Tell me how the one state solution is supposed to work with Palestinians who are taught to hate Jews from birth. Tell me why Israel should allow Hamas to live to attack them another day. Tell me why the world isn’t pressuring Hamas to return the hostages and lay down their arms.
It is supposed to "work" in the same way that every country has laws, and any Palestinians who commit crimes against other citizens would be punished by the Israeli legal system rather than having their neighborhood and neices and nephews bombed into rubble.
But that's the situation now, right? A political arrangement in which Hamas *doesn't* run their country and acts of terrorism are actually punishable in a real, legal sense by Israel rather than having the Israeli response turn them into martyrs seems better, to me.
"Republicans, absent a few libertarians, only love Israel now, out of a reverence for militarism or the evangelical desire to link Israel’s fate with Christendom"
No, actually, it's because they're democratic, free, and allow Arabs to live there with far more freedom than Arab countries give their own Jews. And because they're an outpost of pro-Western values in a region that hates them.
Yeah, I would certainly rather be a Palestinian than a citizen of the UAE or Qatar /s.
Seriously, the only Palestinians that ever had any autonomy in Israel were the ones that were lucky enough to not live in the West Bank or Gaza and were lucky enough to avoid the Nakba. And even then, it's still an apartheid state because they do not have the same rights as Jews. The main Western value they share with us is our (entirely undeserved) smug superiority complex and insistence that the rules don't apply to the rich and powerful. In fact, that is the one and only western value their is.
"Ethno-states and liberal democracies, in the long run, are not compatible"
Simply not true. They were perfectly compatible for decades, and in the Far East they still are. In fact, if the European liberal democracies were true democracies where the will of the electorates was respected (as in Japan), they would still be ethnostates.
Japan "works" because there's no significant racial minority. It's a bunch of islands with a very strict immigration policy. And Japanese democracy itself is rather stagnant and mediocre, as I wrote about here: https://rosselliotbarkan.com/p/japan-of-the-future
But Japan is slowly liberalizing immigration and it's plausible, in 50 years, someone who doesn't "look" Japanese will be prime minister. Unlike Israel, there won't be any real problem with this because Japanese democracy itself was not established, after WW2, on the premise of being "purely" Japanese.
You made the sweeping (incorrect) statement, not me. You didn't say "ethno-states and liberal democracies are not compatible when there are significant racial minorities." That is a much more qualified statement, and one that is at least possibly defensible.
Japan is slowly liberalizing immigration, yes, on a still very small scale, from certain places only, and in a way that is not even remotely comparable to what is happening in the West. As for what will be in a half-century, anything is "plausible."
I could be mistaken but Japan is not an ethno-state, it’s just racially homogenous. Are ethnic Japanese people enshrined in law versus citizens of other ethnicities?
It may not be a de jure one (I don't know for sure either though) but it is certainly a de facto one. Were it not they would be seeing immigration levels comparable to their peer countries in the developed world.
With that broad a definition you could describe the United States as an ethno-state for most of its history, perhaps even now. I don’t think that really gets at what most people mean by ethno-state, especially as it pertains to Israel.
A don't think it is a broad definition when you have a very racially and ethnically homogenous country that has for *centuries* aggressively defended that homogeneity with explicit government policies that continue to this day. They take essentially no refugees/asylum seekers. The US has let millions of people enter the country just since the Biden presidency began. I don't think there is any way to find that remotely comparable.
Read Nathan Thrall’s, The Only Language They Understand. Israel can be stopped, or at least slowed, by the United States. Historically, the only time Israel has ever backed down from their own River to the Sea dream is when we threaten to cut off their weapon supply. Their military dominance depends on us. We have hand but we don’t use if.
This administration has entered into, via soft money power and or hard force, 3 new war fronts, and ginning up for a fourth. The secy of defense is a Raytheon stooge board member. The MIC is in hog heaven.
Yet, like clockwork, we get how Trump is …. connected? … in this mess? … part of … his son in law might …
Huh?
