More than 2,000 people have been arrested at protests on college and university campuses around the country opposing Israel’s military strikes on Gaza since the October 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas, and the subsequent humanitarian crisis there.
I’m Jewish. I’ve seen a lot of antisemitism in my life. I’m now watching Israel destroy what took it and its allies years to build in the Middle East. If anyone is stoking antisemitism it is Israel and its supporters. It’s hard to love a country that has killed 35,000 plus Palestinian civilians in retaliation for the admittedly horrible Hamas attack that killed 1,200 plus Israelis. That’s 70,000+ Palestinian eyes for 2,400+ Israeli eyes. Hardly fair by biblical standards. The well funded repression of protest against Israeli Zionism in the name of fighting antisemitism has to stop. There will be no peace in the world until all hypocritical self interest, whether from the left, right or middle, ends. Based on my 82 years living in a cesspool of hypocrisy I don’t expect I’ll see peace in my time. I do, however, wish all younger than me good luck in taming the forces of naïveté and evil that seem to rule, especially in times of chaotic trauma like these.
thank you. well said. One can be anti the horrific war in Gaza without being antisemitic. And simultaneously be horrified by what Hamas did on Oct. 7th. The right's portrayal of this as binary - If you're anti-the-war you must also be antisemitic / if you are pro-Israel you must be in favor of killing Palestinians - is ridiculous and shallow and clouds the deeper, more complicated history and makes it easier for people to yell at each other and feel self-righteous.
It's just plain lazy to take an either/or position, ie. either you're antisemitic if you oppose Israel's over the top response to Hama's attack or you're anti-Palestinian if you support Israel's right to defend itself. When we take sides on this issue, we're just mirroring what the combatants are doing, that is demonizing one side or the other. Would that the world would pressure both sides to stop killing each other. I wonder if there will ever be a time when people stop using their religion (my god is better than your god) to justify slaughtering those who don't share their beliefs.
Thank you! "Lazy politics" is a perfect description.
The complexity of the situation in the Middle East is lost on many of the students and certainly those who cluelessly blame Biden for the Gaza conflagration.
Can we agree that Israel deserves to exist without threat?
That Israel's founding, while appropriate, displaced others indigenous to the region.
That October 7th was a vicious slaughter of innocents.
That the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent Gazans is an over reaction.
That Hamas is using their own children as shields.
That Israel has blocked humanitarian aid and killed aid providers.
That Hamas is pledged to the elimination of Jews.
That the Nakba in 1948 has never been properly addressed.
That Israel is threatened daily by the proxies of Iran who lob missiles at Israeli citizens with regularity.
That Iran is aligned with Putin who has been a constant pot stirrer in the region to keep our attention away from his atrocities in Ukraine.
My hope is that Israel calls for early elections and Netanyahu finds himself in prison. That he is charged with war crimes.
But for Biden and America to withhold military support for the defense of Israel from Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis is to sacrifice the greater peace and security of the region. It would be a gift to the religious extremist terrorists that rule Iran and want Israel destroyed. Repeat after me. Iran wants Israel gone.
And zoom out further, please. Gaza was once administered by Egypt. Why do you think Egypt has not opened the border to Gaza enough to allow Palestinians to rush to safety? Because Egypt considers Hamas to be a terrorist group. Egypt doesn't want the Palestinians because they are a threat.
We (including the students) should draw back from our armchair criticism of a president who is doing the very best he can to thread the needle of a very complex dynamic.
And please! While we are considering the "big picture", what is the alternative to the careful diplomacy that this administration has been working at 24/7? Does anyone think that "Mr. Muslim Ban" who doesn't want immigration from "shit hole countries" is a good alternative?
Here is the big picture. The choice is binary. Biden or a madman/dictator who will launch Project 2025 and ensure that women are treated as they were 150 years ago - or worse.
Where are the campus protests for women's reproductive rights? Where are the protests for the slowest road to justice we've ever seen - The Insurrection happened in 2021! Top secret documents were stolen and there is no trial date yet! Why aren't students upset about that?
And where are the protests to restore voting rights and get big dark money out of politics? Our democracy is crumbling.
The few who are super wealthy are accumulating trillions and trillions and students have loans that will last for decades. Where are the demonstrations about that? Women can't fully participate in the workforce because child care is so outrageously expensive - if available. I hear crickets.
The list of injustices perpetrated on Americans is long. And President Joseph Biden has been attempting (with some success) to address it. And yet, he can't get the support of many because of the deeds of a leader of a country halfway around the world?
Bill: Yes, but. Israel’s founding led to the displacement of Palestinians because extremists among the Palestinians began violence against Jews in the 1920s. Jews who came to their ancestral homeland after the founding of modern Zionism in 1896 bought land from its owners, often absentee Turkish landlords. How else were they to get land? There may well have been some displacement of Palestinian tenants, but there was a great influx of Muslims into the area at the same time—drawn by development and opportunities largely spurred by the Jewish settlers. In 1947, the UN proposed a partion of the land into what became Israel and Palestine. Jewish leaders accepted that, although geographically it would have been very difficult to survive. The Arabs rejected partition and six (I think) Arab nations tried to eliminate the nascent Jewish state. Not for the last time, they paid for their mistake. I hold no brief for the present Israeli regime, and I hope it is replaced by a much better one at the first instance, but the whole situation is unimaginably complex, and judgments are all going to be flawed.
Thanks for adding this history. I wonder what percentage of the angry ones are interested. I certainly am.
I have often wondered what would have happened if "Israel" had been created as a nonsectarian, not religious based sanctuary for all who desired to live there. A place where democracy and tolerance could thrive.
My wife has family in Israel. Her cousin has made a career of finding common ground for Jewish and Arab kids. Teaching about each others cultures.
Israel is a place of religious tolerance. It is a Jewish state (the UK, France and Italy, among others, are explicitly Christian states), because Jews never found a place where they were truly at home. I used to say that the United States is a homeland for Jews, but in the past few months I have been a lot less sure of that. In any event, as you probably know, 20 percent of Israel's population is Arab (Muslim or Christian, also Druse) and they serve in Parliament and, in some instances, in the IDF. Ironically, given that we lawyers are said to be Jews who can't stand the sight of blood, a very large proportion of the doctors in Israeli hospitals are Arabs.
Your long main comment is wonderful, Bill. And Jon Margolis is spot on. Please remember that Israel is a secular democracy. Its enemies are theocratic religious extremists. The fact that Israel is a "Jewish state" is not simply a function of religion; many many Jews past and present are atheists or non-believers whose highest values include tolerance, peaceful co-existence, and democracy (although tolerance cannot be open-ended; tolerance of religious extremism is self-defeating). The "Jewish state" is a result of centuries of murderous scapegoating of Jews the world over, most famously from Spain to Russia. We must not lose sight of the fact that Israel stands almost alone surrounded by mortal enemies. In the 'big picture' that is the problem that is being ignored by ignorant leftist extremists who bow to Chomskian false equivalences.
Bill & Jon, are you able to address women's rights in Palestine? I ask because to me it is something that perhaps many female students protesting in the streets are unaware of. My understanding is women do not have many rights like they do in the U.S. - rights at least granted by our various laws.
Had Israel been created in 1947 as you suggest--a "nonsectarian, not religious based sanctuary for all who desired to live there" --it would have been unique in that area of the world, as most Arab nations had been discriminating against Jewish residents for decades, in some cases violently and reminiscent of the pogroms of Europe, and forcing them out. Unfortunately, Netanyahu in his effort to make Gaza Hamas-free has imitated his enemies by slaughtering innocent non-Hamas residents of Gaza.
I'm reading a very interesting book, Dear Palestine, by Shay Hazkani (an Israeli historian). According to him -- he cites chapter and verse -- the acquisition of the land that became Israel was not quite as benign as the comments here picture it. There was much more than "some displacement" of the locals, amid much violence and destruction of villages by the Israelis. It's true they were fighting 5 Arab countries. The Arab militaries were much weaker in training and materiel than the Israelis. Much of this has been made clear in the writing of historians, both Arab and Israeli. In many ways it's very similar to the takeover of the American lands from the American Indians. I was taught a rather heroic version of the establishment of Israel, and in many ways it was heroic, but it also has a dark side; and the behavior of Israel over the years, settlements, repression of the Palestinians, coddling of Hamas by Netanyahu to prevent a Palestinian state, all of that has been a disgrace. It has been very disappointing to me to learn the fuller picture. Still, Israel exists; it's not going away. People should stop killing each other and work out a livable arrangement. The present one is not livable.
Thanks. My references were to the early part of Zionist settlement. When I was growing up, in the '50s, I was told that Palestinians cleared out to leave a way for Arab armies to sweep in and kill the Jews. Some left out of fear, but you are right that many were displaced forcibly. To my mind, the attacks on the new state made such expulsions understandable and even necessary in a least some cases.
Have you in the online press the massive protests by ISRAELIS against far right Netanyahu. Have you watched and heard Israelis say they want Democracy.. The students have seen that. I'm not a student, but I've seen the protests. The journalists who work for reputable publications, saw those protests.
Really well done Bill, and very much not lazy. It's almost as though you learned something about how to think critically that some of the protestors and most of their media promoters either don't know or are avoiding because it would obviate their actions.
Thank you! This captures well my own conflicted sentiments on this. I would just add (for myself) - it has been puzzling to me why this issue has seemed to galvanize (a segment of) college students, like nothing else, to protest. My conclusion has been that malign antisemitic (and/or anti-Biden) forces are amplifying and using good faith protesters' legitimate concerns to their own advantage, as HCR's comments also suggest.
Because it's on TV (which doomed the war in Vietnam, thank god), and because Biden's embrace of Netanyahu is so problematic. There's the problem of his wanting to stay in power to avoid jail, of trying to achieve a wildly unpopular court "reform", and of his party's own version of "from the river to the sea" in opposition to longstanding US policy of a two state solution. Sound familiar?
I don't see that Biden has "embraced Netanyahu." He has embraced the democratic state of Israel. Sorta like Biden would never deny aid to red states because they are Trump/MAGA states.
As previously stated in Heather's letter, the United States' monetary contributions to Israel have enabled them to fend off relentless missile strikes from Iran, not necessarily used to bomb Gaza.
And the complexity of the issue of Israel and the Palestinians is demonstrated by this: if the US does not help the nation of Israel - NOT netanyahu and his orcs, but the populace of Israel, regardless of whether they are Jewish or Muslim or Christian or no religion - to defend itself and themselves from Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, etc. - we will be helping Iran. Iran which, thanks to trampler's historic pullout from Obama's 2015 JCPOA, is in the process of "advancing slowly but confidently, accumulating the means for a future [nuclear] weapon while making no overt move to build one." https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/04/10/iran-nuclear-bomb-iaea-fordow/. Does ANYONE want that?
Bill, this is a brilliant list, thank you for sharing it with us. It's not lazy politics as much as it is cynical politics. Those who exploit the situation do so assuming we're all dim bulbs who don't know the history of the region or the peoples involved.
Shane, unfortunately, many here are "dim bulbs." They are too lazy or ill-informed to try to learn the history of today's dilemmas, and now history is repeating itself.
Excellent nuanced reply to a very complicated situation. The exploitation by the RW community and the accelerants (agitators) on the campuses feed the emotive quality to hate the actions perpetrated on the less fortunate.
It is taught in public policy that if you're hungry and starving and someone puts a gun in your hand - it won't matter the cause if they promise you (even empty promises) of a better future. The "religion of hating others" is exploitive.
Bill I agree with many of the points that you make in your excellent historical overview. However, as someone who wrote a book on Egypt (that Nasser banned), I do not believe that Egypt seeks to prevent Gazans from settling in Egypt because of fear of Hamas.
I visited a large Palestinian refugee camp in Egyptian Gaza in 1953. The refugees were housed in temporary tents. Egypt, with a population of 22 million strongly opposed accepting hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.
Now that Egypt has 100,000,000 citizens in a poor country, its opposition to the intrusion of a million Palestinians is even greater. I do not envisage that sending Palestinians into Egypt will ever be an ‘amelioration’ of the current situation.
My Southern brother called me in NYC to express his concern that I might be in danger living near the Columbia campus. "I had no idea there was so much anti-Semitism," he said. He watches a lot of Foxx, and I try to be patient, but I did feel the need to tell him that the situation is complex, and many of the protestors were Jewish, and that I was far more concerned about the police presence and the constant noise of helicopters and the drones tethered to unmarked vehicles on the public street beside my apartment. I am extremely grateful that President Biden has rejected calling in the National Guard. Maybe if Columbia's president had not called in the NYC police so quickly, things could have been resolved soon, but Congress is determined to blow this (not the war but demonstrations against it) up into a political cudgel. Can anyone remember another occasion where the Speaker of the House of Representatives visited the campus of a private university to assert himself?
Oh yes. So well articulated. Would that more people could actually comprehend the extent of the complexity in this situation rather than the either/or simplicity that seems to reign.
The way someone worships God should not be dictated by how someone else worships God. ie You cannot tell me your way is the only one way to worship God. Nor can I tell you.
Then what's the point in "my God is better than your God." I know, but it's so "human," to want to one-up the other guy's God. It's a battle without an actual God winner so it can go on forever. What's not to like.
J. Nol, it may be lazy for most people who are mostly also ignorant of the history of this and won't bother to inform themselves. However, the Rs are making as much hay as they can while being total hypocrites. I was surprised by some of the responses of students at Portland State, who were all for what the protesters were doing. They were both frosh and sounded totally naive. Of the first 12 protesters arrested by Portland police in clearing the library, only 4 were students. Also saw the anarchist symbol as part of the graffiti and the mess the protesters had created inside. I support peaceful protest, but not violence, intimidation, and destruction. Yes, religion is often used to vilify the other, but it is also often used to hide other priorities like conquest, exploitation, etc.
First you have to dehumanize the other, then you can exploit and conquer. Any training of soldiers has to include stamping out empathy, especially for the "other" or the enemy, otherwise those soldiers would have difficulty killing them.
This was a problem in the Civil War when the country was more religious. Soldiers did not want to kill and one case cited in a book about death in the Civil War (title escapes me at the moment)one soldier refused even when threatened with death himself, a southerner.
J Nol, I , too, wonder if people will ever stop cudgeling others of another (or no) religion. I don’t hold out a lot of hope since it seems that our brains are preprogrammed to fear anyone who is different (not of our tribe).
It’s Chinese propaganda on TikTok. That social platform is nothing more than Asymmetric warfare using propaganda to prejudice our children against rational thought and to undermine being pro-America.
Yes, how has this war become Biden’s doing? I have seen reporting that nearly half of the protesters arrested at Columbia were not students or otherwise affiliated with the school. Are they conscientious citizens? Opportunists? Provocateurs? I would like to know.
First. - This conflict in NOT complicated. That’s absurd. The Israelis want to live in peace. The Palestinians want the land now ruled by Israel. It’s that simple. It’s a war and the Palestinians will not agree to peace while they believe there is an ability to take all of Israel. The world is trying to create a solution the Palestinians do not want, and then is blaming Israel for failing to make it happen. The “2 state solution” is a post 1967 invention offered by the west.
Second - The Nakba as a concept of unfair colonialist invasion is 100% propaganda revisionist one sided history. The British had ownership of the land from the Turks. Both were invading colonialists. They split it with the Jews and “indigenous Arabs”. Palestinians at that time were British subjects and included both Arabs & Jews. The coin of the area had both Hebrew & Arabic on it. There was a war between Jews and ALL the surrounding Arab countries. The Jews won what is now called Israel. Period. Gaza was taken by Egypt. The West Bank taken by Jordan. From 1948 to 1967 the 700,000 indigenous Arabs / now called Palestinians who were displaced by the war were “refugees” living in Egypt and Jordan. At the same time 900,000 Jews were expelled from ever Arab country. Centuries of Jewish life were extinguished in days. Those Semitic Jew refugees (ie brown people) ended up in Israel - a 60% majority of Israel’s are the same brownness as the Palestinians. Let’s drop the white colonialist lie already.
Now the Palestinians are hateful to every conceivable cultural similarity as the west. Egalitarianism or gay rights or freedom of speech or assemble or religion as anathema to Palestinian life. Why did Bethlehem go from 80% Christians living safely under Jewish control to 20% living scared under the Palestinians?
Third, it is impossible to be pro-Palestinian without being anti-Israel or anti-Jew - unless you are a Palestinian who is fighting for land you think is yours. Theres no rationale basis beyond ignorance, prejudice, or religious triumphalism (you want the world to convert to Islam even if the conversion comes by the sword) for any westerner to support Palestinians.
If you are a Palestinian I’d ask: over the past 75 years how has the fight been going? I see the propaganda map you use showing Israel slowly taking land. Why should they stop? It’s not your land unless you can secure your borders. That’s just the truth of human history. How’s the terrorist fight going? I know; you think it’s splendid cuz you slaughtered 1200 Jews in October. But Israel is about to make peace with the Saudis. They have good ties to Egypt., UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Jordan just let the Israel Air Force use Jordanian airspace to knock out Iranian missiles. Plus as a.reward for your brutal terrorism, the land Israel unilaterally gifted to you in 2005, Gaza, is now a literal wasteland 100% because of Palestinian stupidity and brutality in attacking the Jews.
Isn’t it time to try peace and negotiations. Why don’t you give back the hostages and ask for a peaceful resolution. Israel left Gaza without getting any assurances. But tried in good faith to give Gaza the ability to self rule. You guys blew it. If you wanna re-do on that concept you must give up violence as your method of gaining statehood. Otherwise I think the tea leaves will see a lot of pain in your future.
May 14 will be the 76th anniversary of the founding of Israel. Marking the beginning of this conflict. Israel will have to learn the lesson we did in Viet Nam: bombing innocent people does not eliminate any threat, nor bring peace. It only provides another generation of enemies.
In the fifty years since the end of the US war in Vietnam, relations have been somewhat normalized, to the point that there are no travel restrictions for US citizens to Vietnam. Will there be normal relations between Israel and other nations fifty years hence?
Putting aside the fact that you are comparing apples and oranges, it is fair to say that Arab interests in the middle east would have long ago benefited from creating their own secular democracies and living in peace with Israel. The problem is not a "Jewish state", which happens to be a secular democracy; the problem is the theocratic dictatorships bent on destroying it, none of whom will open their doors to Palestinians. (Once Netanyahu and Donald Trump go to jail, things might improve).
Had I been Virginia Gay testifying at Stefanik’s committee, I would have responded, “Congresswoman Stefanik, who the hell do you think you are acting like Joe McCarthy badgering witnesses?” Had she done this she would still have her job.
I wonder if all those protesters yelling at one another understand the implications of the US ceasing to provide military support for Israel? In the aftermath of this humanitarian mess I believe and implosion would occur. Huge black hole in the Middle East.
This view seems so self-evident to me. I guess that means I'm still very naive. And the republican party's hypocritical words and deeds for political gain probably should't surprise me either. But the fact that they get away with such transparent power grabbing and destruction of vital American institutions nearly makes my head explode. I hate injustice and that seems to be increasingly what the gop is all about.
Barry. Thank you for your comments. I have always wondered why the Israeli people are committing atrocities against the Palestinians, doing exactly what was done to them in Europe. I am pleased to learn not all Jewish people approve of these actions. While I am only 75, I’m pretty sure , too, tgatvI will not see a peaceful world in my lifetime. I pray for America ever day, that people will wake up and stop the evil doers, mostly republicans, who are trying to take over our country. Sad!
Sharon, to state that Netanyahu's coalition is doing the same to residents of Gaza as the Hitler regime did to European Jews in is World War 2 is simply wrong.
1) European Jews never threatened anyone while Hamas has vowed to destroy Israel and kill all Jews, and acted on that vow on Oct 7.
2) jews in Europe did not have weapons, did not throw grenades into Christian neighborhoods, and did not invite any retaliation that would hurt their neighbors. On the other hand, Hamas has appropriated billions in donations to build tunnels and to build an arsenal, which they lobbed into Israeli cities, weekly, since 2006. Further, Hamas lobbed those rockets from the grounds of apartments, schools and mosques, and fought from spots within crowded neighborhoods. The deaths of their fellow Arabs was the goal, not just the consequence.
3) Hitler's approach to Jews was to enslave them to support Germany's war effort, keeping them under conditions that would allow them to live for 3-4 months under starvation, accidents, or torture took their lives. That's for the ones that weren't first sent to the gas chambers. Israel has not enslaved Arabs from Gaza. Instead, they employed over 18,000 for daily work in Isrseli territory, who were paid fair wages for their work. Hamas's actions caused that source of income to end, killing some of them on Oct 7.
4) German goals included extermination of all Jews. Hamas's goal is the same. Isrsel's goal is to defang Hamas so it stops being a threat to its citizens, not to kill all Arabs.
Has Israel gone too far? As a Jewish Israeli American, I say yes. But I also know that the war in Gaza is just that, a war. Israel might have gone too far, but it is justified in going after Hamas. Or would you recommend that they allow Hamas to restock and continue the near-weekly attacks on civilian areas in Israel like it has since 2006?
If I was your neighbor and kept shooting into your property, would you let me keep doing it? Sure, you could call the police, but who could Israel call?
Barry, I’m hugging you in my heart for speaking truth. Netanyahu and his cronies as well as leaders of Hamas are responsible for this horrific situation, but the general Jewish and Palestinian population are the ones who are suffering. Praying for peace, for reason, for compassion, and decency in the Holy Land.
Barry, I am 100% with you--as are a lot of other fellow Jews who have looked at the mendacity of Israeli politics, especially the government's response to any attacks on or protest against the ultra rightwing and nationalist settlements they keep on planting in areas that were "supposed" to be autonomous Palestinian territories. The typical Israeli government response of a kid throwing stones at a soldier (for every injury 10 Palestinians at minimum must be arrested/die/have their homes destroyed--in an ironic reflection of the ancient Roman practice of "decimation") has escalated to 100 Palestinians must be punished for every injury to an Israeli. This is totally unacceptable.
