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You can criticize Israel all you want without making it a blood libel. As I said, that is not a problem. I will accuse people of blood libel when part of their

by nsguy 3y ago

You can criticize Israel all you want without making it a blood libel. As I said, that is not a problem. I will accuse people of blood libel when part of their strategy is the intentional misuse of language to intentionally deceive and misrepresent reality or if they spread lies. If you don't like it, don't do it. You may or may not be right about the international law usage, the question is whether the person on the street understands it as such and whether you have clarified it enough that they can understand what you're talking about. This Palestine you're referring to, is that a country? What are its UN recognized borders? What does it even mean "if you practice apartheid in Palestine"? You're seriously telling me that there's more convincing evidence that Israel broke international laws than that China, or Yemen, or Syria, or Russia, or the US, or the UK, (EDIT: this list is endless but I can add to it) broke international laws? So I'll pick the "conspiracy against Israel" (or more like politics of the not free world mixed with antisemitism) until you can show me how the UN is indeed treating everyone with no bias. EDIT: Also note this is not the same as claiming that Israel broke no international laws, though I think in the specific cases you're referring to it does not. EDIT: "Israel is a modern state which deserves the scrutiny we give other states" -> totally agree. EDIT2: Even Israelis don't understand "apartheid state" to mean what you think it means. So basically nobody understands the way you put it other then maybe some international law experts (including myself honestly, I'd have to spend time reading international law). But for the purpose of our "blood libel" topic if you say "I claim Israel practices apartheid within the occupied territories of the west bank that remain under their control, not like the south african apartheid which is how this word is commonly understood, but the crime of apartheid as defined by international law XXXX" then maybe it's something we can have an intelligent debate about and I won't automatically label it as "blood libel" like I would the generic usage of "apartheid state" without any other qualifiers. EDIT3: "> "The crime of apartheid" means inhumane acts of a character similar to those referred to in paragraph 1, committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime;" I would need to read more details about the "inhumane acts" but it's worth pointing out that a) Israelis are not a racial group. Palestinians are also not a racial group. b) The Oslo agreements, the withdrawal from Gaza, and other peace efforts are proof that there's no "intention of maintaining that regime". Mostly it's the Palestinians that are intent on maintaining the regime. Again, I'm not going to deny what's going on in the west bank between (mostly Jewish) settlers and (mostly Arab) Palestinians but the UN/ICJ processes are just a political circus with no fairness or justice and are not the way we make progress in this conflict. It's a choice of the Palestinians to not engage (and sure of the Israeli government as well) after they sabotaged the Oslo accords (and by they I mean Hamas mostly, who are, Palestinians).

runarberg 3y ago
> You're seriously telling me that there's more convincing evidence that Israel broke international laws than that China, or Yemen, or Syria, or Russia, or the US, or the UK, broke international laws? I never said that. We are talking about Israel here (and to a lesser extent Apartheid South Africa in sibling threads) not China, Yemen, Syria, nor Russia. Russia and China in particular have several trials at the ICJ and the ICC and have been accused of similar crimes against humanity. But we are not talking about those. Whataboutism gets you nowhere. > show me how the UN is indeed treating everyone with no bias Never claimed it was. There are indeed plenty of biases at the UN. Israel in particular gets a very lenient treatment by Western Countries (biased towards Israel) and bad treatment by many Arab countries (biased against). However taken as an aggregate most of the world (including Western countries) seems to have a problem with Israel’s human rights record. We should take that seriously and not discount it as blood libel. > the question is whether the person on the street understands it as such and whether you have clarified it enough that they can understand what you're talking about. You took issue with the fact that we used a particular term. I clarified—I hope—thoroughly what was meant by this term. If you have a problem with this particular usage of the term, I think you’ll find your self fighting a lot of windmills. > Even Israelis don't understand "apartheid state" to mean what you think it means. Ignorance of international humanitarian law does not excuse its practice, nor does it grant you freedom from scrutiny. Like I said earlier, if the world court can use this term, so can an internet forum. > This Palestine you're referring to, is that a country? I don’t approve of this question because I think you know and don’t need me to explain it to you. But I’ll do it anyway. Palestine is an internationally recognized UN observer state with a population of about 5.5 million, with internationally recognized borders consisting of the West Bank and Gaza, formed on 15th of November 1988 and granted UN observer status on 29th of November 2012. 139 UN member states recognize Palestine as such. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_Palestine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_Palestine This apparent confusion about the state of Palestine also touches on your nibling post where you claim stuff like “Before 1967 when Gaza was part of Egypt and the West Bank was part of Jordan”, “Israel completely withdrew from Gaza in 2005”, and “The Palestinians have no standing in there [Gaza] at all.” None of this is true by the way. Gaza was never annexed by Egypt, merely occupied, Israel only withdrew settlers and ground forces, they still very much occupy the area, and the Palestinian Authority is an internationally recognized government of the state of Palestine that does have standing at the world stage (albeit with matters regarding Gaza they need cooperation with Hamas which controls the territory). From what it looks like you refuse to believe that the state of Palestine has any recognition, or that you refuse to believe that such a state exists at all. However that is not true. Regarding your EDIT3. I gave you the link to the definition of what constitutes inhuman acts. The segment is one paragraph long with 8 enumerated points and the text is highly legible (in general UN documents are meant for the general public to read and very seldomly contain legalese). This is HN and we assume a level of intellectual curiosity of each other. We also generally frown upon ideological battles and flamebates such as “the UN/ICJ processes are just a political circus with no fairness or justice”. These kinds of points are a dead end with nothing to expand upon with interesting points.

