I need a place where I can talk rationally about Israel.

[Mr. Plumbean]

I redact the part where I said that it was just a white thing?

[Mr. Plumbean]

Originally Posted by What Exit?

I disagree with several aspects of your post.
1st, you make it sound like most of the money for the IRA came from New York City when it was very big in Boston and many other cities.
2nd, the real peace was happening during the Clinton years. It did not take 9/11 to finally bring peace there that happened maybe to finish the peace but it was not what brought the peace.

It was a passing throwaway comment not a comprehensive analysis. I'll try harder next time. There is definitely some truth to the fact that 9/11 robbed the IRA of its romance and glory, and helped seal the deal, as well as depleting any enthusiasm in America to fund the IRA, regardless of whether Mick O'Freedomfighter is in New York or Boston (which seems a trivial point to bicker about).

[Sunny Daze]

Originally Posted by Clothahump

Apparently, Hamas threw a riot. Israel responded and some Hamas terrorists died. And Israel is to blame for this?

If the Palestinians wanted peace, there would be peace. If the Israelis wanted war, there would be no more Palestinians.

If anyone wants to discuss things with Clothy, I've set up a lovely new thread just for him.

[SmartAleq]

Yes, perhaps in that thread he can explain to us how the eight MONTH old little girl who was killed by tear gas managed to be such a precocious terrorist that she deserved death. Her name was Laila, and eight other children died in that massacre as well.

[NAF1138]

Originally Posted by SmartAleq

Yes, perhaps in that thread he can explain to us how the eight MONTH old little girl who was killed by tear gas managed to be such a precocious terrorist that she deserved death. Her name was Laila, and eight other children died in that massacre as well.

That didn't actually happen. Gotta check your sources. She died of a preexisting heart condition according to her Palestinian doctor. Her death was unrelated to anything Israel did. Fake news is actually still a thing, despite the tactics of the Right.

I'm back in the office today so I'm going to try to process some stuff and post some thoughts.

In the mean time, I was reading this this morning. I like and trust Tablet as being a source that gets nuance.

[stormie]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

Looking back, how the hell DID the UK and Ireland come to peace terms? I can't figure it out other than people just seem to have collectively decided to stop being angry.

I don't disagree that Palestinians have a claim to the land, which is what does make this all so frustrating.

I think in a perfect world, the UN would step in, piss everyone off, and take Jerusalem away from all parties. It seems to me that is where the major sticking point is. No one gets Jerusalem, carve up two states with Jerusalem being a UN neutral zone or something, displace a few hundred thousand people. Everyone is pissed off but with a lot less to fight over.

That seems like a reasonable solution. The argument now is where to carve. If the Emperor of Everything could step in, create two regions with equally good farmland, grazing, ports, and historical occupancy, then pick up the residents with magnets and drop them in their area, it might work - the hate focus would go to the Emperor. By now, generations of people have lived with war and associated attitudes. That changes societies.

While the Palestinians (Philistines), Israelites and Canaanites have lived in the area since around 12,000 B.C., the Irish and English were historically separate. The Anglo-Saxons flat-out invaded in the reign of Henry II. The invaders were given higher status, more power, and land. The story could be presented as nasty invader vs underdog, which is easier to think about.

While Irish independence began the day after the Anglo-Saxons invaded, the Troubles were short and rapidly became unpopular. The Irish revolutionary armies became drug lords and enforcers. The area became an economic wasteland. Unemployment was appalling. The entire world could see that UK military presence was supporting violence. Thatcher's actions were seen as vicious (although Paisley was equally awful). The international community disapproved. The only thing left was for Thatcher and Paisley to save face. They did this by overtly agreeing on the principle that the people of the island of Ireland as a whole have the right to solve the issues between North and South by mutual consent and without outside interference. Everybody got to pretend that they won by the other side disarming.

It was about 100x simpler than the Israel-Palestine problem.

[The Mighty Quinn]

Originally Posted by SmartAleq

Maybe Jerusalem needs to be another Vatican City. My problem with all of this is that I don't care about nor do I find compelling religious tropism towards a course of action. It doesn't really make any sense to me that Israel MUST be RIGHT THERE and the Israelis appear to be wholly committed to wiping out every last Palestinian, root and branch, with a side order of dashing babies brains out against the stones. Very biblical, but horrifying in practice.

