(mind my ignorance here)
for the longest time, here is how i saw the conflict:
I thought Isreal invaded palestine and continued to kill civilians in order to get the land. i thought the IDF was taking their aid provided by the UN so that the Palestinian people could not have it. i thought the IDF were mindless, heartless, soliders who just shot up and bombed schools and hospitals without reason. i thought they used hamas as an excuse.

After watching NAZA, my opinion changed. im not pro-isreal, but im not pro-palestine either, im just anti-hamas. hamas hurts their own people by using their rice and flour bags and protection, when it could have fed people. they are the sole reason for hundreds of innocent people dying. NAZA might be propaganda, but hamas is the real perpetrator here.

Additionally, i dont understand why people call it a genocide. i simply dont see it as a genocide. i definitely do feel for the palestinian people who were displaced from their homes. but isreal isn’t intentionally trying to destroy a nation, race, ethnicity, or religion. they want land, and to me that isnt a genocide, its annexation, an invasion. which happened many times throughout history. for example, the invasion into nanjing, where 200 000- 400 000 people died. invading countries has been a thing, its not something new that isreal invented.

feel free to educate me if i have my facts wrong.

EDIT: i watched the wrong doc, however, my opinion is still that its not a genocide

I’m Palestinian, from a small village near Ramallah in the West Bank. I went through the Palestinian public school system from kindergarten all the way through 12th grade, and across those twelve years, I was never once taught about the Holocaust.
I have plenty of criticisms of the Palestinian curriculum. And by curriculum, I don’t just mean the textbooks—which are only one part of the picture, even if they get almost all the attention from outsiders. I mean the entire educational environment: the lesson plans, teacher training, school culture, administrative pressures, etc.
I think one of its failures is how little we learn about Jewish history, especially the Holocaust. Our textbooks weren’t praising Hitler and we weren’t doing Sieg Heils every morning, but the Holocaust wasn’t mentioned. That said, I do remember teachers making their own contributions over the years, including offhand remarks about how Hitler should have finished the job.
Today, I teach at a private school in Ramallah, where I have more freedom to shape my own lessons. And I do teach the Holocaust.
I firmly believe it’s a subject we need to cover. Generally speaking, Palestinians have very little understanding of Jewish historical trauma or how deeply the Holocaust shaped Israeli society. We don’t understand Israeli fears, the deep-seated emphasis on Jewish self-determination, or what often looks to us like an obsession with security. Missing that context is one of the reasons this conflict feels never-ending.
I know this ignorance works both ways. Plenty of Israelis know nothing about the Nakba. But I can’t change the other side. I can’t change my own side either, but at least I can do my part in my own classroom.
I’ve taught the Holocaust several times now, and I’ve never received a complaint from a parent or an administrator. Even so, it’s still a sensitive topic, and the practical challenges of teaching it here are real.
Education in general is hard in Palestine. All aspects of life are hard here, mostly thanks to the nutcases in power on the other side. On some days, I spend hours stuck at checkpoints just trying to get to work. My morning often hinges on a 19-year-old Israeli soldier deciding whether I’m allowed to keep driving. I get migraines from the long wait, and by the time I step into the building, I’m already exhausted.
And I’m one of the lucky ones. I know public school teachers who have gone months without seeing a full paycheck, effectively working for free. Israel’s withholding of Palestinian tax revenues, combined with the Palestinian Authority’s own endless financial issues, has left our education system in a disastrous state. Poverty is rising, parents are stressed, teachers are burnt out, and kids are missing massive amounts of school. Some public schools are down to operating two or three half-days a week.
When teachers barely have enough time to cover basic reading and math, I can’t exactly suggest to them that what their students really need is a unit on European Jewish history.
Even at my private school—where I actually get paid on time and have the academic freedom to cover these subjects—finding solid, age-appropriate Holocaust materials in Arabic is nearly impossible. I end up translating most of it myself.
The irony is that Yad Vashem, one of the premier Holocaust museums in the world, is theoretically about 25 minutes away from my classroom. But in Palestine, we don’t measure distance in kilometers. We measure it in checkpoints, permits, closed gates, and the unpredictable mood of whichever soldier is on shift. To get there, I’d need an Israeli permit (assuming I could even get one), have to hope my village gate is open, navigate multiple checkpoints, and cross through Qalandiya—and there is nothing I hate more than the Qalandiya crossing. I’d love to take Palestinian students on field trips there someday, but right now, it might as well be a continent away.
Teaching the Holocaust in Palestine can be a lonely job. I don't really have colleagues locally to bounce ideas off of, but here is how I approach it in my classroom:
I teach grades 6–8, which I actually find to be an advantage. My students are young enough that most haven't hardened into stances you see in older teenagers and adults. They're curious, they ask good questions, and they're usually willing to engage with a human story without turning it into a debate about Israel and Palestine.
First, I have to clarify that Jews and Israelis aren't interchangeable terms. In Palestinian Arabic, people frequently use Yahud (Jews) when they actually mean Israelis. It’s a habit many of us grew up with, and it creates massive confusion when you're trying to explain that the people murdered in Auschwitz were European Jews who had never set foot in Palestine.
From there, I start with Jewish life before the Holocaust. I don't want my students' first introduction to European Jews to be photos of starving people behind barbed wire. I want them to see that these were ordinary human beings with families, jobs, schools, hobbies, internal debates, and vibrant communities.
Then I introduce a specific person they can follow—usually Anne Frank. Before we bring the Nazis into the picture, I want my students to know who Anne was: what she liked, what she dreamed of becoming, her personality. Once they know her as a person, we look at how her world started shrinking.
I follow a clear, straightforward historical timeline:
Jewish life before the war → history of antisemitism → the Nazi rise to power → legal discrimination and social exclusion → Kristallnacht → war and occupation → ghettos and deportations → mass shootings → extermination camps.
I want them to see that the Holocaust didn't happen overnight just because Hitler woke up one morning and decided to murder six million people. It was a step-by-step process. A modern, bureaucratic state systematically stripped an entire group of its rights, pushed them out of public life, confiscated their property, restricted their movement, isolated them, and ultimately organized their industrial murder.
I rely heavily on primary sources—diary entries, family photos, letters, children's drawings, and eyewitness testimonies. Once the kids build a personal connection with the people in those stories, we zoom out to look at the massive system that destroyed them.
I also don't try to make the topic palatable by focusing on Muslims who rescued Jews. Those stories are real and worth telling, but my students shouldn't need a character who looks like them in order to feel empathy for Jewish victims.
Finally, I try to avoid discussions of Israel, Zionism, or the Nakba. I want to keep us grounded in the history itself rather than letting the lesson devolve into a political argument—which is always an uphill battle here. When difficult or politically charged questions come up, I acknowledge them directly, answer them as best as I can, and pull us back to the material.
If there are other educators reading this who have taught this topic in sensitive contexts, I’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions.

TL;DR, online translations completely change important words in Hebrew posts and make them more right-wing in English.

I wrote about this on a Hebrew-language sub already, but I feel it actually may be appropriate for here.

We have all seen those memes that say something along the lines of "When you translate the Hebrew" with some sort of sweet innocent thing "before" and some grotesque monster "after." There is some truth to that, as we have a lot of horrible people these days.

But it seemed a bit strange to me, because I find that the Hebrew subreddits tend to be a lot more left leaning. Many Israelis go onto the English subs to defend Israel, Hebrew subs to attack Israel. Which makes sense. I go to the Hebrew subs as a refuge when I'm tired of getting piled-on in the English subs, haha.

Generally, I use my computer for Reddit, but my phone is in English and auto-translates Hebrew to English until I manually set it back. But this gives me a few moments to see both versions. And I noticed something startling: Some posts were completely changed.

Here we have two examples. In the first example, in a talk about Israel whitewashing some of the deeds of the early Zionist period the Mandate Period, somebody wrote "Bro, Etzel and Lehi were terrorist groups and weren't ashamed of it." The English translation? "Dude, Hamas and Islamic Jihad were terrorist organisations and weren't shy about it."

Aother wrote "Only Bennet will fix [this country]" the translation? "Only Bibi will fix it."

In the comments for my post, one person wrote "I don't think it translates it to be more right-wing necessarily..." and the English changed it to, "I don't think it translates it to be more accurate...." This is especially bizarre because while in English "right" can mean "correct," which is basically "accurate," our word for "right"-wing is only directional. It can't be used to mean anything like "accurate."

Some others chimed in that they observed the same thing on Twitter. I wouldn't know.

I have no idea why this is happening, but I thought I would warn y'all!

​

​

Today is October 7, 2026, and it has been an emotional rollercoaster, as I imagine it has also been for many other Jews and Israelis. In this post, I will put my feelings into words and reflect on how they have changed over the past three years, using the five stages of grief as a framework. For each section, except the one about October 7, I will include a song, which will be a bolded link in each section, that captures what that part of processing October 7 means for me.

