The Volokh Conspiracy
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Two Law School Deans on the Massacre in Israel
Moral clarity from Scalia Dean Ken Randall, and lack thereof from NYU Dean Troy McKenzie.
Some other time, I will express my views on when and if university administrators should express opinions about the issues of the day. For now, it's sufficient to note that they do all the time, and in that context should be judged by what they say, when they say it, and how they say it.
Here is Dean Ken Randall, Scalia Law (my law school) in an email I received this morning:
Dear Students, Faculty, and Staff,
Over the past few days, we have watched images of deadly acts of terrorism against Israel. Whether you have friends and family in the region, or your concerns are centered on your classmates and colleagues here at home, please know that my thoughts are with you. Terrorism has no place in our society, and we stand with the Israeli people. Especially in this season when we observe important Jewish holidays, I know that you will offer support to those in our community who are in need during this difficult time.
By contrast here is NYU Dean Troy McKenzie, in response to an official missive sent to law students by the president of the Student Bar Association, defending the massacre:
Dear Members of the NYU Law Community:
Some of you may have seen a message from the president of the Student Bar Association regarding the horrific conflict in Israel and Gaza. This message was not from NYU School of Law as an institution and does not speak for the leadership of the Law School. It certainly does not express my own views, because I condemn the killing of civilians and acts of terrorism as always reprehensible.
The attack on Israel and the subsequent and ongoing hostilities have made this a period of extreme pain and distress for many members of our community. Since the weekend, I have worked with administrators to provide support to students, faculty, and alumni who have been affected by this crisis.
The feelings that divide people in the world at large are certainly present within the Law School, but I hope that we are able to address them with compassion and mutual respect. The Law School's leadership team will continue to provide the resources and support we can.
In addition to implicitly expressing the view that the righteousness of massacring babies and so forth is just a matter of opinion, McKenzie is being far from forthright. While the NYU SBA does not speak for NYU Law as an institution, it nevertheless is not merely a student group, but part of the NYU administration. The SBA has representation on sixteen different law school faculty-student committees, including admissions and faculty hiring.
And compare McKenzie's mealy-mouthed equivocation to this statement by the student's erstwhile employer, Winston & Strawn. One can have a separate discussion as to whether rescinded her offer was inappropriate "cancel culture"–my own general view of this is that when someone says something egregiously stupid, even evil, one should give that person a chance to reconsider and apologize before taking action–but regardless, W&S managed the moral clarity that Dean McKenzie did not.
UPDATE: Dean Paul Caron, Pepperdine Law School: "Our Pepperdine Caruso Law community is praying for [Professor] Michael [Helfand] and his family [who were in Israel at the time of the attacks], all of our Jewish faculty, staff, students, and alumni, the country and people of Israel, and all people in the region during this horrific time. We are heartbroken by the devastating suffering and loss of innocent lives."
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A high school principal in my area sent an email to the school community saying how upsetting the situation was, especially for the school’s Jewish and Muslim communities, and offering support. Evidently he got a lot of hate mail because he followed up with an apology and a denunciation of Hamas as terrorists.
I notice that the President of Harvard has come out with a second statement, one that actually condemns Hamas.
That ‘student’ is an adult, a near graduate of a prestigious law school and should understand that actions have consequences, and some actions are not excused by an apology, no matter how sincere it is (if it would have been a sincere apology for the action, not a desire to keep a job).
For those whose Google-Fi is weak: NYU Law School Bar Association’s non-binary president Ryna Workman sends email saying Hamas’ slaughter in Israel was ‘NECESSARY’ while refusing to condemn mass-murder of Jewish families
Her offer of employment by Winston & Strawn was withdrawn.
Couldn’t happen to a nicer person but I’m sure some ultra left wing law firm will take her/him (she identifies as non-binary) on.
Public Defender in Rep Tliab’s Michigan district?
No need to travel that far. Bragg or James would take her on in NY.
Those would be prosecutors, not defenders, but it’s easy to get the two mixed up these days. Anyway, she can join the Trump prosecution effort, and still call herself a “public defender.” Law is fluid now. Anything goes, for the “right” reasons.
The more ironic part is that the group it supports HATES it.
Would kill it almost instantly.
Intersectionality truly works wonders!
“[P]retending Hamas are revolutionary ‘anti-colonialists’ is much easier to sell to the Western left than that it is a group composed of reactionary Islamic fanatics…” (source)
Maybe if she hurries and publishes a series of racial slurs a Federalist Society member on the federal bench will hire her.
You mean like the racial slurs that you use:
I mean the racial slurs that draw certain right-wingers to this white, male, conservative blog . . . by design.
Keep whining, Artie.
I was mentioning the record of conservatives (Republican, Federalist Society) hiring people who use racial slurs as federal clerks. Does that (the mention of the record, not the hiring of bigots) bother you?
And by “use,” I presume you mean “quote.”
Yup. Weird thing. Arthur’s been on a three-year crusade against people who “quote” racial slurs, but it turns out he does it himself.
There is nothing funny about your hero’s years-long record of habitual use of racial slurs, at least not among reasoning, educated, modern, mainstream Americans
His right-wing fans, though, can’t seem to get enough of it.
What about your own habitual use, Arthur? I mean, you used it four times in the post I linked to, and you’ve commented on lots of posts. Who knows how many times you’ve used it in total?
Is your argument that I am one-hundredth the bigot that your hero is?
He wishes you would stop trying to help. But you are enough of a disaffected culture war loser and bigot that he wants you to stick around.
These are the people who say look at the difference in outcomes, and you may presume racism.
Unless it’s an attack against Israel. Then no presumption of antisemitism is allowed, as it is a pure disinterested objection to Israeli government action.
Literally people are massacred for being jewish, and they maintain a fiction the massacre isn’t hatred of jews but a proper massacre of civilians who happen to be jewish.
One wonders whether someone who supports the deliberate murder of babies in the furtherance of the aims of an openly genocidal fascist group is of sufficiently good character to become a member of the bar.
I wouldn’t even ask that — it should be presumed.
The law school should have dealt with this the way UMass would have — abolish the student bar association and an interim expulsion for every student who was a member of it. Interim expulsion — they can have a hearing sometime next April, but until then they are expelled (and fail all their fall courses).
And anyone who associates with them is also expelled and/or fired.
This is why I think think that law schools are doomed — joe sixpack doesn’t understand the nuances of torts, but THIS he does, and understands that beheading babies is wrong.
You seem big on expulsion for misconduct. What do you think of recent subtraction from the UCLA faculty?
Like all law schools, UCLA has a current monopoly that it will not enjoy for long.
Hamas has shown its true face, like the Soviets did in Budapest in 1956 and in Prague in 1968 — and the legal profession is now…
If so, that is not the only thing UCLA won’t have for long.
Do you imagine the members of the SBA were consulted about the statement before it was released, rather than the “leadership” just spewing it out reflexively?
Maybe not. That would establish some good precedent for addressing our dwindling stock of Federalist Society racists, superstitious gay-bashers, disgusting immigrant-haters, obsolete misogynists, chanting antisemites, right-wing Islamophobes, and supporters of murderous right-wing governments.
See above, Kirkland.
Where’s the part about massacres being a matter of opinion?
I agree. I couldn’t find a word or phrase that said anything close to that sentiment. I feel like people are not capable any longer of simply reading the words anymore. And to pretend that in war, everyone that dies on one side of a line is guilty and deserving of death and the rest are heaven-bound…is ridiculous. All killing is reprehensible, period. The attack of the Hamas is reprehensible. To expect that all Muslims support Hamas’ actions, is also, reprehensible.
Rather simple:
“The feelings that divide people in the world at large are certainly present within the Law School, but I hope that we are able to address them with compassion and mutual respect.”
Yup, just a matter of opinion
You are making Havoth’s point.
Before the language you quoted, the NYU Dean wrote:
“It [the SBA letter] certainly does not express my own views, because I condemn the killing of civilians and acts of terrorism as always reprehensible.”
So he explicitly and unreservedly repudiated the terrorist attacks and killing of civilians by Hamas. It is extremely uncharitable to interpret the phrase you quote as then indicating that whether terrorism and the killing of civilians by Hamas is morally reprehensible is merely a matter of opinion.
Instead, there are multiple other issues that, frankly, are subject to reasonable debate, including whether Israel’s response is or will be justified to the extent it inflicts significant suffering and unavoidably kills civilians. I don’t think you can honestly say it isn’t a subject of reasonable debate.
And it is legitimate to take issue with whether it was necessary or appropriate for the Dean to say anything other than that the Dean abhors terrorism and the killing of civilians and the community stands by all of the innocent people affected by the acts of terrorism and subsequent war. But if that is the issue, discuss why it was problematic to also ask that the law school community be respectful of each other when discussing this issue.
It is not legitimate to take the worst possible interpretation of the Dean’s statement, which is an interpretation that assumes the statement is all but internally inconsistent.
And, for the record, because clearly people need to hear it explicitly stated by everyone, I condemn Hamas’ terrorism, killing of civilians, and hostage taking as unequivocally and reprehensibly evil. Hamas also bears significant responsibility for Israel’s response and the consequent suffering of innocent Palestinians (at least everyone must agree the children are innocent, whatever you think of the adults).
“It is not legitimate to take the worst possible interpretation of the Dean’s statement, which is an interpretation that assumes the statement is all but internally inconsistent.”
Why not. He left a board opening to make excuses for those who are cheering Hamas. The connotation is is clear to those whose eye are open to see.
But I agree with you that he should have stopped with your quote.
No, you’re missing the difference implied there. The sentence that you guys are leaning on expresses the Dean’s opinion/feelings. Juxtaposing then like that implies that the opposite feeling — support for genocide — is within the range of socially acceptable positions that the school is morally bound to tolerate.
It’s certainly reasonable to acknowledge that the University includes people who support genocide; This much is unambiguously true at this point.
However, saying that you should address defenders of genocide with compassion and respect does sort of look like saying that support for genocide is just another opinion.
I agree that it’s not quite the same thing. But it does look a bit like it.
“saying that you should address defenders of genocide with compassion and respect does sort of look like saying that support for genocide is just another opinion.”
Which would be valid if he had said that. But he didn’t. To get to that point, you have to engage in multiple levels of inference. You have to infer that support of “Palestinians” and their “resistance” is support for Hamas’s methods, you then have to infer that supporting their methods in this case is the same as supporting genocide of an entire people, you then have to infer that the dean made these same inferences and consciously chose to refer to “differences” that should be treated with compassion and respect as including support for genocide.
Genocide wasn’t in the discussion, terrorism and indiscriminate killing of civilians was AND the dean explicitly rejected those things (which, if you are into inferences, you have to understand necessarily means he rejects genocide as morally reprehensible).
Bottom line: You want to be offended. You are the snowflake you complain about. And you should understand, this over interpretation based on multiple inferences is just the sort of thing you hate when leftists do it to your side of the political spectrum. It isn’t useful, it doesn’t help. It just makes you feel morally superior which, apparently, is your goal.
There were valid criticisms to make. Criticizing the dean as kinda sorta saying support of genocide is reasonable position is a stupid criticism. He didn’t.
“Juxtaposing then like that implies that the opposite feeling — support for genocide — is within the range of socially acceptable positions that the school is morally bound to tolerate.”
He didn’t juxtapose his unequivocal denunciation of killing of civilians and acts of terrorism with “support for genocide.” You are making that comparison based on a string of inferences. At some point, it’s just bad faith when it’s inferences all the way down.
Was the NYU dean’s letter ham-handed and too concerned with ensuring everyone was civil? Probably.
Did he say the view that genocide is okay is acceptable? No. He didn’t. You have to really want to see that to find it in his statement.
Again, you are proving Hovath’s point that “people are not capable any longer of simply reading the words anymore.” You are determined to make inferences that render his point evil unless he says exactly what you want him to say in the way you want him to say it.
He unequivocally stated that the “the killing of civilians and terrorism [are] always reprehensible.” There is no wiggle room in that. The statement actively suggests that an opposing view is not acceptable.
Your criticism would be stronger if you criticized what he said, or what he failed to say that he should have, rather than pretending he kinda sorta thinks it’s legitimately debatable whether genocide is okay.
The dean didn’t juxtapose his view that killing civilians and terrorism are “always reprehensible” with “support for genocide.” To see it that way, you have to squint really hard and tilt your head way to the right until it’s up your ass.
And, to be clear, the dean could have made a better statement. Hamas is evil. Genocide is evil. And the terrorism they conducted this past week is evil.
It is extremely uncharitable to interpret the phrase you quote as then indicating that whether terrorism and the killing of civilians by Hamas is morally reprehensible is merely a matter of opinion.
What it does say (whether he intended it or not) that the cheering on of those atrocities should be treated with “compassion” and “respect”. I’m not as worked up about that as some seem to be, because I think it was more an instance of stupid phrasing employed in a clumsy attempt to avoid offending anyone (including those who need offending) than an implied support for shitty people with shitty views. But it was pretty stupid.
