There was a bunch of these nutters in Manchester today. Kind of hard to explain to my daughter, who naturally thought they were protesting against the baby-killers rather than in favour of them.
I mean, I can totally get on board with, in principle, support for a country for the Palestinians. But these people seem largely excited by violence against Israelis.
The point that is being missed is that the Israeli government is now home to fascists. Their minister of Homeland Security and effectively second to Netanyahu is described here;
'Ben-Gvir is a disciple of the late Meir Kahane, who with his rabidly racist Kach party was banned from Israeli politics in 1994 and put on the Israeli and US lists of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). Ben Gvir himself was convicted in 2006 of supporting a terror organization and inciting racism. He’s been seen recently publicly waving a gun at Palestinians in eastern Jerusalem, urging soldiers to shoot demonstrators. An admirer of Hebron mass murderer Baruch Goldstein, he says all Israeli Arabs he deems unloyal to the state must be expelled'
The ignorance about what is going on in Israel seem to be lost in this strange right wing hatred of Palestinians in particular and Arabs in general. If Ben Gvir was a member of Hamas his CV would be trotted out regularly
I fear we are seeing the sort of situation which caused Churchill to say "“If Hitler invaded Hell, I would at least make a favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons."
There's a lot... I mean a lot to dislike about Netanyahu's government. There's also a huge amount to lament about the way that all sorts of people have treated Palestinians over decades. Turning to Hamas is perfectly understandable in that sort of situation.
Both sides can point the finger at the other. Neither side can really be said to be fighting totally justly. But right now (and this might change, my fear is that Israel is going to f@*k this up for want of a better idea that probably doesn't exist), Israel's attitudes and actions are much less flawed than those of Hamas. And part of the tragedy is that the people of Gaza can't disentangle themselves from Hamas, even assuming that they really want to. And plenty probably don't.
A reasonable background for Bartholomew and others who live in a black and white world of goodies and baddies....
England to be the only European team to make the semis?
England new favourites to win?
I think that's unlikely, but it would be amusing if England got further than any other team in the British Isles, having been widely proclaimed the crappiest team therein.
To be fair I said QF was the maximum expectation of us and I will be pleased if I am proved absolutely wrong 👍
There was a bunch of these nutters in Manchester today. Kind of hard to explain to my daughter, who naturally thought they were protesting against the baby-killers rather than in favour of them.
I mean, I can totally get on board with, in principle, support for a country for the Palestinians. But these people seem largely excited by violence against Israelis.
The point that is being missed is that the Israeli government is now home to fascists. Their minister of Homeland Security and effectively second to Netanyahu is described here;
'Ben-Gvir is a disciple of the late Meir Kahane, who with his rabidly racist Kach party was banned from Israeli politics in 1994 and put on the Israeli and US lists of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). Ben Gvir himself was convicted in 2006 of supporting a terror organization and inciting racism. He’s been seen recently publicly waving a gun at Palestinians in eastern Jerusalem, urging soldiers to shoot demonstrators. An admirer of Hebron mass murderer Baruch Goldstein, he says all Israeli Arabs he deems unloyal to the state must be expelled'
The ignorance about what is going on in Israel seem to be lost in this strange right wing hatred of Palestinians in particular and Arabs in general. If Ben Gvir was a member of Hamas his CV would be trotted out regularly
I fear we are seeing the sort of situation which caused Churchill to say "“If Hitler invaded Hell, I would at least make a favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons."
There's a lot... I mean a lot to dislike about Netanyahu's government. There's also a huge amount to lament about the way that all sorts of people have treated Palestinians over decades. Turning to Hamas is perfectly understandable in that sort of situation.
Both sides can point the finger at the other. Neither side can really be said to be fighting totally justly. But right now (and this might change, my fear is that Israel is going to f@*k this up for want of a better idea that probably doesn't exist), Israel's attitudes and actions are much less flawed than those of Hamas. And part of the tragedy is that the people of Gaza can't disentangle themselves from Hamas, even assuming that they really want to. And plenty probably don't.
A reasonable background for Bartholomew and others who live in a black and white world of goodies and baddies....
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
Good evening. I am doing no such thing - the situation is ludicrously complex and nuanced, with decades of suspicion and fear stacked on top of millenia of crap about which version of God gave the place to which group.
There is no good side and no bad side - both sides have blame. Both sides have fault. And innocent civilians are innocent regardless of their side.
But - and its a galaxy-sized but - only one side is pledged to the utter destruction of the other. Only one side has just gone out and committed medieval acts of brutality. So yes, I offer my support to Israel. Because barbarism is inhuman and inexcusable. Hamas has to be eliminated, the same as ISIS did.
Support for peace and security for the Palestinian civilians is not anti-semitism - I've said it and I say it again now. But the hard left wankers do not want the same for the Israelis. From the River to the Sea remember.
As for the other night, thanks once again for a considered response. Apologies if I am misconstruing your position.
I wholeheartedly agree with your galaxy-sized but, and for that reason I find myself supporting Israel's response in a way that I would not have done in the past.
But: What "Victory for Palestine" do the hard left envisage? Specifically? and As I asked, what kind of VICTORY FOR PALESTINE do the anti-semites want us to support? very clearly, to me at least, suggests that you are saying hard left=anti-semite, without qualification. Which feels like it is weaponising anti-semitism as a way to shut down anyone who doesn't want Palestine destroyed. Otoh even as I write this I recognise that part of what you are doing is calling out the 'Victory for Palestine' slogan. And I agree with you there.
It's tough to get my thoughts on this out clearly - I feel a sympathy for the passion you hold and I am reminded again that you combine this with a thoughtfulness that my previous post failed to credit you with. Apologies.
My overriding feeling is that, unless we are all prepared to view the current situation with the complexity it demands, both Israel and Palestine are going to suffer further. And my fear is that, by offering unqualified support to Israel, the UK and US governments and others are offering cover for a pretty unsavoury bunch of leaders in Israel to perpetuate the suffering of a much larger group of people than were caught up in Hamas horrific attack.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
Basic message - it is very unlikely to have been a missle fired from the air given the lack of any incoming trail. His (unstated) conclusion is fairly clear, namely Hamas probably did this. *
* which, when think of the 'cui bono' makes perfect sense. There is little advantage - and much disadvantage - to Israel bombing such a truck. There is however a major advantage for Hamas if they can get everyone to buy into the narrative Israel did it (stir up the rest of the Middle East, increase the international pressure on Israel to stop its offensive, persuade Gazans not to flee N Gaza, which is what Hamas has been trying to do).
