I don’t think they’re saying literally that the same weapons are being sent to one destination or else the other – the issue is the authorization being there or not.
I think the point is that providing weapons for Israel so they can continue the slaughter, basically the whole US political spectrum except for a few scattered outliers is behind, whereas weapons for Ukraine is this big struggle and debate with a lot of people on the pro-invasion side. And even the people who are saying “We MUST arm Ukraine so she can defend herself, what’s going on in an offense against humanity” are also pretty much giving Netanyahu a stern waggling of the finger (if that) and a hearty handshake and a big check in support, as his ongoing genocide continues.
The reason why support for Ukraine is so shaky is that Republicans have been thoroughly compromised by the nation that started the war and has an interest in removing American support for Ukraine. Trump is far from the only leading Republican who is bought and paid for by Moscow.
Israel is an entirely different matter. As much as Netanyahu is a terrible person, he did not start this war and had absolutely no other choice than to respond to Hamas murderous rampage with a campaign to remove the terrorist organization. There was no other option and someone far further left on the political spectrum would have to do the same. Hell, any nation on Earth, including the most peace-loving ones, would have started a full-on war in reaction to attack like this.
The relationship between Israel and the USA is also far firmer than between Ukraine and the USA and not just because of the routinely overstated influence of the “Israel lobby”. Israel is a far more important country, the most important Western partner in the Middle East for strategic reasons alone. It’s a hub for cutting-edge research in pretty much all areas, from biotech to defense and it houses some of the most important chip fabs in the world - think of it as a second Taiwan. It’s also a startup hub, one of the most important places for new high-tech companies to emerge in the world. You have very likely used technology and inventions that came from Israel without knowing it. Intel for example has had a presence in the country since the 1970s, pretty much since the beginning of close US-Israeli ties, and benefited massively from the research and development that happened there.
Israel is small and surrounded by enemies that have tried to destroy it and its people (what do you think “From the river to the sea!” actually means?) from the moment it was conceived by the UN. You are making a serious and sadly these days very common mistake of falling for a massive worldwide propaganda campaign - fueled by Iran, Russia and China, who are doing it in an attempt to weaken one of America’s most important strategic partners - that tries to portray the justified, if brutal, war against an organization that does everything in their power to get as many civilians on both sides killed as a genocide, while at the same time ignoring the real and openly stated genocidal intentions of this terrorist pseudo-state and its supporters. The whole genocide argument falls apart at even the most cursory glance: Why would a country with genocidal intentions go through enormous lengths to minimize civilian casualties, far more so than any other country in the world? The IDF is the only military on the planet that is routinely informing civilians through calls, messages, flyers, hacked TV stations, web services, etc. before air strikes and ground operations. This is nearly completely unheard of elsewhere and entirely unheard of at this kind of scale. This actually hurts Israel militarily, as it allows not just civilians, but also terrorists to get away.
Why would they go through all of this trouble if the aim was to exterminate a people? How would a pluralistic democracy where Israeli Arabs (they don’t like to call themselves Palestinians) have representation in the Knesset and even a Supreme Court judge decide to commit genocide anyway? Not to mention, if they were truly genocidal, they would start with the members of this people within their own borders, with an increasingly harsh campaign to separate them from the majority to slowly lead over to extermination, which is the opposite of what’s happening in Israel, where - despite some very real discrimination, not too dissimilar to minorities in other developed nations - Israeli Arabs has gained more rights, influence and representation instead of less over time.
Note that I’m not saying that there are no war crimes being committed by Israel in Gaza. That would be preposterous. I’m certain that, just like in sadly any war, there are individual soldiers satisfying their blood lust. I’m also not denying that Palestinians have experienced and are experiencing countless injustices from the Israeli state and individual Israelis, especially settlers. This is however entirely different from the allegation that there is a planned, systematic campaign to murder an entire people. I think many people who are parroting this claim have good intentions, but are simply too inexperienced with what wars look like, mistake the absurd overrepresentation of this conflict in the media compared to other, much worse ongoing wars with this war being much worse. Assad had - in a single prison - about as many people murdered as have allegedly (we only have Hamas numbers) been killed in Gaza. The civil war in Sudan has seen massacres at a near incomprehensible scale, with tens of thousands dying over the course of days - yet barely anyone is talking about this. Why is that? Why are we all so obsessed with this tiny strip of arid land in the Middle East? I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be watchful, that the international community should not be Israel’s bad conscience, but there is still something profoundly wrong with the way our media - both news and social media - elevates this conflict above every other war.
Sorry for the wall of text. I hope you don’t mind it and the fact that I have some opinions that go against the majority in this community.
The reason why support for Ukraine is so shaky is that Republicans have been thoroughly compromised by the nation
One reason why support for Israel is so unanimous is that all politicians have been compromised to some degree by AIPAC’s influence. It’s just being done in a “legal” fashion and a lot more competently than the (also fairly effective) job that Russia is doing.
As much as Netanyahu is a terrible person, he did not start this war
had absolutely no other choice than to respond to Hamas murderous rampage with a campaign to remove the terrorist organization
Absolutely false. Or rather – it is false that he was obligated to respond by starving children and everyone else, bombing hospitals, and absolutely guaranteeing the continuation of the conflict. Do you really think there’s a single person in Palestine today who doesn’t want to see Israel eradicated off the face of the planet?
If your goal is to eradicate Hamas, this course of action is the absolute last one you would choose.
They could have chosen to pursue a genuine end to the conflict and address its root causes (which basically boil down to Israel wanting to take land from the Palestinians, reduce them to subhuman status with the society they’re imposing on them, and kill them without warning or recourse any time they feel like – which is why Israel doesn’t want to change anything about that.)
