Israeli officials are facing backlash after years of Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu quietly allowing Hamas to remain in power.
But reporting in the New York Times has revealed that Netanyahu’s government was more hands-on about helping Hamas: they helped a Qatari diplomat bring suitcases of cash into Gaza, indirectly boosting the militant organization, according to the report.
The calculus — the Times reported on Sunday, citing Israeli officials, Netanyahu’s critics, and the man’s own reported statements — was to keep Hamas strong enough to counteract the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, allowing Netanyahu to avoid a two-state peace solution and keep both sides weak.
Israeli security officials got it wrong; they didn’t think Hamas was capable, or even interested, in launching a large attack against the Jewish state.
got it wrong
No? No they got exactly what they wanted. They’ll be able to annex all of Gaza and eventually the west bank.
They sacrificed their people to accomplish their colonist goals.The plan went swimmingly.
Correct, which is exactly the same thing the Zionist Federation of Germany did during WWII. They sold out their own people in order to keep much of their assets while beginning the process of annexing British Mandatory Palestine.
Make no mistake, these same Zionists went on to form Lehi, among other terrorist/militant organizations that share a direct link to modern day Likud. Every policy the modern right wing Israeli government has employed they borrowed directly from the Third Reich’s playbook.
They are literally genocidal, ethno-supremacist, crypto-fascist psycopaths. In no way is that hyperbole. They are essentially Israeli Nazi’s.
Gonna look into this myself later, but I hope you’re lying. That would be some fucked up shit
Go read that Wikipedia information I linked. This isn’t some rabbit hole conspiracy theory. There were multiple attempts by Zionist militant groups (including Lehi) to actively align with Nazi Germany against Britain during WWII. The context is more nuanced than what I am going to be able to explain in a comment here, but I encourage you to research the inter-war period of British Mandatory Palestine that lead up to the modern Israeli state.
Reading though it now and you’re pretty spot on. Obviously there’s a lot more nuance, but seeking an alliance with literal Nazis isn’t a good look.
Btw, your link to Lehi is broken.
Do you mind pointing out where “the Zionist Federation of Germany sold out their own people to keep their assets” ?
Regarding the nuance it’s not unimportant that Lehi was an offshoot of an offshoot and certainly not representative for the entire Yishuv. They were sentenced for their actions (but later pardonned).
In '40-'42 no on knew who was going to come out victorious, so different factions were betting either on both horses. The mufti of Jerusalem, for example, was going all in for the nazi’s. And a lot of Arab nationalists actually preferred Germany over the British which they hated for letting in (jewish) immigrants.
As I understand it, one Lehi leader (Yitzhak Shamir) went on to become Israel’s PM for two terms. He also approved the assassination of Folke Bernadotte, a Swedish diplomat working to negotiate peace in the region.
It’s clear they had influence in post-WW2 Israel.
They sure did, they tried to rehabilitate them. Yithzak Rabin was part of a terrorist group as well, went on to serve as PM for two terms, and was assassinated for working towards a two state solution…
Who? The Palmach? At least they didn’t try to ally with the Nazis like Lehi.
I believe they’re talking about the Haavara agreement. From my understanding the Jewish community worldwide was boycotting Nazi Germany by not doing business with them, and the Haavara agreement was seen as cooperation with the Nazis and their anti-Semitic policy.
That agreement was about paying nazi Germany to facilitate migration to Israel. But riccosuave is making a comparison with Bibi sacrificing a few thousand of his citizens to create a casus belli. So I guess/hope he’s talking about something else?
I love that “pointing out undisputed historical facts that are provable and verified through many sources” often gets met with “quit with the crazy conspiracy theories and anti-______-ism”, regardless of which group you are apparently making conspiracy theories about.
Though the money was meant for Gazan civilians, Western intelligence determined that Hamas was taking money from the funds to use themselves, the outlet reported.
Yep, sure totally meant for civilians guys, wads of money in suitcases. Nothing to see here, a totally legit way of sending funds to civilians.
