Part 5: Israeli-Palestinian conflict

[AndHarry]

New thread again.

Thread 1 - started when 3 Israeli boys were found murdered.

Thread 2 - in which we mainly discussed Operation Protective Edge.

Thread 3 - in which we continued to discuss Operation Protective Edge, the wider conflict and international involvement.

Thread 4 - in which Operation Protective Edge was examined further and we looked at the different views from inside Israel and the international community.

Another reminder of the Mumsnet Talk Guidelines.

Agree dingalong, it's a disgrace. When we are looking to comedians like Russell Brand and Jon Stewart for leadership you know the world has gone mad.

This is quite interesting too - see www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/07/21/how-jon-stewart-made-it-okay-to-care-about-palestinian-suffering.html

Sorry halfdrunk - I wasn't have a go at you - just explaining my own Hamas fatigue - thanks for the link.

kelly - i was testifying to my degrading and hellish treatment at israeli borders earlier on one of these threads. i was held for a similar amount of time and interrogated about literally EVERY aspect of my life that had zero relevance to anything - financial history, lovers, everything! i have only been twice into israel once back and forth across the taba border and once out across that border and flying out of tel aviv. i would never step foot in israel again unless it was being documented and i was surrounded by legal experts! it's hard to explain what being insulted, degraded and badgered by children in mcdonalds like uniforms is like. surreal but hellish.

can i just say again that personally at the point when someone tells you they are ok with children being murdered (by whatever wiggly rationale) there is no point in discussing things further with them. they live on an entirely different moral plane and imo lack some basic sanity. i actually believe compassion and empathy are core factors of sanity - their absence is either a sign of pathological personality disorder or a symptom of having their sanity terribly undermined by brainwashing.

sorry but can we have a link again for saturday's demonstration? the more often it appears the more people might go oh actually maybe i could/should/can make it.

Haven't read the thread today so apologies for parachuting in. I'm debating on this subject with various American friends and friends-of-friends and have been called all the names under the sun, accused of anti-Semitism and so on and can now say that being insulted and repeatedly identified with beliefs are revolting to me hasn't changed my mind, it's just made me think that those people are rude, close-minded and unable to debate effectively. These are top university graduates in positions of considerable influence on this issue, not rent-a-posters

Powerful.

There seem to be so many with the mindset of sergeantmajor though - someone tweeted Save The Children's list naming all the children's killed. And someone else has replied with a YT video of Hamas shooting rockets. They really do think you can justify the targeting of children- because they're Palestinian children, and are somehow 'lesser' than Israelis.

I'm horrified by the parallels to the Holocaust here.

I can well imagine that HB; you get enough of an interrogation just going in or out for a holiday to visit family (although nothing on the scale you describe).They don't seem to care about making a good impression on visitors and as Kelly said the army conscripts are very young and immature. I also read about a student who'd come from Egypt whose laptop was blown up.
Link for demo

AndHarry and Babbas

Shame on Hillary. Utterly spineless.

I think it's usual in the US that the only platform for left-wing liberal current affairs is comedy. I read a blog about it a while back, I'll see of I can find it.

I know Israel has conscription, and figured the military had a young average age. Surely that must make for a very volatile, impulsive army? The power rush must be phenomenal, when you're welding a machine gun or driving a tank.

We must make a stand. It's ordinary people who have to make this stop.

AndHarry

Can't imagine what I would say if I were having to sit across a table from Tony Blair. Dan David Prize for leadership my arse. How easy it is to buy friends when you have the money. And what a body guard Blair has! Smacks of knowing the 'tricks' of your 'friends' too well.

Boycott, boycott, boycott.

Can the outraged world watching really find no one better suited to this task???

www.globalresearch.ca/turning-a-blind-eye-to-israeli-atrocities-middle-east-peace-envoy-tony-blair-parties-as-gaza-burns/5394625

The parallels to the holocaust are shocking.

But I can't help also thinking that a good analogy is kids in a playground having a scrap. When would you intervene? When one kid slaps another? Or when the slapped kid retaliates by breaking bones, crushing the skull, chopping off the legs and smothering the child that slapped him?

Would it ever occur to you to excuse the bully's behaviour? No. What if the bully was himself bullied? No.

You're right, of course, dingalong, we can't change other people's moral code. It has to come from within. That's why it's so important for Israel to silence internal dissent; these are the very people who threaten the equilibrium.

