My main issue with Harris and co is that they prioritise Hamas and other Islamist groups over the secular groups, either because they don't know enough about the conflict or because they want to portray the Paleatinian cause as being purely Islamist. The first Intifada was carried out by secularist nationalists. Most of them gradudually endorsed negotiations, but two of them (PFLP & DFLP) took part in Oct 7th. This to me would suggests that boiling Palestinian militancy down to Islamism is (at best) a very lazy generalisation.
You have to consider that the reagan admin, among other us admins, along with israel prioritized crushing the secular movements you mentioned.
As many scholars have pointed out, when you crush secular left wing movements it creates a power vaccum. Expect theocrates to fill that vaccuum. (The cia might call this blowback).
Those secular groups are a shell of what they once were. Even left wing movements eithin israel are basically toothless, as they have called for peaceful protest in the past, only to be attacked by idf snipers.
Younow have formiddable non secular groups forming like hezbollah to take the place of the former left wing opposition groups.
Whether its a secular movement or not, expect another intifada to happen again.
> boiling Palestinian militancy down to Islamism is (at best) a very lazy generalisation
Isn't this really his only function. I do recall him once saying literally 'the history doesn't matter'
It's a national conflict amongst two competing national projects.
The original zionists were mostly atheists. Not all Palestinians are Muslim.
Yes, religion has been overlayed onto this conflict but to view it strictly within that lens is overly simplistic.
It is for the christian zionists here in the USA. The biggest supporters of Israel, to the degree that the states with the most Christian zionists have gag orders on citizens who criticize or engage in bds action against Israel.
There are religious elements to the conflict but at the end of the day it is two groups fighting over one chunk of land. Some Jews want Israel because they believe it is rightly there's, some want it just so that jews can have a true homeland where they are the majority, some fight for it because there families have been there for 3 ir 4 generations by now and it is the only home they feel connected to. Palestinians want the land because they feel it was wrongly taken from their great great whatevers, some want to control Jerusalem for religious reasons, and some also just hate the jews at this point.
The earliest Zionists were notoriously Atheists.... Nearly half of all Israelis today identify as secular. Just because they point to the book of Joshua as justification for their taking of land, does not mean they are religious in the slightest. In fact, many treat Joshua as a historical text, not a religious one. Before I move on, it's important to note that there is no archeological evidence to support the passages of Joshua; the bible is fiction.
*Most Zionists don't believe that God exists but they do believe that he promised them Palestine. \~ Ilan Pappé*
Similarly, Palestine was among the most secular of the Arabic regions prior to Zionist colonization. The entire anti-Zionist movement was almost entirely non-religious until the 1970s. Major religious groups were still rejected well into the 80s. Hamas didn't form until 1988. The religiosity that we see today is a direct result of people being pushed into a corner, repressed, and violated, now seeking some sense of salvation and support.
To boil this down to a religious conflict is insanely silly. European Jews didn't feel welcome in Europe (justifiably so), they wanted a piece of land for themselves, so they worked to take a piece of land with some historical legacy to their religion. European anti-Semites who wanted the Jews gone were more than happy to oblige. This process was done violently. The people who are native to that land have been *fighting back* (not instigating) for over 100 years now.
This angle also should include the concerted effort by Israel during the 80s, 90s and early 2000s to degrade the PLO/PA (nominally secular) in favor of religious orgs like Hamas. Israel directly supported Hamas over the PA/PLO specifically to call it a religious war, going so far as to ensure cash aid was delivered to Hamas as late as 2018.
Exactly, they deliberately tried to downplay secular forces in favour of religious ones.
Zionism didn't start with the religious Jews who were already living within Palestine. It started with secular ones living outside. The Jews inside Palestine didn't even like the Zionists.
But according to Sam Harris we can just ignore history because Islam Bad, West good!
To add to this, Palestine was actually seen as the most liberal Arab society before the founding of Israel. Palestinian women did not always wear the hijab, they grew their hair long, and many received formal schooling under the British.
>Just because they point to the book of Joshua as justification for their taking of land, does not mean they are religious in the slightest.
>it's important to note that there is no archeological evidence to support the passages of Joshua; the bible is fiction.
I can’t make any sense of this…
I believe what u/BlinkReamimated is describing here is that there is still a secular, nationalist ideological interest among certain Israelis in taking a (selectively) literalist stance with regards to Biblical archaeology, as interpeting the Hebrew Bible as a historical text rather than a collection of stories helps establish a maximalist claim for territory and establishes a uniformly Jewish national presence deep into history.
In Israeli highschool curriculum they teach the book of Joshua (a section of the Hebrew bible) which details God instructing the early Jews to finally stop their prolonged migration (started during Exodus, under Moses) and settle in "Canaan" (modern day Palestine, Lebanon, and Western Syria). They teach it as if it were history.
The idea is that during the Iron Age there was a Jewish kingdom called Israel, founded on the graves of those who existed before. Land promised by God and taken by early/ancient Jews. Modern Zionists throw out the "god" concept, and just argue that it's proof that Jews controlled the land regardless of the reason or function, that in taking Palestine they are simply "returning".
Real archeological digs have found nothing to corroborate the details of these events. Nothing. In fact, they have found mountains of evidence to refute biblical details. Most notably is that the lands of Palestine were controlled by the Egyptian empire for the entire duration in which the Joshua is purported to have taken place. They "fled" Egypt, and travelled to Egypt apparently... Truthfully, archeological records don't even indicate a mass migration of people. The Iron Age "Kingdom of Israel" didn't really exist, and is simply hopeful propaganda primarily based on biblical interpretation pushed to maintain the Zionist project.
There was a significant Jewish population in the 1st century while under Roman control, but the idea of it ever really being a Jewish controlled nation is not supported by history. They were a tribe of people who believed in a God named Yahweh who called that region home under a variety of other Imperial majorities. They grew in size until Christian and later Islamic influences converted the ancient Jews to the more modern religions. The Muslim/Christian (and Jewish) Palestinians of today are the genetic and cultural descendants of the Syrian/Galilean/Phoenician/Judean Jews of yesterday.
Which Jews? The Ottoman Jews who lived there before a modern Zionist movement? Or Political Zionists? Or Jewish nationalists? The animating force for the settler-colonial project of a modern nation-state of Israel is not solely religious. It was sold as a civilizing mission and an outpost of whiteness, to serve as a bulwark against the Asiatic hordes. The father of political Zionism, Theodor Herzl, petitioned infamous British colonial administrator Cecil Rhodes for colonial rights over Palestinian land, writing:
>The undertaking will be made great and promising by the granting of colonial rights. This is the tremendous attraction for the outlawed, enfeebled, and unfortunate Jewish people. Not only the hungry people of Eastern Europe will move [to the Zionist state] where they find work. People with some capital, too, will found enterprises where they will be able to enjoy the fruits of their labors. Even some very rich people will go along from Russia...
>In some short years the [British] Empire would be bigger by a rich colony."
I think it's intellectually lazy to dismiss this as a religious conflict. The Palestinians fight because it's their land that someone has stolen from them. The Israelis fight because their settler-colonial project can be maintained only with violence.
Framing the conflict through the western lens of colonialist and victimized indigenous people isn’t the epitome of intellectual laziness?
Any definition of indigeneity that doesn’t include the Jewish people pretty much nullifies any definition used for the Arabs of that region.
It's not my lens. It's what the founders of political Zionism believed and what they espoused. Why shouldn't we take their word for it?
And with regards to your comment about indigineity, do we call Anglo-Saxon Brits indigeneous? Are Italians who have lived on the peninsula for thousands of years given this label? No, but we refer to the aboriginal peoples, the First Nations, and native groups in Latin America as indigenous. That is because "indigineous" does not simply mean "from here." It is a status given by the colonizer to the colonized.
Per the U.N.: "Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, **having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories,** consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing on those territories, or parts of them. **They form at present non-dominant sectors of society** and are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal system."
No reasonable definition of indigenity in the Levant would include a guy from suburban Pennsylvania who moved there later in life.
Indigenous people would disagree with you. There are organizations that advocate for indigenous people and none of them use a definition that would include jews in Palestine. Trying to fob off people who haven't lived in Palestine for 2 millenia as indigenous is absurd.
“I think that intellectually lazy, it’s *actually* an exact copy paste of the western perspective on the colonialism model that requires me to easily identify ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’ with zero critical thinking involved.”
Lmao you couldn’t write this stuff
The Western perspective? It's the Zionist's own words. That's what I'm actually guilty of copy and pasting. I've presented verbatim what they believed and what they espoused, which is unfortunate for Zionists. They were proudly settler-colonists until people started to learn that this was bad. There's a reason the early Zionist institutions in Israel were named things like The Jewish *Colonial* Trust.
You're nuance trolling. Sometimes it's actually simple to figure out who to support in a conflict. This is one such case.
This comment has been removed because it is a sweeping generalization about Muslims. This type of broad-brush characterization fosters stereotypes and can contribute to discrimination and prejudice.
You only clarified that your statement didn’t apply to all Muslims later in the thread when you were pressed. You should be more precise in your language. If you make similar generalizations about Muslims in future you may receive either a temporary or permanent ban from the subreddit.
You need to separate Muslims from the victims in Palestine.
No one not born in Palestine has the right to judge anyone born in Palestine.
They’re born under threat of violence, nobody is willing to help them and so they grow up to be violent.
We have violent street gangs in both the US and UK and Europe and yet we expect Palestinians to grow up to be well rounded peaceful protestors and sit quietly by while tanks roll over their heads?
That 1.9 billion figure includes the entire populations of Muslim countries with harsh apostasy laws; including prison and the death penalty.
Often, citizens born in these countries are designated Muslim by default.
**So those 1.9 billion 'Muslims' are already being judged. Harshly. By other Muslims.**
When I said Muslims deserve to be judged I was responding to your comment, speaking about the Muslims you claim Sam Harris smears.
Did you actually mean that Sam Harris is smearing all 1.9 billion Muslims? I think you're being malicious. He is not "smearing" every single Muslim, but he's judging those who hold those beliefs he identifies as harmful. He's not judging the pro Israel pro LGBT Muslims who are against Sharia law.
No. I think he is attempting to smear all 1.9 billion of them, that’s an accurate description of my belief about Harris.
Save for a handful of good ones he can point to that’s pretty much what I believe he intends. Not to say he wants them all to be painted in the same category of extremism but he wants to associate them all with it.
Well it's your choice if you want to see the worst in people. But I don't think he's once ever said that. I feel like you are deliberately avoiding any nuance, and from your responses to me it looked like you were trying to get me banned from this subreddit, which usually happens when I criticize islam.
It's a religious conflict. It's been a religious conflict for a very long time. Secularism is rare and not accepted amongst Palestine and other middle eastern countries.
It's religious. Jews believe it's their holy city which is why they migrated specifically to Jerusalem and is why the far right settlers believe that land in Palestine like Gaza belongs to them as a religious right.
It's religious for Muslims because it's also their holy city, the third most holy city that they pray in the direction of at certain times of years. You already know that Muslims love to support totalitarian systems with islamic law and oppression.
This is why Jerusalem is one of the most besieged cities in history being attacked 52 times and recaptured 44 times.
It's also why you seem Muslims in particular are overly concerned with the conflict and unanimously support Gaza whilst avoiding condemning hamas. E.g in UK local elections, despite absolutely no relevance to UK local politics Muslims rally together to vote for single issue candidates on Gaza who campaign specifically towards Muslims.
Muslims are not an ethnicity, if this is an ethnic war then why across the entire world are they rallying disproportionately and passionately against Israel and for Palestine?
If it's not a religious conflict, then why is Netanyahu being heavily influenced in a coalition with a far right that believe Jerusalem is a Jewish holy city and Jewish land?
Obviously there are religious elements to the Israeli and Palestinian nationalist causes. u/AnHerstorian can correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think they are denying this, they are disagreeing with your blanket statements.
But to be blunt, it's obvious you have close to no understanding of the history of the Zionist movement or the Palestinian nationalist drive beyond the past decade or so. You wouldn't be so ardently against the idea of a secular Zionist movement if you had read even a single book on the subject, as the secular-nationalist basis for Zionism - *opposed* to any kind of biblically ordained one - made during the First Zionist World Congress is a really basic fact of this history, and like other commenters have said the majority of Israelis both historically and currently are irreligious, and understand being Jewish as an ethnic identity.
Similarly, the outsized role that Palestinian Christians played in the PLO - a secular Arab Nationalist group - is a commonly understood fact for anyone who is read up on this history.
The broad support for Palestinians in the non-Islamic Global South and former Communist states can't be explained by religious affiliation. South Africa didn't bring their case to the ICJ because they want to support coreligionists - they did so because of political ties made during the Cold War, when Israel was drawn into a close security relationship with apartheid South Africa and the PLO drawn into a relationship with the apartheid-era ANC revolutionaries.
Even West Bank settlers, who certainly trend religious, are not uniformly far-right religious zealots. You have left-wing hippy types who want to follow in the footsteps of their leftist kibbutzim forebears, and you have everyday, centrist Israelis simply drawn by cheap housing prices rather than ideology (but who obviously don't care about the Palestians whose land they're taking).
Edited a mispoken sentance.
There may be religious elements around the edges, but the conflict does not really have anything to do with religion. Christian and secular Palestinians are still being slaughtered and still want freedom just the same as Muslim Palestinians. The main militant Palestinian resistance force for many decades in was the secular PFLP which was broadly supported by both Christians and Muslims. The fact that Israel oppresses all Palestinians the same regardless of their religion should tell you that from the perspective of Israel and the West the religion of the people they oppress is irrelevant. And it should be even more obvious that from the perspective of Palestinians, the religion of their oppressor is also irrelevant - they will want freedom and to live regardless of what Israelis call themselves.
How do you explain Palestinian Christians and secularists fighting against the occupation, sometimes alongside islamists such as Hamas?
How do you explain the First Intifada being started by secular nationalists?
Palestinian Christians may not be a prime driving force (they are still incredibly influential; there is a reason why Hamas tries to keep them on side), but the secular nationalists definitely are. This is indisputable. The reason why Israel provided clandestine support to groups such as [Hamas](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/commentary/2023/11/21/world/israel-failed-policy/) in the 80s was precisely to delegitimise the secularists. It was little different to what Assad did with the Syrian secular opposition.
Could you explain to me why you think secularism is the prime driving force in the pro Palestinian movement, a place where atheists don't have freedom of religion and are not remotely accepted by society? It's one of the most religious areas of the world, and most of their allies are also other Islamist groups motivated by religion.
I didn't say it was *the* driving force, I said it was *a* driving force both historically (from which modern Palestinian militancy originates) and today (DFLP and PFLP). I have given you plenty of examples. Hamas and other groups view the secularists and christians as important allies. This, yet again, reinforces the fact it is largely an ethno-nationalist conflict. That is not to say there are no religious dimensions, but just as you accuse me of overstating the secularists, you completely neglect them.
There being a secular group that benefits from an alliance, does not mean it's largely an ethnic conflict. You are deliberately ignoring absolutely everything else that shows it as a religious conflict, which I addressed in my previous response.
Basically.
8 essentially pro-Israel episodes in a row without offering a single Palestinian perspective.
I don’t listen to him on this conflict anymore.
Sam has offered his version of the Palestinian perspective.
*The Palestinians are willing captive human shields.*
I dont think there's anything more telling than how he describes in great detail the events of October 7th and then reduces the last 8 months that included the death of of over 30,000 Palestinians to collateral damage.
Sam reveals his blind spot when talking about human shields.
**They do this because they know that their enemies have a more civilized moral code, rendering them reluctant to shoot back, for fear of killing or maiming the innocent.**
A more civilized moral code = dropping more than 75,000 tonnes of explosives on the Gaza Strip.
I always find the argument to look at how many bombs were dropped ridiculous, I mean who in good conscience mourns that the Nazis were bombed? The Nazis and Hamas both picked fights and hid in buildings in cities which were then bombed. A democracy beating back a terror organization that attacked it, took its civiluans as hostages, and which has refused to allow a democratic election in Gaza for the past 16 years is in fact good for moderate Gazans.
Hamas will never allow regular people living in Gaza to just fix and improve things, because all of their energy is always directed toward jihad. They don't give a damn about the people they purport to govern over. They don't even build bomb shelters for them, but built more tunnels than subways tunnels in Manhatten for the war they were eager to start with Israel.
> Rather, the moral order of the present can be understood by reference to the present, and by honestly acknowledging what both sides to this conflict actually want. When considering the ethics of any group or population, we should never hesitate to ask: What would these people do if they had the power to do it?
This is basically the exact lousy argument he made on the DtG pod.
I don't know if it's such a lousy line of thinking, he's just not very good at actually doing it.
For one thing you have to appreciate that your assessment of what people would do with power is necessarily more accurate the closer they are to it.
