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Israeli here, can't directly answer your question since I've lived in the US for 99% of my adult life, but I consider myself pro-Israel and resent the way Israe

by Liron 1y ago

Israeli here, can't directly answer your question since I've lived in the US for 99% of my adult life, but I consider myself pro-Israel and resent the way Israel is currently/always being portrayed. I see the key problem as people removing context: Context for why the current situation could easily be different if Hamas acted/acts differently, and context for why there is no "just stop fighting" option that leaves Israel with a high confidence that another Oct 7 won't happen in the next few years.

peterfirefly 1y ago
[flagged]
- Sabinus 1y ago
  >Do you also blame Ukraine for fighting back? If they had decades of conflict and there was a credible peace deal freezing the lines as they are and instead the Ukrainian leaders sold the future of the state for a decades long insurgency I would place blame on them for that.
bigyabai 1y ago
> why there is no "just stop fighting" option I don't recall many people ever seriously asking for that, though I admit I'm not up-to-date on Israeli affairs. Don't the overwhelming majority of outsiders want a two-state solution, or failing that a more secular Israeli administration? Through a lens of historical context and not just Oct 7th, it's hard for me to believe that Israelis don't know how to attain regional peace. We know exactly why Lebanon, Jordan and Syria are angry at the Israeli government, and there are simple ways to fix it if the willpower exists.
- bawolff 1y ago
  > > why there is no "just stop fighting" option > I don't recall many people ever seriously asking for that i live in Canada, literally half a world away. Every street light pole seems to have some sort of "Ceasefire now" sticker on it. I also see similar sentiment in online threads on the topic. I think there is a significant group of people who want Israel to commit to an unconditional ceasefire in Gaza. > We know exactly why Lebanon, Jordan and Syria are angry at the Israeli government When people talk about this topic, they are usually referring to the conflict with Palestine.
  - 18172828286177 1y ago
    People are arguing for an unconditional ceasefire because innocent people and children are literally starving to death. Many of the people arguing for ceasefire probably wouldn’t be so animated about it if that wasn’t the case, i.e. if Israel was conducting a legal war with targeted strikes. That isn’t the case.
    - bawolff 1y ago
      You're responing to me as if my comment disagreed, but i didn't say anything about the "why", just that their exists people who advocate for an unconditional ceasefire. Which i'm sure you'd agree with.
    - ars 1y ago
      Why are they calling for a ceasefire instead of for Hamas to surrender?
      - actionfromafar 1y ago
        First, maybe they still keep a sliver of hope that the Israeli state will be at least marginally morally superior to a terrorist organization. Second, many do call for Hamas to surrender.
      - ImPostingOnHN 1y ago
        because an end to the ethnic cleansing is more important than waiting for surrender, if that's even possible given hamas' disrupted command structure and israel's constant creation of new terrorists a ceasefire provides room for diplomacy that might lead to concessions from both sides for their atrocities, and thus might lead to peace and equality we have seen in the west bank what surrender without a ceasefire or sustainable peace looks like, and it is very bad (see this article for an example)
        bawolff 1y ago
        > a ceasefire provides room for diplomacy that might lead to concessions from both sides for their atrocities, and thus might lead to peace and equality We've had something like 100 years of failed diplomacy at this point. I don't know the solution to this conflict, but i can understand why both sides suspect further diplomacy won't lead anywhere unless something fundamental changes.
- 7952 1y ago
  But reading between the lines there are not many plausible end states. Its a choice between a return to a status quo where Israel has defended borders. Or a removal of Palestinians from the territory. I think most people in the international community would prefer the former even when they don't come out and say it. And that may reasonably be safer and better for Israeli civilians.
  - ivan_gammel 1y ago
    There is always possibility of foreign intervention with security guarantees for Israel. Apparently this is already on the table now. https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250729-qatar-saudi-egypt-join-call-for-hamas-to-disarm-give-up-gaza-rule https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250729-qatar-saudi-e...
- gopher_space 1y ago
  > Through a lens of historical context and not just Oct 7th, it's hard for me to believe that Israelis don't know how to attain regional peace. The subtext to this conflict is that every avenue leading towards a lasting peace also opens the Netanyahu regime to prosecution. Israel isn't an ex-Soviet satellite with a dictator propped up by a cold war giant, but their actions become predictable if you think of the state as Netanyahustan.
  - disgruntledphd2 1y ago
    Yeah, basically the only reason they didn't keep the ceasefire is because Netanyahu would have been pushed out of power (and could therefore be tried for corruption more effectively). But ultimately, the current government is what a (small) majority of Israelis want, which is the most depressing part of this entire conflict. IDF service is mandatory and there appears to be no resistance to this, which supports the point above.
- bigtex88 1y ago
  [flagged]
nielsbot 1y ago
