You might recall that last week in his State of the Union Speech, President Biden came down strongly in favor of the two-state solution in regards to the Gaza War.
I've been attacked before for suggesting that the language and behavior of Mr. Netanyahoo and some members of his political coalition closely resemble the language and behavior of extremist jihadists and their predecessors in the Germany of the 1930s and 40s. It's time, uncomfortable as it is, to rein in the Israeli government by, if necessary, limiting the arms and funds that we provide them with until they agree to follow international law on the treatment of civilians. Yes, this will be difficult and will very likely cost IDF lives that we'd all rather weren't spent but, until some other solution (two-state, limited ceasefire, new Israeli government) is implemented, there doesn't appear to be another acceptable choice. "Never again" applies to genocide everywhere, not just the Jewish people who have suffered and continue to suffer throughout the world. Perhaps if Mr. Netanyahu is really interested in not having a repeat of Oct. 7 and retaining the respect of the rest of the world for the country he purports to love and want to preserve, he'll work on upgrading Israeli intelligence operations and sit down at a bargaining table with the other interested parties. What is too often forgotten is that every day that passes without some progress is another day that the hostages are away from their families and at risk of never seeing them again.
in a few conversations last week, I lost patience with the miserable prick (I've always hated him since the first time I saw his picture) and told someone that Netanyhu needed to have his head blown off (I quickly added another half dozen names all of us know, beginning, of course, with TFF. but I immediately realized that there are guys around him who are WORSE. does Israel have "special elections?" they sure as shit need one.
If I recall correctly, elections are triggered by either a vote of confidence or at the call of the PM. Bibi knows he's SOL if he's out of office, so it's up to the Knesset and the current stance seems to be "not while there's a war on."
Greg Olear had a post awhile back that traced the “Jewish problem” back to its insipid beginnings. So unreal how the insane actions from one generation can reverberate through the centuries.
Gobsmacked. Talk about cognitive dissonance. Preachers and politics—never a good combination. There is so much more to say but I need to compose my thoughts.
Appears that Israeli politics is a microcosm of what exists here! Preachers leading their flock to magaville! Netti, like the amoral orange creature, is a by product of the hatemongering by right wing groups in Israel
Religious (supposedly) Israelis advocating for genocide is dismaying. I understand that humankind is not, in its native state, particularly distant from chimpanzees and can engage in particularly nasty tribalism. I don’t approve of genocide, but I can understand where it comes from. But what is so dismaying is that we all, especially in the US, have expected Israel, as a nation, to be better. Reflecting on the dreadful treatment of Jews over the millennia, we hoped they would rise above revenge. To be not just a democracy, but to be a moral leader in the Middle East. To know what it is like to have your agency, your very identity, denied. To have compassion. And here it’s seeming they are just another tribe of nasty East African Plains Apes, like the rest of us. It’s disheartening.
To say I expected better of them is an understatement. They suffered so much and then to deny humane treatment to the innocents is atrocious. Granted they started it, but apparently Netanyahu had a hand in the Hamas government and not all Palestinians support Hamas. Just like not all Israelis support the duplicitous Bibi. Just like not a majority of Americans support our cult figure. Who will prove better than the gaggle of geese making no sense at all.
The zealot reactionaries in any group are always dangerous, just as the Sunni Saudis were on 9/11 and local militias were on 1/6. I would like to know what transpired when Israeli Benny Gantz came to the US to speak with officials here. I would also like to know how Israel justifies the continuing encroachment of the Settlements. I understand that Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis are terrorists, but clearly not all Palestinians are terrorists.
I was encouraged by the Israeli people who'd taken to the streets long prior to the Hamas attack as they protested Netanyahu's antidemocratic attempt to neuter the Supreme Court of Israel.
It is routine that such articles and posts as I encounter here at TCinLA and from journalists at Common Dreams, The Lever, Counterpunch, Democracy Now!, and other progressive outlets, plus Mehdi Hasan, who is fearless, contain well-documented facts that are just out-and-out absent from the traditional media, including all the major outlets.
For example, just last Friday Jeffrey St. Clair included in his Roaming Charges post at Counterpunch, a few observations:
+ After Aaron Bushnell set himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy in protest of its genocidal war on Gaza, the first responder ordered him to the ground. The second pulled a gun on him as the flames engulfed his body. Only the third tried to put out the fire.
