|
NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets.
Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source. |
On August 08 2025 09:29 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 08 2025 09:17 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 03:16 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 03:09 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 02:49 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 02:22 Billyboy wrote:On August 07 2025 21:07 Nebuchad wrote:On August 07 2025 18:16 Jankisa wrote:
This semantic arguments are exactly what the people who stan for Israel's imperialist brutal campaign want, just drown the discourse in semantics and arguments about opinions.
When faced with a clear timeline of actual war crime, irrefutable step by step plan announced and executed by Israel which resulted in malnourished kids dying of starvation, more then a thousand people gunned down as they are funneled to 4 aid distribution points which replaced more then 200 UN ones, they will simply ignore it and wait to catch an opportunity for some stupid inane gotcha, or, once again try to bog everything down with talking about genocide scholars.
Who the fuck cares what we call what is happening, honestly, nothing is going to change with calling it genocide, Israel will always have some people ready to say it's not, you will never win this kind of an argument, and this argument is easy for people who still probably like to think of themselves as decent people to make.
What they can't and won't do is engage with facts of planned starvation, countless instances of murdering of aid workers, complete disregard for getting the hostages back, leveling of 80 % of structures in Gaza, not letting any journalists in.
There is no strategy we can employ in which this wouldn't happen, you'll never get the engagement you want because this isn't an honest debate in the first place. Faced with that, I'd rather just stick to saying things that are true. It is probably the case that as the world goes more and more rightwing, being correct loses value, but that's fine, we're only some dudes on TL we aren't producing a ton of value anyway. I do not think that assuming the worst of people, treating it as fact, and then being mad about it is a good strategy. Sure you are right sometimes, but lots of times you are not and you miss out on actual conversation and the chance or learning things and influencing people. It is the way most everyone, especially in the age of social media acts, but it is also shit. I don't see it as assuming the worst of people. Everyone has different ideas about morality, that's how it works. It's neither a good or a bad thing, it's just a thing, and sure I can get mad about it sometimes like everyone else but I try and control that. Since I can't get people to change their moralities, I find it less useful to talk about that, so I try and stick to factual claims, that's how I've been operating. I guess I see value in doing it like that because of my own experience, that's how I changed my politics. Breadtube didn't tell me that the rightwing was good and pure and we needed to befriend them, they told me that their ideas were obviously wrong, their influencers were morons and/or dishonest, and their goals for society awful. They made convincing arguments, I didn't enjoy being obviously wrong about politics, so I changed my positions. That won't work on everyone, but it's impossible for something to work on everyone, so... I think sticking to the facts is a great strategy, and has a higher chance of success than attacking. I just think that you will get honest debates (not 100% of the time) if you engage honestly. And I agree that focusing on whether it is genocide or not is kind of missing the point. There will be plenty of time for that when the conflict is over. It is clear that the starving people pictures moved the needle, so there are appeals to emotion that work. Anger is just not that emotion because it is almost always just returned. When the conflict is over, yeah... Not for the first time, "the greatest crime of the left is being correct too early, when there's still time to act"... Anger is returned but that doesn't really matter, you're not trying to have an effect on the person you're talking to you're trying to have an effect on the audience. You want to show that what they're saying makes no sense so that others can recognize it. If you're having a beer with a conservative obviously your strategy will be different. Labeling it genocide does absolutely nothing to stop it, it is a dumb pissing match. And you can certainly go to early and lose credibility. Like for example accusing Israel of genocide during the Oct 7th attack. Or judging people as evil for not instantly agreeing with you and stopping fruitful discussions before they start. Well we've had ten years of discussions by now, I think it's pretty clear that they aren't going to be fruitful, we don't need to try again every time to see if this time is the one. You don't believe in doing that either as we see from how you engaged with Zambrah in the other thread or with GH for the entirety of your life. As already explained in the last few posts, the goal of my posting on TL isn't to stop genocide, I am under no delusion that we are doing anything important here. I just see arguments that don't work and I correct them as well as I can. The last sentence is just silly, obviously I am not "judging people as evil for not instantly agreeing with me", but it's a cool sentence I'm sure you felt proud as you wrote it.
When did I say me? This is the way you operate regardless of poster, I do not think I'm special. And I'd obviously assume that any response to me was some sort of trap and attempted gotcha, because that is how you operated for years. You called this "not an honest debate", assuming you meant RJ gooner, but given how easily and often you come to this conclusion I feel the statement is a lot more true then false.
|
On August 08 2025 09:36 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 08 2025 09:29 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 09:17 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 03:16 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 03:09 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 02:49 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 02:22 Billyboy wrote:On August 07 2025 21:07 Nebuchad wrote:On August 07 2025 18:16 Jankisa wrote:
This semantic arguments are exactly what the people who stan for Israel's imperialist brutal campaign want, just drown the discourse in semantics and arguments about opinions.
When faced with a clear timeline of actual war crime, irrefutable step by step plan announced and executed by Israel which resulted in malnourished kids dying of starvation, more then a thousand people gunned down as they are funneled to 4 aid distribution points which replaced more then 200 UN ones, they will simply ignore it and wait to catch an opportunity for some stupid inane gotcha, or, once again try to bog everything down with talking about genocide scholars.
