Israel/Palestine thread
Welcome! This is the beta version of the new TwoPlusTwo forum.

Israel/Palestine thread

Think this merits its own thread...

Discuss my fellow 2+2ers..

AM YISRAEL CHAI.


[QUOTE=Crossnerd]Edit: RULES FOR THIS THREAD

2+2 Rules

Posting guidelines for Politics and Soci...


These are our baselines. We're not reinventing the wheel here. If you aren't sure if something is acceptable to post, its better to ask first. If you think someone is posting something that violates the above guidelines, please report it or PM me rather than responding in kind.

To reiterate some of the points:

1. No personal attacks. This is a broad instruction, but, in general, we want to focus on attacking an argument rather than the poster making it. It is fine to say a post is antisemitic; it is not okay to call someone an antisemite over and over. If you believe someone is making antisemitic posts, report them or PM me. The same goes for calling people "baby killers" and "genocide lovers". You are allowed to argue that an action supports genocide or that the consequences of certain policies results in the death of children, but we are no longer going to be speaking to one another's intentions. It is not productive to the conversation and doesn't further any debate.

2. Racist posts and other bigoted statements that target a particular group or individuals of such groups with derogatory comments are not allowed. This should not need further explanation.

3. Graphic Images need to be in spoilers with a trigger warning.

4. Wishing Harm on other posters will result in an immediate timeout.

5. Genocidal statements such as "Kill 'em all" etc, are no longer permissible in the thread.

If anyone has any questions about the above, please PM me. I don't want a discussion about the rules to derail the content of this thread. If anything needs clarifying, I will do that in this thread.

Please be aware this thread is strictly moderated[/quote]

) 5 Views 5
07 October 2023 at 09:33 PM
Reply...

27486 Replies

5
w


by Bluegrassplayer k

I would not trust a book to be objective about Hamas if the author claims they are not a terrorist organization.

maybe you should read it.


BGP in 1989. well I think the black South Africans need to compromise. and besides, they are led by terrorists.

could I interest you in some literature? nah, they are all terrorists and any literature that says otherwise is obv false.


Hamas is a terrorist organization. Not all Palestinians are. Suggesting I would be calling all South Africans terrorists because of how I label Hamas, a faction of Palestinian politics and not all of Palestinians, is objectively false.

Israelis outnumber Gazans whereas black citizens in South Africa greatly outnumbered the white citizens.

South Africa resolved in a mostly peaceful manner, whereas Gaza is not being resolved in such a manner.

No matter the technicalities of who controls Gaza, it is an external conflict between Hamas and Israel. South Africa's was an internal system of oppression.

Your comparison completely ignores a lot of the nuance of these two conflicts. Please do not put arguments in my mouth, especially when they are so far off the mark.


where are you getting that Hamas is terrorist? like what is your criteria?


South Africa resolved in a mostly peaceful manner, whereas Gaza is not being resolved in such a manner.

nope


No matter the technicalities of who controls Gaza, it is an external conflict between Hamas and Israel. South Africa's was an internal system of oppression.

nope.

this has been explained to you countless times now. Israel is the occupying force.


https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/me...


by Victor k

its frankly disgusting to think that Israel has any right to act the way they do from a moral perspective. at least mets and Dun dont even try to play that card.

This isn't about having the moral high ground. This is about survival. Over the last 1,000 years there have been hundreds of extinct or almost extinct peoples in the Middle East that could claim the moral high ground over the Arab colonizers; but they were coloznized and genocided and no one cares about genocided people that had the moral high ground.

If Israel decided to take the moral high ground, they would just end up another notch in the belt, a foot note in history of the Arabization of the Middle East, which before the Arab Muslim conquests (still very much ongoing) had been perhaps the most diverse and culturally rich areas in the history of the world.


You keep talking about 30k deaths in several months (a figure that not even Hamas says is accurate but whatever). Meanwhile you're pointing at 20k deaths over almost 50 years.

by Bluegrassplayer k

No matter the technicalities of who controls Gaza, it is an external conflict between Hamas and Israel.


You can point to the technicalities all you want, this is far more similar to a war of external actors, especially when compared to something like Apartheid in South Africa. Your own source, and the use of the word "occupy", suggests this:

In international humanitarian law, a territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of the adverse foreign armed forces.

