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qqueenofhades · 2 months

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What do you think of the movement to vote "uncommitted" in the primary? Personally I think it's a good idea as a protest vote, while not "allowing Trump to win" since it's, ya know, the primary. You're voting for "the Democrat you want to be the candidate for president" not who you actually want to be president. Most of the arguments I've seen against it seem to forget primaries exist...

Well, since you came to me and presumably do want my honest opinion on this topic, I'll share it with you. However, this will also be very blunt and candid, including some things which I haven't yet said in the 4+ months since the whole Israel/Hamas situation kicked off, and therefore also frustrated. This frustration should not be read as/taken as being directed at you personally, but since you're the conduit for this question, that's just something I want to highlight.

So. Why should you vote for Biden in the primary, and not "uncommitted" or whatever else?

First of all, what I desperately want to ask all these self-righteous VOTE UNCOMMITTED IN THE PRIMARY TO SEND BIDEN A MESSAGE types is: what exactly the fuck do you want this message to be, and what action do you expect Biden will take as a result? Is this actually based on an expectation of what he can/and or will actually do, or is it just a froth of misguided Online Leftist "rah rah this Bad Thing Happening Is All Biden's Fault," as we also notably went through when Roe was overturned by the Trump-stacked SCOTUS selected precisely for the purpose of overturning Roe? My god, the amount of bad "THIS IS BIDEN/THE DEMOCRATS' FAULT" posts that appeared, and are still circulating on the particularly idiotic corners of this site. Nothing could ever be Trump/the Republicans' fault in that case; it was the same old same old "DEMOCRATS DON'T CARE ENOUGH TO STOP THIS!!!" puerile fantasy. That's what we are getting now with Israel/Hamas. This isn't Hamas's fault for attacking Israel on October 7 (god forbid; the online left loves Hamas) and it isn't even the state of Israel and Netanyahu's fault for responding with full-scale genocide on Gaza. Or it is, somehow, but not so much that Biden personally couldn't magically reach in and stop it "if he really wanted to." I'm sick and fucking tired of this bullshit sixth-grade bad-faith disingenuous approach to playing Super Moral Social Justice Yahtzee and refusing to acknowledge the thousands of complex factors at play, especially when it involves blaming literally anyone other than Biden, personally (just like the Trump cultists, for whom "IT'S BIDEN'Z FAULT" is the beginning and end of their political theory, just like the Online Leftists). I'm sure this will get me called a genocide apologist by the Very Smart Moral Twitter Thinker types, but I don't think "Biden has failed to magically single-handedly solve this crisis, which stems from one of the most major and long-running issues in post-WWII and indeed pre-WWII world history, in four months" is actually a good reason to vote against him.

Likewise: withholding your vote might make more sense as a strategy if Biden was still only blindly supporting Israel and refusing to do anything to pressure them, which is demonstrably untrue. I know it's hard for some of these people to actually read the news and/or anything outside their ultra-curated Twitter feed, but it's been well-reported and well-documented that he is. If the US was directly involved in the bombing campaign on Gaza, sure, tell Biden that you will vote uncommitted to increase pressure on him to pull out. None of that is actually true, and the "information" about Biden's action in re: Gaza on both Twitter and Tumblr is basically just entirely malicious lies. So again: what message are you sending when you decide to be all precious and announce you're not voting for him? You don't want him to pressure Israel? You're willing to blow this up entirely and increase the media nonsense about BIDEN WEAK DEMOCRATS DIVIDED and give Trump an opening to exploit? You really want to announce to the Trump/Putin/Netanyahu axis of evil that their anti-Biden propaganda is working (since all three of them are working as hard as they fucking can to get Biden out of office, and as someone who opposes all three of them, I think this is a good idea to vote for Biden!) and they need to hammer harder on this wedge issue? Because that's all your oh-so-moral Uncommitted vote is doing. It's not a protest. It's not leverage. It is the withdrawing of leverage. If you want Biden in office so he can be pressured to listen to you and take action that you agree with, you will vote for him. Yes, in the primary. Yes, when it's not directly against Trump.

You want a ceasefire, you say? GREAT! WE ALL WANT A CEASEFIRE AND/OR ACTUAL PEACE AND RECOGNITION OF A PALESTINIAN STATE! That's in fact why you should be busting your fucking ass to make sure Biden gets re-elected, and to give him a strong show of support in the primary. Biden is the only candidate with a credible long-term (and like, baseline functional sane adult) plan for Gaza. Biden is the one who has been pressuring Netanyahu in every single contact to tone it down and stop acting like an insane murderous maniac and therefore torching any remains of sympathy for the attack Israel suffered in October. Biden is the one who has his entire diplomatic team working on high-level contacts with the Israeli government and the Hamas representatives via Qatar, while sufficiently threatening Iran to back down from frothing at the mouth to destroy Israel (once again, just like the rest of the antisemitic western left). Biden is the one who is pushing for this not to be World War III, and yet we get Baby's First Social Justice Activist screaming at him for being GENOCIDE JOE and blaming him personally for not, as I keep putting it, shapeshifting into Netanyahu's body and making this stop. "He should publicly call for a ceasefire!" Or, and this is just a suggestion, he should DO HIS FUCKING JOB and continue to work on serious problems that don't have instant socially media marketable catchphrases and won't come with instant gratification. Also, please tell me how you plan to get both Hamas and Israel to accept the same terms for a ceasefire, abide by it, and do exactly what Big Daddy Biden told them, because you, the dedicated anti-western anti-imperialist, think that's the best course of action?

Like. I mean. As vice president and now as president, Biden is actually one of the least foreign-intervention-happy leaders the US has ever had. He was originally against the Abbottabad raid to take out Osama bin Laden in 2011; he wound down the overseas drone assassination program (at which the Online Leftists screamed bloody murder at Obama, ignored in Trump, and then refused to give Biden any credit for ending) to almost nothing, he pulled the US out of Afghanistan, and even though he's been supporting Ukraine in its fight against Russia, he's also been extremely slow and cautious (in my opinion, too slow and cautious) at giving them all the military hardware they need, even before this latest blockade of aid in the House by Putin's favorite little bitch Mike Johnson. He has already presided over a historic shift in US policy toward Israel, in terms of conditioning the use of lethal aid, imposing reporting requirements, starting to criticize them publicly, and calling for the recognition of a Palestinian state and more humanitarian aid to get into Gaza. Yet in the Online Leftists' mind, because he is not personally out there Captain America-ing away the Israeli bombs and/or calling for Israel to be totally destroyed "from the river to the sea" as the Tumblr activists are fond of using no matter how often Jews ask them to stop, there is nothing he's actually doing! GENOCIDE JOE!!!!! Like, I thought the anti-western anti-American crowd thought all overseas American influence was evil (but all overseas Russian and/or Chinese influence is fine). When Biden actually doesn't recklessly intervene in foreign conflicts like Kennedy/Johnson/Nixon/Reagan/Bush 1/Bush 2/pretty much every American president in the latter half of the twentieth century, you'd think that would get him plaudits? NAH.

"Biden should stop selling Israel weapons without Congressional approval!" Okay, sure, he should. Which he did one time, and he also repeatedly promised to veto and/or not pass any only-Israel aid package that didn't also help Ukraine and Taiwan. He's also not beholden to the frothing antisemitic Online Leftists position that Israel should just lie down and let all of its citizens be killed and its state wiped from existence. Like. We also remember that Jewish voters exist in America, right? And that Jewish lives are something which are repeatedly and demonstrably under threat in the rest of the world, including from Hamas and the Houthis (who are genuinely terrible people and the western left's warm embrace of them as principled anti-Israel actors is all we need to know about their inherent brainrot and moral vacancy). We know that maybe going full masks-off antisemite (which Biden isn't going to do anyway, for any number of reasons) isn't the greatest plan and nothing to which you should be conditioning your vote? Likewise, please tell me how you plan to make Congress (especially the GOP-led clown car House) "do what Biden wants," since you're still beholden to that being the be-all-and-end-all of moral action? Or how you account for Congress at all, and not just think The President is An Almighty King?