Penalty explanation is always piss poor in union. A little corner graphic would work wonders
That's my problem with the game. It's an exciting spectacle, I can see the athleticism and the skill, but often a match is decided by a penalty decision that (unlike say football) I can have no view on because you can't see what it was for. Just a load of bodies heaving about and sometimes the ref blows up and gives something and sometimes he doesn't.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I’d say auld blathers ranting impotently on the internet are pretty much the definition of moral posturing.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
Good evening. I am doing no such thing - the situation is ludicrously complex and nuanced, with decades of suspicion and fear stacked on top of millenia of crap about which version of God gave the place to which group.
There is no good side and no bad side - both sides have blame. Both sides have fault. And innocent civilians are innocent regardless of their side.
But - and its a galaxy-sized but - only one side is pledged to the utter destruction of the other. Only one side has just gone out and committed medieval acts of brutality. So yes, I offer my support to Israel. Because barbarism is inhuman and inexcusable. Hamas has to be eliminated, the same as ISIS did.
Support for peace and security for the Palestinian civilians is not anti-semitism - I've said it and I say it again now. But the hard left wankers do not want the same for the Israelis. From the River to the Sea remember.
As for the other night, thanks once again for a considered response. Apologies if I am misconstruing your position.
I wholeheartedly agree with your galaxy-sized but, and for that reason I find myself supporting Israel's response in a way that I would not have done in the past.
But: What "Victory for Palestine" do the hard left envisage? Specifically? and As I asked, what kind of VICTORY FOR PALESTINE do the anti-semites want us to support? very clearly, to me at least, suggests that you are saying hard left=anti-semite, without qualification. Which feels like it is weaponising anti-semitism as a way to shut down anyone who doesn't want Palestine destroyed. Otoh even as I write this I recognise that part of what you are doing is calling out the 'Victory for Palestine' slogan. And I agree with you there.
It's tough to get my thoughts on this out clearly - I feel a sympathy for the passion you hold and I am reminded again that you combine this with a thoughtfulness that my previous post failed to credit you with. Apologies.
My overriding feeling is that, unless we are all prepared to view the current situation with the complexity it demands, both Israel and Palestine are going to suffer further. And my fear is that, by offering unqualified support to Israel, the UK and US governments and others are offering cover for a pretty unsavoury bunch of leaders in Israel to perpetuate the suffering of a much larger group of people than were caught up in Hamas horrific attack.
I am not, have not, and will not offering "unqualified support for Israel." If they start committing acts of unspeakable barbarism I will criticise them as strongly as I do Hamas.
There was a bunch of these nutters in Manchester today. Kind of hard to explain to my daughter, who naturally thought they were protesting against the baby-killers rather than in favour of them.
I mean, I can totally get on board with, in principle, support for a country for the Palestinians. But these people seem largely excited by violence against Israelis.
The point that is being missed is that the Israeli government is now home to fascists. Their minister of Homeland Security and effectively second to Netanyahu is described here;
'Ben-Gvir is a disciple of the late Meir Kahane, who with his rabidly racist Kach party was banned from Israeli politics in 1994 and put on the Israeli and US lists of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). Ben Gvir himself was convicted in 2006 of supporting a terror organization and inciting racism. He’s been seen recently publicly waving a gun at Palestinians in eastern Jerusalem, urging soldiers to shoot demonstrators. An admirer of Hebron mass murderer Baruch Goldstein, he says all Israeli Arabs he deems unloyal to the state must be expelled'
The ignorance about what is going on in Israel seem to be lost in this strange right wing hatred of Palestinians in particular and Arabs in general. If Ben Gvir was a member of Hamas his CV would be trotted out regularly
I note you don’t call Hamas out for being fascists. There is a lot of criticism from pro-Israelis about the current Israeli gov but silence on the fascism, misogyny, homophobia and medieval attitudes of Hamas. I’ll take an Israeli world over a Hamas world every day. Come on roger, call out the Hamas fascists.
Of course but I want better for a country I have an affinity with. They started with such high ideals and the once oppressed have now become the oppressors and it's beyond depressing. Israel could have been one of the great civilising countries of the Middle East. Even a socialist utopia but what they've turned into is anything but.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
There was a bunch of these nutters in Manchester today. Kind of hard to explain to my daughter, who naturally thought they were protesting against the baby-killers rather than in favour of them.
I mean, I can totally get on board with, in principle, support for a country for the Palestinians. But these people seem largely excited by violence against Israelis.
The point that is being missed is that the Israeli government is now home to fascists. Their minister of Homeland Security and effectively second to Netanyahu is described here;
'Ben-Gvir is a disciple of the late Meir Kahane, who with his rabidly racist Kach party was banned from Israeli politics in 1994 and put on the Israeli and US lists of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). Ben Gvir himself was convicted in 2006 of supporting a terror organization and inciting racism. He’s been seen recently publicly waving a gun at Palestinians in eastern Jerusalem, urging soldiers to shoot demonstrators. An admirer of Hebron mass murderer Baruch Goldstein, he says all Israeli Arabs he deems unloyal to the state must be expelled'
The ignorance about what is going on in Israel seem to be lost in this strange right wing hatred of Palestinians in particular and Arabs in general. If Ben Gvir was a member of Hamas his CV would be trotted out regularly
I note you don’t call Hamas out for being fascists. There is a lot of criticism from pro-Israelis about the current Israeli gov but silence on the fascism, misogyny, homophobia and medieval attitudes of Hamas. I’ll take an Israeli world over a Hamas world every day. Come on roger, call out the Hamas fascists.
Of course but I want better for a country I have an affinity with. They started with such high ideals and the once oppressed have now become the oppressors and it's beyond depressing. Israel could have been one of the great civilising countries of the Middle East. Even a socialist utopia but what they've turned into is anything but.
Its noticeable that the Palestinians who have been the most successful and have the most rights are those that stayed in Israel after 1948.
Perhaps Israel has been rather more civilising than you give it credit for.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
Good evening. I am doing no such thing - the situation is ludicrously complex and nuanced, with decades of suspicion and fear stacked on top of millenia of crap about which version of God gave the place to which group.
There is no good side and no bad side - both sides have blame. Both sides have fault. And innocent civilians are innocent regardless of their side.
But - and its a galaxy-sized but - only one side is pledged to the utter destruction of the other. Only one side has just gone out and committed medieval acts of brutality. So yes, I offer my support to Israel. Because barbarism is inhuman and inexcusable. Hamas has to be eliminated, the same as ISIS did.
Support for peace and security for the Palestinian civilians is not anti-semitism - I've said it and I say it again now. But the hard left wankers do not want the same for the Israelis. From the River to the Sea remember.
As for the other night, thanks once again for a considered response. Apologies if I am misconstruing your position.
I wholeheartedly agree with your galaxy-sized but, and for that reason I find myself supporting Israel's response in a way that I would not have done in the past.
