There's another thread going along the lines of "I don't understand Israel Palestine" and I read the first couple of pages and felt ill. Most people are on there giving very strong opinions without the slightest fucking clue what they are talking about.
I don't expect people to understand this issue very well. I am Jewish. I am Arab. I have lived at least half my life in the Middle East. I have a degree in Theology and a Masters in Middle Eastern studies. It's been my life's work to study the ancient land of Israel and it's modern formation.
What annoys me is that people are so arrogant that they wade in with all the confidence in the world and misrepresent the facts in a way that distorts the problem. Many people on these threads have raised Northern Ireland and Ukraine. I have never commented. Why? Because I don't know enough about those topics to comment.
This thread was great because people largely didn't wade in with nonsense. They discussed, asked questions and it was a serious conversation. But the Western world has a habit of arrogance. Not just in assuming they know everything, but in assuming everyone is like them - when actually different cultures can have very different values around the world.
I have said before, this issue became very trendy for people this last couple of years. The marches and the "free Palestine" slogans and the flags on your profile. Like being gluten intolerant or having the right trainers. It's quite a cringe "comfortable westerner" virtue signal that you're down with current affairs and a Palestinian supporter.
Ultimately they genuinely have almost no fucking clue of what they are supporting. They trot out punch lines which are off the shelf propaganda and have no understanding of the meaning or context. I reckon if you took 100 of these people and asked them 10 basic questions on this issue they constantly ramble on about - perhaps 1 of them might be able to answer!
So largely I think people have absolutely no idea what they are talking about, but they want to feel part of things so they basically pick the "side" that fits their persona. And right now, it's cool to be Pro-Palestine. Down with the imperialist, colonial, blood sucking Israel! That's basically it.
I also think antisemitism is a massive problem on the left of politics. I am left wing and had to more or less stop using twitter because people I liked would be immensely antisemitic and then angrily deny it if you pointed it out - even politely. I was made to feel uncomfortable a LOT because these people have such massive anti Jewish bias which they can't admit to. They can't accept that they - a left wing, highly tolerate, committed antiracist might well be trotting out all the same tired old tropes about Jewish Power and conspiracies that Hitler did. But that is what they are doing.
So the problem is, the left wing of politics are traditionally leaned on to police things like racism, bias, prejudice etc. But they are so invested in the penniless Muslim as the underdog that they can't see that they are actually being immensely biased and holding up the two sides to completely different standards. They also can't see their general philosophy is actually seriously offensive.
I read a fantastic book on this a while ago by a professor in Sheffield, on basically how antisemitism is the one form of prejudice the left can't see and I completely agree with that. I had to stay off Twitter completely in the wake of this because all these socialists who I used to identify with are more or less backing Hamas in this.
Crazy. But I guess antisemitism is such a subtle art form, so deeply ingrained into people's prejudices and because it's not "punching down" at someone necessarily poorer, weaker or generally not white - that some people are completely unable to clock it. Certainly me and my grown children have been pretty deeply distressed by it though.