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Would you dismiss Martin Luther King as an “activist”? But your point is in some ways valid, as it’s important to be able to see Israel through the lens of col

Would you dismiss Martin Luther King as an “activist”? But your point is in some ways valid, as it’s important to be able to see Israel through the lens of colonialism and to show that the state’s brutality applied to brown people of all faiths, including Jews. I also find it really strange that any criticism of Israel is labelled as anti-Semitic. I actually think equating the brutal behaviour of the Israeli government with Judaism is the real anti-semitism. The Tora has exactly zero passages about it being OK to murder children or sterilise black Jewish women.

the_only_law 4y ago
> Would you dismiss Martin Luther King as an “activist”? The word means basically nothing on HN, outside it’s use in political slurring.
ethbr0 4y ago
The central issue with discussions about Israel is a failure to differentiate Israel (the state and government) with Judaism (the religion) with Jew/Hebrew (the ethnicity). (And yes, I realize Israel is a multi-ethnic, multi-religious state, but to a first order approximation and given current political dynamics... it's not) Given that there are relatively few states with as intertwined religions and historical atrocities perpetrated against their people, it makes sense the ability to talk about this is underdeveloped.
- notacoward 4y ago
  > failure to differentiate Israel (the state and government) with Judaism (the religion) with Jew/Hebrew (the ethnicity) That has not been my experience. AFAICT even people who are extremely careful and specific about criticizing the state of Israel - even more specifically the IDF or a political party within Israel responsible for a particular act - still get tarred with the "anti-Semitic" brush. Jewish people have been severely oppressed for centuries, and the state of Israel has been attacked repeatedly. The response has been a strong emphasis on solidarity and mutual support, which is generally laudable, but in some this manifests as militant intolerance of even the tiniest deviation from the (insiders') conventional position. Unfortunately, those few - and I know most Israeli and Jewish people are much more open minded because that has been their tradition for millennia - often end up controlling the debate.
  - throwntoday 4y ago
    >AFAICT even people who are extremely careful and specific about criticizing the state of Israel - even more specifically the IDF or a political party within Israel responsible for a particular act - still get tarred with the "anti-Semitic" brush This is clearly a defense tactic used to avoid criticism and I see it employed heavily by apologist. Criticism in general should be embraced, as nothing is perfect and we can always improve. But in this case, they are well aware of their wrongdoing, which is why they employ such tactics.
    - naravara 4y ago
      > Criticism in general should be embraced, as nothing is perfect and we can always improve. Honestly it depends on how that criticism is framed and who it's being directed towards. It reads differently if the criticism framed as "I care about you and want you to do better" versus "I dislike you and have developed a narrative that justifies mistreating you." It also matters whether the criticism is directed as feedback (e.g. "When you do X it makes me feel Y and I think doing Z would be better") vs. directed towards a third party to intervene in a prosecutorial way.
  - seoaeu 4y ago
    It isn’t enough to focus criticism against a specific individual or narrow group. You also have to consider whether the criticism is justified or echos specific stereotypes For instance, there’s many who feel that some of the criticism against Barack Obama was racist. Not because it isn’t ok to criticize a US president but because prior presidents hadn’t been treated similarly/held to the same standard
    - notacoward 4y ago
      What if someone has consistently criticized other people or governments for comparable behavior? In my experience, it makes absolutely no difference. Even international organizations with rock-solid records of speaking out all over the world get the same treatment. What's the excuse then? It's just guilt by association, only it's not even real association, from people who absolutely should know better.
car_analogy 4y ago
> The Tora has exactly zero passages about it being OK to murder children Now, go and crush Amalek; put him under the curse of destruction with all that he possesses. Do not spare him, but kill man and woman, babe and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and donkey. - 1 Samuel 15 That's one example. The old testament claims God commanded the total extermination of multiple nations competing with the Israelites [1]. This extermination is celebrated to this day during the Purim festival [2]. When someone mentions Judeo-Christian morality, know that the first part of that duo is not remotely "turn the other cheek" - it is literally old testament. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judaism_and_warfare#Wars_of_extermination_in_the_Tanakh_and_Jewish_responses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judaism_and_warfare#Wars_of_ex... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amalek#Jewish_traditions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amalek#Jewish_traditions
- belter 4y ago
  This reminds of something I found quite interesting at the time. "The Holy Quran Experiment": https://youtu.be/zEnWw_lH4tQ https://youtu.be/zEnWw_lH4tQ
- mcv 4y ago
  This might be overly pedantic of me, but Samuel is not part of the Torah. It's part of the Nevi'im.
  - psyc 4y ago
    Here's some classic leadership from Moses. Numbers 31:17 "Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known man by lying with him. But all the young girls who have not known man by lying with him keep alive for yourselves" And from the Big Guy Himself, Deuteronomy 20: "As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves [...] However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy them—the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites" Does that count as one isolated instance, or six? (Just btw: I offer the above merely as a counterexample to a rather glaring claim, not as a criticism of Judaism. Just because I was taught as a small child, by christians, that everyone who disobeys god deserves to die, and if they don't it's solely due to his mercy, doesn't mean everybody contextualizes these passages that way. Also, the term "murder" is slippery because it isn't a synonym of "kill". If you argue an instance of slaughtering people is justified or legal, you can make it "not murder" by mere definition.)
farmerstan 4y ago
maskil 4y ago
Just want to point out that Purim celebrates the rescue of the Jewish people from mass extermination, not the extermination of others. In fact in Jewish tradition Amalek remains a force to this day.
Adverblessly 4y ago
I think you've inadvertently made the case for cancelling the "activit talk". If for example you had a talk in Google Israel that presented the discrimination against Israeli arabs in modern Israel, I suspect you'd get a decent turnout and positive response (especially as Tech is unusually left leaning). If you had a talk that mentioned colonialism (like you do in your post) you'll just get people fruitlessly arguing with each other ("This is our land from 2,000 years ago, the arabs are the colonists", "This is our/your land thanks to a UN decision, settlements that go beyond the 1948/1967 borders are colonialism", "All you jews are colonists"). You'd just end up further dividing your employees into hostile groups, even if they were previously able to work together (by just being silently tolerant of each other's opinions). > I also find it really strange that any criticism of Israel is labelled as anti-Semitic. I think this one is a problem "on both sides". There are some on the Israeli side that will try to silence criticism by equating it to antisemitism. There are some antisemites that will express themselves in the form of "reasonable criticism". There are some that will innocently make some criticism that seems reasonable to them, but due to ignorance of the situation or facts, lack of nuance or just the difficulty of communicating cross culturaly via a limited medium end up with sometimes that seems antisemitic when examined at depth by "the other side". And no matter which way you go, it is very hard to tell where you are.

