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When I use the word 'attacked,' I do not refer to the crime of existing while being Jewish. I use the word 'attacked' to refer to that thing where you use guns and bombs to kill people.
If the Palestinians were there first (debatable), so what? The German gentiles were undeniably 'there' before the German Jews. Does that mean the German Jews were 'attacking' the German gentiles with their presence? No. By logical extension, the Israelis are not 'attacking' the Palestinians by existing in their vicinity.
On the other hand, last year the Palestinians launched a literal attack on Israel. Lots of people died. It started a war. Ring any bells?
Then why are you so concerned that the Palestinians will be 'wiped out'? Since you've just explained why it can't possibly happen regardless of what the Palestinians do, you yourself prove that Palestinian 'resistance' is just a waste of lives. By your own argument there will be no 'wiping out' so what are we even talking about?
I see. When you say 'wiped out' you don't actually mean anyone will be killed. It's a kind of nonviolent 'wiping out' where people lose landownership in a dispute over whose ancestors stole what from whom, but continue living their lives without being bodily harmed in any way. This is one of those irregular verbs, you know, I'm buying a house, you're dispossessing the native population, he's committing genocide.
So in order to prevent the Jews from metaphorically 'wiping them out' (by existing nearby), the Palestinians must heroically resist (by massacring the Jews). I do not like this abuse of language.
Do you know what Irgun and Lehi actually did? I'm incredibly surprised that you would describe the actions of those groups as "the crime of existing while being Jewish" - I don't think many antisemites would be willing to go that far. For context, are you familiar with the Deir Yassin massacre? What you're describing as "the crime of being Jewish" was actually a paramilitary organisation going door to door in a Palestinian village and murdering everyone they found there, women and children included.
If I break into your home and lock you in the basement, occasionally throwing a grenade down there or going in and killing some children, would you consider yourself attacked? After all, I'm just existing in your vicinity and not directly hitting you, so if you tried to fight back against this state of affairs it would actually be YOU who is the violent one.
That argument wouldn't convince me, and if it would convince you then please let me know where you live and whether or not you have a basement.
Started a war? STARTED a war? It was the most successful attack by the Palestinians in some time, but it was in no way the start of the conflict.
I mean, basic human decency and empathy for one. But more specifically, it is because I have read numerous statements by high-ranking Israeli officials and politicians regarding their plans for the Palestinians.
No? I didn't explain why it can't possibly happen, but why I believe that actually going through with it will be a terrible, suicidal decision that permanently stains the Jewish people and renders Israel non-viable. Hell, I think they have already gone far enough that Israel will face far more significant future challenges than another October 7. Saying that a decision would be suicidal doesn't mean that somebody else might make that choice anyway.
Israel has already racked up a very high bodycount. I'm honestly not sure how you came to the conclusion that that was what I meant by wiped out - I legitimately cannot follow your logic.
Someone born during the Deir Yassin massacre would be in their late seventies today. You are literally talking about acts committed by people who have since died of old age.
I actually don't think it's reasonable to retaliate against an entire ethnic group for acts committed multiple generations ago. I think there's a statute of limitations on these things. For instance, I wouldn't consider it justified for England to invade France to take revenge for 1066. At some point you have to let history go.
I see that we are again entering a disagreement about what it means to 'attack' someone. You seem to take a symbolic view. When you say the Israelis attacked the Palestinians, you mean some Israelis attacked some Palestinians roughly eighty years ago. There is a symbolic crime and a symbolic guilt born by the innocent people who had the symbolic misfortune to be born in the wrong place at the wrong time. Therefore, it is okay to murder them. Symbols are taken to justify real violence.
I take a more practical view. When I say the Palestinians attacked the Israelis, I mean the current regime in Gaza attacked Israel last year. They are still alive, and they are still in power.
