I doubt it'll work. Before this, I merely thought of the Israeli government as a bunch of nazis who believe that driving people out of their homes is god's work. Now, I also think they're barbarians.
> Before this, I merely thought of the Israeli government as a bunch of nazis
That's probably the least appropriate analogy ever.
> who believe that driving people out of their homes is god's work
Israel is actually a surprisingly secular country. If you don't know the most basic things about a country, maybe you shouldn't go around calling them nazis and barbarians. There's a word for those kind of attitudes.
Good point. In fact, I may very well not know the most basic things about this country. But then how do you explain the colonization programme? The only explanation I've been able to figure out is some zionist idea of a right to a patch of land; some race-based sense of superiority. Why else bulldozer villages far across the border that was last determined in a treaty? These are horrible crimes, committed willingly by a democratically elected government. I genuinely don't get it.
But I do admit here that I've turned this not-understanding into choosing that it must be plain evil. Maybe it's something different. I'll not delete my original post to keep the thread understandable.
Zionism is the idea that Jews need a Jewish nation to take Jewish refugees fleeing persecution. History has basically proved that to be true.
What it's not:
1. The idea that Jews are in any way superior. All races have equal rights under Israeli law (although secular Jews have some obligations that other groups don't, i.e. mandatory military service) and Israel has a significant Arab population.
2. Religion-based. Early Zionists were all secular socialists. Religious Jews got on board later when they started to see Israel as a sign from God but the traditional position (and the reason why many Ultra-Orthodox Jews still don't support Israel) is that Jews weren't allowed a nation until the Messiah comes.
Israel isn't perfect (obviously) but your comments are completely disproportionate. You need to tone down the hate.
>>Zionism is the idea that Jews need a Jewish nation to take Jewish refugees fleeing persecution.
Makes perfect sense. If you settle a persecuted set of people on a totally unoccupied land, which would be totally harmless. What I don't understand is the need to persecute one already existing set of people to accommodate another set of people who just got persecuted.
If a persecuted tribe in Africa decides to settle down in Antarctica people wouldn't have a problem. But will it be OK, if they invade California drive out the existing set of people there and settle down.
California has been "invaded" and the existing set of people "driven out" what, two times going on three now? (The Spanish driving out the Indians, Americans driving out the Mexicans, and now Hispanics immigrating at record rates driving out white Americans).
This narrative about driving people out is an oversimplification at best, though, just as much for Israel as for California.
>> and now Hispanics immigrating at record rates driving out white Americans
I don't see Hispanics flying around in F-16's bombing white American colonies. If they do, I will be the first to speak out. What you seem to be talking about is natural change in demographics, where a group of people grow in population and the other group doesn't grow much. And then there is natural movement(like immigration in case of Hispanics).
Also if its oversimplification, please explain us the right thing.
No, you made an intentionally irrelevant quip about Hispanics in F-16's, thus demonstrating that you are doing everything in your power to deliberately miss the point. Of course there's no point responding to you. Reddit is exactly the place for that kind of nonsense.
Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. But people can (and do) build that kind of narrative all the time, which was my real point. The reality is always more complicated.
It's not even a valid comparison to the Mexican-American war, that's the point. You can oversimplify vastly different issues down to the same narrative if you want to, which is why these simple narratives tell us nothing.
>>If a persecuted tribe in Africa decides to settle down in Antarctica people wouldn't have a problem. But will it be OK, if they invade California drive out the existing set of people there and settle down.
If you think that's analogous to what happened in Palestine you need a history lesson.
>>What I don't understand is the need to persecute one already existing set of people to accommodate another set of people who just got persecuted.
But they weren't persecuted - they were paid off.
In 1917, at the end of WW1, Britain was given the mandate of administering Palestine - at the time a chunk of the recently-defeated-and-defunct Ottoman Empire. Part of this mandate was the Balfour Declaration, which basically said that Britain would work to build 'a national home for the Jewish people' in Palestine ("it being clearly understood that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine").
