"It Wasn't Muslims"

[American Dream]

Percival wrote:

The guy who wrote that is well known to be someone who likes to spew antisemitic filth every chance he gets.

Not to mention the guy he adapted it from (linked to at the bottom of his piece). He wrote an even more asinine and hateful screed than the one we saw linked to here.

Two wrongs don't make a right, and neither do three, four or five...

[Percival]

Percival wrote:

The guy who wrote that is well known to be someone who likes to spew antisemitic filth every chance he gets.

Not to mention the guy he adapted it from (linked to at the bottom of his piece). He wrote an even more asinine and hateful screed than the one we saw linked to here.

Two wrongs don't make a right, and neither do three, four or five...

Seems there are a few even right here at RI that embrace this garbage.

[yathrib]

From a factual POV, the Khazar hypothesis has been proven to be false. But as you note, it's basically irrelevant anyway. Other than being false, the Khazar thing is not so horrible, except that it has been used as a vehicle or vector for tons of other counterfactual BS by hardcore antisemites.

What I'd like to know: Since most of the people who discuss the Khazars in this context basically take the word to mean "evil," do they also hate other peoples and nationalities that are probably ethnically related to the Khazars, like the present-day Bulgarians or many of the inhabitants of the area around the Caucasus?

According to the best current genetic research, the gentile group most closely related to the Jews are the Kurds, with Armenians coming in a distant second. This in itself is very interesting to me, since both are Indo-Aryan or Indo-Iranian peoples, at least linguistically. But then I guess the dumbasses who harp on the Khazar stuff are not prepared to admit that Jews might be more "Aryan" than they are.

Anyway, the Khazar thing is one of those things that is going to have to be ditched for any intelligent, objective discussion of the issues to take place. If anything Alice, you should want less to do with it than anybody.

Jeff said:

...the Khazars.

What wrong with talking about the Khazars?

As long as foreign colonists are recruited by a racist state to settle a land and brutally "cleanse" that land of its native people, and that this is justified by bullshit racist crap about their "return" after "2000 years of exile", I think it's very important to point out that in addition to the phony morality and phony legality, the criminal zionist project is also based on phony history.

Not that their thieving and killing and genocide would be any more justifiable if they really were genetic descendants of the ancient Israelites (which they are not); but it is one among so many examples of how they lie, and lie and lie. And lie.

[jlaw172364]

@ Alice

You wrote:

"you imply that . . . Israel's inhumane treatment of the Palestinians, i.e. 'legalized" "theft and murder' is no biggie, since, in your psycho headset, 'everyone does it'. Spoken like a true Nazi."

But I wrote that:

[nation states legalizing theft and murder] "does not excuse what Israel does."

At no point did I write or imply that the oppression of the Palestinians was "no biggie."

And then you called me a psycho and a Nazi.

Now, I actually studied International law and I can tell you several things about it:

1. Under its standards, not only is Israel a "rogue, criminal, etc." state, but guess what, so is the United States, the UK, France, China, the Middle Eastern States; in fact, every state that has a military and/or an intelligence agency, because, guess what, they all do the exact same things; it's just that sometimes, there is less publicity in some cases than in other cases.

2. International law has primarily been used by the stronger powers as a weapon against weaker powers. When the strong want to overthrow some third world country, they just load the "tyrant oppresses people" script into the might wurlitzer and push the button. International law adds the veneer of legality to it, but who makes these laws anyway? The stronger, wealthier countries do, or their frontmen from the third world countries who are usually schooled in the wealthy countries and whose families have ties to the ruling classes in the wealth countries


In addition, you seemed to suggest that nation states can exist without legalized theft and murder. You talk about how we have to throw Israel into the dustbin of history along with the Nazis and the S. African Apartheid regime. How telling that you neglected to mention all the other barbaric regimes, such as the United States, the UK, France, Russia, China, the Middle Eastern States, that if we applied the same standards as we do to Israel, would all be in the dustbin? And if you point to some seemingly innocuous, seemingly non-belligerent state, like the Netherlands, I would say to you that you should double-check to make sure that the Netherlands isn't subsidizing some other military or intelligence operation for joint benefit between the two, because that is what wealthier, but non-militarist countries do.

