BibleForums Christian Message Board
Other Categories => Controversial Issues => Topic started by: Fenris on October 29, 2023, 09:58:23 PM
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It never goes away, does it? Sometimes it's dormant and then it comes back. What's going on in the world right now is the worst it's been in my lifetime.
Mobs calling for genocide in major cities around the world. In out of the way places and in NYC, home to the world's largest Jewish population outside Israel. Chicago. Toronto. London. Berlin. Istanbul.
Rallies on college campuses preaching hatred of Jews. My daughter's friend along with other Jewish students had to be locked in the college library to be kept safe from a mob at Cooper Union in downtown Manhattan. Cornell University Jews received death threats on the college message boards.
I see a violent mob in Russia attacked a plane coming from Israel.
And what set this off? Hamas murdered over 1400 Jews on a Jewish holiday. Butchered them. Burned them alive. I just found out they baked a baby to death in an oven. They raped women so hard that they broke their pelvic bones. They took over 200 hostages back to the hellhole they created on Gaza.
I don't even know what to feel anymore.
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Never.
And following a still unfulfilled OT prophecy it will only get worse.
Zach 12:1 - The oracle of the word of the LORD concerning Israel: Thus declares the LORD, who stretched out the heavens and founded the earth and formed the spirit of man within him: 2 “Behold, I am about to make Jerusalem a cup of staggering to all the surrounding peoples. The siege of Jerusalem will also be against Judah. 3 On that day I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples. All who lift it will surely hurt themselves. And all the nations of the earth will gather against it.
Not sure how you see that.
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It never goes away, does it? Sometimes it's dormant and then it comes back. What's going on in the world right now is the worst it's been in my lifetime.
Mobs calling for genocide in major cities around the world. In out of the way places and in NYC, home to the world's largest Jewish population outside Israel. Chicago. Toronto. London. Berlin. Istanbul.
Rallies on college campuses preaching hatred of Jews. My daughter's friend along with other Jewish students had to be locked in the college library to be kept safe from a mob at Cooper Union in downtown Manhattan. Cornell University Jews received death threats on the college message boards.
I see a violent mob in Russia attacked a plane coming from Israel.
And what set this off? Hamas murdered over 1400 Jews on a Jewish holiday. Butchered them. Burned them alive. I just found out they baked a baby to death in an oven. They raped women so hard that they broke their pelvic bones. They took over 200 hostages back to the hellhole they created on Gaza.
I don't even know what to feel anymore.
Feel what God feels.
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Feel what God feels.
I don't know what God feels. I only know what I feel.
Psalm 79 Why should the nations say, “Where is their God?” Before our eyes, make known among the nations that you avenge the outpoured blood of your servants.
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Never.
And following a still unfulfilled OT prophecy it will only get worse.
Zach 12:1 -
Nah, that chapter is consolation.
On that day the Lord will shield those who live in Jerusalem, so that the feeblest among them will be like David, and the house of David will be like God, like the angel of the Lord going before them. On that day I will set out to destroy all the nations that attack Jerusalem.
Which still doesn't make me feel better about what's going on in the world. Honestly, everybody should be feeling bad about it.
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Jewish homes and businesses in Paris are being marked with a star of David.
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So tragic
Some things never change
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https://www.youtube.com/shorts/kEjqeYYMTtw
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100% correct. And yet, people still find ways to blame Israel and Jews. That's antisemitism.
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An amazing thought by Polish literary critic Konstanty Jeleński, in 1968:
Poles have never come out against Jews “because they are Jews” but because Jews are dirty, greedy, mendacious, because they wear earlocks, speak jargon, do not want to assimilate, and also because they do assimilate, cease using their jargon, are nattily dressed, and want to be regarded as Poles. Because they lack culture and because they are overly cultured. Because they are superstitious, backward and ignorant, and because they are damnably capable, progressive and ambitious. Because they have long, hooked noses, and because it is sometimes difficult to distinguish them from “pure Poles.” Because they crucified Christ and practice ritual murder and pore over the Talmud, and because they disdain their own religion and are atheists. Because they look wretched and sickly, and because they are tough and have their own fighting units and are full of khutspah. Because they are bankers and capitalists and because they are Communists and agitators. But in no case because they are Jews.
The last sentence is obviously sarcastic. People hate Jews because they are Jews. They invent the reason afterwards.
Max Nordau made a similar observation at the First Zionist Congress in 1897:
"If you have to drown a dog," says the proverb, "you must first declare him to be mad." All kinds of vices are falsely attributed to the Jews, because one wishes to convince himself that he has a right to detest them. But the pre-existing sentiment is the detestation of the Jews.
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spit it out tell us what you really think.
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spit it out tell us what you really think.
Why is Israel held to a standard that no other country in the world is? Because it's the world's only Jewish state.
The following observation was made back in 1968, and it holds true now.
Israel's Peculiar Position
By Eric Hoffer (LA Times 5/26/1968)
The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews.
Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people and there is no refugee problem. Russian did it, Poland and Czechoslovakia did it, Turkey threw out a million Greeks, and Algeria a million Frenchman. Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese-and no one says a word about refugees. But in the case of Israel the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees.
Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab. Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis.
Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious it must sue for peace. Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world.
Other nations when they are defeated survive and recover but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed. Had Nasser triumphed last June he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews.
No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on. There is a cry of outrage all over the world when people die in Vietnam or when two Negroes are executed in Rhodesia. But when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one remonstrated with him.
The Swedes, who are ready to break of diplomatic relations with America because of what we do in Vietnam, did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore, and ball bearings, and serviced his troop trains to Norway.
The Jews are alone in the world. If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts. And Jewish resources. Yet at this moment Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally. We can rely more on Israel than Israel can rely on us. And one has only to imagine what would have happened last summer had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general.
I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish the holocaust will be upon us.
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No other group of people in human history has been as reviled by so many or targeted for mayhem and destruction as the Jews have been. And for the most part, they are vilified simply for being Jewish. An infinitesimal percentage of the population, Jews keep to themselves and don't bother anyone, holding to a 'live and let live' worldview. So why are they the most hated and persecuted people? An argument can be made that mankind's inhumanity to man is sufficient to explain the hatred, but that doesn't explain why Jews are singled out above all others for such a disproportionate level of hate.
Why would Hitler attempt to systematically exterminate European Jews like vermin? That transcends even the most malicious human mind. It's one thing to dislike a group for whatever reason, but attempting to wipe them from the face of the earth is another matter. Such a level of unreasoning malice goes beyond human capacity for malevolence, and speaks to a dark power operating behind the scenes.
Jews traditionally view Satan as an angelic being simply serving in the role of God's accuser/adversary--just doing what he was designed to do. The Christian perspective of course, sees him as a malevolent, fallen angel bent on opposing God's plans and wreaking havoc in the lives of His people. I believe the latter view offers a good explanation for the gratuitous enmity directed towards Jews throughout their history.
As the descendants of Abraham, the Jews represent the genetic line through which God ultimately sent His messiah--whom Christians believe to be Jesus. Through His resurrection, Jesus conquered the power of death and hell, and wrested dominion of the earth away from Satan. We need only understand how the Devil sees Jews to understand the hate he has for them: as the people that produced the one who will vanquish him and consign him to the fires of eternal torment. He despises them because they facilitated his downfall and sealed his fate. Failing in his attempt to lead a rebellion against God, Satan must now content himself with disrupting what God is carrying out through His people, and taking as many souls to judgment with him as he can.
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The Christian perspective of course, sees him as a malevolent, fallen angel bent on opposing God's plans and wreaking havoc in the lives of His people. I believe the latter view offers a good explanation for the gratuitous enmity directed towards Jews throughout their history.
I don't love this particular piece of theology. "Jesus was Jewish, so Satan hates Jews"? It also lets people off the hook too easily. People hate Jews, not Satan.
There's a simpler answer.
In Numbers 10, we have the following passage-
When the Ark was to set out, Moses would say: Advance, O Lord! May Your enemies be scattered, and may Your foes flee before you.
Medieval Jewish commentator Rashi asks the question, why does it say "Your enemies" and "Your foes"? Shouldn't it say "our enemies"? And he answers his own question by saying that Israel's enemies are also God's enemies.
Is an accident or a coincidence that Israel's enemies are God's enemies? No. It's a central point. God says of the Jewish people, "You are my witnesses, and my servant whom I have chosen..." (Is 43). We are God's stake in this world.
Bad people do not want to be told that God exists, and that He has expectations of moral behavior from His creations. Bad people thus hate God. But they can't harm God. But they can harm His people. And so they hate the Jews.
Mind you, this also explains hate against devout Christians who live their values and are also by extension "God's servants."
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I didn't expect you to agree, my friend. And I wasn't saying Satan hates Jews because Jesus was Jewish, but because they produced the messiah. It's still my opinion that there's a spirit behind the unrelenting, senseless enmity almost universally directed at Jews--which of course, is contingent on a Christian perspective.
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Bad people do not want to be told that God exists, and that He has expectations of moral behavior from His creations. Bad people thus hate God. But they can't harm God. But they can harm His people. And so they hate the Jews.
This doesn't explain the 2 billion Muslims who hate the Jews. They trace their ancestry back to Abraham through Ishmael, consider themselves good, moral people, and profess to worship the same God you do. Despite the evil perpetrated by Muslim agencies such as Hamas and Hebollah, Muslims don't hate God, but simply have the wrong perception of Him, as well as a misguided zeal.
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This doesn't explain the 2 billion Muslims who hate the Jews. They trace their ancestry back to Abraham through Ishmael, consider themselves good, moral people, and profess to worship the same God you do.
The same could be said for Christians who hate Jews. Yes, they exist. There are bad Christians, and bad Muslims, and bad atheists. None of them want to hear that God will judge them on their behavior, so they hate God's servants.
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There are people who are labeled, or self labeled , Christian that are not Christian .
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This doesn't explain the 2 billion Muslims who hate the Jews. They trace their ancestry back to Abraham through Ishmael, consider themselves good, moral people, and profess to worship the same God you do.
The same could be said for Christians who hate Jews. Yes, they exist. There are bad Christians, and bad Muslims, and bad atheists. None of them want to hear that God will judge them on their behavior, so they hate God's servants.
The insanity spreads to the point that apparently for some of the social elites in the US it appears that even some Jews in the intelligentsia Jaye Jews in Israel.
Nothing makes sense other than hatred of Jews in Israel is always the lefts fallback position
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A friend of mine posted an interesting comment lately.
When Muslim terrorists bombed London nobody was protesting in favor of the Muslims. Nobody wore pins to proclaim their support.
When Muslim terrorists attacked the US on 9/11 nobody was calling for restraint, or to see things from all sides, or supporting the jihadists.
When Muslim terrorists attacked Israel the protests support the terrorists, people expect restraint and even a ceasefire and somehow it's all Israel's fault.
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The Koran
O my people! Enter the Holy Land which Allah has destined for you ˹to enter˺. And do not turn back or else you will become losers.” - Soera 5,21
Allah says Israel belongs to the Jews.
But they don't live it.
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Only the Bible believer can understand antisemitism - the secular world is and has been at a loss to grasp what the prophets have foretold and history has confirmed.
The Devil's rage at God's chosen instrument is perpetually manifest and all history turns in this issue.
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When Muslim terrorists attacked the US on 9/11 nobody was calling for restraint, or to see things from all sides, or supporting the jihadists.
When Muslim terrorists attacked Israel the protests support the terrorists, people expect restraint and even a ceasefire and somehow it's all Israel's fault.
Well, at the risk gaining an anti-Semite tag to go along with my other recent descriptors, I'd have to disagree with your friend's assertion that no one called for restraint or thoughtful consideration after 9/11. Congresswoman Barbara Lee pretty famously voted against the military force authorization after 9/11 and urged taking time to think through our next steps. She wasn't alone in american society, but she was definitely in the minority. There was also pushback (and rightly so) against the wave of anti-muslim violence and bigotry. At that time it would have been extremely unpopular to voice an opinion that didn't toe the perceived "patriotic" so the fact that there were fewer voices should not be entirely attributed to the idea that people did not hold those opinions when there was some fraction that were not willing to pay the price for publicly expressing them. I think it's also important to consider that during the war on terror many less than ideal facts about our government, our military, our previous operations and alignments came to light that made the calculus for evaluating and supporting the "patriotic" line quite a bit different. Additionally having seen the horrible repercussions that the war on terror had on our service people and their families, the civilian population of the countries that we waged war in, governmental judicial overreach and curtailing of our freedoms, our economy and debt, and the solidarity of our union, the impetus to stay silent or go along with the 'patriotic' line is a much less potent. I don't think that it would be too much of an overstatement to say that supporting Hamas (insofar as that position is a reaction to all of these factors) is a gross overcorrection, but we got here at least in part due to some arguably poor and self destructive decision making under duress in the past, so I get wanting to avoid repeating past mistakes. I think these current attitudes are at least in part another consequence of our war on terror, and obviously another part is that people really hate the Jewish people.
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There are people who are labeled, or self labeled , Christian that are not Christian .
Unfortunately bad Christians have existed through history and into the present day. Their bad behavior doesn't make them "not Christian" anymore. There are also bad Jews, bad Muslims, and bad atheists.
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Nothing makes sense other than hatred of Jews in Israel is always the lefts fallback position
Yup. Also the far right, and even in the middle. Hatred of Jews is all over the political spectrum.
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A friend of mine posted an interesting comment lately.
When Muslim terrorists bombed London nobody was protesting in favor of the Muslims. Nobody wore pins to proclaim their support.
When Muslim terrorists attacked the US on 9/11 nobody was calling for restraint, or to see things from all sides, or supporting the jihadists.
When Muslim terrorists attacked Israel the protests support the terrorists, people expect restraint and even a ceasefire and somehow it's all Israel's fault.
Weird isn't it?
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Bad people do not want to be told that God exists, and that He has expectations of moral behavior from His creations. Bad people thus hate God. But they can't harm God. But they can harm His people. And so they hate the Jews.
Mind you, this also explains hate against devout Christians who live their values and are also by extension "God's servants."
It's interesting that there's nowhere near the same hostiliy shown towards Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists and other faiths.
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It's interesting that there's nowhere near the same hostiliy shown towards Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists and other faiths.
In the vein of what I've already said in this discussion, I'm going to observe that those faiths tend to be less judgmental of bad behavior than Judaism (and many followers of Christianity. )
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First Israel is made the bad guy after being brutally attacked by a savage terrorist organization. Now Iran, the biggest sponsor of such terrorists, and holder of one of the worst records for human rights, will now chair the UN Human Rights Council. Things are getting crazier and uglier by the day.
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This is hard to watch. A five year old, begging for her life.
https://x.com/bethanyshondark/status/1721308083035455682?s=20
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I've never been able to relate to Numbers 23:9 more than right now. Balaam describes the Jewish people: "Behold, a people who dwells alone, and will not be reckoned among the nations."
Right now I feel like the world is divided into just Jews and gentiles. And most of the gentiles harbor implacable hatred towards the Jews. And they're not afraid or ashamed of it; they're proud of it. It's not just the terrorists, Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, all the others, or their paymasters in Iran; or all the people rallying in support of them on the streets of western countries; of the centers of higher learning, hosting professors who hate Jews, or their students who lap it up; or the leaders of countries, both unfree and free, who insist that Israel stop protecting itself; or the UN, which has hosted so many incidents of hatred; or of the people on the street who don't hate Jews but also won't step outside of their comfort zone to protect any either.
There are just 16 million of us in the world. 0.2% of the world's population. A tiny speck of light in the darkness. And we're surrounded by barbarian hordes. They're at the gates.
I have never felt so alone.
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We're living in the last days, fenris, and we know things are going to get ugly. However, we also know from prophets like Ezekiel and Zechariah that God will make a short work of the nations that are gathered against His people. Take heart. God doesn't promise us a smooth journey, but He does promise a glorious destination at the end of it.
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There are people who are labeled, or self labeled , Christian that are not Christian .
Unfortunately bad Christians have existed through history and into the present day. Their bad behavior doesn't make them "not Christian" anymore. There are also bad Jews, bad Muslims, and bad atheists.
true Christians have received the Holy Spirit through faith in Jesus (Galatians 3:14); and the love of God through the Holy Ghost (Romans 5:5).
"Christians" who hate the Jewish people do not fall under that category.
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We're living in the last days, fenris, and we know things are going to get ugly. However, we also know from prophets like Ezekiel and Zechariah that God will make a short work of the nations that are gathered against His people. Take heart. God doesn't promise us a smooth journey, but He does promise a glorious destination at the end of it.
I don't doubt it. Still this is a most unpleasant experience. Abraham stood alone, the world's sole monotheist. And now, almost 4000 years later, his descendants, the Jewish people, stand virtually alone. So little has changed. I am completely disappointed in the peoples of the world.
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I’ve never had much faith in the peoples of the world…..
Except to do whatever feels good to them regardless of cost or harm to others
A bunch of crabs in a bucket
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I’ve never had much faith in the peoples of the world…..
I hear. I'm just relaying the feeling of how isolated many Jews feel right now.
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Have any of you considered not talking about it anymore? Perhaps not bringing up anything related to race, ethnicity, nation of origin, or the color of one's skin will resolve anti-Semitism among other things.
Edit: This question is open to anyone and everyone, so please feel free to respond.
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Have any of you considered not talking about it anymore? Perhaps not bringing up anything related to race, ethnicity, nation of origin, or the color of one's skin will resolve anti-Semitism among other things.
Well this right here is the dumbest thing I've seen on the internet in a while, and that's saying something.
It's not Jews who bring up their Jewishness. It's antisemites who bring it up. Jews just want to go about their business and be left alone.
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Yeah this sums up my feelings pretty well.
In the Wake of Oct. 7, More and More Jews are Going Tribal
Jews feel cheated by the world. At the lowest moment of modern Jewish history, when we could have expected a sea of global sympathy, we got the opposite.
David Suissa
I can’t recall a time when so many Jews have become so tribal. I don’t mean the quaint MOT (member of the tribe) kind of tribal. I mean the more hardcore, unapologetic now-it’s-only-us kind of tribal.
I felt it in a palpable way the other night at a gathering of highly sophisticated LA Jews. These looked like the kind of knowledgeable people who would embrace the universal side of Judaism and would have no problem criticizing Israel.
And yet, there was little universalism going on that night. Rather, there was a sense of alarm that Jews have reached a dangerous low point and must stick together if they are going to get through this.
Later that night, I tried to put my finger on where this renewed sense of tribalism is coming from.
My gut feel is simply that Jews feel cheated by the world. At the lowest moment of modern Jewish history, when we could have expected a sea of global sympathy, we got the opposite. We got attacked.
We feel abandoned. We feel alone.
This has brought many Jews closer together, to the point that we have no problem putting our own people first. Our message: “Now that we’ve seen your despicable reaction to Oct. 7, dear world, many of us have concluded that we have little to gain by trying to be nice. We’re better off sticking to ourselves and joining our collective fight for survival.”
