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Israel And The Palestinians (now with added Iran/Lebanon)


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A very interesting (long) article from the Intercept which lays out the ways in which the NYT's coverage of sexual assault on October 7th looks to have been critically compromised and very likely materially false:

The Story Behind the New York Times October 7 Exposé (theintercept.com)

On the one hand, this all feels quite moot as, as in all conflict, I've no doubt that sexual violence took place on October 7th. On the other hand, the deliberate messaging about systematic SA which this article gave a lot of the cover for has no doubt had huge propaganda value in shaping the opinions of people who will not now be reading about it's dismantling, in othering the Palestinian people and contributing to the "human animals" narrative, and provoked some of the sexual violence now being reported as carried out against people in Gaza. 

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/02/gaza-aid-airdrops-palestinian-territories-israel-uk-us
 

Quote

 

"We fully expect the third and fourth and fifth one will not look like the first and second one. We will try to learn and improve.”

Few sentences speak more volumes about the self-imposed moral universe the west has chosen to inhabit.

 

 

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https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n05/pankaj-mishra/the-shoah-after-gaza

A long but vital read here about Israel's national psyche, the role of the Holocaust and historic antisemitism in that, how it influences their treatment of Palestinians and how it governs Israel's relationship with other states and diaspora Jews.

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4 hours ago, Dunning1874 said:

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n05/pankaj-mishra/the-shoah-after-gaza

A long but vital read here about Israel's national psyche, the role of the Holocaust and historic antisemitism in that, how it influences their treatment of Palestinians and how it governs Israel's relationship with other states and diaspora Jews.

That was a very interesting read. Thanks for the link.

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This will obviously come to nothing, and Australia is far from the worst offender, but this should be applied across the board to all of Israel's backers even if only so they have an ICC referral for complicity in genocide on their CV.

https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/anthony-albanese-dismisses-icc-war-crimes-allegations-experts-weigh-in-on-the-claims/xu4kueiql

 

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The British media and political class, the journalist in this case obviously being a fine example of the incestuousness and nepotism between the two, truly is rancid. It's all a game to these people, it doesn't matter if those who aren't in the big club are slaughtered and starved, as long as the people who matter get to pat each other on the back while gossiping about how sensible and intelligent they all are.

20240305_121453.jpg.167b16083b4ef7d97a9d854dd57b2df5.jpg

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1 hour ago, Dunning1874 said:

The British media and political class, the journalist in this case obviously being a fine example of the incestuousness and nepotism between the two, truly is rancid. It's all a game to these people, it doesn't matter if those who aren't in the big club are slaughtered and starved, as long as the people who matter get to pat each other on the back while gossiping about how sensible and intelligent they all are.

20240305_121453.jpg.167b16083b4ef7d97a9d854dd57b2df5.jpg

In no just world should someone whose job is to have a column in the paper make more than minimum wage. That papers have as a rule moved away from sourcing opinion and analysis from guests and their own editors in favour of cretins like this with no knowledge of anything other than how to write "this may seem monstrous and/or stupid, but what if..." for 6 figures a year is amazing to me. Maybe it's just the legacy media version of a sort of mid-brow click/outrage bait

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2 hours ago, Dunning1874 said:

The British media and political class, the journalist in this case obviously being a fine example of the incestuousness and nepotism between the two, truly is rancid. It's all a game to these people, it doesn't matter if those who aren't in the big club are slaughtered and starved, as long as the people who matter get to pat each other on the back while gossiping about how sensible and intelligent they all are.

20240305_121453.jpg.167b16083b4ef7d97a9d854dd57b2df5.jpg

British politics is a parlour game. Kind of like just a minute but rules are toe the party line for two minutes, no "gaffes", no "u turns". Bonus points for a printable soundbite. 

Hugo would probably be rather good at it if daddy's chums hadn't swung him that cushy media gig. I often hear The News Quiz and can confirm that he's not there on merit. 

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On 03/03/2024 at 09:19, Dunning1874 said:

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n05/pankaj-mishra/the-shoah-after-gaza

A long but vital read here about Israel's national psyche, the role of the Holocaust and historic antisemitism in that, how it influences their treatment of Palestinians and how it governs Israel's relationship with other states and diaspora Jews.

A lot to digest in that.

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A bit of a pushback against the new McCarthyism in the UK, with those who've tried to hound anyone expressing Palestinian solidarity (or in some cases Muslims simply existing) out of public life seeing it backfire.

Remember the risible claims that plush octopus toys were actually an antisemitic symbol invoking Nazi propaganda about Jewish control of the planet, because Greta Thunberg had one in the background of a photo and she was consistently using her platform to draw attention to Palestine so some absurd smear to discredit her had to be constructed? There was some horrendous abuse directed at a Muslim taking part in an episode of University Challenge which aired in November, as their team had one of those toys on display as a mascot.

