Oh the irony 🤣
Israel is occupying Palestine's house and won't leave and then bomb and starve the Palestinians for being upset about it.
Bad analogy.
**** Official Israel War thread****
- Thread starter EagleHawk
- Start date
Oh the irony 🤣
Israel is occupying Palestine's house and won't leave and then bomb and starve the Palestinians for being upset about it.
Bad analogy.
No, correct analogy. What is happening now is the after affects of what the palestinians did. Had the palestinians not invaded Israel, then Israel wouldn't be fighting back. You're on the side of the terrorists that started this war.
By that thought process you can ask that question of every group of people to ever live some place.
You could go back 10,000 years...it is always going to be the same story.
The US government took large parts of Iowa from the Meskwaki...who took large parts of Iowa from other tribes...and so on and so on.
Yes, and if palestinians want to fight back now against Israel, then they certainly can, but don't be shocked at the outcome. You seem to think that palestinians should have the right to invade Israel and kill Israelis and not expect a response.
You're confused (like a lot of people) about the difference between Israel/Jews/Palestinians/Hamas
By your rhetoric, here, basically power gets to exert power, to whatever extent power wishes to exert power, so long as it has some sort of excuse to do so, and once that power decides to exert itself, it is to be held to no account whatsoever. Just go as do as you wish, power.
The response has been genocide.
I recommend reading, chronologically, Benjamin Pogrund's writings for the Guardian. Another poster tried to use a 2013 article by him to prove to me that Israel was not guilty of apartheid. This was an interesting choice, given Pogrund wrote in 2023 that he could no longer defend Israel and Netanyahu against charges of apartheid. That Israel had gone too far. And this is a guy considered an expert on the subject.
That's a solid place to start for some fairly pro-Israel context.
Hell, for a good summary, just check out John Oliver's piece on Israel-Palestine.
If there was a difference between hamas and palestinians then the palestinians (and you) would be on the side of Israel and you would be hoping for Israel to wipe out hamas. But that's not the case, you're claiming Israel is the bad guy in all of this.
The day that palestinians agree that Jews are equal and should not be exterminated then get back to me. Until that time Israel is going to do whatever it needs to do to survive. When Gaza attacked Israel, then Israel is going to fight back. Once hamas is out of the picture then the palestinians will have the opportunity to show they want peace with Israel. My guess is, they will never accept Israel and don't want peace.
Oh my god. This is how I know you're a victim of a particular narrative. Palestinians have always just wanted to not be treated as unequal. Apparently you're not interested in doing any actual reading (or even watching a piece like Oliver's) to get a better understanding of this.
I'm not going to argue with you. I could parade in front of you example after example of Palestinians and Israelis working together — for decades — to try to mitigate the effects of Israel's increasingly violent, increasingly fascist apartheid occupation of Palestine. I could put in front of you stories of what it was like before Israel went down this path — told by Jews — describing a peaceful coexistence. Israelis and Palestinians as neighbors watching one another's children, living as one, shared community.
The same narrative you're echoing has been used since forever to position one group as "more rightful" than another. In this country, it was the Indians are savages, the blacks are this, that, and the other, the Irish, the Chinese — whatever the new group to be exploited, displaced, genocided, whatever. Same type of narrative. It's always been this narrative in the West versus Muslims. It's always the same type of thing. Dehumanize to whatever end effect is desired. It's amazing that the moment this narrative begins to take shape, that, at this point, we're not just a wee bit more skeptical before going all foaming-at-the-mouth "let's get 'em!"
You're clearly locked in. I won't argue with you further.
I don't doubt that you can find people from both sides willing to work together and get along. The problem is, those palestinians who want peace and a shared community are not in control. The current government of Gaza is not wanting peace, they want to exterminate all Jews. So until that government gets removed there's never going to be peace. The government of Gaza are nothing more than a bunch of terrorists and so Gaza is being treated as a terrorist state. If palestinians want peace, if they want to be treated as equal, then they need to make some changes. If they are unable to make those changes in Gaza, then they should be hoping Israel can get those changes done for them.
This pretty much sums up the current obstacle to a two state solution. The puppetmasters will not accept Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state - only Islamic theocracies have the right to exist in the middle east.
If Palestinians “just” want to be treated as equal, what’s that ‘river to the sea’ thing about?
Detroit Free Press
By Ala Mohammed Mushtaha
January 4, 2024
RAFAH—On Saturday, December 30, our front door was busted down, and twenty masked men barged in and took my father, a widely respected and deeply learned imam here in Gaza.
