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Generational damage – politicalbetting.com

SystemSystem Posts: 13,225
edited April 10 in General
Generational damage – politicalbetting.com

Behind the US public turn against Israel: Diminishing views of @Netanyahu.2023: 31% have confidence in him, 42% have no confidence (net -11)2026: 27% have confidence in him, 59% have no confidence (net -32)via Pew Research poll

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  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659
    On topic:

    I find US Jews to be more openly critical of the Israeli government than my UK Jewish friends.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 28,231
    rcs1000 said:

    On topic:

    I find US Jews to be more openly critical of the Israeli government than my UK Jewish friends.

    Americans more open than Brits generally and especially on politics.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 137,354
    Hence Netanyahu knew Trump was his last chance to remove the Iranian regime, a Republican President, strongly pro Israel and mainly elected by US voters over 50.

    However while Trump launched the strikes he still hasn't sent the groundtroops in Bibi needed to seal the deal
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 137,354
    rcs1000 said:

    On topic:

    I find US Jews to be more openly critical of the Israeli government than my UK Jewish friends.

    US Jews tend to vote Democrat, UK Jews tend to vote Conservative now
  • TazTaz Posts: 28,984
    How is the next Israeli election looking ?
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 28,231
    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    I don't like commenting (seriously) on Israeli/Palestinian stuff as I have no solutions and little hope, but both sides are in a self destructive loop and have been too accepting of their leaders chosen direction. It is no surprise the rest of the world does not look favourably on their governments at the moment.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659

    rcs1000 said:

    Taz said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.

    But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.

    Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.

    Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.

    Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
    I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
    Indeed.
    https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/
    ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
    Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.

    It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
    This is true.

    But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
    Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.

    And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.

    Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
    So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
    No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.

    Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.

    That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
    This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
    No, it is not.

    You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."

    Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.

    And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
    So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
    No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.

    He was saying the inverse.

    He was confusing cause with effect.
    But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
    Yes.

    I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.

    Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
    So, people’s views of a country have nothing to do with what a country does. Rather, you are arguing that Muslims are just inherently hating of Jews?
    Not exactly, but as already discussed the way Israel treats Palestinians is far better than the Chinese treat Uighurs . . . or for that matter, the way the Chinese treat Tibetans, or the way the Turks treat Kurds or the way practically any Arab country treated Jews or . . .

    And yet people obsess about Israel. Funny that.
    Isn’t this a function of Israel being a functioning democracy? We hold it to higher standards - or at least I kind of do.

    I am not surprised when dictatorships (whether notionally communist, monarchies or “illiberal democracies” - which to me is just despotism) treat their minorities abysmally. It is part of their operating model, and it is how they leaders stay at the top of the tree. I feel sorry for those around the world that have to live in such states.

    I think we should be careful in how we interact with them - and if possible favour working wth democracies. But you can’t ignore them and you also can’t go round the world imposing democracy. We’ve tried that before with mixed results.
    Turkey is a democracy and yet how many people demand a state for the Kurds compared to a state for the Palestinians?
    Turkey isn’t thought of as a democracy by many Westerners.

    While there’s some truth in there, there is a chunk of racism in there.
    Kurdistan also is spread across four nations. The other three can hardly be seen as democracies either.

    There are protests, from time to time, in Newcastle from Kurdistan separatists.
    There's also a small but important difference:

    The Kurds in Turkey get the vote.
    The Palestinians in the West Bank do not, while the Israelis do.

    I would also note that -as far as I know- the legal system in Turkey does not have the death penalty for Kurds, but not Turks.
    All true I am sure.

    But by contrast the Economist ranked Israel a “flawed democracy” and Turkey lower at “Hybrid Regime” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index I do not know too much about the validity of the Economist’s conclusions or its methodology. However, it is notable that Israel is the only “blue” country in its region (MENA) and Turkey the only “non-blue” country in its region (Western Europe).
    If you are an Arab and/or Muslim in Israel proper, then you are an Israeli citizen, and you get the vote. And, of course, there are Arab MPs in the Knesset.

    If, on the other hand, you are in the West Bank, then you are in land administered by Israel, and you do not get the vote. By contrast, Israeli settlers (and I note that the Israeli government just approved another 30 odd settlements in the West Bank) do get the vote.

    It is a creeping invasion by Israel, that is every bit as wrong as were Hamas's attacks on Israel from Gaza.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 72,542
    Perfectly plausable until we come to Israel no longer existing

    I just do not see the State of Israel being eradicated without profound implications for the middle east and beyond
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 129,241
    rcs1000 said:

    On topic:

    I find US Jews to be more openly critical of the Israeli government than my UK Jewish friends.

    I think it’s nothing to do with citizenship but how religious you are.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659

    rcs1000 said:

    On topic:

    I find US Jews to be more openly critical of the Israeli government than my UK Jewish friends.

    I think it’s nothing to do with citizenship but how religious you are.
    Actually, I think it's something slightly different, and I was going to write a post on it called "tribes".

    But I'm a little busy with work at the moment.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 72,542
    HYUFD said:

    Hence Netanyahu knew Trump was his last chance to remove the Iranian regime, a Republican President, strongly pro Israel and mainly elected by US voters over 50.

    However while Trump launched the strikes he still hasn't sent the groundtroops in Bibi needed to seal the deal

    How many ground troops, 50,000, 100,000, or more and how many body bags

    Never going to happen
  • TazTaz Posts: 28,984
    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    So just assuming that the U.K. is more anti-Semitic as there’s a growing Muslim community could be deemed an Islamophobic conspiracy theory then.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 137,354
    On latest Israeli polls the Netanyahu led Likud is expected to win most seats but fall short of a majority for his and allied governing parties.

    Second is the hard right Zionist Bennett2026 which is the leading opposition party, so Netanyahu may be a case of better the devil you know

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2026_Israeli_legislative_election
  • MonkeysMonkeys Posts: 880
    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Taz said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.

