The question is not whether Oct 7th was justified, or provoked, but whether it was predictable. And it was. Just as people had predicted Russia would never tolerate NATO on its doorstep, or China tolerate foreign troops and N-weapons in Taiwan, so the uprising by Palestinians was inevitable.
The predictability in this case and even the ones you cited arises from the fact that there exists continuous and/or aggregious provocation. Which I think is the point of the article. Israel kept on provoking until it got the response it was illiciting. There's predictability even in the case of Israel, but there, we know from experience the threshold is difererent and there is no concept of proportionality -- if a Palestinian child throws a stone, the IOF soldiers will throw him in prison to torture and abuse if not shoot to instantly kill in the first place; if Palestinian resistance manages to kill a couple, Israel will kill a few hundred. When I heard of the Oct 7 breach of security and subsequent deaths, the first thought in my mind was, 'they are going to flatten Gaza'. Israel is quite predictible in its monstrosity per its past actions and its stated ambitions and goals to dominate, subjugate, or annihilate the lesser humans.
Predictable, planned and the response (rise of anti-semitism, Israel has the right to defend itself, but do you condemn Hamas, mass rape and beheaded babies lies) already written and sent out to media puppets and the response from Western political vassals already co-ordinated.
It was even more predictable when the Zionist State allowed its electronic and physical defence barrier to become disabled. and then pretend tat they didn't know that it had happened.
Many things are predictable. That is too hazy a statement. How would anyone have predicted the date? And with what proabability of accuracy? It could have happened in Sept 2023, or sometime in Oct, Nov, Dec, 2023 or 2024..... It's easy - using hindsight bias - to say that something is obvious after the fact. I'll make another prediction - this won't be the last attack by Palestine resistance fighters in the history of this conflict. There will be future attacks. I don't know when, I don't know how. I don't know by which groups. I don't even know if the people doing the future attack have been born yet. But based on the history of Israel & Palestine, I think there are few people that believe that this Oct.7th attack is the last of its kind.
Correct, but I'm not a soothsayer. I'll make another prediction: the Israeli fascist regime will get worse before it gets any better. Fascism doesn't die a natural death, it has to be burned out of the national soul. And as Brecht said: "Don't rejoice too soon, the bitch that bore it is in heat again."
>>"I'll make another prediction: the Israeli fascist regime will get worse before it gets any better."
I second your prediction. Powerful empires fight harder to hold on when they are declining (just my observation from reading from history about the rise and fall of civilizations and empires). The US Empire (which includes Israel) is on the decline (IMHO). I see things getting much, much worse (unfortunately) before it gets better. I doubt I'll be alive to see things getting better in my lifetime (though I really hope that I'm wrong).
Hello Niall McLaren, Thank you for quoting Bertolt Brecht. As a keen admirer of everything Brecht, it is satisfying to discover a fellow traveller.
The translation I have reads: " Don't rejoice too soon, the womb it crawled from is still going strong." And so it has come to pass... Brecht's prediction is with us today.
It is no wonder that when the Berlin Wall fell ( or was stage-managed ), Bertolt Brecht's grave was one of the first things to be vandalised. But his beautiful ideas will live on.
I imagine you may have come across Brecht's lyrics, perhaps unknowingly"
"Oh, the shark has pretty teeth, dear, and he shows them pearly white."
Or maybe, "Show me the way to the next whisky bar....Oh, moon of Alabama, we now must say good bye."
Or "The ship, the black freighter, turns around in the harbor, shooting guns from the bow." (Listen to Nina Simone doing this song, "Pirate Jenny." You will remember it for life!)
Bertolt Brecht the playwright, poet and communist lived in exile in the USA when Hitler came to power and returned to communist East Germany in 1947. His plays are masterpieces - The Caucasian Chalk Circle - being one of the best.
Indeed, I looked his name up and read about his life. So many interesting people in our past which some of us have never heard of! (Thank goodness for the internet!)
Lookup hindsight bias. Also look up over-confidence bias (which you are displaying with your statement). There are some other biases present in your statement - like cherry-picking data after the fact to validate probability of events and weak coincedental relationships (i.e. weak causal inferences).
So you were not shocked by Oct.7th? You expected it? Why didn't you tell anyone? You could have saved so many lives!
Niall McLaren. Exactly, no one in the west was paying attention and no one was listening. US Presidents would attempt a peace treaty without success. Camp David, Oslo then Trumps Abraham Treaty all ended in a stalemate.
The PA in the West Bank have no power, and the world ignored Hamas in Gaza. Until October 7th.
I began learning about the ME 35+ years ago. I have travelled to the area. I have read history books. I worked in News and documentary film production. I have listened to the various and numerous leaders throughout the ME including Netanyahu.
The day he was elected and appointed Smotrich as Finance Minister and put Ben-Gvir in charge of national security, it was obvious what the plan was for the Palestinians.
Everyone is a Nostradamus after the fact. Everything is obvious after it has already happened. Everyone is a world-class predictor for past events.
You were aware of the timing of such events? You knew of Israel's plans? You knew how events would play out? You were aware of Hamas's plans? Would you even be here commenting if any number of a hundred+ different events played out differently?
The reality is that the world is very unpredictable, full of randomness, complexities, chaos and unknowable variables and relationships between all these variables. That makes the world scary, uncertain, and impacts people's sense of security. It is comfortable (and convenient) to believe that you "knew" - as it assuages this "uncertainty" and "lack of adequate control" that is prevalent in life.
But believe that you are super-smart, a sharp-shooter at predicting events and probabilities, etc. if it provides you with a level of comfort and sanity in dealing with the world.
Shelley Chadwick - what I want to summarize with is this - ignore everything I said above as it is of secondary importance compared to your being able to maintain sanity in this crazy world and deal with the ghastly and ghoulish behavior of Israel and its supporters. And if you have to believe that you have predicting super-powers for you to feel good about yourself, then so be it.
Various nations warned IsraHeil that something significant was brewing, even IsraHeili soldiers near the Gaza border, whom were told to STFU. IsraHeil extended the music festival for one more day.
They moved troops away from the border.
They took hours to respond.
It doesn’t take Spidey-Sense to realize that they KNEW it was coming. And “retaliation” was in the books all along.