Aside from all this, I am sick to my fucking back teeth of the Precious Moral Princesses (gender neutral) who have spent four years lying about everything Biden has done. We had the personally blaming him for Roe ending (he could unilaterally overturn SCOTUS if he really wanted!) We had the endless bashing about student debt, only to ignore him actually making the most major effort to forgive student debt in all the post-Reagan years. We have had a complete ignoring and/or distortion of his domestic policy accomplishments, which are some of the most momentous since FDR and LBJ. We have had an utter ignoring, revision, and downplaying of the damage Trump did in one term and how very much worse his second would be. We have had to endure "WELL YOU CAN'T ASK ME TO VOTE FOR BIDEN" at every single second for every single thing, because this is such a terrible onerous thing to ask them to lift one single fucking finger to give us some more time to come up with a better solution. And yet, as astutely pointed out by one of my anons yesterday, they utterly don't care whether the obvious outcome of this action is to help Trump get back into power. Apparently that's not a moral reach too far, but straining their delicate tender moral sensibilities to fucking do the goddamn bare minimum to help us out -- both in America and around the world -- no, no. We can't have that.

Like. These people allegedly want a ceasefire, and they want it to come about by asking literally nothing more of them then posting snide anti-Biden diatribes on social media. That's the extent of the effort they're willing to put in. They can't even trouble themselves to take the first step of voting for people who want to address this crisis in a constructive way. So yeah, I have a hard time believing this is anything deeply felt in regard to opposing genocide, and just wants what makes them look morally superior. Also: I don't care if your feelings are genuinely pure and strong and you obviously oppose what's happening in Gaza (we all do!) and want it to end. In that case, why the fuck aren't you throwing your support (yes! Even in the primary!) behind the one guy who's actually working to fix it and not just posting empty platitudes on Twitter? It likewise does not excuse you from the harmful consequences of your rhetoric and actions, if you decide that the best way to act on your deep-seated and genuine desire to stop the genocide is just to blindly bash Biden all day every day. Not voting for Biden in the primary does not excuse the fact that this election is against Trump and everything horrible that he represents, and that we are in this situation largely because the online left has learned literally fucking nothing from 2016 and is eager to do it all over again. Not voting for Biden in the primary does not give you a special Gold Star Moral Activist sticker announcing that you were too virtuous to engage in the process now, but if you're sufficiently placated, you maybe will do it in November. Miss me with that bullshit. I've spent eight years pleading with people to help us fix this mess, by -- yes! engaging with the flawed process that makes partial changes!!! -- and all I hear is that same fucking nonsense. That is a large part of why this response is so steamed.

Anyway. In short, I don't think voting "uncommitted" is a good idea, I think it only helps Trump in the short and long term, I think it protests nothing, I think it represents the same old tired anti-voting schlock that I have had more than fucking enough of, and I don't endorse it by any means. However, you will see that while I can strongly and unequivocally give you my opinion that it is a bad idea, I cannot actually reach through the screen, take control of your body, and force you to obey me one way or the other. So maybe, just maybe, Biden can't do the same with Netanyahu. Weird.

#everentropy #ask #politics for ts #vote and get off my lawn #israel hamas war

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thekeypa · 2 months

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“Children are starving in Gaza. Instead of opening up the borders and allowing humanitarian aid to come in, Israeli soldiers are shooting people who are desperately trying to get food off of trucks. The U.S. cannot continue funding the Netanyahu war machine.”

#bernie sanders #rafah #free palestine #palestine #politics #world news #israel #news #human rights #jerusalem #west bank #gaza

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kp777 · 6 months

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By Ralph Nader

Common Dreams

October 29, 2023

The message of Israeli peace groups’ peaceful solutions are drowned out by the media’s addiction to interviews with military tacticians.

In the midst of extensive coverage of the war in Gaza, there are questions that the U.S. mass media should address:

1. How did Hamas, with tiny Gaza surrounded by a 17-year Israeli blockade, subjected to unparalleled electronic surveillance, with spies and informants, and augmented by an overwhelming air, sea, and land military presence, manage to get these weapons and associated technology for their October 7 surprise raid?

2. What is the connection between the stunning failure of the Israeli government to protect its people on the border and the policy of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu? Recall TheNew York Times (October 22, 2023) article by prominent journalist, Roger Cohen, to wit: “All means were good to undo the notion of Palestinian statehood. In 2019, Mr. Netanyahu told a meeting of his center-right Likud party: ‘Those who want to thwart the possibility of a Palestinian state should support the strengthening of Hamas and the transfer of money to Hamas. This is part of our strategy.’” (Note: Israel and the U.S. fostered the rise of Islamic Hamas in 1987 to counter the secular Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)).

3. Why is Congress preparing to appropriate over $14 billion to Israel in military and other aid without any public hearings and without any demonstrated fiscal need by Israel, a prosperous economic, technological, and military superpower with a social safety net superior to that of the U.S.? USDA just reported over 44 million Americans struggled with hunger in 2022. This, in the midst of a childcare crisis. Should U.S. taxpayers be expected to pay for Netanyahu’s colossal intelligence/military collapse?

Under international law, Biden has made the U.S. an active “co-belligerent” of the Israeli government’s vocal demolition of the 2.3 million inhabitants in Gaza, who are mostly descendants of Palestinian refugees driven from their homes in 1948.

4. Why hasn’t the media reported on President Joe Biden’s statement that the Gaza Health Ministry’s body count (now over 7,000 fatalities) is exaggerated? All indications, however, are that it is a large undercount by Hamas to minimize its inability to protect its people. Israel has fired over 8,000 powerful precision munitions and bombs so far. These have struck many thousands of inhabited buildings—homes, apartments buildings, over 120 health facilities, ambulances, crowded markets, fleeing refugees, schools, water and sewage systems, and electric networks—implementing Israeli military orders to cut off all food, water, fuel, medicine, and electricity to this already impoverished densely packed area the size of Philadelphia. For those not directly slain, the deadly harm caused by no food, water, medicine, medical facilities, and fuel will lead to even more deaths and serious injuries.

Note that over three-quarters of Gaza’s population consists of children and women. Soon there will be thousands of babies born to die in the rubble. Other Palestinians will perish from untreated diseases, injuries, dehydration, and from drinking contaminated water. With crumbled sanitation facilities, physicians are fearing a deadly cholera epidemic.

Israel bombed the Rafah crossing on the Gaza-Egypt border. Only a tiny trickle of trucks are now allowed there by Israel to carry food and water. Fuel for hospital generators still remains blocked.

5. Why can’t Biden even persuade Israel to let 600 desperate Americans out of the Gaza firestorm?

6. Why isn’t the mass media making a bigger issue out of Israel’s long-time practices of blocking journalists from entering Gaza, including European, American, and Israeli journalists? The only television crews left are Gazan-residing Al Jazeera reporters. Israeli bombs have already killed 26 journalists in the Gaza Strip since October 7th. Is Israel targeting journalists’ families? Gaza bureau chief of Al Jazeera Wael Al-Dahdouh’s family was killed in an Israeli airstrike on Wednesday.

Historians remind us that in a gridlocked conflict over time, it is the most powerful party’s responsibility to lead the way to peace.

7. Why isn’t the mainstream U.S. media giving adequate space and voice to groups advocating a cease-fire and humanitarian aid? The message of Israeli peace groups’ peaceful solutions are drowned out by the media’s addiction to interviews with military tacticians. Much time and space are being given to hawks pushing for a war that could flash outside of Gaza big time. Shouldn’t groups such as Jewish Voice for Peace, the Arab-American Institute, Veterans for Peace, and associations of clergy have their views and activities reported?

8. Why is the coverage of the war overlooking the Geneva Conventions, the United Nations Charter, and the many provisions of international law that all the parties, including the U.S., have been violating? (See the October 24, 2023 letter to President Biden). Under international law, Biden has made the U.S. an active “co-belligerent” of the Israeli government’s vocal demolition of the 2.3 million inhabitants in Gaza, who are mostly descendants of Palestinian refugees driven from their homes in 1948. (See, Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide).