    But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.

    Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.

    Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.

    Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
    I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
    Indeed.
    https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/
    ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
    Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.

    It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
    This is true.

    But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
    Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.

    And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.

    Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
    So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
    No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.

    Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.

    That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
    This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
    No, it is not.

    You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."

    Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.

    And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
    So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
    No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.

    He was saying the inverse.

    He was confusing cause with effect.
    But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
    Yes.

    I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.

    Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
    So, people’s views of a country have nothing to do with what a country does. Rather, you are arguing that Muslims are just inherently hating of Jews?
    Not exactly, but as already discussed the way Israel treats Palestinians is far better than the Chinese treat Uighurs . . . or for that matter, the way the Chinese treat Tibetans, or the way the Turks treat Kurds or the way practically any Arab country treated Jews or . . .

    And yet people obsess about Israel. Funny that.
    Isn’t this a function of Israel being a functioning democracy? We hold it to higher standards - or at least I kind of do.

    I am not surprised when dictatorships (whether notionally communist, monarchies or “illiberal democracies” - which to me is just despotism) treat their minorities abysmally. It is part of their operating model, and it is how they leaders stay at the top of the tree. I feel sorry for those around the world that have to live in such states.

    I think we should be careful in how we interact with them - and if possible favour working wth democracies. But you can’t ignore them and you also can’t go round the world imposing democracy. We’ve tried that before with mixed results.
    Turkey is a democracy and yet how many people demand a state for the Kurds compared to a state for the Palestinians?
    Turkey isn’t thought of as a democracy by many Westerners.

    While there’s some truth in there, there is a chunk of racism in there.
    Kurdistan also is spread across four nations. The other three can hardly be seen as democracies either.

    There are protests, from time to time, in Newcastle from Kurdistan separatists.
    There's also a small but important difference:

    The Kurds in Turkey get the vote.
    The Palestinians in the West Bank do not, while the Israelis do.

    I would also note that -as far as I know- the legal system in Turkey does not have the death penalty for Kurds, but not Turks.
    All true I am sure.

    But by contrast the Economist ranked Israel a “flawed democracy” and Turkey lower at “Hybrid Regime” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index I do not know too much about the validity of the Economist’s conclusions or its methodology. However, it is notable that Israel is the only “blue” country in its region (MENA) and Turkey the only “non-blue” country in its region (Western Europe).
    If you are an Arab and/or Muslim in Israel proper, then you are an Israeli citizen, and you get the vote. And, of course, there are Arab MPs in the Knesset.

    If, on the other hand, you are in the West Bank, then you are in land administered by Israel, and you do not get the vote. By contrast, Israeli settlers (and I note that the Israeli government just approved another 30 odd settlements in the West Bank) do get the vote.

    It is a creeping invasion by Israel, that is every bit as wrong as were Hamas's attacks on Israel from Gaza.
    It's a bit nuanced, a good proportion - around 40% - of the West Bank is administered by the Palestinian Authority, and no-one in those areas has voted since 2006. Granted that 60% was supposed to have handed over to PA at some point so it's nuanced both ways.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 22,164
    I wonder what will happen to opinions of Israel when the unholy alliance between the liberal left and islamists ends. It will happen eventually.
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 129,241
    rcs1000 said:

    Perfectly plausable until we come to Israel no longer existing

    I just do not see the State of Israel being eradicated without profound implications for the middle east and beyond

    The destruction of the State of Israel would be an utter tragedy, that would almost certainly involve the loss of hundreds of thousands -or even millions- of innocent lives.

    But that doesn't make Israel's action in the West Bank or in Lebanon any more acceptable.
    Indeed.

    I think a future tipping point is if Saudi Arabia and other nations in the Middle East decide to obtain nuclear technology.

    A lot of people think that’s why Saudi Arabia decided to come under Pakistan’s nuclear umbrella.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 72,542
    rcs1000 said:

    Perfectly plausable until we come to Israel no longer existing

    I just do not see the State of Israel being eradicated without profound implications for the middle east and beyond

    The destruction of the State of Israel would be an utter tragedy, that would almost certainly involve the loss of hundreds of thousands -or even millions- of innocent lives.

    But that doesn't make Israel's action in the West Bank or in Lebanon any more acceptable.
    Absolutely and you missed out Gaza

    Netanyahu is a war criminal and has done immence damage to Israel, but it's extinction would be cataclysmic for everyone
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 137,354
    edited April 10

    rcs1000 said:

    Perfectly plausable until we come to Israel no longer existing

    I just do not see the State of Israel being eradicated without profound implications for the middle east and beyond

    The destruction of the State of Israel would be an utter tragedy, that would almost certainly involve the loss of hundreds of thousands -or even millions- of innocent lives.

    But that doesn't make Israel's action in the West Bank or in Lebanon any more acceptable.
    Absolutely and you missed out Gaza

    Netanyahu is a war criminal and has done immence damage to Israel, but it's extinction would be cataclysmic for everyone
    Not least for Jews for whom Israel is the only nation they can truly feel is theirs and 100% safe in. There are plenty of Christian and Muslim majority nations still, some atheist majority nations, 2 Hindu majority nations but only 1 nation on earth has a Jewish majority, Israel.

    A 2 state solution should remain the goal with a state of Israel next to a state of Palestine
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 60,287
    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Taz said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.

    But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.

    Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.

    Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.

    Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
    I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
    Indeed.
    https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/
    ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
    Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.

    It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
    This is true.

    But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
    Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.

    And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.

    Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
    So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
    No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.

    Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.

    That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
    This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
    No, it is not.

    You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."

    Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.

    And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
    So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
    No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.

    He was saying the inverse.

    He was confusing cause with effect.
    But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
    Yes.

    I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.

    Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
    So, people’s views of a country have nothing to do with what a country does. Rather, you are arguing that Muslims are just inherently hating of Jews?
    Not exactly, but as already discussed the way Israel treats Palestinians is far better than the Chinese treat Uighurs . . . or for that matter, the way the Chinese treat Tibetans, or the way the Turks treat Kurds or the way practically any Arab country treated Jews or . . .

    And yet people obsess about Israel. Funny that.
    Isn’t this a function of Israel being a functioning democracy? We hold it to higher standards - or at least I kind of do.

    I am not surprised when dictatorships (whether notionally communist, monarchies or “illiberal democracies” - which to me is just despotism) treat their minorities abysmally. It is part of their operating model, and it is how they leaders stay at the top of the tree. I feel sorry for those around the world that have to live in such states.

    I think we should be careful in how we interact with them - and if possible favour working wth democracies. But you can’t ignore them and you also can’t go round the world imposing democracy. We’ve tried that before with mixed results.
    Turkey is a democracy and yet how many people demand a state for the Kurds compared to a state for the Palestinians?
    Turkey isn’t thought of as a democracy by many Westerners.

    While there’s some truth in there, there is a chunk of racism in there.
    Kurdistan also is spread across four nations. The other three can hardly be seen as democracies either.

    There are protests, from time to time, in Newcastle from Kurdistan separatists.
    There's also a small but important difference:

    The Kurds in Turkey get the vote.
    The Palestinians in the West Bank do not, while the Israelis do.

    I would also note that -as far as I know- the legal system in Turkey does not have the death penalty for Kurds, but not Turks.
    All true I am sure.

    But by contrast the Economist ranked Israel a “flawed democracy” and Turkey lower at “Hybrid Regime” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index I do not know too much about the validity of the Economist’s conclusions or its methodology. However, it is notable that Israel is the only “blue” country in its region (MENA) and Turkey the only “non-blue” country in its region (Western Europe).
    If you are an Arab and/or Muslim in Israel proper, then you are an Israeli citizen, and you get the vote. And, of course, there are Arab MPs in the Knesset.

    If, on the other hand, you are in the West Bank, then you are in land administered by Israel, and you do not get the vote. By contrast, Israeli settlers (and I note that the Israeli government just approved another 30 odd settlements in the West Bank) do get the vote.

    It is a creeping invasion by Israel, that is every bit as wrong as were Hamas's attacks on Israel from Gaza.
    If you're a Puerto Rican in Puerto Rico, you are in land administered by the United States but you can't vote for the US government. By contrast, settlers from the mainland do get to register for absentee ballots.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659
    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 22,164
    edited April 10
    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    No civilians should pay in either Gaza or the West Bank. That should be the default position but obviously in war and in an insurgency these things become very difficult to manage.

    Just look at all the alleged war crimes committed in Iraq and Afghanistan by British, American and Australian soldiers and probably others.

    It really does feel like the concept of “war crimes” has become meaningless.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 66,944

    rcs1000 said:

    Perfectly plausable until we come to Israel no longer existing

    I just do not see the State of Israel being eradicated without profound implications for the middle east and beyond

    The destruction of the State of Israel would be an utter tragedy, that would almost certainly involve the loss of hundreds of thousands -or even millions- of innocent lives.

    But that doesn't make Israel's action in the West Bank or in Lebanon any more acceptable.
    Indeed.

    I think a future tipping point is if Saudi Arabia and other nations in the Middle East decide to obtain nuclear technology.

    You mean, like Iran?
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 129,241

    rcs1000 said:

    Perfectly plausable until we come to Israel no longer existing

    I just do not see the State of Israel being eradicated without profound implications for the middle east and beyond

    The destruction of the State of Israel would be an utter tragedy, that would almost certainly involve the loss of hundreds of thousands -or even millions- of innocent lives.

    But that doesn't make Israel's action in the West Bank or in Lebanon any more acceptable.
    Indeed.

    I think a future tipping point is if Saudi Arabia and other nations in the Middle East decide to obtain nuclear technology.

    You mean, like Iran?
    No, purely for power.

    Israel stopped Iraq setting up a nuclear power plant.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 27,925
    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659

    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Taz said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.

    But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.

    Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.

    Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.

    Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
    I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
    Indeed.
    https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/
    ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
    Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.

    It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
    This is true.

    But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
    Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.

    And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.

    Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
    So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
    No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.

    Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.

    That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
    This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
    No, it is not.

    You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."

    Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.

    And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
    So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
    No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.

    He was saying the inverse.

    He was confusing cause with effect.
    But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
    Yes.

    I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.

    Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
    So, people’s views of a country have nothing to do with what a country does. Rather, you are arguing that Muslims are just inherently hating of Jews?
    Not exactly, but as already discussed the way Israel treats Palestinians is far better than the Chinese treat Uighurs . . . or for that matter, the way the Chinese treat Tibetans, or the way the Turks treat Kurds or the way practically any Arab country treated Jews or . . .

    And yet people obsess about Israel. Funny that.
    Isn’t this a function of Israel being a functioning democracy? We hold it to higher standards - or at least I kind of do.

    I am not surprised when dictatorships (whether notionally communist, monarchies or “illiberal democracies” - which to me is just despotism) treat their minorities abysmally. It is part of their operating model, and it is how they leaders stay at the top of the tree. I feel sorry for those around the world that have to live in such states.

    I think we should be careful in how we interact with them - and if possible favour working wth democracies. But you can’t ignore them and you also can’t go round the world imposing democracy. We’ve tried that before with mixed results.
    Turkey is a democracy and yet how many people demand a state for the Kurds compared to a state for the Palestinians?
    Turkey isn’t thought of as a democracy by many Westerners.

    While there’s some truth in there, there is a chunk of racism in there.
    Kurdistan also is spread across four nations. The other three can hardly be seen as democracies either.