The US did that with pallets of cash in Afghanistan, but that was explicitly money for warlords. No one tried to hide it. It was completely different.
“I learned it from you”
What about all those pallets that went missing?
I have a vague memory of a $10B cash shipment going missing in Afghanistan.
I thought that was Iraq under W?
I mean hamas is the government of israel. Did you want israel to distribute the humanitarian aid in palestine as well? Might as well govern them too right?
I mean, preferably. And then give them a vote, too. But then I believe in a one state solution.
It’s better than just keeping them all in an open air prison.
Hamas hasnt held a vote ;)
Obviously
if you’re american, that’s suitcases of your money going to terrorists because the corrupt right wing ruling authority of israel would sacrifice unarmed civilians in both israel and palestine to avoid a peace deal. the israeli government is not just rejecting individual proposed peace deals but sabotaging any attempt at peace because they need constant war and fear to stay in power. Bibi Netanyahu will kill your baby himself with his hands if he thinks it will help him remain in power. He’s a war criminal who deserves the Hague.
between this, the pullout in afghanistan and henry kissinger’s entire career, I have to wonder if there’s a terrorist anywhere on earth that isn’t shooting american guns and spending american money.
If imperialism was a timeshare…
You think I as an American wanted this money to go there? NOOOO! I did not.
What we want is just not something out government considers to be relevant. Since the cold war they’ve been operating on the principle that they know better than us stupid poors and that we should be grateful for the evil they do in our name. It’s very “a few good men”.
I mean this isn’t anything new. We’ve known this since at least 2015 when ex-IDF top brass officials that worked in Gaza during the occupation have come clean about it in interviews. And the motivation behind this is also logical. The palestinian authority was playing the white man’s game. They were going through the UN, filing motions against Israel, passing resolutions, and so on. Hamas is much easier to deal with. They don’t bother with all that civilised bureaucratic stuff, in part because no one recognizes them anyway. It’s easier to drop bombs on Hamas than on PA officials and thus continue the illegal occupation. As the current Israeli president has put it in an interview before: “Hamas is an asset” for Israel. [1] They’re easier to work with.
[1] https://theintercept.com/2023/10/14/hamas-israel-palestinian-authority/
They fed a monster to destroy diplomacy and then act surprised when the monster mauled them.
Because it then gives justification to seize the land
I doubt it was the initial plan but that certainly seems to be how they are rolling now. Now they have a solid casus belli to justify massive bombing on a population.
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Unless Evangelicals in the US lose significant political power, it’s unlikely that the US will stop backing Israel. While Israel has been useful for foreign policy n the middle east, the base of Republican support is because they believe that Jews must control Jerusalem for Jesus to come back. (Yeah, I wish that was a weird joke. Sadly, it’s not. Lots of Evangelicals are antisemitic, while still supporting the state of Israel.)
Both parties show unwavering support for.israel, but evangelicals are only relevant to the Republicans. It’s not them, they’re a red herring. It’s weapons manufacturers. They exert a strong power equally over both sides of the aisle, and they make money when people are shooting each other. You can thank the likes of Raytheon, Northrop, and general dynamics for the state of Middle Eastern diplomacy.
The european world will come around once it realizes israel is the only reason the radical muslims arent targetting WEU.
dude did joshua tree enjoy tasting you you fuck?
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Holy shit. Wow. I’d say you wrecked him, but that might be understating it.
It might be a bit naïve to assume that wasn’t the initial plan. I’m not sure which is the case, but I wouldn’t put it past the right-wing coalition parties to be knowingly creating an enemy to have them attack you so you can attack back with the force of a thousand suns. It’s a pretty smart plan, they’ve just bungled what they thought would be the international response because the West has always backed Israel 100% without a hint of criticism.
Not quite. Hamas and Netanyahu are still quite comfortable. It creates a political situation they both want. The latter is “surprised” at all the innocent people the monster killed, but in reality they don’t give a shit. The government gets to consolidate its strength and kill more people.
