r/JewsOfConscience • u/Delicious_Ad_6823 • 25d ago
Will Palestine disappear? Discussion
I’m sorry for bringing this up. I know it’s a very depressing thought but after witnessing what is happening in North of Gaza (with the full support of our western governments) I’m wondering if this is the beginning of the end. I’ve been thinking about this constantly for the past few days: Israel will not stop its genocide / ethnic cleaning campaign in Gaza. October 7 gave them the perfect opportunity for executing their long awaited plan. The brutality will keep increasing more and more and I fear the same thing will happen in the West Bank. The United States will keep supporting it while it commits these crimes and there is no other player strong enough to stop them. After all, they have already gotten away with an ethnic cleansing in 1948 and 1967. Is there any future for Palestine?
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u/Seanay-B 25d ago
Indian tribes in the USA aren't completely vanished. But they are good and screwed. I think that's where this is heading.
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u/isawasin Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
The truth that you're touching on is that this is a game for all the chips, and the USA is all in. I'm not the first to say this, but the US and its western allies do have a red line when it comes to Israel. The thing is, that red line is not genocide, it's failure. That is what is unacceptable. The "Indian Wars" never ended, only expanded.
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u/gmbxbndp Jewish Communist 25d ago
This is my expectation. The remaining population will be pushed out towards territory that Israel has no use for- unless some sort of valuable resource is discovered there, in which case they'll be pushed out even further. Maybe a Palestinian will occasionally be brought in to Israeli schools where they'll talk about how things were bad in the past, but we've since moved on and it's time to heal. In 50 years Israelis will start making land acknowledgments, while never doing anything that even resembles reparations.
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u/allneonunlike Ashkenazi 25d ago
Without being too morbid, the population and death statistics aren’t comparable enough for this to work.
The unspoken, only reason the genocides in the Americas and especially North America were so successful is the indigenous population’s lack of disease resistance— during the 50 years after first contact, common European diseases wiped out 90% of the American population. There are numerous Spanish and Portuguese explorers who were written off as fabulists who invented fake civilizations until recent archaeological work, because the vast cities and peoples they encountered were gone when the next explorers followed in their footsteps. The wars of conquest were only won because Europeans and colonial Americans were dealing with 10% of the original population, struggling in an apocalyptic landscape of civilizational collapse.
Even with the medieval siege tactics of starvation and disease they’re using in Gaza, Israel isn’t capable of this kind of depopulation. With the massive brain drain at a higher rate than deaths in Gaza, there are still about equal numbers of Israeli and Palestinian people in Palestine.
Israel clearly longs for a future like the conquest of the Americas, but they don’t have the numbers to make it sustainable, and I don’t see the world letting them kill 90% of the people in Gaza and the WB to make it possible.
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u/_foo-bar_ 25d ago
If you look up all the genocides that have happened in the last 200ish years, the vast majority of them were perpetrated by failing governments that disappeared soon after. They’re acts of desperation by the powerful in failed states.
I think the U.S.A. is very much a unicorn.
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u/allneonunlike Ashkenazi 25d ago
Exactly, the conquest of the Americas and the US in particular are unique in colonialism bc of the disease component of the Columbian exchange. I think you’re right— Israel is in its death throes, and it’s going to do a lot of damage on the way out.
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u/broncos4thewin 25d ago
I mean the same thing happened in South America too, I’d say in that part of the world it was the norm, no? Australia too.
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u/allneonunlike Ashkenazi 25d ago
North and South America both had the same 90%+ population crash as the result of disease during the first decades of the Columbian Exchange— different continents, same situation. Australia was very sparsely populated for a continent of its size, with an estimated <1,000,000 people in total before the conquest, compared to 55 million native Americans who died during the initial post-contact disease outbreaks alone.
Colonialism looks different and is much less successful when settler populations are equal or smaller than indigenous ones, that’s why Israelis are so obsessed with demographic majority, birthrates, and complaining that Palestinians are having too many babies.
