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

As stated.

I guess this thread is the place for this — I got a press release from our local Sheriff's Office today saying they'd had many media queries about "anti-Jewish Rhetoric being distributed" being distributed in our county. (Apologies for the weird capitalized "rhetoric," our Sheriff's Office is only quasi-literate.) It just said that their major crimes and gang units were "looking into the matter," with no further detail.

I haven't seen examples of what this is referring to, and it struck me that it could be either our local Nazi/Proud Boy types out there distributing horrible leaflets, OR it could be student-led "Free Palestine" social media posts or something, and those things seem like they're increasingly being conflated.

Best piece I've read on literary culture at this time. Hard not to conclude the whole thing is a disgrace.

https://thebaffler.com/latest/at-the-threshold-of-humanity-kattan

Don't know much about this organization but this seems like one way to counteract those who try to stir hate:

The pro-Palestine protesters made it clear that the masked neo-Nazis were not welcome, chanting “Nazis Go Home,” and “show your faces, you fucking cowards,” the Daily Montanan reported.

That is just one of the tactics that organizers of pro-Palestine solidarity protests can use to make clear to neo-Nazis that they are not welcome in that movement, according to Ben Lorber, an extremism expert who is working on a book about antisemitism. “It is vital for Palestine liberation organizers and progressive activists to recognize and counter far-right actors who stand diametrically opposed to the movement’s principles and goals,” Lorber wrote in a recent guide for organizers.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/k7zx5a/neo-nazis-hijack-pro-palestine-protest-mike-enoch

Personally, I find it much better to see an effort to recognize and counteract this kind of thing, rather than dismissing or denying that it exists

that's encouraging

Black-Jewish Alliance ✊🏿✡
@BlackJewishA
Police are attempting to arrest Jews in prayer.

We shout “let us pray” for Palestine.

The police have confiscated copies of our speeches.

GET YOUR COP HANDS OFF OUR JEWISH COMRADES

Video of harassment within that tweet.

https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2023/11/02/frick-museum-in-pittsburgh-postpones-islamic-art-exhibition-over-fears-it-would-appear-insensitive-or-traumatic-amid-gaza-war

“When war broke out in the Middle East, we were as heartbroken as everyone, and we realised that we were about to open an exhibition that a forgiving person would call insensitive, but for many people, especially in our community, would be traumatic.”

it's so insensitive and traumatic that muslims exist

this whole thing is so devastating.

This is where stuff like "It would be insensitive to publish this book about Soviet dissidents at this time" leads to.

yeah that is obviously ridiculous

An Israeli air strike on the Bureij refugee camp today

https://x.com/ramabdu/status/1720067423238308122

If you use this thread on anything going on in Gaza or Israel.

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

The dissonance in reading about individuals expressing concerns about anti-Semitic violence rising in North America while 400 Arab children are dying every day in Gaza is, frankly, enraging

I have seen videos of anti-Semitic violence over the past week. These videos are exclusively Jewish peace protesters getting harassed by cops in North America, Orthodox Jewish peace protesters getting beaten by Israeli Police in Israel

My heart is ripped in two for my Jewish friends who are saying “not in my name” and being disowned, being called “self-hating Jews”, or— as the Times Of Jerusalem said in an op-ed two days ago: “anti-Zionists who claim to be Jewish are as Jewish as the Westboro Baptist Church that claimed to be Christian”

Jfc just because you’re saying “stop bombing Gaza” doesn’t make you “anti-Zionist”, to begin with

I was bothered by a now ex-friend who told me “how can you call it Gazan genocide when they (the Gazans) procreate so quickly”; fine, first I will block you and never speak to you again, second I will call it something else. What, tho? Israel already doesn’t acknowledge a nakba exists. Anti-war Jews are liberally calling it a holocaust, a shoah; those terms are not allowed to me as a non-Jew.

I feel like one can’t even call it “war” or “a conflict”; Gideon Levy argued that it is neither of these things, that it is a violent occupation, nothing more

Haaretz today reports Netanyahu’s latest speech: “nothing can stop us”.

