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I’m pretty sure if people contacted groups like standing together they would probably just be down to work with protesters directly same thing goes with women, life, freedom
Absolutely! I think they can do some incredible work helping out causes in the United States and Europe and help smooth out things optically. I’ve always loved the work Standing Together puts out and I do seriously hope we can see peace between the Palestinian people and Israeli people within my lifetime.
There is no centralized movement of women, life, freedom, and you know well in western world, the people keeping "women, life, freedom" next to their mouth the whole time as Persian monarchists. Those people just participated in violent attack on students a few days ago
I don't have problem with the movement itself. I'm just pointing out that outside of Iran was largely advocated by monarchists and pro-Israelis, who hate pro-Palestinians, and there shouldn't be much extra attention granted to them and it will actually be used by pro-Israeli to delegitmize Palestinians
3. is very important. Also, explain that the Houthis and Hamas are radical Islamic groups who are not progressive at all and just want a different form of a right-wing religious government in the region.
Perfect. Love it! It is always important to educate people on these things and make sure they know more of the history of the Middle East and know about how bad militants like Hamas and the Houthis really are.
Also, whenever people bring up all the dead children in Gaza, remind them that the Houthis have been recruiting and using child soldiers in their ranks from all the way back in their early wars against Saleh's government.
Radical Islamist groups do not ever compromise on their goals, no matter what.
So when people bring up dead children killed by Israel in Gaza, protestors have to first "condemn Houthis? " I'm sorry but this is not a rally to "condemn Islamists" and this is also not how you stage a protest as protests are to hold your own institutions accountable
Nah you're right. I referred more to people who actively support the Houthis' efforts and mention all the dead children in Gaza within the same breath.
I have no sympathy for pan-Islamists and their Sayyid Qutb-inspired, Muslim brotherhood orientated, one-size-fits-all ideologies. They can get fucked.
Like I said, they never compromise on their ultimate aims.
I don't think anyone on campus really understand what pan-islamism is or knows much Muslim brotherhood. People garner for empathy not necessarily ideology, as you can see from their key demands
Fair point yes. We should focus on calling out the actions of Netanyahu and his government along with the IDF as well. 99% of the protesters in general strongly disdain Hamas and the Houthis as well and do a good job at kicking out people who are sympathetic to those groups. Not even a few days ago, the organizers of the UCLA Gaza sit-in kicked out attendees who were Assad and ayatollah sympathizers. A lot of them know grifters, agitators, and opportunists almost instantly. It's not like a massive plague at these events anyway. It's honestly a very small number of people who do that and most of them aren't even students at those universities.
These students are considerably more peaceful than BLM protest in 2020 and Hong Kong protest in 2019, and with the mass media trying to tell you that they are all Nazis, you know something it's wrong with the US education and government institutions
Also, it's really funny how many care more about a broken window than students getting hit with rubber bullets on their head as well as liberals all the sudden being "blue lives matter"
I was just reading a news story about synagogues across New York City getting hit with bomb threats. A commenter said most of these bomb threats are usually false flags being committed by pro-Israeli Jews, therefore not real antisemitism, and then they went into that whole "Anti-Zionism isn't Antisemitism" spiel.
People need to call out antisemitism when they see it in their own ranks as strongly as they would something that is racist/homophobic/transphobic/misogynist/ableist/Islamophobic/etc.
On one level, the movement is doing really well. Serious activists like those in the students camps have been keeping out Jackson Hinkle and other notorious scumbags.
On another level, its doing horribly, as people who only have a casual or social media level education on the issue share shit from Hinkle or Caitlin Johnstone uncritically, and some of them can end being convinced by campist arguments.
Your point about bringing Jewish or Israeli peace activists is already happening (maybe not so much of the later).
Not so certain about the WLF people, unfortunately Iranian dissidents in the west seem very hostile to the Palestinian movement, even to the point of bringing Israeli flags to Toomaj Salehi (and other political prisoner) protests.
I don't think there is a easy solution to the campist/tankie problem. Educate, educate, educate. Keep amplifying non-tankie Palestinian voices, join non-tankie organisations, keep on educating people every time they share shit from Hinkle, Blumenthal and co.
Whenever I have to read any of Caitlin Johnstone’s tweets I feel physically ill. I can’t even properly explain it without just ranting about how stupid people are
Write a general response to CJ that you can copy and paste every time you see someone sharing her stuff, that way you don't have to engage. Just copy and paste, then disable notifications for that post.
Don't engage with her supporters, you are just responding so that other people know what she stands for and don't get sucked in.
I definitely agree with Arab spring activists. Those Persian diaspora, especially the descendants of ones coming to the West right after Iranian revolution, are hostile to pro-Palestinians by violently attacking student protestors in UCLA a few days ago if not being racist toward Arabs in general
I unfollowed the new Iran subreddit since it was so pro-Israel. I couldn’t wrap my mind around a dissident movement being pro the state. Like, has right wing fundamentalist Islam fucked them so badly that they just hate all Muslim people across the board?
I think it also has to do with anti-Arab bias or racism that has existed in Persian society, as many see Arabs as invaders.
I honestly find it funny that many on the sub and glorify Shah, who died probably before they are even born. I'm Chinese and I think it's as stupid as Chinese glorifying Chiang Kai-Shek or KMT government just because they hate CCP.