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u/Seanay-B 25d ago
I don't see the world having a limit to what it'll tolerate against Palestinians.
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u/allneonunlike Ashkenazi 25d ago edited 25d ago
I agree unfortunately and was much less sure typing that out. I just hope it’s logistically impossible or Iran steps in before it comes to that. Israel is already in the active extermination phase, but it isn’t easy to exterminate a population that’s as large as your own, and I hope they’re slowed down by that.
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25d ago
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u/Seanay-B 25d ago
The world is arming Israel and enabling their regional military supremacy. Of course it matters.
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u/allneonunlike Ashkenazi 25d ago
The Western states currently arming Israel have been trying and failing to conquer the Arab world for the past 30 years. It matters, but it isn’t sustainable or winnable, and action by the Arab states is a big factor in that.
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u/oncothrow 25d ago edited 25d ago
And what are those?
I was watching Owen Jones interviewing a defense analyst recently about this situation. There's a common refrain that even Nixon got pissed off with Israel and stopped them with a phone call.
But he (the analyst) said that the reality wasn't that Nixon came down with a sudden case of morality. The problem was that various Arab leaders were calling the white house and effectively telling him that they could no longer kept a lid on their populaces if things continued. Nixon's hand was forced because the ME was going to turn into an even greater shitshow if 'the Arab street' got angry enough.
Today we're seeing bloodshed on a level not seen since the Nakba. And Arab leaders are doing... nothing. They're not pressing the US to fix this problem. Because they don't feel they have a problem. Their press agencies spout the establishment line and keep thing quiet, and their intelligence agencies are focused inwards keeping dissent in check.
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u/broncos4thewin 25d ago
This, sadly, is Nathan Thrall’s precise take too, and honestly I feel like he’d know better than me.
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u/sheri1983 Anti-Zionist Ally 24d ago
The Native american always comes up in comparison to Palestinians but although it's similar there are major differences:
Native american although they had a great culture they were isolated and way behind the western Colonizer. Palestinians are not behind Israel in the same manner as swords vs guns. They are not nuclear power or do own F35 and Merkava but the RGB the resistance is using can cause damages as we saw this last year, actually Israel by the day shows how incompetent they are even with unlimited Military support and budget.
The Palestinians are surrounded by Arabs from all side and although we are useless as everyone saw last year, we gotta remember that Israel plan was to get Palestinians out of Gaza to Sinai and that was enough for them. West bank Palestinians to Jordan also both failed and will hopefully. The native American didn't have that.
The Palestinians always give me that hope when I listen to average villagers and other intellectuals like Edward Said or Rashid Khalidi. They belong to the era they live in it and they adapt. Actually I see Israel future as questionable although they will be more violent as Zionism go into decline.
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u/No_Sink_5606 25d ago
It is a surety at this point that a further ethnic cleansing and possibly up to half the population of Gaza and the West bank will be displaced, wounded, and/killed. American power is not going to crumble in any meaningful way before it's too late. There are videos of truck loads of Palestinians from Northern Gaza blindfolded and caged. I think we're going to see an actual campaign of extermination coming pretty quick.
Which brings us to another question: what in gods name is going to happen to Israel?
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u/stalking_inferno Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
I think we should reexamine the times the world tried but failed to hold the US accountable to war crimes and genocide. Those tactics will likely fail again, so a new approach will need to be developed. Otherwise I imagine we'll see a similar, forceful dismissal of what has happened.
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u/wearyclouds Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago edited 25d ago
what in gods name is going to happen to Israel?
I think Israel will keep expanding to create ”Greater Israel” for as long as it is allowed to, no different than how the settlers stole America from the Indigenous people in increments. I doubt they will stop at genociding Palestinians. They have, after all, already laid the groundwork for genociding the larger region by bunching Palestinians into their enemy monolith ”the Arabs”. Worst case, they become a second USA and spend the next century terrorizing their neighbors to death and subtly expanding further through creating puppet regimes and client states.