Anyway, 9000 Gazans dead today, 3 hostages returned, congrats everyone

“anti-Zionists who claim to be Jewish are as Jewish as the Westboro Baptist Church that claimed to be Christian”

I mean ... fwiw, I do think a very not insignificant number of Christians are let's just say in Westboro's ballpark, if not on the same base

"I was bothered by a now ex-friend who told me “how can you call it Gazan genocide when they (the Gazans) procreate so quickly”"

So much hate.

(xp Not the point of the thread, I know, sorry)

"The dissonance in reading about individuals expressing concerns about anti-Semitic violence rising in North America while 400 Arab children are dying every day in Gaza is, frankly, enraging"

posters on this board are worried about their children being bullied at school for being Jewish

Sorry if my posts were emotional or “in the wrong thread” I shouldn’t post when I’m in a news consumption crying spiral, and I shouldn’t read pro-violence NYT articles (or the NYT at all), I am going to call a friend

I agree with everything else in your post, but you can be horrified by the massacre of innocents in Gaza (and the West Bank) while also being worried about anti-semitic violence

Tbh, the biggest “holy shit what are you guys doing” anti-Semitism concern over the past week has been seeing people on social media cheering on “Yemen declares war on Israel” when it’s the Houthis declaring war, not the Yemeni gvmt, and if anybody is cheering for Houthis then we have a big fucking problem

I have been seeing the odd report of AS attacks across Europe now, like this one.

A Moldovan couple arrested for allegedly spray-painting Stars of David on a Paris school last week reportedly told investigators they were acting on orders from an “individual in Russia.”https://t.co/VvJOmmoCAh

— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) November 2, 2023

in the larger world, the anti-semitism is probably largely being driven by people who care less about the plight of the Palestinian people and care more about being anti-semitic, and seeing an opportunity for an opening to be a bit more free with their bigotry.

"zionist jews" now trending on twitter, that's that shit i don't like

Caitlyn Jenner's dead name is also trending there today, which says it all

sorry meant to post on the "is this anti-semitism?" thread

I thought this was pretty good:

You are criticizing Israel wrong. Here’s how to do it correctly. pic.twitter.com/DiwBTJOuiG

— Matt Lieb?? (@mattlieb) October 28, 2023

nice to finally see a video of Van Horn Street

in the larger world, the anti-semitism is probably largely being driven by people who care less about the plight of the Palestinian people and care more about being anti-semitic, and seeing an opportunity for an opening to be a bit more free with their bigotry.

― omar little, Thursday, November 2, 2023 12:29 PM (ten minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

This is upsetting me a lot right now. I know it sounds naïve but I was genuinely surprised at how fast people seized the opportunity to be flat out anti-Semitic. I grew up spending 1/2 the year in a mostly Jewish community in NY where I as a gentile was often the odd one out. 3 of my 5 lifelong close friends are Jewish. I said to one of them yesterday that I think I grew up in this little bubble were I didn't realize how much anti-semitism there still was out there and he was like yeah no shit you're from NY. Anyway - there are a million upsetting things (upsetting isn't anywhere near strong enough) happening right now but I have been thinking a lot about exactly this, OL. :/

it's not good. i have a friend who was indulging in some "deep thoughts" about judaism around the time kanye was on one about jewish people, and i had an instagram convo w/him re: a couple of his posts. i don't know that i reached him, but i tried. another friend (no longer a friend) started to get very alt-right and was an associate of ow3n b3njamin for awhile, a podcast comedian type guy who started to get into some anti-semitic and racist stuff a few years ago. that particular friend is long gone. he was at my wedding. he probably helped hold me up high in my chair during the hora. he just wound up being a particularly "bad actor" in life. and a pernicious influence on others.

i live in a bubble in Los Angeles obv, but shit does happen here. threats against synagogues, anti-semitic graffiti on a famous local deli last night, etc...

the Poetry Foundation shelved a 3500-word review of a poetry book that discusses the book's criticisms of Israel...the poet author of the book is, of course, Jewish, and so is the reviewer.

