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I can never forget the anecdote about the Israeli policeman/soldier making an old man kiss a donkey’s ass in front of the old man’s grandkid. the naked cruelty and sadistic humiliation
Ever since the unofficial IDF t-shirt design linked of a cross hair over a pregnant women with the words “one shot two kills” I’ve pretty much been at the “these people deserve everything that’s coming and more” stage
I agree, but I also hope that Hamas does not lose discipline and turn this into slaughter for slaughter’s sake. Either way, the worst is probably yet to come.
War is hell, and civilians suffer in every armed conflict. It is preferable to avoid civilian causalities, but that’s often not how it goes at all. After generations of ruthless oppression you’re going to end up with profound dehumanization of your oppressors. And even if deliberate effort is made to avoid civilian casualties every bullet has to land somewhere.
The civilian status of Israeli settlers is ambiguous as they are directly and proactively involved in the process of genocide. idk if they can be considered combatants per se, but they’re definitely in a different category than civilians living peaceably within their own borders. Israeli settlements are a deliberately act of political violence with the express and very conscious intention of displacing and dispossessing Palestinians. They are illegal under international law and by most definitions constitute genocide. The Israeli government has for decades actively pursued a policy of placing Mizrahi on the frontier as a buffer between the Ashkenazi core and the Palestinian territories. And for the most part settlers are ideologically motivated, enthusiastically enacting the goals of Zionism to create a theocratic Israeli ethnostate. Many of them are religious extremists and fascists.
I would prefer that if Hamas is going to take captives they focus on able bodied people of fighting age, but obviously I’m not calling shots on the ground and I will not judge their decisions from the safety of my chair.
Yeah I agree on the moral point. I was more trying to say that I hope Hamas have clear political and military objectives and that its troops stick to achieving those objectives and not giving in to the temptation to get revenge.
I agree with that. I strongly oppose acting for revenge. Even from a strictly utilitarian perspective it’s rarely productive. as previous, I’m not in a position to judge people who do, but I would hope they choose not to.
Yes it’s self defence, but individual soldiers who commit atrocities should face disciplinary action for it. After the fighting cools Hamas should conduct internal reviews of incidents to investigate dispassionately. Those found to have behaved inappropriately should face consequences, such as losing out on being awarded certain medals, or in extreme cases even face dishonorable discharge.
Personally I’d hope they consider a standard more humane than the model that the US, Israel and their allies apply; counting every military aged male or dead child found with a rock by their hand as a combatant seems insane to me. Ultimately though that is for them to decide.
That’s wishful thinking IMO. Is there any reason to believe that Hamas of all organizations has a more humane code of conduct than most other militaries on the planet? They’re literal islamists, I don’t really see how you expect them to behave like anything other than that.
I’m trying to be very careful in how I say this, and I’m not trying to be a debate bro.
I find it triggering to say ALL violence is self-defense. There is no defense for sexual violence.
I can understand killing oppressors and even kidnapping families to gain leverage, but there is no situation that calls for rape and no excuse for it.
I understand that members of the IDF and US military are guilty of this too, and they deserve death.
I understand that you didn’t want to have a bunch of caveats in a blanket statement. I also know this is nothing unique to this conflict and happens in every war, I just think that’s the one area where our support can be critical.
Horrible things happen when settlers try to genocide millions of human beings to steal their land. Every sort of violence, sexual included, is a guarantee. That is what war is. There is no clean war.
That will go both ways, but only one side has the power to put a stop to this brutal status quo. The settlers have to end the genocide, and the war will stop.
I agree that Israel is the one who has the power to stop the war and genocide.
I do not agree that rape is self defense nor is it necessary for revolution. Are you planning on raping the capitalists if we see a revolution in our lifetime? If not, then I’m sure you can understand that it’s possible not to.
I am going to disengage from this conversation.
Any revolutionary should act as human as the circumstances allow, that’s a reasonable moral standard.
