Israel/Palestine post 10/7 - follow-on events/thoughts as relate to other countries

Fantastic!

Here is what some of our other celebrity activists are up to.

god bless our celebrity activists https://t.co/4BdxxqI7f3 pic.twitter.com/BKehYHu1wa

— Adam Johnson (@adamjohnsonCHI) August 24, 2024

Public opinion on Vietnam turned on the Tet Offensive and the general feeling of it being a winnable war rather than the draft/American casualties/certainly not the destruction of Vietnam and Vietnamese lives. (much like Iraq and Afghanistan 40 years later)

I don't know if the two situations are comparable, there's likely a perception amongst Israeli youth that there is a level of external threat that wasn't present for Americans in the 1960s, as the opponent was the other side of the world. Whether this is true or not is secondary to the perception of it. I think the geographic proximity is going to be play a significant role in the differences in attitude

There is a stark turn in public opinion re: Vietnam that coincides with Tet and the war becoming obviously unwinnable. By the spring of 1968 (ie within 2-3 months of the offensive launch) the idea that the war was a mistake becomes the clear majority position and never wavers.

American attitudes toward foreign policy misadventure always boil down to “are we winning.” Body bags coming home and deaths abroad matter far less than being losers.

American wars are fought far from home soil and are thought of as wars of choice, which means if it starts to lose its appeal, its easy to pack up and go home and pretend it never happened.

I don't think there's a parallel here, in fact I think this is relatively unusual in that other wars are more likely to be fought at home, which leads to them being viewed differently by domestic populations

Which is perhaps why photos of massacred Palestinians and the words “You can’t afford groceries but your taxes paid for this and the educations of those who committed it” should start to be distributed

There is a stark turn in public opinion re: Vietnam that coincides with Tet and the war becoming obviously unwinnable. By the spring of 1968 (ie within 2-3 months of the offensive launch) the idea that the war was a mistake becomes the clear majority position and never wavers.

American attitudes toward foreign policy misadventure always boil down to “are we winning.” Body bags coming home and deaths abroad matter far less than being losers.

Quite a takedown of what it sounds like an insanely incoherent book.

https://spectrejournal.com/acting-jewishly-during-a-genocide/

"alleged"

Blogger who documented life in Gaza killed in alleged Israeli strike https://t.co/gk20uAigTJ

— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) August 29, 2024

We have to wait for the strike's trial before we can confirm.

A clear-sighted reflection on Uncommitted and the DNC by Y. L. Al-Sheikh: https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/democrats-palestine-activism-future/

I posted this story about Liberal Party staffers refusing to canvas for the party in the CanPol thread but it might interest people here too: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberal-staffers-gaza-montreal-byelection-1.7306984

during the Korean War, American pilots destroyed 85% of the buildings north of the 38th parallel, killed 20% of the peninsula’s population, bombed dams to create severe famine, killed 10’s of 1000’s of civilians in massacres, they recognize very well what’s happening in Gaza rn https://t.co/39ffHpe8s9

— rob (@lmNOTcatholic) August 29, 2024

That's right.

War crimes and genocide will continue. https://t.co/626QyigNcX

— Rashida Tlaib (@RashidaTlaib) August 30, 2024

A very striking & good poster in Marseille. pic.twitter.com/MfBzOIT3Mp

— Tom Gann (@Tom_Gann) September 5, 2024

has the us government even mentioned aysenur eygi yet

has anyone anywhere even bothered to suggest that she was somehow a threat

i mean it’s one (abominable) thing to provide the weapons to kill hundreds of thousands of palestinians, but it’s another to ignore the straight-up murder of american citizens, right? no?

there is no gain for anyone involved in mentioning it, so no one does

No need to worry, it is all in hand

"The Israelis have reached out, made sure we knew that they were promptly investigating this. As I understand, from just after I came out here, they are moving swiftly on this investigation, and will soon, we think, in the coming days, be able to present their findings and conclusions. We'll obviously withhold our judgment until we see that. We've called for a complete, thorough, swift, and transparent investigation. We'll see what they learn," he added.

https://www.trtworld.com/us-and-canada/no-contact-with-aysenur-eygis-family-white-house-confirms-18205691

Really appalling.

