Israel also had amazing bipartisan support in America. It seems like Netanyahu purposefully made Israel a partisan issue in the US in order to accomplish some short term goals, which was probably very short sighted.
I've really noticed this. Right wing forums seem to have shifted significantly over the last year or 2 from the evangelical support of Israeli state, now increasingly to 'jews are the puppet master' type commentary. Also worryingly the general (and more to do with democrats) call to arms type commentary has been growing too. You like yo hope its a significant minority but it doesn't seem to get pushed down in the forums.
I really dont know how society can deal with this movement if it grows. I suspect the best way is access to quality education + plentiful & reasonably paid jobs when people enter the workforce at all levels. Not trying to be political but I feel this is one of many reasons why things like higher minimum wages are so important and a somewhat egalitarian society as I think much of the discontent ultimately comes from people not happy with their societal status.
> Meanwhile the new guard views Israel as an apartheid state, which isn’t great for Israel.
It’s great for everyone else though. As a US citizen, I’m tired of funding and being morally culpable for Israel’s terrorism and apartheid state. Thankfully as mentioned, the younger generations aren’t buying it anymore.
Edit: Since HN has decided to throttle my replies (why?). Yes I also oppose all US military adventurism and funding. We should be 100% focused on disassembling our nuclear arsenal and convincing others to do the same. This article is about Israel though, so our support of their crimes is the topic of my comment.
It is so weird to me that so many American citizens are more worried about the moral implications of the couple billion sent to Israel than the literally trillions spent on our own wars
I think you'll find that most people concerned about military aid to Israel are likewise not a huge fan of US wars either. It's just that this thread is about Israel, so of course that is the subject that is discussed.
I've read plenty of threads here talking about the US. Very few of them pivot into discussion about military spending. Certainly not 100x or 1000x the number about Israel that pivot into military aid
That has not been my experience. Frankly, I think it’s just that Israel is a more polarizing issue, so it gets more discussion. Reducing our military adventurism has a much broader base of support among non-elites.
Possible, but I don’t see a mechanism for that at this point in time. It’s not like these people hid their opinions of Israel under a bushel in order to get elected; a lot of the more vocal critics of Israel handily won re-election last year, often against vocally pro-Israel opponents. Their voters either agree, or do not view Israel as an issue sufficiently important to override other policy concerns and change their vote.
If something will force these candidates to conform or leave to a pro-Israel position, it’s not obvious how or why that would happen.
That's ridiculously short sighted and bordering on racist.
Let's bomb all of Israel's infrastructure, arm various militias in the country and put economic sanctions on them for 20 years that limits the country to a grain-for-food programme and you'll quickly see Israel join in as a regional "basketcase."
It’s not “bordering” on racist - it is racist! It is sad to see this dehumanization towards Arabs from this community. Posters like this show that they believe that maintaining and increasing US hegemony at the expense of third world peoples is moral.
I never said I agreed with US policy. I just think this is the main reason why US policy is how it is. If you don't understand why people do things, you can't convince them to do otherwise.
I agree. I just think if I was working for the US state department, and I was sizing up various countries around the middle east to build a partnership with, I would choose Israel every time. The only country that comes close is Turkey, and they have coups every couple of decades.
I think the reasons why the ME is so unstable are a bit complex, but it's also not really relevant. If you're interested in a stable regional partner, the reasons why a given country is unstable is not really something you care about.
Considering that the only metric for supporting a Middle Eastern group is that they have to be pro-Israel, of course Israel becomes the natural choice. It’s not about stability considering that Israel is a constant powder keg. That in itself is just the catch-22 of US foreign policy in the Middle East.
The right decision - if you had the best interests for the US and the region - is to completely withdraw. Any other decision leads to more conflict and hostile and opportunist groups (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Russia, et al) growing in influence with every passing moment.
The basic goal of US foreign policy has been to maintain a network of US allies and partners around the world, who can be relied upon to protect US strategic interests, like access through the strait of Hormuz.
Nations like Qatar or SA are fine, but ultimately they are dictatorships that occasionally do stuff like chop up journalists, so you don't invest that much into them. The US had a very close strategic partnership with Iran, which was in this mould, and it didn't turn out very well.
Israel, on the other hand, is a western-style settler-colonial state that has never had a coup, has a strong civil society, and frankly could have gone to the USSR at any point in the cold war and they would have been just fine.