I mean, what justification is there for killing like at least sixty unarmed protesters and wounding 2000 more--1400 of those injuries are gunshot wounds. Who thinks that's okay? Who's the terrorist in this scenario? I don't have all the answers or even a small part of them but I'm pretty firmly okay in being against those in power using military level force against unarmed civilians who mostly just want to be left alone to go about their lives unmolested and unwounded. I look at Israel today and I see America tomorrow and I ain't with that.

This is hyperbole. The IDF's recent actions on the Gaza border were horrific and completely unacceptable, full stop. However, Israel is clearly not "committed to wiping out every last Palestinian". If that was what they wanted to do, given their overwhelming military superiority, they could easily do it.

And do you think it's OK when Palestinian terrorists murder Israeli children? Yes, innocent Palestinian victims vastly outnumber Israeli ones, but I think that's due to the aforementioned overwhelming military superiority, not to any difference in the intrinsic morality of the two sides.

[The Mighty Quinn]

Originally Posted by Swammerdami

I am strongly in favor of Israel's right to exist, but expanding West Bank settlements is wrong. The U.S. President should strongly encourage Israel to cooperate and, at a minimum, freeze expansion of the illegal settlements. I was disappointed when Obama failed to do so.

The broad outlines of an eventual peace settlement have been known for a long time and both sides need to work toward that. This means Israel needs to stop expanding its settlements in the eventual Palestine state, and it needs to start treating Palestinians humanely. Yes, one can understand Israeli reluctance to embrace the Palestinians when the Palestinians embrace anti-Israel terrorism. But there is no choice, if they want to promote a peace process. I don't know how to reduce Palestinian hatred of Israel, but Israel's policies often encourage more hatred.

I don't know what should happen to Jerusalem. Make it a special "International City"? But Trump's decision to deliberately antagonize the Palestinians with his embassy move was despicable.

I have no quarrel with the Jewish religion. But Israelis who insist on occupying Samaria because 3000+ years ago "God gave it them" are part of the problem.

I completely agree with this post. Israel's continued expansion of settlements demonstrates their lack of interest in a meaningful peace process. Israel needs to roll back the settlements, and the Palestinians need to renounce terrorism. And IMO it is morally unacceptable for either side to insist that the other needs to change first.

[Inner Stickler]

Originally Posted by The Mighty Quinn

Israel's continued expansion of settlements demonstrates their lack of interest in a meaningful peace process. Israel needs to roll back the settlements, and the Palestinians need to renounce terrorism. And IMO it is morally unacceptable for either side to insist that the other needs to change first.

This makes a lot of sense to me.

[The Mighty Quinn]

Some important historical notes:

Many people greatly overstate the importance of religion to the founding of Israel. It is true that TODAY, Jewish racism thinly disguised as religious fundamentalism is a mass movement in Israel, and plays a crucial role in justifying and sustaining the violence. But this gross distortion of Judaism is a development of the last fifty years.

The founding generation of Israelis were overwhelmingly secular socialists who didn't conceive or justify their actions at all in a religious context (not to deny that they were, for the most part, appallingly racist). They expected that once the Jews became a "normal" nation, religious observance would wither away, no longer being necessary to sustain Jewish identity.

It's true that they wanted to establish their homeland in Palestine, because the Jews had viewed that as their home for 2000 years and a yearning for Zion was a fundamental part of Jewish identity. And of course those attitudes were ultimately derived from religious texts. But having attitudes and beliefs which can be traced back to religious texts is not at all the same thing as actually believing those religious texts are authoritative and Divinely inspired, a belief which was held by only a small minority of Jewish Israelis in the early years of the State.

They wanted to have a State of their own, to protect them from the anti-Semitic oppression they had been suffering for centuries. Palestine seemed like a logical choice to put this State, and really, was there any place they could have gone where the local population wouldn't have objected to being displaced? If there had been a country in the world that was willing to accept unlimited numbers of Jewish immigrants and grant them full civil rights, there would probably be no Israel today.

Moreover, the great bulk of Israelis are descended from Jewish Holocaust survivors, who went there not because of Zionist ideology, religious or otherwise, but simply because they had nowhere else to go. Many anti-Israeli narratives imply that the Jewish founders of Israel simply chose to move to Israel and displace the Palestinians because of their evil religious Zionist beliefs, when other reasonable options were open to them. This is false.

