It didn’t take long after Secretary Clinton arrived in the Middle East for Egypt to successfully broker a cease fire between Israel and the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. If more rockets are fired into Israel, the cease fire will be violated, so it appears that Netanyahu has succeeded in stopping the rocket fire, for now. He also had the opportunity to test his Iron Dome missile defense system (which appears to have worked surprisingly well). And, of course, he was able to diminish the Gazans’ stock of rockets and to take out a bunch of people on his kill list. He can claim tangible successes.
Egypt’s leader Mohamed Morsi was able to walk a very fine line in maintaining his country’s relationships with Israel and the United States without losing credibility at home. He emerges from the conflict with some credentials as a statesman.
The Gazans get some street cred for resisting, but that’s about all they get. They now have more broken infrastructure which will make it still harder for people to maintain a civil society. A lot of people got killed, including women and children, but also various leaders. Life in the Gaza Strip was a living nightmare before this conflict, and it will now be even worse.
I’m not sure what the Palestinians should do to try to keep up their quest for a state of their own, but resisting Israel with sporadic and ineffectual rocket fire is stupid and counterproductive. And if they think that they repelled a ground invasion with their rocket fire, they are simply wrong about that. They avoided a ground invasion because they agreed to stop firing rockets, and because the United States put tremendous pressure on Israel not to invade.
Things may look pretty good for Israel right now but they should be concerned that some of the rockets reached the outskirts of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. They should be concerned about how little support they had for their bombing campaign, including from American Jews. Their relationship with Egypt held, but just barely. Israel met its immediate goals, but the whole spectacle exposed some glaring new weaknesses and vulnerabilities. The status quo is bad for the Palestinians, but it’s bad for the Israelis, too.
While Gazans might not have won much, the big winner is Hamas, the ruling party in Gaza. They have now cemented the role of the relevant authority which represents Palestinians, not Fatah or President Abbas. This was probably one of the primary objectives they hoped to get out of something like this, and it is was also probably what Netanyahu wanted as well. Fatah looks irrelevant now. Hamas is perceived as the legitimate voice of Palestine.
I am not so sure. That appears more to be what Hamas wants to tell itself than reality. They did receive some diplomatic recognition. But only in the service of cutting off their nuts.
Perhaps. But Hamas didn’t get beaten (as things stand now, anyway), and they are the ones at the negotiating table with Egypt, Israel, and, although denying it negotiates with terrorists, the US, and not Fatah. If power means obtaining seats at such tables, that’s pretty key. Just like the real rivalries in American politics are between leaders of the same party, Hamas’s real threat to its power is not Israel, but Fatah, and this is a big win against Fatah.
But, once again, at the cost of essentially becoming no different from Fatah. A Gaza Strip that doesn’t bite is no different from a West Bank that doesn’t bite. Once things calm down a little and some times goes by, people will notice that Abbas didn’t get his people killed and he didn’t have his infrastructure destroyed or his lieutenants assassinated. And no one will think the key to peace in Palestine is to make a deal with just Gazans.
If Hamas takes over the West Bank, I’ll agree with you. Otherwise, Hamas just had its wings clipped.
I don’t see where Hamas’s wings have been cut. In fact, I see a clear strategic defeat for Israel.
I know Palestinians who are hopeless; who believe that the only way to achieve a measure of comfort and dignity for themselves is to emigrate, and that this is Israel’s game plan. This latest skirmish does nothing to change that. And so long as Israel continues to build settlements, Fatah can’t change it either.
In fairness, the hopeless Palestinians seem to be secular and from educated, successful families. I don’t know if their attitude is typical. I also have an 80 year old Sufi shaykh who is Palestinian but lives in Jerusalem. He’s not hopeless at all. He speaks of how Judaism and Islam are one. He speaks of insincere individuals but not entire the insincerity of entire communities. He speaks of a coming transformation. Of course he’s anything but typical. I’ve no idea what the typical person in Gaza or the West Bank thinks or feels. How I would love to go there but, even if I could get in, what could any individual offer? Besides, it’s probably neither safe nor wise to be something as odd as an American Jewish Sufi in a place where people have prejudices against all three.
