Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.
But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.
Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.
Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.
Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
Indeed. https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/ ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.
It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
This is true.
But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.
And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.
Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.
Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.
That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
No, it is not.
You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."
Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.
And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.
He was saying the inverse.
He was confusing cause with effect.
But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
Yes.
I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.
Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
Is there a phobia against Muslins implicit here?
So we’re becoming more anti-Semitic as a nation due to the growth of the Muslim population here ?
I don’t buy that.
I think people are generally turning against Israel due to its actions.
Stuff like this.
Carpet bombing civilian homes in a town in South Lebanon.
If Bibi can keep the carpet bombing of South Lebanon and South Beirut going until Monday he will be obliged to miss an otherwise mandatory and very dangerous (for his future) corruption related court appearance in Tel Aviv.
Reform UK is a one shot. They'll either fall short in 2029 and Farage will do something else, or they'll get into office (maybe way short of a majority), smash everything, have their own civil war and collapse. The next step would likely be parties emerging to their Right getting more powerful.
Not sure that is correct. They could come up short in 2029 and succeed 2033. If they get into power they will collapse but we could end up with greens or the centrists back rather than extreme right.
The elephant in the room is that Nigel's not getting any younger, and this isn't America.
He's 62 now, older than Cameron, only a year younger than Starmer. He'll be 65 in 2029- that's how old Maggie was when she left office. Does he really want to spend his late sixties being PM? I'm sure he likes it as an abstract concept, but does he really want all that work (harder work than he has done in his life) at that age?
(It's the same reason that I'm sure that, although he can't say it, SKS has pencilled in a 2027/8 retirement. In indelible pencil.)
Interesting that PMs in the first half of the 20th century were significantly older when they came to power than since then.
The oldest of course was Churchill in his second term at almost 77.
Average age of PM on assuming office (including second stints)
Balfour - Churchill 2 : 62 Eden - Thatcher : 57 Major - Starmer : 50
Starmer is the oldest PM at time of first assuming office since Callaghan
Is Starmer the first PM to have made it to the top of two professions? (top of the legal profession debatable, but DPP is the top of that bit of it).
I had this discussion a while back and I think Boris Johnson counts with his stint as editor of The Spectator.
Edit this discussion was in relation to Mark Carney.
Wellington, surely?
Doesn’t count, he was a mere Field-Marshal, top of the tree would be Marshal, like Philippe Pétain.
He was Commander in Chief of the Army twice. Not sure how much higher he could get?
Indeed, I was thinking he was much the most unarguably top of his field (in the Army), to the extent that even now 200+ years he is famous in that context, but almost nobody knows he was subsequently Prime Minister. Every other Prime Minster, I would argue, owes their fame to holding that office. Wellington alone doesn't.
And I don't believe any other PM has popularised an item of clothing, either!
Orbán's last campaign rally ended in a disaster in Debrecen. People showed up not to support him, but to take a last glimpse of the fallen autocratic leader and to say one last time: ORBÁN F*** OFF! https://x.com/SzabadonMagyar/status/2042566531607908768
This is THE most important election anywhere in the world, the most important election since the catastrophe of November 24. It's looking good for Magyar, but I won't believe it until I see it.
Either way, it's a template for Trump's GOP in November.
I believe the incubent Reform councillor had been jailed for 12 months after admitting behaving in a controlling and coercive way to his wife. It was once he had to step down the by election was called.
Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.
But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.
Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.
Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.
Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
Indeed. https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/ ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.
It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
This is true.
But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.
And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.
Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.
Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.
That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
No, it is not.
You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."
Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.
And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.
He was saying the inverse.
He was confusing cause with effect.
But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
Yes.
I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.
Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
Is there a phobia against Muslins implicit here?
No.
Is it a phobia to note that Jewish and Muslim voters have different views on this conflict to each other and always have done? Is it a phobia to note that changing demographics changes opinions?
There is an implication that Muslims are antisemitic - a clear implication so no amount of verbal juggling removes it.
Israel is surrounded by theocratic nations some of which are antagonistic to it and in response have adopted similar theocratic baggage. If only they adopted the democratic norms of their American client, they would recognise that equality under the law for all their citizens is the way forward.