9. What about the human-interest stories that would be revealing? For example: How do Israeli F-16 pilots feel about their daily bombing of the completely defenseless Gazan civilian population and its life-sustaining infrastructures? What are the courageous Israeli human rights and refuseniks thinking and doing in a climate of serious repression of their views as a result of Netanyahu’s defense collapse on October 7?

10. Where is the media attention on the statements from Israeli military commentators, who, for years have declared high-tech U.S.-backed, nuclear-armed Israel to be more secure than at any time in its history? Israel is reasserting its overwhelming military domination of the entire region, fully backed by U.S. militarism.

Historians remind us that in a gridlocked conflict over time, it is the most powerful party’s responsibility to lead the way to peace.

Establishing a two-state solution has been supported by Palestinians. All the Arab nations, starting with the Arab League peace proposal in 2002, support this solution as well. It is up to Israel and the U.S., assuming annexation of what is left of Palestine is not Israel’s objective. (See, the March 29, 2002 New York Times article: “Mideast Turmoil; Text of the Peace Proposals Backed by the Arab League”).

More media attention on this subject matter is much needed.

#israel #palestine #gaza #hamas #benjamin netanyahu #joe biden #human rights #genocide #war crimes #journalism #media

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esyra · 6 months

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When you're talking about freeing Gaza and ending the Zionist occupation, what do you mean by that? I don't think what is happening in gaza is okay. I don't think the israeli government has ever been as careful and moral as it claims to be. I've been protesting against our corrupt evil government and I don't want to be your enemy... But I can't not be a Zionist because where else am I supposed to go? Where are seven million israeli jews supposed to go? I was born in israel, and tired to just live my life being as moral a person as I can. I don't have any home in Europe to return to, and I honestly I don't think i'd be safe there. There's no magically empty place to settle in instead. My parents were born here, and two of my grandparent were born here before ww2. I don't care for the biblical promised land bullshit, but I am *from here*, as much as palestinians are. If it were up to only me, I'd love for you to be my neighbor of equal rights in tel aviv or haifa or wherever. I'd love you to be a citizen of a new fully self governing country if you prefer. I'd love Gaza to be just another city I never go to cause I'm a gremlin who thinks nothing is worth a 30-minutes drive, rather than a place I cant go to cause of war. There is a long bloody history of injustice going back to british people thinking setting one group against the other is a great way to control a population. Ending Zionism and kicking all israeli jews out may feel fair, but it's not right. I'm desperate and I'm scared and I'm grieving, so besides whatever I can to get Netanyahu and his devils out of office and into prison, what do I do? What do we do?

With freedom, I mean about reinstating the state of Palestine as it was before occupation. I actually think Israel has a right to exist, but not on top of another population. Right now, Israel exists on top of Palestinian graveyards and we have a right to exist too, and we should be given our right to return. I don't want you to leave, I know there are people who are born here. But I'm begging you to live with us in Palestine. I'll be honest and say seeing the tiktoks mocking Palestinian deaths have angered me beyond what i thought i could feel. But I don't see you as an enemy, my enemy is the Israeli government and the US government who are the ones who allow this to happen. I want to end zionism because it has proven, over and over again, its existance is dependant on Palestine's extermination. But I don't want to kick you out. I don't know what you can do, I'm honestly hopeless. I don't have any fight left in me. I want my family and my people to live. That's all I'm asking for now. I don't know if this was cohesive but you caught me in a moment of distress. I don't want you to leave. I'd love to be your neighbor, I'd be a great one I promise. But I'm begging you to be with us in Palestine.

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acti-veg · 6 months

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what is your view on Hamas?

They're a right-wing, repressive, fundamentalist organisation who have committed multiple war crimes. They are also one of the few organised groups with enough power to offer any significant military or political resistance to Israeli occupation and apartheid.

We can all agree that the Palestinian people deserve a progressive, pragmatic political movement that truly represents their interests. But unfortunately, that is not what you get when you legally and politically disenfranchise an entire people and subject them to the constant fear of violence and displacement for decades, without any means of legal recourse. What you get are desperate, violent extremists who despise the state of Israel and act accordingly.

The history of the western colonialism in the Middle East (of which Israel is a part) is just back-to-back examples of how western imperialism empowers the worst and most extreme political elements wherever it rears its ugly head. Desolate, dark and bloody situations seldom give rise to englightened, socially progressive freedom fighters that will tick all the boxes for the kind of politically acceptable resistance that western liberals can support.

Besides, I don't think it would make much material difference if Hamas were the diplomatic, peaceful organisation that Netanyahu and western political leaders claim they want to 'negotiate with'. Settlers backed by the IDF would continue to force the Palestinian people out of their homes under whatever pretence they like, then the state would illegally annex their land while the west turns a blind eye and continues to fund and arm them, as we always have.

We shouldn't forget that this is really not Hamas vs Israel, as we're all being trained to think, as if it’s just a case of weighing up the behaviour of two equal sides in a straight forward military conflict. This is not a war, it’s an occupation. This is Israel and their powerful, modern, western-backed military holding the fates of 4.8 million civilians; oppressed, second class citizens living under a military regime, trapped and half starved.

It is easy to condemn Hamas and their violence, as I do without reservation, but it's far more difficult to answer the question of what the Palestinian people are actually supposed to do in order to resist their own destruction, if not take up arms against their oppressors.

#ask #politics #hamas #israel #human issues

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the-garbanzo-annex-jr · 1 month

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by Yoni Kempinski

"It's offensive, but the real damage is that it is making it harder for Israel to recover the hostages and win the war, because of the Hamas strategy. They know they can't defeat Israel militarily, so what they're saying is, ‘okay, we just committed this incredible act of barbarity. We're the darlings of the terrorist world. Now can we survive? We're not going to survive if Israel completes this war. The only way we can survive is if America stops Israel from completing the war. So right now they've got a few battalions left in Rafah and they've got their leadership still intact. So now they're watching Biden and they're saying to themselves ‘this guy's going to stop Israel, and if this guy stops Israel, we're going to survive. We don't have to pay that high a price to survive. The price of the hostages goes up and the risk of a bad outcome goes up. No one's paying attention to Biden more than Hamas and he's sending them exactly the wrong signals.”

On the shift between the initial hugs that Israel received, people in Israel were really moved and impressed by President Biden, by the hugs from the US, Blinkin coming here, saying ‘you guys are not alone,’ there was a feeling that the US is really with us, Ambassador Friedman says that he was not surprised, because “I never thought that Biden was really in charge of this. I think that at some level he does have an affection for the state of Israel, but that gives way entirely to his desperation to be reelected in 2024. So, as the politics start to move away from Israel and they always do, I mean every single battle that Israel's been involved with, when they're attack on the first day or two, they get some sympathy. It always changes, assuming that it would be the same thing here, I wasn't surprised. I am disappointed at how abrupt and how extensive the turning has been on Israel. In particular this idea of trying to create a distinction between Netanyahu and the people of Israel. Israel and America have very close relationships and I wouldn't say that there has been no meddling going on over the last 50 years, because it's such a close relationship. Everybody's interested in everybody else's politics, but this sets a new standard. This idea of going after the elected leader of the state of Israel in a war has really set a new low. It really undermines Israel. I don’t think it’s a policy or Biden’s style. It’s all political, because I think he's looking at this and saying, ‘I don't want to turn on Israel. I still have a lot of centrist Democrat voters, who like Israel, but most of them, especially on the left, don't like Netanyahu, so I can thread this needle by being really, really tough on Netanyahu, but by saying, ‘but of course I love the Jewish people and I love the State of Israel.’ I think that's a political calculation. I think he got together with his people and said, ‘all right, how do I work this thing out? How do I support Israel, but keep my voters? If it was just a political calculation under normal circumstances, politics is a very complicated and sometimes a dirty game. But during a war, when Bibi is trying to defend this country against the greatest threat it's had, maybe in its entire history, it’s really inappropriate.”

#joe biden #israel #hamas #gaza #sympathy for gaza #rafah

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hadeantaiga · 2 months

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Supporting Palestinians shouldn't be getting people fired. It shouldn't be getting people ostracized. Palestinians are not Hamas. They are innocent civilians who desperately need help, who have now been told by Netanyahu to completely evacuate Gaza entirely. They have nowhere left to go.

