Israel, Palestine & the Levant rolling events: Oct 23 on

I have met exactly zero people in between.

To the extent I've talked to people about this, almost everybody I know IRL is "in between" the two positions you describe.

Reddit is a paragon of “nuanced discussion” now. We are truly fucked.

Actually was just thinking about this specific issue in non-Reddit terms which still definitely apply to Reddit. How this conflict is a godsend for the extreme right (and whatever apologists they may have claiming to be “leftist”). Because it so thoroughly divides actual leftists from liberals steeped in realpolitik or whatever they’re on.

a name like Dick Wolf must never be besmirched

There's nothing decent to besmirch. The Law & Order "franchise" is a formulaic, sensationalist pile of shit. All 1,316 episodes of it.

Also pretty depressing how my social media feed was blissfully Ben Shapiro-free until various people decided his thick-headed, one-dimensional take on the Middle East was the voice of reason this past week.

xxp two words: Social Media.

Nuanced discussions are often lacking in the echo chambers of social media and the 24 hour news cycle. The only place where I've seen nuanced discussions about the topic are on platforms that favor more nuanced discussion, such as 4chan and (yes, believe it or not) Stormfront.

We get it. You don't like Reddit.

I don’t like social media illiterates upholding a literal right wing extremist-captured disinformation service as their go-to for balanced discussion.

lol what

Lol hey i wasnt even posting here viborg

Yes, the famously extremist platform, reddit

Extremely milquetoast maybe

i know this is dumb and unhelpful, but to illustrate the kinds of things i’m seeing regular jewish folks share these days: https://www.instagram.com/p/CyZO9L8sM01/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

That’s depressing

As noted, I know numerous IRL people with Israeli flag avatars saying that they stand with Israel no matter what.

Plus I know IlXorz and others who almost uniformly condemn Israel as a brutal apartheid state that continues to use "but the Holocaust" as a laminated carte blanche for every atrocity the IDF wishes to commit. (There is a bit of a strawman in there but that's another topic for another time.)

I have met exactly zero people in between. I know it is not about me and/or my feelz. And I don't love "both sides"ing US politics either. The discourse is polarized and will remain so.

I have also been finding the discourse polarized online - less so in person - but I think the first position you gave is actually an in-between position. I think the two poles of the discourse are actually "I stand with Israel no matter what", versus "Israel should not exist, and any conversation about Israel needs to go back to the fundamental problem of it existing in the first place."

My position is that Israel is not, at this point, fundamentally different from the US or Canada or Australia or any other country that was created by settling already occupied land. It should not have been created, but now that it exists, we aren't going to wind time backwards and expel the Jews from Israel any more than we're going to expel white people from the US. I do agree that it's a brutal apartheid state that uses the Holocaust as an excuse to commit atrocities. But I would like to be able to have conversations on the left about what to do about this that don't start from the implicit premise that Jews should just clear out, as if Jewish settlement is somehow different and more reversible than the Christian settlement our entire country is built on.

While I'm at it, I would absolutely love to be able to jump into discussions about Israel and Palestine that are not filled with coded and not-so-coded antisemitism from people I fundamentally agree with. I would like it if people didn't have to dismiss the Israeli victims in order to show sympathy for the Palestinian victims, or the other way around. It would also be very nice if the New York Times didn't publish bullshit articles about how Jews in New York have put aside their political differences to come together in their shared grief for Israel, as if to confirm every anti-Semite's conviction that when the chips are down all Jews are Zionists at heart. I would like to stop reading about the Hamas attacks as "pogroms" and "the biggest attacks on Jews since the Holocaust," like, no, dude, Israel is a country, you can't frame attacks on your country as an attack on The Jews. It's a horrific mass murder but it's not a pogrom.