They’re enriching themselves off the backs of the Palestinian and Israeli people.
It clearly is not known by people who go “Israel is needs to defend itself against Hamas”. It’s an obvious contradiction if you know Israel funds Hamas, which means, considering Hanlon’s razor, those people simply don’t know any better.
It wasn’t Israel funds being smuggled in, it was Qatari funds. And how would it have looked if Israel blocked official Qatari aid to Gaza?
If you want the technicality that it wasn’t Israeli money then sure, but everyone knew what that money was for and Israel wasn’t just complicit in handing it over, per the very article Israel actually lobbied in the US to not sanction Qatar. Furthermore Israel’s finance minister Bezalel Smotrich has said “The Palestinian Authority is a burden, and Hamas is an asset” and Netanyahu has expressed similar sentiment “Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas”
The Israeli government wants to keep Hamas in power because when your opposition look like crazed lunatics it’s much easier to seem like the sane one for running the worlds biggest open air prison.
Of course they lobbied not to sanction Qatar. Once again how would it look to the world if Israel worked to deny aid to Palestine?
And I never said Netanyahu was a swell guy, he needs to be removed from power as well as Hamas.
The whole idea that they wouldn’t want to look bad that way is just stupid. They don’t want to seem like they’d deny aid to Palestine but have no problem shooting peaceful protesters in Gaza? Or doing air strikes? Or having long-term blockade of Gaza which keeps the entire region is a perpetual humanitarian crisis? No, not allowing Qatar to send money to Hamas under the guise of giving the people money is a step too far.
Oh and Netanyahu is the one who wanted money from Qatar to reach Gaza, other politicians (outside of his influence) were against it. Think about it, why would someone who doesn’t want Gaza to exist make sure that money reaches Gaza?
Given the thousands of rockets fired at Israel by Hamas from Gaza every year, the international community is understanding of a blockade being put in place.
Denying the passage of aid across that blockade however would be seen as far worse.
And the current air-strikes are a result of a large scale attack against Israel, so they are seen by many as justified. Though you can see most of the world now sees Israel as going too far. Thus proving that Israel can only get away with so much before their allies drop off.
Given the thousands of rockets fired at Israel by Hamas from Gaza every year, the international community is understanding of a blockade being put in place.
Is somehow understandable by the international community
Denying the passage of aid across that blockade however would be seen as far worse.
Not aid, money. And somehow not understandable by the international community despite the US verifying that the money sent goes to Hamas? So preventing funds for those rockets is not understandable by the international community?
It’s from the U.S. tyranny playbook: Allow a tragedy to happen, and then you get the support of the people to do whatever it takes to stop terrorism such as Pearl Harbor and 9/11.
This is every colonizer’s playbook: you make constant small incursions, then when the people finally push back, you use it as an excuse to wipe them out and take the land.
I understand you are not implying that pearl harbour and 9/11 where inside jobs.
I think, you just referencing to the public support that followed those events. Right?
Not inside jobs necessarily but both events had credible foreknowledge of an imminent attack that wasn’t acted upon.
Hamas also had credible foreknowledge that Israel would start fucking them and everything near them up if they committed an incredibly successful terrorist strike. That didn’t seem to deter them.
Of course not. Hamas isn’t responsible for israel’s genocide. If anything the israeli response has shown the world just how much of a Nazi state israel truly is.
Hamas isn’t responsible for israel’s genocide.
Yes, I agree (although it’s war, not a genocide). In the same logic, the foreknowledge that Israel had about Hamas’s strike does not make Hamas’s strike Israel’s fault.
Genocide is any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.Sure seems like Israel is trying to get a full bingo card on this one even if you reject the notion of «genocide».
And before you go for the “intent” get out of jail free card…
Israel’s Public Diplomacy Minister: "Erase all of Gaza from the face of the earth. That the Gazan monsters will fly to the southern fence & try to enter Egyptian territory or they will die & their death will be evil.
Gaza should be erased!"
Still questioning a genocidal intent?
