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doberbutts · 10 months ago

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I’m wondering if you have thoughts on James Baldwin’s “open letter to the born again”? I’m struggling a bit with what his point is in that piece; it feels kinda dismissive on Jewish zionists agency in creation of Israel? But I may be missing parts or not getting things

The text in question.

And the segment I think anon is struggling with:

I know what I am talking about: my grandfather never got the promised “forty acres, and a mule,” the Indians who survived that holocaust are either on reservations or dying in the streets, and not a single treaty between the United States and the Indian was ever honored. That is quite a record.

Jews and Palestinians know of broken promises. From the time of the Balfour Declaration (during World War I) Palestine was under five British mandates, and England promised the land back and forth to the Arabs or the Jews, depending on which horse seemed to be in the lead. The Zionists—as distinguished from the people known as Jews—using, as someone put it, the “available political machinery,’’ i.e., colonialism, e.g., the British Empire—promised the British that, if the territory were given to them, the British Empire would be safe forever.

But absolutely no one cared about the Jews, and it is worth observing that non-Jewish Zionists are very frequently anti-Semitic. The white Americans responsible for sending black slaves to Liberia (where they are still slaving for the Firestone Rubber Plantation) did not do this to set them free. They despised them, and they wanted to get rid of them. Lincoln’s intention was not to “free” the slaves but to “destabilize” the Confederate Government by giving their slaves reason to “defect.” The Emancipation Proclamation freed, precisely, those slaves who were not under the authority of the President of what could not yet be insured as a Union.

It has always astounded me that no one appears to be able to make the connection between Franco’s Spain, for example, and the Spanish Inquisition; the role of the Christian church or—to be brutally precise, the Catholic Church—in the history of Europe, and the fate of the Jews; and the role of the Jews in Christendom and the discovery of America. For the discovery of America coincided with the Inquisition, and the expulsion of the Jews from Spain. Does no one see the connection between The Merchant of Venice and The Pawnbroker? In both of these works, as though no time had passed, the Jew is portrayed as doing the Christian’s usurious dirty work. The first white man I ever saw was the Jewish manager who arrived to collect the rent, and he collected the rent because he did not own the building. I never, in fact, saw any of the people who owned any of the buildings in which we scrubbed and suffered for so long, until I was a grown man and famous. None of them were Jews.

And I was not stupid: the grocer and the druggist were Jews, for example, and they were very very nice to me, and to us. The cops were white. The city was white. The threat was white, and God was white, Not for even a single split second in my life did the despicable, utterly cowardly accusation that “the Jews killed Christ’’ reverberate. I knew a murderer when I saw one, and the people who were trying to kilI me were not Jews.

But the state of Israel was not created for the salvation of the Jews; it was created for the salvation of the Western interests. This is what is becoming clear (I must say that it was always clear to me). The Palestinians have been paying for the British colonial policy of “divide and rule” and for Europe’s guilty Christian conscience for more than thirty years.

Finally: there is absolutely—repeat: absolutely—no hope of establishing peace in what Europe so arrogantly calls the Middle East (how in the world would Europe know? having so dismally failed to find a passage to India) without dealing with the Palestinians. The collapse of the Shah of Iran not only revealed the depth of the pious Carter’s concern for “human rights,” it also revealed who supplied oil to Israel, and to whom Israel supplied arms. It happened to be, to spell it out, white South Africa.

Well. The Jew, in America, is a white man. He has to be, since I am a black man, and, as he supposes, his only protection against the fate which drove him to America. But he is still doing the Christian’s dirty work, and black men know it.

My friend, Mr. Andrew Young, out of tremendous love and courage, and with a silent, irreproachable, indescribable nobility, has attempted to ward off a holocaust, and I proclaim him a hero, betrayed by cowards.

For context: Andrew Young, considered the right hand of MLK Jr, had a longstanding and occasionally fraught relationship with the Jewish community. He stepped down from Congress shortly after being forced to choose between voicing support for Palestine and continuing to work towards black-jewish interests by his constituents and fellow politicians, as he felt very strongly about supporting both. This was a fairly unpopular move. While I don't believe he ever called himself Jewish by the strictest sense, he was actively involved in Jewish communities and the known "white" ancestry within him is a Polish Jew in his great grandparents.

To be honest, I don't really see much a problem with this as I think it fairly closely matches up not only with my understanding of the history of this problem but also my own country's part in it as well as my personal feelings on it decades later. It pretty blatantly says that Zionism is utilizing a machination of white supremist colonism due to the extensive history of antisemitism and having had the ancestral land dangled in front of them like bait on a hook from the British Empire, which owned Palestine at the time. It also goes on to say that many Zionists aren't even Jewish and are antisemitic in nature, but are Christians happy to get rid of as many Jews as possible and how that tracks due to the Christian church's millennia-deep history of antisemitism.

I don't think it lets anyone off the hook. I think it pretty much flat out says this is a problem caused first and foremost by white Christians who hate Jews and Arabs alike and have a vested interest in getting the two populations to fight because it'll be easier to kill off just the one group instead of both of them, if one ends up eradicating the other. It even talks about the friction between the black community and the Jewish community, what caused it, what drives it, how that friction in itself is a tool of white supremacy to hurt us both.

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eretzyisrael · 1 year ago

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None of that is true! With all due respect to the Vatican, no one even made the accusation that there were IDF soldiers inside the church compound, at least not at first. This story gets more outrageous at each retelling.

Finally, the next day, the IDF announced the results of its investigation showing that it was not responsible for any deaths at the church, but it still wasn't as clear as it should have been:

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has denied culpability over the deaths of two Christian Palestinian women who were reportedly killed at the Holy Family Parish complex in Gaza on Saturday morning. In an emailed statement to CNA, the IDF said that it had received the letter “describing a tragic incident that took place in the Holy Family Parish.” On Saturday, “representatives of the church contacted the IDF regarding explosions that were heard near the church,” the IDF said. “During the dialogue between the IDF and representatives of the community, no reports of a hit on the church, nor civilians being injured or killed, were raised.” “A review of the IDF’s operational findings support this,” the statement said. The IDF did not respond to a follow-up query asking explicitly if the army was refuting or challenging the reports that an IDF sniper killed two women at the parish.

The Washington Post adds:

Tal Heinrich, a spokeswoman from the Israeli prime minister’s office, also addressed the incident on Monday, asserting that “there was no fighting in the Rimal neighborhood on Saturday where this Catholic church was located.”

That is referring to the Holy Family church, which is in Rimal, not the church in Shejayia.

While the language could have been clearer, the IDF is saying that it did not do anything near the church where the Antouns were.

Which means that either the IDF is lying, or it was a Hamas or other Gaza sniper who murdered these two women.

Let's go back to the original report from the Latin Patriarchate. That memo gave no evidence that the sniper was IDF. No one saw the sniper. The Christians assumed that it must be the IDF - the Latin Patriarchate has a history of being viciously anti-Israel and of following the official Islamist line, and the churches in the region have all been quite antisemitic since before Zionism. Even when persecuted, they never publicly accuse Hamas of mistreating them. If the shooter was wearing a green headband and yelled :"Allahu Akbar" while shooting, Gaza Christians still would try to avoid blaming Hamas. We've seen plenty of stories about how frightened Christians are under Palestinian rule, and virtually all of them are anonymous testimony. They are very scared of their Muslim neighbors.

#gaza #hamas #holy family parish #sniper #murder

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hero-israel · 1 year ago

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So, heard the christian population of behtlehem has decreased a lot, from 80% in 1948 to less then a fifth today. Why?

Many people blame the occupation, and it certainly hasn't helped. But the answer must include the violent oppression that Christians experienced under dhimmitude going back long before the establishment of Israel. Jordan used its own occupation to violently de-Christianize the West Bank, and after the Palestinian Authority was allowed to take over in the 1990s they brought in new policies of anti-Christian harassment: constantly proclaiming supremacy of sharia law, unequal land sales, or just murdering Christians in the street. The terrorist takeover of the Church of the Nativity in 2002 sent a pretty clear message too.

Here is a long and poignant book excerpt that I encourage you to read in its entirety. It includes Palestinian Christian insights on what they experience from both Israel and the PA, as well as the narrator noting that those Christians have a strong personal-safety incentive to complain publicly much less about the latter.