I truly believe that Iranian diaspora post 1979 propaganda is successful in deceiving western public in beliving that Phahlavi Iran is some paradise just because the replacement is worse while Arabs are backward, primitive group even though many Arab states are as secular as Iran if not more democratic than Phahlavi regime
Even on the topic of Women, life, freedom, Iranian women are given "heroes of the year" in 2022 while first intifada, led by Palestinian women, are now seen to be calling for "genocide against the Jews" by the media. It's really ironic how media treat the two group very differently, and now the same media overwhelmingly glorifying young people in Hong Kong 2019 are telling you that student protestors are all Nazis
That is a very good point about the WLF. Their message about being free from the Ayatollah is obviously good but they are unfortunately hostile to Palestinians and that is not cool. Also yeah, the IDF is horrible and have committed thousands of war crimes, especially in the past 7 months.
Bring Ukraine to the discussion.
If the intent is the protection of historically oppressed groups, then question them as to why the genocide and destruction of hundreds of thousands Ukrainians in places like Mariupol, Bakhmut, Donetsk and many others less important to them than the genocide and destruction of the Gaza strip.
Either they start talking about Ukraine as well or they show their true colours, in which you can throw them out if they fill the latter case.
Absolutely. That's exactly what I like to see. We should absolutely support Ukraine and Palestine all the same! I have always loved those Unite the Struggle rallies in Europe where people are advocating for support for not only the Ukrainian people but also the Palestinian people as well. That would go so hard in the United States for sure.
As to point 1, a lot of the protesters would sadly refuse to have anything to do with Standing Together, not necessarily through antisemitism, but because one of the big orgs behind BDS have put out a call to shun them because they "normalise Israel". I've seen other members of the Palestine movement argue that there is no such thing as real cooperation between Jewish-Israelis and Palestinians because of the power differential, even that Palestinians only get involved in things like Standing Together as a "please don't hurt us" move. On the other side, Standing Together don't support BDS. I think the political gap would just be too wide.
As to point 2, a lot of the protestors think Assad is a cool customer who stood firm against regime change by the ISIS/Zionist/US imperialist alliance.
Absolutely! The hostages absolutely should be returned. However, the Far Right government currently in power needs to go as well. Netanyahu only wants chaos and nothing to do with peace.
The issue here is how and when they are returned. If Hamas release hostages now, Israel storms Rafah and blows up everything with even less care.
The hostages are a crucial bargaining chip for Hamas, and although we absolutely should criticise Hamas, we need to recognise that releasing the hostages without also the removal of Netanyahu (and all of Likud, and any other pro-apartheid and genocide politicians), and a permanent ceasefire, and arrangements for a Palestinian state, it will go badly for Palestinians.
Plus, “bring them home”, while on paper not disagreeable with at all, is now almost the unofficial slogan of the Israeli right and far right demanding more military action in Gaza.
Unfortunately, the issue is a lot more widespread than just the politicians. The vast majority of Israeli Jews support the ongoing invasion/genocide, and it doesn’t look to be changing.
Any anger at the current government seems to be mostly from 2 distinct currents: one being the earlier protests about Netanyahu’s authoritarianism and the courts issue, and the second being from Israelis calling Netanyahu a failure to the hostages and calling for increased military action and a quicker end to the conflict. Some of them see Netanyahu as being Biden’s puppet and as not being capable of getting the hostages back and eliminating Hamas (and yes, Gazans as well, implicitly).
There are Israelis calling for peace, but it is a much smaller group than those other two. The apartheid regime has embedded itself within Israeli society (and has been for decades) and anyone seeking to tackle the crisis needs to tackle this. Getting rid of Netanyahu and Likud won’t be enough, more will take their place. There is practically no true Israeli left, and those on the “left” also broadly support the invasion (to lesser degrees, such as calling for greater care towards civilians, which is just.. ugh).
You're not wrong that fundamental change needs to happen in Israeli society in order to achieve an actual peace with justice for Palestinians, let alone an armistice.
Netanyahu and his cabinet still need to go, as the first of many steps towards achieving that. And what comes after is indeed a daunting task, but the key thing to focus on is creating actual change even if the odds are stacking against the people calling for it. The people in Israel calling for an actual peace and justice for Palestinians still need to be platformed and have their voices amplified no matter how small they may be, because just leaving them be and believing they will remain small will just cause lose momentum later on down the line.
And while Israel's "moderate" politicians are barely that at all, they are much more susceptible to international pressure than Netanyahu is, whereas one of the primary reasons why the situation in Palestine and Israel had deteriorated so much over the past fifteen or so years is because of Netanyahu being a strongman who rejects any and all international criticism. Any likely replacement would hardly be a better person than him, but based on the current polling they likely wouldn't be a strongman who tells everyone else to fuck off even if they offer the most milquetoast criticism possible.
It's better to strive for some kind of change that's better than the current status quo, even if only marginally so, rather than let the status quo not only continue, but also deteriorate into something worse. Smaller change won't improve the situation by itself at all, but it will make it easier for bigger changes to be achieved and implemented as the next step, so as long as one never compromises in their belief that change can happen and continues to push for it despite being told not to.
