#actual Palestinians have every excuse in the world to think this way

[lightdancer1]

And in point of fact I'm going to be still more blunt. You can support China's treatment of Uighurs or Palestinians but not both:

If you can see through the self-serving justifications of Israel for deploying the IDF every time Palestinians start shooting at Israelis whenever they get fed up enough with their mistreatment to go for their first and always favored method of expressing that disagreement, you should not find it in you to believe Beijing when it proclaims those 're-education camps' for 'terrorists' in Uighurstan are anything but what they are.

If you don't believe me, pay attention to WHY China and Russia vote with Israel all the time on Israel and Palestine. They know damned well that if Palestinians get anything their own minorities will start demanding it from them next and follow the Palestinian precedent to get very heavily armed and unleash brutality on a grand scale.

Beijing itself knows this, this is why it does what it does, in the ways that it does. And yet too many white Westerners who otherwise see Islam as a medieval religion of fanatics who stone women to death for showing ankles and bay and howl the name 'Muhammad' before unleashing the savage wars of peace suddenly find it in them to pretend they see the Palestinian Islamists as human beings while simultaneously claiming Beijing's view of Uighurs as a mass cultural Al-Qaeda are convincing.

Not how it works. There is nothing especially unique about Palestinians or Palestinian Islam unlike all the other Islams. If you see them as human then the Rohingya and the Uighurs deserve concern, too.

#lightdancer comments on geopolitics #selective empathy #why do palestinians get the lion's share of attention relative to literally everything else going on? #actual Palestinians have every excuse in the world to think this way #people who claim to support Muslims as human and use it as a means to hate Jewish people OTOH #because let's be blunt here the reality is that Uighurstan deserves as much focus as Palestine #the situations are not as different as Israel and China would like to think they are #Xi is well aware of this and so is his Israeli counterparts #no people cannot hold focus on everything all the time equally #but that's also proving a point #you will see dozens of posts about Palestinians and most of the Western commentary on Uighurstan well.... #it repeats Chinese propaganda in a way it will never do that of Tel Aviv #And it will never ask itself why #uighurstan #chinese genocide of uighurs

[pencopanko]

Antisemitism and Islamophobia are very similar (if not the same), actually

So I was scrolling down the #palestine tag for any updates and important information, and I came across this:

And I think we need to sit down and talk about this.

I am a Muslim. I live in Indonesia, a country that is predominantly Muslim and a lot of Muslims here also support the Palestinian cause. Hell, even our government supports it by not only allowing Palestinian goods enter the country without fee, but also by taking in Palestinian refugees and even acknowledging the status of Palestine as a state while not having any political ties with Israel. The topic of the Palestinian tragedy has been spoon-fed to us at schools, sermons, media, etc., so your average Indonesian Muslim would at the very least be aware of the conflict while non-Muslims would hear about it from their Muslim friends or through media.

However, there is a glaring problem. One that I keep seeing way too often for my liking.

A lot of them are antisemitic as hell. The sermons I would hear sometimes demonize Jewish people. Antisemitic statements are openly said out loud on social media. Some are even Nazi supporters who would literally go to anime cons and COSPLAY as members of the Nazi party. This is not just an Indonesian Muslim problem, no, but this is a glaring issue within the global Islamic community as a whole. Today, this sense of antisemitism is usually rooted in general hatred towards the Israeli government and its actions against the people of Palestine, but antisemitism amongst Muslims are also rooted in certain interpretations of verses from the Qur'an and Hadith mentioning Jewish people and Judaism (particularly the Bani Israil), but in a way that is more ridiculing instead of life-threatening when compared to how antisemitism looks like in the Western world.

As someone who prefers to become a "bridge" between two sides in most cases, I find this situation to be concerning, to say the least. While, yes, it is important for us Muslims to support Palestine and fight against injustice, we must not forget that not every Jewish people support the Israeli government. A lot of them are even anti-Zionists who actively condemn Israel and even disagree with the existence of Israel as a state as it goes against their teachings. A lot of them are also Holocaust survivors or their descendants, so it is harmful to think for one second that Hitler's actions and policies were justified. It's just like saying that Netanyahu is right for his decision to destroy Palestine and commit war crime after war crime towards the Palestinians.

As Muslims, we also need to remember that Jewish people (the Yahudi) are considered ahli kitab, i.e. People Of The Book along with Christians (the Nasrani). The Islam I have come to know and love has no mentions of Allah allowing us to persecute them or anyone collectively for the actions of a few. While, yes, there are disagreements with our respective teachings I do not see that as an excuse to even use antisemitic slurs against Jewish people during a pro-Palestine rally, let alone support a man who was known for his acts of cruelty toward the Jewish community in WW2. They are still our siblings/cousins in faith, after all. Unless they have done active harm like stealing homes from civilians or celebrating the destruction of Palestine or supporting the Israeli government and the IOF or are members of the IOF, no Jewish people (and Christians, for that matter) must be harmed in our fight against Zionism.

Contemporary antisemitism is similar to (if not straight up being the exact same thing as) contemporary Islamophobia, if you think about it; due to the actions of a select few that has caused severe harm towards innocent people, an entire community has been a target of hate. Even when you have tried to call out the ones supporting such cruelties, you are still getting bombarded by hate speech. It's doubly worse if you're also simultaneously part of a marginalized group like BIPOC, LGBTQ+, etc. as you also get attacked on multiple sides. This is where we all need to self-reflect, practice empathy, and unlearn all of the antisemitism and unjustified hatred that we were exposed to.

So, do call out Zionism and Nazism when you see it. Call out the US government for funding this atrocity and others before it that had ALSO triggered the rise of Islamophobia. Call your reps. Go to the streets. Punch a fascist if you feel so inclined. Support your local businesses instead of pro-Israel companies.

But not at the cost of our Jewish siblings. Not at the cost of innocent Jewish people who may also be your allies. If you do that, you are no different from a MAGA cap-wearing, gun-tooting, slur-yelling Islamophobe.

That is all for now, may your watermelons taste fresh and sweet.

🍉

Salam Semangka, Penco

#palestine #free palestine #gaza strip #free gaza #israel #israeli occupation #boycott israel #penco writes #penco rambles #yupyupyup #antisemitism #islam #islamophobia #thought piece

[unbidden-yidden]

Here's the thing that really broke me about the goyische left's response to the Hamas massacre: once again, the uncritical, antisemitic double standard for Israel and Jews versus literally anyone else has now expanded to assume that Jews do not deserve human rights or have lost them by virtue of being Israeli.

Let's say, for a moment, that you have been radicalized to really believe that the Hamas attack on civilians was a liberatory action, perhaps unfortunate that it targeted unarmed civilians, but what else were they supposed to do? Besides, Israel has visited similar and worse attacks on Palestine for years, so turnabout is fair play, especially in service of the struggle of liberation of a brutally oppressed group. [To be clear: I take issue with this and find it morally repugnant. But for the moment, let's accept arguendo this belief as a baseline.]

Do you really include rape, torture, killing children at all but especially in front of their parents, or killing parents in front of their children and taking hostages of the survivors, beheading infants, trapping and burning families hidden together alive, stripping and parading hostages naked through the street, mutilating and displaying the bodies of the dead proudly and celebrating their deaths, and doing all of this on a holy day where Jewish people the world over are supposed to be celebrating the end of the holiday season and the beginning of a new cycle of Torah learning. On a day that people will be resting, with their families, unarmed and in their holy spaces, and are explicitly commanded to be happy.

