In what world is 20,179 dead children the lesser of two evils?
>Khalil al-Hayya, a reported target of this air strike, was previously targeted by a 2007 assassination attempt, which killed at least seven of his family members.[33][34][35] His home in Gaza was struck by an airstrike in the 2014 Gaza War.
Israel hardly has difficulties with killing innocent family members. So "civilian strife" is irrelevant in my view, as symmetrically Palestine, Lebanon, Iran, etc are permitted to do the same against Israel. The people targeted in the Qatar strike were all political office holders not soldiers. So for instance it is valid for these countries to bomb the home or place of stay of Ben Gvir or Benjamin Netenyahu and kill them and their family members for the sake of just and fair combat.
Strikes against hamas leadership have war value, and I personally find proportional collateral damage justifiable.
Netanyahu is roughly (not legally but comparable) a commander in chief and targetting him likewise has war value and is justifiable. I'm not sure of ben gvir's role in military matters, but that's what I would base my answer on.
I would challenge you to name an initial inciting incident, which you believe was not preceded by or in reaction to an earlier incident. I can almost guarantee you I'll be able to name an inciting event, prior to it (and you will be able to find another one before that, etc.)
Would you agree and support a group of people who wanted to immigrate to the United States but the USA decided for whatever reason to deny them immigration/citizenship and these people start bombing, kidnapping and torturing American officials and civilians? If not why is Israel special?
I generally support israel because:
- I don't think it corresponds to your hypothetical (which I obviously disagree with)
- It was internationally recognized by the UN, and I find the collective jewish effort put towards nation-building to be legitimizing
- I support a jewish state, and I think jews, including those from the diaspora (based on genetic tests - dietary preferences are irrelevant to me), are indigenous to roughly the territory of modern-day israel
- It is a decently functioning democracy with human rights
- I think its war efforts are usually justified
I'm sure you disagree with all of these ^ and it's better to avoid a breadth-first conversation. I assume you've conceded that "X did it to Y, therefore it's fine for Y to do it to X" is not a functional model here. The ball is in your court.
International recognition of Israel is a point you should be careful with. Just as Israel was formed with violent illicit methods but accepted by the UN later, the reverse could as well happen and "illicitly" retaken Israel will in time be recognized by the UN.
I do not support ethnic or religious states, but it's fine, many disagree. They could have gone anywhere they wanted, as long as it was legal immigration with consent of those already living there.
Explain me again how if these white jews were supposedly so deeply culturally connected to the place, they were whining about lack of European food and had to reverse engineer local food from native Arabs and Jews living there? Do you think eg if I had a scottish great great great grandfather and I lived in America all life, I'd suddenly unlock some knowledge of scottish culture hidden inside my blood somehow? And does it grant me rights to carve out a parcel of Scotland for myself forcing out locals violently against their wishes? The question can also be flipped, if it is just for Israel to kick out people from their so called ancestral home, then I believe it is perfectly justified for eg France or Netherlands to kick out jews living there as it is not their ancestral land and it is the just home of the French or Dutch peoples.
>- It is a decently functioning democracy with human rights
Meaningless if it is not justifiably their land and property. Its the opposite of democracy, its a violation of property rights.
>- I think its war efforts are usually justified
Do you think the present Lebensraum campaign is also justified?
It's easy to argue jews terrorized the british to reclaim their indigenous land, i.e the british had no right to jurisdiction there in the 1st place. Your analogy of denied US immigrants is different if it turns out the US was their original land they were displaced from, they all genetically trace back to it, there has consistently been a presence of that people living there, that people's artifacts are buried under the ground throughout the land, etc etc - no?
Let me find that one patch of Africa where human life originated then. We should all have a right to that place.
What's so special about the value of 2000 years or whatever number Israel prefers? Why not 4000 years and therefore Babylonians/Iraqis? There is no naturalistic or scientific significance to the value selected by Israel. Let us take Israelis like Netenyahu back to their real homeland, the Steppes of Ukraine. A big portion of Israel trace their genetic origin there, their peoples artifacts are buried in Ukraine, etc etc.
Why do you not protest in support of British people of Norman ancestry forcibly taking over France?
The land which is modern day israel/palestine is the only historically jewish land; if not that land there is no other. The connection between jews, and the land which was judea, is very strong - even after thousands of years jews have a powerful cultural desire to to inhabit that native land, to enact nation-building there, and to defend it.
I feel sorry for normans who feel displaced from what is currently french land - it seems they lack either the passion or ability to return, unlike jews vis-a-vis israel (although jews were uniquely catalyzed by the holocaust).
Does that make sense and address what you were saying?