20240306_101113.jpg.6fcda43c1a09f091cad230e19a34d546.jpg

Curious that the three white contestants got no criticism, but the woman wearing a hijab did. Another reason she was criticised was that she was wearing black, red and green, the colours of the Palestinian flag, clearly this meant she was expressing her support for Hamas and the October 7th attack? Even ignoring the obvious flaws in the ridiculous logical fallacy that wearing anything with the colours of the Palestinian flag makes someone a Hamas supporter, she wasn't. It's an orange and pink jacket with a green pocket, she's not responsible for the BBC's lighting. Also, this episode was filmed in March.

Tory member of the House of Lords, Baroness Foster, was one of those most loudly decrying her, explicitly calling her an antisemite. Gorgianeh complained to the HOL standards committee about Foster's conduct but the complaint was dismissed. She has today had to pay damages and put out a grovelling public apology for that defamatory lie, although is still somehow managing to claim the octopus is antisemitic symbol which is obviously fucking nonsense.

Michelle Donelan has also been forced to pay damages and apologise, although having made the remarks in her capacity as a member of the government has disgracefully paid the damages out of taxpayer's money rather than her own pocket, while the supposed apology has a noticeable lack of apologising in it.

A professor and doctor appointed to an advisory group to UK Research and Innovation, a body funded by the Department of Science, Innovation & Technology which Donelan leads, were accused by her in letter she made public of sharing extremist material and in one of their cases explicitly supporting Hamas. This was obviously a lie - the evidence of her supposed support for Hamas was tweeting a Guardian article with the comment "this is disturbing". The other had described Israel's actions as genocide and apartheid.

It's clear that they're not going to stop the authoritarian crackdown on dissent and will continue to accuse anyone who dares to disagree with the their continued active participation in war crimes as an extremist, but it's good to see some sort of consequence with people standing up to them.

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19 hours ago, Dunning1874 said:

A bit of a pushback against the new McCarthyism in the UK, with those who've tried to hound anyone expressing Palestinian solidarity (or in some cases Muslims simply existing) out of public life seeing it backfire.

Remember the risible claims that plush octopus toys were actually an antisemitic symbol invoking Nazi propaganda about Jewish control of the planet, because Greta Thunberg had one in the background of a photo and she was consistently using her platform to draw attention to Palestine so some absurd smear to discredit her had to be constructed? There was some horrendous abuse directed at a Muslim taking part in an episode of University Challenge which aired in November, as their team had one of those toys on display as a mascot.

20240306_101113.jpg.6fcda43c1a09f091cad230e19a34d546.jpg

Curious that the three white contestants got no criticism, but the woman wearing a hijab did. Another reason she was criticised was that she was wearing black, red and green, the colours of the Palestinian flag, clearly this meant she was expressing her support for Hamas and the October 7th attack? Even ignoring the obvious flaws in the ridiculous logical fallacy that wearing anything with the colours of the Palestinian flag makes someone a Hamas supporter, she wasn't. It's an orange and pink jacket with a green pocket, she's not responsible for the BBC's lighting. Also, this episode was filmed in March.

Tory member of the House of Lords, Baroness Foster, was one of those most loudly decrying her, explicitly calling her an antisemite. Gorgianeh complained to the HOL standards committee about Foster's conduct but the complaint was dismissed. She has today had to pay damages and put out a grovelling public apology for that defamatory lie, although is still somehow managing to claim the octopus is antisemitic symbol which is obviously fucking nonsense.

Michelle Donelan has also been forced to pay damages and apologise, although having made the remarks in her capacity as a member of the government has disgracefully paid the damages out of taxpayer's money rather than her own pocket, while the supposed apology has a noticeable lack of apologising in it.

A professor and doctor appointed to an advisory group to UK Research and Innovation, a body funded by the Department of Science, Innovation & Technology which Donelan leads, were accused by her in letter she made public of sharing extremist material and in one of their cases explicitly supporting Hamas. This was obviously a lie - the evidence of her supposed support for Hamas was tweeting a Guardian article with the comment "this is disturbing". The other had described Israel's actions as genocide and apartheid.

It's clear that they're not going to stop the authoritarian crackdown on dissent and will continue to accuse anyone who dares to disagree with the their continued active participation in war crimes as an extremist, but it's good to see some sort of consequence with people standing up to them.

I'm surprised the protesters at Paul Sweeney's surgery haven’t taken similar action as well after his lies.

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On 06/03/2024 at 10:24, Freedom Farter said:

I’ve avoided this thread for some time now.

The ongoing genocide in Gaza actively supported by both our government and our government in waiting is beyond awful.

There have been worse atrocities in my lifetime but this is one where we are active and open participants.  Nothing is happening behind closed doors, it’s there for everyone to see, yet our elected representatives offer only mealy mouthed platitudes.

 

Edited by Granny Danger
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UNRWA staff were abducted by the IDF and waterboarded, beaten and had their families threatened so that they would falsely claim other UNRWA staff were affiliated with Hamas:

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/unrwa-report-says-israel-coerced-some-agency-employees-falsely-admit-hamas-links-2024-03-08/

These false "confessions" obtained via torture were then used by Israel to convince their allied nations to suspend UNRWA funding, exacerbating the famine Gazans are now suffering from.

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