“Will Florida be able
to handle that demand?
Alabama, Arizona, & Tennessee
have also banned artificial meat.”

dildos’re
obviously
next in line.

speakin' of:

Smokin' Joe
BLEW it when
he Failed to ack-
nowledge the Nazis
who ATTACKED those
PEACEFUL PROTESTERS.

damn.
I shouldda
Seen this one
coming. You were
Right xina as per Usual.

One of these things is not like the other:

“Evergreen State College says it will divest:”

“Evergreen State College agreed to explore divestment…”

Just in case anyone was harboring any hopes about divestment actually happening, reading the link should dash those hopes nicely:

“Evergreen school administrators will review whether to change any study abroad programs or investments as a result of the memorandum, Hayes said.”

Feel the walk-back!

(On the flip side, if Evergreen College students can continue studying abroad in the Middle East, they might actually learn something about the place…)

So President Biden said that we shouldn't tolerate anti-Semitic attacks, protesters shouldn't break stuff, and rejected the GOP call to deploy the national guard on college campuses.

Geez what a fascist. I can see why the Undergraduate Anger Brigade is angry.

"Additionally,
the college [TESC]
agreed to publicly call for a ceasefire."

I guess that's Better than
Raising tuition to help
Nutnyahoo with his
little Genocide on
the Palestinians.

What’s happening in Texas is an assault on American democracy
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/05/02/opinions/university-of-texas-at-austin-dei-israel-gaza-protests-joseph/index.html

Eric Adams under pressure to divulge details on ‘outside agitators’ at campus protests
The New York City mayor has claimed police arrested protesters after non-student elements escalated the situation
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/02/eric-adams-columbia-protests

How pervasive is antisemitism on US campuses? A look at the language of the protests
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/03/college-gaza-protests-antisemitism

“on the lamb”? you sure about that? you sure about that? please hire an experienced editor at this paper.

@5: From the last link:

‘The day before the police shut down the protests [at Columbia University], pro-Palestinian students led marches around the heart of the campus chanting “Brick by brick, wall by wall, Israel will fall” and “We don’t want no two state, we will take all of it”. Others led with a variation on the popular but contentious “river to the sea” slogan: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be Arab.”‘

Thirty-five years ago, during the anti-apartheid movement on US college campuses, there was no expectation South Africa would cease to be a sovereign state; just that apartheid would go away, and basic respect for universal human rights would replace it. Today’s protestors seem to have lost that idea.

Wow, Evergreen agreed to call for a ceasefire! Way to hold their feet to the fire, kids.

Is there anyone who doesn't want a ceasefire? I mean besides Hamas?

Biden did not condemn the protesters. He condemned violence and vandalism. Maybe you could have taken two minutes to listen to his actual statement before writing something that is not only false but inflammatory.

Sister Souljah Moment impending in 3,2,1...

Why not just grab a couple of the plentifully abundant sea lions from the SF bay and airlift them up onto the Snoqualmie Trail to hunt down the zebra? Sometimes the best solutions are also the most obvious ones.

@12
Obviously!

“Violent protest
is not protected;
peaceful protest is.”

how ‘bout when
Peaceful* protesters’re
Attacked by violent ones Joe?
you’ve left them outta your critique

see: UCLA pro-Genocide Rioters
attack peaceful protesters
whilst Po-po kick back
& Enjoy the Show

why do you give Nazis a Free Pass?

your fealty to AIPAC
(and bibi)’ve clouded
your good Judgement

maybe you shouldda
just kept Quiet.

*breaking shit’ll
NEVER Help
your Just
Cause

“People Could Have Died”:
Police Raid UCLA Gaza Protest,
Waited as Pro-Israel Mob Attacked Encampment

We get an update from the University of California, Los Angeles, where police in riot gear began dismantling a pro-Palestinian encampment early Thursday, using flashbang grenades, rubber bullets and tear gas, and arresting dozens of students.

The raid came just over a day after pro-Israel counterprotesters armed with sticks, metal rods and fireworks attacked students at the encampment.

The Real News Network reporter Mel Buer was on the scene during the attack. She describes seeing counterprotesters provoke students, yelling slurs and bludgeoning them with parts of the encampment’s barricade, and says the attack lasted several hours without police or security intervention.

”UCLA is complicit in violence inflicted upon protesters,” wrote the editorial board of UCLA’s campus newspaper, the Daily Bruin, the next day.

Four of the paper’s student journalists were targeted and assaulted by counterprotesters while covering the protests.

We speak with Shaanth Kodialam Nanguneri, one of the student journalists, who says one of their colleagues was hospitalized over the assault, while campus security officers “were nowhere to be found.”

Meanwhile, UCLA’s chapter of Faculty for Justice in Palestine has called on faculty to refuse university labor Thursday in protest of the administration’s failure to protect students from what it termed “Zionist mobs.”

Professor Gaye Theresa Johnson, a member of UCLA Faculty for Justice in Palestine, denounces the administration’s response to nonviolent protest and says she sees the events as part of a major sea change in the politicization of American youth.

“This is a movement.
It cannot be unseen.
It cannot be put
back in the
box.”

https://www.democracynow.org/2024/5/2/ucla_pro_israel_counterprotesters_attack_campus

as bibi calls
Hamas an Existenitial
Threat so too does the MAGA
view Progressives & Anti-Genociders

and Uncle Joe
never even Bothered
to call Out the Zionist Mobs

why on Earth is Uncle
Joe handing ’24
over to tfg djt?

Yes, Pro-Palestinian protesters were very, very peacefully marching in America’s largest city — one with a large Jewish population — and peacefully chanting eliminationist slogans against Israel. All very peaceful; how dare Columbia clear such wonderfully peace-loving protesters out of its campus?

I mean, their logic is impeccable: if Israel no longer exists, then there simply cannot be a Palestinian-Israeli conflict, can there?

That is the peace they want.

@16

oooh lookit That!

tS's Pro-Genocider's
here to Lecture us on
Peace. wot's next, lessons
on "Morality," Wormtongue?

whilst Awesome Capitalists
Sociopaths make for
Horrific Rulers and
piss-poor advisors

Remember:
Winner
Takes
ALL.

BTW, Nat, it probably IS a coincidence.

Have you ever met a Boeing employee? They don't have the skills required to give a whistleblower "breathing problems", then Pneumonia and then a MRSA leading to their death. And why bother? What's any one whistleblower going to say? Assembly got sloppy? We already know that.

@17: What, nothing about how the eliminationist chants on Columbia University’s campus were all the work of “Agents Provocateurs,” because REAL pro-Palestinian protesters would never make eliminationist statements against Israel (cough cough xina cough)?

Everyone who commits assault should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, full stop. But don’t cover for eliminationist speech, and then act outraged if someone actually takes it as a threat.

Bernie Sanders' response to Biden's BS is excellent. It's pretty pathetic that a senator has to tell the POTUS to read the GD Constitution of the United States.

Biden clearly DGAF about huge swaths of demographics that are NOT going to vote for him, so I doubt he cares about what Senator Sanders had to say, but at least Sanders said it.

It is especially pertinent that Sanders goes on, in detail, about how none of this is antisemitic and how Netanyahu is committing serious crimes and Biden and the United States are aiding and abetting him, willfully and purposefully, and abhorrently.

Student protests, Gaza, and the humanitarian disaster:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9-EKi8lD_E

As for the 2nd dead whistleblower, it would seem corporate America has decided to use the Putin Playbook when it comes to people they consider troublemakers (the first guy told everyone if he died, it wasn't suicide, and yet they still ruled it suicide).