I never thought I would actually write those words, because “worrying about the world” is hard-wired into Jews. We must be nice, we must contribute, we must not cause trouble, lest they turn against us.
But while we still value that universalist impulse, it’s been superseded by one hard fact: We lost 1400 Jewish souls, massacred in the most brutal and barbaric way possible, and much of the world still turned against us.
The signs are everywhere. The head of the FBI says antisemitism is at historic levels. The ADL reported a 400% increase in Jew hatred. A headline from this morning on I24News: “Pro-Palestinian protesters worldwide call for Israel’s elimination.” Jew hatred across college campuses has become an epidemic. It’s hard to keep track of it all.
Besides the hatred, though, there’s something almost worse: the viciousness. Watch any video of protesters yelling, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” or “We don’t want no two states, we want all of it” or “Globalize the Intifada.” These are not protestors chanting and marching with nobility and conviction.
These are haters screaming in a frenzy of fury, a fury that is threatening and intimidating. You can see a good example from last night with wild protestors at the gates of the White House. The rage was truly scary. No wonder so many Jewish college students are feeling unsafe.
Many Jews have noticed this ugliness and are wondering: “If the haters are treating this like a war, shouldn’t we?”
The good news is that there are still plenty of Jewish supporters out there, and we should express our gratitude to those outside the Jewish community who have shown our community both empathy and solidarity. Tribal or not, we need them as allies.
The problem is that the haters make most of the noise.
The result is that on the streets and campuses of the world, and on social media platforms that reach hundreds of millions, the optics are clearly on the side of demonizing the Jews. Needless to say, the haters have been using Israel’s justified war against Hamas as a convenient cover for their hatred.
More and more Jews, however, are refusing to get sucked in by the old anti-war talking points. As much as they care for the lives of innocent civilians, they have come to understand two things: One, Hamas is murdering their own people, and two, crushing Hamas is a matter of survival. As even Bernie Sanders conceded today on CNN, “I don’t know how you can have a ceasefire, a permanent ceasefire, with an organization like Hamas, which is dedicated to turmoil and chaos and destroying the state of Israel.”
It is this hard, brutal reality that has turned many Jews inward. In a sense, Jews of the Diaspora have caught up to their brethren in Israel. Talk to virtually any Israeli today and they’ll tell you the same thing: If we don’t crush Hamas, we may not survive. A leftist, peacenik friend from Israel captured his dilemma this way: “I hate being tribal, but that’s the reality now.”
But here’s the great irony—crushing Hamas goes beyond the tribe. For one thing, it will improve the chances of normalizing relations with Saudi Arabia. How? Because no Arab country wants to make an alliance with a weak Israel. Israel’s military might, especially against a common enemy like Iran, is the #1 benefit it has to offer.
Crushing Hamas is also good for the Palestinians. Ever since Israel evacuated the Gaza Strip in 2005, the biggest enemy of Palestinians has been Hamas. The terror group has stolen billions in humanitarian aid to build weapons of war instead of schools. So when you hear people call Gaza an open-air prison, you can respond that it is Hamas who are the jailors, and that eliminating Hamas will benefit Palestinians as well as Israelis.
At the moment, however, all of that is secondary.
What is primary is that many Jews around the world feel under siege. They feel cheated. They feel scared. They feel abandoned. And they see their brothers and sisters in Israel in a war of survival.
Faced with such chronic hostility, these Jews have decided they have little choice but to stick together, at least for now, and go tribal.
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Have any of you considered not talking about it anymore? Perhaps not bringing up anything related to race, ethnicity, nation of origin, or the color of one's skin will resolve anti-Semitism among other things.
Well this right here is the dumbest thing I've seen on the internet in a while, and that's saying something.
It's not Jews who bring up their Jewishness. It's antisemites who bring it up. Jews just want to go about their business and be left alone.
hmm, That is a good point the anti-Semites are unlikely to stop identifying jewish people. similarly I would think that ignoring direct threats and attacks on your lives is too much to ask, but have you considered ignoring all other forms of antisemitism in the hopes that it will go away if you stop talking about it or bringing it up?
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have you considered ignoring all other forms of antisemitism in the hopes that it will go away if you stop talking about it or bringing it up?
Antisemitism has been around for more than 2000 years. It's going to magically disappear if I pretend it doesn't exist?
You're already in a hole. Stop digging.
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have you considered ignoring all other forms of antisemitism in the hopes that it will go away if you stop talking about it or bringing it up?
Antisemitism has been around for more than 2000 years. It's going to magically disappear if I pretend it doesn't exist?
You're already in a hole. Stop digging.
That is a good point, antisemitism has been around for a very long time and that should definitely be taken into consideration. Along that line have you ever considered just not ever bringing up historical antisemitism like the holocaust or medieval Christians murdering Jews and so on? Can you imagine how frustrating it might be for people to hear about antisemitism committed by long dead peoples of the past?
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That is a good point, antisemitism has been around for a very long time and that should definitely be taken into consideration. Along that line have you ever considered just not ever bringing up historical antisemitism like the holocaust or medieval Christians murdering Jews and so on? Can you imagine how frustrating it might be for people to hear about antisemitism committed by long dead peoples of the past?
Are we really having this conversation? Did someone here take crazy pills?
Hamas didn't enter Israel and slaughter 1400 Jews because Jews were talking about the Holocaust or medieval Christians. There aren't giant rallies going on in support of Hamas because Jews were talking about the Holocaust or medieval Christians. Jewish students aren't being harassed on college campuses because of how frustrating it might be for people to hear about antisemitism committed by long dead peoples of the past.
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Hamas didn't enter Israel and slaughter 1400 Jews because Jews were talking about the Holocaust or medieval Christians. There aren't giant rallies going on in support of Hamas because Jews were talking about the Holocaust or medieval Christians. Jewish students aren't being harassed on college campuses because of how frustrating it might be for people to hear about antisemitism committed by long dead peoples of the past.
So, your contention is that while some people might assert that antisemitism today is a reaction by people that are frequently being confronted with the accounts of antisemitic deeds and attitudes of their predecessors, but in reality their deeds and attitudes stem from their own antisemitic ideology and they themselves are the actual wellspring of the hatred and bigotry that perpetuates antisemitism as opposed to any Jew or other observer that points out antisemitism in the past or present? Have I understood you correctly?
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So, your contention is that while some people might assert that antisemitism today is a reaction by people that are frequently being confronted with the accounts of antisemitic deeds and attitudes of their predecessors, but in reality their deeds and attitudes stem from their own antisemitic ideology and they themselves are the actual wellspring of the hatred and bigotry that perpetuates antisemitism as opposed to any Jew or other observer that points out antisemitism in the past or present? Have I understood you correctly?
That's a long, rambling sentence, even for you.
Are you honestly suggesting that Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, and all other antisemitic people hate Jews because they're tired of hearing them whine about past injustices? These people think Hitler had the right idea, and believe the world would be a better place if all Jews were exterminated. Israel is facing a clear and present danger today as a result of people who hate Jews because they're Jews--not because of anything related to the past.
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So, your contention is that while some people might assert that antisemitism today is a reaction by people that are frequently being confronted with the accounts of antisemitic deeds and attitudes of their predecessors, but in reality their deeds and attitudes stem from their own antisemitic ideology and they themselves are the actual wellspring of the hatred and bigotry that perpetuates antisemitism as opposed to any Jew or other observer that points out antisemitism in the past or present? Have I understood you correctly?
That's a long, rambling sentence, even for you.
Are you honestly suggesting that Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, and all other antisemitic people hate Jews because they're tired of hearing them whine about past injustices? These people think Hitler had the right idea, and believe the world would be a better place if all Jews were exterminated. Israel is facing a clear and present danger today as a result of people who hate Jews because they're Jews--not because of anything related to the past.
Yeah, it was pretty long. My post was attempting to reiterate what I believe Fenris said during our exchange. In short that refraining from talking about antisemitism, past or present antisemitic deeds & beliefs or more generally race, ethnicity, nation of origin, or skin color is unlikely to end anti-Semitic deeds & beliefs.
Since I have you here have you ever considered not talking about anti-Semitism anymore? Have you ever reasoned that perhaps by not bringing up or avoiding anything related to race, ethnicity, nation of origin, or the color of one's skin that this will resolve anti-Semitism?
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So, your contention is that while some people might assert that antisemitism today is a reaction by people that are frequently being confronted with the accounts of antisemitic deeds and attitudes of their predecessors, but in reality their deeds and attitudes stem from their own antisemitic ideology and they themselves are the actual wellspring of the hatred and bigotry that perpetuates antisemitism as opposed to any Jew or other observer that points out antisemitism in the past or present? Have I understood you correctly?
So your contention is that gentiles only hate Jews because Jews talk about how much gentiles hate Jews. In fact, if Jews stopped talking about how much gentiles hate Jews, then gentiles would cease hating Jews.
Have I understood you correctly?
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Yeah, it was pretty long. My post was attempting to reiterate what I believe Fenris said during our exchange. In short that refraining from talking about antisemitism, past or present antisemitic deeds & beliefs or more generally race, ethnicity, nation of origin, or skin color is unlikely to end anti-Semitic deeds & beliefs.
Since I have you here have you ever considered not talking about anti-Semitism anymore? Have you ever reasoned that perhaps by not bringing up or avoiding anything related to race, ethnicity, nation of origin, or the color of one's skin that this will resolve anti-Semitism?
You know Oscar, you're one of those rare people with so much intelligence, there's too little space left for common sense. Antisemitism will not go away because its reality ceases to be acknowledged or addressed. If it were not a legitimate concern today, there would be no reason to talk about it. BTW, this is a simple matter, and does not require a protracted, convoluted exchange. So, I'll bow out now.
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So, your contention is that while some people might assert that antisemitism today is a reaction by people that are frequently being confronted with the accounts of antisemitic deeds and attitudes of their predecessors, but in reality their deeds and attitudes stem from their own antisemitic ideology and they themselves are the actual wellspring of the hatred and bigotry that perpetuates antisemitism as opposed to any Jew or other observer that points out antisemitism in the past or present? Have I understood you correctly?
So your contention is that gentiles only hate Jews because Jews talk about how much gentiles hate Jews. In fact, if Jews stopped talking about how much gentiles hate Jews, then gentiles would cease hating Jews.
Have I understood you correctly?
I wouldn't call it MY contention, but yes the reasoning does seem to go that if such and such group, leader, media outlet etc just stops talking about race or racism or the racist views, deeds, policies, systems etc of the past and/or present then racism would go away, self correct or otherwise improve...somehow. Also, yes, on the other side of that coin is the idea that racism is perpetuated in large part by the very act of pointing it out, complaining about it, bringing up the past so on and so forth. From where I stand it seems to be a pretty popular notion.
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Do you know who wants people to stop talking about antisemitism? To pretend that it doesn't exist?
Antisemites.
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“Never again?”
Without provocation or warning, Hamas terrorists invaded Israel, intentionally targeting civilians, especially women and children. The goal was not only death and violence, but to strike fear. Moreover, women and children were targeted because the stated goal of Hamas and many of its allies is not merely to remove the state of Israel from the map, but to remove Jewish people from the planet.
It took days and several harmful missteps (calls for “ceasefire”) before President Biden and his administration found their voice. The United States announced that the attacks were barbaric and unacceptable, and we stand on the side of decency and civilization — and with our ally, Israel.
Sadly, the overlay of modern American “team politics” has skewed the only proper response to this atrocity — and the necessary response from Israel. Too many Democrats have sat silently, posted morally weak statements about sadness and ceasefires, or worse, lectured us on why Hamas’ butchery needs to be judged “in context.”
How ironic that the party that is home to virtue-signalers, ever-changing social-media banners for the cause of the day and lawn signs proclaiming “Hate has no home here,” finds itself tongue-tied or worse, explaining away actual, purposeful hate.
There is one notable exception. Conservatives and people of good will must recognize and salute the moral clarity and leadership of Senator John Fetterman. His message has been crystal clear — including hanging the posters of the children held hostage by Hamas on his Senate office wall.
This stands in sharp contrast to those elected officials who continue to lecture us about needing to understand Hamas’ actions “in context,” or those who dare to talk of the barbarism as political “resistance.”
Washington, D.C. has itself become a caricature of moral relativism and selective outrage, a place where partisan power politics is so omnipresent that we are taken aback when genuine statesmanship takes place. Sadly, it’s of no surprise that there are those who are rushing to make sure that any legislation regarding aid packages for Israel’s defense must also include not only aid for the Gaza Strip, but also more aid for Ukraine.
Even in the face of evil — of children being beheaded, raped and held hostage — there are those who see tragedy as leverage to gain political points.
A legislator has the right to be for or against aiding Ukraine, or Israel — or making the aid packages smaller or larger or with added restrictions. That’s all fair game. What is not fair game is abusing bipartisan support for Israel and tying it to additional aid for Ukraine.
I know the game. I’ve worked as a Chief of Staff in Congress and in Harrisburg, twice. It’s just that there are times when we don’t need games — when we should expect better. The mixture of silence, moral relativism, and the political games coming out of D.C. show not only a lack of leadership, but invite other, angrier voices to step into that void.
It was seen in marches and rallies in major cities as crowds gathered with anti-Israel, anti-Semitic and pro-Hamas flags and signs.
And in many ways more frightening, for over three weeks across college campuses — especially Ivy League and “elite” universities, there are not merely pro-Hamas or anti-Israel marches, but actual intimidation and violence threatened as Jewish students are targeted, screamed at and trapped inside dining halls and meeting rooms.
My sense is that some of these screaming students are true anti-Semites, while others have been poorly educated or purposefully misinformed by their professors into believing that Israel persecutes, prosecutes and harasses Muslims and Palestinians — not knowing that Israel gave up the Gaza Strip, leaving behind greenhouses, water desalination plants and water lines; not knowing that Muslims serve as judges and sit in the Israeli Knesset.
And some students are just unthinking lemmings, looking to quickly join what seems to be the cause of the moment — not truly caring about BLM, the Russian-Ukraine war, or the history of Israel or Palestine. Their failing is ignorance and emptiness.
This is why they rip down posters of the children held hostage — many not truly understanding how morally broken and harmful their actions are.
The First Amendment guarantees American citizens a “right of the people to peaceably assemble,” to hold and speak their own values, no matter if they are “wrong” or “offensive.” That does not extend to threatening others or stopping others from speaking — let alone worse.
But colleges don’t teach the importance, the value and the concepts of the First Amendment any more. Colleges lecture about ever-evolving, mythical “hate speech.” Elite universities have led the charge to crush decency and redefine words — carelessly removing true thought and true morality from our campuses.
Today, America’s “best and brightest” are told that Riley Gaines promoting women in sports; Governor Abbott advocating securing the Texas/Mexico border; Moms4Liberty trying to limit the access of books with pictures of oral sex to grade school students; and Jennifer Sey making the case that schools should have reopened sooner during the “lockdowns” are “hate speech.” Yet threatening Jewish students against the backdrop of actual terror attacks is somehow “protected” speech.
In the absence of true leadership, in the absence of moral clarity, evil runs rampant. Hate becomes acceptable.
Many universities have changed America — for the worse. We are seeing this tragically unfold before our eyes. Have current day students never actually studied actual history, the Second World War, seen pictures of the concentration camps — genuine hate speech and barbarism?
Have our elected officials never been to Auschwitz, to the museums in Philadelphia or Washington, D.C.? Do they not truly understand that in reality, for all of our faults — on the world’s scale, ours is the freest, most diverse, most tolerant or most opportunity-based nation on the planet? And, Israel is much more like America than any other Middle Eastern nation — and than many on the planet.
What in God’s name do our politicians and our students think “Never Again” means? It’s not simply a design on a T-shirt, or meme!
For the foreseeable future, people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out—to our families, our communities and in public.
In the longer term, civic leaders, parents, and grandparents must think about how we got here — to a place of moral weakness, misunderstood “tolerance” and the idea that actions do not have consequences…as if life were a game or a college campus, where consequences don’t matter.
We must preserve, protect and defend the First Amendment. Americans should not all think the same and say the same things. But the majority should have unity of purpose and shared values of what America states for. And, we must work even harder to make sure that the clearest, most effective voices are those that promote the values of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
(From the broadandliberty.com website, authored by Guy Ciarrocchi)
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“Never again?”
Over the past few years, the self appointed heroes on the left who have claimed "Of course I would have saved Jews from the Nazis" have taken the side of the modern day Nazis, Hamas.
Never Again is now.
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This is hard to read.
Matt Gurney: What I watched Hamas do
The screams I heard on Monday weren't fake. The monsters at the door weren't actors in a lot of latex. These monsters were real.
MATT GURNEY
NOV 7, 2023
On Nov. 6, one-month-less-a-day after the Hamas assault on southern Israel, I was one of a small number of journalists to receive a briefing by a senior Israeli government official at the Israeli consulate in Toronto. Part of the briefing was the showing of a film, approximately 42 minutes long, that contained video and audio records of the attack. The sights and sounds came from many sources, including home security footage, survivor footage, surveillance cameras at private residences, military facilities and in public places, as well as cameras and Go-Pro-style body worn cameras carried by Hamas. Later in the film, we also see footage taken by Israeli first responders — some of it informally, via body worn cameras and smartphones, but some of it also deliberately and meticulously, as part of the documenting of the attack's aftermath. The video also included audio portions of what the Israeli government claims is intercepted Hamas communications sent during the attack.
I have to preface this near the top: I can't vouch for the authenticity of the videos, or of the translations. I believe that the videos are authentic and the translations accurate — the latter is easier, since it has by now been shown to enough people that any false translations would have been noted by members of the audience, but I don't speak Hebrew or Arabic, and had to rely on the captions. As for the videos, while some of what I saw on Monday was new to me, other clips have already been shared widely on social media. There's a decent chance you've seen some of them, too. For further disclosure, many of the clips are very short — a few seconds each. The Israelis said that in many cases, they are only choosing to release what the families of victims have agreed to allow to be shown. That's an editorial decision, and I haven't seen the unedited videos. I can’t tell you what I wasn’t shown.
So if you're absolutely determined to find a way to discredit or dismiss everything I'm about to say, I'll keep it easy for you. I saw what was presented to me, by Israel, and have little ability to independently confirm any of it.
If you're interested in hearing what I saw, though, here it is.
I should start by telling you I don’t plan to dwell on all the atrocities or try to summarize the whole 42 minutes of carnage I watched in any kind of coherent sequence. It's not that the atrocities aren't important — they're obviously the central point of the briefing for reporters, and what I was asked to bear witness to. My thinking is simply this: much of what I could tell you has been summarized elsewhere. The global media first saw this film, in Israel, two weeks ago; some of my Ottawa-based colleagues saw it last week. If you're looking for a summary of the contents, those exist already. I don't think you'd benefit from just another version of that, and I know I wouldn't enjoy writing one. So in the main, I'll avoid long, descriptive passages where I tell you what I saw. I'll try to offer something different.