#Christianity #Palestinian Christians #Palestine #Bethlehem #Israel

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alarajrogers · 4 months ago

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Friendly reminder from a former-Catholic-now-atheist that today is a great day to remember that "Zionist" does not mean "Benjamin Netanyahu's butt monkey", "eager supporter of the murder of Palestinians", or even "supporter of everything Israel does, right or wrong." It means "someone who believes the Jews should have their own homeland, and preferably, it should be in the place where they originated, that they are indigenous to." Which happens to be Israel.

If you find yourself thinking that Zionism, by itself, is terrible, maybe it's because you're asking one of the following questions! Well, they all have good answers.

Why do Jews need a homeland? Well, first off, why does any ethnic group need a homeland? Secondly, though... do you know anything about antisemitism? It's not just the Holocaust, you know -- Jews have been persecuted in every country they entered, on Earth, since the Romans forced them out of their homeland 2,000 years ago. And the reason they were persecuted? They were outsiders. They didn't do things the way everyone else did. If you're queer or neurodivergent, don't tell me you can't relate to that!

But antisemitism is a thing of the past! Buddy, I don't know how to tell you that your own movement has inspired violence against random Jews. And that the belief that "thinking a Jewish homeland is a good idea" makes someone evil is, um, antisemitic.

But that's not what Zionism means! Zionism is unconditional support for Israel! Right, and socialism means communism, and communism means totalitarian thought control and forcing cis people to be trans and straight people to be gay. What? The right wingers say it, so it must be true, right? It's the people who hold a belief who get to say what it means, not the people who are ideologically opposed to them.

Okay, but what Israel is doing to Palestine is evil and unforgivable. No disagreement there, buddy! What Israel is doing to Palestine is evil and unforgivable. So is what my country, the United States, did to Iraq 20 years ago, but last I checked, if there's anyone around declaring that the United States should not exist because of what we did to Iraq, they are pretty fringe and no one cares what they think. Whereas this belief that Israel should not exist because of its extreme cruelty toward Palestine is getting pretty mainstream on the left!

Okay, but Israelis are colonizers. Is there a statute of limitations on land-back? Israel is the ancient Jewish homeland that they were forced out of 2,000 years ago. (Anyone who tells you that this isn't true is wrong, and if they're Christian, they're also actively lying, because the Christian Bible talks a lot about Jews living in Israel, a lot of our Christmas songs mention it, it's, like, a fundamental part of the story of Jesus, which all Christians are expected to know at least a little bit. It is understandable for Muslims to be misinformed on this point, but Christians know better.) So no, Israelis aren't colonizers, not in Israel-qua-Israel, although the assholes trying to push Palestinians out of the West Bank after Israel signed treaties saying the West Bank belongs to the Palestinians absolutely are.

But the Palestinians were there first! Um... no. What is confusing you is that the Jews were forced off their own land 2,000 years ago. Since then, the Palestinians moved in. It is undeniable that Palestinians were forced off land they had lived on for generations in order to create Israel. But if you're gonna argue that living on land for many generations means you have more right to it than the people who originally held it, you've just shot every land back movement in the foot.

That's not fair to the Palestinians! I agree with you. And if I was forced off my property because Native Americans had it first, and told to go back to my homeland -- which, because I am a mutt of Irish, Italian, German and probably random others' descent, is nowhere -- that would be pretty unfair to me, too, since I didn't participate in stealing it from the Native Americans. Good thing no land back movement that anyone takes seriously is actually demanding such a thing, or there would be billions of displaced refugees of European, African, Asian and mixed heritage being forced to live exactly nowhere. Which is why the Palestinians were given half the land mass of ancient Judea, because goddamn, this situation is unfair to everyone. Jews deserve a homeland and so do Palestinians and it happens to be the same territory. There is no facile "correct" answer here.

Israel is an ethnostate. So is England, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, etc, etc, what's your point? Any land that wasn't taken over by colonizers is technically an ethnostate. However, there are a lot of non-Jews in Israel. Some of whom, the Druze, had several of their children recently killed by a bombing attack by terrorists who are supposedly pro-Palestine, so, um, if an ethnostate by nature oppresses those not of the ethnicity, then those people, oppressed by Israel, should have had common cause with Palestine, right? Yet pro-Palestinian terrorists killed them. Kind of does a lot of damage to the "Israel shouldn't exist because it's an ethnostate" argument. Also, what's Palestine but an ethnostate? And how do you argue for land back movements in colonized territories and also say "it is bad for an indigenous people to be in control of their own homeland?"

The problem with Israel and Palestine, as others have pointed out, is that it is too complicated to have facile solutions. Long-term antisemitism among Muslims prevented the Palestinians from reaching a good mutual agreement with Israel when it was founded 75 years ago, and there has been enormous bad blood and bad actions on both sides ever since. Both sides have hardened into radical positions like "wipe out all the Jews" or "every Palestinian is a potential terrorist and should be treated as such, even babies." This started because of a horrific unprovoked terrorist attack on civilians (which, by the way, is not an effective strategy for "freedom fighters" to get what they want, ever), which lead to the massive and literal overkill of Israel turning Gaza into a parking lot and murdering thousands of innocent people by bombing civilian targets to get rid of Hamas (which, by the way, is not an effective strategy against terrorists, ever).

This doesn't mean the Jews were wrong for wanting a homeland, or wanting it to be on the land that was stolen from them 2,000 years ago by the Romans. It is also not wrong for the Palestinians to want safety in their homeland, particularly since they are not the Romans and weren't responsible for the initial expulsion of the Jews. Both sides are right in what they want, and both sides are horrifically wrong in how they're trying to get it. But being "anti-Zionism" means you are explicitly against an indigenous group who have been persecuted and oppressed for two thousand years returning to their own lands and ruling themselves. I mean. If you're in favor of landback for any other indigenous group, but you're virulently against it for the Jews and only for the Jews, I don't know what to tell you, buddy. That's antisemitism. The Israelis currently engaging in horrific tactics against a civilian population does not negate the necessity of Israel to exist for the safety of the world's Jewish population, who, again, have been persecuted and oppressed for being different than their neighbors, not for anything they actually did, for two thousand years. If you're queer, neurodivergent, a religious minority such as Wiccan or atheist, an ethnic minority such as African-American, or basically anybody who is not an absolutely normal, average member of the society around them... how the fuck do you justify this belief?

Just to repeat for the people who can't read, I am not Jewish. I am a former Catholic who is now an atheist. I just, you know, happen to not be disgustingly antisemitic, so I notice when Jews are treated differently than other people in a situation that's at all similar to theirs. Try learning some history, and paying some attention, and remembering that whatever you learned about Jews from antisemites, it was wrong and you should be re-educating yourself. A nation that commits atrocities does not need to cease to exist, or why is Germany still here? Why is the USA? Why is England? A nation that commits atrocities needs to stop committing them, and make reparations, and try to prevent it from happening again. And there are many Israelis, and many non-Israeli Jews who believe Israel should exist, who want to make that happen. Condemning "Zionists" because Israel is currently engaged in atrocities when you are not in favor of forcibly ending the existence of England as a nation (not Great Britain, I'm talking about England), or the US, or Germany... boy oh boy, I'm smelling antisemitism on the grill there, and it smells rancid. Knock it off. You can support the Palestinians and be absolutely opposed to the actions of the Israeli government without hating everyone in the world that thinks Israel's very existence is a thing that should continue.

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secular-jew · 7 months ago

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Pay attention Christians.

Half of all French MUSLIMS say they want all French Catholics to convert to Islam. More than one-third of all French Muslims want all French churches to be converted to Islamic Mosques. One-quarter of all French Muslims report that the word "France" is a word they reject.

France has 751 no-go zones ("Zones Urbaine Sensibles") where French authorities have ceded control to Muslim gangs and Imams. Nonuslkms can only live in these zones, if they accept "Dhimmi" status, which means they agree to be 2nd class citizens, admit they live in a territory ruled by Islam, and now their heads when they encounter a Muslim.

France is a country where the prison population is 70% Muslim. More than 100 rapes a day are occurring in France, most committed by followers of Muhammads misogynist cult.

45% of French Muslims say they want the total destruction of Israel.

An equal number of French Muslims want to redefine rape murder torture beheading kidnapping burning-alive and massacres as "acts of resistance."

The remaining Jewish families of France, who haven't been forced out, must pretend to not be Jewish, and have left public education entirely.

