Ethnostates: Not Even Once.

The situation in Israel is stark proof that treating a specific area as inherently the property of one ethnic group is a recipe for humanitarian disaster. Do not do this. Ever.

And that same warning goes for those Palestinians who want to “drive the Jews into the sea.” Ethnic cleansing is not and will never be the answer to oppression. You have extremists on both sides claiming an absolute right to the land, and they’re both wrong.

What’s going on between the Israelis and the Palestinians is the same drama that has animated interethnic warfare since the beginning of history. The only thing that will work is synthesis — a secular multicultural society, a blended people. All else is pain and folly.

Anyway, next time @AndrewYang, let me write your tweets about Israel.

I seriously think that Americans struggle to really grapple with the apartheid in Israel because the idea of a historically oppressed group creating an oppressive government of their own doesn’t really compute.

We’ve been taught to think of racial/ethnic groups as having innate moral qualities. They don’t. They’re just people. You give people, ANY people, the sense that brutality is necessary to preserve their in-group, and they will act accordingly. There are no exceptions.

Every time a movie or book or video game tells the story of a revolution gone wrong or an oppressed group becoming oppressive, I see confusion and pushback among westerners, especially Leftists.

Nobody has a pure essence, an incorruptible nature. Nobody, no matter how just their cause or legitimate their claim, is immune from the violence lurking in the human heart.