But: What "Victory for Palestine" do the hard left envisage? Specifically? and As I asked, what kind of VICTORY FOR PALESTINE do the anti-semites want us to support? very clearly, to me at least, suggests that you are saying hard left=anti-semite, without qualification. Which feels like it is weaponising anti-semitism as a way to shut down anyone who doesn't want Palestine destroyed. Otoh even as I write this I recognise that part of what you are doing is calling out the 'Victory for Palestine' slogan. And I agree with you there.
It's tough to get my thoughts on this out clearly - I feel a sympathy for the passion you hold and I am reminded again that you combine this with a thoughtfulness that my previous post failed to credit you with. Apologies.
My overriding feeling is that, unless we are all prepared to view the current situation with the complexity it demands, both Israel and Palestine are going to suffer further. And my fear is that, by offering unqualified support to Israel, the UK and US governments and others are offering cover for a pretty unsavoury bunch of leaders in Israel to perpetuate the suffering of a much larger group of people than were caught up in Hamas horrific attack.
I am not, have not, and will not offering "unqualified support for Israel." If they start committing acts of unspeakable barbarism I will criticise them as strongly as I do Hamas.
Bed is calling but (a) it's the US govt's unqualified support I'm concerned about and (b) it's not unspeakable barbarism on the part of Israel I'm concerned about. I'm concerned that any entirely legitimate attempt by them to eliminate Hamas will cause enormous human suffering because of the geography of Gaza, Egypt's intransigence etc.
I'm not sure there is any other answer at this stage. I support Israel entering Gaza to try to eliminate Hamas. I fear they will fail. This is not their fault. Though I do wish there were a bunch of wets in charge of Israel right now, rather than Netanyahu and his lot. The unity government is at least a start.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
Good evening. I am doing no such thing - the situation is ludicrously complex and nuanced, with decades of suspicion and fear stacked on top of millenia of crap about which version of God gave the place to which group.
There is no good side and no bad side - both sides have blame. Both sides have fault. And innocent civilians are innocent regardless of their side.
But - and its a galaxy-sized but - only one side is pledged to the utter destruction of the other. Only one side has just gone out and committed medieval acts of brutality. So yes, I offer my support to Israel. Because barbarism is inhuman and inexcusable. Hamas has to be eliminated, the same as ISIS did.
Support for peace and security for the Palestinian civilians is not anti-semitism - I've said it and I say it again now. But the hard left wankers do not want the same for the Israelis. From the River to the Sea remember.
As for the other night, thanks once again for a considered response. Apologies if I am misconstruing your position.
I wholeheartedly agree with your galaxy-sized but, and for that reason I find myself supporting Israel's response in a way that I would not have done in the past.
But: What "Victory for Palestine" do the hard left envisage? Specifically? and As I asked, what kind of VICTORY FOR PALESTINE do the anti-semites want us to support? very clearly, to me at least, suggests that you are saying hard left=anti-semite, without qualification. Which feels like it is weaponising anti-semitism as a way to shut down anyone who doesn't want Palestine destroyed. Otoh even as I write this I recognise that part of what you are doing is calling out the 'Victory for Palestine' slogan. And I agree with you there.
It's tough to get my thoughts on this out clearly - I feel a sympathy for the passion you hold and I am reminded again that you combine this with a thoughtfulness that my previous post failed to credit you with. Apologies.
My overriding feeling is that, unless we are all prepared to view the current situation with the complexity it demands, both Israel and Palestine are going to suffer further. And my fear is that, by offering unqualified support to Israel, the UK and US governments and others are offering cover for a pretty unsavoury bunch of leaders in Israel to perpetuate the suffering of a much larger group of people than were caught up in Hamas horrific attack.
This is fundaentally correct. A large part of the problem is unqualified and uncritical support for both sides from outside.
Both Netanyahu and the leaders of Hamas should have been up before an international criminal court long ago. Hamas's most recent crimes may be worse, but they both have a record of criminality.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
Basic message - it is very unlikely to have been a missle fired from the air given the lack of any incoming trail. His (unstated) conclusion is fairly clear, namely Hamas probably did this. *
* which, when think of the 'cui bono' makes perfect sense. There is little advantage - and much disadvantage - to Israel bombing such a truck. There is however a major advantage for Hamas if they can get everyone to buy into the narrative Israel did it (stir up the rest of the Middle East, increase the international pressure on Israel to stop its offensive, persuade Gazans not to flee N Gaza, which is what Hamas has been trying to do).
Let’s see where the facts lie. But it has seemed inevitable to me for a few days that Hamas would directly target fleeing Palestinian civilians. They don’t care about their plight, they only care about the destruction of Jews. And that becomes harder for every yard of ground given up.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
It's never 'very fucking simple'.
It really is. Once the government of your local enemy does what it has just done, you don't have many options.
What do people envisage Israel doing? Raising a protest at the UN?
Why are all the New Zealand players called Barrett?
Same family
Shows how important culture and coaching is when 20% of a national team comes from the same family. Matthew Syed makes this point regarding table tennis. The best players all went to his school because it had a teacher who played and was a good coach.
I had a brief period during that game when I really, really didn't want NZ to win the World Cup. Not because I don't like them - I do, they seem a likeable bunch and I really enjoy watching them play - but I had this horrible vision of Christmas Dinner at the Barrett family where two brothers had won a WC and the third hadn't, and imagining it would feel quite awkward and a bit sad. Then I realised Scott was playing as well (for some reason I had thought the second row was Whitelock and Retallick, again) and, well, fine, you go ahead NZ.
On a similar note, I always wondered how family dos at the Chuckle Family went down, and how their two less successful brothers felt about them. As an only child I worry disproportionately about this sort of thing.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
There was a bunch of these nutters in Manchester today. Kind of hard to explain to my daughter, who naturally thought they were protesting against the baby-killers rather than in favour of them.
I mean, I can totally get on board with, in principle, support for a country for the Palestinians. But these people seem largely excited by violence against Israelis.
The point that is being missed is that the Israeli government is now home to fascists. Their minister of Homeland Security and effectively second to Netanyahu is described here;
'Ben-Gvir is a disciple of the late Meir Kahane, who with his rabidly racist Kach party was banned from Israeli politics in 1994 and put on the Israeli and US lists of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). Ben Gvir himself was convicted in 2006 of supporting a terror organization and inciting racism. He’s been seen recently publicly waving a gun at Palestinians in eastern Jerusalem, urging soldiers to shoot demonstrators. An admirer of Hebron mass murderer Baruch Goldstein, he says all Israeli Arabs he deems unloyal to the state must be expelled'
The ignorance about what is going on in Israel seem to be lost in this strange right wing hatred of Palestinians in particular and Arabs in general. If Ben Gvir was a member of Hamas his CV would be trotted out regularly
I fear we are seeing the sort of situation which caused Churchill to say "“If Hitler invaded Hell, I would at least make a favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons."
There's a lot... I mean a lot to dislike about Netanyahu's government. There's also a huge amount to lament about the way that all sorts of people have treated Palestinians over decades. Turning to Hamas is perfectly understandable in that sort of situation.