Oct 7 happened as a result of the Israeli occupation. If there’s occupation, there will be resistance. Instead Israel could become a democratic state with equal rights for all citizens. Which context has been stripped from the narrative in your opinion? Maybe you’ll say Israel is the original Jewish homeland and therefore the occupation is justified?
- paulryanrogers 1y ago
  > Maybe you’ll say Israel is the original Jewish homeland and therefore the occupation is justified? Being raised evangelical, I was taught the land belonged to the Jews since God judged the original inhabitants, and was given to them forever. Those who taught me see modern Israel as righting ancient wrongs and Palestine as occupying Jewish land. They've even visited the West Bank through a food effort with a Christian missionary. Having left the church, it's much clearer to me that Arabs and Jews have both lived there for thousands of years. Both have a right to exist and the capacity to live peacefully together. Sadly those with guns, reductive beliefs, or (sometimes understandable) grudges just won't stop. I'm ashamed the US is supporting these cycles of violence, especially evangelical Christianity.
  - C6JEsQeQa5fCjE 1y ago
    > Having left the church, it's much clearer to me that Arabs and Jews have both lived there for thousands of years Yes, and there was a lot of mixing and slow but gradual conversion to the dominant socio-cultural muslim group that happened over more than a millenium. After the muslim conquest of Levant in about 630 AD, caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab lifted the Christian ban on Jews entering Jerusalem some time later during his reign. We do not have data on how many jews decided to return there, rather than keep living in civilizational centres across the region and in Europe. What we do know is that the jewish population of Palestine at the time that the British government initiated the process of handing over Palestine to jews in return for Lord Rothschild's money that they needed to keep fighting WW1 [2], was only about 7%. Subsequent immigration of mostly European jews into Palestine, resulted in about 30% jewish population by the time Western powers decided to declare an independent Jewish-dominated state of Israel on top of Palestine in 1947. > Both have a right to exist and the capacity to live peacefully together Brutal occupation has no right to exist. The supremacist state has to go. Apartheid South Africa had to go, and now South Africa is a better country. Nazi Germany had to go, and now Germany is a better country. Imperial colonial Japan had to go, and now both itself and its former colonized territories are better countries. Supremacist ethno-nationalist Israel that occupies natives of the land it was established upon with despicable brutality has to go. In the resulting state that comes after it, yes, people of any religion and ethnicity need to be able to live together in peace. After reparations have been made, the right of return has been honored, most of the stolen land has been given back, and apartheid has been dismantled. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umar [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration
cool_dude85 1y ago
This happened in the occupied West Bank. What would you like Hamas to do differently there?
- Liron 1y ago
  I often don't endorse the behavior of Israeli settlers. I'm responding to the question of what Israelis think about the news in general, a question to which I wanted to contribute the context of Israel's precarious existential security as a sovereign Jewish state.
  - rafram 1y ago
    "Precarious" strikes me as a misleading way to describe a nuclear-armed state (and the only nuclear-armed state in its region).
    - tome 1y ago
      Do you believe Israel's continued existence is assured?
      - Der_Einzige 1y ago
        Even without nukes it would be because the arabs in the region are bad at fighting. But with nukes it for sure is because of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samson_Option https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samson_Option
        tome 1y ago
        I suspect most Israelis think differently. Even if "the arabs in the region are bad at fighting" they still outnumber the Israeli population by something like 20 to 40 times, depending on how you count. About one Israeli was killed for every three Hamas fighters on Oct 7, and it's not an exact comparison for many reasons, but hopefully it provides some perspective. EDIT: There are a couple of axes that helped me get a broader perspective: 1. Whether one supports Israel's continued existence 2. Whether one believes Israel's continued existence is guaranteed Having started about midway between yes and no on 1, and at yes on 2, it was extremely enlightening to reinterpret my observations from the point of view of yes on 1 and no on 2. All Israeli behaviour that I had previously found incomprehensible finally made sense.
xorcist 1y ago
[flagged]
- bawolff 1y ago
  > Would you agree that "Palestinians should suffer for what Hamas did" is a decent summary of the view you describe I'm not the person you are responding to, but sheesh that is an unsympathetic reading of their comment. I do not know if the person you replied to does or does not believe that, but nothing in their comment would imply that. > I do not pretend to have or be able to gain any knowledge that could help this thousand year conflict. Well first step would be listening to what people say instead of adding your own interpretations.
  - xorcist 1y ago
    Yeah, I realize that was dangerously close to ragebait territory, sorry about that. It's just that I saw it as an opportunity to glimpse into the reasoning made and I couldn't find myself with a charitable interpretation that didn't include something very similar to that statement, so why not pop it out there to find out more what the person disagrees with? Feel free to ignore the question, it probably won't change anyone's view anyway.
    - bawolff 1y ago
