President Biden attended a fundraiser in San Francisco late Wednesday where protesters showed up calling for an end to US aid for Israel and a cease-fire in its ongoing war in Gaza.
They can protest, but to disrupt the fundraiser is the stupidest thing they can do. And democrats do not support genocide - they do not think that what happens in Gaza is genocide.
I disagree. The situation is not simple and one sided. For example, I can easily say that if you are for immediate cease fire, then you are for Hamas staying in power. And Hamas does openly state that they would like to destroy all Jews in Israel and Israel itself, and in fact were showing how they would do it by recent events. Basically Hamas official policy is Jewish genocide. So, that makes you genocide supporter, right?
Not at all, Hamas rejects Israel’s right to exist and that is what they have been aiming for since 1987 with the funding of Qatar. So in essence, you now find yourselves in a dissonant situation. While calling for Israel to cease defending itself, you are enabling a genocide of the Israeli people.
Incorrect. Let me ask you a question, Have you ever argued with a religious fundamentalist, and no matter how logical or devastating your argument is (or may seem), they just double down, dig in their heels and do worse? Well…you guys really should start to think.
That “source” dives straight into debunked Israeli propaganda. From repeatedly claiming Hamas took control of Gaza by force to repeating the debunked claim about beheaded babies. Then it ignores anything written after the year 2000.
It buries the fact that Hamas won election more than ten paragraphs down. As if to provide the author a defense of having mentioned it.
They also completely neglect to mention Hamas won that election on a moderate platform and was immediately attacked by Israel, physically and politically, for doing so. When the result of a moderate, anti-corruption, party winning is an immediate de facto declaration of war, I don’t see how anyone can objectively claim Hamas as the oppressor.
Now to the current situation. Israel should be dissolved. The commission of a genocide is beyond the rights of any state and is a clear sign they cannot be trusted partners in peace. The only right answer is a UN transition government to a representative democracy that gives everyone rights to vote and bars the military from acting inside the borders of the successor state.
Let’s not pretend that destroying Israel means just dissolving the state. Hamas quite clearly demonstrated this with recent attack aimed to brutally kill 1000+ of civilian Jews.
Hamas continues reflecting legitimacy of Israel, it never recognized it. Read any encyclopedia entry on Hamas. Sure, they would like to get all the land according to 1967 agreement, but they do not promise to recognize Israel even then.
I reject the legitimacy of Israel. It was built on terrorism, won a few wars, had a chance to create a stable solution and passed, and is now an Apartheid state at best.
Not recognizing Israel doesn’t mean anything else. It’s the diplomatic version of pretending someone is invisible.
It denies right to exist. It is not “invisibility game”. It has direct goal to erase the state and people in it. Hamas actions directly confirm it. For years it attacked civilian population with the goal of eradicate it. They are openly stating this the same multiple times themselves. They are showing it in their murderous actions and you pretend that it is some kind of “invisibility game”? Just Google “Hamas statements about Israel right to exist”. They want to physically destroy it. Jezus!
Edit: Also, your double standards appalling: you reject Israel legitimacy because 70years ago they used terrorism tactics to get rid of Brits. But you seems totaly OK with Hamas today.
I have never said I was okay with terrorists. You can have those words back. And the charter means exactly what it says. We didn’t commit genocide when we denied Saddam’s Iraq or Hitler’s Germany an existence. And not recognizing a state has a known international meaning. No amount of word salad trying to conflate terrorist attacks with genocide can undo that.
The goal of Hamas, stated many times, is to destroy Israel. Hamas actions are terrorism. Hamas goal is genocide aimed against one specific group of people. Your example of WW2 is actually a good one. It was not a genocide despite of the fact that Allies bombed essentially to zero cities like Dresden. Allies goal was to remove Nazi from power. Israel goal is to remove Hamas from power. So, what’s the difference?
I can easily say that if you are for immediate cease fire,
“But did they CoNdEmN Hamas?!” has gotten quite worn out. The answer is… nobody except Hamas is for Hamas. Most people have condemned hamas. Most people are not for Hamas, and that argument only holds water with people that have already decided to support genocide.