No one could have predicted Oct 7th the way it happened and when it happened (well, apart from those who knew about what would happen and possibly even when, see https://rumble.com/v51g2p7-october-7-bombshell-drops-w-ben-swann.html). But many people knew history and were fully expecting something like that to happen any moment. Just like with Ukraine, etc.
Give your pseudo-scientific garbage a rest once in a while.
Palestinians have been "rising" up and attacking Israel since the race was created in 1948. You do understand that there wasn't a race of people calle Palestinians prior to 1948, yes?
As for NATO on Russia's doorstep, that seems to have come true, even without Ukraine joining NATO. Finland beat them to it and Russia now Finland/NATO has an 800 mile border with Russia!
{...since the race was created in 1948. You do understand that there wasn't a race of people called Palestinians prior to 1948, yes?...} 🤔🤔🤔🤔NO, I don't understand !!!
Please, be so kind as to elaborate further in FULL detail, so I and many others may understand.
"There were no such thing as Palestinians. When was there an independent Palestinian people with a Palestinian state? It was either southern Syria before the First World War, and then it was a Palestine including Jordan. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country away from them. They did not exist."
--Golda Mier (As quoted in Sunday Times (15 June 1969), also in The Washington Post (16 June 1969))
AND
"When were Palestinians born? What was all of this area before the First World War when Britain got the Mandate over Palestine? What was Palestine, then? Palestine was then the area between the Mediterranean and the Iraqian border. Eastern West Bank was Palestine. I am a Palestinian, from 1921 to 1948, I carried a Palestinian passport. There was no such thing in this area as Jews, and Arabs, and Palestinians. There were [only] Jews and Arabs."
Golda Meir ("Iron Lady of Israeli politics" Thames TV (1970))
And there were no such things as Kenyans before 1963, before that just various colonized tribes. Many of the nations of today, were colonized, or part of different political empires. Now they exist as political entities when they didn't before. Your point is unpersuasive since there are counter examples of current people who didn't 'exist' before some period in history.
Those who refer to themselves as Palestinians are merely left-over Arabs who refused to accept citizenship offered by the new state of Israel in 1948. THose Arabs that did accept the offer were granted full citizenship in Israel and have the same rights today as any other Israeli citizen.
Those Arabs (nee "Palestinians") that REFUSED to accept the offer are stateless, not citizens of any recognized state, are governed by terrorists and 75 years after the land division, continue to call themselves "refugees" who are "oppressed" by Israel.
Because they are "refugees", the UN created an agency 75 years ago ONLY for these Palestinians, called the UNRWA. that has provided FREE welfare to an ever growing number of Palestinian "refugees".
Prior to Oct 7th, UNRWA oversaw the delivery of 500 truckloads of free food & supplies every single day for 75 years! Why are Palestinians allowed to freely suck at the teat of the UN for decades? I'm sure most people would like ot have all their daily needs provided for them for free. via contributions to the UN. I would.
IMO, this UNLIMITED free welfare should be terminated and the Palestinians should be forced to move to any of the other surrounding 23 Arab countries that might accept them.
If my city was occupied with no way in or out, with water, food and fuel controlled by barbarians outside the barbed wire, we’d be strengthening the children and our warrior men over all else.
To Manny: At the rate Israel is going - genocide in Gaza, the sheer brutality and cruelty of it all, using starvation as a weapon, planting lies and propaganda all over the world, distorting the word 'antisemitic ' ,to be ironic, we will one day even be proud to be called antisemitic!
The Zionist propaganda may work on a large chunk of of the population in the core empire countries (US/UK/Germany) but the further you move away from “empire central” and the influence of it’s hysterical corporate media lackeys, the less ordinary people are fooled or cowed into silence. On the empire periphery and in the global south, the anger and disgust grows by the day. The live-streamed genocide carried out by the US and its rabid Israeli death cult has laid bare the true nature of the racist US empire that only serves the merchants of death in the military-industrial complex. Younger generations in the core empire countries have also been jolted awake to the lies they’ve been indoctrinated with. The US and Israel are flailing desperately with ever more absurd and transparent lies needed to sustain their façade. It’s about to come crashing down. We mustn’t let the mass murderers escape again.
I agree, but must quibble with the "right now," part. It's been that way since I first discovered what was going on when I was about 14, and I'm 79 now. So, nothing new, other than a more desperate clumsiness and obviousness that they didn't used to show, because few were questioning the approved narrative.
Hi Joy, yes, I agree. I recently read the Jakarta Method, and realized that it was going on, but we didn't have social media to set us straight back then. We were (at least some of us) were more easily fooled.
There is no razor wire but Fortress North American is a ghetto. We all need to devote ourselves to cutting through the wire and seeing the world as it is. IMHO the West is well on it ways to being a global pariah, fiscally and morally bankrupt. All this violence and war mongering is driving countries into the waiting arms of BRICS.
At the BRICS, St. Petersburg summit 139 countries attended. There were 21000 attendees and 59 countries are on the waiting list to join.
While Biden was lollygagging around Normandy Putin was giving one and two hour speeches and press conferences at the summit.
Asia is already producing 70% of the world's annual economic production with expanding economies.
We forget we only represent 9% of the world's population. When we should be building our economies, we are alienating the rest of the world, waging war, and pissing away the future.
Too late, Jo. There’s no going back now. Consider that the Amerikkkan military creates 25% of the world’s carbon emissions, yet they want the rest of us to drive electric cars. ( I’d personally prefer a horse for transportation.)
Mother Nature is exacting her revenge, and all we stupid humans can do is adapt to it or die.
If you can walk or cycle, you must live in Noo Yawk or some similar shithole. I live on a farm and dollars to donuts I’m more fit than you are 😁
Homo sapiens doesn’t deserve to enjoy the beautiful planet we’ve fucked up all to hell. Mother Nature will vomit us out like the parasites that we are and good riddance to us.
I am concerned to see the announcement later today about the new cabinet positions in the new, and ANC-diminished South African government. Having the neo-liberal, western- oriented, free-market DA joining the government does not bode well for South Africa or BRICS.
