Rolling MENA 2014 (Middle East)

can we please not do this bullshit on this thread?

But my argument is not with the Palestinians or even with Hamas. People in the thick of it pursue their own agenda as best they can. But what’s our agenda? What do we, in the cosy safety of tolerant old England, think we are doing when we call the Israelis Nazis and liken Gaza to the Warsaw Ghetto? Do those who blithely make these comparisons know anything whereof they speak?

In the early 1940s some 100,000 Jews and Romanis died of engineered starvation and disease in the Warsaw Ghetto, another quarter of a million were transported to the death camps, and when the Ghetto rose up it was liquidated, the last 50,000 residents being either shot on the spot or sent to be murdered more hygienically in Treblinka. Don’t mistake me: every Palestinian killed in Gaza is a Palestinian too many, but there is not the remotest similarity, either in intention or in deed – even in the most grossly mis-reported deed – between Gaza and Warsaw.

Given the number of besieged and battered cities there have been in however many thousands of years of pitiless warfare there is only one explanation for this invocation of Warsaw before any of those – it is to wound Jews in their recent and most anguished history and to punish them with their own grief. Its aim is a sort of retrospective retribution, cancelling out all debts of guilt and sorrow. It is as though, by a reversal of the usual laws of cause and effect, Jewish actions of today prove that Jews had it coming to them yesterday.

Berating Jews with their own history, disinheriting them of pity, as though pity is negotiable or has a sell-by date, is the latest species of Holocaust denial, infinitely more subtle than the David Irving version with its clunking body counts and quibbles over gas-chamber capability and chimney sizes. Instead of saying the Holocaust didn’t happen, the modern sophisticated denier accepts the event in all its terrible enormity, only to accuse the Jews of trying to profit from it, either in the form of moral blackmail or downright territorial theft. According to this thinking, the Jews have betrayed the Holocaust and become unworthy of it, the true heirs to their suffering being the Palestinians. Thus, here and there throughout the world this year, Holocaust day was temporarily annulled or boycotted on account of Gaza, dead Jews being found guilty of the sins of live ones.

-howard jacobson in 2009: http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/howard-jacobson/howard-jacobson-letrsquos-see-the-criticism-of-israel-for-what-it-really-is-1624827.html

For the record and as I told Mordy privately, I regretted that post right away and apologize for it.

I wonder how this split between the non-Israeli Jewish diaspora, which is increasingly anti-Israel, and Israeli Jews, who are increasingly militant/racist/insane will play out in the generations to come.

The word "increasingly" is doing a lot of work here. I think it's broadly true that insane militancy is getting stronger in Israel, but still think it's not very strong. And I think it's broadly true that anti-Israel and anti-Zionist feelings are increasing among American Jews, but also think that American Jews, including young American Jews, generally see themselves as pro-Israel and Zionist. If Israeli politics 20 years from now is dominated by people like Ayelet Shaked, that could change. But that's not Israel now. Israel is represented by Ayelet Shaked about as well as the United States is represented by Michele Bachmann.

There really is no other way to interpret it as it being deliberate. I don't know why, I refuse to believe it is because "sadistic glee". But this is what happened.

There really are lots of other ways to interpret it. Do you think Russians shot down a Malaysian passenger plane with 300 people aboard because they want to kill Malaysians? I don't, and it's not because I'm a Vladimir Putin apologist.

No, the way it looks now, is that separatists shot it down *thinking* it was a Ukranian cargo plane. They messed up. But your comparison is flawed on so many levels.

the neofascist right in israel looks a lot like its european counterparts. same tshirts anyway...

http://www.talschneider.com/2014/07/14/goodnightleftside-2/

but also think that American Jews, including young American Jews, generally see themselves as pro-Israel and Zionist

some interesting stats here

Older Jews are more likely than younger Jews to see caring about Israel as an essential part of what being Jewish means to them. More than half of Jews 65 and older say caring about Israel is essential for their Jewish identity (53%), as do 47% of Jews ages 50-64. By comparison, 38% of Jews in their 30s and 40s and 32% of Jewish adults under age 30 say caring about Israel is central to what being Jewish means to them. It is hard to know whether these age differences suggest that U.S. Jews’ attachment to Israel will weaken over time. If younger Jews retain their lower levels of attachment to Israel, then overall attachment to Israel may weaken with time.

and then there's this:http://www.bjpa.org/Publications/details.cfm?PublicationID=326

Indeed, a mounting body of evidence
has pointed to a growing distancing from Israel of American Jews, and the distancing seems
to be most pronounced among younger Jews.
Insofar as younger Jews are less attached to
Israel, the inevitable replacement of the older
population with younger birth cohorts leads
to a growing distancing in the population
overall.
In recent years, several studies have
pointed to the distancing phenomenon, be
they studies focusing on attitudes toward Is
rael specifically (e.g., Cohen 2002; Luntz), or
those painting a more generalized portrait of
Jewish identity among younger adult American Jews (e.g., Cohen and Kelman 2007;
Greenberg 2004, 2006; Ukeles et al. 2006).
Studies pointing to an attenuated American
Jewish relationship with Israel are not a recent phenomenon; in fact, they stretch back
nearly a quarter of a century. With such titles
as, “Are American and Israeli Jews Drifting
Apart?” (Cohen 1989b), “Ties and Tensions”
(Cohen 1987), or “From Romantic Idealists
to Loving Realists: The Changing Place of
Israel in the Consciousness of American
Jews” (Cohen 1985), a long trail of literature
documents diminished attachment to Israel
among American Jews (see in addition,
Cohen 1983, 1986, 1988, 1989a, 1989c, 1990,
1991a, 1991b, 1992, 1996; Cohen and Liebman
2000; Cohen and Lipset 1991; Liebman and
Cohen 1990; Waxman 1992).

urgh sorry for spacing

IDF talking it up a notch http://htz.li/Wd74M0

Taking, not talking

here we goooooo

Declaring a new phase in its operation, Israel’s military said it was entering the coastal strip to wipe out Hamas’s rocket capabilities and to dismantle what is believed to be an extensive network of tunnels used by the militants to infiltrate Israel.

