Israel and Zionism

[Brooklyn]

Yes or No, only.



As for your question I said previously that I do not know the answer.

But perhaps there may possibly be one: perhaps it is because the majority of the world sees Palestinians as the real victims here. That the actions of Hamas are seen as self defense.

Recall that so many on the far right did not see Bush's attacks on Afghanistan or on Iraq as imperialism but as retaliatory.

Maybe, just maybe, this is how the majority of the world sees Hamas' actions. Not being a mind reader, I cannot say for certain. It would be best if you asked them for a more definitive answer as the most I can do is to speculate.


Now,


Yes or no?

[Matnum PI]

Give me YOUR explanation for why there are protests around the world---that you support----to keep the Israelis for taking an eye for an eye, and going after Hamas. Yet there isn't a single protest for Hamas, and what their part is this mess is? Take your time, and think about it. Give me YOUR opinion why....

For the record, Israel has zero interest in an eye for an eye. Israel has no interest in going into Gaza to brutally rape, murder, and kidnap babies, children, elderly, etc.

[Brooklyn]

By the way, my question goes for all those who condemn Hamas,



Do you condemn Herut's history of unapologetic genocide, one condemned by Einstein and by Sidney Hook, Hannah Arendt, and other Jewish scholars in which they equated such actions with fascism and nazism?




Yes or no?

[Brooklyn]

Give me YOUR explanation for why there are protests around the world---that you support----to keep the Israelis for taking an eye for an eye, and going after Hamas. Yet there isn't a single protest for Hamas, and what their part is this mess is? Take your time, and think about it. Give me YOUR opinion why....

For the record, Israel has zero interest in an eye for an eye. Israel has no interest in going into Gaza to brutally rape, murder, and kidnap children.

https://www.google.com/search?q=israel+ ... shm=rime/1



2,500 dead children in Gaza.

[Baducchi]

..2500 dead children in Gaza...

americans killed so many arabs/muslims, both before and after 9/11, yet what al qaeda did was not ok? how does that work, brook? again, arab/muslim victims, an imperialist aggressor and yet... al qaeda is bad. at least hamas and so many arab/muslims are consistent. what's your excuse?

[Brooklyn]

Yes or no?

[Seacoaster(1)]

Twitter thread from a journalist, who attended a showing a raw footage of the events of October 7-8. Hard to read; must've been difficult to sit and watch:

https://twitter.com/dpatrikarakos/statu ... 8604572865

[a fan]

But perhaps there may possibly be one: perhaps it is because the majority of the world sees Palestinians as the real victims here. That the actions of Hamas are seen as self defense.

That's right. They don't think that the Israelis have the right to defend themselves, and that all the weapons and fences that Israel has isn't needed.

Which not only says a lot about how delusional people can be....it's an enormous reason the conflict won't go away.

[Brooklyn]

But perhaps there may possibly be one: perhaps it is because the majority of the world sees Palestinians as the real victims here. That the actions of Hamas are seen as self defense.

That's right. They don't think that the Israelis have the right to defend themselves, and that all the weapons and fences that Israel has isn't needed.

Which not only says a lot about how delusional people can be....it's an enormous reason the conflict won't go away.

Please clarify for me: are you saying both sides have a right of self defense or not?

[Matnum PI]

Yes or no?

Your question doesn't make sense. "Do you condemn Herut's history of unapologetic genocide, one condemned by Einstein and by Sidney Hook, Hannah Arendt, and other Jewish scholars in which they equated such actions with fascism and nazism? Yes or no?" Einstein et. al. condemned Irgun and then expressed his concerns about Herut with Begin and his followers leading the party. after the fact, he wasn't interested in being a member of the herut party but he didn't condemn them... like he did irgun due to their terrorist actions. einstein and all didn't necessarily hate herut. for that matter, he didn't necessarily hate irgun. he hated terrorism. and he was fearful that herut would be a party terrorism. which proved to be unfounded. and that is where you're on the wrong side of history. in this war, there's only one group that are terrorists. and it's not in 1948 and it's not israel.