As with Cast Lead, and most such operations, Israel had this attack planned a year ago. Just as Cast Lead did, this attack occurred just after an American presidential election and just before the Israeli elections. Similar to the case of Cast Lead Israel broke a period of quiet by killing four unarmed young Palestinians. On November 8 they opened fire on a group of adolescent boys playing soccer, and killed 13 year old Ahmad Abu Daqqa, then two days later killed four more unarmed youth aged 16-19. They then followed up by assassinating Ahmad Al Jaabari, who was in the process of negotiating a long-term truce with Israel. Of course, the Palestinians were supposed to meekly suck it up and take it, and of course, they did not.
4. Can you explain why Netanyahu would want Hamas to replace the collaborationist Fatah and Mahmoud `Abbas as Palestine’s representatives? Let’s not forget the lengths he (and the U.S.) went to to try to overturn the legitimate results of the Palestinian elections.
We’re too obsessed with electoral politics. One of the major factors in recent events is the UN’s upcoming consideration of Palestine as a nation. Israel needed to provoke Hamas and Hamas obliged. One is ruthless and other is ruthless and stupid.
Netanyahu’s interests are different from Israel’s. It is important not to think of a state’s leaders as the same as the state they lead. Netanyahu, like any milatarist leader, particularly including Hamas, gains power domestically when there is a threat of violence, so it is important to Netanyahu to have a credible threat of violence from Palestine to keep his job and allow him to obtain cooperation from his constituents.
The same is the case with Hamas. Hamas’s interests have been, and always will be, to provoke violence from Israel because when when Israel attacks, Hamas’s weapons and ideas look better than Fatah’s. Hamas’s importance in Palestianian lives increases when Israel is making war because Hamas is the group with the weapons.
Since Israel did not defeat Hamas, and Hamas remains in power in Gaza, and many Palestinians have been killed and are really angry with Israel right now, Hamas’s capacity to obtain cooperation from its constituents, i.e., power, has gone up dramatically.
That’s a realist outlook, anyway.
The other way to think about it is that Hamas has actually provided them with hospitals, schools and such while Fatah was just a corrupt POS. And like any other people, they’re going to care less about foreign policy than, “What have you done for me lately?”
You managed to say it so much more concisely than I did. 🙂
I don’t know why people think the Palestinians are somehow different than any other people and value rhetoric and foreign policy towards Israel over other stuff. Listen to your own damn president, Americans. We all want the same thing, and in general, we all vote and operate on the same premises. When an est. 90% of Hamas’ budget goes towards social infrastructure policy spending, and only 10% to weapons, it’s no question as to why Hamas is popular (hey Americans, we spend 50% of your tax-collected budget on weapons).
The Egyptians who just voted for a big chunk of far-right Islamist kooks? Just wait a few years when these Islamist kooks have provided them with neither resistance to Israeli aggression, and have neglected the people for a theocratic agenda that some people might think they want. Then after some organizing, hopefully the secular left — which from the Nasser days is still hopefully rooted to some degree — can take full advantage of the Islamist failures. This is why I didn’t fear the Islamists winning; I already know they will fail on any promise they make.
Sorry, that should read, “tax-collected discretionary budget.” You know, the budget we have control over. Either way, SS doesn’t contribute to the deficit so remove that, and then you have around 25% of defense in our budget (which includes deficits).
Why do you believe that Islamists in Egypt will neglect the people when Islamists in other places, most notably in Palestine, have done a better job than secular “leaders” of providing for the people’s needs, and been far less corrupt?
I didn’t fear the Islamists winning because I don’t fear Islamists – don’t love ’em, don’t agree with ’em, but I find them no worse than secular dictators such as Mubarak who bleed the people dry, and in some cases find them better. :o)
Because the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt is corrupt, Egypt has a lot of secular roots behind overwhelming Islamist outer shell from Nasserist days, and they’re not talking about actual help:
The Tunisian Islamists are different, though. I have high hopes for them.
Also keep in mind who put that Nazi Anwar Sadat in power: it was the Brotherhood. And they expect me to trust them? Hardly. The Brotherhood can go to hell, especially the Egyptian and Jordanian branches.
OK, I admit that I have not followed the political situation in Egypt closely, and it seems you have, so I will accept your analysis. 🙂
“ Hamas’s interests have been, and always will be, to provoke violence from Israel because when when Israel attacks, Hamas’s weapons and ideas look better than Fatah’s. Hamas’s importance in Palestianian lives increases when Israel is making war because Hamas is the group with the weapons.“
That is an attractive assumption for those who are uninformed, but it does not fit with reality.