Who the fuck cares what we call what is happening, honestly, nothing is going to change with calling it genocide, Israel will always have some people ready to say it's not, you will never win this kind of an argument, and this argument is easy for people who still probably like to think of themselves as decent people to make.
What they can't and won't do is engage with facts of planned starvation, countless instances of murdering of aid workers, complete disregard for getting the hostages back, leveling of 80 % of structures in Gaza, not letting any journalists in.
There is no strategy we can employ in which this wouldn't happen, you'll never get the engagement you want because this isn't an honest debate in the first place. Faced with that, I'd rather just stick to saying things that are true. It is probably the case that as the world goes more and more rightwing, being correct loses value, but that's fine, we're only some dudes on TL we aren't producing a ton of value anyway. I do not think that assuming the worst of people, treating it as fact, and then being mad about it is a good strategy. Sure you are right sometimes, but lots of times you are not and you miss out on actual conversation and the chance or learning things and influencing people. It is the way most everyone, especially in the age of social media acts, but it is also shit. I don't see it as assuming the worst of people. Everyone has different ideas about morality, that's how it works. It's neither a good or a bad thing, it's just a thing, and sure I can get mad about it sometimes like everyone else but I try and control that. Since I can't get people to change their moralities, I find it less useful to talk about that, so I try and stick to factual claims, that's how I've been operating. I guess I see value in doing it like that because of my own experience, that's how I changed my politics. Breadtube didn't tell me that the rightwing was good and pure and we needed to befriend them, they told me that their ideas were obviously wrong, their influencers were morons and/or dishonest, and their goals for society awful. They made convincing arguments, I didn't enjoy being obviously wrong about politics, so I changed my positions. That won't work on everyone, but it's impossible for something to work on everyone, so... I think sticking to the facts is a great strategy, and has a higher chance of success than attacking. I just think that you will get honest debates (not 100% of the time) if you engage honestly. And I agree that focusing on whether it is genocide or not is kind of missing the point. There will be plenty of time for that when the conflict is over. It is clear that the starving people pictures moved the needle, so there are appeals to emotion that work. Anger is just not that emotion because it is almost always just returned. When the conflict is over, yeah... Not for the first time, "the greatest crime of the left is being correct too early, when there's still time to act"... Anger is returned but that doesn't really matter, you're not trying to have an effect on the person you're talking to you're trying to have an effect on the audience. You want to show that what they're saying makes no sense so that others can recognize it. If you're having a beer with a conservative obviously your strategy will be different. Labeling it genocide does absolutely nothing to stop it, it is a dumb pissing match. And you can certainly go to early and lose credibility. Like for example accusing Israel of genocide during the Oct 7th attack. Or judging people as evil for not instantly agreeing with you and stopping fruitful discussions before they start. Well we've had ten years of discussions by now, I think it's pretty clear that they aren't going to be fruitful, we don't need to try again every time to see if this time is the one. You don't believe in doing that either as we see from how you engaged with Zambrah in the other thread or with GH for the entirety of your life. As already explained in the last few posts, the goal of my posting on TL isn't to stop genocide, I am under no delusion that we are doing anything important here. I just see arguments that don't work and I correct them as well as I can. The last sentence is just silly, obviously I am not "judging people as evil for not instantly agreeing with me", but it's a cool sentence I'm sure you felt proud as you wrote it. When did I say me? This is the way you operate regardless of poster, I do not think I'm special. And I'd obviously assume that any response to me was some sort of trap and attempted gotcha, because that is how you operated for years. You called this "not an honest debate", assuming you meant RJ gooner, but given how easily and often you come to this conclusion I feel the statement is a lot more true then false.
I tend to believe that people are dishonest faster than I assume people are stupid, you're right. I even have a blog post about that from years ago. It doesn't follow that I "judge them" for being "evil" after that, that's silly. I just move on with my day.
|
On August 08 2025 09:43 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 08 2025 09:36 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 09:29 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 09:17 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 03:16 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 03:09 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 02:49 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 02:22 Billyboy wrote:On August 07 2025 21:07 Nebuchad wrote:On August 07 2025 18:16 Jankisa wrote:
This semantic arguments are exactly what the people who stan for Israel's imperialist brutal campaign want, just drown the discourse in semantics and arguments about opinions.
When faced with a clear timeline of actual war crime, irrefutable step by step plan announced and executed by Israel which resulted in malnourished kids dying of starvation, more then a thousand people gunned down as they are funneled to 4 aid distribution points which replaced more then 200 UN ones, they will simply ignore it and wait to catch an opportunity for some stupid inane gotcha, or, once again try to bog everything down with talking about genocide scholars.
Who the fuck cares what we call what is happening, honestly, nothing is going to change with calling it genocide, Israel will always have some people ready to say it's not, you will never win this kind of an argument, and this argument is easy for people who still probably like to think of themselves as decent people to make.
