In this seemingly forever argument, it seems there is some nuance in that Palestine is not Hamas and vice versa. One of the perspectives as I understand it is that Hamas is actually a threat to the existence of Palestine; the militaristic behaviour undermines Palestinian efforts at independence (and this is an avenue for exploitation by those who don't want to see an independent Palestine).
It is a similar situation with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
You can argue that the government of Israel isn't the will of the people of Israel (in the same way the US government isn't the will of the people of the US), but in my opinion there's more of a separation between 'Palestine' and 'Hamas' than there is between 'Israel' and 'the will of the people of Israel'.
There's a lot of wrongdoing, which means there are a lot of innocents being harmed, and the harming of innocents is the greatest wrongdoing. Harm by inaction is also wrong. Harm by preventing aid and assistance is also wrong.
None of this stuff is easily answered.
The joys of ideology, or maybe more correctly, the joys of living amongst those who take ideology so seriously that they attempt to enforce their fantasies upon the real world.
In my personal logic bubble: Protesting in support of Palestine is not protesting in support of Hamas. Declaring support for Israel is protesting against Hamas and their acts of terrorism against Israel. I can do both of these things without being hypocritical (like I said, in my personal logic bubble).
There's simply no excuse for what Israel has been doing and everyone with a functioning moral compass should be denouncing it. Debating about Hamas is a distraction. They have a right to defend their country, but not treating a whole population as collateral damage.
Palestine attacked, and has attacked for ages, because they and other surrounding countries have a stated long term aim to wipe Jews off the face of the earth.
It's like if people in Wales were constantly firing rockets at London because they wanted to destroy all English people, and England doing nothing about it for years until there was a huge slaughter, and then finally retaliating.
> It's like if people in Wales were constantly firing rockets at London because they wanted to destroy all English people, and England doing nothing about it for years until there was a huge slaughter, and then finally retaliating.
Or just like the IRA… asymmetric warfare/terrorism is a natural response to violent oppression
People are appropriately scouring your position because there was exactly what you are imagining: a population, living West of the rest of the UK, lobbing terrorist attacks at London. It's just that it was the Irish, not the Welsh, doing the attacks. History has given reason to the IRA's despicable methods; once the British got tired of the unionists' intransigeance, they sat down at the negotiation table and hammered a real deal to really end the violence.
The Palestinians engaged in violent warfare against the Israelis studiously study the IRA and the results they got. So your example is actually an example that proves that the Palestinians' methods could lead to success for them. You'll have to try again.
The fact we are not in Israel's shoes is the best hope for a negotiated durable peace. I cannot find a peace deal in the 20th century that did not have the studious support of a neutral third-party.
There are many Israelis who conclude that their country is conducting a genocide in gaza and ask for it to stop [1]. Conversely, there are people who are "far far away", who have access to the same information as everybody else and don't see any wrong doing, and support the destruction of Gaza and its inhabitants. I have a hard time understanding how anyone can think this is right, or maybe they don't know or don't believe what is actually taking place.
What happens in Gaza is first and foremost Hamas to blame, thus I hold zero empathy for the Gaza people, and second, nonetheless important, does not withstand any definition of the term "genocide". If Israel wanted to commit a genocide they would finish the job within a week, the fact that there are so many surgical operations and methods like "knock on the roof" shows Israel are doing their best efforts to avoid civilian casualties. Moreover, as the Palestinians are separated between Judea and Samaria and the Gaza strip, while the first are quiet and living in prosperity while the later are hostages of Hamas, it is a very weird way from Israel's point of view to make what you call genocide.
israel has been documented countless times directly targeting civilians, including reporters, sniping women, children, sexual assault, the list goes on. It's a quick search away to see a very, very long list of war crimes.
Wait, you mean there is “no excuse for what Israel is doing” and “Hamas kidnapping and murdering Israelis” was just a distraction?
