Israel attacks Gaza

[anitram]

it seems like the most pro-Hamas posters in here are the ones who are particularly sensitive to any discussion of anti-Semitism.

Who here is pro-Hamas??

This part of your post is seriously disturbed.

 

[Irvine511]

Yet the claim of a Jewish nation is religious by it's very nature, not secular. It is a conversion religion. Being Jewish does not mean you are member of one race, there is no 'Jewish' people anymore than there is a Catholic or Protestant people therefore any land claim based purely on Judaism is unsustainable. So the idea of prior land rights in general is not applicable.

so what do you suggest we do with the Israelis? send them back to Europe?

i also think you very much misunderstand the ethnic component to Judaism and the fact that it's not analogous to Catholicism or Protestantism. certainly, anyone can convert to Judaism, but to deny that there isn't, for lack of a better word, a "Jewish people" ignores the history of Jews in Europe throughout the Middle Ages.

 

[yolland]

The 'well-off homes in the West' argument is grotesquely ahistorical, as is the assertion that the 'notion' Jews were and are perceived by themselves and others as an ethnoracial group is merely some Zionist political fiction. And neither whitewash is remotely necessary for grasping why the Palestinians correctly perceive that decisions made by the British (who were acting out of political self-interest, not philosemitism) over their heads and against their will, followed by 60 years of independent Israel having the military upper hand and acting like it, has left them, even in the realm of possibility, with far less land than they might have controlled otherwise.

 

[Irvine511]

Long-term occupation does terrible things to a culture -- far worse than the Holocaust did to the Jewish people. The Jewish migrants to the region already had homes in the West. They didn't need to steal that of others.

it's statements like this that belie the anti-Semitism latent in much of the discussion that surrounds this issue.

the subtext is, "we're so sick of hearing about the Holocaust, poor you, stop with your museums and your Spielberg Oscar winning movies, don't you Jews get enough attention?"

and so, some are quick to point out the "Israelis are the new Nazis" and they talk about genocide and ethnic cleansing and, oh the irony.

 

[Irvine511]

Who here is pro-Hamas??

i can PM you three posters who, in my opinion, are pro-Hamas (i.e., they seek the dissolution of Israel) if accusations are names are so important to your understanding of this discussion.

 

[Irvine511]

The 'well-off homes in the West' argument is grotesquely ahistorical, as is the assertion that the 'notion' Jews were and are perceived by themselves and others as an ethnoracial group is merely some Zionist political fiction. And neither whitewash is remotely necessary for grasping why the Palestinians correctly perceive that decisions made by the British (who were acting out of political self-interest, not philosemitism) over their heads and against their will, followed by 60 years of independent Israel having the military upper hand and acting like it, has left them, even in the realm of possibility, with far less land than they might have controlled otherwise.

oh my gosh -- this must mean that Yolland is siding with Purpleoscar, Irvine, Melon, Stongbow, Ann Coulter, and Karl Rove!!!

 

[anitram]

i can PM you three posters who, in my opinion, are pro-Hamas (i.e., they seek the dissolution of Israel) if accusations are names are so important to your understanding of this discussion.

I think it's a pretty bold accusation to make. If you're talking about me, I certainly take great offense.

 

[Irvine511]

I think it's a pretty bold accusation to make. If you're talking about me, I certainly take great offense.

i think you're smart enough to know that i'm not talking about you.

i also think you know that listing names isn't terribly productive in FYM.

 

[financeguy]

um, but this has always been Hamas's policy. why do they parade bodies of dead kids through the street? why do they only need to outlast an onslaught, and offer up hundreds of dead bodies, in order to talk about "victory"?

it's the Hamas apologia in here that's more disturbing than my apparent racism for thinking that not all Israelis are Nazis, apparently.

Ah, so no evidence again.

Interesting that whenever Israel's war crimes are discussed, you want to turn the discussion into something else.

 

[Irvine511]

Ah, so no evidence again.

Interesting that whenever Israel's war crimes are discussed, you want to turn the discussion into something else.

what evidence do you want? this is baffling to me -- Hamas absolutely exploits human tragedy to it's fullest and elevates those who have been killed to the status of being a martyr.

there's ample discussion of Israel's war crimes in here and on the news. but i suppose i'm a racist who's just ignoring the issue if i don't condemn all Israelis as butchers and thieves and genocidal maniacs?

