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The Palestinians? They have not made it clear at all. TMany people living in Gaza, one of the poorest, unsafe, strips of land with the least amount of autonomy

The Palestinians? They have not made it clear at all. TMany people living in Gaza, one of the poorest, unsafe, strips of land with the least amount of autonomy or basic human respect given, don’t have time and energy to focus on a goal of utterly conquering and pushing Israel to the sea. I assume this implies killing all Israelis too? Quite a statement to make about the vast majority of Gaza citizens that can barely survive. — > Either you can afford the defenses you need to exist, or you can't and you stop existing. In no world could Palestine ever stop Israel from existing either. Like: - Kurds or Armenians can’t wipe out Turkey. - Yemenese rebels (Houthi) can’t wipe out Saudi Arabia. - Uyghur’s or Tibet or Hong Kong or Taiwan can’t wipe out China. - Ukraine or Georgia or Bosnia or Crimea can’t wipe out Russia. - Kosovo can’t wipe out Serbia. - Pakistan can’t wipe out India. - IRA or Ireland can’t wipe out Britain. —- Israel is a beautiful place. I enjoyed Tel Aviv quite a bit. I certainly don’t want Israel going anywhere :)

golergka 5y ago
> I assume this implies killing all Israelis too? Yes. > Quite a statement to make about the vast majority of Gaza citizens that can barely survive. Talk to them. Personally, I think that the reason this conflict is so misunderstood in the West is that you guys are just too distant from the cultural norms of the region, and literally can't believe that millions of people could openly and unapologetically be pro-genocide.
- skinnymuch 5y ago
  I have talked to some. You didn’t respond to any other parts of my post. Especially the main point I made of the listing of states in conflict where it is similarly not possible for the smaller side to wipe out the nicer one. The point of that is to show how unreasonable expecting any of those smaller states or people to ever be able to do a serious amount of damage to the stronger power. It is a stretch to say “millions” for Gaza. The population is under 2 million. Technically that is millions. Just want to clarify it means under 2M. It’s also hard to talk to them when I don’t live close by and The 1.8M people in Gaza use the energy equivalent to a town of under 25K people in the US.* * https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electricity_consumption https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electri...
  - golergka 5y ago
    > Especially the main point I made of the listing of states in conflict where it is similarly not possible for the smaller side to wipe out the nicer one. You're conflating the sides of the conflict here. It's not palestinians versus israelis, and it started much earlier than in 20th century. Arabs have already wiped out all the jews from their states already in 1940s — some managed to flee to Israel, but many more were just killed. Yes, Israel managed to build bridges with some arab governments, from Egypt to Saudis, especially lately. But don't conflate government with countries. The majority of arabs all over the muslim world, both Sunni and Shia, despite their internal differences, offer wide popular support to complete genocide of jews.
    - skinnymuch 5y ago
      You’ve most the goal posts and entire discussion. What do Palestinians especially in Gaza, have to do with Arabs as a whole? Your original comment specifically said Palestine. So the topic is Palestine and Israel only. And that’s what it was when I did my comment. Also to note, Arab countries don’t care about Palestine. Egypt actively hurts Palestinians for example. Arab country leadership are awful. Otherwise your comment is a diff topic and isn’t relevant to the treatment, destruction, and deaths of Palestine. > Arabs have already wiped out all the jews from their states already in 1940s — some managed to flee to Israel, but many more were just killed. Do you have any citation for this? I tried looking for numbers. I could not find any besides the general numbers of nearly 1M expelled from Arab countries. Especially the “many more were just killed”.
      - golergka 5y ago
        > What do Palestinians especially in Gaza, have to do with Arabs as a whole? I'm sorry, but I honestly don't see any way of continuing a good faith, productive and civilised discussion after this question. I always try to steelman my opponent's arguments, but I just can't find a way to look at this and not perceive it as trolling.
        skinnymuch 5y ago
- doctorhandshake 5y ago
  I agree with this. I find it amazing that the world expects Israeli leadership to ignore the stated goal of Hamas is to eradicate Israel[1]. Sometimes I ask people to imagine what it would be like if the inhabitants of a large Native American reservation began shelling a nearby US city after openly stating they will not rest until the USA is wiped from the earth. I’m choosing the Native American hypothetical advisedly because I think there are some parallels in the displacement history. To further the analogy, imagine now that the USA is the size of New Jersey, surrounded by states that have attempted also to wipe them out, and that Americans have been enslaved, persecuted, and harried across the globe for thousands of years since leaving New Jersey under duress the most recent time. I’m not a Zionist per se but I get it, and yet I think the formation of modern Israel had a cardinal sin in it, and now Israel is in a bind - threats aside, assuming there was a miraculous peace, allowing Palestinians to participate in Israeli politics _as is in many senses right_ would likely result in a situation in which the Hebrew people lose self-determination and risk being eradicated once again. I think, in response to the most recent Jewish holocaust, the founding mentality of the modern state of Israel was ‘we don’t care what anyone thinks of our methods, we will never be without a land of our own again,’ and, as an American Jew, I hate the way it’s playing out, but I get it. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Covenant https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Covenant