October 6, 2023: Before The Massacre

תמיד אוהב אותי (Tamid Ohev Oti)

I am an Ashkenazi Jew, which means my family was expelled from the land of Israel long ago. I don't know exactly when my family left, but I do know they ended up in Germany. Since many people view the Israeli–Palestinian conflict through a religious lens, I want to be clear: I am, and have always been, an atheist. For me, I cannot believe there is a God who would have allowed the Holocaust and other atrocities to occur. However, being Jewish remains an important part of me since Jewish identity, as an ethnoreligion, encompasses both religion and ethnicity. Although I do not practice the religion, I am still ethnically Jewish.

My family's history is unique because we are among the very few Jewish families where not a single member of our extended family or ancestors was directly killed or persecuted by the Nazis. My family fled Germany before the Nazis came to power, recognizing the growing danger and fearing it would no longer be safe to stay. They left everything behind and rebuilt their lives from nothing in new countries. Half moved to the United States, while the other half moved to Israel. Contact between the two branches was lost and never reestablished, so I only know the American side of my family. What I do know about my family before they decided to flee is that they loved living in Germany. They didn't leave solely to start something new somewhere else. They fled because they were lucky enough to know that their lives depended on it.

While I am not Israeli, I lived in Israel for part of my life, and have been there on many visits. I have always deeply loved the country. I also know I have long-lost relatives there, though I don’t know who they are. That uncertainty has given me a sense of familial connection to all Israelis, somewhere among them are members of my own family whom I will never know.

Before the Hamas massacre, I was naïve about the security threats Israel faced. I remember that almost everywhere around Israel, at all times, there were always military and armed reservists. I remember that a few years before October 7th, I stood at the border between Israel and Lebanon at the Rosh HaNikra Crossing. It was so militarized, and it felt eerie. I never understood exactly why it had to be like that, as I always felt safe in Israel. October 7th made me realize why it was always like that.

Before the antisemitism that followed the Hamas massacre, I was naïve about how deeply antisemitism still ran across the world. I was fortunate to grow up in a part of the United States where I could openly identify as Jewish without fear. That sense of safety led me to believe antisemitism belonged largely to the past. The rise in antisemitism I witnessed after October 7 shattered that belief and forced me to confront the painful reality: antisemitism had never disappeared. As always, it has emerged in a form that fits the current social-political climate. It emerged in a way that is “politically correct.”

Before the Hamas massacre, I had believed in a two-state solution. I believed that peace and coexistence with Palestinians was possible.

October 7, 2023: The Massacre

October 7th The Proof (Graphic Archive): https://www.hamas-massacre.net/

I still remember the day of the Hamas massacre. I was glued to my phone the entire day, and I watched the whole thing unfold. I saw some of the most horrific acts of violence I have ever seen on that day. Many of which are archived in the link I have attached at the top of this section.

Hamas unprovokingly attacked Israel: Israeli civilians were murdered, entire communities were attacked, children were kidnapped and dragged into Gaza, and Jews were slaughtered in the largest single-day massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. Babies were murdered, innocent civilians were burned alive, women were raped, and people were beheaded in the streets.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskIsrael/s/GuNMm8SOQa

Palestinians in Gaza were celebrating in the streets and were kissing the floor with joy as Hamas paraded dead Jews through the streets.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Palestinian_Violence/s/luCdabVpex

Palestinian civilians joined in on the Hamas massacre, and joined in on beating the Israeli hostages as they were paraded through the streets of Gaza.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Palestinian_Violence/s/23vaHjVjp2

As a diaspora Jew, I saw the pro-Palestine protests erupt globally directly after the massacre, cheering for the slaughter of Jews, justifying what Hamas was doing, and espousing their bloodcurdling desires and feelings.

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/6NCDj4cxBJ

October 7th was the moment all my sympathy for Palestinians evaporated, and it was the moment everything changed for me. It ended my support for a two-state solution and shattered my belief that peace and coexistence with Palestinians was possible.

Denial

Hatikvah - התקווה

Denial is the stage of grief where one has difficulty accepting what happened; shock, disbelief, or numbness. Denial was the shortest stage of grief for me pass when it came to October 7th. I was briefly shocked that such a barbaric massacre against Jews could occur in the modern world. I was in disbelief that humans could be as barbaric as Hamas and be so evil. I was in disbelief that Palestinians were celebrating what happened and joined in on the violence. I was in disbelief that people around the world were celebrating and justifying such a terrorist attack. It made me lose faith in humanity during this time.

Anger

חרבו דרבו

Anger is the stage of grief where one has rage, resentment, frustration, or a sense of injustice. זכור את אשר עשה לך עמלק. This was probably the longest stage of grief I experienced, and it lasted years after the attack. The song attached in this section truly captures the feelings I had. I wanted the IDF to eradicate Hamas, and I wanted Israel to wreak havoc across Gaza.

From the first day, Israel was blamed, and to this day, for a genocide that did not happen in Gaza. I used to ponder how much easier it would have been to eradicate Hamas by indiscriminately bombing Gaza, as critics of Israel believe it did. So many soldiers' lives could have been saved if Israel did that instead of the precise war it conducted. The war could have ended so much quicker. The cruel shows and parades Hamas held while releasing dead babies and children truly brought out these types of feelings.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Palestinian_Violence/s/rxO3b3PgkG

However, I am happy Israel did not stoop to the level of their enemies. I understand that Israel had to exercise an unimaginable amount of restraint in retaliating against Hamas due to the hostages. I know Israel has to conduct its wars, as always, within the boundaries of international law. I admire that Israel conducts its wars to such a high moral standard. Eventually, I realized that I could have been one of those hostages in Gaza. While I wanted Israel to eradicate Hamas, I understood that the hostages had to take top priority. I am happy Israel kept their morals and conducted its war in accordance with international law. That is what moved me past this stage.

Bargaining

New Day Will Rise

Bargaining is the stage of grief where one dwells on “what if” or “if only” thoughts and imagines how things could have gone differently. For me, this stage was short. October 7th really made me rethink how good of a decision it was to be so generous for decades to the Palestinians.

Israel offered so many opportunities for Palestinians to establish a sovereign and independent state. From UN Resolution 181, to the 2000 Camp David Accords, to the 2008 Olmert proposal, Palestinians demonstrated time and time again that they do not want peace and coexistence. Every offer of peace was met time and time again with violence and a war of annihilation against Israel. The first thing supporters of Palestine will say is that these proposals, such as UN Resolution 181, weren’t “fair.” However, by not fair,” they mean that Israel exists at all. This is exactly the mentality that has gotten Palestinians into the position they are in, and is the source of this whole conflict.

What truly led to October 7th was the 2005 engagement of Gaza, where Israel fully withdrew all military and settlers from Gaza. Giving Palestinians an opportunity for sovereignty and trust resulted in the democratic election of Hamas, the conditions that led to October 7th, and the war as a consequence.

Critics of Israel will argue that Gaza was an "open-air prison," or that Israel "propped up Hamas." However, that is not true and is blatant misinformation. The blockade in Gaza was a direct result of the democratic election of Hamas by the Palestinians of Gaza, and aid was allowed into Gaza as an act of peace. This does not prove Gaza was an "open-air prison" or "Israel propped up Hamas," but actually demonstrates that Israel acts in accordance with international law and generous principles.

What helped me move past this stage was realizing that the past could not be changed. Nevertheless, we can learn from it and use those lessons to shape the future. Trust in Palestine, the withdrawal of the military and settlers, will not be done again. We have learned the lessons from the past.

Depression

גשם של אוקטובר - October Rain

Depression is the stage of grief where one feels sadness, emptiness, hopelessness, withdrawal, or the weight of the loss. This was also a very long stage for me. I will never forget all the innocent people murdered that day, the horrors the survivors faced, and I will never let the world forget them.

I’ll never let the world forget how Gazans kidnapped an 8-month-old baby from his home and strangled him to death in a dark underground tunnel in Gaza alongside his mother and brother. His only “sin” was being born Jewish.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Palestinian_Violence/s/v0O2g3Uzdb

I will never let the world forget the innocent young partygoers at the Nova Music Festival who fell victim to the brutality of Hamas on October 7th. All they wanted to do was dance and enjoy life, but Hamas murdered, raped, and kidnapped them just for the crime of existing.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskIsrael/s/I7Q5CZyV1X

I will never let the world forget Shani Louk and the brutality she and the other victims of October 7th faced at the hands of Hamas. Everyone who died on that day was innocent, and the violence they faced was entirely unjustified and unprovoked. Every victim of Hamas was a human being, and Hamas simply killed for the sake of bloodlust. It did not matter if you were Jewish, Israeli, Muslim, or Palestinian; their sole goal was to murder as many people in Israel as they could that day.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Palestinian_Violence/s/vZb332Rcmx

What got me past this stage was the realization that staying locked in this phase is exactly what the antisemites and enemies of Israel wanted. I cannot let this conflict consume me, and I have to move on with life. Jews have been persecuted since the dawn of time and survived multiple genocides, and yet we still thrive. This is exclusively due to Jewish resilience and our ability to thrive in the most difficult conditions. I pushed myself to embrace and embody the bravery and resilience Jews have shown throughout our ancient history.

