The Gaza War

[MIguy]

This thread is proof the internet was a mistake.  🫣

[Edman85]

23 minutes ago, MIguy said:

This thread is proof the internet was a mistake.  🫣

Feeds right into adversarial hands.

[Tigeraholic1]

 

[chasfh]

On 11/1/2023 at 9:35 PM, ewsieg said:

None of it says that, nor was that the point I was trying to make.  {snip}

The point I have been making here is that I just don’t see the kind of antisemitism from the left that justifies the inference, or even statement, that the left is just as antisemitic as the right in the wake of Gaza. So when you posted the article about Fetterman saying Israel has the right to remove Hamas, I was looking for criticism from antisemitic leftists based on antisemitic reasons, because I thought you were showing me the thing I was looking for. But if the article doesn’t have any of that, and you want me to contemplate something else related, then I think you need to be clearer about how it relates to my point.

[chasfh]

On 11/2/2023 at 8:08 AM, mtutiger said:

There was also Bernie Sanders getting absolutely flamed in his Twitter replies for recognizing the anniversary of the Tree of Life Synagogue Massacre iirc.

I'm sure those were all closet Trumpers too.

Probably not so closeted … 😏

[chasfh]

23 hours ago, 1984Echoes said:

What are you saying here? Is Israel the bad guys now by trying to protect their citizens from further murders/ barbaric acts of terrorism?

 

Let me restate this:

Osama Bin Laden and his followers are certainly the bad guys in this conflict but that doesn't automatically make America the good guys.  

That makes LOTS of sense, right?

 

Let me make one additional statement: Hamas WANTS Palestinian casualties, women and children. Simply so they can win the propaganda war against Israel. They BUILT tunnels underneath refugee camps, hospitals, etc. They hide AMONGST their fellow Palestinians and shoot rockets at Israeli forces FROM hospitals, camps, etc.

Israel has no choice but to eliminate Hamas. And since Hamas is EMBEDDED in every aspect/ location of Palestinian life, Israel has no choice but to inflict civilian casualties, WHILE trying to hunt down Hamas murderers and terrorists.

Yes, they ARE the good guys. But Hamas has NO PROBLEM SACRIFICING Palestinians in an effort to paintbrush the Israelis as "just as terrible" as themselves. But I'm not blind. And I'm not stupid. I see EXACTLY what Hamas is doing. So yes, the Israelis are the good guys in this fight.

 

I don’t know whether Hamas has actually said they are actively hoping for Israel to kill thousands of their Palestinian civilians so Hamas can win a propaganda war—maybe they have—but I also wonder whether they made a huge miscalculation in which they assumed that by embedding among the civilian population, Israel would not attack the hospitals, schools, etc., so as to avoid those casualties, because the PR hit they and the US would take for doing that would be too great to risk. If that was part of their thinking, they definitely lost that bet.

[chasfh]

23 hours ago, 1984Echoes said:

One further point:

Gazans VOTED for Hamas. Hamas won an election over Fatah because Gazans WANTED Hamas leadership.

Yes, Gazans voted for Hamas in 2006. Well, at least 45% of them did. Fifty-five percent of them, not so much.

[ewsieg]

24 minutes ago, chasfh said:

The point I have been making here is that I just don’t see the kind of antisemitism from the left that justifies the inference, or even statement, that the left is just as antisemitic as the right in the wake of Gaza. So when you posted the article about Fetterman saying Israel has the right to remove Hamas, I was looking for criticism from antisemitic leftists based on antisemitic reasons, because I thought you were showing me the thing I was looking for. But if the article doesn’t have any of that, and you want me to contemplate something else related, then I think you need to be clearer about how it relates to my point.

Well, I didn't want you to contemplate something else, I do think it's related.  Similar to what Pfife and I were discussing yesterday in terms of understanding the reasoning behind something.  I'm not saying progressives are all hidden anti-semites, but it's the progressives that are upset at Fetterman for saying Israel has the right to remove Hamas.  You can decide what reasons they have in doing that, but I guarantee if there are any progressive anti-semite's that exists, they definitively feel emboldened to speak up now.  

 

[pfife]

6 minutes ago, ewsieg said:

Well, I didn't want you to contemplate something else, I do think it's related.  Similar to what Pfife and I were discussing yesterday in terms of understanding the reasoning behind something.  I'm not saying progressives are all hidden anti-semites, but it's the progressives that are upset at Fetterman for saying Israel has the right to remove Hamas.  You can decide what reasons they have in doing that, but I guarantee if there are any progressive anti-semite's that exists, they definitively feel emboldened to speak up now.  

