When Hamas started firing rockets into Israel this week, overwhelming the so-called "Iron Dome", it was completely expected that various nations would start siding with one of the sides in this conflict, as though signalling virtue and trying to affirm that they are on the right side of history was good and just. The problem with this whole argument which remains forever intractable is that there is no right side of history here and neither side of the conflict is good, or fair, or just, or kind.
At this point, I do not even care about the reasons why. Palestine's two parties that alternate in power are either Hamas or Hezbollah and both of them are essentially terrorist organisations who are both descended from the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO). Israel has been gradually goose-stepping its way to the right and Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud Party which is the biggest group in a sordid coalition of the nasty, has meant that Israel has drifted into functional fascism. In Israel we have an ethno-state which is ruled by corporate interests and in Palestine we ethno-state which is ruled by syndicates.
In siding with one side or the other, people by default almost seem to deny one or more truths. In this case, two very big things are simultaneously true:
1. Israel's oppression of Palestinians has led to the rise of Islamic extremism.
2. You cannot negotiate with Islamic extremists. They do not want a political solution.
As far as I am aware, Hamas still operates according to its 1988 Covenant which has in the preamble that its objective is the destruction of the state of Israel. The 1988 Covenant also mentions that Hamas has taken on this objective as part of its process of jihad. This means that because of the objectives, Hamas never actually seeks a lasting political solution. What it wants is a holy war. Unfortunately, Israel which is consistently a bad faith actor and which frequently violates terms of agreements, has no choice now but to defend themselves from the threat it created.
Maybe there are Palestinians who might want a political solution, but neither Hezbollah nor Hamas do. They are a jihadist groups aspiring for holy war. At this point in time, they have decided that the window for rational discussion will be firmly closed; any and all opportunity for reason has passed. Admittedly Israel's security ambitions might be unreasonable, but they are attainable. There is perhaps an end game here.
Maybe there is a subtle difference in messaging here in that Israeli forces do attempt to warn civilians to vacate areas they are about to hit, to save innocent lives. That is the difference between the butchery of 'democratic' Israel and the butchery of 'undemocratic' Hamas. At the end of the day though, it your house, neighbourhood, school, hospital, or members of your family, have been destroyed by a 'democratic' or 'undemocratic' rocket attack, then it really matters not a jot.
What I find particularly galling is that many Christians and conservatives in the Anglosphere west will blatantly ignore the atrocities that have been committed against Palestinians for decades, but they take a sudden interest when the violence goes the other way. I can only assume that this extends from some kind of hope in aspirational transactional theology, whereby supporting Israel is supposed to lead to some kind of blessing from God. I am pretty sure that God cries and mourns over the death of people, irrespective of whether they follow him or not.
What I find equally galling is that many radical Muslims, leftists, Antifa, black nationalists and the anti-Semitic far-right are openly celebrating the terrorist attacks on civilian targets in Israel—some claiming this is an uprising against white supremacist settler-colonialism. They salivate for this type of violence against their enemies here.
Perhaps we should believe people when they tell you who they are. If they choose to side with one side or the other in what is an intractable conflict because of the deliberate choices that people make, and their response can not be to see the deaths of innocent people on the other team as tragic and unnecessary, then we have to assume that they too are not good, or fair, or just, or kind.
Attributing blame, or claiming the moral high ground in a conflict where innocent people have died is nothing short of moral bankruptcy and the only acceptable course of action in my not very well paid opinion here is to stop.
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