you are right — Number2018

No need to read the rest after this line

Solutions? Anything? Anyone? — tim wood

Did you miss my post? I'll save you scrolling up:

Here is TPF, a self-styled philosophy site, and nearly everyone posting has reverted to hostility and anger whether actively or reactively. Let's instead create solutions.
— tim wood

That's because they seek to attribute blame, rather than understanding that both sides are afflicted by religious identity. The solution is simple - accept that we are all human beings, evolved from animal ignorance over thousands of years, and that religion occurs in the course of evolution, for the political purpose of uniting hunter gatherer tribes in a multi-tribal social group.

It took primitive man 35,000 years to figure out that tribes who believed in the same God, and the same set of moral laws could live together in peace. The problem occurs when one civilisation established on this basis, comes into contact with another, similarly constituted civilisation. They then have the same problem they started with - and theoretically, the solution is the same as it was for hunter gatherers. But I'm quietly confident humankind will become extinct before adopting science as a common understanding of reality. — counterpunch

Israel is a client state of the US. Nothing they do happens without the latter's backing. The game to be played is a long one. — StreetlightX

More like the is US an ally of Israel and Israel decides what to do. You see, client states get orders from their masters and here that isn't happening. For the US relations with Israel is above all a domestic policy.

And this isn't because only of AIPAC, it's because Christian evangelists back wholeheartedly Israel, hence the US doesn't treat Israel as a normal country. The whole situation has become to this as everybody panders to religious zealots.

Videos like these are also why the other unthinking line of justification - "Israel has a right to defend itself" - will be showen to be the hollow, cynical, joke that it is. No one with a working lung and spleen will ever be able to take it seriously again. — StreetlightX

Additionally discloses how untenable the Zionist line that only one side of this conflict is a "terrorist organization", despite whatever Olympic-level mental gymnastics will be conducted to justify this and similar attacks that are aired live.

Didn't miss it. Did it escape you that it was not responsive? But of course if you're right, why bother? Israelis and Palestinians, Counterpunch is sure it's hopeless, so have at it. And everyone else. save your breath. Is that your position, your "solution"?

Countries consist of millions of people interacting and consist of multiple different layers of government and in addition to those governments you have countless institutions which have their own rules and norms. To treat a country as if it were an individual person is just not a realistic description. Sure, there may be problems in certain institutions and not in others. Does that mean the entire country is just basically one person that we label as "evil?" Even powerful political leaders can't just press a button to make a certain problem go away unless it's totalitarianism. — BitconnectCarlos

I never label entire countries or people as "evil". I have opposed such views in this thread. But to say that morality doesn't properly apply in the context of international relations because states are not individuals is an evasion. Every single actor in a state has the ability to choose the moral course of action. The unwillingness of some to do so does not excuse the others. The excuse that one was "just following orders" has been thoroughly discredited by the experience of the Holocaust.

Someone has to pull the trigger, fly the plane, drop the bomb. Someone has to select the target, give the order, enforce discipline. Someone has to write the speech, make it, campaign for their view. Someone has to cast the vote, remain silent, pay their taxes.

Everyone here has a choice. Many of these are hard choices. But to claim that noone has a choice because other people are involved is a cowardly evasion.

Solutions? Anything? Anyone? — tim wood

An immediate unilateral de-escalation by the Israeli government / armed forces. A stop to further expansion of settlements.

It's a microcosm of the history of humanity in a sense. Thousand upon thousand of senseless deaths and for what? Pride? "Security"? Nationalism? And yet here we are. We're born after a very long time, live in the little blue planet we're burning up for a nano-second, and we'll return to nothing for ever. To be killed in such a brutal manner, for mere political theatre is digusting. — Manuel

Well said. An author once said something along these lines: a thousand years from now, when the children's children's children look at this in the history book, will they see anything other than a tragedy? Death and destruction over such fantasies as religion and nations, which in due time will all disappear or morph unrecognisably anyways.