But first, let's get this out of the way. I confess that I was afraid when the video started. Simple fear. Fear I'd crack, fear I'd have to look away, fear I'd somehow fail to meet the moment. I don’t know if that was a rational fear — what the hell does meeting the moment even mean? — but I was afraid. I was afraid from the moment I was asked to attend and said yes. As the film began, though, I found many of the videos less graphic than I'd feared, and actually less graphic than some of what I'd already seen and written about. No one should mistake me — the videos are graphic, some of them extremely so. But in many cases, the videos are taken from too far away or from an unsteady camera (particularly the body worn ones) and many of the worst gruesome details are thus obscured or missed.
Not all of them. Lord no, not all. But some. That helped.
There are exceptions. I'll get to them. But I chose to focus mainly on what else was happening in these videos, as the atrocities unfolded. You’ve already heard about the violence. What haven’t you heard much about?
What jumped out at me in many of these videos were the unsettlingly normal details depicting what looked like a pretty normal day, something I found instantly familiar, and suspect you would, too. Early in the presentation, there is footage of Hamas terrorists roaming through a kibbutz unopposed. It seems that many of the civilians have fled or are hiding; they're having a hard time finding anyone. And as they wander through the backyards, I was struck by how utterly banal a scene it was. If you didn’t know what was happening, it’d have been lovely. This truly was, to revive a grimly apt old phrase, the banality of evil.
You see nice gardens, well tended by the owners, something my mom and or my aunt would (for some reason) enjoy pouring countless hours and gallons of sweat into. You see patio furniture with books and newspapers left behind as the residents fled, but if you didn’t know better, you’d think they were inside, putting on the kettle for more tea. The tables are cluttered with mugs and other remnants of all the little details of a normal day in a normal life. The view was something I've seen a thousand times before while visiting friends or neighbours, and what people have seen a thousand times before when visiting me at my home or cottage — a bit of clutter, a few dishes that probably should have gone into the washer already, a garden hose tossed lazily aside instead of being properly coiled back up nice and tight and hung up on its hooks. It's just a pleasant, comfortable outdoor scene, filmed by the people who are hunting for civilians to kill.
They do eventually find some, and murder them in their homes. Other homes they simply set ablaze, patiently holding lighters up to ignite drapes and plants. They shoot a pet dog, too. It doesn't die right away, and seems surprised, more than anything, when it is shot with what looked like an AK-47. It reminded me of one of the dogs I'd had, a weird mutt named Tasha. The dog wasn't attacking the terrorists, it just seemed curious about the newcomers and was sauntering over to check them out when they shot it.
Later clips show further explicit acts of violence. In many instances, the terrorists take care to ensure their victims are dead by shooting them again even after they are down. I view these clips with something of a trained eye, and noted quickly that the shootings are methodical and efficient. The attack force was well-drilled and organized. The killers are mostly task-oriented and focused. They had objectives and stuck to them. But that doesn't mean they weren't having the time of their lives. The National Post's Sabrina Maddeaux was there on Monday as well, and in her column about the briefing, she made a point of flagging something I'd noticed too — glee. Pleasure. Delight. Whooping cheers, selfies with the boys (carefully framed to put dead or captured Jews in the background), huge grins. The attacks were efficient, but not joyless. The Hamas terrorists are thrilled to be doing what they're doing.
And they did so with the benefit of having achieved complete surprise. That’s something else I noticed when I took the time to look past the visceral horror of the murder spree. The Israeli official at the consulate on Monday said, I think correctly, that a full accounting for the failures that made October 7th possible will have to wait until after the war. But there were indeed major failures. Something that jumped out at me over and over in those videos was that the Israeli public had not been alerted and was caught utterly unprepared. There was no warning. They had not had time to take any defensive action. In video after video, I saw people killed after walking or driving into ambushes, or while simply out and about on the streets going about their morning routine. Over and over there is some variation of someone driving toward a few parked cars, oblivious to the danger, and being killed when the Hamas terrorists open fire on them from the side of the road. The murdered Israelis, whom I hope died before really understanding what was happening, are then dragged out of their cars, shot again just to be sure, and often have their phones and other valuables taken. In at least one instance, the Hamas men get into one of the cars and drive away with it. I don’t know if that’s to replace a damaged Hamas vehicle or simply because it was a nice enough car.
It's hard to state how total the surprise seems to have been. I've promised you to mostly spare you blow-by-blow descriptions of what I saw, but I feel as though I have to make an exception here. One video shows a large number of young Israeli women, dressed (barely dressed, to be blunt) in bed clothes and pyjamas, being confined in a large room. Some of them seem to have kept their cellphones and are recording or texting. There are sounds of explosions nearby and the women are terrified, but mostly keeping it together, providing each other comfort and support. A single terrorist is visible in the doorway, cradling a rifle and keeping an eye on the women, who are huddled all together in the far opposite corner. The Israeli official at the briefing explained that these were female soldiers, taken captive when the headquarters they were assigned to was captured early in the attack.
continued...
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part 2
Taken captive in their bed clothes. Tiny shorts and tank tops, light PJs with colourful patterns. A few were in uniform, but most seem to have been asleep when Hamas hit their base, catching them unarmed and barely even dressed. I don't know what became of these women. I don't know why there were no male Israeli POWs in the video, though I can hazard a guess. I do know that someone will have to answer for that kind of failure when this is all over. Those girls never had a chance. How the hell does that happen?
The Israeli official at the briefing explained that these were female soldiers, taken captive when the headquarters they were assigned to was captured early in the attack. Taken captive in their bed clothes. Tiny shorts and tank tops, light PJs with colourful patterns.
Many of the videos shown for us on Monday depict the attack on the music festival. These videos were not the most graphic, but I found them among the most upsetting. Many of the attendees were able to capture and share some videos of what they went through. The events there seemed to have moved slowly, probably due to the sprawling size of the venue, meaning they had time to take and send the videos, but also to realize what was happening and become afraid.
They were right to be afraid. It was a killing field. There wasn't much shelter to be found. The terrain was flat, with not many natural obstacles to hide behind. There was a row of porta-potties, and a Hamas terrorist took time to punch one rifle round through each door; a later photo shows what appears to be those same porta-potties, the doors now open, and one of them splattered with blood, with more pooled on the floor. I guess someone had been hiding inside that one.
Some people escaped by running early enough and fast enough, but many were wounded or slowed by helping the wounded, and a great many seem to have been either gunned down as they ran or were captured trying to hide amid what little cover was available. In one of the most gutting moments of the presentation, a wounded man seems close to escaping, hiding behind a car. (The scene was captured by a dashboard camera in the parking lot.) Hamas terrorists find a different man and march him off and out of the frame, but our wounded man pulls himself slowly almost out of sight. Just when you think he may have escaped notice, a terrorist walks into the frame, casually walks up to the man and shoots him twice with a rifle at point-blank range. Then he wanders off.
There's more. A dumpster seems to have been turned into an improvised shelter by many of the young adults present, and they had time to realize they were in trouble. Many are hurt and bloody. Some are calling out to their mothers and fathers. Then Hamas men find them, and start dragging them away to pickup trucks. They shove as many into the beds as possible and leave with them. Many of them were wounded, all of them were shocked. And as I wrote in an earlier column about this, you don't need to know that much history to know what the sight of Jews being packed tightly into vehicles that will carry them off to their likely deaths is going to ring an awfully grim bell for Jewish people all over the world.
There’s more from the music festival, but the point is made, I think. Many of the clips that follow show what emergency responders found when they began arriving at the sites that had been attacked, after the army had secured the area. There is no pleasant way to say what I'm about to tell you, so I'll just have to say it: you can tell that many of these videos are a number of hours or even days after these people died because the bodies are beginning to change colour and bloat as decomposition begins. (Recent coverage from Israel has recounted how Israeli medical examiners are still working through the carnage of a month ago, due to the sheer number of bodies and body parts that need examination.) Some of these scenes are full of truly appalling sights, including, I sincerely hate having to report, the bodies of women that are nude below the waist and with shirts pulled up, exposing their chests, their legs left spread apart. Many other bodies, including some very small ones, have been burned, sometimes not completely.
These scenes are being documented for the evidence. And a series of photos shows some of the medical examinations, including of more children than I wish to recount. In some cases the bodies are so destroyed it's hard to really tell what they had been. All that’s left is a mass of pulverized viscera or remains burnt into little more than carbonized ash. But sometimes you can tell they were kids because of the pyjamas. I saw a pair of Mickey Mouse PJs wrapped around something that was otherwise pretty unrecognizable and that was probably the hardest moment for me on Monday. My kids used to have PJs a lot like those.
There was also a moment during the briefing on Monday where I felt a strange kind of kinship with the cameraman. He's identified only as a first responder, and the footage is from his body worn camera. (You can tell by his shadow that he was armed with a rifle, so I assume he was a police officer.) It depicts him arriving at the scene of the music festival. He's approaching what looks like a pretty standard beer tent — a place to get a cold drink, a meal and some shade. As the first responder is approaching, he's talking, presumably into a radio, relaying information back to someone unidentified. He reports that he sees a body. And another body. And then another and another and another. Then many. It's a terrible scene, and you can hear tension and fear in his voice, but he's calm. Collected. On-mission. He's doing his job and relaying the info back to his colleagues or commanders. He's also quietly calling out to anyone who might be there. Asking for signs of life. Offering help. Begging people to show him they're alive and need rescue.
But when he gets to the edge of the tent and peers over the counter of the bar, he lets out this little strangled noise. I've been thinking about it for hours and I don't really know how to describe it. He starts rattling off what he's seeing and, just for a moment, his composure broke and he lets out the sound. A sigh? A gasp? A curse? Some tortured combination of all three?
You have to remember, because the camera is body worn, we're seeing it as he sees it. And the sound he makes is in reaction to what he sees when he gets to the beer tent and finds the bodies. So many bodies. A dozen? Twenty? More? It was more than I could take in, everywhere. So many of them that they are stacked in piles. I don't know if they were gunned down in a group and landed that way, or if Hamas fastidiously stacked the corpses of their victims, but it's bodies. Corpses, laying where they fell. It's all that he can see. "Everyone is dead," he reports, or words to that effect. "The stage is full of dead people," he yells — again, that might not be exact, but words close to that. I couldn't take down notes fast enough to get the words precisely right, but the sound I remember perfectly, because even though I basically held it together for the entire presentation, I'm pretty sure that at the moment he gets to the beer tent and sees the corpses piled up in huge pools of congealed blood, I made the exact same sound that he did. The poor man regains his composure and begins checking the bodies before him, moving from victim to victim, looking to render aid. But there’s no one to help.. "She's dead,” he says, almost to himself. “She's dead ... she's dead too ... " You can hear his despair.
There's more I could tell you. But again, you've probably read summaries already, and I think that if I tried to go much further, I'd just be repeating what you’ve already read elsewhere. I've tried above to include details that I hadn't seen in other reports — littler things, more subtle things, that drove home the horror in ways that the sheer violence didn't always manage to do. The barrage of death and murder was relentless and impossible to take in. It was easier, at least for me, to focus on the other details: the total surprise, the night clothes worn by the captured women, the cups on the patio tables. The dog that reminded me of my long-dead mutt. These details, for me, didn't distract from the violence. It amplified it. It made it more real. They were all the tiny details your mind can't imagine and that you'd be forgiven for forgetting. That's why I tried to take as many notes as I could. It was too much, too fast. I hope the details help make it more real for you. They did for me.
To end, I want to make two points.
The first thing might seem like a complete curveball, so please bear with me a moment. Today is not only one month since the attack in Israel, it's also one week since Halloween in North America. Halloween was supposed to be a day when The Line published two columns, one each by Jen Gerson and myself, marking one of our favourite holidays. We did this last year and had a lot of fun with them — and the readers seemed to like them, too. But as Halloween approached this year, the very idea seemed ghastly. How the hell could we talk about scary movies and cheap thrills against the backdrop of these real-life horror shows? The footage from Israel, in many cases, so closely tracks with scenes from many horror films because both tap into a very primal fear: the monster is in the house. That's basically the structure of half of the horror movies you've ever seen, right? The terror of an enemy that can't be negotiated with, or bargained with or reasoned with, that will laugh while they hurt you, because it's fun. And that enemy isn't far away, he's right there, in your garden or your living room, coming through the windows to get you, dragging you out to die. This is a very primal, visceral kind of terror, and while I've traditionally enjoyed a good slasher flick with a bag of popcorn, especially around Halloween, I think it's going to a long time, a very long time before I can ever look at one as entertainment again. The screams I heard on Monday weren't fake. The monsters at the door weren't actors in a lot of latex. These monsters were real.
The second point I want to make is about bravery. I shared some of my early reactions to what I saw on Twitter on Monday, and many people very kindly and generously commended me for my bravery in subjecting myself to that awful video. And I know that's meant well. I really do. And I appreciate it, as the kindness it is intended as. But I showed up in a room in a nice downtown building and I got a briefing. A lot of what I saw was awful, and yes, this stuff absolutely takes a toll on a person. These horrors are just part of me now; it’s poison in my soul that will never go away. But … I just showed up and watched and listened. I knew I was going home at the end. So don’t rush to pin any medals on me, friends. Any bravery I showed on Monday is the very lowest rung on the ladder of courage, and I can say this because a lot of what I saw in those films, though awful, was brave. It was courageous.
I saw people dragging their wounded friends to safety, often being killed in the attempt. I watched captured female soldiers hugging each other, keeping each other calm and safe, fighting to keep contagious panic at bay. I saw a man fleeing the music fest along with a badly wounded woman, keeping his voice calm and soothing as he reassured her that he’d find her help.
And I saw a dad carrying his youngest son into a shelter, his final act before he's killed by a grenade and then shot a few times for good measure.
I want to end by talking about this family. I've left it until now on purpose. If you'd read anything about the media briefing, you'd probably read about this section of the video, because it's probably the most viscerally shocking. It's a dad and two young boys. The dad gets the boys into a shelter but he can't get the door closed and he's killed by a tossed grenade and then shot when he crumples to the ground. The boys wander out. One of them, the smaller one, is badly wounded. He seems to have lost an eye to the grenade's shrapnel — the video is mercifully not clear enough to show that in too much detail, but he's telling his older brother that he can't see out of that eye. They discuss their father being dead while a Hamas terrorist stands in their kitchen, a few feet away, pilfering their fridge for a cold drink. The terrorist casually offers them some food and drink, and leaves when they decline. The boys talk to each other about how their father is dead. "It's not a prank, he's dead," one says to the other. “I know, I saw,” the other agrees.
Seeing that moment was the part of Monday's briefing that I had most feared. That's what I was afraid would break me. I'd read all about it in basically every account of the presentation. And good God, it was awful. I had to take a break writing this part of the column to have myself a good sobbing fit because this is just about the worst thing I have ever seen.
But there was something I hadn't read anywhere else: after their father’s killer stops raiding the fridge and leaves, the older brother grabs a bottle of water and tries to give his younger brother first aid. He tries cleaning out his bloody shrapnel wounds what what supplies he has on hand.
That is bravery. That is courage. Not showing up to watch a video. But being a kid, standing there in your underwear, keeping your wits about you just moments after your dad is murdered before your eyes, and having the presence of mind to grab a bottle of water and do what you can to help your injured little brother.
I hope those kids are okay. They'll go onto great things, I think. So long as Hamas didn't come back later and kill them. I’d love to tell you that didn’t happen, but as of this time, the fate of those two young boys isn’t publicly known.
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people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out—to our families, our communities and in public.
Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies. In order to have the leadership impact that your suggesting, your good will must be trusted, your understanding and interpretation of history needs to be believed valid, your moral clarity thought of as worthy of deferring to and your voice as one that should be valued. I think it is easier to believe any of those things about oneself than it is to actually be worthy of it and harder still to be worthy of it and convince others of that fact.
I am curious, When someone is attempting to lead you in the way that you have described, What are some of the major things that turn you off or turn you away these days, what would you say are the most commonplace failures/ shortcomings? Additionally, let's pretend that you were going to attempt to lead me (let's pretend that you didn't know that I was an incorrigible gelastic weirdo) after I had read your post, what do you think might be the most conspicuous points of skepticism that I might have from just reading your words as you wrote them?
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Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies.
Speaking out against Jew hatred isn't complicated, bro. You just do it.
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Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies.
Speaking out against Jew hatred isn't complicated, bro. You just do it.
You seem very focused on the idea of simplicity when dealing with what I have to say, yet you've spent post after post talking about antisemitism and how it makes you feel and what you think others should feel or do or say, and about the consequences of antisemitism and so on and so forth....can we just dispense with this irrelevant & vacuous non-rebuttal about simplicity and complication...clearly there is alot to talk about here, you know it , I know it, everyone in the thread knows it. It is beginning to feel like a lazy dismissal, and it's boring,when this topic is anything but.
if you actually want to engage, would you like to talk about why the rousing and heartfelt elocutions of those that consider themselves to be possessing goodwill, historical knowledge and moral clarity might find themselves falling flat with young people? Do those things matter when trying to convey the error of antisemitism? If they do matter why isn't it working? are young people just broken? if so how did they get broken? were their parents broken? if so how did their parents get broken? and so on and so forth. If you don't feel like engaging with any of that I understand, but please refrain from telling me how simple something is again, it is literally a waste of your time because it contains no meaning for me.
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You seem very focused on the idea of simplicity when dealing with what I have to say, yet you've spent post after post talking about antisemitism and how it makes you feel and what you think others should feel or do or say, and about the consequences of antisemitism and so on and so forth....can we just dispense with this irrelevant & vacuous non-rebuttal about simplicity and complication...clearly there is alot to talk about here, you know it , I know it, everyone in the thread knows it. It is beginning to feel like a lazy dismissal, and it's boring,when this topic is anything but.
if you actually want to engage, would you like to talk about why the rousing and heartfelt elocutions of those that consider themselves to be possessing goodwill, historical knowledge and moral clarity might find themselves falling flat with young people? Do those things matter when trying to convey the error of antisemitism? If they do matter why isn't it working? are young people just broken? if so how did they get broken? were their parents broken? if so how did their parents get broken? and so on and so forth. If you don't feel like engaging with any of that I understand, but please refrain from telling me how simple something is again, it is literally a waste of your time because it contains no meaning for me.
I don't understand this typing diarrhea. No, there isn't a lot to talk about here. Hating Jews because they are Jews is bad. Go out and say it.
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Because most young people are idiots
Because parents have allowed their children to be indoctrinated by idiots
Because most people get the sum of their information from idiots
Because the church has abandoned traditional concepts of truth and evil has filled the vacuum because Satan is not an idiot
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people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out—to our families, our communities and in public.
Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies. In order to have the leadership impact that your suggesting, your good will must be trusted, your understanding and interpretation of history needs to be believed valid, your moral clarity thought of as worthy of deferring to and your voice as one that should be valued. I think it is easier to believe any of those things about oneself than it is to actually be worthy of it and harder still to be worthy of it and convince others of that fact.
I am curious, When someone is attempting to lead you in the way that you have described, What are some of the major things that turn you off or turn you away these days, what would you say are the most commonplace failures/ shortcomings? Additionally, let's pretend that you were going to attempt to lead me (let's pretend that you didn't know that I was an incorrigible gelastic weirdo) after I had read your post, what do you think might be the most conspicuous points of skepticism that I might have from just reading your words as you wrote them?
