Most active commenters
  • weatherlite(26)
  • reissbaker(16)
  • HDThoreaun(14)
  • Ozzie_osman(13)
  • avmich(13)
  • (12)
  • YZF(11)
  • runarberg(10)
  • tptacek(9)
  • peterashford(8)

←back to thread

517 points xbar | 411 comments | | HN request time: 3.214s | source | bottom
Show context
locallost ◴[] No.39148816[source]
My views on the situation aside, the clearest I saw anyone communicate the issues from a global angle was the former French prime minister Dominique de Villepin

Translated here: https://twitter.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1718201487132885246

Viewed from the angle of the West, I think the message it needs to avoid isolating itself from the world is very unusual for Western media and important.

Quote:

"Westerners must open their eyes to the extent of the historical drama unfolding before us to find the right answers."

And

"This Palestinian question will not fade. And so we must address it and find an answer. This is where we need courage. The use of force is a dead end. The moral condemnation of what Hamas did - and there's no "but" in my words regarding the moral condemnation of this horror - must not prevent us from moving forward politically and diplomatically in an enlightened manner. The law of retaliation is a never-ending cycle."

replies(6): >>39148909 #>>39148934 #>>39148966 #>>39149209 #>>39150381 #>>39151344 #
1. pgeorgi ◴[] No.39148909[source]
All correct and yet, what should happen? Israel stops their campaign. And then?

Spend tons of money on iron dome to shoot down the rockets and hope that Hamas won't manage to conduct another massacre, even if "only" half the scope of October 7?

This mess features not one but two parties who currently reject the concept of a cease fire.

replies(10): >>39148950 #>>39149385 #>>39149812 #>>39149917 #>>39149974 #>>39150129 #>>39150783 #>>39151418 #>>39152292 #>>39153568 #
2. hypeit ◴[] No.39148950[source]
Israel must face the reality that is an apartheid state that exists on occupied land. There is no solution until that happens. Just like apartheid South Africa was dismantled, Israel has to face the same fate or forever be locked into warfare and oppressing Palestinians.
replies(7): >>39149079 #>>39149102 #>>39149282 #>>39149718 #>>39150003 #>>39150676 #>>39151173 #
3. JumpCrisscross ◴[] No.39149079[source]
> that is an apartheid state that exists on occupied land

I’ve heard this line from people who say the West Bank and Gaza are the occupied land, to those who say all of Israel is occupied land. The former makes sense. The latter is extreme.

> like apartheid South Africa was dismantled

South Africa wasn’t as militarised as the Levant has become, unfortunately. As long as Iran seeks the destruction of Israel, itself and through its proxies, any Mandela-type accounting is probably fruitless. (I am open to being convinced otherwise.)

replies(3): >>39149579 #>>39150569 #>>39151852 #
4. hypeit ◴[] No.39149145{3}[source]
It's not "hate speech" to call to the end of an apartheid government.
replies(1): >>39149277 #
5. lacker ◴[] No.39149282[source]
Isn't that exactly the view of reality that the Israeli right wing holds? They would agree that the choices are either dismantling the state of Israel, or eternal warfare. Since they don't want to dismantle the state of Israel, they elect for eternal warfare.

It's funny how on some questions, the most extreme people on both sides agree on the answer. Hamas and the Israeli right wing both agree that the only viable solution is for one ethnic group to control all the land from the river to the sea.

replies(2): >>39149326 #>>39149711 #
6. ◴[] No.39149360{4}[source]
7. locallost ◴[] No.39149385[source]
If I knew the answer to that question I would be a high ranked politician. But for me it's important to keep in mind what he is saying here and also in another part explicitly: a diplomatic solution is possible and history proves that. So what I can do is reject the notion that what is happening is unavoidable.
replies(3): >>39149830 #>>39150030 #>>39150443 #
8. JumpCrisscross ◴[] No.39149394{4}[source]
> They just want Palestinians to have full human rights on their land, from the river to the sea

This is presumably a one-state solution?

The problem here being the Jews would be a minority in this state. Which leads to existential concerns regarding their survival. That can’t be easily brushed aside. Particularly when members of Iran’s Axis sport “death to Israel, a curse upon Jews” [1]. (Hamas and the Houthis sharing a backer isn’t insignificant.)

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slogan_of_the_Houthi_movemen...

9. JumpCrisscross ◴[] No.39149436{5}[source]
> Calling for the destruction of the only Jewish state is hate speech

I’m generally pro-Israel, but I don’t agree with this at all. Israel is a theocracy, and an increasingly right-wing one at that. Arguing against even theocracies in principal would technically argue for dissolving Israel as a Jewish state; I would hardly call that hate speech.

replies(1): >>39149876 #
10. cempaka ◴[] No.39149444{5}[source]
Is there a Christian state?
replies(1): >>39149669 #
11. pphysch ◴[] No.39149579{3}[source]
Anyone can go on Google Earth, look at the official UN borders of Israel, then do a search in Hebrew or "synagogue" (obviously not every synagogue is Israeli) or "checkpoint" and very clearly see the Israeli settlements outside Israel's legal borders. Search "Hizma" for a good example [1].

To make it even more obvious, toggle the "street view" layer over one of these areas and see what gets highlighted.

There is a clear apartness between the neatly-planned Israeli settlements, often built on demolished Palestinian villages, and the organic scattering of indigenous, primarily Arab Palestinian villages. With militarized checkpoints in between. Anyone can see it, if they have the will and a web browser.

[1] - https://earth.google.com/web/search/Hizma+checkpoint,+Sderot...

replies(1): >>39149808 #
12. pgeorgi ◴[] No.39149669{6}[source]
Everything blue on https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:State_Religions.svg
replies(1): >>39150767 #
13. YZF ◴[] No.39149673{4}[source]
I feel that's an extremely naive view. How many Jews live peacefully and enjoy human rights under Arab rule in the middle east? Zero. How many in Gaza under Hamas? Zero. How many live in the west bank in areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority? Zero.

So "Hamas" only wants Tel-Aviv "returned", Jersualem "returned", Haifa "returned", from the river to the sea, but somehow in that vision all the Jewish population lives peacefully and enjoys human rights that don't exist anywhere in the middle east?

replies(2): >>39150076 #>>39151672 #
14. gizmo ◴[] No.39149711{3}[source]
No. The Israeli right wing is trying (and succeeding at) making all of the land between the river and the sea exclusive property of the Jewish people. A quick glance at how the borders have evolved since 1948 makes this evident.

Most Palestinians (and thankfully also a good number of Israeli citizens) want a pluralistic solution, without checkpoints and borders, with equal rights and equal representation for all.

A two-state solution was possible 20 years ago, but with the current settlements in the West Bank with 450k or so Settlers and Gaza's total dependence on Israel for water, internet, electricity and many other of life's necessities, all paths towards a two-state solution have been severed.

Now that Gaza has been bombed and bulldozed what possibility is there for a Palestinian state? All records have been destroyed. The courts are gone. The universities are gone. It's all gone.

Israel will accept neither a one-state or two-state solution. By systematically destroying everything Palestinian the question resolves itself. That seems to be the strategy. And if we can take Israeli politicians at their word, this seems to have been the strategy for the past 20 years at least.

replies(4): >>39149939 #>>39150024 #>>39150819 #>>39151973 #
15. pgeorgi ◴[] No.39149776{4}[source]
> They just want Palestinians to have full human rights on their land, from the river to the sea.

What's the word for word translation of the original slogan again? "From the river to the sea, all land shall be Arab" if my dictionary doesn't fail me...

16. YZF ◴[] No.39149808{4}[source]
I'm not sure what point are you trying to make here.

Nobody, including Israelis, will argue about the status of Palestinians living outside of Israel's border, in areas that are occupied (a terminology of international law that Israel also agrees to, https://casebook.icrc.org/a_to_z/glossary/occupation ) do not enjoy equal rights to Israelis (Arabs, Jews, Christians and other) living within Israel's borders. During the US occupation of Japan or Germany post WW-II could the Japanese or Germans travel freely to the US? Vote in the US elections? It's true that Americans didn't settle those regions (they built military bases they still maintain so maybe a little).

"often built on demolished Palestinian villages" - I think this isn't generally true in the west bank, if that was what this statement was about. There are certainly demolished villages within Israel's borders (going back to the 1948 war).

replies(1): >>39149902 #
17. anon84873628 ◴[] No.39149812[source]
>All correct and yet, what should happen? Israel stops their campaign. And then?

And then everyone who wants peace invests lots of money and expertise over a long time to build a modern, prosperous, stable Palestinian society, despite whatever setbacks, attacks, and sabotage occur from within and without.

The only way to have peace is to give people a better option than becoming terrorists.

replies(10): >>39150054 #>>39150113 #>>39150192 #>>39151429 #>>39151448 #>>39151680 #>>39151741 #>>39154465 #>>39154995 #>>39159067 #
18. noqc ◴[] No.39149830[source]
How does history prove any such thing? That's neither how history or proof work. Most of the wars that have been resolved to everyone's benefit have done so by the unconditional surrender of the aggressors, followed by amicable reconstruction.
replies(3): >>39150001 #>>39151361 #>>39153375 #
19. Wytwwww ◴[] No.39149831{4}[source]
> They just want Palestinians to have full human rights

Hamas certainly doesn't want Palestinians to have full human rights. Regardless of how unjustifiable some Israel's actions are or what one might think about them Hamas is a fundamentalist terrorist organization and they certainly were/are/would be unwilling to extend "full human rights" to Palestinians or anyone living in Gaza or anywhere else.

20. kansface ◴[] No.39149864{4}[source]
The charter of Hamas explicitly calls for the eradication of the state of Israel, the death of presumably all Jews, Muslim rule of all of Palestine, the explicit rejection of peace or any negotiated settlement (with explicit condemnation of the Camp David Accords), and Jihad as individual duty in order to achieve the aforementioned goals.
replies(1): >>39150482 #
21. jjcon ◴[] No.39149876{6}[source]
Huh? Israel is a parliamentary democracy not a theocracy. It is more irreligious than USA/Canada and plenty of Europe:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_irrelig...

replies(3): >>39150340 #>>39150555 #>>39151601 #
22. cassepipe ◴[] No.39149897{4}[source]
That's certainly what you (and me) would very much like Hamas to want but it is certainly not what Hamas actually wants

You can only ignore who they are if you don't listen to what they say

23. Wytwwww ◴[] No.39149902{5}[source]
> During the US occupation of Japan or Germany post WW-II could

Which was a temporary state and certainly didn't last for 50 years.

> It's true that Americans didn't settle those regions (they built military bases they still maintain so maybe a little).

There are no countries in Europe where US is maintaining military bases without full consent of their governments.

> could the Japanese or Germans travel freely to the US? Vote in the US elections?

How is this relevant? The people living in the occupied territories do not enjoy equal rights with the illegal Israeli settlers who have taken parts of them over. It's basically colonialism.

replies(2): >>39150227 #>>39150315 #
24. ◴[] No.39149917[source]
25. cassepipe ◴[] No.39149939{4}[source]
While I mostly agree with you, your point does not seem to contradict at all the point of the comment you are responding to
replies(1): >>39150210 #
26. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39149974[source]
Yes, that is exactly what Israel should do. The "dont let gazans interact with Israelis" strategy was icnredibly effective until Israel got soft on border security. Israel easily is capable of ensuring no Gazans ever escape again. The iron dome is largely succesful at keeping Israelis safe, certainly more so than a long term gazan invasion which would open up the Israelis in gaza to terrorist attacks.
replies(2): >>39150167 #>>39150250 #
27. shakow ◴[] No.39150001{3}[source]
> How does history prove any such thing?

Because there are Jews living in Germany nowadays?

replies(4): >>39150207 #>>39150259 #>>39150262 #>>39151826 #
28. YZF ◴[] No.39150024{4}[source]
You're correct that the Israeli right wing would really like the entire land to be ruled by the Jewish people. Their "success" since 1967 has really been driven by the Arab countries and the Palestinians. The political violence and the wars they waged pushed the Israeli public to become more extreme and unable to imagine a future where it's possible for everyone to live in peace on the same land. I think this is pretty much fact. Rabin who was trying to make peace was assassinated as a direct result of the heated atmosphere in the wake of Hamas' suicide bombing campaign against Israel, which had the goal of sabotaging the peace process.

I don't think it's correct that most Palestinians want what you say they want (surveys?). And even if it's true, the majority of Palestinians has no means of getting what they want. In areas under their control it's certainly hasn't been "pluralistic with equal rights and representation", it's been more like "I have a gun do what I say or else".

I think the two state solution is impossible but not for the reasons you mention. I don't think we need Gaza's courts or universities. It's also not the dependency on electricity etc. It's impossible for other reasons. On the Israeli side nobody is willing to live with an aggressive entity that wants to destroy it having their own state 5 minute driving distance from all their major cities. Gaza (the withdrawal of Israel and the rise of Hamas and their militarization) to them is proof there's no way that can work. There is no trust that the Palestinians will respect any agreement. On the Palestinian side there's no body that actually represents the Palestinians and there are armed factions that have already said they'll reject any agreement and keep on fighting.

Israel has dismantled settlements in Sinai and in Gaza. I don't think the settlements are the problem. If there was a viable option for real peace Israel would dismantle the settlements (+/- maybe some land exchange around major blocks). Ofcourse the settlements don't help because their existence creates friction and hate and they're sort of illegal.

Maybe external parties will somehow enforce a two state solution. It's kind of hard to see now. Maybe we need enough time to pass so we get social processes that take us somewhere better. Also kind of hard to see right now. Maybe Israel will expel all Arabs from the region eventually (or enough of them that they can annex the occupied territories). Also hard to see. Maybe the Palestinians will unite and reject violence as means of making political progress and that will convince Israelis to let them in as equal citizens. Also hard to see. I.e. no solution. Partly has to do with broader geo-political processes, namely China and Russia's conflict with the west. If that's resolved (also hard to see) maybe progress can be made in the middle east as well.

replies(3): >>39150318 #>>39150463 #>>39159358 #
29. saiya-jin ◴[] No.39150030[source]
Well, the alternative to diplomatic solution is total annihilation of palestinians in west bank, be it by forcing them off the land which is impossible since they have nowhere to run and other islamic states refuse them (so much for inter-muslim brotherhood, I guess Iran should take them), or murdering them one by one which seems to be going on now. Or what we had till now, which led to what we have now. It doesnt matter that the other side plays dirty, all sides eventually do. It just doesn't matter for statement above.

It doesn't matter a nanofraction of a bit what government(s) publicly say, those are farts in the wind to be polite, I don't understand why people even care about such PR, its like what Putin says, what does it matter when its clearly said for a specific purpose and truth is optional?

I honestly dont understand the resistance to their own state. Yes they will hate Israel, just like till now they did, just like every single its neighbor since its creation. So what? How did we/they move from this utter hate of neighbors to cca peace? Well certainly not by following the path of trying to eradicate the other, history is pretty clear there. Yes its a bit easier to invade and kill if you want compared to invading a foreign state, but preventing it should be a good thing. Also, US is effectively giving them a blank check, just empty words flying around, I really expected a bit more. A room for Russia or China to step up.

Its like counting some destroyed tunnels or killing few brainwashed young guys mattered in long run, in same vein as say counting Vietcong losses and comparing them to US ones didn't matter. That's whats happening now. What's the plan for rest of existence? I dont see that part, I mean 0. But maybe current Israel government likes this situation, I mean the top guy is former special forces guy, so this is not unusual situation and a bit of blood doesn't matter to them and if there is war people don't focus so much on how effectively he erodes democracy.

So what is this, state-sponsored genocide? Because 100% this is not how Hamas disappears for longer than few months (in same vein al qaeda didn't) and I think literally everybody involved realizes that, this will actually make it much stronger long term, think about all those eager volunteers from places like Saudi arabia. Soviet war was what created Osama. US invasion of Iraq is what pointed him to US.

Suffice to say, when doing grocery shopping I don't buy products from Israel these days, we don't need more wars in middle east and massive refugees waves in Europe. Tiny wallet, but its all I have (apart from vacations but for that Israel was very low in the list anyway).

replies(4): >>39150427 #>>39150468 #>>39150590 #>>39151869 #
30. runarberg ◴[] No.39150076{5}[source]
The West Bank holds the forth largest Jewish population in the world, after France. Now the West Bank is occupied territory, controlled by Israel, so perhaps that doesn’t count.

According to this Wikipedia article[1] there are around 2-3000 jewish people living in Morocco, 1-2000 in Tunisia, and about 100 in Syria and Lebanon (not including the Golan Heights).

I am aware that there were persecutions in the past in many Arabic countries, but the same is true of Europe. Beirut even restored one of their last Synagogues in 2010 after it was damaged, ironically, in an Israeli airstrike.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_population_by_country

replies(1): >>39150279 #
31. ajross ◴[] No.39150129[source]
> All correct and yet, what should happen? Israel stops their campaign. And then?

It remains a mess, but less of a mess? Look, it's all bad guys running the show in that hell hole of a desert. There are no trusted entities anywhere able to run a government that isn't somewhere between actively antagonistic and actively genocidal toward half the local population.

Nonetheless a status quo with less shooting and death is better than a status quo with more. Hamas killed fewer people than Israel did/is, so... yeah, I guess. An occasional October 7th is a better choice than levelling Gaza is. Incrementally. But none of this is going to get better, likely within our lifetimes.

replies(2): >>39150769 #>>39155192 #
32. ◴[] No.39150146{3}[source]
33. pgeorgi ◴[] No.39150157{4}[source]
Hamas controls Gaza, where Israel withdrew nearly 20 years ago. First thing Hamas did: destroy all the infrastructure set up by Israelis. Or maybe Hamas murdered the Fatah officials first. In any case, there was little Israeli left in all that time, and there's a border with a supposedly friendly neighbor, tons of money and expertise by the global community invested in that area, and they squandered it all in favor of raping and pillaging the hippie communities of the Israeli peace movement.
replies(1): >>39151544 #
34. mderazon ◴[] No.39150167[source]
I think you have a slight misconception about living under Iron Dome.

It's not 100% effective and you still have to run to the nearest shelter. In some areas close to Gaza, you have less than 10 seconds to run to the shelter.

So I wouldn't consider that "normal life" by any standards

replies(1): >>39150266 #
35. mderazon ◴[] No.39150192[source]
This is looking at the conflict from western eyes. Religious fundamentalists don't think like that
replies(6): >>39150290 #>>39150577 #>>39150800 #>>39151215 #>>39151317 #>>39152213 #
36. sgift ◴[] No.39150207{4}[source]
... after Germany was bombed to the ground and occupied for years. Only after that came the diplomatic efforts.
replies(1): >>39150872 #
37. gizmo ◴[] No.39150210{5}[source]
I don't think it makes sense to talk about what the extremists in a conflict want when one side is a regional superpower and the other side has no army to speak of (that's why Hamas hides in tunnels).

It's about what the parties can actually accomplish. Hamas gambles on international sympathy because they cannot do anything militarily. They have no bargaining leverage either during possible peace talks. I don't approve of antisemitic slogans wishing for the destruction of Israel but the world will never allow it to happen. Never. Zero chance of that happening.

So while extremists on both sides are the same in the abstract, only one side is facing possible extermination.

replies(1): >>39151340 #
38. YZF ◴[] No.39150227{6}[source]
If Jordan took back the west bank and Egypt took Gaza back then this also wouldn't last for 50 years. This is a unique situation where the party the land was occupied from doesn't want it back and the party that occupied it doesn't want it and the people living on this occupied land also don't really want it (or at least not willing to make peace in exchange for getting it). Because it's so hard to solve we've been stuck for 50 years. Still the legal status of this territory is the same as occupied Japan or Germany. It's a "temporary state", just a very long one.

In terms of "colonialism" I don't think it quite fits the strict definition of the word. Again it's a bit of a unique situation. If we compare to Europe many of the borders were drawn as a result of war, and this would be no different. The difference is that in Europe the population might have been expelled (e.g. like: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expulsion_of_Germans_from_Czec... ) and the area annexed. Another interesting history to look at is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_national_border_change...

replies(2): >>39150349 #>>39151486 #
39. alexisread ◴[] No.39150250[source]
"dont let gazans interact with Israelis" is exactly the definition of apartheid though, unless you're advocating recognising Palestine, and giving them autonomy wrt water, electricity and so on. However the comment "ensuring no Gazans ever escape again." Is rather telling, it implies a recognition that Gaza is effectively a prison - dehumanisation like that fosters this sort of conflict, so really this sort of attitude is far less helpful than say learning from lessons in Japan and Germany post WW2, South Africa post-apartheid and so on.
replies(1): >>39150300 #
40. paulryanrogers ◴[] No.39150259{4}[source]
Are there Jews in Germany today because of diplomacy? Or because those who tried annihilating and enslaving most German Jews were removed from power by force?
41. noqc ◴[] No.39150262{4}[source]
After Germany surrendered unconditionally and was amicably reconstructed.
42. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39150266{3}[source]
There are no 100% effective solutions here. Ive spent a considerable amount of time in Israeli and realize living under the iron dome isnt ideal, but it is the best Israel can do. Long term occupation would lead to more Israeli deaths than a return to the pre october 7th status quo. The only other solution for israel is a legitimate genocide of all Palestinians, and I just dont see that happening in the next century.
replies(1): >>39150347 #
43. YZF ◴[] No.39150279{6}[source]
My point was specific to Palestinian Authority controlled areas of the west bank.

My second point (maybe not so obvious) was about human rights situations in the Arab world and under Palestinian rule. e.g. the Jews living in Morocco can't elect their government because Morocco is a dictatorship ("Monarchy"), ruled by a king.