What they can't and won't do is engage with facts of planned starvation, countless instances of murdering of aid workers, complete disregard for getting the hostages back, leveling of 80 % of structures in Gaza, not letting any journalists in.
There is no strategy we can employ in which this wouldn't happen, you'll never get the engagement you want because this isn't an honest debate in the first place. Faced with that, I'd rather just stick to saying things that are true. It is probably the case that as the world goes more and more rightwing, being correct loses value, but that's fine, we're only some dudes on TL we aren't producing a ton of value anyway. I do not think that assuming the worst of people, treating it as fact, and then being mad about it is a good strategy. Sure you are right sometimes, but lots of times you are not and you miss out on actual conversation and the chance or learning things and influencing people. It is the way most everyone, especially in the age of social media acts, but it is also shit. I don't see it as assuming the worst of people. Everyone has different ideas about morality, that's how it works. It's neither a good or a bad thing, it's just a thing, and sure I can get mad about it sometimes like everyone else but I try and control that. Since I can't get people to change their moralities, I find it less useful to talk about that, so I try and stick to factual claims, that's how I've been operating. I guess I see value in doing it like that because of my own experience, that's how I changed my politics. Breadtube didn't tell me that the rightwing was good and pure and we needed to befriend them, they told me that their ideas were obviously wrong, their influencers were morons and/or dishonest, and their goals for society awful. They made convincing arguments, I didn't enjoy being obviously wrong about politics, so I changed my positions. That won't work on everyone, but it's impossible for something to work on everyone, so... I think sticking to the facts is a great strategy, and has a higher chance of success than attacking. I just think that you will get honest debates (not 100% of the time) if you engage honestly. And I agree that focusing on whether it is genocide or not is kind of missing the point. There will be plenty of time for that when the conflict is over. It is clear that the starving people pictures moved the needle, so there are appeals to emotion that work. Anger is just not that emotion because it is almost always just returned. When the conflict is over, yeah... Not for the first time, "the greatest crime of the left is being correct too early, when there's still time to act"... Anger is returned but that doesn't really matter, you're not trying to have an effect on the person you're talking to you're trying to have an effect on the audience. You want to show that what they're saying makes no sense so that others can recognize it. If you're having a beer with a conservative obviously your strategy will be different. Labeling it genocide does absolutely nothing to stop it, it is a dumb pissing match. And you can certainly go to early and lose credibility. Like for example accusing Israel of genocide during the Oct 7th attack. Or judging people as evil for not instantly agreeing with you and stopping fruitful discussions before they start. Well we've had ten years of discussions by now, I think it's pretty clear that they aren't going to be fruitful, we don't need to try again every time to see if this time is the one. You don't believe in doing that either as we see from how you engaged with Zambrah in the other thread or with GH for the entirety of your life. As already explained in the last few posts, the goal of my posting on TL isn't to stop genocide, I am under no delusion that we are doing anything important here. I just see arguments that don't work and I correct them as well as I can. The last sentence is just silly, obviously I am not "judging people as evil for not instantly agreeing with me", but it's a cool sentence I'm sure you felt proud as you wrote it. When did I say me? This is the way you operate regardless of poster, I do not think I'm special. And I'd obviously assume that any response to me was some sort of trap and attempted gotcha, because that is how you operated for years. You called this "not an honest debate", assuming you meant RJ gooner, but given how easily and often you come to this conclusion I feel the statement is a lot more true then false. I tend to believe that people are dishonest faster than I assume people are stupid, you're right. I even have a blog post about that from years ago. It doesn't follow that I "judge them" for being "evil" after that, that's silly. I just move on with my day.
See to me there is so many more than two options, including that I might not be completely right or right at all, or a miss communication, or that it is an opinion, or that the actual facts are not known, and a whole bunch of other ones. No wonder we will never understand each other.