+ Michel Foucault: “One gets into a more serious and difficult debate when it comes to giving up the death penalty in terms of establishing the principle that no public power (no more than any individual) has the right to take anyone’s life. At that point, you immediately come to the questions of war, the army, compulsory military service, and so on.”
+ Violent crime in the US has declined by 49 percent since it peaked in 1991.
+ Things people have been holding when shot by the LAPD: phones, lighters, a bike part, a car part, a wooden board and, most recently, a plastic fork.
+ A new report from the Texas Defender Service found that 20 of the 21 people sentenced to death in Harris County were people of color.
+ In the U.S., Black women are six times more likely to be killed than white women, according to a new study in The Lancet. In some states, the rate is even higher. In Wisconsin, Black women were 20 times more likely to be killed.
+ A former Missouri car salesman named Harry Trueblood, who sold at least 250 guns across the state, thirty of which ended up at crime scenes, including murders and suicides, was convicted of selling guns without a license and sentenced to…probation.
So, if you are writing about crime in America, and you are not aware of these events and ones like it (these observations were all noted during one week), there is no way you can detect the flaws in policing policy.
This information would shift the narrative completely, not just in the consideration of crime, but with regard to the full progressive agenda.
When this coverage is considered against traditional outlets, one finds that they are so narrow and repetitive that one has to conclude that it is not just ill-considered - it has to be a conscious choice.
It is not as if I am some brilliant investigative journalist digging up obscure stuff. This information is out there and plain to see for those who are looking.
Albert Schweitzer had a quote that I used to think I could handle, maybe not these days. “Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.”
That is a quote from a time when the photographs were not ubiquitous. Now, horrific images of what is happening in Gaza are very hard to completely avoid if you are looking at newspaper websites or other news feeds, at all. They accompany headlines, and they are every day. I consider the argument whether this is genocide or not sets the suffering in some black-white fallacy, where that distinction has any meaning at all as applied to the current daily experience of the Palestinians. It may have political ramifications or impact whether there will be serious repercussions for individual Israeli representatives who are making the decisions they are, but the horror of this, which is clearly intentional, at scale, and the fact that there is no apparent red line for the Israeli government in terms of the number of deaths, or the literal starvation of tens of thousands, is beyond reckoning. The argument that Israel "has a right to defend itself" has become not just a lack of a defense, it has become a damning condemnation, because what is happening in Gaza has gone so far past any rational definition of "defense." And keep in mind that people like me are fully aware that the events of 10/7 have no defense, either, and were horrific (and I am excluding those dramatized claims that were made, which have been subsequently debunked). Sadly, the actions of the Israeli government has burned through much of the sympathy and support that Jews the world over experienced, just as U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq destroyed the sympathy and support of the world that emerged in the immediate aftermath of 9/11.
No argument here, my sentiments too. Just who is the biggest bully with the most firepower. “We’ll show those lone wolf terrorists a thing or two.” Except that wolves run in packs. Somebody forgot that. We screwed the pooch after 9/11 and Netanyahu is doing more damage to the Jewish people than Hitler did. Still like the Schweitzer quote.
One of the great human tragedies is that power corrupts, and all too often oppressed people who gain power end up behaving much like those who previously oppressed them. It is a tale as old as humans, but tragic and unnecessary. It seems that Hamas knew the Achilles heel of Israel's society, the rightful fear of being eliminated, and played to it with devastating results for both sides. Hamas does not care about the Palestinians and sees every dead child in Gaza as another nail in Israel's coffin. And Bibi cares only about staying out of prison on his several fraud and bribery charges. And so it goes.....
I hated to heart this but the stark terms with which you lay out realities among the extreme Jewish right, which many of us have had the sense of if not the specifics, caused me to pause several times to catch my breath, calm down then read on. Extremist Israelis completely and willfully ignore the other reality - that their own words and actions toward Palestinians, the West Bank and Gaza are playing an immense role in creating future terrorists among those children who survive the IDF destruction.
Exactly, just like it is my opinion that the Abu Ghraib disaster helped to create Isis. Coming of age humans imprinted with violence often see nothing else….whether it’s in a family or on a national stage.
