Salt n Vinegar Posted February 22 Share Posted February 22 8 minutes ago, DiegoDiego said: The Israeli economy contracted at an annualised 19.4% last quarter. Mainly down to calling up 300,000 reservists, evacuating 180,000 Israelis from border areas and restricting travel for West Bank Palestinians who work in the construction industry. Somebody is going to make a fortune in the rebuilding of Gaza. Something tells me it won't be the Palestinians. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zen Archer (Raconteur) Posted February 23 Share Posted February 23 Off you fucking go then. Israel's Eurovision entry under scrutiny over alleged reference to Hamas - BBC News 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Freedom Farter Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 (edited) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-immolation_of_Aaron_Bushnell That wikipedia link is worth clicking on for the photo alone. Its a striking image of Bushnell in his military fatigues on fire shortly before he died. Political stunts or protests need to have a strategic goal or else they're really just an exercise in self-expression. I think Bushnell's suicide by self-immolation here will definitely have some efficacy to it. However, it's not going to be like Mohamed Bouazizi, the Tunisian whose self-immolation kicked off the Tunisian Revolution in 2011. Americans have a very distant relationship with their own democracy. They've been conditioned to think their difficulties are nothing to do with government, indeed Reagan's "government is not the solution" mantra is still widely-believed. So if Americans don't scrutinise their state regarding their own suffering its going to be very hard to get them to scrutinise their state for the suffering of foreigners. This is why the foreign policy of the two US political parties is effectively the same, because most Americans are disengaged and demand nothing. So Bushnell's act here isn't going to inspire any kind of uprising in support of his cause. Yet it is going to become a potent symbol among the Americans who already cared. That photo from the Wikipedia page now won't go away. What Bushnell did will become another straw on the camel's back, with Biden being the camel in this metaphor. The amount of straws now piling up will surely break Biden's back soon. Edited February 27 by Freedom Farter 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
welshbairn Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 Quote A police officer approached the scene, aiming a gun at Bushnell off-camera and ordered him to "get on the ground" multiple times, while another officer yells "I don't need guns, I need fire extinguishers". 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sergeant Wilson Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 49 minutes ago, Freedom Farter said: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-immolation_of_Aaron_Bushnell That wikipedia link is worth clicking on for the photo alone. Its a striking image of Bushnell in his military fatigues on fire shortly before he died. Political stunts or protests need to have a strategic goal or else they're really just an exercise in self-expression. I think Bushnell's suicide by self-immolation here will definitely have some efficacy to it. However, it's not going to be like Mohamed Bouazizi, the Tunisian whose self-immolation kicked off the Tunisian Revolution in 2011. Americans have a very distant relationship with their own democracy. They've been conditioned to think their difficulties are nothing to do with government, indeed Reagan's "government is not the solution" mantra is still widely-believed. So if Americans don't scrutinise their state regarding their own suffering its going to be very hard to get them to scrutinise their state for the suffering of foreigners. This is why the foreign policy of the two US political parties is effectively the same, because most Americans are disengaged and demand nothing. So Bushnell's act here isn't going to inspire any kind of uprising in support of his cause. Yet it is going to become a potent symbol among the Americans who already cared. That photo from the Wikipedia page now won't go away. What Bushnell did will become another straw on the camel's back, with Biden being the camel in this metaphor. The amount of straws now piling up will surely break Biden's back soon. Really? I think the Israelis will be more worried about the stains on the pavement. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Freedom Farter Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 (edited) US liberal media reaction to this has been as expected. MSNBC's coverage reminded me of Russian media's coverage of Navalny's death. A quick mention, no analysis, move on immediately. The Washington Post went for a bit more focus. However, they profiled Bushnell like they do terrorists. They listed his "normal" characteristics, such as being a Lord of the Rings fan, to then draw a contrast with his abnormal and extreme political belief of being against genocide. Edit: CNN were an exception (https://twitter.com/JoshuaPHilll/status/1762206067675861116). Credit to them for that. Edited February 27 by Freedom Farter 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
itzdrk Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 1 hour ago, welshbairn said: If you don't stop being on fire, sir, I will be left with no choice but to shoot you. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oneteaminglasgow Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 RIP Aaron Bushnell. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
D Angelo Barksdale Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
D Angelo Barksdale Posted February 29 Share Posted February 29 'Chaotic incident' 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
die hard doonhamer Posted February 29 Share Posted February 29 Another day, another Israeli war crime. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thane of Cawdor Posted February 29 Share Posted February 29 (edited) Decent commentary on Gaza by the much-derided Owen Jones. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/feb/29/britain-israel-war-palestinians-gaza Edited February 29 by Thane of Cawdor Ineptitude 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GHF-23 Posted March 1 Share Posted March 1 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. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vikingTON Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 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. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dunning1874 Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 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. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RH33 Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 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. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bully Wee Villa Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 On 23/02/2024 at 10:31, Zen Archer (Raconteur) said: Off you fucking go then. Israel's Eurovision entry under scrutiny over alleged reference to Hamas - BBC News Israel have shat it. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-agrees-revise-eurovision-song-lyrics-that-evoked-hamas-attack-2024-03-03/ 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zetterlund Posted March 5 Share Posted March 5 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 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dunning1874 Posted March 5 Share Posted March 5 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. 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GHF-23 Posted March 5 Share Posted March 5 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. 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 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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