War in the Middle East, again

[rotting bones]

Not in words, but you did immediately switched the topic to the safety of Palestinians. I’m certain you meant no harm from it — and of course it goes without saying that they deserve to feel 100% safe too, and any attacks on them are atrocious — but when everyone does this all the time, it does give me some idea about where people’s sympathies lie.

A lot of this is due to the fact that Palestinians are long-suffering victims who have been misrepresented in recent media. The Left is based on the idea that we can push for freedom from oppression beyond the traditional logic where one tribe only gains when another loses. The Left would happily implode before abandoning the Jewish community.

That being said, perhaps I’ve been more strongly affected by the way events have played out in my own city of Sydney. When I get the time later today, maybe I’ll write a bit more about that.

There were protesters explicitly shouting for slaughter outside the Opera House a few days ago, if I recall? Or was that just clickbait?

No, it’s true. I’ll write more about the whole sick story later.

Atrocious. This is what comes of theory-free identity politics. People say they want freedom from ideology, but what if the result is full-blown fascism?

[bradrn]

So, in more detail, the whole sorry saga:

• On the evening of the pogrom, the Sydney Opera House was lit up in the colours of Israel — a nice gesture, though only symbolic.
• The same evening, Palestinian groups set up protests in major Australian cities (at least Sydney and Melbourne, not sure about elsewhere).
• Upon learning of the Opera House lighting, the Sydney protest asked for permission to move their location from Town Hall to the Opera House. Astonishingly, this request was approved.
• The Palestinian protesters begin to march to the Opera House. Around the same time, a police advisory goes out: Jews are urged to avoid the city center.
• Once the protesters reach the Opera House, they set off flares, and chant for our slaughter in terms I don’t care to repeat on this forum.
• Midway through the protest, one person dares to briefly unfurl an Israeli flag. He is immediately arrested (‘for his own safety’). Meanwhile, a week on, the police say they still can’t track down the people who called for murder — despite a heavy police presence at the protest itself.

So, there we have it: the Opera House may be lit up in Israeli colours, but people on its steps still scream that we should be gassed, showing the Israeli flag results in instant arrest, and Jews are the ones who are requested to leave the city. Honestly, it’s this last point which bothers me the most — I’ve long gotten used to the idea that people want me dead, but to have Australian bodies backing them up is new and disquieting. (I suspect if they had instead asked Muslims to avoid the city center, there would have been near-riots, and furious write-ups in all the major papers.)

To his credit, our Premier seems embarrassed by the whole affair, and has done his best to avoid this happening again. Other Palestinian protests have been denied since then, and a (thankfully peaceful) gathering in the city last weekend was attended by huge numbers of police. Nonetheless, it continues — people have been threatened and spat on merely for showing the Israeli flag. When I leave home, I am constantly on edge in a way which I never thought I would have to experience in this country.

[rotting bones]

So, in more detail, the whole sorry saga:

• On the evening of the pogrom, the Sydney Opera House was lit up in the colours of Israel — a nice gesture, though only symbolic.
• The same evening, Palestinian groups set up protests in major Australian cities (at least Sydney and Melbourne, not sure about elsewhere).
• Upon learning of the Opera House lighting, the Sydney protest asked for permission to move their location from Town Hall to the Opera House. Astonishingly, this request was approved.
• The Palestinian protesters begin to march to the Opera House. Around the same time, a police advisory goes out: Jews are urged to avoid the city center.
• Once the protesters reach the Opera House, they set off flares, and chant for our slaughter in terms I don’t care to repeat on this forum.
• Midway through the protest, one person dares to briefly unfurl an Israeli flag. He is immediately arrested (‘for his own safety’). Meanwhile, a week on, the police say they still can’t track down the people who called for murder — despite a heavy police presence at the protest itself.

So, there we have it: the Opera House may be lit up in Israeli colours, but people on its steps still scream that we should be gassed, showing the Israeli flag results in instant arrest, and Jews are the ones who are requested to leave the city. Honestly, it’s this last point which bothers me the most — I’ve long gotten used to the idea that people want me dead, but to have Australian bodies backing them up is new and disquieting. (I suspect if they had instead asked Muslims to avoid the city center, there would have been near-riots, and furious write-ups in all the major papers.)