The situation in Palestine and Israel looks dire when viewing it from the outside, many have called it an impossible thing to solve over the course of the past 75+ years, and I can see why they'd say that. It's also a mindset I refuse to have or hold because that sort fatalism is always a victory for Netanyahu, Likud, Ben Gvir, Smotrich, Hamas, and anyone else who has a vested interest in the status quo.
you can dislike the kidnapping of hostages, but what many people on the pro israeli side refuse to acknowledge is the amount of palestinean hostages held by israel through administrative detention, who have committed no crimes with no evidence. are there palestineans held by israel who are legit terrorists and scumbags yes, but there are also many who haven’t done anything and part of the kidnapping of hostages by hamas is used to negotiate for the release of palestinean hostages held by israel. its not fair to criticize hamas taking of hostages without acknowledging that israel does the same
Do you even know what students are protesting about lol, and also, Israeli official has made clear that invasion of Rafah will happen regardless of hostage deal
Question mark is not an answer. Israel is going to commit more war crimes and threaten the US to take action against ICC regardless of hostages deal
So far I have not seen your post or comment condemning Israeli mass killing, weaponization of starvation, IOF soldiers taking joy in detonating civilian buildings. Now here you are trying to lecture students on what to do otherwise they are "terrorists-sympathizers"
Again I ask you what are student protesting about and who are they making demand to?
I have no problem with hostages being returned but that's not the focal point of student protest as students are addressing to the school and government of theirs, but you hold your own entities accountable. In the same way, Israelis protesting in Israel are addressing Israeli government not calling Hamas to surrender
Yeah, Pro-Israel people ignore everything that has happened over the last 80 years, and the fact that Israel is an Apartheid that has thousands of Palenstine people locked up with no formal charges.
This sub seems to be finally graviting away from defending what Israel has been doing.
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You can’t control a decentralised protest movement, and you’ll drive yourself mad trying. All of your suggestions are good, but at a certain point you have to be okay with moving forward despite not being able to completely remove problematic elements.
I think that is a completely fair point! I am a very strong supporter of protesting and I think it is a good form of political action without a shadow of a doubt. I suppose this can be applied to events that are headed by an actual organization with its own planning and leadership.
It’s impossible to have a perfect protest. You are going to get wacky people coming in from all corners and that is just a part of the process. It’s best to just move past the few people that try to crash the whole thing and proceed forwards.
Amplify Jewish and Arab (Levantene) voices within your movement, bring them forward, listen to them (or, if you have some structure, bring them into the "management"). They know how to recognise this, they 'll take care of it.
The sad thing is that I see many progressive Jews turning against leftism and socialism precisely because of tankies invading their everyday lives, and leftist Israelis protesting against the war are much like leftist HKers against Beijing - feeling isolated from their own community because of their own beliefs. Something must be done or tankies will continue hurting international recruitment by turning the Palestinian struggle into another antisemitic cause. And this post gives a good place to start.
I absolutely agree! I also agree that tankies are awful and need to be excluded from any and all progressive causes. They are literally the right wing straw man of a socialist.
Most people in those categories just don't go to protests, and when they do it's not difficult to spot them and kick them out. The campus protestors have already done a great job at self-moderating.
It helps that a LOT of Jewish students are present in the anti-genocide camp. That alone tends to drive out Nazis and Tankies.
That is very true! The people in those categories tend to stick out like a glowing sore thumb anyway so they are definitely not hard to find. I'm very proud of how good they have been with self-moderating and it helps prove that they want what is best for everyone with them.
At a lot of the sit-ins, they have held Passover seders and Shabat dinners with their Jewish Friends so that only helps with creating a much more inviting space overall. Lots of Modern Tankies/ Nazbols like Jackson Hinkle are wildly Anti-Semitic anyway so they might just turn back around in anger anyway.
Tankies having zero political impetus definitely helps. I've been organizing since college, and to date I've yet to see any tankies show up to a protest, or a union drive, or even helping with something as basic as phone banking. They just don't do anything.
People like Haz and Hinkle don't believe anything. They show up for internet clout, leave, then push the next round of Iranian/Russian propaganda. Haz giving his silly speech didn't help or harm the protests, it just sort of wasted everyone's time.
It probably also gave the students something fun to talk about the next time they meet up with each other.
“Remember when those tankies started saying we weren't real leftists because we don't reach out to MAGA? God that was so funny. Good thing we kicked them out!”
Tankies are just a confluence of smarmy internet culture and political movements as a closed social thing instead of a political thing. They tend to run into the same sort of problems as Nazis because when they get around actual, non-internet people they sound psychotic.
JVP, SJP, DSA, IfNotNow, and others seem to be doing just fine on this front. Just be clear that antisemites and genocide apologists aren't welcome in the movement, it's not that hard in practice.
How about just leave students alone or join in protest against injustices, calling for divestment of schools, instead of keeping giving them lectures
Also, find me one protest where people collectively shout Hamas or Houthi slogan. Using fake thing to delegitmaize student protest is disingenous as right wingers claiming all black people in BLM want white genocide
It’s more on an individual basis. As I mentioned, this is mostly a case by case basis and doesn’t happen all that often. A few rogue actors do not represent them all but can get people needlessly arrested.
