naraburns nihil supernum
1yr ago
(text post)
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #1
This is a megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
RenOS
something is wrong
AshLael 1yr ago·Edited 1yr ago
I have to admit I've been moving from a position of sympathy for Gaza towards more sympathy for Israel in the last years, and this attack perfectly exemplifies the reasons why.
Israel aims to destroy military targets, and at most you can complain about a lack of concern for civilians. Though in general they at least attempt to minimize civilian casualties. Hamas actively targets civilians, gleefully massacres them en masse, and then parades their naked bodies through the streets where common people spit on their corpses, so it isn't even just Hamas specifically. And they happily put all of it online, where other arabs cheer them on. WTF would you even attack a music festival?
On top, even when an Israeli attack kills a large number of civilians, you'll often find out that it's because Hamas deliberately put a military base inside a civilian building, actively aiming for this outcome.
Sure the Israelis also have plenty of questionable tactics such as the creeping settlements in the west bank, but everything they do just seems so much ... saner in comparison. It's the difference between a cutthroat CEO who'll backstab you in a corporate deal when it is beneficial for him to do so, and the murderhobo who'll physically backstab you because you were the nearest person and fuck jews, that's why.
How is demolishing mosques, spitting on Christians, urinating on dead Palestinians and bombing entire apartment buildings less gruesome? Israel is far more violent and kills far more Palestinians while there war has a much bigger impact on Palestinian expansion.
How is demolishing mosques, spitting on Christians, urinating on dead Palestinians and bombing entire apartment buildings less gruesome?
Body gore prominence seems like an obvious one. Self-congratulatory spectacle presentation of the corpses is another. Israelis typically aren't doing their misdeed to chants of how great their god is over the bodies of the victims, and that's without their established roof-knock technique.
I would be curious which mosque demolishment or Christian spitting or urination incident you felt was more gruesome than, say, the Palestinians' self-advertised raid shelter results. One category is boorish, and the other might as well have come out of Daesh propaganda.
It's rather unfortunate that Jihadis have the habit of yelling 'Allahu Akbar' every time they're on video. I know intellectually that they're saying the equivalent of 'praise the Lord', but now the phrase is just burned into my brain as the thing that young Arab men say when they're desecrating a corpse.
Walterodim
Only equals speak the truth, that’s my thought on’t
Crowstep 1yr ago
I don't think that's "unfortunate" so much as a feature of Islam's historic role and self-image as a totalizing religion of conquest. Sure, there are plenty of examples of Muslim subcultures that have evolved past that conception, but it's not like it's weird for a conquering Islamic force to praise their God while they put their enemies to the sword. While this might be in bad taste now, it's not new:
Historically, the takbir has been used as a cry of victory.[23] Ibn Ishaq's Life of Mohammed narrates at least two incidents in which it was so used.
"When the apostle raided a people he waited until the morning. If he heard a call to prayer he held back; if he did not hear it he attacked. We came to Khaybar by night, and the apostle passed the night there; and when morning came he did not hear the call to prayer, so he rode and we rode with him, and I rode behind Abu Talha with my foot touching the apostle's foot. We met the workers of Khaybar coming out in the morning with their spades and baskets. When they saw the apostle and the army they cried, 'Muhammad with his force,' and turned tail and fled. The apostle said, 'Allah akbar! Khaybar is destroyed. When we arrive in a people's square it is a bad morning for those who have been warned.'" (page 511) "So he got off his horse and came at him and 'Ali advanced with his shield. 'Amr aimed a blow which cut deeply into the shield so that the sword stuck in it and struck his head. But 'Ali gave him a blow on the vein at the base of the neck and he fell to the ground. The dust rose and the apostle heard the cry, 'Allah Akbar' and knew that 'Ali had killed him." (page 456)[24]
Walterodim
Only equals speak the truth, that’s my thought on’t
RenOS 1yr ago
WTF would you even attack a music festival?
There are a lot of attractive young women at music festivals and it's a soft target. This seems like the most straightforward answer and I haven't heard any alternative explanations.
Sure the Israelis also have plenty of questionable tactics such as the creeping settlements in the west bank, but everything they do just seems so much ... saner in comparison. It's the difference between a cutthroat CEO who'll backstab you in a corporate deal when it is beneficial for him to do so, and the murderhobo who'll physically backstab you because you were the nearest person and fuck jews, that's why.
Some of this disparity will be pretty similar to the disparity between a CEO destroying someone and a murderhobo destroying someone - the rich guy has a lot more tools at his disposal, many more options, and the competence to do it while maintaining the position that he's acting legally and reasonably and that you're the lunatic for losing your temper. Don't get me wrong, I remain firmly on the Israeli side of things, but the asymmetry of position is pretty clear.
They probably didn't know it was one. It was just there and easy to hit as a soft target.
The Hamas objective appears to have been to kill as many civilians as possible, to maximize the initial terror and perception of Israeli impotence. This, in turn, is likely for the strategic purpose of derailing Saudi-Israeli normalization, which has been in the works for some time. It may have also had a tertiary goal of trying to draw out an assessed increase of Palestinian support in various (particularly European) countries to demonstrate/lead to Israeli diplomatic isolation in the response.
For this purpose, a music festival meets the nominal purpose of the objective. It will probably turn out that the music festival was the single biggest source of deaths during the night, as you have a combination of large numbers of people, density, poorly defended, and isolated from response or natural strongpoints to rally a defense.
However, I doubt it was chosen per see. The time-day timing of the attack was almost certainly done for historical, not contemporary, purposes, while the rave was for a weekend because they were expecting to need time to sober up / get over the drug use before the weekend.
Further, the rave almost certainly wouldn't have been targetted deliberately had the multinational nature been known. The night without the raid was a disaster for Israel, but the prominent multinational victims- most notably the German girl- killed and worse internationalized the impact to a much broader audience in a way not-good for the likely intended 'we think this is bad, but you shouldn't retaliate too much' goal Hamas was likely going for.
I have been to similar raves in that area. It is a popular place for such events because lots of open space and the desert at night is beautiful. It is not like this was the event of the year in Israel or something. (I feel like the natural demographics of the Motte might not be super interested in such things but there are a lot of music festivals everywhere all the time if you are into that sort of thing and Israel has a massive techno scene)
It really is odd. I’m not juvenile enough to be shocked that shit happens during war and young military age men do shitty things. The difference is most participants know what they are doing isn’t permissible so they don’t broadcast it to the world. Take for instance abu ghraib. While the soldiers had bad opsec, they weren’t posting the pictures on fucking MySpace.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
zeke5123 1yr ago
You're operating from a mistaken assumption, that what they are doing isn't permissible. Hamas could surround fighters with a wall of infants and machine-gun Israelis from that position, and when one Israeli sniper shot a fighter and the bullet injured an infant, the headline in the New York Times would be "Israeli Commandos Shoot Innocent Palestinian Infant". Israel is held to a set of standards that sort of rhymes with international conventions but is in fact much stricter, while Palestinians are held to none at all.
I mean, sorta. The people who support Hamas hold them to no standard, because if they had standards, they wouldn't support Hamas.
The brutality and cynical tactics that Hamas uses do lead to them having lower support than they would if they were less sociopathic though. There's a lot of people who would totally be on board with a "Free Palestine" agenda if it didn't mean parading the mangled corpses of naked girls through the street.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
AshLael 1yr ago
If Hamas didn't do what they did, they'd either be killed and replaced by someone who would (if they stopped killing Israelis) or killed by the Israelis (if they stopped using protected buildings and people as shields).
The brutality and cynical tactics that Hamas uses do lead to them having lower support than they would if they were less sociopathic though. There's a lot of people who would totally be on board with a "Free Palestine" agenda if it didn't mean parading the mangled corpses of naked girls through the street.
What makes you think this?
Hamas does this because they live in tribal societies where parading the mangled corpses of your enemy's girls through the street is worthy of high praise. It doesn't lead to them having lower support; it leads to them having higher support.
Don't typical-mind. You would be horrified by such things. The people who Hamas needs to convince are overjoyed by it.
Well, at least it convinced EU to pause providing funding to Palestine (not entirely sure how well it was done but likely it effectively funded Hamas).
When I'm saying they would have higher support, I mean among westerners looking on from the outside. I'm not talking about internal Gazan politics, I'm talking about The Discourse and the international response. I think there's e.g. a lot of Germans who are a lot more sympathetic to "we want our land back" than to gunning down bus stops.
The brutality and cynical tactics that Hamas uses do lead to them having lower support than they would if they were less sociopathic though.
That's the weird thing though: their cynical tactics used to be launching rockets from hospital rooftops and parading the inevitable Palestinian corpses, or having Palestinian kids shot for throwing stones, etc etc. The grift has always been provoking Israel to violence and posing as an underdog.
But this, parading enemy civilian corpses around, is a diametrically opposite thing. It's something you do when you have several thousands of tanks ready to roll over the enemy capital, you expect to win, and you want to demoralize the enemy to win easier.
So I don't know, either Hamas expects Iran to nuke Israel, or the old guard that understood the nature of the grift all retired or something and the new leadership got terminally high on their own supply.
So I don't know, either Hamas expects Iran to nuke Israel
Yeah they did make a statement calling on the Arab countries to join the fight and so forth. So maybe the plan was something like 1.Pierce the illusion of Israeli invulnerability 2. Israel's neighbours see the weakness and pounce 3. Palestine is free from the river to the sea.
Or maybe it was just about stirring up enough heat that the Israel-Saudi normalisation doesn't happen. I dunno.
Or maybe it was just about stirring up enough heat that the Israel-Saudi normalisation doesn't happen. I dunno.
I don't see how this was supposed to work. A small terrorist act that causes Israel to respond disproportionally, all right. 400 paratroopers killing Israeli civilians? Again, this is a thing that you do when you have 5000 tanks ready to roll towards Tel Aviv and you want to show your potential Saudi allies that you mean business. They don't have a single tank. Saudis will be like, fuck those idiots.
Also, lets take Russia: they are at least claiming to be not targeting civilians (though in traditional Russian style they blatantly lie that no civilians whatsoever were harmed when it is clearly false).
And they parade tanks and other materiel captured from enemy, not dead civilians.
The thing that has blackpilled me about the conflict more than anything is Corey Gil-Shuster's youtube channel. He goes and asks random Israelis and Palestinians on the streets various questions, which I find really illuminating because it gives a sense of the distribution of views and how well thought out they are, etc. And after you watch a few of those you can't avoid the stark reality that there is a large critical mass of Palestinians who absolutely adamantly refuse to consider any outcome short of the total destruction of Israel.
And given that is the case, and that Israel will absolutely not accept its own erasure, there is just no possible compromise or deal to be had. All you can do is keep fighting for another hundred years and hope some future generation is smarter, I guess.
Amadan
Enjoying my short-lived victory
AshLael 1yr ago
Yeah, I can't say Corey Gil-Shuster's videos showed me anything I didn't already know, but repeatedly he (or his viewers) have tried to ask Palestinians some form of "What would peace look like, since the Israelis aren't going to all pack up and leave?" and the answers are almost always, with varying degrees of circumlocution, "Kill them all." Sure, they'll say in the abstract they "want peace" or they don't personally want to kill anyone, but dig hard enough and they believe "peace" will not be possible until all the Israelis are, literally, gone, and if that means (someone else, of course) kills them all, well, ma sha'allah.
orthoxerox
If you can read this, you're using a custom theme
RenOS 1yr ago
Hamas actively targets civilians, gleefully massacres them en masse, and then parades their naked bodies through the streets where common people spit on their corpses, so it isn't even just Hamas specifically.
The usual suspects online say that since most Israelis have served in the army, they are all technically combatants and can be shot at. Of course, this is a rhetorical trap, since by saying that this doesn't mean you have to parade their naked bodies through the streets where common people spit on their corpses you implicitly agree that it's fine to shoot at them without desecrating their corpses.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
orthoxerox 1yr ago
The usual suspects online say that since most Israelis have served in the army, they are all technically combatants and can be shot at.
Which is nonsense on toast. That's the sort of thing I mean by saying the Israelis are held to a standard which sort of rhymes with international conventions.
That is such an insane understanding of international war conventions that I'm hard-pressed to believe anyone is making that argument in good faith. By that logic, Swedish citizens are fair game for the Taliban.
Is there a video or picture of this? This claim is repeated everywhere I look, but if you mean the short video of the corpse of that German-Israeli woman, she's not naked.
When I was browsing 4chan I've seen images of Hamas soldiers showing off a dead girl with only underpants on. No links though.
If you want to quibble that it's technically not fully nude be my guest, but that's about as convincing to me as "well it wasn't rape bc she was already dead".
I saw one of a live woman with blood and shit on the rear of her trousers being paraded before she was loaded into a truck. I leave it to the viewer to decide if she's been gangraped or developed an untimely attack of anal fissuring.
It's not 'technically not fully nude', just normal not nude, complete with something on her back that looks like a strap of a top. From what I've seen it's not really clear she was stripped of anything at all.
I don't know what you think I'm trying to convince you of, seeing falsehoods repeated irks me, that's my angle here.
In online media, they keep referring to her only as "German", which I think isn't entirely a coincidence. One article I've found about this but am too lazy to dig up right now did mention after multiple paragraphs that not only is she in fact a dual German-Israeli citizen but had in fact lived in Israel for 6 years. Some X post also claimed she's actually an IDF reservist, but I'm not sure.
Israel has announced a “total” blockade of Gaza, including a ban on food and water, after Hamas carried out the biggest attack on the country in decades.
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said on Monday authorities would cut electricity and block the entry of food and fuel as part of “a complete siege” on Hamas-run Gaza.
This seems like there's going to be mountains of deaths, what will the actual effect be?
It won't last. Israel does not want mountains of people dying of thirst on newspaper front pages, it makes them look callous. They will turn the water back on in a few days and the food maybe a few weeks after that, possibly in exchange for hostages. Any gap will be bridged by humanitarian aid coming in through Egypt.
Genius move to cut them off though. Few people will have appreciated that Gaza received water etc from Israel in the first place. Really makes it look like a 'biting the hand that feeds you' type of situation.
I'm pretty sure it will just be interpreted as "here's yet more proof that Israel is a colonialist/apartheid state, they don't even allow the Palestinians to control their own basic human needs like food and water!"
If the gap is bridged through Egypt, why not go on indefinitely though? Given that one reason how the attack went so well is probably the intel from the increased movement & employment that Israel had allowed, it does seem reasonable for Israel to just say cut -all- the movement between Gaza & Israel, but let arab countries support Gaza through Egypt if they so wish.
One thing they could do is bisect Gaza in the rural zone so that the region bordering the densely populated parts of Israel is cut off from the Egyptian supply.
Whether the southern part is supplied or not doesn't matter that much.
It definitely won't last, but I do wonder what would happen if it did and they went full siege mode. At what point do they start offering up the heads of the Hamas leaders? Do they ever?
Egypt has gone back and forth on that in the past. It is neither in Egypt's interests nor in Israel's interests to have people starving to death in the Gaza Strip.
I expect it is mostly a "softening up tactic" before a major ground incursion. If Israel actually kept a full blockade for weeks if not months - and we're assuming effectively enforced (a big if) - then it would be committing a textbook definition of a warcrime. That would essentially guarantee it would lose in the court of public opinion. Like it or not, winning the propaganda war is just as important as the real war. Public sympathy would dry up real quick if tens of thousands were to be dying on live TV. Disproportionately matters.
What are the chances that this leads to Israel attacking Iran? Iran appears to have been a supporter of Hamas. Netanyahu has seemingly been eager for a reason to dismantle Iran's nuclear weapons program. From Netanyahu's perspective, eliminating the program would make recent events a net gain for Israel. However, how would the global community respond to an Israeli assault on Iran? While many countries in the region would likely be pleased, they would need to feign outrage. Russia, having recently gotten weapons from Iran, would denounce the attack. But, given its diminished power, what action could Russia realistically take? Would Biden risk sanctioning Israel for such an action, particularly when his Republican adversaries would likely applaud it?
Biden and Obama have tried to make peace between Iran and the US, which is why the US recently unfroze $6 billion in Iranian funds. It is in the US interest to prevent a large war in the Middle East. It is in Biden's interest to prevent a significant increase in the price of gas that would likely come about because of such a war.
Part of me wonders if Biden is hopeful for a war. Predictions were already on gas prices going higher and Biden emptied the strategic reserve to turn the red wave into a ripple at best.
If there is a war, he can say “not my fault shit happens in the world”
But Trump will blame the war on Biden saying that Biden unfreezing Iran's assets enabled Iran and sent a signal to Iran that we would be OK with them attacking Israel. Trump would point out that during his presidency Iran didn't cause trouble because Trump did things like assassinate Iranian general Soleimani. Trump would claim that Russian invading Ukraine during Biden's but not his presidency is another example of how US perceived weakness causes war.
Israel is already attacking Iran through cyber warfare, sponsoring various extremist groups and assassinations. As for war there really isn't a lot they can do as the countries aren't near each other.
They don't share any airspace and are far from Iran. They would have to fly through several countries while carrying heavy external fuel tanks that make their jets really easy to spot on radar. This is against Iran that massproduces missiles that can reach Israel.
What are the chances that this leads to Israel attacking Iran?
What is an attack on Iran supposed to do, besides a generally cathartic moment?
No, I doubt this will lead to anything overt, at least not until the Gaza Strip siege concludes. I'd expect Israel to take a long-form asymmetric conflict approach for revenge. Fewer F-16s on long-strike missions, and more drone assassinations on IRGC and others.
The attacks on Iran will, ideally from Israel's viewpoint, stop Iran from getting an atomic bomb and damage Iran's economy thereby reducing Iran's ability to fund the enemies of Israel.
I am familiar with some science fiction weapons that could meaningfully achieve that, but nothing in Israel's inventory that would be reasonably be used as that effect.
“Has been a supporter of hamas” is a pretty low bar. Egypt and and Syria used to do it openly. Qatar and Turkey still do. Direct retaliation must require more than that.
I think you are looking at the issue from the viewpoint of a moral philosopher. From Israel's viewpoint what matters is will the attack mean if it attacks Iran, the US won't punish it?
No, I’m not thinking about morality. I’m saying the strategic calculus is unfavorable even if the US doesn’t express disapproval. A shooting war with Iran would result in more Israeli casualties than any terrorist attack, and I don’t get the impression that it would meaningfully cripple their ability to fund Hamas. Far more efficient to spend that money and manpower retaliating against the people who were directly responsible.
There is good reason to believe that even the American high command doesn't think it can actually win a war of invasion against Iran in any realistic scenario.
The Israelis are a paper tiger without daddy America. As this conflict showed (8 billion dollars needed from Uncle Sam within the first day of rocket attacks).
If the Israelis had the capability to attack Iran, then they'd have done it years ago. They don't and ultimately depend on the US to do it. Successive American administrations have turned down every request from Jerusalem.
Iran today is much more capable than it was 10 years ago. If Iran is attacked, they would almost certainly conduct a a massive attack on Saudi Arabia and other US-aligned countries. That would send the world economy into a gigantic depression if oil output suddenly crashed by 10-15 mb/d. Many Western strategic oil stocks are already depleted after the UA war so there wouldn't be much buffer space to absorb the shock.
Would Israel attack Iran if it predicted that Biden would privately oppose but publicly support the attack? From Israel's viewpoint, the attack leading to Iran attacking Saudi Arabia would be a good thing because this would bring US air power into the war.
From Israel's viewpoint, the attack leading to Iran attacking Saudi Arabia would be a good thing because this would bring US air power into the war.
Yes but it would also tank the world economy. And ultimately the US cares far more about that. Already today there are news of a major meeting between the Big Three of Europe (UK/FR/DE) and the US, ostensibly to prevent a wider conflagration in the region. Ultimately, Israel is a client state of the US and has to behave as such. It's on a short leash.
Not him but one thing that comes to my mind is several successful drone attacks that Houthis have launched against Saudi targets in the last few years, including ones that hit oil production facilities. Iran is the Houthis' main backer and most likely source of the drones. Iran has also been providing large numbers of drones to Russia. All these drones give Iran a greater ability to precisely hit targets than they had 10 years ago.
I don't think Israel has any meaningful capability to attack Iran. I wouldn't go so far as to call them a paper tiger, but their ability to project and sustain forces significantly beyond their borders is slim. Iran is pretty far away with numerous countries hostile to Israel in between them. Even a single airstrike seems unlikely to succeed - the combat range of the strike aircraft in their inventory barely reaches the closest border of Iran over the shortest possible route, which overflies a lot of hostile territory. Hitting any actual targets inside Iran would probably require aerial refueling in hostile airspace. I expect they want to keep what forces they have close to home to protect the country from direct threats rather than risk them on super-long-range missions.
They would need to use medium range ballistic missiles or cruise missiles to attack Iran, which they probably don't have, aside from nuclear-tipped ones.
Yes, it is from 1992, but things changed little since then. Israel has strict gun laws and they work as intended. Israel has 6,7 guns per 100 inhabitants, very good 108th place in the world. Just 2.1 more than David Hogg heaven land England and Wales, considered to be gun control movement dream and aspiration.
People who do not like guns usually do not like Israel either and would loathe to praise anything coming from there. The same reason why we never heard about Israeli health care or Israeli abortion laws despite that they would make excellent talking point for Blues against Israel loving Reds.
And people who like guns usually like Israel too (while knowing about it only from dank memes that show it as tough nation armed to the teeth).
So, you want to ask, you are blaming the victims? How dare you?
The Israelis were told by their government: "Millions of people who want to kill you live near your homes separated by wire fence. Do not panic and do not prepare to defend yourselves. Your government and your army will protect you, nothing can happen. Fear that they will cross the fence and slaughter you in your own homes is absurd and delusional. Do not be conspiracy theorist, do not be extremist, trust the plan". And, being normal human beings, they trusted because the government was right so far, because nothing happened so far. This is normal human nature, no one to blame.
Now, when something happened, and if nothing changes and Israelis will continue trusting their government as previously, yes I will blame them, and you shall too.
Any citizen who meets the detailed tests for carrying a private firearm due to self-defense and serving the security forces and is without a criminal or medical record will be required to undergo a telephone interview instead of a physical interview
What are the tests?
Residence in an eligible settlement, rifle veterans 07 and above, officers in the rank of lieutenant and above and combatants in the rank of major and above in the IDF and the security forces, service in special units, firefighters, policemen, and workers and volunteers in the rescue forces
So very generous. And, in addition, citizens will be able to purchase, instead of previous fifty, whole ONE HUNDRED rounds of ammo! Yay!
Bizarre that you think gun control is the most inflammatory issue. Is it a joke? Far and away the most inflammatory issue would be Israel's right to exist and segregate the Arabs and whether that justifies atrocities against Israeli civilians. Literally every discussion online about this, if it goes on long enough, will go back to 1948 or earlier. This is a classic culture war issue.
The Israelis were told by their government: "Millions of people who want to kill you live near your homes separated by wire fence. Do not panic and do not prepare to defend yourselves. Your government and your army will protect you, nothing can happen. Fear that they will cross the fence and slaughter you in your own homes is absurd and delusional.
About a billion plus Indians and a sizeable hundred millions of Pakistanis accept the same deal from their governments without complaint. So do South Koreans, and even their stunted northern cousins. In the former case, there are entire border states where there's a very real risk of Jihadists slipping under the fence and shooting up your village. No demands for guns, just better security from the BSF and Indian Army.
I would be rather concerned if the government was demanding I arm myself to do the job I pay them taxes for, even if I'm a gun nut, and if I ever make it to the US and the decent guns aren't banned, I intend to buy several.
You're observing the very much discussed to death notion that people get along and cheer more for a far-group than they do their far more similar peers who hold much more similar cultural and political views. The Leftists celebrating Palestine don't all want to wear hijabs or ban alcohol, even if a few of them get signal boosted.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
self_made_human 1yr ago
About a billion plus Indians and a sizeable hundred millions of Pakistanis accept the same deal from their governments without complaint.
There's been a whole lot of complaining. And it's not "a billion plus Indians", it's only the relatively few near the hot borders.
So do South Koreans
No, there's more than a fence between the South and the North; there's a 4km wide demilitarized zone with minefields and military bases just south of it (and, I presume, north of it)
About a billion plus Indians and a sizeable hundred millions of Pakistanis accept the same deal from their governments without complaint
Does indians and pakistani hate each other or only their governments? AK 47 doesn't do much good against an army. Against people in toyota trucks they are good enough. A couple of well places snipers could have reduced the festival casualties and probably prevented some of the rapes.
Does indians and pakistani hate each other or only their governments?
Depends. As you'd expect but for a question covering >1.5 billion people.
I didn't notice any animosity from the Pakistani doctors I befriended in London, barring a few jokes about some poor pilot who got shot down in Pakistani airspace and was mildly roughed up before being exchanged. I suppose the fact that I didn't give a shit made them warm up even faster, I'm no nationalist, at least except when I pine for the US.