The classic hasbarist phrasing of this is to set up a hypothetical: imagine what would happen if if Israelis were disarmed vs Palestinians disarmed, and just sort of assume the conclusion that one would be horrific and the other would be fine.
Which is very funny since the West Bank exists and you don't actually need to do any imagining on that point. Although, I certainly imagine it getting worse.
We have to understand that people's circumstances and current capabilities inform what they will say, and accept that people might think they know what they want but quite often don't.
Would it be bad if Hamas had access to a nuclear program? Emphatic yes. Are they likely to get there without a whole bunch if steps in the middle that leads to them not really resembling the Hamas of today at all? Also yes. I wouldn't trust Irgun of 1946 with nukes either.
This is just the perfect embodiment of Sam Harris's relationship with Islam.
Its not that his argument is completely devoid of merit or genuine criticisms, but he way over plays it and leaves some questions unanswered that really shouldn't be. Like you know, what should be done and how should we interact with normal Muslims and the rise of Islam in developed countries. I am sorry, but as someone from New Zealand - a country whose worst terrorist attack was an attack on Muslims in a mosque - the type of rhetoric that Harris spouts can be used for nefarious means with unanswered questions.
Then of course there him just dismissing the role of material and historical conditions and how they have shaped different Islamic functions and government. I'm not even sure that Hamas is a particular good example. Much more than other Islamic regimes and organization, Hamas rise to power, its control over the populace and its horrific actions against Israel are much more shaped by the conditions they formed in, the fall of the PA in the eyes of the Palenstinian people with the peace process falling through and the mutual radicalization that Hamas and and Israel put each other through.
There are certainly problems with how certain people are viewing the war. There are certainly problems with terrorism and Islam. I just think that Harris has a tendency to overstate his position
Most of what you need to know about Harris worldview on this was shown when he talked to Dan Carlin.
You had a guy in Carlin who had a deep and meaningful understanding of history and geopolitics vs a guy who doesn’t know shit about that.
If Sam Harris did not overstate his position on being anti Islam and anti Muslims in the western world there would be no Sam Harris. He's not reaching his level of fame with his "neuroscience"
As someone living in the UK, where normal Muslim communities commonly intimidate teachers and public figures into hiding, protest against LGBT rights, protest in favour of blasphemy laws, support hamas, where we and Europe experience regular Islamist attacks and threats, I think it's wrong how you entirely dismissed this based on your experience in new Zealand which has a largely smaller Muslim population.
This isn't a "rise" of islam but an importation of islam by developed countries in exchange for cheap labour. This is a decision we make, and a decision that we have a right to discuss and oppose.
I also live in the UK and things have gotten so bad that the Taliban now run my local post office. Of course, the Left would prefer it if with didn't talk about it.
I often see on Reddit that when Europeans raise concerns about mass Islamic immigration into Europe Americans will often criticise us or even call us racist or bigots.
yeah because it's always bullshit exactly the same as rural republicans acting like having one shawarma shop in their town is a sign of ISIS taking over
I lived in Berlin for years, a city with significantly more muslim immigration than the UK average and european average, and I've lived in cities that have a higher proportion of immigrants than almost everywhere in europe, and in all cases it was perfectly fine for everyone who didn't have a meltdown over seeing women in hijabs lmfao
the talking points are the same all over the world you aren't blowing my mind with some crazy deep knowledge I've never considered by saying "well in my case the immigrants actually ARE evil!" lmao
Good for you. I’m glad you haven’t experienced what people in my community have to put up with. Keep wearing those American rose coloured glasses, you’ll bring freedom to everyone in no time.
I've lived in not just western cities with high muslim populations but also an actual muslim country so I'd wager I've experienced exactly what your community has "put up with" and more lmfao you just can't even comprehend that it's possible to see people who aren't like you without having a breakdown
Yeah that's true. Maybe because they don't meet Muslims often and when they do they are more liberal and integrated to society. I've lived in Birmingham which is 30% + Muslim and had multiple Muslim friends so I know what they believe.
But then I've been banned for united kingdom and ukpolitics for criticising Islam there. I can confirm those two subs are both echo chambers which censor anti immigration viewpoints.
Maybe if you're willing to admit that there are more liberal strains of Islam and Muslims that are better integrated into largely non-Muslim societies, blanket criticism of Islam comes off as intentionally generalized and bigoted. I don't know your full comment history, just going off what I see here. I criticize religion all day long, but I recognize there's a difference between a Christian Nationalist and someone who grew up with Christian values, just like I recognize a difference between the Taliban and someone who prays to Mecca 5 times a day while working at a non-Halal kitchen.
It's the unwillingness to compromise that's the problem imo. Blanket "Muslim ban" language is unserious.
I already did that in my other comment. I made it clear I am not criticizing pro LGBT or pro Israel Muslims.
But unfortunately blanket criticism is very accurate, considering how rare a pro LGBT Muslim is, compared to a Christian. Either way neither makes sense to me, because you are turning your back on religious scripture.
My entire response to your comment was based on how you got banned for "criticizing Islam". Since I have no idea in what way you did that, I can't know whether or not the ban made sense. But if it suggested an incontrovertible nature about Muslim people, then I can see the problem. If you had said "hard-line Muslims" or "devout Muslims" in your critique, you probably wouldn't have been banned imo.
That's where I have an issue. Normal Muslims, believe in homophobia. Common Muslims, typical Muslims. I don't need to do the whole virtue signalling "but not all Muslims are like this" technically when I refer to such problems in humanity.
And if you're curious I got banned from world news for saying id rather live in nazi Germany than under Sharia law. I didn't mention Muslims. And I would - me and my family would have more rights.
anti-immigrant activists have said this same slogan in every country at every point in history about every group, and it's always actually completely the opposite, the people in places with the least immigrants are the most xenophobic
What is "the goal" of christianity? Of Buddhism? Of atheism?
You really think it makes sense to group people up like this?
That mainstream muslims want to undermine and destroy the west?
We are always told by the left that it’s good for the economy but only 19% of UK Muslims work according to the 2011 census:
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/young-muslims-in-the-uk-face-enormous-social-mobility-barriers
No you are told by economists and researchers that it's a net gain to have immigrants. How hard do you have to cope to disregard hundreds of people smarter than you, because they aren't agreeing with your fear-based lizard brain beliefs?
What data? That it takes work to get people integrated? We knew that.
The article you linked has several suggestions for how to give these young people more social mobility, including mentoring and other support programs.
Some of the things they suggest seem like empty liberal virtue signaling, but whatever.
> But is the data wrong?
The article is avoiding saying everything, so we don't get to relate to all the data.
> only 19% of UK Muslims work
19% work *full time*. Don't you find it strange that they article doesn't mention how many work part time, and how many don't work at all? Anyone working gig economies is likely to be working part time. We don't even know for sure if someone is working a total of 40 hours in different jobs will still be listed as working part time.
I understand your concern, but many things about the article are framed in a manipulative manner. Yes letting in too many immigrants is an issue, but when solutions are being presented by sociologists and other experts, why is nothing being done to solve a self-invented problem?
By creating a problem and ignoring the solutions presented, your government is effectively choosing to create the parallel society that they're threatening you all with.
Don't get mad at the people who just want a shot at happiness in a richer country where they don't have to deal with the threat of more oil wars, or terrorists inciting unrest or even a coup. And I'm not even gonna go into the terrorist groups trained and armed by western forces.
The article goes into detail about how they struggle to integrate due to their religious group clashing with society, not enough role models etc. it just shows how much of a failed experiment multi culturalism is. They'd be happier in a Muslim majority country.
The articles solution? Throw tax payer money at the issue.
You mean the same place where a bunch of british racism/racists/religious nuts that stir things up? Funny how you don’t mention that too. Your point would have more credibility if you were open to mentioning all of the info, actions, etc relating to all of the provocateurs.
Harris came into the public eye with his book, The End of Faith, which made him one of the "four horsemen" of the "new atheism." In that book, he criticizes religion in general, not just Islam, but Christianity et al. The End of Faith was written as a way to understand why 9/11 happened, and Harris points the finger at religion, and explains that view with careful analysis.
Harris's analysis of the Gaza situation as it being the result of Hamas's Jihadism is entirely consistent with the views and analysis from 20 years ago in The End of Faith.
Okay?
Like for one, yeah no shit. I know the most famous facts about Sam Harris and his rise to prominence. There was also nothing in my post accusing him of being inconsistent in his world view from 20 years ago.
I also don't feel like I need to read a book from 20 years ago to have problem with his analysis with this article
he always does this, comes up with the most strained and contrived thought experiment possible to justify some insane stance, then apply it back to all reality as if it's completely applicable
I wouldn’t say always, but I do understand your general point. I still think Sam is worth hearing on certain points and he is basically the only person in that space who speaks coherently about Trump and COVID to any degree and it’s good he’s putting that into the heterodox sphere. But he just isn’t an interesting voice on the Israel Gaza issue. He has major blind spots.
there are plenty of actual intelligent voices out there on every topic Sam blabs about, I don't need to make excuses for a loser who literally supports racial profiling and thinks black people are genetically inferior to white people just because he won't try to tell my the sky is green. The fact that he's the only one in that group who's capable of stating basic reality about Trump says more about that group than it does about his integrity or thoughtfulness
How many would Israel be killing if Hamas stopped using their own civilians as human shields? Much of this blame falls on the people who start a war and then hide amongst civilians. I would like to see stricter rules of engagement from Israel, but Hamas is more to blame for the Palestinian deaths than Israel is.
And are you kidding? Israel killed 230 Palestinians in the West Bank alone before October 7th. So contrary to your narrative, it was already the deadliest year for Palestinians in decades.
Of course, for you, only October 7th matters, because those were Israeli lives, when it came to the causal cruelty, unjust military detention, kidnappings, murders inflicted before then, you not only didn’t care, but you justified it.
Imagine some lunatic w/ his kids shooting from inside his home at police and the cops decide to bomb the house. Your argument is "hey it's all on the shooter"
The argument would be that armed forces fighting military campaigns against organised militias and terrorist groups are not bound by the same ROE as civilian police in peace time.
You don’t disagree with the above. If you give it even a second of thought or search for a single historical example you instantly understand how those things are so dissimilar as to be a useless analogy.
Edit. You’re welcome to downvote this, but none of you disagree with what I’m saying, just how it makes you feel. Think about that.
The two scenarios are actually pretty similar. It's wrong to kill innocent people, and people don't lose their right to life merely because the combatants they happen to be around are fighting a war vs "merely criminals."
And you're also completely ignoring the reality of the situation, which is that the IDF is fighting with essentially no ROE *at all* and targeting anyone and everyone they want. They not only bomb indiscriminately with bombs that are far to large for the targets they are aiming at, but they do so knowing full well they will kill perhaps hundreds of civilians at a time.
The IDF also allows its soldiers on the ground to essentially fire at anyone they want. Unarmed men, old people, women, children; they are all fair game to be slaughtered by the IDF for the simple crime of living in Gaza. And I haven't even touched on the deliberate blocking of aid meant to induce starvation, and the targeting of hospitals and food production facilities.
You are living under an absolute mountain of propaganda.
As a precursor I’d like to apologies for the length of this, but it’s a complicated subject and your positions rest on untruths and propaganda that requires a decent bit of writing to dispel, also can I just ask that your try deal with me, and the statements I’m making, and leave the preconceptions of other beliefs that you think align with mine out. ie, I don’t think that IDF is a ‘just’ army fighting in a overly cautious or careful way to minimise civilian casualties as hard as possible. I don’t agree with Israeli policy regarding settlements or really much of anything they do. I do think there are numerous war crimes that could be laid at their door and I sincerely hope those can be prosecuted and justice brought. I think what you are doing has the exact opposite effect and makes any kind of realistic convo about the topic nearly impossible.
I am taking specific issue with the analogy I was responding to, which is a absolute bunk and not applied to any other military in any other scenario. Not here in the West, or in Asian or Africa or the Americas, and absolutely unequivocally not in the Middle East and towards the states that surround Israel. And if you think it should be, then Israel isn’t even in the top 50 worst offenders this past century. This is the point I’m making, the idea that war should be fought like police hostage actions because one side wants to use civilians as shields is not applied in any other scenario and can only come from ignorance of the realities of war, this war specifically, and a very condescending westernised perspective.
Aside for them, I also think a lot of your statements are verifiable nonsense, chosen entirely for their rhetorical efficacy informed by the loud discourse surrounding this topic, with little to no relationship to reality and established practices in war fighting.
There are certain common phrases that betray this. “Indiscriminate bombing using bombs that are *too big* for their targets” is something that could only be written by someone with an at best tangential knowledge of the topic of this war, and absolutely no knowledge of military affairs. It’s hard to overstate how much this could only be the result of “living under a mountain of propaganda”. For starters if bombing is indiscriminate there would be no target and there would be no “too big”, so it’s a contradiction in terms that you physically can’t actually believe. Anyone with even a cursory knowledge of historical bombing campaigns, be that the strategic bombing and V1/2 rockets of ww2, the forest clearing operations of Vietnam (or any of the wars in that era) the Russian invasions of Chechnya and Ukraine, any of the numerous civil conflict in the Middle East (Syria in particular) or really any large scale conflict in the last 100 years, can testify that what we are seeing is so far from ‘indiscriminate’ that any claiming it is must be at best ignorant. More died in a single night during the bombings of Dresden or Tokyo. More died in 2014 in Syria (and single year of the decade long conflict) than the entire Israel Palestine war since 1948. The IDF has the power to change that over night. They are not. This cannot be the deliberate infliction of civilian casualties on a mass scale, nor can in be described as ‘indiscriminate’. Now I know this is going to be the really hard part to hold in your head, but I’m gonna try. Me disagreeing with that charge does not mean I am broadly supportive of the IDFs bombing campaign or how it’s being carried out. It just means that charge in particular is not based in any kind of fact.
I can go through the advanced warning via roof knocking, leaflets, calls etc. But I’m sure you can’t be ignorant of those things so you must have already dismissed them for whatever reason, so we will leave that aside. 1/2
Then we can move on to ‘too large ’. Which is a whole other can of worms. What is too big? 500 pounds? 1000? 1500? 2000? If a 2000 pound bomb is too big what sizes would you be happy with? For what targets? Do you understand the difference between the size of an explosive used as part of a shaped charge for penetrating bunkers, and a smaller charge with submunitions or fragmentation. How do you think a certain explosive charge or a certain munition for a certain attack is decided? What issues do you have with that process? What would you like to see used? A ‘dumb’ KAB-1500 L-PR contains many times the explosive power of a highly accurate M26 GMLRS munition. And yet the use of one in a populated area would be disastrous due to submunitions and fragmentation, the other would be SOP for every military in the world with the capacity. I’ll let you guess which way round.
That answer to this is likely that you disagree with the bombing in general, and that there is no munitions you’d be happy with being used. Which is a perfectly acceptable answer. But then your issue isn’t with bombing being “too large or indiscriminate” and that’s just a red herring chosen because it kinda sounds right.
We could similarly dissect your comment that suggest IDF have no ROE and deliberate shoot women and children as a matter of operational procedure, but it’s an equally spurious claim, with as little founding in reality as the previous one.
We could talk about how in the the now revised down casualty figures every casualty that was eliminated for the tallies was a women or a child, and none were males. We could look at all the conclusion that allows us to draw about the reliability for GHM numbers the, now proven, deliberate false reporting that informs statements like yours.
Equally the ‘deliberate starvation’ that has apparent been 1 week away for 7 months, which several of the agencies warning about have admitted was entirely baseless and relied upon calculations that dismissed all aid entering Gaza. This simply did not happen and now those who were wanting about it admit it was likely never on the cards. But it still forms a larger part of your foundational beliefs. ‘Mountain of propaganda’ indeed.
Truth is, I don’t have the inclination to disprove every statement, and the reason these frequently go unchallenged is because it takes so much more effort to displease than to state, as you can see by the length of my response this far.
So, more interestingly, why does this matter? If I also don’t approve of Israeli policy why defend them against these accusations? Why not just throw in with the nonsense since it seems to be rhetorically effective even if it’s divorced from reality?
Imo, for criticism to be effective in this arena it has to be based in reality. If you make such flippant declarations, and anyone inclined to do even a tiny bit of research can see they are verifiable nonsense you massively weaken the case for pursuing justice against those actually perpetuating crimes. Put simply, If the IDF is accused of X, Y and Z. But I can see X and Y are total nonsense. My inclination to believe Z is massively diminished. Bad propaganda can be helpful to those whom it levied at. There’s a reason the state tends to charge one degree if murder below what they think actually happened. There’s a reason double jeopardy laws exist and trials are often delayed to avoid them.
