qwertthrowway

I agree, the tree of comments below you just belies these prejudiced and hateful attitudes. Concerned but not surprised that many people interested in tech topics are choosing to discuss how it’s ok to surveil people for their religion and put guilt by association on them… instead of discussing why targeted surveillance of groups based on religion or place of worship is problematic, fueled by bigotry and ignorance.

Theo problem is when you say bad things about someone that isn’t true it’s called slander and if it’s true then it’s backbiting. It’s not good in general to malign people or put a negative look on them without a good reason.

Some of these claims seem outlandish as rationalizations, do you have any evidence or data upholding these claims? I’m not sure how sexual frustration, homosexuality, and the military connect, especially we have the old literature of the Iliad where a famous band of men and their lovers fight.

What about microbial enzyme based cheeses? For example I’ve seen havarti labeled with microbial rennet.

The objective is an end to occupation, this is about establishing justice. it would be narrow minded and misguided to claim this is not about human rights and dignity first and foremost, which is a component of justice. People take solidarity with those being oppressed and wronged. The Israeli occupation and oppression of Palestine has been occurring for over 70 years now, and worldwide this is a galvanizing topic especially considering the major uptick in atrocities committed by the Israeli government and indiscriminate targeting of civilians.

The issue with Rohingya people is also an issue that people take solidarity with and partake in aid of.

I see your comment as dismissing the desire to establish justice in Palestine as if it is only about fighting Jews for being Jewish. Many people also protested the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, which now in the US we recognize as being based on wrong premises. Apartheid was supported by many people but now it is regarded as a dark time in history.

If you wish to be on the side of ignoring the need for justice, know that you won’t be the first to do so. But it does not make it the correct thing to do.

This is a very inaccurate comparison. Palestinians faced the violent expulsion of the Nakbah, and before that in the British mandate period there were attacks from violent Zionist groups. Currently, Palestine is militarily occupied and colonized. In this context, from the river to the sea must be understood as a desire for freedom and for justice.

The oppression faced under occupation by people in the West Bank and in Gaza for over 70 years now reminds us of how situations like Apartheid in South Africa formally continued until 1994.

To dismiss as simple “Jew hate” is really not the correct context; very disappointing to see these broad generalizations dismiss the fundamental needs for human life.

This claim of hierarchy doesn’t make sense for Islam, which explicitly does not have a fixed religious hierarchy like Christianity (which I will also note it’s interesting that Christianity was split into sects but not Islam for this study).

Thanks for your comments I find your writing has some satisfying and interesting components to it. These are important observations— putting in words some of my own feelings of my own western society. I would emphasize also a feeling of decline: that there is a sense of helplessness with the state of society sometimes.

1, this is a human issue above all. One does not have to be Jewish or non-Jewish to recognize the extreme human toll being exacted on Gaza. When I see bombs collapse buildings of innocent residents, hospitals invaded with entire ICU units dying, mass starvation due to a blockade, and a death toll with over 40% being children; I think all of this warrants comparisons with industrial mass murder. Just because it is being termed “self-defense” or a “war” does not make it any less blameworthy. Let’s look at the real human loss here: it’s mostly innocent people in an urban area being killed, where a large percentage of the population is children.

2, the terming of hamas as a “fanatic death cult” appears quite an extreme label. Hamas is more comparable to a political party with political, social, and military wings. In fact, it’s quite clear that Hamas’s brands itself as part of the resistance against occupation; and the motives for recent attacks lie in the Israeli aggression committed against Palestinians in the West Bank this summer and seeking to release Palestinian prisoners, many who were children, women, and held without formal charges. Even comparing how many hostages who have been released talked about how they were treated by Hamas, with the way Palestinian prisoners were treated by Israeli captors, shows that Hamas is not merely a “fanatic death cult”, given they treated prisoners with a degree of humanity they didn’t need to.

It’s also unclear that removing Hamas will fix the situation; after all, before Hamas, the PLO was labeled terrorists and dealt with brutally. In a resistance situation, the occupying force will typically seek to discredit and derail any process that threatens its control.

3, a desire to end occupation must be one that can be accepted by the occupied people. None of the peace process deals appeared to be honest efforts from the Israeli camp because the ultimate end goal of the occupying force has been to take control of “greater Israel” without the people who are living there.

I would propose a way to move forward for Israel would be a one-state solution: to recognize Palestinians as equal people with human rights, give them citizenship in a democratic rule, and allow them to return to their land. All of this without any military occupations. Because it is clear that a two-state solution has been dead for quite a while, given the occupying force has no intentions to end its theft of land in the West Bank.

Also, check out elixirs EEX (a mix of erlang and htmx, in spirit)

I think an honest answer would be to end occupation and oppression of the Palestinians by Israel. Any occupying force has an interest to silence and stop indigenous people from claiming their land rights.

For example, Gaza had been described as an open air prison for almost 2 decades because its borders, imports, sea usage, had all been controlled by Israel. This is not what we call “sovereign rule”. The West Bank has been checkered with military checkpoints and illegal settlements, contravening international agreements.

When people are driven to desperation, and their lives are made miserable because the occupying forces want to remove them, they do not have many options.

I think it is quite adequate to compare Gaza to the situation in for example, the Warsaw Ghetto in WW2, when an uprising was quashed by occupying German forces. This Gaza is a heavily urban area with vast majority of civilians, it cannot be compared to two armies fighting on a battlefield.

If something is in the public domain, is it still accessible for copying or can companies still profit off of selling public domain material? For example, if I “pirate” a public domain text published by some company, am I in the wrong?

Aljazeera posts high quality documentaries and news articles. It has been much better than US media at publishing news about the Israel Palestine situation. Even the BBC was quite poisoned by bias on this issue. Aljazeera has been the largest news outlet that actually published a Palestinian view also.

Glad to see actual discussion on this topic related to technology. Many investigations into social media being used to suppress pro-Palestinian activism, and the involvement of VCs is no less surprising. Anyone in tech who doesn’t care about what’s going on should really take a look into the huge efforts to silence people who are just trying to protect human lives.