unrest among the Palestinians wherever they are and certainly when they are back in Gaza.

      Perhaps the principal push-back against Prof. Feser's thesis would be that mass deportations are immoral except where genocide is the only other pathway to peace. But even if that works, the deportation option itself would have to have a reasonable chance of success. The US is largely viewed as a handmaiden of Satan, the Palestinians won't accept us as having the principal role. Maybe if a consortium of Arab countries were to be the "neutral 3rd party", the Palestinians could stomach it, but probably not then either.

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    3. Michael CopasFebruary 10, 2025 at 4:00 AM

      Tony,

      I don't think that the Palestinians have to be okay with resettlement. They want to stay there partly because many in Gaza (including their elected government) don't believe Israel has a right to be there and they want to continue to berate Israel. That belief within the framework of militant Islam motivates the acts of aggression. Those acts of aggression merit not merely retribution, but retribution that is most likely to prevent further acts of aggression (If you use your house for a drug house you lose it; If you use your land to harbor and hide terrorists that are attacking your neighbors for decades, you lose it). Those on the receiving end of this retribution do not have to be okay with it any more than someone receiving a prison sentence has to be okay with it.

      What would be needed is the cooperation and agreement of several major countries to make the solution work (including countries like Jordan and Egypt to receive the inhabitants of Gaza). You may be right that they would be unwilling or at least disinclined to accept the people of Gaza. If they had concern that their own people would be attacked or the stability of their own country would be jeopardized, the proposal would have to be developed in a way to prevent this. However, relocation of the people of Gaza in mass and establishing a new authority in the land of Gaza seems to me the only way to establish peace in that area. It seems to me that this proposal with any needed variations is the only one that could establish the common good.

      Once people are separated from an area led by Hamas and there are new Islamic authorities in control that don't call for the destruction of Israel, those from Gaza that oppose Hamas will finally have a chance to speak out against them without themselves being terrorized. That will further weaken Hamas and will isolate their leadership. Those that are committed to militancy will be distinguished from those that are not. Those that are peaceful could be resettled with other groups in a land that is no longer under Sharia law. Although remarkably difficult to accomplish, this sort of proposal would establish the common good.

      Regarding the people willingly leaving the land, 90% (!!!) of the people in Gaza left their homes after the warnings of being bombed. So they are not going to stay there at all costs. Now that they are displaced, if there ever were an occasion where they might be resettled, it is now. That no doubt motivated the urgency of Trump's proposal. He knows that decisions need to be made on this NOW. He needs to reach a workable plan and a consensus with the relevant countries. It seems to me that he was making an initial proposal that was serious that he expected would and could be reworked and nuanced. With some modification, the plan is not merely morally licit; it positively contributes to the common good.

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    4. Michael CopasFebruary 10, 2025 at 4:11 AM

      Tony,

      Regarding point 3, countries such as Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria have already taken in refugees. So the question is not whether they would take refugees; the only question is how many they would take.

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    5. TonyFebruary 10, 2025 at 1:33 PM

      Michael, I know that they have taken in refugees in the past. So far as I understand the matter, It is in part that experience that is largely responsible for their being unwilling to take more.

      For the practical details: Lebanon and Syria are in the midst of massive turmoil and unrest already; their accepting huge #s of new Palestinians would be very problematic at best, and likely highly disruptive. And Hezbollah's involvement in both countries makes it difficult to see how sending (possibly radicalized) Palestinians there would be sensible anyway. Jordan was almost overthrown by Palestinian refugees, I doubt you'll move them by any methods of persuasion. And Egypt is adamant about it.

      I don't think permanent, multi-generational refugee camps is a moral objective to move them out, I don't think it's plausible to find a place for permanent resettlement of them elsewhere NOT in permanent refugee camps; I doubt it's feasible to convince them that any deportation will be temporary; I doubt that rebuilding Gaza and moving ALL of the Palestinians back in will prevent a brand new Hamas-like entity from starting without effectively a near-military occupation.

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    6. TonyFebruary 10, 2025 at 1:57 PM

      I don't think that the Palestinians have to be okay with resettlement.

      I agree: along the lines of the other major population movements of the 20th century, they are not voluntary and the world insisted upon them: Germans and Poles (both wars), along with Ukrainians and others, Cheks, French, Slavs and Croations and others in "Yugoslavia"; Hindus and Muslims of India / Pakistan / Bangladesh, and others.

      If you don't want to create a new Palestinian urge for "the homeland" and civil unrest in wherever you resettle them, you would need to effectively break them up family by family: send 1 family to each town of 10,000, everywhere in the world. There: no more Palestinian groups larger than 1 family. This would be a form of intentional political genocide by eliminating, not the human beings, but their social coherence, which might have morally worrisome implications, but it probably would work, if it could be enforced.

      Short of that, every other resettlement solution would carry grave doubt that it would work to defuse their intention to have their homeland (and the attendant intention of the violent-minded among them to deprive Israelis any right to anything). Certainly any resettlements in the Middle East that are comprised mostly of Palestinians would be the constant breeding grounds for unrest.

      Once people are separated from an area led by Hamas and there are new Islamic authorities in control that don't call for the destruction of Israel, those from Gaza that oppose Hamas will finally have a chance to speak out against them without themselves being terrorized.

      That sounds good, but I fear it is naively simplistic. How do you prevent new Hamas-like people in the resettled people from gaining a hearing and becoming leaders? How can you be sure that "the people" would silence this view? Can you successfully prevent the influx of weapons, without major "boots on the ground"?

      Regarding the people willingly leaving the land, 90% (!!!) of the people in Gaza left their homes after the warnings of being bombed.

      In the 1947-48 war, many towns of Muslims left when the Israeli forces were bearing down on them, and have been demanding a return of those lands ever since. Leaving in the face of overwhelming force is not "voluntarily", with the not surprising result that those who left feel like their land was stolen.

      I agree that in principle now is the natural moment for some neutral 3rd party to take over and create the conditions in which peace has a chance. And the particulars of that "peace" are uncertain, so we can argue about them. But it is highly unlikely that America would be a trusted 3rd party by the Palestinians. And: any pathway of resettling the Palestinians back in Gaza without removing the radicals is unlikely to succeed; whereas any pathway of resettling where the radicals are removed is both extremely difficult to accomplish, AND cannot be achieved without employing force to separate them out. It is debatable whether ANY entity using such force and enforcing such division of the Palestinians would be accepted without creating NEW radicalized groups.

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    7. Michael CopasFebruary 11, 2025 at 3:39 AM

      Tony,

      " I know that they have taken in refugees in the past. So far as I understand the matter, It is in part that experience that is largely responsible for their being unwilling to take more."

      This was helpful. Clearly Egypt, Lebanon, and Syria have reason to not take more refugees of those that are destabilizing their country already. That would have to be resolved--if possible--for resettlement in those countries to work.

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    8. Michael CopasFebruary 11, 2025 at 3:55 AM

      Tony,

      I almost block quoted paragraphs from the first part of your second comment. They were again very helpful. Regarding your questions, I think that this would require broader resettlement in units that are as small as possible even if not as small as a single family.


      Delete
    9. Michael CopasFebruary 12, 2025 at 5:11 AM

      Tony,

      Some more interaction on your comments.

      "I don't think permanent, multi-generational refugee camps is a moral objective to move them out"

      I don't either, but I don't think anyone is proposing this.

      "I don't think it's plausible to find a place for permanent resettlement of them elsewhere NOT in permanent refugee camps"

      This would depend entirely on the will and creativity of the leaders of the countries who are (or are not) committed to ending the conflict through their efforts. Resettlement away from Israel and resettlement in smaller units (as small as necessary or possible, whichever is reached first) would be a means to this and to mitigate the ongoing influence of Hamas.

      " I doubt it's feasible to convince them that any deportation will be temporary."

      I don't think Trump plans for it to be temporary. If use of land to seek to destroy your neighbors is grounds for losing that land, there is certainly no moral reason why it should be temporary.

      "I doubt that rebuilding Gaza and moving ALL of the Palestinians back in will prevent a brand new Hamas-like entity from starting without effectively a near-military occupation."

      I don't think Trump plans for them to move back and I agree that having them move back would not be reasonable. The entire point of Trump's plan is to end the conflict that is made possible by the proximity between Israel and those that believe that Israel should be destroyed.

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    10. Michael CopasFebruary 12, 2025 at 5:24 AM

      "How do you prevent new Hamas-like people in the resettled people from gaining a hearing and becoming leaders? How can you be sure that "the people" would silence this view?"

      You can't. But they would not have occasions to launch short range rockets. Their occasion to act on their hatred of Israel would be removed or at least significantly mitigated. Those that wished to conduct international terror would be fewer as the liklihood of getting caught would be higher and the complexity of accomplishing an act of terror against Israel would increase exponentially.

      "Can you successfully prevent the influx of weapons, without major "boots on the ground"?"

      This depends on the country and the location of the militants within that country trying to receive the weapons.

      "In the 1947-48 war, many towns of Muslims left when the Israeli forces were bearing down on them, and have been demanding a return of those lands ever since. "

      These folks don't have occasion to launch missiles into Jerusalem through proximity. They can't waltz into Israel and kidnap 300 innocent people. That is the problem or injustice that the movement out of Gaza would resolve.

      "Leaving in the face of overwhelming force is not "voluntarily", with the not surprising result that those who left feel like their land was stolen."

      Right. Retributive justice for wrongs committed is almost never voluntary. Those that hate Israel will continue to hate Israel, but they will lose the easy occasion to harm the people of Israel. They have used their land to terrorize Israel and through such acts have lost rights to that land.

      "But it is highly unlikely that America would be a trusted 3rd party by the Palestinians."

      They don't need to trust America for the plan to work. The resettlement would require the involvement of other countries to succeed. Any needed military force would be provided by Israel and those that are willing to peacefully resettle could be guided in that resettlement by the countries receiving them.

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  12. bmillerFebruary 8, 2025 at 8:57 AM

    This is my attempt to summarize the immorality of Trump's proposal:

    1. The US has no right to the land and so would it be theft for the US to just take it.
    2. US military would be attacked and engaged in an unjust war by doing so.
    3. It is unjust not only to Gazans but the US to meddle in this conflict and start clearing ground both morally and fiscally.
    4. Getting involved will increase hate for America and Israel
    5. It's unjust to Gazans and other nations to make them immigrate to those other nations
    6. It's Immoral to even threaten such unjust actions

    Additionally, it's prudentially it is a bad negotiating tactic to insult the other party.

    I can't find much to disagree with regarding your analysis if Trump really proposed to unilaterally send troops to the region, deported everyone to neighboring countries started clearing land and building casinos. Personally, I wish he just continued to focus on our own horrible internal messes and fund neither Israel or Gaza.

    But here is a Rueters article claiming no US troops:
    https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israels-defense-minister-orders-army-prepare-gaza-residents-departure-media-2025-02-06/

    Sounds like Israel's troops would keep the peace while the cleanup occurred.

    It seems that several of these objections would not be relevant if that is the case, but it also seems that we would still be seen as weighing in on the side of Israel.

