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alyaza [they/she] @beehaw.org

Israel-Palestine megathread for the remainder of the weekend

the front page is now like half articles on this currently, so it's probably time for a megathread because none of us want to keep track of 12 threads on this subject and all the resulting comments. only major subsequent developments (for example, boots on the ground; pronunciations by governments; that sort of stuff) will get their own thread. otherwise please post stuff in here for the time being. any threads not meeting this criteria will be locked and removed. thank you in advance for your cooperation.

81 comments

  • Omar and Tlaib Are Condemned in the US for Saying What Prominent Israelis Are Saying(direct)

    About 1/3rd through the article, they start highlighting some of the progressive conversations that have been being had in Israel, comparing them to the remarks AOC, Bernie Sanders, Ilhan Omar, Cori Bush, Rashida Tlaib, and others have been criticized as "disgraceful" for.

    Some important ones IMO:

    Daniel Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator and top adviser to former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, who told the BBC, “If anyone told me that what the militants did on the weekend was a legitimate response to years and years of occupation. I would say: ‘No, you’re wrong-headed. You’ve lost sight of humanity and reality.’ And if anyone tells me that what Israel is doing in Gaza today is a legitimate response to what happened on the weekend, it’s exactly the same.”

    Israeli human rights lawyer Michael Sfard, an expert on the rules of war, observed Wednesday that “Hamas committed abominable war crimes for which there can be no forgiveness. But the laws of war weren’t meant only for situations in which our blood is cool, or when there is no justified anger or understandable desire for revenge.” The lawyer explained:

    It’s not easy for Israelis to think about Gazans’ rights in a week when Hamas committed crimes that are still impossible to digest and our whole society is mourning and crying. But Gaza’s catastrophe won’t wait for the end of our seven-day shivah.

    Consequently, this needs to be said: Israel has held millions of people under a brutal blockade for more than 15 years with the support of the entire Western world. That is inhumane and inconceivable, and every solution to this bloody conflict ultimately includes respecting the rights of all people, both in Gaza and Sderot, to live with security and human dignity. And that begins with respecting the most basic rules as set down in the international laws of war, which are designed to reduce the harm to civilians.

    It's easy to get stuck in a North American bubble of media, but it's also important to note what's being said locally by people who have eyes on the ground and have been watching this stuff grow first hand for 75 years since the occupation of Israel.

  • Journalist Rips Palestinian ‘Terrorism’ Narrative to Shreds

    Israel has been calling Palestinian fighters “terrorists” to justify its slaughter of Gaza.

    Breakthrough News journalist, Eugene Puryear, rips this narrative apart, explaining the long history of oppressed and colonized people being demonized and called terrorists and savage to justify the continued occupation of those people. No different than the Native resistance to American colonization, slave rebellions in the Americas, the Haitian Revolution, Palestinians are resisting Israeli colonialism, not out of bloodlust as the media has portrayed it, but because of decades of land thefts, massacres, second-class citizenship and the denial of the right to return that has persisted for decades.

    • This seems to be missing the meaning of the word "terrorist", as in anyone espousing the ideology of instilling fear as a weapon.

      • as in anyone espousing the ideology of instilling fear as a weapon.

        I wish that was what the word "terrorist" means.

        It has always meant anyone using asymmetric tactics to oppose states or capitalism, both violent and non-violent. If it simply meant using fear as a weapon, then every state that has prisons and police would be terrorist.

        The standard usage of the word is so hypocritical that it has become an authoritarian allegiance-signifying pejorative without any deeper meaning.

  • Israel Is ‘Very Sorry’ For Attack That Killed Journalist Issam Abdallah

    The Israeli army has expressed that they are “very sorry” for the death of Lebanese Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah, who was killed in an Israeli shelling at the Lebanon border.

    Despite the IDF’s expression of regret, the vehicle Abdallah was in was clearly marked as a media car. The incident occurred while Abdallah and other journalists were covering ongoing clashes at the border.

    Lebanon’s caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati condemned Israel’s actions, and UN Secretary-General António Guterres expressed condolences, emphasizing the need for journalists to be protected.

  • CBC | As Israel expands Gaza offensive, it has lonely critics in Washington(direct)

    As Israel expands its military offensive in Gaza, some Democrats in the US are expressing growing criticism of Israeli actions. Younger progressive Democrats have been more vocal in calling for civilian protections and a ceasefire. However, support for Israel remains strong among both Democratic and Republican leadership as well as the general public. While progressive critics want to see Palestinian lives prioritized, Israel sees no viable negotiating partner with Hamas controlling Gaza. The article discusses the long history of US support for Israel since its founding and changing views over time. Some analysts believe criticism from the left lacks real political power but could influence younger voters. Ultimately both sides express pessimism about prospects for peace given the deep tensions and lack of trust between Israelis and Palestinians.

    It's evidenced in the vote in the last U.S. Congress to top up American funding for Israel's missile-defence system: a lopsided result of 420 to 9.