You will find hundreds of millions of hardliners, and hundreds of millions more who are indifferent or outright alarmed at the idea of war. If war happens, it's most likely going to be because the US and China kickoff and allies and associates get drawn in. Or an inciting event beyond my power to predict.
I think there's more bellicosity on the Pakistani side, their military relies on fear mongering about India to justify their occasional coups. And the ISI, they need something bigger than Afghanistan to show they're worth more than the damage they deal, which isn't really true itself.
AK 47 doesn't do much good against an army.
I would hope not even the Palestinians are using something as antiquated as a genuine AK-47, or at least the modernized (so early it's hardly modern) AKM. But I get your point.
The festival was one small part of the attack. Technicals stuffed with gunmen were shooting at civilians in urban centers, with many of the videographers within range and great firing positions to respond.
My impression while watching them was almost 100% "Damn, a rifle instead of a phone would be really nice for these guys".
If they had looser gun control laws, I’d expect just as often those looser guns end up in the hands of terrorists as in the hands of people using them for self-defense.
Their military was apparently caught with their pants down, why would you expect civilians to do better instead of just becoming tasty weapon lootboxes?
Because if you own a gun you're already in your house...with the gun. So when you hear your neighbors getting executed, you take out your gun and stop the person doing the executing.
Omitted from The Reload is that they are limited to a single firearm that is not a semiauto rifle. So most typically a semiauto pistol like a Glock. And absent the "Short Barreled Rifle" and "Short Barreled Shotgun" NFA restrictions (that existed to close a loophole during drafting when pistols were going to be similarly restricted but when pistols were removed from the bill, the loophole closure was not), has led to the amusing product design space of pistol chassis systems. Americans answer for short carbines working around their laws was the pistol brace, for Israelis the microroni.
The microroni is just a rifle attachment for a handgun. I suppose you're more accurate with it, but the ballistics of it are still shitty compared to a real rifle.
The gun control policy works well for Israel. They have low crime. They have low suicides.
They do have a very significant problem with Palestinian terrorists, but it's obvious that simply ending gun control would not be a sufficient response to that problem - large scale military action is required. So there is no problem that could actually get solved by a change in gun policy, and several significant problems that could easily be created by it.
I think that for Israeli Jews, trying to make it easier for citizens to own guns would put them between a rock and a hard place.
On the one hand, they would be loath to let ethnically Arab citizens of Israel have guns because that would make it much easier for those of them who want to kill Jews to actually do it.
On the other hand, there is no way to write a gun control law that takes ethnicity into account without making it completely obvious that you are running an ethno-state and thus looking really bad to a lot of people in the broader world.
On the other hand, there is no way to write a gun control law that takes ethnicity into account without making it completely obvious that you are running an ethno-state and thus looking really bad to a lot of people in the broader world.
But they are already running an ethno-state. No outsider considers it not to be an ethnic state unless they are making PR mouth noises pretending to the contrary.
,Yes, but bringing it to the arena of gun laws would take it up a notch and look particularly ugly because it basically would look like "we are going to make it legal for any of our random vigilantes and paramilitary groups to easily buy guns while at the same time we will ensure that it is illegal for the Palestinians to defend themselves from such violence".
On the other hand, there is no way to write a gun control law that takes ethnicity into account without making it completely obvious that you are running an ethno-state and thus looking really bad to a lot of people in the broader world.
Easier than you might think, and Israel is already doing it. To get a gun license in Israel you need to have completed a certain degree of military training (among other requirements). Non-Jews (Druze, Bedouins, some Christian Arabs) who serve in the IDF are not those that you need to worry about starting a riot at the behest of Hamas or Hezbollah.
Human beings have an instinct that makes them lash out violently against oppression, real or perceived. If it were possible to eliminate this instinct through genetic engineering, would it be worthwhile to do so? Would the Palestinians be better off if they were engineered to feel less emotional in response to discrimination and ethnic cleansing?
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
omfalos 1yr ago
You have perhaps read S.M. Stirling's Drakas books? I don't think breeding Homo servus is really a good idea, whether you're doing it to the Palestinians or the Israelis.
Nah, resistance to some forms of oppression, even if irrational from an individual perspective, is very much necessary for the survival of the group. You have to make someone, who wishes to oppress you more than is within the Overton Window, reconsider due to the cost in blood they'd have to pay. Even if you will inevitably lose it they chose to pay it. (Do stop resisting after you're done with the minimum needed to add credibility to your claims, assuming they aren't literally killing you)
While I wouldn't object too hard if it was done for basket cases like Palestine, it's infinitely preferable to just make them as smart as their Israeli cousins, so that integration could be smoother. Can't forget the cultural component and memetic engineering, genius Jihadis cause much of the carnage, the ones who did 9/11 were well educated. The two are inextricable, smarter people can be more pro-social, certainly more productive, and find positive sum ways of solving their problems without resorting to force.
At any rate, I do find making otherwise normal humans into meeker ones distasteful, if you want servants and workers who won't give you lip, just make more robots.
I mean, if we're granting the ability to apply arbitrary genetic behavioral modification to classes of people, I'd rather make all the oppressors uninterested in oppressing...
Anyway, there's a difference between 'would Palestinians in the real world be better off without the instinct now' versus 'Would Palestinians from five hundred years ago be better off today in expectation without the instinct.'
I think this instinct, like a lot of human instincts towards violent retaliation under various circumstances, serves an important evolved purpose as a disincentive towards other people doing those thing in the first place.
An instinct towards psychotically attacking oppressors is an incentive against oppression. Not a strong enough disincentive to stop all oppression, oppression can be really really profitable, but God alone knows how much more oppression there would be in the world and in the history books without that instinct.
No. Striking violently and possibly in a suicidal way to achieve taking your oppressor's life is paramount. Sacrosanct. I would not want to live with a people who have had this urge lobotomized out of them. Indeed I would look at them as lesser beings.
What's in it for Hamas? Israel's response is totally predictable. It's about to be a really rough time to be a Gazan. Hamas leadership must have thought through what happens the week after their attack .... right? I'm genuinely curious what their calculus is/was.
Hamas leadership must have thought through what happens the week after their attack .... right?
72 virgins in heaven, same as always. I always find it illustrative to go back to this passage from their holy book.
The Hour will not begin until you fight the Jews, until a Jew will hide behind a rock or a tree, and the rock or tree will say: ‘O Muslim, O slave of Allah, here is a Jew behind me; come and kill him.
That is a Hadith. Not a passage from their holy book. If we will go down to such a base level of argumentation at least let's get the facts right. Ironically, one side of this conflict actually does have a holy book where their God instructs them to genocide the inhabitants of the land and settle it themselves which they do according to the said book.
Supposedly the Saudis and the Israelis were on the path to normalized relations. Saudi Arabia's remarks could be construed as blaming Israel for the situation, which would derails those normalization talks. Hamas gets a win if it can keep Israeli from having one less enemy.
the hamas leadership gives zero shits about the palestinians there and they'll never have recruitment issues. the optics of giving israel a broken nose and perhaps delaying normalization with the saudis are worth a few thousand lives.
Amadan
Enjoying my short-lived victory
ace 1yr ago
They probably believe that if they cause enough pain they really can eventually force Israel to give up territory for peace. They've seen, from Vietnam to Afghanistan to Algeria, that great powers can be worn down and lose the will for continued occupation. And they're banking on Israel not doing all the things people are asking them to do on Twitter: "Turn Gaza into a parking lot." People here might argue that it would be "rational" for the Israelis to just go ahead and do a genocide, but they aren't going to do that.
I think Hamas is mistaken in that the situation in Palestine is obviously different from those other examples (notably, Israel knows that there would never be peace because Hamas's end goal is literally the destruction of Israel and they'll never settle for anything less). But Palestine does have a lot of global sympathy so Israel still cannot "make the rubble bounce" even if they wanted to.
And while @WhiningCoil's take is just the usual low effort sneering, he's not completely wrong that actual religious beliefs play a part: most Muslims aren't in it for the "72 virgins" but they genuinely do believe that God is on their side and thus they will inevitably prevail.
No, one's person's sneering is sneering. You don't actually know much about Islam except what you learn from mainlining outrage online. Citing spicy quotes from holy books is Twitter-level, which is why you don't pile on in agreement when our resident Joo-posters are throwing around the one about goys being servants of Jews.
Then I don't understand your accusation of sneering, except to grant unearned charity to the obviously guilty party here. You acted like my bringing up that call to genocide was a complete non-sequitur. Like it's unfair or "sneering" to point out someone's publicly stated beliefs, openly expressed, enshrined in religion, government, media, and man on the street interviews.
But how much? Will they agree to 1967 borders? To the 1947 UN partition plan? Or only to pushing the last Jew into the Med?
Answers will probably vary depending on which Palestinian you ask, but as I said below, I've become blackpilled enough to believe that most Palestinians today, deep down, want the destruction of Israel and nothing less. Will anything ever persuade a critical mass to accept some sort of lasting, stable plan for coexistence? Not in a timespan of less than several generations.
notably, Israel knows that there would never be peace because Hamas's end goal is literally the destruction of Israel and they'll never settle for anything less
That's not even the most notable difference. The Afghans weren't attempting to remove America from Long Island, they were attempting to remove America from Afghanistan. The Algerians weren't trying to take Provence, they were trying to take Algeria.
Note that "Hamas" did not decide to do anything; rather, certain leaders of Hamas did. Those who made the decision to launch this attack are almost certainly acting in their own interests. The decision was probably driven in part by internal politics, either between Hamas and its political rivals, or among factions within Hamas. That is hardly an unusual phenomenon (see the Falklands War). Note than "driven by internal politics" does not preclude the possibility that Iran played an important role, given that Hamas relies on Iran for some of its funding, which like all governing organizations Hamas uses to purchase legitimacy (whether in the form of public services or in the form of striking Israel).
That's a good thing to remember in the general case, but it's also relevant to look at the necessary number of people involved in this sort of maneuvers, either directly in terms of men on the scene, and indirectly in terms of immediate support. Even with fairly generous assumptions regarding compartmentalization, it's extremely likely that both the majority of Hamas leadership and literally tens of thousands of individual members were involved.
That both changes how leaders make decisions (cfe more formal example), but it also blends the lines between decisions made by individuals and by organizations.
Yes, but I think you are conflating two different questions: 1) why entities employ political violence; and 2) why individuals go along / participate in political violence / join politically violent organizations. Compare chapters 3 and six here
There are actually reports coming out that only a small part of the military leadership planned this attack and was aware of it and not even the political leaders of Hamas were aware. And other militant groups were only informed moments before the action and joined in an impromptu manner. Obviously impossible to know for sure but this would make much sense since otherwise it would be impossible to keep this secret.
Not knowing much about the topic, the two things I'd look for are 1. generic accelerationist tendencies (end the status quo and force a resolution, whatever it may be) and 2. Ways in which the specific (still living) people behind planning the attack benefit from it personally ('career' advancement/etc) even if it doesn't help the cause overall long-term.
All eyes are on Gaza but reports are also coming in that the Israeli military is putting the West Bank on full lockdown.
Part of this is to prevent wider contagion but it surely cannot be lost on various government ministers (some of whom belong to the utter fringes of the Israeli far-right) that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity to do things in the occupied territories that otherwise wouldn't fly. Israel has a narrow time window for any such actions, so while the world is glued to what happens in Gaza, I would also try to keep an eye on the West Bank.
I suspect the real prize for many members of this govt would be simultaneous ethnic cleansing of both Gaza and West Bank in a massive show of force. 300K reservists have been called up. I'm not predicting it will happen, just pointing out that if there was ever a time, then that time is now.
I wish them the best, you don't treat a tumor by cutting away just the bits that are causing symptoms (severe metastatic palliative cases aside), you chop off as much as you can find.
In both cases, I'm confident the loss in blood and lives will be significantly lower than drawing things out.
I do think ethnic cleansing is such a tiresome term, and so is a definition of genocide that includes cultural redoctrination. Buddy, I tell you, the hypothetical person who does this, it's far worse to murder an entire class of people instead of making them learn a new language and wear new clothes. You're sneaking in connotations, and I'll continue impotently pushing back where I can.
I'm massively in favor of restricting genocide to only include killing and mass prevention of reproduction, but do you have a suggestion for what to call the cultural equivalent?
If tomorrow the Taliban broke into my house, forced me to learn Arabic, stop eating pork or drinking alcohol, changed how my workday is structured, altered the system of government I live under, and prevented me from living with my girlfriend prior to marriage, none of that is genocide but is definitely A Big Deal and I would like a word for it being applied to my entire society collectively. Culturcide is decent but a bit ugly.
How would Zionists behave if they were in the Palestinian position?
This is a key question for determining the moral severity of the terrorist attacks we saw this weekend. A common criticism of Hamas is that they engage in terrorism against civilians whereas their morally enlightened (ostensibly) Israeli cousins only attack military targets. But I think this ignores the fact that Israel has the luxury of successfully hitting military targets. Israel can kill just as many civilians as Hamas by targeting military sites, while also killing relevant military leaders and defending against unwanted criticism. Yet at the end of the day, the same if not more civilians are killed, and the same terror is instilled in the enemy’s civilian population. Regarding an Israeli missile attack in May which killed ten civilians, Amnesty writes:
They were launched into densely populated urban areas at 2am when families were sleeping at home, which suggests that those who planned and authorized the attacks anticipated – and likely disregarded – the disproportionate harm to civilians. Intentionally launching disproportionate attacks, a pattern Amnesty International has documented in previous Israeli operations, is a war crime.
The idea that it is morally acceptable to kill civilians when you also kill military targets at the same time is often brought up when American bombings in Japan during WWII are discussed. However, I’m not convinced that there is a clear moral difference between Hamas actions and, say, the firebombing of Tokyo, where as many as 100k were killed, the vast majority being civilians.
Back to the question at hand, we know that Zionists had no issue bombing embassies and killing non-combatants in order to colonize the land of what is now called Israel. In the 40s, they notably bombed a British embassy, and in the 50s the Israeli government pressured Britain and Italy not to investigate the bombing. Recently, an Israeli historian has claimed that Zionists were responsible for the bombings targeting the Jews of Baghdad in order to pressure Jews to migrate and settle Israel. So, back when Israel’s position was more similar to Palestine, they did in fact engage in terrorist activity. If Israeli militants would behave as Hamas militants were they in that position, then the immorality of Hamas conduct is greatly diminished in severity.
If either side was in each others position they would be extreme ultranationalists/hardcore identitarian tribalists as they are now. I think the Zionists would be more competent at dealing with another invading group had they been equally smart in that scenario. If the zionists were in palestinian position and were invaded by a group called the Yews that behaved just like the Jews did historically, they would hate their guts with an intense fanaticism that is rarely seen. And yes they would of course utilize terorrism like they did historically, and they wouldn't stop had it been the advantageous method for them to utilize in the circumstances. Generally Jews would really, really, really hate a group that behaved against the Jews like Jews behave towards non Jews.
If Israeli militants would behave as Hamas militants were they in that position, then the immorality of Hamas conduct is greatly diminished in severity.
Yes, relatively to Israel that is. Neither Hamas nor the Israelis and their fans are reasonable groups of people, from the perspective of seeking compromise, avoiding bloodshed, acting morally and ethically, with a mind to proportionality, caring consistently about the golden rule, respecting others rights, etc, etc. Including the same people in the west and in the middle east, they are all a bunch of crybullies, quite possible for them to be victimized based on circumstances, but whenever they get the opportunity they will mistreat others for their benefit and cry about being the victims besides.
So I am not a fan of either sides, or even the behavior of their diaspora but I would prefer if they behaved better but alas you can't change them just cause you wish it to be so. Although due to greater power, I find Israel has the greater responsibility to stop illegal settlements.
Anyhow, contemporary Israel bad behavior and war crimes and unhinged genocidal rhetoric we see among Zionists is already bad enough and worse than what the Palestinians do, although one could argue that had they had the power they would be just as bad or worse.
One of the most annoying things about Jewish extremism is not only they are extreme nationalists but they are utterly unwilling to admit it and will gaslight you. Crybullying 101. Yes, Israel is an extreme nationalist country, that is occupying even more land on top of their previous murderous ethnic cleansing, and take various racist policies in the open prison they have palestinians in. Plus their army engages in warcrimes.
Of course Israel is just one example of the issue which is that Jews even outside Israel and not just in Israel are really hardcore racists and support discriminating against the non Jewish ethnic groups of the area and don't respect their national rights. Rights which they assert for themselves.
So the problem that Jews are massive racists is very much real, and those who deny it are making things up and promoting a very false vision of reality.
I don't know about you, but I prefer if ethnic groups weren't massive racists and respected each others rights instead of operating with a mentality that what is yours is mine and what is mine is mine and then lying to your victims.
The pervasive choice that Jews engaging in waging the culture war like you do is to be as racist as possible and deny wrongdoing instead of accept rightfully and justly the error that their peoples have done over the years against other ethnic groups.
Hasn’t the entire Middle East been governed in this way with perhaps the lone exception being current Iraq. Every country has had to brutally repress at times to keep the peace.
Lebanon at one point was different but hasn’t been for decades.
Is this whole line of moral questioning useful? I consider it a given that the civilness is based on security, safety, abundance, lawfulness, peace and so on. Teasing out religious and cultural differences is a little interesting, though I think misses the point. It's fairly universal that stripping away these civilization cornernstones make people more savage.
The more interesting question is, is it ever possible for a 21st century civilization to collide with a 14th century one and for the 14th century one to be warmly embraced and adapted? And I say 14th century because I consider the currently problematic Islamic cultures of the world to be basically the Spanish inquisition with the sign flipped from Christian to Islam.
For a more extreme example, my mind immediately goes to European settlers meeting the already-here indigenous peoples of America. Despite the billions of words written about how harmoniously they must have existed in connection with the Earth and one another, I'm sure they were probably even more insane to deal with than the currently situated Hamas.
(Of course the native Americans didn't have adversaries of the European settlers hooking them up with modern assault weapons)
If 21st century is supposed to mean moving beyond fanaticism, neither civilization is part of 21st century and neither are even American non Jews who throw themselves extreme rhetoric about destroying Gaza.
It is immoral to side with the more prosperous fanatical racists when they could and should be behaving much better and respecting others human rights.
Someone could ironically use your way of thinking to justyfing Nazi conquest of more backward eastern europeans. That you use this kind of rhetoric in defense of Israel acting without any judgement is telling where you are coming from.
Of course many Jewish communists also thoght themselves superior intellectuals with the right to lead and abuse inferior reactionary gentile ethnic groups with tragic consequences.
Is this whole line of moral questioning useful? I consider it a given that the civilness is based on security, safety, abundance, lawfulness, peace and so on. Teasing out religious and cultural differences is a little interesting, though I think misses the point. It's fairly universal that stripping away these civilization cornernstones make people more savage.
Israel does not respect the security, safety, lawfulness and peace of the Palestinians.
It also doesn't respect it for various other countries they bomb.
And they don't respect it for western countries that their lobby promotes policies against them. And against freedom of speech and also the native people having any rights. It is important to note that Israelis have had key influence in Facebook enforcing racist jewish supremacist propaganda as the allowed speech.
The person who banned Trump from twitter was part of Israel's goverment. And Likudists in west including aligned neocons not only promoted mass migration in western countries but also have at times advocated Palestinians moving to europe as the means of solving Israel's problem.
Being too racist against others in the way that actually doesn't allow said nations to exist and prosper goes against others civilization. This mentality does not promote civilization for it is predatory and parasitical. While it is immoral for anyone to support it, especially any non Jew has no reason to support Jewish racism which will turn against them and has them on their crosshair too.
What I find ironic about the whole Jewish issue is the whole whining about racism against Jews by who, Jews of all people who are so pervasively racist as a group.
Now, lest we forget, the Jews aren't the only fanatics in the region. Same in the past, it is an inaccurate vision that sees Jews as center of all evil and any non Jewish group or ideology as center of good. Although the opposite vision which has been more common in 20th and 21st century is even more stupid and dangerous. But they definitely are bullies whenever they can get away with it. If you are a Jew and you try to be a good person you should have a problem with how your ethnic community tends to behave like and how other Jews tend to behave like.
And part of their ultranationalist mentality and racist mentality of both them and non Jewish, Jewish supremacists, is this asinine vision of Jews who never didn't do nothing and how you are insane to think otherwise. Which as we see when you employ your kind of more nazi like arguement, is disingenuous. And I absolutely do see the Jewish supremacist faction which includes non Jews too promote might is right supremacist rhetoric and also rhetoric about how the Jews are just so fucking superior to other groups and they just have the right to behave as they please.
The projection of this faction using rhetoric about racism tends to obscure that the correct response to the bad behavior of Jewish supremacists is to outright condemn them for their racism.
BTW if you are curious where I am coming from I actually think you can support your own group's prosperity while also respecting the rights of others.The homeland system where we have countries that ought to respect each others rights beeing a key part of international justice. Ideally we have something like international justice when this happens. And we don't when ethnic groups are getting, genocided, colonized by others, they lose their land and their rights of self determination and even self respect and right to a historical education of their own ethnic group (that is they are victims of cultural genocide which the nazis like many modern Jews in western countries and far leftists in general, are proponents of) are destroyed under the boot of foreign conquerors or those locals who align with said agenda.
Warmongering imperialists who destroy millions, especially relevant today the modern neocons are the kind of people who we need to keep down. Those who give platforms to those promoting the dangerous rhetoric we have seen these days advocating for warcrimes are culpable for what happens and have the blood of inoccents also on their hands. And those who cultivated an atmosphere where any ethnic group can do no wrong, in this case the Jews, are obviously racist supremacists in favor of said group or groups, but also culpable for whatever happens next in Gaza.
Regarding the Jews acting as racist bullies, it has to do with the dominance of ultranationalist ideology among Jews relating both to religion and even secular Jewish ultranationalism and even combo of Jewish ultranationalism with progressive extremism. This ideology is just classic ridiculous one sided racist propaganda that in clown world stage we are, is increasingly imposed. That Jews never did nothing wrong, that anything otherwise is racist conspiracy theory and insane (and the ridiculous term used by racists, the term antisemite), and that Jews both historically and presently have been oppressed and have the right to destroy and thriump over their oppressors (liek Egypt which enslaved Jews according to religious myth but not necessarilly according to fact). In combo with the same faction promoting the idea of Jews as just superior.
Classic ultranationalist propaganda 101 and non Jews who also perpetuate it are racist supremacists in favor of a foreign ethnic group. So the solution isn't the same predatory mentality against inoccents and against Jews, but not to tolerate the Jewish or other groups ultranationalist bullshit, and to impose a mentality to them that they ought to be less cruel, disrespectful of other groups rights and compromise and avoid having demands were they encroach on the rights of others.
Which Jewish community does in Palestine, stealing land, and doing plenty of warcrimes, plus what they have gotten away with getting already the moral path is a two state solution with 1967 borders. And they do, with control over powerful institutions in the west, and enforcing authoritarian racist supremacist propaganda, promoting mass migration, criminalizing and not tolerating healthy moderate nationalism to their outgroup while encouraging a progressive supremacist alliance of Jewish supremacist, black supremacists and others against western civilization.
This stopping is necessary part of an ideology in favor of the only international justice that ever made sense and ever worked. It is important not to confuse disregarding the fake moralism of principleless trying to manipulate you into allowing you to victimize you with abandoning morality altogether.
Anyway, Jews in current circumstances are not the victimized party but the victimizing party that should make amends towards others. I am not suggesting they become complete pushovers though towards say Hamas. There is a sweet spot and Jews are consistently on the wrong side of it.
*Obviously, when saying Jews here =/ all Jews, I don't think it needs saying but part of the nasty rhetorical tricks of misinterpretation. It does mean Jews as a pattern, average Jew, etc, etc.
Anyhow, contemporary Israel bad behavior and war crimes and unhinged genocidal rhetoric we see among Zionists is already bad enough and worse than what the Palestinians do,
No, it isn’t. Israel should stop settlerism in the West Bank, yes, but it’s not the equivalent of what Hamas is doing in southern Israel right now. Israel should probably show a bit more concern for civilian casualties, but it’s not taking preemptive strikes against a music festival.
Israel has killed far more Palestinians than otherwise. Even just recently. Also Hamas =/ the totality of Palestinian faction even if key to it.
Israel should probably show a bit more concern for civilian casualties, but it’s not taking preemptive strikes against a music festival.
The way you are framing it is downplayment to the extreme.
Enough with the apologia for Israeli warcrimes. I don't think it is an accident that the spaces that promote this including IDW has rhetoric that is upvoted about how Jews are superior. Which we see here as well people write this nonsense and promote the argument of Jews being superior to non Jews.
Israel unmoored from the threat of backlash, would probably have done ever worse, just like so many zionists advocate. And like they have done in the past. There is a real threat of mass murderous ethnic cleansing lying over the Palestinians right now. There is also a lot of rhetoric and an atmosphere created that makes attrocities all that more likely because of the complicity of gatekeepers of discourse.
