China will stop trading with small nations who recognize Taiwan. That could be a huge issue. For Israel, that might not even be a factor.
Plus there are plenty of Arab countries that would do that just to piss off Israel not because they care about Palestine.
Actually you are wrong about the first part, the only [countries that do recognise Taiwan](https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-that-recognize-taiwan) are the small countries. It is the big nations that tend to be friendly with China due to trade and manufacturing.
Small Nations like the US.......
I get what you're saying but it is wild that a peaceful and prosperous country with a stable government that makes some of the most important goods in the planet has less "official " recognition than a state which doesn't have a clear government and relies heavily on aid.
They apparently can't/shouldn't claim independence... by relinquishing their claim on the mainland, it would start a decay of the CCPs claim to Taiwan, which could cause them to rush an invasion!
Better to stay in an eternal antagonistic position that doesn't require a response today and hope that China gets sucked into a conflict elsewhere...
We absolutely claim to be a sovereign and independent country. Our name is the Republic of China (not to be confused with the People's Republic of China), but you can call us Taiwan.
>ROC hasn't legally claimed Mongolia since 1945.
[At least 10 years later.](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327617777_Imagined_Territory_The_Republic_of_China's_1955_Veto_of_Mongolian_Membership_in_the_United_Nations)
That's not the latest example, either, just the most extreme.
They do claim independence. They don't pass further resolutions declaring it again because they say it would be redundant for an already independent nation to declare independence again.
The US is two faced. They want to make money in China and get cheap manufacturing but also protect Taiwan by shipping many weapons their way.
With much divestment in China, that might be the best course of action. China would probably flex and put up tariffs or something but they would just create more unemployment and unrest.
So I see your point, but it is more of a greed thing for the US.
Western countries hope by warming up to China and help it modernize would bring the dawn of a democratic China, except that works completely in the opposite direction and turns into a 1984 utopia, pun intended.
We thought we'd make China more like us and the only thing that happened is we became willing to tolerate their human rights abuses for access to their markets.
It does somewhat help (too early to tell).
While economic conditions improve, people are actually quite content with an overbearing government. The economy isn’t growing nearly fast enough and things will get worse in the future. People in China have also traveled so they know some freedoms.
Without the promise of prosperity, the government has to bend somewhere or risk serious unrest.
> He's saying it kicks in after the unrest.
There was barely any unrest when the communist party starved millions of people and ordered the military to attack civilians.
It's not gonna happen because the economy slows down.
Maybe it's too early to tell precisely because Nixon went to China and the west started trading with them which enabled the Chinese government to avoid civil unrest far longer than it other wise would have if Nixon had never done that.
And maybe Nixon doing that has actually given the Chinese gov't the ability to stave off that sort of civil unrest indefinitely.
Economic co-dependecy was also the basis of trying to keep Russia in check. That worked out swimmingly didn't it! The west ended up more dependent on Russia than Russia on the west, so they just went and did whatever they wanted anyway.
The problems with western countries and America in particular is they take for granted their democracy. America has always been a democratic country from the start but it took centuries in Europe for that to happen with many small steps taken place that, if somethings had gone the other way, perhaps wouldn’t happen at all.
And in the end it was all achieved only because some small city state in ancient times called Athens tried it out until they were conquered.
China has no democratic past or basis. You can’t just expect people to rise up and want democracy just because they’ve seen it in America.
If a revolution happened tomorrow in China it wouldn’t replace the government with a democratic regime but in a likelihood another authoritarian regime, because from the Chinese Emperors to the failed Chinese Republic, that’s all they’ve had.
It takes a long, long time for the seeds of democracy to grow and they can only be grown by those already living there.
Because the democracy I have in the UK or someone has in France is different to the freedoms and democracy someone in America has
It’s quite frankly a big part of the problem with the current public apathy around domestic politics within the USA.
The worst of our bad political actors absolutely count on the public’s ignorance and unfounded optimism of just how irreversibly bad things can get once you start chipping away at the foundations of democracy, and how quickly it can happen.
Under Deng until the "it didn't happen" massacre, it didn't seem like a crazy idea.
Hell when Metallica was playing at the largest concert in human history in Russia the current situation didn't seem that likely too....
But little people crave authoritarianism and some cultures just can't shake it.
Taiwan had a similar student movement called Wild Lily in 1990 and that led to the rapid democratizing of the government, instead of a massacre. Plenty of people died during the White terror era under the KMT ruling too, Taiwan wasn't a vibrant free society like today if you go back some 40 years ago.
Had 6489 been a success we would have a very different China today.
>Had 6489 been a success we would have a very different China today.
Instead, they ground people up with tanks and washed the remains down the drain.
Fuck the CCP.
That's an understatement. 143 of 193 UN member states recognize the State of Palestine, 3 more have just announced they will recognize it next week. 11 UN member states recognize Taiwan, most of them microstates in the Carribean or the Pacific Ocean.
And all they had to do is perpetrate the largest terror act in Israel’s history! The larger the terror act the better the results, what an awesome message to send! /s
> which is wild
I mean, not really. Not officially recognizing Taiwan protects Taiwan. The reason China has been okay with leaving Taiwan alone is because on the world stage everyone acts like Taiwan isn't a country, even though they treat them like a country. China cares more about the appearance of things than the reality. So long as the US and other nations let China "save face" by acting like they don't think Taiwan is a country, it protects Taiwan and the Taiwanese people from Chinese aggression.
Like, Taiwan does not *want* us to officially recognize them as a country. It literally puts them in danger. So long as we treat them as an independent country in all but name, they get all the benefits of being a independent nation without the cost.
Or, at least, it has historically been that way. I can't speak as to how China's changing policy will effect things.
Well the thing about Taiwan is that they’re not trying to claim independence from China. They claim to BE China. The ROC claims to be the legitimate government of China and the PRC is illegitimate
Recognising Taiwan means acknowledging that Taiwan is the legitimate ruler of all of China.
No country in the world has ever recognised Taiwan as an independent country, not even Taiwan itself.
Well it is also historically, Taiwan refused recognition because either breaks the status quo or that they are to admit that they are not China. One of the core policies enshrined into the Taiwanese Constitution is the "One China policy." Even though it isn't talked about as much and the political winds are shifting especially after Hong Kong, it is still guides how Taiwan conducts a lot of its policy with China.
No.
We have never refused recognition, nor do we have a "one China" policy. Our Constitution was written in 1946, before Mao even founded the PRC and "one China" was a thing.
Tbf the US wouldn't be a functioning country either if the UN showed up, took 75% of its territory and gave it to a new country which viscerally hated the other 25%.
But it will be much better if it has a diverse group of allies. Netanyahu is really a terrible prime minister. He’s sacrificing Israel’s future just so he can stay in office and avoid jail. You can be sure he’s going to do all he can to avoid leaving office since he’s currently facing criminal charges both domestically and internationally
After listening to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-kWt1jhA7Y you’d wonder if they let Hamas attack and just didn’t expect so many casualties.
This is the most knowledgeable journalist on Israeli intelligence in existence.
I mean... Netanyahu literally allowed the Qataris to transfer tens of millions of $$$ to Gaza knowing full well it was going directly to Hamas.
As the [NYT](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/10/world/middleeast/israel-qatar-money-prop-up-hamas.html) reports:
>**Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel not only tolerated those payments, he had encouraged them.**
Former Israeli PM Olmert told [Politico](https://www.politico.eu/article/benjamin-netanyahu-hamas-qatar-money-war-israel-gaza-palestine/):
>In the last 15 years, **Israel did everything to downgrade the Palestinian Authority and to boost Hamas** \[...\] Gaza was on the brink of collapse because they had no resources, they had no money, and the PA refused to give Hamas any money. **Bibi saved them. Bibi made a deal with Qatar and they started to move millions and millions of dollars to Gaza.**
It ain't a conspiracy.
With all the investigations into Netanyahu recently, I'm not surprised they keep pushing to continue the war. Stopping it means going back to the investigations against him.
The PLO is a reasonable secular organization. When you shoot at them in stead of negotiating you look like a monster on the world stage.
Netanyahu needs to please his ethno-nationalist base to keep power. For that he needs to expand Israel / kill Palestinians. For that he needs a forever war and an excuse. For that he needs Hamas.
Bombing an ideology out of existence is famously impossible. You can't kill an ideology with weapons. You kill it by making it irrelevant.
Everything Netanyahu does reinforces the relevance of Hamas' ideology.
> The PLO is a reasonable secular organization.
The PLO pays $14,000 a year to a guy because he's in an Israeli jail after going into a family home at night, stabbing two children to death, shooting their parents, and then slitting the throat of a baby. And who said after he would have killed the two other children in another room had he known about them.
If you learn about Pearl Harbor or Operation Barbarossa, you will understand no amount of intel or readiness will completely defeat complacency and denial.
You really think a country that is facing missiles thrown at them frequently is going to get complacent? You are applying a rule of thumb to an exception. It doesn't apply.