 

[financeguy]

Let's be honest here, we have only one country that has real influence with Israel, it's the United States. Which sends billions of dollars in aid, and billions more in military support. And that particular country only supports one side (referring to the government, not the people) and is as absent in its condemnation of Israel as some other countries are in their condemnation of Hamas. In fact, the ironic thing is that a number of Arab states, for their own reasons, actually have criticized Hamas. The US government is yet to criticize Israel at all in this conflict.

So we don't quite have one-sided anti-Israeli WORLD sentiment, do we? Lucky for Israel, they have the support of the one nation that actually matters.

This nails it precisely. Excellent post.

 

[financeguy]

it's statements like this that belie the anti-Semitism latent in much of the discussion that surrounds this issue.

the subtext is, "we're so sick of hearing about the Holocaust, poor you, stop with your museums and your Spielberg Oscar winning movies, don't you Jews get enough attention?"

and so, some are quick to point out the "Israelis are the new Nazis" and they talk about genocide and ethnic cleansing and, oh the irony.

While I strongly disagree with and repudiate Muldfeld's implication that occupation of Palestinian land is equivalent to the Holocaust, the point about Jewish migrants from the West is actually a legitimate point.

Seriously, how come US-borne Jews who have never lived in the Mid East and whose ancestors haven't done so for centuries get to have more land rights in the Middle East than the local people whose ancestors have lived there for generations?

I can understand it if it is Jews who are coming from countries where they are being subject to discrimination and oppression but I don't think anyone can seriously argue that the US and Canada are environments where Jews are suffering active discrimination.

 

[whatAday]

Gaza conflict seen as boost to Mideast hardliners: analysts - Yahoo! News

 

[A_Wanderer]

I think it's the other way around, the racism is usually in media representations of Palestinians as opposed to Israelis (the former are bearded and dress funny, therefore suspect, the latter dress more or less like us, ergo are probably the good guys. Some even have American accents - not surprisingly as some are actually Americans).

But, as apparently we're now in the business of suggesting FYM'rs who are angered at Israel's actions are antisemites, though I doubt if you are a racist, if we really want to talk of racism, some of your posts re Hamas are rather curious. To me saying that Hamas are deliberately getting their own kids killed is a shocking thing to say and potentially a racist slur, and strikes me as worryingly similar to the 'blood libel' slurs that used to be said by anti-semites against Jews. ( Blood libel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia )

Assuming your complaint that the conflict gets disproportionate attention refers to the media in general rather than this forum, in my opinion, saying that Israel doesn't get a fair hearing in the media is just delusional.

The TV station which Hamas runs uses children's programs to indoctrinate the cult of martyrdom, it tells kids that killing Jews is a path to heaven, and the staged marches which have children "playing" military operations are somewhat disturbing

Unlike the blood libel there is actually evidence for the assertion that Hamas has no interests in the future of Palestinian children beyond war.

 

[Bluer White]

^ Well, they are dressed funny.

No beards though.

 

[A_Wanderer]

Who here is pro-Hamas??

This part of your post is seriously disturbed.

To paraphrase Orwell, Muldfeld and Popshopper are objectively pro-Hamas.

They take an objection to Israeli war crimes to a point where they are excusing Islamist terror.

If someone wants Hamas to win (as in consolidate even more control and legitimacy in Gaza, not drive the Jews into the sea or any of that nonsense) then I don't think they care very much about Palestinian rights beyond condemning the Jewish state.

 

[yolland]

the point about Jewish migrants from the West is actually a legitimate point.

I was referring to its use as a historical generalization about Jewish emigration to Israel, period--because that was how it was being deployed, in a blanket way. There certainly were, even in the early years of the Zionist project, some Jews who emigrated purely out of religious or nationalistic idealism rather than a threatening social climate in their country of birth; but the history of where (in the main) Jewish immigrants to Israel were coming from during the late 19th through to the mid-20th centuries, as well as the trajectory of when and where the cause of a Jewish state became popular with various diaspora communities, clearly underscores the central role of first, the pogroms, and later, the rise of Nazism (and in both cases, strong resistance on the part of Western countries to absorbing Commie Jewish refugees), in driving support for a Jewish nation-state. As opposed to continuing the two-thousand-year-old cycle of periodically being driven out of [name of country] and moving on to beg for admission somewhere else, until the cycle repeats itself again.

