#talk to the people directly if you want to know what Israelis are like

[matan4il]

שלום! אני חזרתי לארצות הברית ביום חמישי, אבל אני ממש מתגעגע את ארץ ישראל… (אין לי שאלות, אני רק אוהב את ישראל!)

אווווווווו, נוני, איזה כיף שנהנית מאוד מהביקור.

הדבר הטוב בארץ ישראל זה שהיא לא הולכת לשום מקום. היא תחכה לביקור הבא שלך! ובינתיים, אני מאוז מזדהה עם האהבה הזו לארץ ישראל.

שולחת חיבוק גדול וחם! xoxox

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[fairuzfan]

the reason i shared my great-grandmother's story on here a few months ago is not for sympathy or anything, its to illustrate to you just how deeply, deeply anti-Palestinian the idea of zionism is.

i remember my grandmother, the one who watched her mother die in her home, she called us with a plain tone of voice, and she said "she asked to be buried in [her village] but of course the the zionists wouldn't let that happen." the thing that will not leave my head was the way my grandmother said it, the way it just seemed so natural and so obvious to her. my grandmother is *not* a quiet woman, she yells everything she ever says, whether happy or sad but this she said softly. like she was resigned to this, she expected this.

this woman was exiled once from her village, then again from Palestine, then again and again and again and eventually forced to live in poverty in a refugee camp, she knows the 'israeli' state more intimately than anyone i know, she knows what it will and won't allow in its genocidal apparatus and to her it was obvious that they would not respect her mother's body or last wishes. she knew that.

and i always go back to it when i see discussions on here or on twitter or in academia, like you guys (the moderates, the apologists) have never ever spoken to a nakba survivor or a naksa survivor. you don't know just how deeply its affected our families.

so when we ask you to completely reject zionism, when we demand it from allies, we aren't saying this to be stubborn or nonsensical, we're saying it because we know where zionism will lead us. we've been through the "we just want peace" and the "we need to just talk it out" phases already, how can you not think we've been through those phases after 75 years. we've had our meet and greets and our appeals and now we're at literally the worst stage of genocide against our people and you're still insisting on "talking it out" or some variation of it.

the truth of the matter is that we don't have patience for zionism anymore because look where it got us. look where we're at. even soft zionists, you need to stamp those people out from pretending they've got good points, or that you need to build community with them or whatever. we are literally at the worst part of Palestinian history ever, we need to stop pretending there are grey zones to this. Zionist apologists and the like are creating ambiguity that literally gets our families killed under the guise of "complication". I'm sick and tired of watching these same discussions over and over again about how "Israel is a result of antisemitism" when it very much is not. I'm sick of seeing people who know NOTHING about colonization push their own agendas and provide cover for zionists to do whatever they want. Just stop talking about things you don't understand because I promise you, you're directly contributing to the violence you claim to abhor.

[sonicboomseason3]

a brief recap of what has been going on with the sonic movieverse in the past several months:

paramount has come out in public support of israel

keanu reeves, a man who has publicly rubbed elbows with none other than benjamin netanyahu, reportedly gets cast as shadow for the upcoming third movie

james marsden, the guy who plays tom, got exposed as having written a letter of support for a convicted pedophile

there's fucking??? zionist propaganda in the knuckles series???

kind of connected to the last point but adam pally, the guy who plays wade, is evidently pro-israel too

this is a complete and utter joke.

EDIT AS OF 4/30/24: if people see this version of the post, i'd really appreciate it if you reblog it instead of the other versions, as it's the most updated one with all the information that i want included. thank you :]

you know, it's been a few days since i've made this post, and some of you (not most) are staying determined in defending/justifying/giving the benefit of the doubt to keanu for that photo with netanyahu, whether it's because "it was a decade ago," "him being civil to someone he ran into at a party one time doesn't mean anything," "he's probably just silent because his pr managers won't allow him to speak up," etc. i've made my thoughts on the matter quite clear by directly responding to these people, but at this point, i'm tired of both seeing them in my notes and repeating myself, so take this as my final word on the issue.

i can't help it if you don't think the photo with netanyahu is damning, and i'm done engaging with everyone going out of their way to tell me that. i obviously disagree, especially after finding out that 1. the host of the party, arnon milchan, is a former israeli spy who has a history of developing israel's nuclear program and promoting apartheid in south africa (information that had broken out a few months prior to the party and thus would've been fresh news around the time keanu chose to attend) and 2. keanu has been caught hanging around at least two other weirdos, but if you don't find any of that to be cause for reasonable concern, then there really is nothing else i can say afaik.

with all that said, i'm beginning to realize how strange it is that these people's first instinct when seeing this post is to start debating about keanu's political stances without ever acknowledging any of the other bullet points. you guys realize that this isn't just about him, right? i know tumblr reading comprehension is known for being piss-poor, but like… you realize that i was trying to make a point of how there are MULTIPLE terrible things that have broken out about the people and company involved in the sonic movies, right? and yet, a lot of the people leaping to speak on keanu's behalf in my notes are completely ignoring the parts where i bring up paramount, pally, etc. all in favor of zeroing in on the singular point about keanu and making bad faith assumptions about me for holding him accountable. really makes one wonder where your priorities lie if, in a post that talks about so many other things, me accusing an a-list celebrity with, according to google, a net worth of almost $400 million is where you draw the line and apparently the only thing worth your acknowledgment.

ultimately, what i'm trying to say is that the intention of this post was just to gather up everything that i had been hearing for the past several months and put it all together in one place. there were a bunch of people who didn't know about at least one of the bullet points before seeing this post, and i'm glad that i could help inform them, that was what i was hoping to do! but as for the keanu thing, i've said pretty much all i can say for now, and i don't want to derail the original post even more than i may have already. unless something new comes up, i'm done talking about him.

