BlueOak

@Leo Gura It should be noted that the Saudi's money is also invasive in world politics, and also was as pro-war with Iran in that period. To widen it further, almost any oil-producing nation, or any nation with enough financial clout has a large lever on power. Though i've seen some of the financials and Israel's interests have a huge amount of money invested in candidates. I would say to you, the same thing you say to me, when I talk about the level of corporate influence. That's how it is. It's how it's always been. Then I would say it's not an ideal state of affairs. It creates a disconnect between what people want to what they end up getting, but the worst part is its cloaked in a veil of secrecy. If people could see why something occurred, it would go some way to grounding them in reality, rather than us constantly chasing rainbows or pots of gold that don't exist, and then wondering why they don't happen. So many people don't try, or don't care, because they chase things that are not true in the first place, because they are lied to about how the world operates, then when they don't get them over and over and over again it naturally means they start to give up.

@Nivsch Welcome. I hope it gets better. I need to show more empathy when I communicate. Rather than just be contrarian.

Sure, point me at the Palestinian's I need to convince on here about how their own government has destroyed their people and way of life, who raised their kids thinking resistance was the only way, when in reality it was one aspect of many they could consider, instead of turning their back on resisting what is and taking the hard opposite road. You can't because you have all the power, even the communication, so what do I do keep confirming your own bias for you? Why do you need that, just look in a mirror. They cultivated a culture that sees death as a beneficial end result, I can't stress how stupid that is, but there is nobody here to tell because you've leveled their homes. So I have to instead sit here and try to say why that's not an ideal approach to solving a crisis situation, because you are all that's represented here or speaking. A conversation goes Meta naturally by virtue of having different opinions expressed (remember our discussion about the real point of presidential debates) However I would honestly welcome you to tell me how I could take a more meta view here, hit my ego as hard as you like. I could echo that yes it's an effective way to remove a threat, done while America still has the naval power to somewhat secure their cargo ships or take out missiles headed their way, or that Israel has lived in fear for many decades. That their neighbors want them dead. That it is fully understandable why they would pick the course they have, after feeling exhausted and spent trying other options. But i've been in that state more than once, and making decisions from it just ends badly, I can't think of one good choice I made while afraid and in fight/flight, i've regretted every one of them. I needed someone, an event, or something to pull me out of it, and this is a good mirror for my own resistance when someone tries to say something like: You've got power even when it seems hopeless. You are not only a victim. You are not alone even when it feels like it. Your actions decide how this goes.

@Lila9 Its fair to say evacuation isn't ethnic cleansing. Its fair to say turning half of the infrastructure to rubble there, and having a history of creating opportunistic settlements (which you then have to justify and defend constantly creating tension), leads people to believe you will resettle these areas as your own. I'd be AMAZED if not one new settlement happens. Its fair to say it hasn't happened yet. If anything this word is being held up now, so that isn't the course you choose as a people. Heck, I've seen people in Israel saying we'll go further south next as an example. - If I come back 5 months from now and say you've done ethnic cleansing, what good is it? It would already be done. It's why its nearly useless trying to get you to see the large fallout regionally or internationally from this, because that has happened, but it can always get worse. Leniency does not radicalize. Impulsiveness, carelessness, and inattentiveness is the opposite of vigilance, which might create opportunities for mischief, but men and women earning money, feeding their families, and living in relative safety are not prone to becoming terrorists who want to suicide bomb you, or throw rockets over at you, because their lives are mostly stable and their families cared for. The worse a situation gets the more you radicalize people. With this action you've not deradicalized anyone, you've created hundreds of thousands of new people willing to do violence across the region. Just like their actions created in you. Again this has perfectly played into Iran's hands, both because of the BRICS angle, American isolationism, many groups having an excuse and gaining a large amount of new recruits.

@Nivsch Honestly. Do you think I have a habit of omitting details in these discussions? If anything I put too much into my posts. You are correct though moralizing is used as a convenient cudgle all throughout society. Me I just use what works. Sometimes going full green as they say here is very effective. Other times practically showing people A-B-C is. Other times weighting your message socialist, capitalist, authoritarian or liberal works, it depends on what you want to achieve or who you are speaking to.