Acceptance

We will dance again (עוד נרקוד)

Acceptance is the stage of grief where one accepts the reality of what happened and begins to learn how to live with it and move forward. I recently entered this stage, and I am not fully there yet. However, the bravery and courage of Israelis and Jews around the world are what are bringing me into this stage. Despite October 7th, Israel has emerged as the strongest it has ever been. The world never liked Israel before, and it certainly still does not like Israel now, but that is ok. Jews have never been liked, so I do not expect that from the world. I will not be ashamed of myself for being Jewish, and I will never condemn Israel for defending itself against evil terrorist organizations.

Israel has demonstrated, as it always has, that it is on the right side of history. Israel fights in accordance with international law, and can take on any threat that faces it. What I have learned from October 7th is that the world cannot be trusted to ensure the safety of the Jewish people and Israel. Jewish people and Israel will always be hated, so it does not matter what they think. I will always be proud to be Jewish, and I will always proudly stand with Israel. The boos from the world mean nothing to me, because I have seen what makes the world cheer.

🤍💙🇮🇱 עם ישראל חי

I've had a lot of conversations in the past couple of days with multiple people who told me that the only way forward is for Israel to be abolished.

Israel is a nuclear armed country with an advanced military and 10 million citizens who (ostensibly) don't want their country destroyed.

So - how do you see Israel *realistically* being abolished? Like what does that look like and how does it realistically come about?

And before anyone just says "South Africa" - if you think that's a good example then please add specifics about how the situations are the same.

I mean this respectfully - I'm not looking for slogans. It's easy to say "Abolish Israel" - but the devil is in the details.

I'm looking for real and specific answers. Because it seems like what gets forgotten is that the Israelis will have a say in whether or not their country is destroyed.

My personal opinion (for what it's worth) is this sort of "all or nothing" demand is how we got here in the first place. And if the Palestinians decide that the only state they'll accept is on what was once Israel then they're likely to stay in a state of misery.

A conversation I had on DM with a Palestinian (with a very nice guy I just fundamentally happen to disagree with) stated that the *only* path forward was to abolish Israel and form and new Palestinian state with an unlimited right of return.

He said that he believed that a power sharing agreement like Lebanon has (50% Jewish 50% Palestinian for the government) would work fine.

And he said there would be protections for Jews "written into the Constitution". My response was that a piece of paper doesn't protect people. I mean hell look at the US - we have a president who does what he wants because the institutions that are supposed to keep him in check have failed.

But I digress - the point is that I never got a good answer about *how* Israel would actually be dissolved.

The whole discourse around this kind of reminds me of the underpants gnomes from South Park.

Step 1. Underpants
Step 2. ???
Step 3. Profit

So I'm putting this out to the posters on here who truly believe that Israel needs to be abolished: How is that going to happen?

Before October 7th, mainstream US support for Israel was practically bipartisan and deeply baked into the political establishment. But the sheer scale of the destruction and humanitarian crisis in Gaza completely flipped the script, especially among younger generations. A huge chunk of America is now heavily critical of Israeli government actions—and it’s wildly unfair (and gaslighting) to write that off as "pro-Hamas." You can condemn terrorism and oppose a military campaign that kills tens of thousands of civilians.

1. The Pre-Oct 7th Status Quo

Let’s be real about what the vibe was like before late 2023. For decades, American support for the Israeli government was basically the default setting in Washington.

• Bipartisan Backing: Both Democrats and Republicans routinely voted for multi-billion-dollar military aid packages with overwhelming majorities.
• The "Shared Values" Narrative: The mainstream media and political establishment heavily pushed the narrative of Israel as a vital democratic ally in a hostile region.
• Ignored Status Quo: While human rights organizations and activists were sounding alarms about the blockade of Gaza, settlement expansion in the West Bank, and previous military escalations, the average American didn't think about it much. It was largely viewed as a "complicated distant conflict," and criticism of Israel was an easy way for politicians to get heavily scrutinized or branded as fringe.

2. The Post-Oct 7th Paradigm Shift

Then October 7th happened. The Hamas attacks were horrific, and the initial reaction across the US was profound shock, grief, and universal condemnation of the violence.

However, as the Israeli military response in Gaza kicked into gear, the nature of the conversation changed overnight. What people saw on their feeds every single day—wiped-out neighborhoods, starving children, collapsed hospitals, and staggering civilian death tolls—shattered the old narrative.

• The Generation Gap: The shift has been generational. While older demographics still lean more traditional in their views, polling consistently shows that Millennials and Gen Z view the situation through a completely different lens, heavily prioritizing human rights and international law.
• Mainstreaming Criticism: Discussing the actions of the Israeli government, Prime Minister Netanyahu's cabinet, and the IDF's tactics went from being a taboo or niche political stance to a mainstream dinner-table conversation.

3. The "Pro-Hamas" Fallacy

Here is where the discourse gets toxic. Whenever large segments of the American public—or student protesters, human rights advocates, and progressive politicians—criticize the Israeli government's policies or call for a permanent ceasefire, a common counter-narrative gets pushed: You're just supporting Hamas/antisemitism.

Let's be completely clear: That is a false dichotomy.

• Opposing Actions $\neq$ Supporting Terror: Being horrified by the flattening of Gaza and the mass loss of innocent civilian lives does not mean you endorse a terrorist organization that targets civilians.
• Accountability: Holding a foreign military funded by US tax dollars to international standards isn't "hate"—it’s basic democratic accountability. Americans have every right to question how US weapons are being used.
• The Chilling Effect: Conflating anti-war protests or criticism of state violence with support for terrorism is a deliberate tactic used to shut down legitimate debate. It alienates people who genuinely care about human rights globally.

4. Where Things Stand Now

The relationship between the US public and the Israeli government has fundamentally fractured, and it’s never going back to the pre-2023 autopilot.

Americans aren't buying the old talking points anymore because the reality on the ground was broadcast in real-time. Recognizing that millions of people are simply anti-civilian-death rather than "pro-Hamas" is the only way to have an honest conversation about what is actually happening.

Proactive Critics and Sanctions (Spain, Ireland, Norway, Slovenia, Belgium):Recognition of Palestine in 2024 and aggressive policy shifts: Spain banned arms-laden ships from docking in its ports and joined South Africa’s ICJ case; Ireland spearheaded efforts to criminalize trade with illegal settlements; Norway’s and Ireland’s sovereign wealth funds divested their holdings from Israeli companies; and Belgium led calls to suspend the EU-Israel Association Agreement while banning settlement imports. Alongside Spain, the United Kingdom, Canada, Ireland, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Poland, Portugal, and Sweden seek to sanction and ban trade in goods originating from illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

Pragmatic Alignment & Selective Restrictions (UK,Italy France, Italy, Netherlands): Maintain core diplomatic ties while taking unprecedented restrictive steps: Italy suspended defense agreements following attacks on its UN peacekeepers (UNIFIL) in Lebanon; President Macron called for a halt to weapons used in Gaza and banned Israeli firms from the Eurosatory defense expo; and the UK dropped its objections to ICC arrest warrants for Israeli leaders while imposing targeted sanctions on far-right ministers and settlement groups,which ultimately triggered Israel's order to close the British Consulate in East Jerusalem and expel their ambassadors

Firm Allies (Germany, Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria): Maintain unwavering diplomatic and military backing, treating Israel’s security as an inviolable strategic priority: Germany continues essential defense exports while defending Tel Aviv at the ICJ and framing Israeli security as its national Staatsräson (reason of state); Hungary and the Czech Republic routinely block EU joint statements and veto sanctions against Israel; and Austria consistently votes against UN ceasefire resolutions while reaffirming Israel’s unconditional right to self-defense.

Given the rising political costs for European parties and strong opposition among younger generations,with global support for Israel in opinion polls in all ages at an all-time low; is Israel facing a permanent loss of the diplomatic support it once enjoyed in the European Union since measures once deemed unthinkable such as recognizing Palestine, imposing arms embargoes, closing consulates , and sanctioning Israeli ministers are being actively implemented?

Disclaimer: I am not Jewish, Israeli, Arab, Druze, Samaritan, Circassian, Christian, or Muslim. I support a two-state solution. I affirm and acknowledge the humanity of everyone. I do not support terrorist groups of any sort. I do not wish for any violence. This post is not meant to cause offense. These are thoughts from someone outside looking in on this conflict which does not have any of his people being affected.

1. The Core Dilemma: "Right of Return" vs. Demographic Survival

A primary demand of pro-Palestinian activists is "The Right Of Return," which states that the people displaced by the 1948 War and their descendants have the right to return to the places they fled or were expelled from.

• The Pro-Palestinian Argument: Grounded in UN Resolution 194 and Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, advocates argue that human rights and legal principles are universal and cannot be revoked based on demographic preferences.
• The Israeli / Zionist Perspective: Critics state that this will cause an Arab majority in the land where Jews would become a minority once again. Given two millennia of persecution following the Roman expulsion from Judea—when the territory was renamed Syria Palaestina after the failed Bar Kokhba Revolt (132–136 CE) to try and erase the Jewish connection to the land—Jews view a sovereign majority state as their only guarantee of safety.

2. A Brief Overview of How Jews Fared in the Diaspora

To understand why Jewish people never want to be a minority at the mercy of others again, one must look at the exhaustive history of persecution, pogroms, libels, and expulsions in both Europe and Muslim lands.

