The Israel-Palestine Politics Thread II


So, my daughter graduated from USC and I find this annoying beyond words. For an institution of "higher" education to cancel a speech; esp from an obviously brilliant young woman who worked her ass off in her undergraduate years, became class valedictorian, had a different opinion than some might have wanted to hear, and hadn't even worked out the details of her presentation before she had written it, sickens me.

When I was at the University of California, Santa Cruz, there was a guy named William Shockley. He was essentially the father of the modern semiconductor, who was going to speak on campus. The problem was that this guy was an unabashed racist who believed that black people were intellectually inferior to white people and was going to talk about this idea of his that was way, way out of his line of expertise. Many people didn't want him to speak and I didn't gain a lot of popularity when I disagreed. I wanted him to make an ass out of himself in the face of faculty and students who knew of his stupid ideas and he complied.

I wanted to expose the stupidity of his ideas based on empirical data. He was allowed to speak. He was interrupted, but ultimately people understood who he was. To me, it was a much better result that not allowing him to speak.

In no way would I equate this young woman with that someone like Shockley, but if we restrict speech, it comes with a cost. Authoritarians in various countries around the world don't, and probably never will, get it. Democracy depends on an informed and active populace. Authoritarian regimes prefer ignorance and malleability.
 
InCali said:
In no way would I equate this young woman with that someone like Shockley, but if we restrict speech, it comes with a cost. Authoritarians in various countries around the world don't, and probably never will, get it. Democracy depends on an informed and active populace. Authoritarian regimes prefer ignorance and malleability.
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I see the truth there in this general, but I wonder if here the act of USC is so obviously preposterously ridiculous that it may actually encourage people to do their own learning.

Similarly at Columbia University.

Separately, as a Jewish person living in the USA I think that false accusations of anti semitism, as in these cases, are absolutely heinous in addition to being counter productive.
 
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What has happened in Gaza is an atrocity of a scale that absolutely chills me to the bone. While my wife is Jewish, and is preparing for passover, I don't affiliate with a religion. The thing that baffles me is that it seems that religion is a major cause of the problems we see in the world. I don't know.....maybe it isn't religion per se, but those who feel the need to push, with force, their beliefs on others or stereotype those who belong to a particular group......Man, I don't know.....I don't get it. I am very sympathetic to the cause of the Palestinian people and think the problems we're experiencing now are the result of a very stupid, stupid political decision that was made over 75 years ago, but, given the abject stupidity I see in the world, I can't help but believe someone would have found something that would justify slaughtering (a generic) "them". Makes me sick.
 
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InCali said:
What has happened in Gaza is an atrocity of a scale that absolutely chills me to the bone. While my wife is Jewish, and is preparing for passover, I don't affiliate with a religion. The thing that baffles me is that it seems that religion is a major cause of the problems we see in the world. I don't know.....maybe it isn't religion per se, but those who feel the need to push, with force, their beliefs on others or stereotype those who belong to a particular group......Man, I don't know.....I don't get it. I am very sympathetic to the cause of the Palestinian people and think the problems we're experiencing now are the result of a very stupid, stupid political decision that was made over 75 years ago, but, given the abject stupidity I see in the world, I can't help but believe someone would have found something that would justify slaughtering (a generic) "them". Makes me sick.
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It's sad that any belief system that should make us into better people gets used instead to excuse atrocities instead. I'd like to think God wouldn't want that. That it's not His intent. Humans are just too corrupt to do anything right. :(
 
I listened to an interview of Iranian Professor (English Literature and Orientalism, Tehran) Seyed Mohammad Maranbi today. Some salient points:

- Israel has been striking at Iran for years, but they ignored it. The priority was to build up alliances in the region (Houthis, Hezbollah, Syria, etc). But this was an attack on an embassy, so they didn't have a choice.
- Interestingly he had been in that Damascus embassy building several times.
- He doesn't know, and the Iranian public is unsure, if the Israeli attack happened as a provocative to cause a wider war to bring in the USA, or because the Israelis saw an opportunity to strike and assumed there would be no consequences.
- The counterattack was a success. Iran spent a few million dollars, used mostly their second and third grade stuff, and got past the very best air defense the US and Israel have, which cost them billions of dollars. The purpose of the cheap drones was to deplete US/Israel air defense, and collect intelligence on its abilities.
- He sees a lot of similarities between Israeli arrogance and American exceptionalism. He draws a similarity between the Israeli leadership saying they'd win in Gaza in a few days (it's now been six months), and the American leadership thinking it'd be easy to defeat Russia in the Ukraine proxy war. Neither has the self awareness to take a step back.
- The Iranians people want to see an end to apartheid in Israel.
- Iran doesn't want to be the junior partner of Russia and China, it wants to be its own independent and neutral player, but American aggression pushes it eastward.
- American sanctions on Iran were actually having a big impact, but American aggression against Russia and China encouraged them to normalize trade with Iran, and now Iran is breaking out.

He argued that the biggest loss to Israel in the past few months is not the direct outcome of hostilities with Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran, but the damage that the genocide has done to Israel's reputation, which he sees among Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, etc.
 
blueharvest said:
He should, but he won't.
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Israel's actually had quite a few elections recently. Part of the dysfunction of that country is too many small, extremist parties of various flavours holding the balance of power. Due to the demographic trends in that country, those parties will probably increase in strength.

I don't see a way out for Israel that is internal in nature.
 
How can anybody be this warped?
Some Israelis were also upset that some Gazans hit the beaches recently.

 


There needs to have been a boomer extinction event yesterday.
 
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