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This one is for you guys, and I will strategically withdraw from the convo.
> Lots of people are dead, but the Jews still live in Israel and the Islamic death worshippers still want more Jews dead.
The sentiment goes both ways.
I have, personally, here in the US, heard Palestinians tell me that the Jews need to be wiped out entirely, and Jews tell me that the Palestinians need to be wiped out entirely. As someone with no horse in this race, it is not obvious to me that either side has moral superiority, and I have to judge based primarily on which side seems more hypocritical.
Ultimately, if I was Israeli, I would want to wipe out the Palestinians, and if I was Palestinian, I would want to wipe out the Israelis. I can see it from both of their perspectives. And ultimately ultimately, at least if my dating history is any indication, if you forced me to take a side, I'd take Israel's. So just as some friendly PR advice: The conflict is not morally one-sided, everyone sees this, and acting like it is robs your side of credibility. It is legitimate to calmly and rationally say "my family will not be safe until the Palestinians are wiped out" without pretending that you don't actually want to hurt them. Maybe you specifically don't, but a lot of Israelis do, and they say so openly behind closed doors
(None of what I have just said should be construed to imply that the exact same dynamic does not exist on the other side)
As an aside, the moral preening of the west in modern warfare is infuriating to me. Not only do you not have to be the 'good guys' in a war, but there are never good guys in any war. There are only bad guys.
I wish we could go back to the era of honest warfare (if such a thing even ever existed). Sometimes there is conflict. Sometimes conflict is extreme and violent. That's just part of nature. When you find yourself in an existential conflict, morality doesn't really matter. Winning matters.
I wish we could go back to the world in which, when someone is at war, they are comfortable with saying "fuck you, we will completely destroy you. If you didn't want that, you shouldn't have started this war / provoked us into war". A world in which we were comfortable crushing our enemies, seeing them driven before us, and hearing the lamentations of their women. A world in which we took responsibility for the horrors we unleash, instead of pretending like we're the good guys. There are never good guys. There are only winners and losers. And trust me, you always want to be the winner, regardless of whether or not the winner is the good guys
I wish we could have a public discussion where Israelis say "yeah, fuck the Palestinians, kill them all, it's the only way to be safe" and the Palestinians said "Yeah, fuck the Israelis, kill them all, it's the only way to be safe", and then they did a war until one side was dead, and then whichever side was not dead (I think we all know which side that would be) wins, and there's no more war and nobody ever has to worry about the middle east ever again.
The obsession with morality in the wider Western culture is over the top. War is not a moral contest and can be discussed without emotion or cheap judgements. IMO these obscure what is really going on.
Surely you are not an American, loyal to liberty and justice for all, as you describe the situation in Israel/Palestine as some kind of almost balanced contest where right and wrong are not easy to distinguish for either side, that leaves you taking Israel's side.
In America the Pledge of Allegiance ends with "Liberty and Justice for All". Zionism has no use for this phrase and is the exact opposite - an ethnic cleansing project now going on for 76 years even as Jews in America, equal in number to those in Israel, are not killing the natives, do not hate their fellow Arab-Americans and enjoy all the liberty and justice for all (certainly not fully realized for any American) of those Arab-Americans and all other Americans.
But there is a unique liberty for American Jews. As they enjoy the benefits of American freedom, they may also go to Israel and enjoy the benefits of ethnic cleansing, move into a settlement, pick up one of the AR-15's freely distributed by Israel's "justice" minister to settlers (presumably for "justice") and then go out and shoot a Palestinian without fear of consequences from either Israel or the US.
Zionism - liberty and justice for all Exact opposites
President Biden says he is a Zionist, the armed forces of the US are pledged to Zionism, America is supplying Zionism with everything it needs to kill the Palestinians, the natives. US Secretary of State, a Zionist, sits in on the Israel war council and offers advice.
I stand on a busy street corner in the US calling out to my fellow Americans to support liberty and justice for all for which so many thousands of Americans died in WW2. Reminding them that America is about to spend American live DEFENDING ethnic cleansing, not destroying it as in WW2. One or two come up to me in support, a few give a thumbs up. Otherwise, and across the nation, Americans are quiet under their Zionist leadership, though the blue and white flag of Israel has not yet replaced Old Glory.
I imagine, if one were to stand quietly in Arlington National Cemetery, one might hear the murmur of thousands of voices objecting to what is done by a Zionist president who I have no doubt would claim he represents these many dead.
All Americans are being subjected to restrictions on freedom of speech, particularly on campus, to protect Israel. Zionist donors direct the actions of university administrations. AIPAC directs Congress without even a whisper for investigation of the blatant foreign influence in American politics though "Russiagate" got a real workout.
