[HN Gopher] The pro-Israel information war
___________________________________________________________________
The pro-Israel information war
Author : anigbrowl
Score : 394 points
Date : 2023-12-08 18:49 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (jackpoulson.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (jackpoulson.substack.com)
| throwaway55479 wrote:
| While it might be a bit dated, the leaked 2009 Global Language
| Dictionary [1] remains pertinent to this subject. Essentially, it
| serves as a manual for communication. I discovered it through
| another intriguing resource, the documentary "The Lobby - USA."
| [2] Admittedly, the perspective it offers is somewhat biased, but
| it provides a straighforward presentation of the situation,
| especially through the lens of an undercover agent who recorded
| behind-the-scenes discussions among advocates of the Pro-Israel
| Information War.
|
| [1] https://www.transcend.org/tms/wp-
| content/uploads/2014/07/sf-...
|
| [2]
| https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLHEvpbppx_4rgC8q0TVMf...
| hypeit wrote:
| If I'm ever fired for taking a pro-Palestinian stance, I will
| spend the rest of my life suing everyone involved. The capital
| community has crossed so many lines in their witch hunt for pro-
| Palestinan voices that it's not even funny. Our industry has
| reached a breaking point and I'm not sure what's going to happen
| since most of the VCs are extremely pro-Zionism and a huge
| portion of people under the age of 45 are pro-Palestinian,
| including most engineers and tech people I know.
| ristlane wrote:
| I'm very pro-Palestinian. That's yet another reason why I want
| Hamas gone. There's no chance for social justice while
| terrorists are running the show.
| hypeit wrote:
| They're not terrorists, they're resistance against the
| Israeli colonists. The people in Gaza were kicked off their
| land in 1948 during Nakba.
| sys32768 wrote:
| By your logic, any peoples defeated in warfare and kicked
| off lands are justified to commit murder, rape, to pillage,
| and to kidnap occupiers.
|
| In America that would include hundreds of Native American
| tribes today whose descendants could resist that way
| against Americans, yes?
| hypeit wrote:
| The Native Americans definitely had the right to fight
| back against occupation and did famously on many
| occasions. Sadly they were successfully ethnically
| cleansed from the land.
|
| The Palestinians are 75 years into the process of
| colonization and ethnic cleansing. They are actively
| resisting, as would anyone.
| dubcanada wrote:
| In your mind, how does this get resolved?
| hypeit wrote:
| Step one would be to end the apartheid state of Israel.
| Very much how South Africa ended its apartheid state.
| Nothing can happen until everyone has the same status
| regardless of ethnicity or religion.
| etchalon wrote:
| If the conditions in Gaza continue as they have for multiple
| generations now, the eradication of Hamas will just beget the
| founding a different group with the same approach, or near
| to.
| robertoandred wrote:
| The conditions in Gaza are the result of Hamas and similar
| groups. Israel ended their occupation of Gaza twenty years
| ago and dragged Israelis out. Israel invested in Gaza
| infrastructure, but Hamas ripped it out and used it to make
| weapons. Israel allowed Gazans to work in Israel, who then
| told Hamas where to attack. Israel tried ceasefire after
| ceasefire, but Hamas just sent suicide bombers and rockets.
| And when as a result Israel tightened their border and
| built the Iron Dome, people say they're in the wrong. Those
| same people also never think about why Egypt also has a
| tight border with Gaza.
| hypeit wrote:
| Israel has a land, air and sea blockade on Gaza. The
| residents of Gaza are second generation refugees from the
| cities that Israel ethnically cleansed in Nakba in 1948.
| Israel also bombed Gaza's only airport. Israel has
| routinely murdered, sniped, arrested and abused all forms
| of non-violent protest such as the March of Return.
| robertoandred wrote:
| A blockade? You mean the defenses set up by Israel and
| Egypt after Hamas started attacking?
|
| Ethnically cleansed in Nakba? You mean when Arab
| countries declared war on Israel and then lost?
|
| Non-violent protests? You mean using molotov cocktails,
| rifles, and grenades?
|
| You're describing effects but ignoring the causes.
| hypeit wrote:
| Yes, a blockade:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockade_of_the_Gaza_Strip
|
| Yes, Nakba was an ethnic cleansing:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba
|
| Yes, they sniped peaceful protesters at the March of
| Return: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018%E2%80%932019_G
| aza_border_...
|
| I encourage people to read these links for themselves.
| etchalon wrote:
| Whatever the reasons for the conditions, you have a large
| population of people who lack control of their own fate.
| Historically, those populations don't quiet down and
| accept it.
| wizerdrobe wrote:
| Egypt has a tight border because Israel has a history of
| launching retalitory strikes against neighboring nations
| from which terrorist cells originated.
| dontlaugh wrote:
| Hamas will only end along with the Zionist occupation.
| dubcanada wrote:
| How does this work out? Let's say Israel admits defeat and
| gives Hamas everything it wants. How does this remove Hamas
| from power?
| dontlaugh wrote:
| It doesn't automatically. But it can't happen until the
| occupation ends. And ultimately Hamas gained prominence
| precisely because of the occupation which destroyed all
| other groups with any influence.
| mrangle wrote:
| You understand that your illogical and immoral death pact
| works both ways, right?
|
| Who is dominant militarily? Does it look like the U.N. is
| going to be able to continue the theater of pulling the
| reigns on Israel?
|
| There is a logical reason as to why civilians shouldn't
| be used as pawns in war. It green lights all civilians
| and tragically opens the door to ethnic cleansing.
|
| And yet here you are arguing that the war can't end until
| Israel is removed. Literally demanding the terms, and
| guaranteeing the results, for the removal of
| Palestinians. Crazy talk, from someone who pretends to
| have the interests of the Palestinians at heart.
| ristlane wrote:
| To be clear, you mean the entire nation of Israel, correct?
| pphysch wrote:
| What do you think about the historical evidence of Netanyahu
| promoting Hamas for this very reason?
|
| https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-
| up...
|
| Anyway, we can make a similar argument about the Netanyahu
| regime: it is actively making Jewish, Israeli, and American
| people around the world _less safe_. It is almost treasonous
| that our elected officials are supporting this dangerous
| regime so uncritically.
| mandmandam wrote:
| > almost treasonous
|
| It's fully treasonous imo. Has been since Biden repeated
| the "beheaded babies" lie _twice_ , even against the
| express disapproval of his own staff.
| zeronullempty wrote:
| Paul Graham:
|
| Well, well, well. That felt coordinated. Turns out it was.
|
| https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1733146138226614465?ref_src...
| 1970-01-01 wrote:
| Paul is a critical founder for many companies. Knowing that
| someone is trashing his rep is very important to many others
| here.
| smoldesu wrote:
| Like how Elon "trashed his rep" and then got on a plane to
| meet Netanyahu a week later?
|
| Don't be hyperbolic for the sake of politicking. PG has
| recovered from vastly dumber takes, and still finds people to
| give him money.
| 1970-01-01 wrote:
| No, like this https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38572877
|
| Tweet: https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1733146138226614465
| smoldesu wrote:
| I can't see the Twitter comments, if that's what you're
| referring to.
| skilled wrote:
| https://nitter.net/paulg/status/1733146138226614465
| ristlane wrote:
| Please do coordinate.
| Pxtl wrote:
| The replies in that are pretty terrible. I'd forgotten how
| awful the bluecheck-reply slurry was on Twitter since they
| started selling those.
| metadat wrote:
| And.. the post was flagged and dropped off the front page within
| 2 mins of getting there.
|
| The HN population is apparently not in favor of surfacing or
| discussing the pro-israel / anti-palestinian information war.
| ForkMeOnTinder wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
|
| > Off-Topic: Most stories about politics
| jjgreen wrote:
| But some is allowed it seems
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38562946
| ForkMeOnTinder wrote:
| That story is about economics, not politics.
| pesfandiar wrote:
| Without having to take any sides, just the surprising
| importance of culture wars on social media could be
| interesting. The societal effects of social media are
| regularly discussed here.
|
| This particular issue has become so emotional that careers
| and relationships were ruined just by taking the wrong side.
| Because of that, I imagine most HN folks rationally steer
| clear of any public discussion.
| csydas wrote:
| This is a story about social media technology and a fairly
| deep and documented look at how a specific group is using
| this technology to spread their version of propaganda and
| harassment.
|
| The use of the technology may be political, but I would not
| call this a political article. I was surprised this made it
| to the front page too at first but as I read on, it ended up
| being a really interesting article detailing fairly
| specifically how social media tech is used to engage in
| harassment, attack people for voicing an opposing political
| opinion, alter public narratives on important divisive
| events, etc. It's probably the most plain explanation of how
| this process works and how social media tech accelerates it
| I've read to date.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| I submitted it partly for those reasons and partly because
| it explicitly mentions SV VCs on both sides of this issue.
| There's a lot of implications for would-be founders who
| might adhere to particular public or private ethical
| standards.
| dang wrote:
| The rub is the word 'most', which means there's a line to
| draw--one which everyone would draw differently.
|
| What I can at least say is that HN's approach to this has
| been pretty stable for years now, and we do our best to
| practice it even-handedly.
|
| If anyone wants to read about what the approach is, see https
| ://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so....
| LarsDu88 wrote:
| HN gets rid of political stuff explicitly.
|
| I honestly think this is a good thing as virtually every other
| online forum devolves into emotionally driven politically
| charged clickbait content.
| metadat wrote:
| +1. Unfortunately political articles, even with a heavy and
| highly relevant tech slant, tend to produce toxic
| conversations and don't reach anywhere near their potential
| with regard to curious conversations (as per @dang, this is
| the stated goal of HN).
| anigbrowl wrote:
| I don't think it's specific to this issue, there's a lot of
| people who insist 'no politics om HN' even when there is a very
| straightforward nexus between technology and politics.
| B1FF_PSUVM wrote:
| It's back on. Perhaps - The time has come,'
| the Walrus said, To talk of many things: Of
| shoes -- and ships -- and sealing-wax -- Of cabbages
| -- and kings -- And why the sea is boiling hot --
| And whether pigs have wings.'
| jdross wrote:
| Pro-Palestinian views outrank Pro-Israeli online by around 36 to
| 1 on TikTok and 8 to 1 on other online platforms.
| https://twitter.com/antgoldbloom/status/1721561226151612602
|
| If anything the skew within the platforms is to prioritize pro-
| palestinian views
| https://twitter.com/committeeonccp/status/173279243496103143...
|
| It also seems like these platforms create (rather than support)
| anti-Israeli views:
| https://twitter.com/antgoldbloom/status/1730255552738201854
|
| US views skew pro-israel, and GenZ is closer to 50/50, so if
| there's something going on online, it's not in favor of Israel.
|
| It's probably relevant that there are 1 billion Muslims to 16
| million Jews, and that the largest relevant population of pro-
| Israeli internationals is India and Indian Hindus, and they are
| not on TikTok (blocked in India).
| master_crab wrote:
| Anti-semitism in and of itself is unequivocally wrong.
|
| But conflating anti-Israeli views with anti-Semitic views does
| a disservice to Jews and Palestinians alike.
| jjgreen wrote:
| Funny how so many otherwise clever people get confused about
| this.
| devmor wrote:
| No one is immune to all propaganda, even the most clever
| people.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| I am though.
| aga98mtl wrote:
| I would be surprised if clever people were actually
| confused about that. Only a rich person like PG can afford
| to say the emperor has no clothes.
| gedy wrote:
| There's no confusion, had Israel or the US busted into
| civilian homes and raped and murdered women and children,
| live streaming it - Would you be fine with people marching
| down the streets the next day in middle eastern countries
| with Israeli or American flags saying the same thing?
| freeone3000 wrote:
| That is the world we live in, not a hypothetical. That is
| why there are people marching down the streets.
| pesfandiar wrote:
| Couldn't agree more. It's a common misunderstanding, perhaps
| because there has always been a powerful campaign to equate
| any criticism of Israel to antisemitism.
| squarefoot wrote:
| > perhaps because there has always been a powerful campaign
| to equate any criticism of Israel to antisemitism.
|
| That is the #1 tactic used to build smearing campaigns
| against people critic of Israel. The difference between
| being a racist and expressing disgust for what Israel has
| done in decades to the people of Gaza and the West Bank is
| so huge that either people using the word "antisemite" in
| that context are deeply ignorant, or they simply have an
| agenda. To my knowledge, most journalists and/or
| politicians aren't that ignorant.
| pydry wrote:
| The agenda is an overtly racist one, it is to support:
|
| * Bibi's racist amalek "genocide the palestinians" trope.
|
| * Ben gvir when he hangs a portrait of Israeli terrorist
| Baruch Goldstein up on his wall.
|
| * Isaac Herzog when he calls race mixing a tragedy.
|
| (To give an example of 3 people who obviously represent
| Israel, all of whom are proudly racist).
| DonHopkins wrote:
| >To my knowledge, most journalists and/or politicians
| aren't that ignorant.
|
| Then you have not been paying attention. Add this fact to
| your knowledge: US Republicans really ARE that ignorant.
| They certainly have an agenda, but they are most
| certainly ignorant to have such an idiotic agenda, too.
|
| House Declares Anti-Zionism Is Antisemitism, Dividing
| Democrats
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/05/world/middleeast/house
| -an...
|
| >More than half of House Democrats declined to back the
| Republican-written resolution, as some argued that
| equating criticism of the state of Israel with hatred of
| the Jewish people went too far.
|
| >House Democrats splintered on Tuesday over a resolution
| condemning the rise of antisemitism in the United States
| and around the world, with more than half of them
| declining to support a measure declaring that "anti-
| Zionism is antisemitism."
|
| >The resolution denouncing antisemitism, drafted by
| Republicans, passed by a vote of 311 to 14, drawing the
| support of all but one Republican. Ninety-two Democrats
| voted "present" -- not taking a position for or against
| the measure -- while 95 supported it.
|
| >That reflected deep and growing divisions among
| Democrats between those who have offered unequivocal
| support for the Jewish state and its actions, and others
| -- especially in the party's progressive wing -- who have
| been critical of Israel's policies and its conduct in the
| war with Hamas.
|
| >"Under this resolution, those who love Israel deeply but
| criticize some of its policy approaches could be
| considered anti-Zionist," Representative Jerrold Nadler,
| Democrat of New York and the longest-serving Jewish
| member of the House, said in a floor speech before he
| voted "present." "That could make every Democratic Jewish
| member of this body, because they all criticized the
| recent Israeli judicial reform package, de facto
| antisemites. Might that be the author's intention?"
| ssnistfajen wrote:
| Paul Graham posted some figure of children deaths in Gaza
| since (after) October 7 and a bunch of tech twitter incl.
| some founders and VCs called him an antisemite. His only
| commentary on the figures was "grim". I think it's entirely
| fair for him to say those things out of empathy due to
| having children who are around the same age as many of
| these children in Gaza.
| rushingcreek wrote:
| It's obviously true that criticism of Israel isn't inherently
| antisemitic.
|
| But that's also a convenient excuse used by people who are
| actually antisemitic.
|
| Both of these things can be true at once.
| kingkawn wrote:
| This hairsplitting over possible bad outcomes while actual
| bad outcomes are happening in Gaza is itself israeli
| propaganda
| nerdponx wrote:
| This.
|
| I have always been very very skeptical of the motives and
| intentions of various BDS groups over the years. Lots of
| issues with hypocrisy, propaganda, and double standards.
|
| But that doesn't excuse the murder of thousands of
| civilians in collective retribution for the murder of a
| few dozen.
|
| It's possible for both things to be true: Hamas is bad
| and committed a heinous act of terrorism, _and_ Israel is
| committing a horrifying atrocity against Palestinian
| civilians in retaliation.
| zczc wrote:
| As far as i understand, the main goal of the Israel
| operation is to remove Hamas capability to launch another
| Oct.7-style attack in the future: prevention, not
| retaliation (though one can argue if there is a way to
| achieve this goal with less cost on civilians).
| mandmandam wrote:
| > one can argue if there is a way to achieve this goal
| with less cost on civilians)
|
| Not really, no. There's no argument.
|
| _The entire world_ is calling for a ceasefire because so
| many civilians are being murdered.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| The current approach will not achieve this goal.
| Overwhelming force doesn't stop insurrections unless it
| goes all the way to genocide or ethnic cleansing. That's
| what makes the argument especially pointless.
| kingkawn wrote:
| The IDF listening to its own intelligence assessments
| alone would've prevented Hamas from launching that
| attack. Hence what they are doing is mass retaliation
| against the entire population of Gaza, not to mention the
| killings in the West Bank and the suppression of domestic
| dissent against the war.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| If I tell you someone will break into your house sometime
| in the future...maybe tomorrow, maybe 5 years from now,
| and actually maybe never...how would you change your
| behavior?
|
| There was some intelligence about a potential threat, but
| hardly anything specific that they could easily respond
| to. Coupled with the fact that Hamas has their own
| counterintelligence laying out deceptions in the months
| leading up to the attack.
|
| I guess Israel could have just stationed a few battalions
| over the full length of the border....forever.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Without looking it up, how many people do you think Hamas
| terrorists killed on October 7th?
| nerdponx wrote:
| The initial news reports here in the US mainstream media
| made it seem like dozens or hundreds at most. The music
| festival seemed like the worst of it.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Ok, but we've known for a whole now that the number is
| around 1200 killed. Not what most would call "a few
| dozen".
| zlg_codes wrote:
| Let's correct that: we've _been told_ there were 1200
| killed.
| edanm wrote:
| > But that doesn't excuse the murder of thousands of
| civilians in collective retribution for the murder of a
| few dozen.
|
| 1,200 Israelis were killed, not "a few dozen". 250 were
| kidnapped and held hostage, of those about 130 are still
| being held.
|
| Second, Israel isn't "murdering" civilians in collective
| retribution. It's fighting a war against a neighboring
| "government" that has just invaded it, slaughtered
| thousands of its citizens, and has promised to do it
| again and again.
|
| Many civilians are dying in this war, which is a horrible
| tragedy, and is unfortunately true of every war, which is
| one reason wars are so terrible. But it's hard to say
| this war isn't justified given the promises of Hamas.
| MSFT_Edging wrote:
| > Second, Israel isn't "murdering" civilians in
| collective retribution.
|
| Dehumanization is the first step to a genocide.
|
| Additionally, this does not explain the violence being
| done in the West Bank to Palestinians, a population that
| is notably not ruled by Hamas.
| waffleiron wrote:
| >Many civilians are dying [...] But it's hard to say this
| war isn't justified given the promises.
|
| This is exactly the rhetoric that made Hamas think it was
| okay to kill Israeli civilians. Both think the other is
| an existential threat.
| grumple wrote:
| 1200+ Israelis, mostly civilians, were brutally murdered
| on 10/7.
|
| There have already been real-life anti-semitic attacks on
| people and property. There have been synagogues and
| cemeteries burned, people murdered, shot, and stabbed,
| businesses trashed. [0][1][2][3][4] You can find hundreds
| more sources of recent, very real, physical violence
| against Jews and Jewish places worldwide.
|
| Jews have been subject to thousands of years of very real
| pogroms, genocide, and conspiracy theories. These are not
| "possible" bad outcomes, they actually happened, we're
| seeing some of it now, and we have every reason to
| believe that it will happen again.
|
| 0. https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/04/world/an-existential-
| threat-a...
|
| 1. https://www.timesofisrael.com/historic-synagogue-in-
| tunisia-...
|
| 2. https://www.timesofisrael.com/armenia-opens-probe-
| into-arson...
|
| 3. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-antisemitic-
| incidents-up...
|
| 4. https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2023/1
| 1/05/i...
| kingkawn wrote:
| What is happening now worldwide in terms of anti-semitism
| is absolutely irrelevant in comparison to the mass murder
| in Gaza. I come from people who were the recipients of
| anti-Semitic violence in Europe for centuries. What
| Israel is doing has only and will only make it worse.
| grumple wrote:
| I was responding first and foremost to the assertion that
| such attacks were merely "possible". I demonstrated that
| they are actual. They put real people who have nothing to
| do with this war at risk due to actual antisemitic
| behavior.
|
| Your characterization of military action against military
| targets in Gaza as mass murder is an interpretation, but
| not a reasonable one. Israel was attacked by thousands of
| Hamas soldiers. Hamas governs Gaza (poorly, and
| undemocractically, but they do govern it). Israel is
| responding to the attacks by Hamas by attempting to
| destroy Hamas. Hamas is still launching rockets at Israel
| from Gaza even today. They are still fighting.
|
| War is hell. Civilians die, especially when the
| opposition hides in and under civilian structures. There
| is no magic weapon or method that will eliminate Hamas
| without killing civilians. And Hamas has demonstrated
| over and over that they will not respect ceasefire or
| stop killing, and they have been widely supported by
| Gazans. Hamas must be eliminated and Palestinians must
| actually want and accept peace for there to be peace.
| pydry wrote:
| It's obviously true that calling out or implying anti
| semitism where it doesnt exist doesnt _automatically_ make
| the accuser an racist.
|
| But it usually does.
|
| They are, while doing this, implicitly or explicitly
| endorsing Bibi's "exterminate the palestinians" Amalek
| trope, Ben Gvir hanging a portrait of Baruch Goldstein on
| his wall (shot up a mosque, considered to be a hero by ~10%
| of Israelis) and Isaac Herzog calling race-mixing a
| "tragedy".
|
| (i dont think it's too controversial to suggest that those
| 3 people essentially represent Israel)
|
| This practice of calling all and sundry racist in defense
| of a state founded upon an ideology of racial purity is, of
| course, probably mostly racist projection.
|
| Indeed, it's hard to be a dedicated anti-racist these days
| _without_ being accused of being an anti semite at some
| point.
| fnimick wrote:
| Don't forget Smotrich, a leader in the current
| government, who said it was a "mistake" that the first
| Israeli government didn't "finish the job" of expelling
| all the Arabs from Israel.
| https://www.timesofisrael.com/smotrich-at-knesset-ben-
| gurion...
|
| The current Israeli government has espoused their views
| that Palestinians should not have their own state, that
| all Arabs are terror supporters who are the enemy of
| Israel, who should be exterminated or removed. And this
| was happening regularly long before October 7th. I wonder
| why some Palestinians don't see Israel as a viable
| partner in peace or that they feel their only option is
| to destroy Israel before they are destroyed themselves?
| Animats wrote:
| This is getting into the internal politics of Israel,
| which are a mess. No party has anywhere near a majority.
| Netanyahu has had over 16 years in power, and he stays
| there by trying to hold together a coalition whose
| parties don't get along at all. How he's done that is not
| pretty.
|
| (Imagine the US with Trump in his fifth term of office.
| Now you have roughly the right picture.)
| toyg wrote:
| One could say the same for "the other part": being pro-
| Palestinians doesn't mean being pro-Hamas, but that's also
| a convenient excuse used by people who are actually pro-
| Hamas.
|
| The problem happens when nobody is given the benefit of the
| doubt about being in group 1.
| throw310822 wrote:
| I thought you were going to say:
|
| "One could say the same for "the other part": being pro-
| Israel doesn't mean being a anti-arab racist who wants to
| ethnically cleanse Palestine, but that's also a
| convenient excuse used by people who are actually just
| that".
| mkoubaa wrote:
| Suppose they are both true, what does this imply? That it's
| fair to suspect people of racism because someone else
| hypothetically uses an excuse?
| beltsazar wrote:
| It depends on "Israeli what".
|
| Anti Israeli government: It's not antisemitic.
|
| Anti Israeli people: It's antisemitic.
| rushingcreek wrote:
| It's more complicated than that.
|
| Criticizing Israeli settlements in the West Bank is not
| antisemitic. But suggesting that Israel has no right to
| exist as a Jewish state is antisemitic as it implies ethnic
| cleansing.
|
| Both are arguably criticisms of the Israeli government.
| chimeracoder wrote:
| > But suggesting that Israel has no right to exist as a
| Jewish state is antisemitic as it implies ethnic
| cleansing.
|
| You've got it backwards. The only way for Israel to exist
| as an ethnostate is through an ethnic cleansing. That's
| not specific to Israel; that's inherent to the concept of
| an ethnostate.
|
| The assumption that Israel can _only_ exist as an
| ethnostate is itself a political assertion - it 's the
| hallmark of right-wing Zionism.
| fnimick wrote:
| > The assumption that Israel can only exist as an
| ethnostate is itself a political assertion - it's the
| hallmark of right-wing Zionism.
|
| I had a discussion at length on this with some very
| historically learned people (far more than me) shortly
| after the attack, with the context of Biden's response.