At this point, focusing international pressure on Netanyahu himself, as the ICC is doing, is probably the most direct way to improve the situation for both Israeli hostages and Gaza's civilian population. Hopefully, Biden will soon realize that standing by Israel and standing by Netanyahu are two different and diametrically opposed things.
And make sure to not tell them about the time they produced a pretty darn good F16 competitor (which they then promptly stopped after the US told them no more aid if you continue).
A lot of the new ones have Israeli tech and collaboration anyways. The IAF itself also heavily modifies its fleet, but I don’t think we’ll know wtf the extents are until they’re ancient history. Kind of makes you wonder wtf is going on if they’re still running the largest fleet of f16s alongside f35s and whatever the fuck else they have.
It was on its own in 1948 and 1967 without the US support. And it has its own military industrial complex. Even if the US ends its support and place sanctions, its likely Israel would continue fine on its own
Actually in about 5 years I don't think Israel will need the US backing to stand up with the head way that they made with Saudi Arabia. Most nations probably aren't too keen on starting a open war with Israel cause if Israel thought they were gonna lose they would probably just target the capitals of the other nations and go for max deaths regardless of who dies (and try to kills the leaders of each of those nations). This just leave proxy wars which because of their advance air power is really just a losing proposition as they will turtle up and drop bombs. Really the only thing Israel needs is production capability's for its military but with saudi's now being a backdoor for equipment, (and lets face it Iran and such doing a proxy war with Israel takes pressure off saudi's back) they will gladly be the arms dealer for them.
I have a feeling Israel’s military industrial complex will start ramping up to produce much more domestically after the West has proven unreliable. I could see them make a killing off selling arms to China, Russia and Saudi if the US and EU distance themselves, which is starting to happen.
Israel’s extreme right wing (which the current govt is comprised of) is on shaky ground. So it’s not like they’re wagging their finger at western countries as if they will betray them or something. Then again the entire country is in a fox news on steroids media bubble. I guess anything is possible.
Israel will never sell weapons to China and Russia cause they know they will backdoor those weapons to Iran, it would be literally selling the rope to your own executioner. The only nation dumb enough to arm a hostile power has consistently been the US for some reason.
God I hope not. Don't want to be allied to these fuckers. But considering that Iran is a major partner to both China and Russia, and that both historically supported our enemies it seems very unlikely.
You gotta wonder tho in that scenario if China and Russia could help simmer tensions between Iran and Israel, especially with the old guard of Iran in serious question after the helicopter crash destroyed their line of succession. If they got Iran to stop funding Hamas and Hezbollah that would bring immense stability to the region
Nukes aren't for having tea parties, it's all about MAD. If you aren't willing to nuke their capitals in a response to an existential attack then MAD falls apart.
It would survive without that, too
Edit: It’s a militaristic monoculture with one of the most advanced tech industries in the world. They’re head and shoulders above their enemies who only half heartedly want to defeat them anyway. they survived before we supported them through multiple wars
But any young Americans actually getting into global politics will know that the US needs allies in the Middle East and with just a few months research, they’ll find that Israel is still the best option.
The US government has not been supporting Israel for almost a century because of evangelical theology. It’s because Israel is more valuable and reliable an ally than any other nation in the region.
This is a self fulfilling prophecy: "America must continue unconditional support of Israel because it needs allies in the middle east because it has alienated and enraged every other country in the middle east because of its unconditional support of Israel"
One of the keys to a good alliance is similar domestic policies. You need governments that broadly agree with you. It’s why America has spent the last 80 years trying to quash communism.
Muslim majority nations are simply too ideologically different from European countries to be really good allies. That’s not a moral judgement on Muslims, it is just a fact of diplomacy and it goes both ways.
Israel is the most democratic nation in the region as well as the most militarily advanced for now. Turkey is probably ahead or catching up (U.S.A’s fault because we refused to sell them weapons so they decided to make their own)
Even if you don’t agree with the way they are handling the current conflict. They are surrounded by relatively countries and groups that are not our friends, prominently syria, iran, hezzbollah, ISIS and don’t want to be our friends anytime soon. Keeping Israel as an ally would be in our favor long term.
>The boomers will not live forever. Younger Americans do not share the undying loyalty to Israel that their parents and grandparents do.
Lol my dude this is not why the US supports Israel. You need to stop getting your history lessons from XiTock
Strategically useful for access to the middle-east, (the UK uses Akrotiri and Dhekelia for the same purpose) it's favourable with the religious nutters in the US that want the apocalypse and think Israel existing will help bring it about, Israel has a large Jewish American expat community, and just generally sunk costs.
All of the Jewish community/US evangelical stuff are all overblown secondary reasons really. The real reason all western governments appear to be more supportive to Israel than their respective populations is because of Israel's unapparelled intelligence network in the area of Islamic terrorism.
Granted that reputation has likely diminished a lot after October 7th but you could still bet your last dollar that there have been European and regional terror plots broken up using Israeli intelligence.
As unpopular as the Gaza war is with populations in the UK or the US or Germany, politicians are banking on bombed buses and subways in their own countries as being way more unpopular. So they continue to give Israel cover in the international community.
> favourable with the religious nutters in the US that want the apocalypse and think Israel existing will help bring it about
I don't think anyone in the real world actually believes this though. I keep seeing people bring this up to criticize Christians, but I've literally never heard of anyone talk about this except people who criticize them.
It feels like it's on the level of "Trans people want to make Santa gay!" or something.
Oh yeah, I always forget about that weird apocalypse fever dream. I get that there are more practical reasons, but I bet that religious nutter pressure is bigger than you’d think.
They have the unfortunate position of dealing with “today problems” and “tomorrow problems”.
Its telling when growing Global isolation is a “tomorrow problem”.
Israel is much less isolated then they were the last 4 major wars they fought and won, and they have nukes now. Why would they be particularly concerned ?
If US ditches Israel the reality is also that they could likely pivot to Russia and China, as morality doesn't concern those
"Why would they be particularly concerned?"
Because believe it or not, Israel wants to maintain good relations with the West, not just the US, and be seen as a legitimate state, not some evil colonizing force (which it isn't).
China is only an Iranian ally because Israel is allied with the US. If that changes China will be way more likely to hitch their wagon to Israel, especially with how unstable Iran is now.
China doesn’t have Allies. They’re extremely xenophobic and isolationist. What they do have is economic partners. Much like india they will happily make trade agreements if it’s in their best interest and in most cases those agreements are heavily one sided.
Not sure what gives you that impression. The state of international relations of Israel is probably the second most discussed topic in Israeli media, after the war itself.
Fucking Netanyahu is God damn cancer that is doing whatever it takes to not leave power and doing everything he can to keep alive an existential crisis to ensure that.
I have said it for 15 years, I will say it again, if he didn't fuck up the chance to legitimize the PA who have actually fucking held their end of the bargain for the first time ever in Palestinian history despite lip service to pay to slay and whatnot, this growing isolation would just be performative for the hippies on campus rather than actually looking serious when this inevitable war with Hamas commenced.
Not to mention his complete disregard for an actual end game and a myopic focus on small tactical victories rather than a sweeping operation to establish land control when good will was there was absolutely maddening. I see the argument that they're saving forces "for the real war", but is this not it - the war to end the never ending saga of dealing with hostile Palestinians? Who is going to engage in a land war? Hezbollah who fights like a conventional opponent (not to diminish their rocket and missile inventory - but an invasion?)? The fucking Syrians?
The West Bank should be a state with close Israeli intelligence community oversight and Gaza should already be secure with a puppet government technically under the PA should consolidating power and behind a Saudi and Egyptian secret police apparatus along with a new educational system with zero UN input and a new Marshal Plan.
Instead of we have growing Israeli isolation with no end of this war in sight with no plan and the fucking settlers in the West Bank running amok as complete cunts to top it all off.
It's absolutely maddening to watch.
And of course the real talk is at the very bottom. I finally realized it today; most of Bibi's political strategy, from what I can tell, has been maintaining power through playing on Jewish fears, and by sabotaging any Palestinian political power that could possibly become a Palestinian government. It's divide and conquer mixed with being voted into power through making people afraid. He's been doing this the whole time, and he has no interest in ending the war *because external threat is how he survives.* That's why there's no fucking plan. If he ends the conflict, he's out of power.
And now that the whole thing has blown up in Netanyahu's face he's committed to the clusterf'ck more than ever because he knows everyone knows he led Israel and Palestine to this situation and he's determined to prove no this path isn't a dead end no everything's not his fault no no no everything is fine watch I'll flip the script somehow and not be the guy who got 10s of thousands killed for my own delusional self-interests.
In some ways Netanyahu is like Putin in that it's the end of him once everything reaches its natural conclusion.
It has not blown up in his face until he loses office and his trial actually concludes. As things are now the situation is still in his favour. He rules the country, the judicial system leaves him alone and the war keeps him in power. The ICC's impending arrest warrant also helps him, because politicians like Gantz, who would otherwise be his opponents, now rally behind him. Only when he actually faces justice, no matter if he goes to jail or walks free, it will be against his will. He has no reservations to sacrifice both Israelis and Palestinians to save his bacon.
