[invalidname]

> > I wouldn't count on anything coming from the circle of Netanyahu.

> It's not about whether I trust them or not. It's that everyone is following the same playbook. Every teenager shot on the street is a militant; every house that is flattened was used by terrorists; everyone who has any criticism whatsoever is an antisemite.

I was specifically indicating that my information came from a reputable paper. Not from an a*hole on Twitter. Social media is full of nonsense and terrible people, I don't take part in that.

There is a lot of rage there and a lot of grandstanding.

> What about all the people who can't charge their phones because Israel only allowed 4 hours of electricity per day before the most recent campaign? Or whose phones were destroyed when their homes were destroyed?

This works based on numbers. There are still enough mobile phones to get a sense of movement patterns and target areas that are mostly empty. The army demoed the system to foreign press where areas are marked on a map indicating "safe to bomb" areas. It isn't a perfect system by any stretch but it's the best that can be done in this situation.

I wish there was a way to resolve this without violence. I don't think even the heads of Hamas should be killed. I hope they can be captured and would stand trial if possible. No one should die, especially not the many civilians that are there. But there's absolutely no choice. Every time the Hamas was given leeway it used it for attacks.

Israel released 1000 prisoners, many of them terrorists with blood on their hands as part of a trade a few years back. Most of those terrorists took part in the October 7th attack. They can't help themselves, they are religious fanatics. They are clever enough to manipulate the sentiments we liberals have. Our knee-jerk reaction is to stop violence and they appeal to that. They even manufacture violence against their own people for that purpose.

[hunta2097]

As an atheist, it seems like there is plenty of fanaticism on both sides.

Its impossible to "pick a side" in this conflict, there are good people and a*holes in both countries.

[dragonwriter]

> Its impossible to "pick a side" in this conflict, there are good people and a*holes in both countries.

And, on both sides, its the a*holes (a mild term for people who have engineered decades of war crimes and/or crimes against humanity, including waging war against or actively using inflammatory language to incite the murder of less extreme voices on, nominally, the same side for being less disinclined toward peace) running the war machine and state or state-like apparatus while the good people are trying not to get killed.

[invalidname]

I'm an atheist too. That is a false equivalency.

Guess which country is the 4th or 5th most secular country in the world... It might surprise you: Israel. Yep.

That's thanks to the "Jews" who are jews in creed, not religion. Israel has its fanatics for sure and they gained more power in the last election. But it isn't controlled by its fanatics by any stretch of the imagination.

[mping]

Don't have a horse in the race. Isn't Israeli constitution specifically about the Jewish people, as a ethnic, religious group? I read it discriminates against interfaith marriages, etc

[invalidname]

Israel doesn't have a constitution. There's the declaration of independence which does explicitly say the Jewish People. But the interpretation of that is varied. The closest thing Israel has to a founding father (who died before the country was formed) is Hertzel and he called it "state of the Jews". Many make a strong distinction between that and "Jewish state" as American TV anchors like to say (that's like nails on a blackboard for me).

Israel doesn't have civil unions. It only has religious marriage any religion is OK but the religions do discriminate. This is both problematic and a blessing. I'm not married to my spouse because I'm an atheist, but Israel has a "known in public" status which gives us the same rights (and some obligations) as married people. That means Gay and inter-religion couples can enjoy all the rights.

Another option some people take is to fly to nearby cypress to have a civil union which is recognized in Israeli courts.

About the broader question. Yes, there are religious elements in the government that have been pushing the secular envelope. This creates a lot of friction within Israeli society. E.g. there's a law against pastries in passover which is just the dumbest thing ever... Unenforceable and just stupid. There's also regulations prohibiting Jews from working on a Sabath (supposedly as a labor protection). Notice that both laws mostly affect people who are listed as "Jews" even if they are secular.

[lots2learn]

The laws discriminate against non-jews. Below is a list which includes things like restricting who can emigrate or gain residency, who land can be distributed or leased to, restricting commemoration of ethnic cleansing that the state was founded on, etc.

https://www.adalah.org/en/law/index

[hunta2097]

I think we need a different word for "ethnically Jewish" and "belief in the faith of Judaism", the confusion between the people and the faith causes problems.