One dragged him by his head, and another grabbed him by his beard. My younger brother tried to intervene and reason with the kidnappers, but they beat him. I have a medical condition that makes it hard for me to breathe, so all I could do was watch as the horror unfolded.
I know that if Hamas kills my father, they’ll say that the Israeli army did it. But my father was very keen that even if he died, we should make known the despicable demands they made of him. It was his last request to us, literally as he was being carried out of the door, that should he die, we should publicize the real reason for his death, and it is this:
He wouldn’t preach what Hamas told him to. He refused to tell Gazans that violent resistance, and obedience to Hamas, is the best way out of our current hell.
This story starts before October 7, and even before 2007, when Hamas took control of Gaza.
Our family has lived in Gaza for generations. Before 2007, my father worked for the Ministry of Islamic Affairs. After Hamas took over, they forced him out of his position. This was a hard time for my family; my father was the sole breadwinner. Finally, after three long years, he came back to work first as a mosque servant, then a mosque guard, then an employee of the ministry and finally, he was appointed as a mosque imam. (My father is known throughout the Gaza Strip. He has a doctorate in sharia from Cairo’s storied Al-Azhar University, and is well-respected by his peers.)
For Hamas, being Muslim means supporting Hamas, and people who do not support Hamas aren’t Muslims. If you don’t abide by what Hamas tells you, you’ll lose your job or worse. To keep my father in line, ensuring that he would deliver only Hamas-approved Friday sermons and allow Hamas to use his mosque as a clandestine weapons depot, they arrested my brother and me at least ten times between 2016 and 2019. Sometimes they would speak politely, sometimes they would ask us to comply “for the sake of your sisters,” but always the threat of violence loomed in the background. And several times we were beaten and humiliated in front of our father. They beat him, too, once nearly blinding him.
He was forced to do things for Hamas; move money around, store things, keep their secrets.
As an imam, my father keeps the keys to the mosque and is responsible for safeguarding large sums of money that Muslims give as zakat, the mandatory almsgiving of our faith. Hamas members would take advantage of his duties and use the mosque to stash money, weapons, and equipment.
Sometimes they’d bring a large, wrapped-up prayer rug, which they said had been donated—except my father wasn’t allowed to open the rugs; only special volunteers were allowed to open them or transport the rugs in and out. My father had to open and close the doors and allow the sacred space to be used as a warehouse for Hamas. What choice did he have? It’s a bitter truth that Hamas thinks of mosques as the property of their regime and that they store weapons there.
Once there were big boxes that were marked as food aid. There wasn’t food inside, but something made of iron.
The most egregious thing Hamas imposed on my father was the content of his Friday sermons. They instructed him to brainwash people with their politics, to stick with Hamas and with the “resistance,” and that it’s the only choice. That those who died fighting would be rewarded with 72 black-eyed virgins. Patience, jihad, all of that stuff. Hamas exploits our religion, pretending to be modern-day prophets, likening themselves to the companions of the prophet Muhammad.
Nobody told my father there was a plan to attack Israel on October 7. There’s just this constant overarching message within the mosques, Islamic classes, sermons, and lectures, that the “resistance”—meaning Hamas and only Hamas—is the only way to liberate Al-Aqsa and the only way to alleviate our suffering.
They do all this brainwashing to make you think the cause of our suffering is Israel. But I see very clearly who causes our suffering.
Whereas most aid in Gaza is only accessible to Hamas’s loyalists or those who toe the movement’s line, my father would collect and distribute zakat alms to those who actually needed it. Some congregants would donate food, furniture, and household goods; and many among Gaza’s neediest would come to my father, who would see that they were distributed fairly. My father also strove to give pious Muslims unbiased spiritual guidance, not the propaganda Hamas clerics deliver.
We fled our homes in Gaza City on October 20, moving from place to place until settling at my sister’s home in Rafah several weeks ago. Her home was bombed as well, and now roughly forty people, including women and seniors, are sharing space in a building that is partly reduced to rubble.
Since the war, Hamas has put enormous pressure on imams to persuade the population that their only choice is “the resistance.” Schools and universities aren’t functioning; the one thing that draws people in is prayer.
But now we have reached a time when nearly everyone in Gaza is saying Hamas caused the death of 20,000 people in Gaza and the injury of 50,000 more. So when the group demanded that my father go to a school where thousands of displaced persons are sheltering and urge them to stand with the “resistance”—to trust Hamas—he flat-out refused. My father knows the difference between right and wrong. He knew that refusing to act as a megaphone for Hamas could lead to his death, and yet he refused. He has a clear conscience. So does everyone who knows what really happened to him, and why.
This time, it’s not like the prior wars. This time, people are telling the truth.