UAE Foreign Minister, talking in 2017 about the forthcoming rise of Islamism in the West, because liberalism inevitably leads to a takeover from illiberals.
UAE signed the Abraham Accords in 2020, and has both diplomatic and commercial relations with Israel, while being free to criticise particular actions of their government and military.
Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.
But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.
Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.
Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.
Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
Indeed. https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/ ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.
It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
This is true.
But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.
And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.
Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.
Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.
That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
No, it is not.
You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."
Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.
And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.
He was saying the inverse.
He was confusing cause with effect.
But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
Yes.
I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.
Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
So, people’s views of a country have nothing to do with what a country does. Rather, you are arguing that Muslims are just inherently hating of Jews?
Not exactly, but as already discussed the way Israel treats Palestinians is far better than the Chinese treat Uighurs . . . or for that matter, the way the Chinese treat Tibetans, or the way the Turks treat Kurds or the way practically any Arab country treated Jews or . . .
And yet people obsess about Israel. Funny that.
Isn’t this a function of Israel being a functioning democracy? We hold it to higher standards - or at least I kind of do.
I am not surprised when dictatorships (whether notionally communist, monarchies or “illiberal democracies” - which to me is just despotism) treat their minorities abysmally. It is part of their operating model, and it is how they leaders stay at the top of the tree. I feel sorry for those around the world that have to live in such states.
I think we should be careful in how we interact with them - and if possible favour working wth democracies. But you can’t ignore them and you also can’t go round the world imposing democracy. We’ve tried that before with mixed results.
Turkey is a democracy and yet how many people demand a state for the Kurds compared to a state for the Palestinians?
Turkey isn’t thought of as a democracy by many Westerners.
While there’s some truth in there, there is a chunk of racism in there.
Kurdistan also is spread across four nations. The other three can hardly be seen as democracies either.
There are protests, from time to time, in Newcastle from Kurdistan separatists.
There's also a small but important difference:
The Kurds in Turkey get the vote. The Palestinians in the West Bank do not, while the Israelis do.
I would also note that -as far as I know- the legal system in Turkey does not have the death penalty for Kurds, but not Turks.
All true I am sure.
But by contrast the Economist ranked Israel a “flawed democracy” and Turkey lower at “Hybrid Regime” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index I do not know too much about the validity of the Economist’s conclusions or its methodology. However, it is notable that Israel is the only “blue” country in its region (MENA) and Turkey the only “non-blue” country in its region (Western Europe).
Joe Kernen comes close to having a coronary on air as Pete Buttigieg dogwalks him all over the Squawk Box studio about Trump's economic mismanagement and inflation
"Britain is losing its energy Rajan said the UK used to have considerable influence in terms of culture, finance and world politics.
“In the 1960s and 70s, England is where history was being made,” he said, adding: “It had the cultural effusion, the dividend of the baby boomer years, relative peace.”"
Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.
But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.
Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.
Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.
Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
Indeed. https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/ ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.
It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
This is true.
But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.
And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.
Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.
Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.
That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
No, it is not.
You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."
Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.
And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.
He was saying the inverse.
He was confusing cause with effect.
But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
Yes.
I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.
Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
Is there a phobia against Muslins implicit here?
So we’re becoming more anti-Semitic as a nation due to the growth of the Muslim population here ?
I don’t buy that.
I think people are generally turning against Israel due to its actions.
Stuff like this.
Carpet bombing civilian homes in a town in South Lebanon.
If Bibi can keep the carpet bombing of South Lebanon and South Beirut going until Monday he will be obliged to miss an otherwise mandatory and very dangerous (for his future) corruption related court appearance in Tel Aviv.
Yes- the Israeli version of the Epstein files- Bibi is at least as black and cynical dog as Trump...
"Britain is losing its energy Rajan said the UK used to have considerable influence in terms of culture, finance and world politics.
“In the 1960s and 70s, England is where history was being made,” he said, adding: “It had the cultural effusion, the dividend of the baby boomer years, relative peace.”"