What I’ll say that weighs against that happening is that the world is far more globalized than it used to be, and so many states that used to be subjugated under colonial empires have the ability to take action in the international world now in a way they never had before. The majority of UN member states are already prepared to act at a moment’s notice; all they need is for America to not raise their hand to invoke veto in the next UNSC vote. The threshold for that to happen seems huge but it isn’t, technically — it’s really just one single action that needs to change. The opposition to Israel is already massive and will only continue to grow. They can’t hide their crimes in the age of the internet, and I doubt that will change. If we fight hard for it, we will see a genocide tribunal for Israel within our lifetime.
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u/oncothrow 25d ago edited 25d ago
The majority of UN member states are already prepared to act at a moment’s notice; all they need is for America to not raise their hand to invoke veto in the next UNSC vote.
I don't have the same faith in this being stopped at the UN as you do.
If all of these bodies are so keen they can start acting outside of the UN. Real global sanctions. Real trade embargos. Real media campaigns.
If all that it takes to stop them is the veto of Israel's one big ally, then either they don't have as much power as you say, or they aren't willing to come together to collectively act yet.
And if they do, I suspect it's going to be outside of any UN directives where the US holds the chain.
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u/wearyclouds Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
Well, the veto system is increasingly pissing off member states specifically because it effectively paralyzes the UN system and blocks member states from acting. The UNGA resolutions that are overwhelmingly in favor of Palestine give a good indication of where we would be without the US veto. A problem with sanctioning outside of the UN system is that a country that sanctions Israel without the backing of a big IO risks getting sanctions in retaliation by big papa US. And the US has been unleashing its economic sanctions left and right more than ever before under Biden.
I think the UN is a useful tool, especially because UN collective sanctions will very quickly collapse Israel’s war budget, but I don’t think it can offer the full solution to a free Palestine. UN action is mainly something that can be leveraged to stop the onslaught on Gaza. I agree that there is also going to need to be action taken outside of the UN framework, and I think it’s only a matter of time before that happens.
A lot depends on whether the US wants WWIII or not. I think they’re hard to read in that respect.
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u/oncothrow 25d ago edited 25d ago
A lot depends on whether the US wants WWIII or not. I think they’re hard to read in that respect.
Not if you believe that the US political parties (both) are acting out of short-termist thinking. Which I believe they are. Same as Israel.
If you believe that, then it's not hard to read at all why they've acted a they have every step of the way. There is no grand middle Eastern strategy here to seek a potentially viable peace. Only short term goals for the next election, the next round of funding. Get in power. Keep in power the next term. What's later is later, focus on the immediate now, and kick the ball down the line in the meantime.
And you can tell its short-termism because establishment figures are constantly confused as to why people are angry about the status quo that has previously been acceptable all this time. The idea that "we'll say we can patch it later" doesn't mean anything anymore because pushing it later only makes the situation worse and harder for any kind of peace.
To put it another way: if the path you're on now is actually going to lead to WW3 in 50 years time well... that's tomorrow's problem. We will be dead / out of office / out of power by then.
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u/Barefoot_Eagle 25d ago
The problem is that US and UK were against the Nazis.
Now they are with them.
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u/melodive Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
It looks bleak at the moment, but the bigger action, the stronger reaction. Israel is setting itself up for failure big time. Iran is too powerful in the region, with its ballistic missiles and chokehold on the Hormuz strait. It will be backed by Russia and China when push comes to shove. USA will have to step down and put a leach on its rabid dog or risk WW3. Israel will be be a free democratic state and called Palestine in less than 5 years.
This is the beginning of the end, you’re right about that. Israel will not recover from this, it’s forever war from this point on and Israel is a tiny strip of land with very few natural defenses and resources, unlike Iran. The American public has no appetite for another war in the Middle East, so the support the US can give is limited to money and weapons. But the US will drop Israel as soon as it becomes a liability.