"Additionally, the college agreed to publicly call for a ceasefire"

Do protestors think this sort of statement will have any impact? It's hard to imagine Netanyahu sitting there thinking "Uh oh, one of Washington State's smallest public colleges is calling for a ceasefire. I guess I have no choice now."

thank you xina

the Pro-genociders
Hate Bernie Sanders
a Known Jew. I guess
if you need a Better Ex-
ample of ANTI-Semitism
you'll hafta Make It Up yourself

@17: “Pro-Genocider's”

Help me out here. What do you mean by, “genocide”? Do Hamas’ actions in Israel on 10/7 qualify? Yes or no?

@24

wormmy I answered your Query
weeks ago. but you're either
too Stupid or too Ignorant to
acknowledge anything not in
TOTAL Support of your fascist
little Narrative. and even Then

@25: Was your answer a “yes,” or a “no”?

“TOTAL Support of your fascist
little Narrative.”

You mean like eliminationist slogans? You must have me confused with Pro-Palestine protesters.

@24 NO. Unequivocally, irrevocably, and absolutely NO. A terrorist attack is not genocide. Israel also lied about beheaded babies and rapes, oh and THEY KILLED THEIR OWN ON THAT DAY, TOO, TO JUSTIFY THEIR SCORCHED EARTH RESPONSE.

Wiping out 5% of a population - 70% of which are dead babies, children, and women (and destroying almost all of the infrastructure including hospitals and schools/universities) while working to starve to death the rest of a population (and planning to make sure those who don't starve to death are slaughtered) when Raffah is bombed/invaded IS genocide.

Your refusal to acknowledge reality does not mean that reality does not exist.

Obviously there are lines between terror campaigns and mob rule, and the kinds of protests that benefit a democracy; although they're more muddled fields of transition than bright lines.

As such, while Biden's speech articulated a federal position that overly favored the status quo (and repeated the falsehood that student protesters "forced" the cancellation of graduation ceremonies), I don't see how it (or Biden himself) plummets to the depths of evil implied here.

I suspect that “Biden's bad speech” articulated exactly what the vast majority of Americans feel.

@26 -- wot?
confuse YOU
with The JUST?

not on This Planet.

@29

bingo.

and if we can sneak it* past
"justice" Clarence 'Uncle' Thomas
we can get US some Slaves once again!

MAGA, bitches!

*the Repeal of
the 13th Amendment

Published today:

Jewish Americans to Lead Shabbat Protests Against US Complicity in Gaza
The protests will condemn "the hypocrisy of American politicians cracking down on 'unlawful' behavior at home while repeatedly voting to send Israel more bombs to kill Palestinians in Gaza."

https://www.commondreams.org/news/jewish-protests-gaza

Also:

Opposed to Genocide in Gaza, This Is the Conscience of a Nation Speaking Through Your Kids

This is about a genocide being carried out with American money and with American weapons against a people that has been living under occupation for generation after generation after generation.

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/rashid-khalidi-columbia-gaza-speech

looks like we're at
an Existential Crossroads:
the psychopaths & sociopaths
Vs the Rest Of US. time to Choose a

Side. are you Down
with Genocide or
do you Prefer
Humanity?

the Choice you make
may be your last.

@35
and wot
an Unsurprising
answer. well-played dewey

Adios.

@27: any source for the all-caps assertion that the IDF killed Israelis to justify their actions in Gaza? never heard that CT before.

34,000/2,300,300 = 1.47%. Not saying it won't wind up at 5%, but it's not there yet.

@6, cross-breeding, perhaps?

@27: ah, you got it from Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah. very reliable source.

https://checkyourfact.com/2023/11/08/fact-check-israel-civilians-oct-7/

@27 it's fascinating that you can't find the information on the internet just like I can. Look up "Hannibal Directive."

Israeli order(s) to kill even if there are hostages, just kill everyone no matter what, no matter who (and there is clear video proof of Israelis murdering at least 3 of their own, hostages, waving white flags and thinking they were about to be saved...")

Another Israeli witness confirms Israeli tanks killed own citizens on Oct. 7

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/another-israeli-witness-confirms-israeli-tanks-killed-own-citizens-on-oct-7/3079514#

'Unlawful, Unethical, Horrifying': IDF Ethics Code Author on Alleged Use of 'Hannibal Directive' During Hamas Attack

Asa Kasher, the philosopher who wrote the IDF's Code of Conduct, tells Haaretz that incidents in which the infamous operational order may have been used on October 7 must be investigated immediately: 'There is absolutely nothing [in the code] to allow someone to kill an Israeli citizen, in uniform or not'

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-01-17/ty-article/.premium/unlawful-unethical-horrifying-idf-ethics-expert-on-controversial-hannibal-directive/0000018d-186c-dd75-addd-faedd2b80000

School’s nearly out!
so whattabout
summer Va-
cation?

The Summer of Student Activist Protests

At many college campuses, students are protesting in opposition to the Biden Administration’s unconditional backing, with weapons and diplomatic cover, of Netanyahu’s continuing serial war crimes slaughtering tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, most of them children and women.

Hundreds of faculty members are defending these valiant youngsters and criticizing excessively harsh crackdowns by failed University presidents who are calling in outside police.

With graduations approaching, pro-Netanyahu lobbies and cowed University heads (like Columbia University President Minouche Shafik, who makes a salary of over $2,000 an hour) expect the students to disperse from campus for the summer and end their demonstrations.

The Israeli genocidal crimes
against Gazans will continue
and intensify if Israel invades Rafah.

Millions of refugees will suffer.
What will become of the organized
student calls for a permanent ceasefire,
greatly increased humanitarian aid and cessation of U.S. weapons shipments?

The students who leave
their campus protests can
and should focus on members of
Congress in their Districts and in Washington.

--b yRalph Nader; from ‘the Ralph Nader Radio Hour’

more on how to do just that and more:
https://mailchi.mp/nader/the-summer-of-student-activist-protests-0b75ir9hvs

"... in opposition to the Biden Administration’s unconditional backing, with weapons and diplomatic cover, of Netanyahu’s continuing serial war crimes slaughtering tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, most of them children and women."

like ol' bibi's gotta way with Genocide
ol' ralph's got a way with Words

@14

How [Fascists]
Counterprotesters
at U.C.L.A. Provoked Vio-
lence, Unchecked for Hours

The New York Times used videos filmed by journalists, witnesses and protesters to analyze hours of clashes — and a delayed police response — at a pro-Palestinian encampment on Tuesday.

On Tuesday night, violence erupted at an encampment that pro-Palestinian protesters had set up on April 25.

The clashes began after counterprotesters tried to dismantle the encampment’s barricade. Pro-Palestinian protesters rushed to rebuild it, and violence ensued.

Police arrived hours later, but they did not intervene immediately.

A New York Times examination of more than 100 videos from clashes at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that violence ebbed and flowed for nearly five hours, mostly with little or no police intervention.

The violence had been instigated by dozens of people who are seen in videos counterprotesting the encampment.

The videos showed counterprotesters attacking students in the pro-Palestinian encampment for several hours, including beating them with sticks, using chemical sprays and launching fireworks as weapons.

As of Friday, no
arrests had been made
in connection with the attack.

[why the fuck Not?]

To build a timeline of the events that night, The Times analyzed two livestreams, along with social media videos captured by journalists and witnesses.

The melee began when a group of counterprotesters started tearing away metal barriers that had been in place to cordon off pro-Palestinian protesters. Hours earlier, U.C.L.A. officials had declared the encampment illegal.

[pic] [caption]:
Security personnel
hired by the university are
seen in yellow vests standing
to the side throughout the incident.

It is not clear how the counterprotest was organized or what allegiances people committing the violence had. The videos show many of the counterprotesters were wearing pro-Israel slogans on their clothing.

Some counterprotesters blared music, including Israel’s national anthem, a Hebrew children’s song and “Harbu Darbu,” an Israeli song about the Israel Defense Forces’ campaign in Gaza.