As I have said before on this platform, the policy of the Israeli government CREATES supporters of Hamas and Hezbollah. And it provides fodder for the christofascists here in the USA to further their ultimately totally antisemitic goals of "forcing" the "Rapture": their real unstated purpose behind their support of Israel. Because they "need" Jews in Jerusalem for their fantasy of the antichrist to come who will ultimately wipe all the Jews off the face of the earth. The cooperation between the christofascists here and the Israeli government is about as cynical and manipulative as it gets.
That said, this is also a golden opportunity for Russia, China, and Iran to make hay with US politics--and I have questioned the timeline of the Hamas attack and the Israeli response to it before because it is pretty clear the Israeli government had a good idea what was about to happen and turned their eyes away. Opportunism on all sides, as well as mendacity. There are NO "good" sides to this. And Hamas perpetuating the war by refusing to negotiate and return the people they captured is equally heinous. But interestingly, the Israeli government seems far less worried about that 100 or so still surviving group than about turning Gaza (and eventually, I suspect, the West Bank) to rubble.
"And it provides fodder for the christofascists here in the USA to further their ultimately totally antisemitic goals of "forcing" the "Rapture": their real unstated purpose behind their support of Israel. Because they "need" Jews in Jerusalem for their fantasy of the antichrist to come who will ultimately wipe all the Jews off the face of the earth. The cooperation between the christofascists here and the Israeli government is about as cynical and manipulative as it gets." THIS!!
I share Barry’s opinion. Especially his comment “If anyone is stoking antisemitism it is Israel and its supporters.” After the gun massacre at the Tree of Life Synagogue, I wrote the same comment begging Americans to recognize how Jews around the world were likely to be affected with antisemitism due to the violence that Netanyahu & his extreme government were committing. That Israel did not appear to be concerned about those outside of its state political interests.
I encourage everyone to read more broadly about the modern history of Palestine and the development of Israel through to the present and that effect on the indigenous people of former Palestine. Jimmy Carter’s book “Palestine: Peace or Apartheid” is a good start though not comprehensive. Carter was criticized for his use of “Apartheid”. But, he has been more engaged and supportive of Israel than probably any other U.S. president. Castigated by both Republicans and Democrats, and characterized as a weak president, he is without doubt in my mind the most religious, moral, thoughtful and equitable president we have had since FDR. He was Israel’s best friend over his active life. If Israel had listened to him, they would likely be living in peace today. Palestine would likely have had a state by now. It’s said that the indigenous Jews & Arabs of Palestine are genetically identical, and they had lived essentially in peace during the Ottoman Empire. That violence did not occur until Europeans started immigrating to Palestine in large enough numbers & wealth to worry the great majority Arab population. Real problems developed during the British Mandate occupation after WWI. There is history that has been obscured by politics & politicians as in all history.
Interesting to me is my recently learning other Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia and Eqypt did not want the Palestinians to move into their countries.
True. Arabs are not a homogenous group. They have not wanted Palestinian influence anymore than Palestinians wanted growing European Jewish influence, nor Israel wanted a Palestinian majority in their new state, or expanding state.
Arabs have given Palestinians nominal support since the Jewish militias drove 750,000 Palestinians out in the 1947-48 war to establish Israel. Arabs have had varying attitudes of acceptance or rejection of Israel based on their concerns for their own situation. Jordan though most friendly to Israel, deals with Palestinian refugees being the majority of their population. Lebanon has dealt with large numbers of Palestinian refugees in refugee camps, with small numbers of Palestinian leaders and freedom fighters fighting Israel, drawing responding & preemptive strikes from Israel similar to the strikes on Gaza, making Lebanon dysfunctional.
Egypt (1956 from Britain), Jordan (1946 from Britain) & Lebanon (1943-46 from France) were given their independence around the time of Israel’s establishment. Saudi Arabia was recognized as independent by Britain in 1927.
The interpretation of this history to favor Israel and disfavor Palestinians is similar to our interpretation of Vietnam history. We did not talk about Vietnam as a U.S. ally in WWII with Ho Chi Minh after 1945. We then saw them as an enemy as we supported France’s colonial interests. We then called Ho Chi Minh’s freedom fighters “communists” as we supported puppet governments left by the French. We lost much and gained nothing for these distortions.
To compare US support of French colonial interests in Vietnam to US support of Israel is absurd. The Vietnam war was our folly, a war of immense hubris and greed. It was also falsely contrived. There is no parallel to European and Middle East history, immersed as it is in the persecution and murder of Jews for centuries, no matter whether the Jew being persecuted was a accused of being a communist or a capitalist. (Hitler accused them of both).
Only Jordan, in 1948 and 1967, permitted the Palestinians entry in any significant numbers By September, 1970, the Hashemite Kingdom, for its own survival, had to force out the PLO, PFLP, and other such bands.
Barry, I’m an American of Irish, English and Scots descent with one set of Catholic grandparents and another set of Protestant grandparents. I witnessed, first hand, the “Troubles” in Northern Ireland as a student in 1977.
As you so aptly note, it is hard to love any country that engages in the wholesale slaughter and repression of a people, let alone the evil acts of terrorism such as Hamas conducted. In Ireland, the PLO-trained terrorists created unbearable fear, loss and on-going anger and resentment that continues.
The Irish did manage to create an uneasy peace. It’s far from perfect and doesn’t work for everyone but it has allowed for more people to raise their families and pursue their dreams in relative peace. That matters.
That is my prayer for all the people in Israel and Gaza. My lifetime? One can only hope….
I fully support Israel's right to eliminate the threat of Iranian sponsored terror. Indiscriminate killing of Israelis is a well paid career in Gaza and the West Bank. The leaders and teachers of the 10/7 atrocities must be eliminated, and their populations re-educated to live with Jewish settlers, under the nurturing wing of Allah, with full rights and privileges of Palestinian citizens, as Arab-Israelis live in their Jewish State. I think it's relevant to understand that Arab leaders conspired with Hitler to eliminate Jews last century and still hold their death cult fantasies.
Here is is again, the use of "my god is better than your god" to address issues. Would that we would finally free ourselves from the prison of religion and actually encourage people to think for themselves.
Ethnic nationalism, social remaking can produce as much fervent devotion as religion. Traditionally however religion has been tied to states and peoples that often adds to the fervor. I don't think you can just lay it on "religion" as such. "Mores" have deep roots in human nature.
Those "mores" as you call them, are just plain superstition dressed up as a socially sanctioned belief system. We are capable of much more than that, if only we are allowed to develop the capacity to think. I have nothing against tradition, origin legends and ritual, but so often they are held up as truths rather than the way a particular society organizes itself. Religion, too often is used to justify brutality and serves mostly to separate us from each other. Anyone who accepts religion gives up their right to think for themselves.
"mores" are essential rules and guidelines of social regulation, the "Ten Commandments" are mainly about social regulation; i sometimes think "religion" as an overarching authority was built just to enforce social/tribal/clan/ethnic/imperial/national cohesions, often with their attendant enemies, given humanity's long history of conflicts at all these levels. Not sure I get "so often as they are held up as truths rather than the way a particular society organizes itself" . The 10C is exactly a sanctioning/enforcing document, along with the multitude of other rules you'll find Exodus etc richly adorned with, with or without Yahwah's explicit command. For example, have fun reading the litany of rules about slavery and details for reimbursements for damage done to the many categories thereof. You might also remember that in the process of suppressing Russian Orthodoxy etc in the fledging Soviet Union, the Soviets committed mass atrocities in their efforts to remake society, and religion wasn't the best killing example. Best example I'd say was the deliberate mass starvation of Ukrainian peasant farmers in the early 1930s, we're talking millions here. Of course, that doesn't even get us to the Nazis, who simply wanted to annihilate whole populations so they could colonize most of eastern Europe well into Ukraine with Germans - the Master Race. I will certainly agree that the long persecution of Jews as "killers of Christ" is likely the best example of religious persecution for no other reason. I recommend reading Snyder's Bloodlands, or Plokhy's The Gates of Europe, a history of the Ukrainian region. You will blanch at the sheer level and detail of atrocity and mayhem, at not exactly in the name of "religion", allowing for the Jewish holocaust in the middle of it all.
I prefer "perfect sky parent" since a belief in any god emerges from the human longing to have a perfect parent watching over them, rather than the imperfect parents they actually had.
Business leaders and the press also supported Hitler's rise and have yet to be held accountable. They wield economic security like a blunt object to keep people oppressed, especially in America where consumers are treated like labs rats.
What do Israelis have to do in the West Bank and in Gaza? It's not part of their country. The Israeli settlers are their illegally and should be leaving.
Israelis haven't lived in Gaza in decades. Israel made Gaza "Judenrein"--Jew-free--by pulling every Jewish resident, business, and military base out of Gaza and giving the keys to Palestinians to run Gaza themselves. Palestinians said they wanted independence to govern as they saw fit, and Israel provided that. The result was Gazans elected Hamas as their legal, official government, and last October's massacre was the natural consequence of that.
West Bank and Gaza are part of Israel, which won both territories in the 1967 war. Israel has not declared formal sovereignty over either in hopes of making a deal for an independent Palestinian state, which the Gaza handover was designed to trial. And the largest part of West Bank IS open to Jewish settlement, per the Clinton accords, until such time a final peace treaty is negotiated.
Oh well, you're so right - whatever option do the poor Israelis have but to commit genocide on the Palestinians? Only because they created Hamas because Israel wanted to fight the PLO with them, who could have known they turn out to be so ungrateful? Just because the Palestinians are treated like concentration camp prisoners in their own country - who could hold it against the most moral army in the world in the most horribly victimised 😢 country in the world?
You just have to listen to Israeli tv, to the speeches in the Knesset or watch some IDF Instas to get a pretty good idea what sort of people Israelis in their majority are.
I fully accept that Israel is a nation that was horribly traumatised in its history, and - in my opinion - it just like a person would, has a mental defect due to that trauma. But that doesn't entitle it to commit war crime after war crime after war crime (listen to ICJ presentations regarding the occupation of the Palestinian territories), behave in the most brutal, colonising way towards a country that it has taken all the land from. The West put after WWII all its ugly, stinking guilt into a huge bucket, flung it over the Middle East and said "your problem now"
Just like Jon Stewart said "Listen, Middle East, we didn't want to be drawn in all that drama that OUR actions caused - we just want your delicious oil!"
If the West lets get Israel away again and again and again, Putin and Xi Jinping have won. The world will not forget this and the first signs are there. One should not forget, that the West is in the minority on this issue.
Can't wait for the next episode of this show "Who is the US gonna elect - the criminal in Putin's pocket or the palliative care candidate candidate in Israel's pocket?"
The writers of our reality must to coked up to the eyeballs.
All those words to avoid answering a simple question. I'll restate it so you can try again:
Since you consider this genocide, what war plan would you have enacted to ensure Israel destroyed Hamas without injuring non-combatants in Gaza and therefore avoid the "genocide" you claim is happening?
ensuring the safety and security of Jews is a fundamental mission for Israel, both within its borders and globally. Any Palestinian state that does not ensure its Jewish citizens would be counter to the mission of Israel. Jews living freely in Palestine is part of the Hamas charter.
Barry, you and I are similarly aged, and although I am not Jewish, I vividly recall being horrified while very young by the Nazis' extermination of millions of Jews.
More recently, watching the thousands of Israelis demonstrating against Netanyahu because of his using right wing tactics to destroy Israel's courts in order to avoid prosecution for his numerous indictments, I saw the protests being diluted by the October Hamas attack. I immediately realized that Israel's military intelligence failures and uncharacteristic inattention to anticipating an imminent attack would give Bibi exactly what he needed to stay in power.
Clearly, Hamas' atrocities deserved retaliation, but killing thousands of civilians to "destroy Hamas" can't be justified. Even if Netanyahu destroys every Hamas fighter, which he won't, there will be thousands of Palestinian young people who will remember the horror wrought upon them and they will become the new Hamas fighters. The seeds were already planted by the lack of having a vote in their own destiny. They will take up the Hamas pledge to eradicate Israel, and all hope will be lost for a peaceful Jewish state.
Here and in other parts of the world, right wingers are wailing because of the threat to Jews. My question is, where were they when white supremacists were marching with tiki torches in Charlottesville, shouting "Jews will not replace us" and our resident white supremacist leader characterized the situation by insisting that there were "fine people on both sides"?
Our lives began with witnessing unthinkable evil being justified against powerless scapegoats, and we are still witnessing this evil. I fervently hope that we will begin to see the world awaking to the continued destruction before we die.
Barry, we can pray that the right's reign of terror on all of us - worldwide - will soon be over. If only Bibi and the Orange Menace could get Elon Musk construct a manned rocket to Mars and be its first occupants . . . .
@Barry. If they and you want a cease fire, protest that culpable Hamas leaders live in sanctuary in Qatar and other countries and could have agreed to it. Where are the protests about Arab money in schools? At the Qatar embassy in DC and the UN mission?
Thank you Barry. I'm sorry that you have had to endure antisemitism. No one should be the target of hate or bullying for any reason.
Hamas is the mouse that roared but the Palestinians have been the victims (pawns) of both the Israelis and the Palestinians. Netanyahu and the Israeli war council are like many US politicians. They will do anything to stay in power including delaying the end of this conflict at the expense of the hostages, the Palestinians and the Israelis.
I am a Christian....I too would love to see peace among all who have or do not have a faith. We make it difficult when certain humans want to dominate using "faith" which is precious to those of us who hold a faith. We should respect the honesty and freedom of those who choose "no religion."
We are misusing our faith when we allow it to justify killing our fellow humans which actually goes against the religions or faiths with which I am familiar.
No human being can look upon the starving and devastation in Palestine and be at peace. These are innocent human beings.
We do not fully understand what happened on October 7 nor why it happened. We do not understand why the protective shield over that specific area was not working at the very occasion of the attack. We do not fully understand Netanyahu's relationship
with Hamas.
We do know that Netanyahu would be tried for his criminal accusations if he were not holding his current leadership role in Israel. We do know that Netanyahu wants to take over Gaza.
There is good and evil battling, as has always been true. We must not turn our hearts and eyes and will away from this earth which is OUR home. We are responsible to do what we can to build peace...to serve those in need. We must assist in healing where we are able. To NOT put our heads in the sand and make light of the hellish existence of our fellow members of humanity is required.
Violence on our college campuses...or anywhere.... only helps our enemies.
Thank you President Joe Biden...thank you Jill Biden...thanks to those serving in our Congress who choose peace...who choose making our country great...who choose "Building Back Better".
Thank to those working tirelessly throughout the world for peace and reconciliation. It is an endless challenge. I am so thankful for those we know and see and for those who are unseen but have chosen to give their lives and talents for the preservation of building relationships throughout our entire world. We truly are dependent on one another.
The radicals on both sides have taken over and drown out reasonable voices. Hamas lit the match and created the explosion that was waiting to happen. Who started this is almost impossible to determine. The majority of people want coexistence. Our efforts need to focus on stopping the bullies who use violence and hate speech to further their cause. It’s upsetting to see people caught in the whirlpool of violence and polarized reactivity. There can be no peace unless we talk, and we have to heal across divides.
Yes. We really failed to understand what was going on and overreacted much to our peril and that of the world. 20 years of wasted warfare, death destruction, and diversion from more important goals. I worry about what is unfolding now. Biden warned Netanyahu not to do it we did in Afghanistan and Iraq. He ignored Biden and now look. I worry how Netanyahu in his radicals have really damaged Israel and contributed to reactive antisemitism. These people should never have been in government. Just like George W. Bush should not have been president. It’s interesting to note that administrations that squeak in because of anomalies in the democratic system create destruction.
In the Powell Memorandum of August, 1971, Powell said that public colleges and universities were largely funded by taxpayers, and articulated that high-income business executives and corporations were were among the most significant taxpayers and therefore, funders of higher education (at least pre-Reagan, when the wealthy actually paid taxes -except for Trump). Powell argued that oddly, highly-educated professors were liberal or leaned liberal -thus he called for more conservative influence on campuses around the United States.
Students today (just as they did during the Vietnam era) want to feel empowered and relevant. The news from Gaza is a steady stream of the very worst of humanity. Just as protests eventually led to the American withdrawal from Vietnam, protests led to the demise of South African apartheid, students have every right to peacefully protest war crimes committed by Hamas in the terrorism, killing and kidnapping of innocent people, and Netanyahu's criminally terrorist acts in his continuing indiscriminate bombing and destruction of Gaza.
The GOP are always among the first to yell "don't politicize this mass shooting" at Sandy Hook, Uvalde, Columbine, Las Vegas, or the Tree of Life Synagogue. Yet, the hypocrisy that flows freely through GOP/MAGA/Putin veins ensures they politicize everything from climate action, to diplomacy, and of course -any place else they see an opportunity to manipulate voters. So it should not come as a surprise they are pressuring institutions of higher education. Just as Trump only wanted to direct disaster relief to "Red" States, or Jared Kushner was fine allowing the contagious, deadly pre-vaccine COVID to spread through "Blue" States, watch for MAGA Elise Stefanik and others, if Trump is elevated to the Presidency, to restrict Federal funding to any colleges or universities with programs related to race, gender, environmental conservation, ESG, or economics (in which the writings of John Kenneth Galbraith are preferred over Milton Friedman).
My guess is in a couple of years we'll see Jared Kushner selling Gaza beachfront properties to the highest bidder - the profits will very likely not end up in Palestinian pockets, will they?
Not so sure, George, that the Republicans are yelling "Don't politicize" all the mass shootings.
Might say, rather, they are always vulgarizing them.
Human life? None of them have ever in their lives accessed any humanities, so it's logically twisted to expect any concern for human life from any of them.
They cover for their fellow near-illiterate and marble-mouth white trash in Congress. Vote more, more tax cuts for the billionaires who pay them bribes. Put out videos celebrating the AR-15 and similar weaponry effective for repeated mass murders across America. Hurrah their number one showman with layers of odious orange make-up encrusted on his face, clown-show peroxided hair stiff on his otherwise vain, empty head, and waddling fat layers about his farting, befouling diapered area.
But notice, George, I don't once use the word "love" for any of this crew.
I have a high school buddy (high school class of '58) who is now old and bitter, a true opponent of DEI. There is absolutely no way to reach any middle ground. He'll do anything, even install a dictator as head of the country, to defeat Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. And, let's remember, those marching at Charlottesville in 2017 were shouting "Jews will not replace us." IMO, TFFG is the Chief Wizard of the MAGA/KKK movement and he is extremely aware of it. This is a cancer on the body politic that has been here all along and has been dormant for a few decades, but now it threatens the very existence of our democracy. Perhaps we should all make a pledge to donate ten times more money in this election to various candidates than ever before. After all, it is an investment in something that we need.
I wouldn't doubt if there was a plan among the trump 2016 campaign to divide liberal Jews and conservative Jews, like conservatives have been trying to divide Black people because both groups have historically always been supporters of the Democratic party. If you look at the Republican donor base and its inner circle, it's a multiethnic group of RW billionaires. trump's support of those marching at Charlottesville and his dining with the likes of Fuentes haven't seemed to bother RW Jews within that inner circle. We're being played by RW billionaires. They are loyal to no one but power. They use religion like a cudgel to keep us at each other's throats. Cynical of me I know.
Tracy, you write: " We're being played by RW billionaires. They are loyal to no one but power. " I agree, and this is fairly well documented: "What's the Matter with Kansas?" by Thomas Frank. Project 25 is a pure case of establishing an anti-democratic oligarchy here. The extremely wealthy have found that it is fairly easy to sucker in the white Americans with wedge issues: abortion, race, women's rights, gay rights, immigration, etc. It's tragic that those folks are so ill informed and clueless.
Thank you, Richard. Thought I remembered a connection and certainly the films of him making sure there were as few Blacks as possible in his buildings and his suse
Yes, Richard. Serious times. Serious needs of serious Dems.
And needs of active Dems, and independents, and former Republicans -- not just donating, but also well-focused on the things Heather arrays for us, our conversations.
". . . old and bitter." Sorry for your friend, Richard.
We all know those who don't age well. Someone else on this thread mentions the love of "To Kill a Mockingbird." Among its concerns, how stereotypes let us wrongly see people, such as the shut-in down the street that the little kids saw and feared as some monster. Though that stereotyped guy turned out to be one of the good guys (and a lifesaver for one of the little kids).
Good, however, Richard, that most of the comments on Heather's site turn out to be by those who've contrarily turned out "old and generous."
Peter, that novel has stuck with me ever since my Mom read it to us when I was about 10 and my sister 6. We are both on either our second or third copies of the book, and both read in regularly.
What you tell helps me and other readers better to understand your outlook, your motivation.
For many years now I've been turning over in my mind what it means to have been a victim, the dangers that go with victimhood, especially when victim status becomes an integral part of a person's or a group's identity.
It seems to me that the greatest harm of all arises when the victim is indelibly marked by the evil sustained. The victim then places her or himself outside the law, at the service of whatever vengeance may demand.
Yet, wherever a society is deeply divided, by debased notions of individualism, by racism, by social stratification based on wealth and income, by affiliation tribal, whether the tribe's identity is religious, political or whatever, by all the variations on "us" and "them", that entire society falls victim to its divisions. The have-nots are victims of their deprivation, the haves are had by their having (instead of living and being). We are so often not the masters but the victims of our ideas and our emotions...
A never-ending tale of ultimately unnecessary suffering and unkindness, both inflicted and self-inflicted.
Yet kindness, the lovingkindness that would share such happiness as we find, seems so simple, so obvious.
"I would share my ease and not my disease," said Thoreau.
I still don't understand how the party of the guy defending good people on both sides at at Nazi gathering is upset about antisemitism on college campuses. Seems like an odd disconnect.
Trump is on record saying Hitler had some good ideas. I doubt if any of the ideas had anything to do with better fuel economy for Mercedes-Benz sedans.
It's just politics... they can use the situation to their advantage to demonize the left and force out college and university presidents who they perceive as elitists.