[gothhabiba]

do you know where are the the best places or mosteffective to donate to help palestinians atm? like charities ect

In terms of direct aid it is better to give money directly to families in Ghazza than to a charity. Charities, governmental and nongovernmental organisations &c., are seldom able to use funds to distribute aid right now, as few trucks are getting through, and none to the north of Ghazza.

ETA on Charities in Ghazza:

Taawon Association (in partnership with the Bank of Palestine) are distributing hot meals in Ghazza.

The World Food Programme (WFP) is getting food parcels into Ghazza, though I can't find them sharing a more specific location anywhere. Donate here.

The Palestinian Children's Relief Fund (PCRF) is providing medicine, food, and water. Their website specifically mentions food relief in north, central, and south Ghazza, and water delivered to north and south Ghazza.

Direct aid to Ghazza:

Money given directly to families in Ghazza is used to help them cross the Rafah crossing into Egypt, and/or to purchase plane tickets and apply for visas so they have somewhere to go after arriving in Egypt.

Help Christians in Ghazza get visas to leave

Help Hala Abu Ramadan's family of six leave Ghazza (organized by Mohammed Samhouri, vouched for by @psychoticgerard)

Help Dr. Intimaa AbuHelou's family of 22 leave Ghazza (organized by professer Steve Tamari)

Help Shayma and her family of 16 leave Ghazza (organised by Fardowsa. You may remember a link to a paypal going around to help Shayma; however, paypal has frozen those funds)

Help Shaymaa's family of 13 leave Ghazza (organised by Shaymaa herself, who is in Canada)

Help Sanaa and her family of 5 leave Ghazza and establish themselves in Belgium (organised by Eyad M, vouched for by Motaz Azaiza)

Help sisters Duaa and Deena leave Ghazza and get medical treatment in Cairo (organised by Shereen Alhayek, @.littlestpersimmon's friend's acquaintance)

Help Ahmed (@90-ghost) and his family leave Ghazza via ko-fi, paypal, or gofundme (@unionfish is offering stickers and prints in exchange for donations)

Help a family of Ghazzan refugees in Egypt get medical care and relocate

Buy an e-sim for use in Ghazza

Interruption of arms sent to Israel:

Palestine Action targets arms manufacturers in the US and UK

Palestine Legal offers legal defense for those who get arrested &c. in the course of protest or sabotage on behalf of Palestine

If you have some barrier to donating or to buying e-sims yourself (someone looking through your transactions, no room on your phone for new apps, don't want to mess up the instructions, don't have time to keep up with what's being called for at the moment, literally whatever), I can buy e-sims and move funds on your behalf. My venmo is @gothhabiba; paypal paypal.me/Najia; squarecash $NajiaK; DM me for Zelle information. Feel free to leave a note about where you want it to go (specifically for e-sims; aid to people in Ghazza; &c.)

BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanctions)

You asked specifically about donations, but if you haven't looked into the boycotts being called for by the Palestinian Campaign for Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) and the Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC), I urge you to do so.

BDS chapters in your locality may be calling for their own boycotts, so look into that as well. Think creatively about how to minimise purchase of boycotted goods (e.g., getting your union to refuse to shelve Israeli groceries).

Monday strikes

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) has called for weekly strikes on Mondays. Talk to your union or coworkers about strikes or work stoppages on Mondays, if you can. At least avoid making any purchases (goods, recreation, entertainment, food, &c.) on Mondays.

[redvelvetwishtree]

I have not been following western media at all for the past couple of days but I want to know how they have reported about the freed Israel hostage who said that she was treated well with her needs met and literally even turned back to shake hands and say Shalom to those who were releasing her. Was this shown and hyped up on TV channels and news websites? Was her release video played everywhere?

I only saw a clip of Sky News (Australia I think) where they started showing her speaking to the media and immediately cut it off when she started speaking positively...

Oh and what about another Israeli who was talking about how it was their own military who had actually attacked its own people?

I always ask and look for news and updates directly from Israel like we get it from Gaza. If you search for the Tel Aviv geotag on Instagram, it's mostly people chilling in Israel or some pro-Palestine accounts. Is there a possibility that Israel stops their own people from speaking up?

I know western media loves to cherry pick things to show to curate the image that Israel and the US wants them to curate but surely they cannot omit these things.

Here's a random post I just found, adding it here for now

[oni-1-oni-none]

i could go on for days with the tweets that i've seen on twitter so here's a collective because i don't want tumblr to turn a blind eye and pretend like this ISN'T happening. we shouldn't have to be literally begging people to care about human lives being lost. the fact that we even have to beg is fucking insane.

im going to use my voice because they can't. they can't silence us all if we keep talking about it

full scs of the second pic:

some other stuff like links to support and what companies to boycott:

and one last thing

i know some of you may be tired and trust me, i am too but please don't stop fighting. this is 2 million plus lives we're talking. at the end of the day, they're humans and they don't deserve to be wiped out. no one should.

spread this.

[phoenixyfriend]

Why I think it's important to understand the geopolitical anxieties of Israelis

Oftentimes, it feels like even recognizing that those anxieties exist is viewed as siding with Israel in the current conflict.

And I think that it's... weird, to do that. Dismissing the anxieties wholesale makes it harder to resolve the situation. Addressing them directly is possibly the only way to resolve the situation, because America.

Let me explain.

