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

xp, That was in reference to Israel's whining abt the BBC, but yes, you're conducting a siege of my heart.

(I'm sorry if this has already been discussed, but is Israel calling for the evacuation of northern Gaza because they want to let settlers move there and will they use that toehold to take over Gaza? Is that what the Palestinians think?)

I don't think the exact rationale is clear, but the north is where the actual city of Gaza is. I have no idea how distributed the group is, but presumably that's where the administrative base would be

Yeah, I had assumed to prepare for ground invasion of Gaza City, although I have no particular insight.

I think it's unlikely Israel already has some kind of full Gaza long-term re-occupation plan ready to go (if it even wants to do that) but I have no particular insight. I would just think that the army is not prepared for and doesn't have the manpower that the re-occupation and settlement of Gaza would require even if that was the intention or hope. IDF is only about 170,000 active troops, the rest reserves. Reservists can't really be used for long-term occupation as the country's economy needs to function.

I have been concerned from the beginning that Israel doesn't have much of a plan, which is a nightmare for everyone. Although you would think that they wargame this kind of scenario, but then you would think a lot of things that haven't turned out to be true. If this doesn't devolve into a wider regional war, I think some kind of "regime change" situation in Gaza is more likely than re-occupation.

Biden asked Netanyahu and his war cabinet what was their plan for Gaza on the day after the war. They said they still don't have one. My story on @axios https://t.co/zit04eTbwe

— Barak Ravid (@BarakRavid) October 18, 2023

is Israel calling for the evacuation of northern Gaza because they want to let settlers move there and will they use that toehold to take over Gaza? Is that what the Palestinians think?

haven't heard anyone floating this as a possibility. One (very understandable) fear is that Gazans who leave to Egypt or elsewhere will never be allowed to return

Forcing Palestinians to live in Sinai permanently is definitely a plan that would be popular with the current Israeli administration and their supporters.

“The New State Solution” as I’ve heard it called

Iirc the “new state solution” was one in which both Israel (to a degree) and Egypt (to a much greater degree) ceded some land to Gaza and encouraged their autonomy as an independent state

So Fetterman's tweet about Congress rushing to blame Israel for the hospital tragedy has gotten big-upped by... checks notes... Meghan McCain, Ted Cruz and Ben Shapiro so far.

From Steven Salaita:
https://stevesalaita.com/a-practical-appraisal-of-palestinian-violence/

In corporate media of the anglophone world, siding with Palestinians, even haltingly, wasn’t an option. Quashing pro-Palestine sentiment has always been the norm in these environs, but the suppression in this case was harsher than usual. Politicians on both sides of the aisle rushed to condemn Palestinian terrorism. Corporations performed their usual gestures of anguish and concern. And in a type of pandering that came across more as cruel than vapid, a long list of celebrities pledged support for Israel.

Had this embargo on sympathy for Palestinians not existed, then more Americans might have learned useful context and considered some of the meaningful questions arising from Palestinian resistance.

Useful context begins with the nature of the Israeli state, an avatar of belligerence and inequality. Beyond its role as a force of extraction in the global nexus of U.S. imperialism, Israel was founded by conquest which has yet to be rectified. That conquest included mass displacement of Palestinian Arabs, theft of land, murder of entire villages, appropriation of resources, and destruction of the natural environment.

Given this context, the notion of “self-defense,” the Zionist’s discursive go-to, becomes more complicated. How can an occupying power be in a position of subjection or helplessness? Only in unusual circumstances does the historical oppressor get to claim self-defense. This isn’t one of those circumstances: Israel’s hostility as an occupying power is entirely routine. Checkpoints are aggressive. Border crossings are aggressive. Military patrols are aggressive. Embargoes are aggressive. Home demolition is aggressive. Settlement construction is aggressive. Extraction of land and water is aggressive. One cannot invoke self-defense as a counterpoint to nonstop aggression.

In short, there is no such thing as Israeli self-defense. It is a categorical impossibility.

Then again, maybe the problem with Americans isn’t ignorance or lack of information. Maybe they know damn well that Israel kills in great numbers and are glad of it. Maybe they’re acclimated to the spectacle of colonial violence. Maybe they see it as a benefit to humanity. Maybe they perceive in bloodshed the world as it ought to be. Maybe they know all they need to know about Israel, which is that it acts as a mirror for their own fantasies of heroism and probity.

