Israel

[Anastasis 23469]

Case in point. The Biden administration sees an emergency situation in Gaza. The emergency is that there are not enough bombs to drop. Are you fucking kidding me?
 

https://www.axios.com/2023/12/30/blinken-biden-administration-emergency-israel-weapons-sale

Biden administration works around Congress in another Israel emergency weapons sale

 

 

[RomaVicta 29907]

3 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

I think some of us have the attitude of “ride with an outlaw, die with an outlaw”.  Whether that’s fair or not, Hamas came to power over 15 years ago on a platform of armed conflict/resistance to Israel and they’ve never hidden that.  Their identity is literally wrapped up in armed conflict with Israel and they are dragging Palestinians into it, but everybody knew exactly who they were back in 2007/2008 when they won power.

There’s 2 million Palestinians in Gaza, and a claimed 25,000 Hamas members. Whatever many of us may think, Israel most likely wishes the Palestinian people would boot Hamas out of power and expel them from the Gaza Strip without the need for the IDF to be involved  

If in the coming years, Hamas is still in power, a lot of us will have no sympathy for the plight of Palestinians.  It’s no different than the Russian people allowing Putin to remain in power and getting their sons and husbands killed.  Ride with an outlaw, die with an outlaw.

Is Israel fighting a state army comprised of a cross section of Palestinian society? If Israel needs to level the place to get rid of Hamas, what exactly would a grass roots domestic campaign of civilians against Hamas look like?

It's my understanding that Hamas is not a popular government and its legitimacy, such as it is, relies on an election held 15 years ago where they were not elected based on antipathy towards Israel. Someone here posted a credible polling effort.

Palestinians are no more riding with Hamas than Americans are riding with the Mafia or Colombians are riding with whatever cartel is now established there. They have little say.

I keep seeing smart people using what appears to me to be rationalizations to support a visceral desire for this to be simply a matter of good guys versus bad guys. I don't believe that is the case in the MidEast at all.

[Brisketexan 105127]

Is Israel fighting a state army comprised of a cross section of Palestinian society? If Israel needs to level the place to get rid of Hamas, what exactly would a grass roots domestic campaign of civilians against Hamas look like?
It's my understanding that Hamas is not a popular government and its legitimacy, such as it is, relies on an election held 15 years ago where they were not elected based on antipathy towards Israel. Someone here posted a credible polling effort.
Palestinians are no more riding with Hamas than Americans are riding with the Mafia or Colombians are riding with whatever cartel is now established there. They have little say.
I keep seeing smart people using what appears to me to be rationalizations to support a visceral desire for this to be simply a matter of good guys versus bad guys. I don't believe that is the case in the MidEast at all.

Recent polling (before this war) showed that a sizable plurality of Palestinians in Gaza supported Hamas and the destruction of Israel (those numbers shot up once the war started). The “but not a majority of them supported it” is t a good argument. I noted this before, comparing it to the hardcore anti-Jew Nazis, hardcore anti-Palestinian Israelis, and even our own MAGA movement - once you hit a critical mass of genocidal hatred, you’re fucked.

If 2% of your population thinks people X should be exterminated, you’ve got some real assholes, and you should probably treat them as such. But they will not exert any meaningful influence or control in your society. They are a fringe outlier. If that number hits 20%? 30%? Then you have a serious fucking problem. Because in any split society (that is…ALL societies), that percentage is enough to take control/have outsize influence of a whole political party or movement, and that party/movement in turn has a chance of controlling some/much/all of your government.

So I disagree with you. The Palestinians have, by material plurality, chosen to ride with a genocidal death cult. And the Israelis, by similar plurality, have done the same. Unless and until the death cults are relegated to fringe status, we will have this war, forever and ever and ever.

TLDR; if 2% of the people are Nazis, you have some Nazi assholes…if 30% of the people are Nazis, there’s a very good chance you live in a Nazi state.

[statsman 5463]

Don’t think there are any “just bad” guys here? I disagree. Iran is bad. They are funding Hamas and supplying weapons to Hamas and Hezbollah (and are allied with Syria and are supporting the Houthis). They are supporting bad actors all over the region and world (including the Americas). 
 
Iran is bad. Their removal from the scene would create room for all sorts of productive activity 

[bolverk 29671]

5 minutes ago, statsman said:

Don’t think there are any “just bad” guys here? I disagree. Iran is bad. They are funding Hamas and supplying weapons to Hamas and Hezbollah (and are allied with Syria and are supporting the Houthis). They are supporting bad actors all over the region and world (including the Americas). 
 
Iran is bad. Their removal from the scene would create room for all sorts of productive activity 

With whom are you disagreeing? I don't think I've seen anyone say anything in support of Iran.