But these acts don’t delegitimize the Palestinian cause whatsoever, they are just a sad reality of war.
No, rape is never justified, even in war. However, ugly acts of vengeance are inevitable when the oppressed find themselves with captive members of the oppressor class. They may be unarmed civilians, but they were partying within walking distance of the Gaza border so they were direct beneficiaries of the oppression.
Abducting kids is not okay, hitting them is not okay, sexual violence is not okay, targeting tourists at a rave is not okay.
Taking hostages is fine, and wtf are you supposed to do if you take parents hostage? Just leave the children there in the middle of a war zone alone?
No reason to hit prisoners if they are cooperative. Agreed, sexual violence is never permissible under any circumstances. Attacking Israeli adults is fine, they are settlers and on stolen land economically supporting an apartheid state
Taking hostages is fine, and wtf are you supposed to do if you take parents hostage? Just leave the children there in the middle of a war zone alone?
Israel is small. You can leave the children and the videos of the kids show that the children are not protected, they are hit with sticks and batons and insulted as Jews. Besides that, yes. Those kids are not Tsarist kids. Save your gray propaganda for good goals. You can also find a video in which parents are killed and a child is taken. Or children that are killed. For the outcry that a targeted and thus killed journalist by IDF forces took this ignores that there is a strategic level of Hamas which obviously encouraged what happens, as it is wide spread and communicated via established Hamas video channels and thus shown, it also got an individual vengeance and revenge component.
The actions of Hamas do show their regressive reactionary nature and that the solidarity for socialist groups in Israel is not existent within them. What we know now, too, is also that it doesn’t seem to have been a unified operation, meaning that the PFLP and other Marxist groups within Gaza are not really having impact on the strategic operations or are shut out completely.
This means that critical solidarity ought to be critical. If you do a large incursion like that you really argue that shooting young ravers and killing some after taking them hostage, is the best use of your short lived incursion? In any case I have yet to have seen text based Marxist reasoning which isn’t vibes based or goes beyond “national liberation justifies any violence”.
What is the aim here is to say any person - which includes plenty of Israeli Arabs (at least 20% of the population), also some who were at the rave - outside of Gaza and West Jordan is a legitimate aim to be killed, tortured, (sexually) assaulted, kidnapped. The terror of the guillotine and the committee for hygiene was more targeted and more in line with progressive politics than that. The “no excuse for the terror” doesn’t mean it is arbitrary terror, it is focused on revolutionary goals. They also could’ve had Marxist and pre Marxist reasoning. The operation in Palestina and Israel was not one of national liberation with a class based analysis, but one in which there are people assigned as oppressing colonialists (everyone at the rave i.e. who wasn’t coming from Gaza).
The goal of course is to weaken Israel’s tourism industry, to unify power within Gaza, to divide Israel and Saudi Arabia and have hostages to do prisoner swaps. Though it is somewhat unlikely that this nearly 60 year old practice will work as before with the current right wing government in Israel and the lack of current good will. It did strengthen unity in Israel.
Palestinians fighting for their survival are not reactionary or fascist, and I think you are being chauvinist
Palestinians fighting for their survival are not reactionary
If you think that then you aren’t a Marxist. Of course within Gazan society and Hamas you have reactionaries and reactionary actions. Are all? No. Plenty of groups that are or were active in Gaza aren’t reactionary. Read Marx’s https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/18th-brumaire/
If you think that then you aren’t a Marxist.
what the fuck are you talking about? The primary contradiction is imperialism. If you think those resisting genocide are fascists then YOU aren’t a marxist. Such chauvinism. The fact that some are socially reactionary is immaterial to them being on the objectively correct side of an anti-colonial and anti-imperialist struggle. Failure to support them is tantamount to class treason
If you think those resisting genocide are fascists
Don’t try black propaganda here, not in any way did I claim that. You are ignoring the structures of Gazan orgs and society, you are talking without investigating and you are disturbing. I recommend you disengage.
