Criticizing Israel is not antisemitism, and nobody is arguing that.
Holding Israel to a double standard or denying Jews the right to self-determination is however broadly considered antisemitism[0][1]. "Today, it is used by over 1,000 other governments, universities, NGOs, and other key institutions, demonstrating a clear international consensus."[2]
> Criticizing Israel is not antisemitism, and nobody is arguing that.
Literally everybody on the far right yells antisemitism if you say that Israel is committing genocide. How you can say this isn't so, I'm not sure, but I applaud your ability to cover your eyes and ears, this news cycle is exhausting.
It is a fact that they are committing genocide. Whether or not there are antisemites in the world that agree with that fact does not change that it is a fact. It is what it is. Own it.
Colonialism is brutal and ugly, and we're seeing it broadcast in HD at all hours of all days. Saying that other countries (the USA, UK, Germany, etc, the list goes on) got to do colonialism and ethnic cleansing does not make it acceptable.
Now, you can just come out and say "I believe we should exterminate the Palestinians because we want their land" but nobody seems to have the balls to say that, even though it is absolutely the intent. So instead there's this nation state level misinformation campaign to try to undermine, intimidate, and suppress any dissent from university students to the ICC, which is frankly, exhausting.
Declaring something a "fact" without presenting evidence doesn't make it true. If we're talking about genocide, a clear, deliberate mass extermination campaign is usually what's meant, something akin to what the Jewish people experienced during the Holocaust.
You claim that Israel has an intent to wipe out Palestinians and steal their land. But if that was truly their aim, why hasn't it happened already? Israel has the military capacity to wipe out Gaza or any other area, but they haven't. The absence of full-scale destruction calls into question the assertion of genocidal intent.
In contrast, Palestinian factions like Hamas have repeatedly expressed their goal of annihilating Israel and its Jewish population. They acted on this intent with the October 7th attacks, promising more violence to come. They’ve openly stated their goal of driving Jews "into the sea", that’s genocidal intent, not from Israel, but from groups like Hamas.
So, if we're talking about genocide, where’s the evidence of Israel carrying out systematic, widespread destruction of Palestinians? On the other hand, if we look at Palestinian actions, the genocide you accuse Israel of seems to mirror the actions and rhetoric of those who seek Israel’s complete destruction.
Accusations like these are heavy and need more than just rhetoric. Without solid evidence, they become a diversion, not a reasoned argument.
Airstrikes on hospitals is convincing to me. Next you will tell me that these reports can't be trusted.
Quit the mental gymnastics and just say you're cool with slaughter of people that were unlucky enough to be born into Gaza and the West Bank. Just say it. Cut the bullshit.
Great, so we're in agreement: Gaza has forfeited its right to statehood after committing the October 7th massacre, literally aimed at destroying Israel. Quoting the Hamas spokesman Ghazi Hamad: "Hamas is prepared to repeat the October 7 Al-Aqsa Flood Operation time and again until Israel is annihilated."
I won't support the idea that Hamas has a right to govern Gaza, no. But I think that ideally a single secular pluralistic state would encompass current Israel and the Palestinian territories, and I hope the people who live there would one day assent to such a peaceful coexistence.
Well, partial good news, then: we have a secular, pluralistic state that covers at least most of that territory, namely the State of Israel, and the Jews, Christians Muslims and Druze living there assent to peaceful coexistence.
And entirely different matter is the fate of the people who are not citizens of the state of Israel. Where do you hope for them to live (and why)? Surely not in the pluralistic state we just talked about, since peaceful coexistence is far from a mainstream viewpoint among that population, to put it mildly.
A relevant Ask Project video from recent memory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Grq1Ro9vlyU - note that none of the Palestinians consent to living peacefully with the Jews in one state.
Well, it depends on why you're protesting against Israel.
If you're supporting the dismantlement of the only Jewish state, like Hamas is, then you are in a precarious situation: why do you argue uniquely against Jewish self-determination?