#israel #secular-jew #jewish #judaism #israeli #jerusalem #diaspora #secular jew #secularjew #islam #france #Islamic caliphate #Muslim caliphate #caliphate #French Muslims want Catholics to convert to Islam #French Muslims was churches coverted to mosques #antisemitism #Islamic jihad #demographic jihad

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beardedmrbean · 1 year ago

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Nunya I feel like I’m losing my mind. Horrible acts that have been caught on tape, BY HAMAS, uploaded to the internet, once again, BY HAMAS. Syrians desperately trying to show the world that most of the videos in “Gaza” are actually videos of Syrians. Jew haters openly using slurs and hateful rhetoric about how Jews are evil and they all need to die, stated openly on social media. Evidence Jewish presence in the Middle East for centuries, corroborated by multiple countries. Non Israeli Jews being targeted, with video evidence in other countries. And yet???? I can’t even hide myself away in my usual fandom spaces to take my mind off things because apparently I share spaces with people who state that even thinking of showing sympathy for Israelis makes you evil and you should just die. Just the sheer vitriol I’ve been seeing pales to any I’ve seen before. They’re bloodthirsty and can’t even see it.

Ya this one is far more extreme than even the last one a couple years back where a family was finally evicted from a home that had been purchased by a Jewish family back when the area was still part of the Ottoman Empire, even had the old pre WW1 receipts for that one, still got a bunch of rockets fired at Israel and lots o hate crimes against Jews not in Israel.

This one though, this absolutely boggles my mind how it's gone. Sneak attack during a Jewish holiday isn't unheard of Yom Kippur war being a thing, but that was a organized attack that went after military targets, this was more like if instead of attacking the naval yard Japan just went on a bombing and shooting spree across all the Hawaiian islands they could specifically targeting civilian areas.

Then to cap it all off the international community coming round and telling the US to make a measured response to that kind of thing.

As mask off moments go, I didn't think the massacre of innocents who have zero military value, the rape, murder, and desecration of civilians that's occurred and been broadcast by the people perpetrating it could ever be met with anything other than revulsion from anyone, but instead we're getting what we've gotten.

There's the people that have been waiting in the wings for this to happen so they could go and fan the flames of the hate they've been hanging on to and watch them spread which is going to explain why some things have gone as far as they have.

Folks that may have been on the fence or fairly ignorant about the goings on there other than every once in a while they start shooting at each other for a while getting a healthy dose of lies fed to them, like the esteemed congresswoman omar retweeting that picture from the syrian gas attack on their own people and saying it's palesteinan children.

AFAIK she hasn't acknowledged the fact that she did that either.

Those girls sobbing at their school because people are chanting a chant that is a literal call to the genocide of the whole of the Jewish people (Zionists or not they want you dead) and people laughing at them.

found myself in a Catholic subreddit, where I managed to be fairly disgusted at my fellow Christians making cracks about going in and doing another military crusade to reclaim the holy land and kick out the unbelievers

Deus Vult joke is one thing, going into detail after making it is another.

Old guy that stabbed the 6 year old palestenian migrant here in the US 26 times killing him, that's been roundly condemned and is being rightly investigated as a hate crime, why no similar outrage over the infants who were murdered in Israel from these people?

What people are giving a pass to is insane,

I'm on record many times saying that criticism of Israel and its government is not inherently Antisemitic, it gets there when you apply a different stricter set of rules on them than you do other governments.

Never expected to see a 180 on that with palestine and war crimes, where people would excuse them because of who they were war criming.

Then we get people mad that Israel isn't providing electricity and water to the people that are trying to kill them, how dare they not make killing Jews easier on hamass.

It's lunacy

I'm gonna keep praying for you, and everyone really because even some of the people in gaza don't want this I imagine, gonna keep trying to push out as much verifiable information as I can and moral support I don't know, I'll just be here doin what I can from my little keyboard, whatever that is, trying to see if I can put a little balm on the wounds in the form of a smile or I don't know.

I want all the hate to stop.

I will say there's a certain irony in having the support for the Jewish state be seen as a right wing position, afaik most Jewish Americans have voted blue for a long long time, even the Zionists.

There's a few of the Jewish subreddits that have gone private, most of them by now I'd wager actually if you're over there too that might be a good refuge for you and others, this is all so pervasive I can't think of too many places that aren't going to be hit by it.

I'm sorry I can't be more help, I wish I could.

#anonymous #middle east mess

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originalleftist · 2 months ago

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Regarding the whole Jewish Columbus story...

I have neither the information nor the qualifications to fully evaluate the historical accuracy of that claim. I do know that its a claim that's been made before (I first recall encountering it in Jewish historian Ed Kritzler's book Jewish Pirates Of The Caribbean, while researching Age of Sail piracy), and that the recent report is based on DNA that is supposed to be his and his son's (how reliable the identification of the DNA is is also something I do not know).

I also know that Columbus professed Christian beliefs, though that's not really something you got a choice about in late 15th century Spain (more on that in a bit).

Personally, I find it extremely interesting to try to piece together the details of historical figures' lives, particularly from that era- while recognizing that our information may often be incomplete, and contradictory, if not outright false. And I don't think there is such a thing as irrelevant information, really- its all part of the bigger picture of how events interconnect.

But I do think the reasons why a lot of people will care about this are, or should be, irrelevant.

Of course, Columbus is one of the most famous/infamous people in history, and perhaps more importantly, he is a symbol of much larger historical forces. To those who still see the age of European empire-building as an admirable thing, he is a hero, even the "founding father" of the modern world. And he was a genocidal conqueror and, to Leftist activists and many indigenous peoples, he represents the evils of colonialism and the centuries of horrific slavery and genocide that he unleashed, the effects of which continue through the present.

And unfortunately, there, to anti-Israel activists, seeing or portraying him as a Jew can be exploited to bolster their narrative that Jews have always been "white European colonizers"- the narrative they use to argue that Jews are not indigenous to the Levant, and have no right to a homeland there. This lie, while easily disproved by cultural, historical, and genetic evidence, is pretty foundational to Leftist opposition to Israel's existence, as Leftists would otherwise have a very difficult time explaining why they are opposed to an indigenous people returning to their homeland, and are instead cheering on the mass murder and r*pe of its people.

But:

Columbus is just as I said- a symbol of larger forces. That he was a cruel and ambitious man who was personally responsible for a great deal of suffering I don't doubt. But he was not the single impetus behind colonialism. The European conquest of the Americas would probably have happened anyway, in similar form- if it hadn't been him, it would have been someone else a few years later. And it was Spain-the very Catholic, and deeply, genocidally Anti-semitic* 15th Century Spain-that backed his voyage, gave him his authority, and built a worldwide empire of genocide and slavery based on the results of his voyages (of course, this gives white, especially Christian conservative Anti-semites an ulterior motive as well- if they can put the blame for colonialism's evils on a Jew, they simultaneously deflect responsibility from Christian European Spain, and the Catholic Church, for those offences).

More importantly Columbus, whoever he was, was one man. And in case you missed the memo, treating one man as representative of an entire culture or ethnicity, or blaming them all collectively for that man's actions, is the very definition of bigotry.

At the end of the day, Columbus was one man, who happened to be in the right (or wrong) place and time and have the set of skills to become the emissary for much greater, and decidedly Christian, forces of imperialism and genocide.

#Columbus #History #Propaganda #Misinformation #Colonialism #Bigotry #Content Warning Racism #Content Warning Genocide #Content Warning Antisemitism #Content Warning Rape

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horizon-verizon · 1 year ago

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James Baldwin spoke with such intellectual clarity, vigor, and honesty:

https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/open-letter-born-again/

“Jews and Palestinians know of broken promises. From the time of the Balfour Declaration (during World War I) Palestine was under five British mandates, and England promised the land back and forth to the Arabs or the Jews, depending on which horse seemed to be in the lead. The Zionists—as distinguished from the people known as Jews—using, as someone put it, the “available political machinery,’’ i.e., colonialism, e.g., the British Empire—promised the British that, if the territory were given to them, the British Empire would be safe forever.,

It has always astounded me that no one appears to be able to make the connection between Franco’s Spain, for example, and the Spanish Inquisition; the role of the Christian church or—to be brutally precise, the Catholic Church—in the history of Europe, and the fate of the Jews; and the role of the Jews in Christendom and the discovery of America. For the discovery of America coincided with the Inquisition, and the expulsion of the Jews from Spain. Does no one see the connection between The Merchant of Venice and The Pawnbroker? In both of these works, as though no time had passed, the Jew is portrayed as doing the Christian’s usurious dirty work. The first white man I ever saw was the Jewish manager who arrived to collect the rent, and he collected the rent because he did not own the building. I never, in fact, saw any of the people who owned any of the buildings in which we scrubbed and uffered for so long, until I was a grown man and famous. None of them were Jews.