This is why we should just move on to EVs and stop getting involved at all in the Middle East. I see no morally right way of engaging with either side. Both positions seem to end in “let one side genocide the other side.”
See, it’s statements like this that make me want to run away like heck from this.
Netanyahu is a hack, a war monger, all sorts of bad, but Palestinians continued support for Hamas and seeing large scale cross border kidnapping/murder as a “police issue”, it’s hard for me to feel sympathy.
Have you ever stopped to think _why_ they might continue to support Hamas? The Israeli government (and many citizens) continue to take their land. Force them out of their homes. Treat them worse than animals. They can kill 70k people and face almost zero consequences internationally. They've got the backing of a superpower. If you were treated like that I'm sure you would plead for calm, peace, and love. If people are treated inhumanly on mass scale they will revolt because they feel like they have no other option.
Hamas' mass murdering isn't a "police problem" whatever that's meant to mean and they are quite explicit in their goal of genocide of the Jewish population in the southern levante.
There seems to be a difference in capabilities here. Israel actually appears to be capable of eradicating Palestinians. The reverse does not appear to be true.
But I understand that Israeli soldiers need justification to shoot at children and raise houses- just as Germans needed justification for their genocide.
The argument that all Palestinans deserve to be genocided because of the actions of a terrorist organisation is so asinine that people should be ashamed of themselves.
It is the same reasoning Americans used for their war against the Apaches.
I think Israel's leadership has very unwisely lost the Strategic plot here in favour of tactical political advantages of survival.
The history of middle East for the last 5000 years (since Sargon of Akkad) is replete with 'the king X "pacified" (the most commonly used euphemism) the people in the conquered territory'. It has never gone well for the victors under successors of king X, often within a generation or two.
In today's age when access to technology and information is such that any small sufficiently competent and motivated group can cause massive destruction, is it wise to keep creating motivated enemies and expect they will somehow never become competent or that the competent won't become motivated? It is doubly ironic given Israel's own defense industrial complex is filled with such small motivated and competent groups and the evidence of Ukraine/Russia conflict is staring in the face. This situation will blow up I fear within a generation unless Israeli society chooses different leaders.
Why are there always so many conspiracy theories around the Israeli government. I mean, I'm sure one or two hold water. But the vast majority ...
And an even bigger mystery: why are there never conspiracy theories about hamas and the PLA? I mean, hamas is a conspiracy. There's no serious doubt about that. Obviously while there is a problem in Israel, Palestinians aren't behind hamas, unless they get very well paid. Many very bad state actors support Palestinian organizations, going back a loooong time. The PLA was created with the help of the KGB, imagine that. That's not a theory, that's a fact. Iran supports hamas. Qatar supports hamas. I mean, for hamas there's no doubt. It very much is a conspiracy, against Israel, against Jews (the KGB are the authors of "the protocols of the elders of zion" and the source of the whole Jews wanting to massacre the world theory) and against "the west" in general. China, massacres muslims and "reeducates" them in China, with hamas support btw, and supports hamas ... Do you think the KGB wants to support palestinians? Or muslims? Do you think China does? Do you think Iran wants to support Sunni religious nutcases? How do they treat those in Iran?
A lot of shady stuff happens in the region. This is one of them and certainly something to be aware of.
> Do you think the KGB wants to support palestinians? Or muslims? Do you think China does? Do you think Iran wants to support Sunni religious nutcases? How do they treat those in Iran?
Why is it that every pro Israel comment is full of unrelated questions? My answer to all of these is: I don't care in this context.
"democratically elected" being an extremely load bearing sentiment if you know anything about what people's lives are actually like on the ground. did you know a large majority of the populace didn't even vote in 2006? since 2006? there hasn't been elections since. The median age is 18.
Pulled all their military out? Oh, they still controlled their airspace, critical infra, borders tho? Sounds very self determined!