Do you routinely protest in support of tear down all nations without prejudice, or just focus your antinationalism on the one liberal, democratic Jewish state? If so, why do you feel that only the Jews lack the right to defend themselves as a nation? Is it because you prefer to see the Jews defenseless against harassment and attempts at their genocide?
The protests against Israel are by and large about their treatment of the Palestinians. I'm not close enough to know how many are really advocating for dismantling the state. I'm sure some people do believe Israel is "invalid" since it was created by imperial whim and displacement of the local Arabs. Of course if you take that stance then it's hard to justify the existence of many other nations, the US included. Israel just happens to be more recent and the world has different standards now.
But anyway, the answer to your question is majorly complicated by the fact that many of the most anti-Zionist people are... Orthodox Jews. They seem to have well articulated answers to your questions that can be found online.
If the protests about Israel were largely about their treatment of Palestinians, why did the world erupt in protest against Israel, largely in unison, mere hours after they were invaded by Hamas terrorists on October 7th?
On October 8th, 2023 in Times Square while the blood was still fresh on the ground from the massacres in Israel, protesters chanted "Long live the intifada" and "Smash the settler Zionist state". Visibly Jewish people were followed and had "Hamas should have killed more of you" shouted at them. All only hours after the invasion.
Harvard's Palestine Solidarity Committee (in)famously issued a memorandum right after the attack "hold[ing] the Israeli regime entirely responsible for allunfolding violence."
On October 9th at the Sydney Opera House, hundreds of protesters chanted "F** the Jews" (and allegedly "Gas the Jews").
In Grand Central on October 9th, protestors marched for the "resistance" (i.e. Hamas) and "right of return" (i.e. banishment of Jews from Israel).
All of this happened weeks before the ground invasion in Gaza began on October 27th. Two days later, dozens of travelers were injured as hundreds of protesters stormed a flight from Tel Aviv landing in Dagestan, Russia, as they sought to harrass "Jewish refugees" (i.e. Israelis). Of course, the global antisemitism only continued to climb, with 10,000 incidents recorded in the 11 months following 10/7.
Even this week, a pro-Hamas group organized a shutdown of Grand Central Terminal, while in the real Gaza, protests are sweeping the strip _against_ Hamas. If the mission is solidarity with Gazans, why not protest in favor of the issue that Gazans themselves are risking their lives to advocate for: the removal of Hamas?
> many of the most anti-Zionist people are... Orthodox Jew
There's like 6 of them, and they are called Neturei Karta. The other several million Orthodox Jews do not share their views.
On top of that they are only against having a specifically Jewish government (they refuse to vote), but they do NOT agree with not allowing Jews to live in Israel.
There are many possible criticisms of Israel that don't have anything to do with Jewish self-determination, though... or is the idea that because it's the only Jewish state they get a free pass on all their conduct? I'm not following the logic.
There are many legitimate possible criticisms of the state of Israel, and protesting around those criticisms is a frequent occurrence within Israel.
But how many protests have you seen outside of Israel that were debating a narrow Israel domestic policy issue, versus calling into question the legitimacy of the "Zionist entity"?
There is no free pass only a viewing through the very real lense that “the Jews” has been replaced with “Israel” or “the Israeli lobby,” by racist groups.
The Columbia protests were plainly and unabashedly pro-Hamas, e.g. the chant "يا حماس يا حبيب اضرب اضرب تل ابيب" (Oh Hamas, oh beloved, strike strike Tel Aviv), or the protestors exclaiming "We are Hamas", or any of the other explicit pro-Hamas statements that have been caught on camera.
But I'm not sure what other pro-Palestinian protests have occurred since 2023 other than pro-Hamas protests. Have there been any explicitly pro-Palestinian protests that have advocated against Hamas, or for any other political entity?
If you accept the mainstream Palestinian viewpoint, i.e. the one that endorses Hamas and the Simchat Torah massacre, there is no such thing as too many, because every Palestinian death furthers the jihadist cause of demonizing Israel.
If you accept the mainstream Israeli viewpoint, all of these deaths were unnecessary because they directly resulted from an unprovoked onslaught against innocent civilians, and all of the casualties could have been avoided but for the Gazan misadventure of October 7th.