  - skinnymuch 5y ago
    > Sometimes I ask people to imagine what it would be like if the inhabitants of a large Native American reservation began shelling a nearby US city after openly stating they will not rest until the USA is wiped from the earth. This is easy. They have some valid claims in principle. They also have essentially no power or weapons. After the initial surprise. They’d be able to do nothing. Or in effect nothing. If the US then removed autonomy from these Native Americans, kept them locked in, and gave them electricity equivalent for the average American (aka 1 person) for 70 of the Native Americans, and continued this for decades and decades. That would be awful and cruel from the get go. What is this example supposed to show? > To further the analogy, imagine now that the USA is the size of New Jersey, surrounded by states that have attempted also to wipe them out, and that Americans have been enslaved, persecuted, and harried across the globe for thousands of years since leaving New Jersey under duress the most recent time. To extend this. NJ has the backing of the most powerful country in the world and almost every first world country. NJ is also richer and more powerful than any of the neighbors except for the one farther away who coincidentally has their tragedy, that most powerful country ally screwed with their country. This doesn’t make what they country (Iran) does good. Just nuance. The saddest part of this example is leaving out the Palestine. It’s very sad that they don’t even get to be part of the example. Though perhaps it is fitting as the Gaza Strip barely does exist as is. —- Your Israel bind is flawed. Why can’t Israel leave Palestine alone? Why do they have to incorporate Palestine into Israel? Leave the Gaza Strip alone. The one thing that shouldn’t be done is cutting the grass as Israel does now. With that being the current Israel SOP now, it muddies the water because Israel actually benefits from Hamas by having an easy excuse to cut the grass every so often. Your last point is again flawed. As strategies like cutting the grass above, suffocating Gaza Strip, and pushing settlements further and further has nothing to do with that mentality. ———- Sometimes people confuse people like me and assume I have some sort of allegiance or motive. I want harmony as it is possible. Of course the Arab country leadership and unfortunately many of their uneducated and screwed over in their own right citizens have awful reactions and thinking toward Israel. That’s bad. So is the treatment of Gaza Strip or number of Palestinian children who have been causalities in a period of time like this century. Israel being able to remain their own country and be prepared and strong. Nothing wrong with that! Why would there be? There are people born in Israel now who are 3rd generation now. That’s their home. If I thought any differently, that would make no sense and mean I have something against Jewish people or Israel. When I love both as much as any other country or group of people.
flyinglizard 5y ago
The thing about your list of conflict is that all of them involve a minority against an overwhelming majority and fighting over distinct territories. This is about two populations roughly equal in size fighting over the same territory.
- skinnymuch 5y ago
  Kosovo fought with Albania. Albania and Kosovo have a closer population to Serbia than Palestine to Israel. So that situation is even more uneven population wise. And just as ridiculous as just saying Kosovo. Israel has 2x the population and far more land. This is not about fighting for the same territory. The West Bank government and people are not fighting to get Israel. The weak Hamas government can say whatever they want. Do you have any citation or anything that the majority of Gaza citizens want to take over all of Israel, if they could get back control of Gaza for themselves including land settled on? Anecdotally, I have not seen this be the case.
LorenPechtel 5y ago
Gaza used to be the most prosperous Arab nation that didn't have oil. That's not good for recruiting cannon fodder so they launched the second intifada to destroy the economy. They focus on destroying Israel because it brings them money.
- skinnymuch 5y ago
  They? Do you not see how offensive that is to group together 1.7M people like that? When if that same sort of wording happens for almost any other situation, it’s called out as wrong, which it obviously is, very quickly. There is a common dog whistle and coded word sort of stuff especially recently with China. Instead of specify the authoritarian Govt and elite in China, one may say the Chinese used to be X but now they are doing Y to hurt every one. Or: North Korea was doing well before their famine and the Soviet collapse. Or better than the past 30 years. They screwed everything up and now do silly begging for food and silly missile presentations. Almost no North Korean had a say or any power. Even if most of the population has been tricked into believing the powerful In North Korea are doing fine when they are doing evil things. It’s clear that saying “they” is wrong. The responsible are the elite few in North Korea. —- If it isn’t clear. I believe Hamas sucks. Iran sucks for backing them.
  - nradov 5y ago
    Palestinians literally elected Hamas in a democratic election. So actions by Hamas apparently represent the will of the people. That's hardly comparable to China and North Korea, which are authoritarian dictatorships where the governments were never elected.
    - ocschwar 5y ago
      WHile true, it's worth remembering that Hamas has not submitted to new elections in quite some time.
    - skinnymuch 5y ago
      Palestinians did that under desperation 15+ years ago. No elections since then. Would you call it democratic still if we didnt hold Senate, House, or Presidential elections in the US for the next 15 years?