[Baducchi]

Please clarify for me: are you saying both sides have a right of self defense or not?

raiding a music festival and murdering, raping, and kidnapping is self-defense. attacking kibbutzes and murdering, raping and kidnapping is self-defense? where's the self-defense?

[a fan]

But perhaps there may possibly be one: perhaps it is because the majority of the world sees Palestinians as the real victims here. That the actions of Hamas are seen as self defense.

That's right. They don't think that the Israelis have the right to defend themselves, and that all the weapons and fences that Israel has isn't needed.

Which not only says a lot about how delusional people can be....it's an enormous reason the conflict won't go away.

Please clarify for me: are you saying both sides have a right of self defense or not?

I didn't say a word about "both sides" in my above sentence.

I'm talking about the Israelis, and you don't want to do that. And because you're running the pro-Palestinian-nutjob playbook, you will discuss the Israeli side as little as possible, and direct EVERY conversation to Palestinians every chance you get.

[Brooklyn]

Yes or no?

Your question doesn't make sense. "Do you condemn Herut's history of unapologetic genocide, one condemned by Einstein and by Sidney Hook, Hannah Arendt, and other Jewish scholars in which they equated such actions with fascism and nazism? Yes or no?" Einstein et. al. condemned Irgun and then expressed his concerns about Herut with Begin and his followers leading the party. after the fact, he wasn't interested in being a member of the herut party but he didn't condemn them... like he did irgun due to their terrorist actions. einstein and all didn't necessarily hate herut. for that matter, he didn't necessarily hate irgun. he hated terrorism. and he was fearful that herut would be a party terrorism. which proved to be unfounded. and that is where you're on the wrong side of history. in this war, there's only one group that are terrorists. and it's not in 1948 and it's not israel.

The German Nazi party changed its name to the National Democratic Party of Germany or NDP. While this is the new name that they go by, it does not change the fact that it committed horrendous atrocities which rightfully was condemned by the world. They remain unapologetic to this day and, once again, deserve the condemnation directed towards its crazed adherents.

Same for the Herut. Just because it now goes by Likud, this does not alter the fact that it practiced genocide and has been condemned by the UN for innumerable human rights violations.


So, since people fail to say YES, I can safely assume that the answer to my earlier question is NO and that people here do not condemn Herut/Likud genocide.

[Brooklyn]

Since no one will give me a direct answer to my query, I'll take that as a concession that the critics here refuse to condemn Herut/Likud and I will move on to a subject that we did not settle. And that's the matter of condemning Israel's evils as being equated with anti-Semitism which is another bogus claim made by Islamophobes.

First this:


Was Einstein an Anti-Semite?
According to an increasingly dominant definition, the answer is yes, Neve Gordon and Mark LeVine argue.


https://www.insidehighered.com/views/20 ... sm-opinion


Was Albert Einstein an anti-Semite? Was Hannah Arendt? These questions may sound ludicrous. Yet, according to the definition of anti-Semitism that more than 30 countries -- including the United States through the Biden administration -- recently adopted, these two leading intellectuals could very well be labeled as such. This is due to an open letter they sent on Dec. 4, 1948, to The New York Times, claiming that the right-wing Herut Party in the newly formed State of Israel was “closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties.”

The list of potential anti-Semites goes on. Take the British American Jewish historian Tony Judt, who not long before his death from Lou Gehrig's disease in 2010 described Israel as “autistic” after it had put Gaza “under a punishment regime comparable to nothing else in the world.” The late Hebrew University philosopher and biochemist Yeshayahu Leibowitz would not have fared much better given his criticism of the growing “phenomena of Judeo-Nazism” following Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon. Finally, Israel’s most prominent human rights organization, B’tselem, would also fit the anti-Semitic bill, as it has recently published a report entitled “A Regime of Jewish Supremacy From the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea: This Is Apartheid.”

The definition in question is the 2016 International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) “working definition of anti-Semitism,” which has become a tool of choice for so-called pro-Israel organizations. This definition shifts the meaning of anti-Semitism from its traditional focus on hatred of Jews per se -- the idea that Jews are naturally inferior and/or evil, or a belief in worldwide Jewish-led conspiracies or Jewish control of capitalism, or some combination thereof -- to one based largely and, it seems, most importantly, on how critical one is toward Israel’s colonial and rights-abusive policies.

