:lol: — 180 Proof

You can laugh, but you still have a value system. An idea of good and bad that you claim as authoritative. You laugh at mine but what is yours grounded in? Why is it true? Because Marx said it? On what basis should I pay it any heed whatsoever?

Also worth noting that your worldview seemingly rests on a blatant double standard where ethnic cleansing that targeted Jews are apparently not subject to 'justice' or 'repatriation' otherwise jews would be getting back hebron. bethlehem too was jewish where's our justice?

You laugh at mine [value system] but what is yours grounded in? — BitconnectCarlos

Naturalism.

Why is it true?

Naturalism is internally coherent and consistent with the demonstrable facts of both our species' cognitive limitations and the regularities of the natural world of which we are constituted.

Because Marx said it?

No. Spinoza (Epicurus, A. Murray, P. Foot, M. Nussbaum ...)

... where's our justice?

Your ongoing injustices forfeits it ... ever since "the shofar blew down the walls of Jericho." :eyes:

It's very rare that a foreign head of state attacks student protests, or more properly the university institutions where the students come from, that are in another country. Naturally the formal way would be one state talking to the other states officials. But this is America and Bibi knows how very well how American politics is played. After all, he has spent a long time in the US and understands that he has to talk directly to his base.



In fact, prior to the Revolution of Dignity and the break up of Russian-Ukrainian relations, Putin would often directly address Ukrainians and talk to his "base" just like Bibi is doing now above. Also then talking in a language that Ukrainians understand well.

Well, I guess meddling in American politics and discourse is quite proper when the US is also doing that in Israel.

The war criminal doesn’t like the protests. What a shocker.

They didn’t like Vietnam protests in the 60s either. Plenty of pro-war dullards defending the US invasion of Vietnam and subsequent atrocities inflicted on the Vietnamese people back then too.

Funny to watch it happening again. And once again the students are correct and the dullards will be looked on very poorly in the future.

There's viral footage of Jewish students being barred from their college campuses by protestors. The rabbi of an Ivy league school called for Jews to leave campus because it was unsafe and there have been physical attacks. Hezbollah flags are present and protesters are calling for violence and repeats of 10/7. When you see footage and pictures of Jews being barred from campus it's eerie seeing the same poses from Austria 1938 by brownshirts linking arms to do the blocking. The jihadis and the far left are in bed together. Same shit, slightly different language. Still good races and bad races.

One of the student protest leaders at Columbia was recently caught saying "Zionists don't deserve to live." He was luckily expelled, but probably only because it went viral. Khymani James.

protesters are calling for violence and repeats of 10/7 — BitconnectCarlos

What protesters?

Israel’s defense minister was calling for genocide early on. Excused as just “knee-jerk remarks” right after October 7th. So that kind of rhetoric gets a pass— but a few students making remarks in reaction to genocide is a step too far.

Always amazing to watch the selective outrage.

Maybe it was the thugs flying Hezbollah flags. Sure they're an organization that's killed hundreds of Americans, but that's surely not a problem for you. They're totally, like, anti-imperialists.

:up:

Maybe it was the thugs flying Hezbollah flags — BitconnectCarlos

The thugs that have murdered 15 thousand children or university protesters who’ve murdered 0 people? Which thugs are you referring to?

The war criminal doesn’t like the protests. What a shocker. — Mikie

Netanyahu knows what he is doing. He's talking to his base in the US, those evangelicals who have a special place for Israel in their hearts and at Jewish-Americans. And from @BitconnectCarlos response, you can see that it's going in. After all, the objective here is to make opposing the policies of the state of Israel to be anti-semitism. Straight out of the populist playbook, Bibi isn't interested to approach the larger public that isn't so keen on Israeli actions. Hence what has to be stopped or simply be not covered is especially the protests of any Jewish groups. Kind of takes out essence of the argument, just like Zelenskyi being Jewish yet a Nazi.

