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[hector13]

Considering John hates a group of people based on immutable characteristics it probably isn’t out of the question he would hate Arabs as well as Jews, but I don’t think you meant John to be more than one-dimensional in their hate.

Pretending “from the river to the sea..” has no other meaning is asinine, though.

I suppose before it retained its current meaning, whenever it was used the speaker just got confused looks because nobody knew what it meant yet, if it’s only allowed to have one meaning, and it hasn’t been acquired yet.

On a more serious note, I’ll just indulge my joy for pedantry and say your use of the word “current” implies an understanding that it meant something prior to the antisemitic bile of your claimed singular definition and that the definition thus possesses a malleable, possibly even fluid quality which we’re seeing in action by protestors using the phrase to call for peace in the region, so one day soon - protestors have been chanting it every weekend since the current chapter in the Israel-Gaza conflict ignited, after all - it will have a new meaning that even you couldn’t argue.

It would certainly be harder to paint hordes of people marching for peace as holding a burning hatred for Jews, at any rate.

[Strongpoint]

This really reminds me of the reaction of a random neo-nazi group when asked why they use a Swastika-like symbol as their logo and they start talking some bullshit about ancient runic symbols that have nothing to do with Nazism.

All these claims that "From the river to the sea" and "Globalize the intifada" don't mean what they mean are hypocritical, dishonest, and disgusting. Sorry, I refuse to discuss it any further. It is neither interesting, nor pleasant, nor productive.

[hector13]

I’ve thought the same about your position since you claimed the protests for peace are anti-Semitic.

Can’t help but laugh at your failure to see the irony in using the example of hate groups co-opting extant symbols and twisting them to their own nefarious ends for your point whilst simultaneously failing to understand the same example for mine, though.

[Duuvian]

But...like take the middle east conflict we had under bush, war could been won quite quickly really, but there would have been a huge civilian loss. Would be extremely unpopular on the west, instead the war was just another western loss.

This isn't correct. You should read up about the changes under Petraus, despite his later classified info troubles. Part of that was a rules of engagement change that was vociferously criticized, but was AFAIK a part of a temporary turn-around in Iraq along with an unpopular troop surge that tapered off after a while; IIRC both were around the same time but the rules change may have been a little later. ISIS then arose and that was very bloody on civilians, particularly towards the end.

I'll do the 10 points at some point in the near future after I think about it more.

[pr1mezer0]

The Arabs are semites as well.

Zionists are antisemite.

They feel threatened that "... Palestine will be free."

[Strongpoint]

https://twitter.com/MEMRIReports/status/1724733217150828817

I hope pro-peace activists are in for a long ride, Iran expects them to be active for much longer, even past the destruction of Israel.

[hector13]

Ah, because a prominent Iranian says something, it must be true, particularly as it relates to the West.

[Strongpoint]

Huh? This prominent Iranian talks not about the West but about Iranian plans and goals regarding Israel and Zionism(read Jews) which includes supporting anti-Zionist protests in the Western World.

You may say that it is wrong for them to expect that protests will continue should Israel start losing but my statement is about what Iran expects, not what will actually happen.

I do think that antisemitic crowds aren't going anywhere no matter how this current war will progress. When this kind of stuff starts and it is unopposed - it tends to grow larger. Composition may change but the core will stay the same. But it is merely my subjective prediction.

It is funny how what is happening in Israel goes far better(less badly) than my most optimistic predictions and how I failed to even assume what will happen in EU and NA.

[hector13]

Huh? This prominent Iranian talks not about the West but about Iranian plans and goals regarding Israel and Zionism(read Jews) which includes supporting anti-Zionist protests in the Western World.

You may say that it is wrong for them to expect that protests will continue should Israel start losing but my statement is about what Iran expects, not what will actually happen.

I didn’t say anything beyond implying that Iranian talking points aren’t useful.

The protestors aren’t there because they want Israel to lose though, but considering you also think they’re demanding the extermination of Israel and the Jews, it’s not surprising you don’t understand what they want.

I do think that antisemitic crowds aren't going anywhere no matter how this current war will progress. When this kind of stuff starts and it is unopposed - it tends to grow larger. Composition may change but the core will stay the same. But it is merely my subjective prediction.

It is funny how what is happening in Israel goes far better(less badly) than my most optimistic predictions and how I failed to even assume what will happen in EU and NA.

It’s almost as though you’re not an expert and have little understanding of what you’re talking about, Nostradamus.

[Strongpoint]

The protestors aren’t there because they want Israel to lose though, but considering you also think they’re demanding the extermination of Israel and the Jews

Sorry, but I trust my own eyes and ears coupled with my reasoning. I see what this crowd demands, how it demands, what it promotes, what it tolerates within itself. I also see who the leaders are and what they promote in media (both social and traditional)

I also don't really care what each individual protestor thinks or desires because... it is not what I am evaluating.

