Israel - Palestine Discussion | Post Respectfully | Discuss more, tweet less

Apparently there is a video going around of a few beheaded babies. It’s not gone through the usual channels though and I have no idea if it’s been verified and geolocated. All seems a bit strange.

Ive no intentions to view and find out. I’ll wait for the news on this one. Was done with dead babies long ago. So please don’t dm and ask me for videos.
 
Just seen two people interviewed on Sky news. A Palestinian actress then a Jewish actress whose mum was a holocaust survivor.

Generally it was the same old same old. But the Jewish actress (Emmerdale?) Was asked about how the Jewish community feels. Her main emphasis was fear as the non Jews in the country and govt were not supporting them. I mean wtf? Israel flags on buildings, "we stand with Israel" from virtually every minister. How much support does she want?
 
Beheadings in a kibbutz, it was reported by I24 that man, woman, kids and babies were beheaded but it is now being allegedly denied by the Israeli Army.

It does sound a bit far fetched from a practical view. Beheadings take time and effort compared to just pulling the trigger.

No, i've never beheaded anyone



That's different. The bomb is doing the beheading. Several degrees of separation
 
And do you not see an issue with that? Put the fate of your people's future at hands of the same international community that has been apathetic towards their plight, and fearful of upsetting their Israeli allies?

I think it's a terrible situation, but that's what the reality is (as far as I can tell), after Hamas delivered provocation and justification for a huge military offense to Israel.
 


In the real world, Palestinians are pulling their babies from rubble without heads. This is the Israeli response.
 
None of it is reliable when you know where it's coming from and why it's being framed as it is. Body counts, without being sinister, are all you can go by in a conflict like this because individual propaganda distortions are everywhere (military trains for it: all of them).
 
Just seen two people interviewed on Sky news. A Palestinian actress then a Jewish actress whose mum was a holocaust survivor.

Generally it was the same old same old. But the Jewish actress (Emmerdale?) Was asked about how the Jewish community feels. Her main emphasis was fear as the non Jews in the country and govt were not supporting them. I mean wtf? Israel flags on buildings, "we stand with Israel" from virtually every minister. How much support does she want?
Feels this is part of the issue, this weird publicising your fear on major media that supports you.

Reminds me of that Finkelstein video with the crying woman.
 
I think it's a terrible situation, but that's what the reality is (as far as I can tell), after Hamas delivered provocation and justification for a huge military offense to Israel.
Hamas has only been around since the the late 80s, Palestinians have suffered the same dire straits long before their formation. The Palestinians tried the secular approach to resistance with the PLO. It was crushed with the help of Israel's allies only to be replaced with something more sinister. Do you not see the issue here?
 
A first step would involve speaking with one galvanized voice instead of with two feuding geographically isolated factions, each with a different strategy on how to move forward. A second would be total demilitarization, the ditching of paramilitary groups committed to the destruction of Israel, not being Iranian proxies (both of the latter being obvious showstoppers among the Israelis). Given the events of the past few days, that decision has now been taken off the table since Hamas' days are numbered as well.

Remember when Serbian generals Mladic and Milosevic convinced young Bosnians in Srebrenica to give up their weapons and that they are good friends to them. All while being protected by neutral side that were Netherlands soldiers that presented UN.

Yeah, that was a great moment in history for our country.
 
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This picture is from the bbc, nothing special really. might only register clearly if you’ve seen conflict, but this is 3 days into a conflict that’s barely began, an affluent neighbourhood reduced to rubble. Clear evidence of fires as well as air strikes.countless lives and memories basically destroyed. The hulk of those buildings now only useful to terrorists. And evidence that Israel have completely changed tactics from anything they’ve ever done before.

at this rate it’s gonna be grozny or bakhmut.
 
Individual stories, as if people have forgotten already, are usually bullshit in times of war. I wouldn't even be sharing any of them. Whatever the "side". Keep with tdodgy he general statistics: troop movements, bombardments, developments, regional and elsewhere. Bogged down in dodgy propaganda material in an age of deepfakes is pointless.
 
But Israeli policy has been to divide the Palestinians, with Netanyahu himself claiming it beneficial to keep Hamas' ranks bolstered. The fact is the leaders of neither side want peace, as the status quo bolsters both their respective positions. Iran are obviously culpable in continuing to arm belligerent factions, but the same can be said for the US for giving Israel carte blanche in their own colonialist policies via diplomatic and military protection.

