It has become standard among American and European progressives to refer to the Israel military operation in response to the October 7, 2023 attacks by the Islamic Resistance Movement (“Hamas”) as “genocide.” We can see the same term used in a comment on a post in this blog.
Let’s assume that the progressives are correct, ignoring the fact that the population of Gaza today is 3X what it was in 1990 (typically a “genocide” involves a population reduction, not a population explosion). Given that assumption, these folks say have identified an ongoing genocide. Why won’t they take meaningful action to stop the genocide?
If brave, they could go to Gaza and pick up a rifle (or a shotgun?) and fight alongside the Islamic Resistance Movement and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. If cowardly, they could advocate for the U.S. military and NATO to go in and destroy Israel or, at least, the Israeli military. Instead, however, they’ve decided to be idle bystanders while a genocide is perpetrated. They’ll perhaps post on Twitter or Facebook or occasionally attend a protest demonstration. “Dozens of students stage walk out at Harvard in solidarity with Palestinians” (CBS):
The Harvard students said Palestinians are facing genocide and they wanted to show their support. They’re calling on the university’s administration to address the conflict.
They’re young and healthy, but they won’t fight against genocide. Instead, they want to send meek Harvard administrators to do battle against the IDF.
Also, high school students in Democrat-run Philadelphia:
Hundreds of Philadelphia high school students walked out of school Friday to march around City Hall in support of Palestinians.
“This is not a war. This is a genocide,” Nora, a student in the School District of Philadelphia who helped organize the action, said of the ongoing Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, even in places where Palestinians were told to seek safety. “The goals of today’s protests are … to get justice, and to fight back, and to use our voices.”
Hamas has soldiers who are the same age as American high schoolers (Daily Mail). These Philadelphians say that they want to “fight back”. Why doesn’t that include volunteering in the real fight against genocide?
Across the pond… “200 Bristol students join pro-Palestine demonstration outside Bristol Uni’s Senate House”:
A student-led pro-Palestinian protest broke out today in front of Senate House, with members calling for the end of the “Israeli Apartheid” and accusing the Israeli state of “ethnic cleansing and genocide”.
Members of the Socialist Worker Student Society (SWSS), the student wing of a national Marxist organisation, led the protest with banners and speeches in solidarity with Palestinians.
Chants of “free Palestine” and “in our thousands and in our millions, we are all Palestinians” could be heard during the 45 minute protest.
If they’re healthy enough to go to university and they’ve identified “ethnic cleansing and genocide”, why aren’t they volunteering to put a stop to these crimes against humanity?
Here’s a tweet from Cori Bush, who represents St. Louis in the U.S. House:
Israel is guilty of “ethnic cleansing” and “slaughtering” civilians, presumably with no military justification or rationale (unlike the U.S., which always protected civilians). Israel is committing “atrocities”. Does she advocate sending in the Marines to stop the Israelis? No. Airstrikes on every Israeli military base? No. Cori Bush suggests only that we cut off foreign aid to Israel, which can’t possibly deliver the hoped-for victory to the Islamic Resistance Movement or Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Even after shutting down for coronapanic and spending a ton of money on early Covid-19 vaccination (end result: a higher excess death rate than Sweden’s) Israel has a GDP of about $500 billion per year.
Related:
- International Brigades, in which progressives 100 years ago fought for their beliefs
Have you given any thought to going out there (on the Israeli side) — sounds like a couple of your skills could be of use if there were a way to employ them. Also you could then provide your loyal readers with on the ground insight and observations — which a segment of your loyal readers would find more interesting than your on the ground observations at Oshkosh or in Jupiter when the air conditioner or dishwasher repairmen come to visit.
jdc: I have not identified or decried any ongoing “genocide” and, therefore, it doesn’t make sense for me to travel somewhere to prevent a genocide.
Perhaps they don’t want to expose themselves to injury or death, or perhaps they are committed to nonviolence. I think a better question is why they did not travel to Gaza years ago to try to improve the presumably bad situation that confronts the LGBT community there? They could have arrived there as a “Gaza flotilla” flying rainbow flags.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaza_Freedom_Flotilla
Anon: I can understand being a coward, but I can’t understand highlighting the fact by posting constantly about a “genocide” and then doing nothing (the folks complaining about genocide don’t even post about having sent money to Hamas or the Palestinian Islamic Jihad for weapons). Cowardice is typically a quiet emotional state.