I.e. there's no Jews living under Arab rule while meeting those two conditions. Being able to live in a democratic, free, country with human rights, and under Arab or Palestinian rule. I was well aware there is some (tiny) Jewish population in some Arab countries.

replies(1): >>39150784 #
44. runarberg ◴[] No.39150280{3}[source]
So are there 6 million Stateside Puerto Ricans living in one of the 50 United States who have equal rights to other US citizens. Puerto Rico is still a colony of the United States. Mind you that the Puerto Ricans living on the island of Puerto Rico have infinitely more rights then Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank or occupied East Jerusalem.
45. nojvek ◴[] No.39150290{3}[source]
We could have said this about Germany and Japan after WWII.

Every human no matter their race and religion cares about having food, water, safety, opportunity, live in a law abiding society where their rights are respected and they get “some” choice to vote for their future.

replies(6): >>39150450 #>>39150458 #>>39150472 #>>39150536 #>>39150975 #>>39151456 #
46. loandbehold ◴[] No.39150297{4}[source]
Read Hamas' charter, they are open about their goals: to kill or expel Jews from the river to the sea.
replies(2): >>39151837 #>>39152143 #
47. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39150300{3}[source]
Gaza absolutely is a prison. Keeping Gazans there is the only way to ensure Israelis safety. Is that unfair? Absolutely, but I dont think Israelis are especially interested in fairness here, theyre interested in their security. You cant compare Gaza to post ww2 countries. Gaza has no economy, and a vastly different culture. There is no path toward peace between gaza and Israel. Not even on the 1000 year time span, because that would require gazan quality of life to improve, and they just dont have the land or resources for that to happen.
replies(2): >>39150619 #>>39155273 #
48. sgift ◴[] No.39150315{6}[source]
> Which was a temporary state and certainly didn't last for 50 years.

Because the population in neither one enacted a serious of terror campaigns or "Intifadas" against them. If they did it's almost certain that the allies would still occupy Germany and the US Japan.

edit: Also, until the 2+4 treaty, formally known as the "Treaty on the Final Settlement with Respect to Germany" was signed in 1990 the allies still held part of their occupational rights over Germany. Not 50 years, but 45 at least.

replies(1): >>39150385 #
49. gizmo ◴[] No.39150318{5}[source]
I should point out to people who might not be as familiar with Israeli history that Rabin was assassinated by an Israeli right wing extremist.

As for the rest, while I appreciate the civil response I don't think we agree enough on the facts to have a fruitful discussion.

replies(1): >>39150661 #
50. kasey_junk ◴[] No.39150340{7}[source]
There are at least 5 parties in the ruling coalition that have specific religious orthodoxy as primary parts of their platform.

I agree that the traditional definition of theocracy is probably overkill when describing the Israeli government but specific religious beliefs drive politics there well out of proportion to the beliefs of the constituents.

In a way that feels out of line with secular western democracy at times.

51. smoothjazz ◴[] No.39150347{4}[source]
> The only other solution for israel is a legitimate genocide of all Palestinians, and I just dont see that happening in the next century.

Or giving Palestinians full rights and reparations for the land they stole, that is a valid and quite frankly, the best option.

replies(1): >>39150396 #
52. Wytwwww ◴[] No.39150349{7}[source]
> the party that occupied it doesn't want it

That's not that obvious considering all the illegal settlements. I'm sure they want the land just not the people living there.

But yes, no clear solution especially considering that the only (non-Hamas) option for self government, the Palestinian Authority/Fatah is thoroughly incompetent and corrupt.

53. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39150396{5}[source]
Israel will never give Palestinians full rights, theyre too scared of palestinian terrorism. And for good reason, there is every reason to believe that palestinians will never accept peace with israel. And thats before we even get to the Israeli government believing they have a god given right to the west bank.

Israel stole almost all of the palestinians land. I just cant believe palestinians would ever forget that, I know that I sure wouldnt.

replies(2): >>39150475 #>>39151037 #
54. mvdtnz ◴[] No.39150427{3}[source]
The Palestinian people can oust Hamas, reject Islamic extremism without exception and reform their society to be compatible with a peaceful relationship with their neighbours.
replies(4): >>39150603 #>>39150893 #>>39150937 #>>39151036 #
55. krainboltgreene ◴[] No.39150443[source]
> If I knew the answer to that question I would be a high ranked politician

The solution is simple, avoiding the solution in order to create a western military power ally in the middle east is what high ranked politicians do.

replies(2): >>39151646 #>>39151893 #
56. bitcurious ◴[] No.39150450{4}[source]
Germany and Japan were conquered and unconditionally surrendered, after massive civilian casualties. Nazis were tried and executed. If Israel is should model itself on those examples, it's doing the right and moral thing in waging war until Hamas is destroyed, or unconditionally surrenders.
replies(5): >>39150805 #>>39150806 #>>39150967 #>>39151354 #>>39151670 #
57. siliconwrath ◴[] No.39150458{4}[source]
Germany and Japan were occupied after WWII. https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/united-states...
replies(1): >>39152326 #
58. krainboltgreene ◴[] No.39150463{5}[source]
> the entire land to be ruled by the Jewish people

Not Jewish people, a very select subset of that group: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2784649

replies(1): >>39150652 #
59. bitcurious ◴[] No.39150468{3}[source]
> Well, the alternative to diplomatic solution is total annihilation of palestinians in west bank,

This conflict is taking place in Gaza.

60. pgeorgi ◴[] No.39150472{4}[source]
If Germany or Japan is your guideline here, maybe Israel should get a Bomber Harris (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Harris#Second_World_War) or a Truman (see nuclear weapons dropped on Japan) on the scene?

People are saying that what Israel is doing right now is a genocide. You have seen nothing yet: With either of them at the helm, there would either be an unconditional surrender by Hamas or no Palestinian alive anymore - and by November 15, last year.

We don't do such things anymore, and for good reason, but that means that these past situations are unsuitable as example for the present.

replies(1): >>39151420 #
61. smoothjazz ◴[] No.39150475{6}[source]
You said the only other solution is genocide (which you thankfully say you don't see happening this century). Relenting from their occupation is another solution. I agree with your assessment of their state of mind though.
62. bitcurious ◴[] No.39150493{4}[source]
>They just want Palestinians to have full human rights on their land, from the river to the sea.

What about the rights to elections? Free speech? To be gay and not be thrown off a building? They don't even support these basic human rights in the land they rule, for the people they claim as their own.

63. 7402 ◴[] No.39150536{4}[source]
I think the allies (largely the US) were able to effect massive cultural changes in Japan and Germany after WWII from aggressive, totalitarian, racist societies committed to military victory by any means necessary to relatively peaceful, even pacifist societies only via:

1) Forcing unconditional surrender on Germany and Japan, whereby virtually every citizen of those countries was convinced that they had lost the war and that resorting to armed struggle for their goals was a complete failure for Germany and Japan, and,

2) A lengthy occupation in those countries that accomplished many things, including the "de-nazification" of educational system.

replies(1): >>39151687 #
64. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39150555{7}[source]
Israel likes to say this, but it is not true. The hasidic jews especially enjoy rights that other Israelis just dont have, and they have a large amount of control over the government.
replies(1): >>39150756 #
65. taeric ◴[] No.39150569{3}[source]
I specifically think the mixed use of the word "occupation" to imply that the state of Palestine should include all of the current state of Israel one of the largest trust busting tricks in the modern discourse. I think it is natural to think that the Gaza and West Bank situation is bad and I suspect the majority of even slightly western views would agree.

What shocked me, is that there are some on the far left that fully think all of Israel is an occupation of Palestine. More, they got rather upset when I pointed out that that line of thinking is, ironically, in support of people that have shown genocidal intent.

Curious if you have numbers on how many intentionally refer to all of Israel in this way? (Also curious if my take on that is unfair to folks?)

66. vcryan ◴[] No.39150577{3}[source]
The notion that the problem is religious fundamentalists is itself propaganda. The people are just people; the problem is a brutal racist occupation that has gone on for far too long.
replies(4): >>39151223 #>>39151805 #>>39152540 #>>39153931 #
67. vcryan ◴[] No.39150590{3}[source]
Why should the Palestinians leave? Palestinians leaving is ethnic cleansing.
replies(4): >>39150992 #>>39151059 #>>39151599 #>>39151706 #
68. vcryan ◴[] No.39150603{4}[source]
It doesn't seem like the Palestinian people are extremist Muslims any more than the Israeli people are extremist Jews.
69. vcryan ◴[] No.39150619{4}[source]
Why are we more concerned about the safety of Israelis than the safety of Palestinians?
replies(2): >>39150668 #>>39152450 #
70. YZF ◴[] No.39150652{6}[source]
I'm not sure why we have to bring the Ethiopian Jews into this discussion. I think a lot has changed in this regard since 1993 when this paper was published. Ethiopian jews are much more integrated into Israeli society. But yes, this statement is more complicated than meets the eye, but I don't think this particular topic is current or relevant. I.e. I don't think your typical religious right-wing settler has a problem with including an Ethiopian Jew into their definition of who they think should control the "god given land of Israel". They're probably happier with them than e.g. with some more "modern" Jewish people from the US.
replies(1): >>39152271 #
71. YZF ◴[] No.39150661{6}[source]
I'm curious but I also appreciate the civil discussion. Thanks for the extra context re: Rabin. This topic doesn't lend itself to one liners.
72. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39150668{5}[source]
Im concerned with realistic solutions. Israel has all the power here, the reality is that any solution will be one that benefits them, and hopefully palestinians are willing to go along with.
replies(4): >>39150962 #>>39150974 #>>39151158 #>>39151563 #
73. collegeburner ◴[] No.39150676[source]
apartheid is a loaded term of opinion, not of fact. comparing israel to other true apartheid regimes, such as south africa, is hyperbolic. there exist discriminatory policies that ought to be reformed but i do not believe that word is appropriate.

israel does, in fact, exist on some occupied land that she should return, including many west bank settlements. however, there is something to be said for keeping parts as a bargaining chip against those motivated largely by religious and nationalistic fervor mixed with some basic hatred. other parts of her land were obtained legitimately, going all the way back to the first aliyah after the kiev pogroms in which tens of thousands of jews were massacred. many immigrated legally, though the ottoman empire later threw up some barriers to immigration with hopes to limit their numbers. many were later moved legitimately under the authority of the british in mandatory palestine.

legal immigrants are not necessarily "occupiers". there is also a period past which land becomes naturalized, just like most of the world has been taken and settled by force at some point or another. most of the people who are descendants of those ancient conquerors are just as indigenous as those who were there before. i'd venture to say much of israel, while it ought to be shared better, is populated with naturalized inhabitants.

replies(1): >>39150947 #
74. jjcon ◴[] No.39150756{8}[source]
It is true… that is literally their governmental type. There are religious parties in Israel (just like the religious are largely in the GOP in the USA) but that doesn’t make it theocratic… unless you bend the definition of theocracy beyond all meaning.

That is all not to mention my second point which is that Israel isn’t even a particularly religious country compared to the west.

replies(1): >>39150930 #
75. cempaka ◴[] No.39150767{7}[source]
What rights and privileges do Protestants in England & Denmark enjoy which are denied to those of other faiths?
76. aurelien_gasser ◴[] No.39150769[source]
> Hamas killed fewer people than Israel did/is

That's an understatement, Hamas killed less than 1,000 civilians, Israel killed 20,000+

replies(3): >>39150832 #>>39151820 #>>39155251 #
77. Aeolun ◴[] No.39150783[source]
> All correct and yet, what should happen?

Happy, fed, employed people do not become terrorists. They have too much to lose.

replies(3): >>39151001 #>>39151472 #>>39151511 #
78. runarberg ◴[] No.39150784{7}[source]
You could say the same of Europe prior to 1945. However today hundreds of thousands of Jewish people live in Europe enjoy equal rights and democracy.

What makes you think that Palestine can’t become one of those countries if ever allowed to be democratic and independent?

replies(2): >>39151434 #>>39158868 #
79. Aeolun ◴[] No.39150800{3}[source]
And yet, women in Afghanistan were happy going to university until we let the fundamentalists back in.
80. adhamsalama ◴[] No.39150805{5}[source]
Ethnically cleansing a population is not right or moral in any case whatsoever.
replies(1): >>39151757 #
81. danenania ◴[] No.39150806{5}[source]
The point is that it’s possible for relations to improve over time even when previous generations were bitter enemies. There are plenty of other examples in history apart from WW2.

Investing heavily in Palestine is likely Israel’s cheapest option for stability in the long term. They certainly aren’t going to bomb their way to stability.

If they had gone after Hamas leadership specifically with targeted operations while increasing humanitarian aid, rather than terrorizing the entire population of Gaza, they would have had the world and likely a decent percentage of Palestinians on their side. Instead they have utterly and completely botched it and put themselves in a terrible situation strategically.

replies(2): >>39151773 #>>39151859 #
82. mkoubaa ◴[] No.39150819{4}[source]
A two state solution is still possible. Why do people assume Palestinians want a state of only Palestinians. Palestine had Jews living in it before and a hypothetical future state of Palestine can too. They are not committed to an ethnostate they just want freedom.
replies(3): >>39151284 #>>39151477 #>>39151516 #
83. shakow ◴[] No.39150872{5}[source]
> after Germany was bombed to the ground and occupied for years

Well, looks like that box is checked for Gaza; can we jump to diplomacy now?

replies(1): >>39151553 #
84. Aeolun ◴[] No.39150893{4}[source]
They could. But they’ll never do it as long as it looks like Hamas is the only one fighting for them.
replies(1): >>39151569 #
85. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39150930{9}[source]
Theres no reason democracies cant be theocracies. You can come up with a pained definition to make it so, but if everyone votes for the religious party I think most would agree that thats a theocracy.
replies(1): >>39151846 #
86. mkoubaa ◴[] No.39150932{3}[source]
Well they are not not indigenous.

But calling them "the indigenous" is not correct. DNA studies done by Israeli scientists on Palestinian subjects show that they descend from indigenous groups including Judea.

87. kelnos ◴[] No.39150937{4}[source]
> The Palestinian people can oust Hamas

How? They lack the organization and military capability to do so.

And while Hamas hasn't done them any favors, with the way Israel has been behaving, I'm not surprised your average Palestinian in Gaza isn't feeling like helping the Israeli objective, even if it likely would be in their long-term interests as well.

replies(1): >>39151496 #
88. mkoubaa ◴[] No.39150947{3}[source]
All metaphors are wrong, some metaphors are useful. The word "burn" applies to both first and third degree burns.

Characteristics of apartheid can exist even if it is not at the severity experienced by black south Africans. The analogy here has utility, and racism towards Palestinians is unfortunately a huge problem in Israeli society.

replies(1): >>39152774 #
89. Aeolun ◴[] No.39150952{4}[source]
I think you are reading mmuch more into that reply than is warranted.

It’s simple fact more people have now died due to Israel’s actions.

That doesn’t mean they necessarily need to be punished for it. The international community doesn’t really need to.

If this is anything like the other 10 times Israel did one of their “Let’s provision some extra terrorists” exercises, they’ve already guaranteed that they’ll deal with two or three more decades of the palestinian population hating their guts.

90. nerpderp82 ◴[] No.39150962{6}[source]
I have spent days researching the history of this. The problem in its entirety is Zionism. The only way for Zionism to remain, is for Israel to be permanently at war. Research Likud, read about Netanyahu, Zionism is the contagion and a Forever War is their answer.

Should the Palestinians have agency and self determination?

replies(1): >>39151185 #
91. leereeves ◴[] No.39150967{5}[source]
> Germany and Japan were conquered and unconditionally surrendered

Israel has already done that to Palestine, many decades ago, but they failed to do anything like the Marshall Plan to invest in the occupied lands and create a lasting peace.

If we hope to learn from WW2, we should consider the postwar history of Eastern Europe. Like Israel, the Soviets also failed to invest in the lands they occupied, instead trying to suppress rebellions with violence. Now all of those nations are Russia's enemies.

replies(2): >>39152086 #>>39187789 #
92. mkoubaa ◴[] No.39150974{6}[source]
I agree, any solution that is unpopular to Israelis will be opposed by their democratically elected government that happens to have the military power to prevent it. Even if people elsewhere don't like it
93. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39150975{4}[source]
Germany and japan returned to their pre war borders after the war. Gaza does not have the land or resources to sustain its population. It literally needs to expand to have any amount of stability.
replies(2): >>39151399 #>>39157328 #
94. aurelien_gasser ◴[] No.39150988{4}[source]
Not picking a side or trying to punish anyone, I'm just highlighting that the difference in the number of victims is quite significant. It would be quite a different situation if Israel had killed only sightly more Palestinian civilians than Hamas' did in their attack. Actually, I suspect that this ICJ order would not have occurred, and that there wouldn't be such widespread accusations of genocide.
95. nerpderp82 ◴[] No.39150992{4}[source]
I wanted to let you know that I agree with all your comments. Nothing you have said is out of line. Sometimes it is really hard interacting with the HN crowd, when they get things wrong, it hurts, because they should be able to use their big brains to see through the chaos. Take care.
96. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39151001[source]
Too bad gaza has no land or economy to feed and employ themselves.
replies(2): >>39151621 #>>39154881 #
97. hmcq6 ◴[] No.39151036{4}[source]
The average age in Palestine before Oct 7th was 19. You’re asking a nation of kids to be more mature and organized than the Israeli government who is killing them and their families
replies(1): >>39155157 #
98. Aeolun ◴[] No.39151037{6}[source]
> And for good reason, there is every reason to believe that palestinians will never accept peace with israel.

Not with that attitude they won’t. I’m convinced most people in the region would be happy with peace, whatever form it takes, because they just want to live their lives. Of course that’s contingent on not being oppressed

replies(1): >>39151138 #
99. albedoa ◴[] No.39151044{4}[source]
I march with left-leaning American Jews. Exactly zero of them are called genocidal colonizers by anyone, let alone left-leaning American progressives.

Since you are asserting the existence of something here, are you able to provide an example?

replies(1): >>39157634 #
100. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39151138{7}[source]
> most people in the region would be happy with peace

Unfortunately that's not good enough for Israel. If they give Palestinians sovereignty and give up their security control it would only take a small group to commit terrorist attacks against Israel, so they wont do it unless theyre very confident that no one is Palestine will want to do that.

replies(1): >>39151277 #
101. beedeebeedee ◴[] No.39151144{3}[source]
Actually, if you believe that the bible is true, they killed the indigenous people there first

More historically certain is that there was a stream of people living and moving through that area during waves of human immigration outside of Africa (look up the Sahara pump theory).

102. vcryan ◴[] No.39151158{6}[source]
Israel doesn't doesn't have to use its power for ethnic cleansing and genocide forever.
103. mrangle ◴[] No.39151173[source]
This is a good summary of Islamic radicalization propaganda that seeks to use Palestinian civilians as pawns, with no regard for them. It is this narrative that keeps the Palestinains in prison.

The counterpoint is that you "must" face the reality that this is never going to happen, and that asserting that it will or should is equivalent to damning the Palestinians to the existence that they currently occupy.

Greater Islam does not have an army that can stand against the West, let alone do the Palestinians. All that they have are manipulated terrorists whose actions always cause much more destruction on their side than the inverse.

So I say again, the only realistic and humane view is to take your oppopsite position, recognize the immovable force, and actually attempt to save Palestinian lives via deradicalization and a relocation campaign.

104. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39151185{7}[source]
> Should the Palestinians have agency and self determination?

It doesnt matter what they "should" have. Israel wont give it to them while they think it would undermine their security, and no one has the ability to force them to.

replies(2): >>39151375 #>>39154128 #
105. sfifs ◴[] No.39151215{3}[source]
All major conflicts and wars are fundamentally economic and have been so throughout history
replies(2): >>39151302 #>>39154960 #
106. megaman821 ◴[] No.39151223{4}[source]
Were they occupied or was it an open-air prison? Just throw everything out there and see what sticks.
replies(1): >>39152370 #
107. Aeolun ◴[] No.39151277{8}[source]
It always takes only a small group to commit terrorist acts. That’s true everywhere across the world. Most countries accept that difficulty as the price of freedom.
108. megaman821 ◴[] No.39151284{5}[source]
Where is Palestine state proposal from Palestinians so I can read it? Or is this just fantasy made up by outsiders?
replies(1): >>39152059 #
109. amscanne ◴[] No.39151302{4}[source]
Such a statement seems, at best, a controversial view. For example, I’m pretty sure that the religious aspects of the crusades are generally accepted as the primary cause.
110. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151317{3}[source]
Worth pointing out that both sides have extreme religious fundamentalists.

Also worth pointing out that peace was achieved between Egypt/Israel but it took leaders like Carter, Sadat, Begin to transcend the conflict. Sadly, Biden is no Carter. And there are no Sadats or Begins anymore.

replies(1): >>39151437 #
111. dijit ◴[] No.39151340{6}[source]
it makes total sense to discuss this: because in effect by tipping the balance of power you don't really change anything.

If you made Israel as small as Palestine tomorrow, and Palestine as large as Israel: the same (or, some would argue: worse) situation would exist and the same sentiments from the same sorts of extremists.

Thats what we are talking about, power doesn't matter, only sentiment and perspective has been discussed here.

112. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151354{5}[source]
This myth that Hamas can be destroyed and that if they are, everything will be alright, is completely disproven by the fact that there is no Hamas in the West Bank and Israeli extremists continue to perpetrate crimes there.
replies(3): >>39151478 #>>39151750 #>>39151782 #
113. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151361{3}[source]
Who is the aggressor here?
replies(1): >>39151799 #
114. nerpderp82 ◴[] No.39151375{8}[source]
Sure it does! If we can't agree on what should be, we can never make anything happen. And we all do have agency on how the Palestinians are treated. To deny that is to be complicit.
115. tptacek ◴[] No.39151376{6}[source]
Hamas has repeatedly refused to disavow the original charter, and, of course, their actions on October 7 certainly affirm it.
replies(1): >>39152262 #
116. avmich ◴[] No.39151399{5}[source]
I think the WWII example is really useful here - completion of hostilities and post-war work. Expansion of Gaza may be not necessary at all, looking at Singapore example, not to mention West Bank.
replies(1): >>39151413 #
117. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39151413{6}[source]
It is unimaginable to me for Gaza to ever resemble singapore. Singapore had massive advantages that took hundreds of years to create and its biggest continues to be its position along the straight of malacca. If singapore was not along the straight theres no doubt in my mind that it would be in a much much worse position today. Singapore actually has long standing hostilities with Malaysia. The only reason it exists today in its current form is the economic advantage given by its location.
replies(1): >>39151643 #
118. skybrian ◴[] No.39151418[source]
While I'm not a military expert, I think it would be reasonable to rule out the possibility of a similar massacre any time soon, for decades at least. It seems unlikely that Hamas would get away with it a second time? They put everything into a one-day surprise attack. The Israeli defense was caught unprepared despite being warned, but they have much more power and they can learn.