I see the the author encouraging right-minded people to speak up with regard to those harboring an irrational and dangerous hatred for Jews. People are free to agree or disagree, as he makes clear. You, on the other hand, seem to think that the escalating antisemitism in the world will just vanish if we don't acknowledge it and call it what it is. Ignore it, and maybe it'll go away, right? Millions of indifferent Gentiles ignored Adolf Hitler's antisemitism for several years as he systematically murdered 6 million people.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.
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You seem very focused on the idea of simplicity when dealing with what I have to say, yet you've spent post after post talking about antisemitism and how it makes you feel and what you think others should feel or do or say, and about the consequences of antisemitism and so on and so forth....can we just dispense with this irrelevant & vacuous non-rebuttal about simplicity and complication...clearly there is alot to talk about here, you know it , I know it, everyone in the thread knows it. It is beginning to feel like a lazy dismissal, and it's boring,when this topic is anything but.
if you actually want to engage, would you like to talk about why the rousing and heartfelt elocutions of those that consider themselves to be possessing goodwill, historical knowledge and moral clarity might find themselves falling flat with young people? Do those things matter when trying to convey the error of antisemitism? If they do matter why isn't it working? are young people just broken? if so how did they get broken? were their parents broken? if so how did their parents get broken? and so on and so forth. If you don't feel like engaging with any of that I understand, but please refrain from telling me how simple something is again, it is literally a waste of your time because it contains no meaning for me.
I don't understand this typing diarrhea. No, there isn't a lot to talk about here. Hating Jews because they are Jews is bad. Go out and say it.
diarrhea, idk that fails to truly capture the intentionality of my rambling doesn't it? It's more like vomit, like I have an eating disorder and I cannot help myself but to vomit up these words. Anyway I really wish you'd stop insulting me, If I lose my temper i'm going to get in trouble, not you.
Anyway yeah, I agree, hating Jews because they are Jews is bad, same with any people and nearly all features and attributes that people have no control over. It is simple enough to say 'don't hate jews' in whatever language is familiar to you. This is so simple in fact that I find that it is hardly worth talking about. What I do think is worth talking about it why wouldn't people listen? I think it's interesting to talk about why people say they hate the Jews, heck I think it's really interesting to talk about what constitutes hating the jews in your opinion. I mean Killing Jews it's obvious, but I'd bet money that there are some less obvious ones in there too.
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people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out—to our families, our communities and in public.
Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies. In order to have the leadership impact that your suggesting, your good will must be trusted, your understanding and interpretation of history needs to be believed valid, your moral clarity thought of as worthy of deferring to and your voice as one that should be valued. I think it is easier to believe any of those things about oneself than it is to actually be worthy of it and harder still to be worthy of it and convince others of that fact.
I am curious, When someone is attempting to lead you in the way that you have described, What are some of the major things that turn you off or turn you away these days, what would you say are the most commonplace failures/ shortcomings? Additionally, let's pretend that you were going to attempt to lead me (let's pretend that you didn't know that I was an incorrigible gelastic weirdo) after I had read your post, what do you think might be the most conspicuous points of skepticism that I might have from just reading your words as you wrote them?
I see the the author encouraging right-minded people to speak up with regard to those harboring an irrational and dangerous hatred for Jews. People are free to agree or disagree, as he makes clear. You, on the other hand, seem to think that the escalating antisemitism in the world will just vanish if we don't acknowledge it and call it what it is. Ignore it, and maybe it'll go away, right? Millions of indifferent Gentiles ignored Adolf Hitler's antisemitism for several years as he systematically murdered 6 million people.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.
Well, I actually don't think that antisemitism will disappear if people just ignore it, I was wondering what other people thought of that idea. I do not know that i'd describe the west's reaction to Hitler as overall indifferent in the sense that folks in allied countries were fine with Jews but didn't really care if Hitler hated them. Instead, I think that the allied countries were chock full of racists too and they didn't do anything about the Nazis because they didn't exactly disagree with many of the fundaments of Nazi ideology. Apparently my reading of WW2 where the Japanese were monsters that the west helped create through their insatiable thirst for colonial wealth, is the view of an ignorant person. As you can imagine, I have no hope that my reading of the Nazis being born and nurtured by the racist warmongering ideas and policies of the west will be any better received. Having said that, taking the idea that allied powers were racially progressive good guys that were standing up against the backward racial intolerance of the Nazis is a downright dangerous distortion of the character of these nations who were IMO all very racist and to this day are some matter of degrees off from a full 180.
EDIT: BTW, do you have any interests in answering my initial questions, I really am curious about what you would have to say?
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Because most young people are idiots
Because parents have allowed their children to be indoctrinated by idiots
Because most people get the sum of their information from idiots
Because the church has abandoned traditional concepts of truth and evil has filled the vacuum because Satan is not an idiot
You've used the word idiot quite a bit, what do you mean by this word? Do you mean that they lack intellectual ability or that they are immature or myopic or something like that?
Why would parents allow their children to be indoctrinated by idiots? Where did the indoctrinating idiots come from?
I know that this question really gets folk's goats, but I have to ask... When do you think the church abandoned traditional concepts of truth and evil causing this Satan filled vacuum? Please be as precise as you canby specifying a year , a decade, a century or a millennia ?
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people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out—to our families, our communities and in public.
Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies. In order to have the leadership impact that your suggesting, your good will must be trusted, your understanding and interpretation of history needs to be believed valid, your moral clarity thought of as worthy of deferring to and your voice as one that should be valued. I think it is easier to believe any of those things about oneself than it is to actually be worthy of it and harder still to be worthy of it and convince others of that fact.
I am curious, When someone is attempting to lead you in the way that you have described, What are some of the major things that turn you off or turn you away these days, what would you say are the most commonplace failures/ shortcomings? Additionally, let's pretend that you were going to attempt to lead me (let's pretend that you didn't know that I was an incorrigible gelastic weirdo) after I had read your post, what do you think might be the most conspicuous points of skepticism that I might have from just reading your words as you wrote them?
I'd have thought the simple questions to be asking were whether the attacks are accurately described. If they are not, we can ignore the reports and get on with our lives.
From the descriptions I've seen I'd say that if 75% of it is totally fabricated the remaining 25% is still enough to be horrified. Yes, videos can be selectively edited and cut but when there's talk of piles of bodies presumably they relate to people who were once living. If you want to claim that they were the bodies of people who died for some other reason and were stacked in one place to make a point that reality doesn't actually support then go ahead, but once you get past a certain number of accounts you have to start to wonder whether they are all so fabricated. Or you can accept that a group that openly hates Jews might have attacked Jews and killed Jews, just for being Jews.
As Fenris said, hating Jews just for being Jews is evil. It's just as evil as hating blacks for being black.
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Because most young people are idiots
Because parents have allowed their children to be indoctrinated by idiots
Because most people get the sum of their information from idiots
Because the church has abandoned traditional concepts of truth and evil has filled the vacuum because Satan is not an idiot
You've used the word idiot quite a bit, what do you mean by this word? Do you mean that they lack intellectual ability or that they are immature or myopic or something like that?
Why would parents allow their children to be indoctrinated by idiots? Where did the indoctrinating idiots come from?
I know that this question really gets folk's goats, but I have to ask... When do you think the church abandoned traditional concepts of truth and evil causing this Satan filled vacuum? Please be as precise as you canby specifying a year , a decade, a century or a millennia ?
As to your definitional questions, yes.
Parents allow idiots to indoctrinate their children because the parents are idiots
The idiots indoctrinating the idiot parents’ idiot children are the product of the idiotic public indoctrination system and its evil duocephalous twin the public and private university.
The church in the USA lost its moral ground when it traded God and faith in God for political power with the rise of the Moral Majorityin the late 70s. That and the rise of end times rapture escapism create a generation of theological and spiritual idiotic Christian’s that don’t know the Bible and wouldn’t know Jesus if he walked up and spit in their faces. The church traded piety for political power, holiness for hedonism, and morality for money. Claiming a faith and godliness but denying its power.
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people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out—to our families, our communities and in public.
Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies. In order to have the leadership impact that your suggesting, your good will must be trusted, your understanding and interpretation of history needs to be believed valid, your moral clarity thought of as worthy of deferring to and your voice as one that should be valued. I think it is easier to believe any of those things about oneself than it is to actually be worthy of it and harder still to be worthy of it and convince others of that fact.
I am curious, When someone is attempting to lead you in the way that you have described, What are some of the major things that turn you off or turn you away these days, what would you say are the most commonplace failures/ shortcomings? Additionally, let's pretend that you were going to attempt to lead me (let's pretend that you didn't know that I was an incorrigible gelastic weirdo) after I had read your post, what do you think might be the most conspicuous points of skepticism that I might have from just reading your words as you wrote them?
I'd have thought the simple questions to be asking were whether the attacks are accurately described. If they are not, we can ignore the reports and get on with our lives.
From the descriptions I've seen I'd say that if 75% of it is totally fabricated the remaining 25% is still enough to be horrified. Yes, videos can be selectively edited and cut but when there's talk of piles of bodies presumably they relate to people who were once living. If you want to claim that they were the bodies of people who died for some other reason and were stacked in one place to make a point that reality doesn't actually support then go ahead, but once you get past a certain number of accounts you have to start to wonder whether they are all so fabricated. Or you can accept that a group that openly hates Jews might have attacked Jews and killed Jews, just for being Jews.
As Fenris said, hating Jews just for being Jews is evil. It's just as evil as hating blacks for being black.
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Hmm, I guess i'm not sure what answers you thought I was seeking with my post. What is it that you think i'm asking after?
Let me try and put it this way, In Sojourners post the author wrote that people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out. I saw that and immediately thought about how many people appear to believe themselves to be persons of superlative goodwill having deep encyclopedic historical knowledge and unshakable moral clarity, all topped off with just the right mix of eloquence, pithiness and charm to communicate it to anyone who will listen. Then I thought about how I would characterize the actual accounting those folks gave of themselves when given an opportunity, or when pressed or when observed talking about some other topic. I think that it is an exceedingly rare skillset that it is much easier to overestimate in oneself or to pretend to possess than it is to actually be the kind of person that plants and cultivates ideas within others. I thought the whole piece contained the seeds of its own failure to achieve the sort of thing that it presumably sought to do, or at least motivate others to do. Do you want to talk about that?
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As to your definitional questions, yes.
Parents allow idiots to indoctrinate their children because the parents are idiots
So, is it idiots all the way down then? When it comes to evaluating and understanding the the morality of most situations that people are likely to encounter what degree of intelligence do you think is required (low? medium? high? just looking for a general sense).
On a somewhat related note, do you think that perhaps you've interpreted some of my posts in the past as gasconading my intellectual superiority and belittling your intellect because you maintain a disparaging demeanor of superiority regarding the intelligence of large swaths of the population?
The idiots indoctrinating the idiot parents’ idiot children are the product of the idiotic public indoctrination system and its evil duocephalous twin the public and private university.
While I understand that you value word economy, the implications of your statement are so broad that your laconic style is at odds with actually being able to get anything but a very basic and superficial sense of what you believe is happening, how it happens or even what exactly you think happens at institutions of higher learning. Do you care to flesh out your idea with more detail?
The church in the USA lost its moral ground when it traded God and faith in God for political power with the rise of the Moral Majorityin the late 70s. That and the rise of end times rapture escapism create a generation of theological and spiritual idiotic Christian’s that don’t know the Bible and wouldn’t know Jesus if he walked up and spit in their faces. The church traded piety for political power, holiness for hedonism, and morality for money. Claiming a faith and godliness but denying its power.
I suspect this will go over like a fart at church, but I'd be remiss if I did not ask how you reconcile the churches' complicity in things like the racist attitudes, deeds and policies of the American south with the idea that the church had previously stood on moral ground? There are of course many areas where the Church demonstrated something less than Godly piety and holiness, but we gotta start somewhere right?
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people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out—to our families, our communities and in public.
Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies. In order to have the leadership impact that your suggesting, your good will must be trusted, your understanding and interpretation of history needs to be believed valid, your moral clarity thought of as worthy of deferring to and your voice as one that should be valued. I think it is easier to believe any of those things about oneself than it is to actually be worthy of it and harder still to be worthy of it and convince others of that fact.
I am curious, When someone is attempting to lead you in the way that you have described, What are some of the major things that turn you off or turn you away these days, what would you say are the most commonplace failures/ shortcomings? Additionally, let's pretend that you were going to attempt to lead me (let's pretend that you didn't know that I was an incorrigible gelastic weirdo) after I had read your post, what do you think might be the most conspicuous points of skepticism that I might have from just reading your words as you wrote them?
I'd have thought the simple questions to be asking were whether the attacks are accurately described. If they are not, we can ignore the reports and get on with our lives.
From the descriptions I've seen I'd say that if 75% of it is totally fabricated the remaining 25% is still enough to be horrified. Yes, videos can be selectively edited and cut but when there's talk of piles of bodies presumably they relate to people who were once living. If you want to claim that they were the bodies of people who died for some other reason and were stacked in one place to make a point that reality doesn't actually support then go ahead, but once you get past a certain number of accounts you have to start to wonder whether they are all so fabricated. Or you can accept that a group that openly hates Jews might have attacked Jews and killed Jews, just for being Jews.
As Fenris said, hating Jews just for being Jews is evil. It's just as evil as hating blacks for being black.
Hmm, I guess i'm not sure what answers you thought I was seeking with my post. What is it that you think i'm asking after?
Let me try and put it this way, In Sojourners post the author wrote that people of goodwill, who understand history and who possess moral clarity, must speak up and speak out. I saw that and immediately thought about how many people appear to believe themselves to be persons of superlative goodwill having deep encyclopedic historical knowledge and unshakable moral clarity, all topped off with just the right mix of eloquence, pithiness and charm to communicate it to anyone who will listen. Then I thought about how I would characterize the actual accounting those folks gave of themselves when given an opportunity, or when pressed or when observed talking about some other topic. I think that it is an exceedingly rare skillset that it is much easier to overestimate in oneself or to pretend to possess than it is to actually be the kind of person that plants and cultivates ideas within others. I thought the whole piece contained the seeds of its own failure to achieve the sort of thing that it presumably sought to do, or at least motivate others to do. Do you want to talk about that?
[/quote]
All this seems like yet another distraction from the topic of antisemitism.
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Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies. In order to have the leadership impact that your suggesting, your good will must be trusted, your understanding and interpretation of history needs to be believed valid, your moral clarity thought of as worthy of deferring to and your voice as one that should be valued. I think it is easier to believe any of those things about oneself than it is to actually be worthy of it and harder still to be worthy of it and convince others of that fact.
"People of goodwill" refers to amiable, kind-hearted folks. Understanding history means having a factual perspective of history. Having moral clarity simply refers to the ability to properly discern the right and wrong of a given matter. These attributes are generally self-evident in one possessing wisdom, sound judgment, good character and reputation. So, if you want assess the value of a person's leadership, I would say these qualities are a measure of the veracity of one's word and reliability of his guidance. That said, if someone hates Jews simply because they're Jews, said guidance is a moot point.
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Not to poo poo or abstract your entire heartfelt and rousing speech to a single idea, but I do think that this is where a major sticking point lies. In order to have the leadership impact that your suggesting, your good will must be trusted, your understanding and interpretation of history needs to be believed valid, your moral clarity thought of as worthy of deferring to and your voice as one that should be valued. I think it is easier to believe any of those things about oneself than it is to actually be worthy of it and harder still to be worthy of it and convince others of that fact.
"People of goodwill" refers to amiable, kind-hearted folks. Understanding history means having a factual perspective of history. Having moral clarity simply refers to the ability to properly discern the right and wrong of a given matter. These attributes are generally self-evident in one possessing wisdom, sound judgment, good character and reputation. So, if you want assess the value of a person's leadership, I would say these qualities are a measure of the veracity of one's word and reliability of his guidance. That said, if someone hates Jews simply because their Jews, said guidance is a moot point.
Would you say that using your paradigm places a lot of trust in one's own ability to discern between self evident characteristics that are actually reflective of the reality of a leader's character and practiced simulation of the behaviors and trappings of such a leader? Is there something that distinguishes what you are saying here from an assertion that "I can just tell".
Regarding the mootness of attempting to guide antisemites, Do you believe that being anti-Semitic, engaging in anti-Semitic behaviors and or holding anti semitic beliefs renders a person impervious to change , growth or development?
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I think that it is an exceedingly rare skillset that it is much easier to overestimate in oneself or to pretend to possess than it is to actually be the kind of person that plants and cultivates ideas within others. I thought the whole piece contained the seeds of its own failure to achieve the sort of thing that it presumably sought to do, or at least motivate others to do. Do you want to talk about that?
This is a pitiful excuse for doing nothing in the face of incomprehensible evil. But you be you.
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I think that it is an exceedingly rare skillset that it is much easier to overestimate in oneself or to pretend to possess than it is to actually be the kind of person that plants and cultivates ideas within others. I thought the whole piece contained the seeds of its own failure to achieve the sort of thing that it presumably sought to do, or at least motivate others to do. Do you want to talk about that?
This is a pitiful excuse for doing nothing in the face of incomprehensible evil. But you be you.
Is it incomprehensible? You seem to be constantly asserting that it is all very simple and easy to understand and any gesture toward the idea that that there is anything beyond the most superficial and cursory interpretation of everything from the zeitgeist in Meiji restoration era Japan to the intrinsic value of kidnappers is met with contemptuous incredulity followed by some accusation of cowardice, inaction or cavalier disregard for human life or basic reason...I think you ran out of dramatic sounding descriptors that actually applied so you used "incomprehensible" because it is apparently much more important to you that you say something that feels hostile toward whatever imaginary version of me that you are clinging to than it is to actually say something cogent. Your decision to be so bafoonishly arch is turning your critique of my use of fictional characters into a pitiful self parody. I'm sorry that you are being reminded just how racist the world is, I'm sorry that you have to watch as the pain and torment of your people feeds the confidence of racists that not too long ago used to feel like they needed speak in dog whistles and subterfuge, I'm sorry that any genuine nuance surrounding any of this will most assuredly be used to obfuscate and muddy everything true about this situation in an attempt to justify and perpetuate more hate and more racism and more ways to attempt to assassinate your people as well as your people's character....having said all that though, i'm not doing this to you or your people by thinking and speaking on my thoughts, you can be basic if you like, but I wouldn't be even if I could.
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Would you say that using your paradigm places a lot of trust in one's own ability to discern between self evident characteristics that are actually reflective of the reality of a leader's character and practiced simulation of the behaviors and trappings of such a leader? Is there something that distinguishes what you are saying here from an assertion that "I can just tell".
Exchanges with you are frequently convoluted. Self-evident means self-evident. You either recognize authentic qualities that instill confidence in a person's ability to lead, or you don't. If what he's saying makes sense, heed his advice, and if it doesn't, ignore him. The author is simply encouraging moral, right-minded people to speak out against an escalating antisemitic mentality that can only be detrimental. It's not complicated.