I do like your idea of progressives delivering the Good News to Gaza. Maybe it will be possible to have the rainbow flotilla after this latest round of fighting has calmed down.
Picking up the nearest shotgun and rushing off to fight for some issue is in fact quite ineffective. A few lunkheads with signs getting media attention is probably the most they could accomplish.
123: According to the newspaper of record, a progressive who goes to fight for the Islamic Resistance Movement need not bring his/her/zir/their own weapon.
“As supplies of virtually every basic human necessity dwindle in Gaza, one group in the besieged enclave remains well-stocked: Hamas. … Hamas, they say, has spent years building dozens of kilometers of tunnels under the strip where it has amassed stores of virtually everything needed for a drawn-out fight. … Hamas has hundreds of thousands of gallons of fuel for vehicles and rockets; caches of ammunition, explosives and materials to make more; and stockpiles of food, water and medicine, the officials said. A senior Lebanese official said Hamas, which is estimated to number between 35,000 and 40,000, had enough stocked away to keep fighting for three to four months without resupply.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/27/world/middleeast/palestine-gazans-hamas-food.html
Philip, IDF intercepted a Hamas commander phone call where he requested fuel from Gaza hospital saying that he needed it because he was fighting for good of the country.
And shotgun is considered to be a viable weapon in urban door to door fighting.
For some reason or infinite wisdom or wokeness Israel prohibits civilian shotgun ownership. IDF uses rifle grenade-launcher like attachment for forced entry. But now it could benefit from having a clays or trap shotgun affectionado to stand watch with a 12 gauge to protect everyone having a break from drop munitions from $100 supermarket drones. Apparently years of Iraq and Ukraine conflicts taught little and commercial Israeli anti-drone solutions seems to be not known to IDF. Small drone-dropped bombs fall slower then clay birds fly, and these bombs seem to be effective up to 10 yards, so if intercepted with 2 oz heavy tungsten shot at 30 yards the damage would be limited.
I believe most Palestinians prefer to throw rocks:
That is not a shotgun, but some expensive elephant hunting rifle that has very strong recoil. Dude probably hurt his shoulder, his stance was wrong. Probably some clip from Gulf country or Maghreb country. That rifle costs like a car, at least a used car.
They probably can’t physically get there
Any material support they do give to Hamas is probably a federal crime
If one really believes it is a genocide, why add oneself to the toll of victims? (Usually only Holocaust deniers even mention the non-Jewish victims of the Nazis)
At least this way, we have a better census of “enemies of civilization” who think it’s okay to slaughter babies, old people, and peace-festival-goers over a territorial dispute. (And this has been shocking, really)
Who knew the whole thing (in the US) is mostly the result of the Marxist takeover of our educational institutions mixed with residual cold-war propaganda? https://www.adl.org/resources/blog/contemporary-anti-zionisms-connections-soviet-propaganda
SuperMike, can not get there in the age of container shipping and regular commercial intercontinental flights? When US ally and NATO member Turkey is a major enabler of Hamas? Somehow western ISIS supporters did not have this problem
So those who volunteered to fight in WWII on side of the allies did want to add themselves to the tolls of victims?
Yes, anti-Zionism was an invention of KGB and pet project of CP USSR. USSR even pushed through UN GA resolution against Zionism. Very cynically, because on personal level most of Soviet communists and KGB agents cared little about the subject. Palestinian Authority leader and “president” Abbas even got PhD from Moscow GB-connected foreign relations college for his holocaust – denying dissertation, something that would get a regular soviet citizens blacklisted or even imprisoned.
SuperMike: I think that the righteous can get to Gaza via Egypt and then through a tunnel. The NYT explains how it works for fried chicken: https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/16/world/middleeast/tunneling-kfc-to-gazans-craving-the-world-outside.html
Well, sometimes they do not fight, sometimes they just write a letter. .