What I do see, however, are people saying something akin to one of two primary arguments du jour:

1. There are no "good guys" among the combatants, including Israel.
2. Israel is justified in destroying Gaza on the grounds that Hamas are "bad guys".

Among other discussions and claims over the past couple of months that I've seen are also:

• Palestinians/Arabs are anti-semitic and support the destruction of Israel; therefore, Israel can't live in peace.
• Israel has been oppressing Palestinians in the West Bank/Gaza through occupation or blockade (apartheid/open-air prison).
• The Palestinians/Arabs attacked Israel 50+ years ago and lost; therefore, Israel has a right to the land they won.
• The U.S. shouldn't be supplying Israelis with more weapons when they clearly have a military advantage.
• Islam is inherently opposed to democracy/the modern world.
• Israel is a small country that needs to occupy land in order to have a militarily defensible position.

If you can find a post where someone is saying that Iran isn't a bad actor in all this, I'd appreciate it. Because that is one hot take I have not seen, and I'd like to laugh at that poster.

[Bullneck 19085]

1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

Recent polling (before this war) showed that a sizable plurality of Palestinians in Gaza supported Hamas and the destruction of Israel (those numbers shot up once the war started). The “but not a majority of them supported it” is t a good argument. I noted this before, comparing it to the hardcore anti-Jew Nazis, hardcore anti-Palestinian Israelis, and even our own MAGA movement - once you hit a critical mass of genocidal hatred, you’re fucked.

If 2% of your population thinks people X should be exterminated, you’ve got some real assholes, and you should probably treat them as such. But they will not exert any meaningful influence or control in your society. They are a fringe outlier. If that number hits 20%? 30%? Then you have a serious fucking problem. Because in any split society (that is…ALL societies), that percentage is enough to take control/have outsize influence of a whole political party or movement, and that party/movement in turn has a chance of controlling some/much/all of your government.

So I disagree with you. The Palestinians have, by material plurality, chosen to ride with a genocidal death cult. And the Israelis, by similar plurality, have done the same. Unless and until the death cults are relegated to fringe status, we will have this war, forever and ever and ever.

TLDR; if 2% of the people are Nazis, you have some Nazi assholes…if 30% of the people are Nazis, there’s a very good chance you live in a Nazi state.

THIS.

I've read a lot about the total isolation between Hamas and everyone else in Gaza but I'm not buying it.  No elections since 2005, Hamas kills you if you argue back. Yes, I believe all that, but . . .

Can anyone tell me the Hamas platform leading up to their election?  I'm guessing they pretty much delivered on what they promised.  

I'd also wager there was widespread joy (even before reading what Brisket posted above) and that the general population was euphoric about killing Jews on October 7th.  It wasn't until later they got their "we awakened a sleeping giant" moment.  No they are pushing the "feel sorry for us" narrative.

I do feel sorry for them, but there's some "mess with the bull, get the horns" vibe present.

I'm reading a lot of moralizing by a few people on this thread, about what is right and what is wrong, etc. but no answers (I'm looking at you Fantana) to my question about what Isreal should do.  Please answer.  

 

 

Edited December 30, 2023 by Bullneck

[DDD Dad 14339]

7 hours ago, Anastasis said:

Really more embarrassing for DDD, but he should be well acclimated to that by now. For those that are actually concerned about what is going on in the West Bank as well, this has been the deadliest year for WB palestinians in nearly 20 years.  

 

 

[DDD Dad 14339]

1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

TLDR; if 2% of the people are Nazis, you have some Nazi assholes…if 30% of the people are Nazis, there’s a very good chance you live in a Nazi state.

So…Texas is a Nazi state?

[Biff Tannen 45682]

2 minutes ago, DDD Dad said:

So…Texas is a Nazi state?

Yes?

[bolverk 29671]

9 minutes ago, Bullneck said:

Can anyone tell me the Hamas platform leading up to their election?  I'm guessing they pretty much delivered on what they promised.  

If you haven't watched the John Oliver segment on this mess, you should do yourself a favor and watch it. From what I recall, he goes into this and says that Hamas was downplaying all the Death to Israel stuff. Instead, they campaigned on Fatah's corruption and incompetence. Of course, they later changed their tune.

 

[atomheartbevo 89659]

2 hours ago, Anastasis said:

At what point should we re-evaluate and like really consider pulling the plug on dumping more and more and more arms into the region? I think we crossed that threshold decades ago, but the beat just keeps on and on.