|
| The underlying cultural memory is that of the Holocaust,
| and of thousands of years of oppression and pogroms
| before, where nobody would ever help the Jewish people if
| they were in danger. Thus the belief that the second the
| Jewish people became a political minority in Israel, they
| would be immediately and inevitably subject to ethnic
| cleansing and persecution by the government. Jewish
| supremacy is viewed as the only way for Jews to be safe
| in a world full of people who either hate them or don't
| care enough to help.
|
| This explains Biden's "bear hug" diplomatic approach as
| well, which as much as it was directed to Netanyahu, was
| actually directed at the Israeli population (and he is
| now much more popular than Netanyahu is, from approval
| polling). The only way to defuse the situation long-term
| is to convince the Jewish people that if they accept
| peaceful co-existence without enforced ethnic supremacy
| and apartheid; and the only way to do that is to convince
| them that if they are threatened, that they will not be
| left to die alone as they feel they have been so many
| times before.
| chimeracoder wrote:
| > The underlying cultural memory is that of the
| Holocaust, and of thousands of years of oppression and
| pogroms before, where nobody would ever help the Jewish
| people if they were in danger. Thus the belief that the
| second the Jewish people became a political minority in
| Israel, they would be immediately and inevitably subject
| to ethnic cleansing and persecution by the government.
| Jewish supremacy is viewed as the only way for Jews to be
| safe in a world full of people who either hate them or
| don't care enough to help.
|
| You're describing the reason that some Jews say they
| support the creation of an ethnostate. That's still an
| ethnostate, and treating Israel as synonymous with a
| Jewish ethnostate is the defining right-wing
| characteristic of Zionism.
|
| It's important to note that what you're describing is
| _not_ representative of the general opinion of Jews,
| either globally or in Israel. Many Jewish Holocaust
| survivors and their descendants oppose the creation of an
| ethnostate through ethnic cleansing.
| KittenInABox wrote:
| I actually wonder how to navigate this actually. Like, I
| have seen criticism of things Israel has enacted in order
| to ensure that the population is a majority-Jewish,
| Jewish-own-all-the-political-power. Is that antisemetic
| to argue against anti-arab laws, if those laws are in
| place to ensure that Israel is a _jewish_ state first and
| foremost, as opposed to Israel being a jewish _state_ ,
| if that makes sense?
| ok123456 wrote:
| Why should we in the West support a religious ethnostate?
| No government has the divine right to exist. Governments
| succeed or fail by the will of those who live there.
| simonh wrote:
| Israel has a population of around 2 million Arab Muslims.
| They have full citizenship, serve in the police and army,
| are represented in the Knesset, serve as judges and one
| of them sits on the Supreme Court. One of them won the
| Miss Israel competition a while back. Does that sound
| much like a Jewish ethnostate?
|
| Do you know what the Jewish populations were in Arab
| states back in the 1940s? It was about 800,000. It's only
| the fact that the state of Israel existed, and gave them
| somewhere to flee to, that so many managed to escape with
| their lives.
|
| It is true there were expulsions of palestinians during
| the 1948 invasion by the Arab armies, which is abhorrent,
| but this was in the context of a concerted, explicitly
| declared attempt at mass ethnic cleansing of the Jews.
| They were literally fighting to exist. Then-Secretary-
| General of the Arab League Abdul Rahman Azzam, said,
| "This will be a war of destruction and a great massacre."
| Other Arab leaders made it clear they intended to kill or
| expel the entire Jewish population, a policy which they
| actually carried out in their own countries. So we know
| this wasn't just rhetoric, where they could do it, they
| did.
| ok123456 wrote:
| It's codified in law they're second-class citizens. See
| the "Nation State Law".
|
| The Nakba.
| simonh wrote:
| The legal code and constitution also guarantees equal
| rights under the law. Can you cite an example of an
| Israeli Arab being denied any legal right due to that
| law?
|
| Don't get me wrong, I wish that law didn't exist. It's a
| mistake, but it's mostly posturing by the Jewish
| nationalist faction.
|
| The nakba was an appalling catastrophe. It shouldn't have
| happened. But then the Arab invasion with the explicit
| aim of killing and expelling the Jews shouldn't have
| happened either. Nor should the expulsion of 800,000 Jews
| from Arab countries. They were all terrible disasters.
| The world would be a better place if they hadn't
| happened, but they did. Now we live in the world of
| today.
|
| Are the Arab countries going to let the descendants of
| their Jewish populations back, and return the property
| and land confiscated from them? Are they going to grant
| them citizenship and let them serve in the police, army
| and judiciary with full democratic rights?
| ktothe wrote:
| A codified law is "mostly posturing"?
| simonh wrote:
| I'll ask again, can you cite any example of an Israeli
| Arab being denied any legal right under that law?
| throw0123895 wrote:
| https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israels-
| knesset-pa....
|
| Posted under a throwaway because I am legitimately afraid
| for my employment for touching this issue.
| ok123456 wrote:
| Are Jewish citizens of Israel routinely the subject of
| indefinite administrative detentions?
| polygamous_bat wrote:
| > Can you cite an example of an Israeli Arab being denied
| any legal right due to that law?
|
| Here you go, 30 seconds on Google:
| https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/08/middleeast/israel-arab-
| citize...
|
| Will you stop spreading misinformation now? Or will you
| start splitting hairs, "Oh it's not due to the law,
| probably a coincidence haha"?
| 10u152 wrote:
| Please go and look at the ethnic makeup of Israel. It's
| not an ethnostate. And even if it were there's many that
| are supported by the west that are ethnostates. That's
| not a reason to not support someone.
| ok123456 wrote:
| Please go and look at the ethnic makeup of the government
| of Israel. Please go and look at the stated policies of
| the government of Israel.
|
| The non-Jewish populations are only allowed to exist so
| long as they provide labor and are second-class citizens
| under the law.
| bluish29 wrote:
| It is interesting that the widespread view of isreali
| people that Palestinians doesn't have right to have a
| state is not viewed as bad as the other way around.
| Ironically it can be called antisemitism too. Because
| they are Semitic too [1].
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semitic_people
| Aloisius wrote:
| That's a classic etymological fallacy.
|
| Antisemitism is a word that was coined in the 19th
| century specifically as anti-Jew.
|
| The fact that Semite today can now refer to non-Jews
| doesn't mean Antisemitism refers to non-Jews as well.
| bluish29 wrote:
| I understand that and that is why I said "ironically" and
| "it can" while technically not "antisemitism" as most
| people define it. It can be viewed as valid use of
| languages, because well for a fact jews are not the only
| semetic people.
|
| But anyway that wasn't my actually point anyway and you
| picked this over the main point. It is still valid, and
| you are free to pick a name specifically for it.
| Antiarab, antipalestanian or whatever you want.
| dml2135 wrote:
| Why is saying Israeli should not be a Jewish state any
| different than saying the US should not be a Christian
| state?
| unholythree wrote:
| Well Jews are a cultural and ethnic group as well; so
| saying Israel shouldn't be a Jewish state is similar to
| saying Japan shouldn't be a Japanese state. It was
| explicitly established to create (or some would say
| reclaimed) a Jewish homeland. It's Jewishness is central
| to it's raison d'etre.
| dml2135 wrote:
| I'm not completely bought into your comparison, but
| running with it for a second -- If one were to challenge
| the notion that the Japanese state should privilege
| ethnic Japanese over other people living in its borders,
| no I would not consider that position to be "anti-
| Japanese".
|
| Similarly, I don't understand is how expressing the
| personal view that all of the people living in the
| territory of Israel -- Jews and non-Jews alike -- would
| be better off living in a secular state, is somehow akin
| to anti-semitism.
| sterlind wrote:
| Japan isn't an officially Shinto state, afaik. And it
| wouldn't be wrong to criticize its subjugation of the
| indigenous Ainu people. I think that calling for a multi-
| ethnic, secular Japanese state is fair.
| dijit wrote:
| Japan isn't _officially_ a Japanese country?
|
| Come _on_ mate, thats possibly the most asinine and
| distasteful argument I have seen on this site.
| bluish29 wrote:
| The comment said
|
| > Japan isn't an officially Shinto state
|
| You are just misquoting the comment
| dijit wrote:
| What did the _parent_ to the parent say again?
|
| The parent was suggesting that there is a jewish religion
| and a jewish race and that the race is the qualifier not
| the religion.
|
| Dubious to argue, but if thats the argument then bringing
| religion back in w.r.t. Japan is wrong and he knew it.
| sterlind wrote:
| *she.
|
| I focused on religion because it's how eligibility for
| Aliyah is defined. you're Jewish if your mom was Jewish,
| either because her mom was Jewish or because she
| converted. there are Ashkenazi, Sephardic, Mizrahi and
| Ethiopian Jews. those are all different
| races/ethnicities. specifically, Mizrahi Jews are
| ethnically Arab. so I disagree that race is the
| qualifier.
| harimau777 wrote:
| So wouldn't saying that Israel shouldn't be a Jewish
| state then be similar to saying that the United States
| shouldn't be a white state?
| Dig1t wrote:
| Genuinely curious, why does it imply ethnic cleansing?
| Why does it need to be a binary choice between ethnostate
| and complete ethnic cleansing?
|
| We have seen that in the western world that we do not
| abide the idea of ethnostates, e.g. it is considered
| bigoted to oppose unlimited migration from refugee
| countries into Europe or North America. Likewise it is
| not okay to say "only X race or Y religion can be in
| government". Why is it okay in the case of Israel?
|
| Jews lived and existed before Israel was established and
| they were not ethnically cleansed.
|
| I don't really have a dog in this fight and I'm not
| trying to controversial, I'm genuinely curious because
| the choice you offer seems like a false dichotomy.
| orthecreedence wrote:
| > Jews lived and existed before Israel was established
| and they were not ethnically cleansed.
|
| Are you being genuine here? I think this shows a pretty
| severe ignorance of history.
|
| There's the Holocaust, the Inquisition, various pogroms
| throughout history targeting the jews...
| khazhoux wrote:
| > Criticizing Israeli settlements in the West Bank is not
| antisemitic. But suggesting that Israel has no right to
| exist as a Jewish state is antisemitic as it implies
| ethnic cleansing.
|
| This is precisely an example of the conflation of "anti-
| Israel" with "anti-semitic." It is entirely possibly for
| a person to disagree with the geopolitical decisions and
| military actions that led to the formation of Israel,
| without harboring ill will against anyone for being
| Jewish.
| catlover76 wrote:
| > But suggesting that Israel has no right to exist as a
| Jewish state is antisemitic as it implies ethnic
| cleansing.
|
| I've seen very few serious declarations that Israel has
| no right to exist. I have seen even fewer genuine
| existential threats to it in the past 2 or 3 decades, and
| that's not to discount how big of a deal or how sad an
| event Hamas's attack was.
|
| But I have seen a lot of pro-Israel voices, e.g. at
| recent Congressional PR-stunt hearings, aggressively
| question anyone who doesn't bow in deference to their
| narrative whether they agree Israel has a right to exist.
| That whole line of tactic is a massive distraction from
| the question those voices don't want asked, either of
| themselves or anyone else, which is "do you think Israel
| has the right to do what it is currently doing to the
| Palestinians?"
| mkoubaa wrote:
| Is saying that "no state has a right to exist, that they
| exist with the permission of the governed" antisemitic
| too?
| mrguyorama wrote:
| Supposedly hating israel's actions isn't the same as hating
| jews, yet the town next door got literal death threats for
| having a star of david as a Hanukah symbol because it was
| "pro-israel", and pretty much anyone and anything with any
| connection to jewishness is currently being attacked as "pro-
| israel".
|
| My jewish girlfriend now gets to feel unsafe and threatened
| by people who seem to be anti-jew anything, but claim they
| are only anti-israel.
| khazhoux wrote:
| This is the problem with a nation that is so closely tied
| with a religion.
|
| I don't believe the people out there who are angry at
| Israelis and non-Israeli Jews have a problem with the
| Torah, or keeping Shabbat, or menorahs, etc. They are angry
| at the actions of the Israeli state and military, and
| making the assumption that all Jews support them.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| > They are angry at the actions of the Israeli state and
| military, and making the assumption that all Jews support
| them.
|
| How is that not antisemitism?
|
| Why do they claim displaying a star of David for Hanukah
| is anti-Palestine? The star of David is a _jewish_
| symbol, and they are protesting that _jewish_ symbol by
| saying it is pro-Palestine to display a _jewish_ symbol
| during a _jewish_ holiday. The star of david is not the
| property of a Jewish state any more than displaying a
| Cross during christmas is Pro-Roman.
|
| What about that is anti-Israel instead of Anti-Jewish?
|
| I believed the "we are just anti-israel, anti-
| colonization, not anti-jewish" right up until this shit
| literally hit my backyard. How come a concert of people
| that was explicitly about Palestinian freedom from Israel
| was targeted? Why did Palestinian supporters get
| slaughtered and gang-raped if this was about freeing
| Palestine?
|
| How does my jewish girlfriend feel safe about this
| situation if Pro-Palestine jewish people are being
| slaughtered anyway, and any symbol of jewishness is
| targeted as "Pro-Israel"? Temples are being tagged with
| swastikas, businesses with jewish employees are being
| attacked, jewish college students are being harassed and
| their college leadership struggled to find a way to
| denounce calls to genocide jews. "Pro-Palestine" rallys
| are singing "From the river to the sea", which is
| explicitly a rallying cry about Israel being an
| illegitimate state.
|
| Where's the evidence that this ISN'T about people being
| jewish? At the very least, completely unaffiliated
| people, including people who have never set foot in
| Israel, are being targeted simply because they are
| jewish.
| EvgeniyZh wrote:
| Criticizing the actions of Israel is not anti-semitic, and
| many Israelis and Jews are critical of the Israeli government
| and its actions (even more than usual during the ongoing
| political crisis). Many of the critics I see lack nuance
| (basically, "rooting for the underdog"), but that's a
| different problem. The problem is complicated, and there is
| no simple solution (some kind of two-state may work after
| many years).
|
| But chants like "from the river to the sea" (meaning
| destroying Jewish country) and calls for an intifada (de
| facto violence against Jews) are anti-semitic. Supporting
| Hamas, whose goal is to kill as many Jews as possible, or
| saying Israel shouldn't defend itself against Hamas attacks
| is anti-semitic (Hamas is also bad for Gazans, but that's
| another story). I can go on and on. People holding these
| views may hold them not because they hate Jews (for example,
| I don't think that people removing posters of kidnapped
| Israelis necessarily hate them), but the result is all the
| same. There is also obvious anti-semitism unrelated to
| Israel, like attacking synagogues, drawing stars of David on
| Jewish houses, etc., but that's not what I'm talking about.
|
| And the most vocal anti-Israelis are naturally the most
| extreme ones and usually include some of the stuff I
| mentioned. As a result, people call out anti-semitism,
| usually not referring to anti-Israeli critics you are talking
| about.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| > chants like "from the river to the sea" (meaning
| destroying Jewish country)
|
| What is the truth of that? I've seen Israeli advocates make
| that claim and many repeat it. I've also seen an explainer
| in legitimate source (maybe the NY Times?) say that it
| means both Palestinians and Jews should be free. Does
| anyone have some actual, authoritative information?
| Something from before October 7th might be good.
|
| > saying Israel shouldn't defend itself against Hamas
| attacks
|
| Who has said that?
| EvgeniyZh wrote:
| For example, 2017 Hamas charter [1], page 6:
|
| The establishment of "Israel" is entirely illegal and
| contravenes the inalienable rights of the Palestinian
| people and goes against their will and the will of the
| Ummah ... There shall be no recognition of the legitimacy
| of the Zionist entity. ... Hamas rejects any alternative
| to the full and complete liberation of Palestine, from
| the river to the sea. However, without compromising its
| rejection of the Zionist entity and without relinquishing
| any Palestinian rights, Hamas considers the establishment
| of a fully sovereign and independent Palestinian state,
| with Jerusalem as its capital along the lines of the 4th
| of June 1967.
|
| Again, people may use it trying to say something else,
| but slogans do not exist in a vacuum. Saying "from the
| river to the sea" means that all people should be free is
| akin to saying "arbeit macht frei" is a call for the
| financial independence of working people.
|
| As for your second question, calls for ceasefire appeared
| while Hamas terrorists weree still in Israel, by no less
| than U.S. representatives [2].
|
| [1] https://irp.fas.org/world/para/docs/hamas-2017.pdf
|
| [2] https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-ceasefire-in-gaza-
| mirage-is...
| dralley wrote:
| >Again, people may use it trying to say something else,
| but slogans do not exist in a vacuum. Saying "from the
| river to the sea" means that all people should be free is
| akin to saying "arbeit macht frei" is a call for the
| financial independence of working people.
|
| Their "2017 charter" rather dramatically toned down the
| language. The original version makes no attempt to be
| politically correct.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| > their "2017 charter" rather dramatically toned down the
| language. Go look up the original version which makes no
| attempt to be politically correct.
|
| Do you happen to know where to find it? Is there an
| English translation (not an English version published by
| them, but a translation by someone reliable)? Often all
| sides in Israel speak differently in English and local
| languages, afaik.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| Thank you for some actual evidence. First, to add some
| detail from reading it, first the cut off part:
|
| _However, without compromising its rejection of the
| Zionist entity and without relinquishing any Palestinian
| rights, Hamas considers the establishment of a fully
| sovereign and independent Palestinian state, with
| Jerusalem as its capital along the lines of the 4th of
| June 1967, with the return of the refugees and the
| displaced to their homes from which they were expelled,
| to be a formula of national consensus._
|
| And from p.2, where 'Palestine' is defined
| geographically, which seems to include much or all of
| Israel (including Israel in a two-state solution).
| However, a quick search did not turn up Ras Al-Naqurah or
| Umm Al-Rashrash.
|
| _The Land of Palestine:_
|
| _2. Palestine, which extends from the River Jordan in
| the east to the Mediterranean in the west and from Ras
| Al-Naqurah in the north to Umm Al-Rashrash in the south,
| is an integral territorial unit. It is the land and the
| home of the Palestinian people. The expulsion and
| banishment of the Palestinian people from their land and
| the establishment of the Zionist entity therein do not
| annul the right of the Palestinian people to their entire
| land and do not entrench any rights therein for the
| usurping Zionist entity._
|
| -------------
|
| Second, though I think it obviously weighs significantly
| on the question, I'll point out some considerations:
|
| * Hamas doesn't speak for Palestinians generally. What
| does the Palestinian Authority say? Optimally, we'd need
| information on the Palestinian public now or before Oct
| 7, when the issue was less politicized and information
| more reliable.
|
| * Again, the document is significant, but generally,
| something in a document doesn't reliably tell us the
| beliefs of the public. Even scripture won't tell you what
| people are doing or thinking (even the leaders - compare
| some of their ideas with scripture).
|
| * It's from 2017; I wonder how old the phrase is.
|
| Anyway, hardly criticism; thanks for contributing. It's
| not an easy question.
|
| > calls for ceasefire appeared while Hamas terrorists
| weree still in Israel, by no less than U.S.
| representatives
|
| Warfare, including as currently conducted by Israel, is
| not the only means of Israel defending itself. IMHO
| elliding the two seems like an obviously disingenous
| attack, and it undermines all supporters of Israel by
| making their other claims equally suspect.
| EvgeniyZh wrote:
| > did not turn up Ras Al-Naqurah or Umm Al-Rashrash.
|
| Ras Al-Naqurah, I think, is Rosh HaNikra [1], the current
| northern border of Israel. Umm Al-Rashrash is now Eilat
| [2], the southernmost Israeli city. For me, both were the
| first google links.
|
| > Optimally, we'd need information on the Palestinian
| public now or before Oct 7, when the issue was less
| politicized and information more reliable.
|
| You can check the polls from July 2023 [3]. For example,
| 50% thought that Hamas should stop calling for Israel's
| destruction.
|
| > Again, the document is significant, but generally,
| something in a document doesn't reliably tell us the
| beliefs of the public.
|
| Would you use a slogan actively used by some racist
| organization to call for white supremacy because it also
| meant something else you believe in?
|
| > Warfare, including as currently conducted by Israel, is
| not the only means of Israel defending itself.
|
| I don't see how else you can possibly defend yourself
| from armed people killing your citizens in their homes.
| Again, this specific call happened while Hamas was still
| killing Israelis in Israel.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosh_HaNikra_Crossing
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eilat [3]
| https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-
| analysis/polls-sh...
| dijit wrote:
| River to the Sea has clear meaning regarding the
| establishment of palestine and the eradication of israel.
|
| You can draw a very neat line between the number of jews
| currently permitted to live peacefully in palestine vs
| the number of muslims living within israel.
|
| its not complicated, confusing, unclear or opaque.
|
| River to the Sea means to end the israeli state, and the
| end of that does not have a happy ending for any jews
| living on that land.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| I understand the claim about that interpretation.
| Repeating it doesn't help; we got it. If you know of
| evidence that that's the understanding among
| Palestinians, that would be great.
| gr48thecat wrote:
| Jews, Muslims and Christians have lived in that region
| relatively peacefully for a long time.
|
| The end of Israel as an exclusionary apartheid state does
| not have to mean the end of Jews living there, in a
| pluralist state guaranteeing equal access to Christians,
| Jews and Muslims to their holy sites and shared ancestral
| homeland.
| bushbaba wrote:
| From the river to the sea is the entirety of Israel plus
| Gaza/west bank of landmass. Then calling Palestine shall
| be free is a call to end the state of Israel. hopefully
| Oct 7th should demonstrate what that means, which is
| indiscriminately killing of all Israeli civilians.
|
| If you doubt it ask a few Palestinians what would happen
| to the Jews living in the area if "Palestine is free".
| wolverine876 wrote:
| That repeats the claim - I'm aware of it from the GGP
| comment and of course from other public discussion. What
| I'm looking for is evidence of the claim from reliable
| sources.
| Cody-99 wrote:
| Why do you think groups like Hamas, PIJ, and their
| supporters say it? Hamas literally use the words "from
| the river jordan in the east to the Mediterranean" in
| their charter while calling for the destruction of
| Israel. Reading that that statement as anything other
| than calling for the destruction of Israel is mental
| gymnastics. When far right nationalists tell you what
| they want to do take their word for it.
| pcthrowaway wrote:
| My (current, possibly misinformed) understanding is that
| "from the river to the sea" refers to a Palestinian state
| that stretches from the west bank to Gaza. Under the
| current reality, I don't see how this would be
| accomplished without a mass genocide of (Jewish)
| Israelis.
|
| I'm open to the suggestion that (some?) people chanting
| this hope for this to be accomplished without violence,
| but speakers at such events have also glorified the
| actions of Hamas on October 7th.
|
| For what it's worth, I don't support the actions of
| Israel, or the occupation of West bank and Gaza. I
| support a free Palestine in the sense that West Bank /
| Gaza should be left alone. There's a good chance that
| without the blockade, those territories would better arm
| themselves and it would result in a war which would
| impact Israel much more significantly as West Bank + Gaza
| would likely move to reclaim Israeli land. But at this
| point I don't see an alternative without Israel
| continuing its egregious human rights violations and
| genocide of the Palestinian people.
|
| Kind of a shit situation all around.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| There is a well-established solution to conflict, called
| democracy. People fight it out in ballots and
| legislatures; they resolve differences by the universal
| rules (apply to everyone) in indepedent tribunals
| (courts; they all are guaranteed human rights.
|
| It doesn't work beautifully or easily or perfectly, but
| it keeps a lid on things generally. Our recent
| abandonment of it is awful, and serves only the
| warmongers, hateful, and power-hungry - the people who
| benefit from the absence of things like universal human
| rights.
| mupuff1234 wrote:
| That democracy evaporated very quickly in Gaza.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| So an essential solution hasn't worked everywhere every
| time. Should we abandon it? Should the founders of the US
| quit after the Articles of Confederation didn't work out?
| Later after the Civil War?
| waffleiron wrote:
| I am going to answer this as honestly as possible, but
| this is a personal interpretation (like everything in
| this hn thread), it doesn't refer to a free Palestinian
| state as much as it does to the people. When Israel is
| inherently setup as a country for Jewish people, that
| does indeed call for the abolition of the state of Israel
| as is, but to me that is like saying fighting against
| apartheid in South Africa was calling for a genocide of
| whites. It could have been if they would have fought for
| the need of having an apartheid state, but it wasn't
| necessary.
| abusada wrote:
| Hello there, a Palestinian from the west bank here
| speaking, let me tell you something, our resistance has
| nothing to do with Israel being a Jewish state, if my
| brother stole my house and killed my children i will fight
| him just the same, and you would too and everyone else (I
| assume). jewish, muslim, christian, vegan.. doesn't matter.
|
| Now Hamas does play on the string of religion to get to
| people, and so does Israel (isn't it the promised land
| after all?).. but the main goal is to free the people from
| the oppressive occupation!