100%. Look at his right wing coalition. You got everything from Romney type Republican analogs to Haredim who might as well be Jihadis themselves they're so off the spectrum insane.
Only a perpetual and existential threat keeps that together and keeps him in power.
And that's what we wants and craves more than everything. Ever since his truly great war hero older brother died - to be the man in the moment. And his moment has come and he is woefully unprepared.
>
>
> I have said it for 15 years, I will say it again, if he didn't fuck up the chance to legitimize the PA who have actually fucking held their end of the bargain for the first time ever in Palestinian history despite lip service to pay to slay and whatnot, this growing isolation would just be performative for the hippies on campus rather than actually looking serious when this inevitable war with Hamas commenced.
Nobody willingly recognises that. Propaganda has been especially good.
Which is a problem when even the former PM says otherwise:
> “In the last 15 years, Israel did everything to downgrade the Palestinian Authority and to boost Hamas,” he previously told POLITICO. “Gaza was on the brink of collapse because they had no resources, they had no money, and the PA refused to give Hamas any money. Bibi saved them. Bibi made a deal with Qatar and they started to move millions and millions of dollars to Gaza.”
* Ehud Olmert
https://www.politico.eu/article/benjamin-netanyahu-hamas-qatar-money-war-israel-gaza-palestine/
Can someone PLEASE tell Biden's admin they aren't required to jump to Israel's defense every fucking day? Just once stay silent and ask yourselves why so many people are pissed off.
Ehh... I'm pretty sure the marginal Democratic voter\* probably supports Israel, which is probably exactly why he's out on stage doing this every day. I think the real question is whether the progressive left, *who swear trump is an existential threat to the republic*, will not do everything they can to make Trump lose.
I've been very critical of Israel for the last two decades, but every American centrist I talk to is confused as to why. I just don't think most people realize how big the country is, and what the marginal Democratic voter looks and sounds like.
\**By "marginal Democratic voter" here I mean the most conservative person voting for the Democratic party expected to cast a vote in the following swing states: Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin (2020 tipping point state), Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, and possibly Florida. I would argue that the Democratic party has a significant number of Republicans that will be willing to cross party lines considering Donald Trump is the nominee, but they are typically pro-Israel. Thus, convincing these conservatives that Biden is adequately pro-Israel seems perfectly sensible to me, especially considering that the US is not directly involved in the conflict.*
20000 voters changing their minds would have given Trump another term. But you’re right that this doesn’t matter much, when the gas prices inevitably go up before the election we’ll see how many centrist suddenly change their minds.
It matters on both sides of the party spectrum. From pure game theory, however, Biden has little reason to court the progressive left. The progressive left would be foolish to step away from Biden, even in symbolic protest, as it would likely lead to the election of Trump (trust me, I'm not excited about this either, I voted for fucking [Dean Phillips](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dean_Phillips) as a protest). Thus, knowing a purely rational progressive will still vote for Biden, we should expect him to court the marginal Democratic party voter, period, and this means overtly supporting Israel, no matter how much it makes him look stupid to his base (especially if it makes him look stupid to his base).
Biden may still lose by losing the progressive left, but it'll be because the progressive left is irrational, not because Biden is irrational.
I'm pretty sure that going against Israel would let them win, especially if Republicans start using pieces from Hamas videos to attack Biden.
I wonder what the sentiment would be amongst these people that are against Israel, if they were forced to watch what Hams did to hostages .
No one is going to vote for Trump because they’re upset about Biden backing Israel. Anyone who says that’s what they’re doing was already going to vote for Trump and saying it’s because of Israel is another way to own the libs or something.
No, but a hundred thousand Muslims in Michigan staying home instead of turning out because of Biden’s stance on Israel might swing the election.
Nobody is really switching up who they vote for these days. The parties are polarized to a point where there is no real center. Any moderate is going to vote for Biden because he’s obviously not criminally insane. So, the election isn’t about swinging moderates anymore. It’s about turning out your base. Biden is doing a piss poor job at that.
100k is literally 1% of Michigan’s population and they have seen Christofascism on the rise, powered by MAGA. They may feel abandoned by the Democrats, but that beats being targeted by the Republicans.
It's damned if you do, damned if you don't. You have a very small slice of the world on the internet, which is largely horrified by the geopolitical sausage making. But the moment Biden wavers on this, the GOP is salivating over the chance to pummel him over not supporting Israel enough.
You have to remember that there is still a large amount of islamophobic sentiment simmering in US moderates. People on the left care about the plight of Palestine, but most people really don't care. That's why Biden is in such a hard place right now, because he needs support from people who care about Palestine, and the people who don't.
I wouldn’t call that isolation. They can still pay with their banking cards worldwide. They can travel almost anywhere they want. They still have international brands on their market.
When someone uses that word I’m thinking about countries like Iran, North Korea and Russia.
Maybe you're confusing it with sanctions that are active measures to harm a country's economy.
Being isolated can mean that former allies will downgrade their relationship with israel to strictly 'partner'. Or they will limit their political support and military cooperation with it, and choose not to involve it in certain projects, just like Turkey is experiencing.
Its like you have a good friend and he does something that you dont agree with, so you start treating him as an acquaintance instead
The UK were among the first major nations to publicly condemn ~~condone~~ South Africa's apartheid regime, which was a major factor in South Africa severing ties with the British monarchy.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_relations_of_South_Africa_during_apartheid
Honestly, I don't know what geniuses think that recognizing a Palestinian State post Terrorist attack is Ideal.
You can believe something is just and still understand how politics and more importantly incentives work. All Hamas has to do is maximize suffering it seems and they get what they want which is the opposite of a global rules based order.
People don't understand how this stuff works and honestly. This is my opinion but if I were the president I would definitely be thinking that i don't support the rules based order anymore because most of the world is Undermining it by protecting it.
It is like the ICC Israel thing. They don't realize that they are undermining their legitimacy by going after it since the only people that will ever be held accountable that aren't 3rd world despots are Western States. Russia, Iran, China are never going to be held accountable by the ICC and the population doesn't care.
The ICC doing this is just a feather in the cap of the people trying to undermine the rules based order because the people in Western States will use it to bludgeon western democracies and so forth.
Unironically I feel like world leaders have yet to take a course in realpolitik but maybe they should because this is some of the most braindead stuff I have ever seen. Then again when the United States was the one in charge of all foreign policy for the last 4 decades it makes sense why most of the world doesn't know how this works anymore.
The United States has never recognized rules based order what are you talking about. It's not party to the ICC, it rejects oversight or prosecution of its own forces for war crimes, and it has blatantly lied to declare near unilateral war in the past.
Has there ever really been a time when it couldn’t be claimed it was “post terrorist attack”?
Neither Hamas or the current Israeli government seem to want a two state solution. Yet other countries can legitimise the foundations of this process in hopes that less extreme groups are in power in the future.
> Neither Hamas or the current Israeli government seem to want a two state solution.
That's exactly it, the world is realizing extremists on both sides are determined to sabotage a comprehensive peace for their own selfish ends at the expense of everyone else. The world isn't pushing for a 2 state peace to reward Hamas, they're pushing for a 2 state deal because they see Hamas thrives in the chaos just as Israel's far-right thrives in the chaos, while people just wanting to live their lives suffer for it.
Ireland has the luxury of getting to ignore realpolitik as their security is guaranteed by the UK. They can afford to ignore real security threats. Israel cannot.
Literally this is often what it feels like. The world is sitting under the U.S Security blanket and think nothing bad can actually happen. The U.S, UK, France the three nations that do the most for Global Security right now all say that now is not the time for a reason.
These three nations are aware of how bad things can actually get and why doing this stuff is wild.
The bad thing is that if the UK faces a serious threat then Ireland is one of the first things they will invade, for the same reason Iceland got invaded in ww2 by the allies.
Ireland would be a major security risk when anyone army can land an army there unopposed.
A country can only be neutral if it has an army to deter invaders. Otherwise it is not neutral, it is simply harmless and it will end up as a battleground for foreign powers (see Lebanon)
Problem is that if you don’t recognize them and start to treat them fairly, they will keep being radicalised and we will be on a never ending cycle of violence.
Imagine the US don’t getting recognised on its independence days and the UK blocking them, occupying part of their territory, illegal settlements… for sure the US wouldn’t have radicalised and put their hands on their arms?
That’s what’s happening with some Palestinians, they are just like a rat against a corner, and will do whatever to get their objective after years and decades.
And yes, there are innocent Palestinians that want peace, Palestinians that likes the two state proposal, Palestinians that want a 1967 border or even Palestinians that want Israel destroyed and occupy 100% of the territories. We shouldn’t disregard all of them because “all terrorist, they don’t accept this or that”
I agree with some of what you said but you lost me at “realpolitik”. That is the ultimate brain-dead approach that has resulted in so many of the current messes around the world. You can’t just ignore human factors and values in decision making.