And I was not stupid: the grocer and the druggist were Jews, for example, and they were very very nice to me, and to us. The cops were white. The city was white. The threat was white, and God was white, Not for even a single split second in my life did the despicable, utterly cowardly accusatioi that “the Jews killed Christ’’ reverberate. I knew a murderer when I saw one, and the people who were trying to kilI me were not Jews.

Funny, I literally just mentioned Fascist Spain and "divide and conquer" in the post I answered HERE. I never read this, though, thanks for the link!

Obviously, I agree with him. Making a note to research how Jewish people were involved in the colonization of the two "Western" continents.

#not asoiaf #ask #james baldwin #israel and palestine 2023

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noctomania · 5 months ago

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Let's be very clear.

Israel says they are fighting hamas. We know that's not the real reason they are doing this. Furthermore, it is not just hamas, it is not just Palestinians it is not just Muslims that israelis have a problem with.

When you are raised in a setting that secludes you from anyone who is different from you and being told that everyone is out to get you - you would believe it. If that is all you knew, that which has been told to you with such conviction and assertiveness that surely to a child it must be true.

Israeli zionists have a problem with anyone who is not an israeli zionist.

These people are Christians. They are not hamas they are not muslim they are not Palestinians. Yet this is the treatment they get from zionist israelis in west bank:

youtube

Now im no defender of christianity, if you been around here a while, you know this. However, how would this be received if it happened in america? Of course, not everything is about america, but a lotta shit does involve america. These people are supposedly a part of the "only democracy in the Middle East"?

This is not an isolated case either. I've seen it before.

These are the kinds of attitudes being grown by israels lies and deceit. It emboldens people who have the potential to be better to instead sink to a low that no average person wants to sink to.

And sure spitting in the general direction of someone certainly isn't the lowest, albeit still low. No the lowest i think is straight up murder.

"Seven others were also shot and wounded in the attack at the complex, where most Gaza’s Christian families have taken refuge since the start of the war, according to the patriarchate, which oversees Catholic Churches across Cyprus, Jordan, Israel, Gaza and the West Bank."

This is from an article talking about an idf sniper shooting and killing two Christian women in the Holy Family Parish

“No warning was given, no notification was provided,” the statement continued. “They were shot in cold blood inside the premises of the parish, where there are no belligerents.”

Just a reminder for those who forgot: hamas is not in the west bank, which is where this is

All the self-defense claims really go out the window any time you look into what idf gets up to.

#freepalastine🇵🇸#israel #otherism #christians #idf #iof #catholic church #Youtube

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marcogarnet · 5 months ago

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From the above:

1932 Der Stürmer becomes anti-Semitic tool of the Nazi Party

1933 Cocordat between Nazi Germans and the Catholic Church

1935 Anti—Semitic government gains control of Poland

1935 The German Churches begin to collaborate with the Nazis by supplying records to the government indicating who is a Christian and who is not; that is, who is a Jew.

1937 - The first issue of Die Judenfrage (The Jewish Question), edited by Georg Haller, is published in Germany.

1938 Kristalnacht

1939 The German refugee ship USS St. Louis leaves Hamburg. Most of the thousand or so passengers are Jewish escapees from Nazi Germany.

1939 German invasion of Poland. Einsatzgruppen were assigned to murder Polish Leaders and Jews.

1940 Himmler directive to establish a concentration camp at Auschwitz.

1940 - Six “euthanasia” centers are set up in Germany to murder Jews, the mentally ill, the elderly, the physically ill, and the handicapped

1941 Yellow Star required in all lands ruled by Third Reich (originating in Muslim-dominated countries, it seems to have been introduced in the Umayyad Caliphate)

1943 Warsaw ghetto uprising….

By the end of the war 6,000,000 Jews, including 1,500,000 children have been starved, enslaved, beaten, and eventually murdered.

October 11, 2024 Massacres in Israel. Communities destroyed, rampant murder, hostages taken.

Israel responds, and the world condemns the Jews.

Again….

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eretzyisrael · 6 months ago

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International courts of the United Nations, based in Europe, are no different than the antisemitic courts in Europe's history.

Picking on Jews by biased and antisemitic courts is nothing new in modern history as one delves deeper into the way European courts, judiciaries, legal systems and tribunals handle cases of Jewish victims who are accused of so-called crimes and transgressions they did not commit. There are notorious and historic precedents of European courts using their vaunted apparatus and legerdemain to perform "conjuring tricks" to falsely accuse, prosecute and condemn Jews. For well over one hundred years courts in European countries have been shown to be the bearers of miscarriages of justice.

As examples, this was the case in the Dreyfus trial (1894) in France, the Beilus trial (1913) in Russia and the Nuremberg Laws (1935) in Germany. Now, also coming from Europe from The Hague in Holland are accusations against the Jewish state of Israel and its leaders at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and at the International Criminal Court (ICC) bringing to a global and international level the trials and accusations and antisemitism that Jews used to face in countries during modern history.

Individually and collectively Jews have frequently been falsely accused of crimes against their non-Jewish neighbors that they did not commit.

Often, the accusations by gentile nations against Jews have risen to the level of slanders and blood libels going back to the times when Christians would falsely accuse Jews of killing Christian babies and using their blood to bake Matzos for Passover. Now the two headed international judicial monster of the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court are doing the same thing by accusing Israel and its leaders of things like genocide, killing Arab babies in Gaza, crimes against humanity and war crimes for the "sin" of Israel defending itself against the murderous attacks of the Arab Islamic fundamentalist Hamas terrorist organization.

Both courts, based in The Hague, The Netherlands (aka Holland), have their roots in the United Nations. The ICJ is an official organ of the United Nations and the ICC was formed by acts of the United Nations. The election of the first members of the ICJ took place in February 1946 at the First Session of the United Nations General Assembly and Security Council. The ICJ hears disputes between states.

The UN General Assembly started the Committee on the Establishment of an International Criminal Court in 1995 and the General Assembly convened a conference in Rome in 1998 finalizing the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court that was adopted at the UN General assembly by a vote of 120 to 7, with 21 countries abstaining. At the time Israel voted against the treaty. The ICC began operations in July 2002 with jurisdiction for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression. (Sourced and condensed from Wikipedia).

What is interesting is that for a very long time in history most nations did not have court systems or judiciaries that actually existed or that were fair dispensers of justice. The legal systems of European countries were connected to the church, and that did not augur well for Jews either. The most notorious example is the auto-da-fé instituted by the Roman Catholic Church to investigate, prosecute, punish, torture and put to death heretics, used against the Jews of Spain before and after their expulsion from Spain in 1492. However in modern times, most notably with the establishment of the United States in 1776, its court system was made into one of three branches of government.

For most of history, most Western countries were absolute monarchies tied to their churches but as democratic rule began to seep into Western nations they established courts, judiciaries and legal systems separate from the churches to protect the various rights of their citizens against each other and against the state, or as frequently happened, to impose the laws that the state issued and promulgated.

One would think and hope that court systems in Western countries would help to protect the rights of persecuted minorities such as the Jewish People who were scattered all over Europe and quite often suffered from unfair decrees and accusations. However, as one looks at the history of Europe where the largest population of Jews lived until most Jews were murdered during the Holocaust by the Nazi masters of most of Europe during the Second World War (1939-1945), one sees that the official courts and legal systems that existed in major European countries bought into the stereotypes, prejudices and lies against Jews and prosecuted, via their courts and laws, innocent Jewish members of their societies.

Miscarriage of justice in France during the Dreyfus Case: Accusing Jews of being traitors

The following is sourced and condensed from the Wikipedia article "Dreyfus affair":

The Dreyfus affair was a political scandal that divided the Third French Republic from 1894 until its resolution in 1906. The scandal began in December 1894 when Captain Alfred Dreyfus (1859–1935) a 35-year-old Alsatian French artillery officer of Jewish descent, was convicted of treason for communicating French military secrets to the German Embassy in Paris. He was sentenced to life imprisonment.

In 1896, evidence came to light which identified the real culprit as a French Army Major named Esterhazy. High-ranking military officials suppressed the new evidence, and a military court unanimously acquitted Esterhazy after a trial lasting only two days. The Army laid additional charges against Dreyfus, based on forged documents. Subsequently, writer Émile Zola's open letter J'Accuse...! in the newspaper L'Aurore stoked a growing movement of political support for Dreyfus, putting pressure on the government to reopen the case. In 1899, Dreyfus was returned to France for another trial. The intense political and judicial scandal that ensued divided French society. The new trial resulted in another conviction and a 10-year sentence, but Dreyfus was pardoned and released. In 1906, Dreyfus was exonerated.

