Is the Lebanon walkie-talkie and pager sabotage part of a big picture strategic attack to force Hesbollah to use cell phones, which can be tracked?

It’s a tactic to help Trump get elected in November by creating a larger war in the Middle East.

I doubt it, but I’m just guessing. I don’t know much about these things, but if they know to check, can’t they check the pagers and phones for explosive devises?

Seems like it was just to terrorize and kill. Did they kill some high ranking Hezbollah people? I have not read or watched any of the details about the attack.

Side note: If you have never watched the show Tehran you might like it. Show about the Mossad on a mission in Tehran.

Is it so difficult to call this what it is?
Terrorism.

All part of a deadly “game”’ that I’m afraid will never end.

Whoever invents invisible and silent spy and attack drones that could fly into enemies homes and bunkers undetected and kill with impunity would have the greater advantage.

Hezb. has sworn to wipe out Israel and is funded by Iran. Isr. has sworn to wipe out Hezb.
This is an excellent way to destroy Hezb command and control and sow distrust in communication systems.
Whether you approve of it or not, you have to admit it was a darn clever targeted attack.

@ragingloli I suppose that it’s technically called terrorism, but I have a hard time thinking of it as terrorism when it’s against terrorists. I take that back…according to the definition, it’s not terrorism. “the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims”

I doubt it. I think it was a way to target only Hezbollah soldiers. They all carried pagers or Walkie-Talkies, so Israel figured out how to attach explosives to them without the soldiers knowing. Then, when they ignite them, only the soldiers are killed or injured. Not a bad plan. It makes screws up Hezbollah’s comms for a while until they can figure out something else. If they go to cell phones, that might be a benefit, but I doubt that was the primary focus.

I think it was a dangerous attempt to provoke a wider war in the North now that they have destroyed Gaza without any positive results. I don’t really see what Israel’s long game is and all they are doing is strengthening the hatred of their neighboring populations.

@janbb Once again, go back to see how all this played out. Palestinians in Gaza (Hamas) attacked Israel, not the other way around. Israel responded, for sure, but that is to be expected. While they were focused on Gaza, Hezbollah started attacking Israel. Again, Israel did not initiate conflict. This isn’t about Israel fostering hatred of their neighbors, it is their neighbors fostering hatred against Israel. And both Hamas and Hezbollah are funded by Iran.

@ragingloli is right. It was a terrorist attack. Psychological warfare as well. It’s clear that both sides have been avoiding wider war despite numerous provocations, but if this isn’t a pretext for it, I don’t know what is.

It was the other way round. Hezbollah had been using mobile phones to communicate but wanted something more secure so they went looking for low tec alternatives.

As I understand it when Hezbollah realised their brand-new pagers had been booby trapped Israel cancelled the military operation in which they would have played a significant part but decided to detonate them anyway in a civilian setting. That to my mind is where the operation stepped over the line into terrorism and state-run terrorism at that.

As if to prove my point to the people of Lebanon Israel flew two low flying fighter jets over Beirut this evening.

I don’t get it…Why is it called terrorism when the target of the attack are terrorists?

^^Yeah. Hezbollah members were the targets. Some civilians got killed?

@mazingerz88 That’s just collateral damage. Who cares about innocent people being maimed with life-changing injuries when the baddies are the targets?

I said I think it was to terrorize, but not necessarily to expand the war. I think both sides are trying to tire the population so the people will start to demand peace or leave. The Palestinians have been doing it for years with their constant rockets and suicide bombers. The Israelis do it in response to major aggressions (as opposed to rockets that get caught by the iron dome, but don’t forget the rockets were still being fired).

WWII the US used the A-bomb to stop the war. People can argue about it being justified or whether it had to be done, but that was the basic premise. There have been other aggressions and battles in history where one side finally left the territory or stopped being at war to stop the suffering. The problem is, most of the Jewish Israelis, have nowhere to go! They have been there for a few generations now, and the countries their parents, grandparents, and great grandparents came from are almost all still not good places for Jews, some countries Jews were never even given citizenship when they lived there. If you want to send Jewish Israelis “back” to their countries, then you might as well send half of the Hispanics in the US back to their countries. This is not the British going back to Britain where they are safe and literally back in their country, it is trying to suggest Jews should go back to places where their families were murdered and some places still have high antisemitism.

Hezbollah is connected to the same Muslim groups that want Israel completely gone from the map and the Jews out of the Middle East. Are the second generation Jewish Israelis from Lebanon supposed to go back to Lebanon?

It’s a snowball. Israel keeps getting attacked and Israel reacts by becoming more militant in protecting its borders.

Back to WWII. Imagine if Germany after the war was supposedly over, continued to drop bombs, shoot Jews and Gypsies, literally planned operations to invade neighboring countries and killing American, Russian, UK, or French soldiers and civilians (are those all of the countries that occupied Germany afterwords?). Not a stray lunatic Nazi still on some power trip, but the government planning it and sending rockets and suicide bombers regularly killing people and destroying property. In that situation would you say Germany needs to be stopped? Would you say Germany should stop their aggressions?

The problem with war is generally you get what you give. Sometimes you get worse. That’s the gamble.

Drives me crazy to see people at war like that. I will never understand it. Why can’t the Jewish people have that little piece of land? Lines were drawn creating Iraq and Jordan, and Gaza was part of Egypt, and lines moved and changed.

@JLeslie You do realise that Hezbollah only exists because Zionist colonisers displaced indigenous Palestinian Arabs, and lots of them ended up in Lebanon as refugees? I guess you don’t.

