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

As stated.

I guess this thread is the place for this — I got a press release from our local Sheriff's Office today saying they'd had many media queries about "anti-Jewish Rhetoric being distributed" being distributed in our county. (Apologies for the weird capitalized "rhetoric," our Sheriff's Office is only quasi-literate.) It just said that their major crimes and gang units were "looking into the matter," with no further detail.

I haven't seen examples of what this is referring to, and it struck me that it could be either our local Nazi/Proud Boy types out there distributing horrible leaflets, OR it could be student-led "Free Palestine" social media posts or something, and those things seem like they're increasingly being conflated.

Best piece I've read on literary culture at this time. Hard not to conclude the whole thing is a disgrace.

https://thebaffler.com/latest/at-the-threshold-of-humanity-kattan

Don't know much about this organization but this seems like one way to counteract those who try to stir hate:

The pro-Palestine protesters made it clear that the masked neo-Nazis were not welcome, chanting “Nazis Go Home,” and “show your faces, you fucking cowards,” the Daily Montanan reported.

That is just one of the tactics that organizers of pro-Palestine solidarity protests can use to make clear to neo-Nazis that they are not welcome in that movement, according to Ben Lorber, an extremism expert who is working on a book about antisemitism. “It is vital for Palestine liberation organizers and progressive activists to recognize and counter far-right actors who stand diametrically opposed to the movement’s principles and goals,” Lorber wrote in a recent guide for organizers.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/k7zx5a/neo-nazis-hijack-pro-palestine-protest-mike-enoch

Personally, I find it much better to see an effort to recognize and counteract this kind of thing, rather than dismissing or denying that it exists

that's encouraging

Black-Jewish Alliance ✊🏿✡
@BlackJewishA
Police are attempting to arrest Jews in prayer.

We shout “let us pray” for Palestine.

The police have confiscated copies of our speeches.

GET YOUR COP HANDS OFF OUR JEWISH COMRADES

Video of harassment within that tweet.

https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2023/11/02/frick-museum-in-pittsburgh-postpones-islamic-art-exhibition-over-fears-it-would-appear-insensitive-or-traumatic-amid-gaza-war

“When war broke out in the Middle East, we were as heartbroken as everyone, and we realised that we were about to open an exhibition that a forgiving person would call insensitive, but for many people, especially in our community, would be traumatic.”

it's so insensitive and traumatic that muslims exist

this whole thing is so devastating.

This is where stuff like "It would be insensitive to publish this book about Soviet dissidents at this time" leads to.

yeah that is obviously ridiculous

An Israeli air strike on the Bureij refugee camp today

https://x.com/ramabdu/status/1720067423238308122

If you use this thread on anything going on in Gaza or Israel.

Israel, Palestine & the Levant rolling events: Oct 23 on

The dissonance in reading about individuals expressing concerns about anti-Semitic violence rising in North America while 400 Arab children are dying every day in Gaza is, frankly, enraging

I have seen videos of anti-Semitic violence over the past week. These videos are exclusively Jewish peace protesters getting harassed by cops in North America, Orthodox Jewish peace protesters getting beaten by Israeli Police in Israel

My heart is ripped in two for my Jewish friends who are saying “not in my name” and being disowned, being called “self-hating Jews”, or— as the Times Of Jerusalem said in an op-ed two days ago: “anti-Zionists who claim to be Jewish are as Jewish as the Westboro Baptist Church that claimed to be Christian”

Jfc just because you’re saying “stop bombing Gaza” doesn’t make you “anti-Zionist”, to begin with

I was bothered by a now ex-friend who told me “how can you call it Gazan genocide when they (the Gazans) procreate so quickly”; fine, first I will block you and never speak to you again, second I will call it something else. What, tho? Israel already doesn’t acknowledge a nakba exists. Anti-war Jews are liberally calling it a holocaust, a shoah; those terms are not allowed to me as a non-Jew.

I feel like one can’t even call it “war” or “a conflict”; Gideon Levy argued that it is neither of these things, that it is a violent occupation, nothing more

Haaretz today reports Netanyahu’s latest speech: “nothing can stop us”.