golergka 5y ago

> I assume this implies killing all Israelis too? Yes. > Quite a statement to make about the vast majority of Gaza citizens that can barely survive. Talk to them. Personally, I think that the reason this conflict is so misunderstood in the West is that you guys are just too distant from the cultural norms of the region, and literally can't believe that millions of people could openly and unapologetically be pro-genocide.

skinnymuch 5y ago
I have talked to some. You didn’t respond to any other parts of my post. Especially the main point I made of the listing of states in conflict where it is similarly not possible for the smaller side to wipe out the nicer one. The point of that is to show how unreasonable expecting any of those smaller states or people to ever be able to do a serious amount of damage to the stronger power. It is a stretch to say “millions” for Gaza. The population is under 2 million. Technically that is millions. Just want to clarify it means under 2M. It’s also hard to talk to them when I don’t live close by and The 1.8M people in Gaza use the energy equivalent to a town of under 25K people in the US.* * https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electricity_consumption https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electri...
- golergka 5y ago
  > Especially the main point I made of the listing of states in conflict where it is similarly not possible for the smaller side to wipe out the nicer one. You're conflating the sides of the conflict here. It's not palestinians versus israelis, and it started much earlier than in 20th century. Arabs have already wiped out all the jews from their states already in 1940s — some managed to flee to Israel, but many more were just killed. Yes, Israel managed to build bridges with some arab governments, from Egypt to Saudis, especially lately. But don't conflate government with countries. The majority of arabs all over the muslim world, both Sunni and Shia, despite their internal differences, offer wide popular support to complete genocide of jews.
  - skinnymuch 5y ago
    You’ve most the goal posts and entire discussion. What do Palestinians especially in Gaza, have to do with Arabs as a whole? Your original comment specifically said Palestine. So the topic is Palestine and Israel only. And that’s what it was when I did my comment. Also to note, Arab countries don’t care about Palestine. Egypt actively hurts Palestinians for example. Arab country leadership are awful. Otherwise your comment is a diff topic and isn’t relevant to the treatment, destruction, and deaths of Palestine. > Arabs have already wiped out all the jews from their states already in 1940s — some managed to flee to Israel, but many more were just killed. Do you have any citation for this? I tried looking for numbers. I could not find any besides the general numbers of nearly 1M expelled from Arab countries. Especially the “many more were just killed”.
    - golergka 5y ago
      > What do Palestinians especially in Gaza, have to do with Arabs as a whole? I'm sorry, but I honestly don't see any way of continuing a good faith, productive and civilised discussion after this question. I always try to steelman my opponent's arguments, but I just can't find a way to look at this and not perceive it as trolling.
      - skinnymuch 5y ago
doctorhandshake 5y ago
I agree with this. I find it amazing that the world expects Israeli leadership to ignore the stated goal of Hamas is to eradicate Israel[1]. Sometimes I ask people to imagine what it would be like if the inhabitants of a large Native American reservation began shelling a nearby US city after openly stating they will not rest until the USA is wiped from the earth. I’m choosing the Native American hypothetical advisedly because I think there are some parallels in the displacement history. To further the analogy, imagine now that the USA is the size of New Jersey, surrounded by states that have attempted also to wipe them out, and that Americans have been enslaved, persecuted, and harried across the globe for thousands of years since leaving New Jersey under duress the most recent time. I’m not a Zionist per se but I get it, and yet I think the formation of modern Israel had a cardinal sin in it, and now Israel is in a bind - threats aside, assuming there was a miraculous peace, allowing Palestinians to participate in Israeli politics _as is in many senses right_ would likely result in a situation in which the Hebrew people lose self-determination and risk being eradicated once again. I think, in response to the most recent Jewish holocaust, the founding mentality of the modern state of Israel was ‘we don’t care what anyone thinks of our methods, we will never be without a land of our own again,’ and, as an American Jew, I hate the way it’s playing out, but I get it. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Covenant https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Covenant
- skinnymuch 5y ago
  > Sometimes I ask people to imagine what it would be like if the inhabitants of a large Native American reservation began shelling a nearby US city after openly stating they will not rest until the USA is wiped from the earth. This is easy. They have some valid claims in principle. They also have essentially no power or weapons. After the initial surprise. They’d be able to do nothing. Or in effect nothing. If the US then removed autonomy from these Native Americans, kept them locked in, and gave them electricity equivalent for the average American (aka 1 person) for 70 of the Native Americans, and continued this for decades and decades. That would be awful and cruel from the get go. What is this example supposed to show? > To further the analogy, imagine now that the USA is the size of New Jersey, surrounded by states that have attempted also to wipe them out, and that Americans have been enslaved, persecuted, and harried across the globe for thousands of years since leaving New Jersey under duress the most recent time. To extend this. NJ has the backing of the most powerful country in the world and almost every first world country. NJ is also richer and more powerful than any of the neighbors except for the one farther away who coincidentally has their tragedy, that most powerful country ally screwed with their country. This doesn’t make what they country (Iran) does good. Just nuance. The saddest part of this example is leaving out the Palestine. It’s very sad that they don’t even get to be part of the example. Though perhaps it is fitting as the Gaza Strip barely does exist as is. —- Your Israel bind is flawed. Why can’t Israel leave Palestine alone? Why do they have to incorporate Palestine into Israel? Leave the Gaza Strip alone. The one thing that shouldn’t be done is cutting the grass as Israel does now. With that being the current Israel SOP now, it muddies the water because Israel actually benefits from Hamas by having an easy excuse to cut the grass every so often. Your last point is again flawed. As strategies like cutting the grass above, suffocating Gaza Strip, and pushing settlements further and further has nothing to do with that mentality. ———- Sometimes people confuse people like me and assume I have some sort of allegiance or motive. I want harmony as it is possible. Of course the Arab country leadership and unfortunately many of their uneducated and screwed over in their own right citizens have awful reactions and thinking toward Israel. That’s bad. So is the treatment of Gaza Strip or number of Palestinian children who have been causalities in a period of time like this century. Israel being able to remain their own country and be prepared and strong. Nothing wrong with that! Why would there be? There are people born in Israel now who are 3rd generation now. That’s their home. If I thought any differently, that would make no sense and mean I have something against Jewish people or Israel. When I love both as much as any other country or group of people.

