Israel/Palestine post 10/7 - follow-on events/thoughts as relate to other countries

this is not good: "Student Leader of Columbia Protests: ‘Zionists Don’t Deserve to Live’
After video surfaced on social media, the student, Khymani James, said on Friday that his comments were wrong."

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/26/nyregion/columbia-student-protest-zionism.html?unlocked_article_code=1.nU0.2bCg.WdX-HYzAvSls&smid=url-share

people say shit all the time

most of them don't let themselves be the visible leader of a protest movement

It is incredibly easy to oppose Israeli genocide of Palestinians without saying Jews have to die.

I just don’t get the failure to adapt to the audience… these protesters seem pretty smart!

Training with the IDF and the increased militarization of police after 9/11 go hand in hand, and to be incredulous about this connection is wild to
me, and to claim that Zionism isn’t a settler colonial ideology is also wild.

― butt dumb tight my boners got boners (the table is the table), Friday, April 26, 2024 1:00 PM (seven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I think I'm not explaining myself well or you're misunderstanding. I'm saying that "zionism" gets used as a kind of metonym for these things. Israel did not cause the NYPD to become more militarized, the NYPD sought out Israel's help in becoming more militarized, among many other steps it took. And it was also frankly killing and torturing plenty of people well before 9/11. Zionism did not invent settler colonialism, regardless of whether you think that's the appropriate term.

most of them don't let themselves be the visible leader of a protest movement

this is key. this guy needs to be disavowed and ignored. shit like this utterly taints this movement.

re: judeo-christian seems to be mostly an islamophobic construct of american nationalism and imperialism and of course it does generally just mean white christian nationalism buy often specifically in the context of its (ultimately provisional but superficially unconditional) support for a certain version of zionism - it also relies on a whole cluster of antisemitic assumptions about the special role of jewish people in empire/modernity/capitalism/america/etc.

from the israeli POV maybe the emphases are different

yeah

xps sure fuck that guy I'm just reflexively suspicious of anything from NYT

man alive I kind of agree about some of the double standards and dogwhistling but also zionism is a real thing and it's worth talking about. unfortunately because of all kinds of deep seated assumptions and cultural baggage the discourse can get conspiratorial and divisive very quickly and people are reluctant to call out people on "their side" for falling into these traps because the broader issue is perceived to be more urgent and because there are already so many callouts that are disingenuous and certain people's speech is policed much more than others. idk what to do about this

Left otm

Yeah that's a fair comment. I just refuse to entirely ignore it because it can have very real consequences.

FWIW, I got curious about the origin of the term "judeo-christian." This is what ChatGPT said:

ChatGPT
The term "Judeo-Christian" was popularized in the United States during the mid-20th century, particularly after World War II. Its origins can be traced back to efforts to foster unity and solidarity between Jews and Christians, particularly in response to the Holocaust and as a way to emphasize shared values and beliefs. While it's challenging to attribute the term to a single individual, scholars suggest that its usage gained prominence through theologians, politicians, and intellectuals seeking to highlight the common heritage and moral framework shared by Judaism and Christianity. Some credit figures like Will Herberg, a Jewish theologian, and Dwight Eisenhower, the 34th President of the United States, with popularizing the term. However, its exact originator remains somewhat ambiguous due to its gradual adoption and evolution within American discourse.

man alive don’t post that glurge read a book

If I cared what ChatGPT said I could just hit myself in the head with a hammer

yeah i think some people get lost in the sauce of Zionism as the one weird trick that explains everything bad, otoh i think it's worth talking about collaborations between police departments and the IDF and the way in which they both have a restive segment of the population that they have absolute contempt for and view as an enemy to be kept in line.

This guy is a fucking asshole who seems like he has the sort of online brain poisoning that leads people to say "actually your bad faith critique of my movement is everything I believe, actually [monstrous thing] is good, we should do it more!" And of course he will be the excuse for many reasonable people to write off the pro-Palestine movement, while the existence of similarly psychotic pro-Israel people with massive institutional power will not be a reason to back away from supporting Israel.

From wikipedia

The concept of Judeo-Christian ethics or Judeo-Christian values in an ethical (rather than a theological or liturgical) sense was used by George Orwell in 1939, along with the phrase "the Judaeo-Christian scheme of morals".[6] According to theologian Richard L. Rubenstein, the "normative Judaeo-Christian interpretation of history" is to treat human suffering, such as a plague, as punishment for human guilt.[7]

According to historian K. Healan Gaston, the term became a descriptor of the U.S. in the 1930s, when the country sought to forge a unified cultural identity in an attempt to distinguish itself from fascism and communism in Europe. Becoming part of the American civil religion by the 1940s, the term rose to greater prominence during the Cold War, especially when it was used to express opposition to communist atheism. In the 1970s, the term became particularly associated with the American Christian right, and it is often employed in political attempts to restrict immigration and LGBT rights.

interesting genealogy- esp since it's also flexible enough to incorporate some level of rhetorical support for LGBT rights and feminism as (an unfortunately partially successful) ploy to get women and queers on board with the fight the (generally islamic) enemy

(with an air of you should be grateful and we could treat you like "they" do if you don't comply)

the rainbow israeli flag flying over razed gaza homes is the most hideous instantiation of this

of course none of this is incompatible with blatant homophobia as any queer who has defended palestinian humanity will be familiar with

That Columbia guy can get fucked. It being front-page NYT is sort of absurd though -- had any of you heard of this guy before today (genuinely asking, I could be wrong here)? I hadn't, and I've read a bunch of reports on campus protests this week. Not going to deny that the non-hierarchical approach to movement organizing has some clear drawbacks though. But I'm not sure what conclusions to draw from the fact that this person has extremely terrible opinions, and frankly Aimless is right that this kind of political hardmanning is routine and JoeStork is otm about the hypocrisy. Hell I'm sure we all recall that the NYT published Tom Cotton's call for the military to murder protesters, just one of many pro-murder opinions that are perfectly acceptable to the NYT.