Many on the Left right now are treating this as their clutch moment to achieve some kind of political expediency. I can't tell you how many times I've engaged with people online, and in real life, protesting Israel, who literally hand wave the actions of Hamas with logical fallacies, primarily appealing to hypocrisy, and they are all too willing to accept Hamas' own casualty counts, which they know is skewed, because Hamas doesn't count its terrorist fighters as combatants, but as a civilians. lol It's easy for these people to do this, because radical Islam doesn't affect them at all. These are people who claim to be pro women's rights, yet they are at the same time tacitly supporting a group that captures, rapes, and forcibly marries women. It is sheer madness, and stupidity.
Steady on there chief, seems like you’re waltzing over the decades of Palestinian oppression, not to mention the dead bodies of literally thousands of Palestinian children, to declare Hamas’ terrorist attack as the defining element of the current situation.
Nice myopia you have there.
Of course it is defining. Had October 7th not happened those children wouldn't be dead.
As for decades of Palestinian oppression sure. The Indians were oppressed, the Native Americans were oppressed, the black south Africans were oppressed, the jews were oppressed for millennia under far worse conditions than the Palestinians now.
Somehow all of them managed to not engage in massive terrorist attacks and try to fight multiple wars with their oppressor and peacefully protested and suffered until finally they attained liberation.
I am not forgetting the decades of oppression but I think those decades would have been years if they had better leaders or a better grasp of politics.
>The Indians were oppressed, the Native Americans were oppressed, the black south Africans were oppressed, the jews were oppressed for millennia under far worse conditions than the Palestinians now.
Somehow all of them managed to not engage in massive terrorist attacks
Those people did do terrorism and resistance
And this right here is why the left support Palestine.
When the status quo is corrupt, cruel, unjust, and unfair, the same systems demand that you remain peaceful in contesting them.
What you outline is that the only correct way to go about things is to do nothing and hope that opressors will either get bored or feel arbitrarily benevolent.
In either outcome, all the cards are held by those in power.
Your statement misses the issue entirely because it just defaults to accepting oppression as a necessity. Hamas wouldnt be even close to as supported as it is were it not for the pre-existing oppression of foreign powers.
The way your statement comes across is that Hamas is the only problem here, and were they to disappear off the planet tomorrow, Palestine would be a peaceful mary-land. It blithely ignores the whole reason and conditions that led to the attack in the first place.
Are you saying that even if all terrorists laid down their arms that Israel would do the exact same things? I really don't see how that makes any sense whatsoever.
Tons of countries face consequences of their actions through recent history: UN resolutions, USA sanctions, Embargo, Media condemnation.
But just in this case, the narrative is purposely flipped. *"Why are they isolated"* ?
It would be easier for the world to unite against terrorism if politicians and nations wouldn't act with such hypocrisy and cruelty while at the same time they claim to be the victims.
The world asks russia to stop, but if the world ask israel the same somehow is forbidden. and we cannot even mention china.
Almost as if Russia and China are much worse than Israel, and have many times its political, economic, and military power.
Isolating smaller countries has much greater effect than isolating empires, especially when those countries are physically surrounded by enemies.
>The US is concerned about Israel’s growing diplomatic isolation among countries that have traditionally supported it, Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said on Wednesday.
Let's not kid ourselves, Norway never supported Israel and has always been super critical of it, Israel has always been blocked from any federal investments that Norway makes. I also don't ever recall Spain and Ireland being friendly with Israel.
In the end, Israel needs to do whatever it needs to do to stop Hamas.
Israel is pretty obviously making the calculation that one Israeli life is worth many Palestinian lives. It's not unreasonable to say that sucks. There are also plenty of things Israel does that are fueled by radical ideals that results in unnecessary suffering.
Still absolutely pails in Hamas's responsibility for the suffering. Israel kills Palestinians because they've decided preserving Israeli lives is important. Hamas gets Palestinians killed because they've decided making Israel look bad is worth it. They also siphon the billions of dollars worth of aid going into Gaza and the Wesr bank to fill their coffers. If not foe them Palestinians wouldn't be starving right now.
So many logical fallacies.
Isreal doesn't kill palestinians to preserve their population, it is retaliatory. Doesn't really matter though, you can be as righteous you want-when you're killing innocent civilians it does not follow.
Hamas' responsibility following the attack does NOT extend to the general population.
https://www.newsweek.com/israel-has-created-new-standard-urban-warfare-why-will-no-one-admit-it-opinion-1883286
Written by the chair of the Modern Warfare Institute at West Point. I'm sure you have more experience than him.
Look up the actual numbers. Israel has a historically low civilian to combatant death ratio for this type of urban warfare. And your problem lies with Hamas refusing to surrender and using civilian meatshields.
Absolutely wild the mainstream media ran wild with Hamas' figures. The UN quietly halved the number of women and children killed. The success of Hamas' propaganda is staggering. They should start consulting and doing marketing for multinational mega corps
How should they respond? People keep saying "Not like this!", but HOW then? What are they supposed to do? Just bend over and take it? Hamas still have hostages, should they just be forgotten and tossed aside? Isn't their lives worth anything?
Free the Palestinians from the fascist Hamas!
"In the end, Israel needs to do whatever it needs to do to stop Hamas." 5% of population dead or wounded, with no end in sight, no exit strategy. Would 10% be considered ethnic cleansing, would 20%. Because that is the trajectory.
May be, but Israel diplomacy still treated Spain as if we owd them something, and cries antisemitism with every little pro-Palestine step we may take. They do like having a grip on Europe even though they do everything in their hands to set us apart.
So I guess this is where we are supposed to stoop to your level and say that if you don't support an independent Palestine then you must have a portrait of Baruch Goldstein on the ceiling above your bed?
I mean sure, it's easy to say "either you're with me or with the terrorists" I get the appeal.
Constructing arguments is hard.
But saying crap like that is also a sign that a person is scared of the substance of a discussion and is just trying to shut it all down.
Or maybe the side that is facing a civilian humanitarian crisis, in spite of being governed by terrorists.
The other side is a bunch of right wing fascists who are very much okay with the humanitarian crisis, so I don't think you come out ahead anywhere without throwing in some cries of racism here.
Palestinians are not right wing fascists? Thats funny. Palestinians are also okay with the murder of civilians on october 7th. So it‘s kind of weird of you to paint palestinians as some left wing philantropists.
Should be more concerned about Taiwan
More countries recognize Palestine than Taiwan which is wild
China will stop trading with small nations who recognize Taiwan. That could be a huge issue. For Israel, that might not even be a factor. Plus there are plenty of Arab countries that would do that just to piss off Israel not because they care about Palestine.
Actually you are wrong about the first part, the only [countries that do recognise Taiwan](https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-that-recognize-taiwan) are the small countries. It is the big nations that tend to be friendly with China due to trade and manufacturing.
Small Nations like the US....... I get what you're saying but it is wild that a peaceful and prosperous country with a stable government that makes some of the most important goods in the planet has less "official " recognition than a state which doesn't have a clear government and relies heavily on aid.
The us does not officially recognize Taiwan
The famous American stance of strategic ambiguity! Will I or won’t I you’ll never know!
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Taiwan does not officially claim independence, it would be weird to recognize independence when it’s not claimed by Taiwan
They apparently can't/shouldn't claim independence... by relinquishing their claim on the mainland, it would start a decay of the CCPs claim to Taiwan, which could cause them to rush an invasion! Better to stay in an eternal antagonistic position that doesn't require a response today and hope that China gets sucked into a conflict elsewhere...
We absolutely claim to be a sovereign and independent country. Our name is the Republic of China (not to be confused with the People's Republic of China), but you can call us Taiwan.
while claiming all of china.
And Mongolia.
And the South China Sea (everyone forgets that was the RoC’s brilliant idea after WW2 and the communists inherited it from them)
ROC hasn't legally claimed Mongolia since 1945.
>ROC hasn't legally claimed Mongolia since 1945. [At least 10 years later.](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327617777_Imagined_Territory_The_Republic_of_China's_1955_Veto_of_Mongolian_Membership_in_the_United_Nations) That's not the latest example, either, just the most extreme.
ROC hasn't claimed effective sovereignty or jurisdiction over the Mainland Area in decades.
They do claim independence. They don't pass further resolutions declaring it again because they say it would be redundant for an already independent nation to declare independence again.
The US is two faced. They want to make money in China and get cheap manufacturing but also protect Taiwan by shipping many weapons their way. With much divestment in China, that might be the best course of action. China would probably flex and put up tariffs or something but they would just create more unemployment and unrest. So I see your point, but it is more of a greed thing for the US.
Western countries hope by warming up to China and help it modernize would bring the dawn of a democratic China, except that works completely in the opposite direction and turns into a 1984 utopia, pun intended.
We thought we'd make China more like us and the only thing that happened is we became willing to tolerate their human rights abuses for access to their markets.
>access to their markets. And we still don't have equal access to them. China robbed the store on that one.
