Israel/Palestine thread

Personally, I've been trying to put in some effort to get as much information from reputable sources as I can to make a reasonable interpretation on such a complex situation that's buried in history - and it really is a *****.

As that pertains to Vic's position in this thread, i've come to a few broad positions,

I'd strongly agree with him that Israel, at this point, is completely out of bounds on their current military decisiveness for the Gazans and how that particularly relates to adjudicating the proper level of safety needed for the Israelis moving forward while using the minimum amount of destruction needed to accomplish that.

I'd strongly disagree with him that Hamas, even though Palestinians have in fact supported them to a degree, hold any interest in the safety and prosperity of anyone who lives there. Their actions as well as their funders actions screams that they are indeed looking to fan the flames at the expense of the Gazan people and it's mission accomplished for those rich mother****ing chicken hawks for them to have it end just the way it is now while the avg age of a soon to be 50k death toll is in the teenage years. Hamas absolutely wants what's happening to be the case.

There is a notable deterrent effect to anyone else who wants to try to get at them. The message isn't just for Hamas, it's for anyone else who wants to try. In this region, your bite has often gotten you results. Your bark isn't worth much.

It is not Israel's job to look out for Palestinian interests. This is the job of Palestinian leadership, who have proven woefully inadequate to the task.

The Palestinians have had numerous opportunities to make peace, but have refused because the leadership was more interested in their own interests than those of the Palestinian people, and the longer this drags on the more leverage they are losing, and the less they are going to get. If/when they ever make a peace, it will probably be for much less than offers they were turning down 80, 70, 60, 50 years ago.

Btw heard a very good podcast today that defines a very salient point:

the IDF simply cannot administer aid in Gaza, because their soldiers are sitting ducks for Hamas in any spot that happens.

Gazans would get immediate aid if not for this risk. So right now what's already being discussed is who can administer, distribute and protect aid in Gaza? Someone that Hamas would not kill has to be on that. And everyone is weeks late figuring this out. And it's an everyone issue. It's not one Israel can solve alone.

It holds politicians accountable. I was considering voting for Biden, but will vote third party instead. His actions have cost him my vote.

If you blindly vote for a party no matter what they do, up to signing off on intentionally starving children to death, assassinating journalists and professors and blowing up hospitals, then politicians have no reason to care what you think or what your interests are.

Obviously, they've designed the system to give us as little input as possible, but if you blindly vote for Ds or Rs no matter what they do, you're giving up the tiny amount of democracy we have as much as someone who doesn't vote.

I haven't decided what I am going to do yet, but I have decided I dont want to vote for any politician that writes blank checks for Hamas to build terror tunnels and indoctrinate Gaza to revel in antisemitic hate. The Biden regime suspending payment to UNRWA is a good sign to me they are committed to accountability.

I will hold out my vote for the candidate who is wiling to safeguard that aid money goes for aid for the people, and not suicidal Jihad.

Edit: The truth is I think it is insane this issue is so salient to as many people as it is (in a completely low information biased manner), and they hold the Biden administration as accountable as they do for what another sovereign nation is doing.

IMO the Palestinian people themselves would be much better off if a lot more people held Hamas, Iran and Qatar accountable for this debacle, as opposed to Joe Biden.

Did the podcast (and do you) believe Israel lied when they claimed North Gaza was controlled by the IDF?

From my POV--left by American standards, but moderate in most other countries--Biden was perhaps, just barely doing the very minimum to get my vote as it was. That's a lot of the issue. Nobody liked him to begin with and he was installed by the Wall Street wing as the nominee.

If Biden had like, scaled back the drug war significantly, reduced other military spending, fought political corruption, improved our awful HC system.... or pursued any number of other massively popular policies, myself and I think others would accept the compromise. But he's the same filthy crook he's always been.

It's like if you were deciding whether to date someone you weren't much attracted to and you saw them stiff a waiter.

Of course, I don't hold him responsible for Israel's crimes but for continuing to fund them because arms dealers give him money.

It's not a genocide. Nazi Germany was. The forced islamization or genocide of Armenians was another

Palestinian population has skyrocketed

Maybe the continued funding (much of which is tied into non aggression treaties with Egypt) is what is allowing the US to have the influence it does over Israeli policy? Maybe having some control over Israel is important for broader US interests in the region, and giving this up would have a lot of downstream consequences? For example, at the end of the Yom Kippur War the US ability to leverage the influence it had over Israel and negotiate a peace between Egypt and Israel was extremely beneficial for the US in its struggle for geopolitical control of the region with the USSR.

Most of the criticism (from the left) I have heard about Trump's strategy with Iran is that he completely destroyed any incentives Iran had to "play ball" with us, and so they stopped doing so. Maybe the Biden administration doesn't want to repeat this with Israel.