The fight against neoliberalism is far from over and a fundamental reason governments and democracy in the West are in full collapse. It is one of the major ideologies that have ruined the West.
The zionist playbook always includes provoking others to justify bombing and murder, they've been doing that for decades. I am glad to see that some are finally willing to openly discuss this fact. Thank you Caitlin!
Ever read the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion? There isn't an anti Jewish statement in the whole book but hey, they claim the book is anti-Semitic. I just don't get it. What it IS, is a blue print for ZIONIST takeover of the world. And of course that makes it anti-Semitic since after all, Zionism is a "good thing". And what is really interesting is how may Jews are against Zionism. 19 JEWISH organizations as of latest count world wide. So what gives? Are anti Zionist Jews anti-Semitic? And BTW...a lot of researches claim that the Jews of today, aren't Semitic in the first place like Arthur Koestler with his book "The Thirteenth Tribe". Does that make him anti-Semitic? Someone help me out...I CERTAINLY don't want be called that terrible term! I might have to fly to Israel and wail at the wall in repentence.
The solution, is that in spite of the fact that the US House has passed the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) legislation with a glowing majority,
( otherwise they lose their seats ), but yet to pass in the Senate ( otherwise they also lose their seats .......just a matter of time for a pass there as well ), I have it on good authority that after Netanyahu addresses his US Knesset in Washington next month, he will promise the 330 million USraeli citizens that he will build a wailing wall in Washington, (Psalm 79 being the specialty for all), a synagogue on every street corner, have Hebrew taught in every school from the age of 5 on, cancel all sports events on a Saturday and force all supermarkets to only sell only kosher food with a special kosher Big Mac available at all times.
It will just a lot of time for 330 million Americans to adjust to all these changes.
Contrarian and Courageous, I agree. It baffles me why journalists such as Caitlin cannot incorporate the truths that are reflected in your statements.
These journalists think nothing of "generalizing" about the US government, or even the USA as a collectivity, an evil force. They condemn Biden and his administration and Congress for a despicable collective behavior. But they are incapable of seeing Judaism also as a collectivity, which it is, via its political arm, the Jewish Lobby. This Lobby is concerned with all political interests of Judaism, including the unconditional political and military support for Israel by the US government and the countless funding methods used to transfer US government and citizen monies to Israel and its Jewish citizens; the legal definition and governmental/societal response to “antisemitism”; the dominant roles played by Jews in government and society; the control of the public debate on such concerns via the formulation of a Jewish public narrative; the control of what is politically correct in such a debate; the passage of laws deemed necessary to protect Jews as a group separate from all other US groups; and many others. All these concerns are an ethos within Judaism, just as is the ethos that "the Tribe must survive at all costs, forever."
The IHRA Jewish Leaders Insult Our Intelligence
(Not only human intelligence but artificial intelligence as well)
No problem! The term "anti-Semite" is rapidly loosing it's negative connotation. The more crap they pull the deeper people looking into their behavior. And more and more are finding out that behavior is NOT in their best interest.
To bad the House and other so called "leaders" don't make the effort to read "The Hoax of The Twentieth Century" by the JEWISH professor Arthur C. Butz or make any effort to see what JEWISH men of peace have to say about their insanity like Professor Norman Finkelstein.
As far as the population of Israel goes, well if you are living on land stolen from other people in your own lifetime and in theirs, or you are living on land stolen from their parents and every one knows it, well you are are part of the zionist settler colonialist move.
I agree with you in the instances where land was stolen in their own lifetimes. But I think it is more complicated when people's parents were born there and it's the only home they've ever known. There is a significant protest movement among Israeli citizens who don't want the murdering and oppression done in their names.
"....Whether or not the October 7 attack was justified is a mental judgement; the answer to that question will always necessarily be entirely comprised of subjective opinion....."
No.
First, what exactly would be the "subjective" debate about people in a ghetto (here I speak in the 1940s sense of the world) attempting to free themselves?
"...In November 1940, this Jewish ghetto was sealed off by brick walls, barbed wire and armed guards, and anyone caught leaving was shot on sight. The Nazis controlled the amount of food that was brought into the ghetto, and disease and starvation killed thousands each month....."
"Analyst: Gaza becomes the biggest open-air prison on earth" - Published: 26 May 2021
I've never in my life seen any subjective debates about the uprising of the people held the Warsaw ghetto for example. Because well...there are none to be had about people being subjected to crimes against humanity.
The "anti-semitism" gaslighting we experience now.....is the exact SAME gaslighting tactics that have been used for the past 50 years that covered up what was already an Israeli crime against humanity all that entire time.
The fact is that 50 years leading up to October 6th 2023, the ICC and ICJ, if we take them to be MEASURED BY OWN STANDARDS,.....should already have had arrest warrants issued for the entire Israeli government members for several decades stretching back in time. At the very least. Plus co-conspirators from other countries.
Secondly, what was the "attack "by the Palestinians? Actually wasn't a crazed orgy of civilian mass murder , according to the established facts.
Once you clear out the debunked myths of rape and babies, the overwhelming evidence of facts is that on Oct 7, 2023 the Palestinians from Gaza:
- attacked Israeli military installations
- took hostages in order to recover the thousands of their hostages held in Israel.
The facts also indicate that most deaths in that incident.... resulted from the Israeli military...deliberately....bombing and killing its own people where they stood, as a matter of its own military doctrine.
Further interesting is the Warsaw ghetto was an "uprising" a defensive action....but Palestinians rebelling in the same conditions, well..... that's an......"attack" - an offensive action. Already we have here been ushered to the "anti-semitism" pathway. And everyone walks right in that trap.
So to call this a matter of debate, is basically to say that its OK to keep human beings as animals in a cage.....ignore that crime against humanity entirely....... but open a "debate" as to whether those human beings being subjected to a crime against humanity are criminals for attempting to free themselves from their captors....after NO ONE came to their aid.
And who would be having this "debate" to judge the Palestinians? The people who committed the 50-year long crime against humanity and the people that did NOT come to the aid of the victims of that crime against humanity. Wow.
The world failed these people for 50 years. And are still failing them by even framing this "debate".
Important distinction Caitlin makes between "provoked" and justified". They played the same game in Ukraine. It wipes out and memory holes history and critical thinking.
