It is possible to find the IDF's actions conscionable or unconscionable. Even if the latter, however, it is not possible to find Hamas' actions conscionable, and it is not possible for the IDF to not respond.
People who unqualifiedly support Palestine are either uninformed or bad actors.
It’s no secret that the Israeli government and IDF have done some questionable things. Nor is it debatable that there are some not very nice people in the Israeli government, IDF, and the general population at large. Certainly no one comes to the table with clean hands in this issue. But in terms of lesser of two evils, it’s clear that Israel is not the villain.
The Palestinian "cause" is flawed from Square One. Yassir Arafat and other leaders have taken the bulk of aid money and put it in Swiss bank accounts all for themselves or to fund terror organizations. The Palestinian Authority who governs the West Bank and Hamas who "governs" the Gaza strip, use dirt-smeared children as props to get aid money, while secretly (or not so secretly) using that money to buy weapons or just line their pockets. Palestinian people are pawns in this game: kept in refugee camps in conditions of privation for decades so as to paint Israel as the villain, when in fact, Palestinians are oppressed by their own leadership. Worse yet, young people are brainwashed into fighting and dying for the Palestinian cause, even though doing so is against their own interests.
It’s the same old song and dance: Commit an atrocity, goad the IDF into responding, then play the victim. A well-oiled online troll farm then downplays the attack, while amplifying Israel's response. Wash, rinse, repeat.
The Jewish people remember, all-too-well, what happens when you try to "appease" or negotiate with people whose bargaining position is "you die and everyone in your tribe dies as well!" There is simply no compromise to be had with that position.
Israel knows that it must fight to survive - surrounded on all sides by enemies who have vowed their destruction - even if some of those enemies have softened their position as of late. Continued acts of terrorism and outright war over the decades have erased what little sympathy Israel has for Palestinians or Muslims in general. The Palestinians created this problem by fleeing Israel - other Arabs stayed behind and indeed, are today Israeli citizens. This whole situation is manufactured, to some extent, and again, nurtured and festered by their leadership to create a perpetual crisis in which ordinary citizens are caught in the middle. You might feel sorry for them, but then again, the folks in Gaza elected Hamas, so as they say, elections have consequences.
Israel has a right to exist - and a right to defend itself. Terrorism has no part in the discussion - acts of terror immediately discredit the side committing them. What Hamas hopes to accomplish with this latest outright act of war and terrorism is unclear - retaliation and condemnation will surely occur and their "cause" such as it is will be set back decades, if not forever.
Whatever Israel or the IDF have done over the years, it pales in comparison to beheading babies, raping women, murdering old people, and then defiling their corpses. Hamas has made it all-too-easy for people to think of Palestinians (or Muslims in general) as filthy animals with no conscience. And the first step in any genocide is to make the victims appear to be less-than-human. Again, what Hamas is thinking, strategically, makes no sense. Or maybe they are just bloodthirsty animals? That’s for you to decide. All I know is, my life expectancy in Gaza would be measured in minutes, whereas in Israel, it would be measured in years. And if you’re still not convinced, think of how welcome you’d be in Israel vs. Palestine or any other Islamic country: “Queers for Palestine” is like “Cows for Burger King” and “Women for Palestine” is like “Chickens for KFC.”
As a Jewish convert to Christianity with a fairly wide set of historical books under my belt, it troubles me to see some hierarchs and channels following the world's narrative about "anti-Semitism" and all the things that have been done to "combat anti-Semitism." I'll tell you directly, as a 100% pure blooded Ashkenazi man, how to fix "anti-Semitism:" Anti-Semitism will end when faithless Jews leave other groups of people alone and stop trying to transform their nations and cultures in ways that invariably harm the populations in question. It is really not that complicated.
“Anti-Semitism will end when faithless Jews leave other groups of people alone and stop trying to transform their nations and cultures in ways that invariably harm the populations in question. It is really not that complicated.”
This is utter garbage.
Even if I gave credence to your implied anti-neocon, Jewish conspiracy theory global cabal crap, it would not apply to the Middle East and the state of Israel.
Israel ain’t trying to transform other nations or cultures. It just wants to exist as a Jewish state.
Iran and Hamas and Hezbollah would still be seeking to wipe Israel from the face of the earth, from the River to the Sea.
Neither George Soros nor all the Jewish neocons who have ever existed have anything to do with *that* reality.
And even if somehow you meant only to refer to voter sentiment in western countries, wholly independent of Islamists, your claim STILL would not be true.
Because simplistic, depraved oppressor-oppressed ideology would still paint the Israelis as the rich white capitalist patriarchy oppressing the poor, BiPoC without-agency Palestinians.