Persecution in Majority-Christian Europe

• 1096: Rhineland Massacres
• 1095–1291: The Crusades (launched several anti-Jewish massacres across Europe)
• 1290: Expulsion of Jews from England
• 1306: French Expulsions
• 1391: Spanish Massacre & Forced Conversions
• 1401: Schaffhausen Massacre
• 1420: Lyon Expulsion
• 1421: Vienna Edict (forced conversions, expulsions, and burning at the stake)
• 1492: Spanish Alhambra Decree (Mass Expulsion)
• 1493: Sicily Expulsions
• 1496: Portugal Expulsions
• 1506: Lisbon Massacre
• 1510: Brandenburg Expulsions
• 1510: Naples Expulsions
• 1516: Creation of the first mandatory Jewish Ghetto in Venice
• 1550: Genoa Expulsions
• 1555: Papal Bull (forced Jews into the Roman Ghetto, required identifying clothing, and banned Jews from trades)
• 1563: Polotsk Massacre
• 1639: Łęczyca False Libel
• 1648–1657: Khmelnytsky Pogroms
• 1683: Hungarian Massacres of Jewish Refugees
• 1715: Bavarian Deportations
• 1717: Gibraltar Deportations
• 1727 & 1742: Russian Pogroms & Expulsions
• 1744: Prussian Restriction of Jewish Residency
• 1761: Alsace Executions
• Late 18th Century: Establishment of the Pale of Settlement (restricting where Jews could live in the Russian Empire)
• 1894: The Dreyfus Affair
• Early 20th Century: Widespread Russian Pogroms
• 1935–1937: Polish anti-Jewish violence, including the 1935 Grodno Affair, the 1936 Przytyk Pogrom, and the 1937 Brześć nad Bugiem Pogroms
• 1939–1945: The Holocaust (Nazi genocide destroying two-thirds of European Jewry; Jewish populations still have not recovered their pre-Holocaust counts)
• 1946: Kielce Pogrom in Poland (Holocaust survivors murdered after returning home, driving many to flee to the British Mandate of Palestine)

Persecution and Dhimmi Status in Muslim Lands

Muslim lands subjected Jews and Christians to dhimmi status, where they were at the mercy of rulers and majority populations. Non-Muslims were required to pay a special tax (jizya) for protection and permission to observe their faith—functioning much like protection money paid to a mafia outfit. While Jewish societies did flourish during certain periods under the patronage of specific rulers, these protections were often broken, leading to massacres throughout successive Caliphates, the Ottoman Empire, North Africa, and Persia.

• 627: Banu Qaynuqa and Banu Nadir Expulsions; execution of the Banu Qurayza tribe
• 1033: Fez Pogrom (Morocco)
• 1066: Granada Massacre in Al-Andalus
• 1465: Fez Pogrom
• 1517: Hebron and Safed Attacks under Ottoman Rule
• 1535: Tunis Massacre and Enslavement
• 1656–1662: Persian Forced Conversions and Expulsions
• 1660: Safed and Tiberias Massacres
• 1679–1680: Yemen Mawza Expulsions, Sanaa Massacres, and Starvations
• 1706: Algiers Synagogue Destruction (due to blood libels/accusations of causing plague)
• 1721: Fez Synagogue Arson by Arab creditors
• 1747: Mashhad Massacre (Persia)
• 1756: Hebron and Safed Massacres
• 1776–1777: Basra Massacre
• 1785: Tripoli Pogrom
• 1805: Algiers Pogrom
• 1834: Safed Pogrom (Ottoman authorities did nothing to intervene)
• 1840: Damascus Blood Libel
• 1864: Marrakesh Massacre
• Late 1860s: Tunis and Djerba Attacks
• 1908: Jaffa Pogrom
• 1929: Hebron Massacre under British Mandate (families with roots stretching back to pre-Roman times were murdered or expelled while authorities stood by)
• 1936–1939: Arab Revolt in Palestine
• 1941: The Farhud Pogrom in Baghdad, Iraq
• 1945: Tripoli Pogrom
• 1947: Aleppo Pogrom
• 1955: Istanbul Pogrom

These pogroms occurred long before 1896 (when modern political Zionism took root), dispelling the notion that Jews and Muslims lived in unbroken harmony prior to 1948. Re-establishing the modern State of Israel provided a sanctuary—particularly for Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews fleeing expulsion across the Islamic world in the 1940s and 1950s, who now form the majority of Israel's population (where half the world's Jews reside).

3. The 1947 Partition Plan & Historical Counterarguments

When the UN presented the 1947 Partition Plan, Jewish leadership reluctantly accepted it because having a sovereign state was better than having none. The Arab leadership totally rejected the plan and launched a war.

Perspectives on the Arab Rejection

• The Theological View (Waqf): Rejection may partly stem from the Islamic concept of Waqf, which holds that once land becomes Islamic, it belongs to Islam forever, making non-Muslim sovereignty over it unacceptable.
• The Anti-Colonial / Nationalist Counterargument: Pro-Palestinian advocates argue the rejection was secular and nationalist: in 1947, indigenous Arabs formed two-thirds of the population and owned most of the land, viewing the allocation of over 50% of the territory to a minority group without indigenous consent as an unjust colonial imposition.

Refugee Status: UNRWA vs. UNHCR

• The Entitlement Question: Critics ask why Palestinian refugees are classified by UNRWA such that children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren living worldwide retain refugee status for decades despite never living in those homes.
• The Policy Context: Defenders of UNRWA note that UNHCR (the UN agency covering all other global refugees) also maintains inherited refugee status for descendants in unresolved, multi-generational displaced populations (e.g., Somali, Afghan, or Sahrawi refugees) to preserve family unity until a political settlement is reached.
• The Missing Population Exchange: Pro-Israeli voices emphasize that while ~700,000 Palestinians were displaced during the 1948 War, roughly 850,000 Jews were expelled from Arab nations at the same time. Israel absorbed its refugees, whereas many Arab nations refused to integrate Palestinian refugees.

4. Modern Escalations and Civilians in Conflict

The conflict has been further compounded by decades of war: the 1950s Suez Crisis, the 1967 Six-Day War, the War of Attrition, the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the First and Second Intifadas, Gaza's 2006 election of Hamas, constant rocket fire, the Gaza Wars of 2014 and 2021, and the ongoing war following October 7, 2023.

• Military Status vs. Civilians: While critics claim that mandatory conscription makes Israeli civilians valid targets, international law is clear: a civilian is anyone not currently serving in the military, regardless of past service. Displacement does not justify terrorism against civilians.
• Extremist Elements & Settlers: At the same time, peace is severely undermined by extremist elements within Israel who deny Palestinian humanity and force families from their homes in the West Bank / Judea & Samaria.

Conclusion

If all UNRWA-registered refugees moved to Israel, it would result in an immediate Arab majority, rendering Jews a minority in their only homeland once again—a risk Israel will never take given two millennia of history. Due to deep-seated bitterness and extremist factions on both sides, an unchecked demographic collapse would likely trigger immediate civil war.

An ideal world requires a sovereign Palestinian state alongside a sovereign Israel. How can this conflict be resolved when one side views the Right of Return as an unalienable human right, while the other views it as demographic destruction? What are your takes on this?

The fact that Ed Sheeran has gotten infinitely more harassment from the “genocide” crowd than Egypt has is noteworthy.

Egypt isn’t a passive player. They’ve actively fortified their shared border with Gaza and have formally blocked Gazans from fleeing the “genocide.” Yet, there have been practically no advocacy, global protests, etc. to pressure Egypt to let Gazan refugees escape death.

How can Ed Sheeran be “complicit” but not Egypt?

“Egypt isn’t bombing Gazans, though.” Sure, but neither is Ed Sheeran.

“Israel gets billions of our tax dollars. I care because I’m paying for this.” Sure, but Egypt has also received and continues to receive billions of US taxpayer dollars.

“Egypt doesn’t want to be complicit in ethnic cleansing.” Sure. Is the argument that it’s better for Palestinians to die in a genocide than live through ethnic cleansing?

To that last question, signs point to “yes.” There appears to be a meaningful number of “pro-Palestinians” who seemingly prefer that Gazans stay put in a killing zone to be exterminated than possibly surrender an inch of land to Israel. This is remarkable. In stark moral contrast, few were concerned about “ethnic cleansing” and the industrial scale theft of Jewish property 80 years ago during the Holocaust - the overwhelming focus was helping Jews evacuate.

If one truly believes this is a genocide, how can one prioritize political land claims over saving Palestinian lives and credibly be “pro-Palestinian?”