Lest we forget that Hamas has not existed always in this conflict and the start of it is Jewish murderous conquest and ethnic cleansing of which terrorism played a key role.
This conflict isn't really all that debatable in all its facets. It is a fact that both Hamas and Israel (and those willing to support it unconditional) are fanatical extreme regimes. Also, part of their badness has to do with their global badness. Their fanaticism isn't only a problem for the location of palestine, but their ideology is vile, predatory, and disrespectful of others rights with a more global reach.
One under the banner of Islam, and with elements of anti western (and anti other non muslim, including Christians but other groups too), and the other with the symbol of star of david, with also anti western, obviously anti-christian but also anti Muslim element. And both quite capable of being anti-X other groups in favor of the domination of their own tribe.
Yes, this will probably end with mass civilian casualties among the Palestinians of Gaza. Hamas maybe shouldn’t have started a genocidal war they were guaranteed to lose.
Israel is not a saint, but there’s not exactly a moral equivalence here. Israel isn’t dragging off Palestinian civilian hostages to rape and parade through the streets. Israel didn’t open hostilities by killed 250 people at a concert. Israel isn’t breaking into apartments to kill civilians and drag their carcasses through Tel Aviv to be spat on.
Even in recent events propaganda rages. While the fog of war exists for me too, there are plenty of Israel warcrimes that have been reported over the years.
There is also deliberate bombing of civilians. Israel has murdered far more than just 250 civilians.
There is no moral equivalence if you are a racist who excuses Jewish warcrimes because you believe Jews are superior and non Jews are inferior.
In reality, Americans are incredibly propagandized by Jewish supremacists to become themselves Jewish supremacists. Although some Americans quite more than others. And some deliberately pretend that Israel hasn't done its very fair share of warcrimes.
Yes, this will probably end with mass civilian casualties among the Palestinians of Gaza. Hamas maybe shouldn’t have started a genocidal war they were guaranteed to lose.
Love the passive voice. So you don't even oppose the genocidal war but support it because Hamas started it. Like Hamas started the occupation, after all.
So you support genocidal war by only blaming Hamas for it and not Israel and people like yourself with your bloodthirst, racist bias you support the murder of countless of inoccents in war.
Incidentally, aren't the people of Hamas using your logic to murder Jews? How are you any better than them, when you justify genocidal war and excuse the perpetrators?
Unlike the Palestinians, or even Hamas, your call for revenge doesn't even have the excuse of your country being occupied.
It isn't a mystery that aggressively calling for restraint and trying to keep the zionist genocidal fanatics and warmongers who even want to escalate things to war with Iran down, is the prudent course. Having lived through the mass propaganda of the Iraq war, the current situation smells exactly like that. A bunch of dangerous propagandists out for blood putting civilization in course for destruction.
So no, you are fully 100% at fault for your own rhetoric, and Israel for their own actions. They always had the opportunity to act in a far more restrained manner than they have done. From the very beginning of this conflict that has been a Jewish supremacist imperialist grab.
Simultaneously, it would be a good idea to keep down annoying muslim fanatics too with their own global imperialist nuttery and disrespect towards others. And of course the antiwestern fanatics with their colonizing visions under the pretense of decolonization.
Of which, Jewish supremacists dreaming of ethnically cleansing Palestinians to send them to europe are part of. It is in fact imperative that Israeli reprisals show restraint and avoid the mass murder of civilians. And simultaneously Israel should finally abadon its vile illegal settlements. Maybe the creation of a palestinian state in those areas with nobody of Hamas allowed inside and the preresequite for peace being Hamas to be gone in general. Of course the Jewish supremacist fanatics which includes non Jews have no interest in that and of course Hamas has no interest in itself to be gone.
The main group of non Jewish, Jewish supremacists are mainly from western countries. And these people not only become racist supremacists of extreme proportions but also betray their own countries and nation by aligning with an ultranationalist agenda that is incredibly intolerant and hostile to western civilization in the broadest sense and its component nations and sees it as an antisemitic oppressor to be exploited or destroyed. Or pretends cynically it is an antisemitic oppressor to justify their racist agenda for its destruction. In either case, Jewish tribalism is incredibly racist against the main countries outside of Israel that tend to support it and despises the native people of said countries. Unlike in Israel, the Jews support mass migration and oppose any rights of national identity for their non Jewish victims. For the same reason they support colonization of Palestinian land by Jews, and oppose Palestinian human rights and nationhood. Because they are racist imperialists of extreme proportions who do not respect the rights of others. And fundamentally same as the non Jewish, Jewish supremacists. Including the aware proponent who have ideologically adopted an insane treasonous ideology, and the useful idiot component who ends up helping those who despise them.
Yes, this will probably end with mass civilian casualties among the Palestinians of Gaza. Hamas maybe shouldn’t have started a genocidal war they were guaranteed to lose.
Love the passive voice.
Personal pet peeve: there is no passive voice in that sentence (guaranteed is clearly an adjective).
Can you provide better source than this troll account?
I recognize this one from unironically claiming that Russia has not invaded Ukraine and about biolabs and how Poland is preparing to invade Ukraine. They repeatedly posted lies, misleading claims, bizarre misinterpretations and various propaganda.
Is Joe more immoral than Fred if the action Joe takes is of the same quality Fred would take, were Fred in Joe’s position? The weight of moral philosophy says no. At worst they are equally immoral. But Joe can’t be worse than Fred, if Fred would do the same thing. Joe is only morally worse than Fred if he would behave worse than Fred.
Do you think that one group is more immoral than another simply because of chance? So if two people try to kill each other equally, the one whose gun didn’t jam is more immoral? If two people attempt adultery, the immoral one is the one who is more attractive? I don’t think I’m representing your view correctly here. In the case of Hamas vs Israel, I’m saying Hamas can’t be “more immoral than Israel” if Israel would do the same to them all things being equal. This doesn’t imply that international law is suddenly abolished or that the actions can’t be censured by some third party nation. I’m only making an assertion about morality relative to the two. So an application would be that neither Hamas nor Israel get to claim righteousness or moral high ground.
It’s unknowable but we can still consider things that are likely.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
coffee_enjoyer 1yr ago
I am saying your imaginings about what Zionists would do if in the same situation as Hamas have no weight. You're taking it as a given that the two groups are morally equivalent, using that belief to assert that the Zionists would do the same in reversed circumstances, and then using that assertion to claim the two groups are morally equivalent. It's entirely circular. In reality, we've got no evidence that, in a reversed situation, that the Zionists would target civilians and rape and murder them and drag their bodies through the streets. Their big well-known terrorist action was the bombing of British administrative headquarters in the King David Hotel, which isn't similar.
Per Richard Catling regarding the Deir Yassin massacre in the 40s by Zionists, just weeks before the creation of Israel:
On 14th April at 10 a.m. I visited Silwan village accompanied by a doctor and a nurse from the Government Hospital in Jerusalem and a member of the Arab Women's Union […] I interviewed many of the women folk in order to glean some information on any atrocities committed in Deir Yassin but the majority of those women are very shy and reluctant to relate their experiences especially in matters concerning sexual assault and they need great coaxing before they will divulge any information. The recording of statements is hampered also by the hysterical state of the women who often break down many times whilst the statement is being recorded. There is, however, no doubt that many sexual atrocities were committed by the attacking Jews. Many young schoolgirls were raped and later slaughtered. Old women were also molested. One story is current concerning a case in which a young girl was literally torn in two. Many infants were also butchered and killed. I also saw one old woman who gave her age as one hundred and four who had been severely beaten about the head with rifle butts. Women had bracelets torn from their arms and rings from their fingers and parts of some of the women's ears were severed in order to remove earrings
The men were paraded in the streets of Jerusalem and spat on before being executed.
How would one restrain the temptation to justify any actions by saying that your enemy would have acted like you did? It seems like a fully general way to excuse bad behavior on the part of an underdog in any conflict.
DuplexFields
Ask me how the FairTax proposal works. All four Political Compass quadrants should love it.
Walterodim 1yr ago
It’s the bloody inverse of the golden rule: do unto others what you imagine they might do unto you. It’s the tribal justification for the cleansing fire of war since human history began.
By reasoning? The same way we use our reasoning to predict other future contingencies. There’s a reason so many people were on board with invading Iraq over WMDs and after hearing about Iraq killing innocents. There was then intense backlash once it was realized that this intelligence gathering was horribly faulty and in some cases fraudulent. So it’s actually already normal to consider what our geopolitical enemies would do if they could, and to make judgments as a consequence.
How would Zionists behave if they were in the Palestinian position?
I mean, there are communities of Jews, even fundamentalist Jews, in pockets all over the world, under various governments that treat them across a broad spectrum of disdain and liberalism. Never in my life heard of Jewish terrorist attacks on the civilians of their host countries.
I'll never know exactly, but I think it's reasonable to extrapolate they wouldn't airdrop into a music festival and go on a rape and murder spree. Or bring some left overs home with them to enjoy later.
I don't think you know enough extremist Jews to be saying that. There are Jews as extreme as any in Israel here in the USA. Brooklyn, Lakewood, smaller places like Kiryas Joel in upstate NY. These Jews are no less extreme.
That's not actually true. A lot of the "ultra-Orthodox" in the U.S. have historically had the position that the modern state of Israel is a biblical abomination, as Jews should only return to the Promised Land when the coming of the Messiah shows that God has redeemed the Jews from the sins that resulted in their expulsion. They'll come and protest speeches by prominent Israelis just like pro-Palestinian groups will.
You’re conflating fundamentalism with extremism here; the topic of the discussion is Zionists. A religious group can be fundamentalist but not extremist, for instance the Amish.
I think this is an example of typical-minding a far-group that you don't really interact with in any meaningful capacity. Palestinians aren't regretfully killing or raping civilians because they are limited to those particular targets - they are happy to do so, proud to do so, and will shout their joy from the rooftops. Most of the videos of Palestinians dragging girls back to Gaza or desecrating corpses aren't from Israeli propaganda, they're from pro-Palestine Telegram groups where everyone is in lockstep approval of their actions.
Back to the question at hand, we know that Zionists had no issue bombing embassies and killing non-combatants in order to colonize the land of what is now called Israel. In the 40s, they notably bombed a British embassy, and in the 50s the Israeli government pressured Britain and Italy not to investigate the bombing. Recently, an Israeli historian has claimed that Zionists were responsible for the bombings targeting the Jews of Baghdad in order to pressure Jews to migrate and settle Israel. So, back when Israel’s position was more similar to Palestine, they did in fact engage in terrorist activity. If Israeli militants would behave as Hamas militants were they in that position, then the immorality of Hamas conduct is greatly diminished in severity.
On the other hand, the Jews have spent hundreds of years as second-rate citizens being legally discriminated against and subject to expulsions and pogroms, yet instead of revolting they adapted and flourished despite the persecution. Could it be that they don't see the Palestinian future as envisioned by Israel as something really that terrible, after all, living in ghettoes and shtetls wasn't that bad until the whole industrialized Jewish extermination plan.
I think they only flourished after much of the persecution had been removed. Before about 1800 they had not been much of a factor in European life, it was after Jewish emancipation that they began their rise, as an ethnic group, to riches and influence.
On the other hand, they may have played a larger role than I know in bringing about their own emancipation.
I find no cognitive dissonance in my enjoying the fruits of the American Revolution while also condemning modern-day leftist revolutionaries that have so far only managed to hold a few blocks in Seattle for part of a summer.
This is a key question for determining the moral severity of the terrorist attacks
No, it isn't. Intentionally targeting civilians is morally wrong. You don’t get a free pass to murder Pol Pot's children just because he has done similar things in the past.
4bpp
Now I am become a Helpful, Honest and Harmless Assistant, the destroyer of jobs
Gdanning 1yr ago
I think this "free pass" rhetoric conceals the role of the speaker, and the authorities that the speaker seeks to persuade to act, in war crime discourse. It should be one matter whether in our beliefs, the murderer of Pol Pot's children ought to be assigned the same metaphysical quality of evil or expectation of supernatural punishment as Pol Pot; it's quite another matter whether you (@Gdanning) and the government that represents you get to "withhold the free pass" (by slapping around the murderer, probably also reaping some totally coincidental benefits in the process) if previously you chose to grant the free pass to Pol Pot.
quite another matter whether you (@Gdanning) and the government that represents you get to "withhold the free pass" (by slapping around the murderer,
You seem to be referring here to whether consequences are imposed for immoral actions. But that is not the issue. The issue is whether the action is immoral or not. By "free pass", I meant a moral free pass -- because, again that was the subject of OP's claim -- not a practical free pass. People get away with immoral acts all the time. That does not render them any more or less immoral. It used to be perfectly legal to forcibly rape one's wife. Hence, husbands were given a free pass -- they were not "slapped around" by the state, to use your terminology. But that says nothing about the morality of those actions.
You don’t get a free pass to murder Pol Pot's children just because he has done similar things in the past.
"Free" pass? Not really, it's already been paid for in blood. With additional promissory value if it convinces him to stop after he's had his own medicine.
How would Zionists behave if they were in the Palestinian position?
This is a key question for determining the moral severity of the terrorist attacks we saw this weekend
I deny this claim outright. The only real relevance to our reality is if it manifests in the fevered imagination of some alt-history author.
If, Zionism hadn't succeeded in clawing back their Holy Land, maybe a sizeable portion of the far larger Jewish diaspora would advocate for terrorism. Doesn't matter in the least, didn't happen, and the primary parties involved, namely the militia who might have taken up arms, are now octogenarians or dead. There are plenty of movements that, while nominally advocating for violent resistance in their homeland, have few people willing to do more than shout slogans. The Khalistani chap potentially offed by Modi recently is a good example, the Sikhs back in India are respected and integrated, which they wouldn't be if they had kept up their war.
A common criticism of Hamas is that they engage in terrorism against civilians whereas their morally enlightened (ostensibly) Israeli cousins only attack military targets. But I think this ignores the fact that Israel has the luxury of successfully hitting military targets. Israel can kill just as many civilians as Hamas by targeting military sites, while also killing relevant military leaders and defending against unwanted criticism.
There are few liberation movements, successful or not, that haven't shed civilian blood somewhere down the line.
If Hamas wishes to hit purely military targets, they're eminently capable, since I've seen footage of Israeli FOBs with dead soldiers nude but for hastily thrown on body armor.
Or shoot the people in the checkpoints or other side of the fence.
No, they have made a considered decision that their aims are to be manifested by killing easier targets when they can. They certainly think that it's better to save the life of their own from a decidedly uphill battle against the Israeli military, by shooting at things that won't shoot back. Regretfully, that just pushes the slope a little back, makes it steeper, and it now has an angry Apache waiting on top.
Most Western nations have far more appetite for trading their soldiers for the lives of innocent civilians, or less Afghanistan would have seen more MOABs. A mistake, in my eyes, but they would have seen tangible results from doing so, whereas the Palestinians have no hope from even maximal aggression, as I hope the Israelis are showing them.
Not all people, not all civilizations, not all tribes, are equal. This is a core conservative conceit, it’s also inherent to ideas like HBD that you yourself agree with. Human progress has always involved the conquest of some peoples by others.
“I do not admit that the dog in the manger has the final right to the manger, even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit, for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America, or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place. I do not admit it. I do not think the Red Indians had any right to say, 'The American Continent belongs to us and we are not going to have any of these European settlers coming in here.' They had not the right, nor had they the power.”
Winston Churchill on Palestine (1937)
‘Punching down’, in other words, may be more moral than ‘punching up’. The many settlers of the Americas did what they did and so, perhaps, will the Israelis.
I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place. I do not admit it.
This is, of course, a justification that one day may be used against peoples less backward than Palestinians. «You are animals in comparison, so we do not admit any wrong in dispossessing you».
It must be nice to belong to the highest average IQ population on the planet. Whatever ideology wins, your side comes out on top.
That is the only real justification that matters. I have (as I have said many times) great sympathy for the Palestinians; their armed struggle is justified on grounds of self defense and historical humiliation. Their war crimes are brutal, but expected. If they fight to the end, they’ll die with honor, at least by their own standards (the only ones that matter, in that case).
I think if you take a civilizational view, there ought to be some kind of respect for national achievement. But the thing about war is that if you lose, you probably weren’t really as good as you thought. If Israel is defeated, the Jewish political project will be over, and they can be considered a defeated people who wasted their opportunity for statehood, at least for now. A tragedy, perhaps, but one of many in history. So it does go both ways.
Yes "a tragedy perhaps" but one that can be forgoten and bypassed. Promoted by someone like you who are milking grudges constantly. The point here you are promoting is that the defeat of Palestinians which is more likely now can be forgoten. Not about Israel.
If you really cared about forgetting tragedies, you wouldn't be milking the holocaust.
The issue here is that incredibly immoral sociopathic Jewish supremacists and other bad actors are free to destroy as they please instead of being restrained through accountability. Like, if anyone deserves to be prosecuted for hate speech, it aint most people you whine about whose rhetoric counters your extremism and therefore promote a valuable service to society even if some can go too far, but the cimarafas of the world are the primary faction of the most malevolent abuse of rights today.
It is no accident that all your genocidal racist supremacist rhetoric and even advocating actual warcrimes has not gotten you in trouble by the moderators. Birds of a feather and reveals the fake nature of rationalism which underneath lies hypocritical extreme tribalism. Like the other israel firster and backers of the racist supremacist democrats the fraudster Sam Bankman Fried.
You have a bunch of comments in the mod queue. Most of them, like this one, this one, and this one, are just raging ad hominems.
It is no accident that all your genocidal racist supremacist rhetoric and even advocating actual warcrimes has not gotten you in trouble by the moderators.
If @2rafa was advocating literal genocide (which I'm pretty sure she's not), people are allowed to argue for abominable things here. That's why going on about how much you hate Jews hasn't gotten you into trouble until now, when you lost your self control and made it personal.
You're being really obnoxious and antagonistic and clearly cruising for a banning. Since you posted so many comments like this in such a short time, I'm guessing you knew you'd get modded and figured you'd get your attacks in while you can.
Banned for a week because this is your first formal mod action, but if you come back for another round of "Flame people before I get banned" I'll just delete your posts and permaban you. If you actually want to continue to participate here, get yourself under control.
magic9mushroom
If you're going to downvote me, and nobody's already voiced your objection, please reply and tell me
Amadan 1yr ago
Since you posted so many comments like this in such a short time, I'm guessing you knew you'd get modded and figured you'd get your attacks in while you can.
There's also the possibility of just reading through a thread and responding to everything that drew his ire as he read it.
Since you are making a moral arguement condemning me as hateful and defending cimarafa it is fair to ask what cimerafa advocates if it isn't genocide.
It isn't hard to connect the quote from Churchil. Or this quote by cimarafa
The most important thing for Israel is that it moves toward firing squads and summary execution of perhaps 10,000-30,000 fighting age men in Gaza, as well as the entire political leadership, mercilessly but quickly and professionally. But then again, I’m a Zionist.
along with other rhetoric from them and various people here. Bloodthirsty rhetoric is abominable but opposing it and calling for restraint is correct.
And in fact, it is the pervasive view worldwide, was more popular in the USA in the past to an extend. In addition with a decent size of negativity towards Israel for its mistreatment of Palestinians but without such negativity leading to the same dehumanization against Israelis than we see against Palestinians. Well except some quarters of the world. And of course, you will find in much of the world plenty of negativity towards Hamas. Anyway, negativity up to a point is a moderating pressure on those who would behave badly without it. But it does require a certain objectivity by those who throw it around.
You attack me of being hateful and I will be defending myself but it is those who have allowed the dehumanization of convenient targets and the advocation of atrocities under racist supremacist ideology while being ban happy to dissenters have genuinely been reprehensible.
And in relevance to the Israel and Gaza conflict, in fact it is precisely because of such decisions by people in control of media and social media that so much blood has been spilled in the middle east for the last 20 years.
Also directly related to the culture war reaching the extreme directions it reached. If there were more responsible and ethical and even handed people in charge, and gatekept out unethical virtue signaling extremists, a lot less blood would have been spilled.
Alas the gatekeeping has been done by the extremists with a manichaistic vision of the world who combine being extreme racists who with the pretensions of being antiracists out to destroy hatred. In fact they hate those who are much more moderate than them and perceive that moderation as hatred.
One that is less hostile on groups than the rhetoric against "inferior peoples". Or is it ok for people to advocate against palestnians and not ok to advocate against people who have influence in media, and social media and forums? Well the later is more in line to being against hatred than for it.
This is not a forum nor has ever been a forum where any political rhetoric goes but one where the moderators have always put a thump on the scales. And while I will be responding in a calmer manner, I will never censor the view that is completely against this ideology I speak about. Plus, it matters what opinion people of influence express. Even in lower importance settings with low inluence. And what views do you express? Well, you have ignored all this bloodthirsty rhetoric even some you linked and more besides and other and you only saw fit to imagine hatred against Jews fitting to comment about. When in a conflict when radicalism in favor of Jews that uses the ideology of Jewish superiority and Jews doing no wrong as an asset, negativity is the necessary antidote.
Even though the actual extreme racist rhetoric and advocation for murder here was obviously not against Jews but Palestinians and other groups deemed inferior by the people promoting said rhetoric.
Personally attacking me as hating the Jews when in response to all of this my view was that Jews have a serious problem of racism is you abusing your position as a moderator to personally attack your outgroup based on your sympathies.
It is actually impressive how with so much provocation my rhetoric towards groups like the Jews was restrained to only condemn pervasive racism as a problem and also outside of Jews in general being critical of those advocating of atrocities without myself siding with those who have abused Jews, like Hamas.
I am actually proud of how even handed my views are in comparison with who I am dealing with and the fact I did push back on their hateful rhetoric that promotes atrocities.
But sure, I will stand for the truth with less personal criticisms against the people who advocate for atrocities here.
Now in regards to the issue of who is the hateful in the current political environment.
The reality is that if virtue signalling racist extremists of the politically correct manner where to deradicalize, stopped their propaganda and moderate and listen to the many reasonable criticisms instead of slandering it all as hatred, the world would be a less racist, and hateful place. The people who are reasonable are never going to be perfect to the standards of extremists who see criticism and negativity towards their ingroup as a sin.
This of course applies also to Israel and Gaza conflict and zionism in general. And yes it does applies to groups like Hamas as well.
Plus, human beings are always going to be emotional beings even those who are reasonable enough to qualify as reasonable people. And for the unreasonable filled with fanaticism to lose, the reasonable need to match them in determination and will.
Less provocative racism which we shouldn't appease to, will lead to less proportionate hostility. And will reduce conflict being inflamed. But this would require to have people in positions of power who put their influence to good use for once and gatekeep those who don't. This is me making an observation about the culture war, certainly less flaming the outgroup than the people calling for commiting attrocities, or inferior peoples deserving it. And pertinent to your condemnation of me as hateful. Which is dangerous rhetoric from you considering the willingness of people to harm those perceived as hateful on the Jews.
Pressure in these directions is necessary for less hatred.
I am very much willing to accept the groups I complain about moderating, and have no problem with consistent standards but it would make me happy and consider it a victory for my position. I reject your framing. If those I call progressive supremacists or Jewish supremacists (which excludes Jews who aren't Jewish supremacists and includes non Jews who are Jewish supremacists who I have been quite negative about) abadoning their ideology and accepting that their rights ends where others begins, and vice versa, that their rights also exist, is a great general compromising point. In Israel it would along with far more restraint in dealing with Palestinians (although opposing Hamas is in line with protecting their own rights) and acceptance of how warcrimes of past, present and future are a sin also include of course ending settlements. And I would rather that the racist ideology of Jews did no wrong, Christians and Europeans or non Jews are to blame for interethnic conflict to be abadoned and not tolerated, but without pushing the opposite extreme.
Obviously this position is more moderate and pro Israeli and Jews , than the people I have been arguing with are pro Palestinian. And more pro Jewish than those promoting the Jews didn't do or are doing wrong position. But what makes you angry?
Less "It isn't happening its all in your hateful conspiring head and it is good that it is happening". More "I aknowledge that we or the progressive stack group might have erred in this manner and this isn't how things ought to go and here is how things should change, but lets be fair about it and not go to the other extreme".
Of course, not only many of their critics are reasonable people who are opposing the most pervasive extremism in our time but also even those who are similarly extreme which I am also not a fan of, can in fact make legitimate points too. Indeed, even with the people I complain about, I wouldn't say they are wrong to note that Hamas and the Palestinians supporting it are radicalized too. Which I funnily enough, got zero pushback in observing that fact. It's because people willing to advocate aggressively in favor of Palestinians mistreating Jews are rare here over the opposite.
As far as the more pervasive extremism of the day in western countries, this applies to both racist tribalists for their own groups in line with progressive stack groups and we observe the groups where it is taboo to object to their racism, but not taboo for them to be racist to naturally behave the worse. This is not going to lead to reasonable people objecting being zen monks, and rightfully so.