    There are protests, from time to time, in Newcastle from Kurdistan separatists.
    There's also a small but important difference:

    The Kurds in Turkey get the vote.
    The Palestinians in the West Bank do not, while the Israelis do.

    I would also note that -as far as I know- the legal system in Turkey does not have the death penalty for Kurds, but not Turks.
    All true I am sure.

    But by contrast the Economist ranked Israel a “flawed democracy” and Turkey lower at “Hybrid Regime” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index I do not know too much about the validity of the Economist’s conclusions or its methodology. However, it is notable that Israel is the only “blue” country in its region (MENA) and Turkey the only “non-blue” country in its region (Western Europe).
    If you are an Arab and/or Muslim in Israel proper, then you are an Israeli citizen, and you get the vote. And, of course, there are Arab MPs in the Knesset.

    If, on the other hand, you are in the West Bank, then you are in land administered by Israel, and you do not get the vote. By contrast, Israeli settlers (and I note that the Israeli government just approved another 30 odd settlements in the West Bank) do get the vote.

    It is a creeping invasion by Israel, that is every bit as wrong as were Hamas's attacks on Israel from Gaza.
    If you're a Puerto Rican in Puerto Rico, you are in land administered by the United States but you can't vote for the US government. By contrast, settlers from the mainland do get to register for absentee ballots.
    That's not *exactly* true. If you're a Puerto Rican, then you are a US citizen. If you move -on your US passport- to Colorado for a year, and register to vote there, and then return to Puero Rico, then you continue to be able to vote via your prior Colorado residence.

    But you are correct that there is an asymetry there. It's just a bit less glaring than the one in Israel and the West Bank - largely because it doesn't involve the forcible displacement of Puerto Ricans by the US state.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 27,925
    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 66,944
    I misread the thread header as Natalie Bennett for a minute, and then wondered why a Green leader had such a hard line on Israel.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659
    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 12,979

    I misread the thread header as Natalie Bennett for a minute, and then wondered why a Green leader had such a hard line on Israel.

    Nobody else in the world remembers Natalie Bennett! You get 5 points. You also get the reputation as a Natalie Bennett fancier. To undo this you need 5 million points.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659
    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    And you also seem to completely ignore the violence meted out on Palestinians by settlers.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 27,925
    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 22,164
    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    And you also seem to completely ignore the violence meted out on Palestinians by settlers.
    The settlers are absolute whoppers by all accounts
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 40,310

    https://x.com/IsraeliPM/status/2042596981600596128

    Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu:

    “Israel will not remain silent in the face of those who attack us.

    Spain has defamed our heroes, the soldiers of the IDF, the soldiers of the most moral army in the world.

    Therefore, I have instructed today to remove Spain's representatives from the coordination center in Kiryat Gat, after Spain has chosen repeatedly to stand against Israel.

    Those who attack the State of Israel instead of terrorist regimes will not be our partners regarding the future of the region.

    I am not willing to tolerate this hypocrisy and hostility. I do not intend to allow any country to wage a diplomatic war against us without paying an immediate price.

    Carpet bombing Madrid would at least give the people of Beirut some blessed relief.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 27,925
    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    And you also seem to completely ignore the violence meted out on Palestinians by settlers.
    I think the behaviour of many Israelis is abhorrent.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 66,944
    Omnium said:

    I misread the thread header as Natalie Bennett for a minute, and then wondered why a Green leader had such a hard line on Israel.

    Nobody else in the world remembers Natalie Bennett! You get 5 points. You also get the reputation as a Natalie Bennett fancier. To undo this you need 5 million points.
    I remember her.

    I never fancied her.
  • Richard_TyndallRichard_Tyndall Posts: 34,675
    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 27,925

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Again, it comes back to agency. You're absolving the Gazans of responsibility.
  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 60,216
    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Again, it comes back to agency. You're absolving the Gazans of responsibility.
    And you the Israelis.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 27,925

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Again, it comes back to agency. You're absolving the Gazans of responsibility.
    And you the Israelis.
    In what way? I don't blame anyone for the governments they elect other than their voters (and, whilst I think things would have played out a bit differently with a different government, their more moderate politicians would have still gone in hard on Gaza after 7 October).
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 57,263
    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    And you also seem to completely ignore the violence meted out on Palestinians by settlers.
    I think the behaviour of many Israelis is abhorrent.
    It is not just individual Israelis. The Israeli government systemically colludes with the pogroms and violence of the settlers against the Palestinians of the West Bank.

  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 40,310
    edited April 10
    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Again, it comes back to agency. You're absolving the Gazans of responsibility.
    And you the Israelis.
    In what way? I don't blame anyone for the governments they elect other than their voters (and, whilst I think things would have played out a bit differently with a different government, their more moderate politicians would have still gone in hard on Gaza after 7 October).
    A more measured leadership might have gone in harder on Hamas grandees living it large in Doha rather than women and children going about their business in Gaza City.

    Killing 80,000 Gazans was performative justice by Bibi.
  • Richard_TyndallRichard_Tyndall Posts: 34,675
    edited April 10
    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Again, it comes back to agency. You're absolving the Gazans of responsibility.
    Nope, Hamas are responsible for their own actions. But Netanyahu is also responsible. He was the one who wanted the terrorists in charge rather than those attempting to make peace because he knew that in any reasonable peace Israel would be accepting a two state solution. He has spent his whole political career undermining any possible peace deal as won't accept anything which cedes any of Palestine to the Palestinians. And he doesn't care how many people - Israeli or Palestinian - have to suffer to ensure that goal.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 27,925

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Again, it comes back to agency. You're absolving the Gazans of responsibility.
    Nope, Hamas are responsible for their own actions. But Netenyahu is also responsible. He was the one who wanted the terrorists in charge rather than those attempting to make peace because he knew that in any reasonable peace Israel would be accepting a two state solution. He has spent his whole political career undermining any possible peace deal as won't accept anything which cedes any of Palestine to the Palestinians. And he doesn't care how many people - Israeli or Palestinian - have to suffer to ensure that goal.
    Do you see Hamas as a third party?
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 12,979
    Vance must be the worst ever choice of diplomats. It's amazing how our politicians have accepted this nonsense.