The Biden administration is killing black and brown Muslims, and I keep hearing about Trump. The human mind is indeed malleable with the right programming.
Yeah, I can hardly wait for all the liberal Democrats to start yelling at me to vote for the guy enabling genocide in pursuit of a racially pure theocracy to *stop* fascism.
That’s a very good question - I don’t know. I suspect we will all find out.
If Trump gets a second term, it will be interesting if the Israel apologists suddenly have a problem with Trump - even if he sides with them. It seems no matter what he does, people go crazy.
What frustrates me is that I see many people believing two contradictory things:
1) Setting aside whether what Israel is doing is good or justified, the data is clear: Israel is a very wealthy and powerful country that does not need American financial support to survive. Maybe it did in 1950- but certainly not in 2024. FWIW- I happen to believe this.
2) The US, if it wanted to, could apply a relatively small amount of non-violent coercion to get Israel to change its behavior.
I think people believe #2 because that did in fact work with South Africa. But believing #2 is not compatible with believing #1. It’s true that the US is supplying aid to Israel, but that’s because the U.S. wants to do that- not because Israel needs it to survive. South Africa, albeit geographically large, was (and is) poor, and not strategically important. Domestic politics will likely prevent this from happening, but even if we did cut off the aid, or even implement BDS, I believe Israel’s response will be to tell us to “pound sand”. Life would get harder for Israel but they will survive. The world imposed harsh sanctions on Russia and it hasn’t made a dent in their behavior, and Israel has a much stronger economy than Russia has. Iran continues to terrify the gulf states so they will continue to support Israel, even if they have to be less overt about it.
To those of us who would like to see a different approach from Israel- I am not advocating that we give up. But we should be clear eyed as to what that is going to require and thoughtful about what kind of approach will be successful. I am very skeptical that coercion* is going to get us there, and instead we should be looking for ways to convince Israel itself to change its mind.
*meaning an amount of coercion that Americans would tolerate. Sure, we could march on Tel Aviv and do a regime change but I don’t think anyone thinks that is in the cards.
I think there is a kernel of truth in what you’re saying, but U.S. aid constitutes something like 15% of the Israeli defense budget. Would cutting that off be enough to force their hand? Maybe, maybe not. Though it’s impossible to know if we don’t even try to use it as leverage.
To be clear- I am totally okay with cutting off the aid. But to answer your question- I think what ends up happening is Israel switches from expensive precision munitions to cheaper “dumb” munitions, which could mean more Palestinian death and misery, not less.
And maybe the answer to that is- well, that’s unfortunate but at least we won’t be complicit any more. And maybe that’s the best we can do? I’m torn and I don’t know what the right answer is- but I’d like to see more thinking on these lines - so how does this play out if Israel doesn’t immediately fold due to some pressure?
I'm sorry, but this is just factually wrong.. Russia is the world's largest country with vast natural resources and the 5th largest GDP PPP, with literally decades of experience being embargoed by the West. Israel is a tiny country on the outskirts of a desert with the 49th largest GDP (PPP). Those are 2022 numbers, Russia has improved since their war started, and Israel's economy has shrunk by 20% since theirs has. If the all-time single largest recipient of money from AIPAC decided that Genocide was a bridge too far, or that his unconditional backing of it was almost sure to hand Trump the presidency again and did actually cut off military aid to Israel, the war would be over within a week. But don't worry, Biden cares infinitely more about being able to murder innocent brown people than he does about a Trump 2nd Term.
The solution is the majority of Americans who support a ceasefire making aid to Israel an election issue in Congress. Nothing will change with the executive branch because there is a clear continuity in foreign policy and immigration policy between Trump and Biden. But it's Congress that passes budgets, and we need to make the connection clear between military aid to foreign states, and military spending generally, to our lack of domestic social provisions and failing infrastructure in the United States.
