One-Eyed in Gaza

[Mosby]

This is a post about war crimes in Gaza and the widespread public outrage over them directed at Israel. Since it is a long post, I begin by providing a brief map of what is to follow.

In Part 1 I present a sample of the angry public reaction to Israel's alleged war crimes in Gaza, as gathered mostly from the British liberal press. In Part 2 I consider the source of this anger, pointing to what may be thought to be the most likely one - the great and visible suffering caused by Israel's recent military action. I argue that the hypothesis that this was the cause of outrage against Israel is not decisively rebutted by a standard argumentative move made by Israel's defenders: namely, that if Israel was guilty of war crimes, then so too was Hamas, for sending rockets against Sderot and other civilian centres. In Part 3 I go on to show that the claim that anger at Israel was due, or mainly due, to the suffering caused by its military action is open to question nonetheless. If we are examining this issue under the rubric of responsibility for war crimes, then public outrage about them is skewed when directed, as it widely has been, exclusively at Israel. In Part 4 I draw three conclusions from what has gone before. The first of these concerns the implication of the attitudes explored here for the future progress of international law. The second bears on the present condition of the Western liberal-left. And the third is about the alarming worldwide growth of anti-Semitism.

http://www.jewcy.com/post/oneeyed_gaza

[grassfed]

1. this is a thread for freerepublic

of course, much of DU is "PEP" - Progressive Except for Palestine.



....
"Checkpoint Syndrome"
by IDF Sergeant Liran Ron Furer
http://angrywhitekid.blogs.com/weblog/files/checkpoint_syndrome.pdf

[oberliner]

3. And much of DU is "agree with Obama and the Democrats except about Israel"

It's bizarre that someone expressing opinions that are identical to those of Obama and the Democratic party platform would be told that their posts are suited to "freerepublic".

[Chulanowa]

2. That's right. It's all antisemitism

First it makes its straw man - that nobody, especially in the "western left" is accusing Hamas of war crimes - and then it charges, full throttle at the assumption that therefore accusations of such levied against Israel are based primarily on antisemitism.

It has nothing to do with Israel being a (supposedly) fully democratic western nation funded by several powerful states in its fight against the indigenes with a society (also supposedly) based on the foundation principle that human rights are an absolute must, that continues to provoke violence by it's own war crime occupations in the West Bank and repeated "peace-time" assassinations and airstrikes.

Not at all.

It also has nothing to do with the fact the other side of this coin is a population that has been brutalized both by the Israeli occupying forces and their Arab neighbors to a point of pretty much suicidal desperation reminiscent of Japanese Kamikaze and Lakota Ghost-Shirts, who are armed mostly with homemade rockets and tapped in densely-populated areas that are the frequent target of Israeli attacks, which cause hundred-to-one losses, primarily of civilians.

Nope, not that either.

It's just because we hate jews.

Just like how we hate Turks when we talk about the Armenian genocide, without mentioning the assorted crimes comitted by said Armenians. After all, espionage and tax evasion are illegal too and thus deserve equal mention.

[oberliner]

4. There's not really a lot of talk about the Armenian Genocide around here

Is there?

The conflict between Israelis and Palestinians seems to get special attention for some reason all over the world.

Even in countries which do not give any aid to Israel like the US does.

[azurnoir]

5. yes it is quite odd

how events from 93 years ago just do not get the attention that currently on going events do.

[LeftishBrit]

6. Plenty of current ones don't either

For instance, there is no 'India/Pakistan forum' or 'Sri Lanka forum' or 'Congo forum'' etc.

[azurnoir]

24. True enough but may I point out

that we also do not have "Vishnu Watch" or "Patel Project" editing wiki to appear more favorable to either India or Pakistan, and have you ever heard of a Janjaweed" website or any African country or group having websites or recruiting bloggers for their causes?

[LeftishBrit]

25. There are more Indian and Pakistani bloggers pushing for their causes than one might realize

Looking up the topic brings lots of blogs. Not all are controversial/political but some certainly are.


http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?NewsID=1024900
·
www.pakpositive.com/pakistanibloggers

http://blogs.reuters.com/india/


This is despite the fact that both the Indian and Pakistani governments (as well as the Turkish and other governments) have attempted to suppress and censor political blogging within their countries.

http://help-pakistan.com/main/

www.ft.com/cms/s/d362dbca-170c-11db-abad-0000779e2340,_i_rssPage=81cea682-52a8-11da-8d05-0...

Rather a more serious business than editing and counter-editing wikipedia entries IMO.

I think people in America and to a lesser extent Britain tend to be aware of blogs concerning Israel more than some other countries, because of already being a bit focussed on Israel, not because the others don't exist.