They could have chosen to invoke a war against Hamas itself, while still being at least mindful-on-the-surface of civilian casualties. It would be difficult, since their treatment of Palestinians means that basically anyone who’s an adult could potentially be a Hamas supporter, but them’s the breaks when you oppress an entire population for 75 years; you create a situation that’s boo hoo difficult for yourself to deal with “humanely.”
They could have done literally nothing; it’s not ideal, but at least it wouldn’t have involved killing thousands of children and absolutely guaranteeing continued support for Hamas from this generation of Palestinians and maybe beyond.
Hell, any nation on Earth, including the most peace-loving ones, would have started a full-on war in reaction to attack like this.
In the aftermath of World War 2, the allies faced the issue of what to do with the nation that had invented a whole new type of crime against humanity. What they did was:
Involve the international community
Ensure that anyone accused of this crime would have a chance to defend themselves against the charges with legal representation
Took the “innocent” (relatively speaking) civilians of the country, made some effort to rebuild their country, and carefully set up structures which would address the root causes that had led to the breeding ground for hatred that had been created where the problem had festered in the first place.
And, will you look at that, it worked, and we don’t have a continuing insurrection decade after decade in Germany today, with an oppressive open-air prison for all the German people which keeps flaring up into terrorism and murder.
I’m not excusing any murder, kidnapping, or rape of the innocent on October 7th. The people who did it should be punished. The holocaust was orders of magnitude worse, though, and somehow we managed to react to that without starving millions of children and continuing an endless cycle of suffering even into the present day.
One reason why support for Israel is so unanimous is that all politicians have been compromised to some degree by AIPAC’s influence.
The influence of this organization, while not small, is vastly overstated. I explained in my previous comment the significant strategic importance of Israel to the US and other Western nations, which is the actual reason. That famous Iron Dome defensive system for example is also used by America to protect key locations. American and German (and soon British) tanks are getting equipped with Trophy APS, developed in Israel and used very effectively in Gaza (I’ve seen footage of this system intercepting multiple missiles in a row), which can intercept missiles before they hit the armor. This kind of tech - and it’s not just defense tech - is priceless and you can’t get it anywhere else at this level of quality right now.
This conflict has been going on for a long time before October.
That is an awful and very misleading source going by the note at the top alone (no serious expert is disputing that a terrorist missile fell on that hospital) and by this war I meant this war in Gaza, which Hamas did start. The conflict as a whole can be traced back to arbitrary points in time, but the modern starting point would be when the Arab coalition attacked the young nation of Israel the moment it was founded according to a UN resolution.
starving children and everyone else
Hamas is hoarding vast amounts of food, fuel, medical supplies and are openly stealing aid coming into the strip, often by force. Just like they are to blame for the start of this war, they are to blame for most of the suffering.
bombing hospitals
When a hospital is used to launch missiles at civilians in Israel, how is Israel to respond? Are they supposed to let their own people die or do they have the right to defend themselves? The Geneva convention is very clear on this: The moment a civilian structure is being used for military purposes, it loses all protections. It sounds harsh, but the idea behind this is to discourage this kind of behavior by malevolent actors.
absolutely guaranteeing the continuation of the conflict
Prior to this war, tens of thousands of Palestinians were working in Israel, earning the same wages as Israelis would, which means they earned several times as much as they would in Palestinian territories. Thousands were being treated in Israeli hospitals. Food, power, water and telecommunications were being provided for free. Israel was brokering a deal with Egypt and Palestinians for the exploitation of a gas field at the coast of Gaza, which would have provided energy independence for the strip and a significant source of revenue for Palestinians.
Hamas ended all of this. Israel - despite its many faults - has repeatedly made concessions and incentivized peaceful coexistence. Every single time, they were rewarded with more violence and hate. When they forcefully evicted all settlers out of the Gaza Strip, Hamas thanked them by launching attacks - rockets, bombs, stabbings, shootings, suicide bombers - in response and they deliberately destroyed the greenhouses, water pipes and fields left behind by the settlers. How do you deal with an organization like that?
Do you really think there’s a single person in Palestine today who doesn’t want to see Israel eradicated off the face of the planet?
I wonder if you are aware of what Palestinian children are being taught at school. It makes the kind of hate children in Nazi Germany exposed to look like Sesame Street. I highly recommend you read this report (PDF link at the beginning) in its entirety. It’s lengthy, but very illuminating:
Please tell me what you make of this. This indoctrination has been the primary factor in keeping this conflict alive. It has done far more damage than any bomb or any rampaging settler.
They could have chosen to pursue a genuine end to the conflict and address its root causes
If you respond to one of the worst terrorist attacks in history by making concessions, you are telling the terrorists that violence works and thereby encourage further attacks like these in the future. Is this the kind of message you would want to send? Hamas knew that with their attack, peace between Palestine and Israel would be made impossible for decades. They counted on it, because this is what gives them power. The only response to an organization that works like this can be to destroy it and then and only then work on more peaceful steps to resolve the issue. More on that later.
which basically boil down to Israel wanting to take land from the Palestinians
Most Israelis abhor the settlers and their land grabbing. They want peaceful coexistence. Within the current Israeli government, there are however many politicians that support these deeply unpopular land grabs. This is a problem, but only for the duration of the war, as this government and its parties and politicians are not expected to survive the next election, especially not Netanyahu. I’m sure you recall the mass protest against him that went on for months before this war. His days are numbered.