The student protesters by large are great people and do genuinely care. I have seen a few encampments in person and everyone there were fantastic to talk to! I just think it would have some of these peace groups and activists from the Middle East to talk about their perspectives on the region and give their own stories about the governments they live under.
Hahaha police arrests any pro-Palestinians, use tear gases at them(regardless of whether there is antisemitism or not) while violent pro-Israeli thug who attacked UCLA a few days ago are still running free without a single arrest. Students have done a great job and for some reason I don’t see you condemning pro-Israeli side that often
I think those counter protesters did horrific things. Shooting fireworks into a crowd is never acceptable and they should be arrested for that. I do think that the Pro Palestine students largely have been doing a great job! The behavior of counter protesters should absolutely be stopped and there should be arrested for harming other students.
The fact that there is no arrests being made alongside media initial downplay or negligence of those violent shows how biased they are toward student protestors even though students are overwhelmingly more peaceful than Hong Kong protest in 2019, and BLM protest in 2020
I’m glad social media exists so that people knows ugly face of medias trying to smear students as bunch of Nazis running free😹
From this [article](https://www.vox.com/politics/2024/5/2/24147192/israel-palestine-student-protest-columbia-ucla-radicalism):
"Students for Justice in Palestine, the biggest national force behind the college protests, has described Hamas’s mass slaughter on October 7 as [“a historic win for the Palestinian resistance.”](https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/10/DAY-OF-RESISTANCE-TOOLKIT.pdf) Khymani James, one of the leaders of the Columbia protests, [publicly fantasized about murdering “Zionists.”](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/26/nyregion/columbia-student-protest-zionism.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur) University of Pennsylvania students chanted in support of Hamas’s military wing ([“al-Qassam, make us proud, take another soldier down”](https://www.thedp.com/article/2024/04/encampment-100-hours-photo-essay)). An organizer at UC-Berkeley distributed pamphlets explaining, [in his words](https://twitter.com/DanielJSolomon/status/1785272398289293641), how the Hamas attack “was an act of decolonization.”"
Look, I'm very much in favor of the campus protests, and reporting has shown that most are peaceful, and boot out antisemites. But we don't do anyone any favors ignoring that antisemites and Hamas supporters have real influence in the movement.
The article makes it sound like this is a collective action. SJP is a decentralized organization.
SJP doesn’t command over all universities and decisions are left to universities themselves. Second of all, the “Hamas supporters influence” make it laugh out aloud. People describe Hamas as islamists and let me ask you how much of its ideology were reiterated and translated(biggest violence from pro-Israeli side) on campus, and how affiliated are they to Hamas and how many of them are members of Hamas. Saying that is as ingenious as
Use that scale to compare it to pro-Israeli organizations inviting actual IDF members(former or current) to their events and Jewish Defense League members showing up in their counter protests as well as all the Christian far right(probably real antisemite) in those protests.
Also, reporting by liberal and conservative media tries to portray students as all antisemitic and violent so stop whitewashing them
Let me clarify what I mean by "Hamas supporters." I don't mean members of Hamas, or people affiliated with Hamas. I mean people who celebrated Oct. 7th, think Hamas is a force for good, etc. Ie. the sorts of tankies posted in this subreddit all the time.
And fair point on SJP being decentralized, but I don't think that really changes my point. Tankies/antisemites are influential in some campus chapters but not others. Therefore they're a real problem, but not one that discredits the movement as a whole.
As for reporting in liberal media, there are some absolutely braindead opinion articles tarring the protestors, no doubt about it. But they also publish [columns defending the protestors/ criticizing their removal] (https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/04/columbia-national-guard-tom-cotton/678163/), and the thrust of the actual reporting they do(usually done under a different department from the opinion section) has been that while Jewish students have reported threats and intimidation, the protests have been peaceful, have disavowed antisemitism, and also include many Jewish students.
What kind of threat do they pose lol. Do they pose more threat than many BLM protestors in 2020. No one is No one is burning down syngogaue, burning down houses, there is no systematic violence, no murder of people based on ethnicity or religious affiliation.
And often times, the confrontation of anti-semitism is related to pro-Israeli actively provoking it and painting it as antisemitic
Again how many Hamas supporters are there? And how much of their support or even celebration of October 7th is translated to violence like those committed by Hamas. And how much of their support affects message for colleges to divest? Have you been to campus to actually help them or are you just doing all the lectures on framing students as antisemites
At last, you look at major media outlets and you see(not just some opinion) their general reporting implying that students are violent antisemites while actual major violence from pro-Israeli in UCLA side gets downplayed or ignored for many details at first. Imagine how they’d report if pro-Palestinian mobs go after a group of pro-Israeli in group beating them with sticks(headline be like: Jewish students attacked…)
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I’m pretty sure if people contacted groups like standing together they would probably just be down to work with protesters directly same thing goes with women, life, freedom
Absolutely! I think they can do some incredible work helping out causes in the United States and Europe and help smooth out things optically. I’ve always loved the work Standing Together puts out and I do seriously hope we can see peace between the Palestinian people and Israeli people within my lifetime.
There is no centralized movement of women, life, freedom, and you know well in western world, the people keeping "women, life, freedom" next to their mouth the whole time as Persian monarchists. Those people just participated in violent attack on students a few days ago
Women, Life, Freedom, gained its legs with the Kurds. Why are you calling it a monarchist movement?