Palestinians (including, by the way, no small number of Christian and secular Palestinians) did not vote for Hamas over Fatah because Hamas is better at violence. They voted for Hamas because it was the only alternative to Fatah, which has a history of corruption and collaborationism, and has done exactly nothing to take Palestinians along the road to their goal of independence and self-determination. On the contrary, Fatah has taken them backward while its leaders live high off the hog in Europe, occasionally visiting their grand mansions in the West Bank.
Hamas, on the other hand, has always had a reputation for integrity, and has provided real solutions to day to day misery in the form of social services including schools, hospitals, food banks, and so on. Its leaders live modestly as the rest of the Palestinians do, and do not use Palestinians’ money for their own personal benefit.
The mistake you and virtually all westerners make is in associating Hamas primarily or exclusively with violent resistance (aka terrorism). You (plural) are either completely unaware of Hamas’ critical non-violent activities and services, or you consider them an ancillary activity when, in fact, it is violent resistance that is ancillary to the services it provides.
You are right. I do consider Hamas’s social welfare activities to be ancillary at best to their primary interest, which is the capacity to threaten violence on Israel. I don’t think Hamas has a very strong record of providing humanitarian benefits to people, and I really haven’t run across any Palestinians I know who support Hamas for this reason, so that is why I continue to believe that fear (and revenge, a type of fear) is Hamas’s principal organizing tool, as it is Netanyahu’s for the Isreali right-wing. (Palestinian I know do, however, cite corruption for not supporting Fatah, as you say.)
Santiago, you simply do not have the facts in your possession, that’s all. You clearly do not know Hamas’ history as an organization. You are making very standard assumptions about what Hamas’ primary interest is, or why so many Palestinians, including Christian and secular Palestinians, chose Hamas over Fatah.
Unfortunately, you are basing your assumptions not on real information, but on what you think must be the case. You are a thoughtful person, and I think you care about things, so I would urge you to learn more facts before you form an opinion.
Oh, and by the way, Palestinians do not resist for purposes of revenge. They have much more important goals than that for which to risk their lives.
Well, if you have better facts than me, including your personal testimony, I am always open to that. The testimony I am basing my opinions on Palestinian motivations for support for Hamas come from the testimony of my own small number of Palestinian and Egyptian acquaintances and one reporter for Al Jazeera USA. Some of them are supporters of Hamas, but it is certainly not a large group and may be biased. I also have my own experience living and working for years in slum environments in other parts of the world for context.
Hamas may not be an evil group, just like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is not an evil group, but Hamas did not get on the State Department’s list of terrorist organizations for nothing, even allowing for the political biases involved in getting on such lists.
What are some facts which would indicate to me that Hamas is not using violence as its primary organizing and instead building power through humanitarian infrastructure and relationships? Answers to these questions would help:
Is there any formal renouncement of violence on the part of Hamas?
Are demonstrations that Hamas organizes not characterized by exhortations and slogans of violence?
Are the weapons that Hamas acquires precision in nature, and therefore useful for defensive security and protecting civilians, or are they indiscriminate in nature?
Are military facilities and weapons controlled and civilians kept far enough away from them to avoid injury if such facilities are attacked, or are such weapons hidden or operated near civilians?
I have never suggested that Hamas has not and does not use violence, including terrorism, as a form of resistance – of course it has, that’s undeniable, so I don’t know why you are asking me questions like whether or not Hamas has renounced violence. Of course, it is also noteworthy that people who demand that Hamas, or the PLO, or whomever renounce violence rarely if ever make a similar demand of Israel, but that is another topic for another time.
Here are a few verifiable facts for you:
Israeli scholar, Reuven Paz found that around 90% of Hamas’ activities involve social, cultural, and educational programs, and 80-85% if its budget us used for political work, schools, clinics, welfare organizations, sports programs, etc.
Here are some references for you:
There’s more, but that should get you started anyway.