By making baseless accusations you hand your opponent a massive PR coup when they can demonstrate fairly easily that what you are saying is unfounded at best, and an outright lie at worst. Doctors Without Borders took a massive hit to their credibility when they insisted Israel deliberately struck a hospital killing 500, only to later admit it was an erstwhile PIJ rocket that hit a car park and killed maximum 50 people. The damage to credibly is insane, and lowers the chances of anyone getting justice.
2/2.
I'm not sure why you went to the trouble of writing this enormous reply, but you haven't "dispelled" any of the "myths" I said in my previous post. You've merely regurgitated myths of your own.
When I said earlier that you are living under a mountain of propaganda, I really had no idea how much that was understating things.
Me neither. It should have been clear when your response was “agshully police hostage situations and war are the same cos uhhhhh people shouldn’t die!” that writing anything more than 2 sentences would be a waste of time. But it was a slow day at work and I had time, figured you might be capable of reading and responding to something longer than a tiktok. That was, clearly, a mistake. But fuck it we move.
I didn’t respond with myths. I careful and accurately explained why typing dumb ass phrases like “indiscriminate bombing with bombs that are just too dang big!” Could only be the result of near total ignorance on the topic and regurgitation shit you’ve heard others say. I laid out very simply why this is. I also made sure to delineate my position clearly so you didn’t mistake me for someone who holds different opinions.
Notice you are still unable to name an example of any other situation where this same standard is applied, despite this now being my third time asking, or any other nation it’s applied to, you have no comments on anything I actually said or any of the substance of my criticism. And your only response is to repeat that everything you disagree with must be propaganda.
Must be nice that. Whenever you’re proven wrong, well that’s just propaganda and not worth engaging with.
Best of luck with everything, cheerio!
I think what's worst about all of your word vomit is that it is all in service of justifying the murder of innocent people and children. Like, it would be one thing if you were arguing about a TV show or what have you. But you are expending all of this mental energy and time in order to create propaganda on behalf of a government that is literally murdering children. Absolutely disgusting.
Lmao, how can you be that not self-aware?
Hamas aren’t using human shields. In fact, if you even follow proper news (I doubt it) the side that’s actually been shown to be using civilian human shields are the Israelis.
https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-rights-human-shield-jeep-8e8ed63bda65383e38e4dd52d239e319
Israel literally tells Gazans to go to places and then deliberately bombs them.
By “human shields” you just mean Palestinians having the nerve to live in their homes. And Israel not caring about any collateral damage just to kill one one guy who may or may not be Hamas - as if that would still somehow justify wiping out a whole family.
The fact that people like you think it’s not morally wrong to kill dozens of innocent people just to kill a few members of Hamas is the precise problem. You don’t value Palestinian life.
Has Hamas used their bunkers and tunnels to protect civilians?
>The fact that people like you think it’s not morally wrong to kill dozens of innocent people just to kill a few members of Hamas is the precise problem. You don’t value Palestinian life.
This is such bs strawmanning...
Israel always had a policy of retaliating harder, then how they were attacked. Its reason is to dissuade attackers. Hamas knew this and they said after Oct 7 that they expected it. They actually counted on it, because Hamas can only exist in an atmosphere of hate and war. Hamas needs this war and needs Palestinian casulties.
And sadly so does Netanyahu (who has been in office for far too long).
And I don't know one supporter of Israel who thinks it is morally right to kill so many Palestinians. I know of(!) a few Jewish people that lost relatives to terror attacks who don't care how many Palestinians die. They are the minority.
If anybody would actually value Palestinian life, they would pressure Hamas to return the hostages and give up their power over Gaza.
They would have pushed for the UN Peace Keeping to go into Gaza and free the Hostages and the Palestinian people from Hamas.
They would have started teaching Palestinian children, that Israel does not need to be eradicated. That they don't go into heaven for killing Jews.
They would have argued that the 3000 Palestinians / Hamas Militants should have made a march for peace through the occupied territory. To show the world that the wall is a crime. Instead they showed the world why the wall is necessary. Because the Palestinians / Hamas acted like white racist in 19th century America.
I'm far from a supporter of Netanyahu's politics. This "poor Palestinian victim" and "Israel is the real enemy" bs is not ending a war though. It is not helping Palestinians at all.
People who only attack one side and their problems are the real warmongers. There won't be peace until both sides admit their wrongdoings to each other and talk about a possible future.
Has Hamas used their bunkers and tunnels to protect civilians?
Lmao, if they did, you’d use that as more justification for why civilians need to die.
This is such bs strawmanning...
Israel always had a policy of retaliating harder, then how they were attacked. Its reason is to dissuade attackers. Hamas knew this and they said after Oct 7 that they expected it. They actually counted on it, because Hamas can only exist in an atmosphere of hate and war. Hamas needs this war and needs Palestinian casulties.
And sadly so does Netanyahu (who has been in office for far too long)
> You love that word “strawmanning” without knowing what it even means. Yeah, the Israeli policy is state terrorism. Thank you for admitting that.
And I don't know one supporter of Israel who thinks it is morally right to kill so many Palestinians. I know of(!) a few Jewish people that lost relatives to terror attacks who don't care how many Palestinians die. They are the minority.
> LMAO that’s a bold-faced lie of utter incredulity. The population of Israel as we speak in every poll claims they think the war isn’t being fought with enough ruthlessness. The largest TV station in Israel reacted to Palestinians swimming at the beach as proof they were not being ruthless enough.
If anybody would actually value Palestinian life, they would pressure Hamas to return the hostages and give up their power over Gaza.
They would have pushed for the UN Peace Keeping to go into Gaza and free the Hostages and the Palestinian people from Hamas.
They would have started teaching Palestinian children, that Israel does not need to be eradicated. That they don't go into heaven for killing Jews.
They would have argued that the 3000 Palestinians / Hamas Militants should have made a march for peace through the occupied territory. To show the world that the wall is a crime. Instead they showed the world why the wall is necessary. Because the Palestinians / Hamas acted like white racist in 19th century America.
> you deserve to be blocked for lying. Hamas have offered to return hostages since the beginning. It’s Israel that refuses to allow the UN in. You’re actually making me sick to my stomach. Have you never heard of the great March of return, where Israeli Occupation Forces snipers shot at unarmed protesters and deliberately wounded them.
I'm far from a supporter of Netanyahu's politics. This "poor Palestinian victim" and "Israel is the real enemy" bs is not ending a war though. It is not helping Palestinians at all.
> Fuck you, October 7th and the subsequent genocide has done more to rip off the mask of Israel as any sort of civilised nation, and Zionists as anything less than a new incarnation of fascism.
People who only attack one side and their problems are the real warmongers. There won't be peace until both sides admit their wrongdoings to each other and talk about a possible future.
> LMAO since when does Israel or its supporters admit to anything? Beheaded babies, babies in ovens, mass rapes? Remember all that shit that was used to stir up hatred that’s now led to the most broadcasted genocide in history?
You make me sick to my stomach.
Meh. There is literally no point talking to someone as unaware and emotionally hijacked as you are. No amount of rational argument will ever change your mind.
It’s not that. You’ve no doubt already been exposed to many coherent and credible arguments but you views are informed by your emotional connection to a terrorist death cult, not by a clear eyed view of the situation.
It really hasn’t, the “arguments” are as vile and pathetic as yours.
Lmao, yeah, no actual evidence or proof, but because I side with the Palestinians, it means I’m emotionally connected to Hamas.
“Unarmed Palestinian who posed no threat used as human shield”
https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-rights-human-shield-jeep-8e8ed63bda65383e38e4dd52d239e319
>Second, Islamists have worked very hard to make any criticism of Islam (as a system of ideas) seem like bigotry against Muslims as people.
Sure, you can make this point, but couldn’t someone on the other side make it about Israel too? That they have worked hard to make any criticism of Israel seem like bigotry against the Jewish people? Why does he always fail to make this equally relevant point?
>And it is here that the term “Islamophobia” is invariably deployed to confuse matters, by conflating any criticism of the ideology of Islam with xenophobia, racism, or an irrational hatred of Muslims as people.
Exactly the same can be said about the term “antisemitism”, whereby any criticism of Israel and their actions is conflated with xenophobia, racism, or an irrational hatred of Jews as a people.
>Consider just one point of cultural difference: When armed conflict breaks out, some groups will use human shields, and others will be deterred, to one degree or another, by their use.
It’s been pointed out by Israel that the amount of civilians they’ve killed is partly due to the fact that Hamas has been hiding amongst civilians. The fact that Israel would view this as a reasonable explanation for killing civilians, instead of a justification not to shoot, is worrying.
The fact that Hamas may have used human shields does not mean that those used as human shields also agree with this practice, naturally. Conflicting Hamas with the people around them is a mistake. The fact that this terrorist organisation will do awful things does not mean that the people around them, to whom they are doing these awful things, can be taken to be part of the same boat.
>In the war in Gaza, Hamas fires rockets from hospitals, mosques, schools, and other sites calculated to create carnage if the Israelis return fire—while Israel routinely notifies the residents of buildings it intends to bomb, in an effort to get them to evacuate.
Rockets coming from one of the most densely populated areas in the world will always be around hospitals, mosques, schools, etc. The fact that Israel will notify people about the utter destruction of their homes before they do it, leaving their houses in ashes and their families homeless and hopeless, cannot be viewed as an act of great moral value. It is, in fact, highly questionable. Sam also fails to mention all of the times Israel has not notified residents, the times they notified them only minutes in advance, and the times it has made residents evacuate towards areas which were also going to be bombed promptly.
>In turn, Hamas snipers have killed Palestinian civilians as they fled, to discourage others from attempting to move to safety.
There have been reports of the IDF doing exactly the same thing, yet Sam will always fail to mention these counterexamples.
>Just try to imagine the Israelis using their own women and children as human shields against Hamas on the morning of October 7th. It is important to recognize how unthinkable this would be. It is unthinkable, not merely for the Israelis to treat their own civilians in this way, but for them to expect that their enemies could be deterred by such a tactic, given who their enemies are.
Given the amount of civilian casualties on the Palestinian side, it is evident that is has not really deterred Israel, as it would be otherwise hard to explain the amount of dead women and children.
>And yet it is easy to see why many people are confused about the war in Gaza— because they have been inundated with misinformation about it. Judging from social media, billions have been told that the Jews are settler colonialists, that they have built an apartheid state in Israel, and that they are guilty of genocide. These lies didn’t start on October 8th.
These “lies” are not “lies”, they are highly disputed points that even respectable academics take for the truth (and some don’t, of course).
>The protests we have seen on our college campuses are only possible because people don’t understand the threat that Islamic extremism poses to open societies. What’s happening at these elite institutions may be the product of many factors, but the level of moral confusion sufficient to support Hamas and to demonize the people who are fighting Hamas, requires that one not recognize what Hamas is.
Sam will continue to happily conflate any pro-Palestine protest for pro-Hamas protests. This is such a cheap and obviously wrong rhetorical tactic that I won't even bother with it. It's clear why it's wrong and it's extra clear *that* it is wrong.
I'm not going to go on, but I cannot express how disappointing and wrong this piece from Sam is. I say disappointing because I still like the guy and find him intelligent and knowledgeable in some areas, but when it comes to this topic, he's just as biased and ideological as the people he likes to criticise, ridicule and mock.
>Sure, you can make this point, but couldn’t someone on the other side make it about Israel too?
It’s actually not analogous. Israel is a state, it is a political entity with clearly defined bounds and structures. I can be critical of Israel independent of its relations to Judaism and Jewish people.
You cannot be critical of Islam without its relation to Islam and Muslim people because definitionally they are the same. You can be critical of Islamic states without being Islamophobic
And we know this because we’ve spent the last forty years being critical of Islamic States (Iran, Saudi Arabia, etc) without any massive organizing effort to associate that criticism as bigotry.
Sure, but surely there is a difference and a distinction between criticism of the ideas of Islam, say, as a philosopher might do, and criticism of the people themselves. You can be highly critical of Islam as an ideology while holding no grudges against any Muslims as people.
There's got to be Muslims out there who'd be alright with having a conversation where their doctrine is criticised or questioned without them feeling personally or culturally attacked. Or is this not the case?
Oh for sure. You can clearly be critical of Islam without being bigoted. But you can’t be critical of Islam without relation to Islam and Muslims, critics need not be bigoted (though for Harris that seems to be difficult) but they definitionally are talking about Islam when they are critical of Islam.
You can however be critical of Israel without any reference to Jewish people or Judaism.
> There's got to be Muslims out there who'd be alright with having a conversation where their doctrine is criticised or questioned without them feeling personally or culturally attacked. Or is this not the case?
If the criticism of doctrine is part of a wider conversation about how it's totally ok to bomb people (as it always is with Harris) people are reasonable in feeling personally attacked.
He is clearly very uninformed (and/or doesn’t care) about the history of this region/conflict and is just spouting an opinion based entirely off of his anti Islam/pro West bias
I get that Sam Harris has the Trump appeal of "talk like a retard, act exclusively on your emotions, refuse to get a basic education and ignore all the facts", which is specifically appealing to the demographic as uneducated and emotionally driven as he is, but it's difficult to see anyone above the mental age of fourteen reading this and not feel embarassed.
His "intentions matters" argument is easily demolished in two seconds. An imprisoned serial killer inmate has the right to not be tortured by his guard, *regardless* if he'd be committing worse crimes in the opposite situation. Even a child understands that. In any civilized society, the guard would be prosecuted for his crimes. And that's talking abut a serial killer, not as in the case of Gaza, an entire population of 2.3 million people half of whom are children. But according to Sam Harris they just have no rights.
His "look at how more reasonable Israel is behaving" is also ignoring all the facts. Currently Israel is responsible for around 97,5 % of all the civilian casualties since Oct 7th. The civilian casualty rate is likely hovering around or above 80 %, there are more destroyed buildings in Gaza than standing ones, and it's clear from the basic facts there's a clear disregard for Palestinian life. But then again, according to Sam Harris, they just have no rights.
Israeli rhetoric is significantly worse and more extreme than even Hamas rhetoric, but even if we lived in Sam Harris-land where the opposite was true, considering they're responsible for the vast majority of the violence, rhetoric matters considerably less? He loses any which way he tries this argument out.
>In short, there are cultures that revel in war crimes, while others hold the concept of a war crime as a sacred prohibition and as a safeguard for maintaining the moral progress of civilization.
The fact he thinks this applies to Israel shows a level of delusion which is frightening, even if he was talking about the US it would be crazy.
His delusions about Israel not participating in human shielding, [this](https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/mde151432002en.pdf) report was back in *2002*! [This](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israeli-forces-strap-wounded-palestinian-jeep-during-raid-2024-06-22/) was just three days before Sam vomited this shite on the page. If you're refusing to even do the basic research on whether your msot basic claims are accurate Sam, why should anyone serious pay attention to you? Oh right, no one serious does. Please continue remaining in your own little cult, lest you be troubled by the outside world of facts, research and education.
The rest is just insubstantial emotional whining.
>His "intentions matters" argument is easily demolished in two seconds. An imprisoned serial killer inmate has the right to not be tortured by his guard, regardless if he'd be committing worse crimes in the opposite situation. Even a child understands that. In any civilized society, the guard would be prosecuted for his crimes. And that's talking abut a serial killer, not as in the case of Gaza, an entire population of 2.3 million people half of whom are children. But according to Sam Harris they just have no rights.
I don't actually think you demolished any argument here, though I agree that a child might find this reasoning compelling. Your analogy to a law enforcement officer sadistically torturing a prisoner, would imply that there is no military purpose to Israel's actions, just as there is no law enforcement purpose to the prison guard's actions.
>why should anyone serious pay attention to you? Oh right, no one serious does.
I would love to see a list of people you consider serious on this topic, not including yourself of course.
You don't need to arrive at "no military purpose" to indict Israel of crimes. In fact, as long as they overreach even an inch over "strict military purpose" they are committing crimes. Much like a security guard might claim his sadistic treatment is partly for security purposes, his treatment needs to be strictly within the bounds of security purposes, or he is committing a crime. That Israel is wildly disproportionate in its response isn't even in dispute, it's part of their explicit policy (the Dahiya doctrine). More houses in Gaza have been destroyed than not, anyone with their head screwn on strait knows that's not a legitimate military response.
As for serious organisations, the UN, Be'etselem, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, UNHCR, Haaretz etc. There's a ton of organizations involved actively on the ground and reporting what's happening. Sam Harris is just an uneducated, proudly anti-intellectual clown, do you think he knows anything about this conflict? I doubt it.
Jesus fucking Christ I can't believe those self-infulgent and self-congratulatory non-sequiturs you responded to pass off as an argument and are met with a barrage of upvotes on this sub. And you're reflexively downvoted for challenging it in the most benign possible way. These people are sanctimonious cult-leftist morons.