I'd be much more interested in a good, in-depth report on this total clusterfuck: https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2024/04/26/united-for-israel-march-draws-hundreds-multiple-incidents-of-harassment-reported/

Re: fixating on the term “Zionism,” I like Djene Bajalan’s preference for calling these actions as “Israeli Nationalism,” as it helps clarify a lot of things and avoids the emotional entanglement/investment a lot of older folks have with that idea. Also, that historically it’s a contentious concept, in that there have been multiple zionisms over time, and aome weren’t the current popular meaning used to justify a lot of shit.

So, yeah, I try to use “Israeli nationalism,” for the reasons mentioned above but also because it connects a lot of what we’ve been seeing to 19th century notions of nationalism and how all this is far more contiguous than is admitted.

good call

Here’s the interview Djene did(he’s a professor of Middle Eastern History/Studies at Missouri State and a podcaster/radio host) where he lays out the distinction, and provides a lot of critical history of what happened when the British and the French tried to import European/Bismarckian nationalism to the formerly Ottoman Empire after WWI.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI6D1WuI1kE

Ottoman ambassadors to Europe knew that it would wind up terribly, of course, and wrote back about that back in the mid-19th Century. They mentioned that if it was forcibly imposed in the Leant, it would probably cause warfare for at least a century.

*in the Levant, rather

The ottomans were so concerned about it they committed genocide
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outline_of_the_Greek_genocide

The wise and benevolent Ottoman Empire is one of my least favorite leftist history memes.

Oh I never meant to grant them any positive attribution at all, just that the lands they controlled over had a setup very different than any part of Europe north of them(yeah, obviously), and one of their diplomatic staffers was able to suss out the implications of that difference

yeah fuck the ottoman empire

You know, I wish we didn't assume the worst of posters' intentions

Since when is that a leftist meme? Maybe in the US.

maybe calling it a leftist meme is an exaggeration, but I feel like a lot of overly favorable portrayals of the Ottoman Empire make their way into anti-western-imperialist accounts of middle eastern history.

I have not seen any favorable portrayals of the Ottoman Empire… I do appreciate my storage ottoman though! Great furniture concept

there was also stupid Young Turks (which is maybe still a thing; isn't Cenk Uygur running for president now? that guy is a moron; also it's gotten progressively less left)

I think that name is less about loving the Ottomans and more about Cenk being from Turkey

Which is why he can’t actually run for president

xpost well yeah but it's a fucking stupid name. If there were a German-born US-based leftist youtuber would he call his show "Hitler Youth"?

well I don’t think Rod Stewart would have a big hit with “Hitler Youth” either

Junge Herzen sind heute Abend frei!

I'd be much more interested in a good, in-depth report on this total clusterfuck: https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2024/04/26/united-for-israel-march-draws-hundreds-multiple-incidents-of-harassment-reported/

yeesh that's some ugly shit

there is way too much to unpack in there and it would be nice to have a mainstream media that was capable of doing that for us and of showing these things to people who aren't seeing them and which might complicate some of their kneejerk affinities. maybe it wouldn't matter anyway at this point

xps I haven't come across ottoman apologism outside a turkish nationalist context (which includes the young turks thing) but I'm sure it's happening somewhere. but there is a lot of necessary revisionism going on against late european thought's othering of the empire in the service of nationalist and competing imperial interests and maybe this work can look like apologism in its more vulgar manifestations but it doesn't gloss over the many atrocities it just attempts to put them back into a european and international context they have been excuded from in a manner that has reified contemporary racialised categories in an unhelpful way

Most Turkish people I know well are secular AF and I have never once heard any of them say how fantastic the Ottoman Empire was. Lots of Ataturk reverence, though, because of the secularism (and they loathe Erdogan more than any of us loathe Trump).

that has also been my experience but I have also come across some light genocide denial (not from everyone) which I assume is much worse in overtly nationalist circles. because the ethnic cleansings were such a key part of the imperial/national transition you don't have to like the empire to defend them and if your experience has mostly been a lot of christians demanding you apologise for them I almost get it

various parallels could be drawn

I’ve had Jewish friends tell me that since the term ‘genocide’ was coined in response to the Holocaust, nothing else should actually be called that.

Xp suzy … yes, exactly, which is why the pro-palestine rhetoric using that term to describe zionism is… upsetting to some

Apologies if you all already know this, but Raphael Lemkin coined the term genocide in response to the Holocaust and because the Ottoman-led Armenian genocide had been largely ignored (a fact infamously cited by Hitler iirc). Restricting the term to the Holocaust would directly contradict the point of creating it in the first place.

At UPenn someone at the encampment spray painted “Zios Get Fuckt” on the Ben Franklin statue. University is investigating it as a hate crime.

I did know of Lemkin, and he also coined the term to describe the killing of vast numbers of non-Jewish Poles in the early part of WW2.

I didn’t know that suzy, thanks

I think if there’s any praise of the Ottoman Empire from the American left it is based on a centering of American/western Europe imperialism where what we do is the worst and thus other empires aren’t as bad

if i know american leftists probably also projection of contemporary US racial norms onto every other time and place and indulging in the more "positive" strain of orientalism

xps "zio" is just poor as slurs go so why would you waste a precious opportunity to desecrate a ben franklin statue on that? if they'd sprayed free palestine it would have been much cooler even though they'd probably be getting the same treatment