#america and the middle east

[nezreblogz]

[hussyknee]

[redvelvetwishtree]

Whyyyy would you silence your own people like this, what are you afraid of? Is this release being shown on media?

[wearenotjustnumbers2]

Translation:

The Palestinian Ministry of Health released yesterday that there are only 6 operating ambulances left in Gaza. Serving 2.3 Million people who live under the constant threat of death and injury.

What does this mean? This means that the likelihood of death is far greater than the likelihood of life for anyone injured. So now, We can certainly say that Gaza has become a place for inevitable and imperative death, not just a "war zone".

[humusboii2thereturnoftheking]

Palestine is Ruining the Left

I've taken this from Reddit because I've found it an interesting read, I did not write this myself, a user named u/ u/TooLittleNuance did. Feel free to reply and engage in converation.

I'm an Israeli-American leftist who has been active in American and Israeli politics for a number of years now. I have always advocated for human rights, equity, and self-determination for Palestinians who are oppressed(to different extents) under Israel, a nation that commits itself to Jewish domination of institutions. I always voted and campaigned for progressive Democrats and I assisted with the Israeli Meretz party from abroad. This is why I think the current Palestinian-sympathetic movement is ruining the left:

Abandonment of Pragmatism - Just like the 2020 George Floyd protests("Defund the Police"), the Western left has completely embraced a suicidal strategy of idealistic radicalism. Many of those on the left insist the solution to the conflict is a one-state solution consisting of Palestine "from the River to the Sea". Unfortunately, they've appropriated the Palestinian mythology in their ambitions to magically destroy Israel and the ideology of Zionism by BDS somehow or supporting Palestinian "armed struggle". It doesn't take a lot of thought to see how both of those methods are incredibly ineffective and immoral to advocate for and implement. So, instead of a pragmatic approach, like empowering the Israeli left through donations and advocacy, supporting a reasonable solution(two-state or one-state under Israel), or calling for the ultimate humanitarian end to the war of a unilateral Hamas surrender, the Western left insists on a dream scenario that will never happen. This is the most egregious behavior of the left and it's their most common mistake(i.e. Vietnam). This is due to the fact that Palestinians, especially in Gaza, are suffering under disproportionate Israeli force with no Western movement to realistically end it. In fact, these Western leftists, due to these tactics, are assisting in empowering and legitimizing the far-right of Israel. They are the perfect strawman to turn people off to the left in Israel, which, in turn, results in a lengthened Palestinian suffering.

Maximalism - There's a tendency on the left to outcompete each other in radicalism. It's not catchy or sexy to say "The war tactics that Israel uses are disproportionate and don't consider enough of the humanitarian cost", it has to be "genocide" or "ethnic cleansing" in order to provoke an emotional reaction from uneducated Westerners. It's not "the security policy of Hafradah has resulted in reduced human rights of Palestinians compared to Israelis", it has to be "Apartheid"(with the only legal precedent being South Africa). These maximalist statements immeasurably hurt the movement for true progress on Palestinian human rights. It results in a boy-who-cried-wolf situation: If Israel decides to transfer the entire Gazan population to the Sinai, what is that called? A "genocide"? Due to the present labeling of the war, nobody will believe it. What if Israel permanently transfers or kills 100,000 Palestinian civilians? 200,000? 1 million? What will that be called? How can it get worse than "genocide"? This Maximalist rhetoric is not only inaccurate, but it's incredibly damaging to describe the proportionate extent of Palestinian suffering, which is vital to any movement that faithfully advocates for an upliftment of Palestinian life and identity.

Normalization of Bigotry - Explicit or latent Jew-Hatred is being increasingly embraced by radical sections of the Western left. Tropes such as "Zionist"(a euphemism for "Jew" for many) control of governments or blood libel. Wishing "Death to Zionists" or equating them with Nazis is, in most cases, latent Jew-Hatred. Regardless of your thoughts on the definition of Zionism(there is no definition, it is a meaningless term), it's clear that many believe that "Zionists" are just uppity Jews. Of course, this is genuinely believed by a small portion of the left. However, a substantial part of Western leftists has repeatedly failed to condemn this Jew-Hatred and to stop mirroring the language of these latent or explicit Jew-Haters. This is 1000x worse in the case of Israelis. For Western leftists, it's normal to call Israelis "colonizers", "demons", "rapists", and "child-murderers" on their social media without repercussion or introspective irony. As somebody belonging to the Israeli nationality, I have been desensitized to the insane amount of bigotry from those that I formerly respected. However, many Israelis or Jews aren't as depersonalized as I am, and they definitely take the bigotry to heart. What do you think results from that? Usually, a vote for Likud(Netanyahu's Party) or a donation to AIPAC. Thus, propagating a cycle of bigotry and continuing the suffering of Palestinians.