What happens in the wider conflict (with other Iran-backed militias) is another question.

replies(2): >>39151607 #>>39151916 #
119. avmich ◴[] No.39151420{5}[source]
What Israel is doing right now should be viewed from the point of view of the goal of removing the Hamas threat as such. The logic here is "Hamas should go - what's the best way to make that happen?" and from this POV the situation is not too grim. It's obviously best to avoid casualties as much as possible, but we are far from perfect wars.
120. xdennis ◴[] No.39151429[source]
> And then everyone who wants peace invests lots of money and expertise over a long time to build a modern, prosperous, stable Palestinian society

When Israel left Gaza in 2005 it had no blockade and an airport. Israel blockaded them and bombed their airport because they kept using everything to attack Israel.

If Gaza and the West Bank were given complete independence with no interference, what makes you think it will turn out different and they won't use the open borders to bring in weapons to attack Israel?

replies(1): >>39158356 #
121. int_19h ◴[] No.39151434{8}[source]
Would it be democratic if it became independent, though?

Hamas specifically came to power via elections, but hasn't held any elections since then under various excuses, so they clearly aren't champions of democracy.

replies(1): >>39151833 #
122. avmich ◴[] No.39151437{4}[source]
Ask Carter what he thinks about that. I think he'd at least admit that Biden has a huge hindsight - the world today is so different from 1970-s.
replies(1): >>39151721 #
123. reissbaker ◴[] No.39151448[source]
This is not the approach the West took with ISIS, which involved similarly one-sided fights against terrorist forces [1], nor do I think it's an approach that would have worked. When "everyone who wants peace" doesn't include the people in control of the guns and rockets, who instead want to kill their enemies by any means necessary (and themselves do not respect international law), you can't simply dialogue your way out of it any more than Ukraine could have dialogued their way out of getting invaded by Russia.

The ICJ ruled that Hamas return the hostages unconditionally, but everyone knows that won't happen — Hamas is simply unaccountable. "Everyone who wants peace" can't even get the Red Cross access to the hostages, let alone get them returned. Vague calls for diplomacy with terrorist groups doesn't solve much, which is why people are asking you for specific solutions — it's easy to say Israel should stop fighting, but then: what should it do? How would you actually ensure it doesn't keep getting attacked, repeatedly, as Hamas continues to insist they plan to do?

1: Mosul alone had ~10,000 civilian casualties and that was less densely populated than Gaza City and didn't have tunnels: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/show/thousands-more-civilia...

And it similarly had about 1MM civilians displaced: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/06/world/middleeast/mosul-ir...

And that wasn't the end of the fight against ISIS!

replies(5): >>39151520 #>>39151559 #>>39152296 #>>39152345 #>>39152950 #
124. bart_spoon ◴[] No.39151456{4}[source]
Germany was reduced to rubble, their population submitted to complete and total surrender, and their leaders were all executed. Japan was firebombed into oblivion and then had two atomic bombs dropped on their civilian population. And both were then completely occupied and had their government dismantled and replaced by their conquerors.

What Israel is doing right now seems to be far closer to what happened in Germany and Japan after WW2 than whatever diplomatic solution you are proposing.

replies(1): >>39151693 #
125. maroonblazer ◴[] No.39151472[source]
Not if they have more to gain in 'heaven'. Remember, Hamas are religious fanatics.
replies(3): >>39152418 #>>39153527 #>>39162277 #
126. amscanne ◴[] No.39151477{5}[source]
I feel like you’re assuming that everyone thinks the same way you do. I don’t really think the evidence or history bears out “they just want freedom”. There were many obvious opportunities for this in the past.
replies(1): >>39152038 #
127. wahnfrieden ◴[] No.39151478{6}[source]
With the support of IDF collaboration (and funding from private US organizations). Downvoters don’t like the facts I guess.
128. int_19h ◴[] No.39151486{7}[source]
The people living on this land wasn't ever offered a credible "this is your land & we leave you alone on it" deal, though. No sovereign country would tolerate a complete blockade of its borders, yet that is seemingly what Israel expected from Palestinians when "giving" them Gaza.
replies(2): >>39151637 #>>39151644 #
129. mvdtnz ◴[] No.39151496{5}[source]
They do it in cooperation with the IDF who are determined to do so.
replies(1): >>39153184 #
130. bart_spoon ◴[] No.39151511[source]
That is certainly not true. Exhibit A: Osama bin Laden’s father was literally a multi-billionaire and he himself inherited $30-50 million.
replies(2): >>39151615 #>>39153512 #
131. mupuff1234 ◴[] No.39151516{5}[source]
Israel has a fairly large Palestinians population and most of them want to stay under Israeli control so maybe they know something that you don't?
replies(1): >>39152046 #
132. amluto ◴[] No.39151520{3}[source]
A major problem is that the Gazan people have very legitimate problems with Israel, and this leads to a situation in which enough of them become militant to cause serious problems. Solving that seems like it needs a more wholistic approach than simply trying to get rid of the militants at the cost of causing everyone else to have an even bigger beef with Israel.
replies(5): >>39151764 #>>39151861 #>>39151985 #>>39152392 #>>39155022 #
133. int_19h ◴[] No.39151536{3}[source]
"Everybody else in the region" is mostly descendants of various Semitic peoples who lived in that area for just as long. Palestinians in particular seem to be related to Canaanites, which - if you take the Torah at face value - would actually make them the indigenous people that were a target of genocidal conquest by the original Jewish settlers in the area (although archeologists say that this was more likely intra-ethnic warfare between different groups, and the whole notion of Canaanites as distinct peoples was created to justify the conquest of neighbors).
134. int_19h ◴[] No.39151544{5}[source]
There was also a near-complete blockade.
replies(1): >>39152166 #
135. avmich ◴[] No.39151553{6}[source]
Box is not checked yet, otherwise IDF wouldn't have any resistance.

We should try diplomacy all the time, but right now the offer of Israel is unconditional surrender or continuation of hostilities. Maybe - maybe - less atrocious to civilians than what it was during March 1945 in Germany. Diplomats will keep their work; of course everybody's abilities are limited.

replies(1): >>39163740 #
136. SirSavary ◴[] No.39151559{3}[source]
Note: ISIS was a bunch of European guys who got radicalized and then travelled to the middle east; Hamas is homegrown and was democratically elected by the people of the region.
replies(5): >>39151657 #>>39151677 #>>39151854 #>>39152525 #>>39153007 #
137. int_19h ◴[] No.39151563{6}[source]
Israel can be forced into concessions just as South Africa was, if external actors - most notably, US - stop bankrolling them, and start applying sanctions instead. It only has all the power because others let it have that power, and even contribute directly to increasing said power.
replies(1): >>39151659 #
138. avmich ◴[] No.39151569{5}[source]
Yes, while their optics is like this, it's hard for them to get to a peaceful solution.
replies(1): >>39153910 #
139. avmich ◴[] No.39151599{4}[source]
Because there's an anti-terrorism operation turned to city war going on, and to be in the middle of hostilities is dangerous.

It's really, really hard for palestinians today, yet just remain in place and ignore all calls to leave doesn't look like a good approach. Maybe we don't know something big, it's possible, but from all information from the region leaving still looks like a better option.

140. JumpCrisscross ◴[] No.39151601{7}[source]
> Israel is a parliamentary democracy not a theocracy

Israel legally defines itself in law as the nation-state of the Jewish people [1].

It isn’t a textbook theocracy, but neither is Iran. Elected governments with theocratic characteristics?

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_Law:_Israel_as_the_Nat...

141. avmich ◴[] No.39151607[source]
Hamas doesn't get away from it this time already.
replies(1): >>39151708 #
142. avmich ◴[] No.39151615{3}[source]
He's not "people", he's a "human". One human could be significantly off from the expected behavior; many people are less so.
replies(1): >>39152895 #
143. avmich ◴[] No.39151621{3}[source]
Doesn't mean they can't build it.
replies(2): >>39151639 #>>39152444 #
144. YZF ◴[] No.39151637{8}[source]
Gaza wasn't blockaded when it was handed to the Palestinians. Only later when Hamas came to power: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockade_of_the_Gaza_Strip

EDIT: Just want to add that the reality is more nuanced. Naturally Israel affects control over its border with Gaza and Egypt affected control over its border. Israel has definitely refused to let Gaza operate an airport or a sea port and so it maintained some amount of control together with Egypt. That said a lot of how this evolved was around choices made by Palestinians and the rise of Hamas led to the official blockade being imposed. I do think this was an opportunity for Palestinians to demonstrate how they can govern territory controlled by them and be peaceful neighbors which ofcourse did not happen.

145. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39151639{4}[source]
Building land is quite difficult. Building an economy is almost impossible when under a blockade, and Israel has no reason to end it.
replies(1): >>39152107 #
146. avmich ◴[] No.39151643{7}[source]
Lack of imagination can prevent us from seeing solutions. Gaza certainly has advantages - location, population size and age, attention of the world in XXI century among them.
147. JumpCrisscross ◴[] No.39151644{8}[source]
> people living on this land wasn't ever offered a credible "this is your land & we leave you alone on it" deal, though

Nobody in the former Ottoman Empire did.

> No sovereign country would tolerate a complete blockade of its borders

Plenty of enclave countries exist. The blockade clamped shut when Hamas took power [1]. A coup, mind you, which overthrew Gaza’s fledgling (and flawed) democracy.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockade_of_the_Gaza_Strip

148. consumer451 ◴[] No.39151646{3}[source]
> The solution is simple

Please explain.

replies(1): >>39151733 #
149. reissbaker ◴[] No.39151657{4}[source]
No, ISIS wasn't "a bunch of European guys who got radicalized": https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State
replies(1): >>39151752 #
150. HDThoreaun ◴[] No.39151659{7}[source]
I disagree. Israel is self sufficient and has a much stronger economy than SA ever did. Israel also now has substantial oil reserves which makes sanctions difficult. Israels military is completely sufficient and would be able to oppress palestine just fine without international support. In my estimation the only thing sanctions would do is push Israel toward its final solution to the palestinian problem as they no longer see a downside to ending the issue once and for all.

Israel has nuclear weapons, its not possible to actually force them to do anything.

replies(2): >>39152875 #>>39155361 #
151. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151670{5}[source]
There are two ways to get peace. One is for one side to completely dominate the other at massive cost, and with risk of blowback even after domination. The other is for cooler heads to prevail. Plenty of examples from history of both. And supposedly we had, as a modern world, decided that we prefer the latter path to peace over the former. Hence the United Nations, the Geneva Conventions, etc.
152. pphysch ◴[] No.39151672{5}[source]
This just isn't true. There are even (a few thousand) Jews living in Iran, and the Ayatollahs have come out in defence of Judaism proper.

The main problem for Jews in the region is the fact that the certain Israeli factions aggressively conflates Judaism with Israeli nationalism/Zionism, sacrificing the former to protect the latter. Above all else, that makes it dangerous to be Jewish outside Israel or one of its Western sponsors. And even inside. Because uninformed people, and actual antisemites, buy into that cynical framing.

replies(2): >>39151921 #>>39159345 #
153. Jochim ◴[] No.39151677{4}[source]
> ISIS was a bunch of European guys who got radicalized and then travelled to the middle east;

The prevalence of British and American accents whenever the IDF is interviewed was certainly surprising.

replies(1): >>39152604 #
154. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151687{5}[source]
This only worked because enough was invested into the defeated countries for their populations to prosper. Case in point, after WW1, we got WW2.

The prospects Palestinians are faced with, as proven by the West Bank, are very bleak, making any peace very very unstable.

155. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151693{5}[source]
And the world decided we didn't want to have wars like that ever again, and gave the defeated countries a path to prosper. Sadly, Palestinians have no such path.
replies(2): >>39151794 #>>39154463 #
156. abigail95 ◴[] No.39151706{4}[source]
Because it's a normal outcome of war for territory to shift. It's especially justified if you try to invade another country and then lose spectacularly.
replies(1): >>39161072 #
157. amluto ◴[] No.39151708{3}[source]
Hamas has quite a bit of leadership outside Gaza, and as far as I know, most of them are doing fine. They may even have more political capital than before the attacks. I’m not convinced they didn’t get away with it.
replies(1): >>39152208 #
158. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151721{5}[source]
Carter's approach tells us what he would think. Carter was willing to give the Israelis and the Egyptians massive amounts of aid, conditioned on peace. That is very different than offering one side unconditional support despite that side allowing extremists to formulate and shape plans.
replies(1): >>39152227 #
159. wernercd ◴[] No.39151741[source]
Doesn't matter how much people who want peace invest when terrorists who want to continue fighting are in charge. There is no "modern, prosperous, stable Palestinian society" when terrorists are in charge.

They have had better options... and still choose the path they are on.

160. yon109 ◴[] No.39151750{6}[source]
Where are you getting the idea that tbere is no Hamas in the West Bank? There are very much Hamas militants there that would love nothing more than to commit another Oct. 7th.
161. SirSavary ◴[] No.39151752{5}[source]
Marauding terrorist force that lays claim to an area != the people who inhabit that area*

* I understand that they also recruited locally; that doesn't change the fact that there were thousands of Europeans in ISIS' ranks, along with fighters from many other nationalities.

replies(1): >>39152662 #
162. gafferongames ◴[] No.39151757{6}[source]
Hamas's stated aim and goal is to destroy Israel and ethnically cleanse Palestine of the jews "from the river to the sea".

When somebody tells you they want to destroy you, over and over for years, and then builds up terror factories and uses it to intentionally target women, children and elderly civilians on Oct 7, maybe -- just maybe, Israel has no choice other than to deal with Hamas as they are.

replies(2): >>39152513 #>>39155058 #
163. dang ◴[] No.39151762{5}[source]
Please don't post in the flamewar style to HN, and especially not to this thread. It's against the site guidelines (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html) and strongly against the intended spirit that I tried to describe in the comment that's pinned to the top.
replies(1): >>39151882 #
164. reissbaker ◴[] No.39151764{4}[source]
Sure, and the people of Iraq had very legitimate problems with NATO. Nonetheless the West dismantled ISIS. People can have legitimate grievances without committing mass murder and rape, and in fact I think the mass murder and rape committed by Hamas have been very counterproductive for the lives of Gazans.

What would you have Israel do, that you think would result in it not getting continually attacked by Hamas? Recall that when Israel dismantled its Gazan settlements and withdrew its own citizens at gunpoint nearly 20 years ago — in the hope that would help solve the problem — that's when Hamas took power...

replies(2): >>39151872 #>>39151888 #
165. weatherlite ◴[] No.39151773{6}[source]
> Investing heavily in Palestine is likely Israel’s cheapest option for stability in the long term. They certainly aren’t going to bomb their way to stability.

Even that is non trivial. Money going into Gaza first goes through Hamas. After buying arms and building expensive tunnels, and paying its men, the leftovers go to the rest of the population.

166. weatherlite ◴[] No.39151782{6}[source]
There's also the myth that settlers are responsible for all Palestinian grievances. There are no settlers in Gaza since 2005.
replies(1): >>39151819 #
167. gafferongames ◴[] No.39151794{6}[source]
Hamas has spent the aid and all their funds on funding terror. It's no wonder they have no path to prosper. Hamas made it this way.
replies(1): >>39151810 #
168. consumer451 ◴[] No.39151796{5}[source]
This doesn't track because the USA has bases all around the ME, and supplies Israel's "competition" like KSA and Egypt with arms.

It is much more complicated.

replies(1): >>39151970 #
169. gafferongames ◴[] No.39151799{4}[source]
Hamas on Oct 7th
replies(1): >>39151814 #
170. weatherlite ◴[] No.39151805{4}[source]
Yes people are just people and for some people religion is a big deal. It kinda defines their whole world.
171. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151810{7}[source]
There's no Hamas in the West Bank and no path to prosper there.
replies(1): >>39152486 #
172. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151814{5}[source]
Many people would disagree if you look at the history starting from the Nakba.
replies(3): >>39151907 #>>39152489 #>>39158720 #
173. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39151819{7}[source]
Gaza has been effectively under blockade since then too. Maybe that's a contributing factor? Or maybe there are other common factors?
replies(1): >>39151838 #
174. gafferongames ◴[] No.39151820{3}[source]
Hamas directly and intentionally targeted civilians. Israel is doing what it can to limit civilian casualties while destroying Hamas. Hamas is making that very difficult by blending in with the population, putting command centers under major hospitals and so on.
replies(2): >>39152279 #>>39153337 #
175. ◴[] No.39151826{4}[source]
176. runarberg ◴[] No.39151833{9}[source]
They have tried to hold election. Last attempt was in 2021. Israel prevented occupied East Jerusalem from participating which was a noop for Abbas who cancelled them. Also notable was that EU asked to observe the election, but Israel did not allow that. There have also been local elections on the West Bank, last one in 2021.

Holding elections with two distinct governments and a third one occupying both is not easy. Even Ukraine has difficulty holding a general election with only a portion of its territory occupied and a single government.

But yeah, I think, and I think most would agree, that an independent Palestine would defiantly be democratic.

replies(1): >>39159095 #
177. gafferongames ◴[] No.39151837{5}[source]
Bingo
178. weatherlite ◴[] No.39151838{8}[source]
Hamas is trying to kill as many Israelis as it can, maybe that's a contributing factor to the blockade.
replies(1): >>39156524 #
179. jjcon ◴[] No.39151846{10}[source]
That just plainly isn’t what a theocracy is though- by your definition the US could easily be called a theocracy for most of its history and even today. Beyond that you continue to ignore my other point - the people in Israel are less religious than the US/Canada and much of Europe. They are a less religious democracy than the US and yet you continue to call it what it just patently isn’t?
180. Jochim ◴[] No.39151852{3}[source]
> to those who say all of Israel is occupied land. The former makes sense. The latter is extreme.

In what way is it not? The state was created by western powers less than 100 years ago and has aggressively pursued European and US immigration since then.

The current state of things is an entirely manufactured situation and it's becoming more and more farcical. There's only so many times you can interview a guy with a British or New York accent talking about his ancestral right to the desert before things start looking a little bit weird.

replies(1): >>39152083 #
181. yieldcrv ◴[] No.39151854{4}[source]
Democratically elected by plurality, where the only competition was incompetent, and still only won by plurality… and hasnt had an election in 18 years, which means 50% of the population has never had a democratically exercised opinion because they werent born yet, and of the other 50% not even 50% of the ones that voted had voted for Hamas

people really act like thats a “gotcha”

replies(1): >>39153120 #
182. JumpCrisscross ◴[] No.39151859{6}[source]
> gone after Hamas leadership specifically with targeted operations while increasing humanitarian aid, rather than terrorizing the entire population of Gaza

The aid was going first to fighters, then to stockpiles, then to the people. To the extent it could be traded for weapons it was. Now we’re seeing allegations UNRWA employees participated in the October 7th attacks [1].

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/26/world/middleeast/un-aid-i...

replies(1): >>39154891 #
183. dmix ◴[] No.39151861{4}[source]
> Solving that seems like it needs a more wholistic approach than simply trying to get rid of the militants at the cost of causing everyone else to have an even bigger beef with Israel.

Like giving NGOs money which get funneled into overt terrorists groups by the corrupt politicians planted by the same terrorists? Aka the status quo for multiple decades well before Netanyahu was ever prime minister.

It’s notable none of the surrounding Muslim countries want anything to do with being the neutral power brokers to temporarily help run the state because they know as well as everyone else it’s a never ending hornets nest, that they’ll have as little control of it as Fatah and the various other iterations of “stable” Palestinian governance, who had little ability or interest to quell the extreme violent fringes. Which in every other country in history means control via police, courts, or worst case military… not tacit appeasement and turning a blind eye.

184. weatherlite ◴[] No.39151869{3}[source]
> Well, the alternative to diplomatic solution is total annihilation of palestinians in west bank, be it by forcing them off the land

What makes you so certain it's the Palestinians and not the Jews this will happen to? It's the stated goal of the Palestinians and much of the extreme Muslim world surrounding Israel to drive away the Jews and it's not far fetched to see them eventually succeed.

185. pas ◴[] No.39151872{5}[source]
Israel needs to treat Palestinians as equals. This should start with not blockading Gaza, rolling back settlements in the West Bank, and so on.

Furthermore, supporting those who oppose Hamas instead of playing the dangerous game that now cost tens of thousands of lives.

Also, it's important to note that there are no guarantees. Even if Israel (famous hive mind, of course) did everything right there could have been provocation from/via Iran and whatnot.

replies(1): >>39151925 #
186. Jochim ◴[] No.39151882{6}[source]
Apologies, I didn't intend the comment to come across that way, it was too flippant given the topic.
187. ignoramous ◴[] No.39151888{5}[source]
> Nonetheless the West dismantled ISIS

ISIS-K just carried out the worst terrorist attack in Iran (and it was primarily Iran's Q Solemani who dismantled ISIS; later killed by the US Army). Taliban rules Afghanistan again.

> What would you have Israel do, that you think would result in it not getting continually attacked by Hamas?

Negotiate, like they did with PLO before?