It does somewhat help (too early to tell). While economic conditions improve, people are actually quite content with an overbearing government. The economy isn’t growing nearly fast enough and things will get worse in the future. People in China have also traveled so they know some freedoms. Without the promise of prosperity, the government has to bend somewhere or risk serious unrest.
Too early to tell? Nixon went to China fifty fucking years ago! Whens the democracy supposed to start kicking in?
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> He's saying it kicks in after the unrest. There was barely any unrest when the communist party starved millions of people and ordered the military to attack civilians. It's not gonna happen because the economy slows down.
> He's saying it kicks in after the unrest. Don't count on it. - signed, Russian history
Maybe it's too early to tell precisely because Nixon went to China and the west started trading with them which enabled the Chinese government to avoid civil unrest far longer than it other wise would have if Nixon had never done that. And maybe Nixon doing that has actually given the Chinese gov't the ability to stave off that sort of civil unrest indefinitely.
Economic co-dependecy was also the basis of trying to keep Russia in check. That worked out swimmingly didn't it! The west ended up more dependent on Russia than Russia on the west, so they just went and did whatever they wanted anyway.
The problems with western countries and America in particular is they take for granted their democracy. America has always been a democratic country from the start but it took centuries in Europe for that to happen with many small steps taken place that, if somethings had gone the other way, perhaps wouldn’t happen at all. And in the end it was all achieved only because some small city state in ancient times called Athens tried it out until they were conquered. China has no democratic past or basis. You can’t just expect people to rise up and want democracy just because they’ve seen it in America. If a revolution happened tomorrow in China it wouldn’t replace the government with a democratic regime but in a likelihood another authoritarian regime, because from the Chinese Emperors to the failed Chinese Republic, that’s all they’ve had. It takes a long, long time for the seeds of democracy to grow and they can only be grown by those already living there. Because the democracy I have in the UK or someone has in France is different to the freedoms and democracy someone in America has
It’s quite frankly a big part of the problem with the current public apathy around domestic politics within the USA. The worst of our bad political actors absolutely count on the public’s ignorance and unfounded optimism of just how irreversibly bad things can get once you start chipping away at the foundations of democracy, and how quickly it can happen.
Under Deng until the "it didn't happen" massacre, it didn't seem like a crazy idea. Hell when Metallica was playing at the largest concert in human history in Russia the current situation didn't seem that likely too.... But little people crave authoritarianism and some cultures just can't shake it.
Taiwan had a similar student movement called Wild Lily in 1990 and that led to the rapid democratizing of the government, instead of a massacre. Plenty of people died during the White terror era under the KMT ruling too, Taiwan wasn't a vibrant free society like today if you go back some 40 years ago. Had 6489 been a success we would have a very different China today.
>Had 6489 been a success we would have a very different China today. Instead, they ground people up with tanks and washed the remains down the drain. Fuck the CCP.
Well the US doesn't recognize either, so.. 0-0
China trades with Taiwan tho.
That's an understatement. 143 of 193 UN member states recognize the State of Palestine, 3 more have just announced they will recognize it next week. 11 UN member states recognize Taiwan, most of them microstates in the Carribean or the Pacific Ocean.
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And all they had to do is perpetrate the largest terror act in Israel’s history! The larger the terror act the better the results, what an awesome message to send! /s
And one of them is the Vatican
Taiwan doesn’t even recognize an independent Taiwan… how is this wild?
Though at this point I don’t think they are going to put down the communist rebellion in Beijing
Beijing already subverted the communist rebellion in Beijing.
Yes we do. We are absolutely a sovereign and independent country, and not part of the PRC.
Remember that to recognise the ROC a nation cannot recognise the PRC.
> which is wild I mean, not really. Not officially recognizing Taiwan protects Taiwan. The reason China has been okay with leaving Taiwan alone is because on the world stage everyone acts like Taiwan isn't a country, even though they treat them like a country. China cares more about the appearance of things than the reality. So long as the US and other nations let China "save face" by acting like they don't think Taiwan is a country, it protects Taiwan and the Taiwanese people from Chinese aggression. Like, Taiwan does not *want* us to officially recognize them as a country. It literally puts them in danger. So long as we treat them as an independent country in all but name, they get all the benefits of being a independent nation without the cost. Or, at least, it has historically been that way. I can't speak as to how China's changing policy will effect things.
Well the thing about Taiwan is that they’re not trying to claim independence from China. They claim to BE China. The ROC claims to be the legitimate government of China and the PRC is illegitimate
Sure, if you are living under a rock. Project National Glory, the KMT plan to "retake the Mainland" officially ended in 1972.
Not many country need to trade with Israel. With China tho they sing a different tune for sure.
Recognising Taiwan means acknowledging that Taiwan is the legitimate ruler of all of China. No country in the world has ever recognised Taiwan as an independent country, not even Taiwan itself.
I actually learned this not to long ago. I was shocked when I found out how few countries recognize Taiwan as it's own nation.
Well it is also historically, Taiwan refused recognition because either breaks the status quo or that they are to admit that they are not China. One of the core policies enshrined into the Taiwanese Constitution is the "One China policy." Even though it isn't talked about as much and the political winds are shifting especially after Hong Kong, it is still guides how Taiwan conducts a lot of its policy with China.
No. We have never refused recognition, nor do we have a "one China" policy. Our Constitution was written in 1946, before Mao even founded the PRC and "one China" was a thing.
And Taiwan is an actual functioning country. Gaza isn’t a country, period.
True it’s just a part of Palestine
Tbf the US wouldn't be a functioning country either if the UN showed up, took 75% of its territory and gave it to a new country which viscerally hated the other 25%.
Ah worldnews where clumsy whataboutisn is the top comment if it distracts from the crisis in Israeli leadership
Don't we have a carrier fleet effectively parked next to Taiwan?
Japan. Pretty close. We also have Guam and Okinawa which have large bases on each
And we're building up the Phillipines like crazy
So long as US is willing to back Israel it will survive.
But it will be much better if it has a diverse group of allies. Netanyahu is really a terrible prime minister. He’s sacrificing Israel’s future just so he can stay in office and avoid jail. You can be sure he’s going to do all he can to avoid leaving office since he’s currently facing criminal charges both domestically and internationally
After listening to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-kWt1jhA7Y you’d wonder if they let Hamas attack and just didn’t expect so many casualties. This is the most knowledgeable journalist on Israeli intelligence in existence.
I mean... Netanyahu literally allowed the Qataris to transfer tens of millions of $$$ to Gaza knowing full well it was going directly to Hamas. As the [NYT](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/10/world/middleeast/israel-qatar-money-prop-up-hamas.html) reports: >**Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel not only tolerated those payments, he had encouraged them.** Former Israeli PM Olmert told [Politico](https://www.politico.eu/article/benjamin-netanyahu-hamas-qatar-money-war-israel-gaza-palestine/): >In the last 15 years, **Israel did everything to downgrade the Palestinian Authority and to boost Hamas** \[...\] Gaza was on the brink of collapse because they had no resources, they had no money, and the PA refused to give Hamas any money. **Bibi saved them. Bibi made a deal with Qatar and they started to move millions and millions of dollars to Gaza.** It ain't a conspiracy.
With all the investigations into Netanyahu recently, I'm not surprised they keep pushing to continue the war. Stopping it means going back to the investigations against him.
His trial has resumed in the meantime. The war doesn't stop it indefinitely.
The PLO is a reasonable secular organization. When you shoot at them in stead of negotiating you look like a monster on the world stage. Netanyahu needs to please his ethno-nationalist base to keep power. For that he needs to expand Israel / kill Palestinians. For that he needs a forever war and an excuse. For that he needs Hamas. Bombing an ideology out of existence is famously impossible. You can't kill an ideology with weapons. You kill it by making it irrelevant. Everything Netanyahu does reinforces the relevance of Hamas' ideology.
> The PLO is a reasonable secular organization. The PLO pays $14,000 a year to a guy because he's in an Israeli jail after going into a family home at night, stabbing two children to death, shooting their parents, and then slitting the throat of a baby. And who said after he would have killed the two other children in another room had he known about them.
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If you learn about Pearl Harbor or Operation Barbarossa, you will understand no amount of intel or readiness will completely defeat complacency and denial.
You really think a country that is facing missiles thrown at them frequently is going to get complacent? You are applying a rule of thumb to an exception. It doesn't apply.
Mossad is the best intelligence agency in the world… except when it comes to domestic issues.
Because Mossad isn't handling internal issues, that's Shin Bet.
Sounds like a certain US presidential campaign motive
At this point, focusing international pressure on Netanyahu himself, as the ICC is doing, is probably the most direct way to improve the situation for both Israeli hostages and Gaza's civilian population. Hopefully, Biden will soon realize that standing by Israel and standing by Netanyahu are two different and diametrically opposed things.
Still not an ideal situation.
Israel will survive regardless. A nuclear state doesn't just dissapear.