 

In his statement he said neutralize Hamas, not remove - which is a different military goal.   That said, it's a lower goal that could presumably happen with much less civilian casualties than removal of Hamas.... and some portion of his base (maybe even a large portion)  still backlashed on him.  

Edited November 3, 2023 by pfife

[mtutiger]

44 minutes ago, chasfh said:

The point I have been making here is that I just don’t see the kind of antisemitism from the left that justifies the inference, or even statement, that the left is just as antisemitic as the right in the wake of Gaza. 

I'd have to go back and review the entire thread, but I don't recall anyone drawing an equivalency between the degree of antisemitism being exhibited by the left versus right in society writ large.

[ewsieg]

9 minutes ago, pfife said:

In his statement he said neutralize Hamas, not remove - which is a different military goal.   That said, it's a lower goal that could presumably happen with much less civilian casualties than removal of Hamas.... and some portion of his base (maybe even a large portion)  still backlashed on him.  

That's a good point too, the loudest group doesn't mean its the biggest group.

[chasfh]

17 minutes ago, ewsieg said:

Well, I didn't want you to contemplate something else, I do think it's related.  Similar to what Pfife and I were discussing yesterday in terms of understanding the reasoning behind something.  I'm not saying progressives are all hidden anti-semites, but it's the progressives that are upset at Fetterman for saying Israel has the right to remove Hamas.  You can decide what reasons they have in doing that, but I guarantee if there are any progressive anti-semite's that exists, they definitively feel emboldened to speak up now.  

 

The point was never about whether progressives can criticize Israel, or criticize supportive statements about Israel's policies in Gaza. It's in part about whether the act of criticizing itself constitutes antisemitism. I don't see why progressives can't criticize what Fetterman said for reasons other than antisemitism—that is, I don't think doing so makes it de facto antisemitism. So unless there is antisemitism apparent in the critical statements being made about Fetterman, I don't see how it relates to that point.

Edited November 3, 2023 by chasfh

[ewsieg]

I'm not feeling comfortable agreeing with Pfife so much in these last few posts from today and yesterday.  Pfife, can you go give some half-assed defense to Nessel/Flint in the Politics Schmalitics thread so I can tell you why you're wrong.

[pfife]

5 minutes ago, ewsieg said:

I'm not feeling comfortable agreeing with Pfife so much in these last few posts from today and yesterday.  Pfife, can you go give some half-assed defense to Nessel/Flint in the Politics Schmalitics thread so I can tell you why you're wrong.

A thaw in the cold war?

It sure seems like Nessel screwed that up bad but I don't know enough about the details to gaslight you about it yet

[mtutiger]

9 minutes ago, chasfh said:

So unless there is antisemitism apparent in the critical statements being made about Fetterman, I don't see how it relates to that point.

I mean, it kinda depends on what "apparent" is to a degree right?

"George Soros" is used as a trope in a lot of right wing antisemitism IMV.... that's pretty apparent to me, but it's coded as well in a way that gives plausible deniability.

Edited November 3, 2023 by mtutiger

[chasfh]

10 minutes ago, mtutiger said:

I'd have to go back and review the entire thread, but I don't recall anyone drawing an equivalency between the degree of antisemitism being exhibited by the left versus right in society writ large.

No need to. It may not have been an outright claim that the bucket of antisemitism the progressives carry is filled to the exact same degree as the bucket of antisemitism the right wingers carry. But there was at least an implication that antisemitism on the left has increased since Gaza, and that it's obvious and everyone can see it. I just haven't really seen that, explicitly. All I have seen is criticism of Israel by the left that is conflated with antisemitism, or incidents happening in bastions of progressivism where the antisemitism is assumed to have been by progressives, based on location. I'm open to the idea that all this is true, since I have no dog in that particular match either way, I'm just looking for something more concrete than inferences.

[chasfh]

3 minutes ago, mtutiger said:

I mean, it kinda depends on what "apparent" is to a degree right?

"George Soros" is used as a trope in a lot of right wing antisemitism IMV.... that's pretty apparent to me, but it's coded as well in a way that gives plausible deniability.