> withdrew its own citizens at gunpoint

Yeah, cause settlements are a clear breach of International Law. It was no charity.

> that's when Hamas took power...

Democratically elected, then subsequently undermined and later blockaded.

replies(2): >>39151991 #>>39155037 #
188. Sabinus ◴[] No.39151893{3}[source]
>avoiding the solution

The West isn't the one avoiding the solution. If it were up to us, two state would have been sorted decades ago, as evidenced by the repeated peace summits the US has hosted.

Israel believe they can't integrate the bulk of the Palestinian population, and there to afraid of attack to live next to an independent Palestinian state.

replies(1): >>39152282 #
189. weatherlite ◴[] No.39151916[source]
> While I'm not a military expert, I think it would be reasonable to rule out the possibility of a similar massacre any time soon

I'm not sure its reasonable. No one in Israel is thinking that way at least, and for good reason imo. The motivation to kill is there, so you have to assume there's a lack of ability. OK maybe for a couple of years Hamas will have to regroup, but how much time does it take to get a couple thousands more guns and grenades and bombs when Iran is giving them for free? It doesn't have to be another attack of this magnitude, even killing "only" 100 Israelis would be a huge blow.

You prevent this type of shit from happening again by being dead serious about countering terror, about deploying sufficient defense and not assuming too much about what the enemy can do because you might not have an accurate picture. Israel has been doing none of that in Gaza in the last decade or more.

replies(1): >>39152777 #
190. runarberg ◴[] No.39151921{6}[source]
There were definitely persecutions and ethnic cleansing campaigns following 1948 in the neighboring Arab countries, especially in Iraq, Syria, and following 1967 in Lebanon, which drove a lot of Arab speaking Jews to Israel. Israel’s immigration policy was also very aggressive in inviting Jews from Arabic countries into Israel. Some even believe Israel went as far as stealing people from Ethiopia. So a lot of Jewish communities that once existed outside of Israel have now been absorbed into Israel.

That said, I think it is a mistake—and honestly a bit racist—to claim that Jewish people can’t live and prosper in smaller communities among certain ethno-religous majorities today.

replies(1): >>39152042 #
191. reissbaker ◴[] No.39151925{6}[source]
Israel dismantled all of its Gazan settlements in 2005 and there had never been a blockade at that point, which is exactly what I just referenced in the post you were responding to. Then Hamas took over Gaza, and Israel and Egypt jointly started blockading it. You can't place the blame for Hamas's rule on the blockade — the blockade (and the settlements) didn't exist when they took power.
replies(2): >>39155824 #>>39156485 #
192. Jochim ◴[] No.39151970{6}[source]
I don't think the situation is particularly inscrutable. Israel receives a greater degree of US support and benefits from it to a greater degree. Other ME states are aligned with the US out of convenience, the sale of western weapons plays a part in that.
193. weatherlite ◴[] No.39151973{4}[source]
> And if we can take Israeli politicians at their word, this seems to have been the strategy for the past 20 years at least.

Do you also take Palestinian leaders at their word? Because if so their strategy is to drive out Jews by whatever means necessary. None of them are talking about equal rights and representations, that's just not how their society works and they definitely don't want that together with Jews.

replies(1): >>39153081 #
194. kilolima ◴[] No.39151985{4}[source]
For every Israeli Jewish civilian, there is an equivalent Palestine refugee living in a camp (~7mil). Israeli can only exist as a Jewish majority state as long as the original inhabitants remain displaced. So the Gazans are probably not going to be pro-Israeli any time soon.
replies(1): >>39152991 #
195. reissbaker ◴[] No.39151991{6}[source]
ISIS was defeated in Iraq by a U.S.-led coalition: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_against_the_Islamic_Stat...

IDK what your point is with the Taliban, since they're a different group in a different country that isn't allied with ISIS. (And are unrelated to Israel and Gaza.)

Negotiate, like they did with the PLO before?

The PLO was willing to negotiate and Hamas is not. Hamas has repeatedly said they are not willing to agree to a permanent peace deal with Israel, and have said that they intend to carry out these attacks repeatedly until Israel is destroyed. In this situation, not a hypothetical one where Hamas wants peace, what exactly do you think Israel can do to prevent being attacked?

Democratically elected...

They won the legislative elections but not the prime ministership and subsequently started a massive civil war with the rest of the PA, which ended up in the PA maintaining control of the West Bank and Hamas controlling Gaza. Which is why Israel and Gaza have gone to war many times, but Israel and Ramallah have not — Israel and the PA mutually recognize each other, albeit with a fair amount of mutual enmity.

replies(3): >>39152116 #>>39164248 #>>39167270 #
196. mkoubaa ◴[] No.39152038{6}[source]
I know that there are significant numbers who don't think like I do. I am stating a possibility that is ignored as an option. "they just want freedom" is based on every conversation I've ever had with a Palestinian. Did you ask any of them?
replies(1): >>39152645 #
197. weatherlite ◴[] No.39152042{7}[source]
> That said, I think it is a mistake—and honestly a bit racist—to claim that Jewish people can’t live and prosper in smaller communities among certain ethno-religous majorities today

How is it racist ? There are indeed entire areas where Jews can't really live normally due to harassment. Even in Europe.

replies(1): >>39152092 #
198. mkoubaa ◴[] No.39152046{6}[source]
Many black Americans chose to stay in the USA rather than emigrate to Liberia in the 1800s when given the opportunity. What can you conclude about the situation for black people in America based on that historical fact?
replies(1): >>39152190 #
199. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39152050{7}[source]
Not sure how that easily Google-able question has anything to do with the discussion. Name one famous Israeli from more than 100 years ago. Name one famous American from more than 250 years ago. What am I proving by asking these questions?
replies(2): >>39152398 #>>39173374 #
200. mkoubaa ◴[] No.39152059{6}[source]
I don't follow what the clowns in Hamas, Fatah, or the PLO say. But I know some people personally.

Have you ever talked to a Palestinian person, megaman821?

replies(1): >>39152700 #
201. weatherlite ◴[] No.39152083{4}[source]
> The state was created by western powers less than 100 years ago

That's not entirely accurate at all. There was indeed a UN decision to partition the land and to acknowledge Israel, but no one was enforcing it. The Arabs and Jews were left to battle it out in a horrible war. Jews were facing the real possibility of a second extermination only 3 years after the holocaust (I don't think I'm exaggerating the consequences of what defeat would have looked like had the Jews lost that war).

The British policy towards Jews in Palestine was not consistent at all, and at a certain point they sided with the Arabs and banned Jewish immigration to Palestine - even at the height of the holocaust.

replies(1): >>39152406 #
202. throwA29B ◴[] No.39152086{6}[source]
>Like Israel, the Soviets also failed to invest in the lands they occupied

Don't know about Israel, but you definitely know nothing about the Soviets.

replies(1): >>39152985 #
203. runarberg ◴[] No.39152092{8}[source]
It is racist to zero in on a specific ethno-religous group and say that they in particular are unable to maintain a functioning democracy accommodating of certain minorities. It is the sort of crap that colonial Europe did to justify the horrors of the colonial period.
replies(1): >>39152199 #
204. avmich ◴[] No.39152107{5}[source]
Israel is the one who's going to build it. See, the approach is the following: eliminate Hamas, then start a sort of deprogramming the society, similar to what was happening in Germany, with local specifics of course. Such an approach will take years, but the goal is to have the same effects as in Germany.

It's possible to provide food, water, services while keeping a close eye on the Gaza population and ensuring the idea of peaceful cohabitation is dominant. The economy will slowly - or even not so slowly - rebuild, and that's a part of the demonstration of possible and beneficial, from some positions, approach.

replies(3): >>39152762 #>>39153465 #>>39154664 #
205. ignoramous ◴[] No.39152116{7}[source]
> ISIS was defeated in Iraq by a U.S.-led coalition

Yeah and who defeated them in Syria? There were two coalitions. French/US led and Syria/Iran led.

> The PLO was willing to negotiate and Hamas is not.

In 2014, in a meeting in the UAE post war, Hamas encouraged PLO to reach a political arrangement with Israel on 67 borders. Then in 2017, ratified their charter again to make that point clear. In 2021, Hamas offered to join the PLO and conduct elections, which almost happened only for Israel to not let East Jerusalem residents vote.

> subsequently started a massive civil war

US and Israel encouraged a coup by Fatah by arming and training the Presidential Guard in opposition to Hamas.

> Israel and Ramallah have not

Israel has razed Jenin, Tulkarm, and Nablus just this past month with over 50+ dead.

> Israel and the PA mutually recognize each other

PA is a puppet with bare minimum control over economy, trade, and security of its own people.

replies(2): >>39152233 #>>39152376 #
206. rsoto2 ◴[] No.39152143{5}[source]
This is also in the Likud(Israeli far-right party charter) and actually denotes even more land in the region(Jordan) as property of Israel.
replies(1): >>39152371 #
207. golergka ◴[] No.39152166{6}[source]
It was implemented as a response to indiscriminate rocket fire at civilians.
208. mupuff1234 ◴[] No.39152190{7}[source]
Seems like a weird comparison given that arab israelis are citizens with equal rights and most likely have much more information as opposed to people in the 1800s.

Not the mention that in the long term living in the USA was the right "bet", and pretty sure that if you ask black americans today if they'd like to emigrate to Liberia i assume 99.9% would say no.

209. weatherlite ◴[] No.39152199{9}[source]
There are many places in the world that are not maintaining a functioning democracy, that includes not respecting minorities to Western standards. Blows my mind this is a racist statement to you, but we'll have to disagree then.
210. avmich ◴[] No.39152208{4}[source]
The plan right now could be to deny any remaining Hamas influence to anything in Gaza. Yes, some Hamas members may survive, even politically, outside, but they aren't going to affect anybody in Gaza.
211. samirillian ◴[] No.39152213{3}[source]
I don't think it's too Western-centric to imagine that Palestinians want freedom, which is a universal human desire. Freedom means statehood and self-governance.

Oppression is fertile soil for religious fundamentalists, and radicals of every stripe.

replies(1): >>39152647 #
212. avmich ◴[] No.39152227{6}[source]
That's rather similar to what we have or going to have. Both Israel and Gaza may receive - keep receiving - external aid. The difference is that peace around Gaza, today's and tomorrow's, is going to be enforced more elaborately.
213. reissbaker ◴[] No.39152233{8}[source]
I'm really not sure why it matters who gets to claim credit in Syria. The point is that the US and its allies used the same tactics as Israel is using in Gaza to defeat ISIS, and I think it's silly to say that the U.S. or Iran or whoever should've just tried dialogue with ISIS. The same is true for Hamas.

In 2014, in a meeting in the UAE post war, Hamas encouraged PLO to reach a political arrangement with Israel on 67 borders. Then in 2017, ratified their charter again to make that point clear. In 2021, Hamas offered to join the PLO and conduct elections, which almost happened only for Israel to not let East Jerusalem residents vote.

None of these things are Hamas willing to make a permanent peace deal with Israel, which they have repeatedly stated they are not willing to do. After being frustrated by your off-topic or entirely inaccurate responses, I realized I remembered your username, and you have previously tried to claim to me that Hamas was willing to make peace deals and continually failed to back up your claims, along with similar unsourced claims and irrelevant debate points as I'm noticing in this back-and-forth. I am not really interested in having this "discussion" again!

Just as then, it is still the case that Abbas cancelled the elections, not Israel, even according to Hamas. I cited Hamas's own public statements, Wikipedia, etc and you are still making this same unsourced assertion that somehow Israel did it. But that's not even relevant! Hamas is very clear that they do not want a permanent peace deal with Israel!

By the way, the "PLO" stopped existing a long time before 2014. It's the PA now.

Israel has razed Jenin...

No, it didn't "raze" Jenin or any other city in the West Bank in "the past month," nor has it razed any city in the West Bank since the end of the Second Intifadah other than its own settlements. It fought a small group of Hamas-aligned terrorists with minimal casualties, agreed upon with the PA.

PA is a puppet with bare minimum control over economy, trade, and security of its own people

The PA is just the reformed PLO, that you were just saying should supposedly be emulated by Israel and Hamas. And objectively it is doing far better on literally all of those axes — economy, trade, and security — for its own people than Hamas.

Anyway, once again I point out: you are unable to say what Israel can actually do to prevent Hamas from repeatedly attacking it, given that Hamas does not want a permanent peace deal with Israel.

replies(1): >>39152313 #
214. Lord-Jobo ◴[] No.39152279{4}[source]
> Israel is doing what it can to limit civilian casualties while destroying Hamas.

You should really read the parent article at the top of the page. It doesn't support this statement and the court ruling was created from a mountain of evidence.

replies(1): >>39152770 #
215. krainboltgreene ◴[] No.39152282{4}[source]
If you continually provide missiles and prevent a ceasefire in the UN (a rather unauthoritative body anyways) I would describe you as "avoiding" the solution of not settling/attacking Palestine.

The "We were afraid of the people, they might attack us, we have to do this" line wasn't believable in the 30's and isn't now.

replies(1): >>39152733 #
216. peterashford ◴[] No.39152292[source]
People said Apartheid South Africa couldn't end without a bloodbath. People said peace in Northern Ireland was impossible. People thought the Cold War would never end. Impossible things are impossible until they aren't. I'm not saying that any of these things are easy - they clearly are not. But history shows us again and again that change is possible when people work towards it in good faith. From a practical point of view, I think that the international community needs to be allowed to help - both to maintain the peace and broker a way forward. The status quo will not reach peace. Israel will never have peace and security until Palestine has peace and security.
replies(2): >>39152688 #>>39154982 #
217. peterashford ◴[] No.39152296{3}[source]
Israel needs terms with Palestine, not with Hamas
218. wahnfrieden ◴[] No.39152326{5}[source]
Their borders were restored.
replies(2): >>39152399 #>>39154172 #
219. yyyk ◴[] No.39152345{3}[source]
Mosul had 40k civilian causalties (more than Hamas totals), the coalition just lied about it:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/mosul-m...

220. tptacek ◴[] No.39152367{8}[source]
They killed 1200 people, most of them civilians, raped dozens (at least), filmed murders and posted those videos to the victims Facebook pages. I am, in this one instance, comfortable with the application of Cancel Culture.

There is no advocacy one can pursue more antithetical to the cause of Palestinian human rights than to cheerlead for Hamas.

replies(1): >>39153103 #
221. peterashford ◴[] No.39152370{5}[source]
The West Bank and Gaza are two different locations. The West Bank is occupied and "open air prison" doesn't seem like a bad description of Gaza.
222. halflife ◴[] No.39152371{6}[source]
The likud is not far right, it’s just a right wing party. There are other far right parties. Can you link me to that part of the likud charter? Because the one I’ve read mentions none of that.
replies(1): >>39172918 #
223. yyyk ◴[] No.39152376{8}[source]
>Hamas encouraged PLO to reach a political arrangement with Israel on 67 borders

And then to continue the war from these borders. Duh.

> ratified their charter again to make that point clear.

The one which opposes recognition of Israel and promises to continue the war?

>which almost happened only for Israel to not let East Jerusalem residents vote.

This isn't true at all. Israeli opposes PA polling stations there. There are other ways to vote (like having the stations inside the EU consulates, or by mail). Which they already used in 2006, so PA is actually fine with this. It's that Abbas will lose to Hamas and everyone knows it, so he needs an lie that uninformed people would swallow.

>Israel has razed Jenin, Tulkarm, and Nablus

These cities aren't razed by any normal definition of 'razed'. Some people wanted to start another front and got crushed.

replies(1): >>39152632 #
224. jdietrich ◴[] No.39152392{4}[source]
I fully accept that many Palestinians are motivated to take up arms against the Israelis by a justifiable sense of grievance, but the issue of anti-Semitism long pre-dates the establishment of Israel and exists far beyond the Palestinian Territories. I really don't want to understate this point - from an outside perspective, it is almost impossible to comprehend the depth of hatred against Jews that exists across the Middle East.

Improving the living conditions of Palestinians is almost certainly a necessary precondition to lasting peace, but it is far from sufficient. Unfortunately, we are now stuck in a very stubborn vicious cycle - the Israel-Palestine conflict perpetuates anti-Semitism, which perpetuates the conflict.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Arab%E2%80%93Israeli_War#...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism_in_the_Arab_world

replies(1): >>39152633 #
225. peterashford ◴[] No.39152397{7}[source]
What is that question even for? What are you saying?
226. ◴[] No.39152398{8}[source]
227. Jochim ◴[] No.39152406{5}[source]
> That's not entirely accurate.

It's fair to say that it wasn't directly created by them but their actions in the years prior did lead to the end result. The UK administered the region and had committed to making it a "national home" for the Jewish people. That doesn't necessarily mean a state, but the result was a rapid shift in demographics.

It didn't help that the UK had also made promises of independence to other groups in the region.

> There was indeed a UN decision to partition the land and to acknowledge Israel, but no one was enforcing it. The Arabs and Jews were left to battle it out in a horrible war. Jews were facing the real possibility of a second extermination only 3 years after the holocaust (I don't think I'm exaggerating the consequences of what defeat would have looked like).

I entirely agree with you on the situation that Jews in the region were faced with at the time. One of the depressing things is that despite the proximity to the holocaust, antisemites in allied countries saw the situation as a way to encourage Jews to leave.

I can see how things might have turned out better if there hadn't been so much migration in such a short period of time.

replies(1): >>39152834 #
228. peterashford ◴[] No.39152418{3}[source]
hamas != palestine
229. reissbaker ◴[] No.39152427{10}[source]
Yeah yeah you're still trying to cite the single opinion piece that has no sources for Hamas supposedly being willing to make peace. Hamas's official statements on "peace" are here: https://thehill.com/video/hamas-we-will-repeat-oct-7-terror-...

And their 2017 charter didn't say they were willing to make peace with Israel; in fact it only stated that it was justified to continue fighting Israel as it claims it's an occupying power. Hamas views all of Israel to be "occupied," not just 1967 borders, so that is a call for permanent war. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Hamas_charter

Hamas offered to join the PLO

No they didn't. Why do you keep claiming that? They ran against Fatah in 2021: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Palestinian_legislative...

And once again, the PLO doesn't exist.

Running in PA elections doesn't mean anything about their "peace" plans; they ran in 2006 and certainly had no peace plans then either: they had a charter that literally called for the genocide of the Jews (not Israelis! Not "Zionists." Jews).

Brooklyn doesn't get to decide that

I am not from Brooklyn, nor is any government involved here based in Brooklyn, so I can only assume you're being rabidly antisemitic here.

replies(1): >>39152538 #
230. ◴[] No.39152444{4}[source]
231. halflife ◴[] No.39152450{5}[source]
Because the Palestinian government in Gaza kidnaps babies. And they claimed they would do it again and again until all of Israel is Palestine. You haven’t heard anything even remotely as dangerous from Israeli official statements, let alone action.
replies(1): >>39153849 #
232. jdietrich ◴[] No.39152486{8}[source]
Hamas are active in the West Bank and have significant support and influence. If an election were called (there hasn't been one for more than 18 years) it is overwhelmingly likely that Hamas would win.

Fatah are somewhat less politically extreme than Hamas, but they are scarcely any less corrupt; within the West Bank, the PA is widely viewed as illegitimate.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/7/29/palestinian-authori...

replies(1): >>39153831 #
233. falserum ◴[] No.39152513{7}[source]
It’s their prime minister who has no choice. As soon as war ends, he is out.

Oct events could have been prevented by military presence at the border.

234. ignoramous ◴[] No.39152538{11}[source]
> And their 2017 charter didn't say they were willing to make peace with Israel

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Hamas_charter (ctrl+f peace)

> No they didn't. Why do you keep claiming that? They ran against Fatah in 2021

Running against Fatah does not mean they can't join the PLO, which is an umbrella organization for establishing the Palestinian State (made up of several rival political factions): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestine_Liberation_Organizat...

> Brooklyn

You said Palestinians in the West Bank were objectively "far better", which is completely disregarding their plight against anti-Arab far-right Kahanists (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meir_Kahane originally from Brooklyn) that control those lands.

> so I can only assume you're being rabidly antisemitic here

Rabidly? There we go. https://mondoweiss.net/2023/09/jewish-settlers-stole-my-hous... Nothing about the point being made, just a lot of smear.

replies(1): >>39152756 #
235. jdietrich ◴[] No.39152540{4}[source]
The "people are just people" argument is rarely (if ever) applied to domestic politics. Democrats and Republicans may often loathe each other, but at least they have enough respect to recognise that their differences in opinion are meaningful and sincerely held.

Many Palestinians are just ordinary people who want to get on with their lives, but some are fanatics. Unfortunately for everyone involved, it is the fanatics who are in charge. Of course, the same could be justifiably argued about the current Israeli government; the crucial difference is that Netanyahu and Smotrich can (and likely will) be removed at the next election.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_I...

236. mathieuh ◴[] No.39152604{5}[source]
They were trying to present a certain image, I would imagine they put the German terrorists in front of the German TV cameras, the French in front of the French cameras etc.
237. ignoramous ◴[] No.39152632{9}[source]
> And then to continue the war from these borders

Not a wise move.

> opposes recognition... promises war

I think you're confusing Likud's charter with Hamas'?

> uninformed people would swallow

Some say Egypt, Jordan, and Israel equally sabotaged the elections: https://carnegieendowment.org/sada/84509

> Some people wanted to start another front and got crushed

Truly crushed, or rather collective punishment / war crimes were the words you were looking for? https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/01/israel-opt-je...

replies(1): >>39156881 #
238. endominus ◴[] No.39152633{5}[source]
>the issue of anti-Semitism long pre-dates the establishment of Israel

From your second source that seems to not be the case, at least not in serious degree. "Traditionally, Jews in the Muslim world were considered to be People of the Book and were subjected to dhimmi status. They were afforded relative security against persecution, provided they did not contest the varying inferior social and legal status imposed on them under Islamic rule. While there were antisemitic incidents before the 20th century, during this time antisemitism in the Arab world increased greatly." And later, "The situation of Jews was comparatively better than their European counterparts, though they still suffered persecution." There is more detail at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_under_Musl...