Obviously, if you don't want the US to be a global hegemon, this policy doesn't make sense. However, the US state department almost always does, so this policy is totally rational from their perspective.
Wow! How do you lump in Qatar with Saudi Arabia? Please point us to one time where Qatar did something last heinous as Saudi thugs chopping up a Saudi journalist at the behest of the crown prince.
>Please point us to one time where Qatar did something last heinous as Saudi
Their treatment of "guest workers" (de facto almost slaves) is significantly worse than Saudi killing a single person.
Not only due to numbers affected (the Guardian counted 6,500 deaths). It's that, we expect repressive regimes to kill their opponents but when their acts are turned against truly helpless and unrelated people it's even worse.
Workers rights is a separate discussion and one in which the entire gulf region is shamefully criminal.
I asked about the unparalleled brutality of a Crown Prince ordering the dismemberment of a journalist. Remember, this is a person who we host in the White House to shake hands with a smiling president — it matters that the whole world knows he ordered the killing and that the whole world continues to look the other way. Imagine how he will deal with dissidents for the next decade?
>Workers rights is a separate discussion in which the entire gulf region is shamefully criminal.
It's not. It's a human rights issue, which has led to many deaths. Qatar has a far worse record than the rest of the Gulf.
>Remember, this is a person who we host in the White House to shake hands with a smiling president
So you don't want to do any diplomacy with unsavory regimes? With this standard, the US couldn't even talk to most of the ME, not to mention Russia and China. The world is unlikely to survive that.
>I asked about the unparalleled brutality of a Crown Prince ordering the dismemberment of a journalist.
Well, it's a separate issue that almost the entire ME is guilty of. Just look at the case of Zahra Kazemi[0]. And we have diplomacy with those people!
"was an Iranian-Canadian freelance photographer, who according to the medical examiner was raped, tortured and killed by Iranian officials following her arrest in Iran."
The ME is unstable by design. Why dance around the subject? The US supports anti-democratic dictatorships in the countries it controls.
Guess what comes with unpopular regimes? Perpetual instability due to oppressed populations. In the countries that are not controlled the US supports any group willing to fight the government — sometimes with arms and other times with endless cash to fight the government within the framework of democracy. You think either of those actions support stability?
It's ridiculous to think the instability in the middle east is by US design, there are thousands of factions vying for power and the US has to make strategic calls day by day. Had the US made bad decisions, sure, did they know those decisions were bad at the time, probably not. If you have countries where no group (ethnic or political) has a majority, then no ruling government will be "popular".
It had nothing to do with the United States and the geopolical issues it created. In fact, the Americans sent a commission to Syria which deduced that what the French and Brits were doing was very stupid, at which point the Brits and French told the Americans to piss off.
Perhaps you can first explain why you think that is relevant? AFAIK it was an agreement that the US did not participate in, nor was its intent to destabilize.
> That's ridiculously short sighted and bordering on racist.
Now, here's a true, actual, case of using accusations of racism to avoid criticism. The post you responded to said nothing about guilt.
You could (absurdly) blame the West entirely for the region's state - but most ME countries are still basketcases regardless of who's fault it is (and plenty of it obviously goes to the locals, e.g. Lebanon being a great example of a country mostly ruined by local and regional actors).
Lebanon is quite possibly the worst example you could give, not only due to Israel playing a key role in the country's instability[0] but also to the fact that the areas that were shielded by Israel and the West were immediately experienced economic and political stability[1].
Israel in and of itself is a "basketcase" country that continues to operate the world's largest open-air prison, flaunting every international directive with complete disregard for the UN and operates an apartheid-like system that sees it constantly at war with almost every other nation in the Middle East. It has been entrenched in civil war since its inception but somehow that's not enough to be considered a "basketcase" -- apparently.
2. Besides geography, some of us also know history and chronology. We recall the start of Lebanese Civil War preceded the Israeli invasion by almost five years. Lebanon collapsed long before Israel even thought about it.
In fact one of the main causes for the civil war - and the cause of the Israeli invasion - was that the PLO was able to run a state within a state and attack Israel while being based in Lebanon.
This phenomena - a third party militia embroiling the 'host' nation in its own wars, is exactly one of the outcomes of a failed state (ergo, a basketcase). For better or worse, Israel is a state. Lebanon isn't really a state, it's a collection of tribes with no local central management.
