Israel‘s intention was always clear to those of us that listened to what Israeli politicians and generals were saying at the time, and also to the Palestinian victims of those words and actions. But regrettably few listened to those words and actions and many of the world leaders allowed this to escalate into where we are today rather than intervening at any time, as they are bound to do by the genocide convention.
I am glad that you have changed your mind, and now see the horrors and the crimes for what they are. Hopefully we will both see those responsible brought to justice in a court of law for their horrendous crimes.
And other peoples occupied the region long before judaism was an idea in some shepherd's preaching.
The problem with this logic is, where do you stop. At what point do you declare "these people were the special first ones and anyone before them doesn't matter"?
Much less the mental gymnastics required to believe that which human owned which land in 500bce is relevant to how to deal with things in 2025.
It's not that we should ignore history, it's absolutely worth understanding how we got to the current position, but we shouldn't privilege it over the lives and wellbeing of actual people living right now.
Regardless of where you land, I don't think anyone can look at what's going on in the middle east and think things are going fine - or ever were.
Perhaps, if we ever decide to act globally, we shouldn't permit any more migratory nationalist projects - they seem to be inherently problematic.
Given the demographics of Jewish people outside of Israel, it's hard to disagree with. When you consider the early years of Israel, and how many wars were started to run the Jews out of it, it's even more well-supported.
The best hope for a lasting peace was with the Oslo accords. They were torpedoed by the Palestinians themselves, who were unwilling to accept any kind of compromise that maintained a Jewish state.
Not saying Israel is innocent, but the idea that so many people seem to have that the region would be happy-go-lucky and peaceful for Jewish people if not for the war is hopelessly naive.
You probably wouldn't feel that way 1945.
But despite that I still stand by my statement. Especially in the nuclear age. History does not repeat but it does rhyme. And in 2025, Jews aren't the ones clawing for an exit visa. I'll leave it there because I don't feel the need to argue this point further.
Crimea for Russia as an example, but this is also true for other former Soviet states.
With China it's been Bhutan, India, Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia and Japan. In addition to their claims over Taiwan or their excuse to (culturally) genocide the Uighur in China).
That is ignoring Africa as a whole, where conflicts are far more common. To name a recent example, over 50,000 Nigerian Christians have been killed by Islamists in the past 16 years. The world is far more bloody than most people seem to realize. The world peace has only been a peace in a relative sense.
>Crimea for Russia as an example, but this is also true for other former Soviet states.
In Crimea, the proportion was 3 Russians for every Ukrainian for most of the time since at least 1897:
1897:
Russians 33%
Ukrainians 11%
1989
Russians 67%
Ukrainians 25%
Not sure what happened when the number of Ukrainians dropped from 24% to 15% between 2001 and 2014, I'm not aware of any mass migration during that period (independent Ukraine). On the contrary, the total population contracted from 2.4 mil to 2.2 mil (both Russians and Ukrainians).
I can entertain the plausibility of this form of nationalism not being a catastrophe but I can't think of any times it worked out well.
On a personal note, I harbor particularly harsh judgement on my own nation, the USA, on this front. Unfortunately there's no way to unroll hundreds of years
Sure, maybe if Hamas surrendered there wouldn’t be a blockade, specifically, but given the example of the West Bank right next door it’s hard to imagine that repression wouldn’t continue in some form.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Abbas [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_Authority_Martyrs_...
Until these things lose popular support among the west bank, I don't have a ton of sympathy. Yes we can get into tracing back the chain of causation -- these people grew up in an echo chamber and they had no outside source of information, and Israeli soldiers likely killed family members of theirs unfairly when they were little, so of course they're going to say things like Death to Israel [2] and have a countdown timer until when they want to genocide the entire country [3]
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_to_Israel [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestine_Square_Countdown_Clo...
(These examples actually stem from Iran, where most of the funding for Hamas comes from)
But don't you think it's a little unfair to only defend one side with fatalistic determinism? Israelis are treated as humans who are making horrible decisions. Mahmoud Abbas is treated as a poor innocent bystander who is just the product of his environment, so of course he's going to think those things. I think he's a human too, and he has made very bad decisions too.
