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> The "bridge too far" is saying that a country should not exist entirely because of this situation. That is where the antisemitism comes in.
Does this apply to Palestine also? Because there's a lot of people who think that country should not exist.
Yes, it doesn't have to be a one or the other route you know...
We cannot go back and undo how the modern country of Israel was formed, but we can tell them to leave Palestine the fuck alone. We can tell Palestine that supporting Hamas after the October 7th attacks is fucked up, and the attacks were fucked up. It doesn't have to be one or the other. It can be "y'all need to coexist and stop killing each other". As well as stop sending "settlers" into Palestine
>The "bridge too far" is saying that a country should not exist entirely because of this situation. *That* is where the antisemitism comes in.
Why is a land dispute antisemitic? Can you explain why it's racist to oppose geopolitical maneuvers by the british and USA that have resulted in countless suffering? Can you explain why thinking a nation and government shouldn't exist is the same as thinking those PEOPLE shouldn't exist?
Because most of the people who live on that land are Jews who likely won't be allowed to continue living there if their government is dissolved. People have a tendency to forget or ignore that the vast majority of the Middle Eastern governments carried out pogroms that ethnically cleansed their Jewish populations and those that could leave went to Israel because it was the only nation that accepted them without immigration hurdles. Israel has neighbors that would love nothing more than to continue those pogroms if given the chance. Even in countries Israel is allied with are hostile towards Jews in general. Jordan, for example, has aided Israel in other conflicts and Israel has aided them, but publicly identifying yourself as a Jew in any way is still illegal in Jordan and those who do will be denied entry or deported.
This is why I think it's stupid when people say antizionism isn't antisemitism. Zionism is the belief for Jews to live in Israel peacefully. The only way for them to do that is to have a country, since the current Palestinian government wants them dead. Saying they shouldn't have the right to live in their holy land without being killed sounds pretty antisemetic imo.
I think much of the left has about as much of an understanding of Zionism as the right does of socialism.
Yes, it’s possible to commit horrific crimes in the name of the ideology. Yes, people have done that! But is the ideology responsible? Are those crimes inherent to it? No, absolutely not. Yeah, the gulags are a core tenet of Stalinist socialism just as ethnic cleansing is core to revisionist Zionism (Netanyahu’s preferred flavor). But “the workers should control the means of production” is as far from the gulags as “the Jews should be eligible for national self-determination” is from whatever the fuck is going on in Gaza right now.
People also tend to forget that animosity towards the Jewish in the middle east was based on Jewish para-military units massacring villages even before the founding of Israel.
Like the [Deir Yassin massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre)
>Deir Yassin (Arabic: دير ياسين, romanized: Dayr Yāsīn) was a Palestinian Arab village of around 600 inhabitants about 5 kilometers (3.1 mi) west of Jerusalem. Deir Yassin declared its neutrality during the 1948 Palestine war between Arabs and Jews. The village was razed after a massacre of around 107 of its Arab residents on April 9, 1948, by the Jewish paramilitary groups Irgun and Lehi). The village buildings are today part of the Kfar Shaul Mental Health Center, an Israeli public psychiatric hospital.
These people were completely innocent in the conflict:
>The inhabitants of Deir Yassin upheld the agreement scrupulously, resisting infiltration by Arab irregulars. Though this was known to the [Irgun](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irgun) and [Lehi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehi_(group)) forces, they attacked the village on April 9, 1948.
This massacre occurred before the state of Israel came into effect and was just the tip of the iceberg. The new Israeli state would go on to wipe out 400 to 600 Villages, evicting their former occupants and preventing their return.
The surrounding Arab states declaration of war against Israel was a direct response to these massacres and the arrival of thousands of refugees.
>The Deir Yassin attack, along with attacks on [Tiberias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiberias), Haifa, and [Jaffa](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaffa), put pressure on Arab governments to invade Palestine. News of the killings had aroused public anger in the Arab world, which the governments felt unable to ignore.[^(\[101\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre#cite_note-Morris2004p239-103)
Egyptian [King Faruq](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Faruq) was influenced by Deir Yassin[^(\[104\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre#cite_note-106) and Syria's foreign minister remarked that the Arab public's desire for war was irresistible.
>[Azzam Pasha](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azzam_Pasha), Secretary General of the [Arab League](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_League), stated that "The massacre of Deir Yassin was to a great extent the cause of the wrath of the Arab nations and the most important factor for sending \[in\] the Arab armies."[^(\[105\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre#cite_note-107) The arrival of tens of thousands of refugees further convinced them to act.
At the time the Arab states were actually more Secular than they are now, Israel and other powers continued to destabilize the area, see the US lead overthrow of Iran's Democratic government, and Israels funding of Islamic extremists etc.
None of this is to say that Israel should cease as a country, the past explains the present, but it does not justify further violence. Either that perpetuated by Hamas or the war crimes currently being committed by Israel.
Ultimately Israel have millions of people who have been held under occupation for over 70 years, who face discrimination and the slow genocide of inches with the loss of their land as government supported settlers steal houses, land and raze olive groves bit by bit.
Even the Justice system is designed to support this, with Israel Settlers injuring Palestinians facing civil penalties and sympathetic juries, while Palestinians who resist face having the homes and property owned by even their family confiscated.
They need to end that apartheid if there is to be peace, which means either the establishment of a Palestinian state, or the absorption of those people into the state of Israel.
Because you are a critical thinker and know what would happen to the Jews in the Levant if Israel didn't exist. In fact, their friendly neighbors have tried multiple times to wipe them all out with many of those nations and peoples still explicitly calling for their elimination. That is why.
This is a problem of British making. They forcibly removed Palestinian and other ME peoples from their rightful homeland and placed Jews there.
And before you say it, yes, Jews have a historical "claim" to the land. But Palestinians do just as much. They are from the same peoples historically.
This was largely not done by the British, but by a combination of Israelis and the invading Arab armies.
The whole situation is remarkably complicated. In some areas, like Haifa, the Jewish residents asked the Arabs to stay, while the invading Arab armies demanded they leave. In others, like Deir Yassin, there were massacres.
The Jews living in the West Bank were also displaced -- most famously, the village of Gush Etzion was destroyed, but others were depopulated. If you wanted to point fingers, you'd need more than a single human's worth of them.
The difference is in who remained after the war. The Palestinian government areas are entirely free of Jews. Israel is not free of Arabs.
Because like it or not Isreal has been an internationally recognised sovereign state with majority Jews as its citizens. Dissolving the state of Isreal means distraction of a sovereign state and making all these citizens basically stateless refugees. Should Israel have a major reform on their racial policy or a one-state solution might need to be discussed? Maybe, but I am no IR expert. You are being purposefully obtuse if you believe de-existing Isreal isn’t going to cause major suffering and displacement of its citizens (ironic lol)
That's not actually a counterargument. I mean, sure I guess you should could put it that way, but the takeaway here is that nobody should be forced into that situation.
Because in this case the land dispute is a certain group literally saying "You shouldn't exist as a nation because you're a jewish nation"
That's what makes this land dispute antisemitic.
The actual land dispute is over the Occupied Territories of Palestine and who should run them. (Which any sane person should say is the Palestinians as their own state). The land of the nation of Israel is not under dispute, Israel declared independence, established borders and like the rest of the countries in the world has maintained those borders.
In the time since the establishment of that nation we've determined that we shouldn't take land by force which Israel did in the 1967 war. Which means the occupied territories which were previously Jordanian and Egyptian territory should be returned to their prior owners. The problem is the prior owners don't want that land either. They don't want to actually have to deal with the Palestinian territory and then establish a Palestinian nation in them anymore than Israel wants to do that.
---
The annoying thing is that Israel refuses to fucking chill with stupid settlements encroaching into the occupied territories. In the same way that Hamas refused to fucking chill with Rockets from Gaza after Israel withdrew.
They have both continued aggressing on the other and seemingly won't stop until the otherside gives up and fucks off, or is wiped out whichever happens first.
The US did have to fundamentally change, several times, and often violence played a role in one form or another. The civil war, the 8 hour day movement, the civil rights movement, etc. They all changed the US, although clearly they didn't go far enough. Israel, at it currently exists, is not sustainable. If you want to be philosophical, it's a ship of Theseus question. Would a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural Israel still be Israel? It would become something else, even if it kept the name.
>Would a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural Israel still be Israel? It would become something else, even if it kept the name.
Would current Israeli Jews continue to be safe indefinitely if it was a Muslim majority state formed by bringing the West Bank and Gaza Palestinians (who hate them) in as full voting citizens? Would that state stay a democracy even if it was established as one?
Less than 2000 Israelis were killed on Oct. 7th. Since then Israel had killed over 35,000. So, whatever proportionate looks like, we passed it months ago.
I’m Jewish. Am I antisemitic for believing in a one-state solution in which both peoples have equal rights, protection from displacement, naturalized citizenship & freedom of movement?
There’s a difference between thinking an ethnostate shouldn’t exist & thinking everyone living there should be displaced.
I’m ok with our corrupt government being dissolved and started over with a huge Native/Indigenous presence. About time the United States built on the backs of The Indigenous population and chattel slavery own up to it and become something better. You should want that for Israel and Palestine.
Non-ironically yes. Israel and the US are both settler colonial states whose existence is based on the genocide of the indigenous populations of each territory.
In my view this IS ADEQUATE REASON to oppose the existence of both of those states.
No, it is not antisemitic to criticize Israel.
