Our TV reporters are like touches earpiece "... I'm being told that somebody, somewhere, is saying the words.." glances down at the page in front of them looks back up at the camera "... well, it's.. it's certainly some words, words that describe how they're feeling, which is likely quite bad at this moment. And now we're going to get back to clips of U.S. officials parroting the IDF. Thank you." I read the chat with 'bl00 and spence, and I think my cynical takeaway is that once a country can make nuclear weapons, they can do almost whatever they want to any non-nuclear regional powers, using the threat of proliferation. It's pretty sad that we'll just let Israel be expansionist, even if it takes a genocide to hasten in their perceived manifest destiny. We didn't ever really admonish Israel for their political oppression of Palestinians, but it's nice to know that a rapid, violent military op is also fine. U.S. foreign policy is moreso about an attempt to justify ongoing atrocities in the name of possible future atrocity prevention, sounds like. It reminds me of effective altruism, honestly. Watching all this while my country uses the UN to shield Israel from accountability? Fucking sucks. My heart goes out to Palestine. But all of the tankies supporting Palestine who also fetishize Russia are a fucking joke, at least everyone can agree on that. It'd be hard for me not to wanna police them out of the pro-Palestine camp in America. And the camp is small. Very small. SECOND NAKBA
This was argued in as many words by the Iranian foreign minister in 2008. He said, in effect, Bush put us, Iraq and North Korea in the Axis of Evil. North Korea has nukes and is still here. Iraq did not and is gone. Our instructions are clear. Again, though, that's too simple. The United States has maintained an ambivalent, adversarial relationship with Israel when it benefits us - America fucked Britain over to help the Jews and recognized Israel two years before Britain. But then when the Israelis and British got too big for their britches the Americans fucked them both over (in no small part because it fucked Hungary). There's ample evidence that the CIA/NRO knew damn well the Yom Kippur War was bound to happen and let Israel get a little bit fucked before airdropping a fuckton of foreign aid and that frankly, the fall of Iran as a vassal US state caused America to give Israel too much leeway. Israel is useful to the US. Need some Iranian physicists assassinated? Israel. Need an Iraqi reactor bombed? Israel. Need to shoot down some Soviet MiGs? Israel. Palestine? ... is not. That's really what it comes down to - it's proxy warfare all the way down. Now. How much are you gonna wanna talk about proxy warfare in Intro to Fuckery? 'cuz it's complicated.I read the chat with 'bl00 and spence, and I think my cynical takeaway is that once a country can make nuclear weapons, they can do almost whatever they want to any non-nuclear regional powers, using the threat of proliferation.
I don't disagree that we're using Israel for proxy warfare. But this fits so much with what am_U's saying about effective altruism,. We gotta give them nukes and let them bomb children because it lets us stop these other guys from getting nukes and lets us bomb them easier which gives us lower prices on oil which helps the global stability and peace or whatever. It's all so indirect and sneaky and about the ends justifying the means, and I'm not convinced we're going to get the ends anyways.
That's not effective altruism and you know it. Power of language - you're changing terms from something simple (pragmatism) to something abhorrent ("effective altruism") because you can't argue against pragmatism while "effective altruism" has no credible defenders. "The ends justify the means" is the fundamental nature of politics and has been since Sumeria. "It's all indirect and sneaky" is that "standing on the wall" speech from A Few Good Men and has been going back to Sargon of Akkad. It all fucking sucks. All of it. It has always fucking sucked. All of it. Rashida Tlaib is urging Michigan Democrats to vote against Biden in the primary. She should. He is acting in a way that is abhorrent to her politics, her constituency and her way of life. American policy towards Israel has long needed a change but there hasn't been enough momentum. Now? Now we've got a bunch of simps running around screaming "river to the sea" like it's fucking KONY2012 because if you scratch the surface of the problem even a little tiny bit you can't go "Biden is a Zionist sorted."
"once a country can make nuclear weapons, they can do almost whatever they want to any non-nuclear regional powers, using the threat of proliferation." That's the weird thing about it, we're sanctioning Russia, confiscating their offshore funds, pulling all the stops, etc. I don't think having nukes is the only thing, and the situations are close enough that if the sole point was to get the respective leaders out of power, it's odd that our way of doing it with Israel is via giving them 14 billion with no strings attached.