In a much broader sense, the same forces conflate any effort to empathize with or understand other people - example: if you write that the MAGA people have legitimate grievances about being abandoned by Democrats, corporations, and elite institutions, you are denounced as a Trumper.
Lol…from the archive link you posted we learn that Netanyahu gave a speech to an empty UN room while thousands of people were outside protesting against him. But I love the image of him being all righteous and no one seeing him do it!
I think Satanyahu (or is it Nuttinyahoo? - sorry I get confused) must be the most hated person in the world right now (and rightly so), followed by Biden.
Although there is an urgent need for waking well-meaning general public to the fact that hamas attack was not the starting point of the israeli-palestinian story, I am currently more concerned about different aspect of the issue.
Whether 7.10 could be deemed provoked and/or justified is, imo, not the only question that has to be mulled over and responded. What is the strategy, the logic behind 7.10? What was it purpose?
Most of you here seem to answer that q along the lines of emotionally based payback. A revolt. Emotional outburst of the victim against the oppressor, vengeance, reprisal. You seem to perceive it as directed towards the past only.
I think it's very patronizing of you, insulting the rational capacity of palestinians and their leaders!
I don't think they only aimed at something located in the past or present, I think they aim at the future, knowing full well their potential, their advantages and disadvantages.I think it is a plan, a rational strategy. And i want you to try see it. Or thru it. And judge for yourself if it's good or bad, worth or unworthy of uncritical support.
Nobody is familiar with Berjenki / Kissinger invention of militant Islam weaponization. It started in the late 70s, and became a tool of the CIA/MOSAD. During the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, the Europeans were eager to fund the Palestinian government of Yaser Arafat. Israel used Militant Islam to devide the Palestinian people into 2 opposing groups. They funded Hamas as a wedge. So Hamas leaders are working under the CIA/MOSAD. I wouldn't be too surprised if Israel bought Hams's flying lawn mowers.
Yup the American dream has gone away and the dumb free thinking western powers believe Israel’s rights are theirs and no one’s else’s , Israel was gods only chosen people and the rest of humanity owes them everything for our right to exits … so now the end is near and we can’t resist or gods chosen people will defame us all for denying their rights …you hit it out of the park on your writing this time and many times more !!
We don't know ".........whether Donald Trump is a brave hero sent by Jesus ....". No, but one thing we do know is that when Biden walks into the 'Confessional Box, he comes out free of sin.
Yes. After his part in the deaths of thousands, he is pure.....weak, feeble-minded, but pure, and to top it off, the epitome of hypocrisy
For those confused, in any doubt, hypocrisy is......
- feigning to be what one is not.....
- or believing what one does not.......
- or engaging in behavior that contradicts what one claims to believe or feel.
Because the hypocrisy hat fits, wear it, Gencide Joe. But don't expect a pass upstairs. ever.
The question is not whether Oct 7th was justified, or provoked, but whether it was predictable. And it was. Just as people had predicted Russia would never tolerate NATO on its doorstep, or China tolerate foreign troops and N-weapons in Taiwan, so the uprising by Palestinians was inevitable.
The predictability in this case and even the ones you cited arises from the fact that there exists continuous and/or aggregious provocation. Which I think is the point of the article. Israel kept on provoking until it got the response it was illiciting. There's predictability even in the case of Israel, but there, we know from experience the threshold is difererent and there is no concept of proportionality -- if a Palestinian child throws a stone, the IOF soldiers will throw him in prison to torture and abuse if not shoot to instantly kill in the first place; if Palestinian resistance manages to kill a couple, Israel will kill a few hundred. When I heard of the Oct 7 breach of security and subsequent deaths, the first thought in my mind was, 'they are going to flatten Gaza'. Israel is quite predictible in its monstrosity per its past actions and its stated ambitions and goals to dominate, subjugate, or annihilate the lesser humans.
Not only was it predictable, the IDF *knew* about it:
https://m.jpost.com/israel-hamas-war/article-806634
Predictable, planned and the response (rise of anti-semitism, Israel has the right to defend itself, but do you condemn Hamas, mass rape and beheaded babies lies) already written and sent out to media puppets and the response from Western political vassals already co-ordinated.
Spot on.
It was even more predictable when the Zionist State allowed its electronic and physical defence barrier to become disabled. and then pretend tat they didn't know that it had happened.
Many things are predictable. That is too hazy a statement. How would anyone have predicted the date? And with what proabability of accuracy? It could have happened in Sept 2023, or sometime in Oct, Nov, Dec, 2023 or 2024..... It's easy - using hindsight bias - to say that something is obvious after the fact. I'll make another prediction - this won't be the last attack by Palestine resistance fighters in the history of this conflict. There will be future attacks. I don't know when, I don't know how. I don't know by which groups. I don't even know if the people doing the future attack have been born yet. But based on the history of Israel & Palestine, I think there are few people that believe that this Oct.7th attack is the last of its kind.
Correct, but I'm not a soothsayer. I'll make another prediction: the Israeli fascist regime will get worse before it gets any better. Fascism doesn't die a natural death, it has to be burned out of the national soul. And as Brecht said: "Don't rejoice too soon, the bitch that bore it is in heat again."
>>"I'll make another prediction: the Israeli fascist regime will get worse before it gets any better."
I second your prediction. Powerful empires fight harder to hold on when they are declining (just my observation from reading from history about the rise and fall of civilizations and empires). The US Empire (which includes Israel) is on the decline (IMHO). I see things getting much, much worse (unfortunately) before it gets better. I doubt I'll be alive to see things getting better in my lifetime (though I really hope that I'm wrong).
{... I doubt I'll be alive to see things getting better in my lifetime (though I really hope that I'm wrong)...}
Let's guess, you're in your fifties ??? ...🤔🤔🤔
Hello Niall McLaren, Thank you for quoting Bertolt Brecht. As a keen admirer of everything Brecht, it is satisfying to discover a fellow traveller.
The translation I have reads: " Don't rejoice too soon, the womb it crawled from is still going strong." And so it has come to pass... Brecht's prediction is with us today.
It is no wonder that when the Berlin Wall fell ( or was stage-managed ), Bertolt Brecht's grave was one of the first things to be vandalised. But his beautiful ideas will live on.
