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Culture War Roundup for the week of February 3, 2025

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Stop with the antisemetic conspiracy shit. It's just Netanuahu making an edgy present. "Mocking threat" ? Why mock and threaten your best ally? I am almost certain what your reply will be but honestly don't bother.

It's just Netanuahu making an edgy present

This degree of tastelessness is befitting a bloodthirsty teenager rather than head of state. I doubt SS' exact interpretation of the symbolism, but to deny that it's symbolic is just not serious. Indeed, you concede it is symbolic since you recognize it as a "joke" about a particular Mossad operation.

P.S.

Why mock and threaten your best ally?

(Assuming for the sake of argument that this is what was happening) because the nature of relationship isn't an alliance. Israel offers the US and Trump personally nothing except perhaps tolerance. They do not fight your wars, they do not contribute to your war chest. For all intents and purposes the US is simply doing Israel's bidding, and administrations that oppose this get nowhere and are replaced. Not just Biden, but the whole mighty edifice of the Left, wokeness, progressivism, neo-marxism, all those forces the advances of which had caused the creation of this community, crumbled from the aftershocks of Oct 7. If you don't notice this seismic shift I don't know what to tell you.

The same explanation applies if we assume it's a mere edgy joke, however. Simply put, Israel does not act like a small country dependent on its great ally.

TBH, it sounds to me like it may have been intended along the lines of the Pablo Escobar memorabilia that Hank was gifted in Breaking Bad: macabre, but "cool." So, yes, perhaps just an edgy joke.

Not just Biden, but the whole mighty edifice of the Left, wokeness, progressivism, neo-marxism, all those forces the advances of which had caused the creation of this community, crumbled from the aftershocks of Oct 7. If you don't notice this seismic shift I don't know what to tell you.

I think this overstates things a little, we're barely into the first year of Trump's second term and it's not certain that the progressive moment of late has actually passed.

I will copy paste some parts of my response to SS. ''Israel and the US are allies , the fact that you don't understand how that alliance is expressed and why it's expressed this way is a result of your lack of geopolitical knowledge. Not trying to offend you or anything but you should read more on this''. More specifically to what you are saying , you are incorrect in a number of points . Your first mistake is assuming that alliances mean i fight your wars or contribute to your war chest. This is not a correct, there are other ways for an alliance to be expressed ,especially in the modern world (intelligence , technology , trade etc, cultural similarities). Israel is very technologically innovative and is very culturally similar to the west , and I will follow up in just a second on how important this cultural similarity is so don't dismiss it. Your main mistake is assuming that Israel doesn't fight the US's wars, you are incorrect. The soviet union lost massive influence in the middle east after the Israeli victory in yom kippur , this is one such example. The thing is that the cultural similarity I mentioned before is really important to an actual alliance because it comes down to what people really value. You can't really trust that the geopolitcal interest of fanatical islamists ( who are not a minority in most arab states) will align with yours when it matters, you can't trust that they will inform you of terrorist attacks or be actual allies in whatever conflict you are in. But the truth is you can trust Israel because cultural similarities dictate that when you are fighting they are 'fighting' ( always meaning locally , not referring to a conflict in the pacific for example) when you were fighting Sadam (both times) the Israelis were very happy it was happening and were literally not fighting with you because you asked them not to fight so as not to inflame tensions in the arab world. Iran hates the US and hates Israel , and the Israelis would gladly bomb them , like they did hezbollah who again is an enemy of both the US and Israel. There are a thousand more things I can say but you must disentangle from this idea that being an ally means fighting a war with you, Saudi arabia fought in the first gulf war but the US should never consider them a serious and trusting ally. That may sound a little naive to you but its the truth , alliances are also about cultural similarities which by themselves create an actual almost humanalike relatioship. It is not only cold geopolitical interest that dictates them and you would be very very wrong to think so, in the midst of such differing cultures Israel is a natural US ally whose interests converge with the western entities by default.

More specifically in regards to the pager. Well like I said, hezbollah has shed so much American blood that the instrument of their defeat seems like a valid present.

Good post, to which I'd add: Israel is a nuclear state, and that alone makes them worth guarding.

As others have noted, its tastelessness seems tailored to the recipient. I would need information about Bibi's presents to other world leaders to figure out if he just does that to everyone or if it's just Trump he thinks would appreciate the "haha the exploding pagers" implication.

And yes, my objection to SS is over the "nefarious lying-but-can't-help-giving-hints Jew" proposed symbolism that's verging on the Illuminati memes, not the fact that there is a meaning beyond "a communication device that's made of gold".

If the entire pager operation were carried out by Putin on Ukranian forces, and Putin gifted Trump a pager, you would obviously interpret that with symbolism right? So the idea there's no symbolic intent, and it's a meaningless joke, simply because Israel is ostensibly (but not really at all) an "ally" is your own answer to your question: Netanyahu repeatedly demonstrates his contempt for American leadership because he gets away with it and the insolence strengthens his position politically and symbolically.

In this case, Netanyahu appears to have come to give Trump Gaza as a gift as well, along with the gold pager! It's just a continuation of the deceptive relationship between the United States presidency and Netanyahu. The gold pager is symbolic of that relationship. Beware of Netanyahu bearing gifts.

Putin and Trump are enemies because the geopolitical interests of the entities they represent collide, that must be clear right? So any such present between enemies would certainly be interpreted as some kind of subtle threat. So your analogy is problematic since even by your definition Israel and the US are not enemies , just not allies. But in truth your definition is wrong , and Israel and the US are allies , the fact that you don't understand how that alliance is expressed and why it's expressed this way is a result of your lack of geopolitical knowledge. Not trying to offend you or anything but you should read more on this. Netanyahu sometimes has contempt for American leadership because American leadership does sometimes deserve contempt. Biden for example was a weak president ineffective at geopolitics for many reasons and unable to understand what's actually going on. Anyway , I will repeat , the relationship between the US and Israel is certainly an alliance because alot of their interests intersect , that is the essence of an alliance. If you are interested I can go deeper on this.

Those are good questions, and you’re probably correct that SS won’t bother to address them.

I still must ask you to leave off the personal antagonism.