@coffee_enjoyer comments on "Culture War Roundup for the week of October 14, 2024

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 14, 2024

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coffee_enjoyer ☕️ 1mo ago

I don’t know why you would include the line “the NYT didn’t interview every doctor” if you weren’t insinuating that the sample was biased by the NYT. But okay, if you’re not alleging that, then you’re alleging that the doctors were under some pressure by Hamas to testify in a certain way? This hypothesis is unevidenced, would be evidenced if it happened (given how important it would be for the Israeli propaganda machine), contrary to the nature of the interview (anonymous), and counter-evidenced (20% of doctors said it didn’t happen). So I have to simply ask why you retain this belief. If you’re merely insinuating that the doctors, by virtue of their willingness to volunteer in Gaza, are predisposed to lie (?), or predisposed to like Hamas (?), or by virtue of caring about dying children are willing to exaggerate how many they saw (?)… maybe it would just be helpful if you tell me clearly what you believe.

To copy-paste my original assertion,

Some extremist branches rise up in some Jewish academies, especially among the conservative and non-ultra orthodox. These extremist branches are most likely to pour out students onto the Israeli military. In other words, the Israeli military selects for the extremists which are raised up within the de-centralized schools of Israel

Please notice the italics. My assertion would wholly explain why the children are shot in the head. There are 20k-30k Israeli soldiers in Gaza. How many deprave, genuinely evil Jewish extremist soldiers do you need in order to see too many killed children? Not most. Not half. Mere percents in combat roles. Yet this is not excusable; the failure of Israel to check or punish its extremists is inexcusable.

For some reason you are naive about the extremism in Israel. So I will provide more sources. It’s almost Jihadi, indeed we may call it Jewhadi. Apparently the support for sexually torturing POWs by some Israeli leaders, and the call for killing children by what amounts to a military recruiter, were not sufficient. From Haaretz:

https://archive.is/TndVC

In late January, Rabbi Dov Lior, a leading Orthodox rabbinic figure on the religious far-right, was asked if it was permissible to desecrate the Sabbath to block humanitarian aid to Gaza […] For Lior, blocking aid to a starving population, even against the wishes of the Israeli military and an extreme right-wing government, is a more crucial religious commandment than keeping the Sabbath.

To be a good Jew is to put the collective punishment of Palestinians ahead of basic observance. Recently, Rabbi Eliyahu, Chief Rabbi of Zfat, even wrote a special prayer for those blocking humanitarian aid.

This mode of religious thinking, which sees God as a God of holy wars and vengeance and demands that Jews act violently in His name, has been gaining ground for more than half a century in some extremist corners of Israel and the Diaspora. But since October 7, it has developed into a more coherent and grotesque worldview, a political theology that licenses and even commends collective punishment and the proliferation of gun licenses while undermining or even dismissing efforts to return the hostages. It demands the expulsion or total submission or death of Palestinians

From the New Yorker, interviewing Yehuda Shaul, who founded “an organization made up of former Israeli soldiers dedicated to exposing what they see as the realities of Israeli treatment of Palestinians in the occupied territories”:

Over the years, every once in a while you would see a video of settlers attacking Palestinians with soldiers not intervening. In the past four or five years, there was a transition. We moved from soldiers standing idly by while Palestinians were being attacked to soldiers sometimes even joining the attacks. Sometimes it was soldiers who were settlers, who were back at home in the settlement or the outpost where they live, or where their friends live, and the guys are organizing to go down and attack Palestinians, so they take their gun or come half in uniform and join the attack. Sometimes it’s because specific military units were made up largely of extremist, nationalist, religious guys that the U.S. was even contemplating restricting military assistance to. But after October 7th things got even worse. Now the settlers are the soldiers and the soldiers are the settlers

two more things are happening. One is the sociological change in the Army. What we see is a significant shift within the Army—a change from the old-school, secular, Labor Party-oriented people to nationalist religious people, and especially to the ultra-Orthodox nationalists. People like Smotrich.