To his credit, our Premier seems embarrassed by the whole affair, and has done his best to avoid this happening again. Other Palestinian protests have been denied since then, and a (thankfully peaceful) gathering in the city last weekend was attended by huge numbers of police. Nonetheless, it continues — people have been threatened and spat on merely for showing the Israeli flag.

Again, atrocious. This language is completely unacceptable.

You might be conflating Jews with Israelis (Edit: And, specifically, Zionists) and Muslims with Palestinians though. I'm always suspicious of whether the people calling for Jews to be "wiped out" are religious Muslims. Muhammad, bad as he was, only exiled them from Medina after a war. If the People of the Book doctrine doesn't convince you, it seems impossible to reconcile collective extermination with Islamic tradition: https://www.abuaminaelias.com/dailyhadi ... phet-ants/

Muslims and non-Muslims alike might be shocked when I say this in the 21st century, but Islam has historically seen itself as the bleeding-heart religion extraordinaire. Muslims have always considered people who are moved to tears by misfortune as the most saintly. In early Islamic history, the Muslims who perpetrated acts of wanton cruelty did not usually see themselves as particularly religious. E.g. The Umayyad Caliphate was ruled by notorious disbelievers. I think what happened in later times is that the most marginalized regions became the most religious, and they were also hit by the most traumatic policy consequences. Trauma tends to erase compassion.

In the global policy context, I haven't seen any serious proposals calling for Israel ceasing to exist. However, I have seen serious proposals calling for the eventual abolition of Palestine.

When I leave home, I am constantly on edge in a way which I never thought I would have to experience in this country.

TBH I have felt this way for a while now.

[malloc]

Muslims and non-Muslims alike might be shocked when I say this in the 21st century, but Islam has historically seen itself as the bleeding-heart religion extraordinaire. Muslims have always considered people who are moved to tears by misfortune as the most saintly. In early Islamic history, the Muslims who perpetrated acts of wanton cruelty did not usually see themselves as particularly religious. E.g. The Umayyad Caliphate was ruled by notorious disbelievers. I think what happened in later times is that the most marginalized regions became the most religious, and they were also hit by the most traumatic policy consequences. Trauma tends to erase compassion.

Shocking indeed. Islam has always struck me as especially combative compared with other religious traditions. Based on everything I have read, it seems like Islam has consistently valorized physical courage and struggle and made warfare an important part of its praxis. Compare the fierce struggle of the Palestinians with the frequent invocation of pacifism by American civil rights leaders, for instance. Plenty of anticolonial movements had their militant wings, of course, but few seem comparable to Islamist organizations in terms of sheer ferocity. Whenever did Nelson Mandela call for the extermination of all Dutch people in retaliation for Dutch colonization of his homeland?

Putting it another way, I have always been quite honestly conflicted regarding Islam in general and the Palestinian struggle specifically despite otherwise falling staunchly on the left. While acknowledging the destruction wrought by Western colonialism and Israeli settlement, I find it hard to overlook the incredible violence of many Islamic movements. From the draconian nature of sharia to the massacre of Charlie Hebdo cartoonists to Hamas killing civilians today, the sheer amount of bloodshed gives me pause. Certainly there are contexts where violence is unfortunately necessary, but how does massacring satirical cartoonists or beheading infants advance the cause of emancipation?

[bradrn]

You might be conflating Jews with Israelis (Edit: And, specifically, Zionists)

No, I’m not. You can look up what they said yourself. (The chants have been recently mentioned in Parliament, so should be easy enough to find.)

[rotting bones]

You might be conflating Jews with Israelis (Edit: And, specifically, Zionists)

No, I’m not. You can look up what they said yourself. (The chants have been recently mentioned in Parliament, so should be easy enough to find.)

I know some of them wanted to "wipe out" all Jews. These people definitely exist. This is one of the reasons I want Hamas to die.

I'm just hoping they're not representative of Palestinians, let alone Muslims.

[Man in Space]

You might be conflating Jews with Israelis (Edit: And, specifically, Zionists)

No, I’m not. You can look up what they said yourself. (The chants have been recently mentioned in Parliament, so should be easy enough to find.)