|
| and when we chant "From the river to the sea" we don't mean
| to kill anyone! if we can be free and live together, but
| have dignity and human rights, so be it!
|
| and like Bassem Youssef said, let's imagine a world where
| Hamas doesn't exist, and let's call it for example the west
| bank. how do you justify what's happening there and the
| settlements expansion?
| EvgeniyZh wrote:
| > and when we chant "From the river to the sea" we don't
| mean to kill anyone
|
| Don't you think it may be useful to use a different
| slogan from the people who mean and do that?
|
| > if we can be free and live together, but have dignity
| and human rights, so be it!
|
| But we can't. There won't be a one-state solution that
| satisfies everyone, and the earlier we understand it, the
| better. For the same reasons, the right of return for
| every descendant won't work. We need to come up with a
| meaningful two-state solution, but that failed multiple
| times. So what's left? What solution do you think both
| sides may agree on, assuming good faith negotiations? Do
| you think any side is ready to give up West Jerusalem or
| their right of return stance?
|
| > let's imagine a world where Hamas doesn't exist, and
| let's call it for example the west bank.
|
| I think the situation in West Bank is much better both
| for Israelis and Palestinians than the situation in Gaza
| (even before 7/10), and more importantly, there are ways
| to improve it.
|
| > how do you justify what's happening there and the
| settlements expansion?
|
| I don't justify the settlement expansion; I think it is a
| wrong practice. Do you think removing settlements (plus,
| say, some territory exchange where removal is too
| complicated) would solve all West Bank problems?
| mupuff1234 wrote:
| Is it really worth fighting over a piece of land for
| generations?
|
| It's just dirt, there's nothing special about it. Almost
| all border are the results of war and conquest throughout
| history, israel's borders aren't any different.
| roenxi wrote:
| > Supporting Hamas ... is anti-semitic
|
| > https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-
| propped-up...
|
| Then the Times of Israel is on the record with articles
| accusing Netanyahu of being anti-semitic. I don't think
| those things you list are anti-semitic - they just happen
| to be politically bad for Jews right now. There is a
| difference (an important one) between policies-bad-for-a-
| group and being motivated by an unreasonable hatred of a
| group.
| valianteffort wrote:
| The term "anti-semetic" is in and of itself "anti-semetic".
| It obfuscates the fact that palestinians are true semites by
| conflating itself with any anti-jewish sentiment or
| criticism.
|
| The modern israeli's are not semites. Those that settled
| after WW2 were eastern european converts, khazars, with no
| genetic ties to the middle east. Those that are not ashkenazi
| are migrants from the surrounding countries, who largely did
| not move to the area until after the occupation of palestine.
|
| The term "anti-semite" was invented to reinforce the lie that
| the ruling class of israel have some ancestral claim to the
| land. Using it is playing into that propaganda.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| It's dangerous, tricky terrain. Regardless of your beliefs,
| anti-Semites benefit.
|
| * The anti-Semites are not idiots, mostly; they don't spew
| anti-Semitism publicly but say what is acceptable, which is
| to criticize Israel, and obviously anything anti-Israeli
| helps their cause.
|
| * There's an implication whether people like it or not:
| Israel defines itself as The Jewish State. Also, many people
| are unware that Judaism is non-hierarchical overall; there's
| no pope-equivalent in Israel to which Jewish people have some
| allegiance (remember the old Papist accusation against Roman
| Catholics for dual loyalty); though Israel has some special
| things and history, it has no other role in non-Israeli
| Jewish people's religion, but people make that association
| regardless. Also, many are unaware that most Jewish people in
| the US oppose Netanyahu and the Israeli right, and afaik are
| sympathetic to the Palestinians. Anti-Semites will benefit
| from that implication, even though you don't want them to.
|
| * Not everyone will respect that essential division between
| anti-Israel and anti-Semitic speech, and there's a
| significant risk that large-scale anti-Semitism could spill
| over. It was already at the highest levels in recent history
| (like other prejudices). It's easy to dismiss as as unlikely
| when you aren't at risk; a small risk of catastrophe is a big
| issue when it's your life.
|
| People absolutely need to be able to criticize Israel, but I
| hope they are careful (not silent) and aware that there is no
| easy answer. You are anti-Israel (in this case, at least) and
| not anti-Semitic, but you will help the latter to some degree
| - hopefully a minimized one.
|
| I think the major problem is that we've abandoned and
| actively attack the former social prohibition against
| prejudice, stereotypes, intolerance,
| race/sex/gender/religious discrimination, etc. It used to be
| verboten, but then we are all familiar with the contemporary
| reactionary attack on it (however you perceive it, whatever
| words you use), which seems to have been very successful. A
| very major loss is that without that high wall between us and
| the bad guys and bad behavior, without that bright line,
| there is much more spillover in what we do, and much more
| risk of them walking right in.
| zlg_codes wrote:
| This sociopathic sleight of hand is what upsets me the most.
| They aren't even courageous enough to take criticism on the
| face. They pull the race card, on fucking _Americans_ , who
| helped save their ass in WW2. They wouldn't _have_ a culture
| if we hadn 't saved them, and here they go acting like
| colonialists, with our money.
|
| Congress has a lot of answering to do. That was _our_ money,
| to be spent on _American_ interests, not killing Middle
| Eastern people.
| holmesworcester wrote:
| Another possible explanation for this skew is that TikTok and
| IG are primarily video platforms.
|
| The videos of destruction and death in Gaza are far more
| horrific than corresponding videos in Israel, because the scale
| of what Israel is doing to Gaza is so much greater than what
| Gaza has done to Israel.
|
| Another way of saying it is, it makes sense that someone who
| spends hours on apps optimized for empathy-based addiction
| would be more sympathetic to Gazans than someone who reads the
| newspaper or watches talking heads on TV news, since the latter
| portray the occupation as a two-sided tit for tat.
| wk_end wrote:
| It's also the nature of the violence. It's generally
| acceptable to show shots of bombed-out buildings and the
| like, or even display injured or dead bodies. The footage we
| and Israel have from Hamas depicts first-hand murder, rape
| and torture - all things which are going to violate TOS.
| KittenInABox wrote:
| I'm confused when you say that its acceptable to display
| injured or dead bodies, and yet its violating TOS to
| display murder or torture. The photo of a murder vs a photo
| of a bombed body is not something I understand to be
| distinctly different nor something that would be able to be
| detected by the algorithm.
|
| [Small addition: I've actually seen videos of (alleged)
| hamas torture, particularly the torture and killing of a
| specific woman, from Oct 7, not taken down from TOS. I just
| was under the impression, because there are literally more
| Palestinian dead people, there will be more photos of dead
| Palestinians.]
|
| [Edited to add, since I'm apparently posting too fast: no,
| I really do mean there were censored videos of that naked
| woman in the back of a hamas truck from Oct 7! And that one
| video of an Israeli woman who lives close enough to the
| bombing that she can hear it in the context that it gives
| her peace to know the bombing is happening!]
| wk_end wrote:
| Why are you talking about photos? The word "footage"
| refers to video, and I was replying to a post which said
| specifically (emphasis mine):
|
| > Another possible explanation for this skew is that
| TikTok and IG are primarily *video* platforms [...] The
| *videos* of destruction and death in Gaza are far more
| horrific than corresponding *videos* in Israel
|
| TikTok's "Community Guidelines" [0] read:
|
| > We do not allow gory, gruesome, disturbing, or
| extremely violent content.
|
| If a video depicting torture and killing wasn't taken
| down, either the poor moderators stuck viewing all this
| stuff just hadn't gotten to it yet or it was a failure in
| some way to enforce the TOS; not an indication that the
| TOS allows it.
|
| [0] https://www.tiktok.com/community-
| guidelines/en/sensitive-mat...
| proc0 wrote:
| > The videos of destruction and death in Gaza are far more
| horrific than corresponding videos in Israel
|
| Maybe you haven't seen enough of what happened in 10/7 then.
| I would rather get hit by a bomb then tortured to death in
| the most horrific way possible.
| digging wrote:
| Would you rather get tortured to death horrifically or have
| your closest 200 relatives crushed to death in the rubble
| of everything they own? If we're comparing experiences,
| this might be a more typical choice.
| bjourne wrote:
| As of right now there are likely hundreds or thousands of
| Palestinians trapped under the rubble of their houses
| slowly suffocating or dying of dehydration. A process that
| takes days or weeks.
| sertbdfgbnfgsd wrote:
| > Pro-Palestinian views outrank Pro-Israeli online by around 36
| to 1 on TikTok and 8 to 1 on other online platforms.
|
| > If anything the skew within the platforms is to prioritize
| pro-palestinian views.
|
| That platforms prioritize one over the other is just one
| possible explanation. An alternative explanation is that more
| people already have those views. And it's dishonest to present
| one explanation and omit the other.
|
| Nothing inflames people like injustice.
| mastazi wrote:
| I don't think that parent is suggesting that platforms are
| actively prioritising one over the other.
|
| I think they are saying that the composition of users of
| these apps skews one way rather than the other due to pre
| existing stances, and the fact that the apps are not
| available in some markets.
|
| As a result, certain views are prioritised as a byproduct of
| the fact that all modern social media apps have an algorithm
| that shows you more of what you already agree with, in order
| to maximise ad profits.
| KittenInABox wrote:
| > I think they are saying that the composition of users of
| these apps skews one way rather than the other due to pre
| existing stances
|
| I think the notion that the vast chunk of Twitter or TikTok
| had a pre existing stance on Israel/Palestine before Oct 7
| is kind of silly, imo? Before this I could scroll Twitter
| without seeing anything about Israel or Palestine for...
| idk. Weeks, months at a time. I'll maybe see one thing on
| Palestine being oppressed, usually about West Bank
| settlements, from the one or two people who happen to be
| Palestinian. Now I literally cannot avoid it whenever I
| open either app.
|
| I really struggle to believe anyone beyond a small minority
| even thought about Palestine or Israel before Oct 7.
| michaelsbradley wrote:
| > I really struggle to believe anyone beyond a small
| minority even thought about Palestine or Israel before
| Oct 7.
|
| I grew up in the 1980s and recall intense flareups on
| this subject matter for as long as I can remember. The
| arrival of the Web and social media simply amplified
| them.
| toyg wrote:
| This is the correct view. The Palestinian issue is a
| deeply-felt issue for a quarter of the world's
| population, give or take.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Are those population's countries accepting Palestinian
| refugees?
| toyg wrote:
| The palestinian diaspora at this point is basically
| worldwide, which is somewhat ironic considering who
| caused it.
|
| This has little to do with the actual point, though.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| My point is it is deeply felt up to the point of actual
| sacrifice, either in the form of lives waging a war on
| behalf of Palestinians, or in the form of money re-homing
| them.
| toyg wrote:
| _> My point is it is deeply felt up to the point of
| actual sacrifice_
|
| Because otherwise it invalidates their opinion? So, are
| you ready to sacrifice yourself in the streets for Mr.
| Biden / Mr. Trump / Mr. Macron / Ms. LePen / etc etc, or
| to rehome the "victims" of their policies?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| >Because otherwise it invalidates their opinion?
|
| It provides some signal as to how "deeply" one (or a
| group) feels.
|
| >So, are you ready to sacrifice yourself in the streets
| for Mr. Biden / Mr. Trump / Mr. Macron / Ms. LePen / etc
| etc, or to rehome the "victims" of their policies?
|
| No, I do not deeply feel regarding this topic.
| toyg wrote:
| _> It provides some signal as to how "deeply" one (or a
| group) feels._
|
| Because refusing diplomatic and business relationships,
| repeatedly condemning Israeli actions in the largest
| international forums they have access to, demonstrating
| in the streets of their countries, jeopardizing
| relationships with the richest countries in the world
| because of this topic, etc etc, are not sufficient
| signals...?
|
| You can certainly criticize ambiguities in certain
| environments (e.g. Saudi rulers), but overall I don't
| think one can seriously challenge the depth of feeling on
| the matter when it's shared by literally billions of
| people. Maybe one doesn't get exposed to all that because
| most of these people are poor, living in poor countries
| that are largely ignored by the Western mainstream, but
| they are definitely there.
| hypeit wrote:
| A (further) removal of Palestinians from their land is
| the definition of ethnic cleansing, so no I would hope
| they wouldn't be supporting that.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| That is not how I would characterize giving a couple
| million Palestinians, who are apparently mostly kids, a
| better quality of life.
| hypeit wrote:
| Well, you would be wrong:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_cleansing
| zlg_codes wrote:
| Do you think China provides a better way of life to
| Uyghurs? Serious question.
|
| Given Israel's misleading and lying stances as other
| nations inspect the conditions of the conflict, and their
| regarding of Palestinians as less than human, I am not
| convinced they are interested or even _capable_ of
| providing other cultures a better quality of life.
| Apparently invading other lands and engaging in
| colonialism is cool in 2023.
| yyyk wrote:
| They do have the right to decide if they accept refugees,
| but the justification is inconsistent and odd. Do the
| countries accepting refugees from Ukraine support ethnic
| cleansing there? Or same for any other conflict?
|
| There also a similar weird gulf between the shouts about
| 'genocide' and the refusal to allow any to escape.
| Someone who truly believes that should always allow for
| refugees. I guess most people making these claims don't
| really believe them and except Israel to maintain
| reasonable-enough treatment.
| dragontamer wrote:
| Mmmm.
|
| It's not like the collective West (aside from USA)
| offered safe haven to Jews. We kinda just threw them into
| that corner of the world.
|
| The important issue here is the obviously shrinking
| pseudo-state of Palestine. The 1947 borders of Palestine
| have shifted dramatically in Israel's favor, but Israel
| continues to send settlers to the West Bank.
|
| ---------
|
| Hamas was wrong to attack Israel. But Israel is wrong to
| continue expanding its borders.
| abnry wrote:
| It is interesting to note there are about as many Jews in
| the US as there are in Israel. There are about 7.6
| million Jews in the United States [1]. There are about 8
| million Jews in Israel [2].
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Jews
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Israel
| joecool1029 wrote:
| Not sure why that's relevant, same could be said of the
| Irish in Ireland vs. United States. On the topic though,
| there's only a few hundred Jews left in the first Jewish
| jurisdiction:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Autonomous_Oblast
| fmajid wrote:
| Irish-Americans outnumber Irish-Irish nearly 10:1. For a
| very long time Jewish Americans outnumbered Israeli Jews,
| if not as lopsidedly.
|
| Around 1AD, the greatest concentration of Jewish people
| was Alexandria, Egypt, where they made up 1/3 the
| population, not Jerusalem. The actual history of the
| Middle East defies simplistic narratives.
| woodruffw wrote:
| The context for "safe haven" is the end of WW2. Most of
| America's Jews can date their arrival in the US before
| then; one of the most common windows is 1870 through
| 1920.
| bushbaba wrote:
| To say the west threw them in Israel, forgets to mention
| the mizrahi Jews who are 50% the Jewish-Israel population
| and were kicked out/ethnically cleansed from Arab
| countries.
| MSFT_Edging wrote:
| The US was extremely late to offering any kind of safe
| haven to Jews. Even when it did, it was a single town in
| upstate NY.
|
| Only about a thousand jewish refugees were let into the
| United States.
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/11/nyregion/oswego-
| jewish-re...
| TheOtherHobbes wrote:
| No one threw the Jews into Israel. The Balfour
| Declaration was the result of decades of Zionist
| lobbying.
|
| Zionism is a very complex topic, and some elements seem
| quite murky.
|
| But I certainly agree with your final point. Ignoring the
| religious angle, in terms of political dynamics this
| seems to be a fairly straightforward case of extremist
| nationalism.
| dragontamer wrote:
| > No one threw the Jews into Israel. The Balfour
| Declaration was the result of decades of Zionist
| lobbying.
|
| I mean, the explicit goal post WW1 was to cut up the
| Ottoman Empire (which inevitably would divide the Muslim
| world, as the Ottomans were the major Muslim empire). The
| Jewish/Zionist cause is a useful means to that end. No
| better way to cut-up that region by offering it to Israel
| / a different religious group who had publicly lobbied
| for a place there.
|
| I'd more rather blame 1917 / WW1 politics for this than
| the Jewish people per se. Cutting up and humiliating the
| Central Powers post-defeat was just one of the World War
| 1 issues.
|
| Its Britain who signed it after all, and we all know what
| Britain wanted post WW1.
|
| ----------
|
| I can imagine a parallel universe where Britain would cut
| up the Ottoman Empire differently without creating a
| Jewish land / start of Israel in years following WW1. But
| in most concievable alternative-histories I can think of,
| the four central powers / empires would be dissolved and
| otherwise cut up into tiny pieces and scattered into the
| winds in a humiliating defeat.
| underdeserver wrote:
| In 1947 there was a British rule. Before that the region
| was ruled by the Ottomans for some 400 years.
| Palestinians weren't self-governing at any point before
| the Oslo accords in the early 90s.
| underdeserver wrote:
| Israel hasn't expanded its border by an inch since 1967.
|
| It also left Gaza in 2005, forcibly extracting settlers,
| and left no military presence. In Gaza, in every real
| sense, Israel _contracted_ its borders.
| nielsbot wrote:
| Why should they? Why can't the Palestinians stay where
| they are? Or even better, return to their lands from
| which they were dispossessed? That would be the real way
| to support them.
| instaeloq wrote:
| Actually yes. Several of the neighbouring countries have
| taken in large numbers of Palestinian refugees over the
| years.
|
| Regardless of that point, it's not their responsibility
| to facilitate Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
| lancesells wrote:
| The sentiment of a portion of a country doesn't mean the
| governing body agrees. Even a majority portion doesn't
| always mean that their government is pro or anti
| refugees.
| sjfjsjdjwvwvc wrote:
| This conflict has been a huge thing since the 90s. I
| would argue the vast majority of people in the west had
| an opinion on that conflict.
| smitty1e wrote:
| Since 1948, when modern Israel was founded.
| sabarn01 wrote:
| since the 1880's at least. The status of palistance was
| the cause for the crusades so I think we need to
| understand there is no resolution possible.
| __loam wrote:
| I don't think the crusades are especially relevant to the
| current issues, other than they happened to happen in the
| same place. WWI and the defeat of the Ottomans is
| basically where the current situation arose from.
| busterarm wrote:
| The specific place is important for historical reasons
| and there have been migrations of Jews back to the area
| (after being expelled from Spain/Portugal, etc) since the
| 1490s.
|
| The population was small, up to about 5% of the region
| during the Ottomans (after heavy losses due to multiple
| Black Plague outbreaks), but the reason that specific
| area was chosen (as opposed to alternatives) was because
| there was already a community of Jews there.
|
| Keep in mind that the vast majority of the area was
| uninhabited swamps until the 1940s and huge numbers of
| people died from malaria every year before resettling
| Jews completely changed the local terrain.
|
| Look up details about the the late 1880s and the
| distinctions marking the difference between the Old
| Yishuv and New Yishuv.
|
| Political aspirations of the Old Yishuv were pretty low
| due to the fact that they were broke as shit and depended
| on handouts from abroad, whereas New Yishuv resettlers
| came with money and dreams.
| sabarn01 wrote:
| Jews were a majority of Jerusalem even in 1850. Some
| communities have existed since roman times. Its a
| complicated story that doesn't start within anyone's
| living memory.
| busterarm wrote:
| I largely agree but the community was pretty persecuted
| and dispersed from the early 5th century through
| basically the 1200s.
|
| The biggest problem I find with the collective
| understanding people have of the conflict is that people
| largely think nothing of note happened before 1900 but
| the prior history determines a ton of why later decisions
| were made that people attribute to the start of conflict.
| js2 wrote:
| Just look at the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Jerusalem-2013(2)-Aeri
| al-...
|
| One of the holiest sites to Muslims sits literally atop
| one of the holiest sites to Jews, both millennia old, and
| still having bearing on the conflict today.
|
| But this conflict will never be resolved by litigating
| history. At the end of the day, Jews and Palestinians
| have to want peace more than they want war, and each has
| to accept the other's existence and right to self-
| determination. As a Jew, I have some strong and I believe
| well-informed opinions at why the peace process keeps
| failing, but I don't think the Internet is the place to
| have that discussion. I'm also not sure this is at all
| relevant to the submitted link.
| pasabagi wrote:
| I kind of take the opposite position. History is
| complicated, always. However, the basic problem of Israel
| and Palestine is that Palestinians either live under
| military law (the West Bank) or in a big prison (Gaza).
| That's obviously not a democratic, dignified, or
| otherwise morally defensible situation.
|
| Ultimately, the security needs of Israel need to be
| balanced against the rights of the Palestinians, and as
| it stands, the Palestinians have no negotiating power, so
| they get nothing. If politicians around the world made it
| clear you cannot be 'the only democracy in the middle
| east' while having millions of people subject to military
| law, I expect the Palestinians would have enough
| negotiating room to force some kind of reasonable
| settlement.
| hax0ron3 wrote:
| >Keep in mind that the vast majority of the area was
| uninhabited swamps until the 1940s
|
| Not saying you're necessarily wrong, but I find this hard
| to believe because the majority of the area was not
| uninhabited swamps back during the time of the Roman
| Empire, so why would it have become uninhabited swamps at
| some point between then and the 1940s? Of course terrain
| does change over time, but I've never heard of the Levant
| turning into swamps in post-Roman times.
| simonh wrote:
| As OP pointed out, a billion Muslims is a lot of people.
| They may not have the palestinians at top of mind all the
| time, but a lot of them do at the moment.
| hackyhacky wrote:
| There are a billion Muslims, and literally none of them
| are taking Palestinian refugees. That's how much they
| care about Palestinians.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| > none of them are taking Palestinian refugees
|
| They believe that Israel would like to drive out the
| refugees and seize their land, essentially putting an end
| to Palestinians in Israel. They believe that's what
| happened when Israel was founded and subsequently - there
| are still refugee camps, and a priority of Palestinians
| is the 'right of return' to their former lands - and with
| recent Jewish settlements in the West Bank, and
| specifically with Israeli actions in the West Bank since
| Oct 7.
|
| Essentially, they think refugees will never be allowed
| back.
|
| That doesn't mean they care, but without that issue
| resolved, they won't accept refugees. Also, probably they
| don't want to take on care and feeding of millions, and
| to simultaneously relieve Israel, their enemy, of that
| burden.
| matkoniecz wrote:
| > I really struggle to believe anyone beyond a small
| minority even thought about Palestine or Israel before
| Oct 7.
|
| This appeared repeatedly as important news, sadly mostly
| due to wars and terrorism.
|
| Jerusalem relevance alone for multiple religions with its
| holy sites made it important topic for many.
| TheOtherHobbes wrote:
| People being aware of the issue isn't the same as the
| issue being their primary interest. Or even being in
| their top ten interests.
| mastazi wrote:
| I think you are underestimating the diversity of these
| global platforms.
|
| As an example, Turkey and Saudi Arabia are among the top
| 10 countries in terms of Twitter users.
|
| https://www.statista.com/statistics/242606/number-of-
| active-...
| catlover76 wrote:
| I think it's pretty unfair this person is being down
| voted.
|
| Yes, most Americans knew the conflict existed previous to
| this past October, but few who weren't Jewish or Muslim
| and/or Arab (I think most Arab Christians are
| generally/vaguely pro-Palestinian, but not sure) would
| have had strong opinions about it or been able to tell
| you much. I don't think the issue has ever featured this
| heavily in the US news cycle since oil embargoes in the
| 70s, and the issue is a lot more contentious now due to a
| few different factors.
|
| Right now, unless someone consumes zero news media and
| has very curated social media feeds, I don't see how they
| could avoid understanding this has all been a major
| geopolitical event that is continuing to unfold.
| michaelsbradley wrote:
| > few...would have had strong opinions about it or been
| able to tell you much
|
| That's simply incorrect. Extensive news coverage of the
| flareups I referred to led to the subject matter becoming
| a common topic of conversation and public interest. Heck,
| I remember there being conversations and debates about it
| among kids in my school's cafeteria, and that was in a
| part of the US where at the time way less than 1% of the
| population was Jewish or Muslim.
| Macha wrote:
| > I really struggle to believe anyone beyond a small
| minority even thought about Palestine or Israel before
| Oct 7.
|
| It has been a relatively prominent issue in Ireland, and
| especially Northern Ireland for some time. You can find
| plenty of images over the years of republican murals with
| Palestinian flags on them (e.g. 10 years ago: https://www
| .reddit.com/r/PropagandaPosters/comments/189yeg/o... ),
| or conversely unionist bonfires with palestinean flags on
| it: (e.g. last year https://nitter.dafriser.be/M_Anderson
| SF/status/1542523209311... )
| instaeloq wrote:
| I think your interpretation is wrong.