Absolutely agree with you. It is part of Project 25 already instituted. The Republicans who have embraced the ideology helped to instigate the unrest on campus. They do not in any circumstance want students to think for themselves, so they give them the idea that Biden is the bad one. Shame that the students, who will vote in November, do not see how they have been manipulated by outside agitators. My question is who is manipulating the agitators. This unrest helps along the idea in Project 25 of replacing all the “liberal thinkers” in our universities.
cameron, I have long wondered at the almost fanatic response of my Christian friends regarding Israel: complete and uncritical support, no matter what. A couple of them that are still willing to engage with me on most things have been unable to articulate why.
Last week, a dear friend who is Christian to her soul answered that question in a Facebook post, citing specific verses in the Bible. This quote from her is: "Israel belongs to God Himself. His covenant with the Jewish people for the land of Israel is clear in Genesis 13:14-15. That covenant stand even now. God Almighty says Israel’s land belongs to them, not anyone else."
This was added: "Christians, you are commanded--by God himself--to support and protect Israel. This isn't about politics. It is about obedience.
I find that belief chilling in the face of the atrocities that both have taken and are taking place.
This generation has seen and been through more than several previous generations. New technology has brought us closer as we witness global suffering. “The needs of one have become the concerns of all.”
I am not sure that “this generation” has been through more… Every generation has its challenges. Those challenges come in different shapes and sizes but they happened and will continue to happen.
Internet. Social Media. DGeorge Floyd, BLM, DJT Demagoguery, the worst Respiratory pandemic since 1918, Ukraine War. But really we have to add the phone. Images and video of horrifc violence, inequality, decay of democratic institutions, delivered directly to your palm and daily.
Connie, I think that with the accelerated pace of "life" (thinking of TV's, how movies are made and produced, the explosion of video games (which now encompasses a very descriptive cohort of "gamers") to the expansion of information available on the internet with its complete lack of academic overview and publisher's requirements can safely be described as "more" even though all generations have faced challenges. I never had to worry about either "atomic bomb drills" (although I knew where the "nuclear shelter" was in my elementary school) or active shooter drills as a 1-12 student (no mandatory "K" in that milieu).
Thank you for mentioning John Kenneth Galbraith and the preference for him over Milton Friedman. I attended a Galbraith speech at Iowa State as a student in 1975. What a fantastic speaker and such a great mind.
This is from his Wikipedia page-
Galbraith's main ideas focused around the influence of the market power of large corporations. He believed that this market power weakened the widely accepted principle of consumer sovereignty, allowing corporations to be price makers, rather than price takers, allowing corporations with the strongest market power to increase the production of their goods beyond an efficient amount.
He further believed that market power played a major role in inflation.
He argued that corporations and trade unions could only increase prices to the extent that their market power allowed. He argued that in situations of excessive market power, price controls effectively controlled inflation, but cautioned against using them in markets that were basically efficient such as agricultural goods and housing. He noted that price controls were much easier to enforce in industries with relatively few buyers and sellers. Galbraith's view of market power was not entirely negative; he also noted that the power of US firms played a part in the success of the US economy.
Ding ding ding ding ding. Walmart takes in 1 of ever 3 dollars spent on groceries in the US. Fox News and the rest of the right wing media has convinced a large percentage of Americans that Biden's policies are the major cause of inflation. Some of his policies and programs have caused some of the inflation but so have TFFG's lingering policies like the Chinese tariffs. But Walmart, Home Depot, Tyson, Perdue and other large corporations are charging us more than they did for food and other consumables because they are greedy bastards.
The county in Arkansas where Walmart is headquartered and the belt of their executives live including several of the Walton heirs, has one of the highest child poverty rates in the US.
Gary -what a gift to have been able to see him -thank you for sharing.
Many years ago I was attending an emerging technology conference at MIT and made arrangements to visit Noam Chomsky on my trip from the San Francisco. I had also contacted John's office at Harvard -my understanding of Economics was largely developed through Professor Galbraith's writing and journals. Unfortunately, at the time, his health was in rapid decline and I did not get the opportunity to thank him for his work and writings -intended to improve the quality and dignity of life for all.
Of many books he wrote "The Economics of Innocent Fraud", I consider to be foundational reading (as well as Joel Bakan's "The Corporation, Noam Chomsky's "Miseducation in America" and "Manufacturing Consent", and George Lakoff's "Don't Think of an Elephant". From my perspective they should all be required reading.
Right back atcha George. Seeing Noam Chomsky speak would have been amazing I'm sure.
I've only read a couple of Galbraith's books but I will look for 'The Economics of Fraud" as well as the others you mention.
I agree that college curriculums should include mandatory readings and even AP high school classes.
One of the weed out classes (whether intentional or not) for Engineering students was English I and II. Some of the best engineering students I knew took those classes multiple times before they passed. Maybe include some of those books in with English I & II?
Thanks Gary. And no question that Professor Galbraith’s powerful eloquence would fit in an English curriculum. Interestingly, the best database and application performance people I recruited during my career at Oracle were degreed in Electrical Engineering as opposed to Computer Science or Information Systems. Most couldn’t write a report or spell their way out of a paper bag (and still can’t) however they had supernatural analytical skills when it came to 0’s and 1’s.
I can certainly relate to the writing skills of engineers. One of my college room mates was a EE. He led the team that created the pacemaker for Medtronics to be implanted with someone in need of an MRI. He finally passed English II the quarter he graduated. He too couldn't write a report or spell worth a lick, but he was brilliant. He has multiple patents from his time at other companies as well.
It's been a couple days, George, with Heather yet on break.
In the meantime you say something here -- several good things -- which prompt another in-the-meantime-response from me.
That is, when you list good books, and suggest more might know them -- yes, agreed. But how is it that we simply don't see various others periodically citing these books and doing so in the context that all the more makes them matter to them?
I suggest, George, that the arts of citing others have disappeared. Not only the arts of citing others, but the parallel arts of doing so by transitions that also clarify one's own parallel concerns.
No need to reply, George. Maybe you can do so in some subsequent note you may make on new things Heather may bring up, once she returns from extended break.
Thank you for sharing this Phil. It made me think of commonalities we share as a group or network of people. While we may all have a foundation of varied education we all find LFAA's important. The well-written fact-based (and cited) articles often establishing the connection between U.S. and global events with their historical context. We seek to be well-informed and engaged, two of the three vital pillars of any attempt at meaningful democracy. Aside from a foundation of education we all have a journey through life which has led us here. Our personalities, as well as books, films, and life experiences all contribute to what I hope for all of us is a never-ending quest.
The books I mentioned previously are a handful of material which inspired me (and continues to do so). I worry that just publishing a list of such would not have any real emotional engagement for others. Years ago I organized an event with Charlie Liteky -a war hero and important voice in America's conscience (if we have one as a society). A book on sinister U.S. involvement in the horrific civil war in El Salvador by Charles Clements, a U.S. doctor who recounted his experience as a field medic desperately trying to save lives from the indiscriminate bombs and gunfire, often from U.S. supplied weapons for the right-wing regime responsible for the deaths and torturing of doctors, lawyers, teachers, and people rising against the horror. The work of Naomi Oreskes in publishing "Merchants of Doubt" -important in understanding the generations of the extraction industries destruction of climate and planet while intentionally covering up the damage and catastrophic climate outcomes threatening our world today.
These things (and others) have emotional connections to me, and while others might agree some of my personal experiences and books I've read are important, I'm not sure how to relate the all important emotional context? That's the place where I think many can be moved to join a growing network of people on a quest for life long learning and deeper understandings -which, from my perspective on a vast scale, could eventually lead to a peaceful and collaborative world -instead of one rife with conflict.
Anyway -thank you for a provocative note as we begin the new week.
No, they're leaning on other words, direct from the Bible. I posted on cameron's post from and earlier time on this thread something I finally learned about why there are some Christians that are (my word here) irrational in their support of Israel.
I was being semi in jest, Ally. Evangelicals' support of Israel is purely religious indeed. The OT is full of self-justifying slaughter of foreigners or non-believers, and all taken matter of factly.
When activists and protesters commit crimes the leaders and teachers disrupting tranquility need to be brought to Justice and their populations need to be re-educated. Specifically, taught to live within a merit based, muti-ethnic truth seeking society. Generally speaking, political Islam is not compatible with this principle.
Protester's characterization of Israeli apartheid and genocide were successfully rebutted in the South African case. It's not a crime to minimize casualties of your own troops by bombing enemy tunnels and rocket launch sites, and using air power to eliminate snipers.
No doubt that every nation has a right to be recognized and to defend themselves (except for those who are committed to deny the right for everyone else to exist, or those who commit egregious crimes against people and planet).
I think "re-education centers and/or concentration camps" are not something most people would embrace -especially for disrupting "tranquility" or "disturbing the peace." The First Amendment of the Constitution enshrines such rights (although I know far too many people don't realize there are amendments preceding and subsequent to the Second.
And I'd have to disagree with killing masses of innocent people to get to a handful of extremists is a reasonable response. It is antithetical to international law and fundamental human rights.
Remember George that the vast majority if not all Hamas are the "children" of Gazans, many of them still under the age of 20, so that extends into parents, siblings, aunts and uncles, cousins, neighbourhoods.... think of how many Gazans are hostile to Israel, both in its military occupation and confinement policies, and of course (no surprise) Israel's right to exist. They are the direct descendents of the Catastrophe. I would think it's an almost pointless exercise trying to distinguish between "Hamas extremists" and the larger, "civilian" population.
You do raise an important point Frank, yet I do have hope that fundamentally all people want safety, security, and a desire for a better life for the next and future generations, as opposed to perpetual war, suffering, and horrific violence. And a spark born from that desire yields a fragile yet strengthening peace predicated upon reason.
Agreed... I do hope that human societies, organized it states or whatever, find more collaborative means to manage their affairs. Much as members go on about "capitalist greed" here, trade and the exchange of goods and services is likely the best way to go, depending on the "terms" of course! I'm guardedly hopeful that is where humanity is headed, however fitfully and inequitably. I suspect survival is the more visceral base than "reason". After all, minor counterpoint, reason as technical know-how invented the machine-gun, stand in for the enormous and now very expensive panoply of weaponry in this world. On the side, don't you think it odd that political discourse has been shaping up China as America's "main enemy", the country with whom USA has immense economic and financial ties?
Thanks Frank -and yes, it is clear through nearly every section of the 900+ pages of the Heritage toxic Project 2025 that China is “The Enemy”. I know the right-wing always loves an enemy to bolster military spending. Nevertheless we seem much closer to conflict with Russia due to the criminal Putin. Although China certainly has a disconcerting interest in Taiwan.
Not surprised you'd assume I endorse concentration camps. What I am saying is don't fall for the Dunning Kruger Effect. Don't confuse the determination of fools and fanatics with credibility of their position. Hamas, Iran and the protesters can't believe anyone would protect Jews who they believe god abandoned and will therefore bestow a reward in heaven for exterminating them. But I agree only those who teach and lead this ideology should be punished. I and Israel morn each death much more than Hamas does. Tent camps are being built as we speak to afford all those that want to leave Rafa to do so.
You remind me so much of my old aunty that insisted until her last breath that the concentration camps in Germany never really existed, that it would have been impossible to burn so many people, that it's all just propaganda to make the poor, poor Germans look bad.
Some people just can't be helped. They die ignorant.
Do a google search for "tent camps in gaza" -> images. Hundreds of images. See any pictures with mountains of dead Gazans waiting to be burned like in Auschwitz? Each time you believe something known to be false, you lose the capacity for reason. We still love you, just don't expect us to accept your judgement on things like war.
I do believe the Nazi propaganda film where the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem HAJJ AMIN AL-HUSAYNI MEETS HITLER and ”The Führer stated that Germany would not intervene in internal Arab matters and that the only German “goal at that time would be the annihilation of Jewry living in Arab space under the protection of British power.”
About the campus protests, I too object to the U.S. financed bombing of innocent Palestinians who were not responsible for the attack on Israel. The activists objecting to this bombing need to understand that, when their actions go beyond peaceful protests, they commit the same crime by undermining our college students who are not responsible for the bombing of the Palestinians.
I support the protestors right to make their voices heard; I just wish I didn't believe they were being manipulated to undermine Biden. What's happening in Gaza is definitely a humanitarian crisis. But, the answer is not just to abandon Israel. Getting aid to Gaza and not letting Bibi have free reign are the best that the American President can hope to accomplish.
The big issue is, of course, November; by all means get their message out there, but don't forget that things can get worse. It really doesn't matter if someone hates Biden on a single issue; there is far more at stake. But, if you just can't get past Gaza, remember this: Trump fully supports Bibi and things will get far worse for the people you say you care about.
It is not a humanitarian crisis. It is genocide, and Biden gladly supplies the weapons used. No one is manipulating the students and others. It is Biden who is prepared to lose Michigan, a large chuck of the youth and black vote and hand the nation to Trump for Likud Israel's sake.
Don't harass us and tell use we must vote blue no matter who. Harass Biden and the Democratic leadership. Tell them in no uncertain terms they are on a path to destroy themselves and the nation and must change course.
Biden's hands are tired. He can't just ignore decades of U.S. policy and abandon an ally. Saying he's doing it gladly is just hyperbole. Few, if any, Presidents could do better; many would do worse.
If you think I'm harassing you, you're missing the point. I never said you had to vote blue. All I would ask is that you consider the impact of your vote or lack thereof. If you feel that Trump would handle Israel better, then by all means vote accordingly.
How are Biden's hands tied? He is deliberately ignoring standing US law that should halt all aid to Israel. 22 USC 2034. He is deliberately breaking US law to support Israel.
I have considered the consequences of Trump winning. I may vote for the mother fucker Biden in November but I want him to sweat blood and shit nails from now until then unless he reverses course. He completely cancels every good thing he's done by these acts, so spare me the repetition of what good Biden has done. I'm aware of it.
I also sense an invisible hand of foreign intelligence at work in these demonstrations as well as the apparent Republican strategy to politicize them. Biden's response has been spot-on perfect. Russia and Iran are likely pleased by the chaos they have generated first by encouraging Hamas to sacrifice the Palistinian residents of Gaza with a massacre of innocent Israelis, and now with the protests ignoring the complexity of the situation and the Republicans attacking specifically the women who lead these major universities.
Who do you think is manipulating these students? Have you spoken with them, visited their encampments, read their statements? Can you provide any links to evidence of their manipulation?
I think that as the arrest records filter out it will become more clear. One account I read of the Columbia arrests was that quite a few were simply agitator/anarchists determined to push their social media standing. They’d been on LE radar for some time. More will be revealed I’m guessing in the coming week.
I'm just going with a gut feeling knowing how much foreign interference there was in the last election. I make no pretense that my suspicions have any weight to them beyond that. I'd be more than happy to listen to any inside information that you are willing to share.
Well Kevin I'm not sure what you might accept as information (or which foreign government you might suspect of deluding the students) but I'll try! I'm familiar with college students and grad students as I've taught them in eight institutions over 45 years in the profession, plus been a campus visitor in many more (here and abroad), sometimes in periods of high stress like this one. I've twice visited the MIT encampment, and have contacts in the Columbia and Barnard ones (I used to teach at Columbia). I was close to many students in the Brandeis Jewish Voice for Peace chapter before it was forced to close, and attended a wonderful (and delicious) seder they organized with Palestinian students on campus. I know the level of information common among campus activists in this riskiest/touchiest of movements--no one would join it for fun, though there was nice Arab dancing at the MIT encampment today, and collective singing, in Hebrew, of the verse from Isaiah 2: 4, set to music by many great composers: "Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more."
Most of the student leaders have studied the situation, its history, settler colonialism generally. Some are from Israel, some from Gaza, many are American Jews, some participants are from the Caribbean, Africa, India, former Russian "satellite" states--parts of the world that have been through crises of occupation, settler colonialism and independence struggles more recently than the US--and tend to be interested in and informed about it naturally. And at MIT and other schools where some research is funded by the Israeli military, activist students know quite a bit about university finances and endowment holdings. By and large a university is a place for intellectual ferment, discussion, debate, research: knowledge is prioritized, mouthing off in ignorance stigmatized. If you visit an encampment--where people welcome discussion of topics relevant to this bad situation--you'll find yourself in conversation with thoughtful people, sophisticated about political organizing. Why would America's brightest young people be easy to manipulate? Professors are there too. Why would people whose business is finding out and knowing, trained as skeptics, daily taught and/or teaching that unsubstantiated claims are worthless, be easy to manipulate? I think the ignorance and naivete of university students and their faculty supporters needs to be proven rather than taken for granted.
Many of these same students have been active in registering voters and getting the vote in swing states for the Democrats over the last 5 national elections. I'm sorry that President Biden chose to denigrate them in his remarks yesterday.
Thank you for sharing your perspective. I understand your concerns and why you would want to stand up for the students. I may not have your years in academia, but I am a former grad student. I do respect the students and, like I said, believe they should make their voices heard.
Unfortunately, given the black and white presentation of a complex issue and the hatred for Biden who is between a rock and hard place, I do think it's only fair to raise the issue of outside manipulation. But that's it; I have no intention of pursuing the point. More importantly, I'm not going to use my suspicions to question the sincerity of the protestors or undermine the validity of the protests.
Kevin I talked too much! I could more simply have said that few of the students involved have a black and white notion of this agonizingly complex mess. They do have, as do I, a sense that genocide or even ethnocide is under way (some generals and officials have been explicit), however complex the causes, which is no better for Israelis in the long run than for Palestinians. And that our government is enabling and funding that, and research in many of our universities supporting that.
Who is funding these protests? Where did all of the tents come from overnight? All the same as though they were all ordered at the same time. This isn’t rocket science!
I have brought them food and supplies. if they ask for tents I would buy them tents. I would bring them pallets and zip ties to build the barricades. because they are right. it's time to start calling them encampments by the way. we need to start calling them settlements.
You would but they have tons of new tents that all came overnight. Did you see any solicitations for funds for that? I didn’t. And they aren’t right because they are supporting Hamas and Iran. I support Israel and the Palestinians. But Hamas has no intention of achieving peace. They don’t care about the Palestinians. If you want proof ask me…but your mind has to be open.
?? My tent cost $89, and you can get them for less--if you need one, most kids have one. The kids are making their own food (and serving it to visitors) where they have electricity, as they often do in their dorms, and others drop off supplies in solidarity. They make their signs and posters on pieces of cardboard boxes, with magic markers. So, not an expensive Conspiracy.
So interesting that these “students” —many of which were not students at all — are so loudly protesting about what is happening in Gaza but never said a word about the atrocities committed against Ukrainians. Just as in Israel Ukrainian women, children and men were raped, slaughtered, children killed and kidnapped… and yet there were no calls from students to stop the slaughter or for a Russian ceasefire. Why?
Because this entire middle eastern crisis was planned and manufactured to take our eyes off of Ukraine, destroy America and make billions for a few. They manipulated social media and young people to win an election and made the people of Gaza collateral damage. They did not care about the people of Gaza — only about winning.
I don’t know how Elise Stefanik, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Kristi Noem, Trump, Putin or any of these sick, evil people sleep at night without a care about all of the damage they have done and continue to do.
If students want to demonstrate against anything it should be the forces hijacking their future. The Heritage Foundation, The Federalist Society, the Supreme Court, the MAGA cult and the sociopaths in the GOP.
Power and greed are destroying humanity as we speak. We are at war for democracy. And we all need the be soldiers before it’s too late.
DMS, why would students demonstrate in the case of Ukraine, when their country and for that matter their universities are soberly aligned with them and all humanitarians to act in support of the victims of violence? Most people, including students (and excluding MAGA Republicans), approve of US support of Ukraine, invaded by a hostile power careless of civilian harm—though Russia had not destroyed its cities or killed mostly civilians.
These students, a great many of them Jewish, are protesting the use of their tax dollars in a campaign the World Court has called plausibly genocidal, and their universities’ investments in the war machines that enable the forced displacement and slaughter of a people.
They didn’t destroy their cities? Ukraine wasn’t genocidal? Do you really believe that students who mostly have never paid taxes are only about tax dollar funding? Propaganda is so powerful it has even convinced you of the narrative they want you to believe. Yes… what is happening to the people in Gaza is a war crime. Yes… the adults in the room are holding the administration accountable… and… helping to push the power hungry middle eastern MAGA out of office. Just as not all Gazans are evil nor are all Israelis. Neither should be at the mercy of greedy, power-hungry leaders who use their people as shields.
Your concept of students seems based on the sensationalism of the press. I have taught in colleges and universities for 45 years and my thoughts about them are different. The situation in Gaza and in the West Bank (where 1000+ have been murdered since Oct 7) is complicated—as you say, and as the wide variety of perspectives among protesting students actually attests. But the people of the world agree, including all but one of my Israeli friends, that going on 35,000 mostly civilian deaths and 100s of 1000s of injuries —many necessitating amputations without anesthesia, anesthetics, or even clean water—not to mention famine, is disproportionate. Young people live close to their conscience and we weary, cynical adults are tempted to call their moral vision “oversimplified.” I know you and I don’t disagree on the basics of this ghastly situation, but I want to put in a word for the students. Those I have talked to are thoughtful, informed and serious. (And a great many of them are Jewish, pace Mss Stefanie and Foxx.)
They don’t sleep, or if they do, even in their dreams concoct the next vile, evil, sick event. Every freakin day I keep trying to figure out how we got this far. Intelligent people are ignoring them. Too many people are saying they won’t vote for either TFG (too crazy) or Biden (too old) , they’ll find someone to write in. They are going to kill this country as we know it. I don’t sleep either.
Could not have said it better! This entire ordeal is being orchestrated, by the usual suspects, with no true media to expose the truth. Wake up, folks; those cited by DMS have been at this for quite some time, and they think they've found the goal line.
Exactly! There should be peaceful protests everywhere against Putin’s vile atrocities against Ukrainians and the Heritage Foundation/Federalist Society/unjust Supreme Court/MAGA cult leaders (the combined true origins of American dysfunction and threats to democracy) while at the same time recognizing that protesting against the Hamas Oct 7th attack and against Israeli attacks against peaceful Palestinians are not mutually exclusive, neither have any place in a civilized world.
