Non-motoring > Gibralter Miscellaneous
Thread Author: SteelSpark Replies: 32

 Gibralter - SteelSpark
What's all this about Gibralter? Storm in a teacup, or do we need to get some fire ships ready?
 Gibralter - Telb
Shouldn't that be Gibraltar? :-)
Just the usual Spanish habit of distracting the attention of the locals from their dire financial plight with a bit of sabre rattling. Soon be sorted.
 Gibralter - SteelSpark
>> Shouldn't that be Gibraltar? :-)

Err...no, you're thinking of that place near Spain, I'm talking about a completely different place. ;)
 Gibralter - Telb
Oh! must be a recreation ground near Epsom then!
 Gibralter - Manatee

>> Just the usual Spanish habit of distracting the attention of the locals from their dire
>> financial plight with a bit of sabre rattling. Soon be sorted.

Indeed. Their Falklands. I suppose they feel safe from actual hostilities now we are all one European superstate.

I shall protest by not going to Spain for my holidays (not that I have ever wanted to go to Spain for my holidays).
 Gibralter - sooty123
This sort of thing happens all the time. Border issues type of stuff, fisherman crossing into Gib waters. Might be a quiet time for the papers.
 Gibralter - madf
Gunboat to Madrid is the answer.
 Gibralter - Zero
That part of Spain needs Gibraltar working well, the economic and work situation there is bad enough as it is. Its just noise.
 Gibralter - Old Navy
>> Gunboat to Madrid is the answer.
>>

:-)

The difficult part of that plan is finding a gunboat.

The navy would have trouble finding anything to send.
Last edited by: Old Navy on Mon 5 Aug 13 at 14:11
 Gibralter - Dog
" One of the dubious claims of the Spanish Government is that Gibraltar is geographically part of Spain.
Of course it isn't part of the British Isles but it is an independent territory whose inhabitants have voted overwhelmingly for their status quo.
Self-determination isn't just for African or Asian peoples, is it? It also applies to people whose ancestors have inhabited the Rock for centuries.
And not all of them are wealthy tax-dodgers either.
This is sabre-rattling of the most transparent kind by a desperate right-wing government trapped in an economic mire by its sheer ineptitude in handling the economy. Who on earth would want to deliver the citizens of Gibraltar into the hands of the PP. where ghosts of Franco still stalk?"


From the highly esteemed Mary on the Spain expat forum
 Gibralter - Slidingpillar
One of the dubious claims of the Spanish Government is that Gibraltar is geographically part of Spain

So is Portugal... :o)
 Gibralter - crocks
If you watch the weather on Portuguese TV you've believe Portugal was an island.
 Gibralter - No FM2R
>>If you watch the weather on Portuguese TV you've believe Portugal was an island.

If you watch the News on US TV you'd believe that they were an island also. [unless woman has baby.]
 Gibralter - Armel Coussine
If you watch Al Jazeera you get the weather in Oceania, Asia, the Americas and Caribbean, Africa and Europe. Very international, and in principle you can see where the rain or shine is coming from.

But I mean... what we really want, like everyone else, is the small print. Will the Monsoon reach Nempnett Thrubwell and its cluster of neighbouring hamlets? World-scale weather is damn all use for that.
 Gibralter - Cliff Pope
I bet the Spaniards don't make so much noise about their own enclaves in North Africa.
 Gibralter - Westpig
>> I bet the Spaniards don't make so much noise about their own enclaves in North
>> Africa.
>>

Yes, hypocrisy of the highest order.
 Gibralter - CGNorwich


Can someone explain the legal difference between the claim of the British to Gibralter and the claim of the Israelis to the disputed territories on the West Bank. Both were taken in as spoils of war, albeit a lot longer ago in the case of Gibralter and both were settled by the victorious and militarily dominant power and both Israel and the UK refuse to let go of them.

Complicated thing history.
 Gibralter - Slidingpillar
Go back far enough, who owns what?

The Welsh have a better claim to England than most of the English... Many of the Welsh are Britons kicked out by the Anglo tribes

 Gibralter - corax
>> Go back far enough, who owns what?

No one 'owns' anything. People are just custodians of the land while they are alive and breathing in a nanosecond of earths time.
 Gibraltar - Meldrew
I think that there is a difference in that Gibraltar was ceded or given to UK by a legal document (The Treaty of Utrecht) whereas the Israelis have occupied the West Bank and said, broadly, what are you going to do about it. I do not think that their presence has any legally recognised basis.
Last edited by: Meldrew on Mon 5 Aug 13 at 16:18
 Gibralter - Dog
The difference is that Israel has been occupying more and more Palestinian land over the last 46 years
whereas Britain hasn't occupied one single additional centimetre of Spain in the last 300 years.
 Gibralter - movilogo
Because British politicians don't have backbones.

