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Comment by DanBC | Hacker News Reader

Do you know anyone who has changed their opinion about anything to do with Israel?

These tweets just re-enforce people's existing opinion.

Also, 'ELIMINATED' is a distasteful way of saying 'DEAD' or 'KILLED'.

Yes I do know people who have changed points of view. But I am more interested in the way in which technology has changed the way all of the parties involved are acting. During the Egypt uprising as part of the Arab spring there was a tremendous backlash on Egypt for cutting off (or trying to) Internet access to keep word of what was going on from getting out. I felt that was pretty egregious, but I wouldn't feel bad if Twitter said "We don't want to enable you to prosecute your war and advertise it on our service."

So I find myself internally at a conflicted point. Why was it 'bad' for Egypt to do? Why wouldn't it be 'bad' for Twitter to do? (remember this is me asking myself if I can deduce through introspection why I'm conflicted) I'm not on either 'side' of the Palestinian conflict, but I am interested in trying to reason about morality and the Internet's impact on it.

I'm really sorry that I derailed your thread.

You make some interesting points, and they could have led to some useful discussion.

I'll try (and I'll avoid the traditional flame-war aspects of the discussion.)

I think the difference may be the perceived power balances: in one situation there is an oppressive regime censoring communications to hinder rebels who are protesting against that oppressive regime. In the other situation there is a network who would be asking some account holders not to make posts on their network. Their servers, their rules.

We might dislike twitter for taking a stance, but it's not censorship.

No worries, it was destined to be de-railed.

I think you are correct about the power balances. People revolting in Egypt don't have a 'voice' but the government does, similarly Israel has its own 'voice' in the form of television media, etc and doesn't "need" the amplification that Twitter provides.

Its an interesting dichotomy that I'll have to think more about. Meanwhile this whole thread has been modded into oblivion :-)

The US as a whole tends to be very pro-Israel.

I doubt that a majority of the American people support Israel the way that a majority of American politicians apparently do. My perception is that Zionists are a very powerful special interest group.

"Support Israel" is such a vague term. You can oppose individual policies or decisions while still supporting the basic existence of the country.

The American right tends to be supportive of Israel. The American left is slightly more split, but since American Jews tend to be left-wing they exert enough of an influence on the rest. This doesn't tend to be as true in Europe, where anti-semitism never went fully out of fashion.

Hm, I'm curious: where in Europe is anti-semitism not "fully out of fashion"? I only know my own experience, of course (the Netherands). My impression is that here, apart from Arab immigrants, people couldn't really care less whether someone's Jewish. Most Dutch Jews are so Dutch that it's hard to tell they're Jewish at all, except possibly by their names. But all of this may also be because there are so few Jews in the Netherlands these days (the Nazis did a pretty, ehm, thorough job here, unfortunately).

(This, of course, assumes that by antisemitism you mean actual hatred of Jews, and not "being critical of the something the Israeli government does or did")

> (This, of course, assumes that by antisemitism you mean actual hatred of Jews, and not "being critical of the something the Israeli government does or did")

Well, for example, there's being critical of something the Israeli government does or did, and then there's literally calling them Nazis.

There's also that charming little incident in your country where football supporters, specifically of Ajax, took on a "Jewish" identity for some reason, which was cute until rival supporters chanted "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas". Oddly enough, this kind of racist abuse doesn't seem to happen in the United States. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9404E7DB153FF...

I agree that calling the Israeli government Nazis was way out of line, but I don't see how it's antisemetic. I did not say anything about the Jewish people or about Judaism - I said something (tasteless) about the government of a country. Very tasteless, because many of the people of that particular country are the descendents of those who were persecuted by the Nazis. But how is the comment, in itself, antisemetic? There was no ethnic or religious undertone at all.

Fair point though about the football supporters. Their behaviour show the worst in any people. That said, if Ajax had happened to be associated with Catholics instead of Jews, the rival supporters would've come up with something horribly offensive to Catholics. So I'm not sure that this was real decent antisemitism: more like a very inappropriate form of anti-Ajaxism.

In fact, the way I understand that incident, it's much like using the term "Nazi" to criticize the Israeli governmen. I don't see how that's antisemitic, but it's still ridiculously offensive. When I wrote that, I lowered myself to the standards of mindless hooligans.

Hm, I'm curious: where in Europe is anti-semitism not "fully out of fashion"?

-- Anti-semitism is rampant: In the UK, France, and Germany, etc. Its quite possibly, even trendy. [1,2,3]

____________________________

[1] How my hate-filled family spawned Merah the monster

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/how-my-hatefi...

[M. Merah murdered seven people, including three Jewish <children>, in a series of scooter-borne attacks in the Toulouse area in March 2012.]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/how-my-hatefi...

[2] 'One in six' east Germans think like neo-Nazis

Published: 12 Nov 12 15:51 CET

http://www.thelocal.de/national/20121112-46121.html

[3] Anti-Israel culture war of British liberal elites is not a grassroots movement Too many of our leading British academic and cultural institutions are in the thrall of left-wing activists, but anti-Semitism is far from rife at the British grassroots

http://www.thecommentator.com/article/1381/anti_israel_cultu...

[4] "There is in England a saying that an anti-Semite is someone who hates the Jews more than is necessary." - 2010. Y. Rabim, Nobel Laureate.

The Christian right, which although maybe isn't a majority of Americans is a significant fraction, unconditionally supports Israel for a number of reasons, from Israel being necessary for the Rapture to it being better than its neighbors, to simply being anti-Muslim.

See http://www.patrobertson.com/Speeches/IsraelLauder.asp for their own words, and http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/north7.html for an non-evangelical viewpoint.

Uh-huh. Do they also control the media?

By your rhetorical question ("Do they also control the media?") I assume that you're trying to paint sk5t as some kind of conspiracy nut.

sk5t's comment was: "My perception is that Zionists are a very powerful special interest group." Which strikes me as a calm, rational opinion. (Whether or not you or I agree with it is another matter...)

Yup. AIPAC makes it rain.

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