I desperately want a ceasefire. I want Palestinians to be able to return home and begin rebuilding. I want millions of dollars of support to flow into their hands so they can piece their lives back together.

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noneedforbloodpressure · 2 months

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Yesterday (Feb 29, 2024), the IDF opened fire on Palestinian civilians hoping to get food from aid trucks in Gaza City. You can read what we know in full detail here (NPR, MSF, Reuters, CNN), but I'd like to highlight a few things.

Kamel Abu Nahel, who was being treated for a gunshot wound at Shifa Hospital, said he and others went to the distribution point in the middle of the night because they heard there would be a delivery of food. "We've been eating animal feed for two months," he said. He said Israeli troops opened fire on the crowd as people pulled boxes of flour and canned goods off the trucks, causing them to scatter, with some hiding under cars. After the shooting stopped, people went back to the trucks, and the soldiers opened fire again. He was shot in the leg and fell over, and then a truck ran over his leg as it sped off, he said. (NPR)

Initial statements by the IDF claimed deaths were due to a stampede as the desperate crowd rushed for food. However, conflicting reports from Israeli officials have already come forth reporting otherwise. The articles from NPR, Reuters, and CNN that I've linked above all report the IDF firing into the crowd due to "[feeling] under threat" (CNN), as well as report the firing of tank rounds at the site of the massacre.

Critically, CNN reports the following regarding the IDF's statements regarding panic and stampede: "A local journalist in Gaza, Khader Al Za’anoun, who was at the scene and witnessed the incident... said that the chaos and confusion that led to people being hit by the trucks only started once Israeli forces opened fire" (Bold for emphasis done by me).

I'd like to add that even if the IDF had truly not opened fire and there was only a desperate stampede, I would fully hold the IDF and the Israeli government responsible for the deaths regardless. You cannot starve people and obstruct aid (AP News, TIME Magazine, a different article from Reuters) and then claim you are not responsible for their deaths. Especially not when deliberate starvation has long been known to be a weapon of war and tool of genocide.

This situation is the direct result of the string of unconscionable decisions taken by Israeli authorities while waging this war: a relentless bombing and shelling campaign, a complete siege imposed on the enclave, the bureaucratic hurdles and lack of security mechanisms to ensure safe food distribution from southern to northern Gaza, the systematic destruction of livelihood capacities such as farming, herding and fishing. (MSF)

This January, the Israeli government was ordered by the ICJ to "to 'take all measures within its power' to prevent acts of genocide" (TIME Magazine). It is blatantly obvious that Israel has failed to comply (but if you need more convincing, have this statement by the Human Rights Watch).

"Israel is intentionally starving Palestinians and should be held accountable for war crimes – and genocide, according to the UN’s leading expert on the right to food." (The Guardian)

I doubt that any of us who have been advocating for Palestine are surprised - statements by Netanyahu and other members of the Israeli government have long expressed genocidal intent (AP News). The question now - and indeed, the question has always been - what will the world do to stop this? There is no other option than to demand an immediate and permanent ceasefire, with the acknowledgement that ceasefire is only the first step towards justice. Keep putting pressure on your representatives and governments, keep donating, keep boycotting, keep boosting Palestinian voices and affirming Palestinian humanity - we do not have the luxury of hopelessness.

#free palestine #starvation #genocide #gazagenocide #death #ask to tag #alex tir talks

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laz-laz-ace-pilot · 2 months

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So I got a response from my MP about the genocide in Gaza yesterday.

Some context; my MP is Tobias Ellwood, who is largely known for two things; being the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for the Middle East (this will be relevant later) and trying to save a policeman's life during an attack on Westminster. More recently though, he's been better known for trying to reintroduce conscription, describing his £90,000 salary as 'counting the pennies', running over a neighbour's cat, and trying to ban protests at his home.

Under increasing pressure, he sent out a generalised email yesterday in response to people calling for a ceasefire and well...

... Thank you for your email, I have received a large volume of correspondences on this matter and hope my response can set out my position in more detail. Firstly, you are right to highlight the appalling situation in Gaza caused by the Israeli Prime Minister’s cack-handed and ill thought out invasion. Hamas has lost its right to represent the people of Gaza – but this is not the way towards securing a two state solution. It has simply led to escalation. I warned Israel (after the barbaric attacks on the 7th October but BEFORE the IDF tanks rolled in) NOT to invade until there was a clear plan of governance and security for which any military operation can work towards that minimised the danger to innocent lives and ensured the removal of Hamas. I even wrote a plan that might be considered – published in Politico which I invite you to read: https://www.politico.eu/article/israel-gaza-hamas-uk-benjamin-netanyahu-we-need-a-plan/ The scale of collateral damage is shocking, and I’m pleased international voices (including the UK) are getting louder in criticising Israel. But the only country with the ability to alter Israel’s behaviour is the United States, and behind the scenes they are making their views heard but more needs to be done. On the question of arms sales, I’ve asked for more information on what is being sold. The call to block all arms sales is understandable – but it could have wider economic consequences. Licences are valued at £500m versus overall trade with Israel (including many businesses from Dorset) worth £9bn. Would such action in cutting arms sale alter Netanyahu’s behaviour? Or would we lose precious leverage in speaking and influencing privately? Away from Netanyahu’s appalling response - Israel is an important UK ally and rare democratic state in a troubled part of the world. It requires wise decision making to leverage our influence efficiently. I’d prefer to see consideration of halting specific military exports IF they are involved with IDF’s operations in Gaza. I am seeking clarity in what that is from my relevant ministerial colleagues.

UK funding for UNWRA has NOT been cut. I have checked with the Minister and there was a question raised about FUTURE funding – but right now there is no question of programmes stopping because UK money has been switched off. I have made my views clear. The speed in which threats to turn off future funding were made was ill-considered. Over 13,000 UNRWA staff work in Gaza. Involvement by a dozen with HAMAS (now being investigated by the UN Chief) should not jeopardise the critical work of the most senior UN agency working in such desperate conditions.

Finally, the call for an immediate and permanent ceasefire. Yes, I would like to support this. It’s where this terrible conflict must eventually go. But having been involved in a few cease fires, whilst serving in the British Army, could I spell out some issues which must be in place at the same time.

Cease fires are not something you shout from afar and they just happen.

A Cease fire is the title to a list of agreements BOTH sides have signed up to - that results in a cessation of fighting in order to give space for other activities to take place.

If BOTH warring parties do not support a cease fire (and conditions) – but are intent on continuing the fighting it will not happen. Both HAMAS and Israel are at present intent to keep fighting.

Fighting can be stopped by a third party/force which marches in the separate sides and enforce the peace. I suspect this is NOT what you are calling for.

The details of any ceasefire are almost always arbitrated by a third party / parties. And usually come after a number of rounds of discussions. Such discussions are happening in Egypt and Qatar – but to date little progress has been made.

Details of any ceasefire will include:

Time frames of commencement of ceasefire.

3rd party monitoring teams (UK might play a role here).

No fly zones, buffer zones, humanitarian corridors

Emergency procedures to quash any breaches by individuals seeking to see the ceasefire fail.

agreed incentives to help the cease fire last (outside funding/ hostage release /humanitarian support infrastructure repair) for activities to take place to build trust.

6. All the above supported by an international legal framework – usually in the form of a UN resolution. 7. Agreement on round table discussions to discuss the long term solutions. As you can see a ‘cease fire’ is simple to demand from afar – less simple to implement in practice. And easy to challenge Western governments about why one is not in place. It is worth remembering that such agreements are occasionally signed up to as opportunity for one side or both re-group and re-arm which is something we must be particularly weary of. I hope, if you have read this far – you will appreciate the context of an Opposition party – calling for a vote on a ceasefire. Perhaps it’s an important political statement. But as I highlight above there are practical implications, which, if I am honest are not discussed in detail. The discussion then boils down to an over-simplistic binary position on supporting the people of Gaza without consideration of the magnitude of obstacles to overcome if a meaningful ceasefire was to be introduced. I so dislike such binary and divisive politics, yet right now that’s how the debate on Wednesday is shaping up. We should be better than this. I will push for a cease fire in the context I’ve outlined above. I will think carefully how I will vote. If this is just about having another pop at the Government for political gain – I will probably stay away. The people of Gaza deserve better. I plan visit Rafah in the next couple of weeks. Thanks again for getting in touch. I apologise about the long response. There is nothing simple about conflict and indeed ending it.