Anyway, 9000 Gazans dead today, 3 hostages returned, congrats everyone

“anti-Zionists who claim to be Jewish are as Jewish as the Westboro Baptist Church that claimed to be Christian”

I mean ... fwiw, I do think a very not insignificant number of Christians are let's just say in Westboro's ballpark, if not on the same base

"I was bothered by a now ex-friend who told me “how can you call it Gazan genocide when they (the Gazans) procreate so quickly”"

So much hate.

(xp Not the point of the thread, I know, sorry)

"The dissonance in reading about individuals expressing concerns about anti-Semitic violence rising in North America while 400 Arab children are dying every day in Gaza is, frankly, enraging"

posters on this board are worried about their children being bullied at school for being Jewish

Sorry if my posts were emotional or “in the wrong thread” I shouldn’t post when I’m in a news consumption crying spiral, and I shouldn’t read pro-violence NYT articles (or the NYT at all), I am going to call a friend

I agree with everything else in your post, but you can be horrified by the massacre of innocents in Gaza (and the West Bank) while also being worried about anti-semitic violence

Tbh, the biggest “holy shit what are you guys doing” anti-Semitism concern over the past week has been seeing people on social media cheering on “Yemen declares war on Israel” when it’s the Houthis declaring war, not the Yemeni gvmt, and if anybody is cheering for Houthis then we have a big fucking problem

I have been seeing the odd report of AS attacks across Europe now, like this one.

A Moldovan couple arrested for allegedly spray-painting Stars of David on a Paris school last week reportedly told investigators they were acting on orders from an “individual in Russia.”https://t.co/VvJOmmoCAh

— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) November 2, 2023

in the larger world, the anti-semitism is probably largely being driven by people who care less about the plight of the Palestinian people and care more about being anti-semitic, and seeing an opportunity for an opening to be a bit more free with their bigotry.

"zionist jews" now trending on twitter, that's that shit i don't like

Caitlyn Jenner's dead name is also trending there today, which says it all

sorry meant to post on the "is this anti-semitism?" thread

I thought this was pretty good:

You are criticizing Israel wrong. Here’s how to do it correctly. pic.twitter.com/DiwBTJOuiG

— Matt Lieb?? (@mattlieb) October 28, 2023

nice to finally see a video of Van Horn Street

in the larger world, the anti-semitism is probably largely being driven by people who care less about the plight of the Palestinian people and care more about being anti-semitic, and seeing an opportunity for an opening to be a bit more free with their bigotry.

― omar little, Thursday, November 2, 2023 12:29 PM (ten minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

This is upsetting me a lot right now. I know it sounds naïve but I was genuinely surprised at how fast people seized the opportunity to be flat out anti-Semitic. I grew up spending 1/2 the year in a mostly Jewish community in NY where I as a gentile was often the odd one out. 3 of my 5 lifelong close friends are Jewish. I said to one of them yesterday that I think I grew up in this little bubble were I didn't realize how much anti-semitism there still was out there and he was like yeah no shit you're from NY. Anyway - there are a million upsetting things (upsetting isn't anywhere near strong enough) happening right now but I have been thinking a lot about exactly this, OL. :/

it's not good. i have a friend who was indulging in some "deep thoughts" about judaism around the time kanye was on one about jewish people, and i had an instagram convo w/him re: a couple of his posts. i don't know that i reached him, but i tried. another friend (no longer a friend) started to get very alt-right and was an associate of ow3n b3njamin for awhile, a podcast comedian type guy who started to get into some anti-semitic and racist stuff a few years ago. that particular friend is long gone. he was at my wedding. he probably helped hold me up high in my chair during the hora. he just wound up being a particularly "bad actor" in life. and a pernicious influence on others.

i live in a bubble in Los Angeles obv, but shit does happen here. threats against synagogues, anti-semitic graffiti on a famous local deli last night, etc...

the Poetry Foundation shelved a 3500-word review of a poetry book that discusses the book's criticisms of Israel...the poet author of the book is, of course, Jewish, and so is the reviewer.