This is a farcically shortsighted take. How do you think the children of those victims feel? The children of the survivors who had their homes taken? Do you think that the passage of time just turns this real violence into meaningless "symbolic" violence when the impacts are still tangible and visible? Do you think that this massacre had no impact on history, that it had no long-lasting effects? I struggle to believe that you would apply this standard to any other conflict.
I agree - luckily, "Israeli" isn't actually an ethnic group so that doesn't matter here. Even if it did, that conflict was actually settled and closed, so there's no need for continuing hostilities.
Under this standard, are you aware that the holocaust is further in the past than the Deir Yassin massacre? The passage of time has meant that the holocaust is just "symbolic" violence so you can't even really say that the Nazis did anything bad to the jews! On that note, given that the primary justification for the creation of Israel was the holocaust, we may as well shut the entire enterprise down. At some point you have to let history go, after all.
No, you just decide to arbitrarily pick the starting point of the conflict, so you can point to a reprisal and claim that it is an offensive strike. You are choosing an approach that allows you to just arbitrarily decide who is responsible for starting a conflict by deciding that anything before a certain date doesn't count. I have trouble believing that this is your actual position, given both how transparently weak that argument is and that if you accept it you also remove the justification for the entire state of Israel to exist.
Yes. If nobody alive has any engagement with a subject beyond historical knowledge, then by definition it has been reduced to merely symbolic violence. Literally, the violence exists only in the symbols of our history textbooks. It no longer exists in real life.
Symbols do not justify murder, next question.
Well, first of all, no it wasn't. Secondly, it wouldn't matter if it was.
The primary justification for the establishment of Mexico was to enslave the natives to mine gold and silver to send back to Spain. Now that they've stopped doing that, should they all just get on a boat and sail to Spain? No, of course not, that would be insane.
The justification for the ongoing existence of a nation is to provide a home for the people who live there, not whatever historic reason they had for establishing it however many hundreds of years ago.
This is the thing you're not getting: Revanchism is actually really stupid. The only things that matter are the things that are happening right now to people who are actually alive right now. That's why nobody in power takes the Palestinian cause seriously. Bitching and complaining about things that happened before you were born is not a sound basis for setting geopolitical policies that will affect the lives of millions or billions of people.
No, you see, this is the crux of the issue: It doesn't matter whether it's a reprisal or an 'offensive strike'. Those are the same thing. Attacking innocent people to get revenge on their ethnic group is evil. Yes, really.
I categorically deny the right of anyone to commit murder to get revenge for things that happened before they were born. No exceptions. That is the line I'm drawing in the sand.
Except people do have engagement with this particular violence. There are people who are still living with the consequences of having their families stolen from to this day. Hell, the Israelis are still murdering children and beating old women for daring to pick olives. The violence hasn't stopped and continues to this day.
You don't actually believe this or you would be condemning the IDF for their countless murders of civilians with no more justification than symbols.
Cool, so you're going to condemn the horrendous violence Israel is inflicting upon the Palestinians? October 7 was just a symbol after all - the hostages are back and that violence exists only in the symbols of history books now, and thus can't be any kind of justification.
Who do you honestly think is doing this more? Israel or Hamas? Do you actually believe that Hind Rajab wasn't an innocent? Do you believe that the family members who survived Israel's pager assault have the right to get revenge against the Israelis who did it to them? I don't understand how you can claim to be so opposed to violence while at the same time defending the actions of the IDF and the immense brutality they have inflicted upon the undeserving.
I honestly have no idea what argument you're even trying to make. Your position works if you come out and attack the IDF for what they're doing as well, but I don't think you actually are doing that - you just seem to have picked your side in the conflict and support them because they are your side.
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It's pretty surprising that the justification for the creation of Israel came decades after many jews had already moved to that region for a national project.
I've heard a lot of zionists talk about how the holocaust made it clear that the jews needed their own state to make sure that it never happened again. While I'm sure that the main reason for the creation of Israel is just pure ethnonationalism, that's one of the common reasons people give in defence of it.
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