The West has come to believe that wars can be fought with rules. The rules only work if both sides follow them. War is not like an athletic contest where the losing side goes home and prepares for their next game. The losing side is in very real danger of ceasing to exist. There is great incentive to toss the rules when your side is losing if it is advantageous.
While growing up, I had a neighbor that was a tank commander in the Black Panthers (the 761st Tank Battalion). He was in failing health and so my mother and I would help. I did his yard work and helped him with other chores. I was rewarded with his stories of life. He never married and had no family.
One time he told me about his experiences in WWII. (This was during the time of the Viet Nam war and the media was reporting on US atrocities) In small towns and villages they had to maneuver their tanks through narrow streets. At times, the streets were so narrow that you could touch the buildings on either side of the tank. He said they often came across a baby or young child sitting in the street. At first, they would stop and a soldier would get out of the tank to move the kid and offer the child some food. Unfortunately, they quickly learned that the Nazi's had no problem with placing an explosive device on the child that would be detonated with the soldiers approached. An older child might be found holding a hand grenade that they release when the soldier approached them. Other times the child was bait for a sniper. There were times the child was bait for an ambush. They could trap soldiers in the street by taking out the lead tank and then another vehicle in the rear. He lost many good friends and the Nazi's tactics almost always ended in the death of the child and many Americans. It did not take long to realize the only thing you could do to survive was drive over the child, crushing them. The child was going to die no matter what they did. Running over the child and continuing on meant they were more likely to survive.
I had an uncle that served in Viet Nam as a medic. He lived with us a few years because he had severe PTSD and could not work. He eventually became a taxi driver because it allowed him to work nights, when he could not sleep because of flashbacks and nightmares.
Late one night, I arrived home from visiting my girlfriend. On Saturday nights I would be at her house to watch Saturday Night Live with her and her brother. It was the only time I could stay out past midnight. My uncle was unable to sleep so we talked for a few hours. He started telling me some of the war stories. On the second day after arriving to Viet Nam, he was walking in the streets of a town on his way to a local bar that the American soldiers hung out at. An MP was in his group and they came across a young teen boy. He offered to sell a Zippo lighter to the MP. The MP immediately shot the boy in the head. My uncle was upset about this and started yelling at the MP. The MP and other soldiers restrained him and then gave him the first of many hard lessons he learned. The Viet Cong would reward children who killed an American with a Zippo lighter. Sometimes the lighter was taken off the body of a dead American as a prize.
By the end of his tour he had witnessed too many buddies being blown up by a kid with a hand grenade as they approached the kid. The Viet Cong would financially reward the kid's family. The families were often very poor and had lots of children so sacrificing one to get enough money to buy rice for a few months was worth it.
When the enemy does not value human life, they have no problem doing things we find abhorrent.
The reality of war is there are no civilians. Hundreds of years ago, the winning army often completely slaughtered all the men and often the women and children. Other times the women and children were taken as slaves. The civilians are also in harm's way and very little can prevent that unless we find a way to evacuate all civilians before the shooting starts.
Hamas is a terrorist organization because they commit acts of terror to get their enemies to fear them with the intention of forcing the enemies to disengage. They have no problem using non-combatants as a shield and then making sure the inevitable deaths of the people they placed in harm's way is broadcast to the world with the narrative of how evil their enemy is.
Imagine for one moment that you are a soldier defending your country from an enemy that conducted a sneak attack and killed hundreds and took hundreds hostage. Then they publicly tortured and killed many of the hostages. Every woman taken hostage has been raped multiple times. Friends and family members have been murdered by this unprovoked attack or taken hostage and tortured. It is going to be very difficult to restrain yourself and not kill every Palestinian they come across. Yet the IDF has shown great restrained to protect the civilians as best they can while hunting down those that will do anything they can to murder Jews because they are Jews.
We have forgotten the lessons of history. Almost 84 years ago, we faced an unprovoked attack and our response was the same as the Israeli's today. We vowed to utterly destroy the Japanese military and government so they never again would have the capacity to start a war. Remember, the Japanese committed heinous atrocities against the civilians and POWs. Yes some of our soldiers committed atrocities against the Japanese, but as a whole, we did not have a policy that encouraged and rewarded these atrocities. Once we took back an area, we feed and provided medical care to the survivors and helped them build back a functioning community. It would have been very easy to say screw it and kill every last one. We did not because we wanted to rebuild a country that could live peacefully with their neighbors.
As we’ve developed air power and better technology, we’ve become conceited enough in the West to think that we can just kill the “bad guys” and steer clear of the hard choices, ethical quandaries and ugly reality on the ground that come with meeting your enemies face-to-face in situations where there are no rules and losing means dying. War is ugly. Always has been, always will be.