Anecdotally, I've heard that before the establishment of Israel, relations between the two groups were much less hostile. Muslims and Jews would, for example, have their Jewish or Muslim neighbors watch over their kids during holy days when they'd have to go to mosque/temple. There is also a long history of Jews being treated fairly well in the Arab/Muslim world - better indeed than they were in Christian lands where pogroms were much more common (it's astonishing how many times Germany, in a state of high fervor, decided that the most appropriate thing to do would be to massacre the Jews again). Again, anecdotally, the "depth of hatred against Jews" in the Arabs I've spoken with has little to do with Jews and much to do with the actions of the state of Israel and what it does in the name of Jews.

replies(1): >>39152742 #
239. amscanne ◴[] No.39152645{7}[source]
I don’t live in Gaza, nor do any of the Palestinians that I’ve known. I don’t think it’s fair to assume that the opinion sample is going to be representative for many reasons.

An interesting current data point for me is that the overwhelming majority of Palestinians support the actions of Hamas on October 7th specifically. If someone “just wants freedom” but doesn’t support the slaughter and kidnap of innocent Israeli citizens, they would actually be in the minority — so I don’t think your characterization is broadly correct. This isn’t even considering other historical events and opportunities for independent statehood.

240. JumpCrisscross ◴[] No.39152647{4}[source]
> Freedom means statehood and self-governance

That second bit is a magic variable.

replies(1): >>39154271 #
241. Sabinus ◴[] No.39152662{6}[source]
>ISIS was a bunch of European guys who got radicalized and then travelled to the middle east

>there were thousands of Europeans in ISIS' ranks, along with fighters from many other nationalities

Why did you start off with such strong statements but then retreat to this one after you're challenged? Is ISIS a bunch of European guys or not?

replies(1): >>39153112 #
242. irishloop ◴[] No.39152688[source]
The Palestine/Israel conflict is significantly longer than any of the examples you gave.

Which is not to say that its impossible. But the older I get, the less hope I have.

replies(4): >>39152982 #>>39154907 #>>39162405 #>>39170061 #
243. ◴[] No.39152700{7}[source]
244. Sabinus ◴[] No.39152733{5}[source]
The Israelis would continue the war with Hamas with no US support and a ceasefire in the UN. The US won't sacrifice it's relationship with Israel to try to force a resolution on an intractable issue that doesn't really concern the US, and it's interesting that they would be expected to.

>The "We were afraid of the people, they might attack us, we have to do this" line wasn't believable in the 30's and isn't now.

Haven't the Israelis have come under attack from Palestinians since that time for moving on to the land in numbers that made the Palestinians uncomfortable.

245. reissbaker ◴[] No.39152742{6}[source]
Jews were legal second class citizens and were treated terribly, e.g. being banned from wearing shoes in Morocco, and when the ban was overturned, so many Jews were murdered in riots that the community asked for shoes to be banned again.

https://twitter.com/TaliaRinger/status/1738328128999575931

And it's not just Morocco; Yemen for example had official state policy of kidnapping Jewish orphans to forcibly convert them to Islam. Baghdad massacred Jews starting in the 1820s, long before Israel existed. The Damascus affair was in 1840: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damascus_affair

Dhimmi status is bad! It's not as bad as being pagan in Muslim countries historically, where you could just legally be killed if you didn't convert to Islam. And at times it was better than Europe, which more-frequently murdered its Jews. But it was bad, and it was bad long, long before Israel. There's a reason Mizrahi Jews form the right-wing base in Israel — it's not because it was good.

replies(1): >>39152929 #
246. reissbaker ◴[] No.39152756{12}[source]
Yeah, if you ctrl-f "peace" on that page, you'll see it doesn't appear in the charter at all, not sure why you're copy-pasting the link and saying "ctrl-f" as if it were a gotcha. Similarly, posting random articles about Jewish settlers supposedly stealing someone's home is not an argument for why your very weird "Brooklyn" statement wasn't just rabid antisemitism.

Good luck; not going to keep responding to you.

Edit: I see you have now stealth-edited your comment and are pretending that "Brooklyn doesn't get to decide that" as a response to me saying that the PA is doing better economically and in terms of the security of its people, is supposedly referencing Kahanists. I am not a Kahanist, and am not from Brooklyn, and this is literally the first time you've brought up Kahanists in this discussion (and no, Kahanists do not control the PA, or Ramallah, or Jenin, or whatever), so nice try but not especially convincing.

replies(1): >>39152833 #
247. Sabinus ◴[] No.39152762{6}[source]
The Israelis might not have the appetite to administer Gaza themselves. They would want an Arab state to take it but no one wants that headache and they prefer using the Palestinian issue to bash Israel. UN, maybe?
248. Sabinus ◴[] No.39152770{5}[source]
How close does it come to intentionally targeting civilians?
replies(1): >>39156648 #
249. collegeburner ◴[] No.39152774{4}[source]
"burn" is commonly applied to a range of conditions. "apartheid" is applied with exceptional rarity, and in common parlance, people associate it with the south african regime. in your analogy, this is equivalent to calling a first-degree burn third-degree
250. skybrian ◴[] No.39152777{3}[source]
Seems like I'm assuming the Israeli defense will learn enough from this attack to prevent anything similar, and you're assuming they won't. Either way it's a guess; we don't know the future.
replies(1): >>39152868 #
251. ignoramous ◴[] No.39152833{13}[source]
Stealth edited? That literally was the point I was making and since it flew over your head, I had to make it explicit. Anyways, good luck with the advocacy and/or intimidation. Need plenty of it given the blowback: https://archive.is/blQkz
252. weatherlite ◴[] No.39152834{6}[source]
> I can see how things might have turned out better if there hadn't been so much migration in such a short period of time.

Not enough migration if you asked me, millions of Jews could have been saved from the holocaust. If not in Palestine a real effort should have been made to take them in other places, yet no one was doing it - not in Palestine or anywhere else.

replies(1): >>39153300 #
253. weatherlite ◴[] No.39152868{4}[source]
> Seems like I'm assuming the Israeli defense will learn enough from this attack to prevent anything similar, and you're assuming they won't

I see what you mean now, I was under the impression you think Hamas lost all motivation or means to even try it in the future. Yes if Israel does all the right things the chances of this happening again soon are low.

254. Sabinus ◴[] No.39152875{8}[source]
>In my estimation the only thing sanctions would do is push Israel toward its final solution to the palestinian problem as they no longer see a downside to ending the issue once and for all.

Now that's an interesting thought, I hadn't considered that as a consequence of the US pushing too hard.

255. endominus ◴[] No.39152929{7}[source]
>Dhimmi status is bad!

Except that doesn't seem to the be the case in the context of the time for specifically the Jewish communities living in Muslim-controlled regions? Per https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhimmi - "Generally, the Jewish people were allowed to practice their religion and live according to the laws and scriptures of their community. Furthermore, the restrictions to which they were subject were social and symbolic rather than tangible and practical in character. That is to say, these regulations served to define the relationship between the two communities, and not to oppress the Jewish population." There's a section on Jews on that page that seems unanimous in the view that while dhimmi status was not as good as being a muslim citizen, it was a better than what they had either before the Muslims took over or what they had available elsewhere. It's weird to label what is generally an improvement in living conditions/social regard as stemming from deep-seated discrimination.

Per atrocities - of course there were atrocities committed against Jews. Just as there were atrocities committed by basically every long-lived group against every long-lived group in their territories. No one is stupid enough to say that Muslims have never persecuted Jews, just as they wouldn't say that Christians have never persecuted Jews, or that Muslims never persecuted Christians, or that Christians never persecuted Muslims, or that those groups never persecuted themselves in schisms and internicine warfare. But the impression that Islam is fundamentally and necessarily opposed to the practice of the Jewish faith is fairly contradicted by even the history of dhimma. As the first paragraph of that Wikipedia page states; 'Dhimmī... is a historical term for non-Muslims living in an Islamic state with legal protection. The word literally means "protected person", referring to the state's obligation under sharia to protect the individual's life, property, as well as freedom of religion, in exchange for loyalty to the state and payment of the jizya tax, in contrast to the zakat, or obligatory alms, paid by the Muslim subjects. Dhimmi were exempt from certain duties assigned specifically to Muslims if they paid the poll tax (jizya) but were otherwise equal under the laws of property, contract, and obligation.'

On the other hand, look at how the Jews were treated during the Islamic Golden Age in Spain; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_age_of_Jewish_culture_i... ("The golden age of Jewish culture in Spain, which coincided with the Middle Ages in Europe, was a period of Muslim rule during which, intermittently, Jews were generally accepted in society and Jewish religious, cultural, and economic life flourished."). It's hard to square that with the idea that there is this deep-seated hatred among Muslims towards Jews as the GP stated.

My point is that conflict between the two sides is not inevitable, nor is this idea of extreme latent anti-Jewish sentiment in the Muslim world really true. Purges and persecution that people bring up are probably not caused by ancestral hatred, but rather the same thing that causes every society to suddenly fall into itself in violence and accusation; uncertain economic conditions, unstable political environments, natural disaster, epidemics, war, idiotic rulership, etc.

replies(2): >>39153063 #>>39155106 #
256. bawolff ◴[] No.39152950{3}[source]
> The ICJ ruled that Hamas return the hostages unconditionally

To nitpick, the court did not rule that, they just "called" for that. It wasn't an order so its not binding. It was just a symbolic statement.

At most it was just a way for the court to acknowledge that the conflict is not one sided.

257. ajb ◴[] No.39152982{3}[source]
Ethic conflicts all end eventually. A historian: https://archive.is/zADeF

TLDR: the ways they end are:

- partition

- equal representation

- one side driving out/murdering the other

It does seem like a lot of people have given up on the first two, but if it's not one of those then it's the third one. So we have to work towards making it one of the first two.

replies(1): >>39170071 #
258. dang ◴[] No.39152985{7}[source]
Please omit swipes from your comments here, as the guidelines ask. If you know more than someone else, you're welcome to provide correct information, but please don't post putdowns.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

259. amluto ◴[] No.39152991{5}[source]
I find this argument to be problematic. The world contains an enormous number of descendants of displaced people. I imagine that most of the US population is in this category, for example. (Most people of Native American heritage. The descendants of the Puritans. Most American Jews (displaced from different places, even). The Palestinian-Americans. Descendants of slaves. Many others.)

Yet most of these people do not consider themselves to still be displaced! I certainly feel no particular desire to reconquer the (multiple!) places from which my ancestors were displaced. (There’s a lot of nuance here. Plenty of people, for example, think that Native Americans and their descendants should have better treatment, especially in land that remains Native American.)

But somehow Palestinian refugees, in particular, have unusual, highly politicized issues. The UN agency involved is a different agency than the one that nominally handles every other refugee situation worldwide. There are multigenerational Palestinian refugee camps in countries that do not grant citizenship to the refugees, and there are people who argue that granting citizenship would do them a disservice. (I don’t know whether the people arguing this are doing so in good faith.)

Also…

> Israeli can only exist as a Jewish majority state as long as the original inhabitants remain displaced.

Stories and written records about the Israel go back a long time. If the stories are all true, essentially all Jews worldwide are the descendants of those displaced from Israel. Control of Jerusalem in particular has changed quite a few times, and there are surely plenty of people around, Jews and otherwise, whose ancestors have been displaced multiple times, hundreds of years apart, from the area. (It’s not just Jews and Arabs. Jesus was killed in Jerusalem. Wars have been fought there repeatedly: the Muslim Conquest of the Levant, the Crusades, etc.)

Trying to keep score of the number of living descendants of the various groups who have been displaced from Israel seems unlikely to give any sensible moral answer for who ought to control what part of it, except insofar as maybe the entire place would be better off with a genuine non-religious government, along the lines of how the US nominally works. Good luck!

260. IlikeMadison ◴[] No.39153007{4}[source]
ISIS is 95% of people of African and Middle-Eastern origins. Then maybe a bit of crazies from Indonesia, Chechnya, etc. As well, ISIS was founded in Iraq itself. How is it a "bunch of European"?
replies(1): >>39153097 #
261. reissbaker ◴[] No.39153063{8}[source]
Except that doesn't seem to the be the case in the context of the time

I think not being allowed to wear shoes and being murdered in mass riots when the Sultan allows you to wear shoes is bad. To my eyes there is very little difference between the level of hatred then and now, it's just that the power dynamic has changed, so I think blaming the Muslim world's anti-Semitism on Israel's existence (like the OP did) isn't really based in historical fact. There was anti-Semitism long before Israel existed, and it's not like it was getting better prior to its establishment — the stuff in Yemen was happening through the 20th century, under Ottoman rule (and plenty of other bad stuff, e.g. "Dung Gatherer" laws requiring Jews to perform latrine servicing for Muslims).

replies(1): >>39153379 #
262. gizmo ◴[] No.39153081{5}[source]
Mexico has better chances of winning against the US and driving out the Americans than Hamas has against Israel. Hamas has no advanced military capability.

Palestinians have over the years engaged in many good faith peace talks. Honored their side of many cease-fire agreements. And this is exactly what you would expect. After all, Palestinians stand to gain much more by a sustained peace than Israel does. The status quo (before Oct 7) was pretty great for Israel and terrible for the Palestinians. When actions, words, and incentives all point in the same direction I'm inclined to believe the words. Israel doesn't want a Palestinian state with state rights nor does it want millions of Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. Palestinians will gladly take any serious peace deal, even if that deal strongly favors Israeli interests, because the status quo is unbearable. But none of this matters because Israel has refused to engage in peace talks ever since Hamas got elected.

History teaches us that peace is possible between bitter enemies when both parties want peace and stand to gain by it. When one party desperately needs peace and the other party doesn't, there won't be peace.

replies(2): >>39153178 #>>39153200 #
263. SirSavary ◴[] No.39153097{5}[source]
Your 95% figure is incorrect -- approximately 45% of fighters hailed from Africa and the Middle East, with ~31% originating from Europe (East and West combined).

Here's a BBC article https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-47286935 and the report that it sources its data from https://icsr.info/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Women-in-ISIS-r... if you care to learn more.

replies(3): >>39154452 #>>39157249 #>>39162196 #
264. krainboltgreene ◴[] No.39153103{9}[source]
This comment is in bad faith, it is attempting to paint my retort as cheerleading for Hamas despite the actual content of my comment. You can do better than this, maybe.
replies(1): >>39153135 #
265. SirSavary ◴[] No.39153112{7}[source]
> Why did you start off with such strong statements but then retreat to this one after you're challenged?

There's no retreating in my comment -- it's a fact that they sourced people from everywhere. I threw an asterisk on there at the last second because I wanted to show good faith; there's nothing nefarious about it.

> Is ISIS a bunch of European guys or not?

It was definitely a bunch of European guys, and Asian guys, and American guys, etc... my point was that ISIS was a group of people from around the globe and not an ideology endemic to the region.

See my other comment here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39153097

266. SirSavary ◴[] No.39153120{5}[source]
It's not a "gotcha", it's a factual statement. You can disagree with the mechanisms that brought them to power but it was still a legitimate election.
replies(1): >>39153188 #
267. tptacek ◴[] No.39153135{10}[source]
I think it's a pair of relatively straightforward and banal observations and you have a choice about how personally you want to take them. You can simply say nothing, and reasonable people might reasonably assume that you of course repudiate Hamas wholesale. I'm happy to do so as well.

At the point in which I entered the thread, there was some dispute as to the intent and good faith of Hamas itself. All I care about is that we establish that no such good faith exists. Your own personal beliefs are not something I feel the need to litigate.

268. bestnameever ◴[] No.39153178{6}[source]
> Palestinians have over the years engaged in many good faith peace talks.

So has Israel

> Honored their side of many cease-fire agreements.

So has Israel

> The status quo (before Oct 7) was pretty great for Israel and terrible for the Palestinians.

The status quo was partially the result of Israel being repeatedly attacked.

> Palestinians will gladly take any serious peace deal, even if that deal strongly favors Israeli interests, because the status quo is unbearable.

I think that if this was the case, October 7th would not have happened, Hamas would have surrendered, and the hostages would have been returned.

Having said this, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is highly complex.

replies(1): >>39157141 #
269. kelnos ◴[] No.39153184{6}[source]
I addressed that in my very short comment; not sure where I wasn't clear. With Israel itself admitting that they are killing roughly 2 civilians for every Hamas fighter they kill, why would you think any civilian in Palestine would trust Israel or be interested in working with them?

The fact that it might make logical sense to you or I that they should is entirely irrelevant. We're not there, and if we were, I doubt we'd be much driven by logic at this point. Not to mention we wouldn't have had access to the internet or regular communications with anyone for months now, and only see the death and devastation.

replies(1): >>39155164 #
270. yieldcrv ◴[] No.39153188{6}[source]
yes it is accurate and a rhetorical dog whistle for extremist approaches to making Palestinian civilians inseparable from Hamas

it is also accurate that it was 18 years ago

empathy shouldnt be that hard

271. weatherlite ◴[] No.39153200{6}[source]
> Mexico has better chances of winning against the US and driving out the Americans than Hamas has against Israel. Hamas has no advanced military capability.

I disagree. This isn't Hamas alone, Hamas is backed by Iran. Big proxy armies have been built by Iran and are surrounding Israel - mostly in Lebanon and Syria and now also Yemen. Hundreds of thousands of different kinds of rockets - many of them accurate with big warheads. As for moral support - significant parts of the Muslim world and the Western liberal elites are promoting and supporting the idea that Israel should be dismantled (The Muslims mostly see this done by force. The liberal left by sanctions, but are sympathetic to the idea of violent struggle because of 'oppression').

As for the chances of this working out - I don't think it's low at all. With a patient strategy like this it can eventually happen. They've been at it for around 100 years why can't they go on for another 100? But whatever I think about the chances, I'm positive most Palestinians themselves and the resistance axis supporting them are quite confident in their chances and feel religiously compelled to keep it up.

> After all, Palestinians stand to gain much more by a sustained peace than Israel does

This is a Western approach, not how Palestinians think. You either don't read what the Palestinians are saying or you don't believe them. When they say from the river to the sea - they mean it. It's a big part of their national and religious identity, not something they can give up for a small 1967 border state. Sure, they would have had better GDP and lives had they taken a 67 state with no occupation etc, but that would break their dreams and passions and identities and somewhat their religious beliefs. Those things are more important to them them than safety and GDP, as irrational as it may seem to you. I wish I was wrong about all this but nothing I've seen over the years led me to feel like I'm wrong.

replies(1): >>39157180 #
272. Jochim ◴[] No.39153300{7}[source]
I was referring to the period after the war. To be clear, I don't think that having escaped the holocaust is a negative.

> If not in Palestine a real effort should have been made to take them in other places, yet no one was doing it - not in Palestine or anywhere else.

Agreed, the scale of the migration to palestine, even prior to 1945, indicates an abdication of duty by western countries. At the time Palestine was primarily under the control of the UK.

replies(1): >>39153441 #
273. slowturtle ◴[] No.39153337{4}[source]
> Hamas is making that very difficult by blending in with the population, putting command centers under major hospitals and so on.

If there's a command center under a hospital, then you don't bomb the hospital. The fact that your enemy is using "human shields" doesn't mean that it's justified to bomb and kill everyone, including the shields. Now every relative and friend of the innocent people you killed has a reason to pick up a gun against you.

Obviously this puts you at a disadvantage. Instead of bombing targets on a screen from the comfort of an air-conditioned office in Tel Aviv, you'll have to send special forces in on the ground and probably take a lot of casualties. But you demonstrate to the civilians that you're not just killing them indiscriminately.

replies(1): >>39158401 #
274. locallost ◴[] No.39153375{3}[source]
It provides examples that it happened and thus proves it's possible.
replies(1): >>39160228 #
275. endominus ◴[] No.39153379{9}[source]
This does not address any of the points I raised. You're just reiterating what you already wrote. Here's an abbreviated summary of the history;

1. Jews exist in a region.

2. Muslims take over. Conditions improve for the Jews.

3. Time passes.

4. Muslim civilization declines.

5. Internal strife and conflict. Among others, Jews are blamed.

6. Commenters 1000 years later; "This was caused by incipient hatred of Jews by Muslims."

This does not explain why conditions improved when Muslims originally rose to power in various regions. Again, the persecution of minority population is an expected result of the decline of civilizations. From the Wikipedia article your Twitter source is quoting, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Moroccan_Jews: "Morocco's instability and divisions also fueled conflicts, for which Jews were frequent scapegoats. The First Franco-Moroccan War in 1844 brought new misery and ill treatment upon the Moroccan Jews, especially upon those of Mogador (known as Essaouira). When the Hispano-Moroccan War broke out on September 22, 1859, the Mellah of Tetuan was sacked, and many Jews fled to Cadiz and Gibraltar for refuge. Upon the 1860 Spanish seizure of Tetouan in the Hispano-Moroccan War, the pogrom-stricken Jewish community, who spoke archaic Spanish, welcomed the invading Spanish troops as liberators, and collaborated with the Spanish authorities as brokers and translators during the 27-month-long occupation of the city." This is a nation in decline, lashing out at every perceived cause of trouble, like plague-stricken Europeans slaying cats and dogs and flagellating themselves.

Here are some other quotes from that article;

"The golden age of the Jewish community in Fez lasted for almost three hundred years, from the 9th to 11th centuries. Its yeshivot (religious schools) attracted brilliant scholars, poets and grammarians. This period was marred by a pogrom in 1033, which is described by the Jewish Virtual Library as an isolated event primarily due to political conflict between the Maghrawa and Ifrenid tribes."

"The position of the Jews under Almoravid domination was apparently free of major abuses, though there are reports of increasing social hostility against them – particularly in Fes. Unlike the problems encountered by the Jews during the rule of the Almohads (the Almoravids' successor dynasty), there are not many factual complaints of excesses, coercion, or malice on the part of the authorities toward the Jewish communities."