If I say that a person has cancer, I don't mean that every cell in their body is cancerous.
If I say that a forest is a pine forest, I don't mean that every tree there is a pine.
If I say that a country is rich, I don't mean that every resident of this country is rich.

If I say that the movement is antisemitic, promotes hateful narratives, and actively works to harm Israel's war effort to make it lose, that is what I mean. Motivations of some individuals inside that movement are rather irrelevant. After all, in any crowd, an active core is what matters.

It’s almost as though you’re not an expert and have little understanding of what you’re talking about, Nostradamus.

Neither you are. You know? Besides predictions are funny. Actual experts miss all the time. Take any expert predictions on how the Ukrainian-Russian war will go and it is pure comedy in hindsight.

[hector13]

For not wanting to talk about something, you’re talking about it an awful lot.

I already know your position, and I already reject your position, in much the same way as you know and reject mine.

Again, though, before the main point, the protests aren’t calling for an Israeli loss. Will a ceasefire allow Hamas to re-arm? Probably. Do you think they’re going to be able to have the same quality of weapons and supplies as the IDF, a modern, well-funded, professional state military, which is receiving support from other modern, well-funded, professional state militaries? Probably not.

You’re analogies don’t work. You can have lung cancer without it metastasizing. You can have different types of trees in a forest. Different levels of wealth in a rich country.

Labelling an entire protest anti-Semitic doesn’t separate the majority who were at the protests for peace and the minority who were there to spout hate. It also flies in the face of what you’re saying about “the river and the sea…” phrase only meaning a call for the extermination of Jews, while simultaneously saying “anti-Semitic” - meaning someone who hates Jews - doesn’t mean that everyone at an anti-Semitic protest hates Jews.

Unfortunately, all that position does is dilute what “anti-Semite” means, which is what the bigots want. If they can point to examples of it being erroneously used, they can say it gets used erroneously all the time.

Also, I’ve never presented myself as an expert or made predictions, beyond a continued suffering of civilians in the conflict. Perhaps, as an amateur who understands less than the experts you claim make predictive errors, you should refrain from doing the same?

[Strongpoint]

I said that I don't want to discuss the claim that "from the river to the sea Palestine will be free" doesn't mean what it means. Mostly because it is a Flat-Earther level of denial of reality, it is hard to argue against such dishonesty. I never said that the topic of events in Israel and ongoing protests doesn't interest me.

Again, though, before the main point, the protests aren’t calling for an Israeli loss.

"from the..." well... skip that. Besides that: there are certain symbols allowed on protests that can be easily interpreted like that. Like an image of the Israeli flag thrown in a garbage bin or burning of the Israeli flag. But sure, we can always work around that with an alternative explanation until it is literally "Israel must be destroyed!" and even then you can go - those are opinions of a part of the crowd, not all of it. And I know that almost any antisemitism, unless something VERY direct like "gas the Jews" or "Hitler was right" can be redirected - it is about Israel\Zionists, not Jews in general

Let's look at what is harder to deny. What is the visual main symbol of the protest? A Palestinian flag. Not some peace symbol, not something to symbolize innocent children, not Israeli and Palestinian flags together as a call for those people to reach peace. Plain, simple, Palestinian flag. So, during an armed conflict, protests show support to one of the sides. By definition, if you are pro-Side A, you are anti-Side-B. So those protests are anti-Israeli. One very simple observation proves that.

Now what are their demands? Ceasefire? Not really, they don't really address the Israeli government. They address the governments of their countries to pressure Israel by withdrawing support or even sanctioning Israel. Should they succeed, such actions will hurt the Israeli war effort. They may not call for the defeat of Israel but they surely do call for actions that will make defeat of Israel more likely.

Again, though, before the main point, the protests aren’t calling for an Israeli loss. Will a ceasefire allow Hamas to re-arm? Probably. Do you think they’re going to be able to have the same quality of weapons and supplies as the IDF, a modern, well-funded, professional state military, which is receiving support from other modern, well-funded, professional state militaries? Probably not.

Yeah, It is very unlikely for HAMAS to win alone but not impossible in the long run. Underdogs did win in history, especially when a larger country faced internal problems. Israel has its problems with political unity.

But HAMAS doesn't need to be alone. HAMAS has allies that share their goal of the destruction of Israel. Look at Modern Turkey. Its army will likely squash Israeli 1v1. Sure, Erdogan just talks, he doesn't want a war now. But... Decade or two, a more Islamistic Turkey + rebuilt and battle-hardened Syrian army + Iranian support + HAMAS and Hezbollah + less Israel-friendly politicians in Western countries = goodbye Israel, hello new Genocide of Jews. UN will be very concerned. Hey, there may even be pro-Israeli protests!