the_only_law 4y ago

> Would you dismiss Martin Luther King as an “activist”? The word means basically nothing on HN, outside it’s use in political slurring.

ethbr0 4y ago

The central issue with discussions about Israel is a failure to differentiate Israel (the state and government) with Judaism (the religion) with Jew/Hebrew (the ethnicity). (And yes, I realize Israel is a multi-ethnic, multi-religious state, but to a first order approximation and given current political dynamics... it's not) Given that there are relatively few states with as intertwined religions and historical atrocities perpetrated against their people, it makes sense the ability to talk about this is underdeveloped.

notacoward 4y ago
> failure to differentiate Israel (the state and government) with Judaism (the religion) with Jew/Hebrew (the ethnicity) That has not been my experience. AFAICT even people who are extremely careful and specific about criticizing the state of Israel - even more specifically the IDF or a political party within Israel responsible for a particular act - still get tarred with the "anti-Semitic" brush. Jewish people have been severely oppressed for centuries, and the state of Israel has been attacked repeatedly. The response has been a strong emphasis on solidarity and mutual support, which is generally laudable, but in some this manifests as militant intolerance of even the tiniest deviation from the (insiders') conventional position. Unfortunately, those few - and I know most Israeli and Jewish people are much more open minded because that has been their tradition for millennia - often end up controlling the debate.
- throwntoday 4y ago
  >AFAICT even people who are extremely careful and specific about criticizing the state of Israel - even more specifically the IDF or a political party within Israel responsible for a particular act - still get tarred with the "anti-Semitic" brush This is clearly a defense tactic used to avoid criticism and I see it employed heavily by apologist. Criticism in general should be embraced, as nothing is perfect and we can always improve. But in this case, they are well aware of their wrongdoing, which is why they employ such tactics.
  - naravara 4y ago
    > Criticism in general should be embraced, as nothing is perfect and we can always improve. Honestly it depends on how that criticism is framed and who it's being directed towards. It reads differently if the criticism framed as "I care about you and want you to do better" versus "I dislike you and have developed a narrative that justifies mistreating you." It also matters whether the criticism is directed as feedback (e.g. "When you do X it makes me feel Y and I think doing Z would be better") vs. directed towards a third party to intervene in a prosecutorial way.
- seoaeu 4y ago
  It isn’t enough to focus criticism against a specific individual or narrow group. You also have to consider whether the criticism is justified or echos specific stereotypes For instance, there’s many who feel that some of the criticism against Barack Obama was racist. Not because it isn’t ok to criticize a US president but because prior presidents hadn’t been treated similarly/held to the same standard
  - notacoward 4y ago
    What if someone has consistently criticized other people or governments for comparable behavior? In my experience, it makes absolutely no difference. Even international organizations with rock-solid records of speaking out all over the world get the same treatment. What's the excuse then? It's just guilt by association, only it's not even real association, from people who absolutely should know better.