"During Marinid rule, Jews were able to return to their religion and practices, once again outwardly professing their Judaism under the protection of the dhimmi status. They were able to re-establish their lives and communities, returning to some sense of normalcy and security. They also established strong vertical relations with the Marinid sultans. When the still-fanatic mobs attacked them in 1275{note; no source for this on the Wikipedia page, no link; unable to find what this is referring to}, the Merinid sultan Abu Yusuf Yaqub ibn Abd Al-Haqq intervened personally to save them. The sovereigns of this dynasty benevolently received the Jewish ambassadors of the Christian kings of Spain and admitted Jews among their closest courtiers."

This is not what I would expect of a civilization that is fundamentally racist towards Jews. I would not expect, for example, a Louisiana governor in the 18th century to appoint a black man to be his advisor, yet we see Jews in the position of vizier in Morocco. This does not square.

Racism is not the most useful lens to view this relationship through. The culture of the Middle East is low-trust compared to post-Enlightenment Western societies. There remain sharp social divisions based on old tribal allegiances in even developed nations there (unsurprising, perhaps; there remain living people who remember that this tribe used to be slavers and that tribe killed our uncle and so on). Lashing out at neighbors who one thinks are being treated too favorably has little to do with race or religion, in my experience, and more to do with envy. It is the narcissism of small differences writ large and exacerbated by actual stakes.

replies(2): >>39155723 #>>39162000 #
276. weatherlite ◴[] No.39153441{8}[source]
When you mentioned rapid demographic shift, I was assuming you meant the Jewish immigration in the early 20th century that brought bigger numbers of Jews into Palestine and the beginning of the Palestinian rejection of Zionism. There is a popular view that this (or basically Zionism altogether) should have never been allowed to take place because it eventually led to Palestinian displacement.
replies(1): >>39155879 #
277. mk89 ◴[] No.39153465{6}[source]
Do you believe that people in Gaza will accept that Israel rebuilds it? And for how long? Because I already foresee a minority craving for independence against the old invaders that "enslaved us with money, first took our land, then they tried to buy us out...".

Etc.

The comparison with Germany doesn't stand. Two completely different situations, different histories, different people, different mindsets, different economies. You can't just let them rebuild it and hope that people in Gaza don't plan your destruction again and again.

278. Aeolun ◴[] No.39153512{3}[source]
You think Osama was happy? The man was clearly very, very angry about something, and I doubt it was inheriting a bunch of money.
279. Aeolun ◴[] No.39153527{3}[source]
They have to be religious fanatics because that’s all they have to cling to. If I’m going to fight a losing battle against a grossly superior enemy I also want to believe that I’ll end up in paradise for it.

You might note that that brand of fanaticism goes down rapidly in countries that have high standards of living.

280. imtringued ◴[] No.39153568[source]
You need an anti Hamas Palestinian force that credibly fights against Hamas and has the support of the Palestinians but it is too late for that now.
281. RoyalHenOil ◴[] No.39153831{9}[source]
They support Hamas because they can't see any other potential path to prosperity.

If you want to quell extremism in a country, you have to give them a genuine alternative to extremism. If all of the moderate options get them nowhere, they will reject them.

This is a vital lesson we learned from WWII. Incentives matter.

replies(1): >>39154190 #
282. alexisread ◴[] No.39153849{6}[source]
Erm, https://www.vox.com/world-politics/2023/11/22/23972908/pales...

Children are detained for years under this law.

https://www.axios.com/2023/03/20/bezalel-smotrich-jordan-gre...

This is incitement.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-67926799

Denying access to water is a war crime, and is acknowledged to have happened here.

There are links here, where are yours to prove your assertions?

283. RoyalHenOil ◴[] No.39153910{6}[source]
It's not just their optics. It looks that way to the rest of the world as well.

When the IDF kills (at least) two civilians to every combatant, and then drives many others out of their homes and into starvation, it really does make it look like Hamas is the only organization that will fight for them. And Hamas barely even does that (seeing as they are a terrorist organization that uses Palestinian civilians like sacrificial pawns), but they come far closer to it than any other organization in a position to do anything.

If we want Gazans to support an alternative to Hamas, then we need to come up with an alternative to Hamas that supports Gazans better than Hamas does. That should be pretty easy; it's a very low bar.

284. mderazon ◴[] No.39153931{4}[source]
It's not propaganda. It's a dispute about land with each side not willing to give up land because it's a holy land that God bestowed upon them
285. SomeoneFromCA ◴[] No.39154128{8}[source]
Of course West has the power. The generational shift in US is very clear - GenZ openly does not want to have anyrhing to do with israel. It will carry on and increase with everry next generation. How are you gonna sustain israel in this kind of enviromnent?
replies(1): >>39155306 #
286. pgeorgi ◴[] No.39154172{6}[source]
Except where they weren't. The German borders after 1945 or after 1990 are unlike any other shape of any German nation (or collection of German states) before.
287. pgeorgi ◴[] No.39154190{10}[source]
> They support Hamas because they can't see any other potential path to prosperity.

Prosperity through Hamas? Only for a select few who live in other countries. With the amount of aid and money thrown at Gaza, any third rate politician could have achieved prosperity if only they were genuinely in it for the good of the people.

Hamas didn't, because their priority doesn't lie in the welfare of the Palestinian people but in the eradication of Israel.

(and potentially not even that: there are more billions to amass while living in the safety and comfort of some emirate when the situation on the ground remains volatile and the Palestinian people miserable. In that case, Palestinians don't even have a "way out" of their misery by completing Hamas' mission, because their misery _is_ Hamas' mission.)

replies(1): >>39169646 #
288. samirillian ◴[] No.39154271{5}[source]
I don't grasp the analogy
289. spidersenses ◴[] No.39154452{6}[source]
>with ~31% originating from Europe (East and West combined).

I think the parent comment was referring to the idea that the overwhelmingy majority of those "Europeans" we're rather people of MENA/Turkish immigrant background, not "ethnically" European.

replies(1): >>39160019 #
290. spidersenses ◴[] No.39154463{6}[source]
>and gave the defeated countries a path to prosper.

You're not very familiar with the history of the countries behind the Iron Curtain, are you?

291. bsaul ◴[] No.39154465[source]
Unfortunately , pouring money in gaza while hamas is in power only funnels it to weapons and terror infrastructure.

How do we know it ? We've been doing that for the past 15 years.

292. GordonS ◴[] No.39154664{6}[source]
> then start a sort of deprogramming the society

It could be argued that Israelis need "deprogramming" - look at the scenes we've seen over the past few days, with hordes of Israeli civilians blocking aid from entering Gaza. Look at the torrent of vileness spewed forth online by many Israelis. Look at the Israeli Telegram groups where they share and laugh at images of dead Palestinian children (actually, don't look; it's just too much).

Religious extremism is not just a "Muslim thing".

replies(1): >>39155298 #
293. cultofmetatron ◴[] No.39154881{3}[source]
they've tried. I saw this youtube video awhile back about a man from gaza who built an inland fish farm to raise food to feed people because the fishermen were forbidden by isreal fro boing to the areas where the fish were.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxEqXkdJUWY&ab_channel=Insid...

294. imtringued ◴[] No.39154891{7}[source]
So you're telling me they have an easy way to bait Hamas into exposing themselves by using humanitarian aid as a honey pot?

If the humanitarian aid organisations themselves are Hamas, then you could just arrest them.

replies(1): >>39155202 #
295. Thedarkb ◴[] No.39154907{3}[source]
The ethno-religious conflict in Northern Ireland dates back to the seventeenth century and the question of Irish sovereignty dates all the way back to the twelfth century!
296. tim333 ◴[] No.39154960{4}[source]
I think the Gaza war doesn't fit you hypothesis for a start. The Gaza residents could have made it into another Dubai but they prefered to follow a route that resulted in the current situation.
replies(1): >>39158440 #
297. tim333 ◴[] No.39154982[source]
Peace could be achieved fairly easily if both sides said they want to live in peace. However only one does. I think that will change eventually.
replies(3): >>39155295 #>>39155296 #>>39170078 #
298. rayiner ◴[] No.39154995[source]
> And then everyone who wants peace invests lots of money and expertise over a long time to build a modern, prosperous, stable Palestinian society

What makes you think that’s even possible? Name any other Arab country you could plunk down next to Israel that wouldn’t constantly be trying to destroy Israel?

replies(1): >>39155188 #
299. rayiner ◴[] No.39155022{4}[source]
Their legitimate problems with Israel stem from their illegitimate problem with Israel: that Arabs rejected a two-state solution at inception and repeatedly tried to wipe Israel off the map. More fundamentally, the whole problem stems from Arabs refusing to want to give up any of the territory they acquired during their wars of conquest in the 700s. Palestine is always going to be a proxy for that. (Which is why Qatar is hosting Hamas leadership.)
replies(1): >>39159027 #
300. A4ET8a8uTh0 ◴[] No.39155058{7}[source]
<< Israel has no choice other than to deal with Hamas as they are.

Maybe. Recent drone strike in Lebanon suggests that Israel is rather capable to strike surgically if it is so desires. In Gaza, it does not appear to strike surgically suggesting it made that choice for a reason.

There is always a choice and few would fault just plain self-defense. Based on the existing rubble, current situation is closer to overkill, which does not win Israel support.

Something to consider.

replies(1): >>39161151 #
301. YeGoblynQueenne ◴[] No.39155106{8}[source]
Knowledgeable, level-headed and sensible comment- thanks.
302. weatherlite ◴[] No.39155157{5}[source]
You're saying Gazans make immature choices because of the population's young age? That's a first time I hear this. They're a nation of kids you say.
303. A4ET8a8uTh0 ◴[] No.39155164{7}[source]
<< why would you think any civilian in Palestine would trust Israel or be interested in working with them?

It is not the same, but in a sense this odd naivety was a similar surprised reaction to US withdrawal and quick rollover of 'local' army in Afghanistan.

<< We're not there, and if we were, I doubt we'd be much driven by logic

I think this is worth highlighting. edit: The reason to avoid war is because it is horrific and can remove all sense from a man.

304. edanm ◴[] No.39155188{3}[source]
Israel has had peace with Egypt and Jordan, for a long time now.
305. weatherlite ◴[] No.39155192[source]
> An occasional October 7th is a better choice than levelling Gaza is

Better for who? For Hamas yes, killing Israelis with impunity would be a boost. But for Israel - I don't know of any democracy that can keep going with an 'occasional' October 7th. A country can't sustain that without collapsing at some point. Think about 9-11 but with 80k killed instead of 3000, and around 10000 kidnapped. And the entity responsible is just around the corner and gonna keep doing it on occasion. Those are the proportions. How many of these would the U.S be able to endure before its economy and society collapsed?

replies(1): >>39156962 #
306. edanm ◴[] No.39155202{8}[source]
They're in a different territory that has no Israeli presence. That's like saying the US could've just arrested the members of ISIS..
307. weatherlite ◴[] No.39155251{3}[source]
All Palestinians deaths are civilians by your measures.
308. weatherlite ◴[] No.39155273{4}[source]
> Is that unfair? Absolutely

What's fair to you then? What's the fair solution?

309. ◴[] No.39155295{3}[source]
310. ethanbond ◴[] No.39155296{3}[source]
“Peace while continuing to seize land” is a peculiar-enough type of peace to not really qualify for simply “wants to live in peace” by many people’s definition.
replies(1): >>39155553 #
311. maroonblazer ◴[] No.39155298{7}[source]
If Israel really wanted to wipe the Palestinians off the map they have the resources to do it. But they don't. Based on claims Hamas have made, in their founding charter and other public statements, if they had the resources to wipe the Jews off the map they would do it, without hesitation.

That's the difference.

replies(1): >>39155398 #
312. weatherlite ◴[] No.39155306{9}[source]
I don't know, it's a good question and it might be unsustainable. Another question is how do you dismantle a country threatened by war and genocidal intentions on all borders , a country that's a nuclear power? What's the end game here - let Israel die and hope the population makes it out OK and that Palestinians happily co exist with Israelis? While some use South Africa as an example where this happened peacefully, there are many more examples where this ended up in a huge massacres - Yugoslavia, Syria, Iraq etc. The realistic best case scenario for Israel is Israel collapsing and the vast majority of the Jews fleeing alive to wherever they can. Other scenarios are Jews getting massacred in huge numbers and even nuclear war.
replies(1): >>39155339 #
313. SomeoneFromCA ◴[] No.39155339{10}[source]
The way things are going, the earlier West understands/accepts insustainability of current israel, the less bloody will be the end result. israel could even survive as a Jewish state, but that would require massive diplomatic effort of many forces.
replies(1): >>39155465 #
314. weatherlite ◴[] No.39155361{8}[source]
We don't have much oil, we do have gas reserves. Whatever you fill up your car with - we don't have. Last I heard we import our oil from Azerbijan - a friendly Muslim country with common enemies. Also most calories e.g food are imported. Most agricultural fertilizers, chips and electronics for missiles, cars etc etc. There is talk now in Israel of becoming more independent - especially in regards to arms, but it's going to take a long time and I'm not positive how well Israel can make it. It's a very small country after all. Israel needs to deal with Iran who is supported by Russia and to a lesser extent by China. How long can Israel make it alone against the world's biggest superpowers without the U.S on its side?

And even if Israel can make it like North Korea, I don't think most Israelis would want that kind of life of being completely isolated from the world. If Israeli existence is reduced to isolation and extreme poverty - most would give up I think.

replies(1): >>39156514 #
315. GordonS ◴[] No.39155398{8}[source]
As I'm sure you know, the Hamas charter no longer says anything like that - it explicitly says their beef is with Zionists and their treatment of Palestinians, not Jewish people or the Jewish faith.

The only people we see killing day after day after day, without hesitation, are the IDF.

It's quite clear that Israel has been doing everything they can to render Gaza uninhabitable - senior officials have even publicly said that's their aim. Furthermore, it's clear the aim is a revenge-fueled massacre of civilians, followed by ethnic cleansing - senior officials regularly call for Gazans to be shipped out to other countries.

316. weatherlite ◴[] No.39155465{11}[source]
I think better plans need to be made for dismantling a country (that's what you're aiming at right?) in such a volatile part of the world. It can already be extremely bloody, as I said there are genocidal threats against Israel on all borders and Israel as a nuclear power can become genocidal too if it feels its own people are at risk of a second holocaust. Simply crippling Israel's economy so it collapses and hoping for the best sounds like a very bad idea to me.
replies(1): >>39164647 #
317. tim333 ◴[] No.39155553{4}[source]
It's tricky but there have been attempts at a normal peace deal like the Camp David Summit. But then the Palestinians say no. So instead you get the other stuff you mention.
replies(1): >>39155929 #
318. reducesuffering ◴[] No.39155723{10}[source]
Not quite.

“In 638, Palestine came under Muslim rule with the Muslim conquest of the Levant. One estimate placed the Jewish population of Palestine at between 300,000 and 400,000 at the time.[87] However, this is contrary to other estimates which place it at 150,000 to 200,000 at the time of the revolt against Heraclius.[88][89] According to historian Moshe Gil, the majority of the population was Jewish or Samaritan.[90] The land gradually came to have an Arab majority as Arab tribes migrated there. Jewish communities initially grew and flourished. Umar allowed and encouraged Jews to settle in Jerusalem. It was the first time in about 500 years that Jews were allowed to freely enter and worship in their holiest city. In 717, new restrictions were imposed against non-Muslims that negatively affected the Jews. Heavy taxes on agricultural land forced many Jews to migrate from rural areas to towns. Social and economic discrimination caused significant Jewish emigration from Palestine, and Muslim civil wars in the 8th and 9th centuries pushed many Jews out of the country. By the end of the 11th century the Jewish population of Palestine had declined substantially.”

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_diaspora

You make it sound like they were treated like equals and then only discriminated against many centuries later in a decline. But really, history shows us that they were initially treated well for a few years as they had just been conquered (a classic historical power solidification move) but were then treated terribly the entire rest of the time under Muslim conquest.

replies(1): >>39156350 #
319. pas ◴[] No.39155824{7}[source]
Hamas' rule is the result of many factors over decades. Obviously the blockade and every other security measure was, at best, short-term responses to Hamas' radicalization, but overall simply one more blow to the fragile illusion of peace, and simply more heat under the pressure cooker of Gaza.
320. Jochim ◴[] No.39155879{9}[source]
The early immigration certainly caused issues between two groups and I do think that the decision to support the zionists of the time was incorrect. For many, the purpose seems to have been to reduce their own Jewish populations.

While still a cause of tension, immigration was much lower before the war. The result was just as you said, European Jews were faced with an existential threat a few years after the holocaust.

One of the things I found quite interesting was that Palestine wasn't the only option considered by early Zionists. At some point places like Argentina and Uganda were potential candidates.

replies(1): >>39156309 #
321. ethanbond ◴[] No.39155929{5}[source]
Yeah, the “but first X did Y! But before that P did Q!” goes back thousands of years. All that to say it’s not as simple as “one side wants peace and the other doesn’t.” It’s very messy.
replies(1): >>39164449 #
322. weatherlite ◴[] No.39156309{10}[source]
> For many, the purpose seems to have been to reduce their own Jewish populations.

I'm not really aware of much European support for Zionism outside the Balfour declaration in those years. The declaration remained a declaration and pretty soon the Brits flipped their policy and banned Jewish immigration. You had tiny movements of Christians Zionists (Churchill was a Zionist for instance) but I'm not aware of any substantial support they gave. After the war the big immigration waves were actually from Middle Eastern Jews, not from Europe. Jews from Egypt, Morocco, Lebanon, Syria etc etc whose lives became increasingly dangerous. So my main point is its quite unclear if there was any major support for Zionism in the West in those years. Only after the holocaust could you find a majority that supported establishing Israel in the UN.

If you want to dig into this look into where Israel got its weapons from during its war of survival in 48: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arms_shipments_from_Czechoslov.... From the communists.

323. endominus ◴[] No.39156350{11}[source]
>By the end of the 11th century the Jewish population of Palestine had declined substantially.

Holy shit that's burying the lede. Do you know what happened in Palestine, specifically Jerusalem, at the end of the 11th century?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Crusade

"On 15 July 1099, the crusaders made their way into the city through the tower of David and began massacring large numbers of the inhabitants, Muslims and Jews alike. The Fatimid governor of the city, Iftikhar Ad-Daulah, managed to escape.[16] According to eyewitness accounts the streets of Jerusalem were filled with blood. How many people were killed is a matter of debate, with the figure of 70,000 given by the Muslim historian Ibn al-Athir (writing c.1200) considered to be a significant exaggeration; 40,000 is plausible, given the city's population had been swollen by refugees fleeing the advance of the crusading army.[17]

The aftermath of the siege led to the mass slaughter of thousands of Muslims and Jews which contemporaneous sources suggest was savage and widespread and to the conversion of Muslim holy sites on the Temple Mount into Christian shrines.[18][19]

Atrocities committed against the inhabitants of cities taken by storm after a siege were normal in ancient[20] and medieval warfare by both Christians and Muslims. The crusaders had already done so at Antioch, and Fatimids had done so themselves at Taormina, at Rometta, and at Tyre. However, it is speculated that the massacre of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, both Muslims and Jews, may have exceeded even these standards."

And yes, the various Muslim powers at the time were in steep decline; if they weren't, they should easily have been able to defeat an army as poorly organized as the First Crusade was. The fact that just before the crusaders arrived, every powerful leader in the region died is basically the closest they came to actual divine intervention.

replies(1): >>39162106 #
324. ImPostingOnHN ◴[] No.39156485{7}[source]
It is reasonable for adjoining countries to control their borders, e.g. Egypt and Israel's borders with Palestine. Countries get to control their borders.

Israel takes it a step further and blockades Palestinian access to Palestinian sea routes, something which isn't just a declaration of war, it's an act of war.

325. mlrtime ◴[] No.39156514{9}[source]
> don't think most Israelis would want that kind of life of being completely isolated from the world.

I've never been to Israel but have friends there. I disagree with 'most', they are very resilient and will not leave their home. I offered my home to one mother with a newborn while they were living in a bunker. They would rather stay at home with rockets hitting them than flee.

replies(1): >>39156564 #
326. ◴[] No.39156524{9}[source]
327. ignoramous ◴[] No.39156561{7}[source]
> They own the result.

Care to divulge more? Seems like you're holding it in.

328. weatherlite ◴[] No.39156564{10}[source]
Interesting take. We're just speculating here, it's a very extreme scenario so hard to say. The reason I'm skeptic about it is that most Israelis got used to quite high standards of living - comparable to say France or UK (gdp wise). Complete isolation would bring Israel to the standards of living it had in the 50s. But your point is important - some Israelis will certainly not give up no matter what.
329. ImPostingOnHN ◴[] No.39156648{6}[source]
They hunted down, shot, and killed multiple of their own, underwear-clad civilian citizens who were all the while waving white flags and loudly surrendering in hebrew [0]

Imagine the sort of intentional targeting we don't get to see, because the journalists are killed [1] or the internet is cut [2] or the power is cut [3] or because everyone hiding is terrified to even move, knowing anything moving will be shot on sight [4], even surrendering Israeli hostages [0]. What a nightmare.

Known (indeed, willing) indiscriminate killing of civilians (especially in civilian areas, yikes) is as much a war crime [5] as "intentionally targeting civilians", even if one shouts "get out of there!" or "human shields!" or "terrorists!" or "it's comin' right for us!" in a Calvinball-style declaration whilst doing it.

For more detailed analysis of how Israel seems to be ignoring their obligation to protect Palestinian civilians, I recommend consulting the full ruling [6] from the ICJ, the literal judges of this matter.

0: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/04/world/middleeast/israel-h...

1: https://cpj.org/2024/01/journalist-casualties-in-the-israel-...