.......amongst the "unfortunate-but-necessary violent struggle?"

Like even if you believe in your heart of hearts that all Israelis should die or at least are acceptable casualties in the struggle, do you really believe that there is any excuse for the above atrocities? If you do, I need you to ask yourself some things:

Do you think there is any justification for the manner and cruelty of the deaths?

Do you really think that there is anything a person could do in order to deserve any of these actions as a sentence?

Was the cruel nature of this, designed to inflict the greatest amount of trauma on the survivors and the Jewish people at large, actually necessary to accomplishing the goal of liberation?

Would you accept any of these actions being done to any other group?

If you are a white American, do you think you personally deserve this yourself for everything the United States has done to the native population (never mind anyone else)?

Do you think that civilians can be held 100% accountable for their government's actions? Is that a standard you yourself would like to be judged by?

If context is important, how is the last 2000 years of brutal antisemitism from virtually every part of the world not also relevant context? How is the Holocaust not relevant? The Farhud?

Do you think refugees fleeing genocide should be able to live wherever they can and that other countries and peoples have a duty to step up and take them in? If so, would you call refugees of genocide colonists and settlers?

Do you think that children should have to answer for the crimes of adults? That it is ever okay to kill them in cold blood?

Do you think that non-combatant deaths should ever be celebrated?

Theoretically, if the only way Hamas could accomplish its goal (which we will assume arguendo is Palestinian liberation, despite the mounds of evidence against that) is to kill whatever Israelis they could get their hands on, don't you think that a valid liberation force would just kill people as efficiently as possible rather than take the time to brutalize and humiliate them first? Wouldn't that be the more morally understandable thing to do?

Do you think it's ever okay to mock or talk down to people grieving their dead, no matter who they were, especially if they were random citizens rather than, say, high-profile politicians?

These questions to me are unanswerable and the fact that they are even in question at all unjustifiable. The left has either actively participated in this or remained silent in the face of it. And too many friends who I thought were allies have failed to reach out to even ask if we're okay, let alone made even the weakest of condemnations of the brutality my people have experienced this week.

This tells me that you think my humanity, as a Jew, is conditional. That my right not to experience war crimes is up for debate.

How am I supposed to trust you ever again? Feel safe in your presence? Collaborate with you on other issues? Why should I?

For the people who are posting about the situation yet failed to condemn the torture and brutality against my people, please know that I will likely never fully believe you that you are for restorative justice, against the death penalty, against cruel and unusual punishment, against sexual violence, for children's rights and against the murder of children, against terrorism, against civilian casualties, for the rights and protection of refugees, for freedom of movement, support indigenous groups, and certainly certainly anyone claiming to be against antisemitism. There will forever and always be an asterisk next to your statements in favor of universal human rights which reads: *except Jews.

#if you are my friend and you haven't even said one thing about the victims not deserving this #yet are posting about the situation #we are not on good terms right now #like I understand staying out of it entirely in your posting if you are worried about spreading misinformation #but I see those of you reblogging things justifying the brutal violence against my people #I am hurt and I am angry and I am heartbroken #if you read this and know this is you feel free to reach out if you want to work on it #but there is going to be a *long* road to teshuva #I actively feel unsafe around you right now #I should not have had to say any of this for you to care #resisting the urge to tag specific people #I won't name names publicly - you know who you are

[fishmech]

you really have to be fucking stupid to believe the nonsense about "Israel is waiting til big events to do big attacks"

First of all: they are committing massive murder constantly every day. Not even just since October but for decades.

Second: none of the big events people claim match up are things that actually hide that? You're just making stupid excuses to cover for countries that don't care anyway. About whole populations that have never cared about Palestinian suffering and Israeli crimes.

But most especially it's galling to see people try to claim the fucking met gala as a "big event" that would drown out war. The fucking local fundraising event that doesn't even get live TV or streaming coverage.

Because it's run by the Vogue fashion magazine by and for the fashion community in general, and to fund the Metropolitan Museum Of Arts' ongoing upkeep of fashion and clothing material exhibits in general, and to provide primary funding for the latest yearly fashion exhibition it immediately precedes.

It's something the vast majority of New Yorkers, let alone the vast majority of Americans, let alone the vast majority of the world doesn't care about. When you declare the stupid event as necessary to hide yet another daily Israeli crime, you're basically revealing you don't actually think of the reality of the ongoing genocide, or have any touch with your own national reality.

But hey the same people saying this shit didn't start pretending to care until 6 months ago. Could never be me, my rabbi grandfather taught us that what Israel was already doing was evil and we should support our Palestinian brothers and sisters and oppose further restrictions and encroachment on their land, lives, and existence. So I already was aware of this shit, of how zionism is at best harmful by accident and most of the time harmful on purpose by like 1999.

Just, when I see people convinced that their favorite little internet day must be a smokescreen for an attack it's like. How are you this unserious as a person? What went wrong with your perception of world events that you have to qanon your way into believing niche events are being used as cover? It's frankly treating real life genocide like it's part of a fucking ARG.

[thestrangestthing89]

It's not an apology, it's a clarification. He very directly says "you misconstrued what I said" a thing multiple people around here have been trying to say for months. He said this exact same thing in an Instagram post he made a few months ago but people lack the reading comprehension skills to follow something like that. So he said it in a TikTok video again only some people are still not understanding. And it's because they don't want to. (He has recently taken his Instagram post down, I'm guessing because he is getting relentlessly harassed.) The truth of the matter is that many people didn't take the time to understand basic facts about this situation (like what the word Zionism actually means) and the result was that a lot of misinformation spread because people were desperate to make sure their followers knew they were The Most Progressive and The Most Anti-Racist. They did not talk about this issue in a way that was culturally sensitive. They made assumptions about Noah based on anti-Semitic stereotypes and I don't even think they realize they are doing it because, again, they aren't well-informed. But every time someone twists the word Zionism to mean "pro-genocide" and makes the flying leap that anyone using that word is laughing at people dying they are falling into the stereotype that Jews are bloodthirsty. Anytime people say that any Jewish person has the wrong information in this situation and needs to education themselves about their own culture, they are believing that Jews can't be trusted. They did all of these things to Noah and they did it very easily because they are ignorant. These people essentially turned into an angry mob. I can't even count the amount of comments I saw that were basically "I hate Noah too!!! Wait, what did he do? Someone tell me!" They piled on because their peers were doing it and not because they had any clue what the problem was. It was the cool and trendy thing to do so they did it. And they deluded themselves into thinking they were saving Palestinians in the process when they actually didn't do shit for anyone. The only problem is that the people who did this didn't take the time to inform themselves before piling on. Noah didn't apologize to them because he doesn't have to. They owe him an apology though and I think the ones with larger followings are responsible for a lot of this and imo are lucky they didn't get sued for defamation. He didn't do any of the things they are accusing him. They decided for themselves what he thought and believed based on very little information and they have no right to do this to anyone. They seriously think Noah is responsible for single-handedly killing people. He's not in the military or a politician. He didn't even endorse anyone who did. This whole situation is the stupidest fucking thing in the world. They are more outraged over the bullshit they made up about him the actual political situation and it's because they don't actually care. They are using Palestinians as an excuse to say hateful things, but they aren't helping them at all. I don't think Gen Z-ers are realizing that everyone older than them is getting increasingly more concerned about the way they go about their political activism. It's a serious problem and this current political situation only highlighted problems with them that had been occurring for a while now. Relentlessly harassing any Jewish person online for not speaking exactly to your liking isn't activism. Threatening to kill people who disagree with you isn't activism. Trying to ruin someone's career because they didn't act like your parasocial bestie isn't activism. Spamming the comments of everyone's posts with Free Palestine isn't activism and it sure as hell isn't what spreading awareness looks like. That requires being well informed first. Not to mention learning how to have difficult conversations without screaming hysterically at people and shouting that they must be pro-genocide/racist/misogynist/homophobic every damn second just because they said something you didn't take the time to understand.

