Hamas attacks Israel
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@Mik said in Hamas attacks Israel:
If it were genocide it would have been over a year or so ago.
It all depends on whether one uses a personal definition or the one that the UN, the International Association of Genocide Scholars, Holocaust Museum, The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR - U.S.), The International Court of Justice (ICJ), B'Tselem (The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories), Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, Jewish Voice for Peace - to name a few entities who have defined Israel's activities as a genocide.
Norman Finkelstein, a Jewish scholar of the Palestine situation, notes that 47% of Jews in Israel supported genocide in Gaza - i.e. asking if everyone in a city should be killed, answered "yes". Asked if there are "any innocents in Gaza?", 70% of Jewish Israelis answered "no". He also notes that's why the IDF "targets" toddlers. A member of the Jewish opposition stated that IDF soldiers kill children as a "hobby".
But one can argue that an alternative definition as employed by many mainstream Jewish organizations in the US don't accept that Israel is committing genocide. It's a bit like the word "myth" - one can say that Christianity is based on myth - meaning a narrative which need not be based on fact, but some would argue that "myth" is a falsehood. One's definition leads to different answers.
Genocide - using the above definition, has been pervasive throughout history. The US is based on genocide of many native peoples. The early Zionists knew that genocide would be necessary and discussed it openly - though avoiding the term. Ugly business. Good luck to all involved.
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Honestly it’s like calling a glance at a black woman’s hair ‘white supremacy’.
You take a word with a well understood and emotionally charged meaning and apply it to something very different with the hopes of getting some of the stink of the word on the new thing.
Of course it also cheapens the word if you’re successful.
This tweet pithily demonstrates that since most of us still assign to the word the original horror it was meant to convey, but there’s a palpable absurdity in its use given Hamas is taking days to decide whether it wants it to end and will probably not quite get there. After all, there’s hunger, and there’s release-the-hostages hunger. Their famine seems to be somewhere between the two.
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Imagine if Germany had won WWII and as part of an agreement with Mexico - California, Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Arizona were returned to Mexico. Individuals living in those states would be confined to a narrow area along the coast of California - would Americans accept that that the native Indians had lived here for 14000 years and were rightfully occupying their land? Yeah, I'm sure. Not to say that Genocide isn't the answer- but it was always going to be an ugly business - and Israel's founders as well as many throughout the world knew it would be a problem.
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As Yuval Noah Harari has said it’s not a border dispute, there’s enough land for both peoples. It’s a conflict of narratives and as such is intractable.
While two states is the only eventual solution (since neither people are going anywhere) it seems like we’ve never been further from that in my lifetime.
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As Yuval Noah Harari has said it’s not a border dispute, there’s enough land for both peoples. It’s a conflict of narratives and as such is intractable.
While two states is the only eventual solution (since neither people are going anywhere) it seems like we’ve never been further from that in my lifetime.
@jon-nyc said in Hamas attacks Israel:
As Yuval Noah Harari has said it’s not a border dispute, there’s enough land for both peoples. It’s a conflict of narratives and as such is intractable.
While two states is the only eventual solution (since neither people are going anywhere) it seems like we’ve never been further from that in my lifetime.
Not entirely true. Look at the West Bank - settlers continue to
stealsecure additional land for no compensation. Listen to the Israeli officials and view the patches on Israeli soldiers showing a "greater Israel" comprising territory of several nations.Israel has a blank check of armament and support from the most powerful nation in the world.
Truth be told, Israel will get whatever it wants - BUT, there will be a cost even if Israel manages to influence/edit/quash/purchase social and mainstream media.
Like many on the right, I preferred the days of watching a world based on the principles of Andy Griffith and Mayberry - and maybe we'll get there - just no time soon. It's just hard to drink the Kool-Aid of good guys vs. bad guys in a more interconnected world.