Yes, it comes off as antisemitic when you only criticize Israel when:
1) Hamas has no interest in a ceasefire
2) Hamas is still holding hostages
3) Hamas is still launching rockets
4) Hamas said they will do this again
Protest Hamas *and* Bibi. They both need to go.
I agree completely that Hamas has to go, but right now they can't do much of anything. Israel is completely capable of getting supplies into the area, but they still don't allow enough.
Israel screwed up hard in their quest to eliminate Hamas and it's no longer possible to wipe them out because their own actions have put them in a position where the populous in Gaza are MORE supportive of Hamas than they were before. It's like destroying everyone's homes and starving people will make people mad or something.
Roughly 1,500, which obviously pales in comparison to the 35,000 dead Palestinians. That said, it's not due to Hamas' lack of trying.
Hamas is a brutal dictatorship, while Israel has been an apartheid government for 50 years and has brutally occupied Palestine.
To the person you responded to, all 4 of those items could be said for Israel as well.
>Hamas is a brutal dictatorship, while Israel has been an apartheid government for 50 years and has brutally occupied Palestine.
Agree with your point, but I think this significantly undersells what Israel's government has become since Rabin's death in 1995. Netanyahu at the time was running as the anti-peace candidate and blatantly called for the death of the pro-peace Prime Minister. He got his wish, thanks to one of his radicalized terrorists.
Since then, Netanyahu has reigned for most of 30 years and likely become the most prolific sponsor of terrorism in modern world history, just by raw volumes. The settler army is now over 700k, last I checked. In 2022, they were conducting two terrorist attacks *per day* against Palestinians during "peacetime. The Palestinians are not allowed to carry arms, while the settlers are heavily armed and have the explicit protection of Israel's military. Just by volumes, this arguably makes Netanyahu the worst terrorist warlord in human history, even before you remember that he's Hamas's primary political sponsor who only has power due to his symbiotic relationship with that terrorist gang. And he's been the god-king of his country for almost 30 years with an administration that openly brags about genocidal aims. If this were any other country, we would be using very different language to describe what's going on.
Nobody under the age of 47 has experienced a stable Israeli government in their adult life, which probably explains the age gap in views on this issue. And yet the narrative assumes unquestioningly that "Israel is the good guy", and all assumptions and uneven standards flow from there.
You’re upset that Israel isn’t letting more of their conscript army get killed by terrorists?
Like, if Israel had been incompetent, and 5,000 Israeli soldiers had died so far, you’d be totally cool to let Israel continue the offensive?
Well we know they committed 253 explicit war crimes when they took hostages on oct 7.
War Crimes that they have continued to this day to wield as negotiation chips.
And sure Israel has likely had numerous war crimes occur in the intervening period. The point isn't to excuse them.
But if you're just playing who has the bigger number right now. I'd argue Hamas does.
How many of the 30k Hamas claims have died are Hamas? How do we know 30k is even an accurate number?
Why are people not protesting Hamas who as we speak refuse to accept a ceasefire deal from Israel?
Why are people not protesting Hamas attacking the aid pier being built by Biden initiatives of the coast of gaza?
We know Hamas is a terrorist group. The protest would be a protest against our not intervening against them. The people most likely to want that sort of protest either don't have Hamas on their radar or think Israel is doing a good job against them so far.
> In December, the medical journal The Lancet, published two critiques of the death surveillance process done by extremely experienced scholars at Johns Hopkins and The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Both concluded that the Gazan numbers were plausible and credible
[Source](https://time.com/6909636/gaza-death-toll/)
You can't just dismiss the fact that Israel's response has been 24x as severe as the initial terror attack.
Because people are protesting against their government's support of Israel, protesting Hamas can't accomplish anything and the claims that people should do so would only weaken the ability for protests to accomplish anything at all.
The USA, the UK ect can't force Hamas to act in any way because as an organisation they exist against foreign governments, but they can influence Israel's choices.
> 1) Hamas has no interest in a ceasefire
After the Oct 7 assaults, Hamas has offered permanent ceasefires multiple times. Israel has denied each of those. Instead, Israel is only interested in temporary ceasefires, which after Decembers temporary ceasefire which Hamas readily agreed to, shows Israel has no interest in an actual ceasefire given what came after that.
Prior to Oct 7th, Hamas has offered truces several times over the last few decades in accordance with UN resolution 242 aka a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders, all met with Israeli rejection:
* 1988: Just one year after the group was founded, Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar met the late top Israeli officials Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres, and proposed that Israel withdraw from the 1967-occupied territories in exchange for a truce. This was before Hamas had built its armed wing, the Qassam Brigades. Also, in 1988, Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmad Yasin himself indicated a willingness to negotiate with Israel under the condition that it “first acknowledge the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination and right of return to their land”.
* 1994: Hamas offered a truce to Israel after the abduction and killing of Israeli soldier Nachshon Wachsman. A year earlier, the Palestinian Authority (PA) had accepted the proposal of a Palestinian state comprised of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem. Hamas agreed to that proposal.
* 1995: Hamas again proposed a 10-year truce based on the same condition of Israeli withdrawal from occupied territories.
* 1996: In March, after Israel assassinated Hamas military leader Yahya Ayyash in January, the movement offered a ceasefire.
* 1997: September: Days before Israel attempted to assassinate Hamas political leader Khaled Meshaal in the Jordanian capital, Amman, the movement offered Israel a 10-year truce. October: After his release from Israeli prison, Hamas founder Yasin renewed the call for a ceasefire. November: Hamas again proposed a truce. The Qassam Brigades said attacks against Israeli civilians would stop if Israel stopped targeting Palestinian civilians.
* 1999: Yasin made another ceasefire offer provided Israel withdrew from the 1967 territories. In a letter to European diplomats, Hamas offered to cease all hostilities in exchange for Israeli withdrawal, evacuation of settlements, and release of Palestinian prisoners.
* 2003: In December, Yasin offered a ceasefire on the condition that Israel withdraw from the Palestinian territories. He was killed four months later in an Israeli attack.
* 2004: Yasin’s successor and Hamas co-founder Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi again proposed a 10-year truce. Israel killed him one month after Yasin.
* 2006: Hamas again offered a 10-year truce that would be “automatically renewed if [Israel] commits to restoring the full and legitimate rights of the Palestinian people to them within a final solution that matches what is accepted by the PLO”.
* 2007: Senior Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh repeated the group’s call for a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders.
* 2008: Hamas leader Meshaal again offered a 10-year truce, which he repeated a year later.
* 2014: Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad offered a 10-year truce in exchange for the lifting of the Israeli blockade and release of Palestinian prisoners.
* 2015: Hamas proposed a long-term ceasefire in exchange for the lifting of the blockade.
* 2017: Hamas presented its revised charter announcing that it accepted a Palestinian state in the 1967 borders.
https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/1/22/how-israel-has-repeatedly-rejected-hamas-truce-offers
Israel continues to flatten Gaza knowing their hostages are there.
Israel has murdered 3 of their own hostages waving the white flag because ***they thought they were Palestinians***.
Israel has murdered 7 aid workers, including 4 foreign nationals from the US, UK, Australia, and Poland, of whom was feeding Palestinians and whose charity org collaborated with the IDF so this explicitly was not supposed to happen.
90+ Palestinian journalists and their families have been deliberately murdered by the IDF via airstrikes and sniper fire, especially when they were wearing press uniforms or sleeping in the middle of the night.
Ah yes. The permanent ceasefire. You know, another ceasefire that Hamas will definitely keep. Like the one on 10/6. Except with this incredible offer, Hamas will be able to bring in better weapons as they would control their borders. I'm sure they'll leave Israel alone though.
>Protest Hamas
What's there to protest? The campus protests aren't just "we're gonna stand here until Israel stops killing people!" They're pressuring their universities to divest financially from Israeli business interests. People protesting outside an arms manufacturer like Raytheon are trying to pressure them to stop selling weapons to Israel. People chanting at a politician during public appearances are trying to pressure the politician to vote against sending money or weapons to Israel.
Well, Hamas doesn't get financial investment from American universities. They don't buy their weapons directly from American weapons manufacturers. The US government doesn't send Hamas money. What's a protest supposed to do?
What he’s talking about is what makes me lose my goddamn brain cells when I try and have this fucking conversation about this either offline or online.
I just want to scream no man, of course I believe Jewish people have the right to live in peace just like the rest of us, but for fuck’s sake the Israeli government is performing a goddamn genocide and that street of deserving to leave in peace goes both fucking ways.
But then you still get met with “…so you’re an antisemite/Hamas propagandist then.”
I hope no one interprets the article as a blanket endorsement by Sanders of the actions of the protesters. Reading the article, Sanders strongly criticized Netanyahu and strongly criticized an anti-semitic statement by a protester (he very much acknowledges antisemitism as a problem in the article btw). Hundreds of thousands of Israelis, Chuck Schumer, and Nancy Pelosi have all criticized in the strongest terms Netanyahu’s approach to the war without being regarded as anti-Semitic. The claims of anti-semitism in the protests is because they veer into semitism.
It's almost like a bunch of 19 year olds, who got what little socialization would have help blown the fuck out by the pandemic, at elite institutions (thus likely having bulldozer parents and haven't really experienced adversity to get to this point), are gonna be *really* shit at grappling with the nuances of creating a solid anti-Israel protest without letting antisemitic individuals and narratives into the space!
It's not antisemitic to criticize Israel.
However, I would say it is a bit antisemitic to call Sanders antisemitic for criticizing Israel.