Are you suggesting that Gaza actually belongs to Israel?


by Dunyain k

This isn't about having the moral high ground. This is about survival. Over the last 1,000 years there have been hundreds of extinct or almost extinct peoples in the Middle East that could claim the moral high ground over the Arab colonizers; but they were coloznized and genocided and no one cares about genocided people that had the moral high ground.

If Israel decided to take the moral high ground, they would just end up another notch i

ludicrous. and murdering Gazan babies by the boatload surely doesnt make them any safer.


by Bluegrassplayer k

You keep talking about 30k deaths in several months (a figure that not even Hamas says is accurate but whatever). Meanwhile you're pointing at 20k deaths over almost 50 years.


You can point to the technicalities all you want, this is far more similar to a war of external actors, especially when compared to something like Apartheid in South Africa. Your own source, and the use of word "occupy", suggests this:

the people that are missing are not going to show up all of a sudden. they are dead and not coming back. buried under rubble or executed in ditches by the Zionists.

its not a technicality. its international law.

and by your quoted gotcha definition, it still applies as an occupation. they literally controlled how many calories entered Gaza for years. like they counted the population and then limited the calories entering. people could rarely leave and all travel was controled by Israel. there have been drones flying overhead at all times monitoring everything. and periodically they mow the lawn and kill a bunch of people and destroy the infrastructure.

your whole argument, like all of your arguments boils down buh buh buh USA says so.

but if you dont want to call it an occupation, thats fine. regardless, all of that stuff and many other things compel the Palestinians to resist and fight back.

and as for your nuance, I am going to side with the guys who arent doing genocide. I work from first principles sometimes. one of those is to not support genocide. and if you dont like the word genocide, bc I know you are a semantical person, I just dont support people that kill babies and destroy cities


You've missed the point regarding occupation. USA says Israel was not occupying Gaza prior to this conflict and after they withdrew...

I'm fine with calling it an occupation, the point is that this strengthens my argument and weakens yours. What you are arguing (without realizing it) is that Israel owns Gaza and is fighting a counterinsurgency. If Israel is actually occupying Gaza then that means that they are an external force exerting control over Gaza.

Calling what Israel is doing genocide or not has nothing to do with this conversation.


by Bill Haywood k

Early Zionism simply wasn't like Manifest Destiny. The organizers were socialists and atheists. They justified displacement of the Palestinians with theories of modernization and colonialism. Their justification was that Palestinians were primitives to be pushed aside by European modernization. There were religious members of the World Zionist Organization, but they weren't the main thrust.

Dunyain,
Can we get an amen?


by 5 south k

Dunyain,
Can we get an amen?

All of that happened before any of us was born. Same as all the Jews in the Middle East were kicked out of all their ancestral homes, on top of 10,000 other displacements, most done by Muslim Arabs in the name of Allah.

The point is that Israel is a nation of 15 million people that has been around for 80 years, and the Palestinian people and their governing authority Hamas have promised Israel's destruction, and promise 1,000 more 10/7s. And any sane people that had the capability would be acting towards their survival by neutralizing such an existential threat.

I would argue Israel's flaw is they have not acted decisively enough to protect their survival from the enemy that has declared Holy War and promised their destruction. The Arab Muslims themselves have committed total genocides of whole tribes of peoples for much much less (still very much ongoing) in their colonial settler history.

The Arabs had a great run and conquered, colonized and genocided a lot of peoples. Spain, Iran and now Israel are 3 notable colonies they lost. To this day they are still making advances in other parts of the area, most notably Aizerbaijan, Syria and East Africa. Nothing to be ashamed of.

All in all, a great run of genocide, conquest and colonization that is still ongoing. I suspect the Arab Muslims will still be colonizing long after the US empire has faded to dust, including an eventual reconquest of Israel.


Was just a friendly joke.
But I do agree with your basic argument. Israel exists and have an overwhelming military advantage to the few actors that want to directly attack them. They're not going anywhere and obv dgaf about modern western values when it comes to warfare. Their neighbors would be better off admitting they've been conquered and work out a deal.
If they don't want to work out a deal and continue their jihad they will eventually win but it will probably be generations from now.
All that being said, seems pretty hard to move on from the current situation but it's all we have at the moment. Also as you have said, this is not "morally right" but no one, jew, Arab, whitey, etc... is giving land they've conquered back because it's the right thing to do.
The Palestinians will have the international community on their side for negotiations and should cry uncle.
And Victor, please don't say Hamas has already offered up negotiations, they refuse to acknowledge Israel exists and refuse to admit defeat. Life does not get better for them and the occupation continues until they swallow their pride for the good of their people. Nobody likes to lose, especially to colonizers, but they've lost and only the Houthies seem to be giving them any kind of backup.
It's the same in Ukraine, they're not getting the Donbas back in this war. Will have to wait for a later date. Although they still stand a better chance than the Palestinians.


by Victor k

do you deny that they are using drones with machine guns to kill "KHamas" members?