If it is taboo and racist to oppose the racism of Jews but not taboo for Jews or even non Jews to be racists in favor of Jews, then you got a problem of racism in favor of Jews. Naturally you will get much more of what you incentivize.
Not that complicated and not that hard for people to have a more even handed norm than that, in line with the golden rule. Not hard if people want to do that and much easier if they are incentivized to do that and we put might in service of right instead of defining what is right by might.
And it applies also to the phenomenon I have spent some time talking about which is racist supremacists for a different ethnic group. Note, that I got only a problem with any sort of tribalists for any group if it is above a certain point. It is reasonable for people to like their group. Even handedness is about avoiding certain massive bad behavior, about putting red lines respected reciprocally. It isn't about eliminating racism in an utopian manner that predictably leads to people forgiving the massive and obsessing over the irrelevant.
Not tolerating big problems does include not tolerating the view that inferior peoples should be destroyed.
And it isn't a personal attack but simply a fact that various posters here promote said racist supremacist rhetoric. Completely fair in discussing the culture war to note this fact and acknowledge it as a negative development. How is that radicalized rhetoric not provocative and attention worthy but only the response to it?
Personally I find that it isn't virtuous, or praiseworthy to be silent in line with the more pervasive racist extremism. Nor is it courageous to condemn and punch down on the politically correct targets.
And it is also fair to see the rhetoric in line of mass murder, or carpet bombing the area and ethnically cleansing Palestinians as genocide.
Is there a room in opposition to this ideology and rhetoric? Or are you going to cover with it as a moderator because you sympathize with that faction and paint opposition as hateful? Will you use the position as moderator to impose your perspective?
If you can paint me as hateful, and call this fair, I can only fairly completely reject this framing and say just as fairly as your statement that I stand against hatred you sympathize with, so that is what I advocated here for. So I explain my position over the easy slander.
And I have important reason to do so, because you can get away with your sympathies in the current political environment, for now. While those who are rather more reasonable than you can find themselves mistreated. And you know it. Of course things can change and change in a reasonable direction than the opposite extreme.
Obviously, when we got rather extreme rhetoric against general outgroups here and people promoting extreme rhetoric of their ingroups doing no wrong, others should respond.
Still, in a calmer manner, so there is less of an excuse. So I will change the way I express my values, I won't compromise on being critical of what I ought to be criticizing.
By the way, I don't see the point of you deleting my few posts when you attack me. Isn't this a way for you to paint me in any manner as you please?
Criticism that opposes bloodthirsty fanaticism in fact it is incredibly important to do so and censoring it is feeding a dangerous crocodile. And lack of it has lead to repeated tragedies, while those doing so might be arrogant and contemptuous of those wiser, not knowing what they are doing, when they create interesting times they too will be affected.
As for the general problem of hatred of our times. Those who need to change their ways and behave in a an ethical manner, to avoid their gigantic bias and to stop advocating for attrocities, won't do it when those who are in charge also share their ideology and participate, or enable it. When pushback doesn't exist and in fact it is opposed. So, the key issue here and is to gatekeep better and have ethical people be those in charge who are intolerant of this kind of behavior.
I will consider it a success against hatred if the rhetoric of those who can't coexist with other ethnic groups and don't tolerate their continued existence and are greedy to dominate others are drowned out by those opposing it. Therefore those who would support destroying and oppressing the other ethnic groups stay silent, or actually through incentives never arrive in positions that they are more psychologically susceptible to fall into.
It is no accident that all your genocidal racist supremacist rhetoric and even advocating actual warcrimes has not gotten you in trouble by the moderators. Birds of a feather and reveals the fake nature of rationalism which underneath lies hypocritical extreme tribalism. Like the other israel firster and backers of the racist supremacist democrats the fraudster Sam Bankman Fried.
Well no, it's no accident because the mods here ding people for personal attacks, and rafa didn't attack anyone. Besides which, a motte where she can't say what she thinks is a worse motte. It is because I am rational that I allow her shitty argument - so I can argue against it - just as much as it is because of her rationality that she allows my shitty arguments - so she can argue against them.
I don't remember having ever seen 2rafa try to milk the Holocaust. Maybe she has, somewhere, but I'm at least pretty sure I would have noticed by now if she did it on a regular basis.
I have the sense that you might be projecting your mental concept of what Jewish supremacists are like onto everyone who agrees even partially with things that you consider to be Jewish supremacy adjacent, even if those people do not actually express the ideas that you think they are expressing.
I agree with rafa. I keep telling you Might Morality and Truth are correlated. As are Weakness, Ignorance and Evil. Parent to child, elder to younger sibling, civilised to barbarian, the stronger is often the wiser.
It’s a strange equivalence op is trying to draw. The more obvious one is that with israeli capabilities , hamas would have killed far more jews in a day than jews ever killed palestinians. palestinians owe their lives to jewish clemency, yet are incapable of it. They are ignorant of their own weakness, and morally childish, which is to say, incompetent and cruel .
Given the comments here and elsewhere, I very much doubt any sincerity when it comes to the alleged 'clemency' on Israels part. Apparently, the only reason jews in Israel have not ethnically cleansed, genocided, holocausted or otherwise brutalized their enemy is because it's a bad tactic at the moment. Because, I would suppose from your comment, there are stronger, morally wiser, more competent and actually merciful people out there that prevent the childish and inane racist power fantasies of hateful zionist jews to come to light.
This is a real mask off moment. Zionists wish suffering and death on women and children. They would take the lives of 1000 innocents in the most torturous way possible to save a single one of theirs. Everything they allege a nazi was they wish they could be.
Evil is usually a bad tactic. The holocaust really slowed down the german war effort. I wish they'd understood how bad genocide is tactically. They could have achieved more objectives for less blood.
Anyway, who's mask off? rafa is always for culling the young male population anywhere, anytime.
I don't recognize the claims of the indians or palestinians , and I don't even need to call them savages, - all they have are earlier claims of conquest that have been nullified by more recent ones.
The holocaust really slowed down the german war effort.
This is a common idea, but actually the Holocaust barely affected the German war effort. The whole thing used only a very small fraction of the German manpower and logistics capacity, required no rare materials, and may have even paid for itself by providing slave labor.
What do you call a very small fraction? Seems to me large parts of the military were involved in it, or otherwise 'pacifying' to allow the einsatzgruppen to do their work. All of this wouldn't even be necessary if they just played the kind liberators against soviet oppression.
But that's not even the worst waste: Without the antisemitic obsession , jews would be the usual highly productive workforce, like in WWI, and perhaps they could build an atomic bomb for germany, or find another Haber-Bosch, or Fischer-Tropf process. Slave labor benefits, or the value of their gold teeth, are a joke by comparison.
Sorry for the really late reply but yes, I think that you are right that the overall Nazi anti-Jew campaign probably slowed their war effort by, for example, driving a bunch of scientists out of the country. When I wrote my reply, I thought that you were referring specifically to the wartime Holocaust that started around 1941.
They would take the lives of 1000 innocents in the most torturous way possible to save a single one of theirs.
Most of your comment falls on the wrong side of the rules, I think, but this line in particular seems like standard-issue hyperbolic propaganda. Like, show me one instance where this looks literally true, a single instance of Israel selecting "the most torturous way possible" to kill "1000 innocents" for any reason at all, much less to "save a single one of theirs."
This is (apparently!) a hotly contested issue, so I was feeling mildly reluctant to moderate you in spite of the overall badness of the comment, but that sentence in particular just struck me as entirely too much heat, directed toward your outgroup, for what looks like no light at all.
Not necessarily. If Hamas had Israeli capabilities, they would have different incentives than they currently do. It's possible that they would decide "yeah let's kill as many Jews as we can", but it's also possible that they would decide "you know what, given that the Jews aren't actually an existential threat to us, maybe we should chill out instead of turning most of the world against us by massacring people".
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
Goodguy 1yr ago
but it's also possible that they would decide "you know what, given that the Jews aren't actually an existential threat to us, maybe we should chill out instead of turning most of the world against us by massacring people".
"The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them."
Perhaps all these shall happen...but not before the end of the world
I'd gladly witness your culling by a militarily superior race in its quest for Lebensraum, so long as it's explicitly justified with this inane correlational logic.
Despite the triteness of this platitude, correlation really does not imply causation. There are some tenuous reasons for morality to be weakly correlated with formidability, but overwhelmingly it's just due to the fact that peoples of Western Christian extraction are the strongest, have been for centuries, and have recently developed some queer compunctions. Well, this particular mix of character traits isn't globally optimal, and their exalted status isn't going to last much longer. Technologically advanced Chinese, Turks, Jews, Arabs, Mongols, Africans, whatever, wherever (including in your nations, including in their halls of power) will be as ruthless as they need to, and increasingly prove this as your race decays; first they'll bother with some glib chattering, then they'll stop. You are used to mercy and magnanimity tempering realpolitik. You'll cope about power being self-justifying, inherently beautiful and ultimately more True than any morality when those shackles are cast away.
I'd gladly witness your culling by a militarily superior race in its quest for Lebensraum, so long as it's explicitly justified with this inane correlational logic.
Already happened. And my nazi grandfathers had to witness the full extent of their moral, racial, military and epistemologic inferiority. They fought till destruction because they really believed in the correlation, far more than I do. In a way it vindicated the theory while it destroyed them and their particular beliefs.
When you’re living in your bombed-out capital, your conscience sullied, your army destroyed, your reputation infamous, the universe is trying to tell you something. You can immediately exclude the hypothesis of having done anything right, and of your own superiority.
I don't think realpolitik will triumph if the west falls - people have always resisted the athenians, even when it was hopeless - witness the realists anger at Ukraine. If china dominates, they'll just make their own rules russia and the others will have to obey, and the russians will still be grumbling about 'universalism' .
Eh, I think the use of the word "race" in that quote misleads a bit. All Churchill is really getting across is the old reply to Melos: the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.
Not a very Christian perspective of Churchill, and not one I agree with, but he's not just saying that there's a hierarchy of races, and if you're lower you have no moral claim against your betters.
Eh, I think the use of the word "race" in that quote misleads a bit. All Churchill is really getting across is the old reply to Melos: the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.
Yes. That reply is fundamentally repugnant. Bullets, bombs and other horrors exist to punish such foolishness.
A great and glorious thing it is
To learn, for seven years or so,
The Lord knows what of that and this,
Ere reckoned fit to face the foe —
The flying bullet down the Pass,
That whistles clear: "All flesh is grass."
Three hundred pounds per annum spent
On making brain and body meeter
For all the murderous intent
Comprised in "villanous saltpetre!"
And after — ask the Yusufzaies
What comes of all our 'ologies.
A scrimmage in a Border Station —
A canter down some dark defile —
Two thousand pounds of education
Drops to a ten-rupee jezail —
The Crammer's boast, the Squadron's pride,
Shot like a rabbit in a ride!
No proposition Euclid wrote,
No formulae the text-books know,
Will turn the bullet from your coat,
Or ward the tulwar's downward blow
Strike hard who cares — shoot straight who can —
The odds are on the cheaper man.
One sword-knot stolen from the camp
Will pay for all the school expenses
Of any Kurrum Valley scamp
Who knows no word of moods and tenses,
But, being blessed with perfect sight,
Picks off our messmates left and right.
With home-bred hordes the hillsides teem,
The troop-ships bring us one by one,
At vast expense of time and steam,
To slay Afridis where they run.
The "captives of our bow and spear"
Are cheap — alas! as we are dear.
Yes, he's not a scrub loser to appeal to some predefined theoretically just table of ranks. He is saying instead that this hierarchy is established in a contest of strength; that might makes right through its very utilization. It's an explicitly Hitlerist argument, ironically enough – except it doesn't presuppose proven superiority of Aryans. But this does explain, to some extent, why Hitler believed in such tender kinship with Anglo-Saxons.
(fuckduck9000 would say that this he is exactly correct, as demonstrated by German loss and British victory).
Funny coming from someone like you rather willing to whine about racism, antisemitism while simultaneously pushing your own genocidal and racist supremacist agendas.
Fundamentally your words are hollow and it is BS BS, We Jews are superior (including those of lower IQ and can do as we want.
Like this monstrous inferior savage:
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant: "I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we act accordingly."
It is true that humans are not equal. And trying to enforce that all groups do equally well is folly. However, there is another way that not all groups are equal. And that is morality.
There is a reason why adults who are smarter are not allowed by any sane society to pray on children who are weaker and lower intelligence.
Some people are cruel, predatory, hypocritical, ingrates, and have all the traits of murderous narcisistic sociopaths. I am not talking hre about da Jews although I think you personally have argued one too many times about carpet bombing middle east and similiar rhetoric although never once been banned for it. Recently you have been promoting the final solution to palestinian problem and genocidal mass murder.
The short of it is that you are willing to destroy civilizations and support attrocities because you are a hateful racist fanatic who lacks decency.
AND when others have even a sane menality critical of your people engaging in this dark racist supremacist path that is pervasive, you whine about racism.
Obviously you wouldn't acceept others treating you by the same coin. Indeed, your whine about nazism is utterly hypocritical considering your only difference is your group you are a racist supremacist for.
I am glad in this instance you show your power level as you have done in others. But trully you are allowed to be this way because of others who are like you.
Anyhow, as you very well know (you are someone who whines about others being racist over petty nonsense when you are this kind of person) the concept but pretend not to, because you are bloodthirsty racist supremacist fanatic, obviously there is a value in certain forms of equality even if the concept of equality going far is utterly idiotic.
And that has to do with rights and equality under the law. Just like we shouldn't let ten dumber people gang up on one smarter person, we should also not allow the later defraud the first. but actually you are no IQ supremacist, having opposed HBDers and having supported AA, but suddenly you become the most hardcore of HBD racist supremacist when it comes to da Jews.
A sane society would not tolerate hateful fanatics like you to promote your propaganda and advocate for warcrimes. Least of all your rhetoric in favor of war crimes and mass murder in the middle east is not unrelated to the millions who died there. And of course your rhetoric in favor of cultural genocide in west, and the vile agendas related to that.
Of course you are contemptible from both a universalistic perspective as a malevolent dishonest predatory and parasitical racist supremacist and a local one. Whether the local funnilly enough applies to pretty much most non jewish groups. And likely those you want to use as goldems against your outgroup.
I never opposed it (and have pretty much the standard take here, i.e. that the evidence is compelling). As for AA, I think what I said is that HBD and affirmative action aren’t actually mutually exclusive under a tribal spoils system, but again, I don’t think that has much to do with the point he’s trying to make.
In my more optimistic moments I believe that all the "extermination by Artificial SuperIntelligence" fears will prove to be unfounded, because the sorts of strategies we use to train LLMs will also be used to train future superintelligence to share human values.
In my more pessimistic moments I believe that all the "extermination by Artificial SuperIntelligence" fears will prove to be inevitable, because the sorts of strategies we use to train LLMs will also be used to train future superintelligence to share human values.
Not all people, not all civilizations, not all tribes, are equal. This is a core conservative conceit...
No, it certainly is not, in the sense of moral worth that you are explicitly appealing to.
it’s also inherent to ideas like HBD that you yourself agree with.
I thought HBD was just about population averages in performance, not moral worth? Have I not been told that over and over again for years now? ...In any case, I do thank you for the citation.
I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place.
We learn nothing. The foolishness of Enlightenment Progressivism is without bound. You and everyone else making similar arguments here know for a fact that you have no rigorous, objective, scientific materialist standard for "better" or "higher-grade" or "worldly-wise" other than raw strength. Your appeal is pure Might Makes Right, and you make it because you have lost the ability to even imagine that the roles could be reversed.
It is possible that some violence is more moral than others, because it is directed by ‘higher grade’ civilizations against lower grade ones.
No, that is not possible, nor has it ever been possible. When you design a better microprocessor, that does not give you or your culture additional moral value. Technological advancement does not, cannot, and never will imply moral value. It doesn't matter if I'm knapping flints and you're building star destroyers: our moral responsibilities to each other remain entirely unaltered. To think otherwise is to fatally misunderstand both morality and technology on an extremely basic level.
Describe for me the moral gradations between murder with a stone versus a flint knife, a bronze sword, an arrow, a bullet, or a laser-guided fragmentation submunition. Show me the moral difference between strangling a person with my bare hands and disassembling them with sci-fi nanotechnology. Show me the objective moral difference between oral storytelling around a campfire and Avengers: Endgame, or between a horse and an airplane. What is the moral value of refined aluminum, and what is the exchange rate in charred corpses of your friends and family? What is the atomic mass of love or mercy, or the molecular weight of justice?
Of course, you and most other rational materialists don't actually believe in moral value or morality in any meaningful sense, as these threads have amply demonstrated. They are just words to you, made-up labels to be applied where convinient, because ultimately there is no meaning or value to anything at all, no final accounting, no judge and therefore no justice, beyond that enforced by your own strong arm. And of course, when the nuke goes off in Tel Aviv some day, or the tech shifts the wrong way and its Israelis getting slaughtered down to the old men and the infants, that will not be "a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place", will it? Because chip fabs and language models, right?
And of course, when the nuke goes off in Tel Aviv some day, or the tech shifts the wrong way and its Israelis getting slaughtered down to the old men and the infants, that will not be "a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place", will it? Because chip fabs and language models, right?
There's a reason I'm not an Israeli, namely that I think the chances of Israel losing (everything) are much higher than most people, and especially most Jews, recognize. My existence in the diaspora is comfortable enough, and as such (a sign of loyalty, perhaps) I also don't favor additional (or any) American/Western aid for Israel. Nevertheless, both as a Jew and a supporter of civilization in the endless struggle against savagery, barbarism, and low IQ nonsense, I won't shed any tears if the Israelis decide (and successfully ensure) that enough is enough. The Holocaust was a tragedy of history and, though I don't particularly consider German civilization superior to Jewish civilization, we got fucked and many of us paid the price. That is life, and though I have thoughts on the general principles of the matter, I personally harbor no illusions that I am morally superior to a German or Palestinian, nor do I care to be.
I think Jews are mostly quite aware of, and discuss incessantly, Israel lacking strategic depth and being in a precarious situation and having no choice but to preemptively strike etc etc; if anything, they overestimate the threat from its utterly inept or degraded, and frankly well-taught in previous wars, neighbors.
What they do get wrong is the relative danger of being in the Diaspora, because they take deluded Whites lending vocal support to Hamas and other savages too seriously, and extrapolate this incoherent virtue-signaling gibberish to willingness for participating in or enabling Antisemitic violence locally. I appreciate that progressive Jews at, say, Harvard may experience very… interesting emotions right now; but realistically, they're unlikely to ever get hit with more than a variant of anti-white anti-colonial invective from their peers. Hence «there is only one country where it's safe to live while being a Jew» refrain. (Though judging by Twitter and in light of recent events, India might quality).
Then again, I may be overestimating human rationality and pacification again.
I thought HBD was just about population averages in performance, not moral worth? Have I not been told that over and over again for years now? ...In any case, I do thank you for the citation.
HBD is a fact, what policy implications you draw from it are a function of the rest of your values.
Me? I think we should gene therapy the living shit out of the human population until everyone is at least a 180 IQ Ubermensch, potentially to the limits of human biology and other relevant tradeoffs. Skin color should no more determine your more relevant qualities than the shade of lipstick you choose to wear.
Should. Not does, at present. We look for trillion dollar bills on the pavement, not realizing that it is the pavement. Or at least I hope a bill for a sum so large should reflect it.
I also happen to be less than sympathetic to the accusations of racism of the gaps that provoked the Great Awokening, since any discrepancies are best explained by HBD instead.
HBD is a fact, what policy implications you draw from it are a function of the rest of your values.
And heretofore, HBD proponents have vociferously denied that they consider those of lower genetic IQ to be morally inferior. And yet, here we are.
Me? I think we should gene therapy the living shit out of the human population until everyone is at least a 180 IQ Ubermensch, potentially to the limits of human biology and other relevant tradeoffs.
You also think that less-sophisticated people should be massacred by "more sophisticated" people, if they turn out to be troublesome. The fact that genetic engineering is considerably more hypothetical than massacre engineering raises immediate concerns.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
FCfromSSC 1yr ago
HBD proponents are a heterogeneous group. And if we're talking about 2rafa who seems to have brought it up in this subthread, I'm fairly sure she considers a whole lot of people (including most of us) to be her inferiors in all ways.
Whether there's an "evil gene" (or genes) is in an interesting question, but my guess is that if there is, it's at fixation in the human population. And is a separate thing from IQ. Being stupid doesn't make you evil, though it may make you become more easily convinced that evil things which are not in your self interest actually are.
And heretofore, HBD proponents have vociferously denied that they consider those of lower genetic IQ to be morally inferior. And yet, here we are.
Well, I can't speak for all of them. I just happen to prefer assigning some moral worth on the basis of IQ, and today, race serves as a strong proxy. They could be pink and blue with elephant ears for all I really care. Or a mind upload.
You also think that less-sophisticated people should be massacred by "more sophisticated" people
"Should" seems a bit strong if I stop to assess everything I've uttered on the matter today. If there was a peaceful solution, I'd take it, but if there isn't, then I won't complain at all if the Israelis stamp out their opposition instead of letting it fester. Largely because I think the total amount of violence necessary over a longer period will be lower if it's frontloaded.
The fact that genetic engineering is considerably more hypothetical than massacre engineering raises immediate concerns.
Skin color should no more determine your more relevant qualities than the shade of lipstick you choose to wear.
Yeah, that's never going to happen. We don't have full control of our genes and I'm going to bet even slight tweaks to skin color will have a measurable effect on intelligence. (In either way. Who knows, maybe 300% melanin will actually make us hyper intelligent or whatever).
Whatever genes you alter to change faces, hair, body size. Literally any structural or outward appearance of a human will also alter their brains. It's all interconnected.
I find this a very dubious assertion, within my limit of understanding of genetics. Which I would hope is better than average, even if I don't claim domain expertise like say, our Chris Pratt Dino Wrangler friend can say.
Yes, DNA is unadulterated spaghetti code, but it's not so intractable that something like melanin production can't be targeted without, a priori, not expecting it to blow up the kidneys of something. If I was designing something, I would look for a way to down regulate melanocyte stimulating hormone, to the degree feasible without say, causing visual problems as seen in albinos.
While skin tone isn't a Mendelian trait, I see no reason to think it can't be managed.
As for other phenotypical traits, it depends, but once again I have reason for optimism, or at least faith in plastic surgery. It doesn't have to be a germline modification, you can probably pull it off in-utero or later, the bones have to grow, unless you have a really bad case of baby face.
And since my end goal is liberation from biology in the form of an existence as a mind upload, then I'd say I don't particularly care either way.
I thought HBD was just about population averages in performance, not moral worth?
That's obviously true. But I don't think 2rafa believes a pious 90 IQ Mizrahim settler is morally less worthy than a 150 IQ Persian academic (despite likely preferring the company of the latter); and the 160 IQ Netanyahu certainly would rather have the latter assassinated to ensure the safety of the former.
It's all friend vs enemy; or worse yet, hot take vs hot take. Descriptive frameworks are used to justify normative beliefs that themselves are little more than habitual verbal behavior. It gets pretty tiresome.
«Он знает, что ничто не застанет его врасплох и ничто не заставит сделать какое-нибудь отступление от той сети пустых и насквозь прогнивших афоризмов, в которую он закутался с головы до ног. Для него не существует ни горя, ни радости, ни ненависти, ни любви. Весь мир, в его глазах, есть гроб, могущий служить лишь поводом для бесконечного пустословия.»
But I don't think 2rafa believes a pious 90 IQ Mizrahim settler is morally less worthy than a 150 IQ Persian academic (despite likely preferring the company of the latter);
Are many settlers Mizrachim? In any case I find the settlements project inanely justified by a religious ideology I don’t believe in and unnecessarily provocative at best. The ‘67 borders are amenable to me, although I’d have the Saudis run the Palestinian state. As for who should be in power, well you know my opinion of democracy.
Many of my friends were (gentile) Persians growing up, and many of them still are. It is entirely feasible that a smart Persian academic, even one committed to Israel’s destruction, might have higher moral worth than a 90 IQ Religious Zionist. Iranian hostility to Israel is the result of a PR exercise by the mullahs, it can evaporate within months of regime change. Palestinian hostility, due to the fundamental nature of dispossession, is much more intractable.
‘My people’ are smart, secular, Ashkenazim, although we have thrown our lot in with some I find much more unsavory. Nevertheless, when it comes to broad principles, Iran isn’t discriminating between the settlement fanatic (few or none of whom seem to have been killed on Saturday) and a version of me in Israel, so there is little choice in whom to support for now.
