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[Eckhart Aurelius Hughes]

Some other anarchists and myself were discussing the Israel and Palestine conflict. I got the impression that some people were taking sides in regards to which side was the victim and which side the victimizer. So I had the following to say:

Let's just all agree that we oppose terrorism and statism and be done with it.

Let the terrorists argue with each other over who started it and who is supposedly just committing retaliation terrorism.

To make an analogy, if Joe murders John's innocent 8-year-old son, and in retaliation John murders Joe's innocent 8-year-old daughter, John and Joe are both murderers. And murder and statism are behaviors which I believe any anarchist must adamantly oppose to really be an anarchist. Please note, this is not an issue of pacifism vs. non-pacifism. One can support defensive homicide without supporting retaliatory murder.

Israel's military targets civilians often, and so do some Palestinian fighters. But I still believe the vast majority of Israelis and Palestinians are just regular civilians who just want to peacefully take care of their families, work and live modest lives, and have no interest in engaging in terrorism and war--even when their own side's nationalism and propaganda causes each side to blame the other side for the violence more than they blame their own.

Anyway, once people can agree to oppose all terrorism and statism, then we can work on eliminating it all-together rather than try to justify or engage in terrorism ourselves as supposed retaliation.

What do you all think?

***

In regards to my firm opposition to retaliatory murder and retaliatory aggression in general please also check out the following blog posts and discussions:

How do you feel about vengeance?
Lesson about Revenge
Another Post about Vengeance
Wise Quotes about Vengeance and Revenge
Are anger, discompassion and hatred symptoms of weakness?
Vengeance, Payback, Revenge

Thanks,
Scott

[anarchyisbliss]

To make an analogy, if Joe murders John's innocent 8-year-old son, and in retaliation John murders Joe's innocent 8-year-old daughter, John and Joe are both murderers. And murder and statism are behaviors which I believe any anarchist must adamantly oppose to really be an anarchist.
Scott

I'm iffy on this situation because I believe that in an anarchist society the only thing that would keep people from doing harmful acts to others is the fear of retaliation. in our society if I were to kill you or even attempt to kill you the worst possible outcome you could have me sentenced to is a lethal injection which is only about thirty seconds of mind blowing pain. In an anarchist society with no police force, if I killed you then one of your relatives could easily come to my house and kill or torture me, and it would be that fear of retaliation that would keep me from killing you.

[pjkeeley]

I'm iffy on this situation because I believe that in an anarchist society the only thing that would keep people from doing harmful acts to others is the fear of retaliation. in our society if I were to kill you or even attempt to kill you the worst possible outcome you could have me sentenced to is a lethal injection which is only about thirty seconds of mind blowing pain. In an anarchist society with no police force, if I killed you then one of your relatives could easily come to my house and kill or torture me, and it would be that fear of retaliation that would keep me from killing you.

anarchyisbliss, the idea that the threat of retaliatory violence would stop people from assaulting each only works if groups have equality of power. To explain: if one person or group has a far more likely prospect of being able to exact revenge on the other, then why should the more powerful person or group fear the weaker one? For example, if I have a large extended family comprised of genetically strong members, and due to our strength we have gained a large number of followers (imagine a mafia-style "family"), and all you have is your sister and frail aunt, will there, according to you, be justice? It sounds like in your version of anarchy the strong will rule over the weak, which doesn't sound like anarchy at all.

[Buddhagem]

I don't think one could have a more simplistic understanding of this conflict than the one you posted. To approach this topic from complete ignorance and then come to the conclusion that we'll just oppose statism and terrorism does absolutely nothing to alleviate the systematic destruction of the Palestinian people. It just completely ignores the history and reality of the situation.

While you're "opposing statism" what are you doing to make sure your taxes don't go to continue to fund Israel's occupation of Palestine?

As Americans we are directly responsible for the suffering of the Palestinian people. Those helicopters and bulldozers are made in America and paid for by Americans. You cannot help arm one side to the teeth with the most advanced weapons on the planet and at the same time say, "Well I oppose statism and terrorism."