Biden is making it clearer and clearer that he distinguishes between the STATE of Israel and the LEADERSHIP of the State. And he is getting more than testy about the leadership. I fully support his recent threat to stop military funding to Israel for offensive weapons. I have no problem funding their internal defenses.
As in any country, the people of Israel are divided on this war. I doubt few support Hamas itself, any more than a segment of Americans defended the 9/11 terrorists. But Americans did criticize, then oppose, the governments response to 9/11, particularly when that response embraced Iraq. I'm not sure what the polls are that show Israeli support for the current direction of the war, or more important who conducted them, and my trust in polls is close to zero in any event. But if you read Haaretz you can see the opposition, often eloquent.
Gaza is a country (well over half UN countries recognize Palestine as a country) that is ruled by a rabid dictator class. In this it is EXACTLY like Israel. Each dictator class wants the whole damn territory for "their people" . River to the Sea on both sides, just a deep difference on who gets to live there.
Ousting that class in Israel is looking more an more likely by the people themselves. It was in the works before 10/7. Ousting that class in Gaza is going to take international assistance (something Bibi should have asked for in the first place). The surrounding Arab countries, particularly the powerful ones, are on board. If the people of those countries are leaning more and more Anti-Israel in sentiment, it is BECAUSE of Netanyahu's "handling" of the war.
Oddly enough (but not all that surprising), what I heard in President Biden's speech was baby steps toward acknowledging that Palestinians are people and should be treated that way. Part of me wanted more and was disappointed, but the other part realized that this represented significant progress from the uncritical support for Israel that has been a hallmark of U.S. foreign policy for so long. Now off to reread the speech and see what the president actually said . . .
Our military has expressed concerns about Israel expanding the war, and that may have just happened less than an hour ago. This is how things escalate to at least a regional war, if not more. In the meantime Putin is rubbing his palms together in utter glee because it's a big international distraction from his unwarranted aggression in Ukraine. The stench of Putin and Raisi of Iran permeates this situation.
Just cancelled my subscription, although I just paid in January. While I may agree with some of the things you say in this article, I find your tone to be inciteful. Before the trolls jump in to call me a zionist, as if that is a bad word, I will tell you that it is scary to be a Jew. We don't expect an educated person like you to overlook this issue. Thanks for nothing!
So you object to the "tone"? How would this be inciteful in any way if its a true representation of what this Rabbi is teaching & promoting - AND teaching the current Jewish military! That sure sounds far more inciteful than anything TC has said.
If you, as you said, agree with some of the article - perhaps sitting back & thinking about it, may change your mind about cancelling.
I will tell you why. He’s making it sound that every Jew agrees with this rabbi who is a shonda to the Jewish people. Judaism is like a scale with people that are secular Jews on one side and the ultra orthodox on the other. So, you really can’t pigeonhole us. He is not explaining this at all. I lived in Israel, and I have many friends that have served in Israel and now their kids are serving in Israel. Not everyone is like this Rabbi.
That is not at all what I said, or Mehdi Hassan said. It turns out there are right wing asshole Jews, just like there are right wing asshole Americans. Perhaps you might want to look up the history of the Likud Party that formed Netanyahu. It was founded by Jewish fascists who admired Mussolini, and who were willing to cooperate with the SS against the British until Kristallnacht got them enough public condemnation from the community that they went radio silent on that. These people are as much a blot on the history of Jewish people and Israel as my buffalo-killing/Indian-fighting genocidaire great-great grandfather.
Thank you for the history lesson but you don’t need to school me on any history pertaining to Israel or the Jewish people. I always learned in writing class that you write to the lowest common denominator in an essay such as this. If I read this and my take away was that Jews are bad then I think it does say that. I am sure that you know that there is no differentiation between Zionests and Jews right now. That is my point and also the fact that you didn’t point out that Israel is a democracy and people have been demonstrating for months for new elections because they too want to get rid of Netanyahu. But the article reads like all Israelis are bad. And that is not an objective way to write an essay.
"But the article reads like all Israelis are bad."
huh, not my takeaway on this article at all. But your opinion is valid for you.
Also, you wrote, "Thank you for the history lesson but you don’t need to school me on any history pertaining to Israel or the Jewish people."
You're right, you needed to unsubscribe since you already know everything. TC is very forthright and sometimes to the point of being offensive to many others (based on my observations over the past few years in other Substacks) so you'll be more comfortable not reading or engaging in his forum.
