Israel, Palestine and Iran

[Panto_Villan]

3 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

We can feel sympathy for the civilians on both sides who are caught in the crossfire of power plays by their leaders. 

We can, but you also need to recognise Israel is a democracy and the increasingly nationalist government has been repeatedly re-elected by those civilians over the last couple of decades. These policies weren’t enacted in a vacuum.

I’d have even less sympathy if the civilians involved were settlers, but I don’t think that’s the case here? The settler areas are over the other side of Israel, near the West Bank rather than the Gaza Strip, right?

[sne]

They are hosting Switzerland i Tel Aviv in 4 days in the EURO's qualifications. Not important in the grand scheme of things but still gotta be handled.

[chrisp65]

2 hours ago, TheAuthority said:

I'm shocked that no-one on VT has mentioned which spark lit the fuse of this current crisis. I'm less surprised that all of the main stream outlets are just condemning the actions of the Palestinians without giving any context.

On October 4th, ultranationalist Jews stormed the Al-Asqua Mosque in East Jerusalem. According to Jewish law, entering any part of the Mosque compound is forbidden due to the sacred nature of the site. It's against their own laws FFS, but no, the orthodox radicals stormed the Mosque and starting trying to conduct Jewish religious rituals.

The idea that Hamas just launched a completely unprovoked attack is BS of the highest order and of course isn't being reported so that lines can be blurred and the narrative of terrorism vs the plucky, completely unprovocative Israeli victim can be spun.

The irony that the Jewish people suffered near extermination during WWII but now are trying to inflict the same fate upon the Palestinians is, obviously, not irony. It's a sick indictment of what humans are capable of.

https://theprint.in/world/how-al-aqsa-mosque-3rd-holiest-site-in-islam-became-focal-point-of-israeli-palestinian-tensions/1794531/

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/4/israeli-settlers-storm-al-aqsa-mosque-complex-on-fifth-day-of-sukkot

 

 

I’d feel fairly sure that someone else will be able to quote some Hamas act just before that Israeli act, and on and on and back and back it goes. There was almost no reporting back in July of Israeli action to drive Palestinians out of more areas, the army and contractors were filmed moving in to Arab areas and pouring concrete down wells and springs. Utterly abhorent behaviour that went pretty much unreported. But again, I’m sure if it had been more publicised they could have pointed to something an Arab did in June they would use as justification for driving them off more land.

The Israeli state is passing racist laws to make it easier ‘more legitimate’ to seize more land and drive more people in to poverty and homelessness. The whole state is geared towards ethnic cleansing. But that’s ok, because the U.S. has pledged absolute support for Israel against terrorists.

Biden told us last night that Israel are the good guys. It’s a **** up world.

 

[NurembergVillan]

1 hour ago, Jareth said:

On reflection I think the Brits should have insisted on part of Australia to locate the new Jewish homeland. 

Israelia?

[Jareth]

9 minutes ago, NurembergVillan said:

Israelia?

Good title for a Robert Harris alternative history novel

[LondonLax]

59 minutes ago, Panto_Villan said:

We can, but you also need to recognise Israel is a democracy and the increasingly nationalist government has been repeatedly re-elected by those civilians over the last couple of decades. These policies weren’t enacted in a vacuum.

I’d have even less sympathy if the civilians involved were settlers, but I don’t think that’s the case here? The settler areas are over the other side of Israel, near the West Bank rather than the Gaza Strip, right?

I think it is one of those things where each side goes a little bit further than last time and the response ratchets up and ratchets up to the point where you no longer consider the other side human anymore. You can then justify all sorts of things in the name of your righteous cause.

There are some horrific videos out there from what Hamas was up to yesterday (certainly not suitable to be posted on here) and there will be horrific scenes when Israel’s response gets into full swing. 

[Rustibrooks]

I don’t know if these figures are accurate but this is horrible

[magnkarl]

6 hours ago, Jareth said:

On reflection I think the Brits should have insisted on part of Australia to locate the new Jewish homeland. 

This comment is just asinine. A Brit deciding where a whole people should go, even one which is another’s people’s home, is not even borderline. It’s downright racist.

Britain was one of the last countries in Europe to lift their ban on Jews living here by the way, maybe the question is one where one should reflect on what was done to house the Jews where they wanted to be, rather than finding alternatives which puts them as far away from Europe as possible and as a stop gap against nutty Arabian dictators.