The problem, of course, is that when a state’s actions and its government’s policies cannot be critiqued, then the pursuit of knowledge and academic freedom are threatened. If successful, Israel’s use of the anti-Semitism charge to silence serious and well-grounded criticism could very well become the template for other countries, including the United States government, and powerful corporations to mobilize different kinds of hate-speech accusations to protect rights-abusive behavior.

A Confusing and Misleading Definition

According to the IHRA definition, “Anti-Semitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of anti-Semitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.” This formulation, as numerous Holocaust scholars have explained, is vague to the point of being unusable. It both relies on ambiguous terms such as “certain perception” and “may be expressed as hatred,” while also failing to mention key issues such as “prejudice” or “discrimination.”

The second part of the IHRA’s definition provides 11 examples of contemporary manifestations of anti-Semitism, seven of which refer to the State of Israel. One example of anti-Semitism is the claim “that the existence of the State of Israel is a racist endeavor” while another involves the requirement that Israel behave in a way “not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.” Surely it should be legitimate, not least in a university setting, to debate whether Israel, as a self-proclaimed Jewish state, is “a racist endeavor” or a “democratic nation” without being branded an anti-Semite.

On the one hand, as Holocaust historian Deborah Lipstadt rightly points out, the examples marginalize the kinds of anti-Jewish attacks in recent years -- from Pittsburgh to Halle, Germany -- that have resulted in mass casualties or the broader rise of fascism in the United States with its deeply ingrained anti-Semitism, as evidenced by the Jan. 6 riots at the Capitol.

On the other hand, many scholars have criticized the Israeli state, underscoring its discriminatory and racist policies toward non-Jews. The controversial 2018 "nation-state bill," which reaffirms the Jewish character of the state and legalizes discriminatory policies against Palestinian citizens, is a clear manifestation of a racist law. Moreover, the fact that millions of Palestinians have been living under Israeli occupation for over 50 years without basic civil rights undermines the IHRA document’s assumption that Israel is a liberal democracy like all others.

It is therefore not surprising that concern about the IHRA definition has been growing. Professional associations, such as the British Society for Middle East Studies, student groups and more than 100 Palestinian and Arab academics and intellectuals have argued that the IHRA definition is being used to stifle not just criticism of Israel but also, and more widely, support for Palestinian rights. Roughly 200 international scholars working in anti-Semitism studies and related fields -- including Jewish, Holocaust, Israel, Palestine and Middle East studies -- just drafted the Jerusalem Declaration on Anti-Semitism, a new definition that responds to the IHRA one and is inspired by the 1948 Universal Declaration on Human Rights and the 1969 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. Their aim is twofold: 1) to strengthen the fight against anti-Semitism by clarifying what it is and how it is manifested and 2) to protect a space for an open debate about the vexed question of the future of Israel/Palestine. Meanwhile, 40 Jewish organizations including the fastest growing -- and explicitly anti-Zionist -- Jewish organization in the United States, Jewish Voice for Peace, have “unequivocally opposed” the IHRA definition, precisely because its focus on Israel gives the definition a “strong potential for misuse.”

Today, however, it's no longer a matter of potential misuse. That has become apparent even in colleges and universities, supposedly bastions of open intellectual and political debate. An article in The Conversation has traced how authorities have charged people who have criticized Israel with being anti-Semitic at several institutions in the United States where local jurisdictions have adopted the IHRA definition. There are currently ongoing investigations at Rutgers University, Duke University and the University of North Carolina, with another pending investigation at New York University. These attacks appear to be the harbinger of things to come. They are destructive not only for academic freedom but also for antiracist struggles on campuses.

In response, scores of Israeli academics working in the U.K. have written a letter denouncing the definition and called on university leaders to refuse the demand by Education Secretary Gavin Williamson to adopt the definition or face punitive action. As noted in an extensive report about anti-Semitism on campus from a working group at the University College of London: “The IHRA working definition is unhelpful in identifying cases of harassment … the core definition itself is too vague and narrow, and the 11 examples often do not match experience.” Based on this report, the university’s academic board recommended retracting the adoption of the definition and replacing it with one “fit for purpose.”