Military aid to foreign states is (while large in raw numbers) a comparatively tiny part of the budget. But I agree drawing a line from our outsized military budget to underfunded infrastructure and other areas of domestic spending could potentially be a useful rhetorical tool.
Contra Ross, I do believe there are good answers. It just requires the U.S., having demonstrated that it's willing to support Israel to the hilt when it deserves support, to now apply the pressure necessary to force Israel to withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza and leading an international peacekeeping force guaranteeing a demilitarized Palestinian state.
The USA did invade Canada during the War of 1812, and burned down Toronto. Also entered around Naigra Falls. Lots of historical markers in southern Ontario along Lake Erie about this historical event.
Much like many of the family members of those killed on 10/7, I would be devastated, but even more enraged at other people using them as an excuse to go on a genocidal rampage to avenge them. And we were determined to go on a genocidal rampage against natives, no matter what. https://youtu.be/A5P6vJs1jmY?si=GC7XkNqDwLEUWqWG This is exactly how most Israelis feel about Palestinians.
I was similarly enraged about our response to 9/11.
29,000 people dying in Gaza is tragic but it's not ethnic cleansing. Israel could kill everyone in Gaza but chooses not to. If Hamas had a bomb, there'd be no Israel. Finally, it's a war Hamas started and it's a war they've promised to continued. A cease-fire only allows Hamas to retrench and do this again. Perhaps you can understand why Israel would not be okay with that. If you can't understand why Israel feels the need to eliminate its sworn enemy, it sounds like a blind spot on your part, not Israel's.
Have you really not considered that their hating Israeli's has a lot more to do with who is murdering them and stealing their land than what religion they practice? White supremacist's really managed to achieve everything they wanted by getting Jews and Muslims to kill as many of each other as possible.
You may want to read more history than one cherry picked article to make your point. Judaism is 5800 years old. World’s first monotheistic religion. You think it started in Norway? Or with Zionists in the early 1900s? Google how many Jews are left in Iran, Iraq, Morocco, Syria etc if you want to see real ethnic cleansing. In the meantime, maybe have some sympathy for .02% of the world’s population who want to live in peace without being attacked by their Muslim neighbors.
I have infinite sympathy for Jews, including one of my grandparents. They are going to be the ones who suffer from the massive increase in antisemitism caused by the world watching Israel brazenly commit genocide.
I have nothing but contempt for the genocidal project that is Zionism. Did you even read the article? He admits that antisemitism was widespread in Europe, but Islamic cultures were generally (not always) more accommodating. What changed the dynamic was Zionism. The creation of Israel increased tensions, and realizing their demographic imperative, Zionists found ways to incite violence that resulted in the expelling of many Jews. There is a lot more evidence for that interpretation than innate antisemitism.
You want to live in peace with your Muslim neighbors? Thats news. I would think forcing a population to live in a concentration camp for decades or be subject to settlers who can murder and arrest them at a whim while slowly stealing their houses would be the opposite of wanting to live in peace. It's also kind of hard to claim that when 2/3rds of the country is cheering on the starving and bombing of innocent children, https://mondoweiss.net/2024/02/over-2-3-of-jewish-israelis-oppose-humanitarian-aid-to-palestinians-starving-in-gaza/
Tell me how the one state solution is supposed to work with Palestinians who are taught to hate Jews from birth. Tell me why Israel should allow Hamas to live to attack them another day. Tell me why the world isn’t pressuring Hamas to return the hostages and lay down their arms.
It is supposed to "work" in the same way that every country has laws, and any Palestinians who commit crimes against other citizens would be punished by the Israeli legal system rather than having their neighborhood and neices and nephews bombed into rubble.
It’s hard to punish your terrorists when they run the country.
But that's the situation now, right? A political arrangement in which Hamas *doesn't* run their country and acts of terrorism are actually punishable in a real, legal sense by Israel rather than having the Israeli response turn them into martyrs seems better, to me.
What do you believe Jews are taught to feel about Palestinians from birth?