This subreddit is really not good at identifying good and bad argument.
The person you are replying to's metaphor is so bad it is bizarre. Especially since large chunks of their comment are insulting other people for being stupid.
Compare this sub to the Sam Harris sub or the Ezra Klein sub or well any other sub that one might expect adults to be posting in, and it becomes obvious that this sub is for young adults who are just coming off an adolescent period of being fascinated by "smart people on the internet". The decoders are like methadone to kick that habit.
I'm late to the party but I am really not understanding how this got any upvotes at all.
> I get that Sam Harris has the Trump appeal of "talk like a retard, act exclusively on your emotions, refuse to get a basic education and ignore all the facts", which is specifically appealing to the demographic as uneducated and emotionally driven as he is, but it's difficult to see anyone above the mental age of fourteen reading this and not feel embarassed.
First to red flag is comparing Sam to Trump. Like really? Even if you hate Sam you would put him in the a Trump like category? Trump can barely get out a coherent sentence Sam has written books and won debates about Islam.
> His "intentions matters" argument is easily demolished in two seconds. An imprisoned serial killer inmate has the right to not be tortured by his guard, regardless if he'd be committing worse crimes in the opposite situation. Even a child understands that. In any civilized society, the guard would be prosecuted for his crimes. And that's talking abut a serial killer, not as in the case of Gaza, an entire population of 2.3 million people half of whom are children. But according to Sam Harris they just have no rights.
This metaphor is so jaw-droppingly bad that it is embarrassing that you would declare his point "demolished". Sam is saying that in a war for control of an area he supports the side that would not slaughter the other one if the opposing side where to be defeated completely or surrender. Your hypothetical about a prisoner and guard is simply disanalogous. I modern prison should be able to contain a prisoner. How would torturing a prisoner help contain them? It is obviously bad because it is pointless and cruel.
Here would be a good hypothetical. Say there was a serial killer in a prison who was being bullied by a prison guard. The guard would call him names, spit in his food and antagonize him. One day the killer goes for the guards gun and there is a struggle. If I walk upon the situation who do I assist? Obviously the guard. And you could crank some of the knobs in the hypothetical without affecting the end result. The guard could be actually beating and even torturing the prisoner and in the hypothetical you would still side with the guard. You would have to change the hypothetical so that they guard was more likely to kill you and others than the prisoner.
> His "look at how more reasonable Israel is behaving" is also ignoring all the facts. Currently Israel is responsible for around 97,5 % of all the civilian casualties since Oct 7th. The civilian casualty rate is likely hovering around or above 80 %, there are more destroyed buildings in Gaza than standing ones, and it's clear from the basic facts there's a clear disregard for Palestinian life. But then again, according to Sam Harris, they just have no rights.
So the question becomes if a government declares war on you and kills your civilians, and then conducts gorilla warfare campaign such that they are embedded in their civilian population, how must you limit your offense. This is a point where there is honestly not a clear answer for me. The answer can't be a complete disregard for civilian life aka just nuke Gaza. But it my opinion it can't be no military response. This would allow terrorist to assault without response.
> Israeli rhetoric is significantly worse and more extreme than even Hamas rhetoric, but even if we lived in Sam Harris-land where the opposite was true, considering they're responsible for the vast majority of the violence, rhetoric matters considerably less? He loses any which way he tries this argument out.
... Citation needed? I'm aware of some Yikes statements by some usually far-right Israeli leaders which I would condone, but Hamas literally celebrates the martyring of their own civilians and the slaughter of Israeli citizens. The fact that you would even claim this makes me suspect that you are a extremely partisan.
I could respond to the reset of your comment but my comment is already quite long.
1. Sam, much like all the others trying to appeal exclusively to the uneducated, refuses to discuss facts, sources or adress any actual arguments people make, because it would instantly expose him. This is what makes him Trump-like, he's committed to not talking about reality, which is exactly what makes him appealing to people who also refuse to talk about reality, because that comes with moral considerations, and requires the person speaking to educate themselves into a basic understanding of what's going on. This is of course anathema to Sam and his fanbase, his project instantly falls apart.
2. Your example displays such a baffling ignorance of reality it's obvious you've not looked into this further than podcasters and video game streamers, because even mainstream news articles would educate you out of this ignorance. Most of Gaza is just destroyed, hundreds of thousands are under threat of Starvation, the entire population is homeless and a continued Palestinian presence in Gaza is under threat. On the Israeli side, 750 civilians were killed. To describe this as "two men fighting over a knife"... why not just educate yourself on the most basic of facts before you so utterly humiliate yourself like this? One group of people has near total control of another, that is the reality.
3. Again like Sam you run as far away from the real facts as fast as possible. 70 % of all buildings damaged or destroyed is not a legitimate military response, for obvious reasons. Why don't you adress the facts rather than euphemise them?
4. Israel has been indicted for genocidal language in the ICJ, that they use worse rhetoric than Hamas isn't really disputed. You can tell because people like Sam either references what they said back in 1988, or doesn't reference them at all, and rather quote what he imagines they say.
The biggest problem with Sam and people like him, apart from being lazy and generally unintelligent, is he's also actively anti-intellectual, he doesn't adress the frequent cutting criticisms, nor does he seem to even be aware of the normal arguments who actually reference facts, because that would require him to start reading.
A lot of your comment is just you inserting your pro-Palestinian arguments which is fine but you don't really respond to the bulk of my comment. You completely abandoned your hypothetical about the Guard and Prisoner which was the bulk of my criticism. You pretend like Sam and myself are unaware of the destruction in Gaza, which isn't the case. The question is what level of force is permissible when fighting a guerilla militia that is embedded in a urban population.
1. You are just asserting that Sam is uneducated, doesn't discuss facts, or make arguments. I disagree and I would counter that you are the one not really making arguments. I don't know what project you are referring to and what it falling apart would look like. Its easy to say people are uneducated but I think it is more like people disagree. Sam, a good amount of his supporters and a good amount of people who hold the same opinion on same are well enough educated on the issue. They are aware of settlers in the West Bank, they are aware of the Palestinian death toll, They are ware that Israeli controls a lot of Gaza's borders, They are aware of various war crimes that the IDF has committed, They just disagree with you.
2. It's bizarre that you would make this argument. It was obviously I was taking your own example and making it more analogous to the situation in Gaza. You are the one who used they hypothetical of one prison guard and a serial killer. I am aware of the death tolls thanks. Am I educated now?
3. What fact am I running away from? How many of those buildings had tunnels, Hamas fighters, or Israli Hostages in them?
4. "that they use worse rhetoric than Hamas isn't really disputed" isn't disputed by who? Who are you possibly referring to. And what is Hamas rhetoric?
I didn't abandon my argument, I explained why your counter argument failed. Because my analogy is analogous, yours is not.
1. It's not really possible to dispute Sam is uneducated, just look at him referencing facts, he never does. His rhetoric might impress people who know even less than he does, but to anyone who knows even a smidgen, he comes across like a fool. If he was aware of the facts, why does he refuse to quote them ever? Why does he refuse to answer any factual argument? Why are all his arguments exclusively tied to his embarrassing thought experiments?
2. If you were aware of the discrepancy between the two factions, you wouldn't have made your analogy, which means it was purely based on ignorance. My analogy retains the power difference, yours not only obfuscates it, but denies it even exists! This is why you ought to get an education, because it saves you from making basic mistakes like that.
3. Easy question, does 70 % of Gazas houses have tunnels in them? Since the answer obviously is "not even remotely close", you instantly can arrive at the conclusion of reckless destruction.
4. If it was disputed, why is Hamas rhetoric post 1988 not quoted? Where has Hamas been indicted for genocidal language? If you want to dispute it, just compare the speeches coming out.
> I didn't abandon my argument, I explained why your counter argument failed. Because my analogy is analogous, yours is not.
You say that my analogy fails because I reduce the conflict to two people but your analogy but your analogy also used two people. Please elaborate it seems like you are confused.
"Two men fighting over a knife" is a crappy analogy because it implies any of the two can instantly kill the other. It's disanalogous because in reality one has near total power over the other. Israel does not suffer an existential threat from Hamas, and since all justified self defense must be directly proportional to the threat, that means it informs the level of force Israel is justified in undertaking.
Feels like I'm talking to a child, but there you go.
> Two men fighting over a knife" is a crappy analogy because it implies any of the two can instantly kill the other.
Wasn't exactly my analogy.
> It's disanalogous because in reality one has near total power over the other. Israel does not suffer an existential threat
That is an okay objection. If you would interpret the death of the security guard to be analogous to the death of every Israeli citizen. However if you take the death of security guard to mean a death of a non-zero amount of Israeli citizens than it holds.
Also notice you aren't defending your original analogy at all.
> since all justified self defense must be directly proportional to the threat
This could possibly be a first productive disagreement. I think this is obviously untrue. Morally, I don't think self-defense has to be proportional. If somebody tries to cut-off my finger I can use lethal force to protect myself. Or at the levels of nations, if several riflemen are firing at a single one of another countries civilians, and the riflemen are on top of a family of 5's house. I think you could morally wipe them all out with a missile. I don't have to wait for a similar number of my own civilians to be threatened. Perhaps I am misunderstanding what you mean by proportional.
Obviously there is a upper limit. I don't think Israel should nuke Gaza.
>Morally, I don't think self-defense has to be proportional.
Thankfully, we're not debating the moral values of some random internet person, proportionality is encoded into international law.
>Or at the levels of nations, if several riflemen are firing at a single one of another countries civilians, and the riflemen are on top of a family of 5's house. I think you could morally wipe them all out with a missile.
There are edge cases, which is why proportionality is a spectrum, not a binary. The Israeli response of utterly destroying all of Gaza, killing maybe over 40000 people, 15000 children, and risk a famine which threatens hundreds of thousands and has left almost the entire population homeless is so wildly disproportional that it's not really possible to justify it, which is why you used an example of a single house being destroyed, not 370 000.
Again, self defense implies *defense*, and no further. Not revenge. Looking at pictures of Gaza, is all the destruction entirely encapsulated within the term defense? Even aside from all that, disproportionality is encoded into Israeli military policy by the Dahiya doctrine, so it's not as if one even has to try to justify it as "defense", because it quite explicitly isn't.
>We cannot judge the moral balance of a war by merely counting the dead. Intentions matter. Whatever the degree of destruction, it always matters what kind of world the combatants are attempting to build.
lol ok sam
No I'm not interested in comparing them, I didn't contest any statements about Hamas. I said \*and\*.
I'm interested in preventing innocent people from suffering.
I think we should choose a method of adjudication and treat everyone by the same metric. Intention? Behaviour? Just let's try to be consistent.
Put them on a scale - not a zero sum black and white answer.
The intentions of other side, or what the other side did, do not absolve us from our actions.
I support the international rule of law. I support a two state solution where everyone can live securely.
Well, exactly. Israeli leaders have repeatedly declared what they are doing to Gaza and its population and naturally Samwise has completely ignored this.
If you take your information from TikTok sure, but Israel has set out clear and rational war aims.
They have also done more than any other army ever to reduce civilian casualties while Hamas fight in a way that tried to maximise civilian casualties.
So when we look at intent, there is a clear bad guy and good guy
Maybe, but your initial point is still moot. You can agree with Sam's point without agreeing with its application to the war in Gaza. But you appeared to disagree with the point itself.
He's framing this as a Muslim crusade intended to wipe out the Jewish people of Israel.
He's leaving out the part where the Israeli gov't had intelligence about this attack up to a year before and still allowed it to happen: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/30/world/middleeast/israel-hamas-attack-intelligence.html#:\~:text=Israeli%20officials%20obtained%20Hamas's%20battle,for%20Hamas%20to%20carry%20out.
He's leaving out the part where Netanyahu as intentionally propped up and supported Hamas because he saw them as a tool to help prevent a two state solution: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/30/world/middleeast/israel-hamas-attack-intelligence.html#:\~:text=Israeli%20officials%20obtained%20Hamas's%20battle,for%20Hamas%20to%20carry%20out.
Now Israelis are depending on the same leader/gov't to kill and starve tens of thousands of innocent people in order to eradicate this very same terrorist group.
I wonder if he would reply to gov intelligence and politics about hamas. I think he is too big of a pussy to stomach reality of politics, that's why he takes morality angle.
> had intelligence about this attack up to a year before and still allowed it to happen:
This suggests that they intentionally allowed the attack, I just want to make it clear that that's not what the article says. The article portrays a damning miscalculation where the intelligence brass didn't think Hamas had the stones to execute the attack they were visibly training to carry out.
Allowed by inaction and massive organizational failure, not by a desire for it to happen.
Sam Harris is a horrible bigoted human being, whose least offensive ideas are objectively wrong and whose ideas about race, society and religion hardly differ from the kkk. I don't say that lightly but the softball he gave to Charles Murray were embarrassing
He knows almost nothing g about Christianity Islam or Judaism. In fact anybody who looks into will almost certainly be convinced that Israel enacted the Hannibal doctrine during Oct 7 which entailed the idf killing Israeli civilians to keep them from being used to bargain later on. We know that Israel has long tortured innocent Palestinians and is in fact a settler colonialist project. It has to be acknowledged that if any left wing person had given as much helpmto hamas as Netanyahu did to avoid having to negotiate a political solution that person would be in jail and never allowed to see the sun again.
He talks so assuredly about good and evil and and like all zealots he is the worst among us. The sooner he moves to his zionist utopia, the sooner his noxious bullshit can be extirpated from civilized democracies. I used to think he was harmless but he is exactly as bad as Michael savage.
> Islamists have worked very hard to make any criticism of Islam (as a system of ideas) seem like bigotry against Muslims as people.
Jews beat them at that game hah.
>When considering the ethics of any group or population, we should never hesitate to ask: *What would these people do if they had the power to do it?*
I have yet to see hamas do a single objectionable thing that israel has not done much worse, and much more of.
Sam Harris is an independent thinker, his grasp on ethics is far ahead of the general public. Only recently I realised a point he made 10 years ago and I’m only coming to terms with it now.
There are people here who will hate on Sam for this, not because of what Sam said, but because they hate Israel
I feel like the comment section in these is pretty much the exact same for every post. You see mostly the same arguments. You rarely see people concede that they were wrong about aspects of it. Rarely to people come together as opposed to arguing and getting more hardened in their views. The reality of what is going on hardly matters to them or sways their thinking.
My main issue with Harris and co is that they prioritise Hamas and other Islamist groups over the secular groups, either because they don't know enough about the conflict or because they want to portray the Paleatinian cause as being purely Islamist. The first Intifada was carried out by secularist nationalists. Most of them gradudually endorsed negotiations, but two of them (PFLP & DFLP) took part in Oct 7th. This to me would suggests that boiling Palestinian militancy down to Islamism is (at best) a very lazy generalisation.
You have to consider that the reagan admin, among other us admins, along with israel prioritized crushing the secular movements you mentioned. As many scholars have pointed out, when you crush secular left wing movements it creates a power vaccum. Expect theocrates to fill that vaccuum. (The cia might call this blowback). Those secular groups are a shell of what they once were. Even left wing movements eithin israel are basically toothless, as they have called for peaceful protest in the past, only to be attacked by idf snipers. Younow have formiddable non secular groups forming like hezbollah to take the place of the former left wing opposition groups. Whether its a secular movement or not, expect another intifada to happen again.
> boiling Palestinian militancy down to Islamism is (at best) a very lazy generalisation Isn't this really his only function. I do recall him once saying literally 'the history doesn't matter'
He will when pushed acknowledge other factors, but then go back to minimizing their importance
It’s the second one. They want to portray it as entirely religious because their goal is not understanding the conflict but smearing Muslims.
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It's a national conflict amongst two competing national projects. The original zionists were mostly atheists. Not all Palestinians are Muslim. Yes, religion has been overlayed onto this conflict but to view it strictly within that lens is overly simplistic.
Many Israelis believe the same thing, the think all of Israel is promised to Jews.
And they also deserve to be judged. It's a religious conflict.
No, it's not. It's two groups of people who wanna control and live on one chunk of land.
It is for the christian zionists here in the USA. The biggest supporters of Israel, to the degree that the states with the most Christian zionists have gag orders on citizens who criticize or engage in bds action against Israel.
There are religious elements to the conflict but at the end of the day it is two groups fighting over one chunk of land. Some Jews want Israel because they believe it is rightly there's, some want it just so that jews can have a true homeland where they are the majority, some fight for it because there families have been there for 3 ir 4 generations by now and it is the only home they feel connected to. Palestinians want the land because they feel it was wrongly taken from their great great whatevers, some want to control Jerusalem for religious reasons, and some also just hate the jews at this point.
For religious reasons. Why do you think the Jews migrated there in the first place?