This will have three parts:

Why the propaganda works

How it affects current policy

How we can pressure the (mostly US) government about Israel using what we know about propaganda

Why the propaganda works

A lot of it is just propaganda, yes, but a lot of it is based in history, and a lot is also sort of self-fulfilling at this point. They have had reason to believe that some of their neighbors want all Jews dead or gone for a long time (see: Syria, Lebanon, Yemen), so it's not that it comes from nowhere. When over half the population is either Mizrahi Jews who fled from nearby countries that were happy to have a place to kick their Jewish populations out to, or their descendants, it's not hard to see that 'if someone else is in charge, we'll have to flee again.'

You could tell the French in Algeria to go back to France, but are you going to tell Mizrahi Jews to go back to the ME countries that they left? Sure, some left willingly, but that kind of wholesale eradication doesn't happen unless there's some degree of systemic discrimination or threat of violence. You cannot send Yemeni Jews back to Yemen.

The threat is real. It is not as large as the propaganda claims. It does not in any way justify nearly 30,000 deaths, half of them children. But the threat is not just imagined.

The fact of the matter is this: the propaganda is fueled by actual violence and legitimate fears.

And unless those fears are recognized and accounted for, Israel cannot be talked down.

Being told that a threat does not exist when recent history clearly shows otherwise is not going to convince anyone. I cannot emphasize this enough: even if the far-right government is replaced tomorrow, those fears will persist.

Israel's current government is violently and militarily opposed to restructuring itself in a way that allows for either a secular democratic single state, or a truly free and independent Palestine in a two-state solution. Due to mandatory army service and large scale propaganda, many have been taught since early childhood that the only way for Jews to be safe is for Israel to exist and to be so incredibly overpowered for their size that other nations won't invade them. The fact that both distant history and more recent, across the world, is filled with antisemitic discrimination, feeds this paranoia. A lot of people are out to get them, and have been since well before Israel was established. The destruction of Judea, the Edict of Expulsion, the expulsion of Jews from Spain, pogroms, the Holocaust, the near-total eradication in Yemen, Jordan, and Syria, and so on... this shit keeps happening. Some of it long ago, some if it very recent.

But it does keep happening, and that is why the propaganda works. That is why the fearmongering has teeth. It has happened before, over and over and over again, and it is being loudly threatened again. The propaganda works in Israel, and it also works in Jewish communities, and non-Jewish people who just happen to hear it, based elsewhere in the world. Like America. (This is important.)

Before moving forward, I need to make this clear: There are Jewish Israeli activists, both within Israel and without, that are vocally against Israel's actions against Palestine. Some are organized, and some are individuals. Some stories even go viral: Israeli-born Natalie Portman's been criticizing Netanyahu for years and politicians have called for her citizenship to be stripped for it. Tumblr loves the story of the Swiftie Twitter that went to jail for refusing to join the IDF, and that's very common; plenty of young people get months-long prison sentences, sometimes multiple times. Right-wing mobs go after Jewish Israelis who speak in support of Palestine in any way, and these things get violent.

(In that same article, it also talks about how Israeli Palestinians are suffering much, much worse under the government's crackdown on free speech.)

How it affects current policy

The thing is, there are only really four ways for this to resolve:

Israel wins. They succeed in pushing Palestinians out of Gaza by killing anyone who doesn't comply, and take it over for themselves. (This is bad.)

Israel is cut off from any and all support from abroad, both 'here, you can help yourself with these guns' and 'here, we will fight your enemies for you,' and is very suddenly at risk of invasion, mass murder, and removal from the Palestinian Mandate by those groups they fearmonger about, the ones that include slogans like "death to Israel, a curse upon the Jews." (This is also bad.)

Israel is convinced to stop attacking Gaza, possibly through the threat of no more support, and settles in to figure out a solution with Palestine, whether two-state or secular single state or whatever, and normalizes relations with neighbors enough that they can start cutting back on their military. (This is the best option.)

A foreign power or coalition of powers invades and forces Israel to stop, and oversees a transition from military state to peaceful state while protecting from outside attack, like was done to Japan and Germany following WWII. (This one is... interventionism is bad, but also almost 30k people have died with no end in sight, so it's starting to look like a real possibility.)

We can all agree, I hope, that the first option is not an option. That is Bad.

I also hope we can agree that the second option is not an option. A number of Israelis may be settlers in the traditional sense of the word, but a lot of them are refugees from neighboring countries, survivors of the Holocaust, or descendants of such. "Just go back where you came from" doesn't work when many of them came from places that were also saying 'go back where you came from' because Israel now existed to expel them to. It's also been around for 75 years now, and some three-quarters of the population were born in Israel. Expelling them all, even the ones that were there before the early statehood aliyah? It's... I don't know. I understand in theory why some activists push for it, but I do think it is fundamentally different from any comparative colonization or settlement.

(Note: I do not include Israeli colonies in the Palestinian West Bank. Those do need to be returned to their owners. Give people their houses and land back.)

The third option is the one that most people, I think, would like to see happen. However, the Israeli government is clinging to the propaganda that they will be eradicated as a Jewish people if they do not forcibly take power where they can, and they are spreading it out among Israelis. Dissent by Israeli Jews may not be criminalized, but the society around them sure isn't receptive to it. The recent invasion of Gaza has also inflamed tensions across the region, which means that even countries which were slowly normalizing relations, or at least.

Netanyahu has not been convinced, and by all appearances cannot be convinced. The only thing that may force his hand is the threat of no more military aid, so he suddenly has to start conserving what missiles he does have in order to fend off a possible attack instead of continuing to hammer on Gaza.