And you cannot disconnect IQ from moral worth entirely. It is immoral when something beautiful is destroyed by something uglier and more vulgar. This is in part why we find rape so abhorrent, it is why the Mongol horde razing civilization to the ground is such a deeply ingrained (often subconscious) cultural motif. So yes, Bronze Age savagery by a people who have not contributed to the wider human race in a millennium and who would rather live in poverty and squalor than kneel is morally less noble than, say, the settlement of the Americas by Europeans, regardless of the individual moral worth of members of that culture.
The problem is that in this case, slave morality has been adopted and is being promoted by the dominant and technologically superior civilization. Wouldn’t that make it the pinnacle of human progress? Does your parochial tribe have any right not to embrace diversity and tolerance; does it even have the power for much longer? Especially since it was so intimately involved in the birth of these values (at the very least you acted as midwives).
It’s no coincidence that taking Churchill’s stance here on anything other than Palestine is unthinkable nowadays, nor is it really a good sign of things to come. Given enough time, generational loss of hypocrisy may well prevail over Holocaust guilt-mongering.
I think slave morality is a feature of modern Western hegemony. All it took was 9/11 (casualty rate of 1/10th of the Israeli death rate so far per capita) for American bloodlust to explode to current-Israeli proportions. Ann Coulter infamously spoke for many Americans when she said after 9/11 that
"We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war".
Diversity and tolerance are luxury patrician ideologies, Americans will be no different if or when the time comes.
Ann Coulter infamously spoke for many Americans when she said after 9/11
Yet the meme from that era that survives to this day is the ‘religion of peace’ one. It seems it would be better to describe this as an emergency belief, a temporary unprincipled exception to the general notion of virtuous victimhood that reasserts itself as soon as passions die down.
Note also the WWII analogy: the myth she invokes is absolutely central to the current incarnation of slave morality. Hitler was an avatar of absolute evil precisely because of his blatant disregard of human rights and universalism. He oppressed the weak and powerless more than anyone ever had. This was so unspeakably, cosmologically evil that it easily excuses the unprecedented suffering inflicted upon the German population, the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of young Americans, becoming an accomplice in Stalin’s crimes etc. When Americans start comparing themselves to Hadrian instead, I’ll believe they’re getting uncucked.
Oh, punching down is absolutely more moral than punching up in the modern western world. The "Up" basically pays for the continued existence of the "Down" these days, and thus punching up is nothing more than biting the hand that feeds you, the crime that Dante punished down at the very center of the lowest circle of hell, right next to where Satan was imprisoned.
Is there any evidence Palestinians lack other options if they got rid of Hamas? And Israel would be forced to allow a S Africa type situation in a short time?
How would Zionists behave if they were in the Palestinian position?
I think that a good example could be found around the founding of Israel. Were there atrocities when Israel was the weaker side on the brink of extinction - rapes used as a weapon of war. People gathered in building set on fire. Summary executions of Palestinian non combatants. These are not rhetorical questions - the Wikipedia articles are grossly inadequate.
Are they? The lists of killings and massacres in Mandatory Palestine and during the 1948 war and in Israel seem pretty thorough. Everybody was massacring the hell out of everybody else, including Irgun bombings of civilians, summary execution of Arab civilians for violating curfews they hadn't been notified of, and one massacre by IDF forces with 3 or 4 reported rapes. Fog of war, biased reporting, etc., but AFAIK nobody objective thinks there's a side without blood on their hands there. At most they try to excuse or disavow some or all of it. (Or both? I don't recall any Law of Merited Impossibility apologetics here but maybe that's just my inattention or bad memory.)
I'm not actually aware of a "People gathered in building set on fire" massacre, though. You're not thinking about the Cinema Rex fire at the start of the Iranian Revolution?
But I think this ignores the fact that Israel has the luxury of successfully hitting military targets. Israel can kill just as many civilians as Hamas by targeting military sites, while also killing relevant military leaders and defending against unwanted criticism.
It's not luxury, it's capability. Luxury implies that it shouldn't be held against Hamas.
However, I’m not convinced that there is a clear moral difference between Hamas actions and, say, the firebombing of Tokyo, where as many as 100k were killed, the vast majority being civilians.
The firebombings could be justified if they took out some doomsday weapon that was guaranteed to win Japan the war and there was no other way to stop them. I don't believe the firebombings would qualify, there wasn't much to threaten the US by that point.
Israel can kill just as many civilians as Hamas by targeting military sites, while also killing relevant military leaders and defending against unwanted criticism.
There is little evidence Israel wants this. Hamas chooses to put its rocket launchers on top of hospitals because making Israel look like a big meanie is their only tactic with any hope of success.
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Notes -
For those who haven't seen it - drone footage of the aftermath of the music festival attack (no gore): https://twitter.com/samueloakford/status/1711174266706682029
I have to admit I've been moving from a position of sympathy for Gaza towards more sympathy for Israel in the last years, and this attack perfectly exemplifies the reasons why.
Israel aims to destroy military targets, and at most you can complain about a lack of concern for civilians. Though in general they at least attempt to minimize civilian casualties. Hamas actively targets civilians, gleefully massacres them en masse, and then parades their naked bodies through the streets where common people spit on their corpses, so it isn't even just Hamas specifically. And they happily put all of it online, where other arabs cheer them on. WTF would you even attack a music festival?
On top, even when an Israeli attack kills a large number of civilians, you'll often find out that it's because Hamas deliberately put a military base inside a civilian building, actively aiming for this outcome.
Sure the Israelis also have plenty of questionable tactics such as the creeping settlements in the west bank, but everything they do just seems so much ... saner in comparison. It's the difference between a cutthroat CEO who'll backstab you in a corporate deal when it is beneficial for him to do so, and the murderhobo who'll physically backstab you because you were the nearest person and fuck jews, that's why.
How is demolishing mosques, spitting on Christians, urinating on dead Palestinians and bombing entire apartment buildings less gruesome? Israel is far more violent and kills far more Palestinians while there war has a much bigger impact on Palestinian expansion.
Body gore prominence seems like an obvious one. Self-congratulatory spectacle presentation of the corpses is another. Israelis typically aren't doing their misdeed to chants of how great their god is over the bodies of the victims, and that's without their established roof-knock technique.
I would be curious which mosque demolishment or Christian spitting or urination incident you felt was more gruesome than, say, the Palestinians' self-advertised raid shelter results. One category is boorish, and the other might as well have come out of Daesh propaganda.
It's rather unfortunate that Jihadis have the habit of yelling 'Allahu Akbar' every time they're on video. I know intellectually that they're saying the equivalent of 'praise the Lord', but now the phrase is just burned into my brain as the thing that young Arab men say when they're desecrating a corpse.
I don't think that's "unfortunate" so much as a feature of Islam's historic role and self-image as a totalizing religion of conquest. Sure, there are plenty of examples of Muslim subcultures that have evolved past that conception, but it's not like it's weird for a conquering Islamic force to praise their God while they put their enemies to the sword. While this might be in bad taste now, it's not new:
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There are a lot of attractive young women at music festivals and it's a soft target. This seems like the most straightforward answer and I haven't heard any alternative explanations.
Some of this disparity will be pretty similar to the disparity between a CEO destroying someone and a murderhobo destroying someone - the rich guy has a lot more tools at his disposal, many more options, and the competence to do it while maintaining the position that he's acting legally and reasonably and that you're the lunatic for losing your temper. Don't get me wrong, I remain firmly on the Israeli side of things, but the asymmetry of position is pretty clear.
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They probably didn't know it was one. It was just there and easy to hit as a soft target.
The Hamas objective appears to have been to kill as many civilians as possible, to maximize the initial terror and perception of Israeli impotence. This, in turn, is likely for the strategic purpose of derailing Saudi-Israeli normalization, which has been in the works for some time. It may have also had a tertiary goal of trying to draw out an assessed increase of Palestinian support in various (particularly European) countries to demonstrate/lead to Israeli diplomatic isolation in the response.
For this purpose, a music festival meets the nominal purpose of the objective. It will probably turn out that the music festival was the single biggest source of deaths during the night, as you have a combination of large numbers of people, density, poorly defended, and isolated from response or natural strongpoints to rally a defense.
However, I doubt it was chosen per see. The time-day timing of the attack was almost certainly done for historical, not contemporary, purposes, while the rave was for a weekend because they were expecting to need time to sober up / get over the drug use before the weekend.
Further, the rave almost certainly wouldn't have been targetted deliberately had the multinational nature been known. The night without the raid was a disaster for Israel, but the prominent multinational victims- most notably the German girl- killed and worse internationalized the impact to a much broader audience in a way not-good for the likely intended 'we think this is bad, but you shouldn't retaliate too much' goal Hamas was likely going for.
I have been to similar raves in that area. It is a popular place for such events because lots of open space and the desert at night is beautiful. It is not like this was the event of the year in Israel or something. (I feel like the natural demographics of the Motte might not be super interested in such things but there are a lot of music festivals everywhere all the time if you are into that sort of thing and Israel has a massive techno scene)
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It really is odd. I’m not juvenile enough to be shocked that shit happens during war and young military age men do shitty things. The difference is most participants know what they are doing isn’t permissible so they don’t broadcast it to the world. Take for instance abu ghraib. While the soldiers had bad opsec, they weren’t posting the pictures on fucking MySpace.
You're operating from a mistaken assumption, that what they are doing isn't permissible. Hamas could surround fighters with a wall of infants and machine-gun Israelis from that position, and when one Israeli sniper shot a fighter and the bullet injured an infant, the headline in the New York Times would be "Israeli Commandos Shoot Innocent Palestinian Infant". Israel is held to a set of standards that sort of rhymes with international conventions but is in fact much stricter, while Palestinians are held to none at all.
I mean, sorta. The people who support Hamas hold them to no standard, because if they had standards, they wouldn't support Hamas.
The brutality and cynical tactics that Hamas uses do lead to them having lower support than they would if they were less sociopathic though. There's a lot of people who would totally be on board with a "Free Palestine" agenda if it didn't mean parading the mangled corpses of naked girls through the street.
If Hamas didn't do what they did, they'd either be killed and replaced by someone who would (if they stopped killing Israelis) or killed by the Israelis (if they stopped using protected buildings and people as shields).
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What makes you think this?
Hamas does this because they live in tribal societies where parading the mangled corpses of your enemy's girls through the street is worthy of high praise. It doesn't lead to them having lower support; it leads to them having higher support.
Don't typical-mind. You would be horrified by such things. The people who Hamas needs to convince are overjoyed by it.
Well, at least it convinced EU to pause providing funding to Palestine (not entirely sure how well it was done but likely it effectively funded Hamas).
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When I'm saying they would have higher support, I mean among westerners looking on from the outside. I'm not talking about internal Gazan politics, I'm talking about The Discourse and the international response. I think there's e.g. a lot of Germans who are a lot more sympathetic to "we want our land back" than to gunning down bus stops.
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That's the weird thing though: their cynical tactics used to be launching rockets from hospital rooftops and parading the inevitable Palestinian corpses, or having Palestinian kids shot for throwing stones, etc etc. The grift has always been provoking Israel to violence and posing as an underdog.
But this, parading enemy civilian corpses around, is a diametrically opposite thing. It's something you do when you have several thousands of tanks ready to roll over the enemy capital, you expect to win, and you want to demoralize the enemy to win easier.
So I don't know, either Hamas expects Iran to nuke Israel, or the old guard that understood the nature of the grift all retired or something and the new leadership got terminally high on their own supply.
Yeah they did make a statement calling on the Arab countries to join the fight and so forth. So maybe the plan was something like 1.Pierce the illusion of Israeli invulnerability 2. Israel's neighbours see the weakness and pounce 3. Palestine is free from the river to the sea.
Or maybe it was just about stirring up enough heat that the Israel-Saudi normalisation doesn't happen. I dunno.
I don't see how this was supposed to work. A small terrorist act that causes Israel to respond disproportionally, all right. 400 paratroopers killing Israeli civilians? Again, this is a thing that you do when you have 5000 tanks ready to roll towards Tel Aviv and you want to show your potential Saudi allies that you mean business. They don't have a single tank. Saudis will be like, fuck those idiots.
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Also, lets take Russia: they are at least claiming to be not targeting civilians (though in traditional Russian style they blatantly lie that no civilians whatsoever were harmed when it is clearly false).
And they parade tanks and other materiel captured from enemy, not dead civilians.
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The thing that has blackpilled me about the conflict more than anything is Corey Gil-Shuster's youtube channel. He goes and asks random Israelis and Palestinians on the streets various questions, which I find really illuminating because it gives a sense of the distribution of views and how well thought out they are, etc. And after you watch a few of those you can't avoid the stark reality that there is a large critical mass of Palestinians who absolutely adamantly refuse to consider any outcome short of the total destruction of Israel.
And given that is the case, and that Israel will absolutely not accept its own erasure, there is just no possible compromise or deal to be had. All you can do is keep fighting for another hundred years and hope some future generation is smarter, I guess.
Or the unthinkable option, of course. Always lurking in the background.
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Yeah, I can't say Corey Gil-Shuster's videos showed me anything I didn't already know, but repeatedly he (or his viewers) have tried to ask Palestinians some form of "What would peace look like, since the Israelis aren't going to all pack up and leave?" and the answers are almost always, with varying degrees of circumlocution, "Kill them all." Sure, they'll say in the abstract they "want peace" or they don't personally want to kill anyone, but dig hard enough and they believe "peace" will not be possible until all the Israelis are, literally, gone, and if that means (someone else, of course) kills them all, well, ma sha'allah.
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The usual suspects online say that since most Israelis have served in the army, they are all technically combatants and can be shot at. Of course, this is a rhetorical trap, since by saying that this doesn't mean you have to parade their naked bodies through the streets where common people spit on their corpses you implicitly agree that it's fine to shoot at them without desecrating their corpses.
Which is nonsense on toast. That's the sort of thing I mean by saying the Israelis are held to a standard which sort of rhymes with international conventions.
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That is such an insane understanding of international war conventions that I'm hard-pressed to believe anyone is making that argument in good faith. By that logic, Swedish citizens are fair game for the Taliban.
It's the sort of stuff one says when they are losing a debate and has to quickly to think of something, anything to save face.
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Also, would not apply to many of people from the festival.
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Is there a video or picture of this? This claim is repeated everywhere I look, but if you mean the short video of the corpse of that German-Israeli woman, she's not naked.
When I was browsing 4chan I've seen images of Hamas soldiers showing off a dead girl with only underpants on. No links though.
If you want to quibble that it's technically not fully nude be my guest, but that's about as convincing to me as "well it wasn't rape bc she was already dead".
I saw one of a live woman with blood and shit on the rear of her trousers being paraded before she was loaded into a truck. I leave it to the viewer to decide if she's been gangraped or developed an untimely attack of anal fissuring.
Clearly, it was a burrito. It's the sacrifice you have to make to eat something so delicious.
Yes, I saw that one, too. Not very nice either.
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It's not 'technically not fully nude', just normal not nude, complete with something on her back that looks like a strap of a top. From what I've seen it's not really clear she was stripped of anything at all.
I don't know what you think I'm trying to convince you of, seeing falsehoods repeated irks me, that's my angle here.
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In online media, they keep referring to her only as "German", which I think isn't entirely a coincidence. One article I've found about this but am too lazy to dig up right now did mention after multiple paragraphs that not only is she in fact a dual German-Israeli citizen but had in fact lived in Israel for 6 years. Some X post also claimed she's actually an IDF reservist, but I'm not sure.
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Israel announces ‘total’ blockade on Gaza
This seems like there's going to be mountains of deaths, what will the actual effect be?
It won't last. Israel does not want mountains of people dying of thirst on newspaper front pages, it makes them look callous. They will turn the water back on in a few days and the food maybe a few weeks after that, possibly in exchange for hostages. Any gap will be bridged by humanitarian aid coming in through Egypt.
Genius move to cut them off though. Few people will have appreciated that Gaza received water etc from Israel in the first place. Really makes it look like a 'biting the hand that feeds you' type of situation.
I'm pretty sure it will just be interpreted as "here's yet more proof that Israel is a colonialist/apartheid state, they don't even allow the Palestinians to control their own basic human needs like food and water!"
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If the gap is bridged through Egypt, why not go on indefinitely though? Given that one reason how the attack went so well is probably the intel from the increased movement & employment that Israel had allowed, it does seem reasonable for Israel to just say cut -all- the movement between Gaza & Israel, but let arab countries support Gaza through Egypt if they so wish.
One thing they could do is bisect Gaza in the rural zone so that the region bordering the densely populated parts of Israel is cut off from the Egyptian supply.
Whether the southern part is supplied or not doesn't matter that much.
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It definitely won't last, but I do wonder what would happen if it did and they went full siege mode. At what point do they start offering up the heads of the Hamas leaders? Do they ever?
Probably eventually, but the optics and footage online would make it impossible. Even total carpet bombing would be preferable from a PR perspective.
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The mere fact that there is a blockade doesn't tell anyone that Israel had been giving Gaza anything.
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Not unless Egypt also blocks the entry of food, which seems unlikely.
IIRC Egypt doesn't allow goods through their entry point into Gaza, only people. All goods must go through Israel's entry points.
Egypt has gone back and forth on that in the past. It is neither in Egypt's interests nor in Israel's interests to have people starving to death in the Gaza Strip.
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I expect it is mostly a "softening up tactic" before a major ground incursion. If Israel actually kept a full blockade for weeks if not months - and we're assuming effectively enforced (a big if) - then it would be committing a textbook definition of a warcrime. That would essentially guarantee it would lose in the court of public opinion. Like it or not, winning the propaganda war is just as important as the real war. Public sympathy would dry up real quick if tens of thousands were to be dying on live TV. Disproportionately matters.
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Probably mountains of deaths, but they won’t be clearly distinguishable from the civilian casualties of the ground invasion.
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What are the chances that this leads to Israel attacking Iran? Iran appears to have been a supporter of Hamas. Netanyahu has seemingly been eager for a reason to dismantle Iran's nuclear weapons program. From Netanyahu's perspective, eliminating the program would make recent events a net gain for Israel. However, how would the global community respond to an Israeli assault on Iran? While many countries in the region would likely be pleased, they would need to feign outrage. Russia, having recently gotten weapons from Iran, would denounce the attack. But, given its diminished power, what action could Russia realistically take? Would Biden risk sanctioning Israel for such an action, particularly when his Republican adversaries would likely applaud it?
I fail to see a single reason to assume Biden would sanction Israel for such an attack in any situation, Republican applause or not.
Biden and Obama have tried to make peace between Iran and the US, which is why the US recently unfroze $6 billion in Iranian funds. It is in the US interest to prevent a large war in the Middle East. It is in Biden's interest to prevent a significant increase in the price of gas that would likely come about because of such a war.
Part of me wonders if Biden is hopeful for a war. Predictions were already on gas prices going higher and Biden emptied the strategic reserve to turn the red wave into a ripple at best.
If there is a war, he can say “not my fault shit happens in the world”
But Trump will blame the war on Biden saying that Biden unfreezing Iran's assets enabled Iran and sent a signal to Iran that we would be OK with them attacking Israel. Trump would point out that during his presidency Iran didn't cause trouble because Trump did things like assassinate Iranian general Soleimani. Trump would claim that Russian invading Ukraine during Biden's but not his presidency is another example of how US perceived weakness causes war.
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Israel is already attacking Iran through cyber warfare, sponsoring various extremist groups and assassinations. As for war there really isn't a lot they can do as the countries aren't near each other.
Israel could launch repeated airstrikes on Iran.
They don't share any airspace and are far from Iran. They would have to fly through several countries while carrying heavy external fuel tanks that make their jets really easy to spot on radar. This is against Iran that massproduces missiles that can reach Israel.
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What is an attack on Iran supposed to do, besides a generally cathartic moment?
No, I doubt this will lead to anything overt, at least not until the Gaza Strip siege concludes. I'd expect Israel to take a long-form asymmetric conflict approach for revenge. Fewer F-16s on long-strike missions, and more drone assassinations on IRGC and others.
The attacks on Iran will, ideally from Israel's viewpoint, stop Iran from getting an atomic bomb and damage Iran's economy thereby reducing Iran's ability to fund the enemies of Israel.
I am familiar with some science fiction weapons that could meaningfully achieve that, but nothing in Israel's inventory that would be reasonably be used as that effect.
Well they do have nuclear weapons if we are talking about sci-fi scenarios
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Slim to none.
“Has been a supporter of hamas” is a pretty low bar. Egypt and and Syria used to do it openly. Qatar and Turkey still do. Direct retaliation must require more than that.
I think you are looking at the issue from the viewpoint of a moral philosopher. From Israel's viewpoint what matters is will the attack mean if it attacks Iran, the US won't punish it?
No, I’m not thinking about morality. I’m saying the strategic calculus is unfavorable even if the US doesn’t express disapproval. A shooting war with Iran would result in more Israeli casualties than any terrorist attack, and I don’t get the impression that it would meaningfully cripple their ability to fund Hamas. Far more efficient to spend that money and manpower retaliating against the people who were directly responsible.
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There is good reason to believe that even the American high command doesn't think it can actually win a war of invasion against Iran in any realistic scenario.
Agreed. But lots of damage could be inflicted by air attacked. Alan Dershowitz wants Israel to destroy Iran's nuclear ambitions. https://twitter.com/HappyCamper2626/status/1710815116479058301
A rather unsurprising turn of events
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The Israelis are a paper tiger without daddy America. As this conflict showed (8 billion dollars needed from Uncle Sam within the first day of rocket attacks). If the Israelis had the capability to attack Iran, then they'd have done it years ago. They don't and ultimately depend on the US to do it. Successive American administrations have turned down every request from Jerusalem.
Iran today is much more capable than it was 10 years ago. If Iran is attacked, they would almost certainly conduct a a massive attack on Saudi Arabia and other US-aligned countries. That would send the world economy into a gigantic depression if oil output suddenly crashed by 10-15 mb/d. Many Western strategic oil stocks are already depleted after the UA war so there wouldn't be much buffer space to absorb the shock.
TL;DR near zero.
Would Israel attack Iran if it predicted that Biden would privately oppose but publicly support the attack? From Israel's viewpoint, the attack leading to Iran attacking Saudi Arabia would be a good thing because this would bring US air power into the war.
Yes but it would also tank the world economy. And ultimately the US cares far more about that. Already today there are news of a major meeting between the Big Three of Europe (UK/FR/DE) and the US, ostensibly to prevent a wider conflagration in the region. Ultimately, Israel is a client state of the US and has to behave as such. It's on a short leash.
Serbia was a client of Russia at the time Serbia pushed Russia to start WW I.
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The American stockpile is depleted because the Biden administration didn’t want to lose an election.
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Can you elaborate on that?
Not him but one thing that comes to my mind is several successful drone attacks that Houthis have launched against Saudi targets in the last few years, including ones that hit oil production facilities. Iran is the Houthis' main backer and most likely source of the drones. Iran has also been providing large numbers of drones to Russia. All these drones give Iran a greater ability to precisely hit targets than they had 10 years ago.
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I don't think Israel has any meaningful capability to attack Iran. I wouldn't go so far as to call them a paper tiger, but their ability to project and sustain forces significantly beyond their borders is slim. Iran is pretty far away with numerous countries hostile to Israel in between them. Even a single airstrike seems unlikely to succeed - the combat range of the strike aircraft in their inventory barely reaches the closest border of Iran over the shortest possible route, which overflies a lot of hostile territory. Hitting any actual targets inside Iran would probably require aerial refueling in hostile airspace. I expect they want to keep what forces they have close to home to protect the country from direct threats rather than risk them on super-long-range missions.
They would need to use medium range ballistic missiles or cruise missiles to attack Iran, which they probably don't have, aside from nuclear-tipped ones.
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I am surprised that no one yet opened the most inflammatory aspect of the latest events in Israel. So I am going to do it.
Who if not me, when if not now?
So why it happened? It happened as it happened because, in words of our friends in US Dept of Justice: Israel Has a Successful Gun Control Policy.
Yes, it is from 1992, but things changed little since then. Israel has strict gun laws and they work as intended. Israel has 6,7 guns per 100 inhabitants, very good 108th place in the world. Just 2.1 more than David Hogg heaven land England and Wales, considered to be gun control movement dream and aspiration.
It is easy to understand why we do not hear about Israeli gun laws.
People who do not like guns usually do not like Israel either and would loathe to praise anything coming from there. The same reason why we never heard about Israeli health care or Israeli abortion laws despite that they would make excellent talking point for Blues against Israel loving Reds.
And people who like guns usually like Israel too (while knowing about it only from dank memes that show it as tough nation armed to the teeth).
So, you want to ask, you are blaming the victims? How dare you?
The Israelis were told by their government: "Millions of people who want to kill you live near your homes separated by wire fence. Do not panic and do not prepare to defend yourselves. Your government and your army will protect you, nothing can happen. Fear that they will cross the fence and slaughter you in your own homes is absurd and delusional. Do not be conspiracy theorist, do not be extremist, trust the plan". And, being normal human beings, they trusted because the government was right so far, because nothing happened so far. This is normal human nature, no one to blame.