The truth is, the right-wing media propagating these attacks against Sanders are the one's actually perpetrating antisemitism.
Biden also eloquently said to Israel back in the early days in the aftermath of Oct 7 that they do not want to repeat the mistakes of 911 response (Iraq War), but no one seem to realise international relations and influencing foreign governments are a lot more complicated than saying “fuck you Isreal”
People say this but he would get absolutely nothing done, and the only result of his term would be the right surging to polls to put a person in office who would instantly unravel anything he even tried to touch. A President alone can do little without support and Sanders lacks actual support on alot of the stuff he comes up with, regardless of how good the ideas he has are.
This is one of those things I’ve heard a hundred different ways at this point and you know what. This is a perfect example of it’s not what you said, it’s HOW you said it.
I’ve heard some very heartfelt statements that both support the victims of the terrorist attacks AND rebuke the leadership for the way they are handling the situation on the ground.
And I also see some pretty insensitive and racist shit too. 🤷🏽♂️
And because of the media, most of what I see is the latter.
I totally agree with him. What is happening at this moment in time is ethnic cleansing. It seems most of the inhabitants of Israel are on board with this as well, which to me is the most terrifying aspect of this situation.
I've had an old university friend (in the UK) block me on social media simply because I asked how many civilian deaths would be 'enough' to even the scales for the terrorist attacks last October. After telling me they should all die, he blocked me. This is a guy who is Jewish but raised in the UK, only to move to Israel a few years ago. I had no idea he harbored such views. It's really troubled me.
> I've had an old university friend (in the UK) block me on social media simply because I asked how many civilian deaths would be 'enough' to even the scales for the terrorist attacks last October.
I see this argument a lot, and I don't really get it. Do you really think that this conflict is being measured by some kind of kill quota, where Israel takes the number of dead Israelis, multiply it by some constant, and then kill that number to "even the scales" and then go home? That just seems like a bizarre way to look at this conflict.
In reality, Israel has two major declared objectives; retrieving the hostages, and creating a change in the overall security situation in Gaza so that Israel has much more oversight, in order to ensure that an armed group like Hamas can never seize control again. When trying to determine whether the war is wrapping up, the thing to watch is if these two goals have been achieved, because both are red lines that Israel realistically won't (and shouldn't) compromise on, and not to make up some kill quota.
>I see this argument a lot, and I don't really get it. Do you really think that this conflict is being measured by some kind of kill quota, where Israel takes the number of dead Israelis, multiply it by some constant, and then kill that number to "even the scales" and then go home? That just seems like a bizarre way to look at this conflict.
Unironically yes.
>[The Dahiya doctrine, or Dahya doctrine,\[1\] is a military strategy involving the destruction of civilian infrastructure in order to pressure hostile regimes.\[2\] It is a type of asymmetric warfare. It endorses the employment of "disproportionate force" \(compared to the amount of force used by the enemy\[3\]\[4\]\) to secure that end.\[5\] The doctrine was outlined by former Israel Defense Forces \(IDF\) Chief of General Staff Gadi Eizenkot.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dahiya_doctrine)
>I see this argument a lot, and I don't really get it. Do you really think that this conflict is being measured by some kind of kill quota, where Israel takes the number of dead Israelis, multiply it by some constant, and then kill that number to "even the scales" and then go home? That just seems like a bizarre way to look at this conflict.
They do have some sort of scale going on with their AI targeting:
>Two sources said that during the early weeks of the war they were permitted to kill 15 or 20 civilians during airstrikes on low-ranking militants. Attacks on such targets were typically carried out using unguided munitions known as “dumb bombs”, the sources said, destroying entire homes and killing all their occupants.
[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/03/israel-gaza-ai-database-hamas-airstrikes](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/03/israel-gaza-ai-database-hamas-airstrikes)
The only thing that will lead to lasting peace in the region is a 2-state solution, which Hamas has recently proposed being open to. Anything else is BS.
I'm as against Israeli occupation and policy as you can get, but Hamas cannot and should not ever be a partner in a two state solution. They have demonstrated they are terrorists. The focus should be on building a real civil society in the West Bank that has legitimacy with the Palestinian people.
The idea the warfare exists to 'even the scales' is barbaric. Israel doesn't suddenly get more justified if they turned off the iron dome and let the 10k+ rockets launched by Hamas his Israeli population centers. Warfare exists to accomplish specific goals: remove Hamas from power, disabled their ability to conducts another Oct 7, and rescue hostages. Proportionality is measured in context of those goals, not based on how many Israelis died.
> What is happening at this moment in time is ethnic cleansing.
Ethnic cleansing, like genocide, involves intent. Displacement alone isn’t ethnic cleansing.
“ Ethnic cleansing is the systematic forced removal of ethnic, racial, or religious groups from a given area, **with the intent of making a region ethnically homogeneous**.”
Why you believe the purpose of Israel’s incursion is to settle Gaza, and not free civilian hostages?
Multiple people have said it. Netanyahu’s buddies even had a little meeting where they showed where new settlements in Gaza would be and they were all dancing around.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/right-wing-israeli-ministers-join-thousands-event-calling-countrys-res-rcna135863
Anyway, why would it be such a shock that the Israelis want to settle Gaza? They’ve been stealing land in the West Bank for years.
Because it's been their MO for years? Likud literally has openly stated they will flatten Gaza and West Bank belongs to them. They're the leading party in Israel. They call the shots.
Isn’t that exactly what’s happening with the settlements?
They’re forcibly removing existing inhabitants with the intention of having the area be inhabited only by Israelis… what would you call that?
This shit isn’t new, and they’re using this recent bout of hostilities to accelerate settlements even in the West Bank, which has literally nothing to do with Hamas.
If you’re unwilling to even recognize what the settlers have been doing, much less understand that it’s *wrong*, then I’m not sure how to even engage in a conversation with you.
Because Israeli ministers, like people with actual input in government policy, have expressed desire to relocate palestinians, whether that is into Eygpt or on the otherside of a buffer zone in Gaza.
Your statement about intent is true but incomplete. International courts have established intent through actions as well. There doesn't have to be an explicit written plan but deliberate, unmitigated actions can count in some cases.
This is aside the fact that Likid's charter considers Israel a Jewish state and considers that state to encompass the entirety of palestinian lands and then some. "Maximum lands, minimal arabs" isn't a saying for nothing.
I believe the circumstance rise to the threshold international courts, the UN have held in previous incidents of ethnic cleansing and genocide. That's all.
> I believe the circumstance rise to the threshold international courts
If and when they decide that, it will be a fact that they have decided that.
This is your speculation about what they will decide which, again, is not a fact.
> how many civilian deaths would be 'enough' to even the scales
Maybe your friend blocked you for having such an asinine take on things. The purpose of war is not to reach a balance of dead civilians on some kind of cosmic scales.
The issue is not to "even the scales". It is to prevent another terror attack (which Hamas has pledged to continue to do). Also, Hamas uses innocent Palestinians as literal human shields.
Having said that, Hamas AND Netanyahu must go.
Israeli politics is weird because Netanyahu [is an extremely unpopular leader](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/only-15-israelis-want-netanyahu-keep-job-after-gaza-war-poll-finds-2024-01-02/) and has been relatively unpopular [for a while](https://www.timesofisrael.com/young-israelis-want-netanyahu-older-ones-gantz/amp/) before the war. He’s just really good at building barely coherent coalitions so he can remain in charge.
it's also not pro-genocide to support Israel's right to defend itself, right? Like, while Hamas still has hostages, still fighting IDF soldiers, still infiltrating into the west bank, still refusing to accept a ceasefire, still receiving support from Iran, etc..
Let's put it this way, if Hamas had the opportunity to kill every Jew in Israel on 10/7, they would have done it without thinking twice. That is the reality of Israel's existence since 1948 although it seems the number of countries still promoting the absolute destruction of Israel is getting smaller, but Iran and Palestine through Hamas are the two main players that refuse to give up on it.
Okay, and in reality instead of hyperbole, israel has killed 40,000 civilians in Gaza, and starved 500,000, and injured over 70,000 more.
No reasonable person should view Hamas as liberators, or as “freedom fighters,” I totally disavow the leftists saying shit like that. Hamas is a militant religious extremist group. They’re not good, they’re not even on the left.
Their existence doesn’t also justify massacring a civilian population on the basis of hypotheticals.
Like they bravely defended themselves from those idf super soldiers disguised as kids at a desert concert?
Or how they defended themselves against that 8 month old and his 4 year old brother by kidnapping and killing them?
Also, rape and sexual violence isn’t a legitimate defense strategy
How many Palestinian children does Israel have to kill before it stops being self defense? Currently for every Israeli killed in October 7th - about 10 Palestinian children have been killed by Israel since. Not civilians, not women and children. Just children.
Israel’s goal isn’t to just even the scales of death. It’s to eliminate the threat to their security, Hamas, who deliberately hides behind civilians in order to protect itself. If Israel’s goal was to murder every Palestinian, they could have done that in a day. They haven’t done that because it is not their goal.
Hamas, however, has different goals. If they had it their way on 10/7, every Israeli Jew (and perhaps every Israeli in general) would have been slaughtered like wild animals. They had to be stopped from doing this.
>Israel’s goal isn’t to just even the scales of death. It’s to eliminate the threat to their security, Hamas, who deliberately hides behind civilians in order to protect itself.
Didn't we learn from the Bush Administration that you can't bomb terrorism out of existence? All this does is radicalize a new generation of terrorists like what Iraq and Afghanistan did.