This is spot on. Those who use violence to get what they want can only be stopped with violence. It is a hard lesson I learned back in the day on the playground. When I had enough of a bully and fought back, that is when the bullying stopped. They would rather pick on someone who will not fight back, it is much safer.
But in fact the Israelis are better at “just killing the ‘bad guys’” than any nation on earth has ever been.
It just doesn’t seem that way because of leftist media reporting in general, and their repetition of false casualty numbers put out by Hamas’ “Ministry of Health”.
You can say it’s because the Israelis are more moral, or merely because they know the world is watching and so they have more incentive than any nation ever to act responsibly. I’m sure the second point at least plays a big part. But regardless of the reason, the facts are the facts.
Sobering and truthful comment. These stories accord with some of what I've heard too. For those of us who are lucky enough to have never seen combat, it is hard to even imagine the things that really keep our veterans up at night. There are no words enough to thank them.
"In actuality, what we’re talking about are millions of people who gleefully, openly, support murdering even Israeli women and children. When you start to realize how mainstream and wildly popular this thinking is in Palestinian society, other things start to make sense."
Likewise, when we are talking about millions of Americans on the left who tacitly, explicitly and covertly support murdering their political opponents on the right, we start to realize how widely popular this thinking is in BlueSky society and other things make sense.
“Likewise, when we are talking about millions of Americans on the left who tacitly, explicitly and covertly support murdering their political opponents on the right,…”
The ones who support it covertly are not the problem…
Failure to denounce fellow further leftists who explicitly support murdering their political opponents on the right is regrettable, surely.
If you want to say that Dem politicians and media/influencers who fail to unequivocally denounce are part of the problem, I’ll actually strongly agree with you there, too.
But sorry, the millions on the left who fail to denounce are not the problem that the leaders plus those who explicitly support it are.
I'm for doing things the correct way, which is the old way. Everyone asks why we can't win wars anymore. Well, it's because we don't actually fight like it is a war.
Don't forget also indoctrinated by Leftist academia, who folded the Palestinians into their pantheon of sacred victims decades ago. The Jewish scapegoat rides again—settler-colonial white-supremacist imperialist apartheid genocide etc—all synonyms for "the Jews are evil and their state must be destroyed".
In my own anecdotal experience, and based on what I see in studies in schools, the kids are definitely illiterate. It’s related to them being ignorant and miseducated, and there’s a fun chicken egg game, and don’t get me started on the parental situations they’re dealing with, but they have difficulty sounding out words more than three syllables long. By most standards you’d argue illiteracy in people under 26.
IMO the college-miseducated are the ones who are disproportionately pro-Hamas, oppressor-oppressed ideologues.
But they are the least likely to be the “functionally illiterate” you are describing. I actually believe that within their cohort it would be a negative correlation, though how strong I would not venture a guess.
In all honesty, I forgot this was a discussion about Hamas and Palestine completely. Just jumped in to say the kids can’t/don’t read.
You are correct, but I do think there’s a link between people who do not read books for fun in their spare time and people willing to believe what they’re told by those in authority even if it makes no sense and goes against what they previously believed to be true. They will be literate in they read for school but unable to form a cohesive theory of mind for people who don’t believe the exact same things as them. In part because they spend so little time seeing through other eyes, as in books.
I’m probably stretching the definition of literacy anyhow.
You are just another evil straight white cisheteronormative male Christian (or Jewish) capitalist patriarchal oppressor.
You have no valid lived experience from which to comment truthfully and correctly about anything.
You and your kind are responsible for all evil - and little good - in our zero-sum power-based world.
Hmmph - you’re so evil that you don’t support Hamas.
Hamas’ murder, rape, torture and baby-killing rampage of October 7th was entirely morally justified. The poor BiPoC, without agency Palestinians have the right to overthrow their white Israeli oppressors BY. ANY. MEANS. NECESSARY.
This includes rape, torture and baby-killing.
How can you possibly disagree with this?
Oh, I forgot.
Because you are just another evil straight white cisheteronormative male Christian (or Jewish) capitalist patriarchal oppressor…
Prior to October 7th, I used to describe the Israeli-Palestinian issue as follows.
The Israelis are between 90% and 99% in the right; the Palestinians are between 1% and 10% in the right. Anyone who claims it’s 50-50 or even 60-40 Israel, let alone that the Palestinians are mostly or entirely right, is just not being objective. But anyone who claims the Israelis are 100% in the right is also wrong. And reasonable people can disagree in this 90% - 99% range.
[I myself was always at about 98%.]
Post October 7th, however, while the Israelis might not be 100% in the right, any sane, moral semi-objective individual should recognize - no matter what they think/feel about “the Palestinians” - that *Hamas* is between 99.9% and 100% wrong.