He literally called out the lack of compassion. You can be pro-palestine, surely noone is suggesting otherwise, while showing compassion and condemning these heinous acts. He is providing students a path to choose a side without making reprehensible statements.
In any other situation, this is exactly what the prof would want from the head of a law school.
Guy,
Why is denouncing cheering on Hamas, a “reprehensible statement.”
Why are your hands over your eyes and your hands over your hears.
Your “hit dog” thing is preventing you from reading what I’m saying.
I’m saying that the dean is denouncing cheering Hamas on as incorrect. He is saying that, in spite of legitimate disagreement, there is no need to be reprehensible and support Hamas.
Legitimate? no, and that is the quarrel we have
As leftists see things, there’s “legitimate disagreement” about whether Israel has a right to exist, whether it’s OK to resist (or even shoot at!) police, whether it’s OK to steal, whether your house & bank account are really yours, etc., etc.
Straw man, straw man, straw man…
I’d put that sentiment firmly within “The feelings that divide people in the world at large are certainly present within the Law School…” as it puts her calling the massacre of civilians as necessary within the sphere of acceptable feelings on the law school. He’s distancing himself and the school from those words but not outright denouncing the position as beyond the pale of civilized discourse.
Bingo.
Seems to me like you’re ignoring the clear statement
in favor of projecting your own tenuous interpretation. That’s weak, lame.
In particular, acknowledging that different viewpoints exist does not ascribe value or validity to those viewpoints. Your post is a huuuuge stretch.
In particular, acknowledging that different viewpoints exist does not ascribe value or validity to those viewpoints.
He didn’t simply acknowledge that they exist. He then said…
“I hope that we are able to address them with compassion and mutual respect”
He’s saying that the cheering on of atrocities should be addressed with “compassion” and “respect”.
I agree no compassion nor respect is required, just like none is required for Jack Phillip’s beliefs.
I also agree the schools should take a morally clear position on this, just like they should take a morally clear position against the persecution of trans people.
People with ignorant and disgusting beliefs should be shunned, and morality promoted with a clear voice.
You mean the way all the biens-pensants ignored Donald Trump’s statement that “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally” and instead claimed that Trump called Nazis “very fine people” (or like Joe Biden, claimed that Trump has “yet once to condemn white supremacy, the neo-Nazis”)?
That’s different, because Trump.
“It certainly does not express my own views, because I condemn the killing of civilians and acts of terrorism as always reprehensible.”
That is as unambiguous as a statement can get. Perhaps you’re a bit too emotional right now to be posting on this subject if you’re going to ignore direct statements and instead tell everyone what you think is being said between the lines.
We have Blackman and Bellmore for that crap.
The statement may condemn the killings, but it doesn’t condemn the people who support the killings. Opinions differ!
“Opinions differ!”
Indeed, and some are to be denounced.
He literally said its reprehensible.
I think you, and the prof, are reading too much into this.
You cannot hear what your ears are closed to.
They do say “a hit dog will holler”. I wonder if despite the way speech is handled in other subjects on this site, this subject matter is skewing rational thought.
Why are you implicitly defending reprehensible views.
Rational thought says beheading children is never acceptable
I agree, that you think I am saying otherwise shows that you’re struck and have lost possession of your ability to read and reason.
Abortion is reprehensible but firmly within the bounds of discourse. At one point in time slavery was reprehensible but within the bounds of discourse. I think you’re giving too much leeway if not support to people that outright support rapists and butchers.
I’m for Abortion from the moment Mr. Jizz meets Miss Ovum, right up to where the Fetus crosses the Introitus.
Of course since it’s a medical procedure, you need the Zygote, Blastula, Embryo, Fetus, to sign the consent form.
This is 2023 (man!) we don’t do medical procedures without Adequate Informed Consent! you can lose your license.
Frank
How much slack do the right-wing bigots at this blog deserve? The gay-bashers trying to hide their bigotry behind religion. The white grievance-consumed racists. The old-timey misogynists. The core audiences of this white, male, conservative blog.
He said it’s reprehensible. He DIDN’T say that the people who don’t believe it’s reprehensible, are being reprehensible.
If that’s not somewhat implied, I don’t know where that cycle of demands ends.
Nobody (sane) supports the murder of babies. The people who killed Israeli innocents should be meticulously held to account, without mercy.
Fewer and fewer people support — and few people should support — Israel’s right-wing violence and abuse of others, though. And plenty of people — especially those with memories — expect Israel to overreact and kill plenty of innocent Palestinians (using weaponry and other resources supplied by Americans) in the near future.
It is reasonable to question those who are loud currently but were silent when the country operating behind American skirts engaged in immoral violence and a superstitious vendetta against innocents for years.
Israel is squandering its goodwill among Americans, especially younger Americans. Its advocates have used support of Israel’s disgusting right-wing belligerence as a left-right divider in American politics, and Israel has aligned with the losing and less attractive side of the American culture war.
Moral clarity is being an equal opportunity objector to brutality. Those who are yelling now but were silent about what some in Israel have described as a longstanding campaign of annexation and dispossession (which seem to be fancy words to describe the assholes known as “settlers”) and other objectionable Israeli conduct are correct to be outraged concerning the recent brutality but are in no position to criticize anyone else.
Murder of Jewish babies, or murder of babies who happen to be jewish, for reasons com…booom! Live
Anyway, for reasons completely unrelated to being jewish.
I suppose the Nazis would have gotten more purchase claiming they weren’t against jews qua religion, but because of a culture of finances and control and what they were doing to Europe, unrelated to jewishness.
Kill them because of what evil they were up to, unrelated to purely coincidental jewishness.
You do realize this is entirely unresponsive to Arthur’s comment? You’re just having an argument with an imaginary poster in your head.
I realize this is an emotional time, but maybe calm down before you post this nonsense “rebuttal” of a point no-one here has made.
FFS, when people explicitly state this: “The people who killed Israeli innocents should be meticulously held to account, without mercy.” You then go on about how he doesn’t mind the killing of babies. You are defective.
“when the country operating behind American skirts engaged in immoral violence and a superstitious vendetta against innocents for years.”
You think that puts “Reverend” Kirkland on the right moral side here?! It’s the Jews, not the Islamists (Hamas and their kindred spirits among Muslims) who are known for “immoral violence” and “superstitious vendettas” in pursuit of martyrdom and the after-life the dream of?
You are unaware of the Reverend’s longstanding hostility to Israel and his helpful urging of the exile and resettlement of all Israelis to West Texas, a relatively unsettled expanse of land in his view? (No kidding, he used to regularly call for that on these boards before turning to ceaseless attacks on EV.)
I proposed offering American citizenship to Israelis. I also proposed statehood for Israel. That is a strange version of hostility, you lying, bigoted, worthless right-wing asshole.
This is why guys like you lose at the marketplace of ideas and must comply with the preferences of better people.
The only thing you’re “Better” at than me is buggering young boys,
umm, that didn’t come out like I meant, umm, because I don’t bugger young boys, and you could teach classes in it.
I was morbidly curious so briefly unmuted to read Kirkland.
Its a classic “But statement” without the but.
One pro forma “of course killing babies is bad” and then several paragraphs of the US, Israel and right wingers are really at fault. His real feelings are the multiple victim blaming sentences.
Funny you should talk about West Texas. I was just reading this morning about how the Comanches used to raid white settlers in Texas and commit grievous atrocities on them–murdering babies and adult males, raping and enslaving girls and women–much like Hamas is doing in Israel right now. Nevertheless, it’s still possible to have sympathy with the Comanche whose land was being encroached on by the whites, yet condemn their behavior toward noncombatant settlers.
I get it. The Palestinians should be happy that the Israelis have let them have Gaza, the way Americans let the various Indians have their reservations.
Kirkland offers one of the better comments ever on this fraught subject. What he has not done—and by not doing exposed himself to wrath from Bernstein and his acolytes—is condemn NYU for being NYU, and tolerating pro-Palestinian advocacy which occurred outside the context of this terrorism.
Netanyahu, Bernstein, and other commenters here, demand pure, annihilating rage against Palestinians everywhere, as punishment for imputed association with Hamas. That raises a more nuanced question, as Kirkland’s comment suggests.
Let me put this simply so the meaning will be clear to you – you are FOS about “demand(ing) pure, annihilating rage against Palestinians everywhere, as punishment for imputed association with Hamas.”
And where pray tell do you find “nuance” in Kirkland’s comment?
neurodoc, perhaps you do not number yourself among Bernstein’s acolytes. But tell me, where have you ever seen Bernstein express acceptance, let alone approval, for any remark which suggests any Palestinian might have a justified grievance against Israeli actions targeting Palestinians, from the founding of Israel onward.
Although I might be doing Bernstein an injustice because I do not read everything he publishes here, I can’t recall even one such instance. I can readily understand why no one would expect such remarks now, from anyone.
Maybe for Bernstein on the subject of Israel’s policies toward Palestinians it seems like now all the time. Perhaps Professor Bernstein could correct me, and quote here a remark he has published condemning an Israeli government policy targeting Palestinians. If he does that I will apologize for being too comprehensively critical, while still noting his advocacy seems generally uncritical with regard to Israel.
Let me be blunt: they DON’T have a justified grievance. Not anymore. If you want to whine about what happened in 1948, fine, but that was 75 years ago. Right now, the Palestinians have only themselves to blame for the position they’re in.
That thinking is an existential threat to Israel.
Whether Israel wants to continue down the right-wing path is Israel’s call.
It’s their funeral.
You mean commit and cheer monstrous atrocities at the slightest opportunity?
What happened in 1948 is that, after two decades of intermittent attacks on the Jews that were their neighbors, the ancestors of today’s “refugees” joined with the armies of the neighboring Arab nations in an attempt to “drive the Jews into the sea.” This attempted genocide failed. The Israelis did not want those who’d just attempted to murder them living among them, so those who had left to follow behind the invading armies were not let back into Israel, and those who had stayed in Israel and attacked their neighbors were expelled. (Other Muslims remained peaceful and were allowed to stay. Their descendants are a substantial minority in Israel today, and better off than most of the population of every Arab nation – as long as they avoid entanglement with anyone wanting to murder the Jews.)
The Arab nations that had been encouraging the “Palestinians” to violence all along had plenty of room for those expelled from Israel – but they would not share space, jobs, or even food. They pinned the refugees into the West Bank and into camps such as Gaza, right up against the fortified borders of Israel, and left it to the western nations to feed, house, and clothe them. And their great-grandchildren are still there, and still being indoctrinated in utterly misplacing the blame for their predicament, and in attempting to finish what Hitler started.
Remember this: Muslims in need may get charity from Christians, atheists, and sometimes even Jews, but not from their fellow Muslims. And they’ll blame the hand that feeds them for their poverty.
Everyone everywhere at every time throughout history has “justified grievance” in one form or another. Using that as an excuse for the beheading of babies is lame.
“from the founding of Israel onward”
The Hebron massacre was the killing of sixty-seven or sixty-nine Jews on 24 August 1929 [wikipedia]
20 years before independence.
Shift those goal posts, Lathrop.
He is a dolt. I cannot even say useful idiot.
Goal posts? Where do you think they were before I shifted them? Where do you think I put them?
Your too self-centered to see them, I guess
Kirkland offers one of the better comments ever on this fraught subject.
I unmuted Kirkland for a moment just so I could see what this subthread was all about. Holy crap. If anyone ever had doubts about what pieces of shit both he and you are, those doubts should now be firmly laid to rest.
I am starting to think the bigoted conservative dumbasses at this blog are never going to like me.
Or the American mainstream.
Or modern America,
Thanks to the culture war, I am content.
“But”.
DO explain this “superstitious vendetta against innocents” line, though.
What EXACTLY do you refer to, Kirkland? I can’t even begin to guess what real-world action those words refer to.
Start with the settlers. Dispossession. Annexation.
If that isn’t enough for you, you are part of the problem rather than than anywhere near a solution.
“Nobody (sane) supports the murder of babies.”
Thousands of protestors, including Harvard students, and a couple of members of Congress DO support the murder of babies. So can we have them all declared insane?
https://nypost.com/2019/01/30/the-left-would-wise-to-worry-about-its-anti-semitic-wing/
Yes, most (all?) of Farrakhan’s statements are “noxious filth.” And yes, the leaders of the Women’s March are “vanguard figures on the left.” But so what?! The rest of their ideology, aside from their views on Jews and Israel, is also “noxious filth”! (Read Ayn Rand if you don’t understand what I mean.) Anyone who is willing to go along with “redistribution of wealth” or “from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs” has already revealed himself a moral degenerate; adding anti-Semitism does little to complete their moral portrait.
I’m pretty open-minded, I would have let the law student keep her job even though I think she’s completely wrong. I imagine the firm was hearing about this from clients and obviously chose them over her.
