Israel-Palestine Video: Biden's Settlements Humour

On Thursday, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden made an appearance at Radio and Television Correspondents' Dinner in Washington. He said:

I just got back from five days in the Middle East. I love to travel, but it's great to be back to a place where a boom in housing construction is actually a good thing.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JO1-DRrJGuQ&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

Israel-Palestine: Gaza Rockets, Settlements, & Relations with Washington

Comments

[Barry]

Gerry Seinfeld seems to have aged a lot - I could hardly recognize him - what with his gray hair and all. His jokes don't seem to be quite as good as they used to be either.

Barry

[Dave]

I don't think a boom in housing construction has been a good thing in my area. Small businesses have been forced out by large chain stores moving into the area, farms are disappearing, problems resulting from the strain on infrastructure, and property taxes have gone through the roof. My area has been turned into another one of NYC's bedroom communities. Many long-time residents are now leaving.

[Mike Dunn]

That was cringeworthy. Judging by Biden's delivery even he wasn't that keen on the joke.

[Samuel]

Israel's settlements in the West Bank are making the country more and more similar to South Africa everyday.

Professor Juan Cole today emphasizes the Israeli hunger for cheap labor as they import Thai workers to do the hard labor that unreliable Palestinians no longer will do. This is similar to what happened in South Africa when Indian laborers were brought in to replace native Africans. Professor Cole also underscores the crucial issue of demographic change. The Jewish Population is shrinking relative to the Palestinian one and I don't even think he is citing the numbers for the West Bank, only the pre-1967 borders. Israel 2010, just in case you missed Apartheid.

http://www.juancole.com/

"The Thai farmworker's death is, as Lady Ashton said, shocking and most lamentable. That it was a Thai who was killed, however, puts the spotlight on the plight of guest workers in Israel, many of whom are fighting deportation because Israeli policy is to offer permanent residency only to Jews.

Israel's population is about 7.5 million, with 5.6 million Jews. But there are some 800,000 Israelis residing outside Israel if one counts the second generation, and it is not clear whether they are counted in the census. Israel has a million and a half Arabs, and some 300,000 other non-Jewish citizens (many of them Russians).

Jewish-Israeli population growth has fallen to only 1.7 percent a year, while Palestinian-Israeli growth is 2.6 percent a year, suggesting that the latter will be a third of the population by 2030. Since the Rabbinate is resisting allowing conversions among the 300,000 classified as non-Jews, their proportion of the population may also grow.

The irony of Israel importing Thai and Filipino labor on a rotating basis while imposing a 45% unemployment rate on Gaza, is hard to miss."