Halls of Shrewd'm / US Policy
No. of Recommendations: 8
No. of Recommendations: 0
Thanks, when was that taped? I visited his X site,I can't find any updates, with respect to his current thoughts. Can you find anything current? Thank you.
No. of Recommendations: 2
"[You can take] the worst thing you can say about Hamas, multiplied by a thousand times, and it still will not meet the Israel repression and killing and dispossession of Palestinians."
Ouch.
No. of Recommendations: 3
Thanks for posting that. I've been running into similar, but not as good as this one. Someone went to the trouble of creating a long meme that expresses this. I've run into it before, and it gives you pause, looking for a resolution, and there is no resolution. We like things clean in our heads, and it isn't clean. Hamas did a terrible horrific thing, but were the Palestinians aware? And if a few were aware, do we not listen to all of them because of this? So it isn't clean, it's dirty and messy, just like life. And which stories are true? It's likely that both hands are bloody, so do we judge which hand is the bloodiest? There is no resolution here, and we inherently don't like that.
No. of Recommendations: 5
It's likely that both hands are bloody, so do we judge which hand is the bloodiest? There is no resolution here, and we inherently don't like that.
And the relative bloodiness of the hands doesn't lead to a resolution anyway. Israel - or if you prefer, Israeli Jews - are not going to agree to a "resolution" that involves the expulsion of the Jews. Their refusal is not based on culpability. They're not claiming that the Palestinians deserved for the British to decide that the old Mandate territory would become the new Jewish state, any more than the indigenous peoples of any modern country deserved what happened to them. But they will not accept a resolution that involves them being expelled from Israel.
While framed in moral terms, I personally believe that much of the difference in opinion on the issue (at least among those who believe that a resolution should include the continued existence of a Jewish state of Israel - many do not) stems from an empirical disagreement. To wit: what would happen if the Palestinian people were granted their own independent state. Will that bring peace? If you believe it will, it seems folly - and culpable - that Israel has not agreed to one. In discussions I've had with folks at my temple who are keen advocates for Palestinian rights, to a person they all believe that. That if Israel and the PLO could agree on borders and terms for a second state, it would very likely lead to peace. They believe that the Palestinian people - and more crucially the future governing parties in a future Palestine - want the presence of a Palestinian state, not the absence of an Israeli one.
If you believe it won't lead to peace - that the creation of an independent Palestinian state under current conditions will result in virtually no change to the current situation and the likely end of the Jewish state - then it is more defensible. Not because the Palestinian people deserve to be afflicted with Hamas, but because given the fact that they are afflicted with Hamas there are only limited options for Israel to take in response.
Again, some folks don't think the existence of Israel is defensible at all - that the only moral thing the Jews in Israel can do is leave. But among those that want to see an Israeli state continue and advocate for Palestinian statehood, that seems to be the common empirical assumption.
No. of Recommendations: 9
There are two pervasive lies that Re circulating in the media that tend to exculpate Israel's response to the horrific attack they suffered.
First, Israel says it is going to war against Hamas. Wars are between nations. Gaza is not a sovereign nation. They have no self determination; don't control their borders; they have no control over their economy. They have no air force, no armored vehicles nor artillery, no standing army or navy. What kind of war can they wage. The IDF will be engaged in a massacre.
The response to the crimes committed by Hamas are being visited on the women and children of Gaza. This brings us to the second lie. Hamas does not govern Gaza or the Palestinians. It is a radical violent splinter group. The PLO is the nominal governing body of the Palestinians, and I don't think that Hamas takes their marching orders from the PLO, a largely impotent organization.
Invading Gaza will almost certainly not eradicate Hamas. The intent, I think, is to cynically get 1 million Palestinians to flee to Egypt, and then finally refuse them right of return under some pretext. There are already 2 million refugees denied right of return abroad.
Israel is certainly a victim of a horrifically violent event, but they have already visited worse upon the Palestinians and yet even more is shortly to follow.
fd
No. of Recommendations: 8
Hamas does not govern Gaza or the Palestinians.