Not even a comparison. But you wouldn’t know that because you have no clue about the differences between Palestinians and Israelis.
"Republicans, absent a few libertarians, only love Israel now, out of a reverence for militarism or the evangelical desire to link Israel’s fate with Christendom"
No, actually, it's because they're democratic, free, and allow Arabs to live there with far more freedom than Arab countries give their own Jews. And because they're an outpost of pro-Western values in a region that hates them.
Yeah, I would certainly rather be a Palestinian than a citizen of the UAE or Qatar /s.
Seriously, the only Palestinians that ever had any autonomy in Israel were the ones that were lucky enough to not live in the West Bank or Gaza and were lucky enough to avoid the Nakba. And even then, it's still an apartheid state because they do not have the same rights as Jews. The main Western value they share with us is our (entirely undeserved) smug superiority complex and insistence that the rules don't apply to the rich and powerful. In fact, that is the one and only western value their is.
"Ethno-states and liberal democracies, in the long run, are not compatible"
Simply not true. They were perfectly compatible for decades, and in the Far East they still are. In fact, if the European liberal democracies were true democracies where the will of the electorates was respected (as in Japan), they would still be ethnostates.
Japan "works" because there's no significant racial minority. It's a bunch of islands with a very strict immigration policy. And Japanese democracy itself is rather stagnant and mediocre, as I wrote about here: https://rosselliotbarkan.com/p/japan-of-the-future
But Japan is slowly liberalizing immigration and it's plausible, in 50 years, someone who doesn't "look" Japanese will be prime minister. Unlike Israel, there won't be any real problem with this because Japanese democracy itself was not established, after WW2, on the premise of being "purely" Japanese.
You made the sweeping (incorrect) statement, not me. You didn't say "ethno-states and liberal democracies are not compatible when there are significant racial minorities." That is a much more qualified statement, and one that is at least possibly defensible.
Japan is slowly liberalizing immigration, yes, on a still very small scale, from certain places only, and in a way that is not even remotely comparable to what is happening in the West. As for what will be in a half-century, anything is "plausible."
I could be mistaken but Japan is not an ethno-state, it’s just racially homogenous. Are ethnic Japanese people enshrined in law versus citizens of other ethnicities?
It may not be a de jure one (I don't know for sure either though) but it is certainly a de facto one. Were it not they would be seeing immigration levels comparable to their peer countries in the developed world.
With that broad a definition you could describe the United States as an ethno-state for most of its history, perhaps even now. I don’t think that really gets at what most people mean by ethno-state, especially as it pertains to Israel.
A don't think it is a broad definition when you have a very racially and ethnically homogenous country that has for *centuries* aggressively defended that homogeneity with explicit government policies that continue to this day. They take essentially no refugees/asylum seekers. The US has let millions of people enter the country just since the Biden presidency began. I don't think there is any way to find that remotely comparable.
Read Nathan Thrall’s, The Only Language They Understand. Israel can be stopped, or at least slowed, by the United States. Historically, the only time Israel has ever backed down from their own River to the Sea dream is when we threaten to cut off their weapon supply. Their military dominance depends on us. We have hand but we don’t use if.
This administration has entered into, via soft money power and or hard force, 3 new war fronts, and ginning up for a fourth. The secy of defense is a Raytheon stooge board member. The MIC is in hog heaven.
Yet, like clockwork, we get how Trump is …. connected? … in this mess? … part of … his son in law might …
Huh?
The Biden administration is killing black and brown Muslims, and I keep hearing about Trump. The human mind is indeed malleable with the right programming.
Trump and Netanyahu are political allies. One of Trump’s first major foreign policy decisions was to move the American embassy to Jerusalem.
Yes. Years ago.
Gazacaust is happening now and Trump has had nothing to do with it and isn’t the president.
So do you think a potential second Trump administration’s policy towards the ongoing ethnic cleansing will be better than Biden’s?