Another common error is that found in the Johnstone article SmartAleq linked above, which implies that Israel was a creation of Western imperialism. This denies the historical agency of the Jewish people, reducing them to a puppet in the hands of Western oligarchs. In fact, Israel exists because the Jews won the civil war which erupted in the power vacuum caused by the withdrawal of the British Empire. No Western State gave any significant military aid to the Jews, and in fact the very first State to recognize Israel as a nation was the USSR.

[The Mighty Quinn]

Thanks for starting this thread, NAF. Your thoughtful and humane approach is always a breath of fresh air, and certainly there is a great need for a space where these issues can be discussed rationally.

[NAF1138]

Originally Posted by The Mighty Quinn

Thanks for starting this thread, NAF. Your thoughtful and humane approach is always a breath of fresh air, and certainly there is a great need for a space where these issues can be discussed rationally.

Thanks, I appreciate this.

I have a friend from high school who is Jewish and who's husband is Jewish and in tech so they lived in Israel for the past 5 years working for a start up. They moved back 6 months ago or so and we were talking (on Facebook, like you do) recently about the current goings on and she said that most of the pro Israel media in the US is wrong because in the US we are always afraid of anti semitism and not nearly as many Palestinians want to push Israel into the sea as Hamas would have you believe.

Also, the current government is behaving monstrously,, but also being somewhat overblown by the pro Palestinians and is absolutely being used as a wedge by the anti Zionists (who are not always the same).

It's a mess.

Then I read stuff like this (written in 2013) and I don't know what to do. Because it's clear that the current Israeli government is making things worse and does not give any kind of shit. But it feels like going against Israel puts me in a very real position of supporting people who would gladly see me and my family dead. That sounds like an exaggeration, but it doesn't feel like one. In situations like this what feels real often outweighs actual facts.

Dunno. Still grappling.

[What Exit?]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

Thanks, I appreciate this.

I have a friend from high school who is Jewish and who's husband is Jewish and in tech so they lived in Israel for the past 5 years working for a start up. They moved back 6 months ago or so and we were talking (on Facebook, like you do) recently about the current goings on and she said that most of the pro Israel media in the US is wrong because in the US we are always afraid of anti semitism and not nearly as many Palestinians want to push Israel into the sea as Hamas would have you believe.

Also, the current government is behaving monstrously,, but also being somewhat overblown by the pro Palestinians and is absolutely being used as a wedge by the anti Zionists (who are not always the same).

It's a mess.

Then I read stuff like this (written in 2013) and I don't know what to do. Because it's clear that the current Israeli government is making things worse and does not give any kind of shit. But it feels like going against Israel puts me in a very real position of supporting people who would gladly see me and my family dead. That sounds like an exaggeration, but it doesn't feel like one. In situations like this what feels real often outweighs actual facts.

Dunno. Still grappling.

It is very tough. I support Israel but cannot support the current government, but hey, I can say the same thing about the US currently.



I am basically against any theocracy and Israel is beginning to look like one. The non-Ultra Orthodox really need to re-assert control of Israel.

[NAF1138]

Originally Posted by What Exit?

It is very tough. I support Israel but cannot support the current government, but hey, I can say the same thing about the US currently.



I am basically against any theocracy and Israel is beginning to look like one. The non-Ultra Orthodox really need to re-assert control of Israel.

Well that's the thing isn't it? And this has been a problem for at least a millenia. Judaism is a religion practiced by the Jewish people, but the Jewish people are an ethnic group (much like the Palestinians are) also. But, the religion is so deeply entwined with the ethnicity it gets complicated in a modern world.

And, while the Palestinians are mistreated by Israel, I do always wonder why it is the Israeli treatment of Palestinians that draws all the attention and not the Jordanian, Lebanese, or Syrian treatment of the same people. Yes, currently that is the largest conflict, but the Palestinians have been waging these same wars against those nations for even longer and no one is calling for BDS of Jordan.

I don't know. It's all a mess.

