Wtf are you talking about, there is no swap to be made. Both Gaza and the entirety of the West Bank belong to Palestinians. There is plenty of land in Israel proper, the settlers should just GTFO.
Are you claiming that the last few decades we have seen the kind of Anti-semitism of the beginning of the 20th century that would justify a program of mass settlement of Jewish people on land outside Israel? Because that is a ridiculous thing to say.
There is no mass scale anti-semitism. Israel is not the safest place for Jews (north america is). Palestinian land is not needed for Jewish settlement, Israel proper has plenty plenty of land, enough to be proposing land swaps every now and then.
Israeli settlements are entirely indefensible and entirely a crime.
Archaeology has repeatedly confirmed that the Jewish peoples originated in the Southern Levant thousands of years prior to Arabs leaving the Arabian Peninsula. Archaeology has also repeatedly confirmed that the presence of Arabs and the Arabic language in the Middle East and North Africa everywhere outside of the Arabian Peninsula, including the Southern Levant where Israel is situated, is the result of past imperialist colonialist expansions and forced assimilations.
Historic records repeatedly emphasize not only the Indigenous presence of Jews in the Southern Levant, but the fact that there remained a number of them in the Southern Levant to meet every outside group which came into the region, including Arabs. Even Arabic and Ottoman Empire historical records confirm that Jews were in the Southern Levant before them.
Case in point, the historic and linguistic origins of the name, “Jew.” European languages call Jews “Jude,” “Jew,” etc, because they are shortened derivations from “Judean.” A “Judean” is a native of “Judea” which was one the historic Jewish nations in the Southern Levant which predates Arabs arriving in the Southern Levant. Even the terms that Arabic speakers use for Jews, “Yahud” and “Yahudi,” testify that Jews are the Indigenous population of the Southern Levant. As there is no “J” sound in Hebrew, the actual name of “Judea” was “Yahuda.” A “Yahud” or “Yahudi” is a native of the historical Southern Levantine nation of “Yahuda.”
Buddy, I’m Greek. I know this argument and it’s bullshit. We don’t have a right to the coast of Asia Minor, Constantinople/Istanbul or the South of Italy and Jews don’t have a right to Eretz Israel just because of what happened in antiquity.
Are you seriously trying to pitch Israeli apartheid and occupation as some kind of anti-colonial struggle?Like, seriously, that’s your angle here?
Malaka, I’m from the Balkans. We have seen nationalists of a thousand different varieties do a thousand different crimes in the name of what you call “past colonialism”. It’s precisely under that kind of banner that the Serbs massacred Srebrenica. It’s what we did in Tripolitsa. It’s what the Ustasha did to the Serbs, what the Bulgarians did to the Greeks, what the Turks did to the Armenians and the Greeks, it’s what we all did to the Jews, and so on and so on.
So GTFO with the bullshit. Go sell it to the kind of idiotic Evangelical Americans that Bibi thinks he can ally himself.
Well. If no one can claim land permanently, then it all becomes a negotiation of words and actions regarding who gets to live where. The people in Palestinian Territories are beholden to those that let them have their independence. They abused those freedoms granted to them. If they did not like settlers in their territory, then they should have treated the situation diplomatically instead of murdering and raping like savages. Hamas should surrender instead of hiding behind civilians.
Europe, and since they’re so intent on genociding the native population like the other europeans who colonised the U.S, Canada, Australia and New Zealand did, it is time they go back home (Deutschland especially)
Remember there’s always a place for Jews in Europe and the rest of the developed world, not so much for palestinians and other brown ppl.
Hamas is an ideology. Even Israel recently stated this and said you can’t stop an ideology. This dovetails perfectly into the sentiment of this article. Both together, plus idf actions show genocide is really what they want.
We can’t stop an ideology, but we can destroy governments based on an obnoxious ideology. And that is progress, obviously. Japanese Militarism, Soviet Communism, Nazi Fascism, Italian Fascism, Spanish Fascism… all still around as fringe ideologies, but I’m sure most of us are happy that governments that held these ideologies fell. Israel obviously is trying to destroy the current Hamas government in Gaza, not kill all of the residents.
When the ratio of civilian death to hamas death is far greater, you need to realise something is fundamentally wrong with the actions of the idf.
Additionally, reports of Jewish attacks on Palestinians are up too, which was high even prior to the war.
All that will happen is more people will join the cause to fight against the occupation of Palestine.
You all want to see an end to attacks you saw prior to the war, but you need to realise all that will happen is more hostility due to the wanton destruction of their home.
The leaders the idf seek are in Qatar, but they already knew this, which is why for weeks, the world was told this is a war against hamas the ideology they now state can’t be destroyed!
Seems like to me that here we have the same thing that USA did with the wmd excuse.