As to why Palestinians of all religious persuasions both in Gaza and the West Bank voted for Hamas over Fatah, all the reliable information I have, anecdotal (like yours) and otherwise says it was not because Hamas is more effective than Fatah at using violence, but because of the reasons I have stated in earlier comments. I have anecdotal evidence from Christian and Palestinian friends and associates who are very active in non-violent resistance as to why they voted for Hamas, and it was because Hamas was the only alternative offered to the corrupt, self-servingly collaborationist, and ineffectual Fatah. It was not because they considered Hamas better at using violence.
Sorry, it’s late and I am tired. I have anecdotal evidence from Christian and Muslim Palestinian friends…
McCain’s view that the situation called for Bill Clinton to fly over there and broker a deal was so off the mark and to see Sec of State Clinton successful (if even for just the moment) should humiliate anyone who still listens to McCain.
Sexism on display.
Remember the 1974 Egypt/Israel war? It took that to get the Camp David Accords.
It’ll be interesting to see what, if anything, happens after the cease-fire. With Hillary involved, maybe there will finally be some motion in settling the issues, and less talking about having talks….
So, I think it’s too early to say that Hamas lost. Maybe they’ll be able to argue that it forced Israel to finally start negotiating. Or maybe not. We’ll see.
Cheers,
Scott.
The occupation hasn’t yet become painful enough for Israel. Perhaps when the first Jewish president is in the White House, and has the cred to stand up to Israel and threaten its security, things will change. I doubt the Palestinians have the means to bring about change through violence. I think non-violence could work, but it would take leadership and unity of message that’s nowhere to be seen at the moment. There are scattered voices of nonviolence which have never gained real traction, and Israel does its best to make sure they never do.
I agree that techniques of nonviolence have the promise of bringing an end to the conflict, but it’s hard to see them being instituted here. They worked in South Africa, India and the USA in a context of a society that had a at least marginally well-functioning (though racist) civil society. There was violence against the oppressed, but the scale seems so much larger here. In Gaza and the West Bank, there is so much inward-directed violence that it’s hard to see a nonviolent movement gaining hold. Too much power is held by “religious” people who seem to have little or no interest in compromise.
Ultimately, negotiation is the only solution to the conflict. That can only happen when both sides see it as being in their interest to participate. What makes each side come to that conclusion can be moral suasion or a calculation that the costs of the status quo are too high. Sometimes Total War has been required; sometimes moral outrage is sufficient.
It’s hard to say what the future holds.
One has heard stories of women going on strike in Africa to force the men in power to moderate their positions. A more powerful women’s movement in the region may be a way forward…
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
“there is so much inward-directed violence that it’s hard to see a nonviolent movement gaining hold.“
Interesting to see how often the dispossession, daily violence and year in year out crushing oppression and deprivation of the Israeli occupation and colonization of their land are discounted in favor of some imagined internal flaw when assessing Palestinian society.
As for a nonviolent movement gaining hold, there have been over the decades, and are now any number of very active non-violent movements in Palestine and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Some of them have resulted in small victories, most of them have been brutally and quietly crushed. Pretty much all of them have been kept invisible.
Most important of all we need to understand and heed these words by Rabbi Brant Rosen taken from this excellent essay on his blog.
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The Palestinians have been using non-violent resistance since the ’20’s and ’30’s. They have been using non-violence as a form of resistance continuously since then.
There have been numerous non-violent resistance groups and movements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories since the occupation began. Israelis and many people from other parts of the world have joined some of these non-violent groups and movements.
The fact that you are unaware of the fact that Palestinians have used a variety of non-violent methods of resistance against Israel’s occupation and oppression is a strong indicator of just exactly how effective it has been or is likely to be.
You and I are making the same point, I think.
Maybe. “Past performance is no guarantee of future success.” 😉
There were nonviolent groups who thought that the US Civil War could be avoided as well. They didn’t have a critical mass to prevent it, though.
Yes, there have been actors (on both sides) that have tried to have the issues resolved peacefully. They are to be commended. But they haven’t (yet) been strong enough to result in progress toward a solution. For a variety of reasons.
If this problem were easily solved, it would have been done long ago. I don’t know how it’s going to turn out. Maybe Hamas will be emboldened and figure that battling the IDF is still the way forward. Maybe Bibi will find a pretext to invade after all. Maybe Hillary and Morsi will find a way to thread the needle. Who knows.