But she’s also very stupid– if your lifeplan is to practice law in New York City, it should not come as a surprise that many of your future colleagues are Jewish. More to the point, the in-house counsel that ultimately decides which biglaw firms get work are disproportionately of the Jewish faith. Sending such an inflammatory message was, obviously, going to have consequences. It shows such poor judgment that I wonder about her ability to represent her future clients’ interest. Perhaps she should volunteer for Hamas, I imagine they could use a lawyer.
Let’s see how this sifts if law firms start firing conservative bigots, such as gay-haters, racists, and xenophobes.
It’s abundantly clear you haven’t seen the inside of a biglaw office. HINT: Pro-LGBT, pro-abortion, anti-racism and pro-unrestrained immigration are the official position. It’s been the case for about two decades that conservatives dissent from the official view at their peril. A conservative can get fired for supporting traditional marriage, for a leftist it takes outright condoning terrorism. Biglaw is a decidedly leftist affair.
I was a partner at a large law firm. You?
Carry on, bigoted clinger.
Really? Fascinating, Arthur. Which one?
None of your business.
Why is that fascinating? Do my comments resemble the comments of the people who offer legal analysis without legal experience at this blog?
I was chair of an ABA committee for several terms, too.
“Why is that fascinating? Do my comments resemble the comments of the people who offer legal analysis without legal experience at this blog?”
Um, yes, in fact, they do. Much more so than they resemble the comments of people with legal experience.
Do you guys recognize that the Volokh Conspirators are the disaffected, defeated, dispirited, doomed, disrespected fringe of American legal academia?
Didn’t realize The Penn State Nittily Lions (HT B. Osama) were a “Large Law Firm”, although they have provided plenty of billable hours for them.
And what’s the deal with S-S-S-S-S-tuttering John Fetterman
and your commutation?
Here’s a tip, don’t wear shorts, sweatshirt, and a Hoodie to your parole hearing, when are you eligible? 2041?
Frank
Your recurrent comments concerning John Fetterman are entirely in line with the average level of discourse at this blog . . . and part of the reason strong, mainstream law schools no longer want people such as this blog’s operators on campus.
Considered law for about 10 minutes because it was one of the requirements to be an FBI agent, back when the FBI actually hunted down bad guys,
and “The Paper Chase” movie made law school look sort of cool
then found out how little they make ( on average, if there’s anything, I’m “average”) and my talents were more in memorizing complex Organic Chemistry pathways than obscure Appeals Court decisions,
and you can be illiterate as fuck as a doctor and nobody cares,
Frank “Fists, do some harm!”
How did Biglaw change? That’s how it is either going to change back and/or be replaced by something else.
History repeats itself and in the 1960s, the corporate world, including Biglaw, was very socially conservative — that was part of the underlying dynamics of the anti-vietnam protests.
Well, Artie, there are very few conservative bigots of any kind, so luckily for us, that won’t happen.
If that is true, why do they all congregate at the Volokh Conspiracy?
Yeah, it’s… several people at my firm were in Israel for the holidays. I’m not going to express anything about the situation, to them, except relief that they and their families are safe.
The situation in Israel is incredibly complex, and it’s natural to try to reduce the issue to elements where we can find moral clarity. There’s vindication to be found in condemning Hamas’s attacks on civilians, for instance. But we have to resist the temptation to let our outrage over these shocking terrorist attacks lead us to condone and overlook excesses in the response.
Israel has always responded to terrorist attacks on its own citizens by exacting at least as many deaths in return, several times as many in some cases. They are right now laying siege to Gaza, and we just don’t have enough visibility into what they’re doing to know how careful they’re being or how many Palestinian civilians are dying. Everything about the rhetoric we’re hearing from government officials there conveys that they intend to punish all Gazans. They are expecting us to pretend that we trust them, and counting on our domestic politics (in the US) to grant them a certain impunity.
The thirst for blood I’m seeing online is just… disheartening. It’s the same passion for war that led us to Afghanistan and Iraq after 9/11. There is no question that Hamas is guilty of a whole series of crimes, the latest only being an especially outrageous example. It is natural to feel a need to exact revenge, to use overwhelming violence to put an end to this threat once and for all. But we have seen where that path leads, again and again. It’s part of what has led us here, in the first place. We just keep making the same mistakes, over and over.
Your selective outrage seems to be a right-wing bigot problem.
Yeah, well, you can go on being a moron then.
It’s not complicated at all. The Jews / Israel want to be left alone; the Palestinians want the Jews dead. Yes, it really is that simple, and only an actual moron can’t see that. They’ve been telling us this for decades but you refuse to see.
Yes, the world really is full of cartoonishly evil villains that make every moral judgment about them abundantly obvious and clear, yes, that is how the world works, yet for some reason these conflicts are intractable and everywhere. One wonders why the rest of the world isn’t able to see things as clearly as you.
Geeze, Hamas comes right out and says they want the Jews dead, and you won’t even take their word for it!
Understanding Hamas’s Genocidal Ideology
There’s something deeply pathological about somebody who denies the genocidal ambitions of an organization that proudly brags about them.
Yes, I am familiar with this talking point. You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Consider: Suppose that Hamas, in an unforeseen turn of events, unilaterally ceases offensive actions against Israeli territory, and asks the Israeli government to come to the table to negotiate an abiding peace agreement.
Do you think that Israel refuses to talk, pointing to the Hamas charter as evidence of Hamas’s “true” intent? Or do you think they enter negotiations?
The fact of the matter is that Hamas’s stated intent in its foundational documents, vis-a-vis Israel, is just rhetoric. It’s intended to position Hamas as in opposition to the complicit and corrupt Palestinian Authority, while crowding out space for Islamic Jihad and other potential militant groups. If “genocide” were their true goal, they’d take an entirely different approach to effecting it.
What Israel cares about is action. They would not decline to deal with Hamas, if Hamas could be counted on to engage in negotiations, just because of what their charter says. As part of any such negotiations, they might insist that Hamas drop the genocidal language of its charter and commit to acknowledging Israel’s right to exist. But that would be a good-faith gesture to cap a successful negotiation. Israel would concede nothing to obtain it.
The same goes for much of the anti-Israel and anti-American rhetoric throughout the middle east. It is offensive to the precious ears of white, past-their-prime keyboard warriors in the rural US, and it is convenient propaganda for the Israeli government. But Israel counts on your being too stupid and ignorant to grasp that Hamas is a militant group whose strategic aims are far less grand than the genocidal rhetoric they espouse.
Hamas’s attacks on Israel came as the Palestinian conflict was slipping from the world stage and Israel began normalizing relations with other Middle Eastern countries, relying on American support to close the deal. At the same time, Iran appears to have seen an opportunity to upset Israel’s warming to Saudi Arabia, via its proxies in Hezbollah and Hamas. That’s all this is – a spectacular terrorist attack designed to derail an alignment of regional powers against the Iran-Hezbollah axis – not a failed attempt at genocide.
Consider instead of your hypothetical: Reality. Hamas has declared they want all Jews dead. Not one single thing they have done calls that declaration into doubt.
SimonP…I am not really sure how to interpret your post. Yes, there is a long history between Hamas and Israel; decades. I think that is what you meant by complex.
Is this action by Hamas casis belli?
The rules in war are different than peacetime. It is true that many Gazan civilians are going to die. They are, after all, human shields. They are human shields because of Hamas’ leadership and I hope there is an especially warm place for the Hamas leadership in the afterlife. For citizens of Gaza, they have been told to leave. Rafah remains open (sporadically), and Beit Hanun is a possibility to evac (admittedly tenuous).
Let’s also remember: Americans were murdered and savagely butchered, with Americans taken hostage. It is also an American fight.
All I will say is that Hamas and Israel cannot coexist in peace, side-by-side. If you have any doubt at all in your mind, you can find imagery on X and Tik Tok and Telegram of what was done in K’Far Aza and that will be enough to answer any lingering doubts.
SimonP…I am not really sure how to interpret your post.
That is because you’re an idiot and responding irrationally, going exactly where the propaganda is leading you by the nose.
Is this action by Hamas casis belli?
Of course. Israel would be perfectly justified in taking steps necessary to bring the perpetrators of these crimes to justice. Seeing as how Gaza has no effective force of its own to do so, I would say that Israel is justified in physically invading Gazan territory in order to seek out and capture members of Hamas, in order to bring them to justice. And if the members of Hamas do not surrender and instead fight back, that includes the use of military force.
The rules in war are different than peacetime. It is true that many Gazan civilians are going to die. They are, after all, human shields.
The laws of war do not entitle a warring party to kill civilian “human shields” at will. Blaming Hamas for their deaths is a dishonest dodge, intended to excuse war crimes. It is precisely this kind of rhetoric that I am cautioning against.
“Perpetrators of crime”. You mean terrorist actions.
I wasn’t trying to euphemize, but I appreciate your making clear how pointless your comments are likely to be.
“The laws of war do not entitle a warring party to kill civilian “human shields” at will.”
So, you acknowledge that Hamas uses other Gazans as human shields.
What do the laws of war say about that? Who bears responsibility for the deaths of those civilians?
It’s a war crime for Hamas to employ civilians as human shields, and a war crime for Israel to intentionally kill them.
Hamas puts them in harm’s way, but it’s Israel pulling the trigger.
If you were any more full of shit you’d be the Reverend Sandusky
Just adding to your thousand-plus-long streak of unwanted and pointless comments, I see. Can’t let down your fans!
Just look at it like I’m the Cal Ripken of rapist witty comments. You’re the Marv Throneberry. OK, recognize I have to footnote my Cultural references for you millenial fucks who think history began with “Dawson’s Creek”
Marvin Eugene Throneberry (September 2, 1933 – June 23, 1994) was an American Major League Baseball player. Affectionately known as “Marvelous Marv”, he was the starting first baseman for the 1962 New York Mets, a team which set the modern record for most losses in a season with 120. Throneberry became a well known figure after appearing in numerous Miller Lite beer commercials in the 1970s and 1980s.
“and a war crime for Israel to intentionally kill them.”
And not a war crime if they lack the intent to kill those people being used as human shields.
Your argument (such as it is) depends on an assertion that the Israelis are willfully choosing to expend ordnance in order to specifically cause civilian deaths rather than using it to harm actual threats from Hamas.
When Israel bombs an apartment block to the ground in order to kill a Hamas commander on one of the floors, they are knowingly and intentionally targeting civilian infrastructure and civilians.
“Collateral damage” is someone who was inadvertently near to a target when you take them out with a precision strike. It’s not the dozens of human shields between you and your target that you have to shoot through.
For an example, during WWII the U.S. set up day care facilities at factories so Rosie the Riveter could drop off the kids during her shift. That doesn’t mean the Japanese couldn’t legally bomb the B-29 factory even if there were kids at the day care[1].
And that analysis doesn’t change even if an evil government kidnapped kids off the street and chained them to factory roofs. If the Germans very publicly sent a cute toddler to sea with each U-Boat, you still depth charge U-Boats.
It is not a war crime to kill civilians, even intentionally, if (a) the goal is military in nature; and (b) the civilian harm is not disproportionate to the military benefit.
I would contend that Israel both (a) intentionally and recklessly kills Palestinian civilians, for the sake of killing civilians and making them suffer, and (b) routinely employs disproportionate force to achieve their ostensibly “military” goals.
You have the first amendment right to contend whatever dumbass things you want.
@David – hey, I can read the news just as easily as you can. The news cycle is catching up to your asinine apologia.
It is a war crime to attack from within a civilian populace because common sense and long experience shows that it most certainly will draw return fire. And such return fire will highly likely harm those civilians.
There is simply no way to determine if the return fire “intended” to harm those civilians. The presumption of guilt rests entirely upon the people who chose to attack from within the civilians thus exposing them to the harms of warfare.
That they choose to hide behind X numbers of civilians is not an argument, it is an equivocation, and a false one at that. In fact, precisely contra your assertion, the greater the number of civilians present the greater the crime of trying to use them as a shield.
It’s not a war crime to attack a militarized site even if someone has placed human shields there.
Because military targets are always valid targets.
Placing people there as shields is a war crime – attacking the site afterwards is not.
Why?
Because otherwise there is no incentive to not use them, because nobody who does that is worried about being dragged to the Hague.
Incentives matter, and the laws of war, such as they are, reflect that, because the people who codified them understood incentives and human beings.
You evidently do not, or refuse to apply that knowledge to warfare?
We aren’t talking about Hamas putting a handful of innocent civilians on a military base, in order to protect themselves from bombardment. We’re talking about Hamas intentionally selecting hospitals, schools, and apartment buildings to plan, train, store equipment, etc. And that’s if we’re taking Israel’s word for it, which we should perhaps be careful about doing.
When Israel targets those hospitals and apartment buildings for an airstrike, they are intentionally targeting a site that is primarily civilian in nature, in order to reach a putatively-legitimate military target. They know, and therefore intend, that such targeting carries a high risk, if not certainty, of civilian deaths.
