But in any case, nothing, absolutely nothing, that you have mentioned justifies Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. — Benkei

And nothing you've said justifies the Arab world's 2700 year history of murdering, ethnically cleansing, and subjugating Jews to second class citizens. Israel demands reparations now.

Let's have this discussion. Why do we only have to have the discussions that you want? We'll first do my discussion, then we'll do yours, how's that sound?

You want to play the victim game we can play the victim game and don't for a second even think about telling me that the oppression of my people isn't relevant to modern times.

I am speaking here as a Jew, not as an "objective" observer here. I don't think there is such a thing as a truly objective observer. Jews are still bitter at the Romans for that.

Part of the reason this conversation is muddled and confusing is depending on the time I'll either be speaking as a Jew or as an "objective" observer - whatever that may mean. With you I'm capable of being the latter, but the discussion gets more personal it's harder to adopt that lens -- especially when outsiders claim that the land rightfully belongs to the "Palestinians" who apparently only started existing in 1964.

If you're really a white European who believes that the issue began in 1947 or '48 then you're really just playing your own game. Everybody else is playing baseball and you're off playing handball with yourself in the corner. Sure, maybe if everything just magically begins in '47 then Israel is the "bad guy" who knows? Who cares? But that's your own viewing of the conflict and it's not one that the actual players in the game share.

Please explain to me e.g. why an Arab massacre perpetrated against the Jews in 1941 in Iraq doesn't matter in this. Is it because Israel wasn't a state? Tell that the Jews.

And the idea that the Israelis are magnanimous for returning land that they stole is the typical Orwellian turn that should be resisted. — Benkei

No, they stole our land. We're just being nice enough to give some our land to them. It is not their land. You're just insanely biased in favor of the Arabs for some reason. Are you white or are you an Arab, because if you're a white non-muslim I have no idea what causes you to read history this way. If you're an Arab muslim it makes sense.

In an imaginary world where all Palestinian factions decided 1967 borders were acceptable and right of return was stricken from the table, do you think Israelis would even vote for it? — schopenhauer1

Yes, and we've already been there with the 2000 Camp David Accords. The Israelis offered that and Arafat rejected. Israel has offered insane concessions in the past including returning all of Gaza and the WB + a good chunk of Jerusalem itself including the Old City. I specifically remember Israel offered 1/2 to 3/4 of the Old City which is very generous for a stronger power to offer. I can't speak for this current administration, but past Israeli administrations would have absolutely gone for it. Hamas has never offered this though.

Also, just wondering, besides "spoils of war" was there an initial reason for the settlements? I do know the ultra-orthodox tend to want control of that area because it aligns more with the ancient Judean kingdom/province, so has Biblical and historical significance. — schopenhauer1

It's not just spoils of war or security. There's been Jewish communities in that region for 3000 years, so when territory is won back that territory will often have Jewish communities who want to join up with Israel. The thing about the Middle East is that these strict boundaries or borders are a relatively new phenomenon. Arab and Jewish communities had been living side by side for thousands of years all mixed together and now when we draw these borders things can get awkward.

Are you more interested in helping the Palestinians or in making Israel pay? Pick a side.

The way you talk about your race is a problem, I won't play games about who is and who isn't allowed to speak, especially when it's based on ethnicity or religion. — Judaka

You're allowed to speak, of course, but should you if you don't have a sufficient grasp of the cultural/historical backdrop? As a parallel when writing a philosophy paper before you begin your argument you need to hash out your opponent's position in its entirety and pay it due respect. Same applies to ethno-cultural critiques. One's first task when engaging with a foreign culture is to take it in, to listen, not to judge.

I don't take you to be the spokesperson of a race. — Judaka

I'm no spokesperson of the Jewish people, but I know a hell of a lot more than a non-Jew who has never engaged Jewish culture. I'm also a Jew who has studied quite a bit of Jewish history on top of long-term direct engagement with multiple Jewish communities across the US.

I'm not perfect, but I should be treated as an authority on this subject. I try to be honest when a cultural question transcends my expertise. You're an authority in your own area, where ever that is.

French history should belong to the French nationality, not the "French ethnicities", do you not think that is the best way forward? — Judaka

I don't even know if there is a single French ethnicity. I think it's multiple ethnicities? In any case this is a French matter. I'm not in a position to say who rightfully "claims" their history.

I agree in principle that these issues need to be handled with patience and respect but diplomacy rarely factors into my posting online, I would handle things differently in different contexts. — Judaka

:up:

See, it's all in the framing. You only want to talk about Israel, but others take a broader view of the conflict and are actually interested in addressing all the ways in which the Palestinian people are being abused right now. Wouldn't it be easier to help them if we were to focus on several sources as opposed to just one?