flyinglizard 5y ago

The thing about your list of conflict is that all of them involve a minority against an overwhelming majority and fighting over distinct territories. This is about two populations roughly equal in size fighting over the same territory.

skinnymuch 5y ago
Kosovo fought with Albania. Albania and Kosovo have a closer population to Serbia than Palestine to Israel. So that situation is even more uneven population wise. And just as ridiculous as just saying Kosovo. Israel has 2x the population and far more land. This is not about fighting for the same territory. The West Bank government and people are not fighting to get Israel. The weak Hamas government can say whatever they want. Do you have any citation or anything that the majority of Gaza citizens want to take over all of Israel, if they could get back control of Gaza for themselves including land settled on? Anecdotally, I have not seen this be the case.

LorenPechtel 5y ago

Gaza used to be the most prosperous Arab nation that didn't have oil. That's not good for recruiting cannon fodder so they launched the second intifada to destroy the economy. They focus on destroying Israel because it brings them money.

skinnymuch 5y ago
They? Do you not see how offensive that is to group together 1.7M people like that? When if that same sort of wording happens for almost any other situation, it’s called out as wrong, which it obviously is, very quickly. There is a common dog whistle and coded word sort of stuff especially recently with China. Instead of specify the authoritarian Govt and elite in China, one may say the Chinese used to be X but now they are doing Y to hurt every one. Or: North Korea was doing well before their famine and the Soviet collapse. Or better than the past 30 years. They screwed everything up and now do silly begging for food and silly missile presentations. Almost no North Korean had a say or any power. Even if most of the population has been tricked into believing the powerful In North Korea are doing fine when they are doing evil things. It’s clear that saying “they” is wrong. The responsible are the elite few in North Korea. —- If it isn’t clear. I believe Hamas sucks. Iran sucks for backing them.
- nradov 5y ago
  Palestinians literally elected Hamas in a democratic election. So actions by Hamas apparently represent the will of the people. That's hardly comparable to China and North Korea, which are authoritarian dictatorships where the governments were never elected.
  - ocschwar 5y ago
    WHile true, it's worth remembering that Hamas has not submitted to new elections in quite some time.
  - skinnymuch 5y ago
    Palestinians did that under desperation 15+ years ago. No elections since then. Would you call it democratic still if we didnt hold Senate, House, or Presidential elections in the US for the next 15 years?