Take care, and have a good life. Peace be with you.
An estimated 30,000 dead in Gaza already and the killing continues. It's hard to be "objective" about that. I've been a regular reader of +972 Magazine (https://www.972mag.com/) for several years, so I'm aware that by no means all Israelis support Netanyahu. But still -- the killing continues.
I'm sorry it sounds that way to you. TC tends to be very forthright & out front with what he believes - that is what it is. I think he and most of the people who comment here are aware of the different groups that make up Judaism. But almost every religion has its different groups that make up the whole. From what I've read, there is a lot of disagreement in the Israeli public.
But Leila, what this particular Rabbi - someone with a great deal of influence - is saying sounds a lot like the extremist views of many other religions.
You are correct. This rabbi does sound and is extremist and I would never support him. But that’s the same in every religion. Don’t you think Hamas is extreme?
Of course we do! October 7 was terrible. However, 1,200 dead Israelis is not justification of a "Warsaw Ghetto" style campaign in Gaza that results in 30,000+ deaths over the course of a bit over four months. And watching the self-made videos of IDF members publicly celebrating their participation in what are obvious war crimes makes me sick. I am reminded of the Israeli Sabra I knew in grad school who had been a platoon leader in the infantry company that liberated the Wailing Wall in 1967. He told me as they stood there and worshiped as Jews there for the first time in 20 years, he heard his company commander's prayer: "Help us God. We won!" Israel needed that help and too many there - like Netanyahu and the rest of the Likud fascists - took advantage of the situation to push their ultimately terrible vision.
Absolutely - Hamas, and all the other offshoots in different countries. What Hamas did on the 7th of Oct was horrific - no question. Hiding among the Palestinian people and using tunnels underneath hospitals etc? Horrific. For the Palestinian civilians to have to exist with it - lose their homes - and lives because of it & be unable to do anything to stop it is also horrific.
Extremism is all around ALL of us - domestic terrorism right here amongst us! It only makes it more important to speak up against it.
My problem is that the speaking up is one sided and most of the time are simply lies. But I have no desire to get into a discussion about that. I was merely suggesting that in this case, a little more diplomacy would have been helpful. Thank you for condemning Hamas. Most people do not.
As many Israelis have pointed out, being against the Israeli government is not anti-Semitism. Although Netanyahu and that crowd like to say that it is, to silence their critics since they have no good things to argue with.
I don't know if I am not explaining myself or you are obtuse. I am not pro Netanyahu. I am simply saying that the degree of antisemitism all over the world is at high alert. Demonizing Jews is not the way to go. Thank you all for your comments. I hope I gave you some food for thought.
As to the rise of antisemitism in the US, it has ALWAYS been bubbling away under the surface. I blame trump's permission to people to speak out of their worst sides far more than anything that has happened in this war. The war has simply provided a focus for the worst side being underlying antisemitism, rather than underlying racism or intolerance of other peoples ways of leading their own lives.
It is sickening for me to hear that the government of Israel is behaving like the oppressive and terrorists governments of countries that have had Jews in their sights for eons, including the German plan to exterminate them all. Really Netanyahu, you want Israel to be seen as the butchering pariah of the region. If Hamas did the unspeakable, you want to do them one better. What does that make you? They were barbaric, protect yourself, but maybe you shouldn’t have egged them on. Also, the settlements you have encouraged just tells me that you are the bully who has no right to take a high and mighty stance on any subject. Joe is right, you are doing more damage to your countrymen than Hitler ever did.
MONSTROUS!!! The Jews can no longer claim to be the victims of persecution. They are now guilty of the same. NO MORE MONEY TO ISRAEL -- unless this war is ended in some sort of decent fashion, and Palestine becomes a nation again.
