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On November 30 2023 21:00 raynpelikoneet wrote:
What should i know about West Bank to make an informed judgement of Gaza?
- Israel has been militarily occupying the West Bank since 1967.
- This occupation is illegal under international law.
- The long term plan by Israel regarding this occupation is that they're using it to gradually take the land of the West Bank away from Palestinians, either by building settlements for Israelis on occupied land or by chasing the people who currently live in villages and/or houses to give these villages and/or houses to Israeli settlers.
- This is done with explicit support of the State and the army, and using violence when necessary.
- After Oct 7th, this process has accelerated.
- The ultimate goal is that there would no longer be an occupied Palestine and that all of these territories would belong to Israel.
- To achieve this goal, the government of Israel is fine with violence and with a continuation of the conflict. They're not seeking peace or security.
- To ensure that peace is difficult to reach, the government of Israel has been willing to prop up Hamas, as their status as a terrorist organization decredibilizes the palestinian cause and the fact that Palestine is divided between Hamas on one side and the Palestinian Authority on the other makes it less likely that Palestine can become a nation state.
- The reason why you wouldn't want Palestine to become a nation state if you're the government of Israel is because it's much harder to grab land from a recognized nation, and your goal is grabbing land, not reaching peace.
- You can draw inferences from how they're behaving in the West Bank to have a picture of how they plan to behave in Gaza in case Gaza becomes occupied long term, but currently their plan for Gaza is not long term occupation, it's ethnic cleansing in a much less subtle and long term way, hoping to use the Oct 7th attacks as a justification, so that might not become relevant.
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It is fine though, i just wanted to have opinions on some stuff. You gave me some, so. 
Poor Israel in views of TL. 
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On November 30 2023 19:41 raynpelikoneet wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2023 18:57 Liquid`Drone wrote:On November 30 2023 18:28 raynpelikoneet wrote:On November 30 2023 18:25 Liquid`Drone wrote:
Now, to be clear, I don't idealize or support a violent response to Israel's actions. However, I also don't believe for a second that the oppression would stop if the violence stopped (even if the violence is a genuine reason for increased oppression). I also believe that the violence is an almost inevitable reaction to the oppression (it's hard for me to think of any subjugated group entirely pacifist in their response to that subjugation), but I also don't think events like October 7th are inevitable (it's also hard for me to think of any other instance where a subjugated group managed to inflict that type of damage upon its oppressors).
Do you have any other way of stopping the conflict (war?) than what Israel is doing? I'm not talking about the current invasion of Gaza to stop Hamas, but rather what has been happening in the west bank (not saying there are no terrorists there, but it's not governed by Hamas) for the past decades. Solving Gaza, right now, is way above my pay grade and I'm not really opining strongly on that, other than 'avoid actions that cause too much human suffering' (which is why I've mostly been firmly arguing against blocking food water electricity and supplies. I also don't really think that bombing locations with both Hamas and civilians solves anything, but it's not a discussion I particularly care about engaging in). The West Bank is different. There, according to this, we have 141 Israeli casualties and 1220 Palestinian casualties since 2008, but only 12 Israeli non-settler non-IDF casualties. These are more managable numbers. (For comparison, the ANC killed 52 civilians between 1976 and 1984). But like, I just flat out don't believe the 'Israel's hand is forced by Hamas/palestinians' 'If Palestine would just be nice, they'd get to have much larger territory', because as far as I am concerned, this is disproven by the settlers taking more and more territory. This is a trend that has only been increasing over the past years, and one with significant political support. Not in any way arguing that all Israelis support this: For example, here are some opinion pieces/articles in Hareetz by (what I assume are jewish writers) who largely make the same arguments I do: Data collected by the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reveals that there have been at least 570 attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank this year – an average of three attacks a day Israeli Settlers and Their Political Allies Are Turning the West Bank Into Apartheid Land
This camp is no longer offended by the word 'apartheid' – in fact it's doing everything it can to make it happen. Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett might have a new 'brother' as part of his plans to form a new center-right party and unseat Netanyahu's LikudSettlers Have a Very Effective System for Forcing Palestinians Out of Their Homes
Herding sheep into others' fields, preventing access to water, blocking roads, killing animals and breaking into homes in the middle of the night – these and other tactics are part of the daily terror perpetrated by settlers in Palestinian villages
Israeli Defense Officials Slam Gov't for Harming Efforts to Fight Settlers' ViolenceBasically, all this needs to stop, and I can't take Israeli claims that 'everything would be good if Hamas would lay down their arms' seriously until it does. If you want to turn the discussion from Gaza to west bank, be my guest, but i am not engaging into it for obvious reasons. If you want to talk about situation real or not real in Gaza we can do that. Afaik atm Israel is not attacking the west bank, are they?