They worked with the "Jewish Agency for Palestine" (these days the Jewish Agency for Israel), who had been buying the land in the area from the previous owners - mostly Arab clans and local sheiks and so on. Nothing was seized, nobody was driven out or persecuted.
How does that relate to governance? Depending on the laws of the nation, property ownership and residence may not imply voting rights (or any sort of say in governance, voting or otherwise). I truly have no idea of the laws regarding this in that part of the world, but a simple argument of land purchase without addressing those issues doesn't really sway me too far one way or the other.
One of the things it took me a while to get my head around was that there kinda was no overarching nation at the time in question - at least not in the way we think of it today. The Ottoman Empire was defunct; nominally there were laws of the nation, but it was in no position to enforce them, and many of them hadn't been popular anyway (as they were secularizing).
In practice the people in the area operated as 'millets' - micronations unified by religious belief, governing themselves according to religious law. When the British took over administration of the region in 1917, they didn't try to change this.
So for the most part, the landowners that the Jewish Agency was buying from were the governance. The trade wasn't like one citizen of a nation selling to another citizen of the nation; it was like one country selling land to another country (and so moving its borders).
All Israeli citizens have equal rights. You can gain citizenship if you have a Jewish background, just like someone with an Irish background can gain an Irish citizenship.
The statement was that all races have equal rights under Israeli law not that all citizens have equal rights. Furthermore, Ireland has a naturalization process whereas the Israeli one is limited to Jews and spouses of existing citizens. Residents of the West Bank and Gaza are NOT classified as citizens of Israel. So either the West Bank and Gaza are part of Israel or they are not. If they are not, then the residents there are under occupation. If they are, then why are they not granted citizenship.
I do not think that what Israel is doing is better or worse than what other countries have done or are currently doing and should not be treated any better or worse because of it. But it would be disingenuous to spin it as anything but what it is. To me, the strategy is to occupy and take over territory over time. It works. See the history of the United States versus native people, Australians versus aborigines, Chinese versus Tibetans. Might makes right. For Americans, we still benefit greatly from what happened in the past. Its not to say that the Palestinians are blameless, just that Israel has the 'bigger gun' in this fight.
Say what you will about history, but how people are treated right now is telling.
It's fairly uncontroversial historical fact that the Jews are originally from Palestine.
Why don't you do research on the early Zionists, if you're actually curious about the subject and not just trying to score points in an internet debate? Probably most of the early Zionists were very secularist.
Unfortunately I do not trust much of what I read about Israel, there is just too much propaganda from all sides. Everything is twisted for some cause. The only thing I know for certain is that the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948 was probably a really bad idea since it has led to so many wars.
What propaganda? You're contributing literally nothing to this discussion except to smear Israel with vague counterfactual innuendos, and accusing me of propaganda? I'm trying to be as fair and honest as I can be. What are you trying to do?
> But then how do you explain the colonization programme?
I don't especially like the settlements, actually, and neither do a lot of Palestinians. I'd be happier if the lot of them were either removed or simply abandoned to the jurisdiction of Palestinian authorities.
Sharon actually closed a lot of them awhile ago, but just like any democracy, it's hard to get away with alienating any constituency. You'll notice that even though Sharon pulled all the settlements out of the Gaza Strip, it didn't seem to improve matters there any. Also, the settlements provide a lot of jobs and economic benefits to Palestinians. It's a complicated issue, much more complicated than this bullshit of yours about "the Israelis are Nazis" (which itself is pretty fucking racist, BTW).
As for the bulldozers, do you have any good sources on that? As far as I can readily find, most demolitions are either carried out because structures were constructed (often in Israel itself) without proper building permits (though this is allegedly enforced unfairly), or because there are terrorists actively holed up inside them. Interestingly, Israel also demolishes a lot of the settlements.
This is probably a good time to point out one of my simple ground rules about this issue: I think any criticism of any party, or any policy, is reasonable, as long as one accepts that both Israel and Palestine have a right to exist as independent states.