  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659
    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    And you also seem to completely ignore the violence meted out on Palestinians by settlers.
    I think the behaviour of many Israelis is abhorrent.
    It is not just individual Israelis. The Israeli government systemically colludes with the pogroms and violence of the settlers against the Palestinians of the West Bank.

    You mean like the way it approved 30 new settlements in the West Bank this week, that will involve the IDF throwing Palestinians off their land?

    And if the Palestinians were to fight back when this happened, it would just be evidence that they can't be trusted with their own state.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 57,263
    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
    Why should the Palestinians not have the right to national self determination the same as the Israelis?

    Should they have to exist in ever smaller bantustans hemmed in by encroaching settlements that steal their land and water?
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 60,287
    https://x.com/forecasterenten/status/2042628510729277697

    Tucker Carlson has been in absolute free fall among the GOP. His net favorable has dropped by 47 points.

    Meanwhile, Trump crushes Tucker among the GOP. Trump's net favorable is 54 pts higher than Carlson's.

    When you up against Trump, you in the grinder to quote Good Burger.
  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 60,216

    I misread the thread header as Natalie Bennett for a minute, and then wondered why a Green leader had such a hard line on Israel.

    "Please! I like Israel!"
  • boulayboulay Posts: 9,124
    Quite extraordinary how a relatively small patch of the earth has caused so many problems, violent deaths, wars, economic damage, diplomatic carnage and, compared to its size probably more comment here and elsewhere than anywhere else in the world. The fact that this small area even has a huge bearing on UK parliamentary constituencies to such an extent and whether football fans can visit makes it even more nuts.

    Really utterly bored of it all. Want something new to happen to get excited about. Maybe all the world’s zoo animals simultaneously rise up and start taking out humans, or Nessie and Bigfoot to set up an only fans and announce their existence.
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 12,979
    boulay said:

    Quite extraordinary how a relatively small patch of the earth has caused so many problems, violent deaths, wars, economic damage, diplomatic carnage and, compared to its size probably more comment here and elsewhere than anywhere else in the world. The fact that this small area even has a huge bearing on UK parliamentary constituencies to such an extent and whether football fans can visit makes it even more nuts.

    Really utterly bored of it all. Want something new to happen to get excited about. Maybe all the world’s zoo animals simultaneously rise up and start taking out humans, or Nessie and Bigfoot to set up an only fans and announce their existence.

    There's a quiet corner of the world that will be forever England. Otherwise it's all madness.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 60,287
    https://x.com/trump_repost/status/2042641482226569447

    The Iranians don't seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short term extortion of the World by using International Waterways. The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate! President DONALD J. TRUMP
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 90,369

    I wonder what will happen to opinions of Israel when the unholy alliance between the liberal left and islamists ends. It will happen eventually.

    I wonder what you are on about.

    ..Generational divide hits both parties: 57% of *Republicans under 50* are negative on Israel..
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 13,589

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Hamas took over Gaza (violently) in 2006 - when Netanyahu was not in power
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 51,169
    edited April 10
    boulay said:

    Quite extraordinary how a relatively small patch of the earth has caused so many problems, violent deaths, wars, economic damage, diplomatic carnage and, compared to its size probably more comment here and elsewhere than anywhere else in the world. The fact that this small area even has a huge bearing on UK parliamentary constituencies to such an extent and whether football fans can visit makes it even more nuts.

    Really utterly bored of it all. Want something new to happen to get excited about. Maybe all the world’s zoo animals simultaneously rise up and start taking out humans, or Nessie and Bigfoot to set up an only fans and announce their existence.

    It's a version of "all happy families are the same ..." ie strife gets more attention. We're seeing it with Trump's America atm. It's colonising global headspace.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Hamas took over Gaza (violently) in 2006 - when Netanyahu was not in power
    While that's true, the Netanyahu government did secretly funnel money to Hamas via Qatar in the years running up to October 7.

    A cynic would suggest that was because they wanted an impacable enemy who demanded the death of Israel, rather than the more pragmatic Fatah which sought a two State solution.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 79,785

    https://x.com/trump_repost/status/2042641482226569447

    The Iranians don't seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short term extortion of the World by using International Waterways. The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate! President DONALD J. TRUMP

    He's spending too much time with Nigel Farage.
  • carnforthcarnforth Posts: 9,450
    Five years for Sarkozy. Although:

    "If the conviction is upheld after appeals, the five-year sentence could potentially include actual prison time, though French courts sometimes allow alternative arrangements such as house arrest with electronic monitoring for certain sentences."
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659

    https://x.com/trump_repost/status/2042641482226569447

    The Iranians don't seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short term extortion of the World by using International Waterways. The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate! President DONALD J. TRUMP

    And he didn't even thank me for my attention in this matter.

    :disappointed:
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 13,589
    edited April 10
    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Hamas took over Gaza (violently) in 2006 - when Netanyahu was not in power
    While that's true, the Netanyahu government did secretly funnel money to Hamas via Qatar in the years running up to October 7.

    A cynic would suggest that was because they wanted an impacable enemy who demanded the death of Israel, rather than the more pragmatic Fatah which sought a two State solution.
    Yes but that wasn’t @Richard_Tyndall point
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 14,487
    I think this depends on what comes after Netanyahu. If the genocidal psychopathy is restricted to one individual then Israel can recover - an aberration. The extraordinary protests against the government before this all kicked off have had a lasting impact on me; there’s a nation there I instinctively want to support.