Both sides can point the finger at the other. Neither side can really be said to be fighting totally justly. But right now (and this might change, my fear is that Israel is going to f@*k this up for want of a better idea that probably doesn't exist), Israel's attitudes and actions are much less flawed than those of Hamas. And part of the tragedy is that the people of Gaza can't disentangle themselves from Hamas, even assuming that they really want to. And plenty probably don't.
A reasonable background for Bartholomew and others who live in a black and white world of goodies and baddies....
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
It's never 'very fucking simple'.
When you're fighting fascists who will exterminate all Jews if they can, it is.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
It's never 'very fucking simple'.
It really is. Once the government of your local enemy does what it has just done, you don't have many options.
What do people envisage Israel doing? Raising a protest at the UN?
Netanyahu is bombing civilian areas and placing them under siege, as he has done many times before.
The undeniable fact that is that two parties are engaged in war crimes, even if Hamas's most recent ones have been the worse ones.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
It's never 'very fucking simple'.
It really is. Once the government of your local enemy does what it has just done, you don't have many options.
What do people envisage Israel doing? Raising a protest at the UN?
Netanyahu is bombing civilian areas and placing them under siege, as he has done many times before.
The undeniable fact that is that two parties are engaged in war crimes, even if Hamas's most recent ones have been the worse ones.
The civilian areas where Hamas launched their thousands of missiles?
Why are all the New Zealand players called Barrett?
Same family
Shows how important culture and coaching is when 20% of a national team comes from the same family. Matthew Syed makes this point regarding table tennis. The best players all went to his school because it had a teacher who played and was a good coach.
I had a brief period during that game when I really, really didn't want NZ to win the World Cup. Not because I don't like them - I do, they seem a likeable bunch and I really enjoy watching them play - but I had this horrible vision of Christmas Dinner at the Barrett family where two brothers had won a WC and the third hadn't, and imagining it would feel quite awkward and a bit sad. Then I realised Scott was playing as well (for some reason I had thought the second row was Whitelock and Retallick, again) and, well, fine, you go ahead NZ.
On a similar note, I always wondered how family dos at the Chuckle Family went down, and how their two less successful brothers felt about them. As an only child I worry disproportionately about this sort of thing.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
So all of the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis are saying this? A majority of relatives? Or a few whose views have been picked up on. Are the relatives calling for vengeance lesser? Maybe you can go and tell them?
16 points on Opinium, with swingback already built in, and a massive lead for SKS.
And the economy not looking too rosy either.
LAB 800% clear soon all you LAB can enjoy that!
Meanwhile we are enjoying the Rugby 👍
I am not Lab...
But you will be absolutely delighted when Keir wins 👍
Lets be brutally honest about it. Most of the country will be delighted when *Rishi loses*
Probably. Hope you are delighted when your CON MP increases his majority 💙
With the SNP shitting the bed this badly, I'm sure he will. So I don't need to worry about a push to unseat him. So I can vote for my own party and arse with it.
16 points on Opinium, with swingback already built in, and a massive lead for SKS.
And the economy not looking too rosy either.
LAB 800% clear soon all you LAB can enjoy that!
Meanwhile we are enjoying the Rugby 👍
I am not Lab...
But you will be absolutely delighted when Keir wins 👍
Lets be brutally honest about it. Most of the country will be delighted when *Rishi loses*
Probably. Hope you are delighted when your CON MP increases his majority 💙
With the SNP shitting the bed this badly, I'm sure he will. So I don't need to worry about a push to unseat him. So I can vote for my own party and arse with it.
Fair enough. You could even vote CON for a change 👍
16 points on Opinium, with swingback already built in, and a massive lead for SKS.
And the economy not looking too rosy either.
LAB 800% clear soon all you LAB can enjoy that!
Meanwhile we are enjoying the Rugby 👍
I am not Lab...
But you will be absolutely delighted when Keir wins 👍
Lets be brutally honest about it. Most of the country will be delighted when *Rishi loses*
Probably. Hope you are delighted when your CON MP increases his majority 💙
With the SNP shitting the bed this badly, I'm sure he will. So I don't need to worry about a push to unseat him. So I can vote for my own party and arse with it.
Fair enough. You could even vote CON for a change 👍
Why on earth would I want to do that? I am not a bad man.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
It's never 'very fucking simple'.
It really is. Once the government of your local enemy does what it has just done, you don't have many options.
What do people envisage Israel doing? Raising a protest at the UN?
Netanyahu is bombing civilian areas and placing them under siege, as he has done many times before.
The undeniable fact that is that two parties are engaged in war crimes, even if Hamas's most recent ones have been the worse ones.
Netanyahu is bombing Hamas areas.
That's what happens in war.
He's been up front and warned the civilians to get out.
What would you have him do? Allow Hamas to hide in civilian areas and say "oh well, nothing we can do then"?
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
I'm sure that many innocent Gazans will be killed and injured by the Israeli attacks, but how many will be routinely raped or deliberately decapitated?
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
No, there are three ways to end a conflict like this.
1: Both sides decide not to take retribution/fight.
2: One side chooses to surrender and give the other side everything they want.
3: One side destroys the other side.
We're now closer to option 3 than option 1. Hamas want to murder every Jew "from river to sea", they're explicit on that. So this only ends with either Israel destroyed, or Hamas destroyed. It is an existential battle.
I'm sure that many innocent Gazans will be killed and injured by the Israeli attacks, but how many will be routinely raped or deliberately decapitated?
It depends how much spare time Hamas fighters have over the next few days.
Incidentally when it comes to war crimes, it is Hamas that is conducting the war crimes. Hamas are hiding in civilian areas, which is contrary to the Geneva Convention and a war crime.
If bombing a civilian area is the only proportionate way to achieve the objective of destroying Hamas then it is not a war crime, it is war.
That is why using human shields is a crime. It is, as typical, Hamas that is showing no concern for life though this time Gazan lives rather than Israeli lives.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
16 points on Opinium, with swingback already built in, and a massive lead for SKS.
And the economy not looking too rosy either.
LAB 800% clear soon all you LAB can enjoy that!
Meanwhile we are enjoying the Rugby 👍
I am not Lab...
But you will be absolutely delighted when Keir wins 👍
Lets be brutally honest about it. Most of the country will be delighted when *Rishi loses*
Probably. Hope you are delighted when your CON MP increases his majority 💙
With the SNP shitting the bed this badly, I'm sure he will. So I don't need to worry about a push to unseat him. So I can vote for my own party and arse with it.
Fair enough. You could even vote CON for a change 👍
Why on earth would I want to do that? I am not a bad man.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
So why don't the descendants of the Sudeten Germans have a burning desire for revenge ?
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Alastair Meeks @AlastairMeeks · 1h I’m currently expecting them to hold both. This seems as good a place as any to record that expectation.