Your little “imagine this” might make sense if it was remotely applicable. The double standards and racism are so stark. You give so much consideration to Israeli Jews not being able to go back (Israel invites Jews and gives stolen land and property to Jews coming from entirely safe countries today), yet Israel’s colonialism has created the greatest number of refugee since the Second World War, and millions of Palestinians have no home to go to, have to make lives in other countries, and millions are left dispossessed, brutalised and terrorised by the Israeli state and settlers. Where’s your consideration for them? It appears you don’t have any at all, and sympathise entirely with the oppressor and brutaliser.

@Kropotkin How do you define racism? I swear I don’t understand the definition of that word anymore. I want Palestinians to have equality, freedom, I don’t see them as different than anyone else. They are the same races as Jews. They are white, Black, blonde, brunette, and everything in between. My husband is half Mizrahim, otherwise know as an Arab Jew (not used as much anymore) his father’s family is from the Middle East, their weddings have belly dancers! He grew up on Lebanese/ME food. His dad spoke Arabic in his childhood home. I really don’t think of Arabs as different or in any negative light just for being born Arab or Muslim or Persian, etc.

Are you saying the UN decisions to draw lines in many parts of the Middle East didn’t displace other groups? I think it is horrible anyone is removed from their home or land. I know horrible things have happened to the Palestinians, I am not discounting that.

How do you want to resolve it? What do you want the Israelis to do? The Jews, Druze, and the other Arabs in Israel who have allegiance to the state of Israel?

80% of Jews in Israel were born there.

Now what? Throw the Jews out? Send them back to Lebanon, Morocco, Syria, Iraq, Latvia, Germany,… then what? There will be peace in the Middle East?

Edit: Don’t you see the Jews and Palestinians have more in common than differences when it comes to being displaced and brutalized.

^^People who see Israel as terrorists and colonizers most probably feel Jews should leave and go somewhere else. They don’t care how, they don’t care where. Or they want Jews to capitulate and give those displaced Palestinians back the land they were displaced from.

They probably think that would bring peace to that region because let’s face it, the ONLY reason for them that all these deaths and strife these past several decades were caused by Jews stepping back in there.

They probably don’t think Israelis should all die either but it’s not their problem. They want Palestinians back in there so Iran and Hezbollah and Hamas would be at peace.

^^Some people who sincerely are trying to be fair to both sides want Israel to give up those occupied territories thinking that might convince Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran to stop attacking Israel? And if not and the attacks continue, just be on the defense and that’s it. Live with that. Forever with some of your neighbors attacking you and would go to their graves dreaming of your extinction.

And the Jews should be contented and happy with that. Since they have no business being there in the first place. Defend just…defend. Do not counter attack, do not occupy anymore land because it will be an act of genocide.

Hamas isn’t going to give up, that’s a ridiculous hope. And Israel isn’t going to put itself in a position to let Hamas massacre another thousand people at a concert. All of the cease fire games playing is a waste of time until leadership of both sides comes to the realization that status quo isn’t going to work.

As for Hesbullah, they are Iranian opportunists. They really don’t have a dog in the fight except acting as shills for Iran.

And as for the Palestinians – they could have negotiated peace 50 times over the last 75 years but chose not to. Crying that it’s someone else’s fault is simply cowardice.

@Kropotkin I have no problem agreeing some Palestinians are stateless, live in dire conditions, and are refugees, but as far as I know (you can correct me if I’m wrong) they are the only group that gets to keep refugee status even when they are citizens of another country and wealthy and even their children born in the new country are given refugee status. Fuck, I should be a refugee under that rule and many other Americans, certainly a huge portion of Jewish people. Here’s the UNRWA definition: https://www.unrwa.org/palestine-refugees

Palestinians in Israel can be citizens of Israel, most choose not to even apply.

I really don’t understand all of the politics, and who knows if Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza can answer completely honestly when asked their opinions for fear of the government, family, and peers doing something harmful. I have seen discussions where Palestinians and Jewish Israelis discuss a way forward and sometimes the Palestinians sound more reasonable to me than the Israelis, and sometimes the reverse. Seems to me peace can be made if the fanatics weren’t there to contend with.

You go back to ‘48, but if you go back farther in history it is the Jews who were forced to leave what is now called Israel. Where does it stop?

@elbanditoroso I agree, Hamas won’t give up. What’s your solution? Just keep killing thousands of people? I feel like the Palestinians are as trapped as the Israelis in reference to Hamas. People blame the Gazans for voting them in, but I don’t think most Gazans felt that what has happened over the last 20 years would be what we have seen.

Just watching TV this morning where they were discussing cease fire and peace talks will probably stall until after the US presidential election. That is so disgusting to me. Reminds me of what happened with the Iran hostages in the 70’s. I will never understand it.

It’s the other way around. Hezbollah had distributed the devices amid concerns that smartphones were being used by the Israeli military and intelligence agencies to track down and kill its members.

Trail which the BBC followed from Taiwan, to Japan, Hungary, Israel and back to Lebanon.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0e1wpr0q44o

@elbanditoroso Of course Hamas is never going to give up. But to Americans who feel the taxes they pay goes to killing Palestinian children, I don’t think they care that Hamas will never stop until Israel is wiped off from that region.

They probably are hoping Hamas would stop attacking after Israel gives up the occupied territories. Probably the same hope many Israelis have as well. It seems though that it is not up to them to make the decisions at this point in time.

@mazingerz88 You can care about Israel not being wiped out and also not want our government to support killing Palestinians or leveling Gaza It’s not a binary choice.

^^True but not when you are protesting with pro-Hamas slogans along with anti-semitic slogans or posting complaints about your taxes but no mention of Israel’s tough predicament and all you keep repeating is Israel’s supposed acts of genocide when Hamas use civilians as shields.

Imagine if Western media had been emphasizing what Hamas did on Oct 7th, if they had shown the video in the beginning, if there was pressure on the Palestinians to make a peace deal and to return the hostages.

If there had been world pressure on Hamas this current war might be over. Instead, a lot of the West aligned with the Gazans and Hamas feels support to not cooperate. They probably feel they (Hamas, Hezbollah, etc) can win if they keep going.