I don’t think the US government gave a shit about Rachel Corrie either.

Dear Americans, If you are killed by the Israeli government, our country won't care.

No one will be held accountable. It doesn't matter who you are, Israel can kill Americans and get away with it. https://t.co/oUa8LRoWQo

— Rashida Tlaib (@RashidaTlaib) September 9, 2024

Thread on the NYer piece, about Jewish Currents.

I didn't know that Camus quote ("my mother over justice"). Its appalling.

It was inevitable that a major magazine was going to do a piece on @JewishCurrents & I dont besmirch anyone for trying to counterbalance the Leifers of the world. But the Journalist's outsized focus on "disillusioned" liberals is cloyingly nauseating herehttps://t.co/YMuLvejpXw

— Nathan Tankus (@NathanTankus) September 9, 2024

Uh… the public was extremely divided on the issue prior to Tet Offensive, so to even say “public opinion” is misleading. 1967 is when the antiwar protests really started ramping up, and … a lot of it had to do with the draft and restrictions on deferments.

It makes me wonder if there is a significant amount of antiwar sentiment and service avoidance among Israeli youth … and if not, then wtf
― sarahell, Tuesday, August 27, 2024 1:20 AM (two weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

Anvil covered this somewhat, but I find it to be a weird tic of Americans to view every situation in the world through the lens of something Americans have experienced. Vietnam could not be a worse analogy for Gaza. The vast majority of Israel's population lives within maybe two hours drive to Gaza. Most Americans had never even heard of Vietnam/French Indochina. Not a single American had been killed by Vietnamese people. Huge percentages of Israelis know someone killed by Hamas, either on October 7 or in one of their past bombings. Most Israelis have at some point gone into bomb shelters under Hamas rocket fire (or Hezbollah rocket fire, or both).

Americans have literally never had a modern war on or even near their soil. There are a lot of different Israeli sentiments about Gaza, but the idea that Vietnam would be a particularly useful tool in guessing how Isrealis would react to a situation that pretty much could not be more different is silly. I got on the same point when people were trying to make it into a 9/11 - Iraq analogy, which is also a terrible analogy, although maybe less terrible since at least Americans were killed in America on 9/11.

And just to be clear, I'm not talking about justifying the IDF's actions or anything in the situation, I'm just trying to address the failure to understand why there aren't more conscientious objectors. The average person who feels directly threatened doesn't say "well but my grandfather may have evicted their grandparents from their home," they just react to the threat. An ordinary person whose friend or relative is murdered doesn't tend to think "yes but there are historical reasons." Israelis who grow up in Israel know Israel as their home and their country just like you know America as your home and your country, and if they feel like someone is attacking it/them, very few of them have the wherewithal to do historical and political analysis, they just want the threat to go away.

Certainly some people may see that in the long term the threat is more likely to go away if you reach a political settlement vs engage in forever war/occupation, but expecting ordinary people, and particularly ordinary 18 and 19yos, to respond to what they see as a threat on their lives by refusing to participate in a military in which nearly everyone they know serves, and being baffled when they don't, seems extremely clueless and sheltered.

they just want the threat to go away

that is true as far as it goes, but there are many paths Israel could take to 'making the threat go away' which do not involve genocide. it does not require any special historical analysis to see that negotiation is an available path that incidentally kills far fewer human beings than dropping large quantities of high explosives in a densely populated area until you are just (to borrow a memorable phrase) bouncing the rubble.

"In one photo, two Israeli soldiers snuggle up in the twin sized bed of a child they’ve either killed or displaced. In another, a child’s doll is splayed out on the hood of a car. Another soldier in a child’s bed. And another in a crib. Maybe this one goes in carefree: soldiers giggle uncontrollably in an emptied playground, pushing each other in red-binned carts. "

https://thebaffler.com/latest/running-amok-turfah

"The pervasive sadism cannot be explained away as the behavior of soldiers at war"

that is true as far as it goes, but there are many paths Israel could take to 'making the threat go away' which do not involve genocide. it does not require any special historical analysis to see that negotiation is an available path that incidentally kills far fewer human beings than dropping large quantities of high explosives in a densely populated area until you are just (to borrow a memorable phrase) bouncing the rubble.