Sounds great, right? This is why we are all (I hope) calling our senators or representatives or whatever your country has to tell them to stop supporting Israel monetarily or with military aid. This is why I keep giving suggested topics for Americans to call their senators about, even if I'm just one voice, and there are much louder ones saying the same thing, but better.

And yet, the Senate passed the aid bill. They snuck it into a Veteran Affairs thing as a last-minute amendment, but they passed it, and any failure in the House will have little to do with sympathy for Palestine and a lot to do with domestic border policy.

So... Americans are also pretty convinced of the whole 'if we stop supporting Israel, they will be invaded and killed off by the Iran-backed militias' thing. Many do feel sympathy for Palestinians, hence the 'Israel, you need to knock that shit off' comments, but they also are genuinely of a belief that the Israeli propaganda of 'we will be overrun by antisemitic Muslim extremist militias and exterminated like in the Holocaust' is true.

Like. Either they fear for Israelis due to the antagonistic forces in the region, or they belong to Christofascist ideologies about how supporting Israel is the way to avoid suffering in Armageddon.

You can't get to the latter on ethics or morality or whatever. You can only rely on ulterior motives (the border things) or telling them 'your reelection is in jeopardy, change your mind or you're going to be voted out.'

The former, though... you can. They believe the things that Israel claims and has been claiming since 1948, with regards to threats.

And if you acknowledge why the propaganda works, you can address it.

How we can pressure the government about Israel using what we know about propaganda

If you say that there is no threat to Israel from Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, or so on, you will be dismissed as an idealist who hasn't done any research. If you say that Israelis should be left to their own devices, you will be viewed as cruel, and if you say they should be removed and the land given back to Palestinians, you will be laughed away (silently, but it'll happen). You cannot convince the American government with these tactics.

What can you say?

Israel is making things worse for itself in regards to these exact threats. Pushing on Gaza is making neutral and nearly-normalized countries like Egypt and Saudi Arabia less inclined to get in the way of the 'death to Israel' militias. The campaign is creating a whole new generation of extremists who will join the militias out of a desire to prevent more of these deaths by Israeli hands, and that will only increase the threat to Israel.

Destroying Hamas isn't going to do shit if Hezbollah, Iraq, Iran, the Houthis, and so on, invade. Especially if twenty years down the line, all those orphans that Israel just created these past few months start a new Hamas for revenge because, hi, look how many orphans you just created.

Netanyahu is working against the interests of the Israeli people. He is trying to remain in power, and the Gaza war is a distraction from the charges being levied against him.

Netanyahu has a vested interest in seeing that Donald Trump is elected, as they are much closer than the at best strained relationship with Biden. This is very complicated but if your senator or rep is a Democrat, it is relevant.

Israel's continued offensive is leading to the risk of millions of Palestinian refugees entering Egypt and destabilizing them, which, in an already unstable country in an already wobbling region, is going to risk another war across the Middle East. The US still has not pulled out all troops from the last one.

The US cannot afford, monetarily or in terms of foreign relations, to aid in causing a new regional war.

If Israel slows, halts, and withdraws peacefully from Gaza, tensions will settle enough to avoid possible invasion by those hostile forces they're so worried about. The UN can, if necessary, deploy forces to maintain relative stability until peace treaties are worked out. We'd like to avoid option 4 if possible.

The only way I can see to convince the US government to stop supplying weapons to Israel is to push on the fact that continuing to do so will, due to Netanyahu and his party's actions, put Israel in more danger rather than less.

There are other things to say to your senators, and I'll be making a post about that soon (not today, but probably this weekend; stuff like Michigan, UNRWA, international reputation), but in regards to just the geopolitics surrounding the propaganda, this is it. This is why we have to understand it. Because the way we get the United States government to stop giving aid to Israel to defend itself is by telling them 'this is putting them in more danger due to their head of state's aggression.'

This was very long, but I've seen a lot of misinformation and a lot of generalization, and a lot of it is... not great. Well-meant, sometimes, but not great. I felt it necessary to be very clear and very specific. I'm anticipating a lot of comments to the effect of "you forgot about this" and "but that doesn't excuse their actions" and "well, not all activists believe--" and I know.

I know.

But I've had people say "Nobody is advocating for the removal of all Jewish Israelis" to my ask box hours after I was talking about Yemen, a country that enacted a removal of all Jews and largely under the control of a group that has a slogan about doing just that to the Jewish Israelis.

So let me be very clear that I have seen a lot on tumblr recently, a lot of it extremist, and I'm not pulling any of this out of my ass or making up a guy to be mad at. I may not know everything on this topic--I may not even know much at all, given that it covers centuries of conflict due to the Ottomans--but I've been listening to hours upon hours of news from a variety of sources (Al Jazeera, BBC, NPR, and more) every day just to make sure I understand.

Please trust that, even if I get some things wrong, even if I don't cite every detail or generalize just a bit here and there, that I mean well. Please trust that I am making this in good faith and am trusting you to respond to it in kind.

Call your reps. Write them an email. Donate to a Palestinian charity.

It's a slog, but we can make a difference.