The donor pocketbook is where artistic freedom hits a wall

This is where stuff like "It would be insensitive to publish this book about Soviet dissidents at this time" leads to.

― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes)

yeah that is obviously ridiculous

― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive)

Reflexive censorship of art always seems to crop up when wars begin and wartime propaganda cranks up the red hot rhetoric. Even as recently as the invasion of Ukraine there were ridiculous people calling for cancellation of symphonies by Russian composers as a sign of solidarity with Ukrainians.

O rly

If a HAMAS sympathizer or a HAMAS-adjacent amateur lone wolf carries out a gun attack in the USA killing more than 10 people in the name is Palestine … this poll will flip like a flapjack. https://t.co/NkWdyaliV7

— Malcolm Nance (@MalcolmNance) November 2, 2023

and if my granny had wheels, she'd be a bicycle. I like the specificity of ten or more people, it shows a vigorous imagination.

Reflexive censorship of art always seems to crop up when wars begin and wartime propaganda cranks up the red hot rhetoric. Even as recently as the invasion of Ukraine there were ridiculous people calling for cancellation of symphonies by Russian composers as a sign of solidarity with Ukrainians.

― more difficult than I look (Aimless), Thursday, November 2, 2023 1:41 PM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
My kid’s teacher canceled their Russia unit. Like I really don’t think it matters to Ukrainian lives whether our kids are learning about faberge eggs and Baryshnikov

re: that poll.. I'm not really sure that Israel needs much military support anyway... they're a major arms manufacturer/exporter, inventors of the Uzi submachine gun. And they seemed to have no issues selling arms to South Africa's white minority government

and yet the House just approved 14.5 billion in aide to Israel for some reason

$4 billion for the Iron Dome, which kind of seems like locking the gate after the dog gets out.

Wake Forest professor resigns after backlash due to tweet

https://journalnow.com/news/local/wake-professor-resigns-following-backlash-of-social-media-post-on-israeli-hamas-war/article_4e1022a4-78ea-11ee-a828-ffa8e334019a.html

(She’s a really good poet, fwiw!)

14.5 billion in aide to Israel for some reason

er, mm, by long tradition all those billions can only be spent on armaments produced by US-based death merchants military-industrial complex manufacturers.

And lots of defence contracting

Protests are being planned for Armistice Day. Looks like the match will be lit on the tiniest pretence

"They died for your freedom, but don't you dare think about exercising it." https://t.co/xyCICKV35j

— James B (@piercepenniless) November 3, 2023

Clare Hymer
@ClareHymer
HAPPENING NOW: Another peaceful sit-in calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, this time at Kings Cross Station.

the only additional freedoms that came because of GB participation in the world wars was the bankrupting and partial destruction of an evil global empire and the resultant decline arguably sped up the process of decolonisation that followed. "Protect our freedoms" my fucking arsehole, it was a warfare state that forced conscripts onto the battlefield, which is the absolute opposite of freedom.

David Adler
@davidrkadler
New bill in the French 🇫🇷 Senate : 'An insult committed against the State of Israel is punishable by two years of imprisonment and a fine of 75,000 euros.'

I don't even want to paste in what Germany are doing, just utterly disgusting

Belgian transport workers saved the lives of thousands of Jews in the 1940s by unlocking the doors of trains headed for the extermination camps. Now, they're refusing to load weapons onto ships headed to Israel. This is a meaningful & timeless solidarity with humanity. pic.twitter.com/kvcUMcnJd7

— Amro Ali (@_amroali) November 3, 2023

March in London this Saturday.

🚨The route for the March for Palestine on Saturday 25 November has now been confirmed. 🇵🇸

It will be assembling on Park Lane at 12:30PM and marching to Whitehall.#CeasefireNOW #FreePalestine pic.twitter.com/iStUNeB25L

— PSC (@PSCupdates) November 23, 2023

BREAKING: Several pro-Palestine activists were arrested for staging a sit-in on the march route of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade in New York City pic.twitter.com/kv9pUQgO77

— BreakThrough News (@BTnewsroom) November 23, 2023

some dear friends among those arrested

HARVARD LAW REVIEW EDITORS VOTE TO KILL ARTICLE ABOUT GENOCIDE IN GAZA

You can read the article here

Seldowitz arrested!

https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/22/us/seldowitz-ex-obama-official-islamophobic-comments/index.html

Excellent! what a shitbag!

