• Evilsandwichman [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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        13 days ago

        For myself I say that if we’d gone through what the Palestinians had gone through, we would’ve been infinitely harsher (for God’s sake there are people committing murder over someone simply speaking a foreign language in their vicinity); empathy is easy for us to toss away because realistically no one’s Israeling our country or any other Western country; we don’t have empathy for our own humanity’s sake, and we don’t have it for self preservation purposes either. At the very least we should be following international law because we want the other side to do the same so we don’t just commit monstrosities against each other, but realistically Western countries are so powerful and untouchable we just simply don’t. For everything we were ever told about Iran, in their last engagement with Israel they specifically did their best to solely target military bases, which is why civilian casualties were so low; Israel however know they can get away with what they do which is why they target apartment buildings and hospitals (and why our military target civilian infrastructure). We don’t have empathy for our own humanity’s sake, and we don’t have it for self preservation purposes cause we know no one can do anything about it.

        For myself I refuse to condemn Hamas because as I said: if we’d been in their position, we would’ve been infinitely harsher. Israel, despite being so powerful and with all the freedom in the world to decide to be moral, torture their prisoners hostages and commit horrific acts against them; Hamas however have not done the same at all, even though they literally have nothing to lose (it’s not like Israel isn’t being as horrifically evil as they can be). Palestinians (and Hamas) are desperate, and yet they’re still trying to be reasonable.

  • regul [any]@hexbear.net
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    13 days ago

    As I recall, libs were demanding a ceasefire in which Israel got all of its aims and Palestinians got nothing or less than nothing.

    • Chana [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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      13 days ago

      Liberals weren’t demanding anything. They were saying, “vote blue no matter who” and, “how dare you criticize Biden, you Trump supporter!” while giving bad faith knee-jerk responses to all pro-Palestinian positions, particularly (1) pivoting to alleged increased antisemitism for which there is virtually no evidence on the left (purely an attempt at deflection) and (2) trying to extract condemnations of Hamas and reframe the narrative as Hamas vs. “Israel” having “a right to defend itself” (mass murder children).

      Liberals were doing the exact opposite of demanding anything remotely pro-Palestine. They were defending Israel and criticizing (and oppressing!) pro-Palestinian voices and loudly announcing that they would fight against any electoral consequences for those enabling the genocide.

      • Evilsandwichman [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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        13 days ago

        A lib I know who does support Palestine was still a Kamala supporter who despite me asking him why libs don’t push her to stop supporting Israel, especially if she wants to win, just kept dodging the question and still kept saying Trump would be worse; like just tell her point blank she is going to lose herself the campaign if she doesn’t stop; if libs would all unanimously keep harping on about it rather than just clap along like trained seals she’d have to acknowledge that she’d failed her election run before the voting had even started; instead they insisted on pretending it was all okay, and now they’re still dodging responsibility and saying it’s the left that cost Kamala the election. Even the pro-Palestine lib was still in favor of the party making the genocide a reality (because without America, the genocide would’ve ended unimaginably earlier).

        • Hestia [she/her, fae/faer]@hexbear.net
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          13 days ago

          The Kingdom of Conscience will be exactly as it is now. Moralists don’t really have beliefs. Sometimes they stumble on one, like on a child’s toy left on the carpet. The toy must be put away immediately. And the child reprimanded. Centrism isn’t change – not even incremental change. It is control. Over yourself and the world. Exercise it. Look up at the sky, at the dark shapes of Coalition airships hanging there. Ask yourself: is there something sinister in moralism? And then answer: no. God is in his heaven. Everything is normal on Earth.

  • Rom [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    13 days ago

    Are they STILL banging the “criticism of Israel is antisemitism” drum? Either provide evidence of actual antisemitism coming from the left or shut the fuck up already. So fucking tired of being called antisemitic for suggesting Israel should stop doing genocide.

    • QuietCupcake [any, they/them]@hexbear.net
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      13 days ago

      Are they STILL banging the “criticism of Israel is antisemitism” drum?

      That rhetoric is foundational to the Zionist project. It will never not be a drum they bang on.

      So fucking tired of being called antisemitic for suggesting Israel should stop doing genocide.

      finkelstein - “tell me about it.”

