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Thank you, Dang. As someone on the Israeli left I feel like I'm between a rock and a hard place- I do not condone Netanyahu and his government and am indeed ve

by ido 3y ago

Thank you, Dang. As someone on the Israeli left I feel like I'm between a rock and a hard place- I do not condone Netanyahu and his government and am indeed very critical of Israeli governments of the past decades. But on the other side, my 78 year old mother is fleeing to shelter every couple hours as my hometown (not anywhere near the west bank or the Gaza strip) gets hit by rockets, as do my young nieces and nephews, some of which developed psychological issues from the stress. And the stories from what people experienced on the October 7th attacks wrench my gut. At the same time I'm also sorry for the Palestinians suffering during this war, the vast majority of them civilians. I wish instead of people treating it like a football match where you to support "your side", they could process the nuance of opposing any violence towards civilians and support peace (with the goal of a two state solution with Israel and Palestine co-existing according to the 1967 borders and UN resolution 242). IMO this would require that both Netanyahu and Hamas do not stay in power.

mqp 3y ago
It wouldn't just require a change of leaders. It would require an end to apartheid against Palestinians. It would require the colonist settlement of Israel giving back all it's land to the Palestinians. It would require all those involved being brought in front of the ICC for war crimes, genocide and ethnic cleansing.
bryanlarsen 3y ago
In your opinion what are the chances of having an early election to replace Netanyahu? AFAICT it requires a non-confidence vote in the Knesset, but how likely do you think this could happen?
- reissbaker 3y ago
  Not the OP but Netanyahu is living on borrowed time — he won't be replaced in the middle of the war, but even Likud is having private talks about who replaces him once it's over. I would give very high probability that he is replaced well before his term is up.
  - drc500free 3y ago
    Unfortunately, given Bibi's single-minded focus on staying in power, "he won't be replaced in the middle of the war" guarantees that he will try to make this a forever war.
    - __blockcipher__ 3y ago
      I'm curious if pressure from the US ever mounts enough to end this war. Currently we're supporting Israel just like we always have and are just making some empty statements to signal to the more left-leaning segment of the Democrat voter base. I think it's most likely this reality continues, but it does seem possible, albeit unlikely, that Democrat voter discontent gets high enough that we force an end to the war in the next two months. Of course, even if that somewhat far-fetched scenario comes true we'll probably be up to at least 40,000 Gazans killed :/
    - Qem 3y ago
      > "he won't be replaced in the middle of the war" guarantees that he will try to make this a forever war. He's already in escalation with Lebanon: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/12/10/violence-escalates-between-israel-and-lebanons-hezbollah-amid-gaza-assault https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/12/10/violence-escalates...
      - reissbaker 3y ago
        That actually sounds like Lebanon is attempting to escalate by hitting Israel with drone attacks.
    - reissbaker 3y ago
      IMO he doesn't have the votes in the Knesset to do it, and the US is already applying significant pressure to wrap it up soon. Not to mention the Israeli economy can't take the workforce drain to sustain the war at this level for much longer. He doesn't have forever, whether he likes it or not.
- ido 3y ago
  I think it's close to 100% that we will have an early election, as he can't placate his right-extremist coalition partners on which his government depends. I would guess we'd be up to a 2024 elections.
- edanm 3y ago
  I'll be a bit more pessimistic than others here. Netanyahu knows that elections won't go favorably for him, but he's very smart and has survived this long - and he's still in charge; he'll be putting a lot of effort towards fending off early elections, certainly until he can show some win for Israel here (not that I think it's possible at this point). We're also in a situation where he knows that dragging out the war might be the best strategy for him personally, which worries me greatly.
dang 3y ago
I've been in touch with several Israeli HNers who are in much the same position as you describe, and I admire their, and your, capacity to stay open despite being under orders of magnitude more pressure than most of us here. This is the spirit I'm asking for commenters to find in themselves before posting. (Edit: Lest this seem like an expression of bias: I've been in touch with HNers on the other side of the conflict as well and can say similar things about them.)
- stoorafa 3y ago
  You’ve been in touch with Palestinians use HN? Not to seem one-sided, I didn’t realize Gazans had sufficient internet access, let alone food or water, to browse HN.
  - ido 3y ago
    I've been in contact with Palestinians, you may be aware of millions of them living abroad (same as Israelis, like myself) and millions more living in the west bank (the total Palestinian population world-wide numbers 14.3 million, Gaza only houses 2.3M). You don't have to be on ground zero in Gaza to be a Palestinian.
  - dang 3y ago