Yeah, I can hardly wait for all the liberal Democrats to start yelling at me to vote for the guy enabling genocide in pursuit of a racially pure theocracy to *stop* fascism.
That’s a very good question - I don’t know. I suspect we will all find out.
If Trump gets a second term, it will be interesting if the Israel apologists suddenly have a problem with Trump - even if he sides with them. It seems no matter what he does, people go crazy.
I do know—it won’t be
What frustrates me is that I see many people believing two contradictory things:
1) Setting aside whether what Israel is doing is good or justified, the data is clear: Israel is a very wealthy and powerful country that does not need American financial support to survive. Maybe it did in 1950- but certainly not in 2024. FWIW- I happen to believe this.
2) The US, if it wanted to, could apply a relatively small amount of non-violent coercion to get Israel to change its behavior.
I think people believe #2 because that did in fact work with South Africa. But believing #2 is not compatible with believing #1. It’s true that the US is supplying aid to Israel, but that’s because the U.S. wants to do that- not because Israel needs it to survive. South Africa, albeit geographically large, was (and is) poor, and not strategically important. Domestic politics will likely prevent this from happening, but even if we did cut off the aid, or even implement BDS, I believe Israel’s response will be to tell us to “pound sand”. Life would get harder for Israel but they will survive. The world imposed harsh sanctions on Russia and it hasn’t made a dent in their behavior, and Israel has a much stronger economy than Russia has. Iran continues to terrify the gulf states so they will continue to support Israel, even if they have to be less overt about it.
To those of us who would like to see a different approach from Israel- I am not advocating that we give up. But we should be clear eyed as to what that is going to require and thoughtful about what kind of approach will be successful. I am very skeptical that coercion* is going to get us there, and instead we should be looking for ways to convince Israel itself to change its mind.
*meaning an amount of coercion that Americans would tolerate. Sure, we could march on Tel Aviv and do a regime change but I don’t think anyone thinks that is in the cards.
I think there is a kernel of truth in what you’re saying, but U.S. aid constitutes something like 15% of the Israeli defense budget. Would cutting that off be enough to force their hand? Maybe, maybe not. Though it’s impossible to know if we don’t even try to use it as leverage.
To be clear- I am totally okay with cutting off the aid. But to answer your question- I think what ends up happening is Israel switches from expensive precision munitions to cheaper “dumb” munitions, which could mean more Palestinian death and misery, not less.
And maybe the answer to that is- well, that’s unfortunate but at least we won’t be complicit any more. And maybe that’s the best we can do? I’m torn and I don’t know what the right answer is- but I’d like to see more thinking on these lines - so how does this play out if Israel doesn’t immediately fold due to some pressure?
I agree it’s a fair and necessary question to consider. The idea that Israel will just “stop” is not grounded in reality.
I'm sorry, but this is just factually wrong.. Russia is the world's largest country with vast natural resources and the 5th largest GDP PPP, with literally decades of experience being embargoed by the West. Israel is a tiny country on the outskirts of a desert with the 49th largest GDP (PPP). Those are 2022 numbers, Russia has improved since their war started, and Israel's economy has shrunk by 20% since theirs has. If the all-time single largest recipient of money from AIPAC decided that Genocide was a bridge too far, or that his unconditional backing of it was almost sure to hand Trump the presidency again and did actually cut off military aid to Israel, the war would be over within a week. But don't worry, Biden cares infinitely more about being able to murder innocent brown people than he does about a Trump 2nd Term.
The solution is the majority of Americans who support a ceasefire making aid to Israel an election issue in Congress. Nothing will change with the executive branch because there is a clear continuity in foreign policy and immigration policy between Trump and Biden. But it's Congress that passes budgets, and we need to make the connection clear between military aid to foreign states, and military spending generally, to our lack of domestic social provisions and failing infrastructure in the United States.