You’re analogies don’t work. You can have lung cancer without it metastasizing. You can have different types of trees in a forest. Different levels of wealth in a rich country.

Exactly what I meant. Obviously, there are many different people there. They have different personalities, views, goals, and ideologies. But I am not evaluating them, neither am I evaluating an "averaged protestor." I evaluate the protest movement as a whole.

Have you ever been inside a large protest? I have been. Anything that is too radical for the crowd will be labeled as provocation and those people will be kicked out with the speed of sound. So if there are only "some" antisemites in the crowd and they are tolerated by the crowd - it makes the crowd itself antisemitic to at least some degree. In fact, you admit that there is "the minority who were there to spout hate", doesn't the presence of such minority makes the protest as a whole hateful at least to some degree?

[Bumber]

No one has been calling for a unilateral ceasefire, it has always been posited as mutual.

That's a bit like asking for a ceasefire between US and Al Qaeda right after 9/11, isn't it?

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently said, "Ceasefire means there is no military solution, only a diplomatic and cultural solution."

So what is the diplomatic solution with Hamas or Al Qaeda, given a mutual ceasefire must necessarily involve their participation? Keeping in mind both are fundamentally Sunni jihadist organizations who don't share the same definition of the word "free" as understood by Western civilization.

Where is the grounding in reality for anything mutual?

[Strongpoint]

That's a bit like asking for a ceasefire between US and Al Qaeda right after 9/11, isn't it?

9/11 was very tame compared to this - https://rumble.com/v3unwo5-warning-graphic-hashabbat-hashchora-black-saturday-part-4.html ,
https://rumble.com/v3vxkmx-warning-graphic-hashabbat-hashchora-black-saturday-part-5.html  (warning, graphic and nsfw don't even begin to describe this.)

Imagine such videos circulating in the USA. in any country, really. Almost all Israelis have seen those or similar videos. Or worse.

I don't know how anyone can believe that there will be a ceasefire after the October 7th massacre. They lack basic empathy if they fail to understand what kind of mood Israeli society has now. At most, you can ask (not demand) to be merciful and not fall to this level.

[hector13]

The Palestinian flag represents the Palestinian people.

Palestinians /=/ Hamas.

The same Palestinian people under the Israeli air strikes for ”damage, not accuracy, those under blockade who can’t get basic necessities, while Hamas’ smuggling links allow them to get them for themselves. If Hamas are not being punished by the blockade, who is? Palestinian civilians, that’s who. That’s what the protestors find unacceptable, not Israel’s victory or existence.

The foreign protests are addressed to their own government because they want their government to change their position on the war to discourage Israel from the indiscriminate bombing or starving the civilian populace of Gaza, not to reconsider viewing Hamas as a terrorist organization or allow them to continue their terrorism unmolested.

There you go making predictions again, and that’s a whole heck of a lot of assumptions being made about some complex geopolitics there. Given your failure to predict the direction of this conflict and politics in Europe and NA, I’m quite willing to believe you’ll be wrong about a lot of those predictions too.

You also complained about my use of a strawman - I didn’t but whatever - and that is a huge one there. How does a ceasefire in Gaza end in Israel’s destruction along the lines you set out? It doesn’t, is the answer.

Even if Hamas won this conflict it won’t result in the destruction of Israel. It’ll result in a hugely emboldened Hamas, and possibly result in more overt support from anti-Zionist nations, but it will also probably result in an increase of support for Israel from the West to balance that out. The conflict will certainly end Netanyahu’s policy of appeasement toward Hamas.

Your analogies had grey in them, while anti-Semitic has an established meaning, which is “hatred of Jews”.  Anti-Semitic elements doesn’t mean there’s hatred within a protest, particularly a large enough one that they can be ejected from one part, and re-enter it at another point.

Equally so, the police are able to arrest people shouting racist abuse and endorsing violence from within the protest. Bearing in mind the police can’t be everywhere, they can’t arrest everyone who shouts that shit, but they do try to identify them and arrest them later.

If there was any resistance to that I’d be willing to say there’s acceptance of those views within protests, but there isn’t. If the main protest broke away from their route and protested in front of the Israeli embassy, I’d agree with you, but they don’t.

Edit: also I forgot to mention I have never once argued “from the river to the sea…” doesn’t have an anti-Semitic meaning, just that’s not the only meaning, and the people marching for peace aren’t using it to mean the destruction of the Jews and Israel.