[spacelazarwolf]

hey, i wanted to ask smth abt supporting jewish people rn but i TOTALLY respect if you dont answer: i saw your post abt not wanting goyim to reblog this blog is safe for jewish people post and i wanted to ask, what is a good way i can make my blog safer for jewish people? is there anything i can do? i am educating myself and am following a ton of jewish bloggers,,, but i wanted to know if there was anything to do to make my blog safer for jewish people

tbh the best way is to show not tell. clicking reblog on a bugs bunny "i wish all my followers a happy whatever jew holiday" is easy and doesn't actually require you to do anything to make yourself safe for the jews who interact with you.

particularly in this time of internet chaos, when i look at (general) your blog and i see posts about israel, palestine, zionism, jews, the holocaust, etc. i'm checking for a few things:

do the posts link credible sources? do they link sources at all?

are they sharing outdated info?

are they sharing posts with links to accredited aid organizations?

is the phrasing of the posts intended to spark outrage? if so, does it follow up with any specific actions that can be taken?

who are the majority of the posts from? are you reblogging from palestinian and jewish bloggers or mostly from non palestinian gentiles?

are you reblogging directly from people who have been outwardly antisemitic over the past month (or longer)?

is there any overt antisemitism, islamophobia, or racism?

are they sharing posts that dehumanize jews, israelis, muslims, or palestinians?

are most of their posts calling for more violence, or are they prioritizing an end to the current suffering?

how do they talk about "zionists"? is there any indication that they have a specific definition in mind when they use the word "zionist" or are they potentially using, intentionally or unintentionally, it as a dogwhistle?

how do they talk about the people they disagree with or think are bad people? do they critique their opinions and actions, or do they condemn them and dehumanize them entirely? do they view these people as beyond saving or deserving of violence?

do they prioritize changing minds or punishing people who are on the "wrong side"?

obviously a lot of this is subjective and will depend on the person who's deciding whether or not to follow you, but if i can tell you value all human life, even the people you disagree with, then i'll be more likely to follow.

[bsof-maarav]

it's good this is my only social media and that i've insulated myself from the worst of this place. i'm not watching that video. i understand the value in bearing witness. but for me, it's like this. i know what's been happening to the hostages already, i don't need to be convinced. i don't want to violate them further by watching the beginning of the worst part of their lives and i don't want to be even more secondhand traumatized either. it would make me less, not more, able to do what i can do to be of use to the hostages.

but even more than i'm not watching that video, i'm not watching the absolutely psychopathic response to it by the mobs who are indulging in an orgy of probably the two oldest forms of hatred in the world--misogyny and antisemitism.

when i heard this video would be released, i had that impulse to hope that maybe now my former friends and community would finally get it. but it's not the case. we've all known this whole time. there's been no mystery about what kind of violence the go-pro wearing terrorists are perpetrating. we've already seen enough to know, even without seeking it out. journalists have described it thoroughly as well. if someone says they need to see something more explicit for "proof," they're nothing but consumers of terrorist torture porn. it's pure רַע

i'm not even going to try writing any appeals about these womens' humanity because anyone who doesn't get it, that's because they don't want to get it and they probably never will. they're getting off on this dehumanizing violence and trying to join it as part of the virtual mob. they're empty people and they are not going to change.

we are looking directly at this hate, some of us for the first time, and it's a window through time, through which we can see what many generations of Jews, and particularly Jewish women, have seen before. the violence and hatred is unchanging. only the technology of the violence has changed. the violence itself has not. the hatred has not. we know more about every previous age now, more about how our ancestors' hearts felt when they were breaking, the fear and anger, the determination to survive and make something better.

it's unbearable to know how outnumbered we are, how much of the world is morally and ethically dead when it comes to us, and how many of them accept, deny, are indifferent to, or celebrate this violence against us. it always has been unbearable, untenable, and yet we're here: the latest in a long line of generations who move forward even when it feels impossible, and do what we can to make a better world for the next ones with the conviction that no one should be hurt like this. never again.

and now i'm going back to listening to Israeli music. because i try to experience some kind of peace and calm each day, whatever i can, so i will have some strength to send. through davening, i try to send strength to the hostages to help them survive. we're one family, and all deeply connected. i have to hope that it helps in some way.

if you want to say Mi Sheberach and Tehillim for these women and don't know how, please reach out. or just daven from the heart for them, dedicate it to their merit, say each of their names out loud. light an extra Shabbat candle for them. set an extra place at your table. put something about them in a public place to make their reality present there. you'll have to protect it from attack. but do it anyway.

and if you want to know what you can do to pressure your political representatives or organizations to do something to free these captives, and all of the captives, i'll be here to talk about that as well.

[determinate-negation]

hello! one thing i have seen is the neutrality stance is that innocent civilians have been getting killed on both sides and that being pro-palestine means that you are “okay” with innocent civilians in isra*l dying as well. i was having a convo with a friend and they basically said i am disgusting for not acknowledging that however i do but how does one discuss that without appearing to be a zionist ? like i know that innocent civilians dying is terrible but when people bring that up as a way to support isr*el i am left confused on what to say as i don’t believe innocent people should die but ik it’s “different”? do u have any resources or response to help with this dilemma?

i think it is totally possible to acknowledge israeli civilians who died and recognize on an interpersonal level peoples grief, and say that the situation israel has created in gaza since the blockade, and in general since 1948 is the driver of violence. if there was no israel there would be no hamas, and they purposefully supported them to detract from support secular communist palestinian movements. you cant talk about this without discussing the larger historic context and if you do then youre not addressing the full picture. on one level this is an argument between ideologies, liberalism and radicalism, and idk how much you can actually convince someone lol. you cant condemn violence on two sides without looking at whos been instigating the violence, and also historically preventing and punishing peaceful protest and literally everything else they could do. a colonial situation is generally marked by violence. its upheld by the presence of the army and their ability to kill indigenous people with impunity, and regardless of how sad it might be to civilian victims families, frequently marked by clashes between settlers and indigenous people. idk if this can directly help you lol but the book black skin white masks by frantz fanon really influenced how i think about this. and how is supporting palestine equivalent to being ok with civilian deaths when a lot of the relatives of people killed in the attack and held hostage have said they dont want the israeli government using this to kill palestinians and justify war. but the israeli government has ignored them and gone ahead with their explicit desire to destroy gaza and complete the nakba, as many of them have said word for word. this article Meet the Hamas Massacre Survivors Opposing Israeli Brutality in Gaza has a bunch of their testimonies. israel is also indiscriminately bombing gaza, where the hostages are, and already have killed a few of them

[doberbutts]

I typed this whole thing up but they re-blocked me after they posted another rant on another one of my posts so;

That is absolutely not everything you said, and you know it.