[Pencil]

This is conspiracy theory territory so take it for what it's worth

I read an op-ed a couple of years ago, around the previous flare-up/war.
The Cliff's notes version went like this:

The current Israeli government really, really doesn't want to honor the Oslo accord (agreement, treaty?) from '92(?) which means returning to the borders as they were in 1967. That would mean emptying the West Bank of all settlements, and that would be instant political suicide.
So periodically, Israeli soldiers are told to go close to the border and basically going neener-neener, you can't touch me. Some young Palestine hotheads start throwing rocks and the whole mess starts again. Bibi can then throw his hands up in the air and say: See, there's no way to reason with these people.

[/]

It's certainly not the case, but it made me wonder what would happen, should the security council try to enforce the Oslo thingy.

[Solfy]

I read a very good opinion piece in today's paper that was written by a Rabbi. His central thesis was that it is possible to be critical of Israel without being an anti Semite. He outlined five indications that a given critique is probably anti-Semitic, because it's not always easy to tell the difference between an objection to the actions of the people and an objection to the people themselves, and both types of objections are out there.

[stormie]

That seems sort of 'of course', but I guess not.

[Solfy]

Yes and no. As I think this thread touches on, it can be hard to criticize Israel without being branded a hater. It can also be hard to support the existence of Israel without having people assume you're condoning all of their actions. He attempted to illustrate common red flags to make it easier to see when people really are being extreme and when they're lodging more balanced criticism. He also framed it using illustrative attitudes common from the left and right in the US.

[NAF1138]

Originally Posted by Solfy

I read a very good opinion piece in today's paper that was written by a Rabbi. His central thesis was that it is possible to be critical of Israel without being an anti Semite. He outlined five indications that a given critique is probably anti-Semitic, because it's not always easy to tell the difference between an objection to the actions of the people and an objection to the people themselves, and both types of objections are out there.

I'd be interested in reading that. Is there a link to it online somewhere?

[Glazer]

If Israel is going to survive it is going to have to take the high road. But it's awfully hard to take the high road when every time you try you get attacked. They need to take a lesson from Teddy Roosevelt. Talk softly and carry a big stick. They already have the big stick. It's the talking softly that they need to work on.

[stormie]

Originally Posted by Solfy

. . . it can be hard to criticize Israel without being branded a hater. It can also be hard to support the existence of Israel without having people assume you're condoning all of their actions. He attempted to illustrate common red flags to make it easier to see when people really are being extreme and when they're lodging more balanced criticism. He also framed it using illustrative attitudes common from the left and right in the US.

Yes! I have been thinking about this very concept in conflict issues ranging from the pedestrian (as in, pedestrian-vs-bicyclist) to the barely imaginable.

[Solfy]

Here's a link. I was posting mobile yesterday which made it hard to link. Note that the Pgh paper has gone partial paywall, but you should have enough free articles to be able to read this one.

Incidentally I erred yesterday - I assumed the author was male. I blame my Catholic bias that all religious leaders are assumed male until proven otherwise.

[NAF1138]

Breaking news: things are about to get worse

A rocket attack by Palestinians last night was mostly contained by Israeli missile defense shields, though a school, which was one of the targets, was destroyed. Fortunately it was empty because it was a night attack.

Bibi has, predictably, responded in a way that will make this all Israel's fault in a couple of days.

How is Hamas winning the war or hearts and minds? It's Hamas?!

Haaretz article with live updates


Edit: more on the story

Note, my posted sources are from Haaretz which is generally sympathetic to Palestinians.

[Tamerlane]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

How is Hamas winning the war or hearts and minds? It's Hamas?!

Rhetorical question?

Hamas, unlike quasi-ally/quasi-rival Palestinian Islamic Jihad, is a bottom up-organizing group. It's a bit like the difference between the Trotskyists( only the educated workers can properly lead a revolution! )and the Maoists( revolution can derive from the peasant masses! ). Hamas funds schools, hospitals and charities, while simultaneously waging guerilla war against Israel. They're also autocratic thugs of course, happy to curtail liberties to their own benefit and at the expense of their suffering constituents.

But they pose as defenders of the common man and if you're being treated in Hamas medical facilities, having your children educated in Hamas schools and are are managing to barely survive in part because Hamas is giving you free bread, you're a lot less likely to criticize the lack of a free press. And they strike back at the people you've regarded your whole life as thieving oppressors who starve your children with blockades and shoot your relatives for throwing rocks.