Is that true? Hamas might not have de jeure authority over Gaza (although they perhaps have as much claim to it as anyone else, given that they were the prevailing political party in the last election held there). But it certainly is the de facto governing authority over the area. As you point out, the PLO (and the PNA) is impotent in Gaza. Hamas is in charge, and has exercised that authority in various ways (all of the ministries in Gaza are held by Hamas members, for example).
I certainly agree that what is going to happen to the Palestinians in Gaza is going to be horrific. But Israel is going to try to root out Hamas entirely - and whether they can or will succeed, they are certainly going to make the attempt.
No. of Recommendations: 2
Wrong on several counts.
First Hamas won the last elections that were held in Gaza and overthrew the rest of the Palestinian Authortiy years ago. They ARE the governing body.
Secondly, the intent is to destroy Hamas' combat power, not 'drive Palestinians into Egypt'. If they wanted to do that they would have done it when they controlled the Sinai Peninsula.
And finally, what Hamas did is so far beyond the pale as to transcend humanity.
No. of Recommendations: 2
Israel is certainly a victim of a horrifically violent event, but they have already visited worse upon the Palestinians and yet even more is shortly to follow.
fd
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And so?
What you have Israel do? Give Hamas a free punch, call for peace and change, and then wait politely for the next punch?
I feel sorry for the innocent Palestinians who suffer under Hamas domination. But that suffering will be perpetual unless somebody forcibly does something about it, as Israel is about to do.
Actually, despite the inevitable civilian casualties, Israel cleansing Gaza of the Hamas infection will very likely save Palestinian lives over the long run.
No. of Recommendations: 8
BHM
The path forward is clearly to end the apartheid. Rabin was assassinated by extremist Jews for coming to this conclusion.
A solution exists as ratified by the UN where much of the West Bank and Gaza are allotted to Palestine. But Israel has settled much of this allotted territory and usurped 80% of the water rights in contravention to UN resolution. All this for their incoming "right of return" immigrants or, from an assertion based on ancient literature that this is their "homeland", (most are of eastern European ancestry, not middle eastern heritage).
From what I know of Arabic culture, had Jews entered Palestine in a respectful spirit of cooperation they would have been accepted. Instead, they embarked on a ruthless pogrom of ethnic cleansing from day one. How would you expect this to turn out?
Extermination of Hamas is a fruitless endeavor. For every one they kill, 2 to 10 will be radicalized. Gaza is the new Warsaw.
fd
No. of Recommendations: 5
A solution exists as ratified by the UN where much of the West Bank and Gaza are allotted to Palestine. - fd
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Israel pulled out of Gaza and abandoned control in 2005. It even forcibly evicted Israeli settlers who refused to move. So you can see the peaceful paradise the Gazans have built for themselves. This despite that massive aid that has been bestowed upon them over the years. So it is long past time for a new approach. Israeli eradication of Hamas will ultimately save Palestinian lives versus the perpetual status quo.
BTW, the Palestinians turned down a sovereign homeland just for themselves in 1948.
Hamas and other Middle East countries are calling for the total elimination of Israel and killing 100% of the Jews and you blame Israel for apartheid. What would you have the Israelis do? Give up their sovereignty and live under peaceful Palestinian rule?
No. of Recommendations: 13
The path forward is clearly to end the apartheid. Rabin was assassinated by extremist Jews for coming to this conclusion....
From what I know of Arabic culture, had Jews entered Palestine in a respectful spirit of cooperation they would have been accepted. Instead, they embarked on a ruthless pogrom of ethnic cleansing from day one. How would you expect this to turn out?
David Brooks' column in today's NYT....."The Missed Chance for Peace".....details missed opportunities, from the outset, for potentially workable solutions that seemed within grasp, focusing especially on President Clinton's efforts with Ehud Barak of Israel and Arafat. It would have required concessions on both sides. Barak was a "yes." Arafat waffled and waffled, and refused to commit.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/12/opinion/israel-...The essence.....
