Comments

  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    That's a false dichotomy. — 180 Proof

    Provide your sources and evidence. It isn’t hard. Last government of Palestine that was not the colonialist scum was the ottoman caliphate. Both the PA and Hamas (the duly “elected” governments of the Palestinians) have said they want one given the chance to rule. Who among the likely Palestinian leaders is not advocating for an Islamic government/state?
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    I intend to keep distressing you. — StreetlightX

    You haven’t distressed me, you’ve just demonstrated what has been the case for 1,900 years. The West are anti-Semites and incapable of self-reflection on the matter because it so ingrained. You are literally advocating for the establishment of a murderuous aparthaid state that would shit all over your human rights under the guise of advocating for human rights. You can’t even see it for what it is and think anyone pointing it out is supportive of Israel doing bad things. Oppress women? Fine. Kill gays? A O.K. End freedom of speech? Good. Freedom of association? Your stamp of approval. Freedom of religion? Who doesn’t enjoy a dhimmi adding to the coffers?

    I’ll do my best to change my way of thinking to prefer the caliphate over the Israelis. The contribution of the other Muslim nations in the past 200 years stand as a shining example of why their form of human rights violations are the way to go. The success of the Arab Spring at brining about structural changes and modernization towards secular liberal democracies is a sight to behold.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Just a single sentence. So easy. — StreetlightX

    Funny, I thought single sentences were for the ordinary language philosophers that feel the need to number them as they blather on. But sure, KISS - great contribution to critical thinking.

    I look forward to more of your wisdom packaged into a single sentence. Perhaps we can change this to “Sloganeers-R-Us” or “the Aphorism Forum.” If we manage it right, maybe we can get a live feed to a fortune cookie factory that can just take random excerpts from your posts and put them in their cookies.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    More words to say you are an apartheid supporter. Keep going, by all means. — StreetlightX

    2+2=4?

    Good demonstration of advocating for a cure that is worse than the disease. Childish but for the fact that most children understand that some initially good sounding ideas are actually pretty bad.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    ↪Ennui Elucidator This is alot of words to say that you are an apartheid supporter.

    Which is fine, but it makes you a despicable peice of shit.     — StreetlightX

    You are better than this. Here, let me say it again, I am an anti-Zionist. I think the existence of Israel as conceived is contrary to my notions of legitimate government and that it needs to be changed away from ethno/religious/nationalism and towards non-secular egalitarianism.

    My solution to the problem of apartheid is different than yours and considers more of the features of the situation. Acknowledging that bad things will happen if your solution is imposed, which things should also be avoided, is not to support the status quo, but to say we should change it in other ways. And yes, saying “be patient” to those that suffer smacks of supporting injustice, but that is like saying that a doctor who tells a patient they must get a bit better before they can go into surgery is supportive of the malady.

    There are solutions to the Israel/Palestine problem. The solution almost certainly goes through reformations of Israel and not the establishment of a Muslim state on its territory. The solution probably involves demanding various bad actors in Palestine stop acting badly and that both sides accept that neither is going away and both are entitled to kindness and governmental support. It also probably involves inflicting harm on a number on specific, guiltless individuals to make room for the social reconciliation that needs to take place.

    Again, the actual people who live in Israel are human beings and generally fall within the scope of moral regarded afforded to all people. Their chosen form of government is entitled to the same regard as any other government and with that, their government is obligated to reform in ways that do not unreasonably imperil fundamental interests (such as life remaining in their homes).

    The longterm success of both peoples is through mutual reconciliation and cooperation, not protracted division. The religious-zionism that has come to define Israeli national policy needs to end immediately, further displacement of established Palestinian communities needs to end immediately, and Israeli-Arabs and Palestinians alike must be given equal opportunity to organically grow the same way that Jewish Israelis are.

    We could go further into particular issues and policy positions, but the fact that my solutions involve nuance does not mean I support the Israelis being assholes.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Your special pleading is tiresome ... — 180 Proof

    Because despite your general erudition, you have absolutely no answer to the question and the obviousness of the problem imposes itself on you (you know, reality). Take responsibility for your policy positions and the consequences they engender. How do you end Jewish apartheid without supporting and enabling Muslim apartheid? That isn’t special pleading. It isn’t saying treat Jews or Muslims differently. It isn’t legitimizing one form of apartheid over another. It is specifically treating them as equals and identifying the futility of “ending” apartheid to be replaced with more apartheid.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    To defeat anti-semitism, simply become an anti-semite I guess. — StreetlightX

    No. To defeat anti-semitism, recognize they structures of anti-semitism and try to dismantle them. Combine that with taking personal responsibility for when you perpetuate it and stop doing that.