This idea that the onus lies on the Palestinians to steer a path to peace is a false one at best. And even if they do oblige there's no guarantees Israel would oblige them in a just manner, nor would it guarantee they'd cease obliging the ultra-orthodox demographic who consider it a God given right for them to amass as much land as they can.

The power differential in the Israeli - Palestinian issue is lopsidedly in favor of the Israelis, so ultimately they have all the power (this is doubly so when you consider they are fully backed by the US). Therefore any attempt to engage them militarily by way of Hamas or any of the other usual suspects, will obviously securitize them into thinking they have to leverage their power to suppress what they regard as threats. Therefore, having a paramilitary organization dedicated to their destruction (even worse an Iranian proxy) only incentivizes the Israelis to be restrictive and seek military solutions. Once you remove Hamas and other similar groups, the Israeli excuse to securitize and restrict goes away. That would've been the preferred approach, but now that Hamas have effectively done what they were created to do, they are probably going to be destroyed and untold amounts of Palestinians affected (killed, injured, displaced, or lacking in basic services to survive).
 
Just seen two people interviewed on Sky news. A Palestinian actress then a Jewish actress whose mum was a holocaust survivor.

Generally it was the same old same old. But the Jewish actress (Emmerdale?) Was asked about how the Jewish community feels. Her main emphasis was fear as the non Jews in the country and govt were not supporting them. I mean wtf? Israel flags on buildings, "we stand with Israel" from virtually every minister. How much support does she want?
I think this is a flaw in human emotion. I know several Jewish people who are very much on the progressive side of the field, and those who are Republican leaning are very centrist when it comes to geo politics... EXCEPT for when it comes to Israel. Part of me completely gets it, the other part of me wonders where any sense if objectivity went. At the same time we shouldn't underestimate their fears of persecution with the rise of anti semitism amongst non Muslims so looking at it that way - they probably now see danger coming from more than one direction.
I think one could write a term paper on that topic alone.
 
Hamas has only been around since the the late 80s, Palestinians have suffered the same dire straits long before their formation. The Palestinians tried the secular approach to resistance with the PLO. It was crushed with the help of Israel's allies only to be replaced with something more sinister. Do you not see the issue here?

Palestinians have to share the blame for failed statehood. Suggested the same book to people about 4 times now, but read the iron cage by rashid khalidi.
 
The power differential in the Israeli - Palestinian issue is lopsidedly in favor of the Israelis, so ultimately they have all the power (this is doubly so when you consider they are fully backed by the US). Therefore any attempt to engage them militarily by way of Hamas or any of the other usual suspects, will obviously securitize them into thinking they have to leverage their power to suppress what they regard as threats. Therefore, having a paramilitary organization dedicated to their destruction (even worse an Iranian proxy) only incentivizes the Israelis to be restrictive and seek military solutions. Once you remove Hamas and other similar groups, the Israeli excuse to securitize and restrict goes away. That would've been the preferred approach, but now that Hamas have effectively done what they were created to do, they are probably going to be destroyed and untold amounts of Palestinians affected (killed, injured, displaced, or lacking in basic services to survive).
If this is the case, then explain the West Bank where the PA has basically been working with Israel and sometimes Americans and lost enormous amounts of support because, after a long time of doing that, the Israelis are still stealing Palestinian land, as per international law, within the West Bank.

Abbas is hated precisely because of what I have written above.
 
Hamas has only been around since the the late 80s, Palestinians have suffered the same dire straits long before their formation. The Palestinians tried the secular approach to resistance with the PLO. It was crushed with the help of Israel's allies only to be replaced with something more sinister. Do you not see the issue here?

The issue is obvious. Have Islamists helped though?
 
The power differential in the Israeli - Palestinian issue is lopsidedly in favor of the Israelis, so ultimately they have all the power (this is doubly so when you consider they are fully backed by the US). Therefore any attempt to engage them militarily by way of Hamas or any of the other usual suspects, will obviously securitize them into thinking they have to leverage their power to suppress what they regard as threats. Therefore, having a paramilitary organization dedicated to their destruction (even worse an Iranian proxy) only incentivizes the Israelis to seek military solutions. Once you remove Hamas and other similar groups, the Israeli excuse to securitize and restrict goes away. That would've been the preferred approach, but now that Hamas have effectively done what they were created to do, they are probably going to be destroyed and untold amounts of Palestinians affected (killed, injured, displaced, or lacking in basic services to survive).
With all due respect this is a naively optimistic take.