"Throughout this horrible week, my mind has repeatedly flashed back to Dec. 23, 2000. That was the day the Palestinians were offered a path to having their own nation on roughly 95 percent of the land in the West Bank and 100 percent of the land in the Gaza Strip. Under that outline, Israel would also swap some of its own land to compensate the Palestinians in exchange for maintaining 80 percent of its settler presence in the West Bank.
The Palestinians would control, in President Bill Clinton's formulation, 'Arab areas' of East Jerusalem. And on the most sensitive religious sites, there would have been divided sovereignty or jurisdiction, with Palestinians controlling the Haram al-Sharif (including the Aqsa and Dome of the Rock mosques) and Israel controlling the Western Wall and the holy space of which it is a part. There would also be a return of many refugees into the new Palestinian state (without the right of return to Israel itself).
There were a million complexities ' and many errors made by the Israeli, Palestinian and American sides along the way. But this offer pointed the way to the sort of fair solution negotiators had been struggling their way toward for years. It is hard to see this kind of option ever being on the table again. And the Palestinians let it slip away.
This memory comes hauntingly back because the misery that Palestinians and Israelis are now enduring did not have to happen. They could have reached some kind of moderately effective arrangement, which would have given the two nations a chance to pursue their own destinies.
Another reason I think back on this history is the way a simplistic oppressor/oppressed, colonizer/colonized, 'apartheid Israel' narrative has been imposed on this conflict.
The real history is much more complicated. It is the story of the Palestinians who were offered a state in 1947 that the Arab states opposed. More recently, it is the story of flawed human beings on both the Israeli and Palestinian sides, who were confronted with a devilishly complicated situation. They worked doggedly to secure peace and made real, if stumbling, progress toward that end. It is the story of how radicals on both sides undermined their efforts, leading to the bloodshed we see today. This is what happens when the center does not hold."
No. of Recommendations: 0
To pay homage to the name of this board, what do you expect from (monotheistic) religions?
Hamas is trying to do to Jews what Jews did (or rather, boasted and wished they had done) to Canaanites, as per the Torah. Just a few centuries too late.
Beneath all the complexity of modern considerations like democracy, self-rule, equality, non-discrimination; lies the plain and simple fact that this a religious conflict. It's Jihad on both sides. Neither will concede while fired up by religious zeal. Hamas openly so, Israel under the hood.
No. of Recommendations: 4
The path forward is clearly to end the apartheid. Rabin was assassinated by extremist Jews for coming to this conclusion.
A solution exists as ratified by the UN where much of the West Bank and Gaza are allotted to Palestine.
The risk, though, is that wouldn't be a solution.
Certainly it would resolve the most severe privations being suffered by the Palestinian people. But it doesn't resolve the underlying conflict. Hamas' goals are not only to secure a Palestinian state. They inarguably include eliminating the Israeli state - undoing the Nakba and returning the entire area to the status quo ante before the arrival of the Jews. They also include killing as many jewish people as possible, though they would probably deny that this is still the case.
Creating an independent Palestinian state in which Hamas controls Gaza does not end the conflict. It merely elevates it into an intolerable security threat. Hamas will still fire rockets and stage assaults from Gaza into Israel - only they'll have the resources and military materiel that being an independent sovereign state allows them to accumulate. Then Israel retaliates, attacks Hamas positions in Gaza and seals the border....and we're right back where we started, except that Israel's position is vastly worsened and Hamas' is greatly strengthened. But make no mistake - the conflict and violence very much can continue even if "apartheid" is ended and the West Bank and Gaza is allocated to a new Palestinian state. One can optimistically believe that ending the immiseration of Gaza would "solve" the problem, but it's far from a certain outcome - and given the new geopolitical balance in the region after the Iraq war, probably not even the most likely one.