They need to learn to ask for a clarification before assuming the absolute worst about people. They do this to people in the fandom constantly and it's why no one decent posts here regularly anymore. They are ignorant, plain and simple. But they are so desperate for peer approval and for people to think they are the best activists ever that they don't realize how much damage they do when they behave this way.

The people still pissed at Noah were always going to be. They were always going to pick him apart because they are anti-Semitic and they made that very clear. All he is saying is that people need to understand that both Jews and Palestinians are human and stop taking sides. A thing that anyone with a shred of human decency has been saying for months. The people who haven't been saying this tend to be very young (teens and early 20s) and it's because they fell for a lot of unverified information on TikTok - something that is concerning a lot of people given that it is an election year in the US. All anyone had to do here was listen and they didn't. They are too busy trying to be morally superior to anyone to bother having an actual conversation. They still aren't listening. There was nothing wrong with what Noah said here either. But people are determined to believe that he was laughing at people dying when he wasn't. This literally never happened. They just heard a word they weren't familiar with a jumped to awful conclusions. It's not their place to educate anyone on anything. They are not qualified to do so. And I wish people were smarter about who they were reblogging and weren't so desperate to get more followers by jumping on the bandwagon. They cause so much drama in the fandom constantly by acting like this. This is just the latest example.

The people who think it's now suddenly ok to be violent and homophobic towards someone just because they perceived that person to do something they didn't like, were waiting for an opportunity. They wanted to be horrible and they think they got a reason. They didn't and there is never a reason to behave like this. But it did reveal just how many people in this fandom are horrible human beings. The people who weren't saying this directly were still agreeing with those people and were not better than them. It should have set alarm bells off in their heads that the only people who agreed with them were being vile. That should have been the first clue they were on the wrong side. I wish people learned to think for themselves better. They were clearly jumping on the bandwagon and didn't understand what was going on. And I stand by my comment from a few months ago, we would not be dealing with relentless drama in the fandom if the show had a higher rating. And I do think they need to focus more on their original adult audience again. Most of us do not feel comfortable posting regularly in this fandom when it got taken over by kids who don't understand any of the things they are upset about, but they are upset with everyone and everything constantly. No one came here to babysit.

#social media seriously needs to do more about cyber bullying and the spread of misinformation #the people who did this to him owe him an apology #it used to be if you spread a rumor about someone you got sent to the principal and were forced to write a letter of apology #but kids are gently parented now and they can't handle being told they did something seriously wrong #they can't accept wrongdoing and they can't figure out how to fix it #so they just double down and act like even worse assholes than they've been acting #and everyone is fucking tired of it #no one wants to deal with this behavior anymore #gen z is increasingly becoming a group of people no one can trust #stranger things #noah schnapp

[germiyahu]

I would like to politely request that if you find yourself not understanding the point of my posts, don't engage with them. Don't embarrass yourself.

Because I certainly don't want to have to point out the irony of a person reacting to my (long winded) wry post about how uninformed uninterested Americans project and misinterpret the motivations, on a societal level, of Israelis and Palestinians... in a way that completely confirms that. You don't understand Zionism, point blank. You have not done your research, you do not understand why Jews for their entire history have yearned to return to Eretz Yisrael, and so you lie about that history, or you uncritically regurgitate other people's lies that you've heard about it.

You don't expect better of Muslims either, and there's a reason I only mentioned how people like you interpret this conflict to be about Jews vs Muslims, so do not pretend you care about the maybe 10% of Palestinians who are Christians. I note that the antizionist crowd routinely erases Bedouins, Druze, Samaritans, Circassians, Christian and Muslim Arabs who choose an Israeli identity over a Palestinian one. Not a single antizionist can mention the actual diversity of Israeli society without acting like their teeth are being pulled. So spare me.

My post was a (long winded and wry) assessment of what I have seen and what I think the general slacktivist Left conceive of Israel and Palestine. That it's a conflict between enlightened secular Christian-Lite white people who should know better, who should be over things like wanting a return to Zion... and what you see as noble savage barbaric Muslims who at least live a good honest non capitalist life, and we as the West owe them whatever they want because the War on Terror was horrific, yes.

But in the process you 1) erase the Jewish heritage and connection to their indigenous homeland, and replaces every single motivation for Zionism as racist imperialist bloodthirsty greed. Have fun gaslighting all of us as to how that's not blood libel. And you 2) excuse suicide bombing, targeting civilians, stabbing and driving over random people, mass shootings, war rape, hostage taking, torture, making fun little games out of torture... you'll excuse everything Hamas and their allied groups do in the name of "resistance," not just because you dehumanize Jews, but because I believe you really don't think Muslims are capable of being better than that. And because yeah, they're attacking Jews, who you view as privileged and annoying and the root of all problems in the world, so that's another reason not to expect better of them.

It ignores that there are tens of millions of Muslims who care about democracy, human rights, coexistence, peace... a lot of them are Palestinians. But you don't listen to them, you don't let them take the lead in their own liberation movement. You cheer on fascists because that's what a Muslim is in your head. Hezbollah, Al-Qaeda, ISIS, Hamas, now the Houthis: masked insurgents who have no regard for the sanctity of human life, no regard for their own people, sadistic manchildren who are only interested in enriching themselves and causing pain in the world, thinly scaffolded with the most cruel interpretations of a religion that a billion people follow. The only difference between you and your conservative racist parents is that you think the terrorists are the good guys now.

But thanks for stopping by :)

#antisemitism #leftist antisemitism #israel #palestine #another long winded post for the archives

[daphnasworld]

someone is really posting a real long text about how they were in a pro palestinian demonstration and where fished by nazis only to go on how you have to be careful as anyone is vulnerable towards propaganda and that antisemitism is wrong while at the same time literaly writing:

"They started talking about "Zionist" propaganda in the US, about how it was deeply entrenched in capitalism. Things that, on the surface, seemed reasonable but it set off alarm bells in my head."

Excuse me, but if you are talking about Zionist "propaganda" in connection with capitalism and say that it sounds reasonable, than you are in fact antisemitic. Point blank. It is just picking up the old antisemitic trope of "jews and money" while connecting it with the "jews control the world/media" trope.

You can be left all you want and believe in how good of a person you are and that you are against all hate, but you are proving with your very own words that you are not that pure of a person as you would like to be. You know that antisemitism is bad so you of course claim to be not antisemitic. But your words prove the opposite.

(It's just the same with all the racists who hate to be called racists, but have no probl3m qith acting racist.)

Many leftists are sadly very antisemitic, you just don't realise it. While far right wing people are rather open about their antisemitism the far left is hiding it behind words like capitalism and establishment - which ironically many people in the right have adopted today. So of course you are open to being fished by literal nazis and of course it takes you hours to realise it. Simply because so many of your views agree with each other. You simply believe that it is about israel, while the right know that it is about jews.