If Hamas had returned the hostages there would have been a different dynamic this point, but no one can know for sure what would have happened.

^^Not sure how the western media showing videos of October 7 in the beginning might elicit the kind of world reaction, strong enough that it would lead into pressure needed to compel Palestinians into releasing the hostages? Is that scenario possible?

And by Palestinians do you mean Hamas fighters? Who clearly knew what they were doing, sacrificing kids to gain moral advantage.

Hamas is a suicidal force. They are immune to any pressure except the pressure to survive and keep operating in that land called Palestine. So they can strike at Israel whenever convenient.

@mazingerz88 I mean maybe the Palestinian people would be more open to a treaty. If they feel the world agrees with them that there should not be an Israel, that has to be more empowering to stay the course of wanting all of the land.

I think there are some Palestinians who want a treaty, they talk a lot about wanting freedom of movement in and out of Israel and want to be able to travel, but most also seem to say they want one country, the country of Palestine. Maybe they have to out of fear, hard to gauge.

Hamas will likely never make a peace agreement. The only way to free the Gazans is to dismantle Hamas.

^^To some dismantling Hamas is Israel committing genocide.

@mazingerz88 There might be a way to do it that isn’t quite so destructive.

The dismantling of Hamas isn’t the problem it is the way Israel goes about it. There are almost 50,000 dead in Gaza already, in terms of the population of the United States that would mean 5 million dead and another 5 million wounded. The scale is horrific and the slaughter has been going on for almost a year now not to mention the destruction of schools, hospitals, homes and entire districts.

I wouldn’t go quite so far as to call it genocide but if we don’t call it that we have to invent a new word. Mass murder and terrorism are inadequate to describe a small piece of land being rendered uninhabitable.

@JLeslie Is there? Great if Israelis asap elect that leader who has that solution.

@flutherother If you don’t want to call it genocide or ethic cleansing (I will call it that, but I understand others think it’s inaccurate or premature), then Israel’s actions in Gaza could at least be described as war crimes.

356 dead in Lebanon so far. I keep hearing talk of “World War III”, but world war requires multiple nations to involve themselves in a conflict—I think we’re more likely to see a continued unending weapons flow to Israel, and other nations twiddling thumbs and hand-wringing while people continue to die.

First, let’s be crystal fucking clear that this was a terrorist attack by Israel. By definition, it wasn’t “targeted” because all of the pagers detonated simultaneously and there was no way to ensure that innocents wouldn’t be harmed. And they were harmed. Israel murdered a 9-year-old-girl. She wasn’t “collateral damage,” Fatima Abdullah was fucking human being and her life mattered. Oh and then Israel detonated the walkie-talkies during her funeral. They also killed 11-year-old Bilal Kanj.

Furthermore, the objective couldn’t have been to target Hezbollah, because they only killed a handful of Hezbollah but likely gained thousands of new supporters. It’s a net INCREASE in people wanting to harm Israelis. And by injuring so many civilians, Israel is essentially telling the world that Israeli civilians (and their supporters) are fair game for violence.

@smudges “Why is it called terrorism when the target of the attack are terrorists?

Because Israelis themselves engage in acts of terrorism, which makes them “terrorists.” Nearly every Israeli citizen serves in the IDF, which makes them complicit in war crimes and war criminals. That would mean that every rocket/SCUD missile and suicide bomber would be “justified” using your logic. Therefore, Oct. 7th was justified. Is that the world we want to live in? It’s easy to throw the label “terrorist” on “the other guy” (especially when they’re poor, powerless and have brown skin) but that game leads to escalation and murder. In fact the IDF labels every male in Gaza in a certain age range a “terrorist” to pad their statistics. It doesn’t matter if their hands are in the air with a white flag.

Israel is the original terrorist in the situation. Those refugees in Lebanon who had their home stolen have every right to return after the war under international law. Israel shot at unarmed Palestinian civilians trying to return after the Nakkba. This is why their descendants are considered refugees. Because Israel has been denying them their basic human rights for multiple generations. This is the origin of Hezbollah.

@JLeslie “Why can’t the Jewish people have that little piece of land?”

Because in order for that to happen they have to ethnically cleanse the people who have been living there for hundreds (thousands in some cases) of years and commit acts of genocide and terrorism and employ the same grotesque strategies that the Nazis did. Zionism is grotesque and brings out psychopathic and evil ideologies in the people who support genocide to achieve the dream of a “little piece of land.” The idea of an ethnostate, is itself grotesque because by definition you have a racist state. You can try to say things are “separate but equal” but things are never equal when you play that game. Look at these people going an a boat ride to watch civilians get blown up as they fantasize about colonizing Gaza.

If you look at the Arabs citizens in Israel, their metrics are way worse than the colonizers. Infant mortality is double, life expectancy is shorter, 95% of Arabs are in the lowest economic cluster, Arabs have lower employment numbers, much higher poverty and childhood poverty numbers, They predominantly work as low-skilled wage-slaves and earn nearly half as much as Jews. Class sizes are bigger and less money is spent per child and fewer years of education. It turns out that when you have an ethostate it’s hard to see the brown people as equals.

This isn’t a criticism of Jews. There are plenty of Jews around the world who recognize that Israel is a sick nation with twisted ideologies. And being abusive to the “the brown people” isn’t some disorder unique to Israeli Jews, it’s a sickness that arises in all ethostates and colonizers.

After likely hundreds of thousands of dead Palestinians (mostly women and kids) at the hands of the Israelis (paid for with our fucking taxes), raping Palestinian children in prisons, the attempted erasure of a people, we should finally come together as a planet and revoke Israel’s statehood. Call it Palestine, allow the refugees to return, hold elections and basically implement what was done in South Africa. There needs to be some UN investigations and trials for those who committed war crimes. People (including Hamas criminals) need to go to The Hague.