I think that we do know that neither side’s maximal positions will prevail (no matter how sincerely each feels the logic and justice of their position).
I like to hope that a solution will be found sooner rather than later. But it is only a hope at the moment.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
Well, it seems I managed to miss your point – thanks for clarifying for me.
There are a number of factors consistently overlooked by those hard-core individuals who demand pure non-violence from oppressed, threatened peoples. One of them is that for every successful non-violent liberation effort several conditions have coincided to make that success possible. Two of those conditions have been a certain level of readiness on the part of the powerful entity to give up its hold, and/or strong, consistent external support and/or support from members of the power group. It is also a fact that for every major successful non-violent liberation movement there have been accompanying violent ones.
To the best of my knowledge none of the hard-core advocates of pure non-violence has examined the dynamic among the various factors and elements on all sides that have lead to a successful liberation. They simply say “Look! Gandhi was non-violent, and he succeeded!” without considering the state of the British empire at the time, and without examining the contribution of the liberation movements in India that did not forgo violence. Same for the efforts to bring civil rights to American Blacks.
I wish someone would find a way to study whether non-violence alone can work in a situation in which the powerful party is absolutely determined to hold onto is oppressive power, as Israel is, and whether a non-violent liberation movement can succeed without concomitant violent movements.
Of course, I also believe that people who put the onus on the oppressed to solve the problem are blaming the victim, and leaving the victimizer unmolested to continue its deprivations.
This whole thing reminds me of making an abused child responsible for the abuse. It is absurd, and does nothing to help the child or stop the abuser.
These are pretty scattered thoughts – sorry. I wish I had the time and mental energy to be more coherent, but perhaps it is clear enough the way it is.
It doesn’t matter at all what the Palestinians do, the apartheid state is solidifying around them with the complicity of the international community. And Netanyahu gets his pre-election war like clockwork. And the US pours another $3.1 billion down the drain for another year, which Netanyahu disses the President.
Brilliant foreign policy, Hillary. Just brilliant. /s
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What form of resistance do you suggest them to take, Booman? Do you expect them to just take Israel’s jackboot on their neck and get on their knees and beg? Hamas hasn’t always existed for the Occupation, they are a creation of Israel, and yet even before they existed Israel didn’t negotiate. Hamas is just another conjuration of the Zionist assholes for why their illegal wars are justified; it’s make believe. If Hamas didn’t exist tomorrow, they’d come up with some new rationale. I’m all ears: what do you expect them to do?
My advice to the Palestinians is to begin focusing on American public opinion, keeping in mind that they have very little control over whether or not their messages will be presented to the American people and knowing that violence will always be portrayed as terrorism aimed at the total destruction of Israel.
In my opinion, Abbas has actually made more progress with American public opinion than Arafat ever did, precisely because he isn’t targeting civilians. All of that was been undermined by the fact that Abbas doesn’t control the Gaza Strip and he can’t speak as the leader of all Palestinians.
It is no easy task, but as long as American politicians are 100% behind whatever Israel wants to do, at least publicly, then Palestinian statehood has no chance. Terrorism, whether it is aimed at Israelis or aimed at Americans, is completely counterproductive because it makes Americans more supportive of Israel, not less.
There is no magic trick, but refraining from violence and insisting upon their rights and dignity is the best path because they cannot win by any force other than moral force.
It’s not terrorism when it’s resistance to Israeli aggression, especially not when it’s against IDF soldiers. So it’s exactly as I said: you expect them to keep taking it until American opinion changes. It won’t change. And there won’t/can’t be a Palestinian State. There are no viable paths because of the settlements.
It’s been a long day, and I’m not happy that your comment made me walk across the room to pull out Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict so I could remember that the authors are Erica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan. Read it.
This isn’t a question of how the word “terrorism” gets applied or the binary thinking of launching rockets on the one hand or “taking it” on the other. Honestly, do you think that Palestinians will win back a country by force? The sham of Israel’s “self-defense” and America’s support for it would buckle under if Palestinian militants in the region have enough self-restraint to renounce violence and activists in the West enough creativity to make us understand our role in the miserable situation. But the Israeli occupiers can always count on enough few people to throw rocks and launch rockets to create a moral fog.