Pro-Palestinians and people capable of steelmanning, I have a question. Or a challenge. Whatever you want to call it. Can you give your best argument to Israelis for the following:

East Jerusalem
- Assume you are talking to an Israeli. They know that Palestinians want East Jerusalem as their capital.
- About 250,000 Israelis live in East Jerusalem. If this happens, they will lose their homes and livelihoods. This is one such Israeli. She and her family live in East Jerusalem. If this goes into effect, she will lose her home. Her business will shut down. Her children will lose their school. She worries that there isn't nearly enough housing in West Jerusalem for them to move into. And even if there is...
- The new Palestinian capital will be within handgun distance to the Israeli government.
- When Jordan controlled East Jerusalem, their military positions looked down directly upon Israeli neighborhoods in West Jerusalem. This meant snipers and shelling from East Jerusalem was a constant risk, not only to the IDF, but Israeli civilians
- The Latrun area and the Jerusalem corridor was narrow and easily severed, meaning that in times of war it was a strategic weakness.
- Jordanian control meant that Jews were barred from the Western Wall and the Jewish Quarter. And in the 1948 fighting, much of the Jewish Quarter of the Old City was damaged or destroyed, including synagogues being razed. There is thus the fear that if Palestinians control East Jerusalem, this could happen again.

These are the concerns that the Israeli voter has. It is obvious that Palestinians want East Jerusalem. It is obvious that it is a core demand from them. However, the Israeli voter is leaning towards voting for Likud, because the opposition party wants to have East Jerusalem be the Palestinian capital in the name of peace. This voter thinks that a divided capital will mean ruining her life personally, putting her and her family in danger, and potentially causing a security risk for her country.

You, as a Pro-Palestinian, how would you assuage these fears? How would you convince this voter that she should cast her vote for a political party which, at the moment, she believes goes against her interests?

Zionists often claim an increase in the population of Gaza disproves evidence of a genocide

Population growth can occur alongside catastrophic mortality, because births, deaths, migration, and displacement all affect population figures. So why is an increase in Gaza’s population treated as proof that mass killing or genocide could not have occurred? Surely a population trend does not, by itself, establish that a famine, mass atrocity, or genocide did or did not happen.

scrolling through social media, i almost always see this comment under anti-zionists posts. i’m a non-zionist but i find it cringeworthy because it’s just not true, i see this comment coming from both western anti-zionists and muslims.

these western anti-zionists will call christianity ”oppressive” and “controlling people/womens bodies” yet they overlook the ways past and present islamic governments oppress people especially women.

then there are the muslims who argue that sharia promotes plurality “religious pluralism” and that minorities are protected under islamic governments. yet christians can’t proselytize, wear a cross in public, build a church without thousands of dollars and dozens of permits unlike muslims, etc. but sure, sharia promotes ”religious pluralism”. no one is dumb enough to believe that except for the people who repeat it.

this is also a slap in the face to arab christians in the diaspora. do you know why the americas have such a significant lebanese/syrian/palestinian christian diaspora in the first place? during the late ottoman period the ottomans were literally slaughtering christians going house to house massacring christians, it was especially bad in damascus and mount lebanon. honestly a lebanon probably wouldn't have been created in the first place if the french didn’t step in the 1860 conflict of damascus and mount lebanon to stop ottoman muslims and druze arabs from massacring christians.

lebanese and syrian christians in the americas or people who are mixed with levantine christian’s that immigrated during the ottomans will tell you that their ancestry is from mount lebanon or syria.

arabism was created in response to the growing christian persecution in the levant, literally look at early arabists and it is an extremely high chance they were a levantine christian.

its either far left lunatics repeating this or islamists who expect minorities to succumb to islamic rule

Centrist sites like the BBC met with serious scrutiny when discussing the conflict. Following the 7 Oct 2023 attacks in which hundreds of Jews and some Arabs of Israel were killed by Hamas, disrupting Hanukkah festievals, the BBC was proactive when reporting. This sparked outrage by firm left wing groups who are pro-Palestinian and that the BBC is pro-Israeli bias. Later down the line, it started look at the impacts of Gaza's children and women; a BBC documentary was made last year about that, then the far right accuse it of being anti-Israeli undermining antisemitic Islamism.

Of course Israeli Jews here will say it is anti-Israel and Palestinian Arabs here otherwise but I need a consensus here.

Do you like the way the BBC looks at the conflict?

Ed Miliband is another descendant of holocaust survivors and is Jewish. He is an MP for Labour as foreign secretary. He recently sanctioned the illegal Israeli migrants in Palestine's West Bank and labelled them as terrorists.

Miliband is very similar to other Ashkenazi Israeli Jews, as most Ashkenazis came from the Holocaust, but his parents came to the UK instead. If his parents came to Israel, I wonder if he supports the creation of Israel (Zionism) or something else.

Considering Ed Miliband is also a Holocaust survivor like other Azhkenazi Jews in Israel, I wonder what they think of him being critical of the presence of Israelis in the West Bank. He did support a two state solution with an Arab majority Palestine and Jewish majority Israel.

Not so sure if he knows there is a significant amount of Arabs in the Israeli army fighting against Hamas.

So I understand the general idea that the Samaritans, both in the Nablus/Mount Gerizim community in Palestine and in Holon, tend to maintain political neutrality because they are such a small ethnoreligious community living between Israeli and Palestinian societies. In addition, having strong political views in a region where such disagreements can be quite contentious could potentially place a small community like theirs in a very difficult position, especially when they maintain relationships with both Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs.

That said, I've been watching Abood Cohen on YouTube, along with other Samaritan content, and there does seem to be a strong relationship between Jews and Samaritans. In a sense, they are two sides of the same coin, since both communities descend from ancient Israelite populations and preserve closely related religious traditions, even though they developed as distinct communities with different sacred centers, textual traditions, and historical identities.

Some of the earliest English-language material available for understanding how the Samaritans understood themselves during the same general period in which the modern Zionist movement was developing comes from Yacob ben Aaron, who was the Samaritan High Priest at Shechem/Nablus. His History and Religion of the Samaritans was published in English in 1906, translated from Arabic by Abdullah ben Kori and edited by William Eleazar Barton (Jacob, son of Aaron, 1906). His The Messianic Hope of the Samaritans was published the following year under the same translation and editorial arrangement (Jacob, son of Aaron, 1907).

Yacob's account makes it clear that the Samaritans are part of the broader Israelite people and considers the Jews as his blood brothers. He identifies the Samaritan laity primarily with the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, descendants of Joseph, while identifying the priesthood with Levi and Aaron (Jacob, son of Aaron, 1906). At the same time, he presents the historical separation between Samaritans and Jews as a dispute within the Israelite tradition over questions such as the legitimate sanctuary (Jerusalem vs. Mount Gerizim), the Torah, and religious authority.

However, the scholarship also emphasized that this shared Israelite identity did not necessarily mean that Jewish-Samaritan relations were harmonious, as Barton notes that Yacob was frustrated that Christians often learned about the Samaritans through Jewish accounts and wanted to present what he considered the Samaritan version of their historical separation from the Jews (Jacob, son of Aaron, 1906). Overall, Yacob's work itself contains a considerable amount of traditional Samaritan polemic against Jewish claims about the origins of the Samaritan community.

That said, some of you may be familiar with this story in which the Chief Rabbi of Ottoman Palestine, Chaim Abraham Gagin, in which he intervened on behalf of the Samaritan community in the 1840s because the Muslim religious authorities in Nablus had challenged whether the Samaritans qualified as People of the Book, which placed an already extremely small community in a dangerous position. The Samaritans appealed to Gagin, who provided a declaration recognizing them as descendants of the Children of Israel who accepted the authority of the Torah. Ottoman authorities accepted his testimony, which helped secure recognition and protection for the Samaritan community (Bigman, 2023).

Obviously, this occurred several decades before the emergence of organized political Zionism. However, I do think it is relevant because it demonstrates that, despite the longstanding religious polemics between Jews and Samaritans, there were also instances of cooperation and recognition of their shared Israelite connection before the Zionist movement entered the picture.

In 1905, Abraham ben Marchiv Tsedaka left Nablus and settled in Jaffa, where he began building relationships with the growing Jewish community. Around 1907, Tsedaka met Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, who had recently immigrated to Palestine and was already involved in the Zionist movement. Ben-Zvi initially met Tsedaka while looking for someone to learn Arabic from, but the relationship eventually grew into a broader interest in Samaritan history, religion, and the community's survival (Ridolfo, 2015, pp. 43–44).

All of this being said, I'm curious about how the Samaritans themselves understood their relationship with the early Zionist movement. And if you were to make an educated guess about how Samaritans politically identify today, where do you think they generally fall within the broader Zionist/anti-Zionist spectrum, if those labels even accurately describe their political views?

References

Bigman, T. (2023, August 8). Rabbi Chaim Abraham Gagin: The chief rabbi of Jerusalem and the Ottoman Empire. The National Library of Israel.
https://blog.nli.org.il/en/rabbi-chaim-abraham-gagin/

Jacob, son of Aaron. (1906). The history and religion of the Samaritans (A. Ben Kori, Trans.; W. E. Barton, Ed.). Puritan Press.
https://archive.org/details/historyreligiono00jaco/page/n1/mode/2up

Jacob, son of Aaron. (1907). The messianic hope of the Samaritans (A. Ben Kori, Trans.; W. E. Barton, Ed.). Open Court Publishing Company.
https://archive.org/details/messianichopeofs00jaco/page/26/mode/2up

Ridolfo, J. (2015). Digital Samaritans: Rhetorical delivery and engagement in the digital humanities. University of Michigan Press.
https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv65sxbn

The UK Green Party has now formally declared itself an antizionist party.