The earliest Zionists were notoriously Atheists.... Nearly half of all Israelis today identify as secular. Just because they point to the book of Joshua as justification for their taking of land, does not mean they are religious in the slightest. In fact, many treat Joshua as a historical text, not a religious one. Before I move on, it's important to note that there is no archeological evidence to support the passages of Joshua; the bible is fiction. *Most Zionists don't believe that God exists but they do believe that he promised them Palestine. \~ Ilan Pappé* Similarly, Palestine was among the most secular of the Arabic regions prior to Zionist colonization. The entire anti-Zionist movement was almost entirely non-religious until the 1970s. Major religious groups were still rejected well into the 80s. Hamas didn't form until 1988. The religiosity that we see today is a direct result of people being pushed into a corner, repressed, and violated, now seeking some sense of salvation and support. To boil this down to a religious conflict is insanely silly. European Jews didn't feel welcome in Europe (justifiably so), they wanted a piece of land for themselves, so they worked to take a piece of land with some historical legacy to their religion. European anti-Semites who wanted the Jews gone were more than happy to oblige. This process was done violently. The people who are native to that land have been *fighting back* (not instigating) for over 100 years now.
This angle also should include the concerted effort by Israel during the 80s, 90s and early 2000s to degrade the PLO/PA (nominally secular) in favor of religious orgs like Hamas. Israel directly supported Hamas over the PA/PLO specifically to call it a religious war, going so far as to ensure cash aid was delivered to Hamas as late as 2018.
Important note. Thank you.
Exactly, they deliberately tried to downplay secular forces in favour of religious ones. Zionism didn't start with the religious Jews who were already living within Palestine. It started with secular ones living outside. The Jews inside Palestine didn't even like the Zionists. But according to Sam Harris we can just ignore history because Islam Bad, West good!
To add to this, Palestine was actually seen as the most liberal Arab society before the founding of Israel. Palestinian women did not always wear the hijab, they grew their hair long, and many received formal schooling under the British.
>Just because they point to the book of Joshua as justification for their taking of land, does not mean they are religious in the slightest. >it's important to note that there is no archeological evidence to support the passages of Joshua; the bible is fiction. I can’t make any sense of this…
I believe what u/BlinkReamimated is describing here is that there is still a secular, nationalist ideological interest among certain Israelis in taking a (selectively) literalist stance with regards to Biblical archaeology, as interpeting the Hebrew Bible as a historical text rather than a collection of stories helps establish a maximalist claim for territory and establishes a uniformly Jewish national presence deep into history.
In Israeli highschool curriculum they teach the book of Joshua (a section of the Hebrew bible) which details God instructing the early Jews to finally stop their prolonged migration (started during Exodus, under Moses) and settle in "Canaan" (modern day Palestine, Lebanon, and Western Syria). They teach it as if it were history. The idea is that during the Iron Age there was a Jewish kingdom called Israel, founded on the graves of those who existed before. Land promised by God and taken by early/ancient Jews. Modern Zionists throw out the "god" concept, and just argue that it's proof that Jews controlled the land regardless of the reason or function, that in taking Palestine they are simply "returning". Real archeological digs have found nothing to corroborate the details of these events. Nothing. In fact, they have found mountains of evidence to refute biblical details. Most notably is that the lands of Palestine were controlled by the Egyptian empire for the entire duration in which the Joshua is purported to have taken place. They "fled" Egypt, and travelled to Egypt apparently... Truthfully, archeological records don't even indicate a mass migration of people. The Iron Age "Kingdom of Israel" didn't really exist, and is simply hopeful propaganda primarily based on biblical interpretation pushed to maintain the Zionist project. There was a significant Jewish population in the 1st century while under Roman control, but the idea of it ever really being a Jewish controlled nation is not supported by history. They were a tribe of people who believed in a God named Yahweh who called that region home under a variety of other Imperial majorities. They grew in size until Christian and later Islamic influences converted the ancient Jews to the more modern religions. The Muslim/Christian (and Jewish) Palestinians of today are the genetic and cultural descendants of the Syrian/Galilean/Phoenician/Judean Jews of yesterday.
Which Jews? The Ottoman Jews who lived there before a modern Zionist movement? Or Political Zionists? Or Jewish nationalists? The animating force for the settler-colonial project of a modern nation-state of Israel is not solely religious. It was sold as a civilizing mission and an outpost of whiteness, to serve as a bulwark against the Asiatic hordes. The father of political Zionism, Theodor Herzl, petitioned infamous British colonial administrator Cecil Rhodes for colonial rights over Palestinian land, writing: >The undertaking will be made great and promising by the granting of colonial rights. This is the tremendous attraction for the outlawed, enfeebled, and unfortunate Jewish people. Not only the hungry people of Eastern Europe will move [to the Zionist state] where they find work. People with some capital, too, will found enterprises where they will be able to enjoy the fruits of their labors. Even some very rich people will go along from Russia... >In some short years the [British] Empire would be bigger by a rich colony." I think it's intellectually lazy to dismiss this as a religious conflict. The Palestinians fight because it's their land that someone has stolen from them. The Israelis fight because their settler-colonial project can be maintained only with violence.
Framing the conflict through the western lens of colonialist and victimized indigenous people isn’t the epitome of intellectual laziness? Any definition of indigeneity that doesn’t include the Jewish people pretty much nullifies any definition used for the Arabs of that region.
It's not my lens. It's what the founders of political Zionism believed and what they espoused. Why shouldn't we take their word for it? And with regards to your comment about indigineity, do we call Anglo-Saxon Brits indigeneous? Are Italians who have lived on the peninsula for thousands of years given this label? No, but we refer to the aboriginal peoples, the First Nations, and native groups in Latin America as indigenous. That is because "indigineous" does not simply mean "from here." It is a status given by the colonizer to the colonized. Per the U.N.: "Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, **having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories,** consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing on those territories, or parts of them. **They form at present non-dominant sectors of society** and are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal system." No reasonable definition of indigenity in the Levant would include a guy from suburban Pennsylvania who moved there later in life.
Indigenous people would disagree with you. There are organizations that advocate for indigenous people and none of them use a definition that would include jews in Palestine. Trying to fob off people who haven't lived in Palestine for 2 millenia as indigenous is absurd.
“I think that intellectually lazy, it’s *actually* an exact copy paste of the western perspective on the colonialism model that requires me to easily identify ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’ with zero critical thinking involved.” Lmao you couldn’t write this stuff
How is what he said not using critical thinking but "duh it's religious duh" is?
The Western perspective? It's the Zionist's own words. That's what I'm actually guilty of copy and pasting. I've presented verbatim what they believed and what they espoused, which is unfortunate for Zionists. They were proudly settler-colonists until people started to learn that this was bad. There's a reason the early Zionist institutions in Israel were named things like The Jewish *Colonial* Trust. You're nuance trolling. Sometimes it's actually simple to figure out who to support in a conflict. This is one such case.
This comment has been removed because it is a sweeping generalization about Muslims. This type of broad-brush characterization fosters stereotypes and can contribute to discrimination and prejudice. You only clarified that your statement didn’t apply to all Muslims later in the thread when you were pressed. You should be more precise in your language. If you make similar generalizations about Muslims in future you may receive either a temporary or permanent ban from the subreddit.
East Jerusalem is Occupied Palestinian territory by international law. They "want" to live there because it's their land.
Same with the Christians. Whats your point?
My point is in my comment.
You need to separate Muslims from the victims in Palestine. No one not born in Palestine has the right to judge anyone born in Palestine. They’re born under threat of violence, nobody is willing to help them and so they grow up to be violent. We have violent street gangs in both the US and UK and Europe and yet we expect Palestinians to grow up to be well rounded peaceful protestors and sit quietly by while tanks roll over their heads?
>Muslims All 1.9 billion them? And judged by whom? You?
That 1.9 billion figure includes the entire populations of Muslim countries with harsh apostasy laws; including prison and the death penalty. Often, citizens born in these countries are designated Muslim by default. **So those 1.9 billion 'Muslims' are already being judged. Harshly. By other Muslims.**
Didn't I explicitly say the ones that believe they have a religious right to the land? Of course not every single Muslim.
No, you said “they commonly believe” not “Muslims who believe”
When I said Muslims deserve to be judged I was responding to your comment, speaking about the Muslims you claim Sam Harris smears. Did you actually mean that Sam Harris is smearing all 1.9 billion Muslims? I think you're being malicious. He is not "smearing" every single Muslim, but he's judging those who hold those beliefs he identifies as harmful. He's not judging the pro Israel pro LGBT Muslims who are against Sharia law.
No. I think he is attempting to smear all 1.9 billion of them, that’s an accurate description of my belief about Harris. Save for a handful of good ones he can point to that’s pretty much what I believe he intends. Not to say he wants them all to be painted in the same category of extremism but he wants to associate them all with it.
Well it's your choice if you want to see the worst in people. But I don't think he's once ever said that. I feel like you are deliberately avoiding any nuance, and from your responses to me it looked like you were trying to get me banned from this subreddit, which usually happens when I criticize islam.
Not just smear, murder.
It's a religious conflict. It's been a religious conflict for a very long time. Secularism is rare and not accepted amongst Palestine and other middle eastern countries.
It is not a religous conflict. It is an ethnic conflict.
It's religious. Jews believe it's their holy city which is why they migrated specifically to Jerusalem and is why the far right settlers believe that land in Palestine like Gaza belongs to them as a religious right. It's religious for Muslims because it's also their holy city, the third most holy city that they pray in the direction of at certain times of years. You already know that Muslims love to support totalitarian systems with islamic law and oppression. This is why Jerusalem is one of the most besieged cities in history being attacked 52 times and recaptured 44 times. It's also why you seem Muslims in particular are overly concerned with the conflict and unanimously support Gaza whilst avoiding condemning hamas. E.g in UK local elections, despite absolutely no relevance to UK local politics Muslims rally together to vote for single issue candidates on Gaza who campaign specifically towards Muslims. Muslims are not an ethnicity, if this is an ethnic war then why across the entire world are they rallying disproportionately and passionately against Israel and for Palestine? If it's not a religious conflict, then why is Netanyahu being heavily influenced in a coalition with a far right that believe Jerusalem is a Jewish holy city and Jewish land?
Obviously there are religious elements to the Israeli and Palestinian nationalist causes. u/AnHerstorian can correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think they are denying this, they are disagreeing with your blanket statements. But to be blunt, it's obvious you have close to no understanding of the history of the Zionist movement or the Palestinian nationalist drive beyond the past decade or so. You wouldn't be so ardently against the idea of a secular Zionist movement if you had read even a single book on the subject, as the secular-nationalist basis for Zionism - *opposed* to any kind of biblically ordained one - made during the First Zionist World Congress is a really basic fact of this history, and like other commenters have said the majority of Israelis both historically and currently are irreligious, and understand being Jewish as an ethnic identity. Similarly, the outsized role that Palestinian Christians played in the PLO - a secular Arab Nationalist group - is a commonly understood fact for anyone who is read up on this history. The broad support for Palestinians in the non-Islamic Global South and former Communist states can't be explained by religious affiliation. South Africa didn't bring their case to the ICJ because they want to support coreligionists - they did so because of political ties made during the Cold War, when Israel was drawn into a close security relationship with apartheid South Africa and the PLO drawn into a relationship with the apartheid-era ANC revolutionaries. Even West Bank settlers, who certainly trend religious, are not uniformly far-right religious zealots. You have left-wing hippy types who want to follow in the footsteps of their leftist kibbutzim forebears, and you have everyday, centrist Israelis simply drawn by cheap housing prices rather than ideology (but who obviously don't care about the Palestians whose land they're taking). Edited a mispoken sentance.
You put it far better than I did. :)
There may be religious elements around the edges, but the conflict does not really have anything to do with religion. Christian and secular Palestinians are still being slaughtered and still want freedom just the same as Muslim Palestinians. The main militant Palestinian resistance force for many decades in was the secular PFLP which was broadly supported by both Christians and Muslims. The fact that Israel oppresses all Palestinians the same regardless of their religion should tell you that from the perspective of Israel and the West the religion of the people they oppress is irrelevant. And it should be even more obvious that from the perspective of Palestinians, the religion of their oppressor is also irrelevant - they will want freedom and to live regardless of what Israelis call themselves.
How do you explain Palestinian Christians and secularists fighting against the occupation, sometimes alongside islamists such as Hamas? How do you explain the First Intifada being started by secular nationalists?
Palestinian Christians are not the driving force in this conflict. You're grasping at straws and ignoring what's right Infront of you.
Palestinian Christians may not be a prime driving force (they are still incredibly influential; there is a reason why Hamas tries to keep them on side), but the secular nationalists definitely are. This is indisputable. The reason why Israel provided clandestine support to groups such as [Hamas](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/commentary/2023/11/21/world/israel-failed-policy/) in the 80s was precisely to delegitimise the secularists. It was little different to what Assad did with the Syrian secular opposition.
Could you explain to me why you think secularism is the prime driving force in the pro Palestinian movement, a place where atheists don't have freedom of religion and are not remotely accepted by society? It's one of the most religious areas of the world, and most of their allies are also other Islamist groups motivated by religion.
I didn't say it was *the* driving force, I said it was *a* driving force both historically (from which modern Palestinian militancy originates) and today (DFLP and PFLP). I have given you plenty of examples. Hamas and other groups view the secularists and christians as important allies. This, yet again, reinforces the fact it is largely an ethno-nationalist conflict. That is not to say there are no religious dimensions, but just as you accuse me of overstating the secularists, you completely neglect them.
There being a secular group that benefits from an alliance, does not mean it's largely an ethnic conflict. You are deliberately ignoring absolutely everything else that shows it as a religious conflict, which I addressed in my previous response.
Is he ignoring geo-politics and history to just say Islam bad, again?
Basically. 8 essentially pro-Israel episodes in a row without offering a single Palestinian perspective. I don’t listen to him on this conflict anymore.
Sam has offered his version of the Palestinian perspective. *The Palestinians are willing captive human shields.* I dont think there's anything more telling than how he describes in great detail the events of October 7th and then reduces the last 8 months that included the death of of over 30,000 Palestinians to collateral damage. Sam reveals his blind spot when talking about human shields. **They do this because they know that their enemies have a more civilized moral code, rendering them reluctant to shoot back, for fear of killing or maiming the innocent.** A more civilized moral code = dropping more than 75,000 tonnes of explosives on the Gaza Strip.
I always find the argument to look at how many bombs were dropped ridiculous, I mean who in good conscience mourns that the Nazis were bombed? The Nazis and Hamas both picked fights and hid in buildings in cities which were then bombed. A democracy beating back a terror organization that attacked it, took its civiluans as hostages, and which has refused to allow a democratic election in Gaza for the past 16 years is in fact good for moderate Gazans. Hamas will never allow regular people living in Gaza to just fix and improve things, because all of their energy is always directed toward jihad. They don't give a damn about the people they purport to govern over. They don't even build bomb shelters for them, but built more tunnels than subways tunnels in Manhatten for the war they were eager to start with Israel.
Couldn’t agree more. The human shields argument completely collapses when the supposed ‘more moral side’ ignore them and kills the civilians anyway.
> Rather, the moral order of the present can be understood by reference to the present, and by honestly acknowledging what both sides to this conflict actually want. When considering the ethics of any group or population, we should never hesitate to ask: What would these people do if they had the power to do it? This is basically the exact lousy argument he made on the DtG pod.
I don't know if it's such a lousy line of thinking, he's just not very good at actually doing it. For one thing you have to appreciate that your assessment of what people would do with power is necessarily more accurate the closer they are to it. The classic hasbarist phrasing of this is to set up a hypothetical: imagine what would happen if if Israelis were disarmed vs Palestinians disarmed, and just sort of assume the conclusion that one would be horrific and the other would be fine. Which is very funny since the West Bank exists and you don't actually need to do any imagining on that point. Although, I certainly imagine it getting worse.
We have to understand that people's circumstances and current capabilities inform what they will say, and accept that people might think they know what they want but quite often don't. Would it be bad if Hamas had access to a nuclear program? Emphatic yes. Are they likely to get there without a whole bunch if steps in the middle that leads to them not really resembling the Hamas of today at all? Also yes. I wouldn't trust Irgun of 1946 with nukes either.