Israelis have “children”, while Palestinians have “people aged 18 and younger”. https://t.co/5nmLPc0VKN pic.twitter.com/gsoSs9HE8N

— Karl Hansen (@karl_fh) November 23, 2023

https://www.972mag.com/october-7-families-victims-hostages-peace/

This is a very good article

They made a fake Hamas website that's literally just "hello we are evil please give us money to kill Israel and take over ze vorld muhahha" https://t.co/NyZtNla8Dw pic.twitter.com/PNQ7sd5qyi

— Hbomberguy (@Hbomberguy) November 24, 2023

Cal CS lecturer apparently being investigated for giving this talk at the end of a lecture

https://www.reddit.com/r/berkeley/comments/181vkym/peyrin_kao_after_lecture_transcript_about/

Its not just that the hamas.com site is so ill-thought out, its also why did it take Israel 38 days to create it? In fact, why did it take them any days to create it, why wasn't this built and registered beforehand, years ago ready. to update whenever necessary. The PR and propaganda for western markets has been so basic and lackadaisical, its unathomable

if they ever got called on that site directly, in a press conference or something, what would be the answer? "the site is meant to show the evil of Hamas, ppl aren't meant to believe that it was actually created by Hamas but it shows what they stand for" or something like that?

Also why are they the ones tweeting it out directly, instead of either using a major western personality to do it, or a smaller niche one and letting it bubble up from there. It feels like they haven't built any of that out

I’m not sure “Israel’s propaganda ops aren’t robust enough!” is the lesson we should be garnering.

It's an observation not a lesson. Anyway on top of the myth of the allseeing ominpotence of the Israeli intelligence services going down the toilet, they are coming out of this looking like rank amateurs on the PR and propaganda front.

oh absolutely.

On top of the bragging about being the only democracy in the Middle East, Israeli governments like to present an image of being sleekly professional, efficient and effective in the midst of dreadful chaotic Arab states who couldn't organize the proverbial piss up in a brewery.

I didn't previously have much of an opinion either way on the attempted interference in UK elections thing (kind of presume all states do this to some extent), but it seems less likely now

A thread on the topic of hasbara and its failings as of recent:

https://x.com/MouinRabbani/status/1727948091053977757?s=20

The addendum points out something salient, too, and that is that since the late aughts, Palestinians have been training people to be citizen journalists and broadcast news to the world...so that the hegemony of Israeli narratives has essentially been shattered by social media platforms. This also explains why older people still tend to be more pro-Israel and younger people tend to be more pro-Palestine, I think.

Table

Americans overall continue to side strongly with Israel, but polling shows those views have grown increasingly polarized across party and generation since even before the war. An NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll earlier this month found 48 percent of Gen Z and millennial adults said Israel’s military response has been “too much,” compared with 38 percent of the public overall. Most young adults disapprove of Biden’s handling of the situation, according to national polls this month by Fox News, Quinnipiac University and Marist College. And a recent poll from NBC News found that 70 percent of voters age 18 to 34 disapprove of Biden’s handling of the war.

This is from

https://wapo.st/410Ydis

(Non-paywall gift link)

thanks!

So tired of watching Israeli government spokespeople bullying, browbeating and arguing with interviewers, while mechanically churning out the same buzzwords and set phrases. Not sure what the point of interviewing these people is.

Hamas offering the release of the rest of the hostages for all Palestinian prisoners.

Here are the latest developments in Gaza and the occupied West Bank as the truce deal between Israel and Hamas enters its third day.

🔴 LIVE updates: https://t.co/QSgZrAagUW pic.twitter.com/dJsmQJnEjV

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) November 26, 2023

https://news.snbc13.com/burlington-shooting-palestinian-students-hisham-awartani-kenan-abdelhamid-and-another-hurt-heavy-police-in-burlington-vermont/

Was about to post that. Awful.