Before October 7, people were afraid—and of course some people are still afraid—but ironically, when there is fighting, Hamas goes underground, and people can be more vocal about how Hamas has ruined our lives. People are starting to publicly violate the laws, rules, dictates, and orders of Hamas. They are openly cursing Hamas and its leaders in the streets and markets, and ignoring the directives of the few Hamas officials and police still above ground. They have caused so much damage, it’s undeniable. They’ve imposed themselves on our society, on my father, for too long. We’re all paying the price. People want freedom. We hope deeply that this war will end, and that Hamas will end with it.
I don’t know where my father is. I don’t know if I will ever see him alive again. My hope in telling this story to the public, and putting my name to it, is to somehow offer my father a measure of protection. Hamas may wish to release him and show the world that they would never harm an admired mosque preacher. God alone knows the future, but what I know is that, under no circumstances, would my father want to become a propaganda tool.
Mr. Mushtaha shared his story with The Free Press as part of the ongoing series Voices from Gaza, our partnership with the Center for Peace Communications.
Hamas Kidnapped My Father for Refusing to Be Their Puppet.
Last weekend, twenty masked men dragged away my father—an imam in Gaza. His crime? He refused to brainwash his people with their politics.By Ala Mohammed Mushtaha
January 4, 2024
RAFAH—On Saturday, December 30, our front door was busted down, and twenty masked men barged in and took my father, a widely respected and deeply learned imam here in Gaza.
One dragged him by his head, and another grabbed him by his beard. My younger brother tried to intervene and reason with the kidnappers, but they beat him. I have a medical condition that makes it hard for me to breathe, so all I could do was watch as the horror unfolded.
I know that if Hamas kills my father, they’ll say that the Israeli army did it. But my father was very keen that even if he died, we should make known the despicable demands they made of him. It was his last request to us, literally as he was being carried out of the door, that should he die, we should publicize the real reason for his death, and it is this:
He wouldn’t preach what Hamas told him to. He refused to tell Gazans that violent resistance, and obedience to Hamas, is the best way out of our current hell.
This story starts before October 7, and even before 2007, when Hamas took control of Gaza.
Our family has lived in Gaza for generations. Before 2007, my father worked for the Ministry of Islamic Affairs. After Hamas took over, they forced him out of his position. This was a hard time for my family; my father was the sole breadwinner. Finally, after three long years, he came back to work first as a mosque servant, then a mosque guard, then an employee of the ministry and finally, he was appointed as a mosque imam. (My father is known throughout the Gaza Strip. He has a doctorate in sharia from Cairo’s storied Al-Azhar University, and is well-respected by his peers.)
For Hamas, being Muslim means supporting Hamas, and people who do not support Hamas aren’t Muslims. If you don’t abide by what Hamas tells you, you’ll lose your job or worse. To keep my father in line, ensuring that he would deliver only Hamas-approved Friday sermons and allow Hamas to use his mosque as a clandestine weapons depot, they arrested my brother and me at least ten times between 2016 and 2019. Sometimes they would speak politely, sometimes they would ask us to comply “for the sake of your sisters,” but always the threat of violence loomed in the background. And several times we were beaten and humiliated in front of our father. They beat him, too, once nearly blinding him.
He was forced to do things for Hamas; move money around, store things, keep their secrets.
As an imam, my father keeps the keys to the mosque and is responsible for safeguarding large sums of money that Muslims give as zakat, the mandatory almsgiving of our faith. Hamas members would take advantage of his duties and use the mosque to stash money, weapons, and equipment.
Sometimes they’d bring a large, wrapped-up prayer rug, which they said had been donated—except my father wasn’t allowed to open the rugs; only special volunteers were allowed to open them or transport the rugs in and out. My father had to open and close the doors and allow the sacred space to be used as a warehouse for Hamas. What choice did he have? It’s a bitter truth that Hamas thinks of mosques as the property of their regime and that they store weapons there.
Once there were big boxes that were marked as food aid. There wasn’t food inside, but something made of iron.
The most egregious thing Hamas imposed on my father was the content of his Friday sermons. They instructed him to brainwash people with their politics, to stick with Hamas and with the “resistance,” and that it’s the only choice. That those who died fighting would be rewarded with 72 black-eyed virgins. Patience, jihad, all of that stuff. Hamas exploits our religion, pretending to be modern-day prophets, likening themselves to the companions of the prophet Muhammad.
Nobody told my father there was a plan to attack Israel on October 7. There’s just this constant overarching message within the mosques, Islamic classes, sermons, and lectures, that the “resistance”—meaning Hamas and only Hamas—is the only way to liberate Al-Aqsa and the only way to alleviate our suffering.