How about Bibi Netanyahu saying “You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. 1 Samuel 15:3 ‘Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass’," .
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant called residents of Gaza, about half of whom are children, “human animals” as he ordered a “complete siege” on the enclave including a total blockade of food, fuel, and electricity.
Former military officer Eliyahu Yossian said the IDF must enter Gaza “with the aim of revenge, zero morality, maximum corpses,” and toldChannel 14 in Israel on Monday that “there is no population in Gaza, there are 2.5 million terrorists.”
Earlier this year, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said at an event in Paris, “There’s no such thing as Palestinians because there’s no such thing as a Palestinian people.” He also said the West Bank town of Huwara should be “wiped out” by “the state of Israel,” while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presented a map of what he called “The New Middle East”—without the illegally occupied West Bank, Gaza, or East Jerusalem—at the United Nations General Assembly just weeks before the onslaught in Gaza began.
Sure seems like a pattern of intent. I could find you that video of Bibi back in 2002 saying much the same if you like. This isn’t new.
Not to say the Israeli isn’t 110% shit but the ‘bingo card’ you present remains completely empty. Sure they’d like all Gazans to flee to Egypt but anyone calling this a genocide just hasn’t seen a real genocide yet
It was hubris and arrogance and incompetence.
You know false positives exist right?
Theres some who think the mistakes of Pearl Harbor wasn’t anything but incompetence/human error.
He is a conspiracy nut
No, not at all, but I understand new facts can change upheld beliefs.
What facts do you have that Jewish people allowed Oct 7 to happen?
Or even the american government allowing 9/11?
The Saudis are US allies. They did 911. Yet we remain allies. It doesn’t mean we ‘did it’ through them. But it’s suspect and deserves consideration.
A closer inspection already showed it was rogue saudi elements and a combination of arrogant, incompetent analysts during a transition period of presidencies.
You should give that consideration.
The New York times did a few pieces on it at the beginning of Dec.
“Israel Knew Hamas’s Attack Plan More Than a Year Ago.
A blueprint reviewed by The Times laid out the attack in detail. Israeli officials dismissed it as aspirational and ignored specific warnings.” https://archive.ph/SDOlUYeah, them dismissing it was a mistake. They thought it was BS.
They get a lot of threats. Some will be false positives or false negatives.
Doesnt mean they wanted or allowed the attack to happen. Ffs this entire thread is full of brain dead communists or some shit
full of brain dead communists or some shit
Communist?
I do not think it means what you think it means.
No, not inside jobs, but not dealt with appropriately so as to get America involved or to pass the patriot act. We know for a fact that the CIA was still trying to flip one of the terrorist pilots the day of.
Conspiracy theories and antisemitism go hand in hand.
Case in point right here.
I don’t understand how this is antisemitism
The belief that israel allowed hamas to attack them to take Palestinian land is anti semitic as fuck.
It has no basis in any available evidence. Israeli people were pissed at the incompetence of the government.
The only reason to peddle this lie is to propagate the belief of that Israel has no right to protect its Jewish citizens that Hamas wants to massacre.
I am not against Jewish people, but Netanyahu. There’s a difference.
And you even stated the people.were.pissed off over the incompetence of the government. So, it’s almost as if the government should have done better than they actually did.
So are you, in the context of this thread, under the belief that is a conspiracy to allow Hamas to do oct 7 in order for Jewish people to take Palestinian land? Despite that conspiracy theory having no evidence?
It is not nust Netanyahu trying to rescue the hostages. It is israelis too.
You keep saying no evidence but you clearly haven’t even tried google since the New York Times shows up pretty easily.
I already replied to this brainless line of thought. Scroll up when you get the reading comprehension.
I don’t fault anyone for being born, but I fault them for what they do with life. I am not against Jewish people, but Netanyahu’s regime. I do not support HAMAS, but the Palestinian people who, along with ethnic jews, are being exterminated. Nuance. Fine details.
Do you believe jewish people conspired to let hamas attack on oct 7 in order to take Palestinians land? Despite no evidence?