Just gonna say: Hamas’s official policy is that a two-state solution would be enough as accomplishment of their goals. That aside, even if Hamas goes away someone worse will take their place. To steal a random quote from the internet: The next generation of Palestinian terrorists/freedom fighters will think and do things that will make ISIS look like peace-loving hippies.
I am not claiming that ALL democrats do that. Those who support Israel do not think that this is genocide. Better?
I think the use of word genocide in this context is just scoring easy political points, honestly. What is happening there is not standard situation, but it does not look even remotely close to the genocide where everybody agrees that it is genocide.
It is effectively genocide. While it’s true they aren’t specifically trying to wipe out everyone that’s ethnically Palestinian, what they are trying to do is remove everyone living in Palestine who isn’t Israeli either by murdering them or causing them to flee into another country. That’s close enough to genocide to qualify, particularly when the people murdered by the Israeli army are about half women and children.
Their ultimate goal is the complete elimination of the state of Palestine. Are you seriously going to claim that isn’t genocide?
@MxM111 much better thanks! Sorry for the misunderstanding.
As for political points though, I don’t see why you think no one is in earnest in this context.
The reason I call it a genocide is because in my honest opinion it meets Raphael Lemkin’s definition of genocide. Increasingly I believe it is appearing to meet the definitions used in international law.
I have a longstanding interest in human rights, including genocide prevention. As you can probably see from my post history - especially in @worldwithoutus - I’m interested in a wide range of human rights crises in the world today.
[Genocide] refers to a coordinated plan aimed at destruction of the essential foundations of the life of national groups so that these groups wither and die like plants that have suffered a blight. The end may be accomplished by the forced disintegration of political and social institutions, of the culture of the people, of their language, their national feelings and their religion. It may be accomplished by wiping out all basis of personal security, liberty, health and dignity. When these means fail the machine gun can always be utilized as a last resort. Genocide is directed against a national group as an entity and the attack on individuals is only secondary to the annihilation of the national group to which they belong. 1946. Raphael Lemkin
I can easily see arguments that this situation is not applicable here. Israel stated goal is security, return of the hostages and Hamas destruction. (Hamas on the other side openly state destructions of Israel and Jews “from the river to the sea” as its one of the main goals, i.e. actual genocide). None of this fits into above definition. And while it is true that there are members of parliament from ultra right that want to do ethnic cleansing (but not genocide) this is not official position.
So, again, I will argue that calling this complex situation genocide is an easy political point scoring. Does not help discussion of the actual problem.
can easily see arguments that this situation is not applicable here. Israel stated goal is security, return of the hostages and Hamas destruction.
Who cares about their stated goals? Judge by their actions, and their actions are:
An artificially induced famine, with a quarter of the population suffering from acute food shortage.
Rape, torture and kidnapping (and of course wanton murder) of Gazans in the territories they’ve managed to capture.
Murder of at least more than 1% of the population. More likely much more because the hospitals who are supposed to count dead people aren’t functioning anymore, and there are still people buried under rubble.
Etc etc.
And then they’ve stated that they’ll make fucking “deradicalization camps”. This is official Israeli policy coming from the mouth of Netanyahu himself. Total victory is sounding awfully close to a final solution now.
@MxM111 I don’t find your arguments convincing. Incidentally, Hamas’s own genocidal intentions are irelevant to the argument about whether Israel is carrying out a de facto genocide against Palestinian civilians.
Out of interest what is the “political point” that you think I, as a non-American from the other side of the world, would even be making?
I don’t even subscribe in here, as I’m not interested in the minutia of US politics, it came up on All. As far as I can tell, unfortunately the bulk of both your main parties support and aid what Israel is doing.
Which right now happens to be a genocide that it’s everyone’s duty as a human being, to try to stop.
They can protest, but to disrupt the fundraiser is the stupidest thing they can do. And democrats do not support genocide - they do not think that what happens in Gaza is genocide.
So… why is biden flaking for aid?
Why does the senate refuse to consider a Ukraine funding bill without Israel aid? why do most democrats support funding Israel?
Sure seems like most politicians support israel.
Have a look at this.
So protest, as long as it doesn’t disrupt anything?
Anything? Did I say that disruption was a problem? No. The stupidity is that by their action they make Trump election more likely.
