M. Grégoire
@evan No. Most Israelis want to have a Jewish state, and that's fine so long as non-Jews are free and treated respectfully in Israel.
(I also have no objection to states that are officially Islamic or Christian, with a similar proviso for minorities.)
Of course this means that Palestinians ought not to be ruled by Israel. You can only have a liberal, democratic, religious state if there's a majority in favour of the official religion.
Evan Prodromou
@mpjgregoire a democratic, secular, multi-ethnic state was the stated goal of the PLO before the Oslo Accords.
Not all Palestinians are Muslim; not all Muslims are Islamists.
M. Grégoire
@evan I doubt that Palestinians want a secular state either, though they're not really free to express their opinions.
M. Grégoire
@evan What you write is true to be sure, but the PLO was the main Palestinian organisation 25 years ago. Hamas is explicitly Islamist; I think Fatah is officially secular. I don't know which better reflects the desires of the Palestinian. Indeed, maybe they're mostly opposed to both Hamas and Fatah.
For what it's worth, I've lived (briefly) in a Muslim majority society that's officially secular, and in one that's officially Islamic, though never in one using Sharia as the basis of its laws.
Evan Prodromou
@mpjgregoire @jeremy_pm Yes, many of the remaining Palestinian Christians are in the diaspora.
M. Grégoire
@jeremy_pm
Historically there were many Christian and some non-religous Palestinians, but that's less true today.
According to Wikipedia, the percentage of the global Palestinian population that is Christian was 6.5% about 30 years ago. At present, of Palestinians living in the Holy Land, it's only 1 to 2% who are Christian.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_Christians
There are other religious and ethnic groups with long-standing presence in the area of course. I once worked with a fellow who was Druze.
Jeremy Jupiter Jones
Palestine is a secular populace. Traditionally made up of Jews, Christians, Muslims and those who are secular. The land of Palestine is a holy land for Jews, Christians and Muslims. No single faith or people are superior to another. Neither the Christian or Muslim faiths existed 3,000 years ago.
Human rights are universal.
M. Grégoire
@evan Yes, that's what I thought. But also I presume the diaspora would have lower fertility rates than the roughly 3.5 per woman in Palestine, and thus for the Christian proportion to be declining overall.
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