Then maybe with people living as equals in society things can be worked out. But a society based on Jewish supremacy will always produce psychotic extremists (just as one based on Mormon supremacy, or German supremacy, or Filipino supremacy or Pagan supremacy or Arab supremacy any other ideology that says some people are “more” and others are “lesser” based on some inherent attribute).

Published in Ha’aretz 22 September 1967:

“Our right to defend ourselves from extermination does not give us the right to oppress others.
 
Occupation entails foreign rule.
 
Foreign rule entails resistance.
 
Resistance entails repression.
 
Repression entails terror and counter-terror.
 
The victims of terror are mostly innocent people
 
Holding on to the occupied territories will turn us into a nation of murderers and murder victims
 
Let us get out of the occupied territories immediately.”
 
— Shimon Tzabar, David Eherenfeld, Dan Omer,
Raif Elias, Haim Hanegbi, Uri Lipshitz, Dr. Moshé Machover, Eli Aminov, Rafi Zikhroni, Arie Bober, Shneur Sherman, Yehuda Rosenstrauch

@gorillapaws Why can Iraq exist? Lebanon, Syria, Jordan? Weren’t those borders drawn following the Ottoman empire?

Fine, dissolve Israel, where do the Jewish people go? They can’t stay in the ME. It’s too hostile to them. The majority of Israelis were born there, that’s the country they know.

I willingly concede there were Arabs there for hundreds of years, no one argues that. There were Jews there too. Palestinians were supposed to be part of Jordan.

@JLeslie “Fine, dissolve Israel, where do the Jewish people go?”

They stay where they are. The white people got to stay in the South after the slaves were freed. Same with South Africa after Apartheid ended. It was actually an excuse used to continue Apartheid, that if they ended it the whites wouldn’t be safe anymore.

There needs to be some accountability. Pilots who dropped 2k bombs on women and kids on refugee tents need to face the equivalent of the SS in Nuremberg, and the Architects of “Where’s Daddy?” and pager bombings need to face justice. but after some truth and reconciliation, that seems like the only way forward.

@JLeslie “I willingly concede there were Arabs there for hundreds of years”

Some were there for thousands of years.

@gorillapaws The Israelis are not the same as the Black people in the South at the time of emancipation. When I say not the same I don’t mean Black people are different than Jewish people, I am only talking about the circumstance. As far as race, there are Black Jews, Jews come in every color, this is about a people, the Jewish people. Israel is not a white, Black, and brown situation, I don’t know if you think that, but many do and it’s tiresome. I assume you weren’t talking about skin color, but rather just using an analogy.

The Blacks in the South got a shit deal and many still suffer to this day from the history. Following slavery was years of segregation and terror.

The Palestinians also are in a shitty deal and so are the Jewish Israelis, and hell, let’s include the Druze, the Bedouins…

So, you expect the Jews to stay in Israel? The Palestinian government will treat them as equals? Be ok with gay Israelis? Women will be equal? Why not give the Jewish people and any Arabs loyal to Israel an area in the US? Create a state for them here. Or, a state in Germany? They slaughtered us. The Muslim Brotherhood is hostile to Jews and Christians. The Druze went with Israel, because historically the Arab/Palestinians were hostile to them.

There were Jews in Palestine before 1948.

This is a war. I think the pagers were terrorizing, I willingly agree anything where the population will think using an every day device might blow up is terrorizing. I don’t know if it reaches the definition of terrorism, I just don’t know. It’s a time of war, and so people die. I hate it.

You seem to think Palestinians want one state, I assume you think it will be a Democracy, and the terrorism will stop? Are you going to implode the shopping mall and university and new buildings to give land back to Palestinian families?

@JLeslie “The Israelis are not the same as the Black people in the South at the time of emancipation.”

Right, the Israeli Jews are more like the former slaveowners than the slaves.

@JLeslie “So, you expect the Jews to stay in Israel? The Palestinian government will treat them as equals?”

I think it’ll be like post-Nazi Germany. There will be an adjustment period with international supervision with an aim to build a new society based on equality. It’s going to take time but history has shown that it can be done.

“Why not give the Jewish people and any Arabs loyal to Israel an area in the US?”

Because Ethnostates create evil. What would you say if I said I had a dream for a Christian whites-only country where only pure blooded white Protestant people could come? You’d call me a sick fuck (and rightfully so). Fantasies about pure races and enforcing racial purity via laws and de facto culture is not a beautiful dream.

Why not a dream of beautiful Jewish communities living with their neighbors all over the world? would that be so bad?

@JLeslie “This is a war.”

It’s not a war. It’s an extermination. This is Hitler shit.

@JLeslie “I assume you think it will be a Democracy, and the terrorism will stop? Are you going to implode the shopping mall and university and new buildings to give land back to Palestinian families?”

I’m sure there will be hard years ahead, but it’s the only viable alternative at this point. As to property, courts can adjudicate territory and claims just as was done after WW2.

@gorillapaws I think it’ll be like post-Nazi Germany. There will be an adjustment period with international supervision with an aim to build a new society based on equality. It’s going to take time but history has shown that it can be done.

I think there is one HUGE difference, Germany was an educated, fairly liberal, industrialized society before the war. Sure, parts of the ME have gone through liberal periods, but it is now fraught with dictators, terrorist groups, and theocracies. Maybe you are right, maybe Palestine could have everyone living there in one country equal and happy. My Israeli friend wanted and still wants that, but it would be Israel not Palestine in her idea of it.

Would you tell Italians they shouldn’t have a country? If they had been driven out and then eventually given back a country, would it be ok for them to return? The “problem” is both the Palestinians and the Jews have claim to the land. I think most people agree on that.