reduce them to subhuman status with the society they’re imposing on them
That is one hell of an accusation. Israel has no control over Palestinian schools, not even in the West Bank, and they only have limited influence over the PNA. Neither did they interfere with how Hamas governed the strip, beyond retaliating for attacks and preventing the smuggling of weapons and materials that could be used for the creation of weapons and tunnels into the strip. Both Gaza and the West Bank are highly repressive ethno-religious autocracies similar to many other Muslim-majority states. This is not the fault of Israel - they would certainly prefer it if these were liberal democracies like Israel itself. In my opinion, the worst thing Israel does day-to-day to Palestinians outside of the war is restricting their movement within the West Bank. Random check- and choke points, arbitrary restrictions on movement, unpredictable treatment at the checkpoints. That’s a serious issue that needs to be addressed, but given the highly volatile security situation - Hamas is very active in the West Bank as well - it’s unlikely that there would be improvements for Palestinians in the near future.
and kill them without warning or recourse any time they feel like
I’m not sure if you are aware of this, but there is what can only be called a human sacrifice ritual going on in the West Bank. Teenagers (mostly) are being encouraged to attack certain Israeli check points near a Palestinian hospital with slings - serious weapons that can kill a man at long distance and have been used for warfare for millennia. Soldiers then shoot back at them using small-caliber ammunition, aiming at their legs. Pretend-medics (seriously, these men are not trained at all; their incompetence is staggering), then pretend to tend to them - many die or end up with lifelong injuries. All of this happens at set locations in front of a large number of journalists ready to capture the macabre spectacle with their cameras - and it provides a steady daily trickle of “murdered kids” for Palestinians propagandists to use in order to sway naive, well-meaning Westerners to support organizations that openly advocate for the destruction of Israel.
This has been going on for decades. I first saw a TV report on this back in the 1990s and it fundamentally changed my view of the conflict. There is something seriously wrong with a society that values its children so little, its willing to throw their lives away this callously for political gain. Fundamental reform is needed.
invoke a war against Hamas itself, while still being at least mindful-on-the-surface of civilian casualties
How? They are mindful, they are, as I explained in my previous comment, above and beyond what every other military is doing to minimize casualties, but they are fighting against a terrorist pseudo-state that is doing the very opposite, deliberately doing everything in their power to increase the number of dead on their side. Read this in-depth academic report on the issue:
It’s accessible and you can get the gist of it from the first few pages, if you don’t have much time. The evidence provided in it is overwhelming.
since their treatment of Palestinians means that basically anyone who’s an adult could potentially be a Hamas supporter
This is not the fault of Israel, but of Palestinian terror organizations. They only wear uniforms during parades. Even in their own propaganda footage, they can be seen fighting in civilian clothes. This is deliberate. They not only hope to blend in (some terrorists have even been caught wearing female clothing), but also to encourage twitchy, scared soldiers to see any Palestinian as a threat and fire at them, in the hopes that this way, more civilians are killed, which to Hamas, as they have repeatedly and openly stated, is the goal for both internal and external propaganda.
the significant strategic importance of Israel to the US and other Western nations, which is the actual reason
Yes, I agree with this. I said “one reason” when I started my message; this is the other reason. Honestly, that side of it, I don’t care about in the slightest. The US has a lot of friends and a lot of strategic partners. If one of them starts killing children in large numbers, I think it’s reasonable to reevaluate if the strategic geopolitical gains are the diplomatic losses (not to mention the going to Hell for at the end of our lives.)
Most of what you’re saying factually about the conflict, I actually fully agree with. A think a whole lot of your statements of judgement could be viewed in absolute exact mirror image from the opposite side, though.
how is (country) to respond?
do they have the right to defend themselves?
How do you fight an enemy like this?
Are Palestinians allowed to say these things about Israel?
Why not?
I could send you any number of videos or news stories about IDF soldiers killing children or people who are obviously innocent, equally fucked-up stories to match your (very real) fucked-up stories about what Hamas is doing. Do you want me to do that; do you not believe that these things are happening? I can send you reliable sources if you want; what’s reliable to you? New York Times, Wikipedia, Haaretz or Israeli media? That’s a for real serious question. Do you not believe that the IDF is doing atrocities? What source would you believe? UN reports?
(I believe, I should say, that the answer is no: Palestinians should not be able to justify anything they do to innocent Israelis in these terms. I just think it cuts both ways: No murder and rape at the music festival, no starvation of children. Surely you can see that both of those are punishment of the innocent for “crimes” committed by others that they may not agree with or be in any way responsible for? Or no?)
Lack of food to a civilian population is abhorrent by any standard. Don’t give me crap about how Hamas is hoarding the aid. Hamas is a profoundly corrupt organization and always has been. The people who weren’t starving before, and now are, are doing so because Israel is blocking the aid. These are the numbers; there is not enough to feed everyone. That’s Israel’s decision and the consequences of it are on the Israeli government.
Would that situation be alright for the United States to impose on Israel to redress an injustice the Israeli leadership and military had committed? A yearslong embargo like the one on Gaza, and then sudden reduction of food aid (which the population was now dependent on) to a small fraction, even as famine and starvation set in? Even to the extent of starving people who never agreed with Netanyahu’s policies, or people too young to even understand what was happening?
If you claim the right for Israel to do these things to Gaza, why would the Palestinians or the Americans not have the right to do this to Israelis? What’s the difference?
You agree with that factually, right? The 6/6 map showing the present day?