If you do, that is anti semitic.
Israel was built for European immigrants. They’re not Semitic. Arabs are.
There’s jews that lived ther, jews that migrated from Europe, and jews that came from the Ottoman states and the Middle East to escape discrimiation under islamic regimes. Descendants of the latter group being the largest today iirc
Dna sequencing shows that the Y chromosome from israelis is much closer to other middle easterners and jews that never left the middle east than any europeans.
This is an anti semitic lie that you peddle. The jews in israel rn have always been middle eastern.
Here the original & complete NY times article, for those who want to read what they have written, and not what is speculated.
This isn’t a new discovery, is it? People already know about this, it’s been like this for years. This has always been one of Netanyahu’s many criticisms, even at home.
It’s important to make the distinction between the Israeli religious authority funneling money to Hamas to create a political antagonist to the PLO/PA in the '90-'00s, and the object of this article.
Then there’s money coming from all over the world as support to Palestine. They need this money to buy food/commodities from the rest of the world. Israel has always overseen this flow of money, just like they and Egypt keep watch over which goods enter and leave.
This money was always passed to the PA as executive government of Palestine. But since 2006, Hamas took control of Gaza. So the aid money goes to Hamas. And because Hamas can’t have a bank account, it’s brought in cash.
How would the world have reacted if Israel had blocked aid money from entering Gaza since 2006? How many Gazans would have died?
Right, but Gaza needs aid because Israel has blockaded Gaza for decades (which Israel has claimed was an act of war when Egypt blockaded Israel). If Israel lifted the blockade, then they wouldn’t need to worry about funneling aid to Gaza.
Yeah they would just need to worry about more weapons that could kill israelis lol. There is a reason the blockade is there
They blockade Gaza to keep weapons out so Gaza smuggles weapons in to break the blockade…
Huh.
Sounds like they’re creating their own problem.
The cause of the blockade premeditates the smuggling so no.
If you a lock a terrorist and other terrorists fight you over it, the terrorists are still at fault.
Dont let the anti semitism stop your brain from working.
The cause of the blockage was terrorism (or “freedom fighters”, depending on your POV) that was caused by Israel failing to negotiate in good faith on a two state solution, and actively repressing Palestinian organizations that were garnering international support.
Again: Israel is causing most of their own problems; it’s like they’ve never heard of blowback.
BTW - if you think opposition to Israeli politics is the same thing as antisemitism, well, you aren’t arguing in good faith. That would be like saying that opposition to US foreign policy is because you hate Jesus.
I already explained elsewhere why it is antisemitic. You can read that, or you can admit that you dont care and talk in bad faith.
And only one government there wants the other side wiped out. Hint: it is the one chanting from river to sea.
Thank god none of you idiots have power. Keep crying as hamas terrorists keep getting wiped off the map.
I think its fair to say the blockade didnt work to keep things out of gaza. So other than being a type of effective security theater it seems to have been bad policy on its own terms
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Great job they did keeping weapons out. Now combine this with all the intelligence they ignored that an attack was coming and try to take it seriously.
Mistakes happen. Doesnt mean you need to do more lmao.
Based on the facts that are coming out, i don’t think this was a mistake.
What facts? The only real thing is that mossad was too arrogant in thinking hamas couldnt paraglide in and kill israelis.
What makes you think they’re worried about funneling aid to Gaza?
It’s just an inconvenient one. It makes it a lot harder to jerk about how “complex” the situation is when there’s such an obvious villain. Everything Hamas has done, Netanyahu is an accomplice to.
The only complexity here is for people who can’t fathom the concept of two bad guys. The only good people here are the civilians being happily sacrificed for Hamas and Netanyahu. Their leaders sip cocktails in luxury and don’t care about how many die.
Exactly. It’s heartbreaking. You don’t need to wave a flag to be upset. It’s just innocent people dying constantly.
Reporting on corruption, especially when fatal, needs to be repeated for as long as people are unaware.
That’s US taxpayer money. Mazel tov!