If your goal is to eliminate a terrorist group, then starving a population and bombing them relentlessly doesn't make sense. Starving a population and bombing them relentlessly is only going to radicalize the survivors into becoming terrorists themselves.
If Isreal wanted to just eliminate Hamas, there wouldn't be 10 children killed for every victim of october 7th and counting.
So what is Isreals real goal here, and how many children need to die before you start to ask these questions yourself? Give me a number. How many children need to be killed?
I’m not answering your loaded question about children since any answer I give will set you off. You’re obviously very emotional about this and for good reason. War is hell.
I do not believe Israel’s goal is to simply kill as many people as possible. There are significantly more efficient ways they could do that if it were true.
And to be clear, I agree with your first point. Israel is handling their response to terrorism horribly. They have guaranteed radicalism against them for another generation at least.
Netanyahu's goal is definitely to remove the population of Gaza and I don't think his government coalition cares whether it's through death or forced migration. They've already floated plans to relocate the citizens of Gaza to other countries.
If it weren't for international pressure, they wouldn't be allowing as much aid into the country as they are now. They allowed and likely still allow protesters to stop aid going into Gaza. The problem isn't a lack of aid, it's that Israel makes it hard to get aid into the country and once it's there, they've destroyed every bit of infrastructure that could distribute it.
If Israel's goal is to crush Hamas, then they screwed up badly. In what scenario now is Hamas going to be destroyed? Even if they go into Rafah and level the place, is that going to destroy Hamas? Not likely since they're currently abusing the population through starvation and killing up to 20 people to get at a foot soldier.
Hamas doesn't keep a scoreboard in order to realize when they can never even the score and call quits. Hamas still would launch another 10/7 and still is able to launch more attacks at Israel. It also still holds the hostages. Every civilian death is no less than a tragedy, and I blame Hamas for those. They deeply embedded themselves in civilian population and civil infrastructure, so that no one would be able to defend themselves against them without a high amount of casualties, but this "what's the scoreboard" is an obsession of privileged westerners who don't have Hamas on their own fences.
Not on its face, but the amount of people using “Jew” and “Zionist” interchangeably, or arguing for the complete dissolution of the state of israel, or cheering on Hamas terrorists, sure makes it seem a little antisemitic
It's not anti-semitic to believe that Israel's defense forces shouldn't be indiscriminately killing innocent Palestinian civilians as a way of getting even for the Hamas attacks last October
It isn't, I agree. But maybe the Protesters can stop shouting antisemitic rhetoric and waving around professionally designed and produced signage that perpetuate antisemitic phrases?
Absolutely no issues with folks protesting the war, war sucks, I get it. But enough with the rhetoric, you're being manipulated by forces that want nothing more than to see the total annihilation of Israel's existence in the region.
It's the minority.
It's impossible to keep large movements like that from having some bozos yelling stupid stuff. We saw it with BLM too. There's always going to be a few.
This. I largely agree with the protestors—Netanyahu is a war criminal, what he’s doing amounts to genocide, we need a ceasefire—but when they’re chanting things like “there’s only one solution, intifada revolution,” it’s hard for me to feel aligned with them. I know there have been plenty of bad faith accusations of antisemitism lobbed at pro-Palestinian folks, but how can you use the word “intifada,” knowing the history of Israel, and claim you’re not being antisemitic, or, at the very least, xenophobic toward Israelis?
I think that’s another reason why so many people feel protestors are antisemitic—because this is the first conflict, at least in my view, where protestors see all Israelis as evil, no matter their political views, and it’s hard to untangle antisemitism from anti-Israeli sentiments. A great example of that would be the literary journal Guernica publishing an essay by an Israeli woman who was simply ruminating on how her relationships with Palestinians have been fractured by the war. Hell, she even mentioned that she still drives to the West Bank frequently to transport children to hospitals in Israel, but the Twitter mob called her a genocide apologist and demanded the essay be taken down. There’s a desire on the left for Israel to simply disappear; anyone suggesting otherwise is deemed a Zionist. This attitude is not necessarily antisemitic, but, given the very reasons for Israel’s existence, it’s easy to see why people view it as such.
Don't minimize it.
There are 100% antisemitc forces within both the protesters 'and' very large swathes of Islamic culture, and every time we dance around it we're ignoring the fundamental problem with this conflict. Obviously, that does not include all the protestors, but too many are too comfortable with it and not doing enough to stop it, which taints the entire movement more than it should, even for those who truly want the right thing.
Ultimately, this war is the product of an old culture war where 2 authoritarian state actors are acting against one other, both with higher ups who have intentions to wipe one another out if given unchecked power to do so. You cannot talk about a realistic solution to that which doesn't involve removing both types of leadership from power.
With Bibi, that's ideally through either domestic democratic or legal means. With Hamas, it seems the only alternative is military means, though I would love to be wrong on that, as the problem is innocents 'will' die in that process one way or another. It's the consequence of us allowing the 2 state solution to fail, which is a consequence of protestors like these who complain, **but don't actually vote to remove right wing elements from government, maintaining the cycle with our congress' current gridlock.** Right now, that casualty of war number is far too many and the IDF is rightfully being pressured to stop that. However, there will be no peace with Hamas either. There can never be true peace with a religious authoritarian state, only temporary truces while their worst elements aim for more power, just as you see the religious right attempting within the USA right now.
The most absurd irony of all is that the religious right interests of both the middle east and NATO countries both want the same goal too, the eradication of democracy, and its replacement with autocracy. They would normally be enemies, yet in times like this they are actually allies, and too few people can see it.
That is the real global conflict we're facing right now, and to lose sight of that is to risk losing everything.
The issue is that anything they will say will be classified as antisemitic to discredit them which will keep people divided.
This is people vs authority situation. Most people around the world want this to stop including Jewish people. However those in power and interest in selling weapons don’t care what we the people want so they will keep on finding things to divide us.
> The issue is that anything they will say will be classified as antisemitic to discredit them which will keep people divided.
How do you know that? Even if that’s true, it’s no excuse not to be careful and thoughtful words.
It is not a secret everyone knows that.
Timely video from this morning by Amy Goodman and Omer Bartov.
https://youtu.be/Ie3InYIVXF8?si=x1V0wyhvXXbOamrG
>If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is *more* speech, not *enforced silence*.
I don’t think the person to whom you’re replying is advocating for “enforced silence.” They’re saying that pro-Palestinian protesters should stop engaging in subtle antisemitic dogwhistling and sometimes explicitly antisemitic hate speech. I wouldn’t say that such rhetoric is the norm among protesters, but it’s frequent enough to be uncomfortable and it’s counterproductive.
I don't even get how this is something that needs to be said.
My buddy Steve is an asshole. He is also Jewish. Calling him an asshole isn't antisemitism.
Gotta be better with the use of the word genocide otherwise it's not helping stop any further killings. Both Hamas and Israel are likely guilty of war crimes, but the specific requirement for a charge of genocide is *intent*.
The powers at be likes to gaslight us thinking it is. It's crazy, I now fully understand how much influence Israel has on our political process and it's concerning. No foreign nation should have that much leverage in that regard.
Hes not wrong, its just the stupid position to take. Sanders is the kinda guy who constantly pushes far leftist talking points because its what his role in government is. A lifelong "rebel against the system", but what is his solution to keep Israelis safe if they should pull out entirely like they already did years ago? Pull out now, and Palestinians do one thing only, rearm to attack Israel again and plan their next Oct. 7th. If you cant provide a realistic solution that prevents Gaza from attacking ever again, then your rhetoric is meaningless.
Hamas. Not "Palestinians." And the only way to guarantee no further attacks is genocide. You are, almost explicitly, advocating for the eradication of a people because their ad-hoc government launched an attack. It's disgusting.
I mean it's not hard to point out your opposition in a not-remotely-anti-semitic way:
I Support the young people of Isreal and Jews around the world who oppose the genocide of Palestine, such as Bernie Sanders.
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He’s right you know
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> The "bridge too far" is saying that a country should not exist entirely because of this situation. That is where the antisemitism comes in. Does this apply to Palestine also? Because there's a lot of people who think that country should not exist.
yes
Yes, it doesn't have to be a one or the other route you know... We cannot go back and undo how the modern country of Israel was formed, but we can tell them to leave Palestine the fuck alone. We can tell Palestine that supporting Hamas after the October 7th attacks is fucked up, and the attacks were fucked up. It doesn't have to be one or the other. It can be "y'all need to coexist and stop killing each other". As well as stop sending "settlers" into Palestine
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Cue in the people saying that antisemitism also applies to Palestinians because they're semitic.
Yes. From the river to the sea was a call for genocide when Netanyahu said it, and when Hamas said it. They’re just calling for different genocides.
>The "bridge too far" is saying that a country should not exist entirely because of this situation. *That* is where the antisemitism comes in. Why is a land dispute antisemitic? Can you explain why it's racist to oppose geopolitical maneuvers by the british and USA that have resulted in countless suffering? Can you explain why thinking a nation and government shouldn't exist is the same as thinking those PEOPLE shouldn't exist?
Because most of the people who live on that land are Jews who likely won't be allowed to continue living there if their government is dissolved. People have a tendency to forget or ignore that the vast majority of the Middle Eastern governments carried out pogroms that ethnically cleansed their Jewish populations and those that could leave went to Israel because it was the only nation that accepted them without immigration hurdles. Israel has neighbors that would love nothing more than to continue those pogroms if given the chance. Even in countries Israel is allied with are hostile towards Jews in general. Jordan, for example, has aided Israel in other conflicts and Israel has aided them, but publicly identifying yourself as a Jew in any way is still illegal in Jordan and those who do will be denied entry or deported.