I've been attacked before for suggesting that the language and behavior of Mr. Netanyahoo and some members of his political coalition closely resemble the language and behavior of extremist jihadists and their predecessors in the Germany of the 1930s and 40s. It's time, uncomfortable as it is, to rein in the Israeli government by, if necessary, limiting the arms and funds that we provide them with until they agree to follow international law on the treatment of civilians. Yes, this will be difficult and will very likely cost IDF lives that we'd all rather weren't spent but, until some other solution (two-state, limited ceasefire, new Israeli government) is implemented, there doesn't appear to be another acceptable choice. "Never again" applies to genocide everywhere, not just the Jewish people who have suffered and continue to suffer throughout the world. Perhaps if Mr. Netanyahu is really interested in not having a repeat of Oct. 7 and retaining the respect of the rest of the world for the country he purports to love and want to preserve, he'll work on upgrading Israeli intelligence operations and sit down at a bargaining table with the other interested parties. What is too often forgotten is that every day that passes without some progress is another day that the hostages are away from their families and at risk of never seeing them again.
in a few conversations last week, I lost patience with the miserable prick (I've always hated him since the first time I saw his picture) and told someone that Netanyhu needed to have his head blown off (I quickly added another half dozen names all of us know, beginning, of course, with TFF. but I immediately realized that there are guys around him who are WORSE. does Israel have "special elections?" they sure as shit need one.
and I will certain subscribe to Mehdi's Substack.
If I recall correctly, elections are triggered by either a vote of confidence or at the call of the PM. Bibi knows he's SOL if he's out of office, so it's up to the Knesset and the current stance seems to be "not while there's a war on."
Has there ever been a time since 1949, when there has not been a war on in the Middle East.
Not that I can think of, and it might go back further than that.
Greg Olear had a post awhile back that traced the “Jewish problem” back to its insipid beginnings. So unreal how the insane actions from one generation can reverberate through the centuries.
Gobsmacked. Talk about cognitive dissonance. Preachers and politics—never a good combination. There is so much more to say but I need to compose my thoughts.
Appears that Israeli politics is a microcosm of what exists here! Preachers leading their flock to magaville! Netti, like the amoral orange creature, is a by product of the hatemongering by right wing groups in Israel
So, I’m back.
Religious (supposedly) Israelis advocating for genocide is dismaying. I understand that humankind is not, in its native state, particularly distant from chimpanzees and can engage in particularly nasty tribalism. I don’t approve of genocide, but I can understand where it comes from. But what is so dismaying is that we all, especially in the US, have expected Israel, as a nation, to be better. Reflecting on the dreadful treatment of Jews over the millennia, we hoped they would rise above revenge. To be not just a democracy, but to be a moral leader in the Middle East. To know what it is like to have your agency, your very identity, denied. To have compassion. And here it’s seeming they are just another tribe of nasty East African Plains Apes, like the rest of us. It’s disheartening.
To say I expected better of them is an understatement. They suffered so much and then to deny humane treatment to the innocents is atrocious. Granted they started it, but apparently Netanyahu had a hand in the Hamas government and not all Palestinians support Hamas. Just like not all Israelis support the duplicitous Bibi. Just like not a majority of Americans support our cult figure. Who will prove better than the gaggle of geese making no sense at all.
Right there with you. I need to compose my thoughts -- and my stomach.
Preachers and politicians should never collude. Didn’t Jesus say something like that.
The zealot reactionaries in any group are always dangerous, just as the Sunni Saudis were on 9/11 and local militias were on 1/6. I would like to know what transpired when Israeli Benny Gantz came to the US to speak with officials here. I would also like to know how Israel justifies the continuing encroachment of the Settlements. I understand that Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis are terrorists, but clearly not all Palestinians are terrorists.
I was encouraged by the Israeli people who'd taken to the streets long prior to the Hamas attack as they protested Netanyahu's antidemocratic attempt to neuter the Supreme Court of Israel.
It is routine that such articles and posts as I encounter here at TCinLA and from journalists at Common Dreams, The Lever, Counterpunch, Democracy Now!, and other progressive outlets, plus Mehdi Hasan, who is fearless, contain well-documented facts that are just out-and-out absent from the traditional media, including all the major outlets.
For example, just last Friday Jeffrey St. Clair included in his Roaming Charges post at Counterpunch, a few observations:
+ After Aaron Bushnell set himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy in protest of its genocidal war on Gaza, the first responder ordered him to the ground. The second pulled a gun on him as the flames engulfed his body. Only the third tried to put out the fire.
+ Michel Foucault: “One gets into a more serious and difficult debate when it comes to giving up the death penalty in terms of establishing the principle that no public power (no more than any individual) has the right to take anyone’s life. At that point, you immediately come to the questions of war, the army, compulsory military service, and so on.”