|
On August 08 2025 10:57 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 08 2025 09:43 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 09:36 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 09:29 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 09:17 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 03:16 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 03:09 Billyboy wrote:On August 08 2025 02:49 Nebuchad wrote:On August 08 2025 02:22 Billyboy wrote:On August 07 2025 21:07 Nebuchad wrote:
[quote]
There is no strategy we can employ in which this wouldn't happen, you'll never get the engagement you want because this isn't an honest debate in the first place. Faced with that, I'd rather just stick to saying things that are true. It is probably the case that as the world goes more and more rightwing, being correct loses value, but that's fine, we're only some dudes on TL we aren't producing a ton of value anyway. I do not think that assuming the worst of people, treating it as fact, and then being mad about it is a good strategy. Sure you are right sometimes, but lots of times you are not and you miss out on actual conversation and the chance or learning things and influencing people. It is the way most everyone, especially in the age of social media acts, but it is also shit. I don't see it as assuming the worst of people. Everyone has different ideas about morality, that's how it works. It's neither a good or a bad thing, it's just a thing, and sure I can get mad about it sometimes like everyone else but I try and control that. Since I can't get people to change their moralities, I find it less useful to talk about that, so I try and stick to factual claims, that's how I've been operating. I guess I see value in doing it like that because of my own experience, that's how I changed my politics. Breadtube didn't tell me that the rightwing was good and pure and we needed to befriend them, they told me that their ideas were obviously wrong, their influencers were morons and/or dishonest, and their goals for society awful. They made convincing arguments, I didn't enjoy being obviously wrong about politics, so I changed my positions. That won't work on everyone, but it's impossible for something to work on everyone, so... I think sticking to the facts is a great strategy, and has a higher chance of success than attacking. I just think that you will get honest debates (not 100% of the time) if you engage honestly. And I agree that focusing on whether it is genocide or not is kind of missing the point. There will be plenty of time for that when the conflict is over. It is clear that the starving people pictures moved the needle, so there are appeals to emotion that work. Anger is just not that emotion because it is almost always just returned. When the conflict is over, yeah... Not for the first time, "the greatest crime of the left is being correct too early, when there's still time to act"... Anger is returned but that doesn't really matter, you're not trying to have an effect on the person you're talking to you're trying to have an effect on the audience. You want to show that what they're saying makes no sense so that others can recognize it. If you're having a beer with a conservative obviously your strategy will be different. Labeling it genocide does absolutely nothing to stop it, it is a dumb pissing match. And you can certainly go to early and lose credibility. Like for example accusing Israel of genocide during the Oct 7th attack. Or judging people as evil for not instantly agreeing with you and stopping fruitful discussions before they start. Well we've had ten years of discussions by now, I think it's pretty clear that they aren't going to be fruitful, we don't need to try again every time to see if this time is the one. You don't believe in doing that either as we see from how you engaged with Zambrah in the other thread or with GH for the entirety of your life. As already explained in the last few posts, the goal of my posting on TL isn't to stop genocide, I am under no delusion that we are doing anything important here. I just see arguments that don't work and I correct them as well as I can. The last sentence is just silly, obviously I am not "judging people as evil for not instantly agreeing with me", but it's a cool sentence I'm sure you felt proud as you wrote it. When did I say me? This is the way you operate regardless of poster, I do not think I'm special. And I'd obviously assume that any response to me was some sort of trap and attempted gotcha, because that is how you operated for years. You called this "not an honest debate", assuming you meant RJ gooner, but given how easily and often you come to this conclusion I feel the statement is a lot more true then false. I tend to believe that people are dishonest faster than I assume people are stupid, you're right. I even have a blog post about that from years ago. It doesn't follow that I "judge them" for being "evil" after that, that's silly. I just move on with my day. See to me there is so many more than two options, including that I might not be completely right or right at all, or a miss communication, or that it is an opinion, or that the actual facts are not known, and a whole bunch of other ones. No wonder we will never understand each other.
So which one do you think is going on in this case?
|
I now think that the occupation is going to happen. If deliberate starvation does not cause quick and strong action against Israel, then accepting full occupation is not a bridge too far. The starvation can easily be used as a reason for the occupation.
Even if Israel does not have proper resources for full occupation, forcing a shitty solution in Gaza will tie the hands of the next governments. They will have to either continue the occupation or pull out of Gaza. Both will be problematic and unpopular. Settlers will also insert themselves into Gaza, as that furthers their goal. Pulling out will make the government look weak, which is likely to make the election after next way too close. Especially, any successful attacks will be very damaging. Sounds great if you are the current government and are likely to lose power in the next election.
Any third parties that insert into Gaza are very unlikely to actually put Palestinian interests first, instead of using Gaza as a bargaining tool with Israel. They are unlikely to treat Palestinians any better than Hamas. Any freedom is likely to be used to criticise Israel and the other occupiers, who are again unlikely to prioritise the will of the people in any negotiations.
Occupying Gaza will also kill any possibility of having a deal with the Palestinian Authority. Denying PA a role in Gaza while expanding settlements in the West Bank simply means that Israel does not view PA as a legitimate representative of Palestinians. Elections will not fix that.
|
Yeah, seems like full steam ahead for occupation and they will likely hand Gaza to this guy:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasser_Abu_Shabab
Can't wait for the resident Israeli defenders to explain how reasonable it is to first go on with a full scale occupation, killing more people, yet again, and then handing it to ex-ISIS smuggler warlord backed by them and the US.
I'm sure they will, after this inevitably fails because Gazans won't really be onboard to be ruled by a guy who is propped up by the people who bombed the fuck out of them again blame the people of Gaza because they are refusing to work with Israel and only want Hamas.
|
|
|
An article that's going to be published tomorrow on Gaza is crazy, it sounds similar to what I've written on this forum it's that uncompromising. Who would have guessed that the only thing we needed for journalists to start doing their job again is our governments deciding to back Netanyahou a little less (it was me, I would have guessed)
|
Thank you for posting this news. It helps keep hope alive and it's an important step in the right direction.
|
On August 08 2025 19:49 Legan wrote:
I now think that the occupation is going to happen. If deliberate starvation does not cause quick and strong action against Israel, then accepting full occupation is not a bridge too far. The starvation can easily be used as a reason for the occupation.
Israel can't admit to starvation as that would mean admitting co-responsibility.
That and 'full occupation' doesn't have to mean street fighting or IDF troops on every corner.