Tourists shouldn’t have voluntarily given their money to state that’s been doing genocide openly for decades.
This is a stance that would mean that any person buying US/UK/French/Iranian/Turkish/South Korean/Philipine/Maroccon/Brazilian/Mexican products deserves to die.
It is a moralistic idealist claim, not a Marxist one.
purchasing a US made product in a store, say if its the cheapest option for example, is completely incomparable to booking a flight, reserving a place to stay, and going to travel to and financially support a genocidal state and the settlers living under it…
Targeting tourists at a rave on stolen land next to an open air prison that holds the rightful stewards of that land is ok
It makes me sad that they killed people at a concert and it reminds me of two things.
1 - Hamas are bad guys that i only like because theyre rescuing their people from oppression.
2 - Ill never go to Isreal even if i win the lottery so its not my problem to stress myself out over.
i makes me sad that people would go to a fucking concert next to a concentration camp
Is there any evidence that Hamas have been committing sexual violence? I’ve been reading about this all day but haven’t seen literally anything.
If they’ve done that, sure, fuck them, but all ive seen is racist libs trying to attribute it to them based on videos they refuse to share.
Is there any evidence that Hamas have been committing sexual violence?
I’d say it’s basically guaranteed it happened, like in every war. The real question is whether it’s sanctioned or condoned by the higher ups or not, that I can’t answer.
I admit I haven’t watched any of the videos so I am going off of how people have described them.
My husband has been watching the videos, he said they were parading around a German tourist’s naked dead body.
And I’ve read in multiple places of a woman being thrown in a jeep with blood in the back of her pants.
I’m have been taking these at face value, but thank you for the reminder that we live in a new age of disinformation. I hope that the videos are fake.
EDIT: This Daily Mail article has screenshots of the two videos I referenced although the most graphic one is blurred. Not a reliable source, but evidence that these videos do exist and more legit news organizations are still doing more due diligence to verify their authenticity.
I think it is unlikely that a video was faked that happens to have the distinctive tattoos and hairstyle of a woman who was known to be in Israel at the time.
Is there any evidence that Hamas have been committing sexual violence?
Yes. Even inside of Gaza i.e. against some people deemed gay, some “traitors”. Within torture it is mostly not complementary with sexual violence. So within this conflict there will be some cases, the question will be if it is widespread policy (unlikely), if it is “lack of oversight+patriarchy+spaces without law+antisemitism”, etc.
However in any case the limit for certain types of violence and certain targets of violence is important. During the last day we did see that plenty on this site aren’t really differentiating or equating everyone in Israel as guilty and therefore fine to be killed (without making clear if they mean targeted, or as collateral damage i.e. car bombings that kill civilians in front of military bases).
The line of the ANC’s MK was different in that regard that not all violence and all targets were seen as acceptable or justified. So the site’s line is more regressive than feminist Marxists ought to be.
*Edit: Hamas did shit the bed in this operation. *
I know a guy with a Hebrew text tattoo at BJJ. That’s going to be a weird moment if he brings this up. Is there any way to navigate the issue without inspiring anger like Jeremy Corbyn?
All oppressed people have the right to violence - Lizzy Borden
Don’t tell that to US media 💀
The Israelis have the power to end the political and economic conditions (which they created and maintain) which lead to violence
The Palestinians do not
If you’re saddened or angered by the deaths of Israeli civilians, you can take those complaints straight to the Israeli government. Any handwringing about violence committed by the Palestinians is de facto support for the illegal occupation of Palestinian land and the apartheid state of Israel.
One of the most standout moments from the pod ever was when Felix went on a rant (and showed emotion for once) where he talked about how Netanyahu wants the Jewish diaspora to experience antisemtism and be afraid for their lives because it serves his agenda for that to be the case.
Libs on reddit and the MSM calling this an “intelligence failure” are out of their minds. Mossad allowed for this to happen to drum up fear and jingoism and justify horrific reprisals against the Palestinian people.