And does opposing Netanyahu's government's policies instill anti-semitism? Well, does Putin's actions instill Russofobia? Did the actions of Al Qaeda and ISIS instill Islamofobia? Unfortunately, but not so much as you would anticipate. The majority of people can still perfectly understand the difference between a regime or fringe terrorist groups and entire populations of people. But naturally there are racists who do want to justify their bigotry.

Funny to watch it happening again. And once again the students are correct and the dullards will be looked on very poorly in the future. — Mikie

Vietnam (and Afghanistan) are actually special cases of the US fighting hopeless wars because it's normalcy to use military force. It would be a good thread to talk just why the US loses wars in a peculiar fashion. (Kind of relevant when the US might do it again in Ukraine, even if Europe in aggregate is supporting Ukraine more)

I wouldn't also underestimate the long term consequences of this. Students now opposing Israel's actions can have long term consequences as that is the future elite of America. Especially the Israeli Lobby can turn into being loved as much as the gun lobby: powerful, but not perhaps well liked by everyone. But notice that the political system in the US did respond with Nixon finally ending the commitment to the Vietnam war. And that was the end of the Vietnam war protests also.

Thus the obvious thing is to think about really what happens after when Netanyahu declares the operations having been over. Will then the protests just fade away like Occupy-Wall Street or BLM? (At least until the next Israeli-Palestinian war after this one)

After all, the objective here is to make opposing the policies of the state of Israel to be anti-semitism. — ssu

We can all oppose Bibi's policies, but opposing an Israeli response to 10/7 is ridiculous. What does any other country do when 1200 of its are murdered by terrorists? According to ChatGPT Netanyahu has not announced any plans to reinstate Israeli settlements in Gaza (who would even want to go back there?)

Bibi also notes the insane rise in anti-Semitism on college campuses - a phenomenon which virtually all Jews have taken note of and at least here in America have led many lose their historic loyalty to the Democratic Party. Like much of America, we're tired of the racist DEI tirades and double standards where violent rhetoric against certain groups is accepted and encouraged, while other groups are treated as a protected, oppressed class.

Police know what's up though and they've started covering up holocaust memorials near the protests because they know these get vandalized. It's a very troubling phenomenon for Jews worldwide.

Mikie, why don't you go punch a few babies? And to anyone who calls you out on it - you just bring their attention to Gaza. So people who go around punching or burning babies aren't necessarily bad people, Israel is much worse after all. And you oppose Israel which makes you good.

We can all oppose Bibi's policies, but opposing an Israeli response to 10/7 is ridiculous. — BitconnectCarlos

What is wrong with my argument that Israel should fight as Americans fought when fighting Al Qaeda and ISIS and avoid civilian casualties? What is wrong with refraining from rhetoric and actions that easily make the ICJ rule against Israel? What's wrong with refraining from calling Gaza the evil city and the population "Human animals"?

What is so ridiculous about that?

And do notice that actually opposing Bibi's policies is what Israel wants to called to be anti-semitism.

What is wrong with my argument that Israel should fight as Americans fought when fighting Al Qaeda and ISIS and avoid civilian casualties? — ssu

Israel has a very humane combatant to civilian ratio. I don't see what there is to complain about.

What's wrong with refraining from calling Gaza the evil city and the population "Human animals"? — ssu

Are these from Ben Gvir or Bibi? Ben Gvir is the hard right. Didn't GWB have similar rhetoric after 9/11? What can I say? Emotions run high. Hamas is a very wicked organization and I don't know how else to frame it. What does one say when one's people have suffered the worst massacre since the Holocaust and their neighbors are out on the streets celebrating en masse? Yet we're suppose to be civilized.

Israel has a very humane combatant to civilian ratio. I don't see what there is to complain about. — BitconnectCarlos

Lol.