Propaganda - This war has sparked the largest disinformation campaigns in human history. Multiple state entities (Israel, U.S., Russia, Iran, Qatar) and numerous private entities are pumping out loads of propaganda in order to manipulate uneducated Westerners into supporting their interests. Since October 7th, known Russian disinformation propagator, Jackson Hinkle, has skyrocketed in followers due to his ability to mislead Western leftists on the war. I have seen an unfathomable amount of reposts from Al Jazeera and MiddleEastEye, known Qatari state propaganda and major propagates of misinformation. I have always appreciated the value of institutional skepticism that embodied many of the historical and academic leftist leaders. However, right now, those values are completely thrown out in favor of Russia or Iran's geopolitical advocacy of "everything the West does is bad". The previous three points of behavior are certainly emboldened by the paid disinformation and bots that propagate anti-Western sentiment to destabilize Western democracy. Meanwhile, the basic interests of Palestinian civilians are left unregarded while these state operatives kill their only lifeline.

Reactionary Resurgence - One of the main factors that attracted me to the left was its rejection of reactionary ideology(the establishment of traditional institutions from the past). For Israelis and Palestinians, reactionary rhetoric is normalized and encouraged in many cases. However, this reactionary ideology that has plagued those who share my nationality has spread to Western leftists in their advocacy for Palestine. Western leftists constantly appropriate the far-right and reactionary talking points that many radicalized Palestinians spout. An example would be the insistence on the exclusive indigeneity of Palestine from the River to the Sea, which abandons the progressive values of anti-nationalism and intersectionality. Another example would be the appropriation of Palestinian Martyrdom, in which many of them embraced the idea that human life can be inherently reduced to a political or national cause by their manner of death. This is a clear rejection of the values of individualism, secularism, and anti-nationalism.

Historical Negligence - Those who are even a little bit informed on the Israel-Palestinian Conflict understand that the conflict is too complex to be treated as a soccer match of Israelis vs. Palestinians. Many Israeli and Palestinian leaders set roadblocks to an equitable peace, while many others progressed the conflict to a more positive state. Even more than the historical complexity of this conflict, evaluating the moral complexity requires a graduate degree in a relevant field with hundreds of hours of research. I typically advise not to trust anybody's commentary of the conflict with any less credibility than the previous sentence. However, the Western left has instead decided to follow the historical and moral analysis of demagogues. There's constantly factually wrong or misleading historical information on many of these Palestinian-sympathetic accounts. An example is the map of a "disappearing Palestine" that millions have reposted, a blatantly misleading map meant to depict "Zionist colonization", meanwhile, neglecting the historical borders of the conflict. There are many other forms of historical negligence that they commonly employ that are extremely damaging for understanding the conflict.

In conclusion, Western leftists are keeping up with the Western traditions of white saviorism and interfering with this particular trendy foreign conflict. I could have written a few more grievances that I have of the Western left(including the embracement of far-right Islamist groups) but I wanted to keep the post relatively short. In several months, Western leftists will forget about the Gazans suffering under the disproportional force of the IDF. Nobody will self-criticize the ideas or tactics that they engaged in, meanwhile, the Israeli left-wing and reliable non-Hamas Palestinian advocacy organizations are left in the dust by an ineffective white-savior-esqe Western movement. Not only that but due to all of these factors making the left look like lunatics, Biden and the Democrats are being affected in the polling, which may result in Trump being elected, a terrible outcome for Palestinians.

[herpsandbirds]

Veiled Chameleon (Chamaeleo calyptratus), 2 males, family Chamaeleonidae, South FL, USA

Not native to North America, Introduced.

Native range is SW Arabian Peninsula

photographs by Stephanie Olson

[simply-ivanka]

Democrats foster an America Last agenda!