Biden’s support for genocide makes Trump’s election more likely. The protesters want him to stop.
If they don’t think it’s genocide they are choosing to turn a blind eye.
I disagree. The situation is not simple and one sided. For example, I can easily say that if you are for immediate cease fire, then you are for Hamas staying in power. And Hamas does openly state that they would like to destroy all Jews in Israel and Israel itself, and in fact were showing how they would do it by recent events. Basically Hamas official policy is Jewish genocide. So, that makes you genocide supporter, right?
Hamas’ official policy is to accept the 1967 borders and a two state solution. It seems like you have a problem separating reality from propaganda.
Not at all, Hamas rejects Israel’s right to exist and that is what they have been aiming for since 1987 with the funding of Qatar. So in essence, you now find yourselves in a dissonant situation. While calling for Israel to cease defending itself, you are enabling a genocide of the Israeli people.
Since the Israeli’s are being genocided, wouldn’t that be a good reason for a ceasefire?
Go protest Hamas and tell me how far that gets you.
Why? Protesting Israel achieves the same goal.
Incorrect. Let me ask you a question, Have you ever argued with a religious fundamentalist, and no matter how logical or devastating your argument is (or may seem), they just double down, dig in their heels and do worse? Well…you guys really should start to think.
That “source” dives straight into debunked Israeli propaganda. From repeatedly claiming Hamas took control of Gaza by force to repeating the debunked claim about beheaded babies. Then it ignores anything written after the year 2000.
It buries the fact that Hamas won election more than ten paragraphs down. As if to provide the author a defense of having mentioned it.
They also completely neglect to mention Hamas won that election on a moderate platform and was immediately attacked by Israel, physically and politically, for doing so. When the result of a moderate, anti-corruption, party winning is an immediate de facto declaration of war, I don’t see how anyone can objectively claim Hamas as the oppressor.
Now to the current situation. Israel should be dissolved. The commission of a genocide is beyond the rights of any state and is a clear sign they cannot be trusted partners in peace. The only right answer is a UN transition government to a representative democracy that gives everyone rights to vote and bars the military from acting inside the borders of the successor state.
Now who openly calls for genocide?
Israel is a country. Dissolving a country and putting a regional transition government in place is not a genocide.
But I’m not surprised you’d try to associate it as such.
Let’s not pretend that destroying Israel means just dissolving the state. Hamas quite clearly demonstrated this with recent attack aimed to brutally kill 1000+ of civilian Jews.
Nice to know you think West Point is propaganda Do you also think gravity is fake?
If Harvard came out and said there were 5G microchips in vaccines I would press F to doubt too.
Hamas continues reflecting legitimacy of Israel, it never recognized it. Read any encyclopedia entry on Hamas. Sure, they would like to get all the land according to 1967 agreement, but they do not promise to recognize Israel even then.
I reject the legitimacy of Israel. It was built on terrorism, won a few wars, had a chance to create a stable solution and passed, and is now an Apartheid state at best.
Not recognizing Israel doesn’t mean anything else. It’s the diplomatic version of pretending someone is invisible.
It denies right to exist. It is not “invisibility game”. It has direct goal to erase the state and people in it. Hamas actions directly confirm it. For years it attacked civilian population with the goal of eradicate it. They are openly stating this the same multiple times themselves. They are showing it in their murderous actions and you pretend that it is some kind of “invisibility game”? Just Google “Hamas statements about Israel right to exist”. They want to physically destroy it. Jezus!
Edit: Also, your double standards appalling: you reject Israel legitimacy because 70years ago they used terrorism tactics to get rid of Brits. But you seems totaly OK with Hamas today.
I have never said I was okay with terrorists. You can have those words back. And the charter means exactly what it says. We didn’t commit genocide when we denied Saddam’s Iraq or Hitler’s Germany an existence. And not recognizing a state has a known international meaning. No amount of word salad trying to conflate terrorist attacks with genocide can undo that.
The goal of Hamas, stated many times, is to destroy Israel. Hamas actions are terrorism. Hamas goal is genocide aimed against one specific group of people. Your example of WW2 is actually a good one. It was not a genocide despite of the fact that Allies bombed essentially to zero cities like Dresden. Allies goal was to remove Nazi from power. Israel goal is to remove Hamas from power. So, what’s the difference?