Military aid to foreign states is (while large in raw numbers) a comparatively tiny part of the budget. But I agree drawing a line from our outsized military budget to underfunded infrastructure and other areas of domestic spending could potentially be a useful rhetorical tool.
Contra Ross, I do believe there are good answers. It just requires the U.S., having demonstrated that it's willing to support Israel to the hilt when it deserves support, to now apply the pressure necessary to force Israel to withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza and leading an international peacekeeping force guaranteeing a demilitarized Palestinian state.
https://gordonstrause.substack.com/p/israel-and-the-palestinians
I get the difficulty of that lift politically. But the answer is clear.
It's my belief that the Palestinians will be removed and Gaza become part of territorial Israel populated by Israelis
Where are all those now mythical International Peace Keeping Forces? What hope we all had way way back then.....when we were young....
The USA did invade Canada during the War of 1812, and burned down Toronto. Also entered around Naigra Falls. Lots of historical markers in southern Ontario along Lake Erie about this historical event.
It is all quite surreal now...
Much like many of the family members of those killed on 10/7, I would be devastated, but even more enraged at other people using them as an excuse to go on a genocidal rampage to avenge them. And we were determined to go on a genocidal rampage against natives, no matter what. https://youtu.be/A5P6vJs1jmY?si=GC7XkNqDwLEUWqWG This is exactly how most Israelis feel about Palestinians.
I was similarly enraged about our response to 9/11.
29,000 people dying in Gaza is tragic but it's not ethnic cleansing. Israel could kill everyone in Gaza but chooses not to. If Hamas had a bomb, there'd be no Israel. Finally, it's a war Hamas started and it's a war they've promised to continued. A cease-fire only allows Hamas to retrench and do this again. Perhaps you can understand why Israel would not be okay with that. If you can't understand why Israel feels the need to eliminate its sworn enemy, it sounds like a blind spot on your part, not Israel's.
The “sworn enemy” that Israel openly supported as a way to undermine more widely appealing brands of Palestinian nationalism
Have you really not considered that their hating Israeli's has a lot more to do with who is murdering them and stealing their land than what religion they practice? White supremacist's really managed to achieve everything they wanted by getting Jews and Muslims to kill as many of each other as possible.
Jews have always been on that land. And, if you recall, were “ethnically cleansed” from every country in the Middle East.
No, they weren't. Zionists were behind that. https://www.currentaffairs.org/2023/09/the-history-of-arab-jews-can-change-our-understanding-of-the-world
You may want to read more history than one cherry picked article to make your point. Judaism is 5800 years old. World’s first monotheistic religion. You think it started in Norway? Or with Zionists in the early 1900s? Google how many Jews are left in Iran, Iraq, Morocco, Syria etc if you want to see real ethnic cleansing. In the meantime, maybe have some sympathy for .02% of the world’s population who want to live in peace without being attacked by their Muslim neighbors.
I have infinite sympathy for Jews, including one of my grandparents. They are going to be the ones who suffer from the massive increase in antisemitism caused by the world watching Israel brazenly commit genocide.
https://yasha.substack.com/p/in-the-name-of-all-jews
I have nothing but contempt for the genocidal project that is Zionism. Did you even read the article? He admits that antisemitism was widespread in Europe, but Islamic cultures were generally (not always) more accommodating. What changed the dynamic was Zionism. The creation of Israel increased tensions, and realizing their demographic imperative, Zionists found ways to incite violence that resulted in the expelling of many Jews. There is a lot more evidence for that interpretation than innate antisemitism.
You want to live in peace with your Muslim neighbors? Thats news. I would think forcing a population to live in a concentration camp for decades or be subject to settlers who can murder and arrest them at a whim while slowly stealing their houses would be the opposite of wanting to live in peace. It's also kind of hard to claim that when 2/3rds of the country is cheering on the starving and bombing of innocent children, https://mondoweiss.net/2024/02/over-2-3-of-jewish-israelis-oppose-humanitarian-aid-to-palestinians-starving-in-gaza/