The difference between the Protestants and the Jews is the Jews are a tiny group and people constantly want to kill us AND Protestant is a religion while the Jewish people are just that, a people. The Jewish people are like a nation, like Italian, German, Japanese, Egyptian, etc. So much so, that even science labels us that way through DNA, which I find a little nerve racking.

We are a minority constantly under the threat of attack whether you want to believe it or not. You have to put yourself in the mindset of a Black person, I think that is easier for you. That is similar to a Jewish person in terms of POV of our experience in the world from a transgenerational trauma perspective.

The research on generational trauma now used to explain the Black American experience started with researching Jews and their experience post Pogroms and Holocaust. I think you just see Jews as WHITE oppressors. Or, WHITE and powerful. We aren’t white to the Nazis and many of us literally are not fair skinned. Over 50% of Jews in Israel are “Arab” Jews otherwise known as Mizrahim. My husband is half Mizrahi. The majority of European Jews in Israel arrived after the Holocaust. I know I’ve told you this before. Black people have stories about lynchings, my people went to the gas chambers.

I understand why you want to defend the Palestinians, I want them to be safe and free too, like I want for everyone, but what I am asking is for you to take the time to understand the Jewish perspective and experience. Not the Israeli, but the Jewish one. Then you will also maybe have some empathy for the Israelis. The only way forward is to understand both groups. They both need to feel like they are getting what they need and want. I would say Jews more than anything want to feel safe.

@JLeslie I understand the Jewish perspective just fine. The Zionist perspective doesn’t represent the Jewish perspective. Many Jews all over the world abhor that Palestinian innocents are being slaughtered in their name and are making it much more likely that they or someone they love could be the victim of a retaliatory terror attack.

“Would you tell Italians they shouldn’t have a country?”
If they were engaging in killing hundreds of thousands of women and kids, creating an apartheid state and ignoring the UN, the International Court of Justice, committing terrorism and trying to start wars with even more countries, then yeah, I’d tell Italy that it’s time for a major fucking change and that their entire society needs a complete recalibration.

As far as I’m concerned the vast majority of Israelis are moral degenerates, at least based on this poll from back in March/April. That’s on the citizens of that particular nation-state not on Judaism as a whole or the Jewish people.

” The “problem” is both the Palestinians and the Jews have claim to the land. I think most people agree on that.”

There was no legal claim to the land beyond personal holdings acquired prior to 1948 and the allocation of land by the UN was entirely disproportionate to the populations at the time and a betray of prior deals made to the people living there, not to mention completely disregard their human rights to self-determination. The problem was that the Zionists chased the people who had a right to live there away and killed them and then prevented them from returning when they had every legal right to do so under the very same international laws that created Israel in the first place.

You can’t have a democratic ethnostate when you’re the minority. That necessitates removing/killing people to get your population numbers high enough so you can dominate the other people. That’s the problem: it’s the dream of an ethnostate.

@JLeslie “The Jewish people are like a nation”

Some Jews see themselves that way. There were way more Jews living all around Europe than in Israel at the time of the destruction of the second temple:

“But historical documents tell a slightly different tale. Based on accounts such as those of Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, by the time of the destruction of the Second Temple in A.D. 70, as many as 6 million Jews were living in the Roman Empire, but outside Israel, mainly in Italy and Southern Europe. In contrast, only about 500,000 lived in Judea, said Ostrer, who was not involved in the new study.”(source)

Understand that there’s a lot of reimagining of history being done by Zionists to create a justification for their goal of a state in the former “Judea/Sumeria.” Things like the Palestinians were never really a people, “Palestine wasn’t a place,” “The innocent Jews were attacked out of nowhere from their evil Arab neighbors at the founding of Israel and it was just self-defense.”

This mythology is created so ordinary people can feel good about supporting the IDF with their tax dollars, or maybe even one day signing up for Aliyah. No good person wants to think of themselves as supporting the systematic abuse and oppression of a group of people to get what they want.

@JLeslie “We are a minority constantly under the threat of attack whether you want to believe it or not”

1. It’s in Israel’s political interest for Jews worldwide to feel like Isreal is the only safe place for them. The crimes against humanity they commit only make this more likely to happen.

2. There are threats to the safety of Jews, primarily from right wing extremists. Ironically Zionist groups have been supporting these same right wingers and helping them get into power (Including Trump who is rumored to have had Hitler’s speeches on his nightstand—maybe the only book he ever read).

So Israel doesn’t make the Jewish people safer, not by a long shot.

As far as the Protestant comparison, the point was that a “pure society” IS the grotesque thing, whether I chose Protestantism, or the Irish, it doesn’t matter. Building a society on purity of the people is twisted and leads to degenerate thinking. I understand there was trauma from the Holocaust. That doesn’t get resolved by seeking a society based on “purity.”

@JLeslie “I think you just see Jews as WHITE oppressors.”

No, I see the Palestinian as the brown, powerless occupied and oppressed people that are the natural byproduct of ethnically cleansing the land. I’m not saying all Jews are white, I’m saying the victims are all brown and that does matter, because the UN never would have drawn the boundaries for the state of Israel where they did if the inhabitants were white or had wealth and power. The racism against the Palestinians extends to Europe and the US as well.

Oh geez, sticking with the race thing. Not all Palestinians are brown, and color has nothing to do with it. The Middle East is not the United States of America.

@JLeslie Do you really think the UN would have carved up Mandate Palestine the way it did if the Palestinians were wealthy, had blonde hair and blue eyes? There was a complete disregard for the views of the Arabs when the decision was made for where the borders were drawn. In many parts (especially southern Israel) the Zionists were a tiny fraction of the population in the huge chunk of territory that was granted to Israel. If you can’t see how that completely disregards the majority of a place’s inhabitants right to self-determination, then I can’t help you.