    The creation of a Jewish state for the Jews can only be described as a situation in which one ethnic group (or whatever group) provides themselves with advantages over other ethnic groups. The historic justification was/is the Jews were constantly persecuted and could only ensure their own survival and self determination by the creation of a state for themselves. Given that Palestine had some fair bit of cultural capital, it seemed a more obvious choice than trying to carve a new nation out of other places. The state of Israel was established primarily as a secular object of the Jewish diaspora, not a fulfillment of the ingathering of the exiles in furtherance of the messianic age. There is zero religious significance to the creation of Israel in 1948 and being anti-Zionist is something Jews are free to be.

    Sorry if history and political theory intrude on your delusions of an apartheid free Middle East because the Jews have been driven out.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Lol. — StreetlightX

    You laugh and the Palestinians and Israelis go on dying in an intractable situation that is exacerbated by foreign do gooders that can’t manage to place the blame for the vast majority of Palestinian suffering where it belongs - with the Muslim states who refused to permit the Palestinians entrance and safeguard in their misguided effort to weaken and de-legitimize Israel. The politics of oil have so rotted the brains of people engaged in this discourse that it is revolting.

    You want the Palestinians to stop suffering? End Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan, and Egypt (you can throw in Iran for good measure if you like). Sure, they will still be displaced and desirous of returning to their ancestral lands, but they won’t be living in a ghetto between those that they would destroy and those that would see them suffer. The Palestinians could have been engaged in self-advocacy for 70 years from a place of relative comfort, but instead are forced to live in squaller.

    But all of this is apologetics, of course. Saying that Israel is founded on unacceptable principles and that they did bad things is some defense of Israel. The Knesset is presently writing me thank you letters and the pro-Israeli lobby is buying me my next computer.

    The farcical interpretation you give to what I have written is barely even worth the sarcasm I am now inclined to give it and certainly not worth the time I spent trying to get you past your sloganeering.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Everything else - i.e. all of what you've said - is just so much apologist bullshit. — StreetlightX

    Just say it. End Jewish apartheid now and restore Muslim apartheid. No one will hold it against you. It is abundantly clear from your position, but it would be refreshing for you to be honest.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Strawman. Red herring. Canard. Tired old apologetic bs. — 180 Proof

    Right. Because the Palestinians don’t want to be in charge of the entire land and impose a muslim state. That is just an invention of the Zionists.

    I never pegged you for being so historically illiterate and overwhelmingly naive. Try to construct a single scenario in which Israel disists from “oppression” and the Israeli state remains. You don’t even have to give a fully fleshed out idea, just like five steps.

    1) Israel stops being oppressive,
    2) Hamas, the PLO, and every other armed organization refrains from taking any action against Israel,
    3) No other Arab state invades Israel or otherwise enacts retribution,
    4) Palestinians, now free to X, ???
    5) Jewish state of Israel dissolved and the Muslim and Jewish occupants of the area form a liberal secular state because …. ???
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    e idea that Israel's existence is premised on kidnapping children, bulldozing houses, and extra-judicial murder is more anti-semetic than anything I could even dream of coming up with. Well done though, I guess. — StreetlightX

    Have you read the history books? A displaced people (who everyone seems to think are europeans despite 1,500 years of being driven from every place they settled after they were expelled from their “homeland”) starts emigrating to a land with the intent to form their own government which will protect their identity as its founding principal. They acquire arms and resources and declare independence and right to control a territory despite the fact that that land was already occupied by people who didn’t agree with them and outnumbered them 2 to 1. After successfully repelling those that would disagree with them and attempt to defend their 1,000,000 co-religionists from the new government being imposed on them, they go on to increase their numbers, power, and territorial claims.

    You tell me how that story ends with anything besides head scratching and dismay.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    The arsonist blames the bonfire — 180 Proof

    No one is blaming anything. The Zionist movement can be definitionally apartheid as far as I am concerned. Any nationstate founded on being the state for X to the exclusion of all ~X is of necessity apartheid. Again, Israel exists. Israel ceasing to exist doesn’t end apartheid, it just ends Israel and lets the Muslims become perpetrators of apartheid. The Palestinians have expressly said that. Why don’t you take them seriously?

    If apartheid is going to be the case in Israel/Palestine no matter what tomorrow, the next day, or the day after, at what point do we get to say to everyone, “Hey. Killing innocents is wrong.”? When do the Palestinians, who are oppressors in waiting, shift into not getting to complain that the Jews are shooting back?
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Stop apartheid.

