As I write these words, I am sitting at home in Tel Aviv, trying to figure out how to protect my family in a house with no shelter or safe room, following with growing panic the reports and rumors of horrible events taking place in the Israeli towns near Gaza which are under attack. I see people, some of them my friends, calling on social media to attack Gaza more fiercely than ever before. Some Israelis are saying that now is the time to eradicate Gaza entirely — essentially calling for genocide. Through all the explosions, the dread and the bloodshed, speaking about peaceful solutions seems like madness to them.

Yet I remember that everything that I am feeling now, which every Israeli must be sharing, has been the life experience of millions of Palestinians for far too long. The only solution, as it has always been, is to bring an end of apartheid, occupation, and siege, and promote a future based on justice and equality for all of us. It is not in spite of the horror that we have to change course — it is exactly because of it.

  • flossdaily@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I hope the world remembers this the next time they want to start calling Israel apartheid for building security fences on their borders.

    For their entire existence they’ve lived with genocidal neighbors who would, in a heartbeat, murder all Jewish children and wipe them from the map.

    Palestinian terrorists have been raining rockets down at Israeli civilians constantly for years.

    But if Israel does a targeted, surgical strike of terrorist infrastructure, CALLING the buildings ahead of time to people evacuate, and even dropping a warning shot first… There is no end to people calling Israel the villain.

    Hell, people lose their shit if Israel bulldozes a house that Palestinians were using as a terrorist base.

    Glad to see at long last that the world is remembering who the actual terrorists are, and finally backing Israel.

      • flossdaily@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        That just shows that Israel has the better military. Everyone already knows that.

        It has nothing to do with who is justified in the conflict.

        If 10,000 people wielding rocks tried to take over the Whitehouse, I’m pretty sure we’d see 10,000 dead people with rocks in their hands. Does that make them the good guys?

        Palestinians have been TARGETING Israeli children for death. Israel had been targeting military targets, and with a better record of minimizing civilian casualties than even the United States.

        … Let’s it put it this way: if Palestinians put down their weapons, this conflict would be over in a matter of months.

        If Israel out down their weapons, Palestinians would murder them all. It’s in their elected leaders’ charter, for fucks sake.

    • JoBo@feddit.ukOP
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      1 year ago

      Read the fucking room. Or better still, the article. Israel is the aggressor and has left the Palestinians nothing to lose.

      • bangupjobasusual
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        1 year ago

        I’m sorry but that’s not true, there are going to be consequences for this. Israel cannot back down now because it sets an absolute precedent that you can do shit like this to get your way. I do not agree with Israel’s policies in the region or the atrocities that they certainly have committed but this… this has the power to turn public opinion. The repercussions are going to be horrifying and hamas knows it, and they don’t care.

        • Astroturfed@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Yes, they should just lay down and take it. Maybe we should give them all some of those super loud rape whistles and they can just all blow them constantly. That will surely make the Israelis stop.

        • idiomaddict@feddit.de
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          1 year ago

          That ain’t it, chief. Israel is a violent colonizer. Individual Jews are often persecuted for being Jewish. Those are separate and unrelated statements.

          • Gorilladrums
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            1 year ago

            Israel isn’t a colonizer. This bullshit narrative is literally only believed by Marxists who get all their information through propaganda. About 70% of Israelis were already there, they’re native to the region. This idea that the majority of Israelis are European Jews is false, and so is the idea that Palestine before 1948 being a homogenous islamist Arab state. This region was always populated by Jews, Christians, and other groups. Jews, specifically, were oppressed and colonized by the various islamic empires because islam is deeply antisemtic, but they were still there despite all of their hardships. Israel didn’t pop out of thin air, and the European Jews who did migrate didn’t start from scratch. There were already large Jewish communities all over the region. When the Ottoman Empire fell, these Jewish communities finally had a chance to do something and so they started organizing, and with the help of the Brits they formed the modern state of Israel. When the Arabs saw this, they felt that their power was threatened and so they tried to genocide the Jews and destroy the state of Israel entirely… multiple times, and they failed each time. That’s how we got to where we are. It’s an oversimplification obviously, but it is an accurate portrayal of the situation. Trying to portray the origins of the modern state of Israel as the same as the colonization of the Americas is inaccurate in every way.

                • idiomaddict@feddit.de
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                  1 year ago

                  Correct, why would they want to live there? The West Bank and golan heights are much nicer.

                  • Gorilladrums
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                    1 year ago

                    Israel did have Israeli settlements in Gaza, but it unilaterally gave them up to Gaza in 2005. The Israelis who were living were mad and didn’t want to leave voluntarily so Israel forcefully evicted them and took down the settlements. The hope was that by disengaging with Gaza, there would be an alternative path for peace with the Palestinians as they refused any peace offer or a two state solution.

      • flossdaily@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        If you want to know who the lying shill is, look elsewhere in the thread. I called him out, and you can see his comment history for yourself.

    • A_A@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I believe it is not possible,
      not for me,
      not for you,
      to have a complete and balance view of the whole situation. Trying to do so would drive me mad with anger and desperation.