The fact that starting October 8th *so* many leftists have been pro-Hamas demonstrates how much depraved, simplistic oppressor-oppressed ideology has taken over the left.
What you describe about the history is absolutely true but I see evil acts perpetrated by every single party involved in this mess. I remember so many breath stopping acts done by the Palestinians and I know that the current popular attitude is at the very least a result of being ill informed. Still I can't give Israel a pass either given what I've seen the past few years. I just feel rather sad and hopeless about all of it these days.
I absolutely would not tell you Israel is full of gentle souls who’ve never done anything wrong. There are bad people there just like there are bad people everywhere. I'd also note that when you're forced to interact with and fight evil people, you can quickly find yourself doing things you would never do under normal circumstances.
However, just the fact that Israel could easily wipe the Palestinians out from the air and there are living Palestinians does at least tell you there's a huge, huge, difference between them.
I remember well the hijacking of Egypt Air and the brutal executions following it in Malta which included not just Jews but Americans. I remember many other atrocities. I understand what you are saying. But I believe it is disgraceful how violence begets more violence which begets more violence. When do we just say "ENOUGH!"?
That's just the thing; We don't ever get to say "enough." When you're faced with people that use violence to get their way, the choices are to stop them or submit to them.
Now that the IDF has ceased military operations in Gaza, the Gazans are back to what they do when they are not attacking Israel, they are fighting among themselves. Hamas is now fighting other factions because they are seeking to work with Israel to find a way out of this nonsense. Hamas has no interest in stopping their war on Israel. They are just buying time so they can rearm and recruit more fighters so that they can try again in a few years.
Living here (in the US) I have not actually seen any of the parties do anything. I am dependent on the description and the reporting I get from others. I am skeptical of all of it. So I do not know or see any of what I hear.
It's a shame we can't resurrect Genghis Khan or Vlad Tepes to deal with these animals. They were two men who knew how to deal with the Muslims, and were genuinely feared for it.
The genocidal terrorist group played stupid games and one stupid prizes. Frankly they are lucky Israel is a moral and humanitarian country because Hamas and every supporter deserved to be swept into the dust bin of history.
Today the NY Times lionized international non-lawyer and proud Jew hater Francesca Albanese as a righteous champion of the Palestinian cause. The far left is just like Hamas, more invested in dead Jews than thriving Arabs.
Throughout its history the NY Times has been the home office of Jews who oppose the Jewish state and support its enemies, all to prove how morally superior and enlightened they are. (Only rubes and bigots support their own faith, nation, or people.) They ignored the Holocaust and have been pushing Palestinian propaganda for decades now.
This tradition continues and will most likely never change.
So far so good John. Everything you say makes sense. Many people have made the same explanation. Putting a fence around these people wont (didnt) work. They can be pushed down or tunneled under. Further this latest iteration of the conflict has identified a secret weapon, public opinion, together with the means to control it, the internet / social media. To the surprise of Hamas their (little) invasion was spectacularly successful. But the winning strategy was that, whilst it was still going on they had started the second front of public opinion which made the aggressor the victim. To this day, even whilst there us a peace process and hostage return, the propal marches are bigger than ever. And if you look at what is being broadcast is the injustice of it all. No more starvation stories, and i suggest that the physical destruction will be the genocide. Demolishing buildings is the new genocide. The marches will now pivot from free free palestine and from the river to the sea to much more simple get rid of the Jews. Under the cover of a new objective of a pluralistic nation where all will live in harmony, hold hands and sing kumbaya. What is the solution dont know. Maybe a rabbit will be pulled out of a hat in the next few days. Or Jesus returns or maybe has already returned and will expose himself. If that happens will the marches stop. Of course not.
As to the 1947 UN partition proposal I was surprised to see that the UK abstained from voting while America took only minutes to vote in support. The Truman administration didn't hesitate, and an international Friendship was born between Israel and America. The UK? Well they're still "figuring things out," bless their little hearts.
It is possible to find the IDF's actions conscionable or unconscionable. Even if the latter, however, it is not possible to find Hamas' actions conscionable, and it is not possible for the IDF to not respond.
People who unqualifiedly support Palestine are either uninformed or bad actors.
In what way have the IDF action been better than Hamas?
It’s no secret that the Israeli government and IDF have done some questionable things. Nor is it debatable that there are some not very nice people in the Israeli government, IDF, and the general population at large. Certainly no one comes to the table with clean hands in this issue. But in terms of lesser of two evils, it’s clear that Israel is not the villain.