I visited Brecht's house in Berlin a few years ago. Beautiful, respectfully cared for. Outside the cemetery as well, with Hegel's tomb.
Thank you, Joy in HK.
I'd never heard of Bertolt Brecht before seeing his name here. Another amazing find here courtesy of the internet...
I imagine you may have come across Brecht's lyrics, perhaps unknowingly"
"Oh, the shark has pretty teeth, dear, and he shows them pearly white."
Or maybe, "Show me the way to the next whisky bar....Oh, moon of Alabama, we now must say good bye."
Or "The ship, the black freighter, turns around in the harbor, shooting guns from the bow." (Listen to Nina Simone doing this song, "Pirate Jenny." You will remember it for life!)
Lol Joy! “Mack the Knife”!
Us Boomers know such things, thanks to the talented Bobby Darrin 😉
To Mikhael Arnold,
Bertolt Brecht the playwright, poet and communist lived in exile in the USA when Hitler came to power and returned to communist East Germany in 1947. His plays are masterpieces - The Caucasian Chalk Circle - being one of the best.
Indeed, I looked his name up and read about his life. So many interesting people in our past which some of us have never heard of! (Thank goodness for the internet!)
Anyone that was shocked by the 7/10 retalliation was not paying attention. 50 years and 1 day since Oct 6th 1973.
Right on Shelley. I ask people What about Oct.6? Oct. 5? Oct 4?
Don’t make me go all the fucking way back to 1948.
But do “you condemn Hamas?”
Do YOU condemn Nat Turner? John Brown? How about Crazy Horse, Tecumseh, Geronimo?
If you don’t condemn those individuals, then FUCK NO, I don’t condemn Hamas.
Lookup hindsight bias. Also look up over-confidence bias (which you are displaying with your statement). There are some other biases present in your statement - like cherry-picking data after the fact to validate probability of events and weak coincedental relationships (i.e. weak causal inferences).
So you were not shocked by Oct.7th? You expected it? Why didn't you tell anyone? You could have saved so many lives!
And who would have listened? The power structure doesn't hear what it doesn't want to hear, look at global warming, Ukraine, Iraq, on and on.
Huh? Please re-read my comment as you seem to have misunderstood the gist of it. (that last sentence of the comment was meant sarcastically).
Niall McLaren. Exactly, no one in the west was paying attention and no one was listening. US Presidents would attempt a peace treaty without success. Camp David, Oslo then Trumps Abraham Treaty all ended in a stalemate.
The PA in the West Bank have no power, and the world ignored Hamas in Gaza. Until October 7th.
I began learning about the ME 35+ years ago. I have travelled to the area. I have read history books. I worked in News and documentary film production. I have listened to the various and numerous leaders throughout the ME including Netanyahu.
The day he was elected and appointed Smotrich as Finance Minister and put Ben-Gvir in charge of national security, it was obvious what the plan was for the Palestinians.
Like I said before, look up hindsight bias.
Everyone is a Nostradamus after the fact. Everything is obvious after it has already happened. Everyone is a world-class predictor for past events.
You were aware of the timing of such events? You knew of Israel's plans? You knew how events would play out? You were aware of Hamas's plans? Would you even be here commenting if any number of a hundred+ different events played out differently?
The reality is that the world is very unpredictable, full of randomness, complexities, chaos and unknowable variables and relationships between all these variables. That makes the world scary, uncertain, and impacts people's sense of security. It is comfortable (and convenient) to believe that you "knew" - as it assuages this "uncertainty" and "lack of adequate control" that is prevalent in life.
But believe that you are super-smart, a sharp-shooter at predicting events and probabilities, etc. if it provides you with a level of comfort and sanity in dealing with the world.
Shelley Chadwick - what I want to summarize with is this - ignore everything I said above as it is of secondary importance compared to your being able to maintain sanity in this crazy world and deal with the ghastly and ghoulish behavior of Israel and its supporters. And if you have to believe that you have predicting super-powers for you to feel good about yourself, then so be it.
LOL, l was actually going to ignore everything you said (so eloquently) to maintain my sanity but thanks for taking the time.
"Those that ignore history are doomed to repeat it".
‘Scuse me, Chang.
Various nations warned IsraHeil that something significant was brewing, even IsraHeili soldiers near the Gaza border, whom were told to STFU. IsraHeil extended the music festival for one more day.
They moved troops away from the border.
They took hours to respond.
It doesn’t take Spidey-Sense to realize that they KNEW it was coming. And “retaliation” was in the books all along.
They ain’t foolin’ NOBODY.
You must be high again.
No one could have predicted Oct 7th the way it happened and when it happened (well, apart from those who knew about what would happen and possibly even when, see https://rumble.com/v51g2p7-october-7-bombshell-drops-w-ben-swann.html). But many people knew history and were fully expecting something like that to happen any moment. Just like with Ukraine, etc.
Give your pseudo-scientific garbage a rest once in a while.
Palestinians have been "rising" up and attacking Israel since the race was created in 1948. You do understand that there wasn't a race of people calle Palestinians prior to 1948, yes?
As for NATO on Russia's doorstep, that seems to have come true, even without Ukraine joining NATO. Finland beat them to it and Russia now Finland/NATO has an 800 mile border with Russia!
So what was the point you wanted to make?
Your only point is the one on your head.
I think JoJo is a Zionist troll (from the braindead comments that he/she/bot makes)
Lol Chang… what would someone from Palestine BE called? Chinese? 😂
{...since the race was created in 1948. You do understand that there wasn't a race of people called Palestinians prior to 1948, yes?...} 🤔🤔🤔🤔NO, I don't understand !!!
Please, be so kind as to elaborate further in FULL detail, so I and many others may understand.
"There were no such thing as Palestinians. When was there an independent Palestinian people with a Palestinian state? It was either southern Syria before the First World War, and then it was a Palestine including Jordan. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country away from them. They did not exist."