--by Neil Bedi, Bora Erden, Marco Hernandez, Ishaan Jhaveri, Arijeta Lajka, Natalie Reneau, Helmuth Rosales and Aric Toler; May 3, 2024

University of California; Los Angeles

more:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/us/ucla-protests-encampment-violence.html

pro-Genocide
ANTI-Peaceful
Demonstrators
showin' US what
it Takes to bring a bit
o' the olde Ultraviolence
+ spot o' Fascism to America.

maga,
bitches

why did Biden not DEMAND Attacks
on Peaceful Demonstrations
CEASE?

Joe
you're
NOT instilling
Condidence in the Electorate

they'll
turn Automatically
(reflexively) to El trumpfster.
Let us Hope Joe says Sayonara in
time (8/22) for a replacement if bibi's
Genocide is STILL fucking Ongoing. tho I
Don't see the Middle East putting up with That

@42: Well, if your St. Ralph has commanded college students to demonstrate all Summer long, then I guess they have no choice but to do so!

It’s pretty funny that a guy who himself has an Ivy League education could believe overprivileged students might possibly do this.

But I guess admitting the campus protests are fizzling out, having accomplished exactly nothing, while Americans continue to support Israel in overwhelming numbers, is just too hard a reality for some folks to face.

@45

it ain't About Ralph wormmy
it Ain't about the protesters
wormmy it ain't About the
'Spoilt Children' wormmy

it IS about Murdering
35,000 human beings their
Homes Hospitals Universities
LIVES Destroyed to keep nutnyahoo
outta Prison. the ONGOING War CRIMES
Israel COMMITS On The Daily the sheer Terror
it rains down on Gazans in their open-air Prison

That's what This's about.

say, that reminds me:

“There
is no justify-
cation for terrorism. Ever.”

tensorna on December 8, 2023 at 8:44 AM

speaking Truth!
howsoever Inadvertently.

oh, and This:

‘There
Is No Justifi-
cation for Terrorism,’
Says Man Justifying Genocide

more, most disturbingly:
https://theneedling.com/2023/09/02/there-is-no-justification-for-terrorism-says-man-justifying-genocide/

that’s a
fucking
BINGO.

also:
END THE HORROR
END THE GENOCIDE
and END O U R SPONSOR-
SHIP OF THIS ON-GOING GENOCIDE

Just say 'NO!" to TERRORISM
smokin' fuckin' Joe Whilst
you still CAN. tho I think
Joe's prolly NOT
gonna Do So.

damn.

"But
I guess
admitting
the campus
protests are fizzling out... "

much like the
Climate Justice
Movement it all started
with One sole Protester; one
College in NY calling for an END to Genocide

becomes a Movement spreading around
the Planet like Ripples in a pond.
Students PLANET-Wide're Join-
ing Up with Columbia Univers-
ity's students (in a Show of
Moral Force you got-
ta be Most Envious
of) to Lead the
World towards
fucking JUSTICE.

that you wormmy might call them
"fizzling Out" is Testament to
your 'humanitarianism' and
perverse wish-fullfilment
& twisting of REALITY
Mr Wormtongue.

@13, @14, @43, @44: Why not just say the attacks at UCLA were the work of "Agents Provocateurs," or a 'False-Flag' operation? That's what you repeatedly said about the Pro-Palestine protesters at Columbia University, when they chanted eliminationist hate slogans against Israel. (Although you seem to have since dropped your claim, but only after Garb@5 kindly provided a link to the Guardian's story, confirming Pro-Palestine protesters had indeed chanted eliminationst hate slogans on Columbia University's campus. Thanks, Garb!)

And you have every bit as much evidence this happened at UCLA as you did when you claimed it was happening at Columbia.

@46: I thought @42 was about Ralph, and his silly request for the failed protests at Columbia University (and elsewhere) to get dragged along on Summer vacation by the soon-to-depart students. Isn't that what you'd quoted him saying?

Before the students' failed protests fizzle out completely, I'd really like to know how Pro-Palestine protesters' chanting of eliminationist hate slogans against Israel at Columbia University helped so much as a single child in Gaza. Could you please explain how Pro-Palestine protesters' chanting of eliminationist hate slogans against Israel at Columbia University helped so much as a single child in Gaza? Because if you can't, then this whole "protest" thing begins to look like a complete and total waste of everyone's time.

"why did Biden not DEMAND Attacks
on Peaceful Demonstrations
CEASE?"

Because "demands" never work.

Oh they may "work" in situations like these protests, where a group "DEMANDS" X, Y, Z, and get a vague promise on Z, but the President doesn't resort to that sort of political theatre.

My entire adult life I've been looking at posters on utility poles "Demanding" this or that. I've seen invitations to "Day of Rage" events (which sound exhausting). I've seen mass actions (APEC, WTO, Women's March) that are impressive in scale and sometimes violent, but ultimately end in stalemate.

Also, a "demand" from Biden would almost certainly ensure that something horrific would happen because Republicans are horrible people.

To me, the most awful thing of this whole war (besides the death and carnage) is how eerily similar this is to The US reaction after 911. I have no doubt that this is what Hamas and whoever backs them was hoping for.

@6
“Zebra still on the lamb”
I think that qualifies as animal porn-which is certainly in line with the Stranger brand!

The latest polling is confirming a dynamic called "negative follower group," where a population, though tacitly supportive of an argument, can be driven to strong opposition due to the claimants over reach in word and deed. It was certainly in play during the Vietnam War, and likely is today.

The mystique of aggressive direct action campaigns, its blotting out the lessons from successful movements that didn't go "volume 11," and the general radicalizing effect of crowd psychology can lead movements that otherwise had potential into a box canyon. Reviving the spirit of 68 may yield emotional satisfaction, but will likely result in alienating the general population.

Israel calls 10/7 their 9/11. Was 9/11 a genocide, tensor?

@51- a friendly zebra can’t help a sheep over the fence?

@21 xina, @46 and @47 kristofarian, and @50 Catalina Vel-DuRay, and everybody: At this point I consider BOEING part of the GOP fossil fueled crime syndicate anymore.
Neofascism is rampant, and largely due to power-crazed men who hate women and non-whites. No matter what they're hellbent on calling all the shots until one blinding last flash before the Earth and all inhabitants are toast.

@51 pat L and @56 dvs99 For the WIN!!!
Lol Thank ewe both for making my day.

Actually, Nathalie, if I read correctly in the corresponding
article in The Seattle Times, isn't Z really a zebra stallion?
Nonetheless, he obviously wants his freedom.
Never mind the mares and female young un who
were recaptured enroute to Montana via I-90.
Z must be laughing his b&w ass off at lookie-loos
trying to catch him, and longing for the Serengeti.

If intentionally bombing and cutting off all international aid isn't a war crime, why not? It isn't mutually exclusive. If you don't call something genocide that is legal but clearly in the wrong, like starving hundreds of thousands of emaciated and dismembered kids to get back at a few thousand terrorists, then you shouldn't call it acceptable. Men's laws may give you the right, but the Son of Man's ethics and divine laws (which apparently justify ownership of the Holy land) will hold you accountable. Laws without morals are useless, and a man without honor is worse than dead.

@57. Please explain how a ragtag group of opportunists who pulled off a fluke against civilians under the nose of the IDF could possibly kill all Israelis. Just because that is their ethos doesn't mean they could ever possibly deliver on it, as they don't even have an air force or more sophisticated weapons than paragliders, fertilizer rockets, and small arms.