The Dreyfus affair came to symbolise modern injustice in the Francophone world; it remains one of the most notable examples of a complex miscarriage of justice and antisemitism. The affair divided France into pro-republican, anticlerical Dreyfusards and pro-Army, mostly Catholic anti-Dreyfusards, embittering French politics and encouraging radicalisation. The social context was marked by the rise of nationalism and antisemitism.

Hatred of Jews was now public and violent. Jews in metropolitan France in 1895 numbered about 80,000 (40,000 in Paris alone), who were highly integrated into society; an additional 45,000 Jews lived in Algeria, a French colony. Antisemitism circulated by La Libre Parole, as well as by L'Éclair, Le Petit Journal, La Patrie, L'Intransigeant and La Croix, drew on antisemitic roots in certain Catholic circles.

Publications remarking on the Dreyfus affair often reinforced antisemitic sentiments, language and imagery. Antisemitic disturbances and riots broke out in 1898 in cities across Metropolitan France, mostly in January and February. Antisemitic riots predated the Dreyfus affair, and were almost a tradition in the East, which the Alsatian people observed upon the outbreak of any revolution in France. But the 1898 disturbances were much more widespread. There were three waves of unrest in 55 localities. These waves and other incidents totaled 69 riots or disturbances across the country. Additionally, riots took place in Algeria from 18–25 January. Demonstrators at these disturbances threw stones, chanted slogans, attacked Jewish property and sometimes Jewish people, and resisted police efforts to stop them.

The shock of the Dreyfus affair also affected the Zionist movement which found fertile ground for its emergence.

The Austro-Hungarian journalist Theodor Herzl appeared profoundly moved by the Dreyfus affair, which followed his debut as a correspondent for the Neue Freie Presse of Vienna and was present at the degradation of Dreyfus in 1895. The catalyst for Herzl's 'conversion' is usually seen as the Dreyfus affair, which made him realise the impossibility of Jewish existence in Europe. Before the wave of antisemitism that accompanied the degradation, Herzl was convinced of the need to resolve the "Jewish question", which became an "obsession" for him. In Der Judenstaat (State of the Jews), he considered that:

"If France – bastion of emancipation, progress and universal socialism – can get caught up in a maelstrom of antisemitism and let the Parisian crowd chant 'Kill the Jews!' Where can they be safe once again – if not in their own country? Assimilation does not solve the problem because the Gentile world will not allow it as the Dreyfus affair has so clearly demonstrated."

Herzl's shock was great, for, having lived his youth in Austria, an antisemitic country, he chose to live in France for its humanist image, which made it appear a shelter from extremist excess. He had originally been a fanatic supporter for assimilation of Jews into European Gentile society. The Dreyfus affair shook Herzl's view on the world, and he became completely enveloped in a tiny movement calling for the restoration of a Jewish State within the biblical homeland in the Land of Israel. Herzl quickly took charge in leading the movement.

In 1897 he organized the First Zionist Congress in Basel and is considered the "inventor" of Zionism as a real political movement". Theodor Herzl wrote in his diary in 1897:

"Were I to sum up the Basel Congress in a word – which I shall guard against pronouncing publicly – it would be this: At Basel I founded the Jewish State. If I said this out loud today, I would be answered by universal laughter. Perhaps in five years, and certainly in fifty, everyone will recognize this."

The Dreyfus affair also marked a turning point in the lives of many Jews from Western and Central Europe, as the pogroms of 1881–1882 had done for the Jews of Eastern Europe, as many Jews had believed that they were Frenchmen first. Yet Jews, despite the state-sanctioned efforts of the emancipation movement, were never truly accepted into society and were often deemed aliens and outsiders, even when they showed extreme devotion by fighting courageously in the wars of their respective countries.

Miscarriage of justice in Russia during the Beilis Case: Accusing Jews of blood libels

The following is sourced and condensed from the Wikipedia article "Menahem Mendel Beilis":

Menahem Mendel Beilis (1874–1934) was a Russian Jew accused of ritual murder in Kiev in the Russian Empire in a notorious 1913 trial, known as the "Beilis trial" or the "Beilis affair". Although Beilis was eventually acquitted after a lengthy process, the legal process sparked international criticism of antisemitism in the Russian Empire. Beilis was an ex-soldier and the father of five children. He was employed as a superintendent at the Zaitsev brick factory in Kiev. On March 12, 1911, a 13-year-old boy named Andriy Yushchinskyi disappeared on his way to school. Eight days later, his mutilated body was discovered in a cave near the Zaitsev brick factory. Beilis was arrested on July 21, 1911, after a lamplighter testified that the boy had been kidnapped by a Jew. A report submitted to Tsar Nicholas II by the judiciary named Beilis as the murderer.

Beilis spent over two years in prison awaiting trial. Meanwhile, an antisemitic campaign was launched in the Russian press against the Jewish community, with accusations of ritual murder. They eventually found the real killers: A gang of gentile criminals - Rudzinsky, Singayevsky, Latyshev, Cheberyak.

The Beilis trial took place in Kiev from September 25 through October 28, 1913. The prosecution was composed of the government's best lawyers. Professor Sikorsky of Kiev State University (father of Igor Sikorsky), a medical psychologist, testified as an expert witness for the prosecution that in his opinion it was a case of ritual murder.

Beilis was represented by the most able attorneys of the Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Kiev bars. Two prominent Russian professors spoke on behalf of the defense in praise of Jewish values and exposed the falsehood of the accusations, while Aleksandr Glagolev, philosopher and professor of the Kiev Theological Academy of the Orthodox Christian, affirmed that "the Law of Moses forbids spilling human blood and using any blood in general in food." The well-known and respected Rabbi of Moscow, Rabbi Yaakov Mazeh, delivered a long, detailed speech quoting passages from the Torah, the Talmud and many other books to conclusively debunk the testimony of the "experts" brought forth by the prosecution.

The Beilis trial was followed worldwide and the antisemitic policies of the Russian Empire were severely criticized.

Due to his great fame, Beilis could have become wealthy through commercial appearances. Spurning all such offers, he and his family left Russia for a farm purchased by Baron Rothschild in Palestine, then a province of the Ottoman Empire. Beilis had difficulty making ends meet but he remained. When friends and well-wishers pleaded with him to go to America, he would respond: “Before, in Russia, when the word ‘Palestine’ conjured up a waste and barren land, even then I chose to come here in preference to other countries. How much more, then, would I insist on staying here, after I have come to love the land!”

When Beilis's financial situation became desperate, he finally gave in. In 1921 he settled in the United States where in 1925 he self-published an account of his experiences titled The Story of My Sufferings. Originally published in Yiddish the book was later translated into English and also Russian. Beilis died in New York in 1934.

Miscarriage of justice in Germany during the Nuremberg Laws: Accusing Jews of being subhuman

The following is sourced and condensed from the Wikipedia article "Nuremberg Laws":

The Nuremberg Laws were antisemitic and racist laws that were enacted in Nazi Germany on 15 September 1935, at a special meeting of the Reichstag convened during the annual Nuremberg Rally of the Nazi Party. The two laws were the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour, which forbade marriages and extramarital intercourse between Jews and Germans and the employment of German females under 45 in Jewish households; and the Reich Citizenship Law, which declared that only those of German or related blood were eligible to be Reich citizens. The remainder were classed as state subjects without any citizenship rights. A supplementary decree outlining the definition of who was Jewish was passed on 14 November, and the Reich Citizenship Law officially came into force on that date.

Out of foreign policy concerns, prosecutions under the two laws did not commence until after the 1936 Summer Olympics, held in Berlin. After Hitler rose to power in 1933, the Nazis began to implement antisemitic policies. The Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, passed on 7 April, excluded so-called non-Aryans from the legal profession, the civil service, and from teaching in secondary schools and universities. Books considered un-German, including those by Jewish authors, were destroyed in a nationwide book burning on 10 May. Jewish citizens were harassed and subjected to violent attacks. They were actively suppressed, stripped of their citizenship and civil rights, and eventually completely removed from German society.

