zazen

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Everything posted by zazen

  1. @Hatfort Well written. Hassan Abi is pretty on point.
  2. @Nivsch Avi Dirchter (minister of Agriculture) is calling it the Nakba of Gaza. https://www.instagram.com/reel/Czmp3E3rK1Y/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA== Macron can support Israel’s right to defend itself is while also supporting a ceasefire. The hostages are being bombed too.
  3. “We must expel Arabs and take their place. Up to now, all our aspirations have been based on an assumption – one that has been vindicated throughout our activities in the country – that there is enough room in the land for the Arabs and ourselves. But if we are compelled to use force – not in order to dispossess the Arabs of the Negev or Transjordan, but in order to guarantee our right to settle there – our force will enable us to do so.” - Ben Gurion ( First prime minister of Israel ) Source: https://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/2013/04/06/the-ben-gurion-letter/
  4. https://x.com/AbbyMartin/status/1723871914697838751?s=20 ''37 prematurely born babies detached from their incubators at Al Shifa Gaza hospital under attack and siege due to lack of electricity and oxygen and now wrapped in blankets to avoid hypothermia. Kept alive with basic medical methods and at risk of death (2 died earlier today)'' https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-11-12/ty-article/israeli-security-cabinet-member-calls-north-gaza-evacuation-nakba-2023/0000018b-c2be-dea2-a9bf-d2be7b670000 https://x.com/hahauenstein/status/1723441134221869453?s=20 - video of Avi Dichter mentioning this to be a Gaza Nakba. No translation offered so if someone who speaks hebrew can confirm that would be great - although Hareetz already has which is reputable enough? "We are now actually rolling out the Gaza Nakba," says Avi Dichter, Israel's Minister for Agriculture and former head of Shin Bet. Palestinians will get no right to return to the newly conquered land of northern Gaza. Encroachment and settlements just like in West bank except on a mass scale. They will frame helping Gazans to move South to 'safety' as heroic, moral and noble all the whilst the true intention is that of a land grab. Propaganda uses decent human emotion to support indecent inhumane actions.
  5. That’s a shame. Sad to see them make fools of themselves for personal gain, fame or because the world just doesn’t listen to their cause. Their opportunism doesn’t invalidate the immense amounts of suffering we are seeing however as one can see for themselves in the link below: https://x.com/gozukarafurkan/status/1723798343040614634?s=46&t=DuLUbFRQFGpB8oo7PwRglQ That can’t all be “Pallywood.” My response to Pallywood wouldn’t be that “most of the suffering is fabricated and denying a humanitarian crises exists that breaks international law” but “why is it they need to stoop so low - because the world doesn’t listen to their cause or because that’s their source of possible income due to Israel blockading and hindering their economic development.” My response to Hamas having significant support in Gaza is not "Oh well exterminate everyone in Gaza then," it's "Wow, how hellish must Israel have made life in Gaza for that to be the case?"
  6. The Israeli propaganda machine is unmatched: “I’m not saying that the life in Gaza is great,” Israeli Ambassador Gilad Erdan said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “And, obviously, Hamas is the only one that should be held accountable for any situation in Gaza. But there is a standard, due to international humanitarian law. What does it mean, a humanitarian crisis? And I’m saying, again, there is no humanitarian crisis, based on the international humanitarian law right now in Gaza.” Denial of reality, denial that the world is waking up en mass. I write this from the gym in London, where even on BBC they are showing incubator babies dead from the electrical cuts to the hospital. Yesterday marked one of the largest protests in UK history with almost 1 million people. Unlike the incubator hoax story that led to US getting involved in the gulf wars this is evidently in our faces. I don’t see how Israel can recover from this tarnished reputation. “The witness who testified before the U.S. Congress was later identified as the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to the United States. The information provided was part of a larger effort by the Kuwaiti government to garner international support against Iraqi aggression.“
  7. Of course they have ties. I should have clarified that a lot of secular Jews base their Jewish identity on ethnicity and culture and have civic ties to the places they now live in more than they have nationalistic religious tie to Israel. Even if they do have an affiliation to Israel, that doesn’t mean you can elevate Jewish historical ties and claim the land but deny the Palestinians historic and present day ties to the land. It needs to be a shared heritage and land for all the people not just the Jews. The argument that Jews have only one homeland while Muslims have multiple lands oversimplifies the diversity within these groups. Muslims, like Jews, have distinct cultural, historical, and national identities. We can’t move Spanish people all to Italy just because they share European values and have Catholic ties for example - they have distinct identities based off their culture and land.
  8. Well put 👍🏻 although I don’t think Palestinians reward extremists as much as they have no options left to emancipate themselves with. Even amongst Hamas their are factions and infighting and some more extreme than others.
  9. Allowing Jews who have little to no tie to Israel the right to return and settle on someone else’s land doesn’t seem high value or consciousness to me. The people who were expelled from that land and are refugees don’t have a right to return but someone who has no connection except that maybe he has a ancestor from 2000 years ago who lived there has right to return. I don’t know how these people feel no shame for this? Only if they believe they are gods chosen people.