We have a moral responsibility to oppose Israel's continued occupation of Palestine and its gross violation of human rights and international law. We have a moral obligation to stand with the people of the world and support the international consensus of a two state settlement based on the 1967 borders, not because we are statists but because it would be the best possible outcome for the people of Palestine.

To better inform yourself about this situation I'd recommend visiting "if americans knew" dot org

peace

[anarchyisbliss]

I'm iffy on this situation because I believe that in an anarchist society the only thing that would keep people from doing harmful acts to others is the fear of retaliation. in our society if I were to kill you or even attempt to kill you the worst possible outcome you could have me sentenced to is a lethal injection which is only about thirty seconds of mind blowing pain. In an anarchist society with no police force, if I killed you then one of your relatives could easily come to my house and kill or torture me, and it would be that fear of retaliation that would keep me from killing you.

anarchyisbliss, the idea that the threat of retaliatory violence would stop people from assaulting each only works if groups have equality of power. To explain: if one person or group has a far more likely prospect of being able to exact revenge on the other, then why should the more powerful person or group fear the weaker one? For example, if I have a large extended family comprised of genetically strong members, and due to our strength we have gained a large number of followers (imagine a mafia-style "family"), and all you have is your sister and frail aunt, will there, according to you, be justice? It sounds like in your version of anarchy the strong will rule over the weak, which doesn't sound like anarchy at all.

Thats not my entire line of thinking. Besides couldn't that frail aunt just as easily shoot a gun as one of those big mafia men, or poison someone's food, etc. I am saying that the reason I do not kill or even harm people is for fear of retaliation, but obviously I didn't make that clear, my apologies.

[Dreamshift]

Well, to return to the question at hand. I think the whole thing started in WWII when the Western world said: "were sorry that guy kill millions of your familiy and friends based on religion, we're goning to give you your holy land back." Well, we didn't exacly have the "right" to do that considering nearly 2000 years ago the Arabs took it from the Romans after their collapse and has been occupied since. I openly ponder though if the advent of oil in the area and the world war didn't make the West "give back" the holy land because they wanted a hold on the area for oil. But I'm a poor student when it comes to specifics or important things... I wouldn't be surprised if I'm wrong about the whole thing--but that one ignorant person's perceptions on the situation.

On to the fact of the conflict: killing people who didn't agree to fight you isn't very nice. Civilians aren't prepared to die for that cause, I know I'm not. I really don't know much about it, I'm too worried about Zimbabwe right now to put forth the effort to listen in on the genocides there. Man this world's a mess right now--but I guess its always been hasn't it?

[mark black]

I agree with Dreamshift - the world's a mess, and it's a mess largely because of religious tribalism, which is the fundamental basis of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. These religiously defined tribes have conflicting territorial and economic interests - over which they fight. Efforts to achieve peace that deal solely with territory and economics are doomed to failure because these are wants - which are inherrently unlimited. Tribalism is the problem, for this brings wants into conflict.
The solution is a simple scientific fact: humankind is a single species.

[Mo_reese]

I believe: The West were power-mad at the end of the war. They divided up the Arabs lands such to facilitate continued fighting among the different sects. The established Israel, as Dreamshift mentioned to have a permanent "aircraft carrier" in the middle east.
Israel is a puppet of the big bully US. The US also uses Israel to redistribute wealth from the lower classes to the Elite Class. Taxpayer money is sent to Israel where their leaders take a cut and then buy US arms at inflated costs, boosting the arms mfr profits and the arms mfr's and Israel give some of the money back to the politicians as payback. When Pres Biden says the economy is booming, he is correct that it's booming from bomb making profits. This "economy" is only a measure of the success of Wall Street and not the Non-Elite Class.

[Mo_reese]

As Americans we are directly responsible for the suffering of the Palestinian people. Those helicopters and bulldozers are made in America and paid for by Americans. You cannot help arm one side to the teeth with the most advanced weapons on the planet and at the same time say, "Well I oppose statism and terrorism."