Hamas are terrorist scum - but they're quite good at propaganda. And Israel's heavy hand plays right into that propaganda. People don't like being bombed and shot. Every Palestinian civilian killed is a feather in Hamas' cap and a wonderful recruitment poster. And every Palestinian civilian killed by a far stronger Israel just reinforces the underdogism which I am convinced is the driving factor in certain elements of the left leaning towards the Palestinian side of the narrative.

I can't remember the quote( it was in Holidays in Hell ), but P.J. O'Rourke once noted that the Israeli response was just over the top nuts( this was to the original intifada I believe ). Comparing it to the then very autocratic South Korean government crackdown on seriously rioting SK students, he noted the disproportionate death toll and could just shake his head.

Israel does itself no favors. I know the reasoning, I can understand the logic - but it is wrong. Just as wrong as the Palestinians refusing to take a page from Gandhi's book - which wouldn't work everywhere, but surely would in Israel's internally divided democracy.

[Tamerlane]

I should add that I've long, long been an advocate for an internationalized Jerusalem. It would still be a hot potato and I'm sure the UN would have its hands full administering it and might fumble the job. But IMHO it is still a better option than what we ended up with. So I'm with you there.

But it is likely that ship has sailed.

[Pencil]

I read somewhere that Israel has just started building a pier to block traffic from the Sea to Gaza. It's gonna get a lot worse, and I'm starting to doubt that it will get better. At least not with the current occupant at Camp RunAmuck @1600 Penn Ave.

[NAF1138]

So...I think its past time this thread got a bump. Reading through it was weirdly comforting. Its oddly comforting that six years later things are in the same terrible state they were because at this exact moment things feel so much worse than ever, but that's recency bias talking.

So, for those of you who are still around...how ya doing?

[JackieLikesVariety]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

Its oddly comforting that six years later things are in the same terrible state they were because at this exact moment things feel so much worse than ever, but that's recency bias talking.

interesting and, honestly, hope you and everyone else can find comfort even if it's that.

it really does feel like things are worse than ever but how much of that is the possibility of rump getting the oval office again?

also, for the Palestinians, I think absolutely things are worse than ever. if you don't think so, I'll need to know why.

I hope it continues to be a rational place; glad Clothy is gone, far as I know.

[NAF1138]

Well, at this exact moment war isn't great for anyone. I was more thinking the discourse about the conflict wasn't actually any different.

Bibi is a maniac. Hamas are still committing atrocities. Normal people are getting caught in the middle.

[What Exit?]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

Well, at this exact moment war isn't great for anyone. I was more thinking the discourse about the conflict wasn't actually any different.

Bibi is a maniac. Hamas are still committing atrocities. Normal people are getting caught in the middle.

Bibi and his inner circle and Hamas should all go to jail. The whole thing stinks.

This is nothing like Ukraine where Putin is clearly the evil one in the wrong and Ukraine are clearly the small peaceful country valiantly holding out.


I don't see Israel getting better either as the hard-liners and ultra-conservatives seem to be gaining in power and not losing power. Much like Modi in India and far too many other nations.

[JackieLikesVariety]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

I was more thinking the discourse about the conflict wasn't actually any different.

that makes sense, sorry I misunderstood!

[kirin]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

Well, at this exact moment war isn't great for anyone. I was more thinking the discourse about the conflict wasn't actually any different.

Bibi is a maniac. Hamas are still committing atrocities. Normal people are getting caught in the middle.

Bibi and the Israeli far-right prefers Hamas to Fatah - there's that. You can't train pit bulls to maul and then complain about being mauled.

[kirin]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

How is Hamas winning the war or hearts and minds? It's Hamas?!

The answer's obvious. Israel is killing a shit-ton more Palestinians than Hamas has killed Israelis. Israel's not the victim here, dude. Sorry.

[NAF1138]

Originally Posted by kirin

The answer's obvious. Israel is killing a shit-ton more Palestinians than Hamas has killed Israelis. Israel's not the victim here, dude. Sorry.

You are quoting me from six years ago. Just making sure you understand that before posting more.

[Sputnik]

NAF, please don’t quote him, most of us have him on ignore and his posts appear when you quote him. You’ll see soon enough why.
Thanks.

[kirin]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

You are quoting me from six years ago. Just making sure you understand that before posting more.

Have your opinions changed?