I’ve seen drone footage of Hamas launching rockets from a hospital, so I’m pretty confident Israel isn’t making that up.
We have all seen footage of rocket barrages arising from within built up, multi storied urban areas. Areas that most certainly contain large concentrations of civilians. Hospitals present or not that is a war crime.
More than that: I’ve been looking at photos of a blown-up hospital, and it does not look like damage from bombing (as Hamas lied). It looks like damage from a missile that blew up on the launch pad.
SimonP, as a legal matter, it is not a war crime if civilians are killed because they are human shields in the midst of combat. In war, you target the enemy intentionally; sadly, there are occasions where civilians are present. That is sad.
Nonetheless, it is not a war crime. It is a reality of armed combat in war.
The amount of civilian deaths cannot be disproportionate to the military value of the target. How do you figure that computes, when Israel destroys an apartment block, to get at the place where a commander sleeps?
What is a proportionate response to murderous animals beheading babies?
SimonP…I am not really sure how to interpret your post.
Like one should interpret anything he says…as the rantings of a moron.
“Everything about the rhetoric we’re hearing from government officials there conveys that they intend to punish all Gazans. ”
They literally warned Gazans to leave now, before they begin their assault. That rather contradicts your claim.
It’s true that they’re generally going to treat the ones who don’t leave as part of Hamas. What else can they do? Hamas doesn’t use uniforms, they build their military bases under hospitals and schools. There is no way to distinguish Hamas soldiers from civilians, intentionally.
And I don’t believe they’re setting out to punish anybody. The goal at this point is to utterly destroy Hamas, root and branch. Not “punish” them. Punishment suggests they might reform if given incentives to, and that idea is dead now.
They literally warned Gazans to leave now
As people have said over and over again: Leave how? All the borders are closed.
It’s true that they’re generally going to treat the ones who don’t leave as part of Hamas. What else can they do?
How about not shooting civilians?
Hamas doesn’t use uniforms, they build their military bases under hospitals and schools. There is no way to distinguish Hamas soldiers from civilians, intentionally.
Yes, that’s why we call them terrorists, and why everyone with a brain is happy to agree that they’re the worst kind of war criminals. But the solution to that isn’t to commit more war crimes of your own.
The goal at this point is to utterly destroy Hamas, root and branch.
Sure, but how? As you point out, Hamas don’t wear uniforms. (And, even if they did, they could take those uniforms off.) I very much doubt that Hamas keeps some kind of membership list. The whole point of these kinds of terrorist organisations is that they can blend into the civilian population when they wish. Hamas can’t be destroyed, because it can become invisible at wish. All Israel can do is what it’s been doing for decades: “cut the grass”. That is, kill specific people who are known to hold leadership roles, and kill fighters when they’re actually fighting.
Hamas is the notional government of this dysfunctional enclave. They’re not just some random terrorist organization that happens to evade detection or punishment by the local government.
It would help if you showed at least a little bit of knowledge about the situation here.
What does that have to do with anything? Are you under the impression that bombing civilians is OK just because their government committed crimes?
It has everything to do with what is happening.
Hamas is Gaza and Gaza is Hamas.
You might as well be telling me about the underground opposition party that was wiped out in Dresden.
What you’re advocating is collective reprisal, and it is neither legally nor morally OK.
https://guide-humanitarian-law.org/content/article/3/collective-punishment/
No, this is not collective reprisal. In order for it to be that, Gaza would have to already be under Israeli control, so that they had the ability to pick and chose who got killed.
And international law recognizes military necessity as justifying the death of innocent shields, you do NOT have to refrain from killing them along with the combatants. You just have to not specifically target the shields.
Of course, to the extent the shields are voluntary, they’re not even innocent shields anymore, they’re combatants themselves.
Of course, to the extent the shields are voluntary, they’re not even innocent shields anymore, they’re combatants themselves.
Didn’t realize that you were going to start defending Hamas’s decision to massacre Jewish Israelis, but there you are.
Didn’t realize that an outdoor musical festival and farming cooperatives were military targets in need of shielding.
Wow, who knew.
“What you’re advocating is collective reprisal”
No. I am advocating the utter defeat of a self identified enemy in a mutually recognized war.
Again, the Gazans could end this immediately via unconditional surrender followed by their complete disarmament and de-Hamasification.
Is there anyone here willing to admit they think de-Hamasification is not an appropriate solution for Gaza?
“unconditional surrender”
It should be Israel’s war goal.
If by ‘bombing civilians’ you mean deliberately bombing civilians for the sale of bombing civilians, a la Douhet, then I don’t think that is OK.
OTOH if you mean civilians being killed as a side effect of attacking military targets, then that may be justified even when those civilians are citizens of an allied country, or your own country.
Two examples from WWII are the sinking of the Norwegian ferry carrying heavy water[1], and the pre-Normandy bombing of French rail yards. Wiki says “more than 50,000 killed” in Overlord related bombing.
[1]a bombing, if not an aerial bombing. Carried out by an SOE trained Norwegian.
I agree
HAMAS built GAza into a prison. Gazans chose HAMAS as their prison keepers Gazans shelter HAMAS militants and weapons. They are not exactly innocent; they are enablers. And therefore are justifiable “collateral damage.”
Putin’s mouthpiece over here advocating for the killing of civilians.
Good one Don, now go fuck yourself.
When Israel loses American support (other than private gifts), these dumbasses are going to be surprised and wonder why it occurred.
Don Nico 20 hours ago
Flag Comment Mute User
HAMAS built GAza into a prison. Gazans chose HAMAS as their prison keepers Gazans shelter HAMAS militants and weapons. They are not exactly innocent; they are enablers. And therefore are justifiable “collateral damage.””
Don That is a valid point – A fact conveniently overlooked by those that want to condemn civilian deaths. Few , if any, of the civilians acting as human shields are in fact civilians.
As Michael says, they’re not just terrorists, they’re the local government.
Basically your position devolves to, “Israel just has to suck it up and accept that they’ll be randomly subject to genocidal attacks, and eventually may be nuked, because Hamas won’t help them distinguish Hamas members from non-members, and they’re not allowed to kill anybody but Hamas.”
That’s a fine position for you, you don’t live in Israel.
No, it doesn’t. Israel is choosing the path of siege and mass destruction because that is the most efficient way for it to engage in this war, with the least risk to its own soldiers. They would be perfectly justified to invade and attempt to round up members of Hamas – as they appear to be gearing up to do. And if they meet with violence, their forces would be entitled to respond in kind.
No one is saying that Israel must accept these kinds of attacks as part of their existence. All that we’re saying is that the strategy of shocking the Gazan population into submission, by obliterating hospitals and apartment blocks via air strikes and laying seige to the entire territory, is itself criminally disproportionate, and will have the end result of just subjecting Gazans to further hopelessness and poverty, which is what breeds more terrorists to attack Israel.
When the Gazans come to recognize that Hamas means only death and destruction, when they are no longer willing to by Iran’s cannon fodder perhaps things will change.
If the Gazan’s wish to stop what is coming then unconditional surrender would be a wise option.
They do have a choice in this matter.
In the short term, the more Israel shoots at Palestinians, the more the Palestinians support Hamas. Which is, in fact, one of the exact reasons why Hamas carried out its attacks.
Which is why a prolonged siege is the best response. Let the Gazans turn on the Hamas captors
When the Gazans come to recognize that Hamas means only death and destruction, when they are no longer willing to by Iran’s cannon fodder perhaps things will change.
When has this ever worked? And what has resulted?
What you’re describing has been Russia’s strategy in Ukraine and Chechnya – pound the citizens, until their leaders relent. The Iran and Syrian regimes, with their own dissident and rebel groups. The U.S., with Iran, Venezuela, North Korea, Cuba.
So there are two ways it tends to work. Either an autocratic regime succeeds in snuffing out all resistance, after years of shocking death and destruction that it is never held accountable for. Or a policy winds on for decades, causing generations of suffering, without making any discernible progress whatsoever in moving regimes subjected to them.
Israel’s handling of the occupied territories has historically followed the latter pattern. They now want to move to the former.
“When has this ever worked? And what has resulted?”
Germany 1945
Japan 1945
The United States 1865
There are three, there are plenty of others, but I refused to get bogged down discussing such things with a mendacious idiot.
You think that the Emperor of Japan and the Nazi regime surrendered because they were facing a popular uprising? Ditto, the Confederacy?
These are regimes that surrendered when they lost the wars they started. They are not regimes that collapsed only because their opponents pressured their populations to rise up against them.
Lord you are an idiot.
“When the Gazans come to recognize that Hamas means only death and destruction, when they are no longer willing to by Iran’s cannon fodder perhaps things will change.”
Is not a demand for them to “rise up”.
All they must do is stand down. Stop being patsies for the mad Shia Mullahs.
Your confusion over this speaks volumes about what you actually think is going on. If you truly think that Hamas is an occupying force compelling the Gazans to fight then all the more reason for Hamas to be destroyed.
Thomas D – “When has this ever worked? And what has resulted?”
Germany 1945
Japan 1945”
The Hirohito toured toyko after the march 1945 firebombing. What wasnt well reported was that much of the japanese population turned their backs on the hirohito. Much of the civilian population was done with the war. The unfortunate thing was the military was still in control which is why the war continued until august of 1945.
One of the positives that emerged was that bombing of the civilian population destroyed the war like culture of the japanese. The result has been 75+ years of a peaceful and prosperous society. So while we should all regret the killing of civilians, the destruction of the culture increases the likelihood of the palestinians developing a peaceful and prosperous society.
SimonP, it is neither criminally disproportionate, nor wrong, for Israel to seal off Gaza as a part of a declared war. That is legal.
Gazan should heed the advice of Israel and leave Gaza immediately, if they value their lives.
Sherman said it best: War is all hell.
“Gazan should heed the advice of Israel and leave Gaza immediately, if they value their lives.”
And if they don’t, or can’t, then too fucking bad for them because they’re just Palestinians and you clearly don’t value their lives at all.
It actually is against International Law to cut off food, water, and power to civilians, even in war.
Thank you, some of these people are just obtuse.
As people have said over and over again: Leave how? All the borders are closed.
Not true until yesterday. There was one port where people were going to until it was bombed. $100 says it was Hamas that bombed it. Earlier in the day they sent notes out to everyone to not leave. They don’t want people to leave; they want people to be their human shields so they can film more propaganda against the Israelis.
How about not shooting civilians?
If there are 20 Hamas soldiers standing behind 100 human shields, and the Hamas soldiers are shooting at Israel, what are Israeli IDF guys supposed to do? Answer the question directly, WITHOUT a negative.
Yes, that’s why we call them terrorists, and why everyone with a brain is happy to agree that they’re the worst kind of war criminals. But the solution to that isn’t to commit more war crimes of your own.
You progressives are so naive. Hamas is COUNTING on this thinking to stay alive and get the upper hand. Until now, it’s worked. Not anymore, and nor should it. Stop emoting and start thinking.
“You progressives are so naive.”
No. They are intellectually dishonest and objectively on the other side.
Pity for you that better Americans have won the culture war and will continue to establish the rules with which clingers will live.
Maybe if you guys ditched the bigotry and superstition you would have been more competitive at the modern American marketplace of ideas.
If there are 20 Hamas soldiers standing behind 100 human shields, and the Hamas soldiers are shooting at Israel, what are Israeli IDF guys supposed to do? Answer the question directly, WITHOUT a negative.
Personally I’d suggest seeking cover, but that’s just me.
Hamas is COUNTING on this thinking to stay alive and get the upper hand.
No, what they’re counting on is their ability to hide among the civilian population.
Stop emoting and start thinking.
If there’s anyone here who’s “emoting” it’s you. All I’m suggesting is that everyone has an obligation to comply with the law regardless of whether anyone else does. That doesn’t seem like a particularly strange stance for a legal blog.
Personally I’d suggest seeking cover, but that’s just me.
That’s because you have the I.Q. of a turnip. You can’t defeat an enemy who is trying to destroy you and your people by simply “taking cover”.
People at the kibbutzes took cover in their bomb shelters. Animals burned them out.
“All the borders are closed.”
Talk to their Arab brothers then.
They literally warned Gazans to leave now, before they begin their assault. That rather contradicts your claim.
No, it doesn’t, as you well know. This is ass-covering language. Gazans have nowhere to go, they have no idea what Israel will target or when, they might not be able to physically relocate themselves fast enough to escape Israel’s violence. More to the point – people should not have to abandon their homes and their communities, and become transient, just so that it is easier for Israel to destroy everything they have managed to scrap together in their meager strip of land.