    When I said "HNers on the other side of the conflict" I had in mind users who aren't necessarily Palestinians but have strong identification with their plight. However, it's worth saying that HN has some valued members in Gaza (as well as in the West Bank, of course, and Palestinians in other places). Here's one memorable example: https://news.ycombinator.com/posts?id=daliaawad https://news.ycombinator.com/posts?id=daliaawad, My experience as a Gazan girl getting into Silicon Valley companies - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26251143 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26251143 - Feb 2021 (460 comments). Someone who knows Dalia has been in touch with us, but at least at that time, they unfortunately had lost contact with her and don't know if she's still alive. Also this YC startup: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25849054 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25849054 - Jan 2021 (104 comments) --- Some other threads over the years (I just looked up Gaza, of course there are also many Palestinians on HN from the West Bank and other places): Lifehacker: Tarek Loubani on 3D-Printing in Gaza - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20623545 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20623545 - Aug 2019 (68 comments) Gaza: Coding in a conflict zone - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18128432 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18128432 - Oct 2018 (88 comments) Marc Benioff joins Valley notables backing Gaza’s first coding academy - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13374027 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13374027 - Jan 2017 (137 comments) How to Get More Women in Tech: Lessons from a Hackathon in Gaza - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13240777 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13240777 - Dec 2016 (12 comments) Mentoring in Gaza's first hackathon - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11858963 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11858963 - June 2016 (152 comments) Mentor startups in Gaza - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9267716 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9267716 - March 2015 (63 comments) Wireless in Gaza: the young entrepreneurs beating the blockades - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8715085 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8715085 - Dec 2014 (54 comments) What It's Like to Build a Startup in Gaza - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8404414 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8404414 - Oct 2014 (80 comments)
hsuduebc2 3y ago
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psipisi 3y ago
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- baz00 3y ago
  I think the feminist in question wants attribution for herself rather than to make a point. Both sides have been harmed. The war is about reducing continuing harm from an organisation that literally said that this was just the start of things...
  - lern_too_spel 3y ago
    By harming civilians? Like GGP, I am disgusted by everyone carrying a weapon in this conflict. These people were driven out of their homes and walled off in poverty a few decades ago by an unelected government, which legitimized itself with elections only after they were gone. Some of the displaced are violent. That doesn't justify inflicting further pain on the rest.
    - baz00 3y ago
      Please don’t make excuses for either side.
      - lern_too_spel 3y ago
        Where did I excuse the violent or the people advocating violence? Some are violent on both sides of the conflict, and all of them are wrong.
- 4gotunameagain 3y ago
  This is silly, and it reduces women to beings without agency. It is a cultural thing, and sex has nothing to do with it. One could even argue that it is women who raise those boys like that (which is of course not correct). It is the dominator culture, which feminism until the third wave was trying to abolish. Fourth wave feminism is a product of it.
- Levitz 3y ago
nerdponx 3y ago
A close friend of mine lived in Israel for a long time, and I got the sense that your feelings are echoed by many. It's too easy for people in America and Europe to sit at their desks and repost propaganda on social media in favor of "their side".
- edanm 3y ago
  There are plenty of Israelis on all sides of this issue. There are also plenty of Israelis who frequent HN, btw (like me).
  - hef19898 3y ago
    That the Israelian public is devided on the current Israelian government and its policies was reported on in Germany when it was about the judicative reforms. Reporting this devide between religious hardliners and more liberal people stopped with the Hamas and Gaza attacks. Since then, it basically comes down to equating Israel as a nation (ignoring the fact that policy is made governments) with all Israelians (ignoring opposition to the current Israelian government) with all jews everywhere else. Ehy am I saying this? Because every critique of Israel as nation, and the policies of the current government, have been almost immediately been called out as being anti-semitic. I think that does a disservice to everyone: jews, because it makes ever jew kind of a target for people oposing Israel (after all Israel is representative for each and every jew, if you believe certain articles). It makes it harder for Israelian opposition forces to get traction and it squarely devides Arabs / Muslims from jews, making dialogue extremely hard. One can critizie Israel as a nation without being an anti-semite. One can also be supportive of Gazan civilians without supporting Hamas. By preventing this discourse, nobody is gaining anything.