We have a moral responsibility to oppose Israel's continued occupation of Palestine and its gross violation of human rights and international law. We have a moral obligation to stand with the people of the world and support the international consensus of a two state settlement based on the 1967 borders, not because we are statists but because it would be the best possible outcome for the people of Palestine.

peace

I agree we Americans are directly responsible for backing a madman that has expanded his quest to exterminate all Palestinians in Gaza to the West Bank and most likely he will not stop there. This situation reveals that we do not have a true representative democracy in the USofA. 70% of Americans of both parties do not want the government to continue assisting Netanyahu's genocidal quest. While half of the People's Class have inadequate healthcare, we are spending billions on bombs, jet and missiles. The problem is that the arms manufacturers are making tons of profits and they are paying off our representative to keep the grift flowing.

[Sy Borg]

Scott, I am not an anarchist (since anarchy is a recipe or suffering and strife) so I instead embrace centrism. To me, an interest in philosophy is an interest in understanding actual reality rather than being a teamster, who embraces atrocities as long as it's perpetrated by the right team.

So I agree with your OP in principle. There are no "good guys" or "bad guys", just humans fighting, as they have done since long before H. sapiens emerged. If you go back in modern history, this can be seen as a problem largely created by the British for promising the same plot of land to Jews, Arabs and the French, and then removing themselves before their mistakes backfired in their faces.

Then again, if we dial the blame game back far enough, we have the Ottomans, the Mongols and the tribes that preceded them. We cannot count how many genocides have been perpetrated along the way. Probably hundreds. Humans have always fought each other in this zero sum game that is life. However, today, misguided and hate-filled people support their "team" even when it is ultimately none of their business.

There is extraordinary naivete, or wilful blindness, that so many people still believe that governments represent them rather than corporate and religio-political interests. Of course, governments, think tanks and corporations work to retain this delusion and encourage hatred in the ideologically driven and self-hatred in the idealistic so they can continue their manipulations without too much interference.

[Gertie]

Some other anarchists and myself were discussing the Israel and Palestine conflict. I got the impression that some people were taking sides in regards to which side was the victim and which side the victimizer. So I had the following to say:

Let's just all agree that we oppose terrorism and statism and be done with it.

Let the terrorists argue with each other over who started it and who is supposedly just committing retaliation terrorism.

To make an analogy, if Joe murders John's innocent 8-year-old son, and in retaliation John murders Joe's innocent 8-year-old daughter, John and Joe are both murderers. And murder and statism are behaviors which I believe any anarchist must adamantly oppose to really be an anarchist.

States, by definition, oppose murder, as unlawful killing. As far as I'm aware anarchism does not, by definition.

[Mounce574]

I don't think one could have a more simplistic understanding of this conflict than the one you posted. To approach this topic from complete ignorance and then come to the conclusion that we'll just oppose statism and terrorism does absolutely nothing to alleviate the systematic destruction of the Palestinian people. It just completely ignores the history and reality of the situation.

While you're "opposing statism" what are you doing to make sure your taxes don't go to continue to fund Israel's occupation of Palestine?

As Americans we are directly responsible for the suffering of the Palestinian people. Those helicopters and bulldozers are made in America and paid for by Americans. You cannot help arm one side to the teeth with the most advanced weapons on the planet and at the same time say, "Well I oppose statism and terrorism."

We have a moral responsibility to oppose Israel's continued occupation of Palestine and its gross violation of human rights and international law. We have a moral obligation to stand with the people of the world and support the international consensus of a two state settlement based on the 1967 borders, not because we are statists but because it would be the best possible outcome for the people of Palestine.