Now if you don't want to be antisemitic you really have to think hard about all your views regarding not only jews but also capitalism, the media, "powerful" people in politics and also israel. Because many people use those points to hide their antisemitism. It is possible that those people have teached amd shown you stuff regarding these matters that sounded reasonable. It is okay that you believed them. But check all of that regarding antisemitism. Really analyze them. It can be that if you deny any connection with antisemitism right of the bat or start to feel uncomfortable once you take a closer look while inforning yourself on the many forms of antisemitism, that this reactions/feelings could be an indicator for actual antisemitism.

While you are at it please inform yourself what words like genocide and appartheit mean, how the israeli army takes care of making escape routes safe and hamas doesn't and think about what other state informs the people hours if not days before in various ways where they are going to attack because someone started to shot bombs at them from there, and how you would want and expect the country you live in to react to an attack like on october 7th. If 240 people of your country - even children - would have been abducted. What would you want your country to do? And if you are asking for a ceasefire, who are you asking? Only one side or both? And if you only ask one side, why are you asking the side that got shot at first? Why not ask the side that started shooting rockets? And can it still be called a ceasefire if only one side stops shooting rockets?

And isn't it weird that apparently only Israel is commiting a genocide on the people of gaza, even though they inform them when they are gonna bomb which buildings and are making sure that the escape routes are safe, while hamas doesn''t give a fuck about their own people. How can you claim that hamas doesn't want to and tries to commit a genocide on the jewish people after even admitting it themself and constantly shooting rockets at Israel, and made all those horrible crimes on october 7th and say that they will never stop and even tell every palestinian in the whole world to take a knife and grab a jew?

Hamas doesn't care about their people. What is happening to the people in gaza is horrible. I cry with and for all the innocent people there. But hamas isn't innocent. What is happening right now happens because of hamas. That is why they attacked israel, that is why they took hostages. Because they knew that no country in the world that cared for it's own people could let it slide.

They did it so that Israel would have to defend itself - and that so called leftist would be stupid enough to go on the streets and protect hamas and spread antisemitism.

#i stand with israel #israel #antisemitism #Sadly i only got to know of that post because neil gaiman liked it #neil gaiman #i am dissapointed #sorry for babbling #Very emotional right now #I hope you still understand the point i wanted to make

[zestingbloodorange]

I understand people immediately saying "if this was an animal people would care" out of frustration, and I know most people are not ready for this conversation and I know most people don't even want to hear this because they don't care.and i know a lot of people think this is insane to say. but if you want to talk about empathy and compassion you have to understand this, and you need look deeper.

The reality is the majority of people don't care about animals if people cared about the living they wouldn't have reached this level of cruelty. animals are tortured for things as stupid as useless as makeup and to just look at them in a zoo and for films...etc basically just for human entertainment and financial gain.If people cared about animals we wouldn't have reached this point of global warming and this amount of animals going extinct.

Animals get tortured and killed by every age group for no reason and they die out of starvation and out of thirst and avoidable and curable illnesses. we take everything from them and abandon them in so many ways literally and metaphorically.

Animals get punished for existing with us.

And everytime someone does something for animals they get told they should've done that for humans instead,everytime someone speaks up for animals they get told there's more important things to care for whilst they themselves are doing nothing for those important things or helping other humans but the thing is people that actually do things for animals also actually do things for other humans.

Most cruel people start their cruelty with animals because animals can't tell on them and then they get hungry for more and start getting cocky and this has been proven by so many studies and cases.

A lot of people have no sympathy for animals because they genuinely think an animal's life doesn't matter and only exists for them so they can do whatever they want to them and if they have a little bit of shame they would use an excuse to justify what they do/did.

Maybe ask yourself if a person doesn't have sympathy for a living being that's basically lost in this world how do you expect them to have it for other humans ?.

And a great example for people with empthy and compassion is what you're seeing right now. people in gaza are taking their time to also help animals not just themselves and each other,they actually care and feel for the living.they respect life.

And in this time a very critical time I keep seeing some people saying why are people in gaza sharing their resources with animals they should focus on themselves and making jokes under posts of Palestinians giving a dog water for example saying "why are you feeding Netanyahu" it may seem stupid but it should make you think.

If you twist my words in any way to make this post malicious even in your head that's on you.

(Note : English is not my first language and there's a lot of better explanations to this available online)

#palestine #gaza #free palestine #empathy #humans #animals #nature #humanity #capitalism #فلسطين #غزة

[screamingfromuz]

weird how you reblog posts saying Israel was founded on genocide while also reblogging posts saying the IDF has some measure of honor. like did you see the video of how they shot an Israeli citizen thinking he was Palestinian? Yuval Doron Castleman wa shis name, and the video is not hard to find. the had his hands up in the air, and he was shot multiple times. this happened in the past 24 hours. was there a specific point where the state of Israel became good?

you talk about Jewish people feeling unsafe around anti-Israel talk, but do you ever wonder if people of color feel unsafe around you, and your excusing of ceuel and dehumanizing police forces?

you are very funny to me, you kind of people little anon. So full of yourself yet cannot comprehend complex concepts of grey morality.

I don't fully agree with everything I reblog, I reblog things I believe are important to talk about.

The founding of Israel has several faces that should be acknowledged. It was both a victory to an indigenous land back movement and offered a desperately needed sanctuary for hundred of thousands that would flee, and horrible disaster to another indigenous group. This does not contradict. For peace to exists we must acknowledge the co existence of those narratives. Horrible things were done in 1947-1949, by everyone involved (Britian, Israel, Palestinians, Jordan, Egypt, Syrian, Lebanon), and ignoring or diminishing it is foolish. On the other side, blowing it up is just as stupid and destructive.

using the correct term is important, as using the wrong terms might leads fools such as yourself to misunderstand the problem, and worsen the actual problem by "trying to help".

the IDF takes extreme measures to be careful with civilian life while simultaneously being careless with it. Again, both things are true as the same time.

Me saying that I do not consider the actions in Gaza genocide, does not mean I agree with all of them. as explained in this post (and it various reblogs), the use of the word "Genocide" is done as a way to shut down conversations and vilify Israel. The things that are happening are horrific and I hate it, I mourn every death. But as I refuse to call this a genocide, any criticism I will have will be either dismissed or twisted and used against me. For that reason, I limit my criticism to Israeli circle and the real world.

I saw the video, of course I did. And what do you want me to say? that it is horrific? That I knew that something like this was gonna happen at some point? The soldiers fucked up, they will be trialed for that. This are problems that stem from militarized society that I fight against.

Israel is a state. It is not bad or good in your simplistic moral scale, like any other country on the planet. But Israel is my home, and I would not abandon if even if it is fucked up in here. There have been 9 months of protests before the war, people are still protesting and sighing petitions and working to build a better future here, for all of us. just like the people in Poland and in Hungary, we want a better country. The point is that you don't care, you don't want Israel to exist. You are calling or erasing Israel from the map without understanding the devastating consequences of such action. You don't care about our effort and our criticism unless you can twist if to the support of the eradication of Israel.

what you fail to understand, is how much your "anti-Israel" talk is toxic, destructive and full of antisemitism. Of course we feel unsafe! you are not criticizing Israel, you are calling for it's destruction and to the horrible consequences to the Jewish people that will follow.

I have talked about this, many Jewish and Israeli talked about it, but the amount of hate a vitriol your kind spew, the silencing methods you employ does not leave a place to our criticism. Nuanced opinions of the systems of violence, the militarization of the Israeli society, about the ties between culture and crime, of neglect, those are swept aside as they do not satisfy your "Israel bad" criteria.