[kirin]

Originally Posted by Sputnik

NAF, please don’t quote him, most of us have him on ignore and his posts appear when you quote him. You’ll see soon enough why.
Thanks.

Of course, because the hive mind here is the same as the hive mind on the Dope. You'll see later this year how utterly divorced from reality the hive is.

I promise I will come back to remind you of this.

[etaoin shrdlu]

Do not forget.

[kirin]

Originally Posted by etaoin shrdlu

Do not forget.

I shan't.

There's gonna be a lot of disbelief when Trump wins later this year. That'll be just the start of the fun.

[kirin]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

You are quoting me from six years ago. Just making sure you understand that before posting more.

You bumped a years-old thread but you're criticizing me for quoting years-old posts lol.

[Dr. Winston O'Boogie]

Originally Posted by Tamerlane

Hamas are terrorist scum - but they're quite good at propaganda. And Israel's heavy hand plays right into that propaganda. People don't like being bombed and shot. Every Palestinian civilian killed is a feather in Hamas' cap and a wonderful recruitment poster. And every Palestinian civilian killed by a far stronger Israel just reinforces the underdogism which I am convinced is the driving factor in certain elements of the left leaning towards the Palestinian side of the narrative.

....

Israel does itself no favors. I know the reasoning, I can understand the logic - but it is wrong. Just as wrong as the Palestinians refusing to take a page from Gandhi's book - which wouldn't work everywhere, but surely would in Israel's internally divided democracy.

Israel is making it harder and harder to defend their actions, but I still lay the blame on the actions of Hamas. Rape is never defensable. Torture and kidnapping of civilians is not defensable. They use the Palestinian people as human shields. They build tunnel entrances inside hospitals. They knew that kicking the bully in the nuts would lead to the bully kicking the shit out of you.

Air strikes are great for softening up military targets, but what happens when that military target lies under a hospital? The Israeli Army could have gone in with ground troops without the air strikes, but their losses would have been substantial. They valued Israeli soldier lives above Palestinian civilian lives. But, if Hamas had not built their tunnels and their access there, Israel would have had no reason to attack at all. Hamas cares less about Palestinian civilian lives than Israel does.

[kirin]

Originally Posted by Dr. Winston O'Boogie

Israel is making it harder and harder to defend their actions, but I still lay the blame on the actions of Hamas. Rape is never defensable. Torture and kidnapping of civilians is not defensable. They use the Palestinian people as human shields. They build tunnel entrances inside hospitals. They knew that kicking the bully in the nuts would lead to the bully kicking the shit out of you.

Riddle me this: if Hamas was Israel's existential threat, why did Israel withdraw from Gaza while simultaneously occupying and stealing land from the PA-controlled West Bank?

If Hamas were this existential threat, you'd think that Israel would have wanted to wipe them out decades ago. In fact the opposite is true: Israel tolerated - even supported - Hamas because Hamas fits right into what Israel's grand scheme has been all along: one state, not two states.

Israel didn't think Hamas was really anything more than a nasty insurgency within Gaza, which is partly why they got sucker-punched on October 7th. Israel didn't think Hamas was really all that dangerous, but they did know that Hamas, like Israel, believes that Greater Israel is only big enough for one entity. Israel can point to Hamas and say "OMG! The A-Rabs want to have another holocaust"

Meanwhile the one government that supports a two-state solution and the one Palestinian government that is supposedly accepting of Israeli legitimacy gets undermined repeatedly by Israeli settlers. Palestinians in the West Bank get their land stolen every fucking day and I bet none of you know much less care. Thanks to the pro-Zionist media in the United States.

[Jaglavak]

Originally Posted by Dr. Winston O'Boogie

Hamas cares less about Palestinian civilian lives than Israel does.

Thats not the half of it. When Israel was first created, all of the arab states around it attacked and tried to wipe them off the map. When that didn't work they tried it again and got their asses kicked again. Then they went back to the old ways, the thousand year war ways. Gaza has been crafted as a weapon against Israel for decades.