The Nuremberg Laws had a crippling economic and social impact on the Jewish community. Persons convicted of violating the marriage laws were imprisoned, and (subsequent to 8 March 1938) upon completing their sentences were re-arrested by the Gestapo and sent to Nazi concentration camps. Non-Jews gradually stopped socialising with Jews or shopping in Jewish-owned stores, many of which closed due to a lack of customers. As Jews were no longer permitted to work in the civil service or government-regulated professions such as medicine and education, many middle-class business owners and professionals were forced to take menial employment. Emigration was problematic, as Jews were required to remit up to 90% of their wealth as a tax upon leaving the country. By 1938 it was almost impossible for potential Jewish emigrants to find a country willing to take them. Mass deportation schemes such as the Madagascar Plan proved to be impossible for the Nazis to carry out, and starting in mid-1941, the German government started mass exterminations of European Jews.

For the most part, Germans accepted the Nuremberg Laws, partly because Nazi propaganda had successfully swayed public opinion towards the general belief that Jews were a separate race, but also because to oppose the regime meant leaving oneself open to harassment or arrest by the Gestapo. Although a stated goal of the Nazis was that all Jews should leave the country, emigration was problematic, as Jews were required to remit up to 90 per cent of their wealth as a tax upon leaving the country. Anyone caught transferring their money overseas was sentenced to lengthy terms in prison as "economic saboteurs". An exception was money sent to Palestine under the terms of the Haavara Agreement, whereby Jews could transfer some of their assets and emigrate to that country. Around 52,000 Jews emigrated to Palestine under the terms of this agreement between 1933 and 1939.

By the start of the Second World War in 1939, around 250,000 of Germany's 437,000 Jews had emigrated to the United States, Palestine, Great Britain, and other countries. By 1938 it was becoming almost impossible for potential Jewish emigrants to find a country that would take them. After the 1936–39 Arab revolt, the British were disinclined to accept any more Jews into Palestine for fear it would further destabilise the region. Nationalistic and xenophobic people in other countries pressured their governments not to accept waves of Jewish immigrants, especially poverty-stricken ones. The Madagascar Plan, a proposed mass deportation of European Jews to Madagascar, proved to be impossible to carry out. Starting in mid-1941, the German government began resorting to mass exterminations of European Jews. The total number of Jews murdered during the resulting Holocaust is estimated at 6 million people.

Conclusion: The more things change, the more they stay the same

In the eyes of the non-Jews, the Jews can never win. This is true in all fields because antisemitism is a universal disease that will only be "cured" and eradicated with the coming of the true Jewish Messiah who will finally place the world under the banner of God, the Holy One Blessed Be He, and his Torah. No matter what they do and no matter which way they turn and no matter the places and circumstances Jews find themselves in, they are always falsely accused of things they did not do.

In the case of the non-Jewish legal systems of modern times it has been no different. In the cases of Dreyfus in France and Beilis in Russia, the legal systems of those countries nominally targeted individual Jews but the true targets were the large numbers of Jews living in Western and Eastern Europe. Dreyfus was falsely accused of being a traitor to France, of spying for Germany, while Beilis was falsely accused of murdering a Christian boy in a classical blood libel. In turn, aided by much of the local press of the time in France and Russia it riled up the masses of non-Jews to heights of antisemitism, Jew-hatred, and violence and the degradation of the Jewish minorities in those countries. This was a horrible abuse of legal systems for one purpose only: Get the Jews and hit them hard where it hurts.

Nazi Germany took this judicial tyranny against the German Jews a step further by targeting not individual Jews but rather getting at them as a collective group. With the virtual stroke of a pen the laws of Germany were sharpened into a knife aimed at all the Jews of Germany. The Nuremberg Laws were worse than the Roman Catholic Church's auto-da-fé against the Jews of Spain because in Spain a Jew could still "save" himself by claiming to be a Christian while the Jews of Germany were not afforded such a device to escape their fate as untermenschen (subhumans) that no claim of becoming a Christian would ever save them.

Now comes Jew-hatred on an international global colossal legal scale when the nations of the world, via the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, accuse the Jewish state of Israel of "genocide", "crimes against humanity" and "war crimes" in Gaza because the Israelis have the temerity to fight back against the barbarous attacks by the Arab radical Islamic fanatics of Hamas and try to root out all the terrorists in Gaza who were responsible for the massacre, murdering and wounding thousands and kidnapping hundreds of innocent Israelis on October 7, 2023.

Rabbi Yitschak Rudomin was born to Holocaust survivor parents in Israel, grew up in South Africa, and lives in Brooklyn, NY. He is an alumnus of Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin and of Teachers College–Columbia University and heads the Jewish Professionals Institute dedicated to Jewish Adult Education and Outreach – Kiruv Rechokim. He was the Director of the Belzer Chasidim's Sinai Heritage Center of Manhattan 1988. 1988–1995, a Trustee of AJOP 1994–1997 and founder of American Friends of South African Jewish Education 1995–2015. He is also a docent and tour guide at The Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust in Downtown Manhattan, New York and the author of The Second World War and Jewish Education in America: The Fall and Rise of Orthodoxy.Contact Rabbi Yitschak Rudomin at [email protected]

...

#Israel #Jews #antisemitism

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professionallywriterblocked · 10 months ago

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https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/17/does-israel-have-the-right-to-self-defence-in-gaza

That link is to an Aljazeera article examining Isreal's right to self-defense. The tldr: many experts say no because Isreal controlled the area for years either via direct means, aka occupation, or through the Israeli governments well known "mowing the grass operations."

Further, the post you were responding to was about Israeli action against Gaza and its people. This may include Hamas, a terrorist organization that killed many innocent people on 10/7. I have no sympathy for those people. However, Gaza also holds well over a million innocents. It holds many children. It holds architecture that is important to Christians and Muslims. It holds communities of people with no reasonable way out of a conflict they did not start.

Holding true to the morals set forth in the previous paragraph, I cannot stand the IDF. It is the most powerful military force in the area, and it chooses to use it via snipers killing grandmothers. (https://m.economictimes.com/news/international/us/what-is-israels-military-strength-heres-everything-you-need-to-know/amp_articleshow/104615713.cms)

In the art of child murder the idf too takes the lead. (https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/08/28/west-bank-spike-israeli-killings-palestinian-children) that link is to a human rights watch article explaining the idf's lack of penalty for the deaths of those in Palestine's West Bank. This says nothing of the other children murdered in Gaza. Though it is a war zone, the idf has taken no extra precautions to ensure the safety of civilians. In fact, the idf has done the opposite. The idf calls for evacuation to one location and then bombs it. The following politico article talks about this in some more detail. (https://www.politico.eu/article/israel-bombs-refugee-camps-central-gaza-report/)

Furthermore, the IDF is also using its expanded resources to kill catholics in Gaza, I guess they aren't Jewish enough to be people.

I ask of you sir, what warning was given to these women? What of the children? What of the peaceful Christians? Let's not forget that not every man is a terrorist either, and thus, many of them are innocently killed to satisfy idf blood lust. The following is a quote from CBS News, "More than 20,900 Palestinians — two-thirds of them women and children — have been killed." (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/israel-hamas-war-gaza-refugee-camps-bombed-central-gaza-netanyahu-repeats-hard-line/).

Continuing, the assertion that the state of Israel is willing to subject itself to humanitarian cease fires is laughable. It was a prisoner exchange with trucks moving (https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/22/israel-agrees-to-ceasefire-deal-paving-way-for-some-captives-release) as far as prevention of civilian casualties are concerned the idf couldn't care less. (https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/10/16/why-israels-gaza-evacuation-order-so-alarming)

Isreal has no real need to be in Gaza to stop Hamas attacks again. Isreal is intentionally killing non combatants, women, children, and fathers. Isreal is engaged in prisoner exchanges, not hostage nor peace negotiations. Isreal has found no proof that Hamas was using the hospitals, schools, and mosques as fortresses nor weapons platforms. The idf argues with its high court for permission to use human shields. It is cowardly and shameful. Hamas and the IDF have much to answer for, to hide, and to regret.

Next time you see a video of a child dying remember this, the war could have been stopped but US vetoed this.

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eitherandor-blog · 6 months ago

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The Boy in the Bubble

I don't understand what's going on in Israel and Palestine.

I used to say that as a way to excuse my ignorance to the conflict. This was easier than devoting the time to learn and listen. It was immature and myopic to not care enough to educate myself. Easy enough to do when I did not think it affected me and others in my world.

Even though that's no longer an excuse, today I would say I'm also confused. Still learning and ignorant about a lot. However, my confusion comes from a different vantage point.