    Sorry that you seem so morally unclear about this.     — StreetlightX

    You still seem to miss it - Israel cannot stop apartheid and continue to exist. The result of Israel ceasing to exist isn’t the end of apartheid, it is just the end of Jewish apartheid and the resumption of Muslim apartheid. So your solution isn’t about apartheid at all, it is about remaining silent as Muslims kill the fleeing Jews. Sort of sucks that the Muslims were so honest about the violent means to their liberation and the religious duty to drive off the Zionists.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Critique Palestinians all you like. In the meantime, sucks about the mirdeous Israeli state. — StreetlightX

    Sucks for whom? The Palestinians? Yup. Anyone else? You’ve already seen the statistics about how bad the Palestinians are in extracting blood from the Israelis. You can take to the internet to read about the ineptness of the Arab world at coming to the Palestinian’s aid in that task. So we are back at the beginning - Israel isn’t going anywhere, Palestinians are being abused more than necessary for Israel to preserve its existence and relative safety, and you and 180 have yet to announce a considered policy about how we can get from shitsville to something approximating a moral/desirable resolution that doesn’t involve a whole lot of dead Jews.

    P.S. See Seppo? Your reading skills are lacking and the anti-semitism is glaring - Jews get to die and apartheid Muslims get to resume control over the conquered land they lost to the British. Or maybe you think the Ottomans were egalitarian.

    My reading comprehension is just fine, thanks. Your writing and communication skills, evidently, are not up to par. — Seppo
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Or if you prefer, my critique was about whether the failure to include Israel in the discussion as an entity with interests was textbook anti-semitism because, as it happens, everyone is oppressive including the Palestinians. Even now, you can’t be bothered to say that you would tell the asshole, oppressive Palestinians that slaughtering fleeing Jews is too much because the only oppression you think is important is that which the Jews (you know, the group actually doing the apartheid) visit upon the Palestinians. So the Jews get to die and the Palestinians get a pass.

    It isn’t enough to simply say, “A religious state that privileges a particular religion and ethnic decent over another and tries to maintain that group to the disadvantage of other groups is illegitimate,” but you must remain silent as the Jews are killed. The Muslims, who are crying foul because they aren’t the ones that get to oppress all of the other cultures within their nationstate, are to be praised for their freedom fighting. So we support the apartheid wanna-bes and make emojis about the real prospect of Israelis being killed. Seems strange, no?
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    ↪Ennui Elucidator Again, not my problem. — StreetlightX

    Again, no one said it was. And again, my criticism of 180’s comment was never about how right Israel was, but about whether Israel could ever critique the Palestinians methods, especially given that Israel is predicated upon the oppression of the Palestinians. You know, that thing that Amnesty International (who you invoked) is saying,
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    This isn't the winning point you think it is. — StreetlightX

    Which? That Israel as a non-Apartheid state on their definition is an impossibility? Go ahead, explain how Israel can exist without being an apartheid state. Or maybe you thought I was discussing something else when I told you that the only way for Israel to stop oppressing the Palestinians was for all Zionists to leave (you know, those folks trying to establish a Jewish state).
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    ↪StreetlightX
    Ding ding ding… we have a winner… Apartheid since inception, Israel predicated on Jews dominating non-Jews in Palestine.

    So I guess I was talking about whether Israel can exist as a legitimate state on your view. Huh. Who would’a thunk it. Even Amnesty international agrees with me.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank

    The crime against humanity of apartheid under the Apartheid Convention, the Rome Statute and customary international law is committed when any inhuman or inhumane act (essentially a serious human rights violation) is perpetrated in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over another, with the intention to maintain that system. A regime of oppression and domination can best be understood as the systematic, prolonged and cruel discriminatory treatment by one racial group of members of another with the intention to control the second racial group.

    Thus, the crime against humanity of apartheid is committed when serious human rights violations are committed in the context, and with the specific intent, of maintaining a regime or system of prolonged and cruel discriminatory control of one or more racial groups by another.

    . . .

    Since its establishment in 1948, Israel has pursued an explicit policy of establishing and maintaining
    a Jewish demographic hegemony and maximizing its control over land to benefit Jewish Israelis while minimizing the number of Palestinians and restricting their rights and obstructing their ability to challenge this dispossession. In 1967, Israel extended this policy beyond the Green Line to the West Bank and Gaza Strip, which it has occupied ever since. Today, all territories controlled by Israel continue to be administered with the purpose of benefiting Jewish Israelis to the detriment of Palestinians, while Palestinian refugees continue to be excluded.
    Demographic considerations have from the outset guided Israeli legislation and policymaking. The demography of the newly created state was to be changed to the benefit of Jewish Israelis, while Palestinians – whether inside Israel or, later on, in the OPT – were perceived as a threat to establishing
    a Jewish majority, and as a result were to be expelled, fragmented, segregated, controlled, dispossessed of their land and property and deprived of their economic and social rights.