"I don’t know how Elise Stefanik, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Kristi Noem, Trump, Putin or any of these sick, evil people sleep at night without a care about all of the damage they have done and continue to do."
Not in my experience as a crime writer and newspaper reporter, G.P. Psycho- and sociopaths sleep quite well, not haunted by demons, because they truly believe the story they tell themselves about being the hero of their lives. That is a demon to the rest of us, but not for them.
Heather…as always thanks for your input….this time a. ‘review’ of the demonstration scene. I find myself torn in my response…the October 6th debacle was quite clearly a ‘crime against humanity’ and was hugely threatening to the stability of state of Israel….and the Netanyahu initial response was very understandable and Biden’s very vocal support..also understandable….and if the last 6 months had fallen within the parameters of the Geneva Convention protocols…I would not be writing this.
But very very painfully clearly the Geneva Conventions, particularly the many subsets of the fourth Convention (protection of non combatants) have been violated to the point that The Hague is looking at naming Netanyahu a criminal and his behavior a crime against humanity…34,000 dead Palestinian women and children and another hundred thousand severely wounded, 2 million Palestinians totally marginalized and verging on starvation..about 1 million in Rafah soon to be most likely bombed to smithereans and the country an essential rock pile.
And my tax dollars are supporting this ‘venture.’ Before this phenomenon I’d have said I was ‘pro-Israeli’ ….now I can’t say that.
And I have far more sympathy for the Palestinian people than I had 6 months ago and I think our country needs to seriously consider our financing of this crime against humanity…there have been two the Initial Hamas behavior AND the subsequent Israeli ‘response’.
Thank you Heather Cox Richardson. The Republicans on the search for a way to maintain their power have corrupted the efforts of the student protesters by making it their own. And the fact that foreign powers use it as well is of concern. Biden did well to establish the positive direction we must support. You continue to help us see the light in your Letters. Again, thank you.
The Trumplicand are "making it their own" by condemning the protests as part of their campaign against "liberal\Marxist" higher education. The uprising against Biden is the result of his alliance with genocide. I wouldn't ask the Arab-Americans of Michigan to vote for Biden than I would ask Jewish-Americs to vote for an open neo-Nazi fan of Hitler. Likud Israel has stepped as far outside the pale of civilized society as Nazi Germany.
Today's student protests are different from those of my youth when we were against U.S. policy. These students are protesting against the investment policies of their universities. They see the hypocrisy of schools that teach equity and justice yet support war with their financial policies. In the past, schools have changed their strategies to disinvest from apartheid and oil and gas companies without losing money and shirking their roles as fiduciaries of their endowments. When schools like Brown and Wesleyan agreed to meet with students and then to vote on where they invest their money, there was no need to think about calling in the riot police. We all need to see that decision-makers listen to us, that our voices have power, that our colleges and universities practice what they teach.
They are also protesting against the use of their tax dollars to pay for the weaponry with which our President and now our Congress have been enabling the slaughter.
It's not necessarily one thing or the other, but my sense is that those who voted some version of "uncommitted" in the Democratic primaries were protesting against the government's involvement in the war, but that the students were frequently protesting against their school's funding of entities that were contributing to Netanyahu's war.
Yes, precisely. But they're aware also that beyond their address to the administrations and trustees of their universities lies a nation that has had little access to education about Gaza's awful and worsening situation over the last 76 years, and that the press reactions to their encampments, however biased, will bring (and have brought) attention to a wider array of facts and views. Which could have an effect in Congress and above all on the President.
I worry that what we are witnessing on campuses today is a result of influence by bad actors with other agendas than “Saving Palestine”. Social Media is a poisonous snake that lies in wait for the opportunity to strike. Small nips and jabs like the House impeachment efforts have never reached beyond the true believers, but this divide will potentially give Trump the election, and then we can kiss it all goodbye. Americans have hated Biden’s international policy the most, when in fact his administration has reset the strength-through-coalition that the US applies to reinforce its strength. Trump wants to stoke fear and hatred to promote isolationism, and reset the MAGA standard of a strongman nation only willing to negotiate with other strongmen. It’s working.
These protests engage Heather -- good, as they engage other things vital to us all.
Universities differed long ago, as when I entered the University of Michigan in 1965. Harlan Hatcher was its president back then.
As both a zoologist and novelist, he typified American higher education. All during its rise, from the Justin Morrill land grant legislation in 1862 to the Powell memo in 1971, all university presidents were writers, scholars.
The Powell memo changed all that. Money and the billionaire classes took over. So university presidents have long been bereft of any humanities.
And now the protests – American university youth protest U.S. taxpayers having to pay for the mass murder, destruction, and starvation in Gaza, and for arming Israel so far-right settlers further occupy West Bank land and murder Palestinians there.
As American novels, histories, memoirs, and other humanities no longer center any university, the dehumanized presidents have no imagination other than that of the billionaire classes they serve. Helplessly they but have militarily-armed police beat their students and arrest them.
I was at the University of Michigan from 1968-72. The protests there made me evolve from a sheltered suburban girl to someone much more aware and politically active. My parents were old school (aka not crazy) Republicans but from 1968 on I have been a Democrat. Some of the demonstrations were incredibly moving -- such as when dozens and dozens and dozens of white crosses were planted in the grass around the Diag (a diagonal path that ran through campus - one for each Michigan soldier killed in Vietnam. I've never forgotten it.
Back at MSU in 1971 after my USMC stint, I was one of the lucky ones who actually took advantage of the GI Bill. Kent State was still a raw wound: I had watched on AFVN from Phu Bai as National Guard troops violated every rule in the DoD manual I had used to teach riot control to my Marine company in my previous duty post. Murder by stupidity, but murder nonetheless. Now I hear some Republicans calling for the Guard to be brought in for these protests: a bigger mistake I can't imagine.
I was at Michigan State University from '69 through 73" and participated in the demonstrations opposing the war in Vietnam. My parents were old world pacifists and socialists who supported my stance. It was painful to watch the tv images of what we were doing in a country where we had no business being and demonstrating against it seemed to be the only honorable thing to do. I also went to DC and joined the marches there. I like to think we played some part in shortening the war. And then, of course, there was Kent State.
My time at UNC Chapel Hill in the 60’s was similar. My whole family was aghast that my parents would allow me to attend such a radical institution when women should attend the Women’s College in Greensboro or, shudder, UNC State.
Placing it in time, Bob Dylan sang "Only a Pawn in Their Game at the march on Washington in 1963 -- I just went to the lyrics and then to a video watching it. I saw a profound mix of facial expressions, explained by civil rights activist Bernice Johnson who noted “Pawn” as the first song that showed “the poor white was as victimized by discrimination as the poor black". Manipulations are playing out within social/political structures everywhere — and are counterbalanced by tendencies to flock in more homogeneous assemblies while it’s nearly impossible to escape being a pawn in someone’s game. Bob Dylan’s lyrics to "Only A Pawn In Their Game" amaze me again today in the light of these times.
Yes, Joan, the music (such as you mention) was vital then for waking up many.
And in proportion to its vitality, Louis Powell and his corporate cohorts got determined to extirpate as many humanities as they could from all college life.
And, wow, did they succeed. Except many youth today somehow on their own have come rather to dislike the ease by which our billionaires and corporate classes just launch and condone unjust war. (Their allies include Putin and his oligarchs, and their Ukraine barbarism, on similar barbarism scale as Netanyahu and his far-right settlers continually seizing more of the West Bank.)
I was at U of M from 1979-1983 and lived in Ann Arbor from 1988-1990; my husband was there from 1977-1990 (including his post-doc). Things were very different then from what you all experienced. There *were* a few demonstrations, most of which concerned divesting from apartheid South Africa. But not many, and not one single day of my time at university was disrupted by anything except the Hash Bash. The most was people with clipboards asking for signatures on petitions as you entered the UGLI.
Anti Semitism is being used as a first phase against free speech and protecting individual rights. They are rolling out the Fascist red carpet. The white christian nationalists are penetrating our educational institutions and campuses : the petri dish for free thought, education, democracy and expression. How sad. There must be some pretty strong lobbyists supporting Stefanik and others. And yet another Putin / Netanyahu tactic to weaken Biden.
Shades of 1968 indeed! Interchange a few words in the news reporting and it's deja view all over again.
I think Congress has no right to dictate how universities should be run or to pressure presidents to resign, any more than say, they can pressure a corporation. What they can do is threaten to cut off the spigot of federal money flowing into most universities, especially the Ivy League.
Also, if Freedom of Speech does not protect speech that threatens, intimidates, or coerces individuals, doesn't that also hold with the former president intimidating jurors, witnesses, and court personnel?
Going to university used to mean you were going to pursue the understanding of humanity as seen by the old guard to develop your personal understanding from which humanity progressed. Today, their purpose is more focused on improving your financial future. Our thoughtful legislature is more interested in using whatever target they can use to project their vitriol rather than investigate issues and lead efforts towards a reasoned response.
We no longer have the subtlety for a reasonable debate on any topic much less a profound one on the limits of the Freedom of Speech. We need to remember the goals of enumerating such a freedom. I think it was called into life to protect the powerless from the powerful not to allow a person to spew a lie into the public discourse without response nor to allow "fighting words" and or aggressive physical actions to cower someone you disagree with.
"Congress will not tolerate your dereliction of duty to your Jewish students ..." Many Republicans must be more than bemused by this statement from the leaders of the Committee. After all, no Republican politician and certainly few ordinary Republicans have given notable philosophical or material aid to American Jews or the State of Israel. And not to beat a dead horse, antisemitism is rampant in the Republican party. And particularly in its more deeply Fascist violent gangs.
Well, Israel ruthlessly and cold-bloodedly killing tens of thousands of civilians, mainly unarmed women and children, injuring even more may increase anti-Semitic feelings world-wide - who would have thought? Interesting that the mental condition of the Jewish diaspora seems to be much more relevant than the condition of the Palestinians, seems a bit like somebody sitting at the bedside of a brain-aneurism patient complaining about the paper cut they got this morning.
"Israel ruthlessly and cold-bloodedly killing . . ."
Really? What is your battle plan for destroying Hamas while not injuring non-combatants in Gaza? Please lay out how Israel should conduct this war so we may all learn your kinder and gentler way of destroying terrorists who just murdered 1,500 of your citizens. You don't get to say "Just don't kill innocents!" You have to tell us how your war would differ from current.
Antisemitic attacks on Jews in the United States are not "paper cuts." If you think otherwise, put on traditional Jewish garb and go strolling. You'd be lucky to come out with only paper cuts. Yes, Gaza has an aneurism. But that aneurism was caused by Hamas and those who support it, not Israel, which was doubling the number of permits for Gazans to work in Israel last October (i.e., expanding good relations) when Hamas decided the mass-murder of Jews would be good sport.
I found an old button from my days in college (class of ‘70) that reads “War is not the answer”
I still believe that, but will admit I still don’t know what the answer is.
I do know that accepting war as the answer leads to continuing the invention and manufacture of ever more expensive and deadly weapons. And I know that sending those weapons to those who accept the premise of war as the answer has never worked to settle differences.
War always and only results in lost lives, damaged people, and massive destruction of habitat and environment.
Can it really be that there is no alternative to violence? Can violence ever lead to peace?
I wholeheartedly agree with you in the abstract, Victor: War is the worst of all options if you have any others you can choose. That said, humanity loves war. If it didn't, there wouldn't be at least one on the planet any given day of any given year. We are hard-wired to war and conflict, it seems. The other is that most wars are avoidable but some aren't. Israel-Hamas is the latter. All Hamas had to do to avoid all this was not murder Israelis. But it did, and now Israel will finish this fight it didn't start. I find this war sad because of the number of innocent deaths on both sides, but not immoral because Israel has no choice but to fight it.
You still want to start the whole Hamas shtick? You want to tell me you have to starve thousands of children, cut off water, cut off electricity, destroy the entire medical system, destroy practically all housing, destroy all universities and schools, throw rockets and children playgrounds, force women giving birth - including caesareans - without anaesthetics, because you can't find Hamas? Which, by the way, is still not and will not be beaten by the most moral army in the world. How bloody incompetent is this most moral army in the world? Let Putin have a go - he managed to kill "only" 10,000 civilians so far, about 500 of them children.
But let's not play this silly game - we all know the Gaza war has nothing to do with Hamas or hostages - the Gaza war is about Israel "cleansing" Gaza (and later the Westbank, they seem to have already started) from Palestinians, also called genocide, or massmurder, or lots and lots and lots of killing, if you prefer. The reason I know that is that I listen to Israeli politicians and the Israeli parliament. There they tell you on a daily basis, you just have to listen.
My guess is that the powers to be are hanging in the rafters, waiting for the when they'll give Bibi the boot, they will then say "He was the war criminal, bad, bad Bibi. Well, he's gone now, nothing to see here, lets just all move on" And the West - or what's left of it - will lap it up 😂😂😂, the rest of the world probably not so much.
Israel will probably never be held accountable - which will be just another little step to help the US on the way down from the superpower throne.
So far the governments in the West still toe the US/Israeli set line - the populations world-wide may just teach them better. And no industrial-military-complex dick swinging will be able to control that.
'Russia, China, and Iran are amplifying the protests “to score geopolitical points abroad and stoke tensions within the United States,” as well as to “undermine President Biden’s reelection prospects.” '
This, very much this. If Hamas had not attacked when it did, it seems very likely to me that Netanyahu would have been forced to call for elections, and a saner coalition would not have responded as, er, spectacularly to an attack. Their timing, then was driven by the desire to elicit the response that Netanyahu would give. Netanyahu, for his part, seems to want to be part of the Putin-Orban-Trump club and I wouldn't put it past him to be using the war to get himself there. Hurting Biden is certainly a goal of his, and I have seen, even in this forum, attempts to undermine Biden derived from this. When this is all over, it is my hope that Israel will dust off Eichmann's old glass box for Netanyahu's trial.
As for the protests - it seems obvious to me that many of them are young idealists being manipulated by old cynics.
I am glad that we finally got the supplemental aid bill passed. Funding is leverage, and only now that it is available can Biden is it as a diplomatic tool in dealing with Bibi.
But Bibi seems to be part of the club to undermine democracy. That Israel should have such a prime minister is a horror to me. I had hoped, before the attack, that the Israeli people would have seized him and thrown him in the Jordan. But then Jordan would have had to pursue a case against Israel for dumping toxic waste in shared waters.
Yes… and isn’t it also interesting that this very well planned attack—with printed instructions ! —happened to take place on Putin’s birthday no less. 🧐
I remember protests in the 60’s and the 70’s. Why is no one harnessing all that good student energy toward a productive purpose? Raising money to feed Gaza? Raising money for Gazans left homeless and destitute? Agitating for elections to replace Hamas with some sensible leaders for Gaza? Agitating for elections to replace Netanyahu with some sensible leaders for Israel? Getting lost in the weeds of anti-Palestinian/anti-Semitic displays against college campus administrators is just giving the fundamentalist wing of the Republican Party more excuses to waste tax-payer money throwing monkey wrenches into the wheels of the Biden administration. Ugh.
I sound like a crazy conspiracy theorist and I know it. But I think both Hamas’ attack on Israel and the student protests were/are designed and timed specifically to lessen Biden’s chance of re-election, to take our eyes off Ukraine, and to weaken American generally. I do not believe these protests are organic. When I see matching pricy tents or lots of catering, I wonder who is paying for that. I do think the students are sincere, but when I hear them speak, I also think they’re naive and ignorant of the incredibly complex and fraught history of that part of the world. And the anti-semitism is unconscionable.
Sabine, I am more than aware, particularly as my father was German and my husband is Italian, and I have lived outside of the US. But to pretend that what happens here electorally doesn’t affect the rest of the world is naive. And to think that Putin doesn’t have the motivation is worse than naive.
This is not at all like 1-6. It is unruly, violent, and wrongheaded, but these twerps are not trying to overturn an election. They are not trying to hang the vice president and kill congressional democrats. They are trying and generally failing to push their universities around and bully them over Israel.
The protests are also not at all like ours in the 1960s and early 70s. We were protesting a war that our country was actively engaged in. It was killing our brothers, lovers, and husbands. And over something that was no real threat to our country. The Vietcong were not chanting "death to America" and trying to export communism, no matter what McNamara. And in the end we WON--because we had skin in the game. Too many American families were impacted.
In contrast--these demonstrations cherry pick the outrage, and the fact that it is Gaza they care about and Israel they demonize speaks volumes in a world full of potential grievances. It is NOT OUR WAR. No matter what any particular American believes, we have nothing with any teeth to say about it. And terrorizing American Jews is blatant antisemitism. No matter what their excuse might be.
But we must also see who benefits. The Vietnamese had no intention of exporting communism to the United States. But the :Global Infatida" crowd means it when they chant "Death to America". And now they are teaching our "best and brightest" to chant it too, against their own country, as they sit in privilege at our finest institutions of higher learning. The fact that it is a cause celebre excuses neither the ignorance nor the bad behavior.
War anywhere draws energy and resources away from solving important problems humans face. Do you want a world where violence is used to obtain goals rather than finding solutions that though not optimal are at least workable? Small nongovernmental groups are at a distinct disadvantage when dealing with a sovereign nation, even a small one.
The issues we face were understood long ago. First it gave birth to the League of Nations which failed because of it's structure. Then came the United Nations. It has failed because of it's structure. The less powerful were to be protected by the Charter which the powerful also had to sign. But one flaw was the powerful were busy misleading the powerless. A signature didn't carry weight between a sovereign nation's internal political changes.
Ukraine has been modern example of that failure. Now, the stateless Palestinians are too. It is globalism versus isolationism as well. The Pacific and Atlantic Oceans no longer provide protection from nation state attacks or even business and tourist activities spreading deadly disease. Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) has been recognized as a mental illness.
We need to honor our commitments to the world and understand that our success depends on everyone's efforts. We are one family, one earth, and one future.
I'm not referring to just this conflict. The permanent members of the Security Council bear responsibility both for stabilizing and unfortunately destabilizing the member nations.
Also, there is no obligation to provide citizens from member countries to implement the resolutions of the UN removing the teeth from any resolution. What nation(s) would go into Gaza and protect Palestinians from the military decisions of Hamas or Israel? Who would enforce the ceasefire? Who would implement the decisions or the IRC and the ICC? Who would be the independent investigator? Who would protect the journalist and aid workers? Who would police the Black Market,?
I’m Jewish. I’ve seen a lot of antisemitism in my life. I’m now watching Israel destroy what took it and its allies years to build in the Middle East. If anyone is stoking antisemitism it is Israel and its supporters. It’s hard to love a country that has killed 35,000 plus Palestinian civilians in retaliation for the admittedly horrible Hamas attack that killed 1,200 plus Israelis. That’s 70,000+ Palestinian eyes for 2,400+ Israeli eyes. Hardly fair by biblical standards. The well funded repression of protest against Israeli Zionism in the name of fighting antisemitism has to stop. There will be no peace in the world until all hypocritical self interest, whether from the left, right or middle, ends. Based on my 82 years living in a cesspool of hypocrisy I don’t expect I’ll see peace in my time. I do, however, wish all younger than me good luck in taming the forces of naïveté and evil that seem to rule, especially in times of chaotic trauma like these.
thank you. well said. One can be anti the horrific war in Gaza without being antisemitic. And simultaneously be horrified by what Hamas did on Oct. 7th. The right's portrayal of this as binary - If you're anti-the-war you must also be antisemitic / if you are pro-Israel you must be in favor of killing Palestinians - is ridiculous and shallow and clouds the deeper, more complicated history and makes it easier for people to yell at each other and feel self-righteous.
It's just plain lazy to take an either/or position, ie. either you're antisemitic if you oppose Israel's over the top response to Hama's attack or you're anti-Palestinian if you support Israel's right to defend itself. When we take sides on this issue, we're just mirroring what the combatants are doing, that is demonizing one side or the other. Would that the world would pressure both sides to stop killing each other. I wonder if there will ever be a time when people stop using their religion (my god is better than your god) to justify slaughtering those who don't share their beliefs.
Thank you! "Lazy politics" is a perfect description.
The complexity of the situation in the Middle East is lost on many of the students and certainly those who cluelessly blame Biden for the Gaza conflagration.
Can we agree that Israel deserves to exist without threat?
That Israel's founding, while appropriate, displaced others indigenous to the region.
That October 7th was a vicious slaughter of innocents.
That the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent Gazans is an over reaction.
That Hamas is using their own children as shields.
That Israel has blocked humanitarian aid and killed aid providers.
That Hamas is pledged to the elimination of Jews.
That the Nakba in 1948 has never been properly addressed.
That Israel is threatened daily by the proxies of Iran who lob missiles at Israeli citizens with regularity.
That Iran is aligned with Putin who has been a constant pot stirrer in the region to keep our attention away from his atrocities in Ukraine.
My hope is that Israel calls for early elections and Netanyahu finds himself in prison. That he is charged with war crimes.
But for Biden and America to withhold military support for the defense of Israel from Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis is to sacrifice the greater peace and security of the region. It would be a gift to the religious extremist terrorists that rule Iran and want Israel destroyed. Repeat after me. Iran wants Israel gone.
And zoom out further, please. Gaza was once administered by Egypt. Why do you think Egypt has not opened the border to Gaza enough to allow Palestinians to rush to safety? Because Egypt considers Hamas to be a terrorist group. Egypt doesn't want the Palestinians because they are a threat.
We (including the students) should draw back from our armchair criticism of a president who is doing the very best he can to thread the needle of a very complex dynamic.
And please! While we are considering the "big picture", what is the alternative to the careful diplomacy that this administration has been working at 24/7? Does anyone think that "Mr. Muslim Ban" who doesn't want immigration from "shit hole countries" is a good alternative?
Here is the big picture. The choice is binary. Biden or a madman/dictator who will launch Project 2025 and ensure that women are treated as they were 150 years ago - or worse.