I still think the Tories will probably lose one of them, although it's difficult to say which.
Yes, having previously said that the Tory price on Betfair was too long when it was above 3, I now think it's too short - at the time of writing it's down to 2.14, almost evens. My current guess is that it should be something like Lab 2.1, Con 2.4. Unless there's a poll that we've not seen, there isn't much evidence to make the Tories favourites - it contradicts the published polling from early in the campaign (which showed Labour ahead or tied) and implicitly assumes that the Tory position has since improved, which seems frankly unlikely.
Little idea what's happening in Tamworth except for the comments at the Conference that it was close.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
Hamas aren't going to surrender, you naive fool.
The kind of people who behead children and use civilians as human shields aren't interested in a peace process.
If Israel commits to the total elimination of Hamas, that means a comprehensive annexation of the Gaza strip and displacement or death of the millions who live there. We can argue about whether that is right/wrong - but first, whether that is even possible?
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
Hamas aren't going to surrender, you naive fool.
The kind of people who behead children and use civilians as human shields aren't interested in a peace process.
If Israel commits to the total elimination of Hamas, that means a comprehensive annexation of the Gaza strip and displacement or death of the millions who live there. We can argue about whether that is right/wrong - but first, whether that is even possible?
Yes, they're not interested in a peace process, which is why they need to be destroyed and killed until they do surrender. Even if it takes years of fighting.
The Nazis surrendered in the end, why can't Hamas?
What's naive and foolish is to suggest that there's an alternative to war here. They're not interested in a peace process, you know that, I know that, so that only leaves conflict as the resolution however depressing that may be.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
The Germans unconditionally surrendered.
This difference may become important in Gaza.
Yes, Israel needs to keep killing and destroying Hamas and levelling every building they hide in, and destroy all their tunnels and so on and so forth until Hamas unconditionally surrender.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
You've heard of the Muslim world's policy toward the Jews?
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
The Germans unconditionally surrendered.
This difference may become important in Gaza.
Yes, Israel needs to keep killing and destroying Hamas and levelling every building they hide in, and destroy all their tunnels and so on and so forth until Hamas unconditionally surrender.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
The Germans unconditionally surrendered.
This difference may become important in Gaza.
Yes, Israel needs to keep killing and destroying Hamas and levelling every building they hide in, and destroy all their tunnels and so on and so forth until Hamas unconditionally surrender.
We will know on Friday. Personally I think a 3 way fight makes it interesting. A single seat doesn't matter, but it will be a very interesting study in whether tactical voters can get it right in these seats.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
The Germans unconditionally surrendered.
This difference may become important in Gaza.
Yes, Israel needs to keep killing and destroying Hamas and levelling every building they hide in, and destroy all their tunnels and so on and so forth until Hamas unconditionally surrender.
Goodness knows why but Con has now gone clear favourite for Mid Beds:
Con 2.14 Lab 2.7
Quite a turnaround - Lab having been favourite until last 24 hours.
Having failed to successfully blame EVs for the Luton fire, the good people of the right are piling on to back the Tories.
They must defeat woke. They WILL defeat woke.
If the Conservatives can poll 34% in Mid Beds., that's an objectively awful result (a 26% fall), but probably enough to eke out a hold.
In Tamworth, the gap is enormous. Alistair Meeks is probably right to make the Conservatives narrow favourites.
34% might do it for the Conservatives in Mid Beds, but I can't see them holding on with less than 40% in Tamworth, which would require 3 in every 5 2019 Tory voters to stick with them, in proportion at least. And I don't think they are going to hang on to 40% in Tamworth.
Bear in mind the circumstances of the by-election, a particularly Conservative scandal. An MP forced out by tawdry scandal, made worse by the then PM writhing around trying to let him off the hook. Add into the mix the fact that the Conservative candidate if successful is only keeping the seat warm as part of a deal to allow another Conservative MP to jump ship at the GE. All of which might be a good reason for Conservatives not to bother this time.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
The Germans unconditionally surrendered.
This difference may become important in Gaza.
Yes, Israel needs to keep killing and destroying Hamas and levelling every building they hide in, and destroy all their tunnels and so on and so forth until Hamas unconditionally surrender.
No different to us fighting the Nazis.
I am pretty certain this is not what will happen.
Not least because not all Hamas are in Gaza.
Indeed. The political leadership live in penthouse flats in places like Dubai iirc.
But I meant more that there will be a ceasefire and so kind of soupy mushy negotiated way forward after a month or two of horrible slaughter.
Qatar and other middle eastern countries help fund Hamas .
France 24 have a good article showing who is giving support to them . Yet we allow them to own football clubs and they have huge investments in the UK .
The west turns a blind eye because of the money . There is a large stench of hypocrisy.
Even more disturbing is the somewhat symbiotic relationship between Netanyahu and Hamas .
Netanyahu pours petrol on the fire and then portrays himself as the only one able to put out the fire . Whilst Hamas was generally limited to firing rockets this plan worked .
Both Hamas and Netanyahu need each other .
This time though Netanyahu pouring petrol exploded with intelligence failures leading to the horrific scenes we’ve seen.
People will say now is not the time but Netanyahus obsession with remaining in power to needs to be called out. He does not have Israelis best interests in mind .
We can only hope that once yet another tragic episode of bloodshed comes to an end he is shown the door , his saviour routine has been shown up for what it is .
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
Hamas aren't going to surrender, you naive fool.
The kind of people who behead children and use civilians as human shields aren't interested in a peace process.
If Israel commits to the total elimination of Hamas, that means a comprehensive annexation of the Gaza strip and displacement or death of the millions who live there. We can argue about whether that is right/wrong - but first, whether that is even possible?
Yes, they're not interested in a peace process, which is why they need to be destroyed and killed until they do surrender. Even if it takes years of fighting.
The Nazis surrendered in the end, why can't Hamas?
What's naive and foolish is to suggest that there's an alternative to war here. They're not interested in a peace process, you know that, I know that, so that only leaves conflict as the resolution however depressing that may be.
If you're serious about stopping Hamas, you need to go after their enablers, particularly Iran. Targeted airstrikes inside Gaza also make sense to knock out the immediate threat.
A ground invasion? Ineffective, performative vengeance. It's exactly what Iran wants you to do - further radicalise the Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank, weaken Western resolve as civilian casualties mount, weaken the IDF, turn the rest of the Muslim world against you.
In some respects I'm more hawkish than you - I think Netanyahu should've worked harder to pin this on Iran.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
The Germans unconditionally surrendered.
This difference may become important in Gaza.
Yes, Israel needs to keep killing and destroying Hamas and levelling every building they hide in, and destroy all their tunnels and so on and so forth until Hamas unconditionally surrender.
No different to us fighting the Nazis.
I am pretty certain this is not what will happen.