Kind regards, Tobias

I just... I don't think I could write a more condescending, twisted or imperialist response if I tried. The bit about the not suspending arms deals, the 'explanation' of ceasefires/ cease fires, the grammatical and spelling errors. I've been trying to write a concise response for the last hour and I just can't. The only positive is that the growing pressure does seen to be getting to him.

There is another vote on a ceasefire today. Please keep pressuring your MPs. It is slow work but its getting there.

#uk politics #free palestine #free gaza #given that it was a copy paste response I think im okay to post it on here #and people should be aware of the attitude of british mps to this crisis

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mariacallous · 5 months

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Once the present operation against Hamas is completed, Israel plans to maintain “overall security responsibility” over Gaza for the indefinite future, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told ABC News. This would likely require a continued presence of Israeli forces in Gaza, raids against suspected Hamas installations, control over the population’s movements, and isolation of the territory from the outside world.

In short, Israel would protect its security interests with an iron fist. Yet, it would disown the responsibilities that would normally flow from this exercise of control—making it armed occupation by another name. Those responsibilities include the duties to care for the population that has fallen under foreign military authority and arrange for governance of the territory.

“We don’t want to govern Gaza,” Israel’s foreign affairs minister, Eli Cohen, has told the Wall Street Journal. “We just want to protect our people.” This is a kind of novel concept of “occupation lite,” which externalizes the costs, risks, and burdens of occupation, beyond the steps needed to preserve Israel’s security.

In support of its security objectives, Israel would likely retain the power to deny humanitarian access for deliveries of food and medicine, or to turn off the tap for water, energy, and other life-sustaining supplies. Humanitarian agencies might find this objectionable, but in the interest of being able to reach the local population in desperate need, they would presumably consent to operate under these conditions.

Israel would also disown responsibility for the vast reconstruction effort necessary to restore Gaza’s destroyed civilian infrastructure, homes and businesses. Instead, it would expect international donors, in particular the EU and its members, along with Arab states and perhaps China, to queue up once more for the privilege.

The U.S. government believes that Israel must not return to the role of occupying power. Instead, feverish planning work is going on, trying to find a way to square the circle, enforcing Israel’s security interests while also avoiding a permanent state of armed occupation. But unless it is embedded in a credible peace process promising to finally resolve the Palestinian issue, this effort is doomed.

Washington is proposing that the Palestinian Authority under President Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah party, which runs the West Bank, should extend its authority to Gaza once the conflict ends. However, team Abbas is hardly credible. Its administration of the West Bank is notoriously ineffective and beset by corruption. Fatah has a weak standing in the polls and postponed elections indefinitely in 2021. Its general silence during the present, dramatic crisis is likely to have dented its credibility further, especially in Gaza.

Moreover, having been violently displaced from Gaza by Hamas in 2007, the Palestinian Authority under Fatah hardly seems to offer a guarantee against the resurgence of radicalism in the territory. Accordingly, Israel has already confronted U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken with its opposition to this option.

The Palestinian Authority is also playing hard to get. If Israel remained in charge of hard security, the Palestinian Authority would likely be seen as little more than an Israeli or American enforcement agent. Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh told the Guardian that “to have the Palestinian Authority go to Gaza and run the affairs of Gaza without a political solution for the West Bank” would be “as if [the] Palestinian Authority is going aboard an F-16 or an Israeli tank.”

Abbas has suggested that the Palestinian Authority might return to Gaza, but only if there is a clear road to a settlement for the West Bank, Gaza, and also East Jerusalem.

An alternative, or an additional step, would be to deploy an international governance mission. That mission would combine peacekeeping with steps to supervise local government and build more reliable structures of self-government over time. The examples of East Timor and Kosovo are often invoked in this context. Both were major international deployments drawing on hundreds of civilian administrators and thousands of soldiers.

It is unlikely that Western powers will put themselves forward as potential peacekeepers. They would instantly turn into veritable magnets for jihadist spoilers. Heavily armed U.S. forces withdrew ignominiously from Lebanon in 1983, when terrorists killed 241 Marines, and from Somalia a decade later after 18 service members died in the Black Hawk Down Incident.

Members of the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Conference might also be rather hesitant. With Israel claiming the right to intervene militarily whenever it deems necessary, and likely to maintain a military presence in the territory, an Arab force could only aim at supporting an international governance mission while keeping civil order in Gaza. Again, this role would bring it perilously close to appearing to act as Israel’s surrogate in keeping the territory and its population under control while keeping it in a permanent state of hopelessness and limbo.

In addition, international administration is no panacea. While it is meant to foster indigenous structures of governance, it often hinders their establishment. International governance tends to relieve emerging local leaders from accountability for inefficiency and corruption. Any failing of governance will be blamed on the international mission, rather than the newly empowered elite.

Moreover, an international governance mission would presumably supervise the actions of the emerging local authorities, whether led by Fatah or others, correcting and at times overruling their actions. This would strengthen the sense of foreign control, or disguised occupation, among the population and foster resistance in the mid-term.

The attempt to construct fresh institutions and fill them with genuine democratic leaders under international tutelage may also be criticized as the kind of illusion that fueled similar, ultimately futile and in retrospect naive attempts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Who, after all, can ensure that Palestinians in Gaza would not opt for the ideological successors to Hamas instead of a tame Palestinian Authority some years down the line, especially if a new militant organization appears to be the only body representing their demands for genuine Palestinian statehood with some energy?

There is a critical difference between Gaza on one hand and East Timor and Kosovo on the other. The operation in East Timor was launched after Indonesian troops ransacked the territory in 1999, after the population opted for independence in a U.N.-sponsored referendum. Around 1,400 Eastern Timorese were killed, with half a million violently displaced.

The United Nations provided an international governance mission supported by 1,600 international police personnel and 9,000 troops. Over a period of two and a half years, the mission provided reassurance and stability for the terrorized population, while preparations were made for eventual independence in May 2022.

In Gaza, too, an international presence might well be welcomed initially. Its would presumably spell the end of Israeli offensive in Gaza, which has already cost around 15,000 mainly civilian lives and resulted in the destruction of much of the civilian infrastructure. But a welcome may not last long.

In East Timor, the aim of the mission was clear: preparing the territory for independence within an agreed, short period. In Gaza, the situation would look quite different. Unless it is tied to implementing a peace settlement including full statehood, international administration would lead nowhere. It would become yet another symbol of the disenfranchisement of the Palestinian people and be seen as a tool to maintain the status quo forever more.

This kind of risk became clear a few years into the international operation in Kosovo. The international civil mission was supported by a large, NATO-led military presence. In the wake of the Kosovo War, NATO was widely seen by Kosovo’s mainly ethnic Albanian population as its heroic savior from Serbian repression.

The U.N. mandate for the operation left the eventual status of Kosovo open, focusing instead on building capacity for local self-government. However, as the mission progressed, the population became restless, demanding commencement of final status negotiations.

By 2004, despite the status of NATO troops in the country as liberating heroes, violent riots demanding independence erupted. This forced the U.N. to launch talks on final status. The U.N. mediator in the end concluded that the population would not accept any outcome other than independence, despite fierce resistance by Serbia. To this day, Kosovo’s status remains contested and attempts to normalize relations between Serbia and Kosovo have stalled, leading to military tensions dampened by the forever continuing NATO presence.

In short, international administration can only work if it is clear from the outset that it serves to move a territory to the political status desired by its population, as was the case in East Timor and, eventually, Kosovo. Where there is no clear and irreversible direction of travel toward that status, the mission itself will be seen as a tool to frustrate the wishes of the population, triggering unrest and violent protest in favor of change. And where there is no prospect of a status settlement, the mission will take on the mantle of armed occupation after a time.