I know some of them wanted to "wipe out" all Jews. These people definitely exist. This is one of the reasons I want Hamas to die.

I'm just hoping they're not representative of Palestinians, let alone Muslims.

They didn’t just say they wanted to “wipe out” the Jews. I’ll not repeat it, but I will phrase it like this:

They wanted to repeat what happened in World War II.

[rotting bones]

Shocking indeed. Islam has always struck me as especially combative compared with other religious traditions. Based on everything I have read, it seems like Islam has consistently valorized physical courage and struggle and made warfare an important part of its praxis. Compare the fierce struggle of the Palestinians with the frequent invocation of pacifism by American civil rights leaders, for instance. Plenty of anticolonial movements had their militant wings, of course, but few seem comparable to Islamist organizations in terms of sheer ferocity. Whenever did Nelson Mandela call for the extermination of all Dutch people in retaliation for Dutch colonization of his homeland?

Putting it another way, I have always been quite honestly conflicted regarding Islam in general and the Palestinian struggle specifically despite otherwise falling staunchly on the left. While acknowledging the destruction wrought by Western colonialism and Israeli settlement, I find it hard to overlook the incredible violence of many Islamic movements. From the draconian nature of sharia to the massacre of Charlie Hebdo cartoonists to Hamas killing civilians today, the sheer amount of bloodshed gives me pause. Certainly there are contexts where violence is unfortunately necessary, but how does massacring satirical cartoonists or beheading infants advance the cause of emancipation?

Another shocking fact about the history of ideas is that Marxists have always argued against "anarchist terrorism", which Marxists believe are a consequence of anarchist individualism. A systemic understanding, Marxists argued, reserves the potential for violence for cases where victory is possible. This is why a lot of radical leftists are fed up with Marxists always saying, "not yet."

Mainstream Islam opposes people taking the law into your own hands. Despite all the rhetoric against homosexuality, Islamic law requires multiple witnesses for punishing it. The people who disagree with the rule of law belong to the Kharijite heresy, a sect of religious anarchists in early Islam. Something in Islamic messaging always motivates idiots to reinvent it anew.

Note that the hadith on the ants I cited belongs to the highest possible degree of authenticity. More hadiths on cruelty: https://www.abuaminaelias.com/dailyhadi ... l-jawwazh/

Not that these protesters would care. If you're a materialist, you ought to realize that "tradition" and "ethics" are misdirections obscuring the true workings of power. For many "Muslims", these hadiths are shields to hide behind as they continue their depredations. This is why I think religious revitalization is dangerous. Not because I support cruelty. I don't. I just think it can only be reduced by systemic changes, and traditional religion makes it difficult to understand this. If you are against cruelty and you support a Caliphate, then you oppose yourself without knowing it.

[zompist]

Muslims and non-Muslims alike might be shocked when I say this in the 21st century, but Islam has historically seen itself as the bleeding-heart religion extraordinaire. Muslims have always considered people who are moved to tears by misfortune as the most saintly. In early Islamic history, the Muslims who perpetrated acts of wanton cruelty did not usually see themselves as particularly religious. E.g. The Umayyad Caliphate was ruled by notorious disbelievers. I think what happened in later times is that the most marginalized regions became the most religious, and they were also hit by the most traumatic policy consequences. Trauma tends to erase compassion.

Which regions are you considering marginalized? Overall, over the last millennium, the most powerful Muslim states were Turkey and Persia, which tended I think to be the most cosmopolitan. (The Mughals weren't powerful for as long; they were a mixed bag.) The modern Islamic fundamentalist movements start with the Wahhabis in eastern Arabia, which were pretty marginalized before oil was discovered.

But a lot depends on perspective. By European standards the (premodern) Islamic states were tolerant: e.g. you'd rather be a Jew or Christian in an Islamic states than a Jew or a Muslim in a Christian one. But there wasn't exactly the modern notion of freedom of thought. I recall reading that Omar Khayyam (in his philosophy books, not his poetry) was very careful to avoid certain religious questions.

[rotting bones]

They didn’t just say they wanted to “wipe out” the Jews. I’ll not repeat it, but I will phrase it like this:

They wanted to repeat what happened in World War II.

