Israel-Hamas War 2023

[Valmy]

If they want to be responsible for the Palestinians well they need to accountable to the Palestinians. They should grant them all citizenship at the end of that "de-radicalization" program. One state solution.

But they won't do that and don't want a two state solution either.

So yeah...that sounds like apartheid.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I find the comparisons to apartheid to be simplistic and unhelpful, it is generally better to just go after Israeli negative behavior as Israeli negative behavior. Trying to squeeze into South Africa's apartheid example because that was a "big word" in the 80s and 90s doesn't IMO make a ton of sense.

There are serious concerns about Jewish supremacism, undermining of Israel's democracy, treatment of non-Jews under many policies / ideas promoted by the Israeli far-right, but they don't easily compare to apartheid--which was a system distinct to South Africa and tied into race. Jewish supremacism in Israel is not tied to race at all (in fact most Israeli Jews are functionally the same race as the Palestinians).

There's also a lot of international law issues at play in Israel/Palestine that were distinct from what went on in South Africa (one of the biggest is actual international boundaries for Palestine have never been accepted, they were proposed in 1947 but not ratified by anyone involved, Gaza and the West Bank, and to some degree even Israel, exist in a sort of perpetual unsettled gray area.)

In fact a big difference from apartheid and Israel-Palestine is there is still a perpetual war going on between these two entities (or between the one entity of Israel and the quasi-entity of Palestine), that wasn't a condition of the apartheid regime, excepting relatively mild black insurgency movements that were usually easily suppressed by the white ruling government.

Another significant factor is the "Palestinians" are just Arabs who are culturally homogenous with Arabs in the immediate regions of bordering Arab countries, and who have at times even been part of those countries (and in fact some are permanently), the Israel-Palestine dispute is much more a case of "this group really wants certain specific land they lost through bad wars they started, so they are squatting as refugees forever instead of engaging in  any form of political settlement." There's not really any comparable history with apartheid.

[Barrister]

I find the comparisons to apartheid to be simplistic and unhelpful, it is generally better to just go after Israeli negative behavior as Israeli negative behavior. Trying to squeeze into South Africa's apartheid example because that was a "big word" in the 80s and 90s doesn't IMO make a ton of sense.

There are serious concerns about Jewish supremacism, undermining of Israel's democracy, treatment of non-Jews under many policies / ideas promoted by the Israeli far-right, but they don't easily compare to apartheid--which was a system distinct to South Africa and tied into race. Jewish supremacism in Israel is not tied to race at all (in fact most Israeli Jews are functionally the same race as the Palestinians).

There's also a lot of international law issues at play in Israel/Palestine that were distinct from what went on in South Africa (one of the biggest is actual international boundaries for Palestine have never been accepted, they were proposed in 1947 but not ratified by anyone involved, Gaza and the West Bank, and to some degree even Israel, exist in a sort of perpetual unsettled gray area.)

Another significant factor is the "Palestinians" are just Arabs who are culturally homogenous with Arabs in the immediate regions of bordering Arab countries, and who have at times even been part of those countries (and in fact some are permanently), the Israel-Palestine dispute is much more a case of "this group really wants certain specific land they lost through bad wars they started, so they are squatting as refugees forever instead of engaging in  any form of political settlement." There's not really any comparable history with apartheid.

Otto, I've resisted that term for Israel for decades.  And who knows - maybe tomorrow I'll disagree with it's usage again.

But the idea of permanent security control over WB/Gaza by Israel, with no political rights for the inhabitants, is strongly reminiscent of apartheid.

[Razgovory]

Sounds like occupation. 

[Barrister]

Sounds like occupation.

And I mean that's going to need to be the short-term solution to Gaza.  And the US occupied Japan for several years, as well as part of West Germany.

But it was never at all contemplated to be a permanent solution.

(my sentence structure sucks - start two sentences with "and", and the other with "but")   

[Tamas]

How sinister that plan is depends largely by what they mean by deradicalisation? Broad rights given to themselves to arrest people? China-style camps like for the uighurs? The latter of course would send the world into a frenzy unlike the Chinese one were nobody cares.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Yeah, it would be a military occupation. Has literally been Gaza's condition since 1947–including the 20 years Egypt occupied it but didn't count Gazans as Egyptian citizens (they even issued them special passports that made clear they weren't Egyptian.)

A military occupation is generally not a positive thing, but not IMO the same thing as apartheid. Apartheid wasn't part of an ongoing military conflict over control of land.

Things can be called bad without saying they are the same as other bad things.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

How sinister that plan is depends largely by what they mean by deradicalisation? Broad rights given to themselves to arrest people? China-style camps like for the uighurs? The latter of course would send the world into a frenzy unlike the Chinese one were nobody cares.

at the very least it'll probably mean the children will get better, maybe even decent, educational materials instead of the antisemitic tripe Hamas was feeding them.
Not that it'll help though.

[viper37]

land they lost through bad wars they started

How did they start the war?

[viper37]

maybe even decent, educational materials

Imported from Russia?