Unfortunately--and this of course is the tragic irony it always comes back to (I say 'irony,' both because of the resulting Palestinian dispossession and because it echoes the pattern of cutting risky and questionable deals with rulers in exchange for safe residence that characterizes so much of Jewish diaspora history)--this was obviously never going to happen without those aspirations to nationhood being put into contest (through wooing an imperial power, of necessity) with the aspirations to nationhood of some other people elsewhere, because we're talking here about a longstanding diaspora population who'd long since been stripped of all formally recognized claims to a homeland. That is the irreversible part. What should not be irreversible is the 1967 annexation and occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, whose continuation justifiably makes the discrepancy in land entitlement you're citing all the more a source of outrage for the Palestinians. The particulars of Israel's Law of Return (which is a repatriation law, such as many countries have, favoring people with ancestral ties to the nation when granting citizenship) can certainly also be debated--as indeed it often is among Israelis--but that is a separate matter from the occupation itself, as well as from the debates over Palestinian right of return, which everyone recognizes would be a major negotiations point in any land-for-peace agreement.

 

[financeguy]

The TV station which Hamas runs uses children's programs to indoctrinate the cult of martyrdom, it tells kids that killing Jews is a path to heaven, and the staged marches which have children "playing" military operations are somewhat disturbing

Unlike the blood libel there is actually evidence for the assertion that Hamas has no interests in the future of Palestinian children beyond war.

Yes, but the problem is, one doesn't have to delve too far to find equivalent dodgy and racist propaganda on the other side....

Israeli Textbooks and Children’s Literature Promote Racism and Hatred Toward Palestinians and Arabs

By Maureen Meehan
Israeli school textbooks as well as children’s storybooks, according to recent academic studies and surveys, portray Palestinians and Arabs as “murderers,” “rioters,” “suspicious,” and generally backward and unproductive. Direct delegitimization and negative stereotyping of Palestinians and Arabs are the rule rather than the exception in Israeli schoolbooks.

Professor Daniel Bar-Tal of Tel Aviv University studied 124 elementary, middle- and high school textbooks on grammar and Hebrew literature, history, geography and citizenship. Bar-Tal concluded that Israeli textbooks present the view that Jews are involved in a justified, even humanitarian, war against an Arab enemy that refuses to accept and acknowledge the existence and rights of Jews in Israel.

“The early textbooks tended to describe acts of Arabs as hostile, deviant, cruel, immoral, unfair, with the intention to hurt Jews and to annihilate the State of Israel. Within this frame of reference, Arabs were delegitimized by the use of such labels as ‘robbers,’ ‘bloodthirsty,’ and ‘killers,’” said Professor Bar-Tal, adding that there has been little positive revision in the curriculum over the years.

Bar-Tal pointed out that Israeli textbooks continue to present Jews as industrious, brave and determined to cope with the difficulties of “improving the country in ways they believe the Arabs are incapable of.”

Hebrew-language geography books from the 1950s through 1970s focused on the glory of Israel’s ancient past and how the land was “neglected and destroyed” by the Arabs until the Jews returned from their forced exile and revived it “with the help of the Zionist movement.”

“This attitude served to justify the return of the Jews, implying that they care enough about the country to turn the swamps and deserts into blossoming farmland; this effectively delegitimizes the Arab claim to the same land,” Bar-Tal told the Washington Report. “The message was that the Palestinians were primitive and neglected the country and did not cultivate the land.”

Israeli Textbooks and Children’s Literature Promote Racism and Hatred Toward Palestinians and Arabs


I suppose I could also be cynical and point out that America and Israel are smart enough to wait until their kids get to high-school age before seeking to recruit them as soldiers:-

Uncle Sam Aggressively Recruits Teenagers as Armed Forces Miss Recruiting Quotas

"An effective sales approach would be to tailor a program to fit the needs and interests of the individual (high) school," exhorts the US Army's School Recruiting Program Handbook.
"For example, one school may place a premium on its music program; another may give prominence to its athletic program. One school may place more emphasis on its academic scholarship program. Each school has a distinct chain of command structure."

Thus, the handbook, first published in Fall 2004, directs Army recruiters on how to strategize an high school program to maximize enlistment among students. And if that's not enough to entice teenagers, in June 2005, the Defense Department began working with an outsourced direct marketing company to develop a database of personal and private information about every American aged 16 to 25. Included in the database are Social Security numbers, ethnicity and racial data, email addresses, birth dates and grade point averages.

High School Campus Recruiting Buried in President Bush's much-touted No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 was Section 9528, a requirement that all public and private high schools receiving federal funds must "provide access to students' names, addresses and phone numbers" to military recruiters. It also mandates that high schools must allow military recruiters the same campus access to students as is granted to college recruiters and prospective employers.