Never will happen.  Republican Christians have injected their theories about what an over 2,000 year-old book written by multiple authors over several centuries has to say on the matter. And a bunch of Republicans may hate the Jews these days, but they claim to love Jesus and his homeland.  And we have several million Jewish people in the US as well.  We are ride or die with Israel.

[RomaVicta 29907]

2 hours ago, statsman said:

Don’t think there are any “just bad” guys here? I disagree. Iran is bad. They are funding Hamas and supplying weapons to Hamas and Hezbollah (and are allied with Syria and are supporting the Houthis). They are supporting bad actors all over the region and world (including the Americas). 
 
Iran is bad. Their removal from the scene would create room for all sorts of productive activity 

You're getting tiresome if you're addressing what I wrote. In fact, you can't break out of the mindset that I decry. 

I described a disposition where one wants to believe that a fight is between good guys and bad guys. You inferring that I mean to say there are no bad actors on the anti-Israel side is absurd. I've made it clear on this page that the acts of Hamas were unspeakably horrific. If Israel caught those guys and skinned them alive, I wouldn't raise an eyebrow.

I'll make my position even clearer: I don't know what the solution is in this conflict. It's complicated and inherent issues such as described by Brisket above may indeed make it impossible to solve through negotiation. I don't know. 

I don't want the US to have any hand in the slaughter going on in GAZA. Even speaking in terms of being "friends" with Israel or any other nation is a silly notion cooked up for the morons watching at home. We have been allies. Our obligations are lined out by agreements and treaties. If those pieces of paper and that relationship no longer serve the interests of the US, then they must be altered.

Our name is tarnished by supporting the corrupt and bloodthirsty Israeli government's slaughter of innocent Palestinians. We should only be offering humanitarian aid. We should never have rolled a carrier up off the coast and stood in that way with Israel.

@Brisketexan I appreciate the tone and intelligence of your post about genocide. I think I've described my position for the most part, so maybe we come to foundational point of our disagreement. 

I will only add that in your description of the two nations, consider the the relative capabilities of carrying out genocide. Israel is an actual nation state with a relatively huge military capablility. Cutting that capability lose to do whatever it may is akin to the US firing nukes after 9/11. Bye, Afghanistan. We can use tactical nukes instead of Hellfire missiles fired from drones. 

I wouldn't support that level of retaliation. I would be shocked if you would support such a thing. That's what I see going on in Gaza.

Edited December 31, 2023 by RomaVicta

[atomheartbevo 89659]

3 hours ago, RomaVicta said:

It's my understanding that Hamas is not a popular government and its legitimacy, such as it is,

The fact that Hamas has so few actual card-carrying members (25,000) in such a large population (2 million Palestinians in Gaza) speaks volumes about their lack of popularity and more about Iran’s reach and how the Palestinians felt about Israel in 2007/2008   Of course, there are plenty of Palestinians that love the idea of Hamas, but don’t want the baggage associated with it - we saw them show themselves on October 7th.

The Palestinians are going to have to decide how much pain they can tolerate in allowing Hamas to remain in power - whether folks agree or disagree with Israel and their actions after Oct. 7th, Hamas is exactly who they have always been, and it was inevitable that they on their own, or with Iran’s prodding, were going to do something big if given the chance.

[atomheartbevo 89659]

42 minutes ago, RomaVicta said:

I will only add that in your description of the two nations, consider the the relative capabilities of carrying out genocide. Israel is an actual nation state with a relatively huge military capablility. Cutting that capability lose to do whatever it may is akin to the US firing nukes after 9/11. Bye, Afghanistan. We can use tactical nukes instead of Hellfire missiles fired from drones. 

I wouldn't support that level of retaliation. I would be shocked if you would support such a thing. That's what I see going on in Gaza.

Most of us don’t understand or support such a thing, because we’ve never been faced with an existential threat that manifested on our territory in our lifetimes, and that includes 9/11 and the Cold War.  The closest we faced happened a few years ago on January 6th with Trump and MAGA, but that resolved itself later in the day, and if you didn’t follow the news for 6-8 hours, you might have even missed the worst of it (and I’d argue that most Americans have no idea how close the Republicans came to fucking up our nation).

 Israel, from the 1940s (after the Holocaust) through the 1970s, faced multiple external existential threats  and since then, the existential threat comes from within, and it manifested itself on October 7th. I have friends from Israel that I went to school with back in the 80s, they have done their military service, and so have their kids (including a few now), and in talking to them or reading what they’ve said on social media, they were shaken to their core over October 7th.

9/11 for most of us generated anger and a thirst for revenge. October 7th for a lot of Israelis is about fear, and fear makes people/countries do even more drastic things than anger.  The Palestinians are going to suffer for that Israeli fear of Hamas, especially seeing that Hamas sees the Palestinians as human shields and propaganda pieces. It doesn’t help that Israel has very little room for error, literally and figuratively.