Didn't miss it. Did it escape you that it was not responsive? But of course if you're right, why bother? Israelis and Palestinians, Counterpunch is sure it's hopeless, so have at it. And everyone else. save your breath. Is that your position, your "solution"? — tim wood

Did it escape you that it was not responsive? — tim wood

Could you explain what you mean by this?

You asked for solutions. I explained the real nature of the problem and gave you the solution. The solution is sound. It's not the fault of the solution that it will - almost certainly, not be adopted.

1,111 posts on this forum, on this subject, met by indifference similar to your own, convince me of that.

One problem Israel faces, aside from those already mentioned, is that it's an extremely paranoid state — Manuel

This is true. And the problem with paranoia is that, as you said, it is self-fulfilling. However the present violence comes to a lull - it won't be an end - Israel will come out on the other side of this even more paranoid than before. Considering that most everyone can see it for the terrorist state that it is, I have no doubt it will double down - because it has no other choice. Things will get worse before they get better.

One thing that's not mentioned as much as it really, really ought to be is the fact that much of the current violence is a cynical election ploy by Netanyahu, who has been stuck at electoral idle for 2 years now and is hoping this nationalist surge will finally break him out of his current political impotence. It's a gamble (a 'good' one, as far as murder goes), and if he wins, he'll take it as a vindication and things will get unimaginably bad. If it doesn't - I dunno, the Israeli political system will stay in it's current black hole and that could take it anywhere.

An immediate unilateral de-escalation by the Israeli government / armed forces. A stop to further expansion of settlements. — Echarmion

For a start; imo not enough. That is, it will take more than that. I think it will take fully embracing Palestinian self-determination and working toward its realization. But do you think, as I do, that 1) the Palestinians at least at the moment have little or no useful concept of self-realization, and 2) that their "allies" have crushed it out of them and are not interested in its return? And there's a potential irony in this: that to have peace, the Israelis will have to fight just as hard for the Palestinians and their interests as they now do against them - or even harder because in that event they will be dealing more directly with the real enemies.

I don't think any dead Palestinians - victims of present Israeli war crimes - would care for this wordy bullshit justifying their murder, but it's quite easy to see that this proliferation of Symbolic, jargon-filled babble is nothing but a reaction-formation aimed at avoiding at all costs the Real of Isreali genocide. See, I can play this game too! Difference is, someone will actually read this instead of having their eyes glaze over five words in.

Ok. But what is your deepest desire? Is it identical
to what was behind your previous the most intensive debates?

One of the nice things about discussing Israel-Palestine is just how clear-cut and totally unambiguous the moral lines are. The claims of 'complexity' are nothing more than political demobilizers, meant to muddy the waters and stall out action. There's a clip circulating around of the late, great Michael Brooks, and he makes this point better than I possibly could:

Or for some reading: https://www.jacobinmag.com/2021/05/israel-palestine-sheikh-jarrah-al-aqsa-mosque

Well said. An author once said something along these lines: a thousand years from now, when the children's children's children look at this in the history book, will they see anything other than a tragedy? Death and destruction over such fantasies as religion and nations, which in due time will all disappear or morph unrecognisably anyways. — Echarmion

Yes. If we're still around by that time...

It's a gamble (a 'good' one, as far as murder goes), and if he wins, he'll take it as a vindication and things will get unimaginably bad. If it doesn't - I dunno, the Israeli political system will stay in it's current black hole and that could take it anywhere. — StreetlightX

And I heard Finkelstein mention that the remaining option are to the right and to the far right of Netanyahu. If that's correct, that's pretty nuts.

And to do this on top of the recent peace deals with other Arab countries, such as the UAE, is dumbfounding.

Ok. But what is your deepest desire? Is it identical to what was behind your previous the most intensive debates? — Number2018

Who gives a damn?