It’s following a long history of European and US powers carving up the world filled with “brown savages” for the Europeans to rule and exploit because there was no moral consideration for those people’s rights. Again, the point isn’t that Jews don’t come in all shapes, sizes with various skin tones who themselves were the victims of racism and mistreatment all over the world and especially the holocaust, it’s that the people being dispossessed of their land and rights were not regarded as worth consideration by the US and the Europeans making the decisions. And that absolutely was informed by racism (remember black people had to ride in the back of the bus and had separate water fountains at the time).

@gorillapaws I have no idea if all “white” people lived in the land of Palestine if the same divisions would have been made by the UN. Maybe not. Many of the brown and Black nations voted for the creation of Israel. How do you explain that?

There are still almost 2 million Arabs living in Israel, many of whom are Israeli citizens. Many Palestinians choose not to be citizens. I am tired of hearing how many Jewish people lived in Israel. If you believed Israel was a legitimate state, which you don’t, the number wouldn’t matter. Just like the example of giving back Italy to the Italians, it wouldn’t matter how many Italians were still there. The country was created for the Jewish people, not for the Jewish people living in Palestine. There is a difference.

If we dissolve Israel, what will you do for the Israelis to relocate them? They cannot just stay there. Some might, but most won’t if it is hostile towards them.

Your premise is you are against Israel existing at all, it was unfairly created. You are against a homeland for the Jews. You are in favor of a homeland for the Palestinians where they would allow other groups to live there. Do I have the summary correct? This last paragraph?

@JLeslie “Many of the brown and Black nations voted for the creation of Israel. How do you explain that?”

I’m pretty sure they weren’t on the committee who drafted the borders and if they had been, Israel’s borders would have looked a lot more like the Woodhead Commission Partition Plan. And I think that could have been justified, but understand that the Zionist leaders wanted the whole thing (and many still do).

@JLeslie “I am tired of hearing how many Jewish people lived in Israel”

That’s an easy way to just dismiss the central problem. It really does make a difference, and is important to understand.

@JLeslie “If you believed Israel was a legitimate state, which you don’t, the number wouldn’t matter.”

I actually do think there is a case for Israel as a legitimate state. I believed it my whole life, though I’m realizing how unjust the borders were when it was created and how that played a major role in setting up all future conflicts. It’s only now that Israel is engaging in genocide that I think it deserves the political equivalent of the death penalty for its crimes. When civilians are blockading humanitarian aide to starving people without recourse, that’s a symptom of a very sick society. I think it’s time for a 1-state solution where everyone is an equal and it should be called “Palestine” because the name “Israel” will forever be tainted with the stench of genocide. “Never Again” was supposed to mean something, and didn’t only apply to the Jewish people.

@JLeslie “If we dissolve Israel, what will you do for the Israelis to relocate them?”

Nothing. They stay where they are. I think the recent settlements might become the property of the former owners through legal cases, but it would get worked out. Most people just want to live in peace and raise a family with a better life for their children than they, themselves had. There will undoubtedly be hatred on both sides, but history has shown that these wounds can heal.

@JLeslie What’s the alternative. The only other model that’s ever “worked” in other historical examples of genocide is the complete erasure of the Palestinian people. Objective complete. No more Arabs in Israel. They can bulldoze the graves, expunge the fossil record, and make-believe that Israel was always theirs, and that the Amelek was defeated and that they wanted so hard to work with their Arab neighbors but had no choice but to systematically annihilate them (you know, because they’re all terrorists, or future-terrorists).

I don’t think you can see it, but Zionism itself is the thing that has driven the conflict. Because it’s not just about having a “homeland for the Jews” but by definition, it’s also about having the non-jews not be there, or existing as a second-class citizens as a minority population.

Jews and Arabs coexisted together in the region more-or-less in peace for hundreds of years. That model could one day work again if the idea of an ethnostate is abandoned as a horrible mistake.

If Herzl had founded his Jewish homeland in Ethiopia (there have been Jews living there for millennia) as was the original plan, don’t you think the same problems would be happening there with the Ethiopians?

@gorillapaws I have no idea how Ethiopia would have reacted. Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt, see the value the Israelis have brought to the ME regarding technology, agriculture, and economy. The Druze and Bedouins sided with the new Jewish state from the beginning and are full citizens and fight and lead in the army, and are judges and lawyers. Maybe Ethiopians would have been accepting, I don’t know much about Ethiopia or Ethiopians.

There wasn’t total peace between Muslims and Jews in the ME for hundreds of years. There was antisemitism in some places, there were pogroms against the Jews. There were taxes levied (Jizya tax) on the Jews to be tolerated.

@gorillapaws Zionism itself is the thing that has driven the conflict. Because it’s not just about having a “homeland for the Jews” but by definition, it’s also about having the non-jews not be there, or existing as a second-class citizens as a minority population.

Yes. That is the fundamental, underlying problem. Liberal Zionists like to act like Netanyahu is some kind of outlier, that if we could just get someone more moderate in office, things would look different. But the way it looks now—Gaza razed, thousands of Palestinians dead, Lebanon being bombarded, is the way it is has to look under Zionism as an ideology. Carving out a homeland always meant an ethno-state; the Palestinian territories were a concession, one doomed to shrink and eventually be annexed, as has been happening since Israel’s founding. It was inherently unstable from the beginning. The settlements aren’t some extreme exception; they are perfectly in line with Zionist aims.

@JLeslie “I have no idea how Ethiopia would have reacted”
It probably would have looked a lot like this. The colonized don’t like being colonized, and colonizers are forced to create sick narratives for why they deserve other people’s land and resources.

“Colonialism is bad—except when the Jews do it” doesn’t track with history. Again, look at the Arab citizens of Israel, all of their datapoints show that they’re not treated as equals. Colonialism always results in similar outcomes.