I say it here as I loudly say it on the street, as I am just about to leave to say it on the street today. I DO NOT STAND WITH ISRAEL, I STAND WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL! AMRICANS - THROW OFF THE IRON GRIP OF ZIONISM!
People will calming walk by, a few will give thumbs up. My country has been captured and we the people sleep as a pointless war with Iran for Israel is about to claim American lives. Incredible.
BINGO. I am not an American. I am a white settler-colonialist living on stolen land Down Under. Entirely OK with it BTW. I was born in a hospital named after George V and was named after the son-in-law of the last KIng-Emperor. If my current king ordered the RAF to do to New York or Washington what Netanyahu is doing to Gaza I'd think it ill advised but I'd still be thrilled to see some spirit left in the dynasty. Your country rightfully belongs to the Windsor-Mountbattens.
As for ethnic cleansing. This works a treat. The ethnic cleansing in the Eastern Mediteranean after WW1 enabled Greece and Turkey to coexist. The peace of East-Central Europe was enabled by the expulsion of the Gerrnans from the former Czechoslovakia and Poland.
It is worth noting that the the Iraqi PM who expelled all the Jews from Iraq (Nuri As-Said) famously said that the Israelis need to do the same for all their Arabs because Sunni Muslims would never live peacefully as a minority alongside Israelis.
Yeah, I grew up a long time ago and realized that all of that bullshit political moralizing is bullshit. I really, truly, do not give a fuck if every single person in the middle east dies. In fact, that might even be a good thing, because we wouldn't be sending billions of my dollars to jews in the desert if they were all dead.
Don't get me wrong. I am very strongly confident that Israel is in fact engaging in ethnic cleansing. I have heard American Jews say, to my face, that they openly support such a thing. I just don't care.
I'm pretty confident that, if they had the chance to turn the tables, the Palestinians would do the same thing. I would, in their position. Force me to live my whole life in an open air prison and I would want to kill my jailers too.
From my perspective, the only permanent solution to the israel/palestine problem is when one side completes the genocide of the other. I don't really care which side wins, I just want them to stop stealing my fucking money.
But at the end of the day, Jews are whiter, smarter, and the women are hotter, so if I had to pick a side, I'd pick that one.
If Jews control our society and are willing and able to ruthlessly enforce that on anyone who doesn't like it, do you think it's a good strategy to go around loudly and publicly putting a target on your back? That's how you get your phone to explode, and I wish I was joking but at this point, I think there's real chance of that happening to people who spout inconvenient truths too loudly.
I'd rather be on the winning side. Or at least not jailed and gassed for opposing the winning side
I agree but its bad strategy to public proclaim you want to wipe out your enemies in the modern western world. Like's who gonna actually be like, " I support Israel because they are honest that they want to wipe out the Palestinians. I will not support Palestinians because they are not honest that they want to wipe out the Israel."
You know what's a worse strategy? To control every aspect of our society and government and force us to give you billions of dollars to engage in ethnic cleansing while loudly _and obviously_ lying about not doing it.
That's how you get camps and showers. Don't say I didn't warn you
Finkelstein on the Oct 7th massacre: "I, for one, will never begrudge—on the contrary, it warms every fiber of my soul—the scenes of Gaza’s smiling children as their arrogant Jewish supremacist oppressors have, finally, been humbled."
Yeah, this guy's not a twisted psychopath, his soul is warmed finding out hundreds of people were tortured and murdered—never mind the fact that some of them could have been his cousins.
Finkelstein is a moral cretin and someone needs to tell him that no matter how much he hates Jews and weeps tears of joy at their murder, it will never make him not Jewish.
Hate Israel all you want, but people who applaud massacres reveal themselves as anti-human and not worth heeding.
What did Sinwar expect to happen? Victory over the Yahood? More like a one day orgy of violence and false pride in the killing, rape, torture, and kidnapping of their enemy, followed by a year of death and destruction for the people who's "liberation" he was pretending to fight for. What kind of people do this?
And don't tell me it's out of "desperation". Gaza could have been a model for a successful Arab state in the area if only they had spent the billions of dollars of aid money they received to develop their economy instead of on weapons and tunnels, and lining their leaders pockets.
Who 'wants peace'? “Hamas wants to destroy Israel, right? But as Mehdi Hasan shows in a new video on blowback, Israeli officials admit they helped start the group.”?
This is just another "clear in hindsight" rationalization meant to paint Hamas and the Palestinians as helpless clay in the hands of the Jews, with no agency of their own.
