Thought for the Day

[Stavros]

It could equally be said that there is a fine line between being pro-Israel and anti-Palestinian, and that line has been crossed on many occasions.

I tend to think in terms of parallel lines characterising a lot of the conflict since the first Aliyah in 1880. The settlers were astounded to find Arabs living and working where they expected a half-empty undeveloped land. Zionist/Nationalist pamphlets continued to peddle this lie right up to the 1940s. The two communities thereafter failed to accommodate each other, much as in the late Ottoman era the existing Jewish communities had lived as far apart from the Arabs as possible. There have been examples of co-operation, friendship, inter-marriage, but the post-war settlement that evolved from 1917 to 1921 robbed both the Arab and Jewish residents of Palestine an independent voice: just as then they would have had to find a way to live together, so this remains true today.

The left has never spoken with a united voice, but I don't think any political movement has. We have seen in the UK how some radical Trans activists have alienated people they need for support with aggressive, intolerant views, I often just ignore it on the basis that most people most of the time are reasonable and respond well to coherent arguments stated plainly, rather than at ten decibels at one end of a megaphone -it is one of the reasons why Trump never won and can never win the popular vote in the US, and why it is counter-productive to denounce people with contrary views as 'Transphobic' or worse. There are other ways to peel an onion, one doesn't need an axe.

If the left has a problem, so too do those who support Israel, but can't or will not distinguish between Israelis in general, and the Fascists like Netanyahu, unwilling it seems to me, to accept the Fascist past that was part of the Israel project from the start, of people like Avraham Stern or Menachem Begin. It is thus possible to be a fierce critic of Netanyahu and the other minority parties in his coalition on the basis of their politics and political history without getting into an existential doom-loop about the life and death of Israel. Extremist politics might be a consequence of the extreme positions taken by both sides, with violence its most obvious form of expression, and right now the HAMAS attack of October '23 has badly damaged relations. That kind of violence forces people to take sides, and thus open a rift between them. It will take a long time for these wounds to heal.

Once upon a time they did try to put it behind themselves, and for all the flaws in the 1993 Treaty, it offered a framework for change. Itamar Rabinovich once wrote a book, via Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken, about an earlier phase of 'peace talks' that went nowhere. The irony is that after the peace talks that did go somewhere, the choice not to take that road was made by the people who murdered Yitzhak Rabin, or people like Ariel Sharon, Netanyahu and Likud, and though Avi Shlaim does point out that the other major group to reject that Treaty was HAMAS, the main weight of his criticism is on Israel-

". The main conclusion is that the Oslo accord was not doomed to failure from the start: it failed because Israel, under the leadership of the Likud, reneged on its side of the deal."
The Rise and Fall of the Oslo Peace Process (ox.ac.uk)

Netanyahu's days in politics may be numbered, but like the men he admires from Israel's past, he is going down fighting, and I don't think he cares how many he he takes with him. Why should any reasonable person support him and his Nationalist politics, given that it has failed so badly over so many decades and has left Gaza in ruins, and set back the cause of peace for another dismal decade?

[Stavros]

Kristi Kreme: one bite and it's not just your teeth that ache. How desperate are these people to kiss Trump's 'ring'..?

The Kristi Noem and Kim Jong Un Controversy, Explained | TIME

[KnightHawk 2.0]

Kristi Kreme: one bite and it's not just your teeth that ache. How desperate are these people to kiss Trump's 'ring'..?

The Kristi Noem and Kim Jong Un Controversy, Explained | TIME

They're very desperate,and South Dakota Governor Kristi-Pruneface-Noem is the latest example.

[KnightHawk 2.0]

Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley says she will for the twice impeached,four times indicted fraudster and charlatan Donald Trump,the same person who called her birdbrain and relentlessly attacked her on his failed social media platform. And not surprised at all she flip flopped and bent the knee.

[Stavros]

I may have missed something here, but what puzzles me is why the woman in question was not asked to swap her seat with someone willing to abide by the regulations when sitting next to an exit. I was once moved from an internal flight in China because I was seated next to an exit but couldn't read the instructions, and I did so willingly. After all, it's not as if changing seats would cost more.

Frontier Airlines passenger refuses to comply with exit row instructions causing plane to deboard | The Independent

[Luke Warm]

Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley says she will for the twice impeached,four times indicted fraudster and charlatan Donald Trump,the same person who called her birdbrain and relentlessly attacked her on his failed social media platform. And not surprised at all she flip flopped and bent the knee.

She’s trying to cover her bases for a 2028 campaign. She doesn’t realize that her chances in 2028 will be just as bad as they are now. Republicans are not going to nominate someone non-white, a woman, who was raised in a Hindu family (she is Christian now but that’s not going to persuade Republicans on a national basis when there are plenty of white males they could nominate) and she is not authentically “MAGA” she is just pandering.

[KnightHawk 2.0]

The MAGA King aka Mr. Bitch.&. Moan Donald Trump and his enablers falsely claims that the New York Trial,is unfair and rigged. Y'all want some cheese with that whine?, The New York Trial shows that nobody is above the law,including a twice impeached,four times indicted fraudster,charlatan and sore loser. The court should remove the cameras and microphones so he can't spine the narrative or whine,bitch and moan every day about how unfair he's being treated.

[KnightHawk 2.0]

Today Justice Prevailed and showed that nobody is above the law. Donald Trump comments shows a lack of remorse ,and he can make all the false claims that he wants about him being innocent,but the jury says you're not..

[filghy2]

In the second most important election of this year, Indian voters have rejected Narendra Modi's invitation to turn their country into an effective dictatorship. Although his party still won with a reduced majority, it's a heartening sign that the world's largest democracy has resisted manipulation by appeals to religious nationalism.
https://www.vox.com/world-politics/3...-2024-modi-bjp

[Stavros]

Over the last few days I have watched some of the two hearings the House had with Dr Fauci and Attorney General Garland. What strikes me about them, is that Republicans in particular -Jordan, Gaetz and McClintock in the case of Garland, and MTG in the case of Fauci, were not asking questions to which they wanted to know the answers -they knew the answers, so in fact that they were making statements to go on the record. And yet, though there were complaints about the 'decorum' of MTG, it seemed to me the only reason Jordan and his chums asked Garland to appear was to insult him, and in the process insult the intelligence of the people watching. There was an almost deliberate lack of intelligence, given that 'lawmakers' know now the system works and know the range of Garland's responsibilities.

What is all this for? It is a pathetic side show, whose only result, intended or not, is to diminish public faith in Congress.