Serious, bad faith or extremely reductive misrepresentation that I can't tell is borne from ignorance willful or accidental.
your comment is the equivalent of acting like cuba's economy is all their own choosing, without analyzing the immense damage sanctions (and why sanctions were there in the first place) have done to the country, or accosting haiti without knowing why their struggles exist. context matters.
2006 is 20(!) years ago, the elections had a 70% turnout, and Hamas received only 44% of the vote.
Considering that about 60% of the Gaza population is age 20 or younger, that means about 18% of the current population voted for Hamas.
And of course Israel directly helped this by arresting a huge number of Hamas politicians right before the elections, and openly interfering with the election process in general.
So no, Hamas does not represent the will of the people in Gaza, and calling it "democratically elected" is at this point a straight-up lie.
Support for Hamas also came from Netanyahu[0], he explicitly gave support to be used as wedge for the Palestinian cause, to perpetuate the conflict giving casus belli to Israeli actions against Palestinians in Gaza.
This argument you make is the same one Osama bin Laden uses in his 2004 “Letter to the American People”: he argues that because the American people re-elected George W. Bush, the populace was complicit in the policy consequences, self-rationalizing 2001.
Congratulations for using a heuristic that resulted in 9/11! Osama’s rationalization at least had a more accurate premise that the American people continued to be able to vote — unlike in Palestine. So congrats on having either a worse moral compass or worse reasoning skills than Bin Laden!
One MAGA hat at a Republican rally doesn't mean all Republicans are MAGA.
If anything is to be learnt, it is that individuals should be judged as individuals, or at least that individuals should not be judged by the worst actions of a group that they may (only appear to) be a part of.
A good way for "one side" to trivialise or demonise "the other side" would be to seed "the other side" with extremist messaging.
Hamas also has widespread support within Palestine. Overwhelmingly the population of Palestine supports the actions of October 7. There is no clean separation between Palestine and Hamas, as much as one side wants you to believe there is.
I mostly agree, except for the blatant calls for genocide from the Israeli side, and the blatant calls for genocide from the Palestinian side. I honestly don't know who to support - neither side wants to live with the other, and it seems, eventually, one of those sides will get their wish. To the detriment of us all.
No, it's actually really simple. You start with these two questions:
1. Is Israel an apartheid state?
2. Is Israel committing a genocide?
At this point (IMHO) you need to do some serious mental gymnastics not to answer "yes" to both questions. As soon as you do, it gets real simple. The existence of Hamas doesn't justify either of these things.
The people who bring this up are engaging in respectability politics or engaging in weaponized cvility. Instead of addressing the underlying issues, the focus is on the methods and the actions of the oppressed when it is the oppressor that sets the level of violence. As Nelson Mandela put it:
> A freedom fighter learns the hard way that it is the oppressor who defines the nature of the struggle, and the oppressed is often left no recourse but to use methods that mirror those of the oppressor. At a certain point, one can only fight fire with fire.
People understood this quite clearly with apartheid South Africa. Can you imagine protesters having to do the performative "does apartheid South Africa have a right to exist?" pledge? No, me neither.
While I actually have sympathy for people on both sides of the struggle, I also find it hard to answer "yes" to both questions, mostly because of how muddied the definitions of everything are. It's obvious to me, that both the Israeli government and Hamas are both committing serious warcrimes, and that there no good actors here, here are some questions I don't have an answer to.
For example, is Palestine its own country? Is Hamas is its rightful government? Does that extend to the West Bank or only in Gaza? Palestinians seem to say that Palestine is its own country, Israelis say that Palestinians are not a part of Israel - so how can it be an apartheid state if BOTH sides say they aren't part of the same country at all?
Is Israel committing a genocide? Well, what does a genocide look like? Israel is still distributing food in Gaza, to this day. I don't think it would look like this, but at the same time, there are terrorists on both sides (Itamar ben-Gvir being the most prominent on the Israeli side, in my opinion).