I would beg to disagree. It's not the worst, of course, but is quite indifferent at civilian casualties. At least when they are Arab / Palestinian. What many Finnish UN blue berets have seen in Lebanon tells this. There really is no true commitment to go to lengths in avoiding civilian casualties. Shooting unarmed Israeli hostages that wave white flags tells this so clearly. To give another example from Lebanon, if there's an orchard next to the road and you might be ambushed from the position, then just fire machine guns at the orchard when you drive passed it. If a small girl is killed (who is in her family's orchard), then make a statement that a terrorist was killed in the fighting. But of course, when you political leadership talks about human animals, then it's quite logical to act this way.

But you can believe Netanyahu's words that the IDF is the "most moral" army ever.

Lebanon was 40 years ago. RoEs change. I will not pretend to be familiar with the IDF's RoEs but ChatGPT tells me they're in line with international standards.

It's hard to get accurate casualty counts because the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry does not distinguish between civilian and combatant. Recently it was revealed that they had only had data for 22k of the supposed ~33k dead. And Israel, last I checked claimed 13k Hamas dead. And according to the IDF Hamas's own rockets misfire and land in Gaza 12% of the time.

True information is hard to come back and impossible to verify for the public. But war in Gaza is a very unusual type of war unlike any modern war given the sheer degree of embeddedness of the enemy in the civilian population. Hamas has been seen firing rockets in civilian clothes. Imagine fighting that.

Ultimately, imho, it doesn't really matter. Even before Israel responded to 10/7 there was cheering and protests against it. Once Israel is seen as epitome of injustice and racism there's really nothing Israel can do. They've lost the propaganda war among Gen Z. Israel could be very humane, civilians would still die because that is war, and there would still be protests.

Once Israel is seen as epitome of injustice and racism there's really nothing Israel can do. — BitconnectCarlos

Of course not, they can stop oppression and apartheid any day. They chose not to. And that makes Israeli leadership and those who support their morally vacuous policies immoral.

All states oppress, and even if they didn't the citizenry will have their own biases.

Vacuous.

You don't understand the people, the culture, or the religions of the region. All you care about is whatever some incredibly corrupt international organization decides which consists of members much, much worse than Israel. Where are the ICC arrest warrants for Hamas leaders in Doha?

The thugs that have murdered 15 thousand children or university protesters who’ve murdered 0 people? Which thugs are you referring to? — Mikie

So people who go around punching or burning babies aren't necessarily bad people, Israel is much worse after all. — BitconnectCarlos

So now the people burning babies— Israel— are the good guys, and carrying a flag is the true baby-burning.

Living in opposite-land must be nice. I prefer the real world, but then I’m not a genocide apologist.

10/7 was attempted genocide. But weakness is goodness for you, so you wail against the strong in their response.

There is no genocide but there are modern day brown shirts — the student groups barring Jews from their campuses and who are openly calling for antisemitism violence.

10/7 was attempted genocide. — BitconnectCarlos

:lol:

There is no genocide — Moses

There is.

but there are modern day brown shirts — Moses

There aren’t.

Unless I've missed it, I seem to be the only one (here) mentioning/remembering the hostages - the news reporting 129 still held. This latest edition of horrors, doesn't anyone else remember who set the stage ablaze and how?

I seem to be the only one (here) mentioning/remembering the hostages — tim wood

How brave and exceptional. The only one! Wow! Great job!

15,000 children dead…but yeah, good to keep emphasizing the hostages, many of which Israel has already killed. All with good intentions of course.

Self-determination is at the heart of Palestinian nationalism for sure and the belief that Palestinians who voted for Hamas and sided with Iran (both committed to fight Israel), have a right to do so, is a foolish way to think about international politics, people who do not have a properly functioning and acknowledged state and live next to great powers don't have the right to pursue any foreign policy they want. That's what Mearsheimer would say, wouldn't he? Best to listen to someone who’s been right for the last 30 years, right?

As Anger Grows Over Gaza, Arab Leaders Crack Down on Protests

It won’t do any good. People really dislike genocide, which is exactly what this is— all pathetic gaslighting by dullards notwithstanding.

It will continue until the genocide stops.

Another overtly racist remark. How surprising.

Another overtly racist remark — Mikie

The hungry dreams of bread.