It’s pretty bad when I have to sympathise with a cunt like Leo Varadkar.

Irish citizen Emily Hand was one of the hostages being held by Hamas. She is only six years old. When her father heard she’d been taken hostage and (initially) suspected dead, he said he was so happy she was dead because he feared what would happen to her.

She was released yesterday. Leo Varadkar made a statement about it:

This is the full statement I issued yesterday regarding the release of Emily Hand pic.twitter.com/v6N6bmbbmo

— Leo Varadkar (@LeoVaradkar) November 26, 2023

#Breaking The Israeli foreign minister says he has summoned the Irish ambassador in Tel Aviv "for a reprimand" following Taoiseach Leo Varadkar's remarks on the release of Emily Hand https://t.co/P57j6GyMMp

— RTÉ News (@rtenews) November 26, 2023

In response to Mr Varadkar's social media remarks, Israeli foreign minister Eli Cohen accused the Taoiseach of "losing his moral compass" and needing "a reality check".

"Emily Hand was not 'lost', she was kidnapped by a terror organization worse than ISIS that murdered her stepmother," he said. He added: "Emily and more than 30 other Israeli children were taken hostage by Hamas, and you Leo Varadkar are trying to legitimize and normalize terror. Shame on you!"

That's so stupid

"his love has been constant" lol ok

Not sure what is “lol ok” about that.

not sure "thank god my daughter is dead" is a constant love but we all show love in different ways

Yeah because he was in the horrors imagining her being tortured and harmed - that’s the context for that remark. Given he didn’t know that he’d ever see her again, it would be better for the child to have died rather than the child to have been tortured during the rest of her life. Didn’t think that would need so much (or any) explaining. I’m not even a parent and I understand what he meant.

we all show love in different ways, don't we

I’d rather my child were dead than raped and tortured for two months. I’m glad you can be so smug about the superiority of the way you prefer people to show love. Get bent.

as a parent i’m saying each of you should stfu

Why are Israel going after...Ireland?!

yeah it's a mystery

https://www.irishtimes.com/world/europe/2023/11/09/there-can-be-no-peace-or-security-for-israel-without-justice-for-palestinians-says-varadkar/

worse than ISIS

this is some tim heidecker shit

This is where twitter really comes into its own.

this is actually so insane, does BBC think no one in the world speaks arabic and will be able to tell that they are lying? https://t.co/80wa1P7VUt pic.twitter.com/ccYx2DgMB4

— tara (@taraxrh) November 26, 2023

https://abcnews.go.com/US/suspect-arrested-shooting-3-students-palestinian-descent-vermont/story?id=105173520

https://heavy.com/news/jason-j-eaton-burlington-vermont/

another one of these people who sounds like they were in a precarious mental situation already and then spent entirely too much time online and went over the deepend.

Cindy McCain on Gaza:

“We are looking at possibly being on the brink of famine. With that comes disease. We need more trucks in, we need to have more access to distribute that aide. Hopefully a longer time to do that, not just four days.”

“It is a massive, catastrophic event… pic.twitter.com/vJMNHaSRIX

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) November 28, 2023

cindy mccain probably the only human in the mccain clan

Exqueeze me, are you hating on Edwin?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qrTmNDZ-nc

i'm not fooled, you can't put a wig on Billy Corgan and get away with it

(in seriousness though, you know it's fucking bad when a McCain of all people says enough is enough)

she's like a director of the world food program it's kinda her job

ton of people whose job it is who are turning a blind eye to what's happening, tbf

not that anybody deserves special credit for doing their job in this case

Never has the university seemed so desolate and despicable. Institutions truly showing their asses.

@Columbia cancelled another #Palestine-focused event, this time one organized by Columbia Global Centers in Amman, Jordan. It was scheduled for this Thursday on "Academic Praxis and the Question of Palestine”. 🧵1/3 pic.twitter.com/DCKFWN4Jn4

— Katherine Franke (@ProfKFranke) November 27, 2023

Worth clicking through, but what it gets at is that Said had bulletproof glass on his offices and faced constant bomb threats throughout his time at Columbia. They've now effectively disavowed him and his scholarship. A real pity.