Reform UK is a one shot. They'll either fall short in 2029 and Farage will do something else, or they'll get into office (maybe way short of a majority), smash everything, have their own civil war and collapse. The next step would likely be parties emerging to their Right getting more powerful.
Not sure that is correct. They could come up short in 2029 and succeed 2033. If they get into power they will collapse but we could end up with greens or the centrists back rather than extreme right.
The elephant in the room is that Nigel's not getting any younger, and this isn't America.
He's 62 now, older than Cameron, only a year younger than Starmer. He'll be 65 in 2029- that's how old Maggie was when she left office. Does he really want to spend his late sixties being PM? I'm sure he likes it as an abstract concept, but does he really want all that work (harder work than he has done in his life) at that age?
(It's the same reason that I'm sure that, although he can't say it, SKS has pencilled in a 2027/8 retirement. In indelible pencil.)
Interesting that PMs in the first half of the 20th century were significantly older when they came to power than since then.
The oldest of course was Churchill in his second term at almost 77.
Average age of PM on assuming office (including second stints)
Balfour - Churchill 2 : 62 Eden - Thatcher : 57 Major - Starmer : 50
Starmer is the oldest PM at time of first assuming office since Callaghan
Is Starmer the first PM to have made it to the top of two professions? (top of the legal profession debatable, but DPP is the top of that bit of it).
I had this discussion a while back and I think Boris Johnson counts with his stint as editor of The Spectator.
Edit this discussion was in relation to Mark Carney.
Wellington, surely?
Doesn’t count, he was a mere Field-Marshal, top of the tree would be Marshal, like Philippe Pétain.
He was Commander in Chief of the Army twice. Not sure how much higher he could get?
Indeed, I was thinking he was much the most unarguably top of his field (in the Army), to the extent that even now 200+ years he is famous in that context, but almost nobody knows he was subsequently Prime Minister. Every other Prime Minster, I would argue, owes their fame to holding that office. Wellington alone doesn't.
And I don't believe any other PM has popularised an item of clothing, either!
Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.
So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.
And the answer is... it does not appear so.
If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.
These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.
Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?
Sure, that could be a role.
But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."
Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.
But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.
Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.
Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.
Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
Indeed. https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/ ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.
It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
This is true.
But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.
And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.
Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.
Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.
That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
No, it is not.
You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."
Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.
And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.
He was saying the inverse.
He was confusing cause with effect.
But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
Yes.
I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.
Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
Is there a phobia against Muslins implicit here?
No.
Is it a phobia to note that Jewish and Muslim voters have different views on this conflict to each other and always have done? Is it a phobia to note that changing demographics changes opinions?
There is an implication that Muslims are antisemitic - a clear implication so no amount of verbal juggling removes it.
Israel is surrounded by theocratic nations some of which are antagonistic to it and in response have adopted similar theocratic baggage. If only they adopted the democratic norms of their American client, they would recognise that equality under the law for all their citizens is the way forward.
Someone upthread suggested we should suspend trade and esp. any arms dealing with Israel.
I’m not so sure of that.
The world is a much more fucked up place than it was in my young adulthood. Britain can’t be some smug peacenik, it’s has to work with the world as it is. Britain needs to treat Israel as it does China, a country to be wary of, but with which there is much to transact.
In theory yes, but I'm not sure what our common ground with Israel is at the moment. They are acting comprehensively against our interests, and pretty much of everyone else, maybe even of themselves. At least with China we have a common interest in reopening Hormuz.
Not getting at you, but it does puzzle me somewhat that there are people who - perfectly fairly - criticise Israel’s brutal treatment of Palestinians while ignoring China’s far greater and more systemic murder of the Uighers.
I was making a realpolitik point here in response to @Gardenwalker's original comment in the same vein. Israel isn't serving our interests at all while China sometimes does. On the moral point, I think it is important not to single out Israel as being uniquely bad (although it is bad). Oddly both Israel's detractors and diminishing number of supporters have an agenda to pretend Israel is a special case.
And yes, China's incarceration and killing of Uyghurs is going under the radar and not getting the attention it should.
Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.
But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.
Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.
Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.
Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
Indeed. https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/ ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.
It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
This is true.