Edited December 31, 2023 by atomheartbevo

[bolverk 29671]

20 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Most of us don’t understand or support such a thing, because we’ve never been faced with an existential threat that manifested on our territory in our lifetimes, and that includes 9/11 and the Cold War.  The closest we faced happened a few years ago on January 6th with Trump and MAGA, but that resolved itself later in the day, and if you didn’t follow the news for 6-8 hours, you might have even missed the worst of it (and I’d argue that most Americans have no idea how close the Republicans came to fucking up our nation).

 Israel, from the 1940s (after the Holocaust) through the 1970s, faced multiple external existential threats  and since then, the existential threat comes from within, and it manifested itself on October 7th. I have friends from Israel that I went to school with back in the 80s, they have done their military service, and so have their kids (including a few now), and in talking to them or reading what they’ve said on social media, they were shaken to their core over October 7th.

9/11 for most of us generated anger and a thirst for revenge. October 7th for a lot of Israelis is about fear, and fear makes people/countries do even more drastic things than anger.  The Palestinians are going to suffer for that Israeli fear of Hamas, especially seeing that Hamas sees the Palestinians as human shields and propaganda pieces. It doesn’t help that Israel has very little room for error, literally and figuratively.

You're absolutely correct that it's a perspective that we Americans can't really understand, and I hope to never come closer than when we did that day as a few thousand dumbasses stormed the Capitol. I can only imagine the angst that Israelis felt on 10/7, especially given their history.

But I also ask you to apply that same level of empathy to the 2+ million Palestinian civilians living in the Gaza Strip, who I'm sure right now feel like they're facing quite an existential crisis knowing that there's nowhere for them to retreat to. 

I just went on the old MAPfrappe site to redraw a rough outline of the Gaza Strip and superimposed it over Austin. It's a very small territory that's getting smaller and smaller as the internally displaced population is getting crammed into an increasingly tight corner of the strip. Imagine the fear those people are facing as bombs keep dropping while they have insufficient food and disease is spreading due to unsanitary living conditions.

https://mapfrappe.com/?show=1029

 

Reposting the damage map from above to visualize the destruction, as well as the extent of the "humanitarian zone" that 2+ million people are gradually getting pushed into.

[bolverk 29671]

For further perspective, this is the West Bank over Central Texas.

 

The Palestinian Authority is only in control of the beige areas (3+ million population), which is, of course, always subject to IDF operations. The blue zones are reserved for either the Israeli military or Israeli settlers. Again, just posting these for perspective.

[atomheartbevo 89659]

33 minutes ago, bolverk said:

But I also ask you to apply that same level of empathy to the 2+ million Palestinian civilians living in the Gaza Strip, who I'm sure right now feel like they're facing quite an existential crisis knowing that there's nowhere for them to retreat to. 

I would like to.  To me, Hamas is as much an enemy of the Palestinian people as Hamas is an enemy of the Israelis, while Iran is using the Palestinian people (through Hamas) to try and keep Israel off balance. But as you or somebody else said, the extremists in Israel and among the Palestinians are preventing the Israelis and Palestinians from coming together against the common enemy. 

In some ways, the Palestinians suffer from the same issues that North Korean civilians do - they’ve got decades of their leadership completely fucking them over so that they could get rich and push their personal agendas, whether it was Arafat or later Abbas and Hamas, and over multiple generations that mindset becomes very damaging.

 Israel cannot allow Hamas to exist going forward, and Hamas is going to do everything they can to blend in with the Palestinian civilian population, so this doesn’t end well or quickly, and it won’t end unless the Palestinians help end it.

[RomaVicta 29907]

I think we've carried this conversation to impasse. I appreciate the quality of the discussion, my friends.

[Brian Fantana 6685]

11 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

I would like to.  To me, Hamas is as much an enemy of the Palestinian people as Hamas is an enemy of the Israelis, while Iran is using the Palestinian people (through Hamas) to try and keep Israel off balance. But as you or somebody else said, the extremists in Israel and among the Palestinians are preventing the Israelis and Palestinians from coming together against the common enemy. 

In some ways, the Palestinians suffer from the same issues that North Korean civilians do - they’ve got decades of their leadership completely fucking them over so that they could get rich and push their personal agendas, whether it was Arafat or later Abbas and Hamas, and over multiple generations that mindset becomes very damaging.

 Israel cannot allow Hamas to exist going forward, and Hamas is going to do everything they can to blend in with the Palestinian civilian population, so this doesn’t end well or quickly, and it won’t end unless the Palestinians help end it.