It can just as well mean starving the place until something gives.
|
On August 13 2025 05:16 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 04:48 KwarK wrote:On August 13 2025 04:46 Jankisa wrote:
I firmly believe that one of the reasons why we aren't are people like you who are either defending Israels actions Didn't do this On August 13 2025 04:46 Jankisa wrote:
or saying how there is no hope, so, I guess, we shouldn't do anything. Didn't say this. Go read the damn post. Well, we can argue about reality until we are blue in our faces, as I said, anyone who wants to subject themselves to reading your post history in the Israel Palestine thread can see for themselves that you do do this. Again, I read your post, your post contains 0 prescriptions on what is to be done. Your "point" is that assigning blame is counterproductive. I agreed with this and moved on to call out things in your post that were either false or misleading. I say what is to be done is to condemn what Israel is doing and to stop them. It's pretty simple, you can say that Israel should stop what they are doing and we can put this to bed. I believe that Hamas should release all of its hostages, but given that we both know that is their only remaining leverage we can agree that they won't. The only way to stop this war is for Israel to stop it. There were many off ramps for both sides, the last one and the one that gave the most hope was the peace agreement that Israel broke in March that got us the starvation and GHF. This happened because Nehtyanahu wanted to prolong the war. This is the part that you never mention. This is where the problem is. If everyone focuses on the past and the endless history of violence the discussion gets muddled and dragged away from the solutions. The solution was there, the phases were ongoing, until they weren't. Was this the rubicon? Can there be more then one? Or is the rubicon only October 7th? Maybe it's the first intifada, maybe it's the assassination of Yitzak Rabin? This is what is actually happening, I don't care about 1967, I care about 2025. This is what you are completely unwilling to discuss, I and others have brought it up in the other thread but you don't care and you don't engage with that. There was hope, recently, and Israel trampled it. But that's all just virtue signaling and not reading posts.
I don't think everyone agrees on this, I think many think at this point it is anti leverage. It seems like the hostages are what the war hawks in Israel needs to keep pushing for more war.
I'd guess there are plenty of these things that people assume everyone agrees on that they actually do not which causes others to believe that they are being dishonest, when in fact they just have different opinions about things that are not binary.
|
What other leverage does Hamas have? Maybe I'm reading and listening to wildly different sources, but logically and from everything I've read Hamas has the hostages and that is the last thing that they have to negotiate with.
If nothing, the hardliners in Israel have said over and over again that the war doesn't stop until Hamas is destroyed, not that they have to keep going until they get hostages, because the longer it goes and closer they get to that the less there is a chance that hostages survive.
They agreed, in January in the ceasefire agreement that consisted of 3 phases to release all of them in exchange for peace. This is the ceasefire that Israel broke and I mentioned a few times in this thread, because they don't want to end the war.
I want for this war to end. Everyone except Nethyanahu and other hardliners in Israel wants this.
The longer this goes the more suffering there is, less hope there is, that is the point.
This is why I think that everyone who's goal is to stop the suffering should spend most of their time criticizing Israels government and making them stop.
|
Moving the discussion from US politics to here.
https://tl.net/forum/general/532255-us-politics-mega-thread?page=5166#103301
On August 13 2025 17:50 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 17:38 Magic Powers wrote:On August 13 2025 17:33 Gorsameth wrote:
I dont even think you disagree on what should happen for Palestinians to have a future. I think its that Kwark does not think any of those things have a chance of happening, based on politics, the state of the world and human history.
The current state of Gaza is the result of decades of negligence, you understandably want the current slaughter to end. We all do.
But if you look past tomorrow, if the slaughter ends the world is just going to go back to neglecting Gaza, the unmanageable situation will continue to compound, as is has for decades before. Some military/terrorist force be it Hamas or its inevitable successor will continue to further oppress the people and hate Israel and the next oct 7th is basically inevitable.
The situation is hopeless because Gaza is stuck in a never ending cycle it cannot escape from on its own and requires a monumental outside effort to break, and no one wants to or has any real incentive, outside of Israel, to commit to that. I don't understand this argumentation. If we end the slaughter, then the slaughter will just continue? I don't get it. If the slaughter ends, then the slaughter ends. So what if it can happen again? It ended. That means there's a time where it doesn't happen. And that's infinitely better than the slaughter continuing. If it starts again later, then it hasn't happened in between, which is preferable to no pause to the slaughter. I don't understand what's so hard to understand about this. Is anyone arguing it shouldn't stop? I admit I have only skimmed the last few pages, is anyone making the argument it shouldn't stop? Or is the argument that it should stop, but that the cycle of violence is basically unending?
People have often argued that, if Hamas is not destroyed prior to a withdrawal of the IDF, then that'll be at least as bad as - likely worse than - the continuation of the war as is.
This argument comes up every single time someone proposes that Israel should end the offensive and withdraw and then allow for Gaza to be rebuilt. People keep arguing that this would end in an equally bad scenario as just continuing the offensive/slaughter.