Understanding the actions taken and explaining them is not endorsing or supporting said actions. it's called having an understanding.

I understand that this ask is a result of your underdeveloped moral compass, and truly hope you would be able to develop a healthy one little anon.

You don't know me, you see fractions of me through a screen, pieces of opinions I share on this wretched hell hole in hope of a good constructive criticism, in hope that by speaking out people will feel less alone.

for summery anon, life is more complex then your little fanfiction version of it. I hope you grow out of this mindset.

#I swear that so many of you cannot hold complex thoughts even if your life are dependent on that #people are stupid #israel #palestine #antisemitism #faulty moral compass #ask uz

[petefromarma]

Dont get me wrong but that course of events you laid out sounds like a mostly good thing? Gabe saying anything even kinda resembling an apology is already better than the Absolutely Nothing I was expecting

i’m putting this under a cut as it’s long

yeah i mean i do think them donating to a relief org would be the absolute best thing possible bc like as of rn nothing abt this is materially helping palestinians. it’s all just noise which honestly i probably shouldn’t be contributing to bc i always knew this was going to happen and i’ve always known what pete and gabe are like. i’ve also always known what the other three are like but pete and gabe are the only ones who have done and said things prior to this incident (other than being silent) irt palestine that warranted outright criticism. anyway my main problem rn is w gabe’s statement.

the reason i’m unimpressed w it is bc i feel like it’s smth either he or an intern paraphrased in like two minutes (again, always knew this was going to be the response if any), and doesn’t address what the majority of the problem was imo, which was that he was parroting blood libel propaganda put out by the israeli govt re oct 7th. i haven’t gone and looked at the post myself recently, only seen screenshots of his comments, so idk if he took that part down, but that to me is the greatest issue. i never had a problem w him mourning the civilian casualties/hostages of oct 7th.

like addressing the discontent at all IS a good thing but i don’t believe his comment covers anything that he actually needed to apologize for and i’ve already seen teenage westerners who clearly learned abt palestine for the first time like. five months ago. trying to speak on this situation with authority that is not earned and not deserved.

and i’d like to be clear and say that i don’t believe all or even most blunders re saying something ignorant online require a full apology; i think that in most cases, deleting whatever was said is enough. i don’t think pile ons or bullying are conducive to rehabilitation or a change in behavior. however, to me, this is a special situation in which i believe a full retraction is necessary bc as i said before, he was spreading israeli govt propaganda.

none of what he said was new to me either. i know he’s the descendant of holocaust survivors, and more than that, i know his family had to flee europe and later uruguay. i know that like many jewish families do, his parents kept a box in their home in nyc filled with their passports and valuables in case they needed to get out of the country in a hurry; he needs to realize that this and so much worse is the reality that palestinins are living every single day.

the israeli govt preys upon and exploits the generational trauma of jewish individuals/families/communities in order to sow fear, terrorize palestinians, and further the colonization of palestinian land; i have complete understanding of how he’s been radicalized to this point, but it doesn’t excuse what he’s said and done and i think the only real way of fixing this is putting his money where his mouth is and making a public donation. again i’m not demanding anything of him, i’m not saying this will or won’t happen, i’m just saying what i think SHOULD be done and what would be the most effective from a harm reduction standpoint. can he come back from being radicalized to the point he was/is? i don’t know. i’d like to think so. all i know is that that statement didn’t address what i think it should have addressed IF it was supposed to be considered at all meaningful and i think the way ppl have been reacting to it is inappropriate.

anyway, sidebar bc i’m going to attempt to stop talking about this after this post and go back to focusing on initiatives that actually benefit ppl in palestine rn, but i think fans (who are not palestinian) who were shocked by this were living in a fantasy world and i think the way those fans esp those on twt have reacted toward meredith has been abhorrent. as i said a lot of this has just been noise rather than any action that is meaningful in any way and i think that while we should be realistic abt what we are going to get from them we should also be able to acknowledge where any actions of theirs are lacking.

#also if anyone has a problem w me using the term blood libel i’m not sorry bc it is what the israeli govt is doing

[bigfrood]

so this is about the hozier statement please help me understand why his statement was so bad both herw and om twitter people are dissapointed but like .?!?! Isnt his statement rational and well thought out and balanced given that life has been lost on both sides yes the isralie government has been awfully unfair with palestinians for years almost 75? I think but hammas killed children and civilians took them hostages isralie government bombed hospitals and schools and churches two wrongs dont make a right an immediate cease fire with diplomatic talks is a good way to go and to call for that is a good statement so i dont get why people are so up in arms about this ? Please help me understand youre take if is different

Please check out these videos, they are about 8 minutes long in total and they worded what I wanna say better than I could ever hope to word it:

https://twitter.com/Hakeemfederer/status/1714734864086261838?t=lJARc717B09mqwfZmtF9tg&s=19

https://twitter.com/_TheRockII/status/1713975193339605115?t=9gKHtgV1f5T_heX6Xto2Bg&s=19

(This one is an Irish person, like Hozier who should know better)

One of my main problems with Hozier's statement is that it IS balanced like you're saying, because here's the thing:

The situation in Palestine isn't balanced.

To be neutral in a situation where there is an oppressive party and an oppressed party is necessarily in favour of oppression.

I don't disagree with most of his statement, my main problem with his take is also my main problem with yours, except you're saying "Israel has been awfully unfair with Palestinians" and he used language that was slightly stronger but still doesn't begin to cover the situation.

There is no place for "both sides" in this narrative. It is not a war or a conflict, but an occupation, where the apartheid state that has been committing war crimes for decades is now also committing genocide in front of the whole world with video! evidence! And no one is stopping it, countries and individuals are actually supporting it, even!

I can't believe that in the year of our lord 2023 I have to bring up the point that genocide, apartheid and settler colonialism are a big deal, and aren't just Israel "being unfair".

But the fact that you're willing to ask and understand makes me think that you are a good person who's trying to do what's right, so that's why I'm responding.

It's not fair to describe what Hamas did as equal to what Israel did in any capacity, starting from the very root of the problem, I'm asking you this:

If Israel hadn't STOLEN and COLONISED Palestinian land and occupied Palestine, do you think there would even be Hamas??

In Arabic we have an addition to the famous "an eye for an eye" line: ".. and whoever started is more unjust".

It's true that Hamas killed civilians, but what exactly do you think Israel has been doing in Palestine for almost 8 decades?? Hamas was formed in the late 80s. It has existed for less than half the duration of the occupation, with a vast inequality in resources in favour of Israel, yet one is considered a terrorist organisation and the other a country!!

Also, Hamas isn't every Palestinian, but every Palestinian is suffering at the hands of Israel. Israel is using Hamas as an excuse for their crimes.

Even the human cost is unequal, so many more Palestinian lives were lost!

Like any human being I am deeply affected by the loss of lives, however, anyone who blames any party involved other than Israel and by extension any international force that has the ability to stop it but hasn't for killing Palestinians and putting Israeli "civilians" in harm's way is being awfully unfair. Uninformed at best, and malicious with an agenda at worst.

I don't think the Irish or the Algerians or us Egyptians or any people in history who has been occupied got their freedom through peace talks.

But I don't mind an immediate cease fire and diplomatic talks, anything that would stop this genocide, really.