Yeah I don't think there's any disagreement here. Everyone has to change. The extremists govern both sides.

[Brisketexan 105127]

You're getting tiresome if you're addressing what I wrote. In fact, you can't break out of the mindset that I decry. 
I described a disposition where one wants to believe that a fight is between good guys and bad guys. You inferring that I mean to say there are no bad actors on the anti-Israel side is absurd. I've made it clear on this page that the acts of Hamas were unspeakably horrific. If Israel caught those guys and skinned them alive, I wouldn't raise an eyebrow.
I'll make my position even clearer: I don't know what the solution is in this conflict. It's complicated and inherent issues such as described by Brisket above may indeed make it impossible to solve through negotiation. I don't know. 
I don't want the US to have any hand in the slaughter going on in GAZA. Even speaking in terms of being "friends" with Israel or any other nation is a silly notion cooked up for the morons watching at home. We have been allies. Our obligations are lined out by agreements and treaties. If those pieces of paper and that relationship no longer serve the interests of the US, then they must be altered.
Our name is tarnished by supporting the corrupt and bloodthirsty Israeli government's slaughter of innocent Palestinians. We should only be offering humanitarian aid. We should never have rolled a carrier up off the coast and stood in that way with Israel.
[mention=593]Brisketexan[/mention] I appreciate the tone and intelligence of your post about genocide. I think I've described my position for the most part, so maybe we come to foundational point of our disagreement. 
I will only add that in your description of the two nations, consider the the relative capabilities of carrying out genocide. Israel is an actual nation state with a relatively huge military capablility. Cutting that capability lose to do whatever it may is akin to the US firing nukes after 9/11. Bye, Afghanistan. We can use tactical nukes instead of Hellfire missiles fired from drones. 
I wouldn't support that level of retaliation. I would be shocked if you would support such a thing. That's what I see going on in Gaza.

The fact that Hamas has so few actual card-carrying members (25,000) in such a large population (2 million Palestinians in Gaza) speaks volumes about their lack of popularity and more about Iran’s reach and how the Palestinians felt about Israel in 2007/2008   Of course, there are plenty of Palestinians that love the idea of Hamas, but don’t want the baggage associated with it - we saw them show themselves on October 7th.
The Palestinians are going to have to decide how much pain they can tolerate in allowing Hamas to remain in power - whether folks agree or disagree with Israel and their actions after Oct. 7th, Hamas is exactly who they have always been, and it was inevitable that they on their own, or with Iran’s prodding, were going to do something big if given the chance.

It seems we have reasonable consensus that the 1) Israel has a right (even an obligation) to respond to Hamas and Oct 7 with force, but not 2) to wage indiscriminate war against the Palestinians in Gaza. The challenge, as always, is what path 1) looks like without it crossing over into path 2). I think most of us agree that Israel’s path thus far is well into the path 2) realm.
It would be quite helpful if Israel devoted significant energy to the message (and consistent action) of “we are at war with Hamas, NOT with the Palestinian people.” But they really can’t say that, and not just because their actions aren’t consistent with it….its also because in the mind of their government and a significant chunk of their population, Israel IS at war against all Palestinians. Thus, my observation on how once you reach a certain percentage of genocidal fucksticks, you become a genocidal fuckstick country.
Nothing that has happened since Oct 7 makes future acts of genocide less likely. They obviously make them more likely. At this point, even if Israel does succeed in eliminating the organization and leadership known as Hamas, within 5-10 years, they will be facing “Hamas 2, genocidal boogaloo.”
There’s no hope in the region. None. Zero. It is a land of death and blood, and will be until the heat death of the universe.

[Anastasis 23469]

13 hours ago, bolverk said:

For further perspective, this is the West Bank over Central Texas.

 

The Palestinian Authority is only in control of the beige areas (3+ million population), which is, of course, always subject to IDF operations. The blue zones are reserved for either the Israeli military or Israeli settlers. Again, just posting these for perspective.

 

How many checkpoints would one have to go through to get from San Marcos to Georgetown?

[Brisketexan 105127]

 
How many checkpoints would one have to go through to get from San Marcos to Georgetown?

Oh, if you think it’s so easy to run a gauntlet that starts with drunk bobcat sorority girls, has to navigate through a passel of other Tx State students driving up 35 to get debauched downtown, through I-35 downtown traffic, then the clusterfuck that is the upper/lower deck split, ending in encounters with racist Wilco law enforcement, HAVE AT IT, TOUGH GUY.
You’d never make it past the sorority girls.
Nor should you.

[YGIFS 19450]

Wait, we're still talking about ethnic cleansing, right?  