― more difficult than I look (Aimless), Tuesday, September 10, 2024 1:16 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Sure, but that doesn't really have anything to do with what I wrote, which is about individual 18 and 19yos' decision to become conscientious objectors or not, rather than what course the Israeli government chooses.

but the idea that Vietnam would be a particularly useful tool in guessing how Isrealis would react to a situation

I don't think anyone did that? The Vietnam detour was about American reactions and what gets Americans to stop supporting killing people outside of our borders.

Americans aren't being drafted and sent to fight in Israel, so I'm not really sure what relevance it has there either. But yes, other posters were doing that.

iirc the Vietnam detour was my fault, and that was within the context of discussing whether explicit images of suffering lead to stronger pushback against atrocities (as opposed to just the knowledge these atrocities are happening). So not really "about" either Israel or the US.

Mr. Blinken said that “no one should be shot and killed for attending a protest.”

“Apparently it was an accident, ricocheted off the ground and just got hit by accident,” he told reporters. That went beyond any explanation offered publicly by the Israeli military, and Mr. Biden did not say what it was based on.

Xp man alive — the uh preference not to want to kill people is still a thing. I don’t see that as uniquely American

Nor is the preference to not want to be killed

"Cradling the Israeli education system is a society that echoes those values. In 2014, settlers in the kibbutzim around Gaza gathered with their families on hilltops—bringing plastic chairs and old sofas, popcorn, and hookahs—to watch bombs drop on Palestinian homes. The following year, a group of settlers in the West Bank set a Palestinian home on fire, burning an eighteen-month-old boy and his parents to death; at a wedding sometime after, Israeli settlers recorded themselves dancing with guns as one repeatedly stabbed a photo of the baby. That same year, a Palestinian child in Jerusalem was kidnapped by settlers, doused with gasoline, and burned alive; two of the three settlers charged with his death were themselves minors. In 2024 at the border with Egypt, settlers blocking aid inflate bounce houses and distribute snacks to soldiers, and a child with an Israeli flag tied around her neck like a cape says to a journalist, “What I care? Kill them. I don’t care.”

tbh we don't really need two distinct threads anymore, but fwiw this one is about "other countries"

New faculty guidelines from Barnard College at Columbia University. Professors are not allowed to post signs on their door "that support a geopolitical view or perspective". When talking about "geopolitical views or perspectives", faculty must talk about both sides. pic.twitter.com/ol39ppYIWJ

— Layla 🪬 (@itslaylas) September 11, 2024

I'm just trying to address the failure to understand why there aren't more conscientious objectors

i could not possibly care less about anything

hundreds of thousands of people have been killed but i'm sure certain people had good reasons not to do the absolute least they could to even recognize it

was this posted here? it might offer some insight into IDF culture: https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jul/18/national-religious-recruits-challenge-values-of-idf-secular-elite

the Barnard guidelines are wild, though this is certainly not confined to that school

we’re a long way from 1968

idk about y'all but I find America's most elitist academic institutions enthusiastically embracing authoritarianism to defend a foreign nation's unprecedentedly violent campaign of genocide and ethnic cleansing a little ominous. they are really going to the mat for Israel!

see also: the Democratic Party. everyone rightfully freaking out over Trump's racist conspiracy theorizing at the debate needs to reckon with Biden freestyling for the IDF with his magical ricochet fantasy

Do we have an I Love Hyperbole thread?

there's the J0rdan S. one.

which part did you find hyperbolic?

"Unprecedentedly" might be hyperbolic here.

Oh god sorry I meant within Israel there

Enthusiastically and everyone

Oh and cryptosicko otm

"everyone" is obviously being used there to delimit a set ("everyone who")