That's a shame if so.
Could Israel achieve this kind of total win? Militarily. If they were so minded and could bear the international pressure to stop not least from the US after a month or two. Virtual hand to hand combat in the incredibly dense urban jungle of Gaza's streets. Miles and miles of tunnels to clear. Civilians deliberately placed in the way to help break young national service kids Israeli morale.
I'm minded to think going into Gaza is a trap the Israeli will regret.
Qatar and other middle eastern countries help fund Hamas .
France 24 have a good article showing who is giving support to them . Yet we allow them to own football clubs and they have huge investments in the UK .
The west turns a blind eye because of the money . There is a large stench of hypocrisy.
Even more disturbing is the somewhat symbiotic relationship between Netanyahu and Hamas .
Netanyahu pours petrol on the fire and then portrays himself as the only one able to put out the fire . Whilst Hamas was generally limited to firing rockets this plan worked .
Both Hamas and Netanyahu need each other .
This time though Netanyahu pouring petrol exploded with intelligence failures leading to the horrific scenes we’ve seen.
People will say now is not the time but Netanyahus obsession with remaining in power to needs to be called out. He does not have Israelis best interests in mind .
We can only hope that once yet another tragic episode of bloodshed comes to an end he is shown the door , his saviour routine has been shown up for what it is .
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
Hamas aren't going to surrender, you naive fool.
The kind of people who behead children and use civilians as human shields aren't interested in a peace process.
If Israel commits to the total elimination of Hamas, that means a comprehensive annexation of the Gaza strip and displacement or death of the millions who live there. We can argue about whether that is right/wrong - but first, whether that is even possible?
Yes, they're not interested in a peace process, which is why they need to be destroyed and killed until they do surrender. Even if it takes years of fighting.
The Nazis surrendered in the end, why can't Hamas?
What's naive and foolish is to suggest that there's an alternative to war here. They're not interested in a peace process, you know that, I know that, so that only leaves conflict as the resolution however depressing that may be.
If you're serious about stopping Hamas, you need to go after their enablers, particularly Iran. Targeted airstrikes inside Gaza also make sense to knock out the immediate threat.
A ground invasion? Ineffective, performative vengeance. It's exactly what Iran wants you to do - further radicalise the Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank, weaken Western resolve as civilian casualties mount, weaken the IDF, turn the rest of the Muslim world against you.
In some respects I'm more hawkish than you - I think Netanyahu should've worked harder to pin this on Iran.
Why are all the New Zealand players called Barrett?
Same family
Shows how important culture and coaching is when 20% of a national team comes from the same family. Matthew Syed makes this point regarding table tennis. The best players all went to his school because it had a teacher who played and was a good coach.
I had a brief period during that game when I really, really didn't want NZ to win the World Cup. Not because I don't like them - I do, they seem a likeable bunch and I really enjoy watching them play - but I had this horrible vision of Christmas Dinner at the Barrett family where two brothers had won a WC and the third hadn't, and imagining it would feel quite awkward and a bit sad. Then I realised Scott was playing as well (for some reason I had thought the second row was Whitelock and Retallick, again) and, well, fine, you go ahead NZ.
On a similar note, I always wondered how family dos at the Chuckle Family went down, and how their two less successful brothers felt about them. As an only child I worry disproportionately about this sort of thing.
I continue to find it very hard to find a balance in my views on the Israel/Palestine conflict, beyond 100% condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas, and an underlying solidarity with civilians on all sides, but particularly Gazans as their lives are torn apart once more.
It feels like this conflict is the very definition of one with no easy answers (the latest Moral Maze is good at navigating this, incidentally). And so when, with apologies for naming names @boulay@BartholomewRoberts@RochdalePioneers and others seem to refusing any complexity whilst happily eliding the cause of Hamas with Palestinian solidarity more generally, and apportioning collective responsibility on a bunch of poor civilians, I find my sympathies swinging away from Israel quite dramatically.
I'm sure this is not fair - Israelis are not responsible for the brainlessness of anonymous posters on the internet. But just as those who are cheerleading a blank cheque for Israel's response seem to lump together anyone who has any qualms about all this as a raging anti-semite, I am finding it very hard not to be suspicious that the outrage of some is being manufactured in order to provide cover for an Israeli response that, in terms of pure human suffering, will vastly outweigh the atrocities that Hamas have perpetrated in the past week or so.
You named three posters including me who consistently disagree on political matters for various reasons from various standpoints, social situations, backgrounds and aims. It shows the weakness in your mealy mouthed attempt to try and state some moral equivalence between what has happened in Gaza pre last Saturday and post. We are not a cabal giving a blank cheque to Israel and you can dress up your views however you want but you are a wet useful idiot for murderous terrorists who killed innocent civilians out of the blue in the most horrific ways. Fuck your pathetic moral posturing.
I thnk you are making my point for me.
I’m really not. I’m sure you think that you are evaluating things in a “moral maze” way and showing great insight and intellectual breadth but sometimes it’s just very fucking simple - there are bad guys and good guys. Hamas are the bad guys as you clearly failing to get. Israel were being bad but nothing compared to Hamas. Don’t overthink it, it’s not a uni philosophy class. It’s dead babies and now dead Palestinians based directly on what Hamas did last weekend.
And what do you say to the relatives of the slaughtered Israelis whose views I posted earlier today, which were not dissimilar to those of maxh ? "Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
It may be the worst sort of Thought For The Day mithering, but this sort of conflict only stops when someone, preferably someones on each side, decide not to take the retribution they are entitled to. And, as @Nigelb's link showed, there are some with the strength to say that, even after what they've suffered.
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
Even if every Hamas fighter was dead, there would be another similar organisation within a year, recruiting from the million refugees with a burning desire for revenge.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Nazis were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Wipe out the untermensch.
What are you wittering on about?
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
Hamas aren't going to surrender, you naive fool.
The kind of people who behead children and use civilians as human shields aren't interested in a peace process.
If Israel commits to the total elimination of Hamas, that means a comprehensive annexation of the Gaza strip and displacement or death of the millions who live there. We can argue about whether that is right/wrong - but first, whether that is even possible?
Yes, they're not interested in a peace process, which is why they need to be destroyed and killed until they do surrender. Even if it takes years of fighting.
The Nazis surrendered in the end, why can't Hamas?
What's naive and foolish is to suggest that there's an alternative to war here. They're not interested in a peace process, you know that, I know that, so that only leaves conflict as the resolution however depressing that may be.
If you're serious about stopping Hamas, you need to go after their enablers, particularly Iran. Targeted airstrikes inside Gaza also make sense to knock out the immediate threat.
A ground invasion? Ineffective, performative vengeance. It's exactly what Iran wants you to do - further radicalise the Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank, weaken Western resolve as civilian casualties mount, weaken the IDF, turn the rest of the Muslim world against you.