Now, when something happened, and if nothing changes and Israelis will continue trusting their government as previously, yes I will blame them, and you shall too.
Are there signs that something is changing?
Looks like it.
https://thereload.com/israeli-loosens-gun-carry-rules-after-unprecedented-terror-attack/
What are the tests?
So very generous. And, in addition, citizens will be able to purchase, instead of previous fifty, whole ONE HUNDRED rounds of ammo! Yay!
Bizarre that you think gun control is the most inflammatory issue. Is it a joke? Far and away the most inflammatory issue would be Israel's right to exist and segregate the Arabs and whether that justifies atrocities against Israeli civilians. Literally every discussion online about this, if it goes on long enough, will go back to 1948 or earlier. This is a classic culture war issue.
Yes this was either a parody or this place is becoming a parody of itself.
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About a billion plus Indians and a sizeable hundred millions of Pakistanis accept the same deal from their governments without complaint. So do South Koreans, and even their stunted northern cousins. In the former case, there are entire border states where there's a very real risk of Jihadists slipping under the fence and shooting up your village. No demands for guns, just better security from the BSF and Indian Army.
I would be rather concerned if the government was demanding I arm myself to do the job I pay them taxes for, even if I'm a gun nut, and if I ever make it to the US and the decent guns aren't banned, I intend to buy several.
You're observing the very much discussed to death notion that people get along and cheer more for a far-group than they do their far more similar peers who hold much more similar cultural and political views. The Leftists celebrating Palestine don't all want to wear hijabs or ban alcohol, even if a few of them get signal boosted.
There's been a whole lot of complaining. And it's not "a billion plus Indians", it's only the relatively few near the hot borders.
No, there's more than a fence between the South and the North; there's a 4km wide demilitarized zone with minefields and military bases just south of it (and, I presume, north of it)
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Does indians and pakistani hate each other or only their governments? AK 47 doesn't do much good against an army. Against people in toyota trucks they are good enough. A couple of well places snipers could have reduced the festival casualties and probably prevented some of the rapes.
Depends. As you'd expect but for a question covering >1.5 billion people.
I didn't notice any animosity from the Pakistani doctors I befriended in London, barring a few jokes about some poor pilot who got shot down in Pakistani airspace and was mildly roughed up before being exchanged. I suppose the fact that I didn't give a shit made them warm up even faster, I'm no nationalist, at least except when I pine for the US.
You will find hundreds of millions of hardliners, and hundreds of millions more who are indifferent or outright alarmed at the idea of war. If war happens, it's most likely going to be because the US and China kickoff and allies and associates get drawn in. Or an inciting event beyond my power to predict.
I think there's more bellicosity on the Pakistani side, their military relies on fear mongering about India to justify their occasional coups. And the ISI, they need something bigger than Afghanistan to show they're worth more than the damage they deal, which isn't really true itself.
I would hope not even the Palestinians are using something as antiquated as a genuine AK-47, or at least the modernized (so early it's hardly modern) AKM. But I get your point.
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I’m going to guess that whatever the gun laws were, a (presumably drugged-to-gills) trance festival would have a strict no guns policy.
The festival was one small part of the attack. Technicals stuffed with gunmen were shooting at civilians in urban centers, with many of the videographers within range and great firing positions to respond.
My impression while watching them was almost 100% "Damn, a rifle instead of a phone would be really nice for these guys".
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If they had looser gun control laws, I’d expect just as often those looser guns end up in the hands of terrorists as in the hands of people using them for self-defense.
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Their military was apparently caught with their pants down, why would you expect civilians to do better instead of just becoming tasty weapon lootboxes?
Seems it worked for a few communities.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/defenders-of-kibbutz-nir-am-say-they-killed-2-terrorists-saturday-preventing-takeover/
The military was mostly absent and then playing catchup. Civilians were not absent.
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Because if you own a gun you're already in your house...with the gun. So when you hear your neighbors getting executed, you take out your gun and stop the person doing the executing.
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Omitted from The Reload is that they are limited to a single firearm that is not a semiauto rifle. So most typically a semiauto pistol like a Glock. And absent the "Short Barreled Rifle" and "Short Barreled Shotgun" NFA restrictions (that existed to close a loophole during drafting when pistols were going to be similarly restricted but when pistols were removed from the bill, the loophole closure was not), has led to the amusing product design space of pistol chassis systems. Americans answer for short carbines working around their laws was the pistol brace, for Israelis the microroni.
The microroni is just a rifle attachment for a handgun. I suppose you're more accurate with it, but the ballistics of it are still shitty compared to a real rifle.
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The gun control policy works well for Israel. They have low crime. They have low suicides.
They do have a very significant problem with Palestinian terrorists, but it's obvious that simply ending gun control would not be a sufficient response to that problem - large scale military action is required. So there is no problem that could actually get solved by a change in gun policy, and several significant problems that could easily be created by it.
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I think that for Israeli Jews, trying to make it easier for citizens to own guns would put them between a rock and a hard place.
On the one hand, they would be loath to let ethnically Arab citizens of Israel have guns because that would make it much easier for those of them who want to kill Jews to actually do it.
On the other hand, there is no way to write a gun control law that takes ethnicity into account without making it completely obvious that you are running an ethno-state and thus looking really bad to a lot of people in the broader world.
But they are already running an ethno-state. No outsider considers it not to be an ethnic state unless they are making PR mouth noises pretending to the contrary.
,Yes, but bringing it to the arena of gun laws would take it up a notch and look particularly ugly because it basically would look like "we are going to make it legal for any of our random vigilantes and paramilitary groups to easily buy guns while at the same time we will ensure that it is illegal for the Palestinians to defend themselves from such violence".
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Easier than you might think, and Israel is already doing it. To get a gun license in Israel you need to have completed a certain degree of military training (among other requirements). Non-Jews (Druze, Bedouins, some Christian Arabs) who serve in the IDF are not those that you need to worry about starting a riot at the behest of Hamas or Hezbollah.
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Human beings have an instinct that makes them lash out violently against oppression, real or perceived. If it were possible to eliminate this instinct through genetic engineering, would it be worthwhile to do so? Would the Palestinians be better off if they were engineered to feel less emotional in response to discrimination and ethnic cleansing?
You have perhaps read S.M. Stirling's Drakas books? I don't think breeding Homo servus is really a good idea, whether you're doing it to the Palestinians or the Israelis.
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Nah, resistance to some forms of oppression, even if irrational from an individual perspective, is very much necessary for the survival of the group. You have to make someone, who wishes to oppress you more than is within the Overton Window, reconsider due to the cost in blood they'd have to pay. Even if you will inevitably lose it they chose to pay it. (Do stop resisting after you're done with the minimum needed to add credibility to your claims, assuming they aren't literally killing you)
While I wouldn't object too hard if it was done for basket cases like Palestine, it's infinitely preferable to just make them as smart as their Israeli cousins, so that integration could be smoother. Can't forget the cultural component and memetic engineering, genius Jihadis cause much of the carnage, the ones who did 9/11 were well educated. The two are inextricable, smarter people can be more pro-social, certainly more productive, and find positive sum ways of solving their problems without resorting to force.
At any rate, I do find making otherwise normal humans into meeker ones distasteful, if you want servants and workers who won't give you lip, just make more robots.
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I mean, if we're granting the ability to apply arbitrary genetic behavioral modification to classes of people, I'd rather make all the oppressors uninterested in oppressing...
Anyway, there's a difference between 'would Palestinians in the real world be better off without the instinct now' versus 'Would Palestinians from five hundred years ago be better off today in expectation without the instinct.'
I think this instinct, like a lot of human instincts towards violent retaliation under various circumstances, serves an important evolved purpose as a disincentive towards other people doing those thing in the first place.
An instinct towards psychotically attacking oppressors is an incentive against oppression. Not a strong enough disincentive to stop all oppression, oppression can be really really profitable, but God alone knows how much more oppression there would be in the world and in the history books without that instinct.
So again, I think its better to keep overall.
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No. Striking violently and possibly in a suicidal way to achieve taking your oppressor's life is paramount. Sacrosanct. I would not want to live with a people who have had this urge lobotomized out of them. Indeed I would look at them as lesser beings.
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What's in it for Hamas? Israel's response is totally predictable. It's about to be a really rough time to be a Gazan. Hamas leadership must have thought through what happens the week after their attack .... right? I'm genuinely curious what their calculus is/was.
72 virgins in heaven, same as always. I always find it illustrative to go back to this passage from their holy book.
It's pure, undiluted derangement.
That is a Hadith. Not a passage from their holy book. If we will go down to such a base level of argumentation at least let's get the facts right. Ironically, one side of this conflict actually does have a holy book where their God instructs them to genocide the inhabitants of the land and settle it themselves which they do according to the said book.
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Epistemic status: Pure speculation.
Supposedly the Saudis and the Israelis were on the path to normalized relations. Saudi Arabia's remarks could be construed as blaming Israel for the situation, which would derails those normalization talks. Hamas gets a win if it can keep Israeli from having one less enemy.
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the hamas leadership gives zero shits about the palestinians there and they'll never have recruitment issues. the optics of giving israel a broken nose and perhaps delaying normalization with the saudis are worth a few thousand lives.
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They probably believe that if they cause enough pain they really can eventually force Israel to give up territory for peace. They've seen, from Vietnam to Afghanistan to Algeria, that great powers can be worn down and lose the will for continued occupation. And they're banking on Israel not doing all the things people are asking them to do on Twitter: "Turn Gaza into a parking lot." People here might argue that it would be "rational" for the Israelis to just go ahead and do a genocide, but they aren't going to do that.
I think Hamas is mistaken in that the situation in Palestine is obviously different from those other examples (notably, Israel knows that there would never be peace because Hamas's end goal is literally the destruction of Israel and they'll never settle for anything less). But Palestine does have a lot of global sympathy so Israel still cannot "make the rubble bounce" even if they wanted to.
And while @WhiningCoil's take is just the usual low effort sneering, he's not completely wrong that actual religious beliefs play a part: most Muslims aren't in it for the "72 virgins" but they genuinely do believe that God is on their side and thus they will inevitably prevail.
One person's sneering is another persons short, concise, cited answer.
No, one's person's sneering is sneering. You don't actually know much about Islam except what you learn from mainlining outrage online. Citing spicy quotes from holy books is Twitter-level, which is why you don't pile on in agreement when our resident Joo-posters are throwing around the one about goys being servants of Jews.
That passage from the Koran is literally cited in the Hamas Charter. It's article 7.
Yes, I'm aware. We aren't disagreeing about whether or not Hamas hates Jews and wants to wipe out Israel.
Then I don't understand your accusation of sneering, except to grant unearned charity to the obviously guilty party here. You acted like my bringing up that call to genocide was a complete non-sequitur. Like it's unfair or "sneering" to point out someone's publicly stated beliefs, openly expressed, enshrined in religion, government, media, and man on the street interviews.
I was referring to "they do it for the 72 virgins."
I can believe they act with motives that rise above the level of memes without granting "charity" to them.
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But how much? Will they agree to 1967 borders? To the 1947 UN partition plan? Or only to pushing the last Jew into the Med?
Answers will probably vary depending on which Palestinian you ask, but as I said below, I've become blackpilled enough to believe that most Palestinians today, deep down, want the destruction of Israel and nothing less. Will anything ever persuade a critical mass to accept some sort of lasting, stable plan for coexistence? Not in a timespan of less than several generations.
Right, and if Palestinians will have had all their aggression bred out of them, why give them any extra land? They will be satisfied with their lot.
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That's not even the most notable difference. The Afghans weren't attempting to remove America from Long Island, they were attempting to remove America from Afghanistan. The Algerians weren't trying to take Provence, they were trying to take Algeria.
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Note that "Hamas" did not decide to do anything; rather, certain leaders of Hamas did. Those who made the decision to launch this attack are almost certainly acting in their own interests. The decision was probably driven in part by internal politics, either between Hamas and its political rivals, or among factions within Hamas. That is hardly an unusual phenomenon (see the Falklands War). Note than "driven by internal politics" does not preclude the possibility that Iran played an important role, given that Hamas relies on Iran for some of its funding, which like all governing organizations Hamas uses to purchase legitimacy (whether in the form of public services or in the form of striking Israel).
That's a good thing to remember in the general case, but it's also relevant to look at the necessary number of people involved in this sort of maneuvers, either directly in terms of men on the scene, and indirectly in terms of immediate support. Even with fairly generous assumptions regarding compartmentalization, it's extremely likely that both the majority of Hamas leadership and literally tens of thousands of individual members were involved.
That both changes how leaders make decisions (cfe more formal example), but it also blends the lines between decisions made by individuals and by organizations.
Yes, but I think you are conflating two different questions: 1) why entities employ political violence; and 2) why individuals go along / participate in political violence / join politically violent organizations. Compare chapters 3 and six here
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There are actually reports coming out that only a small part of the military leadership planned this attack and was aware of it and not even the political leaders of Hamas were aware. And other militant groups were only informed moments before the action and joined in an impromptu manner. Obviously impossible to know for sure but this would make much sense since otherwise it would be impossible to keep this secret.
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Not knowing much about the topic, the two things I'd look for are 1. generic accelerationist tendencies (end the status quo and force a resolution, whatever it may be) and 2. Ways in which the specific (still living) people behind planning the attack benefit from it personally ('career' advancement/etc) even if it doesn't help the cause overall long-term.
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Suck up sympathy and NGO money. Same as always.
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All eyes are on Gaza but reports are also coming in that the Israeli military is putting the West Bank on full lockdown.
Part of this is to prevent wider contagion but it surely cannot be lost on various government ministers (some of whom belong to the utter fringes of the Israeli far-right) that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity to do things in the occupied territories that otherwise wouldn't fly. Israel has a narrow time window for any such actions, so while the world is glued to what happens in Gaza, I would also try to keep an eye on the West Bank.
I suspect the real prize for many members of this govt would be simultaneous ethnic cleansing of both Gaza and West Bank in a massive show of force. 300K reservists have been called up. I'm not predicting it will happen, just pointing out that if there was ever a time, then that time is now.
The West Bank has already been carved up into discontinuous enclaves.
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I wish them the best, you don't treat a tumor by cutting away just the bits that are causing symptoms (severe metastatic palliative cases aside), you chop off as much as you can find.
In both cases, I'm confident the loss in blood and lives will be significantly lower than drawing things out.
I do think ethnic cleansing is such a tiresome term, and so is a definition of genocide that includes cultural redoctrination. Buddy, I tell you, the hypothetical person who does this, it's far worse to murder an entire class of people instead of making them learn a new language and wear new clothes. You're sneaking in connotations, and I'll continue impotently pushing back where I can.
I'm massively in favor of restricting genocide to only include killing and mass prevention of reproduction, but do you have a suggestion for what to call the cultural equivalent?
If tomorrow the Taliban broke into my house, forced me to learn Arabic, stop eating pork or drinking alcohol, changed how my workday is structured, altered the system of government I live under, and prevented me from living with my girlfriend prior to marriage, none of that is genocide but is definitely A Big Deal and I would like a word for it being applied to my entire society collectively. Culturcide is decent but a bit ugly.
Memetic coercion?
It's also more deserving of "colonization" than the way that word is bandied about today, if barely.
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"Forced assimilation" works for me.
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"Memocide," I suppose (from "meme").
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How would Zionists behave if they were in the Palestinian position?
This is a key question for determining the moral severity of the terrorist attacks we saw this weekend. A common criticism of Hamas is that they engage in terrorism against civilians whereas their morally enlightened (ostensibly) Israeli cousins only attack military targets. But I think this ignores the fact that Israel has the luxury of successfully hitting military targets. Israel can kill just as many civilians as Hamas by targeting military sites, while also killing relevant military leaders and defending against unwanted criticism. Yet at the end of the day, the same if not more civilians are killed, and the same terror is instilled in the enemy’s civilian population. Regarding an Israeli missile attack in May which killed ten civilians, Amnesty writes:
The idea that it is morally acceptable to kill civilians when you also kill military targets at the same time is often brought up when American bombings in Japan during WWII are discussed. However, I’m not convinced that there is a clear moral difference between Hamas actions and, say, the firebombing of Tokyo, where as many as 100k were killed, the vast majority being civilians.
Back to the question at hand, we know that Zionists had no issue bombing embassies and killing non-combatants in order to colonize the land of what is now called Israel. In the 40s, they notably bombed a British embassy, and in the 50s the Israeli government pressured Britain and Italy not to investigate the bombing. Recently, an Israeli historian has claimed that Zionists were responsible for the bombings targeting the Jews of Baghdad in order to pressure Jews to migrate and settle Israel. So, back when Israel’s position was more similar to Palestine, they did in fact engage in terrorist activity. If Israeli militants would behave as Hamas militants were they in that position, then the immorality of Hamas conduct is greatly diminished in severity.
If either side was in each others position they would be extreme ultranationalists/hardcore identitarian tribalists as they are now. I think the Zionists would be more competent at dealing with another invading group had they been equally smart in that scenario. If the zionists were in palestinian position and were invaded by a group called the Yews that behaved just like the Jews did historically, they would hate their guts with an intense fanaticism that is rarely seen. And yes they would of course utilize terorrism like they did historically, and they wouldn't stop had it been the advantageous method for them to utilize in the circumstances. Generally Jews would really, really, really hate a group that behaved against the Jews like Jews behave towards non Jews.
Yes, relatively to Israel that is. Neither Hamas nor the Israelis and their fans are reasonable groups of people, from the perspective of seeking compromise, avoiding bloodshed, acting morally and ethically, with a mind to proportionality, caring consistently about the golden rule, respecting others rights, etc, etc. Including the same people in the west and in the middle east, they are all a bunch of crybullies, quite possible for them to be victimized based on circumstances, but whenever they get the opportunity they will mistreat others for their benefit and cry about being the victims besides.
So I am not a fan of either sides, or even the behavior of their diaspora but I would prefer if they behaved better but alas you can't change them just cause you wish it to be so. Although due to greater power, I find Israel has the greater responsibility to stop illegal settlements.
Anyhow, contemporary Israel bad behavior and war crimes and unhinged genocidal rhetoric we see among Zionists is already bad enough and worse than what the Palestinians do, although one could argue that had they had the power they would be just as bad or worse.
You are making this up.
One of the most annoying things about Jewish extremism is not only they are extreme nationalists but they are utterly unwilling to admit it and will gaslight you. Crybullying 101. Yes, Israel is an extreme nationalist country, that is occupying even more land on top of their previous murderous ethnic cleansing, and take various racist policies in the open prison they have palestinians in. Plus their army engages in warcrimes.
Of course Israel is just one example of the issue which is that Jews even outside Israel and not just in Israel are really hardcore racists and support discriminating against the non Jewish ethnic groups of the area and don't respect their national rights. Rights which they assert for themselves.
So the problem that Jews are massive racists is very much real, and those who deny it are making things up and promoting a very false vision of reality.
I don't know about you, but I prefer if ethnic groups weren't massive racists and respected each others rights instead of operating with a mentality that what is yours is mine and what is mine is mine and then lying to your victims.
The pervasive choice that Jews engaging in waging the culture war like you do is to be as racist as possible and deny wrongdoing instead of accept rightfully and justly the error that their peoples have done over the years against other ethnic groups.
Hasn’t the entire Middle East been governed in this way with perhaps the lone exception being current Iraq. Every country has had to brutally repress at times to keep the peace.
Lebanon at one point was different but hasn’t been for decades.
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Is this whole line of moral questioning useful? I consider it a given that the civilness is based on security, safety, abundance, lawfulness, peace and so on. Teasing out religious and cultural differences is a little interesting, though I think misses the point. It's fairly universal that stripping away these civilization cornernstones make people more savage.
The more interesting question is, is it ever possible for a 21st century civilization to collide with a 14th century one and for the 14th century one to be warmly embraced and adapted? And I say 14th century because I consider the currently problematic Islamic cultures of the world to be basically the Spanish inquisition with the sign flipped from Christian to Islam.
For a more extreme example, my mind immediately goes to European settlers meeting the already-here indigenous peoples of America. Despite the billions of words written about how harmoniously they must have existed in connection with the Earth and one another, I'm sure they were probably even more insane to deal with than the currently situated Hamas.
(Of course the native Americans didn't have adversaries of the European settlers hooking them up with modern assault weapons)
If 21st century is supposed to mean moving beyond fanaticism, neither civilization is part of 21st century and neither are even American non Jews who throw themselves extreme rhetoric about destroying Gaza.
It is immoral to side with the more prosperous fanatical racists when they could and should be behaving much better and respecting others human rights.
Someone could ironically use your way of thinking to justyfing Nazi conquest of more backward eastern europeans. That you use this kind of rhetoric in defense of Israel acting without any judgement is telling where you are coming from.
Of course many Jewish communists also thoght themselves superior intellectuals with the right to lead and abuse inferior reactionary gentile ethnic groups with tragic consequences.
Israel does not respect the security, safety, lawfulness and peace of the Palestinians.
It also doesn't respect it for various other countries they bomb.
And they don't respect it for western countries that their lobby promotes policies against them. And against freedom of speech and also the native people having any rights. It is important to note that Israelis have had key influence in Facebook enforcing racist jewish supremacist propaganda as the allowed speech.
The person who banned Trump from twitter was part of Israel's goverment. And Likudists in west including aligned neocons not only promoted mass migration in western countries but also have at times advocated Palestinians moving to europe as the means of solving Israel's problem.
Being too racist against others in the way that actually doesn't allow said nations to exist and prosper goes against others civilization. This mentality does not promote civilization for it is predatory and parasitical. While it is immoral for anyone to support it, especially any non Jew has no reason to support Jewish racism which will turn against them and has them on their crosshair too.
What I find ironic about the whole Jewish issue is the whole whining about racism against Jews by who, Jews of all people who are so pervasively racist as a group.
Now, lest we forget, the Jews aren't the only fanatics in the region. Same in the past, it is an inaccurate vision that sees Jews as center of all evil and any non Jewish group or ideology as center of good. Although the opposite vision which has been more common in 20th and 21st century is even more stupid and dangerous. But they definitely are bullies whenever they can get away with it. If you are a Jew and you try to be a good person you should have a problem with how your ethnic community tends to behave like and how other Jews tend to behave like.
And part of their ultranationalist mentality and racist mentality of both them and non Jewish, Jewish supremacists, is this asinine vision of Jews who never didn't do nothing and how you are insane to think otherwise. Which as we see when you employ your kind of more nazi like arguement, is disingenuous. And I absolutely do see the Jewish supremacist faction which includes non Jews too promote might is right supremacist rhetoric and also rhetoric about how the Jews are just so fucking superior to other groups and they just have the right to behave as they please.
The projection of this faction using rhetoric about racism tends to obscure that the correct response to the bad behavior of Jewish supremacists is to outright condemn them for their racism.
BTW if you are curious where I am coming from I actually think you can support your own group's prosperity while also respecting the rights of others.The homeland system where we have countries that ought to respect each others rights beeing a key part of international justice. Ideally we have something like international justice when this happens. And we don't when ethnic groups are getting, genocided, colonized by others, they lose their land and their rights of self determination and even self respect and right to a historical education of their own ethnic group (that is they are victims of cultural genocide which the nazis like many modern Jews in western countries and far leftists in general, are proponents of) are destroyed under the boot of foreign conquerors or those locals who align with said agenda.
Warmongering imperialists who destroy millions, especially relevant today the modern neocons are the kind of people who we need to keep down. Those who give platforms to those promoting the dangerous rhetoric we have seen these days advocating for warcrimes are culpable for what happens and have the blood of inoccents also on their hands. And those who cultivated an atmosphere where any ethnic group can do no wrong, in this case the Jews, are obviously racist supremacists in favor of said group or groups, but also culpable for whatever happens next in Gaza.
Regarding the Jews acting as racist bullies, it has to do with the dominance of ultranationalist ideology among Jews relating both to religion and even secular Jewish ultranationalism and even combo of Jewish ultranationalism with progressive extremism. This ideology is just classic ridiculous one sided racist propaganda that in clown world stage we are, is increasingly imposed. That Jews never did nothing wrong, that anything otherwise is racist conspiracy theory and insane (and the ridiculous term used by racists, the term antisemite), and that Jews both historically and presently have been oppressed and have the right to destroy and thriump over their oppressors (liek Egypt which enslaved Jews according to religious myth but not necessarilly according to fact). In combo with the same faction promoting the idea of Jews as just superior.
Classic ultranationalist propaganda 101 and non Jews who also perpetuate it are racist supremacists in favor of a foreign ethnic group. So the solution isn't the same predatory mentality against inoccents and against Jews, but not to tolerate the Jewish or other groups ultranationalist bullshit, and to impose a mentality to them that they ought to be less cruel, disrespectful of other groups rights and compromise and avoid having demands were they encroach on the rights of others.