The Palestinian "cause" is flawed from Square One. Yassir Arafat and other leaders have taken the bulk of aid money and put it in Swiss bank accounts all for themselves or to fund terror organizations. The Palestinian Authority who governs the West Bank and Hamas who "governs" the Gaza strip, use dirt-smeared children as props to get aid money, while secretly (or not so secretly) using that money to buy weapons or just line their pockets. Palestinian people are pawns in this game: kept in refugee camps in conditions of privation for decades so as to paint Israel as the villain, when in fact, Palestinians are oppressed by their own leadership. Worse yet, young people are brainwashed into fighting and dying for the Palestinian cause, even though doing so is against their own interests.
It’s the same old song and dance: Commit an atrocity, goad the IDF into responding, then play the victim. A well-oiled online troll farm then downplays the attack, while amplifying Israel's response. Wash, rinse, repeat.
The Jewish people remember, all-too-well, what happens when you try to "appease" or negotiate with people whose bargaining position is "you die and everyone in your tribe dies as well!" There is simply no compromise to be had with that position.
Israel knows that it must fight to survive - surrounded on all sides by enemies who have vowed their destruction - even if some of those enemies have softened their position as of late. Continued acts of terrorism and outright war over the decades have erased what little sympathy Israel has for Palestinians or Muslims in general. The Palestinians created this problem by fleeing Israel - other Arabs stayed behind and indeed, are today Israeli citizens. This whole situation is manufactured, to some extent, and again, nurtured and festered by their leadership to create a perpetual crisis in which ordinary citizens are caught in the middle. You might feel sorry for them, but then again, the folks in Gaza elected Hamas, so as they say, elections have consequences.
Israel has a right to exist - and a right to defend itself. Terrorism has no part in the discussion - acts of terror immediately discredit the side committing them. What Hamas hopes to accomplish with this latest outright act of war and terrorism is unclear - retaliation and condemnation will surely occur and their "cause" such as it is will be set back decades, if not forever.
Whatever Israel or the IDF have done over the years, it pales in comparison to beheading babies, raping women, murdering old people, and then defiling their corpses. Hamas has made it all-too-easy for people to think of Palestinians (or Muslims in general) as filthy animals with no conscience. And the first step in any genocide is to make the victims appear to be less-than-human. Again, what Hamas is thinking, strategically, makes no sense. Or maybe they are just bloodthirsty animals? That’s for you to decide. All I know is, my life expectancy in Gaza would be measured in minutes, whereas in Israel, it would be measured in years. And if you’re still not convinced, think of how welcome you’d be in Israel vs. Palestine or any other Islamic country: “Queers for Palestine” is like “Cows for Burger King” and “Women for Palestine” is like “Chickens for KFC.”
Good points, all
As a Jewish convert to Christianity with a fairly wide set of historical books under my belt, it troubles me to see some hierarchs and channels following the world's narrative about "anti-Semitism" and all the things that have been done to "combat anti-Semitism." I'll tell you directly, as a 100% pure blooded Ashkenazi man, how to fix "anti-Semitism:" Anti-Semitism will end when faithless Jews leave other groups of people alone and stop trying to transform their nations and cultures in ways that invariably harm the populations in question. It is really not that complicated.
“Anti-Semitism will end when faithless Jews leave other groups of people alone and stop trying to transform their nations and cultures in ways that invariably harm the populations in question. It is really not that complicated.”
This is utter garbage.
Even if I gave credence to your implied anti-neocon, Jewish conspiracy theory global cabal crap, it would not apply to the Middle East and the state of Israel.
Israel ain’t trying to transform other nations or cultures. It just wants to exist as a Jewish state.
Iran and Hamas and Hezbollah would still be seeking to wipe Israel from the face of the earth, from the River to the Sea.
Neither George Soros nor all the Jewish neocons who have ever existed have anything to do with *that* reality.
And even if somehow you meant only to refer to voter sentiment in western countries, wholly independent of Islamists, your claim STILL would not be true.
Because simplistic, depraved oppressor-oppressed ideology would still paint the Israelis as the rich white capitalist patriarchy oppressing the poor, BiPoC without-agency Palestinians.
Go peddle your garbage elsewhere.
The West has come to believe that wars can be fought with rules. The rules only work if both sides follow them. War is not like an athletic contest where the losing side goes home and prepares for their next game. The losing side is in very real danger of ceasing to exist. There is great incentive to toss the rules when your side is losing if it is advantageous.
While growing up, I had a neighbor that was a tank commander in the Black Panthers (the 761st Tank Battalion). He was in failing health and so my mother and I would help. I did his yard work and helped him with other chores. I was rewarded with his stories of life. He never married and had no family.
