International Politics

[steviewevie]

1 minute ago, lost said:

 

Like Russians calling Ukranians Nazi's or Ukranians calling Russians Orc's. War isn't nice.

 

I guess Israel could use that in their defence....War isn't nice. We said these things and then killed all these people, but we were angry.

[Neil]

28 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

That is the Israeli argument. 

But then some Israeli leaders have said things...calling them human animals etc....whilst at same time destroying them. 

i don't see iyt as an attempt to wipe everyonme out, its abou causing damage and not giving a sh*t about consequences.

[steviewevie]

10 minutes ago, Neil said:

i don't see iyt as an attempt to wipe everyonme out, its abou causing damage and not giving a sh*t about consequences.

 

Yes, think so too...so not sure if that would be considered as genocide...have to see what ICJ decides. Definitely a whole load of war crimes have been committed though.

But even if ICJ did decide Israel had been carrying out genocide, or genocidal acts, Israel and US would just refute and ignore it...not sure about UK...

[Neil]

8 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

 

Yes, think so too...so not sure if that would be considered as genocide...have to see what ICJ decides. Definitely a whole load of war crimes have been committed though.

But even if ICJ did decide Israel had been carrying out genocide, or genocidal acts, Israel and US would just refute and ignore it...not sure about UK...

agree.

[MEGATRONICMEATWAGON]

22 hours ago, 1986 said:

 

No anger or aggression here either, and I'll try and address one point at a time. Starting by saying that no one is claiming that antisemitism isn't rife in the world or that it doesn't exist. And no one is defending the murder of 1500 civilians enjoying a music festival. But you can't just write off a genocide or tar people who are protesting an actual  ongoing ethnic cleansing as being covered in antisemitism. It's just not true.

 

On the protests, I've been to 2 of them in London and they have been overwhelmingly peaceful, at their peak they reached half a million people and less than 1% of them caused any trouble. I can't speak for worldwide but from what I've read these college campus occupations have been escalated by the police, not the students. Worth noting as well there is a strong Jewish representation at a lot of demonstrations as well, including the ones I've been to, because they don't agree in genocide in their name. Are they antisemetic?

 

I'm sure there are some wackos who targeted one particular woman for singing an (albeit potentially targeted and tone deaf) song but you've also over simplified the actual issue most people have with Israel's inclusion in Eurovision, which (apart from them not being European) is simple - Israel has been taking part in a genocide of Palestinians since October 8th (and general apartheid and war crimes and murders for 70 years before that). If Russia aren't allowed to play anymore, Israel should have been banned a long time ago.

 

On the ceasefire issue, that's not actually true, Hamas have offered the hostages back on a few occasions now (some sources saying as early as 2 days after their attack), but Israel, to the fury of the families has said no. Also worth noting the IDF have actually killed Israeli hostages by "accident," presumably mistaking them for Palestinian citizens which as we know has been fair game as far as they're concerned. Israel has also turned down other offers for ceasefire brokered by countries such as Egypt. Their overall goal is clear.

 

A genuinely equal two-state solution has never been offered, and why would it? Israel has all the power and weapons and takes the homes of Palestinian people when it feels like it. Including now in the West Bank, where Hamas doesn't operate but for some reason has still seen hundreds of deaths of Palestinians and yet more land grabs. This quote from the NYT sums up Netanyahu's stance on the subject.

 

 

You're absolutely right, this pre dates Oct 7th by a long time. I assume the '48 war you're referring to is the Nakba, which wasn't much of a war so much as a hostile take over. A quick Google sums up what happened during that particular conflict.

 

Moving on to the phrase that you equate to a white supremacist chant, again without labouring it, a quick search found The Guardian's explanation of it which is;

“Between the river and the sea” is a fragment from a slogan used since the 1960s by a variety of people with a host of purposes. And it is open to an array of interpretations, from the genocidal to the democratic.

The full saying goes: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” – a reference to the land between the Jordan River, which borders eastern Israel, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west.

(Screengrab of that wouldn't work on that for some reason)

Sounds much more complicated than just ending of Jewish people, because it is. Language develops over time and if you listen to interviews of the people actually saying the chant today, and not the likes of Suella Braverman, it's purpose is what it says - from the river Jordan to the Med, Palestine will be free to self govern and live in dignity. The clear reason for this chant today is Palestinians do not live in any measurable freedom and haven't for many years, they have lived under constant apartheid and blockade where the IDF control their food and medicine supplies and can shoot anyone on site when they feel like it (and often do). Of course this phrase can be misused by the wrong types, but again it's less than productive to conveniently throw antisemetic at everyone who uses it for genuine activist reasons. 