by nsguy 3y ago

runarberg 3y ago

> You're seriously telling me that there's more convincing evidence that Israel broke international laws than that China, or Yemen, or Syria, or Russia, or the US, or the UK, broke international laws? I never said that. We are talking about Israel here (and to a lesser extent Apartheid South Africa in sibling threads) not China, Yemen, Syria, nor Russia. Russia and China in particular have several trials at the ICJ and the ICC and have been accused of similar crimes against humanity. But we are not talking about those. Whataboutism gets you nowhere. > show me how the UN is indeed treating everyone with no bias Never claimed it was. There are indeed plenty of biases at the UN. Israel in particular gets a very lenient treatment by Western Countries (biased towards Israel) and bad treatment by many Arab countries (biased against). However taken as an aggregate most of the world (including Western countries) seems to have a problem with Israel’s human rights record. We should take that seriously and not discount it as blood libel. > the question is whether the person on the street understands it as such and whether you have clarified it enough that they can understand what you're talking about. You took issue with the fact that we used a particular term. I clarified—I hope—thoroughly what was meant by this term. If you have a problem with this particular usage of the term, I think you’ll find your self fighting a lot of windmills. > Even Israelis don't understand "apartheid state" to mean what you think it means. Ignorance of international humanitarian law does not excuse its practice, nor does it grant you freedom from scrutiny. Like I said earlier, if the world court can use this term, so can an internet forum. > This Palestine you're referring to, is that a country? I don’t approve of this question because I think you know and don’t need me to explain it to you. But I’ll do it anyway. Palestine is an internationally recognized UN observer state with a population of about 5.5 million, with internationally recognized borders consisting of the West Bank and Gaza, formed on 15th of November 1988 and granted UN observer status on 29th of November 2012. 139 UN member states recognize Palestine as such. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_Palestine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_Palestine This apparent confusion about the state of Palestine also touches on your nibling post where you claim stuff like “Before 1967 when Gaza was part of Egypt and the West Bank was part of Jordan”, “Israel completely withdrew from Gaza in 2005”, and “The Palestinians have no standing in there [Gaza] at all.” None of this is true by the way. Gaza was never annexed by Egypt, merely occupied, Israel only withdrew settlers and ground forces, they still very much occupy the area, and the Palestinian Authority is an internationally recognized government of the state of Palestine that does have standing at the world stage (albeit with matters regarding Gaza they need cooperation with Hamas which controls the territory). From what it looks like you refuse to believe that the state of Palestine has any recognition, or that you refuse to believe that such a state exists at all. However that is not true. Regarding your EDIT3. I gave you the link to the definition of what constitutes inhuman acts. The segment is one paragraph long with 8 enumerated points and the text is highly legible (in general UN documents are meant for the general public to read and very seldomly contain legalese). This is HN and we assume a level of intellectual curiosity of each other. We also generally frown upon ideological battles and flamebates such as “the UN/ICJ processes are just a political circus with no fairness or justice”. These kinds of points are a dead end with nothing to expand upon with interesting points.