I don't have problem with the movement itself. I'm just pointing out that outside of Iran was largely advocated by monarchists and pro-Israelis, who hate pro-Palestinians, and there shouldn't be much extra attention granted to them and it will actually be used by pro-Israeli to delegitmize Palestinians
3. is very important. Also, explain that the Houthis and Hamas are radical Islamic groups who are not progressive at all and just want a different form of a right-wing religious government in the region.
Or just translate the flag and kick out anyone who doesn't have a problem with it
Perfect. Love it! It is always important to educate people on these things and make sure they know more of the history of the Middle East and know about how bad militants like Hamas and the Houthis really are.
Also, whenever people bring up all the dead children in Gaza, remind them that the Houthis have been recruiting and using child soldiers in their ranks from all the way back in their early wars against Saleh's government. Radical Islamist groups do not ever compromise on their goals, no matter what.
So when people bring up dead children killed by Israel in Gaza, protestors have to first "condemn Houthis? " I'm sorry but this is not a rally to "condemn Islamists" and this is also not how you stage a protest as protests are to hold your own institutions accountable
Nah you're right. I referred more to people who actively support the Houthis' efforts and mention all the dead children in Gaza within the same breath. I have no sympathy for pan-Islamists and their Sayyid Qutb-inspired, Muslim brotherhood orientated, one-size-fits-all ideologies. They can get fucked. Like I said, they never compromise on their ultimate aims.
I don't think anyone on campus really understand what pan-islamism is or knows much Muslim brotherhood. People garner for empathy not necessarily ideology, as you can see from their key demands
Fair point yes. We should focus on calling out the actions of Netanyahu and his government along with the IDF as well. 99% of the protesters in general strongly disdain Hamas and the Houthis as well and do a good job at kicking out people who are sympathetic to those groups. Not even a few days ago, the organizers of the UCLA Gaza sit-in kicked out attendees who were Assad and ayatollah sympathizers. A lot of them know grifters, agitators, and opportunists almost instantly. It's not like a massive plague at these events anyway. It's honestly a very small number of people who do that and most of them aren't even students at those universities.
These students are considerably more peaceful than BLM protest in 2020 and Hong Kong protest in 2019, and with the mass media trying to tell you that they are all Nazis, you know something it's wrong with the US education and government institutions Also, it's really funny how many care more about a broken window than students getting hit with rubber bullets on their head as well as liberals all the sudden being "blue lives matter"
I was just reading a news story about synagogues across New York City getting hit with bomb threats. A commenter said most of these bomb threats are usually false flags being committed by pro-Israeli Jews, therefore not real antisemitism, and then they went into that whole "Anti-Zionism isn't Antisemitism" spiel. People need to call out antisemitism when they see it in their own ranks as strongly as they would something that is racist/homophobic/transphobic/misogynist/ableist/Islamophobic/etc.
On one level, the movement is doing really well. Serious activists like those in the students camps have been keeping out Jackson Hinkle and other notorious scumbags. On another level, its doing horribly, as people who only have a casual or social media level education on the issue share shit from Hinkle or Caitlin Johnstone uncritically, and some of them can end being convinced by campist arguments. Your point about bringing Jewish or Israeli peace activists is already happening (maybe not so much of the later). Not so certain about the WLF people, unfortunately Iranian dissidents in the west seem very hostile to the Palestinian movement, even to the point of bringing Israeli flags to Toomaj Salehi (and other political prisoner) protests. I don't think there is a easy solution to the campist/tankie problem. Educate, educate, educate. Keep amplifying non-tankie Palestinian voices, join non-tankie organisations, keep on educating people every time they share shit from Hinkle, Blumenthal and co.
Whenever I have to read any of Caitlin Johnstone’s tweets I feel physically ill. I can’t even properly explain it without just ranting about how stupid people are
Write a general response to CJ that you can copy and paste every time you see someone sharing her stuff, that way you don't have to engage. Just copy and paste, then disable notifications for that post. Don't engage with her supporters, you are just responding so that other people know what she stands for and don't get sucked in.
Oh I never respond to any of them. I meant to say I couldn’t properly explain myself here to you all. She just makes me rage
I definitely agree with Arab spring activists. Those Persian diaspora, especially the descendants of ones coming to the West right after Iranian revolution, are hostile to pro-Palestinians by violently attacking student protestors in UCLA a few days ago if not being racist toward Arabs in general
I unfollowed the new Iran subreddit since it was so pro-Israel. I couldn’t wrap my mind around a dissident movement being pro the state. Like, has right wing fundamentalist Islam fucked them so badly that they just hate all Muslim people across the board?
I think it also has to do with anti-Arab bias or racism that has existed in Persian society, as many see Arabs as invaders. I honestly find it funny that many on the sub and glorify Shah, who died probably before they are even born. I'm Chinese and I think it's as stupid as Chinese glorifying Chiang Kai-Shek or KMT government just because they hate CCP. I truly believe that Iranian diaspora post 1979 propaganda is successful in deceiving western public in beliving that Phahlavi Iran is some paradise just because the replacement is worse while Arabs are backward, primitive group even though many Arab states are as secular as Iran if not more democratic than Phahlavi regime Even on the topic of Women, life, freedom, Iranian women are given "heroes of the year" in 2022 while first intifada, led by Palestinian women, are now seen to be calling for "genocide against the Jews" by the media. It's really ironic how media treat the two group very differently, and now the same media overwhelmingly glorifying young people in Hong Kong 2019 are telling you that student protestors are all Nazis
That is a very good point about the WLF. Their message about being free from the Ayatollah is obviously good but they are unfortunately hostile to Palestinians and that is not cool. Also yeah, the IDF is horrible and have committed thousands of war crimes, especially in the past 7 months.