@JLeslie “There wasn’t total peace between Muslims and Jews in the ME for hundreds of years.”

That’s not the claim I made. In Palestine there were very few documented cases of violence between Jews and Arabs over the centuries prior to Zionism. The problem really began when land started being purchased from absentee landlords in Turkey and Arabs started being evicted from the land their families had lived on for centuries so Jewish immigrants could move in. Furthermore their livelihoods were disrupted and the Zionists only wanted to employ “Hebrew” labor, as it was called at the time. This pattern continued for decades and gave birth to the violence in the region (i.e. Palestine, not the wider Middle East region—apologies for the ambiguity) that largely didn’t exist prior.

@Demosthenes Correct me if I am wrong, I thought Hezbollah was bombing northern Israel prior to the pager attack and Israel bombing into Lebanon.

There are Israelis who think the whole area should be theirs, but I think the majority for many years were fine either dividing the land, or having open borders and Palestinians and Jews moving throughout the lands freely. Israel became more and more to the right over time, as a reaction to the violence.

I see both groups as suffering and used as pawns. Both sides reacting to each other.

I don’t see how anyone can be just one sided thinking one group is all good and the other is all bad. That is not the story in my mind. It is a snowball over time.

Having split lands, Gaza and West Bank, is crazy to me. West Bank was supposed to be part of Jordan I thought? Isn’t that why it’s called the West Bank? It’s east as far as Israeli geography.

@gorillapaws I’m not well versed when it comes to history, so you can correct me. In the 1940’s wasn’t part of Ethiopia under Italian control and the Italians were suggesting to create a Jewish state there as an option?

@JLeslie I’m not sure about the 1940’s Ethiopia, but In the late 1800’s Ethiopia was considered “Plan A” for a Jewish homeland and Palestine was “Plan B” and I thought the British rejected the idea (though I’m now confused why the British had authority and not the Italians). There are some orthodox sects that believe the return to Jerusalem before the messiah is born is a violation of God’s plan, which is why I believe Ethiopia was preferred. I’m not an expert in such details though and may be mistaken.

@gorillapaws In my mind the biggest driver to “give” the Jews a homeland by the European countries was to get the Jews out of the country. It was an antisemitic act not a generous act. I am not saying all countries that voted for Israel were in that frame of mind, but I do think many were.

@JLeslie “It was an antisemitic act not a generous act.”

100% agree. Nothing in my response should be construed to indicate that I feel nothing but the deepest of empathy to the Jewish people. A people who were victimized across the world and mistreated for millennia. I understand the motivation for a Jewish homeland at the time of Herzl, the fears of Jewish persecution were proven well-founded by Hitler and the Holocaust. I understand the motivations behind Zionism. They’re perfectly rational goals at the time. The problem is that colonialism compels the colonizers into acts of evil and it corrupts the society.

And there’s nothing incompatible with acknowledging that the early Zionists’ intentions were rational, and yet Israel as a colonial project in the modern world has devolved into a grotesque society that is committing the greatest crime against humanity in the 21st century.

@gorillapaws You say “at the time” so do you think there is no need for Jewish people to feel at risk anymore and in turn no need for a homeland? Let’s take both Jews around the world and also specifically Jewish people in Israel.

Most Jewish people in the US purposely blended in and became part of the mainstream and laws in the US helped with that process, but right now there is scary all around. The left and right extremists are behaving in a very antisemitic fashion. I’m not talking about reasonable debates about the Israel and Palestinian situation, I mean in-your-face threats to American Jewish people. I worry for the safety of Arabs in our country too at this time and for many years now. It’s not our majority I worry about, but the fringes and lunatics. Minority groups can achieve incredible power. Hitler was voted in by the minority. You probably think only a minority of Palestinians support Hamas.

Certainly, Jews in Israel have a reason to feel on edge and a need to have their own country. It’s a trust issue.

I think having an ethno-state produces evil ideologies and that will result in evil acts. Evil acts will result in reprisals against innocents. Ergo an ethno-state is the wrong solution to security (for any group of people) and makes people less secure, especially as time goes on.

@JLeslie “The left and right extremists are behaving in a very antisemitic fashion.”

I think you’re very wrong about antisemitism from the left in the US and abroad. Equivocating between the Left that wants to oppose genocide, the illegal occupation and apartheid state of Israel and the psychopaths on the right who want to exterminate the Jewish race (or at least have them return to Israel so Jesus can pop out of his celestial spaceship and send all of the Jews to burn in eternity while the Christians can party in heaven with God forever or some shit like that) si not only offensive, but profoundly misguided. I understand how things were portrayed in the media, but the people on the left were anti-Zionists, not anti-semites. If those protests were so allegedly hostile to Jewish students, why did they have Passover Seder in the middle of the protest camp? I’m sure there were some isolated incidents of bona fide antisemitism, but they were definitely the exception and not accepted by the wider protest movement, and when we talk about violence, the only Jews that were injured that I’m aware of were on the pro-Palestinian side except for the girl who was stabbed in the eye.

@JLeslie “You probably think only a minority of Palestinians support Hamas.”

I think this genocide has galvanized support for whoever in Gaza is opposing Israel, whether it’s called “Hamas” or the “Fuck Israel Association.” The crimes committed in Gaza, the West Bank and now in Lebanon have made the desire to commit violence against Israelis and possibly Jews around the world (as Israel at least presents itself as representing all Jews) much bigger than it was before. I would argue that Jews around the world are much less safe the longer Zionism continues.

@JLeslie “Jews in Israel have a reason to feel on edge and a need to have their own country.”

The White slaveowners said the same thing about ending slavery. As did the whites in South Africa: “We can’t give them equality or they’ll kill us all, We have no choice but to rule over them.”

@gorillapaws Why can the Arabs have ethno-states and not the Jews?