Where are the campus protests for women's reproductive rights? Where are the protests for the slowest road to justice we've ever seen - The Insurrection happened in 2021! Top secret documents were stolen and there is no trial date yet! Why aren't students upset about that?
And where are the protests to restore voting rights and get big dark money out of politics? Our democracy is crumbling.
The few who are super wealthy are accumulating trillions and trillions and students have loans that will last for decades. Where are the demonstrations about that? Women can't fully participate in the workforce because child care is so outrageously expensive - if available. I hear crickets.
The list of injustices perpetrated on Americans is long. And President Joseph Biden has been attempting (with some success) to address it. And yet, he can't get the support of many because of the deeds of a leader of a country halfway around the world?
This is indeed lazy. This is lunacy.
Excellent post, Bill. I wish I could "like" it a thousand times.
Can you put your post in the form of a letter to the editor of one of the major newspapers? It deserves to be widely read and shared.
Bill: Yes, but. Israel’s founding led to the displacement of Palestinians because extremists among the Palestinians began violence against Jews in the 1920s. Jews who came to their ancestral homeland after the founding of modern Zionism in 1896 bought land from its owners, often absentee Turkish landlords. How else were they to get land? There may well have been some displacement of Palestinian tenants, but there was a great influx of Muslims into the area at the same time—drawn by development and opportunities largely spurred by the Jewish settlers. In 1947, the UN proposed a partion of the land into what became Israel and Palestine. Jewish leaders accepted that, although geographically it would have been very difficult to survive. The Arabs rejected partition and six (I think) Arab nations tried to eliminate the nascent Jewish state. Not for the last time, they paid for their mistake. I hold no brief for the present Israeli regime, and I hope it is replaced by a much better one at the first instance, but the whole situation is unimaginably complex, and judgments are all going to be flawed.
Thanks for adding this history. I wonder what percentage of the angry ones are interested. I certainly am.
I have often wondered what would have happened if "Israel" had been created as a nonsectarian, not religious based sanctuary for all who desired to live there. A place where democracy and tolerance could thrive.
My wife has family in Israel. Her cousin has made a career of finding common ground for Jewish and Arab kids. Teaching about each others cultures.
Israel is a place of religious tolerance. It is a Jewish state (the UK, France and Italy, among others, are explicitly Christian states), because Jews never found a place where they were truly at home. I used to say that the United States is a homeland for Jews, but in the past few months I have been a lot less sure of that. In any event, as you probably know, 20 percent of Israel's population is Arab (Muslim or Christian, also Druse) and they serve in Parliament and, in some instances, in the IDF. Ironically, given that we lawyers are said to be Jews who can't stand the sight of blood, a very large proportion of the doctors in Israeli hospitals are Arabs.
Your long main comment is wonderful, Bill. And Jon Margolis is spot on. Please remember that Israel is a secular democracy. Its enemies are theocratic religious extremists. The fact that Israel is a "Jewish state" is not simply a function of religion; many many Jews past and present are atheists or non-believers whose highest values include tolerance, peaceful co-existence, and democracy (although tolerance cannot be open-ended; tolerance of religious extremism is self-defeating). The "Jewish state" is a result of centuries of murderous scapegoating of Jews the world over, most famously from Spain to Russia. We must not lose sight of the fact that Israel stands almost alone surrounded by mortal enemies. In the 'big picture' that is the problem that is being ignored by ignorant leftist extremists who bow to Chomskian false equivalences.
Bill & Jon, are you able to address women's rights in Palestine? I ask because to me it is something that perhaps many female students protesting in the streets are unaware of. My understanding is women do not have many rights like they do in the U.S. - rights at least granted by our various laws.
Had Israel been created in 1947 as you suggest--a "nonsectarian, not religious based sanctuary for all who desired to live there" --it would have been unique in that area of the world, as most Arab nations had been discriminating against Jewish residents for decades, in some cases violently and reminiscent of the pogroms of Europe, and forcing them out. Unfortunately, Netanyahu in his effort to make Gaza Hamas-free has imitated his enemies by slaughtering innocent non-Hamas residents of Gaza.
I'm reading a very interesting book, Dear Palestine, by Shay Hazkani (an Israeli historian). According to him -- he cites chapter and verse -- the acquisition of the land that became Israel was not quite as benign as the comments here picture it. There was much more than "some displacement" of the locals, amid much violence and destruction of villages by the Israelis. It's true they were fighting 5 Arab countries. The Arab militaries were much weaker in training and materiel than the Israelis. Much of this has been made clear in the writing of historians, both Arab and Israeli. In many ways it's very similar to the takeover of the American lands from the American Indians. I was taught a rather heroic version of the establishment of Israel, and in many ways it was heroic, but it also has a dark side; and the behavior of Israel over the years, settlements, repression of the Palestinians, coddling of Hamas by Netanyahu to prevent a Palestinian state, all of that has been a disgrace. It has been very disappointing to me to learn the fuller picture. Still, Israel exists; it's not going away. People should stop killing each other and work out a livable arrangement. The present one is not livable.
Thanks. My references were to the early part of Zionist settlement. When I was growing up, in the '50s, I was told that Palestinians cleared out to leave a way for Arab armies to sweep in and kill the Jews. Some left out of fear, but you are right that many were displaced forcibly. To my mind, the attacks on the new state made such expulsions understandable and even necessary in a least some cases.
Have you in the online press the massive protests by ISRAELIS against far right Netanyahu. Have you watched and heard Israelis say they want Democracy.. The students have seen that. I'm not a student, but I've seen the protests. The journalists who work for reputable publications, saw those protests.
Brilliant- captures the complexity that seems to be missed by the narratives on both the left and the right.
Really well done Bill, and very much not lazy. It's almost as though you learned something about how to think critically that some of the protestors and most of their media promoters either don't know or are avoiding because it would obviate their actions.
As someone once said to me: "There are three sides to every story. My side, your side and the truth."
The Truth.......I find it hard to believe that Israel did not know anything about this suprise attack. Did I miss something here?
Amen. People rather feel than think. Not helpful!
Bill Even more confusing, I have been known to change my mind.
Thank you! This captures well my own conflicted sentiments on this. I would just add (for myself) - it has been puzzling to me why this issue has seemed to galvanize (a segment of) college students, like nothing else, to protest. My conclusion has been that malign antisemitic (and/or anti-Biden) forces are amplifying and using good faith protesters' legitimate concerns to their own advantage, as HCR's comments also suggest.
Because it's on TV (which doomed the war in Vietnam, thank god), and because Biden's embrace of Netanyahu is so problematic. There's the problem of his wanting to stay in power to avoid jail, of trying to achieve a wildly unpopular court "reform", and of his party's own version of "from the river to the sea" in opposition to longstanding US policy of a two state solution. Sound familiar?
I don't see that Biden has "embraced Netanyahu." He has embraced the democratic state of Israel. Sorta like Biden would never deny aid to red states because they are Trump/MAGA states.
As previously stated in Heather's letter, the United States' monetary contributions to Israel have enabled them to fend off relentless missile strikes from Iran, not necessarily used to bomb Gaza.
YES!!!!!! to all of what you write! Thank you, Bill
And the complexity of the issue of Israel and the Palestinians is demonstrated by this: if the US does not help the nation of Israel - NOT netanyahu and his orcs, but the populace of Israel, regardless of whether they are Jewish or Muslim or Christian or no religion - to defend itself and themselves from Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, etc. - we will be helping Iran. Iran which, thanks to trampler's historic pullout from Obama's 2015 JCPOA, is in the process of "advancing slowly but confidently, accumulating the means for a future [nuclear] weapon while making no overt move to build one." https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/04/10/iran-nuclear-bomb-iaea-fordow/. Does ANYONE want that?
Bill, thank you so much for your clarity.
Bill, this is a brilliant list, thank you for sharing it with us. It's not lazy politics as much as it is cynical politics. Those who exploit the situation do so assuming we're all dim bulbs who don't know the history of the region or the peoples involved.
Shane, unfortunately, many here are "dim bulbs." They are too lazy or ill-informed to try to learn the history of today's dilemmas, and now history is repeating itself.
Excellent nuanced reply to a very complicated situation. The exploitation by the RW community and the accelerants (agitators) on the campuses feed the emotive quality to hate the actions perpetrated on the less fortunate.
It is taught in public policy that if you're hungry and starving and someone puts a gun in your hand - it won't matter the cause if they promise you (even empty promises) of a better future. The "religion of hating others" is exploitive.
Bill I agree with many of the points that you make in your excellent historical overview. However, as someone who wrote a book on Egypt (that Nasser banned), I do not believe that Egypt seeks to prevent Gazans from settling in Egypt because of fear of Hamas.
I visited a large Palestinian refugee camp in Egyptian Gaza in 1953. The refugees were housed in temporary tents. Egypt, with a population of 22 million strongly opposed accepting hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.
Now that Egypt has 100,000,000 citizens in a poor country, its opposition to the intrusion of a million Palestinians is even greater. I do not envisage that sending Palestinians into Egypt will ever be an ‘amelioration’ of the current situation.
To say protesters calling out Israel’s brutality is antisemitism is not only lazy, it is woodenheaded and deliberately misleading.
Palestinians are Semitic. No one in these protests is antisemitic, they are anti-genocide, and anti-Israel.
For the Christian nationalists like Johnson to categorize these protests as antisemitic assumes the USA’s electorate is mighty stupid.
My Southern brother called me in NYC to express his concern that I might be in danger living near the Columbia campus. "I had no idea there was so much anti-Semitism," he said. He watches a lot of Foxx, and I try to be patient, but I did feel the need to tell him that the situation is complex, and many of the protestors were Jewish, and that I was far more concerned about the police presence and the constant noise of helicopters and the drones tethered to unmarked vehicles on the public street beside my apartment. I am extremely grateful that President Biden has rejected calling in the National Guard. Maybe if Columbia's president had not called in the NYC police so quickly, things could have been resolved soon, but Congress is determined to blow this (not the war but demonstrations against it) up into a political cudgel. Can anyone remember another occasion where the Speaker of the House of Representatives visited the campus of a private university to assert himself?
Can we please top line this:
"Can anyone remember another occasion where the Speaker of the House of Representatives visited the campus of a private university to assert himself?"
Political cudgel is accurate and the current gop method.
Beautifully and succinctly stated. I so appreciate your analysis. Thank you, Bill.
This comment is worth sharing
Oh yes. So well articulated. Would that more people could actually comprehend the extent of the complexity in this situation rather than the either/or simplicity that seems to reign.
Bill Alstrom -- !!!
The way someone worships God should not be dictated by how someone else worships God. ie You cannot tell me your way is the only one way to worship God. Nor can I tell you.
That is, or course, one perspective. Another is, that human beings created god(s) not the other way around.
But “God” is impressed. Hahahaha
Which one?
They are all the same. God manifests in many forms.
Then what's the point in "my God is better than your God." I know, but it's so "human," to want to one-up the other guy's God. It's a battle without an actual God winner so it can go on forever. What's not to like.
J. Nol, it may be lazy for most people who are mostly also ignorant of the history of this and won't bother to inform themselves. However, the Rs are making as much hay as they can while being total hypocrites. I was surprised by some of the responses of students at Portland State, who were all for what the protesters were doing. They were both frosh and sounded totally naive. Of the first 12 protesters arrested by Portland police in clearing the library, only 4 were students. Also saw the anarchist symbol as part of the graffiti and the mess the protesters had created inside. I support peaceful protest, but not violence, intimidation, and destruction. Yes, religion is often used to vilify the other, but it is also often used to hide other priorities like conquest, exploitation, etc.
First you have to dehumanize the other, then you can exploit and conquer. Any training of soldiers has to include stamping out empathy, especially for the "other" or the enemy, otherwise those soldiers would have difficulty killing them.
This was a problem in the Civil War when the country was more religious. Soldiers did not want to kill and one case cited in a book about death in the Civil War (title escapes me at the moment)one soldier refused even when threatened with death himself, a southerner.
To answer your "I wonder..." I say not ever, unless there is a drastic change in the "god gene" of people.
J Nol, I , too, wonder if people will ever stop cudgeling others of another (or no) religion. I don’t hold out a lot of hope since it seems that our brains are preprogrammed to fear anyone who is different (not of our tribe).
https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5933521/&sa=U&sqi=2&ved=2ahUKEwiHi-yW8PGFAxXMJNAFHdC1CBIQFnoECBMQAQ&usg=AOvVaw24AMTtwjaEW6ua2tvUEr4e
Also well said. I appreciate your use of the word binary. War is often not simple and this conflict is especially complicated.
How this war has become Biden’s doing and fault is clearly Republican propaganda.
This - perfectly stated.
And Russian propaganda on TikTok that has fueled the protests in the first place
The fuel comes from academic Chomskian far-left false equivalences. The kids should have been out there protesting MAGA the past eight or nine years.
It’s Chinese propaganda on TikTok. That social platform is nothing more than Asymmetric warfare using propaganda to prejudice our children against rational thought and to undermine being pro-America.
Yes, how has this war become Biden’s doing? I have seen reporting that nearly half of the protesters arrested at Columbia were not students or otherwise affiliated with the school. Are they conscientious citizens? Opportunists? Provocateurs? I would like to know.
First. - This conflict in NOT complicated. That’s absurd. The Israelis want to live in peace. The Palestinians want the land now ruled by Israel. It’s that simple. It’s a war and the Palestinians will not agree to peace while they believe there is an ability to take all of Israel. The world is trying to create a solution the Palestinians do not want, and then is blaming Israel for failing to make it happen. The “2 state solution” is a post 1967 invention offered by the west.
Second - The Nakba as a concept of unfair colonialist invasion is 100% propaganda revisionist one sided history. The British had ownership of the land from the Turks. Both were invading colonialists. They split it with the Jews and “indigenous Arabs”. Palestinians at that time were British subjects and included both Arabs & Jews. The coin of the area had both Hebrew & Arabic on it. There was a war between Jews and ALL the surrounding Arab countries. The Jews won what is now called Israel. Period. Gaza was taken by Egypt. The West Bank taken by Jordan. From 1948 to 1967 the 700,000 indigenous Arabs / now called Palestinians who were displaced by the war were “refugees” living in Egypt and Jordan. At the same time 900,000 Jews were expelled from ever Arab country. Centuries of Jewish life were extinguished in days. Those Semitic Jew refugees (ie brown people) ended up in Israel - a 60% majority of Israel’s are the same brownness as the Palestinians. Let’s drop the white colonialist lie already.
Now the Palestinians are hateful to every conceivable cultural similarity as the west. Egalitarianism or gay rights or freedom of speech or assemble or religion as anathema to Palestinian life. Why did Bethlehem go from 80% Christians living safely under Jewish control to 20% living scared under the Palestinians?
Third, it is impossible to be pro-Palestinian without being anti-Israel or anti-Jew - unless you are a Palestinian who is fighting for land you think is yours. Theres no rationale basis beyond ignorance, prejudice, or religious triumphalism (you want the world to convert to Islam even if the conversion comes by the sword) for any westerner to support Palestinians.
If you are a Palestinian I’d ask: over the past 75 years how has the fight been going? I see the propaganda map you use showing Israel slowly taking land. Why should they stop? It’s not your land unless you can secure your borders. That’s just the truth of human history. How’s the terrorist fight going? I know; you think it’s splendid cuz you slaughtered 1200 Jews in October. But Israel is about to make peace with the Saudis. They have good ties to Egypt., UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Jordan just let the Israel Air Force use Jordanian airspace to knock out Iranian missiles. Plus as a.reward for your brutal terrorism, the land Israel unilaterally gifted to you in 2005, Gaza, is now a literal wasteland 100% because of Palestinian stupidity and brutality in attacking the Jews.
Isn’t it time to try peace and negotiations. Why don’t you give back the hostages and ask for a peaceful resolution. Israel left Gaza without getting any assurances. But tried in good faith to give Gaza the ability to self rule. You guys blew it. If you wanna re-do on that concept you must give up violence as your method of gaining statehood. Otherwise I think the tea leaves will see a lot of pain in your future.
What about The Intercept's discovery of US administration opposition to the two-state solution? https://theintercept.com/2024/04/17/united-nations-biden-palestine-statehood/
Absolutely. And what does violence do but incite further violence. When does that stop?
May 14 will be the 76th anniversary of the founding of Israel. Marking the beginning of this conflict. Israel will have to learn the lesson we did in Viet Nam: bombing innocent people does not eliminate any threat, nor bring peace. It only provides another generation of enemies.
There is NO parallel between the Vietnam war and Israel defending itself, day after day, year after year, for 76 years.
In the fifty years since the end of the US war in Vietnam, relations have been somewhat normalized, to the point that there are no travel restrictions for US citizens to Vietnam. Will there be normal relations between Israel and other nations fifty years hence?
Putting aside the fact that you are comparing apples and oranges, it is fair to say that Arab interests in the middle east would have long ago benefited from creating their own secular democracies and living in peace with Israel. The problem is not a "Jewish state", which happens to be a secular democracy; the problem is the theocratic dictatorships bent on destroying it, none of whom will open their doors to Palestinians. (Once Netanyahu and Donald Trump go to jail, things might improve).
Had I been Virginia Gay testifying at Stefanik’s committee, I would have responded, “Congresswoman Stefanik, who the hell do you think you are acting like Joe McCarthy badgering witnesses?” Had she done this she would still have her job.
To oppose how Israel responded to October 7 is not "hostility or prejudice against Jewish people" (Oxford Languages definition of antisemitism).
Kneejerk, or blind support of all things Israel does is, however "mandated" in Zechariah 2:8-10 and Genesis Genesis 13:14-15.
I wonder if all those protesters yelling at one another understand the implications of the US ceasing to provide military support for Israel? In the aftermath of this humanitarian mess I believe and implosion would occur. Huge black hole in the Middle East.
This view seems so self-evident to me. I guess that means I'm still very naive. And the republican party's hypocritical words and deeds for political gain probably should't surprise me either. But the fact that they get away with such transparent power grabbing and destruction of vital American institutions nearly makes my head explode. I hate injustice and that seems to be increasingly what the gop is all about.
Barry. Thank you for your comments. I have always wondered why the Israeli people are committing atrocities against the Palestinians, doing exactly what was done to them in Europe. I am pleased to learn not all Jewish people approve of these actions. While I am only 75, I’m pretty sure , too, tgatvI will not see a peaceful world in my lifetime. I pray for America ever day, that people will wake up and stop the evil doers, mostly republicans, who are trying to take over our country. Sad!
Sharon, to state that Netanyahu's coalition is doing the same to residents of Gaza as the Hitler regime did to European Jews in is World War 2 is simply wrong.
1) European Jews never threatened anyone while Hamas has vowed to destroy Israel and kill all Jews, and acted on that vow on Oct 7.
2) jews in Europe did not have weapons, did not throw grenades into Christian neighborhoods, and did not invite any retaliation that would hurt their neighbors. On the other hand, Hamas has appropriated billions in donations to build tunnels and to build an arsenal, which they lobbed into Israeli cities, weekly, since 2006. Further, Hamas lobbed those rockets from the grounds of apartments, schools and mosques, and fought from spots within crowded neighborhoods. The deaths of their fellow Arabs was the goal, not just the consequence.
3) Hitler's approach to Jews was to enslave them to support Germany's war effort, keeping them under conditions that would allow them to live for 3-4 months under starvation, accidents, or torture took their lives. That's for the ones that weren't first sent to the gas chambers. Israel has not enslaved Arabs from Gaza. Instead, they employed over 18,000 for daily work in Isrseli territory, who were paid fair wages for their work. Hamas's actions caused that source of income to end, killing some of them on Oct 7.
4) German goals included extermination of all Jews. Hamas's goal is the same. Isrsel's goal is to defang Hamas so it stops being a threat to its citizens, not to kill all Arabs.
Has Israel gone too far? As a Jewish Israeli American, I say yes. But I also know that the war in Gaza is just that, a war. Israel might have gone too far, but it is justified in going after Hamas. Or would you recommend that they allow Hamas to restock and continue the near-weekly attacks on civilian areas in Israel like it has since 2006?
If I was your neighbor and kept shooting into your property, would you let me keep doing it? Sure, you could call the police, but who could Israel call?
Barry, I’m hugging you in my heart for speaking truth. Netanyahu and his cronies as well as leaders of Hamas are responsible for this horrific situation, but the general Jewish and Palestinian population are the ones who are suffering. Praying for peace, for reason, for compassion, and decency in the Holy Land.
The leaders support this ongoing war, not the people.
Thanks, Barry.
Barry, I am 100% with you--as are a lot of other fellow Jews who have looked at the mendacity of Israeli politics, especially the government's response to any attacks on or protest against the ultra rightwing and nationalist settlements they keep on planting in areas that were "supposed" to be autonomous Palestinian territories. The typical Israeli government response of a kid throwing stones at a soldier (for every injury 10 Palestinians at minimum must be arrested/die/have their homes destroyed--in an ironic reflection of the ancient Roman practice of "decimation") has escalated to 100 Palestinians must be punished for every injury to an Israeli. This is totally unacceptable.
As I have said before on this platform, the policy of the Israeli government CREATES supporters of Hamas and Hezbollah. And it provides fodder for the christofascists here in the USA to further their ultimately totally antisemitic goals of "forcing" the "Rapture": their real unstated purpose behind their support of Israel. Because they "need" Jews in Jerusalem for their fantasy of the antichrist to come who will ultimately wipe all the Jews off the face of the earth. The cooperation between the christofascists here and the Israeli government is about as cynical and manipulative as it gets.
That said, this is also a golden opportunity for Russia, China, and Iran to make hay with US politics--and I have questioned the timeline of the Hamas attack and the Israeli response to it before because it is pretty clear the Israeli government had a good idea what was about to happen and turned their eyes away. Opportunism on all sides, as well as mendacity. There are NO "good" sides to this. And Hamas perpetuating the war by refusing to negotiate and return the people they captured is equally heinous. But interestingly, the Israeli government seems far less worried about that 100 or so still surviving group than about turning Gaza (and eventually, I suspect, the West Bank) to rubble.