They do all this brainwashing to make you think the cause of our suffering is Israel. But I see very clearly who causes our suffering.
Whereas most aid in Gaza is only accessible to Hamas’s loyalists or those who toe the movement’s line, my father would collect and distribute zakat alms to those who actually needed it. Some congregants would donate food, furniture, and household goods; and many among Gaza’s neediest would come to my father, who would see that they were distributed fairly. My father also strove to give pious Muslims unbiased spiritual guidance, not the propaganda Hamas clerics deliver.
We fled our homes in Gaza City on October 20, moving from place to place until settling at my sister’s home in Rafah several weeks ago. Her home was bombed as well, and now roughly forty people, including women and seniors, are sharing space in a building that is partly reduced to rubble.
Since the war, Hamas has put enormous pressure on imams to persuade the population that their only choice is “the resistance.” Schools and universities aren’t functioning; the one thing that draws people in is prayer.
But now we have reached a time when nearly everyone in Gaza is saying Hamas caused the death of 20,000 people in Gaza and the injury of 50,000 more. So when the group demanded that my father go to a school where thousands of displaced persons are sheltering and urge them to stand with the “resistance”—to trust Hamas—he flat-out refused. My father knows the difference between right and wrong. He knew that refusing to act as a megaphone for Hamas could lead to his death, and yet he refused. He has a clear conscience. So does everyone who knows what really happened to him, and why.
This time, it’s not like the prior wars. This time, people are telling the truth.
Before October 7, people were afraid—and of course some people are still afraid—but ironically, when there is fighting, Hamas goes underground, and people can be more vocal about how Hamas has ruined our lives. People are starting to publicly violate the laws, rules, dictates, and orders of Hamas. They are openly cursing Hamas and its leaders in the streets and markets, and ignoring the directives of the few Hamas officials and police still above ground. They have caused so much damage, it’s undeniable. They’ve imposed themselves on our society, on my father, for too long. We’re all paying the price. People want freedom. We hope deeply that this war will end, and that Hamas will end with it.
I don’t know where my father is. I don’t know if I will ever see him alive again. My hope in telling this story to the public, and putting my name to it, is to somehow offer my father a measure of protection. Hamas may wish to release him and show the world that they would never harm an admired mosque preacher. God alone knows the future, but what I know is that, under no circumstances, would my father want to become a propaganda tool.
Mr. Mushtaha shared his story with The Free Press as part of the ongoing series Voices from Gaza, our partnership with the Center for Peace Communications.
@OhAdam
I see you’re still interested in this topic, but you missed this question. Care to take a stab at it now?
It's yet another example of a partial truth being accepted as a full truth, because the partial truth, you know, foments anger and hate (and, for many, an excuse for genocide and ethnic cleansing perpetrated by Israel).
Opinion | ‘From The River To The Sea’ Doesn’t Mean What You Think It Means
A 2018 piece by a Palestinian on what the phrase, which features prominently in anti-Israel protests, means to the activists who use it
forward.com
When you’re parroting KKK chants, is it effective to say, ‘I don’t mean it quite the way they mean it?’
So… you're just going to stay simple, choosing the most convenient little excerpt. If this is what you need to do to look the other way, fine.
Look, Hamas of today has a whole historical evolution story, too. One well worth considering should anyone want a fuller understanding of this thing. And while it's not a good one for Hamas, it's also quite unfavorable for Israel, to be sure.
I’m going to stay direct.
You didn’t address my question.
If you’re parroting the KKK do you blame the audience for their lack of nuance in understanding the distinction you’re trying to create, while parroting the KKK?
Or do you reconsider parroting the KKK?
"I'm going to stay direct." Holy shit, you're such a gaslighter.
This is your question, again:
If Palestinians “just” want to be treated as equal, what’s that ‘river to the sea’ thing about?
Now, you named Palestinians in your question. Not Hamas, not Tlaib. Palestinians. I answer by providing historical context that is Palestinian-based.
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I’m accused of ‘gaslighting’ for citing your source.
That’s rich.
Do you consider the ADL to be ‘gaslighters’ too?
And your source made exactly my point.
I modified it slightly, to ask how you viewed it with the KKK instead of Hamas, but you demurred.
Again.
If you’re parroting the KKK do you blame the audience for their lack of nuance in understanding the distinction you’re trying to create, while parroting the KKK?
Or do you reconsider parroting the KKK?
What entity is Israel supposed to deal with in regards to a Palestinian state?
Who represents the Palestinians in any negotiation?
Ah, okay I am following. Can you show me how this line is used by Hamas as you contend? Not how it is being represented by Israel or US, but actually show me Hamas' actual language?