The U.S. was founded on slavery, genocide, theft, and exploitation. These institutions have been reformulated and endure to this day, yet I don't hear you calling for the end of the U.S. Or don't you believe that they occur?

I never argued that nobody should care about the Palestinians; clearly, the Israelis must have cared about them enough NOT to completely exterminate them over the seventy years. You know, the real, historic Nazis exterminated most of European Jewry in only five years, in addition to killing tens of millions of other people. Israel has had the capacity to exterminate the Palestinians almost since its inception, yet it hasn't. If Israel were really Nazi Germany, or like the U.S. and the UK, the Palestinians would be just like the Mau Maus or Native American; dimly recalled by the occasional historian or scattered into marginalized reservations.

I certainly hope that the Israelis and the Palestinians can form an enduring peace between them. I don't want to see the Palestinians exterminated any more than I want to see the Israelis or any other group exterminated. I don't know how you can automatically read an eliminationist bias into what I wrote. Perhaps you are an antisemite, but more likely is that you have digested so many "facts" about Israel that you experienced pattern recognition for a mild defense of Israel with foaming Likudnik jingoism.

I don't consider myself particularly Jewish; I would classify myself as a nominal Jew. I disclosed that I was a Jew because I feel that it is relevant, although not determinative to my views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

But anyway, I digress:

The real point I'm trying to make is that Israel's crimes get way more press and Israel is subject to way more vitriol than other nation states for various anti-Israel, anti-Jew, anti-West reasons; this bad press arises, by the way, Nordic, in the "alternative" press, as opposed to the "mainstream" press, which I'm sure many of you will agree, especially if you follow the money, is merely a a difference in branding. In fact, I would argue that the mainstream's lack of coverage actually heightens the anti-Israel bias because it puts it into the category of suppressed truth, which conveniently ties in with white supremacist notion of ZOG controlling all media.

Right now, I would wager that there are hundreds of conflicts raging, that involve hundreds and thousands of deaths; but nobody reports them or focuses on them. How many people know that the UK exterminated Kenyan Mau Mau by the hundreds of thousands? This is only one example.

That was the only point I was trying to make.

[American Dream]

jlaw, I agree with what you said above to a point, in that it is true that many states do horrible things and many are built on a horrible and violent history.

Still what I said above in a different context also applies to any such possible apologia for Israel's crimes:

Two wrongs don't make a right, and neither do three, four or five...

[OP ED]

If Israel were really Nazi Germany, or like the U.S. and the UK, the Palestinians would be just like the Mau Maus or Native American; dimly recalled by the occasional historian or scattered into marginalized reservations.

um? i'm pretty sure they ARE "scattered into marginalized reservations"...

[MacCruiskeen]

Right now, I would wager that there are hundreds of conflicts raging, that involve hundreds and thousands of deaths; but nobody reports them or focuses on them. How many people know that the UK exterminated Kenyan Mau Mau by the hundreds of thousands? This is only one example.

That was the only point I was trying to make.

But is the the UK's slaughter of the Mau Mau currently being supported by the USA to the tune of billions of dollars yearly? No. And is Kenya still officially ruled by the British? No.

This might go some way towards explaining why the ongoing suppression, land-theft and mass murder in Palestine currently excites such passions, in the West in particular, where we have been taught (not least because of WWII) that we all bear responsibility for what our governments do, and that international law should be respected, not to mention human life and liberty.

[Percival]

I really thought this was the last place I would run in to people talking about such intellectually bankrupt things like the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion.

I guess you just cant get away from these types no matter where you go on the internet.

[jlaw172364]

I am well aware that two rights don't make a wrong. Given that my last post was a long-winded bloviation, I'll try to be brief:

When one goes through the "alternative" press, one finds a very detailed chronicling of Israeli crimes. One does not find the same thing for say, North Korea, or Somalia, or England, or the U.S., or China.

Additionally, I find that people who criticize Israel, often have no clue about what their own countries have done, or are currently engaged in, or are planning for the future.

How can a Chinese, a U.S., or a U.K. citizen have moral standing to say what should or shouldn't be done about Israel when they can't even keep from subsidizing their own government's crimes, let alone even keep track of them?