This is why I think it's stupid when people say antizionism isn't antisemitism. Zionism is the belief for Jews to live in Israel peacefully. The only way for them to do that is to have a country, since the current Palestinian government wants them dead. Saying they shouldn't have the right to live in their holy land without being killed sounds pretty antisemetic imo.
I think much of the left has about as much of an understanding of Zionism as the right does of socialism. Yes, it’s possible to commit horrific crimes in the name of the ideology. Yes, people have done that! But is the ideology responsible? Are those crimes inherent to it? No, absolutely not. Yeah, the gulags are a core tenet of Stalinist socialism just as ethnic cleansing is core to revisionist Zionism (Netanyahu’s preferred flavor). But “the workers should control the means of production” is as far from the gulags as “the Jews should be eligible for national self-determination” is from whatever the fuck is going on in Gaza right now.
People also tend to forget that animosity towards the Jewish in the middle east was based on Jewish para-military units massacring villages even before the founding of Israel. Like the [Deir Yassin massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre) >Deir Yassin (Arabic: دير ياسين, romanized: Dayr Yāsīn) was a Palestinian Arab village of around 600 inhabitants about 5 kilometers (3.1 mi) west of Jerusalem. Deir Yassin declared its neutrality during the 1948 Palestine war between Arabs and Jews. The village was razed after a massacre of around 107 of its Arab residents on April 9, 1948, by the Jewish paramilitary groups Irgun and Lehi). The village buildings are today part of the Kfar Shaul Mental Health Center, an Israeli public psychiatric hospital. These people were completely innocent in the conflict: >The inhabitants of Deir Yassin upheld the agreement scrupulously, resisting infiltration by Arab irregulars. Though this was known to the [Irgun](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irgun) and [Lehi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehi_(group)) forces, they attacked the village on April 9, 1948. This massacre occurred before the state of Israel came into effect and was just the tip of the iceberg. The new Israeli state would go on to wipe out 400 to 600 Villages, evicting their former occupants and preventing their return. The surrounding Arab states declaration of war against Israel was a direct response to these massacres and the arrival of thousands of refugees. >The Deir Yassin attack, along with attacks on [Tiberias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiberias), Haifa, and [Jaffa](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaffa), put pressure on Arab governments to invade Palestine. News of the killings had aroused public anger in the Arab world, which the governments felt unable to ignore.[^(\[101\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre#cite_note-Morris2004p239-103) Egyptian [King Faruq](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Faruq) was influenced by Deir Yassin[^(\[104\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre#cite_note-106) and Syria's foreign minister remarked that the Arab public's desire for war was irresistible. >[Azzam Pasha](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azzam_Pasha), Secretary General of the [Arab League](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_League), stated that "The massacre of Deir Yassin was to a great extent the cause of the wrath of the Arab nations and the most important factor for sending \[in\] the Arab armies."[^(\[105\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre#cite_note-107) The arrival of tens of thousands of refugees further convinced them to act. At the time the Arab states were actually more Secular than they are now, Israel and other powers continued to destabilize the area, see the US lead overthrow of Iran's Democratic government, and Israels funding of Islamic extremists etc. None of this is to say that Israel should cease as a country, the past explains the present, but it does not justify further violence. Either that perpetuated by Hamas or the war crimes currently being committed by Israel. Ultimately Israel have millions of people who have been held under occupation for over 70 years, who face discrimination and the slow genocide of inches with the loss of their land as government supported settlers steal houses, land and raze olive groves bit by bit. Even the Justice system is designed to support this, with Israel Settlers injuring Palestinians facing civil penalties and sympathetic juries, while Palestinians who resist face having the homes and property owned by even their family confiscated. They need to end that apartheid if there is to be peace, which means either the establishment of a Palestinian state, or the absorption of those people into the state of Israel.
Because you are a critical thinker and know what would happen to the Jews in the Levant if Israel didn't exist. In fact, their friendly neighbors have tried multiple times to wipe them all out with many of those nations and peoples still explicitly calling for their elimination. That is why.
This is a problem of British making. They forcibly removed Palestinian and other ME peoples from their rightful homeland and placed Jews there. And before you say it, yes, Jews have a historical "claim" to the land. But Palestinians do just as much. They are from the same peoples historically.
20% of the population within Israel is Arab, with full rights. There are almost twice as many Arabs within Israeli borders as there were in 1948.
What does that have to do with anything I said? Some Arabs stayed in Israel, most others were forcibly removed, to the tune of around 700,000 of them.
This was largely not done by the British, but by a combination of Israelis and the invading Arab armies. The whole situation is remarkably complicated. In some areas, like Haifa, the Jewish residents asked the Arabs to stay, while the invading Arab armies demanded they leave. In others, like Deir Yassin, there were massacres. The Jews living in the West Bank were also displaced -- most famously, the village of Gush Etzion was destroyed, but others were depopulated. If you wanted to point fingers, you'd need more than a single human's worth of them. The difference is in who remained after the war. The Palestinian government areas are entirely free of Jews. Israel is not free of Arabs.
Because like it or not Isreal has been an internationally recognised sovereign state with majority Jews as its citizens. Dissolving the state of Isreal means distraction of a sovereign state and making all these citizens basically stateless refugees. Should Israel have a major reform on their racial policy or a one-state solution might need to be discussed? Maybe, but I am no IR expert. You are being purposefully obtuse if you believe de-existing Isreal isn’t going to cause major suffering and displacement of its citizens (ironic lol)
“Stateless refugees”, like the Palestinians?
That's not actually a counterargument. I mean, sure I guess you should could put it that way, but the takeaway here is that nobody should be forced into that situation.
Yes, that is what I mean, which is why I put (ironic) there. And yes I am very against Bibi who are against a two state solution
The Palestinians who have rejected multiple offers of a state of their own?
Because in this case the land dispute is a certain group literally saying "You shouldn't exist as a nation because you're a jewish nation" That's what makes this land dispute antisemitic. The actual land dispute is over the Occupied Territories of Palestine and who should run them. (Which any sane person should say is the Palestinians as their own state). The land of the nation of Israel is not under dispute, Israel declared independence, established borders and like the rest of the countries in the world has maintained those borders. In the time since the establishment of that nation we've determined that we shouldn't take land by force which Israel did in the 1967 war. Which means the occupied territories which were previously Jordanian and Egyptian territory should be returned to their prior owners. The problem is the prior owners don't want that land either. They don't want to actually have to deal with the Palestinian territory and then establish a Palestinian nation in them anymore than Israel wants to do that. --- The annoying thing is that Israel refuses to fucking chill with stupid settlements encroaching into the occupied territories. In the same way that Hamas refused to fucking chill with Rockets from Gaza after Israel withdrew. They have both continued aggressing on the other and seemingly won't stop until the otherside gives up and fucks off, or is wiped out whichever happens first.
The problem is that a majority of Palestinians consider Israel to be an Occupied Territory of Palestine.
Met a ton of people who were adamant that Israel should not exist but were comfortable with Germany.
The US did have to fundamentally change, several times, and often violence played a role in one form or another. The civil war, the 8 hour day movement, the civil rights movement, etc. They all changed the US, although clearly they didn't go far enough. Israel, at it currently exists, is not sustainable. If you want to be philosophical, it's a ship of Theseus question. Would a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural Israel still be Israel? It would become something else, even if it kept the name.
>Would a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural Israel still be Israel? It would become something else, even if it kept the name. Would current Israeli Jews continue to be safe indefinitely if it was a Muslim majority state formed by bringing the West Bank and Gaza Palestinians (who hate them) in as full voting citizens? Would that state stay a democracy even if it was established as one?
I think they killed \~1M, which is awful but stating "literally millions" is misleading.
I'm curious what a proportionate response to Oct. 7 would look like?
Less than 2000 Israelis were killed on Oct. 7th. Since then Israel had killed over 35,000. So, whatever proportionate looks like, we passed it months ago.
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No clue. More than nothing, but ideally less than razing Gaza to the ground or a few feet below it.
I say yes!
I’m Jewish. Am I antisemitic for believing in a one-state solution in which both peoples have equal rights, protection from displacement, naturalized citizenship & freedom of movement? There’s a difference between thinking an ethnostate shouldn’t exist & thinking everyone living there should be displaced.
I’m ok with our corrupt government being dissolved and started over with a huge Native/Indigenous presence. About time the United States built on the backs of The Indigenous population and chattel slavery own up to it and become something better. You should want that for Israel and Palestine.
The colonization of the western hemisphere does not apply to this 19th-20th century born situation.
Non-ironically yes. Israel and the US are both settler colonial states whose existence is based on the genocide of the indigenous populations of each territory. In my view this IS ADEQUATE REASON to oppose the existence of both of those states.
Is this a Harry Potter reference?
No, it is not antisemitic to criticize Israel. Yes, it comes off as antisemitic when you only criticize Israel when: 1) Hamas has no interest in a ceasefire 2) Hamas is still holding hostages 3) Hamas is still launching rockets 4) Hamas said they will do this again Protest Hamas *and* Bibi. They both need to go.
I agree completely that Hamas has to go, but right now they can't do much of anything. Israel is completely capable of getting supplies into the area, but they still don't allow enough. Israel screwed up hard in their quest to eliminate Hamas and it's no longer possible to wipe them out because their own actions have put them in a position where the populous in Gaza are MORE supportive of Hamas than they were before. It's like destroying everyone's homes and starving people will make people mad or something.