GAZA FUCKING STARTED THIS. WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT
With the establishment of a relationship of oppression, violence has already begun. Never in history has violence been initiated by the oppressed. How could they be the initiators, if they themselves are the result of violence? How could they be the sponsors of something objective whose objective inauguration called forth their existence as oppressed? There would be no oppressed had there been no prior of violence to establish their subjugation.
And it is clear that in the colonial countries the peasants alone are revolutionary, for they have nothing to lose and everything to gain. The starving peasant, outside the class system is the first among the exploited to discover that only violence pays. For him there is no compromise, no possible coming to terms; colonization and decolonization a simply a question of relative strength.
Get this into your head: if violence were only a thing of the future, if exploitation and oppression never existed on earth, perhaps displays of nonviolence might relieve the conflict. But if the entire regime, even your nonviolent thoughts, is governed by a thousand-year old oppression, your passiveness serves no other purpose but to put you on the side of the oppressors.
And fuck off, smooth brained westerners like you think events are all just discrete occurrences with no connections to decades of past actions. Yeah the history of this conflict began this morning jfc.
We need some sort of equivalent of the “too small” taunt for when libs come in here spout off their moronic takes. Like “too smooth” of a brain or something.
This is an account of things from the mid-1980s:
"As with the Holocaust, I tried to remember my very first encounter with the occupation. One of my earliest encounters involved a group of Israeli soldiers, an old Palestinian man, and his donkey.
Standing on a street with some Palestinian friends, I noticed an elderly Palestinian walking down the street, leading his donkey. A small child no more than three or four years old, clearly his grandson, was with him.
Some Israeli soldiers standing nearby went up to the old man and stopped him. One soldier ambled over to the donkey and pried open its mouth. “Old man,” he asked, “why are your donkey’s teeth so yellow? Why aren’t they white? Don’t you brush your donkey’s teeth?”
The old Palestinian was mortified, the little boy visibly upset. The soldier repeated his question, yelling this time, while the other soldiers laughed. The child began to cry and the old man just stood there silently, humiliated. This scene repeated itself while a crowd gathered. The soldier then ordered the old man to stand behind the donkey and demanded that he kiss the animal’s behind.
At first, the old man refused but as the soldier screamed at him and his grandson became hysterical, he bent down and did it. The soldiers laughed and walked away. They had achieved their goal: to humiliate him and those around him.
We all stood there in silence, ashamed to look at each other, hearing nothing but the uncontrollable sobs of the little boy. The old man did not move for what seemed a very long time. He just stood there, demeaned and destroyed.
I stood there too, in stunned disbelief. I immediately thought of the stories my parents had told me of how Jews had been treated by the Nazis in the 1930s, before the ghettos and death camps, of how Jews would be forced to clean sidewalks with toothbrushes and have their beards cut off in public.
What happened to the old man was absolutely equivalent in principle, intent, and impact: to humiliate and dehumanize. In this instance, there was no difference between the German soldier and the Israeli one.
Throughout that summer of 1985, I saw similar incidents: young Palestinian men being forced by Israeli soldiers to bark like dogs on their hands and knees or dance in the streets."
Sara Roy, Harvard professor and child of a Holocaust survivor:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/03064220308537274
“the world’s largest open air prison should be blamed for rising up against the settle colonists with billions of dollars in US military aid.”
Hey folk hear that? Israel’s open air prison camp just kinda started this shit, today.
rude and uncivil.
I mean okay whatever, but your self defense just brought THE GREAT PALESTINIAN GENOCIDE upon you, and the world at large won’t do much until 25 years later.
In other words, there’s some realpolitik ideas that might have been appropriate to consider
you think this started today? The Palestinian genocide has been upon us for decades. Really easy for you to sit here and talk about tactics when 1) you don’t know shit about their situation, and 2) you aren’t currently confined to an open air prison where a genocide against your people is being carried out block by block.
So you don’t think reprisals tomorrow and beyond will be worse than the status quo?