In some respects I'm more hawkish than you - I think Netanyahu should've worked harder to pin this on Iran.
What does "going after Iran" entail though?
I don't know. Perhaps more strikes on Iranian backed groups in Iraq and Syria, ultimatum on Qatar to stop hosting Hamas leaders, etc
But I'm surprised that Biden hasn't provided alternatives to invading Gaza.
(Perhaps he has, and Netanyahu has ignored them for the populist option of massive bloodshed and displacement.)
Qatar and other middle eastern countries help fund Hamas .
France 24 have a good article showing who is giving support to them . Yet we allow them to own football clubs and they have huge investments in the UK .
The west turns a blind eye because of the money . There is a large stench of hypocrisy.
Even more disturbing is the somewhat symbiotic relationship between Netanyahu and Hamas .
Netanyahu pours petrol on the fire and then portrays himself as the only one able to put out the fire . Whilst Hamas was generally limited to firing rockets this plan worked .
Both Hamas and Netanyahu need each other .
This time though Netanyahu pouring petrol exploded with intelligence failures leading to the horrific scenes we’ve seen.
People will say now is not the time but Netanyahus obsession with remaining in power to needs to be called out. He does not have Israelis best interests in mind .
We can only hope that once yet another tragic episode of bloodshed comes to an end he is shown the door , his saviour routine has been shown up for what it is .
Thanks . That’s very interesting . Netanyahu has never wanted peace or any chances of an agreement so sabotaging that has helped his political ambitions . Keep the public terrified and they’ll keep voting for the so called hard man to protect them. I want to vomit every time I see him on tv , western leaders know what he’s been doing and know he’s part of the problem not the solution.
Qatar and other middle eastern countries help fund Hamas .
France 24 have a good article showing who is giving support to them . Yet we allow them to own football clubs and they have huge investments in the UK .
The west turns a blind eye because of the money . There is a large stench of hypocrisy.
Even more disturbing is the somewhat symbiotic relationship between Netanyahu and Hamas .
Netanyahu pours petrol on the fire and then portrays himself as the only one able to put out the fire . Whilst Hamas was generally limited to firing rockets this plan worked .
Both Hamas and Netanyahu need each other .
This time though Netanyahu pouring petrol exploded with intelligence failures leading to the horrific scenes we’ve seen.
People will say now is not the time but Netanyahus obsession with remaining in power to needs to be called out. He does not have Israelis best interests in mind .
We can only hope that once yet another tragic episode of bloodshed comes to an end he is shown the door , his saviour routine has been shown up for what it is .
Thanks . That’s very interesting . Netanyahu has never wanted peace or any chances of an agreement so sabotaging that has helped his political ambitions . Keep the public terrified and they’ll keep voting for the so called hard man to protect them. I want to vomit every time I see him on tv , western leaders know what he’s been doing and know he’s part of the problem not the solution.
I think the economic squeezing of Gaza is underplayed. The blockades have kept them poor and desperate, worsening the anger.
Comments
I thought that was a big no no.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/14/opinion/palestinian-ethical-resistance-answers-grief-and-rage.html?unlocked_article_code=KtULgQiWG7iVv7a2kBOO0S_GVv73_YHENW_8R6ondUPDjkeleo0Znhzt5nEtDjsZ5tVOdKBAUeCmHtGEAAD-P8VDo022SNBYUp_aR3RhmkZtLQ7MH7WRKtmacPGsDl2Eb7gBV_LTanbf1nP34QGFw-8XvtA5Ks60JFhykDPVoRD0PVNA2riJ0NjCa9cVJ8UZQHjQdiew-B69b8mnLFVNoi5ce8T5ac1JhYAHjV8wgspFCehtXqCy5oLi8A5IrMaqzIkfO7qoqc8hPH6ZLXrc0_kHWLork5kKDJEuK1A1j1niXLDbcexPsHCjEQSQiYt-UStVkIJ8v7JDIkB40ero2Alabarjub2SvNDhFYF01mNqrvS5-9Be_RCBVeLXdU4&smid=url-share
Could be their marketing strategy
Hubris, Nemesis, Aer Lingus.
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same
If you keep on bevvying
You’ll be a Scotsman, my son!
https://youtu.be/1Lm1hsOvBZ8?si=4-9AZTep2jdKIcgK
I wholeheartedly agree with your galaxy-sized but, and for that reason I find myself supporting Israel's response in a way that I would not have done in the past.
But:
What "Victory for Palestine" do the hard left envisage? Specifically? and
As I asked, what kind of VICTORY FOR PALESTINE do the anti-semites want us to support?
very clearly, to me at least, suggests that you are saying hard left=anti-semite, without qualification. Which feels like it is weaponising anti-semitism as a way to shut down anyone who doesn't want Palestine destroyed.
Otoh even as I write this I recognise that part of what you are doing is calling out the 'Victory for Palestine' slogan. And I agree with you there.
It's tough to get my thoughts on this out clearly - I feel a sympathy for the passion you hold and I am reminded again that you combine this with a thoughtfulness that my previous post failed to credit you with. Apologies.
My overriding feeling is that, unless we are all prepared to view the current situation with the complexity it demands, both Israel and Palestine are going to suffer further. And my fear is that, by offering unqualified support to Israel, the UK and US governments and others are offering cover for a pretty unsavoury bunch of leaders in Israel to perpetuate the suffering of a much larger group of people than were caught up in Hamas horrific attack.
Seriously though that was a great game . Feel for Ireland , the All Blacks defence was incredible .
And the economy not looking too rosy either.
Meanwhile we are enjoying the Rugby 👍
https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1713241560752533662
Basic message - it is very unlikely to have been a missle fired from the air given the lack of any incoming trail. His (unstated) conclusion is fairly clear, namely Hamas probably did this. *
* which, when think of the 'cui bono' makes perfect sense. There is little advantage - and much disadvantage - to Israel bombing such a truck. There is however a major advantage for Hamas if they can get everyone to buy into the narrative Israel did it (stir up the rest of the Middle East, increase the international pressure on Israel to stop its offensive, persuade Gazans not to flee N Gaza, which is what Hamas has been trying to do).
Con 2.14
Lab 2.7
Quite a turnaround - Lab having been favourite until last 24 hours.
They must defeat woke. They WILL defeat woke.
Perhaps Israel has been rather more civilising than you give it credit for.
I'm not sure there is any other answer at this stage. I support Israel entering Gaza to try to eliminate Hamas. I fear they will fail. This is not their fault. Though I do wish there were a bunch of wets in charge of Israel right now, rather than Netanyahu and his lot. The unity government is at least a start.
Both Netanyahu and the leaders of Hamas should have been up before an international criminal court long ago. Hamas's most recent crimes may be worse, but they both have a record of criminality.
https://twitter.com/Savanta_UK/status/1713094182951125455
NEW Scottish Westminster VI for
@TheScotsman
📈Labour tied with SNP for first time in a Savanta poll.