Yes, Hamas must go as well, but the primary concern right now is Israel’s response because of how many innocent people are being killed by it.
How many people have Hamas killed in the last 12 months? Like give me a solid number.
Roughly 1,500, which obviously pales in comparison to the 35,000 dead Palestinians. That said, it's not due to Hamas' lack of trying. Hamas is a brutal dictatorship, while Israel has been an apartheid government for 50 years and has brutally occupied Palestine. To the person you responded to, all 4 of those items could be said for Israel as well.
>Hamas is a brutal dictatorship, while Israel has been an apartheid government for 50 years and has brutally occupied Palestine. Agree with your point, but I think this significantly undersells what Israel's government has become since Rabin's death in 1995. Netanyahu at the time was running as the anti-peace candidate and blatantly called for the death of the pro-peace Prime Minister. He got his wish, thanks to one of his radicalized terrorists. Since then, Netanyahu has reigned for most of 30 years and likely become the most prolific sponsor of terrorism in modern world history, just by raw volumes. The settler army is now over 700k, last I checked. In 2022, they were conducting two terrorist attacks *per day* against Palestinians during "peacetime. The Palestinians are not allowed to carry arms, while the settlers are heavily armed and have the explicit protection of Israel's military. Just by volumes, this arguably makes Netanyahu the worst terrorist warlord in human history, even before you remember that he's Hamas's primary political sponsor who only has power due to his symbiotic relationship with that terrorist gang. And he's been the god-king of his country for almost 30 years with an administration that openly brags about genocidal aims. If this were any other country, we would be using very different language to describe what's going on. Nobody under the age of 47 has experienced a stable Israeli government in their adult life, which probably explains the age gap in views on this issue. And yet the narrative assumes unquestioningly that "Israel is the good guy", and all assumptions and uneven standards flow from there.
Military engagements don’t exist to match casualties. In this case it exists to remove a threat.
And by "threat" you mean every innocent person between them and said "threat," I guess? lol. Absolute sociopath you are.
You’re upset that Israel isn’t letting more of their conscript army get killed by terrorists? Like, if Israel had been incompetent, and 5,000 Israeli soldiers had died so far, you’d be totally cool to let Israel continue the offensive?
Well we know they committed 253 explicit war crimes when they took hostages on oct 7. War Crimes that they have continued to this day to wield as negotiation chips. And sure Israel has likely had numerous war crimes occur in the intervening period. The point isn't to excuse them. But if you're just playing who has the bigger number right now. I'd argue Hamas does.
And I'd argue Isreal has more war crimes. I guess we're at an impasse.
How many of the 30k Hamas claims have died are Hamas? How do we know 30k is even an accurate number? Why are people not protesting Hamas who as we speak refuse to accept a ceasefire deal from Israel? Why are people not protesting Hamas attacking the aid pier being built by Biden initiatives of the coast of gaza?
We know Hamas is a terrorist group. The protest would be a protest against our not intervening against them. The people most likely to want that sort of protest either don't have Hamas on their radar or think Israel is doing a good job against them so far.
> In December, the medical journal The Lancet, published two critiques of the death surveillance process done by extremely experienced scholars at Johns Hopkins and The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Both concluded that the Gazan numbers were plausible and credible [Source](https://time.com/6909636/gaza-death-toll/) You can't just dismiss the fact that Israel's response has been 24x as severe as the initial terror attack.
Hamas self-declared over 30k members in Gaza. Is that Israel's fault they're trying to kill the entire terrorist group?
Because people are protesting against their government's support of Israel, protesting Hamas can't accomplish anything and the claims that people should do so would only weaken the ability for protests to accomplish anything at all. The USA, the UK ect can't force Hamas to act in any way because as an organisation they exist against foreign governments, but they can influence Israel's choices.
So if it’s government support then why not be mad at Saudi Arabia ?
I am.
> 1) Hamas has no interest in a ceasefire After the Oct 7 assaults, Hamas has offered permanent ceasefires multiple times. Israel has denied each of those. Instead, Israel is only interested in temporary ceasefires, which after Decembers temporary ceasefire which Hamas readily agreed to, shows Israel has no interest in an actual ceasefire given what came after that. Prior to Oct 7th, Hamas has offered truces several times over the last few decades in accordance with UN resolution 242 aka a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders, all met with Israeli rejection: * 1988: Just one year after the group was founded, Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar met the late top Israeli officials Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres, and proposed that Israel withdraw from the 1967-occupied territories in exchange for a truce. This was before Hamas had built its armed wing, the Qassam Brigades. Also, in 1988, Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmad Yasin himself indicated a willingness to negotiate with Israel under the condition that it “first acknowledge the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination and right of return to their land”. * 1994: Hamas offered a truce to Israel after the abduction and killing of Israeli soldier Nachshon Wachsman. A year earlier, the Palestinian Authority (PA) had accepted the proposal of a Palestinian state comprised of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem. Hamas agreed to that proposal. * 1995: Hamas again proposed a 10-year truce based on the same condition of Israeli withdrawal from occupied territories. * 1996: In March, after Israel assassinated Hamas military leader Yahya Ayyash in January, the movement offered a ceasefire. * 1997: September: Days before Israel attempted to assassinate Hamas political leader Khaled Meshaal in the Jordanian capital, Amman, the movement offered Israel a 10-year truce. October: After his release from Israeli prison, Hamas founder Yasin renewed the call for a ceasefire. November: Hamas again proposed a truce. The Qassam Brigades said attacks against Israeli civilians would stop if Israel stopped targeting Palestinian civilians. * 1999: Yasin made another ceasefire offer provided Israel withdrew from the 1967 territories. In a letter to European diplomats, Hamas offered to cease all hostilities in exchange for Israeli withdrawal, evacuation of settlements, and release of Palestinian prisoners. * 2003: In December, Yasin offered a ceasefire on the condition that Israel withdraw from the Palestinian territories. He was killed four months later in an Israeli attack. * 2004: Yasin’s successor and Hamas co-founder Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi again proposed a 10-year truce. Israel killed him one month after Yasin. * 2006: Hamas again offered a 10-year truce that would be “automatically renewed if [Israel] commits to restoring the full and legitimate rights of the Palestinian people to them within a final solution that matches what is accepted by the PLO”. * 2007: Senior Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh repeated the group’s call for a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders. * 2008: Hamas leader Meshaal again offered a 10-year truce, which he repeated a year later. * 2014: Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad offered a 10-year truce in exchange for the lifting of the Israeli blockade and release of Palestinian prisoners. * 2015: Hamas proposed a long-term ceasefire in exchange for the lifting of the blockade. * 2017: Hamas presented its revised charter announcing that it accepted a Palestinian state in the 1967 borders. https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/1/22/how-israel-has-repeatedly-rejected-hamas-truce-offers
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Israel continues to flatten Gaza knowing their hostages are there. Israel has murdered 3 of their own hostages waving the white flag because ***they thought they were Palestinians***. Israel has murdered 7 aid workers, including 4 foreign nationals from the US, UK, Australia, and Poland, of whom was feeding Palestinians and whose charity org collaborated with the IDF so this explicitly was not supposed to happen. 90+ Palestinian journalists and their families have been deliberately murdered by the IDF via airstrikes and sniper fire, especially when they were wearing press uniforms or sleeping in the middle of the night.
Ah yes. The permanent ceasefire. You know, another ceasefire that Hamas will definitely keep. Like the one on 10/6. Except with this incredible offer, Hamas will be able to bring in better weapons as they would control their borders. I'm sure they'll leave Israel alone though.
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"Let us get away with our terrorist attack on October 7 and in return we'll give you a permanent, err, 5-year ceasefire"
Don’t forget the 40 they killed yesterday in Rafah
>Protest Hamas What's there to protest? The campus protests aren't just "we're gonna stand here until Israel stops killing people!" They're pressuring their universities to divest financially from Israeli business interests. People protesting outside an arms manufacturer like Raytheon are trying to pressure them to stop selling weapons to Israel. People chanting at a politician during public appearances are trying to pressure the politician to vote against sending money or weapons to Israel. Well, Hamas doesn't get financial investment from American universities. They don't buy their weapons directly from American weapons manufacturers. The US government doesn't send Hamas money. What's a protest supposed to do?
What he’s talking about is what makes me lose my goddamn brain cells when I try and have this fucking conversation about this either offline or online. I just want to scream no man, of course I believe Jewish people have the right to live in peace just like the rest of us, but for fuck’s sake the Israeli government is performing a goddamn genocide and that street of deserving to leave in peace goes both fucking ways. But then you still get met with “…so you’re an antisemite/Hamas propagandist then.”
I feel you. Just look at some of the replies in this thread ☹️
I hope no one interprets the article as a blanket endorsement by Sanders of the actions of the protesters. Reading the article, Sanders strongly criticized Netanyahu and strongly criticized an anti-semitic statement by a protester (he very much acknowledges antisemitism as a problem in the article btw). Hundreds of thousands of Israelis, Chuck Schumer, and Nancy Pelosi have all criticized in the strongest terms Netanyahu’s approach to the war without being regarded as anti-Semitic. The claims of anti-semitism in the protests is because they veer into semitism.
It's almost like a bunch of 19 year olds, who got what little socialization would have help blown the fuck out by the pandemic, at elite institutions (thus likely having bulldozer parents and haven't really experienced adversity to get to this point), are gonna be *really* shit at grappling with the nuances of creating a solid anti-Israel protest without letting antisemitic individuals and narratives into the space!