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    1. TonyFebruary 11, 2025 at 9:17 AM

      It's unjust to Gazans and other nations to make them immigrate to those other nations

      Addressing just this one point: It is not "unjust" in the sense of intrinsically unjust. If they are left with no possible means of physical support present in that land, the only physically possible options are either (a) support is brought in to Gaza by outsiders, or (b) the Gaza people move (whether they move voluntarily or forced is not germane to the physical constraint). If nobody can or is willing to bring in support from outside because of the past problems and ongoing lack of safety, then (b) is the ONLY POSSIBLE solution. In such a context, (b) is moral.

      Now: if (b) is the only possible solution, is it really immoral to force them to leave temporarily, so that Gaza can be cleaned up from dangers and made livable? In light of a whole smorgasbord of comparable cases in the 20th century where various peoples were forced to leave for regional safety and peace reasons, the world has for over 100 years been saying, roughly: the law of nations includes the possibility of forced migration. The presumptive moral argument is that "the nations", i.e. the world acting together, can force it if that is the only reasonable pathway to safety and peace in that region.

      Maybe the world is wrong in such an argument. But that claim would have to be argued, and not by assuming that a people has an absolute right to the land they currently occupy.

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  13. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 10:15 AM

    Hello, Mr. Feser.

    I made several of these points to some people who hold that Trump is merely negotiating or bluffing, which you asserted to be immoral on the grounds that if an action is immoral it is immoral to threaten to carry it out.

    In response to this, they have cited Solomon's threat to cut the babe in half as an example of an immoral action that was threatened and considered acceptable. Could you help clarify this point?

    Much appreciated

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  14. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 2:14 PM

    Dr Freser,
    The option to the current situation is interminable wars with Islam's Little Satan in the Middle East and Islam's Bid Satan in the USA. Your insightful critique of Trump's attempt to change the character of the conversation does not include any constructive comments in stark contrast to the style St Thomas to acknowledge the strengths of the indispensable opposition.
    AF Cieszkiewicz

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    1. David MarcoeFebruary 8, 2025 at 2:51 PM

      This is a salient point. To quote the Angelic Doctor, “We must love them both, those whose opinions we share and those whose opinions we reject. For both have labored in the search for truth and both have helped us in the finding of it.”

      I would point out that Trump voiced concern for the interminable fighting and the abject devastation caused by the current conflict, while noting that everything tried to this point has not worked. Even if Trump is in error—even grave error—his position expresses some concern for the good, and so is not wholly unmoored from wisdom.

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    2. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 6:34 PM

      Saint Thomas was talking about thinkers, not schoolyard bullies.

      Delete
  15. TonyFebruary 8, 2025 at 2:50 PM

    Apparently, Trump's proposal is swiftly evolving: even before the NR article came out, Trump had revised it by saying the Palestinians would be moved out "temporarily", whatever that means. And several other aspects are moving about.

    While I mostly agree with Prof. Feser on this being a terrible idea and probably immoral on several fronts, I suspect that he and others jumping into the fight with condemnations is more probably just contributing to exactly what Trump wants. I doubt that he ever seriously intended to undertake this idea in practice. I also doubt that he intended it as a "negotiating tactic" with the Palestinians (though, by being an even badder "bad cop" than the Israelis, maybe he helped Israel's negotiating position a bit). Like with many other comments Trump makes, I suspect the whole thing is a throw-away line, something for the chattering class to focus on and spend themselves against, while he goes about other things altogether. It's not like there's any huge contingent of Americans who will be gravely angry with him if the idea simply fizzles out of discussion and notice as if it had never existed. The idea of America just becoming the shiny new owner of a brand new Gaza "Riviera" is so STUPID along with its moral problems that it could hardly have been the result of careful planning. So, it's my guess that Trump never meant it seriously, though he is delighted with the level of outraged discussion about it.

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    1. David MarcoeFebruary 8, 2025 at 5:38 PM

      You might be right, considering how he used John Bolton as a stalking horse for negotiations.

      Still, I don't view the idea as harshly as you do. The general concept might work under certain conditions (if not the present ones), everything else that's been tried has failed, and realistically, doing nothing is not really an option. That said, there are simply too many things vitiating against the idea.

      And as I said elsewhere, I have to give Ed's argument some thought. I'm still left with the with the issue that you yourself (and others) pointed out above: a good portion of the people of Gaza simply refuse to live in peace with their neighbors. What is to be done? I fear that anger and desperation may lead to a far uglier solution.

      Delete
  16. AnonymousFebruary 8, 2025 at 6:33 PM

    It's symptomatic of a very declining superpower.

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  17. Modus PownensFebruary 8, 2025 at 9:41 PM

    Dr. Feser,

    I appreciate you reminding us all the Gazans inherent dignity as those created in the image of God. It's something I've struggled with remembering since the horror of Oct. 7, so I needed to read your rebuke, and I need to pray for forgiveness.

    I too share doubts at the practicality and morality of Trump's "modest" proposal. Putting aside moving them, it's immoral to sell out a community's native culture and common life, even one as unpleasant and as wretched as the Gazans. We don't deserve our country's culture and way of life being dissolved for the sake of foreign materialist interests. Neither do they.

    With that said, it's a little remiss to not mention the fact that Gazans elected a jihadist group intent on wiping out the Jews, knowing full well of that intent. Your argument doesn't also mention the history that the Palestinians have been inveterate warmongers, not just against the Jews but there fellow Arabs, for the last 100 years, and for the sake of international peace and order among nations, there needs to be severe consequences for unrepentantly starting wars of aggression.

    Furthermore, as best as we can tell, Hamas still enjoys high favorability among the civilian population, and we all know that Gazan civilians participated in the Oct. 7 attack and that civilians also helped hide hostages. They aren't innocent but complicit to some significant degree in the same way German citizens in Nazi Germany were not innocent but complicit in their government's warmongering. It is hardly without precedent for peoples who commit barbaric actions to be punished after losing the war they started, thus forfeiting their sovereignty and self-determination. That doesn't mean there is a carte blanche for punishing the Palestinians or that it is moral to relocate the Palestinians en masse in this case, but I think it does show some kind of harsh measure can't be dismissed out of hand, given the history of the conflict, international precedent of similar scenarios, and the Gazans manifest culpability.

    Trump and his apologists aren't wrong when they insist there is a definitive need to rethink our assumptions when it comes to this issue. Because more of the same nostrums about "2-state solutions" and that Palestinians, after turning down multiple pathways to an independent state, continue insist on "not before we first slaughter all the Jews" deserve one. Otherwise, 5, 10, 15 years from now, we'll have more blood-letting of both Jews and Palestinians after the insanity of trying and failing at the same non-solutions that don't recognize the Palestinians for being what they are.

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    1. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 10:09 PM

      You are not up to date. Hamas changed their charter in 2017 where they accepted 1967 borders while 23 percent of their homeland.

      Even before they never said they planned to kill all Jews but rather to dismantle the Zionazi state just like Soviet Union was dismantled without any Russians being killed.

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  18. AnonymousFebruary 9, 2025 at 8:07 AM

    Gaza lost the war it started, so it loses land. Akin to how Germany lost land -- and rightly so -- after WWII. It might be immoral for the US to take it, but it's certainly not immoral for someone to take it, even at the cost of forced displacement from ancestral lands. I don't hear Germans protesting for the reinstatement of pre-1945 Germany.

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    1. AnonymousFebruary 9, 2025 at 4:41 PM

      Might is always right? So if Hitler had won his war...

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    2. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 10:13 PM

      Brilliant rhetorical answer to expose the hellbound Zionazi.

      Eventually their real colors come out.

      Delete
  19. English CatholicFebruary 9, 2025 at 1:39 PM

    > They aren't innocent but complicit to some significant degree in the same way German citizens in Nazi Germany were not innocent but complicit in their government's warmongering.

    This is bonkers. You might as well say that American and British citizens were complicit in the USAF's and RAF's mass-incineration of German and Japanese civilians.

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    1. Modus PownensFebruary 9, 2025 at 8:43 PM

      Considering the sort of genocidal campaign the Third Reich waged on the Eastern front against Slavs and other untermenschen, not to mention many Germans moved West to settle the created lebensraum. Not to mention the their complicity in the Holocaust. That whole society was mobilized for genocidal war by a fascist, Aryan supremacist ideology, and a charismatic madman. I don't think it's as bonkers as you claim.

      Did that warrant the firebombing of German cities, including Dresden, or the Red's Army's rape of Berlin, or even the forced relocation of 12 million German speakers at the war's end? No. But it did warrant the occupation and splitting of that country in half for years at then end of the war.

      In the same way, the Palestinian society has been mobilized for one purpose: to eradicate the Jews, and then they'll get around building a state. The Palestinian nationalist movement is the only one I know to actually turn down -- multiple times! -- a offers to or pathways with international backing to instead wage guerilla war as a prelude to 1948 or commit the Second Intifada after being offered a state in the early 2000s.

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    2. The Great Thurible of DarknessFebruary 11, 2025 at 11:12 AM

      Germany was split in half for reasons of realpolitik in the emerging Cold War, not as a punishment for the German people for their complicity in the actions of the Third Reich.

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    3. Modus PownensFebruary 11, 2025 at 9:02 PM

      Thurible,

      Does one rule out the other? Can't there be more than one realpolitik reason for why something occurs?

      Sure, there were growing tensions that induced the Allies to carve of the remains of the Axis in the manner that they did, but it's clear that dividing Germany between England, France, the U.S., and the USSR was to punish Germany for instigating WW2 and wiping out tens of millions brutally. That way she couldn't arise again as a hegemon on the continent to threaten her neighbors like she did after WW1. So yes, the partitioning and occupation of the German state was a de facto punishment of Germans being members of the German nation, and, through industrialized total war and or tacit consent to Nazi ideology and policy, bore at least some complicity for the Third Reich's brutality and aggression, no?

      I mean, you anti-zionist, anti-Israel types demand Israel must be held to account even though its Netanyahu's government right now running the show. The state of Israel was and is guilty of "apartheid," "genocide," and "ethnic cleansing," with the implication that Israel ought to lose territory, or be divested from, or suffer some punitive action that will hurt the run-of-the-mill Israeli, no? Is that not punishment on Israelis as a whole regardless if not every Israeli has served in the IDF or has fought in one of Israel's wars? So you can't be in principle against it when someone argues that the Gazans' and Palestinians' warmongering in pursuit of genocide warrants some type of retributive measure to prevent more of it lest you want to talk out of both sides of your mouth.

      There is lots of precedent in international relations for a bellicose people to start a war, lose it, and lose territory or even its own sovereignty. Like, if a would-be aggressor is weighing whether or not it should invade its neighbor knows that it's guaranteed to keep all its original territory once hostilities end, that belligerent country is likely to be more willing to roll the dice and attack, knowing that its borders will remain secure afterward. To deter aggressive warmaking, there needs to be a significant risk of harsh penalties for those who engage in it. Part of the reason why there isn't much progress in this interminable conflict is because the international community never lets the Palestinians suffer fully the consequences of their habitual choice to choose violence over negotiation, reconciliation, and peace.

      After this war is finally over, and if Hamas remains in power, or the Gazans are still permitted autonomy, it's then likely some other Islamist faction will take control and, again in the name of jihad, attack Israel. If you dispute this, than you haven't been paying attention to the last 100 years.