Which Jewish community does in Palestine, stealing land, and doing plenty of warcrimes, plus what they have gotten away with getting already the moral path is a two state solution with 1967 borders. And they do, with control over powerful institutions in the west, and enforcing authoritarian racist supremacist propaganda, promoting mass migration, criminalizing and not tolerating healthy moderate nationalism to their outgroup while encouraging a progressive supremacist alliance of Jewish supremacist, black supremacists and others against western civilization.
This stopping is necessary part of an ideology in favor of the only international justice that ever made sense and ever worked. It is important not to confuse disregarding the fake moralism of principleless trying to manipulate you into allowing you to victimize you with abandoning morality altogether.
Anyway, Jews in current circumstances are not the victimized party but the victimizing party that should make amends towards others. I am not suggesting they become complete pushovers though towards say Hamas. There is a sweet spot and Jews are consistently on the wrong side of it.
*Obviously, when saying Jews here =/ all Jews, I don't think it needs saying but part of the nasty rhetorical tricks of misinterpretation. It does mean Jews as a pattern, average Jew, etc, etc.
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Just nitpicking, but didn’t the British arm the natives during the American War of Independence?
Not with AK-47s and RPGs
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No, it isn’t. Israel should stop settlerism in the West Bank, yes, but it’s not the equivalent of what Hamas is doing in southern Israel right now. Israel should probably show a bit more concern for civilian casualties, but it’s not taking preemptive strikes against a music festival.
Israel has killed far more Palestinians than otherwise. Even just recently. Also Hamas =/ the totality of Palestinian faction even if key to it.
The way you are framing it is downplayment to the extreme.
Enough with the apologia for Israeli warcrimes. I don't think it is an accident that the spaces that promote this including IDW has rhetoric that is upvoted about how Jews are superior. Which we see here as well people write this nonsense and promote the argument of Jews being superior to non Jews.
Israel unmoored from the threat of backlash, would probably have done ever worse, just like so many zionists advocate. And like they have done in the past. There is a real threat of mass murderous ethnic cleansing lying over the Palestinians right now. There is also a lot of rhetoric and an atmosphere created that makes attrocities all that more likely because of the complicity of gatekeepers of discourse.
Lest we forget that Hamas has not existed always in this conflict and the start of it is Jewish murderous conquest and ethnic cleansing of which terrorism played a key role.
This conflict isn't really all that debatable in all its facets. It is a fact that both Hamas and Israel (and those willing to support it unconditional) are fanatical extreme regimes. Also, part of their badness has to do with their global badness. Their fanaticism isn't only a problem for the location of palestine, but their ideology is vile, predatory, and disrespectful of others rights with a more global reach.
One under the banner of Islam, and with elements of anti western (and anti other non muslim, including Christians but other groups too), and the other with the symbol of star of david, with also anti western, obviously anti-christian but also anti Muslim element. And both quite capable of being anti-X other groups in favor of the domination of their own tribe.
Yes, this will probably end with mass civilian casualties among the Palestinians of Gaza. Hamas maybe shouldn’t have started a genocidal war they were guaranteed to lose.
Israel is not a saint, but there’s not exactly a moral equivalence here. Israel isn’t dragging off Palestinian civilian hostages to rape and parade through the streets. Israel didn’t open hostilities by killed 250 people at a concert. Israel isn’t breaking into apartments to kill civilians and drag their carcasses through Tel Aviv to be spat on.
Really?
https://twitter.com/Partisangirl/status/1711026961257267208?cursor=QAAAAPAxHBlmnoDS3ayE574v8oewjZyY1L8vjIG5pd-16r4v9MTencL6-74v_IWzqYiV5b4vwMS5gam_1r8vJQISFQQAAA#r
Even in recent events propaganda rages. While the fog of war exists for me too, there are plenty of Israel warcrimes that have been reported over the years.
https://twitter.com/KeithWoodsYT/status/1711364819863888227#m
There is also deliberate bombing of civilians. Israel has murdered far more than just 250 civilians.
There is no moral equivalence if you are a racist who excuses Jewish warcrimes because you believe Jews are superior and non Jews are inferior.
In reality, Americans are incredibly propagandized by Jewish supremacists to become themselves Jewish supremacists. Although some Americans quite more than others. And some deliberately pretend that Israel hasn't done its very fair share of warcrimes.
Love the passive voice. So you don't even oppose the genocidal war but support it because Hamas started it. Like Hamas started the occupation, after all.
So you support genocidal war by only blaming Hamas for it and not Israel and people like yourself with your bloodthirst, racist bias you support the murder of countless of inoccents in war.
Incidentally, aren't the people of Hamas using your logic to murder Jews? How are you any better than them, when you justify genocidal war and excuse the perpetrators?
Unlike the Palestinians, or even Hamas, your call for revenge doesn't even have the excuse of your country being occupied.
It isn't a mystery that aggressively calling for restraint and trying to keep the zionist genocidal fanatics and warmongers who even want to escalate things to war with Iran down, is the prudent course. Having lived through the mass propaganda of the Iraq war, the current situation smells exactly like that. A bunch of dangerous propagandists out for blood putting civilization in course for destruction.
So no, you are fully 100% at fault for your own rhetoric, and Israel for their own actions. They always had the opportunity to act in a far more restrained manner than they have done. From the very beginning of this conflict that has been a Jewish supremacist imperialist grab.
Simultaneously, it would be a good idea to keep down annoying muslim fanatics too with their own global imperialist nuttery and disrespect towards others. And of course the antiwestern fanatics with their colonizing visions under the pretense of decolonization.
Of which, Jewish supremacists dreaming of ethnically cleansing Palestinians to send them to europe are part of. It is in fact imperative that Israeli reprisals show restraint and avoid the mass murder of civilians. And simultaneously Israel should finally abadon its vile illegal settlements. Maybe the creation of a palestinian state in those areas with nobody of Hamas allowed inside and the preresequite for peace being Hamas to be gone in general. Of course the Jewish supremacist fanatics which includes non Jews have no interest in that and of course Hamas has no interest in itself to be gone.
The main group of non Jewish, Jewish supremacists are mainly from western countries. And these people not only become racist supremacists of extreme proportions but also betray their own countries and nation by aligning with an ultranationalist agenda that is incredibly intolerant and hostile to western civilization in the broadest sense and its component nations and sees it as an antisemitic oppressor to be exploited or destroyed. Or pretends cynically it is an antisemitic oppressor to justify their racist agenda for its destruction. In either case, Jewish tribalism is incredibly racist against the main countries outside of Israel that tend to support it and despises the native people of said countries. Unlike in Israel, the Jews support mass migration and oppose any rights of national identity for their non Jewish victims. For the same reason they support colonization of Palestinian land by Jews, and oppose Palestinian human rights and nationhood. Because they are racist imperialists of extreme proportions who do not respect the rights of others. And fundamentally same as the non Jewish, Jewish supremacists. Including the aware proponent who have ideologically adopted an insane treasonous ideology, and the useful idiot component who ends up helping those who despise them.
Personal pet peeve: there is no passive voice in that sentence (guaranteed is clearly an adjective).
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Can you provide better source than this troll account?
I recognize this one from unironically claiming that Russia has not invaded Ukraine and about biolabs and how Poland is preparing to invade Ukraine. They repeatedly posted lies, misleading claims, bizarre misinterpretations and various propaganda.
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No, it really isn't. It's a way to excuse the attacks by inventing a straw Zionist who would have acted the same or even worse.
Is Joe more immoral than Fred if the action Joe takes is of the same quality Fred would take, were Fred in Joe’s position? The weight of moral philosophy says no. At worst they are equally immoral. But Joe can’t be worse than Fred, if Fred would do the same thing. Joe is only morally worse than Fred if he would behave worse than Fred.
Then the weight of moral philosophy is approximately the same as the weight of the angels dancing on pinheads.
"You would have done the same if you were in my position, therefore what I did is OK" is probably false and certainly unprovable in this case.
Do you think that one group is more immoral than another simply because of chance? So if two people try to kill each other equally, the one whose gun didn’t jam is more immoral? If two people attempt adultery, the immoral one is the one who is more attractive? I don’t think I’m representing your view correctly here. In the case of Hamas vs Israel, I’m saying Hamas can’t be “more immoral than Israel” if Israel would do the same to them all things being equal. This doesn’t imply that international law is suddenly abolished or that the actions can’t be censured by some third party nation. I’m only making an assertion about morality relative to the two. So an application would be that neither Hamas nor Israel get to claim righteousness or moral high ground.
It’s unknowable but we can still consider things that are likely.
I am saying your imaginings about what Zionists would do if in the same situation as Hamas have no weight. You're taking it as a given that the two groups are morally equivalent, using that belief to assert that the Zionists would do the same in reversed circumstances, and then using that assertion to claim the two groups are morally equivalent. It's entirely circular. In reality, we've got no evidence that, in a reversed situation, that the Zionists would target civilians and rape and murder them and drag their bodies through the streets. Their big well-known terrorist action was the bombing of British administrative headquarters in the King David Hotel, which isn't similar.
I am not taking it as a given.
Per Richard Catling regarding the Deir Yassin massacre in the 40s by Zionists, just weeks before the creation of Israel:
The men were paraded in the streets of Jerusalem and spat on before being executed.
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How would one restrain the temptation to justify any actions by saying that your enemy would have acted like you did? It seems like a fully general way to excuse bad behavior on the part of an underdog in any conflict.
It’s the bloody inverse of the golden rule: do unto others what you imagine they might do unto you. It’s the tribal justification for the cleansing fire of war since human history began.
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By reasoning? The same way we use our reasoning to predict other future contingencies. There’s a reason so many people were on board with invading Iraq over WMDs and after hearing about Iraq killing innocents. There was then intense backlash once it was realized that this intelligence gathering was horribly faulty and in some cases fraudulent. So it’s actually already normal to consider what our geopolitical enemies would do if they could, and to make judgments as a consequence.
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I mean, there are communities of Jews, even fundamentalist Jews, in pockets all over the world, under various governments that treat them across a broad spectrum of disdain and liberalism. Never in my life heard of Jewish terrorist attacks on the civilians of their host countries.
I'll never know exactly, but I think it's reasonable to extrapolate they wouldn't airdrop into a music festival and go on a rape and murder spree. Or bring some left overs home with them to enjoy later.
Extremist Jews consider their homeland to be Israel which nullifies your example
I don't think you know enough extremist Jews to be saying that. There are Jews as extreme as any in Israel here in the USA. Brooklyn, Lakewood, smaller places like Kiryas Joel in upstate NY. These Jews are no less extreme.
AFAIK Hasidim are not Zionist. With that said they have engaged in violence to defend their community in the past: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Square_arson_attack
Right but you said Jews. You didn't say Zionists.
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That's not actually true. A lot of the "ultra-Orthodox" in the U.S. have historically had the position that the modern state of Israel is a biblical abomination, as Jews should only return to the Promised Land when the coming of the Messiah shows that God has redeemed the Jews from the sins that resulted in their expulsion. They'll come and protest speeches by prominent Israelis just like pro-Palestinian groups will.
You’re conflating fundamentalism with extremism here; the topic of the discussion is Zionists. A religious group can be fundamentalist but not extremist, for instance the Amish.
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I think this is an example of typical-minding a far-group that you don't really interact with in any meaningful capacity. Palestinians aren't regretfully killing or raping civilians because they are limited to those particular targets - they are happy to do so, proud to do so, and will shout their joy from the rooftops. Most of the videos of Palestinians dragging girls back to Gaza or desecrating corpses aren't from Israeli propaganda, they're from pro-Palestine Telegram groups where everyone is in lockstep approval of their actions.
Although both the lock-stepping Nazis and the celebrating Palestinians are/were anti-Semites, I’d instead characterize the latter as “like-minded.”
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On the other hand, the Jews have spent hundreds of years as second-rate citizens being legally discriminated against and subject to expulsions and pogroms, yet instead of revolting they adapted and flourished despite the persecution. Could it be that they don't see the Palestinian future as envisioned by Israel as something really that terrible, after all, living in ghettoes and shtetls wasn't that bad until the whole industrialized Jewish extermination plan.
I think they only flourished after much of the persecution had been removed. Before about 1800 they had not been much of a factor in European life, it was after Jewish emancipation that they began their rise, as an ethnic group, to riches and influence.
On the other hand, they may have played a larger role than I know in bringing about their own emancipation.
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I find no cognitive dissonance in my enjoying the fruits of the American Revolution while also condemning modern-day leftist revolutionaries that have so far only managed to hold a few blocks in Seattle for part of a summer.
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No, it isn't. Intentionally targeting civilians is morally wrong. You don’t get a free pass to murder Pol Pot's children just because he has done similar things in the past.
I think this "free pass" rhetoric conceals the role of the speaker, and the authorities that the speaker seeks to persuade to act, in war crime discourse. It should be one matter whether in our beliefs, the murderer of Pol Pot's children ought to be assigned the same metaphysical quality of evil or expectation of supernatural punishment as Pol Pot; it's quite another matter whether you (@Gdanning) and the government that represents you get to "withhold the free pass" (by slapping around the murderer, probably also reaping some totally coincidental benefits in the process) if previously you chose to grant the free pass to Pol Pot.
You seem to be referring here to whether consequences are imposed for immoral actions. But that is not the issue. The issue is whether the action is immoral or not. By "free pass", I meant a moral free pass -- because, again that was the subject of OP's claim -- not a practical free pass. People get away with immoral acts all the time. That does not render them any more or less immoral. It used to be perfectly legal to forcibly rape one's wife. Hence, husbands were given a free pass -- they were not "slapped around" by the state, to use your terminology. But that says nothing about the morality of those actions.
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"Free" pass? Not really, it's already been paid for in blood. With additional promissory value if it convinces him to stop after he's had his own medicine.
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I deny this claim outright. The only real relevance to our reality is if it manifests in the fevered imagination of some alt-history author.
If, Zionism hadn't succeeded in clawing back their Holy Land, maybe a sizeable portion of the far larger Jewish diaspora would advocate for terrorism. Doesn't matter in the least, didn't happen, and the primary parties involved, namely the militia who might have taken up arms, are now octogenarians or dead. There are plenty of movements that, while nominally advocating for violent resistance in their homeland, have few people willing to do more than shout slogans. The Khalistani chap potentially offed by Modi recently is a good example, the Sikhs back in India are respected and integrated, which they wouldn't be if they had kept up their war.
There are few liberation movements, successful or not, that haven't shed civilian blood somewhere down the line.
If Hamas wishes to hit purely military targets, they're eminently capable, since I've seen footage of Israeli FOBs with dead soldiers nude but for hastily thrown on body armor.
Or shoot the people in the checkpoints or other side of the fence.
No, they have made a considered decision that their aims are to be manifested by killing easier targets when they can. They certainly think that it's better to save the life of their own from a decidedly uphill battle against the Israeli military, by shooting at things that won't shoot back. Regretfully, that just pushes the slope a little back, makes it steeper, and it now has an angry Apache waiting on top.
Most Western nations have far more appetite for trading their soldiers for the lives of innocent civilians, or less Afghanistan would have seen more MOABs. A mistake, in my eyes, but they would have seen tangible results from doing so, whereas the Palestinians have no hope from even maximal aggression, as I hope the Israelis are showing them.
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Not all people, not all civilizations, not all tribes, are equal. This is a core conservative conceit, it’s also inherent to ideas like HBD that you yourself agree with. Human progress has always involved the conquest of some peoples by others.
‘Punching down’, in other words, may be more moral than ‘punching up’. The many settlers of the Americas did what they did and so, perhaps, will the Israelis.
This is, of course, a justification that one day may be used against peoples less backward than Palestinians. «You are animals in comparison, so we do not admit any wrong in dispossessing you».
It must be nice to belong to the highest average IQ population on the planet. Whatever ideology wins, your side comes out on top.
That is the only real justification that matters. I have (as I have said many times) great sympathy for the Palestinians; their armed struggle is justified on grounds of self defense and historical humiliation. Their war crimes are brutal, but expected. If they fight to the end, they’ll die with honor, at least by their own standards (the only ones that matter, in that case).
I think if you take a civilizational view, there ought to be some kind of respect for national achievement. But the thing about war is that if you lose, you probably weren’t really as good as you thought. If Israel is defeated, the Jewish political project will be over, and they can be considered a defeated people who wasted their opportunity for statehood, at least for now. A tragedy, perhaps, but one of many in history. So it does go both ways.
Yes "a tragedy perhaps" but one that can be forgoten and bypassed. Promoted by someone like you who are milking grudges constantly. The point here you are promoting is that the defeat of Palestinians which is more likely now can be forgoten. Not about Israel.
If you really cared about forgetting tragedies, you wouldn't be milking the holocaust.
The issue here is that incredibly immoral sociopathic Jewish supremacists and other bad actors are free to destroy as they please instead of being restrained through accountability. Like, if anyone deserves to be prosecuted for hate speech, it aint most people you whine about whose rhetoric counters your extremism and therefore promote a valuable service to society even if some can go too far, but the cimarafas of the world are the primary faction of the most malevolent abuse of rights today.
It is no accident that all your genocidal racist supremacist rhetoric and even advocating actual warcrimes has not gotten you in trouble by the moderators. Birds of a feather and reveals the fake nature of rationalism which underneath lies hypocritical extreme tribalism. Like the other israel firster and backers of the racist supremacist democrats the fraudster Sam Bankman Fried.
Where did you get the info that 2rafa and the moderators are """birds of a feather"""?
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You have a bunch of comments in the mod queue. Most of them, like this one, this one, and this one, are just raging ad hominems.
If @2rafa was advocating literal genocide (which I'm pretty sure she's not), people are allowed to argue for abominable things here. That's why going on about how much you hate Jews hasn't gotten you into trouble until now, when you lost your self control and made it personal.
You're being really obnoxious and antagonistic and clearly cruising for a banning. Since you posted so many comments like this in such a short time, I'm guessing you knew you'd get modded and figured you'd get your attacks in while you can.
Banned for a week because this is your first formal mod action, but if you come back for another round of "Flame people before I get banned" I'll just delete your posts and permaban you. If you actually want to continue to participate here, get yourself under control.
There's also the possibility of just reading through a thread and responding to everything that drew his ire as he read it.
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Since you are making a moral arguement condemning me as hateful and defending cimarafa it is fair to ask what cimerafa advocates if it isn't genocide.
It isn't hard to connect the quote from Churchil. Or this quote by cimarafa
https://www.themotte.org/post/695/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/145883?context=8#context
along with other rhetoric from them and various people here. Bloodthirsty rhetoric is abominable but opposing it and calling for restraint is correct.
And in fact, it is the pervasive view worldwide, was more popular in the USA in the past to an extend. In addition with a decent size of negativity towards Israel for its mistreatment of Palestinians but without such negativity leading to the same dehumanization against Israelis than we see against Palestinians. Well except some quarters of the world. And of course, you will find in much of the world plenty of negativity towards Hamas. Anyway, negativity up to a point is a moderating pressure on those who would behave badly without it. But it does require a certain objectivity by those who throw it around.
You attack me of being hateful and I will be defending myself but it is those who have allowed the dehumanization of convenient targets and the advocation of atrocities under racist supremacist ideology while being ban happy to dissenters have genuinely been reprehensible.
And in relevance to the Israel and Gaza conflict, in fact it is precisely because of such decisions by people in control of media and social media that so much blood has been spilled in the middle east for the last 20 years.
Also directly related to the culture war reaching the extreme directions it reached. If there were more responsible and ethical and even handed people in charge, and gatekept out unethical virtue signaling extremists, a lot less blood would have been spilled.
Alas the gatekeeping has been done by the extremists with a manichaistic vision of the world who combine being extreme racists who with the pretensions of being antiracists out to destroy hatred. In fact they hate those who are much more moderate than them and perceive that moderation as hatred.
One that is less hostile on groups than the rhetoric against "inferior peoples". Or is it ok for people to advocate against palestnians and not ok to advocate against people who have influence in media, and social media and forums? Well the later is more in line to being against hatred than for it.
This is not a forum nor has ever been a forum where any political rhetoric goes but one where the moderators have always put a thump on the scales. And while I will be responding in a calmer manner, I will never censor the view that is completely against this ideology I speak about. Plus, it matters what opinion people of influence express. Even in lower importance settings with low inluence. And what views do you express? Well, you have ignored all this bloodthirsty rhetoric even some you linked and more besides and other and you only saw fit to imagine hatred against Jews fitting to comment about. When in a conflict when radicalism in favor of Jews that uses the ideology of Jewish superiority and Jews doing no wrong as an asset, negativity is the necessary antidote.
Even though the actual extreme racist rhetoric and advocation for murder here was obviously not against Jews but Palestinians and other groups deemed inferior by the people promoting said rhetoric.
Personally attacking me as hating the Jews when in response to all of this my view was that Jews have a serious problem of racism is you abusing your position as a moderator to personally attack your outgroup based on your sympathies.
It is actually impressive how with so much provocation my rhetoric towards groups like the Jews was restrained to only condemn pervasive racism as a problem and also outside of Jews in general being critical of those advocating of atrocities without myself siding with those who have abused Jews, like Hamas.
I am actually proud of how even handed my views are in comparison with who I am dealing with and the fact I did push back on their hateful rhetoric that promotes atrocities.
But sure, I will stand for the truth with less personal criticisms against the people who advocate for atrocities here.
Now in regards to the issue of who is the hateful in the current political environment.
The reality is that if virtue signalling racist extremists of the politically correct manner where to deradicalize, stopped their propaganda and moderate and listen to the many reasonable criticisms instead of slandering it all as hatred, the world would be a less racist, and hateful place. The people who are reasonable are never going to be perfect to the standards of extremists who see criticism and negativity towards their ingroup as a sin.
This of course applies also to Israel and Gaza conflict and zionism in general. And yes it does applies to groups like Hamas as well.
Plus, human beings are always going to be emotional beings even those who are reasonable enough to qualify as reasonable people. And for the unreasonable filled with fanaticism to lose, the reasonable need to match them in determination and will.
Less provocative racism which we shouldn't appease to, will lead to less proportionate hostility. And will reduce conflict being inflamed. But this would require to have people in positions of power who put their influence to good use for once and gatekeep those who don't. This is me making an observation about the culture war, certainly less flaming the outgroup than the people calling for commiting attrocities, or inferior peoples deserving it. And pertinent to your condemnation of me as hateful. Which is dangerous rhetoric from you considering the willingness of people to harm those perceived as hateful on the Jews.
Pressure in these directions is necessary for less hatred.
I am very much willing to accept the groups I complain about moderating, and have no problem with consistent standards but it would make me happy and consider it a victory for my position. I reject your framing. If those I call progressive supremacists or Jewish supremacists (which excludes Jews who aren't Jewish supremacists and includes non Jews who are Jewish supremacists who I have been quite negative about) abadoning their ideology and accepting that their rights ends where others begins, and vice versa, that their rights also exist, is a great general compromising point. In Israel it would along with far more restraint in dealing with Palestinians (although opposing Hamas is in line with protecting their own rights) and acceptance of how warcrimes of past, present and future are a sin also include of course ending settlements. And I would rather that the racist ideology of Jews did no wrong, Christians and Europeans or non Jews are to blame for interethnic conflict to be abadoned and not tolerated, but without pushing the opposite extreme.
Obviously this position is more moderate and pro Israeli and Jews , than the people I have been arguing with are pro Palestinian. And more pro Jewish than those promoting the Jews didn't do or are doing wrong position. But what makes you angry?
Less "It isn't happening its all in your hateful conspiring head and it is good that it is happening". More "I aknowledge that we or the progressive stack group might have erred in this manner and this isn't how things ought to go and here is how things should change, but lets be fair about it and not go to the other extreme".
Of course, not only many of their critics are reasonable people who are opposing the most pervasive extremism in our time but also even those who are similarly extreme which I am also not a fan of, can in fact make legitimate points too. Indeed, even with the people I complain about, I wouldn't say they are wrong to note that Hamas and the Palestinians supporting it are radicalized too. Which I funnily enough, got zero pushback in observing that fact. It's because people willing to advocate aggressively in favor of Palestinians mistreating Jews are rare here over the opposite.
As far as the more pervasive extremism of the day in western countries, this applies to both racist tribalists for their own groups in line with progressive stack groups and we observe the groups where it is taboo to object to their racism, but not taboo for them to be racist to naturally behave the worse. This is not going to lead to reasonable people objecting being zen monks, and rightfully so.
If it is taboo and racist to oppose the racism of Jews but not taboo for Jews or even non Jews to be racists in favor of Jews, then you got a problem of racism in favor of Jews. Naturally you will get much more of what you incentivize.
Not that complicated and not that hard for people to have a more even handed norm than that, in line with the golden rule. Not hard if people want to do that and much easier if they are incentivized to do that and we put might in service of right instead of defining what is right by might.