The donor pocketbook is where artistic freedom hits a wall

This is where stuff like "It would be insensitive to publish this book about Soviet dissidents at this time" leads to.

― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes)

yeah that is obviously ridiculous

― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive)

Reflexive censorship of art always seems to crop up when wars begin and wartime propaganda cranks up the red hot rhetoric. Even as recently as the invasion of Ukraine there were ridiculous people calling for cancellation of symphonies by Russian composers as a sign of solidarity with Ukrainians.

O rly

If a HAMAS sympathizer or a HAMAS-adjacent amateur lone wolf carries out a gun attack in the USA killing more than 10 people in the name is Palestine … this poll will flip like a flapjack. https://t.co/NkWdyaliV7

— Malcolm Nance (@MalcolmNance) November 2, 2023

and if my granny had wheels, she'd be a bicycle. I like the specificity of ten or more people, it shows a vigorous imagination.

Reflexive censorship of art always seems to crop up when wars begin and wartime propaganda cranks up the red hot rhetoric. Even as recently as the invasion of Ukraine there were ridiculous people calling for cancellation of symphonies by Russian composers as a sign of solidarity with Ukrainians.

― more difficult than I look (Aimless), Thursday, November 2, 2023 1:41 PM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
My kid’s teacher canceled their Russia unit. Like I really don’t think it matters to Ukrainian lives whether our kids are learning about faberge eggs and Baryshnikov

re: that poll.. I'm not really sure that Israel needs much military support anyway... they're a major arms manufacturer/exporter, inventors of the Uzi submachine gun. And they seemed to have no issues selling arms to South Africa's white minority government

and yet the House just approved 14.5 billion in aide to Israel for some reason

$4 billion for the Iron Dome, which kind of seems like locking the gate after the dog gets out.

Wake Forest professor resigns after backlash due to tweet

https://journalnow.com/news/local/wake-professor-resigns-following-backlash-of-social-media-post-on-israeli-hamas-war/article_4e1022a4-78ea-11ee-a828-ffa8e334019a.html

(She’s a really good poet, fwiw!)

14.5 billion in aide to Israel for some reason

er, mm, by long tradition all those billions can only be spent on armaments produced by US-based death merchants military-industrial complex manufacturers.

And lots of defence contracting

Protests are being planned for Armistice Day. Looks like the match will be lit on the tiniest pretence

"They died for your freedom, but don't you dare think about exercising it." https://t.co/xyCICKV35j

— James B (@piercepenniless) November 3, 2023

Clare Hymer
@ClareHymer
HAPPENING NOW: Another peaceful sit-in calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, this time at Kings Cross Station.

the only additional freedoms that came because of GB participation in the world wars was the bankrupting and partial destruction of an evil global empire and the resultant decline arguably sped up the process of decolonisation that followed. "Protect our freedoms" my fucking arsehole, it was a warfare state that forced conscripts onto the battlefield, which is the absolute opposite of freedom.

David Adler
@davidrkadler
New bill in the French 🇫🇷 Senate : 'An insult committed against the State of Israel is punishable by two years of imprisonment and a fine of 75,000 euros.'

I don't even want to paste in what Germany are doing, just utterly disgusting

Belgian transport workers saved the lives of thousands of Jews in the 1940s by unlocking the doors of trains headed for the extermination camps. Now, they're refusing to load weapons onto ships headed to Israel. This is a meaningful & timeless solidarity with humanity. pic.twitter.com/kvcUMcnJd7

— Amro Ali (@_amroali) November 3, 2023

i used to subscribe to the Nation but the design is so incredibly offputting that i struggled to read anything in it

I have been thinking of LRB, NYRB, and perhaps one more. Unfortunately most of the more mass market left leaning mags/journals are either poorly designed, actually rather milquetoast, or exceptionally expensive

I have never read Granta!