I would not be averse to insulting these people as racially inferior Untermensch.

[rotting bones]

Which regions are you considering marginalized? Overall, over the last millennium, the most powerful Muslim states were Turkey and Persia, which tended I think to be the most cosmopolitan. (The Mughals weren't powerful for as long; they were a mixed bag.) The modern Islamic fundamentalist movements start with the Wahhabis in eastern Arabia, which were pretty marginalized before oil was discovered.

But a lot depends on perspective. By European standards the (premodern) Islamic states were tolerant: e.g. you'd rather be a Jew or Christian in an Islamic states than a Jew or a Muslim in a Christian one. But there wasn't exactly the modern notion of freedom of thought. I recall reading that Omar Khayyam (in his philosophy books, not his poetry) was very careful to avoid certain religious questions.

I would say that practically the entire Muslim world has been marginalized to some extent or other by the end of the colonial period. Notice how one of the least marginalized, Turkey, is also one of the least fundamentalist. One of the most marginalized, Afghanistan, is one of the most.

[malloc]

Mainstream Islam opposes people taking the law into your own hands. Despite all the rhetoric against homosexuality, Islamic law requires multiple witnesses for punishing it. The people who disagree with the rule of law belong to the Kharijite heresy, a sect of religious anarchists in early Islam. Something in Islamic messaging always motivates idiots to reinvent it anew.

Sure but plenty of states governed by Islamic law currently exist and they routinely execute people for homosexuality. None of the red tape or injunctions against cruelty you describe stops Iranian authorities from executing people for everything from homosexuality to drinking alcohol.

[rotting bones]

Sure but plenty of states governed by Islamic law currently exist and they routinely execute people for homosexuality. None of the red tape or injunctions against cruelty you describe stops Iranian authorities from executing people for everything from homosexuality to drinking alcohol.

Iran's legal system follows a different Shia code called the Jafari fiqh. What I know about it is that it's very extreme. E.g. IIRC it says that Muslims become ritually unclean from contact with non-Muslims, which I don't believe any Sunni fiqh says.

Besides, Islamic fiqh was a legal system people came up with in the middle ages. What do you expect? All Islamic law is definitely homophobic. It is only more accepting of homosexuality relative to Christianity, which did not require multiple witnesses to testify. Before relatively recent times, the Christian stereotype of Muslims is that they were all homos. There is surviving gay poetry from Muslim countries disguised as Sufi poems that address Allah as The Beloved.

Muslims can imagine they oppose cruelty all they like. That doesn't change the fact that the Islamic legal system doesn't achieve that goal. The point is that all religious conservatism is cruel. The Islamic world is cruel because it's conservative.

PS. I heard Iran became Shia for the same general reason England became Protestant. It had something to do with divorce proceedings.

PPS. Also, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard is frankly not very traditional in its methods.

[keenir]

Sure but plenty of states governed by Islamic law currently exist and they routinely execute people for homosexuality. None of the red tape or injunctions against cruelty you describe stops Iranian authorities from executing people for everything from homosexuality to drinking alcohol.

Probably for the same reason that Christian fundamentalists cite Biblical laws when they attack witches and gays -- yet the fundies have no problem wearing mixed fabrics.

Iran's legal system follows a different Shia code called the Jafari fiqh. What I know about it is that it's very extreme. E.g. IIRC it says that Muslims become ritually unclean from contact with non-Muslims, which I don't believe any Sunni fiqh says.

Muslims can imagine they oppose cruelty all they like. That doesn't change the fact that the Islamic legal system doesn't achieve that goal.

Except you can't simply say "the Islamic legal system"...not just because there is no one single system, but also because you yourself admitted as much - bolded above.

PS. I heard Iran became Shia for the same general reason England became Protestant. It had something to do with divorce proceedings.

In terms of the ruling classes, I believe it was a way to rally the populace beneath a single banner, for war against the Ottomans. (who had courts for four different Islamic legal systems, as well as courts for their other faiths' adherents)

[Linguoboy]

Not in words, but you did immediately switched the topic to the safety of Palestinians. I’m certain you meant no harm from it — and of course it goes without saying that they deserve to feel 100% safe too, and any attacks on them are atrocious — but when everyone does this all the time, it does give me some idea about where people’s sympathies lie.

