I for one will be holding my representatives responsible who continue to vote for the US to enable a genocide. The videos coming out of Gaza have turned me and many others into single issue voters.
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Unfortunately, that isn't likely to happen. Netanyahu has, to date, handled Trump deftly and Rubio's current presence in Israel seems to be aimed at offering support to the ground offensive, not opposition. I honestly have no idea what kind of backlash it would take to shake U.S. support for this genocide.
It is worth noting that Andrew Cuomo, in a desperate last-minute gamble to boost support in the NYC mayoral race, has come out against Israel. Considering that much of the attacks on Mamdani have focused on his support for Palestine (construing him as antisemitic), it's notable that other candidates also seem to think that being anti-Israel is actually the vote winner for moderates right now.
I understand that that's the current shorthand, but it seems inaccurate and unnecessarily polarizing to me.
For better or worse, Netanyahu represents the Israeli governement, which represents Israel. Similar with Trump and the USA, or Putin and Russia. Sorry for the people who don't agree with them, but that's an internal power struggle, and as an outsider it is normal to abstract that away. For all of us: Your country is doing what it does.
As a Belgian, I spit on my idiotic, nasty governements. Insert tiny violin, whatever Belgium does on the international forum, I'll still be tarred with it. Similarly, we talk about Germany's role in world war 2, even if only about 10% of them were associated with the NSDAP.
Every power struggle is always represented overly simplistic. Sorry for both the jews and Israëli's who don't agree with it, you're probably good people. This time I am lucky to sit at a very comfortable sideline, criticising your country. But the point stands: Israel is correctly described as officially committing a genocide, and hence it can't be described as the good side.
It is incredulous to you and I because our culture would never support such a thing. I implore you to look at the Arabic channels that Hamas and the other Islamic bodies publish.
It should be also noted, and this is extremely well documented, that between 1/3 and 1/5 of all Hamas rockets fall back into the Gaza strip. That is an extraordinarily dense urban area, and all those injuries are blamed on Israel. Culturally, it makes sense for Arab media to report them as "killed in a war with Israel". But Western media then translates and reports that as "killed by Israel".
This is not some conspiracy theory the Arabs status very clearly. I highly suggest that you go through the Arabic Telegram channels. I personally speak Arabic, but if you don't then Telegram has a built-in translation feature anyway. Or go through any other Arab media, it's all over the place.
If you don't want to see children getting hurt, then stop protecting and encouraging Hamas.
It means that Hamas has children stand guard around rocket launchers. As far back as a decade ago, when this started becoming more and more common, I saved a video of a Hamas rocket fuse failing, killing the children guarding it. That was quite when I started taking more of an interest in what is going on over there.
The human shields are Gazan citizens - many of which are themselves happy to die "for the resistance" thanks to UNRWA education. This I have been told at least twice by Gazans face to face, and dozens of times online. Yes, I know Gazans and I speak with them online in Arabic. I suffer a lot of abuse, I have a thick skin (I laugh that I'm divorced, you can't insult me more than my ex).
There is no euphemism. These are real people risking their lives - and sometimes loosing - to protect military equipment designed to exterminate Jews. That is not a euphemism either - even the Gazans who work in Israel clearly state that all Gazans would happily kill any Jew. Just a few weeks before the October attacks I was having a conversation, pleasant and civil, and the guy tells me "without your weapons the Arabs would trample you" - I was unsure if he was threatening me. Just a few weeks after that they overran the Kibbutz where I until recently worked, and killed over 10% of the population. That is literal, biblical, decimation.