I have only gotten really informative pieces (though not neccesarily correct, as interrogating that stuff would require a broad level of knowledge) on what's been happening in Syria through twitter. Really good analysts still post on there so no case for really getting out of there.

Ah yes, X, the last bastion of intelligent long form cultural and political writing.

At the end of a two-week trial over whether the Trump administration targeted pro-Palestinian international students for their political views, a State Department officials confirmed that criticism of Israel was one of the considerations in revoking student visas. Taking the stand was John Armstrong, the senior bureau official in the Bureau of Consular Affairs.

“Pushed for examples of things he might consider in weighing whether to deny or revoke a student’s visa, Mr. Armstrong testified that calls for limiting military aid to Israel or ‘denouncing Zionism’ could all factor in his agency’s decisions,” the NYT reports.

Closing arguments in the trial are expected to begin today.

table you might consider New Left Review.

i want to like the Tribune and it's not even expensive but again i think the design is terrible

Design of Tribune still not great I agree, writing has gotten better though.

Ah yes, X, the last bastion of intelligent long form cultural and political writing.

― Black Sabaoth (Boring, Maryland), Monday, 21 July 2025 bookmarkflaglink

The culture in the West is gone to the dogs, my friend. I am actually reading less and less about it.

But I don't think you'd get anything like this in the LRB or NYRB blogs with the immediacy. Maybe Bluesky might get to be as good an aggregator.

https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/east-mediterranean-mena/syria/compromise-urgently-needed-southern-syria

to the piece that z_tbd posted, i’d say that it’s good that it’s out in the open if it weren’t already out in the open. still fucking abominable— if the courts find in favor of the admin, we’re even more cooked than i thought

I know I’ve harped on this before but it blows my tiny little mind that Americans practically have to swear a loyalty oath to another country. I genuinely wonder why we don’t just make Israel the 51st State.

because then Muslim Americans could move there

Twenty-six OECD countries – including the U.K., France and Canada – called for the Gaza war to end immediately and condemned the "inhumane killing of civilians" seeking aid at Gaza Humanitarian Foundation aid sites.

In their joint statement, the countries urged the Israeli government to "immediately lift restrictions on the flow of aid and to urgently enable the UN and humanitarian NGOs to do their life-saving work safely and effectively," adding that the government's "denial of essential humanitarian assistance to the civilian population is unacceptable."

Israel's Foreign Ministry rejected the call, deeming it "disconnected from reality" and saying, "The statement fails to focus the pressure on Hamas and fails to recognize Hamas's role and responsibility for the situation

From Haaretz

the preservation of human life in gaza is a terrorist activity to these people, so it makes sense https://t.co/V2KkxbaamN

— joolsd (@joolsd) July 21, 2025

i found the JC takedown of the adam kirsch book to be sadly lacking. kirsch is an utter hack, but surely we deserve to have something better than that in terms proposing a counter argument

Extraordinary scenes in the Commons tonight as Tory MP @kitmalthouse correctly accuses UK foreign secretary David Lammy of complicity in Israel’s crimes and warns him that he could end up in The Hague pic.twitter.com/blnxemWy6T

— Nicholas Guyatt (@NicholasGuyatt) July 21, 2025

https://www.axios.com/2025/07/22/columbia-students-protest-punishment

and the response from Columbia University Apartheid Divest

OFFICIAL CUAD PRESS RELEASE:

In a historic first, Columbia has suspended nearly 80 students for participating in a teach-in honoring Basel al-Araj. The announcement comes just ahead of the University's deal with the Trump administration and the Anti-Defamation League. pic.twitter.com/lNnBNzKaC2

— CU Apartheid Divest (CUAD) (@ColumbiaBDS) July 22, 2025

In other words, Columbia can no longer be considered an institution of higher learning.

this is insane behaviour from columbia

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/jul/22/harvard-educational-review-palestine-issue-cancelled

In March 2024, six months into Israel’s war in Gaza, education in the territory was decimated. Schools were closed – most had been turned into shelters – and all 12 of the strip’s universities were partially or fully destroyed.

