I can guarantee you that is never going to happen. You ban VPNs and all the companies R&D departments will leave. A VPN is an essential part of corporate data infrastructure. If a company is unable to secure intellectual property, it will move it elsewhere, leaving only sales and manufacturing, at best.
And since France is in Schengen, I’m sure other European countries would love to get those corporate taxes for themselves.
Of course Israel knows this is not possible, but it’s a nice statement to point at every time they get caught killing civilians. “Look we told them to leave, nothing we can do after that.”
The problem is that they are based on two false assumptions.
The IDF today dropped leaflets over Beit Lahia in the Gaza Strip calling on people to leave their homes and go to shelters
There are no bomb shelters in Palestine or place to run to. If there were, Hamas would take them over. They are literally sardines. Unless Egypt will take refugees, so far that looks like a no.
The leaflet does not specify humanitarian corridors or how they can flee.
So I just heard about this whole thing last night. What is the preferred Israeli response to this?
To me it looks like Hamas using occupied buildings as places to attack from, the Israel being told they aren’t allowed to hit back at people using human shields.
Your response seems to be equivalent to “never defend yourself against someone holding an innocent hostage.”
To clarify, I’m not sure what response doesn’t result in more innocent people dying.
I don’t really care about this specific conflict more than any other. And morally I don’t care for the lives of one side more than the other. And morally I don’t care who lived in what cities 100 years ago (note: unless those specific people are involved).
My confusion seems to be that the ‘right’ response people seem to want to this is no response.
Israel definitely is well within their rights to retaliate against Hamas, it would be foolish to claim otherwise. It’s the exact way they are doing it that is the issue, they are behaving nearly as poorly as their enemy. You can’t just tell the world “look at the barbarity of Hamas slaughtering innocent civilians just out there kibbutzing” and then turn around and bomb civilian hospitals, completely disregard rules of engagement around medical aid killing humanitarian volunteers you were aware of, shutting off all power, water and closing food supply to the Gaza strip, and then act like it’s somehow better than that.
Hamas absolutely sucks and Israel has every right to defend themselves from terrorism, but the Palestinian children buried under rubble didn’t deserve any of this. (Neither did the Israeli citizens who were slaughtered and kidnapped for that matter.)
Israel has the technology, the troops, and the tactics to be far more precise and surgical in their retaliation, but their response has been punitive and brutal, and seems to almost maximize collateral damage. Of course that’s what Netanyahu and his thugs will all but directly say they want given the opportunity to speak. I do not believe that properly represents the citizens of Israel who are generally much more sympathetic to the people of Palestine.
Both the citizens of Israel and Palestine have been failed by their leadership. Agree or disagree, at this point, I just had to write that down somewhere. I know people from both Palestine and Israel, wonderful people, all this is heartbreaking.
War is hell, even if you play by the rules, why make it even worse?
Thanks. It’s hard for me to judge tactics from video, as I can’t really tell what is accidental collateral damage vs purposeful. The statements by Israeli leadership definitely supports the view that they are purposefully being punitive… which is monstrous.
Stop the occupation of Palestine, stop the settlement of the West Bank, and stop the apartheid status of Palestinians in Israel. Then either allow Palestine to be an independent country in the UN, responsible for their own security and economy. Or give all Palestinians voting rights in Israel as a one state solution. After that is set and done set up an independent criminal court to judge on all war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in this region, this will of course also include Hamas.
Israel used to occupy Gaza the same way it currently does the West Bank; there were even Jewish settlers living there. The IDF withdrew in 2005 as a token of goodwill towards peace and a future Palestinian state, evicting all Jewish residents as well. Gaza then elected Hamas, whose founding charter calls for the extermination of all Jews, and started lobbing rockets. Israelis aren't exactly keen to see a repetition of that.