Maybe none of this makes any sense. I don't really feel I know enough about any of this, and maybe I've gotten it all wrong. But it's been a hard week. I don't mean to ask for special sympathy for myself as a Jew, because many people are suffering more here, but do please consider that your Jewish posters are under a lot of stress. Some of us (not me, but people I know) have friends and family in Israel, so we may be dealing with worry for them, or with having family members whose political opinions we find abhorrent, or both. We're having to navigate liberal spaces where the justified anti-Israel sentiment gets mixed in with a lot of stray antisemitism. I know I feel a lot more visible as a minority right now than I'm used to being in the US. And for people like me, who are descended from Holocaust survivors, there's also a particularly helpless horror and grief at seeing Israel do things to the Palestinians that were done to us in the Holocaust. I've never felt any sense of identification with Israel, I don't rationally think that being Jewish connects me to the Israelis, and yet the idea of Jews being the ones to create the ghettos and the death marches is viscerally appalling to me and I can't help feeling an irrational sense of guilt and responsibility. But at the same time I don't want the Holocaust and its after-effects minimized. I think there's a willingness to forget that Israel was founded by people who were terrified and traumatized to an extraordinary level, and much as I oppose Israel and its actions, that's something I can't mentally take out of the empathy equation because it's a trauma that's also embedded in my family.

Sorry about the long post, which kind of went all over the place. I just wanted to convey that I feel like I'm being pulled in a million emotional directions at once even if my politics are pretty aligned with ilx, and that this is likely the case for a lot of Jewish people you know. So just keep this in mind, folks, if you find yourself putting pressure on Jews you know to say the right thing in the right way.

<3

<3

appreciate the post, lily

Yeah great post Lily.

But I would like to be able to have conversations on the left about what to do about this that don't start from the implicit premise that Jews should just clear out, as if Jewish settlement is somehow different and more reversible than the Christian settlement our entire country is built on.

the serious position i encounter most commonly on the left (and support myself) is for a one-state solution - a single, secular democratic state, with civil rights for all, right of return for palestinian refugees and some form of reparations. a two-state solution may be nice in theory but most on the left would tend to agree it's a dead prospect these days - israel has done everything it can with the settlements to make it logistically impossible, and the prospect of a lasting peace from it seems like it would be even less likely. "jews should just clear out" is just more ethnic cleansing, it is not a serious or just position.

That’s an amazing post Lily, thank you for posting.

xxp two words: Social Media.

Nuanced discussions are often lacking in the echo chambers of social media and the 24 hour news cycle. The only place where I've seen nuanced discussions about the topic are on platforms that favor more nuanced discussion, such as 4chan and (yes, believe it or not) Stormfront.

i think viborg was just calling reddit a nazi site in a particularly oblique way there but i wouldn't blame anyone for taking it at face value

Oh wait, it was a parody. Ignore that. Sorry viborg.

Lily Dale, I understand your point of view and you don’t have to apologise for it, or for having complicated feelings, or anything. I don’t think anyone should be asking anything of their Jewish friends about Israel anyway, like you have to prove your views are the right ones. I would very much like to hope that this is widely understood but I know that it isn’t.

In any case, the situation you describe where people may have family over there is complicated and people are being really short sighted and tbh dismissive when saying it’s happening “over there”. The relationship with the diaspora is pretty unique in many ways, which you’ve mentioned. I don’t have to think that anything Bibi’s government does or did is justified or right to feel sorrow for the hostages or the victims of the massacres, some of whom were literal Holocaust survivors.

xp yeah that’s my fault I’m not very awake

Lily, that was an amazing post. It resonates with me because (in the words of a progressive friend with hawkish family members) ‘your Jewish friends are not OK right now’ and I’m trying to make sure I say that I love them and acknowledge their feelings, whatever I may think about the actions of our/their elected officials, lobby groups and militaries. Same goes for friends who have connections to Palestinians (and those who advocate for them).