[azurnoir]

30. Perhaps you are "unaware" however

the 2 organizations to which I was referring do a bit more than edit wiki something I have come to find amusing, while the blogs you mention are interesting when it comes to the US none of these works quite so hard to influence policy, nor does India or Pakistan have quite the lobbying network that Israel does with in the US, which is not to say they do not have lobbyists or networks here but none as large or influential as Israels

[oberliner]

7. That was exactly my point

The poster wrote: "when we talk about the Armenian genocide"

I don't think there are a lot of people talking about the Armenian genocide.

[bemildred]

9. It does get a great deal of attention.

But all that attention is not just coming from antisemites. There are lots of posts from pro-Israeli types pointing out obscure acts of antisemitism all over the world, and there are a lot of posts from pro-Israeli "news" sources, and there is a good deal of effort put into getting the public to care about the issue from a positive, pro-Israeli point of view. The fact that that results in flame wars indicates that a.) a lot of people do care about the subject and b.) there is vehement disagreement about the subject. I'm not sure if it would be an improvement if nobody cared, and I think pro-Israeli posters should think carefully about whether they really don't want people to care about it. And it is really not intellectually honest to say you want people to care about it, but only if they agree with your point of view.

[oberliner]

10. Someone ought to do a study

Would that there were a database of all the posts on I/P and related issues, including the deleted ones, for someone to study.

What conclusions would they draw, I wonder.

[bemildred]

11. Well, I've been studying it for some time now.

And my conclusion is that people are all over the place on this subject. It's more like a continuum from loons on one side through various categories of reasonable people who somewhat disagree to loons on the other side. I can also say that I think that it is a counterproductive mistake to try to simplify it into a black-an-white you-are-with-us or-against-us issue. That sort of approach just pisses people off, and the newly pissed off people are NOT on your side.

[oberliner]

16. Do you think one side or the other has more loons?

On DU, that is.

[bemildred]

19. I think it's about even, with the loons.

In the more general category of reasonable people that somewhat disagree, I think the Palestinians have an edge, but they are the underdogs, at least they appear so, so that's not too surprising.

The DU administration on the other hand, leans somewhat the other way, but tries to be fair and consistent. Not an easy task.

So on the whole I think DU is "fair", that's one reason I like it here. You can say almost anything if you do it in an intelligent and not-too-inflammatory way, but the trolls get weeded out.

[oberliner]

20. I think that the Palestinian side has both more loons and more reasonable people

I think that on DU, the Israeli side is the underdog, and that the DU administration leans towards the Palestinian side (but I would agree that they try to be fair and consistent).

I completely agree with your final paragraph.

[bemildred]

22. Eh, OK. nt

[LeftishBrit]

26. Interesting. My view - perhaps influenced by my being a foreigner -

is that there are really three groups on DU, not two.

(1) Pro-Israel

(2) Pro-Palestinian

(3) Anti-Israel American-isolationist

The third group is less prevalent on I/P than on some other parts of DU. But these are people who are IMO anti-Israel *not* so much on pro-Palestinian grounds, but because they think that Israel has a negative influence on America; 'plunders its treasury'; 'gets America into wars'; etc. They're the ones who are ready to accuse those who disagree with them of disloyalty to America and placing their first loyalties with Israel, even of being traitors. I find them a pretty unpleasant xenophobic group, and often RW in some other respects.

I think the existence of the third group influences the composition of the other groups. At least in my case: if only groups (1) and (2) were present, I'd be right on the borderland between them, but the existence of (3) tends to push me slightly over the edge into (1) on this board.

The mirror-image of (3) are the neocon Bushie-types who use Israelis as strategic allies, or to put it bluntly pawns, in a war against Iran and the Muslim world, and regard Palestinians as expendable because they're on the wrong side in the 'culture war'. They are not much represented on DU, but of course there are plenty of them elsewhere. I don't consider them as truly pro-Israel - they are anti-Palestinian and *use* the Israelis - just as I don't consider DU's group (3) as truly pro-Palestinian.

'So on the whole I think DU is "fair", that's one reason I like it here. You can say almost anything if you do it in an intelligent and not-too-inflammatory way, but the trolls get weeded out.'

I agree!

[bemildred]

27. A reasonable point of view.

American-isolationist is actually a very old political view here, and it is often combined with xenophobia, and it can be hard to frame in the usual left-right political dichotomy. But nationalism, which is really what that is, is like that. Israelis take their own nationalism for granted, but think it is strange in US-ians. Russian nationalism was a factor in the dissolution of the USSR. I suspect similar things could happen here soon.

[Chulanowa]

12. I've sometimes entertained the thought...

Of hitting the library and the depths of the internet, maybe even making some calls to various news agencies for their stories and such, in order to put together a fully-fleshed, fact-not-opinion timeline, because I've seen so goddamn much misinformation on both sides (though perhaps it's my own bias, but I DO see way more of it from the Israel side)

Problem is, that's a shitload of work and typing, to do something for an internet message board, where it'll just get me called names, then locked because, you know, it doesn't link to an accepted outlet of the mouthpiece media.