Well said, Linda.
"And it provides fodder for the christofascists here in the USA to further their ultimately totally antisemitic goals of "forcing" the "Rapture": their real unstated purpose behind their support of Israel. Because they "need" Jews in Jerusalem for their fantasy of the antichrist to come who will ultimately wipe all the Jews off the face of the earth. The cooperation between the christofascists here and the Israeli government is about as cynical and manipulative as it gets." THIS!!
I share Barry’s opinion. Especially his comment “If anyone is stoking antisemitism it is Israel and its supporters.” After the gun massacre at the Tree of Life Synagogue, I wrote the same comment begging Americans to recognize how Jews around the world were likely to be affected with antisemitism due to the violence that Netanyahu & his extreme government were committing. That Israel did not appear to be concerned about those outside of its state political interests.
I encourage everyone to read more broadly about the modern history of Palestine and the development of Israel through to the present and that effect on the indigenous people of former Palestine. Jimmy Carter’s book “Palestine: Peace or Apartheid” is a good start though not comprehensive. Carter was criticized for his use of “Apartheid”. But, he has been more engaged and supportive of Israel than probably any other U.S. president. Castigated by both Republicans and Democrats, and characterized as a weak president, he is without doubt in my mind the most religious, moral, thoughtful and equitable president we have had since FDR. He was Israel’s best friend over his active life. If Israel had listened to him, they would likely be living in peace today. Palestine would likely have had a state by now. It’s said that the indigenous Jews & Arabs of Palestine are genetically identical, and they had lived essentially in peace during the Ottoman Empire. That violence did not occur until Europeans started immigrating to Palestine in large enough numbers & wealth to worry the great majority Arab population. Real problems developed during the British Mandate occupation after WWI. There is history that has been obscured by politics & politicians as in all history.
Interesting to me is my recently learning other Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia and Eqypt did not want the Palestinians to move into their countries.
True. Arabs are not a homogenous group. They have not wanted Palestinian influence anymore than Palestinians wanted growing European Jewish influence, nor Israel wanted a Palestinian majority in their new state, or expanding state.
Arabs have given Palestinians nominal support since the Jewish militias drove 750,000 Palestinians out in the 1947-48 war to establish Israel. Arabs have had varying attitudes of acceptance or rejection of Israel based on their concerns for their own situation. Jordan though most friendly to Israel, deals with Palestinian refugees being the majority of their population. Lebanon has dealt with large numbers of Palestinian refugees in refugee camps, with small numbers of Palestinian leaders and freedom fighters fighting Israel, drawing responding & preemptive strikes from Israel similar to the strikes on Gaza, making Lebanon dysfunctional.
Egypt (1956 from Britain), Jordan (1946 from Britain) & Lebanon (1943-46 from France) were given their independence around the time of Israel’s establishment. Saudi Arabia was recognized as independent by Britain in 1927.
The interpretation of this history to favor Israel and disfavor Palestinians is similar to our interpretation of Vietnam history. We did not talk about Vietnam as a U.S. ally in WWII with Ho Chi Minh after 1945. We then saw them as an enemy as we supported France’s colonial interests. We then called Ho Chi Minh’s freedom fighters “communists” as we supported puppet governments left by the French. We lost much and gained nothing for these distortions.
To compare US support of French colonial interests in Vietnam to US support of Israel is absurd. The Vietnam war was our folly, a war of immense hubris and greed. It was also falsely contrived. There is no parallel to European and Middle East history, immersed as it is in the persecution and murder of Jews for centuries, no matter whether the Jew being persecuted was a accused of being a communist or a capitalist. (Hitler accused them of both).
Only Jordan, in 1948 and 1967, permitted the Palestinians entry in any significant numbers By September, 1970, the Hashemite Kingdom, for its own survival, had to force out the PLO, PFLP, and other such bands.
Barry, I’m an American of Irish, English and Scots descent with one set of Catholic grandparents and another set of Protestant grandparents. I witnessed, first hand, the “Troubles” in Northern Ireland as a student in 1977.
As you so aptly note, it is hard to love any country that engages in the wholesale slaughter and repression of a people, let alone the evil acts of terrorism such as Hamas conducted. In Ireland, the PLO-trained terrorists created unbearable fear, loss and on-going anger and resentment that continues.
The Irish did manage to create an uneasy peace. It’s far from perfect and doesn’t work for everyone but it has allowed for more people to raise their families and pursue their dreams in relative peace. That matters.
That is my prayer for all the people in Israel and Gaza. My lifetime? One can only hope….
We are kin, minus the Catholic part. The parallels between "The Troubles" and the situation in Gaza are very, very close.
I fully support Israel's right to eliminate the threat of Iranian sponsored terror. Indiscriminate killing of Israelis is a well paid career in Gaza and the West Bank. The leaders and teachers of the 10/7 atrocities must be eliminated, and their populations re-educated to live with Jewish settlers, under the nurturing wing of Allah, with full rights and privileges of Palestinian citizens, as Arab-Israelis live in their Jewish State. I think it's relevant to understand that Arab leaders conspired with Hitler to eliminate Jews last century and still hold their death cult fantasies.
Here is is again, the use of "my god is better than your god" to address issues. Would that we would finally free ourselves from the prison of religion and actually encourage people to think for themselves.
Ethnic nationalism, social remaking can produce as much fervent devotion as religion. Traditionally however religion has been tied to states and peoples that often adds to the fervor. I don't think you can just lay it on "religion" as such. "Mores" have deep roots in human nature.
Those "mores" as you call them, are just plain superstition dressed up as a socially sanctioned belief system. We are capable of much more than that, if only we are allowed to develop the capacity to think. I have nothing against tradition, origin legends and ritual, but so often they are held up as truths rather than the way a particular society organizes itself. Religion, too often is used to justify brutality and serves mostly to separate us from each other. Anyone who accepts religion gives up their right to think for themselves.
"mores" are essential rules and guidelines of social regulation, the "Ten Commandments" are mainly about social regulation; i sometimes think "religion" as an overarching authority was built just to enforce social/tribal/clan/ethnic/imperial/national cohesions, often with their attendant enemies, given humanity's long history of conflicts at all these levels. Not sure I get "so often as they are held up as truths rather than the way a particular society organizes itself" . The 10C is exactly a sanctioning/enforcing document, along with the multitude of other rules you'll find Exodus etc richly adorned with, with or without Yahwah's explicit command. For example, have fun reading the litany of rules about slavery and details for reimbursements for damage done to the many categories thereof. You might also remember that in the process of suppressing Russian Orthodoxy etc in the fledging Soviet Union, the Soviets committed mass atrocities in their efforts to remake society, and religion wasn't the best killing example. Best example I'd say was the deliberate mass starvation of Ukrainian peasant farmers in the early 1930s, we're talking millions here. Of course, that doesn't even get us to the Nazis, who simply wanted to annihilate whole populations so they could colonize most of eastern Europe well into Ukraine with Germans - the Master Race. I will certainly agree that the long persecution of Jews as "killers of Christ" is likely the best example of religious persecution for no other reason. I recommend reading Snyder's Bloodlands, or Plokhy's The Gates of Europe, a history of the Ukrainian region. You will blanch at the sheer level and detail of atrocity and mayhem, at not exactly in the name of "religion", allowing for the Jewish holocaust in the middle of it all.
“ Religion, too often is used to justify brutality and serves mostly to separate us from each other.”
I agree but that is man’s interpretation of “religion” not a truth about religion itself.
But religions are both created and interpreted by human beings.
Yes! Follow the invisible leader!
I prefer "perfect sky parent" since a belief in any god emerges from the human longing to have a perfect parent watching over them, rather than the imperfect parents they actually had.
My go to: Imaginary Sky Pilot.
Business leaders and the press also supported Hitler's rise and have yet to be held accountable. They wield economic security like a blunt object to keep people oppressed, especially in America where consumers are treated like labs rats.
Truth there
What do Israelis have to do in the West Bank and in Gaza? It's not part of their country. The Israeli settlers are their illegally and should be leaving.
Israelis haven't lived in Gaza in decades. Israel made Gaza "Judenrein"--Jew-free--by pulling every Jewish resident, business, and military base out of Gaza and giving the keys to Palestinians to run Gaza themselves. Palestinians said they wanted independence to govern as they saw fit, and Israel provided that. The result was Gazans elected Hamas as their legal, official government, and last October's massacre was the natural consequence of that.
West Bank and Gaza are part of Israel, which won both territories in the 1967 war. Israel has not declared formal sovereignty over either in hopes of making a deal for an independent Palestinian state, which the Gaza handover was designed to trial. And the largest part of West Bank IS open to Jewish settlement, per the Clinton accords, until such time a final peace treaty is negotiated.
It's more complicated than you think.
Oh well, you're so right - whatever option do the poor Israelis have but to commit genocide on the Palestinians? Only because they created Hamas because Israel wanted to fight the PLO with them, who could have known they turn out to be so ungrateful? Just because the Palestinians are treated like concentration camp prisoners in their own country - who could hold it against the most moral army in the world in the most horribly victimised 😢 country in the world?
You just have to listen to Israeli tv, to the speeches in the Knesset or watch some IDF Instas to get a pretty good idea what sort of people Israelis in their majority are.
I fully accept that Israel is a nation that was horribly traumatised in its history, and - in my opinion - it just like a person would, has a mental defect due to that trauma. But that doesn't entitle it to commit war crime after war crime after war crime (listen to ICJ presentations regarding the occupation of the Palestinian territories), behave in the most brutal, colonising way towards a country that it has taken all the land from. The West put after WWII all its ugly, stinking guilt into a huge bucket, flung it over the Middle East and said "your problem now"
Just like Jon Stewart said "Listen, Middle East, we didn't want to be drawn in all that drama that OUR actions caused - we just want your delicious oil!"
If the West lets get Israel away again and again and again, Putin and Xi Jinping have won. The world will not forget this and the first signs are there. One should not forget, that the West is in the minority on this issue.
Can't wait for the next episode of this show "Who is the US gonna elect - the criminal in Putin's pocket or the palliative care candidate candidate in Israel's pocket?"
The writers of our reality must to coked up to the eyeballs.
All those words to avoid answering a simple question. I'll restate it so you can try again:
Since you consider this genocide, what war plan would you have enacted to ensure Israel destroyed Hamas without injuring non-combatants in Gaza and therefore avoid the "genocide" you claim is happening?
It should be easy for you to answer, so go ahead.
Thanks for calling out the word "genocide", used so freely here.
Or do you believe Israelis should have just shut up and accepted the mass murders?
Once again radicals are calling the shots, to the detriment of all.
ensuring the safety and security of Jews is a fundamental mission for Israel, both within its borders and globally. Any Palestinian state that does not ensure its Jewish citizens would be counter to the mission of Israel. Jews living freely in Palestine is part of the Hamas charter.
"Reducate" is an interesting term for kill.
Barry, you and I are similarly aged, and although I am not Jewish, I vividly recall being horrified while very young by the Nazis' extermination of millions of Jews.
More recently, watching the thousands of Israelis demonstrating against Netanyahu because of his using right wing tactics to destroy Israel's courts in order to avoid prosecution for his numerous indictments, I saw the protests being diluted by the October Hamas attack. I immediately realized that Israel's military intelligence failures and uncharacteristic inattention to anticipating an imminent attack would give Bibi exactly what he needed to stay in power.
Clearly, Hamas' atrocities deserved retaliation, but killing thousands of civilians to "destroy Hamas" can't be justified. Even if Netanyahu destroys every Hamas fighter, which he won't, there will be thousands of Palestinian young people who will remember the horror wrought upon them and they will become the new Hamas fighters. The seeds were already planted by the lack of having a vote in their own destiny. They will take up the Hamas pledge to eradicate Israel, and all hope will be lost for a peaceful Jewish state.
Here and in other parts of the world, right wingers are wailing because of the threat to Jews. My question is, where were they when white supremacists were marching with tiki torches in Charlottesville, shouting "Jews will not replace us" and our resident white supremacist leader characterized the situation by insisting that there were "fine people on both sides"?
Our lives began with witnessing unthinkable evil being justified against powerless scapegoats, and we are still witnessing this evil. I fervently hope that we will begin to see the world awaking to the continued destruction before we die.
Thank you Nancy for beautifully extending my thoughts. Barry
Barry, we can pray that the right's reign of terror on all of us - worldwide - will soon be over. If only Bibi and the Orange Menace could get Elon Musk construct a manned rocket to Mars and be its first occupants . . . .
@Barry. If they and you want a cease fire, protest that culpable Hamas leaders live in sanctuary in Qatar and other countries and could have agreed to it. Where are the protests about Arab money in schools? At the Qatar embassy in DC and the UN mission?
Thank you Barry. I'm sorry that you have had to endure antisemitism. No one should be the target of hate or bullying for any reason.
Hamas is the mouse that roared but the Palestinians have been the victims (pawns) of both the Israelis and the Palestinians. Netanyahu and the Israeli war council are like many US politicians. They will do anything to stay in power including delaying the end of this conflict at the expense of the hostages, the Palestinians and the Israelis.
Barry Gerber,
I am a Christian....I too would love to see peace among all who have or do not have a faith. We make it difficult when certain humans want to dominate using "faith" which is precious to those of us who hold a faith. We should respect the honesty and freedom of those who choose "no religion."
We are misusing our faith when we allow it to justify killing our fellow humans which actually goes against the religions or faiths with which I am familiar.
No human being can look upon the starving and devastation in Palestine and be at peace. These are innocent human beings.
We do not fully understand what happened on October 7 nor why it happened. We do not understand why the protective shield over that specific area was not working at the very occasion of the attack. We do not fully understand Netanyahu's relationship
with Hamas.
We do know that Netanyahu would be tried for his criminal accusations if he were not holding his current leadership role in Israel. We do know that Netanyahu wants to take over Gaza.
There is good and evil battling, as has always been true. We must not turn our hearts and eyes and will away from this earth which is OUR home. We are responsible to do what we can to build peace...to serve those in need. We must assist in healing where we are able. To NOT put our heads in the sand and make light of the hellish existence of our fellow members of humanity is required.
Violence on our college campuses...or anywhere.... only helps our enemies.
Thank you President Joe Biden...thank you Jill Biden...thanks to those serving in our Congress who choose peace...who choose making our country great...who choose "Building Back Better".
Thank to those working tirelessly throughout the world for peace and reconciliation. It is an endless challenge. I am so thankful for those we know and see and for those who are unseen but have chosen to give their lives and talents for the preservation of building relationships throughout our entire world. We truly are dependent on one another.
and...GOD SAVE UKRAINE!!!!
Spot on and I would at that "Bibi" is a Trumpian and a war criminal.
Thank you.
So well said.
The radicals on both sides have taken over and drown out reasonable voices. Hamas lit the match and created the explosion that was waiting to happen. Who started this is almost impossible to determine. The majority of people want coexistence. Our efforts need to focus on stopping the bullies who use violence and hate speech to further their cause. It’s upsetting to see people caught in the whirlpool of violence and polarized reactivity. There can be no peace unless we talk, and we have to heal across divides.
It reminds me of the huge changes we imposed on ourselves because of Bin Laden. We reacted with a sledge hammer instead of reason and a scalpel.
Yes. We really failed to understand what was going on and overreacted much to our peril and that of the world. 20 years of wasted warfare, death destruction, and diversion from more important goals. I worry about what is unfolding now. Biden warned Netanyahu not to do it we did in Afghanistan and Iraq. He ignored Biden and now look. I worry how Netanyahu in his radicals have really damaged Israel and contributed to reactive antisemitism. These people should never have been in government. Just like George W. Bush should not have been president. It’s interesting to note that administrations that squeak in because of anomalies in the democratic system create destruction.
Thank you Professor Richardson.
In the Powell Memorandum of August, 1971, Powell said that public colleges and universities were largely funded by taxpayers, and articulated that high-income business executives and corporations were were among the most significant taxpayers and therefore, funders of higher education (at least pre-Reagan, when the wealthy actually paid taxes -except for Trump). Powell argued that oddly, highly-educated professors were liberal or leaned liberal -thus he called for more conservative influence on campuses around the United States.
Students today (just as they did during the Vietnam era) want to feel empowered and relevant. The news from Gaza is a steady stream of the very worst of humanity. Just as protests eventually led to the American withdrawal from Vietnam, protests led to the demise of South African apartheid, students have every right to peacefully protest war crimes committed by Hamas in the terrorism, killing and kidnapping of innocent people, and Netanyahu's criminally terrorist acts in his continuing indiscriminate bombing and destruction of Gaza.
The GOP are always among the first to yell "don't politicize this mass shooting" at Sandy Hook, Uvalde, Columbine, Las Vegas, or the Tree of Life Synagogue. Yet, the hypocrisy that flows freely through GOP/MAGA/Putin veins ensures they politicize everything from climate action, to diplomacy, and of course -any place else they see an opportunity to manipulate voters. So it should not come as a surprise they are pressuring institutions of higher education. Just as Trump only wanted to direct disaster relief to "Red" States, or Jared Kushner was fine allowing the contagious, deadly pre-vaccine COVID to spread through "Blue" States, watch for MAGA Elise Stefanik and others, if Trump is elevated to the Presidency, to restrict Federal funding to any colleges or universities with programs related to race, gender, environmental conservation, ESG, or economics (in which the writings of John Kenneth Galbraith are preferred over Milton Friedman).
My guess is in a couple of years we'll see Jared Kushner selling Gaza beachfront properties to the highest bidder - the profits will very likely not end up in Palestinian pockets, will they?
As you say Sabine -it might be part of why Saudi Arabia provided billions to Jared as a "pre-investment".
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/10/us/jared-kushner-saudi-investment-fund.html
Ouch.
Not so sure, George, that the Republicans are yelling "Don't politicize" all the mass shootings.
Might say, rather, they are always vulgarizing them.
Human life? None of them have ever in their lives accessed any humanities, so it's logically twisted to expect any concern for human life from any of them.
They cover for their fellow near-illiterate and marble-mouth white trash in Congress. Vote more, more tax cuts for the billionaires who pay them bribes. Put out videos celebrating the AR-15 and similar weaponry effective for repeated mass murders across America. Hurrah their number one showman with layers of odious orange make-up encrusted on his face, clown-show peroxided hair stiff on his otherwise vain, empty head, and waddling fat layers about his farting, befouling diapered area.
But notice, George, I don't once use the word "love" for any of this crew.
I have a high school buddy (high school class of '58) who is now old and bitter, a true opponent of DEI. There is absolutely no way to reach any middle ground. He'll do anything, even install a dictator as head of the country, to defeat Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. And, let's remember, those marching at Charlottesville in 2017 were shouting "Jews will not replace us." IMO, TFFG is the Chief Wizard of the MAGA/KKK movement and he is extremely aware of it. This is a cancer on the body politic that has been here all along and has been dormant for a few decades, but now it threatens the very existence of our democracy. Perhaps we should all make a pledge to donate ten times more money in this election to various candidates than ever before. After all, it is an investment in something that we need.
I wouldn't doubt if there was a plan among the trump 2016 campaign to divide liberal Jews and conservative Jews, like conservatives have been trying to divide Black people because both groups have historically always been supporters of the Democratic party. If you look at the Republican donor base and its inner circle, it's a multiethnic group of RW billionaires. trump's support of those marching at Charlottesville and his dining with the likes of Fuentes haven't seemed to bother RW Jews within that inner circle. We're being played by RW billionaires. They are loyal to no one but power. They use religion like a cudgel to keep us at each other's throats. Cynical of me I know.
Tracy, you write: " We're being played by RW billionaires. They are loyal to no one but power. " I agree, and this is fairly well documented: "What's the Matter with Kansas?" by Thomas Frank. Project 25 is a pure case of establishing an anti-democratic oligarchy here. The extremely wealthy have found that it is fairly easy to sucker in the white Americans with wedge issues: abortion, race, women's rights, gay rights, immigration, etc. It's tragic that those folks are so ill informed and clueless.
I wish I had more money to donate - but the Dems just send me more inane emails
Or text messages telling me the world is ending - today.
Will donate to billboards when I get an extra dime.
Wasn’t tfg’s father a klan member?
Virginia, you ask: "Wasn't tfg's father a klan member?" Maybe not an enrolled member, but clearly a sympathizer, being arrested at a KKK rally in 1927. https://www.newsweek.com/was-donald-trump-father-kkk-1864382
Thank you, Richard. Thought I remembered a connection and certainly the films of him making sure there were as few Blacks as possible in his buildings and his suse
….subsequent Justice Department case add to the perception of his racism.
Yes, Richard. Serious times. Serious needs of serious Dems.
And needs of active Dems, and independents, and former Republicans -- not just donating, but also well-focused on the things Heather arrays for us, our conversations.
". . . old and bitter." Sorry for your friend, Richard.
We all know those who don't age well. Someone else on this thread mentions the love of "To Kill a Mockingbird." Among its concerns, how stereotypes let us wrongly see people, such as the shut-in down the street that the little kids saw and feared as some monster. Though that stereotyped guy turned out to be one of the good guys (and a lifesaver for one of the little kids).
Good, however, Richard, that most of the comments on Heather's site turn out to be by those who've contrarily turned out "old and generous."
I am just completing my long-belated reading of To Kill a Mockingbird.
Not surprised that the crazed ideologues want to ban it, to burn it.
Truth must be uprooted and consigned to the flames of hatred.
And this book tells truths far too actual.
In America.
In Israel.
Worldwide.
Peter, that novel has stuck with me ever since my Mom read it to us when I was about 10 and my sister 6. We are both on either our second or third copies of the book, and both read in regularly.
What you tell helps me and other readers better to understand your outlook, your motivation.
For many years now I've been turning over in my mind what it means to have been a victim, the dangers that go with victimhood, especially when victim status becomes an integral part of a person's or a group's identity.
It seems to me that the greatest harm of all arises when the victim is indelibly marked by the evil sustained. The victim then places her or himself outside the law, at the service of whatever vengeance may demand.