Yes, Israel had a strategy of divide and conquer (like every other group ever in every conflict) against the PLO, who at the time were menacing Jews everywhere w terrorism, but Hamas has roots in the Muslim Brotherhood, which was active since the 1920s. Also, just think clearly for a second: could there really be an outside force so powerful that it turns its opponents into theocratic terrorists who've dedicated their whole lives and the their children's lives to the destruction of their neighbors? Not even the Jews are that strong and devious!
The Western Left pursues this very paternalistic and condescending strategy toward their new sacred victims, the Palestinians: they have no responsibility for ANY of their actions, no agency, everything they've ever said and done is the fault of the Israelis. This is part of the reason they're a failed society that needs to be fed by the UN, the Left has indulged all their worst inclinations and worst ideas, such as the glorificiation of Intifada!, which has led to this disastrous moment where Gaza lies in ruins.
Two and a half years on you could say the same thing about Ukraine. It will end the only way it was ever going to end, though with a lot more dead Russian and Ukrainian teenagers, thanks to neocon psychopathy.
So I had a brief moment of surreality the other day, when I looked up the precise location of the village my great grandparents lived in before they fled the Russian Revolution to Canada.
It is less than 10 miles from the current Russo-Ukrainian front line.
It is weird to think that slavs are murdering each other by the thousands over who gets to say they own _my_ (German) ethnic homeland.
("Germans in Ukraine?" I hear you say? As I understand it, that part of Ukraine was effectively uninhabited until Catherine the Great recruited my German ancestors to settle it at the start of the 1800s. It is, for all intents and purposes, _our_ land. Not the Ukrainians', not the Russians', but the Mennonite's)
Interesting, my only disagreement is why they are killing themselves. The land itself seems like the least important part of this conflict. Like everything in this war the land is just another proxy.
I think the IDF will run into a quagmire in southern Lebanon as they have the two previous occasions they invaded. Hezbollah is not a physical state and is not as easy to destroy as traditional state entity.
Another factor to consider is that Israel is very unstable socially and politically. Israeli society is politically, ethnically, and religiously fragmented.
What has changed for me, and I suspect for millions of other Americans, is waking up to the reality that maybe Israel is not the innocent lamb surrounded by ravenous wolves that we have been propagandized to believe. I have taken a deeper dive into the history of Israel and I am beginning to understand the difference between Judaism and Zionism. I am currently reading, The Empty Wagon: Zionism’s Journey From Identity Crisis To Identity Theft, by Rabbi Yaakov Shapiro. Current commentary, by Rabbi Shapiro can be heard on YouTube.
I don't think it is a stretch to say--for the sake of argument--that something has indeed "happened:" Iran has been revealed as less potent than previously assessed, and has even been knocked a bit bloody.
With Iran's weakness possibly revealed, David Ignatius was trotted out on "Washington Week" to chum it up with Jeffrey Goldberg and to promote Harris as possessing the fortitude to take the kill shot--if I recall Ignatius correctly. Of course, this is speculation, and most likely evidence of very little regarding a larger expedition into Persia.
No one has seen a genuine response from Iran yet because they(Iran) are still trying to avoid all-out war. All-out war between Iran, Israel and the US would be a complete disaster. They can’t “win” maybe - but everyone with regional proximity will suffer. Aside from that - oil price rise would probably cripple the global economy.
True. All true. But all out war already reached Israel on Oct 7. Waging war by proxy is still waging war. The US, UK, EU, Canada, Australia and Japan (as well as Iran and Qatar) could afford to finance tunnels in Gaza as well as the real estate portfolio of the late Isma'il Haniyeh so they can easily afford to pay a bit more for gas.
Ignatius is a slimy intel community ass-kisser, owned by the IC and the neocons. Anything he says comes directly from the mouths of the neocon war-mongers.
I'm not sure how weak or not Iran is. I hate that reluctance to go to war is considered weakness but here we are (I also understand why it's seen this way).
I can see why Iran getting involved in war could be really bad for them. They could take much down with them, which could be disastrous for all, but it does seem like without war Iran has an opportunity to make some moves with the backing of Russia and especially China.
Many horrible things have happened, and the image of Israel, the US and the EU has detoriated. That's the reflection you wanted to provoke with your post I guess
Iran was seen not too long ago as a pariah nation, but they joined BRICS in 2024 and now have some powerful allies. Russian envoys travel regularly to Iran, for example, and military cooperation between the 2 countries has accelerated. At the same time, the reputations of Israel and the United States have been tarnished by the ethnic cleansing underway in Palestinian territories. And Russia has demonstrated the weakness of US military power via the war in Urkaine. So the world order has changed dramatically over the last year.
I actually am not online enough, or something, to understand what this means. I am online enough to see it pop up from time to time. Is it tongue in cheek or meant as a fact.
