this post was submitted on 23 Aug 2024
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165
Israeli society’s dehumanization of Palestinians is now absolute (www.972mag.com)
submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
30 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

At 5:40 a.m. on Aug. 10, the IDF Spokesperson sent a message to reporters informing them of an Israeli airstrike on a “military headquarters located in Al-Taba’een school compound near a mosque in the Daraj [and] Tuffah area, which serves as a shelter for residents of Gaza City.”

Shortly after this announcement, shocking images from Al-Taba’een school circulated around the world, showing piles of dismembered flesh and body parts being removed in plastic bags. The images were accompanied by reports that around 100 Palestinians had been killed in the Israeli attack, with many more hospitalized. Most of those killed were in the middle of fajr, or dawn prayers, at a designated space inside the school compound.

The IDF announcement explicitly stated that the school “serves as a shelter for residents of Gaza City,” meaning that the IDF knew refugees had fled there in fear of the army’s own bombings. The statement did not claim that there was any gunfire or rocket attacks from the school, but that “Hamas terrorists … planned and promoted … terrorist acts” from it. Nor did it claim that the civilians who took refuge in the school were given any warning, only that the army had used “precision weapons” and “intelligence.” In other words, the army bombed a populated shelter knowing full well the deadly repercussions its assault would inflict.

This dehumanization has reached new heights in recent weeks with the debate over the legitimacy of raping Palestinian prisoners. In a discussion on the mainstream TV network Channel 12, Yehuda Shlezinger, a “commentator” from the right-wing daily Israel Hayom, called for institutionalizing rape of prisoners as part of military practice. At least three Knesset members from the ruling Likud party also argued that Israeli soldiers should be allowed to do anything, including rape.

But the biggest trophy goes to Israel’s Finance Minister and Defense Ministry deputy, Bezalel Smotrich. The world “won’t let us cause 2 million civilians to die of hunger, even though it might be justified and moral until our hostages are returned,” he lamented at an Israel Hayom conference earlier this month.

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[–] [email protected] 39 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I didn't want to paint all Israelis with the same brush, but Jesus Christ, the people they allow in their government are indescribably vile.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

The problem with Israel is that its leader was a bit too vile. About half of the elected knesset refused to form a coalition government with Netenyahu, resulting in years of failing to form a governing coalition.

Eventually, the path out of the stalemate ended up being forming a coalition with far right members of the knesset that had previously been political pariahs; including appointing a convicted terrorist to the role of minister of national security.

Prior to October 7, this was an extremely tenous political position. The coalition was hanging on by a thread. The attempted judicial ~~coup~~ reform was stopped by massive public backlash. And the politian whose divisiveness was central to the political crises that enabled the far right to join the coalition was in the middle of defending himself in a criminal trial. However, when a crisis like October 7 happens, you are stuck with the leaders you have. And Israeli leadership at the time was possibly the worst in the history of the country for handling it (unless you agree with their manifest destiny version of Zionism, in which case I think they are doing quite well).

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

The hamas attack was a godsend for the Israeli government. They couldn't have done better themselves.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 months ago (2 children)

There are lots of dissenting Israelis... but the overwhelming majority of the country is in favor of genocide. The country was founded by colonizing settlers. They went there to steal land and drive out the native peoples living there. Stands to reason colonial racism is a very prominent and popular idea in public opinion.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago (2 children)

The country was not 'founded'. It was given to the Jewish people as reparation for what the Nazis had done (and the world ignored).

The problem is that Palestinians had lived there for 2000 years (since the Diaspora by Rome).

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The zionist project began long before WW2. It was not given to them. Palestinians never agreed to giving away their home. The Europeans just did not care if they colonized Palestine or not.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

The country was not 'founded'. It was given to the Jewish people as reparation for what the Nazis had done (and the world ignored).

That's not true. Zionism as a political movement started with Theodore Herzl in the 1880s as a 'modern' way to 'solve' the 'Jewish Question' of Europe. Since at least the 1860's, Europe was increasingly antisemitic and hostile to Jewish people. Zionism was explicitly a Setter Colonialist movement and the native Palestinians were not considered People but Savages by the Europeans. While Zionist Colonization began before it, the Balfor Declaration is when Britain gave it's backing of the movement in order to 'solve' the 'Jewish Question' while also creating a Colony in the newly conquered Middle East after WWI in order to exhibit military force in the region and extract natural resources. That's when Zionist immigration started to pick up, out of necessity for most as Europe became more hostile and antisemitic. That continued into and during WWII, European countries and even the US refused to expand immigration quotas for Jewish people seeking asylum. The idea that the creation of Israel is a reparation for Jewish people is an after-the-fact justification. While most Jewish immigrants had no choice and just wanted a place to live in peace, it was the Zionist Leadership that developed and implemented the forced transfer, ethnic cleansing, of the native population, Palestinians.

Zionism’s aims in Palestine, its deeply-held conviction that the Land of Israel belonged exclusively to the Jewish people as a whole, and the idea of Palestine’s “civilizational barrenness" or “emptiness” against the background of Euro pean imperialist ideologies all converged in the logical conclusion that the native population should make way for the newcomers. The idea that the Palestinian Arabs must find a place for themselves elsewhere was articulated early on. indeed, the founder of the movement, Theodor Herzl, provided an early reference to transfer even before he formally outlined his theory of Zionist rebirth in his Judenstat. An 1895 entry in his diary provides in embryonic form many of the elements that were to be demonstrated repeatedly in the Zionist quest for solutions to the “Arab problem ”-the idea of dealing with state governments over the heads of the indigenous population, Jewish acquisition of property that would be inalienable, “Hebrew Land" and “Hebrew Labor,” and the removal of the native population.

Transfer Committee and the JNF led to Forced Displacement of 100,000 Palestinians throughout the mandate.

The problem is that Palestinians had lived there for 2000 years (since the Diaspora by Rome).

The label of Palestinians, or People of Palestine, was in use even 3000 years ago to refer to the people as a whole that inhabited the levant. At the time, even the Israelites were Palestinian. From at least the 10th century to the 19th century, Palestine was normally a place Jewish people could go to seek asylum from persecution.