They are. Maybe not with bombs, but they are definitely committing aggressions against the people there: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/30/no-work-and-no-olives-harvest-rots-as-west-bank-farmers-cut-off-from-trees
And I'm glad we're back on the topic, because that is actually what I wanted to post this morning when I got drawn back into the discussion about whether a Palestinean equivalent to Mandela or Ghandi would have achieved peace.
The fact that they aren't mass murdering Palestinean civilians in West Bank right now, doesn't mean it isn't under assault as well.
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On November 30 2023 21:05 raynpelikoneet wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2023 21:01 Liquid`Drone wrote:I'm sorry but you're going to have to do better than 'this is a lie hamas started using the water pipes for their bombs'. Here are various news articles from various times between october 7th and november 17th from organizations such as Reuters, AP, the UN human rights office of the high commissioner, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty that all reference what I am talking about: OHCHR, ' Israel must stop using water as a weapon of war: UN expertAP1AP2Reutersamnesty, not about gaza right now specificallyhuman rights watchThere are multiple mentions of this: 'Israel initially severed all water supply to Gaza after Oct. 7' or 'The besieged Gaza Strip’s 2.3 million people don’t have access to clean, running water after Israel cut off water and electricity to the enclave' or 'Gaza normally gets its water supplies from a combination of sources, including a pipeline from Israel, desalination plants on the Mediterranean Sea and wells. Those supplies were slashed when Israel cut off water' Or this one: 'On October 15 Israel announced that it was partially restoring the water supply to Gaza’s south, but without fuel to pump it, delivery is limited, and the north remains cut off.' - obviously they could only restore it if they were restricting it. Show nested quote +Before October 7, Israel supplied the Gaza Strip with 18 million cubic meters (18 billion liters) of potable water a year through three water pipelines, some nine percent of the enclave's annual use. Does everyone die of not getting water now? And yes, HAMAS literally started cutting off their water pipes to make bombs or grenade launchers or whatever... EDIT: I assume some people don't understand this is true, so...
Maybe not everyone instantly, but it's a pretty huge humanitarian crisis. And you sticking your head in the sand isn't going to make it go away. The UN is up in arms, whether that is the general council, the UNRWA or UNICEF, they are pretty much unanimous in declaring it a huge humanitarian crisis due to overcrowding from internal displacement, lack of clean water, lack of fuel and lack of all other supplies. And that is ignoring the fact that Israel is planning on ending the ceasefire. If you don't trust the UN, I am guessing Doctors without Borders, Red Cross, Oxfam Novib, Amnesty International or any other NGO isn't going to convince you either. So, yeah, you do you, and Israel can do no wrong!
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United States42252 Posts
I’m enjoying the argument that Israel didn’t cut off the water because some people in Hamas at one point used some pipes. As if two things can’t both be true.
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@JimmiC
Most of the Jewish settlers in the West bank are going there for economic reasons. It used to be more for religious purposes, but that hasn't been the main motivation in a very long time. Don't need to take my word on this, it's the settlers themselves who are admitting it.
I'm pointing that out in response to this:
"There are parallels, but there is also some major difference which point to intent. The biggest and one you would think the leftist posters would notice and think about are that unlike the SA apartheid, or any other one, Israel is not gaining wealth off the people they oppress. They are not robbing natural resources, they are not getting wealthy off the slave labour."