Surely you can see the problem with moving into someone else’s house, telling them at gunpoint they need to find a new place to live, telling them they can’t leave their new place they live now without your permission (which basically never comes), telling them you’ll control how much food and water and any type of goods they can receive and then say you’re “wanting peace”? No? Is that reasonable, is a settled peace enforced by overwhelming atrocity at any resistance, visited on both the guilty and the innocent; is that the reasonable outcome from that situation?
when you oppress an entire population for 75 years
Palestinian territories were occupied by other nations, namely Egypt and Jordan, for decades during this time (a significant part of Palestine still is). This often repeated (and now outdated - it’s 2024) 75 years of oppression meme is highly misleading. Both Egypt and Jordan were not benevolent in their occupation and permitted the Palestinians under their rule no influence on how they were being governed. Furthermore, Palestinian refugees in various middle Eastern nations are essentially without rights for perpetuity. Please educate yourself on this instead of spreading falsehoods.
you create a situation that’s boo hoo difficult for yourself to deal with “humanely.”
What on Earth is that supposed to mean?
They could have done literally nothing
You can not be serious.
it’s not ideal
The hell it isn’t.
it wouldn’t have involved killing thousands of children
I am not denying that many children have died in Gaza, but the numbers released by Hamas are not reliable at all. Read this:
Also, see the above report on Hamas deliberately putting civilians, including children, at danger. Hamas is to blame, not Israel.
absolutely guaranteeing continued support for Hamas from this generation of Palestinians and maybe beyond
Support for Hamas in Gaza, according to independent Palestinian polls, is lower than in the West Bank, where almost no bombs are falling. This is patently false. The opposite would be happening if what you said were true.
In the aftermath of World War 2
We are not in the aftermath phase of this war yet. Israel is sending in aid into areas that they are controlling, which is all you can realistically expect of them. During WW2, the Allies - unlike Israel - deliberately targeted civilians with bombs and low-flying aircraft - my own grandmother recalled how she had to flee from a funeral that was attacked by strafing allied warplanes flying at tree level, low enough for them to see who they were attacking. Also, nobody demanded of the Allies that they supplied the enemy with food, water, power, electricity and telecommunications, all demands that are frequently uttered towards Israel.
Involve the international community
This was kind of necessary, because a global coalition had been fighting against the Nazis. There’s a reason why there were American, British, French and Soviet judges at the Nuremberg trials. There is no international coalition fighting in Gaza. It’s a totally different kind of war.
Ensure that anyone accused of this crime would have a chance to defend themselves against the charges with legal representation
Yahya Sinwar used to be in an Israeli prison for the abduction, torture and murder of several Palestinians and Israelis. He had received a fair trial with representation and in prison, he was able to get a degree from the University of Tel Aviv. One day, he complained about vision problems. Israeli doctors discovered a tumor in his brain and removed it, saving his life. He was released in 2011 as part of an exchange to free a hostage held by Hamas and ended up as the mastermind behind the October 7 attacks. One of the surgeon’s nephews is among the civilians Hamas abducted into Gaza.
This man received a fair trial and treatment for his abhorrent crimes and yet, once released, he orchestrated one of the worst terrorist attacks in history. How do you deal with people like this?
Took the “innocent” (relatively speaking) civilians of the country, made some effort to rebuild their country, and carefully set up structures which would address the root causes that had led to the breeding ground for hatred that had been created where the problem had festered in the first place.
The Nazis were only in power for 12 years. While they indoctrinated many - and I recall from my elderly relatives that some of the hate they were taught as schoolchildren remained with them for their entire lives - they did not have the decades upon decades of time that Palestinian extremists had to indoctrinate the children of their people.
In order to remove the Nazis from power, in order to eliminate them as a threat, much of Germany had to be razed to the ground and it needed to be occupied for decades. Millions were killed, millions were displaced. Those who survived and rebuilt had very little interest in dealing with the past. The process of denazification that followed took many decades and was only getting into full swing once the children of those who had experienced WW2 as adults started to ask serious questions. “What did you do during the war, mom/dad?” became an uncomfortable staple of many family dinners in the late '60s. The '68 revolution ousted many former Nazis out of positions of power in West Germany, against a state that chose to react to this with violence and repression, until the pressure became overwhelming. The modern German culture of remembrance, the Germany as we know it today as a tolerant, pluralistic nation with an honest approach to its past was born in those days.
Hamas need to go first, then there needs to be a benevolent occupation and a complete rewiring of Palestinian society, to the point that at some point, children are beginning to ask uncomfortable questions to their parents. Only then can we start to talk about concessions towards Palestine.
with an oppressive open-air prison
Gaza was never an open-air prison. This is yet another propaganda talking point that you are repeating, without ever having bothered to check its veracity. I encourage you to look into what life in Gaza was like before the war. The only oppressors there were Hamas.
I’m not excusing any murder, kidnapping, or rape of the innocent on October 7th. The people who did it should be punished.
Two sentences. That’s all you have to say about the people responsible for this war, its continuation and worst atrocities. You only vaguely state that they should be punished, but don’t appear to have thought about how that’s supposed to happen.
and somehow we managed to react to that without starving millions of children
1.170.000 civilians died in Germany during WW2, many of which through bombs, but a significant portion of these died from starvation. The Allies were not sending over food during the war. After the war, hundreds of thousands more died from starvation, exposure and disease, especially in 1946 and 1947, when the entirety of Germany was directly occupied. There was aid being sent at that point, but it was wholly insufficient. Please educate yourself before making statements like these. You aren’t exactly doing your credibility any favors with this.
continuing an endless cycle of suffering
Did you know that there was a point in time, up until well into the 1970s, when the borders between Palestinian and Israeli territories were very open? There was almost complete freedom of travel, which citizens from both sides of the border used. There are still some older Israelis who recall going to restaurants in Gaza. Terrorism conducted by ruthless opportunists ended this, terrorism fueled by pure hatred, by virulent antisemitism deliberately destroyed the tiny sprouts of hope and peace that were sprouting. None of the violence that followed would have happened without massacres like the Munich attack.