    - edanm 3y ago
      I very much agree that calling any criticism of Israel anti-semitic is both factually wrong and very bad, on many levels. The main thing that upsets Israelis is when the criticism is: 1. Specific only to Israel, and/or far harsher on Israel than on other similar countries for no reason. 2. The criticism offers no path by which Israel is allowed to defend itself. It's totally legit (and morally must be done) to criticize Israel if it does bad things - but if literally every action that Israel takes is criticized as being "too much", the end result can only be "Israel cannot do anything". Btw, small language nitpick - the correct term is "Israeli" not "Israelian", at least in English.
xdennis 3y ago
> with the goal of a two state solution with Israel and Palestine co-existing according to the 1967 borders Why are the 1948-1967 borders considered so important? They lasted for 19 years. Also, in 1967 Gaza was occupied by Egypt. Do people want that again?
- midasuni 3y ago
  The 1967 borders were what was agreed in the peace process in the 90s. 1948 borders are irrelevant.
  - yyyk 3y ago
    There was never any agreement on borders. You can look at any past offer and see one side or the other complaining why it's unacceptable.
programmarchy 3y ago
I can empathize with this, and hope your family remains safe. But I'm afraid Netanyahu and Hamas are just tips of icebergs, and criticism at that level will not be even remotely sufficient to resolve the underlying issues. I'd love to be corrected, but it seems to me that _all_ religions (not only Judaism or Islam) are plagued by supremacist beliefs about their own ethnic group. At the ethnic group level, religion seems to be an evolutionary advantage if not a primary driving force of genetic success. But at the global, human level, it is often catastrophic. Religious apologists tend to paper over their (often subconscious?) supremacist fundamentals with moral teachings and utopian visions, but I think it's crucial that these beliefs are publicly examined and criticized on the global stage, "heresy" be damned. Would be curious to hear your thoughts.
- edanm 3y ago
  Judaism is very different to other religions in some ways. It is not a proselytizing religion - it's not looking to convert anyone to Judaism. It has certain supremacist beliefs - the Jews are the "chosen people" of God, giving them certain duties and certain privileges. But it's not necessarily a "Jews are better" line of thinking. Though of course many religious Jews may phrase it in those terms. Worth mentioning that the majority of Israelis are secular, so the religious view on this, whatever it is, is a minority view in Israel.
  - hattmall 3y ago
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nradov 3y ago
Israelis can potentially vote out Netanyahu in the next election. But how exactly would you propose to remove Hamas from power without a lot of civilian deaths? Hamas leadership prefers the current state of affairs because it has made them wealthy by taxing the populace and embezzling foreign aid. They have no incentive to agree to a peace deal or allow new multiparty elections. There doesn't appear to be any realistic solution short of a massive, forceful intervention by a neutral foreign coalition.
- boppo1 3y ago
  Is there any way Israel could undermine Hamas with prosperity? Make the lives of palestinians better, give back settlements, etc? Get average palestinians to think "wtf who are these terrorist asshats, Israel is a good neighbor."
  - nradov 3y ago
    Israel should stop expanding settlements. Those only make a final peace deal harder to achieve. But that won't solve the Hamas problem. Hamas leaders don't care what average Gazans think nor will they voluntarily give up power. Prosperous Gazans already have to pay Hamas protection money, so more prosperity in Gaza means more resources flowing to Hamas to buy weapons.
    - ido 3y ago
      The problem is that there is no "Israel should or shouldn't do" - countries don't have agency like that, their governments do. And those currently in power intentionally wanted to make a peace deal harder to achieve, because they don't want peace.
  - sa501428 3y ago
    Before the Sharon/Netanyahu/extremist takeover, Israel was serious about peace. But in the last two decades, Netanyahu has seen Hamas as an asset to undermine the PA, block moderates, and eliminate the 2 state option [1,2]. Israel has killed Hamas leaders who wanted to work towards peace [3]: >> After Israel assassinated Jabari, Reuven Pedatzur, a military analyst for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, reported: >> Our decision makers, including the defense minister and perhaps also Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, knew about Jabari’s role in advancing a permanent cease-fire agreement. … Thus the decision to kill Jabari shows that our decision makers decided a cease-fire would be undesirable for Israel at this time, and that attacking Hamas would be preferable. An Israeli government that was actually interested in peace could halt and reverse the settlements in the West Bank, end the apartheid (e.g. military vs civilian courts for Palestinians, different class of citizenships, travel restrictions, prevention from visting Jerusalem's holy sites, etc.), the blockade of Gaza, etc. Treating Palestinians as humans (and not propping up Hamas) would likely go a long way towards undermining Hamas. Most Palestinians already didn't like Hamas - 70% wanted the PA in July 2023 according to the Washington Institute. [1] https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up-hamas-now-its-blown-up-in-our-faces/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up... [2] https://theintercept.com/2023/10/14/hamas-israel-palestinian-authority/ https://theintercept.com/2023/10/14/hamas-israel-palestinian... [3] https://theintercept.com/2023/11/17/hillary-clinton-hamas-israel/ https://theintercept.com/2023/11/17/hillary-clinton-hamas-is...