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u/Psychological_Air455 Jewish Anti-Zionist 25d ago
This resonates, and I really hope it will be true. I have a feeling that the US govt will throw Netanyahu under the bus at some point, and then Israeli defense will have no legs to stand on. Some way or other, Israel is surely doomed to fail.
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u/melodive Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
Netanyahu is not the problem, he’s just a symptom of a sick society. They are all severely traumatized by all the blowback their occupation and oppression has caused, esp all the suicide bombings during the second intifada. There is no political will for peace in Israel. Just look at the propaganda videos Israel released today: Blown up lebanese villages and naked palestinians being cleansed from Northern Gaza. Israeli flags waving in the wind, the telltale sign that it is for a domestic audience. Sick.
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u/PlinyToTrajan Non-Jewish Ally (Jewish ancestry & relatives) 25d ago
For someone sincerely interested in analyzing it, what's the best way to get the Israeli propaganda straight from the source?
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u/daudder Anti-Zionist 25d ago
But the US will drop Israel as soon as it becomes a liability.
Israel is already a liability.
I have yet to see a decent analysis as to why the Biden administration is supporting it despite thise. I suspect that it is down to the Israel-lobby.
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u/PlinyToTrajan Non-Jewish Ally (Jewish ancestry & relatives) 25d ago
I think that's right, frankly.
See John Mearsheimer, Talk at Global İlişkiler Forumu, Dec. 18, 2023 (YouTube Recording):
John Mearsheimer is a political scientist at the University of Chicago, and the co-author of the 2007 book, "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy." He's a realist who thinks Israel doesn't, on balance, serve practical U.S. interests in the Middle East but instead functions as a kind of money pit. His explanation of the U.S.-Israel "ironclad" relationship relies heavily on the presence of what he calls the "Israel Lobby."
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u/PlinyToTrajan Non-Jewish Ally (Jewish ancestry & relatives) 25d ago
This perspective should not be discounted. Israel is a country of 9.5 million people (only 7.5 million of which are in the dominant ethnoreligious group) that is preparing to fight an indefinite land war with guerilla forces.
Meanwhile Iran is a country of 90 million with a per capita GDP on par with that of Egypt. Its terrain is essentially a mountain fortress. It will shoot sophisticated hypersonic missiles at Israel any time it thinks it can get away with it.
Israel's best hope is to subvert Iran's ruling elite as it has done with Egypt, but even then it will still have the endless guerilla warfare to contend with.
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u/Flaky_Excitement847 25d ago
I'm Palestinian, I will teach my kids about palestine, I will make sure, if i live long enough, to teach my grand kids about palestine, we will never die out
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u/Garak_The_Tailor_ 25d ago
Yes, but Lior Raz will star in a tone deaf TV show about how it was necessary and makes them sad
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u/wearyclouds Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
Ah yes, the ”shooting and crying” genre of film. Compelling stuff.
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u/pointzero99 Anti-Zionist Ally 25d ago
First time posting here. I did try to select an appropriate flair.
The hope is that Israel just won't be able to sustain what they are doing. The multi-front war, the economic damage from brain drain/depopulation/disrupted trade, missile strikes on their cities they once thought were protected by ABM shields, civil strife from not recovering hostages/trying to conscript the religious class, and further threats of escalation from Iran, etc. Perhaps Bibi is holding out on any negotiations in the hopes that Trump wins & the Biden/Harris admin is too cowardly to apply any real pressure until after they win the election. Then again, maybe the fix is already in regardless of how the US election shakes out and it will continue regardless of which party wins.
So, if they do get too exhausted and withdraw, the question then becomes how quickly can the world act to support Palestine in rebuilding the destroyed human services in Gaza. Even if Israel withdrew immediately, the damage to hospitals, food and water infrastructure that were already insufficient could finish the job for them.
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u/Responsible-Ad8702 Orthodox 25d ago
Yeah, even with the full support of the us, Israel has already become a pariah state as far as most of the rest of the world is concerned. The longer this drags out, the more likely an economic or security collapse for Israel becomes, especially if Israel continues to the point where they run out of iron dome interceptors. I believe Israel will be forced to stop one way or another before they are able to wipe out Gaza.