It's been really funny to watch what only the progressives originally called for (a cease-fire, in this instance) get slowly normalized enough that it becomes U.S. foreign policy. Can't wait to ignore the progressives again. Sounds like the "undecided" vote in Michigan air dropped 38k meals to Palestine the other day, by the way. It's obviously wayyyy shy of the million+ meals they'll need every day, but it's a message to Netanyahu. Hopefully the message isn't interpreted as "we're so weak we'll only do something symbolic and inconsequential".
Fuckin'... do you even realize how much your snark interferes with your happiness? a deeply involved process involving constant diplomacy combined with a wearying Israeli electorate has resulted in a change in the legitimacy and acceptability of Israeli reprisals and you're out here going "see? I told you we should have stood in front of the stampede in the first place, they would have never dared to run us over!"
It's probably the converse, I think, the snark is a coping mechanism for a lack of happiness. It's a lot of that, agreed, but are you sure that the pro-Palestine progressive movement here in the 'States can be wholly discounted in influencing U.S. diplomatic efforts?constant diplomacy combined with a wearying Israeli electorate
Yes and yes. I'm very happy, in general, but not about this stuff. Feeling guilty that none of it directly affects me. But it does fuck over some of my good friends, and plenty of other innocents, so I guess that's more than enough. Maybe I just come off very poorly in plaintext. I suspect everyone does, though. I also focus on this kinda stuff here because I don't really get to anywhere else. Like at a baby shower a few weeks ago: "How've you been, am_U?" "I'm good! Very good. It's gonna be a crazy year, though, I'm worried, towards the end of the year" "Why?" "Oh, just the election and everything" "What do you mean?" aaaaaand the shift: "Ah, y'know, election years are always kinda nutzo lately. Anyway, ..", then I change the subject, and that's all she wrote. If someone doesn't wanna talk about something, or feels unequipped or uncomfortable about it, I'm never going to force the subject. Maybe I need to post more in Pubski to prove to people that I have a life? I don't know. This shit troubles me though, and I'm keen to understand it. I do apologize if it comes across as grating and single-minded.
Well, Russia's long been an enemy, for starters. And Russia was completely unprovoked by Ukraine, physically, at least. Post-9/11 anti-Islamic sentiments play in, and as we all know, the Jews have gotta be in the holy land for Jeebus to come back. The U.S. also didn't help found Russia, so we don't feel a sense of responsibility for their success and safety, and while Russian losses in WWII were almost unfathomable, there wasn't a genocide against them. But yeah, ultimately, of course whether or not you're a U.S. geopolitical ally has the most to do with it. Speaking of the import of language, 'bl00 used the phrase "foreign catastrope" to describe Oct. 7th. It's not really foreign, though. It's a domestic attack from an occupied territory, ultimately because of a lack of political influence in the Israeli system. But it is perceived as a foreign attack by the Israelis, which is a tacit admission that continuing to slowly invade and disable Palestine was a terrible idea. It's punishing the side pushing for a two-state solution while also imagining them as foreigners. Makes no fucking sense. It's also really hard to convince me that Israeli intel (hella top notch, the best money can buy) had no knowledge of an operation large enough to kill 1,200 Israelis, especially when the political survival of the current regime in Israel depends on waging war on Palestinians. But I digress.
Oh yeah totally. Agree with you 100%, Just, this is why I find the argument that this is all very sneaky realpolitik to end Netanyahu hard to believe. Biden is an avowed Zionist.
"Zionism" means the protection of a Jewish state in Israel. Anyone with even a cursory familiarity with geopolitics since the 1880s will recognize the utility to the United States of a Jewish state in Israel. Conversely, anyone arguing otherwise is revealing either deeply anti-American politics or deep naiivete.
"Protection" being the operative word of evergreen disagreement. I still think the odds are that Israeli intel knew about Oct. 7 and buried it, because "protection", to some, might mean sacrificing a thousand people if it justifies a violent response that will, yes, undoubtedly do a lot of protecting. For one beautiful moment of my life, I almost half-believed that U.S. support of Ukraine portended a principled U.S. geopolitik that aligned with my values, and wasn't one opportunistic fuck-up after the other. Nah I'm just kidding.