Also most of the tunnels under Gaza were there already because Israel created them and Hamas expanded on the network.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir, and several other high level cabinet figures in charge of the military campaign very early used genocidal rhetoric in line with scripture to justify wanton destruction, and even though you may not find it in their official charter to eliminate all Palestinians, they are wiping out Palestine from the river to the sea to establish Greater Israel, and their actions speak louder than any words and desperate attempts to snuff out any criticism or accountability for that by paying off the media, murdering journalists, assaulting protestors, and upholding whataboutisms to enable that status quo that useful idiots like you and tensor parrot like duckspeakers ad nauseum without using your brains to think critically. It is unquestionably a genocide, and the 5% figure includes injured civilians, you know, dismembered kids and people that survived being buried alive and shot and who will die in due course without clean water, shelter, medical facilities, food, and sanitation. What is being done to the population is no less barbaric and heinous than any human rights catastrophe we have seen in our lifetimes save in Guatemala and Rwanda, per capita and over time. It must end now. There is no question that it is wrong and a genocide. It is beneath us all as human beings to tolerate this travesty of human suffering and annihilation of human rights.

https://youtu.be/RhJ0q7X3DLM?feature=shared

Get up, stand up!
Stand up for your rights.
Get up, stand up!
Don't give up the fight!

Today is Sat 5/4 and the last zebra has been apprehended.....using white bread. It's always been a mystery to me why police/people try to catch dogs & other stray animals by pursuing them. If I was a police or animal control officer, I'd keep a ready supply of hot dogs & Oreos on hand at all times.

Usually I'm very sympathetic to police, but the officer who accidentally discharged his weapon because he used the flashlight on his gun as a general flashlight should be terminated immediately. Employment practice considers termination of employment as the equivalent of the death penalty. Accidental discharge of a weapon is forgivable. Discharging a weapon because of stupidity & disobedience to safety rules is not. I'm not afraid of guns in general as, long ago, I shot just about all types of hand guns & rifles on target ranges. That said, guns of all types are just plain f** dangerous. The first & last thing you're taught is gun safety because guns are inherently very dangerous if not handled properly. And there's no way you can justify pointing your gun at things because you're using the flashlight that's attached to it. Absolutely, positively, unequivocally, unarguably, without a doubt, NO WAY. If you did it to save someone's life & it worked, you'd be lucky. If you did it to save someone's life & it went bad, it's you're fault. You're literally better off fumbling around in the dark. The people around you are even better off if you are fumbling around in the dark. And not like this guy was fumbling around in the stupid with the light on.

""dissent must never lead to disorder." I'm pretty sure that's the whole point of protest. Speaking truth to power, being a voice calling for change by whatever means necessary, is the whole bedrock of this country's self-mythology."
That is the MAGA mantra of Trump's Bumpkin Cohort. That's the ignorance of the bumpkins who were born in a barn, lived their lives on a farm, & think that the world has infinite space & it all belongs to the individual bumpkin who thinks that.....and they all think that.
Again I commend to you the scene in the movie Selma where MLK tries to convince the head of the Selma chapter to allow the NAACP national personnel to conduct the protest because, while the local chapter will protest in anger & piss off the entire nation, the national people know how to run the protest dispassionately in a way that will EDUCATE the nation......and education NOT disorder is the goal of protest. The left can be just as ignorant & uneducated as the right.

@54: Ahab already answered @57, but to demonstrate how easy the answer really is (and to link to sources), I’ll crowdsource it.

‘The Convention defines genocide as any of five "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group."‘

(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide_Convention)

‘These motivations were published in bin Laden's November 2002 Letter to the American people,[4][5] in which he said that al-Qaeda's motives for the attacks included Western support for attacking Muslims in Somalia, supporting Russian atrocities against Muslims in Chechnya, supporting the Indian oppression against Muslims in Kashmir, condoning the 1982 massacres in Lebanon, the presence of US troops in Saudi Arabia,[5][6][7] US support of Israel,[8][9] and sanctions against Iraq.[10] Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri asserted that Israeli repression of Palestinians during the Al-Aqsa Intifada was the immediate cause that forced Al-Qaeda to launch the September 11 attacks.[11][12][13]’

(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motives_for_the_September_11_attacks#:~:text=Al%2DQaeda%20leadership%20asserted%20that,%2C%20American%20cultural%20imperialism%2C%20etc.)

Bin Laden tried to kill my sister (and succeeded in killing her boss, her mentor, and several other of her co-workers) not because he had any “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group,” but because he objected to American foreign policy. Even had he killed millions upon millions of Americans in America, he completely lacked the intent required to fulfill the charge of genocide.

By contrast (and, of course, the reason I’ve been able to have such fun by jerking kristo’s chain) Hamas’ killing Jews, for being Jews, on land Hamas has declared it will cleanse of Jews, is so obviously genocide, he can’t answer my question. If he answers yes, then Israel is protecting its citizens from genocide, and all of the moral authority he’s trying to claim goes instead to Israel. If he answers no, then his definition of genocide is obviously useless, or he’s just using the word as a club to compel agreement.

@60: Hamas is the only entity happy with this situation. Of course Gaza is a man-made humanitarian disaster, but it’s not genocide, because neither Hamas nor the IDF has the intent required to make it genocide.

As I’ve recently quoted, a recent poll showed an overwhelming majority of America registered voters want a cease-fire, but only after Hamas has left power in Gaza, and returned the hostages to Israel. This shows Americans recognize the truth of what @57 and @58 noted: Hamas is the root cause of this war, and the war cannot end until Hamas has gone from Gaza. Hence, yelling “genocide” at Israel accomplishes nothing, as the last seven months have indeed shown.

@64/tens ...Bin Laden tried to kill my sister (and succeeded in killing her boss, her mentor, and several other of her co-workers)
At least we know where George Santos is blogging now.
Go ahead and invent some new words for us and continue trying to enforce your unique definition of genocide.

Lotta ink spilled here and elsewhere arguing over whether events in Gaza are “genocide” or just good old fashioned killing of civilians. I’d submit that it a) doesn’t matter, ans they anre both terrible, and b) insisting that it is the former makes people defensive for the wrong reasons and impedes any resolution of the problem.

There is plenty of blame to go around on both sides and that’s been happening for decades. How about we agree it is a humanitarian disaster and get started on getting more aid into Gaza? If people spent half as much time talking to people who can actually make a difference (hint-contacting Congresspeople is far more likely to help than demanding universities sell Boeing stock which a) seems unlikely to happen and b) will make no difference whatsoever to Boeing), you might accomplish something without giving Donald Trump a yuge undeserved gift.

Ahab, it is a logical fallacy to make the amount of deaths from 10/7 scale with the US population. In response to those 40,000 Americans, the response would have killed and injured approximately 16,665,000 Americans in kind.

The rest is a lot of nice conjecture and speculation, but ultimately a whole bunch of justification for genocide based on what the Trump administration and Netanyahu allowed to happen by forcing Iran out of the Obama administration's international nuclear energy deal. Using the same justification as Saddam Hussein's infamous yellow cake intel as a justification for the WMD to eliminate Gaza as a necessity is quite the stretch when Netanyahu allowed cars full of cash from Qatar to reach them to divide and conquer Fatah which had a chance to legitimize the Palestinian government and recognized Israel.

There can be no pursuit of peace and legitimacy of Palestine while this injustice in Gaza and continued seizure of Palestinian land by manic settlers with impunity continues. Without a diplomatic solution the war will continue to escalate as it already has threatened to several times.

On 10/7, only 1,000 or so Hamas fighters attacked, and they only had about 20,000-25,000 troops formed from the remnants of the Muslim Brotherhood, not 50,000. You have some wildly inaccurate and troubling imaginings to ultimately talk in circles to justify genocide.