The settlements may not be using slave labour, but they exist predominantly for economic purposes. It is economic exploitation in every conceivable manner other than slavery. The settlers benefit from oppression and exploitation of people and land.
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On November 30 2023 19:21 Magic Powers wrote:
Cerebrate keeps repeating his favorite quote. Time to dismantle it and make sure it can never be used unironically again.
"If the Arabs put down their weapons today, there would be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons today, there would be no more Israel."
1) The word being used is "Arabs". Palestinians are a subsection of "the Arabs", they're not "all Arabs". Hence using the word "Arabs" and applying it to this conflict is already dubious.
2) Palestinians have had their land stolen by Israel, not once but many times, and it's still happening today. Neither high nor minimal levels of violence by Palestinians have been able to change this fact.
3) Israel enforces strict Apartheid.
4) Israel has killed far more Palestinians than the other way around.
Need I go on?
It's absurd to repeatedly use such a quote in this context. It's strictly a form of victim blaming. The victim should not receive equal blame for resisting against the oppressor.
Furthermore, if Palestinians laid down their weapons for good, then the oppression would not end. Israel would keep the land and would continue to oppress Palestinians. This is true because it's what has been observed for decades. It's therefore on Cerebrate to prove the claim wrong. Unfortunately he can't prove it wrong, he hasn't even attempted to do that.
Meanwhile if Israel were to end the oppression of Palestinians, that would be a completely unprecedented case. It has never even happened before. Well isn't that interesting.
Several things here:
1) There is plenty of historical precedent that Israel would give up land; it’s been sourced multiple times in this thread.
2) None of your rebuttals to the quote have any obvious link to it; it doesn’t reference land at all, and all your points take place in the context of neither side dropping their weapons. The quote itself is a hypothetical, so any argument refuting or affirming it is pointless.
3) Now if you want to argue what the quote is IMPLYING, we can have a discussion. IMO the quote is implying two premises; 1) Arabs (including Palestinians) are the ones looking to instigate violence and Israelis avoid it, and 2) Arabs would obliterate Israel if it couldn’t defend itself. There’s a ton of historical precedent for 2) as being true, whereas 1) is significantly more dubious. It’s clear Arabs don’t have the monopoly on violence, and the West Bank encroachment (with violence included) does not seem to have a reasonable moral justification. That being said, Israel has clearly historically conceded much in the name of peace in the region, and while the Arab nations have never won a war against Israel for us to know if they’d make the same concessions for peace, the rhetoric thrown around by them leads me to be highly skeptical.
4) This post and your following one are starting to come off as singling Cerebrate out and being vindictive towards him. You’re typically pretty reasonably grounded in your posts but these aren’t your finest; your emotions may be getting the better of you. I encourage you to reflect a bit and come back with a cooler head.
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Joe Brandon managed to get the ceasefire extended another day. I for one didn't think it would last an hour but somehow it keeps going. Blinken is keeping with net to "discuss the next stage of the offensive" but now that the pipeline is started its hard to see how well them restarting it will be received before all the hostages are out. By then we can only hope enough resistance piles up to stop the war.
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On November 30 2023 18:57 Liquid`Drone wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2023 18:28 raynpelikoneet wrote:On November 30 2023 18:25 Liquid`Drone wrote:
Now, to be clear, I don't idealize or support a violent response to Israel's actions. However, I also don't believe for a second that the oppression would stop if the violence stopped (even if the violence is a genuine reason for increased oppression). I also believe that the violence is an almost inevitable reaction to the oppression (it's hard for me to think of any subjugated group entirely pacifist in their response to that subjugation), but I also don't think events like October 7th are inevitable (it's also hard for me to think of any other instance where a subjugated group managed to inflict that type of damage upon its oppressors).