  • OldSoulHippie [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    13 days ago

    I kinda miss when it took them 20 years to rewrite history, like support of the Iraq war. Now we have the receipts because of social media and they can just be like “that’s old shit. Why you bringing up old shit?”

    • MolotovHalfEmpty [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      13 days ago

      The Labour government here has started doing it after 3 days!

      Their party line to defend against the massive, substantial criticism of the so called Online Safety Bill they’re using to surveil and censor the internet here is now “We cannot return to the dark days of violent exploitation & serious online danger. Why are you siding with pedophiles?”

      After 3 days.

  • CliffordBigRedDog [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    13 days ago

    I dont understand this sudden about face

    Whats so different with the situation now and whats been happening for the past 2 years

    I think anyone with a brain would know this is entirely cynical but why didnt they do this earlier if they’re gonna do it now

    • Belly_Beanis [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      13 days ago

      I think it’s because the government and media is still trying to figure out social media like they did with cable TV. They learned their lesson during Vietnam when pictures and videos of kids getting blown up or VC POWs getting executed by US troops was being aired on the 6 o’clock news every night. It made Americans lose their taste for war.

      So when the US invaded Iraq and Afghanistan, they were much more controlling over what was being broadcasted. A picture of about a dozen US coffins was a scandal. Yet, you won’t find much in the way of combat footage like you did with Vietnam. Americans were still doing horrendous shit (as seen with Abu Ghraib or Navy SEALs mutilating bodies). It was just tightly kept quiet. Actual footage like kids running from a napalm attack or troops carrying bodies on stretchers back to helicopters? There’s no documentation.

      Fast forward to now. They could control where journalists went during Iraq and Afghanistan, physically. They can’t control civilians live streaming a hospital getting double tapped by Israeli aircraft. They have no idea what to do when Israelis upload pictures of themselves to Instagram committing war crimes. They can’t shut down the internet without it causing problems for themselves.

      At this point, the evidence of genocide has grown to where it’s undeniable. There’s too many photos. Too many videos. Too many posts by Israelis bragging about killing people. There’s a mountain of recordings with Netanyahu talking about wiping Palestinians off the face of the earth. Rather than trying to contain it (which would fail), they are trying to change the narrative to “We were always against Israel and its genocide of the Palestinians.” It’s hit critical mass and America’s enemies are gaining credibility by condemning the zionist entity.

    • MolotovHalfEmpty [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      13 days ago

      It’s because famine experts are saying that it’s likely reached the point of no return.

      Starvation builds and spreads over time. It kills the old, young, and ill first. But it’s not just a lack of food that kills you. At a certain point your body starts shutting down, your organs damage themselves, and just suddenly being given food and water isn’t enough to reverse the process or the damage. It takes serious medical intervention.

      Western governments and media are trying to register their faux-concern now, when they know it’s likely already too late for most people trying to survive but before the world sees the scale of the death.

      For them there’s the further complication that a) actual footage of famine, never mind deliberate famine as extermination, isn’t that common and hasn’t been normalised in the ways that killing via warfare has to their populations and b) their very direct, very cut and dry role in defunding, banning, and smearing the likes of UNRWA are a legal liability under international law that they can’t handwave away like ‘defensive weapons’ etc

      That’s incredibly bleak, I know, but that’s my honest read having worked for aid groups and hearing what those people are talking about. I’m not suggesting that there is zero hope or that people give up on Gaza though. We have a moral duty as people to keep fighting for each and every person. And even if we lose that fight, to make sure the people responsible are exposed for what they are.

    • brain_in_a_box [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      13 days ago

      I think they’re realising that we’ve reached the point where what comes next is a Gaza with no one left alive. Their claims that this is just a war with some collateral damage might work now, while they can keep the official death count frozen, but once the killing ends and the settlers start moving into a completely baron wasteland with no one left alive, they will completely lose any plausible deniability if they don’t pivot now.

  • Hestia [she/her, fae/faer]@hexbear.net
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    13 days ago

    Early on in the genocide I saw a video on Reddit that showed a father lamenting the death of their child, holding them in their arms with a chunk of their head missing and their brain visible. There wasn’t even a context warning for the clip. That image and the sound of total despair I heard from the father still haunts me.

    And that was just a single clip. The evidence of the atrocities Israel has committed is easy to find. I will never allow democrats to act like their hands are clean and they had no idea what was going on this entire time.