    But if they elect a government in the same vein then I think pariah status is inevitable.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 40,569
    "Lord Peter Mandelson is set to be fined up to £300 for public urination in London, however Kensington and Chelsea council is unable to find a suitable address to send the fixed penalty notice to."

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/czd7gd5m024o
  • Richard_TyndallRichard_Tyndall Posts: 34,675

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    One of the reasons Hamas took over in Gaza is because Israel under Netenyahu actively supported them and encouraged other countries to doubtless same. Netanyahu wanted chaos in Gaza and that is exactly what he got.
    Hamas took over Gaza (violently) in 2006 - when Netanyahu was not in power
    While that's true, the Netanyahu government did secretly funnel money to Hamas via Qatar in the years running up to October 7.

    A cynic would suggest that was because they wanted an impacable enemy who demanded the death of Israel, rather than the more pragmatic Fatah which sought a two State solution.
    Yes but that wasn’t @Richard_Tyndall point
    He didn't have to be in power to be responsible for where we are now. You do realise that the family of Yitzhak Rabin, along with many other people, blame Netanyahu for the assassination. He may not have pulled the trigger but he was the one demonising Rabin including calling him a Nazi and a traitor. He did everything in his power to undermine the Oslo acords before and after he became PM and to sow division between Palestinians and Israelis. More than any single man today, he is responsible for the bloodshed in the region over the last 30 years.
  • BattlebusBattlebus Posts: 3,480
    Under the heading of they must know its going to be shit ...

    Just scanned the Nominations for the May 7th County Elections locally. Full slate for Conservatives, Reform, LibDems and Greens. Labour only contesting 85% of seats. As it's a true blue area with shades of Gails, the Reform result will be interesting as they have barely made any inroads here up to now. So Labour not even putting up paper candidates.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 90,369
    boulay said:

    Quite extraordinary how a relatively small patch of the earth has caused so many problems, violent deaths, wars, economic damage, diplomatic carnage and, compared to its size probably more comment here and elsewhere than anywhere else in the world. The fact that this small area even has a huge bearing on UK parliamentary constituencies to such an extent and whether football fans can visit makes it even more nuts.

    Is it nuts ?

    The region has been a focus of western foreign policy since WWII owing to its outsize role in global energy supplies - and the fact that it's a strategic choke point (see also Suez).

    Without oil, we'd probably have found some way, over the last six or seven decades, to happily ignore it. As the events of the last month demonstrate though, that's not really possible even if we try (as the UK and Europe more or less have tried this time around).
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 90,369
    Eabhal said:

    I think this depends on what comes after Netanyahu. If the genocidal psychopathy is restricted to one individual then Israel can recover - an aberration. The extraordinary protests against the government before this all kicked off have had a lasting impact on me; there’s a nation there I instinctively want to support.

    But if they elect a government in the same vein then I think pariah status is inevitable.

    Agreed on both counts.

    But I wouldn't assume that the protestors are now in the majority.
    That's not entirely clear.
  • Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 5,559
    Battlebus said:

    Under the heading of they must know its going to be shit ...

    Just scanned the Nominations for the May 7th County Elections locally. Full slate for Conservatives, Reform, LibDems and Greens. Labour only contesting 85% of seats. As it's a true blue area with shades of Gails, the Reform result will be interesting as they have barely made any inroads here up to now. So Labour not even putting up paper candidates.

    Can I ask which council?
  • nico67nico67 Posts: 8,420
    Iran should insist that a Lebanon ceasefire is part of any deal .

    And Trump needs to STFU . His latest comments are hardly going to help the negotiations.

  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 24,670
    boulay said:

    Quite extraordinary how a relatively small patch of the earth has caused so many problems, violent deaths, wars, economic damage, diplomatic carnage and, compared to its size probably more comment here and elsewhere than anywhere else in the world. The fact that this small area even has a huge bearing on UK parliamentary constituencies to such an extent and whether football fans can visit makes it even more nuts.

    Really utterly bored of it all. Want something new to happen to get excited about. Maybe all the world’s zoo animals simultaneously rise up and start taking out humans, or Nessie and Bigfoot to set up an only fans and announce their existence.

    Yes, well, if we can stop burning oil and gas and then no longer need to worry about oil exports from the Middle East I suspect that the interest in the region will drop to the level of Africa, and all the wars that continue in Sudan, Congo and elsewhere.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 22,164
    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
    Why should the Palestinians not have the right to national self determination the same as the Israelis?

    Should they have to exist in ever smaller bantustans hemmed in by encroaching settlements that steal their land and water?
    Because, ultimately, there’s plenty of arab states but only one Jewish state.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 22,164
    nico67 said:

    Iran should insist that a Lebanon ceasefire is part of any deal .

    And Trump needs to STFU . His latest comments are hardly going to help the negotiations.

    Why don’t you let Lebanon negotiate on behalf of itself. Iran isn’t interested in Lebanon, only Hezbollah.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 51,169

    The Israel/Palestine debate must be almost as boring as Trans (and I don't mean Trans-Jordan)

    More boring than 'small boats'?
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 57,263

    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
    Why should the Palestinians not have the right to national self determination the same as the Israelis?

    Should they have to exist in ever smaller bantustans hemmed in by encroaching settlements that steal their land and water?
    Because, ultimately, there’s plenty of arab states but only one Jewish state.
    There are plenty of european states too, so why should England exist?

    Denying that Palestinians are a people with a national consciousness is one of the steps to cultural genocide.
  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 60,216

    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
    Why should the Palestinians not have the right to national self determination the same as the Israelis?