Israel is not innocent in this conflict, far from it. I’m not denying the Nakba, I’m not denying the everyday suffering of Palestinians, I would never state that they shouldn’t do more, I will never be a supporter of the current government, but you are making the serious mistake of portraying the Palestinians, which are their own people with agency, with the ability to choose their leaders and their futures, as these hapless children that are perpetually being bullied around. Don’t infantilize them like that. They have a shared responsibility for this continued conflict and its time they start building a future for themselves.
Ukraine is mostly getting old stock, weapons that would otherwise be destroyed, because they are at or past their expiration date.
Israel gets the latest kit, which they are buying with American money from American arms manufacturers. An entirely different mechanism. It should be noted that Israel is mostly self-sufficient in terms of military weapons, but it’s of course more convenient for them to take this aid than to make weapons they could make themselves.
As for “political capital”, Ukraine and Israel are so thoroughly different in this regard, it’s like they are from two different planets. In no way are they comparable other than that America has a vested interest in keeping both alive and on its side.
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Sorry, bud, but we’ve gotta help some white colonists genocide native brown people. I’m sure you understand.
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Sorry Zel, your weapons are sent to Israel so they can murder some brown people.
Israel and Ukraine need very different weapons. This is false.
I don’t think they’re saying literally that the same weapons are being sent to one destination or else the other – the issue is the authorization being there or not.
I think the point is that providing weapons for Israel so they can continue the slaughter, basically the whole US political spectrum except for a few scattered outliers is behind, whereas weapons for Ukraine is this big struggle and debate with a lot of people on the pro-invasion side. And even the people who are saying “We MUST arm Ukraine so she can defend herself, what’s going on in an offense against humanity” are also pretty much giving Netanyahu a stern waggling of the finger (if that) and a hearty handshake and a big check in support, as his ongoing genocide continues.
The reason why support for Ukraine is so shaky is that Republicans have been thoroughly compromised by the nation that started the war and has an interest in removing American support for Ukraine. Trump is far from the only leading Republican who is bought and paid for by Moscow.
Israel is an entirely different matter. As much as Netanyahu is a terrible person, he did not start this war and had absolutely no other choice than to respond to Hamas murderous rampage with a campaign to remove the terrorist organization. There was no other option and someone far further left on the political spectrum would have to do the same. Hell, any nation on Earth, including the most peace-loving ones, would have started a full-on war in reaction to attack like this.
The relationship between Israel and the USA is also far firmer than between Ukraine and the USA and not just because of the routinely overstated influence of the “Israel lobby”. Israel is a far more important country, the most important Western partner in the Middle East for strategic reasons alone. It’s a hub for cutting-edge research in pretty much all areas, from biotech to defense and it houses some of the most important chip fabs in the world - think of it as a second Taiwan. It’s also a startup hub, one of the most important places for new high-tech companies to emerge in the world. You have very likely used technology and inventions that came from Israel without knowing it. Intel for example has had a presence in the country since the 1970s, pretty much since the beginning of close US-Israeli ties, and benefited massively from the research and development that happened there.
Israel is small and surrounded by enemies that have tried to destroy it and its people (what do you think “From the river to the sea!” actually means?) from the moment it was conceived by the UN. You are making a serious and sadly these days very common mistake of falling for a massive worldwide propaganda campaign - fueled by Iran, Russia and China, who are doing it in an attempt to weaken one of America’s most important strategic partners - that tries to portray the justified, if brutal, war against an organization that does everything in their power to get as many civilians on both sides killed as a genocide, while at the same time ignoring the real and openly stated genocidal intentions of this terrorist pseudo-state and its supporters. The whole genocide argument falls apart at even the most cursory glance: Why would a country with genocidal intentions go through enormous lengths to minimize civilian casualties, far more so than any other country in the world? The IDF is the only military on the planet that is routinely informing civilians through calls, messages, flyers, hacked TV stations, web services, etc. before air strikes and ground operations. This is nearly completely unheard of elsewhere and entirely unheard of at this kind of scale. This actually hurts Israel militarily, as it allows not just civilians, but also terrorists to get away.
Why would they go through all of this trouble if the aim was to exterminate a people? How would a pluralistic democracy where Israeli Arabs (they don’t like to call themselves Palestinians) have representation in the Knesset and even a Supreme Court judge decide to commit genocide anyway? Not to mention, if they were truly genocidal, they would start with the members of this people within their own borders, with an increasingly harsh campaign to separate them from the majority to slowly lead over to extermination, which is the opposite of what’s happening in Israel, where - despite some very real discrimination, not too dissimilar to minorities in other developed nations - Israeli Arabs has gained more rights, influence and representation instead of less over time.
Note that I’m not saying that there are no war crimes being committed by Israel in Gaza. That would be preposterous. I’m certain that, just like in sadly any war, there are individual soldiers satisfying their blood lust. I’m also not denying that Palestinians have experienced and are experiencing countless injustices from the Israeli state and individual Israelis, especially settlers. This is however entirely different from the allegation that there is a planned, systematic campaign to murder an entire people. I think many people who are parroting this claim have good intentions, but are simply too inexperienced with what wars look like, mistake the absurd overrepresentation of this conflict in the media compared to other, much worse ongoing wars with this war being much worse. Assad had - in a single prison - about as many people murdered as have allegedly (we only have Hamas numbers) been killed in Gaza. The civil war in Sudan has seen massacres at a near incomprehensible scale, with tens of thousands dying over the course of days - yet barely anyone is talking about this. Why is that? Why are we all so obsessed with this tiny strip of arid land in the Middle East? I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be watchful, that the international community should not be Israel’s bad conscience, but there is still something profoundly wrong with the way our media - both news and social media - elevates this conflict above every other war.