Israel Matzav: Moonbats try to counter IDF recruitment efforts

Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Moonbats try to counter IDF recruitment efforts

And you thought this only happened in countries that aren't fighting existential conflicts.

A group calling itself 'New Profile' (probably a reference to the 'profile' that IDF recruits receive that indicates their physical worthiness for combat units) is planning to hold events at public schools in Tel Aviv to counter 'brain washing' by the IDF that is urging teenagers not to dodge the draft.
In a move to protest the IDF's plan to send thousands of officers into the country's schools on Wednesday, New Profile - a movement opposed to what they see as "brainwashing" by the army - plans to set up a demonstration in which members dressed as IDF officers will wash a large model of a human brain.

The organizers of the planned protest hope to draw attention to the IDF's nationwide campaign for students and voice their opposition to the "militarization of Israeli society."

 

[financeguy]

I was referring to its use as a historical generalization about Jewish emigration to Israel, period--because that was how it was being deployed, in a blanket way. There certainly were, even in the early years of the Zionist project, some Jews who emigrated purely out of religious or nationalistic idealism rather than a threatening social climate in their country of birth; but the history of where (in the main) Jewish immigrants to Israel were coming from during the late 19th through to the mid-20th centuries, as well as the trajectory of when and where the cause of a Jewish state became popular with various diaspora communities, clearly underscores the central role of first, the pogroms, and later, the rise of Nazism (and in both cases, strong resistance on the part of Western countries to absorbing Commie Jewish refugees), in driving support for a Jewish nation-state. As opposed to continuing the two-thousand-year-old cycle of periodically being driven out of [name of country] and moving on to beg for admission somewhere else, until the cycle repeats itself again.

Unfortunately--and this of course is the tragic irony it always comes back to (I say 'irony,' both because of the resulting Palestinian dispossession and because it echoes the pattern of cutting risky and questionable deals with rulers in exchange for safe residence that characterizes so much of Jewish diaspora history)--this was obviously never going to happen without those aspirations to nationhood being put into contest (through wooing an imperial power, of necessity) with the aspirations to nationhood of some other people elsewhere, because we're talking here about a longstanding diaspora population who'd long since been stripped of all formally recognized claims to a homeland. That is the irreversible part.

The historical context for the creation of the Israeli state is to provide a homeland for Jewish people fleeing from pogroms and worse, I am not disputing that for a second.

The particulars of Israel's Law of Return (which is a repatriation law, such as many countries have, favoring people with ancestral ties to the nation when granting citizenship) can certainly also be debated--as indeed it often is among Israelis--but that is a separate matter from the occupation itself, as well as from the debates over Palestinian right of return, which everyone recognizes would be a major negotiations point in any land-for-peace agreement.

They are separate matters certainly, but it's an overcrowded spot of land, which I guess is part of what creates the conflict.

 

[financeguy]

Unlike the blood libel there is actually evidence for the assertion that Hamas has no interests in the future of Palestinian children beyond war.

That simply does not make rational sense to me.

I simply do not believe that a parent, any parent, has no interest in the future of their children beyond sending them to be killed in a war.

That's why I am arguing that there may be an unknowing racist underlying subcurrent to this whole 'Hamas breed kids to send them to battle' theory, or, even worse, the 'Hamas gets kids killed for propaganda advantage' thesis.

I greatly doubt Irvine's opinion that the Palestinian leadership is rejoicing and celebrating the deaths of their own kids. I find it a suspect proposition.

 

[A_Wanderer]

Nobody is saying that parents want their kids to die.

But using dead kids for propaganda is the reality, and I would cite Mohammed al-Dura as a perfect example.

 

[financeguy]

Nobody is saying that parents want their kids to die.

How else are posts such as the following supposed to be interpreted?

Hamas also deliberately stockpiles their weapons where there are lots and lots of civilians. bloody kids on Al-Jazeera is a great PR tactic.

don't know if this is the case here, but this is one of Hamas's tactics -- maximize their own civilian casualties in order to gain the greatest possible sympathy.

i mean no irony by my statement. dead kids help Hamas.

the truth of the matter, is that this appears to be a tragic, inexcusable mistake by the IDF.

and Hamas is likely thrilled.

i'm basing this on what i've been saying all along -- regardless of military importance, blowing up a school is precisely the kind of thing Hamas wants the IDF to do.

we know Hamas loves dead Palestinians. why would they not do things to ensure they get as many of them as possible.

i think Hamas is a murderous theocratic mafioso organization that uncovers bodies in the morgue so they can parade them through the streets. i think Hamas wants more dead Palestinians so they can wail about "no justice, no peace."