According to Wikipedia, there have been 1,332 Israeli deaths, of which 395 were IDF. So, that’s 70% civilians deaths on the Israeli side. The same article says that 61% of Palestinian deaths were civilian.
The fact that Qatar is harboring the Hamas government leadership is a problem. If Hamas surrenders, the war will end, but that will be difficult if the leadership is safely ensconced in Qatar and still has willing fighters in Gaza. How many deaths will be enough before Hamas surrenders, or the Gazans reject Hamas and new leaders emerge to make peace with Israel? Palestinians should popularly reject Hamas like the Italians eventually rejected Mussolini. As long as the population of Gaza supports Hamas in this war, it is a little bit hard to complain about civilian deaths.
While it’s clear there were civilians killed by Hamas on the 7th, even Israeli sources have shown evidence that a large number of civilians were mistakenly killed by IDF attacks, it is unclear how many people were killed by IDF. Also, many sources will claim any male between the ages of 16-40 (military-aged male) killed was a fighter without any further verification, so it’s difficult at this stage to say with much reliability the number of civilians versus militants killed especially in a place like Palestine with an active guerilla movement.
Hamas seems to be more of an organizing force than a specific ideology that all of Palestine supports, many people see the struggle against Israel as a fight for their people’s survival and have turned to more extremist measures because of the failures of all other methods over several decades.
How is it at all hard to complain about civilian deaths in any conflict unless you are heartless? No matter what some of their population does the majority of people there are just living their lives and are in large part children.
I know why Palestinians support Hamas and certainly Israel’s right-wing government also shares a lot of the blame for the current war. However, when the duly-elected and popularly-supported Hamas government chose war, they acceded to civilian casualties. They killed (and raped) Israeli civilians on purpose because they knew that the IDF would respond with overwhelming force, which would further their goal of discrediting Israel and undermining the normalization of relations with Arab neighbors. And they are supported in all of this with overwhelming public support in Gaza, not to mention Iran and Qatar.
Hamas is a state actor. They are the duly elected government of Gaza. It is true that those elections were a long time ago, but polls still show a majority of Palestinians support Hamas, including the October 7 attack. Hamas may not have tanks and fighter jets, but they sure as hell have trained soldiers, a variety of weapons, VERY extensive defensive infrastructure, foreign relations with other governments, and popular support. So, in what way is the Israeli-Hamas war NOT a state operation?
I don’t feel like typing a huge explanation. All I’ll say is, if you think this time bombing “the terrorists” into submission will work, you’re delusional.
Hamas is not the only militant group in Palestine, they have conventional troops but the majority of militants in Palestine are guerilla fighters which are inseparable from the population. They are not fighting a conventional war with tanks, it is an asymmetric war in a densely populated urban area, using tunnels and ambushes. So even if the ‘Hamas’ government was removed, it’s not the same as stopping a government like in Nazi Germany etc.
Hamas uses guerilla tactics, but that doesn’t make them any less a state actor. You haven’t actually refuted any of my points about Hamas being the elected government of Gaza, having an organized military and foreign relations, and continuing to enjoy the support of their population.
Remember also that the Nazi government called for the German people to continue resisting the Allies by adopting guerilla tactics. What if the German people had retained their Nazi ideology and continued to fight the Allies using guerilla tactics in urban areas with popular support? Maybe it would look something like what is happening in Gaza, including the civilian casualties.
I didn’t disagree with the idea they could be seen as a state actor but there are many active groups in Palestine, it’s not the same as an organization like the Nazi party. I don’t understand what point you are trying to make. Are you trying to liken the Palestinian people to Nazis so that they can be massacred guilt-free?
No, read the thread. I was responding to a comment that said Israel can’t fight an ideology. My point is that you can fight an ideology and we have many times. You cannot entirely eliminate an ideology, but you can destroy governments that are based on an ideology. My examples included the Nazi government.
Hamas is a popularly-supported state actor espousing and ACTING on an obnoxious, violent ideology that started a war with a much more powerful state by literally killing civilians. Civilian casualties on the Gaza side are unfortunate, but also expected as a natural consequence of war. The other argument in this thread is that the ratio of civilian casualties shows that Israel is purposely genociding Gazans, which is belied by the fact that the ratio of civilian casualties is about the same on both sides (while admitting that precise figures are hard to verify).
And, no, I don’t think that Gazans should be massacred. Nor do I think that German civilians should have been massacred when the Allies invaded Germany. However, the German people surrendered and repudiated the Nazi ideology. If they had not, perhaps Germany would still be occupied by the Allies and it would look a bit like Gaza today.
In other news, majority of Palestinians support the removal of Israeli settlers from the West Bank.
Maybe they could work out a swap?
But first, Hamas must be destroyed, and Hamas’s supporter Netanyahu prosecuted.
Wtf are you talking about, there is no swap to be made. Both Gaza and the entirety of the West Bank belong to Palestinians. There is plenty of land in Israel proper, the settlers should just GTFO.