I'm not sure which camp GP subscribes to, however.
1. Hamas bears the moral responsibility for all of the suffering in the war they started on October 7th, and the Palestinian people bear the moral responsibility of electing and supporting them (and participating in the invasion, and not returning the hostages).
3. How can you argue that Gaza has been starved and ethnically cleansed when the population of the Gaza strip has increased since the start of the war?
"The antisemite does not accuse the Jew of stealing because he thinks he stole something. He does it because he enjoys watching the Jew turn out his pockets to prove his innocence."
Although I laud your unassailable argument highlighting yet another instance of double standards against Jews, ultimately there is little upside in engaging with the "no, no, technically there is a difference between anti-Zionism and antisemitism" crowd. I am sad that Hacker News is rife with this kind of bigotry, but I don't see the tide of this battle turning anytime soon.
In case, dear reader, you are one of the intellectually curious ones who holds the opposing viewpoint, ask yourself why you demand that only the Jews lack the right to self determination?
Given that the Jews were forcibly expelled from their homeland by the Romans, by definition, any Jewish self-determination would need to take place in a land that is at least partially[0] already inhabited. You now have two choices:
1. Deny Jews the right to self-determination altogether, continuing the dispossession of an actively persecuted people, indeed, the same one that was about to face the Holocaust in Europe, thereby punishing them for their own historical victimization, or
2. Acknowledge the legitimacy of Jewish self-determination, even if it takes root in their historical homeland and entails negotiating with and sharing the land with other peoples, thereby accepting that historical justice often requires grappling with imperfect realities, and that two national claims can coexist without one invalidating the other.
Or are you arguing that self-determination only applies to groups of people who haven't been exiled from their homeland (i.e. the people that need self determination the least)?
[0] Before Zionism, the population of Mandatory Palestine was 98% smaller than the same region today. Even the Arab population has increased 26-fold. So, yes, technically it was inhabited, but dramatically less developed. And even then, Jerusalem was 60% Jewish.
> Given that the Jews were forcibly expelled from their homeland by the Romans
2000 years ago.
You're saying that events from millennia in the past mean that the Palestinians should have had to cede the land they lived on to a group of outsiders from Europe.
People can make of that what they may (I think it's ridiculous), but you at least have to admit that it completely invalidates your argument that Zionism is just like any other demand for self-determination. We're talking about a demand for other people's land, based on appeals to events from thousands of years ago.
You're changing the topic. Nobody is talking about ceding land, we're talking about re-establishing a nation in the historic homeland of the Jewish people. And besides, no Zionist demanded land or induced anyone to cede their land prior to 1947 anyway, since all Zionist land acquisition was through voluntary purchases and legal land transfers.
So are you arguing that the Jews are not a people that merit self determination? Or are you saying that because they were expelled from their homeland so long ago, they forfeited the legitimate claim to self determination?
> Nobody is talking about ceding land, we're talking about re-establishing a nation in the historic homeland of the Jewish people
You're saying the same thing with different words. In order to "re-establish" that nation, they had to take over control of Palestine, against the will of the people who actually lived there.
> no Zionist demanded land or induced anyone to cede their land prior to 1947 anyway
That's not true at all. The entire point of Zionism was to take over political control of Palestine and found a Jewish state there. The mainstream Zionist movement wanted all of Palestine, and the radical right wing of Zionism (the "Revisionists," who eventually became Likud, Netanyahu's party) even wanted what is now Jordan.
> all Zionist land acquisition was through voluntary purchases and legal land transfers
That's formally correct before 1947, but the goal was to take over all of Palestine. The leadership of the Jewish Agency (the Zionist quasi-government in British-run Palestine until early 1948) knew that ultimately, it would come down to war with the Arabs, and they prepared for it. They were also very interested in forced "population transfer" (which today would be called "ethnic cleansing"), which they hoped the major powers would agree to.