....

Whenever Palestinian resistance threatens to gum up imperialism, cities throughout the democratic West readily enact fascist policies, shutting down protests, firing or arresting dissenters, doing away with civil liberties, and demanding obedience. In the immediate aftermath of the Palestinian operation, media outlets across the spectrum deployed a vocabulary that would facilitate Israeli genocide. The little bits of sympathetic coverage took the form of Jews talking to other Jews about Israel, which further consigned Palestine to a place of foreignness and unfamiliarity (the conditions for genocide in the first place). Boardrooms enacted swift discipline. University presidents made clear that Palestinian students and employees were prohibited from speaking.

The real conflict doesn’t exist between civility and terrorism; it exists between Palestinian fortitude and Western anxiety.

One of the many reasons that Irish people as a whole are largely sympathetic towards the plight of the Palestinians is due to our shared history of occupation and oppression. We are also extremely well versed in being called terrorist sympathisers (and less charming epithets) for pointing out that violent oppression and inevitably violent suppression of peaceful movements leads to inevitable results. Many of which are not going to even breathe on the notion of respectability politics, let exist in the same sphere as it. I’m putting the rest behind a hide tag cos long and not directly related.

So this is to say, as someone whose family has been directly affected by violence of the sort I describe upthread, at the hands of an occupying class upheld by state and military power - I’m absolutely sick and tired of seeing these takes posted here. Yes, states have a monopoly on violence. But I could not read about the suffering of the Israelis kidnapped and tortured and feel anything except immense sadness for them, personally. What did they do to deserve that? To cast that in the same view as militant resistance which usually goes against police or the military, the very people who usually inflict the most damage on behalf of a state? I read about the children killed in Coventry by IRA bombings and I thought, blood doesn’t pay for blood. The IRA killing those children and robbing any of their futures doesn’t bring back the dead of Bloody Sunday, or any of the countless millions the British killed or exiled or starved.

Which is really just to say: as comforting as it might be to imagine that everyone who posts here is a generic white American and that their lives or families might never have been touched by the violence so sweetly codified in that article and that therefore we all need telling, it’s wrong, it’s inaccurate, and it speaks over everyone who doesn’t want civilians to suffer in their name. Fuck that.

my first and last post itt: great post gyac

Oh fuck. Wishing I hadn’t said that now.

Lol.

But seriously, thank you for saying that gyac.

I don’t even know what Netanyahu and company thought the outcome of their short term plan that became the status quo was going to be. Occasional rockets from Gaza -> Iron Dome blocks most of it -> retaliatory strikes and conditions get progressively worse in Gaza, rinse and repeat… forever?

I feel like there’s a lack of interest in the material conditions of everyone in the region from his government, just a consolidation and expansion of power riding on everyone’s shared misery. And I don’t think we’ve seen the end of that yet. It hurts.

gyac, I know that not everyone needs telling— my mom and her sister were born in a demilitarized zone after their families were liberated from Oflag X C Lübeck. My mother doesn't have a birth certificate. They arrived in the US with nothing because of Nazi terror. Perhaps you could take a fucking step back every once in a while and think that other people have reasons behind their opinions, too. You don't have a monopoly on being correct.

It's curious that when mentioning civilians, often, only Israeli civilians are mentioned. This again fits a pattern wherein there are pleas for "humanity" but the Arab and the Palestinian are left out of that equation, for reasons that are pretty easily identifiable.

With that, I'm not going to post anymore in this thread or the antisemitism thread. I hope that this current conflict ends with as little further bloodshed as possible on both sides, and that there might emerge a peaceful, one-state solution in our lifetimes that allows Israeli Jews, Israeli Arabs, Palestinians, and others in the Levant the dignity they deserve.

For everyone else, I hope that our ideological differences don't make any of you think I'm a monster. I certainly care about many of you and wish you and yours peace and safety.

It's curious that when mentioning civilians, often, only Israeli civilians are mentioned. This again fits a pattern wherein there are pleas for "humanity" but the Arab and the Palestinian are left out of that equation, for reasons that are pretty easily identifiable.