 

There is plenty of examples of real antisemitism in the world we should be tackling, calling out Israel for their constant war crimes is not one of them.

 

 

 

Thank you for your detailed response and some of it is certainly new to me. 

 

Firstly, I'm also of the opinion that to call it a genocide or ethnic cleansing is wide of the mark. There are Arab-Palestinians living in Israel (over 2 million) and they have all the rights (so, I have read so far) that Israelis do. They can vote, be elected into office, work as they choose etc. If Israel was really enacting genocide there would be far better ways of going about it than they currently are. Carpet bombing at will or not warning civilians to leave certain areas before they go in with ground forces. The worldwide average for urban warfare is the death of 9 civilians for every 1 combatant. If - a very big if, we were to trust the Hamas stats on how many people have died, we're looking at 2.5 civilians to 1 combatant death. Again, to me, none of that demonstrates a genocide or will to ethnically cleanse Gaza.

 

As for Jewish people at protests against Israel's actions, I'm not saying that by virtue of being at the protests is antisemitic, but certainly there has been a running undertone across the globe from NYC to Sydney to London to Hamburg of antisemitism. You can watch multiple videos of people chanting en masse Death to Israel, Gas the Jews, calling for Jihad or Intifada. There is also a noticeable undercurrent of hatred for LBTQ groups who would like to support the Palestinians, yet they are turned on as well by their fellow protestors. Meanwhile, in Israel, they have the most progressive human rights for LGBT in the whole of the Middle East.

 

About the hostage situation, it's true Hamas did offer to give back all the hostages if Israel agreed to not enter Gaza, but of course Israel would never have accepted that deal. Why would they? They just lost 1,400 innocent people - the majority of which weren't just killed, but women were gang raped and shot in the head as men climaxed, babies put in ovens, women thrown over pickups and paraded through streets with hundreds of people running after them cheering. It was like they were killing with a sense of happiness at all. There was absolutely no chance Israel was going to say, "Okay, you killed our people in the worst ways possible, give us back the 200 hostages and we'll call it quits."

 

To compare it to the Ukraine-Russia war and why Russia is banned from the Euros or Eurovision etc, Israel didn't just decide one day to push into Gaza and start shooting. If Oct 7th hadn't happened, the Palestinians wouldn't be paying the price for their Hamas leaders' attack. And Oct 7th wasn't even the start of the resentment towards Hamas. Hamas has fired about eight thousand missiles towards Israel since they took power in 2007 and in the original Hamas Charter from 1988 they had a clear directive - The Preamble to the 1988 Charter stated: ″Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam invalidates it, just as it invalidated others before it″. It emphasizes the importance of jihad for the Palestinian question, adding that "initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavours." - Also highlighting perhaps why no peace deals or two-state solution has come about, because frankly, Hamas (and about 60% of the people in Gaza who support them, just want Israel to vanish completely).

 

The revised Charter in 2017 tried to roll back on the antisemitism, but after a couple of decades of hatred, 8k rockets, and then October 7th and the gleeful barbarity of it all, Israel finally said enough is enough.

 

I would say though that the settlements in the West Bank are hotly contested to their legality, that's true. But as it stands, there is no state there. If any of the negotiations over a two-state solution had actually come to fruition, I doubt the settlements would be still going up. Even now, the settlements only account for about 5% of the land in the West Bank. Not to mention Israel did remove some of the settlements in Gaza and the West Bank in 2005.

 

And the last point, the screengrab from the Guardian, even they acknowledge the chant can be interpreted as being genocidal in that very same quote.

 

My feeling is that unless the Palestinians actively protest Hamas instead of Jewish people like the singer at Eurovision, and hand back the hostages, and overthrow Hamas, there won't be peace in the area for a very long time.

 

I do agree though for any two-state solution to work, the Israeli people also need to oust Netanyahu from power and install a more open-minded person at the top.

 

 

Edited May 14 by MEGATRONICMEATWAGON

[steviewevie]

26 minutes ago, MEGATRONICMEATWAGON said:

 

Thank you for your detailed response and some of it is certainly new to me. 