    Jewish Israelis form a group that is unified by a privileged legal status embedded in Israeli law, which extends to them through state services and protections regardless of where they reside in the territories under Israel’s effective control. The Jewish identity of the State of Israel has been established in its laws and the practice of its official and national institutions. Israeli laws perceive and treat Jewish identity, depending on the context, as a religious, descent-based, and/or national or ethnic identity.     — “Amnesty International on Apartheid”
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Anyway, back to Israeli apartheid. — StreetlightX

    How is that a change of subject. How does apartheid end on your view with Israel continuing to exist?

    You keep using the word, so a bit of substance would be nice. Are you just asking for Israel to respect the borders drawn by the non-oppressive British (or the very wise UN if you prefer) and give Muslims equality under the law within those borders? Are you asking for Israel to stop giving preferential treatment to Jews regarding the right of return? Give me a sense for what it will take for Israel to end apartheid of the people who have grown in number from around 1,000,000 in 1947 to 6,000,000 today as a direct result of the Israeli ethnic cleansing that is second only to the Nazi’s purge of Jews in Europe.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Seems like a problem for Israel. — StreetlightX

    And every other country, but we are discussing Israel here and we don’t want to venture into accusations of whataboutism by the Australians or Americans. Still waiting to hear from the Danes, though.

    So go on, tell us, are the Palestinians limited in their methods of driving the Zionists from their shores because the mere presence of a non-Muslim not born in Palestine prior to 1948 is oppressive or are there limits? The soon to be fleeing Zionists would like to know at what point they can criticize the Palestinians for shooting them in the back.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    So Israel can only exist on the basis of mass suffering of others? — StreetlightX

    Its called the Nakba for a fucking reason. Maybe the Palestinians got it wrong, too. You tell me. How does Israel exist without causing the mass suffering of others? (Notice your change again from “oppression” to “mass suffering”)
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    then you forfit your right to exist. — StreetlightX

    So there it is. Israel shouldn’t exist. Fine, we’ve established that. And now that Israel shouldn’t exist, should the Palestinians be allowed to kill the Israelis in the street till every last one is gone or is there some limit to their methods of driving the Zionists from their shores?

    P.S. For the sake of posterity, StreelightX edited his post after I responded and added the bit about my abstracting again.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Yeah, can't ask Israel to stop doing apartheid without 'removing myself from conversation'. Propagandist clown. — StreetlightX

    But you didn’t ask that. You said they have to stop all oppression. See the difference?

    From the perspective of the Palestinians, the mere existence of Israel is oppression and the vast majority of Jews currently living in Israel need to leave. They aren’t wrong that they are being oppressed in that way - that land was forcibly taken, that refugees were not allowed to return to their homes, that they do not have an Islamic state. Those three things cannot be remedied without Israel ceasing to exist. Stop oppression = stop existing. Or maybe you had some other oppression in mind and you were planning on telling the Israelis and Palestinians when Israel has satisfied your sensibilities.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Yes. Next point. — StreetlightX

    Then you have removed yourself from the conversation of what Israel should do. That is a standard that cannot be met and isn’t even worthy of discussion. So long as you hold that standard and acknowledge that anyone that feels oppressed by you can kill you wherever they find you without moral guilt, I guess you at least aren’t a hypocrite. I strongly urge you to make yourself available to them as soon as possible with atonement in hand so that you can get on with judging other people in good conscience.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Because if your response to "Israel is comitting crimes against humanity" is "yes but security" then nothing you say deserves to be taken seriously and you are a propagandist who deserves nothing but scorn. — StreetlightX

    Go ahead and find where I said that. One quote. What crime against humanity (for whatever that means) did I say Israel gets to do? Collective punishment? Right out. Collateral damage? Ignoble. Unequal treatment under the law? Contemptible. Pick your crime against humanity and let’s see where I say “Yup, that is fine because SECURITY!!!…!!!…!!!”
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Ooh no not a terrorist incident 20 years ago!! Guess Israel has to do an apartheid now. — StreetlightX

    Of course they don’t, nor is that a moral response to the bombing. Yet again, you conflate saying that the Palestinians did something wrong with saying that Israel is justified in doing any horrible thing. This convulsive “Israel is evil!!! Stop talking about ethics!” grows wearisome.

