Rolling MENA 2014 (Middle East)

It doesn't have to. We were at a birthday BBQ the other night, and a friend, after a couple of beers, said, apropos of nothing and to no one in particular: "I think I can say this around you guys, but I am so ashamed of Israel right now." I just sort of shook my head and said "there's no reason to do this here." And that was that.

xp I don't even know why Josh brought up post-9/11 wars because they were terrible ideas, justified by lies, which led to the US killing a bunch of civilians. If the comparison is meant to imply that, like Americans and Iraq, Israelis will come to view this operation as a disgrace and feel deeply embarrassed about supporting it then OK.

On CNN just now: Israel is running out of ammo, so the US are going to ship them some more. Never forget.

So Israel is pretty much losing this war. Or have they already lost?

how are they losing the war, exactly?

their objective is to terrorize the palestinian population and bomb the shit out of any infrastructure they can. i'd say it's going pretty well for them

nah, that isn't their objective. their objective is to stop hamas, which they won't. hamas managed to shut down ben gurion, kill more than fifty israeli soldiers, and there was enough palestinian deaths to turn it into an international outrage. israel, meanwhile, is running out of ammo, don't know how to handle the tunnels, and domestic response has become so insane that media is fabricating diplomatic transcripts and freaking out because john kerry talks to turkey instead of egypt. my guess is it will be seen as a loss like the lebanese war some years back.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uoemv7DNsnE&feature=youtu.be

UNWRA spokesperson breaks on telly

I don't even know why Josh brought up post-9/11 wars because they were terrible ideas, justified by lies, which led to the US killing a bunch of civilians. If the comparison is meant to imply that, like Americans and Iraq, Israelis will come to view this operation as a disgrace and feel deeply embarrassed about supporting it then OK.

I figured that would be pretty obvious.

ugh - http://www.jta.org/2014/07/30/news-opinion/politics/senate-backs-israels-goals-in-gaza-conflict#ixzz38z09Up8X

feel like number one priority for Americans against this kind of shit should be undermining/countering AIPAC

how that is done? idk anybody know any Jewish anti-Zionist billionaire donors

Soros funds j street iirc

ah why didn't I think of that

not particularly impressed by their stance at the moment tbh:

http://jstreet.org/blog/post/j-street-statement-on-the-current-crisis_1

Brian Eno weighs in: http://p4k.in/WNxJQc

it's pretty obvious why America's support is so one-sided

so when does Israel declare "victory"? the IDF must have specific strategic goals here but fuck if I can tell what they are

Sad my man Eno has waded into this, esp. since he is best buds with Dawkins, no friend to the Muslims.

Why isn't Eno allowed to share his view on this? Rather, why does that make you 'sad'?

Also: Just as Israel does not equal Jews, Palestine does not equal Muslims. I don't get what you are trying to say.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/31/world/middleeast/fighting-political-islam-arab-states-find-themselves-allied-with-israel.html

he is best buds with Dawkins

this is p sad tbf

the meta saudis egypt israel v qatar turkey and hamas is some next level shit

otm - plus extra-Iranian dimension.

xpost He's absolutely allowed to say whatever he wants. I've just always thought of Eno, besides being a personal hero of mine, as a very measured, intelligent man. Which to my mind puts him above crying "ethnic cleansing" and comparing Israel to the Klan. Israel comes off pretty shitty without that kind of hyperbole.

the Klan thing is kinda weird cuz he's like "America, why would you support someone like the Klan?" well um WE MADE THE KLAN

Not too keen on Eno's hyperbolic either, but it's not hard to see that it comes from a well meaning heart. It's hard to leave out the rage and anger when facing such blatant injustice, the crimes Israel forces are committing here.

Henry Siegman:

"When one thinks that this is what is necessary for Israel to survive, that the Zionist dream is based on the repeated slaughter of innocents on a scale that we’re watching these days on television, that is really a profound, profound crisis — and should be a profound crisis in the thinking of all of us who were committed to the establishment of the state and to its success," Siegman says. Responding to Israel’s U.S.-backed claim that its assault on Gaza is necessary because no country would tolerate the rocket fire from militants in Gaza, Siegman says: "What undermines this principle is that no country and no people would live the way that Gazans have been made to live. … The question of the morality of Israel’s action depends, in the first instance, on the question, couldn’t Israel be doing something [to prevent] this disaster that is playing out now, in terms of the destruction of human life? Couldn’t they have done something that did not require that cost? And the answer is, sure, they could have ended the occupation."

Not even Mordy - I hope - could still uphold the fairy tale that this is Israel merely defending itself, an "appropriate response". The mass murder and destruction of Gaza, the attacking of UN shelters, the killing of children, Bibi announcing an even heavier ground war today: no one in their right mind could justify these cruelties against humanity.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WnEAxa1tFc

I suppose it could be justified better if indeed there was a clear endgame. It doesn't make me comfortable to wait and see which tack Israel takes once the tunnels are destroyed to its satisfaction. Because the odds that this is over when its done are nil.

If there's any weak consolation it's that thus far the West Bank has resisted being drawn into this, for the most part.

Xpost it says a lot about me that my first instinct was to respond by posting Pump Up the Volume.