Speaking of 9/11, Also ironic how tensorna holds George W. Bush accountable for allowing 9/11 to happen (see comments below) by ignoring intelligence and all the warnings but gives Netanyahu and his cabinet and the IDF a pass because, as I believe ehen Ahab has claimed, they didn't pose a significant threat or could never have possibly pulled it off despite warnings from even Egypt of what was coming.

https://www.thestranger.com/slog-am/2023/09/11/79162521/slog-am-bob-ferguson-makes-it-official-2500-dead-in-morocco-quake-ai-uses-a-ton-of-water/comments

Clearly tensorna is scapegoating Hamas for 9/11 Islamist terrorism because of this personal loss that personally affected them by Bin Laden attempting to off their sister and succeeding in killing their sister's boss and mentor and such. And yet, tensorna can't actually apply that scrutiny to Netanyahu because of the emotional blind spot and association with Al Qaeda, even though it was mostly Saudis who pulled off the attacks. Tell me, tensorna, was your almost killed and traumatized sister worth the blood and treasure and millions of civilians killed and displaced in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, and the Levant after ISIL filled the power vaccuum? Here yoi go cheerleading an even worse evil against children now to satiate that deep seated hatred. Psychology is a mother, man. I have heard enough from these irrational enablers of purest hell on earth.

"I have heard enough
from these irrational
enablers of purest
hell on earth."

-@Garbby

not yet.

omg. it's like
having a nut & a yahoo
on the Board of the Stranger

stuffing us with
pro-genocide
propaganda
& rhetoric.

moving on:

At the University of California Los Angeles, the New York Times reports “U.C.L.A. asked for officers after a clash between pro-Palestinian demonstrators and counterprotesters grew heated overnight.”

This misleading report fails to clarify that, as Alejandra Caraballo of Harvard Law puts it “the police stood aside and let a pro Israeli lynch mob run wild at UCLA.

They did nothing for two hours as violent Zionists assaulted students, launched fireworks into the encampment, and sprayed mace on students.”

The accompanying videos must be seen to be believed.

This is yet another glaring example of media manipulation on behalf of Zionist aggression against non-violent student protesters.

And:

Bringing the civil war within the Democratic Party on this issue into full view, the College Democrats of America – the official student outreach arm of the DNC – has issued a statement commending the “heroic actions on the part of students...for an end to the war in Palestine…[and] for an immediate permanent ceasefire.”

This statement goes on to say “Arresting, suspending, and evicting students without any due process is not only legally dubious but morally reprehensible,” and excoriates the White House for taking “the mistaken route of a bear hug strategy for Netanyahu and a cold shoulder strategy for its own base,” noting that “Each day that Democrats fail to stand united for a permanent ceasefire…more and more youth find themselves disillusioned with the party.”

more
https://www.ralphnaderradiohour.com/p/life-or-death-foods

on publishing
pro-genociders:

Why do the
'leadershp' of
tS want yet another
trumpf maladministration?

oh
and
BTW?

the nazis
who attacked
peaceful protesters
at UCLA? sponsored by

jerry seinfeld.

fucking
OUCH.

Garb@61: There’s nothing in the Genocide Convention which requires the perpetrators to have the ability to kill most of the population of the targeted group. They merely need the intent, whilst committing any of the five acts defined in the Convention. Hamas certainly both had intent, and took some of those five actions. There’s really no question Hamas’ 10/7 attacks were genocidal in nature; the issue is the Stranger, you, and others want to abuse the word “genocide” to beat everyone else into agreement with you — and you’re becoming ever-more frustrated that it’s not working.

Meanwhile, Pro-Palestinian protesters on Columbia University’s campus chanted eliminationist slogans against Israel, without a peep of criticism from supposed opponents of “genocide”. That’s a tell, and everyone who wants to see it already has.

@65: I quoted from the Genocide Convention, which has contained the world’s definition of “genocide” for seventy-five years now. It is the Stranger and others (e.g. kristo’ and Garb here) who have abused the meaning of that word. Please feel free to direct your ire at them.

@72. If the situation on the ground in Gaza isn't a genocide, whatever you call it; do you find it acceptable? If not, why should it continue as is? What other ways of solving this _ could work besides implementing famine and collective punishment and homelessness on the entire polity/territory? Can you think of a better way?

Garb@68: "Clearly tensorna is scapegoating Hamas for 9/11 Islamist terrorism..."

And where did you get that? I know of no connection between Hamas and 9/11. The only reason I even addressed 9/11 at all is because you explicitly asked me to do so, @54.

My point in mentioning 9/11 affecting my family is to demonstrate how it is indeed possible to talk even about muderous attacks calmly, rationally -- and without constantly insisting upon use of the word, "genocide".

If anyone in the Israeli government, up to and including their current PM, aided Hamas before 10/7, then they are complicit in the 10/7 attacks, and everyone involved should be held accountable, preferably by trial in Israel and/or The Hague. Please feel free to quote me saying otherwise.

Garb@73: I answered this one months ago:

"Yes, Hamas should immediately cease-fire, release all hostages, and evacuate all military resources from inside/underneath civilian infrastructure in Gaza.

"As the US Congress and President cannot directly compel Hamas to take these actions, they should pressure international police and banking regulators to throttle the flow of weapons and money to Hamas. When foreign nationals are found sending arms and money to Hamas, the U.S. and allies should seek extradition and prosecution of these individuals, and meantime refuse to accept their passports for entry. In any cases where the governments of countries where these suspects reside refuse to extradite them, the leaders of those governments can also receive passport refusals."

(https://www.thestranger.com/guest-editorial/2024/02/05/79372189/please-help-end-the-gaza-war/comments/1)

The unprecedented level of destruction and killing points to large-scale war crimes in Israel’s attack on Gaza. There is also evidence of a “widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack” that the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court defines as a crime against humanity. Moreover, dozens of statements of Israeli leaders, ministers in the war cabinet, and senior army officers since 7 October—that is, people with command authority—suggest an “intent to destroy” Palestinians “as such,” in the language of the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. The statements include depictions of all Palestinians in Gaza as responsible for the Hamas attack on 7 October and therefore legitimate military targets, as expressed by Israeli President Herzog on 13 October and by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu when he invoked, on 29 October, the Biblical story of the total destruction of Amalek by the Israelites, just as Israel began its ground invasion. Casting an entire civilian population as enemies marks the history of modern genocide, with the Armenian genocide (1915-1918) and the Rwanda genocide (1994) as well-known examples. The statements also include dehumanizing language, such as Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s reference to “human animals” when he proclaimed “total siege” on Gaza on 9 October. The slippage between seeing Hamas as “human animals” to seeing all Palestinians in Gaza in this way is evident in what Israeli Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories Maj. Gen. Ghassan Alian promised to people in Gaza the next day: “Hamas has turned into ISIS, and the residents of Gaza, instead of being appalled, are celebrating. … Human animals must be treated as such. There will be no electricity and no water [in Gaza], there will only be destruction. You wanted hell, you will get hell.”

These expressions of intent need to be understood also in relation to the widespread incitement to genocide in Israeli media since 7 October. Israeli journalist David Mizrachi Wertheim, for instance, wrote on social media on 7 October that “If all the captives are not returned immediately, then turn the [Gaza] Strip into a slaughterhouse. If a hair falls from their head – execute security prisoners. Violate all norms on the way to victory.” He also added, “we are facing human animals.” Four days later, another Israeli journalist, Roy Sharon, commented on social media “that if, in order to finally eliminate the military capabilities of Hamas, including Sinwar and Deif, we need a million bodies, then let there be a million bodies.” Annihilatory language now also appears in public spaces, such as banners on bridges in Tel Aviv that call “to annihilate Gaza” and explain that “the picture of triumph is 0 people in Gaza.” There are dozens of examples of incitement in Israeli media, which recalls the incitement to genocide in Rwanda as genocide was unfolding there in 1994.

From: Statement of Scholars in Holocaust and Genocide Studies on Mass Violence in Israel and Palestine since 7 October

December 9, 2023

https://contendingmodernities.nd.edu/global-currents/statement-of-scholars-7-october/#:~:text=Moreover%2C%20dozens%20of%20statements%20of,of%20the%20Crime%20of%20Genocide.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IjbZO8LCOf4&

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/israel-hamas-war-netanyahu-rejects-biden-warning-innocent-palestinian-lives/

"Majoritarianism is not the path to what you want, since on the occasions you find yourself in disagreement with the majority (and there will always be such occasions), you have no rights to do anything other than what the majority dictates." - Ahab
https://www.thestranger.com/slog-am/2024/02/16/79387857/slog-am-alexei-navalny-is-dead-sound-transit-east-link-opens-in-april-a-massive-peer-reviewed-ai-rat-penis/comments

https://apnews.com/article/south-africa-israel-un-court-palestinians-genocide-ffe672c4eb3e14a30128542eaa537b21

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Fighting “human animals.” Making Gaza a “slaughterhouse.” “Erasing the Gaza Strip from the face of the earth.”