(Netanyahu would genetically test as levantine descent, not ukrainian steppe - ashkenazis have consistently avoided assimilation and the connection to the levant remains; as a person he also culturally resembles an ashkenazi jew, not a ukrainian)
Are you sure about netanyahu? How can you say that about a clearly polish looking person without dna test results? What percentage of his dna is Levantine? If it is 10% Levantine and 90% Steppe why is it not laughed out the room if he claims the extreme minority portion of his dna as his primary identity?
Netanyahu was born in Tel Aviv. You think he is “illegal” in Israel because of his DNA?
You are making a straw-man argument about Israel, which is 20% Arab and is not calling for them to be deported. The “dual loyalties” bit is something you got out of your side’s trope archive.
Why, what is a trope about that? Dual loyalties is a valid question to ask any immigrant or person who declares himself to have his other or real home elsewhere. Which many (not all) jews often do with regard to Israel. Its the same for Chinese, Indians, Nigerians or any other group.
Dual nationals or people who feel loyalty to Israel should of course have the freedom of speech like anyone else to say they feel affinity toward any country. But the test I use to answer this question is, should their country launch a war against Israel, which side will they fight for?
>The “dual loyalties” bit is something you got out of your side’s trope archive.
That's a very pleasant accusation of course. What "side" do you think mine is?
Netanyahu is an ashkenazi jew. We know who his parents, grandparents, etc are - he's also claimed to have taken a genetic test, which registered him as primarily ashkenazi. Do you have evidence to the contrary?
Netanyahu is an ashkenazi jew. His family traces back to ukraine and lithuania, where it remained jewish; unassimilated. Trace ancestors back further, and you will get to judea. The culture in judea provides a lens which very strongly helps to explain who netanyahu is today. If you trace back earlier than judea to e.g. canaanites, you will lose any useful lens for understanding jews today. This is why judea is not an arbitrary point in the timeline; it is the center of jewish ethnogenesis. Does that make sense?
I assume you concede that there is a perfectly valid reason for jews to be interested in the land that is roughly modern day israel/palestine, i.e. it is the place where jews originated.
I could just as much find the people with genetics tracing to that region who are Muslims and Christians today. And if I manage to muster a number larger than those fraction of Israeli jews with genetic roots there, what would you say?
If I am 1% Native American and 99% English, what am I? Native or English?
On #1 we seem to agree - of course the jewish interest in their indigenous land (the land of jewish ethnogenesis) is valid.
And of course the answer to #2 is a clear "yes". If muslim passion for and capability to seize israel increased sufficiently, it could of course become a muslim state. It seems we entirely agree here, and you return to this point most often - but it's also a completely moot point as it applies evenly to all parties - isn't it?
Jews have a unique claim to israel - they're the only people existing today which tightly trace their ethnogenesis to that region. Can you name another? (E.g. not palestinians - their ethnogenesis is strongly linked to islam / arabia.)
(If we agree here, which I think we do, I'd love to discuss your "relitigation of israel" idea because I think it's interesting and bananas)
Your response to #2 confuses two different things. I made that statement in relation to moral justification for who owns the state per your standards. It is quite unrelated to the quite practical matter of who captures it, owns it. It is also "moot" morally as well since 3000 year old genetics are moot to legal status and ownership of the land, whether the person with genes going back there is Muslim, Christian or Jew. I do not believe in ethnostates.
My idealistic plan is what I came after some thought toward a just and fair solution as possible to all parties involved. The freed up land such as those evicted for lack of legal documents and the remainder of unallocated government land of the former Israeli government should of course be available to any person in the world with the suitable money and paperwork to buy property. In time this can become a new country but it should be administered by an international military force meanwhile. Ideally this should have been the unbroken rule of the British colonial government itself, but history is what it is.
Have you searched "are jews indigenous to israel?", and did you find any interesting information? Would you like me to recommend some sources on the subject which are not blatantly pro-jewish?
Can you elaborate on what you mean by "don't believe in ethnostates"? Are you saying that you personally would never attempt to start one? That you don't like when others engage in building ethnostates? That you would, if you had the power, deny others the right to do so?
With israel of course we don't even need to come to such theoretical matters, as the entity was founded by vile terroristic attacks against the very country that granted it the land and naked robbery of others property and it continues today to rob others lands and thus the valid and just response is to shoot the invaders and thieves until they desist as is the right of any property owner to do to a intruder that threatens their life.
You said before you feel Israels actions are justified, so I am asking again, justify the illegal settlers. If not then I hope you have no problem with the land owners engaging in valid self defense.
No sane (and non-ideological) person will defend israel at every turn. I want to avoid answering your question with a question but I also want to make sure we're talking about the same thing - whose land would you argue israel is settling?