Although it's notable that this is like the 3rd or 5th time someone's tried to 'personalize' this and make this about who "I" am (is he happy? is he mentally OK? What's your deepest desire?). I love these questions. They're an an admission of utter substancelessness. They're a sign that one is one the exact right track. It gives me life, right before I ignore this kind of shit entirely.

we need to determine if Zizek's line of thought still could be relevant. — Number2018

Zizek: “Maybe I’m too much a humanist utopian, but secretly I hope that the coronavirus crisis will scare the shit out of Israelis and Palestinians and seduce them into, ‘Okay, let’s try a little bit more of collaboration and mutual help.’

https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-slavoj-zizek-s-brutal-dark-formula-to-save-the-world-1.8898051

Left wing clowns like Zizek wouldn't know philosophy if it hit them in the eye!

"My formula is much more brutal, and darker. The state should simply guarantee that nobody actually starves, and perhaps this even needs to be done on an international scale, because otherwise you will get refugees. For our part, we need to forget about cars, air travel, fashion – and everyone should give back to society according to their ability. This means, for one thing, that the state should be given a certain right to mobilize people when needed. Can you imagine any other way to solve the problems we face?”

Yes, I can. I have explained how to achieve a prosperous sustainable future - 1,111 times on this forum, but left wingers, who use sustainability as an anti-capitalist bettering ram, don't want solutions. They want problems they can exploit for political ends - from the environment, to BLM, to Israel and Palestine. They don't really care people are dying. They just want to signal their virtue.

And I heard Finkelstein mention that the remaining option are to the right and to the far right of Netanyahu. If that's correct, that's pretty nuts. — Manuel

Interesting. I was under the impression that Yair Lapid, is the most likely next candidate, and is more of a centrist. Which is not saying a great deal, but still. If you want to distinguish yourself from a Yahu, leveraging the bubbling condemnation of these attacks would seem to make sense to me. I feel like push comes to shove - and this is shove - nobody really wants violence. But I could be gravely misreading the Israeli propensity to open aggression (like, I do think they'd prefer if the Palestinians to be genocided out of the limelight, and not in it). If you find any good analysis, let me know.

I haven't looked into Israeli domestic policy in some time. I too was under the impression that Netanyahu's rival recently, Benny Ganzt (?), was more moderate. So I'm unclear too, but I tend to trust Finkelstein.

As for a source, it's quite a long video, all of it interesting but the relevant point here begins around 55:38:

https://www.splicetoday.com/politics-and-media/norman-finkelstein-on-israel-in-2021-the-katie-halper-show

For a start; imo not enough. That is, it will take more than that. I think it will take fully embracing Palestinian self-determination and working toward its realization. But do you think, as I do, that 1) the Palestinians at least at the moment have little or no useful concept of self-realization, and 2) that their "allies" have crushed it out of them and are not interested in its return? — tim wood

I don't know what it means to have "no useful concept of self-realisation". Who has a useful concept of self-realisation and where did they get it?

And there's a potential irony in this: that to have peace, the Israelis will have to fight just as hard for the Palestinians and their interests as they now do against them - or even harder because in that event they will be dealing more directly with the real enemies. — tim wood

I don't know if I'd call that irony. Perhaps from the perspective of an intransigent nationalist it would seem ironic. To me it just seems like the way things are: Peace requires, to use a biblical term, to love your neighbor like yourself. Europe eventually managed an imperfect peace in this way, though lots of American money of course helped along the way.

Yes. If we're still around by that time... — Manuel

Well someone probably is. If not us, maybe our intelligent toasters.

They don't really care people are dying. They just want to signal their virtue. — counterpunch

Meanwhile, people really are dieing. Why do we allow that to happen?

Lunatic

But to say that morality doesn't properly apply in the context of international relations because states are not individuals is an evasion. — Echarmion

This is not the claim that I am making.