--Golda Mier (As quoted in Sunday Times (15 June 1969), also in The Washington Post (16 June 1969))
AND
"When were Palestinians born? What was all of this area before the First World War when Britain got the Mandate over Palestine? What was Palestine, then? Palestine was then the area between the Mediterranean and the Iraqian border. Eastern West Bank was Palestine. I am a Palestinian, from 1921 to 1948, I carried a Palestinian passport. There was no such thing in this area as Jews, and Arabs, and Palestinians. There were [only] Jews and Arabs."
Golda Meir ("Iron Lady of Israeli politics" Thames TV (1970))
And there were no such things as Kenyans before 1963, before that just various colonized tribes. Many of the nations of today, were colonized, or part of different political empires. Now they exist as political entities when they didn't before. Your point is unpersuasive since there are counter examples of current people who didn't 'exist' before some period in history.
I wasn't making a "point". I was relating a FACT.
Those who refer to themselves as Palestinians are merely left-over Arabs who refused to accept citizenship offered by the new state of Israel in 1948. THose Arabs that did accept the offer were granted full citizenship in Israel and have the same rights today as any other Israeli citizen.
Those Arabs (nee "Palestinians") that REFUSED to accept the offer are stateless, not citizens of any recognized state, are governed by terrorists and 75 years after the land division, continue to call themselves "refugees" who are "oppressed" by Israel.
Because they are "refugees", the UN created an agency 75 years ago ONLY for these Palestinians, called the UNRWA. that has provided FREE welfare to an ever growing number of Palestinian "refugees".
Prior to Oct 7th, UNRWA oversaw the delivery of 500 truckloads of free food & supplies every single day for 75 years! Why are Palestinians allowed to freely suck at the teat of the UN for decades? I'm sure most people would like ot have all their daily needs provided for them for free. via contributions to the UN. I would.
IMO, this UNLIMITED free welfare should be terminated and the Palestinians should be forced to move to any of the other surrounding 23 Arab countries that might accept them.
Good observation Joy.
At one time there were no “Americans” either, unless you count the Native ones who sure as hell didn’t call themselves Americans.
If my city was occupied with no way in or out, with water, food and fuel controlled by barbarians outside the barbed wire, we’d be strengthening the children and our warrior men over all else.
Zionists in Israel are the ones creating "antisemitism":
1- By declaring that they represent all Jews in the world.
2- By occupying Palestine, treating Palestinians as non-humans, and establishing an apartheid regime.
3- By stealing the land, destroying the houses, cutting the trees, stealing the animals of the Palestinians, supported by the military.
4- By creating the worst suffering in the world, doing genocide on Gaza, and being proud of it.
5- By wanting to define "antisemitism", criticism of the savagery they do.
6- By interfering in the politics and elections in many countries (mostly in the US and UK).
7- By the lies and propaganda they spread.
8- By saying I am (and Caitlin) antisemitic or a self-hating Jew.
By saying that they are gawd’s chosen people. Not much difference between the Nazis saying that they are the master race.
Same ideology, same goals.
And remember that there are 700,000 Israeli settlers who think they have a right to squat on Palestinian land.
How many Palestinian homes have they demolished after kicking the occupants out? I’d say that is driving anti semitism.
To Manny: At the rate Israel is going - genocide in Gaza, the sheer brutality and cruelty of it all, using starvation as a weapon, planting lies and propaganda all over the world, distorting the word 'antisemitic ' ,to be ironic, we will one day even be proud to be called antisemitic!
The irony being that I don't hate Jews at all.
The Zionist propaganda may work on a large chunk of of the population in the core empire countries (US/UK/Germany) but the further you move away from “empire central” and the influence of it’s hysterical corporate media lackeys, the less ordinary people are fooled or cowed into silence. On the empire periphery and in the global south, the anger and disgust grows by the day. The live-streamed genocide carried out by the US and its rabid Israeli death cult has laid bare the true nature of the racist US empire that only serves the merchants of death in the military-industrial complex. Younger generations in the core empire countries have also been jolted awake to the lies they’ve been indoctrinated with. The US and Israel are flailing desperately with ever more absurd and transparent lies needed to sustain their façade. It’s about to come crashing down. We mustn’t let the mass murderers escape again.
Palestine will be free.
But you wonder how mad these people in charge are right now - walking on the razor's edge of nuclear suicide.
Nobody cares what the global south thinks or wants.
With that level of arrogance and supremacist disdain for most of humanity on display, you’d make a model Israeli Zionist.
I am simply stating a fact, from the point of view of those who rule over us. I didn't say that I like it or that you have to.
For that matter, they aren't much more interested in public opinion in their own milieus.
There is so much gaslighting going on in the western world right now, and so much important information being withheld by the mainstream media.
I agree, but must quibble with the "right now," part. It's been that way since I first discovered what was going on when I was about 14, and I'm 79 now. So, nothing new, other than a more desperate clumsiness and obviousness that they didn't used to show, because few were questioning the approved narrative.
Hi Joy, yes, I agree. I recently read the Jakarta Method, and realized that it was going on, but we didn't have social media to set us straight back then. We were (at least some of us) were more easily fooled.
There is no razor wire but Fortress North American is a ghetto. We all need to devote ourselves to cutting through the wire and seeing the world as it is. IMHO the West is well on it ways to being a global pariah, fiscally and morally bankrupt. All this violence and war mongering is driving countries into the waiting arms of BRICS.
At the BRICS, St. Petersburg summit 139 countries attended. There were 21000 attendees and 59 countries are on the waiting list to join.
While Biden was lollygagging around Normandy Putin was giving one and two hour speeches and press conferences at the summit.
Asia is already producing 70% of the world's annual economic production with expanding economies.
We forget we only represent 9% of the world's population. When we should be building our economies, we are alienating the rest of the world, waging war, and pissing away the future.
Bravo Robert. We should also be addressing climate change, though this will be BRICS problem now as we'll be irrelevant.
Exactly! there are a whole raft of urgent issues we should focused on as we make ourselves "irrelevant."
Too late, Jo. There’s no going back now. Consider that the Amerikkkan military creates 25% of the world’s carbon emissions, yet they want the rest of us to drive electric cars. ( I’d personally prefer a horse for transportation.)
Mother Nature is exacting her revenge, and all we stupid humans can do is adapt to it or die.
It's not too late to make the future less bad.