The risk that the mission is seen as tainted from the outset by the local population is even more pronounced in this instance. Even after the vast destruction and loss of life brought about by Israel, the operation would still be visibly confined by requirements imposed by an Israel intent on enforcing its security interests in the territory for the indefinite future. Israel’s strategy of externalizing the tasks and costs of maintaining a virtual international occupation, while keeping a firm hold of security control, therefore cannot succeed.

While formally opposing continued occupation, the United States is at risk of serving Israel’s doomed strategy by bringing together external actors to help facilitate that strategy. But international governance, however well-intentioned, will quickly take on the mantle of occupation. And continued occupation, in whatever guise, will breed continued violence aiming to overcome it. The only difference is the hypothetical international mission would become its target alongside Israel.

The only way out of this dilemma is to be serious about embedding arrangements for post-war Gaza in a clear path toward a settlement of the Palestine issue, once and for all. In fact, all relevant actors other than Israel’s present leadership seem to accept that there is no chance for post-conflict governance in Gaza unless there is a clear and credible path toward a comprehensive settlement.

Abbas has made cooperation on governance in Gaza dependent on a settlement. So have the potentially force-contributing Arab states. If they are wise, the Western governments expected to pay, once more, billions for rehabilitation and reconstruction, will do the same before they reach for their checkbooks.

Blinken has now started to repeat this mantra in his more recent visits to Middle Eastern capitals, seeking to shore up regional support for the emerging U.S. post-conflict design. Yet, in view of the disappointing experience of the past three-quarters of a century, the challenge is to make the prospect of a settlement a real one.

In fact, despite the traumatic outrage of Oct. 7 and the massive amount of violence unleashed in response, there could now finally be a chance for a settlement. Miraculously, the key Arab states have not disowned the Abraham Accords, and even Saudi Arabia is still (for now) holding out the possibility of an accord with Israel.

This leaves in place the first key piece in the puzzle—the recognition by all that Israel has a right to exist. Even Iran might be impelled not to obstruct a regional settlement, if China can be brought to support a grand settlement.

Addressing Palestine would be a key element of that process, but it would be a broader design, offering economic integration and common security for the Middle East as a whole, including Israel. This will require an amazing degree of coordination among diverse sets of actors, through a large group of states convened by the United States in cooperation with the U.N.

The question is whether, after the trauma of Oct. 7, Israel will find the courage to engage in a process as complex and challenging as this one, perhaps after a change in government. But the truth is that the Palestine issue will not go away. It cannot be resolved through security control over millions of Palestinians for the indefinite future.

If this present tragic episode is not to become the breeding ground for yet more endless violence, this is in fact the moment to embrace a grand design for peace for the entire region.

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justinspoliticalcorner · 3 days

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Jonathan Nicholson at HuffPost:

Soon after Iran’s April 13 attempted airstrike on Israel — a massive bombardment of about 300 missiles and drones — a Ukrainian YouTuber couldn’t help but notice the difference in global reaction. U.S. forces, including fighter jets, joined by French and British forces, helped Israel down almost all of the incoming fire in an impressive display of military resources and Western know-how. It was a lesson not lost on the Ukrainians. A Ukrainian-born YouTuber who goes by Yewleea, who says she left New York to return to her home country to help with the war, called it “kind of incredibly fucking hypocritical,” given Israel’s state-of-the-art air defense system and unrealized Western promises of aid to Ukraine. “That was done specifically to make a point,” she said in a livestream. “They didn’t need the help. Ukraine does need the help. And Ukraine was promised all the help. Yet we’re not receiving it.”

That same attack, though, ultimately ended up freeing about $60.8 billion in U.S. military and economic aid for the beleaguered Eastern European country by pushing the stalled funding to the forefront in Washington. A week after Ukrainians saw footage of the global powers rushing to knock out of the sky the same kind of Iranian Shahed drones they face nightly alone, many tuned into C-SPAN to watch 72% of the House vote Saturday, after months of delay, to give Ukraine the desperately needed aid. “It’s been said it’s never too late to do the right thing. Well, we’re coming really close,” said Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.), a co-chair of the Congressional Ukraine Caucus, on the House floor. But the road to get there, for Ukrainians and their allies, began with the Iran attack and the world’s reaction to it. “This night Ukrainians got a clear view of what we truly mean for the US. We’re not allies, never have been,” Stas Olenchenko, a Kyiv-born analyst living in Europe, posted on social media.

[...] “Unfortunately, in Ukraine and our part of Europe, we do not have the level of defense that we saw in the Middle East a few days ago. Our Ukrainian sky and our neighbors’ skies deserve the same level of security,” he said. “And I appreciate everyone who sees our need for security as a need for equal security for all, because all lives are equally valuable.” The White House greeted the complaint by noting how much aid had already been sent to Ukraine or saying there were substantive differences between the two situations.

[...] Neither Ukraine or Israel is in NATO. While Ukraine has, like many post-Soviet countries, had big issues with corruption, its president, unlike Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu, has not entered the fifth year of a corruption trial. In terms of longevity, the U.S. has recognized Israel since 1948, within minutes of the Jewish state’s creation. But it also signed the Budapest memorandum in 1994, convincing Ukraine to abandon its nuclear weapons. On Tuesday, after a pro-Ukraine rally on the U.S. Capitol grounds, Daniel Balson, director of public engagement with the advocacy group Razom for Ukraine, said Ukrainians didn’t “begrudge” the help Israel received. “It simply reinforces the fact that with additional ammunition, both for the fighting on the front as well as for air defenses, there could be a very different story coming out of Ukraine today,” Balson said.

The news that both houses of Congress voting to fund aid to Ukraine has been greeted with cheers in Ukraine.

#Ukraine #Foreign Aid #118th Congress #Russian Invasion of Ukraine #Foreign Policy #Ukraine Aid #Israel/Hamas War #Israel

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palestinegenocide · 1 month

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Now everyone hates Israel

This was a huge week in American Jewish political history.

First, the director of a movie about Auschwitz, the English director Jonathan Glazer, accepted an Oscar for the film by stating that his Jewishness should not be used to justify the slaughter of Gazans.

Right now, we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people. Whether the victims of October 7 in Israel or the ongoing attack on Gaza — all the victims of this dehumanization, how do we resist?

In saying “We,” Glazer also spoke for his producer Len Blavatnik, a billionaire who stood silently behind him and who just months ago had joined the Harvard donor revolt for alleged antisemitic — actually pro-Palestinian speech — on campus. A revolt that toppled the Harvard president.

Glazer’s speech was followed four days later by the “momentous speech” by New York Senator Chuck Schumer, speaking as a Jew and calling on Netanyahu to hold new elections because his rightwing policies are hurting Israel. “As a lifelong supporter of Israel, it has become clear to me, the Netanyahu coalition no longer fits the needs of Israel,” said Schumer, the most powerful Jewish politician in American history.

Here too the Gaza slaughter figured largely. Schumer fears that the massive civilian death toll in Gaza, which causes him “anguish,” will cause Israel to become a “pariah” nation.

In coalition with far-right extremists like Ministers Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, and as a result, [Netanyahu] has been too willing to tolerate the civilian toll in Gaza, which is pushing support for Israel worldwide to historic lows. Israel cannot survive if it becomes a pariah.

The first thing to observe about Schumer’s speech, and Glazer’s too, is that Palestinian lives are finally counting in American politics. The unbelievable onslaught on a captive people that caused Susan Abulhawa to somehow get in there and come back and tell us there’s a holocaust in Gaza that language cannot describe has at last registered for American politicians.

So just as Joe Biden said eight days ago that Netanyahu “cannot have another 30,000 Palestinians dead”– as if the first 30,000 were mere table stakes — those killings, now at least 31,700, are also cracking the conscience of the American Jewish community.

Schumer is at the center of the organized Jewish community. He has long put himself forward as the guardian of Israel– “a bellwether for the Jewish community, who has refrained from sharp criticism of the Israeli government” (as J Street put it)– and his speech has huge significance.

American Zionists are in complete crisis now. They know that Israel is already a pariah state in the eyes of the world. They know that you cannot destroy a territory in the genocidal manner that Israel has — and force the hand of the U.S. president in support of the genocide out of concern for his political donations, and topple Ivy League presidents who allow their students to criticize Israel — you can’t do these things without grave consequences.