Somehow western people always forget this stuff, but luckily the religious fanatics just love to do religious fanatical things, so it makes it easy to point to examples.
That’s a pretty salient fact when you have the might of such a military on your side.
I find it funny how I am at the same time supposed to accept that Palestinian (leaders) are all terrorists and also that Israel justifiably act equally terrible. The whole point of being a respectable state is to not commit crimes (and kill family members „unfairly“).
Or, they can go around and do so, but their claim would be as valid as Hamas' claim to morality...
1. Israel's 18 year blockade of Gaza is an effective mechanism to prevent weapons coming into Gaza
2. Hamas has been launching rockets into Israel for 18 years
That's the main argument for the current obliteration of gaza.
well, you're leaving out the UK wrt French fisherman invading, thus depriving them of the full extent of their territorial waters. And Ukraine's territorial waters have been curtailed.
but the only place I can think of that's similar to what you're talking about would be the Houthis. I guess they do have free navigation in their territorial waters, and turns out they make great neighbors! https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3071vp2d8yo I guess nothing can go wrong!
Yet the level of incompetence demonstrated when Hamas took the hostages was beyond incompetence. A retired general hopped in his car and rounded up a bunch of troops to extract his daughter. No officers were present in the area.
It seems weird that a military that had 3D mapping and monitoring of a region allowing it to detect and target concealed Hezbollah artillery in buildings somehow was caught flat footed. It’s weirder that there hasn’t been any commentary about this in an age where every decision made is analyzed to death.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/01/israels-female...
Yeah. "Weird." Kinda like how it was weird that a music festival was moved to be next to a military base that was the target of an operation that one of the greatest signals intelligence powers in the world "didn't know about" over a couple of years of planning.
Weird that the IDF moved into the crowd instead of evacuating the festival. Weird that there were photos of massive numbers of bombed out cars that were disposed of before any forensics could happen. Kinda weird that IDF copters and tanks opened fire indiscriminately (or, sometimes, targeting Israelis due to Hannibal doctrine).
Really "weird" operation all around. Seems like it really didn't have to happen the way it did.
From my perspective, they handed over control of the region and have had countless opportunities since the handoff to occupy the land permanently had they so chosen. Couldn't it just as easily be argued that they no longer trust sharing a border with them?
I don’t know anything about the impetus for the Oct 7th attack was, but you have to wonder why.
They were content with the Palestinians keeping to themselves in that corner of the land. At least that's what it looked like between 2005 and 2023. That isn't to say they had no designs on it further in the future, they might have had plans to annex it after fully claiming the West Bank. (Or at least certain groups within Israel)
West Bank should have went to the Palestinians following the Oslo accords, and it partly did, but that all came to a halt with the deadly suicide attacks led by Hamas on Israel. Another opportunity was in 2000 Camp David accords, but that too ended with the second Intifada. A third opportunity came in the form of the Israeli disengagement from Gaza. Had it been a success story - the Palestinians building their own little Singapore in there, as the world was willing to pour in infinite capital - it would have pushed forward another such a move in the West Bank. But alas it ended with Hamas swiftly coming to power, years of rocket attacks on Israel, then October 7th and the rest is history.
I doubt the Israeli public will ever give the Palestinians anything, at this point; any time a concession was made, Israel found itself in a worse and worse security situation. The great Israeli-Palestinian peace attempt over the past three decades failed miserably.
These populations simply will not coexist, for great many reasons - religious, cultural, historical, tribal, and external.
Oct. 7 was not only the most deadly day for Jews since the holocaust, it was also the most deadly day for Zionists since the conception of Zionism. Whatever Israel did after Oct. 7 was not to protect Jews, but to protect Zionism. The very same ideology which has stripped Palestinians of their civil rights. And because Zionism is a foundational ideology of Israel, I would expect them to behave exactly the way they did. But I also see Zionism as a fundamentally immoral ideology which should not be a policy of any state. So from a human rights perspective, the right thing for Israel to do since Oct. 7 (as well as much earlier) was to admit defeat, grant Palestinians civil rights (including the right of return and reparations for past wrongs), and abandon Zionism as a policy. Later they could file criminal charges, or have a special tribunal punishing the perpetrators of oct. 7, maybe even as a part of a peace treaty which also grants Palestinians civil rights.