The people already living there under Ottoman and British rule obviously with suitable legal arrangements deemed agreeable by the former governments. The terroristic appropriation of British administered land just a few decades ago is of course not something anyone of a calm mind would deem as valid so by necessity claims of validity must trace from previous governments. Obviously if it were say a few centuries ago it'd have been not a matter worth doing anything about, time matters. And right now, further other peoples legal lands too, which settlers come at gunpoint and rob. Your state supports the illicit settlers viz the current ongoing expansions by technically non-state actors, quite aside from the state itself being an illicit settlement of course.
So your question is "how to justify the movement of newcomers into the midst of former residents of british palestine and the ottoman empire"? The obvious initial answer - and I'm sure you'll have a pointed followup which I look forward to and will likely cause me to disavow israel in various ways - is that the lack of any state apparatus there (due to disintegration of the ottomans and withdrawal of the british) creates an environment in which there is a lack of formal resistance to the construction of a new state.
Essentially territory that is unencompassed by anything strongly resembling a state is a favourable place to construct a state.
If that's correct, then it sounds like your grievances are (1) the builders of israel used terror against the british and were ungrateful to them (2) local arabs were opposed to the construction of the state of israel (3) since the construction of israel, the rights of arabs there have been impacted (4) the territory of israel was not fully purchased from some other entity (5) the right of diaspora jews to return to the land of their ethnogenesis "expired" over the course of ~3000 years (6) you don't support ethnostates.
I want to understand if this is a nearly exhaustive list, and I would like to know the nature of how these points sum together in such a way that opposes you to israel: e.g., is there any single point that alone would maintain your opposition to israel? (Imagine you somehow changed your mind on all points but one of them at random - is there any chance you still remain opposed to israel?) Is there any single point on which your entire opposition to israel hinges? (Imagine you somehow changed your mind on just one random point - is there a non-zero chance you now generally support israel?) Understanding how these grievances sum together will let us know which points are worth discussing, and will give a nice sense of the scope of our disagreement.
Why 3000 years? I go back further. Restore Inanna, Baal, Ishtaar, Set, Osiris. Return the levant to the original civilizations and their descendants.
Unfortunately none of the points you quoted are negotiable in isolation, Israel was a very recent false creation and the best solution after much thinking I have come up with is indeed relitigating all land claims to the last government ie British or Ottoman and the points regarding innocent victims vs invaders. Obviously this also means "Israel" must either willingly accept these terms or be subjected to a continued campaign of repelling by the true stakeholders and suitable international military force first, both of which are completely justified under most reasonable interpretations of property and land ownership.
This is of course distinct from the mere practical fact of some entity owning some place. Russia currently owns places that are justifiably Ukrainian property but it doesn't make its ownership claims valid. If it can keep on to it for a few centuries stably which is to say without internal threads to break off or constant barrages of freedom fighters haven't existed for 200 years and people legitimately identify as Russian, then it is Russia. Otherwise it is not, and I support arming and aiding Ukrainians to repel the invaders.
I believe we must help Iran, Lebanon, etc build nukes. This will have the added benefit of the gulf arab countries being forced to build nukes and Israel's mindless hyperviolence having a degree of checks and balances put upon it.
Let me ask you a question now, you said you don't agree with everything your government does. Would you disagree with shooting illegal settlers who are right now robbing others lands? Why or why not?
"Would you disagree with shooting illegal settlers who are right now robbing others lands?" Who is doing the shooting?
If no previous state is interested, the land stateless - correct?
My followup would be, "you don't seem indifferent about israel"
Then I would expect you to say, "well israel is particularly illegal"
And I would say, "how, particularly?"
And it seems you'd say "israel is illegally invading the west bank"
So I would say, "whose sovereign territory is it invading?"
And you would say "that of the former ottoman and/or british empire"
And I'd say "then the west bank has no sovereign authority; those you listed have exited"
Is that a fair portrayal of how our perspectives line up? To me, this establishes that specific reason for opposing israel is invalid. If you still feel opposed to israel there are plenty of other reasons you could find - but this specific reason is invalid, isn't it?
Israel is illegal simply because it in very recent and active memory illicitly terrorized Britain and stole British land illegally through vile extreme terrorism and ungrateful torture of its very benefactor's people.
A present state structure existing or not is irrelevant if people are already living there, that land has no valid legal deeds from Israel and they are invading others property. Where even is Israel? Israel hates defining its map, which conveniently seems to always expand to where people are already living, against their wishes. Even if we accept the Israeli government as valid, where are the definitions of its borders and the land grant slips for these acts of robbery? If you feel that region is stateless, and since you have presented no objection as of yet to Israeli squatters killing and displacing the people living there, I would hope you can say you are just as much okay with the locals repelling and killing the invaders. Since it is after all neutral grounds.
