I think The Atlantic is actually pretty close to the mark. Committed, hardcore ideologues frequently turn out to be authoritarian, even if they refer to themselves as "anarchists". Most of these ideologues are busy administering ever more stringent purity tests to anyone they encounter lest someone in their vicinity commit wrongthink.
There is a name for people who build coalitions through compromise and diplomacy, and work towards pragmatic solutions to actual problems — they're called "centrists".
During times of great strife, centrists are also known as “enablers”. Fence sitting only works until you realize that the Overton window has shifted a field away from the fence on which you’ve been sitting.
Have you considered, and hear me out here, that the bias is yours?
I mean if their reporting about everything but this one topic is good, perhaps their “Zionist pro-war bias” and “genocide whitewashing” only seem that way to you because you’ve assumed an extremist position on the issue?
It's not a reason I myself would rely on to end a subscription but I'm glad for the data point and don't see the point in cross-examining. I'm thankful they took the time to answer my question.
I'm glad you didn't. Your reasoning was perfectly sound. The fact that your answer got downvoted is simply further evidence that there are those who want to hold a position without genuinely considering the arguments in favor of the alternate position.
This is so condescending. You assume that your side has considered the opposing arguments and the other side has not and that is why they hold the wrong position.
Completely crazy. Not only had the war in Iraq hurt Israeli security, rather than improving it, Israel opposed the war knowing that it would be damaging rather than beneficial. What you have is not "the Israel Theory", what you have is a conspiracy theory.
Ariel Sharon was the prime minister of Israel in 2002. Netanyahu was a civilian. You seem to be unable to tell these two very different people apart. I suggest going easy on the green stuff.
Current prime minister, former and future prime minister, that's an irrelevant distinction here. Clearly the Israelis thought the Iraq war was in their interest, which is the original claim here, and is clearly evidenced by Israeli attempts to lobby in favor of the invasion.
>Not only had the war in Iraq hurt Israeli security, rather than improving it
I am aware there was internal debate in Israel on relative benefits of taking out Iraq's conventional military capability, its economic potential, remnants of its WMD program and breaking apart Iraq's territorial integrity versus the risk of Iraq falling under Iran's influence. Evidently Netanyahu's faction prevailed in the debate. Though both sides would have preferred taking out Iran first before going after Iraq.
>what you have is a conspiracy theory.
You can call it whatever you want. The true test of a theory is if it fits the evidence and its ability to predict events. Do you have a better theory of why Americans and Europeans repeat the same failed policies over and over in the middle-east?
Here's my prediction on Iran : I don't know what Trump will do ,if he will ultimately accede to Israel's wishes, but if a 'civil war' breaks out or If Trump or any future American regime decides to invade Iraq. It will conservatively lead to a decade of war, one million deaths, millions of refugees (from Iran, Iraq). If the Islamic Republic collapses I am doubtful on whether Iran will survive as an integral nation. But Israel will get what it wants. which will be - taking out Iran's nuclear program, breaking Iran apart and Israel becoming the regional uncontested power (until Turkey or Egypt emerges but thats the next round). Israel will likely formally annex more of Syria, and Southern Lebanon as well or create a buffer zone rump state. Palestinians will never see sovereignty. They will be ethnically cleansed or live in a glorified bantustan. Iraq may not survive in its current form. It will be a bloody, expensive mess for everybody else. Likely American lives will be lost. I struggle to see how a regime change would be achieved without US boots on the ground. The Iranian people will be all but certainly worse of. Just like the people of Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya, etc.
Like I said to the other person here, Netanyahu was acting in a private capacity as a civilian, not a representative or office holder of the government of Israel. It amazes me how you conspiracy nutters can't tell the difference.
You don't have a "theory". You worked backwards from your conclusion that "Israel = bad" and created an entirely false narrative that only sounds plausible in your own deluded head. Furthermore, you have absolutely no proof, obviously, for your conspiratorial ravings, so the most charitable description of your thoughts on the matter would be a "conjecture" not a "theory".
And I'm sorry but I don't care about your predictions.
> You worked backwards from your conclusion that "Israel = bad"
I did work backwards. from the evidence. I didn't start with "Israel is responsible for everything". In fact i used to dismiss that theory as "low iq" and believe "that it's complicated". It is complicated, but not as complicated as i used to think.
Saying Netanyahu was "just a civillian" and had no political influence in the Bush admin, in Israel or the Israel Lobby is particularly comical he is the current primeminister and longest running leader of Israel. That period was just a brief interlude when he was not serving in a formal capacity. His vision of the middle-east is exactly what the middle-east is today.
edit : I partially take back 'Libya' - i think the Libya affair is less influenced by the Israeli interests. But still, even though Gadaffi had given up his WMD program and become a friend of US and Europe, he was still a foe of Israel. So he still never could become a friend of the west. Funny how that works isn't it. Almost Like Europe and the US can't have a relationship independent of Israel's interests.