      I don't know why people find the reasoning so shocking. It plays out the same in pretty much every country. Look at US during 9/11 or world war 2. Some sort of attack happens, people get scared (often legitamently), they support measures they think will get their security back. Sometimes those measures are reasonable, sometimes they are more wtf, more often they are somewhere in between. As the saying goes: hurt people hurt people. That's not to say they are neccesarily illogical. There are real threats out there and sometimes the options to defend one self are limitted to unsaoury things. Most people if given the choice between shooting someone or being shot themselves, chose to shoot the other person. No matter where you live, you have probably seen people react this way, even if just on a very small scale.
- 1y ago
brentm 1y ago
The problem here though is what will ever give Israel confidence that Oct 7 will never happen again? We know that going after terrorists for years and killing them just creates more terrorists (Iraq, Afghanistan). The young children who do not end up dying of starvation will be men in 20 years, still in Gaza with no options to leave and resent Israel who they will consider to be effectively their jailer. The situation is just untenable. I don't like to think that the result of Oct 7 is a more open Gaza but I don't really know what other options Israel has. Hamas obviously started this but Israel won the war a long time ago. The world deserves an end. The longer it goes on the more Hamas will actually have achieved some kind of lasting positive image of Gaza which is rooted in their actions on Oct 7th and that would be an incredibly bad outcome for all.
- bluecheese452 1y ago
  We don’t know this. There are several wealthy nations that have produced many terrorists and several poor nations that have produced none. The most famous terrorist in history was a wealthy man from a wealthy nation.
  - giardini 1y ago
    Whom do you refer to as "the most famous terrorist in history"?
    - aspenmayer 1y ago
      Considering that they mention his family wealth, I can only assume that they mean Osama bin Laden. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osama_bin_Laden https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osama_bin_Laden
      - bluecheese452 1y ago
        Yep that is who I meant.
        1y ago
chimineycricket 1y ago
>the way Israel is currently/always being portrayed Israeli soldiers, politicians, and many civilians are portraying themselves this way. Soldiers post videos sniping a child in the head calling it a "legendary video", politicians say Palestinians should starve, civilians block aid trucks. Do you resent the way they are portrayed or do you mean you resent what a lot of Israelis are doing?
- 18172828286177 1y ago
  [flagged]
- 9dev 1y ago
  Especially the politicians. Some of the things said on record in the Knesset could have been uttered in the NSDAP, if you switch Palestinian for Jew. It’s disgusting, and most importantly not at all a matter of propaganda.
18172828286177 1y ago
[flagged]
- bawolff 1y ago
  Can you be more specific why you think so? I don't think what the commenter you are responding to said would meet the definition of collective punishment under international law.
  - 18172828286177 1y ago
    Israel is directly causing a mass starvation event in Gaza. Innocent children and women are dying every single day, and if nothing is done soon, scores more will in the near future. The commenter’s position is that the situation in Gaza is justifiable because Israel had to take action against Hamas. This is textbook collective punishment: causing suffering to a massive number of people due to the actions of a minority.
    - bawolff 1y ago
      > Israel is directly causing a mass starvation event in Gaza. Innocent children and women are dying every single day, and if nothing is done soon, scores more will in the near future. Asuming all that is true, the person you are responding to never said they supported the policies that lead to that or that state of affairs. It is possible to imagine that someone could both believe that Israel's continued military operation is neccessary and that changes could be made to relieve the humanitarian situation. I dont know if the person you are responding to actually believes that, but based on their comments there is no reason to think they dont. Edit: I would also add that the war crime of collective punishment has a specific intent requirement. The perpetrator has to specificly intend to punish the group for an act. Even if the person you were responding to supported all the things you mentioned, unless they supported it as a punishment for oct 7, instead of out of a belief (for example) that it would allow Israel to defeat hamas, then it would not be collective punishment. It would be other war crimes but not collective punishment. See https://opiniojuris.org/2023/10/24/a-short-history-of-the-war-crime-of-collective-punishment/ https://opiniojuris.org/2023/10/24/a-short-history-of-the-wa... for a summary of what collective punishment is. P.s. not so fun fact, the ICC lacks juridsiction over collective punishment, and given they are the main legal body investigating this conflict, we probably arent going to see any investigations into collective punishment
empath75 1y ago
I am very much of the opinion that Hamas should not be allowed to continued to exist for Israel's benefit and for Palestine's, but there is a lot of space in between "just stop fighting" and "genocide", and Israel is way closer to one side of that than I would prefer.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
lo_zamoyski 1y ago