This is all the more the case after the recent attacks. If Hamas' atrocities lead demonstrably to the creation of a Palestinian state, they will be enormously popular among the Palestinian people. Their approach to the conflict will have been proven correct, and they will be the ones who brought a Palestinian state into existence. There is no way that any other political entity or organization would be able to displace them as the de facto rulers of Palestinians in Gaza.
No. of Recommendations: 2
For every one they kill, 2 to 10 will be radicalized.
This is what I currently see. Hamas will have successfully created thousands of new terrorists with their action.
I don't think Israel's "retribution" is going to do what they think it is going to do. OTOH, Hamas does need to be eliminated based on their behavior, but doing so without injuring the innocent is difficult to impossible.
Alan
No. of Recommendations: 3
Hamas will have successfully created thousands of new terrorists with their action. I don't think Israel's "retribution" is going to do what they think it is going to do. OTOH, Hamas does need to be eliminated based on their behavior, but doing so without injuring the innocent is difficult to impossible.
I'm not sure what you think Israel thinks their actions are going to do. They're well aware that their retribution will spawn many more new terrorists, and that there's no way to eliminate Hamas without injuring a lot of innocent people or creating thousands of new terrorists. They know full well that whatever they do, things will be worse than they were before the attacks. Even if (or especially if) they did nothing in response.
Again, there is no "good" outcome here. Only least-bad outcomes.
Israel's goal is to eliminate the experienced, entrenched, and well-organized terrorist organization. That has two beneficial consequences, even if there are loads of bad consequences. The first, it makes it clear that any future attacks that are able to achieve this level of atrocity will result in the destruction of the organization and people that perpetrate them. And second, you replace the experienced and well-organized terrorists with inexperienced new terrorists. Even if the latter are more numerous (at first), you'd rather have a bunch of newcomers to the fight than battle-hardened veterans.
The outcome will be terrible, and it will result in thousands of new terrorists - and it will still be better (in their estimation) than inaction or a token response.
No. of Recommendations: 1
From what I know of Arabic culture, had Jews entered Palestine in a respectful spirit of cooperation they would have been accepted. Instead, they embarked on a ruthless pogrom of ethnic cleansing from day one. How would you expect this to turn out?
Erm, okay.
The Jews were there first.
No. of Recommendations: 1
Albaby: The outcome will be terrible, and it will result in thousands of new terrorists - and it will still be better (in their estimation) than inaction or a token response.
Yes, there is no resolution. Nothing is clearly leading to great outcomes, just least bad outcomes. If you want a resolution, it isn't there. If you think anything is resolved, you are on the wrong track. We just continue to continue.
No. of Recommendations: 1
I'm not sure what you think Israel thinks their actions are going to do.
They are creating a "consequence" in an attempt to reduce the bad behavior in the future.
I was hoping Israel would be more surgical in their approach, rather than inflicting significant harm on a very large population. That would certainly not have been as expedient, and perhaps moving quickly is required to save the hostages. I agree I am in no position to judge here, but the future for at least one more generation looks bleak at this point.
Alan
No. of Recommendations: 5
I was hoping Israel would be more surgical in their approach, rather than inflicting significant harm on a very large population.
I suspect that a surgical response is infeasible. Hamas has shown itself to be both willing and extremely adept at interweaving its operations and resources into the civilian population. There is no real downside to them doing so, because on the whole it is Israel - and not Hamas - that is blamed for the civilian casualties that result. Their leadership and a lot of their infrastructure (especially underground facilities and materiel) is thus mostly insulated from remote or tactical attacks, like aerial assaults or drone strikes.
So the only response that is capable of achieving any of Israel's military objectives is a ground invasion, so that troops can take direct control over the area and destroy the tunnels, underground resources, and (hopefully for Israel) Hamas leadership.
There is almost certainly no response that can both: i) seriously damage Hamas; and ii) avoid significant harm on a very large population.
No. of Recommendations: 0
Who cares. Let them kill each other. Both are nothing but a headache to the rest of the world.