Even the land purchases were extremely predatory. Imagine the worst aspects of gentrification, but at the scale of a country and enacted for explicitly racist reasons. The Zionists bought up land from landlords who didn't even live in Palestine, and then forcibly removed the Palestinian farmers who lived on the land.
Even so, they never purchased more than about 6% of Palestine, before they forcibly took most of the rest in 1947-48.
> So are you arguing that the Jews are not a people that merit self determination?
First, the obvious question, as I've said, is "where?" Is easy and relatively harmless to say in the abstract that "this group of people is a nation and deserves self-determination." But when you start laying claims to other people's lands, that becomes a problem.
I don't really want to get into who is "a people," but I'll just point out that what you're saying implies that American Jews are just Israelis who happen to live abroad. I think that's incredibly wrong. Jews belong to many different nationalities.
It sounds like you're against the idea of national self determination altogether. Can you think of an example of a successful assertion of the right to self determinism which didn't involve a national entity asserting sovereignty over a body of land populated by a diverse group of people?
As we have already established, the population in the land of the historical mandate has exploded, including a manifold increase of Arabs (living peacefully within the borders of modern Israel as equal citizens, I might add), so clearly it is possible to accommodate this diverse population in a Jewish state.
Are you against all national self determination? Or is there some threshold of homogeneous concentration of one people after which it becomes legitimate? If the Zionist pioneers had managed to achieve a 99% majority of Jewish population in Palestine through legal immigration before asserting sovereignty, would that pass your test?
Or would you just prefer to see the European Jewry perish in toto under the Holocaust and Eastern European pogroms?
> If the Zionist pioneers had managed to achieve a 99% majority of Jewish population in Palestine through legal immigration before asserting sovereignty, would that pass your test?
The whole enterprise was illegitimate, because it was carried out against the will of the population of Palestine. The population did not want a foreign group of people to come in, settle the land and take over. The British colonial rulers forced Zionism on the Palestinian population undemocratically.
You keep on appealing to self-determination, but you completely ignore the Palestinians' right to self-determination on the land they had inhabited for centuries.
> Or would you just prefer to see the European Jewry perish in toto under the Holocaust and Eastern European pogroms?
The way to avert the Holocaust would have been to prevent the rise of fascism in Europe. The vast majority of Jews were anti-Zionist, and did not want to leave their home countries. The idea that Polish Jews would have all left Poland for the Middle East before WWII is just fanciful. Only a small percentage of them wanted to pack up and go to Palestine, a far-away place they knew nothing about.
This isn't a serious argument. You want the Jews to have self determination if and only if they can conjure into existence a magical fairy land free of compromise or can will into existence powers like militarily defeating the Nazis despite lacking even a basic police force.
> Only a small percentage of them wanted to pack up and go to Palestine, a far-away place they knew nothing about.
And pray tell, what happened to the ones who stayed?
> You want the Jews to have self determination if and only if they can conjure into existence a magical fairy land free of compromise
I think it's much more serious than arguing that they had the right to take over land already inhabited by another group of people, because of events from 2000 years ago. It just doesn't seem to occur to you that the Palestinians also have rights, and shouldn't have been forced to give up their land.
> or can will into existence powers like militarily defeating the Nazis despite lacking even a basic police force.
You're supposing that Jews would have left Europe en masse for Palestine. They wouldn't have. Most Jews before WWII did not accept Zionism. For example, in Poland, the dominant Jewish political movement was the Jewish Labour Bund, which was hostile to Zionism and which strove for Jewish civil rights inside the Polish Republic. In the real world, the only way the Jews of Europe could have been saved would have been by preventing the rise of fascism.
To get back to your original point, you still haven't acknowledged that Zionism was fundamentally different from other movements for self-determination. It was a movement for self-determination on land that the group in question did not inhabit, and which an entirely different group of people already inhabited. When Zionism succeeded, it created a massive refugee population (the previous inhabitants of the land the Zionists wanted for their own "self-determination") and sparked a conflict that has been going on for nearly a century now.