 Gibralter - SteelSpark
>> The difference is that Israel has been occupying more and more Palestinian land over the
>> last 46 years
>> whereas Britain hasn't occupied one single additional centimetre of Spain in the last 300 years.

Is that an accurate statement?

Isn't it more accurate to say that Israel has occupied the land since they seized it in the 1967 war, and continue to build upon some of it?

Have they actually seized more land since 1967? Haven't they actually given some land back, rather than taking more?

Didn't Spain cede Gibraltar to the British and Jordan cede the West Bank to Israel? Yet the West Bank is considered an occupied territory but Gibraltar isn't.


 Gibralter - Zero
>
>> Didn't Spain cede Gibraltar to the British and Jordan cede the West Bank to Israel?
>> Yet the West Bank is considered an occupied territory but Gibraltar isn't.

Not true, the west bank was captured by Israel in the 6 day war, not ceded by Jordan, and is an area of Israeli Military Control, so those within (both Jewish or Palestinian) are under martial law. Altho some small areas have Palestinian control, they are still subject to IDF incursions as they see fit.
Last edited by: Zero on Mon 5 Aug 13 at 17:00
 Gibralter - SteelSpark
>> >> Didn't Spain cede Gibraltar to the British and Jordan cede the West Bank to
>> Israel?
>> >> Yet the West Bank is considered an occupied territory but Gibraltar isn't.
>>
>> Not true, the west bank was captured by Israel in the 6 day war, not
>> ceded by Jordan

Yes, Israel captured it in the 6 day war, but then Jordan eventually ceded it to Israel, by giving up their claim to it, and revoking the Jordanian citizenship of people who remained there.

Gibraltar was captured by the British (and Dutch) in 1704, and then Spain eventually ceded it to Britain in 1713, by giving up their claim to it.

As with many things, the language used is important, to heal or keep the wound open.

The Spanish population of Gibraltar could, to this day, have kept calling Gibraltar an "occupied territory", and called wherever they moved to a "refugee camp" (a term normally used to refer to a tented area for recently displaced people, not a town of fixed buildings where a majority of the population never lived in the original area).

The squeaky wheel...
 Gibralter - Zero

>> Yes, Israel captured it in the 6 day war, but then Jordan eventually ceded it
>> to Israel, by giving up their claim to it, and revoking the Jordanian citizenship of
>> people who remained there.

Jordan has no claim on the West Bank, it was merely captured by them in the 1948 Arab War. It was an illegal occupation right up to the time the Israelis illegally occupied it. They had nothing to cede.
 Gibralter - Dog
>>Is that an accurate statement?

I'm sure you're quite correct SS, on some of the details, but I really don't want to get into any lengthy discussion on the Israel/Palestinian situation, I just wish that folk could live in peace with their neighbours like we do here ...
all one of them ;)
 Gibralter - Dutchie
The Spanish should leave Gibraltar alone,like Meldrew mentioned it was a signed agreement in Utrecht (Netherlands).They have more to worry about high youth unenployement for starters I believe about 40%.
 Gibralter - Meldrew
First Minister has asked for a gunboat or something a little bigger, to aid morale. There is an allegation, in the Times, that the concrete blocks that have been placed in the British waters have spoiled the fishing for a very few small Spanish fishing boats that are permitted to fish there as a gesture of goodwill or a concession; in fact only one boat takes advantage of this arrangement. Spain are mentioning banning the transit of building materials across the road border too and a €50 charge for crossing the border; as this would presumably be applied to Spaniards as well that doesn't seem too clever.
 Gibralter - Cliff Pope
>> that doesn't seem
>> too clever.
>>

Regimes that embark on aggresive territorial ventures are rarely clever. Usually it's a desperate gambit to try to hide domestic problems, often resulting in both losing the immediate objective and in the longer term their own collapse.
 Gibralter - Fursty Ferret
Pub quiz question (and no looking at Google Maps!) - if you set sail due south from Gibraltar, which well-known North-African state do you land in?

Spain. We're not the only place with exclaves in the area - but we are the only one with a receipt. :-)
 Gibralter - Manatee
Not the Budgies by any chance?
 Gibralter - NortonES2
I believe the Spanish held polls in the city of Ceuta and Melilla where the current residents vote solidly to remain Spanish and reject Moroccan reunion:) Spain, which relies upon the United Nations Charter, "the Right of Self-Determination", to continue to retain sovereignty over Ceuta and Melilla and to respect the rights of their inhabitants, now seeks to deny that same right to Gibraltarians. Perhaps they think no-one will notice.
Last edited by: NIL on Tue 6 Aug 13 at 10:07
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