Do you have any other way of stopping the conflict (war?) than what Israel is doing? I'm not talking about the current invasion of Gaza to stop Hamas, but rather what has been happening in the west bank (not saying there are no terrorists there, but it's not governed by Hamas) for the past decades. Solving Gaza, right now, is way above my pay grade and I'm not really opining strongly on that, other than 'avoid actions that cause too much human suffering' (which is why I've mostly been firmly arguing against blocking food water electricity and supplies. I also don't really think that bombing locations with both Hamas and civilians solves anything, but it's not a discussion I particularly care about engaging in). The West Bank is different. There, according to this, we have 141 Israeli casualties and 1220 Palestinian casualties since 2008, but only 12 Israeli non-settler non-IDF casualties. These are more managable numbers. (For comparison, the ANC killed 52 civilians between 1976 and 1984). But like, I just flat out don't believe the 'Israel's hand is forced by Hamas/palestinians' 'If Palestine would just be nice, they'd get to have much larger territory', because as far as I am concerned, this is disproven by the settlers taking more and more territory. This is a trend that has only been increasing over the past years, and one with significant political support. Not in any way arguing that all Israelis support this: For example, here are some opinion pieces/articles in Hareetz by (what I assume are jewish writers) who largely make the same arguments I do: Data collected by the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reveals that there have been at least 570 attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank this year – an average of three attacks a day Israeli Settlers and Their Political Allies Are Turning the West Bank Into Apartheid Land
This camp is no longer offended by the word 'apartheid' – in fact it's doing everything it can to make it happen. Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett might have a new 'brother' as part of his plans to form a new center-right party and unseat Netanyahu's LikudSettlers Have a Very Effective System for Forcing Palestinians Out of Their Homes
Herding sheep into others' fields, preventing access to water, blocking roads, killing animals and breaking into homes in the middle of the night – these and other tactics are part of the daily terror perpetrated by settlers in Palestinian villages
Israeli Defense Officials Slam Gov't for Harming Efforts to Fight Settlers' ViolenceBasically, all this needs to stop, and I can't take Israeli claims that 'everything would be good if Hamas would lay down their arms' seriously until it does.
Is this not a fundamental component of conflicts of this nature where there is a long history of various forms of both sides letting the pendulum swing a little too far each time as a reaction to the other?
Once you’ve got a situation where there has been tons of violence, a long history of resentment and fear, and a wide swath of both populations the other is beyond saving, they both have essentially the same thought.
I think we both agree if Israel and hamas both agreed to just be entirely peaceful and nice forever, we’d have zero issues. The problem is that there is simply not nearly enough support or belief on that on either side.
We are well past the point where we can pretend Palestinian civilians widely believe in a 2 state solution where they each do their own thing and just kind of exist as 2 countries next to each other.
Support for Hamas is extremely high and Hamas loves to reiterate they want to kill all Jews and wipe Israel off the map. The whole “yeah but they are mad for a reason” thing works both ways because the conflict has been going on so long. The amount of people involved, the nature of the conflict itself, and the amount of time the conflict has been going on for, combine to create an extremely resentful situation.
We are all familiar with the boring ole “yeah but when you fight back against terrorists, you kill people and so then you radicalize more people and so it only gets worse”, right? And it’s old and boring because it’s such an accepted fact and such a standard part about all of these situations.
And so when Palestinians launch attacks like October 7, should we not expect Joe Shmoe Israeli civilian to react the same way? Of course we all realize October 7 radicalized a shit ton of Israelis. The situations are only distinct in ivy tower discussions. The whole “well yeah but when you examine history and…” means absolutely jack shit to a Palestinian who lost a family member. And it also means jack shit to an Israeli who lost a family member.
I have seen a huge number of folks here immediately take the “yeah, but” route when faced with examples of Israeli civilian suffering, as if you have any belief whatsoever that it should make a difference to the victims. I am just assuming people are making a decision not to focus on it. So just to be clear and make sure we’re all on the same page, this whole “yeah but then you radicalized more people so checkmate” thing occurs every time there is an attack against Israeli citizens. October 7 will be cited as an example peace isn’t possible for an extremely long time by people who were personally impacted. There are plenty of examples to point to with actual infants being killed. It radicalizes Israelis just the same as those same dynamics radicalize Palestinians.
It is important to not just give 1 side a pass when doing that will consistently make the situation worse.
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On December 01 2023 01:21 Ryzel wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2023 19:21 Magic Powers wrote:
Cerebrate keeps repeating his favorite quote. Time to dismantle it and make sure it can never be used unironically again.