 

Firstly, I'm also of the opinion that to call it a genocide or ethnic cleansing is wide of the mark. There are Arab-Palestinians living in Israel (over 2 million) and they have all the rights (so, I have read so far) that Israelis do. They can vote, be elected into office, work as they choose etc. If Israel was really enacting genocide there would be far better ways of going about it than they currently are. Carpet bombing at will or not warning civilians to leave certain areas before they go in with ground forces. The worldwide average for urban warfare is the death of 9 civilians for every 1 combatant. If - a very big if, we were to trust the Hamas stats on how many people have died, we're looking at 2.5 civilians to 1 combatant death. Again, to me, none of that demonstrates a genocide or will to ethnically cleanse Gaza.

 

As for Jewish people at protests against Israel's actions, I'm not saying that by virtue of being at the protests is antisemitic, but certainly there has been a running undertone across the globe from NYC to Sydney to London to Hamburg of antisemitism. You can watch multiple videos of people chanting en masse Death to Israel, Gas the Jews, calling for Jihad or Intifada. There is also a noticeable undercurrent of hatred for LBTQ groups who would like to support the Palestinians, yet they are turned on as well by their fellow protestors. Meanwhile, in Israel, they have the most progressive human rights for LGBT in the whole of the Middle East.

 

About the hostage situation, it's true Hamas did offer to give back all the hostages if Israel agreed to not enter Gaza, but of course Israel would never have accepted that deal. Why would they? They just lost 1,400 innocent people - the majority of which weren't just killed, but women were gang raped and shot in the head as men climaxed, babies put in ovens, women thrown over pickups and paraded through streets with hundreds of people running after them cheering. It was like they were killing with a sense of happiness at all. There was absolutely no chance Israel was going to say, "Okay, you killed our people in the worst ways possible, give us back the 200 hostages and we'll call it quits."

 

To compare it to the Ukraine-Russia war and why Russia is banned from the Euros or Eurovision etc, Israel didn't just decide one day to push into Gaza and start shooting. If Oct 7th hadn't happened, the Palestinians wouldn't be paying the price for their Hamas leaders' attack. And Oct 7th wasn't even the start of the resentment towards Hamas. Hamas has fired about eight thousand missiles towards Israel since they took power in 2007 and in the original Hamas Charter from 1988 they had a clear directive - The Preamble to the 1988 Charter stated: ″Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam invalidates it, just as it invalidated others before it″. It emphasizes the importance of jihad for the Palestinian question, adding that "initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavours." - Also highlighting perhaps why no peace deals or two-state solution has come about, because frankly, Hamas (and about 60% of the people in Gaza who support them, just want Israel to vanish completely).

 

The revised Charter in 2017 tried to roll back on the antisemitism, but after a couple of decades of hatred, 8k rockets, and then October 7th and the gleeful barbarity of it all, Israel finally said enough is enough.

 

I would say though that the settlements in the West Bank are hotly contested to their legality, that's true. But as it stands, there is no state there. If any of the negotiations over a two-state solution had actually come to fruition, I doubt the settlements would be still going up. Even now, the settlements only account for about 5% of the land in the West Bank. Not to mention Israel did remove some of the settlements in Gaza and the West Bank in 2005.

 

And the last point, the screengrab from the Guardian, even they acknowledge the chant can be interpreted as being genocidal in that very same quote.

 

My feeling is that unless the Palestinians actively protest Hamas instead of Jewish people like the singer at Eurovision, and hand back the hostages, and overthrow Hamas, there won't be peace in the area for a very long time.

 

I do agree though for any two-state solution to work, the Israeli people also need to oust Netanyahu from power and install a more open-minded person at the top.

 

 

 

extremists on all sides seem to have taken over, muslim brotherhood nutters in Hamas, and kahanist nutters in Israeli government.

 

[steviewevie]

Biden imposes 100% tariff on China made electric cars...all very trumpian. Will we do same?

[steviewevie]

All kicking off in Georgia.

[fred quimby]

3 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

Biden imposes 100% tariff on China made electric cars...all very trumpian. Will we do same?

Looks like everyone wants to. EU are putting large tariffs.  They can just make them cheap and masses . Next they will move production closure

[Neil]

great post @MEGATRONICMEATWAGON

[steviewevie]

11 minutes ago, Neil said:

great post @MEGATRONICMEATWAGON

ultimately it was always go back to Jews wanting a state where they are not a minority that can be persecuted and their historical links to Palestine, and Arabs that have lived in Palestine for centuries and don't themselves want to become a minority.