Yes, you seem to vascillate between reasonableness and defending the indefensible. — Benkei

I haven't commented much on Andrew4Handel's statements. He has expressed a wide range of opinions some of which I would agree with and some of which I wouldn't.

The only reason you bring up Hamas is as a red herring in this thread. "But they do it too!" As if that makes everything ok.

If you want to discuss Hamas, start a thread on it and then every time you point out something they did I'll just say: "Yeah, but Israel did this therefore totally legit!". Or maybe I won't... I suspect you barely know anything about Hamas since you were obviously not aware they've already stated multiple times they'd accept the 1967 borders as a compromise. — Benkei

It's entirely how the issue is framed. The question of Hamas need not be a red herring, it's only a red herring if we're single-mindedly focused on Israel.

Here's how we should be framing it: What is the current source of the oppression of the Palestinians? The answer to that would be Israel and Hamas and the PA, but also the Arab countries which are complicit in not helping their fellow Arabs. To only focus on one of these sources skews the conversation.

Hamas accepts '67 borders + RoR. Not just '67 borders AFAIK.

The only person here entirely outside of the overton window is the only guy you seem to agree with. — Benkei

You're telling me @Andrew4Handlel is the only person in the discussion who is outside of the overton window and who I agree with?

... Except Iraq, Afghanistan, Kurds, Libya, Egypt and Islamism in general have all been discussed. It gets plenty of attention really but as Baden pointed out, more whataboutism. — Benkei

I almost never see Egypt or Jordan or how Hamas treats its own people discussed. If someone does introduce Hamas oppressing its own people it's always either me or Andrew. I cannot remember the last time I heard Egypt or Jordan or Qatar mentioned here. Afghanistan and Iraq are only relevant because of the west's involvement.

I don't particularly care who I'm 'siding with' because I'm not an idiot who thinks labels mean anything whatsoever. — StreetlightX

Ok, what's funny to me was that the Arabs supported the withdrawal as did the more moderate to left section of the Israeli population, so basically those who are interested in peace or at least going in that direction.

And on the other side we have the Israeli right many of whom do not care about peace and.... you who is against Israel "ethnically cleansing" its own population of Jews. :death:

Yes, obviously. — StreetlightX

You know that you're siding with the Israeli right on this one? I just like to let you know when you're further to the right than me.

I've already said I don't care if X is allowed to use some roads while Y is allowed to use others near checkpoints. No one is building roads in other countries without their permission and Gaza is not a country. It is not independent.

Ethnically cleanse as in murder? Or move? Was in ethnic cleansing when Israel forced Israelis to move out of Gaza in 2005?

I have no idea what you're talking about. We're talking about the use of separate roads, right? Near checkpoints? To speed up the process?

I said I wouldn't have a problem if in Arab countries they had some system like that near checkpoints. Gaza is simply not its own country.

Yes, Jews being ethnically cleansed from Arab lands and repeatedly subject to massacres in Palestine before the existence of Israel is utterly irrelevant to you. I wouldn't have expected anything different from you.

If you can't condemn roads being built that Jews would not be allowed to travel on but Arabs would, you're an anti-semite. Period. — Baden

I honestly wouldn't mind if it were in Egypt or something and it was near a border and they just let the Egyptian citizens speed through quicker. It would hasten the process.

I

Jews have lived in the region for thousands of years, continuously. Way, way before Israel. Jewish populations have been ethnically cleansed from Arab lands.

You're dropping the earlier discussion because you just don't know. You need to make an effort to learn the history of the demographics in that area before you jump to conclusions like that the Palestinians are just entitled to the entire WB for some reason.

As for the roads are these near security checkpoints? It might make sense to allow some cars through quicker, but I would think this is only around the border.

The West Bank is a Palestinian territory under Israeli occupation. — Baden

Which sector of the WB are you talking about? Or are you talking about all of it? Why does all of the WB necessarily belong to the Palestinians? What about the Jewish communities there?

Would you consider it acceptable for an Arab state to build roads in Israel that Arabs but not Jews were allowed to travel on? Or to build settlements there exclusively for Arabs? — Baden

No because Israel is its own country. Israel doesn't build settlements in other Arab countries.

look at the leadership, look a the heads of business. look at the power circles.

take 2 seconds to understand the intricacies of japan's society and how difficult it is for non-japanese to understand and you might begin to learn. not everything needs to be formally spelled out - discrimination often occurs in back rooms or behind closed doors.

look at who is succeeding in these countries. when you speak the language, know the culture, know the region, have a history... that's gonna help, it's not hard to understand.