    I checked who voted which way, and the following were Nay votes:

    • Cori Bush (D)
    • André Carson (D)
    • Jesús G. "Chuy" García (D)
    • Raúl M. Grijalva (D)
    • Thomas Massie R)
    • Marie Newman (D)
    • Ilhan Omar (D)
    • Ayanna Pressley (D)
    • Rashida Tlaib (D)

    Present:

    • Henry C. "Hank" Johnson, Jr. (D)
    • Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D)

    No Vote:

    • Debbie Lesko R)

  • Seattle Rabbi David Basior Eulogizes Former Congregant Killed by Hamas, Says Occupation Must End

    As more details emerge about the shocking Hamas attack on Saturday, we speak with Rabbi David Basior of Kadima Reconstructionist Community, a progressive Jewish group in Seattle focused on social justice. Basior’s former congregant Hayim Katsman was among those killed in Israel by Hamas militants who stormed Kibbutz Holit. The 32-year-old was a gardener, mechanic and peace activist who worked with anti-occupation groups. During the attack, he shielded a woman from bullets with his own body, saving her life at the cost of his own. Katsman’s family have said that he would not have wanted his death to fuel retribution against Palestinians. “Life is the utmost. It is the most core teaching that I have received from my tradition, from my ancestors,” says Basior, who evokes the phrase “never again,” used in remembrance of the Holocaust and other genocides, and says that precept means the violence against Palestinians “must be spoken out against.”

  • Noura Erakat: Western Leaders & Media Are Justifying Israel’s “Genocidal Campaign” Against Palestinians

    The unfolding crisis in Gaza, where relentless Israeli bombardment has killed more than 1,500 people since Saturday, is “a humanitarian catastrophe,” says Palestinian American human rights attorney Noura Erakat. She says Western leaders and the mainstream media have relied on racist, Islamophobic tropes to build a false consensus “that war is inevitable and that whatever consequences come out is the fault of Hamas, thereby further blaming the victims for their own killing and massacres.” Erakat also decries the Israeli order that 1.1 million residents in Gaza relocate under threat of a ground invasion. “What we are seeing is a genocidal campaign. You cannot forcibly transfer 1.1 million Palestinians in a 225-square-mile enclosed area. There is nowhere for them to go,” says Erakat, an associate professor at Rutgers University and author of Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine.

  • Maps and Misinformation

    Sorry, not news or updates, but also not worth creating a thread.

    I've been seeing lots of maps on Lemmy (mostly in French-speaking communities communities). A number of them look like this:

    And then I've seen others that look like this (usually labelled as "fact" or "reality"):

    With the exception of an amazing 3-day event that took place in my school (we had some history professors/researchers come in over 3 days and present us arguments from both sides, then moderate a debate...) I received no education about this, and even if I had it would have been about 20 years ago or more.

    I suspect we have all seen a version of this map before. I can read the Wikipedia, and watch the documentaries, but where should I look to be able to come to a decision on my own regarding these maps? Meaning, is one of them more factual than the other?

    • All those maps seem to show the same things, in slightly different ways. Basically, "statistics massaging" done with maps.

      The "Fact" one seems to have the most information, as in:

      • Since 1917, the British had control ver the "Mandate of Palestine", which was neither Israel nor Palestine.
      • Both Jews and Arabs started buying land and settling there, hoping to become the majority population in case a referendum was held when the British retired.
      • Since 1941, the Jewish ideated a plan on how to win a possible referendum by getting One Million of their own in there, presenting it in 1944 as a solution for Holocause refugees, but then realizing that it wouldn't be enough, that they'd still be missing people and they'd need "Arab refugees", as in Jews fleeing persecution from Arab countries.
      • In 1947, after WWII, the UN proposed a plan to split the land, which the Arab countries rejected.
      • In 1948 the British planned to GTFO... and just the day before, Israel was formed and declared that the whole land would be theirs.
      • The moment the British left, all the Arab countries attacked Israel which they saw as illegitimate... and with the idea of genociding everyone.
      • However, Israel won that war, and let any Arabs choose whether to stay or GTFO. About 150,000 decided to accept Israeli citizenship, about 700,000 got pushed into Jordan/Palestine.
      • As predicted, a lot of Jews fled Arab countries fearing persecution, which propped up the numbers of Israeli citizens, and further increased the hatred in Arab countries.
      • In 1967, Israel got attacked again, and won again, letting it lay claim to the area previously known as Jordan/Palestine.
      • But people in that area, were mostly Arabs, which didn't sit well with Israel, who started a colonization process, mainly to cut off the "Palestine enclave" from Jordan... and to intersperse some Jewish population inside, lest the area decoded to hold a referendum and the Arab side win.
      • People in the Gaza area were Arab/Palestinian, and it has open access to the sea, so instead Israel tried to contain those people by walling them off, and telling Egypt to take them... which Egypt doesn't really want to (we're in the middle of a worldwide migration crysis, nobody wants millions of immigrants).
      • In 1995, after a lot dirty tactics from bother sides, a Palestinian governance was established... but by then the ex-Jordan area was already decimated by Israeli colonists.

      Misinformation:

      • The "disappearing Palestine" map, starts by claiming all the territory was Palestine, which is false, it was a "Mandatory Palestine" under British control. If you compare it with the first "Fact" map, you'll notice it claims all the white area as Arab owned, which is false.
      • The UN plan seems to be correct on all the maps, little to manipulate there since it failed anyway.
      • The 1948/1949 maps match what Israel claimed after preemptively declaring itself as a state, getting attacked, and winning.
      • The 1967 maps also show how Israel got control over the whole area, and progressively has been eating away at any possible Arab/Palestinian claim.
      • The 1995 and "NOW" maps show why Israel conceded a Palestinian governance: mainly over territories where people identifying as Palestinians are no longer a majority.

      Personally, I'd say the "Fact" one along the AlJazeera one, paint the most complete picture.

      For sources, check Wikipedia for:

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