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Comment by switchbak | Hacker News Reader

The president just threatened Greenland with military action. That is absolutely fucking unprecedented in living memory, and well before.

And that passed without much more than an exasperated sigh.

No, I think the populace will go along with whatever these folks deem acceptable. It’s like a bad movie.

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The latest is that the US is gonna take over Gaza and deport everyone there. I do wonder if there's any hot button items anymore.

I'm not American, but my read of this announcement looks something like:

* The Trump Administration doesn't believe in the two state solution stalemate. * They have leverage over The Netanyahu Administration in Israel due to the ongoing military support needed. * The Netanyahu Administration wants to incorporate Gaza into Israel as also doesn't believe in two state solution but cannot do so without repercussions. * US could take over Gaza as the West won't sanction it, China needs to sell to it, RoW not an issue. * Trump wants US to take over Gaza, use US corps and workers to rebuild paid for by Israel, and then sell back to Israel at a later time.

I don't agree with that position but I think that's what the deal looks like overall.

What does Israel produce that we want? Are they paying cash for this service, seems expensive, how did they manage to get so much US dollars?

They are the US's proxy against Iran in the Middle East, primarily, which makes it a strategic relationship. Addition, based on the 2022 data, the US imported $21BB from Israel and had a trade deficit of ~$7BB.

> US's proxy against Iran in the Middle East

If I have to hire a hitman to take out my mistress I'm going to just opt to not have a mistress. I guess we will have never ending reasons for needing a proxy against Iran?

My (perhaps naive) take is that we all got “Trump immunity” from the first time around the rollercoaster and understand that a lot of it is ineffective bluster that never goes anywhere. Look at the tariffs that’s already been “delayed”.

In a normal administration, gutting the NSF would be the main story. If his statements on Gaza are indeed just bluster, they still succeed in focusing attention away from his current actual actions.

When their children are being drafted to go die in some war things will change rapidly. I'd give it a coin flip that's where we're headed right now.

EDIT: To be clear, that's predicated on assumption things are fundamentally different here and now from Germany in the 1930s. If not, we're already cooked.

> To be clear, that's predicated on assumption things are fundamentally different here and now from Germany in the 1930s.

It's hard to take stuff like this seriously. Even if you're worried about fascism specifically, why Germany in the 1930s and not Italy in the 1920s? The latter seems more relevant to the present moment. I think the reason is that the German Nazis are the bad guys of history and these kinds of comparisons have less to do with historical parallels but more with Godwin's Law.

The economic conditions that were present in both Italy and Germany in the inter war years just aren't present here and now. That's why I think there's a chance we can avoid fascism. Or maybe I'm wrong. We'll find out!

With all these things, part of why it's so exhausting is having to deal with most of the statements being totally bullshit. They chuck around threats without restraint, but they only carry out some of them. So far.

Protesting for Gaza was squashed last time by basically everyone, and will be again.

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