W. Post

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/15/world/middleeast/israelis-watch-bombs-drop-on-gaza-from-front-row-seats.html?_r=1

"atmosphere of fear in Israel"

well Charles Krauthammer has confirmed that Israel's doing the correct and moral thing by invading, we can all sleep well tonight!

what would they have to gain from deliberately targeting children? sadistic glee? is that really what you believe?

― Mordy, Wednesday, July 16, 2014 5:03 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

sadistic glee:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/dorsey/israeli-crowd-cheers-as-missile-hits-gaza-live-on-cnn

Exactly.

Meanwhile, Bill Maher manages to defend slaughter and domestic violence in 140 characters:

http://i.imgur.com/WPotumg.jpg

Operation Protective Edge

i've been thinking for like 5 minutes but i literally do not have words for that besides fuck bill maher

Has been and always will be a horrible person

christ Maher's smug mug. enough of him.

I am a big Zionist and screw Bill Maher and screw people in Sderot who treat a war like a Transformers movie and screw anybody who thinks that being a Zionist means you're psyched about innocent people getting killed.

I support dropping that shithead on Hamas. Or Israel.

An unusually cogent piece appears on the NYT Op page:

Israel immediately sought to undermine the reconciliation agreement by preventing Hamas leaders and Gaza residents from obtaining the two most essential benefits of the deal: the payment of salaries to 43,000 civil servants who worked for the Hamas government and continue to administer Gaza under the new one, and the easing of the suffocating border closures imposed by Israel and Egypt that bar most Gazans’ passage to the outside world.

Yet, in many ways, the reconciliation government could have served Israel’s interests. It offered Hamas’s political adversaries a foothold in Gaza; it was formed without a single Hamas member; it retained the same Ramallah-based prime minister, deputy prime ministers, finance minister and foreign minister; and, most important, it pledged to comply with the three conditions for Western aid long demanded by America and its European allies: nonviolence, adherence to past agreements and recognition of Israel.

Israel strongly opposed American recognition of the new government, however, and sought to isolate it internationally, seeing any small step toward Palestinian unity as a threat....

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/opinion/gaza-and-israel-the-road-to-war-paved-by-the-west.html

here's the first issue of a magazine ISIS have put out - https://ia902500.us.archive.org/24/items/dbq01_desktop_en/dbq01_desktop_en.pdf

http://ottomansandzionists.com/2014/07/18/the-turkish-governments-journey-down-the-rabbit-hole/

the one comment so far worth reading too

bill maher was at a video game party years and years ago and my friend who worked at c@pc0m drug him out by his collar because he was drunk and grabbing all these womens's asses and being gross

this is really tremendous: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/18/father-children-gaza-bloodshed-palestinians-israelis

Turks tossing around genocide accusations is p rich. they should know amirite

xp

if only hamas had a state sponsor like putin who could casually mention that hamas would be willing to completely demilitarize under agreeable supervisory bodies in exchange for open borders + lifting naval embargo - i feel like that could actually produce change between Israel + Gaza (thinking of syria as a template). it's hard to imagine bibi agreeing to this, but it's even harder for me to imagine hamas agreeing :/

yeah good guardian piece
xp

look i know this kind of terminology gets thrown around in extremely loose and inflammatory ways but idk how to interpret this in any other way than to say it's fascist:

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/15326#.U8q0_WK9KSO

a political rival of netanyahu's and not a minister w/ portfolio (if i read wiki correctly) but still:

Sovereignty – Gaza is part of our Land and we will remain there forever. Liberation of parts of our land forever is the only thing that justifies endangering our soldiers in battle to capture land. Subsequent to the elimination of terror from Gaza, it will become part of sovereign Israel and will be populated by Jews. This will also serve to ease the housing crisis in Israel.

a "solution" to make "living room", i mean, come on now...

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/20/world/middleeast/attack-kills-at-least-20-egyptian-soldiers-at-checkpoint-in-western-desert.html

http://www.theonion.com/articles/palestinians-starting-to-have-mixed-feelings-about,36497

Netanyahu keeps it classy by saying that Hamas is using "telegenically dead Palestinians for their cause".

"we killed way more children than that but they only show the cute ones"

rumsfeltian prose

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/bs-md-jewish-families-20140720,0,4513989.story

Kerry's "It's a hell of a pinpoint operation" at least indicates he might have the same kernel of self-hatred that Obama must have.

yeah i likewise found that satisfying

otoh, he's repulsive

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/kerry-snaps-at-cnns-crowley-hamas-tries-to-provoke-questions-like-yours/

these tunnels are nuts:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/07/21/how-hamas-uses-its-tunnels-to-kill-and-capture-israeli-soldiers/

http://972mag.com/how-can-you-possibly-oppose-this-war/93924/

I lol'd
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BtEe-a6CUAAt6Sd.jpg

I mean, it makes fucking sense.

really good read: http://www.newrepublic.com/article/118751/how-israel-palestine-peace-deal-died

(very inside-baseball narrative)

FAA bans all flights into Ben Gurion

https://a248.e.akamai.net/f/1362/5848/6m/s.telegraph.co.uk/graphics/html/Years/2014/July/img/gazaDeaths2.png

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/palestinianauthority/10984259/Revealed-the-Palestinian-children-killed-by-Israeli-forces.html

http://www.timesofisrael.com/for-second-time-rockets-found-at-un-school-in-gaza/