If the U.S. had warned the citizens of Nagasaki that they had 24 hours to vacate the city before we dropped an atom bomb on it, would you claim that any of the victims killed by the blast brought it on themselves? Would it make our action any less of a war crime? You’re engaged in precisely the kind of bloodthirsty rhetoric that I am warning against. That’s not surprising to me, because I know precisely the kind of sociopath you are. But it’s what you’re doing.
“Gazans have nowhere to go, they have no idea what Israel will target or when…”
What I’ve read indicates that the IDF calls specific places and tells the inhabitants that that building is about to be bombed, and they should leave. The statements we’ve seen in the press recently were similar; Israel was saying that it was going to bomb certain places, and that Gazans should leave *those places* — not leave Gaza altogether.
There have also been reports that Hamas tells Gazans to ignore the warning calls from the IDF and stay put.
Okay, so it appears that you understand the dilemma that ordinary Palestinians are in.
Israel tells them: we’re going to bomb your home into dust. You can either be there when we do it, or not.
Hamas tells them: you better not go anywhere. Keep in mind we just killed hundreds of Israelis, injured thousands, and have taken dozens, if not hundreds, of hostages.
What would you do?
Leave the home.
At some point, when that becomes good advice for Israelis, will you take the same position?
Am Chai Yisrael. 🙂
They aren’t going anywhere.
If, as seems increasingly likely, Israel loses American support, going somewhere else may become Israelis’ only hope. Some would stay — religious kooks and delusional dumbasses, mostly— but I hope most would make better choices.
“What would you do?” I wouldn’t have voted for the criminally insane to rule my country in the first place. If I found the criminally insane using my apartment building as a base for murderous attacks and using my family as human shields, any of them I found alone would be dead before the Israelis could mount an attack.
Overwhelming violence against Japan helped to end the war.
It was still a war crime.
“war is cruelty, and you cannot refine it”
But I will point out that nothing in the “law” of war in 1945 that forbid bombing of civilians. That Geneva convention was post war.
The law of war long predates the Geneva Conventions. The Geneva Conventions sought to formalize it, as part of the whole post-war international order, after particularly egregious violations.
For fuck’s sake. You have to know this. You are trying to wave off leveling a city with an atomic bomb by making a pedantic point about when the Geneva Conventions were adopted. You’re a sociopath.
“You’re a sociopath.”
A true sociopath wants tens/hundreds of thousands of Allied soldiers and millions of Japanese to die due to an invasion.
But I will point out that nothing in the “law” of war in 1945 that forbid bombing of civilians. That Geneva convention was post war.
And yet the Nazi and Japanese leaders were still prosecuted for bombing civilians after the war. Specifically, the definition of “war crimes” used at those tribunals included “wanton destruction of cities, towns, or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity”.
https://history.state.gov/milestones/1945-1952/nuremberg
“not justified by military necessity”
A loophole big enough to fly a Lancaster, B-17 or B-29 through.
Can you id a single German, for instance, convicted of bombing a civilian target from the air?
OK Simon.
The Soviet didn’t have any problems with their people being kidnapped. Do you know why?
The first few times it happened, they found out who was behind it, kidnapped the family members of that person, and returned them to him, chopped up into small pieces, in a box.
That worked.
Israel isn’t brutal enough to do that — but it would work if they did.
The Romans did the same thing — they just used the horror of crucifixion to do it.
Her poor judgment is ultimately the biggest factor, I agree, and I think it’s the only way to distinguish her firing from other terminations some people would consider “cancel culture.” She was the leader of an organization and ostensibly supposed to represent it. She very publicly made a statement in that capacity that had nothing to do with the organization’s mission and was one that she knew was probably considered minority and extremely offensive to many, suggesting that she probably did it for her own sake. That sort of impulsivity is not a good quality in most jobs.
If I ran a law firm and had to legally justify firing her, I’d just say that one cannot support mass murder and meet the ethical standards of my firm.
Note: A lawyer may ethically defend someone _accused of_ mass murder. But her statements did not do that, they defended and applauded the murders themselves.
So, if she didn’t have to work with a lot of Jews, her applauding the killing of children would be A-OK, right?
> Law firm Winston & Strawn said on Tuesday that it had rescinded a job offer to a New York University law student who wrote in a student bar association online publication that “Israel bears full responsibility” for Hamas’ deadly attack in Israel.
How long until the student in question sends out a new email claiming that a secret worldwide cabal of Jews conspired to do this?
A cabal using Jewish space lasers?
Yes, the republican hoi polloi here tend to forget that liberals are largely anti-Israel (BDS etc.) but Jew-hating and Jew-murdering are still, and have always been, the red meat of the Right
Wrong. That shibboleth has been disproven over and over. The Jews continue to vote for Democrats, but no one has been a better friend to Israel than Republicans. So whatever planet you live on, I hope the weather is good.
Speaking of existential threats, I’m not sure if those are the kinds of friends Israel should be keen to have.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2018/05/14/half-of-evangelicals-support-israel-because-they-believe-it-is-important-for-fulfilling-end-times-prophecy/
Yes, we keep eliding the 800lb gorilla in the room. The doomsday cult that is modern American Christianity has been propping up Israel for the last century because it fulfills the prophecies that will bring about the end of times, Armageddon, and the destruction of mankind. Love of Jews themselves is immaterial as their destiny is to be slaughtered to make way for the righteous.
The Hasidim know this, but, eh, if the goy wants to keep giving them billions in welfare every year so they don’t have to lift a finger to defend their own nation (especially on the recent Sabbath), then who are they to complain?
BULLSHYTE!!!!!
American Christians support Israel because it’s our religion and our holy land, too…
All the more reason that Jerusalem should not be controlled by any one nation, but by UN forces instead. Anyone who owns Jerusalem owns God…to those that believe that
Christians may be deluded, but only leftists are so deluded as to forget that the UN is a dictators’ club, and their troops are much better at child-raping than at standing firm against anyone willing to fire a gun or throw a bomb at them.
Mrs Drackman was hesitant to move South based on the Marxist Stream Media’s portrayal (“Deliverance” “Mississippi Burning”), but I get way more “Hooknose” “Hebe” from the Knee-grows who patron the Pawn Shop I’m a silent partner in (Usually when I have to tell Ja-rule’ that his diamond ring is worthless Cubic Zirconium and worth bupkis) and way worse in New Yawk with every other cab/uber driver a former Somali warrior,
Nicest by far are the Southern Baptists, except for that little ish-yew of Hay-Zeus’s Divinity/Crucifixion (which needed to happen in order for Christianity to happen, if you believe that kind of thing)
OK, I get that they support us, because the Third Temple has to be built before Hey-Zeus comes back from his 2000 year Road Trip, hey, I’ll take my Pro-semites anyway I can get them…
Frank
I forgot about the third temple — and you do know what’s there now — the mosque.
Yes, it’s called the “Dome of the Rock” saw it when I went to the Wailing Wall (Yes, I Wailed) in 2007.
Ironically, in Med School we called the Bulletin Board where they posted the answers to Exam questions (and Grades) “the Wailing Wall”
There was definitely a lot of Wailing there…
Frank “Wail like a Mofo”
Don’t forget the red heffer. Need that as well.
“doomsday cult that is modern American Christianity has been propping up Israel for the last century because it fulfills the prophecies that will bring about the end of times”
A utter lie. I’m sure you can do some “nutpicking” but its a fringe of a fringe at best. Basic Christian doctrine that no one can hasten the return of Jesus.
Your comment is bigoted too.
My people would have thrown in Satan somehow as well — i.e. you’d wind up strengthening Satan in attempting to do so.
Basic Christian doctrine that no one can hasten the return of Jesus.
Christian evangelicals are, on the whole, a confused bunch – but no, I don’t imagine that many of them do suppose that they can “trigger” the end times by simply creating the conditions foretold in the Bible.
But that’s not the same as saying that Christian evangelicals don’t in some sense cheer on and facilitate the creation of conditions that they believe are the fundamental prerequisites to the Eschaton. They obviously don’t believe it’s by their will that the end of the world will come, but they likely do view themselves as giving effect to God’s will, whatever it is.
And if this particular Antichrist doesn’t pan out (Obama), there’s always the next one (Trump?), or the one after that. The evangelical imagination is endlessly malleable.
Simple Simon spouting nonsense.
You just made my point. You stated that you are pro-Israel. Not a mention of the Jews except that the foul creatures vote democrat.
“no one has been a better friend to Israel than Republicans.”
Maybe so, though they’ve have some stiff competition from Orban, Bolsonaro, and other international fascists. But what does that have to do with the Jew-hating addressed by the comment above? Are you suggesting that all American Jews somehow owe loyalty to Israel? Sounds pretty antisemitic to me.
What part of “Kill the Jews” do American Jews not understand?
All of it or at least 70% considering that’s how many voted for Barry Hussein Osama and his Ed McMahon, Parkinsonian Joe. Left my own Sin O’ Gogue in Atlanta when 1/2 the shul supported that Black Surpremercist Warlock, I get the support for Ass-off ( I didn’t vote for him) because he’s a MOTT) never seems to change,
Frank
Liberals love Jews, hate Israel. Conservatives love Israel, hate Jews. You think conservative white liberal groups did all this shit below? Noooo…your fellow Great Replacement, anti-stranger conservative theorists have been doing it all along. And all your sorry-ass silence all along has you implicated:
1980 – Congregation Shaare Tikvah, Temple Hills, Maryland
1983 – Beth Shalom synagogue in Bloomington, Indiana
1994 – attacks on Temple Beth Israel in Eugene, Oregon
1999 – arson attacks on three Jewish congregations in Sacramento, California, including B’nai Israel
1999 – Los Angeles Jewish Community Center shooting by a white supremacist
2000 – White supremacist Richard Baumhammers shoots out windows at Congregation Beth El, Pittsburgh, and Congregation Ahavath Achim in Carnegie, Pennsylvania
2002 – 2002 white supremacist terror plot
2002 – Another attack on Temple Beth Israel in Eugene, Oregon by white separatists
2003 – Molotov cocktail thrown through window at Valley Beth Shalom synagogue in Encino, California
2009 – United States Holocaust Memorial Museum shooting
2009 – Bronx terrorism plot to bomb the Riverdale Temple and nearby Riverdale Jewish Center
2012 – Firebombing in Rutherford and Paramus, NJ
2014 – Overland Park Jewish Community Center shooting by a Neo-Nazi
2018 – Pittsburgh synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
2018 – Los Angeles synagogue attack
2019 – Shooting at Chabad of Poway synagogue in Poway, California
2019 – Failed plot to bomb the Temple Emanuel Synagogue in Pueblo, Colorado and poison its members. The would-be perpetrator pled guilty in 2020
2019 – 2019 Jersey City shooting. Shooting at a Kosher supermarket in Jersey City, New Jersey
2019 – July 28, 2019, synagogue in N. Miami Beach, FL
2019 – Monsey Hanukkah stabbing
2022 – Colleyville synagogue hostage crisis
I haven’t got time to go through the entire list, so I just looked up the last two items you listed:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsey_Hanukkah_stabbing
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colleyville_synagogue_hostage_crisis
So that’s your supposed “conservative theorists”? Really?!
Good use of the word ‘shibboleth’, BTW
how about you post the text of the “official missive sent to law students by the president of the Student Bar Association, defending the massacre” and criticize that directly?
If it says what you claim, I’m likely to agree with you.
Does it?
Ope, I should have scrolled down in VC first. Looks like Eugene posted the NYU SBA info earlier. Let me digest that, and it’s entirely possible Prof Bernstein was posting in response.
Deleted
I can’t help it but Professor Bernstein’s comment has too much of a whiff of fair-weather-libertarianism about it: you are libertarian in the summer breeze until it starts hurting.
It is possible that the Student Bar Association, contrary to the dean’s assertion, is an official part of the faculty – I do not know – but if so, the dean would indeed deserve Bernstein’s condemnation for trying to obfuscate.
However, Bernstein with an oratory jiu-jitsu move, disposes of “opinion” as a legitimate characterization of ill-conceived and perfectly condemnable ideas. That then allows to paint the dean as fellow traveller on a barbarian train.
Bernstein proves to be less of a libertarian than Rosa Luxemburg, the Polish founder of the German Communist Party who declared that “freedom is always the freedom of the one who thinks differently.” This freedom, like it or not, includes the freedom to hold outlandish positions including the support of the Hamas massacres. It is combatted not by cancelling and McCarthy’ing anyone who doesn’t condemn the massacres strongly enough, it is combatted by argument.
Don’t get me wrong: I am referring to people’s utterances about, not the Hamas massacres themselves. They need to be combatted by military action, a military action not blind but shrewdly aware of medium and long-term consequences.
The Volokh Conspirators are not fair-weather libertarians. Or often libertarian. Or libertarianish. Or libertarians.
They are faux libertarians and standard-issue movement conservatives.
If Rosa Luxemburg hadn’t been shot in one of the first acts of the Wiemar Republic, what would she have thought during the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, when Stalin had the international Communist Party order all its members to be friendly to Nazis? (But the Nazis were still sending Communists to concentration camps.)