  10. What is your definition of apartheid? Why do many reputable organisations that call it that then. Even Israel’s own human rights group B'Tselem stated in a 2021 report that Israel is maintaining a maintaining a regime of Jewish supremacy, which it considers as apartheid.
  11. So the world is lower in consciousness and higher values than Israel? And that’s why they don’t ‘understand’ Israel - because they haven’t grown up to its level?
  12. There were protestors for those as well. The difference with this is that its been going on for decades without end, building and brewing. And now with more right wing nationalist governments coming to power all over the world Israel is ahead and gone too far right with its policies and encroaching of the West Bank for example. That mixed with social media today where all is visible is what’s made the world awake to this cause. People have been condemning Hamas but also are for the Palestinians to be made free. Can you see that Israel is an apartheid state? Babies dying in hospitals due to lack of electricity and resources that Israel has cut off. Is every Hospital or the whole of Northern Gaza a Hamas camp site or base? This is just unjustifiable - even Israel’s own allies such as Belgium and Macron from France are saying this. Even when Elon Musl says that Israel’s strategy will only create more Hamas fighters pro Israelis just say he’s unwise and doesn’t know any better. The arrogance and narcissism is palpable - and in the end parasitic to the host that harbours it. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna124786
  13. Most people don’t support terrorists but a just cause to resist oppression and a modern day apartheid state which needs be dismantled in a post apartheid world. Modernity has no appetite for apartheid. Yes, the cause which at its core is a resistance movement was used by terrorist factions or more extreme people who use terrorist tactics - but that doesn’t invalidate the cause or excuse Israel’s actions. If someone thinks a solution to the Palestinian issue is that they should remain under the rule or control of Israel because they are undeveloped or may cause terror you are calling for an apartheid state. Apartheid as a system, is inherently discriminatory and involves institutionalized racial segregation and discrimination. That makes them a racist at worst and a racist sympathiser at best.
  14. Israel in reality already exists as a one state but as an apartheid state (they occupy West Bank and control Gaza). We live in a post apartheid world and Israel’s current form is just not acceptable to modern sentiments. That is all that people are calling an end to, not Israelis or Jews themselves. Seeing the current situation and what’s wrong about it isn’t complicated - it’s getting to the solution that is complicated.
  15. People tend to link specific words with extreme scenarios. For instance, when hearing "ethnic cleansing," the immediate association is often with mass killings, like the Holocaust. However, ethnic cleansing also involves expulsion or displacement, as seen in current situations, such as Gazans being pushed towards Egypt or people from the West Bank moving into Jordan. While these events may not reach the extreme levels of mechanistic killing seen in the Holocaust, they still represent instances of ethnic cleansing. The extreme cases often shape our understanding of the associated words, even if the current reality is not identical.
  16. That's the crux of the matter, whats the reason for the war in the first place. There's a difference between ISIS who's reason for war is to establish Islamic Globalism and a group resisting on what was their homeland but using religion to give juice to their cause . Securing a living space for their race is what Hitler was going for, and what hard line Zionism orients around - ethnocentric racial superiority - but this time they have religious sentiments such as being the chosen people to fuel it further whilst living in a time where the standards of what is right and wrong have changed ie colonial expansion and expulsion being bad. So they play the long game and this can only occur strategically and slowly enough to go under the radar of the international community. You mentioned in a earlier post, the idea of Palestinians or other Arabs probably being better managed under Israeli or Western leadership because they are unable to govern themselves. If I heard that anywhere else Id mistake that for being a colonial apologist - the belief that people have to earn their liberation by submitting to oppression, to prove that they will be responsible with their liberation because they are less developed. By that logic lets bend over to the Japanese at how orderly and respectfully they seem to live. Allow a people their own growth or whatever is imposed will be disposed by retaliation, rebellion and resistance. If Israel or any countries safety requires the occupation, imprisonment and oppression of a people, you don't have safety and never will. History has shown us this by the dismantling of the colonial powers. Everything that colonial power will have will be inherently violent and must be upheld through violence - that violence will be justified through ideas of superiority and the idea that those you oppress must be more violent and oppressive than you. And when that oppression is resisted as it always has been, that violence will be used to feed the fear of safety needed to maintain that cycle, a cycle set in motion by the colonizers first and which frames the colonized as the undeveloped violent ones that need be tamed in a modern world. Having developed capabilities doesn't automatically mean a having developed character or consciousness. There are tribes with little technological or political development yet they have pure hearts and will share their food and homes with you, despite lacking material abundance.
  17. Curios to know what viewpoints you guys disagree on within the video. Before assuming he's a radical Islamist you can check this video where he critiques the Islamists obsession with establishing Islamic state for example:
  18. The current occupied areas by the Russians were part of Russia historically and the population there were more pro Russian so he could just take that land and have a strategic win + gain respect domestically. Occupying the other parts of Ukraine would be never ending struggle as they are more heavily opposed to Russia - it would be a Israel/Palestine situation that never ends. Putin got what was Russia's historically and further created a buffer zone to secure Russia against Nato. Pretty sure that would be the end of it. The West also want to shift resources to the Middle East for the war on terror 2.0.