I grew up with organized religion a part of my life. For me, it was being raised Catholic, a sect of the larger Christian faith. [Please do not embarrass me and ask that I compare and contrast Catholicism with other Christian denominations.] On a weekly basis, my family would go to church, then my sisters and I had catechism classes aka Sunday school. I would do this week in and out, not really sure what I believed or was learning.

What stuck with me, from its constant refrain mid-mass to the lessons and conversations in class afterward, was a theme of peace. It seemed that this was the example set by Jesus Christ, one that we should follow. I don't recall much and would never tout my knowledge of Christianity (then or now). That said, I feel fairly confident that living and acting with peace was a primary tenet.

...

While I did not keep Christianity in my life, I would have regular interaction with some other traditions and faiths. This has mostly concentrated on Judaism. As a kid growing up, I was fortunate to attend many bar and bat mitzvahs. Then a bit older when in college, I went to our local Hillel for Shabbat services and dinners on Friday nights, and joined their improv troupe. Celebrating the high holidays with family and friends has always been an annual invitation for me.

Islam is much less present in my life with even more for me to learn (and let me acknowledge, I have TONS to learn about Judaism too!). I have learned some things on Islam over the years from media coverage, readings, and personal testimony from many sources. From what I have learned and been exposed to, neither Judaism or Islam espouse violence. I don't know all the particulars and recognize that each organized religion has its denominations which expand the points of view. However in my religious encounters, for both Judaism and Islam (not to mention Christianity), they are at the core about unity, community, and faith.

It makes sense to me for people around the world to be transfixed on the devastation and death amounting in Israel and Palestine. What I cannot understand is how the conversation and angle is individually focused on one population and people. I see posts on social media where people remark the violent attacks against Israelis, but say nothing when civilian targets are bombarded and unarmed Palestinians are similarly murdered. Just as supporters of Palestine note the recurring, unending destruction of Palestine's infrastructure and people..but say nothing about the hostages taken and lives lost from Hamas and Palestinian militant groups.

I want a ceasefire. I believe in a two-state solution, acknowledging that the pathway to it seems currently unfathomable and is far more complicated than the outcome may imply. To me, this resolution is due to wanting peace for all sides and people. I think the firepower and backing of the Israeli military, and state overall, exponentially outnumber and dominate what Palestine has. I have a hard time personally using the term "genocide" knowing that Jewish people are hated if not hunted by parts of the world (and Jewish people compose much of Israel, though Judaism does not equal Israel). However, the havoc wreaked on infrastructure and human bodies has truly taken a toll. The numbers are unconscionable. For me the "genocide" label has shock factor, whether or not you accept it. It is the action and death toll that are longer lasting. If this is not an intentional elimination of a population, what is it? How can anyone justify what has happened and continues in the Gaza Strip?

My ideal conclusion though does not mean dissolution of the state of Israel or any wavering support of Jewish people, 'foreign and domestic.' I also would not want to elevate a confrontational and antisemitic rule in Palestine, if that is in fact the core of Hamas, or any government. I also believe in changes to the leadership in Israel that do not propagate fear or detest of Palestinians, whereby the forthcoming government officials acknowledge the harm caused. Palestine should do the same.

From what I read, it seems that there are biased leaders within each government, prejudiced and hating, some wanting annihilation of the other. Derogatory language and allusions to genocide are made by politicians from each region, not to mention select supporters. I don't think I am saying anything new but if people hate each other, the notion of peace and coexistence seems truly impossible.

I have spent some time working in violence prevention on a more local scale in the city of Chicago. One lesson learned- that was also part of our coaching and outreach workers ethos- is that violence begets more violence. That has plainly become a norm for Israel and Palestine too. What "started" on October 7th has heightened attention of this conflict while also bringing it home. Folks are derided for their viewpoints, some threatened for their identity or affiliation with one side or the other. While I want a separate and stable Palestine, that will never justify prejudice against Jewish people or wishing harm unto anyone even of a different side.

The people I know in the States who talk or write about their personal connection to what's happening in Gaza reference their allegiance to one side or the other, without room for any middle. Even though I am not a religious person, figuring out where I fit in the conflict, it makes total sense that folks draw on a shared experience or identity and align with those who possess the same belief system. But just as folks are buoyed in their beliefs, there are people of the same faith who find themselves on the other side of the issue..also because of their religion and spirituality.

There are organizations and individuals who state that because of their faith (in this case, Judaism), they are speaking out against the actions of Israel. Just as we see across religions, people interpret and practice their faith in varying ways. Is it possible Judaism and Islam can be used to promote peace? Can people of other faiths and those who do not practice one see the lives and losses for both Israel and Palestine, all at once? Emphatically we should all reject antisemitism and islamophobia. Why can't we want a home, a safe place, for Israelis and Palestinians?

I know as a white christian-raised person living in the US, there are particular privileges I hold specific to this war, and the conflict more broadly, that keep me safely in a bubble, immune and unexposed unless I seek to engage. What's become most troubling for how I access the topic is it seems impossible for people to talk in a comprehensive, nuanced way about what is happening, how folks feel, what it means, and how we can all find a peaceful resolution.

Perhaps it is because I am an extrovert or maybe it's the organizer and facilitator in me, but by nature, I strive to talk things out with people, even when we may not agree. As painful as the war is, I wish folks could talk about it more and people were open to talking about it with me. Not because I am an expert or want to debate anyone, but because (1) I learn more, (2) maybe the other person could learn something too, and (3) I believe we affirm our humanity when we connect and communicate even through difference.

I haven't said, written, or posted a lot about this topic because it feels like there is no space for a middle ground, no one interested in discussing the "gray" between the opposing sides and governments. Rather than post and perpetuate a half truth of just one side, I've generally refrained from providing anything public. That is an assumption on my part as I know my silence is perceived differently by some. Let me say clearly then that whether or not we agree, I hope if you're reading this, it won't be the last time we discuss the topic. Because I refuse to be secluded from the real world, all that affects YOU, and the many lived realities outside my own. I don't know what will resolve this conflict, but I am certain that not talking about it will never make things better. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

...

["The Boy in the Bubble" is the opening track on Graceland, an objectively- in my opinion :) - stellar album by Paul Simon. Give it a listen and try out the full CD if you haven't heard it already.]

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drmaqazi · 1 year ago

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JEWISH TERRORISM AND GENOCIDE OF PALESTINIANS IN THE OCCUPIED HOLY LAND SINCE 1948 till today and counting.....

January 14, 2002, assassination of Palestinian resistance leader Raed al-Karmi

http://www.revisionisthistory.org/palestine7.html January 24, 2002, assassination of Elie Hobeika who was preparing to testify at a war crimes trial in Belgium against his former ally Ariel Sharon regarding Sharon’s masterminding of the Sabra and Chatila massacres

http://www.revisionisthistory.org/palestine7.html March 4, 2002, Israelis Murder Palestinian Family: Mother and three children

“The body of Mohammad Abu Kweik, 8, is lifted from the carnage after the Mitsubishi pick-up truck he was travelling in was bombed by Israeli forces in the West Bank Palestinian ghetto of Ramallah, March 4, 2002. Six Palestinian civilians, including the boy’s mother, Bushra Kweik, 38, and two sisters, Bara, 14, and Aziza, 16, were killed when Israeli troops bombed their truck after their mother had picked them up from school. The car behind them was also hit. The man the Israelis were attempting to assassinate was not in either vehicle. Two Palestinian children, ages 4 and 16, were killed in the second vehicle.” Also on March 4, Israeli troops opened fire on an ambulance in the Jenin refugee camp and killed a doctor, 57 year old Khalil Suleiman. Three medics and a nine year old girl were wounded in the Israeli army attack.

http://www.revisionisthistory.org/palestine46.html March 10, 2002, 13-year-old Mahmoud Ghanem was shot in the head by Israeli troops, west of Nablus.

http://www.revisionisthistory.org/palestine46.html “‘Children have been shot in other conflicts I have covered--death squads gunned them down in El Salvador and Guatemala, mothers with infants were lined up and massacred in Algeria, and Serb snipers put children in their sights...in Sarajevo--but I have never before watched soldiers entice children like mice into a trap and murder them for sport,’ Hedges wrote. His account, coolly factual yet full of passionate intensity, was written not for his own paper but for Harper’s Magazine, which sent Hedges to Gaza on his vacation.” The Nation, March 11, 2002