Biden may lose Michigan because his hand was forced. American Jews who care about democracy in the U.S. are finally shaking loose. And Jews who see that corrupt Zionist influence is feeding antisemitic ideas about Jews are acting to openly criticize Israel.

Schumer acted out of pure desperation. He sees Biden being hurt politically if the Jewish community cannot pivot and condemn a genocide. He sees Israel becoming a “pariah” state.

There is today no difference between right-wing and left-wing Zionists inside the Democratic Party. They have all now gathered around the Schumer/Biden delusion that if you just get rid of Netanyahu, Israel will be able to curb the slaughter, pursue the two-state solution, and save the Jewish state.

So, we are seeing Zionism in an ongoing public crisis. Because Netanyahu won’t go. Or if he does go, he will be replaced by others who are equally or almost as warmongering and who will be able to do nothing to end the occupation. So Israel will just continue to be a pariah state. And the tsunami of boycotts, long predicted by Israel lovers, will really be upon us. Even Schumer said that the U.S. must restrict aid to Israel if it cannot stop slaughtering civilians.

This is a crisis of Jewish identity. Schumer again and again cited Jewish tradition and conscience as motivators for his speech. “What horrifies so many Jews especially is our sense that Israel is falling short of upholding these distinctly Jewish values that we hold so dear. We must be better than our enemies, lest we become them.”

However cynical you are about Jewish values and conscience — and I’m as cynical as they come — his speech represents a great wake-up call for Jews who care about human rights to take on the genocide-enablers in the U.S. Jewish community. Despite the love he expressed for Israel and the mythologies about its creation and supposed democracy, Schumer’s speech is historic and important on this ground.

Because as more than one critic of Schumer’s said this week, he is giving permission to others. The most powerful Jewish politician in U.S. history is saying, As a Jew I tell America, Israel is doing wrong. Yes, everyone hates Israel now!

So Schumer has opened the doors on the Jewish discussion that I and others in the American Jewish anti-Zionist community have long sought: How can we support a discriminatory, brutal state in our name as Jews over there when we absolutely oppose religious nationalism and persecution of minorities here?

This discussion will see the empowerment of a new generation of anti-Zionists, and their ultimate victory. Because the Jewish state will be unable to transform itself to suit American liberal values. And regardless of the political arrangements in coming years in Israel/Palestine — partition into two states, or one state — Israel’s transformation to pariah status is so well advanced now by its own actions that no Zionist will ultimately be able to save its racist apartheid constitution. And idealistic Jews here will help transform that land.

I’d add that in directing Israelis what to do– go have another election!– Schumer exposed a great secret of Zionism: It is an international Jewish ideology that will always cause confusion about national interest. Schumer could well argue that he was justified in directing Israelis because Israel interferes in our politics all the time, and as Netanyahu did in 2015. “Imagine if, I don’t know, some foreign leader who was ostensibly an ally of the United States, came here and gave an address before Congress that threw the American president under the bus on their key policy item of the times,” as a New York Jewish liberal Zionist put it in praising Schumer’s speech.” Can you imagine it?”

I can imagine just that because Schumer himself said after he voted against the Iran deal, he did so out of Israel’s interest not the American one.

So Zionism has always been a huge asterisk on American Jewish liberal values. This week that asterisk began to fall apart.

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clarabosswald · 6 months

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I've been reading your posts about the Israel-Palestine issue and I'm messaging you without going on anon to show that I have a genuine desire to understand. You've said you don't support apartheid and you're not a zionist so I want to ask why you believe the issue is that complicated, and get your genuine response. I'm from Pakistan, a country created in the name of religious protection and it has been at the helm of several genocides and displacements to this day. I lived in South Africa where the settler population coexists after the abolition of apartheid. I'm now a settler in Canada and I support the fight for land back and the dissolution of the colonial state even as I reside in it because I would prefer to be welcomed on this land after Indigenous sovereignty has been returned. I am just curious if you really do feel such an attachment to Israel's existence knowing that from its conception it has been a settler colonial apartheid state. Certainly Netanyahu has worsened it but the ethnic cleansing, ghettoization, displacement, imprisonment without grounds, and torture of Palestinians has been ongoing for decades. I do believe that most people currently advocating for Palestine's liberation and the dissolution of Israel as a state don't want to kill or even displace all Israelis, there is just an understanding that Israel's existence depends on the subjugation of Palestinians. And as for Hamas, most people would not want Hamas as a governing body but Israel has backed all Palestinian resistance efforts especially peaceful ones into such a corner that at this point Hamas is like any violent resistance force such as the ones in Ireland, Algeria, Haiti, Vietnam or elsewhere. Would you disagree that the violence they enact is rooted in Israeli violence? Decades of brutal oppression can only lead to radicalization in this way. I hope that you will understand I'm genuinely trying to gain your perspective on these issues and not trying to attack you. This situation is personal to me because the loss of lives is heartbreaking and I've lived in so many countries where violence not only paints the history but the present and I wish we lived in a world where borders and militaries did not exist. But I've come to learn that unfortunately peace is often achieved when there is violent resistance to oppression.

I already sent follow up direct messages so I'm SO SORRY for spamming you but I guess I'm nervous about you misreading my tone since it's easy to do that online and people have attacked you regarding all this. I just want to reiterate I make no claims to knowing everything and certainly not to knowing you and your allegiances or politics. I can tell you care about people and that's why I want to have a genuine conversation, if you'll engage with me

hi - first of all, you seem to be coming with good faith and nowadays that's not obvious at all, so thank you for that

the first thing i want to address is that yes, i'm not a zionist. at the same time i've got no fucking idea what constitutes "zionism" in western eyes at this point in time. but i don't believe jewish people have got some super special holy right of "owning" israeli lands or whatever, just because they're jewish and it's the people's ~promised land~. that's zionism how i understand it. and i don't believe in that because i'm a secular (non-believing) jew.

"why you believe the issue is that complicated" is a question that on the one hand seems extremely weird to me, and on the other hand... really makes complete sense. i say that it's complicated because there are literally decades upon decades at the very least of history behind the events that started on october 7th. and i've found that westerners seem to be desperate for some easy-to-digest, eli-5 version of it. they want fairytale morality where they can say that one side is 100% good and the other side is 100% evil. they don't want to think, to have mental/moral struggles. i think it's... naive at best, to expect something that involves decades/centuries of history and millions upon millions of people, to be that simple.

"I am just curious if you really do feel such an attachment to Israel's existence" - because it's where i was born, where my family was born, where my friends were born, the only place i've ever lived in. it's my home. it's hot and humid, the people are often rude and inconsiderate, every time it rains there's a stupid amount of flooding in the streets... and it's the only home i've ever known. is that really that hard to understand?

"I do believe that most people currently advocating for Palestine's liberation and the dissolution of Israel as a state don't want to kill or even displace all Israelis" - you know, i believe so too. that's why it's so flabbergasting to see many of the same people repeat the speaking points of different organizations that for many years have called for exactly the killing/displacement of all israelis (or at least all the jewish ones). the absolute lack of critical thinking and source-checking is infuriating. or just... the general ignorance. 99% of the people who are involved in the recent protests have probably never even heard of hamas before october 7th. honestly, considering what i've seen and heard, some of them probably still are ignorant of its existence. for fuck's sake, i've seen people think that the gaza strip is the west bank because it's located to the west.

"And as for Hamas, most people would not want Hamas as a governing body but Israel has backed all Palestinian resistance efforts especially peaceful ones into such a corner that at this point Hamas is like any violent resistance force such as the ones in Ireland, Algeria, Haiti, Vietnam or elsewhere." - can you give examples to the most recent peaceful palestinian efforts? the most recent attempt at the peace process i can think of off the top of my head is the oslo accords... possibly camp david? and i assume i don't need to explain what those were and what happened after them? but i might be missing something more recent. your mentions of other locations in the world are an excellent shout because i do believe the israeli-palestinian conflict is nothing like them. i do believe it's a unique conflict in global terms. i do think the ongoing comparisons in the west to other historical conflicts is part of the same western attempts to simplify it and make it more palatable (?) to the western audience.