While I agree with FBF's assertion that nothing has changed in the overall picture yet regarding the middle east, I hardly see that as a reflection of what's happening globally, especially where Russia is involved (I mean a lot has happened and changed there, to mixed results on all sides). Many events only seem big when looking back on them (while in the moment it's hard to see what they mean).
I understand "Nothing Ever Happens" to mean that if you bet on the status quo, you'll usually be correct.
I mean, for fucks sake, they blatantly stole the last election, and the people who spend all day bragging about their gun collection couldn't even be bothered to use them when their own government was stolen out from under them.
Iran has been exposed as the sole source and supporter of war against Israel in the region. The Sunni countries are notably sitting this out, with some verbal tut-tutting. It seems they would like to see Iran's proxies and Iran defeated more than they feel any inter-Islamic solidarity with the people of Gaza, with Hamas, or with Hezbollah. If the USA would stop assisting Iran, and drive down petroleum prices by increasing domestic production, then Iran, starved of funds, would not be able to finance its proxies. This would be good for regional peace.
Also, the extraordinary series of focused attacks from Israel, slaughtering senior enemy personnel, contrasts with the futile missile barrages from Iran. Israel clearly outclasses its main enemy. This is not a good image for Iran, or more particularly for the Mullah regime.
Wrong. Don't forget Qatar. The Qataris have a very strong interest in disrupting any peace deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia and they are major supporters of Hamas.
Gulf state rulers other than Qatar want things to be quiet so they can enjoy their wealth and protect themselves from their own populations, including possible threats from MB or other groups.
Also Saudis have been fighting Iranian proxies in Yemen for years. They are in effect active combatants on the same side as Israel.
We will see. I think there are powerful interests, like China and Russia, that will be backing Iran going forward. They aren't going to be starved of funds. I think China especially doesn't want to see Iran go to war though, which would disrupt their energy supplies. It might just be in Iran's long term strategic interests to avoid getting in a war with Israel/US, Israel seems to be doing everything possible to pick a fight with them.
If oil prices fall it will be hard to make up the shortfall. Russia has the same problem.
Russia is not in a position to backstop anybody, and as you point out, China and Iran have overlapping interests which only go so far.
Israel seems to be interested in actually damaging Iran's proxies, not just playing symbolic games at this point. Israel would kill everyone in Hamas and Hezbollah if they could. It is not the same game as it was before 10/7. Israel would like the USA to destroy Iran for them, as the USA destroyed Iraq. That would be a very big undertaking and I don't think the US regime is up for it. I hope not.
What do you guys make of the supposed nuclear test by Iran? I'm waiting for the dust to settle down but I do believe it should't be discarded as mere superstition. After how many years of MOSSAD infiltration, a nuke or two might be possible.
Nothing has happened but a lot has been revealed, not least being the limits on American power, the irrelevancy of the EU and the success that Iran Qatar and Pakistan have had in bending the UK to their will. A couple of decades after 9/11 and Hamas and the PFLP can mobilise significant numbers within America for public protests in favour of jihad. Pro-jihadist Muslim leaders have had charge of London and Scotland. Houellebecq's relevancy is obvious. It is also worth noting that US assets like the International Court of Justice are being weaponised against heads of government who are nominal US allies.
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This one is for you guys, and I will strategically withdraw from the convo.
And your point is…?
"Nothing has happened."
Click bait is when an incendiary title is posted, sometimes with the closing word "Discuss!"
> Lots of people are dead, but the Jews still live in Israel and the Islamic death worshippers still want more Jews dead.
The sentiment goes both ways.
I have, personally, here in the US, heard Palestinians tell me that the Jews need to be wiped out entirely, and Jews tell me that the Palestinians need to be wiped out entirely. As someone with no horse in this race, it is not obvious to me that either side has moral superiority, and I have to judge based primarily on which side seems more hypocritical.
Ultimately, if I was Israeli, I would want to wipe out the Palestinians, and if I was Palestinian, I would want to wipe out the Israelis. I can see it from both of their perspectives. And ultimately ultimately, at least if my dating history is any indication, if you forced me to take a side, I'd take Israel's. So just as some friendly PR advice: The conflict is not morally one-sided, everyone sees this, and acting like it is robs your side of credibility. It is legitimate to calmly and rationally say "my family will not be safe until the Palestinians are wiped out" without pretending that you don't actually want to hurt them. Maybe you specifically don't, but a lot of Israelis do, and they say so openly behind closed doors
(None of what I have just said should be construed to imply that the exact same dynamic does not exist on the other side)
As an aside, the moral preening of the west in modern warfare is infuriating to me. Not only do you not have to be the 'good guys' in a war, but there are never good guys in any war. There are only bad guys.