|
| OP stated: "If anything the skew within the platforms is to
| prioritize pro-palestinian views".
|
| They're explicitly stating that they believe pro-
| palestinian views are prioritized.
| mastazi wrote:
| I don't see how that quote from OP is incompatible with
| my point, please explain
|
| > They're explicitly stating that they believe pro-
| palestinian views are prioritized.
|
| I'm also saying that they are prioritised, here is a
| sentence from my previous comment:
|
| > As a result, certain views are prioritised
| Affric wrote:
| > "If anything"
|
| This is an important clause here. It means that they do
| not believe that pro-Israel views are prioritised but
| __if__ any it is the case that there are prioritised
| views are pro-Palestinian views.
|
| Now, you could argue that this is a bad faith rhetorical
| device but it is not "explicitly stating that they
| believe pro-Palestinian views are prioritised".
| xkekjrktllss wrote:
| However it is utter nonsense because they offer no
| support for either being prioritized.
|
| Of course pro-Israel views can be prioritized and still
| be in the minority.
|
| Politically, we know the bias of the Western ruling class
| is aggressively pro-Israel. This indisputable knowledge
| that means the most likely bias is pro-Israel.
| lossolo wrote:
| The majority of the world is against Israel's occupation of
| Palestine, a stance that is reflected in numerous UN
| General Assembly votes. Holding a pro-Israel position in
| this context represents a very US centric view, which is
| not similarly echoed in the rest of the world.
| xkekjrktllss wrote:
| > _The majority of the world is against Israel 's
| occupation of Palestine_
|
| The majority of the global ruling class is _for_ Israel
| 's occupation of Palestine.
|
| History is incomprehensible if we ignore class conflict.
| underdeserver wrote:
| No, the majority of the world is against Israel's
| occupation of the West Bank, and until 2005 when Israel
| left Gaza, its occupation of Gaza.
|
| The October 7th attack was carried out against civilians
| in their homes living on land that is internationally
| recognized as Israel by an overwhelming majority of
| countries.
| azinman2 wrote:
| And where do you think that comes from? Some coherent well
| researched culturally deep understanding of history and the
| current status of things by the entire population? Of course
| not, it's propaganda. There are ethnic conflicts worldwide
| that often have more bloodshed, many occurring simultaneously
| right now, but this gets all the rhetoric and attention.
| bluefishinit wrote:
| If you watch some of the content in question you'll see
| that it actually is often in-depth analysis of history done
| by younger people. I've seen many clips discussing Nakba
| and the right of return for instance.
| prox wrote:
| This explains my gripe with most of the messaging on
| socials (I came across at least) . You see accounts who
| never cared to post anything of this conflict suddenly
| being outraged and reposting stuff. It's not that they
| should not care, but it's a "outrage of the week" sort of
| thing, and as you say, often with nothing of the careful
| history and understanding.
|
| For sure it's a tragedy.
| lancesells wrote:
| The "outrage of the week" is attention going to a current
| event. Our attention and hours are limited so for the
| majority you choose what's top of mind. There are 1000s
| of things we should all be addressing collectively but
| the conflict du jour usually wins our attention.
|
| In my country (US) we've had ~200k deaths from opioid
| prescriptions. It gets attention but it's really not
| enough when the perpetrators should be in prison for
| life.
|
| None of this is a good thing but "outrage of the week" is
| simply attention and attention span. We're all limited.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| I think you're overlooking the fact that it's located in an
| area that has religious significance for Jews, Christians,
| and Muslims, which most other conflicts don't. Hundreds of
| millions of people believe in the idea of a supreme deity
| who takes a close personal interest in this specific part
| of the world.
| azinman2 wrote:
| China has allowed a huge amount of anti-semitism to surge
| on its social networks and media recently. They are not
| coming from an Abrahamic religion. It's more than that.
|
| Meanwhile the Islamic world has ok'd (in the UN and other
| forums) China to literally create concentration camps to
| sterilize and erase the Uygur culture and Islamic
| religion.
|
| Things are not so straightforward.
| cies wrote:
| I've long time stopped believing its about religion. Yes,
| religion is used as greese to get groups of people to
| "side". But the underlying reasons are --as always--
| material.
|
| You think the "red scare" was actually about the commies
| attacking? No, it was about limiting an alternative
| economic system == resource control.
| sertbdfgbnfgsd wrote:
| > There are ethnic conflicts worldwide that often have more
| bloodshed, many occurring simultaneously right now, but
| this gets all the rhetoric and attention.
|
| That's funny, because you sound like the kind of person who
| says the same about every conflict.
| Terr_ wrote:
| > An alternative explanation is that more people already have
| those views.
|
| Treading a fine line here between Bayesian priors and
| stereotypes, but the worldwide Muslim/Jewish population split
| is something like 112:1. Obviously that's not going to be the
| same proportion on a given media-service, but it should still
| inform our expectations of what is the "default" state before
| theorizing about platform algorithm-tweaking or propaganda-
| campaigns.
| ToucanLoucan wrote:
| This also presumes that any Muslim will be pro-Palestine
| and any Jewish person would be pro-Israel, a pretty strong
| statement given that entire communities _within Israel_ are
| staunchly opposed to their ongoing actions against Hamas,
| which increasingly seem to be actually against Palestinian
| people, whom themselves also have a wide and diverse set of
| opinions about Hamas.
|
| The war is shockingly unpopular on both sides of itself and
| seemingly the only people who are in favor of Israel's
| current plan of action is the Israeli government and the
| people who, for PR reasons, refuse to criticize Israel
| since Israel has done such an excellent job propagandizing
| people into thinking being anti-Israel in any way is
| synonymous with being anti-Semetic.
| zone411 wrote:
| > have a wide and diverse set of opinions about Hamas
|
| 75% of Palestinians "support the military operation
| carried out by the Palestinian resistance led by Hamas on
| October 7th." 76% have positive views of Hamas (other
| armed terrorist groups have even larger support).
|
| https://www.awrad.org/files/server/polls/polls2023/Public
| %20...
| bjourne wrote:
| I really wish people would stop citing pollsters with no
| pedigree. What is the Arab World for Research &
| Development? Who is funding them? Who is conducting their
| polls? Who staffs them? Are their results reliable?
| brailsafe wrote:
| The alternative explanation seems unlikely. I'd think that if
| it were true, there'd be even one single instance of that
| having come up in conversation prior to bad graffiti and
| printed propaganda showing up all over my neighborhood.
| Getting a glimpse of what people allow themselves to be
| subjected to on the various platforms seems to indicate it's
| younger, easily influenced, volatile reactionary people
| suddenly being inflamed by whatever hot conflict of the day
| it is; people I wouldn't normally talk to anyway and who
| wouldn't have any authentic connection with it. The only time
| it's come up in real life was when I bumped into some Israeli
| guests at a hostel, and they were talking about what their
| families were going through and whether they'd have to go
| back and serve.
|
| It doesn't come up on my Instagram presumably because I had
| previously unfollowed everyone who posted about whatever
| other injustice they'd been told to be pissed about, and
| shockingly I don't feel the need to go and vandalize property
| to spread the word.
| digging wrote:
| You've specifically isolated yourself from people who would
| talk about the issue, so you're not in a position to
| determine whether or not people have been talking about it.
| In my social circles, the conversation about injustice in
| Palestine is over a decade old.
| sertbdfgbnfgsd wrote:
| > In my social circles, the conversation about injustice
| in Palestine is over a decade old.
|
| Indeed, I would say that anyone older than 10 has
| participated in such conversations. The person you're
| responding to makes it sound like it's a new thing.
| sabarn01 wrote:
| There is an ocean of injustice in the world and this one
| issue causes more anger than many that are equally abhorrent.
| TillE wrote:
| It's one of very very few issues where America and most of
| the west have stood firmly in support of violence and
| oppression for decades, even on issues like settlements
| where the US formally acknowledges the illegality and takes
| no action.
|
| Of course people care primarily about the actions of their
| own democratically elected government, that's the whole
| point. There's no need to protest when people agree with
| their government.
| sabarn01 wrote:
| Settlements are of course wrong, but I don't really see
| any concrete action that Israel could take other than
| removing settlements. Even if they did that the
| fundamental facts on the ground wouldn't change. I don't
| see how they lift the blockade and any 2 state solution
| seems a nonstarter.
| thelock85 wrote:
| The Israeli govt can and should halt establishing new
| settlements or expanding existing settlements, especially
| when expansion is zero-sum with further displacement
| (e.g. Hebron). It can also enforce the criminality of
| extrajudicial settler violence.
|
| Agreed any real solutions are a nonstarter in current
| situation, but a lack of imagination or will about how to
| move forward just further normalizes the illegality of it
| all.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Settlements are of course wrong, but I don't really see
| any concrete action that Israel could take other than
| removing settlements.
|
| It could do a _lot_ in the West Bank (where the fully or
| partially PA administered territory is divided into 166
| non-contiguous regions), and anything there xould be done
| in a way that it looks like a win for the Fatah-led PA,
| weakening the perception that Hamas and its violence is
| the only entity capable of delivering for the Palestinian
| people, undermining Hamas politically.
|
| OTOH, the whole reason Israel fostered Hamas during the
| direct occupation of Gaza was to create an Islamist
| competitor for the more secular and sympathetic to non-
| Muslim states PLO, and the reason they've (and government
| ministers have said this explicitly) continued to support
| them in between periods of active conflict is to deflect
| pressure for peace and a two-state solution, so there's
| zero chance of the Netanyahu government doing this.
| sabarn01 wrote:
| I think I agree with that. Which is the PA should be
| boosted and rewarded with increased freedom and autonomy
| as a counter example to Gaza. As it stands right now
| Israel is almost rewarding being more intransigent.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| International "Support" should be clear that settlements
| in the West Bank are a deal breaker, and that a sovereign
| West Bank should be recognized internationally. I can
| only hope Israel ousts Bibi after this, as it's clear
| evidence that occasional violence in Gaza is NOT a
| workable system, and the settlements in the West Bank by
| groups of people that are largely considered extreme
| right and have not a lot of sympathy from most other
| Israel citizens aren't helping either.
| mandmandam wrote:
| Are there actually many equally abhorrent issues right now?
| I can think of like, 2, and they're both involving the
| exact same actors.
|
| Doctors were forced at gunpoint to leave premature babies
| to rot at Al Nasr hospital. And you're surprised that the
| world is horrified?!
|
| Journalists and healthcare staff and schools have been
| targeted at a shocking rate. Civil infrastructure and
| historic churches blown up without the thinnest veil of a
| reason. More UN staff killed than any 'conflict' in
| history. Human rights groups and genocide experts are
| calling this genocide, ethnic cleansing, and worse.
|
| And this wasn't done by some poor, decimated, tin pot
| dictatorship. This was done by a nuclear power, and it was
| supported by England and American politicians against the
| express wishes of a large majority of their populations.
|
| There's no gain; none. No conceivable good can come from
| this. Believing that such acts will end Hamas/terror is
| _profoundly_ delusional.
| sabarn01 wrote:
| South Sudan, Libya, Myanmar, North Korea, Syria,
| Venezuela, Ukraine/Russia
|
| There is no end to this confit regardless. It will go on
| as you have 2 groups with claims on the same land. Wars
| are won when the loser accepts defeat I don't see that
| ever happening. There have been multiple attempts at a
| negotiated solution like the Peel commision, the 1948 UN
| partition, or the oslo accords. All have been rejected.
| dralley wrote:
| This comes off as ignorant of events happening elsewhere.
|
| Approximately 600,000 people died in the Tigray conflict
| in Ethiopia in the two years from November 2020 to
| November 2022. 40% of the Ethiopian population is
| children.
|
| The Yemeni civil war (2016-present) had killed at least
| 377,000 people, as of two years ago. By now, many more
| than that.
|
| There are mass graves in Mali and Sudan where hundreds of
| bodies are just piled up on top of each other, visible
| from space, thanks to collaboration between Wagner Group
| and the local regime.
|
| Syria is bombing their own population once again at this
| very moment, in continuation of their 10 year civil war
| which has killed at least 300,000. Notably, many, many
| images from the Syrian civil war have been recycled as
| supposed footage from Gaza
| (https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2023/12/08/images-of-
| syrian-...) for propaganda purposes - not that there
| isn't plenty of legitimate horrible footage from Gaza
| too.
| jstarfish wrote:
| > Believing that such acts will end Hamas/terror is
| profoundly delusional.
|
| This is the apocryphal "pounding them into submission"
| (or, "display of overwhelming force"). The idea is to
| break them, and discourage them from thinking to ever try
| something like this again.
|
| Problem is, you need to make sure _they_ had anything to
| do with it in the first place. If someone launches a
| false flag op, you 're being trolled into committing
| genocide against civilians.
|
| I fear they're being played but they've become a
| schizophrenic dealing with their demons via Howitzer.
| Paranoia is easily exploited.
| DiogenesKynikos wrote:
| Right now, there is nowhere else in the world where so many
| civilians are being killed. Nothing else even comes close.
| 20k deaths in just two months is a massive death toll for
| such a short conflict. For comparison, it's more than the
| civilian death toll in the nearly 2-year-old war in
| Ukraine.
|
| The other thing is that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
| has been going on for decades, and many people have formed
| strong opinions on it. The United States is deeply involved
| in the conflict, as it is Israel's major international
| backer. There are both Palestinian and Jewish diasporas all
| around the world that care deeply about the issue. There
| are many reasons why this conflict captures so many
| people's attention.
| bushbaba wrote:
| 20k deaths includes Hamas militants. So far the militant
| to civilian casualty ratio is actually lower than most
| other modern urban conflicts. Some being as high as 10
| civilians for every 1 militant death.
| squidbeak wrote:
| Where does your militant data come from? And does it
| differentiate between fighters active before the invasion
| and those after?
|
| Because large numbers of formerly peaceful men will now
| be engaged in the fight, either from grief at losing
| their families, or the natural instinct to resist an
| invader.
| yyyk wrote:
| That's just untrue. Sudan, Yemen and (earlier) Ethiopia
| had much much more, without even going into Ukraine
| (nobody should accept the Russian figures) or Syria
| (death toll exceeding all Israeli-Arab wars combined).
| Doing a death toll per month analysis is misleading
| because high intensity can't last very long due to
| geography alone.
| bjourne wrote:
| No, it's true. Roughly 1% of Gaza's pre-war population
| has already been killed by Israel. 81% has been displaced
| and over 60% of all buildings have been damaged or
| destroyed. The amount of destruction Russia was brought
| upon Ukraine doesn't even come close.
| cies wrote:
| > equally abohorrent
|
| Comparing it to the Ukraine's invasion and we can see this
| is so much more "invasive". There's a literal wall around
| 2M ppl with little agency, while most of them are refugees
| from the other side of the wall.
|
| To methis is one of the most abohorrent conflicts in earth
| in this day and age. Given South Africa is no longer
| segregated, and Rwanda reconciled.
|
| I'd be interested to hear what's equally abhorrent in your
| view.
| dijit wrote:
| Gaza borders Egypt and the West Bank borders Jordan.
|
| If they are blockaded by the country that they cant get
| along with then it is at least partially on Egypt and
| Jordan that they are given no way out.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Israel has a secret* agreement with Egypt which it made
| Egypt sign as a condition for not occupying the border
| between Gaza and Egypt, which stipulates what Egypt can
| and can't let through the border.
|
| *The existence of the agreement is not secret, but the
| contents are.
| zlg_codes wrote:
| So Israel is exerting undue influence it hasn't earned...
| not surprised. I think we need to push pressure on these
| other countries. What can Israel do for them that the
| West can't?
| bushbaba wrote:
| The wall wasn't always there. Just like how the wall
| trump put between US and Mexico wasn't always there.
| Actions have consequences and the West Bank situation
| regressed from continued suicide bombing and terrorist
| attackers.
| the-dude wrote:
| Afaik there was already a wall pre-Trump
| sabarn01 wrote:
| Gaza has been pseudo self governed since 2005, and is
| ruled by an authoritarian theocratic regime. The
| situation was intolerable on 10/6 but understood. What
| exactly should israel do after the 10/7 attacks. To me
| attempting to degrade Hamas is what any other state would
| do. War in one of the most densely populated places on
| earth is going to kill a lot of people. The only other
| option it would seem to me would be to ignore the attacks
| which I'm sure wouldn't be acceptable to the citizens of
| Israel.
| bjourne wrote:
| During Second World War the Czech resistance assassinated
| Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich. To exact revenge the
| Nazis destroyed the village of Lidice and murdered 340
| villagers. If we had social media back then, people would
| have made the same argument you now do. That the Germans
| had no choice but to eradicate the village. Because, hey,
| the only other option would be to ignore the attacks
| which surely wouldn't have been acceptable to any German.
| makapuf wrote:
| I don't know if this is really the right word being non
| native but this seems like whataboutism. Sorry if it is a
| too loaded term, but it does seem to fit. The fact that
| there are many other injustice does not make it less of it.
| toss1 wrote:
| If you want to start counting drivers, there are at least
| three
|
| 1) The algorithms of the platforms
|
| 2) The disinformation / astroturfing / asymetric warfare,
| driven from Russia, Iran, CCP, and many other 'interested
| parties'
|
| 3) The actual organic opinions
|
| The drivers are in about that order of force. The point of #2
| is to make it _appear_ organic, so people can make the
| argument that 'it's just people's opinion', even when it is
| wrong.
| xkekjrktllss wrote:
| Correct. On any given topic, popular opposition to the
| Western ruling class is overwhelmingly false, fake,
| astroturfed etc. while support for the Western ruling class
| is plain and simple truth. Thank you for being brave and
| speaking up!
| toss1 wrote:
| This has zero to do with "western ruling class"
|
| This is about authoritarians starting and driving a
| global war on democracy. Russia => Iran => Qatar =>Hamas.
| Why do you think Hamas leaders and Iranian leaders met in
| Moscow in mid-October? Gaza is opening a 2nd front on the
| Ukranian war. Putin & Russian officials have repeatedly
| stated that they think it is their right to rule at least
| the entire Soviet and Iron Curtain territory. Russian
| media is openly cheering the Republicans for blocking
| Ukraine aid.
|
| But you can go right on believing the shrill propaganda,
| as if Hamas was some kind of organic protest movement
| (they are not, they are terrorist occupiers of
| Palestine). Just be sure you enjoy it when you no longer
| have a vote that counts after autocrats take over in your
| country, as they already have in Iran, Gaza, Hungary,
| etc.
| samatman wrote:
| A platform with a proprietary algorithm which ranks and
| boosts content does not get the benefit of doubt.
|
| They are _per se_ responsible for what people see. If pro-
| Palestinian views are on TikTok at 36:1, that 's what TikTok
| wants, they could easily promote content at a different
| ratio.
| dralley wrote:
| I'm not sure that fully explains it. There is incredible
| amounts of anti-Israel disinformation as well, that would be
| easily debunked with a reverse image search if anyone could
| be bothered.
|
| https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2023/10/11/hamas-attacks-
| isr...
|
| https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2023/12/08/images-of-
| syrian-...
| joekrill wrote:
| I'm skeptical that hashtags are really a good way to measure
| these things. They seem rather arbitrary in some cases
| (particularly that second link). It seems like it would be
| pretty easy to selectively choose specific hashtags to give any
| impression you want.
| gtroja wrote:
| >so if there's something going on online, it's not in favor of
| Israel
|
| What if that 1 (in 36 to 1, or 8 to 1) is specifically the pro
| Israel effort? (As in if there weren't, the pro Palestine would
| be consensus)
| jakelazaroff wrote:
| _> US views skew pro-israel, and GenZ is closer to 50 /50, so
| if there's something going on online, it's not in favor of
| Israel._
|
| That's one interpretation. Another is that the skew would be
| even _more_ pronounced if not for platforms prioritizing pro-
| Israel content.
| catlover76 wrote:
| Which would those be? Facebook and normal American media
| outlets?
| Leary wrote:
| >Pro-Palestinian views outrank Pro-Israeli online by around 36
| to 1 on TikTok
|
| That's because TikTok is a global platform where the voices of
| 1.9 billion Muslims outweigh those of the 19 million Jews.
| bluefishinit wrote:
| Cherry picking a few hashtags is not a credible analysis. That
| being said, it's well known that millennials and gen z support
| Palestine so it's not surprising a platform with those
| demographics would have more pro Palestine content.
| rcpt wrote:
| I am surprised that tiktok makes that data public
| slibhb wrote:
| There's all kinds of propaganda from both sides all over the
| internet. But the linked article is about organized pressure
| campaigns.
|
| It's been interesting to observe that various official Israeli
| accounts have taken to posting tik-tok-like videos that quickly
| show images, footage, text commentary, all with very little
| context.
|
| Of course pro-Palestinian people/groups are doing the same
| thing, but it feels odd to see a first-world government engaged
| so directly in pushing that sort of propaganda. I can't imagine
| the US army directly tweeting this kind of stuff. The US, I
| feel, would do it through proxy groups.
|
| I don't have much to add about any of this, only that you
| clearly cannot trust the sort of videos, images, and statements
| all over the internet. As they say, in war, truth is the first
| casualty.
| stavros wrote:
| If, generally, 99% of people are in favor of X, and 1% of
| people are in favor of Y, but on some platform 70% of posts are
| in favor of X, and 30% in favor of Y, which way does that
| platform skew?
| matteoraso wrote:
| >US views skew pro-israel, and GenZ is closer to 50/50, so if
| there's something going on online, it's not in favor of Israel.
|
| That could also mean that Israeli online propaganda is
| ineffective, not that it doesn't exist. Even if they haven't
| made ground online, pro-Israeli views are universal in the
| mainstream media, with pro-Palestine reporters being fired.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| What is your specific assertion here? Are you saying something
| about the article? Does it demonstrate that this group has not
| suppressed pro-Palestine speech in places in the US?
|
| > there are 1 billion Muslims to 16 million Jews
|
| The vasty majority of Muslims are not in the US, the area
| relevant to the article. Also, to complicate things, afaik most
| Jewish Americans oppose Israel's right wing, especially the
| current government, and are sympathetic to Palestinians. And
| afaik most Israeli support in the US is right-wing evangelical
| Christians (if I am defining the subgroup accurately), a much
| larger group than Jewish Americans.
| givemeethekeys wrote:
| Take a wild guess how support changes when confronted by a
| major attack.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| If you are saying that American Jewish people now support
| the Israeli government, that is not what I've seen. But I
| lack a poll or other evidence - do you have one?
| chirau wrote:
| There is also the likelihood that even those ratios are like
| that after the pro-Israeli factor.
|
| They could very well be more than that but you can't shut them
| all up. So that 36 to 1 might be after the fact.
|
| Just from the populations you mention, which is obviously a
| super rough calculation, if we assume all Muslims to be pro
| Palestine and all Jews to be pro Israel, we would be expecting
| something like 60 to 1 ratio.
|
| So the existence of that 36 to 1 might even be the result of
| the bias.
|
| I am not saying this is the case, I'm just saying don't dismiss
| the claim simply based on the ratio you see.
| underlipton wrote:
| Many black Americans hold pro-Palestinian views because of the
| perceived similarity to civil rights abuses in America and
| South Africa, as well as Palestinian support for Black Lives
| Matter. Brown Americans for similar reasons. American youth
| cohorts (under 40) are blacker and browner than its elderly,
| and the most likely to use the platforms in question. The
| oblique suggestion of shadowy puppeteers tricking minorities
| and youth and whipping them into a mob that's rallying against
| their own interests is an old racist and ageist canard, and
| disappointing, if unsurprising, to see conjured here.
|
| No one group has a monopoly on reason.
| MSFT_Edging wrote:
| Not to mention the policing styles of American cops and the
| IDF are very similar and literally share training and
| tactics.
|
| The actual treatment of Palestinians on the ground mirrors
| the experience black Americans and others literally deal with
| in the US.
| DiogenesKynikos wrote:
| My subjective experience is that since Elon Musk visited Israel
| and met with the government a week ago, Twitter has started
| heavily promoting pro-Israeli accounts.
|
| Of course, Elon Musk decided to visit Israel after he came
| under criticism for agreeing with a blatantly anti-Semitic
| Tweet,[0] so some may question how sincere Musk's sudden change
| of heart is.
|
| 0. https://edition.cnn.com/2023/11/27/tech/elon-musk-isaac-
| herz...
| __loam wrote:
| > so if there's something going on online, it's not in favor of
| Israel.
|
| More people live outside the United States and Israel than in
| them, and they use these platforms. Many of those people have
| been out are descendants of subjects of colonialism and
| Imperialism, whether at the hands of Europe or America. Many of
| those people view Israel as a colonial project.
|
| And yeah, as you mentioned, a large portion of the world is
| Muslim.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Pro-Palestinian views outrank Pro-Israeli online by around 36
| to 1 on TikTok
|
| Judging this by the method used (counts of uses of top 5
| hashtags associated with the conflict) is ludicrously bad as a
| methodology, because, aside from not looking at sentiment, its
| prone to being radically wrong if one side is more consistent
| in hashtag use than the other.
| paulddraper wrote:
| What's the more correct way?
| dragonwriter wrote:
| I'm not sure the design of these platforms exposes one to
| researchers, but the absense of a better method doesn't
| reinforce conclusions based on a defective method.
| fastasucan wrote:
| Not expecting tik tok to be a representation of the Gen Z
| population and to expect the normal should be a 50/50
| distribution in addition to think that the groups are
| mutual exclusive. i.e if you have posted content that
| "suppport" either side that means you do not support the
| opposite. Its perfectly fine to be horrified both of
| civilians killed in a terrorist attack and civilians being
| bombed.
| submeta wrote:
| Well, that's not a fair comparison. Palestinians may have a lot
| of muslims on their side, but the whole western world---or more
| precisely: their media and people in power---fully support
| anything Israel does. No consequences. Au contraire:
|
| Looking at Germany for instance, anyone remotely criticising
| Israel for even gross violations of international human rights
| or Geneva Conventions (for instance for withholding water,
| food, medicines, and electricity for 2.2mil civilians in Gaza)
| will be attacked, silenced, stigmatised, smeared by the
| majority of media, politician, police, attorneys, etc. Many
| artists, intellectuals, activists, thinkers, academics have
| been cancelled, smeared (for instance Greta Thunberg, Ai Wei
| Wei, Candice Brice, Ilan Pappe, and many many more). And even
| more people are afraid to speak about Israel critically,
| fearing to lose their job or called antisemite, when in fact
| Zionism is not Judaism and the state of Israel does not
| represent all jews around the world, and cannot be sacrosanct.
|
| In the US the support is even larger. Just today the US vetoed
| a Security Council decision for a ceasefire in Gaza. And this
| inspite of many people in the state department internally
| rebelling against this blind support for Israels retaliatory
| move in Gaza.
|
| Disclosure: I have family in Israel, some of them went to the
| streets in Tel Aviv every week for months to protest against
| the judicial overhaul. And who are in panic mode seeing the
| right wing coalition partners of Netanyahu getting stronger and
| stronger. And I have family members in the military who after
| 7/10 want to ,,kill arabs now". I just do not think flattening
| Gaza and/or dehumanising Palestinians will make Israel any
| safer.
| peter422 wrote:
| Many in the US government have been critical of Israel's
| strategy in the last week or so (Lloyd Austin, etc).
| Unfrozen0688 wrote:
| The slogan river to the sea is anti Israel.
| submeta wrote:
| ,, The phrase was also used by the Israeli ruling Likud
| party as part of their 1977 election manifesto which stated
| "Judea and Samaria will not be handed to any foreign
| administration; between the Sea and the Jordan there will
| only be Israeli sovereignty." This slogan was repeated by
| Menachem Begin."