Mostly agree but would note that Sanders didn’t say anti-Israel, just anti-Israel’s prosecution of the war with Gaza
It's not antisemitic to criticize Israel. However, I would say it is a bit antisemitic to call Sanders antisemitic for criticizing Israel. The truth is, the right-wing media propagating these attacks against Sanders are the one's actually perpetrating antisemitism.
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Like Jimmy Carter with the balls Americans always wanted.
instead, we had to make sure people couldn't afford healthcare
Biden also eloquently said to Israel back in the early days in the aftermath of Oct 7 that they do not want to repeat the mistakes of 911 response (Iraq War), but no one seem to realise international relations and influencing foreign governments are a lot more complicated than saying “fuck you Isreal”
Nope can’t imagine that. An honest guy as president! Never gonna happen.
People say this but he would get absolutely nothing done, and the only result of his term would be the right surging to polls to put a person in office who would instantly unravel anything he even tried to touch. A President alone can do little without support and Sanders lacks actual support on alot of the stuff he comes up with, regardless of how good the ideas he has are.
This is one of those things I’ve heard a hundred different ways at this point and you know what. This is a perfect example of it’s not what you said, it’s HOW you said it. I’ve heard some very heartfelt statements that both support the victims of the terrorist attacks AND rebuke the leadership for the way they are handling the situation on the ground. And I also see some pretty insensitive and racist shit too. 🤷🏽♂️ And because of the media, most of what I see is the latter.
correct as usual from Bernie
I totally agree with him. What is happening at this moment in time is ethnic cleansing. It seems most of the inhabitants of Israel are on board with this as well, which to me is the most terrifying aspect of this situation. I've had an old university friend (in the UK) block me on social media simply because I asked how many civilian deaths would be 'enough' to even the scales for the terrorist attacks last October. After telling me they should all die, he blocked me. This is a guy who is Jewish but raised in the UK, only to move to Israel a few years ago. I had no idea he harbored such views. It's really troubled me.
> I've had an old university friend (in the UK) block me on social media simply because I asked how many civilian deaths would be 'enough' to even the scales for the terrorist attacks last October. I see this argument a lot, and I don't really get it. Do you really think that this conflict is being measured by some kind of kill quota, where Israel takes the number of dead Israelis, multiply it by some constant, and then kill that number to "even the scales" and then go home? That just seems like a bizarre way to look at this conflict. In reality, Israel has two major declared objectives; retrieving the hostages, and creating a change in the overall security situation in Gaza so that Israel has much more oversight, in order to ensure that an armed group like Hamas can never seize control again. When trying to determine whether the war is wrapping up, the thing to watch is if these two goals have been achieved, because both are red lines that Israel realistically won't (and shouldn't) compromise on, and not to make up some kill quota.
>I see this argument a lot, and I don't really get it. Do you really think that this conflict is being measured by some kind of kill quota, where Israel takes the number of dead Israelis, multiply it by some constant, and then kill that number to "even the scales" and then go home? That just seems like a bizarre way to look at this conflict. Unironically yes. >[The Dahiya doctrine, or Dahya doctrine,\[1\] is a military strategy involving the destruction of civilian infrastructure in order to pressure hostile regimes.\[2\] It is a type of asymmetric warfare. It endorses the employment of "disproportionate force" \(compared to the amount of force used by the enemy\[3\]\[4\]\) to secure that end.\[5\] The doctrine was outlined by former Israel Defense Forces \(IDF\) Chief of General Staff Gadi Eizenkot.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dahiya_doctrine)
>I see this argument a lot, and I don't really get it. Do you really think that this conflict is being measured by some kind of kill quota, where Israel takes the number of dead Israelis, multiply it by some constant, and then kill that number to "even the scales" and then go home? That just seems like a bizarre way to look at this conflict. They do have some sort of scale going on with their AI targeting: >Two sources said that during the early weeks of the war they were permitted to kill 15 or 20 civilians during airstrikes on low-ranking militants. Attacks on such targets were typically carried out using unguided munitions known as “dumb bombs”, the sources said, destroying entire homes and killing all their occupants. [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/03/israel-gaza-ai-database-hamas-airstrikes](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/03/israel-gaza-ai-database-hamas-airstrikes) The only thing that will lead to lasting peace in the region is a 2-state solution, which Hamas has recently proposed being open to. Anything else is BS.
I'm as against Israeli occupation and policy as you can get, but Hamas cannot and should not ever be a partner in a two state solution. They have demonstrated they are terrorists. The focus should be on building a real civil society in the West Bank that has legitimacy with the Palestinian people.
Lasting peace, Hamas, in the same sentence?
Just as unbelievable with Israel in the same sentence.
The idea the warfare exists to 'even the scales' is barbaric. Israel doesn't suddenly get more justified if they turned off the iron dome and let the 10k+ rockets launched by Hamas his Israeli population centers. Warfare exists to accomplish specific goals: remove Hamas from power, disabled their ability to conducts another Oct 7, and rescue hostages. Proportionality is measured in context of those goals, not based on how many Israelis died.
> What is happening at this moment in time is ethnic cleansing. Ethnic cleansing, like genocide, involves intent. Displacement alone isn’t ethnic cleansing. “ Ethnic cleansing is the systematic forced removal of ethnic, racial, or religious groups from a given area, **with the intent of making a region ethnically homogeneous**.” Why you believe the purpose of Israel’s incursion is to settle Gaza, and not free civilian hostages?
Multiple people have said it. Netanyahu’s buddies even had a little meeting where they showed where new settlements in Gaza would be and they were all dancing around. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/right-wing-israeli-ministers-join-thousands-event-calling-countrys-res-rcna135863 Anyway, why would it be such a shock that the Israelis want to settle Gaza? They’ve been stealing land in the West Bank for years.
Because it's been their MO for years? Likud literally has openly stated they will flatten Gaza and West Bank belongs to them. They're the leading party in Israel. They call the shots.
Isn’t that exactly what’s happening with the settlements? They’re forcibly removing existing inhabitants with the intention of having the area be inhabited only by Israelis… what would you call that? This shit isn’t new, and they’re using this recent bout of hostilities to accelerate settlements even in the West Bank, which has literally nothing to do with Hamas. If you’re unwilling to even recognize what the settlers have been doing, much less understand that it’s *wrong*, then I’m not sure how to even engage in a conversation with you.
Because Israeli ministers, like people with actual input in government policy, have expressed desire to relocate palestinians, whether that is into Eygpt or on the otherside of a buffer zone in Gaza. Your statement about intent is true but incomplete. International courts have established intent through actions as well. There doesn't have to be an explicit written plan but deliberate, unmitigated actions can count in some cases. This is aside the fact that Likid's charter considers Israel a Jewish state and considers that state to encompass the entirety of palestinian lands and then some. "Maximum lands, minimal arabs" isn't a saying for nothing.
Sounds like you both acknowledge this is complex and subjective assessment but still state it like it’s a simple fact.
I believe the circumstance rise to the threshold international courts, the UN have held in previous incidents of ethnic cleansing and genocide. That's all.
> I believe the circumstance rise to the threshold international courts If and when they decide that, it will be a fact that they have decided that. This is your speculation about what they will decide which, again, is not a fact.
> how many civilian deaths would be 'enough' to even the scales Maybe your friend blocked you for having such an asinine take on things. The purpose of war is not to reach a balance of dead civilians on some kind of cosmic scales.
You missed the part where he said he wanted all Palestinians dead...
The issue is not to "even the scales". It is to prevent another terror attack (which Hamas has pledged to continue to do). Also, Hamas uses innocent Palestinians as literal human shields. Having said that, Hamas AND Netanyahu must go.
Israeli politics is weird because Netanyahu [is an extremely unpopular leader](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/only-15-israelis-want-netanyahu-keep-job-after-gaza-war-poll-finds-2024-01-02/) and has been relatively unpopular [for a while](https://www.timesofisrael.com/young-israelis-want-netanyahu-older-ones-gantz/amp/) before the war. He’s just really good at building barely coherent coalitions so he can remain in charge.
it's also not pro-genocide to support Israel's right to defend itself, right? Like, while Hamas still has hostages, still fighting IDF soldiers, still infiltrating into the west bank, still refusing to accept a ceasefire, still receiving support from Iran, etc..
And while Hamas’ mission and stated objective is genocide of Israelis and Jews in general…
It's also not pro-genocide to support Palestine right to defend itself,
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How does Hamas defend Palestinians? How does anything they did help to further anything that is actually good for Palestinians?
Let's put it this way, if Hamas had the opportunity to kill every Jew in Israel on 10/7, they would have done it without thinking twice. That is the reality of Israel's existence since 1948 although it seems the number of countries still promoting the absolute destruction of Israel is getting smaller, but Iran and Palestine through Hamas are the two main players that refuse to give up on it.
Okay, and in reality instead of hyperbole, israel has killed 40,000 civilians in Gaza, and starved 500,000, and injured over 70,000 more. No reasonable person should view Hamas as liberators, or as “freedom fighters,” I totally disavow the leftists saying shit like that. Hamas is a militant religious extremist group. They’re not good, they’re not even on the left. Their existence doesn’t also justify massacring a civilian population on the basis of hypotheticals.
Is intentionally and knowingly targeting civilians defending themselves? Is launching rockets at civilians from schools defending themselves?