The Israelis haven't refused to declare their borders because of the Palestinian hostilities for starters (it wouldn't make sense). And it also doesn't explain why they've ramped up settlement efforts in PA run territory (an essentially demilitarised faction).
 
No country worth its salt would accept a total demilitarization, unless you want to self-destruct. You're living in a fantasy land and I don't believe for one second that you seriously meant that.

Contrary to what some would like to portray, they aren't a swashbuckling band of noble Che Guevara cosplayers. They are a paramilitary faction that doesn't represent a country, and in the US, EU and a slew of other countries, a terrorist organization. Therefore demilitarization would be an essential step.

Even if you kill every single Hamas member, as long as the same conditions persists, another extremist organization will take their place. That's how it works. Keep the blinders on and history will repeat itself.

Its been done with Al-Qaeda and ISIS, both of which had their leaders killed and capabilities marginalized into being virtual non-entities. This despite the usual trope of "you can kill the militant but you can't kill the ideal they represent - a new group will simply replace them" trope. That myth has been successfully squashed.
 
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The issue is obvious. Have Islamists helped though?
Again, the 'issue' has predated the 'Islamists'. Its a common theme with conflicts in the middle east - these radical factions aren't conjured spontaneously. They fill a vacuum where people are hopeless, pushed to the edge and bereft of options. There no was Hamas in 1947 or even 1977, likewise no terrorists in Iraq prior to 2003, no Hezbollah prior to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1980.

Israel could and will easily demolish Hamas, but in doing so they only compound further suffer and misery on the Palestinians, spawning a new belligerent faction that will only cause the cycle to hopelessly persist.
 
Yeah parallels, if you ignore pretty much the entirety of the situation.
How so? He was asking why the support for Israel or Palestine is so divided down sectarian lines. One side identifies with the other because of their own experience, which they view as similar.

Obviously, it's more nuanced than that. But the question didn't ask for nuance, since it was about broad strokes.
 
With all due respect this is a naively optimistic take.

The Israelis haven't refused to declare their borders because of the Palestinian hostilities for starters (it wouldn't make sense). And it also doesn't explain why they've ramped up settlement efforts in PA run territory (an essentially demilitarised faction).

The settlement expansion is driven by domestic political conditions that allow it to happen, which in turn is underwritten by insecurity.
 
They are both terrible events in their own right.

I don't think there's an obligation to do so on the next breath. Because what happens in actuality is the next breath becomes the next post, which becomes the next page, which becomes the next thread, which becomes "whataboutism"

And who does it look bad to? And why? Language isn't neutral. There's a purpose behind efforts to silence or minimize anything outside of the events from Sunday.

I just think it's something people use to drive the anger and hatred on both sides and we should be able to acknowledge the atrocities in their own right while not forgetting the past either.

It's a fine line and while I don't think anyone here is using it to drive hatred, plenty others are. It's an old, effective tactic extremists utilise. The "look what they've done to us" and revenge mentality keeps these conflicts fuelled.
 
Its been done with Al-Qaeda and ISIS, both of which had their leaders killed and capabilities marginalized into being virtual non-entities
You leave out that other militant factions were largely involved, too, including Hezbollah, in the destruction of ISIS as an entity in various parts of the mid-east. Iraqi militias, too, as you have to know given your own background, played and still play a role.
 
Its been done with Al-Qaeda and ISIS, both of which had their leaders killed and capabilities marginalized into being virtual non-entities. This despite the usual trope of "you can kill the militant but you can;'t kill the ideal they represent - a new group will simply replace them" trope. That myth has been successfully squashed.
Factions like ISIS aren't a viable parallel considering they were equally, if not more brutal to the people in the nations they lay sieged on, and were despised with even more fervour by the people of Iraq and Syria, who by the way played an equal if not bigger role in annihilating them.

The reason Hamas continues to exist is because of Israel's heavy handed response, spawning generation after generation of grief-stricken Palestinians with nothing to lose, being easy prey for their recruitment drive.
 
The settlement expansion is driven by domestic political conditions that allow it to happen, which in turn is underwritten by insecurity.
Its not, that might be the security justification for it, but I think we both know that's hardly the drive for it. Its driven largely by ultra-orthodox or extreme hardliners who consider the land to be theirs, and theirs only. Its also a means for the government to weaken the Palestinian negotiating hand when it comes to peace, which if/when it arrives will leave them with completely disconnected, fractured cobbles of land.