nailer 3y ago
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- ido 3y ago
  We didn't have the UN to organize international agreements and compromises before 1945. I don't think there's any other realistic chance for peace, like the Israelis the Palestinians are too stubborn to simply give up and surrender.
  - nailer 3y ago
    Why is being within the 1967 borders a realistic chance of peace? Israel was previously within its 1967 borders, in 1967, Arab states declared war on it anyway. A realistic chance of peace is Arab states realising that they’re not going to be able to kick Jews out of the Jewish homeland.
    - Hikikomori 3y ago
      Ah that time the Arab states declared war by being surprise attacked by Israel.
cutler 3y ago
But what about reparations? Israel has destroyed most of Gaza's infrastructure and housing. Israel is responsible for this act of genocide.
- xenospn 3y ago
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NotSammyHagar 3y ago
I wish more people had your perspective. I see a lot of us politicians who miss this basic human nuance, let's all be against all violence and attacks on civilians - we don't need to both sides it, just humanize our behavior. I think like you state, I want innocents, civilians everywhere on all sides to avoid violence, terrorism, bombings, this seemingly endless horror. I see many us politicians making misleading statements about wanting to say you must support destroying Hamas, and that's all they can say, and they attack people who say we must protect innocent people - and they can't accept any criticism about needing to protect civilians on the Palestinian side. It's easy to over-react to an attack, and I hope people like you are able to control the reaction. I'm in the US, and it's important to me to remind people that the US destroyed Iraq in response to 9/11 (and Iraq wasn't behind it, regardless of them being an evil government) and a million people died and also we bear eternal shame for kidnapping people and torturing them in black prisons during that terrible time. I was a young adult at that time and I failed to make any impact on US choices. I hope other people do better than I did.
yyyk 3y ago
You massively discount the radicalizing effect. After what happens, neither side will agree to peace under your formula (which never worked even in more optimistic times).
somewhereoutth 3y ago
A thorough, and thoroughly depressing, analysis of Netanyahu and his thinking: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/21/the-netanyahu-doctrine-how-israels-longest-serving-leader-reshaped-the-country-in-his-image https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/21/the-netanyahu-... Of particular note, and to your point: > Netanyahu is not a conventional ideologue. His opposition to a two-state solution does not derive from any messianic conviction or biblical inspiration. While many of his supporters are religious traditionalists, he is staunchly secular and doesn’t even keep kosher. Instead, his worldview is shaped by deep pessimism. “I’m asked if we will for ever live by the sword – yes,” he told a group of Knesset members in 2015. He had absorbed this view as a child. His father, Benzion Netanyahu, was a dyspeptic historian of the Spanish Inquisition who died in 2012, at the age of 102. “Jewish history is in large measure a history of holocausts,” Netanyahu Sr once told the New Yorker’s David Remnick. For Netanyahu the son, that catastrophic vision of history has meant that nearly all matters of defence appear refracted through the lens of existential threat. According to such calculus, any Palestinian state would almost certainly devolve into an Islamist terror state threatening Israel’s existence; therefore indefinite Israeli control over the occupied territories is an absolute necessity for Jewish survival.
- AtlasBarfed 3y ago
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ramijames 3y ago
As another Israeli on the left: why are you still there? Why is your family? I'm genuinely curious.
- hattmall 3y ago
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- ido 3y ago
  Since 2005 I've only lived in Israel for about 1 year. I currently live in Berlin. For my family, the downsides of immigration are too great vs the downsides of upper-middle class living in metropolitan Tel Aviv. Israel is the only place where their mother tongue is the dominant local language, where their culture is the dominant local culture, where they have their friends and family and professional networks. Where they're not foreign. Immigration is a pain in the ass and I'm not surprised most people don't do it.
  - mzmzmzm 3y ago
    Just wondering... if in your describing community and culture are the valuable features of Israeli daily life, why aren't more people interested in a single state solution? Tel Aviv seems like a thriving, resilient hub. Would it be so buffetted by (admittedly major) changes to borders and civil rights across Judea?
  - deleted 3y ago
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WentFullRetard 3y ago
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by ido 3y ago