@Nivsch Quote: Ethnic cleansing is the systematic forced removal of ethnic, racial, or religious groups from a given area, with the intent of making a region ethnically homogeneous. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_cleansing If Israel intends to settle that area after they are done, this is exactly what is happening in the North of Gaza.

I usually use the words ethnic cleansing. It certainly is that. Removing a population, culture or ethnic group from an area. 50%+ of which is now rubble. After that, the definition of genocide is usually numbers. I used it to provoke an emotional response in you. To get you to look at it, because I know it resonates personally with the history of your people. If it helps to repeat the obvious, yes Hamas were toxic, but that isn't a sufficient word. Hamas brought about the destruction of their own people, they were self-destructive, they viewed you as invaders, and the world as a battleground. That's probably as self-destructive as you can get, they are literally killing themselves both in a spiritual sense (attacking a part of themselves they hate) , but also practically fighting a much larger opponent, because they were radicalized through a chain of events, even to the point that death is somehow a benefit to them. It is certainly not the only place this is visible, its an ongoing radicalization of the youth at present in many countries, with different expressions, even in Western ones. If you want to kid yourself that turning an area to rubble, in an attempt to get hostages back, is a well-planned military operation you can. It's simply false. The goal here is to get rid of Hamas and the Palestinian presence in the north of Gaza, in that yes its somewhat well executed. Maximum force brought to bear on an opponent while minimizing your own casualties. The long-term fallout of acting unilaterally is something I can't impart to you, despite trying with so many posts. I guess the only way is for you to live it. I could try again and say this was because of a chain events you were part of, you were not just victims, but also part of this situation that has manifested, but you are right, logic can't be applied to emotion while the suffering is as raw as it is. Just don't try to apply logic to those you hate either, because they are feeling the same thing.

You don't effectively recover hostages by carpet bombing areas. You effectively recover hostages by making them the priority first. Surgical precision is needed to recover hostages, and is more beneficial in war time anyway. All of that was at your disposal a certain level domestically and much more internationally. There was a wealth of special forces, intelligence operatives and others that would have been happy to help at the start of this. As well as precision airpower and missiles. I have come to realise Israel thinks it's alone, even now. It acts alone and it's creating a reality where it will become more alone. Someone will turn around in the future and say look we are alone now, and I will have to try and explain how you got there. You are making what you feel a reality. *I want to also say thank you for acknowledging I was trying to help, at the least, the guy sitting thousands of miles away looking at this is not your enemy, they never were.

1) No you are not. You are dealing with a % of the population who has become radicalized, more so now because of your actions. Only 1 in 200 people are born psychopaths. 2) As I have said in other threads and this one, there were multiple ways to handle this situation, you have chosen genocide. Do not make me out to be a hippy, when in previous conversations I have said airstrikes and covert action, such as professional special forces, to recover hostages should have been part of any operation. These methods should have been used first, and then if you wanted to conduct this campaign when the hostages were recovered, you still could have. Allies should have been brought in first, giving you political legitimacy, outside resources, and a cushion that isn't just one lone president Biden being vilified by the world. - I won't repeat it all, its in the thread I linked. For all the reasons i've already discussed, it would have been better for you long term, when your emotion dies down, to have gone this route. You have a black-and-white understanding of reality. Where people need to be one or the other. That is not how life is. Its very complicated, with many factors, and a lot of emotion here especially.

@Lila9 I also apologize if I am coming across as too logical rather than emotional or understanding of your emotional state. I have a bias towards wanting to avoid aggression and violence. So any lessening of it I can inspire in anyone, I will usually go out of my way to do. In whatever form works. I do not say things I don't honestly feel or mean. My words only have value if they are truthfully what I am thinking or feeling. The power is mostly with you all, not Hamas currently, they are almost powerless in pure reaction to survive but I think you all feel that way too. Perhaps the energy and focus is best put in showing you that you do have options, power, and a real say in how this goes. Survival thinking is not your only option, you did (and still do have a few allies left willing to help), though you are creating the pure isolationism you feel to be reflected in the world around you. That is a choice on your part, and I wish at least you could understand that you help create and shape the wider reality you experience going forward.