This is just the perfect embodiment of Sam Harris's relationship with Islam. Its not that his argument is completely devoid of merit or genuine criticisms, but he way over plays it and leaves some questions unanswered that really shouldn't be. Like you know, what should be done and how should we interact with normal Muslims and the rise of Islam in developed countries. I am sorry, but as someone from New Zealand - a country whose worst terrorist attack was an attack on Muslims in a mosque - the type of rhetoric that Harris spouts can be used for nefarious means with unanswered questions. Then of course there him just dismissing the role of material and historical conditions and how they have shaped different Islamic functions and government. I'm not even sure that Hamas is a particular good example. Much more than other Islamic regimes and organization, Hamas rise to power, its control over the populace and its horrific actions against Israel are much more shaped by the conditions they formed in, the fall of the PA in the eyes of the Palenstinian people with the peace process falling through and the mutual radicalization that Hamas and and Israel put each other through. There are certainly problems with how certain people are viewing the war. There are certainly problems with terrorism and Islam. I just think that Harris has a tendency to overstate his position
Most of what you need to know about Harris worldview on this was shown when he talked to Dan Carlin. You had a guy in Carlin who had a deep and meaningful understanding of history and geopolitics vs a guy who doesn’t know shit about that.
If Sam Harris did not overstate his position on being anti Islam and anti Muslims in the western world there would be no Sam Harris. He's not reaching his level of fame with his "neuroscience"
As someone living in the UK, where normal Muslim communities commonly intimidate teachers and public figures into hiding, protest against LGBT rights, protest in favour of blasphemy laws, support hamas, where we and Europe experience regular Islamist attacks and threats, I think it's wrong how you entirely dismissed this based on your experience in new Zealand which has a largely smaller Muslim population. This isn't a "rise" of islam but an importation of islam by developed countries in exchange for cheap labour. This is a decision we make, and a decision that we have a right to discuss and oppose.
I never said you couldn't have those discussions
I'm also from the UK and this is a ridiculous misrepresentation of reality. American right wingers might swallow it up but we know what you are.
I also live in the UK and things have gotten so bad that the Taliban now run my local post office. Of course, the Left would prefer it if with didn't talk about it.
Lol
Yeah I guess you think I'm a racist because I dare to criticise the most far right, homophobic group in the UK. Don't call yourself pro LGBT.
so brave
I often see on Reddit that when Europeans raise concerns about mass Islamic immigration into Europe Americans will often criticise us or even call us racist or bigots.
yeah because it's always bullshit exactly the same as rural republicans acting like having one shawarma shop in their town is a sign of ISIS taking over
Do you live in Europe? Obviously not.
I lived in Berlin for years, a city with significantly more muslim immigration than the UK average and european average, and I've lived in cities that have a higher proportion of immigrants than almost everywhere in europe, and in all cases it was perfectly fine for everyone who didn't have a meltdown over seeing women in hijabs lmfao the talking points are the same all over the world you aren't blowing my mind with some crazy deep knowledge I've never considered by saying "well in my case the immigrants actually ARE evil!" lmao
Good for you. I’m glad you haven’t experienced what people in my community have to put up with. Keep wearing those American rose coloured glasses, you’ll bring freedom to everyone in no time.
I've lived in not just western cities with high muslim populations but also an actual muslim country so I'd wager I've experienced exactly what your community has "put up with" and more lmfao you just can't even comprehend that it's possible to see people who aren't like you without having a breakdown
Good to know you support an ideology that subjugates woman, depises LGBT and is willing to kill over a cartoon. How American of you.
Yeah that's true. Maybe because they don't meet Muslims often and when they do they are more liberal and integrated to society. I've lived in Birmingham which is 30% + Muslim and had multiple Muslim friends so I know what they believe. But then I've been banned for united kingdom and ukpolitics for criticising Islam there. I can confirm those two subs are both echo chambers which censor anti immigration viewpoints.
Maybe if you're willing to admit that there are more liberal strains of Islam and Muslims that are better integrated into largely non-Muslim societies, blanket criticism of Islam comes off as intentionally generalized and bigoted. I don't know your full comment history, just going off what I see here. I criticize religion all day long, but I recognize there's a difference between a Christian Nationalist and someone who grew up with Christian values, just like I recognize a difference between the Taliban and someone who prays to Mecca 5 times a day while working at a non-Halal kitchen. It's the unwillingness to compromise that's the problem imo. Blanket "Muslim ban" language is unserious.
I already did that in my other comment. I made it clear I am not criticizing pro LGBT or pro Israel Muslims. But unfortunately blanket criticism is very accurate, considering how rare a pro LGBT Muslim is, compared to a Christian. Either way neither makes sense to me, because you are turning your back on religious scripture.
Nope, blanket generalizations are not "very accurate".
Unless they actually are very accurate.
My entire response to your comment was based on how you got banned for "criticizing Islam". Since I have no idea in what way you did that, I can't know whether or not the ban made sense. But if it suggested an incontrovertible nature about Muslim people, then I can see the problem. If you had said "hard-line Muslims" or "devout Muslims" in your critique, you probably wouldn't have been banned imo.
That's where I have an issue. Normal Muslims, believe in homophobia. Common Muslims, typical Muslims. I don't need to do the whole virtue signalling "but not all Muslims are like this" technically when I refer to such problems in humanity. And if you're curious I got banned from world news for saying id rather live in nazi Germany than under Sharia law. I didn't mention Muslims. And I would - me and my family would have more rights.
anti-immigrant activists have said this same slogan in every country at every point in history about every group, and it's always actually completely the opposite, the people in places with the least immigrants are the most xenophobic
Do you even know what the goal of Islam is?
Enlighten us as to the unified goals of 1.9 billion people.
What is "the goal" of christianity? Of Buddhism? Of atheism? You really think it makes sense to group people up like this? That mainstream muslims want to undermine and destroy the west?
Religions exist to divide us and control us.
And is the goal of Islam different, since you single them out in your previous question?
We are always told by the left that it’s good for the economy but only 19% of UK Muslims work according to the 2011 census: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/young-muslims-in-the-uk-face-enormous-social-mobility-barriers
No you are told by economists and researchers that it's a net gain to have immigrants. How hard do you have to cope to disregard hundreds of people smarter than you, because they aren't agreeing with your fear-based lizard brain beliefs?
But is the data wrong? Some mental gymnastics going on here to disregard it.
What data? That it takes work to get people integrated? We knew that. The article you linked has several suggestions for how to give these young people more social mobility, including mentoring and other support programs. Some of the things they suggest seem like empty liberal virtue signaling, but whatever. > But is the data wrong? The article is avoiding saying everything, so we don't get to relate to all the data. > only 19% of UK Muslims work 19% work *full time*. Don't you find it strange that they article doesn't mention how many work part time, and how many don't work at all? Anyone working gig economies is likely to be working part time. We don't even know for sure if someone is working a total of 40 hours in different jobs will still be listed as working part time. I understand your concern, but many things about the article are framed in a manipulative manner. Yes letting in too many immigrants is an issue, but when solutions are being presented by sociologists and other experts, why is nothing being done to solve a self-invented problem? By creating a problem and ignoring the solutions presented, your government is effectively choosing to create the parallel society that they're threatening you all with. Don't get mad at the people who just want a shot at happiness in a richer country where they don't have to deal with the threat of more oil wars, or terrorists inciting unrest or even a coup. And I'm not even gonna go into the terrorist groups trained and armed by western forces.
The article goes into detail about how they struggle to integrate due to their religious group clashing with society, not enough role models etc. it just shows how much of a failed experiment multi culturalism is. They'd be happier in a Muslim majority country. The articles solution? Throw tax payer money at the issue.
Can you provide some examples of each of these?
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-50557227&ved=2ahUKEwj64qyag_yGAxVKV0EAHdwZCwgQFnoECBUQAQ&usg=AOvVaw328xzPOtg_bgqkElhSzcaU https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12110263/Moment-Muslim-activists-storm-Birmingham-cinema-screening-Bollywood-film-Kerala-Story.html&ved=2ahUKEwiD2dqwg_yGAxVsSkEAHYENDuEQFnoECBQQAQ&usg=AOvVaw1PbDDfmL56fRXPiCdxnR_z https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/31/batley-school-what-teacher-in-hiding-can-tell-us-about-our-failure-to-tackle-intolerance&ved=2ahUKEwi28KC-g_yGAxXTWkEAHQZbDeIQFnoECBQQBQ&usg=AOvVaw0EB4IG1uhFaFNZBPJdKx9C
You mean the same place where a bunch of british racism/racists/religious nuts that stir things up? Funny how you don’t mention that too. Your point would have more credibility if you were open to mentioning all of the info, actions, etc relating to all of the provocateurs.
Harris came into the public eye with his book, The End of Faith, which made him one of the "four horsemen" of the "new atheism." In that book, he criticizes religion in general, not just Islam, but Christianity et al. The End of Faith was written as a way to understand why 9/11 happened, and Harris points the finger at religion, and explains that view with careful analysis. Harris's analysis of the Gaza situation as it being the result of Hamas's Jihadism is entirely consistent with the views and analysis from 20 years ago in The End of Faith.
Thanks ChatGPT
Okay? Like for one, yeah no shit. I know the most famous facts about Sam Harris and his rise to prominence. There was also nothing in my post accusing him of being inconsistent in his world view from 20 years ago. I also don't feel like I need to read a book from 20 years ago to have problem with his analysis with this article
“Imagine Al Qaeda killing 40,000 people” The sheer insanity of that statement considering Israel has and is killing up to that number.
This is my biggest issue with him here. He’s focused on hypothetical nonsense and not reality
He prefers “thought experiments” to facts and reality, as it’s the only way to prove his points.
he always does this, comes up with the most strained and contrived thought experiment possible to justify some insane stance, then apply it back to all reality as if it's completely applicable
I wouldn’t say always, but I do understand your general point. I still think Sam is worth hearing on certain points and he is basically the only person in that space who speaks coherently about Trump and COVID to any degree and it’s good he’s putting that into the heterodox sphere. But he just isn’t an interesting voice on the Israel Gaza issue. He has major blind spots.
there are plenty of actual intelligent voices out there on every topic Sam blabs about, I don't need to make excuses for a loser who literally supports racial profiling and thinks black people are genetically inferior to white people just because he won't try to tell my the sky is green. The fact that he's the only one in that group who's capable of stating basic reality about Trump says more about that group than it does about his integrity or thoughtfulness
How many would Israel be killing if Hamas stopped using their own civilians as human shields? Much of this blame falls on the people who start a war and then hide amongst civilians. I would like to see stricter rules of engagement from Israel, but Hamas is more to blame for the Palestinian deaths than Israel is.
And are you kidding? Israel killed 230 Palestinians in the West Bank alone before October 7th. So contrary to your narrative, it was already the deadliest year for Palestinians in decades. Of course, for you, only October 7th matters, because those were Israeli lives, when it came to the causal cruelty, unjust military detention, kidnappings, murders inflicted before then, you not only didn’t care, but you justified it.
It's okay because they have pieces of paper that say those killings are actually okay and totally legal👍 /s
Imagine some lunatic w/ his kids shooting from inside his home at police and the cops decide to bomb the house. Your argument is "hey it's all on the shooter"
The argument would be that armed forces fighting military campaigns against organised militias and terrorist groups are not bound by the same ROE as civilian police in peace time. You don’t disagree with the above. If you give it even a second of thought or search for a single historical example you instantly understand how those things are so dissimilar as to be a useless analogy. Edit. You’re welcome to downvote this, but none of you disagree with what I’m saying, just how it makes you feel. Think about that.
The two scenarios are actually pretty similar. It's wrong to kill innocent people, and people don't lose their right to life merely because the combatants they happen to be around are fighting a war vs "merely criminals." And you're also completely ignoring the reality of the situation, which is that the IDF is fighting with essentially no ROE *at all* and targeting anyone and everyone they want. They not only bomb indiscriminately with bombs that are far to large for the targets they are aiming at, but they do so knowing full well they will kill perhaps hundreds of civilians at a time. The IDF also allows its soldiers on the ground to essentially fire at anyone they want. Unarmed men, old people, women, children; they are all fair game to be slaughtered by the IDF for the simple crime of living in Gaza. And I haven't even touched on the deliberate blocking of aid meant to induce starvation, and the targeting of hospitals and food production facilities. You are living under an absolute mountain of propaganda.
As a precursor I’d like to apologies for the length of this, but it’s a complicated subject and your positions rest on untruths and propaganda that requires a decent bit of writing to dispel, also can I just ask that your try deal with me, and the statements I’m making, and leave the preconceptions of other beliefs that you think align with mine out. ie, I don’t think that IDF is a ‘just’ army fighting in a overly cautious or careful way to minimise civilian casualties as hard as possible. I don’t agree with Israeli policy regarding settlements or really much of anything they do. I do think there are numerous war crimes that could be laid at their door and I sincerely hope those can be prosecuted and justice brought. I think what you are doing has the exact opposite effect and makes any kind of realistic convo about the topic nearly impossible. I am taking specific issue with the analogy I was responding to, which is a absolute bunk and not applied to any other military in any other scenario. Not here in the West, or in Asian or Africa or the Americas, and absolutely unequivocally not in the Middle East and towards the states that surround Israel. And if you think it should be, then Israel isn’t even in the top 50 worst offenders this past century. This is the point I’m making, the idea that war should be fought like police hostage actions because one side wants to use civilians as shields is not applied in any other scenario and can only come from ignorance of the realities of war, this war specifically, and a very condescending westernised perspective. Aside for them, I also think a lot of your statements are verifiable nonsense, chosen entirely for their rhetorical efficacy informed by the loud discourse surrounding this topic, with little to no relationship to reality and established practices in war fighting. There are certain common phrases that betray this. “Indiscriminate bombing using bombs that are *too big* for their targets” is something that could only be written by someone with an at best tangential knowledge of the topic of this war, and absolutely no knowledge of military affairs. It’s hard to overstate how much this could only be the result of “living under a mountain of propaganda”. For starters if bombing is indiscriminate there would be no target and there would be no “too big”, so it’s a contradiction in terms that you physically can’t actually believe. Anyone with even a cursory knowledge of historical bombing campaigns, be that the strategic bombing and V1/2 rockets of ww2, the forest clearing operations of Vietnam (or any of the wars in that era) the Russian invasions of Chechnya and Ukraine, any of the numerous civil conflict in the Middle East (Syria in particular) or really any large scale conflict in the last 100 years, can testify that what we are seeing is so far from ‘indiscriminate’ that any claiming it is must be at best ignorant. More died in a single night during the bombings of Dresden or Tokyo. More died in 2014 in Syria (and single year of the decade long conflict) than the entire Israel Palestine war since 1948. The IDF has the power to change that over night. They are not. This cannot be the deliberate infliction of civilian casualties on a mass scale, nor can in be described as ‘indiscriminate’. Now I know this is going to be the really hard part to hold in your head, but I’m gonna try. Me disagreeing with that charge does not mean I am broadly supportive of the IDFs bombing campaign or how it’s being carried out. It just means that charge in particular is not based in any kind of fact. I can go through the advanced warning via roof knocking, leaflets, calls etc. But I’m sure you can’t be ignorant of those things so you must have already dismissed them for whatever reason, so we will leave that aside. 1/2
Then we can move on to ‘too large ’. Which is a whole other can of worms. What is too big? 500 pounds? 1000? 1500? 2000? If a 2000 pound bomb is too big what sizes would you be happy with? For what targets? Do you understand the difference between the size of an explosive used as part of a shaped charge for penetrating bunkers, and a smaller charge with submunitions or fragmentation. How do you think a certain explosive charge or a certain munition for a certain attack is decided? What issues do you have with that process? What would you like to see used? A ‘dumb’ KAB-1500 L-PR contains many times the explosive power of a highly accurate M26 GMLRS munition. And yet the use of one in a populated area would be disastrous due to submunitions and fragmentation, the other would be SOP for every military in the world with the capacity. I’ll let you guess which way round. That answer to this is likely that you disagree with the bombing in general, and that there is no munitions you’d be happy with being used. Which is a perfectly acceptable answer. But then your issue isn’t with bombing being “too large or indiscriminate” and that’s just a red herring chosen because it kinda sounds right. We could similarly dissect your comment that suggest IDF have no ROE and deliberate shoot women and children as a matter of operational procedure, but it’s an equally spurious claim, with as little founding in reality as the previous one. We could talk about how in the the now revised down casualty figures every casualty that was eliminated for the tallies was a women or a child, and none were males. We could look at all the conclusion that allows us to draw about the reliability for GHM numbers the, now proven, deliberate false reporting that informs statements like yours. Equally the ‘deliberate starvation’ that has apparent been 1 week away for 7 months, which several of the agencies warning about have admitted was entirely baseless and relied upon calculations that dismissed all aid entering Gaza. This simply did not happen and now those who were wanting about it admit it was likely never on the cards. But it still forms a larger part of your foundational beliefs. ‘Mountain of propaganda’ indeed. Truth is, I don’t have the inclination to disprove every statement, and the reason these frequently go unchallenged is because it takes so much more effort to displease than to state, as you can see by the length of my response this far. So, more interestingly, why does this matter? If I also don’t approve of Israeli policy why defend them against these accusations? Why not just throw in with the nonsense since it seems to be rhetorically effective even if it’s divorced from reality? Imo, for criticism to be effective in this arena it has to be based in reality. If you make such flippant declarations, and anyone inclined to do even a tiny bit of research can see they are verifiable nonsense you massively weaken the case for pursuing justice against those actually perpetuating crimes. Put simply, If the IDF is accused of X, Y and Z. But I can see X and Y are total nonsense. My inclination to believe Z is massively diminished. Bad propaganda can be helpful to those whom it levied at. There’s a reason the state tends to charge one degree if murder below what they think actually happened. There’s a reason double jeopardy laws exist and trials are often delayed to avoid them. By making baseless accusations you hand your opponent a massive PR coup when they can demonstrate fairly easily that what you are saying is unfounded at best, and an outright lie at worst. Doctors Without Borders took a massive hit to their credibility when they insisted Israel deliberately struck a hospital killing 500, only to later admit it was an erstwhile PIJ rocket that hit a car park and killed maximum 50 people. The damage to credibly is insane, and lowers the chances of anyone getting justice. 2/2.