I really get wanting to believe that this would be a solution, but the fact of the matter is that there are very real security concerns; a not-small number of Palestinians believe that the state of Israel should be destroyed by violently removing all Jews from the land, as we saw last weekend. You can say that that anger and resentment is somewhat justified - hell, I'd largely agree - but Israel is under no circumstances going to allow its existence to be threatened. The fundamental purpose of Israel existing is to provide a safe homeland for Jews, and Israel will stop at nothing to ensure that.
Giving all Palestinians full voting rights is not going to happen so long as there's such a complete lack of trust between the two groups. Israelis, probably correctly, fear that they'd quickly become a minority within their own state and ultimately be subjected to government persecution or expulsion. You have to keep in mind that a huge chunk of Israelis come from Arab countries that forcibly seized their assets and expelled them. Israelis will not accept the possibility of their own government doing the same.
Idealism simply is not applicable in this situation. If Israel fully withdrew from the West Bank, they have no reason to believe that it wouldn't simply be a repeat of the Gaza fiasco from 2005, with the situation being even worse since attacks out of the West Bank could threaten Jerusalem. Any analysis of the situation must begin and end with the immutable fact that Israel will prioritize its own security above anything else, including Western condemnation.
None of this is to excuse the many unjustifiable travesties that Israel does commit against the Palestinians, which are numerous, nor does it excuse settlements in the West Bank at all, which are disgusting abominations that actively serve to make peace even more impossible than it already is. But fundamentally, Israel is never going to make any kind of withdrawals or concessions unless it feels its security remains guaranteed, and any proposal that doesn't accept this is doomed.
I'm gonna nitpick here, but:
stop the apartheid status of Palestinians in Israel
Statements like this really need to be more clear, because they can otherwise severely muddy the waters of an already extremely messy situation. What exactly are you referring to here by "Israel"? Arab citizens of Israel, Palestinian or otherwise, have full rights. Palestinians within the West Bank and Gaza are severely restricted and oppressed a lot, and sure, you can make an apartheid analogy if you want. But is it not our entire fundamental premise that the West Bank is not Israel, but rather is Palestine? Palestinians do not live under any kind of apartheid within Israel, unless you are including the West Bank as part of Israel, which no one but the most extreme Israeli nationalists would ever do. So either Palestinians live under apartheid and the West Bank is a legitimate part of the state of Israel, or Palestinians live in Palestine under a strict foreign military occupation and not under an apartheid in Israel.
Not going to get into an argument about Hamas vs Isreali tactics, but you should be aware that it is far, far from the case that Palestinians inside of Israel let alone in OPT have the rights you think they do:
In your statement you are completely disregarding the security concerns of the Palestinians, calling the current state of the Gaza strip a ‘token of good will’ is absolutely ludicrous. If you really believe this I would invite you to read the wikipedia article on the great march of return: en.wikipedia.org/…/2018–2019_Gaza_border_protests.
And finally it is not stupid idealism to want to end the current status quo in Israel, I think it has become clear over the last few days that it is not possible to suppress a population without some kind of response: an apartheid state is a state of violence. And I hope we can all agree (at least if you are not an ethnonationalist) that the current state of South Africa is much much better than it was during apartheid.
The Palestinians absolutely have legitimate security concerns. They are also, in no universe, ever going to be able to resolve them by violently overthrowing the Israelis, and no amount of winning the moral argument will change this fact. This notion of establishing a Palestinian state through violent resistance must be abandoned - no matter how righteous it may or may not be - because Israel will defend itself down to the last Jewish life before allowing another Jewish diaspora, and it will win. If Egypt, Jordan, and Syria were all defeated in 1967 in six days, it is simply not in the realm of possibility that some loosely organized Palestinian resistance is going to be re-taking Jerusalem.