mqp 3y ago

It wouldn't just require a change of leaders. It would require an end to apartheid against Palestinians. It would require the colonist settlement of Israel giving back all it's land to the Palestinians. It would require all those involved being brought in front of the ICC for war crimes, genocide and ethnic cleansing.

bryanlarsen 3y ago

In your opinion what are the chances of having an early election to replace Netanyahu? AFAICT it requires a non-confidence vote in the Knesset, but how likely do you think this could happen?

reissbaker 3y ago
Not the OP but Netanyahu is living on borrowed time — he won't be replaced in the middle of the war, but even Likud is having private talks about who replaces him once it's over. I would give very high probability that he is replaced well before his term is up.
- drc500free 3y ago
  Unfortunately, given Bibi's single-minded focus on staying in power, "he won't be replaced in the middle of the war" guarantees that he will try to make this a forever war.
  - __blockcipher__ 3y ago
    I'm curious if pressure from the US ever mounts enough to end this war. Currently we're supporting Israel just like we always have and are just making some empty statements to signal to the more left-leaning segment of the Democrat voter base. I think it's most likely this reality continues, but it does seem possible, albeit unlikely, that Democrat voter discontent gets high enough that we force an end to the war in the next two months. Of course, even if that somewhat far-fetched scenario comes true we'll probably be up to at least 40,000 Gazans killed :/
  - Qem 3y ago
    > "he won't be replaced in the middle of the war" guarantees that he will try to make this a forever war. He's already in escalation with Lebanon: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/12/10/violence-escalates-between-israel-and-lebanons-hezbollah-amid-gaza-assault https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/12/10/violence-escalates...
    - reissbaker 3y ago
      That actually sounds like Lebanon is attempting to escalate by hitting Israel with drone attacks.
  - reissbaker 3y ago
    IMO he doesn't have the votes in the Knesset to do it, and the US is already applying significant pressure to wrap it up soon. Not to mention the Israeli economy can't take the workforce drain to sustain the war at this level for much longer. He doesn't have forever, whether he likes it or not.
ido 3y ago
I think it's close to 100% that we will have an early election, as he can't placate his right-extremist coalition partners on which his government depends. I would guess we'd be up to a 2024 elections.
edanm 3y ago
I'll be a bit more pessimistic than others here. Netanyahu knows that elections won't go favorably for him, but he's very smart and has survived this long - and he's still in charge; he'll be putting a lot of effort towards fending off early elections, certainly until he can show some win for Israel here (not that I think it's possible at this point). We're also in a situation where he knows that dragging out the war might be the best strategy for him personally, which worries me greatly.

dang 3y ago

I've been in touch with several Israeli HNers who are in much the same position as you describe, and I admire their, and your, capacity to stay open despite being under orders of magnitude more pressure than most of us here. This is the spirit I'm asking for commenters to find in themselves before posting. (Edit: Lest this seem like an expression of bias: I've been in touch with HNers on the other side of the conflict as well and can say similar things about them.)