Regarding the mootness of attempting to guide antisemites, Do you believe that being anti-Semitic, engaging in anti-Semitic behaviors and or holding anti semitic beliefs renders a person impervious to change , growth or development?
Anyone can change for the better if they are amenable to such change. However, those investing time and energy in an emotion-driven campaign of hate and violence are generally not engaging in the soul-searching required to embrace such change. With that, I'm done here.
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Is it incomprehensible? You seem to be constantly asserting that it is all very simple and easy to understand and any gesture toward the idea that that there is anything beyond the most superficial and cursory interpretation of everything from the zeitgeist in Meiji restoration era Japan...
Blah blah blah.
It isn't too much to ask that people stop treating Jews badly simply because they're Jews.
Typing a whole paragraph of pseudo intellectual nonsense to cover up moral cowardice. Shaking my head here.
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Is it incomprehensible? You seem to be constantly asserting that it is all very simple and easy to understand and any gesture toward the idea that that there is anything beyond the most superficial and cursory interpretation of everything from the zeitgeist in Meiji restoration era Japan...
Blah blah blah.
It isn't too much to ask that people stop treating Jews badly simply because they're Jews.
Typing a whole paragraph of pseudo intellectual nonsense to cover up moral cowardice. Shaking my head here.
The pseudo-intellectual nonsense is just my personality and not something that i'm doing in order to try to obfuscate my cowardice. It obviously wouldn't work anyway because you have every confidence that you can see right through everything that I say and can peer directly into my lilly liver.
Our exchanges are an example to me of why some folks find listening to folks like you extremely difficult. While I do not think that mere hypocrisy or a cartoonish adherence to a simplistic that's-that, just-so view of the world is a refutation of a valid point in and of itself, I think it does illustrate why it's not the least bit confusing that people see that attitude and convulse with rejection of the ideas presented by the person with it. I do not know if you agree with Rabbi that the world is full of idiots, but you do seem to not understand that your hostility toward whatever I say is the same kind of blind all encompassing unreasonable hostility that keeps folks from listening to anything you and others like you have to say. You are not completely wrong, but the only people that are going to listen are those that either agree with the ancillary guff that makes up your worldview, or people who can hear you out in spite of it.
You seem to want folks to listen in spite of any of your shortcomings and less than stellar views(if you even recognize that you have any shortcomings or less than stellar views).You seem to want folks to be the second type of person that doesn't have to agree with the whole of your deal so long as they can agree that Anti-semitism is wrong and needs to be eradicated. Unfortunately you do not want to be the kind of person yourself when it comes to other sets of topics. This thread seems to be full of folks wondering how something so obvious as rejecting anti-Semitism could fail to gain universal footing. Many have explained it away with supernatural this and that, with assertions that people are just too dumb to understand, That people are too cowardly to embrace justice.
No one seems to be willing to consider that maybe there are some false positives in there whereby criticism isn't the same as accepting anti semitism. If I don't believe that people that commit such and such terroristic crime or hold this or that horrible view is is now a worthless irredeemable person, then I get chucked into the antisemite or supporter of terrorism pile. The world of people that don't exactly agree with you and the world of people that want you dead at all costs are all mushed up into one in your mind.
You seem incapable of considering the possibility that the people you would hold up as those of good will, historical knowledge, and moral clarity might not be viewed as such because of their other views attitudes and approach. Wile I believe that a good idea is a good idea even if the messenger is a dirtbag, that isn't how you act and it isn't what you actually promote and because of that it is incomprehensible that you actually feel that you should expect it. People that cannot separate the idea that Israel has made choices that were not in the best interest of Palestinians from the idea that Israel deserves retributive acts from the Palestinians for those transgressions are people that think in the same shallow binary way that you do. People that cannot both hold that Israel deserves criticism for bad choices they made that hurt people and that Israel is not irredeemably evil aren't doing some alien form of thinking that only idiots do, they are doing the kind of thinking that you have consistently demonstrated.
You do not seem to think that there is any room to do anymore considering than you have already done. You do not seem to think that your thinking could be improved in any way on this issue, and you do not see any parallels between your own rigid reactionary judgemental overly simplistic way of thinking and that of the people that will never ever hear you because they are doing the exact same thing. I think that there actually is a solution and it doesn't require an exorcism, or magic or a decision to be a coward . I think that acting better is a good place to start...act better than you have to, act better than you want to, act better than the people around you deserve, act better than you actually are... I think that thinking better is a fine place to begin acting better....But who wants to listen to a coward.
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The pseudo-intellectual nonsense is just my personality
Understood. Your personality renders you incapable of calling out injustice.
Our exchanges are an example to me of why some folks find listening to folks like you extremely difficult. While I do not think that mere hypocrisy or a cartoonish adherence to a simplistic that's-that, just-so view of the world is a refutation of a valid point in and of itself, I think it does illustrate why it's not the least bit confusing that people see that attitude and convulse with rejection of the ideas presented by the person with it.
You are not presenting any ideas. All you are saying is that "things are complicated". And sometimes they are. Higher mathematics is complicated. Particle physics is complicated. Microbiology and biochemistry are complicated. Understanding the nature of God is complicated. Studying the Talmud is complicated.
You know what's not complicated? Calling out racism and bigotry and antisemitism. That's very simple.
Unfortunately George Orwell was correct. 'Some ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals believe them.' Cicero made a similar observation some 2,000 years ago. "There is nothing so absurd that some philosopher has not already said it."
I do not know if you agree with Rabbi that the world is full of idiots, but you do seem to not understand that your hostility toward whatever I say is the same kind of blind all encompassing unreasonable hostility that keeps folks from listening to anything you and others like you have to say.
Dude. I'm a religious Jewish guy. On a Christian message board. I have no problem listening to ideas that I disagree with. The qualifier being that they need to be grounded in some sort of internal consistency and logic. And nothing that you are saying is that. Jews are being attacked all over the world. And your supposedly deep response is "wellll its comliiiiiicated".
This thread seems to be full of folks wondering how something so obvious as rejecting anti-Semitism could fail to gain universal footing.
I'm not wondering. It doesn't have universal footing because that's how prevalent Jew hatred is. Because most people, in spite of what they may believe, are not moral individuals.
And then there's you, standing on the sidelines. Because "its complicated".
No one seems to be willing to consider that maybe there are some false positives in there whereby criticism isn't the same as accepting anti semitism.
Yes, and I'm also told that someone can be "anti Zionist" without being a Jew hater. And yet every Anti Zionist also hates Jews.
Crazy, right?
You seem incapable of considering the possibility that the people you would hold up as those of good will, historical knowledge, and moral clarity might not be viewed as such because of their other views attitudes and approach. Wile I believe that a good idea is a good idea even if the messenger is a dirtbag, that isn't how you act and it isn't what you actually promote and because of that it is incomprehensible that you actually feel that you should expect it. People that cannot separate the idea that Israel has made choices that were not in the best interest of Palestinians from the idea that Israel deserves retributive acts from the Palestinians for those transgressions are people that think in the same shallow binary way that you do. People that cannot both hold that Israel deserves criticism for bad choices they
Israel is a country. Like any other country, it is ruled by people. People who are flawed and can make mistakes. And yet. Nobody claims that other countries don't have the right to exist. They save that gem for Israel and Israel alone. Now why should that be, O great intellectual mind?
You do not seem to think that there is any room to do anymore considering than you have already done. You do not seem to think that your thinking could be improved in any way on this issue, and you do not see any parallels between your own rigid reactionary judgemental overly simplistic way of thinking and that of the people that will never ever hear you because they are doing the exact same thing. I think that there actually is a solution and it doesn't require an exorcism, or magic or a decision to be a coward . I think that acting better is a good place to start...act better than you have to, act better than you want to, act better than the people around you deserve, act better than you actually are... I think that thinking better is a fine place to begin acting better....But who wants to listen to a coward.
Well, yes. If "thinking better" means "incapable of making a simple moral judgement on bigotry" then I'm fine the way I am. Thanks.
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Last night, actress Gal Gadot chaired a screening of videos taken by Hamas on 10/7 at the LA Museum of Tolerance. Attendees were attacked outside by pro Hamas protestors.
Today there were shots fired at two Jewish schools in Montreal.
A poll taken by the Jewish Federation shows that 70% of American Jews fear for their safety.
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The pseudo-intellectual nonsense is just my personality
Understood. Your personality renders you incapable of calling out injustice.
Our exchanges are an example to me of why some folks find listening to folks like you extremely difficult. While I do not think that mere hypocrisy or a cartoonish adherence to a simplistic that's-that, just-so view of the world is a refutation of a valid point in and of itself, I think it does illustrate why it's not the least bit confusing that people see that attitude and convulse with rejection of the ideas presented by the person with it.
You are not presenting any ideas. All you are saying is that "things are complicated". And sometimes they are. Higher mathematics is complicated. Particle physics is complicated. Microbiology and biochemistry are complicated. Understanding the nature of God is complicated. Studying the Talmud is complicated.
You know what's not complicated? Calling out racism and bigotry and antisemitism. That's very simple.
Unfortunately George Orwell was correct. 'Some ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals believe them.' Cicero made a similar observation some 2,000 years ago. "There is nothing so absurd that some philosopher has not already said it."
I've presented plenty of ideas, you just pretty consistently choose to clip out a sentence or 2 and then restate it as something completely different than what I was saying. In the sense that "racism is complicated" was ever an assertion of mine (it never really was) and not just something that you attributed to me because you refuse to see what i'm actually saying (it absolutely is), The complicated part has never been that it's not so simple to call out racism or even label it as bad, it has always been that I reject the idea that if a person engages in racism then labeling them as evil and worthless is somehow the only acceptable view and anything short of that is either cowardice or support for racism. What you mean by "calling it out" is a very narrow set of acceptable stances and appearently everything outside of that is bitter ashes in your mouth that you absolutely must spit out at me even if that is a position that you completely made up based on an unrelated post. More to the point, the exchange that prompted you to take me to task for my assertion that calling out antisemitism is complicated had nothing whatsoever to do with me suggesting that calling out antisemitism was complicated. Instead I was trying to talk about why instances of people of goodwill, knowledge of history and moral clarity might fall on deaf ears in the context of the piece that Sojourner posted. Instead you come along to completely misinterpret what I was asking as some sort of assertion about the complexity of calling out antisemitism. Again, your ridiculous behavior is a prime example of why It would require me to muster the best version of myself to not think of this everytime you want to make a point so that I would be able to judge it on its merits and not on your absolute clownery...and that was what I was trying to talk about, but lets see how you ignore this and go on to tell me about how I'm using all my pretty words to hide the fact that i'm afraid of racists or whatever.
I do not know if you agree with Rabbi that the world is full of idiots, but you do seem to not understand that your hostility toward whatever I say is the same kind of blind all encompassing unreasonable hostility that keeps folks from listening to anything you and others like you have to say.
Dude. I'm a religious Jewish guy. On a Christian message board. I have no problem listening to ideas that I disagree with. The qualifier being that they need to be grounded in some sort of internal consistency and logic. And nothing that you are saying is that. Jews are being attacked all over the world. And your supposedly deep response is "wellll its comliiiiiicated".
well, maybe you are really good at it usually Fenris, but in our exchanges you have made a piss poor showing of it...so I do not believe you. Again you've completely made up this idea that my response to Jews being attacked is "well, it's complicated". You spent a significant portion of your time in this thread bemoaning the reaction that the world is having to the attacks and in so many words asking why the world will not "call out" the antisemitism in the way you appearently want them to. I think that outside of the fact that a lot of people are racist, the answer is, i'd argue, that many people are repulsed by the views and bearing of folks like you that believe themselves to be people of goodwill, possessing knowledge of history and strong moral clarity, but cannot even hear what a person with a slightly different view on an admittedly hot button issue is saying much less stop yourself from accusing them of all manner of derisive nonsense, cannot help but be absolutely belligerent and hostile toward the very prospect of listening to the suggestion that there is any complexity to the matter if they get the inkling that it might have the slightest chance of vaguely humanizing those that they refuse to accept as having any humanizing traits, Cannot accept anything short of consigning to worthlessness the humans you deem irredeemable else be tarred as cowards and so on...I think that actually is the complication, it is complicated to listen to or be lead on moral issues by people that demonstrate their moral...unreliability at every turn and wouldn't admit it even if they could see it, but they also cannot see it.
This thread seems to be full of folks wondering how something so obvious as rejecting anti-Semitism could fail to gain universal footing.
I'm not wondering. It doesn't have universal footing because that's how prevalent Jew hatred is. Because most people, in spite of what they may believe, are not moral individuals.
And then there's you, standing on the sidelines. Because "its complicated".
Again, a position that you made up for me. I do agree though, people believe they are moral when they are not. People believe they see through the BS when they are just cultivating their own heap of BS. People think they have the answers, that they've solved everyone else when they have not. You won't see past yourself because you don't think you need to, because you think you already have, and so too do many of the racists the you pride yourself on calling out.
No one seems to be willing to consider that maybe there are some false positives in there whereby criticism isn't the same as accepting anti semitism.
Yes, and I'm also told that someone can be "anti Zionist" without being a Jew hater. And yet every Anti Zionist also hates Jews.
Crazy, right?
How would you ever know? if you've demonstrated anything it's that if someone says anything short of PURE EVIL! IRREDEAMBLE! then you are incapable of listening and just gleefully label them as whatever you want.
Your mind is made up, and it's inconceivable to you that a good reason to unmake it exists anywhere. If you had done anything but repeatedly with a self satisfied confidence show that you are pot committed to calling out what you view as morally objectionable ideas by ignoring, misconstruing misquoting and otherwise taking the least generous reading of everything i've said and using it to brand me with the most ignominious motives, intent and character that you could muster then I might believe that you haven't done the same to at least some of the people that you've labeled as Anti-zionists...as it stands it would not surprise me if at some point a guy said in passing that Israel should maybe reconsider their policy on supply truck access to the Gaza strip, and you flipped out and called him a disgusting Anti-Zionist anti-Semite that wants to see people of Israel blown up by a fleet of c4 laced box trucks.
You seem incapable of considering the possibility that the people you would hold up as those of good will, historical knowledge, and moral clarity might not be viewed as such because of their other views attitudes and approach. Wile I believe that a good idea is a good idea even if the messenger is a dirtbag, that isn't how you act and it isn't what you actually promote and because of that it is incomprehensible that you actually feel that you should expect it. People that cannot separate the idea that Israel has made choices that were not in the best interest of Palestinians from the idea that Israel deserves retributive acts from the Palestinians for those transgressions are people that think in the same shallow binary way that you do. People that cannot both hold that Israel deserves criticism for bad choices they
Israel is a country. Like any other country, it is ruled by people. People who are flawed and can make mistakes. And yet. Nobody claims that other countries don't have the right to exist. They save that gem for Israel and Israel alone. Now why should that be, O great intellectual mind?
Man, this place is full of folks that are so judgemental of other people's intelligence and insecure about their own intellect that you guys really can't imagine that an appearently intelligent person doesn't think that IQ is all that important or crucial to any of these discussions much less that i'd value lording my intelligence over you for some reason. The only person in this conversation that is obsessed with intelligence levels or how intellectual anything sounds is you. Don't put your insecurities on me bro.
To the point, I guess death to America the great satan doesn't count really? I'd count it, but I can see how you could argue that the Israel hate is on a different level. I hope that you are just asking this as an aside and not because you thought that my point was that people don't irrationally hate Israel, because like, I was saying the exact opposite. Anyway, Israel or Jews are not the only people/country that anyone has wanted to completely eradicate, although it may have the longest standing genocidal imperative against it. Israel is also not the only country currently or throughout history whose right to exist has been disputed, rejected or fought over. So, on the face of it your assertion that Israel is unique in this way is incorrect.
You do not seem to think that there is any room to do anymore considering than you have already done. You do not seem to think that your thinking could be improved in any way on this issue, and you do not see any parallels between your own rigid reactionary judgemental overly simplistic way of thinking and that of the people that will never ever hear you because they are doing the exact same thing. I think that there actually is a solution and it doesn't require an exorcism, or magic or a decision to be a coward . I think that acting better is a good place to start...act better than you have to, act better than you want to, act better than the people around you deserve, act better than you actually are... I think that thinking better is a fine place to begin acting better....But who wants to listen to a coward.
Well, yes. If "thinking better" means "incapable of making a simple moral judgement on bigotry" then I'm fine the way I am. Thanks.
No, I don't think that thinking better would prevent a person from making moral judgements on bigotry. I think it would make one less likely to make a judgement like "this person is a bigot, therefore they are worthless & irredeemably evil and do not now and cannot ever in the future have any value to society"
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I've presented plenty of ideas...
I started this topic for two reasons.
The first, to highlight the plight of Jews in the world today.
And the second, to share my own personal feelings of isolation and to perhaps get some moral support.
You're not helping with either. If anything, you're making things worse.
So I am asking you, politely, to bow out of this discussion.
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I've presented plenty of ideas...
I started this topic for two reasons.
The first, to highlight the plight of Jews in the world today.
And the second, to share my own personal feelings of isolation and to perhaps get some moral support.
You're not helping with either. If anything, you're making things worse.
So I am asking you, politely, to bow out of this discussion.
Okay, I will bow out. I hope you get what you need.
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I'm Arab and I Don't Understand Why the World Can't Acknowledge Jewish Pain
Nov 13, 2023 at 9:59 AM EST
By Hussain Abdul-Hussain
research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Many many years ago, I learned Hebrew out of curiosity and in a bid to penetrate into a world that I once thought was evil and conspiring against the Arabs and Muslims. Once in, I was surprised how wrong I was, how wrong almost every Arab and Muslim around me was. Israel was not on a mission to kill us all, was not conspiring against us. Israel wanted to live, and let live. In the Middle East, it's we, the Arabs, who never seem to let live, even if that means that we die.
These days, I watch both Hebrew networks and Arabic ones. The Israelis are suffering immense pain over the 1,200 of them who Hamas killed in cold blood on 10/7. Survivors are struggling with agony and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. All of Israel is living in anxiety over the fate of the 240 hostages Hamas took on the day Israelis now call Black Saturday.
In Israeli media, I see a lot of tears for the victims of October 7, now mixed with tears over fallen soldiers fighting in Gaza. The thing about all this Israeli pain is that it is almost exclusively in Hebrew. The world does not see Israelis hurt or hear them cry. All the world sees are Israeli fighter jets raining death on Hamas from 15,000 feet above the ground to punish those who killed Israelis and to free the hostages.
The world does not feel Israeli pain. It only sees and hears Palestinian pain. The world likes to take the side of the underdog, even when the underdog is guilty. Of course, they don't see it that way. One billion Muslims have a much louder voice than 16 million Jews, making it harder to hear the truth, easier to tell lies. So the world blames Israel, even when Palestinians started the carnage like Hamas did on 10/7.