I wish we could go back to the era of honest warfare (if such a thing even ever existed). Sometimes there is conflict. Sometimes conflict is extreme and violent. That's just part of nature. When you find yourself in an existential conflict, morality doesn't really matter. Winning matters.
I wish we could go back to the world in which, when someone is at war, they are comfortable with saying "fuck you, we will completely destroy you. If you didn't want that, you shouldn't have started this war / provoked us into war". A world in which we were comfortable crushing our enemies, seeing them driven before us, and hearing the lamentations of their women. A world in which we took responsibility for the horrors we unleash, instead of pretending like we're the good guys. There are never good guys. There are only winners and losers. And trust me, you always want to be the winner, regardless of whether or not the winner is the good guys
I wish we could have a public discussion where Israelis say "yeah, fuck the Palestinians, kill them all, it's the only way to be safe" and the Palestinians said "Yeah, fuck the Israelis, kill them all, it's the only way to be safe", and then they did a war until one side was dead, and then whichever side was not dead (I think we all know which side that would be) wins, and there's no more war and nobody ever has to worry about the middle east ever again.
Conan was one of the good guys.
The obsession with morality in the wider Western culture is over the top. War is not a moral contest and can be discussed without emotion or cheap judgements. IMO these obscure what is really going on.
Yes.
Surely you are not an American, loyal to liberty and justice for all, as you describe the situation in Israel/Palestine as some kind of almost balanced contest where right and wrong are not easy to distinguish for either side, that leaves you taking Israel's side.
In America the Pledge of Allegiance ends with "Liberty and Justice for All". Zionism has no use for this phrase and is the exact opposite - an ethnic cleansing project now going on for 76 years even as Jews in America, equal in number to those in Israel, are not killing the natives, do not hate their fellow Arab-Americans and enjoy all the liberty and justice for all (certainly not fully realized for any American) of those Arab-Americans and all other Americans.
But there is a unique liberty for American Jews. As they enjoy the benefits of American freedom, they may also go to Israel and enjoy the benefits of ethnic cleansing, move into a settlement, pick up one of the AR-15's freely distributed by Israel's "justice" minister to settlers (presumably for "justice") and then go out and shoot a Palestinian without fear of consequences from either Israel or the US.
Zionism - liberty and justice for all Exact opposites
President Biden says he is a Zionist, the armed forces of the US are pledged to Zionism, America is supplying Zionism with everything it needs to kill the Palestinians, the natives. US Secretary of State, a Zionist, sits in on the Israel war council and offers advice.
I stand on a busy street corner in the US calling out to my fellow Americans to support liberty and justice for all for which so many thousands of Americans died in WW2. Reminding them that America is about to spend American live DEFENDING ethnic cleansing, not destroying it as in WW2. One or two come up to me in support, a few give a thumbs up. Otherwise, and across the nation, Americans are quiet under their Zionist leadership, though the blue and white flag of Israel has not yet replaced Old Glory.
I imagine, if one were to stand quietly in Arlington National Cemetery, one might hear the murmur of thousands of voices objecting to what is done by a Zionist president who I have no doubt would claim he represents these many dead.
All Americans are being subjected to restrictions on freedom of speech, particularly on campus, to protect Israel. Zionist donors direct the actions of university administrations. AIPAC directs Congress without even a whisper for investigation of the blatant foreign influence in American politics though "Russiagate" got a real workout.
I say it here as I loudly say it on the street, as I am just about to leave to say it on the street today. I DO NOT STAND WITH ISRAEL, I STAND WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL! AMRICANS - THROW OFF THE IRON GRIP OF ZIONISM!
People will calming walk by, a few will give thumbs up. My country has been captured and we the people sleep as a pointless war with Iran for Israel is about to claim American lives. Incredible.
BINGO. I am not an American. I am a white settler-colonialist living on stolen land Down Under. Entirely OK with it BTW. I was born in a hospital named after George V and was named after the son-in-law of the last KIng-Emperor. If my current king ordered the RAF to do to New York or Washington what Netanyahu is doing to Gaza I'd think it ill advised but I'd still be thrilled to see some spirit left in the dynasty. Your country rightfully belongs to the Windsor-Mountbattens.
As for ethnic cleansing. This works a treat. The ethnic cleansing in the Eastern Mediteranean after WW1 enabled Greece and Turkey to coexist. The peace of East-Central Europe was enabled by the expulsion of the Gerrnans from the former Czechoslovakia and Poland.
It is worth noting that the the Iraqi PM who expelled all the Jews from Iraq (Nuri As-Said) famously said that the Israelis need to do the same for all their Arabs because Sunni Muslims would never live peacefully as a minority alongside Israelis.