Israel is the absolute worst
How so?
I’d hardly call what they’re doing unique
Oh no, Israel can’t be bad since everyone else also kills and maims, but let’s forget they have killed a large number of civilians in a span of 2 months, more journalists and medical professionals and UN workers in any other conflict ever. Boo fucking hoo.
Israel can’t be bad
Where did you get that from?
You were responding to someone saying Israel are the worst. Worst, being the superlative of bad and all.
“Absolute worst” and “bad” aren’t equivalent
Hmmm, you’re right, I guess it would be more correct like this: “Israel can’t be more bad than the average genocider…”
It would be more correct of a statement by you
But the person I replied to could have just called them bad…or explained why they are worse than every other genocidal group
I mean, who hasn’t done a little Genocide here or there amirite?
Historically it does seem to be a reoccurring theme but they aren’t even the only group doing that today
What exactly is your point? Because I seriously doubt that it’s math…
My point was to ask why they think Israel is the absolute worst
Ok. How far back are we talking in history? Just to know if I should throw Genghis Khan in or not, so we can do a top 10 and see where Israel lands
Feel like everyone is fair game if we are using “absolute”
In 2018, Netanyahu’s administration came up with a plan, according to the New York Times. As part of a peace agreement with Hamas, Qatar would bring millions into Gaza to distribute to Gazan families, the outlet reported. (…)
Though the money was meant for Gazan civilians, Western intelligence determined that Hamas was taking money from the funds to use themselves, the outlet reported.
Let’s take this at face value. 1) Why has Israeli media decried all sort of help towards Gaza Palestinians as “financing terrorism” if Netanyahu was willing to send them money himself? 2) If the Israeli government wanted to provide financial support to Palestinian civilians in Gaza, why not make the peace deal public? Why not establish criteria of transparency to make sure that the money got where it should have? 3) If you’re willing to send money to Gaza, why not send the required supplies yourself, when you’re the main country blockading it?
If we accept the narrative of the article, it is like Israel wanted the money to be misused.
Israel is set to wipe Gaza off the map. Of course they wanted the money to be misused.
Does everybody not understand Israel’s goal is to eliminate Gaza and the West bank and replace them with Israeli settlements? They’ve been doing it for years.
No not everybody does understand that. When we cry genocide they really don’t understand that is EXACTLY what is happening. We’re not just throwing the word around. They are killing and ousting a people group, that is two forms of genocode
They made a blood tithe they feel can never be repaid. Compared to that it’s pretty clear they see all this *waves hand around* as trivial amounts of collateral damage.
This shit makes my blood boil. I need to find an article on the 2006 Palestinian elections. I have heard that Bush kind of forced it on them and there were a bunch of centrist leaders on there that split the vote so Hamas was able to get in power.
It seems that Israel needs Hamas in power to be the boogey man, so they can justify their horrific apartheid policies
Can we point out the fact that netanyahu loves Lehi, like dudes obsessed and lehi’s newsletter was named “Hamaas” which means “the deed” in Hebrew.
Have no heard of Lehi. Is he an Israeli Alex Jones or Steve Bannon?
It’s a proto isreali terrorist organization that was officially absorbed into the Israeli military after Israel became a thing
Yuck.
Holy fuck. That article has some damning parts 😮
Most of Israels history and prehistory is pretty racist, sectarian and excessively violent.
Israel’s existence is propped up solely to pander to the “authority” of the religulous. The creation of Israel was an attempt to make the Bible be true. This is the shit that happens when you believe that book - not only do you immediately and ultimately betray the principles in that book, but you discredit it utterly as well, which it richly deserves.
I am reading a book on the last hundred or so years of Zionism. It is really depressing, it is basically a product of European imperialism and racism. Europe was happy to fund Israel so they could do something with the Jews…
The nascent Israeli’s also kicked Palestinians off of their land and murdered them with paramilitary groups and then had Europe retroactively say it was ok because it was the Jewish homeland. Not to say the Palestinians didn’t as well, but I can’t say I blame them, they were getting invaded and killed and had their land taken.