      I don't want the U.S. to take control of Gaza. Trump is needlessly trying to solve an intractable problem that is a low priority for our interests in the Middle East. It's primarily Israel's problem. The UN also clearly can't be trusted to administer Gaza. There are no good solutions here, only bad and worse. Even so, that doesn't mean we ought to intervene and doing something drastic.

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    4. TonyFebruary 13, 2025 at 3:16 PM

      The UN also clearly can't be trusted to administer Gaza.

      Amen to that. They have fouled up so much in the area that they don't deserve hardly to be even invited to the table as observers, much less have a say, and ipso facto no right to control any aspects of the resolution.

      I wonder if the surrounding countries that were signatory to the Abraham Accords, plus the ones who were about to sign before Biden nixed it, could be trusted to manage Gaza?

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    5. Modus PownensFebruary 15, 2025 at 12:32 PM

      You know, that probably would be the best option, split the difference between Israel and the Arab world. For the sake of the rapprochement between Israel and the Sunni and Gulf Arab states, it makes sense that the two parties work with one another for the sake of the future promised -- Arab and Jew working together in peace -- by the Abraham Accords, rebuilding Gaza together.

      I don't know about Qatar, though. There seems to be powerful and rich brokers in that country that want to fund Palestinian jihad.

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  20. AnonymousFebruary 10, 2025 at 4:29 AM

    I'm not sure what is the correct answer here.

    Who owns Gaza right now? Israel? Hamas can't, after Oct 7th, right? Gazans collectively own the land or each one owns his own plot where his (now) pile of rubble stands? But wouldn't that be forfeited due to Hamas' actions? Hamas' actions were on behalf of the people, it seems.

    Who exactly owns the land anymore?

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    1. NormFebruary 10, 2025 at 12:40 PM

      In scholastic philosophy, the notion of freedom and leadership is always tied to the right to do what you "ought" to do.

      So when you elect someone to be your representative, morally speaking you are only giving them the right to do what is right and good, you aren't giving them the right to do what is wrong. As such when the leader dies something wrong, that guilt doesn't rebound on to you such that you become responsible.

      You could have voted for many other reasons, although sometimes people do vote precisely for that wrong thing that the leader could do , they may see it as something good.

      Another way in which you can't be held guilty is simply because you are a civilian non combatant.

      So I don't think there is a case where an individual citizen "forfeits" their right to their property or land in their own ancestral home.

      I wonder in what situations though would Prof seeing a right to permanently or temporarily take control of enemy land as legitimate.

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    2. AnonymousFebruary 11, 2025 at 2:02 PM

      Thanks. Gazans did continue to overwhelmingly support Oct 7th even several months later.

      I guess one could say that Gazans collectively own Gaza, but they are simply without legitimate representation atm, perhaps?

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    3. NormFebruary 11, 2025 at 8:41 PM

      Anon

      With a authoritarian terrorist group like Hamas, it's hard to ever imagine genuine support as opposed to coerced support , there could be many Gazans who support them under the rubric of "fighting for us" or "only group that is fighting"and not on the goal of killing Israelis, although there will always be many who do support the latter horrific goal.

      Voting has always been complicated, think about how many people vote for a person just on one thing they may have once said at a particular time and it just happened to click.

      That's why holding non combatants responsible on who they voted for can never qualify as a Just Cause.

      I would like Prof to elaborate a little bit on when it would be right for countries to invade and take over if required, temporarily or permanently.

      I think it has to do with bordering nations.

      But even then displacing people can't ever be a viable option.

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    4. Michael CopasFebruary 13, 2025 at 2:47 AM

      Norm,

      "In scholastic philosophy...As such when the leader dies something wrong, that guilt doesn't rebound on to you such that you become responsible...So I don't think there is a case where an individual citizen "forfeits" their right to their property or land in their own ancestral home."

      I have read fairly broadly among the scholastics (Alexander of Hales, Phillip the Chancellor, St. Albert the Great, St. Bonaventure, St. Thomas, Henry of Ghent, Bl. Duns Scotus) and I am not sure what "scholastic" principle you have in mind here and where you might have drawn it from. Corporate solidarity between rulers and their people is something that pervades Scripture and the scholastics were aware of this, so I am not sure what you are talking about. If you have not read the scholastics more broadly and don't have receipts, you need to show more caution in suggesting that you speak on behalf of scholasticism to those that don't know better.

      What you are describing is in fact individualism rather than scholasticism. Man is not an island. He is part of a family and a broader community that he has responsibility for. The majority of the people of Gaza both elected Hamas and, according to a survey after the attack, the vast majority supported the attack on Israel. So, yes they have lost their rights to their land as I have argued above.

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    5. TonyFebruary 13, 2025 at 3:09 PM

      So when you elect someone to be your representative, morally speaking you are only giving them the right to do what is right and good, you aren't giving them the right to do what is wrong. As such when the leader [does] something wrong, that guilt doesn't rebound on to you such that you become responsible.

      Actually, if you specifically elect a pro-abortion candidate because she is pro-abortion, and then she votes in favor of a law promoting abortion, you do indeed bear a real portion of the responsibility (and guilt) for that law and evil acts done because it is a law. So does the representative, and so does the person acting on that law: responsibility is not zero-sum.

      But as Michael urges, corporate responsibility is something different. It has always been the case, throughout all of history, that when nation A's leader does something wrong that harms nation B, and (whether through war or negotiations) it is admitted that A harmed B and owes some kind of recompense, the recompense that comes from A is (in general) due from A as a whole, not solely from those who personally and expressly approved of their leader's bad act. If a fine is to be paid, it may be collected from A as a whole, not by deciding person-by-person who specifically approved of the act. If trade is to be sanctioned, it is trade of the whole nation of A, not just individuals who are personally guilty.

      Indeed, the general of the justification of fighting the enemies soldiers and trying to kill them is NOT that those soldiers are, individually, guilty of grave crimes. Rather, they are agents of their state, carrying out their state's directives. The POW rules imply that we explicitly don't hold individual private soldiers as guilty of the unjust war, we detain them solely as (morally neutral) agents of their government which is bent on unjust war.

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    6. NormFebruary 14, 2025 at 7:01 AM

      Tony

      If you look at my first response, I noted that, there are people who might vote for precisely that wrong thing.

      But I think they would be protected as no military or non combatants

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    7. NormFebruary 14, 2025 at 8:53 AM

      With regards to what I wrote on the freedom of a ruler to do only what he ought to do

      Aquinas writes

      "If, therefore, a multitude of free men is ordered by the ruler towards the common good of the multitude, that rulership will be right and just, as is suitable to free men. If, on the other hand, a rulership aims, not at the common good of the multitude, but at the private good of the ruler, it will be an unjust and perverted rulership. The Lord, therefore, threatens such rulers, saying by the mouth of Ezekiel: “Woe to the shepherds that feed themselves (seeking, that is, their own interest): should not the flocks be fed by the shepherd?” Shepherds indeed should seek the good of their flocks, and every ruler, the good of the multitude subject to him."

      And also citing Aquinas on Just War

      "Secondly, a just cause is required, namely that those who are attacked, should be attacked because they deserve it on account of some fault"

      I think combining these views you more or less get the view I wrote above.

      Aquinas refers to the unjust rulership as a tyranny,

      Furthermore Aquinas talks of those under a tyrant as themselves standing in need of aid , speaking of different ways in which their situation could be remedied including praying to God.

      People under tyranny cannot be held responsible for actions of the Tyrant.

      I do think Hamas qualifies as such a tyrant. A tyrant where the people under them are the victims of that tyranny.

      Aquinas also talks about the tyranny of democracy which involves the people, but as Prof Feser often emphasizes, this critique is not aimed at electing people or voting per se. So electing people and voting is not necessarily the democracy of Aquinas' critique.

      Now I think with Hamas it's very easy to see that given their barbarianism and manner of stifling opposition, any polls of the people have to be taken with a pinch of salt. I don't think the people can overthrow Hamas even if they wanted to.

      So accordingly I don't think they can be held accountable.

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    8. Michael CopasFebruary 15, 2025 at 5:27 AM

      Norm,

      The first text of Aquinas that you quoted states that rulers that are not acting for the common good of the political body they rule are tyrants and merit punishment from God. Very good. Everyone agrees with that.

      Aquinas is of course talking about the relationshiop between a ruler and his people when he is not acting for their good as a whole. The assumption is that the people as a whole want was it for their good and the tyrant is not giving it. In other words, he is NOT talking about relations between two political bodies and how to handle when one political body attacks another in an unprovoked way. Nor is he talking about how to handle a situation where the ruler and the people are ***of the same will*** in their desire to harm the common good not merely of their own political body, but of surrounding nations and the world. He is not addressing that. So combining this text with just war theory does not get you to the following conclusion:

      "that guilt doesn't rebound on to you such that you become responsible"

      That is your conclusion and it is not the result of carefully examining the texts and their principles and then extrapolating principles. The texts have not been carefully elucidated by you in scholastic fashion in conjunction with the explication of principles. You have simply grabbed a couple of texts and the resulting intellectual soup you have produced has resulted in an asserted principle that is completely absent in those or ANY scholastic text. The soup is of your own making. It is not Thomistic or scholastic. Perhaps I will add more later, but this will have to suffice for now.

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    9. TonyFebruary 15, 2025 at 11:01 AM

      @ Norm:

      I have worked a lot of various articles and comments on those very passages of St. Thomas. There are important distinctions to be recognized in how they work out in application.

      1. The distinction between an act (of the ruler) that is (a) clearly and manifestly bent on his own good and manifestly not compatible with the common good, and other acts, which may be different by being (b) something for which it is not manifest whether it is for the common good or not, it is unclear or uncertain; or (c) something that is for the ruler's good AND ALSO for the common good (or, may be so, contingently); and (d) something that the ruler chooses thinking that it is for the common good, but he is merely mistaken in judgment. All of these have different results (as to whether they are binding on the ruled people) than (a).

      In particular, in regard to (d), St. Thomas points out that where many individuals must work coherently to achieve a common goal, they must submit to a single deciding judgment rather than each following his own judgment. The ruled people suspend their judgment, not in that they do not make an estimation of the best course, but in that they don't FOLLOW their own estimation of it, but submit to the ruler's judgment. This means that when the ruler intends to achieve the common good, but his judgment is merely mistaken as to the method, his rule does bind others even though it is not "for" the common good in the limited sense that it is not the best course to follow. It remains "for" the common good in a more critical sense: the final cause is a cause via intention, and the ruler INTENDS the common good by the means he chooses. Thus it does not belong to the ruled people to refuse obedience to the rule on account of their own (conflicting) prudential estimation, even if theirs is actually more correct.

      The result for (d) also colors (b) and (c), because in large social matters, there are a great many factors that interplay in how a good is achieved, and (i) it is usually uncertain whether the claimed proximate good sought by the ruler in issuing a directive is the real objective, (ii) and whether private goods (to the ruler) that also attend the directive are the more driving motives, because many actions have multiple results; (iii) there are many facts the ruler does or might know that other people do not, that might affect the benefits sought and the method chosen; and (iv) there is a great deal of contingency in complex affairs that (for planning and estimating outcomes) assume predictable behaviors by free-will humans. These are all considered under the virtue of prudence. As a consequence, the prudence of the ruled requires granting the benefit of the doubt to the ruler's orders the vast majority of the time. But not all: when the ruler commands something intrinsically immoral, the above gray areas fall away.