Phil, thanks for clearing this up. I stand corrected. (hey, now, the IDF tweet didn't change my mind about the situation, but blvr and you did! dialog rocks - and thanks for your patience)
As a sidenote, I agree that the Nazi reference was over the top and I regret using it. I do not agree, however, that it was "fucking racist", since I called a government something, not a race or a nation's people.
That's a generalization. By my understanding, Labor and Kadima accept that Palestine should exist as an independent state, and Likud do not. This would make Likud unreasonable, but Likud does not represent all Israelis, nor is it fair to equate support for Israel's defense and continued existence with support for Likud's policies in particular.
There are also Palestinian factions which are unreasonable, including Hamas. I think it's doubly unfortunate that both Hamas and Likud have managed to win various elections.
Wait, i write a nasty, unfriendly post and get many upvotes. Then I admit that the nasty unfriendly post might've been based on a lack of understanding and ask for someone to explain better, and I get downvoted? What's going on, HN?
EDIT: I'm editing this comment because HN won't allow me to respond to blvr's post. blvr, thanks for elaborating. I don't mean to sound hateful, and I'm willing to accept that I have it all wrong. But still, can you explain the colonization thing? Why do they do it? Note, this is not criticism: I'd really like to understand it better. It's been pointed out by many in this thread by now that I've been assuming things.
Aie, damn. Lost in translation. I meant the settlements. But people have been elaborating about those in other comments by now. And I've come to stand corrected that even if the settlements are horrible, they're less horrible than suicide bombings and the likes.
Self-reply: I am ashamed by this comment by now. In particular, the Nazi comparison is way out of line, and unnecessarily offensive. Overall, the comment is short-sighted and childish.
It's a testament to the overall excellence of the HN community that the comment sparked a discussion, not a flamewar.
Could you please spare us from the anti-semitic card? HN is not the mainstream media and many here are not ignorant, so this tactic doesn't work here. It also betrays your lack of objectivity on the matter.
Dude, he played the fucking nazi card before i said a word. And you're defending him, and saying I'm super PC b/c i think calling israelis "nazis" is not ok. wtf is your problem.
I'm curious, why do you equate "critical of the Israeli government" to antisemitism? I have no problem with Jews at all. In fact, if you read carefully, you'll see that the word Jew (or anything like it) does not appear in my post.
There are ways to be critical of the Israeli government without being antisemitic. You could be critical of, say, something relating to unemployment insurance.
But that's not what people are usually talking about when this argument comes up - instead, they're criticizing Israel's right to exist or Israel's right to defend itself (which amounts to the same thing). When they're not being so explicit, they want Israel to embark on a policy which would lead to the end of Israel (accepting indefensible borders, the 'right of return', etc.)
In short, they're making the 'anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism' argument. Personally, I think anti-Zionism is just the first type of antisemitism to try and simultaneously deny it's antisemitic. Let me try to explain with an analogy.
Let's say I was anti-France - that I believed French national identity was somehow illegitimate, and that therefore France shouldn't be a country. Since France shouldn't exist, France also isn't entitled to defend itself from external attack. However, I have no problem with French people! Great wine, great cheese - they just shouldn't be able to have a country. If a French person objects, I'll just patiently remind him that I'm not anti-French, I'm merely anti-France. Perhaps I'll criticize him a bit for inappropriately throwing out the anti-French card.
Sound ridiculous? Well, that's exactly how it sounds to me when someone argues that my people can't establish a state (in the same imperfect way most states are established) and then can't defend our state from attack. Everyone else's national self-determination is fine, but ours is somehow not.
So yes, when people make this sort of argument against Israel - a type of argument they would never make against Sweden or France or Mexico - in that case I do believe they're being more than a little biased against my people in particular, and therefore antisemitic.
Hm. That's a very good point. But I believe that there's one hole in your argument: it's that a country defending its right to exist means that it's allowed to commit atrocities. I strongly believe that Isreal has a right to defend itself. In fact, I think they have every right to do what this thread was actually about: track down and assasinate a terrorist.