@Lila9 YES Its easier to judge from an outside perspective, that's why you go to it for clarity! People with distance are not operating purely on emotion, they can give us a perspective we lack in any situation. That's also why we listen to other people with the opposite view to ours to form a framework to operate out of. That's the whole point! (Its much of the point of life too) You can obtain near-systematic thinking just by listening to enough perspectives and involving them in the discussion! Because they are the system! Or you can do it all yourself, but like you say fewer people are capable of modeling a situation sufficiently in their mind, and everyone is flawed or more vulnerable to gaps in logic on their own when they try. I can only do it to the degree I've studied and absorbed the subject, usually by encountering people who have challenged my perspective to deepen it. Collectively though you can do it with a group much easier. Simply. How you get worse results, is just doing what comes into your own head, or even worse what you think is a good idea in the moment. How you get better results is constantly engaging with many other viewpoints on a subject, until you understand it well enough to form a multi-faceted conclusion. The point is taken that I don't live in the level of fear Israeli's do. That I am not used to the same intensity in our actions here, if anything my bias is near the opposite of intensity, its comfort. But that means I can give you something you currently lack, the completely opposite side of this, not the Palestinian side, the actual opposite. The guy the other side of the world viewing this and deciding what it means going forward in our dealings with your country. The entire world is connected, in so many ways, and you will be affected by the actions you take. - At the bare minimum you get to address how you speak to that voice, you get to begin to form answers to questions you will hear repeated for the next 20, 30, 50 years of your life here and now. However, as i've said a 100 times, you don't just use the stick on a problem, you use the carrot and the stick. No matter your country's stage of development, that's a universal thing. Unilateral action by a state rarely works out for the best, for anyone, including the state itself. Now what else do you want me to say about Palestinians to make you feel better, if that is possible, I can try. Other than Hamas have caused their entire country to fall apart and their homeland to burn? What other criticism is needed? This whole if you are not with us you are against us, is a deep problem you have personally and collectively. To some people, it would create enemies where none exist. To me, I just see it as your pain expressed, and the suffering you've endured looking for an outlet, and for that, you have my deepest sympathies. I hope when this all ends, life is better, despite all my pessimism and seeing cycles repeat.

Winning isn't the societal purpose of a live debate. Discourse and having views exchanged, opinions heard, and people feeling like they are part of the process is. By alienating them, or pretending they don't exist, the system is undermining its legitimacy.

Here is where the republican party is slightly more democratic than the democratic party: It is not much. Trump wanted to avoid the debates for example, but the republican party still had them. So the party itself is more democratic than the democrats on this issue. I know there are 50 other reasons you are going to say the opposite of those you hate, but it's important I highlight where democracy is breaking down in America generally, and why/how, the country is sliding into a dictatorship. if I don't do this, and if it goes further, I can't say I showed it happening.

I am not unaware that people of influence put forward candidates that they can tolerate. They fund them, position them, and get them in power. A few things are different: Money and power is in fewer hands, so fewer views are presented. Propaganda to manufacture support is more intense and invasive. Less space is provided for opposing viewpoints to be discussed, this problem is systemic, and I don't think you see the natural progression to anarchy it brings as more of the whole is excluded. Populists naturally fall outside this narrowing system and that's another reason why populism is growing. It seems also a factor of declining masculinity, as the masculine energy or influence on society allows space for opposing views to exist. People are not as fragile when there is healthy masculinity in society, in their lives, or fearful of debate happening. Populism aside, yes powerful people have often decided who you get to see in the first place, but I've never seen it be limited to two people in America like this during my lifetime. Surely you can see that's a downgrade toward dictatorship from a dozen potential presidents.

If you mean: Business as usual. The further slide into dictatorship in America. The trend that has been going on throughout my lifetime, yes. If you mean this always happened. No. Journalism was not propaganda, it was journalism, at its best a search for facts, at its worst sensationalism of stories for drama. Either way, people did not pretend challengers didn't exist. People did not elect their candidates ahead of votes. People were not so scared of rivals they decided they couldn't tolerate an opposing opinion. That last part is the snowflake generation made manifest. In decades gone by all of these men/women would be on a stage and the debate, seeing the opposing opinions, would be the point. That would be the democratic part of the process in action.