This doesn't add up in my brain. Am I too dumb or what else could it be? Is 2 + 2 = 5 or am I just completely blind and I'm actually the one arguing 2 + 2 = 5 and I don't realize it?
|
United States43222 Posts
There's two questions.
1. Is it reasonable to demand that Israel not prosecute a war against Hamas, given that Hamas has repeatedly attacked Israel and insists that it will continue to do so indefinitely.
2. What does the future hold for Gazans if Hamas remains in power.
Both are sticking points.
Many people think that the humanitarian cost of defeating Hamas is too high and that Israel should just accept that sometimes Hamas will cross into Israel and kill a thousand civilians. This view is not especially popular in Israel. It was different before October 7 but October 7 changed that. I won't weigh in on that because what I think doesn't matter, I'm not an Israeli being asked to tolerate Hamas attacks.
For me the problem with Hamas remaining in power is that it is resignation to decades more of the same escalating cycle that got us here. People seem to want to go back to how things were before but how things were before inevitably led to how things are now. Essentially it's an invalid and nonsensical suggestion. Let's say the problem was that people are falling to the deaths and the proposed solution is to put them back in the sky, that's not only not a solution, it's directly causing the problem.
|
On August 13 2025 21:44 KwarK wrote:
There's two questions.
1. Is it reasonable to demand that Israel not prosecute a war against Hamas, given that Hamas has repeatedly attacked Israel and insists that it will continue to do so indefinitely.
2. What does the future hold for Gazans if Hamas remains in power.
Both are sticking points.
Many people think that the humanitarian cost of defeating Hamas is too high and that Israel should just accept that sometimes Hamas will cross into Israel and kill a thousand civilians. This view is not especially popular in Israel. It was different before October 7 but October 7 changed that. I won't weigh in on that because what I think doesn't matter, I'm not an Israeli being asked to tolerate Hamas attacks.
For me the problem with Hamas remaining in power is that it is resignation to decades more of the same escalating cycle that got us here. People seem to want to go back to how things were before but how things were before inevitably led to how things are now. Essentially it's an invalid and nonsensical suggestion. Let's say the problem was that people are falling to the deaths and the proposed solution is to put them back in the sky, that's not only not a solution, it's directly causing the problem.
What does "reasonable" mean? Is this war reasonable? Was October 7 reasonable? Is Israel's response reasonable? We're arguing from a position that is unreasonable to begin with. Anything that's less terrible than this situation is by default more reasonable. If this slaughter continues, that's unreasonable. It's completely unacceptable. I can easily think of scenarios that are more reasonable. Israel withdrawing is among those scenarios and I don't see why that wouldn't be the case.
Has Hamas repeatedly attacked Israel? Yes. Has Israel repeatedly attacked Gaza? Also yes. Yes, yes, and yes. For so many generations this has been going on, and if you want to argue it's not fair for Israel, it's just as unfair for Gaza. And Israel has in fact killed 10 times more Palestinians than the other way around. Pre-Oct 7 that was the figure. Post-Oct 7 the figure is 50 times more. And now we're on the brink of a famine. Only in Gaza, not in Israel. The only side suffering since after October 7 is Palestinians. Israelis are not suffering. And yet we're asking that Hamas surrenders, but we don't ask Netanyahu to withdraw. Well, other people don't. I can't accept that.
Is it acceptable that Hamas remains in power? No. Is it acceptable that Netanyahu remains in power? No. No to both.
10-50 times of the burden is being shouldered by Palestinians. Blaming Hamas for this is absurd. Hamas is at fault for attacking Israel and provoking a violent response, but Netanyahu is at fault for the almost two-year long continuation of this war which he could've ended after just a few weeks or months.
What does the future hold for Palestinians with Hamas in power? Simple: not getting slaughtered by the tens of thousands. That's the number one priority.
Nobody's arguing that Hamas should be allowed to cross into Israel. Nobody. I've never seen anyone make that argument.
I have argued that Hamas will continue to attack Israel. But October 7 changed the game completely. Israel is now 100% aware of this threat and will never allow it to happen again as long as Hamas is in power. Hamas can keep sending missiles into Israel, most of which will be stopped and the damage will be minimal. Anything beyond that is wishful thinking on Hamas' part. Hamas doesn't have the capacity for another October 7. No further proof for that is required other than seeing how this war has taken place inside of Gaza for 99% of the conflict since October 7. Hamas doesn't have what it takes to commit another October 7.
More importantly, Hamas doesn't have the capacity to kill thousands of Israelis. Meanwhile to prevent the extremely unlikely deaths of any Israelis, Netanyahu is willing to kill tens of thousands of Palestinians. Again, this doesn't add up. The numbers don't add up.
I know what the counter argument is, and I don't care about that counter argument. People say "Israel shouldn't have to let anyone die to save the Palestinians". I find this argument completely and utterly insane and devoid of all empathy. That's all I can say to that. Tens of thousands of dead Palestinians for the sake of maybe saving a few Israelis. That doesn't add up. That reasoning is wrong and terrible. And yet people have made this argument many times. I don't want to hear it. It's a shit argument.
|
On August 13 2025 21:44 KwarK wrote:
There's two questions.