2: https://www.wired.com/story/israel-gaza-internet-blackouts-w...

3: https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-middle-east-67073970

4: https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/16/middleeast/idf-sniper-gaza-ch...

5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiscriminate_attack#The_1977...

6 (PDF warning): https://www.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/192...

330. yyyk ◴[] No.39156881{10}[source]
>Some say Egypt, Jordan, and Israel equally sabotaged the elections: https://carnegieendowment.org/sada/84509

The entire article is about how nobody buys Abbas' excuses (the other link is similarly not relevant to the discussion).

replies(1): >>39159800 #
331. ajross ◴[] No.39156962{3}[source]
Then we'll deal with that "at some point" I guess? Again, Israel is a bad guy too. It's all bad guys. All options suck. So pick the one with less death and just shuffle along until some unknown event in the far future acts to break the stalemate and produce a peaceful region (or, more realistically, acts to break the equilibrium and we get a genuine demographic disaster that returns the area to a "single ethnicity" state, which sucks even more, but may be unavoidable).

Tough love: Israel can't expect to continue to act as it has in the decades since the fall of the PA. It ultimately depends on international support and that support will eventually run out, c.f. the linked article. It won't happen soon, or all at once, but it will happen and there needs to be a plan for regional coexistence, and as you'd surely agree there really isn't one beyond an imagined (and largely impossible) total military victory.

332. gizmo ◴[] No.39157141{7}[source]
When Hamas got elected Israel aborted all peace talks and built a fence with gun turrets around Gaza. No peace talks means no peace.
replies(1): >>39158442 #
333. gizmo ◴[] No.39157180{7}[source]
The belief that “the other” is fundamentally unreasonable can be used to justify arbitrary amounts of violence. Lets not forget that Hamas is pretty unpopular in Gaza and that most people just want to live their lives and not see their children get blown up. This is not my biased western perspective.
replies(2): >>39157611 #>>39161735 #
334. aoeusnth1 ◴[] No.39157249{6}[source]
I looked at the source. Are you confusing “women and minors as % of total” from a country with % of fighters in IS originating from that country?
335. southernplaces7 ◴[] No.39157328{5}[source]
No they didn't. Germany lost a large chunk of its eastern lands that was "given" to Poland (but in reality conytrolled by the Soviets) and Japan's large prewar empire in northern China and Korea (since the early 1930s) was taken away from the Japanese leaving them only the home islands. A bit of basic historical knowledge is good if one is going to argue.

As for Gaza not being able to sustain its population, i'm doubtful. It's a tiny territory almost devoid of material/natural resources, but then there are many places and enclave countries in the world that are similar in size, heavily populated and with good standards of living. The reason why: They're not unremittingly belligerent with their neighbors, run by a government explicitly dedicated to the erasure of one of those neighbors, and overall allowed to exchange with the rest of the world fully.

With that said, the hardline stance of Netenyahou and those who support him is doing little favors to Israel either, if a path to peace is what Israel wants.

336. weatherlite ◴[] No.39157611{8}[source]
We have very clear instances from history where the opposite is true. The amount of senseless wars and violence is staggering. Arguably more often than not. I don't think this is different, we are going to disagree on that.
337. ajross ◴[] No.39157634{5}[source]
Replying here in a flagged subthread because I really do think this is important:

So... those two accusations are so commonly made and debated that they both have their own wikipedia pages:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zionism_as_settler_colonialism

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_genocide_accusatio...

I mean, sure, you can retreat to arguments about whether it's a personal accusation or just an abstract idea, or whether I can substantiate use of the combined pharse "genocidal colonizer" (which of course I can't). But we both know that's hairsplitting.

The point I was trying to make is that there is a large population of people[1] out there who AGREE with you on virtually every practical, relevant point of public policy or international relations.... but who will never make common cause with you if they perceive your goals as the invalidation of the nationality of nine million people. There's no solution here that doesn't involve Zionists, just as there's no solution that rejects Islam.[2]

[1] And in particular people with significant influence over the Israeli policy you want to see changed!

[2] Realistically there's just no solution, and it would do well for everyone involved to recognize that and resign ourselves to the policy of just reducing immediate harm as what amounts to a BATNA.

replies(2): >>39158398 #>>39160696 #
338. tptacek ◴[] No.39158278{7}[source]
A supermajority of all Gazans are too ever to have voted (in part because Hamas, which won the 2006 election by throwing PA supporters off rooftops, hasn't allowed another election since). It is not reasonable to say that Gazans elected Hamas.
replies(1): >>39163658 #
339. anon84873628 ◴[] No.39158356{3}[source]
That certainly will happen. It's part of the "despite whatever setbacks, attacks, and sabotage occur from within and without" aspect. Israelis need to be able to turn the other cheek in order to break the cycle of violence.

I realize that this goes against human nature and may be impossible.

340. tptacek ◴[] No.39158398{6}[source]
Both those accusations are colorable and have non-inflammatory interpretations.

For example, sociologically speaking, Israel is a settler-colonialist state. What activists don't acknowledge is that the concept of "settler-colonialism" was invented to describe the distinction between extractive colonialism, of the King Leopold of Belgium type, and the long-term sustainable kind, of the New Zealand type. It was a way of working out why some human migration seems to "work" and others don't. Later --- I think probably in part due to the abuses of "settlers" within Israel, in the West Bank --- the term became an epithet. I suspect it's used largely by people who don't know the meaning.

Similarly, there's a colloquial meaning to the word "genocide" that doesn't intersect with the legal meaning. It's any campaign of mass violence directed at a race or creed. That meaning is dilutive of the original concept of genocide, which really did mean an effort to erase (through murder, sterilization, or kidnapping) an entire ethnicity. But it has meaning nonetheless.

However justified the military operation of Gaza might be, it would be difficult for a supporter of the IDF to argue that it doesn't consistute mass violence targeting Palestinians, even if it pretty clearly doesn't have either the intention or the potential to erase the Palestinian identity (I feel like if you asked an activist selected at random for a percentage of Palestinians killed in Gaza, you'd get a double-digit number from most of them, which of course not even close).

replies(1): >>39158616 #
341. LegitShady ◴[] No.39158401{5}[source]
>If there's a command center under a hospital, then you don't bomb the hospital.

Thats not what the geneva convention says.

342. tstrimple ◴[] No.39158440{5}[source]
Because Gaza is famously known for its oil wealth. Why pretend like completely different circumstances should lead to the same results?
343. LegitShady ◴[] No.39158442{8}[source]
It turns out being the group who sent suicide bombers to restaurants, nightclubs, and busses, and who call for genocide of the jews regularly, are not a credible partner for peace.

And when israel does work with them, people say "See, bibi was supporting hamas!"

344. anon84873628 ◴[] No.39158507{3}[source]
47% of Gaza's population is under the age of 18, meaning they have lived completely under the blockade and Hamas. Politically they only "want" what they have been indoctrinated to want.

Give them school, art, romance, the option to travel the world, choose their career... and they probably won't care as much about their parent's grievances. Give them no such options and you are guaranteed to have more combatants.

No one said it would be quick or easy. This will take multiple generations. It requires the Israelis to make a bet on the Palestinian youth.

345. ◴[] No.39158616{7}[source]
346. pgeorgi ◴[] No.39158720{6}[source]
The Nakba, you mean when all neighboring Arab countries said "hey Palestinians, step out of the way, we'll kill the Jews real quick and then you can have all the land"?

And then lost the war they've started?

Yes, that's a catastrophe for Arabs, just like losing WW2 was a catastrophe for certain Germans. And also for those in Germany who were exiled from their (sometimes extensive) land, no matter what they thought of the war and its outcome.

Eastern Prussian didn't then go and tried to kill the Western German president when the FRG took them in, though. Besides some whining by a few select bunch, that chapter is closed.

Not so for the Arabs for whom the "Nakba" was and is that the military campaign failed and not that Palestinians now live in misery.

replies(2): >>39158956 #>>39162251 #
347. YZF ◴[] No.39158868{8}[source]
Sure. We can say the same about the middle ages and prehistoric societies. It's entirely possible that one day Palestine (or we can call it Israel who cares what the country is named) can become a country where all these people that want to kill each other today and lay their claims to the land can be more like Switzerland. The likelihood of that happening in the immediate future is pretty slim. These are long term processes. If we want to experiment let's pick another location in the region that's less complicated, like Syria, Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt- pick one. when those become like the UK or Switzerland or France or Germany, i.e. prosperous, free, democratic countries, then we can try this in "Palestine"/"Israel". And really, if we turned the entire middle east into the EU then the tiny little piece of land people are fighting over becomes less of a problem anyways because there's not the same shortage of land/resources. I'm sure many Jewish people would prefer to live and work in Beirut for example or live in some remote area in Syria or Iraq and grow weed. "A wolf will reside with a lamb, and a leopard will lie down with a young goat; an ox and a young lion will graze together, as a small child leads them along." - beautiful.

The US tried to bring democracy to Iraq ... and Russia. That didn't quite end up as expected.

Seriously though, I think it could become. One day. It's been going the opposite direction. These are processes that are measured in generations. There are some major issues that would need to be addressed (like being a safe haven for Jews from persecution) even if the middle east emerges from it's "dark ages". Also I don't think the parties here really want this sort of solution right now (i.e. they wouldn't even be willing to work towards it and they're actively working against it).

replies(1): >>39159605 #
348. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39158956{7}[source]
Not at all.

"During the foundational events of the Nakba in 1948, dozens of massacres targeting Arabs were conducted and about 400 Arab-majority towns and villages were depopulated;[3] with many of these being either completely destroyed or repopulated by Jewish residents and given new Hebrew names. Approximately 750,000[4] Palestinian Arabs (about half of Palestine's Arab population) fled from their homes or were expelled by Zionist militias and later the Israeli army"

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba#:~:text=During%20the%2....

replies(1): >>39159020 #
349. tptacek ◴[] No.39159020{8}[source]
This did happen and I don't think there's a lot of prevarication to be done about how bad it was, but if we're talking about it as a way of imputing original sin to the citizens of Israel, it's worth keeping in mind that most of them are descendants of Arab Jewish people who were counter-Nakba'd --- chased from their homes across the Middle East and North Africa by pogroms.

I get why you'd respond to the previous comment, though, which reads as if it's an attempt to deny the events of the Palestinian Nakba. You're right to do that. All I'm here to say is that the 20th century history of that region is complicated and no simple narrative will get anybody to where we are today.

replies(1): >>39159122 #
350. amluto ◴[] No.39159027{5}[source]
Even ignoring whether you’re right or whether you are simplifying in a fair or unfair manner, I think it’s unhelpful to treat people as though they are mere continuations of their predecessors.

All living Gazans were born after the 700s. The vast majority were born after 1948. Most were born after 1967.

Telling people that their very real problems may stem from the misbehavior of dead, long dead, and extremely long dead people, even if those people are their ancestors, doesn’t change the fact that actual living Gazans have very real problems.

replies(1): >>39165742 #
351. ethics13 ◴[] No.39159067[source]
It is an incredibly naive outlook as that has been in place since 2005 in Gaza.
replies(1): >>39159819 #
352. YZF ◴[] No.39159095{10}[source]
defiantly? So you really think that the Hamas would abide by a democratic result that removes it from power? After it took power in Gaza by force, killing many Palestinians (hundreds!) that belonged to Fatah? I think there's little indication that Palestinians in power are interested in democracy, human rights, personal freedoms etc. Neither Fatah/PA nor Hamas. If Israel withdrew unilaterally from the entirety of the west bank it'd be a carbon copy of Gaza. Militarized, dug up with tunnels, rockets aimed at Israel, Jihadi antisemitic education system, zero human rights, rule by force, corruption. The only reason the PA is able to keep existing is because the IDF is supporting it, otherwise the Hamas would already be ruling the west bank cities (and/or Israel would retake them and re-establish the military rule over them).

There's a path to Israeli citizenship for Arabs living in east Jerusalem and Israel has de-facto annexed it. But Israel did allow the 2006 elections to happen there. I wasn't really aware of the details about 2021 but I think you forgot to mention that Hamas refused to allow the elections to take place in Gaza (and participate at all?). At the end of the day this is just another political battle tool. I think it would make sense for the Palestinians to have elections in the areas under their control, by insisting on extending those to areas not in their control they are making a political statement and trying to push towards the outcome they want to see. It's only fair that Israel pushes the opposite direction towards the outcome it prefers to see. There is still a dispute and the sides do not agree. If Palestinians were truly concerned about democracy they would restrict the process to the areas they control ("A" territory in the west bank and Gaza) which would make sense, i.e. give the people that live in areas under Palestinian control a say in who runs those areas, and wouldn't really make a statement as to what the eventual agreement would look like.

replies(1): >>39159440 #
353. Ozzie_osman ◴[] No.39159122{9}[source]
In many ways I agree with you. I'm not promoting any original sin.I'm simply responding the narrative that "Hamas started all this on October 7th, so as conclusion, all of what Israel is doing is justified."
replies(1): >>39159172 #
354. tptacek ◴[] No.39159172{10}[source]
Sure. It's easy to accept both arguments though: Hamas must be destroyed, but no matter how diabolical Hamas' tactics are, you still can't fight them primarily through an air war that kills tens of thousands of innocent Gazans.

Either way, my only stake in this little subthread is to stick up for the complexity of the history of the region, which both sides of the argument have a tendency to flatten to the point of unrecognizability.

355. YZF ◴[] No.39159345{6}[source]
I don't know if you missed my point below but can Jews in Iran live in a democracy? Do they enjoy human rights and freedoms similar to what Jews enjoy in Israel?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Jews#Legal_discriminat...

"For example, if a Jew were to kill a Muslim, the family of the victim would have the right to ask that the death penalty be imposed, but if a Muslim kills a Jew, the penalty would be left to the discretion of the judges with the wishes of the victim's family carrying no legal weight" - I mean only fair, right?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Jews

"There were two waves of confiscation of homes, farmlands and factories of Jews in Iran. In the first wave, the authorities seized the properties of a small group of Jews who were accused of helping Zionism financially. In the second wave, authorities confiscated the properties of Jews who had to leave the country after the Revolution. They left everything in fear for their lives and the Islamic Republic confiscated their properties using their absence as an excuse"

So no, it's is not reasonable to ask Jews in Israel to live under similar conditions that Jews are subjected to in Iran (and really it's much worse than you're painting it). I stand by my original statement.

I think your last statement really tells it all. "makes it dangerous to be Jewish" tells us that the problem really is antisemitism. Israels' critics are the ones "conflating" things and the treatment of Israel by its haters is primarily coming from a place of hating Jews (and sorry, I'm going to put "uninformed" in the same bucket, because if you hate Jews because you're uninformed you're still an antisemite). As a Jewish person living out of Israel I see this in play. Israel is saying that much of the criticism against it is antisemitism and I think that's not way off the reality. It's also true that there's plenty of criticism that's not antisemitic but the bulk of it is. Saying Israel is somehow responsible for this is just victim blaming. If we were more aggressive about antisemitism not being ok/acceptable then we'd just be left with the valid criticism (of which there's plenty) and Israel wouldn't be able to hide behind the antisemitism defense. It's not that hard to tell whether criticism is valid or not, just s/Israel/Non-Jewish country/g and see if it still rings reasonable. That's the test Israel tries to get its critics to apply. Then it's either accused of whataboutism or colonialism or something else by people who don't want to apply this test.

EDIT: another by the way is that Iran is not an Arab country.

replies(1): >>39179377 #
356. reducesuffering ◴[] No.39159358{5}[source]
> Maybe external parties will somehow enforce a two state solution.

IMO, this should've always been the solution. What has happened is akin to parents letting teenage brothers bloodily beat each other up for many many decades without properly dictating a peaceful intervention assured by a much more powerful force. The world needs to acknowledge that these two parties have shown they are unable to form a peaceful equilibrium, and it's just enabling killing to continually be hands off. Get all the world powers positions on the floor, split the difference, tell Israel and Palestine these are the borders and security arrangement, guaranteed for X decades. No more lives will be lost as long as support for upsetting that agreement (intifada/nakba/etc.) is severed. Letting two extremist right wing sides religiously duke it out over "the holy land" isn't acceptable in the 21st century.

357. runarberg ◴[] No.39159440{11}[source]
> At the end of the day this is just another political battle tool.

Show me a democracy where elections aren’t just another political battle tool. In anarchist circles there is even a saying: “If elections changed anything, they would abolish it.”

Of course the Palestinian governments are no different. Hamas wanted general elections because they thought they could gain more power. Fatah didn’t because they thought they would loose power. The game of politics happened and they had elections which were boycotted by Hamas and everybody (already in power) wins.

The onset of the Palestinian civil war is a whole lot more complected than to blame it on Hamas. Remember that the Irish also had a civil war after the 1921 treaty, and today both the North and the Republic are thriving democracies. The reality is that it is a whole lot easier to hold power in the modern world via elections (unless you are occupied, or otherwise exploited by a colonial power), and you have no reasons to believe that Hamas or Fatah or any governing body in a future free Palestine wouldn’t see that.

358. runarberg ◴[] No.39159605{9}[source]
Sorry, but describing an entire region of the Earth as “emerging from its ‘dark ages’” comes a cross as a bit racist.

The ‘Dark Ages’ is a rejected term in historiography and kind of only serves to demonstrate the author’s disrespect for the time period which they are describing. Describing a current regions as being in the ‘dark ages’ does the same to my ears. The fact that you talk this way about the Middle East shows me that you may not respect this region and the people that live there.

> The US tried to bring democracy to Iraq

The US (and allies) invaded and occupied Iraq. That is (a) not a way to bring democracy, and (b) a proven way of hampering many economical and governmental prospects. It ended up exactly as expected—and vocally predicted by experts at the time—in a complete travesty.

Finally (and this is kind of an aside) turning the Middle East into the EU is a very colonial way of thinking. The Middle East deserves their own democracy. The EU holds a legacy, and owes much of its wealth, to colonialism. Some EU members even hold colonies to this day, others exploit cheaper labor markets (including in the Middle East) in what has been described as Neo-colonialism (a misnomer IMO as it cheapens the horrors of the actual colonial period). I certainly hope the Middle East won’t copy this from the EU and start prospering off of exploiting a different region of for its resources.

359. ignoramous ◴[] No.39159800{11}[source]
> The entire article is about how nobody buys Abbas...

You read it?

Egypt & Jordan:

  The heads of the Egyptian and Jordanian intelligence services, Abbas Kamel and Ahmad Hosni, visited the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority to meet with Abbas in mid-January. The two officials hoped to dissuade Abbas from proceeding to elections...
Israel:

  Meanwhile, Israel strongly opposes any potential Hamas victory in Palestinian elections. In March, the Israeli government dispatched Nadav Argaman, head of the Shin Bet security service, to meet Abbas in his headquarters in Ramallah. Seeing data predicting a huge victory for Hamas and resounding loss for Fatah, Israel made a final effort to persuade Abbas to backtrack on the election move.
> the other link is similarly not relevant

  For almost a year, Jenin refugee camp has been at the centre of Israel's escalating military crackdown... its residents continue to be subjected to relentless military raids which amount to collective punishment.  

  Israel continues to enjoy total impunity for the system of apartheid it imposes on Palestinians – a system which is partly maintained through violations like unlawful killings.
replies(1): >>39159900 #
360. anon84873628 ◴[] No.39159819{3}[source]
Only for Israel to bomb it all away after one setback? What a waste. The Oct 7 attacks were horrible but the response was not proportionate or productive.

Over 47% of Palestinians are under the age of 18, meaning they have grown up only knowing the post-2005 situation. Which can rightly be described as an open air prison with no hope of the opportunities all humans deserve.

Israel - and the rest of the complicit world - allowed a generation of prisoners to be born under Hamas and is now massacring them like fish in a barrel. You can call that a naive view too, but I doubt history will look kindly on all the justifications.

361. yyyk ◴[] No.39159900{12}[source]
Also this:

Abbas declared he would postpone elections on the basis of Israel’s refusal to allow them to be held in East Jerusalem. Palestinians overwhelmingly denounced Abbas’ decision. Voters argue other options for timely elections — without a full postponement — exist, and the postponement is merely an excuse to extend Abbas’ hold on power.

Furthermore, Israel declared that it never notified the Palestinian Authority of its refusal to hold elections in Jerusalem. The European Union, the mediator for this election dispute, also rejected Abbas’ postponement rationale on the same basis. On the procedural level, representatives of the Palestinian Central Elections Committee were reportedly aware of alternative election sites in East Jerusalem. The options are said to have included polling stations in United Nations facilities or European embassies in Jerusalem or facilitating electronic voting for Jerusalemite voters. But despite the array of options to encourage timely elections, the Palestinian Authority — under Abbas’ leadership — rejected all offers.

As we can see, this has nothing to do with E.Jerusalem voting, and a lot with Abbas - and everyone else - not wanting Hamas to win.

replies(1): >>39167495 #
362. SirSavary ◴[] No.39160019{7}[source]
Even if that's what the parent comment was implying it still wouldn't be correct; much more than 5% of ISIS' fighters were "crazies" from "Indonesia, Chechnya, etc".
363. noqc ◴[] No.39160228{4}[source]
I'm not convinced by the examples that you have listed (a conspicuously empty list at that), and examples are only evidence by analogy anyway. The reactivity of hydrogen is not proof of the reactivity of helium.
replies(1): >>39161106 #
364. albedoa ◴[] No.39160696{6}[source]
> Replying here in a flagged subthread

This is like the arsonist talking about "a burning house". Whose flagged sub-thread is it? Why is it flagged?

> whether I can substantiate use of the combined pharse "genocidal colonizer" (which of course I can't).

Hold on. That is quite the lift and shift. You asserted the existence of "many" non-genocidal non-colonizers who are being repeatedly called genocidal colonizers by left-leaning Americans. When pressed to name one (1) of those many, you said that you "of course" can't substantiate the use of that phrase. (Whether that prevents you from naming one is debatable.)