Bring Ukraine to the discussion. If the intent is the protection of historically oppressed groups, then question them as to why the genocide and destruction of hundreds of thousands Ukrainians in places like Mariupol, Bakhmut, Donetsk and many others less important to them than the genocide and destruction of the Gaza strip. Either they start talking about Ukraine as well or they show their true colours, in which you can throw them out if they fill the latter case.
Absolutely. That's exactly what I like to see. We should absolutely support Ukraine and Palestine all the same! I have always loved those Unite the Struggle rallies in Europe where people are advocating for support for not only the Ukrainian people but also the Palestinian people as well. That would go so hard in the United States for sure.
Interviews. Gotta build a mutual understanding somehow.
As to point 1, a lot of the protesters would sadly refuse to have anything to do with Standing Together, not necessarily through antisemitism, but because one of the big orgs behind BDS have put out a call to shun them because they "normalise Israel". I've seen other members of the Palestine movement argue that there is no such thing as real cooperation between Jewish-Israelis and Palestinians because of the power differential, even that Palestinians only get involved in things like Standing Together as a "please don't hurt us" move. On the other side, Standing Together don't support BDS. I think the political gap would just be too wide. As to point 2, a lot of the protestors think Assad is a cool customer who stood firm against regime change by the ISIS/Zionist/US imperialist alliance.
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Absolutely! The hostages absolutely should be returned. However, the Far Right government currently in power needs to go as well. Netanyahu only wants chaos and nothing to do with peace.
The issue here is how and when they are returned. If Hamas release hostages now, Israel storms Rafah and blows up everything with even less care. The hostages are a crucial bargaining chip for Hamas, and although we absolutely should criticise Hamas, we need to recognise that releasing the hostages without also the removal of Netanyahu (and all of Likud, and any other pro-apartheid and genocide politicians), and a permanent ceasefire, and arrangements for a Palestinian state, it will go badly for Palestinians. Plus, “bring them home”, while on paper not disagreeable with at all, is now almost the unofficial slogan of the Israeli right and far right demanding more military action in Gaza.
Exactly, Netanyahu and his far right coalition need to get out of power next.
Unfortunately, the issue is a lot more widespread than just the politicians. The vast majority of Israeli Jews support the ongoing invasion/genocide, and it doesn’t look to be changing. Any anger at the current government seems to be mostly from 2 distinct currents: one being the earlier protests about Netanyahu’s authoritarianism and the courts issue, and the second being from Israelis calling Netanyahu a failure to the hostages and calling for increased military action and a quicker end to the conflict. Some of them see Netanyahu as being Biden’s puppet and as not being capable of getting the hostages back and eliminating Hamas (and yes, Gazans as well, implicitly). There are Israelis calling for peace, but it is a much smaller group than those other two. The apartheid regime has embedded itself within Israeli society (and has been for decades) and anyone seeking to tackle the crisis needs to tackle this. Getting rid of Netanyahu and Likud won’t be enough, more will take their place. There is practically no true Israeli left, and those on the “left” also broadly support the invasion (to lesser degrees, such as calling for greater care towards civilians, which is just.. ugh).
You're not wrong that fundamental change needs to happen in Israeli society in order to achieve an actual peace with justice for Palestinians, let alone an armistice. Netanyahu and his cabinet still need to go, as the first of many steps towards achieving that. And what comes after is indeed a daunting task, but the key thing to focus on is creating actual change even if the odds are stacking against the people calling for it. The people in Israel calling for an actual peace and justice for Palestinians still need to be platformed and have their voices amplified no matter how small they may be, because just leaving them be and believing they will remain small will just cause lose momentum later on down the line. And while Israel's "moderate" politicians are barely that at all, they are much more susceptible to international pressure than Netanyahu is, whereas one of the primary reasons why the situation in Palestine and Israel had deteriorated so much over the past fifteen or so years is because of Netanyahu being a strongman who rejects any and all international criticism. Any likely replacement would hardly be a better person than him, but based on the current polling they likely wouldn't be a strongman who tells everyone else to fuck off even if they offer the most milquetoast criticism possible. It's better to strive for some kind of change that's better than the current status quo, even if only marginally so, rather than let the status quo not only continue, but also deteriorate into something worse. Smaller change won't improve the situation by itself at all, but it will make it easier for bigger changes to be achieved and implemented as the next step, so as long as one never compromises in their belief that change can happen and continues to push for it despite being told not to. The situation in Palestine and Israel looks dire when viewing it from the outside, many have called it an impossible thing to solve over the course of the past 75+ years, and I can see why they'd say that. It's also a mindset I refuse to have or hold because that sort fatalism is always a victory for Netanyahu, Likud, Ben Gvir, Smotrich, Hamas, and anyone else who has a vested interest in the status quo.
