Wrong, so very very wrong. This tired trope needs to die yesterday. It’s used by those ignorant of history as a thought-stopping cliché. Usually phrased as “Those Middle Easterners have been fighting each other for thousands of years, what can you do…”
That is grossly false. The Ottoman Empire took the Levant in 1516. For the next 400 years there was no fighting there. It was a Pax Ottomanica. There was no Arab–Jewish conflict. It didn’t exist and never had existed.
The Arab–Jewish conflict is only one hundred years old. It started in the 1920s. It was the fault of the British, who mismanaged their mandate and then washed their hands of the problem they had started. We sure can answer “who started it”: it was the British. Though Lawrence of Arabia makes for a thrilling movie, it was the aftermath of that which started the trouble.
If there was no “Arab-Jewish conflict” during this time, it is because throughout the Middle East, the Arabs (and in places their Ottoman masters too) had their boots firmly planted upon our dhimmi necks.
(Not that Christians were any better, and the worst of the slaughters came from Crusaders).
“There was no Black-White conflict under Jim Crow!”.
Part of the reason Gazans are acting the way they are is because they are starving to death. Keeping aid distribution centers open longer would help alleviate that desperation. Having regular hours and consistent hours of operation would help alleviate that desperation.
If every time you open the aid station scores of people get killed then they are emphatically NOT “firing into a hillside” or in any safe manner so fucking stop doing that.
Why is the aid station for Gazans next to such a place? Move one or the other. This is not rocket science.
According to the Israeli government and the IDF everybody else in the world is a tool of Hamas. Which is fucking ridiculous.
What most disturbs me is that you won’t for even a moment consider that Israeli just might in the wrong about something.
See, the difference is that I’d at least listen to someone presenting what they believe to be evidence of “socialist policy”, even if I think it unlikely. Because I understand that over time political parties, governments, and societies can change and not always in good ways.
Rather like how the Republican party used to be rabidly anti-communist yet it was a Republican who opened relations with China (see Nixon’s visit to China).
Unlike you I can admit my nation has committed atrocities. My nation has committed genocide against the Natives, apartheid against people of African descent, bombed civilians (numerous examples). My nation isn’t always right, in fact, sometimes it is very, very wrong. Most people can admit the wrong-doing of their nations but you shout down the very possibility of an error. And that’s why I say you’re in denial, because you won’t face the human fallibility of your people as well as everyone else’s.
So… you’re saying all those videos on the internet are CGI or AI generated? Every single report, without exception, from many different sources are deliberately lying?
Why the FUCK are these “aid centers” right next to such sensitive military sites that lethal force is needed to protect said military sites?
And - funny that - starving people showing up looking for food. You do understand that’s something starving people do, right?
Actually… it is.
Why the FUCK are aid stations near such sensitive military zones?
Oh, right - seventy percent of Gaza is now off limits to Gazans and the IDF uses lethal force to keep it that way. No matter who they have to shoot. And the Gazans aren’t allowed to leave, either. It’s like shooting fish in a barrel.
Actually, no - it is actually NOT standard practice to automatically shoot anyone who jumps over a fence at a “military outpost” everywhere else in the world. There are some zones where the military very, very clearly posts that lethal force can be used but - what a notion - aid stations for starving people aren’t set up next to them! Arrested? Sure. Usually it’s lost hikers or lost tourists or the like. If they’re harmless they’re released. If they’re not harmless then the military police or other appropriate authority deals with them… but “deals with them” doesn’t normally involve shooting them out of hand.
I get that it’s a war zone - rules are slightly different than in peace time - but if you’re right next to a goddamned aid station for starving civilians try a little fucking restraint. Or relocate the aid station. Or relocate whatever is so fucking important that it’s worth more than a human life.
It says something very negative that, apparently, the IDF’s approach to “fixing” the problem is killing people and no other alternative.
What some people here want us to believe is that they’re not building strawmen to deflect from their wholesale repetition of blatantly false Israeli propaganda. Clearly they are.
Nobody said Iran weren’t interested in building an atomic bomb.
The army is there to protect the aid station, obviously. It’s not nearby by coincidence. If the army wasn’t there, Hamas would come and kill the aid workers and the “Israeli collaborators” protecting them and take the aid. Rather counterproductive.
Nah, that’s a pretty silly thing to say.
Israel is wrong about a whole lot of things. Another idiotic statement.
None of the credible reports are about the original claim, which was that Israel is randomly shooting up people waiting in line for food. That’s what I said was a lie.
AGAIN, because Hamas keeps murdering aid workers. Keep the fuck up.
Like I said, you’re more than welcome to go rush a Ukrainian base with fifty of your buddies if you think that wouldn’t get you shot.
For the last fucking time, the army is there to protect the aid distribution center and the workers who staff it. You can’t relocate them away from each other unless you want Hamas to kill the aid workers again.
I agree this has probably stiffened Iran’s resolve to get an atomic bomb but I am not really sure that makes a difference. They wanted one before. They want one now. They have long been working towards one. Now they are working towards one but more?
Plus, if they want to start rebuilding the facilities they need to work on a nuke, they might find it a little difficult since Israel has shown that it can achieve air superiority over any part of Iran at any time.
Israel has, mostly through subterfuge, delayed Iran’s project for many years already. Where does this idea that they’ll just stand by and let Iran restart its nuclear project come from?
Remember, this is a ceasefire, not a peace treaty. It can end at any time. If Iran wants a more permanent peace, they’ll have to agree to give up enrichment. There is zero reason for Israel to agree to a peace that doesn’t include the elimination of Iran’s nuclear program and strict limits on their ballistic missiles too.
@Babale, serious question: Why do you so vehemently support a Hamas ally? Because Netanyahu and Hamas are definitely allies. Both want the same thing: War and violence with as many atrocities as possible, on both sides, because atrocities on either side firm up the support for both of them. Both of them work together towards this common goal. When there are two factions in a conflict that want the same goals, and work together to achieve those goals, they’re allies.
That’s not support. That’s your feels. Which is fine but, for the SDMB, do you have anything more to support what you are saying? Like proof Netanyahu and Hamas are in cahoots?
Serious answer: I don’t support Netanyahu. I blame him for October 7th more than anyone else on the Israeli side, I disagree with almost all of his everyday policies, I find many of his political allies revolting, and most of all, I think his judicial reform bill is an absolute disgrace and a naked attempt to turn Israel into a dictatorship.
I don’t really think that’s an accurate description of Netanyahu. But I can’t really convince you of a different assessment I’ve come to through watching the man for the twenty years or so I’ve cared about politics; so I’m not going to try. But that aside, I find him just as distasteful as you do, even if for other reasons.
Netanyahu famously allowed Qatari funds meant for humanitarian aid to enter Gaza, where the government is Hamas. He is (rightly) maligned for this move in Israel, but the way it’s portrayed abroad - that he’s directly funding Hamas as a proxy or something - is pretty silly.