Considering that most universities have robust guidelines that prohibit racist or anti-Semitic utterances, the adoption of the IHRA definition does not add substantive content that might help reduce hate speech on campuses. Moreover, antiracist working groups within universities that we have spoken to are all vehemently against adopting the IHRA definition.

Even the primary author of the definition himself, Kenneth Stern, has declared that “right-wing Jews are weaponizing it,” nowhere more so than on college campuses. As he put it, the widespread use of the definition on campuses “will harm not only pro-Palestinian advocates but also Jewish students and faculty, and the academy itself.”

Why Is the Criticism Ignored?

Unfortunately, such critiques have barely dented the definition’s acceptance within the corridors of institutional power. Here are six major reasons why.

First, all of Israel’s governments, from 1948 until the present, have equated Israel with the Jewish people. The equation is based, however, on an empirical fallacy, since more than half of the worldwide Jewish population does not live in Israel, more than 20 percent of the country’s citizens are not Jews, and an additional five million stateless Palestinians live within the area that Israel controls. The conflation of Israel with all Jews has, in fact, been a core goal of Zionism from the start, and its success has led to a myopic focus on criticism of Israel as the main threat to Jews worldwide.

Second, the fact that the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance drafted the definition creates an immediate association with the Holocaust. That makes it exceedingly difficult to question the definition’s accuracy or motives.

Third, more than half a century of distorted media coverage of Israel has left the majority of Americans and many Europeans largely ignorant of Israel’s rights-abusive policies, helping to cast Israeli Jews as the eternal victims and Palestinians as aggressors. That has allowed the IHRA’s proponents to classify Israel as a liberal democracy when it's anything but for half the people living under its control, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.

Fourth, institutionalized Jewish life in the diaspora has, for over half a century, focused on supporting Israel. Thus, the IHRA definition serves the purposes of mainstream Jewish organizations quite well, especially when it comes to policing speech in the media and in cultural spheres as well as on college campuses. In this regard, it is not particularly surprising that 145 organizations representing a who’s who of right-wing Zionist groups sent a letter to Facebook’s Board of Directors, calling upon them to fully adopt the IHRA definition as the “cornerstone of Facebook’s hate speech policy regarding anti-Semitism.”

Fifth, while the IHRA document casts the definition as legally “nonbinding,” and therefore not capable of stifling free speech and academic freedom, it is packaged as especially relevant for law enforcement agencies and for “training police officials.” The impact of the document is thus clear: its “nonbinding” designation frames the definition as benign and distracts us from how it is being used to surveil and even criminalize critical speech about Israel.

The final and in many ways most important reason the IHRA definition has been widely adopted is that it allows conservative and even moderate political forces to discipline, silence and marginalize progressive voices against racism, poverty, the climate crisis, war and predatory capitalism. Palestinians have managed to globalize their struggle for self-determination, and progressives of different stripes has championed their cause over the years. Yet now if Black Lives Matter, climate, Indigenous or feminist activists voice support for the Palestinian cause while criticizing Israel, they can be branded anti-Semitic, which can, in effect, delegitimize the other progressive issues such activists support.

A Devil’s Bargain

The fact that the IHRA definition is being wielded as a weapon to suppress a variety of progressive causes and as a tool to punish activists who fail to dissociate from Palestine is also apparent on university campuses. If a recent opinion piece in Inside Higher Ed specifically cited the IHRA definition as “great … and readily available” for teaching about anti-Semitism in universities, the reality is that it isolates Jewish students who are concerned about social justice. Rakhel Silverman, national organizer for the group Judaism on Our Own Terms, or Joot (until recently known as Open Hillel) explained to us, “The official stance of Hillel against any collaboration with anti-Zionist or BDS-supporting (which is considered anti-Semitic according to the IHRA) groups on or off campus prevents Jewish students from working with other social and racial justice and interfaith groups, including progressive Jewish groups. We can't work to unite against white supremacy or engage with Black-Palestinian solidarity groups because these groups support BDS, even though many Jewish students support BDS as well.”

