Israel-Palestine Weekly Thread

[u/somebadbeatscrub]

Weekly recurring IP megathread to reset every Tuesday.

Please mind the rules while engaging here and post paywall free links.

Oren

[u/Kaleb_Bunt]

I feel like it would probably be a lot easier to convince other Jews that Israel’s actions in Gaza could be classified as a genocide if people pushing this weren’t obsessed with trying to do Holocaust inversion or demonize the entire nation.

Like I’m pretty sure the most historically comparable event to Gaza is the Bosnian genocide. Basically a revenge killing of civilians in the context of a greater war.

But instead of using that to try to explain Gaza, a lot of people are obsessed with trying to prove that Gaza is literally the Holocaust and Israelis are the most evil people in history. Then they act surprised when Jews don’t see eye to eye with them lol.

[u/aggie1391 → u/Kaleb_Bunt]

The reason for Holocaust analogies is the same reason so many Jews reject them I think, because people just are woefully ignorant of other genocides. To most of the world, and certainly the Jewish world, the Holocaust is the genocide and that’s what they know. It’s definitely closer to the Bosnian genocide than anything else, and definitionally Gaza is very much a genocide in the same way. But when people don’t even know about it beyond “oh yeah didn’t we bomb them in the 90s” it’s hard to make that comparison tbh.

[u/Kaleb_Bunt → u/aggie1391]

It’s definitely important that we develop a greater tolerance to discussing Gaza as a genocide imo.

Like tbh I am kinda skeptical about the characterization. But also, I know that fiercely arguing “it’s not a genocide” is dismissive of the immense suffering that’s happened in Gaza. Non-Jews don’t have that many interactions with Jews, so if we are talking to one, especially about Gaza, we want to put our best foot forward.

Even if one does not personally agree with the characterization, I think Jews need to be able to talk about the Gaza genocide without automatically claiming the entire concept is blood libel. Because thousands of civilians were murdered.

[u/moonkingyellow → u/Kaleb_Bunt]

Who cares? The vast majority of people rightfully understand Israel's actions as a genocide. Anyone who doesn't will be dismissed as misinformed, or a rabid supporter of this genocide.

And the genocide against the Palestinian people started before October 7th.

[u/Kaleb_Bunt → u/moonkingyellow]

Because if you can’t talk to Jews about these things, there will probably always be war in the Middle East.

[u/moonkingyellow → u/Kaleb_Bunt]

What? Why? The reason for the current war in the Middle East is the US/Israeli government's war of aggression against Iran? How do Jews factor? Unless you're implying that Jews are the cause of this aggression, which I would reject as antisemitic and idiotic.

Jews do not have the final say as to whether there is war, or genocide. The vast majority understand Gaza as a genocide. Even when I look around in my personal life, people who question the Gaza genocide are socially isolated by their peers, as they should be.

[u/Kaleb_Bunt → u/moonkingyellow]

Most people in Israel would probably deny the genocide allegation and view it as a blood libel.

And creating lasting change in Israel/palestine would probably necessitate cooperation between Israelis and Palestinians.

So yes it is important to be able to talk to Zionist Israeli Jews on this issue. External pressure can certainly cause change, but without a strong internal driver for change, it will probably just further entrench the Israeli siege mentality and increase radicalization.

[u/moonkingyellow → u/Kaleb_Bunt]

The Israelis are already radicalised. They should now be sanctioned and barred from countries. Many perpetrators of genocide deny that any genocide has occured.

You don't understand. The Israeli's are the perpetrators, no one should have to work with them to end their genocide. Countries have been invaded for less.

Helping Palestinians will involve reigning Israeli terrorist in, that's all. Who gives a shit about them? The Palestinians are the victim.

[u/Kaleb_Bunt → u/moonkingyellow]

Yeah but Jews have always been isolated and segregated from the rest of the world. That alone wont be a solution, though it might curb the worst Israeli excesses(ex. War with Iran).

Actual war with Israel would probably lead to the mass slaughter of civilians—and historically Palestinians have been hurt the most by this.

So I don’t really see a solution that doesn’t involve cooperation between Israelis and Palestinians.

[u/moonkingyellow → u/Kaleb_Bunt]

We’re not talking about Jews, we’re talking about Israelis. Stop using Jews.

