#this post is meant to support Palestnians without just adding to all the bullshit people are leveraging against Jewish people

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Please note there are articles from sites I was specifically told to look at as well because they're more reliable for Palestinian news due to not being connected to Hamas propaganda. I mean this as genuine information sharing from areas I'm hoping are reliable so I can support Palestinians properly as well without falling for antisemitic dogwhistles. I'm genuinely trying and I do mean all this in good faith. When I'm sharing things/talking about things criticising the government and the military and anyone else as individuals committing awful acts against Palestinians or supporting these things in other ways because of their own suffering, I do genuinely intend to just criticise that, not Israel even existing as a whole or Zionism's existence as though it is a monolith when it isn't, etc etc.

Israeli people are going through horrors right now too at the hands of the terrorist group Hamas and this is fucked up and needs to end, antisemitism is a huge problem that is only getting worse and impacting Jewish people around the world, way too many people in the pro-Palestine movement in Western countries are falling for antisemitic dogwhistles and then radicalising worse and worse against Jewish people as a whole while telling themselves and others it's about Palestine even while actively causing issue for things that would help Palestinians because their Jew-hatred has become more important and many of them likely never actually cared about bringing freedom to Palestinians, Zionism isn't inherently bad there are just extremist sections of it like there are with any ideology in the world that people then bad faith point to in an attempt to paint the entire thing as all the same thing going for the same goals when it isn't, antisemitic people then use Zionist interchangeably with 'Jew' to hide what they're actually calling for, Jewish people are native to the Levant and Israel as a country full of millions of people should not be destroyed with all those millions displaced nor should anyone aim to destroy it as part of seeking an end to the oppression that is going on (we don't even get calls for that in countries where settlers aren't historically native in any sense of the word so I don't see why challenging and fighting the radicalisation happening in Israel is expected to include that now as an end result; that's just radicalisation on the Western side of things which also needs to be challenged and fought. We cannot reach justice for Palestinians by enacting injustice on Jewish people any more than justice can be reached for Israeli people by enacting injustice on Palestinians.

With the wording of the article being what it is, I think/hope it's talking only about areas that are Palestinian land that have been taken over and held with cruelty and support from the soldiers, not Israel itself as a country, which is why I'm sharing it as well as the other sources that have been cleared as reliable rather than propaganda.

It also talks about Israeli social justice groups I'm hoping are the helpful ones because I don't remember seeing them on the shitlist and they're calling this out too.

I'm sharing these because we need reliable news reporting on this that isn't just propaganda kicked around by bad faith actors so Palestinians can be taken seriously in their fight for freedom from genuinely oppressive systems they're facing, rather than what too many people use to intentionally whip up antisemitism in people who couldn't care less what's actually happening because outrage is enough for them and Jews are the easy bogeyman to unleash that rage onto regardless of what's specifically happening to Palestinians by specific groups and how that system is upheld according to Israeli activists and even IDF members themselves.

But it does need to be talked about. So here are articles from the ABC but also Times of Israel and +972 Magazine. Please read my notes after as well.

I will finish by again saying PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE if you are a non-Jewish pro-Palestine activist reading this PLEASE understand this is the result of not just Hamas' horrific actions against Israeli civillians being utilised by the government and military to fuel the pain and rage of Israeli civillians against Palestine, but also OUR ACTIONS AGAINST JEWISH PEOPLE AS A WHOLE.

Do not take this post and turn it into another weapon against Jewish people. If you seriously need to be reminded this isn't a monolith situation, there are multiple mentions of Israeli groups standing against what is happening, and the only reason we have some of these articles at all is because of ex members of the IDF speaking out, including people at the commanding level!! Not to mention +972 itself is run by Israeli people. Israel as a whole is not the problem; the rampant radicalisation of people there is the problem.

BUT

If we are going to genuinely talk about that in actual good faith, we CANNOT be going around ignoring our part in that radicalisation. Jewish people around the world are TERRIFIED right now and understandably so. We are allowing antisemitism to sweep through the movement in huge waves that are only getting worse, even to the point of abandoning the people we profess to be fighting for in favour of just attacking Jewish people harder.

(On a positive note, the vaccinations have begun and Palestinians will be less at risk of facing a polio outbreak on top of everything else:)

This is not a simple situation in any sense of the word. There are atrocities happening all over and then bad faith actors are using those acts to push for annihilation of whichever group they want to point the angry mob at. If you want to criticise Israel on this topic, make sure you don't lounge complacently on criticising radicalisation in our own movement, among Westerners in general, in our schools and places of worship and workplaces and especially protests, or we are doing exactly the radicalisation we supposedly are criticising Israel for doing.

Every time we pull shit like what I've linked from my blog above, we push more Jewish people into the radicalisation we insist we're trying to stop. You have to understand that if we want the things in the above articles to end, we cannot be giving Jewish people more reason to believe we just want them dead. There are definitely way too many people who clearly do, who gleefully use actual points about radicalised behaviour among Jewish people to shut down Jewish callouts of antisemitism in our movement and beyond while also continuing to enact that antisemitism even harder, and it makes it nigh impossible to discuss occupation of and radicalisation against Palestinians as a result because many Jewish people are now so used to flinching away from the cudgel they've understandably come to expect from any form of criticism of Israel or attitude toward Palestinians from Westerners, because it's impossible for them to know if we're actually trying to address the actual issues or just picking up the same antisemitic club pretending to be activism again.

We have to move forward trying to incorporate all of this and remove the antisemitic behaviour in our movenent rather than constantly deny it if we are going to actually reach peace, healing, safety and freedom for everyone in Palestine and Israel.

"At the end of the day, this idea that we will be able to achieve stability and security and peace for Israelis while continuing the occupation and stepping on the throats of millions of Palestinians is just not going to work. There is always going to be another generation, there is always going to be another people who will not accept this. Occupation has never worked before in history and it's not going to work now. The only way we're going to have peace, stability and security is if both sides walk out of the room with rights and dignity."

- Yehuda Shaul, former Israeli Military Commander

(I think this is the best I can do for wording all this right now so I hope I handled it somewhat ok.

Again, I am not anti-Israel. I do not believe in destroying Israel and displacing the millions of people who have now lived there for generations any more than I can ignore the building information about areas of Palestinian land that are occupied and the atrocities that are being inflicted on Palestinians and the extremists existing who wish they could wipe them all out. They don't deserve the horrors being inflicted on them by members of the IDF and I also don't believe any Israeli deserves the horrors being inflicted on them by Hamas.

I'm genuinely meaning all this in good faith and trying to help everyone here and I never ever intend to pull more bigotry while fighting it elsewhere. I'm trying to learn information on all this and how to handle it delicately and effectively without causing more islamophobia or antisemitism.

This is an absolute minefield to navigate no matter how well meaning one is because there are so many facets and historical atrocities on both sides involved and that's before including the part the West played in all this to begin with and continues to play while acting like this is only Israel's or Palestine's problem and we somehow had nothing to do with it when we have like at least 70% to do with it because of our rampant antisemitism.

I'm still learning and figuring out how to effectively and with as minimal harm as possible communicate my learnings and thoughts as I go. Please be patient with me if you have any patience left to spare.)