In 1990, only two and a half per cent of graduate officer cadets in the infantry were nationalist religious. In 2015, it was nearly forty per cent. That’s about three times their size in society. So you have this change, this sociological change, of middle-, high-class, secular, better educated military people going into cybersecurity and signal intelligence, more into positions that can advance their status in the economy post-military service, while the combat rank and file is being filled more with the ideologues, the nationalist-religious guys, as well as blue-collar people. In the past decade, there has been a big fight in the I.D.F. about who the real authority is. Is it the rabbi or the commander?

In 2016, two Palestinian attackers stabbed a soldier, wounding him. The Palestinians were shot. One of them was killed—the other one was neutralized, laying on the ground. Minutes later, a military medic called Elor Azaria arrived and he shot one bullet into the head of the Palestinian—basically executed him. And it was all filmed by a Palestinian activist who was living nearby. Once this came out, there was outrage. Ultimately, Azaria was indicted, but there was outrage about the fact that he was indicted. And it got to a place where even Netanyahu, who was the Prime Minister, called the shooter’s parents to show support. Ultimately, Moshe Ya’alon, who was the minister of defense at the time—a right-winger and a former chief of staff of the I.D.F.—had to resign, among other reasons, because he supported the indictment. Azaria was sentenced to eighteen months for basically an execution that was filmed.

That was the moment where the rank and file within the Army, plus the political base of the Likud Party and the Israeli right, essentially rebelled against the old guard who want to say that the I.D.F. is a professional army with discipline, who want to tell a story to the world of adherence to international law, checking ourselves, investigation, accountability. Now it became, “In our Army, we have different ethics than you, and we have a different idea of rule of law than you have. And it’s unacceptable that a soldier will be indicted for this.” For me, that’s the threshold where you understand that, at least at the level of the rank and file, the ideas had changed.

For me, the idea that bad things are happening in Gaza, that bad things will happen in detention centers, is not surprising. But how bad they are, to be honest, is surprising. I fear that we’re just scratching the surface here. And I fear the fact that the media is largely not yet in Gaza. I fear that we’re going to discover that we’ve reached serious new lows in our behavior—in terms of rules of engagement that were extremely permissive in the amount of collateral damage allowed, and in terms of treatment of detainees

I think there is a big chunk of Israeli society that, for them, the kind of assault that is alleged against detainees actually sounds reasonable. It sounds reasonable to people in the Knesset today and for ministers in the government. You saw thousands of Israelis standing and defending these soldiers, even with what is alleged that they’ve done. That’s how low we’ve reached. An entire section of Israeli society and the political class and government have actually stood up to defend these actions.

—

Now responding to other points:

Are you willing to clearly state this is false and you do not hate Jews?

Jews are not a monolithic group. I hate the extremists, and I do not hate the others. I probably have positive valence toward secular Jews. While I hate aspects of progressivism, I do not see it as Jewish-driven like some commenters here.

I can’t help but ask: have you invested your identity into Israel in some way? Are you yourself a religious zionist? Your posts come off as biased, to say the least. You misread my original post, which isn’t a big deal, but maybe it hints to deeper biases in this discussion. I am a random American guy from the east coast, have made friends of all faiths. There is no reason for me to be biased against Israel. But, you know, if I grew up singing songs about how Israel is the pure God-given land of my forefathers, and that everyone else has it out to get me, and that I have to love other Jews as tribesmen, that is going to bias me, right? So I think I am naturally less biased than anyone who grew up in a religiously Jewish household. If you think about how Hitler was able to make young Germans prejudicial and extremist, it was through singing songs about their homeland, hyping up their history, believing they were the chief victims of the last world war, increasing love for pan-Germans and sending them to German summer camps to instill values and camaraderie. So should we really be surprised if Israel has a lot of extremists — more than a Western nation? They are maxxing for extremism, except unlike the Hitler Youth, some of the orthodox get little secular education and are trained in the violent Old Testament.