Right. There's been a lot of coding and inferences, and not so much apparent. Just looking for more apparent.

[pfife]

2 minutes ago, mtutiger said:

I mean, it kinda depends on what "apparent" is to a degree right?

"George Soros" is used as a trope in a lot of right wing antisemitism IMV.... that's pretty apparent to me, but it's coded as well in a way that gives plausible deniability.

Likewise in the accusations of antisemitism.   Many claimed to see antisemitism in "All about the benjamins" when Ilhan Ohmar said that.   I did not, I saw the title of the huge hit by Puff Daddy from 1997, where Benjamin is a reference to Ben Franklin on the 100 bill, a reference to money.   Moreover, her reference to all about the benjamins made no sense from an antisemitic perspective and all of the sense from a pursuing money persective.  

[mtutiger]

2 minutes ago, chasfh said:

Right. There's been a lot of coding and inferences, and not so much apparent. Just looking for more apparent.

Do you think right wing antisemitism is apparent when you see it come across in coded language?

[ewsieg]

High level quick view of the left on Israel, and understanding a potentially hypocritical thought process here as I've often argued here that just because rural America has complaints the left doesn't agree with, it doesn't make them racists, it's that it's not that there are a lot of anti-semites on the left per se, but it's simply that this is a conflict between two groups of people and one race is darker and poorer than the other, ipso facto they have to take their side.  

[mtutiger]

6 minutes ago, pfife said:

Likewise in the accusations of antisemitism.   Many claimed to see antisemitism in "All about the benjamins" when Ilhan Ohmar said that.   I did not, I saw the title of the huge hit by Puff Daddy from 1997, where Benjamin is a reference to Ben Franklin on the 100 bill, a reference to money.   Moreover, her reference to all about the benjamins made no sense from an antisemitic perspective and all of the sense from a pursuing money persective.  

I mean, the whole "Jews being good with money" thing is about the oldest antisemitic trope in the book, isn't it?

[pfife]

Just now, mtutiger said:

I mean, the whole "Jews being good with money" thing is about the oldest antisemitic trope in the book, isn't it?

Yes that is true, but all ethnicities pursue money, and that's also capitalism

[mtutiger]

Just now, pfife said:

Yes that is true, but all ethnicities pursue money, and that's also capitalism

Have all ethnicities been targeted for pursuing money the way Jews have been in the past? And, in some dark corners of society, still are?

That history is what makes it a trope.... and yeah, when a politician, advertently or not, ends up using a trope, it's not exactly a huge surprise when it causes controversy. 

[pfife]

Just now, mtutiger said:

Have all ethnicities been targeted for pursuing money the way Jews have been in the past? And, in some dark corners of society, still are?

That history is what makes it a trope.... and yeah, when a politician, advertently or not, ends up using a trope, it's not exactly a huge surprise when it causes controversy. 

I don't think all ethnicities have been targeted for pursuing money the way Jews have in the past, or still are.

I also don't think because someone says someone else is "all about the Benjamins" and the person is Jewish means that they're leveraging that trope - they could be saying that the group/person that happens to be Jewish is pursuing money which is inherent in most (I did say all before) ethnicities and is a fundamental part of the capitalist system in which we all live.

It also could be the case that Omar's antisemitic AF.  Deeper analysis of other quotes could definitely show evidence of that. 

It's my contention that if one accuses her or anyone of antisemitism, the burden of proof is on the accuser to provide evidence and in this particular situation with this particular statement, IMO there's plenty of reasonable doubt.   This is no different of a standard than we apply to accusations in this forum, and have explicitly stated it several times.

Furthermore, in terms of evaluating efficacy of evidence supporting accusations, I don't find "it's not apparent to you" to be particularly convincing, which is why in legal areas we have the reasonable person standard.  

Maybe others do not want to apply the high legal-esque standard in this situation that I have here but to each their own.  They run the risk of falsely accusing someone of antisemitism.   The other side of the coin is that my standard could result in not recognizing antisemitism but I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt, metaphorically innocent until proven guilty per se.

[Biff Mayhem]

22 minutes ago, mtutiger said:

I mean, the whole "Jews being good with money" thing is about the oldest antisemitic trope in the book, isn't it?

I equate it with "Germans are good at engineering". If saying a race of people is good at something, that's usually a compliment. Someone saying "Jews control the world because they're good with money" is a different rabbit trail.