Edited October 8, 2023 by magnkarl

[TheAuthority]

7 hours ago, LondonLax said:

This isn’t a one off response to people entering a mosque.

I think you need to read a bit more about it. Unless you are referring to the nearly 20 years of oppression in an open air prison?

[magnkarl]

28 minutes ago, TheAuthority said:

I think you need to read a bit more about it. Unless you are referring to the nearly 20 years of oppression in an open air prison?

That is a valid point, but it’s also a very valid point to talk about Hamas and their ties to other terrorist states/organisations such as Iran, Hezbollah, Taliban and Russia.

It’s been tit for tat since all of Israel’s neighbours decided to invade from all sides back in the 50s. This is the last bloody iteration of two groupings not wanting peace. They were getting there with the Oslo accords before Hamas couped the elections in 2005/6 and stole power from PLO/Fatah. 

[chrisp65]

1 hour ago, magnkarl said:

It’s been tit for tat since all of Israel’s neighbours decided to invade from all sides back in the 50s. This is the last bloody iteration of two groupings shafted by Britain and France with incompatible promises and deals.

That’s the problem though, if you want to go back and say ‘x’ started it in the 1950’s. Then you’ll quickly find ‘x’ saying that ‘y’ started it in 1948, at which point they’ll produce a bit of paper where Britain or France promised them something slightly vaguely worded in the 1920’s.

There’s a problem here that goes back to empire, that goes back to World War 1 and frankl;y goes back a thousand years before that. 

There’s nothing to be gained from trying to prove the other side started it.

[VILLAMARV]

22 hours ago, LondonLax said:

There will of course be many Palestinian’s who are devastated by this behaviour. 

Perhaps I should have worded my previous post as a more direct question as it was intended.

This reads as rather a sarcastic post to me, coming off the back of the videos you posted - did you intend for it to come across like that?

[magnkarl]

1 hour ago, chrisp65 said:

That’s the problem though, if you want to go back and say ‘x’ started it in the 1950’s. Then you’ll quickly find ‘x’ saying that ‘y’ started it in 1948, at which point they’ll produce a bit of paper where Britain or France promised them something slightly vaguely worded in the 1920’s.

There’s a problem here that goes back to empire, that goes back to World War 1 and frankl;y goes back a thousand years before that. 

There’s nothing to be gained from trying to prove the other side started it.

Of course, as with every conflict. This one in particular has been raging since the coming of Islam, and before then the area was still full of conflict as this is where most religions believe their holy sites to be. I just wish someone would stop Hamas from taking power from the more peaceful PLO by rigging the elections in 2005 with the backing of some pretty awful people.

After that moderates in Israel have a hard time getting a word in because Benny shouts about Hamas at every turn. It’s damning for both sides.

[Jareth]

4 hours ago, magnkarl said:

This comment is just asinine. A Brit deciding where a whole people should go, even one which is another’s people’s home, is not even borderline. It’s downright racist.

 

[ml1dch]

11 minutes ago, Jareth said:

 

Broadly disagree with the point, but any time Avenue Q is brought into the discourse it deserves all the likes.

[chrisp65]

 

 

[Lichfield Dean]

Not necessarily the wisest tweet by the usually level headed Luke Skywalker

 

 

[maqroll]

I'm surprised that this hardline Israeli regime has been caught so flatfooted. The cynic in me initially suspected that they allowed it to happen so that the IDF might have an excuse to flatten Gaza and not worry about political blowback. But over 700 Israeli deaths so far has got me thinking that they actually have been taken by surprise. That's a staggering number of casualties, and the optics of the Hamas assault are pretty horrifying. So whether or not Netanyahu sees an opportunity here, he's likely been weakened politically by not only the Hamas assault but the perceived slow response.

 

[maqroll]

1 hour ago, Lichfield Dean said:

Not necessarily the wisest tweet by the usually level headed Luke Skywalker

 

 

It's a fairly typical reflexive position taken by American liberals and the cognitive dissonance is always fascinating to me.

Edited October 8, 2023 by maqroll

[Panto_Villan]

6 minutes ago, maqroll said:

It's a fairly typical reflexive position taken by American liberals and the lack of cognitive dissonance is always fascinating to me.

I think up until the Camp David peace process went off the rails, being a full-throated supporter of Israel was perfectly defensible imo.

Mark Hamill is 72 now. If he spent the first 50 years of his life seeing Israel as the good guys it can be hard to change that view, even when more recent events mean you probably should.

Edited October 8, 2023 by Panto_Villan