Israel / Palestine News Thread

[Karmadhi]

37 minutes ago, Nivsch said:

@Karmadhi In this kind of environment, evolved or advanced western minded people too can behave differently in heated situations when face survival challenges. You see this in America's wars and the Europeen coalition as well. Israel's historical as well as present policies aren't worse than those of the rest of the West in any sense.

If you compare the West bombing of Yugoslavia it was far more surgical and less civilian deaths than this war for example.

I have not seen the West in the last 10 years or so intentionally target journalists, medics, hospitals etc.

Did the US have a policy of sniping childreen in the Middle East?

Many other examples.

The war crimes in Gaza are perhaps the worst of the 21st Century.

To be honest you do not need to look at Al Jazeera or other media outlets which Israelis percieve as anti Jewish or biased against Israel.

Just read what B'Tselem, they are Israeli and they seem to well report a lot of the horrible things going on there.

You can educate yourself just by reading Israeli sources.

Lastly and this is off topic. Which Israeli leader would you prefer to be in power if Bibi steps down?

Edited October 15, 2024 by Karmadhi

[Leo Gura]

12 minutes ago, Nivsch said:

Why not?

By Ethno state I mean to more than 50% of the population to be Jews.

You can have whatever percentage of whoever in a nation without having to devote your nation to one priveleged ethnicity or religion.

This kind of priveleging leads to racist policy and oppression of minorities.

Obviously I don't expect Israel to appreciate this or change.

Edited October 15, 2024 by Leo Gura

[Nivsch]

4 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

You can have whatever percentage of whoever in a nation without having to devote your nation to one priveleged ethnicity or religion.

This kind of priveleging leads to racist policy.

I agree that no ethnicity should be privileged, but technically you still need to have slightly above 50% of the power to the law and court to stay western.

Edited October 15, 2024 by Nivsch

[zazen]

43 minutes ago, Nivsch said:

@Karmadhi In this kind of environment, evolved or advanced western minded people too can behave differently in heated situations when face survival challenges. You see this in America's wars and the Europeen coalition as well. Israel's historical as well as present policies aren't worse than those of the rest of the West in any sense.

That's what makes the West stand out, in particular the US. They are not at risk of survival, yet act out barbarically across the planet as if they need to stamp out some existential threat. Bombing regions into the stone age whilst calling people in those regions primitive and backwards - when they act primitive and backwards. Acting out impulsive and violent like stage red, but with all the gadgets and tech that stage orange offers, justifying it through stage blue and green morality. American exceptionalism is a form of barbarity with a face lift of utopian ideals.

As far as Israel is concerned, they literally create their survival challenges by their very own policy. No country or group is actually a existential threat to Israel, yet they amplify them as threats to their ''survival'' to justify their policies of ''defense'' which happen to be settlement expansion and further land grabbing now to create buffer zones between them and their ''enemies''.

Edited October 15, 2024 by zazen

[Nivsch]

7 minutes ago, zazen said:

No country or group is actually a existential risk to Israel,

This actually doesn't matter if there is a real tangible enough existential threat or not.

The experience of Israelis is that there is. And when not to Israel, to their own lives.

From there their thinking about Palestinians and any operation Israel conducts against terrorist organizations stems.

Edited October 15, 2024 by Nivsch

[PurpleTree]

15 minutes ago, Nivsch said:

I agree that no ethnicity have to be privileged, but technically you still need at least 50% of the power to the law and court to stay western.

To stay western or jewish?

 

24 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

I will go back and research. Busy right now. Just your tone seems to be a bit apologetic. Calling you Pro Israel was perhaps a bit of an exageration. My apologies.

I just think this endless back and forth on a message board is quite ridiculous. 

You are not changing anybodys mind. You are not changing anything. You are not helping anybody in the warzone with your posts. And you’re not a better person because of it, not at all. Maybe it makes you feel a bit better about yourself.

And that’s not to you personally mostly to the guys writing their ideological essays on here and stuff.

Edited October 15, 2024 by PurpleTree

[Nivsch]

8 minutes ago, PurpleTree said:

To stay western or jewish?

Western. Orange. Human rights. Individual rights.

[zazen]

There's an argument that goes, "If you or any other society were in our position, you'd act the same," but that's simply not true. In the other thread about Western imperialism, a similar claim is  made: "If another country or civilization had the wealth, power, and tools that the West has, they'd also exploit it through global conquest and domination the way the US does today." I've seen many right wingers use this case of projection and universalizing of bad behavior as a way to excuse it because it's just a ''inevitability'' of human nature - an ''externality'' of a ''system of perverse incentives'' (moloch) that absolves any one party of blame.

Many civilizations throughout history, despite possessing the military and economic means to engage in aggressive territorial conquest, chose other pathways to spread their influence. Through religion, culture, trade, or diplomacy. The Islamic Golden Age, the Mauryan Empire under Ashoka, and the Tang Dynasty are just a few examples of civilizations (on different continents) that exercised restraint or focused on cultural diffusion rather than outright domination.

They demonstrate that violent conquest is not an inevitable result of power. It's a choice that's been resisted by some of the greatest empires in history. These civilizations recognized that expansion and influence don’t need to be built on the corpses of your enemies. The imperial mindset - that to be powerful means to dominate is retroactively used by imperial apologists in the West to excuse the blood soaked history of their own empires. They conflate wealth with worth, and so any means that helps them to obtain and accumulate wealth/resources is glorified and justified. This is where the 'might makes right' mentality stems from. 