One time he told me about his experiences in WWII. (This was during the time of the Viet Nam war and the media was reporting on US atrocities) In small towns and villages they had to maneuver their tanks through narrow streets. At times, the streets were so narrow that you could touch the buildings on either side of the tank. He said they often came across a baby or young child sitting in the street. At first, they would stop and a soldier would get out of the tank to move the kid and offer the child some food. Unfortunately, they quickly learned that the Nazi's had no problem with placing an explosive device on the child that would be detonated with the soldiers approached. An older child might be found holding a hand grenade that they release when the soldier approached them. Other times the child was bait for a sniper. There were times the child was bait for an ambush. They could trap soldiers in the street by taking out the lead tank and then another vehicle in the rear. He lost many good friends and the Nazi's tactics almost always ended in the death of the child and many Americans. It did not take long to realize the only thing you could do to survive was drive over the child, crushing them. The child was going to die no matter what they did. Running over the child and continuing on meant they were more likely to survive.
I had an uncle that served in Viet Nam as a medic. He lived with us a few years because he had severe PTSD and could not work. He eventually became a taxi driver because it allowed him to work nights, when he could not sleep because of flashbacks and nightmares.
Late one night, I arrived home from visiting my girlfriend. On Saturday nights I would be at her house to watch Saturday Night Live with her and her brother. It was the only time I could stay out past midnight. My uncle was unable to sleep so we talked for a few hours. He started telling me some of the war stories. On the second day after arriving to Viet Nam, he was walking in the streets of a town on his way to a local bar that the American soldiers hung out at. An MP was in his group and they came across a young teen boy. He offered to sell a Zippo lighter to the MP. The MP immediately shot the boy in the head. My uncle was upset about this and started yelling at the MP. The MP and other soldiers restrained him and then gave him the first of many hard lessons he learned. The Viet Cong would reward children who killed an American with a Zippo lighter. Sometimes the lighter was taken off the body of a dead American as a prize.
By the end of his tour he had witnessed too many buddies being blown up by a kid with a hand grenade as they approached the kid. The Viet Cong would financially reward the kid's family. The families were often very poor and had lots of children so sacrificing one to get enough money to buy rice for a few months was worth it.
When the enemy does not value human life, they have no problem doing things we find abhorrent.
The reality of war is there are no civilians. Hundreds of years ago, the winning army often completely slaughtered all the men and often the women and children. Other times the women and children were taken as slaves. The civilians are also in harm's way and very little can prevent that unless we find a way to evacuate all civilians before the shooting starts.
Hamas is a terrorist organization because they commit acts of terror to get their enemies to fear them with the intention of forcing the enemies to disengage. They have no problem using non-combatants as a shield and then making sure the inevitable deaths of the people they placed in harm's way is broadcast to the world with the narrative of how evil their enemy is.
Imagine for one moment that you are a soldier defending your country from an enemy that conducted a sneak attack and killed hundreds and took hundreds hostage. Then they publicly tortured and killed many of the hostages. Every woman taken hostage has been raped multiple times. Friends and family members have been murdered by this unprovoked attack or taken hostage and tortured. It is going to be very difficult to restrain yourself and not kill every Palestinian they come across. Yet the IDF has shown great restrained to protect the civilians as best they can while hunting down those that will do anything they can to murder Jews because they are Jews.
We have forgotten the lessons of history. Almost 84 years ago, we faced an unprovoked attack and our response was the same as the Israeli's today. We vowed to utterly destroy the Japanese military and government so they never again would have the capacity to start a war. Remember, the Japanese committed heinous atrocities against the civilians and POWs. Yes some of our soldiers committed atrocities against the Japanese, but as a whole, we did not have a policy that encouraged and rewarded these atrocities. Once we took back an area, we feed and provided medical care to the survivors and helped them build back a functioning community. It would have been very easy to say screw it and kill every last one. We did not because we wanted to rebuild a country that could live peacefully with their neighbors.
As we’ve developed air power and better technology, we’ve become conceited enough in the West to think that we can just kill the “bad guys” and steer clear of the hard choices, ethical quandaries and ugly reality on the ground that come with meeting your enemies face-to-face in situations where there are no rules and losing means dying. War is ugly. Always has been, always will be.
This is spot on. Those who use violence to get what they want can only be stopped with violence. It is a hard lesson I learned back in the day on the playground. When I had enough of a bully and fought back, that is when the bullying stopped. They would rather pick on someone who will not fight back, it is much safer.
But in fact the Israelis are better at “just killing the ‘bad guys’” than any nation on earth has ever been.
It just doesn’t seem that way because of leftist media reporting in general, and their repetition of false casualty numbers put out by Hamas’ “Ministry of Health”.
You can say it’s because the Israelis are more moral, or merely because they know the world is watching and so they have more incentive than any nation ever to act responsibly. I’m sure the second point at least plays a big part. But regardless of the reason, the facts are the facts.