    Should they have to exist in ever smaller bantustans hemmed in by encroaching settlements that steal their land and water?
    Because, ultimately, there’s plenty of arab states but only one Jewish state.
    22 Arab League states = 13,000,000 sq. km. of territory (about 3/4 the size of Russia)

    Israel = 20,000 sq. km. of territory (roughly the size of Wales)
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 22,164
    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
    Why should the Palestinians not have the right to national self determination the same as the Israelis?

    Should they have to exist in ever smaller bantustans hemmed in by encroaching settlements that steal their land and water?
    Because, ultimately, there’s plenty of arab states but only one Jewish state.
    There are plenty of european states too, so why should England exist?

    Denying that Palestinians are a people with a national consciousness is one of the steps to cultural genocide.
    No matter what reform think, the English haven’t been persecuted for thousands of years. I don’t expect you to understand, as a non-Jew, but the Jewish state is of absolute vital importance.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 72,895
    Preserve this one kids. It is going to come back and haunt this chap imho (he's Polanski's key economics advisor iirc (and was also Corbyn's)):

    James Meadway
    @meadwaj
    ·
    1h
    Something that has been very striking in comparing the Greens to the more traditional left is the absence of factional divisions treated as existential threats - something the Labour Party dramatically suffers from, too. There are debates but they aren’t life-or-death.

    https://x.com/meadwaj/status/2042639457757634857
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 22,164

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
    Why should the Palestinians not have the right to national self determination the same as the Israelis?

    Should they have to exist in ever smaller bantustans hemmed in by encroaching settlements that steal their land and water?
    Because, ultimately, there’s plenty of arab states but only one Jewish state.
    There are plenty of european states too, so why should England exist?

    Denying that Palestinians are a people with a national consciousness is one of the steps to cultural genocide.
    No matter what reform think, the English haven’t been persecuted for thousands of years. I don’t expect you to understand, as a non-Jew, but the Jewish state is of absolute vital importance.
    I agree. It is. But that doesn't give them the right to treat others in the same way they have been treated for thousands of years. There was a path to peace and the current Israeli Government share the blame equally for it not succeeding.
    I don’t disagree at all. But the issue is all this talk of “apartheid” misses the point in that Israel will always be an ethno-state or it is nothing. A one state solution cannot work because then it ceases to be the Jewish haven.
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 12,979
    I presume everyone thinks that Vance has been sent to fail?

    Vance though isn't that stupid.

    Quite a weekend ahead.
  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 60,216
    edited April 10
    Omnium said:

    I presume everyone thinks that Vance has been sent to fail?

    Vance though isn't that stupid.

    Quite a weekend ahead.

    He is an Orban Legend.
  • RattersRatters Posts: 2,068
    edited April 10
    I think we'd be better off if Palestine was absorbed into its neighbouring Arab nations:

    - As a part of Israel, both the West Bank and especially Gasa are treated horrendously. Of course in the latter case there's two sides to things, but Israel's response to October 7th went so far past the line that looking back it looks like a dot. Israel is never going to be a fair and just ruler of this land.

    - The two state solution is seemingly dead and I'm not sure there's any way to revive it. Israel won't allow Gaza, in particular, the power and rights of a nation state.

    - Israel will never let Palestinians be equal citizens within the wider borders of Israel.

    - So absorbing them into Egypt and Jordan would allow the Palestinians to have equal rights within a country to other citizens. It's not an independent Palestine, but the example of Kurdistan is a better one than the seats quo.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 60,287
    https://x.com/politico/status/2042639770476552489

    BREAKING: Kamala Harris just gave the clearest signal yet she’ll run for president again in 2028.
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 12,979

    Omnium said:

    I presume everyone thinks that Vance has been sent to fail?

    Vance though isn't that stupid.

    Quite a weekend ahead.

    He is an Orban Legend.
    Perhaps Hungary for the Presidency next time.
  • nico67nico67 Posts: 8,420
    I think this is a really good article.

    https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/5824238-trump-geopolitical-catastrophe-iran/

    The quote from that below really gets to the heart of the matter .

    “Iran has now discovered that its arsenal of drones and missiles is just as useful as a nuclear weapon and far more flexible. Iran forced Trump to abandon demands for “unconditional surrender” because it demonstrated it could inflict mutual assured destruction on a regional scale.

    True, Iran could not stop Israel and the Trump administration from bombing Iranian targets at will. But the U.S. could not stop Iran from destroying Gulf oil and gas facilities and bringing shipping through the Strait of Hormuz to a standstill. “

  • nico67nico67 Posts: 8,420

    https://x.com/politico/status/2042639770476552489

    BREAKING: Kamala Harris just gave the clearest signal yet she’ll run for president again in 2028.

    Everything she said would happen if Trump was elected has .

    She was proven right .
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 72,895

    https://x.com/politico/status/2042639770476552489

    BREAKING: Kamala Harris just gave the clearest signal yet she’ll run for president again in 2028.

    No. No. Please make it stop.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 64,659

    https://x.com/politico/status/2042639770476552489

    BREAKING: Kamala Harris just gave the clearest signal yet she’ll run for president again in 2028.

    I wonder if she'll even make it to the first primaries this time around.
  • Richard_TyndallRichard_Tyndall Posts: 34,675
    nico67 said:

    https://x.com/politico/status/2042639770476552489

    BREAKING: Kamala Harris just gave the clearest signal yet she’ll run for president again in 2028.

    Everything she said would happen if Trump was elected has .

    She was proven right .
    She holds a lot of responsibility for him getting elected. Such arrogance and lack of self awareness.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 104,218
    nico67 said:

    https://x.com/politico/status/2042639770476552489

    BREAKING: Kamala Harris just gave the clearest signal yet she’ll run for president again in 2028.

    Everything she said would happen if Trump was elected has .

    She was proven right .
    People don't like to public admit they were wrong though, even if they acknowledge it, which is what rerunning the same candidate would force them to.