It's possible to be critical of both Hamas and Israel, while recognizing that what Israel is doing to Palestinians is evil and a war crime. Just war principles are important to observe. The Nazis were a thuggish and murderous regime with plenty of complicity from the German populace, but the firebombing of Dresden was evil, as were the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Targeting civilians is evil. If we accept that these are evil, and we ought to, then we must accept that what Israel is doing is unacceptable. Bibi should be punished. You can target Hamas, and you should, but just war does not allow for the means Israel has used.
insane_dreamer 1y ago
> I see the key problem as people removing context this is also the main problem with your post; your context goes back to Oct 7, whereas it should go back to 1948 (or earlier). You cannot drive people from their land into a barren reservation, oppress them for decades, and expect them to not resist or fight back. It's the same colonization tactics that were used on the Native Americans, who launched their Intifadas and occasionally also committed the type of horrible atrocities as Hamas did on Oct 7. You can't justify Oct 7, but the reality is human nature is such that unless you remove the conditions which caused Oct 7 in the first place -- then it will repeat, maybe not Hamas, maybe not in this generation, but the next generation, as we've already seen. The Israeli government is trying to "solve" the Palestinian problem the same way that the US government "solved" the Native American problem -- kill enough of them, make deals and then break them (this is the Israeli settler problem), and move them far enough away from their original lands, for long enough, that you finally and completely break their spirit and ability to resist. And if that means bombing and starving tens of thousands of women and children, so be it. And the Israeli God-given "right" to the Palestinian land, because it's the "holy land" from 2000 years ago, is very much like the God-given "manifest destiny" that US colonizers invoked to "settle" the West. It was genocide then and it's genocide now.
- ncr100 1y ago
  Yup - granting power to the state -- from a democratic citizen to the state -- is risky and here it permits a corrupt anti-life (e.g. genocide) state to operate unchallenged. As it was with the USA, this is a foundational tragedy of Israel. The innate xenophobic "kill the THEM!" human quality appears to be alive and well, across the world today.
lawlessone 1y ago
>see the key problem as people removing context ok when is it contextually ok to starve children?
franczesko 1y ago
Being pro-Israel, what's your take on quotes from figures such as Smotrich and Ben-gvir?
- tguvot 1y ago
  majority of israeli population finds them despicable. in polling for next election smotrich party disappears and ben-gvir party shrinks
Yeul 1y ago
What is the context? A bunch of religious crazies decide to build a colony on the sovereign territory of another state. Now unless you ascribe to that religion or believe that your tribe can do no wrong it all seems simple.
- senderista 1y ago
  What state? The Ottoman Empire? The British Empire? In either case, foreign colonial states?
  - 9dev 1y ago
    The sovereign state of Jordan, for example?
    - dlubarov 1y ago
      Are we talking about the West Bank now? Jordan relinquished any claim they may have had to the territory.
ASalazarMX 1y ago
> there is no "just stop fighting" option that leaves Israel with a high confidence that another Oct 7 won't happen in the next few years How can the same country that prides itself in their intel/spying prowess, and has demonstrated sophisticated capabilities and attacks, claim it will be helpless if they don't absolutely disappear another group of people and take their territory? I seriously doubt the Oct 7 attack caught Israel by surprise, given the scale of it and the level of compromise Israel had on Hamas. Given the disproportionate response Israel was prepared to employ, it was a perfect casus belli to appropriate even more land, as it is happening right now.
- ncr100 1y ago
  Agreed - the apathy and simultaneous granting of an individual's power to e.g. the state or the movement + abandonment of agency is the literal killer here.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
nandomrumber 1y ago
Australian here. Aside from a vocal minority, the impression I get around from conversations with and reading other Australians is that the Australian people largely agree with your position.
xg15 1y ago
Unlike the Palestinians, you can simply move to the US though.
oa335 1y ago
settler attacks against West Bank Palestinians were not caused by Hamas, but by the settlers religious belief that the land is promised to them. That is a key part of the context as well. And in that vein, what options to Palestinians have to defend against violent settlers and displacement?
- tguvot 1y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Price_tag_attack_policy&useskin=vector https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Price_tag_attack_...
arp242 1y ago
Maybe not locking people up in the world's largest open-air prison for an entire generation and constantly kicking their teeth in would help. Just a thought. "Give me liberty or give me death" as you say in America, I believe. Or does that only apply to the white man?
ncr100 1y ago
Do you feel apolitical, or that you must be apolitical? As if you have no say in how things turn out? This grants power while losing agency. And it is more, and more common, e.g. in the United States with its "Deep State" myth of the Q-Anon sect.
ychnd 1y ago
In terms of civilian deaths, Oct 7 is the least important event in this entire fuckup. Or do you think Palestinian lives matter less?
Dig1t 1y ago
Isn’t the greater context that most of these people (Palestinians) had their ancestral homes stolen by “settlers”? I would vote for a pretty extreme government if someone came and stole my house. Also, the situation on the ground seems pretty clear cut. You can literally watch videos of brutal war crimes committed by Israel on Reddit. Everyone has direct proof.