I only brought it up because the 50 Palestinians killed by a sniper drone while in a breadline reminded me of babies in ovens and women's pelvises being broken from rape level propaganda.


If you read the article, the survivors recount that a tank was firing as well.


there have been reports of these things firing on people since October from many different accounts.

essentially, they are doing weapons testing a captive civilian population. believe it or dont.


by Victor k

there have been reports of these things firing on people since October from many different accounts.

essentially, they are doing weapons testing a captive civilian population. believe it or dont.

LOL.

1 million camera phones, on top of thousands of "journalists with cameras" and not even a single picture. This is Bigfoot or Loch Ness monster level nonsense.


by 5 south k

Was just a friendly joke.
But I do agree with your basic argument. Israel exists and have an overwhelming military advantage to the few actors that want to directly attack them. They're not going anywhere and obv dgaf about modern western values when it comes to warfare. Their neighbors would be better off admitting they've been conquered and work out a deal.

Only if Israel lets them. They just might, who knows what the future holds.

Like I have said before, the more desperate Israel's situation gets, the less it is going to take care for the Palestinian people. Like Micro says, they have dropped enough bombs to kill everyone and have killed 20,000 people (allegedly), so obviously they are showing massive restraint (although not US level restraint). But this doesn't have to continue indefinitely if they keep getting pushed.


by Dunyain k

LOL.

1 million camera phones, on top of thousands of "journalists with cameras" and not even a single picture. This is Bigfoot or Loch Ness monster level nonsense.

theres been plenty of pictures of them.


Dun likes to talk a lot about culture

this is the guy who got fired and thrown in jail for expressing that he doesnt want to murder Palestinians


by 5 south k

Was just a friendly joke.
But I do agree with your basic argument. Israel exists and have an overwhelming military advantage to the few actors that want to directly attack them. They're not going anywhere and obv dgaf about modern western values when it comes to warfare. Their neighbors would be better off admitting they've been conquered and work out a deal.
If they don't want to work out a deal and continue their jihad

This is the main reason Israel is leveling gaza

You attack us, we destroy your country

That pushes it back at least a few generations


If you ignore the reality the Arab Palestinians themselves are colonizers, and the Kurds are actually native (or at least their colonizations happened thousands of years earlier); it is actually an interesting parallel how the Arabs handle the Kurds versus how the Israeli Jews handle the Palestinians, with the EXTREME disparity of interest and lack of support for Kurds.

In the fever dream every thing seems as is it should be of course; but I do wonder if historians will look back and puzzle why the entire world has decided we have to support Arab Muslim colonial interests so vigorously, and completely ignore their victims. Maybe it is all just about the oil.


who did the Palestinians colonize? what do the Kurds matter to the Palestinians?


It's insane that when israel defends itself, propogandists say " they were killed by the zionists, they were killed by the occupiers, they were killed by the apartheid state".

They were killed by the military of Israel, a legitimate state. Using your propoganda does not change the fact that israel has been a state for 76 years

Is sort of impressive though. Saying it over and over has brainwashed much of American youth

Dei has been the best propoganda of all in college campuses

Label Israel as colonizers and palestenians as captive over and over and then people are surprised at the uneducated protests?

https://www.city-journal.org/article/how...


by Victor k

who did the Palestinians colonize? what do the Kurds matter to the Palestinians?

1,500 years ago not a single person spoke Arab and not a single person practiced Islam. Now it is almost 100% of both. And genetically the Palestinians are mostly a mix of settlers from various Muslim conquests. Very much a settler colonial people.

But in the fever dream that is our reality the second to last group of settlers (out of a very long list) have rights to the land, at least in this case. The rules are pretty arbitrary; for example no one is saying any of the Christian, Jewish, Kurdish etc. communities in the ME (all having roots to their land much longer than the Palestinians) that have been displaced in our liftetimes have any rights to their historical land or will ever get to go back.

Reply...