Sorry for the wall of text. I hope you don’t mind it and the fact that I have some opinions that go against the majority in this community.
One reason why support for Israel is so unanimous is that all politicians have been compromised to some degree by AIPAC’s influence. It’s just being done in a “legal” fashion and a lot more competently than the (also fairly effective) job that Russia is doing.
This conflict has been going on for a long time before October.
Absolutely false. Or rather – it is false that he was obligated to respond by starving children and everyone else, bombing hospitals, and absolutely guaranteeing the continuation of the conflict. Do you really think there’s a single person in Palestine today who doesn’t want to see Israel eradicated off the face of the planet?
If your goal is to eradicate Hamas, this course of action is the absolute last one you would choose.
In the aftermath of World War 2, the allies faced the issue of what to do with the nation that had invented a whole new type of crime against humanity. What they did was:
And, will you look at that, it worked, and we don’t have a continuing insurrection decade after decade in Germany today, with an oppressive open-air prison for all the German people which keeps flaring up into terrorism and murder.
I’m not excusing any murder, kidnapping, or rape of the innocent on October 7th. The people who did it should be punished. The holocaust was orders of magnitude worse, though, and somehow we managed to react to that without starving millions of children and continuing an endless cycle of suffering even into the present day.
Lengthy reply, you have been warned.
The influence of this organization, while not small, is vastly overstated. I explained in my previous comment the significant strategic importance of Israel to the US and other Western nations, which is the actual reason. That famous Iron Dome defensive system for example is also used by America to protect key locations. American and German (and soon British) tanks are getting equipped with Trophy APS, developed in Israel and used very effectively in Gaza (I’ve seen footage of this system intercepting multiple missiles in a row), which can intercept missiles before they hit the armor. This kind of tech - and it’s not just defense tech - is priceless and you can’t get it anywhere else at this level of quality right now.
That is an awful and very misleading source going by the note at the top alone (no serious expert is disputing that a terrorist missile fell on that hospital) and by this war I meant this war in Gaza, which Hamas did start. The conflict as a whole can be traced back to arbitrary points in time, but the modern starting point would be when the Arab coalition attacked the young nation of Israel the moment it was founded according to a UN resolution.
Hamas is hoarding vast amounts of food, fuel, medical supplies and are openly stealing aid coming into the strip, often by force. Just like they are to blame for the start of this war, they are to blame for most of the suffering.
When a hospital is used to launch missiles at civilians in Israel, how is Israel to respond? Are they supposed to let their own people die or do they have the right to defend themselves? The Geneva convention is very clear on this: The moment a civilian structure is being used for military purposes, it loses all protections. It sounds harsh, but the idea behind this is to discourage this kind of behavior by malevolent actors.
Prior to this war, tens of thousands of Palestinians were working in Israel, earning the same wages as Israelis would, which means they earned several times as much as they would in Palestinian territories. Thousands were being treated in Israeli hospitals. Food, power, water and telecommunications were being provided for free. Israel was brokering a deal with Egypt and Palestinians for the exploitation of a gas field at the coast of Gaza, which would have provided energy independence for the strip and a significant source of revenue for Palestinians.
Hamas ended all of this. Israel - despite its many faults - has repeatedly made concessions and incentivized peaceful coexistence. Every single time, they were rewarded with more violence and hate. When they forcefully evicted all settlers out of the Gaza Strip, Hamas thanked them by launching attacks - rockets, bombs, stabbings, shootings, suicide bombers - in response and they deliberately destroyed the greenhouses, water pipes and fields left behind by the settlers. How do you deal with an organization like that?
I wonder if you are aware of what Palestinian children are being taught at school. It makes the kind of hate children in Nazi Germany exposed to look like Sesame Street. I highly recommend you read this report (PDF link at the beginning) in its entirety. It’s lengthy, but very illuminating:
https://unwatch.org/un-teachers-call-to-murder-jews-reveals-new-report/
Please tell me what you make of this. This indoctrination has been the primary factor in keeping this conflict alive. It has done far more damage than any bomb or any rampaging settler.
If you respond to one of the worst terrorist attacks in history by making concessions, you are telling the terrorists that violence works and thereby encourage further attacks like these in the future. Is this the kind of message you would want to send? Hamas knew that with their attack, peace between Palestine and Israel would be made impossible for decades. They counted on it, because this is what gives them power. The only response to an organization that works like this can be to destroy it and then and only then work on more peaceful steps to resolve the issue. More on that later.
Most Israelis abhor the settlers and their land grabbing. They want peaceful coexistence. Within the current Israeli government, there are however many politicians that support these deeply unpopular land grabs. This is a problem, but only for the duration of the war, as this government and its parties and politicians are not expected to survive the next election, especially not Netanyahu. I’m sure you recall the mass protest against him that went on for months before this war. His days are numbered.
That is one hell of an accusation. Israel has no control over Palestinian schools, not even in the West Bank, and they only have limited influence over the PNA. Neither did they interfere with how Hamas governed the strip, beyond retaliating for attacks and preventing the smuggling of weapons and materials that could be used for the creation of weapons and tunnels into the strip. Both Gaza and the West Bank are highly repressive ethno-religious autocracies similar to many other Muslim-majority states. This is not the fault of Israel - they would certainly prefer it if these were liberal democracies like Israel itself. In my opinion, the worst thing Israel does day-to-day to Palestinians outside of the war is restricting their movement within the West Bank. Random check- and choke points, arbitrary restrictions on movement, unpredictable treatment at the checkpoints. That’s a serious issue that needs to be addressed, but given the highly volatile security situation - Hamas is very active in the West Bank as well - it’s unlikely that there would be improvements for Palestinians in the near future.