3. That said, I was thinking more of the recent collapse though. Nothing forced the Lebanese politicians to loot the state besides themselves, especially the wars 30 and 40 years ago. It's entirely locally made collapse.
The dumb algorithm you applied - find action of West/Israel years ago, ignore everything that preceded, succeeded it or caused it and ignore the responsibility of the locals (or Russia or anyone else), is one of the main causes of collapse. Its proponents ignore the welfare of the people they supposedly speak for in order to score an illusionary point against their political enemies.
Another outcome: surprisingly Israel has no reason to work overmuch to counter the insane campaign against it and the campaign's absurd claims. The campaign mainly serves its interests.
No, sorry, you don’t get it to lump the Jewish people into this. It’s incredibly dishonest on your part to even go in that direction and you should feel embarrassment for trying to steer it towards that.
Steer what to where? Are you saying Israel's history and present are not connected to Jewish history and the 20th century atrocities? That's an extremely bizarre position to hold.
What isn't connected to Jewish history? Let's see… Christianity's out, as is everything influenced by that. Same with Islam. Considering conquerers, trade, settlement – even just the impact of the United States – that leaves… not very much.
The atrocities of WWII are more recent than the start of Jewish history, but it's called “World War II” for a reason. Think of the impact of the Geneva Conventions, for just one example.
They would've happened very differently if Judaism wasn't a thing, so I'd say they were connected. Judaism is at about as important as the Roman empire, or the people who introduced horses to the Americas – though perhaps less important than the people who crossed the Beringa land bridge.
Anti-semitism, including of the extremely violent variety, did not start with WWII. The Balfour Declaration was a response to Jews wanting to get the hell out of a Europe that hated them and liked to go kill them every so often.
The Balfour Declaration was a request from a banker so powerful that he could order the British government to create a new colony. It has nothing to do with anti-semitism.
Anti-semitism has nothing to do with the movement to create a homeland for the Jewish people (which then tried to garner the support of various governments, which is where the Balfour Declaration comes in)? It has everything to do with it.
Were there various colonialism-related issues involved too, of course. But pretending like that's the entire story is quite disingenuous.
This is clearly colonialism by definition. It’s the entire story because there is no justification for oppressing and colonizing others, even if the people doing it also face discrimination. It’s not an excuse and shouldn’t be part of the conversation.
I think there's an interesting argument to be had here about the point at which "self-determination" becomes "colonialism". A group that is sufficiently geographically diffuse does not have a right to self-determination (ipso facto, because it's not the majority anywhere). Your position seems to be that an attempt by such a group to concentrate geographically somewhere in order to exercise the right to self-determination is fundamentally illegitimate because any such attempt is "colonialism".
Is that an accurate representation of your views? If not, what is?
> Your position seems to be that an attempt by such a group to concentrate geographically somewhere in order to exercise the right to self-determination is fundamentally illegitimate because any such attempt is "colonialism".
If that relocation involves creating a new state or otherwise taking power over the region, then yes that’s my definition of colonialism.
> If that relocation involves creating a new state
Creating a new state is what the right to self-determination is all about, yes.
It sounds like we have some fundamental disagreements on definitions here, though I would be interested in your take about how you feel the right to self-determination can be meaningfully exercised by a geographically dispersed group, if at all.
I don’t think a new state can ethically be created without a democratic choice to do so by the existing population of a region.
I think a humanitarian route would be to lobby for open immigration in existing democracies. For instance, I think we all would have been a lot better off if instead of creating the state of Israel, we offered US citizenship to anyone who needed it after WWII. I’m also a proponent of a modern day open border policy for the US (where I’m a citizen).
I don't see how open immigration solves the self-determination problem, unless the premise is that:
1) You allow open immigration.
2) You then allow a democratic vote, including by the new immigrants, to partition the existing state (the essence of self-determination).
which comes back to pretty much my original premise: that the only way for a geographically dispersed population to have self-determination is to be able to move to a single area where they can them democratically vote to have that area become autonomous or sovereign...
Needless to say, the pre-existing population of that area would likely not perceive this process favorably.
The other option I see is to posit that in modern democracies the principle of self-determination is unnecessary. I suspect a number of people in Catalonia and Scotland would disagree...