I am not naïve, and I know Israel was never going to do that. That is where international laws should have kicked in which were supposed to pressure Israel into doing the right thing, by doing stuff like sanctions and boycotts. International law, however, failed spectacularly.
EDIT: to prevent misunderstanding, when I say Zionism I mean the belief that Israel should be a Jewish supremacy state on Palestinian lands, like I explained here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44718838
There are no civil rights in Gaza, but that's not because of Israel - that's because Hamas is a fundamental, radical and totalitarian Muslim organization which is right next to ISIS in their methods and beliefs.
The suggestion that Jews admit defeat, hand their heads to Hamas and the likes and ask for forgiveness does not resonate as sane. It's like suggesting a rape victim to move in with the family of the perpetrator and look for reconciliation. The Palestinian and Jewish populations are not compatible with each other and I see no path to coexistence under the same governing body. These populations are too far apart on any conceivable metric.
Luckily Israel took the opportunity to do just about the opposite of what you suggested and aggressively dismantled the Iranian ring of fire that surrounded it. Lebanon and Syria have been transformed, Iran caught a massive blow and any dreams of breaking Israel by force must be a distant past now. The Middle East will have to accept Israel, and by the looks of things this is where it's going. If you haven't been to the region you'll never understand the collective Middle Eastern mentality that despises weakness and worships victors.
I‘m gonna answer your strongest points on material grounds though, and ignore your more racist stuff.
> The "right of return" (meaning the inflow of millions of third, fourth and fifth Palestinian descendants from neighbour Arab countries) is their - and the Arab's world - tool to dismantle Israel.
That is a) just your opinion, and b) irrelevant in the context of human rights. The Palestinian were unjustly expelled and they have a right of return under international law. Israel had no right to expel them in the first place, the expulsion was a historic wrong, and for justice to resume they are owed the right of return as well as reperation. Whatever that does to Israel’s demographics is a non-concern in the context of international humanitarian law. If such a right were granted and it would result in Israel no longer being a majority Jewish state, that would simply be a new reality we would have to deal with. Minority rights are a thing that international law also guarantees, and surely Jewish Israelis should be happy living is a minority in a land which guarantees their rights as such.
> The suggestion that Jews admit defeat, hand their heads to Hamas and the likes and ask for forgiveness does not resonate as sane.
We have been here before, and yes, this is the sane option. Rhodesia admitted defeat to the terrorist organizations ZANU and ZAPU, South Africa to the ANC, The French Algerians to the FLN (which was probably more brutal than Hamas). And outside of settler colonies we have South Vietnam admitting defeat to the Viet Cong. Brutal regimes which owe their existence to the oppression of others like Rhodesia, Apartheid South Africa, French Algeria, and South Vietnam are frequent targets of terrorists, those same terrorists often become the ruling power post liberation, and the settler (or otherwise the beneficiaries of the past oppression) most of the time are able to live just fine under their new rule without the systemic oppression. In all likelyhood, even if Hamas were to rise to power in a post-apartheid Israel state (which honestly is rather unlikely) chances are they would not be able (nor even willing) to exert the kind of oppression onto a hypothetical Jewish minority in such a state.
I think your other, bigger mistake is to equate Israel to the colonialist adventures of Africa's past. That's complete misunderstanding of Israeli psyche and source of strength (and indeed you are talking about Israel in an overriding manner, as if it's not their choice on how to solve this). While colonialists in Africa could always turn back to Europe and the white world (and many did), Jews in Israel don't feel nearly the same. Colonialists didn't flee anything, they just came looking for a better future or an adventure. Jews came to Israel to form a homeland. Jews have an undisputed connection to the land through countless artefacts and written history, while colonialists never had that in relation to Africa. Jews have nowhere to return to; where would they go, back to Auschwitz? To the pogroms of Russia, Ukraine and Poland?