I'm always worried for the safety of my Jewish friends. They're never entirely safe even in the best of times and situations like these have a tendency of turning up the background anti-Semitism of society to the point that they become decidedly less so. I'm also used to worrying about the safety of my Muslim and Middle Eastern friends. What is disturbing and novel in this situation is seeing innocents targeted specifically on the basis of being Palestinian. I don't recall encountering that before in my lifetime, which probably means others haven't either, and I think that's worth drawing attention to, because--at least in this country--we're not attuned to it in the same way we are more generalised anti-Semitism or Islamophobia.

[Travis B.]

Not in words, but you did immediately switched the topic to the safety of Palestinians. I’m certain you meant no harm from it — and of course it goes without saying that they deserve to feel 100% safe too, and any attacks on them are atrocious — but when everyone does this all the time, it does give me some idea about where people’s sympathies lie.

I'm always worried for the safety of my Jewish friends. They're never entirely safe even in the best of times and situations like these have a tendency of turning up the background anti-Semitism of society to the point that they become decidedly less so. I'm also used to worrying about the safety of my Muslim and Middle Eastern friends. What is disturbing and novel in this situation is seeing innocents targeted specifically on the basis of being Palestinian. I don't recall encountering that before in my lifetime, which probably means others haven't either, and I think that's worth drawing attention to, because--at least in this country--we're not attuned to it in the same way we are more generalised anti-Semitism or Islamophobia.

Does your average bigot make a difference between Palestinians and non-Palestinian Arabs or Muslims though? They seem perfectly willing to confuse Sikhs with them simply based on headgear and the typical color of their skin (re: the Oak Creek gurdwara massacre).

[malloc]

Admittedly, my impression of Islam is heavily colored by the fact that 9/11 happened when I was only thirteen and just beginning to understand politics and global issues. I understand on an intellectual level that Al-Qaeda does not represent Islam in general and judging the religion based on one crime is unfair. Yet it also feels like Islamic terrorism has contributed heavily to the background noise of politics for as long as I can remember. All the major examples of religious terrorism I recall over the past few decades have come from Islamic organizations. Regardless of my leftist position in general, I genuinely struggle to avoid the impression that Islam is especially combative compared with other religious traditions.

[keenir]

Yet it also feels like Islamic terrorism has contributed heavily to the background noise of politics for as long as I can remember. All the major examples of religious terrorism I recall over the past few decades have come from Islamic organizations.

Do the attacks in Japan by various small religions/cults count as religious terrorism or just terrorism? Ditto the various IRA & UVF groups.

[Travis B.]

Admittedly, my impression of Islam is heavily colored by the fact that 9/11 happened when I was only thirteen and just beginning to understand politics and global issues. I understand on an intellectual level that Al-Qaeda does not represent Islam in general and judging the religion based on one crime is unfair. Yet it also feels like Islamic terrorism has contributed heavily to the background noise of politics for as long as I can remember. All the major examples of religious terrorism I recall over the past few decades have come from Islamic organizations. Regardless of my leftist position in general, I genuinely struggle to avoid the impression that Islam is especially combative compared with other religious traditions.

Don't forget terrorism by white supremacists and other far right-wingers too, though, ranging from the massacre in El Paso to the Christchurch mosque mass murders to the "Unite the Right" car attack.

[Travis B.]

Yet it also feels like Islamic terrorism has contributed heavily to the background noise of politics for as long as I can remember. All the major examples of religious terrorism I recall over the past few decades have come from Islamic organizations.

Do the attacks in Japan by various small religions/cults count as religious terrorism or just terrorism? Ditto the various IRA & UVF groups.

I would consider the Irish republican versus the British gov't and Ulster loyalist fighting to be a mixture of a low-intensity civil war of sorts (the main reason to not consider it a civil war is that it did not reach the statistic of 1000+ dead per year to officially qualify as a "war") and just plain gangster activity, considering that the Provisional IRA in many ways functioned like a combatant in a civil war while most of the other republican groups plus practically all of the loyalist groups functioned more like organized crime groups than combatants. (If I recall correctly, the loyalist groups killed more other loyalists than actual members of the Provisional IRA.)