This is what passes for nuance in Washington DC.

Having said that, being European, it's actually my fault, as I'm a Nazi.

 

[yolland]

They are separate matters certainly, but it's an overcrowded spot of land, which I guess is part of what creates the conflict.

If it were up to me, sitting here in my comfy room in Indiana, to draw up the final boundaries, they would be more generous than what will probably result. But it's not, and even Israel's Arab neighbors seem to now be pushing the pre-1967 West Bank and Gaza territories as the goal to aim for. (Not that it's their right to tell the Palestinians what to do either, and certainly some of those regimes have in various ways f*ed over the Palestinians themselves enough times in pursuing their own regional interests.) So I see little practical use in tearing out my hair over the particulars of any future negotiations, especially at this miserable point, and prefer to focus on getting my own government to stop being so one-sided in implementing its role in getting that process back on the table.

I do think that the unevenness of the UN which melon pointed out is a serious problem regardless, and find the idea that 'this counteracts US one-sidedness, so it's OK' to be poor thinking, no matter how correct that diagnosis of the US. Not only does it hand Israel a great excuse to not take the UN seriously, but it also undercuts the UN's moral authority as an international organization.

 

[anitram]

Nobody is saying that parents want their kids to die.

But using dead kids for propaganda is the reality, and I would cite Mohammed al-Dura as a perfect example.

I think or I hope that even the most pro-Palestinian people recognize that Hamas does this. Hell, it's the sort of propaganda that happens in pretty much every war, and is not even unique to the Israel/Palestinian conflict. For example, Bosnia comes to mind.

But in the end, if that child is blown up in a way that clearly contravenes international law for whatever reason, and I think everyone can agree that there HAS been some of that happening here, then really, how much does it matter? Is it more important to discuss Hamas' PR moves or the fact that the children are, you know, in fact dead?

Hamas are a bunch of thugs, their actions are par for the course, but the bigger tragedy here is not them photographing dead bodies; it's the dead bodies in the first place. And THAT is what we should be striving to put an end to at the end of the day.

 

[A_Wanderer]

How else are posts such as the following supposed to be interpreted?

And he is talking about Hamas, do you think that Hamas is a fairly representative example of attitudes among the Palestinian people?

 

[financeguy]

George Galloway, hyping it up:-

YouTube - GEORGE GALLOWAY STOP MASSACRE (FULL VERSION) 8/1/09

At 4:15:

Now, I don't believe the British government understands the terrifying risks that it is running with the policy it is pursuing. As you've heard me say here before, they're always looking for some Muslim cleric to ban, some Muslim organisation to proscribe, some hapless Imam to blame for the radicalisation of Muslim youth.

How rrrrradical do ya think Muslims in Britain are feeling after two while weeks of watching this slaughter in Palestine?

Uh oh.

 

[financeguy]

And he is talking about Hamas, do you think that Hamas is a fairly representative example of attitudes among the Palestinian people?

They voted for Hamas.

 

[financeguy]

Hamas are a bunch of thugs, their actions are par for the course, but the bigger tragedy here is not them photographing dead bodies; it's the dead bodies in the first place. And THAT is what we should be striving to put an end to at the end of the day.

Absolutely, and it's simply weird, bizarre and disturbing that some here want to turn it into a debate about something else.

Is it possibly a form of sublimated Kollektivschuld about their taxpayer's money going to finance US-supported Israeli war crimes?

 

[A_Wanderer]

They voted for Hamas.

They also voted for Abbas, and there was a little civil war which went on before Hamas had control of Gaza.

I think that as a group which uses violence against civilians for political ends, and embraces a faith based ideology, Hamas does make calculated decisions to maximise civilian deaths to make Israel loose the propaganda war.

I don't think that most parents embrace the idea of having their children murdered.

 

[anitram]

I have to say I find it a little weird that when Bosnians were being photographed in smitherines and Kosovars were being photographed bloodied and muddied, and a lot of that was courtesy of the KLA, we weren't hearing the same tune. And as murderous as the Serbian regime under Milosevic was, the KLA would probably be considered a terrorist organization by most of the West in other circumstances, and nevermind the Jihadists in Bosnia or the thugs that hurt their own people there. And yet, the world correctly concluded that the solution here was to stop the asymmetrical "war" rather than to endlessly discuss whether the dead bodies were there for PR purposes. Even if they were, that didn't change the reality on the ground.