Such inflammatory rhetoric is a key component of South Africa’s case accusing Israel of genocide at the U.N. world court, a charge that Israel denies. South Africa says the language — in comments by Israeli leaders, soldiers and entertainers about Palestinians in Gaza since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack sparked war — is proof of Israel’s intent to commit genocide.

With the ground offensive getting underway in late October, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cited the Bible in a televised address: “You must remember what Amalek has done to you.” Amalekites were persecutors of the biblical Israelites, and a biblical commandment says they must be destroyed.

Two days after the Hamas attack, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel was “fighting human animals,” in announcing a complete siege on Gaza.

Deputy Knesset speaker Nissim Vaturi from the ruling Likud party wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that Israelis had one common goal, “erasing the Gaza Strip from the face of the earth.” Israeli Heritage Minister Amichay Eliyahu, from the far-right Jewish Power party, suggested that Israel drop a nuclear bomb on Gaza and said there were “no uninvolved civilians” in the territory.

Israeli soldiers caught on video made similar remarks as they sang and danced in the early days of Israel’s ground offensive. https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-soldiers-gaza-viral-videos-idf-072894147302535cc9632863888e53a4

On Oct. 7, a journalist wrote on X that Gaza should become “a slaughterhouse” if the roughly 250 people taken hostage by Hamas were not returned.

Military officials and two Israeli pop singers are also cited by South Africa for making inflammatory comments.

“The language of systemic dehumanization is evident here,” lawyer Tembeka Ngcukaitobi said for South Africa in remarks before the court. “Genocidal utterances are therefore not out in the fringes. They are embodied in state policy.”

And since Oct. 7, such speech has moved further into the mainstream.

Israelis, like Palestinians, have been hardened by decades of deadly conflict and its sense of intractability. Some in Israel say the trauma of Hamas’ unprecedented attack unleashed the current discourse.

“The intense collective trauma gave free rein to the expression of dark feelings of revenge that in the mainstream was less pleasant to utter until today,” deputy editor-in-chief Noa Landau wrote in the daily Haaretz. She said the statements reflected “the social zeitgeist.” - This is moral licensing due to trauma, as if the Palestinians were not subject to generational trauma in kind to justify their genocidal intent and rhetoric.

There's a hell of a lot of genocidal rhetoric and intent! And even though the cabinet has largely reduced their genocidal rhetoric in response to being held accountable, their actions are clearly in line with these statements.

It's a genocide. All genocides are characterized by obfuscation of their actions and claiming that there is no other choice than to commit genocide or else the opposition will eliminate them. That's demagoguery.

Speaking of Carl von Clausewitz:

https://www.patriciarobertsmiller.com/2024/01/11/book-proposal-for-deliberating-war-where-there-is-a-will-there-is-a-ferry/

'Because it is so common to refer to a policy disagreement as a war on the in-group, it is tempting to dismiss the frame as a metaphor, simply a rhetorical strategy to mobilize a base and get attention. That is, to treat the metaphor of politics as war as a meaningless stylistic choice (mere rhetoric). Another way to dismiss the significance of the framing is to normalize it, to say that politics is a kind of war. Advocates of such a strategy often cite the 19th century military theorist Carl von Clausewitz: “War is politics by other means.” The former approach treats the politics as war frame metaphorically and the latter literally, but neither takes the frame seriously. And both thereby normalize treating policy disagreements as skirmishes in a larger war.
...
First, even under the best of circumstances, deliberating about war is vexed. A community has (or should have) the opportunity to deliberate about whether we should go to war, how it’s being conducted, when and whether to end it, and, in retrospect, what happened and why. Yet many people sincerely believe that we shouldn’t deliberate about whether to go to war; if we are attacked (or are about to be attacked), we should—in a state of anger and outrage—respond with however much aggression is necessary to crush the antagonist. Many people believe that a community shouldn’t deliberate about war once it’s started, since to question whether to continue the war dishonors those who have already died for it, or who are currently risking their lives for it. For similar reasons (dishonoring those who have sacrificed), we shouldn’t deliberate about a war afterwards—whether it was well-conducted, necessary, could have been ended earlier. Thus, for many people, we shouldn’t deliberate about a war before, during, or after—that is, at all. In such a situation, those who call for deliberation are easily characterized as cowards, ditherers, unmanly overthinkers, traitors, dupes of the enemy. Characterizing a disagreement as war makes deliberation harder.
...
Wars have different ends, ranging from limited territorial to political/physical extermination of the Other. Wars with limited territorial goals (such as the 1859 Pig War) assume the continued coexistence of all parties (except the pig). At the other extreme are wars oriented toward the complete destruction of a political, cultural, religious, or ethnic entity (the Third Punic War, Hitler’s goals in WWII). While limited political goals doesn’t necessarily mean limited destruction, or limited violation of norms (e.g, the Iraq invasion had limited goals—regime change—but high levels of destruction and norm violation), wars of extermination necessarily require almost complete violation of norms. Communities faced with an antagonist determined on our destruction generally give complete moral, legal, military, and rhetorical license to in-group actors. Thus, paradoxically, a political or military leader who wants to violate norms can get license to do so by claiming that the community is already faced with an antagonist determined on in-group extermination. They can get permission to conduct a war of extermination by claiming it already is one.
So, if politics is war, what kind of war?

"Thus, paradoxically, a political or military leader who wants to violate norms can get license to do so by claiming that the community is already faced with an antagonist determined on in-group extermination. They can get permission to conduct a war of extermination by claiming it already is one."

So, if politics is war, what kind of war? If it’s a war of extermination in which actors are granted full license to violate any and all legal, moral, and rhetorical norms, then it’s a war on democracy.'

@74. Smells like you need your diaper changed again.

Garb@76: South Africa can help end the war in Gaza by auditing their banks' records, to ensure money does not flow through South African banks to Hamas. They can also investigate their own arms dealers, to ensure no weapons go to Hamas. South Africa really, really shouldn't use the Israel-Hamas war to remind everyone of how much the ANC and the PLO had in common, back in their Cold War days.

@79. I'm all for defunding and disempowering Hamas, but you have to realize that the Gazan people don't have much ability to unseat Hamas, and Hamas grossly limited free speech and cracked down on dissent in order to rule with an iron fist. I just don't agree that removing Hamas from power must be done in this manner with the collective punishment of innocent kids.

And South Africa doesn't need to be discredited because of who they are making the arguments, but the arguments being made. Given that the people representing South Africa are former victims of apartheid themselves speaking up, it makes sense that they would recognize the signs of injustice. Every time you can't defend an argument, you try to discredit the arguer. That isn't going to work in this case; what was published in the Israeli media and said by Netanyahu and his far right Likud/Jewish Power cabinet stands on its own merits and isn't the result of South Africa making it up.

@80: " I'm all for defunding and disempowering Hamas, but you have to realize that the Gazan people don't have much ability to unseat Hamas,"

Which is why you have to realize I suggested nothing about anyone in Gaza trying to unseat Hamas. I asked for tougher international enforcement of laws which already prohibit money and arms from going to Hamas.

"I just don't agree that removing Hamas from power must be done in this manner with the collective punishment of innocent kids."

Which, as Theodore noted @78, is why there should be worldwide protests against Hamas' ongoing war crimes against the children of Gaza. When can we expect those to begin?