by Liron 1y ago

peterfirefly 1y ago

[flagged]

Sabinus 1y ago
>Do you also blame Ukraine for fighting back? If they had decades of conflict and there was a credible peace deal freezing the lines as they are and instead the Ukrainian leaders sold the future of the state for a decades long insurgency I would place blame on them for that.

bigyabai 1y ago

> why there is no "just stop fighting" option I don't recall many people ever seriously asking for that, though I admit I'm not up-to-date on Israeli affairs. Don't the overwhelming majority of outsiders want a two-state solution, or failing that a more secular Israeli administration? Through a lens of historical context and not just Oct 7th, it's hard for me to believe that Israelis don't know how to attain regional peace. We know exactly why Lebanon, Jordan and Syria are angry at the Israeli government, and there are simple ways to fix it if the willpower exists.

bawolff 1y ago
> > why there is no "just stop fighting" option > I don't recall many people ever seriously asking for that i live in Canada, literally half a world away. Every street light pole seems to have some sort of "Ceasefire now" sticker on it. I also see similar sentiment in online threads on the topic. I think there is a significant group of people who want Israel to commit to an unconditional ceasefire in Gaza. > We know exactly why Lebanon, Jordan and Syria are angry at the Israeli government When people talk about this topic, they are usually referring to the conflict with Palestine.
- 18172828286177 1y ago
  People are arguing for an unconditional ceasefire because innocent people and children are literally starving to death. Many of the people arguing for ceasefire probably wouldn’t be so animated about it if that wasn’t the case, i.e. if Israel was conducting a legal war with targeted strikes. That isn’t the case.
  - bawolff 1y ago
    You're responing to me as if my comment disagreed, but i didn't say anything about the "why", just that their exists people who advocate for an unconditional ceasefire. Which i'm sure you'd agree with.
  - ars 1y ago
    Why are they calling for a ceasefire instead of for Hamas to surrender?
    - actionfromafar 1y ago
      First, maybe they still keep a sliver of hope that the Israeli state will be at least marginally morally superior to a terrorist organization. Second, many do call for Hamas to surrender.
    - ImPostingOnHN 1y ago
      because an end to the ethnic cleansing is more important than waiting for surrender, if that's even possible given hamas' disrupted command structure and israel's constant creation of new terrorists a ceasefire provides room for diplomacy that might lead to concessions from both sides for their atrocities, and thus might lead to peace and equality we have seen in the west bank what surrender without a ceasefire or sustainable peace looks like, and it is very bad (see this article for an example)
      - bawolff 1y ago
        > a ceasefire provides room for diplomacy that might lead to concessions from both sides for their atrocities, and thus might lead to peace and equality We've had something like 100 years of failed diplomacy at this point. I don't know the solution to this conflict, but i can understand why both sides suspect further diplomacy won't lead anywhere unless something fundamental changes.
7952 1y ago
But reading between the lines there are not many plausible end states. Its a choice between a return to a status quo where Israel has defended borders. Or a removal of Palestinians from the territory. I think most people in the international community would prefer the former even when they don't come out and say it. And that may reasonably be safer and better for Israeli civilians.
- ivan_gammel 1y ago
  There is always possibility of foreign intervention with security guarantees for Israel. Apparently this is already on the table now. https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250729-qatar-saudi-egypt-join-call-for-hamas-to-disarm-give-up-gaza-rule https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250729-qatar-saudi-e...
gopher_space 1y ago
> Through a lens of historical context and not just Oct 7th, it's hard for me to believe that Israelis don't know how to attain regional peace. The subtext to this conflict is that every avenue leading towards a lasting peace also opens the Netanyahu regime to prosecution. Israel isn't an ex-Soviet satellite with a dictator propped up by a cold war giant, but their actions become predictable if you think of the state as Netanyahustan.
- disgruntledphd2 1y ago
  Yeah, basically the only reason they didn't keep the ceasefire is because Netanyahu would have been pushed out of power (and could therefore be tried for corruption more effectively). But ultimately, the current government is what a (small) majority of Israelis want, which is the most depressing part of this entire conflict. IDF service is mandatory and there appears to be no resistance to this, which supports the point above.
bigtex88 1y ago
[flagged]

nielsbot 1y ago

Oct 7 happened as a result of the Israeli occupation. If there’s occupation, there will be resistance. Instead Israel could become a democratic state with equal rights for all citizens. Which context has been stripped from the narrative in your opinion? Maybe you’ll say Israel is the original Jewish homeland and therefore the occupation is justified?

