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Is it wrong how I’m repeatedly relating Jews to discussions on Palestine?

Some of you have likely noticed that I have a tendency to relate a Palestinian situation directly to Jews somehow, and I’ll be honest, I feel kind of weird doing it because proportionately speaking the Palestinian gentiles are suffering more than the Jewish citizens. I guess that it would be like repeatedly talking about Italians (e.g. Antonio Gramsci) while the Fascists were atrociously assaulting Africans.

Should I feel guilty? I don’t know… maybe I shouldn’t feel guilty. I mean, since a lot of Zionists like to focus on Jews when discussing Palestine and whatnot, maybe it’s important to have somebody doing that albeit from the opposite end of the spectrum, if that makes sense. I certainly don’t want to overshadow discussions on Palestinians, nor am I going to pretend that the suffering that they and Jews face is somehow equal, but given how many like to justify or overlook Zionist atrocities by centering the subject on Jews, maybe it’s important to have a kind of counterbalance to that.

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  • It's crucial, I think. To fully understand the situation, we're going to have to understand all aspects of it. As anti-Semitism is disappointingly rife, we should not forget it. And it is imperative, I think we agree, to highlight the relationship between Zionism and antisemitism (including Zionism putting Jews in direct physical danger).

    It comes through constantly. Yesterday, I saw a Finkelstein interview. The interviewer, Kay Burley, I think, said something about Israel being a safe haven for Jews and doesn't Finkelstein feel bad for challenging that.

    Putting aside the point that Finkelstein is based, the implication is that wherever the interviewer is from (Britain?) is not safe, unwilling to become safe, or begrudgingly safe and the sooner all the Jews leave, the better. I don't want to say this is intentional. But it's implied every time the claim is made.

    I don't want Jews to feel like they have to go to Israel to be safe; they should feel safe as my next-door neighbour. Highlighting stories about Jews caught in the cross fire in some way and being vocal about it could help create that atmosphere. Justice dies when good people remain silent, and all that. There may also be an argument that if we can make the west significantly less antisemitic, we might also encourage Israelis to leave Palestine. At the least it will make the choice easier.

    [Edit: I just realised another implication of this—antisemites will have an incentive to ramp up antisemitism to make Israeli Jews feel as though they are safer fighting in Palestine than leaving. We should be on guard for this. It's another reason why being vocal about harm to Jews does not automatically mean ignoring Palestinians; it's part of the same struggle and could help Palestinians.]

    Zionism gives antisemites an excuse: 'if you want to be safe, go to Israel (and disposses the Palestinians to secure it)'. The logic is premised on antisemitism and colonialism. The very people who make life unsafe and difficult for Jews and other oppressed people's essentially say, 'If you want freedom and security you can't have it here, you have to do the same thing that we did/do somewhere else'.

    And as we know, some Jews will accept that logic, hence Zionism. But what will actually liberate Jews and other oppressed people's, including Palestinians, is abolishing class society. (If only someone had predicted this circa 1843–4.)

    Then there's the problem of equating Zionism with Judaism. This is actively harmful to Jews. It's used as an excuse to oppress non-/anti-Zionist Jews. But as antisemites aren't overly interested in fine distinctions, they don't really care if any Jew suffers for it. If an antisemite targets a Jew for being anti-Zionist, they'll lose no sleep to later discover they were pro-Zionism.

    The 'support' only extends to the settler colonial project; any benefit to Jewish people is incidental. It's a double win for racists who want Jews out of 'their country' and who are always looking for ways to oppress Arabs.

    This is partly why I dislike the 'Israel lobby' rhetoric. Not only is it inherently antisemitic as it's based on a hive mind trope, but it also masks the motivations of racist imperialists. They don't need to be lobbied to support settler colonialism.

    Just as I see e.g. Europe as an outpost of a single Anglo-European empire based in the US, I see Israel as an outpost, too. Not as a last stand hidden behind a circle of wagons that has to beg for aid. That model subverts history in so many ways.

    The 'Israel lobby' rhetoric seems to be a front that diverts anger away e.g. from the US, British, etc, states – the international bourgeoisie – onto Israel, which has been framed as representing all Jews. Albeit, it's Zionists who make that equation and anti-Zionists who tend to say 'Israel lobby'. The effect is that anti-Zionists can fall into a trap created by structural antisemitism, normalising it for 'apolitical' 'bystanders'.

    Another aspect is that while Israelis are settlers in Palestine, many would be refugees elsewhere (and likely mistreated in much of the rest of the 'international community'). This will become worse if there's a Jewish refugee crisis. The more the Zionist logic is pushed, the worse this will be.

    I'm optimistic that a free Palestine would find a way to live in peace with Jews (and Christians and atheists) in a sovereign Palestine without expelling everyone. (No idea what that would look like in detail). It does seem to be a stated aim of Hamas, which seems clear that their enemy is Zionism, not Judaism. But that won't help Jews in the rest of the world, refugee from Israel or otherwise. I don't want any settlers settling Palestine or for Jews to be persecuted in the rest of the world (or for their Judaism in Palestine).

    When Palestine is free, we will still have to find a way to tackle and end antisemitism. This war is going to make it worse and harder to fight. So keeping Judaism in mind throughout this war may help us to be prepared for what comes after. It doesn't diminish Palestinian suffering unless it's framed as a hierarchy. And ultimately, when Palestine wins, Palestinians will still have to fight, alongside Jews, against the same forces that lead to the oppression of both.