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    10. TonyFebruary 15, 2025 at 11:28 AM

      Now I think with Hamas it's very easy to see that given their barbarianism and manner of stifling opposition, any polls of the people have to be taken with a pinch of salt. I don't think the people can overthrow Hamas even if they wanted to.

      So accordingly I don't think they can be held accountable.

      I agree that MANY cannot be held personally guilty. On that basis, they could not, for example, be tried, convicted, and imprisoned for the stuff Hamas did.

      The distinction, though, is between personal and corporate responsibility. If Hamas, with even modest support from a portion of Gazans, have made it functionally impossible for Israel to secure its safety without removing all Gazans from the territory for a period, that unjust war waged by Hamas could make it reasonable (and just) under the law of nations for Israel to remove all Gazans for that temporary period. Indeed, the law of nations has approved permanent forced removal, even of a people manifestly NOT personally guilty of anything at all, to secure a future peaceful resolution of otherwise impossible-to-satisfy aspirations over a given territory. The forced removal is not to be understood as personal punishment for personal sins, but as corporate treatment for corporate behavior, intentions, aspirations which are incompatible with peace. Yes, individuals are run over roughshod in the process. That's life.

      People under tyranny cannot be held responsible for actions of the Tyrant.

      Not personally, no. Except that even a tyrant acts through the obedience of underlings, and they can be held personally responsible for manifestly unjust acts.

      However, a people ruled by a tyrant may, in some cases, be held partially responsible for not rebelling against the tyrant. This could obtain if the tyrant's rule is manifestly unjust and there is a reasonable chance of success in rebelling, or if they fail to consider the option of rebelling when success might have been possible. In some cases individual resistance would be obligatory even when it would cost the person prison or his life. And a people's failure to rebel could be a corporate defect for which they must accept corporate consequences, including owing reparations for an unjust war waged by their nation under the tyrant. Lastly, a people might hold some corporate responsibility for permitting a tyrant to come into control, even if they have little chance of success in getting rid of the tyrant after he establishes control. Indeed, except in the case of full-on overthrow from outside by main force, there is often some aspect of corporate responsibility for a tyrant's rise to power, even if it is diffuse and obscure.

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    11. NormFebruary 15, 2025 at 12:42 PM

      Well Michael

      Firstly, I don't really appreciate the way in which you are reducing my position to mere assertion.

      If I were to play that game, I could also say your position amounts to nothing more then asserting that "Thomas didn't particularly address this or that issue in the way I would have liked" when clearly the attempt is to show that the conclusion actually does follow from his general principles, but I am going to try and give you a more detailed response.

      Your first attempt to say that the paragraph I cited is irrelevant because it doesn't pertain to "two political bodies" doesn't make any sense at all. The question at stake is precisely how a nation ought to treat or consider the people of an enemy state, and that by definition also involves a consideration of how those people relate to the actions of the ruler,so it is not irrelevant. What are the actions that can be counted as genuinely "acting on behalf" and what can't be. The moment the leader turns from the common good in some respect, automatically his relationship to the people is turned on its head because by definition he is no longer oriented towards their common good, he can no longer be said to act on behalf of them.

      I also think that the common good is not a matter of mere "majority opinion". It's more objective then that.

      This is why presumably Prof Feser can maintain that even if Trump carries out an unjust invasion of Gaza, American civilians won't suddenly deserve to be attacked.

      By your logic, an unjust invasion means that all civilians of the invading nation now suddenly become fair game.

      On the second way you accuse of not considering the issue with regards to the situation where the vast majority of the people who are supporting the ruler, I infact did consider the situation and noted that in this particular case, it just seems to be clear that the Palestinian people are themselves victims of Hamas and polling can't be taken to be genuine precisely because of Hamas barbaric ways of dealing with people.

      What information are people acting on , why they think this way , what's motivating them are things that are so hard to determine for a single person even in a liberal electorate like the USA where people can generally said to have made a choice with minimum coercion.

      That complexity becomes even more astronomical when considering an authority like Hamas, to presume the guilt of those people on such grounds would be preposterous.

      You remember last year, when you defended Melania (although you graciously conceded when you realised the error), if someone were to accuse you of being some kind of "progressive heretical catholic worthy of being exocommunicated" at the time, that would clearly have been unjust right since you just lacked the relevant information.

      As such we have to be even more charitable with people ruled by Hamas, so even if one were to concede your principle of attributing mass guilt, there would just be the practical impossibility of doing so.

      Although I don't think that principle holds anyway.







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    12. TonyFebruary 16, 2025 at 4:00 PM

      By your logic, an unjust invasion means that all civilians of the invading nation now suddenly become fair game.

      Well I don't think that an unjust invasion means that all civilians of the invading unjust nation suddenly become fair game. But I also don't think this means that said civilians and their property are sacrosanct and must not be harmed by the justified response, neither in their persons nor in their possessions. War inflicts damage, including on civilians, and no war hasn't done that.

      The (relatively) hard, bright-line division between soldiers and civilian non-combatants is, in broad terms, something more or less modern. Soldiers being in uniform to denote them as "combatants" weren't the norm before uniforms were the norm, and it wasn't always the case. In the old days, when the enemy was attacking your city, the entire city was going to be called on to help out, and nuts to whether they had been paid as soldiers: if they didn't serve by delivering water, or helping dump rocks on the enemies heads, or various other assistance, the enemy would win and they would die, so they helped out. In more modern times, while official soldiers serve in uniform, people who work in a bomb factory also help the war effort, and academics in a laboratory or classroom do, and factory workers putting out steel for tanks do. These are not innocent of the war effort in every sense, and it is probable that if your tank division smashes through a bomb factory during battle killing some civilians, that's within ius in bello.

      But even for civilians that are wholly innocent of the war effort by their unjust government: the responding army might need to run roughshod over their village in order to prosecute the war, and in effect destroy their homes and even kill some of them accidentally. This is not per se unjust warfare. In a similar fashion, once the unjust aggressor has been defeated, the just winner must still create conditions leading to a lasting peace, and this might require forced movement of some part of the peoples, territorial changes, imposition of caretaker regimes, and so on. The fact that some (many) of the affected civilians were not directly party to the war effort or the unjust regime doesn't change the fact that their polity is rightly being forced to accept conditions which, outside of a peace settlement, would look like unjust theft of property. That's what war and its conclusion look like. It makes no sense to impose on the Israelis (or any other combatant at war) that they must abide by peace-time rules in finishing up a war.

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    13. Michael CopasFebruary 17, 2025 at 12:15 PM

      Norm,

      "Firstly, I don't really appreciate the way in which you are reducing my position to mere assertion."

      Oh you don't. Well that's nice.

      "If I were to play that game, I could also say.."

      You could say alot of things Norm. In fact, it is clear you do say alot of things. What I am wondering is whether the lots of things you like to say might be supported by means of true premises and ultimately reduced to true principles (or at least a careful reading of Aquinas). That is what I am not finding in the lots of things you say.

      "I also think that the common good is not a matter of mere "majority opinion". It's more objective then that."

      Glad you recognize the fact that the common good is not a matter of mere 'majority opinion.'

      "By your logic, an unjust invasion means that all civilians of the invading nation now suddenly become fair game."

      Fair game? You misunderstand me. I am not proposing that anyone is hunted. That would require involving the game and fish and would be far to complicated.

      If you would for me to engage whatever point you wish to make, you are going to have to make that point a bit finer than the blunt instrument of suggesting that I am arguing about making some person(s) "fair game." Look at what I have argued (make some effort here). See if you can repeat my argument back to me where I recognize it showing that you understand it. And then just tell me that you think the argument is sound or unsound and follows and doesn't follow and why.

      "to presume the guilt of those people"

      Now I agree. We shouldn't presume. We should take the democratic election Hamas, coupled with the surveys (that you seem hell bent on completely ignoring), coupled with the fact that there are not mass uprisings against Hamas, coupled with the fact that Hamas continues to get new recruits from the mothers and fathers of Gaza, coupled with the fact that the people of Gaza hide the leaders of Hamas, coupled with the fact that they hides the weapons of the people of Hamas in their living spaces, and take all of this together to conclude that yes the people of Gaza are collectively responsible for the unprovoked aggression and horrific acts against Israel. There you have it, no "presuming" at all.

      Presuming innocence in the face of insufficient evidence is noble. Doing so in the face of a mountain of evidence while telling everyone to completely ignore the surveys and its corroboration of the other evidence is not a serious approach.

      In terms of a reliable reading of Thomas on these questions, why don't you read Tony. He has actually read these texts closely, understands them, and knows how to make arguments from them. He also understands and has explained to you the difference between personal and corporate responsibility. His careful reading of the relevant texts and the helpful distinctions he provides merit your attention.

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    14. NormFebruary 18, 2025 at 9:39 PM

      Tony

      My view of responsibility and cooperation is along the lines of Father John.C.Ford in his seminal article The Morality of Obliteration Bombing, Apart from the immediate material cooperation that the soldiers engage in and the formal cooperation of leaders, I don't think that level of cooperation of ordinary citizens rises to the point where they can be held culpable or guilty of losing their life and property.

      Ford even acknowledges that these people may have sympathies, may participate in munition building etc

      But that level of cooperation cannot be taken to mean that they are now military targets or can licitly have their property taken away from them.

      I think that there's a chance that the majority are being coerced into supporting Hamas as I said above.
      If polling in a democratic country is usually not completely reliable.

      Even more for a people governed by barbarians like Hamas, should such polls be taken with a pinch of salt.

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    15. TonyFebruary 22, 2025 at 1:54 PM

      Apart from the immediate material cooperation that the soldiers engage in and the formal cooperation of leaders, I don't think that level of cooperation of ordinary citizens rises to the point where they can be held culpable or guilty of losing their life and property.

      Norm, I agree with Fr. Ford's general thesis that obliteration bombing is wrong, but I still don't think that leads to the conclusion you state above. Here are some distinctions to be made that clarify why I don't think so:

      Sometimes the loss of property, and even loss of life, has nothing at all to do with any assignment of personal OR corporate guilt or innocence in any relevant sense. It has happened on occasion that in pursuing a necessary move forward, our own army ends up destroying OUR OWN people's property, it just happens to be in the way and we can't go around it, so we go through it. Tough. Personal or corporate guilt or innocence is not the relevant metric: we don't decide "we can destroy that property because they are guilty" or something like that. Well, no more is true when we run through an enemy village (that has been left unoccupied as we advance toward it).

      But a comparable decision-making model is used when, unfortunately, some civilians also happen to be in the way, even though we TOLD them to get the heck out. (That is, in both versions, when we are demolishing our own town to move forward, or demolishing the enemy's village, in both cases they knew we were coming through and refused to budge.) Sometimes civilians are just too ornery and stubborn for their own good, and ignore orders to evacuate, and we can't make it not so. (This might also happen if a firefighter brigade has to dynamite a couple of streets to create a fire break: all the occupants were told to flee, but a few refused, and it's not possible to go back (again) and check for stragglers defying orders, and even if there were time you don't have the manpower to physically overcome the idjits and forcibly move them. So it's not strictly limited to war scenarios.)