stoorafa 3y ago
You’ve been in touch with Palestinians use HN? Not to seem one-sided, I didn’t realize Gazans had sufficient internet access, let alone food or water, to browse HN.
- ido 3y ago
  I've been in contact with Palestinians, you may be aware of millions of them living abroad (same as Israelis, like myself) and millions more living in the west bank (the total Palestinian population world-wide numbers 14.3 million, Gaza only houses 2.3M). You don't have to be on ground zero in Gaza to be a Palestinian.
- dang 3y ago
  When I said "HNers on the other side of the conflict" I had in mind users who aren't necessarily Palestinians but have strong identification with their plight. However, it's worth saying that HN has some valued members in Gaza (as well as in the West Bank, of course, and Palestinians in other places). Here's one memorable example: https://news.ycombinator.com/posts?id=daliaawad https://news.ycombinator.com/posts?id=daliaawad, My experience as a Gazan girl getting into Silicon Valley companies - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26251143 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26251143 - Feb 2021 (460 comments). Someone who knows Dalia has been in touch with us, but at least at that time, they unfortunately had lost contact with her and don't know if she's still alive. Also this YC startup: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25849054 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25849054 - Jan 2021 (104 comments) --- Some other threads over the years (I just looked up Gaza, of course there are also many Palestinians on HN from the West Bank and other places): Lifehacker: Tarek Loubani on 3D-Printing in Gaza - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20623545 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20623545 - Aug 2019 (68 comments) Gaza: Coding in a conflict zone - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18128432 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18128432 - Oct 2018 (88 comments) Marc Benioff joins Valley notables backing Gaza’s first coding academy - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13374027 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13374027 - Jan 2017 (137 comments) How to Get More Women in Tech: Lessons from a Hackathon in Gaza - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13240777 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13240777 - Dec 2016 (12 comments) Mentoring in Gaza's first hackathon - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11858963 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11858963 - June 2016 (152 comments) Mentor startups in Gaza - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9267716 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9267716 - March 2015 (63 comments) Wireless in Gaza: the young entrepreneurs beating the blockades - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8715085 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8715085 - Dec 2014 (54 comments) What It's Like to Build a Startup in Gaza - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8404414 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8404414 - Oct 2014 (80 comments)

hsuduebc2 3y ago

[flagged]

psipisi 3y ago

[flagged]

baz00 3y ago
I think the feminist in question wants attribution for herself rather than to make a point. Both sides have been harmed. The war is about reducing continuing harm from an organisation that literally said that this was just the start of things...
- lern_too_spel 3y ago
  By harming civilians? Like GGP, I am disgusted by everyone carrying a weapon in this conflict. These people were driven out of their homes and walled off in poverty a few decades ago by an unelected government, which legitimized itself with elections only after they were gone. Some of the displaced are violent. That doesn't justify inflicting further pain on the rest.
  - baz00 3y ago
    Please don’t make excuses for either side.
    - lern_too_spel 3y ago
      Where did I excuse the violent or the people advocating violence? Some are violent on both sides of the conflict, and all of them are wrong.
4gotunameagain 3y ago
This is silly, and it reduces women to beings without agency. It is a cultural thing, and sex has nothing to do with it. One could even argue that it is women who raise those boys like that (which is of course not correct). It is the dominator culture, which feminism until the third wave was trying to abolish. Fourth wave feminism is a product of it.
Levitz 3y ago

nerdponx 3y ago

A close friend of mine lived in Israel for a long time, and I got the sense that your feelings are echoed by many. It's too easy for people in America and Europe to sit at their desks and repost propaganda on social media in favor of "their side".

edanm 3y ago
There are plenty of Israelis on all sides of this issue. There are also plenty of Israelis who frequent HN, btw (like me).
- hef19898 3y ago
  That the Israelian public is devided on the current Israelian government and its policies was reported on in Germany when it was about the judicative reforms. Reporting this devide between religious hardliners and more liberal people stopped with the Hamas and Gaza attacks. Since then, it basically comes down to equating Israel as a nation (ignoring the fact that policy is made governments) with all Israelians (ignoring opposition to the current Israelian government) with all jews everywhere else. Ehy am I saying this? Because every critique of Israel as nation, and the policies of the current government, have been almost immediately been called out as being anti-semitic. I think that does a disservice to everyone: jews, because it makes ever jew kind of a target for people oposing Israel (after all Israel is representative for each and every jew, if you believe certain articles). It makes it harder for Israelian opposition forces to get traction and it squarely devides Arabs / Muslims from jews, making dialogue extremely hard. One can critizie Israel as a nation without being an anti-semite. One can also be supportive of Gazan civilians without supporting Hamas. By preventing this discourse, nobody is gaining anything.
  - edanm 3y ago
    I very much agree that calling any criticism of Israel anti-semitic is both factually wrong and very bad, on many levels. The main thing that upsets Israelis is when the criticism is: 1. Specific only to Israel, and/or far harsher on Israel than on other similar countries for no reason. 2. The criticism offers no path by which Israel is allowed to defend itself. It's totally legit (and morally must be done) to criticize Israel if it does bad things - but if literally every action that Israel takes is criticized as being "too much", the end result can only be "Israel cannot do anything". Btw, small language nitpick - the correct term is "Israeli" not "Israelian", at least in English.