“But did they CoNdEmN Hamas?!” has gotten quite worn out. The answer is… nobody except Hamas is for Hamas. Most people have condemned hamas. Most people are not for Hamas, and that argument only holds water with people that have already decided to support genocide.
Just gonna say: Hamas’s official policy is that a two-state solution would be enough as accomplishment of their goals. That aside, even if Hamas goes away someone worse will take their place. To steal a random quote from the internet: The next generation of Palestinian terrorists/freedom fighters will think and do things that will make ISIS look like peace-loving hippies.
This is what happens when you give no accountability to an ENTIRE NATION. They devolve into a country of Donald Trumps.
The difference of threat levels of Hamas compared to Israelis is night and day.
@MxM111 that’s the No True Scotsman fallacy.
You’re basically claiming that no one who is “really” a US democrat is calling out the Gaza conflict as a genocide. But plenty are.
He’s claiming that if Democrats support it, it’s not genocide.
Way to distort my words!
If you’re pretending that Netanyahu isn’t committing genocide, your words are already distorted.
I am not claiming that ALL democrats do that. Those who support Israel do not think that this is genocide. Better?
I think the use of word genocide in this context is just scoring easy political points, honestly. What is happening there is not standard situation, but it does not look even remotely close to the genocide where everybody agrees that it is genocide.
It is effectively genocide. While it’s true they aren’t specifically trying to wipe out everyone that’s ethnically Palestinian, what they are trying to do is remove everyone living in Palestine who isn’t Israeli either by murdering them or causing them to flee into another country. That’s close enough to genocide to qualify, particularly when the people murdered by the Israeli army are about half women and children.
Their ultimate goal is the complete elimination of the state of Palestine. Are you seriously going to claim that isn’t genocide?
Uh no. Everyone except the US and friends consider this to be a genocide. The UN definition is easily met.
@MxM111 much better thanks! Sorry for the misunderstanding.
As for political points though, I don’t see why you think no one is in earnest in this context.
The reason I call it a genocide is because in my honest opinion it meets Raphael Lemkin’s definition of genocide. Increasingly I believe it is appearing to meet the definitions used in international law.
I have a longstanding interest in human rights, including genocide prevention. As you can probably see from my post history - especially in @worldwithoutus - I’m interested in a wide range of human rights crises in the world today.
I can easily see arguments that this situation is not applicable here. Israel stated goal is security, return of the hostages and Hamas destruction. (Hamas on the other side openly state destructions of Israel and Jews “from the river to the sea” as its one of the main goals, i.e. actual genocide). None of this fits into above definition. And while it is true that there are members of parliament from ultra right that want to do ethnic cleansing (but not genocide) this is not official position.
So, again, I will argue that calling this complex situation genocide is an easy political point scoring. Does not help discussion of the actual problem.
Who cares about their stated goals? Judge by their actions, and their actions are:
An artificially induced famine, with a quarter of the population suffering from acute food shortage.
Rape, torture and kidnapping (and of course wanton murder) of Gazans in the territories they’ve managed to capture.
Murder of at least more than 1% of the population. More likely much more because the hospitals who are supposed to count dead people aren’t functioning anymore, and there are still people buried under rubble.
Etc etc.
And then they’ve stated that they’ll make fucking “deradicalization camps”. This is official Israeli policy coming from the mouth of Netanyahu himself. Total victory is sounding awfully close to a final solution now.
In order to be called genocide goals are crucial. If you are saying that it does not fit definition of genocide, then don’t use this word.
@MxM111 I don’t find your arguments convincing. Incidentally, Hamas’s own genocidal intentions are irelevant to the argument about whether Israel is carrying out a de facto genocide against Palestinian civilians.
Out of interest what is the “political point” that you think I, as a non-American from the other side of the world, would even be making?
I don’t even subscribe in here, as I’m not interested in the minutia of US politics, it came up on All. As far as I can tell, unfortunately the bulk of both your main parties support and aid what Israel is doing.
Which right now happens to be a genocide that it’s everyone’s duty as a human being, to try to stop.