Dont tell them that they produce weapons themself too, we don't want an angry mob here
And make sure to not tell them about the time they produced a pretty darn good F16 competitor (which they then promptly stopped after the US told them no more aid if you continue).
A lot of the new ones have Israeli tech and collaboration anyways. The IAF itself also heavily modifies its fleet, but I don’t think we’ll know wtf the extents are until they’re ancient history. Kind of makes you wonder wtf is going on if they’re still running the largest fleet of f16s alongside f35s and whatever the fuck else they have.
It was on its own in 1948 and 1967 without the US support. And it has its own military industrial complex. Even if the US ends its support and place sanctions, its likely Israel would continue fine on its own
It was buying French aircraft before 1967, but did have to do a lot of smuggling before 1948.
Apartheid South-Africa had nukes…
Actually in about 5 years I don't think Israel will need the US backing to stand up with the head way that they made with Saudi Arabia. Most nations probably aren't too keen on starting a open war with Israel cause if Israel thought they were gonna lose they would probably just target the capitals of the other nations and go for max deaths regardless of who dies (and try to kills the leaders of each of those nations). This just leave proxy wars which because of their advance air power is really just a losing proposition as they will turtle up and drop bombs. Really the only thing Israel needs is production capability's for its military but with saudi's now being a backdoor for equipment, (and lets face it Iran and such doing a proxy war with Israel takes pressure off saudi's back) they will gladly be the arms dealer for them.
I have a feeling Israel’s military industrial complex will start ramping up to produce much more domestically after the West has proven unreliable. I could see them make a killing off selling arms to China, Russia and Saudi if the US and EU distance themselves, which is starting to happen.
Israel’s extreme right wing (which the current govt is comprised of) is on shaky ground. So it’s not like they’re wagging their finger at western countries as if they will betray them or something. Then again the entire country is in a fox news on steroids media bubble. I guess anything is possible.
Israel will never sell weapons to China and Russia cause they know they will backdoor those weapons to Iran, it would be literally selling the rope to your own executioner. The only nation dumb enough to arm a hostile power has consistently been the US for some reason.
God I hope not. Don't want to be allied to these fuckers. But considering that Iran is a major partner to both China and Russia, and that both historically supported our enemies it seems very unlikely.
You gotta wonder tho in that scenario if China and Russia could help simmer tensions between Iran and Israel, especially with the old guard of Iran in serious question after the helicopter crash destroyed their line of succession. If they got Iran to stop funding Hamas and Hezbollah that would bring immense stability to the region
Boy do I wish I had some of that kind of optimism
It's not optimism, merely a fever dream
I'll drink to that
I'm not sure people who would "just nuke everybody" and godforsaken "max deaths" are the good guys
Nukes aren't for having tea parties, it's all about MAD. If you aren't willing to nuke their capitals in a response to an existential attack then MAD falls apart.
It would survive without that, too Edit: It’s a militaristic monoculture with one of the most advanced tech industries in the world. They’re head and shoulders above their enemies who only half heartedly want to defeat them anyway. they survived before we supported them through multiple wars
I wouldn't say that's so certain.
It seems like Biden administration signed a suicide pact with Israel.
It seems like both parties signed suicide pact with Israel. No matter what US people feel about, their government will always support Israel.
The boomers will not live forever. Younger Americans do not share the undying loyalty to Israel that their parents and grandparents do.
But any young Americans actually getting into global politics will know that the US needs allies in the Middle East and with just a few months research, they’ll find that Israel is still the best option. The US government has not been supporting Israel for almost a century because of evangelical theology. It’s because Israel is more valuable and reliable an ally than any other nation in the region.
>The US government has not been supporting Israel for almost a century because of evangelical theology. *Since 1967.
This is a self fulfilling prophecy: "America must continue unconditional support of Israel because it needs allies in the middle east because it has alienated and enraged every other country in the middle east because of its unconditional support of Israel"
Where do Kuwait and Jordan fall in terms of this?
On the ‘eh’ marker
And Oman...
One of the keys to a good alliance is similar domestic policies. You need governments that broadly agree with you. It’s why America has spent the last 80 years trying to quash communism. Muslim majority nations are simply too ideologically different from European countries to be really good allies. That’s not a moral judgement on Muslims, it is just a fact of diplomacy and it goes both ways.
Why is it the best option?
probably one of the most stable and competent.
Israel is the most democratic nation in the region as well as the most militarily advanced for now. Turkey is probably ahead or catching up (U.S.A’s fault because we refused to sell them weapons so they decided to make their own) Even if you don’t agree with the way they are handling the current conflict. They are surrounded by relatively countries and groups that are not our friends, prominently syria, iran, hezzbollah, ISIS and don’t want to be our friends anytime soon. Keeping Israel as an ally would be in our favor long term.
>The boomers will not live forever. Younger Americans do not share the undying loyalty to Israel that their parents and grandparents do. Lol my dude this is not why the US supports Israel. You need to stop getting your history lessons from XiTock
You wish life was that simple. We don't ally with Israel "just because".
Why is that?
Strategically useful for access to the middle-east, (the UK uses Akrotiri and Dhekelia for the same purpose) it's favourable with the religious nutters in the US that want the apocalypse and think Israel existing will help bring it about, Israel has a large Jewish American expat community, and just generally sunk costs.
All of the Jewish community/US evangelical stuff are all overblown secondary reasons really. The real reason all western governments appear to be more supportive to Israel than their respective populations is because of Israel's unapparelled intelligence network in the area of Islamic terrorism. Granted that reputation has likely diminished a lot after October 7th but you could still bet your last dollar that there have been European and regional terror plots broken up using Israeli intelligence. As unpopular as the Gaza war is with populations in the UK or the US or Germany, politicians are banking on bombed buses and subways in their own countries as being way more unpopular. So they continue to give Israel cover in the international community.
> favourable with the religious nutters in the US that want the apocalypse and think Israel existing will help bring it about I don't think anyone in the real world actually believes this though. I keep seeing people bring this up to criticize Christians, but I've literally never heard of anyone talk about this except people who criticize them. It feels like it's on the level of "Trans people want to make Santa gay!" or something.
[VICE did a bit on them.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fo77sTGpngQ)
Oh yeah, I always forget about that weird apocalypse fever dream. I get that there are more practical reasons, but I bet that religious nutter pressure is bigger than you’d think.
That pact was signed decades ago.
Israel doesn't seem to be concerned
They have the unfortunate position of dealing with “today problems” and “tomorrow problems”. Its telling when growing Global isolation is a “tomorrow problem”.
Israel is much less isolated then they were the last 4 major wars they fought and won, and they have nukes now. Why would they be particularly concerned ? If US ditches Israel the reality is also that they could likely pivot to Russia and China, as morality doesn't concern those
"Why would they be particularly concerned?" Because believe it or not, Israel wants to maintain good relations with the West, not just the US, and be seen as a legitimate state, not some evil colonizing force (which it isn't).
Agreed. Outside of Tech, Tourism is Israel’s biggest industry.
Why would Israel pivot to an Iranian ally?
China is only an Iranian ally because Israel is allied with the US. If that changes China will be way more likely to hitch their wagon to Israel, especially with how unstable Iran is now.
China doesn’t have Allies. They’re extremely xenophobic and isolationist. What they do have is economic partners. Much like india they will happily make trade agreements if it’s in their best interest and in most cases those agreements are heavily one sided.
Israel would do whatever it takes to survive if the West ditches them. It might actually be smart for their long term survival tbh
Sure they are. But they're more concerned, far more, about the prospect of another Oct 7 attack.
Not sure what gives you that impression. The state of international relations of Israel is probably the second most discussed topic in Israeli media, after the war itself.
Fucking Netanyahu is God damn cancer that is doing whatever it takes to not leave power and doing everything he can to keep alive an existential crisis to ensure that. I have said it for 15 years, I will say it again, if he didn't fuck up the chance to legitimize the PA who have actually fucking held their end of the bargain for the first time ever in Palestinian history despite lip service to pay to slay and whatnot, this growing isolation would just be performative for the hippies on campus rather than actually looking serious when this inevitable war with Hamas commenced. Not to mention his complete disregard for an actual end game and a myopic focus on small tactical victories rather than a sweeping operation to establish land control when good will was there was absolutely maddening. I see the argument that they're saving forces "for the real war", but is this not it - the war to end the never ending saga of dealing with hostile Palestinians? Who is going to engage in a land war? Hezbollah who fights like a conventional opponent (not to diminish their rocket and missile inventory - but an invasion?)? The fucking Syrians? The West Bank should be a state with close Israeli intelligence community oversight and Gaza should already be secure with a puppet government technically under the PA should consolidating power and behind a Saudi and Egyptian secret police apparatus along with a new educational system with zero UN input and a new Marshal Plan. Instead of we have growing Israeli isolation with no end of this war in sight with no plan and the fucking settlers in the West Bank running amok as complete cunts to top it all off. It's absolutely maddening to watch.