Yet, wherever a society is deeply divided, by debased notions of individualism, by racism, by social stratification based on wealth and income, by affiliation tribal, whether the tribe's identity is religious, political or whatever, by all the variations on "us" and "them", that entire society falls victim to its divisions. The have-nots are victims of their deprivation, the haves are had by their having (instead of living and being). We are so often not the masters but the victims of our ideas and our emotions...
A never-ending tale of ultimately unnecessary suffering and unkindness, both inflicted and self-inflicted.
Yet kindness, the lovingkindness that would share such happiness as we find, seems so simple, so obvious.
"I would share my ease and not my disease," said Thoreau.
Thank you Phil -and yes, vulgarizing to be sure.
I still don't understand how the party of the guy defending good people on both sides at at Nazi gathering is upset about antisemitism on college campuses. Seems like an odd disconnect.
Trump is on record saying Hitler had some good ideas. I doubt if any of the ideas had anything to do with better fuel economy for Mercedes-Benz sedans.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/06/donald-trump-hitler-michael-bender-book
It's just politics... they can use the situation to their advantage to demonize the left and force out college and university presidents who they perceive as elitists.
Absolutely agree with you. It is part of Project 25 already instituted. The Republicans who have embraced the ideology helped to instigate the unrest on campus. They do not in any circumstance want students to think for themselves, so they give them the idea that Biden is the bad one. Shame that the students, who will vote in November, do not see how they have been manipulated by outside agitators. My question is who is manipulating the agitators. This unrest helps along the idea in Project 25 of replacing all the “liberal thinkers” in our universities.
Precisely to the point!
🤣 But then isn’t TFG a medley of disconnections?
cameron, I have long wondered at the almost fanatic response of my Christian friends regarding Israel: complete and uncritical support, no matter what. A couple of them that are still willing to engage with me on most things have been unable to articulate why.
Last week, a dear friend who is Christian to her soul answered that question in a Facebook post, citing specific verses in the Bible. This quote from her is: "Israel belongs to God Himself. His covenant with the Jewish people for the land of Israel is clear in Genesis 13:14-15. That covenant stand even now. God Almighty says Israel’s land belongs to them, not anyone else."
This was added: "Christians, you are commanded--by God himself--to support and protect Israel. This isn't about politics. It is about obedience.
I find that belief chilling in the face of the atrocities that both have taken and are taking place.
This generation has seen and been through more than several previous generations. New technology has brought us closer as we witness global suffering. “The needs of one have become the concerns of all.”
I am not sure that “this generation” has been through more… Every generation has its challenges. Those challenges come in different shapes and sizes but they happened and will continue to happen.
Internet. Social Media. DGeorge Floyd, BLM, DJT Demagoguery, the worst Respiratory pandemic since 1918, Ukraine War. But really we have to add the phone. Images and video of horrifc violence, inequality, decay of democratic institutions, delivered directly to your palm and daily.
Connie, I think that with the accelerated pace of "life" (thinking of TV's, how movies are made and produced, the explosion of video games (which now encompasses a very descriptive cohort of "gamers") to the expansion of information available on the internet with its complete lack of academic overview and publisher's requirements can safely be described as "more" even though all generations have faced challenges. I never had to worry about either "atomic bomb drills" (although I knew where the "nuclear shelter" was in my elementary school) or active shooter drills as a 1-12 student (no mandatory "K" in that milieu).
Thank you for mentioning John Kenneth Galbraith and the preference for him over Milton Friedman. I attended a Galbraith speech at Iowa State as a student in 1975. What a fantastic speaker and such a great mind.
This is from his Wikipedia page-
Galbraith's main ideas focused around the influence of the market power of large corporations. He believed that this market power weakened the widely accepted principle of consumer sovereignty, allowing corporations to be price makers, rather than price takers, allowing corporations with the strongest market power to increase the production of their goods beyond an efficient amount.
He further believed that market power played a major role in inflation.
He argued that corporations and trade unions could only increase prices to the extent that their market power allowed. He argued that in situations of excessive market power, price controls effectively controlled inflation, but cautioned against using them in markets that were basically efficient such as agricultural goods and housing. He noted that price controls were much easier to enforce in industries with relatively few buyers and sellers. Galbraith's view of market power was not entirely negative; he also noted that the power of US firms played a part in the success of the US economy.
Ding ding ding ding ding. Walmart takes in 1 of ever 3 dollars spent on groceries in the US. Fox News and the rest of the right wing media has convinced a large percentage of Americans that Biden's policies are the major cause of inflation. Some of his policies and programs have caused some of the inflation but so have TFFG's lingering policies like the Chinese tariffs. But Walmart, Home Depot, Tyson, Perdue and other large corporations are charging us more than they did for food and other consumables because they are greedy bastards.
The county in Arkansas where Walmart is headquartered and the belt of their executives live including several of the Walton heirs, has one of the highest child poverty rates in the US.
Gary -what a gift to have been able to see him -thank you for sharing.
Many years ago I was attending an emerging technology conference at MIT and made arrangements to visit Noam Chomsky on my trip from the San Francisco. I had also contacted John's office at Harvard -my understanding of Economics was largely developed through Professor Galbraith's writing and journals. Unfortunately, at the time, his health was in rapid decline and I did not get the opportunity to thank him for his work and writings -intended to improve the quality and dignity of life for all.
Of many books he wrote "The Economics of Innocent Fraud", I consider to be foundational reading (as well as Joel Bakan's "The Corporation, Noam Chomsky's "Miseducation in America" and "Manufacturing Consent", and George Lakoff's "Don't Think of an Elephant". From my perspective they should all be required reading.
Right back atcha George. Seeing Noam Chomsky speak would have been amazing I'm sure.
I've only read a couple of Galbraith's books but I will look for 'The Economics of Fraud" as well as the others you mention.
I agree that college curriculums should include mandatory readings and even AP high school classes.
One of the weed out classes (whether intentional or not) for Engineering students was English I and II. Some of the best engineering students I knew took those classes multiple times before they passed. Maybe include some of those books in with English I & II?
Thanks Gary. And no question that Professor Galbraith’s powerful eloquence would fit in an English curriculum. Interestingly, the best database and application performance people I recruited during my career at Oracle were degreed in Electrical Engineering as opposed to Computer Science or Information Systems. Most couldn’t write a report or spell their way out of a paper bag (and still can’t) however they had supernatural analytical skills when it came to 0’s and 1’s.
I can certainly relate to the writing skills of engineers. One of my college room mates was a EE. He led the team that created the pacemaker for Medtronics to be implanted with someone in need of an MRI. He finally passed English II the quarter he graduated. He too couldn't write a report or spell worth a lick, but he was brilliant. He has multiple patents from his time at other companies as well.
It's been a couple days, George, with Heather yet on break.
In the meantime you say something here -- several good things -- which prompt another in-the-meantime-response from me.
That is, when you list good books, and suggest more might know them -- yes, agreed. But how is it that we simply don't see various others periodically citing these books and doing so in the context that all the more makes them matter to them?
I suggest, George, that the arts of citing others have disappeared. Not only the arts of citing others, but the parallel arts of doing so by transitions that also clarify one's own parallel concerns.
No need to reply, George. Maybe you can do so in some subsequent note you may make on new things Heather may bring up, once she returns from extended break.
Thank you for sharing this Phil. It made me think of commonalities we share as a group or network of people. While we may all have a foundation of varied education we all find LFAA's important. The well-written fact-based (and cited) articles often establishing the connection between U.S. and global events with their historical context. We seek to be well-informed and engaged, two of the three vital pillars of any attempt at meaningful democracy. Aside from a foundation of education we all have a journey through life which has led us here. Our personalities, as well as books, films, and life experiences all contribute to what I hope for all of us is a never-ending quest.
The books I mentioned previously are a handful of material which inspired me (and continues to do so). I worry that just publishing a list of such would not have any real emotional engagement for others. Years ago I organized an event with Charlie Liteky -a war hero and important voice in America's conscience (if we have one as a society). A book on sinister U.S. involvement in the horrific civil war in El Salvador by Charles Clements, a U.S. doctor who recounted his experience as a field medic desperately trying to save lives from the indiscriminate bombs and gunfire, often from U.S. supplied weapons for the right-wing regime responsible for the deaths and torturing of doctors, lawyers, teachers, and people rising against the horror. The work of Naomi Oreskes in publishing "Merchants of Doubt" -important in understanding the generations of the extraction industries destruction of climate and planet while intentionally covering up the damage and catastrophic climate outcomes threatening our world today.
These things (and others) have emotional connections to me, and while others might agree some of my personal experiences and books I've read are important, I'm not sure how to relate the all important emotional context? That's the place where I think many can be moved to join a growing network of people on a quest for life long learning and deeper understandings -which, from my perspective on a vast scale, could eventually lead to a peaceful and collaborative world -instead of one rife with conflict.
Anyway -thank you for a provocative note as we begin the new week.
They must be leaning on Jesus alleged words "the poor will be with you always" .
No, they're leaning on other words, direct from the Bible. I posted on cameron's post from and earlier time on this thread something I finally learned about why there are some Christians that are (my word here) irrational in their support of Israel.
I was being semi in jest, Ally. Evangelicals' support of Israel is purely religious indeed. The OT is full of self-justifying slaughter of foreigners or non-believers, and all taken matter of factly.
When activists and protesters commit crimes the leaders and teachers disrupting tranquility need to be brought to Justice and their populations need to be re-educated. Specifically, taught to live within a merit based, muti-ethnic truth seeking society. Generally speaking, political Islam is not compatible with this principle.
Protester's characterization of Israeli apartheid and genocide were successfully rebutted in the South African case. It's not a crime to minimize casualties of your own troops by bombing enemy tunnels and rocket launch sites, and using air power to eliminate snipers.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org › wiki
South Africa v. Israel (Genocide Convention) - Wikipedia
No doubt that every nation has a right to be recognized and to defend themselves (except for those who are committed to deny the right for everyone else to exist, or those who commit egregious crimes against people and planet).
I think "re-education centers and/or concentration camps" are not something most people would embrace -especially for disrupting "tranquility" or "disturbing the peace." The First Amendment of the Constitution enshrines such rights (although I know far too many people don't realize there are amendments preceding and subsequent to the Second.
And I'd have to disagree with killing masses of innocent people to get to a handful of extremists is a reasonable response. It is antithetical to international law and fundamental human rights.
Remember George that the vast majority if not all Hamas are the "children" of Gazans, many of them still under the age of 20, so that extends into parents, siblings, aunts and uncles, cousins, neighbourhoods.... think of how many Gazans are hostile to Israel, both in its military occupation and confinement policies, and of course (no surprise) Israel's right to exist. They are the direct descendents of the Catastrophe. I would think it's an almost pointless exercise trying to distinguish between "Hamas extremists" and the larger, "civilian" population.
You do raise an important point Frank, yet I do have hope that fundamentally all people want safety, security, and a desire for a better life for the next and future generations, as opposed to perpetual war, suffering, and horrific violence. And a spark born from that desire yields a fragile yet strengthening peace predicated upon reason.
Agreed... I do hope that human societies, organized it states or whatever, find more collaborative means to manage their affairs. Much as members go on about "capitalist greed" here, trade and the exchange of goods and services is likely the best way to go, depending on the "terms" of course! I'm guardedly hopeful that is where humanity is headed, however fitfully and inequitably. I suspect survival is the more visceral base than "reason". After all, minor counterpoint, reason as technical know-how invented the machine-gun, stand in for the enormous and now very expensive panoply of weaponry in this world. On the side, don't you think it odd that political discourse has been shaping up China as America's "main enemy", the country with whom USA has immense economic and financial ties?
Thanks Frank -and yes, it is clear through nearly every section of the 900+ pages of the Heritage toxic Project 2025 that China is “The Enemy”. I know the right-wing always loves an enemy to bolster military spending. Nevertheless we seem much closer to conflict with Russia due to the criminal Putin. Although China certainly has a disconcerting interest in Taiwan.
Not surprised you'd assume I endorse concentration camps. What I am saying is don't fall for the Dunning Kruger Effect. Don't confuse the determination of fools and fanatics with credibility of their position. Hamas, Iran and the protesters can't believe anyone would protect Jews who they believe god abandoned and will therefore bestow a reward in heaven for exterminating them. But I agree only those who teach and lead this ideology should be punished. I and Israel morn each death much more than Hamas does. Tent camps are being built as we speak to afford all those that want to leave Rafa to do so.
You remind me so much of my old aunty that insisted until her last breath that the concentration camps in Germany never really existed, that it would have been impossible to burn so many people, that it's all just propaganda to make the poor, poor Germans look bad.
Some people just can't be helped. They die ignorant.
Do a google search for "tent camps in gaza" -> images. Hundreds of images. See any pictures with mountains of dead Gazans waiting to be burned like in Auschwitz? Each time you believe something known to be false, you lose the capacity for reason. We still love you, just don't expect us to accept your judgement on things like war.
I do believe the Nazi propaganda film where the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem HAJJ AMIN AL-HUSAYNI MEETS HITLER and ”The Führer stated that Germany would not intervene in internal Arab matters and that the only German “goal at that time would be the annihilation of Jewry living in Arab space under the protection of British power.”
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/film/hajj-amin-al-husayni-meets-hitler
About the campus protests, I too object to the U.S. financed bombing of innocent Palestinians who were not responsible for the attack on Israel. The activists objecting to this bombing need to understand that, when their actions go beyond peaceful protests, they commit the same crime by undermining our college students who are not responsible for the bombing of the Palestinians.
Excellent assessment of both the Powell Memo and GOP "manipulations", George.
Thank you!
I agree with you George!👍!
A long, long goal as you say
I support the protestors right to make their voices heard; I just wish I didn't believe they were being manipulated to undermine Biden. What's happening in Gaza is definitely a humanitarian crisis. But, the answer is not just to abandon Israel. Getting aid to Gaza and not letting Bibi have free reign are the best that the American President can hope to accomplish.
The big issue is, of course, November; by all means get their message out there, but don't forget that things can get worse. It really doesn't matter if someone hates Biden on a single issue; there is far more at stake. But, if you just can't get past Gaza, remember this: Trump fully supports Bibi and things will get far worse for the people you say you care about.
It is not a humanitarian crisis. It is genocide, and Biden gladly supplies the weapons used. No one is manipulating the students and others. It is Biden who is prepared to lose Michigan, a large chuck of the youth and black vote and hand the nation to Trump for Likud Israel's sake.
Don't harass us and tell use we must vote blue no matter who. Harass Biden and the Democratic leadership. Tell them in no uncertain terms they are on a path to destroy themselves and the nation and must change course.
Biden's hands are tired. He can't just ignore decades of U.S. policy and abandon an ally. Saying he's doing it gladly is just hyperbole. Few, if any, Presidents could do better; many would do worse.
If you think I'm harassing you, you're missing the point. I never said you had to vote blue. All I would ask is that you consider the impact of your vote or lack thereof. If you feel that Trump would handle Israel better, then by all means vote accordingly.
How are Biden's hands tied? He is deliberately ignoring standing US law that should halt all aid to Israel. 22 USC 2034. He is deliberately breaking US law to support Israel.
I have considered the consequences of Trump winning. I may vote for the mother fucker Biden in November but I want him to sweat blood and shit nails from now until then unless he reverses course. He completely cancels every good thing he's done by these acts, so spare me the repetition of what good Biden has done. I'm aware of it.
I also sense an invisible hand of foreign intelligence at work in these demonstrations as well as the apparent Republican strategy to politicize them. Biden's response has been spot-on perfect. Russia and Iran are likely pleased by the chaos they have generated first by encouraging Hamas to sacrifice the Palistinian residents of Gaza with a massacre of innocent Israelis, and now with the protests ignoring the complexity of the situation and the Republicans attacking specifically the women who lead these major universities.
Who do you think is manipulating these students? Have you spoken with them, visited their encampments, read their statements? Can you provide any links to evidence of their manipulation?
I think that as the arrest records filter out it will become more clear. One account I read of the Columbia arrests was that quite a few were simply agitator/anarchists determined to push their social media standing. They’d been on LE radar for some time. More will be revealed I’m guessing in the coming week.
Deja vu of the Portland Black Lives Matter riot. It was later found that outsiders were causing much of the vandalism.
This was also true in Richmond, Va.
Sure hope so (that more will be revealed in the coming week).
I'm just going with a gut feeling knowing how much foreign interference there was in the last election. I make no pretense that my suspicions have any weight to them beyond that. I'd be more than happy to listen to any inside information that you are willing to share.
Well Kevin I'm not sure what you might accept as information (or which foreign government you might suspect of deluding the students) but I'll try! I'm familiar with college students and grad students as I've taught them in eight institutions over 45 years in the profession, plus been a campus visitor in many more (here and abroad), sometimes in periods of high stress like this one. I've twice visited the MIT encampment, and have contacts in the Columbia and Barnard ones (I used to teach at Columbia). I was close to many students in the Brandeis Jewish Voice for Peace chapter before it was forced to close, and attended a wonderful (and delicious) seder they organized with Palestinian students on campus. I know the level of information common among campus activists in this riskiest/touchiest of movements--no one would join it for fun, though there was nice Arab dancing at the MIT encampment today, and collective singing, in Hebrew, of the verse from Isaiah 2: 4, set to music by many great composers: "Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more."
Most of the student leaders have studied the situation, its history, settler colonialism generally. Some are from Israel, some from Gaza, many are American Jews, some participants are from the Caribbean, Africa, India, former Russian "satellite" states--parts of the world that have been through crises of occupation, settler colonialism and independence struggles more recently than the US--and tend to be interested in and informed about it naturally. And at MIT and other schools where some research is funded by the Israeli military, activist students know quite a bit about university finances and endowment holdings. By and large a university is a place for intellectual ferment, discussion, debate, research: knowledge is prioritized, mouthing off in ignorance stigmatized. If you visit an encampment--where people welcome discussion of topics relevant to this bad situation--you'll find yourself in conversation with thoughtful people, sophisticated about political organizing. Why would America's brightest young people be easy to manipulate? Professors are there too. Why would people whose business is finding out and knowing, trained as skeptics, daily taught and/or teaching that unsubstantiated claims are worthless, be easy to manipulate? I think the ignorance and naivete of university students and their faculty supporters needs to be proven rather than taken for granted.
Many of these same students have been active in registering voters and getting the vote in swing states for the Democrats over the last 5 national elections. I'm sorry that President Biden chose to denigrate them in his remarks yesterday.
Thank you for sharing your perspective. I understand your concerns and why you would want to stand up for the students. I may not have your years in academia, but I am a former grad student. I do respect the students and, like I said, believe they should make their voices heard.
Unfortunately, given the black and white presentation of a complex issue and the hatred for Biden who is between a rock and hard place, I do think it's only fair to raise the issue of outside manipulation. But that's it; I have no intention of pursuing the point. More importantly, I'm not going to use my suspicions to question the sincerity of the protestors or undermine the validity of the protests.
Kevin I talked too much! I could more simply have said that few of the students involved have a black and white notion of this agonizingly complex mess. They do have, as do I, a sense that genocide or even ethnocide is under way (some generals and officials have been explicit), however complex the causes, which is no better for Israelis in the long run than for Palestinians. And that our government is enabling and funding that, and research in many of our universities supporting that.
Who is funding these protests? Where did all of the tents come from overnight? All the same as though they were all ordered at the same time. This isn’t rocket science!
I have brought them food and supplies. if they ask for tents I would buy them tents. I would bring them pallets and zip ties to build the barricades. because they are right. it's time to start calling them encampments by the way. we need to start calling them settlements.
You would but they have tons of new tents that all came overnight. Did you see any solicitations for funds for that? I didn’t. And they aren’t right because they are supporting Hamas and Iran. I support Israel and the Palestinians. But Hamas has no intention of achieving peace. They don’t care about the Palestinians. If you want proof ask me…but your mind has to be open.
When I watched the tv footage of encampments being cleared away I thought, wow, tents aren’t that cheap. Where did they all come from?
?? My tent cost $89, and you can get them for less--if you need one, most kids have one. The kids are making their own food (and serving it to visitors) where they have electricity, as they often do in their dorms, and others drop off supplies in solidarity. They make their signs and posters on pieces of cardboard boxes, with magic markers. So, not an expensive Conspiracy.
Kids camp. Everyone has tents in my experience.
Trump was going to move the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in support of Bibi.
He did. That was a ill-advised and provocative move.
So interesting that these “students” —many of which were not students at all — are so loudly protesting about what is happening in Gaza but never said a word about the atrocities committed against Ukrainians. Just as in Israel Ukrainian women, children and men were raped, slaughtered, children killed and kidnapped… and yet there were no calls from students to stop the slaughter or for a Russian ceasefire. Why?
Because this entire middle eastern crisis was planned and manufactured to take our eyes off of Ukraine, destroy America and make billions for a few. They manipulated social media and young people to win an election and made the people of Gaza collateral damage. They did not care about the people of Gaza — only about winning.
I don’t know how Elise Stefanik, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Kristi Noem, Trump, Putin or any of these sick, evil people sleep at night without a care about all of the damage they have done and continue to do.
If students want to demonstrate against anything it should be the forces hijacking their future. The Heritage Foundation, The Federalist Society, the Supreme Court, the MAGA cult and the sociopaths in the GOP.
Power and greed are destroying humanity as we speak. We are at war for democracy. And we all need the be soldiers before it’s too late.
DMS, why would students demonstrate in the case of Ukraine, when their country and for that matter their universities are soberly aligned with them and all humanitarians to act in support of the victims of violence? Most people, including students (and excluding MAGA Republicans), approve of US support of Ukraine, invaded by a hostile power careless of civilian harm—though Russia had not destroyed its cities or killed mostly civilians.
These students, a great many of them Jewish, are protesting the use of their tax dollars in a campaign the World Court has called plausibly genocidal, and their universities’ investments in the war machines that enable the forced displacement and slaughter of a people.