Settlers Aka occupiers.
Amazing no one stop to ask where these “settlers” come from?
Are you claiming that the last few decades we have seen the kind of Anti-semitism of the beginning of the 20th century that would justify a program of mass settlement of Jewish people on land outside Israel? Because that is a ridiculous thing to say.
There is no mass scale anti-semitism. Israel is not the safest place for Jews (north america is). Palestinian land is not needed for Jewish settlement, Israel proper has plenty plenty of land, enough to be proposing land swaps every now and then.
Israeli settlements are entirely indefensible and entirely a crime.
Archaeology has repeatedly confirmed that the Jewish peoples originated in the Southern Levant thousands of years prior to Arabs leaving the Arabian Peninsula. Archaeology has also repeatedly confirmed that the presence of Arabs and the Arabic language in the Middle East and North Africa everywhere outside of the Arabian Peninsula, including the Southern Levant where Israel is situated, is the result of past imperialist colonialist expansions and forced assimilations.
Historic records repeatedly emphasize not only the Indigenous presence of Jews in the Southern Levant, but the fact that there remained a number of them in the Southern Levant to meet every outside group which came into the region, including Arabs. Even Arabic and Ottoman Empire historical records confirm that Jews were in the Southern Levant before them.
Case in point, the historic and linguistic origins of the name, “Jew.” European languages call Jews “Jude,” “Jew,” etc, because they are shortened derivations from “Judean.” A “Judean” is a native of “Judea” which was one the historic Jewish nations in the Southern Levant which predates Arabs arriving in the Southern Levant. Even the terms that Arabic speakers use for Jews, “Yahud” and “Yahudi,” testify that Jews are the Indigenous population of the Southern Levant. As there is no “J” sound in Hebrew, the actual name of “Judea” was “Yahuda.” A “Yahud” or “Yahudi” is a native of the historical Southern Levantine nation of “Yahuda.”
Buddy, I’m Greek. I know this argument and it’s bullshit. We don’t have a right to the coast of Asia Minor, Constantinople/Istanbul or the South of Italy and Jews don’t have a right to Eretz Israel just because of what happened in antiquity.
What you seem to be saying then is that the argument that past colonialism doesn’t matter therefore present colonialism shouldn’t matter either.
Are you seriously trying to pitch Israeli apartheid and occupation as some kind of anti-colonial struggle?Like, seriously, that’s your angle here?
Malaka, I’m from the Balkans. We have seen nationalists of a thousand different varieties do a thousand different crimes in the name of what you call “past colonialism”. It’s precisely under that kind of banner that the Serbs massacred Srebrenica. It’s what we did in Tripolitsa. It’s what the Ustasha did to the Serbs, what the Bulgarians did to the Greeks, what the Turks did to the Armenians and the Greeks, it’s what we all did to the Jews, and so on and so on.
So GTFO with the bullshit. Go sell it to the kind of idiotic Evangelical Americans that Bibi thinks he can ally himself.
Well. If no one can claim land permanently, then it all becomes a negotiation of words and actions regarding who gets to live where. The people in Palestinian Territories are beholden to those that let them have their independence. They abused those freedoms granted to them. If they did not like settlers in their territory, then they should have treated the situation diplomatically instead of murdering and raping like savages. Hamas should surrender instead of hiding behind civilians.
Europe, and since they’re so intent on genociding the native population like the other europeans who colonised the U.S, Canada, Australia and New Zealand did, it is time they go back home (Deutschland especially)
Remember there’s always a place for Jews in Europe and the rest of the developed world, not so much for palestinians and other brown ppl.
Hamas is an ideology. Even Israel recently stated this and said you can’t stop an ideology. This dovetails perfectly into the sentiment of this article. Both together, plus idf actions show genocide is really what they want.
We can’t stop an ideology, but we can destroy governments based on an obnoxious ideology. And that is progress, obviously. Japanese Militarism, Soviet Communism, Nazi Fascism, Italian Fascism, Spanish Fascism… all still around as fringe ideologies, but I’m sure most of us are happy that governments that held these ideologies fell. Israel obviously is trying to destroy the current Hamas government in Gaza, not kill all of the residents.
When the ratio of civilian death to hamas death is far greater, you need to realise something is fundamentally wrong with the actions of the idf.
Additionally, reports of Jewish attacks on Palestinians are up too, which was high even prior to the war.
All that will happen is more people will join the cause to fight against the occupation of Palestine.
You all want to see an end to attacks you saw prior to the war, but you need to realise all that will happen is more hostility due to the wanton destruction of their home.
The leaders the idf seek are in Qatar, but they already knew this, which is why for weeks, the world was told this is a war against hamas the ideology they now state can’t be destroyed!
Seems like to me that here we have the same thing that USA did with the wmd excuse.