[viper37]

Sounds like occupation.

At what point does an occupation becomes colonization?  When you remove people to put your own, is that still an occupation?  When you destroy people's home to build you own settlement is that an occupation?

What is an occupation, what is an invasion?  What is an annexation?  Did Germany annex France in WWII or did it occupy the country?  Should Churchill have shake the hand of Germany's leader and congratulate him on pacifying this troublesome country filled of dissidents posing a danger to his country?  Two wars in less than 30 years apart?  Clearly, Germany felt threatened by such an aggressive neighbour.  They declared war and lost.  Too bad for them.  England should just have ditched them, instead of fighting in the air, on the beaches, etc.

[Razgovory]

Sounds like occupation.

At what point does an occupation becomes colonization?  When you remove people to put your own, is that still an occupation?  When you destroy people's home to build you own settlement is that an occupation?

What is an occupation, what is an invasion?  What is an annexation?  Did Germany annex France in WWII or did it occupy the country?  Should Churchill have shake the hand of Germany's leader and congratulate him on pacifying this troublesome country filled of dissidents posing a danger to his country?  Two wars in less than 30 years apart?  Clearly, Germany felt threatened by such an aggressive neighbour.  They declared war and lost.  Too bad for them.  England should just have ditched them, instead of fighting in the air, on the beaches, etc.

Germany didn't annex France in WW2 because no peace treaty was signed.  If you paid attention in history class you would know that.  I remind you that you live on stolen land.  Are you as interested in decolonizing Turtle Island as you decolonizing Israel? 

[Josquius]

I find the comparisons to apartheid to be simplistic and unhelpful, it is generally better to just go after Israeli negative behavior as Israeli negative behavior. Trying to squeeze into South Africa's apartheid example because that was a "big word" in the 80s and 90s doesn't IMO make a ton of sense.

Many have tossed around the term apartheid for years. And I've often disagreed with it with regards to Gaza and the wall- the treatment of the Israeli Arabs which never really gets a mention would be a closer analogy there.
But in this theoretical it absolutely would be an apartheid style situation with Gaza.

There are serious concerns about Jewish supremacism, undermining of Israel's democracy, treatment of non-Jews under many policies / ideas promoted by the Israeli far-right, but they don't easily compare to apartheid--which was a system distinct to South Africa and tied into race. Jewish supremacism in Israel is not tied to race at all (in fact most Israeli Jews are functionally the same race as the Palestinians).

Thats a weird flip. Isn't it at the core of zionism and the general arguments of pro Israeli folks that Jews are a race?

There's also a lot of international law issues at play in Israel/Palestine that were distinct from what went on in South Africa (one of the biggest is actual international boundaries for Palestine have never been accepted, they were proposed in 1947 but not ratified by anyone involved, Gaza and the West Bank, and to some degree even Israel, exist in a sort of perpetual unsettled gray area.)

South Africa had unrecognised borders too - Namibia.
Not to mention in the context of apartheid the very relevant Bantustans.

Another significant factor is the "Palestinians" are just Arabs who are culturally homogenous with Arabs in the immediate regions of bordering Arab countries, and who have at times even been part of those countries (and in fact some are permanently), the Israel-Palestine dispute is much more a case of "this group really wants certain specific land they lost through bad wars they started, so they are squatting as refugees forever instead of engaging in  any form of political settlement." There's not really any comparable history with apartheid.

Honestly this sounds like something the Apartheid government might have said.
"The blacks in south Africa are just bantus. An extension of the bantus with all those other countries in Africa. Why they're just immigrants here too."
Of course there's a lot of similarity across Arabs. But this doesn't make any subgroup somehow irrelevant.
And pretty sure the Palestinians do want a settlement with it being the Israeli right who are content with the current (pre October) situation and slowly further weakening the Palestinian situation?

[OttoVonBismarck]

At what point does an occupation becomes colonization?  When you remove people to put your own, is that still an occupation?  When you destroy people's home to build you own settlement is that an occupation?

A lot of times the answer is "it doesn't matter", colonization is heavily abused as a political term. It makes more sense to hit at the core issues at hand without using labels as cudgels.

It takes slightly more work but is a better framework for discussion. It isn't incredibly difficult to say things like "the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank is not morally justifiable, and exacerbates a number of regional tensions" or to differentiate it from say, the Allied occupation of Germany post-WWII, which virtually no one takes moral issue with. It isn't crazy hard to just recognize the ways in which a thing are objectionable.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Thats a weird flip. Isn't it at the core of zionism and the general arguments of pro Israeli folks that Jews are a race?

No. Jews are a "people" is how I often see them describe themselves. Even the most hardcore Orthodox Jew doesn't think all Jews belong to the same race.

More conservative Jews do try to deny genetic similarity with the Arab population, but pretty basic science has shown there is a lot of intermixing that has occurred over the millennia. And also just like the primary way to easily distinguish an Israeli Jew from an Israeli Arab is how they are dressed, that isn't something you can say about say, black people in America.