[Brisketexan 105127]

Tapa glitch

[Brisketexan 105127]

Wait, we're still talking about ethnic cleansing, right?  

If you mean that many of them are “ethnic,” and we would shower with them, then yes. I am pro ethnic cleansing, and always have been.

[YGIFS 19450]

You lost me at "we would shower with them"  

[Anastasis 23469]

17 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Oh, if you think it’s so easy to run a gauntlet that starts with drunk bobcat sorority girls, has to navigate through a passel of other Tx State students driving up 35 to get debauched downtown, through I-35 downtown traffic, then the clusterfuck that is the upper/lower deck split, ending in encounters with racist Wilco law enforcement, HAVE AT IT, TOUGH GUY.
You’d never make it past the sorority girls.
Nor should you.

Well that wasn't exactly the type of ritualized and systematic dehumanization I was thinking of, but point made. 

[Brisketexan 105127]

Well that wasn't exactly the type of ritualized and systematic dehumanization I was thinking of, but point made. 

Forget it Jake….it’s Texas State.

[InkaUtexas 25924]

Damn lawyers and their elitist attitudes. Crown and Anchor types.

[atomheartbevo 89659]

8 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

It seems we have reasonable consensus that the 1) Israel has a right (even an obligation) to respond to Hamas and Oct 7 with force, but not 2) to wage indiscriminate war against the Palestinians in Gaza. The challenge, as always, is what path 1) looks like without it crossing over into path 2). I think most of us agree that Israel’s path thus far is well into the path 2) realm.

8 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

It would be quite helpful if Israel devoted significant energy to the message (and consistent action) of “we are at war with Hamas, NOT with the Palestinian people.” But they really can’t say that, and not just because their actions aren’t consistent with it….its also because in the mind of their government and a significant chunk of their population, Israel IS at war against all Palestinians. Thus, my observation on how once you reach a certain percentage of genocidal fucksticks, you become a genocidal fuckstick country.

Agreed with everything you’ve said, but I’d toss in that even if Israel came up with a perfect message about only being at war with Hamas and not the Palestinians, does it matter since Hamas does everything they can to blend back in with the Palestinians after they attack/fight?  They stockpile weapons and ammo in schools and hospitals and not big warehouses marked “Hamas”.  Their fighters can quickly shed their gear and blend right in and look like a Palestinian male.

[atomheartbevo 89659]

Hamas fired off 20 or so rockets from the Gaza Strip into Israeli areas, included Tel Aviv.  Many intercepted, no deaths or injuries.

Meanwhile

https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog-december-31-2023/

Quote

Israel plans to permanently replace all Palestinian laborers with foreign workers, in a major, ambitious initiative aimed at ridding the country of a perceived security threat, the Kan public broadcaster reports.

Thousands of construction and agriculture workers from the West Bank have been barred from entering Israel for work since Hamas’s mass invasion and onslaught of October 7. Hamas reportedly gathered some of its intelligence for the attack from Gazans who had permits to work in Israel.

To prevent a potential repeat in the West Bank, Kan says the government does not intend to allow the Palestinian workers back after the ongoing war.

The reported plan by the finance, interior and labor ministries would see Israel bring in 25,500 workers from Sri Lanka, 20,000 from China, 17,000 from India, 13,000 from Thailand and 6,000 from Moldova. In some cases, this will require signing new deals with countries involved, and diplomatic work is being done to advance these deals, the report says.

Additionally, the government intends to incentivize Israelis to work in construction and agriculture, as well promoting technologies that could cut the number of employees needed in these fields.

 

[Jatrain 288]

Is Israel’s endgame in this coming into focus?

(Israeli Finance Minister) Smotrich then suggested that the removal of around 90 percent of Gaza's residents would help achieve his goal. "If there are 100,000 or 200,000 Arabs in Gaza and not two million, the whole discourse about the day after will be different," he said…..

Smotrich's comments are the latest in a growing list of troubling remarks by Israeli lawmakers to seemingly support expelling Gazans en masse out of the Strip in order to ensure Israel's security after the war.

[Brian Fantana 6685]

Yeah totally not ethnic cleansing though.

[BrickHorn 18230]

16 hours ago, Jatrain said:

Is Israel’s endgame in this coming into focus?

(Israeli Finance Minister) Smotrich then suggested that the removal of around 90 percent of Gaza's residents would help achieve his goal. "If there are 100,000 or 200,000 Arabs in Gaza and not two million, the whole discourse about the day after will be different," he said…..

Smotrich's comments are the latest in a growing list of troubling remarks by Israeli lawmakers to seemingly support expelling Gazans en masse out of the Strip in order to ensure Israel's security after the war.