Ultimately, however, the IHRA definition is not only deployed as a weapon against progressives, but it also allows Israel to create alliances with anti-Semites. Indeed, the definition can be seen as playing a role in achieving one of Theodor Herzl's wishes, expressed in a June 12, 1895, diary entry, where he notes that a Jewish state would lead anti-Semites to “become our most dependable friends. The anti-Semitic countries our allies.” Once criticism of Israel becomes the primary marker of anti-Semitism, then the unquestioned support of American evangelicals for Israel is considered a blessing, even as anti-Jewish stereotypes remain prevalent among members of their communities, while Israel’s alliance with Europe's most illiberal and anti-Semitic governments (particularly Hungary's and Poland's) is considered ethically kosher.

Despite the incessant work of the pro-Israel lobby and the Israeli government, this kind of devil's bargain will not end up benefiting Jews, particularly those in the diaspora. Only the most honest and robust debate about Israel and Zionism, on campus as well as more broadly, will ensure Jewish students and the wider Jewish community are truly protected from anti-Semitism and can participate most fully in the struggles for social, racial, economic and climate justice that have finally been foregrounded today.






Bottom line: Einstein, Sidney Hook, and Hannah Arendt were NOT anti-Semite. Same with those who subscribed to or supported their work.

[Matnum PI]

Begin died in '92. All those people are dead. Of course they remain unapologetic to this day. they're dead. Irgun did terrible things. Some might say for good reasons but still did terrible things none the less. That was Irgun. Herut and Likud were and are nothing like Irgun. One was a organization that committed terrorist acts. The latter two are political parties. They didn't just change their name. They changed. Dramatically. Which is why your question doesn't make sense. Your question isn't a question. It's a factually incorrect attack.

[a fan]

Since no one will give me a direct answer to my query, I'll take that as a concession that the critics here refuse to condemn Herut/Likud and I will move on to a subject that we did not settle. And that's the matter of condemning Israel's evils as being equated with anti-Semitism which is another bogus claim made by Islamophobes.

Enjoy your "conversation" with yourself, Brookie. I've seen this playbook before in Ann Arbor.

I'll pay attention when you detail, at length, all the atrocities committed against the Jewish people.

Until then? You're just gonna keep right on acting like the Jewish people are insane, and are defending themselves for no reason.

This is what your team does. You're a HUGE part of the problem, Brookie, and a reason why there is never going to be peace.

[lagerhead]

Black September Munich ‘72
Palestine Liberation Front ‘85 Leon Klingjoffer

Innocents.

Just putting it out there

[Kismet]

Some takeaways from today's shoot-down of multiple Iranian supplied cruise missiles & drones, fired from W Yemen by Houthi rebels, by the USS Carney operating in the Red Sea.

https://news.usni.org/2023/10/19/u-s-de ... s-pentagon

-- the 2 largest ships of the Baatan amphib group(ARG) had been operating in the Persian Gulf. They departed the Gulf & were last reported in the Red Sea. It was surprising that they had no escorts to protect them from air attack.
-- there is speculation that they will either transit Suez & join the Ford strike group currently in the E Med near Israel, or they might pull into the S Israel port of Eliat (accessible from the Red Sea) & offload the 26th MEU (Marine Expeditionary Unit) there.
-- the Carney is one of our oldest destroyers. She is one of our 4 destroyers homeported in Rota, Spain for Euro ballistic missile defense. She was not reported as part of the Ford strike group. She just transited Suez into the Red Sea on Wed, just in time to be in range to bring down those targets over the Red Sea, while the Baatan ARG was in transit, within range.
-- given the range of the Houthi weapons vs the distance from the launch point in W Yemen to potential targets in Israel, it's not unreasonable speculation to wonder if the unescorted Baatan ARG was their target.
-- it only required SM-2 missiles to bring down these targets. The SM-2 is the least capable standard missile we deploy. All our destroyers & cruisers all carry the SM-3 &/or SM-6 longer range missiles capable of ballistic missile defense.
-- when the Ike joins the Ford we'll have 8 destroyers & cruisers in the E Med + however many of our other 4 Rota based destroyers join the Carney.
-- The command ship USS Mount Whitney just departed homeport of Gaeta, Italy, with the Commander 6th Fleet & battle staff embarked, to join the growing strike group in the E Med. I think the last time this happened was in 2011 for Libyan operations.
-- this is the largest naval force in the Med in my recent memory.
-- Israel could be targeted by Iran & proxies along multiple axes, from N to S.