You did start it with Avi, whether you believe it counts or not. You posted several multi-paragraph posts mentioning him directly by name. Even if you don't tag someone, they can still see it in their name tag if they search their name through tumblr's search function. Yes, even if you block them. Yes, even if they've blocked you. I can say that for certain because there are people in my name tag right now who I know for sure I have blocked and I also can still see when they talk about me if they put my username in their post.

He found your posts about him through this, not by circumventing your block but because he can see when you type out his username in your posts. So there is no "he went around my block to see it" because he wasn't even aware there was beef between you until after he found your posts about him- he's stated a few times that he used to be mutuals with you and didn't even realize you'd blocked him until recently. You did start it. And he was, understandably, upset about it, and posted about it on his blog.

Additionally, some of the things you've said regarding him- and Israeli Jews in general- are pretty antisemitic. It is not antisemitic to call out the atrocities and genocide that Israel is performing on Palestine- something Avi himself has said over and over again. However, there are people who are using antisemitic language or using the conflict as an excuse to be antisemitic, and that is where his problem is. Just as he also posted calling for justice for those affected by anti-arab and Islamophobic violence stemming from conflict.

And it's not like that's not true, that people are being antisemitic and using this conflict as an excuse, or even that people are being antisemitic to him and using this conflict as an excuse. He's gotten plenty of harassment coming from people straightup lying about him to justify it, and has posted it on his blog for others to see, so it's not like he's making it up. He also has posted about what he's doing within his local community, mourning with those who have lost loved ones, and how to provide aid to those trapped in Gaza. He's posted critiquing both the Israeli and the US government.

What more exactly do you want from him here? And why does he have to be A Good Jew in order to have his complaint of antisemitism be heard? Because you've decided he's white, when historically even "white" European Jews were not considered white by antisemitic governments? Didn't we just have a black celebrity get in trouble for saying exactly that? Because you've decided he's white, when more accurately he's multi-ethnic regarding one side of his family being entirely comprised of non-white Jews and the other side still not Ashkenazi, which he's publicly posted about? Because you've decided he's white, when whiteness and Judaism has always been a fraught conversation?

Certainly you understand that equating a population to the very same people that want to exterminate them and have tried before with relative success is always going to be an incendiary topic, and that the people you accuse of doing this are going to be upset when they see it?

I'm not lying for anyone, and besides my white Jewish bestie is a woman. I'm not his trained monkey though, since that seems to be the implication. I just think your behavior is poor and I think you do a lot of inflammatory blogging, which is why I didn't often reblog from you in the first place.

I am, though, sort of wondering why you are so focused on this one specific Jewish guy who has stated over and over again that he wants peace in the region and he wants the innocents living there to stop being killed. Is it because he said he doesn't want the Jewish people who want peace currently living there to be expelled? A lot of Palestinians don't want that either. And I think it's weird to be harassing a Jewish guy who has repeatedly said he wants peace, just because he wants peace in a way you personally find unsatisfying.

[fairuzfan]

Scrolling through a blog because I remember them being pointed out as Zionists a while back and then I found this post about standing together where the tags are FILLED with non-Palestinians calling BDS performative and shit like yeah I'm aware they fought the israelis at the border of Gaza to let aid in but by the time BDS had come out with the condemnation of standing together, they WERENT doing that. They were just talking. They didn't do SHIT when bds put out that condemnation. Now that they're finally doing something (too little too late btw) you wanna take this as a chance to yell at BDS?? Do you guys think it's appropriate to tell Palestinian orgs what they're doing correctly or incorrectly based on your own viewpoints??

"They work to deradicalize israelis so they use a specific vocabularly" I want you to know that Palestinians have been using that vocabulary for 75 years. No they're not doing something new. They're doing the same thing our elders have been doing for generations. And do you know what we learned from that? That israelis hate our guts more than you can fathom.

If standing together had FROM THE START done shit to help Palestinians in tangible ways, I wouldn't be saying anything. But they didn't. They JUST started a couple months ago with their efforts at the Gaza crossing so now you want to moralize and say "at least they're doing something"??? By all means they should continue doing this, I'm not telling them to stop but the way this post is just so rude... bds initiatives are widely supported by most Palestinians around the world (and yet we criticize it still, obviously) so you all have absolutely no reason to take this as a chance to diss it if youre not palestinian.

You guys actually need to stomp this shit out from your posts why the fuck are you all letting this happen. Bds has been around for longer than standing together and DOES help Palestine by making it clear that companies building on west bank territories (which the companies are owned by ISRAEL not Palestinians) will not be bought from or supported, meaning that they withdraw their contracts to put the israeli government in a monetary bind.

Also you all talk about "israeli deradicalization" as if we are at a point in time where deradicalization is the goal. We know people in '48 and the West Bank and Gaza. Like sorry but that is not what we are thinking about right now! Slow change might have been useful a while ago, but we literally cannot afford slow change right now.