    Let’s say it to gether one last time - Israel has done lots of bad things both currently and historically. Is “stopping all oppression immediately” an ethically required choice for Israel or are they permitted to do something else?
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Never mind Israeli everyday murder then. — StreetlightX

    Of course it should be minded. And they should stop doing it absent compelling reason beyond vague handwaving towards the eternal imminent threat. Who has disagreed? Or said that Israel shouldn’t be criticized? How is questioning the legitimacy of the Palestinian method of resisting the occupation an excuse for Israel to be shits?
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    How can any state (of emergency) maintained by on-going ethnic cleansing, military atrocities & apartheid be "legitimate"? — 180 Proof

    You keep hurling the accusations as if they are new or will somehow fall differently. The question isn’t “is ethnic cleansing” legitimate or are “military atrocities” OK, but whether, given the circumstance Israel finds itself in, must it give up all forms of oppression to be given your leave to say that the Sbarro bombing was wrong?

    Put aside Israel’s criticism. Was the Sbarro bombing immoral? Worthy of criticism? Questionable? Tell me how you analyze the methods of the oppressed when a civilian establishment is deliberately targeted and children murdered.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    The parallel is too stark to merely be, as some would have it, a bad analogy / false equivalence: Gaza City (intifada) ~ Warsaw Ghetto (uprising). — 180 Proof

    Too stark? You mean that the PA and Egypt colluded against their Muslim siblings to starve the Gaza Strip to weaken Hamas and bring the region back under the PA’s control? Or how the Israeli’s aren’t preparing death camps and ovens for their bodies?

    The tone deafness of the comparison is remarkable. The Zionist project as the modern Nazi, how convenient. Hitler had two legs… Sharon had two legs….. Connection?

    The Palestinians and Isarelis are literally at war and despite Israel having taken the decisive advantage fifty years ago, they still provide essential services, support, jobs, etc. to the populations sworn to destroy them. The analogy to Nazis is willfully cruel and basically contemptible.

    Yes, Palestinians are in a shitty circumstance and Israel does things to contribute to that. No, you can’t give Jordan, Egypt, and the Palestinians a pass for the way that they perpetuate it to political advantage in their fight against the Zionists. The Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto didn’t have the luxury of conspiring with their friends to make their situation seem more dire so that the United Jewish League would send in the calvary, save them, and kill the Poles/Nazis who had done them dirty.

    But again, absolutely none of this has anything to do with whether a) the Palestinians can be condemned for their methods and b) whether any level of oppression is morally tolerable. Your quoted binary that follows the PLO charter should tell you something.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    Ariel fuckin' Sharon's mea culpa, no? Hardly a leftwinger's "adoption of the Palestinian position". :sweat: — 180 Proof

    Amazing how you say that Israel can’t condemn the Palestinians for killing children and think you find moral ground by pointing to someone saying there is an occupation. I’ve never once denied the “occupation” or the oppression. It doesn’t make a lick of difference when discussing whether blowing up children is contemptible.

    The left’s adoption of the position isn’t around the occupation, it is around whether Israel has any legitimacy despite it and the extent to which Israel must become defenseless to atone for it.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    And what is truly, deeply ironic is that Hamas (as well as other muslim groups) take pride in having conquered Palestine and subjugated its non-Arab inhabitants. They see the Zionist as trying to undo the will of Allah. When did the Muslims/Arabs stop their oppression/occupation? When did they gain the moral high ground over the claims to Palestine?


    … Article Eleven:

    The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that the land of Palestine is an Islamic Waqf consecrated for future Moslem generations until Judgement Day. It, or any part of it, should not be squandered: it, or any part of it, should not be given up. Neither a single Arab country nor all Arab countries, neither any king or president, nor all the kings and presidents, neither any organization nor all of them, be they Palestinian or Arab, possess the right to do that. Palestine is an Islamic Waqf land consecrated for Moslem generations until Judgement Day. This being so, who could claim to have the right to represent Moslem generations till Judgement Day?

    This is the law governing the land of Palestine in the Islamic Sharia (law) and the same goes for any land the Moslems have conquered by force, because during the times of (Islamic) conquests, the Moslems consecrated these lands to Moslem generations till the Day of Judgement.