xdennis 3y ago

> with the goal of a two state solution with Israel and Palestine co-existing according to the 1967 borders Why are the 1948-1967 borders considered so important? They lasted for 19 years. Also, in 1967 Gaza was occupied by Egypt. Do people want that again?

midasuni 3y ago
The 1967 borders were what was agreed in the peace process in the 90s. 1948 borders are irrelevant.
- yyyk 3y ago
  There was never any agreement on borders. You can look at any past offer and see one side or the other complaining why it's unacceptable.

programmarchy 3y ago

I can empathize with this, and hope your family remains safe. But I'm afraid Netanyahu and Hamas are just tips of icebergs, and criticism at that level will not be even remotely sufficient to resolve the underlying issues. I'd love to be corrected, but it seems to me that _all_ religions (not only Judaism or Islam) are plagued by supremacist beliefs about their own ethnic group. At the ethnic group level, religion seems to be an evolutionary advantage if not a primary driving force of genetic success. But at the global, human level, it is often catastrophic. Religious apologists tend to paper over their (often subconscious?) supremacist fundamentals with moral teachings and utopian visions, but I think it's crucial that these beliefs are publicly examined and criticized on the global stage, "heresy" be damned. Would be curious to hear your thoughts.

edanm 3y ago
Judaism is very different to other religions in some ways. It is not a proselytizing religion - it's not looking to convert anyone to Judaism. It has certain supremacist beliefs - the Jews are the "chosen people" of God, giving them certain duties and certain privileges. But it's not necessarily a "Jews are better" line of thinking. Though of course many religious Jews may phrase it in those terms. Worth mentioning that the majority of Israelis are secular, so the religious view on this, whatever it is, is a minority view in Israel.
- hattmall 3y ago
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nradov 3y ago

Israelis can potentially vote out Netanyahu in the next election. But how exactly would you propose to remove Hamas from power without a lot of civilian deaths? Hamas leadership prefers the current state of affairs because it has made them wealthy by taxing the populace and embezzling foreign aid. They have no incentive to agree to a peace deal or allow new multiparty elections. There doesn't appear to be any realistic solution short of a massive, forceful intervention by a neutral foreign coalition.

boppo1 3y ago
Is there any way Israel could undermine Hamas with prosperity? Make the lives of palestinians better, give back settlements, etc? Get average palestinians to think "wtf who are these terrorist asshats, Israel is a good neighbor."
- nradov 3y ago
  Israel should stop expanding settlements. Those only make a final peace deal harder to achieve. But that won't solve the Hamas problem. Hamas leaders don't care what average Gazans think nor will they voluntarily give up power. Prosperous Gazans already have to pay Hamas protection money, so more prosperity in Gaza means more resources flowing to Hamas to buy weapons.
  - ido 3y ago
    The problem is that there is no "Israel should or shouldn't do" - countries don't have agency like that, their governments do. And those currently in power intentionally wanted to make a peace deal harder to achieve, because they don't want peace.
- sa501428 3y ago
  Before the Sharon/Netanyahu/extremist takeover, Israel was serious about peace. But in the last two decades, Netanyahu has seen Hamas as an asset to undermine the PA, block moderates, and eliminate the 2 state option [1,2]. Israel has killed Hamas leaders who wanted to work towards peace [3]: >> After Israel assassinated Jabari, Reuven Pedatzur, a military analyst for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, reported: >> Our decision makers, including the defense minister and perhaps also Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, knew about Jabari’s role in advancing a permanent cease-fire agreement. … Thus the decision to kill Jabari shows that our decision makers decided a cease-fire would be undesirable for Israel at this time, and that attacking Hamas would be preferable. An Israeli government that was actually interested in peace could halt and reverse the settlements in the West Bank, end the apartheid (e.g. military vs civilian courts for Palestinians, different class of citizenships, travel restrictions, prevention from visting Jerusalem's holy sites, etc.), the blockade of Gaza, etc. Treating Palestinians as humans (and not propping up Hamas) would likely go a long way towards undermining Hamas. Most Palestinians already didn't like Hamas - 70% wanted the PA in July 2023 according to the Washington Institute. [1] https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up-hamas-now-its-blown-up-in-our-faces/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up... [2] https://theintercept.com/2023/10/14/hamas-israel-palestinian-authority/ https://theintercept.com/2023/10/14/hamas-israel-palestinian... [3] https://theintercept.com/2023/11/17/hillary-clinton-hamas-israel/ https://theintercept.com/2023/11/17/hillary-clinton-hamas-is...