But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.
And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.
Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.
Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.
That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
No, it is not.
You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."
Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.
And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.
He was saying the inverse.
He was confusing cause with effect.
But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
Yes.
I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.
Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
Is there a phobia against Muslins implicit here?
No.
Is it a phobia to note that Jewish and Muslim voters have different views on this conflict to each other and always have done? Is it a phobia to note that changing demographics changes opinions?
There is an implication that Muslims are antisemitic - a clear implication so no amount of verbal juggling removes it.
Israel is surrounded by theocratic nations some of which are antagonistic to it and in response have adopted similar theocratic baggage. If only they adopted the democratic norms of their American client, they would recognise that equality under the law for all their citizens is the way forward.
Earlier, @BartholomewRoberts raised the question of whether the rise in the amount of criticism of Israel in the West was due to more Muslims.
So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.
And the answer is... it does not appear so.
If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.
These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.
Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?
Sure, that could be a role.
But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."
Interesting. So just assuming it’s Muslims seems a little Islamophobic to me.
Home Alone 2. Wall Street 2. The "Clamp" character in Gremlins 2 is an obvious pastiche.
Actually the resemblance is surely more to the Gremlins themselves: vicious little monsters bent on the destruction of civilisation as we know it with maximum cruelty; amorality and violence...
Someone upthread suggested we should suspend trade and esp. any arms dealing with Israel.
I’m not so sure of that.
The world is a much more fucked up place than it was in my young adulthood. Britain can’t be some smug peacenik, it’s has to work with the world as it is. Britain needs to treat Israel as it does China, a country to be wary of, but with which there is much to transact.
In theory yes, but I'm not sure what our common ground with Israel is at the moment. They are acting comprehensively against our interests, and pretty much of everyone else, maybe even of themselves. At least with China we have a common interest in reopening Hormuz.
Not getting at you, but it does puzzle me somewhat that there are people who - perfectly fairly - criticise Israel’s brutal treatment of Palestinians while ignoring China’s far greater and more systemic murder of the Uighers.
I was making a realpolitik point here in response to @Gardenwalker's original comment in the same vein. Israel isn't serving our interests at all while China sometimes does. On the moral point, I think it is important not to single out Israel as being uniquely bad (although it is bad). Oddly both Israel's detractors and diminishing number of supporters have an agenda to pretend Israel is a special case.
And yes, China's incarceration and killing of Uyghurs is going under the radar and not getting the attention it should.
I think it's partly because literally nobody is defending China's treatment of the Uyghurs, so there's no-one to argue against. We are broadly in agreement that the Chinese regime is evil.
Israel's treatment of the Palestinians, on the other hand, is defended, justified and/or condoned by many people in the West, and Israel is supposed to be a Western ally. We expect our enemies to be evil; that's why they're our enemies. We don't expect evil from our allies and are naturally upset when they seem to be doing evil. Hence the fuss about Israel.
I hadn't realised former Senator Ben Sasse was dying. He has done an interview with the NYT about his cancer - stage 4 pancreatic, multiply metastasised.
How Ben Sasse Is Living Now That He Is Dying https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/09/opinion/ben-sasse-death-pancreatic-cancer.html ..Sasse: There’s a company in Silicon Valley called Revolution Medicines, and they have a drug called daraxonrasib, and that’s my drug. I’m able to take it orally, as of now. So, I don’t have an infusion port right now. I take it orally, but it’s a nasty drug. It causes crazy stuff like my body can’t grow skin and so I bleed all out of a whole bunch of parts of me that shouldn’t be bleeding.
Douthat: Yeah. You look terrible.
Sasse: Thank you.
Douthat: How do you feel?
Sasse: I feel better than I deserve...
Pancreatic cancer is very, very nasty. And frequently quickly fatal. Sympathies.
5 year survival rate less than 5% iirc
Most pancreatic cancer is very nasty, although a small subset are neuroendocrine tumours, like Steve Jobs had, and these are much more treatable (unless you ignore all your doctors’ advice, as Steve Jobs did).