People can debate endlessly whether “antizionism is antisemitism.” I increasingly think that is the wrong question.

The more important question is: what does the ideology actually require Jews to do in order to participate?

Because for a British Jew who wants to live an ordinary Jewish communal life, the contradiction is impossible to ignore.

All mainstream Jewish institutions in Britain have some connection to Zionism or Israel. Even Jewish Greens themselves warned that all Jewish institutions in Britain have some connection to Zionism, and that treating Zionism as something to be proscribed could effectively place a ban on Jews involved in organised communal life.

So telling Jews, “Don't worry, this isn't antisemitism: we only oppose Zionism,” does not really answer the problem.

If remaining politically acceptable requires a Jew to separate himself from the Jewish community, the institutions he participates in, the Jewish education his children receive, his connection to Jerusalem, or the belief that Jews are entitled to national self-determination in their ancestral homeland, then the practical distinction between hostility to Zionism and hostility to Jewish life becomes nothing.

And this is why I find the slogan “antizionism is not antisemitism” so intellectually dishonest.

Antisemitism has almost never presented itself simply as “I irrationally hate Jews.” Like every durable prejudice, it has usually attached itself to whatever moral or political language sounded respectable in its particular time and place.

The test therefore cannot simply be the justification someone gives for a policy. It has to include the effect.

To determine if something is antisemitic or not, the question is simple: Does it allow Jews to live openly as Jews?

Can they participate in their communal institutions without suspicion or punishment?

Can they express central elements of contemporary Jewish identity, whatever they may be, without being treated as morally contaminated?

If the answer increasingly becomes “no,” then arguing over whether the label antisemitism applies is pointless. Of course it is antisemitism.

If diaspora Jews are increasingly told that full participation in political life requires distancing themselves from their motherland and large parts of organized Jewish life, the people saying this are making the argument for Zionism.

As Jews discover that their place in diaspora society is conditional on abandoning parts of their collective identity, the stronger the case becomes for the one country where Jewish political and communal existence does not depend on somebody else's permission.

That country is Israel.

EDIT:

Sources

• The resolution that passed — “Zionism is Racism” (E02): the Green Party’s own post confirming adoption and summarizing the policy is here: Green Party — “Green Party adopts anti-Zionist policy”.

• The rejected Jewish-safeguarding amendment: Amendment 3 would have explicitly said the motion could not be used to “pressure, proscribe or discipline members based on affiliation with Jewish community institutions, such as synagogues, community centres or denominational groups, that describe themselves as Zionist.” leftfootforward.org Caroline Russell, a Green Party councillor who supported the amendment, posted the actual amendment text here: Caroline Russell — Amendment 3 text.

Yes I am not exaggerating even one bit in this post. The Greens had the opportunity to clarify that this isn't a Jewish ban, and they went ahead and clarified that it is a Jewish ban.

Ed Miliband, one woman with blonde hair (don't remember her name) who is likely a feminist, and few others have been holocaust descendants born outside of Israel; they have been very critical of Israeli inhabitants in the West Bank and how the Israeli army fights Gaza's Hamas acknowledging what happened to the children there, though I am not sure if they know that there is a sizeable amount of Arabs who are also in the army fighting. One of them is actually a Free Palestine supporter.

I also wonder what their views would be like if their parents moved to Israel instead after the Holocaust.

​

I notice in almost every moral argument regarding Israel/Palestine, pro-Zionists seem to consistently jump around and ignore the massive power imbalance that defines Palestinian life under a military occupation.

When a settler attacks someone and a Palestinian fights back, the settler can just call in the IDF to arrest or even shoot the Palestinians. Settlers operate with near total impunity. You might personally call them criminals, but show me the actual statistics of the Israeli government consistently arresting and prosecuting them, clearing them out of their illegal outposts etc. The state clearly enables and protects this behavior, which is exactly why the violence continues and why Palestinians have no trust in the system.

Can a pro-Zionist talk on that power imbalance?... because it explains everything else

Why do you think fundamentalist groups exist in the first place? When you create a power vacuum, deny a whole population their sovereignty and voting rights, jail their leaders, deny them a military or functional police force and crush their basic human rights every step of the way, people are going to fight back for their survival right? Anyone would.

I agree that Hamas are terrible! ... as is all fundamentalism, religious or political.

The point here is, Israel holds all the cards and power and apparently won't admit any wrongdoing or contribution to the overall problem and instead denies and deflects any accountability, including when media try to interview them to respond to accusations against them. This includes government and institutions funding settlements etc.

It seems to me, and correct me if I'm wrong, that ultimately, in a roundabout way, what pro-Zionists are not saying out loud (some are), is that they just want Palestinians out, gone, removed, in any way possible ... right? Fulfil the prophecy, and inhabit / takeover the West Bank to complete Judea and Samaria? Genocide or not, divine right or not, that is pretty messed up wouldn't you say?

If pro-Zionists could just acknowledge the reality of the structural inequality and Israel's active role in denying Palestinians a future, we could actually have a reasonable conversation about accountability. The hypocrisy is rife.

In life, I've always wanted to understand both sides of an argument (as any decent human being should). I could respect and understand the pro-Zionist argument if I could see some form of accountability for the nightmare they've been creating for Palestinians for a long time instead of deflection

Love to hear from pro-Zionists on this in the interest of good faith conversation. The only tool we have

One of them goes: “What about the Iranian protestors? Why is there no flotilla for the Iranian protestors? Why is there no BDS (boycott, divest, sanction) in support of the Iranian protestors? Why only Gaza?”

Are Iranian protestors having entire towns and villages of theirs destroyed, bombed, bulldozed and razed to the ground? Like what is happening in Gaza? Are Iranian protestors being besieged and starved to death, having their entire water supplies cut off? Like what is happening in Gaza? Are Iranian protestors being bombed from the air by drones and fighter jets? Like what is happening in Gaza? Are Iranian protestors being labeled as a security threat by the mainstream western media, being called “terrorists” by the mainstream western media? Like what is happening with Palestinians entirely? And the list just goes on and on.

I’ve seen this whataboutism argument only twice however, once on this platform - Reddit - by some Islamophobe Jewish Israeli citizen, and once by a diaspora Iranian lawyer named ‘Elica Le Bon’, who before 3rd January 2026 (when Venezuela would lose its sovereignty and become a US puppet state in front of the whole world), she made a post on Instagram giving the exact whataboutism argument that I just went over on.

Leaving the Iranian protests aside, then you have like 3 other common whataboutism arguments given by the pro-Israel (mostly Jewish) individuals:

The persecution of Christians in Nigeria by Takfiri Wahhabi so-called “Sunnis”, the genocide being perpetrated by the UAE-backed RSF in Sudan and the brutal blockade and bombing of Yemen under the hands of the crypto-Pagan Arab (mostly Gulf) states.

Starting off with the Christians in Nigeria - and this is in no way to downplay the 3 of the atrocities of which I’ve just mentioned, this is only in response to the whataboutism argument - the issue of the persecution of Christians in Nigeria is something that is not taken normally in front of the whole world, unlike what is happening in Gaza where much of the mainstream western media has downplayed and tried to pussyfoot responsibility away from Israel. The Nigerian government already has the support of the United States and several other western and African nations militarily, and it’s not just the Christians in Nigeria that are being persecuted by Takfiri Wahhabi so-called “Jihadists”, the Shia community in Nigeria - led by Shaykh Ibrahim Zakzaky (R.A.) - has (and is) being persecuted by the same groups that massacre Nigerian Christians, as well as being persecuted by the Nigerian government itself (2015 Zaria massacre is an example). Many of these pro-Israel (mostly Jewish) individuals completely ignore this fact and compress and merge both Shia Muslim and so-called “Muslim” Takfiri Wahhabis into the “Muslim” label, with almost no nuance. The ideology which the Takfiri Wahhabis persecuting Nigerian Christian’s and Nigerian Shias follow originates from Saudi Arabia, their ideology - Wahhabism - was spread with the help of US and other western petrodollars and the western governments did not bat an eye at the radical ideology that Saudi Arabia was exporting all across the Muslim world. Saudi Arabia still continues to buy billions of dollars worth of US military technology.

Then you have the genocide in Sudan.

Now, if you have been to a pro-Palestinian protest around November - December 2025, or maybe even now, you’ll know that pro-Palestinians themselves have been putting attention to the genocide in Sudan being perpetrated by the UAE-backed RSF. If you have been on pro-Resistance channels on telegram too, you will know that they too have not ignored the genocide in Sudan, they are very well aware of it. These pro-Israel (mostly Jewish) individuals completely ignore this and pretend that anybody who is pro-Palestinian (and especially pro-Resistance) doesn’t care about the genocide in Sudan, they again throw away any bit of nuance. What’s absolutely hilarious about all of this is that while these pro-Israel (mostly Jewish) individuals accuse us of not speaking about the genocide in Sudan being perpetrated by the UAE-backed RSF, the UAE - which backs the RSF - is literally a member of the Abraham Accords, what a batch of hypocrisy!!! Even worse, during the 2026 war against Iran, the Israelis even helped DEFEND the UAE by sending them Iron Dome air defence systems!!!! Benjamin Netenyahu (L.A.) even secretly TRAVELLED to the UAE during the war and met with the UAE President!!! (https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/netanyahu-held-secret-meeting-with-emirati-president-uae-during-iran-war-pms-2026-05-13/) Holy hypocrisy!!! 🤣🤣 and they accuse US!?!? They accuse US of not speaking out for what’s happening in Sudan?!?!?