1. Is it reasonable to demand that Israel not prosecute a war against Hamas, given that Hamas has repeatedly attacked Israel and insists that it will continue to do so indefinitely.
2. What does the future hold for Gazans if Hamas remains in power.
Both are sticking points.
Many people think that the humanitarian cost of defeating Hamas is too high and that Israel should just accept that sometimes Hamas will cross into Israel and kill a thousand civilians. This view is not especially popular in Israel. It was different before October 7 but October 7 changed that. I won't weigh in on that because what I think doesn't matter, I'm not an Israeli being asked to tolerate Hamas attacks.
For me the problem with Hamas remaining in power is that it is resignation to decades more of the same escalating cycle that got us here. People seem to want to go back to how things were before but how things were before inevitably led to how things are now. Essentially it's an invalid and nonsensical suggestion. Let's say the problem was that people are falling to the deaths and the proposed solution is to put them back in the sky, that's not only not a solution, it's directly causing the problem.
I never really got an answer to this, despite posing the question in one form or another many times.
October 7th is by far, and it's not particularly close the worse such incident with a Hamas incursion into Israel, many western and Israeli experts have raised questions as to why this happened.
There were many warnings, both from foreign intelligence services, Israels own Intelligence and border guards that something big was happening, not only were these warnings ignored, Israeli people in charge let a huge party be organized right next to the fence which caused a big chunk of those casualties. Troops were moved to West bank, the response times for protecting Kibutzes and repelling the terrorists were abysmal, especially given how close Gaza is to major cities and military bases.
If Israel really wants to make sure another October 7th never happens again, the first step would be to go after everyone who organized and lead it, the second, that in my opinion should have happened more then a year ago is to get rid of people who failed at protecting Israel, determine why and make sure something like this never happens again.
To use a stupid analogy, if there is a dog sanctuary next to my house, I have to have it there because of history and I can't get rid of it, if I leave a huge hole and a bunch of dogs come and kill a bunch of my chickens, it's pretty reasonable to kill those dogs.
It's also pretty reasonable to go and kill the dogs who seem rabid and might do this again.
It's not reasonable to keep killing the dogs, even small ones who could have never killed anything while never addressing the issue who is responsible for leaving the hole in the fence.
In the end, if I was the one who left the hole in the face, it might be a good idea for me to keep killing the dogs over there so no one starts asking questions how did the initial fuck up happen.
This is my biggest problem, Israels leadership is doing things in a way that is consistent with someone who wants to prolong the suffering of Gazans and to me, it seems pretty clear that their major motivation is to not go to elections, not lose them and not have to face the responsibility for dropping the ball with security in the first place.
|
United States43222 Posts
I'll ignore the Hamas = rabid dogs and Gazans = regular dogs part because you didn't mean it like that.
Obviously it was an intelligence failure (or allowed to happen which I wouldn't put past Netanyahu but I have no evidence for). But there are still two pretty big issues with your assertion that Israel's burden to defend itself requires that they significantly up their intelligence operations.
1. There is no burden to defend yourself. That's not a thing. Gaza, and their government Hamas, have an obligation to not cross into Israel and murder a thousand people. Israel does not have an obligation to maintain sufficiently strong fences to minimize casualties when Hamas attacks. Hamas are not rabid dogs. Obviously they maintain fences anyway, even though they shouldn't have to, because we live in a world in which they do have to. But asserting that they have a responsibility to do more to minimize the impact of Hamas attacks is pure victim blaming. That's not an obligation that Israel has to Gaza, though it may be one that the Israeli government has to its own people.
2. You're arguing that October 7 was an intelligence failure and that if Israel is serious about preventing another massacre then instead of dropping bombs in Gaza they should seriously step up their intelligence game and proactively go after threats in a targeted way. Makes sense. That already happened. That already happened a lot. It's been very widely reported.
Israel's leadership is obviously indefensible and literally criminal in the sense that their own legal system has ruled as much. Prolonging the suffering of Gazans is a loaded term though, it's really not clear what possible outcome wouldn't prolong the suffering of Gazans.
|
Well, I'm not Mike so thank you for making that distinction, analogy is an analogy, I obviously don't think of people as dogs.
1. Yeah, Israeli government failed it's people. Given that the situation is what it is, and we can't really change it, it's pretty obvious that a government led by guy who's name is "Mr. Security" got elected with a promise to keep them safe. I blame him, he's not a victim, he's the one responsible for his people listening to their colleagues, he's responsible for troop placement and response times along the border, I blame him.
2. I think that can't really happen with the current establishment. I think that the way and intensity of what they are doing in Gaza is making Israel less secure in the long term because it's radicalizing everyone there and across the world watching it.
The thing that helped the situation the most in the last year was the ceasefire. There was a surge of aid and food generally into Gaza, there was hope, I linked to 2 interviews already, one from an ex-PM of Israel and one from a Israeli reporter who said as much. That was stopped by Israel breaking that ceasefire and not going through with phase 3 which would bring all hostages home and end the war.
That would be a good thing for everyone, people in Israel want the hostages home. People in Gaza want the end of war.
