Tag: european

Partition of Europe: A Textbook of European History 1715-1815, The by Philip Guedalla (1889 – 1944)

Philip Guedalla writes, “History is the most interesting part of geography, and European history is particularly dependent upon the conformation of Europe.” Between the Peace of Utrecht (1713) and the Congress of Vienna (1815), Europe was continuously partitioned and re-partitioned by war. Frederick the Great created Prussia at the expense of Austria. Catherine the Great seized the Ukraine. And in France, the old order fell and Napoleon redrew the map of Europe. (Summary by Pamela Nagami, M.D.)

From Metternich to Bismarck: A Textbook of European History by Lionel Cecil Jane (1879 – 1932)

This short work opens in 1815, at the close of a period of twenty-five years of almost continuous war. The Congress of Vienna assembled to consider the restoration of the old order. Our author writes, “they rejected the ideal of ‘nationality’, the principle of the ‘rights of peoples’, opposing to it the principle of ‘stability’, founded upon recognition of the ‘rights of sovereigns’ and upon the establishment of a balance of power.” This was the Metternich system, which fell before the revolutions of 1848. Participation in the Crimean War earned nascent Italy a seat at the diplomatic table and Cavour began the campaign for Italian Unification. The Prussian junker Bismarck emerged and, through deft diplomacy and short wars, engineered the downfall of Austria and France, and created the modern German state. (Summary by Pamela Nagami, M.D.)

Israel in context of European settler colonialism

Seeing Israel in the context of European settler colonialism:
it partly fits, and at the same time it doesn’t.

The other colonial powers were looking mainly for profit and power,
not for survival against murderous persecution. Morally that changes
some things, but not everything: it does not entitle Zionists to
oppress Palestinians,
let alone to commit massive and repeated atrocities.

Keep in mind that colonization is not limited to European
countries. Ancient empires practiced colonization — Rome, for instance.
Nowadays, China is practicing settler colonialism in Tibet,
and Indonesia in its half of New Guinea.

India’s treatment of Muslims under its system of Hindu nationalism
is not “colonization’ in a territorial sense, but it has much in common.

[pol note or two about that]