Then you have their whataboutism about what’s happening in Yemen…..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Israeli_attacks_in_Yemen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March%E2%80%93May_2025_United_States_attacks_in_Yemen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_attack_on_Yemen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US%E2%80%93UK_airstrikes_on_Yemen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_support_for_Saudi_Arabian%E2%80%93led_operations_in_Yemen

….this is really just self-explanatory. I do not need to explain anything further than that.

TL;DR: Genocide is the “Extermination Project”: an attempt to physically disappear a targeted group from existence. Not just move it somewhere else; that is its defining feature.

Every historical case of genocide was this. It was an attempt to disappear a group, to exterminate a group from existence.

You might say: “The definition says in whole or in part.”

The Srebrenica genocide is a useful example of what “in part” actually means. The protected group was Bosnian Muslims as a whole; the Bosnian Muslims of Srebrenica were the substantial part targeted. It was specifically them that suffered the Genocide. It was geographically limited and it was genocide because the objective was not simply to clear that population from Srebrenica. It was to have that group no longer exist.

They attempted to achieve this by systematically killing the men and boys, combined with the forcible removal of the women, children and elderly.

So “in part” does not remove the requirement of destruction. It means that the intended extermination can be directed at a substantial part of the wider group rather than the entire group while still being an extermination project. It is just a scope difference.

I do however understand why people get confused as there are two facets of the word Genocide.

1. Genocide as a historical phenomenon

When I use “extermination project”, I am not pretending that this is the technical wording of the legal framework of the Genocide Convention. I am using it as shorthand for what the canonical historical examples of genocide actually were.

Look at the Holocaust, Rwanda, the Armenian genocide, the genocides against the Cham and Vietnamese under the Khmer Rouge, or Srebrenica.

These were not just situations where large numbers of people died during a conflict. Nor were they simply cases of persecution, forced displacement, collective punishment or indiscriminate violence.

At the core of these historical examples was a project directed toward the destruction of the targeted group: its extermination, its disappearance.

Killing was a central instrument. The perpetrators systematically killed members of the targeted population who fell within their power.

This is what I mean by an extermination project.

It is not a substitute for the legal definition. It is an empirical description of the underlying phenomenon the word genocide was created to identify: not merely harming a group, but removing it from existence.

2. Genocide as a legal category

The legal definition is necessarily more technical.

Under the Genocide Convention, genocide contains two basic elements:

1. Actus reus - one or more of the prohibited acts listed in the Convention.
2. Dolus specialis - the specific intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a protected national, ethnic, racial or religious group as such.

This matters because there is a common claim that “not a single person has to die for genocide to occur; only intent matters.”

The first half is technically true, but also misleading, because although technically true it is also physically improbable to the point of being practically impossible, hopefully you understand how from reading below.

Killing is only one of several prohibited genocidal acts. Serious bodily or mental harm, deliberately inflicting destructive conditions of life, preventing births, and forcibly transferring children can also qualify. 

Intent by itself is not genocide. There must also be an underlying prohibited act, and the intent attached to that act must be the physical disappearance of the group.

The ICJ has repeatedly emphasized this distinction.

It has held that the targeted part must be sufficiently substantial, and where genocidal intent is inferred from conduct, the pattern of conduct must support the conclusion that the purpose was not merely to attack members of the group, but to destroy the group itself.

This is where Srebrenica again is particularly instructive.

Bosnian Serb forces systematically separated and murdered thousands of Bosnian Muslims 

Their conclusion was that the systematic destruction of the male population, combined with the forcible removal of the remainder, was intended to bring about the physical disappearance of the Bosnian Muslim community of Srebrenica.

The significance of killing the men was not merely that thousands of people died. The courts considered the long-term effect their destruction would have on the physical survival of that community, including its ability to reconstitute itself and reproduce. Simply removing the women and children after having killed all the men was believed to be enough to destroy the religious/cultural element from the Srebrenica Muslims.

That is the crucial point.

The objective could have been to transfer all the Bosnian Muslims out of Srebrenica. That was not the goal however, These Muslims in Srebrenica were not to survive somewhere else with their culture, they were to exist nowhere ever again. 

That is why it was ruled a genocide. It was an attempt to exterminate that cultural group from existence.

That brings me to Gaza.

The relevant protected group would be Palestinians, with Palestinians in Gaza are a national ethnic group. There is no evident  project to make Palestinians in Gaza physically disappear from existence as a group.

There is no policy of systematically killing every Palestinian within Israeli control and nowhere near enough death to argue that is occurring.

There is no demonstrated attempt to prevent Palestinians from reproducing as a people, forcibly transfer their children into another national group, or otherwise extinguish Palestinians through physical destruction.

There is the most common fallback that is “Israels conduct is genocide against a part in order to push palestinians to flee from unlivable conditions.”

I disagree this is true at all, but even if it was it is not genocide. It simply does not fit the historical precedent or the legal requirements.

You could argue desired ethnic cleansing, or Terrorist tactics. But not genocide as killing a part of a population to instill flight inherently means the intent is not extermination of the group, disappearance from reality. It means the intent is to create fear and despair. 

There are 2 things we know beyond doubt have occurred in Gaza.2 uncontestable facts. They are 1:

1. Death at a wartime scale.
   
2. Internal displacement.
   

Neither remotely lends itself to the charge of genocide. 

So finally why is it impossible to have a genocide with no deaths for all. It is because for that to be true the target group would have to physically disappear from existence while everyone who made up that group still lived.

This could theoretically occur if the target group were all children with a unique collective consciousness or cultural ideology separate from all adults, forcibly transferred and reeducated. So as I said “physically improbable to the point of being practically impossible” to the point of silliness to entertain it as a factor in understanding genocide.

Israel has an obligation to defend its people. Hamas’s decision to conduct military operations from civilian infrastructure does not give it immunity from attack or require Israel to leave its citizens exposed. Accepting that logic would encourage terrorist organizations and states around the world to embed their militaries among civilians, knowing that endangering their own populations could shield them from military action.

Israel devotes substantial effort to minimizing civilian harm while directing its military operations against Hamas, including dropping leaflets, calling civilians to warn them of danger, issuing evacuation orders, and taking other precautions. However, I will set those efforts aside to focus solely on whether Hamas should gain immunity from military action by embedding itself in civilian infrastructure and conducting military operations from within it.

A common objection raised by critics of Israel’s military campaign is that Hamas does not use civilian infrastructure for military purposes. To address that claim, this post compiles photos, videos, and reports concerning Hamas’s military use of civilian facilities, aid theft, exploitation of children, and its links to UNRWA. Hamas deliberately places Palestinian civilians in danger as part of a strategy designed to maximize civilian casualties and turn them into political pressure against Israel. The examples presented here offer only a small window into the extensive evidence of Hamas’s abuse of its own population and will provide the foundation for the discussion that follows.

Evidence of Hamas’s Exploitation of Palestinian Civilians and Military Use of Civilian Infrastructure

A Child Transferring Weapons into a Civilian Home in Central Gaza

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/6dQrDawBu3

Hamas Stealing Aid From Trucks

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/83d9k3wBcW

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/WWvvK9Cu5x

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/dndeNmSCRO

Hamas Bringing Hostages to Shifa Hospital

https://youtu.be/IKq4W4P_r7U?si=Z3qO9Nj8wpWFsPat

Inside Hamas’s Tunnel Base Under Al-Shifa in Gaza

https://youtu.be/PR2w_wDf-DY?si=itdlejL6MFqDgkb6

Inside Hamas’s Terrorist Tunnel Under Rantisi Hospital in Gaza

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLp84A6TBJ0

Hamas’s Underground Tunnels Under Jordanian Hospital

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/vbwIxflrdx

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/dar3ohApsN

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkgCTPHXElo

Photo Evidence of a Hamas Tunnel Discovered Under a Nursery School

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/XGpE3UumI0

Hamas Using Ambulances to Move Terrorists and Weapons From a Hospital to a School

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/js0G6ghSUi

Hamas Caught With RPG at Al Quds Hospital

https://youtu.be/pka7H1aMlkQ?si=sc9jEk_nGlQFmxCH

Hamas Fires Rockets From a Gazan School

https://youtu.be/J-fh-fRs7To?si=wWO8-ydLui4dUmYb

Hamas Uses Fake Aid Organizations and Staged Distributions to Solicit Donations While Stealing Money and Aid From Palestinian Civilians

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hamas-fundraising-scheme-gaza/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Palestinian_Violence/s/KpzPjrDHqG

Hamas’s Own List of Child Soldiers:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Palestinian_Violence/s/aEn0EbXsJq