nailer 3y ago

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ido 3y ago
We didn't have the UN to organize international agreements and compromises before 1945. I don't think there's any other realistic chance for peace, like the Israelis the Palestinians are too stubborn to simply give up and surrender.
- nailer 3y ago
  Why is being within the 1967 borders a realistic chance of peace? Israel was previously within its 1967 borders, in 1967, Arab states declared war on it anyway. A realistic chance of peace is Arab states realising that they’re not going to be able to kick Jews out of the Jewish homeland.
  - Hikikomori 3y ago
    Ah that time the Arab states declared war by being surprise attacked by Israel.

cutler 3y ago

But what about reparations? Israel has destroyed most of Gaza's infrastructure and housing. Israel is responsible for this act of genocide.

xenospn 3y ago
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NotSammyHagar 3y ago

I wish more people had your perspective. I see a lot of us politicians who miss this basic human nuance, let's all be against all violence and attacks on civilians - we don't need to both sides it, just humanize our behavior. I think like you state, I want innocents, civilians everywhere on all sides to avoid violence, terrorism, bombings, this seemingly endless horror. I see many us politicians making misleading statements about wanting to say you must support destroying Hamas, and that's all they can say, and they attack people who say we must protect innocent people - and they can't accept any criticism about needing to protect civilians on the Palestinian side. It's easy to over-react to an attack, and I hope people like you are able to control the reaction. I'm in the US, and it's important to me to remind people that the US destroyed Iraq in response to 9/11 (and Iraq wasn't behind it, regardless of them being an evil government) and a million people died and also we bear eternal shame for kidnapping people and torturing them in black prisons during that terrible time. I was a young adult at that time and I failed to make any impact on US choices. I hope other people do better than I did.

yyyk 3y ago

You massively discount the radicalizing effect. After what happens, neither side will agree to peace under your formula (which never worked even in more optimistic times).

somewhereoutth 3y ago

A thorough, and thoroughly depressing, analysis of Netanyahu and his thinking: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/21/the-netanyahu-doctrine-how-israels-longest-serving-leader-reshaped-the-country-in-his-image https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/21/the-netanyahu-... Of particular note, and to your point: > Netanyahu is not a conventional ideologue. His opposition to a two-state solution does not derive from any messianic conviction or biblical inspiration. While many of his supporters are religious traditionalists, he is staunchly secular and doesn’t even keep kosher. Instead, his worldview is shaped by deep pessimism. “I’m asked if we will for ever live by the sword – yes,” he told a group of Knesset members in 2015. He had absorbed this view as a child. His father, Benzion Netanyahu, was a dyspeptic historian of the Spanish Inquisition who died in 2012, at the age of 102. “Jewish history is in large measure a history of holocausts,” Netanyahu Sr once told the New Yorker’s David Remnick. For Netanyahu the son, that catastrophic vision of history has meant that nearly all matters of defence appear refracted through the lens of existential threat. According to such calculus, any Palestinian state would almost certainly devolve into an Islamist terror state threatening Israel’s existence; therefore indefinite Israeli control over the occupied territories is an absolute necessity for Jewish survival.

AtlasBarfed 3y ago
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ramijames 3y ago

As another Israeli on the left: why are you still there? Why is your family? I'm genuinely curious.

hattmall 3y ago
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ido 3y ago
Since 2005 I've only lived in Israel for about 1 year. I currently live in Berlin. For my family, the downsides of immigration are too great vs the downsides of upper-middle class living in metropolitan Tel Aviv. Israel is the only place where their mother tongue is the dominant local language, where their culture is the dominant local culture, where they have their friends and family and professional networks. Where they're not foreign. Immigration is a pain in the ass and I'm not surprised most people don't do it.
- mzmzmzm 3y ago
  Just wondering... if in your describing community and culture are the valuable features of Israeli daily life, why aren't more people interested in a single state solution? Tel Aviv seems like a thriving, resilient hub. Would it be so buffetted by (admittedly major) changes to borders and civil rights across Judea?
- deleted 3y ago
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WentFullRetard 3y ago

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