There is a plausible, though still mostly confined to dreams, path to peace that involves the Palestinians de-militarizing, Israel abandoning all settlements and withdrawing to the 1967 borders, the establishment of a joint security force between Israelis and Palestinians that has zero tolerance for nationalistic violence, and a gradual opening of economic and cultural integrations over time. There'd probably need to be some land-swaps, and Jerusalem would probably need to be governed by some kind of joint administration as well, but there does exist a framework where peace is imaginable.
Key to this, though, is that Israel stops settlements and that Palestinians completely abandon any consideration of violence. Under no circumstances will Israel make any steps towards peace if it feels its security is threatened, and seeing as they're the ones with the guns, anyone hoping to see peace simply must accept this fact. So long as aggressive violence is seen as a way to solve the conflict, there will never be peace.
The West Bank has seen minimal Palestinian-initiated conflict, and in exchange, Israel has built more settlements, let them burn fields, and kicked people out of their homes. It’s not security that drives the settlement projects. They want the land.
Where is that smile coming from? Is this a funny online game of words for you?
Israel has to defeat Hamas decisively and Hamas just tries to save their own sorry asses by telling the civilian population to stay where the israelian ground offensive will start. It is a deliberate plan by Hamas that civilians get killed. They want those pictures to drum up their support in Arab states.
Iran is officially the Islamic Republic of Iran too, though. Most countries are like that. Republic of Finland, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Federal Republic of Germany, Russian Federation etc.
Israel has been calling Palestinian fighters “terrorists” to justify its slaughter of Gaza.
Breakthrough News journalist, Eugene Puryear, rips this narrative apart, explaining the long history of oppressed and colonized people being demonized and called terrorists and savage to justify the continued occupation of those people. No different than the Native resistance to American colonization, slave rebellions in the Americas, the Haitian Revolution, Palestinians are resisting Israeli colonialism, not out of bloodlust as the media has portrayed it, but because of decades of land thefts, massacres, second-class citizenship and the denial of the right to return that has persisted for decades.
as in anyone espousing the ideology of instilling fear as a weapon.
I wish that was what the word “terrorist” means.
It has always meant anyone using asymmetric tactics to oppose states or capitalism, both violent and non-violent. If it simply meant using fear as a weapon, then every state that has prisons and police would be terrorist.
The standard usage of the word is so hypocritical that it has become an authoritarian allegiance-signifying pejorative without any deeper meaning.
If it simply meant using fear as a weapon, then every state that has prisons and police would be terrorist.
Well… you said it 🙈
The Oxford definition adds “unlawful” as an extra requirement, but I’d readily call Iran’s morality police “terrorist”, despite being lawful and state sponsored.
I agree Iran uses fear to control its citizens, but that’s a pretty facile statement in an English speaking community. How do you feel about Anastasija Kukhta or Mikhail Lazakovich, both convicted of terrorism?
Russia and Belarus also use fear to control their citizens. Setting a place on fire to make the state fear you, definitely can be called terrorism. Asking for sanctions against a state… hm, kind of? Technically, many of the sanctions against Russia are also intended to instill fear, including amongst civilians so they stop supporting their state. Making the EU fear whether it will have enough fuel for the winter, is another case.
There’s a lot of terrorising going around these days.
The word is useless for describing violent acts in a meaningful way. It can mean making children traumatized with bombs, or making HOA members afraid their property value will decrease with graffiti, vastly different actions and outcomes.
No one who wants to be taken seriously should use the word “terrorist” in a descriptive context. It is not a meaningful word, it’s a noise people make when the word they actually mean is socially inappropriate or politically inopportune.
The word is useless for describing violent acts in a meaningful way
Agree.
It is not a meaningful word
Disagree.
“Terrorism” has a clear meaning, and observing when people use it, or avoid using it, is even more meaningful, as proven by those examples.
PS: I’ve been called a “no freeloading terrorist”, a “TV remote terrorist”, and a “cleaning terrorist”. It may not tell you much about what I did, but it should convey enough meaning about what they were thinking.