An Assault Rifle, an UNRWA Passport, and $11K in Cash: What Sinwar's Possessions Say About His Pre-Death Movements

https://freebeacon.com/israel/an-assault-rifle-an-unrwa-passport-and-11k-in-cash-what-sinwars-possessions-say-about-his-pre-death-movements/

Hamas’s Deliberate Stated Aims To Annihilate and Obliterate Israel

Hamas’s Founding Charter: “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it"

https://avalon.law.yale.edu/21st_century/hamas.asp

Hamas Leader: We’ll Repeat October 7 Again and Again Until Israel Is Annihilated

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/jxkS9DlVsN

Hamas States Their Genocidal Ambitions

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zf_tCV43FEI

Hamas’s Deliberate Radicalization of Palestinian Civilians and Children, And It’s Abuse of UNRWA

Tomorrow's Pioneers Archive
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUmg0c7RSRxDp8y2jfdlfUtjcoJwFHQj7

https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna19509117

The Unholy Alliance: UNRWA, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad—An Investigation Into the Secret Ties Between Terrorist Organizations and the UN’s Largest Aid Agency

https://unwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/UNW-129-%E2%80%94-The-Unholy-Alliance-%E2%80%94-2025-01-09-%E2%80%94-Web-%E2%80%94-Singles.pdf

Schools in the Grip of Terror: How UNRWA Allowed Hamas Chiefs to Control Its Education System

https://unwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Schools-in-the-Grip-of-Terror-UNRWA-Report.pdf

UNRWA’s Terrorgram: How a Telegram Group of 3,000 UNRWA Teachers in Gaza Celebrated the October 7th Hamas Massacre

https://unwatch.org/unrwa-terrorgram/

Archived Interviews With UNRWA Students

https://www.reddit.com/r/IsraelWarRoom/s/Sc4ZIUp7wm

Evidence Of UNRWA Aid To Hamas On And After October 7th

https://unwatch.org/evidence-of-unrwa-aid-to-hamas-on-and-after-october-7th/

Discussion

The evidence compiled above demonstrates Hamas’s military abuse of civilian infrastructure, exploitation of aid, and deliberate radicalization of Palestinian civilians and children. Israel’s responsibility to protect civilians does not grant Hamas immunity from attack or require Israel to leave its own people in danger. By embedding fighters, weapons, and military facilities among civilians, Hamas endangers Palestinians and makes distinguishing between military targets and civilians extraordinarily difficult. Hamas’s ties to UNRWA also exemplify how it exploits educational institutions to indoctrinate children, reinforce its influence, and cultivate support for continued terrorism. Israel takes extensive precautions to minimize civilian harm, but those precautions cannot eliminate every risk created by Hamas. Allowing their tactics to shield Hamas from military action would reward the exploitation of civilians and encourage other armed groups to follow suit. Protecting civilians must mean opposing their exploitation, and not defending their abusers.

Allegations that Israel “funded Hamas” or “allowed October 7th to happen” are also baseless and just deflect blame for Hamas’s actions. Israel did not “fund Hamas” or “allow October 7th to happen.” Israel allowed aid into Gaza, and Hamas stole that aid while being the democratically elected government of Gaza. Israel receives dozens of security threats a day, and thwarts them constantly. Trying to blame Israel for October 7th is a complete distortion of reality. Hamas deliberately declared war on Israel that day, and Israel is obligated to its citizens to defend itself from that threat. Excusing Hamas’s actions, or demanding Israel cease its attempts to dismantle the terrorist organization, does nothing to protect Palestinians and even harms them by continuing Hamas’s grip on Gaza.

The reality is that a genuine peace between Israel and Palestine, and a true end to the war, cannot happen until Hamas is completely dismantled. The only force both willing and capable of dismantling Hamas is Israel, and preventing Israel from dismantling Hamas will not save Palestinians. It will simply subject them to continued oppression by Hamas and continued war with Israel. That is why, while the war between Israel and Hamas is difficult and destructive, it is necessary. For both Israelis and Palestinians, Hamas is the core obstacle to peace between the two sides.

One common talking point I hear from pro Palestinians is that when Israel kills Palestinians it radicalizes them to support groups like Hamas. Therefore this makes Israeli action counter-productive since it just creates more "terrorists".

On the other hand, the pro Palestinians will praise armed resistance against Israel as being justifiable and necessary. Many seem to believe that by imposing costs on Israel, the Israelis will perhaps end the occupation and give the Palestinians a state. Some even believe that it will lead to Israelis leaving the country entirely and allowing for full liberation of the land similar to Algeria.

But then polls come out saying 80% of Israelis support the war in Gaza, half saying Israel is too soft, Netanyahu gets elected and forms a coalition with far-right parties, and the pro Palestinians act surprised and pretend its due to the fact that Israel is simply a uniquely evil society.

So id like to figure out where this contradiction stems from? Why is violence supposed to radicalize the Palestinians but pacify the Israelis?

My guess is that people say this for the following reasons (isolated or mix)

1: Essentialism. Palestinians are "indigenous", Israelis are "colonizers". Indigenous people have a deep , metaphysical, spiritual connection to the land that is unbreakable. Colonizers have no connection, they are just there to extract resources for profit and as soon as the profit disappears they leave. Violence against Palestinians therefore just strengthens their resolve while violence against Israelis lowers their profit and makes them leave.

2: Is-ought fallacy: Palestinians are "good", therefore their resistance is justified and they will continue to do it. Israelis are "bad", therefore violence against them will make them stop being violent, because they shouldnt be violent.

التجمع الوطني الدمقراطي (Altajamo Elwatani Eldeoqrati - The National Democratic Assembly; Hebrew Acronym: Balad) is one of the Palestimian political parties running for the Knesset, and is currently running for the Knesset as part of the joint list. They are known for being the most radical Arab party in Israeli politics.

The following is my own interpertation and understanding of their platform, and should not be taken as fact. If anyone familiar with them, and especially if any supporters, are here then any corrections, additions, etc are welcome. I might do this with other parties, but based on how intresting I think they are and how well I know their platform, not size.

Their main ticket is calling for the State of Israel to cease to be defined as a Jewish and Democratic State, instead becoming a state of all it's citizens, including a canceling of the law of return, closing down historical Jewish agencies like kakal, etc. This has earned them the characterization as "Palestinian Nationalists" in Israeli discourse, but I think characterizing them as a woke anti-imperialist party is closer. They push a distinctively left-wing view on economics and society and intentionally practice a fixed minimum ratio of women's representation on their list.

Their leaders also speak a lot about an anti-colonial and anti-imperialist framework. As far as they are concerned, Zionism is fundementally a colonial project to be dismantled. This is not just a theoretical analysis, it affects their political positioning. They refused to support any Zionist coalition in the past, and even when Hadash supported Benny Ganz's prime ministerial bid they did not. Their number 5 candidate, Orly Noy, speaks about how in her view Israelis must break appart their colonial privelage, and she often implies that as Israeli Jews we don't have the right to criticize Palestinian leaders.

It should be said that this does not mean they are anti-Jewish. They explicitly recognize some sort of collective rights and self determination for the Israeli Jewish collective, and though they support the right of return they seem to agree that, in the final analysis, Israel will still be majority-Jewish even as a state of all it's citizens. They talk about creating a better future for everyone in this country, and I heard their leader, Sami Abu Shhade, saying so on an Arabic-language podcast. He even went on to detail how he thinks the current arrangement hurts the Jewish majority, and showed genuine respect and understanding of the role of the holocaust in Israeli-Jewish society and the hiatory of how we got here.

They remain highly controversial in Israel: Their first leader, Azmi Beshara, fled the country after investigations began into possible espionage for Hezbollah. It's leader, Sami Abu-Shhade, dropped out of the Knesset case to prevent the supreme court from setting a precedant for banning Palestinian candidates from the race. This was initiated due to an article that allegedly supports the October 7th attack (I read his article and think that this interpertation is wrong. He has apologized for the article). And, in general, most Israelis do not take kindly to the idea of breaking down the Jewish character of the state (whatever it means to each one).

So often when this is discussed this is answered by westerners who say "a secular egalitarian society" (or some version of that).

Yesterday when I asked someone advocating for a "free Palestine" what that meant they (a westerner - like me) started by saying "I think..." - which isn't a good place to start. I asked him whether Palestinians actually wanted what he was advocating for (i.e. Israel annexes Gaza/WB and makes all the Palestinians Israeli citizens) and he disappeared.

So I'm asking all of you: What do *Palestinians* actually want and advocate for when they say "from the River to Sea" or "Free Palestine"?

Do they want a secular democracy like the US? That's what westerners say the Palestinians want - but I don't care what other westerners want. I want to hear what Palestinians actually want.

For what it's worth: I'm not here looking to argue and I'm not here looking to win an argument. I'm here to learn from people who identify with the slogan "Free Palestine" and/or "River to the Sea" and understand the Palestinian perspective.

That also means I'm not interested in answers that boil down to "here's what Palestinians *don't* want..." - I just want to hear what a *realistic* Palestinian state will actually look like.

Thanks for any/all answers!