Edited October 15, 2024 by zazen

[Karmadhi]

28 minutes ago, Nivsch said:

I agree that no ethnicity should be privileged, but technically you still need to have slightly above 50% of the power to the law and court to stay western.

Issue Leo is saying Nivsch is that Israel gives special rights and privileges to Jews over non Jews.

The percentage of population is irrelevant, what matters is that a Jewish person should be equal to a non Jewish person.

 

Edited October 15, 2024 by Karmadhi

[royce]

25 minutes ago, PurpleTree said:

You are not changing anybodys mind. You are not changing anything.

You're talking about yourself, maybe you're being too closed-minded. People change their minds all the time—I change mine every day.

Be water my friend.

Edited October 15, 2024 by royce

[Karmadhi]

28 minutes ago, PurpleTree said:

I just think this endless back and forth on a message board is quite ridiculous. 

You are not changing anybodys mind. You are not changing anything. You are not helping anybody in the warzone with your posts. And you’re not a better person because of it, not at all. Maybe it makes you feel a bit better about yourself.

And that’s not to you personally mostly to the guys writing their ideological essays on here and stuff.

Why are you writting here then?

If you see it as pointless.

[Nivsch]

21 minutes ago, zazen said:

"If you or any other society were in our position, you'd act the same," but that's simply not true

Do you see France sitting here between Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria and not acting the same as Israel does? Of course it will.

Edited October 15, 2024 by Nivsch

[hundreth]

16 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

Issue Leo is saying Nivsch is that Israel gives special rights and privileges to Jews over non Jews.

The percentage of population is irrelevant, what matters is that a Jewish person should be equal to a non Jewish person.

 

@Nivsch's point is that without the Jewish majority the votes will inevitably lead to non western values. Which seems true. If votes are determining policy, that will be the result.

[hundreth]

45 minutes ago, zazen said:

As far as Israel is concerned, they literally create their survival challenges by their very own policy. No country or group is actually a existential threat to Israel, yet they amplify them as threats to their ''survival'' to justify their policies of ''defense'' which happen to be settlement expansion and further land grabbing now to create buffer zones between them and their ''enemies''.

To be fair, Israel has had major wars with multiple Arab / Muslim nations attacking them at once with the goal of their extermination. This occurred while Gaza / West Bank were not in their control.

This is a valid concern.

It's hard to say how much the landscape has changed and what is true today, but this all happened basically yesterday.

[PurpleTree]

14 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

Why are you writting here then?

If you see it as pointless.

No reason.

I was trying to find a reason but I couldn’t.

Edited October 15, 2024 by PurpleTree

[hundreth]

Sometimes it's worth zooming out just a little.

[royce]

@hundreth  I really hope you're just trolling, please tell me you're not being that simple. 

[hundreth]

Just now, royce said:

@hundreth  I really hope you're just trolling, please tell me you're not being that simple. 

It isn't the whole picture, but if you're capable of holding two truths at once there is something there.

Of course this doesn't take away from the plight of the Palestinians and isn't justification for land theft.

It's just that at the end of the day, what's done is done. The Jews are there now. Much like how the Jews were exiled from land to land over the years, even as recently as post 1948, the Palestinians have essentially been exiled. It is not their fault, but this is what happened. In the case of the Jews, Israel has taken in most of these refugees, and life goes on. In the case of the Palestinians, a conceptual division was created between them and the rest of the Muslim / Arab world - and thus life for them cannot go on. They must fight to the death for lines on a map. 

Where does this fight to the death lead? To death. There will not be a two state solution. There won't be a state within a state where is a tunnel linking one side of Palestine to the other. There won't be a one state solution where a population war ensues and constant conflict. The end result is the exile of the Palestinians one way or the other. And if not, then the extermination of the Jews living there now. In either scenario, it's not good. 

With all the money and resources spent on this never ending war, and all the lives lost - these Palestinians could all have been multi millionaires living somewhere else. Now of course not everything is about money, but life goes on. Life isn't about lines on a map either. 

[zazen]

36 minutes ago, hundreth said:

Sometimes it's worth zooming out just a little.

Netenyahu and Ben Shapiro used this to influence Jordan Peterson lol. I kind of get it at a glance but we have to zoom out whilst not missing depth and distinction. This is propaganda at play which can easily deceive us, including me when I first saw it.

Imagine suggesting that a European country should cede land or sovereignty for the benefit of another group based solely on shared European identity.

It’s illogical and un-ethical particularly to the people who have deep rooted historical ties to that land. This conflation is used to dilute distinct identities into one big grouping of “Arabs” to then make it look like they’re unreasonable in not just giving a slither of their “collective” land. Imagine Portugal had to give up land to a persecuted group and they were told it’s fine because they’re European and there’s plenty of European states.

 

Edited October 15, 2024 by zazen

[hundreth]

Just now, zazen said:

It’s illogical and un-ethical particularly to the people who have deep rooted historical ties to that land. This conflation is used to dilute distinct identities into one big grouping of “Arabs” to then make it look like their u reasonable to just give a slither of their “collective” land. Imagine Portugal had to give up land because it’s European.

I think given the alternatives, it is the most reasonable. Are European Jews and Middle Eastern Jews the "same entity?" - probably even further apart than the Palestinians and other Arabs. They are together now because it is practical.

The alternative is one side wins. Maybe "your" side wins, and justice is served. I'm guessing this applies more to @royce than yourself, who is happy to see dead Zionists. Ok great, now all of the Jews are wiped out from the area. Will this extermination be justice? Will a fight to the death where Palestinians are exiled be justice?

This is the reality, and given that reality I believe it is "logical." It may not be idealistic, but it is logical.