uh oh - Reports today the Eisenhower strike group will now deploy to Central Command Area which includes Red Sea and Persian Gulf ad NOT to the Eastern Med as previously announced.
https://www.13newsnow.com/article/news/ ... 69b028de41

https://news.usni.org/2023/10/23/uss-dw ... iddle-east

[Brooklyn]

Since no one will give me a direct answer to my query, I'll take that as a concession that the critics here refuse to condemn Herut/Likud and I will move on to a subject that we did not settle. And that's the matter of condemning Israel's evils as being equated with anti-Semitism which is another bogus claim made by Islamophobes.

Enjoy your "conversation" with yourself, Brookie. I've seen this playbook before in Ann Arbor.

I'll pay attention when you detail, at length, all the atrocities committed against the Jewish people.

Until then? You're just gonna keep right on acting like the Jewish people are insane, and are defending themselves for no reason.

This is what your team does. You're a HUGE part of the problem, Brookie, and a reason why there is never going to be peace.

Nah, it's the opposite obviously. You're the problem. You want a war but won't have to fight it and can watch all the blood shed from the comforts of your living room while you spend the day counting your war profits.

I've called enough times for the one state solution in order to stop all the trouble but it gets ignored by trouble makers like yourself who delight in death and war profits.

No surprise. It's the same pattern we saw in LP back in the day.


We, the patriots want peace. But our efforts have all been in vain as you warmongers continue to get your way.

Here's a good read on the subject:





Peace Dividends? Not in Our Lifetimes
War is America's Growth Stock

by William J. Astore Posted onOctober 23, 2023
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission.

When the Soviet Union fell in 1991, America heard something about “peace dividends” and “a new world order.” With the Soviet Union gone, the Cold War over, America could take all the hundreds of billions it had been spending on weapons and wars and spend it instead on America. We could, in theory, embrace peace, reinvest in America, and save our children from a world of incessant wars and preparations for the same.

It was not to be.

The collapse of the Soviet Union coincided with Desert Shield/Storm, when America allegedly kicked its “Vietnam Syndrome” once and for all, according to then-President George H.W. Bush. This “syndrome” was allegedly inhibiting America’s pursuit of righteous victory through military means, and the expulsion of Iraqi forces from Kuwait was allegedly proof that America was back and that military force had powerful efficacy for good.

Out went the idea of peace dividends. This was America’s moment to dominate, a Pax Americana achieved through military force or threats of the same. U.S. dominance of the Middle East contributed to the decision by Al Qaeda to launch attacks against the USA, but any U.S. culpability for 9/11 was swept away by another President Bush, George W., who explained that Al Qaeda had no rationale for 9/11 other than their hatred of American freedoms.

The aftermath of 9/11 was an orgy of American violence directed against “evildoers” everywhere. It was a two-decade global war on terror, GWOT as jihad, leading to wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and elsewhere. Even as these wars proved disastrous, those who advocated for them saluted themselves as being right but (perhaps) for the wrong reason, the “wrong” reason being some version of having loved America too much, whereas those who’d opposed these wars were “wrong” even though events had proven them to be right (they were wrong apparently because they didn’t love America enough, especially its domineering government).

It’s been a long time, more than three decades, since I’ve heard anyone mention peace dividends. Even when President Biden ended the Afghan War in 2021, military spending soared upwards, and this was before the Russia-Ukraine War. With the Hamas attacks on Israel and the impending invasion and destruction of Gaza by the IDF, America will likely embrace war and increase military spending with even more fervor.