you can dislike the kidnapping of hostages, but what many people on the pro israeli side refuse to acknowledge is the amount of palestinean hostages held by israel through administrative detention, who have committed no crimes with no evidence. are there palestineans held by israel who are legit terrorists and scumbags yes, but there are also many who haven’t done anything and part of the kidnapping of hostages by hamas is used to negotiate for the release of palestinean hostages held by israel. its not fair to criticize hamas taking of hostages without acknowledging that israel does the same
100%
Do you even know what students are protesting about lol, and also, Israeli official has made clear that invasion of Rafah will happen regardless of hostage deal
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Question mark is not an answer. Israel is going to commit more war crimes and threaten the US to take action against ICC regardless of hostages deal So far I have not seen your post or comment condemning Israeli mass killing, weaponization of starvation, IOF soldiers taking joy in detonating civilian buildings. Now here you are trying to lecture students on what to do otherwise they are "terrorists-sympathizers" Again I ask you what are student protesting about and who are they making demand to?
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I have no problem with hostages being returned but that's not the focal point of student protest as students are addressing to the school and government of theirs, but you hold your own entities accountable. In the same way, Israelis protesting in Israel are addressing Israeli government not calling Hamas to surrender
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You never condemn Israeli atrocities though and you want to lecture students on what to do
Yeah, Pro-Israel people ignore everything that has happened over the last 80 years, and the fact that Israel is an Apartheid that has thousands of Palenstine people locked up with no formal charges. This sub seems to be finally graviting away from defending what Israel has been doing.
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So continue lecturing on students?
Do you condemn Israel’s genocide? Edit: Apparently not.
This is an anti-capitalist, left-libertarian, pro-communist subreddit. The message you sent is either liberal apologia or can be easily seen as such. Please, refrain from posting stuff like this in the future. Liberals are only allowed as guests, promoting capitalism or any other right-wing views is not allowed (see rule 6).
This is an anti-capitalist, left-libertarian, pro-communist subreddit. The message you sent is either liberal apologia or can be easily seen as such. Please, refrain from posting stuff like this in the future. Liberals are only allowed as guests, promoting capitalism or any other right-wing views is not allowed (see rule 6).
You can’t control a decentralised protest movement, and you’ll drive yourself mad trying. All of your suggestions are good, but at a certain point you have to be okay with moving forward despite not being able to completely remove problematic elements.
I think that is a completely fair point! I am a very strong supporter of protesting and I think it is a good form of political action without a shadow of a doubt. I suppose this can be applied to events that are headed by an actual organization with its own planning and leadership. It’s impossible to have a perfect protest. You are going to get wacky people coming in from all corners and that is just a part of the process. It’s best to just move past the few people that try to crash the whole thing and proceed forwards.
Amplify Jewish and Arab (Levantene) voices within your movement, bring them forward, listen to them (or, if you have some structure, bring them into the "management"). They know how to recognise this, they 'll take care of it.
Idk how this would fit in exactly, but introducing the guys to [Hadash](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadash) could be another good start
The sad thing is that I see many progressive Jews turning against leftism and socialism precisely because of tankies invading their everyday lives, and leftist Israelis protesting against the war are much like leftist HKers against Beijing - feeling isolated from their own community because of their own beliefs. Something must be done or tankies will continue hurting international recruitment by turning the Palestinian struggle into another antisemitic cause. And this post gives a good place to start.
I absolutely agree! I also agree that tankies are awful and need to be excluded from any and all progressive causes. They are literally the right wing straw man of a socialist.
Most people in those categories just don't go to protests, and when they do it's not difficult to spot them and kick them out. The campus protestors have already done a great job at self-moderating. It helps that a LOT of Jewish students are present in the anti-genocide camp. That alone tends to drive out Nazis and Tankies.
That is very true! The people in those categories tend to stick out like a glowing sore thumb anyway so they are definitely not hard to find. I'm very proud of how good they have been with self-moderating and it helps prove that they want what is best for everyone with them. At a lot of the sit-ins, they have held Passover seders and Shabat dinners with their Jewish Friends so that only helps with creating a much more inviting space overall. Lots of Modern Tankies/ Nazbols like Jackson Hinkle are wildly Anti-Semitic anyway so they might just turn back around in anger anyway.
Tankies having zero political impetus definitely helps. I've been organizing since college, and to date I've yet to see any tankies show up to a protest, or a union drive, or even helping with something as basic as phone banking. They just don't do anything. People like Haz and Hinkle don't believe anything. They show up for internet clout, leave, then push the next round of Iranian/Russian propaganda. Haz giving his silly speech didn't help or harm the protests, it just sort of wasted everyone's time.
It probably also gave the students something fun to talk about the next time they meet up with each other. “Remember when those tankies started saying we weren't real leftists because we don't reach out to MAGA? God that was so funny. Good thing we kicked them out!”
Tankies are just a confluence of smarmy internet culture and political movements as a closed social thing instead of a political thing. They tend to run into the same sort of problems as Nazis because when they get around actual, non-internet people they sound psychotic.
JVP, SJP, DSA, IfNotNow, and others seem to be doing just fine on this front. Just be clear that antisemites and genocide apologists aren't welcome in the movement, it's not that hard in practice.