I’m really valuing ILX right now as a place where we can discuss the current situation with the candour, respect and seriousness it requires.

xp i didn't even notice it was a parody actually lol

good posts Lily, gyac and suzy

xp it's not very good parody, that's why

Wow, Reddit is not a nazi site, and comparing it to a few is abhorrently combative and reductive. Reddit, like fewer and fewer places online, has a variety of views and communities, but honestly even reading some of the threads posted in subs as large as /r/worldnews have been enlightening, empathetic, and nuanced in ways I haven't seen in places like Instagram and especially X, the latter being much closer to an actual nazi site these days.

I'm also Jewish, and battling complicated feelings about this as well (excellent post, Lily! Thank you for sharing), though fortunately I don't have family in Israel. I've already come out and shared this background in the Noname thread when I was confronted with the reality that one of my favorite rappers allowed some blatantly antisemitic raps on her new record. I also support a secular, one state solution as ufo describes above. I am really not looking forward to the heightened Islamophobia and antisemitism that will inevitably surge from all of this. The general upward trend of hate coupled with these events of the last two weeks have me feeling very concerned for a lot of people, both near and far.

xp ok I was wrong, we didn't get it.

Good post octobeard.

Yes I found that too re: reddit. There are people posting from Gaza and Israel in the r/worldnews daily megathreads.

Drawing comparisons between things that are not Nazis and actual Nazis violates the rules of several subreddits, including, I believe, the one devoted to discussing the Israel-Palestine situation.

One could say such comparisons demonstrates a refusal to engage in the actual conversation being had while also stoking the anger, prejudice, hatred, and vengeful thinking, behind the actions causing the cycle of violence and retribution in the first place. If people doing this are also willing to engage in the actual conversations being had, then it shouldn't matter, but sadly I find this is often not the case.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/17/spain-rejects-israeli-claims-of-its-officials-aligning-with-hamas

Just wanting to point out that Palestinians and others who have been subject to unjust and international war on their homelands are also feeling pretty traumatized at the moment.

What Lily Dale’s post speaks to is what a Jewish friend wrote a few days ago about what’s going on, and that is that despite the mentions of the Shoah, the overwhelming majority of Israeli and mainstream Jewish reaction to these events speaks to a complete and utter lack of connection with Jewish ancestors, who were a diasporic, hated, and perpetually exiled people. This is the pain and history that comes before the Shoah, and which the Israeli state is now enforcing on another group of people. To what end?

Thanks Lily. I've shared your post with my wife whose views and conflicts sound very similar to yours. She's Jewish and trying to navigate being pushed and pulled by people around her, talking with our kids about it who are getting views pushed on them by our temple, and her best friend who is coming down more pro-Israel than her.

Just wanting to point out that Palestinians and others who have been subject to unjust and international war on their homelands are also feeling pretty traumatized at the moment.

xposts

Yes, Lily, many thanks for that terrific post, I'm Jewish and it really helped me clarify my thoughts (it didn't go "all over the place" at all!). Literally everything you said resonates with me.

Not everyone seems to understand, which is why I posted it.

If you mean specific people itt, then by all means quote them. Otherwise it comes across like you’re taking issue with Lily’s post and replies to it.

I’d also point out that discussion not taking place on this thread doesn’t mean they’re not happening.

Thanks for your post, Lily.

I think my post was pretty clear, and wasn’t meant to denigrate Lily’s post. Not sure why I need to clarify for your sake only, since it seems what you’re looking for is a fight.

FWIW (and with respect!) I don't like that "mainstream Jewish reaction", feels reductive to me, a mainstream Jew who doesn't think that way

Got it— I could have been more specific, in that what I meant was “the reaction of Jewish people as portrayed in the mainstream press.” Apologies for that.

That this reductive portrayal in the mainstream media speaks to what Lily and others have been saying— that these narratives are harmful and
antisemitic— is pretty clear! Obviously, I’m not trying to parrot them, as both irl and on here, I have many many Jewish friends who are against the occupation and ongoing state violence.