They did during the Obama Administration, they have with the Biden Administration and they will continue if Harris gets into the White House.

REPOST

[kaapstadgirly]

palestinianartist

sending love from South Africa 🫶🏻 what about you?

[hltabdallah]

Greetings. I'm Laura Abdallah, a 30-year-old currently struggling to earn a living with my husband who's 37 but unfortunately lost his job as well as our house. This made us more vulnerable and we cannot even afford meals. We've been trying everywhere to get help for our child who's the only hope we have, but unfortunately, Oxygen Deficiency puts her down to the ground. We're pleading with any well-wisher/donor to contribute any amount to help us raise medical fees to get her well.

We are raising funds to support my child who's got Oxygen Deficiency as was posted in my Tumblr account. I'm equally affected by war and chemical pollution in Gaza. Your donation will help us reach our $26, 100 target for treatment. Every little bit helps, and we appreciate your support. Click the link below to donate now and make a difference this trying time! Thank you so much and God bless you.

Contribution link on the same is here.

https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=WKN654SWABDV2

[nando161mando]

The National: We publish a timeline of a year of Israel's bombardment of Gaza. It's all here in black and white - the war crimes, murdered journalists, flattened hospitals, orphaned children. 7567 words, 42,000 deaths. Don't look away

[nezreblogz]

[degeneratedworker]

“People all over the world, take action to stop the US and British aggression” People's Republic of China c. 1950s

[his-heart-hymns]

We don't need sugar-coated diplomatic statements. We require this same harsh criticism and condemnation of Israel.We must name and shame Israel at every international stage.

Bolivia and Coulumbia has backed Brazil president's statements.

African Union that consists of 55 member states kicked the Israeli delegation out of its recent meeting in Ethiopia.

[theeternalwombtarot]

My sister said something to me earlier today that further solidified the idea that generations before mine have been constantly made to feel intimidated or afraid of this government and the horrible people who work for it and push its agendas. “They’re watching your social media if you’re not careful about what you say they won’t allow you to get a job or be successful.” Is one of the main things they’ve taught my sisters generation. I told her that you couldn’t intimidate a generation of people who’ve never had this countries protection, care, or protection. I couldn’t give a fuck less if I’m being completely honest with you right now. There’s absolutely nothing this country or the people in it could threaten me with in order to make me shut the fuck up about what they’re doing and the shitty choices they’ve made as a collective. You’ve told generations of Americans that if they don’t shut up and submit to what you’re doing and pushing that their family members would need to move into a state of fear and be afraid for them and that they should be afraid for their livelihoods, their success and their ability to create and build foundations for themselves and it’s about time people get to hear that loud and clear. The fear mongering and the oppression and the silencing of people in this world has got to stop and you only stop cycles of behavior by no longer participating them and changing the way that you behave and react.

They’re trying to make your children uneducated and ignorant by stopping the creation of educational television programs and creating shows and media meant for them that start fucking with their minds from an early age, our teachers are severely underpaid, the curriculum in schools is lacking, they pass laws to take race theory out of the curriculum and stop teaching about the history and oppression of people of color. They ban and attempt to sell apps to American companies so that they can better censor the content that over 1 billion people are consuming every single day that has allowed the truth to spread faster than lies for the first time since this country was founded.

You fucked up letting our generations students with progressive and out of the box ideas into Ivy Leagues to climb your elitist ladder and subjecting generations of individuals to generational trauma and oppression. People have been waiting over forty years for this generation to come into existence. We’re here now. It’s too late.

[claraameliapond]

Israeli character in trailer for new Captain America movie reignites calls for Boycott - make sure you boycott the entire film and don't engage in any positive marketing for it

[herpsandbirds]

The mastigure looks like a chuckwallah!

I totally see the resemblance!

Chuckwallas and Uromastyx/Mastigures are both mainly herbivorous desert dwelling lizards that have sort of rounded bellies, and can flatted against rocks.

Sahara Mastigure aka Geyr’s Dabb Lizard (Uromastyx geyri), family Agamidae, found in north Africa

photograph by Manfred Werner 

Chuckwalla (Sauromalus ater), male, family Iguanidae, found in the southwestern U.S. and NW Mexico

photograph by Greg Risdahl/USFWS