Israel/Palestine thread

in other news

Syria’s ousted leader Bashar Assad says he wanted to keep fighting but Russians evacuated him

The new Syria government is trying to make relations with the US by releasing Assad hostage Travis Timmerman and returning him to the US. They hope the US takes away the terrorist designation of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham

They are not happy with what Israel is doing at the moment, but are not condemning it as hard as expected

THere is a chance they can be allies with Israel (although Israel seems to not trust them)

I differentiate between extremists and non extremists. Currently it seems non extremists are the majority, by far.

Timmerman left days ago. but calling him an Assad hostage is absurd. he illegally crossed into Syria in the middle of a civil war and is a citizen of the main hostile orchestrator. hes either an idiot or a spy.

Oh, ok. I don't necessarily agree, but hey, as long as you apply this basic standard for all the kidnapped and imprisoned people on the other side, I can live with it. Israel has abducted/imprisoned any number of Palestinian civilians under dubious pretexts, but I'm sure you can handwave that away by calling them all Hamas.

A huge number of said brutalized people are kids, olds, and various others that have no say in anything Hamas does. I also like how you say they, "have had no interest in creating a permanent peace treaty" -- implying that the other side DOES have such an interest, when they extremely certainly DO NOT.

This, of course, never happened (even places like The Times of Israel don't go this far). Now, part of the protests involved some group trying to block AVOWED ZIONISTS access to campus places, but there's a big gap between that geopolitical tendency and one's ethno-religious identity. Evidence of this is all the Jewish students/activists who took part in the pro-Palestine protests... what, do you think they banned themselves from the library?

In before you completely ignore me destroying your dumb claims for the nth time.

Considering that much of what is discussed in this thread relates to so called holy land and the rights to pray and practice religion, I’d say any discussions about God are relevant.

And since I’m the mod, I get to make the rulings.

I’m glad we agree that killing people for the right to pray at a specific spot is morally reprehensible and stupid.

First thing is first. HTS/Turkey is going VERY hard at the Kurds right now. But it isn't convenient to the narrative to bring this up, so isn't really part of the narrative.

The reality the world is so obsessed with Palestinian self-determination and so indifferent towards Kurds is a very good example of how the Palestinian activist movement itself has very little first principles driving it, and is pretty much entirely driven by ulterior motivations.

I admit I have payed very little attention to Greta Thunberg over the years, although if I did pay attention I doubt I would agree with most of her politics. But this post popped up on my timeline a few days ago, and whatever her motives, she should be given credit for addressing this giant hypocrisy.

lol, holy ****. You ACTUALLY believe this, I'm sure. Anyway, all anyone needs to do to understand that your claims here are false is to spend 5 minutes with any Hasidic/ultra-orthodox member of the faith.

I do think that Israel's misadventures in the region are MORE ABOUT imperialism than religious conquest, so, I don't know, hang your hat on that one if you wish.

How would you define someone that when polled with the question "do you agree with Hamas actions" after 10 7 , responds affirmately (agreeing somewhat or more)?

extremist or non extremist?

It's either that, or it's that the country under which most of us live is DIRECTLY, OPENLY, and MASSIVELY funding and arming Israel's genocide, where that is not the case for Syria/Turkey and the Kurds. Same thing explains our relative lack of interest in war crimes in Africa and elsewhere. Oh, and also the Kurds/Africans don't have their own massive industry of lobbying/PR within the West that Israel does. There are 100x more "Israeli" hasbara propaganda accounts yelling at us about how we love terrorists than there are on behalf of the Kurds, or anybody else for that matter. It's easy to lose the indifference when somebody is spitting in your face.

Pretty simple and logical motivations, but nah, I bet it's these conspiratorial and scary ULTERIOR MOTIVATIONS you're fearmongering about.

Would you hold this same standard to other religions. That the words of their most extreme minority views invalidate any general statements concerning the general beliefs of the population?

The wildest part of this giant discrepancy is IF Israel was a one party theocratic state, were said govt espoused ultra-orthodox beliefs, it would be pretty equivalent to entities like Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthis and the Iran govt. itself.