That is to say I really don't care that much about standing together despite what it may seem. They do not occupy my mind nearly as much as i talk about them. I'm just astounded that you guys are giving them money when you can be donating to Palestinians in Gaza directly.

Also I was right, silverfox66 is a zionist so. Don't reblog them.

[criptochecca]

Full transcript of the interview VICE news journalist Isobel Young had with Hamas fighter Abu Khalid in 2021, following the bombing of Gaza of May of that year

Isobel Young: What makes you so certain that joining Hamas, joining the Al-Qassam Brigades and ultimately turning to violence is the answer here?

Abu Khalid: There's no solution but this weapon [his rifle]

"Abu Khalid is 25 years old. He's one of thousands who joined Hamas as a teenager and has been active in the group ever since"

IY: The fact that you're down here, in tunnels that have been built under civilian areas, launching rockets from civilian areas as well. Doesn't that mean that you're endangering Palestinians that you're claiming to be fighting for?

AK: We are sacrificing ourselves and our times and everything we do in order to ensure a better future for our children.

IY: But are you also not sacrificing the civilians that are directly above you?

AK: Of course we don't want them to get killed or get targeted, but this is the only choice we have. This is what we can do. And they are supporting us. You can't go to the sea, you can't go to the air, you can't go to anywhere. So, that's why we are building tunnels. This is the only mean which is possible for Al-Qassam brigade.

IY: Over 250 Palestinians are dead after these just eleven days. You know, 13 Israelis are dead. This is just one of so many escalations over the last few years and it's only a matter of time before the next one. What is any of this really achieving?

AK: The one who started this war was not Hamas or the Palestinians but the Israeli occupation and uhm...

IY: You guys fired the first rockets.

AK: Who said that? We warned them! We tell them not to storm our Holy Land [videos of the IDF attacking Palestinians in Al Aqsa during Ramadan in May 7] We're talking about a holy site for muslims. It doesn't mean that the first rocket being launched from Gaza started the war. The first aggression is the occupation, they stormed our home. So we'll keep going unless they Israeli stop their occupying our lands.

--

Later Isobel went to a Hamas training summer camp for teenagers.

Isobel Young: What would you say to people who would say that you are brainwashing young children and you're training them to fight?

Abu Yahia: We don't force the students to sign up for these camps. As soon as this generation was born they witnessed bombing, destruction and the panic the people of Gaza experienced.

IY: And do you think it's this kind of experiences that motivate these young people to come to training camps like these?

AY: Definitely, definitely.

--

Transcript of tweet below

Video of a Palestinian child from Gaza, wounded and crying. The tweet reads: This child's father was killed by Israel a week ago. The first thing he said while crying was that tomorrow he would enlist in the jerusalem Brigades (Al-Quds Brigades) and avenge his father against the Zionists. Israel is the one that creates these resistance fighters.

Full VICE documentary below

[waxing2you]

hey gang! haven't posted in a while. so let's talk about the boiled one phenomenon/TOE, that webseries with the character that made me unable to sleep correctly for a few days.

okay, so, i do believe that uh. thing with the hands. his name's locust. i'm not very sure how he ties into the story, but i do know a few things. when he gets a victim, he hollows them out- making it look as though nothing happened- and takes their heart (or, in the title, a "love thumper"). i'm not very sure how TOE (the organate enterprises) fits into it, but based on what i'm seeing, it seems to be the company behind the nature broadcast, the ad for the star candies, and whatever showed up after the ad for the star candies. do i know what this means? of course not

okay here's the part that i'm definitely sure of. there's lots of references to the bible, and locusts. i'm not christian, or even that interested in the bible, so if anyone wants to correct me here, do it. however, the locusts in the bible eat everything they come across. also, locust is mentioned in revelations (which i will talk about in a minute)

the boiled one's introduction has heavy, HEAVY references to the bible. mostly, i saw the sky opening up and the trumpets in the ears of the victims as VERY biblical sounding. however, when zamperini's (his name is likely a reference to watanabe matsuhiro, who was in the japanese military and a known war criminal) laying in the bed while being interviewed, we see the sign about jesus turn into "i can see you" above him. we can also see the uh. hair? spikes? whatever? of the boiled one in the window. personally, i see it as very similar to how god watches over people- all-seeing, all-knowing, etc etc. plus, most of the events in the fetal fanfare part (sky opening, trumpets) tie directly to revelations. plus, the "tree of heaven" part ties to it as well... but i don't know about a tree of heaven. maybe it may tie to the garden of eden? but i'm unsure. anyways, time to focus on zamperini, the war vet.

job zamperini, while being a reference to the events of prisoners of war in japan, also references job's suffering in the bible. again, not a christian, but job's story involves god taking everything from him. plus, the ephrata branch (according to comments under emortalmarcus's video) is named after a town in pennsylvania. ephrata, while being a town in PA (which may tie to why it wasn't placed in zamperini's original hometown) sounds similar to efrata/efrat, which is an israeli settlement, believed to be the original location of bethlehem- more ties to religion and christ.

overall, i personally believe it's leading to a focus on zamperini and watanabe. zamperini turned to christ to deal with the pain and suffering he endured while a prisoner of war, and watanabe died in 2003. i do believe the boiled one is watanabe's ghost coming back and using biblical imagery, themes, and events to torment him further. however, i'm not very sure how my boy locust ties into this (and i haven't even SPOKEN about that creature that follows you after the lights turn off) or how TOE ties into that and all. overall, i need me some more lore to figure out if doctor nowhere is focusing completely on zamparini's story, or if he's using it as a symbol of war (like one of the comments on the original series said)

overall 10/10 series i saw the boiled one on a thumbnail of a video and genuinely shat myself