So screw it, I'll deliver in small doses, interspersed with logic, a bit of soothsaying, and my own acerbic opinions

[oberliner]

15. Well it's good that we can talk about it

Even when there are disagreements, it's nice to have a forum where people can argue and try to share information and correct misinformation.

[LeftishBrit]

18. I agree there.

[Chulanowa]

23. It's an uphill battle

There are good places for honest and forthright discussion about the issue somewhere on the net, I'm sure. Frankly, DU isn't among their number. Moderation is good, over-moderation on an issue no one is impartial over is bad. To say nothing of fact-free content with a link being immediately preferred over fact-full content without a link. Given that western media follows western politics on the issue, that lends itself to some pretty strong bias from the get-go. :shrug:

But, something's better than nothing, and this area's better than many others I've seen.

[LeftishBrit]

13. This is true, and I don't think all the attention comes from antisemites or anything...

I think there are some countries and conflicts that are much more in the media than others - for all kinds of reasons.

I have noticed that anything on Venezuela grabs LOTS of attention and debate on DU; whereas that country is not nearly so much on people's radar in the UK.

I do find it interesting, however, that there isn't a forum on south Asia, for instance. Especially given that quite a number of my friends and students are of Indian or Pakistani descent, and one is Sri Lankan, these countries are of interest to me. And I would have thought to others. Or a China forum - given the size of and rapid changes in the country.

[LeftishBrit]

8. I think that there are many reasons why people condemn Israel's actions in Gaza

(1) They (or we, as this would include me) think these actions resulted in disproportionate suffering and were/are counterproductive and wrong. We also condemn other countries and groups whose actions result in suffering - including Hamas. Criticizing Israel doesn't mean supporting Hamas, and vice versa.

(2) They are anti-Israel due to antisemitism, or at least influenced by antisemitism.

(3) They are so fed up with the American Right and Britain's collusion with it that they have a 'mirror-image-ist' tendency to regard all American allies as a sort of axis of evil.

I think Geras is himself being somewhat blind in one eye by not considering (1) and (3) sufficiently - he rejects (1) by assuming that many people *only* criticize Israel. Some do (especially many of the pro-boycotters), but many don't.

I am familiar with Norm Geras' blog, partly because he's the husband of the writer for children and young people, Adele Geras, whose books I've found interesting. I am *extremely* ambivalent about him. OTOH, he defends secular humanism (which appeals to me!) and is also FERVENTLY anti-torture under all circumstances. OTOH, he defends the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and 'war on terror', which as you can imagine puts me strongly off. One thing I do like about his blog is his 'Normative' interviews with a wide variety of people, some of whom have quite different views from him.

[Chulanowa]

14. Especially hte pro-boycotters?

Well, given that the Palestinian Territories don't have anything to boycott, what with having no economy, that kind of stands to reason that Israel's the only one of the two catching that particular flak...

[LeftishBrit]

17. This was shorthand for saying that those who are in favour of boycotting Israel..

are often exceptionalist against Israel.

Though as a matter of fact, I would say that a lot of what's been done to Gaza (before the war) really *does* amount to a boycott and has been quite counterproductive as boycotts often are, and only served to strengthen the Palestinian Right and Hamas. There are only certain situations where boycotts can work: (1) the country has a reasonable economy to start with; (2) the country was and felt secure and in good standing with the community of nations before the boycott. (1) doesn't apply to Palestine, and (2) doesn't apply to either Israel or Palestine.

[ProgressiveMuslim]

28. A "boycott" doesn't generally end with malnourished children, does it? nt

[LeftishBrit]

32. Depends on such factors as the initial state of the economy.

The long-term economic sanctions on Iraq (more enforceable than a boycott, but the same principle) certainly resulted in many malnourished children.

[Mosby]

21. Thanks for the info re Geras

I think your #2,3 are right on but even if people are concerned that Israels actions in gaza were disproportunate that still doesn't explain the massive attention Israel gets on blogs etc. I think you mentioned sri lanka, did you hear anything in the media about the SL army bombing a hospital last week?

Ps-- posting from bberry sorry.

[Idealism]

31. If you watch Democracy Now, you hear about Sri Lanka

And the hospital bombing is mentioned.

Its a great program, you should watch it. Very international-news oriented.

www.democracynow.org

[LeftishBrit]

33. Yes, I heard about the Sri Lanka hospital - horrible

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7863538.stm


I listen a lot to BBC World Service, so I probably get more international news than I would otherwise.

[Idealism]

29. Is Jewcy an acceptable source for articles?