"If the Arabs put down their weapons today, there would be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons today, there would be no more Israel."
1) The word being used is "Arabs". Palestinians are a subsection of "the Arabs", they're not "all Arabs". Hence using the word "Arabs" and applying it to this conflict is already dubious.
2) Palestinians have had their land stolen by Israel, not once but many times, and it's still happening today. Neither high nor minimal levels of violence by Palestinians have been able to change this fact.
3) Israel enforces strict Apartheid.
4) Israel has killed far more Palestinians than the other way around.
Need I go on?
It's absurd to repeatedly use such a quote in this context. It's strictly a form of victim blaming. The victim should not receive equal blame for resisting against the oppressor.
Furthermore, if Palestinians laid down their weapons for good, then the oppression would not end. Israel would keep the land and would continue to oppress Palestinians. This is true because it's what has been observed for decades. It's therefore on Cerebrate to prove the claim wrong. Unfortunately he can't prove it wrong, he hasn't even attempted to do that.
Meanwhile if Israel were to end the oppression of Palestinians, that would be a completely unprecedented case. It has never even happened before. Well isn't that interesting. Several things here: 1) There is plenty of historical precedent that Israel would give up land; it’s been sourced multiple times in this thread. 2) None of your rebuttals to the quote have any obvious link to it; it doesn’t reference land at all, and all your points take place in the context of neither side dropping their weapons. Neither side never has, so there’s absolutely no way to refute (or affirm) the quote in question using historical examples. 3) Now if you want to argue what the quote is IMPLYING, we can have a discussion. IMO the quote is implying two premises; 1) Arabs (including Palestinians) are the ones looking to instigate violence and Israelis avoid it, and 2) Arabs would obliterate Israel if it couldn’t defend itself. There’s a ton of historical precedent for 2) as being true, whereas 1) is significantly more dubious. It’s clear Arabs don’t have the monopoly on violence, and the West Bank encroachment (with violence included) does not seem to have a reasonable moral justification. That being said, Israel has clearly historically conceded much in the name of peace in the region, and while the Arab nations have never won a war against Israel for us to know if they’d make the same concessions for peace, the rhetoric thrown around by them leads me to be highly skeptical. You’d be better off arguing these points more clearly instead of the oppression angle if your goal is to debunk the quote. 4) This post and your following one are starting to come off as singling Cerebrate out and being vindictive towards him. You’re typically pretty reasonably grounded in your posts but these aren’t your finest; your emotions may be getting the better of you. I encourage you to reflect a bit and come back with a cooler head.
Before I address the first three points, let me address number 4) I don't single out individuals, I single out arguments. If an individual has a posting history with an overwhelming amount of bad argumentation - such as that of Cerebrate - I will eventually call out that individual. Cerebrate keeps misrepresenting the historic conflict between Jews and Palestinians, sometimes completely making things up and straight up attempting to rewrite history. It has nothing to do with me not liking him as a person. I reject his argumentation, and it just so happens that he's one of the most active posters, which is why he's been more on the receiving end of people's criticism. I've also called out RenSC2, RvB, Mohdoo, JimmiC, and most recently rayn. That's an awfully broad way of "singling out" individuals and "being vindictive" towards them, wouldn't you agree? Doesn't seem very selective to me.
1) Israel has only claimed land in the West bank, they've not returned it (edit: I don't know if they've claimed land elsewhere, but I've worded the sentence poorly. The point is that no land was returned). Displacement and Apartheid has made sure of that. All of that land has never belonged to the State of Israel to begin with, and it still doesn't. Please cite sources to the contrary.
2) No obvious link? I'm not sure what you mean by that. Can you elaborate? Anything specific?
And what do you mean by land not being referenced? What would you call the forceful eviction of Palestinians, and the creation of no-go zones where Palestinians are strictly disallowed to enter where they were freely roaming around prior to the Jewish settlements? Do you want to claim that these Palestinians left their homes without any forceful coercion, and that they're surrounded by 20 feet walls, barbed wire and armed checkpoints out of their own volition? Would you argue that none of this required violent and unlawful means, and that the continued Apartheid is not based on the threat of violence and imprisonment against Palestinians?