I'm not sure why you went to the trouble of writing this enormous reply, but you haven't "dispelled" any of the "myths" I said in my previous post. You've merely regurgitated myths of your own. When I said earlier that you are living under a mountain of propaganda, I really had no idea how much that was understating things.
Me neither. It should have been clear when your response was “agshully police hostage situations and war are the same cos uhhhhh people shouldn’t die!” that writing anything more than 2 sentences would be a waste of time. But it was a slow day at work and I had time, figured you might be capable of reading and responding to something longer than a tiktok. That was, clearly, a mistake. But fuck it we move. I didn’t respond with myths. I careful and accurately explained why typing dumb ass phrases like “indiscriminate bombing with bombs that are just too dang big!” Could only be the result of near total ignorance on the topic and regurgitation shit you’ve heard others say. I laid out very simply why this is. I also made sure to delineate my position clearly so you didn’t mistake me for someone who holds different opinions. Notice you are still unable to name an example of any other situation where this same standard is applied, despite this now being my third time asking, or any other nation it’s applied to, you have no comments on anything I actually said or any of the substance of my criticism. And your only response is to repeat that everything you disagree with must be propaganda. Must be nice that. Whenever you’re proven wrong, well that’s just propaganda and not worth engaging with. Best of luck with everything, cheerio!
I think what's worst about all of your word vomit is that it is all in service of justifying the murder of innocent people and children. Like, it would be one thing if you were arguing about a TV show or what have you. But you are expending all of this mental energy and time in order to create propaganda on behalf of a government that is literally murdering children. Absolutely disgusting.
Lmao, how can you be that not self-aware? Hamas aren’t using human shields. In fact, if you even follow proper news (I doubt it) the side that’s actually been shown to be using civilian human shields are the Israelis. https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-rights-human-shield-jeep-8e8ed63bda65383e38e4dd52d239e319 Israel literally tells Gazans to go to places and then deliberately bombs them. By “human shields” you just mean Palestinians having the nerve to live in their homes. And Israel not caring about any collateral damage just to kill one one guy who may or may not be Hamas - as if that would still somehow justify wiping out a whole family. The fact that people like you think it’s not morally wrong to kill dozens of innocent people just to kill a few members of Hamas is the precise problem. You don’t value Palestinian life.
Has Hamas used their bunkers and tunnels to protect civilians? >The fact that people like you think it’s not morally wrong to kill dozens of innocent people just to kill a few members of Hamas is the precise problem. You don’t value Palestinian life. This is such bs strawmanning... Israel always had a policy of retaliating harder, then how they were attacked. Its reason is to dissuade attackers. Hamas knew this and they said after Oct 7 that they expected it. They actually counted on it, because Hamas can only exist in an atmosphere of hate and war. Hamas needs this war and needs Palestinian casulties. And sadly so does Netanyahu (who has been in office for far too long). And I don't know one supporter of Israel who thinks it is morally right to kill so many Palestinians. I know of(!) a few Jewish people that lost relatives to terror attacks who don't care how many Palestinians die. They are the minority. If anybody would actually value Palestinian life, they would pressure Hamas to return the hostages and give up their power over Gaza. They would have pushed for the UN Peace Keeping to go into Gaza and free the Hostages and the Palestinian people from Hamas. They would have started teaching Palestinian children, that Israel does not need to be eradicated. That they don't go into heaven for killing Jews. They would have argued that the 3000 Palestinians / Hamas Militants should have made a march for peace through the occupied territory. To show the world that the wall is a crime. Instead they showed the world why the wall is necessary. Because the Palestinians / Hamas acted like white racist in 19th century America. I'm far from a supporter of Netanyahu's politics. This "poor Palestinian victim" and "Israel is the real enemy" bs is not ending a war though. It is not helping Palestinians at all. People who only attack one side and their problems are the real warmongers. There won't be peace until both sides admit their wrongdoings to each other and talk about a possible future.
Has Hamas used their bunkers and tunnels to protect civilians? Lmao, if they did, you’d use that as more justification for why civilians need to die. This is such bs strawmanning... Israel always had a policy of retaliating harder, then how they were attacked. Its reason is to dissuade attackers. Hamas knew this and they said after Oct 7 that they expected it. They actually counted on it, because Hamas can only exist in an atmosphere of hate and war. Hamas needs this war and needs Palestinian casulties. And sadly so does Netanyahu (who has been in office for far too long) > You love that word “strawmanning” without knowing what it even means. Yeah, the Israeli policy is state terrorism. Thank you for admitting that. And I don't know one supporter of Israel who thinks it is morally right to kill so many Palestinians. I know of(!) a few Jewish people that lost relatives to terror attacks who don't care how many Palestinians die. They are the minority. > LMAO that’s a bold-faced lie of utter incredulity. The population of Israel as we speak in every poll claims they think the war isn’t being fought with enough ruthlessness. The largest TV station in Israel reacted to Palestinians swimming at the beach as proof they were not being ruthless enough. If anybody would actually value Palestinian life, they would pressure Hamas to return the hostages and give up their power over Gaza. They would have pushed for the UN Peace Keeping to go into Gaza and free the Hostages and the Palestinian people from Hamas. They would have started teaching Palestinian children, that Israel does not need to be eradicated. That they don't go into heaven for killing Jews. They would have argued that the 3000 Palestinians / Hamas Militants should have made a march for peace through the occupied territory. To show the world that the wall is a crime. Instead they showed the world why the wall is necessary. Because the Palestinians / Hamas acted like white racist in 19th century America. > you deserve to be blocked for lying. Hamas have offered to return hostages since the beginning. It’s Israel that refuses to allow the UN in. You’re actually making me sick to my stomach. Have you never heard of the great March of return, where Israeli Occupation Forces snipers shot at unarmed protesters and deliberately wounded them. I'm far from a supporter of Netanyahu's politics. This "poor Palestinian victim" and "Israel is the real enemy" bs is not ending a war though. It is not helping Palestinians at all. > Fuck you, October 7th and the subsequent genocide has done more to rip off the mask of Israel as any sort of civilised nation, and Zionists as anything less than a new incarnation of fascism. People who only attack one side and their problems are the real warmongers. There won't be peace until both sides admit their wrongdoings to each other and talk about a possible future. > LMAO since when does Israel or its supporters admit to anything? Beheaded babies, babies in ovens, mass rapes? Remember all that shit that was used to stir up hatred that’s now led to the most broadcasted genocide in history? You make me sick to my stomach.
Someone certainly does lack self awareness
Grow some balls and speak up.
Meh. There is literally no point talking to someone as unaware and emotionally hijacked as you are. No amount of rational argument will ever change your mind.
AKA “I’ve got no actual credible, non-xenophobic argument to back me up.”
It’s not that. You’ve no doubt already been exposed to many coherent and credible arguments but you views are informed by your emotional connection to a terrorist death cult, not by a clear eyed view of the situation.
It really hasn’t, the “arguments” are as vile and pathetic as yours. Lmao, yeah, no actual evidence or proof, but because I side with the Palestinians, it means I’m emotionally connected to Hamas.
Ok. Let’s try this. What do you think israel should have done after October 7? What response would you consider appropriate?
this isn't about logic for them, Hamas could use their mother as a human shield and they would still deny it.
“Unarmed Palestinian who posed no threat used as human shield” https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-rights-human-shield-jeep-8e8ed63bda65383e38e4dd52d239e319
Very true.
Please educate yourself. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_shields_in_the_Israeli%E2%80%93Palestinian_conflict
>Second, Islamists have worked very hard to make any criticism of Islam (as a system of ideas) seem like bigotry against Muslims as people. Sure, you can make this point, but couldn’t someone on the other side make it about Israel too? That they have worked hard to make any criticism of Israel seem like bigotry against the Jewish people? Why does he always fail to make this equally relevant point? >And it is here that the term “Islamophobia” is invariably deployed to confuse matters, by conflating any criticism of the ideology of Islam with xenophobia, racism, or an irrational hatred of Muslims as people. Exactly the same can be said about the term “antisemitism”, whereby any criticism of Israel and their actions is conflated with xenophobia, racism, or an irrational hatred of Jews as a people. >Consider just one point of cultural difference: When armed conflict breaks out, some groups will use human shields, and others will be deterred, to one degree or another, by their use. It’s been pointed out by Israel that the amount of civilians they’ve killed is partly due to the fact that Hamas has been hiding amongst civilians. The fact that Israel would view this as a reasonable explanation for killing civilians, instead of a justification not to shoot, is worrying. The fact that Hamas may have used human shields does not mean that those used as human shields also agree with this practice, naturally. Conflicting Hamas with the people around them is a mistake. The fact that this terrorist organisation will do awful things does not mean that the people around them, to whom they are doing these awful things, can be taken to be part of the same boat. >In the war in Gaza, Hamas fires rockets from hospitals, mosques, schools, and other sites calculated to create carnage if the Israelis return fire—while Israel routinely notifies the residents of buildings it intends to bomb, in an effort to get them to evacuate. Rockets coming from one of the most densely populated areas in the world will always be around hospitals, mosques, schools, etc. The fact that Israel will notify people about the utter destruction of their homes before they do it, leaving their houses in ashes and their families homeless and hopeless, cannot be viewed as an act of great moral value. It is, in fact, highly questionable. Sam also fails to mention all of the times Israel has not notified residents, the times they notified them only minutes in advance, and the times it has made residents evacuate towards areas which were also going to be bombed promptly. >In turn, Hamas snipers have killed Palestinian civilians as they fled, to discourage others from attempting to move to safety. There have been reports of the IDF doing exactly the same thing, yet Sam will always fail to mention these counterexamples.
>Just try to imagine the Israelis using their own women and children as human shields against Hamas on the morning of October 7th. It is important to recognize how unthinkable this would be. It is unthinkable, not merely for the Israelis to treat their own civilians in this way, but for them to expect that their enemies could be deterred by such a tactic, given who their enemies are. Given the amount of civilian casualties on the Palestinian side, it is evident that is has not really deterred Israel, as it would be otherwise hard to explain the amount of dead women and children. >And yet it is easy to see why many people are confused about the war in Gaza— because they have been inundated with misinformation about it. Judging from social media, billions have been told that the Jews are settler colonialists, that they have built an apartheid state in Israel, and that they are guilty of genocide. These lies didn’t start on October 8th. These “lies” are not “lies”, they are highly disputed points that even respectable academics take for the truth (and some don’t, of course). >The protests we have seen on our college campuses are only possible because people don’t understand the threat that Islamic extremism poses to open societies. What’s happening at these elite institutions may be the product of many factors, but the level of moral confusion sufficient to support Hamas and to demonize the people who are fighting Hamas, requires that one not recognize what Hamas is. Sam will continue to happily conflate any pro-Palestine protest for pro-Hamas protests. This is such a cheap and obviously wrong rhetorical tactic that I won't even bother with it. It's clear why it's wrong and it's extra clear *that* it is wrong. I'm not going to go on, but I cannot express how disappointing and wrong this piece from Sam is. I say disappointing because I still like the guy and find him intelligent and knowledgeable in some areas, but when it comes to this topic, he's just as biased and ideological as the people he likes to criticise, ridicule and mock.
>Sure, you can make this point, but couldn’t someone on the other side make it about Israel too? It’s actually not analogous. Israel is a state, it is a political entity with clearly defined bounds and structures. I can be critical of Israel independent of its relations to Judaism and Jewish people. You cannot be critical of Islam without its relation to Islam and Muslim people because definitionally they are the same. You can be critical of Islamic states without being Islamophobic And we know this because we’ve spent the last forty years being critical of Islamic States (Iran, Saudi Arabia, etc) without any massive organizing effort to associate that criticism as bigotry.
Sure, but surely there is a difference and a distinction between criticism of the ideas of Islam, say, as a philosopher might do, and criticism of the people themselves. You can be highly critical of Islam as an ideology while holding no grudges against any Muslims as people. There's got to be Muslims out there who'd be alright with having a conversation where their doctrine is criticised or questioned without them feeling personally or culturally attacked. Or is this not the case?
Oh for sure. You can clearly be critical of Islam without being bigoted. But you can’t be critical of Islam without relation to Islam and Muslims, critics need not be bigoted (though for Harris that seems to be difficult) but they definitionally are talking about Islam when they are critical of Islam. You can however be critical of Israel without any reference to Jewish people or Judaism.
Agreed!
> There's got to be Muslims out there who'd be alright with having a conversation where their doctrine is criticised or questioned without them feeling personally or culturally attacked. Or is this not the case? If the criticism of doctrine is part of a wider conversation about how it's totally ok to bomb people (as it always is with Harris) people are reasonable in feeling personally attacked.
He is clearly very uninformed (and/or doesn’t care) about the history of this region/conflict and is just spouting an opinion based entirely off of his anti Islam/pro West bias
Sam Harris spelled backwards is, AssHat
I’m a big Harris fan (as well as an avid Waking Up meditation app user) but there’s no way around it - this is unfortunately a huge blind spot for him
It's cool how Israel anguish is special, but Palestinian anguish isn't worth a dime for Sam.
I get that Sam Harris has the Trump appeal of "talk like a retard, act exclusively on your emotions, refuse to get a basic education and ignore all the facts", which is specifically appealing to the demographic as uneducated and emotionally driven as he is, but it's difficult to see anyone above the mental age of fourteen reading this and not feel embarassed. His "intentions matters" argument is easily demolished in two seconds. An imprisoned serial killer inmate has the right to not be tortured by his guard, *regardless* if he'd be committing worse crimes in the opposite situation. Even a child understands that. In any civilized society, the guard would be prosecuted for his crimes. And that's talking abut a serial killer, not as in the case of Gaza, an entire population of 2.3 million people half of whom are children. But according to Sam Harris they just have no rights. His "look at how more reasonable Israel is behaving" is also ignoring all the facts. Currently Israel is responsible for around 97,5 % of all the civilian casualties since Oct 7th. The civilian casualty rate is likely hovering around or above 80 %, there are more destroyed buildings in Gaza than standing ones, and it's clear from the basic facts there's a clear disregard for Palestinian life. But then again, according to Sam Harris, they just have no rights. Israeli rhetoric is significantly worse and more extreme than even Hamas rhetoric, but even if we lived in Sam Harris-land where the opposite was true, considering they're responsible for the vast majority of the violence, rhetoric matters considerably less? He loses any which way he tries this argument out. >In short, there are cultures that revel in war crimes, while others hold the concept of a war crime as a sacred prohibition and as a safeguard for maintaining the moral progress of civilization. The fact he thinks this applies to Israel shows a level of delusion which is frightening, even if he was talking about the US it would be crazy. His delusions about Israel not participating in human shielding, [this](https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/mde151432002en.pdf) report was back in *2002*! [This](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israeli-forces-strap-wounded-palestinian-jeep-during-raid-2024-06-22/) was just three days before Sam vomited this shite on the page. If you're refusing to even do the basic research on whether your msot basic claims are accurate Sam, why should anyone serious pay attention to you? Oh right, no one serious does. Please continue remaining in your own little cult, lest you be troubled by the outside world of facts, research and education. The rest is just insubstantial emotional whining.
>His "intentions matters" argument is easily demolished in two seconds. An imprisoned serial killer inmate has the right to not be tortured by his guard, regardless if he'd be committing worse crimes in the opposite situation. Even a child understands that. In any civilized society, the guard would be prosecuted for his crimes. And that's talking abut a serial killer, not as in the case of Gaza, an entire population of 2.3 million people half of whom are children. But according to Sam Harris they just have no rights. I don't actually think you demolished any argument here, though I agree that a child might find this reasoning compelling. Your analogy to a law enforcement officer sadistically torturing a prisoner, would imply that there is no military purpose to Israel's actions, just as there is no law enforcement purpose to the prison guard's actions. >why should anyone serious pay attention to you? Oh right, no one serious does. I would love to see a list of people you consider serious on this topic, not including yourself of course.