I support Israel and though I'd like to see more courageous action from Bibi (such as deposing Hamas and facilitating new elections with the help of PA) any complaints about the current campaign I have are more strategic than moral. I blame every Palestinian death on Hamas. I blame Israel for not empowering the PA, or finding a way to reward the West Bank for embracing non-violence (compared to Hamas), but I don't blame them for fighting this war.

And if you feel it necessary to say that this means I support baby-killing, just know that I have heard that charge already this week.

I blame every Palestinian death on Hamas.

see i blame every israeli death on hamas since they were the ones shooting the rockets, just as i blame every palestinian death on the idf since they were the ones dropping the bombs

you want it to be one way

Actually, the whole Eno thing and response was worth a re-read: http://davidbyrne.com/gaza-and-the-loss-of-civilization

Peter Schwartz reply is excellent

yeah Schwartz is OTM. perfectly articulated my basic views, and then much more.

i had a very different experience of israel from eno's

In my limited experience of Israel, which is somewhere i like a lot but not somewhere i'd visit again through choice for the foreseeable future, there's a lot of sympathy for the people of Palestine. Most of the people i spoke to understood that they had a terrible quality of life under current conditions and would like to see that improve. Most wouldn't have relished another bombing campaign. Again in my limited experience, there wasn't really so much empathy though - less willingness to engage with why people would turn to Hamas, why the proposals that Israel had put on the table weren't gratefully accepted, why people are still so angry after so many years, etc. I get the sense the imbalance between sympathy and empathy is probably true on the other side too. The work that organisations like the Peres Centre For Peace is doing to bridge that gap is terrific.

The current action on both sides seems to be predicated on the idea that people can be bombed out of their 'wrong' opinions without any real attempt to understand why those opinions are there in the first place. It's not unique to Israel, though, either. Most forms of terrorism, and the constant terrorist threat posed by US drones, seems to come from the same root. There may be a concerted attempt to degrade Hamas' military capabilities but it's tough to see the main thrust as much other than collective punishment of the people of Gaza for not degrading their influence and a warning that if this doesn't happen in the future, there will be more punitive, disproportionate bombing campaigns every few years until it does. There's no empathy with the psychological oppression of occupation, no understanding that while Hamas might mean sporadic rocket attacks to Israel, it means schools, hospitals and food to people with limited access to all three, etc.

I hope more reactions continue to shift from knee-jerk hyperbole to more thoughtful, productive pieces, both like the comment above as well as in pieces such as this one:

http://www.jewishjournal.com/rob_eshman/article/10_truths_about_the_israel_gaza_conflict

re: deposing Hamas

is there truth to the idea that deposing/dismantling Hamas, assuming at this point that they are unwilling to join in politics on the condition of demilitarization, will leave a vacuum in Palestine into which a much worse radical group is likely to enter? given the way this has been playing out, it seems like the climate has become more hospitable to radicalization if not immediately then on down the line after a generation of Palestinian children, whose early memories will be substantially influenced by the events of the last month, come of fighting age.

i guess i wonder what the "long game" result is that Israel sees out of all of this.

I blame every Palestinian death on Hamas.

Well that sure is handy.

I appreciate what Peter Schwartz is trying to do but the whataboutery is ridiculous. Many of the countries he thinks we should be protesting against, including Syria, Russia and Venezuela, are countries that western governments are already hostile towards, thus obviating the need for street protests. (Venezuela's rights and wrongs are a whole other issue really, I'm just citing it because he does) He jumbles together too many different situations and timeframes (Why mention Argentina in 2014, decades after the junta?) for his point to stick.

Yeah, it's such a stupid argument. The reason people are "harder" on Israel is because it's seen as a western democracy, it's got the full support of the United States, the difference of power between Israel and Palestine, and it's been illegally occupying lands since 67. People are so disingenuous when they ask why people don't protest as much about other conflicts. I mean, the same could in that case be said of non-Israelis who care passionately about Israel.

I do get a little upset still by some of the people I follow who talk about Israel as though it's some kind of singularly evil force in the world, but that's not a point I feel like loudly arguing at this time. Much as I don't feel like trying to make the case that Israel is not committing "genocide" (even though I think they are probably not) when I see Israeli people I vaguely know saying stuff like this:

"Since you brought it uppp... Your right , there must be a real long term solution.... That being said, they just need to be wiped off the map. Completely. Sorry for sounding so blunt :)"

Direct quote, emoji and all.

People focus on Israel in part because there are very vocal groups in this country drawing a lot of attention to Israel, including both its detractors and supporters!

Also, there WAS a lot of focus on Syria for a time. Then media fatigue sets in, people feel there is no solution, don't know who to support, etc., and frankly (unfortunately) there will eventually be media fatigue on Israel too.

I think Israel's long game is very clear, just repeat 1982-present endlessly

People focus on Israel in part because there are very vocal groups in this country drawing a lot of attention to Israel, including both its detractors and supporters!

Is that really true? I don't get the impression that the detractors are all that vocal. For sure there is a difference this time around, thanks to social media, but historically that has not been the case. Or am I missing something?

Yeah, that's a good point about Syria. Whenever a conflict drags on people lose interest. Same thing happened with Iraq and Afghanistan ffs.