Against that backdrop, a prestigious American education journal decided to dedicate a special issue to “education and Palestine”. The Harvard Educational Review (HER) put out a call for submissions, asking academics around the world for ideas for articles grappling with the education of Palestinians, education about Palestine and Palestinians, and related debates in schools and colleges in the US.

“The field of education has an important role to play in supporting students, educators, and policymakers in contextualizing what has been happening in Gaza with histories and continuing impacts of occupation, genocide, and political contestations,” the journal’s editors wrote in their call for abstracts.

A little more than a year later, the scale of destruction in Gaza was exponentially larger. The special issue, which was slated to be published this summer, was just about ready – contracts with most authors were finalized and articles were edited. They covered topics from the annihilation of Gaza’s schools to the challenges of teaching about Israel and Palestine in the US.

But on 9 June, the Harvard Education Publishing Group, the journal’s publisher, abruptly canceled the release. In an email to the issue’s contributors, the publisher cited “a number of complex issues”, shocking authors and editors alike, the Guardian has learned.

But the cancellation of an entire issue of an academic journal, which has not been previously reported, is a remarkable new development in a mounting list of examples of censorship of pro-Palestinian speech.

How does something like this even qualify as ‘pro-Palestinian’. This is just ‘don’t talk about there being human beings in Palestine’. Unbelievably horrific, just wanting to erase the idea of Palestinians while Israel works to erase them physically.

a number of complex issues like being a fucking coward

Israel's defense minister accuses France of 'surrender to terrorism'
Israeli defense minister, Israel Katz, said France’s intention to recognize Palestine as a state was a “surrender to terrorism”.

“Instead of standing with Israel in this time of trial, the French president is acting to weaken it,” Katz wrote on X. “We will not allow the establishment of a Palestinian entity that would harm our security, endanger our existence, and undermine our historical right to the Land of Israel. We are all united to prevent this grave danger.”

Another interview from Chotiner, on the aid fiasco.

https://archive.ph/7pbCH

I don't really know what this means or will lead to, but good for France. I haven't bothered to post the 90 deranged things Israel did in the past week (and posting about the absolute horror of starvation in Gaza has felt gross), but their increasingly strident announcements of genocidal intent must be countered somehow. If this was motivated by that vote to annex the West Bank, even better

.@WSJ has given Yaser Abu-Shabab, Israel-backed criminal gang head, a voice to write his opinion.

I will lose my mind. This is an unprecedented dark time of media in history. It’s the darkest. pic.twitter.com/8s31MwKFZY

— Abubaker Abed (@AbubakerAbedW) July 25, 2025

ADL-Backed Bipartisan Bill Threatens to Censor Israel Criticism on Social Media
https://www.commondreams.org/news/adl-bill-censors-israel-criticism

Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) and Don Bacon (R-Neb.) rolled out the bill, called the Stopping Terrorists Online Presence and Holding Accountable Tech Entities (STOP HATE) Act, at a press conference Wednesday, alongside Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).

The bill would mandate that social media companies work with the federal government to implement moderation policies that curb the speech of groups the government designates as "terrorists." They'd be required to provide regular reports to the U.S. attorney general. Those that don't comply would be fined $5 million each day they refuse.

The lawmakers justified the measure by citing some recent examples of overt antisemitism and calls for violence on social media.

...

Bacon also suggested that merely stating opposition to pro-Israel congresspeople, including himself, constitutes antisemitism.