    It happened like this: When the leaders of the Islamic armies conquered Syria and Iraq, they sent to the Caliph of the Moslems, Umar bin-el-Khatab, asking for his advice concerning the conquered land - whether they should divide it among the soldiers, or leave it for its owners, or what? After consultations and discussions between the Caliph of the Moslems, Omar bin-el-Khatab and companions of the Prophet, Allah bless him and grant him salvation, it was decided that the land should be left with its owners who could benefit by its fruit. As for the real ownership of the land and the land itself, it should be consecrated for Moslem generations till Judgement Day. Those who are on the land, are there only to benefit from its fruit. This Waqf remains as long as earth and heaven remain. Any procedure in contradiction to Islamic Sharia, where Palestine is concerned, is null and void.

    "Verily, this is a certain truth. Wherefore praise the name of thy Lord, the great Allah." (The Inevitable - verse 95).

    …

    Article Thirty-Two:

    World Zionism, together with imperialistic powers, try through a studied plan and an intelligent strategy to remove one Arab state after another from the circle of struggle against Zionism, in order to have it finally face the Palestinian people only. Egypt was, to a great extent, removed from the circle of the struggle, through the treacherous Camp David Agreement. They are trying to draw other Arab countries into similar agreements and to bring them outside the circle of struggle.

    The Islamic Resistance Movement calls on Arab and Islamic nations to take up the line of serious and persevering action to prevent the success of this horrendous plan, to warn the people of the danger eminating from leaving the circle of struggle against Zionism. Today it is Palestine, tomorrow it will be one country or another. The Zionist plan is limitless. After Palestine, the Zionists aspire to expand from the Nile to the Euphrates. When they will have digested the region they overtook, they will aspire to further expansion, and so on. Their plan is embodied in the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", and their present conduct is the best proof of what we are saying.

    Leaving the circle of struggle with Zionism is high treason, and cursed be he who does that. "for whoso shall turn his back unto them on that day, unless he turneth aside to fight, or retreateth to another party of the faithful, shall draw on himself the indignation of Allah, and his abode shall be hell; an ill journey shall it be thither." (The Spoils - verse 16). There is no way out except by concentrating all powers and energies to face this Nazi, vicious Tatar invasion. The alternative is loss of one's country, the dispersion of citizens, the spread of vice on earth and the destruction of religious values. Let every person know that he is responsible before Allah, for "the doer of the slightest good deed is rewarded in like, and the does of the slightest evil deed is also rewarded in like."

    The Islamic Resistance Movement consider itself to be the spearhead of the circle of struggle with world Zionism and a step on the road. The Movement adds its efforts to the efforts of all those who are active in the Palestinian arena. Arab and Islamic Peoples should augment by further steps on their part; Islamic groupings all over the Arab world should also do the same, since all of these are the best-equipped for the future role in the fight with the warmongering Jews.

    "..and we have put enmity and hatred between them, until the day of resurrection. So often as they shall kindle a fire of war, Allah shall extinguish it; and they shall set their minds to act corruptly in the earth, but Allah loveth not the corrupt doers." (The Table - verse 64).
     — “The Covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement”
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    This sort of nonsense is why people aren't taking you seriously. — Seppo

    Maybe you should read the charter I posted and what 180 said regarding the ability of Israel (or anyone for that matter) to question the methods of the Palestinian. It is right there in the Palestinian charter from 1967 - armed resistance, no legitimate Israel state, absolute liberation as the only acceptable resolution, non-cooperating in resolving the situation in any other way, educating their children to fight to the death, etc. You might also note their plan to escalate into full warefare drawing in the Arab states who have a moral duty to liberate Palestine from the “the Zionist and imperialist presence.”

    This is all old stuff, Seppo. There is zero new territory being covered in 180’s comments, the left’s adoption of the Palestinian position regarding their oppression, and the compete erasure of Israel’s legitimacy. You don’t have to take me seriously - the people doing the killing don’t give a rat’s ass what either of us post.

    What you seem to miss is that at the root of the problem is this issue of what Jews are and whether they have/had a state. The Palestinian claim that they go back to their state was vapid in ‘67 and has only become more stupid since. Where does a third generation Israeli go?

    The criticism is routinely not of the Israeli state as such (though state action is the target), but that the goals of the Israeli state are either a) illegitimate or b) reprehensible. Just take a look at StreetlightX’s latest comment where he yet again makes the claim that apartheid is inherent in the Zionist - I’m sorry, I meant Israeli - project. “ Israel kills random old Palestinian men - and children - on the street as a matter of systemic and encouraged course” He of course will jump up and down about the “current” Israeli posture rather than the historical one, but the only reason Israel wasn’t accused of apartheid in ‘67 is because the world hadn’t popularized the word yet.

    The state of Israel exists. They are 6 million people or so people there that prefer that state to the Palestinian one. The Palestinians have vowed to restore Palestine and drive out the Zionists. In 70 years no middle ground has been found, but Israel will remain at eternal fault with no moral standing to question the resistance.