"And South Africa doesn't need to be discredited because of who they are making the arguments, but the arguments being made."

Actually, I was noting they could, you know, ensure their laws, and international laws, against funding and arming terrorists, be rigorously enforced by South African authorities. To date, the only activity I have seen South Africa take is to sue Israel in the ICJ. How, exactly, has that crippled Hamas' ability to attack Israel from behind children? Also, why exactly is it out of line to note South Africa's ruling party once killed white civilians for being white civilians? Isn't killing persons merely for being part of "a national, ethnical, racial or religious group," a really, really bad thing?

So you're saying the worst crimes against humanity are necessary because if they aren't allowed to happen then they will only lead to worse outcomes.

Do the Holocaust next!

Garb@80: "I just don't agree that removing Hamas from power must be done in this manner with the collective punishment of innocent kids."

In what manner do you propose it be done?

@82:

“Why not nuke Gaza and be done with it?
Because Israel would be irradiating
the rest of Israel out of habitable
existence in the process.”

much as bibi’s Ongoiing Genocide
on Palestine poisons the
Planet for Jews?

Bingo
Cap’n.

@86: “…poisons the
Planet for Jews?”

Well, yes, as you know, the eliminationist hate rhetoric against Israel got pretty ugly on Columbia University’s campus, but clearing out those protesters proved not only welcome, but also quick and easy. I somehow doubt New York City will become hostile to Jews as a result. :-)

so
wormmy
'Protesters'
are are the Reason
why Anti-semitism's
sweeping the planet?

it has Nothing to DO
with nutnyahoo & his
Reich wing 'leadership'
and their Massacring of
40,000 Palestinians the In-
juring of 100,000 More un-
counted tens of Thousands
buried in the Rubble the com-
Plete destruction of Gaza's Hos-
pitals and Healthcare systems not
to mention virtually ALL of Gazans'
Educational systems? it's all because
of the Protesters? convince Us wormmy

and Convince
the World

don't forget
to blame
HAMAS!

@88: “'Protesters'
are are the Reason
why Anti-semitism's
sweeping the planet?”

The protesters at Columbia University were chanting eliminationist hate slogans, not about the current war in Gaza, but about eliminating Israel entirely. As you may recall in Seattle, pro-Palestinian protesters were using attack imagery and chanting eliminationist slogans right after 10/7, before the Israeli military response. So yes, I do in fact blame the protesters’ hate speech for spreading hatred.

“don't forget
to blame
HAMAS!”

Well yes, Hamas continues to commit the war crime of hiding behind civilians and civilian infrastructure, as described @58. Why should we not blame Hamas’ war criminals for their ongoing war crimes against the civilian population of Gaza?

What would I do?

First, I would move the UN Headquarters to Jerusalem so there would be no preposterous and false accusations of Hamas infiltration into the organization. It would be the best solution for resolving the conflicts.

I would stop bombing and cutting off aid convoys from the international community and enabling famine in the north.

I would not evacuate a city of a million people who have already been displaced from the north in Gaza City and Khan Younis, where they were told to flee, in complete defiance of the international community, half of the Knesset, all the protestors in Tel Aviv trying to get their hostages back, and Biden who has called the invasion of Rafah over the top and wrong and demanded an end to the conflict.

I would hold Netanyahu and Sinwar accountable for their actions in court and prevent them from unilaterally deciding what to do with the arms we send them, and I would cut off all arms until they can be used in good faith and not in an irreverent genocidal attack against the last not completely destroyed corner of Gaza where half the population is homeless.

The people in Rafah have nowhere to evacuate to. Where will they go? Those still in Gaza City are forced to eat grass and drink seawater, and are dying in scores. With the attacks on the press and the removal of Al Jazeera, there will be even less accountability for the war crimes in place. Displacing a civilian population in this way is a shameless war crime on its face.

By the way, the 35,000 dead Gazans and nearly 80,000 injured are only the official figures. Tens of thousands more are unaccounted for, and the true amount of dead and injured cannot be quantified until there is a ceasefire or permanent end to the conflict. They are buried there, bodies decomposing under the rubble and in the streets and elsewhere where they have starved to death and died of starvation, thirst, disease, malnutrition, and despair. There is literally no where for anyone to flee to except for the sea, and even that is not safe. Fishing boats are fired upon and the people living in squalor in sand dunes in tents without sustenance are barely eking by. If Rafah is attacked, the cost will be tens of thousands of more lives. This is a city full of women and children with only a few battalions of Hamas fighters left.

I wish Hamas would give up their arms and surrender, and that Egypt would open their borders for the refugees to flee, and that Qatar and Iran and Lebanon would stop trying to escalate this conflict, but Israel is doing that on its own through its aggressive actions and pre-emptive strikes. They feel they have license to do whatever they want because we are protecting them from accountability both with our arms sales and our veto power in the UN. But it is wrong on its face. These are Jewish supremacists in charge of the war effort, racists and racial supremacist fascists by any other name, who have become the very monsters they are fighting against. They have made common cause with the far right in this country who are cracking down on an dissent and upholding straw men to enable this status quo of genocide.

Tensor you should count yourself among them. You have absolutely no criticism for the most extremist elements of Israeli society, never giving them any scrutiny but always putting the agency on Hamas. Your solution is for the total surrender of Hamas, but that doesn't give the Netanyahu administration or the IDF any agency. You put it all in Hamas's hands while completely giving a pass to whatever they decide to do, even in defiance of international law and our own conditions of arms sales, so you don't have to hold them accountable. It's the same mental copout as a human shield, which Hamas denies doing by the way. How else would you fight a guerilla war against a vastly superior adversary with billion in foreign aid, a naval blockade, an air force of constant bombardment that levels your country to dust, and kills without discrimination? You have to be able to assess that they have very limited means to wage war and this is the only way they believe they can put up a fight. Not the 10/7 attacks, which should lead to the elimination of Hamas, but guerilla warfare is a common tactic that even we in the USA used against the British Empire to establish this country.

Also, it's in really bad taste for you to troll kristo and make these really childish and immature bad faith twisting of arguments to what you aren't actually asked. It's a weak deflection, and you truly have earned your moniker of Grima Wormtongue, because all you do is reveal to anyone with character and conscience that you are a sociopath and a bold faced enabler of genocide, even though you just can't bring yourself to call it what it is. How sad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf8KJksAZPo

from 'Notes From
The Edge Of The
Narrative Matrix':

I don’t oppose the butchery in Gaza because I love Hamas or hate Jews or love Islam or hate America.

I don’t oppose the butchery in Gaza because I’m a lefty or a commie or an anarchist or an anti-imperialist.

I oppose the butchery in Gaza because I’m not a fucking psychopath.

Opposing Israel’s butchery in Gaza is so obvious, so common sense, such a bare-minimum, fundamental-level, Being Human 101 position that if it isn’t immediately self-evident to you after learning the basic facts, your problem is much, much deeper than whatever ideology or bias or prejudice you might happen to have. There’s something wrong with you as a person.

If you support Israel’s butchery in Gaza, you’ve got much bigger problems than merely not having the correct ist or ism belief system.

You’re just all fucked up inside. Your conditioning has made you into a generally shitty human being. You have deep and immensely consequential flaws in your character, and you won’t mature as a person until you heal and transcend them.

Opposing Israel’s atrocities in Gaza doesn’t make you a good person, it just makes you a normal person — and supporting Israel’s atrocities in Gaza makes you a bad person.

Nobody gets any points for opposing an active genocide; that’s just the basic, bare-minimum requirement for a normal human being with a functioning empathy center in their brain.