"I even saw an article today. It was about me, but talking about we have to oppose congressmen who are pro-Zionists, right?" said Bacon, who is notably not Jewish. "It's all over our social media and it's unacceptable."

no idea if this is likely to pass. the article mentions the same pair tried in 2023 and failed, though obviously things have changed since then

these people are sick in the head

Trump reiterated today that he wants a thank you note for providing aid to prevent people from starving to death in Gaza

https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3luzlbcby6n27

The New Republic thought of the same Onion headline that I did re MTG invoking genocide in Gaza:

https://newrepublic.com/post/198544/marjorie-taylor-greene-republican-randy-fine-israel-genocide-gaza

The Worst Person You Know Just Made a Good Point on Israel

On X Monday evening, Marjorie Taylor Greene castigated fellow MAGA Republican Representative Randy Fine for denying the starvation crisis in Gaza. She also notably joined the small cohort of members of Congress to describe Israel’s actions in Gaza as a genocide.

Greene’s post came in reaction to Fine’s controversial comments last week, in which he dismissed a report about the starvation of Palestinians in Gaza, including children, as “Muslim terror propaganda.” “Release the hostages,” Fine wrote. “Until then, starve away.”

Greene questioned Fine’s commitment to his constituents in Florida’s 6th congressional district, citing his alleged decision to move with his wife to Washington, D.C., rather than, per Greene’s advice, to “live in the district he will represent.”

“I can only imagine how Florida’s 6th district feels now that their Representative, that they were told to vote for, openly calls for starving innocent people and children,” Greene wrote. “It’s the most truthful and easiest thing to say that Oct 7th in Israel was horrific and all hostages must be returned, but so is the genocide, humanitarian crisis, and starvation happening in Gaza.”

Matt Kennard
Verified

@kennardmatt
BREAKING: End of mission for British spy flights over Gaza for Israel

Shadow R1 which has been flying daily over Gaza is returning from RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus to RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire tonight

I have information showing this marks the end of UK’s spy-for-Israel program

Anne Frank died of typhus. Who is responsible for her death? https://t.co/yGfonMFXr1

— Blair (@__seab) July 30, 2025

wtf that they even feel like they need to add "more context" there — when everyone's starving of course people with already fragile health are going to die first. That's a really great reason not to starve people.

I haven’t followed closely because the situation in the US is so depressing on this subject but are liberals and general shitheads actually pivoting to “what’s happening now is bad” to cover themselves?

they sure are

Kiiiiind of. Every hint of condemnation always has to be prefaced with a lot of throat-clearing about Oct. 7. And none of that is giving anyone pause about continuing to call pro-Palestinian activists antisemites.

The whole media and government and education apparatus though still thinks “this is cool, actually.”

yes, it is abominable. Obama finally saying something is just the tip of the iceberg. No big tent for these fucks, afaic.

Not to defend libs I've been wondering whether the Western public reacts to starvation in a particular way. Maybe since Live Aid (?) this stuff does hit a nerve...

Ofc the videos of burning tents, shootings, ruins and whatever other carnage has also been shocking too.

Civilians were starving two years ago. There were photos of dead and mutilated children two years ago. What changed?

the images of starving children were not as ubiquitous nor dramatic circa 2023. i think that's basically it, sadly.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/carney-canada-recognize-palestinian-state-conditions-1.7597525

in September

They're all at it now.

lol but Canada waiting for France and the UK (well ish I guess) to do it first is vmic

Re the comments above about how "starvation" travels better politically, I thought this was well stated. (Posting a screenshot because it was the easiest way to copy the text.)

https://i.imgur.com/X7kKGCo.png

Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/DMpKRRBs0cE/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

yeah that is otm. it's a failure of education that we tend to think famine as a wholly natural disaster. I think the suggestion that people who lived through the 80s might be particularly affected by photos of starving children fits in here too, as it was years and years later that I learned the 83-85 Ethiopian famine wasn't exclusively the result of drought

that said, I'd like to believe that at least some of the shift might be accounted for by the persistent headlines about aid-seekers being slaughtered as well. of course the fact the US is so directly implicated in that slaughter (the interview vid I posted in the other thread is devastating but very informative) has been largely elided, so I'm not that encouraged

on that note: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/31/the-mathematics-of-starvation-how-israel-caused-a-famine-in-gaza