I’m not sure if you are aware of this, but there is what can only be called a human sacrifice ritual going on in the West Bank. Teenagers (mostly) are being encouraged to attack certain Israeli check points near a Palestinian hospital with slings - serious weapons that can kill a man at long distance and have been used for warfare for millennia. Soldiers then shoot back at them using small-caliber ammunition, aiming at their legs. Pretend-medics (seriously, these men are not trained at all; their incompetence is staggering), then pretend to tend to them - many die or end up with lifelong injuries. All of this happens at set locations in front of a large number of journalists ready to capture the macabre spectacle with their cameras - and it provides a steady daily trickle of “murdered kids” for Palestinians propagandists to use in order to sway naive, well-meaning Westerners to support organizations that openly advocate for the destruction of Israel.
This has been going on for decades. I first saw a TV report on this back in the 1990s and it fundamentally changed my view of the conflict. There is something seriously wrong with a society that values its children so little, its willing to throw their lives away this callously for political gain. Fundamental reform is needed.
How? They are mindful, they are, as I explained in my previous comment, above and beyond what every other military is doing to minimize casualties, but they are fighting against a terrorist pseudo-state that is doing the very opposite, deliberately doing everything in their power to increase the number of dead on their side. Read this in-depth academic report on the issue:
https://stratcomcoe.org/publications/hybrid-threats-hamas-use-of-human-shields-in-gaza/87
It’s accessible and you can get the gist of it from the first few pages, if you don’t have much time. The evidence provided in it is overwhelming.
This is not the fault of Israel, but of Palestinian terror organizations. They only wear uniforms during parades. Even in their own propaganda footage, they can be seen fighting in civilian clothes. This is deliberate. They not only hope to blend in (some terrorists have even been caught wearing female clothing), but also to encourage twitchy, scared soldiers to see any Palestinian as a threat and fire at them, in the hopes that this way, more civilians are killed, which to Hamas, as they have repeatedly and openly stated, is the goal for both internal and external propaganda.
How do you fight an enemy like this?
Continued below.
Yes, I agree with this. I said “one reason” when I started my message; this is the other reason. Honestly, that side of it, I don’t care about in the slightest. The US has a lot of friends and a lot of strategic partners. If one of them starts killing children in large numbers, I think it’s reasonable to reevaluate if the strategic geopolitical gains are the diplomatic losses (not to mention the going to Hell for at the end of our lives.)
Most of what you’re saying factually about the conflict, I actually fully agree with. A think a whole lot of your statements of judgement could be viewed in absolute exact mirror image from the opposite side, though.
Are Palestinians allowed to say these things about Israel?
Why not?
I could send you any number of videos or news stories about IDF soldiers killing children or people who are obviously innocent, equally fucked-up stories to match your (very real) fucked-up stories about what Hamas is doing. Do you want me to do that; do you not believe that these things are happening? I can send you reliable sources if you want; what’s reliable to you? New York Times, Wikipedia, Haaretz or Israeli media? That’s a for real serious question. Do you not believe that the IDF is doing atrocities? What source would you believe? UN reports?
(I believe, I should say, that the answer is no: Palestinians should not be able to justify anything they do to innocent Israelis in these terms. I just think it cuts both ways: No murder and rape at the music festival, no starvation of children. Surely you can see that both of those are punishment of the innocent for “crimes” committed by others that they may not agree with or be in any way responsible for? Or no?)
Lack of food to a civilian population is abhorrent by any standard. Don’t give me crap about how Hamas is hoarding the aid. Hamas is a profoundly corrupt organization and always has been. The people who weren’t starving before, and now are, are doing so because Israel is blocking the aid. These are the numbers; there is not enough to feed everyone. That’s Israel’s decision and the consequences of it are on the Israeli government.
Would that situation be alright for the United States to impose on Israel to redress an injustice the Israeli leadership and military had committed? A yearslong embargo like the one on Gaza, and then sudden reduction of food aid (which the population was now dependent on) to a small fraction, even as famine and starvation set in? Even to the extent of starving people who never agreed with Netanyahu’s policies, or people too young to even understand what was happening?
If you claim the right for Israel to do these things to Gaza, why would the Palestinians or the Americans not have the right to do this to Israelis? What’s the difference?
I want you to take a look at this map:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/interactive/2023/israel-palestine-gaza-west-bank-borders/
You agree with that factually, right? The 6/6 map showing the present day?
Surely you can see the problem with moving into someone else’s house, telling them at gunpoint they need to find a new place to live, telling them they can’t leave their new place they live now without your permission (which basically never comes), telling them you’ll control how much food and water and any type of goods they can receive and then say you’re “wanting peace”? No? Is that reasonable, is a settled peace enforced by overwhelming atrocity at any resistance, visited on both the guilty and the innocent; is that the reasonable outcome from that situation?
Part 2 (of 2, thankfully):
Palestinian territories were occupied by other nations, namely Egypt and Jordan, for decades during this time (a significant part of Palestine still is). This often repeated (and now outdated - it’s 2024) 75 years of oppression meme is highly misleading. Both Egypt and Jordan were not benevolent in their occupation and permitted the Palestinians under their rule no influence on how they were being governed. Furthermore, Palestinian refugees in various middle Eastern nations are essentially without rights for perpetuity. Please educate yourself on this instead of spreading falsehoods.