Yes wars are accelerating the climate crisis and some of the 'they' what us to drive EVs though some elites still very much want us to keep petrol.
I personally prefer walking or cycling. Keeps me fit too.
Yes Mother Nature is shaking us off, our physiology can't adapt to change this fast.
If you can walk or cycle, you must live in Noo Yawk or some similar shithole. I live on a farm and dollars to donuts I’m more fit than you are 😁
Homo sapiens doesn’t deserve to enjoy the beautiful planet we’ve fucked up all to hell. Mother Nature will vomit us out like the parasites that we are and good riddance to us.
I am concerned to see the announcement later today about the new cabinet positions in the new, and ANC-diminished South African government. Having the neo-liberal, western- oriented, free-market DA joining the government does not bode well for South Africa or BRICS.
The fight against neoliberalism is far from over and a fundamental reason governments and democracy in the West are in full collapse. It is one of the major ideologies that have ruined the West.
The zionist playbook always includes provoking others to justify bombing and murder, they've been doing that for decades. I am glad to see that some are finally willing to openly discuss this fact. Thank you Caitlin!
Ever read the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion? There isn't an anti Jewish statement in the whole book but hey, they claim the book is anti-Semitic. I just don't get it. What it IS, is a blue print for ZIONIST takeover of the world. And of course that makes it anti-Semitic since after all, Zionism is a "good thing". And what is really interesting is how may Jews are against Zionism. 19 JEWISH organizations as of latest count world wide. So what gives? Are anti Zionist Jews anti-Semitic? And BTW...a lot of researches claim that the Jews of today, aren't Semitic in the first place like Arthur Koestler with his book "The Thirteenth Tribe". Does that make him anti-Semitic? Someone help me out...I CERTAINLY don't want be called that terrible term! I might have to fly to Israel and wail at the wall in repentence.
Save on the airfare to Israel, Courageous Lion.
The solution, is that in spite of the fact that the US House has passed the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) legislation with a glowing majority,
( otherwise they lose their seats ), but yet to pass in the Senate ( otherwise they also lose their seats .......just a matter of time for a pass there as well ), I have it on good authority that after Netanyahu addresses his US Knesset in Washington next month, he will promise the 330 million USraeli citizens that he will build a wailing wall in Washington, (Psalm 79 being the specialty for all), a synagogue on every street corner, have Hebrew taught in every school from the age of 5 on, cancel all sports events on a Saturday and force all supermarkets to only sell only kosher food with a special kosher Big Mac available at all times.
It will just a lot of time for 330 million Americans to adjust to all these changes.
Contrarian and Courageous, I agree. It baffles me why journalists such as Caitlin cannot incorporate the truths that are reflected in your statements.
These journalists think nothing of "generalizing" about the US government, or even the USA as a collectivity, an evil force. They condemn Biden and his administration and Congress for a despicable collective behavior. But they are incapable of seeing Judaism also as a collectivity, which it is, via its political arm, the Jewish Lobby. This Lobby is concerned with all political interests of Judaism, including the unconditional political and military support for Israel by the US government and the countless funding methods used to transfer US government and citizen monies to Israel and its Jewish citizens; the legal definition and governmental/societal response to “antisemitism”; the dominant roles played by Jews in government and society; the control of the public debate on such concerns via the formulation of a Jewish public narrative; the control of what is politically correct in such a debate; the passage of laws deemed necessary to protect Jews as a group separate from all other US groups; and many others. All these concerns are an ethos within Judaism, just as is the ethos that "the Tribe must survive at all costs, forever."
The IHRA Jewish Leaders Insult Our Intelligence
(Not only human intelligence but artificial intelligence as well)
https://open.substack.com/pub/iwasathought/p/the-ihra-jewish-leaders-insult-our?r=3kqrek&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
The Jewish Lobby
https://open.substack.com/pub/iwasathought/p/the-jewish-lobby?r=3kqrek&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
No problem! The term "anti-Semite" is rapidly loosing it's negative connotation. The more crap they pull the deeper people looking into their behavior. And more and more are finding out that behavior is NOT in their best interest.
To bad the House and other so called "leaders" don't make the effort to read "The Hoax of The Twentieth Century" by the JEWISH professor Arthur C. Butz or make any effort to see what JEWISH men of peace have to say about their insanity like Professor Norman Finkelstein.
You mean tong kiss the wall?
tongue... I don't think they kiss it, I think they lick it.
I'm still not convinced that most Jews ARE Zionists. I see a lot of prominent Jewish people speaking out against what's happening in Gaza.
As far as the population of Israel goes, well if you are living on land stolen from other people in your own lifetime and in theirs, or you are living on land stolen from their parents and every one knows it, well you are are part of the zionist settler colonialist move.
I agree with you in the instances where land was stolen in their own lifetimes. But I think it is more complicated when people's parents were born there and it's the only home they've ever known. There is a significant protest movement among Israeli citizens who don't want the murdering and oppression done in their names.
It's not complicated.
The first level of zionism as practiced in Israel is the stolen land.
They are second generation settler colonists. Inheriting stolen land does not make the crime disappear, nor the theft legitimate.
Whether they agree to murder as a means of maintaining the theft, is a second level, not the first. So they are already zionists.
I hope you are not a white person living in the U.S. or Australia.
No one is “white”. That’s a settler merely part of the colonial mythology.
You are correct. But, it is important to recognize 2 things:
1- The Jews with conscious and moral courage are about 1%.
2- The mainstream media with its powerful voice drowned the moral Jews.
"....Whether or not the October 7 attack was justified is a mental judgement; the answer to that question will always necessarily be entirely comprised of subjective opinion....."
No.
First, what exactly would be the "subjective" debate about people in a ghetto (here I speak in the 1940s sense of the world) attempting to free themselves?
Does this seem like Gaza?
https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/warsaw-ghetto-uprising
"...In November 1940, this Jewish ghetto was sealed off by brick walls, barbed wire and armed guards, and anyone caught leaving was shot on sight. The Nazis controlled the amount of food that was brought into the ghetto, and disease and starvation killed thousands each month....."