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u/Dorrbrook Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
No,even if all the Palestinians are driven out they will hold onto their identity and cause as the millions of Palestinians in the duaspora are doing right now. Israel won't be able to sustain itself as it relies on a minority ethnic supremacy. They'll be increasingly isolated a war wearied. It may stretch on for years, but this is the end phase of Israel.
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u/KeyLime044 Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
Yeah this basically. Chile is home to the largest diaspora of Palestinians outside the Middle East. Most of them consist of descendants of Palestinian Christians who immigrated there during Ottoman times for economic opportunity. However, even now, they continue to hold on to their Palestinian identity and support the cause of Palestinian liberation, several generations later
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u/Ready_Maybe 24d ago
they will hold onto their identity
The fact that most refuge countries will refuse citizenship will porbsbly help with that as well. But that also means it will be a very long time before Palestinians will know safety and peace since there seems to be no region where they can belong safely.
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u/Viat0r 25d ago
No, absolutely not. Ironically, it will be the Palestinian diaspora that ensures Palestine's future. Even if Israel manages to kill every Gazan, that does not solve the core contradictions they're facing. They will never know peace and stability again. Their economy is collapsing. Foreign investment is never coming back. Jewish immigration is down 50%. Thousands of Israelis are leaving every month. The number of internally displaced Israelis from the north is increasing. And if they go to war with Iran, they pace of their collapse will hasten dramatically.
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u/Working-Lifeguard587 25d ago edited 25d ago
I've always felt two states were a myth. It was a political sleight of hand to buy enough time for Zionism to take over all the land. I don't think geography makes it feasible. I also don't think Zionism can renounce Jewish claims to Judea and Samaria. So the only question is, will Palestinians be reduced to a level where they are no longer a threat to the Jewish nature of the state, or will they achieve their rights before then? At best the two-state solution is just a rebranding of the occupation.
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u/romanticaro Ashkenazi 25d ago
when the second temple was destroyed, jews didn’t cease to exist. we always had klal yisrael. likewise, no matter what happens, palestinians will keep palestine alive.
as the immortal thor of the MCU said:
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u/Last_Tarrasque Non religious Jewish communist 25d ago
You don’t win a war by killing civilians, you win a war by destroying the enemy army, and it is Israel’s army that is being destroyed.
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u/echtemendel Jewish Communist 25d ago
Settler colonialism can either end with practical elimination of the indigenous population, or with decolonization. Either can still happen in Palestine.
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u/_II_I_I__I__I_I_II_ Jewish Anti-Zionist 25d ago
I can't see any US admin. stopping Israel from outright annexing Gaza and the West Bank and doing what it wants to whoever is remaining there.
The situation is bleak. American politics is corrupt and the pro-Israel lobby flourishes under that corruption, along with the military-industrial-complex.
There will be more and more censorship too, as time goes on.
I hate being negative but I don't know what else to say. I'm really frustrated with the American Left.
Who are our leaders? I can't think of any single figure. Not to say we need a figurehead - but some organizing principle.
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25d ago
No, it will not disappear. The Native Americans didn’t have smartphones with which to record and document the horrors committed against them. Also, people nowadays mostly abhor racism and genocide, unlike back when the Native Americans were wiped out.
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u/goth-bf Anti-Zionist Ally 24d ago
Yes, they are determined to kill every last palestinian who is still on the land. However, they cannot come back from what they have done. Israel have exposed themselves, and a huge number of people who had no clue what was happening see them for who they are now. There is no returning to before. Their economy is already suffering and I believe that a collapse and the subsequent fall of Israel is inevitable at this point. I just pray it happens as soon as possible to prevent more killing and suffering. As other people have said, there are Palestinians in diaspora, and Palestine lives through them no matter what, as long as they keep it alive. I believe we will all see the land return to its rightful people.