What on Earth is that supposed to mean?
You can not be serious.
The hell it isn’t.
I am not denying that many children have died in Gaza, but the numbers released by Hamas are not reliable at all. Read this:
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/how-gaza-health-ministry-fakes-casualty-numbers
Also, see the above report on Hamas deliberately putting civilians, including children, at danger. Hamas is to blame, not Israel.
Support for Hamas in Gaza, according to independent Palestinian polls, is lower than in the West Bank, where almost no bombs are falling. This is patently false. The opposite would be happening if what you said were true.
We are not in the aftermath phase of this war yet. Israel is sending in aid into areas that they are controlling, which is all you can realistically expect of them. During WW2, the Allies - unlike Israel - deliberately targeted civilians with bombs and low-flying aircraft - my own grandmother recalled how she had to flee from a funeral that was attacked by strafing allied warplanes flying at tree level, low enough for them to see who they were attacking. Also, nobody demanded of the Allies that they supplied the enemy with food, water, power, electricity and telecommunications, all demands that are frequently uttered towards Israel.
This was kind of necessary, because a global coalition had been fighting against the Nazis. There’s a reason why there were American, British, French and Soviet judges at the Nuremberg trials. There is no international coalition fighting in Gaza. It’s a totally different kind of war.
Yahya Sinwar used to be in an Israeli prison for the abduction, torture and murder of several Palestinians and Israelis. He had received a fair trial with representation and in prison, he was able to get a degree from the University of Tel Aviv. One day, he complained about vision problems. Israeli doctors discovered a tumor in his brain and removed it, saving his life. He was released in 2011 as part of an exchange to free a hostage held by Hamas and ended up as the mastermind behind the October 7 attacks. One of the surgeon’s nephews is among the civilians Hamas abducted into Gaza.
This man received a fair trial and treatment for his abhorrent crimes and yet, once released, he orchestrated one of the worst terrorist attacks in history. How do you deal with people like this?
The Nazis were only in power for 12 years. While they indoctrinated many - and I recall from my elderly relatives that some of the hate they were taught as schoolchildren remained with them for their entire lives - they did not have the decades upon decades of time that Palestinian extremists had to indoctrinate the children of their people.
In order to remove the Nazis from power, in order to eliminate them as a threat, much of Germany had to be razed to the ground and it needed to be occupied for decades. Millions were killed, millions were displaced. Those who survived and rebuilt had very little interest in dealing with the past. The process of denazification that followed took many decades and was only getting into full swing once the children of those who had experienced WW2 as adults started to ask serious questions. “What did you do during the war, mom/dad?” became an uncomfortable staple of many family dinners in the late '60s. The '68 revolution ousted many former Nazis out of positions of power in West Germany, against a state that chose to react to this with violence and repression, until the pressure became overwhelming. The modern German culture of remembrance, the Germany as we know it today as a tolerant, pluralistic nation with an honest approach to its past was born in those days.
Hamas need to go first, then there needs to be a benevolent occupation and a complete rewiring of Palestinian society, to the point that at some point, children are beginning to ask uncomfortable questions to their parents. Only then can we start to talk about concessions towards Palestine.
Gaza was never an open-air prison. This is yet another propaganda talking point that you are repeating, without ever having bothered to check its veracity. I encourage you to look into what life in Gaza was like before the war. The only oppressors there were Hamas.
Two sentences. That’s all you have to say about the people responsible for this war, its continuation and worst atrocities. You only vaguely state that they should be punished, but don’t appear to have thought about how that’s supposed to happen.
1.170.000 civilians died in Germany during WW2, many of which through bombs, but a significant portion of these died from starvation. The Allies were not sending over food during the war. After the war, hundreds of thousands more died from starvation, exposure and disease, especially in 1946 and 1947, when the entirety of Germany was directly occupied. There was aid being sent at that point, but it was wholly insufficient. Please educate yourself before making statements like these. You aren’t exactly doing your credibility any favors with this.
Did you know that there was a point in time, up until well into the 1970s, when the borders between Palestinian and Israeli territories were very open? There was almost complete freedom of travel, which citizens from both sides of the border used. There are still some older Israelis who recall going to restaurants in Gaza. Terrorism conducted by ruthless opportunists ended this, terrorism fueled by pure hatred, by virulent antisemitism deliberately destroyed the tiny sprouts of hope and peace that were sprouting. None of the violence that followed would have happened without massacres like the Munich attack.
Israel is not innocent in this conflict, far from it. I’m not denying the Nakba, I’m not denying the everyday suffering of Palestinians, I would never state that they shouldn’t do more, I will never be a supporter of the current government, but you are making the serious mistake of portraying the Palestinians, which are their own people with agency, with the ability to choose their leaders and their futures, as these hapless children that are perpetually being bullied around. Don’t infantilize them like that. They have a shared responsibility for this continued conflict and its time they start building a future for themselves.
The political capital and dollar bills used are the same though.
No.
Ukraine is mostly getting old stock, weapons that would otherwise be destroyed, because they are at or past their expiration date.
Israel gets the latest kit, which they are buying with American money from American arms manufacturers. An entirely different mechanism. It should be noted that Israel is mostly self-sufficient in terms of military weapons, but it’s of course more convenient for them to take this aid than to make weapons they could make themselves.
As for “political capital”, Ukraine and Israel are so thoroughly different in this regard, it’s like they are from two different planets. In no way are they comparable other than that America has a vested interest in keeping both alive and on its side.