I was saying if if you're a neutral third party evaluating a regional conflict between two parties, how these two parties treat their minorities (e.g. Egyptian Jews, Israeli Arabs) is relevant in an evaluation of the conflict. If one party treated their minorities extremely poorly and the other party treats them less poorly but not in an ideal manner, then that should impact our evaluation. It would be ridiculous to spend all our time and energy as a neutral third party denigrating the more humanitarian side and completely ignoring the other especially when the other treatment is ethnic cleansing.

Additionally, plenty of other countries have had racial problems but these problems have been improved on. There has been progress. We didn't advocate for the immediate destruction of these states that have/had racial problems either, we just work towards improvement ideally within established, democratic channels.

where did your link go?

Not sure, the person whose Twitter it was might have deleted it

I tried to use mod powers to fix it, it looks like the Twitter user changed their access permissions to non-public.

Hmmm... Curious. Any way to find it somewhere else based on title in the link?

Edit: I was in the middle of the video.

I was saying if if you're a neutral third party evaluating a regional conflict between two parties, how these two parties treat their minorities (e.g. Egyptian Jews, Israeli Arabs) is relevant in an evaluation of the conflict. If one party treated their minorities extremely poorly and the other party treats them less poorly but not in an ideal manner, then that should impact our evaluation. — BitconnectCarlos

Obviously, all facts should impact the evaluation. But then one can do good things in one area and bad things in another, and those don't cancel out. It can still be shitty for the western powers to invade Afghanistan, even if the Taliban do terrible stuff.

It would be ridiculous to spend all our time and energy as a neutral third party denigrating the more humanitarian side and completely ignoring the other especially when the other treatment is ethnic cleansing. — BitconnectCarlos

That rather depends on the circumstances. In general, you should do what is effective to stop the poor treatment from happening. There is no rule that says you must always deal with the worst people first. To stay on topic: Public condemnation of the Israeli government is probably more likely to be effective than public condemnation of Hamas, because Hamas doesn't need to win elections.

I'll happily deal with a minor issue if I can do so quickly and easily than tackle a major issue with slim chance of success. Effectiveness matters. Of course there are circumstances where it would be really important to hand out condemnation in proportion to the amount of immoral action, like if you're an editor for a news network that fills a limited attention span of viewers.

Additionally, plenty of other countries have had racial problems but these problems have been improved on. There has been progress. We didn't advocate for the immediate destruction of these states that have/had racial problems either, we just work towards improvement ideally within established, democratic channels. — BitconnectCarlos

The point is that asking e.g. the Israeli people responsible for commanding and executing airstrikes to stop is in no way equivalent to asking for the destruction of Israel. Israel is not remotely in danger of being destroyed.

In the Middle East, where we provide nearly $4 billion dollars a year in aidvto Israel, we can no longer be apologists for the rightwing Netanyahu government and its undemocratic and racist behavior. — Sen. Bernie Sanders, NYT, 5/14/2021

FeelTheBern :fire:

Had a look about. Couldn't find it.

Meanwhile, people really are dieing. Why do we allow that to happen? — Echarmion

I explained the philosophical nature of the problem - and the solution. It's religious identity maintained in denial of the validity of a scientific understanding of reality, we should have accepted in common as truth from around 1635. That's not what happened. Instead, science was decried as heresy, even while it was used to drive the Industrial Revolution. It's like giving machine guns to monkeys. We have advanced technologies while remaining ideologically primitive; it's bound to end badly.

The woman's name in the video is Ruth Wisse, a professor at Harvard who is also known for her conservative views. Unsure what the event she spoke at was.

"What you find hateful, do not do to anyone. That is the whole of Torah, the rest is commentary. Go and study it." ~Rabbi Hillel the Elder, 1st c BCE

Gotta support David over Goliath. — BitconnectCarlos

:up: Finally, sounds like you support the weaker oppressed Palestinians over the stronger oppressor Israel. Perhaps, Bitcon, you have a "moral conscience"? :roll: Irony of Ironies, isn't it? how behaving more like the enemy than the enemy you have become what you (claim to) hate most.