Gandhi and MLK proved that non-violence, as unlikely as it seems, can work. However, it would require a willingness to unify around a non-violent message and strategy. It would require a great leader (like Gandhi or MLK or the much less well known Muslim non-violent leader and contemporary of Gandhi, Badshah Khan) who could give people hope and unify them in the face of so much pain and injustice.
Our education in successful non-violent movements is impoverished. That’s why Gandhi and MLK seem to us to have been anomalies. It’s also why the obstacles are much easier to see than the possibilities.
What Gandhi and MLK proved was that non-violence is effective as one major element in liberation. They did not prove that non-violence alone works, nor did they prove that non-violence will work at all when the party in power is absolutely determined to continue the status quo and there are insufficient outside and inside forces pushing it to do the right thing.
As for the Palestinians under occupation, one of the things Israel-firsters are fond of pointing out is how quiescent they were until the First Intifada. And that quiescence allowed Israel to quietly confiscate and colonize more and more and more of their land, almost without resistance, while using them as cheap labor to build the colonies that were part of the program to ultimately deny them their state and any degree of self-determination.
Yeah, being non-violent and depending on international law and political processes has really been great for the Palestinians.
That’s more bullshit neo-colonist thinking right there. It would be one thing if the US were consistent in telling all oppressed peoples to renounce violence in their quest for liberation. But that’s not how it works. It’s only the Palestinians that must utilize non-violence in the views of the West. Somehow, arms find their way to other people because they’re fighting regimes we don’t like. Don’t ask me how that works.
FTR, I think nonviolence is more successful at toppling oppressors. But I’m also aware that it’s not my struggle, and I have no business lecturing them how they should continue their fight when I’m neither Palestinian nor on a special “diet”. Moreover, non-violent struggles are incredibly hard to conjure, you need charismatic and strong leaders, and you also need other factions that splinter off who are a little more radical than you are. Ghandi and MLK didn’t operate in a vacuum.
The premise that non-violent movements wouldn’t have been successful but for the existence of parallel, violent movements is often repeated but unsupported. In fact, the opposite is more often true.
The claim that pure non-violent movements without the existence of parallel, violent movements is equally unsupported. The reality is, we just don’t know because no one has studied the actual dynamic among all the elements that go into a successful liberation movement.
The opposite is more often true? I hear that statement from time to time, but when I ask for evidence I get crickets.
Comparing the outcomes of non-violent and violent opposition is exactly the subject of Why Civil Resistance Works, using data for statistical analyses and delving into case studies in separate chapters. It has a chapter on the First Intifada.
I am not talking about non-violence versus violence, I am talking about the interaction among all the various elements and conditions surrounding and involved in a successful liberation. You can make all the claims you want that pure non-violence works better than anything else, but without actual evidence, it is just ideology.
And it is not just the question of whether pure non-violence, pure violence, or the two combined in some proportion works best. I have suggested and continue to suggest that to be successful liberation also requires other contextual conditions.
The book does exactly that: examines the factors that lead to success or failure of liberation, with data and case studies. But you don’t seem interested.
And does it take into account the contribution of violent resistance to the success of a liberation effort? Does it take into account the state of readiness of the party in power? Does it take into account external and internal support for the liberation effort?
You claimed that non-violence alone is more successful than non-violence when a violent element is also present. How many successful liberation efforts have been accomplished purely with non-violence? I have only had anyone try to answer this question once, and they could only come up with one obscure example.
The book sounds interesting. I will add it to my reading queue. In the meantime, I would appreciate answers to my questions.
Honestly, the answers to your questions are in the book. The regressions models demonstrated that violent resistance has a consistently negative and statistically significant effect on success. The case study of the First Intifada is 28 pages long. You’ll either agree or disagree with its data and conclusions, but I don’t think that you’ll be satisfied with my answers, whatever they are.
In other words, like everyone else to whom I have posed this question, you cannot name a single successful purely-non-violet liberation effort.
“The regressions models demonstrated that violent resistance has a consistently negative and statistically significant effect on success.“
And yet, it appears very clear that for Hamas responding violently to Israel’s violence has resulted in a net positive effect:
http://souciant.com/2012/11/how-israel-lost/
Fool’s Gold, in my opinion.
Yeah, so were the victories of the American Revolution, I guess.