And the response to this brutal crackdown from our brave and virtuous progressive activists has been a collective shrug of indifference, with some exceptions where those pillars of moral rectitude have taken a bold stance... in support of the fascist theocracy that has massacred its own people.
During the Gaza conflict it was highly suspected most of the outrage was manufactured by organized propaganda networks and spread into the mainstream. During this conflict and the Sudan conflict we can see it confirmed, zero attention in the mainstream because its missing the influence of an organized propaganda network creating, disseminating, legitimizing and boosting a narrative. Isreal and the CIA are terrible at modern day youth propaganda they should boosting this like crazy.
The people who kill iranians are the same who finance hamas. Think it's easy to eliminate hamas without hurting civilians? I've heard there was no carpet bombing.
I’m not sure why and I’ve never heard it articulated, but based on overwhelming evidence, progressives will not criticize Islam, Islamic regimes, or cultural practices.
I feel strongly about this issue. I don't feel it's divisive, it might be dismissive but my point in the comment is factual.
Edit: Take a look at The Intercept as an example. Protests began three weeks ago. The only posts TI has on Iran basically amount to "Israel bad" and "Son of Shah likes Israel and Israel is bad, therefore son of Shah is bad". That's it. This is a moral failure of the highest order and it underscores, for me at least, that most of these faux-progressives' activism is purely performative.
I get you -- when I was doing investigative reporting about policing and technology, the Intercept's energy was basically "great pitch, but we want you to do 8mo more work before we'll talk; good luck not being able to afford rent in the meantime".
But, friend, with love -- shit talking about what people are doing or not doing is not the answer. Lead by example.
> But, friend, with love -- shit talking about what people are doing or not doing is not the answer. Lead by example.
Why do you assume I'm not doing? Having said that, my options are limited to obtaining the lion and sun flag and participating in a demonstration. Quiet solidarity in other words. Shit talking about people who have a platform and are not using it because Israel is absolutely valid and legitimate.
That by the way is the danger with a singular obsession with one conflict, which, objectively, is not even the deadliest conflict in its region, let alone the world. Everything is either viewed through the Israel prism, as in "we're not going to express any solidarity with Iranian protesters because the fall of the theocracy might benefit Israel", or, it gets ignored entirely because there's no clout to be gained on social media.
Just to be clear, I never said I disagreed with you. But I've seen a lot of infighting happening in these spaces that stems from shit talking -- people who can no longer work together anymore because of how the shit talking bifurcated the work instead of building layers between.
> This is a moral failure of the highest order and it underscores, for me at least, that most of these faux-progressives' activism is purely performative.
It is worse than that. Faux-progressives will also play into antisemitic conspiratorial tropes that this was all perfectly and precisely planned.
Wouldn't your energy be better spent doing what you think the should be doing rather than complaining about them not doing what you think they should be? Take some agency in the world.
If you hadn't noticed we've got our own fascist theocracy attacking its own people in the western world. We're trying to avoid giving it any more energy with vaguely-defined popular policy goals. And staying out of another country's affairs, regardless of how evil those affairs are, is a valid moral pillar.
Now perhaps there is an interesting academic discussion about whether if we had done more to direct Demented Donnie towards Iran, that he wouldn't be attacking the rest of NATO trying to steal Greenland to create some dipshit's idea of a legacy. But that is hardly definitive with the kind of moral clarity that you're asserting.
Are you referring to the theocracy that is massacring another nation's people? Asserting an opinion on that is a bit lower on the scale of international intervention, right? And from what I've seen, most of those arguments are in terms of stopping our own countries' support of that country - not for outright intervention in that country.
Apologies, I deleted my comment because I felt it wasn’t contributing to the discussion, and since I’m not an American I don’t wish to pontificate about either Trump or ICE.
I will say however, as someone born in a country ruled by a totalitarian regime, that the US is nowhere near that, and claims to the contrary offend me personally because they trivialize authoritarianism and totalitarianism.
Why wouldn't you place more importance on making sure existing freer countries don't descend into new autocracy and totalitarianism? From my perspective it's not a trivialization, but rather a legitimate concern about where we're headed. And so far over the past year, these types of concerned predictions have been shown to be quite correct.
Like sure, it's certainly possible that we will have a domestic US outcome of "mission accomplished" sometime over the next couple years, ICE is drastically wound down and goes back to only being at the border, there is a full accounting of whom they deported and to where, the US citizens and lawful residents who were harmed by their extremely-urgent overzealousness are compensated for their damages, and so on. Just from everything we've seen, it's not very likely.
There is a name for people who build coalitions through compromise and diplomacy, and work towards pragmatic solutions to actual problems — they're called "centrists".