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_the_river_to_the_sea
| Unfrozen0688 wrote:
| I hope my tax money serves you well.
|
| Very nice cherry pick, you are good. inshallah
| bjourne wrote:
| Clips of bodies being buried in mass graves, of corpses with
| maggot-infested wounds, of limbs scattered in shopping bags, of
| children screaming in terror as their city blocks gets bombed,
| or of soldiers stripping civilians naked are not "pro-
| Palestinian" per se. But they show the terrible brutality of
| this "war". That may cause people with some empathy and with
| hearts not cold as stone to demand an end to the terror. That
| is "pro-Human" not "pro-Palestinian".
| andrepd wrote:
| Pro-Ukraine viewd also outnumber pro-Russia views on twitter or
| facebook. Are the conclusions you draw from this fact the same?
| Why/why not?
| lossolo wrote:
| > It's probably relevant that there are 1 billion Muslims to 16
| million Jews,
|
| Anecdotally, all of my friends here in the EU are pro-
| Palestinian, and none of us is Muslim. It's also relevant to
| consider the context of Israel's occupation of Palestine and
| illegal settlements in light of the UN General Assembly's pro-
| Palestinian votes.
|
| One of the examples from before current conflict[1]: Approve
| 128 nations. Against 9 nations: Guatemala, Honduras, Israel,
| Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Togo and United
| States.
|
| 1.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_General_Assembl...
|
| Today, there was another vote in the UN Security Council
| regarding a ceasefire. Thirteen nations voted in favor of it,
| the UK abstained, and the US vetoed.
| A1kmm wrote:
| I think the fundamental assumption of the analysis that there
| are two mutually exclusive groups, 'pro-Israel' and 'pro-
| Palestine' is flawed. It is possible to simultaneously support
| the interests of Palestinian and Israeli civilians (and support
| a peaceful Israel within the 1967 boundaries), while condemning
| the massacre of civilians under the orders of Likud (and other
| far right parties) and Hamas.
|
| I think it is currently about an order of magnitude more
| civilians deaths have resulted from the actions of Likud
| (Netanyahu etc..., who control the government and hence the
| IDF) than from the actions of Hamas. IDF is apparently
| disrupting civilian aid, destroying infrastructure including
| hospitals, and causing mass population movements into areas
| that cannot support them, so the risk of death from starvation
| and infectious disease at a massive scale as an indirect result
| is high. The Likud-controlled IDF are also apparently enforcing
| a 'lock down' of Palestinian civilians in the West Bank while
| allowing Israeli citizens to seize land by force and further
| expand the occupied territories.
|
| So the scale of the atrocities seems to be much higher on the
| Likud side than the Hamas side, covers both the West Bank and
| Gaza, and it makes sense that the Palestinian victims of those
| atrocities would receive more support. That doesn't mean that
| all the people who care about the plight of the Palestinian
| population are anti-Israel (they are just not posting about it
| because they are likely prioritising issues).
| 1970-01-01 wrote:
| Paul G. is a critical founder for many companies. Knowing that
| someone is actively trashing his rep is very important to many
| others here.
| everybodyknows wrote:
| What did he say? Nothing new on his home page.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38572076
| pazimzadeh wrote:
| he tweeted a while back the number of palestinian vs israeli
| children who have died since october 7
|
| there were way more palestinian children who had died, and
| some didn't like that being broadcast
| flyinglizard wrote:
| Is this the metric for who's right? Should both sides
| equalize in the name of some obscure justice?
| NotYourLawyer wrote:
| ... based on unverified claims by Hamas.
| Unfrozen0688 wrote:
| Okay, and? This shows nothing.
|
| More nazis died than english. Does that mean the nazis
| where better?
| pazimzadeh wrote:
| this would work both ways. more israelis died on october
| 7th than any time since the holocaust. does this mean
| hamas is getting better?
| izacus wrote:
| Hey... talking about children here. The heck are you
| doing?
| sebzim4500 wrote:
| Ok. More German children died in WWII than US children.
| Are the Nazis the good guys now?
| Unfrozen0688 wrote:
| It is still not some metric of who is right? The media
| here wants to make it sound like Israel is just
| intentionally murdering civilians, that's just not true.
| Everything targeted has had Hamas targets in it.
| SalmoShalazar wrote:
| Conflating nazis and children does not seem to be the
| logical masterstroke you think it is.
| Unfrozen0688 wrote:
| Only children dies in Gaza and only adult civilians got
| bombed in Nazi germany by the allies?
| ristlane wrote:
| Nobody wins in a conflict like this. If Hamas is defeated,
| and their successors don't launch missiles at Israel, then
| there will be peace. Judging by past examples, those who
| strive peacefully for social justice have been the most
| successful in attaining it.
| sinistersnare wrote:
| MLK Jr. has a lot to say to disagree with you.
|
| https://letterfromjail.com/
|
| > over the past few years I have been gravely
| disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost
| reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great
| stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the
| White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the
| white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to
| justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the
| absence of tension to a positive peace which is the
| presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with
| you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your
| methods of direct action";
|
| just because missiles do not fly, does not mean there is
| a positive peace.
| ristlane wrote:
| I don't think you're claiming that when MLK said "direct
| action", he meant things like launching missiles, killing
| & raping, etc. I don't think you believe that.
| fxd123 wrote:
| It's almost as if Israel has defensive technology (Iron
| Dome) to protect their citizens from Palestine's rocket
| attacks that target civilian areas (which is a war crime)
| smoldesu wrote:
| People aren't asking for a reciprocal death count from
| Israel, they want them to resist escalation.
| fxd123 wrote:
| > People don't want a reciprocal death count from Israel
|
| Unfortunately, many people in this thread do want that
|
| > they want them to resist escalation
|
| I want Hamas to resist escalation too. Why has Hamas
| broken every ceasefire in history? Why does Hamas
| continue to fire rockets at civilian areas?
| smoldesu wrote:
| Hamas is one of hundreds of organized anti-Israel groups
| that exist in the Middle East. If we use every one of
| those as an excuse to treat civilians as collateral, then
| the murder of innocents never ends. Israel is the only
| country _capable_ of standing down in this situation.
| fxd123 wrote:
| "Standing down" means Israel will cease to exist.
|
| > If we use every one of those as an excuse to treat
| civilians as collateral
|
| These terrorist groups are using civilians as collateral.
| That's not Israel's fault
| kar1181 wrote:
| One of things I struggle with is on certain issues like Ukraine
| and Israel libertarian folks I normally (largely) agree with
| seem to hold inexplicable views which seem to border on
| religious rather than practical. It makes me then wonder about
| everything else how can the two topics seemingly have different
| grades of reason versus so much of everything else.
| dang wrote:
| All: if you're going to comment, please take a moment to be sure
| that you're up on the site guidelines
| (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html) _and_ that the
| comment you 're about to post will be strictly within them. Note,
| for example:
|
| " _Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less,
| as a topic gets more divisive._ "
|
| As this is probably the most divisive topic that exists right
| now, the comments should be as thoughtful and substantive as
| commenters can make them. At a minimum, that means no flamebait,
| no name-calling, and no snark. Thank you.
| seydor wrote:
| I think the behavior of the EU is more problematic TBH. Ursula
| VdL went heavily pro-israel the first day kind of giving carte
| blanche to israel for the following days
|
| This situation is not a good look for western response in
| general. The world is watching. Reminder that Srebrenica was 8000
| deaths, but 17100 palestinians are justified losses.
| Dalewyn wrote:
| I'm siding with Israel on this conflict, because Hamas has gone
| out of their way to deny any sympathies:
|
| * Hamas initiated military hostilities (acts of war) without
| any formal declaration. This is inexcusable in a civilized
| world.
|
| * Hamas took civilians hostage. This is inexcusable in a
| civilized world, in fact it's a war crime.
|
| * Hamas have military installations interspersed with civilian
| facilities and spaces. This is inexcusable. There is a reason
| we strictly separate military and civilian in a civilized
| world, and that reason is because we want to minimize civilian
| casualties in an armed conflict.
|
| * Hamas are targeting Israeli civilians in their missile
| strikes. This is inexcusable and is worse than Israeli strikes
| inevitably catching Palestinian civilians. The results of
| Hamas's actions are deliberate, while the results of Israel's
| actions are in very large part inevitable due to the
| interspersing of Hamas combatants and facilities with
| Palestinian civilians.
|
| The Palestinian civilian casualties in Gaza are undeniably
| tragic, but I have no sympathies for Hamas nor, and I admit I
| am brutal in saying this, the Palestinians who invited Hamas so
| deeply into their everyday lives.
| seydor wrote:
| good for you, but this is not about how we feel, but about
| making peace. The palestine issue won't be solved this time
| like it was not solved in decades of war. you will just have
| thousands more new terrorists now, who watched family members
| die while trying to follow orders that israel had given them
| to protect them. This is a complex issue and not one for
| taking sides.
| ristlane wrote:
| If Hamas wanted peace, they could have it. They don't. They
| want to kill the Jews.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Why is Israel settling the West Bank and refusing to make
| peace with Fatah and the PA? There's no Hamas in power
| there but Israel has refused to stop violently removing
| people from their land on the basis of their ethnicity.
| KittenInABox wrote:
| I want to believe that Hamas is hiding among civilians, but
| there has already been reported major violations where there
| cannot be any military benefit for Israel about this. A
| hospital with a children's ward was labeled to be a command
| center for Hamas, but when the BBC came to examine the
| command center, they not only found nothing to indicate a
| major military use but also had video evidence (from previous
| video taken earlier in the day by Israeli military) that what
| was there was actively staged for them. And then we find out
| that the children's ward had babies in incubators-- and the
| Israeli military did nothing to save those babies despite
| taking control of the hospital. Like, when Palestinians were
| able to get back to the hospital they found the babies as
| corpses rotting in the incubators. This was confirmed by
| neutral third party reporters. WTF?
|
| How much grace can someone reasonably hold for a military
| force that repeatedly lies and then allows babies in
| incubators to die in the hospital they took over? At what
| point should we hold a much more well funded, a much more
| democratic, and a much more supposedly civilized civilization
| to higher standards than the terrorists they're fighting?
| jenadine wrote:
| Are you talking about the hospital that was actually
| destroyed accidentally by the Hamas and the Hamas blamed it
| on Israel?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-
| Ahli_Arab_Hospital_explosio...
| fny wrote:
| No he's talking about Shifa hospital where the IDF later
| showed an underground bunker:
| https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israeli-army-
| displ...
| m_a_g wrote:
| I think it's tragic that you have no sympathy for children
| and innocent civilians dying. No matter the side.
| sonotathrowaway wrote:
| These types of responses always skip over the most crucial
| parts of history:
|
| The IDF originally funneled money to the founder of Hamas in
| order to weaken popular support for Fatah, and Netanyahu
| facilitated Qatari payments to Hamas when it seemed that
| support for the Palestinian Authority was rising. His far
| right defense minister publicly resigned, saying that
| Netanyahu was financing terrorism against Israel.
|
| Including in these facts into the argument makes it seem less
| like Israel is fighting a terrorist group, and more like
| Israel tolerates a terrorist organization as their best
| alternative to a two state solution.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| It also skipped most of a century of historical context,
| pretending the conflict started two months ago out of
| nowhere. The specific origins of hamas are certainly
| relevant but so is the nakba, the 2018 border protests, the
| apartheid structure of israeli governance of palestine.
| etc.
| Terr_ wrote:
| Yeah, IMO a key idea--which I wish was more popular in the
| zeitgeist--is this:
|
| The vast majority of Palestinians and Israelis are _both_
| being abused by their respective leaderships, which--for
| many years now--have _desired and actively promoted_ some
| degree of violent-threat and indefinite strife, because it
| 's how they maintain power and crush political rivals.
|
| _____________
|
| _P.S.:_ For fellow Americans thinking "that can't happen
| here", there's good evidence that Richard Nixon tried to
| sabotage--or at least delay--US/Vietnam peace talks in
| order to get himself elected President. [0] In either case,
| the war continued for another five years.
|
| [0] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/notes-
| indicate-nix...
| xav0989 wrote:
| I don't think that most (nearly all?) pro Palestine critics
| are saying that Hamas is in the right. All of the wording
| I've seen was focused on Israel's and the IDFs response and
| actions. As you've mentioned, killing civilians is a war
| crime.
|
| Many civilized nations have military installations, such as
| headquarters and office facilities, co-located and intermixed
| with civilian facilities. They also have military bases and
| complexes, but the intermixing is not unique to Hamas.
|
| When the Palestinians in Gaza have been denied elections in
| nearly 2 decades and have expressed discontent with Hamas as
| well, it sounds disingenuous to characterize it as "invited
| [...] so deeply into their everyday lives."
| mrtksn wrote:
| She probably destroyed her career with this, since acted way
| beyond her limits. I still wonder, was she overcompensating due
| to her being German?
|
| It's very normal for EU to be pro-Israel, that's EU's official
| position and IMHO it's the correct one but EU's position is
| also pro-Two states solution and EU has significant
| humanitarian missions and political support for many of the
| Palestinian demands. Some EU countries are also very
| sympathetic towards the Palestinian cause and some countries
| which have huge importance for EU, like Turkey, the issue is
| very emotional.
|
| Very wrong of Vdl to act as if EU is all-in for the Zionist
| aspirations. As EU Commission president, should have strongly
| condemned the terrorist attack that Israel suffered and offer
| any help possible and at the same time she should have pushed
| for a solution of the root cause(Israeli occupation and
| extremist antisemitic politics seeking the demise of the Israel
| - both unacceptable).
|
| Maybe the bigger lesson here is that you should never go all-in
| on one side of a very complex issue. A kind of an issue where
| the rights and wrongs are quite evenly distributed and there's
| no way you end up on the correct side of it. Whoever-pro you
| are, you lose and she lost.
| toyg wrote:
| VdL has 'destroyed her career' many times over, during her
| stint. She repeatedly tried to look decisive rather than
| wise; sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.
|
| The truth is that the Commission President continues to be a
| job in search of political weight and legitimacy, but you
| can't get that after you are nominated to the post by
| scheming national rulers - it has to come from the ballot
| box. She tries hard to compensate for what is a structural
| weakness that was supposed to be fixed by the
| _spitzenkandidaten_ process... a process that she blew up
| herself.
| oezi wrote:
| > the Zionist aspirations
|
| What has the current conflict to do with Zionist aspirations?
| mrtksn wrote:
| Sorry, I'm not going to bite that. Too complex of an issue
| to go over what happens why.
| Pxtl wrote:
| Imho, being heavily pro-Israel on the first day was perfectly
| appropriate. They'd just seen a crapload of innocent civilians
| butchered, and a bunch of them taken hostage.
|
| Obviously you can still think that Palestinians have legit
| grievances without supporting massacre, and likewise you can
| support the Israeli right to defend itself. But at some point
| the actions of the Israeli military looks less like an effort
| to root out Hamas and more like ethnic cleansing.
| qaq wrote:
| Information warfare has being part of war for a long time. It is
| happening from both sides of this war with multiple players
| taking part. Israel obviously has a large amount of resources
| dedicated to it, but Arab states and Russia a chipping in heavily
| too on the other side.
| imp0cat wrote:
| This. Take everything you read with a grain of salt.
| sampa wrote:
| oh that evil omnipresent Russia!
| Boogie_Man wrote:
| This article, more than making me feel one way or another about
| the particular issue at hand (Isreal Hamas) makes me speculate
| what other unknown, better coordinated, better funded, interest
| groups might be doing this sort of thing on a massive scale.
|
| I'm reminded of the "Come out - we have you surrounded" meme
| where the mentally insane man is hiding behind a desk with a
| shotgun screaming "Get out of my head" or "I hate the
| Antichrist", because that's how thinking about these groups make
| me feel
| ristlane wrote:
| Anyone can coordinate. When the Jews coordinate, it strikes a
| particular nerve for a lot of people.
| hypeit wrote:
| No, when capital coordinates people get worried and
| rightfully so. There are _a lot_ of non Jewish Zionists, just
| as there are a lot of Jewish non-Zionists. In our industry,
| the VCs are overwhelmingly Zionist while the rest of the
| industry is non-Zionist and it 's the Zionists that are
| getting people fired and blacklisted.
| quonn wrote:
| This sounds like a bad cliche. If true, please provide
| evidence.
| mandmandam wrote:
| https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1733146138226614465
|
| Plenty of examples wrapped up in a short well sourced
| tweet. Enjoy.
| shihab wrote:
| This article is not about Jews co-ordinating, it's about
| foreign govt agents in _military uniforms_ coordinating with
| powerful sillicon valley leaders to punish, among other
| things, American citizens for holding wrong-think.
| Boogie_Man wrote:
| I legitimately don't understand what you're trying to imply.
| As far as I can tell it's a very indirect attempt to imply
| that people "having a nerve struck" over "Jews coordinating",
| are bad in a nonspecific way. Can you state more clearly what
| you mean so I can consider it?
| ajb wrote:
| Not the op, but "Jews secretly controlling xxx" where xxx
| is finance, the news, etc is a common, and very
| antisemitic, meme.
|
| I think the article is probably just pro Palestinian, but
| the fact that it's examining only propaganda on one side
| and not the other, even though there will be the same kind
| of operation on both sides _because there always is_ , make
| s me also a bit suspicious of it.
| Boogie_Man wrote:
| I hear what you're saying, thank you for clarifying for
| op. I think there is a logical jump from coordinating to
| controlling in this instance. The article doesn't say
| "The Jews control the media", but rather "Here are
| documented instances of pro-Israeli people in positions
| of power coordinating to do X Y or Z".
|
| I can understand that it might seem like an attack on
| Israel itself, and that an attack on Israel might
| actually be the intended purpose of the reporting, but
| it's hard for me to prioritize that over the importance
| of honest reporting of this sort. It's journalism that is
| informative and relevant, and that seems to be angering
| powerful people. I would like a companion peace on the
| propaganda war from "the other side", but this is the
| only one available to me at the moment. Fostering an
| environment in which this sort of journalism can safely
| be done is critical.
| mmcwilliams wrote:
| It's very unfair to say that the reaction to this is because
| of "the Jews" and not because a close US ally who has much of
| the support of its military and intelligence apparatus at its
| disposal is doing this.
| neom wrote:
| It's very interesting to me that a large new org (say BBC, DW,
| CBC whatever) will publish some YouTube video report about some
| political subject (Canada and India, Ukraine and Russia, Taiwan
| and China), and within 15 minutes the video has a comments
| section containing 200+ posts in a very obvious direction. Are
| 100s of Canadians really awake at 5am posting on a BBC video
| about Canadian support for Ukraine 15 minutes after it was
| posted? Are 100s of Taiwanese people really awake at 3am
| commenting on a DW video about China-Taiwan relations? 15
| minutes after it was posted? I can't tell if I've become
| paranoid over the last 4/5 years or if it's real, but it seems
| so stark to me how intense manipulation on platforms is, be it
| YouTube, TikTok, or Instagram.
| Boogie_Man wrote:
| I shift from making myself not think about it to becoming a
| complete paranoid nut to telling myself it probably isn't so
| bad and doesn't matter a few times a year. There are levels
| to this sort of thinking, and it exists on a spectrum. I
| think everyone can agree on a conceptual level that
| manipulation occurs. A basic, mostly harmless example would
| be a music star "organically going viral" and "being
| discovered as a result" not being quite as organic as it
| seems. Where it changes from healthy skepticism to paranoia
| is a line I struggle to draw personally.
| pphysch wrote:
| I don't think there is a more potent example right now than the
| Israel Lobby.
|
| The Holocaust and Hitler basically define modern Western
| morality, and Zionism's claims to legitimacy are closely
| related to those concepts. Associating someone with "Hitler" or
| "antisemitic" is worse than calling them "bin Laden" or
| "slavemaster".
|
| Other popular foreign lobbies in Washington, from Ukrainian,
| Taiwanese, Kurds, Uyghurs, don't have nearly the same
| influence.
| mk89 wrote:
| Saying this as a person that typically doesn't care at all
| about these things: you can't possibly compare Hitler to Bin
| Laden. The first is _definitely_ worse - and I am sorry for
| people who lost family or friends in 9 /11. But he was way
| worse. The guy started a world war, he literally killed
| dozens of millions of civilians and made life shi*ier for
| everyone on this planet. What he and his crew did to people,
| to society, and everything else - books have been written so
| that we hopefully, as humanity, won't repeat again.
| john-radio wrote:
| > what other unknown, better coordinated, better funded,
| interest groups might be doing this sort of thing on a massive
| scale.
|
| There is no better-coordinated or -funded lobbying group than
| the military-industrial complex, which is, of course, all in on
| Israel.
| Animats wrote:
| _" That's where the efforts of J-Ventures' hasbara WhatsApp group
| come in. The group, which also includes attorneys and individuals
| affiliated with the influential American Israel Public Affairs
| Committee (AIPAC), has tirelessly worked to fire employees and
| punish activists for expressing pro-Palestinian views."_
|
| Is that even legal under US law? Apparently it is in some states.
| Federal law does not, apparently, prohibit political
| discrimination. But some states do - California, New York, DC,
| Colorado, and North Dakota.[1]
|
| This should be reported to the FBI's Foreign Influence Task
| Force.[2] Anyone involved in such suppression activities may be
| considered an "unregistered foreign agent".[3] Anyone or any
| organization attempting to influence US policy on behalf of a
| foreign government is supposed to register. Here's the
| database.[4]
|
| [1] https://www.legalmatch.com/law-library/article/political-
| aff...
|
| [2]
| https://www.fbi.gov/investigate/counterintelligence/foreign-...
|
| [3]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Agents_Registration_Ac...