> The other option I see is to posit that in modern democracies the principle of self-determination is unnecessary.
For geographically dispersed people? Yes, sovereignty is impossible and undesirable as you’d have to take it from the locals wherever you were getting the land from.
For people living under an oppressive regime (or one they view that way), it’s a different story. They are the locals and thus should have a government that fits the local population.
You can’t create sovereignty out of thin air. You have to take it from someone if you’re going to give it to someone else. All the land on this planet has been accounted for for some time now.
Well Jews lived under oppressive regimes wouldn't you agree? It couldn't get much more oppressive. So their only choice was to try settle a place completely empty or where the locals would greet them. Zionism considered this btw, all plans failed. There weren't that many options.
Their choice was to fight the oppressive regimes where they lived, not become the oppressive regime for other people. Of course not all Jewish people are Zionist so there were other options aside from colonizing Palestine.
Its really not though, the declaration never went into specifics on what parts will become Jewish exactly for this reason. It said a Jewish home IN Plaestine, not that all of Palestine will become Jewish. And even if it is "the definition of colonialism", what does it have to do with anything now?
A colony is the establishment of a new state on or in territory occupied by someone else. This is as textbook a case of colonialism as there is.
> And even if it is "the definition of colonialism", what does it have to do with anything now?
It’s literally the basis for every problem we’re discussing. Israel didn’t magically become not a colony, it’s enforced its apartheid state since it was created by western superpowers.
> A colony is the establishment of a new state on or in territory occupied by someone else
That's you interpreting Balfour / Zionism the way you see fit, there were movements in Zionism that wanted to split the land, in fact the main movement wanted to split the land since 1937 for sure (agreeing to the Peel committee split plan) and maybe even before that.
But the declaration itself just says - a national Jewish home in Palestine. There were unoccupied territories in Palestine 100 years ago. In fact there still are, even when this tiny land inhabits 15 million people and not just 1.5 millions like 100 years ago.
If Balfour wanted to say explicitly that all of Palestine is to become Jewish he would have said so.
It doesn't even say a state or a country, just a "national home". You're attributing to Balfour more than what was written.
Define unoccupied. It was scarcely populated, definitely then and definitely by today's standards, and the Palestinian national movement was only in it's infancy. Most Palestinian wanted to be part of Syria back then afaik.
It wasn't inconceivable that two people can create two states there then, and still isn't now. So no, I don't buy that everything was a colonialist plot. Some Zionists saw it as an expansionist enterprise and some didn't. We know for sure that on 1937 Zionism was seeking a split to the land or at least willing to make it happen. If the Palestinian agreed to the Peel committee in 1937 which offered Israel a very small state we wouldn't have been having this discussion now.
Why is the Balfour Declaration a main point in your argument? It could have not happen and yet Jews would still have been desperate to find a state of their own. I am not sure how it relates to anything besides it being a piccant topic (a powerful banker!)
This is the other thing: the US backed Israel because Israel was strong; Israel was not strong because the US backed them.
At the end of the mandate period, Israel was the only country in the region with a real military, because the UK had just spent the last decade training and arming that military.
At the time, the US was virulently antisemitic (see McCarthy era stuff for examples), as was most of europe.
Well, the CIA released a report that said very clearly Israel would win the 6 day war[1] without any real trouble, and this is largely considered the point at which the US started backing Israel seriously.
Obviously, it's very complicated, but I think the basic picture of the middle east at the time is a bunch of states that were dysfunctional by design, with borders drawn up by powers like the UK who had the colonial modus operandi of creating states that were fraught with ethnic and sectarian tension, so these states would rely upon them for support.
When the mandatory period ended, the Israelis had two massive advantages: they had a classic, european style 'nation', not some post-colonial territory that had literally never worked as a nation ever; and they had an army that had been fighting a civil war against the palestinians for its whole existence, with british support and training. So it's not really surprising they win the first Arab-Israeli war. Then after that, they basically can build on this to secure more support and more weapons, and build stronger military institutions, etc.
In 1948 Britain armed the Arab armies(or just left the equipment). Israel had to procure some crappy weapons undercover all around the world, but even that was not enough. Their airplanes didn't even have enough bombs, dropping bottles(or was it sacks) to scare away 10 countries strong army.