That presupposes that October 7 was somehow good for Likud. The fact of the matter is, Netanyahu's entire political career has been aligned along "I will keep you safe from Hamas" and he didn't.
We'll see. They just admitted publicly the goal is indefinite military control with "buffer zones" of stolen Palestinian land. https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/02/23/world/israel-hamas-war-gaza-news More so than staying safe from Hamas, this seems like Netanyahu's real goal and that of a lot of people that voted for him. Certainly this war hasn't made people more leftist over there.
Dude they've been admitting publicly that Palestinians gotta go for seventy fucking years. They've been doing that one murder, one humiliation, one annexation at a time the whole time until they were given an excuse to glass Gaza and here we are. But they WERE given an excuse and it just gets uglier from there. 'cuz yeah. I watched Bush's approval rating go from 50% to 90% in One Fucking Day. Here's a candlelight vigil for victims of September 11 in Tehran.
That sucked ! And like, is my point. We should not have bombed so many people after 9/11. Yet we did. And now we're letting Israel do the same thing for a lot of the same reasons and it's like we've learned nothing.
It's too late for it now, Israel's existed for a while, so a two state answer is still best. But I don't see why it's self evident that the only option at the time was a colonial project, or why an ethostate is inherently a good idea. So much of our culture now in the USA is embracing diversity and inclusion. Anyone arguing the USA should be an ethostate of White Christians is a deplorable, but the same arguments are made for why Israel should be allowed to do what they do.
It wasn't evident at the time. What was evident at the time was that Europe had torn itself apart over ethnic lines and here's America, trying to keep the Soviets from overrunning the ruins. The most expedient solution for American interests was a place the Jews could go that wouldn't prompt the Soviets to call for their genocide (again). So do me a solid - stop changing the subject. I didn't mention "diversity and inclusion" I didn't mention "ethnostates" I didn't talk about "two state answers" NONE OF THAT SHIT is under debate here. Your argument is "Joe Biden is a Zionist" and fucking hell of course he is. The alternative to Zionism has been fucking genocide going back to 1492.
i think that's maybe just your definition? I don't want the Jews to be genocided again lol. To me Zionism is unquestioning support for Israel as it is, an ethostate where Arabs are a second class citizen and Palestine is occupied and blockaded. It's support for Israel as a colonial project. And if finding an expedient place to live requires doing a genocide of your own, maybe it wasn't a good place to pick idk.
If you want a "Jewish" state, I don't see how you can possibly say that talking about ethostates is off topic. It's not a space where Jewish people can be safe it's a Jewish state. In Israel, a place were people already lived. It's saying they have more of a right there than the Arabs. It is absolutely picking a side.
Yeah well BIden's not Zionist enough for the Christian Zionists, because that's not a threshold that exists. He still hasn't figured out that MAGA will hate him regardless of what he does, and on any issue whatsoever. If part of a long-term plan includes being on the wrong side of history in the moment that it mattered, the plan sucks. It looks like this is a personal issue for Biden, to me. Yeah, he is some degree of Zionist, for sure. And I do think that he's built the type of white house where people don't typically challenge him, but for different reasons than why Trump's underlings wouldn't buck Trump. I should also just say that I absolutely do think Israel should exist, but I think the way it was brought into existence and the way that it operates is a disgrace. The holocaust was real, and it was maybe the most morally reprehensible thing in human history, but there were ways to better get along with the people whose land they invaded, and just about all of those ways were carefully avoided.sneaky realpolitik to end Netanyahu
Actually, I think the True Zionists typically decide who is and is not welcome to identify with them, and it's pretty obvious that they'd have no place for me. Literally any criticism of the Israeli gov't is all that it takes to be disqualified. Congrats, you're not really a Zionist.
This is actually really funny. A Southern Baptist telling a Jew that the Jew is not a Zionist, after the Jew tells the Southern Baptist that the Southern Baptist is a Zionist. Are we inside of a joke? Maybe we just walked into a bar.