Woah honey, andharry, babbas those are all worrying stories and show a defensive/bullying mindset that is just bizarre. When I was a teenager I always thought I'd like to visit Israel, experience life on a kibbutz etc and it wasn't until University that I realised what was happening to the Palestinians.
Also at university I got to see some of the shenanigans of the UJS/Labour alliance at NUS conference which is why, for example, it doesn't surprise me in the least that Jim Murphy MP is a friend of Israel.
I really don't know how to argue with some of Israel's defenders as they seem to be lacking any capacity to accept that Palestinians are human like them. And I am starting the find the antizionism/antisemitism argument more and more baffling as there don't seem to be any sensible boundaries to it- as in the response to the tricycle theatre.

I'm in a similar position Andharry. If I'm not accused of anti semitism then I'm a self hating jew. Not all my Jewish friends think like this but enough of them to make me question how I know these people.

There seems to me to be an absolute divide in the Jewish community. Those totally appalled and those totally in favour. Very scary.

The justifications are pathetic and feeble and centre around hamas and palestinians choosing to die. It's sickening. The number of times I have sent this article to people is rising: m.aljazeera.com/story/201483112622663607

On the Israeli army- what you have is kids being brutalised, and kids killing kids. The average age of the soldiers from the IDF who have died is very young, I'd imagine. Just out of boyhood.

honey re: the demo, I think many people have preconceptions about what one is like/ who goes on one- I didn't go on one until I went to university and many of my friends have never been on one. It's vital that it's massive: I think the advertising of it needs to kind of tackle people's worries about what demos are like....

QnBoudi …. I just wish Ed Miliband was Prime Minister, as based on HIS record in government he’d make a real difference to those in Gaza.

UK Voice to Israel – Miliband with his Oxbridge Debating Society face on, would have snorted far louder than Cameron.

Arms to Israel - Labour having decimated our manufacturing (halved it over 13-years), Miliband would gladly have put more British workers in a Job Centre and let Israel buy their arms from elsewhere.

Plight of Gaza Palestians – Labour would have offered them British Passports to come here.

That is how you make a REAL difference to regimes who (whether we believe it or not) feel their country and their citizens are not best served by allowing someone next door SWORN to eradicate you from the map, continuing to build up the armaments to do it.

With that success behind us, we can then lecture China on Human Rights, and then look for ways to make a real difference there.

dingalong that first link was very useful, thank you. I suspect that even as I argue with friends they are thinking deep down that I am one of the 'clever sneaky antisemites who hides their antisemitism in criticism of Israel' This, despite the fact I am their long term friend, teach students every year about the horrors of the holocaust, etc etc- doublethink, even triple think! I think I've probably really lost one good friend over this- or at least, things won't ever be quite the same there

springheeled i have a seven year old son who is really not very comfortable with big crowds. that's what is offputting for me along with the difficult travel etc. last time i donated what we'd have spent on train and tubefares to the medical aid for palestine fund. i really feel i need to be there but don't know how. there's no one to have my son and i don't think i can subject him to being made to be in massive crowds and have a hugely long day of travel on top.

Every demo Ive been on has been peaceful (although I was at the Poll tax ones as a student a million moons ago, different thread tho), there is usually a really good vibe and vast differing types of people, families (we are going en masse as a family). Usually the police and security are friendly and chatty, Ive met new friends going on them.

Saturdays one is vital, a massive showing is what everyones hoping to achieve.

A new viral campaign on FB and twitter - go to www.facebook.com/groups/308186506020831/

Take a picture of your kid sleeping, or just their bed and teddies if you prefer, with a sign condemning the attacks on children. Share, share, share it widely. Let the UK and Israeli government know that ordinary people simply will not stand for this.

Honey if you did want to go, Ill be there with my 5 year old and will be dictated by him as to how long we last <img loading="lazy" class="inline-flex mumsnet-emoji" alt="Grin" src="https://www.mumsnet.com/build/assets/grin-D7Eg_B6y.png"> I think theres a few of us going via MN and hoping to meet but you mustnt feel guilty about not making it, my neighbour is desperate to go but she is 67 with very bad hips and I think itll be too much for her.

Not everyone can make the demo, but hopefully the boycott will grow strenght so we can make our presence known that way.

god letsleepingbabieslie another powerful page, so simple yet so effective, thanks for sharing that.

At least the Palestine - Israel conflict BRINGS MUSLIMS TOGETHER.

When Shia and Sunni are killing each other on sight, Shia Iran supports and embraces Sunni Palestinians due to their shared 'tunneled visions' on Israel. Bless.

honey I get that- I'd take my son on a demo (though he'd grumble incessantly) but certainly couldn't envisage taking my daughter; she wouldn't cope and it would be a nightmare! Their dad had them last time or I couldn't have gone.