Jews are ready, willing and able to fight to the end and currently possess the strongest military in the Middle East (and probably in Europe) by far. The combination of technology, economy, psychology and resilience means Israel could easily outlast any other Middle Eastern country (which are artificial entities to begin it, a result of Sykes-Picot agreements).
And, indeed, look: Syria is out, Lebanon is hanging on the brink of another civil war, Jordan is there just thanks to monarchical oppression (where are their civil rights?), Iraq is a failed state, Saudis want Israeli technology and good favors, the GCC are all in bed with Israel (other than Qatar and Kuwait), Iran is on its knees, Egypt is thirsty and illiterate. Who's left, other than perhaps Turkey (but then they have their business with the Greek which are very close to Israel)?
I've had many such discussions on the internet but not even once did I encounter someone offering that Israel disposes of its F35, nukes and security apparatus and hand the keys to ISIS/Hamas terrorists. There's a first time for anything.
We're not discounting cultural differences. We're just discounting your claims regarding cultural differences.
> ...you'll never understand the collective Middle Eastern mentality that despises weakness and worships victors.
From the content of your arguments, I get the feeling that this statement is pure projection.
> I think your other, bigger mistake is to equate Israel to the colonialist adventures of Africa's past. [...] Jews have nowhere to return to; where would they go, back to Auschwitz? To the pogroms of Russia, Ukraine and Poland?
GP never said that the Jews should leave. In reference to Africa, he said "those same terrorists often become the ruling power post liberation, and the settler (or otherwise the beneficiaries of the past oppression) most of the time are able to live just fine under their new rule without the systemic oppression."
> I've had many such discussions on the internet but not even once did I encounter someone offering that Israel disposes of its F35, nukes and security apparatus and hand the keys to ISIS/Hamas terrorists.
GP said Israel should surrender their oppressive political system, not their weapons.
And then they used it to one up everything the world has seen in that region in recent past.
It seems like only Israel has agency in the middle east, why do you think it is so?
Why do you think they targeted the US for 9/11? Because they "hated our freedoms"?
Generally I think they targeted the US because of Islamist Ideology. Islamism links conquest and imperialism to a proof of the religious validity of Islam. Once the West has begun its control over Arab countries the idea in the 1920s has emerged where the reason why Islam lost its prominence is because they lost the "true" islam. Therefore the solution is to return to medieval Islam, similarly to fascism nostalgia to the Roman/German empires.
In that context, even the fact that the United States exists as a cultural force and influences arab teens to wear jeans is a major threat. Don't be naive that it is all over Palestine, Islamism started prior to the existence of Israel.
Notable Israel offered Gaza to Egypt as part of the Camp David Accords and Egypt didn't want it.
You don't have to speculate. You can actually just look at what the bombers stated the purpose of their attack was. It wasn't part of a conquest; it was an attempt to punish us for our history in that region, with a very specific policy of ours mentioned explicitly by many of the masterminds of 9/11.
The only Islamist movement seeking conquest in recent history was ISIS, which is why a lot of their attention was spent expanding their caliphate into their neighbors' territories rather than launching quixotic attacks at the US on our soil. I'm not including ISIS-K in this assessment, as they glow more than Langley.
One part is rejection of modernism and romanticism of a fantastic past similar to fascist movements. Other is anti-colonialism, but only in the context of european colonialism, not muslim colonialism, which is fine. Because of the aforementioned romanticism to the middle ages, part of any Islamist project is creating a Caliphate, and it is easy to see in Islamic history that these were boundless.
The reason Palestine may be important for them is that according to their perception, while european colonialism is a humiliation, there is no greater shame than the existence of Israel, as it is no some vast British Empire, but rather a nation built by refugees and therefore weak by definition, thereby enhancing their defeat, which in their mind has religious implications. As Islam is a conquering religion, and their conquests are a proof of Allah's power.
>The reason Palestine may be important for them
When I said they did 9/11 over US support of Israel, I didn't mean that they did it because of Israel's occupation of Palestine. They did it because Israel is the inventor of modern terrorism (Lehi and Irgun, the head of the latter was even an Israel PM!) and has terrorized every single surrounding nation since its invention by the British over a century ago.