well that escalated quickly! Business as usual or the tip of the iceberg?

What?

Read the whole sentence. The AP report I read indicated that while Israel did conduct airstrikes against 3 high rise buildings, the buildings were evacuated and there weren't casualties.

It's possible that report is outdated, granted.

I was not suggesting there are no casualties period, only in that specific attack.

Peace has to be something both sides want, and to this point that's never been the case.

Ultimately both groups believe this is their ancestral home, and from their own POV, they are both correct.

There was an attempt in the past for other nation states to take in Palestinians, but those largely failed, as they didn't assimilate, and in one notable instance tried to overthrow the government of Jordan because the King made peace with Israel.

And now Netanyahu certainly profits from ongoing hostilities, and no doubt is manipulating the situation to ensure them. Note that you can't condemn either the governments of Palestine or Israel en toto, as there have been instances where either seemed willing to proceed with peace, but in both cases bad actors have existed that made that impossible.

Honestly, I don't think there is a solution. I think ultimately Israel will win, driving out Palestinians from their homes in the West bank and Jerusalem. Even the rest of the Muslim countries largely seem resigned to that fate now.

I do think the US should withdraw support for Netanyahu's government. That would be a step in the right direction until a different government that was a better partner and more dedicated to a peaceful resolution came along.

But at this point neither side wants peace. Hamas demands the territory and still demands the right of return for Palestinian refugees. And doing so would make Jews a minority in the one nation they can call their own, and is considered a deal breaker for every single major party in Israel.

It's strange that you'd omit the attacks that did have multiple casualties in your overview. The IDF have been targetting the family homes of Hamas operatives and killing their children.

The description of police "facing off" against protestors is weasel words as well.

Colonizing language. We're comfortable with it because we do it to black folks every day. Look at how the news media covers protests and riots right here in the US. The United States pours money into Israel, and we sympathize with them because Israel is doing to Palestine what the United States government did to the Native Americans.

What Israel is doing is the equivalent of "I feared for my life" that we hear from police when a black kid throws a rock.

​

Always the oppressor, never the oppressed.

Dancing Israelis.

Wow. Yes, 1500 rockets being fired into your country is the equivalent of a kid throwing a rock.

And colonizers? Hard to take such language seriously considering that this is the Jewish homeland going back 3000 plus years, and they themselves were driven from it in large numbers by the ancestors of the very people that fired those rockets. And, let's check notes, what was the nation that was the last self-governing polity on this soil prior to Israel? Oh, right, Israel.

Israel is far from blameless, both sides have moral stains to be sure.

But this is not a clear cut issue, and never has been. If it was, there would likely have been a resolution.

I've repeatedly stated that neither side is blameless. Whereas you are willing to ignore any and all hostilities by Hamas. The fact no one mentioned the 1500 rockets launched against Israel is pretty consistent with the slant you and your fellow travellers consistently provide. If that had been Israel, you would have been screaming war crimes.

AP and Reuters are generally fairly objective. And their reports don't match what we saw in this thread prior to my citing them.

It’s never a clear cut issue for colonizers. It’s important that things be muddled. Gives them more time to take more land and kill more of the local population. Like the US did and still does here.

So what is different from what I said and what is going around? Perhaps you were not careful and caught TDS from someone around here. It is a terrible disease that runs through some of the people I have contact with in the universe. Some think it causes a massive decrease in cognitive functions, but I am pretty sure most of those victims were dumb as fuck to begin with.

Casualties? I'm seeing seven, according to reports. There were about that many in the US Capitol riots that the GOP seem to want to say didn't happen.

Japan technically firebombed the US during WW2. You don't have many folk burning for vengeance over that, because it had fuck all effect.

Hiroshima, on the other hand.

You're talking the odd scalping versus the contaminated blankets. Pretty obvious you've bought the Cowboys vs Indians narrative.

If the US responded to 7 casualties like Israel does, you'd have entire states aflame.

Israel has the right to defend themselves and Hamas are terrorists.

None of that changes the fact that many in the Israeli government are massively for violence.

But I'm sure people like this have the best of intentions...

It's dubious the smallpox blankets incident even occurred.