Yeah, I grew up a long time ago and realized that all of that bullshit political moralizing is bullshit. I really, truly, do not give a fuck if every single person in the middle east dies. In fact, that might even be a good thing, because we wouldn't be sending billions of my dollars to jews in the desert if they were all dead.
Don't get me wrong. I am very strongly confident that Israel is in fact engaging in ethnic cleansing. I have heard American Jews say, to my face, that they openly support such a thing. I just don't care.
I'm pretty confident that, if they had the chance to turn the tables, the Palestinians would do the same thing. I would, in their position. Force me to live my whole life in an open air prison and I would want to kill my jailers too.
From my perspective, the only permanent solution to the israel/palestine problem is when one side completes the genocide of the other. I don't really care which side wins, I just want them to stop stealing my fucking money.
But at the end of the day, Jews are whiter, smarter, and the women are hotter, so if I had to pick a side, I'd pick that one.
Besides, here's another thought:
If Jews control our society and are willing and able to ruthlessly enforce that on anyone who doesn't like it, do you think it's a good strategy to go around loudly and publicly putting a target on your back? That's how you get your phone to explode, and I wish I was joking but at this point, I think there's real chance of that happening to people who spout inconvenient truths too loudly.
I'd rather be on the winning side. Or at least not jailed and gassed for opposing the winning side
I agree but its bad strategy to public proclaim you want to wipe out your enemies in the modern western world. Like's who gonna actually be like, " I support Israel because they are honest that they want to wipe out the Palestinians. I will not support Palestinians because they are not honest that they want to wipe out the Israel."
You know what's a worse strategy? To control every aspect of our society and government and force us to give you billions of dollars to engage in ethnic cleansing while loudly _and obviously_ lying about not doing it.
That's how you get camps and showers. Don't say I didn't warn you
Lol 😂 the Black Knight always triumphs!
The courage requisite for peace is born from acknowledging an adversary's humanity.
Which the Islamists have never done, ever.
Incorrect. Perhaps you can study the Siege of Jerusalem (1187), for enlightenment.
Jerusalem would not be standing if not for Saladin recognizing the humanity within her walls. Food for thought!
"Hamas has not been defeated and is still present throughout the Gaza Strip"
"Hezbollah, although shorn of its senior command, has not been defeated"
Depends on what counts as defeated, and hard to get reliable info about this.
In a recent interview, Norman Finkelstein was more blunt: "Gaza is gone".
Finkelstein on the Oct 7th massacre: "I, for one, will never begrudge—on the contrary, it warms every fiber of my soul—the scenes of Gaza’s smiling children as their arrogant Jewish supremacist oppressors have, finally, been humbled."
Yeah, this guy's not a twisted psychopath, his soul is warmed finding out hundreds of people were tortured and murdered—never mind the fact that some of them could have been his cousins.
Finkelstein is a moral cretin and someone needs to tell him that no matter how much he hates Jews and weeps tears of joy at their murder, it will never make him not Jewish.
Hate Israel all you want, but people who applaud massacres reveal themselves as anti-human and not worth heeding.
"Gaza is gone" is joyous news to some. Maybe Finkelstein is wrong... we shall see.
What did Sinwar expect to happen? Victory over the Yahood? More like a one day orgy of violence and false pride in the killing, rape, torture, and kidnapping of their enemy, followed by a year of death and destruction for the people who's "liberation" he was pretending to fight for. What kind of people do this?
And don't tell me it's out of "desperation". Gaza could have been a model for a successful Arab state in the area if only they had spent the billions of dollars of aid money they received to develop their economy instead of on weapons and tunnels, and lining their leaders pockets.
Who 'wants peace'? “Hamas wants to destroy Israel, right? But as Mehdi Hasan shows in a new video on blowback, Israeli officials admit they helped start the group.”?
https://theintercept.com/2018/02/19/hamas-israel-palestine-conflict/
https://x.com/Mauerback/status/1715685270761205918?s=20
So what! America helped create Al Qaeda. Big mistakes, but two wrongs Don't Make a right. That doesn't disprove what I said.
Who 'wants peace'?
This is just another "clear in hindsight" rationalization meant to paint Hamas and the Palestinians as helpless clay in the hands of the Jews, with no agency of their own.
Yes, Israel had a strategy of divide and conquer (like every other group ever in every conflict) against the PLO, who at the time were menacing Jews everywhere w terrorism, but Hamas has roots in the Muslim Brotherhood, which was active since the 1920s. Also, just think clearly for a second: could there really be an outside force so powerful that it turns its opponents into theocratic terrorists who've dedicated their whole lives and the their children's lives to the destruction of their neighbors? Not even the Jews are that strong and devious!