People barely comprehend how what the U.S. does to its African-American and Hispanic-American citizens, on a historic level, and on a contemporary level, differs from what Israel does to the Palestinians only in terms of sophistication, and the fact that U.S. has such vast real estate holdings that it can easily preempt the kind of claustrophobic land disputes which are the root of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from occurring. If Israel and Palestine were in an area the size of the United States, and assuming if they were reasonable, they would merely divide up the land and keep their separate camps, plus heterogeneous buffer states.

Another thing; people assume Israel isn't part of a larger policy of shoving a big fat thorn into the Muslim world's eye; that it is in Israel's best rational interest to oppress the Palestinians.

Nothing would make the great powers shit their pants more than if Israel and the Muslim world suddenly made unequivocal peace with each other.

But this is virtually unthinkable at the moment because the extremists war-mongers on ALL sides of the conflict have a vested interest in preventing such a scenario.

Well, I tried to be brief.

[Searcher08]

Really, again: are you serious?

Do you really want 9/11 weighed down with antisemitic tropes like the Protocols of Zion, Holocaust denial and Henry Ford's International Jew?

Werd.
I scanned that site and thought "turd" and "punchbowl"...

What next?
"9/11 blown wide open by heroes of NAMBLA" ?

[American Dream]

jlaw wrote:

When one goes through the "alternative" press, one finds a very detailed chronicling of Israeli crimes.

I can't say that this corresponds to my experience in the U.S. Most of the last 30 years or so that I've been reading the alternative press, I've seen them pretty well ignore Israel/Palestine. Nowadays, a few of the more leftist media outlets that I see do cover it, but I would say that most tend to if anything, tread a bit lightly around Israel (e.g. Democracy Now!, The Nation etc.). I wouldn't really say that these are read by vast numbers of people in "America".

One does not find the same thing for say, North Korea, or Somalia, or England, or the U.S., or China.

Well, I don't think this proves much, as the U.S. press is fairly provincial in general. It seems that it is areas where the U.S. is most involved that get extensive coverage. Since the U.S. is so heavily involved in financing and supporting Israel, U.S. citizens have a special responsibility for confronting the ongoing oppression. I would say that if anything, Palestine/Israel deserves more and better coverage, not less.

People barely comprehend how what the U.S. does to its African-American and Hispanic-American citizens, on a historic level, and on a contemporary level, differs from what Israel does to the Palestinians only in terms of sophistication, and the fact that U.S. has such vast real estate holdings that it can easily preempt the kind of claustrophobic land disputes which are the root of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from occurring. If Israel and Palestine were in an area the size of the United States, and assuming if they were reasonable, they would merely divide up the land and keep their separate camps, plus heterogeneous buffer states.

It is true that America's Black and Latin populations still function as colonial subjects to some degree (although at core it's a question of class), but we're back to the fact that no quantity of wrongs can ever add up to a right. As to your characterization of the dispute, I think it's bullshit. No amount of land would be enough for the rulers in Israel- they want it all, and more...


So jlaw, i must confess I'm left very much wondering about you. Your line reminds me of the people we had to contend with a few years ago, back when they murdered Rachel Corrie. These emotionally-polarized defenders of Israel were obviously well-versed on the propaganda of the day and took a very similar position to the one you are taking. What's so new and exciting about your "singling out Israel" argument that should make us discard all concerns about human rights and social justice?

[jlaw172364]

Well, I wrote a long post, but then deleted it. I doubt it would have convinced anyone of anything.

Let us suppose that Jews moved to Palestine, bought up property, managed to form Israel, but never bothered to get more aggressively militaristic. What would the outcome have been? Peaceful coexistence with their neighbours?

A related question: could Israel have been founded without shedding a drop of blood?

Prior to the formation of Israel as a nation state, the various settlements would constantly raid each other in tit-for-tat massacres. The earliest documented raid was allegedly done by Palestinians against Jews, but this hardly justifies all of the counter-blood-baths that followed on either side.

Was there ever a founding of a nation that didn't require a mass blood sacrifice as a prerequisite?