[Neil]

28 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

ultimately it was always go back to Jews wanting a state where they are not a minority that can be persecuted and their historical links to Palestine, and Arabs that have lived in Palestine for centuries and don't themselves want to become a minority.

its about more than majority/minority, it about possession/dispossession. the Palestinians can't accept any peace deal because that would be them accepting that they've been dispossessed of their land, their farms their homes, and culture All the while they keep up the struggle they can tell themselves that  they can win those things back.

[steviewevie]

3 minutes ago, Neil said:

its about more than majority/minority, it about possession/dispossession. the Palestinians can't accept any peace deal because that would be them accepting that they've been dispossessed of their land, their farms their homes, and culture All the while they keep up the struggle they can tell themselves that  they can win those things back.

well they've lost so much it's difficult...and Hamas will feel emboldened that although so many Palestinian lives have been destroyed Israel have lost a lot of support globally.

[MEGATRONICMEATWAGON]

1 hour ago, Neil said:

great post @MEGATRONICMEATWAGON

 

Cheers, Neil!

[MEGATRONICMEATWAGON]

1 hour ago, steviewevie said:

Biden imposes 100% tariff on China made electric cars...all very trumpian. Will we do same?

 

I just read about that actually, how Biden wants to also look tough on China, as Trump was. Biden and the Dems would never say that Trump was right however. 

 

In the last couple of years Germany (I live in Germany, hence why I'm including them in the discussion 😛) has already mulled over tariffs on cars to protect their own production and have blocked deals from Chinese investors trying to gain sizeable chunks of companies in all kinds of sectors. Hamburg's port, semiconductors, and medical equipment providers. Which is hilarious given that Merkel was warning Trump not to start a trade war with China just five years ago. 

Edited May 14 by MEGATRONICMEATWAGON

[MEGATRONICMEATWAGON]

5 hours ago, steviewevie said:

 

extremists on all sides seem to have taken over, muslim brotherhood nutters in Hamas, and kahanist nutters in Israeli government.

 

 

Now I have to go and read up on Kahanism, lol. 

[steviewevie]

.

Edited May 15 by steviewevie

[steviewevie]

 

[efcfanwirral]

 

Don't know if it fits in international 

or UK but, thoughts? Alongside the slow build up of war propaganda recently around conscription and the like.

 

This is essentially saying fight them directly in Ukraine or it'll be a Nato country next and we'll have to fight them there.

Edited May 15 by efcfanwirral

[steviewevie]

6 hours ago, efcfanwirral said:

 

Don't know if it fits in international 

or UK but, thoughts? Alongside the slow build up of war propaganda recently around conscription and the like.

 

This is essentially saying fight them directly in Ukraine or it'll be a Nato country next and we'll have to fight them there.

 

Well yes Russia could defeat Ukraine over the next few months...Russia has been building and buying a sh*t loads of weapons, and has more people to throw at it, and Ukraine are kind of exhausted and supplies have been cut over the last 6 months because of Reublicans blocking things in senate (under command of Trump apparently). So a push over this summer is expected, and looks like it has started. But Ukraine will now start getting more weapons from US etc so may or may not be able to resist.

So Russia push might win and they take the whole of Ukraine, or Ukraine holds them off and then there is another counteroffensive and they push Russia back to its borders, or most likely there is some sort of deal maybe after US election and Ukraine loses some of its land to Russia but becomes a member or closer to Nato. Whether that would be acceptable to Putin who knows. If Trump gets in who knows. Say Trump is in and starts talking about pulling out of Nato or less funds for Nato or whatever, and then Russia take Ukraine, and then start on Estonia, what do european nations do? What does Poland do? Or Germany?

Or Putin falls out of a window and some nice guy takes over.

We are definitely heading into turbulent times though, Russia-Ukraine, Israel-Gaza, China-Taiwan. All the ingredients are there, and lots more countries have nukes these days. And to top it off we have the possibility of Trump getting into office, and f**k knows what that will throw into the mix.

[steviewevie]

[HotChipWillBreakYourLegs]

Starvation as a weapon of war.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/16/palestinian-lorry-drivers-israeli-settlers-attack-gaza-aid-convoy

 

[lazyred]

The Isreali cabinet are split on what to do with Gaza. The Defence minister Gallant is supported by Gantz who the US are backing. 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/15/israel-war-cabinet-split-looms-as-defence-minister-demands-plan-for-post-war-gaza

 

[steviewevie]

 

[steviewevie]