Note the DATES on these two descriptions below:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-10778110
"David Cameron describes blockaded Gaza as a 'prison' "- Published: 27 July 2010
https://edition.cnn.com/videos/world/2021/05/26/gaza-no-exit-wedeman-pkg-intl-hnk-vpx.cnn
"Analyst: Gaza becomes the biggest open-air prison on earth" - Published: 26 May 2021
I've never in my life seen any subjective debates about the uprising of the people held the Warsaw ghetto for example. Because well...there are none to be had about people being subjected to crimes against humanity.
The "anti-semitism" gaslighting we experience now.....is the exact SAME gaslighting tactics that have been used for the past 50 years that covered up what was already an Israeli crime against humanity all that entire time.
The fact is that 50 years leading up to October 6th 2023, the ICC and ICJ, if we take them to be MEASURED BY OWN STANDARDS,.....should already have had arrest warrants issued for the entire Israeli government members for several decades stretching back in time. At the very least. Plus co-conspirators from other countries.
Secondly, what was the "attack "by the Palestinians? Actually wasn't a crazed orgy of civilian mass murder , according to the established facts.
Once you clear out the debunked myths of rape and babies, the overwhelming evidence of facts is that on Oct 7, 2023 the Palestinians from Gaza:
- attacked Israeli military installations
- took hostages in order to recover the thousands of their hostages held in Israel.
The facts also indicate that most deaths in that incident.... resulted from the Israeli military...deliberately....bombing and killing its own people where they stood, as a matter of its own military doctrine.
Further interesting is the Warsaw ghetto was an "uprising" a defensive action....but Palestinians rebelling in the same conditions, well..... that's an......"attack" - an offensive action. Already we have here been ushered to the "anti-semitism" pathway. And everyone walks right in that trap.
So to call this a matter of debate, is basically to say that its OK to keep human beings as animals in a cage.....ignore that crime against humanity entirely....... but open a "debate" as to whether those human beings being subjected to a crime against humanity are criminals for attempting to free themselves from their captors....after NO ONE came to their aid.
And who would be having this "debate" to judge the Palestinians? The people who committed the 50-year long crime against humanity and the people that did NOT come to the aid of the victims of that crime against humanity. Wow.
The world failed these people for 50 years. And are still failing them by even framing this "debate".
Important distinction Caitlin makes between "provoked" and justified". They played the same game in Ukraine. It wipes out and memory holes history and critical thinking.
In a much broader sense, the same forces conflate any effort to empathize with or understand other people - example: if you write that the MAGA people have legitimate grievances about being abandoned by Democrats, corporations, and elite institutions, you are denounced as a Trumper.
Lol…from the archive link you posted we learn that Netanyahu gave a speech to an empty UN room while thousands of people were outside protesting against him. But I love the image of him being all righteous and no one seeing him do it!
https://archive.is/6XrRy
See him lecturing the empty room and being important to himself only. Or to his 7 fanboys that were there to inflate his ego.
HaHa - that pic was hilarious!
Yeah…it’d be a shame if that went viral. I’ve seen him holding up the map, but not to an empty room.
😂
I think Satanyahu (or is it Nuttinyahoo? - sorry I get confused) must be the most hated person in the world right now (and rightly so), followed by Biden.
That article is from Sept ‘23
That article is from Sept ‘23
Although there is an urgent need for waking well-meaning general public to the fact that hamas attack was not the starting point of the israeli-palestinian story, I am currently more concerned about different aspect of the issue.
Whether 7.10 could be deemed provoked and/or justified is, imo, not the only question that has to be mulled over and responded. What is the strategy, the logic behind 7.10? What was it purpose?
Most of you here seem to answer that q along the lines of emotionally based payback. A revolt. Emotional outburst of the victim against the oppressor, vengeance, reprisal. You seem to perceive it as directed towards the past only.
I think it's very patronizing of you, insulting the rational capacity of palestinians and their leaders!
I don't think they only aimed at something located in the past or present, I think they aim at the future, knowing full well their potential, their advantages and disadvantages.I think it is a plan, a rational strategy. And i want you to try see it. Or thru it. And judge for yourself if it's good or bad, worth or unworthy of uncritical support.
Nobody is familiar with Berjenki / Kissinger invention of militant Islam weaponization. It started in the late 70s, and became a tool of the CIA/MOSAD. During the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, the Europeans were eager to fund the Palestinian government of Yaser Arafat. Israel used Militant Islam to devide the Palestinian people into 2 opposing groups. They funded Hamas as a wedge. So Hamas leaders are working under the CIA/MOSAD. I wouldn't be too surprised if Israel bought Hams's flying lawn mowers.
Yup the American dream has gone away and the dumb free thinking western powers believe Israel’s rights are theirs and no one’s else’s , Israel was gods only chosen people and the rest of humanity owes them everything for our right to exits … so now the end is near and we can’t resist or gods chosen people will defame us all for denying their rights …you hit it out of the park on your writing this time and many times more !!
We don't know ".........whether Donald Trump is a brave hero sent by Jesus ....". No, but one thing we do know is that when Biden walks into the 'Confessional Box, he comes out free of sin.
Yes. After his part in the deaths of thousands, he is pure.....weak, feeble-minded, but pure, and to top it off, the epitome of hypocrisy
For those confused, in any doubt, hypocrisy is......
- feigning to be what one is not.....
- or believing what one does not.......
- or engaging in behavior that contradicts what one claims to believe or feel.
Because the hypocrisy hat fits, wear it, Gencide Joe. But don't expect a pass upstairs. ever.
You are well past the point of salvation
Hi Contrarian
Genocide Joe will be met at the fiery gates of hell by Lucifer, who will hold up his hands and say, Nuh-Uh! Your kind ain’t welcome here !
Apetition to excommunicate Joe Biden: https://www.change.org/p/excommunicate-president-joe-biden-bf979783-ac08-4576-a53f-c786ea23dc9c
HAS ANYONE SEEN BEN SWANN on this subject about October 7th? Seems he has evidence about foreknowledge by the buckets full. https://truthinmedia.com/episode/how-did-october-7th-happen/
Caitlin posted an archive link that has lots more links. One discusses how Netanyahu knew that Hamas was going to attack.
More likely Natenyahu purchased the handgliders, and machine guns? He actually started Hamas.