    Before the oppressor (and his patrons/apologists) can legitimately criticize and condemn the oppressed for their means and methods of resistance, he must completely dismantle the entire state-apparatus of oppression now. Until then, the logic of oppression entails that there cannot be "innocents" in the oppressor's camp, especially in so far as the oppressor tactically discounts them – his own noncombatant civilians – as potentially "acceptable losses", that is, the necessary cost of maintaining his strategem of oppression. In order to survive, the oppressed must resist – always have and always will – by any means necessary. — 180 Proof
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    And for anyone who cares even a little about the context for the relations between the Israelis, Palestinians, and Arab world, here is the PLO in its own words from 1967. I leave it to the reader to decide for itself whether Israelis avowed fear of destruction by the Palestinians is misplaced, unjustified, or unworthy of consideration when evaluating the ethics of Palestinians murdering non-combatants or Israel’s obsession with security.


    . . .

    Article 7: That there is a Palestinian community and that it has material, spiritual, and historical connection with Palestine are indisputable facts. It is a national duty to bring up individual Palestinians in an Arab revolutionary manner. All means of information and education must be adopted in order to acquaint the Palestinian with his country in the most profound manner, both spiritual and material, that is possible. He must be prepared for the armed struggle and ready to sacrifice his wealth and his life in order to win back his homeland and bring about its liberation. . .

    Article 9: Armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine. This it is the overall strategy, not merely a tactical phase. The Palestinian Arab people assert their absolute determination and firm resolution to continue their armed struggle and to work for an armed popular revolution for the liberation of their country and their return to it . They also assert their right to normal life in Palestine and to exercise their right to self-determination and sovereignty over it.

    Article 10: Commando action constitutes the nucleus of the Palestinian popular liberation war. This requires its escalation, comprehensiveness, and the mobilization of all the Palestinian popular and educational efforts and their organization and involvement in the armed Palestinian revolution. It also requires the achieving of unity for the national (watani) struggle among the different groupings of the Palestinian people, and between the Palestinian people and the Arab masses, so as to secure the continuation of the revolution, its escalation, and victory. . .

    Article 15: The liberation of Palestine, from an Arab viewpoint, is a national (qawmi) duty and it attempts to repel the Zionist and imperialist aggression against the Arab homeland, and aims at the elimination of Zionism in Palestine. Absolute responsibility for this falls upon the Arab nation - peoples and governments - with the Arab people of Palestine in the vanguard. Accordingly, the Arab nation must mobilize all its military, human, moral, and spiritual capabilities to participate actively with the Palestinian people in the liberation of Palestine. It must, particularly in the phase of the armed Palestinian revolution, offer and furnish the Palestinian people with all possible help, and material and human support, and make available to them the means and opportunities that will enable them to continue to carry out their leading role in the armed revolution, until they liberate their homeland.

    . . .

    Article 19: The partition of Palestine in 1947 and the establishment of the state of Israel are entirely illegal, regardless of the passage of time, because they were contrary to the will of the Palestinian people and to their natural right in their homeland, and inconsistent with the principles embodied in the Charter of the United Nations, particularly the right to self-determination.

    Article 20: The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine, and everything that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void. Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.

    Article 21: The Arab Palestinian people, expressing themselves by the armed Palestinian revolution, reject all solutions which are substitutes for the total liberation of Palestine and reject all proposals aiming at the liquidation of the Palestinian problem, or its internationalization.

    Article 22: Zionism is a political movement organically associated with international imperialism and antagonistic to all action for liberation and to progressive movements in the world. It is racist and fanatic in its nature, aggressive, expansionist, and colonial in its aims, and fascist in its methods. Israel is the instrument of the Zionist movement, and geographical base for world imperialism placed strategically in the midst of the Arab homeland to combat the hopes of the Arab nation for liberation, unity, and progress. Israel is a constant source of threat vis-a-vis peace in the Middle East and the whole world. Since the liberation of Palestine will destroy the Zionist and imperialist presence and will contribute to the establishment of peace in the Middle East, the Palestinian people look for the support of all the progressive and peaceful forces and urge them all, irrespective of their affiliations and beliefs, to offer the Palestinian people all aid and support in their just struggle for the liberation of their homeland. . .
     — “ The Palestinian National Charter: Resolutions of the Palestine National Council July 1-17, 1968”
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    colonial complicity. — StreetlightX

    Pathetic and rhetorical, much like the word “apartheid.” It adds nothing to the discussion and obscures the fact that Israel declared independence from everyone at its inception and was conceived as a reclaiming of ancestral land. You can disagree with the project, but you can’t change the facts. “Dhimmi” isn’t a modern invention and Arab nations are far more responsible for colonization and apartheid than a 70 year old state on nothing piece of land.