If Israel had not been aggressively militaristic, there is a strong chance that it would be locked in perpetual warfare with Palestine, and under this scenario it would eventually fall because Palestine would draw in surrounding Arab countries, which could then lead Israel to call in Europe and the U.S. as allies. Would this alternate universe look any better than the present one?

In a perfect world, neither side, or any side for that matter, would waste an iota of time and/or energy fighting each other. But we don't live in that world. We live in a world where people are either killing each other, or plotting to kill each other. And within our own society, people either compete with each other for the best of everything, or plot to compete, which is really a disguised form of sublimated warfare. Israel is aggressive because it would rather be aggressive than defensive, peaceful, and potentially eliminated, because it reasonably believes the world to be a dangerous place.

Years of victimization through massacres, pogroms, holocausts, and various wealth-seizing schemes, forged Israel out of people who decided it would be better to oppressors than oppressees.

To say that Latinos and African Americans are colonial subjects is gigantic euphemism. I don't recall King George pumping crack cocaine into the 13 colonies so that he could fill up his dungeons with slaves; then again, that would have been bad policy. The U.S. has a policy of trying to turn its African American citizens into fodder for its prisons, and thus its slaves; the latinos, it exploits for awhile, and then deports.

I volunteered down in the lower 9th ward of New Orleans for four months 1 year after Katrina and it looked very similar to footage of the Gaza strip. You had the National Guard cruising around in Hummers shooting people, beating up people; you had the gangs and the police doing the same thing; you had no hospitals or any social support services except those provided by a handful of volunteers; you had massive federal, state, and private sector fraud where basically ALL of the aid money was stolen, you had people being put into FEMA trailers with formaldehyde, and this is only the stuff that actually made the news. When I was down there, I heard stories about things that happened that may never come out because the military and the intelligence agencies have got the whole thing so tightly sewed up that . . . well, they always do say that we only hear about their failures, never their successes. I guess it all depends on how you define success.

Well meaning U.S. citizens wag a finger at Israel, but when you mention any of the above to them, they've either never heard of it, or they don't know what to do about it. If we can't stop it in our own country, who are we to try to stop it in another country? Was the invasion of Iraq justified because Saddam was a monstrous dictator? Is Iraq a better place now that he is gone? Would Israel be a better place if we invaded, overthrew the Israeli regime and tried to make democracy their? Palestinian militias backed by their neighbour would promptly exterminate the remaining Israelis.

I'm not saying that I'm right, and you guys are wrong, or that I'm righteous, and that you are antisemites. I'm saying that this whole thing is a giant gray area, that tends towards darkness. I'm saying people should recognize their own culpability before pointing fingers and measuring out nooses. I think Israel's problem is rooted in the fact that it is based on the notion that a nation state is something that the Jews must have if they are to survive as a people. I think this notion comes from the observation that nation states are efficient tools that enable distinct peoples to survive across many generations due to the fact that they render certain advantages to their controllers.

The Jews elected not to have a nation state for centuries and faced certain problems because of this choice. Now that they've made another choice, they face different problems.

[American Dream]

Well jlaw, I have grown tired of engaging with you. Your one-sided apology for Israeli abuses is nothing if not emotionally and politically polarizing. You very much represent the other side of the coin to the anti-Semites who love to bash Israel and Jews, all in the name of Palestinian liberation. There really is no good reason to abandon the struggle for Human Liberation, of which Palestinian Liberation is an integral part, no matter what sophistic rationales you try to concoct here, but never mind that. You can battle it out with the haters for all eternity if you want, but it makes for a rather boring and unenlightening show.

I hope you find a better shtick some day...

[OP ED]

this thread is still here?

[Cosmic Cowbell]

Now I'm really pissed.

How the hell the does jlaw172364 rate a "psycho -AND- a "Nazi" rating from Alice in under 10 fucking post, whereas -I- only get a "racist" allegation after some 600. I mean WTF, what does a guy gotta do around here anyways.

And how dare you Jlaw, trying to bring some semblance of balance to RI. You must not of lurked long enough before jumping right in...stoopid jews

That said, I do appreciate it. The kiss of death for you at this point.

So sorry....