+ Violent crime in the US has declined by 49 percent since it peaked in 1991.
+ Things people have been holding when shot by the LAPD: phones, lighters, a bike part, a car part, a wooden board and, most recently, a plastic fork.
+ A new report from the Texas Defender Service found that 20 of the 21 people sentenced to death in Harris County were people of color.
+ In the U.S., Black women are six times more likely to be killed than white women, according to a new study in The Lancet. In some states, the rate is even higher. In Wisconsin, Black women were 20 times more likely to be killed.
+ A former Missouri car salesman named Harry Trueblood, who sold at least 250 guns across the state, thirty of which ended up at crime scenes, including murders and suicides, was convicted of selling guns without a license and sentenced to…probation.
So, if you are writing about crime in America, and you are not aware of these events and ones like it (these observations were all noted during one week), there is no way you can detect the flaws in policing policy.
This information would shift the narrative completely, not just in the consideration of crime, but with regard to the full progressive agenda.
When this coverage is considered against traditional outlets, one finds that they are so narrow and repetitive that one has to conclude that it is not just ill-considered - it has to be a conscious choice.
It is not as if I am some brilliant investigative journalist digging up obscure stuff. This information is out there and plain to see for those who are looking.
Thank goodness, people like TCinLA are looking.
A plastic fork.
I had to close my eyes for a moment at that one.
Albert Schweitzer had a quote that I used to think I could handle, maybe not these days. “Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.”
That is a quote from a time when the photographs were not ubiquitous. Now, horrific images of what is happening in Gaza are very hard to completely avoid if you are looking at newspaper websites or other news feeds, at all. They accompany headlines, and they are every day. I consider the argument whether this is genocide or not sets the suffering in some black-white fallacy, where that distinction has any meaning at all as applied to the current daily experience of the Palestinians. It may have political ramifications or impact whether there will be serious repercussions for individual Israeli representatives who are making the decisions they are, but the horror of this, which is clearly intentional, at scale, and the fact that there is no apparent red line for the Israeli government in terms of the number of deaths, or the literal starvation of tens of thousands, is beyond reckoning. The argument that Israel "has a right to defend itself" has become not just a lack of a defense, it has become a damning condemnation, because what is happening in Gaza has gone so far past any rational definition of "defense." And keep in mind that people like me are fully aware that the events of 10/7 have no defense, either, and were horrific (and I am excluding those dramatized claims that were made, which have been subsequently debunked). Sadly, the actions of the Israeli government has burned through much of the sympathy and support that Jews the world over experienced, just as U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq destroyed the sympathy and support of the world that emerged in the immediate aftermath of 9/11.
No argument here, my sentiments too. Just who is the biggest bully with the most firepower. “We’ll show those lone wolf terrorists a thing or two.” Except that wolves run in packs. Somebody forgot that. We screwed the pooch after 9/11 and Netanyahu is doing more damage to the Jewish people than Hitler did. Still like the Schweitzer quote.
Without religion the world would be a much more peaceful place.
Amen!
One of the great human tragedies is that power corrupts, and all too often oppressed people who gain power end up behaving much like those who previously oppressed them. It is a tale as old as humans, but tragic and unnecessary. It seems that Hamas knew the Achilles heel of Israel's society, the rightful fear of being eliminated, and played to it with devastating results for both sides. Hamas does not care about the Palestinians and sees every dead child in Gaza as another nail in Israel's coffin. And Bibi cares only about staying out of prison on his several fraud and bribery charges. And so it goes.....
Does the Golden Rule always get kicked to the curb? As you said, fear is the driver, but the lessons create more fear. The Fear Rule rules
I hated to heart this but the stark terms with which you lay out realities among the extreme Jewish right, which many of us have had the sense of if not the specifics, caused me to pause several times to catch my breath, calm down then read on. Extremist Israelis completely and willfully ignore the other reality - that their own words and actions toward Palestinians, the West Bank and Gaza are playing an immense role in creating future terrorists among those children who survive the IDF destruction.
Exactly, just like it is my opinion that the Abu Ghraib disaster helped to create Isis. Coming of age humans imprinted with violence often see nothing else….whether it’s in a family or on a national stage.