Towards the end of S.C Gwynne’s mesmerizing "Empire of the Summer Moon," Quanah Parker explains to a friend named Miller how “the white man had pushed the Indian off the land.” Quanah, a Comanche warrior who had surrendered to the U.S. government in 1875, directs Miller to sit on a cottonwood log. "Quanah sat down close to him and said 'Move over.' Miller moved. Parker moved with him, and again sat down close to him. ‘Move over,’ he repeated. This continued until Miller had fallen off the log. 'Like that,' said Quanah."

[bolverk 29671]

The Israeli Supreme Court turned down the recent effort to weaken the judicial system, which was the subject of all the protests prior to the war. This is a victory for Israeli democracy and a rejection of Israel's far-right.

Good analysis about the decision and how this plays into a lot of the culture war stuff, along with the actual hot war, going on over there:

Spoiler

The Twin Fronts in the Battle Over Israel’s Identity
Monday’s court ruling joined the war in Gaza in a widening crisis over what kind of state Israel will be.

The decision by the Israeli Supreme Court to reject legislative control over the judiciary ends for now the languishing effort by the far-right government of Benjamin Netanyahu to diminish the courts, which had already sparked nine months of protests that only ended when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7.

The protests had deeply divided Israel, but the subsequent war united it, with even pilots and reservists who had vowed to ignore military exercises immediately showing up to fight before they were called.

If the court’s decision on Monday ripped off this wartime poultice, displaying anew the cultural war at the heart of Israeli politics, Mr. Netanyahu and his government responded by appealing again to wartime unity to try to downplay their loss. It was another version of Mr. Netanyahu’s argument against just about every critic of his performance and his policies — that these are all subjects to be discussed “after the war.”

And the ruling of the court, however important, is expected to have little or no impact on the conduct of the war itself.

“I don’t think the ruling will change anything,” said Amit Segal, a political columnist for the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth who reported a leak of the ruling and is considered close to Mr. Netanyahu. Even before the war, he said, “Netanyahu did not have enough artillery, so to speak, to overwhelm the opponents.” So it helps him that this ruling has arrived during war, Mr. Segal said, because “he can justify a lack of reaction, and after the war he will have more pressing matters,” like his own political survival.

But the court and the war are connected in a way, because they are both crucial to Israel’s future and future identity. Israel regards the war as existential — the best way to restore its reputation in the region as ineradicable and as a beacon of security for Jews worldwide. The court decision goes to the heart of the debate over whether Israel will remain a thriving democracy, which is vital to its special relationship with the West.

Seen narrowly, the court has ruled that the judiciary must be able to provide a check on the ability of a simple majority in Israel’s Parliament, the Knesset, to change the country’s fundamental laws and to alter the democratic character of the state. It left open the possibility of fundamental legal changes by a special vote with a larger majority.

Mr. Netanyahu and his allies have argued that the courts have too much power over legislation by elected lawmakers, are too liberal and are chosen undemocratically.

The court ruling was seen by critics of Mr. Netanyahu, whose own trial on corruption charges is ongoing, as having saved the nature of a balanced democracy in a country with no constitution and no upper house. Some, like the former attorney general and former Supreme Court judge Menachem Mazuz, called it “the most important ruling since the foundation of the state.”

Until now, Mr. Mazuz said in a telephone interview, “the Knesset had the feeling that they could do whatever they wanted, determine that there are two suns during the day and four at night.” But the court had ruled “that there are limitations on the Knesset’s authority, that it is impossible to harm the democratic or Jewish character of the state, that there are limitations.” That, he said, could allow a different and improved agreement down the road “between the legal and political systems.”

But the ruling also “plays into existing issues of cultural war in Israel,” said Bernard Avishai, an Israeli-American analyst in Jerusalem. “Increasingly there is a divide between people who think the war is winnable and — like Netanyahu — that Israel’s sole objective is to get stronger and more intimidating, and those who think that the war is not really winnable in those terms, that we need some kind of diplomatic vista, that we can’t continue to alienate the rest of the world, the region and the United States, where we get our weapons,” he said.

The court ruling “has made more vivid this growing tension between those who want a plausible diplomatic solution and those who want to go back to the status quo before the war, who are the same people who wanted to defang the court,” Mr. Avishai said.

Mr. Netanyahu and his allies, he added, are pushing for a “Jewish state ruling over the whole land of Israel,” including annexing large parts of the West Bank and even, as some ministers suggest, resettling Gaza, while “the court was seen as trying to liberalize the country, which was a challenge to the status quo and the annexation and ‘Land of Israel’ supporters.”