-1

Context

Amadan I will be here longer than you coffee_enjoyer 1mo ago

I don’t know why you would include the line “the NYT didn’t interview every doctor” if you weren’t insinuating that the sample was biased by the NYT. But okay, if you’re not alleging that, then you’re alleging that the doctors were under some pressure by Hamas to testify in a certain way?

I've already explained this several times. What I believe is that every doctor in Gaza is obviously someone who sympathizes with Palestinians and has seen a lot of dead children. They aren't out in the field, so they see kids coming in with bullet wounds, and they probably aren't doing forensics to determine if it looks like a direct shot or a ricochet. If people tell them "IDF soldiers are shooting children," how skeptical will they be? Are they really seeing a lot of direct "kill shots" (e.g. to the head and chest, as opposed to various other random wounds like you'd expect of civilians caught in crossfire?) If they see one or two, how much convincing do they need? If you have one or two doctors willing to go along with a fabrication or an embellishment (such as doctoring an X-ray scan), and then disseminates them, who is going to call bullshit on them? How much evidence would the NYT need?

What I believe, and have explained, is that the truth is probably much messier than either "Yes, the IDF is now sniping children as SOP" or "Every doctor in Gaza is now making up stories of children being sniped." It's going to be a combination - a soldier here or there who said "Fuck 'em all" and is willing to shoot children, a few credulous doctors, a very active Hamas PR campaign (with no small amount of help from people like you). The fact that the NYT is willing to signal-boost any hint of Israelis misdeeds and spin a narrative of Jews being child-killing monsters, on the thinnest of evidence, helps make the extreme version of the story more plausible to people like you, who hate Israel and/or Jews.

If you just want me to agree that shooting children is bad and anyone who does so intentionally should be prosecuted, I agree. That Israel is allowing it is your claim; I suspect Israel is "allowing" it in the same sense that the US "allowed" atrocities in Viet Nam, and Iraq, and Afghanistan. Some people got away with shit, sometimes the brass were willing to look the other way, but sometimes people got caught and were prosecuted, and the American public was definitely not "okay" with it. Only people with a deep ideological hatred of America would say we committed war crimes out of sheer American evilness.

Okay. That is genuinely surprising to me, though I am not sure I believe you. But I'll take your word for it--

I can’t help but ask: have you invested your identity into Israel in some way? Are you yourself a religious zionist? Your posts come off as biased, to say the least.

Oops. There's the tell. Gotta admit, I was waiting for that.

As I have told the other Joo-posters who eventually pulled that on me (and not that it is your business or should matter): nope. No Jewish or Israeli affiliations whatsoever. Well, I do have Jews in my family tree. Which according to some Joo-posters would make me a Jew genetically, so maybe my Jew-genes "bias" me. But given that my entire family is Protestant and I have literally never set foot in a synagogue in my life, that would have to be some deep DNA-programming.

coffee_enjoyer ☕️ Amadan 1mo ago

I don’t think it’s a given that these humanitarian doctors sympathize with Palestinians especially rather than humankind generally. I also don’t think that sympathy to Palestinian kids in their practice would lead to biasing their answers to a survey. There’s a subset of doctors who seek out wild ways to help people, and there is no wilder or more attention-grabbing way to help people than volunteering in Gaza. I would wager (total conjecture here) that volunteering in Gaza is actually a coveted position for young medical school graduates. Maybe 1% are accepted. It will probably shift to Arabic-speakers for practical reasons, so maybe that’s a small selection bias. It beats potentially getting malaria in Africa or helping alcoholic Appalachians in West Virginia.

that’s a tell

There’s no tell. I remember almost zero biographical details of any posters. Google tells me that your name is Gaelic for fool. Why do you think the Irish are so critical of Israel — are they all secret anti-semites too? You are clearly impassioned in this particular topic. Slippery this, that’s a tell that, Jew-hater there, alt accusations yonder… it’s all so tiresome .jpg

I don’t think it’s a given that these humanitarian doctors sympathize with Palestinians especially rather than humankind generally.