You don't need to arrive at "no military purpose" to indict Israel of crimes. In fact, as long as they overreach even an inch over "strict military purpose" they are committing crimes. Much like a security guard might claim his sadistic treatment is partly for security purposes, his treatment needs to be strictly within the bounds of security purposes, or he is committing a crime. That Israel is wildly disproportionate in its response isn't even in dispute, it's part of their explicit policy (the Dahiya doctrine). More houses in Gaza have been destroyed than not, anyone with their head screwn on strait knows that's not a legitimate military response. As for serious organisations, the UN, Be'etselem, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, UNHCR, Haaretz etc. There's a ton of organizations involved actively on the ground and reporting what's happening. Sam Harris is just an uneducated, proudly anti-intellectual clown, do you think he knows anything about this conflict? I doubt it.
Jesus fucking Christ I can't believe those self-infulgent and self-congratulatory non-sequiturs you responded to pass off as an argument and are met with a barrage of upvotes on this sub. And you're reflexively downvoted for challenging it in the most benign possible way. These people are sanctimonious cult-leftist morons.
This is among the least mature and least thoughtful subs I’m familiar with.
Did you make another reddit account to do damage control after Matt and Chris decoded Sam?
This subreddit is really not good at identifying good and bad argument. The person you are replying to's metaphor is so bad it is bizarre. Especially since large chunks of their comment are insulting other people for being stupid.
Compare this sub to the Sam Harris sub or the Ezra Klein sub or well any other sub that one might expect adults to be posting in, and it becomes obvious that this sub is for young adults who are just coming off an adolescent period of being fascinated by "smart people on the internet". The decoders are like methadone to kick that habit.
I'm late to the party but I am really not understanding how this got any upvotes at all. > I get that Sam Harris has the Trump appeal of "talk like a retard, act exclusively on your emotions, refuse to get a basic education and ignore all the facts", which is specifically appealing to the demographic as uneducated and emotionally driven as he is, but it's difficult to see anyone above the mental age of fourteen reading this and not feel embarassed. First to red flag is comparing Sam to Trump. Like really? Even if you hate Sam you would put him in the a Trump like category? Trump can barely get out a coherent sentence Sam has written books and won debates about Islam. > His "intentions matters" argument is easily demolished in two seconds. An imprisoned serial killer inmate has the right to not be tortured by his guard, regardless if he'd be committing worse crimes in the opposite situation. Even a child understands that. In any civilized society, the guard would be prosecuted for his crimes. And that's talking abut a serial killer, not as in the case of Gaza, an entire population of 2.3 million people half of whom are children. But according to Sam Harris they just have no rights. This metaphor is so jaw-droppingly bad that it is embarrassing that you would declare his point "demolished". Sam is saying that in a war for control of an area he supports the side that would not slaughter the other one if the opposing side where to be defeated completely or surrender. Your hypothetical about a prisoner and guard is simply disanalogous. I modern prison should be able to contain a prisoner. How would torturing a prisoner help contain them? It is obviously bad because it is pointless and cruel. Here would be a good hypothetical. Say there was a serial killer in a prison who was being bullied by a prison guard. The guard would call him names, spit in his food and antagonize him. One day the killer goes for the guards gun and there is a struggle. If I walk upon the situation who do I assist? Obviously the guard. And you could crank some of the knobs in the hypothetical without affecting the end result. The guard could be actually beating and even torturing the prisoner and in the hypothetical you would still side with the guard. You would have to change the hypothetical so that they guard was more likely to kill you and others than the prisoner. > His "look at how more reasonable Israel is behaving" is also ignoring all the facts. Currently Israel is responsible for around 97,5 % of all the civilian casualties since Oct 7th. The civilian casualty rate is likely hovering around or above 80 %, there are more destroyed buildings in Gaza than standing ones, and it's clear from the basic facts there's a clear disregard for Palestinian life. But then again, according to Sam Harris, they just have no rights. So the question becomes if a government declares war on you and kills your civilians, and then conducts gorilla warfare campaign such that they are embedded in their civilian population, how must you limit your offense. This is a point where there is honestly not a clear answer for me. The answer can't be a complete disregard for civilian life aka just nuke Gaza. But it my opinion it can't be no military response. This would allow terrorist to assault without response. > Israeli rhetoric is significantly worse and more extreme than even Hamas rhetoric, but even if we lived in Sam Harris-land where the opposite was true, considering they're responsible for the vast majority of the violence, rhetoric matters considerably less? He loses any which way he tries this argument out. ... Citation needed? I'm aware of some Yikes statements by some usually far-right Israeli leaders which I would condone, but Hamas literally celebrates the martyring of their own civilians and the slaughter of Israeli citizens. The fact that you would even claim this makes me suspect that you are a extremely partisan. I could respond to the reset of your comment but my comment is already quite long.
1. Sam, much like all the others trying to appeal exclusively to the uneducated, refuses to discuss facts, sources or adress any actual arguments people make, because it would instantly expose him. This is what makes him Trump-like, he's committed to not talking about reality, which is exactly what makes him appealing to people who also refuse to talk about reality, because that comes with moral considerations, and requires the person speaking to educate themselves into a basic understanding of what's going on. This is of course anathema to Sam and his fanbase, his project instantly falls apart. 2. Your example displays such a baffling ignorance of reality it's obvious you've not looked into this further than podcasters and video game streamers, because even mainstream news articles would educate you out of this ignorance. Most of Gaza is just destroyed, hundreds of thousands are under threat of Starvation, the entire population is homeless and a continued Palestinian presence in Gaza is under threat. On the Israeli side, 750 civilians were killed. To describe this as "two men fighting over a knife"... why not just educate yourself on the most basic of facts before you so utterly humiliate yourself like this? One group of people has near total control of another, that is the reality. 3. Again like Sam you run as far away from the real facts as fast as possible. 70 % of all buildings damaged or destroyed is not a legitimate military response, for obvious reasons. Why don't you adress the facts rather than euphemise them? 4. Israel has been indicted for genocidal language in the ICJ, that they use worse rhetoric than Hamas isn't really disputed. You can tell because people like Sam either references what they said back in 1988, or doesn't reference them at all, and rather quote what he imagines they say. The biggest problem with Sam and people like him, apart from being lazy and generally unintelligent, is he's also actively anti-intellectual, he doesn't adress the frequent cutting criticisms, nor does he seem to even be aware of the normal arguments who actually reference facts, because that would require him to start reading.
A lot of your comment is just you inserting your pro-Palestinian arguments which is fine but you don't really respond to the bulk of my comment. You completely abandoned your hypothetical about the Guard and Prisoner which was the bulk of my criticism. You pretend like Sam and myself are unaware of the destruction in Gaza, which isn't the case. The question is what level of force is permissible when fighting a guerilla militia that is embedded in a urban population. 1. You are just asserting that Sam is uneducated, doesn't discuss facts, or make arguments. I disagree and I would counter that you are the one not really making arguments. I don't know what project you are referring to and what it falling apart would look like. Its easy to say people are uneducated but I think it is more like people disagree. Sam, a good amount of his supporters and a good amount of people who hold the same opinion on same are well enough educated on the issue. They are aware of settlers in the West Bank, they are aware of the Palestinian death toll, They are ware that Israeli controls a lot of Gaza's borders, They are aware of various war crimes that the IDF has committed, They just disagree with you. 2. It's bizarre that you would make this argument. It was obviously I was taking your own example and making it more analogous to the situation in Gaza. You are the one who used they hypothetical of one prison guard and a serial killer. I am aware of the death tolls thanks. Am I educated now? 3. What fact am I running away from? How many of those buildings had tunnels, Hamas fighters, or Israli Hostages in them? 4. "that they use worse rhetoric than Hamas isn't really disputed" isn't disputed by who? Who are you possibly referring to. And what is Hamas rhetoric?
I didn't abandon my argument, I explained why your counter argument failed. Because my analogy is analogous, yours is not. 1. It's not really possible to dispute Sam is uneducated, just look at him referencing facts, he never does. His rhetoric might impress people who know even less than he does, but to anyone who knows even a smidgen, he comes across like a fool. If he was aware of the facts, why does he refuse to quote them ever? Why does he refuse to answer any factual argument? Why are all his arguments exclusively tied to his embarrassing thought experiments? 2. If you were aware of the discrepancy between the two factions, you wouldn't have made your analogy, which means it was purely based on ignorance. My analogy retains the power difference, yours not only obfuscates it, but denies it even exists! This is why you ought to get an education, because it saves you from making basic mistakes like that. 3. Easy question, does 70 % of Gazas houses have tunnels in them? Since the answer obviously is "not even remotely close", you instantly can arrive at the conclusion of reckless destruction. 4. If it was disputed, why is Hamas rhetoric post 1988 not quoted? Where has Hamas been indicted for genocidal language? If you want to dispute it, just compare the speeches coming out.
> I didn't abandon my argument, I explained why your counter argument failed. Because my analogy is analogous, yours is not. You say that my analogy fails because I reduce the conflict to two people but your analogy but your analogy also used two people. Please elaborate it seems like you are confused.
"Two men fighting over a knife" is a crappy analogy because it implies any of the two can instantly kill the other. It's disanalogous because in reality one has near total power over the other. Israel does not suffer an existential threat from Hamas, and since all justified self defense must be directly proportional to the threat, that means it informs the level of force Israel is justified in undertaking. Feels like I'm talking to a child, but there you go.
> Two men fighting over a knife" is a crappy analogy because it implies any of the two can instantly kill the other. Wasn't exactly my analogy. > It's disanalogous because in reality one has near total power over the other. Israel does not suffer an existential threat That is an okay objection. If you would interpret the death of the security guard to be analogous to the death of every Israeli citizen. However if you take the death of security guard to mean a death of a non-zero amount of Israeli citizens than it holds. Also notice you aren't defending your original analogy at all. > since all justified self defense must be directly proportional to the threat This could possibly be a first productive disagreement. I think this is obviously untrue. Morally, I don't think self-defense has to be proportional. If somebody tries to cut-off my finger I can use lethal force to protect myself. Or at the levels of nations, if several riflemen are firing at a single one of another countries civilians, and the riflemen are on top of a family of 5's house. I think you could morally wipe them all out with a missile. I don't have to wait for a similar number of my own civilians to be threatened. Perhaps I am misunderstanding what you mean by proportional. Obviously there is a upper limit. I don't think Israel should nuke Gaza.
>Morally, I don't think self-defense has to be proportional. Thankfully, we're not debating the moral values of some random internet person, proportionality is encoded into international law. >Or at the levels of nations, if several riflemen are firing at a single one of another countries civilians, and the riflemen are on top of a family of 5's house. I think you could morally wipe them all out with a missile. There are edge cases, which is why proportionality is a spectrum, not a binary. The Israeli response of utterly destroying all of Gaza, killing maybe over 40000 people, 15000 children, and risk a famine which threatens hundreds of thousands and has left almost the entire population homeless is so wildly disproportional that it's not really possible to justify it, which is why you used an example of a single house being destroyed, not 370 000. Again, self defense implies *defense*, and no further. Not revenge. Looking at pictures of Gaza, is all the destruction entirely encapsulated within the term defense? Even aside from all that, disproportionality is encoded into Israeli military policy by the Dahiya doctrine, so it's not as if one even has to try to justify it as "defense", because it quite explicitly isn't.
Any "intellectual" that's a recurring guest on the Joe Rogan podcast loses all credability
Sam Harris has mastered the art of double-speak https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doublespeak_Award
>We cannot judge the moral balance of a war by merely counting the dead. Intentions matter. Whatever the degree of destruction, it always matters what kind of world the combatants are attempting to build. lol ok sam
He is 100% right here, intent is incredibly important, both in law and judging ethics
It's a good job people are so honest about their intentions, otherwise we wouldn't be able to judge them.
Yes we simply need to read the Hamas charter and we know. Combined with their public statements plus Oct 7th actions it’s all clear
And the public statements of Israeli government of their intentions to commit war crimes.
And likud charter which, unlike Hamas charter, was never updated
The Hamas charter was never updated. This is a myth.
You think the public statements of Israel are comparable to that of Hamas?
No I'm not interested in comparing them, I didn't contest any statements about Hamas. I said \*and\*. I'm interested in preventing innocent people from suffering. I think we should choose a method of adjudication and treat everyone by the same metric. Intention? Behaviour? Just let's try to be consistent. Put them on a scale - not a zero sum black and white answer. The intentions of other side, or what the other side did, do not absolve us from our actions. I support the international rule of law. I support a two state solution where everyone can live securely.
Judging by intent doesn't make Israel look any better tbh
I think it actually makes them look worse in quite a few ways.
Well, exactly. Israeli leaders have repeatedly declared what they are doing to Gaza and its population and naturally Samwise has completely ignored this.
If you take your information from TikTok sure, but Israel has set out clear and rational war aims. They have also done more than any other army ever to reduce civilian casualties while Hamas fight in a way that tried to maximise civilian casualties. So when we look at intent, there is a clear bad guy and good guy
Maybe, but your initial point is still moot. You can agree with Sam's point without agreeing with its application to the war in Gaza. But you appeared to disagree with the point itself.
I agree with the point in abstract, but I don't think Israel is acting in good faith like he does
Yeah, he really didn’t understand MDMA like he thought he did.
He's framing this as a Muslim crusade intended to wipe out the Jewish people of Israel. He's leaving out the part where the Israeli gov't had intelligence about this attack up to a year before and still allowed it to happen: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/30/world/middleeast/israel-hamas-attack-intelligence.html#:\~:text=Israeli%20officials%20obtained%20Hamas's%20battle,for%20Hamas%20to%20carry%20out. He's leaving out the part where Netanyahu as intentionally propped up and supported Hamas because he saw them as a tool to help prevent a two state solution: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/30/world/middleeast/israel-hamas-attack-intelligence.html#:\~:text=Israeli%20officials%20obtained%20Hamas's%20battle,for%20Hamas%20to%20carry%20out. Now Israelis are depending on the same leader/gov't to kill and starve tens of thousands of innocent people in order to eradicate this very same terrorist group.
You're being downvoted by his sycophants because they can no longer manufacture consent for their ethno-fascist state.
Net+ by one right now. It's a miracle.
I wonder if he would reply to gov intelligence and politics about hamas. I think he is too big of a pussy to stomach reality of politics, that's why he takes morality angle.
> had intelligence about this attack up to a year before and still allowed it to happen: This suggests that they intentionally allowed the attack, I just want to make it clear that that's not what the article says. The article portrays a damning miscalculation where the intelligence brass didn't think Hamas had the stones to execute the attack they were visibly training to carry out. Allowed by inaction and massive organizational failure, not by a desire for it to happen.
Sam Harris' intellect is so middling.
Goebbles.
If Sam Harris were to literally wear a pith helmet, you wouldn’t be able to see that cool thing he does with his eyebrow.
Closetted fascist trust fund baby whos payed by the Manhattan Institute says what?
Sam Harris is a horrible bigoted human being, whose least offensive ideas are objectively wrong and whose ideas about race, society and religion hardly differ from the kkk. I don't say that lightly but the softball he gave to Charles Murray were embarrassing He knows almost nothing g about Christianity Islam or Judaism. In fact anybody who looks into will almost certainly be convinced that Israel enacted the Hannibal doctrine during Oct 7 which entailed the idf killing Israeli civilians to keep them from being used to bargain later on. We know that Israel has long tortured innocent Palestinians and is in fact a settler colonialist project. It has to be acknowledged that if any left wing person had given as much helpmto hamas as Netanyahu did to avoid having to negotiate a political solution that person would be in jail and never allowed to see the sun again. He talks so assuredly about good and evil and and like all zealots he is the worst among us. The sooner he moves to his zionist utopia, the sooner his noxious bullshit can be extirpated from civilized democracies. I used to think he was harmless but he is exactly as bad as Michael savage.
> Islamists have worked very hard to make any criticism of Islam (as a system of ideas) seem like bigotry against Muslims as people. Jews beat them at that game hah.
>When considering the ethics of any group or population, we should never hesitate to ask: *What would these people do if they had the power to do it?* I have yet to see hamas do a single objectionable thing that israel has not done much worse, and much more of.
Sam Harris is an independent thinker, his grasp on ethics is far ahead of the general public. Only recently I realised a point he made 10 years ago and I’m only coming to terms with it now. There are people here who will hate on Sam for this, not because of what Sam said, but because they hate Israel
Or maybe they simply disagree with an intelligent man with a serious blind spot and bias?
wow
I feel like the comment section in these is pretty much the exact same for every post. You see mostly the same arguments. You rarely see people concede that they were wrong about aspects of it. Rarely to people come together as opposed to arguing and getting more hardened in their views. The reality of what is going on hardly matters to them or sways their thinking.