Chris Hedges’ “A Gaza Diary: Scenes from the Palestinian Uprising,” Harper’s October 2001 http://harpers.org/archive/2001/10/a-gaza-diary/ http://www.revisionisthistory.org/palestine46.html March 6-16, 2002. 200 Palestinian civilians slaughtered in Jabalya refugee camp in the Gaza ghetto

http://www.revisionisthistory.org/palestine51.html March 14, 2002, Israeli tank fires at close range on a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

The Ugly History of Jewish Desecration of Many Christian Sites in the Holy Land by Willis Carto

http://tinyurl.com/3464np7 http://www.amfirstbooks.com/IntroPages/ToolBarTopics/Articles/Featured_Authors/Carto,_Willis/Barnes_2006-2010/Willis_A._Carto_2010_05-06_TBR;_The_Ugly_History_of_Jewish_Desecration_of_Many_Christian_Sites_in_the_Holy_Land.html Israeli tank fired at close range on a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary March 14, 2002

The Ugly History of Jewish Desecration of Many Christian Sites in the Holy Land by Willis A. Carto As early as December 1955, not long after the institution of the Jewish state of Israel, Father Leonard Feeney, a Boston-based Roman Catholic clergyman, compiled the following list of Christian churches and other institutions that had been attacked or otherwise destroyed by the newly-ensconced Jewish occupation regime in the Holy Land. In assembling this shocking list -- which would come as a complete surprise to modern-day Christians who believe that Israel has been a good friend to Christians in the Holy Land -- Father Feeney noted that his list did not include the loss in lives and property suffered by the nearly one million Arabs (Christian and Muslim alike) who had been evicted from their ancient homes during the then-seven years since Jews had seized power over Palestine. And, needless to say, since Feeney first compiled the list, there have been many more examples of such Jewish attacks. The clergyman’s summary of Jewish destruction of Christian sites follows.... The Jews have defiled and destroyed the following Church buildings: the Church of Saint John the Baptist at Am Karim; the Church of the Beatitudes at Capharnaum; the Church of Mensa Christi on the shores of the Sea of Galilee; the Church of Saint Peter at Tiberias; the Cenacle (the place ofthe Last Supper) at Jerusalem; the Convent of Mary Reparatrix at Jerusalem; the Convent and Hospice of Notre Dame at Jerusalem; the Convent of the Sisters of Saint Ann at Haifa; the Franciscan Convent at Tiberias; the Patriarchal Seminary at Beit-Jala, the Salesian houses at Cremisan; the Sisters’ Convent at Am Karim; the School of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Sion at Katamon; the Sisters’ residence at Capharnaum; and the church and rectory at Ikret. Catholic authorities have estimated that the Jews have destroyed Church property in the Holy Land at the rate of more than two million dollars’ worth a year. To enumerate only French Catholic institutions, they have demolished four hospitals, 16 dispensaries, two hospices, four seminaries, 32 schools and orphanages, and seven retreat houses. Among the countless other desecrations we might mention, none is more heart-rending than that of Jerusalem’s Church of the Dormition -- the magnificent Romanesque shrine to the Mother of God which was pillaged by Israeli soldiers and then turned into a Jewish dance hall for the young men and women of Haganah. It was only after a hundred such incidents that the Apostolic Delegate, Archbishop Hughes, unequivocally charged that there is now in operation a “deliberate Jewish effort to decimate the Arabs and to destroy Christianity in Palestine.” http://tinyurl.com/3464np7 March 8, 2002, “When CBC News spoke with Ismail Hawarjeh at Bethlehem's hospital earlier this month, there was no way to verif

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news4dzhozhar · 1 year ago

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Israeli forces kill two Christian women in ‘cold blood’ inside Gaza church

**So, will the West care now that it's not Muslims?**

Two Christian women – an elderly mother and her daughter – were shot dead by an Israeli soldier on the grounds of a Catholic church in Gaza City, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem has said.

“Around noon [10:00 GMT] today … a sniper” of the Israeli army “murdered two Christian women inside the Holy Family Parish in Gaza” where Christian families have been sheltering since the Israel-Hamas war broke out, the patriarchate said in a statement on Saturday.

“Nahida and her daughter Samar were shot and killed as they walked to the Sister’s Convent. One was killed as she tried to carry the other to safety,” it said.

The patriarchate highlighted that no warning was given before the shooting started and added that “they were shot in cold blood inside the premises of the Parish, where there are no belligerents.”

Seven more people were also wounded by gunfire as they tried to protect others, the statement said.

“This is a targeted death campaign during the Christmas season on the world’s oldest Christian community,” Hammam Farah, Nahida and Samar’s family member, said in a statement on X.

This morning Israeli snipers shot and killed my two family friends in an attack on the Holy Family Catholic Church in Gaza.

Nahida (Um Emad Anton) and Samar, mother and daughter, were walking to the Sisters’ Convent to use the only bathroom.

Reporting from Rafah in southern Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said the church, which was accommodating Christians in Gaza, has been a target of direct Israeli bombardment over the past few days.

“Major parts of it have been destroyed. Snipers are shooting at every moving object in the yard,” he added.

In its statement, the patriarchate said three projectiles fired by an Israeli tank had also struck a convent of the Sisters of Mother Teresa charity, destroying its generator and fuel supplies, and rendering a building housing 54 disabled people uninhabitable.

“The 54 disabled persons are currently displaced and without access to the respirators that some of them need to survive,” it added.

According to the Vatican press agency, the strikes wounded three people.

“The 800 remaining Christians in Gaza are on the verge of extinction. They’ve made life very difficult for this community,” Mahmoud said.

Pope deplores killings

Pope Francis on Sunday deplored the killings, suggesting Israel was using “terrorism” tactics in Gaza.

“I continue to receive very grave and painful news from Gaza,” Francis said at his weekly blessing.

“Unarmed civilians are the objects of bombings and shootings. And this happened even inside the Holy Family parish complex, where there are no terrorists, but families, children, people who are sick or disabled, nuns.”

Francis said the two women were killed by “snipers” and also referred to the Patriarchate’s statement that a convent of nuns of the order founded by Mother Teresa was damaged by Israeli tank fire.

“Some would say ‘It is war. It is terrorism.’ Yes, it is war. It is terrorism,” he said.

It was the second time in less than a month that the pope used the word “terrorism” while speaking of events in Gaza.

On November 22, after meeting separately with Israeli relatives of hostages held by Hamas and Palestinians with family in Gaza, he said: “This is what wars do. But here we have gone beyond wars. This is not war. This is terrorism.”

Who are the Christians of Gaza?

Gaza’s Christians are one of the oldest communities in the Middle East, dating back to the first century.

However, the number of Christians in Gaza has dwindled in recent years. Today there are only approximately 1,000 left, a sharp drop from the 3,000 registered in 2007, when Hamas assumed complete control over the enclave.

According to Kamel Ayyad, a spokesperson for the Church of Saint Porphyrius, which was recently bombed by Israel, the majority of the population is from Gaza itself.

The rest arrived here after the creation of the state of Israel, which displaced about 700,000 Palestinians – an event they refer to as the Nakba, or “catastrophe”.

The Israeli blockade of Gaza following Hamas’s rise to power in 2007 accelerated the flight of Christians from the poverty-stricken enclave.

“It’s become very difficult for people to live here,” said Ayyad. “Many of the Christians left for the West Bank, for America, Canada or the Arab world, seeking better education and health.”

While most of Gaza’s Christians belong to the Greek Orthodox faith, smaller numbers worship at the Catholic Holy Family Church and the Gaza Baptist Church.

‘Living under siege’

After Saturday’s church attack, Italy’s top diplomat Antonio Tajani issued a “heartfelt appeal to the Israeli government and army to protect Christian places of worship”.

“That is not where the Hamas terrorists are hiding,” he said on X.

Under the recent Israeli bombardments, Christians and Muslims alike sought refuge at several churches in Gaza like Saint Porphyrius.

But after this church was bombed, they all moved to the nearby Holy Family Church, located 400 metres (1,300 feet) away, which has also been bombed now.

Israel has said it is looking into what happened at the Holy Family church on Saturday.

But living under siege, Christians in Gaza attest to a spirit of solidarity that has united faiths in their struggle for survival and their dream of freedom.

“We are all Palestinians. We live in the same city, with the same suffering,” said Ayyad.

“We are all under siege and are all the same.”

#gaza in ruins #gaza under siege #gaza under genocide #gaza is a graveyard for children #stop funding genocide #genocide #israel is an apartheid state #apartheid #illegal occupation #collective punishment #propaganda kills #save gaza #save palestine #free palestine 🇵🇸

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