To answer your question directly now that I've made the previous points: what he's suggesting should happen isn't what bothers me. It's how he's describing the current situation.

I can't agree with a statement that's condemning resistance for RESISTING while also not coming close to properly condemning the genocidal occupation that started it all and keeps the violence going.

I can't agree that he's calling this genocide a "response" when what's happening now has been happening decades before Hamas even existed. The situation did NOT start 2 weeks ago or when Hamas was formed, but it started with the occupation and will only end when that occupation is gone.

I can't possibly agree when he calls what's happening a cycle of violence implying that there is anyone to blame but Israel, when it's a cycle of violence in the sense that Israel commits war crimes regularly and quite often, doesn't face consequences from any international organisation, or anyone really, which allows it to continue committing even worse war crimes.

I hope this helps you understand, and I hope you do the right thing and stand with Palestine.

#gaza #Hozier #free gaza #Palestine #free palestine #things are actually quite simple once you know the basic facts #occupation bad #freedom good #that's it. that's the situation. #I have about a million relevant tweets and screenshots but I don't want this to get longer than it already is

[workersolidarity]

🇵🇸🇮🇱 A FEW THOUGHTS ON GAZA, THE PALESTINIAN RESISTANCE, AND THE EVENTS OF OCT. 7TH

I have to say, I don't think people really get it yet, I don't think anybody alive right now could possibly understand the implications the events of October 7th have had on the world order, or the effects it's going to have.

October 7th changes EVERYTHING.

Israel can never go back to the status quo, Palestine can never go back to the status quo, the US position in the middle east can never go back to the status quo, and the knock-on effects this is going to have are going to echo through time for many many generations to come.

As much as the U.S. wishes it could go back to the status quo, and as much as it thinks it can just magically wish the old order back into place through sheer imperialistic will, but it's not happening. It's not going to happen and the US has no more ability to turn back the clock than I do to bring my recently deceased mother back to life.

What Hamas and Palestinian Resistance groups did was part of a defined strategy to get us right where we are today.

"Hamas KNEW what this would bring on Gaza" is a refrain you're going to hear CONSTANTLY for some time, and honestly, its not wrong, nor does it excuse Israel's genocide on Gazans, nor its abuse of Palestinians in the West Bank or Jerusalem.

Instead, what it does is it illuminates the situation for us, and gives us a window with which to see the aims of the Palestinian Resistance, along with the incredible discipline and bravery, and cruel coldness of the best military tacticians it took to launch this operation.

Hamas not only managed a surprise attack on Israel, but it actually used Israel's OWN world-famous spy network to help execute this attack.

The incredible levels of detailed planning, strategic thinking, discipline within the ranks of officers and rank-in-file, (which they do have a hierarchy), and just the incredible patience this took is stunning in itself.

But this was, as retired UN Weapons Inspector, Scott Ritter has said multiple times, "a cold and calculated" decision. Extremely cold. Extremely calculated.

What the Resistance has done is to use Israel's own military bravado to instigate it into bombing the life out of the Gaza Strip, and to go diving into Gaza City with tanks and armored vehicles where the Resistance can pick them off one by one, ducking in and out of buildings through mouseholes and tunnels, and making some of the most jaw dropping propaganda videos in the history of guerilla warfare.

Each of these effects were part of the goals of the Resistance, to:

a) let Israel flatten Gaza and expose themselves to the entire world as the FUCKING MONSTERS these Zionists really are and to

b) force this issue onto the global stage in a way that initiates the world to confront the contradictions and issues surrounding Gaza and the wider relationship between the West and the Arab world, and, to also, of course,

c) instigate Israel into ground operations in Gaza where they are weak and vulnerable, and lastly, to

c) create guerilla warfare videos that will inspire Resistance groups, Guerilla groups, radicals, and military tacticians across the globe for generations to come.

The scale of what that will mean going forward is just so incredibly poorly understood this early on. I think we can't even begin to imagine the geopolitical implications of everything that's unfolded, and everything that is likely to unfold in West Asia, and across the entire world. (Hint: it's not going to be pretty process no matter what)

The effects of the events of October 7th will reverberate through every corner of the globe and affect every human being on this earth before this is over. I can promise you that.

@WorkerSolidarityNews

#palestine #palestine war #palestinian resistance #al qassam brigades #hamas #october 7th #gaza #gaza city #gaza strip #gaza war #free gaza #free palestine #islamic resistance #politics #geopolitics #political analysis #world politics #global politics #us politics #international politics #geopolitical analysis #current events #news #war #wars #socialist politics #the resistance #zionism #war crimes #israel

[the-rainbow-lesbian]

I'm not Jewish so I don't really have much of a personal stake in the situation but I must admit there is something about all this stuff that just feels...wrong...

I support Palestinian independence and I think what Israel is doing is objectively wrong. It does sorta seem they're trying to wipe the Palestinians out so they don't have to worry about them anymore, seeing as how they've been bombing places that were supposedly safe. Killing children will not bring the hostages back.

That being said, something about the way people are so quick to act as if Israel is the single most evil country in the world (as if others haven't also committed human rights violations) is so strange to me. And the way people are outright calling for the extermination of Israel, not even in a subtle way. Like it or not, there are people who live there and they won't have anywhere to go. Why is extermination of a group of people only okay if it happens to the right group of people? And all these things about how Israel is controlling the media, the claims that the 10/7 massacre was fake just because 40 babies weren't actually beheaded (and acting like it's sooooo out there and crazy to believe that that would actually happen), saying that Jewish people don't have a right to complain about feeling unsafe on campus because Palestinians have it worse... It's scary and the fact that NOBODY is being like "hey guys being pro-Palestine isn't an excuse to be antisemitic" when I'm sure they would have just 10 years ago is CRAZY. It's so easy to do and yet they don't do it. I don't think any criticism of Israel automatically equates to antisemitism, but it's clear to me that the situation is being leveraged to justify antisemitism and I just wish we could bring this up without people being like, "So you think murdering children is okay?" Like, no? You can't say a damn thing about it. Why did people get so extreme so quickly? What happened?

All this is to say I feel very conflicted about all this and although I'm sure you have people trying to paint you as a genocide enabler, I think your heart is in the right place. I appreciate that you're one of the few non-conservatives that look at things from a different angle. I feel like I'm going crazy.

exactly, you're not jewish, and many people don't have any stakes in this game either but they are suddenly very invested in this war when it's not even the most deadly conflict going on in the world, people only supposedly care about palestinians when israel is waging a war against hamas but don't really care about palestinians who live in syria and lebanon who live in actual refugee camps and have little to no rights, and generally, people don't care about arabs and middle eastern people, did anyone take to the streets and camp on their campuses to protest the syrian civil war? or to protest the horrendous atrocities the IRGC commits against the iranian people?

there is a difference between "children die in wars and that's very tragic" and "israel a jewish majority country is actively targeting children" and there are propaganda machines that are very much invested in having you believe that israel is some sort of genocidal evil state hellbent on killing children for fun, even though if genocide was israel's goal they would've already nuked gaza and not sent soldiers on the ground and risk their lives, and not continue to allow aid in and open one more entry point in shalom karem crossing that they had to close later because hamas shot rockets and killed two soldiers, hamas has been preventing civilians from accessing aid since this war started and now prevented more aid from entering to gaza through that crossing.

you might be getting there in noticing a pattern but it's all connected, you say israel is "objectively wrong" but if you were kidnapped by a terrorist organization would you want your government to do absolutely nothing to rescue you? unfortunately casualties are a reality of war and I think every decent person wishes that wars would all collectively stop but we live in reality and when a terrorist organization invades your border and massacres your civilians you have the right to defend yourself, and israel has warned civilians in advance to evacuate before they begin striking an area, this is the most recent example of them trying to urge a family to leave rafah asap and the response is both horrifying and eye opening x

people here in the west don't understand the middle east and your naivety is being taken advantage of, I know I sound like a conspiracy theorist but the terrorist organizations who want to eradicate israel know they can't defeat the idf so they are trying to win the information war by investing in this propaganda that israel is committing a genocide and targeting women and children and that israel is also the worst country in the world and they are using good old blood libels so that people turn against jews like they did when the nazis took over, do you think they started with rounding up jewish civilians to the gas chambers or with propaganda that dehumanized and demonized jewish people to allow this to happen? unfortunately stupidity is in abundance and people in the west are such useful idiots.