They didn’t destroy their cities? Ukraine wasn’t genocidal? Do you really believe that students who mostly have never paid taxes are only about tax dollar funding? Propaganda is so powerful it has even convinced you of the narrative they want you to believe. Yes… what is happening to the people in Gaza is a war crime. Yes… the adults in the room are holding the administration accountable… and… helping to push the power hungry middle eastern MAGA out of office. Just as not all Gazans are evil nor are all Israelis. Neither should be at the mercy of greedy, power-hungry leaders who use their people as shields.
Your concept of students seems based on the sensationalism of the press. I have taught in colleges and universities for 45 years and my thoughts about them are different. The situation in Gaza and in the West Bank (where 1000+ have been murdered since Oct 7) is complicated—as you say, and as the wide variety of perspectives among protesting students actually attests. But the people of the world agree, including all but one of my Israeli friends, that going on 35,000 mostly civilian deaths and 100s of 1000s of injuries —many necessitating amputations without anesthesia, anesthetics, or even clean water—not to mention famine, is disproportionate. Young people live close to their conscience and we weary, cynical adults are tempted to call their moral vision “oversimplified.” I know you and I don’t disagree on the basics of this ghastly situation, but I want to put in a word for the students. Those I have talked to are thoughtful, informed and serious. (And a great many of them are Jewish, pace Mss Stefanie and Foxx.)
They don’t sleep, or if they do, even in their dreams concoct the next vile, evil, sick event. Every freakin day I keep trying to figure out how we got this far. Intelligent people are ignoring them. Too many people are saying they won’t vote for either TFG (too crazy) or Biden (too old) , they’ll find someone to write in. They are going to kill this country as we know it. I don’t sleep either.
Could not have said it better! This entire ordeal is being orchestrated, by the usual suspects, with no true media to expose the truth. Wake up, folks; those cited by DMS have been at this for quite some time, and they think they've found the goal line.
Exactly! There should be peaceful protests everywhere against Putin’s vile atrocities against Ukrainians and the Heritage Foundation/Federalist Society/unjust Supreme Court/MAGA cult leaders (the combined true origins of American dysfunction and threats to democracy) while at the same time recognizing that protesting against the Hamas Oct 7th attack and against Israeli attacks against peaceful Palestinians are not mutually exclusive, neither have any place in a civilized world.
"I don’t know how Elise Stefanik, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Kristi Noem, Trump, Putin or any of these sick, evil people sleep at night without a care about all of the damage they have done and continue to do."
Sociopaths sleep very well at night.
Exactly so, Shane.
We’ll never be able to crawl into other people’s heads, but it’s for sure that sociopaths are hunted by their own demons at night.
Not in my experience as a crime writer and newspaper reporter, G.P. Psycho- and sociopaths sleep quite well, not haunted by demons, because they truly believe the story they tell themselves about being the hero of their lives. That is a demon to the rest of us, but not for them.
Heather…as always thanks for your input….this time a. ‘review’ of the demonstration scene. I find myself torn in my response…the October 6th debacle was quite clearly a ‘crime against humanity’ and was hugely threatening to the stability of state of Israel….and the Netanyahu initial response was very understandable and Biden’s very vocal support..also understandable….and if the last 6 months had fallen within the parameters of the Geneva Convention protocols…I would not be writing this.
But very very painfully clearly the Geneva Conventions, particularly the many subsets of the fourth Convention (protection of non combatants) have been violated to the point that The Hague is looking at naming Netanyahu a criminal and his behavior a crime against humanity…34,000 dead Palestinian women and children and another hundred thousand severely wounded, 2 million Palestinians totally marginalized and verging on starvation..about 1 million in Rafah soon to be most likely bombed to smithereans and the country an essential rock pile.
And my tax dollars are supporting this ‘venture.’ Before this phenomenon I’d have said I was ‘pro-Israeli’ ….now I can’t say that.
And I have far more sympathy for the Palestinian people than I had 6 months ago and I think our country needs to seriously consider our financing of this crime against humanity…there have been two the Initial Hamas behavior AND the subsequent Israeli ‘response’.
Thank you Heather Cox Richardson. The Republicans on the search for a way to maintain their power have corrupted the efforts of the student protesters by making it their own. And the fact that foreign powers use it as well is of concern. Biden did well to establish the positive direction we must support. You continue to help us see the light in your Letters. Again, thank you.
The Trumplicand are "making it their own" by condemning the protests as part of their campaign against "liberal\Marxist" higher education. The uprising against Biden is the result of his alliance with genocide. I wouldn't ask the Arab-Americans of Michigan to vote for Biden than I would ask Jewish-Americs to vote for an open neo-Nazi fan of Hitler. Likud Israel has stepped as far outside the pale of civilized society as Nazi Germany.
Today's student protests are different from those of my youth when we were against U.S. policy. These students are protesting against the investment policies of their universities. They see the hypocrisy of schools that teach equity and justice yet support war with their financial policies. In the past, schools have changed their strategies to disinvest from apartheid and oil and gas companies without losing money and shirking their roles as fiduciaries of their endowments. When schools like Brown and Wesleyan agreed to meet with students and then to vote on where they invest their money, there was no need to think about calling in the riot police. We all need to see that decision-makers listen to us, that our voices have power, that our colleges and universities practice what they teach.
They are also protesting against the use of their tax dollars to pay for the weaponry with which our President and now our Congress have been enabling the slaughter.
It's not necessarily one thing or the other, but my sense is that those who voted some version of "uncommitted" in the Democratic primaries were protesting against the government's involvement in the war, but that the students were frequently protesting against their school's funding of entities that were contributing to Netanyahu's war.
Yes, precisely. But they're aware also that beyond their address to the administrations and trustees of their universities lies a nation that has had little access to education about Gaza's awful and worsening situation over the last 76 years, and that the press reactions to their encampments, however biased, will bring (and have brought) attention to a wider array of facts and views. Which could have an effect in Congress and above all on the President.
I worry that what we are witnessing on campuses today is a result of influence by bad actors with other agendas than “Saving Palestine”. Social Media is a poisonous snake that lies in wait for the opportunity to strike. Small nips and jabs like the House impeachment efforts have never reached beyond the true believers, but this divide will potentially give Trump the election, and then we can kiss it all goodbye. Americans have hated Biden’s international policy the most, when in fact his administration has reset the strength-through-coalition that the US applies to reinforce its strength. Trump wants to stoke fear and hatred to promote isolationism, and reset the MAGA standard of a strongman nation only willing to negotiate with other strongmen. It’s working.
Jane, I agree. There are far, far too many opportunities for "agitators" to get involved for a variety of reasons/motivations.
These protests engage Heather -- good, as they engage other things vital to us all.
Universities differed long ago, as when I entered the University of Michigan in 1965. Harlan Hatcher was its president back then.
As both a zoologist and novelist, he typified American higher education. All during its rise, from the Justin Morrill land grant legislation in 1862 to the Powell memo in 1971, all university presidents were writers, scholars.
The Powell memo changed all that. Money and the billionaire classes took over. So university presidents have long been bereft of any humanities.
And now the protests – American university youth protest U.S. taxpayers having to pay for the mass murder, destruction, and starvation in Gaza, and for arming Israel so far-right settlers further occupy West Bank land and murder Palestinians there.
As American novels, histories, memoirs, and other humanities no longer center any university, the dehumanized presidents have no imagination other than that of the billionaire classes they serve. Helplessly they but have militarily-armed police beat their students and arrest them.
I was at the University of Michigan from 1968-72. The protests there made me evolve from a sheltered suburban girl to someone much more aware and politically active. My parents were old school (aka not crazy) Republicans but from 1968 on I have been a Democrat. Some of the demonstrations were incredibly moving -- such as when dozens and dozens and dozens of white crosses were planted in the grass around the Diag (a diagonal path that ran through campus - one for each Michigan soldier killed in Vietnam. I've never forgotten it.
Back at MSU in 1971 after my USMC stint, I was one of the lucky ones who actually took advantage of the GI Bill. Kent State was still a raw wound: I had watched on AFVN from Phu Bai as National Guard troops violated every rule in the DoD manual I had used to teach riot control to my Marine company in my previous duty post. Murder by stupidity, but murder nonetheless. Now I hear some Republicans calling for the Guard to be brought in for these protests: a bigger mistake I can't imagine.
Thank you- agree
I was at Michigan State University from '69 through 73" and participated in the demonstrations opposing the war in Vietnam. My parents were old world pacifists and socialists who supported my stance. It was painful to watch the tv images of what we were doing in a country where we had no business being and demonstrating against it seemed to be the only honorable thing to do. I also went to DC and joined the marches there. I like to think we played some part in shortening the war. And then, of course, there was Kent State.
And please don’t forget Jackson state.
My time at UNC Chapel Hill in the 60’s was similar. My whole family was aghast that my parents would allow me to attend such a radical institution when women should attend the Women’s College in Greensboro or, shudder, UNC State.
We overlapped, Laurie, for your freshman, my senior year.
I was writing lit and film reviews for The Michigan Daily then. You probably saw some.
Laurie McFadden! 50 + years ago did we live in the same house on Tappen St🤭? SAH Vashon is me, Stephanie Harlan. Hi!
Placing it in time, Bob Dylan sang "Only a Pawn in Their Game at the march on Washington in 1963 -- I just went to the lyrics and then to a video watching it. I saw a profound mix of facial expressions, explained by civil rights activist Bernice Johnson who noted “Pawn” as the first song that showed “the poor white was as victimized by discrimination as the poor black". Manipulations are playing out within social/political structures everywhere — and are counterbalanced by tendencies to flock in more homogeneous assemblies while it’s nearly impossible to escape being a pawn in someone’s game. Bob Dylan’s lyrics to "Only A Pawn In Their Game" amaze me again today in the light of these times.
Yes, Joan, the music (such as you mention) was vital then for waking up many.
And in proportion to its vitality, Louis Powell and his corporate cohorts got determined to extirpate as many humanities as they could from all college life.
And, wow, did they succeed. Except many youth today somehow on their own have come rather to dislike the ease by which our billionaires and corporate classes just launch and condone unjust war. (Their allies include Putin and his oligarchs, and their Ukraine barbarism, on similar barbarism scale as Netanyahu and his far-right settlers continually seizing more of the West Bank.)
Joan, I'd never heard that. Those lyrics are as true now as they were 60 years ago. Chilling.
https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=8X0UmfBwA_U
Thank you Phil.
I was at U of M from 1979-1983 and lived in Ann Arbor from 1988-1990; my husband was there from 1977-1990 (including his post-doc). Things were very different then from what you all experienced. There *were* a few demonstrations, most of which concerned divesting from apartheid South Africa. But not many, and not one single day of my time at university was disrupted by anything except the Hash Bash. The most was people with clipboards asking for signatures on petitions as you entered the UGLI.
ps
I miss Ann Arbor. I loved it there.
Anti Semitism is being used as a first phase against free speech and protecting individual rights. They are rolling out the Fascist red carpet. The white christian nationalists are penetrating our educational institutions and campuses : the petri dish for free thought, education, democracy and expression. How sad. There must be some pretty strong lobbyists supporting Stefanik and others. And yet another Putin / Netanyahu tactic to weaken Biden.
Irony- I believe Stephanik is a Harvard grad
Shades of 1968 indeed! Interchange a few words in the news reporting and it's deja view all over again.
I think Congress has no right to dictate how universities should be run or to pressure presidents to resign, any more than say, they can pressure a corporation. What they can do is threaten to cut off the spigot of federal money flowing into most universities, especially the Ivy League.
Also, if Freedom of Speech does not protect speech that threatens, intimidates, or coerces individuals, doesn't that also hold with the former president intimidating jurors, witnesses, and court personnel?
Going to university used to mean you were going to pursue the understanding of humanity as seen by the old guard to develop your personal understanding from which humanity progressed. Today, their purpose is more focused on improving your financial future. Our thoughtful legislature is more interested in using whatever target they can use to project their vitriol rather than investigate issues and lead efforts towards a reasoned response.
We no longer have the subtlety for a reasonable debate on any topic much less a profound one on the limits of the Freedom of Speech. We need to remember the goals of enumerating such a freedom. I think it was called into life to protect the powerless from the powerful not to allow a person to spew a lie into the public discourse without response nor to allow "fighting words" and or aggressive physical actions to cower someone you disagree with.
"Congress will not tolerate your dereliction of duty to your Jewish students ..." Many Republicans must be more than bemused by this statement from the leaders of the Committee. After all, no Republican politician and certainly few ordinary Republicans have given notable philosophical or material aid to American Jews or the State of Israel. And not to beat a dead horse, antisemitism is rampant in the Republican party. And particularly in its more deeply Fascist violent gangs.
Ken Zimmerman
You articulated that much better than I could.
Well, Israel ruthlessly and cold-bloodedly killing tens of thousands of civilians, mainly unarmed women and children, injuring even more may increase anti-Semitic feelings world-wide - who would have thought? Interesting that the mental condition of the Jewish diaspora seems to be much more relevant than the condition of the Palestinians, seems a bit like somebody sitting at the bedside of a brain-aneurism patient complaining about the paper cut they got this morning.
"Israel ruthlessly and cold-bloodedly killing . . ."
Really? What is your battle plan for destroying Hamas while not injuring non-combatants in Gaza? Please lay out how Israel should conduct this war so we may all learn your kinder and gentler way of destroying terrorists who just murdered 1,500 of your citizens. You don't get to say "Just don't kill innocents!" You have to tell us how your war would differ from current.
Antisemitic attacks on Jews in the United States are not "paper cuts." If you think otherwise, put on traditional Jewish garb and go strolling. You'd be lucky to come out with only paper cuts. Yes, Gaza has an aneurism. But that aneurism was caused by Hamas and those who support it, not Israel, which was doubling the number of permits for Gazans to work in Israel last October (i.e., expanding good relations) when Hamas decided the mass-murder of Jews would be good sport.
I found an old button from my days in college (class of ‘70) that reads “War is not the answer”
I still believe that, but will admit I still don’t know what the answer is.
I do know that accepting war as the answer leads to continuing the invention and manufacture of ever more expensive and deadly weapons. And I know that sending those weapons to those who accept the premise of war as the answer has never worked to settle differences.
War always and only results in lost lives, damaged people, and massive destruction of habitat and environment.
Can it really be that there is no alternative to violence? Can violence ever lead to peace?
I wholeheartedly agree with you in the abstract, Victor: War is the worst of all options if you have any others you can choose. That said, humanity loves war. If it didn't, there wouldn't be at least one on the planet any given day of any given year. We are hard-wired to war and conflict, it seems. The other is that most wars are avoidable but some aren't. Israel-Hamas is the latter. All Hamas had to do to avoid all this was not murder Israelis. But it did, and now Israel will finish this fight it didn't start. I find this war sad because of the number of innocent deaths on both sides, but not immoral because Israel has no choice but to fight it.
You still want to start the whole Hamas shtick? You want to tell me you have to starve thousands of children, cut off water, cut off electricity, destroy the entire medical system, destroy practically all housing, destroy all universities and schools, throw rockets and children playgrounds, force women giving birth - including caesareans - without anaesthetics, because you can't find Hamas? Which, by the way, is still not and will not be beaten by the most moral army in the world. How bloody incompetent is this most moral army in the world? Let Putin have a go - he managed to kill "only" 10,000 civilians so far, about 500 of them children.
But let's not play this silly game - we all know the Gaza war has nothing to do with Hamas or hostages - the Gaza war is about Israel "cleansing" Gaza (and later the Westbank, they seem to have already started) from Palestinians, also called genocide, or massmurder, or lots and lots and lots of killing, if you prefer. The reason I know that is that I listen to Israeli politicians and the Israeli parliament. There they tell you on a daily basis, you just have to listen.
My guess is that the powers to be are hanging in the rafters, waiting for the when they'll give Bibi the boot, they will then say "He was the war criminal, bad, bad Bibi. Well, he's gone now, nothing to see here, lets just all move on" And the West - or what's left of it - will lap it up 😂😂😂, the rest of the world probably not so much.
Israel will probably never be held accountable - which will be just another little step to help the US on the way down from the superpower throne.
So far the governments in the West still toe the US/Israeli set line - the populations world-wide may just teach them better. And no industrial-military-complex dick swinging will be able to control that.
See my answer to your other rant-lette.
'Russia, China, and Iran are amplifying the protests “to score geopolitical points abroad and stoke tensions within the United States,” as well as to “undermine President Biden’s reelection prospects.” '
This, very much this. If Hamas had not attacked when it did, it seems very likely to me that Netanyahu would have been forced to call for elections, and a saner coalition would not have responded as, er, spectacularly to an attack. Their timing, then was driven by the desire to elicit the response that Netanyahu would give. Netanyahu, for his part, seems to want to be part of the Putin-Orban-Trump club and I wouldn't put it past him to be using the war to get himself there. Hurting Biden is certainly a goal of his, and I have seen, even in this forum, attempts to undermine Biden derived from this. When this is all over, it is my hope that Israel will dust off Eichmann's old glass box for Netanyahu's trial.
As for the protests - it seems obvious to me that many of them are young idealists being manipulated by old cynics.
I am glad that we finally got the supplemental aid bill passed. Funding is leverage, and only now that it is available can Biden is it as a diplomatic tool in dealing with Bibi.
But Bibi seems to be part of the club to undermine democracy. That Israel should have such a prime minister is a horror to me. I had hoped, before the attack, that the Israeli people would have seized him and thrown him in the Jordan. But then Jordan would have had to pursue a case against Israel for dumping toxic waste in shared waters.
Yes… and isn’t it also interesting that this very well planned attack—with printed instructions ! —happened to take place on Putin’s birthday no less. 🧐
I remember protests in the 60’s and the 70’s. Why is no one harnessing all that good student energy toward a productive purpose? Raising money to feed Gaza? Raising money for Gazans left homeless and destitute? Agitating for elections to replace Hamas with some sensible leaders for Gaza? Agitating for elections to replace Netanyahu with some sensible leaders for Israel? Getting lost in the weeds of anti-Palestinian/anti-Semitic displays against college campus administrators is just giving the fundamentalist wing of the Republican Party more excuses to waste tax-payer money throwing monkey wrenches into the wheels of the Biden administration. Ugh.
I sound like a crazy conspiracy theorist and I know it. But I think both Hamas’ attack on Israel and the student protests were/are designed and timed specifically to lessen Biden’s chance of re-election, to take our eyes off Ukraine, and to weaken American generally. I do not believe these protests are organic. When I see matching pricy tents or lots of catering, I wonder who is paying for that. I do think the students are sincere, but when I hear them speak, I also think they’re naive and ignorant of the incredibly complex and fraught history of that part of the world. And the anti-semitism is unconscionable.
It's only crazy if you're wrong, and I don't think you are...
Thanks, Ally. You live up to your name ❤️
As surprising as it probably is - not everything in this universe evolves around the US.
Sabine, I am more than aware, particularly as my father was German and my husband is Italian, and I have lived outside of the US. But to pretend that what happens here electorally doesn’t affect the rest of the world is naive. And to think that Putin doesn’t have the motivation is worse than naive.
This is not at all like 1-6. It is unruly, violent, and wrongheaded, but these twerps are not trying to overturn an election. They are not trying to hang the vice president and kill congressional democrats. They are trying and generally failing to push their universities around and bully them over Israel.
The protests are also not at all like ours in the 1960s and early 70s. We were protesting a war that our country was actively engaged in. It was killing our brothers, lovers, and husbands. And over something that was no real threat to our country. The Vietcong were not chanting "death to America" and trying to export communism, no matter what McNamara. And in the end we WON--because we had skin in the game. Too many American families were impacted.
In contrast--these demonstrations cherry pick the outrage, and the fact that it is Gaza they care about and Israel they demonize speaks volumes in a world full of potential grievances. It is NOT OUR WAR. No matter what any particular American believes, we have nothing with any teeth to say about it. And terrorizing American Jews is blatant antisemitism. No matter what their excuse might be.
But we must also see who benefits. The Vietnamese had no intention of exporting communism to the United States. But the :Global Infatida" crowd means it when they chant "Death to America". And now they are teaching our "best and brightest" to chant it too, against their own country, as they sit in privilege at our finest institutions of higher learning. The fact that it is a cause celebre excuses neither the ignorance nor the bad behavior.
It may not be OUR WAR but it is OUR taxes that are providing Israel with the weapons to destroy Gaza.
But, Anabel, we are supplying the weapons being used to bomb the Palestinians.
I take it you haven't listened to a single student to really find out what they ask for, have you?
War anywhere draws energy and resources away from solving important problems humans face. Do you want a world where violence is used to obtain goals rather than finding solutions that though not optimal are at least workable? Small nongovernmental groups are at a distinct disadvantage when dealing with a sovereign nation, even a small one.
The issues we face were understood long ago. First it gave birth to the League of Nations which failed because of it's structure. Then came the United Nations. It has failed because of it's structure. The less powerful were to be protected by the Charter which the powerful also had to sign. But one flaw was the powerful were busy misleading the powerless. A signature didn't carry weight between a sovereign nation's internal political changes.
Ukraine has been modern example of that failure. Now, the stateless Palestinians are too. It is globalism versus isolationism as well. The Pacific and Atlantic Oceans no longer provide protection from nation state attacks or even business and tourist activities spreading deadly disease. Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) has been recognized as a mental illness.
We need to honor our commitments to the world and understand that our success depends on everyone's efforts. We are one family, one earth, and one future.
Sorry to say, but to a large degree the UN fails because of the US vetoes.
I'm not referring to just this conflict. The permanent members of the Security Council bear responsibility both for stabilizing and unfortunately destabilizing the member nations.
Also, there is no obligation to provide citizens from member countries to implement the resolutions of the UN removing the teeth from any resolution. What nation(s) would go into Gaza and protect Palestinians from the military decisions of Hamas or Israel? Who would enforce the ceasefire? Who would implement the decisions or the IRC and the ICC? Who would be the independent investigator? Who would protect the journalist and aid workers? Who would police the Black Market,?