  19. True, that's why if you can't trust their character, you can at best trust them to pursue their own interest. Not as much need to rely on character, consciousness or stage of development when you can rely on self interest of both parties aligning. A stage orange person who's money oriented may start a business with a stage green person who's environmentally oriented - the sustainable business and social investing trend. Different values, but they align to cooperate. Even the ESG movement is basically the marrying of the capitalist financiers with the anti-capitalist social liberals. The capitalists still get to make money whilst appeasing and avoiding revolution from the socialists. Europe established peace after world war by the same means, cooperation and economic interdependence - the deeper connection came later. Likewise the US with its strong navy established the safety of sea lanes and global flow of trade to allow countries to become more dependent on each other which aligned their interests despite their opposing sentiments. Even with this conflict, we can see who among the Muslim world is the most and least vocal depends on who is the most interdependent. Saudi is less vocal as they depend on the USA for security. They may not trust USA, but their incentives align - Saudi gets security whilst US gets a stronghold in the region including petrodollar. USA becoming a net energy exporter thanks to shale etc obviously changes that which is why Saudi has to orient towards peace among the region including with Iran. Turkey has been more vocal because although they do trade a lot with the West, financial ties can more easily be re-oriented away but security not - and security is more of a need over prosperity. Turkey has one of the strongest armies in the region and isn't dependent and left as vulnerable. To see people made refugees is sad, but to see refugees on their own land made refugees once again with whats happening now is appalling.
  20. Peace only requires cooperation, not deep connection. It is operational based on incentive and personal gain rather than intention and personal trust. It's more of a association rather than a brother/sisterhood alliance. When each side can't trust the others intention - hidden heart of the other, they can rely on incentives to align and the hidden hand of personal gain to allow their society to at least be operational and civil. Distrusting everyone's wiser than trusting everyone, but knowing who to trust is superior to both. Good judgement grants the freedom to trust as without judgment you get hurt less by simply assuming everyone is bad - the opportunity cost however is peace, prosperity and passing on the good people among the other side. The more actively distrusting you are whether as a person or country, the more cautious others are of you - in a sense you only condemn and hurt yourself. This is what Israel does when it shuns world opinion. Netenyahu and his cabinets narcissistic middle finger to the world is its loss. Using spiral dynamics lingo for this - if you can't trust their state of being, you can rely on structural incentive (state vs structure). The question is what structure of society best incentives both towards peace? A apartheid like structure with unequal rights and a security apparatus that discriminates on a segment of the population definitely doesn't.
  21. ''For every Hamas member you kill how many do you create? And if you create more than you kill, you've not succeeded.'' - Elon Musk This video by the Israeli professor Sam Vaknin seems very fair and objective. Unfortunately, it seems a solution barely exists or would be hard to come to fruition.
  22. @DawnC It's a complex situation with a long history of back and forths that will take a lot of time to delve into every detail of. I see wrongs on both sides and a just cause on both also, but for practical purposes we can either discuss the current situation going forward and the general root cause of the issue. Labels often confine us to the actions associated with those labels more than they liberate us. Labels are like psychic chains, nationalities are like psychic cages and literal interpretations of religion are like a psychic straitjacket. Each more confining, restricting and stubborn. Both parties have mutually exclusive claims to the land, divinely legitimized by their religions. It's very hard to negotiate over land that is claimed holy by both sides, especially in the case of Jerusalem and the site of Al Aqsa. Wishful thinking would be for either or both of them to discard religion and give away parts of the land, but even non religious people have land disputes. What makes it harder is that it's a small piece of land with limited resources, and we expect both parties who feel entitled to this land to negotiate over this. The peace proposals never admitted full sovereignty to the Palestinians, the security apparatus from Israels side that they insisted on setting up in Palestine feels intrusive and could at any time creep towards authoritarian - as has been confirmed by whats happening in the West Bank. This nullifies a two state solution defined by Israel that wishes to 'occupy' the Palestinian side with some form of security to thwart any future terrorism - including the plans to handle Gaza indefinetley as Netenyahu is saying. They will not be governed peacefully by a regime that just bombarded their homes and killed their loved ones. If people are tamed like animals - every movement, thought and action - they will lash out like such for the freedom to be human again. To add insult to injury, this is not only done in a random land but on their own home land which humiliates them further and only adds to an angered resistance that eventually erupts. *Solutions* Genocide by expulsion won't work as they will only plot their return from slightly further away (Egypt or Jordan), two state won't work because no side is willing to capitulate to what they feel entitlement to, one state governed by Israel won't work because they have shown to abuse their position of power by being complicit in settlement expansion and unequal rights. That leaves a one state solution ideally a secular state with equal rights for all or possibly a Lebanon style system where each side is given positions of power equally in governing the country. In practice, a quasi one state already exists with Israel controlling Gaza, and occupying the West Bank. Is it feasible though? Are both sides willing to work for this? I'm not sure after all thats happened, but if Jews are able to live within Europe and especially in Germany where Nazi's once industrially massacred them, then hopefully they can live together and put the past aside.