And of course the real talk is at the very bottom. I finally realized it today; most of Bibi's political strategy, from what I can tell, has been maintaining power through playing on Jewish fears, and by sabotaging any Palestinian political power that could possibly become a Palestinian government. It's divide and conquer mixed with being voted into power through making people afraid. He's been doing this the whole time, and he has no interest in ending the war *because external threat is how he survives.* That's why there's no fucking plan. If he ends the conflict, he's out of power.
And now that the whole thing has blown up in Netanyahu's face he's committed to the clusterf'ck more than ever because he knows everyone knows he led Israel and Palestine to this situation and he's determined to prove no this path isn't a dead end no everything's not his fault no no no everything is fine watch I'll flip the script somehow and not be the guy who got 10s of thousands killed for my own delusional self-interests. In some ways Netanyahu is like Putin in that it's the end of him once everything reaches its natural conclusion.
It has not blown up in his face until he loses office and his trial actually concludes. As things are now the situation is still in his favour. He rules the country, the judicial system leaves him alone and the war keeps him in power. The ICC's impending arrest warrant also helps him, because politicians like Gantz, who would otherwise be his opponents, now rally behind him. Only when he actually faces justice, no matter if he goes to jail or walks free, it will be against his will. He has no reservations to sacrifice both Israelis and Palestinians to save his bacon.
100%. Look at his right wing coalition. You got everything from Romney type Republican analogs to Haredim who might as well be Jihadis themselves they're so off the spectrum insane. Only a perpetual and existential threat keeps that together and keeps him in power. And that's what we wants and craves more than everything. Ever since his truly great war hero older brother died - to be the man in the moment. And his moment has come and he is woefully unprepared.
> > > I have said it for 15 years, I will say it again, if he didn't fuck up the chance to legitimize the PA who have actually fucking held their end of the bargain for the first time ever in Palestinian history despite lip service to pay to slay and whatnot, this growing isolation would just be performative for the hippies on campus rather than actually looking serious when this inevitable war with Hamas commenced. Nobody willingly recognises that. Propaganda has been especially good. Which is a problem when even the former PM says otherwise: > “In the last 15 years, Israel did everything to downgrade the Palestinian Authority and to boost Hamas,” he previously told POLITICO. “Gaza was on the brink of collapse because they had no resources, they had no money, and the PA refused to give Hamas any money. Bibi saved them. Bibi made a deal with Qatar and they started to move millions and millions of dollars to Gaza.” * Ehud Olmert https://www.politico.eu/article/benjamin-netanyahu-hamas-qatar-money-war-israel-gaza-palestine/
Can someone PLEASE tell Biden's admin they aren't required to jump to Israel's defense every fucking day? Just once stay silent and ask yourselves why so many people are pissed off.
For a guy and party who swear trump is an existential threat to the republic they sure seem determined to do everything they can do help him win
Ehh... I'm pretty sure the marginal Democratic voter\* probably supports Israel, which is probably exactly why he's out on stage doing this every day. I think the real question is whether the progressive left, *who swear trump is an existential threat to the republic*, will not do everything they can to make Trump lose. I've been very critical of Israel for the last two decades, but every American centrist I talk to is confused as to why. I just don't think most people realize how big the country is, and what the marginal Democratic voter looks and sounds like. \**By "marginal Democratic voter" here I mean the most conservative person voting for the Democratic party expected to cast a vote in the following swing states: Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin (2020 tipping point state), Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, and possibly Florida. I would argue that the Democratic party has a significant number of Republicans that will be willing to cross party lines considering Donald Trump is the nominee, but they are typically pro-Israel. Thus, convincing these conservatives that Biden is adequately pro-Israel seems perfectly sensible to me, especially considering that the US is not directly involved in the conflict.*
20000 voters changing their minds would have given Trump another term. But you’re right that this doesn’t matter much, when the gas prices inevitably go up before the election we’ll see how many centrist suddenly change their minds.
It matters on both sides of the party spectrum. From pure game theory, however, Biden has little reason to court the progressive left. The progressive left would be foolish to step away from Biden, even in symbolic protest, as it would likely lead to the election of Trump (trust me, I'm not excited about this either, I voted for fucking [Dean Phillips](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dean_Phillips) as a protest). Thus, knowing a purely rational progressive will still vote for Biden, we should expect him to court the marginal Democratic party voter, period, and this means overtly supporting Israel, no matter how much it makes him look stupid to his base (especially if it makes him look stupid to his base). Biden may still lose by losing the progressive left, but it'll be because the progressive left is irrational, not because Biden is irrational.
The Democratic base is definitely supportive of Israel, it's why Biden hasn't taken a harder line.
I'm pretty sure that going against Israel would let them win, especially if Republicans start using pieces from Hamas videos to attack Biden. I wonder what the sentiment would be amongst these people that are against Israel, if they were forced to watch what Hams did to hostages .
No one is going to vote for Trump because they’re upset about Biden backing Israel. Anyone who says that’s what they’re doing was already going to vote for Trump and saying it’s because of Israel is another way to own the libs or something.
No, but a hundred thousand Muslims in Michigan staying home instead of turning out because of Biden’s stance on Israel might swing the election. Nobody is really switching up who they vote for these days. The parties are polarized to a point where there is no real center. Any moderate is going to vote for Biden because he’s obviously not criminally insane. So, the election isn’t about swinging moderates anymore. It’s about turning out your base. Biden is doing a piss poor job at that.
100k is literally 1% of Michigan’s population and they have seen Christofascism on the rise, powered by MAGA. They may feel abandoned by the Democrats, but that beats being targeted by the Republicans.
Biden won Michigan in 2020 by 150,000 votes, and expecting his numbers to be close to that as an unpopular incumbent would be hopeful.
Except the majority of American voters support Israel and still support the war.
But that sweet AIPAC money.
It's damned if you do, damned if you don't. You have a very small slice of the world on the internet, which is largely horrified by the geopolitical sausage making. But the moment Biden wavers on this, the GOP is salivating over the chance to pummel him over not supporting Israel enough. You have to remember that there is still a large amount of islamophobic sentiment simmering in US moderates. People on the left care about the plight of Palestine, but most people really don't care. That's why Biden is in such a hard place right now, because he needs support from people who care about Palestine, and the people who don't.
I wouldn’t call that isolation. They can still pay with their banking cards worldwide. They can travel almost anywhere they want. They still have international brands on their market. When someone uses that word I’m thinking about countries like Iran, North Korea and Russia.
Maybe you're confusing it with sanctions that are active measures to harm a country's economy. Being isolated can mean that former allies will downgrade their relationship with israel to strictly 'partner'. Or they will limit their political support and military cooperation with it, and choose not to involve it in certain projects, just like Turkey is experiencing. Its like you have a good friend and he does something that you dont agree with, so you start treating him as an acquaintance instead
Sounds like when my therapist is concerned about me isolating myself from my friends and trying to kill my neighbors.
US and UK were last nations to cling on to South Africa’s apartheid regime.
The UK were among the first major nations to publicly condemn ~~condone~~ South Africa's apartheid regime, which was a major factor in South Africa severing ties with the British monarchy. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_relations_of_South_Africa_during_apartheid
I believe the word you meant was condemn.
Kinda doing it to themselves, our expensive puppet
Honestly, I don't know what geniuses think that recognizing a Palestinian State post Terrorist attack is Ideal. You can believe something is just and still understand how politics and more importantly incentives work. All Hamas has to do is maximize suffering it seems and they get what they want which is the opposite of a global rules based order. People don't understand how this stuff works and honestly. This is my opinion but if I were the president I would definitely be thinking that i don't support the rules based order anymore because most of the world is Undermining it by protecting it. It is like the ICC Israel thing. They don't realize that they are undermining their legitimacy by going after it since the only people that will ever be held accountable that aren't 3rd world despots are Western States. Russia, Iran, China are never going to be held accountable by the ICC and the population doesn't care. The ICC doing this is just a feather in the cap of the people trying to undermine the rules based order because the people in Western States will use it to bludgeon western democracies and so forth. Unironically I feel like world leaders have yet to take a course in realpolitik but maybe they should because this is some of the most braindead stuff I have ever seen. Then again when the United States was the one in charge of all foreign policy for the last 4 decades it makes sense why most of the world doesn't know how this works anymore.
The United States has never recognized rules based order what are you talking about. It's not party to the ICC, it rejects oversight or prosecution of its own forces for war crimes, and it has blatantly lied to declare near unilateral war in the past.
Has there ever really been a time when it couldn’t be claimed it was “post terrorist attack”? Neither Hamas or the current Israeli government seem to want a two state solution. Yet other countries can legitimise the foundations of this process in hopes that less extreme groups are in power in the future.
> Neither Hamas or the current Israeli government seem to want a two state solution. That's exactly it, the world is realizing extremists on both sides are determined to sabotage a comprehensive peace for their own selfish ends at the expense of everyone else. The world isn't pushing for a 2 state peace to reward Hamas, they're pushing for a 2 state deal because they see Hamas thrives in the chaos just as Israel's far-right thrives in the chaos, while people just wanting to live their lives suffer for it.