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/p/plag/5...ox-blankets-to-indians?rgn=main;view=fulltext

Abstract: In this analysis of the genocide rhetoric employed over the years by Ward Churchill, an ethnic studies professor at the University of Colorado, a "distressing" conclusion is reached: Churchill has habitually committed multiple counts of research misconduct—specifically, fabrication and falsification. While acknowledging the "politicization" of the topic and evidence of other outrages committed against Native American tribes in times past, this study examines the different versions of the "smallpox blankets" episode published by Churchill between 1994 and 2003. The "preponderance of evidence" standard of proof strongly indicates that Churchill fabricated events that never occurred—namely the U.S. Army's alleged distribution of smallpox infested blankets to the Mandan Indians in 1837. The analysis additionally reveals that Churchill falsified sources to support his fabricated version of events, and also concealed evidence in his cited sources that actually disconfirms, rather than substantiates, his allegations of genocide.

As to the rest, 3 dead, several dozen injured, including a bus hit by a rocket in Holon where a 5 year old child was put into critical care.

And that doesn't discount the intent, which was to kill as many as possible indiscriminately.

It also doesn't discount Israel's culpability, and the fact that their military is far stronger and capable of much more. Indeed, they've killed 30 per last reports, and as I've repeatedly said there's questions of internal political motivation that loom over this that stinks to high heaven.

But this 'the little guy is right because he's little' narrative is tired. Hamas has a dedicated terrorist wing, and the more peaceful option in Palestine was the PLO. Hamas has had as its core objective the destruction of Israel for decades.

It seems to me that you are beating that wardrum against palestine pretty fucking hard while trying to pretend you are not. Calm down Mr. SJW. Biden is going to help Isreal. It is what he does and loves to do. He has made a career on it. You will get your dead palestinians. And we will get a good look at a person who wants to have people slaughtered thousands of miles away for something that probably has never effected him.

OK, Tererun. This is why it's hard for moderates to take extremists seriously. They lie so goddamn often.

Are you meant to be the moderate or the extremist here, D?

The Extremist: "Quit killing Palestinians."
The Moderate: "They shouldn't have mouthed off like that."

Saying both sides are problematic and they both have real concerns?

In what world is that extremist?

Hey, @Bailey pulled out a whole bunch of quotes showing just how awful some Israeilis can be.

Because we know that Arabs and Palestinians never, ever, say bad things about Jews.

1946 Zionists bombed the King David Hotel killing 91 people of various nationalities. Why? Because they wanted a homeland where they could be safe from would-be exterminators. Were they justified? 11 million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. Are the grievances of the Palestinians so great that they offset the grievances of the Jews? Taking one side in that dispute and dismissing the validity of the other side's grievances is ignoring the messy realities of history.

The problem is that Israel was given the land upon which millions of Palestinians had already settled, and over the past decades, Israel has taken more and more of that land. It should sound familiar because it's what the US did to the Native Americans. That the Jews were murdered in the Holocaust is true, and it's vile, but it does not excuse colonization of already settled land and killing those who lived there before because they happen to be in the way of expansion. That, too, is a reality, and the Palestinians are refugees in the land they once called their home.

The way Palestinians are treated by the IDF is the same way black men are treated by the police here in the US. It's the same way the Native Americans were treated by US armed forces during our westward expansion. The slightest provocation, or simply existing, was grounds for overwhelming retaliation. It wasn't enough to fight back, it was necessary to wipe out entire swathes of people as a lesson, to put them in their place, to make them understand that we were the occupying force taking what was in our Manifest Destiny, and that their mere existence was a threat.

... said no one.

Lobbing hundreds of rockets at Israeli cities is not "mouthing off."

Sounds a bit like how Israel's neighbors have responded to them for ... well, as long as modern Israel has existed.

Literally the day after the state of Israel was formed, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Iraq sent in their armies. Israel's neighbors have wanted it wiped off the face of the earth from the very beginning. Only the rationale has changed.

You mean in that same post where I said Israel has the right to defend themselves and that Hamas are terrorists?

If Israel's actions are a response to Hamas, then I'm sure we'll see Israel move to remove checkpoints and allow freedom of movement through the other Palestinian territories not under Hamas control right?

Are you @Demiurge? If not, then the response did not apply to you. He posed himself as the moderate in that equation and @Tererun as the extremist.

As for the rest, Hamas is no match for the IDF. No match. None.
The IDF uses the same tactics the US police do when it comes to making themselves out to be the aggrieved party. I wonder why that is?

https://www.amnestyusa.org/with-who...-with-a-chronic-human-rights-violator-israel/

Don't be a colonizer like our forefathers. You can be against people being attacked while also acknowledge that Israel is an occupying force that is slowly killing off Palestinians and taking their land, because that's what they're doing.

is this your first day on wordforge?

Matter-of-fact Arabs want to "push Israel into the sea" because Israel gets hot in the summer, and they need to cool off and relax with some swimming! Who doesn't enjoy a day at the beach?