Which should determine Palestinian’s strategic thinking: rage at America’s hypocrisy or their most effective course of action? Provoking and strengthening Hamas is in the interest of right-wing Israeli politics. Believing that Hamas is the inevitable and only Palestinian option is the best that the neo-colonialists can hope for.
“Provoking and strengthening Hamas is in the interest of right-wing Israeli politics.“
Really? And how’s it working out so far?
And, by the way, it is an error to point to Hamas as the villain here. According to multiple IDF reports, and in this particular case, a report by Gershon Baskin, who was a key Israeli player in the truce negotiations cut off by Israel when they murdered Ahmad Al Jaabari, the rockets that are terrorizing residents of southern Israel are not Hamas rockets, but are shot by various fringe groups that are not under the control of Hamas. Baskin also stated last week that when Hamas does retaliate with rockets they generally shoot them at military targets, or empty fields. So much for Hamas targeting children.
It’s not terrorism when it’s resistance to Israeli aggression
Terrorism is a tactic, and its definition has nothing to do with whether you like the cause the terrorists say they support.
Your comment is indistinguishable from the way the neoconservatives define terrorism: Nothing done by “your side” counts, and everything done by the other side does.
If you’re resisting IDF soldiers through violence, it is not terrorism. That’s what I said and/or meant if you think it’s ambiguous and could be inferred to mean attacks on civilian populations.
Was firebombing Germany in WWII terrorism? It’s a war, but I think it’s arguable that it was (I believe it was). I think you could argue that it wasn’t, though.
The only real gray area I can see outside of war is targeting something like the Pentagon.
If you want to limit your comments to firefights with the IDF, that’s a lot better. In the context of the rocket fire or suicide bombings, saying “It’s not terrorism if it’s resisting Israel” put a different picture in my head. I support Irish liberation and the unification of the island, but I don’t have any trouble saying that the Provos and the Real IRA engaged in terrorism.
As for firebombing Germany, most definitions of terrorism exclude state action. You generally see terms like “war crime” applied to state action during a war.
Israel was founded on and is maintained by violence, sanctioned, encouraged and facilitated by the U.S. And now the Palestinians are supposed to take the moral high ground and practice non-violence. Give me a break. I don’t think either violence or non-violence will work for them, however: they are royally screwed. I repeat: the U.S. is complicit in their oppresion and subjegation. The US is guilty. No one in the US government does anything for them except occasionally blah-blah. Hillary Clinton is an appalling publicity seeker: she’s tickled pink by her ‘success’.
Not only is the US complicit, there are other parallels as well:
In fact, as Prof. Mearsheimer states:
A Pillar Built on Sand
Apparently, the US can’t even bring itself to condemn both sides:
U.S. blocks U.N. Security Council action Israel, Gaza conflict
Olmert says “IF the two-state solution collapses”?! Really?! Has he looked at a map of the OPT lately? Did no one tell him how his country is colonizing them with the obvious intent of making a viable Palestinian state impossible?
Plenty of people still playing make-believe that such a solution still exists. It doesn’t. With the internet and new-media, the status quo cannot stand. Either Israel is going to go batshit insane and utilize a final ethnic cleansing, or it’s going to fall apart.
Get in touch with reality. Israel has already succeeded in its long-time goal – a goal that goes back to Ben Gurion and beyond – of obviating a Palestinian state by creating enough facts on the ground to make it impossible.
And I’m not even going to address your insistence upon putting all the responsibility on the wronged party because I know that is a waste of time.
A key point from Juan Cole:
Excellent diary on top of rec list @ GOS by david mizner.
On Gaza: Okay, I’m Going to Try to Say This Calmly
Read the whole thing!
Nethanyahu lost this one and the fluffers of the Israeli Government and the IDF look more unhinged and murderous after each confrontation. Downward spiral since the incursion in Lebanon in 2006 (and before).
Nethanyahu lost this one and the fluffers of the Israeli Government and the IDF look more unhinged and murderous after each confrontation. Downward spiral since the incursion in Lebanon in 2006 (and before).
Including to the American public and media. I’ve been surprised by how much of the American coverage of the battle has focused on the suffering of the Palestinians. The coverage was much more pro-Israel during Operation Cast Lead and the abortive was in Southern Lebanon a few years ago.
The Netanyahu government seems determined to shoot itself in the foot.