[hussyknee]

If y'all want to feel sympathy for the Israelis, you better have it for every single genocider. Slavers and settlers that scalped Natives and Nazis and Imperial Japan and Stalinists and Serbs and the British East India company and white nationalists and Islamic fundamentalists and Hindutvas and Assad's forces and and and.

People do not become genociders because of victimhood. The majority of the worst colonial empires were people who hadn't been oppressed themselves in centuries. Groups become genocidal because they have power and want to take their trauma or paranoia out on someone weaker than they are. Even the ones who aren't gleefully enthusiastic go along with it because the benefits and risks of dissent outweigh your moral conscience. You're not forced to make those choices. That's not what indoctination is. Indoctrination helps dehumanization. It's making it easy to silence every doubt and qualm and instinct for empathy and compassion. But you still choose. You make a conscious decision to see a human being as a vermin to be eradicated. It's easy to do that when you have no incentive to see them as human and no consequences for treating them accordingly.

For fuck's sake, stop using the Holocaust as an excuse for Zionists. Half of them are converts or the children of converts who never lived the Jewish generational legacy of persecution. Most of their families migrated from places where they had a perfectly comfortable lives, and the other half was born in Israel and never knew what being a marginalized minority was like. Israelis are literally the least oppressed Jews in the known world. They victimize Palestinians because colonizers and oppressors live in mortal fear of the people they colonize and oppress, because they KNOW that they're crushing them and have to manufacture all sorts of narratives to rationalize and justify that they're actually the good guys.

Colonization and genocide is a result of power. I and a lot of other BIPOC have been traumatized by Zionists before we ever knew the word for them, because they keep taking out their paranoia of Jewish hate on Black people, Natives, immigrants, Muslims and Arabs and every kind of racial minority that have no systemic power to hurt them. They have such a foothold in the Jewish communities of Europe and its settler colonies (Australia, the Americas), because white Jews have assimilated into whiteness. However conditional their acceptance among white Christians, they have the same racial and institutional power over Black and brown colonized people. Which makes it easy for them to choose Zionism— the legitimizing of white colonial anxiety in place of fear of their oppressor. Antisemitism is their ready and convenient way to rationalize the racism and Islamphobia and racial superiority they already have.

Do you think Jews are the only people who have ever been genocided? The Holocaust was not exceptional, it was exceptionalized by the Western powers to launder their own atrocities that far outstripped Nazi Germany. Look at what they're doing with Ukraine. They're being genocided and colonized and they deserve empathy and help against Russia. But the West isn't concerned about Armenia the same way even though it's also an Eastern European country. They definitely weren't concerned about any of the other countries Russia has attacked or helped genocide (like Syria). Including Ukraine itself before all this. Putin has been attacking Donbas since 2014.

So why now? They care about who's genociding Ukraine, not about Ukrainians. Russia under Putin is very much a threat to NATO and Ukraine is bordered by NATO countries. The Western PR machine still had to make Ukrainians white, because Slavs are ethnically marginalized in Western Europe, and even North America to a lesser degree. They have white privilege over all Asians and Africans and Indigenous people because the colour system of race is based on European colonization, but they have only conditional whiteness in the imperial sphere of both the US and Russia. But because they're ethnically European, the US and Western Europe was able to launch a PR "Look They're Just Like Us!" campaign to elevate them to full whiteness, so that their own citizens would actually give a shit about this country they'd barely heard of before. That's why we're all more concerned about Ukraine than any other Eastern Europeans (we're all conditioned into white supremacy). After that, the US went around thumping its own chest for a full year and half, trying to launder its military image after the twenty year Muslim genocide that was the War on Terror (still ongoing).

This is exactly what they did with European Jews. High-ho, somebody victimized by the Enemy! Dust them off and lookie! They're European! People will give a shit that we liberated them if we make them all white! But uh, do we really want five million Jewish refugees in here? Oh I know, we'll thrown in with those crazy Jewish terrorists that were giving the Brits so much trouble, and give them a state! They're also from Europe after all, and Civilized™, unlike the savages!

And then the liberated Jews accepted doing exactly what the Nazis did to them. Not because they had to! They could have just lived in Palestine, that whole region of the Levant was pretty secular and multicultural. But they didn't see Arabs as human beings! Because Europeans are taught to see Black and brown people as servants and savages! They massacred Palestinians and took the place over because they could and then called it the War of Independence. The first people they victimized after that? Were Arab Jews. They colluded with Arab nationalists to have them ethnically cleansed entirely out of their countries and scooped them up to create a labouring underclass! Put them up in such squalid conditions that scores died!

And did those people look around and realize white Jews were their oppressors and they had far more in common with Palestinians? No. They threw in with their oppressors to help make Palestinians lives a generational nightmare. Because power and assimilation! This is the exact same reason why Zionists has been trying to cosy up to Nazis since before Hitler.

(Oh and by the way? Germans never regretted the Nazis or the Holocaust. The Americans "denazification" was a dead fail. They just used Israel to make a whole dog and pony show of how very sorry they were and how it was a Dark Moment in Their History™ (because nothing they've ever done to colonized people counts). They paid reparations because the West made them, but they never got over the massive post-war genocide the Allies subjected their people to, or the way they carved up the country like a Christmas turkey. But again, did they hold Britain, France, US and Russia responsible for it? Did they acknowledge that the most severe cases of post-war violence came from American GIs? Of course not. Obviously the biggest threat was...the Poles.)

If you really see all those TikTok videos of families dancing to their genocide songs, taunting starving and dehydrated Palestinians and teens lampooning Palestinian mothers grieving their dead children and think "they're also victims because Western imperialists exploited their fear and made them into monsters" then I don't even know what to say to you. That level of infantilization, wilful ignorance and need to turn sadism into victimhood is breathtakingly racist and paternalistic. Even if you believe #Not All Israelis, the point is there's enough Israelis. Also what is even there to feel sorry for?? Are Israelis about to be turned out and shot in the streets? Starve to death? Have their limbs amputated without anesthetic and still die of sepsis? Literally what??

Emotions are signifiers of your own internal biases and perspectives. They aren't indicative of justice or morality. We can't move through a deeply unequal world and believe that compassion is having the same responses, judgements and feelings for everyone. It's not empathy you're feeling for Israelis, it's conditioned philosemitism and casual racism against Palestinians. If you actually followed the videos and images and news coming out of Palestine, you would feel about as sympathetic towards them as Nazis. You would understand that this kind of atrocity doesn't come from trauma or having been victims. It comes from having zero consequences for doing them. It comes from unchecked, gleeful, sadistic power.