  • I feel comfortable saying it here although I haven't said it to anyone I know: The Israeli/Hebrew propaganda right now tries SO HARD to compare Hamas with Nazis, capitalizing on "Murdered JewsTM", that I really did not fall off the chair when seeing the "gas the Jews" video from Sydney.

    If you can distinguish Zionists from Jews, that'd be cool, but I'll give you the Jew Pass for not doing so, because that connection is our fault exclusively.

    Antisemitism is such a beautiful excuse for what's happening right now. They're not wrong, it exists and we truly are a persecuted people, but we're also war criminals. Israeli history textbooks are written in a way that emphasizes the former while completely (completely) sleeps on the latter. The narrative is clean and makes so much sense: persecuted Jews coming from the holocaust just wanted to return to their homes but they were persecuted there too 🥺 (which is wrong, early settlers weren't part of the holocaust, they came way beforehand. and the post-holocaust Jews only started migrating two years after the Nakba)

    I'm so disappointed by my leftist friends here who seem so shocked of the Hamas attacks but cannot take right now the reality that these same pictures are circling from Gaza for years. They seem to think that not murdering babies with bare hands but rather with nukes makes us somehow morally superior. Why can't they understand the power imbalance? And why can't they remember that almost every other occupied people resisted in such gruesome, inhumane ways? Would my friends with Algerian ancestry talk that way about their grandparents, knowing some of their people also beheaded children and committed rape during the war? Is it really they're "human animals", or... maybe you just lose some of your humanity after that many years of occupation?

    You know what, you don't even have to go as far as Algeria, the Nakba itself included raping of Palestinians, but it isn't widely known here :/

    Feel free to ask anything btw, but please try to show some empathy, I'm well aware that I'm on the colonizing side and there's no need to remind me of that, and no I don't think leaving is the best I can do right now. Thanks I'm just a bit agitated rn

    • If you can distinguish Zionists from Jews, that’d be cool, but I’ll give you the Jew Pass for not doing so, because that connection is our fault exclusively.

      Everyone here is distinguishing between Zionists and Jews. In all communist circles I'm a part of or that I've seen, everyone is distinguishing between Zionists and Jews. Even Hamas distinguishes between Zionists and Jews. Even other Jews distinguish themselves from Zionists, no matter how hard the Israeli regime tries to equate the two.

      maybe you just lose some of your humanity after that many years of occupation?

      There is no credible evidence that Hamas or the various other resistance groups (including PFLP) have "lost their humanity". This is all Zionist propaganda. 3/4ths of the settlers that died were IDF. I said "died" because some settlers were killed by their own side. There's videos around of them protecting women and children. The operations targeted military targets. Hamas has always been clear about this. In all the years they have existed (as well as the other resistance groups, and the PLO before them), there has never been one accusation of rape that stuck beyond atrocity propaganda. Not one accusation of "beheading" that stuck. The Palestinian resistance is not a drug cartel or ISIL. They don't behead people. They take targets prisoner and eliminate IOF officers.

      Very strange things to say for a 1 day old account from another instance. Feels like you're trying to get us to say "yeah actually Hamas did some horrible shit too". They didn't. Stop implying they did.

      • Everyone here is distinguishing between Zionists and Jews

        OP is talking about a tendency in the back of their head to link the two too much. I know communists are more aware of the distinction. I'm also well aware that Hamas, and for that matter all Palestinian resistance entities do. But outside of here the situation is different, and what I was trying to say it that nobody is immune to propaganda so there's no need to whip yourself if you mess up that distinction, because it's messed up everywhere else. Just gotta be more careful outside of here because Zionists will pick up on that, if they haven't already shoved it to your mouth.

        there has never been one accusation of rape that stuck beyond atrocity propaganda

        Absolutely my bad, sorry for spreading misinformation. I went and checked and the only evidence of sexual abuse is that video of the girl in the tender, Shani Louk, and the rest of the accusations are unverified. I found a Zionist confessing it, claiming she went and asked people that reported rape in the festival but they gave incoherent testimonies. My apologies regarding the rape thing again and the beheading as well. I needed to separate the wheat from the chaff better before writing it

        However the targeting of civilians isn't just propaganda, some of my colleagues' relatives have been involved, one of them killed in that music festival and the other was kidnapped from Kibbutz Be'eri, also my neighbor's sister live in Nahal Oz and experienced the Hamas patrols walking around the town and breaking into homes killing/kidnapping people. And idk of anyone who's denying it, all pro-Palestinian outlets that I follow acknowledge it. For example +972 mag.

        This is usual resistance and I'm not sure they're able to target solely military entities, because up until recently the Gazan border was patrolled heavily. Only a week ago many of its forces were moved to the West Bank in order to back up settler terror attacks for the Sukkot holiday.

        Also there are the rockets targeting mostly-Jewish civilian areas. But again, it's not too dramatic, and not at all the first instance of armed trolling of civilians of an occupying entity.

        Very strange things to say for a 1 day old account from another instance

        That's fair. If it's of any help, this is my previous account from before I messed up my personal instance and had to wipe it

    • Huh I just opened Twitter and saw the first based tweet in Hebrew I've seen in the last few days claiming what I claimed in the 4th paragraph, and it gathered a considerable amount of likes. It's happening?

      https://twitter.com/freyisrael1/status/1711636106708394433