Step 1, take over a tiny territory packed with people using any means necessary.
Step 2, make birth control unavailable, outlaw exramarital sex, and stomp all over womens rights.
Step 3, close the borders block any migration to other less crowded countries.
Step 4, spout a relentless campaign of hate propaganda.
Step 5, butcher any moderate Palestinian voices.
Step 6, torpedo any peace deals with random attacks
Step 7, make the path to becoming an independent adult hinge on joining Hamas.
Step 8, wait until the average age in the territory is under 20 years old.
Step 9, build a worldwide propaganda machine to pull idealistic suckers to your side
Step 10, stage an unprovoked attack and make it as brutal and animalistic as possible.
Step 11, hide behind women and children and fight to the death

Bingo, you just created 100,000 bloodthirsty new recruits and at the same time drove a wedge between Israel and their international supporters. Neither goal was possible in peacetime but has now been accomplished by war. Gaza didn't happen by accident.

[kirin]

Originally Posted by Jaglavak

Thats not the half of it. When Israel was first created, all of the arab states around it attacked and tried to wipe them off the map. When that didn't work they tried it again and got their asses kicked again. Then they went back to the old ways, the thousand year war ways. Gaza has been crafted as a weapon against Israel for decades.

Step 1, take over a tiny territory packed with people using any means necessary.
Step 2, make birth control unavailable, outlaw exramarital sex, and stomp all over womens rights.
Step 3, close the borders block any migration to other less crowded countries.
Step 4, spout a relentless campaign of hate propaganda.
Step 5, butcher any moderate Palestinian voices.
Step 6, torpedo any peace deals with random attacks
Step 7, make the path to becoming an independent adult hinge on joining Hamas.
Step 8, wait until the average age in the territory is under 20 years old.
Step 9, build a worldwide propaganda machine to pull idealistic suckers to your side
Step 10, stage an unprovoked attack and make it as brutal and animalistic as possible.
Step 11, hide behind women and children and fight to the death

Bingo, you just created 100,000 bloodthirsty new recruits and at the same time drove a wedge between Israel and their international supporters. Neither goal was possible in peacetime but has now been accomplished by war. Gaza didn't happen by accident.

Sure, let's pretend like the Aliyah and Zionist terrorism against international political figures and diplomats never happened. Let's also pretend the Suez Crisis, which Israel started, never happened. Interesting perspective of "history" you have there.

Israel was created by ethnic removal/cleansing Arab non-Jewish families that had lived there undisturbed for generations. The Palestinians were forced out of "Israel" and pushed into in Gaza, where they were initially under Egyptian jurisdiction but then under Israeli occupation until the war of 1967. To suggest Israel was just minding its own business leading up to the war is nonsense (see Suez Crisis and Israel's refusal to obey international law).

[NAF1138]

Originally Posted by Sputnik

NAF, please don’t quote him, most of us have him on ignore and his posts appear when you quote him. You’ll see soon enough why.
Thanks.

Apologies. I haven't hung out in the main message board for a while.

[NAF1138]

@kirin it wasn't a criticism but a legitimate question because how I responded changes depending on if we are going to talk about the events of October 7th or if you felt this way prior. Much like 9/11, October 7th changes things.

[Sputnik]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

Apologies. I haven't hung out in the main message board for a while.

Not a problem. I’m glad you’re back.

[kirin]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

@kirin it wasn't a criticism but a legitimate question because how I responded changes depending on if we are going to talk about the events of October 7th or if you felt this way prior. Much like 9/11, October 7th changes things.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. You asked how Hamas is winning hearts and minds. I don't necessarily think Hamas is winning anything; rather, I think Israel is losing sympathy, for the same reason they were losing it in 2018, and in 2006, and in the years prior to that. The situation/problem is unchanged except for the fact that Hamas was able to scale its terrorism, which has in turn led to a massive increase in the scale of the Israeli response.

[Zeener Diode]

Originally Posted by NAF1138

@kirin it wasn't a criticism but a legitimate question because how I responded changes depending on if we are going to talk about the events of October 7th or if you felt this way prior. Much like 9/11, October 7th changes things.

I missed the earlier (pre-Oct 7) posts, but after reading I feel whatever was said summed up what I might have composed to reply. Post-Oct 7, I'm more focused on what's happening in this country WRT the conflict over there.

[Jaglavak]

Originally Posted by kirin

Let's also pretend the Suez Crisis, which Israel started, never happened. Interesting perspective of "history" you have there.

Oh, you mean Israel's response to eight years of Egyptian military blockade of the Red Sea? The one that Egypt actually started? I got your "history" right here.