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Comment by b215826 | Hacker News Reader

I'm not sure I understand the point of this article as Israel isn't even a major arms exporter [1]. There are several major countries that profit off of wars -- America, France, the UK, etc., all are prominent weapons exporters. And all these countries export to "problematic" buyers.

[1] https://www.statista.com/chart/18417/global-weapons-exports/

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Not everything has to have some black and white "point". Some stories are just facts that are part of a larger picture. You are pointing out that there are more details in this domain than are in the article, but the specific context you've added seems largely irrelevant. Drawing an arbitrary comparison like you've done here hardly alters the validity of the facts in the article. Israel's geopolitical standing is an entity worthy of study, I think that is clear. How can you say this article has "no point"? I think your displaying some kind of bias to arrive at such a strange reductive statement.

I'm not questioning the validity of the article and I'm not defending Israel. But it's basic knowledge that (i) several first-world countries make a nice profit off of wars in the third world and (ii) almost all of these countries are liberal Western (or West-aligned) democracies. This is the reason why I don't understand why the author has singled out Israel here. Put it another way, could you name an arms exporter, which could be a company, country, etc., that doesn't sell to despotic regimes?

You're implying the author and associated publisher have some kind of agenda against Israel, if that's the argument you're making, then you need to present a little bit more proof. I don't see anything in the article that says "unlike other western countries… Israel does X, Y, AND Z bad things"

>There are several major countries that profit off of wars -- America, France, the UK, etc., all are prominent weapons exporters. And all these countries export to "problematic" buyers.

Okay? And that somehow makes Israel exempt here, or something? Two wrongs make a right? We can't discuss Israel without making sure more "major" countries fix themselves first?

Help me out here, I'm not sure I see where you're going with this.

> And that somehow makes Israel exempt here, or something

It doesn't. But it's irresponsible journalism to write an article of this sort without admitting that every single arms exporter sells to autocracies.

>But it's irresponsible journalism to write an article of this sort without admitting that every single arms exporter sells to autocracies.

Again, it's a book review. The correct thing to do is discuss the books, both of which surely mention that other countries sell to autocracies.

It's premature optimization. Why bother with Israel when the main English reading audience likely has much more direct influence over the biggest war profiteer - america.

Blaming Israel, is either anti-Semitism, that's it's only with criticism when people representing Jews do it, or colonialism, that it's only bad when it's not western powers doing it.

It's only a story because it's Israel, and Israel is seen as lesser than France or the USA

Employing a black/white worldview and insisting that it's only either colonialism or anti-Semitism ignores nuance and is a really bad take.

> Israel isn't even a major arms exporter

Israeli MICs primarily make money off IP licensing, not exports.

Companies like Rafael, IAI, Elbit, Elta, etc will generate the core IP and then sell the IP and co-manufacture with MICs in countries like South Korea, Taiwan, France, USA, Italy, and India.

This is the same business model that France used with Israel in the 70s, and also acts as a way for Israel to not piss off Western allies and generate revenue because a first world country with 9 million citizens can only manufacture so much.

> I'm not sure I understand the point of this article as Israel isn't even a major arms exporter.

Did you read it? It was a book review of two books that covered Pegasus and Israeli defence exports.

Information warfare is both more affordable, more able to be used covertly, and often more effective.

The tools totalitarian & authoritarian systems - in particular - use to keep themselves in power are often information tools. Their challenge is to suppress the population. The first challenge there-in is identifying who your potential enemies are. No bomb will tell you that. Hacking your citizens phones will tell you that. Israel's special craft here is thus immensely alluring to thr worst of the worst.

The article is a book review of two books, one by an author with a history of research into Israel-Palestine and one on Pegasus spyware.

They might not be "major" but they are likely the world's leader in making electronic surveillance of protestors and reporters possible by despotic regimes.

a murderer on the stand, “why are you looking at my case? what about all the other people who murdered someone and haven’t been prosecuted yet?”

Classic whataboutism.

And what’s the problem with whataboutism when it is part of an argument of having unrealistic moral expectations from a single country?

It’s morally acceptable, and correct, to criticize both. Does this make sense? Feels strange asking this, because it is so obviously apparent, but I feel the need to given your response.

I’m not sure where I said you shouldn’t criticize both.

What I’m saying is that international “morales” are extremely relative. One day Israel is criticized for bombing houses in Gaza by the US, another day the US bombs weddings in Afghanistan largely unnoticed.

Are they both bad? sure. Is it fair? irrelevant.

However, if you are making an argument for example that asymmetric warfare requires attacking targets in dense civilian population and sometimes mistakes happen, then it is absolutely essential to compare to other countries.

And people that shout “whataboutism” on knee jerk are not helping anyone

Happy to see this reach it's natural conclusion, in terms of subscribing to moral relativism. I think if this is one's worldview, it's hard to not use a "whataboutism" style of argument whenever questions of morals or ethics arise. Without a strong internal grounding, it's challenging not to resort to comparisons, I agree with you.

it seems that when you’re arguing with someone you assume a lot of things about your counterpart

i didn’t subscribe to moral relativism. I didn’t say that there is no moral truth, I said in international politics morality is often used cynically to project power.

However, let’s disengage from this argument as I can sense aggressiveness and insincerity in your style of discussion

Notice how I said "one", not "you"? Also at the end of the post, when I said:

> I agree with you

where that is "you", and not "one"?

I find it fascinating that you are doing exactly what you accuse me of, where you are assuming things that are not true. This generally happens (in my experience) where people are unable to disassociate their opinions from their "self", and here I am making a direct inference that this applies to you as well.

Happy to continue the discussion, although it seems you might be unable to split emotions from logic.

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