At this point the only “moral” path forward in my mind is a secular single state managing the region. That is never going to happen until the United States stops seeing Israel as the useful idiot projecting Western power into the region.
At this point the only “moral” path forward in my mind is a secular single state managing the region.
In a theoretical situation, I’d completely agree.
But at this point, realistically, the situation is so fraught that I don’t think there’s a single authority anywhere on the planet capable of forming, administering, or managing that theoretical state.
You certainly couldn’t have Israelis or Palestinians running it, and every other solution would, by default, mean it would be a region ruled by a government not of or by the people…which would make it exceptionally difficult to convince those people that it was, in fact, for the people.
Basically, any individual or small coalition of nations trying to effect this solution would be, in essence, colonialism/hegemony, since as much as the Israelis and Palestinians don’t want each other running things, one thing they’d likely agree on is that neither of them want a foreign power running things. (Perhaps they might be okay with it, depending on which foreign power, but then we’re back to the issue that no one power would be agreeable to both parties.)
While it’s still nigh-impossible, really the only possible way this could happen would be a sort of UN peacekeeping administration, but that would likely be a huge negative impact on the Israeli side, so they wouldn’t be likely to go for this anyway. Even if you do let these people have some sort of democratically representative seat at the table, it’s either population based, favoring Israel, or it’s not, and it’s just a same-number deal, favoring Palestine. Or they’re non-voting members of that leadership group, which neither side would stand for, effectively giving up sovereignty.
There might be room for some sort of UN government in which there were two chambers like the US legislature, one scaled for population, the other not, but with a certain amount of seats…and explicit veto powers… residing with a UN contingent…but again, this is a theoretical solution that Israel is not ever going to stand for.
The only thing I could see bringing them to the table would be if all their Western allies made all aid contingent upon their cooperation. But that’ll never happen because of the value of the Western ally state in the Mideast, no matter how troublesome they may be.
So ultimately, we’re left with a situation where innocent lives are so comparatively unimportant to the governments who could do anything about it, versus the value of their alliances, that the incentive to stop the bloodshed isn’t as great as the incentive to keep it going…and that calculus is not likely to significantly change in the near future.
It’s definitely possible. South Africa managed it. All the black people didn’t kill all the white as soon as they got democracy, and in fact, white people kept a lot of the power, land, and money after lol. You just require a strong Constitution, international support and diplomats at the table, and a peace and reconciliation commission to push peace and moving forward over revenge. Create strong protections in the Constitution and some UN oversight for a bit and you should be fine. Have the new government, now a coalition of the former Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority government, work together with the international community to remove Hamas. Have all that international aid build up the run-down Palestinian parts of the country, like in Gaza, so they stop having power problems, have drinkable water,and not bombed buildings. (The PA fought a civil war against Hamas before, and Hamas has less than majority support in Gaza, so plenty of Palestinians would fight them to keep peace if the quality of life without their interference was better.)
The only problem that I agree with is that Israel wouldn’t accept it. It would need to be a secular government, accepting of Jews, Muslims, and Christians. But the whole idea of their state is based on Jewish power and being in that place specifically for religious reasons. Sharing power and land with the people who originally lived there basically goes against the idea of its founding. You’d need a US that’s focused on peace in the region over power projection and who knows if that will ever happen. We’d need someone like Bernie to get elected, and a Congress with the balls to threaten to withold aid to them.
While I’m not saying it’s categorically impossible, and I agree that there are some parallels that could be drawn with South Africa, realistically there are several big and very relevant differences which unfortunately seem (to me) to make your theoretical scenario impractical and unlikely at best.
Very broadly speaking, the differing religions would be a massive, nearly insurmountable challenge on its own, but even if they could get past it, it would always be there, making any effort at resolving any issue orders of magnitude more difficult than it might otherwise be.
The immediate road block of course is also that each side wants as its main goal mutually exclusive things…and since they’re overwhelmingly likely to view all decisions through the lens of achieving those goals, there will never be consensus even on the most basic things.