      These illustrate examples where civilians lose life or property and it's not in the least related to obliteration bombing, and these are not much disputed in arguments about ius in bello (well, not disputed by people of reasonable minds).

      Well, it is sometimes the case that after the cease fire is in place, and a peace treaty is negotiated, civilians are forced to move to accommodate the terms of peace: even where the loser in the war is not giving up total land area, sometimes the loser must give up region A and in return gets region B, and people from A are forced to move to B (and vice versa). This has happened more than once: Germany and Poland, etc. Sometimes people of the winning side in the war also have to move to effect these peace terms. So, it's not strictly on the basis of assigned guilt that they are forced to move, it's on the basis of OTHER KINDS of considerations. And this also happens when it isn't because of a war, but in order to pull off a non-war radical political change, e.g. India dividing into the main part (now India) and a break-off portion (now Pakistan) in 1947. Millions upon millions of innocent Polish civilians and Muslim Indians and Hindu Indians had to move without anyone pointing a finger of blame at them.

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    16. TonyFebruary 22, 2025 at 1:55 PM

      Finally, when a country loses the war and the peace negotiations inflict a loss of territory as a penal matter, the civilians can also be forced to move legally and morally. The fact that the citizens are not personally guilty doesn't come into it: their COUNTRY is corporately responsible, and the penalty is a corporate loss that affects the citizenry.

      If you would like to deny that countries can (morally) be required to submit to such corporate penalties for instigating an unjust war, you would have to argue down a vast literature of the law of nations that generally approve of that in principle. And that wouldn't even touch the matter of loss of territory not as penal imposition but merely for security purposes or to make peace more feasible.

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  21. ROLL TIDEFebruary 10, 2025 at 10:17 AM

    Until Iran is dealt with by the USA nothing will change...end of story!

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  22. AnonymousFebruary 10, 2025 at 12:18 PM

    It's worth noting that the Gaza "redevelopment" proposal is merely the most extreme example of Trump's foreign policy modus operandi, namely, to provoke and insult.

    Look at the list of countries that Trump has angered by his words or actions since he took office three weeks ago: Canada, Mexico, Panama, Colombia, Denmark, Palestine, Jordan, Egypt, South Africa and India. That's three countries per week.

    Ed is right when he asserts that Trump's diplomacy is that of a gangster, not a statesman.

    With his self-destructive statecraft, Trump is merely accelerating the time when China surpasses the United States as the world's leading superpower.

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  23. AnonymousFebruary 10, 2025 at 7:50 PM

    It seems like there are several unclear things.

    First, who owns Gaza? It's confusing, because it seems to have gone between the Ottoman Empire, the British Empire, Egypt, Palestine, and Israel. The Ottoman Empire no longer exists, and Britain and Egypt don't claim it. If Israel owns Gaza, then they would be free to give the territory to the USA.

    Second, how many of the Palestinians want to stay there vs. starting a new life elsewhere vs. returning to Gaza after it's been cleaned up? If I was in their shoes, I would want to leave.

    Third, do countries that initiate terrorism or unjust wars of aggression forfeit the right to their land? If the Canadian government commits a terrorist attack against the USA or invades the USA, can the USA fight back and simply absorb Canada as a punishment for attacking it?

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    1. Michael CopasFebruary 11, 2025 at 4:04 AM

      First: It is contested. Gaza and its people are not a recognized state internationally and their elected leaders don't believe that Israel has a right to exist as a state. They want Israel out of the land entirely. The two state solution has been rejected by Hamas because it would involve formal recognition of Israel as a state with the right to exist. The hatred of Israel and belief that they don't have a right to be in the land motivated the terror attacks of October 2023.

      Second: A survey before the conflict showed that 30% would be willing to resettle. I will try to locate the link.

      Third: Yes and Yes.

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  24. Michael CopasFebruary 11, 2025 at 4:07 AM

    "The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research poll conducted before the October 7 terror attacks found that 31% of Gazans were already considering emigration—44% among young people. The most popular countries were Turkey, followed by Germany, Canada, the United States and Qatar."

    From:

    https://www.wfiwradio.com/2025/02/11/trumps-gaza-relocation-proposal-sparks-heated-debate-among-palestinians-no-life-left-here/

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  25. Michael CopasFebruary 11, 2025 at 4:20 AM

    If anyone has the slightest doubt regarding how demonically evil Hamas is, simply watch Trump's Forbes interview that was published late yesterday with the title: "breaking news: trump issues direct threat to Hamas". "Let hell break out is also on the caption". The people of Israel and their leaders are not cruel and never target innocent civilians (even though Hamas hides behind innocent civilians). The people of Hamas and those that support them are cruel and do target innocent civilians. The difference is between people of good will and those that are malicious. The fight is between good and evil. Those that think otherwise would have use see shades of grey in those that are responsible for the holocaust.

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    1. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 10:20 PM

      Watch Atrocities, Inc to see how the anti-Zionist award winning Jewish journalist Max Blumenthal demonstrates how Israel is the evil entity and always has been since it began its crimes against the innocent natives of Palestine whether the Muslim, Christian, or Jewish Palestinians. And yes, the Zionist colonized murdered Jewish Palestinians who were against the crime of Zionism too.

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  26. AnonymousFebruary 11, 2025 at 6:35 AM

    I don't know if this comment will get posted, but I felt compelled to make it anyway. Those rabid animals forfeited that land on October 7, 2023. According to a poll taken shortly after 10/7 by a pro-Palestinian organization, 75% of those savages supported 10/7. Thirteen percent were undecided, and only 12% opposed it. My guess is that 12% opposed it because it brought Israeli retaliation, not because they saw anything wrong with torturing infants to death. In the same poll, 98% of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza supported Hamas' military wing. Every one of them is scum, and they deserve whatever they get. If that makes me gravely evil, fine, I'm gravely evil. I don't care.

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    1. Michael CopasFebruary 11, 2025 at 10:53 AM

      Dear Anonymous Friend,

      There are Christians in Gaza that don't want the destruction of Israel and they too are oppressed by Hamas and take a significant risk even stating that they do not support the decisions of Hamas. I suspect that the number would be even higher if the people were not led by Hamas. However, you are right that they merit loss of land because of the acts of aggression against Israel.

      You can hate what is evil in those that committed such evil and wish for them to both be punished for what they did and wish for them to change for their own good and the good of those around them. There is alot of evil to hate and every bit of that will receive retribution either now or in the age to come. Trump's proposal would bring retributive justice now and would, again, serve the common good.

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    2. The Great Thurible of DarknessFebruary 11, 2025 at 11:08 AM

      "If that makes me gravely evil, fine, I'm gravely evil. I don't care."

      Looks like you and Hamas have a lot in common, then.

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    3. Miguel CervantesFebruary 12, 2025 at 6:38 PM

      And surveys show that 65% of Lebanese Christians supported the October 7 attack on Israel. I don't agree with them, but does this make them rabid dogs too, fit for expulsion? We all need to take a deep breath and start thinking like the old Christian West, instead of Nazis. Just because a country begins an unjust war, it doesn't give another country the right to obliterate it.

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    4. Michael CopasFebruary 14, 2025 at 5:46 AM

      Miguel,

      Thinking like Nazis? Obliteration? I think you should take a deep breath that will permit some distinctions that are not elucidated by that sort of rhetoric.

      The first distinction is to note that you are mixing together distinct points from distinct commenters as though both reflect the views of Nazis. My comments and arguments for why the group as a whole has lost rights to their land are laid out above in multiple places. As I noted, property ownership is not an absolute right and subservient to the common good. For reasons that I have noted in several places above, the people of Gaza have forfeited rights to their land.

      Second, the people of Gaza are not a nation or state generally recognized by other countries. So the suggestion that the proposal of moving them is "obliterating" a nation is false. Once again, there is a need to take a deep breath and aim for precision.

      Third, the language of "obliteration" and "Nazis" is careless. It suggests the sort of violence seen in something like an atomic bomb or the systematic killing of a people in concentration camps. Again, that rhetoric is not helpful. The breaking up of a corrupt political body that is not even a nation is not even remotely analagous to such things, so you might want to try for a bit more precision and deep breathing before using such rhetoric.

      Fourth regarding the Lebanese Christians, that is regretful but is also irrelevant. No one is proposing that merely agreeing with the acts of a political body that you are not a part of is grounds for losing your land. The argument is that committing such atrocities by a political body by use of your land to do so (e.g. launch rockets into Israel and hiding the terrorists who do so) is such grounds. The head and the members of that political body as a whole bear responsibility for this.

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    5. Miguel CervantesFebruary 14, 2025 at 6:19 PM

      Michael, there are a few distinctions you might consider.
      Property ownership versus the common good of a society is not the issue here; the question is the existence of the society itself. Unfortunately, you seem to deny the reality that a Palestinian society exists at all, making just about any eventually possible in your book.

      Almost all societies (just about all of them mutually recognising each other's existence) have recognised the existence of a Palestinian people - this is obvious from the insistence of almost all countries (including the U.S., Canada, Australia, the UK, Spain, Italy, France, China, India etc etc, and Israel itself in the past) on a two-state solution. This only confirms the presence of two peoples in what has been, for almost two thousands years, the Roman and Byzantine province of Palestine, the Caliphate's province of Filastin, the Ottoman Sanjak of Jerusalem and the Mandate of Palestine.

      The term Nazi is appropriate, because it reflects the ultimate consequence of the modern concept of the absoluteness of society and its state (totally alien to the old West). The Nazis openly considered the eradication of other peoples for perceived grievances, or for their own convenience. This revival of paganism was never part of the Christian West's worldview.

      In the Christian West, the just war did not justify genocide, whether the inhabitants of the aggressor country agreed with its rulers or not. Your arguments would legitimise the complete disappearance of German in 1945, as will happen to Palestine if the Natanyahu and his allies get their way.

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    6. Michael CopasFebruary 15, 2025 at 5:14 AM

      Miguel,

      "the common good of a society is not the issue here"

      Wow. Glad to know that. Where can I get one of those little magic wands where I just make an assertion and "presto" it is as I have said. You do recognize that little ole distinction between an assertion and an argument right? Distinctions, distinctions. Deep breaths. Cool headedness. Keep them all in mind.

      "you seem to deny the reality that a Palestinian society exists at all"

      That has only occurred in your imagination, Miguel. There is a political body led by Hamas and that political body richly merits being broken. There you have it. Your concern has been neatly addressed.

      In terms of their cultural identity as a people (this is perhaps more what you have in mind with "society"), the cultural norms of that society could be maintained outside the rubble of Gaza and the land that lies beneath it. However, that is beside the point as well as cultural norms of a society are subservient to the common good. If a central mission of a society is to destroy one's neighbors, such a society has lost rights to the means by which they attempt to destroy their neighbors. So societies are not absolute goods; they are subservient to the common good.