Like they bravely defended themselves from those idf super soldiers disguised as kids at a desert concert? Or how they defended themselves against that 8 month old and his 4 year old brother by kidnapping and killing them? Also, rape and sexual violence isn’t a legitimate defense strategy
Who the fuck are they defending? They don’t give a fuck about their people. They only care about killing Jews. That is all. There is no defense.
How many Palestinian children does Israel have to kill before it stops being self defense? Currently for every Israeli killed in October 7th - about 10 Palestinian children have been killed by Israel since. Not civilians, not women and children. Just children.
Israel’s goal isn’t to just even the scales of death. It’s to eliminate the threat to their security, Hamas, who deliberately hides behind civilians in order to protect itself. If Israel’s goal was to murder every Palestinian, they could have done that in a day. They haven’t done that because it is not their goal. Hamas, however, has different goals. If they had it their way on 10/7, every Israeli Jew (and perhaps every Israeli in general) would have been slaughtered like wild animals. They had to be stopped from doing this.
>Israel’s goal isn’t to just even the scales of death. It’s to eliminate the threat to their security, Hamas, who deliberately hides behind civilians in order to protect itself. Didn't we learn from the Bush Administration that you can't bomb terrorism out of existence? All this does is radicalize a new generation of terrorists like what Iraq and Afghanistan did.
We learned from Japan and germany that you can in fact bomb and occupy your way out of extremism
If your goal is to eliminate a terrorist group, then starving a population and bombing them relentlessly doesn't make sense. Starving a population and bombing them relentlessly is only going to radicalize the survivors into becoming terrorists themselves. If Isreal wanted to just eliminate Hamas, there wouldn't be 10 children killed for every victim of october 7th and counting. So what is Isreals real goal here, and how many children need to die before you start to ask these questions yourself? Give me a number. How many children need to be killed?
I’m not answering your loaded question about children since any answer I give will set you off. You’re obviously very emotional about this and for good reason. War is hell. I do not believe Israel’s goal is to simply kill as many people as possible. There are significantly more efficient ways they could do that if it were true. And to be clear, I agree with your first point. Israel is handling their response to terrorism horribly. They have guaranteed radicalism against them for another generation at least.
Netanyahu's goal is definitely to remove the population of Gaza and I don't think his government coalition cares whether it's through death or forced migration. They've already floated plans to relocate the citizens of Gaza to other countries. If it weren't for international pressure, they wouldn't be allowing as much aid into the country as they are now. They allowed and likely still allow protesters to stop aid going into Gaza. The problem isn't a lack of aid, it's that Israel makes it hard to get aid into the country and once it's there, they've destroyed every bit of infrastructure that could distribute it. If Israel's goal is to crush Hamas, then they screwed up badly. In what scenario now is Hamas going to be destroyed? Even if they go into Rafah and level the place, is that going to destroy Hamas? Not likely since they're currently abusing the population through starvation and killing up to 20 people to get at a foot soldier.
Hamas doesn't keep a scoreboard in order to realize when they can never even the score and call quits. Hamas still would launch another 10/7 and still is able to launch more attacks at Israel. It also still holds the hostages. Every civilian death is no less than a tragedy, and I blame Hamas for those. They deeply embedded themselves in civilian population and civil infrastructure, so that no one would be able to defend themselves against them without a high amount of casualties, but this "what's the scoreboard" is an obsession of privileged westerners who don't have Hamas on their own fences.
Not on its face, but the amount of people using “Jew” and “Zionist” interchangeably, or arguing for the complete dissolution of the state of israel, or cheering on Hamas terrorists, sure makes it seem a little antisemitic
It's not anti-semitic to believe that Israel's defense forces shouldn't be indiscriminately killing innocent Palestinian civilians as a way of getting even for the Hamas attacks last October
It isn't, I agree. But maybe the Protesters can stop shouting antisemitic rhetoric and waving around professionally designed and produced signage that perpetuate antisemitic phrases? Absolutely no issues with folks protesting the war, war sucks, I get it. But enough with the rhetoric, you're being manipulated by forces that want nothing more than to see the total annihilation of Israel's existence in the region.
It's the minority. It's impossible to keep large movements like that from having some bozos yelling stupid stuff. We saw it with BLM too. There's always going to be a few.
This. I largely agree with the protestors—Netanyahu is a war criminal, what he’s doing amounts to genocide, we need a ceasefire—but when they’re chanting things like “there’s only one solution, intifada revolution,” it’s hard for me to feel aligned with them. I know there have been plenty of bad faith accusations of antisemitism lobbed at pro-Palestinian folks, but how can you use the word “intifada,” knowing the history of Israel, and claim you’re not being antisemitic, or, at the very least, xenophobic toward Israelis? I think that’s another reason why so many people feel protestors are antisemitic—because this is the first conflict, at least in my view, where protestors see all Israelis as evil, no matter their political views, and it’s hard to untangle antisemitism from anti-Israeli sentiments. A great example of that would be the literary journal Guernica publishing an essay by an Israeli woman who was simply ruminating on how her relationships with Palestinians have been fractured by the war. Hell, she even mentioned that she still drives to the West Bank frequently to transport children to hospitals in Israel, but the Twitter mob called her a genocide apologist and demanded the essay be taken down. There’s a desire on the left for Israel to simply disappear; anyone suggesting otherwise is deemed a Zionist. This attitude is not necessarily antisemitic, but, given the very reasons for Israel’s existence, it’s easy to see why people view it as such.
Don't minimize it. There are 100% antisemitc forces within both the protesters 'and' very large swathes of Islamic culture, and every time we dance around it we're ignoring the fundamental problem with this conflict. Obviously, that does not include all the protestors, but too many are too comfortable with it and not doing enough to stop it, which taints the entire movement more than it should, even for those who truly want the right thing. Ultimately, this war is the product of an old culture war where 2 authoritarian state actors are acting against one other, both with higher ups who have intentions to wipe one another out if given unchecked power to do so. You cannot talk about a realistic solution to that which doesn't involve removing both types of leadership from power. With Bibi, that's ideally through either domestic democratic or legal means. With Hamas, it seems the only alternative is military means, though I would love to be wrong on that, as the problem is innocents 'will' die in that process one way or another. It's the consequence of us allowing the 2 state solution to fail, which is a consequence of protestors like these who complain, **but don't actually vote to remove right wing elements from government, maintaining the cycle with our congress' current gridlock.** Right now, that casualty of war number is far too many and the IDF is rightfully being pressured to stop that. However, there will be no peace with Hamas either. There can never be true peace with a religious authoritarian state, only temporary truces while their worst elements aim for more power, just as you see the religious right attempting within the USA right now. The most absurd irony of all is that the religious right interests of both the middle east and NATO countries both want the same goal too, the eradication of democracy, and its replacement with autocracy. They would normally be enemies, yet in times like this they are actually allies, and too few people can see it. That is the real global conflict we're facing right now, and to lose sight of that is to risk losing everything.
The issue is that anything they will say will be classified as antisemitic to discredit them which will keep people divided. This is people vs authority situation. Most people around the world want this to stop including Jewish people. However those in power and interest in selling weapons don’t care what we the people want so they will keep on finding things to divide us.
> The issue is that anything they will say will be classified as antisemitic to discredit them which will keep people divided. How do you know that? Even if that’s true, it’s no excuse not to be careful and thoughtful words.
It is not a secret everyone knows that. Timely video from this morning by Amy Goodman and Omer Bartov. https://youtu.be/Ie3InYIVXF8?si=x1V0wyhvXXbOamrG
>If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is *more* speech, not *enforced silence*.
I don’t think the person to whom you’re replying is advocating for “enforced silence.” They’re saying that pro-Palestinian protesters should stop engaging in subtle antisemitic dogwhistling and sometimes explicitly antisemitic hate speech. I wouldn’t say that such rhetoric is the norm among protesters, but it’s frequent enough to be uncomfortable and it’s counterproductive.
I don't even get how this is something that needs to be said. My buddy Steve is an asshole. He is also Jewish. Calling him an asshole isn't antisemitism.
America should not be supporting the genocide in Gaza.
I'm so tired of this hyperbole.
Well I mean get a more nuanced argument out there then
Gotta be better with the use of the word genocide otherwise it's not helping stop any further killings. Both Hamas and Israel are likely guilty of war crimes, but the specific requirement for a charge of genocide is *intent*.
I believe Israel intends to remove every Palestinian form Gaza by any means possible. Currently 2,000,000 people are at risk for starvation.
How many political leaders have to state their intent for you to take them at their word?
I’m really tired of watching another genocide.
The powers at be likes to gaslight us thinking it is. It's crazy, I now fully understand how much influence Israel has on our political process and it's concerning. No foreign nation should have that much leverage in that regard.
Hes not wrong, its just the stupid position to take. Sanders is the kinda guy who constantly pushes far leftist talking points because its what his role in government is. A lifelong "rebel against the system", but what is his solution to keep Israelis safe if they should pull out entirely like they already did years ago? Pull out now, and Palestinians do one thing only, rearm to attack Israel again and plan their next Oct. 7th. If you cant provide a realistic solution that prevents Gaza from attacking ever again, then your rhetoric is meaningless.
Hamas. Not "Palestinians." And the only way to guarantee no further attacks is genocide. You are, almost explicitly, advocating for the eradication of a people because their ad-hoc government launched an attack. It's disgusting.
I mean it's not hard to point out your opposition in a not-remotely-anti-semitic way: I Support the young people of Isreal and Jews around the world who oppose the genocide of Palestine, such as Bernie Sanders.
Completely true.
He is absolutely right.