    Israel does bad things. Misdescribing/miscontextualizing it doesn’t make it worse, it just makes you look prejudiced. Or maybe you want to claim that Israelis have some other state to go back to as they are driven into the sea.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    So yeah, let's talk about the things Israel is interested in, like ethnic cleansing and wonton murder. — StreetlightX

    Thinking like this is beneath you. Not least of which because Israel has no independent interests aside from those which we grant it by convention. Some Israelis do bad things. Far too many Israelis support them in those bad things and turn a blind eye. Cruelty is cruelty. One need not fancy it up with talk of oppression and apartheid. Do some Israelis (and elected governments) speak in reprehensible terms? Yes. And they do so as a direct result of their oppression. But as you suggest, being oppressed is insufficient justification for doing awful things.

    One could write horrible stories about the Palestinians. Would you call them out for apartheid? Ethnic cleansing? Is Hamas a terrotist organization worthy of international sanction and criminal prosecution? Is your criticism of them blunted merely because they are shitty at their jobs? (You know, can’t equalize the body count).
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    What is not complicated is that there are clear oppressors and oppressed. What is not complicated is that Israeli war crimes far outstrip anything the Arabs and Palestinians have committed combined. What is not complicated, therefore, is having moral clarity as to who deserves our support and who doesn't. — Benkei

    I thought that context clear from the post itself which talks about aggression and war crimes. — Benkei

    The context was clear. Who we should support. If our support is predicated upon who has the least dirty hands, why does it matter where that dirt came from if the choice is binary? Who would you rather succeed as a nation Syria or Israel? If you have to support one or another, which do you support?

    Clarity on what particular act is wrong is different than clarity on what that means in terms of your/our behavior. I was responding to your claim of desert, not your identification of unequal wrongs within the limited context of Israel/Palestine. The context of my response seems well summarized in this

    It isn’t so clear how we support the Palestinians and BDS the Israelis without encouraging the Palestinians in their bad conduct and hampering Israel’s ability to do the good things. — Ennui Elucidator

    Give support or not give support was the binary. Give Gaza food and non-military resources and give Israel military aid seems to be the situation on the ground.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    to distract from rather concrete issues. Like Israeli state sanctioned murder and land grabbing. — StreetlightX

    Again - Israel is wrong when it murders (definitionally) and wrong when it land grabs (definitionally). Israel is wrong when it blows up children and tells us that collateral damage is justifiable because the bad actors hide in population centers and that it shouldn’t be forced to risk its own soldiers in an invasion of Gaza to directly address the bad actors. Israel is wrong, wrong, wrong. Can I be any clearer? What issue would you like me to point at and say “Israel was wrong!”?

    The only questions I have been trying to discuss are whether there is ever a time where oppression is justified and whether on oppressor must stop all forms of oppression before it can be critical of how the oppressed behave. Trying to turn that question into approval of specific conduct or Israel’s conduct generally is on you, not me. When done with the assessment, we might find that Israel has never justifiably oppressed anyone and that continued oppression is completely unjustifiable and that 180’s admonition to instantly stop the oppression is well considered.

    Either have the conversation or don’t. Stop saying that considering Israel’s interests means approving of their actions.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    ↪Seppo


    Stop patting yourself on the back and checking what is in your pants. Go ahead and quote what I said that you take issue with and I will respond. You can even fairly summarize it. Pick any method you want to have a conversation on here that approximates a good faith reading of what I wrote and a response thereto and I am happy to engage.
  • Israel killing civilians in Gaza and the West Bank
    ↪StreetlightX Exactly. If you steal someone's house and murder their family, you don't get to plead self-defense or whine about your "legitimate interests" when they try to defend themselves (even if in so doing they themselves cross various moral lines). — Seppo

    Why do you start so strong and then fall into oblivion? Unless you were born in 1950 or earlier, you have ZERO responsibility for what happened in 1948 or 1967. If Gaza was sealed off because Israel yet again tore down tents/shacks, you might have a point about why Israeli’s shouldn’t complain when Gazans dig tunnels under their walls and slaughter Israeli families in their sleep. Israel doesn’t get to engage in collective punishment and neither do the Palestinians. When a 10 year old is blown up in the street, it doesn’t matter which side did it, whoever did it was wrong. Why is that so hard to understand?
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Ennui Elucidator

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