NET are distinct from pancreatic cancer though - they are things like bile duct cancer
I have my Driving License reply from Agent Anderson. Fair play to him that is a rapid reply.
He's hasn't got the nuances quite right (I expect he is treating it as the usual problem whatever that is) - but he's offered to intervene, wqhich is the main thing.
Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.
But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.
Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.
Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.
Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
Indeed. https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/ ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.
It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
This is true.
But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.
And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.
Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.
Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.
That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
No, it is not.
You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."
Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.
And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.
He was saying the inverse.
He was confusing cause with effect.
But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
Yes.
I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.
Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
Is there a phobia against Muslins implicit here?
No.
Is it a phobia to note that Jewish and Muslim voters have different views on this conflict to each other and always have done? Is it a phobia to note that changing demographics changes opinions?
There is an implication that Muslims are antisemitic - a clear implication so no amount of verbal juggling removes it.
Israel is surrounded by theocratic nations some of which are antagonistic to it and in response have adopted similar theocratic baggage. If only they adopted the democratic norms of their American client, they would recognise that equality under the law for all their citizens is the way forward.
I have my Driving License reply from Agent Anderson. Fair play to him that is a rapid reply.
He's hasn't got the nuances quite right (I expect he is treating it as the usual problem whatever that is) - but he's offered to intervene, wqhich is the main thing.
Are Israel committing war crimes? Almost certainly yes. Are the other actors also committing war crimes? Again, almost certainly yes.
But Israel gets criticised and Hamas and Hezbollah get excused and twas forever thus.
Islamism anti-semitism has swamped western media.
Israel is a nation state; Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.
Are you saying that Neyenyahu's government should now be judged as a terrorist organisation ?
I’m saying they should be judged in the context of the wider middle east and not of an impossibly privileged western european liberal standard
Indeed. https://www.972mag.com/israelis-war-crimes-gaza-taboo/ ..Last week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Golan made international headlines when he declared in an interview on Israeli public radio that “a sane country does not wage war against civilians, does not kill babies as a hobby, and does not aim to expel a population.”..
Well he’s not wrong, is he? But his party is nowhere in the polls which demonstrates that proportion responses to violence are not politically viable.
It’s so easy to criticise from the safety of the UK but if we were all living under threat of rocket attacks from a terror organisation you can be certain that the jingoism would start and we’d elect a hardline government promising to respond hard.
This is true.
But at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy.
Funny, I seem to recall in 2000 when Israel accepted Clinton's peace proposals and Arafat rejected them that many in the West, especially on the Left, deplored Israel even then.
And elements have only become more antisemitic since then.
Israel could lay down its arms and many in the West would say or do nothing as its enemies slaughtered them.
So we should suspend all judgement of Israel because “many, especially on the Left, deplored Israel in 2000”.
No, but we should not mix up cause and effect.
Israel needs to stand up for itself and defeat its own enemies, because nobody besides America will step in to intervene on its behalf.
That was true 20 years ago, it is doubly true today.
This is a non-sequitur to my original post.
No, it is not.
You originally claimed "at core, Western opinion is that Israel no longer has justice on its side. If Israel would stop rolling out apartheid like policy internally and stop settling the West Bank aggressively, then it would garner more sympathy."
Yet that is BS. Even 26 years ago, when Isrsel had halted settlements, engaged in the peace process and accepted Clinton's proposals, Israel was still hated by many and unsupported even then.
And since then the West has only become more Islamist and antisemitic, not less, with the Holocaust fading out of living memory.
So, you’re saying that opinion has turned against Israel as Israel has adopted more aggressive policies? Which is also what Gardenwalker is saying.
No, I am saying opinion was against Israel and then Israel adopted more aggressive policies.
He was saying the inverse.
He was confusing cause with effect.
But you also said that opinion now is more against Israel than it was. Why is that? Is that unrelated to the actions of the Israeli government under Netanyahu?
Yes.
I gave 2 totally unrelated reasons, we have changed demographically, the ratio of Jews to Muslims is completely different to what it was. And the Holocaust has faded out of living memory.
Besides we were giving zero support even then, so less opinion does not change jack consequentially.