You cannot deny, however, that Israel has been less than kind to the Palestinian people in many instances. Is pointing that out antisemitic? No. What about if it's pointed out in an absolutely tasteless way, for instance by using a Nazi reference? Still not. It's tasteless, and I apologize, but it's not denying Israel's right to exist or defend itself. I'm not convinced that maintaining a situation that essentially boils down to having first-class and second-class citizens is the only way to guarantee the continued existence of Israel.
And, it's important that we're allowed to discuss this. If any criticism of Israel's actions is called antisemitism, we're effectively censoring the entire debate. Now I'll be the first to admit that arguing on the internet has little direct value, but I daresay that the "antisemitism!!" gut reaction is at least as harmful as people like me rudely denouncing the people running a government in situation as complex as Israel's as "a bunch of Nazis".
Actually we can deny Israel has committed atrocities or done anything else bad or worse than other countries. in fact it has not.
you're now making factual assertions, which are false, and which you have never researched, you've only heard them from biased unscholarly sources like CNN. and you just believed them, without adequate questioning of them.
is it a coincidence that you believe false factual statements condemning israel, but not ones condemning france? or what?
and that you're so damn sure israel is guilty that you insist no one could even dispute it, even though you're highly ignorant on the topic and do not provide any factual arguments documenting any atrocities. (there are many purported documentations of such things. i've seen them before. they are not exactly high quality or persuasive. they only convince biased people or people who don't look too closely.)
It's actually very important to point out when people are being antisemitic, just like it's important to point out when people are being racist or sexist. Most people don't like to think of themselves as bigots, so pointing out their bigotry sometimes wakes them up a bit.
For example, you obviously don't like being called an antisemite, and you don't want to think of yourself as an antisemite. I hope that pointing out your very real bigotry will bother you enough that you'll spend some time exploring the underlying facts and thinking more about why the Jewish state is held to a standard no other nation is, and whether its actions are actually 'atrocities' or whether this belief comes from other antisemitic propaganda and lies.
Dude, you called them nazis and then you assume i'm mad about any kind of criticism? you can't figure out it's actually that specific statement that's a problem?
the excuse that "i am only criticizing israel (which just happens to be the jewish state, what a coincidence), not jews" is an extremely common statement of anti-semites. using it without further elaboration only makes you look more anti-semitic.
"Dude", I'll again admit that that comment was out of line.
Nevertheless, I have a hard time understanding what you hope to gain by your approach here. While you may be quite right that stating "i am only criticizing israel, not jews" is common among people who hate Jews, did you ever consider that this does not imply the inverse? It does not mean that everyone criticizing Israel hates Jews. As a programmer, you must understand this.
IMHO, the fastest way Israel support organisations can lose popular support in countries outside Israel is by calling people who criticize them (no matter how tastelessly) antisemites. I never understood why commenters like you and pro-Israel organisations appear to be so trigger happy with the term. It moves the entire discussion from the sphere of fact and opinion to the sphere of taboos.
I'll happily discuss fact and opinion with you. So whether or not Israel did right or wrong things - that's an HN-worthy discussion. But playing the antisemite card on a criticism of a government, even if this criticism is exceptionally harsh and inappropriate, that just doesn't work. I called a bunch of politicians something horrible. You called me something comparably horrible.
- criticizes israel in public, in ways anti-semites like to criticize israel
- is not anti-semitic
- does not include any clarifications in his criticism to differentiate himself from anti-semites
I think all good people know such clarifications are needed when you sound like you might be an anti-semite but actually aren't. If you leave them out, you're giving aid and comfort to anti-semitism and misleading people about your character, at best.
Note that any old clarifications won't work. Many anti-semites try to clarify how they aren't anti-semitic. A decent person would have to figure out how to say something that objectively differentiates himself. And he would care to do it if he wanted to publicly agree with the anti-semitic position on some specific point.
No, but the GP seems to imply that it will help change the mind of those critical of Israel. I'm one of those, and it didn't change my mind. Admittedly, I'm just a single sample though.