    That said, it worked for Trump. I worry the Dems still have some big divisions about the candidate being 'progressive' enough.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 57,263
    Scott_xP said:

    https://x.com/trump_repost/status/2042641482226569447

    The Iranians don't seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short term extortion of the World by using International Waterways. The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate! President DONALD J. TRUMP

    They have a strait...
    And are Flush with success...
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 104,218

    Preserve this one kids. It is going to come back and haunt this chap imho (he's Polanski's key economics advisor iirc (and was also Corbyn's)):

    James Meadway
    @meadwaj
    ·
    1h
    Something that has been very striking in comparing the Greens to the more traditional left is the absence of factional divisions treated as existential threats - something the Labour Party dramatically suffers from, too. There are debates but they aren’t life-or-death.

    https://x.com/meadwaj/status/2042639457757634857

    Sounds like wishful thinking, but they are in the honeymoon of their recent rise in the polls, so people are overegging them from all sides.
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 129,241
    edited April 10

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
    Why should the Palestinians not have the right to national self determination the same as the Israelis?

    Should they have to exist in ever smaller bantustans hemmed in by encroaching settlements that steal their land and water?
    Because, ultimately, there’s plenty of arab states but only one Jewish state.
    There are plenty of european states too, so why should England exist?

    Denying that Palestinians are a people with a national consciousness is one of the steps to cultural genocide.
    No matter what reform think, the English haven’t been persecuted for thousands of years. I don’t expect you to understand, as a non-Jew, but the Jewish state is of absolute vital importance.
    I agree. It is. But that doesn't give them the right to treat others in the same way they have been treated for thousands of years. There was a path to peace and the current Israeli Government share the blame equally for it not succeeding.
    I don’t disagree at all. But the issue is all this talk of “apartheid” misses the point in that Israel will always be an ethno-state or it is nothing. A one state solution cannot work because then it ceases to be the Jewish haven.
    The apartheid analogy is due to the recent law.

    A Jewish settler can murder several Palestinians and will not face the death penalty.

    A Palestinian can murder one Jewish settler and will face the death penalty, their 'trial' will be held under a military court, they may not be able to choose their own defence counsel in most circumstances, in the past the defence counsels are IDF soldiers who have said the Palestinians are vermin who need to be wiped out.

    The evidentiary rules mean proper cross examinations cannot be carried out, the prosecution just needs to say 'national security' and that ends the cross examination.

    96% of trials end in conviction, the sentence must be carried out within 90 days, and the appellate process is close to non existent.

    If that's not apartheid like then what would you call it?
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 104,218
    Battlebus said:

    Under the heading of they must know its going to be shit ...

    Just scanned the Nominations for the May 7th County Elections locally. Full slate for Conservatives, Reform, LibDems and Greens. Labour only contesting 85% of seats. As it's a true blue area with shades of Gails, the Reform result will be interesting as they have barely made any inroads here up to now. So Labour not even putting up paper candidates.

    If it is a true blue area is it unusual for Labour not to put up a full slate there? They never have in my lifetime in places like Wiltshire.
  • Richard_TyndallRichard_Tyndall Posts: 34,675

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    tlg86 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    FPT, and remarkably (and coincidentally) on topic:

    Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.

    So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.

    And the answer is... it does not appear so.

    If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.

    These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.

    Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?

    Sure, that could be a role.

    But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."

    It's interesting that you bring up the holocaust. There was a much more recent genocide of jews on 7 October 2023.

    My view is that the Americans (and anyone else who cares about Israel) should have said to the Israelis "leave it to us, we'll sort this" and then you say to the Palestinians "either you play nice with us or you play nice with the Israelis."

    That doesn't mean I think what's happened since is acceptable, but the Palestinians, Hezbollah and their backers get a free pass from Western observers.
    So, there are two Palestines.

    There's the West Bank and there's Gaza.

    They have -historically- had different governments. One (Gaza) was run by Hamas. The other (the West Bank) was run by Fatah.

    Gaza attacked Israel in October 7, not the West Bank.

    Why should the Palestinians in the West Bank pay for the actions of Hamas in Gaza?
    Okay, replace Palestinians with Gazans in my post clever clogs.
    My posts have all been about the West Bank, though.

    Because -while I think Israel has over-reacted to the October 7 attacks- it was attacked, and it was (and maybe still is) defending itself.

    That doesn't make the creeping invasion of the West Bank, that long predates October 7, any more acceptable.
    But I very much support the Israelis staying there. They pulled out of Gaza and look what happened. Exactly the same would happen in the West Bank.
    So, your basic premise is that Palestinians and Israelis should not be afforded the same rights?
    Why would Israel afford the same rights to non-Israelis?
    Why should the Palestinians not have the right to national self determination the same as the Israelis?

    Should they have to exist in ever smaller bantustans hemmed in by encroaching settlements that steal their land and water?
    Because, ultimately, there’s plenty of arab states but only one Jewish state.
    There are plenty of european states too, so why should England exist?

    Denying that Palestinians are a people with a national consciousness is one of the steps to cultural genocide.
    No matter what reform think, the English haven’t been persecuted for thousands of years. I don’t expect you to understand, as a non-Jew, but the Jewish state is of absolute vital importance.
    I agree. It is. But that doesn't give them the right to treat others in the same way they have been treated for thousands of years. There was a path to peace and the current Israeli Government share the blame equally for it not succeeding.
    I don’t disagree at all. But the issue is all this talk of “apartheid” misses the point in that Israel will always be an ethno-state or it is nothing. A one state solution cannot work because then it ceases to be the Jewish haven.
    Oh I agree with you on this. And again I have no problem with the state of Israel existing as a Jewish state (as long as they treat their minorities properly as well). But there has to be a Palestinian state as well. The West Bank and Gaza are not Israel and Israelis should not be settling them.
This discussion has been closed.