According to Wikipedia, there have been 1,332 Israeli deaths, of which 395 were IDF. So, that’s 70% civilians deaths on the Israeli side. The same article says that 61% of Palestinian deaths were civilian.
The fact that Qatar is harboring the Hamas government leadership is a problem. If Hamas surrenders, the war will end, but that will be difficult if the leadership is safely ensconced in Qatar and still has willing fighters in Gaza. How many deaths will be enough before Hamas surrenders, or the Gazans reject Hamas and new leaders emerge to make peace with Israel? Palestinians should popularly reject Hamas like the Italians eventually rejected Mussolini. As long as the population of Gaza supports Hamas in this war, it is a little bit hard to complain about civilian deaths.
While it’s clear there were civilians killed by Hamas on the 7th, even Israeli sources have shown evidence that a large number of civilians were mistakenly killed by IDF attacks, it is unclear how many people were killed by IDF. Also, many sources will claim any male between the ages of 16-40 (military-aged male) killed was a fighter without any further verification, so it’s difficult at this stage to say with much reliability the number of civilians versus militants killed especially in a place like Palestine with an active guerilla movement.
Hamas seems to be more of an organizing force than a specific ideology that all of Palestine supports, many people see the struggle against Israel as a fight for their people’s survival and have turned to more extremist measures because of the failures of all other methods over several decades.
How is it at all hard to complain about civilian deaths in any conflict unless you are heartless? No matter what some of their population does the majority of people there are just living their lives and are in large part children.
I know why Palestinians support Hamas and certainly Israel’s right-wing government also shares a lot of the blame for the current war. However, when the duly-elected and popularly-supported Hamas government chose war, they acceded to civilian casualties. They killed (and raped) Israeli civilians on purpose because they knew that the IDF would respond with overwhelming force, which would further their goal of discrediting Israel and undermining the normalization of relations with Arab neighbors. And they are supported in all of this with overwhelming public support in Gaza, not to mention Iran and Qatar.
All of the ‘successes’ you mentioned were state operations with standing armies. As more apt comparison would be our wars in iraq or afghanistan.
Hamas is a state actor. They are the duly elected government of Gaza. It is true that those elections were a long time ago, but polls still show a majority of Palestinians support Hamas, including the October 7 attack. Hamas may not have tanks and fighter jets, but they sure as hell have trained soldiers, a variety of weapons, VERY extensive defensive infrastructure, foreign relations with other governments, and popular support. So, in what way is the Israeli-Hamas war NOT a state operation?
I don’t feel like typing a huge explanation. All I’ll say is, if you think this time bombing “the terrorists” into submission will work, you’re delusional.
We’ll see. Odds are you’re right, though. It probably won’t work. That said, you never know what the trigger for change will be.
Hamas is not the only militant group in Palestine, they have conventional troops but the majority of militants in Palestine are guerilla fighters which are inseparable from the population. They are not fighting a conventional war with tanks, it is an asymmetric war in a densely populated urban area, using tunnels and ambushes. So even if the ‘Hamas’ government was removed, it’s not the same as stopping a government like in Nazi Germany etc.
Hamas uses guerilla tactics, but that doesn’t make them any less a state actor. You haven’t actually refuted any of my points about Hamas being the elected government of Gaza, having an organized military and foreign relations, and continuing to enjoy the support of their population.
Remember also that the Nazi government called for the German people to continue resisting the Allies by adopting guerilla tactics. What if the German people had retained their Nazi ideology and continued to fight the Allies using guerilla tactics in urban areas with popular support? Maybe it would look something like what is happening in Gaza, including the civilian casualties.
I didn’t disagree with the idea they could be seen as a state actor but there are many active groups in Palestine, it’s not the same as an organization like the Nazi party. I don’t understand what point you are trying to make. Are you trying to liken the Palestinian people to Nazis so that they can be massacred guilt-free?
No, read the thread. I was responding to a comment that said Israel can’t fight an ideology. My point is that you can fight an ideology and we have many times. You cannot entirely eliminate an ideology, but you can destroy governments that are based on an ideology. My examples included the Nazi government.
Hamas is a popularly-supported state actor espousing and ACTING on an obnoxious, violent ideology that started a war with a much more powerful state by literally killing civilians. Civilian casualties on the Gaza side are unfortunate, but also expected as a natural consequence of war. The other argument in this thread is that the ratio of civilian casualties shows that Israel is purposely genociding Gazans, which is belied by the fact that the ratio of civilian casualties is about the same on both sides (while admitting that precise figures are hard to verify).
And, no, I don’t think that Gazans should be massacred. Nor do I think that German civilians should have been massacred when the Allies invaded Germany. However, the German people surrendered and repudiated the Nazi ideology. If they had not, perhaps Germany would still be occupied by the Allies and it would look a bit like Gaza today.