car_analogy 4y ago

> The Tora has exactly zero passages about it being OK to murder children Now, go and crush Amalek; put him under the curse of destruction with all that he possesses. Do not spare him, but kill man and woman, babe and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and donkey. - 1 Samuel 15 That's one example. The old testament claims God commanded the total extermination of multiple nations competing with the Israelites [1]. This extermination is celebrated to this day during the Purim festival [2]. When someone mentions Judeo-Christian morality, know that the first part of that duo is not remotely "turn the other cheek" - it is literally old testament. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judaism_and_warfare#Wars_of_extermination_in_the_Tanakh_and_Jewish_responses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judaism_and_warfare#Wars_of_ex... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amalek#Jewish_traditions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amalek#Jewish_traditions

belter 4y ago
This reminds of something I found quite interesting at the time. "The Holy Quran Experiment": https://youtu.be/zEnWw_lH4tQ https://youtu.be/zEnWw_lH4tQ
mcv 4y ago
This might be overly pedantic of me, but Samuel is not part of the Torah. It's part of the Nevi'im.
- psyc 4y ago
  Here's some classic leadership from Moses. Numbers 31:17 "Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known man by lying with him. But all the young girls who have not known man by lying with him keep alive for yourselves" And from the Big Guy Himself, Deuteronomy 20: "As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves [...] However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy them—the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites" Does that count as one isolated instance, or six? (Just btw: I offer the above merely as a counterexample to a rather glaring claim, not as a criticism of Judaism. Just because I was taught as a small child, by christians, that everyone who disobeys god deserves to die, and if they don't it's solely due to his mercy, doesn't mean everybody contextualizes these passages that way. Also, the term "murder" is slippery because it isn't a synonym of "kill". If you argue an instance of slaughtering people is justified or legal, you can make it "not murder" by mere definition.)

farmerstan 4y ago

maskil 4y ago

Just want to point out that Purim celebrates the rescue of the Jewish people from mass extermination, not the extermination of others. In fact in Jewish tradition Amalek remains a force to this day.

Adverblessly 4y ago

I think you've inadvertently made the case for cancelling the "activit talk". If for example you had a talk in Google Israel that presented the discrimination against Israeli arabs in modern Israel, I suspect you'd get a decent turnout and positive response (especially as Tech is unusually left leaning). If you had a talk that mentioned colonialism (like you do in your post) you'll just get people fruitlessly arguing with each other ("This is our land from 2,000 years ago, the arabs are the colonists", "This is our/your land thanks to a UN decision, settlements that go beyond the 1948/1967 borders are colonialism", "All you jews are colonists"). You'd just end up further dividing your employees into hostile groups, even if they were previously able to work together (by just being silently tolerant of each other's opinions). > I also find it really strange that any criticism of Israel is labelled as anti-Semitic. I think this one is a problem "on both sides". There are some on the Israeli side that will try to silence criticism by equating it to antisemitism. There are some antisemites that will express themselves in the form of "reasonable criticism". There are some that will innocently make some criticism that seems reasonable to them, but due to ignorance of the situation or facts, lack of nuance or just the difficulty of communicating cross culturaly via a limited medium end up with sometimes that seems antisemitic when examined at depth by "the other side". And no matter which way you go, it is very hard to tell where you are.