The Western Left pursues this very paternalistic and condescending strategy toward their new sacred victims, the Palestinians: they have no responsibility for ANY of their actions, no agency, everything they've ever said and done is the fault of the Israelis. This is part of the reason they're a failed society that needs to be fed by the UN, the Left has indulged all their worst inclinations and worst ideas, such as the glorificiation of Intifada!, which has led to this disastrous moment where Gaza lies in ruins.
Some friends!
Two and a half years on you could say the same thing about Ukraine. It will end the only way it was ever going to end, though with a lot more dead Russian and Ukrainian teenagers, thanks to neocon psychopathy.
So I had a brief moment of surreality the other day, when I looked up the precise location of the village my great grandparents lived in before they fled the Russian Revolution to Canada.
It is less than 10 miles from the current Russo-Ukrainian front line.
It is weird to think that slavs are murdering each other by the thousands over who gets to say they own _my_ (German) ethnic homeland.
("Germans in Ukraine?" I hear you say? As I understand it, that part of Ukraine was effectively uninhabited until Catherine the Great recruited my German ancestors to settle it at the start of the 1800s. It is, for all intents and purposes, _our_ land. Not the Ukrainians', not the Russians', but the Mennonite's)
Do Slavs look different from Germans?
Yeah they do, their women are hotter 😂
Liking this because I'm half-Polack.
Interesting, my only disagreement is why they are killing themselves. The land itself seems like the least important part of this conflict. Like everything in this war the land is just another proxy.
Oh, I mean, that's obvious.
The Russians are doing it to stop short range nukes from being emplaced 500 miles from Moscow
The Ukrainians are doing it because they're retarded and actually believe Western lies
Do you think a major war between Iran and Israel may be imminent?
As mentioned in my first comment, I am going to keep quiet in this thread to let you guys have at it ;)
I'll answer this question soon enough in another entry.
I think the IDF will run into a quagmire in southern Lebanon as they have the two previous occasions they invaded. Hezbollah is not a physical state and is not as easy to destroy as traditional state entity.
Hezbollah has been damaged possibly severely but not anywhere close to being destroyed.
I believe too Iran will develop a nuclear weapon in the near future which will change everything.
Another factor to consider is that Israel is very unstable socially and politically. Israeli society is politically, ethnically, and religiously fragmented.
Israel is not a monolithic entity and public morale will drop unless Netanyahu or his successors achieve quick and decisive military victories.
What has changed for me, and I suspect for millions of other Americans, is waking up to the reality that maybe Israel is not the innocent lamb surrounded by ravenous wolves that we have been propagandized to believe. I have taken a deeper dive into the history of Israel and I am beginning to understand the difference between Judaism and Zionism. I am currently reading, The Empty Wagon: Zionism’s Journey From Identity Crisis To Identity Theft, by Rabbi Yaakov Shapiro. Current commentary, by Rabbi Shapiro can be heard on YouTube.
I thank Rabbi Yaakov Shapiro for opening my eyes.
I don't think it is a stretch to say--for the sake of argument--that something has indeed "happened:" Iran has been revealed as less potent than previously assessed, and has even been knocked a bit bloody.
With Iran's weakness possibly revealed, David Ignatius was trotted out on "Washington Week" to chum it up with Jeffrey Goldberg and to promote Harris as possessing the fortitude to take the kill shot--if I recall Ignatius correctly. Of course, this is speculation, and most likely evidence of very little regarding a larger expedition into Persia.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yc48kGiTO80
As a military age male in America, I will brush up on my Xenophon so I can really enjoy my future tour of duty in the land of Cyrus and Xerxes.
No one has seen a genuine response from Iran yet because they(Iran) are still trying to avoid all-out war. All-out war between Iran, Israel and the US would be a complete disaster. They can’t “win” maybe - but everyone with regional proximity will suffer. Aside from that - oil price rise would probably cripple the global economy.
True. All true. But all out war already reached Israel on Oct 7. Waging war by proxy is still waging war. The US, UK, EU, Canada, Australia and Japan (as well as Iran and Qatar) could afford to finance tunnels in Gaza as well as the real estate portfolio of the late Isma'il Haniyeh so they can easily afford to pay a bit more for gas.
Ignatius is a slimy intel community ass-kisser, owned by the IC and the neocons. Anything he says comes directly from the mouths of the neocon war-mongers.
I'm not sure how weak or not Iran is. I hate that reluctance to go to war is considered weakness but here we are (I also understand why it's seen this way).
I can see why Iran getting involved in war could be really bad for them. They could take much down with them, which could be disastrous for all, but it does seem like without war Iran has an opportunity to make some moves with the backing of Russia and especially China.