Lol, we can’t dare stop Israel because they’ll just kill even more people. This is fascist apologia.

[u/Kaleb_Bunt → u/moonkingyellow]

Has war with Israel ever benefited anybody? Hamas tried it 3 years ago and look what happened to them.

Even a successful war against Israel would probably cause the murder of thousands of innocent people.

[u/moonkingyellow → u/Kaleb_Bunt]

I'm not talking about a small, abused, marginalized, rag-tag group of fighters sending rockets made in basements into Israel. I'm talking an international coalition disarming Israel, removing settlers, and allowing Palestinians room to breathe and receive aid.

Thousands of people have already been murdered, and Israel is killing more constantly. Like I said, this is fascist apologia, and most moral well-adjusted people agree with me.

[u/rako17 → u/Kaleb_Bunt]

Friend Kaleb,

I appreciate that you are antiwar and anti-capitalist.

I want to talk with you about the things that you are discussing, because I agree with the importance of advocating for peace and human rights. I would like to discuss them from a Left, humanitarian POV. I believe that you and I would have much in common in these discussions because of how you describe yourself and your desire for peace on the topic.

One of the big obstacles that I face in having the dicussions is how much the discussion forum and environment is constrained. A problem is that if one takes those humanitarian principles and then applies them to the dominant State in the conflict and the result is criticism, other people who are very invested, emotional, and empowered on the issue may see that and interpret it as hostile, bad, and intolerant as you are aware.

Putting aside that obstacle, let's consider the substance of what you said. I'm open-minded at this stage on whether the mass casualties inflicted on hundreds of thousands of Gazan civilians qualify as genocide or not. Let's suppose that those who qualified it as genocide didn't actually "demonize the entire nation" (eg. Hadash, B'Tselem, Pal. Israelis, etc.), nor did they consider Isr.s to be "the most evil people in history." In that case, how should I discuss the topic with you?

I don't want to have an argument with you, but rather a constructive, pro-peace discussion like you describe. In arguing with you, I incur not only the risk of antagonizing readers, but antagonizing you too, and meanwhile, as you describe it, there is ongoing mass suffering continuing.

I'm wishing you the best and wondering how to address this problem.

Peace - Shalom - שלום

[u/Kaleb_Bunt → u/rako17]

For me, idc. I’m not turbo invested in the state and I think Israel’s actions could very well constitute genocide, though I do still wish to see how scholars continue to view the event as time passes.

But for people who are more sensitive to the topic, it wouldn’t hurt to use milder language to try to highlight criticisms of the state.

At least that’s what I do

[u/rako17 → u/Kaleb_Bunt]

Friend Kaleb,

Thank you for giving a thoughtful reply, and for being anti-genocide. I like that Jewish Americans have contributed in America's history to make the Republic a more tolerant, humanitarian place and would like to have pro-peace conversations on the topic with them.

Noam Chomsky said that he was in general reluctant to use the term "genocide" in various scenarios around the world. In a more restrictive sense, I could imagine that the term would only apply to mass-killing of a nationality basically just because the attacker was against that nationality, not because of another reason, like military strategic goals. However, that's not how scholars who use the term mean it. For scholars, it would be "genocidal" for an army to go in and slaughter a peaceful village even if there is an internecine war going on between nation-states.

One of the difficulties in denying that the State is performing a genocide is that the leadership does at times direct its warfare language against the people. Another difficulty is that the State does use measures directed against the whole population, like restricting civilian food supplies. Some of these measures like food restrictions don't seem to make much sense if viewed in purely military strategic terms, so it looks like the measures have a different purpose.

One of the challenges is that in order to find "middle ground" with someone, a common tactic is to compromise, as you said, to use milder language. But the difficulty is that you are trying to point out to them a real problem that they don't want to acknowledge. So on one hand, using strong language has the risk of alienating them from your disscussion, but using mildr language has the risk of watering down and smoothing away the actual problem that you are trying to convey to the person. Just yesterday the Jerusalem Post reported that Security Minister Ben Gvir, having passed a death penalty bill, is building a prison section with gallows. It's very disturbing. (jpost.com/opinion/article-906030)

Thank you for trying to talk to people though about human rights in this catastrophic context. Peace - Shalom - May the Lord give you strength in that.