      "The term Nazi is appropriate, because it reflects the ultimate consequence of the modern concept of the absoluteness of society and its state"

      Ah, duly noted. So your absolutizing the palestinian society as though it is NOT subservient to the common good is an act of Naziism. You have made my case rather nicely for me.

      "perceived grievances"

      Once again, duly noted. Bombardment with rockets, kidnapping 300 innocent civilians, raping women and even babies, murder of 1000 innocent people only "perceive grievances". Your true colors are shining right on through Miguel. Are you leading the charge for the charge in this revival of paganism wherein such grievances are only "perceived"? Are you the new tyrant in the tyranny of relativism where we cannot call such things what they are and discuss what such overwhelmingly grotesque evils deserve?

      "Your arguments would legitimise the complete disappearance of German in 1945, as will happen to Palestine if the Natanyahu and his allies get their way."

      Not quite so fast. Slower heartrate and respiration and all that. When Germany was defeated in WWII and its leaders were held to account, there was not the immediate rise of a new third reich in the people of Germany. The Nazis were not so cowardly as to hide behind their wives and children. Hamas however is. As Israel has tried to dismantle Hamas they have been unable to sucessfully do so, because mother and fathers continue to give their young sons to the cause of fighting Israel and supporting Hamas. In other words, separating Hamas from the people of Gaza is far less feasible than separating the leadership of the their reich from the citizens. So I support the handling of WWII and the punishment of Nazi's just as it was done. In this situation, I support the retribution of those causing the evil (you do realize that this is Hamas right?) as I have proposed above. So, contrary to your remarkably confused suggestions: Israel is not analogous to the Nazis in this situation. Hamas is analogous to the Nazis. They are demonically evil and merit retribution just as the Nazis did. As the people: 1. elected Hamas, 2. protected and supported their evil actions, 3. continue to support Hamas' evil actions, and 4. cannot be easily separated from Hamas as the Nazi parties leadership could be separate from the general public of Germany, 5. Are using their private homes as bases from which to launch rockets, and 6. proximity to and hatred of their neighbors is inciting the conflict, then yes they merit loss of their land.

      There. Now with such distinctions in place we should all be able to breath easy, follow distinctions, and tone down the rhetoric.

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    7. Miguel CervantesFebruary 15, 2025 at 9:30 PM

      Michael, your first paragraph is incoherent. Your second assumes that Palestine is assimilable to Hamas, whereas it has existed since the Roman empire; a region whose population was not made up of Romans, Greeks, Turks or English. You seem to imagine that its 98% non-Jewish population during almost two thousand years was just a collection of anonymous squatters who sole purpose was to keep the seat warm for the Mitteleuropans to move in a hundred years ago. Perhaps the US, Tel Aviv (in the past), Spain, France, Canada, Australia etc were hallucinating when they signed up to the two state solution, thereby recognising the existence of the Plestinian people.
      The Nazi analogy is apt. They advocated the obliteration of peoples for perceived grievances or pure convenience, whereas the Christian West did not allow this, even in the case of just war resulting from aggressions infinitely worse than the ones you mention. As Germany democratically elected the Nazis, and supported them even more during the 1930s, and during the war, practically till the bitter end, it would indeed have been a candidate for the genocide you seem to imagine so appropriate for Palestine.

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    8. Michael CopasFebruary 16, 2025 at 4:33 AM

      Miguel,

      Not understood by Miguelito and incoherent are not synonymous. If you think expulsion from a land because you are launching rockets at your neighbors is even remotely analogous to incinerating innocent Jews in the Holocaust, you have abandoned rational discourse. Good luck convincing anyone but fellow idealogues with that approach.

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    9. Modus PownensFebruary 16, 2025 at 11:14 PM

      Miguel,

      "Mitteleuropan..."??? Clever rhetorical sleight of hand, this.

      A couple questions...

      1) Do you believe the Holocaust happened?
      2) Do you see "Jews" in your alphabet cereal in the morning?

      I have you at a disadvantage here. I ask because, and bear with me here, although I'm far from a fluent German speaker, I'm descended from Donauschwaben (Danube-Swabians) who were.

      See, after WW2, the Serbs in the former Yugoslavia scapegoated the German-speaking minority who had settled there centuries ago in the wake of Austria-Hungary kicking out the Ottomans. The German-speakers allegedly collaborated with the Nazis after they rolled into Yugoslavia. In retribution, the Serbs deprived them of all political and civil rights, murdered thousands, rounded up tens of thousands, and worked many to death in labor and internment camps. My great-grandmother and then 13-year-old grandmother survived and escaped, and like many millions across the globe who suffered displacement due to ethnic and sectarian violence in the years right after WW2 -- with apparent exception of the Palestinians -- settled elsewhere, started new lives, and made the best of it with nothing but the clothes on their backs. So my mother and I grew up learning stories from actual eyewitnesses who saw what "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing" look like up close and in the flesh, as well as enough German to know "Mitteleuropan" means "middle European" or "central European." (Wikipedia also claims it has Nazi ideological connotations, which is suggestive of how you came by such an idiosyncratic term. I mean, after all, the Nazis didn't deliberately target Jews for being Jewish, right, Miguel? Lots of Europeans of various different backgrounds and ethnicities from "middle Europe" happened to end up dead in places called Auschwitz -- as well as colonize "Palestine" at the native Arabs expense, if I take your meaning.)

      Out of what you might call a sense of family honor, I become a tad bit livid and skeptical when activists, ideologues, and armchair historians cynically, grossly, and irresponsibly appropriate terms like "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing" as slurs to seize the moral high ground in political debate without doing the hard legwork required by international law to prove those crimes -- as has been norm these last 16 months. I'm a little rubbed raw from it. And from the outside looking in, I don't see that the Palestinian experience, which admittedly has been full of suffering, including what has just happened in Gaza, looks like anything my "Nana," "Oma," and "Opa" saw and relayed to their now-Americanized kin. In fact, the atrocities of Oct. 7 more closely resembles the Serbian partisans' brutality against Germans, Wehrmacht and native civilian alike, as relayed by my Opa, before they had the full means of the state to persecute en masse at their disposal.

      Delete
    10. Miguel CervantesFebruary 16, 2025 at 11:51 PM

      No need to get cranky. What you say is incoherent because it does not relate to my argument. Launching rockets that kill a few goats is not a motive for obliterating a people or removing them from their country. Nothing, in fact, could ever justify what you support; the obliteration of Palestine. At least that is the view of the Christian West. There were other views in Pagan antiquity and Mein Kampf of course.

      Delete
    11. Michael CopasFebruary 17, 2025 at 11:29 AM

      Miguel,

      Oh. Wow. I had no idea I was in the presence of someone who speaks for the entire Christian west. What a privilege. I am amazed that the spokesperson for the entire Christian west has the time to comment on this blog. You must be busy with everyone asking you what the entire Christian west thinks about this and that. Such a busy man and you are giving your valuable time to explaining what the Christian west thinks here. What a privilege for us all to be in your presence.

      Miguelito you are quite the character. You call someone a Nazi and then are surprised that they might just be offended by that, eh? Well that is because the word "Nazi" has no meaning to you. Those of us who are not historical derelicts and understand what the term refers to and who don't use the term as a fill in for "someone I don't agree with politically" generally don't take kindly to being compared to those who murdered millions of Jews.

      It is clear that you can't take yourself seriously with such outlandish claims and don't worry, I don't take you seriously either. In fact, rest easy. It seem almost no one here takes you seriously with such absurd claims. While such rhetoric might be offensive from someone that I thought were a serious thinker who understood the meaning of the terms he was using, I don't find it offensive from you, so don't worry. I am not "cranky". I find outlandlish claims like that generally amusing. However, at this point the whole "Nazi" schtick from leftist idealogues is fairly tired. It is fun to mock and make light of, but at this point it is mostly droll.

      Delete
    12. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 3:46 PM

      In keeping with Miguel's other comments, Trump should send 3 million of the Hispanic illegals in the US over to Palestine, and make it a Christian nation. For Gaza to be Christian is better than it being an Islamic jihadist state. It can still be "Palestine" to retain its long-standing existence on paper as a directorate of a dozen overlords over the last 27 centuries.

      Delete
    13. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 8:11 PM

      Launching rockets that kill a few goats is not a motive for obliterating a people or removing them from their country.

      Wow, you are really stooping to the bottom of the barrel, really trolling here. Hamas has launched over 4,000 rockets, and while they have only killed a few dozen Israelis with them, their intention is to kill more: Israeli missile-defense has defeated many. Many Israelis have had to flee to bomb shelters or leave their homes. Rockets have destroyed schools and infrastructure. The rockets are intended to kill, and do so indiscriminately, which means they are per se a terror tactic. Such methods definitely justify military response to quell the attacks.

      "Obliterating a people". Get real: if the Israelis were intending to actually kill off the Palestinians, they could do it a lot more effectively than they have been doing so far. It's obvious that their methods are not intended to destroy the entirety of the Palestinian people.

      Delete
    14. Michael CopasFebruary 18, 2025 at 3:32 AM

      Miguelito,

      I know that feigning moral outrage has become such theatre for leftist idealogues that it might be difficult to recognize authentic and justified outrage. If you read Modus Powens comment and give a split second more thought to what is going on, you might just find that his comment reflects such authentic and justified anger. He actually *knows* what the term Nazi means. He knows what his ancestors went through. And your ignorant and callous use of the term "Nazi" to apply to those who were on the receiving end of such horrific atrocities would provoke outrage among any reasonable person who knew so well what the term "Nazi" meant. He has every right to be angry and you have every reason to rethink such stupidity.

      Delete
    15. Miguel CervantesFebruary 18, 2025 at 6:57 PM

      Well, as you continue to be tired and irritated from searching your imagination for material with which to answer the points I made above, I suppose the discussion is over. By all means start lobbying the embassies of Russia. The US, France. Botswana and the other 150 countries that recognise the existence of the Palestinian people.

      Delete
    16. Michael CopasFebruary 19, 2025 at 4:01 AM

      Oh Miguelito,

      Modus Pownens is outraged at your stupid comments and rightfully so. As I have noted, I just find you and your comments droll. You are not a very careful reader are you? That is often coupled with not being a very careful thinker.

      Regarding your great song and dance about the "people" of Palestine. Great. The "people" of Palestine that live in Gaza have lost their rights to their land for the reasons I have mentioned above. Now, you can be a happy little camper since I said "people".

      Delete
    17. AnonymousFebruary 19, 2025 at 6:42 PM

      I'm sure that Modus, your good self and the rest of George's feigned identities will work it out as easily as their outrage.


      Delete
    18. G. M.February 20, 2025 at 12:34 AM

      I hope you are not insinuating that in my spare time in Moscow, I have been able to create the obviously different persons who grace this site with their comments? Do you think I dash around Russian-English phrase books looking for the the obviously instinctual and native use of slang and argot among the comments? Do you think I need to create endless fictional personae in order to entertain discussion and put my intellectual capacities on display? Do you think I would would sink to sockpuppeting just to engage in petty personal abuse? I can and do engage in intellectual discussion of the highest standard under my own name, with others of my own level.

      Delete
    19. Modus PownensFebruary 20, 2025 at 6:04 PM

      Anonymous the Nth,

      I have no idea who "George" is except this G.M. who commented, apparently.

