the USA, Israel, and national interest

Max, when you are the target of anti-sentiment, it is not very easy to distinguish between rational and irrational reasons for it.

Not to mention that I'm sympathetic for Palestinians who don't know any better, but I have no respect for their culture or beliefs. As far as I'm concerned all religious groups are morons. And recently it's seemed like a lot of Israel critics subscribe to some Prime Directive. I'd love it if Israeli culture totally consumed Palestinian culture and became the reigning regional hegemony.

The European left has this really confusing hatred of Israel. I mean, I understand sympathizing with Palestine and stuff, but European lefties are so overboard with their anti-Israeli sentiment that it's a little uncomfortable

LOL @ idea of "The European left"

WTF is that?

uh okay so Mordy is also crazy

I'd love it if Israeli culture totally consumed Palestinian culture and became the reigning regional hegemony.

nice

I'm not crazy. I just don't have any sympathy for religious ideologies (and that includes far right wing Judaism).

Mordy, most Americans don't think about Israel much. Since they've been spoonfed headlines from an overwhelmingly pro-Zionist media-industrial complex for 60 years, of course they're not gonna see things as sharply as many of those engaged with the topic.

As for Perrin's 'one-sidedness,' as usual it's a bit more complicated:

It's interesting to note how all the excuses for slaughtering Palestinians when the PLO was Hitler are now being used to tar Hamas. They reject compromise, are bottomless Jew haters, are addicted to death, want to drive Israel into the sea, etc. Naturally, being human beings, there are Palestinians who match these descriptions (just as there are Israelis who view Palestinians as dogs, pigs, insects, and cancers). But accurate labeling isn't the goal here; finding excuses to justify attacks that were pre-planned is the overall point. Again, this goes back to the PLO period, when Fatah offers of two-state negotiation, beginning in 1976, were not only rejected by Israel, but were often answered with air strikes. When the PLO kept offering to talk, Israel found ways to undermine Palestinian moderation, from helping anti-PLO Muslims gain political/military traction (which led to Hamas), to outright attempts at physical annihilation, like the 1982 invasion of Lebanon. Now that Fatah has been reduced to Israeli-client status, the same bloody playbook is being used against Hamas, and will be used against whoever succeeds them.

http://dennisperrin.blogspot.com/2008/12/killing-floor-expands.html

I'm trying to expand into fertile foreign markets here.

Not having sympathy for religious ideologies does not give you a free pass to say "I would like to see these people's culture completely wiped out" without catching any shit for it.

I've been following this conflict since I was eight or nine. Israel never responded to negotiation with air-strikes. They've responded to attacks with air-strikes. Let's not whitewash history.

XP I didn't say wiped out. I said consumed. Let it become absorbed by secular Westernism. I don't think there's any inherent value in fundamentalism.

As far as I'm concerned all religious groups are morons

well, happy Martin Luther King Day.

Let it become absorbed by secular Westernism

Of which Israel is a notable exponent?

fair amount of truth in that perrin post, though obviously it's framed in a conspiracy-theory mode that makes israel the only party, the only agency, in the whole mess.

xposts

God-bless-our-righteous-bombs secular Westernism

saying you're sympathetic to Palestinians but have no respect for their culture is kind of worthless. you're basically saying i'd dig these people if they were entirely different than they are.

israeli culture is secular and western?!

Uh no. There's value to human life. There's no intrinsic value to human beliefs.

And yes. Israeli culture is secular and western. Ever been to Tel Aviv?

Or Haifa?

their culture=the way they live

There isn't really intrinsic value to human life.

Secular and western, a bit like Turkey

i wish people who employed this kind of rhetoric would just acknowledge that the only way to achieve the "consumption" of one culture by another is to kill everyone of that culture.

Yay. Let's support clitoridectomies too. :/

lol mordy are u drunk

what are you even talking about?

what is the standard of 'secular' we are using? france? the US?

human culture = clitoredectomies

israeli state probably a biiit more secular than a hamas-governed palestine, but we are talking about degrees.

Dude, what are you talking about? I'm not exactly lobbing a challops here. Some cultures suck. Some aspects of some cultures suck. We have no obligation to tolerate them.

probably best if they ignored each other, passive-aggresively.

I think I could take Israel a lot more seriously if they granted Palestinians living within Israel the same rights as Jews.

Uh, they do. Arab citizens have the exact same rights as Jews.

There are even Arab representatives in the knesset.

how dare they bring their disgusting fundamentalist culture into the western secular knesset

they were elected... you know... Democracy.

Like Hamas were, you mean?

Some cultures suck. Some aspects of some cultures suck. We have no obligation to tolerate them.

That's funny, I know someone who insists on believing that about another group mentioned in this thread....

Some cultures suck.

e.g., that fucking your inferior wife thru a hole in the sheet while illegally occupying land cuz God gave it to you 5,000 years ago stuff.

e.g., that fucking your inferior wife thru a hole in the sheet while illegally occupying land cuz God gave it to you 5,000 years ago stuff.

Cute. Asshole.

Again, I'm not saying anything challopsy here. I hate large swaths of Charedi culture too.

I think I could take Israel a lot more seriously if they granted Palestinians living within Israel the same rights as Jews.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, January 13, 2009 5:28 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

im pretty sure they do tbh but i am open to persuasion if my perception is wrong.

im no challops expert but "i hate all fundamentalist religion" + "a lot of human culture sucks" + "israel should consume palestine" is kind of a challops trifecta

The third one is more challopsy than the first two - but I don't see what is challopsy about not liking certain cultures.

can you not see the distinction between "i have no respect for palestinian culture" and "Muslim fundamentalism is appalling in many ways"? also many people believe the latter without calling for actions that are tantamount to exterminating Muslims (good luck with that, by the way.)

Wow. I never called for exterminating anyone.

But nice strawman, I guess??

i believe you didn't mean to but you basically did.