The Jews understood a long time ago that the world is not a fair place. International justice is erratic and unreliable. This is exactly why the Jews went out of their way to create Jewish sovereignty, to establish a nation state and a government that can protect Jews anywhere on the planet, anytime. Even if the Jews are connected historically, culturally, and emotionally to this biblical land, Zionism has never been just about the land; the early Zionists were open to building their sovereign state elsewhere, though they reasoned that no spot could have attracted as many Jewish immigrants as the land of Israel.
Many Jews died to earn that Israeli sovereignty, and they continue to die for it—even now. Hamas's 10/7 massacre threatened Israel's existence, and Israelis are now fighting the fight of their lives—a second War of Independence, as they call it.
But what Israelis think and say remains mostly in Israel, far from global media. It is the Arabs and Muslims who set the global narrative, who have repeatedly turned the Jews' fight for sovereignty into a fight over real estate: We lived in this land thousands of years before them, therefore we are its rightful sovereigns. But who lived in this land before the advent of the Arabs? In fact, in many countries that we call Arab today, Jews lived and spoke Hebrew, then Aramaic, then Arabic, long before Islam even existed.
Israel must fight for its survival. The only alternative to war is peace. Yet one would be hard pressed to see one sign of peace in the thousands of protests against the war worldwide. Peace will only come when the Arab world recognizes Israel, but the protesters are not shouting for peace; they are shouting against Israel, hoping that a ceasefire can save Hamas.
I wish I had a magic wand to make my fellow Arabs and the rest of the world see what I see. There will never be peace without justice. Using our numbers as Muslims and Arabs to impose our narrative will not beat Israel and it is not the way to peace.
I write this to voice my dissent. I want peace, and peace depends upon winning the trust of those we want to live in peace with, not instigating the world against them. Peace requires admitting the truth. It requires admitting Jewish pain.
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The hatred that begins with antisemitism threatens the whole world
by Elisha Wiesel, Opinion Contributor
My father loved the Jewish story of the just man who wandered the town of Sodom, shouting the dangers of its inhabitants’ evil deeds.
It was a story he lived. After bearing witness to the horrors of Auschwitz, he demanded that the world fight evil. He warned that hatred which begins with antisemitism inevitably threatens the whole world.
But as with the just man, my father’s protests were ignored.
The United Nations did nothing in 1948 when the Arab Middle East violently rejected Israel’s existence. Seventeen years later, it equated Zionism with racism.
“This is not the first time the enemy has accused us of his own crimes,” my father wrote of Israel’s trial in the court of world opinion. “Our possessions were taken from us, and we were called misers; our children were massacred, and we were accused of ritual murder.”
Antisemitism at the United Nations has become a fact of life. Last week, the UN adopted eight resolutions, all of which condemned Israel. One of the resolutions was drafted and co-sponsored by Syria, whose dictator, Bashar al-Assad has murdered 300,000 of his own citizens.
The Simchat Torah bombing of a Parisian synagogue in 1980 shattered any sense of French Jewish post-war safety. My father lashed out at those who denied the Jewish people’s right to exist. “Perhaps the killers think we have forgotten our history”, he wrote. “We have forgotten nothing.”
Antisemitism in France has exploded over the last decade. Last week, French President Emmanuel Macron called for a ceasefire that would give Hamas time to regroup. He declined to participate in Sunday’s rally of 180,000 Jews and allies marching against antisemitism, saying “I have to make choices… otherwise, I’d be at demonstrations every week”.
It was only 80 years ago that more than one-third of the global Jewish population was wiped out in Europe. My father saw Israel as the only guarantee against a second Holocaust.
In 2014, Israel was widely attacked in the media for responding militarily to Hamas rocket attacks against civilians. My father published an ad exposing Hamas as a death cult, guilty of engaging in child sacrifice through its use of human shields. The London Times refused to run the ad; fellow Jews he thought of as friends attacked him for it after his death.
So many of us have woken up since Oct. 7 to a nightmare where we are told that we must accept terror attacks as the price for living in our ancient homeland. We are told that we may not destroy enemies that are trying to destroy us.
We are victims of constant psychological warfare. We are glued to our screens, watching images of suffering among Gaza’s civilian population that have now replaced the Israeli victims. You and I look at it and say: this must stop. Which of course is what Hamas wants. Our moral reaction is what they are counting on in order to be able to kill again and again.
We must reject the gaslighting. Israel could turn Gaza into dust from the air, but she is sacrificing her precious heroes in a ground war precisely to avoid civilian casualties. Meanwhile, Hamas seeks to maximize those casualties by hiding its military equipment and personnel in hospitals, stealing resources meant for civilians, opening fire during civilian evacuations through humanitarian corridors.
Former President Barack Obama, on a recent podcast, stated that “all of us are complicit to some degree” in the violence unleashed on Oct. 7. But that isn’t so. My father was not complicit, because he was not convinced of the wisdom of unlocking billions of dollars for Iran that could ultimately fund Hamas and this attack.
Israel is not complicit, either. Nothing could ever justify the rape and desecration of women in the southern Kibbutzim of Israel or the dragging of a corpse through the Gaza streets for Hamas supporters to spit upon.
We will likely not convince the skeptics that we deserve the same rights as every other people: to secure our borders and defend our citizens. And yet today we will march, regardless, several hundred thousand of us coming together resolutely on the National Mall. For the just man speaks up, not only to convince others.
Heed my father’s words: “In the beginning, I thought I could change man. Today, I know I cannot. If I still shout today, if I still scream, it is to prevent man from ultimately changing me.”
We deserve to exist in peace and security. Neither Israel nor Gazan civilians can afford this to be anything other than the last battle. This war can only end with the complete destruction or surrender of Hamas. The world may not want to listen to these truths, but we, like my father before us, must shout them nonetheless.
Elisha Wiesel, is the son of the late Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel.
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The hatred that begins with antisemitism threatens the whole world
by Elisha Wiesel, Opinion Contributor
My father loved the Jewish story of the just man who wandered the town of Sodom, shouting the dangers of its inhabitants’ evil deeds.
It was a story he lived. After bearing witness to the horrors of Auschwitz, he demanded that the world fight evil. He warned that hatred which begins with antisemitism inevitably threatens the whole world.
But as with the just man, my father’s protests were ignored.
The United Nations did nothing in 1948 when the Arab Middle East violently rejected Israel’s existence. Seventeen years later, it equated Zionism with racism.
“This is not the first time the enemy has accused us of his own crimes,” my father wrote of Israel’s trial in the court of world opinion. “Our possessions were taken from us, and we were called misers; our children were massacred, and we were accused of ritual murder.”
Antisemitism at the United Nations has become a fact of life. Last week, the UN adopted eight resolutions, all of which condemned Israel. One of the resolutions was drafted and co-sponsored by Syria, whose dictator, Bashar al-Assad has murdered 300,000 of his own citizens.
The Simchat Torah bombing of a Parisian synagogue in 1980 shattered any sense of French Jewish post-war safety. My father lashed out at those who denied the Jewish people’s right to exist. “Perhaps the killers think we have forgotten our history”, he wrote. “We have forgotten nothing.”
Antisemitism in France has exploded over the last decade. Last week, French President Emmanuel Macron called for a ceasefire that would give Hamas time to regroup. He declined to participate in Sunday’s rally of 180,000 Jews and allies marching against antisemitism, saying “I have to make choices… otherwise, I’d be at demonstrations every week”.
It was only 80 years ago that more than one-third of the global Jewish population was wiped out in Europe. My father saw Israel as the only guarantee against a second Holocaust.
In 2014, Israel was widely attacked in the media for responding militarily to Hamas rocket attacks against civilians. My father published an ad exposing Hamas as a death cult, guilty of engaging in child sacrifice through its use of human shields. The London Times refused to run the ad; fellow Jews he thought of as friends attacked him for it after his death.
So many of us have woken up since Oct. 7 to a nightmare where we are told that we must accept terror attacks as the price for living in our ancient homeland. We are told that we may not destroy enemies that are trying to destroy us.
We are victims of constant psychological warfare. We are glued to our screens, watching images of suffering among Gaza’s civilian population that have now replaced the Israeli victims. You and I look at it and say: this must stop. Which of course is what Hamas wants. Our moral reaction is what they are counting on in order to be able to kill again and again.
We must reject the gaslighting. Israel could turn Gaza into dust from the air, but she is sacrificing her precious heroes in a ground war precisely to avoid civilian casualties. Meanwhile, Hamas seeks to maximize those casualties by hiding its military equipment and personnel in hospitals, stealing resources meant for civilians, opening fire during civilian evacuations through humanitarian corridors.
Former President Barack Obama, on a recent podcast, stated that “all of us are complicit to some degree” in the violence unleashed on Oct. 7. But that isn’t so. My father was not complicit, because he was not convinced of the wisdom of unlocking billions of dollars for Iran that could ultimately fund Hamas and this attack.
Israel is not complicit, either. Nothing could ever justify the rape and desecration of women in the southern Kibbutzim of Israel or the dragging of a corpse through the Gaza streets for Hamas supporters to spit upon.
We will likely not convince the skeptics that we deserve the same rights as every other people: to secure our borders and defend our citizens. And yet today we will march, regardless, several hundred thousand of us coming together resolutely on the National Mall. For the just man speaks up, not only to convince others.
Heed my father’s words: “In the beginning, I thought I could change man. Today, I know I cannot. If I still shout today, if I still scream, it is to prevent man from ultimately changing me.”
We deserve to exist in peace and security. Neither Israel nor Gazan civilians can afford this to be anything other than the last battle. This war can only end with the complete destruction or surrender of Hamas. The world may not want to listen to these truths, but we, like my father before us, must shout them nonetheless.
Elisha Wiesel, is the son of the late Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel.
Impressive testimony Fenris.
Do you think it's an accident the Al-Aqsa Mosque is build exactly on the place of the Jewish Temple?
I don't.
It's a spiritual battle.
Not very comforting, I know.
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On the brighter side, 260k+ marching in support of Israel in the swamp today
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Impressive testimony Fenris.
Do you think it's an accident the Al-Aqsa Mosque is build exactly on the place of the Jewish Temple?
I don't.
Well I mean that was the Muslim MO when they conquered places. They would build a Mosque atop another religion's holy sites to show that Islam was ascendant and powerful. They did the same thing in places like India.
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For the same reason that "Allahu akbar" isn't just "God is great", but "God is greater". They gotta keep telling you, showing you, and killing you because how else will they convince themselves?
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I personally witnessed the murder of an innocent elderly fisherman by a man yelling "Allahu akbar."
I cannot be convinced that there is not a violent demon named Allah.
He can be either tacit or implicit in his murderous aims.
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I personally witnessed the murder of an innocent elderly fisherman by a man yelling "Allahu akbar."
I cannot be convinced that there is not a violent demon named Allah.
He can be either tacit or implicit in his murderous aims.
That is awful. I'm sorry that happened, to you both.
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For the same reason that "Allahu akbar" isn't just "God is great", but "God is greater". They gotta keep telling you, showing you, and killing you because how else will they convince themselves?
Ah, this is deep. very deep. Islamic societies are all failures by any metric. So they all have to go around convincing themselves that they are ascendant. Even as Israel blows up the Hamas parliament building, Hamas police HQ, Hamas military academy, they still feel powerful.
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Self delusion is indeed the most powerful form of delusion.
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Heartening how so many Islamic people took to the streets in protest of the murderous Hamas attack on Israel...
Wait a minute...
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Hundreds of thousands of people have turned out at the national mall in support of Israel. There are far more who support Israel than Hamas, and here we see good demonstration of that fact. First good thing to happen in DC in a while.
https://www2.cbn.com/news/us/hundreds-thousands-rally-israel-national-mall-combat-outbursts-antisemitism?inid=c5214fa8-7cdc-45a0-a9a7-f2277ead0f5f
(https://images.jpost.com/image/upload/c_fill,g_faces:center,h_537,w_822/563717)
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I heard something quite funny earlier today on the Triggernometry channel:
"If you chant 'From the river to the sea!', you have an IQ of forty-three."
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Arizona State University canceled an event that would have featured Rashida Tlaib as a speaker--arguably the most vocal antisemite in Congress. The Jew-haters are still gonna make noise, but at least we're starting to see some push back.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/arizona-state-university-cancels-event-featuring-rep-rashida-tlaib
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Hundreds of thousands of people have turned out at the national mall in support of Israel.
About 290,000 people showed up.
An overwhelming majority were Jews.
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Hundreds of thousands of people have turned out at the national mall in support of Israel.
About 290,000 people showed up.
An overwhelming majority were Jews.
I was unaware most were Jews. Still, it's nice to see a pro-Israel counterbalance to the venomous antisemitism of late.
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I was unaware most were Jews.
My wife and daughter both attended. They were on different chartered busses from the NYC area. My daughter's bus was all Jewish kids. My wife's bus had one non Jewish person on board (a retired cop friend of mine, as it turns out.)
Still, it's nice to see a pro-Israel counterbalance to the venomous antisemitism of late.
Yes. One still wishes that there were pro Israel rallies, organized and attended by non Jews. We shouldn't be the only ones showing up for ourselves.
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Yes. One still wishes that there were pro Israel rallies, organized and attended by non Jews. We shouldn't be the only ones showing up for ourselves.
Agreed. I believe there are millions of pro-Israel allies in the US--mostly Christians--who are not vocal enough. The silence is even more pronounced when contrasted with all the noise made by anti-Israel/pro-Hamas cretins.
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There are tens of millions of Protestants in the country who love the state of Israel and love Jews. Some of those loveable people are right here. :) I just wish it were more visible out there.
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Most Americans see it for what it is, and eagerly await the disbandment of Hamas and stability for Israel and the region.
Pro - Palestinian rallies mostly serve to enforce those sentiments.
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Most Americans see it for what it is, and eagerly await the disbandment of Hamas and stability for Israel and the region.
Pro - Palestinian rallies mostly serve to enforce those sentiments.
I think that's probably true. On the other hand, I think that a lot of people will be bystanders in whatever goes on. Again, the attendees at the rally in DC were nearly all Jews.
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"First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."
—Martin Niemöller
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"First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."
—Martin Niemöller
This is the pragmatic reason for speaking up.
There's also a moral reason.
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True. But a moral lesson can be gleaned from the experience the quote alludes to.
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Our most prestigious colleges led by unthinkably incompetent overseers allowing for the calls to Jewish genocide on campuses in the name of free speech?
Perhaps we truly are failing as the indominable & righteous democratic experiment after all.
Even so-called believers silent on the dissolution of the constitution at the behest of wolves and pied pipers?
Or is it simply mass illiteracy?
Demogogues in high places appear to be testing that principle daily.
Oops! Did I say that?!
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Our most prestigious colleges led by unthinkably incompetent overseers allowing for the calls to Jewish genocide on campuses in the name of free speech?
I don't think the university presidents are incompetent. The opposite, they know good and well what they're doing. (Former) UPenn President Magill was smirking the whole time during her questioning in front of Congress.
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"We must allow free speech, even if it's despicable unless it becomes act". I could buy that if they actually universally meant it, but they don't, and when it comes to things like intifada, there is no speech/act distinction.
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"We must allow free speech, even if it's despicable unless it becomes act".
Thought experiment: Would these universities allow "free speech" if it called for the genocide of any other minority?
And it's not free speech if it's harassment, which is a crime.
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Time for Purim, the original version.
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"We must allow free speech, even if it's despicable unless it becomes act". I could buy that if they actually universally meant it, but they don't, and when it comes to things like intifada, there is no speech/act distinction.
I agree. Also a growing number of speakers shouted down by university students probably find free speech on campus to be selective.
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"We must allow free speech, even if it's despicable unless it becomes act".
Thought experiment: Would these universities allow "free speech" if it called for the genocide of any other minority?
And it's not free speech if it's harassment, which is a crime.
Exactly
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On the topic of whether a university would regard calling for the genocide of a minority as free speech, I wouldn't be surprised if the university had a selection box of definitions of genocide.
There is, for example, genocide in the sense of wiping out a whole group of people. There is also the act of saying something which members of a group don't like and, as a result, feel unhappy about. Feeling unhappy equals being in danger of mental-health-related ill health, which leads to suicidal thoughts, ergo someone is trying to kill this group, ergo it is genocide.
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To many ergos for me
I believe the marketplace is sufficient to police speech
I do not believe that speech should be regulated in any way except by the speakers and the listeners
But then, if you bother me too much, you risk a bullet in the head, so there is that
As with any speech, the first key is “know your audience”
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There is, for example, genocide in the sense of wiping out a whole group of people.
Which what we're talking about here.
On the topic of whether a university would regard calling for the genocide of a minority as free speech
It seems just yesterday (actually it was prior to 10/7/2023) "misgendering" someone was considered "hate speech" and students who committed this terrible crime faced disciplinary measures. No universities were protecting this under the guise of "free speech". Yet today one can call for the violent elimination of a nation state and harass students who ascribe to a certain religious belief over it, and it's "well colleges need to be a bastion of free speech".
FYI multiple colleges are being sued under Title VI over this, including Harvard, Columbia, MIT, and UPenn.
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I believe the marketplace is sufficient to police speech
I do not believe that speech should be regulated in any way except by the speakers and the listeners
When the act occurs on a college campus that receives federal funds, Title VI says otherwise.
A Jewish student at Columbia complained to the administration that she felt unsafe as protesters were following her around on campus. (Under NYS Penal law, this is aggravated harassment, an "A misdemeanor".) The administration refused to do anything about it, telling her "You're the only person who feels unsafe".
Are we cool with this? Because I'm not.
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As long as she can put a .45 in their face and make them uncomfortable, I’m good with it
😳
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As long as she can put a .45 in their face and make them uncomfortable, I’m good with it
She can't, and she shouldn't have to.
She can't, because that's called "menacing", which is also an "A misdemeanor". The answer to a crime is not another crime.
And she shouldn't have to, because why are universities and the City of New York allowing this behavior to go on?
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I believe the marketplace is sufficient to police speech
I do not believe that speech should be regulated in any way except by the speakers and the listeners
When the act occurs on a college campus that receives federal funds, Title VI says otherwise.
A Jewish student at Columbia complained to the administration that she felt unsafe as protesters were following her around on campus. (Under NYS Penal law, this is aggravated harassment, an "A misdemeanor".) The administration refused to do anything about it, telling her "You're the only person who feels unsafe".
Are we cool with this? Because I'm not.
I wonder if a transgender student would be told that they were the only one who felt unsafe if they were deliberately misgendered. It seems unlikely. Because, you know, being called a man when you identify as female has got to be far worse than being told that people like you need to be wiped off the face of the earth.
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It seems just yesterday (actually it was prior to 10/7/2023) "misgendering" someone was considered "hate speech" and students who committed this terrible crime faced disciplinary measures. No universities were protecting this under the guise of "free speech". Yet today one can call for the violent elimination of a nation state and harass students who ascribe to a certain religious belief over it, and it's "well colleges need to be a bastion of free speech".
While calling for the violent destruction of a nation and its people is never a good thing, when you "misgender" a person, you're going too far. (At least that seems to be the perspective these days).