Most of them are probably not literally Hamas agents or Jew-haters. If you asked them, the average doctor would probably say "I want peace for everyone in the Middle East." However, if you asked them "Who do you think is to blame?" I suspect the great majority of doctors in Gaza would say "The Israelis," and if you asked them (outside of Gaza, where presumably they could answer truthfully), "Do you think Hamas is to blame?" they'd give you answers similar to what we hear from American leftists, that Hamas is a justified/expected reaction to oppression and occupation, October 7 was horrible but the Israelis brought it on themselves, etc. So yes, they are probably mostly humanitarians, but they are humanitarians who would have strong incentives and ideological motivations to be willing to endorse a narrative that the IDF is targeting Palestinian children.

I would wager (total conjecture here) that volunteering in Gaza is actually a coveted position for young medical school graduates. Maybe 1% are accepted. It will probably shift to Arabic-speakers for practical reasons, so maybe that’s a small selection bias.

How many videos from Gaza have you actually watched? I've watched quite a few. Some in Arabic, as I said.

I can't say how "coveted" medical positions there are, but I doubt they are actually that competitive - if you are a medical school graduate who contacts an aid organization and says "I want to volunteer to work in Gaza," I doubt you'd have much trouble being accepted. From what I have seen, the majority of doctors working there are either Palestinians, or European or American doctors who have some Arab/Palestinian ancestry. Not all, but most. I have seen a few who are white or Asian; they mostly seem to come from fairly leftist charity organizations. Something like Save the Children - which does not directly employ medical workers (their thing is mostly providing food and education to children in poor countries). Save the Children doesn't explicitly take a political position on the Gaza war, but they are among those demanding an immediate cease fire. I suspect that the average Save the Children aid worker in Gaza does not hate Jews or support Hamas, but if you asked them "Do you think the IDF is deliberately shooting children?" would say "Yes" because they've heard of it happening and are willing to embrace any narrative that engenders horror and makes a cease fire more likely. I think this is typical of all aid organizations in Gaza. Look at Medicins Sans Frontieres. Are they explicitly anti-Israeli? No, but it's pretty clear who they think are the victims and who are the responsible parties.

You are clearly impassioned in this particular topic.

That's a tell too. You're right that it's tiresome. Insisting that someone is "impassioned" because they have a point of view is just a windy way of saying "You mad bro?" or "Why so serious?" If I used less words my posts would be too low effort to rebuke your voluminous walls of text; when I use more words: "Wow, why do you care so much? Must be because you're a Jeeeew!"

I don't particularly have a passion for Israel - I have stated before that I actually don't like Israel that much, I just dislike their enemies more. I do think the plague of Joo-posters is corrosive to reasonable discourse, because they are (without exception) disingenuous both about the facts and about their motives for posting. So it is one of the topics where I'll weigh in, because while I don't want to ban shitty points of views, I don't want to let them dominate the discussion and claim the field.

I am claiming you are impassioned because you misread my post with extraordinary confidence, and then proceeded to act like I was lying for informing you that you misread my post. Not because you have a point of view. This is despite my original assertion having abundant and frankly unnecessary qualifiers due to the sensitivity of our pro-Israel contingent.

corrosive to reasonable discourse

This is ironic, no? I didn’t mind your faux pas but now you’re claiming some sort of moral high ground. After woefully misreading my post you wrote

slippery goalpost-moving

Again, stop being slippery. Do we need to go through this word by word?

Debunking you point by point and line by line, while tedious,

are now pretending that that's what was in dispute.

Again, moving goal posts.

[random accusation that I use alts]

There’s definitely some corrosion and disingenuous posting, I agree with you there.

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Why are you called The Motte?

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