Now you are asserting the existence of "a large population of people". How should we expect you to respond if I challenge you to name one (1) of that large population? I don't love chasing goalposts.

replies(1): >>39161022 #
365. ajross ◴[] No.39161022{7}[source]
Please stop. I really don't know what you're arguing about or why. It feels like you want to argue with me as a proxy for the violence you can't affect?

Really I think I substantiated the issue pretty well. If you feel really strongly that there are not any accusations of genocide or colonization being made against jews in current discourse, maybe go correct the wikipedia articles I linked?

replies(1): >>39161354 #
366. vcryan ◴[] No.39161072{5}[source]
People use the word "war" to describe this, but it is a stretch in this case. The outcome is predetermined. Israel will kill as many people as it chooses and destroy as much infrastructure as it chooses. They will stop when they decide to stop. There is no threat that in this "war," Israel will lose. People in Israel right now are living their best lives (for the most part) while Palestinians are digging their kids out of the rubble and eating dog food to stay alive.
367. locallost ◴[] No.39161106{5}[source]
The list is empty if you haven't read what I originally posted and linked. Obviously you haven't. Politics is neither chemistry nor physics, it is what is referred to as the art of the impossible. Many nasty situations in the past seemed impossible to solve diplomatically, but it was made possible. No matter how bleak it might have looked. Again, refer to the link I posted that kicked off this discussion.
replies(1): >>39161788 #
368. gafferongames ◴[] No.39161151{8}[source]
Hamas are people who kidnap babies and hold them hostage. Something to consider.
replies(1): >>39161756 #
369. albedoa ◴[] No.39161354{8}[source]
> Really I think I substantiated the issue pretty well.

It is not our problem that you think that.

> If you feel really strongly that there are not any accusations of genocide or colonization being made against jews

That is, of course, not even in sight of your original assertion. But you know that.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Bo6g6RsCEAAECKg?format=jpg

replies(1): >>39161962 #
370. loeg ◴[] No.39161735{8}[source]
Hamas is more popular in Gaza than the Republican party is in the US. It is not true to say that they are "pretty unpopular."
371. ◴[] No.39161756{9}[source]
372. noqc ◴[] No.39161788{6}[source]
I assure you that I read the tweet, and the list remains utterly null.

In a broader sense, I don't fault you for looking at war and thinking, or rather hoping, that in a just world, this wouldn't be the solution to any problem.

It is unsettled whether or not humanity can create such a just world, but we certainly haven't done it yet. Requiring the unconditional surrender of Hamas through force is very much a reasonable and acceptable way forward.

replies(1): >>39163077 #
373. ajross ◴[] No.39161962{9}[source]
You really, truly don't see how people might be alienated by the kind of rhetoric, though? I mean, just look at your own tone in this subthread. Does that sound to you like a way to move me to your side of the argument? Ultimately that's really my point: people want to be angry. You want to be angry. But in this situation that just perpetuates the damage! Both sides are deserving of anger!

The best we can do is cool things down enough so people stop dying. And... you're making things worse, not better.

374. reissbaker ◴[] No.39162000{10}[source]
I don't think you can excuse anti-Semitism in the last 200 years because 1000 years ago there was less anti-Semitism, or conclude that because 1000 years ago was less anti-Semitic that "racism is not the most useful lens to view this relationship through;" after all, European anti-Black racism was much better 1000 years ago, too (a Black military commander was not even particularly unusual in the 1600s, as evidenced by Shakespeare!), and your Louisiana example is from the same time period that the Muslim world's anti-Semitism was running rampant, too. Your theory of economic decline being the reason for anti-Semitism doesn't hold water for the examples I gave of the Ottoman Empire, whose precipitous decline came in the 20th century, yet whose anti-Semitism arose in the 19th century. [1] Scholars don't blame the Ottoman anti-Semitism on economic malaise, but instead point to it being imported by Christian Arabs from Europe:

Historian Martin Gilbert writes that it was in the 19th century that the position of Jews worsened in Muslim countries.[38] According to Mark Cohen in The Oxford Handbook of Jewish Studies, most scholars conclude that Arab anti-Semitism in the modern world arose in the nineteenth century, against the backdrop of conflicting Jewish and Arab nationalism, and was imported into the Arab world primarily by nationalistically minded Christian Arabs (and only subsequently was it "Islamized").

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_the_Ott...

replies(1): >>39162554 #
375. reissbaker ◴[] No.39162106{12}[source]
A massacre in the final year of the 11th century (1099) does not I think explain a continuous decline for hundreds of years.
376. reissbaker ◴[] No.39162196{6}[source]
That's not what the article says at all. It says 45% of the foreign fighters hailed from Africa and the Middle East. The foreign fighters numbered ~42k total. It's unknown how many total fighters ISIS had, but estimates range into 200k total, which would imply that the vast majority of ISIS was native; more conservative estimates are that half of the fighters were "foreign fighters," which would mean that ~75% of the fighters were MENA-native (since the foreign fighters were about half MENA-native). [1] The strongest claim you could make regarding European contributions is that ISIS was around 16% European, including fighters from Chechnya. (The weakest country-of-origin claim is it was about 7% European including Chechnya, although given that Chechen ISIS fighters nearly outnumbered all other European ISIS fighters combined — and that Chechnya is a majority-Sunni-Muslim semi-autonomous region of Russia, and ISIS was attempting to form a Sunni Muslim caliphate — I think the least-European claim might point out that trying to bundle that into a pan-European identity group is probably mistaken, and the most-accurate depiction is "ISIS was a bunch of radicalized Sunni Muslims, mostly from the Middle East and North Africa.")

TL;DR: ISIS was not "a bunch of European guys who got radicalized." It was mostly people from the Middle East and North Africa: somewhere between 75-93%. 95% MENA is probably not correct either, but it's much closer to correct than your original claim.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State

377. runarberg ◴[] No.39162251{7}[source]
You can’t really describe the events like this and leave out the massacres and the number of refugees storming into neighboring countries as a result. This kind of narrative would have Britain start World War 2 as we can easily omit all the Nazi atrocities and powergrabs in Czechia and Poland, just like we can omit the atrocities and land grabs committed by Zionists prior to the Arab invasion.
378. faizmokh ◴[] No.39162277{3}[source]
and the IDF is not? There's a lot of videos showing the IDF dancing holding up Torah scroll in destroyed hospitals or buildings.
379. endominus ◴[] No.39162554{11}[source]
You realize that the evidence you bring up actually proves the argument I've been making, don't you?

>Scholars don't blame the Ottoman anti-Semitism on economic malaise, but instead point to it being imported by Christian Arabs from Europe

So this was not a latent feature of Islam or Muslim culture, but an import from a more anti-Semitic culture (of course, the word Semitic here is not quite correct, given that Arabs are also Semites - I don't know why that word is preferred when the actual meaning being conveyed is anti-Jewish). The original poster I was responding to said this;

>the issue of anti-Semitism long pre-dates the establishment of Israel

Perhaps that poster only meant that anti-Jewish sentiment rose in the region a few decades previous, but the most common way I have heard of that belief, it comes from a "clash of civilizations" mindset that holds that the region has been rabidly anti-Jewish for many centuries.

Also, to your point that the Ottoman Empire only began declining in the 20th century, see https://www.britannica.com/topic/decline-of-the-Ottoman-Empi...: "But the grandeur of the Ottoman Empire did not last, and Süleyman’s rule was followed by a slow and arduous decline that spanned nearly four centuries."

replies(1): >>39163154 #
380. locallost ◴[] No.39163077{7}[source]
"And that's the cunning of history; when you're at the bottom, something can happen that gives hope. After the 1973 war, who would have thought that before the end of the decade, Egypt would sign a peace treaty with Israel?"

so at least the list is obviously > 0. That's a good starting point for you to reconsider where else you've made a mistake.

replies(1): >>39167574 #
381. reissbaker ◴[] No.39163154{12}[source]
Anti-Semitic refers specifically to anti-Jewish racism [1], "Arabs are also Semites so..." isn't an accurate understanding. English isn't Latin, combining roots can form a word with new meaning.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say things about "latent feature of Islam or Muslim culture." I do not think cultures are predetermined by hidden latent variables unique to them and are unrelated to their environments, and so that if something was introduced to the culture environmentally it somehow doesn't count. Similarly, European culture was once much less anti-Black a thousand years ago, and so anti-Black racism isn't a "latent feature" by the same standard. Nonetheless we can look at how cultures are

1. today, and

2. in the recent past

And see that anti-Black racism is now endemic. Similarly, anti-Semitism has been common for hundreds of years in Muslim societies, and blaming it on Israeli statehood is a non-sequitur since it has existed for less than a hundred.

If you insist on searching for hidden variables that are independent, I will point out that the Quran says that Jews are majority treacherous and "you will always find deceit on their part, except for a few" [2]. But of course, much of the Quran is simply a reference to the Christian Bible (e.g. references to the Jews killing Jesus [3], who Islam considers a prophet), so is it truly "latent" or is it an import from Christianity? Ultimately cultures are not machine learning models trained independently from each other on separate hardware; everyone steals from everyone else, so I think the distinction isn't meaningful. There has been significant anti-Semitism in the Muslim world for a long time, and it was endemic long before Israel existed. I reject victim-blaming the Jews for Muslim anti-Semitism due to the Jews creating Israel.

1: https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/oi/authority...

2: https://quran.com/en/al-maidah/13

3: https://quran.com/en/al-baqarah/61

replies(1): >>39167724 #
382. skissane ◴[] No.39163658{8}[source]
If Hamas held new elections, they'd likely win easily, because they are so popular with Palestinians in Gaza. From the perspective of the average Gazan, Hamas massacres the hated Israeli oppressor, Fatah collaborates with them. Even Gazans who dislike certain aspects of Hamas rule - the corruption and the ultra-rigid interpretations of Islam – mostly still approve of the October 7 atrocity [0]. I suppose, if Israeli soldiers had killed my father or mother or sister or brother or son or daughter – whatever the rights or wrongs of that military action in the abstract – I might also find it hard to resist that temptation.

The PA refuses to hold new elections in the West Bank, because they know if they do, Hamas will very likely win. The US makes some noises every now and again about demanding the PA to hold new elections, but it is questionable if they really mean it, because they also know what the outcome of any fair election is likely to be, and it is not an outcome they would welcome.

[0] https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/poll-shows-palesti...

replies(1): >>39169161 #
383. shakow ◴[] No.39163740{7}[source]
> Box is not checked yet, otherwise IDF wouldn't have any resistance.

That's a misqualification; Germany offered resistance up to the last day, Berlin didn't fall without a fight.

384. dragonwriter ◴[] No.39164248{7}[source]
> The PLO was willing to negotiate and Hamas is not.

The last negotiations between thr PA and Israel were broken off by Israel because the the PA and Hamas both agreed that Hamas should be involved.

And then Israel specifically targeted and assassinated Hamas leaders that were leading the internal support for negotiations.

> Which is why Israel and Gaza have gone to war many times, but Israel and Ramallah have not

This is false; Israel is waging a significant campaign in the West Bank now as well as Gaza, and has essentially every time they have engaged in active combat in Gaza.

It’s not “against Ramallah" in the same way as it is “against Gaza” because Gaza is essentially a single administrative zone where, when Israel is “withdrawn”, is continguous and able to be centrally administered. The West Bank has parts administered dirextly by Israel, while the parts nominally administered by the PA are divided into 79 tiny noncontiguous areas separated by Israeli-administered areas. The PA innthe West Bank is sructurally impotent, but that doesn't stop Israel from going to war against the Palestinians there as well as in Gaza.

385. tim333 ◴[] No.39164449{6}[source]
Yeah but ignoring history a bit if A and B say ok lets sign an agreement, do our own thing and not attack each other you get a kind of peace. If B says no A must be destroyed then you don't. It's not really a moral question of who's right and wrong so much as a practical agreement to move on.
replies(1): >>39165305 #
386. SomeoneFromCA ◴[] No.39164647{12}[source]
Israel is already genocidal. I am not in fact aiming at dismantling israel. What I am saying this will happen anyway, if West won't change its approach.
replies(1): >>39165482 #
387. ethanbond ◴[] No.39165305{7}[source]
The recent Camp David Summit didn’t come to any agreement? And the Camp David Accords before then weren’t signed by the principals in this conflict.
388. weatherlite ◴[] No.39165482{13}[source]
Is Hamas genocidal in your eyes? Genuinely curious.
replies(1): >>39171049 #
389. rayiner ◴[] No.39165742{6}[source]
> I think it’s unhelpful to treat people as though they are mere continuations of their predecessors.

Those groups exist, and see themselves as continuations of their predecessors. When October 7 happened, my cousin posted a picture of the Dome of the Rock with the caption that it was the first step in retaking Jerusalem. An aunt posted about the Ummah. They aren’t even Arabs—just wannabes. Zooming out, Arabs who are happy to bomb the shit out of fellow Arabs (like Saudi does to Yemen) lend political and monetary support to the idea of an undivided Palestine (from the river to the sea—without Israel), and to Hamas, because they cling to a notion of territorial integrity of the lands considered by their ancestors in the 700s. In 1947, the Arab League and leaders of the Arab states opposed the UN partition plan and went to war with Israel precisely because of that idea.

You can’t hope to understand what’s actually happening in the Middle East by viewing people as individuals. The grievance of the people of Gaza, as a group, isn’t just that their life sucks materially, which is something you could fix. That may be the case for some individuals, but that’s not the case for the group and what the group does collectively. The group’s grievance is that Israel exists on what should be Arab land from the river to the sea.

390. dragonwriter ◴[] No.39167270{7}[source]
> The PLO was willing to negotiate and Hamas is not.

The last negotiations between thr PA and Israel were broken off by Israel because the the PA and Hamas both agreed that Hamas should be involved.

And then Israel specifically targeted and assassinated Hamas leaders that were leading the internal support for negotiations.

> Which is why Israel and Gaza have gone to war many times, but Israel and Ramallah have not

This is false; Israel is waging a significant campaign in the West Bank now as well as Gaza, and has essentially every time they have engaged in active combat in Gaza.

It’s not “against Ramallah" in the same way as it is “against Gaza” because Gaza is essentially a single administrative zone where, when Israel is “withdrawn”, is continguous and able to be centrally administered, and can effectively be controlled by someone during that time. The West Bank has parts administered directly by Israel, while the parts nominally administered by the PA are divided into 79 tiny noncontiguous areas separated by Israeli-administered areas. The PA innthe West Bank is sructurally impotent, but that doesn't stop Israel from going to war against the Palestinians there as well as in Gaza.

replies(1): >>39169538 #
391. ◴[] No.39167495{13}[source]
392. noqc ◴[] No.39167574{8}[source]
Alliances are not the same as peace. Egypt's tepid alliance with Israel has also served to anger the rest of the islamic world, and Gaza in particular is much more isolated as a result. This is one of those apples to oranges comparisons that you assured me weren't relevant.
393. endominus ◴[] No.39167724{13}[source]
And this is exactly why the point about Semites comes into play; Arabs and (Middle-Eastern) Jews are functionally the same race. A Jewish person who converted to Islam would no longer be dhimmi, and would no longer pay the jizya or any other tax levied against non-Muslim populations. None of the discrimination noted would legally apply to him or her. It is not a status built on the race of the individual, but on their religion. Hence, it is literally not racist in the most basic way imaginable - it is not based on race! It's like calling ancient Spartan oppression of helots racism, or the British discrimination against the Irish sexism, or South African apartheid transphobia; it betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of what those words mean. This is why I said that racism is not the most useful lens to view the relationship between the groups through. They are the same race, with differing religions.
replies(1): >>39169306 #
394. tptacek ◴[] No.39169161{9}[source]
I'm not so sold on conviction through precognition.
replies(1): >>39169591 #
395. reissbaker ◴[] No.39169306{14}[source]
I mean, racism is a fairly fuzzy term and not based on hard science; plenty of people refer to the condition of Palestinians in Israel as "racism" (or in fact do use the word "apartheid"), but to invert what you're saying here — they can just convert to Judaism [1], so should the term apply? Anyway, regardless of whether we want to call it racism, Muslim societies were definitely anti-Semitic.

1: E.g. this man who actually did convert, immigrated to Israel, and then was jailed and beaten by the PA when he tried to visit his family in the West Bank https://www.timesofisrael.com/palestinian-convert-to-judaism...

396. reissbaker ◴[] No.39169538{8}[source]
Israel is waging a significant campaign in the West Bank now as well as Gaza

Israel is not launching airstrikes or displacing millions or doing anything remotely similar in the West Bank. There is targeted fighting as there often is with tens of Hamas-aligned militants dead. Every time there has been a major war in Gaza for like the past 20 years there has been nothing similar happening in the West Bank, and that's because Hamas does not control the West Bank and Israel is fighting Hamas. Ramallah does not look like Mosul right now and it hasn't in any of these repeated conflicts with Hamas, and Gaza has and does.

The last negotiations between the PA and Israel were broken off by Israel because the the PA and Hamas both agreed that Hamas should be involved.

No, Hamas never agreed to be part of peace negotiations. Israel broke off talks when Fatah and Hamas talked about merging governments in 2014 — not Hamas agreeing to be part of peace talks, which they never have — while the Hamas charter still included explicit calls for genocide of the Jews. Hamas has never stated that they are willing to make a permanent peace deal with Israel, and if they had, I would love to see one of you provide a source from Hamas saying that they are willing to make a permanent peace deal: I've been very willing to provide sources for Hamas official's frequent calls for the total destruction of Israel, e.g. https://www.timesofisrael.com/hamas-official-says-group-aims...

397. skissane ◴[] No.39169591{10}[source]
I never said anything about “convicting” anyone, I was simply describing the reality on the ground (insofar as I understand it)
398. RoyalHenOil ◴[] No.39169646{11}[source]
Yes, it is an extremely low bar.

But from the perspective of someone living in the West Bank, Hamas is the least horrible of the options. It is the only organization that looks like it might eventually push back Israeli settlements and give West Bank Palestinians back their homes.

If we want don't want people on the West Bank to support Hamas, give them a better alternative. The PA is utterly failing to resist the encroaching settlements. Of course they're going to turn to Hamas!

If there was a third option that wasn't a corrupt terrorist organization, but had the teeth to remove Israeli settlements from the West Bank, you would see support for Hamas fall.

399. peterashford ◴[] No.39170061{3}[source]
Apartheid started in 1948. It was around for quite a long time. And the roots of the division in Northern Ireland went back centuries. But yes, long running divisions are harder to solve. Harder != impossible. And look at history - stuff changes.
400. peterashford ◴[] No.39170071{4}[source]
I think that's the head of the nail firmly hit. Succinct summary :o)
401. peterashford ◴[] No.39170078{3}[source]
That is an unhelpful and incorrect view
402. wahnfrieden ◴[] No.39171049{14}[source]
Only one side is credibly an existential threat to the other
replies(1): >>39172974 #
403. rsoto2 ◴[] No.39172918{7}[source]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8V96T8rIkFc
404. weatherlite ◴[] No.39172974{15}[source]
Was Hamas genocidal on October 7th?
replies(1): >>39178401 #
405. runarberg ◴[] No.39173374{8}[source]
If Christopher Columbus can be Italian, then Jesus Christ can be considered a Palestinian.
406. nerpderp82 ◴[] No.39178401{16}[source]
The first casualty of war is the truth. Many of the atrocious events by Hamas are not as clear cut as originally reported. It looks like the primary goal of Hamas was to capture hostages for a large scale prisoner exchange. The IDF over reacted and to suppress the capture of hostages, killing both Hamas fighters and Israeli citizens. I am describing the situation, not absolving anything or anyone.

Look for the analysis by Scott Ritter on Youtube.

https://www.google.com/search?q=hannibal+protocol+haaretz

I do not think outright murder of civilians was the goal of the October 7th attack.

replies(1): >>39178634 #
407. wahnfrieden ◴[] No.39178634{17}[source]
Btw I wouldn’t share Ritter as a source even if you agree with the analysis - he’s compromised financially and ethically
replies(1): >>39207238 #
408. pphysch ◴[] No.39179377{7}[source]
> I think your last statement really tells it all. "makes it dangerous to be Jewish" tells us that the problem really is antisemitism. Israels' critics are the ones "conflating" things

The cynical conflation of Judaism/Jewish ethnicity with Israeli Zionism is absolutely driven by the Zionist regime and their hasbara appendages like ADL. Do you know what the "ADL definition of antisemitism" is and why that is significant? It explicitly equates "criticism of Israel/Zionism" with antisemitism. They have literally legalized this conflation in many respects.

It is totally disingenuous to imply that antisemites are the ones driving this confusion. They certainly benefit from it, but so does the Zionist regime, both at the expense of Jewish people of all backgrounds.

replies(1): >>39184100 #
409. tptacek ◴[] No.39184100{8}[source]
You can read HN threads about this issue and see the kernel of truth on both sides of the argument of whether antisemitism is "weaponized" by supporters of Israel, but you do your side of the argument no favors throwing around phrases like "their hasbara appendages like ADL". I'm well aware of the criticisms leveled against the ADL, and they may well be valid, but you're obliged to introduce them more seriously and carefully if you don't want to come across sounding like you believe any Jewish advocacy group is definitionally politically Zionist and thus ineligible to charge antisemitism.
410. Scea91 ◴[] No.39187789{6}[source]
> Soviets also failed to invest in the lands they occupied

Soviets occupied lands more developed than them. They did not fail to invest, they looted the lands, for example the Uranium from Czechoslovakia [1].

[1] https://www.cairn.info/revue-annales-historiques-de-l-electr...

411. nerpderp82 ◴[] No.39207238{18}[source]
Even if your claims are true, he has valuable insights and connects things in ways that others do not. The phrase "wouldn't share" is an interesting way to suppress a viewpoint.

I still watch mainstream news even though it is compromised financially, ethically and politically.