paulryanrogers 1y ago
> Maybe you’ll say Israel is the original Jewish homeland and therefore the occupation is justified? Being raised evangelical, I was taught the land belonged to the Jews since God judged the original inhabitants, and was given to them forever. Those who taught me see modern Israel as righting ancient wrongs and Palestine as occupying Jewish land. They've even visited the West Bank through a food effort with a Christian missionary. Having left the church, it's much clearer to me that Arabs and Jews have both lived there for thousands of years. Both have a right to exist and the capacity to live peacefully together. Sadly those with guns, reductive beliefs, or (sometimes understandable) grudges just won't stop. I'm ashamed the US is supporting these cycles of violence, especially evangelical Christianity.
- C6JEsQeQa5fCjE 1y ago
  > Having left the church, it's much clearer to me that Arabs and Jews have both lived there for thousands of years Yes, and there was a lot of mixing and slow but gradual conversion to the dominant socio-cultural muslim group that happened over more than a millenium. After the muslim conquest of Levant in about 630 AD, caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab lifted the Christian ban on Jews entering Jerusalem some time later during his reign. We do not have data on how many jews decided to return there, rather than keep living in civilizational centres across the region and in Europe. What we do know is that the jewish population of Palestine at the time that the British government initiated the process of handing over Palestine to jews in return for Lord Rothschild's money that they needed to keep fighting WW1 [2], was only about 7%. Subsequent immigration of mostly European jews into Palestine, resulted in about 30% jewish population by the time Western powers decided to declare an independent Jewish-dominated state of Israel on top of Palestine in 1947. > Both have a right to exist and the capacity to live peacefully together Brutal occupation has no right to exist. The supremacist state has to go. Apartheid South Africa had to go, and now South Africa is a better country. Nazi Germany had to go, and now Germany is a better country. Imperial colonial Japan had to go, and now both itself and its former colonized territories are better countries. Supremacist ethno-nationalist Israel that occupies natives of the land it was established upon with despicable brutality has to go. In the resulting state that comes after it, yes, people of any religion and ethnicity need to be able to live together in peace. After reparations have been made, the right of return has been honored, most of the stolen land has been given back, and apartheid has been dismantled. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umar [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration

cool_dude85 1y ago

This happened in the occupied West Bank. What would you like Hamas to do differently there?

Liron 1y ago
I often don't endorse the behavior of Israeli settlers. I'm responding to the question of what Israelis think about the news in general, a question to which I wanted to contribute the context of Israel's precarious existential security as a sovereign Jewish state.
- rafram 1y ago
  "Precarious" strikes me as a misleading way to describe a nuclear-armed state (and the only nuclear-armed state in its region).
  - tome 1y ago
    Do you believe Israel's continued existence is assured?
    - Der_Einzige 1y ago
      Even without nukes it would be because the arabs in the region are bad at fighting. But with nukes it for sure is because of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samson_Option https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samson_Option
      - tome 1y ago
        I suspect most Israelis think differently. Even if "the arabs in the region are bad at fighting" they still outnumber the Israeli population by something like 20 to 40 times, depending on how you count. About one Israeli was killed for every three Hamas fighters on Oct 7, and it's not an exact comparison for many reasons, but hopefully it provides some perspective. EDIT: There are a couple of axes that helped me get a broader perspective: 1. Whether one supports Israel's continued existence 2. Whether one believes Israel's continued existence is guaranteed Having started about midway between yes and no on 1, and at yes on 2, it was extremely enlightening to reinterpret my observations from the point of view of yes on 1 and no on 2. All Israeli behaviour that I had previously found incomprehensible finally made sense.

xorcist 1y ago

[flagged]

bawolff 1y ago
> Would you agree that "Palestinians should suffer for what Hamas did" is a decent summary of the view you describe I'm not the person you are responding to, but sheesh that is an unsympathetic reading of their comment. I do not know if the person you replied to does or does not believe that, but nothing in their comment would imply that. > I do not pretend to have or be able to gain any knowledge that could help this thousand year conflict. Well first step would be listening to what people say instead of adding your own interpretations.
- xorcist 1y ago
  Yeah, I realize that was dangerously close to ragebait territory, sorry about that. It's just that I saw it as an opportunity to glimpse into the reasoning made and I couldn't find myself with a charitable interpretation that didn't include something very similar to that statement, so why not pop it out there to find out more what the person disagrees with? Feel free to ignore the question, it probably won't change anyone's view anyway.
  - bawolff 1y ago
    I don't know why people find the reasoning so shocking. It plays out the same in pretty much every country. Look at US during 9/11 or world war 2. Some sort of attack happens, people get scared (often legitamently), they support measures they think will get their security back. Sometimes those measures are reasonable, sometimes they are more wtf, more often they are somewhere in between. As the saying goes: hurt people hurt people. That's not to say they are neccesarily illogical. There are real threats out there and sometimes the options to defend one self are limitted to unsaoury things. Most people if given the choice between shooting someone or being shot themselves, chose to shoot the other person. No matter where you live, you have probably seen people react this way, even if just on a very small scale.
1y ago