Professor Bernstein, you might be surprised by my response to this student. I think she is confused; I really do. S/he being non-binary weighs heavily in my conclusion that she is confused. Hopefully in the coming days and weeks, she will find some moral clarity.
I hope that s/he is able to sit back and think about what has transpired here. She is paying an appropriate price for her remarks (withdrawn employment offer; social ostracism). I have found that a significant setback in life prompts contemplation and transformation. I would like to think (and hope) that will be the case here.
All of that said: She will never work in my company if I have anything to say about it.
My guess is that during the course of its contemplation and re-assessment it will conclude that it has been a victim of IZC and will be less confused but more wrong.
She is not confused, she is evil. Confused would be missing some facts, not justifying atrocities.
“Moral clarity” is an oxymoron since morals are simply “principles of right and wrong behaviour” (Oxford online dictionary), and there’s no universal standard of right and wrong behavior.
Additionally, the Hamas terrorists (and their supporters) have just as much – if not more – “moral clarity” than the Israelis they’re attacking.
And how about the Y’all Qaeda (and various VC commenters), and their plans to attack and take over the US?
I’m sure their moral clarity is just as pure as Hamas’, Dean Randall’s, and Prof. Bernstein’s
Moral clarity doesn’t mean what you think it means. It doesn’t mean that everybody clearly sees that one position is right. It means that everybody can clearly see what positions people actually hold.
Mass atrocities like this don’t dictate your position, they provide moral clarity by wiping away all ability to obfuscate your position.
I guess that is true. There have been a shocking number of people commenting on the VC in the last few days who’ve unequivocally called for the worst war crimes and crimes against humanity. That certainly provided a fair amount of clarity.
Jews have — in living memory — been actual targets of “the worst war crimes and crimes against humanity”. I haven’t seen anyone calling for that kind of campaign against any religion or ethnic group, so I must have muted the people you’re talking about.
Either that, or you’re demonstrating yet again that you have the morality of a scorpion.
Does invoking the Albigensian Crusade count? Or was that just a “joke”?
https://reason.com/volokh/2023/10/09/monday-open-thread-21/?comments=true#comment-10266674
That’s your example of “unequivocally called for”? You are the joke here.
We have terrorists live-streaming their atrocities. We have protesters chanting “Gas the Jews”. And you think that one line is unequivocal?
If the Latin confuses you, feel free to scroll up and down a bit around that comment, and you’ll find a number of VC regulars calling for all inhabitants of the Gaza strip to be killed or ethnically cleansed.
The burden of supporting your claim is on you. If you can’t do it, the rest of us will draw the obvious conclusions.
I did. If you’re literally not willing to read the comments that I referred you to, that’s on you.
I did. If you’re literally not willing to read the comments that I referred you to, that’s on you.
As usually, you’re completely full of shit. You linked to a single comment in Latin that translates to “For the Lord knows who are his”.
I think Martinned is right here. I can’t remember my Latin so I googled the phrase. The first hit was a wiki page that gives the common translation “”Kill them all; let God sort them out.”
And the linked comment thread indicates that that was indeed Bob from Ohio’s meaning: “12th century attacks demand 12th century responses.”
That does seem to be endorsing a policy of killing all the Gazans without respect to guilt.
(1209, so 13th century actually, but…)
And the linked comment thread indicates that that was indeed Bob from Ohio’s meaning: “12th century attacks demand 12th century responses.” . That does seem to be endorsing a policy of killing all the Gazans without respect to guilt.
All Gazans, or just all Hamas? If Bob meant the former than I will concede that it was a stupid thing to say (though I’ll note his comment of a couple of hours ago that “All Hamas must die or surrender.”, not “All Gaza”). But even that wouldn’t support Martinned’s claim that…
There have been a shocking number of people commenting on the VC in the last few days who’ve unequivocally called for the worst war crimes and crimes against humanity.
“All Gazans, or just all Hamas?”
Well, the original (1209) context was the Papal Legate was taking a mixed Catholic/Cathar city, and was asked what to do about sorting out the Catholics from the heretics. His answer was to kill everyone in the city and let God sort them out at the Pearly Gates. So that sounds like ‘All Gazans’ to me.
Absaroka, that’s a terribly inaccurate translation of what was actually written in the comment that Martinned linked to. In particular, the comment here said nothing like “kill them all”, and so it notably omitted the part that would remotely qualify as “the worst war crimes and crimes against humanity”.
So that sounds like ‘All Gazans’ to me.
If you ignore the totality of his other statements on the subject (especially the one I cited), perhaps. It could also just be a somewhat inaccurate use (with regard to its original) of the expression.
Me for one, that’s what you do with Terrorists.
” Or was that just a “joke”?”
Certainly not. All Hamas must die or surrender.
I think it’s an exaggeration to say “the worst” war crimes. Hamas had a lot of room to achieve “the worst” status, even if their actions were remarkably bad. I mean, they could have just stuck around murdering innocents until the last man among them was dead, and thrown in a bit of biological warfare as a topper. Maybe recited some Vogon poetry while they were doing it. As it is they apparently only raped children and adults, they skipped raping the babies. As far as I know, anyway…
OK, I know you’re actually talking about how Israel responds to this. So, let’s discuss that.
Remember that Hamas does not wear uniforms, they deliberately site their military facilities in residential areas, command centers under schools and hospitals. They are all in on using innocent shields. There is literally no way for Israel to confine their response to combatants, as a result of deliberate Hamas strategy.
And Hamas is just going to keep killing as many Israelis as they can, so long as they are able. Hamas is about as close to comic book villain status as it gets, and I’m not talking Hydra, I’m talking Kid Miracleman, “Eating babies, shitting skulls.” level evil. Deliberate, systematic, genocidal cruelty of the sort we haven’t seen since WWII. Hardly shocking when you consider they actually have a Nazi connection.
So, what IS Israel to do? Commit war crimes, or just accept that they will be perpetually subject to murderous violence by a genocidal foe which may, at some point, even get hold of a nuclear bomb, since their state sponsor has a nuclear weapons program.
I think, realistically, they have to commit ‘war crimes’. And it is Hamas that has made that unavoidable.
If you like, think of it as a trolley problem, where the smaller group of people are actually responsible for arranging for the problem to exist…
Bellmore, does the U.S. have to support its ally Israel and help it commit war crimes? Has Hamas made that unavoidable too?
Do we have to? Well, no, we’re not under existential threat here, like Israel is.
Israel is not under existential threat here, in the same way the US wasn’t at 9/11. An existential threat is something like the Yom Kippur war, not a bunch of terrorists with hang gliders. The whole reason why people resort to terrorism is because they aren’t able to create an existential threat.
No, actually they are.
First, keep in mind that, given the disparity of population, this was about the same as if 9-11 in the US had involved about 30,000 dying, the population of a mid sized city. It’s a lot bigger than 9-11 in relative terms.
Second, keep in mind that in the case of 9-11, people were “just” killed, not raped and tortured before being killed.
So, try to imagine the US response if the Taliban had raped and murdered 30,000 Americans, then taken a few thousand hostages and retreated. Think we’d be measured in our response? No, we’d erase the foe from the face of the Earth. So would any country subject to that scale of attack, if they could.
But, that said, yes, Hamas is an existential threat, because their explicit goal is genocide, and they’re getting better at killing people as they go along. What are they going to do next? Weaponized Smallpox? A dirty nuke? You can’t discount those possibilities, because they have a state sponsor that’s pursuing WMDs, and Hamas would absolutely go nuclear if they had nukes.
30,000 dead Americans is a lot, but by no means an existential threat.
Hamas does not, to the best of your or my knowledge, have the ability to jeopardise the existence of the state of Israel. The only way you get there is by imagining capabilities that Hamas is a long way from developing.
“30,000 dead Americans is a lot, but by no means an existential threat.”
WTF?
How many does it take?
You understand that “existential threat” is not a synonym for “bad,” right? An existential threat is one that poses a threat to the country’s existence. (Hence the name!) 30,000 murdered Americans would be an unimaginable tragedy, but there’s no chance it would cause the country to cease to exist. (Indeed, we lost orders of magnitude more to Covid.)
Well, duh: 330M, give or take a few.
Apparently Martinned’s position is that Hamas haven’t exceeded their bag limit yet.
Yes, it’s true, at present Hamas lacks the capablity to destroy Israel. If they had it, they’d use it, and Israel is still around, after all.
The reason they’re an existential threat is because their goal IS to destroy Israel, and they keep getting better at killing Israelis. So you can’t rule out their successfully acquiring that capablity, at which time they WOULD use it.
Or, rather, the only way to rule it out is to destroy them before they acquire it.
@Brett: I see no evidence that Hamas is getting better at killing Israelis. The capability they deployed this weekend is basically just as sophisticated as anything they could have done in the last few decades. Israel, on the other hand, is getting better and better at defending itself.
Brett, Martinned is willfully blind. Not recognizing that Hamas represents an existential threat to Israel is willful blindness driven by ideology.
Nah, Martinned isn’t blind. He’s shown clearly that Misek is his kin.
“The whole reason why people resort to terrorism is because they aren’t able to create an existential threat.”
Well, that is moral clarity. As I’ve said earlier – not naive, but objectively on the other side.
Because you didn’t think that statement through did you?
If you and I are in a room together, and (as you did just now) freely accept and admit that I mean to see you dead, do you have to wait until I find the knife to act?
If you and I are in a room together, and (as you did just now) freely accept and admit that I mean to see you dead, do you have to wait until I find the knife to act?
Yes. Under the law of self-defence in any jurisdiction known to man, you don’t get to pre-emptively kill someone just for their intentions. The typical phrase is “imminent threat”. (E.g. art. 51 UN Charter.)
https://www.findlaw.com/criminal/criminal-law-basics/self-defense-overview.html#:~:text=Generally%2C%20self%2Ddefense%20only%20justifies%20using%20force%20in%20response%20to%20an%20imminent%20threat.
Ah yes, imminent threat.
Imminent.
Not existential.
Terrorism is indeed imminent threat, and as you so clearly told us all, is merely a prelude to existential.
Look, I get that you are mainly arguing for attention, and there really is nothing I can say that will diminish your capacity for displays of idiocy, so by all means keep talking so there can be no doubt that you are an excuser, apologist and equivocator for terrorism and war crimes.
And Hamas is still killing people in Israel. Every time the Israelis think they’ve cleared them out, new sleepers break cover and start killing people.
I should say, “Not yet”, anyway. Wait until Iran has nukes, maybe we will be.
Then someone should probably start talks with Iran to persuade them not to develop nuclear weapons.
As if talks will deter them.
Deterrence is not the objective of talks. If you think you can bomb Iran out of its nuclear ambitions, you really must live in your mother’s basement without any human contact.
I did not say bomb. There are other avenues to deter them.
Treating them as the pariah that they are would be a start.
Of course we could bomb Iran out of their nuclear ambitions. We just don’t want to kill as many people as doing that would take.
Deterrence is not the objective of talks. If you think you can bomb Iran out of its nuclear ambitions, you really must live in your mother’s basement without any human contact.
And if you think you can TALK Iran out of its nuclear ambitions, you haven’t even been born yet. Their religion DEMANDS that they kill Jews, and make everyone else submit to Islam. Period. If you’re going to ignore that, I feel sorry for you.
And if you think you can TALK Iran out of its nuclear ambitions, you haven’t even been born yet. Their religion DEMANDS that they kill Jews, and make everyone else submit to Islam. Period. If you’re going to ignore that, I feel sorry for you.
– The point is to *bribe* Iran out of its nuclear ambitions, by giving it something it wants more than nukes.
– Islam does not, in fact, demand that they kill Jews. You can tell that by the fact that Jews have been living in majority-Muslim regions for 1400 years, and for most of that time have lived there more safely than in the majority-Christian areas next door.
Martinned, Islam does not demand that they immediately kill all the Jews. It does demand that they eventually get around to doing it.
” You can tell that by the fact that Jews have been living in majority-Muslim regions for 1400 years,”
Mostly past tense at this point, I hope you’re aware. The genocide of Jews is essentially finished at this point, and they’re now doing clean up on the remaining Christians.
“Of course we could bomb Iran out of their nuclear ambitions. We just don’t want to kill as many people as doing that would take.”
We can destroy all their facilities without killing many civilians. Yes, even the underground ones.
Its a lack of will.
Obama showed that they could. We had a path to normalization. First, slow down nuclear refinement and loosen sanctions. Abide by the agreement, show that the US could be trusted, and we’d have seen the Iranian hardliners lose their persuasiveness and moderates be rewarded. Once that baseline was established, we could have moved on to other regional issues.
Trump threw that all away. By withdrawing from the agreement, he showed the Iranian regime that the Americans could not be trusted to abide by any agreement. This empowered the hardliners and pushed the regime away. Now we’re stuck with a more conservative president, a vindicated military regime, and an ailing Ayatollah with a pending leadership crisis.