I don't see how that would have been a net negative when it comes to long term suffering.
|
United States43222 Posts
Let’s imagine for a second an exceedingly unlikely scenario. There’s a ceasefire and a new government in Gaza. Iran stops supplying Gazans with weapons and the million young, displaced, radicalized, justifiably vengeful, and propagandized Gazans who grew up under Hamas rule all decide to forgive Israel. No more rocket attacks on Israel, no more answering air strikes. Completely impossible but let’s imagine it anyway.
Let’s imagine what that Gaza looks like. What it’s birth rate looks like. What its employment rate looks like. What its major industries and economic activities are. How its government is financed, how it provides services and so forth. Where people live.
What I’m imagining is still an overcrowded intergenerational refugee camp with no meaningful economic activity taking place, no mobility, wholly dependent upon outside aid, and no end in sight. What I’m imagining is large numbers of people who have been fucked over by the world who are rightfully furious about it. And people with an awful lot of time on their hands to think about how furious they are and with absolutely no prospect of any of the issues changing.
I’m often told I have no empathy for Gazans and I think that that couldn’t be further from the truth. I don’t think they’re evil or inhuman or monsters or whatever, I put myself in their shoes to the extent that I am able and think that their fury is wholly warranted. It makes sense. They’re not evil, they’re normal people reacting to an awful situation.
And my hypothesis that a Gaza under a ceasefire still turns to radical violent politics isn’t exactly untested. I’m arguing it as a hypothetical but we’ve already seen a Gaza under a ceasefire, it turned to Hamas. By the polling Hamas would still win an election held today.
A ceasefire isn’t enough. If we want Gazans to choose peace then we need to give them more than that because right now the argument for an end to violence isn’t convincing Gazans. They need a future they can believe in for themselves and their families and “this but without the airstrikes” doesn’t cut it.
A ceasefire is just things getting worse more slowly for as long as it lasts, and then when it inevitably ends it’ll be back to airstrikes.
|
On August 14 2025 00:50 KwarK wrote:
Let’s imagine for a second an exceedingly unlikely scenario. There’s a ceasefire and a new government in Gaza. Iran stops supplying Gazans with weapons and the million young, displaced, radicalized, justifiably vengeful, and propagandized Gazans who grew up under Hamas rule all decide to forgive Israel. No more rocket attacks on Israel, no more answering air strikes. Completely impossible but let’s imagine it anyway.
Let’s imagine what that Gaza looks like. What it’s birth rate looks like. What its employment rate looks like. What its major industries and economic activities are. How its government is financed, how it provides services and so forth. Where people live.
What I’m imagining is still an overcrowded intergenerational refugee camp with no meaningful economic activity taking place, no mobility, wholly dependent upon outside aid, and no end in sight. What I’m imagining is large numbers of people who have been fucked over by the world who are rightfully furious about it. And people with an awful lot of time on their hands to think about how furious they are and with absolutely no prospect of any of the issues changing.
I’m often told I have no empathy for Gazans and I think that that couldn’t be further from the truth. I don’t think they’re evil or inhuman or monsters or whatever, I put myself in their shoes to the extent that I am able and think that their fury is wholly warranted. It makes sense. They’re not evil, they’re normal people reacting to an awful situation.
And my hypothesis that a Gaza under a ceasefire still turns to radical violent politics isn’t exactly untested. I’m arguing it as a hypothetical but we’ve already seen a Gaza under a ceasefire, it turned to Hamas. By the polling Hamas would still win an election held today.
A ceasefire isn’t enough. If we want Gazans to choose peace then we need to give them more than that because right now the argument for an end to violence isn’t convincing Gazans. They need a future they can believe in for themselves and their families and “this but without the airstrikes” doesn’t cut it.
A ceasefire is just things getting worse more slowly for as long as it lasts, and then when it inevitably ends it’ll be back to airstrikes.
This is why I referred to other conflicts such as the Korean war, which resulted in a split between two oppressed nations, one becoming prosperous and one remaining oppressed. There are a lot of parallels between Korea and Israel-Palestine. It's a great example showing that oppression and war doesn't have to be the end of things. The two split countries' administrations imposed completely different policies post-war and experienced completely different fates. North Korea is still poor and oppressed while South Korea is rich and, well, very hierarchical but certainly not oppressed, and consistently moving away from corruption and authoritarianism. At the same time Koreans are technically still at war, and the threat is constant. It's so prevalent that South Koreans have a big gun culture that is at least on par with that of US Americans. They celebrate guns. And the military is always ready to strike if it becomes necessary. They're constantly worried. And yet people aren't being slaughtered. The war has turned cold for many years.
I don't see a reason why Israel-Palestine doesn't have a realistic chance of experiencing a similar outcome. Sure, one of the sides could remain oppressed. That would presumably be the Palestinians under Hamas rule. But this doesn't mean there has to be a continuous hot war leading to tens of thousands of casualties. North Korea hasn't attacked South Korea in a long time. And that's not because there aren't any tensions on the border. Tensions remain. But it's under control.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