brentm 1y ago

The problem here though is what will ever give Israel confidence that Oct 7 will never happen again? We know that going after terrorists for years and killing them just creates more terrorists (Iraq, Afghanistan). The young children who do not end up dying of starvation will be men in 20 years, still in Gaza with no options to leave and resent Israel who they will consider to be effectively their jailer. The situation is just untenable. I don't like to think that the result of Oct 7 is a more open Gaza but I don't really know what other options Israel has. Hamas obviously started this but Israel won the war a long time ago. The world deserves an end. The longer it goes on the more Hamas will actually have achieved some kind of lasting positive image of Gaza which is rooted in their actions on Oct 7th and that would be an incredibly bad outcome for all.

bluecheese452 1y ago
We don’t know this. There are several wealthy nations that have produced many terrorists and several poor nations that have produced none. The most famous terrorist in history was a wealthy man from a wealthy nation.
- giardini 1y ago
  Whom do you refer to as "the most famous terrorist in history"?
  - aspenmayer 1y ago
    Considering that they mention his family wealth, I can only assume that they mean Osama bin Laden. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osama_bin_Laden https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osama_bin_Laden
    - bluecheese452 1y ago
      Yep that is who I meant.
      - 1y ago

chimineycricket 1y ago

>the way Israel is currently/always being portrayed Israeli soldiers, politicians, and many civilians are portraying themselves this way. Soldiers post videos sniping a child in the head calling it a "legendary video", politicians say Palestinians should starve, civilians block aid trucks. Do you resent the way they are portrayed or do you mean you resent what a lot of Israelis are doing?

18172828286177 1y ago
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9dev 1y ago
Especially the politicians. Some of the things said on record in the Knesset could have been uttered in the NSDAP, if you switch Palestinian for Jew. It’s disgusting, and most importantly not at all a matter of propaganda.

18172828286177 1y ago

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bawolff 1y ago
Can you be more specific why you think so? I don't think what the commenter you are responding to said would meet the definition of collective punishment under international law.
- 18172828286177 1y ago
  Israel is directly causing a mass starvation event in Gaza. Innocent children and women are dying every single day, and if nothing is done soon, scores more will in the near future. The commenter’s position is that the situation in Gaza is justifiable because Israel had to take action against Hamas. This is textbook collective punishment: causing suffering to a massive number of people due to the actions of a minority.
  - bawolff 1y ago
    > Israel is directly causing a mass starvation event in Gaza. Innocent children and women are dying every single day, and if nothing is done soon, scores more will in the near future. Asuming all that is true, the person you are responding to never said they supported the policies that lead to that or that state of affairs. It is possible to imagine that someone could both believe that Israel's continued military operation is neccessary and that changes could be made to relieve the humanitarian situation. I dont know if the person you are responding to actually believes that, but based on their comments there is no reason to think they dont. Edit: I would also add that the war crime of collective punishment has a specific intent requirement. The perpetrator has to specificly intend to punish the group for an act. Even if the person you were responding to supported all the things you mentioned, unless they supported it as a punishment for oct 7, instead of out of a belief (for example) that it would allow Israel to defeat hamas, then it would not be collective punishment. It would be other war crimes but not collective punishment. See https://opiniojuris.org/2023/10/24/a-short-history-of-the-war-crime-of-collective-punishment/ https://opiniojuris.org/2023/10/24/a-short-history-of-the-wa... for a summary of what collective punishment is. P.s. not so fun fact, the ICC lacks juridsiction over collective punishment, and given they are the main legal body investigating this conflict, we probably arent going to see any investigations into collective punishment

empath75 1y ago

I am very much of the opinion that Hamas should not be allowed to continued to exist for Israel's benefit and for Palestine's, but there is a lot of space in between "just stop fighting" and "genocide", and Israel is way closer to one side of that than I would prefer.