3) Arabs are not a hivemind. The overwhelming majority of them are not extremists. It may be difficult to spot the extremists among the masses, but that doesn't mean that the ideology of the masses can be equated to that of the extremists. They're not equals.
I'm also not sure why you're using the term "Israelis" if you're using the term "Arabs". The common distinction is between Jews and Arabs, not between Israelis and Arabs.
Neither are Jews a hivemind. So Arabs are certainly not "looking to instigate violence" any more than Jews are, and Jews are no more "avoiding violence" than Arabs.
Hence it also doesn't follow that "Arabs would obliterate Israel". No, they wouldn't. Extremists certainly would. But extremist Jews would also do the same to Arabs. Therefore I want to make sure that this distinction stays intact during our discourse.
The conflict is therefore multi-layered. On the one hand you have extremists like Taliban, Hamas, Hezbollah, ISIS, etc. This extremism drives the fringe part of the conflict between Jews and Arabs, and also between Arabs and other Arabs. The fringes of a conflict don't define the entire conflict, but they often have an affliction with the conflict. From Israel's side (mainly the settlers, the administration and the IDF) there's a conflict happening with the Palestinian population at large. This conflict specifically is by and large driven by these groups within Israel. Hamas enters into the picture as they're a part of this conflict in Gaza. Hamas are then further sponsored by enemy/terrorist states such as Iran and Qatar to continue driving the extremist element of the conflict. That extremism is then used by Israel's oppressive administration as an excuse to make themselves look like an entirely innocent victim (by convenient association with the people of Israel, who I'd argue are by and large innocent, although I'm not sure if for example KwarK would agree) that is acting "for the protection" of those people. Meanwhile the oppression continues and the extremist side of the conflict further incentivizes the justification of the oppression. Thus we have a vicious cycle that is further driven by disinformation.
And to be sure that you truly understand my position: in no way am I taking a side here. The treatment of Jews in Arab nations is no less condemnable. Millions used to live in the Middle East and Africa in the 20th century, and most of them are gone. A few hundred thousand might be left. Even today Jews are still being expelled. This would make for an entirely separate topic worth opening a thread for, one that absolutely links to the Israel-Palestine conflict in an ideological and political sense. Though it can be argued that not all of this movement out of Arab nations can be explained by anti-Jewish hatred/policies (I'm sure some of them left for Israel or other countries for economic reasons or otherwise), but millions? Millions didn't just decide to leave without any force or coercion, no. That was a matter of persecution and displacement, in a way comparable to the situation in the West bank.
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Magic Powers, it’s possible we are working with different versions of the term “extremists”. Since Hamas advocates for killing all Jews and eliminating Israel entirely, I feel like we can all agree Hamas is extremist. And I would also say anyone who supports killing all Jews is an extremist. So anyone who supports Hamas in a non-zero way is definitely extremist because Hamas’s ambitions are the absolute maximum level of extreme. Do we align there? Is it extremist to want Israel to be entirely wiped out and all Jews killed? When someone supports Hamas, that is what they are doing. Supporting Hamas is an extremist position.
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On December 01 2023 02:32 Mohdoo wrote:
Magic Powers, it’s possible we are working with different versions of the term “extremists”. Since Hamas advocates for killing all Jews and eliminating Israel entirely, I feel like we can all agree Hamas is extremist. And I would also say anyone who supports killing all Jews is an extremist. So anyone who supports Hamas in a non-zero way is definitely extremist because Hamas’s ambitions are the absolute maximum level of extreme. Do we align there? Is it extremist to want Israel to be entirely wiped out and all Jews killed? When someone supports Hamas, that is what they are doing. Supporting Hamas is an extremist position.
People who express support for Hamas are certainly extremists, yes.
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I think It is more interesting to know what support Hamas in a non zero way means to Mohdoo.