Right now, in Gaza, the situation is horrific and catastrophic.
Those hospitals and clinics that have not been evacuated are overwhelmed and are barely functioning. No electricity, no medical supplies. Surgeons in Al-Shifa hospital are now operating without painkillers.

— Christos Christou (@DrChristou) October 16, 2023

the serious position i encounter most commonly on the left (and support myself) is for a one-state solution - a single, secular democratic state, with civil rights for all, right of return for palestinian refugees and some form of reparations. a two-state solution may be nice in theory but most on the left would tend to agree it's a dead prospect these days - israel has done everything it can with the settlements to make it logistically impossible, and the prospect of a lasting peace from it seems like it would be even less likely. "jews should just clear out" is just more ethnic cleansing, it is not a serious or just position.

― ufo, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 bookmarkflaglink

Yes. This seems to tie a little bit with the Land back movement which goes on with the odd, small success.

I think the question is working it through to a one state solution and what to do with people who aren't prepared to accept it. People who think it was theirs all along.

In the meantime more displacement, and right this minute, is the order of the day.

This has got to be stopped.

settlers and the idf have killed 55 palestinians in the west bank and wounded 1100 since saturday. https://t.co/FBNOx9nhTi

— hasanabi (@hasanthehun) October 17, 2023

By the standards of how much support Israel usually polls at this is a total public relations collapse. Don’t know if I’ve ever seen them with minority support in polling before. https://t.co/rVsWkq3C1p

— ettingermentum (@ettingermentum) October 17, 2023

The President of the University of Pennsylvania has released her 3rd or 4th public statement apologizing for letting a Palestinian writers conference take place last month

Following up on this: UPenn's Palestinian students staged a walkout yesterday and held a 7 hour demonstration on campus.

Ben Gvir is such a goon. What he's doing is both murderous and idiotic.

“I’m Israeli Jewish, American as well. My partner is Palestinian. And I can do things that he can’t do.”@saribashi describes how Israel’s apartheid system affects everyday life in Israel and Palestine. pic.twitter.com/WevhmhMofJ

— Democracy Now! (@democracynow) October 17, 2023

They underestimate our commitment to war crimes.

BREAKING | Israeli media reports a 'very difficult event' – Israeli soldiers killed in the collapse of a booby-trapped building in south Lebanon.

Israeli sources to Sky News Arabia say 9 soldiers were killed in the incident.

— The Cradle (@TheCradleMedia) November 13, 2024

Well, if you will go wandering about in someone else's country.

Civilians killed = normal
Soldiers killed = very difficult event

A few months ago, a movie about military officers enjoying a normal life - picnics, parties - as they oversee the mass killing of people around them, won an Oscar. https://t.co/dmswjbUbDN

— Mohammad Alsaafin (@malsaafin) November 14, 2024

https://www.timesofisrael.com/pms-chief-of-staff-questioned-on-suspicion-of-forgery-illegal-altering-of-records/

the quoted section in that tweet is from this Haaretz piece, which is more broadly about the IDF building infrastructure for a longer-term occupation of Gaza: https://archive.ph/eEnRb

"Israeli" soldiers set fire to Mahdia Al-Shawa School in Beit Hanoun just right after the aid trucks arrived there, following more than forty days without food. They burned down the school and all the aid supplies, forcing the displaced people to evacuate by force. pic.twitter.com/HJxqDqdCq3

— Ania Lewandovska 🍉 (@Anna_AnninaEl) November 15, 2024

On the failures of the current Israeli strategy.

THREAD: Today, Israel assassinated Muhammad Afif, Hizbullah’s media head, killing him along with other civilians in a Christian residential neighbourhood of Beirut. Beyond its clear violations of international humanitarian law, the timing of this assassination exposes Israel’s…

— Amal Saad (@amalsaad_lb) November 17, 2024

is there a way to read that without being logged in?

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1858207352723567101.html should do