Israel / Palestine

Yes true, I do agree with that 100% - but (and I may be showing my ignorance here) I didn't think that it would be fair to say that all conflict between Israel and Palestine is around the settlements.

No, but tacitly enabling the settlements makes it pretty hard for moderate voices in Palestine to stand up against the extremists

The Hamas attack that killed 1300 people was awful yes? Should be condemned, those responsible should be brought to justice etc. In the last 10 days Israel has now killed 3000+ Palestinians and flattened half of Gaza city. That's ignoring the amount of injured and displaced and the ground campaign hasn't even started yet.

Yes true - as I say, I agree that they should stop (or rather have not started, but obviously we can't turn back the clock)

The Hamas attack that killed 1300 people was awful yes?

Is that a question?

Hamas are also consistently firing rockets (much less successfully, I grant you) at civilian targets in Israeli cities.

Perhaps if Israel had stopped at 1300, that would make you happy.

You mean if they did the same thing then your statement of them being as bad as each other would be correct? Then yes, but it's not and they're not.

"much less successfully, I grant you" yeah because they're literally home made
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qassam_rocket
Israel has F35s
They're not the same.

The way you wrote it reads to me as:
'The Hamas attack that killed 1300 people was awful was it? Should be condemned, those responsible should be brought to justice etc, blah blah blah'

I'm sorry that reading appears to be hard for you

nothing controversial.

Depending on perspective, of course.

Arguably:

Israel has suffered a terrorist attack and has a right to defend itself

Because, surely, so does Palestine.

But whereas Palestine's (rather the military wings of Hamas's) defence (both current and previous) was abhorrent and unconscionable, and to be condemned, Israel's (the government / IDF) past and ongoing illegal occupations, settlement, extra-judicial killings, airstrikes etc... are, at the government level, de facto tolerated.

You can actively stop the settlements and remove them — they already have in Gaza previously. However, the Israeli government (and large % of its people, half support West Bank annexation acc to Reuters as of this year) have continued to support and build infastructure to support settlements in the West Bank. There are litteral Israeli only highways that litter the West Bank!

You and others in this thread seem to very quickly brush off the ongoing colonial project that is the Israeli state with ease. This past year plus has been the most violent period (towards palestinians) in the West Bank since the early 2000s with near daily raids in cities like Jenin and Nablus —which itself was under siege for weeks just a few months ago. The recent action out of gaza is directly linked to this, yet it recieved little coverage and attention by western governments and media outlets (or this forum!).

Don't mind Hamas, most of their rockets are home made, they just shout loudly.

They also have guidance systems, factories, and larger rockets with larger range.
Every rocket used against civilian targets (due to not being able to target any specific military target) is considered a war crime / violation of international law.

Sure Israel has F35s. They are hugely expensive, and generally very accurate and precise.
It would be a lot cheaper for Israel to use heavy artillery but that would also be a war crime.
That said, the Israeli settlements are also considered a war crime.

When this all ends, who knows what the war crime score card will say...

You and others in this thread seem to very quickly brush off the ongoing colonial project that is the Israeli state with ease.

I don't think so, although I guess that depends what you mean - do I believe the Israeli state has a right to exist and to defend itself? Yes. Do I agree they are also doing things which are absolutely unconscionable? Also yes.

I'm probably coming across as pro Israel because I genuinely think the position is difficult and find the "it's all just Israel being an oppressor" narrative overly simplistic. Yes, Israel has done lots of bad stuff, and I'm not forgiving what it has done, but there seems to be zero understanding from some on this thread of the history of persecution of Jews and the threat posed by Hamas (who don't accept Israel's legitimacy at all, and do want Israel to cease to exist).

They're both shitty groups of people, with shitty ideas doing shitty things that mainly impact not shitty, innocent people caught in-between, trying to tot up and argue over who's worst is pointless.

Thank you. This is descending into the same well worn facts being thrown back and forth with nothing new being learned. We have twitter for that.

Not sure whether to post here or epic WTF, but did Biden really just describe Hamas as ‘the other team’? Pretty sure that’s what he said, lunchtime news on raido4

Biden gives me worn out Ted Lasso vibes.

I dread to think how Trump would be doing things right now...

I dread to think how Trump would be doing things right now...

Trump was considered by the majority of Israel media and govt to be a "friend of Israel", I can only begin to imagine how that would've manifested in reality... and it's not good.

Biden and the Democrats never earned the "friend of Israel" status, and to be fairly clear you either have that status (assumption of you fully backing whatever the hell Israel does) or you don't... it's very binary this whole "friend of" thing.

Trump ok'd the move of the us embassy to Jerusalem. This brought things to a head.

I thought Biden's speech was pretty good.

Also humanitarian assistance allowed via Egypt.

Congratulations, quite possibly the most pretentious, reductionist summing up yet!

He's not wrong though.

Not sure about the pretentiousness, but yeah it's pretty reductionist as I wasn't trying to sum up everything, that's pretty much impossible, but just point out that playing the"who's the worst" game isn't useful and is filling up this thread with petty arguements between people that broadly agree.

pretentious

This is quite a generalisation for such a nuanced conflict (isn't any conflict though?). Read their revised 2017 charter or any interviews before Oct 7 - they say their beef is with Zionists/Zionism only. Expelling "all non-Muslims" isn't remotely true; Christian Palestinians have lived with and suffered the same consequences as their Muslim counterparts since the beginning, even in the West Bank. Palestinian politicians will talk about how they fought together (along with other, non-Zionist Jewish communities) in past episodes of history too.

On the issue of liberation, some Hamas officials have have even expressed plausibility to a return to the 1967 borders or some kind of two-state solution. It's definitely not their preferred outcome (and why would it be?).

Impossible to consider Hamas outside the wider theo-political context...

https://carnegie-mec.org/2018/07/11/flexible-resistance-how-hezbollah-and-hamas-are-mending-ties-pub-76782