No, you're dodging the point. You're basically saying Jews deserved self-determination only if they could pull off the impossible: either magically prevent fascism, or create a homeland without upsetting anyone. That's not how history works. Zionism wasn't a luxury ideology, it was a response to existential threat. Jews didn't have the option to stay in Europe: Europe made that brutally clear. And yes, the land was inhabited, but so what? Every nationalist movement has had to contend with messy realities. The alternative you're proposing amounts to telling the Jews: stay stateless, stay vulnerable, or wait for miracles. That's not a serious moral position; at best it's an abdication, at worst a double standard against the Jews (i.e. antisemitism).
Actually, I've never said that Jews deserved self-determination in a separate country specifically created for Jews. Jews lived (and still live today) in many countries. They deserve equal rights in their home countries.
> The alternative you're proposing amounts to telling the Jews: stay stateless, stay vulnerable
Jews were not stateless. They were Polish, German, French, Russian, English, American, etc. You mean to say that there was no Jewish state, which is something entirely different from being stateless. American Jews today, for example, are "stateless" by your loose terminology, but arguably have more rights than and are safer than Israeli Jews.
> Jews didn't have the option to stay in Europe: Europe made that brutally clear.
Without the rise of Hitler, Jews would have been able to remain in Europe. The rise of fascism and WWII were a catastrophe for civilization, which could have been averted.
> magically prevent fascism
There's nothing magic about it. For example, if the Social Democrats and Communists had coordinated against fascism, they might have been able to prevent Hilter's rise. If France and Britain had decided to defend Czechoslovakia in 1938 or prevent the remilitarization of the Rhineland in 1936, there may very well have been no WWII and no Holocaust. However, one thing I can tell you for certain is that the chance that most Jews would have decided to move to the Middle East is basically zero. They weren't Zionists and didn't want to leave their home countries.
> Every nationalist movement has had to contend with messy realities.
You're hiding a lot behind that phrase, "messy realities."
I have yet to see you acknowledge the Palestinians and their rights in any way. You're asserting the right of Jews to take over control of Palestine, depriving the Palestinians not only of the right of self-determination, but taking their land and expelling them. You've now justified this in two completely different ways: first by an appeal to ancient history, and then by an appeal to the Holocaust.
> That's not a serious moral position; at best it's an abdication, at worst a double standard against the Jews (i.e. antisemitism).
I was wondering how long it would take you to explicity come out and start accusing me of antisemitism. But if you really want to choose the right insult, you should call me a "self-hating Jew."
Let me just summarize your position: European Jews, facing extermination, should have tried harder to stop Hitler, trusted the same governments that sold them out, stayed put in countries that were turning into slaughterhouses and politely avoided seeking refuge in the only place in the world that would take them just because it might offend your sensibilities. And now, after a few of them survived the industrial attempt to wipe them out, you want to tell them they were wrong to have escaped.
You dress up your objection to Zionism behind a pseudomoralistic veneer of Palestinian rights, but your real position is that Jewish survival was a problem because it confuses your personal narrative of Palestinian nationalism. That’s not a serious moral argument. That’s historical cruelty crudely disguised as moral purity.
And no, I never insulted you, but the position that European Jews should have just tried harder against the Nazis is a laughably sadistic viewpoint regardless of who holds it.
There is a difference between anti-Zionism and antisemitism. The former is condemning a land-grab because of some 2000 year old claim. The latter is hating Jews because they are Jews. There is a world of difference there.
The forefathers of everyone in Europe, with very few exceptions, occupied a different strip of land 2000 years ago and were driven out by romans, goths, huns, germans or whomever. Most pieces of land changed hands a dozen times or more. Should we now rearrange all the maps and revert to our 2000 year old original national lands and identities? Why 2000 years, why not 500, 5000 or 10000? The maps looked different in those periods as well.
Set aside the 2000 year old history for a moment. Given that the Jews were a persecuted minority across Europe - and indeed faced the a campaign of extermination far worse than early Zionists feared - one can see the moral necessity for their self determination.