|
| [4] https://search.justice.gov/search?affiliate=justice_fara
| rcpt wrote:
| There have been many arguments that AIPAC should register under
| the Foreign Agents Registration Act but my understanding is
| that in it's current form AIPAC doesn't qualify.
|
| I see this as a reason to strengthen the Foreign Agents
| Registration Act.
| Animats wrote:
| That issue came up regarding China's Confucius Institutes.[1]
| There's been something of a crackdown on those.
|
| Politico has some coverage of the current Israel-related
| lobbying push.[2] There are a lot of players. "An
| unsanctioned coterie of pro-Israel quasi-lobbyists has
| descended on D.C." Some have formally registered as agents of
| Israel. Some haven't.
|
| The big issue here is when activities go beyond lobbying.
| Anyone can lobby Congress; that's a constitutional right in
| the US. Getting people fired on behalf of a foreign power,
| though, is a legally questionable activity.
|
| [1] https://thediplomat.com/2023/11/the-rise-and-fall-of-
| confuci...
|
| [2] https://www.politico.com/news/2023/10/22/pro-israel-
| lobbying...
| DevX101 wrote:
| AIPAC itself is a result of the President Eisenhower and later
| Robert F Kennedy (DOJ) demanding the American Zionist Council
| (AZC) register as foreign agents. Because of this, the AZC
| rebranded to AIPAC with the same leadership and the issue
| seemed to have fell off the high priority political radar
| since.
|
| Incidentally, the founder of AIPAC, Isaiah Kenen registered
| twice with the U.S. Department of Justice under the Foreign
| Agent Registration Act (FARA) as an agent for Israel. Prior to
| leading AIPAC, he was the leader of the American Zionist
| Council. He was also chief information officer for the Israeli
| Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
|
| AIPAC's mission is pretty clear: to promote the interests of
| Israel. This is fine, and not unique, but that seems to me to
| be the textbook definition of a foreign agent, and it should be
| registered as such.
|
| AIPAC has a very large budget and will be spending over $100M
| in 2024 to defeat any candidate for US Congress that did not
| align with their pro-Israel goals.
| nielsbot wrote:
| It was also formed to influence public opinion in the wake of
| the Israeli massacre at Qibya, which looked pretty bad.
|
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/made-by-
| history/wp/2018/...
| lossolo wrote:
| You should watch this documentary:
|
| https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15721106
|
| The documentary "Boycott" explores the legislation passed in
| several U.S. states, including Arkansas, Arizona, and Texas,
| that requires individuals to pledge not to boycott Israel as a
| condition for receiving government funds. This legislation
| emerged in response to the Palestinian-led BDS (Boycott,
| Divestment, Sanctions) movement against Israel. The film
| follows individuals who challenged these laws, including a
| publisher in Arkansas, an attorney in Arizona, and a speech
| pathologist in Texas, highlighting their legal battles and the
| implications for free speech
| m_a_g wrote:
| Bit of a tangent, but I'm proud of the HN community. This post
| was flagged almost immediately, even though there were around 70
| upvotes. Then, the admins decided to give us a chance. And so
| far, the discussions have been civil and very interesting.
| nostromo wrote:
| Don't forget that you can "vouch" for an article or comment
| that you think was unfairly flagged. From the FAQ:
|
| > If you see a [dead] post that shouldn't be dead, you can
| vouch for it. Click on its timestamp to go to its page, then
| click 'vouch' at the top. When enough users do this, the post
| is restored. There's a small karma threshold before vouch links
| appear.
| m_a_g wrote:
| That's a great reminder, thank you!
|
| I should revisit the guidelines and the FAQ sometime.
|
| Also, here is a link that explains undocumented features and
| behaviors of HN for anyone interested:
|
| https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented
| Scubabear68 wrote:
| I have no skin in this game.
|
| What I have seen is a confusion (perhaps intentional) between
| anti-semitism, and protesting Israel's behavior since the Hamas
| attack in October.
|
| Criticizing Israel's response is not anti-Semitism- it is
| literally just criticizing the response.
| ristlane wrote:
| Holding Israel to a higher standard than all other nations is a
| sign of antisemitism.
| Scubabear68 wrote:
| I'm not holding them to a higher standard.
|
| Imagine if you will someone going to start large scale
| bombing NYC. Or London. Or Rome.
|
| The Hamas attack was unprecedented and horrific. I don't know
| that it justifies declaring all out war on and entire city.
|
| I can say that without being anti-Semitic.
| ristlane wrote:
| Hamas is hiding among civilians. I don't want innocent
| people to be hurt, but their use of human shields is simply
| the standard playbook in this type of warfare. Hamas
| rationally wants Gazan civilians to be nearby and
| indistinguishable from combatants.
| ajb wrote:
| This is true but not the whole story. If Hamas were dug
| in under an Israeli school or hospital, would it
| similarly by okay to treat civilian deaths as 'just Hamas
| fault'? Obviously not. The problem here has that the
| situation is between a war and a policing situation. Gaza
| is not a state, but it is not a suburb of Israel either.
| So who is responsible for the safety of Palestinian
| civilians?
| ristlane wrote:
| If Hamas were entrenched under an Israeli school or
| hospital, the civilians would vacate the area so the IDF
| could take care of it.
|
| In Gaza, Hamas may be preventing civilians from leaving
| (but I'm not there to verify). It would help to have
| civilian corridors into the south and into Egypt, but
| again that's not in the best interests of Hamas.
|
| I'd like the IDF to do their best. They are indeed
| responsible for trying not to kill civilians. There's
| only so much they can do, short of a so-called
| "ceasefire".
| edanm wrote:
| Hamas rules Gaza, Israel doesn't (or at least didn't)
| have a military presence inside of Gaza. Israel withdrew
| all Israelis and all military forces from Gaza, as was
| often demanded of it ("End the Occupation"). I'm not sure
| what makes the situation unclear (for the specific things
| you talked about).
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| Would Israel allow Gaza to have a conventional standing
| army? With barracks, heavy weapons and maybe airbases?
|
| Isn't it a bit silly to complain about their lack of
| adherence to conventional military practices?
| aprilthird2021 wrote:
| The IDF HQ is in a heavily populated part of Tel Aviv. If
| a country dropped an enormous bomb on it which flattened
| nearby civilian homes and populations, would it be okay
| because the IDF is "hiding" among civilians? The IDF also
| literally used human shields until 2005 when it was
| banned (and a bit more afterwards trying not to get
| caught), so is it okay to kill ~20000 Israeli civilians
| as a result of that?
| dubcanada wrote:
| If you take what happened in Israel and change the location
| to London, do you think UK would just shrug it off? I am in
| no way saying what is currently happening is okay, but the
| response was the response, replace Israel with most other
| military dominant countries and you would get a similar
| response, especially if you were the stronger party.
| Depending on who we talk about, it may actually have been
| way worse.
|
| I believe what OP is saying is that most other countries
| would have done the same. And for you to impart hatred on
| Israel for doing what most other countries would have done
| is anti-semitism.
| Scubabear68 wrote:
| It is interesting to me how your narrative went from
| somewhat reasonable to talking about "imparting hatred"
| and concluding it is anti-Semitic.
|
| Which is kind of what the article is talking about.
| dubcanada wrote:
| Please correct me if my interpretation of your statement
| is incorrect, I meant nothing by it purely trying to
| explain what I thought you meant.
| Scubabear68 wrote:
| Thanks. No, I don't hate Jews or Israel. I am very
| critical of the Israeli government at the moment, which
| is hardly a unique view.
| ls612 wrote:
| Imagine if a terrorist group murdered 2750 people in New
| York and in response the US said they would topple the
| government which supported them and occupy their country
| indefinitely.
| dubcanada wrote:
| US has toppled governments and occupied countries over
| far less... probably not the best example.
| ajb wrote:
| They did that. In fact, the US waited quite a long time
| to see if the Taliban would give up bin Laden, before
| invading.
| aprilthird2021 wrote:
| And it was one of the biggest US political mistakes of
| all time
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| >Imagine if you will someone going to start large scale
| bombing NYC. Or London. Or Rome.
|
| The response to Sep 11, 2001?
| robertoandred wrote:
| You don't think the Hamas attack was a declaration of war?
| underlipton wrote:
| It's difficult to declare war in the middle of a siege.
| robertoandred wrote:
| Did you think Gaza was under siege?
| aprilthird2021 wrote:
| Isn't blockading people and food and goods and putting
| the entire population of Gaza on a "starvation plus" diet
| and constantly and blatantly violating int'l law to throw
| West Bank Palestinians off their land further and further
| while laughing about it publicly a declaration of war?
|
| When Palestinians protested nonviolently at the gates of
| Gaza and were shot to death, was that an act of war?
|
| When Israeli West Bank settlers burned a home in Duma
| with a family still inside and laughed about the small
| child who burned alive their and taunted onlookers, was
| that an act of war?
| robertoandred wrote:
| Was Palestine suicide bombing buses and launching rockets
| declarations of war? Do you think Israel controls Egypt's
| borders with Gaza, or do you think Israel should allow
| terrorists to rape, torture, and murder their citizens?
| willis936 wrote:
| Then what is holding Israel to a lower standard to other
| nations a sign of?
| JackRumford wrote:
| Not all other nations - just Palestine. Because Israel is in
| position of power.
| sealeck wrote:
| Criticising current Israeli government policy doesn't hold
| Israel to a higher standard than that of other countries.
|
| Also Israel critics also tend to be _much more likely_ to
| condemn the actions of other states (e.g. Saudi Arabia in
| Yemen, Indonensia in Papaua, etc). The issue is that the
| press is less interested in this and the general American
| public is much more interested in Israel than they are in
| Saudi Arabia.
| mantas wrote:
| Are they? There's interesting statistics about UN human
| rights committee resolutions by country. Israel alone gets
| most resolutions.
| omginternets wrote:
| My friend, not conflating groups is literally one of the
| standards for public discourse in 2023.
| krapp wrote:
| It's the same standard the entire world held the US to after
| 9/11. A response to the attacks by Al-Qaeda was justified,
| the 20 year "Crusade" across the Middle East was not. A
| response by Israel against Hamas terrorism is justified - a
| campaign of extermination and genocide is not.
|
| It isn't even a high standard, "don't commit genocide" has
| been the bare minimum requirement for any modern country,
| much less democracy, for nearly a century. It would be
| antisemitic to believe that Israel is uniquely incapable of
| meeting that minimum standard.
| ristlane wrote:
| I don't believe that the IDF wants to kill Gazan civilians.
| krapp wrote:
| It's weird that they're killing so many civilians then,
| isn't it?
| ristlane wrote:
| No, it's exactly what I'd expect. It's not what I want to
| see, but it's happening.
| callalex wrote:
| And yet they keep doing it, over and over and over and
| over again.
| givemeethekeys wrote:
| Can you provide examples of a Genocide where the population
| of the people being exterminated multiplies during the
| genocide process?
| craigmccaskill wrote:
| So I have to have been involved in protesting a non-Israel
| conflict to have an opinion on this one?
| wolverine876 wrote:
| I've heard this claim, but what is your personal reasoning?
| It's an oddly narrow condition. Isn't 'prejudice against
| Israel' more general and effective? Enumerating prejudice in
| every possible form seems impossible and impractical.
|
| FWIW, it's included in a definition from the last ~20 years
| that is favored by pro-Israel groups.
|
| Possibly, it's just rhetorical and diversionary, putting
| critics on the defensive to carefully defend and establish
| all speech as non-anti-Jewish, which diverts time and
| attention.
|
| I think those tactics work for Israel when the issues aren't
| so stark and prominent, and so few people see the critique of
| the critics (i.e., few see the accusation that the speech is
| antisemitic). With everyone watching closely, the apparent
| rhetorical tactics become noticeable.
| mardifoufs wrote:
| Which other nation is allowed to literally colonize land than
| even itself doesn't consider to be part of their country?
| What other nation can get away with military enforcement of
| said colonies?
|
| If anything, Israel is given more slack in the west than any
| other nation. More civilians died in Gaza than in Ukraine yet
| clearly, only one nation has been condemned officially by
| western states and that's not Israel
| incrudible wrote:
| The question is, what is so special about the Israeli/Palestine
| conflict that leads to these outsized protests? I do not
| recollect a similar response to the treatment of ISIS or the
| war in Yemen, even though both had the unconditional support of
| the US war machine. Even if the left could be absolved of
| antisemitism, the resistance groups it is aligning itself with
| clearly can not.
| dml2135 wrote:
| I certainly remember similar sized, if not larger, protests
| against the Iraq war.
| shmatt wrote:
| Iraq never attacked anyone. A better comparison is the war
| in Afghanistan.
|
| If we compare # of people in each country. 10/07 for Israel
| was like 15 9/11s (this is a quote from a President Biden
| speech).
|
| So not only is it worth asking - how many Americans didnt
| want to fight Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. But how many would
| be against some sort of war like that, if tomorrow morning
| they woke up to a 9/11 sized attack in 15 of the biggest US
| cities, happening at the same time
|
| Not only did the US go far from home to destroy
| Afghanistan, but the whole world joined them to do it
| together
| toyg wrote:
| Yeah, and the war in Afghanistan resulted in nothing but
| temporary bloody vengeance. 20 years later, and we're all
| back to where we were before - minus millions of
| civilians dead or displaced.
| oezi wrote:
| The US didn't go to war to 'destroy Afghanistan'. They
| went to war to fight the Taliban.
|
| > Iraq never attacked anyone
|
| I am not sure Kuwait would agree.
| givemeethekeys wrote:
| Or Iran, for that matter. That said, the 2nd Gulf War was
| started by the US.
| bnralt wrote:
| It's also interesting that immediately after 9/11, the
| majority of American still had a positive view of the
| Afghan people[1].
|
| [1] https://news.gallup.com/poll/9994/public-opinion-war-
| afghani...
| catlover76 wrote:
| I think your point is pretty cogent, the comparison is
| not bad. But it suffers from a pretty big flaw in that
| the US hadn't spent the preceding several decades
| subjugating Afghanis or encroaching upon their land;
| didn't have a government whose members and officials
| openly issued bigoted and racist statements against
| Afghanis, etc.
|
| US foreign policy isn't nice or morally sound, but one
| thing it was not doing in the run-up to 9/11 and its
| subsequent invasion of Afghanistan was directly fucking
| up Afghani lives and killing Afghani children. Same can't
| be said for Israel in its relationship to the
| Palestinians.
| toyg wrote:
| In the UK, the Iraq invasion provoked the biggest protests
| ever witnessed. The current stuff is small potatoes in
| comparison.
| notaustinpowers wrote:
| The free flow of information and lack of government control
| over access to that information. Much of the early Iraq war
| and even, to an extent, conflicts with ISIS and Yemen had the
| benefit of those citizens not having access to the internet.
| So any information many American citizens were getting was
| filtered through what the military allowed to be known, then
| further filtered by the news.
|
| With Palestine and Israel, we were able to see it with our
| own eyes. I remember specifically watching TikToks of a
| teenage girl in Gaza posting about the evacuations, hearing
| the bombs in the background, etc. It felt "real" to us, which
| is a terrible way to put it, but I believe that is why the
| protests are much larger than other conflicts.
| mantas wrote:
| I remember quite a lot of footage from ISIS around the
| internet. The difference was that mainstream media didn't
| pick them up. Nor there was a widespread support to ISIS.
| Even though both ISIS was similar to Hamas and dealing with
| ISIS was as brutal as Gaza invasion with many collaterals.
| notaustinpowers wrote:
| There were lots of videos from ISIS, but there wasn't
| much, if any, coming from the citizens of Iraq or Syria.
| But we're seeing a lot of videos, photos, messages, etc
| coming from the citizens of Gaza.
|
| We, as a world, are seeing civilian life and casualties
| during a war in near real-time. This is something that
| many of us have never experienced before.
| mantas wrote:
| A good question is how much of those are legit civilians
| and how many are undercover Hamas production.
| notaustinpowers wrote:
| Are you asking that same question to everything coming
| out of Israel? Or everything coming out of Ukraine?
| ajb wrote:
| Actions of Western democracies are usually subject to greater
| scrutiny. Indeed, the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism
| allowed for this: it says that it is antisemitism to hold
| Israel to a higher standard than other democracies - not than
| other nations altogether.
| incrudible wrote:
| ISIS was defeated by a coalition including western
| democracies. Well over a thousand civilians died by US
| bombs alone.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| The fact that it wasn't Americans on the ground but other
| Iraqis is a gigantic difference.
| thsksbd wrote:
| "what is so special about the Israeli/Palestine conflict that
| leads to these outsized protests?"
|
| Good question. 75 years of history those other two conflicts
| lack
| incrudible wrote:
| Wahabism dates back over 200 years, the Sunni/Shia divide
| over a thousand years.
| krapp wrote:
| It went viral on social media, the other conflicts didn't.
| That's really it. Many people's awareness of the world and
| the moral weight of what happens there comes directly from
| social media.
|
| A lot of people were upset about China and the Uyghurs as
| well, for a while, but not until after it became a thing
| influencers talked about. And then they stopped caring after
| social media moved on. Even on HN, where anti-China sentiment
| is rampant, people no longer seem to mention it.
| rcpt wrote:
| There is something particularly grating about how Israel acts
| with impunity on the world stage yet continues to receive
| unfaltering support from the US government.
|
| They secretly introduced nuclear weapons into the Middle East
| and refused to sign any of the treaties which are responsible
| for humanities current existence.
|
| According to Snowden the NSA provides them with whatever data
| they'd like, even that on Americans, without any filtering
| whatsoever.
|
| Bibi clowned all over Obama for years and yet he still had to
| agree with nearly every policy he pushed. Biden has been
| practically begging them to cut back on West Bank
| settlements. They won't even meet us there and still we send
| over money for them to do whatever they please.
|
| As an American it's embarrassing.
| givemeethekeys wrote:
| What would you do if you were running the show in Israel?
| You're responsible for a group of people that none of your
| neighbors want, even if they are the same race, ethnicity
| and religion, and those people have an ongoing campaign to
| push you out, which has been unsuccessful for as long as it
| has been going on. Oh yeah, their population is now many
| multiples higher than when all this started.
| pphysch wrote:
| Yitzhak Rabin had some good ideas, but extremist factions
| in Israel (now led by Netanyahu) killed him off.
| givemeethekeys wrote:
| So, what would you do?
| rcpt wrote:
| I don't know maybe give me unfettered access to all the
| NSAs data and I'll get back to you.
| toyg wrote:
| What would I do? Abandon the racist and outdated
| ethnostate ideal, which is dying all over the world
| anyway, and enfranchise "those people". Instead of "two
| people, two states", choose "one land, one humanity".
| This is the only way we don't all end up nuking each
| other.
| givemeethekeys wrote:
| > one land, one humanity
|
| Now, remember - you are running Israel. And, most people
| on the right agree with you that there should just be one
| land, one humanity.
|
| But, the folks in the camps - they don't want to
| surrender and accept citizenship to your "one land, one
| humanity" country.
| jltsiren wrote:
| The literal answer is that I would resign and move to
| another country. Given that I've moved to another country
| a few times already, I'm fairly sure I would do that in
| the situation you describe.
|
| Answering more to the spirit of the question: I believe
| that the situation between Israel and Palestinians is
| broken and can't be fixed until something unexpected
| happens. Neither side has an acceptable way forward.
|
| As a rule of thumb, people who talk about right and wrong
| don't want peace. Those concepts are far more useful for
| justifying wars than ending them. Peace is achieved by
| compromises that make both parties lose interest in the
| war. There was a genuine desire for peace in the 90s, but
| it failed, because nobody could find an acceptable
| compromise. The leaders of both parties realized that the
| sacrifices required to make the compromise acceptable to
| the other side were worse than status quo.
| catlover76 wrote:
| I would say the US has been limp-dicked in the past few
| weeks with their admonitions and entreaties that Israel try
| to avoid killing civilians (as if there isn't a strong case
| to be made that this is part of Israel's goal, both as a
| matter of simple revenge and also a strat for getting their
| hostages back).
|
| However, criticizing our government as weak would require
| believing it cares about Palestinian lives in the first
| place, which is a highly questionable assumption at this
| point.
| proc0 wrote:
| It's because on the surface it's an interracial conflict
| (it's not really, I guess, but that is the perception for
| most), and lots of people are obsessed over racial dynamics
| and analyzing history through that lens.
|
| There are so many other conflicts going on with many more
| dead, but if it's not interracial then somehow it is not
| talked about.
| aprilthird2021 wrote:
| This is an insane take. First of all, the Uighur genocide
| by China is an interracial conflict, and second of all, it
| is a racial conflict, how can you say it is not? The
| Palestinians are on ethnicity of people and the Israelis
| are another. Even the "Arab Israelis" are the few
| Palestinians who were given what all Palestinians want,
| freedom and citizenship, and their homes back.
| nitwit005 wrote:
| One answer is these media efforts. Isreal works hard to draw
| attention to its conflicts, and to try to turn that attention
| into support.
|
| I'd note the Ukranians worked very hard to draw attention to
| their war as well, and they were quite successful at that.
| qvrjuec wrote:
| Think of it the other way around - the only real weapon
| Hamas has against the much stronger Israel is shifting
| public opinion, so it's in their incentive to bring as much
| negative attention as possible to Israel in the conflict
| anigbrowl wrote:
| Religion, hundreds of millions of people feel spiritually
| invested in that part of the world.
| skitout wrote:
| " The question is, what is so special about the
| Israeli/Palestine conflict that leads to these outsized
| protests? "
|
| - Jerusalem (and more globally Israel and Palestine) is holly
| for Jews, Muslims and Christians ; more than half of the word
| population and more than 90% of US population
|
| - Israel is a key ally of the USA, and this is a topic
| important in US politics for long time - including for some
| evangelical voters for religious question
|
| - Westerners have colonized (or inflicted violence to) most
| of the non western countries on this planet in "recent"
| history... Israel is seen by some as a Western country
| colonizing just another developing country, with support of
| other western countries... echoing recent history for many.
| It is as such a symbol for a long time.
|
| - USA, France... have had some big Islamist attack, what
| happened in Israel echoed to this for some people... and
| echoes to the clash of civilization western word vs Muslim
| which is central in the ideology of a growing number of
| westerners
|
| - It is easier to understand, more divisive, with more people
| or causes we can identify with, than in Syria (everybody
| hates ISIS) or Yemen (arabs fighting arabs fighting other
| arabs in a desert ?)... And we have more images
| ARandumGuy wrote:
| Israel and pro-Israel commentators have spent a lot of time and
| effort trying to ingrain the idea that Israel == Jews. Of
| course, not all Jews are Israeli, and not all Israelis are
| Jews. And there are many Jewish Israelis who are critical of
| the actions of the Israeli government.
|
| Of course, a lot of criticism of Israel is rooted in
| antisemitism. But saying all criticism of Israel is antisemitic
| deflects legitimate criticism, and makes it harder to identify
| legitimate antisemitism.
| matrix87 wrote:
| > But saying all criticism of Israel is antisemitic deflects
| legitimate criticism
|
| Who is saying this? All I've heard are people on one side
| insisting that people are saying this, sounds like a straw
| man
| the_gastropod wrote:
| This isn't _exactly_ the same, but it 's pretty close.
| Here's Nikki Haley tweeting: "Anti-Zionism is antisemitism.
| No federal funds for schools that don't combat
| antisemitism." [1]
|
| [1]
| https://twitter.com/NikkiHaley/status/1720501916088590704
| 49531 wrote:
| The US House of Representatives passed a measure on Tuesday
| which "clearly and firmly states that anti-Zionism is
| antisemitism"[1]; so at least 311 congress members are
| saying it.
|
| 1. https://www.congress.gov/118/bills/hres894/BILLS-118hres
| 894i...
| samatman wrote:
| anti-Zionism is the proposition that Israel must be
| destroyed. Zionism is the movement to ensure that the
| Jewish homeland in the form of the state of Israel be
| created and sustained, anti-Zionism is its antithesis.
|
| This is not the same as being critical of that state,
| being anti-Israel isn't antisemitic (except when it is,
| obviously), but nor is it anti-Zionism. Saying Netanyahu
| should be dragged before the Hague, that the
| international community should demand an immediate
| ceasefire or force a two-state solution, that Israel must
| uphold the right of return: none of these are anti-
| Zionism, nor antisemitic.
|
| If your position is not that Israel must be destroyed,
| good, don't call yourself anti-Zionist though. If it is,
| then yes, that's antisemitic, or the word is meaningless.
|
| Similarly, find another slogan besides "From the river to
| the sea", because that is, in fact, a call to ethnically
| cleanse all Jews from Israel. It has meant that since the
| establishment of Israel, and you don't get to wander in
| and say it means something different at this point. If
| you don't mean that, don't say it. Find literally any
| other way to express yourself.