I am not saying support for a ceasefire or wanting a better life for the Palestinians is inherently antisemitic, I am saying there were actual antisemitic things happening that are terrorizing Jewish people. I don’t know what is happening now, but it was happening.

To clarify, I have no idea how many Palestinians support Hamas, I was only saying Hamas was in power when maybe the Gazan majority wanted them out.

@JLeslie “Why can the Arabs have ethno-states and not the Jews?”

Where did I say that? I don’t support an Arab ethno-state. If Arabs wanted to treat Jews as less than equal I would oppose that too. Like I said, there should be international supervision to ensure security and full integration. To be crystal clear, there would be no official state religion, discrimination (against anyone) would be illegal.

@gorillapaws I am talking about Iraq, Iran, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and so on. I think you are talking about a territory in historical Palestine.

Did you know in the 1950’s the Jews in Syria had their ID stamped that they were Jewish, they couldn’t travel very far from where they lived, they couldn’t easily leave the country. Prior to that in the early 1900’s some had left Syria-Lebanon for economic reasons and some antisemitism was heating up there was some Muslim or maybe it was Arab imperialism. In the 1990’s remaining Syrian Jews were finally given permission to leave. It sounds a lot like Gaza to me the last 20 years. I think it is really hard for any American to really understand the dynamic in the ME, including the Palestinian Territories and Israel.

@JLeslie How about this? Anyone can “have” an ethno-state. It’s none of my business. But the thing is, Israel is our business. We give them an unconditional, unending supply of weapons. In that case, it’s very much a problem that they have an ethno-state. It’s funny when people say “let Israel do what they want, they’re their own country!” Okay, I agree. Stop sending them aid immediately and let them fend for themselves. Somehow that never seems to be an option…

@JLeslie “I am talking about Iraq, Iran, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and so on. ”

I oppose antisemitic practices in those countries (and everywhere else in the world). I also oppose racial purists who are claiming that the Latin American asylum seekers are coming to “replace” white Americans which is really the same kind of thing. Also, as @Demosthenes points out, the US is implicated in Israel’s decisions because we support it militarily, financially and diplomatically in the UN.

@gorillapaws I meant those countries are ethnic Arab countries.

@gorillapaws and @Demosthenes if what you want to happen happened and the US stopped giving Israel any help and Israel decided to follow all the things you want it to do including allowing back all the displaced back where they came from before there was the State of Israel…but in the end all the Jews were either killed or driven out…what then?

@mazingerz88 It’s like asking what if Rames II came back as a huge, magical mummy and annihilated all of the first born Jews on the planet. There is no scenario where that could happen. If Arabs started massacring the Jews you can be certain the US and our allies would step in to save them and I’d be first in line to do what I could to stop it.

^^I hope you’re right. Let’s hope no faction of avenging Hamas, Hezbollah or Iranian sneak in a thermonuclear bomb and kill everyone including themselves.

@mazingerz88 How would a 1-state solution make that more likely? I would argue the current approach makes such an outcome far more likely. If they had access to a thermonuclear device, they could easily set that thing off right offshore of Tel Aviv.

^^I just feel it’s ideal, somewhat easy to say 1-state solution would work. Sustainable peace where Jews and Arabs are all safe and relatively happy in one location for centuries to come.

But it may not be that easy. I haven’t lived in Israel as a Jew who would go to bed knowing people are out there to get me no matter what I do. Or a Palestinian unsupportive of Hamas but fearful enough of them to do anything about it.

I would be interested in hearing what Netanyahu and those Israelis who support him have to say about how they could see all the things that their generation are doing now would lead to Israel surviving and thriving in peace long after they are gone.

@mazingerz88 ”...Those Israelis who support him have to say”

My guess is they expect a total ethnic cleansing of all Palestinians. The final solution.

@mazingerz88 “I just feel it’s ideal, somewhat easy to say 1-state solution would work. Sustainable peace where Jews and Arabs are all safe and relatively happy in one location for centuries to come.”

I’m not suggesting it will be a fun or easy process. But the long-term forecast would result in fewer deaths all around than perpetual occupation, repression, oppression, murder, terrorism, counterterrorism, genocide. But things are better in Rwanda. The Germans stopped being Nazi’s. The former slaves didn’t murder every white person after the emancipation proclamation and the defeat of the Confederacy. South Africa still has it’s challenges, but they’re much better off than before.

Lord, my flight reaction is kicking in. It’s good the Israelis don’t rely on me to fight.

@gorillapaws Ultimately there can be no “two-state solution” if the second state consists of two non-contiguous parts, one of which has been reduced to rubble, and the other is heavily occupied with illegal settlements. The “two-state solution” is a farce at this point. The only two viable options as I see them are: continued occupation, annexation, and eventual ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians (the status quo) or a one-state solution that sees the elimination of a Jewish ethno-state. I understand that both of those options sound awful to many, but the first option is the current situation, is what the U.S. is actively supporting, and is the most likely to continue indefinitely into the future.

@Demosthenes What about two states and make West Bank larger and move Palestinians from Gaza? I assume they won’t be happy without access to the sea? Or, it could be across north Israel?

After listening to hours of interviews with Palestinians it sounds like they will never accept two states, although some admit to not being able to speak freely, and others do say two states would be ok, but mostly they sound honest and against the two state solution.

I saw one very reasonable Palestinian say let’s try something and when people feel safer maybe there will be a next step towards one state and free movement for everyone. The Israelis in that particular room sounded less reasonable to me, but I think Israelis feel they did that with Gaza and the Gazans proved to not be peaceful and so any thoughts of moving freely disintegrated. I don’t mean most Palestinians aren’t reasonable, only that I could see he wanted to move forward and saw things can be renegotiated again in the future.

Has there ever been a secret ballot vote for Palestinians living in Israel to say what they want? If they want the Israeli government gone? That would be interesting.