Anti-Zionism is antisemitic because it declares that no, it is preferable for Jews to continue to face the Holocaust and other attempts at their genocide than to concede their right to self defense as a people.
There are different things here that you are glossing over and conflating.
Yes, there is a moral right and necessity for self-determination and self-defense for the Jews after the Holocaust. But there is no necessity or justification for that to happen in Palestine, especially when this means displacing and slaughtering the Palestinians who have lived there for quite a few centuries. And indeed Palestinians do have a moral right of self-determination and self-defense as well. So the essence of Zionism, which is the idea of taking over Palestine for a Jewish state, is deeply immoral because of that. And this immorality doesn't simply disappear because of the wrongs that were done to the Jews by non-Palestinians. And because of that, anti-Zionism is a moral imperative, because it aims to correct an immorality. Whereas antisemitism is something completely different.
> Anti-Zionism is antisemitic because it declares that no, it is preferable for Jews to continue to face the Holocaust and other attempts at their genocide than to concede their right to self defense as a people.
Which means that you think the only possible way to avoid a genocide of Jews and for Jews to defend themselves is to settle in Palestine? Nothing else would have done? Given that there were quite a few wars around the establishment of Israel which could have very well wiped Israel off the map that is quite a bold statement.
I rather think this idea of self-defense and self-determination of the Jewish people being only possible in Israel/Palestine is a religiously derived idea, nothing that has any basis in political and military facts or morals. It was just a "wouldn't it be nice to do this in Gods Promised Land?" kind of thing, current inhabitants be damned...
Got it, so you only specifically object to the Jews settling in their ancestral homeland which they immigrated to legally and was 98% less populated than today, because the Nazi-aligned mufti of Jerusalem objected to their presence.
Care to suggest a superior choice of venue for Jewish sovereignty where the Jews had a better claim to the land, and the locals were prepared to welcome their national project?
Although marginally better traffic might be a side effect of congestion pricing, its primary effect is a wealth transfer from lower- and middle-class residents of Manhattan, who must buy goods locally at higher prices, to MTA contractors and their labor unions, who already make construction on the New York subway far and away the most expensive in the world.
Where is the congestion pricing tracker that measures the higher cost of groceries to working-class lower Manhattan residents?
Not only are delivery vehicles levied an additional toll of up to $32.40 under congestion pricing, but every employee, service provider and vendor who travels by car is also assessed the fee.
I don't even understand the scenario you're talking about now -- are you referring to a delivery driver that would be driving their personal vehicle to work in the congestion zone? And then getting on a delivery truck, which would then need to exit the congestion zone and re-enter in order to itself be charged a fee?
How many people do you think the scenario above applies to, in the real world?
The article talks about his a speech he made in Paris in March of 2023 in which he calls Palestinians a made-up people. The podium he is speaking from features a map of Israel that includes Jordanian and Syrian territory. Israel is literally invading and annexing Syrian territory (which the media is playing down as 'buffer zones'
Because to (imo) Israel's great shame, its current finance minister is a right-wing extremist with very little support among the electorate, but unfortunately a very elevated position in the government because of Netanyahu's political necessities.
His view doesn't come close to representing the majority Israeli view; I'm fairly certain that in most surveys these days he gets literally 0 seats in the Israeli Knesset.
It's not accurate to say that his views are not represented by mainstream Israeli citizens. Most Israelis think the attack on Gaza has either been justified or not gone far enough! Israeli leadership very much represents the views of the majority in Israel (and Zionists outside of Israel).
When he says "Surveys today show a majority of Israelis wanting a ceasefire-for-hostages deal" he is right. But Netanyahu isn't likely to allow it to happen unless forced by an outside party.
When one is close to a hostage deal Netanyahu does something to torpedo it, like this recent statement of his:
The alleged patch suggests that there is some Israeli ambition to conquer all of the Levant. There is no such Israeli settler movement.
As far as Lebanon, there is no mainstream support whatsoever to settle north of the Blue Line. The article you linked describes the idea as "far-right". I would invite you to talk to an Israeli and ask them what they think about Israel annexing Lebanon.