#free palestine #colonialism #asks #gaza genocide #palestinian genocide #western imperialism #paternalism #white supremacy #racism #islamophobia #anti arab racism #anti zionism #antisemitism #zionazis #fuck israel #israeli war crimes #history #war propaganda #nazi germany #muslim lives matter #knee of huss

[arcofacatboy]

is it weird to say i feel like i'm mourning arc of a scythe? like it'd be one thing if the book was actually just not that great n whatnot like harry potter but. the book is actually good. i almost wonder if neil tripped and fell into writing a book with good commentary when he seems to be so incapable of understanding those same things

its not that its nessecarily that its just good, perse, but it made me want to read again. i felt like this series was meant for me, and it permanently affected my taste in books

sorry if it seems like im venting in your askbox its just. im kinda just wondering if my feelings are just felt by me or if others understand

No it’s okay - I’m gonna break some of this down with my own thoughts where I can.

First of all, I can’t really say how you should label your feelings about Neal and his books. I’ve personally tried to avoid using words like mourning or grieving due to the context of why I’m retracting support from Neal in the first place. People, children, are being ruthlessly murdered every day. Me being upset that my (now former) favorite author is completely apathetic towards the victims of genocide will never compare to the grief, pain, and trauma that the people of Gaza and Palestine have been made to face for months now. That doesn’t mean you can’t label your feelings that way! That’s just something I try to keep in mind when talking about Neal myself.

The reason I shifted the focus of this blog, while keeping its original branding, is because I want to at least try to help in a way Neal is refusing to - making his fans aware of the absolutely inhumane treatment of Palestinians at the hands of the Israeli government. Like Neal, I’m by no means an expert on… anything going on right now. I try my absolute best to spread accurate information, but that doesn’t make me a professional or expert. I’m not Israeli, and I’m not Palestinian. I’m a white person living in the relative safety of the USA, who isn’t going to be the target of antisemitism or Islamophobia. I should not be anybody’s primary source of information. But, unlike Neal, I feel like I’m at least doing something, and I want to keep trying to do as much as I can. I’m not trying to one-up Neal here, this isn’t a competition - but I’m saying that all the excuses he’s used for saying nothing could easily be applied to me, and many of the people who have spoken out against him. And yet, here we are.

I haven’t reread Arc Of A Scythe with knowing the additional context that Neal is okay with being completely silent on a genocide, but I have been rereading Dry while keeping that in mind, and, yeah. Neal makes a lot of parallels to real-world crises in that book, and how governments, people in power, and regular people treat them - with where I am in the book right now, everyone not affected by the Tap-Out seems to be completely apathetic and not concerned, because the Tap-Out hasn’t made their life any worse… so it can just be swept under the rug while the people of Southern California lose access to potable water. Literally most of my notes are pointing out how hypocritical Neal is being with his commentary - he’s doing things right now that he portrays as bad things to do in the book. The most egregious example so far is linked here.

So, I can’t say why Neal has taken the stance that he has right now. There’s no point in speculating if he was always this performative in his activism, or if he’s fallen into the Israeli propaganda trap, because it ultimately doesn’t matter. He’s being ignorant and harmful, and he deserves to be condemned for that either way.

You’re not alone in how you feel, I think - a lot of former/current AOAS fans have been really thrown for a loop by Neal’s shit. We have to move forward from here, but no one person can tell you how to do that. (Also, none of this was me trying to be rude or disrespectful, so I’m sorry if it came off that way. One adjustment I’ve had to make for this blog is not talking like a YouTube shitpost, so my tone probably seems a little different from posts I made pre-“Neal being a colonialist sympathizer”.)

P.S about the Harry Potter thing: I’m not sure what you mean by “not that great”, but I agree with you there. There’s so much “not that great” stuff in Harry Potter that the average person doesn’t even know about - the entire franchise is rooted in these really weird ideas about race, class, and a million other things, so it’s bad beyond “oh the goblins are antisemitic caricatures and the author is a terf”. Those things are still extremely bad, don’t get me wrong. But if you want to know more about how bigotry permeates into every part of the franchise - not just the movies, books, and Hogwarts Legacy! - I recommend this video essay by Lily Simpson. It’s ten hours long, but definitely worth a watch. (Yes I did watch the entire thing over like, a week this summer.)

#arc of a scythe #scythe #the toll #thunderhead #neal shusterman #aoas #gleanings #unwind dystology

[mavreos]

I'm ready to be tore apart by some crazy ass people who sincerely are a waste of oxygen but I need to say something, and I'll get political, very, and also pretty raw and without filters. Feel free to discuss in the comments if you wanna

I thought it was more of an urban legend but I actually saw someone that advocated the Liberation of Palestine and defended Hamas unapologetically. Let's be serious, such people are not just scumbags, but they are worse than Israel cause they don't understand the totality of geopolitics, and don't understand how Hamas is just a toy used by the Israeli Government to act recklessly against the Palestinians. I know using one's brain nowadays is getting more and more tiring but I'd like to ask you to do such otherwise we're all gonna meet our extinction pretty soon.

Let's start from common sense and the basis of Law from a sociological perspective. An eye for an eye is batshit, it can't work in a society that wants to progress, so using that excuses to praise Hamas is just stupid, especially because Hamas is composed of cowards that attack civilians, and despite they might be racists towards Palestinians this doesn't legitimates something like the 7th of October, where international investigations (yeah, without bias) found out numerous girls were victims of sexual abuses, something that isn't a rarity among the units of Hamas. Not on that date but they've been using PALESTINIANS, not Jewish people, but their own people, as human shields, they've had for several years a statute that declared that their mission wouldn't have completed until all of the Jewish people would have been wiped out of the face of the Earth. It's funny cause, there are way more leftists who basically worship these terrorists. Probably they don't know that before their ascension, Mussolini style, they passed their time killing all the parties in Palestine who weren't fighting like them against Israel. They are totalitarian, theocratic (forced women to wear the veil) and antisemitic, they don't make distinctions between soldiers and civilians and focus only on attacking civilians like I said, raped women multiple times and uses human shields. Netanyahu let millions of dollars pass from Qatar TROUGH Israel to get to Hamas while they stopped medicines coming by international organisations from getting to the Stripe Of Gaza, the leaders of Hamas live lifes full of luxury in Qatar while people kill themselves. Defending Hamas is as criminal as defending Israel, if not more since Netanyahu uses them as a Scape goat to be stuck in a perpetual war because those fuckers attacked first. I'm really disgusted by all such "leftist" who are ready to defend the worst shit just to go against someone else, Hamas has lost support during the last years even in Gaza, respect born from fear and forced because of the context isn't genuine. Defending Hamas won't help the people of Palestine nor the people of Israel who protests against their government every day. Same discourse with Ukraine-Russia, where people were crying out of joy for the Azov Battalion while they're Nazist and committed several war crimes, I think it's a vice of the Leftist people to do so. And of the western world in general, to support a side just because, without critically looking. We must stand with the people, those above are always committing war crimes using us as sacrificial flesh for their sick ideals and for their greed. What's up with the True Anarchist spirit that advocated for a freedom from all the higher powers ? Bah

I wish the best to all the people going through wars right now, I know this might not be useful at all, but someone knows about you, you won't be forgotten

#free gaza #gaza strip #gaza genocide #israel hamas war #hamas massacre #hamas war crimes