Is that really true today? It's certainly not true in this thread. Is it true on NPR or CNN or in the NYTimes or Wall Street Journal? That's certainly not what I've seen.

Is that really true today? It's certainly not true in this thread. Is it true on NPR or CNN or in the NYTimes or Wall Street Journal? That's certainly not what I've seen.

It's absolutely been true in my experience — I mentioned upthread that the news will talk about "Israeli civilians" or "the Israeli people" but will then talk about "Palestinians" without ever using words like "civilians" or even "people." It's (relatively) subtle but it's absolutely rhetorical dehumanization in action.

It's curious that when mentioning civilians, often, only Israeli civilians are mentioned. This again fits a pattern wherein there are pleas for "humanity" but the Arab and the Palestinian are left out of that equation, for reasons that are pretty easily identifiable.

and that there might emerge a peaceful, one-state solution in our lifetimes that allows Israeli Jews, Israeli Arabs, Palestinians, and others in the Levant the dignity they deserve.

From that piece above:

"Whenever Palestinian resistance threatens to gum up imperialism, cities throughout the democratic West readily enact fascist policies, shutting down protests, firing or arresting dissenters, doing away with civil liberties, and demanding obedience."

They may have demanded obedience but governments haven't got it. There have been many demonstrations across Europe and the US. I can see a further shift of public opinion over time, which could lead to policy shift on Israel in the next decade.

While things look very bleak for Palestinians now it's a long game...

This stuff is just not going to work:

https://www.nplusonemag.com/online-only/online-only/a-surge-in-suppression/

They banned Palestinian solidarity demonstrations in France - but in Paris this evening people turned out anyway, and forced the cops to leave pic.twitter.com/xjkPOTKQ1N

— Steven Methven (@StevenJMethven) October 19, 2023

On the IDF's invincibility myth

I just keep finding these old threads where I repeatedly pointed out that the IDF is not capable of preventing infiltration from multiple borders 😮‍💨 while y’all were talking about some superpower force you made up in your heads… https://t.co/avfDrmxS8Z

— ‏تمار 🌴 Тама́р 🌴 תמר (@tamars) October 19, 2023

I've been staying away from social media and just catching up on events via Jonathan Katz's Substack page. It's been excellent at putting everything in a historical context (Katz studied history before moving into journalism) but it's also mightily depressing. This in particular:

It’s notable to me that in his Tel Aviv speech, Biden again name-checked the “two-state solution”—the old dream of the 1990s that envisioned a Jewish state and a Muslim-majority Arab state living side by side, or in a sort of checkerboard, within the borders of the old British Mandate (plus or minus the Golan Heights). Anyone who has actually been paying attention to the situation on the ground for the past 20 years knows that dream is completely dead; it was killed by an explosion of Religious Zionist settlement activity in the West Bank that, as Netanyahu intended, has stripped the Palestinian Authority of even more of its potential land and rendered any possibility of drawing a border impossible. Biden doesn’t know this, or feels he has to say he doesn’t know this, because most Americans don’t know it; for most of those 20 years it has been in neither the government, nor media, nor either political party’s interest to look at those facts or communicate them. “Confirmation bias, political convenience, intellectual bankruptcy, and bureaucratic inertia,” as the resigned State Department official Josh Paul said.

The problem is that a one-state solution is even less likely.

I think you could at least make the case that a one state solution is possible in the far future whereas I don’t know what a serious proposal for a two state solution could look like at this point. Anyone who is serious about a single binational state (I kind of dislike the word “solution”) would I think have to be playing a long game and thinking about how to lay groundwork.

Even after Israel told Palestinians to evacuate the north and head to what it called “safe zones” in the south, strikes continued across the territory overnight and Palestinian militants continued firing rockets into Israel.

the news will talk about "Israeli civilians" or "the Israeli people" but will then talk about "Palestinians" without ever using words like "civilians" or even "people."

I don't see this, I just googled "Palestinian civilians" site:nytimes.com and got page after page of hits, same for "Israeli civilians," e.g. in the first article that came up, which is from yesterday:

"Thousands of protesters marched in grief, fury and solidarity across the Middle East on Tuesday night and Wednesday, after hundreds of Palestinian civilians were killed in an explosion at a hospital in Gaza."