So, people’s views of a country have nothing to do with what a country does. Rather, you are arguing that Muslims are just inherently hating of Jews?
Not exactly, but as already discussed the way Israel treats Palestinians is far better than the Chinese treat Uighurs . . . or for that matter, the way the Chinese treat Tibetans, or the way the Turks treat Kurds or the way practically any Arab country treated Jews or . . .
And yet people obsess about Israel. Funny that.
It is bizarre the unhealthy focus on Israel but never a mention of the same and much worse elsewhere, never marches , protests etc. Seems to be kept specifically for them to be bad un's. Not to approve of some of their recent tactics but very odd they are singled out.
"Britain is losing its energy Rajan said the UK used to have considerable influence in terms of culture, finance and world politics.
“In the 1960s and 70s, England is where history was being made,” he said, adding: “It had the cultural effusion, the dividend of the baby boomer years, relative peace.”"
The Boomers are really missed now that we are all retired etc, the clowns who dropped the baton after us should be ashamed , handed a golden goose and they have turned it into a carrion crow
Comments
They paid him good money for those pardons.
(narrator: *1...and security chief of Babylon 5, but let's not overegg the pudding)
https://x.com/_a_khalifa/status/2042275019276120185
UAE signed the Abraham Accords in 2020, and has both diplomatic and commercial relations with Israel, while being free to criticise particular actions of their government and military.
But by contrast the Economist ranked Israel a “flawed democracy” and Turkey lower at “Hybrid Regime” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index I do not know too much about the validity of the Economist’s conclusions or its methodology. However, it is notable that Israel is the only “blue” country in its region (MENA) and Turkey the only “non-blue” country in its region (Western Europe).
@atrupar
Joe Kernen comes close to having a coronary on air as Pete Buttigieg dogwalks him all over the Squawk Box studio about Trump's economic mismanagement and inflation
https://x.com/atrupar/status/2042604161590599762
"Britain is losing its energy
Rajan said the UK used to have considerable influence in terms of culture, finance and world politics.
“In the 1960s and 70s, England is where history was being made,” he said, adding: “It had the cultural effusion, the dividend of the baby boomer years, relative peace.”"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/04/10/amol-rajan-britain-cultural-powerhouse-rosebud-india/
NEW THREAD
So, I decided to do some digging. The Pew Research Center is probably the best resource for comparing views on Israel from different countries over time. Plus, there's also Morning Consult, which does similar numbers.
And the answer is... it does not appear so.
If you take two countries with essentially no Muslim immigration (South Korea and Japan), then both countries populations have become signifcantly less enamoured with Israel in the last five years or so. South Korea has gone from basically flat favorability to -60. While Japan has swung to an even more negative -79.
These shifts are, if anything, even worse than the moves in countries with significant Muslim minorities.
Now, could it be because memories of the holocaust are fading?
Sure, that could be a role.
But something terrible happening in the past to your ancestors doesn't give you the right to be a shit now. I wouldn't say to an Armenian, "hey, go kick a Turk, after all, his ancestors were responsible for the Armenian genocide."
Trump has proved once again that he is an instinctive peacemaker, not a warmonger like many of his predecessors.
https://x.com/Nigel_Farage/status/1976560230872825902
And yes, China's incarceration and killing of Uyghurs is going under the radar and not getting the attention it should.
https://www.birmingham.gov.uk/download/downloads/id/31538/birmingham_city_council_statement_of_persons_nominated.pdf
Israel's treatment of the Palestinians, on the other hand, is defended, justified and/or condoned by many people in the West, and Israel is supposed to be a Western ally. We expect our enemies to be evil; that's why they're our enemies. We don't expect evil from our allies and are naturally upset when they seem to be doing evil. Hence the fuss about Israel.
He's hasn't got the nuances quite right (I expect he is treating it as the usual problem whatever that is) - but he's offered to intervene, wqhich is the main thing.
I imagine he will have a lackey who does the replies (and the intervening) on his behalf
I virtually never see female servers or waitresses in "Indian" restaurants. They are almost always all blokes.
Why is this?
Not to approve of some of their recent tactics but very odd they are singled out.