War is America’s growth stock. Our politicians brag that military aid to countries like Ukraine and Israel serves to create jobs in America. Rarely is any mention made of Russian dead, of Palestinian dead, or for that matter of any dead, as America dominates the global trade in weaponry. The idea of “the merchants of death,” the opposition by the U.S. Senate in the 1930s to making profits by killing people, seems like ancient history, seems absurd, given America’s tight embrace of militarism. If we’re not fighting wars we’re arming others to fight wars. And we console ourselves that we’re only providing “good guys” with guns, for, as the NRA taught us, the only way to stop bad guys with guns is to give good guys even more guns.

Perhaps that’s the essence of U.S. foreign policy today. We give “good guys” like Ukrainians and Israelis all the guns they want to go kill “bad guys” like Russians and Palestinians while congratulating ourselves for “investing” in America’s arms manufactures. Indeed, members of Congress have said that providing older weapons from U.S. stockpiles of the same to countries like Ukraine is positively wonderful, since it forces the U.S. military to buy new weapons for itself, helping to create more jobs among the makers of guns, ammo, and bombs. What a win-win!

Lately I’ve been reading a lot about President Lyndon Johnson and how his “Great Society” and fight against poverty was done in by the calamitous Vietnam War in the 1960s. What’s tragic today in America is that we no longer have a vision of a great society, a better society, a fairer, more just, and more equitable society. Endless war and wildly excessive military expenditures is our only vision.

The result is that “peace” has become a word rarely heard in America, a Pollyanna-like concept, easily dismissed as pie-in-the-sky. In fact, the last U.S. president to speak sincerely and powerfully for peace was John F. Kennedy, and that was sixty years ago. No president since JFK has stood before us to advance a vision of eventual world peace rather than of endless war and expensive preparations for the same.

We are told and taught today that peace is impossible and war is inevitable. Those who promote peace are dismissed as dreamers and weaklings as the “warriors” and hawks are promoted for their alleged realism and toughness.

Constant wars and preparations for the same destroy democracy and lead to spiritual death, to cite the words of James Madison and Martin Luther King Jr. Those are the true dividends of war, not jobs in American factories producing bullets and bombs. The true dividends of peace are a restoration of democracy and spiritual renewal in America.

Which dividends as a people do we truly want?

William J. Astore is a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF). He taught history for fifteen years at military and civilian schools. He writes at Bracing Views.








link: https://original.antiwar.com/William_As ... lifetimes/



This is the real reason why we never have peace. For those of you who still insist on having more war and genocide, when your children come home in pine boxes, there blood will be in your hands, not mine. I called for peace, you did not.

[a fan]

Since no one will give me a direct answer to my query, I'll take that as a concession that the critics here refuse to condemn Herut/Likud and I will move on to a subject that we did not settle. And that's the matter of condemning Israel's evils as being equated with anti-Semitism which is another bogus claim made by Islamophobes.

Enjoy your "conversation" with yourself, Brookie. I've seen this playbook before in Ann Arbor.

I'll pay attention when you detail, at length, all the atrocities committed against the Jewish people.

Until then? You're just gonna keep right on acting like the Jewish people are insane, and are defending themselves for no reason.

This is what your team does. You're a HUGE part of the problem, Brookie, and a reason why there is never going to be peace.

Nah, it's the opposite obviously. You're the problem. You want a war but won't have to fight it and can watch all the blood shed from the comforts of your living room while you spend the day counting your war profits.

I've called enough times for the one state solution in order to stop all the trouble but it gets ignored by trouble makers like yourself who delight in death and war profits

Your "solution" is to eliminate the Jewish People from the region, and have Israel run by Muslims----"One State", pushing out all Jewish people.

Murder every last Jewish person-----and when they're all gone. You'll have "your peace". That's your "plan".

Told ya, fellas. I've heard these folks a million times. They come telling us they care about the Palestinians...they don't. They just want the Jewish people out of Israel. That's all this is about. It's why they never blame any Muslims for any part of this mess, and why he won't type the word "Hamas". For him, Hamas are the good guys.