Due to the state policies and culture, the region has birthed (I say with no ill will toward them beyond the usual disgust one has for a criminal element committing murder and property crime) a distorted populace of a culture of thievery and ungratefulness, forever thieving, forever ungrateful, forever lying. Through obviously no fault of race or blood, rather the filtering effect of the governance system and culture created by a formerly traumatized group in WW2. For instance the eagerness to accept any person of Jewish descent as immigrant leads to, as an unwanted side effect, criminals of all stripes fleeing to Israel and then lawyers pausing or preventing their extradition for years. A sense of unearned right to other peoples lands and properties, starting from the vile reaction to Britain itself closing the borders and changing the immigration policy of land that it literally owns, behaving as if its their own land. Nazi Germany was deprogrammable without too much effort as it was only a few years. This problem has been going on for a few generations already and is going to take immense effort to deprogram back to normalcy.
The squatters invading and stealing others lands are of course widely documented, loutish teens with the support of some IDF member entering and robbing someones house or farm. This is part of the same history and culture of ungratefulness and sense that everything belongs to them.
On the settler accusation, we still haven't fleshed out the nature of property rights outside of any state. Without coming to an understanding here we have no framework in which to judge israel's "settler" activity. (Note I fully understand and accept stateless people's use of physical force to preserve and enrich themselves.)
I am aligned with and equally upset by your "immigrate and delay extradition" concerns.
Breadth-first discussion is not effective, and I'd like to focus on the significant remaining objection I see from you: this matter of ingratitude towards the british. I think this is a lazy or naive characterization - e.g. the british installed a hitler ally as the negotiating partner of zionist leadership in ~1920. What do jews owe britain?
Its not breadth first, thats the very lineage that turned this country into a distorted culture of congenital ingrates. They don't have to owe Brits anything, Britain owned the land, they disliked British immigration controls and then behaved as if they own the land and started vile terroristic activities against the country that saved their side in WW2.
Why not? If you think the houses settlers are invading are "Israeli" then define Israels strict borders? Israel never defines its borders, its always changing based on whims. Obviously they have no legal papers for the lands they are stealing, they are making shit up as they go along. Therefore I think, it is necessary given Israel's weak and confused memory regarding their land borders to be given a very good, kinetic reminder as to their precise border lines.
Britain or anyone else could install literal Hitler or Stalin for all I care, this changes nothing about the fact that they rightfully own a given parcel of land.
It sounds like the terms "ingratitude" / "ingrate" are not relevant to your stance and are just emotive distractions; I suggest we avoid those terms.
Israel has a bunch of contested borders with varying levels of international recognition.
Britain displaced the ottomans, and it seems you feel they had a valid claim to the previously ottoman lands. Then jews displaced the british - why, to you, does that same validity not apply here?
Why is Israel trying to expand into Lebanon? What claims does it have there? Israel's statements are all bullshit, it never owned any of these lands and stole them from the Brits and now stealing from Palestinians, Lebanese and soon by their own admission Syrians and Turks too.
- I assume you agree that as britain's displacement of the ottomans was valid, so too is the jewish terrorist/renegade displacement of britain
- I assume you agree britain was not acting altruistically, given its installation of a hitler ally as the jewish partner in diplomacy
From the jewish perspective, britain allowing jews access to their own homeland is not an act meriting a response of gratitude.
The remaining concern is regarding expulsion - I'd rather discuss this directly and not by analogy. Is there a particular large-scale instance of israel expelling some people which you feel is particularly unjustifiable?
First, Israel still has no single written constitution and instead operates through Basic Laws, something its own parliament acknowledges. So, not a democracy.
Second, Israel was established through armed Zionist paramilitary groups conducting terror campaigns. Look up the Irgun and Lehi, both of which carried out bombings and other attacks that were described as terrorism by contemporary governments and organizations.
Third, the claim that it “has human rights” is impossible to square with reality. Israel maintains a decades-long military occupation of the West Bank, where Palestinians live under military law while Israeli settlers living in the same territory are governed by Israeli civilian law. Human rights organizations document torture and abuse in Israeli detention facilities holding Palestinians. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch published extensive reports documenting systematic violations of Palestinians’ rights. both organizations completely reject the characterization of Israel as a state that upholds human rights. What evidence are you prepared to put forward that Israel “has human rights” in the face of the evidence that its human rights are reserved for one class of people?
Are citizens of israel able to vote for their leadership?
And, of course, not everyone in the Israeli-occupied territories has suffrage.