There is a segment in every society that can and may do these things. How we work to change it is our test.
Biden is making it clearer and clearer that he distinguishes between the STATE of Israel and the LEADERSHIP of the State. And he is getting more than testy about the leadership. I fully support his recent threat to stop military funding to Israel for offensive weapons. I have no problem funding their internal defenses.
As in any country, the people of Israel are divided on this war. I doubt few support Hamas itself, any more than a segment of Americans defended the 9/11 terrorists. But Americans did criticize, then oppose, the governments response to 9/11, particularly when that response embraced Iraq. I'm not sure what the polls are that show Israeli support for the current direction of the war, or more important who conducted them, and my trust in polls is close to zero in any event. But if you read Haaretz you can see the opposition, often eloquent.
Gaza is a country (well over half UN countries recognize Palestine as a country) that is ruled by a rabid dictator class. In this it is EXACTLY like Israel. Each dictator class wants the whole damn territory for "their people" . River to the Sea on both sides, just a deep difference on who gets to live there.
Ousting that class in Israel is looking more an more likely by the people themselves. It was in the works before 10/7. Ousting that class in Gaza is going to take international assistance (something Bibi should have asked for in the first place). The surrounding Arab countries, particularly the powerful ones, are on board. If the people of those countries are leaning more and more Anti-Israel in sentiment, it is BECAUSE of Netanyahu's "handling" of the war.
Oddly enough (but not all that surprising), what I heard in President Biden's speech was baby steps toward acknowledging that Palestinians are people and should be treated that way. Part of me wanted more and was disappointed, but the other part realized that this represented significant progress from the uncritical support for Israel that has been a hallmark of U.S. foreign policy for so long. Now off to reread the speech and see what the president actually said . . .
don't forget the hot mic
Our military has expressed concerns about Israel expanding the war, and that may have just happened less than an hour ago. This is how things escalate to at least a regional war, if not more. In the meantime Putin is rubbing his palms together in utter glee because it's a big international distraction from his unwarranted aggression in Ukraine. The stench of Putin and Raisi of Iran permeates this situation.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/alleged-israeli-strike-reported-deep-inside-lebanon/
Just cancelled my subscription, although I just paid in January. While I may agree with some of the things you say in this article, I find your tone to be inciteful. Before the trolls jump in to call me a zionist, as if that is a bad word, I will tell you that it is scary to be a Jew. We don't expect an educated person like you to overlook this issue. Thanks for nothing!
So you object to the "tone"? How would this be inciteful in any way if its a true representation of what this Rabbi is teaching & promoting - AND teaching the current Jewish military! That sure sounds far more inciteful than anything TC has said.
If you, as you said, agree with some of the article - perhaps sitting back & thinking about it, may change your mind about cancelling.
By the way - I'm not a troll - just saying.
I will tell you why. He’s making it sound that every Jew agrees with this rabbi who is a shonda to the Jewish people. Judaism is like a scale with people that are secular Jews on one side and the ultra orthodox on the other. So, you really can’t pigeonhole us. He is not explaining this at all. I lived in Israel, and I have many friends that have served in Israel and now their kids are serving in Israel. Not everyone is like this Rabbi.
That is not at all what I said, or Mehdi Hassan said. It turns out there are right wing asshole Jews, just like there are right wing asshole Americans. Perhaps you might want to look up the history of the Likud Party that formed Netanyahu. It was founded by Jewish fascists who admired Mussolini, and who were willing to cooperate with the SS against the British until Kristallnacht got them enough public condemnation from the community that they went radio silent on that. These people are as much a blot on the history of Jewish people and Israel as my buffalo-killing/Indian-fighting genocidaire great-great grandfather.
Thank you for the history lesson but you don’t need to school me on any history pertaining to Israel or the Jewish people. I always learned in writing class that you write to the lowest common denominator in an essay such as this. If I read this and my take away was that Jews are bad then I think it does say that. I am sure that you know that there is no differentiation between Zionests and Jews right now. That is my point and also the fact that you didn’t point out that Israel is a democracy and people have been demonstrating for months for new elections because they too want to get rid of Netanyahu. But the article reads like all Israelis are bad. And that is not an objective way to write an essay.
"But the article reads like all Israelis are bad."
huh, not my takeaway on this article at all. But your opinion is valid for you.