And most critics of Israel that use the viewpoints of the orthodox communities as a "gotcha" to broad brush criticize Israelis are completely indifferent towards this giant double standards in their worldview.

but you might be the only person in this thread that thinks that is what they are fighting about

so we can talk about it all you want, but it has zero to do with the conflict

Erdogan is an awful person and no friend of israel, and seems to be funding the new regime. So i agree -- it's complicated

I would love it if all religious people everywhere stopped trying to be involved in politics. Belief in an invisible super-being should be considered a conflict of interest to serving the populace.

Zero people tangibly benefit from either side killing anybody for spooky magic land and old buildings they can use for private sky daddy diaries.

This isn’t true, not even according to your own posts in this thread.

Religion is very much a primary aspect to this war, and hand waving it away when it doesn’t suit your narrow narrative is what people should ignore.

Cross since you want to debate it

Muslims Christians and Jews all pray in Jerusalem right now

so that cannot be what this war is about

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now it is true that Jews and Christians could not pray there from 1947-1967 so maybe that was part of the 1967 war, no doubt

but has little to do with today

None of this is true, but even if it was this seems to be you acknowledging you dont actually have any first principles except for antagonism the US, and you are mostly indifferent towards human rights violations that aren't attributed to the US in your opinion.

Also, the correct analogy is Kurds/Palestinians as far as lobbying goes. And yes, this is correct there is a giant Palestinian lobby with ulterior motivations that does not exist for Kurds.

Well, they were only the most striking example of my point, and they're far from an extreme minority. There are moderate Jewish people who believe similarly, too. I gotta say, I didn't expect you to have a problem with my answer to MAFF's truly remarkable take of

For the record, I hold that all of the mainstream organized religious are roughly equally malignant as each other, and I do, of course, hold the others to the same standards as Judaism. In my ideal society, the practice of PUBLIC organized religion is strictly banned, although I have no interest in policing any private expression of religious faith.

When the right to pray or access a religious site is a point of contention so strong that it prevents a ceasefire or permanent peace, then there is a problem. And it’s a problem both sides seem to have. It’s extremely selfish and stupid to let people continue to die for some of these religious sticking points.

All we hear is blablabla we will never give up Jerusalem bc 2500 years and God this and the Temple annd the Dome and blaaaghhhh vomit. Enough already. People are dying. Religious nut jobs on both sides should gtfo of the way. Let rational people divide the land without worrying which sky daddy they may offend.

Religion has nothing do to with this war. The war is about land and nations, not religion. Nothing I said says it is about religion

If it was about religion, then as i keep saying, Egypt Jordan and Saudi would not be Israeli allies

In fact, and Islamic State government is taking over Syria, and will likely have better relations with Israel than the Secular Assad government

so again it cannot be about religion

so not sure what we gain about continuing to discuss this, but ill keep showing you how it isnt about religion if we want to waste time and you can keep saying it is, and this gets us nowhere closer to discussing how to solve the conflict between Israel and the Palestenian territories

And you can’t claim it’s nothing to do with religion when all participants involved consistently use religious symbols as their emblems.

Intentional nonsense. It’s literally called the Holy Land.

And just ftr, if it’s not about religion then it’s about imperialism, which you also claim it’s not. You’ve painted yourself into a snug little corner.

Ah, yes, that classically powerful Palestinian lobby. In the US, AIPAC ALONE is more powerful than all Palestinian advocacy groups combined. In before you call the center-left of the Democratic Party part of an organized pro-Palestine lobby or something equally dumb.

If I remember right, you've said in the past that the milquetoast, centrist, imperialist, corporate Democratic Party engaged in Marxist practice or had Marxist roots or some such silly thing. My apologies if I'm getting that mixed up inaccurately with all the related crazy things you say.

but it's not

Jordan made it a point of contention from 48-67 but for the last 57 years, all people have been able to pray freely in Jerusalem. But it is still the capital of Israel

the biggest issue is that neither side really wants a 2 state solution or peace. not sure how they get past that hurdle.

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I get the confusion. You think i am saying that Jerusalem has to stay because of religious reasons, and maybe that is partially true so i get what you are saying. But secular Jews in Israel do not want to give up Jerusalem, The last word in the Israel National Anthem is Jerusalem, many Jews just care about Jerusalem

this guy answers it kind of how i would

anyhow, i do not think we will ever agree on this cross, so i'm probably going to stop talking about it

No, we will never agree.

But I’m glad to see you referencing secular Jews now. I guess we’re not so fake when it suits you.