There are more issues and questions and uncertainty around the problems in Israel, Palestine, the Levant as a whole, Iran's involvement and so on.
Even worse, for most Israelis (who are 70% of Arab descent), the country of Israel no longer existing could mean a real genocide for the Israel side! (A counter-genocide?) Regardless, if this issue were easy to solve, it would have been solved already.
Honestly, the situation seems to complicated to boil down to two "simple" questions and I admire that you can have such an "obvious" outlook, but the more I look at Israel and the Middle East (and read, and research), the more questions I have.
Yes, Israel is unequivocally committing genocide in Gaza. Genocide is not just "are they killing everybody", but also "are they driving people from their ancestral homelands"?
Israel is constitutionally an ethnostate. If there is an existing population, there is literally no way to establish an ethnostate without genocide - either through killing or displacement.
The definitions aren't muddled. Apartheid [1] and genocide [2] are both defined by the UN. Apartheid in particular is also objectively true. Do Israeli Arabs have the same rights as Jewish Israelis? No, objectively [3][4].
As for Palestine being its own country, it clearly isn't. Palestinians live on land claimed by Israel and recognized by pretty much every country in the world. But what if it was? Then Israel is illegally occupying it. Is that better? Why does this matter? Does one make the treatment of Gazans (in particular) more acceptable?
> Even worse, for most Israelis (who are 70% of Arab descent), the country of Israel no longer existing could mean a real genocide for the Israel side!
You can't use a theoretical future genocide to justify a current actual genocide. Also, it's ahistorical. Did this happen when apartheid South Africa ended? What about slavery? No, what actually happened was the former oppressors continued to commit violence against the previously oppressed.
While I appreciate your candor, words matter. I wouldn't call Israel an apartheid state if, in fact, it was two different countries warring to the death over not enough land. I think that situation is closer to reality, with the "victorious" side refusing to completely destroy the loser and the loser refusing to surrender to the "victor".
That situation has changed for the worse in recent years, and the world should step in, if it can. How the world should step in is not obvious - especially if the thorny history of the region is considered.
Finally, on the "current vs future 'genocides'" - dismissing Israel's legitimate security concerns would be as wrong as dismissing Israel's obvious warcrimes, in my opinion. I can't, in good conscience, advocate for action that would replace one genocide with another and it's important to me to consider my actions and words in that light. You may think differently, but maybe you value human life and morality differently than I do.
It's obvious you've made up your mind, but I don't think you've convinced anyone who hasn't already made up their mind, nor have you addressed, what I believe, are very valid questions about the conflict.
Hamas has unilaterally broken every ceasefire and peace treaty. This war started with them unilaterally breaking a peace treaty, invading, kidnapping 1000+ civilians, and raping and murdering most of them.[1]
Does this justify what Israel is doing to the West Bank? Most people would say no. On the other hand, before the invasion normal Palestinians were chanting "Death to Israel" and "Death to America" on a daily basis, and they still refuse to recognize the existence of the nation of Israel. If your counterparty doesn't agree that you have a right to exist, there's no negotiating.
"kidnapping 1000+ civilians, and raping and murdering most of them" has been debunked by Haaretz, Israel's "Defense" Minister, UNs ICO, The Jerusalem Post.
So I just wasted my time reading through this garbage and I can't find anything that debunks what you claimed it does? The whole thing boils down to Israel fired a lot of ammunition, therefore it was actually Israel killing all the civilians.
On top of that, the whole article is mainly sourcing from "The Electronic Intifada", which definitely seems like the most objective source for objective truth on Oct 7th.
The devil is in the linked documents. The whole thing boils down to multiple claims primarily from the Israeli sources (press), but also public statements of the officials.
You seem to be suggesting it's all about the Hannibal Directive. It's not all.
And the thing you call "garbage" is for example the defense minister (Yoav Gallant) who was in power on Oct 7, stating in an interview in Israeli TV (Channel 12, as reported by Times Of Israel, much earlier reported by Haaretz), that Hannibal Directive has been issued and admission - from the top military figure, no less - that civilians have been killed.