Also, you wrote, "Thank you for the history lesson but you don’t need to school me on any history pertaining to Israel or the Jewish people."
You're right, you needed to unsubscribe since you already know everything. TC is very forthright and sometimes to the point of being offensive to many others (based on my observations over the past few years in other Substacks) so you'll be more comfortable not reading or engaging in his forum.
Take care, and have a good life. Peace be with you.
An estimated 30,000 dead in Gaza already and the killing continues. It's hard to be "objective" about that. I've been a regular reader of +972 Magazine (https://www.972mag.com/) for several years, so I'm aware that by no means all Israelis support Netanyahu. But still -- the killing continues.
Return the hostages….
Nah, not what I read
I'm sorry it sounds that way to you. TC tends to be very forthright & out front with what he believes - that is what it is. I think he and most of the people who comment here are aware of the different groups that make up Judaism. But almost every religion has its different groups that make up the whole. From what I've read, there is a lot of disagreement in the Israeli public.
But Leila, what this particular Rabbi - someone with a great deal of influence - is saying sounds a lot like the extremist views of many other religions.
You are correct. This rabbi does sound and is extremist and I would never support him. But that’s the same in every religion. Don’t you think Hamas is extreme?
Of course we do! October 7 was terrible. However, 1,200 dead Israelis is not justification of a "Warsaw Ghetto" style campaign in Gaza that results in 30,000+ deaths over the course of a bit over four months. And watching the self-made videos of IDF members publicly celebrating their participation in what are obvious war crimes makes me sick. I am reminded of the Israeli Sabra I knew in grad school who had been a platoon leader in the infantry company that liberated the Wailing Wall in 1967. He told me as they stood there and worshiped as Jews there for the first time in 20 years, he heard his company commander's prayer: "Help us God. We won!" Israel needed that help and too many there - like Netanyahu and the rest of the Likud fascists - took advantage of the situation to push their ultimately terrible vision.
Absolutely - Hamas, and all the other offshoots in different countries. What Hamas did on the 7th of Oct was horrific - no question. Hiding among the Palestinian people and using tunnels underneath hospitals etc? Horrific. For the Palestinian civilians to have to exist with it - lose their homes - and lives because of it & be unable to do anything to stop it is also horrific.
Extremism is all around ALL of us - domestic terrorism right here amongst us! It only makes it more important to speak up against it.
My problem is that the speaking up is one sided and most of the time are simply lies. But I have no desire to get into a discussion about that. I was merely suggesting that in this case, a little more diplomacy would have been helpful. Thank you for condemning Hamas. Most people do not.
My Jewish grandmother would have disagreed with you. This is NOT what her generation fought for.
Not exactly sure of what your grandmother would disagree with. I am sure she would not enjoy the antisemitism of today.
As many Israelis have pointed out, being against the Israeli government is not anti-Semitism. Although Netanyahu and that crowd like to say that it is, to silence their critics since they have no good things to argue with.
I don't know if I am not explaining myself or you are obtuse. I am not pro Netanyahu. I am simply saying that the degree of antisemitism all over the world is at high alert. Demonizing Jews is not the way to go. Thank you all for your comments. I hope I gave you some food for thought.
As to the rise of antisemitism in the US, it has ALWAYS been bubbling away under the surface. I blame trump's permission to people to speak out of their worst sides far more than anything that has happened in this war. The war has simply provided a focus for the worst side being underlying antisemitism, rather than underlying racism or intolerance of other peoples ways of leading their own lives.
It is sickening for me to hear that the government of Israel is behaving like the oppressive and terrorists governments of countries that have had Jews in their sights for eons, including the German plan to exterminate them all. Really Netanyahu, you want Israel to be seen as the butchering pariah of the region. If Hamas did the unspeakable, you want to do them one better. What does that make you? They were barbaric, protect yourself, but maybe you shouldn’t have egged them on. Also, the settlements you have encouraged just tells me that you are the bully who has no right to take a high and mighty stance on any subject. Joe is right, you are doing more damage to your countrymen than Hitler ever did.
MONSTROUS!!! The Jews can no longer claim to be the victims of persecution. They are now guilty of the same. NO MORE MONEY TO ISRAEL -- unless this war is ended in some sort of decent fashion, and Palestine becomes a nation again.