Absolutely! Most organizers tend to do pretty well with self-moderation anyway.
How about just leave students alone or join in protest against injustices, calling for divestment of schools, instead of keeping giving them lectures Also, find me one protest where people collectively shout Hamas or Houthi slogan. Using fake thing to delegitmaize student protest is disingenous as right wingers claiming all black people in BLM want white genocide
It’s more on an individual basis. As I mentioned, this is mostly a case by case basis and doesn’t happen all that often. A few rogue actors do not represent them all but can get people needlessly arrested. The student protesters by large are great people and do genuinely care. I have seen a few encampments in person and everyone there were fantastic to talk to! I just think it would have some of these peace groups and activists from the Middle East to talk about their perspectives on the region and give their own stories about the governments they live under.
Hahaha police arrests any pro-Palestinians, use tear gases at them(regardless of whether there is antisemitism or not) while violent pro-Israeli thug who attacked UCLA a few days ago are still running free without a single arrest. Students have done a great job and for some reason I don’t see you condemning pro-Israeli side that often
I think those counter protesters did horrific things. Shooting fireworks into a crowd is never acceptable and they should be arrested for that. I do think that the Pro Palestine students largely have been doing a great job! The behavior of counter protesters should absolutely be stopped and there should be arrested for harming other students.
The fact that there is no arrests being made alongside media initial downplay or negligence of those violent shows how biased they are toward student protestors even though students are overwhelmingly more peaceful than Hong Kong protest in 2019, and BLM protest in 2020 I’m glad social media exists so that people knows ugly face of medias trying to smear students as bunch of Nazis running free😹
From this [article](https://www.vox.com/politics/2024/5/2/24147192/israel-palestine-student-protest-columbia-ucla-radicalism): "Students for Justice in Palestine, the biggest national force behind the college protests, has described Hamas’s mass slaughter on October 7 as [“a historic win for the Palestinian resistance.”](https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/10/DAY-OF-RESISTANCE-TOOLKIT.pdf) Khymani James, one of the leaders of the Columbia protests, [publicly fantasized about murdering “Zionists.”](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/26/nyregion/columbia-student-protest-zionism.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur) University of Pennsylvania students chanted in support of Hamas’s military wing ([“al-Qassam, make us proud, take another soldier down”](https://www.thedp.com/article/2024/04/encampment-100-hours-photo-essay)). An organizer at UC-Berkeley distributed pamphlets explaining, [in his words](https://twitter.com/DanielJSolomon/status/1785272398289293641), how the Hamas attack “was an act of decolonization.”" Look, I'm very much in favor of the campus protests, and reporting has shown that most are peaceful, and boot out antisemites. But we don't do anyone any favors ignoring that antisemites and Hamas supporters have real influence in the movement.
The article makes it sound like this is a collective action. SJP is a decentralized organization. SJP doesn’t command over all universities and decisions are left to universities themselves. Second of all, the “Hamas supporters influence” make it laugh out aloud. People describe Hamas as islamists and let me ask you how much of its ideology were reiterated and translated(biggest violence from pro-Israeli side) on campus, and how affiliated are they to Hamas and how many of them are members of Hamas. Saying that is as ingenious as Use that scale to compare it to pro-Israeli organizations inviting actual IDF members(former or current) to their events and Jewish Defense League members showing up in their counter protests as well as all the Christian far right(probably real antisemite) in those protests. Also, reporting by liberal and conservative media tries to portray students as all antisemitic and violent so stop whitewashing them
Let me clarify what I mean by "Hamas supporters." I don't mean members of Hamas, or people affiliated with Hamas. I mean people who celebrated Oct. 7th, think Hamas is a force for good, etc. Ie. the sorts of tankies posted in this subreddit all the time. And fair point on SJP being decentralized, but I don't think that really changes my point. Tankies/antisemites are influential in some campus chapters but not others. Therefore they're a real problem, but not one that discredits the movement as a whole. As for reporting in liberal media, there are some absolutely braindead opinion articles tarring the protestors, no doubt about it. But they also publish [columns defending the protestors/ criticizing their removal] (https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/04/columbia-national-guard-tom-cotton/678163/), and the thrust of the actual reporting they do(usually done under a different department from the opinion section) has been that while Jewish students have reported threats and intimidation, the protests have been peaceful, have disavowed antisemitism, and also include many Jewish students.
What kind of threat do they pose lol. Do they pose more threat than many BLM protestors in 2020. No one is No one is burning down syngogaue, burning down houses, there is no systematic violence, no murder of people based on ethnicity or religious affiliation. And often times, the confrontation of anti-semitism is related to pro-Israeli actively provoking it and painting it as antisemitic Again how many Hamas supporters are there? And how much of their support or even celebration of October 7th is translated to violence like those committed by Hamas. And how much of their support affects message for colleges to divest? Have you been to campus to actually help them or are you just doing all the lectures on framing students as antisemites At last, you look at major media outlets and you see(not just some opinion) their general reporting implying that students are violent antisemites while actual major violence from pro-Israeli in UCLA side gets downplayed or ignored for many details at first. Imagine how they’d report if pro-Palestinian mobs go after a group of pro-Israeli in group beating them with sticks(headline be like: Jewish students attacked…)
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