      My reason for getting involved right here in this thread is well-explained in my comment above at Feb. 16. Overall, it's the same reason why I decide to waste my time to get involved in any petty spat in the hinterlands of the Web: to argue for the truth, as fallible as I am, the best I see it.

      To make it more explicit, the pro-Palestinian anti-Israel people here, as well as the whole the internet, are woefully ignorant of history (as in basic history of the region, in understanding what war is and how it works, and in the tumult of history generally) and the relevant international law, especially how it pertains to terms like "genocide" and "apartheid."

      My training is in journalism, philosophy, and technical writing. All three are heavily involved in the ethics of communication -- that's the throughline here for me. When people use language dishonestly, molesting the truth, I find it a particularly disgraceful evil. Our digital age is rife with sophistry, and no topic now more than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. From the partisan cherry-picking of history to the defamatory slinging of legal terminology, truth and decency die cynical deaths here. It's my opinion, the Palestinian case, when you strip away all the posturing and victimology, it ultimately rests on Holocaust denialism in service to the end of enacting another and cheapening the lessons of other atrocities. It's really that simple when it comes down to the brass tax of the issue.

      Miguel's "mitteleuropans" I take to be an obscurantist way of advancing the Israelis as just central Europeans colonizers, and are in no way Jewish, instead of just coming out and asserting such a controversial proposition out loud. The same people who call Israelis "mitteleuropans" are the same people, in my experience, who find the politically correct overemphasis on the Holocaust in the Western mind as indicative that the Holocaust must be a totally rotten and false myth installed by nefarious Jewish interests to keep us true Westerners docile and subservient.

      That's offensive to the truth, and I want a Christian right that respects the truth, that isn't so ideological as to embrace antisemitism, otherwise it can't make sense of Oct. 7. I want a Christian right that knows the difference between good and evil, and I want a Western civilization that does too. That's what's really at stake. Do we know the difference between good and evil, and can we act accordingly.

      Delete
    20. AnonymousFebruary 21, 2025 at 10:13 PM

      Which Russian-English phrase book are you using? Very good. Keep it up.

      Delete
  27. The Great Thurible of DarknessFebruary 11, 2025 at 11:30 AM

    Fine, lets kick the Palestinians out of Gaza, and then in 1000 years some future empire can issue its own Balfour Declaration, promising to create a "national home for the Palestinian people," trigger a mass exodus of the Palestinian diaspora back to its ancestral homeland, disposs the remnants of the Jewish people, and start this mess all over again.

    (And don't even try and tell me Palestine is not the ancestral homeland of the Palestinians who live there. Genetic studies show that they're closely related to the other traditional inhabitants of the land, and many can trace their ancestry to well before the Muslim conquest).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 10:00 PM

      Of course some part of the greater Palestine area is the ancestral home of many Palestinians. Some in southern Lebanon, or southern Syria, or in Jordan. And some in Israel. You know, the region. Let's make sure Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan give up territory too.

      There's a difference between saying that the people who are there are ancestrally connected to the region, and saying that they have an ancestral politico-regional entity to which they have long standing allegiance. If you have to go back 3500 years to find it, and the region since has been home to many other political entities not organized with respect to the Palestinian people as its owner, then a Palestinian "homeland" in the sense of an ancestral state is a pretty tenuous idea. You can erect a state for them if you want (heck, everyone needs a state these days), but don't pretend that this means they have definitive claims to a specific portion of it above all others.

      Delete
  28. AnonymousFebruary 12, 2025 at 10:17 AM

    The state of Israel is under divine protection.
    Nothing can thwart the will of God.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousFebruary 13, 2025 at 12:38 AM

      That's hardly obvious.

      Delete
    2. AnonymousFebruary 13, 2025 at 2:46 PM

      The state of Israel is under divine protection.

      The promise of protection to Abraham's descendants had a purpose: to produce the Savior: salvation comes through the Jews. The true descendants of Abraham include those who believed, like he did, in the Messiah to come - i.e. those who believe in Christ. "God is able to raise up children of Abraham from these very stones" (Mt 3:9).

      God promised to protect people, not a state. The state of Israel clearly was destroyed several times in the past.

      Delete
    3. AnonymousFebruary 14, 2025 at 1:13 PM

      The tiny modern state of Israel fought and won its war for independence in 1948 and has since then been victorious in every war it has fought. In 1959, in 1967, and in 1973. It has beaten down Hamas and Hezbollah and humiliated Iran. Although it let its guard down on October 7, since its inception, Israel has hunted down and eliminated its enemies around the world. That is proof enough of its protection.

      Delete
    4. AnonymousFebruary 15, 2025 at 10:31 AM

      The state of Israel has been in existence for about 76 years - hardly an epoch or millennium. Many states have lasted for that long without anyone claiming God intends they continue to survive forever. It might yet fail, just like the political state of Israel fell to the Babylonians, and then to the Greeks, and then to the Romans, and then was obliterated.

      I hope it doesn't fail: I hope it succeeds. I also hope that it's people come to believe in the Messiah, convert and are baptized, and then make their state into a Judeo-Christian state - a Christian state of Judean heritage.

      Delete
    5. AnonymousFebruary 15, 2025 at 8:16 PM

      The state of Israel will endure. Israel will remain Jewish.

      Delete
  29. AsherFebruary 12, 2025 at 1:23 PM

    An excellent book about the Palestinian/Israeli conflict. Free to read online:
    https://www.kalamullah.com/Books/The_Hundred_Years_War_on_Palestine_-_Rashid_Khalidi.pdf

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 8:10 AM

      Yes this is an excellent book indeed.

      Delete
  30. AnonymousFebruary 12, 2025 at 3:08 PM

    If Trump became a dictator and banned abortion, same sex marriage, no fault divorce contraception, and pornography nationwide, wouldn't that be a good thing? A dictatorship is not forbidden by the Bible, church teaching or natural law.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousFebruary 12, 2025 at 9:18 PM

      Well , Dr. Feser, what say you about that?

      Delete
    2. AnonymousFebruary 13, 2025 at 12:37 AM

      Dictatorship is forbidden. Trump has made an oath to God to "faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States".

      The problem is that people today don't really know what a dictator is.

      Delete
    3. AnonymousFebruary 13, 2025 at 2:03 PM

      Oaths can be broken. And I wrote my comment about Trump being a dictator in sarcasm, because some people? many people? may want want a "benevolent" dictator. I hope I am wrong.
      https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/15/us-far-right-francisco-franco-spanish-civil-war

      Delete
  31. Paul D. Van PeltFebruary 15, 2025 at 1:34 AM

    Trying to think of this from a more practical view. Condeming to proposal as immoral does not holdmuch sway on the world stage, seems to me.Holding it as an example of new colonialism could have better traction.
    Trumps other recent ideas around Greenland and Canada are absurd on their face. They show disregard for established sovereignty and recklessness unparalleled in modern time. Above all that, they are ramblings of a foolish man. I wonder how he got this advice?

    ReplyDelete
  32. MaolsheachlannFebruary 15, 2025 at 6:07 AM

    Your substantive criticisms seem unobjectionable to me, but suggesting it's a bad negotiating tactic is another thing. This is Trump. I'm not sure there's a person alive who can teach him about negotiation.

    ReplyDelete
  33. AnonymousFebruary 15, 2025 at 8:30 AM

    Is it 'their' land, Dr Feser? Palestine was Ottoman Turkish land for 400 years prior to Israel. Turks entered WW1 on the side of the losers and aggressors and afterwards collapsed leaving the land in the hands of the League of Nations who decided to give it to the Jews. That's binding international law. Now, Israel did grant Palestine to the Palestinians in 2005 but they subsequently voted for hamas knowing they were fond of jihadist attacks on Israel. Also terrorist entities are illegal and can surely be legitimately expelled from areas under their control. Einstein reportedly said, 'Insanity is doing the same thing again and again but expecting different results'. The 2-state solution is dead in the water since Israel has already given away close to 99% of the alleged 'occupied territories' inc Gaza yet they haven't received peace. There's no way Israel can give away more land let alone have a terrorist entity with a state in the midst of Jerusalem. Do you have a better alternative than Trump's?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousFebruary 15, 2025 at 8:22 PM

      Trump's alternative is perfect. Make Gaza the next Riviera. And build a Trump Hotel there.

      Delete
    2. AnonymousFebruary 15, 2025 at 8:56 PM

      And Greece was "Turkish" land for over 500 years. So...
      Treating people like dogs drives them into the arms of extremists. If Tel Aviv withdrew to the 1967 borders, Palestine might be a viable state. Expecting the fractured tortured Palestinian bantustans to behave like a successful country is the worst cynicism.

      Delete
    3. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 7:00 AM

      The "1967 borders" are not borders and were not made in 1967. They are, in fact, the 1949 Armistice Lines resulting from illegal Jordanian and Egyptian occupation. Why do you want to retroactively justify illegal Jordanian and Egyptian occupation let alone base a PALESTINIAN state on it?
      Tel Aviv was bought fair and square from Arabs AND apart from that was included in League of Nations Mandate for Palestine for Jewish settlement in San Remo.
      The Palestinians never had a state. They simply lived in an administrative area of the Ottoman empire . That empire collapsed. Just because you live somewhere doesn't give you a right to a state. You have a right to your houses and fields etc but that's it. As stated the Israelis have handed over almost 99% inc Sinai Gaza and areas of West Bank. The Palestinians have been mollycoddled for years yet keep throwing opportunities away and choosing the wrong path. They're not animals or automata but they are responsible for their own decisions. No one has had a better option than Trump

      Delete
    4. Miguel CervantesFebruary 16, 2025 at 11:46 PM

      The Norwegians never had a state, they simply lived in .... The Germans never had a state, they simply lived in ... The Dutch never had a state, they simply lived in... The Belgians never had a state, they simply lived in... the Estonians, The Finns, The Latvians, all sub Saharan countries, the inhabitants of the 13 colonies. This goes on to include ALL countries endowed with states. ALL of them lacked a state, recently or further back. Did NO peoples exist before these states? Your argument against the existence of Palestine would oblige us to deconstruct all peoples.

      I don't subscribe to the view that every people or tribe absolutely needs a nineteenth-century style national state. It is also perfectly true that states, that is to say historical developments, can fashion peoples which now seem to have grown out of the ground. What's happened in Palestine is a perfectly normal national development like all the rest. Whether you don't like that, or Tel Aviv finds it inconvenient is beside the point.

      All peoples, regional entities and historical conformations have a right to continued corporate existence, regardless of whether they have all been ruled by others or not. That is the principle of subsidiarity at work. It's how Europe was organised during the hegemony of the Christian West, before the Enlightenment, and conservative monarchic or Parliamentary absolutisms triumphed at the start of the eighteenth century.

      The 1967 lines are more generous to Tel Aviv than the "legal" partition plan of the UN after WWII. The Zionists most certainly did not "purchase" all the land within the 1967 lines. Nothing gave them the right to set up a state in Palestine in the first place. However, the entire world, and Tel Aviv itself in the past, recognises that there are two peoples there now, and both need viable states. The Palestinian bantustans as Tel Aviv organises them would not be viable.