Just imagine if we had Hillary staying the course, where we’d be now. The next step would have been a JCPOA 2.0. We could have traded more sanctions relief for more cooperation in Syria, Lebanon, and regional proxies. We might even have been able to get Iran and Saudi Arabia to start talking (instead of leaving that to the Chinese-led kleptocratic order).
It’s people like you who make peace so difficult to achieve.
Obama showed how easy it was to be taken advantage of. We can thank him for Robert O’Malley too.
@Bob: I don’t think you have a very realistic understanding of how deep Iran’s nuclear facilities are under ground. Nothing short of nuking them would destroy them.
https://apnews.com/article/iran-nuclear-natanz-uranium-enrichment-underground-project-04dae673fc937af04e62b65dd78db2e0
SimonP
Obama’s actions emboldened Irans leaders. The reality is quite the opposite of the pro iranian talking points you are reading from.
@Joe: On what basis do you claim that Iran’s leaders were “emboldened” by the JCPOA, other than, “Hur dur, everything Obummer did was BAD!!”?
The JCPOA was agreed to in 2015, and implemented in 2016. Iran abided by the terms of the JCPOA through the Trump administration – as Trump’s own government confirmed – until Trump unilaterally decided to withdraw from the agreement. Even after Trump withdrew the US from the agreement, Iran stepped out of non-compliance only incrementally, first seeking to preserve it with the remaining parties to the JCPOA, then by taking reversible steps towards non-compliance. Only after it became clear that Trump had no interest in re-opening the deal did Iran abandon it themselves.
While Iran is hostile to moderation in its politics anyway, Trump’s actions clearly proved to the Iranian establishment that Rouhani’s attempt to deal with the U.S. and obtain limited sanctions relief was hopeless, resulting in the election of a more conservative president in 2021. Biden is now trying to undo the damage that Trump did, but with Iran’s complicity in Russia’s invasion in Ukraine and also possibly in the Hamas attack, that is starting to look hopeless and a political non-starter for Biden.
Trump did more than any president in recent history to undermine our standing in geopolitics. No foreign government can any longer trust America’s promises, and no hostile nation feels the need to make concessions to us. If our foreign policy is not to their liking, they need only wait out an election cycle and back Republicans.
SimonP 54 mins ago
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@Joe: On what basis do you claim that Iran’s leaders were “emboldened” by the JCPOA, other than, “Hur dur, everything Obummer did was BAD!!”?”
Simon – you displaying the typical naive belief that the JCPOA was actually working. At best it was only a temporary pause to ease the sanctions and to take advantage of the flow of money to fund their state sponsored terrorism.
The funding of pallet loads of cash to payoff the Mullahs. You may recall there were a few american political prisoners released as part of the deal, which only emboldened future hostage taking. Note that 5 americans were released as part of Bidens $6b deal.
Who do you think funded Hamas.
Dnt be so naive.
As previously stated – Even Chamberlin was so stupid as to fund Hitlers war machine
Simon P comment _ “It’s people like you who make peace so difficult to achieve.”
That is what they said about Churchill – Until Sept 1 1939.
Simon – quite being so naive.
@Joe:
Simon – you displaying the typical naive belief that the JCPOA was actually working.
And you’re displaying the typical stupidity and basic dismissal of facts and history that one has come to expect from commenters here. There was a time that it was actually challenging to defend my views, here on the VC. (Well, maybe not here here; that was a long time ago, before the Reason days.)
Anyway – it’s not my naive belief. It was the position of the U.S. government, including under Trump, that the deal was working. He withdrew from the JCPOA, not because it wasn’t working, but because it wasn’t designed to address Iran’s other activities in the region. It was designed to extend the “breakaway” timeline for the development of a nuclear weapon, and it was designed to achieve this by requiring Iran to ship its enriched uranium out of the country, disable centrifuges, and permit inspections. Iran not only complied with these conditions, but continued to comply with them after Trump pulled out of the deal and “snapped back” sanctions, for a time, in an ultimately futile attempt to give Trump a way back into the deal.
The “pallets of cash” – and it’s always telling when one’s opponents recall evocative images rather than provide reasoned arguments – were always Iran’s money. We’re talking about cash that had been caught up in the U.S.’s web of sanctions. That’s true of the amounts handed over in exchange for American prisoners recently, as well – though with that portion, it is being held on Iran’s behalf, may only be spent on certain approved uses, and hasn’t been substantially disbursed yet. So it certainly has nothing to do with any training or support provided to Hamas.
And, again – my underlying point here has been that abiding by the JCPOA would have given the U.S. standing to be able to push Iran away from sponsoring regional groups like Hezbollah, Hamas, and its proxies in Iraq and Syria. An Iran with years of sanctions relief, a working JCPOA, and perhaps even ongoing diplomatic talks with the U.S. is not an Iran who would secretly be working to help Hamas launch a spectacular and deadly terrorist attack timed to disrupt the normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia.
Trump laid the groundwork for what is happening now in Israel. He did this by emboldening Netanyahu and the far-right in Israeli politics, by deprioritizing the Palestinian issue, by offering multiple gifts to Middle Eastern regimes without requiring any kind of progress on the Palestinian issue, by antagonizing Iran, by cozying up to MBS. If American policy has any role in those attacks, it all stems from decisions that Trump made and that Biden has chosen to continue.
I think Israel may give them a few (Nuke-ular Weapons, Pronounce it right! like “W” and Jimmuh Cartuh did)
And since matter can’t be created or destroyed, what happens to the Plutonium after it reaches critical mass?? (I mean besides go “Boom” and initiate a Fusion reaction) Could the Ear-Ronians recover it and use it for their own bomb??
Frank
Wonder if Carter feels any remorse over the monster he birthed when he threw the Shah under the bus?
“the monster he birthed when he threw the Shah under the bus?”
The Shah was plenty monstrous in his own right. The US created the monster when it couped Mosaddegh.
There were talks; they never dissuaded the ayatollahs, only slowed them down a bit.
And then the Trump administration reminded them that you can’t rely on the US to have a consistent foreign policy from one administration to the next.
There you are correct Martin. But Iran really was it was only slowed down a bit, even though there actually were in compliance with the JCPOA when Trump denounced it
“Nothing short of nuking them would destroy them.”
Do you even read the articles you post? Some opinions that it would “harder”, not imposible.
““So the depth of the facility is a concern because it would be much harder for us. It would be much harder to destroy using conventional weapons,”
“It is not clear that such a one-two punch would damage a facility as deep as the one at Natanz.”
The access tunnels and ventilation are far closer.
Not yet, Brett.
But there are all those military-aged men who have walked across our open border and it is only a matter of time before we are….
I think it’s an exaggeration to say “the worst” war crimes. Hamas had a lot of room to achieve “the worst” status, even if their actions were remarkably bad.
Hamas has the objective of driving all Jews out of Israel, which is the same crime as the ethnic cleansing of Gaza suggested by a couple of VC commenters. Many within Hamas would also happily kill all the Jews instead, which is equivalent to “kill ’em all” solution that at least one or two people have talked about here in the comments. (And, I assume, in the dark corners of social media.)
But no, in no way has Hamas made it “unavoidable” for Israel to do any specific thing. Israel is in the driver’s seat here, and can respond using a range of tools, from diplomatic to military to intelligence-based.
…and what would be your suggestion as to how Israel should proceed?
I have no idea. It’s not my area of expertise, and I have no understanding of Israel’s capabilities in different areas. For example, how good is Israel’s intelligence about the internal structure of Hamas? (Who is in charge? Where are these individuals on any given day? Etc.)
Putting pressure on Qatar to stop funding Hamas seems like an obvious part of any strategy. Beyond that, it depends on how Israel sees its chances of success along different avenues, which I couldn’t possibly assess.
Maybe make Gaza a Gun Free Zone? We know how well that works in reducing violence, right?
Wait, you’re opposed to disarming Hamas? Why on earth would you oppose that?
How do you get calling for Gaza to be a Gun Free Zone as opposing disarming Hamas?
How do you not???
Maybe — this is kind of radical, but hear me out. Maybe since you admit it’s not your area of expertise, you don’t have any understanding of Israel’s capabilities, and you generally have no idea what you’re talking about, you could stop complaining about the actions of what people who DO have all of that information are doing?
Or I could focus on international law, an area that I do have expertise on.
Kill all of the Terrorists?, absolutely, like we did with the Wehrmacht and the Imperial Japanese Forces.
Or enough so the only remaining ones can only muster some weak “Werewolf” resistance like the Germans did for awhile after WW2, or those hold out Japanese Soldiers in the Pacific
And here’s where I go Old Testament, you can’t have a single male Palestinian remain in Gaza, because I believe in a Merciful J-Hay, I’d make a one time offer to drop them over Terror-Ann, second price is a 5.56 x 45 Craniotomy
Frank
Look what you made me do is not a great argument Brett.
No one here is defending Hamas. Lotsa folks into dehumanizing a people, collective punishment, and maybe some light genocide.
Lots of options for Israel that is not shut off the water and start acting like civilians are Hamas.
“Both siding” is defending Hamas. Plenty of “both siding” here.
There is a good side here and a bad side. Hamas = Nazi
I mean, literally Hamas = Nazi. They’re historically joined at the hip. A pity the Middle East never got de-Nazified.
https://dennisprager.com/column/german-nazisms-successor-islamic-nazism
If Israelis were the good guys they would have leashed the settlers, and stopped voting for right-wing assholes and religious kooks, long ago.
They should do as they wish. And be ready for the consequences.
“Look what you made me do” is the defense for every defensive war in history, Sarcastr0. If they hadn’t attacked, YOU’D be the aggressor!
There’s no dehumanizing here, humans are perfectly capable of doing horribly evil things, and Hamas demonstrates that. But do you have any (Not already proven futile…) solution to the problem they present Israel, besides going into Gaza and wiping them out?
Really, it seems like you and Martinned just want Israel to suck it up and let their citizens be horribly murdered, because Hamas has arranged for taking them out to involve civilian casualties.
It is a war Sarcastr0, what do you suggest the Israelis use…squirt guns?
You might as well come out and tell us how pissed you are that Jews just aren’t laying down meekly to die.
Dude, it is war. What Israel is doing is legal within the context of a declared war. I would say that Israel has been somewhat restrained in their response.
I would say that Israel has been somewhat restrained in their response.
I was saying the same thing to my wife last night as we were watching some news coverage of the operation. If that was my country and I was in charge, I’m not sure I wouldn’t be sorely tempted to turn Gaza into a parking lot.
I freely admit that, among my other faults, I lack anything even remotely approaching the temperament needed for being in that sort of position.
It is war agains Hamas.
No one said anything about squirt guns.
Pretty sure attacking Gaza collectively including civilians as a proxy for Hamas is not legal.
Which is what you are aruguing for, isn’t it?
“Pretty sure attacking Gaza collectively including civilians as a proxy for Hamas is not legal.”
I’m not sure what you are saying. Can you contrast that with “Pretty sure attacking Germany collectively including civilians as a proxy for the Nazi party is not legal”.
The distinction between being at war with a country and its government seems pretty thin. If you win, sure, you have trials for the ex government, not the peons, but in the midst of the war the citizens/subjects of the enemy government get treated as enemies as well. You can’t practically sort out the supporters and opponents of the enemy government.
It is a tired rhetorical trick that he, and others of his ilk, play here.
Arguing as if the Gazans lack agency in this war with Israel, without expressly stating such, or explaining why this is the case.
It is dishonest.
Not only that, but Israel isn’t attacking civilians as a proxy for Hamas. They’re attacking Hamas (and giving the civilians a heads up when doing so), which routinely uses the civilian population as shields, with some civilians being collateral damage…as in all wars.
Just more of Sarcastr0’s bullshit.
“Which is what you are aruguing for, isn’t it?”
There you go again distorting a comment to argue with the commenter.
I think, realistically, they have to commit ‘war crimes’.
I thank you, Brett, for being so open and honest about this otherwise pretty-clear conviction among the right. I now can honestly tell other people that I’ve encountered conservatives online who actually do believe that Israel is entitled to engage in “war crimes” in Gaza – and who would blame Hamas for it!
Did you miss the sneer quotes, perchance?
What is the war crime? It is not a war crime to kill your enemy in combat in the context of a declared war. Which is what we have now.
Martinned, you are apparently invested in failed policies: Oslo, Disengagement, and Conflict Management (mowing the lawn). These policies have been shown to be failures. It has been conclusively shown that Israel cannot coexist side-by-side with Hamas.
There is nothing for Israel to negotiate with an enemy whose sworn covenant involves the physical extinction of Jews (Hamas Charter). You appear to be willfully blind to that reality; I’ll choose not to speculate on why that is the case.
