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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   29600 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 2, 2023

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The Palestinians could also refrain from indiscriminate bombardment of civilian population centers. Or the gangrape.

Israel doesn't need to build settlements to put a stop to this.

The fact that the Palestinians don't do worse is reflective of their incapacity to do so, not a lack of desire for the same, or else they wouldn't be cheering at the sight of a hot blonde Israeli woman dead with blood and shit on her genitals.

This and the rest of your arguments are all correct, but they don't refute my point. Israel has been and is continuing to provoke the Palestinians, and they do not need to do that.

Do you presume that refraining from building more settlements in contested territory is both necessary and sufficient for the animosity to end? I would have to disagree there.

Other than that, I too think you're correct, we're roughly on the same page, arguing about the punctuation.

As I think more about this, I may be changing my mind.

Do you presume that refraining from building more settlements in contested territory is both necessary and sufficient for the animosity to end?

Earlier this morning, I would have answered your question this way: "I don't know, but building settlements certainly doesn't help, and so Israel can't say they are acting entirely in self-defense."

But I just remembered that Arabs have much higher birth rates than Jews, so if Israel stops all interference in Palestine, the balance of power may shift decisively in the latter's favor. Palestine today is not capable of inflicting catastrophic damage on Israel, but that could change if the difference in birth rates is sustained. So there may be an argument here that Israel has no choice but to do what it is doing today - to wholly conquer and subjugate the Palestinians...

My apologies for being indecisive! This is my first time writing about this issue, and I am realizing that there are gaps in my thinking.

But I just remembered that Arabs have much higher birth rates than Jews, so if Israel stops all interference in Palestine, the balance of power may shift decisively in the latter's favor. Palestine today is not capable of inflicting catastrophic damage on Israel, but that could change if the difference in birth rates is sustained. So there may be an argument here that Israel has no choice but to do what it is doing today - to wholly conquer and subjugate the Palestinians...

You're in some extremely dangerous territory here.

The argument you've deployed is also completely applicable to white nationalism and the extermination of people of colour. Maybe you are actually a white nationalist who thinks that is a good idea, but if you aren't I think you owe it to yourself to explain exactly what differentiates the two situations.

I don't think the birth rate difference is important. But I do think it's important to understand that this conflict does not go away if Israel stops building settlements. That's the marginal issue. But it's not the core issue.

The grim reality is that it's impossible to have peace because a great many Palestinians do not want peace.

But I just remembered that Arabs have much higher birth rates than Jews, so if Israel stops all interference in Palestine, the balance of power may shift decisively in the latter's favor.

This is just wrong though? It's an old trope, popular both with Palestinians ("Our women's wombs are our greatest weapon!") and with Jews ("those fecund savages are swelling up like yeast, we must not fall behind!") but in actuality Arab fertility has been declining, Jewish one has been stable, and so they've converged in Israel:

Contrary to the projections of the demographic establishment at the end of the 19th century and during the 1940s, Israel’s Jewish fertility rate is higher than those of all Muslim countries other than Iraq and the sub-Saharan Muslim countries. Based on the latest data, the Jewish fertility rate of 3.13 births per woman is higher than the 2.85 Arab rate (since 2016) and the 3.01 Arab-Muslim fertility rate (since 2020).

The Westernization of Arab demography is a product of ongoing urbanization and modernization, with an increase in the number of women enrolling in higher education and increased use of contraceptives.

Far from facing a “demographic time bomb” in Judea and Samaria, the Jewish state enjoys a robust demographic tailwind, aided by immigration.

However, the demographic and policy-making establishment persists in echoing official Palestinian figures without auditing, ignoring a 100% artificial inflation of those population numbers. This inflation is accomplished via the inclusion of overseas residents, double-counting Jerusalem Arabs and Israeli Arabs married to Judea and Samaria Arabs, an inflated birth rate and deflated death rate.

Official Palestinian TFR is like 3.57 but even if we take that at face value and assume it won't decline (it obviously will, they don't have any cultural immunity or institutional capacity to resist the background anti-natalist pressure, unlike Jews), it won't provide for a stark divide in the foreseeable future – and of course the subset of Jews who disproportionately contribute to the trend, Haredim, themselves have a TFR of 6-7, so they're on a much faster exponential and will be a counterweight to Arabs on their own by the end of the century. Specifically, they have like 1.2 million people now and grow at 4% annually; Palestinians are at 5 million and grow 2.5% annually – both will be between 20-30 million strong.

My apologies for being indecisive! This is my first time writing about this issue, and I am realizing that there are gaps in my thinking.

No worries, we're here to debate after all, and if people reconsider their perspectives, that's The Motte working as intended!

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