And this has little to do with the US. This is a situation where, if it is to be resolved, I feel it would be best handled with as little direct US involvement as possible, instead channeling all formal interaction through the mechanisms of the UN. America has a rather poor record when it comes to nation building, and as far as Israel is concerned, most regional powers would likely assert that the US government is incapable of being a neutral mediator in the situation given their longstanding relationship with the Israeli government, and that any possible diplomacy they may attempt would be fundamentally and critically tainted by their history.
And honestly… they’d be right to make this objection. I cannot envision any scenario in which America attempts this delicate statecraft and does not compromise the effort by looking after its own interests in the process.
It’s also a very real possibility that any attempt at lasting peace that even shows a glimmer of potential will likely be intentionally sabotaged by regional neighbors. Nearly as much as the Israeli government wants to see the entire area controlled by a Jewish government, that’s how much many of the neighboring powers want to see that government eradicated and replaced with Muslim leadership. And if they can’t accomplish that, they’ll be content to simply play spoiler, and destabilize the region as they are now.
I’ve always found the religion excuse to be a scapegoat, an excuse to not try for peace. The fact is that people care about a lot of other stuff above religion, including food, shelter, water, quality of life, self-determination, hope, etc. The Palestinians would 100% make peace if they can have those things. People with differing religions live in the US, the UK, and all sorts of places. Hell, they lived fine together in that same area during the Ottoman Empire and before. There are even plenty of Christian Palestinians, too.
Sure there’s a lot of animosity now, but I bet in one generation of living together, they’d be mostly fine. Just look at the differences between the Civil rights in the 60’s, where you had various violent black liberation groups, Malcolm X saying the rift could never be healed and black people should make their own place in Africa, etc. And then there’s the 70’s and 80’s, where you started having the black friend in every movie, to today, where we had a black President. It’s not perfect, even now, but way better than the Palestinians in Gaza. Just let the kids go to school together for a few years lol.
Now there is a couple religious issues that will need to ironed out, but that’s where a strong, neutral hand is required. And i think a one state solution even helps some of those. Such as with a one-state solution, everyone gets Jerusalem and shares it. With a two state solution, you have to do this weird thing where ostensibly no one gets it, even though Israel has all the power over it.
Right now, they want mutually exclusive things in that Israel wants all the land and Palestinians want to live in the place they’ve lived for generations, as well as food, water, etc. Palestinians will shout from the river to the sea, but they’ve shown willingness to settle for a 2 state solution plenty of times before. On the other hand, Israel has no reason to similarly bend. But, if Israel didn’t have so much power because of the US, their position probably wouldn’t be so inflexible. They couldn’t afford to be, and then maybe we’d see some compromise.
I agree that the US would probably hurt more than help, though.
I think your view is overly optimistic and naive, but for their sakes I hope that’s how it goes down.
But if I was a gambler, I would bet all my chips against that being what actually happens.
Israeli security officials got it wrong; they didn’t think Hamas was capable, or even interested, in launching a large attack against the Jewish state.
I wholeheartedly don’t think they cared. Netanyahu and the other far right Knesset officials clearly knew about the impending attack, clearly they might as well have killed those people themselves.
they literally did. that is what “allowing an action you could have stopped” means. They chose killing.
At least Israelis have recognised that the blood is in Bibi’s hand on October 7 attack. Many predict that the next elections could oust him for good.
Fascists allowing a couple of “common people” from “their side” to die in order to open the door for more violent action by said Fascists is just tradition.
im glad they’re finally talking about this in western media.
Remember Israel also stole Palestinians tax money. Effectively charging them for their own imprisonment
As part of a peace agreement with Hamas, Qatar would bring millions into Gaza to distribute to Gazan families, the outlet reported.
Israel should have allowed this!
Hamas takes all that money, historically, and gives little or nothing to the people of Gaza. They literally deny the UNRWA the ability to distribute material aid.