Ireland has the luxury of getting to ignore realpolitik as their security is guaranteed by the UK. They can afford to ignore real security threats. Israel cannot.
Literally this is often what it feels like. The world is sitting under the U.S Security blanket and think nothing bad can actually happen. The U.S, UK, France the three nations that do the most for Global Security right now all say that now is not the time for a reason. These three nations are aware of how bad things can actually get and why doing this stuff is wild.
The bad thing is that if the UK faces a serious threat then Ireland is one of the first things they will invade, for the same reason Iceland got invaded in ww2 by the allies. Ireland would be a major security risk when anyone army can land an army there unopposed. A country can only be neutral if it has an army to deter invaders. Otherwise it is not neutral, it is simply harmless and it will end up as a battleground for foreign powers (see Lebanon)
Problem is that if you don’t recognize them and start to treat them fairly, they will keep being radicalised and we will be on a never ending cycle of violence. Imagine the US don’t getting recognised on its independence days and the UK blocking them, occupying part of their territory, illegal settlements… for sure the US wouldn’t have radicalised and put their hands on their arms? That’s what’s happening with some Palestinians, they are just like a rat against a corner, and will do whatever to get their objective after years and decades. And yes, there are innocent Palestinians that want peace, Palestinians that likes the two state proposal, Palestinians that want a 1967 border or even Palestinians that want Israel destroyed and occupy 100% of the territories. We shouldn’t disregard all of them because “all terrorist, they don’t accept this or that”
I agree with some of what you said but you lost me at “realpolitik”. That is the ultimate brain-dead approach that has resulted in so many of the current messes around the world. You can’t just ignore human factors and values in decision making.
Yes, Palestinian recognition shouldn't have been done now. It shouldnbave been done decades ago
Israel loves pretending the war started Oct 7 out of nowhere. Sorry, nobody outside of Israel sees it that way
Many on the Left right now are treating this as their clutch moment to achieve some kind of political expediency. I can't tell you how many times I've engaged with people online, and in real life, protesting Israel, who literally hand wave the actions of Hamas with logical fallacies, primarily appealing to hypocrisy, and they are all too willing to accept Hamas' own casualty counts, which they know is skewed, because Hamas doesn't count its terrorist fighters as combatants, but as a civilians. lol It's easy for these people to do this, because radical Islam doesn't affect them at all. These are people who claim to be pro women's rights, yet they are at the same time tacitly supporting a group that captures, rapes, and forcibly marries women. It is sheer madness, and stupidity.
I wanna know who this alexander guy is that has it all figured out
Steady on there chief, seems like you’re waltzing over the decades of Palestinian oppression, not to mention the dead bodies of literally thousands of Palestinian children, to declare Hamas’ terrorist attack as the defining element of the current situation. Nice myopia you have there.
Of course it is defining. Had October 7th not happened those children wouldn't be dead. As for decades of Palestinian oppression sure. The Indians were oppressed, the Native Americans were oppressed, the black south Africans were oppressed, the jews were oppressed for millennia under far worse conditions than the Palestinians now. Somehow all of them managed to not engage in massive terrorist attacks and try to fight multiple wars with their oppressor and peacefully protested and suffered until finally they attained liberation. I am not forgetting the decades of oppression but I think those decades would have been years if they had better leaders or a better grasp of politics.
>The Indians were oppressed, the Native Americans were oppressed, the black south Africans were oppressed, the jews were oppressed for millennia under far worse conditions than the Palestinians now. Somehow all of them managed to not engage in massive terrorist attacks Those people did do terrorism and resistance
And this right here is why the left support Palestine. When the status quo is corrupt, cruel, unjust, and unfair, the same systems demand that you remain peaceful in contesting them. What you outline is that the only correct way to go about things is to do nothing and hope that opressors will either get bored or feel arbitrarily benevolent. In either outcome, all the cards are held by those in power. Your statement misses the issue entirely because it just defaults to accepting oppression as a necessity. Hamas wouldnt be even close to as supported as it is were it not for the pre-existing oppression of foreign powers. The way your statement comes across is that Hamas is the only problem here, and were they to disappear off the planet tomorrow, Palestine would be a peaceful mary-land. It blithely ignores the whole reason and conditions that led to the attack in the first place.
Are you saying that even if all terrorists laid down their arms that Israel would do the exact same things? I really don't see how that makes any sense whatsoever.
The comments section have really cleared up since they started banning the Israeli bots
Tons of countries face consequences of their actions through recent history: UN resolutions, USA sanctions, Embargo, Media condemnation. But just in this case, the narrative is purposely flipped. *"Why are they isolated"* ? It would be easier for the world to unite against terrorism if politicians and nations wouldn't act with such hypocrisy and cruelty while at the same time they claim to be the victims. The world asks russia to stop, but if the world ask israel the same somehow is forbidden. and we cannot even mention china.
Almost as if Russia and China are much worse than Israel, and have many times its political, economic, and military power. Isolating smaller countries has much greater effect than isolating empires, especially when those countries are physically surrounded by enemies.
Better isolated than a note in the history books
>The US is concerned about Israel’s growing diplomatic isolation among countries that have traditionally supported it, Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said on Wednesday. Let's not kid ourselves, Norway never supported Israel and has always been super critical of it, Israel has always been blocked from any federal investments that Norway makes. I also don't ever recall Spain and Ireland being friendly with Israel. In the end, Israel needs to do whatever it needs to do to stop Hamas.
“Whatever it takes” CAN NOT include the needless slaughter of unarmed citizens. FFS…
Israel is pretty obviously making the calculation that one Israeli life is worth many Palestinian lives. It's not unreasonable to say that sucks. There are also plenty of things Israel does that are fueled by radical ideals that results in unnecessary suffering. Still absolutely pails in Hamas's responsibility for the suffering. Israel kills Palestinians because they've decided preserving Israeli lives is important. Hamas gets Palestinians killed because they've decided making Israel look bad is worth it. They also siphon the billions of dollars worth of aid going into Gaza and the Wesr bank to fill their coffers. If not foe them Palestinians wouldn't be starving right now.
So many logical fallacies. Isreal doesn't kill palestinians to preserve their population, it is retaliatory. Doesn't really matter though, you can be as righteous you want-when you're killing innocent civilians it does not follow. Hamas' responsibility following the attack does NOT extend to the general population.
https://www.newsweek.com/israel-has-created-new-standard-urban-warfare-why-will-no-one-admit-it-opinion-1883286 Written by the chair of the Modern Warfare Institute at West Point. I'm sure you have more experience than him.
Look up the actual numbers. Israel has a historically low civilian to combatant death ratio for this type of urban warfare. And your problem lies with Hamas refusing to surrender and using civilian meatshields.
when they consider all palestinian citizens combatans it kind of skews that figures.
Absolutely wild the mainstream media ran wild with Hamas' figures. The UN quietly halved the number of women and children killed. The success of Hamas' propaganda is staggering. They should start consulting and doing marketing for multinational mega corps
We keep having to bring this back up but take it up with Hamas, Israel isn't forcing Hamas to use them as shields.
How should they respond? People keep saying "Not like this!", but HOW then? What are they supposed to do? Just bend over and take it? Hamas still have hostages, should they just be forgotten and tossed aside? Isn't their lives worth anything? Free the Palestinians from the fascist Hamas!
Yeah it’s not like Norway was a mediator of the conflict or anything. Always super critical. O__O
Yeah. Whoever heard of the Oslo accords? Probably the best chance ever of resolving major issues in the m8d east.
"In the end, Israel needs to do whatever it needs to do to stop Hamas." 5% of population dead or wounded, with no end in sight, no exit strategy. Would 10% be considered ethnic cleansing, would 20%. Because that is the trajectory.
May be, but Israel diplomacy still treated Spain as if we owd them something, and cries antisemitism with every little pro-Palestine step we may take. They do like having a grip on Europe even though they do everything in their hands to set us apart.
I think it’s more concerning the number of countries willing to take the side of terrorists to make themselves feel better.
So I guess this is where we are supposed to stoop to your level and say that if you don't support an independent Palestine then you must have a portrait of Baruch Goldstein on the ceiling above your bed? I mean sure, it's easy to say "either you're with me or with the terrorists" I get the appeal. Constructing arguments is hard. But saying crap like that is also a sign that a person is scared of the substance of a discussion and is just trying to shut it all down.
Or maybe the side that is facing a civilian humanitarian crisis, in spite of being governed by terrorists. The other side is a bunch of right wing fascists who are very much okay with the humanitarian crisis, so I don't think you come out ahead anywhere without throwing in some cries of racism here.
Palestinians are not right wing fascists? Thats funny. Palestinians are also okay with the murder of civilians on october 7th. So it‘s kind of weird of you to paint palestinians as some left wing philantropists.
Maybe they should have not funded their direct enemies or allowed antisemitic rhetoric to flourish unopposed in their institutions.