That you think this should be fine when it 's done to Muslims makes you, at the very least, a bigot. — Baden

when did i ever say this??? in any case if we started actually applying attention to muslim on muslim oppression the range of topics covered would be much much broader and israel would proportionally receive less attention.

The 'Japanese people' and 'the Italian people' are anyone with a citizenship, all of whom are subject to the rule of law. — StreetlightX

nice, well i guess all i gotta do is get that full japanese citizenship and ill be 100% japanese and ready to succeed over there. it's all just a piece of paper, isn't it?

by institutionally discriminating against non-Shinto or non-Christian — StreetlightX

oh you're telling me now that there's no institutional discrimination in japan or italy? tell me more about how perfect these countries here. this is very unlike you and i thought you would know better than to make this mistake. it's such an easy one to avoid.

Would it be the case that Japan or Italy did discriminate like Israel, they too would be shitty countries, deserving of unrelenting critique. — StreetlightX

now you're starting to get it. that lightbulb is slowly turning on.

Additionally, an enthostate is definitionally racist. — StreetlightX

yeah, and japan clearly isn't for the japanese people, italy couldn't possibly be for the italians ... clearly no other state does this.

I think you should name names here. — Benkei

oh these people know who they are. they're just too far outside the overton window to productively engage, but occasionally we'll hurl insults at each other as a way of saying hi.

Yeah nobody here that ever posted about terrorism in other countries or Hong Kong. — Benkei

i was talking about muslim on muslim oppression which is considered so pervasive in the west (and not without reason) that we just don't talk about it because we just don't care. it's not nearly as exciting as an ethnic struggle! :starstruck:

The ethnic conflicts in Africa, the middle east, Europe and around the world. To equate strong beliefs in ethnic and racial histories with racism and tribalism, it's not a stretch, bitconnect, this isn't about some Western cultural attribute. Anyone can just look at history and make the connections. — Judaka

I've never denied this. If we could press a button and eliminate ethnic histories there'd certainly be some not outlandish case for doing so, but in the context of the middle east it's just a fact of life and "phasing out" ethnic histories just isn't a thing. these ethnic stories are also mixed heavily with religion.
we need to deal with reality as it is, not try to encourage people to abandon or phase out their ethnic histories. the cat is too far out of the bag at this point.

You want "outsiders" to shut up about it, let and let live you say, don't be so arrogant to tell others what they can and can't do. But this is a bit of an over-exaggeration, it's not like the West can force the citizens and governments of these various nations to change their thinking and such concerns have got nothing to do with whether ethnic histories are ethical or not. — Judaka

no, i want outsiders - if they choose to engage - to engage as a partner, not as parent or a king unless the offense is very egregious. other cultures will have problems, just like yours, but it's all about how you address it. it's about tact.

Within the West, European ethnic histories are virtually a no-go, talking about a white racial history as a white person, is a huge red flag. — Judaka

you can talk about british history, french history, irish history - it's fine to celebrate that heritage and your connection with it. i'm fine with "german pride" as long as it strongly rejects nazism - again, its all about the story behind it.

there is no "white racial history." brits are not poles who are not czechs who are not italians. there is no "white history."

I sniff Anti Semitism. Anti Semitism is Anti-Semitism. A handful of ethnic groups have no homeland and you want the Jews to be in perpetual diaspora. — Andrew4Handel

For some people they'd rather have Jews perpetually at risk of massacre or death than to have their own homeland because that would be "racist." The very idea of a Jewish homeland is just racist to them.

Likewise most people on this thread have shown time and time again they don't care about children other than the ones that die when Israeli is defending itself against Hamas and other terrorists. — Andrew4Handel

:100:

It's all about selective outrage and fomenting division. If Gaza was just some third world country crushed under Hamas with no Israel no one would care because it would just be another boring case of Muslims oppressing Muslims.

It's called now days ethnic cleansing. The Jews didn't perpetrate large massacres, but enough to start the Palestinian exodus. Yet I don't know how biased the history is here. — ssu

I don't know too much about those smaller massacres, you'll have to enlighten me on the history there. Where and when did these smaller massacres take place and did news then travel to other villages causing mass exodus? Let's go to the history on this one.

I deeply dislike the term ethnic cleansing in its use as an inflammatory accusation. Expulsion is very different from genocide and those two terms should not be conflated at all. They are so radically different.

Gen. Grant ordered the Jews out of his military district in 1862 during the Civil War, is this "ethnic cleansing?" The term originally referred to the murder during the Bosnian genocide.