If you can’t meet that basic, bare-minimum standard, you deserve to be viewed with suspicion and disdain, and anyone in your personal life who cares about truth, morality and humanity should seriously reassess their relationship with you.

https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/i-oppose-israels-atrocities-in-gaza?publication_id=82124&post_id=144350805&isFreemail=true&r=k7ee3&triedRedirect=true

from
I Oppose Israel's Atrocities In Gaza
Because I'm Not A Psychopath

--by Caitlin Johnstone; May 6, 2024

thanks
Garbby.

from 'Notes From
The Edge Of The
Narrative Matrix':

I don’t oppose the butchery in Gaza because I love Hamas or hate Jews or love Islam or hate America.

I don’t oppose the butchery in Gaza because I’m a lefty or a commie or an anarchist or an anti-imperialist.

I oppose the butchery in Gaza because I’m not a fucking psychopath.

Opposing Israel’s butchery in Gaza is so obvious, so common sense, such a bare-minimum, fundamental-level, Being Human 101 position that if it isn’t immediately self-evident to you after learning the basic facts, your problem is much, much deeper than whatever ideology or bias or prejudice you might happen to have. There’s something wrong with you as a person.

If you support Israel’s butchery in Gaza, you’ve got much bigger problems than merely not having the correct ist or ism belief system.

You’re just all fucked up inside. Your conditioning has made you into a generally shitty human being. You have deep and immensely consequential flaws in your character, and you won’t mature as a person until you heal and transcend them.

Opposing Israel’s atrocities in Gaza doesn’t make you a good person, it just makes you a normal person — and supporting Israel’s atrocities in Gaza makes you a bad person.

Nobody gets any points for opposing an active genocide; that’s just the basic, bare-minimum requirement for a normal human being with a functioning empathy center in their brain.

If you can’t meet that basic, bare-minimum standard, you deserve to be viewed with suspicion and disdain, and anyone in your personal life who cares about truth, morality and humanity should seriously reassess their relationship with you.

https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/i-oppose-israels-atrocities-in-gaza?publication_id=82124&post_id=144350805&isFreemail=true&r=k7ee3&triedRedirect=true

from
I Oppose Israel's Atrocities In Gaza
Because I'm Not A Psychopath

--by Caitlin Johnstone; May 6, 2024

thanks
Garbby.

Garb@90: So, Hamas has continued their long-standing and well-documented war crimes, of using civilians in Gaza for human shields. Your response contains exactly one concrete recommendation for what to do about Hamas, and it’s both small and tangential. Then you give a literal wish list. (Why, if I didn’t know better, I’d say you weren’t entirely serious about ending this war.)

On your other recommendations, I’m happy to report Iran’s attempt to escalate the situation was, quite literally, shot down. (If, nonetheless, your concerns about ‘WW3’ remain from your old account here, we can try to help you with those.)

By moving the UN to Jerusalem, do you mean just UNRWA, or all of the UN? I really don’t understand how doing either would lessen concerns about terrorists using UNRWA for cover; that’s a security problem on the ground, not an issue about siting HQ.

Finally, what are your sources for your claim, “This is a city full of women and children with only a few battalions of Hamas fighters left.” Hamas’ primary method of operation has been to hide behind civilians, and that includes to follow them wherever they go. Why do you claim Hamas fails to do this now?

@92: Just one editing suggestion: your main operative phrase is spelled, “gang-rape in Israel.”

(Unless you’re actually talking about Hamas’ ongoing war crimes in Gaza; see @57 &c. for details.)

Otherwise, well done!

"... you truly have earned your moniker of Grima Wormtongue, because all you do is reveal to anyone with character and conscience that you are a sociopath and a bold faced enabler of genocide, even though you just can't bring yourself to call it what it is. How sad."

bingo.
and yet
'words' just
bounce off him
like Na'vi arrows
off 3' of Corporate
Boilerplate. Impunity

thru Immunity.
see: @93; 94
ad infinita

@66 dvs99, and @77 CDizzle (a.k.a.Garb Garblar) for the WIN!!!

@69 kristofarian: The youth of this deeply divided country would prefer the Orange Turd seizing control--however ILLEGALLY---of the White House again, like a replay of 2016 in 2024? YIKES! Is it because they're too buried in their phones and don't give a shit? What can be done to wake the younger generations up from their iPhone sleepwalking? They WON'T like the consequences of their complacency.

Auntie dear, I don't think the "youth" of the country pays much heed to either the Young Democrats OR the College Republicans. Those are the politics nerds.

I hope they have the sense to vote and to vote for Biden. It's their funeral if they don't.

no, auntie Gee
(most) young people
here Don't prefer El trumpfster

but

“Each day that Democrats fail to stand united for a permanent ceasefire…more and more youth find themselves disillusioned with the party.”

This is what the "democratic"
party is so Fond of inquiring:

"Where the Fuck ELSE
they gonna GO?"

meaning:
'kids these days -- they can either
fucking Take it or they can
fucking LEAVE it.'

I Cannot blame the Victims.*

*from Chris Hedges
one of My Faves
on his

Interview with Congressional candidate Dennis Kucinich on the genocide in Gaza and the corruption of the two party system.

The presidential election in November looks set to pit Donald Trump, who will most likely dismantle what is left of our decayed democracy, against Joe Biden, who is a full partner in the genocide of the Palestinians in Gaza.

Not, for most of us, a palatable choice. The two ruling parties, who have foisted these candidates on the public, have at the same time conspired with their corporate sponsors to block third parties and independents, along with mavericks such as Bernie Sanders, from running viable campaigns.

The only groups that consistently win in our elections are the militarists, corporations and the billionaire class, who, of course, fund and stage manage the electoral farce.

On all of the major issues – endless war, trade deals, deindustrialization, government surveillance, the steady decline of social services including a for-profit health care system that allows corporations to prey on the sick, the bloated prison population and militarized police – there is little daylight between the two ruling parties.

How can we reclaim our democracy and provide real and meaningful political alternatives?

Are we forever condemned to the diminishing returns offered by the least-worst option? Is there a way to create an electoral system that is not captive to big money and dominated by groups such as the Israel lobby?

Joining me to discuss the state of our anemic democracy – a system the political philosopher Sheldon Wolin referred to as inverted totalitarianism -- is Dennis Kucinich.

--by Chris Hedges; April 27, 2024

much more, illuminatingly:
https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/the-chris-hedges-report-with-independent

@Garb & kristo: You’re free to engage @57 and @58 any time you want. That you have not done so tells us all we need to know. In particular, from @58:

“I understand being opposed to Israeli war crimes against civilians. What I don't understand in being blind to Hamas war crimes against civilians. It's a war crime to operate your insurgent network alongside civilians. As an insurgent, you must operate your network separately from civilians, even if doing so places you, the insurgent, in danger. If you don't do that, you're a war criminal, and you're going to get civilians killed, and it will be your fault when that happens. I literally do not understand how people who are so passionate about Palestinian lives just ignore this issue.”

Also, I cannot possibly have “earned” the term, “Grima Wormtongue,” from you, because it is not yours to bestow. You stole it from the rightful owner, and use it without permission. No one can “earn” property which has been stolen by thieves.

If you simply cannot do any better than name-calling for your “argument,” then at least make up your own names to call people.

@99

NO One's
EARNED the
monniker Wormtongue
quite like YOU wormmy at
Least not in recent memory

I'll let the Curious
amongst us
search for
their sel-
ves.

you Struggle So
to claim Someone
OWNS your Handle

Why?

oh
and
I'll do
my 'engaging'
howsoever I see

fucking fit.
you can bugger
off now.

[is this mic
working]?

@101
uh, no.

how 'bout now?

@103 -- Si!

@97 Catalina Vel-DuRay: +1 "I hope they have the sense to vote and to vote for Biden. It's their funeral if they don't." BINGO. I share your concerns.

@98 kristofarian: +1 I share your concerns, too, about youth becoming more disillusioned with the Democratic party if Democrats don't stand united for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza-Palestine.

What is this world coming to?

I don't see my previous post to Catalina Vel-DuRay @96 and kristofarian @97.
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