I mean at this point it is pretty clear the biggest obstacle to any sort of ceasefire is Hamas and their handling of the hostages. I am guessing even if Hamas was inclined to deal them they cant, because of some combination of:

1. They lost them and/or never had them (plenty of other militant groups and Palestinian "civilians" were involved in 10/7)
2. They tortured, raped and/or killed a lot of them and dont want to release any evidence

But I dont really see how this is Biden's fault.

I dont know if we expect it but count me in those who want a ceasefire. Also nearly everyone I consider left wing (which is a lot of people).

It is worrisome but biden the next day said Israel has accepted cease-fire terms and hamas is holding it up so i dont think the administration expects a cease-fire without hostage return

How do you define "controlled" for these purposes? Some sort of operational upper hand? The last IDF soldier to die in the North was 8-9 days ago. So in that sense it must certainly be "safer" than the south, where 5 have died since that time.

I guess more important than what I think is what did Israel mean when they said they controlled north Gaza?

do you want to bet that I cant? I told you I would give you odds

we get 500 images of palestinians, 500 images of israelis, I will be able to sort them out with a high degree of accuracy.

Clearly you believe I cannot do it, so unless you are broke, you should put your money where your mouth is

but alas, actions speak louder than words; you wont take this bet, you will simply continue to complain about my point but you wont take the necessary steps to refute it

my $1000 versus your $750

Israel claimed they had full operational control of the North on multiple occassions.

and yet the Resistance releases daily videos of tanks, troop carriers, or bulldozers being blown up. and of snipers getting sniped (not so easy to face actual soldiers rather than picking off children). and of booby traps collapsing buildings on them.

youre confusing the words genocide and eradication

they are not the same

palestinian population has skyrocketed, so they have not been eradicated

^ you see, that is true

palestinian population has skyrocketed, so they have not been under a genocide

^^ that statement isnt true, because population decline isnt a requirement of genocide

since you are ignorant as to the definition of this word, I will post it for you

The word “genocide” was first coined by Polish lawyer Raphäel Lemkin in 1944 in his book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe. It consists of the Greek prefix genos, meaning race or tribe, and the Latin suffix cide, meaning killing. Lemkin developed the term partly in response to the Nazi policies of systematic murder of Jewish people during the Holocaust, but also in response to previous instances in history of targeted actions aimed at the destruction of particular groups of people. Later on, Raphäel Lemkin led the campaign to have genocide recognised and codified as an international crime.

https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention...

next I will post the definition of eradicate, since you seem to be ignorant about that as well

e·rad·i·cate
[əˈradəˌkāt]
verb
destroy completely; put an end to:
"this disease has been eradicated from the world"

Just incredible. Israel creates a massive human catastrophe and somehow it's the rest of the world's responsibility to deal with the fallout. A million people forced from their homes and zero consideration for how they will be kept alive. I guess that's Egypt's fault. Why doesn't Egypt help?

Anyway, back in the real world, IDF is blocking food shipments and doing its best to keep the UN from helping, the US has been forced to airlift supplies in against the wishes of its ally, just an absolute absurdity.

World Food Programme says northern Gaza ...

Surely it means they can let people return to their houses and set up an aid distribution network.

Whatever the exact opposite of Rafah is, I suppose. Hamas clearly controls Rafah. So some form of base of operations seems like it makes sense.

Trolly, it's well understood by pragmatic level-headed analysts of this conflict (and historians) that "the day after solution" is not an Israeli solution. It cannot be. And it cannot be because THAT, is an occupied apartheid state, for someone like you.

It's not just ineffective and untenable, it's impossible. Everyone involved in this thing understands that the "day after solution" involves other stakeholders who can be shoulder to shoulder with Gazans without being perceived as evil western occupiers. And this is particularly true because unlike other conflicts, the refugees are not being accepted by neighbouring countries. It's a truly special case.

Many thought this day after solution would be needed when the campaign was done. It's now obvious that actually, even mid-campaign, the time is now. It's certain this is already being negotiated. I'm sure this is one Biden would love to put his stamp on (but it can't be the USA in there either).

Btw do I think the IDF facilitate the day after? Yeah sure. But they can't own the whole process for very long.

Israel didn't cause any catastrophe

Hamas did

As i said all along

Some saudi qatar jordan Egypt alliance will have to be the transition team

Propaganda is a part of war, for both internal and external audiences. I am not sure it is productive to over analyze it. No one asks Hamas what it means when they make up a bunch of **** about destroying Israeli tanks. We all get it.

they literally post the videos.

and given that Israel is now using 1960s troop carriers that are so weak that many soldiers refuse to enter one, it seems likely they have destroyed a lot more armor than you realize.