[batwynn]

I’ve gotten a few insistent anons lately demanding I state my thoughts and opinions on the current and past history of Palestine on this blog. (You can tell they don’t follow my more personal side blog, I guess.) On the one hand, I do understand people wanting to know that someone they follow has similar opinions on severely important things like this. But on the other hand, most of the asks have that certain… tone that gives me the feeling that they are more interested in ‘catching’ me in something, than any actual concern over my politics or the actual people involved. They’re worded in a way that is very immature—in a way that leaves very little room for anything other than the exact statements parroted back to them that they expect. Which I can’t do. One, because I can’t read their minds to say exactly what they want me to say. Two, because I’m an entire person with a whole life that they know nothing about—something that comes with all the flaws of being a human person with my own history and education based on where I lived and who I knew. And three, because I don’t want to parrot someone else’s words to appease a random person I don’t know. And the thing is, I’ve had this conversation already with nearly everyone in my life. I’ve gone over it at least a dozen times with friends and family from all walks of life. Some conversations were harder than others. All of them were hard. Partially because what is happening is hard to talk about, and partially because I don’t really know what to say. What do I say that changes anything? What do I say that isn’t speaking over someone who is directly affected? What do I say that won’t be misinterpreted by someone willingly misinterpreting/looking for a fight? What can I say that doesn’t hurt anyone at all? Because someone out there will always be hurt, no matter how carefully I try to word things. And I have tried. I’ve written this post 80+ times for months now. I’ve read other’s words and found parts that spoke to me and for me very well, but then have that certain edge that goes into the harm territory. Some lean into Zionism, some lean into antisemitism. Some are just outright racist, some are full on fascist. And that’s really the entirety of it. I just don’t want people to be hurt anymore. So to answer your questions, anon:

I don’t know what the right thing to say is and no matter how careful I am, it will never be correct enough for you. I am angry and horrified at the harm that has been done over many years to the Palestinian people. None of my words can really summarize that history, or what is happening to them right now. Every single day I learn something new, and every single day it is someone doing irreparable harm to innocent people. I am disgusted by the never ending terrorism and harm done by people who think that killing innocents is a worthy way to get them what they want. And that goes for anyone who does this, including but not limited to the Hamas, the Israeli army, or my very own colonizing country. I am alarmed at how black and white people are treating this, and how no consideration is allowed for those who fall between the cracks or who dont follow their strict narrative. That people forget that Jewish Palestinian people exist when they go on their rants, or what people from every ‘side’ or corner of the world can want the end of the harm. That people have hatred for Jewish and Muslim people with no regards to who they actually are and what they believe. That there are so many who support Palestinian freedom, and then parrot outright fascist talking points. That many come to support their Jewish friends, but then say that Palestinian children deserve to die because _____. So, no. There is nothing I can say that really matters. Because no matter what I say someone out there will twist my words, or misunderstand, or tell me that I’m supporting something I don’t support. Because no matter what I say, I just can’t write the right words on fucking Tumblr to stop the harm from being done.

[fromchaostocosmos]

Footage has emerged of Khymani James, a student at Columbia University and a leading figure in the ongoing "Gaza Solidarity Encampment" at the college, making incendiary statements—including "Zionists don't deserve to live"—during a video he appeared to have recorded in January. The video was unearthed by the Daily Wire, a conservative-leaning media outlet, after which James posted a statement on X, saying: "What I said was wrong. Every member of our community deserves to feel safe without qualification." On social media, James' resurfaced remarks have sparked a backlash from users, with one writing: "The internet lives forever. We know your true feelings. You are a clear and present danger to all people."

On April 17, students at Columbia University established a protest camp, dubbed the "Gaza Solidarity Encampment," to demonstrate against ongoing Israeli military operations in Gaza. Newsweek has contacted Khymani James and the Columbia University press office by X direct message and email, respectively, outside normal working hours. Thursday, the Daily Wire published a video of James making controversial remarks both during and after a virtual meeting with two Columbia University employees who expressed concern about earlier remarks he had made and indicated the matter could go to a disciplinary hearing.

In the statement James published after the footage went viral online, he said he regretted his remarks. He added: "I also want people to have more context for my words, which I regret. Far right agitators went through months of my social media feed until they found a clip that they edited without context. "When I recorded it, I had been feeling unusually upset after an online mob targeted me because I am visibly queer and Black."

Responding to James' statement, an X user wrote: "The clip is so egregious, you can't qualify it by saying 'well I felt bad and bad things were said to me.' Your statement also fails to say the word 'sorry.'" Another user commented: "What's up with pro Palestinians and their desire to kill? This is Khymani James, a leader of Columbia University's anti-Israel Gaza Solidarity Encampment. Just sick?" Earlier this week James organized a human chain to block a group of what he said were Zionists from entering the protest camp, urging protesters to take "one step forward" in unison and "push them out of the camp."

I'm very much do not like the Daily Wire and do not support their politics, philosophy, or views.

I do think, however, it is worthwhile to share the video they have of Khymani James statements. If there was another source that could provide this video I would use that instead of the Daily Wire, but unfortunately that is not the case.

Warning for antisemitism, Holocaust Inversion, and more.

Edit: (if anyone knows how to post it so the video plays directly in tumblr please either let me know or reblog this with that addition because ppl are more likely to watch it on tumblr then click the link, thank you)