Ny sister-in-law has completely lost her mind over this BBC reporting of the hospital explosion controversy and is posting all sorts of dubious stuff on Facebook, including the accusation about "blood libel" - for context, she did literally grow up on a kibbutz. The ironic thing is my brother used to work at the BBC and, during the Scottish Independence referendum, was constantly mocking nationalists accusing the BBC of bias.

Bet you're looking forward to Christmas.

Believe me I go nowhere near this subject with my brother and his family. Corbyn was bad enough.

Apparently the BBC is to blame for the cancellation of Biden's trip to Jordan etc., the worsening relations in the Middle East as a whole and making Jews the world over feel less safe. Who knew the BBC was so powerful?

Public opinion, pt 1.

58% of Britons think there should be an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

18% think there should probably be.

Just 3% think definitely not.

That 3% is the position of Labour, the Tories and most newspapers.

Totally out of touch with public opinion.

Ceasefire now! @YouGov pic.twitter.com/IwGnyRXlLc

— Owen Jones (@OwenJones84) October 19, 2023

pt2

Holy shit pic.twitter.com/THcVzvTol0

— ettingermentum (@ettingermentum) October 20, 2023

35% not supporting is higher than I would've thought.

Do you support or oppose a large-scale ground operation in Gaza?

Support: 65%
Oppose: 21%
Don't Know: 14%

via Lazar#Israel

— Israel Elects (@israel_elects) October 20, 2023

Pakistan is also making 155M shells for Ukraine for the US so this could get awkward https://t.co/MCJ2LiLqV9

— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) October 19, 2023

A miracle saved us from Israeli missiles.

Israel hit our building of 7 floors and 21 flats with two missiles penetrating floors 5 & 4 where they exploded killing a mother who was preparing food for her kids & two of her daughters

I had 30 civilians in my 3rd floor #gazagenocide https://t.co/6uPFi6PSIg pic.twitter.com/lrEbdeaTFF

— Refaat in Gaza 🇵🇸 (@itranslate123) October 20, 2023

Really don't see Netanyahu surviving this..

Just really rotten stuff.https://t.co/SAOL6okPxA pic.twitter.com/2lC3Dr3one

— Abe Silberstein (@abesilbe) October 19, 2023

I hadn't been previously aware but apparently he's a lame duck and not planning to run for anything again. I would say those associated with him are tainted now though. I hope they are.

where did you see that?

actually a friend told me so it may be wrong, not sure the source and can't find anything now

At least 18 people are reported to have been killed in an Israeli airstrike on a Greek Orthodox church compound in Gaza on Thursday. Palestinian officials said at least 500 Muslims and Christians had taken shelter in the church from Israeli bombardments.

Waiting for a long Twitter rant from the IDF against The Guardian on this one

Likud guy Amir Weitmann going in two footed on RT, saying Russia will pay

Okay this is important: the University of London's @ForensicArchi team, and veteran war crimes investigator @CobbSmith, are suggesting, not definitively yet, that the Gaza hospital attack was "more consistent w/ the impact marks from an artillery shell" fired by the Israelis. https://t.co/54UYcJR1dH

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) October 20, 2023

It was on Channel 4 News earlier - not the murderous blood stained BBC - also the recorded message from Hamas members discussing the attack appears to have been "heavily edited".

So maybe Twitter sleuths didn't solve this after all

Got an absolutely worthless response from my rep touting this letter that he sent Biden - https://adamsmith.house.gov/_cache/files/a/3/a31a0979-6c28-4285-992d-94b513f3ad33/2251B35EAC0D7ACC5F1EA362BFF46DD7.quill---letter-l13380---letter-to-president-biden-on-israel---signed.pdf

Okay this is important: the University of London's @ForensicArchi team, and veteran war crimes investigator @CobbSmith, are suggesting, not definitively yet, that the Gaza hospital attack was "more consistent w/ the impact marks from an artillery shell" fired by the Israelis. https://t.co/54UYcJR1dH
— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) October 20, 2023
― papal hotwife (milo z), Friday, 20 October 2023 19:37 (two hours ago) link

An artillery shell... from where? A stealth mode tank that entered gaza in the middle of the night?