I find it weird that newspapers characterize students as being “pro-Palestinian” as opposed to anti whatever you call this.
@davidho I found this article by Prof Amos Goldberg (translated from the Hebrew) very helpful and though soul destroying at one level it explains with clarity how the IDF and the pro-IDF media can manipulate events to justify their actions because it is not an exact replication of the holocaust of 1939-45.
https://thepalestineproject.medium.com/yes-it-is-genocide-634a07ea27d4
@davidho But they're not strictly opposed to "this" because if they were, they'd also care about this (in Sudan): https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/AP23119521787089-1684220570.jpg?fit=1170%2C780&quality=80
Or this in Haiti: https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2023/02/11/dance-19-bd7fa3a47ed56567b5a2a02e60f0386738ab1c06.jpg?s=1200&c=85&f=webp
@davidho It is Hamas that caused this, that horrifyingly profits from this, and that continues to cause it by repeatedly refusing Israel‘s offers for a ceasefire.
@davidho They wave Palestinian flags, wear Palestinian keffiyas, and chant slogans about Palestine. They never criticize Palestinian or Hamas actions like operating from schools and hospitals, placing military installations in and under residential areas and humanitarian agencies. Calls for ceasefires are never for bilateral agreements, only for Israel. There is no demand to Hamas for return of hostages, allowing Red Cross access to hostages. They have clearly chosen a side, so it is accurate.
@davidho If they were "antiwar" protesters, you would hear the occasional call for Hamas to stop indiscriminately lobbing rockets at civilian Israeli targets, or criticism of Iran and Hezbollah and the Houthis for their opportunistic attacks (also directed at civilians). Or perhaps condemnation of the large number of Palestinian civilians who joined the attacks on Oct 7. The violent slogans and symbols employed are not antiwar, but rather the slogans of one party in the war. The name is apt.
@davidho There are no calls to divest from Qatar, the financial base of one side of this conflict and the country who harbors its violent leaders.
On the other hand, there is also no call for action against Syria, who is currently attacking Palestinian refugee camps and killing Palestinians. Similarly, there is no call to boycott Egypt, which closes its border to Palestinian refugees and is Israel's partner in keeping Gaza cut off. So maybe they aren't as pro-Palestinian as they claim to be.
@davidho Honestly, the "this" you show a picture of is awful. But it is not what they are protesting. Your "this" could just as easily be a picture of Mauriopul or Khartoum taken on the same day, and they are not mentioning any of that. They are not generically protesting the "this" in your picture. They are demonstrating in support of one side in one particular conflict and not making a general statement war or about anything else. It is entirely accurate to describe them as "pro-Palestinian".
@richard_merren Get the fuck outta here with that bullshit
@richard_merren @pixplz People like you are the main problem with the world today 🖤 Please do better 🖤
@HarastaEva
You really need to read up on the Nakba and history of the US and Israel’s actions in the region. Decades of occupation, oppression, apartheid, land stealing and literal murder does not lend itself to peace. Israel is not the hero of this story.
@Mogleg @davidho You mentioning the word „apartheid“ makes me wonder if you know that there are around 2,080,000 Arab Israelis who live as integrated Israeli citizens in the state of Israel (21.1% of the overall population), and if you know that there are Arab Israelis among the victims of the October 7 attack (both among the people who were murdered and among the people who were taken hostage).
By these sentences, I do not justify or defend Israeli settlement policy in the West Bank.
The word „apartheid“ is a polemical marker when applied to Israel. As is „occupation“ when it is used to put the legitimacy of the state of Israel in question. (I cannot tell by your brief statement whether you mean this.)
The October 7 attack was murderous. It was the worst pogrom since 1945. And it happened in Israel.
I do not think anyone or any entity is a hero. I think looking for a hero, or for the heroic cause, is not helpful at all.
@HarastaEva @Mogleg @davidho Arab Israelis are definitely treated as second class citizens within Israel. Non-IDF veterans are excluded from many professions, and Arab Israelis are not allowed to serve in the IDF.
Meanwhile the government of the Mandatory Palestine was set up by the same British imperial bureaucrats who set up Apartheid in South Africa. It’s entirely appropriate to refer to Israel as an Apartheid state. Why do you think they were the last allies of Apartheid South Africa?
@escarpment @davidho Lots of people have been cheering the Houthis for doing that blockade, ostensibly for the sake of Palestinians, but the blockade has been preventing aid shipments from reaching Darfur…so it’s even worse than you suggest, sometimes.