To better inform yourself about this situation I'd recommend visiting "if americans knew" dot org

peace

Truth be told, in 1947 when Israel became a country, Palestine failed to meet UN regulations. The reason there is country for Palestine is due to their constant desire to destroy Israel. In the Palestinian Liberation Organization- their maps don't show Israel as a country, their charter (like the American Constitution) is to destroy Israel and kill all Israelis, and they have joined with Hamas and Hezbollah. The Gaza strip is a territory that Israel controls the boundaries of. Israel has attempted to work with the Palestinians to achieve peace, but for some reason, they never agree to this. They don't follow cease fire treaties either: example would be Oct 6th 2023, a peace treaty was signed and entered. Oct 7th, 2023- Hamas slaughtered over 1,000 innocent people in Israel. Sadly, many Palestinians harbor terrorists. Israel only retaliates- it doesn't initiate conflict. War is ugly, and civilian lives are impacted whether intentionally or not. However, if Hamas would quit using the population as human shields, it might lessen the loss of life.
As a veteran of the United States Army, I don't believe that negotiating with terrorists should ever be an option. If Israel agrees to do a cease fire- it will just allow Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, and any other "enemies" to collaborate and rebuild for a larger attack on the country. America is Israel's ally and we should support Israel.

[Mo_reese]

Truth be told, in 1947 when Israel became a country, Palestine failed to meet UN regulations. The reason there is country for Palestine is due to their constant desire to destroy Israel. In the Palestinian Liberation Organization- their maps don't show Israel as a country, their charter (like the American Constitution) is to destroy Israel and kill all Israelis, and they have joined with Hamas and Hezbollah. The Gaza strip is a territory that Israel controls the boundaries of. Israel has attempted to work with the Palestinians to achieve peace, but for some reason, they never agree to this. They don't follow cease fire treaties either: example would be Oct 6th 2023, a peace treaty was signed and entered. Oct 7th, 2023- Hamas slaughtered over 1,000 innocent people in Israel. Sadly, many Palestinians harbor terrorists. Israel only retaliates- it doesn't initiate conflict. War is ugly, and civilian lives are impacted whether intentionally or not. However, if Hamas would quit using the population as human shields, it might lessen the loss of life.
As a veteran of the United States Army, I don't believe that negotiating with terrorists should ever be an option. If Israel agrees to do a cease fire- it will just allow Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, and any other "enemies" to collaborate and rebuild for a larger attack on the country. America is Israel's ally and we should support Israel.

We've gone thru most of this in other threads. First there is no valid justification for snipers shooting children. Also, there is no valid justification for genocide or ethnic cleansing and what is happening in Gaza and the West Bank meets the definitions of those actions.
This war started long before Oct 7. Both sides have broken peace treaties, some on both sides have vowed to kill all on the other side, and both sides are guilty of terrorism and crimes against humanity. I am concerned about what is happening there because of the involvement of my government. I protested against my government's involvement in the war in Vietnam, the Iraq War and what is happening in Palestine. I agree that we, as an ally of Israel, should help them defend themselves, but not to the point of genocide.

[Sy Borg]

Here is what is actually happening. Hamas's cynicism is always ignored. The west, by not taking Hamas's deliberate placing of women and children in combat zones seriously, is incentivising Hamas to place civilians in danger:

[Pattern-chaser]

Truth be told, in 1947 when Israel became a country, Palestine failed to meet UN regulations.

[...]

As a veteran of the United States Army, I don't believe that negotiating with terrorists should ever be an option. If Israel agrees to do a cease fire- it will just allow Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, and any other "enemies" to collaborate and rebuild for a larger attack on the country. America is Israel's ally and we should support Israel.

Just say that an external and irresistibly-powerful military force came into your country, and annexed a broad diagonal of land, maybe 32 of your states, and gave it to some other people? [In 1947, Israel was formed from 55% (!!!) of what was formerly Palestine.] Is it likely, do you think, that as a veteran and a patriot, you might then wish to oppose this new country, forcibly planted in the middle of your own country, with all means at your disposal? Would there come a time when you just gave up and accepted that your land, the land of your ancestors for many generations, is lost? Or would you carry on resisting the occupation...?