Many horrible things have happened, and the image of Israel, the US and the EU has detoriated. That's the reflection you wanted to provoke with your post I guess
Iran wants to do as little as possible. Time is on their side.
Iran was seen not too long ago as a pariah nation, but they joined BRICS in 2024 and now have some powerful allies. Russian envoys travel regularly to Iran, for example, and military cooperation between the 2 countries has accelerated. At the same time, the reputations of Israel and the United States have been tarnished by the ethnic cleansing underway in Palestinian territories. And Russia has demonstrated the weakness of US military power via the war in Urkaine. So the world order has changed dramatically over the last year.
Aren't they about to sign some kind of military pact? Very curious what the terms of that will be.
And the Strait of Hormuz remains open...
Ish - very risky crossing at the moment
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/nothing-ever-happens
Nothing. Ever. Happens
Similar sentiment:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/plus_%C3%A7a_change,_plus_c%27est_la_m%C3%AAme_chose
I actually am not online enough, or something, to understand what this means. I am online enough to see it pop up from time to time. Is it tongue in cheek or meant as a fact.
While I agree with FBF's assertion that nothing has changed in the overall picture yet regarding the middle east, I hardly see that as a reflection of what's happening globally, especially where Russia is involved (I mean a lot has happened and changed there, to mixed results on all sides). Many events only seem big when looking back on them (while in the moment it's hard to see what they mean).
I understand "Nothing Ever Happens" to mean that if you bet on the status quo, you'll usually be correct.
I mean, for fucks sake, they blatantly stole the last election, and the people who spend all day bragging about their gun collection couldn't even be bothered to use them when their own government was stolen out from under them.
Because Nothing Ever Happens
Iran has been exposed as the sole source and supporter of war against Israel in the region. The Sunni countries are notably sitting this out, with some verbal tut-tutting. It seems they would like to see Iran's proxies and Iran defeated more than they feel any inter-Islamic solidarity with the people of Gaza, with Hamas, or with Hezbollah. If the USA would stop assisting Iran, and drive down petroleum prices by increasing domestic production, then Iran, starved of funds, would not be able to finance its proxies. This would be good for regional peace.
Also, the extraordinary series of focused attacks from Israel, slaughtering senior enemy personnel, contrasts with the futile missile barrages from Iran. Israel clearly outclasses its main enemy. This is not a good image for Iran, or more particularly for the Mullah regime.
Wrong. Don't forget Qatar. The Qataris have a very strong interest in disrupting any peace deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia and they are major supporters of Hamas.
Qatar is the outlier in the region. Literally every other Sunni power is sitting this out.
Unsurprising. Given a chance the Muslim Brotherhood would direct something like October 7 against the ruling families of the Gulf.
Gulf state rulers other than Qatar want things to be quiet so they can enjoy their wealth and protect themselves from their own populations, including possible threats from MB or other groups.
Also Saudis have been fighting Iranian proxies in Yemen for years. They are in effect active combatants on the same side as Israel.
We will see. I think there are powerful interests, like China and Russia, that will be backing Iran going forward. They aren't going to be starved of funds. I think China especially doesn't want to see Iran go to war though, which would disrupt their energy supplies. It might just be in Iran's long term strategic interests to avoid getting in a war with Israel/US, Israel seems to be doing everything possible to pick a fight with them.
If oil prices fall it will be hard to make up the shortfall. Russia has the same problem.
Russia is not in a position to backstop anybody, and as you point out, China and Iran have overlapping interests which only go so far.
Israel seems to be interested in actually damaging Iran's proxies, not just playing symbolic games at this point. Israel would kill everyone in Hamas and Hezbollah if they could. It is not the same game as it was before 10/7. Israel would like the USA to destroy Iran for them, as the USA destroyed Iraq. That would be a very big undertaking and I don't think the US regime is up for it. I hope not.
What do you guys make of the supposed nuclear test by Iran? I'm waiting for the dust to settle down but I do believe it should't be discarded as mere superstition. After how many years of MOSSAD infiltration, a nuke or two might be possible.
A formal announcement is required.
Nothing has happened but a lot has been revealed, not least being the limits on American power, the irrelevancy of the EU and the success that Iran Qatar and Pakistan have had in bending the UK to their will. A couple of decades after 9/11 and Hamas and the PFLP can mobilise significant numbers within America for public protests in favour of jihad. Pro-jihadist Muslim leaders have had charge of London and Scotland. Houellebecq's relevancy is obvious. It is also worth noting that US assets like the International Court of Justice are being weaponised against heads of government who are nominal US allies.
Claudeen Gay got fired.