I get that people are upset over the plight of the Palestinian civilians caught in the middle--even though great effort is being taken by Israel to minimize collateral damage. But people fail to understand that extreme measures are necessary in order to obliterate Hamas and avoid a repeat of the 10/7 attack. Perhaps if anti-Israel people had murderous next-door neighbors who denied their right to exist, they would get a clearer picture of the situation. (Especially if they fired shots at you using their family members as shields).
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While calling for the violent destruction of a nation and its people is never a good thing, when you "misgender" a person, you're going too far. (At least that seems to be the perspective these days).
I get your criticism, I guess, I mean Fenris claimed that a Jewish student claimed to be followed around by protesters at Columbia, and hey if it happened like that then i'd say protesters shouldn't be singling out any random student based on some aspect of their identity and following them around...it's not just a terrifying thing to do to someone, it also seems an ineffective way to protest to me. I mean you seem to be dismissive of the idea that misgendering is a terrible thing to do to someone, but you love the Jewish people so you've got your priorities straight? Some folks think that things like misgendering is a matter of life and death, perhaps you don't, but you seem to want to make the comparison so as to insinuate that it is hypocritical to care about this superfluous issue but not care about the life and death threats to the Jewish people. I think its a false dichotomy you are drawing, in multiple ways in addition to insinuating that there is some general species of folks who hate or are at least apathetic to Jews because they are too wrapped up in the foolishness of caring about the wellbeing of trans people. Maybe I'm wrong and you're trying to express an "also" and not an "instead" but that's what it looks like you're saying to me.
I get that people are upset over the plight of the Palestinian civilians caught in the middle--even though great effort is being taken by Israel to minimize collateral damage. But people fail to understand that extreme measures are necessary in order to obliterate Hamas and avoid a repeat of the 10/7 attack. Perhaps if anti-Israel people had murderous next-door neighbors who denied their right to exist, they would get a clearer picture of the situation. (Especially if they fired shots at you using their family members as shields).
Is that what's happening, people are failing to understand? I could just as easily say that what folks don't understand is that attempting to obliterate Hamas through extreme measures that incur even this "minimized" amount of collateral damage in the form of lives and livelihoods has...I suppose, some non-zero chance of obliterating Hamas in the sense of destroying its leadership, infrastructure, weapons, institutional knowledge and foot soldiers, in the area, but it is just as likely to generate the disfigured, disgruntled disenfranchised generation that will ultimately replace them. I could say that folks don't understand that this is most likely a punt, Hell it might pin them down at the 1 yard line , but with plenty of time left on the clock. I Could say folks don't understand that criticizing Israel about policies and views that contributed to the sentiments and conditions that created opportunity for a lunatic ideology like Hamas to gain power and support and further radicalize and spread is not always antisemitism, sometimes it is an assertion that if there is not fundamental change in attitude and policy , this is simply going to happen again because killing unhappy people doesn't simply leave all the happy contented folks behind to then go on a be happy, but people just don't understand that.
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Oscar, I'm not going to engage in another endless, protracted, discussion that accomplishes nothing except to demonstrate that we hold conflicting opinions on virtually everything. The current circumstances now surrounding Israel are fulfilling Bible prophecy, and the way events ultimately turn out are in accordance with the foreordained will of God. No actions, words or sentiments will change that. (Since I know that's nonsensical to you, just I'll leave it at that).
The Jews have been the most reviled, persecuted people in human history--an antipathy that culminated in Hitler's systematic "final solution" that wiped out millions of European Jews. When your forebears have been subjected to extermination attempts, and you currently live surrounded by enemies who deny your right to exist, I imagine you develop a very strong sense of self-preservation. A two state solution will probably be attempted at some point, but in the interim, Israel will do whatever is necessary to prevent a repeat of the 10/7 attack. Consider that my final reply.
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Oscar, I'm not going to engage in another endless, protracted, discussion that accomplishes nothing except to demonstrate that we hold conflicting opinions on virtually everything. The current circumstances now surrounding Israel are fulfilling Bible prophecy, and the way events ultimately turn out are in accordance with the foreordained will of God. No actions, words or sentiments will change that. (Since I know that's nonsensical to you, just I'll leave it at that).
Seems like you kinda buried the lead, and what people actually fail to understand is that it doesn't matter that there are many perfectly rational and sometimes conflicting ways to think about this situation because this is ordained by God to happen so any other rationale is actually meaningless and couldn't possibly have any effect on God's will. Odd that you would assert that what people do or do not understand about reasons or outcomes has anything to do with it.
The Jews have been the most reviled, persecuted people in human history--an antipathy that culminated in Hitler's systematic "final solution" that wiped out millions of European Jews. When your forebears have been subjected to extermination attempts, and you currently live surrounded by enemies who deny your right to exist, I imagine you develop a very strong sense of self-preservation. A two state solution will probably be attempted at some point, but in the interim, Israel will do whatever is necessary to prevent a repeat of the 10/7 attack. Consider that my final reply.
My forebears have been subjected to extermination attempts, and there are plenty of enemies around us too that deny plenty-o-rights , sometimes even the right to exist. I wonder what my people are justified in doing?...perhaps I should create a thread about it and watch all the support and defenses of the actions my people have taken over the last few years in the united states roll in....Or does it need to be backed up by biblical prophecy? All that is rhetorical, not that you were going to answer, I get it, reasons don't matter , what fits or can be tortured into your interpretation of your religion is what ultimately justifies your position the argument is just window dressing.
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So, Oscar, how is that sincere seeking God thing working out for you?
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So, Oscar, how is that sincere seeking God thing working out for you?
Fine I suppose, though I had to buy my own Ipad :P. Thanks for asking.
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So, Oscar, how is that sincere seeking God thing working out for you?
Fine I suppose, though I had to buy my own Ipad :P. Thanks for asking.
So
Times God doesn’t give us all the toys we want or ask for, no matter our sincere prayers…🥸
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So, Oscar, how is that sincere seeking God thing working out for you?
Fine I suppose, though I had to buy my own Ipad :P. Thanks for asking.
So
Times God doesn’t give us all the toys we want or ask for, no matter our sincere prayers…🥸
yeah I am starting to notice that, its practically impossible to predict what he's going to do...I mean outside of appearently everything that is happening in Israel/Palestine right now, which I've been told is unequivocally what he wants to be happening right now I guess in an attempt to avoid just giving me an ipad pro...probably not how I'd handle it, but his ways are higher than Cupertino's ways.
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I get that people are upset over the plight of the Palestinian civilians caught in the middle--even though great effort is being taken by Israel to minimize collateral damage.
The people protesting Israel aren't critical of Israel's handling of the war. They're critical of Israel existing at all. They aren't calling for Hamas to release hostages, or surrender. They're calling for Israel to step defending itself against a foe that is a genocidal lunatic religious fundamentalist terrorist group.
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I get your criticism, I guess, I mean Fenris claimed that a Jewish student claimed to be followed around by protesters at Columbia, and hey if it happened like that then i'd say protesters shouldn't be singling out any random student based on some aspect of their identity and following them around...it's not just a terrifying thing to do to someone, it also seems an ineffective way to protest to me.
By wondering about the "effectiveness" of the activity, it shows that you've entirely missed the point. They're not trying to be "effective". They are trying to be intimidating, and they are succeeding, with the blessing of the Columbia University administration.
Is that what's happening, people are failing to understand? I could just as easily say that what folks don't understand is that attempting to obliterate Hamas through extreme measures that incur even this "minimized" amount of collateral damage in the form of lives and livelihoods has...I suppose, some non-zero chance of obliterating Hamas in the sense of destroying its leadership, infrastructure, weapons, institutional knowledge and foot soldiers, in the area, but it is just as likely to generate the disfigured, disgruntled disenfranchised generation that will ultimately replace them.
It's amazing, because not one person during world war 2 claimed that "bombing Germany will only create more Nazis". When a country is at war with totalitarian state, you have to destroy the state, and worry about deradicalizing the population afterwards.
And I have never seen one single pundit worry about how terror attacks against Israel will radicalize the population. Jews are just expected to suck it up when lunatics try to murder them. But when they strike back- Oh noes!! Arabs might get mad!!!
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The Jews have been the most reviled, persecuted people in human history--an antipathy that culminated in Hitler's systematic "final solution" that wiped out millions of European Jews. When your forebears have been subjected to extermination attempts, and you currently live surrounded by enemies who deny your right to exist, I imagine you develop a very strong sense of self-preservation. A two state solution will probably be attempted at some point, but in the interim, Israel will do whatever is necessary to prevent a repeat of the 10/7 attack. Consider that my final reply.
My daughter just gifted me a book. The title is "Hitler's willing executioners". The author's premise is that it wasn't just members of the SS or the Nazi party who carried out the Holocaust, but rather even ordinary everyday "non radical" Germans.
Before the author addresses his primary premise, he first goes into defining Antisemitism in order to explain how the Holocaust could happen in the first place. And he makes a very interesting point.
Most forms of prejudice are based first on differentness. "He's Irish, I'm Italian, he's different than me and I don't like him". Usually with the additional "And because he's different, he's also inferior".
Antisemitism is different.
Jews aren't hated because they're "different". Jews aren't considered "inferior".
Jews are demonized. Jews are considered diabolical. Jewish existence is considered an upset to the natural order of things. People consider it their moral obligation to end Jewish existence.
The Nazis are a perfect example. Hamas is another. Hamas isn't interested in a peace deal, or a two-state solution, or indeed coexistence with Jews at all. Hamas considers it their religious obligation to annihilate Israel via Jihad, and once that's done, to murder every Jew in the world.
And what are the foes of Israel talking about? That Israel isn't "being careful enough" it its war against Hamas? No, Israel actually being very careful. According to the UN, the average civilian to combatant ratio for wars in the 21st century is about 9:1. 9 civilians killed for every 1 combatant. Or, to view it another way, 90% of the causalities in an average war are civilians.
The IDF in Gaza has a kill ration of about 1.3:1. That's 1.3 civilians killed foe every combatant- IF Hamas casualty numbers are to be believed. (And there are reasons to believe they're inflated). That means Israel is being very careful to not harm civilians.
And yet what is Israel accused of? Genocide. The very worst crime.
Did anyone accuse Bashir Assad of genocide when he killed 500,000 civilians in Syria? No.
So why the accusation against Israel? Because Antisemitism is about demonizing Jews. So that the people who hate Jews are justified in destroying them.
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My forebears have been subjected to extermination attempts, and there are plenty of enemies around us too that deny plenty-o-rights , sometimes even the right to exist.
What people is that, exactly?
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By wondering about the "effectiveness" of the activity, it shows that you've entirely missed the point. They're not trying to be "effective". They are trying to be intimidating, and they are succeeding, with the blessing of the Columbia University administration.
I guess it could be true that their only purpose was intimidation of a specific student. I was giving these people the benefit of actually caring about what they claim to care about and had the intent of doing something outside of just scaring another kid, but yeah could be just intimidation. Where did you get all this information on the mindset and intention of these protesters, I personally didn't find anything that fits the way you've depicted events.
It's amazing, because not one person during world war 2 claimed that "bombing Germany will only create more Nazis". When a country is at war with totalitarian state, you have to destroy the state, and worry about deradicalizing the population afterwards.
haha, well yeah that's not a bad point. It is true that it is just as conceivable that a concerted effort to implement programs, policies and attitude shifts after reaching the benchmarks that satisfy the total destruction of Hamas in the minds of the folks that have the power to declare that can likely mitigate the generation of would-be future terrorists. I'd argue that Nazis and Hamas and its ilk, while there are ideological parallels (like really hating the Jewish people for instance) and comparable underlying motives & methods ( Like using antisemitism to facilitate recruiting and justification for territorial gains), are fairly dissimilar in some fundamental ways. We are still not rid of Nazis, In part because the ideology therein appeals to the discontentment of those that can consider themselves the (entirely made up imo) Nazi racial categories. In that way Nazism is not absolutely tied to German national identity, but It was largely a nationalist movement. I say all of that so that you don't absolutely drag me when I claim that the dissimilarities between Nazism and Hamas and similar Islamic terrorist organizations limits the efficacy of a "Bombing Germany" style strategy when applied to them in the sense of how tightly mated to national identity Nazism was and how tightly associated Islam and Islamic nationalism is to Hamas. As a writer of terrible sentences I even recognize that was one of my worst. Anyway that is before I mention How much more intrinsically accustomed to decentralized power structures and non-traditional warfare these various Islamic groups are (including Hamas although Palestinian nationalism is a key feature for them) than Nazi's during WW2 could have ever hoped to be. All that to say that your point isn't entirely irrelevant, but I would be concerned with overgeneralizing the Nazi parallels especially as they apply to the possibilities of radicalizing folks outside of the "home" nation/state.
So none of that means that a good post conflict plan for mitigating radicalization is some kind of hopeless endeavor, but it certainly isn't front loaded in the sense that it is readily apparent to me that there is such a plan. I think there is good reason to distrust our wars on terrorism to effectively plan, deploy and support those sorts of long term goals because historically, for whatever reasons it has not appeared to work out that way. This is one reason that I'm personally skeptical that future radicalization will be contained through well considered and implemented policy, outside of what I mentioned in the previous section, as well as just best laid plans.
Anyway, ultimately my original post was critical of the idea that there was some key simple concept that people fail to understand, as opposed to giving at least some folks the credit of understanding well enough but disagreeing or expressing skepticism without being categorized as either inherently anti-Semitic or failing to consider this one simple weight loss secret because the only thinkers will I presume think like you if they are actually thinking.
This is by no means a comprehensive download of all of my thoughts and feeling on the issues at hand , and I'm fine to continue to talk about this if you have further points....heck I'll even make some effort to consider your feelings.
And I have never seen one single pundit worry about how terror attacks against Israel will radicalize the population. Jews are just expected to suck it up when lunatics try to murder them. But when they strike back- Oh noes!! Arabs might get mad!!!
I don't know much about what the pundits are saying, that isn't really my thing, However I actually do worry about how Hamas' actions will radicalize people in and outside of Israel, I'd argue that It already has. Perhaps you should stop watching pundits, sounds like they aren't doing you any favors.
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My forebears have been subjected to extermination attempts, and there are plenty of enemies around us too that deny plenty-o-rights , sometimes even the right to exist.
What people is that, exactly?
Black people, Neurodivergent people, LGBT..etc people, Irreligious people. Pick one or combine them into a Voltron of weirdos if you prefer.
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I guess it could be true that their only purpose was intimidation of a specific student. I was giving these people the benefit of actually caring about what they claim to care about and had the intent of doing something outside of just scaring another kid, but yeah could be just intimidation. Where did you get all this information on the mindset and intention of these protesters, I personally didn't find anything that fits the way you've depicted events.
Where did I get this idea of their mindset? Gee, I don't know. Because one of my daughter's friends had to be locked inside the college library at Cooper Union with the other visibly Jewish students while protesters banged on the doors and yelled "Free Palestine"? Because Jewish student organizations on college campuses have been the subject of protests and intimidation and even building damage and arson? C'mon. If you don't see all this is because you're not paying attention. Or because you don't want to see it.
We are still not rid of Nazis,
No, but we're rid of the Nazi state. Considering that they started a war that killed 50 million people, I'd say that's a major accomplishment.
In that way Nazism is not absolutely tied to German national identity, but It was largely a nationalist movement. I say all of that so that you don't absolutely drag me when I claim that the dissimilarities between Nazism and Hamas and similar Islamic terrorist organizations
And you don't find it the least bit interesting that a nationalist movement and a religious fundamentalist movement both had the goal of exterminating the Jewish people? Because I find it extremely interesting. It looks to me like lots of people just hate Jews, and whatever they believe in, they use it as a justification for their pre existing hatred.
So none of that means that a good post conflict plan for mitigating radicalization is some kind of hopeless endeavor, but it certainly isn't front loaded in the sense that it is readily apparent to me that there is such a plan.
The war is justified. Even if what happens afterwards is less than ideal, Hamas must be removed from power.
I think there is good reason to distrust our wars on terrorism
This is not a "war on terrorism". It's a war on the state of Hamas that exists in Gaza. World war 2 was not a "war on Naziism". It was a war on the German state controlled by Nazis.
Anyway, ultimately my original post was critical of the idea that there was some key simple concept that people fail to understand
I think it is you that has a failure to understand.
heck I'll even make some effort to consider your feelings.
How generous of you.
Perhaps you should stop watching pundits, sounds like they aren't doing you any favors.
I guess you aren't considering my feelings anymore. It was nice while it lasted.
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Black people, Neurodivergent people, LGBT..etc people, Irreligious people.
Which one of these were your forebears?
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Where did I get this idea of their mindset? Gee, I don't know. Because one of my daughter's friends had to be locked inside the college library at Cooper Union with the other visibly Jewish students while protesters banged on the doors and yelled "Free Palestine"? Because Jewish student organizations on college campuses have been the subject of protests and intimidation and even building damage and arson? C'mon. If you don't see all this is because you're not paying attention. Or because you don't want to see it.
How strange, Do you think that everyone has a daughter whose friend had this expirience? Why would it be surprising that I didn't find this personal story that your daughter's friend conveyed to you presumably via your daughter in my admittedly cursory google search? You aren't referencing a news article or even a reddit post that I might actually have access to, but a story from people you have personal relationships with, I'm boggled. Anyway I was referring to what You wrote:
"A Jewish student at Columbia complained to the administration that she felt unsafe as protesters were following her around on campus. (Under NYS Penal law, this is aggravated harassment, an "A misdemeanor".) The administration refused to do anything about it, telling her "You're the only person who feels unsafe"."
So even this updated story that you are conveying is different than that one, admittedly perhaps you conveyed that story about your daughter's friend earlier or somewhere else and it was unclear what I was referring to. Now that we are on the same page, I read that story and thought that it was an ineffective way to protest, you go on to claim that it isn't a protest at all, so I asked how you knew that and then you shared a seemingly entirely different story that It would make no sense for me to know about. So I guess thanks, you've set me straight.
No, but we're rid of the Nazi state. Considering that they started a war that killed 50 million people, I'd say that's a major accomplishment.
Agreed
And you don't find it the least bit interesting that a nationalist movement and a religious fundamentalist movement both had the goal of exterminating the Jewish people? Because I find it extremely interesting. It looks to me like lots of people just hate Jews, and whatever they believe in, they use it as a justification for their pre existing hatred.
Ouch, my knee got a little scraped up from this dragging you've given me. What could you mean that I don't find it interesting, I'm literally wasting my time on a forum to talk about this with someone who obviously thinks I'm an idiodic dirtbag, Of course I'm very interested. I also clearly stated in a part of my post that you didn't quote that Nazis and Hamas both use antisemitism as a convenient recruitment and justification mechanism. Honestly I don't even believe that it is always about hatred, I think alot of times antisemitism and other forms of racism are just things people use to justify stealing, subjugating and otherwise mistreating other human beings for personal gain and profit. I actually believe that race as a concept was more or less created to justify all manner of profit on the backs and lives of other humans and in some ways was prototyped through copying the aspects of antisemitism that allowed the marshalling of minds and bodies towards atrocities that were profitable. That's not the whole story of course, and I don't believe it was quite as conscious as all that but I think that is always in the mix with big racisms.
but seriously, what do you mean when you ask if I find it interesting, why would you think I don't?