For Dahlia Scheindlin, an Israeli analyst and pollster, “there is a direct link between the outcome of this war and the nature of Israel, what kind of state it will be and whether it can continue to claim to be democratic.”

The war, she said, “has been a great accelerator for the most far-reaching designs of a far-right government, including the annexation, possible expulsion and complete, formal Jewish sovereignty over all of the land and the people within it.”

Mr. Netanyahu is expected to use the ruling to continue to try to shore up his thin majority in Parliament, built on his coalition with religious nationalists and the far right. Already, Mr. Netanyahu has refused to condemn some of the harshest statements by his allies about annexing the West Bank and resettling Gaza. He has presented himself as the vital bulwark against the criticisms of the rest of the world, including the United States, and the whole idea, favored by President Biden, of a future Gaza ruled by a “revitalized” Palestinian Authority.

In one recent example, Mr. Netanyahu has supported his far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who rejected Mr. Biden’s demand that Israel transfer to the Palestinian Authority the part of the Palestinian tax funds it collects on behalf of the authority, intended for its employees in Gaza, intimating that he would resign from the government.

“Bibi is still their champion,” Mr. Avishai said.

Mr. Netanyahu has also made clear, as recently as a news conference on Saturday, that he does not intend to resign, even after the war and even as his Likud party sinks in the opinion polls. A Channel 13 poll said that elections now would secure Likud only 16 seats and, along with its current coalition parties, only 45 seats in the 120-seat Knesset, compared to 38 seats for Mr. Netanyahu’s rival Benny Gantz and 71 seats for opposition parties.

Ms. Scheindlin, the pollster, said Likud’s coordinated call for wartime unity after the court ruling was politically savvy, because even the party’s supporters did not care as much about the judicial overhaul as about other issues, including the outcome of the war. Mr. Segal, however, said that the ruling might help shore up Likud’s support, because many of the party’s voters would be angry about it.

Still, the call for unity and the charge that the court ruling hurts the war effort are “pretty cynical,” Ms. Scheindlin said, “since it was the judicial reform bill that actually ripped apart the country.”

Mr. Netanyahu said that “the court’s decision contradicts the people’s desire for unity, particularly at a time of war,” while Itamar Ben Gvir, the national security minister, said: “At a time when our soldiers are giving their lives for the people of Israel in Gaza every day, the judges of the high court decided to weaken their spirit.”

The subtext, Ms. Scheindlin said, is that “nothing we don’t like should happen until the war is over, and the war will never be over,” at least not for a very long time.

 

[Anastasis 23469]

Alan Dershowitz being floated by Netanyahu to represent Israel at ICJ. 

[Brian Fantana 6685]

[Jatrain 288]

7 hours ago, Anastasis said:

Alan Dershowitz being floated by Netanyahu to represent Israel at ICJ. 

Moving up in the world from Epstein.  

[Brian Fantana 6685]

South Africa tells ICJ Israel is committing genocide in Gaza | AP News

[Neonmoon 38129]

South Africa officially has a “neutral” stance on Russia’s genocide in Ukraine. They are clowns 

[Anastasis 23469]

8 hours ago, Brian Fantana said:

South Africa tells ICJ Israel is committing genocide in Gaza | AP News

Interesting there is not more interest in this on the sub. Maybe a gif to get things going. 
 

 

[Brian Fantana 6685]

8 hours ago, Neonmoon said:

South Africa officially has a “neutral” stance on Russia’s genocide in Ukraine. They are clowns 

Clearly. But it's still notable as the first country to bring this to the ICJ I believe.

[956 Worldwide 34710]

Centcom rn.

[Brian Fantana 6685]

In case you're ever confused about 956 absolutely wanting every Palestinian dead...lmao

[Brian Fantana 6685]

Bloodthirsty freak

[956 Worldwide 34710]

lol, we’re bombing the Houthis and not Gaza, get over yourself. 

[Brian Fantana 6685]

My favorite part is how you never deny it 🤣

[956 Worldwide 34710]

Wtf are you even talking about. I am absolutely glad to see CENTCOM destroying Houthi missile sites, it’s Good. 

[Brian Fantana 6685]

Same. I'm blasted. Pay me no jeed

Heed

[wildcat09 29354]

It's amazing how anything international just fucking splinters people's brains so badly. The Houthis are religious fanatic shitheads who are doing the one fucking thing the entire goddamn United States Navy exists to prevent and these attacks are the most clearly legal deployment of US force since the initial invasion of Afghanistan, but countless people on the left (including some in fucking Congress) think it's illegal. 

Fucking American exceptionalism is the real mind virus. The leftists who fall for it just invert it's standard mode, so they think America is the only bad actor in the world.