> they still refuse to recognize the existence of the nation of Israel. If your counterparty doesn't agree that you have a right to exist, there's no negotiating.
Quick question - does Israel recognize the existence of the state of Palestine?
I saw someone post this was due to H1B visas. Then I drilled into the comments and saw it was a Palestine protest. It is getting hard to know what is true anymore as everyone is trying to push their own narrative.
To me, this seems like a rather unfortunate indicator of the death in intellectualism in this country. Granted I recall having stances and an optimistic naivete after graduating college and positions that, while still broadly liberal and left-leaning, shifted notably over the decades since. However, it pains me a bit to see how much "essentialism" stands as an argument and way of understanding the world, even to graduates of a top-tier institution. The argument that the Israel/Palestine situation is "essentially" genocide, rather than a tragic and complicated reality where the precise characterization of the situation is debated immensely and relies on ones own biases and expanding or narrowing the definition of the term. The further argument that since Google does business with Israel, they are "essentially" complicit and supporters of aforementioned genocide.
Depending on one's biases, my previous statement will likely elicit some sort of reaction, especially to college grads of this generation, without me ever stating a position.
This all to me is a rather unfortunate place for academia and intellectualism to have landed in the past decades. Or was it always this bad? I don't think so, I do think that always-online and recommendation engines and gameification of social media has created an acceleration of this.
But it pains me to think about where this is evolving to, and how these graduates will navigate life in the extremely complicated, suboptimal, often hateful or self-interested world we live in, if this is where they get to after graduating from a top institution.
Agreed that thinking about the natural progression of today's circumstances are painful to think about, and about the death of intellectualism.
However, I'd like to play devil's advocate here, and speak to your "without ever stating a position" line. I'd argue that's just careful wording hiding under the mask of intellectualism.
The argument against Israel is, as you say, that it is "essentially" genocide. Speaking as one of the cohort (although slightly older than new grad) of which you're referring, every argument against Israel is to my view quite straightforward. Killing innocent people is bad, doing so for political reasons is worse, and when you do it to an entire city/nation/people you have genocide ipso facto. While it's not a very complex take, it really doesn't need to be when there is a preponderance of evidence.
Contrasted with the defense of Israel's actions, and you have a vast array of whataboutisms, downplaying, justifying by means of referring to authority (in Israel), calling critics anti-Semitic, etc.
In my personal experience I find the majority of pro-Israel arguments to be at heart anti-intellectual.
So when you dress up a complex situation by emphasizing how above and beyond all understanding it is, to me that feels you are intentionally muddying the waters to try to obfuscate the real problem. And that, I would say, is also anti-intellectual.
Just because we have generational problems with anti-intellectualism does not mean this particular circumstance belongs in that category.
The intellectual take is that Israel is an apartheid state committing genocide. That's what's backed by history and facts. The "god promised us this land" European movement is anti-intellectual in every conceivable way.
It is a similar situation with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
You can argue that the government of Israel isn't the will of the people of Israel (in the same way the US government isn't the will of the people of the US), but in my opinion there's more of a separation between 'Palestine' and 'Hamas' than there is between 'Israel' and 'the will of the people of Israel'.
There's a lot of wrongdoing, which means there are a lot of innocents being harmed, and the harming of innocents is the greatest wrongdoing. Harm by inaction is also wrong. Harm by preventing aid and assistance is also wrong.
None of this stuff is easily answered.
The joys of ideology, or maybe more correctly, the joys of living amongst those who take ideology so seriously that they attempt to enforce their fantasies upon the real world.
In my personal logic bubble: Protesting in support of Palestine is not protesting in support of Hamas. Declaring support for Israel is protesting against Hamas and their acts of terrorism against Israel. I can do both of these things without being hypocritical (like I said, in my personal logic bubble).