🎗️SNP 35% (-3)
🌹LAB 35% (+1)
🌳CON 19% (+2)
🔶LD 6% (-1)
⬜️Other 4% (=)
1,002 Scottish adults, 6-11 October
(change from 9-14 June)
What do people envisage Israel doing? Raising a protest at the UN?
On a similar note, I always wondered how family dos at the Chuckle Family went down, and how their two less successful brothers felt about them. As an only child I worry disproportionately about this sort of thing.
"Fuck your pathetic moral posturing ?"
Yes Israel is flawed, nobody denies that, but I'll take flawed over fascist terrorists all day any day.
Hamas need to be defeated. Only then when Israel is safe can we look at hopefully getting better for Palestinians.
The undeniable fact that is that two parties are engaged in war crimes, even if Hamas's most recent ones have been the worse ones.
I think France will just beat South Africa. Will be tight again. Good for the home nation to get to SF. Hope France win.
Will be difficult for us against either but if we get to SF I am happy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kane_Barrett
So you can go back to worrying about him.
In Tamworth, the gap is enormous. Alistair Meeks is probably right to make the Conservatives narrow favourites.
That's what happens in war.
He's been up front and warned the civilians to get out.
What would you have him do? Allow Hamas to hide in civilian areas and say "oh well, nothing we can do then"?
The current leadership of Hamas should absolutely be removed from circulation and ideally held accountable for the evil they have done. But I'd settle for shot in the head when they're not expecting it. But the practicalities are that that is likely to happen at horrible collateral cost to relatively innocent lives. And killing the leadership doesn't kill the idea- if anything, it strengthens it for the next generation.
That is why it ain't simple.
1: Both sides decide not to take retribution/fight.
2: One side chooses to surrender and give the other side everything they want.
3: One side destroys the other side.
We're now closer to option 3 than option 1. Hamas want to murder every Jew "from river to sea", they're explicit on that. So this only ends with either Israel destroyed, or Hamas destroyed. It is an existential battle.
If bombing a civilian area is the only proportionate way to achieve the objective of destroying Hamas then it is not a war crime, it is war.
That is why using human shields is a crime. It is, as typical, Hamas that is showing no concern for life though this time Gazan lives rather than Israeli lives.
Unless the Israelis kill every Palestinian, this is just the beginning of another cycle.
And yet the Tamil Tigers were destroyed and a new cycle didn't begin. Why was that?
Hamas need to be destroyed, like the Nazis and others of their ilk before them. From the ashes of that tragedy, hopefully something better can emerge.
Little idea what's happening in Tamworth except for the comments at the Conference that it was close.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12630183/Pro-Palestinian-Tory-MP-Crispin-Blunt-UK-complicit-war-crimes-Israel-Gaza-prosecute-UK-government.html
The Germans were defeated and they surrendered, the victorious Allies didn't wipe out anyone. It was the Germans, like Hamas, who want to engage in genocide.
The Tamils were defeated and they surrendered, the Sri Lankans didn't wipe out anyone.
Sometimes in war there's a victor and a loser. When the loser accepts defeat, the world can move on. That is what needs to happen here, a clear and unambiguous victory for Israel over Hamas and for the Palestinians to accept that Hamas was defeated and to move on to other means rather than Hamas.
https://x.com/vonderleyen/status/1713216116611272894
Perhaps he’ll instruct Jolyon.
He’s one of the biggest tits in the Parliamentary Conservative Party, which is saying something. He should have been deselected about 15 years ago.
He should have the whip removed.
The kind of people who behead children and use civilians as human shields aren't interested in a peace process.
If Israel commits to the total elimination of Hamas, that means a comprehensive annexation of the Gaza strip and displacement or death of the millions who live there. We can argue about whether that is right/wrong - but first, whether that is even possible?
The Nazis surrendered in the end, why can't Hamas?
What's naive and foolish is to suggest that there's an alternative to war here. They're not interested in a peace process, you know that, I know that, so that only leaves conflict as the resolution however depressing that may be.
This difference may become important in Gaza.
The horror, the horror...
No different to us fighting the Nazis.
We will know on Friday. Personally I think a 3 way fight makes it interesting. A single seat doesn't matter, but it will be a very interesting study in whether tactical voters can get it right in these seats.
Bear in mind the circumstances of the by-election, a particularly Conservative scandal. An MP forced out by tawdry scandal, made worse by the then PM writhing around trying to let him off the hook. Add into the mix the fact that the Conservative candidate if successful is only keeping the seat warm as part of a deal to allow another Conservative MP to jump ship at the GE. All of which might be a good reason for Conservatives not to bother this time.
But I meant more that there will be a ceasefire and so kind of soupy mushy negotiated way forward after a month or two of horrible slaughter.
But maybe this time is different.
France 24 have a good article showing who is giving support to them . Yet we allow them to own football clubs and they have huge investments in the UK .
The west turns a blind eye because of the money . There is a large stench of hypocrisy.
Even more disturbing is the somewhat symbiotic relationship between Netanyahu and Hamas .
Netanyahu pours petrol on the fire and then portrays himself as the only one able to put out the fire . Whilst Hamas was generally limited to firing rockets this plan worked .
Both Hamas and Netanyahu need each other .
This time though Netanyahu pouring petrol exploded with intelligence failures leading to the horrific scenes we’ve seen.
People will say now is not the time but Netanyahus obsession with remaining in power to needs to be called out. He does not have Israelis best interests in mind .
We can only hope that once yet another tragic episode of bloodshed comes to an end he is shown the door , his saviour routine has been shown up for what it is .
A ground invasion? Ineffective, performative vengeance. It's exactly what Iran wants you to do - further radicalise the Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank, weaken Western resolve as civilian casualties mount, weaken the IDF, turn the rest of the Muslim world against you.
In some respects I'm more hawkish than you - I think Netanyahu should've worked harder to pin this on Iran.
I'm minded to think going into Gaza is a trap the Israeli will regret.
But what is the alternative?
Dark times.
https://theintercept.com/2018/02/19/hamas-israel-palestine-conflict/
But I'm surprised that Biden hasn't provided alternatives to invading Gaza.
(Perhaps he has, and Netanyahu has ignored them for the populist option of massive bloodshed and displacement.)
Thanks . That’s very interesting . Netanyahu has never wanted peace or any chances of an agreement so sabotaging that has helped his political ambitions . Keep the public terrified and they’ll keep voting for the so called hard man to protect them. I want to vomit every time I see him on tv , western leaders know what he’s been doing and know he’s part of the problem not the solution.
I’ve been banging on about this for weeks.
https://foreignpolicy.com/podcasts/ones-and-tooze/the-economics-of-the-israel-hamas-war/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Israel–Hamas_war