You know, much earlier in this thread, given all of the talk of Hamas' 2017 Charter, I posted an excerpt or two just so people might see just how plainly US media, and of course anything coming from Israel/Zionists, interprets language in Hamas' 2017 Charter to establish a certain narrative.
It's worth reading the whole thing.
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Do you consider the ADL to be ‘gaslighters’ too?
ADL:
“From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” is an antisemitic slogan commonly featured in anti-Israel campaigns and chanted at demonstrations.
This rallying cry has long been used by anti-Israel voices, including supporters of terrorist organizations such as Hamas and the PFLP, which seek Israel’s destruction through violent means. It is fundamentally a call for a Palestinian state extending from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, territory that includes the State of Israel, which would mean the dismantling of the Jewish state. It is an antisemitic charge denying the Jewish right to self-determination, including through the removal of Jews from their ancestral homeland.
Sigh. I just posted the ƒucking charter, itself. Read the damn thing.
Sigh, the ADL is a Jewish organization, so I take that with a grain of salt.
Even ADL staffers have been critical of the ADL.
Arguably, ADL is less Jewish and more Zionist, which makes that grain of salt actually a big pile of salt.
So, a very qualified ‘yes’ to my question?
I’ve already read their charter. Posted a link to it on this forum, in fact.
Do you find this part credible:
Hamas rejects the persecution of any human being or the undermining of his or her rights on nationalist, religious or sectarian grounds. Hamas is of the view that the Jewish problem, anti-Semitism and the persecution of the Jews are phenomena fundamentally linked to European history and not to the history of the Arabs and the Muslims or to their heritage.
You wanted an example of Hamas using the phrase as I suggested:
In December 2012, Khaled Mashaal, a leader in exile, reflected the traditional Hamas hardline, “The state will come from resistance, not negotiation. Liberation first, then statehood. Palestine is ours from the river to the sea and from the south to the north,” he said in a speech. “There will be no concession on any inch of the land. We will never recognize the legitimacy of the Israeli occupation, and therefore there is no legitimacy for Israel… We will free Jerusalem inch by inch, stone by stone. Israel has no right to be in Jerusalem.”
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There are only a handful of ships on site, and they have finite magazines.
We’re going to need to scale up to keep this going.
What we can’t do is get in a situation where we’re expending 2 million dollars missiles to dust $2k drones forever.
A $2M missile vs. a $2,000 drone: Pentagon worried over cost of Houthi attacks
The cost of using expensive naval missiles — which can run up to $2.1 million a shot — to destroy unsophisticated Houthi drones — estimated at a few thousand dollars each — is a growing concern, according to three other DOD officials.
Great. Now list the hundreds, if not thousands of times, both in written and spoken word, that Israeli leaders and politicians state that this same land, using the phrase, "from the river to the sea", should be theirs, often including direct language mirroring that of Mashaal.
You do this all the time, and you're doing it again. Your interest is never in achieving any greater understanding that might rival whatever it is that is your current position. Your interest is in feeling like you're "winning" a debate.
I never even remotely suggested Hamas doesn't or hasn't used the phrase. My contention is that US media, Zionist-friendly media, has twisted this phrase into a narrative that removes its history and context, including that Israel has used this same phrase historically to indicate a similar range of varying tenors of "this is ours, not yours", and also to promote the idea that Hamas (and, often, all Palestinians by whatever abstract association) is the only party with any guilt whatsoever.
All to hide that Israel has been an consistent brutal occupier, has a wealth of violent attacks against Palestinian people for many decades now, to the extent that even its staunch defenders, over the years, no longer can defend the government of Israel.
I'll say it again. Another poster offered up an article by Benjamin Pogrund, a 2017 piece, defending Israel against international charges of apartheid. Pogrund is considered, on the international stage, to be an expert on matters of apartheid. Pogrund, his writings read chronologically, is a really good indicator of the arc of the State of Israel, its government, and its handling of Palestine. I think it's August of 2023 where he, always finding whatever cause to defend Israel, could no longer.
Decades of writing by this person whose perspective is really interesting.
Peace.
You’re so disingenuous.
You asked, “Can you show me how this line is used by Hamas as you contend? Not how it is being represented by Israel or US, but actually show me Hamas' actual language?”
I did exactly what you asked. Gave the example of Hamas using the phrase while stating their goal to eradicate Israel.
So I’ll ask you a third time:
If you’re parroting the KKK do you blame the audience for their lack of nuance in understanding the distinction you’re trying to create, while parroting the KKK?
Or do you reconsider parroting the KKK?