And it applies also to the phenomenon I have spent some time talking about which is racist supremacists for a different ethnic group. Note, that I got only a problem with any sort of tribalists for any group if it is above a certain point. It is reasonable for people to like their group. Even handedness is about avoiding certain massive bad behavior, about putting red lines respected reciprocally. It isn't about eliminating racism in an utopian manner that predictably leads to people forgiving the massive and obsessing over the irrelevant.
Not tolerating big problems does include not tolerating the view that inferior peoples should be destroyed.
And it isn't a personal attack but simply a fact that various posters here promote said racist supremacist rhetoric. Completely fair in discussing the culture war to note this fact and acknowledge it as a negative development. How is that radicalized rhetoric not provocative and attention worthy but only the response to it?
Personally I find that it isn't virtuous, or praiseworthy to be silent in line with the more pervasive racist extremism. Nor is it courageous to condemn and punch down on the politically correct targets.
And it is also fair to see the rhetoric in line of mass murder, or carpet bombing the area and ethnically cleansing Palestinians as genocide.
Is there a room in opposition to this ideology and rhetoric? Or are you going to cover with it as a moderator because you sympathize with that faction and paint opposition as hateful? Will you use the position as moderator to impose your perspective?
If you can paint me as hateful, and call this fair, I can only fairly completely reject this framing and say just as fairly as your statement that I stand against hatred you sympathize with, so that is what I advocated here for. So I explain my position over the easy slander.
And I have important reason to do so, because you can get away with your sympathies in the current political environment, for now. While those who are rather more reasonable than you can find themselves mistreated. And you know it. Of course things can change and change in a reasonable direction than the opposite extreme.
Obviously, when we got rather extreme rhetoric against general outgroups here and people promoting extreme rhetoric of their ingroups doing no wrong, others should respond.
Still, in a calmer manner, so there is less of an excuse. So I will change the way I express my values, I won't compromise on being critical of what I ought to be criticizing.
By the way, I don't see the point of you deleting my few posts when you attack me. Isn't this a way for you to paint me in any manner as you please?
Criticism that opposes bloodthirsty fanaticism in fact it is incredibly important to do so and censoring it is feeding a dangerous crocodile. And lack of it has lead to repeated tragedies, while those doing so might be arrogant and contemptuous of those wiser, not knowing what they are doing, when they create interesting times they too will be affected.
As for the general problem of hatred of our times. Those who need to change their ways and behave in a an ethical manner, to avoid their gigantic bias and to stop advocating for attrocities, won't do it when those who are in charge also share their ideology and participate, or enable it. When pushback doesn't exist and in fact it is opposed. So, the key issue here and is to gatekeep better and have ethical people be those in charge who are intolerant of this kind of behavior.
I will consider it a success against hatred if the rhetoric of those who can't coexist with other ethnic groups and don't tolerate their continued existence and are greedy to dominate others are drowned out by those opposing it. Therefore those who would support destroying and oppressing the other ethnic groups stay silent, or actually through incentives never arrive in positions that they are more psychologically susceptible to fall into.
You weren't modded for hating Jews, you were modded for ad hominem attacks on other posters. End of.
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Well no, it's no accident because the mods here ding people for personal attacks, and rafa didn't attack anyone. Besides which, a motte where she can't say what she thinks is a worse motte. It is because I am rational that I allow her shitty argument - so I can argue against it - just as much as it is because of her rationality that she allows my shitty arguments - so she can argue against them.
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I don't remember having ever seen 2rafa try to milk the Holocaust. Maybe she has, somewhere, but I'm at least pretty sure I would have noticed by now if she did it on a regular basis.
I have the sense that you might be projecting your mental concept of what Jewish supremacists are like onto everyone who agrees even partially with things that you consider to be Jewish supremacy adjacent, even if those people do not actually express the ideas that you think they are expressing.
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I agree with rafa. I keep telling you Might Morality and Truth are correlated. As are Weakness, Ignorance and Evil. Parent to child, elder to younger sibling, civilised to barbarian, the stronger is often the wiser.
It’s a strange equivalence op is trying to draw. The more obvious one is that with israeli capabilities , hamas would have killed far more jews in a day than jews ever killed palestinians. palestinians owe their lives to jewish clemency, yet are incapable of it. They are ignorant of their own weakness, and morally childish, which is to say, incompetent and cruel .
Given the comments here and elsewhere, I very much doubt any sincerity when it comes to the alleged 'clemency' on Israels part. Apparently, the only reason jews in Israel have not ethnically cleansed, genocided, holocausted or otherwise brutalized their enemy is because it's a bad tactic at the moment. Because, I would suppose from your comment, there are stronger, morally wiser, more competent and actually merciful people out there that prevent the childish and inane racist power fantasies of hateful zionist jews to come to light.
This is a real mask off moment. Zionists wish suffering and death on women and children. They would take the lives of 1000 innocents in the most torturous way possible to save a single one of theirs. Everything they allege a nazi was they wish they could be.
Evil is usually a bad tactic. The holocaust really slowed down the german war effort. I wish they'd understood how bad genocide is tactically. They could have achieved more objectives for less blood.
Anyway, who's mask off? rafa is always for culling the young male population anywhere, anytime.
I don't recognize the claims of the indians or palestinians , and I don't even need to call them savages, - all they have are earlier claims of conquest that have been nullified by more recent ones.
This is a common idea, but actually the Holocaust barely affected the German war effort. The whole thing used only a very small fraction of the German manpower and logistics capacity, required no rare materials, and may have even paid for itself by providing slave labor.
What do you call a very small fraction? Seems to me large parts of the military were involved in it, or otherwise 'pacifying' to allow the einsatzgruppen to do their work. All of this wouldn't even be necessary if they just played the kind liberators against soviet oppression.
But that's not even the worst waste: Without the antisemitic obsession , jews would be the usual highly productive workforce, like in WWI, and perhaps they could build an atomic bomb for germany, or find another Haber-Bosch, or Fischer-Tropf process. Slave labor benefits, or the value of their gold teeth, are a joke by comparison.
Sorry for the really late reply but yes, I think that you are right that the overall Nazi anti-Jew campaign probably slowed their war effort by, for example, driving a bunch of scientists out of the country. When I wrote my reply, I thought that you were referring specifically to the wartime Holocaust that started around 1941.
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Most of your comment falls on the wrong side of the rules, I think, but this line in particular seems like standard-issue hyperbolic propaganda. Like, show me one instance where this looks literally true, a single instance of Israel selecting "the most torturous way possible" to kill "1000 innocents" for any reason at all, much less to "save a single one of theirs."
This is (apparently!) a hotly contested issue, so I was feeling mildly reluctant to moderate you in spite of the overall badness of the comment, but that sentence in particular just struck me as entirely too much heat, directed toward your outgroup, for what looks like no light at all.
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Not necessarily. If Hamas had Israeli capabilities, they would have different incentives than they currently do. It's possible that they would decide "yeah let's kill as many Jews as we can", but it's also possible that they would decide "you know what, given that the Jews aren't actually an existential threat to us, maybe we should chill out instead of turning most of the world against us by massacring people".
"The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them."
Perhaps all these shall happen...but not before the end of the world
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I'd gladly witness your culling by a militarily superior race in its quest for Lebensraum, so long as it's explicitly justified with this inane correlational logic.
Despite the triteness of this platitude, correlation really does not imply causation. There are some tenuous reasons for morality to be weakly correlated with formidability, but overwhelmingly it's just due to the fact that peoples of Western Christian extraction are the strongest, have been for centuries, and have recently developed some queer compunctions. Well, this particular mix of character traits isn't globally optimal, and their exalted status isn't going to last much longer. Technologically advanced Chinese, Turks, Jews, Arabs, Mongols, Africans, whatever, wherever (including in your nations, including in their halls of power) will be as ruthless as they need to, and increasingly prove this as your race decays; first they'll bother with some glib chattering, then they'll stop. You are used to mercy and magnanimity tempering realpolitik. You'll cope about power being self-justifying, inherently beautiful and ultimately more True than any morality when those shackles are cast away.
Already happened. And my nazi grandfathers had to witness the full extent of their moral, racial, military and epistemologic inferiority. They fought till destruction because they really believed in the correlation, far more than I do. In a way it vindicated the theory while it destroyed them and their particular beliefs.
When you’re living in your bombed-out capital, your conscience sullied, your army destroyed, your reputation infamous, the universe is trying to tell you something. You can immediately exclude the hypothesis of having done anything right, and of your own superiority.
I don't think realpolitik will triumph if the west falls - people have always resisted the athenians, even when it was hopeless - witness the realists anger at Ukraine. If china dominates, they'll just make their own rules russia and the others will have to obey, and the russians will still be grumbling about 'universalism' .
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Eh, I think the use of the word "race" in that quote misleads a bit. All Churchill is really getting across is the old reply to Melos: the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.
Not a very Christian perspective of Churchill, and not one I agree with, but he's not just saying that there's a hierarchy of races, and if you're lower you have no moral claim against your betters.
Yes. That reply is fundamentally repugnant. Bullets, bombs and other horrors exist to punish such foolishness.
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Yes, he's not a scrub loser to appeal to some predefined theoretically just table of ranks. He is saying instead that this hierarchy is established in a contest of strength; that might makes right through its very utilization. It's an explicitly Hitlerist argument, ironically enough – except it doesn't presuppose proven superiority of Aryans. But this does explain, to some extent, why Hitler believed in such tender kinship with Anglo-Saxons.
(fuckduck9000 would say that this he is exactly correct, as demonstrated by German loss and British victory).
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Funny coming from someone like you rather willing to whine about racism, antisemitism while simultaneously pushing your own genocidal and racist supremacist agendas.
Fundamentally your words are hollow and it is BS BS, We Jews are superior (including those of lower IQ and can do as we want.
Like this monstrous inferior savage:
It is true that humans are not equal. And trying to enforce that all groups do equally well is folly. However, there is another way that not all groups are equal. And that is morality.
There is a reason why adults who are smarter are not allowed by any sane society to pray on children who are weaker and lower intelligence.
Some people are cruel, predatory, hypocritical, ingrates, and have all the traits of murderous narcisistic sociopaths. I am not talking hre about da Jews although I think you personally have argued one too many times about carpet bombing middle east and similiar rhetoric although never once been banned for it. Recently you have been promoting the final solution to palestinian problem and genocidal mass murder.
The short of it is that you are willing to destroy civilizations and support attrocities because you are a hateful racist fanatic who lacks decency.
AND when others have even a sane menality critical of your people engaging in this dark racist supremacist path that is pervasive, you whine about racism.
Obviously you wouldn't acceept others treating you by the same coin. Indeed, your whine about nazism is utterly hypocritical considering your only difference is your group you are a racist supremacist for.
I am glad in this instance you show your power level as you have done in others. But trully you are allowed to be this way because of others who are like you.
Anyhow, as you very well know (you are someone who whines about others being racist over petty nonsense when you are this kind of person) the concept but pretend not to, because you are bloodthirsty racist supremacist fanatic, obviously there is a value in certain forms of equality even if the concept of equality going far is utterly idiotic.
And that has to do with rights and equality under the law. Just like we shouldn't let ten dumber people gang up on one smarter person, we should also not allow the later defraud the first. but actually you are no IQ supremacist, having opposed HBDers and having supported AA, but suddenly you become the most hardcore of HBD racist supremacist when it comes to da Jews.
A sane society would not tolerate hateful fanatics like you to promote your propaganda and advocate for warcrimes. Least of all your rhetoric in favor of war crimes and mass murder in the middle east is not unrelated to the millions who died there. And of course your rhetoric in favor of cultural genocide in west, and the vile agendas related to that.
Of course you are contemptible from both a universalistic perspective as a malevolent dishonest predatory and parasitical racist supremacist and a local one. Whether the local funnilly enough applies to pretty much most non jewish groups. And likely those you want to use as goldems against your outgroup.
Wait, what? 2rafa opposing HBDers? I'd have to see the posts to believe it.
I never opposed it (and have pretty much the standard take here, i.e. that the evidence is compelling). As for AA, I think what I said is that HBD and affirmative action aren’t actually mutually exclusive under a tribal spoils system, but again, I don’t think that has much to do with the point he’s trying to make.
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In my more optimistic moments I believe that all the "extermination by Artificial SuperIntelligence" fears will prove to be unfounded, because the sorts of strategies we use to train LLMs will also be used to train future superintelligence to share human values.
In my more pessimistic moments I believe that all the "extermination by Artificial SuperIntelligence" fears will prove to be inevitable, because the sorts of strategies we use to train LLMs will also be used to train future superintelligence to share human values.
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No, it certainly is not, in the sense of moral worth that you are explicitly appealing to.
I thought HBD was just about population averages in performance, not moral worth? Have I not been told that over and over again for years now? ...In any case, I do thank you for the citation.
We learn nothing. The foolishness of Enlightenment Progressivism is without bound. You and everyone else making similar arguments here know for a fact that you have no rigorous, objective, scientific materialist standard for "better" or "higher-grade" or "worldly-wise" other than raw strength. Your appeal is pure Might Makes Right, and you make it because you have lost the ability to even imagine that the roles could be reversed.
No, that is not possible, nor has it ever been possible. When you design a better microprocessor, that does not give you or your culture additional moral value. Technological advancement does not, cannot, and never will imply moral value. It doesn't matter if I'm knapping flints and you're building star destroyers: our moral responsibilities to each other remain entirely unaltered. To think otherwise is to fatally misunderstand both morality and technology on an extremely basic level.
Describe for me the moral gradations between murder with a stone versus a flint knife, a bronze sword, an arrow, a bullet, or a laser-guided fragmentation submunition. Show me the moral difference between strangling a person with my bare hands and disassembling them with sci-fi nanotechnology. Show me the objective moral difference between oral storytelling around a campfire and Avengers: Endgame, or between a horse and an airplane. What is the moral value of refined aluminum, and what is the exchange rate in charred corpses of your friends and family? What is the atomic mass of love or mercy, or the molecular weight of justice?
Of course, you and most other rational materialists don't actually believe in moral value or morality in any meaningful sense, as these threads have amply demonstrated. They are just words to you, made-up labels to be applied where convinient, because ultimately there is no meaning or value to anything at all, no final accounting, no judge and therefore no justice, beyond that enforced by your own strong arm. And of course, when the nuke goes off in Tel Aviv some day, or the tech shifts the wrong way and its Israelis getting slaughtered down to the old men and the infants, that will not be "a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place", will it? Because chip fabs and language models, right?
There's a reason I'm not an Israeli, namely that I think the chances of Israel losing (everything) are much higher than most people, and especially most Jews, recognize. My existence in the diaspora is comfortable enough, and as such (a sign of loyalty, perhaps) I also don't favor additional (or any) American/Western aid for Israel. Nevertheless, both as a Jew and a supporter of civilization in the endless struggle against savagery, barbarism, and low IQ nonsense, I won't shed any tears if the Israelis decide (and successfully ensure) that enough is enough. The Holocaust was a tragedy of history and, though I don't particularly consider German civilization superior to Jewish civilization, we got fucked and many of us paid the price. That is life, and though I have thoughts on the general principles of the matter, I personally harbor no illusions that I am morally superior to a German or Palestinian, nor do I care to be.
Fair enough, then, and I apologize for interpreting your comments otherwise.
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I think Jews are mostly quite aware of, and discuss incessantly, Israel lacking strategic depth and being in a precarious situation and having no choice but to preemptively strike etc etc; if anything, they overestimate the threat from its utterly inept or degraded, and frankly well-taught in previous wars, neighbors.
What they do get wrong is the relative danger of being in the Diaspora, because they take deluded Whites lending vocal support to Hamas and other savages too seriously, and extrapolate this incoherent virtue-signaling gibberish to willingness for participating in or enabling Antisemitic violence locally. I appreciate that progressive Jews at, say, Harvard may experience very… interesting emotions right now; but realistically, they're unlikely to ever get hit with more than a variant of anti-white anti-colonial invective from their peers. Hence «there is only one country where it's safe to live while being a Jew» refrain. (Though judging by Twitter and in light of recent events, India might quality).
Then again, I may be overestimating human rationality and pacification again.
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I regret that I have but one upvote to give.
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HBD is a fact, what policy implications you draw from it are a function of the rest of your values.
Me? I think we should gene therapy the living shit out of the human population until everyone is at least a 180 IQ Ubermensch, potentially to the limits of human biology and other relevant tradeoffs. Skin color should no more determine your more relevant qualities than the shade of lipstick you choose to wear.
Should. Not does, at present. We look for trillion dollar bills on the pavement, not realizing that it is the pavement. Or at least I hope a bill for a sum so large should reflect it.
I also happen to be less than sympathetic to the accusations of racism of the gaps that provoked the Great Awokening, since any discrepancies are best explained by HBD instead.
And heretofore, HBD proponents have vociferously denied that they consider those of lower genetic IQ to be morally inferior. And yet, here we are.
You also think that less-sophisticated people should be massacred by "more sophisticated" people, if they turn out to be troublesome. The fact that genetic engineering is considerably more hypothetical than massacre engineering raises immediate concerns.
HBD proponents are a heterogeneous group. And if we're talking about 2rafa who seems to have brought it up in this subthread, I'm fairly sure she considers a whole lot of people (including most of us) to be her inferiors in all ways.
Whether there's an "evil gene" (or genes) is in an interesting question, but my guess is that if there is, it's at fixation in the human population. And is a separate thing from IQ. Being stupid doesn't make you evil, though it may make you become more easily convinced that evil things which are not in your self interest actually are.
I certainly don’t consider you my inferior, Nybbler!
At least until the Gobbler model comes out
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Well, I can't speak for all of them. I just happen to prefer assigning some moral worth on the basis of IQ, and today, race serves as a strong proxy. They could be pink and blue with elephant ears for all I really care. Or a mind upload.
"Should" seems a bit strong if I stop to assess everything I've uttered on the matter today. If there was a peaceful solution, I'd take it, but if there isn't, then I won't complain at all if the Israelis stamp out their opposition instead of letting it fester. Largely because I think the total amount of violence necessary over a longer period will be lower if it's frontloaded.
I certainly wish it were otherwise.
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Yeah, that's never going to happen. We don't have full control of our genes and I'm going to bet even slight tweaks to skin color will have a measurable effect on intelligence. (In either way. Who knows, maybe 300% melanin will actually make us hyper intelligent or whatever).
Whatever genes you alter to change faces, hair, body size. Literally any structural or outward appearance of a human will also alter their brains. It's all interconnected.
I find this a very dubious assertion, within my limit of understanding of genetics. Which I would hope is better than average, even if I don't claim domain expertise like say, our Chris Pratt Dino Wrangler friend can say.
Yes, DNA is unadulterated spaghetti code, but it's not so intractable that something like melanin production can't be targeted without, a priori, not expecting it to blow up the kidneys of something. If I was designing something, I would look for a way to down regulate melanocyte stimulating hormone, to the degree feasible without say, causing visual problems as seen in albinos.
While skin tone isn't a Mendelian trait, I see no reason to think it can't be managed.
As for other phenotypical traits, it depends, but once again I have reason for optimism, or at least faith in plastic surgery. It doesn't have to be a germline modification, you can probably pull it off in-utero or later, the bones have to grow, unless you have a really bad case of baby face.
And since my end goal is liberation from biology in the form of an existence as a mind upload, then I'd say I don't particularly care either way.
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That's obviously true. But I don't think 2rafa believes a pious 90 IQ Mizrahim settler is morally less worthy than a 150 IQ Persian academic (despite likely preferring the company of the latter); and the 160 IQ Netanyahu certainly would rather have the latter assassinated to ensure the safety of the former.
It's all friend vs enemy; or worse yet, hot take vs hot take. Descriptive frameworks are used to justify normative beliefs that themselves are little more than habitual verbal behavior. It gets pretty tiresome.
«Он знает, что ничто не застанет его врасплох и ничто не заставит сделать какое-нибудь отступление от той сети пустых и насквозь прогнивших афоризмов, в которую он закутался с головы до ног. Для него не существует ни горя, ни радости, ни ненависти, ни любви. Весь мир, в его глазах, есть гроб, могущий служить лишь поводом для бесконечного пустословия.»
Are many settlers Mizrachim? In any case I find the settlements project inanely justified by a religious ideology I don’t believe in and unnecessarily provocative at best. The ‘67 borders are amenable to me, although I’d have the Saudis run the Palestinian state. As for who should be in power, well you know my opinion of democracy.
Many of my friends were (gentile) Persians growing up, and many of them still are. It is entirely feasible that a smart Persian academic, even one committed to Israel’s destruction, might have higher moral worth than a 90 IQ Religious Zionist. Iranian hostility to Israel is the result of a PR exercise by the mullahs, it can evaporate within months of regime change. Palestinian hostility, due to the fundamental nature of dispossession, is much more intractable.
‘My people’ are smart, secular, Ashkenazim, although we have thrown our lot in with some I find much more unsavory. Nevertheless, when it comes to broad principles, Iran isn’t discriminating between the settlement fanatic (few or none of whom seem to have been killed on Saturday) and a version of me in Israel, so there is little choice in whom to support for now.
And you cannot disconnect IQ from moral worth entirely. It is immoral when something beautiful is destroyed by something uglier and more vulgar. This is in part why we find rape so abhorrent, it is why the Mongol horde razing civilization to the ground is such a deeply ingrained (often subconscious) cultural motif. So yes, Bronze Age savagery by a people who have not contributed to the wider human race in a millennium and who would rather live in poverty and squalor than kneel is morally less noble than, say, the settlement of the Americas by Europeans, regardless of the individual moral worth of members of that culture.
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The problem is that in this case, slave morality has been adopted and is being promoted by the dominant and technologically superior civilization. Wouldn’t that make it the pinnacle of human progress? Does your parochial tribe have any right not to embrace diversity and tolerance; does it even have the power for much longer? Especially since it was so intimately involved in the birth of these values (at the very least you acted as midwives).
It’s no coincidence that taking Churchill’s stance here on anything other than Palestine is unthinkable nowadays, nor is it really a good sign of things to come. Given enough time, generational loss of hypocrisy may well prevail over Holocaust guilt-mongering.
I think slave morality is a feature of modern Western hegemony. All it took was 9/11 (casualty rate of 1/10th of the Israeli death rate so far per capita) for American bloodlust to explode to current-Israeli proportions. Ann Coulter infamously spoke for many Americans when she said after 9/11 that
Diversity and tolerance are luxury patrician ideologies, Americans will be no different if or when the time comes.
Yet the meme from that era that survives to this day is the ‘religion of peace’ one. It seems it would be better to describe this as an emergency belief, a temporary unprincipled exception to the general notion of virtuous victimhood that reasserts itself as soon as passions die down.
Note also the WWII analogy: the myth she invokes is absolutely central to the current incarnation of slave morality. Hitler was an avatar of absolute evil precisely because of his blatant disregard of human rights and universalism. He oppressed the weak and powerless more than anyone ever had. This was so unspeakably, cosmologically evil that it easily excuses the unprecedented suffering inflicted upon the German population, the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of young Americans, becoming an accomplice in Stalin’s crimes etc. When Americans start comparing themselves to Hadrian instead, I’ll believe they’re getting uncucked.
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Oh, punching down is absolutely more moral than punching up in the modern western world. The "Up" basically pays for the continued existence of the "Down" these days, and thus punching up is nothing more than biting the hand that feeds you, the crime that Dante punished down at the very center of the lowest circle of hell, right next to where Satan was imprisoned.
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Is there any evidence Palestinians lack other options if they got rid of Hamas? And Israel would be forced to allow a S Africa type situation in a short time?
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I think that a good example could be found around the founding of Israel. Were there atrocities when Israel was the weaker side on the brink of extinction - rapes used as a weapon of war. People gathered in building set on fire. Summary executions of Palestinian non combatants. These are not rhetorical questions - the Wikipedia articles are grossly inadequate.
Are they? The lists of killings and massacres in Mandatory Palestine and during the 1948 war and in Israel seem pretty thorough. Everybody was massacring the hell out of everybody else, including Irgun bombings of civilians, summary execution of Arab civilians for violating curfews they hadn't been notified of, and one massacre by IDF forces with 3 or 4 reported rapes. Fog of war, biased reporting, etc., but AFAIK nobody objective thinks there's a side without blood on their hands there. At most they try to excuse or disavow some or all of it. (Or both? I don't recall any Law of Merited Impossibility apologetics here but maybe that's just my inattention or bad memory.)
I'm not actually aware of a "People gathered in building set on fire" massacre, though. You're not thinking about the Cinema Rex fire at the start of the Iranian Revolution?
It's common enough trough history. I was not mentioning the war, just a list of most despicable things that are less than Nanking
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It's not luxury, it's capability. Luxury implies that it shouldn't be held against Hamas.
The firebombings could be justified if they took out some doomsday weapon that was guaranteed to win Japan the war and there was no other way to stop them. I don't believe the firebombings would qualify, there wasn't much to threaten the US by that point.
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There is little evidence Israel wants this. Hamas chooses to put its rocket launchers on top of hospitals because making Israel look like a big meanie is their only tactic with any hope of success.
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