Wonderful analysis, Ask – thanks!
But what can you expect from a Norwegian – socialists, all of you! 😉
Now I must read the rest and see whether I can find something to disagree with. 🙂
Well, thanks. But the analysis was really made by david mizner. I just added some comment/snark to round it off.
And what can I say, my last vote for parliament was the socialist left party (which is a party of the old social democrat conviction). People calling Obama and his policies ‘socialist’ are beyond clueless…
I didn’t know you were Norwegian. Former American, expat/long-term resident, or born and raised? If I had to pick a country to be born, it’d definitely be Norway. Just seeing the PM’s response to terrorism was enough; we don’t even need to get into the weeds of socialist policy 🙂
Born and raised in Norway. Expat for 25 years, of which 20 in the US.
Now 50/50 between Norway and NYC (until I find a new gig).
By the way, one of the people I shared a house with in Sweden is a Norwegian woman who breeds Norwegian Forest Cats. Do you know the breed? From the pictures they are very pretty.
Yes, they are quite common. At the summer cabin we often have visits from an almost feral female with her litters (they belong at a nearby farm, but spend most of the time in…the forest).
Here’s a shoot of 5 siblings – 3 weeks old – Norsk Skogskatt
So cute!
I’m just glad they got a ceasefire. Such a stupid war.
Drew, I am very glad for the ceasefire, too. But it is not a war when a powerful entity bombards 1.7 million stateless human beings it has imprisoned in the Gaza strip, held under an oppressive siege, and denied even the most basic fundamentals of a decent live for years. It doesn’t matter who “started it”, or what the imprisoned population does to defend itself, it is not a war.
My god, this is exceptionally one-sided, even for you.
Just to pick one ridiculously one-sided remark:
“resisting Israel with sporadic and ineffectual rocket fire is stupid and counterproductive.“
Yeah, really? And what about collectively punishing 1.7 million human beings for years on end by, among other things “putting them on a diet”, making sure to limit the availability of food and the ability to produce their own food to keep available calories just above starvation level?
And what about having your soldiers take potshots at adolescent boys playing soccer in the streets of their town and murdering a 13 year old boy in the process?
And what about summarily executing Ahmad Al Jaabari while he was in the process of negotiating a long-term truce?
Behavior like that is not stupid and counterproductive?
.
Cross-posted from my new diary – Netanyahu Will Pay Heavy Price at the Polls
Oh, those poor guys, deprived of the sadistic pleasures they enjoyed four years ago when they were actually allowed to go in there and tear up the place.
Sick, sociopaths. If you’re not resisting enrollment in the IDF, you’re complicit in their crimes. Full stop. And as we see here, they not only accept that complicity, but they enjoy blowing up some “barbarians.”
Sure, Hamas rockets are ineffective, especially with Iron Dome.
What other fucking choice do they have?
Gaza is the world’s largest open-air prison. Full stop. Israel treats this shit like a giant video game, too.
I’m sorry. I see too many parallels between the Israeli view of Palestinians and the GOP view of anyone who isn’t a white Christian. Because you’d better goddamn believe that if the GOP could do to America’s brown people what the Israelis are doing now, they sure as fuck would.
And in a hell of a lot of ways, they are. The weapons of choice are just a lot more subtle on the part of the corporate GOP fuckers.
I hear “Israel has every right to exist and to defend itself” I think “America has always been a white, Christian country”.
It’s only degrees of tragedy.
Very hopeful article for Palestinians posted in Counterpunch 11/21/12, “The Limits of Israeli Belligerence”, by PhD candidate in Mideast/North African Studies @ U of Az. http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/11/21/the-limits-of-israeli-belligerence/
This article was posted before the cease fire but the author was already calling it a political & military defeat for Israel. It’s one of the problems with 4th generation or asymmetrical warfare. The author points out Israel was losing 1.1 billion dollars a week of lost business due to shuttered factories and closed retail outlets because Palestinians now have longer range rockets. Have no idea what Gaza’s GDP is but suspect it’s not even close to a billion dollars for the past 5 years. In contrast, Israeli aggression kills children & people at an always disproportionate rate to Jewish losses but structurally Israel is reduced to rearranging the rubble and misery left over from their last attack.
Good find – thanks.