Probably not, no, but why can't they go to Palestine? In hindsight its all clear the mess we're in but the 40s and 50s were different times and jews were interested in building their own communities in that region.

Are you going to tell holocaust survivors in 1945 that they can't go to Israel? The one place where jews aspire to be ruled by other jews and not risk being murdered by their own host countries? Israel wasn't even a state at this point, it was just jews living in British controlled palestine.

There was nothing to go back to. Virtually everything was destroyed or stolen. The European Jews had to seek lives elsewhere whether it was in the US, Canada, UK, or Israel. Jews certainly would not want to have lived in Germany.

Yeah, under Judaka's ideas there would just be no Jewish people or Jewish identity. I've already been over this with Judaka and I don't feel like rehashing this.

Assimilation can always be an option, but it should never be something to be pushed or forced on a group of people. It takes an incredible degree of arrogance to come as a complete outsider to another group and just tell them outright that they need to "be like us" or "become western" - whatever that means. We've already seen this narrative play out so many times in the Western world like with the Native Americans I just can't believe some people haven't learned by now.

Ethnic histories justify racism because they allow people to inherit grievances, fault and characteristics through their ethnicity. — Judaka

Every culture or ethnicity tells itself stories and through these stories or histories we come to understand ourselves and the other. Ethnic histories can justify racism if that story is being told in a bad, simplistic way. After WWII so many Jews felt incredibly ill not only of Germany, but the German people as well as Europeans in general.

Thankfully, after (largely Jewish) writers began producing Holocaust-related literature and re-examining that period in history it allowed us to recast our history and our own understanding in more nuanced terms: Europe is not irredeemably anti-Semitic, there were many groups that went out of their way to save Jews, and the story simply isn't as clear cut as many would think it is. The more we study the Holocaust, the more we move away from this simplistic, black-and-white rendition ("woe is me, Europe hates Jews, we can never trust anyone who isn't Jewish") to something a little more reflective of reality.

Many of those who poured hundreds of hours into that writing and research were Jews who were deeply inspired by their ethnic connection to the conflict. In fact, the field of Holocaust literature is largely dominated by Jews who have made a real, serious effort to understand their own history and their people's history and this has allowed Jews to move forward as a group in a much more productive way and reshape their history in a healthier way which benefits everyone. There's also a ton of universal knowledge about human behavior and how humans act under bureaucracy that was revealed through this heavy literature.

Yeah, that's cool.

I was watching a youtube video today where they interviewed a bunch of asexual people and the majority of them said that they did not feel welcome in the LGBTQ community. They've been marginalized by a marginalized community. I just think issues like this present interesting challenges to the oppressor-oppressed framework.

Our ethnic identities help ground us and allow us to relate to others better. Having an ethnic identity to a considerable extent makes us an authority on that ethnicity. It provides a good jumping off point for cultural engagement and allows us a venue to direct difficult questions to (for instance, if someone is from group of people that at one point in history had a problem with your group.) If we don't address these types of questions and issues these issues just persist.

I do notice that the West is allowing or even celebrating minorities having ethnic and racial histories. It's garbage, I don't support that. — Judaka

Do you honestly dislike events where people talk about or present their own cultures? I can't imagine thinking that way. I love learning about where other people are from and their experiences.

More importantly, have you noticed that groups without roots tend to struggle more? Groups like Native Americans? African Americans (not Nigerians, who are doing very well)? Was our attempt to assimilate/integrate the Native Americans a good thing?

Is oppression synonymous with unfairness and injustice? Then sure... I don't really understand your definition. If I replace "oppression" with "unfair" then I agree. — Judaka

Yeah, basically.

These things do matter though: I don't think you'd like it very much if you had a disability that was repeatedly portrayed in books and movies as something to be laughed at or pitied. Especially if that's how many people are getting their only exposure to that disability. Portrayal matters.

It's a mix of both. Jews were similarly being expelled and dispossessed of their property in Arab lands. It was very difficult, heated, chaotic times. Sometimes the Arabs just fled, other times their leaders advised or ordered them to leave, and other times Israel expelled them. The Arab Palestinians had always opposed the creation of the Jewish state and were first to attack it even before the Arabs were able to. Retaliating against this involved going into Palestinian towns where the militias ran their operations. After 1948 Israel was extremely vulnerable with its fragmented borders.

I obviously don't condone everything and the history here is messy. 1967 is its own story. Israel has been willing to give territory back, like Sinai, in exchange for peace with the Egyptians so these territorial acquisitions are hardly permanent. Israel on numerous occasions has offered to give territory back.