      Delete
    5. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 8:09 AM

      https://youtube.com/shorts/3f068lqBlRs?si=XbZEzB5KUMXfg6rd

      Delete
    6. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 7:55 PM

      Whether you don't like that, or Tel Aviv finds it inconvenient is beside the point.

      Who is this Tel Aviv that you speak of?

      Delete
  34. For Truth and JusticeFebruary 16, 2025 at 5:54 AM

    Excellent article by Ed Feser.

    I would also add the following:

    1. “The attack suffered by Israel on October 7, 2023 was unimaginably evil” is a problematic statement for multiple reasons.

    I do not contend that there was no evil committed on that day.

    Indeed, I would insist on that evil was committed in that day.

    However, the qualifier “unimaginable” is very problematic.

    And specifying “October 7, 2023” is very problematic.

    How many of us know that many Israeli military posts were attacked on that day?

    I read that 15 were attacked.

    The Zionist control of our media that has been indoctrinating us for decades hides this.

    How many of us know that all Israelis whether male or female are required to serve in Israeli military for a few years?

    Thus, almost every Israeli adult is expected to help in occupying, oppressing, stealing from, killing, imprisoning (same as taking as hostage), and labeling all who resist
    as “terrorists”

    How many are aware that hundreds of civilians killed on that day were killed by Israeli military due to the Hannibal directive?

    See this article for proof:
    https://amp.abc.net.au/article/104224430

    It is wrong to specify October 7 because it feeds into the wicked Zionist narrative that the violence started on that day.

    It is like saying that the Japanese-American conflict started on the day that America dropped an atomic bomb in Hiroshima.

    I condemn the use of atomic bomb in Hiroshima but my point is rather that we all realize how wrong it is to think that the conflict started on that day.

    Even if we bracket out the colonization of Palestine and then the attack on hundreds of Palestinian villages and ethnic cleansing resulting in Palestinians herded into the concentration camp known as Gaza…even if we bracket that out and start decades later in 1967 when Israel occupied the Wst Bank and Gaza, it has been more than 57 years of occupation and mass murder of Palestinians every month and often every week since then.

    Can anyone imagine that if Texas was occupied by Mexico or Chinese or whoever for 57 years, that at least some Texans won’t engage in an October 7 like operation?

    Imagine also that every adult was required to serve a few years to help occupy, oppress, kill, and torture Texan people who were resisting the occupation.

    And may we all note that on October 7 and for years before October 7, Israel was holding 5,000 Palestinian hostages (who the mainstream Zionist media calls prisoners) in their Israeli dungeons including a lot of children.

    And Israel has been keeping a medieval siege on concentration camp if Gaza for past 17 years.

    Thank you Professor Feser for your morally excellent article.

    But I hope the points I raise above make sense.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 7:58 PM

      Truth and Justice, there ain't much of that in your post.

      Delete
    2. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 9:23 AM

      The Zionist control of our media

      See this article for proof:
      https://amp.abc.net.au/article/104224430

      Wait, you are using an ABC article as proof of Israeli perfidy while insisting that the Zionists control our media? What the...

      How many of us know that all Israelis whether male or female are required to serve in Israeli military for a few years?

      Actually, most of us had heard this.

      It is wrong to specify October 7 because it feeds into the wicked Zionist narrative that the violence started on that day.

      However many atrocities that constitute intrinsically evil acts occurred before October 7, new ones were committed on October 7.

      Can anyone imagine that if Texas was occupied by Mexico or Chinese or whoever for 57 years, that at least some Texans won’t engage in an October 7 like operation?

      And if the Texans committed intrinsically evil acts, it would be right to point that out and condemn such acts, regardless of how many prior unjust acts they were responding to.

      And may we all note that on October 7 and for years before October 7, Israel was holding 5,000 Palestinian hostages (who the mainstream Zionist media calls prisoners)

      Some of those 5,000 had committed acts which are not only crimes against Israel, they were intrinsically immoral acts against Israeli people, and they deserve to be in prison even if Israel is itself unjust in other ways. How many? I don't know. Do you?

      Israel's unjust acts do not justify intrinsically immoral acts in response.

      Delete
    3. For Truth and JusticeFebruary 17, 2025 at 4:22 PM

      You are distracting from genocide. I never condoned loss of life on any single date in some October out there.

      But alas it is the modus operandi of Zionists to focus on a given day to distract from a century of wicked oppression by Zionists against Palestinian people by the introduction of terrorism in Middle East by those Zionists (anyone remember bombing of David Hotel?).

      Most of the 5,000 were simply resisting the destruction of their homes.

      And many were children and a lot were not even charged by the wicked illegitimate lying Zionist regime.

      That day in October was only launched to free the innocent thousands of innocent n Palestinians.

      But Zionists lie as much as they breathe.

      They will continue to do so until they face the just punishment from God Almighty.

      Then they will try to repent but it will not count.

      Delete
    4. AnonymousFebruary 18, 2025 at 10:04 AM

      You are distracting from genocide.

      Are you referring to the Hamas's stated intention to wipe out Israel? That genocide? Hmmmm...well, I admit I hadn't been talking about that. If you want to bring it up, by all means do so.

      Delete
  35. AnonymousFebruary 16, 2025 at 10:13 AM

    'For Truth and Justice'
    Your comments are predicated upon the assumption that Israel is occupying Palestinian land AND that Gaza is objectively a concentration camp. To take the last first: when has there ever been a concentration camp 20+ miles long with a beachfront, shopping malls, cafes (and cafe lattes), mosques, roads where the 'prisoners' ride around in cars and scooters, mosques , multiple hospitals etc etc? Answer: Never. Anywhere.

    Israel is not occupying Palestinian land. Palestine was never a Palestinian state rather it was one area of the Ottoman Turkish (non-Arabic) empire that sided with the losers of WW1 bankrupted themselves and collapsed. The land fell into the hands of the victors who gave it to the Jews (San Remo, 1920 'Mandate for Palestine' League of Nations) as binding international law. All Jerusalem, Gaza, West Bank, Israel is for the Jews by international law. Note the contradiction in the pro-Palestine camp: Jews/Zionists stole the land and occupy it YET the Western Powers gave the land to the Jews out of guilt or Christian Zionism. The only tragedy for the Palestinians is the nakhba or refugee crisis precipitated by 1948 Arab-Israeli war. But if Arabs had not attacked there'd have been no refugee crisis. Note that the whole basis for a Palestinian State based on '1967 borders' is demonstrably false. 1967 borders are the 1949 Armistice Lines resulting from illegal Jordanian and Egyptian occupation. They have nothing to do with a Palestinian state.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 4:37 PM

      Your pathetic and wicked comments are predicated on Might is Right.

      You will never understand until when you face the punishment God will subject you to.

      You are correct about “bankruptcy” in the sense that Rothschild Zionist Jewish banking tycoon father told his Zionist Jewish sons who controlled banks in Germany to not lend money to German government in WW1 as the wicked British promised Zionists to allow them in o steal part of Palestine if they betray their German govt.

      That led the evil Nazis to wrongly blame all Jews for the wicked betrayal by the Zionists.

      The victor’s write history and they lie so those who care for truth need to put effort to find the truth.

      Delete
    2. AnymouseFebruary 18, 2025 at 9:54 AM

      You are correct about “bankruptcy” in the sense that Rothschild Zionist Jewish banking tycoon father told his Zionist Jewish sons who controlled banks in Germany to not lend money to German government in WW1 as the wicked British promised Zionists to allow them in o steal part of Palestine if they betray their German govt.

      Ahh, nice to see we are dealing with a balanced Anonymous.

      These are presumably the same British authorities who remained "neutral" in favor of the Arabs and against the Israelis for the last 100 years.

      Delete
    3. AnonymousFebruary 18, 2025 at 1:46 PM


      Anonymous, Your use of the word "wicked" pretty well identifies you.

      Delete
  36. Donald SensingFebruary 16, 2025 at 11:56 AM

    My BA is in philosophy from Wake Forest, 1977, and my M.Div from Vanderbilt, 1999. One of the things I learned in those field is, "You do not have to take a text *literally* to take it seriously." And I think that is the error Prof. Feser has made here.

    When the Israelis withdrew from Gaza in (IIRC) 2004-2005, they actually offered to do much the same thing as Trump said, although on a smaller scale. Hamas seized power shortly afterward and killed every Gazan who got in their way.

    But could it happen now? I think this is less a real proposal than Trump's way of signaling to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and other Arab states that the status quo antebellum may not be restored. Trump's real message, I think, is, "This perpetual warfare between Israel and Hamas stops now." And yes, it has been perpetual; I visited the southern Israeli town of Sederot in 2007 on the same day it received a rocket bombardment from Gaza.

    What Trump did was describe a wealthier, peaceful future for Gaza and put the ball into the Arabs' court: "If not that, then what? Because more years of war is not on the table."

    Here is a no-paywall link to a Wall Street Journal piece that offers insights: https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-gaza-hamas-palestinians-relocate-israel-benjamin-netanyahu-82f40f95?st=icxS7d&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousFebruary 17, 2025 at 4:29 PM

      Here is a no-paywall link to the truth:

      Israel never withdrew from Gaza.

      They simply went outside the concentration camp known as Gaza and put a siege on it created as Nakba survivors were fleeing from their lives from Zionist terrorist gangs like Stern Gang, Irgun, etc.

      In fact, Stern Gang and Irgun were classified as terrorists by UK.

      According to International Law and something called Common Sense and Common Morality, putting a siege on people is not called giving them freedom but is a form of occupation and pure recalcitrant wickedness.

      But Zionists like to lie as much as they breathe.




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    2. AnonymousFebruary 18, 2025 at 1:18 PM

      Yes, but as has already been established Gaza is NOT a concentration camp rather the label just happens to be convenient for those who have a relativist and subjective outlook on truth. An area of 20+ miles with a Mediterranean beachfront, cafeterias, shopping malls loaded with chocolate and clothing, multiple hospitals and mosques and where the citizens get to vote for their own leaders is NOT a concentration camp. It's not a prison. It's just a dense urban area with restrictions due to the propensity of its citizens to vote for self-confessed paranoid racist antichrist jihadists ie hamas (see 1988 charter). As we all know Israel DID withdraw but since the Gazans voted for hamas by a massive circa 43% Israel had no choice but to place restrictions . But if hamas had made peace on Oct 7 or any time before those restrictions would have come down. The Palestinians should have accepted Israel's 'mighty gift' of Gaza and made peace. They should have accepted the (general) will of God and the international community in the 1920s and helped the Jews build a state in the former Ottoman territory of Palestine.

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  37. AnonymousFebruary 19, 2025 at 5:10 AM

    I agree with you Mr. Feser, it's an immoral proposal but then I have always felt that any involvement in the middle east is immoral. Washington gave good advice when he admonished us to avoid foreign entanglements. Arabs and Jews hate each other on the time scale of thousands of years and anything western nations do to involve themselves in their blood feud can only be seen as a personal emolument benefiting a few. My proposal, for what it's worth, is that we leave, once and for all, foreign entanglements and any involvement which does not directly benefit America. I have no hopes that this will ever happen but nevertheless I find it devoutly to be wished.

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