| roflyear wrote:
| I always was under the impression that Anti-Zionism was
| just being against Zionism.
| the_gastropod wrote:
| From Wikipedia [1], the definition of anti-Zionism is:
|
| > [The belief that] the modern State of Israel, and the
| movement to create a sovereign Jewish state in the region
| of Palestine--the biblical Land of Israel--was flawed or
| unjust in some way
|
| This is _very_ different from "Israel must be
| destroyed".
|
| Similarly, your interpretation of "From the river to the
| sea" is extreme. It's only really been a scrutinized
| slogan since Hamas started using it in 2017. Its previous
| ~60 years of use were consistently about creating a
| secular, multi-ethnic, democratic state for all the
| people inside its borders.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Zionism
| ARandumGuy wrote:
| The Wikipedia page on "Criticism of Israel" [1] has an
| extensive section on critics of Israel accused of
| antisemitism, if you'd like a good starting point.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Israel#Supp
| ressio...
| __loam wrote:
| Israel spends a lot of money on this in the United States
| and does have impact on our laws and freedoms.
|
| https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/investigations/2019/05/
| 0...
| mantas wrote:
| And then there's pro-Palestine people against any Jews.
| Especially weird when anti-Israel people call out non-Israeli
| Jews. Okay, where do you expect them to go if you don't want
| Israel to exist AND don't want them in their current
| whereabouts?
| nielsbot wrote:
| You just did the thing: Conflating being pro-Palestine
| (Anti-zionist) with anti-Jew.
|
| Why is it weird to mention non-Israeli jews when being
| Anti-zionist? The point is to NOT conflate Zionism with
| being Jewish.
|
| The matter of what should happen in Israel/Palestine is
| separate from this discussion. Anyway, they wouldn't (in
| theory) necessarily have to go anywhere. Jews and Arabs
| could have lived together in a single democratic country
| where one religion/ethnicity isn't favored over another.
| cmilton wrote:
| I feel like this a great point. As an American, I'm not
| labeled as any particular religion. I honestly wish there
| were no labels at all. I would much rather look at things as
| right and wrong based on the specific situation.
|
| The goal, in my opinion, is division. Without it, they have
| nothing.
|
| Peace above all!
| NickC25 wrote:
| It's intentional. The Israel lobby has worked tirelessly to
| conflate antisemitism with any critique of Israel whatsoever,
| no matter how legitimate.
|
| It's sad, and in the long run completely self-defeating, but
| nobody seems to realize that. The more Israel and their lobby
| overreacts to honest, legitimate and peaceful critique of their
| actions, the more extreme that the responses will inevitably
| be....especially in times like these where Palestinians have
| legitimate reasons to be angry with Israel, and when Israel's
| citizenry has the right to be angry with their government.
|
| Nobody is right, and everyone is wrong. Everyone has blood on
| their hands. Pretending otherwise is dumb. Likud and Hamas are
| responsible, not the innocent Israelis nor the innocent
| Palestinians.
|
| Fuck Hamas, fuck Likud.
| proc0 wrote:
| Provoking an overreaction was the intention... and yet that is
| not factored into the criticism.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| >Criticizing Israel's response is not anti-Semitism- it is
| literally just criticizing the response.
|
| Okay - then what should be Israel's response? For me what they
| are doing is the bare minimum with the minimum casualties from
| the options they have. Hamas is Gaza's government. Hamas has
| intertwined the civilian and the military infrastructure. Hamas
| has made sure that the civilian Palestinians will suffer if you
| target Hamas. And it was Hamas that made sure with organized
| rape, torture and atrocities on Oct 7 that it can't be
| overlooked or forgiven.
|
| Here is a good rule of thumb - if you are going to stir shit -
| stick to just killing. Don't livestream torture and rape, so
| diplomacy will have something to work with.
| DiogenesKynikos wrote:
| Their response should be to leave the occupied territories,
| which aren't theirs to begin with, and to recognize a
| Palestinian state. Israel has held millions of Palestinians
| under military occupation for more than half a century, and
| it's way past time that that ended.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| Even if you are right it is after hamas has paid the price
| for the rapes.
| DiogenesKynikos wrote:
| Israel has now killed 20k Palestinians and destroyed half
| of the Gaza Strip. That is a crime of vastly greater
| proportion.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| Nope. Hamas killed them by designing gaza in such a way
| as to maximize collateral.
| callalex wrote:
| If you find yourself on the "she shouldn't have dressed
| that way" side of the argument, it's probably time to
| take a step back and reevaluate.
| xpe wrote:
| All deaths are tragedies, yes.
|
| But it is not valid to say that all deaths are equal
| crimes. These are not morally equivalent:
|
| A. 1,000 people killed in the name of religion
|
| B. 1,000 people (civilians) killed despite efforts to
| target only military targets
|
| I don't claim to know the _quality_ of the IDF's efforts
| to minimize civilian deaths, but I do know that intent
| matters here. The IDF has attempted (imperfectly of
| course) to reduce civilian deaths. Hamas does nothing of
| the sort. They are happy to kill non-combatants; any
| infidel will do.
|
| I want fewer deaths. Yes. It is heartrending to see the
| suffering on both sides. I welcome pressure on the IDF to
| minimize non-military casualties.
|
| But remember this: there is no amount of public opinion
| that will stop Hamas from murdering again. Don't forget
| the difference here. Israel is receptive to public
| opinion. There are many internal critics. Hamas isn't
| receptive, is it? Will public scorn stop them?
|
| Hamas has designed their entire operation so that
| innocent people take the brunt of even the most targeted
| military operations. If the IDF attacks, there will be
| collateral damage and lost Palestinian lives. It is
| awful. However, this does not mean than IDF attacks are
| immoral in the big picture. Allowing Hamas to continue
| risks future violence. So what response is ethically
| warranted?
|
| The IDF certainly could do better. No one is completely
| innocent here. But some are doing better than others.
| Hamas has proven itself to massacre indiscriminately.
|
| The basic argument for Israel goes like this: some degree
| of IDF incursion into Palestine and aggression against
| Hamas is required to save future lives from more
| massacres. It is only question of how much and when.
|
| Perhaps the IDF should have waited some length of time to
| build more of an international coalition? I'll grant
| this. I'm not an expert.
|
| If it were possible to merely assume a defensive posture
| and stop them, I would say, sure try that. But I think
| that has been tried and it cannot work. Am I missing
| something?
|
| Minimizing death isn't the perfect ethical metric, but it
| is a reasonable starting approximation. To do so, we have
| to factor in all deaths, across a long time scale. I
| don't think there is any neat way to do it. It is a
| fucking mess; we chose the least worst option.
|
| I have no hate, luckily. If someone I knew had been
| killed, it might be impossible to have any emotional
| distance. I only hate ideas that cause people to hate
| each other. I'm open to criticism. I don't know the right
| answers. But I know some answers are worse than others.
| edanm wrote:
| Israel did leave Gaza though. Gaza elected Hamas, and they
| carried out this attack.
|
| So what should Israel do specifically in Gaza?
| DiogenesKynikos wrote:
| Israel left Gaza and then blockaded it, and has carried
| out major bombing campaigns against Gaza and ground
| invasions several times.
|
| The conflict is not limited to Gaza. In the West Bank and
| East Jerusalem, Israel continues to build its illegal
| settlements, to subject the Palestinian population to a
| humiliating and brutal military occupation, and to kill
| Palestinians regularly (several hundred in the West Bank
| this year).
|
| Until Israel leaves the occupied territories and allows
| the Palestinians to live as normal people, there will be
| Palestinian resistance. A few years ago, the people of
| Gaza tried nonviolent resistance, protesting at the
| border fence. Israel responded with live ammunition,
| killing hundreds of protestors.
|
| The Palestinians have tried every way to obtain their
| freedom: protest, negotiation, armed resistance. Nothing
| works. Israel is, by far, the stronger party, and it does
| what it wants to the Palestinians with no consequences.
| mandmandam wrote:
| Your comment is entirely regurgitated Israeli propaganda that
| has been repeatedly debunked.
|
| I'll be as polite as I can about this, and take it one step
| at a time.
|
| > Okay - then what should be Israel's response?
|
| The world has been clear about this. Stop killing civilians
| and treat Palestinians as humans with rights.
|
| > what they are doing is the bare minimum with the minimum
| casualties from the options they have.
|
| That's not remotely true. Human rights groups and genocide
| experts around the world are screaming at world leaders to
| take action. Schools and refugee camps and humanitarian
| corridors and civil infrastructure and entire residential
| blocks are being vaporized without warning.
|
| > Hamas is Gaza's government
|
| The last election was in 2006, so this talking point is real
| stale.
|
| > Hamas has intertwined the civilian and the military
| infrastructure.
|
| The only proof that has been offered of that has been
| incredibly shoddily made, as if daring people to believe it.
|
| > Hamas has made sure that the civilian Palestinians will
| suffer if you target Hamas.
|
| That doesn't excuse war crimes, and it's _highly_ fucked up
| to think that it does somehow.
|
| > And it was Hamas that made sure with organized rape,
| torture and atrocities on Oct 7 that it can't be overlooked
| or forgiven.
|
| The only evidence of organized rape that I've seen presented
| turned out to be a 10 year old photo of Kurdish women [0].
| Torture? No evidence. By atrocities, do you mean the debunked
| beheaded babies? Or the debunked babies in oven claim? The
| debunked pregnant women cut open claim?
|
| What Hamas did was atrocious, killing civilians and
| kidnapping people. So why embellish so devilishly? Only to
| excuse genocide, and grab land.
|
| > Here is a good rule of thumb - if you are going to stir
| shit - stick to just killing. Don't livestream torture and
| rape, so diplomacy will have something to work with.
|
| Again with the claims of "livestreamed torture and rape",
| which no one has actually seen.
|
| You know who can be _documented_ to have tortured and raped
| people in the last couple decades? Israel and the US. On
| many, many occasions. But in your view, at least they 're
| smart enough not to livestream it - they only took photos.
|
| 0 -
| https://twitter.com/MaxBlumenthal/status/1724688009293873502
| prmph wrote:
| Your response is deeply disturbing. Is there any additional
| evidence that will convince you of the Hamas atrocities,
| including rape, mutilation, burnings, and of the fact that
| they clearly wasted their atrocities to be seen by the
| largest number of people? That they wanted to cause as much
| horrific suffering and kill as many as possible? There's
| too much evidence to ignore.
|
| Your response reminds me of the Sandy Hook conspiracy
| theories. Peace cannot be built on refusing to acknowledge
| the clear evidence in front of you. To me the most
| dangerous thing in the world is a lack of respect for
| truth.
| underlipton wrote:
| >Okay - then what should be Israel's response?
|
| The same response I have concluded should have been the US'
| response to 9/11: turn the other cheek, and invest heavily in
| reconciling with "enemy" forces while rebuilding "enemy"
| infrastructure and institutions, while dealing with
| individual bad actors on a case-by-case basis as a matter of
| legal (rather than martial) procedure.
|
| And I'm not joking.
|
| I feel bad for Israelis who have let their government doom
| them to a generation of government mismanagement and
| expensive, arduous military adventure. My single-payer health
| insurance and my friends' free college education went into a
| couple Patriot missiles, and I do wonder what they're going
| to have to give up.
| ketzo wrote:
| It is a shame that this could never, ever happen
| politically, when from an outside, dispassionate
| perspective, it just seems obviously and objectively
| correct.
| dijit wrote:
| 1) thats politically a dead end,
|
| nobody will immediately make friends after a massacre and
| mass rape. Especially after decades of tensions and double
| especially when the muslim world once descended on Israel
| at once.
|
| 2) Quiet reminder that there are 1B followers of Islam and
| there has always been a wish (especially from Iran) to end
| the existence of Israel: the Palestinian people are
| unfortunately a pawn in that game. - Winning over the
| palestinians wont actually win you over anything. Instead
| you will have terrorist attacks by "palestinians" until the
| tensions are stoked again.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Winning over the palestinians wont actually win you
| over anything.
|
| Establishment of a Palestinian State with a stake in
| peace and stability would win you something.
|
| > Instead you will have terrorist attacks by
| "palestinians" until the tensions are stoked again.
|
| One of the things this would win you is someone with
| interest and capacity to respond to this where the
| occupation/colonialism/ethnic-/religious-conflict
| narrative would not be applicable.
| dijit wrote:
| I would love to sit here and write a comment about how
| youre absolutely right.
|
| But, I empathise fully with Israel and also with the
| Palestinian people.
|
| On Israels side you have what amounts to a large
| motivated but not universal contingent of people who will
| literally slaughter themselves to make you look bad on
| the world stage, pulling out long protracted altercations
| where the intent is clearly to provoke the most
| disgusting outcome and whom have a history of invading,
| slaughtering and rioting. Sometimes bringing in half the
| Muslim world to do it.
|
| I would be fucking terrified.
|
| But for the Palestinians, you have an interloper,
| stealing the best of your ancestral lands, relegating you
| to tiny torrid stretches of impoverished city because
| they claim that they "don't trust you" based on nothing
| but your accident of birth. living every day knowing that
| this tiny population of privileged people who dont look
| like you at all and are so heavily financed that they
| live significantly better lives on your land. Meanwhile
| hearing constantly that they continuously kill your
| countrymen. For all you know: for the crime of existing.
|
| I'd be pissed too, and I wouldn't let up either.
|
| Both sides feel like the victim, its easy for us to sit
| here half a world away and conjure up idealised
| scenarios. But Israel is scared of the entire middle east
| and having an irate and catastrophically motivated
| population bent on its eradication and tries to handle it
| the best it can.
|
| Palestine is scared of being obliterated and is outright
| hateful towards what it considers oppressors.
|
| Trust is hard earned and fragile, and there _are_
| external actors involved that would like this tension to
| go on indefinitely.
| bushbaba wrote:
| That was attempted, and more death followed. Heck many of
| the gazans who were employed by the kibbutz ended up being
| spies to inform Hamas of security procedures AND killed
| kibbutz workers.
|
| We both know that solution only works if the other side
| wants peace. Most gazans want death to Israel and death to
| all Jews globally (see the recent polls). The schools teach
| it is good to kill a Jew in America, Europe, or Israel.
| sebzim4500 wrote:
| Under your plan, how many instances of oct 7 do you think
| Israel should tolerate before they rethink things?
| yard2010 wrote:
| Jesus. No skin and no knowledge on this case
| deepfriedchokes wrote:
| I think a lot of people get "turn the other cheek" wrong,
| much like "a few bad apples", and "blood is thicker than
| water".
|
| Here's the passage from Matthew 5:38-39 KJV:
|
| "38 Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an
| eye, and a tooth for a tooth:
|
| 39 But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but
| whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him
| the other also."
|
| What Jesus is advocating is nonviolent resistance, not
| walking away. MLK Jr. understood this passage well.
| kromem wrote:
| While that is definitely true and an important distinction, I
| will say that unfortunately all too often as discussions on the
| topic deepen there's a troubling correlation between the most
| vocal voices engaged in criticizing Israel and legit
| antisemitism views creeping in.
|
| Which isn't a one sided phenomenon. The reverse is true as
| well, where often the most vocal voices rationalizing Israel's
| actions and behavior around civilian casualties often have
| anti-Muslim perspectives crop up as back and forth conversation
| goes on.
|
| One of the litmus tests I've noticed is the capacity to
| acknowledge and condemn the civilian suffering of both sides.
| The commenters who recognize and condemn both the Oct 7th
| terrorist attack and the targeting or indiscriminate killing of
| civilians in the response to it tend to be rational and level
| headed driven by humanitarian concerns.
|
| Those who only recognize the suffering of one side and dismiss,
| dehumanize, or rationalize the suffering of the other side - or
| worst of all propagandize the denial of it's occurrence or
| scope - tend to quickly fall into revealing rather abhorrent
| views with a mere scratching of the surface.
|
| Not everyone who criticizes Israel is antisemitic nor everyone
| who criticizes Hamas is anti-Muslim, but many who _are_
| antisemitic or anti-Muslim seem keen to defend their respective
| side of the conflict quite emphatically and unilaterally.
| Scubabear68 wrote:
| I get your point, but at the same time dragging anti-semetism
| into the argument weakens the voices of those who really are
| not anti-Semitic at all, but genuinely question the Israeli
| government response to the Hamas attacks.
|
| Which is, I suspect, the point - to weaken those viewpoints.
|
| And to address others in this thread around US actions around
| the world, I am critical of the U.S. war on Afghanistan and
| the second Iraq war as well as the Israeli attacks on Gaza.
|
| One can be critical of a government without despising it.
| submeta wrote:
| That is my observation as well. In Germany many right wing
| groups who have deep seated antisemitic prejudices (,,they
| control the world, they want to exchange our white
| population", etc) now fully express their hate against arabs
| / migrants hiding / excusing their behaviour with philo-
| semitism or support for Israel. They apparently do not have a
| iota of compassion for the dying civilians in Gaza.
| miketery wrote:
| No one is claiming criticism of Israel is anti-semitism.
|
| However if you say that Israel should not exist, you are in
| essence implying the Jews should be driven to the sea, and this
| is anti-semitic.
|
| The other thing is that many anti-semites, will use the cover
| of I'm anti Israel, while they hide their anti-semitism. Many
| such cases.
|
| We can't deny that the proportion of focus on Israel compared
| to other conflicts should give us pause. You can criticize
| Israel all you want, but the extent and focus across media and
| leftists is curious.
| odiroot wrote:
| That's a really... weird article to read. It's like reading a
| fantasy book about another universe. Or a desperate attempt at
| "inception".
|
| Reddit, at least, seems to be (rightfully or not) dominated by a
| strongly anti-Israel narrative.
|
| Even the "great" BBC is not willing to call a spade a spade.
| Interesco wrote:
| Interestingly I've seen a strong pro-Israel bias, particularly
| on the larger subreddits (like the default ones). Some of the
| smaller ones do seem to have a pro-Palestine (or pro-civilian)
| outlook but nothing that I would describe as "strongly anti-
| Israel"
| m_a_g wrote:
| The default subreddits are truly awful. r/worldnews is the
| first one that comes to mind. They were accusing the murdered
| Reuters journalist of being a member of hamas.
|
| I decided to never look at those subreddits ever again.
| SalmoShalazar wrote:
| When the crisis was initially unfolding, I followed a few of
| the major subreddits, and it was entirely pro-Israel. It was
| kind of shocking how uniformly pro-Israel the comments were.
| nitwit005 wrote:
| Most of the complaints I've seen are in the opposite direction,
| complaining about how pro Isreal reddit is.
|
| I'm sure it depends on what subredits you look at. The
| moderators are essentially free to enforce their politics.
| elihu wrote:
| I think it depends on what subreddit you're on. /r/worldnews
| tends to be very pro-Israel, unless the comment are on a story
| about settler violence. /r/politics is more balanced.
| Unfrozen0688 wrote:
| Most of what I see online and in the news is pro-palestine.
|
| Reading up on the conflict, I support Israel more and more.
| skybrian wrote:
| What have you read?
| aprilthird2021 wrote:
| What did you read that changed your mind?
| fxd123 wrote:
| Is there a reason why you created an account specifically for
| this comment thread?
| Unfrozen0688 wrote:
| It is a troll account.
| rs999gti wrote:
| Was this posted because of the recent Hamas sex crimes featured
| on the homepage of cnn.com?
|
| https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/06/middleeast/rape-sexual-violen...
| MPlus88 wrote:
| I don't pro anything. I am against the ethnic cleansing and
| extermination of a people. In this case, the people are the
| Palestinian people.
| nomdep wrote:
| Its one side or the other. A cease fire was tried last week and
| Hamas didn't respect it, so if Israel retreats the war will not
| magically end.
|
| And the Palestinian side is a terrorism-led state full of
| hateful fanatics, so I don't get why you prefer to exterminate
| the Jews.
| qwertthrowway wrote:
| Glad to see actual discussion on this topic related to
| technology. Many investigations into social media being used to
| suppress pro-Palestinian activism, and the involvement of VCs is
| no less surprising. Anyone in tech who doesn't care about what's
| going on should really take a look into the huge efforts to
| silence people who are just trying to protect human lives.
| dubcanada wrote:
| I find this whole thing very weird, it's all about what side are
| you on as if it's a game to win. Are you pro-Palestine or pro-
| Israel, wrong answer and you're out of the club!
|
| Are you not just allowed to have an opinion without you being
| classified as some sort of adjective? The same thing is happening
| with politics, you're either a republican or a democrat. Well,
| what if you're just a regular guy who pours concrete for a
| living. Why can't you just be Bob Smith?
| fxd123 wrote:
| > which also included a denunciation of the "Zionist ideology
| which promotes an exclusivist state,"
|
| That's an interesting claim, since Israel is definitely _not_ a
| exclusivist state. Yet again, 'anti-zionism' seems to be used as
| a dog whistle for anti-semitism
|
| This article is pretty bad, it screams the typical "jews run the
| media" trope
|
| The authors also collaborated on an article called 'Moderna is
| spying on you'. So they are anti-vax conspiracy theorists as
| well? Yikes
| ComputerGuru wrote:
| Not an exclusivist state, really?
| https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/israel-adopts-divisive-la...
|
| Basically every human rights org has come out and declared it
| an apartheid state based off how non-Jews are treated within
| Israel proper and in Israeli-occupied territory.
| fxd123 wrote:
| > Although the law is largely symbolic
| ComputerGuru wrote:
| Then why pass it? Also "largely" is not "altogether." And a
| symbolic law speaks to intent, which is embodied in the
| other not-so-symbolic laws.
| mrangle wrote:
| There was always going to be an opinion war after 1200 massacred
| civilians, when a large portion of the other side doesn't take
| the primary tack of "stop bombing Palestine" but instead "Free
| Palestine".
|
| This particular pro-Palestinian argument being so imprecise and
| tactically wrong, at this crucial time to saving the lives of
| Palestinians, only guarantees an unsovable hurricane of noise
| with no outcome but more civilian deaths and more war.
|
| As the other side can not and will not reward the spark of the
| initial massacre to force a benefits negotiation, obviously. Let
| alone one that discusses ceding territory.
|
| It's morally logical to be aghast at the Palestinian Civilian
| death toll, regardless of the argument as to who is ultimately
| responsible.
|
| But it is morally unforgiveable for people, living in safety and
| ostensibly in support of voiceless Palestinians in a war zone, to
| decide to put a territory argument above Paelstinian lives.
|
| This argument further endangers Palestinian lives when it
| radicalizes them in a manner, within the context of an unwinnable
| situation, that all but assures their deaths.
|
| Hamas has been clear about their choice of the promise of
| territory over the lives of the entire Palestinian population.
|
| Less doomed and morally clearer people need to make the choice to
| discharge the Palestinian population from their duty as pawns.
| Even if it means living a long life in another desert that isn't
| under terrorist militia control. In the context of an absolutely
| unwinnable situation.
|
| Israel is clear, whatever one thinks of the nature of that
| clarity. That the Palestinians are unclear is why there will be a
| continued "information war" until the exact point when there
| isn't the possibility of Palestinians tolerating a single further
| death. At which point the rallying cry will focus solely on
| Palestinian lives.
|
| We should all hope that this mutual clarity comes in this very
| minute. If not in this minute, then in the next. So that the
| maximum number of lives can be saved.
|
| People can rail against that reality forever, but it will remain
| reality.
| knd775 wrote:
| > There was always going to be an opinion war after 1200
| massacred civilians, when a large portion of the other side
| doesn't take the primary tack of "stop bombing Palestine" but
| instead "Free Palestine".
|
| The West Bank shows what happens if they only stop being bombed
| without actually being free. Palestine needs to be free in
| order for there to be peace.
| mrangle wrote:
| Your comment implies that Palestinian civilians can't have
| peace until Israeli territory is ceded back to them. This is
| in the context of October 7th and a the current Gaza seige.
| It is reflective of the loudest echo in the war zone.
|
| There won't be a single outcome but the most negative one for
| radicalized Palestinian civilians as a result. Hopefully,
| morally clearer voices will be raised higher.
| aprilthird2021 wrote:
| No I think his comment implies Gazans see how Israeli
| settlers treat West Bank Palestinians (sometimes burning
| their homes while families are inside and laughing at
| whosoever dies) and think that they'd rather support
| strongmen who attempt to fight back against Israel.
|
| It's the exact same mentality that drove normal Afghan
| people to support the Taliban.
| carabiner wrote:
| If you want to stop making hummus, stop smashing chickpeas.
| pphysch wrote:
| There's so much (intentional) confusion around basic terms in
| this info war.