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On December 01 2023 01:29 Sermokala wrote:
Joe Brandon managed to get the ceasefire extended another day. I for one didn't think it would last an hour but somehow it keeps going. Blinken is keeping with net to "discuss the next stage of the offensive" but now that the pipeline is started its hard to see how well them restarting it will be received before all the hostages are out. By then we can only hope enough resistance piles up to stop the war.
I think the hostage exchanges are just about done for now and Israel isn't going to hesitate to restart bombing and invading further south based off the most recent talks from Netanyahu and Blinken.
Blinken indicated US support was ostensibly contingent on Israel (continuing to in his view?) act in “compliance with international humanitarian law,” and for "Israel to take every possible measure to avoid civilian harm,”
Now the obvious question (besides how you follow international law during a clearly illegal occupation) given the strategy in the north of Gaza is, how are they possibly going to do that, but for ethnically cleansing Gaza (to the degree that meets those conditions)?
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On December 01 2023 04:06 Godwrath wrote:
I think It is more interesting to know what support Hamas in a non zero way means to Mohdoo.
“On a scale of 0-10, how much do you want Hamas to achieve their stated goals”
Hamas is very clear about their goals. They have indicated they intend to continue working towards those goals. So I think it’s easy to just boil it down to that.
It’s totally valid to say stuff like “Palestinians have reason to be angry” and other similar things. And that belief can be held without wanting Hamas to continue to operate and work towards their goals. I think a common error people make is to feel like they must use some organization or entity as a placeholder when discussing power struggles. If someone believes the IDF is immoral and a net negative for humanity, it does not necessitate supporting Hamas.
As I’ve indicated before, Israel and Gaza are at war because Hamas is the formal governing body of Gaza and they have declared war against Israel. Israel accepts this label. As a participant in war, Gaza and Israel are within their right to conduct forms of violence towards the opposing military. They are not within their right to conduct forms of violence against non-military targets.
Entirely avoiding civilian harm during a formal war is not possible or a reasonable metric to meet, which is why I consider war unethical as an idea. However, if we assume that moral is already being violated, the next step is for each military to avoid civilian harm to whatever extent is possible. In the case of Hamas, they openly declare harm towards Israeli civilians is a core component of their goals. This is a moral violation egregious enough to stand pretty much alone when compared to all other world governments. Am I forgetting any, or is Hamas the only governing body that openly declares killing all of a specific ethnicity a core goal? I think they may be the only one.
So while I think “supporting Palestinian people waging war” against Israel” is ethical within the context that the war is already in motion, the extent to which Hamas extends beyond that by openly celebrating civilian casualties and reiterating their intention to kill many more is an extreme outlier and way beyond what can be reasonably supported in any way.
There are plenty of comparisons to be made with Israel making an effort to push Palestinians out of land. Harboring and acting on racism towards Palestinians, and other related Israeli moral failings. But it goes well beyond a false equivalent to say those failings are identical to October 7, the videos Hamas posted of it, and the extent to which they celebrated the specific atrocities committed. So that’s my logic at least. But happy to hear how your views may compare to mine.
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@JimmiC
The links you provided regarding Israeli laws on citizenship are concerned with the State of Israel, but not the settlements. Israel has extended protection to the settlers by sanctioning the settlements over and over again, but that is its own process separate from Israeli citizenship. The settlements simply "happened" while the State of Israel watched, in part didn't intervene, and in part actively supported them through law. There was no official "intention" by the state, but the state offers protection regardless.
Scholars have justified these movements as "returning to Jewish homeland", and also by arguing that an Arab Palestine never existed. These two points were and still are the justifications being used to counter accusations of it being a war crime. The accusation is that the settlers are occupants and thus committing a war crime against Palestinians.
As the settlements grew, they eventually occupied much more space than the whole Palestinian population in the West bank does today. These spaces became more and more fortified, and movement of Palestinians became controlled very tightly and under heavy surveillance as well as force and unlawful violence. The settlements have thus become safe havens for Jewish settlers who now go there to benefit from disproportionate funding from the State of Israel to the whole area. All of these settlements receive a lot more funding per capita than any other area within the State of Israel itself. This is why there is an incredibly high economic incentive for the settlers to stay, and for new settlers to arrive.
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EPT