Gaza is entirely different. There was a centuries-old Jewish presence in Gaza until 1929, when the Jews were ethnically cleansed by an Arab pogrom. That same Jewish-owned land was resettled again in 1946, but the Egyptians ethnically cleansed Gaza again in 1948, and kept Gaza Judenrein until 1967. Israel decided to pull all Jews out of Gaza again in a bid for peace in 2005, but of course we all know how that turned out.
It is an ideology that is gaining popularity in Israel though. I am regurgitating what Israel's own Finance minister is saying.
"In an interview for the documentary, In Israel: Ministers of Chaos, produced by European public service channel, Arte, [Israel's Finance Minister Bezalel] Smotrich claimed that Israel would expand “little by little” and eventually encompass all Palestinian territories as well as Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia."
I have little desire to defend Smotrich (nor would Israelis, as his extremist party is currently polling at ~3% support), but even he wouldn't dare claim support for something as far-flung as the alleged "Greater Israel" ideology.
On the contrary, after Smotrich was merely perceived to lend support for expansionism, having spoken at a conference behind a graphic reminiscent of the Irgun's emblem depicting the entire Mandate for Palestine, it triggered a minor diplomatic incident, and the Israeli government immediately apologized to Jordan and clarified that Israel is committed to maintaining its peace agreement with Jordan.
But all of this is a smokescreen: Israel is a democracy desperately suing for peace with its neighbors, and at no point in history has initiated a war to expand its borders (or for any other purpose). There is no popular support for attacking or invading Israel's neighbors within the country, and there has never been such a policy in the country's history.
The 1956 Sinai campaign is a counter example of how opportunism has always trumped any desire for peace. If it weren't for Eisenhower, they'd had gotten away with it as well.
The current Syria campaign is another counter example. Look at how they have systematically captured all water resources East of the Golan heights. Whoever is in charge is suing for expansion, not peace.
> at no point in history has initiated a war to expand its borders (or for any other purpose)
Israel started the Six Day War claiming that the closing of straits was a grounds for war, this justifying their first strike, but they have had Gaza under siege and blockade for years, and don't consider it a grounds for war when they do it to others. Just one small point
You can continue to say it is far flung or a conspiracy but apparently Israeli newspapers disagree with you. Honestly who am I to believe? Random anonymous commenter on hacker news or many articles in Israeli newspapers written by journalists? I’ll go with Israeli newspapers and real journalists.
Israel is a democracy desperately suing for peace with its neighbors, and at no point in history has initiated a war to expand its borders (or for any other purpose).
'56, '67 and '82 were all unambiguously started by Israel.
It is also currently engaged in an effort, which it initiated on December 9th, to expand its illegally annexed territorial holdings in Syria as we speak.
Up front, I am a fervent Zionist, with just a personal musing:
Accumulation of many discussions post 10/7 made me reevaluate how I think, and thus talk about, the greater Israeli political factors.
It's unconvincing when framed in terms of more rabid politicians with little popular support. At the end of the day, people correctly perceive that this isn't a temporary political situation, even when they don't know a Smotrich from a Smeagol.
If they do, it's unconvincing because these people are the government, and hold the levers of power to implement the vision regardless of what percentage of voters back it up specifically. To wit, Ben-Gvir proudly announcing new settlements in Golan Heights.
I ended up downgrading my chunky Supermicro server to a cheap Chinese AOOSTAR with an Intel N100 for $199[0], and slapped in an NVMe drive and extra RAM. Since I only need 8-9TB of storage, a zpool mirror worked perfectly for my use case. The build quality is mediocre but the product is more than adequate for my home NAS use case.
Holding Israel to a double standard or denying Jews the right to self-determination is however broadly considered antisemitism[0][1]. "Today, it is used by over 1,000 other governments, universities, NGOs, and other key institutions, demonstrating a clear international consensus."[2]
[0] https://holocaustremembrance.com/resources/working-definitio... [1] https://www.ajc.org/use-of-the-working-definition-in-the-us [2] https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounder/about-ihra-workin...