|
| Anti-Semitism, "antisemitism", anti-Judaism, anti-Zionism, and
| anti-Israel are all different concepts.
|
| Semitic peoples include both Jews and Arabs. To erase the latter
| (as Zionism does) and replace them with Europeans is by
| definition anti-Semitic, therefore Zionism is anti-Semitic.
|
| To address that, Zionism coined the term "antisemitism" as a
| synonym for "anti-Zionism".
|
| Being pro-2-state-solution is pro-Israel (and pro-Palestine, pro-
| Semitic) but anti-Zionist.
|
| Anti-Zionism is also not anti-Judaism, because there are many
| non-Jews that identify as Zionists, e.g. from Winston Churchill
| to Joe Biden and Donald Trump.
|
| (There are also distinctions between ethnic and religious
| Judaism)
|
| All this said, there are unfortunately real anti-Semitic, anti-
| Jew, anti-Israel individuals and groups out there that also
| leverage this confusion.
|
| This does not take away from the fact that anti-Zionism is an
| extremely sound moral and political position, akin to anti-Nazism
| and other anti-totalitarianisms.
| thsksbd wrote:
| My Israeli brother-in-law is afraid to join a pro-Palestine rally
| because he looks too Jewish.
|
| Life's ironies I guess.
| ComputerGuru wrote:
| Every pro-Palestine rally I've been to has had many Jews and
| they're welcomed with open arms. It's not a religious war,
| despite what some would have you believe. Tell him about
| IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace.
| simplypeter wrote:
| People tend to support David against Goliath. I've never been
| there, and I had no idea what was happening. All the information
| I have (and most of what you have) is propaganda, from both
| sides.
| hotdogscout wrote:
| Paul Graham just went vocally against Israel on twitter:
|
| https://twitter.com/shaunmmaguire/status/1733164336640901561
|
| I assume this is why the post is still up, among other
| intrusions.
| ComputerGuru wrote:
| "Vocally against Israel" when he was just responding to
| character assassinations?
| ars wrote:
| Please keep in mind this was posted on the Eve of the Jewish
| Shabbath (in the US, and in the middle of the Shabbath in
| Israel), so the conversation here is missing a lot of voices.
| narag wrote:
| Two ideas:
|
| 1. It was surprising to me that Hamas believed that filming and
| publishing their atrocities was a good idea. And more surprising
| that the response hasn't been a bigger backlash.
|
| 2. That makes me think that despite the fact that both parts
| think that infowar is necessary, the real war is fought on the
| ground, with weapons, bullets and bombs. Not with protests,
| declarations and tweets.
|
| Neither Israel nor the Palestinians' supporters in the West give
| a fuck.
| Unfrozen0688 wrote:
| 1. News outlets here actually did not show the full Hamas
| footage from Oct 7.
|
| But they have no problem showing Hamas propaganda.
| CrzyLngPwd wrote:
| You know it is in overdrive when the ICC thinks about
| investigating the IOF for war crimes and Netanyahu says the ICC
| is anti-Semitic.
|
| https://www.euronews.com/2021/02/06/israel-netanyahu-denounc...
|
| If Israel has its way, even thinking about Gaza as a
| concentration camp would be anti-Semitic.
|
| "anti-Semitic" has been thrown around so much that it has lost
| its value. A red balloon, a walrus, or a nice cup of tea can be
| anti-Semitic nowadays.
| senderista wrote:
| "One participant even suggested that they appeal to the
| university's 'woke' aversion to exposing students to
| uncomfortable ideas. The participant drafted a sample letter
| claiming that Tlaib's appearance threatened ASU's 'commitment to
| a safe and inclusive environment.' The following day, ASU
| officially canceled the Tlaib event, citing 'procedural issues.'"
| YeBanKo wrote:
| This article made it to front with 297 pts and generally it
| negative towards Israel. I don't think any of the articles about
| Hamas atrocities and their use of social media made to cause
| panic and fear made it that far on HN.
|
| Back in Oct about a week after the attack Bloomberg 's reporting
| on the attack and the beginning of the ended up being flagged on
| NH and only has 23pts:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37910148
|
| It seems that anti-Israel propaganda is way more successful than
| this pro-Israel information war.
| senderista wrote:
| I'm not trying to deflect, but I do find it interesting that just
| 2 months ago, >100K Armenians were permanently displaced from
| their homes in Nagorno-Karabakh where they've lived for literally
| millenia, and I saw essentially no coverage of this in Western
| media (in contrast, it was all over Russian media, possibly
| because Armenia is a historical ally of Russia and a lot of
| Russians are frustrated that Russia and the CSTO did basically
| nothing to prevent this ethnic cleansing). The Armenian-American
| community is rather large (>500K) but apparently nowhere near as
| influential as the Jewish-American community.
|
| There are many other recent instances of ethnic cleansing that
| nobody seems to care about. The number of ethnic Germans who were
| permanently expelled from their homes in Europe and the USSR (at
| about the same time as Palestinians) exceeds the number of
| Palestinian refugees by more than an order of magnitude (10-12M,
| with at least 500K dead), making it the largest ethnic cleansing
| in modern history, but this episode is basically forgotten
| (presumably because sympathy for Germans was rather scarce after
| WW2). The hundreds of thousands of Turks and Greeks who were
| mutually expelled from their homes after WW2 will never get to
| return either. Nor will all the ethnic minorities in the former
| Yugoslavia who were "cleansed" from their historic homelands. So
| my question is, given that ethnic cleansings are not uncommon in
| the recent past, and that the Palestinian Nakba is not even close
| to the worst case, why is it basically the only one that anyone
| seems to care about?
| ComputerGuru wrote:
| Totally unrelated, did you know it was Israel that armed the
| Azeri army for their ethnic cleansing campaign?
|
| https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/rjhofzoet
| senderista wrote:
| I certainly did. They won't even sell Harop or Spike to
| Ukraine.
|
| Did you know about the Israeli killer drone sales demo for
| the Azeris that practiced on live Armenian soldiers?
|
| https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2017-08-15/ty-
| article/is...
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > I'm not trying to deflect, but I do find it interesting that
| just 2 months ago, >100K Armenians were permanently displaced
| from their homes in Nagorno-Karabakh where they've lived for
| literally millenia, and I saw essentially no coverage of this
| in Western media
|
| Strange, I saw a lot of coverage of it in Western media when it
| happened (and a kot today, because of an apparent diolomatic
| breakthrough.)
|
| Its true that a lot of the coverage during the event was
| colored by relating it to the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian war,
| Armenia's status as a CSTO ally of Russia.
|
| > So my question is, given that ethnic cleansings are not
| uncommon in the recent past, and that the Palestinian Nakba is
| not even close to the worst case, why is it basically the only
| one that anyone seems to care about?
|
| In the West and the US specifically, the role of Israel and the
| local governments degree of positiive engagement with Israel
| creates a rather different context to most ethnic cleansings
| elsewhere in the world.
| skitout wrote:
| You do point some interesting points.
|
| Note that the issue in not the Nakba anymore. From memory Oslo
| was about giving to a demilitarize Palestinian state about 10%
| of the Palestine mandate territory mostly in "islands"
| controlled by Israel, then progressively over a long period,
| increasing it to 22%, with quite no hope to get East Jerusalem
| back. And now (even before oct. 7) that seems impossible, far
| too much for the Israelis. (in 1992 89% of the population was
| "Palestinian")
|
| In general westerners don't care about what happen abroad when
| there is nothing connected to them. In French media we have
| seen many stuff about Nagorno-Karabakh (with an Armenian point
| of view), because there are Armenian in France, and because it
| fits the narrative of the clash of civilizations Christian Vs
| Muslim. But it was far, in unimportant countries for us, few
| dead, no suspense, nothing spectacular...
|
| Israel Palestine is another beast :
|
| - Jerusalem in Holly for half of the world population and most
| westerners
|
| - Israel as been important in US politics for decades (partly
| because of the first point) and the USA are direct and strong
| ally
|
| - Most non western country have been colonized or assaulted by
| westerners in "recent" history... This conflict is also the
| echo and symbol of this : westerners assaulting non westerners
| (while giving moral lesson to the world)
|
| - For some westerners that is the echo of Muslim and terrorists
| attacking westerners - us (9 11, Paris attack are in all
| minds), and for some kind of a symbol of the clash of
| civilization
|
| - And this is happening now, with a lot of pictures, media
| coverage, with new images everyday, some suspense, some
| twist...
| senderista wrote:
| Now that I think about it, one salient distinction might be
| that Palestinian refugees became largely stateless after
| their expulsion. The Arab states didn't want them (and still
| don't, no matter what they say), and there was nowhere for
| them to go in Palestine besides the refugee camps. Most
| expelled ethnic refugees have a homeland willing to receive
| them, or at least sympathetic nations willing to give them
| asylum.
| skybrian wrote:
| Despite all this, as a casual observer, my general impression is
| Israel has done terribly at making the case for war, and
| specifically the kind of war their military seems to be carrying
| out.
|
| The most relevant comparison seems to be with the Russians.
| Russia has no credibility in the West and Israel is rapidly
| losing any they had, at least with younger people. My general
| impression is of a Russian-level intensity of destruction, too.
|
| But perhaps these impressions are wrong. I would normally assume
| the Israelis aren't complete idiots. I'd like to read a
| "steelman" case for this military campaign, if anyone knows of
| one. Why are these impressions misleading? What's really going
| on?
|
| (Yes, a major difference is that this is a counter-attack, but
| beyond that?)
| aprilthird2021 wrote:
| You will be made quite miserable if you find what you seek. The
| Israeli politicians basically see Gaza as a "problem"
| population which they cannot deal with and which is hampering
| their national goals. And it's shockingly and ironically
| similar to how Jewish people were looked at in another time and
| another place by another leader
| Animats wrote:
| Some of this information war seems to be intended from keeping
| the US from considering a third option - sitting this one out.
| One U.S. State Department official resigned over this when he saw
| Israel's weapons shopping list.[1]
|
| The US could provide humanitarian aid, but not military aid. Cut
| military aid to Israel. Maybe still provide Iron Dome reloads,
| but that's about it. Bring in a hospital ship off Gaza, to care
| for the injured. Send a few frigates to protect it from all
| parties. Discourage outside interference. Then wait to see how
| this plays out. It's not the US's fight, after all.
|
| Creating a lot of noise over the issue tends to force people to
| choose a side and eliminates middle options. That may be part of
| the intent of this campaign. "Are you with us, or against us".
| No, we're fed up with both of you.
|
| [1] https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-political-scene/why-a-
| sta...
| mastrsplyntr wrote:
| Why is America so fixated on Israel? Groups like AIPAC and the
| Israeli lobby seem to be steering U.S. policies in ways that
| don't necessarily benefit the U.S., while potentially harming its
| interests. Here's what's at stake:
|
| This alliance seems to be turning about two billion people and
| dozens of muslim-majority nations against America, driving them
| towards alliances with countries like China. American taxpayer
| money is being heavily invested in Israel. We're talking about a
| staggering $260 billion given to Israel, seemingly without direct
| benefits to the U.S. Ethically, the U.S. is on shaky ground. By
| consistently supporting Israel, even in cases involving civilian
| casualties, the U.S. appears to be undermining international law
| and the United Nations, often standing alone against global
| consensus. Looking at the U.S. presidency, it seems like
| candidates from both major parties have to win the favor of the
| Israeli lobby to secure their nomination. Take Obama, for
| example. Despite his apparent disdain for Netanyahu - remember
| the leaked conversation with Sarkozy where they called Netanyahu
| a liar? - he still seemed unable to counter the lobby's
| influence. This focus on Israel is a massive distraction from
| more pressing issues, like the rise of China.
|
| And let's be clear - Israel's loyalty as a Western ally is
| questionable. It's kept friendly ties with the Kremlin, hasn't
| joined in sanctioning Russia, and has turned down requests to
| send defensive weapons to Ukraine. It seems Israel would not
| hesitate to shift its allegiance to China if it suited its
| national interests.
| miketery wrote:
| It's realpolitik. It's not about Israel. It's about Russia and
| Iran. To a lesser extent it's also about the Suez.
|
| It also doesn't hurt that any aid, is defense spending in the
| US which is a stimulus for jobs or manufacturing for defense.
|
| Overall it's cheap expenditure for the US.
| paulddraper wrote:
| > Why is America so fixated on Israel?
|
| 1. It's a Western-style democracy in an Eastern anti-democratic
| location.
|
| 2. It doesn't hurt that there have been plenty of ethnic Jews
| in foreign policy positions.
|
| 3. The military industrial complex doesn't see costs as costs.
| tlogan wrote:
| I have no skin in this game but I have a lot of Jewish friends.
|
| I have two conclusions:
|
| - Whoever is in charged for this "pro-Israel" information war
| failed miserably. Even in Jewish communities.
|
| - Putin is clearly the winner here.
|
| The mistakes are the following:
|
| - They focused way too much on the mainstream media. And nearly
| nothing on TikTok, forums, etc.
|
| - They did nothing about China's and Russia's influence and their
| own info-war.
|
| - They assumed Biden is popular - or maybe they hoped his support
| will help in public. It did not.
|
| - They pushed "canceling" but public option about canceling
| changed considerable in last 6 months.
| aprilthird2021 wrote:
| Israeli politicians' own statements are the worst PR their
| government could ever have. Anyone remember the security
| minister saying "There are to be no expressions of joy" after
| Palestinian prisoners who were detained for years and never
| charged with any crime were returned home?
| hackandthink wrote:
| Journalists live dangerously in an information war:
|
| https://www.afp.com/en/inside-afp/journalists-killed-and-inj...
| Waterluvian wrote:
| I think the frustrating thing about the "information space" is
| that through a sum of "intentionally manipulative," "willfully
| ignorant," and "poised to attack you" voices, the whole space is
| pretty useless if your goal is to try to reconcile your strong
| emotions and thoughts on deeply nuanced, complex issues.
|
| I'm inclined, more than ever, to just stay quiet, but as a social
| animal that's exceedingly uncomfortable.
| istultus wrote:
| What an absolute mind-fuck.
|
| I think the greatest thing the Moscow-Teheran-Beijing "bot army
| diplomacy doctrine" is showing us is that you can radicalize both
| the US right AND the US Left at the same time by speaking to each
| side's idiocies at full throat.
|
| We are nearing Elders of Zion territory here where the ratio of 2
| Billion Muslims to 15 Million Jews, and thus the constant stream
| of anti-Israeli propaganda, now contains propaganda suggesting
| that we are deceived and in fact there is more pro-Israeli
| discoursem when in reality it is being drowned out.
| ssnistfajen wrote:
| What discourse you see online is entirely dependent on who you
| follow. TikTok is not force feeding you pro-Palestine content
| (and pro-Palestine [?] pro-Hamas, people who are unironically
| pro-Hamas are not to be taken seriously since they usually come
| with other nonsensical takes on everything). Neither is
| Twitter, Youtube, Instagram, or any other platform where
| content is recommended based on user preferences. Don't like
| what you see? Close it or use whatever feedback function built-
| in to strongly signal your distaste, and the algorithms will
| recommend less of that. My tech twitter timeline was unusable
| for weeks after October 7 because many people I follow started
| posting pro-Israel messages nonstop, to the point where I had
| to mute them because it's not what I followed them for despite
| having sympathy for Israelis after the attack from Hamas.
|
| I started getting ads obviously funded by the State of Israel
| and pro-Israel organizations on Youtube, on Twitter, on
| Instagram, and on TikTok (for a day or two). There were
| "Missing Person" posters of October 7th victims in my
| neighbourhood street which is located more than 10000+km from
| Israel (I feel bad for them and hope they will return home safe
| and sound, but what are these posters trying to achieve here in
| my neighbourhood? My local representative legislator is already
| supporting Israel and condemning Hamas). I'm not going to stop
| recognizing propaganda for being propaganda even if I mostly
| agree with its underlying message. That's a basic critical
| thinking skill and evidently that skill is lacking even mong
| highly successful and "intelligent" people on HN, tech Twitter,
| and so on.
| submeta wrote:
| There is no need for Russian/Iranian propaganda bots. Israel
| does that already for them: Seeing how Israel tries to defeat
| Hamas by withholding water, food, electricity, medicines for
| 2.2mil civilians in Gaza or by using genocidal language by
| Netanyahu and his war cabinet (Netanyahu: ,,they are Amalek!",
| Gallant: ,,they are human animals", Herzog: ,,there are no
| innocent in Gaza", and then compring Hamas to
| Hitler/Nazis/ISIS/Satan) or by bombing hospitals, schools,
| ambulances, killing civilians by the thousands, then at the
| same time handing out guns to Settlers who loot, kill, start
| pogroms in the West Bank.
| maximinus_thrax wrote:
| > suggesting that we are deceived and in fact there is more
| pro-Israeli discoursem when in reality it is being drowned out
|
| Ironically, people are jumping at the opportunity to contradict
| you and actually adding some new data points that you're
| actually right.
| jakefromstatecs wrote:
| > people are jumping at the opportunity to contradict you and
| actually adding some new data points that you're actually
| right.
|
| This argument is called a double-bind.
| grumple wrote:
| Exactly my thoughts on this. Hamas prepares propaganda videos
| that get shared widely on TikTok, openly calls for murdering
| Jews globally, and it gets amplified by 1.8 billion people
| whose holy book calls for attacks on Jews and on platforms that
| have repeatedly been used to spread misinformation (not just
| about this conflict). Nobody bats an eye; instead there's a
| conspiratorial take here as though the Jews secretly control
| the global social media narrative.
| fortran77 wrote:
| This is a bunch of easily disproved nonsense. Shame on Hacker
| News for aiding and abetting Hamas terrorists.
| zlg_codes wrote:
| It is a disgusting waste of my tax dollars to send it to an
| imperialist group trying to settle an area that was never theirs.
| Journalists are killed more by Israel than the rest. Why, if they
| were satisfied and confident they are correct? Those are the
| actions of guilty souls. Same for the ADL; they hide behind
| accusations of anti-semitism if you criticize them at all. They
| have weak positioning and simply want to genocide other groups.
| No better than ISIS and the Taliban as far as I'm concerned.
|
| Money sent to Israel could have gone to Ukraine. Instead,
| Americans sponsored the massacre of innocent Gazans. I didn't
| vote for that, most of us didn't vote for that. Why should we
| accept it, or approve of Israel's genocidal war? The least they
| could do is be honest about how much they hate people showing the
| world the truth.
|
| I truly have no respect or love in my heart for human beings who
| are comfortable killing to cover up their war crimes. As an
| American I'm sick of my tax dollars going to a bunch of desert
| conflicts that won't improve life for _anyone_.
| jhallenworld wrote:
| I've been watching Project Ask recently:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/@CoreyGilShusterAskProject/videos
|
| It's fascinating to hear opinions on the ground from both sides.
| Some things I've learned or concluded:
|
| Young Palestinians are much more radical than older ones, who
| seem more flexible.
|
| I personally think the two-state solution is a non-starter, and
| watched these videos to see if a one state solution is at all
| viable (meaning make Palestinians into Israeli citizens with full
| rights- basically the Zionists conquered the land, but they must
| also take the people). The problem is that neither side wants
| this.
|
| Many Jewish Israelis think the Arabs would outnumber them due to
| birth rate, but recently Ultra-Orthodox Jews have an even higher
| birth rate, and Palestinian birth rate has fallen (I speculate
| due to increased education). Extremist settlers absolutely won't
| have it, and there is rampant racism. Palestinians want the Jews
| gone from their lands, but when pressed would probably accept
| those of Palestinian descent.
|
| Sadly, I think we are going to continue with the one state with
| Apartheid. And, an interesting thing has happened in post-
| Apartheid South Africa: the realization that they are
| collectively poor, and not a rich first world country. One
| example from SA is that the electrical infrastructure was sized
| for only the whites, now that the full population is counted,
| there is just not enough, it's a big current problem. Any per-
| capita measurement of Israel should include the Palestinians to
| see the depth of this problem.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Have you thought about why young Palestinians have a different
| opinion from older ones? The opinion of powerless people is not
| set in stone, but is often a reaction to things outside of
| their control.
| jhallenworld wrote:
| Direct experience? Learning from their parents? Typical young
| person reaction to perceived injustice?
|
| They have internet, but unfortunately it's not a force for
| moderation.
| goalonetwo wrote:
| Coming from Europe and living in the US for the last couple of
| years, I'm shocked at how society here is clearly pro-israel.
|
| It is very clear that in the US the life of an israel citizen is
| valued way above the one of a palestinian. It is sad to lose that
| level of humanity.
|
| all of the discourse also conveniently ignores that Israel
| created a large-scale open-air prison in Gaza and removed any
| hope left for people living there.
| neilv wrote:
| I don't know what's going on, and I wonder who actually has
| accurate information.
|
| Speaking as an early online person, who has long believed in the
| democratizing power and goodness potential of the Internet...
| Contemporary "social media" are usually wastelands, both of
| rampant manipulation, and of people who haven't yet learned
| critical thinking nor even seen much examples of same.
|
| I would like to call for there to once again be eminently
| credible and respected journalists, academics, and officials, who
| research and understand various global situations, and report
| accurate assessments that people can trust.
|
| Trustworthy experts could answer immediate questions, and also
| show everyone else by example, how to think and speak better, to
| answer future questions.
| paganel wrote:
| This [1] is why the Palestinians are winning the information war
| among the people that still have a well-functioning soul. And, of
| course, the fact that the Tsahal has already annihilated
| thousands of Palestinians kids ("people under 18 years of age",
| to use the BBC euphemism) and is planning to annihilate thousands
| more.
|
| [1]
| https://old.reddit.com/r/redscarepod/comments/18dp0jp/mental...
| mupuff1234 wrote:
| https://twitter.com/sama/status/1732925866836210151
| loughnane wrote:
| I think it's been clear to most of us from the early days that
| the media is the second front in this war in way it's never been.
|
| "Success", whatever that looks like, lies in getting the rest of
| the world to care more about your side and/or be too apathetic or
| paralyzed to side when your enemies.
|
| That's always been the case to some degree, but this conflict is
| dropping on a hyper-connected video world that is new.
|
| It'd be foolish for the heads of either camp to not try to
| manipulate popular opinion. Sadly that makes it harder--though
| not impossible--to grok the truth, but practically I don't see it
| ever changing for the simpler.
| ChumpGPT wrote:
| Can you imagine that all it took for her to lose her job was
| ""Freedom for Palestine".
|
| That's the insanity about this whole thing. The Zionists don't
| believe Palestine nor the Palestinians deserve a homeland while
| many Jews believe they do. Zionism is an incredibly powerful
| entity that even brought Musk to his knees.
|
| That's the real story here.....
|
| Just saying....
| nomdep wrote:
| "Freedom for Palestine" implies "death to the Jews". Gaza has
| been attacking Israel the twenty years they have been free.
|
| Also, a couple of years back saying that all lives matter could
| to the same, so why the surprise?
| zer00eyz wrote:
| This is not surprising at all.
|
| I feel like we had this war's WMD moment and its just not being
| covered!
|
| The Al-Shifa hospital is a pretty interesting place:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Shifa_Hospital
|
| In 2014 it was called "...a de facto headquarters for Hamas
| leaders, who can be seen in the hallways and offices." From:
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/while-israe...
|
| The US and Israel claim that the hospital is again being used by
| Hammas:
| https://web.archive.org/web/20231205215049/http://www.reuter...
|
| "Hamas is using bunkers built by Israel under Al-Shifa Hospital,
| former Israeli prime minister says" From:
| https://edition.cnn.com/middleeast/live-news/israel-hamas-wa...
|
| Israel takes the hospital: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-
| east-67436154 and this is one of the few reports from the time. I
| find it odd that there is more coverage on getting there then on
| everything they found (or did not find).
|
| It takes almost a week to get footage of the "tunnel" that they
| found: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/19/idf-israel-
| arm...
|
| I have yet to see a diagram, or some solid on the ground
| reporting. I hear mixed messages that the tunnel is on the
| "hospital compound" or was found "Under a wall" that the tunnel
| is under the hospital or to a pharmacy next door. I get that
| there is a fog of war, but the BBC and CNN and all our other
| normal news sources just quit covering or explaining at that
| point.
|
| Israel has a history of bombing hospitals (2014):
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/21/gaza-crisis-un...
| so not exactly the first time this sort of thing has gone on.
|
| I would love for someone to COVER this, to explain what happened,
| what went right and what went wrong. To put all the peices in one
| place and paint a more accurate picture, because right now there
| isn't one, and I think that's indicative of this entire war.
| wslh wrote:
| I flagged the article since it is political in HN and it is
| unbalance with the antisemitism and anti-Israel information war.
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