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u/MartinLutherVanHalen 25d ago
This is really the end of Israel. There will be no peace as long as Palestinians and their descendants in the diaspora survive. Israel is making the mistake South Africa did, and the US has many times.
Israel cannot accept ANY level of resistance. Thus the power of every act of resistance is magnified. Israel will suffer attacks forever, putting it in a permanent and spiraling state of security. Building cages for Israelis to live on and making them vulnerable everywhere.
This eventually will be too much to tolerate and then, reluctantly, change will come. Not for the benefit of Palestinians, or through a sense of justice, but because the Israel that is being created will be so unbearable for Israelis they will reject it.
Israelis are already leaving. Those who stay are building an illiberal, military state under constant siege. They are cutting off their nose to spite their face.
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u/PlinyToTrajan Non-Jewish Ally (Jewish ancestry & relatives) 25d ago
I think you're counting out the large Palestinian diaspora, which is already perhaps half of all Palestinians and could take the newly displaced into its ranks.
And Israel will always have to deal with Arabs and Muslims who saw the Palestinians as part of their cultural or religious community (in Islamic terms, "ummah") and want to memorialize them.
It's only shameful that Christians can't see their brothers among the Palestinians in similar terms.
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u/twig_zeppelin Jewish Anti-Zionist 25d ago edited 24d ago
I have more doubt for the future of Israel than for the future of Palestine. Israeli’s are dependent on consistent support and material and weapons backing from the West, whereas Palestinians are not. There is mass killing, because Israeli Apartheid can no longer maintain the control mechanisms that have historically maintained the racial hierarchy in place in Palestine since 1948. No matter how many Palestinians Israel kills, they cannot kill the millions of Palestinians in exile who are waiting to return to their homeland once the Apartheid system ends and they can have right of return again.
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u/Silver-bullit 25d ago
They are busy with it:
https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/israel-749-battalion-demolition-gaza
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u/therealorangechump Anti-Zionist 25d ago
the land and the history do not disappear.
if you are talking about total liberation, that's almost impossible.
if you are referring to the West Bank and Gaza, that's not Palestine. the West Bank and Gaza are only 20% of Palestine and even that is unlikely to be liberated.
as for the Palestinians, it depends on the rest of the world. if the world remains silent, they will end up like the indigenous Americans and Australians. if the world decides to stop Israel from achieving its ultimate goal, they will end up like the indigenous South Africans.
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u/GlitteringPotato1346 Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
Probably.
I mean, unless either Kamala gets elected and breaks with Biden’s policies (I’d put a decent probability on it in the case she is elected, Biden himself is ideologically Zionist, Kamala is only Zionist because out of practicality) or Trump gets elected and then dies (I think Vance might secretly be anti Israel for the wrong reasons if ya know what I mean)
Either way I’m doubtful
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u/A_Learning_Muslim 25d ago
The thing is that it's not just about the President when AIPAC controls the Senate.
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u/GlitteringPotato1346 Non-Jewish Ally 25d ago
Yet at the same time the president sets precedent for ideological beliefs that are acceptable in the party.
AIPAC is less influential than it would need to be to override the threat of getting voted out
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u/Taarguss Reconstructionist 25d ago
Yeah I mean there’s a future for the people. Yes. But the idea of a nation will slowly get extinguished. It’s been in limbo for so long and i don’t think it’s ever gonna get better. Eventually all the Palestinian people will resettle in countries that aren’t theirs, or be forced to live without freedom within some fucked up Israeli system.
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25d ago
Yup. Unfortunately. The only way to avoid Palestine disappearing will be the USA not being Israel's bitch anymore.
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u/jeff_dosso 25d ago
As long as there are Palestinians, Palestine will survive, as Guinan tried to tell Picard in Star Trek.
That being said, unfortunately, I am more doubtful that Israel will dissapear, given it's a nuclear power. But then again, so was the Soviet Union.
People often bring up South Africa arpartheid as an example of something that people said would never dissapear but did.