Israel has declared war, with the obliteration of Hamas within Gaza a war goal. I don’t have a problem with Israel sending every member of Hamas on the One Way Train to Paradise. Perfectly legitimate war aim and not a war crime. It is a declared war and combat is underway. Since Hamas is like a medieval death cult, their honor will prevent them from surrendering; suits me fine, they’ll die violently. The world will be a materially safer place without them.
You seem to ‘forget’ that Americans were murdered savagely as well, and taken hostage. I don’t mind America holding Israel’s coat while Israel destroys the organization responsible; hell, I’d help them (discreetly).
Oh BTW, Rafah crossing is open intermittently (people can leave, but nothing comes in). Gazans should make their way to Rafah and leave immediately. Walk along the shoreline if you have to, and get to Rafah. Gazan civilians should heed the warnings that Israel has made constantly since Saturday evening, if they value their lives.
What is the war crime? It is not a war crime to kill your enemy in combat in the context of a declared war.
No, but killing civilians can be.
I don’t have a problem with Israel sending every member of Hamas on the One Way Train to Paradise.
By and large, I don’t either.
There is nothing for Israel to negotiate with an enemy whose sworn covenant involves the physical extinction of Jews (Hamas Charter).
You may have noticed that negotiating with Hamas wasn’t on my list of suggestions above. For that very reason.
You seem to ‘forget’ that Americans were murdered savagely as well,
I’m not forgetting that. It’s just irrelevant to any of the questions posed.
Gazans should make their way to Rafah and leave immediately.
That doesn’t sound like very good advice.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/10/alarm-as-israel-again-hits-rafah-border-crossing-between-gaza-and-egypt
“Gazan civilians should heed the warnings that Israel has made constantly since Saturday evening, if they value their lives.”
And those who cannot or will not leave, for whatever reason, will be killed and you’re perfectly ok with that.
Your take isn’t nuanced or objective – all you’re looking for is vengeance and you don’t give a fuck who is in the way. I’d say you aren’t much better than those you wish dead.
The IDF has given Gazan civilian very clear instructions where to go (e.g. crossings, safety corridors). Perhaps you are unaware of this. Go check for yourself, Jason.
War is terrible.
And those who cannot or will not leave, for whatever reason, will be killed and you’re perfectly ok with that.
Did we evacuate German cities before bombing them, during WWII? Not so far as I recall.
Civilian casualties are normal during a war, that’s the bigger part of what makes war hell. But it’s not Israel that made this war necessary, so they’re on Hamas’s head.
We also fire-bombed Tokyo. Perhaps you’d like to suggest we revisit that strategy here Brett?
Perhaps we’ve discovered better ways to minimize civilian casualties in war over the last 70 years and should utilize that knowledge.
Why don’t you just come out and say it: Israel can do whatever they want and you won’t care as long as the people dying are Palestinians.
Jason, it would be better if there were no war at all. I mean that. Nobody (aside from Hamas) wanted any of this.
Well, we’ve always known these sociopaths for who they are. They’ve been talking about murdering liberals and overthrowing American democracy for years. It’s not surprising to me that they take a “turn the desert into glass” approach to the whole issue now. They’re the same ones who helped us get into the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
apedad has no clue about what moral clarity is.
Beheading babies and killing civilians FIRST during a surprise attack is most certainly a universal wrong.
Not that it matters in the grand scheme of things, but there is in fact no evidence that any babies were beheaded.
https://twitter.com/Lowkey0nline/status/1712016228338786407
I think you forgot your Namenda, you meant to say “6 million Jews were murdered”
Just children, so that’s okay.
“No evidence”
This is an interesting hill to die on.
‘Pointless to deny that they deliberately murdered innocent women and children point blank in their homes. But gosh darn it, them removing heads is just unimaginable and my denial can only be refuted by direct evidence (that I can later claim was staged.)’
The elision attempt is breathtaking in it’s audacity, if not it’s rhetorical success.
Your black heart is duly noted.
There are multiple US and French media reports from people who were at the kibbutz.
Since when do disaffected right-wingers trust journalists?
Starting a comment with “not that it matters” is the literal opposite of dying on any hill.
Yeah, and the guy at the guy at the meeting who says he’s “just playing” Devil’s advocate isn’t really playing at all.
It mattered to you, obvious rhetorical assertion being all too obvious rhetorical assertion.
Starting a comment with “not that it matters” is the literal opposite of dying on any hill.
The fact that you felt the need to make the comment gives lie to your “I’m not a racist, but…” brand preamble.
@ Martinned:
Oh, that’s a relief. They only murdered them but spared them beheading.
You are in rare form today.
Congratulations: You’ve managed to misrepresent my comment into literally the opposite of what I said.
It does matter, because it’s what they intend to use to justify their own murder of hundreds (if not thousands) of Palestinian children over then next few weeks. Of course, it is almost certainly a hoax, and was obviously so from the beginning. But who’s gonna let facts get in the way of a good blood-lust?
There is, in fact, evidence:
https://nbcmontana.com/news/nation-world/at-least-40-babies-killed-beheaded-in-israeli-kibbutz-outside-gaza-reports-say-israel-palestine-hamas-terrorists-terrorism-invasion-middle-east-conflict-attack
https://cbsnews.com/live-updates/israel-hamas-palestinian-war-attacks-gaza-strip/#post-update-2e0fc8e1
Technically, the IDF refused to release photos of the beheaded babies, out of respect to the families. That doesn’t mean there isn’t eye witness testimony confirming it.
Israel kibbutz the scene of a Hamas “massacre,” first responders say: “The depravity of it is haunting”
Israel-Hamas war escalates with 40 babies killed in ‘extraordinary day of death and destruction’
Check CNN today
but there is in fact no evidence that any babies were beheaded
And here, those who didn’t already know what an idiot you are learn that you’re too stupid to understand the difference between a single news outlet saying that they haven’t received something from the IDF and that something not existing.
Eh, stupid, or just trying to minimize the evil as much as he can? Could be either.
Deniers gonna deny.
Why do “liberals” “try[…] to minimize the evil”? To avoid / prevent the evil being punished. Why don’t they want evil punished? What sort of a person does not want evil punished?!
I regularly listen to Dennis Prager. He says that, for most of his life, he did not believe in the Devil. He says that, lately, he’s changed his mind about that. I see his point.
And I guess you’re too stupid to understand the difference between me posting one link as evidence of what I said – an example of many other sources – and me including lots of links that would get my comment stuck in moderation limbo indefinitely.
No, we’re able to see that you didn’t go looking for evidence, you just seized on the first denial that it existed.
One dean has integrity and fortitude and the other is afraid on his students and social media
I’ll defer to what the Great Willy Shakespeare said about Shysters.
Frank
There’s actually a lot of misconceptions about that particular quote. Read in context (I know, I know) it’s actually pro-lawyer.
At some point, the fallacy of the foreign policy implemented by Obama and carried through with the Biden administration needs to be addressed
Obama embraced antisemites, projected anti-american ideals, cozied up to Iran, pushed away from the only real democracy in the ME. Trump pushed back against the insanity of coddling anti american regimes , then Biden restarts the insanity of Obama’s coddling of terrorist regimes.
DN – not sure that is a correct assessment
Obama’s hot mike – lets wait until after the election
Russia taking the crimea during obamas admin, attacking ukraine during the biden administration
Obama cancelling poland’s missile defense.
Biden family receiving a few $m from china
Trump imposing tariffs on china
russian hoax
too many contradictory facts puts your assessment in doubt
If Trump isn’t in Putin’s pocket*, why are his followers listening and calling to abandon Ukraine?
Claiming the invasion wouldn’t have happened is interesting theoretically, but you deal with the world you get, not the one you wish (or imagine) you got.
Expanded war against Ukraine is an ongoing fact. Why does he want to step aside?
* A strong statement. Some deal we will never know about is more likely.
Let’s jump to the end.
“Because blah blah blah.”
“So Putin would have not invaded because blah blah blah, which is synonymous with I will step aside and do nothing if he does, which would:
A. Scare Putin
B. Encourage him
Krayt – both you and DN changed the subject instead of addressing the statement I made – Please address that statement instead of changing the subject.
Obama embraced antisemites, projected anti-american ideals, cozied up to Iran, pushed away from the only real democracy in the ME. Trump pushed back against the insanity of coddling anti american regimes , then Biden restarts the insanity of Obama’s coddling of terrorist regimes.
In the broader geopolitical arena, Obama’s policies emboldened Iran, Hamas , PA, mulsim brotherhood,etc. and contributed to far more long term damage to the US and western democracies interests. The JCPOA was nothing more than a facade
All of the rending of garments over that piece of shit Floyd George (Yes, I consider a drug addict domestic violence felon a “Piece of Shit” although it’s unfair to shit, most of which never beat anyone)
but 20 (at least) murdered/kidnapped Amuricans gets fucking celebrations??
On second thought, maybe (Dr) Baruch Goldstein didn’t do a great thing.
He should have carried more ammo.
Frank
^ Most moral Zionist.
Thanks! I try
“And me, a little man, compared to him, the great, can’t condemn it.”
Those who decapitate babies and murder young children are not part of any human species I recognize and should be dealt with accordingly.
Naw that’s all too human. History is too bloody to pretend otherwise.
They should be killed regardless.
No one is arguing otherwise.
Death penalty opponents?
The guys with the parachuting terrorists in their Twitter profile?
The President of the Student Bar Association at New York University?
Ok, I never want to see you claim that we’re ‘denying somebody’s humanity’ when we criticize them, ever again.
I notice a trend of comments from the anti-Zionist left (Jeremy Corbyn et al) – one sentence recognising that what Hamas did was appalling, and then a paragraph (or two) on what Israel has done, and should or should not do in response. Basically, “what happened was terrible BUT…”
Well, I mean…just look how Israel was dressed.
Here is a purer form of leftist sentiment from a Yale professor:
“@zareenagrewal.bsky.social @ZareenaGrewal
Settlers are not civilians. This is not hard.”
I wonder if our Eurotrash friend here finds a call to murder 6 million Jews by a professor at the number 2 US college bad?
“Settlers” in the West Bank are engaged in a coercive project of dispossession and displacement. They establish their communities, they threaten nearby Palestinians (expressly or implicitly), they draw Israeli state protection for their own safety, they expand and build.
I don’t know that any of the victims of Hamas’s attack were properly termed “settlers.” But the basic sentiment that Grewal articulates is defensible. Israel is engaged in an active project of establishing “facts on the ground” in the West Bank, by encouraging settler activity and pushing Palestinians off land. Another war crime, and likely to push Palestinians in the West Bank, eventually, into the arms of militant groups.
A few?
It seems to be official government policy since the obnoxious right-wing assholes took over in Israel.
Well, you’re experienced with assholes, I’ll give you that.
Fucking them mostly.
Frank
The area where Hamas has repeatedly murdered Israelis is as far from the West Bank as it is possible to be in Israel.
Wowie Zowie almost 12 hours with only a single post.
Poor captcrisis. All dressed up and nowhere to comment.
Better to keep silent and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.
You have commented 13 times on this post alone. You may draw your own conclusions from this.
Post=Bernstein
Comment=Estrogen
Who didn’t see this coming?
SHAME: Biden Won’t Refreeze Iran’s $6 Billion
Oh, and I hear that it’s actually more than $6B, that’s just the money from one fund.
What is it with Democrats and shipping pallet loads of cash to sponsors of terrorism?
There are reports that the total amount freed up to Iran totals something in the range of $50 billion.
Because I know someone will ask:
https://thefederalist.com/2023/10/11/the-u-s-money-trail-with-iran-is-worse-than-you-think/
Further on outrages in academia.
Zareena Grewal, an American studies professor at Yale University, defended tactics used by Hamas following its invasion of Israel on Saturday morning. “Settlers are not civilians. This is not hard,” Grewal wrote in response to a Sky News journalist’s tweet insisting: “Civilians are civilians are civilians, doesn’t matter where.”
https://www.nationalreview.com/news/settlers-are-not-civilians-yale-professor-defends-hamas-terrorism/
Got that? “settlers are not civilians,” so ever atrocity committed this past weekend is justified.
One problem, though. Virtually all of the people killed this past weekend were living within Israel’s 1967 borders, as Gaza was emptied of Israelis/Jews in 2005.
Conclusion: every single Israeli in her mind is a “settler.” Tel Aviv and every other city or village in Israel is a “settlement.”
Got that? This gives lie to the claim that they are only upset about the “occupied territories.” It’s a lie. One parroted by the fellow travelers here.
They view all of Israel as a settlement, and want to kill every Jew there.
And this is a professor at Yale. According to Grewal’s profile on Yale’s website, she is “a historical anthropologist and a documentary filmmaker whose research focuses on race, gender, religion, nationalism, and transnationalism across a wide spectrum of American Muslim communities.” Grewal has received research funding from both the Fulbright and the Luce Foundations.
This is where our elite academic institutions are today.