I have directed the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group (CSG) to begin moving to the Eastern Mediterranean. As part of our effort to deter hostile actions against Israel or any efforts toward widening this war following Hamas’s attack on Israel, the Strike Group includes the guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea (CG 58), guided-missile destroyers USS Gravely (DDG 107) and USS Mason (DDG 87), and Carrier Air Wing 3, with nine aircraft squadrons, and embarked headquarters staffs.
How much time have you got? I guess the biggest factor is that referendums are hard to pass in Australia, especially when the campaign becomes partisan. And this one was VERY partisan. But also Australia has a particular type of racist ignorance when it comes to our First Nations Peoples and our colonial history in general. We’re now currently the only settler colonial nation that has not recognised its First Nations Peoples in their constitution. Settler colonialism is not a competition, but if it was Australia kind of wins the gold. I say that as a white Australian.
I’m Norwegian and even though the Saami have their own government within the nation state of Norway there are still plenty of people in denial of the apartheid that was done against them. For each year the Sami government is delegitemised and it’s done through nationalistic fervour.
Nationalism and intellectual suicide go hand in hand.
There’s a lot of different views, many with some truths to it. I’ll try to give an answer but please take into account my answer is quite bias too.
The question, unlike the title of the article, the actual vote is on
whether the Constitution should be changed to include a recognition of the First Peoples of Australia by establishing an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice.
The problem is, how exactly or what exactly is an Aboriginal/Torres strait Islander voice. It’s not like Australia is voting to not give these groups voting rights like many articles seem to suggest.
It’s about what does this voice mean, do they have the power over government, can they stop laws, does it even help, whose even in it?
And there is no answer real answer, most answers I see are “it’s about creating a voice” or “we want to see Aus support before putting into action” etc (this may have changed later but that was the initial info I was getting), so you basically asked the Australian people to vote into changing the consitution on a potential something? Which for many feels like a permanent change or an unknown thing.
So all the no side had to do was be like “oh if you don’t know, then best to err on the safe side and vote no”. “Who knows what this could do”. “You can always wait and change it later”.
Imo the votes would have been very different if it instead just asked “would you like to see an Aboriginal / Torres strait Islander voice in government” and not touched the constitution. Or if they just made the voice/team/group and showed Aus how helpful it was before asking them to change the consitution.
And (I’m prob showing more bias here) if the yes side didn’t just call everyone racist who looked at the no vote (which I believe many are swing voters), it couldve provided enough time/listening to make changes to the argument that would change the voters. For example if they made it clear that it would just be used to support better decision making and help understanding etc. Though I can’t be too harsh when many of the no side arguments felt objectively like lies.
Racism and lack of bipartisan support were likely huge factors as other commenters said. There was also division between Indigenous people regarding the efficacy of the Voice to Parliament. Some saw it as a great step forward, others saw it as toothless or symbolic, others still believed it would delegitimise their sovereignty over the land. The Opposition latched onto this for their own gains I believe. Together with Fair Australia (conservative lobbying group) they dealed in fear, misinformation and distrust. They absolutely dominated over social media and took control of the narrative very quickly. This became a lot easier for them due to the cost of living crisis. Take a White Australian in the outer suburbs or rural areas, tell them to care about this thing they don’t understand instead of their rising mortgage payments and cost of groceries, when the Opposition is feeding into their latent ignorance and distrust of First Nations people that all Australians have, and you’ve lost them already.
This reads eerily similar, so basically the same parallel that the U.S. and Australia have been struggling with together for the last 20 years (and assuredly before then).
About 1/3rd through the article, they start highlighting some of the progressive conversations that have been being had in Israel, comparing them to the remarks AOC, Bernie Sanders, Ilhan Omar, Cori Bush, Rashida Tlaib, and others have been criticized as “disgraceful” for.