Sobering and truthful comment. These stories accord with some of what I've heard too. For those of us who are lucky enough to have never seen combat, it is hard to even imagine the things that really keep our veterans up at night. There are no words enough to thank them.
wow this was great
was like a book or a movie!
thanks!
"In actuality, what we’re talking about are millions of people who gleefully, openly, support murdering even Israeli women and children. When you start to realize how mainstream and wildly popular this thinking is in Palestinian society, other things start to make sense."
Likewise, when we are talking about millions of Americans on the left who tacitly, explicitly and covertly support murdering their political opponents on the right, we start to realize how widely popular this thinking is in BlueSky society and other things make sense.
“Likewise, when we are talking about millions of Americans on the left who tacitly, explicitly and covertly support murdering their political opponents on the right,…”
The ones who support it covertly are not the problem…
They are though. Because they don’t speak out against it, they encourage those that do it.
Failure to denounce fellow further leftists who explicitly support murdering their political opponents on the right is regrettable, surely.
If you want to say that Dem politicians and media/influencers who fail to unequivocally denounce are part of the problem, I’ll actually strongly agree with you there, too.
But sorry, the millions on the left who fail to denounce are not the problem that the leaders plus those who explicitly support it are.
I'm for doing things the correct way, which is the old way. Everyone asks why we can't win wars anymore. Well, it's because we don't actually fight like it is a war.
Everyone: Read this right to the end. Then share it as widely as you can.
The only reason why young people are sympathetic to the Palestinians is because most of them are now functionally illiterate.
Don't forget also indoctrinated by Leftist academia, who folded the Palestinians into their pantheon of sacred victims decades ago. The Jewish scapegoat rides again—settler-colonial white-supremacist imperialist apartheid genocide etc—all synonyms for "the Jews are evil and their state must be destroyed".
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Thanks, Andy!
No, I don’t agree that they are illiterate.
I do agree that they are ignorant. And woefully miseducated.
But not functionally illiterate.
There are enough true reasons to explain and deplore how we have gotten to where we are. There is no reason to add falsehoods on top of the truth.
In my own anecdotal experience, and based on what I see in studies in schools, the kids are definitely illiterate. It’s related to them being ignorant and miseducated, and there’s a fun chicken egg game, and don’t get me started on the parental situations they’re dealing with, but they have difficulty sounding out words more than three syllables long. By most standards you’d argue illiteracy in people under 26.
IMO the college-miseducated are the ones who are disproportionately pro-Hamas, oppressor-oppressed ideologues.
But they are the least likely to be the “functionally illiterate” you are describing. I actually believe that within their cohort it would be a negative correlation, though how strong I would not venture a guess.
In all honesty, I forgot this was a discussion about Hamas and Palestine completely. Just jumped in to say the kids can’t/don’t read.
You are correct, but I do think there’s a link between people who do not read books for fun in their spare time and people willing to believe what they’re told by those in authority even if it makes no sense and goes against what they previously believed to be true. They will be literate in they read for school but unable to form a cohesive theory of mind for people who don’t believe the exact same things as them. In part because they spend so little time seeing through other eyes, as in books.
I’m probably stretching the definition of literacy anyhow.
You are just another evil straight white cisheteronormative male Christian (or Jewish) capitalist patriarchal oppressor.
You have no valid lived experience from which to comment truthfully and correctly about anything.
You and your kind are responsible for all evil - and little good - in our zero-sum power-based world.
Hmmph - you’re so evil that you don’t support Hamas.
Hamas’ murder, rape, torture and baby-killing rampage of October 7th was entirely morally justified. The poor BiPoC, without agency Palestinians have the right to overthrow their white Israeli oppressors BY. ANY. MEANS. NECESSARY.
This includes rape, torture and baby-killing.
How can you possibly disagree with this?
Oh, I forgot.
Because you are just another evil straight white cisheteronormative male Christian (or Jewish) capitalist patriarchal oppressor…
Well, guess we have to let the mentally ill speak…..
Do you think he's using irony? or sarcasm? I actually don't.
The great thing about Substack is that by perusing other posts and comments, this is very easy to figure out…
P.S. That the author himself “liked” the comment should be a giveaway…
Prior to October 7th, I used to describe the Israeli-Palestinian issue as follows.
The Israelis are between 90% and 99% in the right; the Palestinians are between 1% and 10% in the right. Anyone who claims it’s 50-50 or even 60-40 Israel, let alone that the Palestinians are mostly or entirely right, is just not being objective. But anyone who claims the Israelis are 100% in the right is also wrong. And reasonable people can disagree in this 90% - 99% range.
[I myself was always at about 98%.]