"Would you disagree that the violence they enact is rooted in Israeli violence?" - to be as thorough about it as i can? no, i don't, because this (arab-jewish tensions/clashes/violence in the region of palestina/palstine/israel) goes way before the state of israel was declared. at the same time i think this is infantilizing towards palestinians. neither side's violence is just reactionary or devoid of responsibility and choice.

"Decades of brutal oppression can only lead to radicalization in this way." - what's maddening to me about this specific argument point is that the exact same thing can be said of israelis in particular and jewish people worldwide in general. (my point being that i do not accept any kind of excuse for violence against civilians and innocents, anywhere.)

"This situation is personal to me because the loss of lives is heartbreaking and I've lived in so many countries where violence not only paints the history but the present" - i appreciate your sympathy and sense of personal connection. from my perspective i can tell that since october 7th i've had to start paying a lot less attention/ignoring western opinions, or i'd have gone mad weeks ago. (not just as a form of speech. i'm so thankful for going back to therapy a few months ago.) it probably started back when i started following the russian invasion of ukraine. i've seen western reactions to the suffering of the ukrainian people and there was something very... disconnected, about those reactions. i realized that you can't... just make someone understand what it's like to live under rocket/missle/drone fire. the sound of them hitting around you. or exploding overhead. feeling the shockwave hit your body while you hide in shelter and can only hope that the roulette won't land on you this time because it was, 100% directed at you and your family and friends, at civilians, openly and unapologetically. to live in war in your own home. it's the exact same now with the current war (which is far from being the first war i've lived through). i've reached the conclusion that the only opinion that really mattes is that of palestinians and israelis. the rest just cannot begin to comprehend.

"But I've come to learn that unfortunately peace is often achieved when there is violent resistance to oppression." - and after over 75 years of violence (if we're only counting since the establishment of israel, which, i repeat, is really not the starting point of any of this, neither is the current war since october 7th), where did that get us? what did that achieve?

to which i can segue to one of my main opinions: the whole reason this conflict has been going on for so long, and only gets worse, is because more importance is being given to the past than to the future. the heads of both israeli and palestinian leaderships are stuck in the past and up their own assholes (either alternatively or at the same time, it's a true biological miracle). the only thing that will truly make a change is when people will realize that the wheels can't be turned back and we can't replicate what used to be. the only way to create a sustainable and peaceful future for both israelis and palestinians would be to give up the glorification of the past. but to be clear, i'm well aware that i'm an idealist and the chances of my ideals actually happening are nonexistent.

this post is long enough as is but i want to touch on a few more points and attempt to paint a slightly more complete picture here.

the old yishuv (if you're interested, the hebrew version of this wiki article is a lot more comprehensive, and google translate should do a good enough job on it)

Expulsions and exoduses of Jews

Jewish exodus from the Muslim world

Mizrahi Jews in Israel

Ethiopian Jews in Israel

Arab citizens of Israel

The Hamas Networks in America: A Short History

fuck bibi, fuck ben gvir, fuck smotrich, fuck levin, fuck their coalition of religious nutjobs and rightwing extremists, fuck the west bank settlers, fuck jewish terrorism, fuck jewish supremacy.

#asks #belligerentbarbie

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republicansaredomesticterrorists · 6 months

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Biden is ratcheting up the pressure on a desperate Netanyahu who is spiraling out of control. American threats of pulling aid are the only thing that can control Israel. This happens behind the scenes whenever the hardliners in Israel get out of control. When books are written in a few years it will be revealed as always. Israel would never yield to anything other than massive U.S. threats.

It’s past time for this to end. Not just the current war but the whole issue that’s dragged on for decades. The UN needs to be empowered so they can step in and end a crisis like this.

Netanyahu’s response thus far has not been proportional and needs to end. Don’t get me wrong, Hamas brought this on the people of Gaza as they always do. They are a terrorist proxy of Iran and do not represent the ordinary people of Gaza. For far too long they have deliberately gotten Palestinians killed just to sway public opinion against Israel. They brutally slaughter innocent Israeli civilians and then use innocent Palestinians as human shields. Their benefactor, Iran, is itself a proxy for brutal dictator Putin of Russia.

Putin needs a distraction from Ukraine so he meets with Hamas and Iranian leadership both before and during the October 7th war. Hamas needs to play off the Israelis as an enemy so they can keep power on Gaza. Netanyahu and his right-wing party need Hamas as an enemy so they can stay in power. The Iranians, and other Middle East leaders, need to play off Israel and the West to keep the support of their own people.

The other Middle Eastern states will no longer take in Palestinian refugees because once in they never leave. Further they are extremely radicalized and don’t understand how normal life works because for decades they have been pushed into the streets to protest and fight by their proxy masters or some heavy handed Israeli action. Nobody cares for the Palestinians and they are nothing more than pawns to everyone involved. This needs to change. They are people with basic human rights and need peace and prosperity they same as everyone else in the world. They need to free themselves from Hamas and outside influences and the UN and its members need to step up and help them once they are free from the terrorists. For their part the Israelis need to get rid of Netanyahu and his right-wing government. They also deserve peace and security without imposing themselves on their Palestinian neighbors.

This is complicated and I don’t have the answers. It will be a long and arduous procedure that will require effort from all parties. One thing that is clear is that the killing needs to stop. The finger pointing needs to stop. The “what aboutisms” need to stop.

Some will say Russia’s involvement is a conspiracy theory. It’s not and all the world’s intelligence agencies and governments know this. To think otherwise is to be naive. The Russians have supplied all the weapons that Hamas and Hezbollah use and Iran supplies the money. Both states supply the military intelligence reports.

Some of you will forever say what about what the meddling the US and other Western states have done in the past but will never acknowledge what bad actors like Russia, Iran, China, North Korea, and others are continuing to do. These dictators can longer invade and promote terrorism as acts of foreign policy. Next up is Taiwan which will not go well for China that will suffer enormous losses beyond what Russia is experiencing in Ukraine. We can not repeat the 1930’s and be led to another world war by unscrupulous dictators.

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dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 2 months

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President Joe Biden's growing frustration with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to mount, with the Democrat captured on a hot mic saying that he and the Israeli leader will need to have a “come to Jesus meeting.”

The comments by Biden came as he spoke with Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., on the floor of the House chamber following Thursday night's State of the Union address.

In the exchange, Bennet congratulates Biden on his speech and urges the president to keep pressing Netanyahu on growing humanitarian concerns in Gaza. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg were also part of the brief conversation.

Biden then responds using Netanyahu's nickname, saying, “I told him, Bibi, and don’t repeat this, but you and I are going to have a ‘come to Jesus’ meeting.”

An aide to the president standing nearby then speaks quietly into the president’s ear, appearing to alert Biden that microphones remained on as he worked the room.

“I’m on a hot mic here,” Biden says after being alerted. “Good. That’s good.”

The president on Friday acknowledged the comments, lightheartedly poking at reporters that they were “eavesdropping” on his conversation. Asked if he thought Netanyahu should be doing more to alleviate the humanitarian suffering, Biden responded, “Yes, he does.”

A widening humanitarian crisis across Gaza and tight Israeli control of aid trucks have left virtually the entire population desperately short of food, according to the United Nations. Officials have been warning for months that Israel’s siege and offensive were pushing the Palestinian territory into famine.

Biden has become increasingly public about his frustration with the Netanyahu government’s unwillingness to open more land crossings for critically needed aid to make its way into Gaza.

In his address on Thursday, he called on the Israelis to do more to alleviate the suffering even as they try to eliminate Hamas.

“To Israel, I say this humanitarian assistance cannot be a secondary consideration or a bargaining chip,” Biden said.

The president announced in his speech Thursday that the U.S. military would help establish a temporary pier aimed at boosting the amount of aid getting into the territory. Last week, the U.S. military began air dropping aid into Gaza.

Biden said the temporary pier, ”will enable a massive increase in humanitarian assistance getting into Gaza.”

#us politics #news #abc news #state of the union address #president joe biden #2024 #israel #gaza #Palestine #free palestine #Sen. Michael Bennet #Antony Blinken #Pete Buttigieg #Benjamin Netanyahu #humanitarian aid #genocide

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