Top UN official in New York steps down citing genocide of Palestinian civilians

This place needs a [shadowbanned] tag, at #20 on the front-page for 5 minutes, then vanished.

I submitted this earlier it was nuked within minutes. Never even got to leave a comment.

But allegations of ethnic cleansing which are aligned with US geopolitical interests have no trouble staying unflagged or making it to the front page here.

“They make a desolation and call it peace.” Gaius Cornelius Tacitus

Regardless of the words used, All I see and hear is the stories of the dead, maimed and traumatised on both sides. I hope that it stops soon but I’ve always been a optimist.

> He said that the UN had failed to prevent previous genocides against the Tutsis in Rwanda, Muslims in Bosnia, the Yazidi in Iraqi Kurdistan and the Rohingya in Myanmar

At least the "Muslims in Bosnia" part has been dealt by with NATO effectively ending the war. But note it wasn't a peaceful solution: it involved 3 months of airstrikes and civilian casualties. This kind of approach will never work in Palestine.

An understanding of events of October 7 starts with an understanding of the historical context of Palestine and Israel: most of the coverage of the events of October 7 deal with the symptoms of the violence and not the source. An understanding of the source of the violence, by no means justified, is needed.

This history starts with an understanding of Zionism, an ideology that is racist, not in its origin, but in the way it manifested itself in the land of Mandatory Palestine. And this racism is part of the settler colonial movement where the logic of the elimination of the Native was activated. These elimination policies were in the DNA of the Zionist encounters with the Natives of Palestine in the late 19th century. They wanted as much of the land of Palestine as possible with as few of the Palestinians as possible. There was always the demographic dimension as well as the geographic dimension in the earliest policies of the Zionist movement and into what later became Israel. The more space the Zionists had, the less space the indigenous people had. These elimination policies could take different forms: genocide, ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and they take different forms in different places. What happened in Gaza cannot be taken out of this context of Zionists/Israeli elimination and the ethnic cleansing of half of the population of Palestine that took place in 1947-1949 and the destruction of over 500 villages. The ruins of some of these same destroyed villages where the attackers originated from, and were next to the kibbutzim that were attacked. None of this justifies the violence that took place on October 7 but is needed to understand the source of the violence. The source of this violence is the racist ideology, of a racist Zionist ideology that needs to eliminate the Native. Zionism is not unique in this regard and is similar to other European colonial settler movements that desired to eliminate the native populations on the land they colonized.

I, for one, cannot help but notice that when Iran and every single organization it is enabling is proudly declaring that their whole raison d'être is to wipe Israel off the map and kill as many Jews as it takes, or when Palestinians brandish Nazi symbols on their protests, the usual policy is to ignore any and all such things. Up to the point that BBC is reluctant to call Hamas terrorists. You don't see anyone stepping down precisely because October 7 happened, either.

The same thing applies to the Russo-Ukrainian war, the whole thing bears huge marks of genocide/ethnocide on the occupied territories, and yet hardly anyone high-profile openly calls it that despite all marks being checked, and will likely just change subject when pressed — I guess it's bad for business.

Same as with Uighurs, but it's so last decade. Boring! And we like cheap labor, admit it. Change the subject! Change the subject!

I expect to have a lot of downvotes, which sort of proves my point further. Wrongthink! Only white people commit racism, only Israel does genociding, (blood libel allegations incoming)

My deep suspicion is that the deep rooted antisemitism which used to be totally ok in 1920s and 1930s, had never gone away from Europe since the WW2. It's just that it became passé to flaunt it, and yet everyone has been doing it, in actions if not the words. And these days lots of groups got an opportunity to show their true colors openly.

I for one would prefer all words, but especially words like genocide have a meaning. Israel is hunting Hamas and engaging in self-defence, not commiting genocide.