Post October 7th, however, while the Israelis might not be 100% in the right, any sane, moral semi-objective individual should recognize - no matter what they think/feel about “the Palestinians” - that *Hamas* is between 99.9% and 100% wrong.
The fact that starting October 8th *so* many leftists have been pro-Hamas demonstrates how much depraved, simplistic oppressor-oppressed ideology has taken over the left.
What you describe about the history is absolutely true but I see evil acts perpetrated by every single party involved in this mess. I remember so many breath stopping acts done by the Palestinians and I know that the current popular attitude is at the very least a result of being ill informed. Still I can't give Israel a pass either given what I've seen the past few years. I just feel rather sad and hopeless about all of it these days.
I absolutely would not tell you Israel is full of gentle souls who’ve never done anything wrong. There are bad people there just like there are bad people everywhere. I'd also note that when you're forced to interact with and fight evil people, you can quickly find yourself doing things you would never do under normal circumstances.
However, just the fact that Israel could easily wipe the Palestinians out from the air and there are living Palestinians does at least tell you there's a huge, huge, difference between them.
I remember well the hijacking of Egypt Air and the brutal executions following it in Malta which included not just Jews but Americans. I remember many other atrocities. I understand what you are saying. But I believe it is disgraceful how violence begets more violence which begets more violence. When do we just say "ENOUGH!"?
That's just the thing; We don't ever get to say "enough." When you're faced with people that use violence to get their way, the choices are to stop them or submit to them.
Now that the IDF has ceased military operations in Gaza, the Gazans are back to what they do when they are not attacking Israel, they are fighting among themselves. Hamas is now fighting other factions because they are seeking to work with Israel to find a way out of this nonsense. Hamas has no interest in stopping their war on Israel. They are just buying time so they can rearm and recruit more fighters so that they can try again in a few years.
Maxim 6: “If violence wasn’t your last resort, you failed to resort to enough of it.”
Read The Jewish War, by Josephus. You will feel EVEN WORSE.
Just curious, what have you actually “ seen” that’s got you so convinced that Israel is complicit in savage acts?
Living here (in the US) I have not actually seen any of the parties do anything. I am dependent on the description and the reporting I get from others. I am skeptical of all of it. So I do not know or see any of what I hear.
That is a very smart way to be.
They need to be completely crushed. This isn’t over.
It's a shame we can't resurrect Genghis Khan or Vlad Tepes to deal with these animals. They were two men who knew how to deal with the Muslims, and were genuinely feared for it.
The genocidal terrorist group played stupid games and one stupid prizes. Frankly they are lucky Israel is a moral and humanitarian country because Hamas and every supporter deserved to be swept into the dust bin of history.
Today the NY Times lionized international non-lawyer and proud Jew hater Francesca Albanese as a righteous champion of the Palestinian cause. The far left is just like Hamas, more invested in dead Jews than thriving Arabs.
Throughout its history the NY Times has been the home office of Jews who oppose the Jewish state and support its enemies, all to prove how morally superior and enlightened they are. (Only rubes and bigots support their own faith, nation, or people.) They ignored the Holocaust and have been pushing Palestinian propaganda for decades now.
This tradition continues and will most likely never change.
Albanese is a cnut.
So far so good John. Everything you say makes sense. Many people have made the same explanation. Putting a fence around these people wont (didnt) work. They can be pushed down or tunneled under. Further this latest iteration of the conflict has identified a secret weapon, public opinion, together with the means to control it, the internet / social media. To the surprise of Hamas their (little) invasion was spectacularly successful. But the winning strategy was that, whilst it was still going on they had started the second front of public opinion which made the aggressor the victim. To this day, even whilst there us a peace process and hostage return, the propal marches are bigger than ever. And if you look at what is being broadcast is the injustice of it all. No more starvation stories, and i suggest that the physical destruction will be the genocide. Demolishing buildings is the new genocide. The marches will now pivot from free free palestine and from the river to the sea to much more simple get rid of the Jews. Under the cover of a new objective of a pluralistic nation where all will live in harmony, hold hands and sing kumbaya. What is the solution dont know. Maybe a rabbit will be pulled out of a hat in the next few days. Or Jesus returns or maybe has already returned and will expose himself. If that happens will the marches stop. Of course not.
Thanks
As to the 1947 UN partition proposal I was surprised to see that the UK abstained from voting while America took only minutes to vote in support. The Truman administration didn't hesitate, and an international Friendship was born between Israel and America. The UK? Well they're still "figuring things out," bless their little hearts.
@DonSurber pointed out that PBS, FINANCIAL TIMES & REUTERS are all using the descriptive "Gazans" instead of "Palestinians."
I agree this shows a shift in Overton Window.