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lo_zamoyski 1y ago

It's possible to be critical of both Hamas and Israel, while recognizing that what Israel is doing to Palestinians is evil and a war crime. Just war principles are important to observe. The Nazis were a thuggish and murderous regime with plenty of complicity from the German populace, but the firebombing of Dresden was evil, as were the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Targeting civilians is evil. If we accept that these are evil, and we ought to, then we must accept that what Israel is doing is unacceptable. Bibi should be punished. You can target Hamas, and you should, but just war does not allow for the means Israel has used.

insane_dreamer 1y ago

> I see the key problem as people removing context this is also the main problem with your post; your context goes back to Oct 7, whereas it should go back to 1948 (or earlier). You cannot drive people from their land into a barren reservation, oppress them for decades, and expect them to not resist or fight back. It's the same colonization tactics that were used on the Native Americans, who launched their Intifadas and occasionally also committed the type of horrible atrocities as Hamas did on Oct 7. You can't justify Oct 7, but the reality is human nature is such that unless you remove the conditions which caused Oct 7 in the first place -- then it will repeat, maybe not Hamas, maybe not in this generation, but the next generation, as we've already seen. The Israeli government is trying to "solve" the Palestinian problem the same way that the US government "solved" the Native American problem -- kill enough of them, make deals and then break them (this is the Israeli settler problem), and move them far enough away from their original lands, for long enough, that you finally and completely break their spirit and ability to resist. And if that means bombing and starving tens of thousands of women and children, so be it. And the Israeli God-given "right" to the Palestinian land, because it's the "holy land" from 2000 years ago, is very much like the God-given "manifest destiny" that US colonizers invoked to "settle" the West. It was genocide then and it's genocide now.

ncr100 1y ago
Yup - granting power to the state -- from a democratic citizen to the state -- is risky and here it permits a corrupt anti-life (e.g. genocide) state to operate unchallenged. As it was with the USA, this is a foundational tragedy of Israel. The innate xenophobic "kill the THEM!" human quality appears to be alive and well, across the world today.

lawlessone 1y ago

>see the key problem as people removing context ok when is it contextually ok to starve children?

franczesko 1y ago

Being pro-Israel, what's your take on quotes from figures such as Smotrich and Ben-gvir?

tguvot 1y ago
majority of israeli population finds them despicable. in polling for next election smotrich party disappears and ben-gvir party shrinks

Yeul 1y ago

What is the context? A bunch of religious crazies decide to build a colony on the sovereign territory of another state. Now unless you ascribe to that religion or believe that your tribe can do no wrong it all seems simple.

senderista 1y ago
What state? The Ottoman Empire? The British Empire? In either case, foreign colonial states?
- 9dev 1y ago
  The sovereign state of Jordan, for example?
  - dlubarov 1y ago
    Are we talking about the West Bank now? Jordan relinquished any claim they may have had to the territory.

ASalazarMX 1y ago

> there is no "just stop fighting" option that leaves Israel with a high confidence that another Oct 7 won't happen in the next few years How can the same country that prides itself in their intel/spying prowess, and has demonstrated sophisticated capabilities and attacks, claim it will be helpless if they don't absolutely disappear another group of people and take their territory? I seriously doubt the Oct 7 attack caught Israel by surprise, given the scale of it and the level of compromise Israel had on Hamas. Given the disproportionate response Israel was prepared to employ, it was a perfect casus belli to appropriate even more land, as it is happening right now.

ncr100 1y ago
Agreed - the apathy and simultaneous granting of an individual's power to e.g. the state or the movement + abandonment of agency is the literal killer here.

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nandomrumber 1y ago

Australian here. Aside from a vocal minority, the impression I get around from conversations with and reading other Australians is that the Australian people largely agree with your position.

xg15 1y ago

Unlike the Palestinians, you can simply move to the US though.

oa335 1y ago

settler attacks against West Bank Palestinians were not caused by Hamas, but by the settlers religious belief that the land is promised to them. That is a key part of the context as well. And in that vein, what options to Palestinians have to defend against violent settlers and displacement?

tguvot 1y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Price_tag_attack_policy&useskin=vector https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Price_tag_attack_...

arp242 1y ago

Maybe not locking people up in the world's largest open-air prison for an entire generation and constantly kicking their teeth in would help. Just a thought. "Give me liberty or give me death" as you say in America, I believe. Or does that only apply to the white man?

ncr100 1y ago

Do you feel apolitical, or that you must be apolitical? As if you have no say in how things turn out? This grants power while losing agency. And it is more, and more common, e.g. in the United States with its "Deep State" myth of the Q-Anon sect.

ychnd 1y ago

In terms of civilian deaths, Oct 7 is the least important event in this entire fuckup. Or do you think Palestinian lives matter less?

Dig1t 1y ago

Isn’t the greater context that most of these people (Palestinians) had their ancestral homes stolen by “settlers”? I would vote for a pretty extreme government if someone came and stole my house. Also, the situation on the ground seems pretty clear cut. You can literally watch videos of brutal war crimes committed by Israel on Reddit. Everyone has direct proof.