Some important ones IMO:
Daniel Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator and top adviser to former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, who told the BBC, “If anyone told me that what the militants did on the weekend was a legitimate response to years and years of occupation. I would say: ‘No, you’re wrong-headed. You’ve lost sight of humanity and reality.’ And if anyone tells me that what Israel is doing in Gaza today is a legitimate response to what happened on the weekend, it’s exactly the same.”
Israeli human rights lawyer Michael Sfard, an expert on the rules of war, observed Wednesday that “Hamas committed abominable war crimes for which there can be no forgiveness. But the laws of war weren’t meant only for situations in which our blood is cool, or when there is no justified anger or understandable desire for revenge.” The lawyer explained:
It’s not easy for Israelis to think about Gazans’ rights in a week when Hamas committed crimes that are still impossible to digest and our whole society is mourning and crying. But Gaza’s catastrophe won’t wait for the end of our seven-day shivah.
Consequently, this needs to be said: Israel has held millions of people under a brutal blockade for more than 15 years with the support of the entire Western world. That is inhumane and inconceivable, and every solution to this bloody conflict ultimately includes respecting the rights of all people, both in Gaza and Sderot, to live with security and human dignity. And that begins with respecting the most basic rules as set down in the international laws of war, which are designed to reduce the harm to civilians.
It’s easy to get stuck in a North American bubble of media, but it’s also important to note what’s being said locally by people who have eyes on the ground and have been watching this stuff grow first hand for 75 years since the occupation of Israel.
It’s very telling that the media began insinuating (or labeling outright) Representatives Omar and Tlaib as being antisemitic for criticizing Israel’s response, but when Sanders says the same thing, and even more, they don’t.
If it’s not antisemitic for a Jewish person to say, it’s not antisemitic for someone else to. No one is immune from criticism that would otherwise be valid, simply because of who is giving it.
fyi: if you’d like a vetted cause to donate to, people are fundraising for Palestine Children’s Relief Fund which is one of the best charities i’m aware of that does relief work in Gaza and puts basically all of the money given to them toward actual work and not salaries or overhead.
Couple weeks ago I did a cleanse and found my subscriptions had ballooned to nearly $150/mo. They should not be able to charge on auto pay when they switch the terms and raise the prices.
I hope it eventually switches from “give out the secret number to take your money” to “use the secret number to spend your money”. Then I can use a script, a third party service, or whatever to handle recurring payments.
My rule for a while has been to limit myself to one major subscription at a time. It really curtails the rampant streaming costs.
I made an exception for spotify for a while (so I’d have spotify + one streaming service + maybe one small low-cost one) but with how expensive they’ve all gotten I’ve reverted to only spotify and low-cost stuff.
Right now I just have spotify and dropout TV so I can catch up on Dimension 20.
After a purge I’m left with YNAB, Microsoft 365, GitHub Copilot, and a YouTube membership to City Planner Plays (s/o).
I’m particularly annoyed with MS365 because of how intertwined with Windows it has become, making it harder to get rid of the subscription… and it is kinda nice to reinstall Windows, login, and everything is just … there. Just as it was 20 minutes ago.
100% agree with you. It’s why I use Privacy.com and set a limit to what it can charge. Stuff gets more expensive without me noticing, welp. I gotta decide if it’s worth it to keep paying.
(Sorry, sounds like a shill. It’s just saved me multiple times in the past.)
There’s little doubt of the attacker motive given he invoked his god, and given the timing. But nothing suggest the teacher was personally targeted for his faith. He may have been the first person the attacker ran into.
Someone died because of the Day of Rage. Apologies for my error. But go on, make sure we all know he was a great Catholic. Cause you know, if he’d been Jewish, there would be plenty on the platform making justifications for it.
I only mentioned his familiy’s faith because you mentioned it. This murder is front page news and talked at length by medias, but your comment is the first time I heard of his supposed faith, so I went and checked.
It would be interesting to understand the motivation. This might be an attack on the school as an institution, which affects people of all faith.
There’s no justification for killing innocent civilians, Jewish or not.
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