The war is justified. Even if what happens afterwards is less than ideal, Hamas must be removed from power.
Does a just war mean that there is no room for criticism? I'm not even sure that justice is an especially useful way to consider war outside of getting people to do war, that is I think it biases our conceptualization heavily toward the "doing it" part and obfuscates the reconstruction and prevention aspects. I know that you hate when I talk about WW2 because I'm appearently super ignorant of its history, but while I think that the use of nuclear bombs was justified (that is the war where they dropped those right? :P), I also have plenty of criticisms and questions regarding that decision. I think what makes us different, or one thing is that I think its perfectly okay to question and criticize such things and I am confident that it doesn't make me some kind of WW2 era Japanese colonial imperialist or a spineless hippie.
This is not a "war on terrorism". It's a war on the state of Hamas that exists in Gaza. World war 2 was not a "war on Naziism". It was a war on the German state controlled by Nazis.
I mean I think that is where we disagree, I think in some sense it is a war on Islamic nationalism/imperialism too, because I think that Unlike Nazism there are stronger ties to broader ideological imperatives that extend well beyond the borders of Palestine or Israel, and again I believe that Hamas is fundamentally a terrorist organization and it comes with all the cool new updates in decentralized power structures and strategy tactics and doctrine that just were not a thing for the Nazis.
I think it is you that has a failure to understand.
I mean, Okay...I don't.
How generous of you.
I mean I genuinely thought it was, You seemed to really want to instill in me that it is something I should consider when interacting with you...now that I tell you that I'm going to make an effort I feel like you unhappy with it. Is it because I said it in a slightly teasing way?
I guess you aren't considering my feelings anymore. It was nice while it lasted.
I haven't had cable in like a decade so like I genuinely couldn't name 10 current pundits on the tv news, I don't know who hosts the daily show now, I don't even watch those like comedic late night bits about politics or the internet based pundits that float around on youtube or tic-tok (okay my GF loves tic-tok and shows me stuff sometimes but I don't seek it and usually recognize it as anger bait). I see political memes but only because I lurk on lots of boards and forums or social media to see what other humans are saying. What i'm saying is that I think that based on your post while I don't live in some kind of absolute vacuum you seem to have taken it for granted that I'm paying attention to "the pundits" and I actively don't. I assumed that it was because you do, and you do because you think that is like the default thing to do, and it doesn't have to be. I think it is all generally anger bait, and can have an extremely distorting effect on you and what you think about others as I believe was exemplified by your belief that I'm watching a bunch of goons that just want to piss me off so that I can count toward their unique impressions and consequently ad revenues. I've been frustrated with everyone on every side complaining about how this or that form of media is being irresponsible and or deceptive because I felt like no one was taking responsibility for their consumption as a part of that calculus...so I decided to be personally responsible for my consumption. IOW I actually thought it was good advice, you honestly seem really easily triggered and I reckon some of that is because I'm a nightmare to talk to, but some of it I'd bet is due to your consumption habits. take it or leave it, we don't need to argue this point unless you just want to , and in that case have at you.
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Black people, Neurodivergent people, LGBT..etc people, Irreligious people.
Which one of these were your forebears?
I suppose that depends on how exclusive your definition of forebears is. I was using it in the sense of people who came before me with whom I share biological, sociological, ideological and/or behavioral traits and therefore personally identify with or am identified as by external entities. Savvy?
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How strange, Do you think that everyone has a daughter whose friend had this expirience? Why would it be surprising that I didn't find this personal story that your daughter's friend conveyed to you presumably via your daughter in my admittedly cursory google search? You aren't referencing a news article or even a reddit post that I might actually have access to, but a story from people you have personal relationships with, I'm boggled.
You're a very difficult person to have a conversation with. And the reason for that is that you are very insulting to people. You're accusing me of being a liar. I see why other people here say that they won't continue a conversation with you. Get yourself some manners. Seriously.
It took me about 5 seconds to find the news story in question.
So even this updated story that you are conveying is different than that one, admittedly perhaps you conveyed that story about your daughter's friend earlier or somewhere else and it was unclear what I was referring to. Now that we are on the same page, I read that story and thought that it was an ineffective way to protest, you go on to claim that it isn't a protest at all, so I asked how you knew that and then you shared a seemingly entirely different story that It would make no sense for me to know about. So I guess thanks, you've set me straight.
You sit there behind your keyboard and make fun of a religious minority. A minority that is reporting that they feel like their safety is being ignored by multiple college administrations who are all facing Title VI suits on this very matter.
Ouch, my knee got a little scraped up from this dragging you've given me. What could you mean that I don't find it interesting, I'm literally wasting my time on a forum to talk about this with someone who obviously thinks I'm an idiodic dirtbag,
Yeah, I see why people won't talk to you.
Of course I'm very interested. I also clearly stated in a part of my post that you didn't quote that Nazis and Hamas both use antisemitism as a convenient recruitment and justification mechanism. Honestly I don't even believe that it is always about hatred, I think alot of times antisemitism and other forms of racism are just things people use to justify stealing, subjugating and otherwise mistreating other human beings for personal gain and profit.
We're not talking about "other forms of racism". The title of the discussion is "antisemitism".
Does a just war mean that there is no room for criticism?
Israel's haters are not complaining about the way the war is carried out. They're calling for Israel to surrender. This after the largest slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust and while Hamas is still holding 130 hostages.
It's sick.
I mean I think that is where we disagree, I think in some sense it is a war on Islamic nationalism/imperialism
It's a war on Hamas controlled Gaza. WW2 was a war on Nazi controlled Germany.
I mean I genuinely thought it was, You seemed to really want to instill in me that it is something I should consider when interacting with you...now that I tell you that I'm going to make an effort I feel like you unhappy with it.
I don't think that you know how to interact politely. You take everything as a slight or a personal attack and throw personal attacks back.
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I suppose that depends on how exclusive your definition of forebears is. I was using it in the sense of people who came before me with whom I share biological, sociological, ideological and/or behavioral traits and therefore personally identify with or am identified as by external entities. Savvy?
So you don't actually have forebears who were the victims of genocide. I get it.
I'm talking about a hatred that led to the murder 6 million people and the destruction of an entire civilization. This is in living memory, mind you. My grandfather, grandmother, and her brother were the only survivors of their large and extended families. The Polish town they lived in had 2,000 Jews before the war. Just 15 survived.
That's what antisemitism leads to.
And now Hamas wants to do the same thing.
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You're a very difficult person to have a conversation with. And the reason for that is that you are very insulting to people. You're accusing me of being a liar. I see why other people here say that they won't continue a conversation with you. Get yourself some manners. Seriously.
It took me about 5 seconds to find the news story in question.
Yes, I'm difficult to have a conversation with. I wasn't accusing you of lying in this particular case, I basically asked you for a source on the mindset of the "protesters" in your story and you presented a seemingly different story that was personally transmitted to you which is fine, anecdotes are fine, but I feel like you said it like I should be aware of your anecdote, and again it appears to be a totally different story. I didn't even look up the story about your daughter's friend because I was only ever asking about the initial story here:
"A Jewish student at Columbia complained to the administration that she felt unsafe as protesters were following her around on campus. (Under NYS Penal law, this is aggravated harassment, an "A misdemeanor".) The administration refused to do anything about it, telling her "You're the only person who feels unsafe"."
Are you suggesting that these 2 stories are in fact the same story?
You sit there behind your keyboard and make fun of a religious minority. A minority that is reporting that they feel like their safety is being ignored by multiple college administrations who are all facing Title VI suits on this very matter.
To be fair I'm not making fun of your religion, just your decision to share a seemingly personally conveyed story that was completely different than the one that I was referring to in a manner that seemed to suggest that you think I should be aware of your daughters friend's admittedly terrible expirience. Sorry, I legit thought it was funny that that made sense to you.
Yeah, I see why people won't talk to you.
Okay maybe it was unfair to assert that you think I'm an "Idiodic dirtbag" when you never actually called me either of those things...that wasn't fair. I should have just said that it feels as if you are hostile toward me, yet I'm still here discussing this topic precisely because I find it interesting.
We're not talking about "other forms of racism". The title of the discussion is "antisemitism".
I mean, I felt like in context it was relevant to speak about racism more generally in order to further clarify the nature of my interest in the topic.
Israel's haters are not complaining about the way the war is carried out. They're calling for Israel to surrender. This after the largest slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust and while Hamas is still holding 130 hostages.
It's sick.
Perhaps the Israel haters are not criticizing the way the war is carried out, but I am, or more specifically I've been critical of the way the war is being thought about and framed and the limits of the analogy between Hamas and Nazis. I've also expressed my skepticism of the efficacy of the war regarding future radicalization, the limits of eliminating Hamas through military force, and the post war plan for deradicalization and recidivism prevention. So do you have further issues with those points of critique?
It's a war on Hamas controlled Gaza. WW2 was a war on Nazi controlled Germany.
And I disagree, moreover while I'm fairly certain you have no significant influence over Israeli policy, I do believe that ignoring the broader ideological conflict has the potential to lead to future issues if it is not addressed by policy makers and influencers.
I don't think that you know how to interact politely. You take everything as a slight or a personal attack and throw personal attacks back.
I'm not sure I do either. I read your response as sarcastic, but hey if it wasn't then my mistake for reading sarcasm where there was none and I apologize.
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So you don't actually have forebears who were the victims of genocide. I get it.
I'm talking about a hatred that led to the murder 6 million people and the destruction of an entire civilization. This is in living memory, mind you. My grandfather, grandmother, and her brother were the only survivors of their large and extended families. The Polish town they lived in had 2,000 Jews before the war. Just 15 survived.
That's what antisemitism leads to.
And now Hamas wants to do the same thing.
So, does this mean that there is no valid criticism that can be leveraged regarding the war?
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Yes, I'm difficult to have a conversation with. I wasn't accusing you of lying in this particular case, I basically asked you for a source on the mindset of the "protesters" in your story and you presented a seemingly different story that was personally transmitted to you which is fine, anecdotes are fine, but I feel like you said it like I should be aware of your anecdote, and again it appears to be a totally different story.
I wasn't talking about some specific protest, just the general antisocial behavior of these protesters in general.
I didn't even look up the story about your daughter's friend because I was only ever asking about the initial story here:
"A Jewish student at Columbia complained to the administration that she felt unsafe as protesters were following her around on campus. (Under NYS Penal law, this is aggravated harassment, an "A misdemeanor".) The administration refused to do anything about it, telling her "You're the only person who feels unsafe"."
Are you suggesting that these 2 stories are in fact the same story?
One takes place at Columbia University and the other at Cooper Union. Are they the same story or not? You tell me.
To be fair I'm not making fun of your religion, just your decision to share a seemingly personally conveyed story that was completely different than the one that I was referring to in a manner that seemed to suggest that you think I should be aware of your daughters friend's admittedly terrible expirience. Sorry, I legit thought it was funny that that made sense to you.
We're not talking about my religion, we're talking about people who hate Jews. Which is, believe it or not, not a Jewish problem. It's a gentile problem.
Perhaps the Israel haters are not criticizing the way the war is carried out, but I am, or more specifically I've been critical of the way the war is being thought about and framed and the limits of the analogy between Hamas and Nazis. I've also expressed my skepticism of the efficacy of the war regarding future radicalization, the limits of eliminating Hamas through military force, and the post war plan for deradicalization and recidivism prevention. So do you have further issues with those points of critique?
And I have addressed those points, which you ignored.
And I disagree
Then there really isn't much more to talk about, it there?
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So, does this mean that there is no valid criticism that can be leveraged regarding the war?
Yes, of course there can be valid criticism. For example, I feel like Israel should have invaded Rafah already.
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I wasn't talking about some specific protest, just the general antisocial behavior of these protesters in general.
yeah okay, so you are specifically talking about people that claim to be protesting, but are in fact strictly using the façade of protest in order to obfuscate their real intention which is to intimidate Jewish people? I definitely agree that there are people like that, I tend to think that they like to hide in the midst of people whose actual intent is to protest much in the same way other types of racists like to use various legitimate policies and positions as cover for their actual racist goals. I think they like to muddy the water that way. If you are strictly talking about those people and not that generally protest or criticism of Israel or the war is generally speaking merely an excuse to intimidate Jewish people then I do not disagree with you. It hasn't been super clear to me that you were making the distinction that i've described here.
One takes place at Columbia University and the other at Cooper Union. Are they the same story or not? You tell me.
So why bring up the cooper station story at all and continue to drill it long after I told you that I was specifically referring to the Columbia story? When I specifically said that perhaps there was confusion about which story I was referring to and then I clarified that it was the Columbia story that I was talking about , Why didn't you just say "Yes, we were referring to 2 different stories" And then go on to provide or explain that you couldn't or wouldn't provide a source to the Columbia story as you understood it. I genuinely don't understand why you thought that what you did instead was supposed to make sense to me.
We're not talking about my religion, we're talking about people who hate Jews. Which is, believe it or not, not a Jewish problem. It's a gentile problem.
you said:
"You sit there behind your keyboard and make fun of a religious minority. A minority that is reporting that they feel like their safety is being ignored by multiple college administrations who are all facing Title VI suits on this very matter."
so I was just clarifying that your nor anyone else religious minority status was what I was making fun of, I was making fun of you as an individual and specifically your baffling choices in this conversation. Now I'm making fun of the fact that you specifically brought up the idea that I was making fun of a religious minority that I think it is safe to say you belong to only to immediately turn around and say "We're not talking about my religion". I feel like I'm talking to an angry bag of squirrels.
And I have addressed those points, which you ignored.
Welp, lets review, The first point that I ignored:
You say:
"It's amazing, because not one person during world war 2 claimed that "bombing Germany will only create more Nazis". When a country is at war with totalitarian state, you have to destroy the state, and worry about deradicalizing the population afterwards.
and I go on to completely ignore it by responding with:
haha, well yeah that's not a bad point. It is true that it is just as conceivable that a concerted effort to implement programs, policies and attitude shifts after reaching the benchmarks that satisfy the total destruction of Hamas in the minds of the folks that have the power to declare that can likely mitigate the generation of would-be future terrorists. I'd argue that Nazis and Hamas and its ilk, while there are ideological parallels (like really hating the Jewish people for instance) and comparable underlying motives & methods ( Like using antisemitism to facilitate recruiting and justification for territorial gains), are fairly dissimilar in some fundamental ways. We are still not rid of Nazis, In part because the ideology therein appeals to the discontentment of those that can consider themselves the (entirely made up imo) Nazi racial categories. In that way Nazism is not absolutely tied to German national identity, but It was largely a nationalist movement. I say all of that so that you don't absolutely drag me when I claim that the dissimilarities between Nazism and Hamas and similar Islamic terrorist organizations limits the efficacy of a "Bombing Germany" style strategy when applied to them in the sense of how tightly mated to national identity Nazism was and how tightly associated Islam and Islamic nationalism is to Hamas. As a writer of terrible sentences I even recognize that was one of my worst. Anyway that is before I mention How much more intrinsically accustomed to decentralized power structures and non-traditional warfare these various Islamic groups are (including Hamas although Palestinian nationalism is a key feature for them) than Nazi's during WW2 could have ever hoped to be. All that to say that your point isn't entirely irrelevant, but I would be concerned with overgeneralizing the Nazi parallels especially as they apply to the possibilities of radicalizing folks outside of the "home" nation/state.
So none of that means that a good post conflict plan for mitigating radicalization is some kind of hopeless endeavor, but it certainly isn't front loaded in the sense that it is readily apparent to me that there is such a plan. I think there is good reason to distrust our wars on terrorism to effectively plan, deploy and support those sorts of long term goals because historically, for whatever reasons it has not appeared to work out that way. This is one reason that I'm personally skeptical that future radicalization will be contained through well considered and implemented policy, outside of what I mentioned in the previous section, as well as just best laid plans.
Anyway, ultimately my original post was critical of the idea that there was some key simple concept that people fail to understand, as opposed to giving at least some folks the credit of understanding well enough but disagreeing or expressing skepticism without being categorized as either inherently anti-Semitic or failing to consider this one simple weight loss secret because the only thinkers will I presume think like you if they are actually thinking.
This is by no means a comprehensive download of all of my thoughts and feeling on the issues at hand , and I'm fine to continue to talk about this if you have further points....heck I'll even make some effort to consider your feelings.
And it goes on like that for a while back and forth as I point by point ignore all of your posts with a wall of text explaining where I agree with your points and where I disagree. To claim that my points or responses aren't good or lack depth or understanding would be understandable, but to claim that I've simply ignored your responses as this thread evidences the exact opposite makes me wonder if there is some kind of Chinese spyware on your device that is redacting everything I say and replacing it with "I know you are but what am I?"...which is crazy right, that would be too specific, like why would China be specifically targeting my conversation with you? Like are they just beta testing this program on me before they launch it worldwide to cause communication mayhem on barely used religiously affiliated internet forums everywhere?
Then there really isn't much more to talk about, it there?
Honestly after this last post I'm not sure that you were ever taking to me in the first place, as opposed to talking to about how you feel about other people to me.
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So, does this mean that there is no valid criticism that can be leveraged regarding the war?
Yes, of course there can be valid criticism. For example, I feel like Israel should have invaded Rafah already.
ha nice one, I suppose that does constitute criticism of the war. you got me there.
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I was making fun of you as an individual
Oh. You were making fun of me. As an individual.
I feel like I'm talking to an angry bag of squirrels.
Ok, you know what? Discussion over. If this forum had a "block" feature I would block you so I'd never have to listen to your nonsense again.
Have a nice life.
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Oh. You were making fun of me. As an individual.
Exactly, your religious disposition is merely coincidental.
Ok, you know what? Discussion over. If this forum had a "block" feature I would block you so I'd never have to listen to your nonsense again.
was it ever a discussion though, I really don't feel like you were ever actually engaging with what I was actually saying. Anyway it seems trivially easy to just ignore my posts the old fashioned way honestly.
Have a nice life.
You too.
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So, this US resolution to immediately cease fire in Gaza represents an about-face and an attempt to ham-string ongoing American support for Israel's defensive program - a seemingly politically expedient gesture voted down by the UN (China and Russia, of course). The US could have intervened, with an orchestrated human relief effort in Gaza, or, better yet, led a coalition while IDF continues to root out Hamas & terrorists.
Overt political expediency at a time of festering resentment within the US and growing global resistance against Israel.
Blatant public efforts to influence the political structure of sovereign Israel.
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The wise objective would be for the US to support Israel in their mission of smashing the genocidal lunatics that are Hamas. Biden seems to be making the calculation that he needs Muslim votes in Michigan and Minnesota and only by ensuring Hamas' survival can he get those votes. Either he doesn't believe that it will cost him votes of American supporters of Israel, or he doesn't care. He certainly is cavalier about Israeli lives.
The ultimate amusing outcome would be that he carries Michigan and Minnesota but loses the election anyway because he loses a "safe" blue state like NJ.