Part of the reason people on the right are beginning to hate Israel is. They are causing 2 million more refugees. So yes they think about it, but not in the way you think they do. The populist left and even the center, lost the argument you are trying to argue against, its all about self-interest now. I will say racists, nationalists but even more people who just hate migrants (programmed to domestically, turning anger away from economic realities or challenges), are starting to turn against Israel, because they link up what you are doing with problems they are facing themselves. What's 2 million split 20 ways? 100k a piece. Those 20 countries will get the majority of the migrants eventually through the gradual relocation of families, often 'encouraged' by the neighboring states. So you will cause them 100,000 new migrants. You might say not all will leave, you only leveled half the land. Okay. 50,000 if you manage to limit the war to that single region, somewhat unlikely at this amount of regional tension. You already see people fearmongering about the border and Palestinians entering countries ahead of time, because the people doing it want to get the message out now. So around the globe for right-wingers who hate migration, and people who understand social issues, you are giving everyone the social and economic burden of your actions. And BTW even if its 5 migrants, the right will still magnify that to be an invading horde for their own propaganda these days.

1) We already had this discussion: Yes Hamas wanted to destroy you. Very true. They committed a horrific act. What was Israel's response? A horrific act of greater magnitude. Someone else would just argue morals with you, i'm not that person. I can use that if affects you, to say you are as bad as they are, worse right now. But what does that matter to your life tomorrow practically? The point I am making, is this action is going to harm your country more than help your country. I am trying to appeal to your survival instinct and self-interest. Trying to show you a larger picture, where isolationism or unilateralism is causing the world itself to split apart, country by country, groups internally inside those countries fracturing, and turning individuals against each other. Yes we can all act on emotion. My first thought when I saw this was Israel should occupy Gaza. That was my emotional reaction, it is usually my emotional reaction when I see noncombatants harmed. Thankfully I have distance from it, so I was able to logically look at the problem, and calculate better options. Israel instead, and I understand why, acted purely on emotion, they acted unilaterally, and with no regard for anything else except revenge. Had they sort out military and diplomatic allies, they would have obtained a more logical systematic view from perspectives with distance to the tragedy, which by the way didn't necessarily mean altering what course Israel took. At the minimum, this current military effort would have been more effective with international support and expertise, with fewer economic, diplomatic, or security problems for Israel (and America) in the long term. For the same reason you say humans act irrationally, is the same reason I say they can act rationally. Its a choice you make every day. Often times we are faced with it. Acting purely on emotion results in terrible consequences for our personal lives, and the breakdown of social order. Putting us in jail as an example, or causing relationships of all kinds to break apart when they don't need to. In this case, it results in mass murder, going both ways. 2) Yes Hamas have caused Palestine a great deal of suffering, their actions in response to a chain of choices, have brought about the ruin of their homeland. Again you can see this highlighted in front of you, yet you cannot accept the opposite. You can't see that this sort of closed-loop thinking will result in an obvious consequence of further and now magnified violence towards you and your country. I will repeat, it will cause further security issues, fear/social repression, diplomatic issues, issues with your trade and economy, and yes a wealth of people now willing to throw rockets or bombs into your homeland for the next generations. - In some ways Iran's got exactly what it wants, making you a clear enemy of BRICS in a heavily contested region of the world, and turning most popular opinion against you. On the extreme end, I would not be surprised if Israel became a proxy war within my lifetime, slightly hyperbolic but not much with the pace of BRICS development in that region, and the waning international support that accompanies unilateral military actions.

Two things 1) From a self-preservation standpoint knowing your neighbors, why are you catering to their most dangerous and worst tendencies? 2) Yes. And Israel has given them hundreds of thousands more recruits, an excuse to do what they are doing, and legitimacy for a more extreme position or government. In their mind, they are not terrorists but fighting outside invaders. Why is it you can't see that one action creates the consequences of the next? Why do you think everything happens in a vacuum? Any excuse? There is an ethnic cleansing going on nearby. If that happened in Europe you can be sure we'd be up in arms. Russia tried a horrific but different version of destroying a culture or way of life they didn't like, and united almost the whole continent against them.

Of course its a self-created reality, you don't see me showing much surprise overall. Now Israel is creating what comes next. You can see the past but I don't understand why you can't see how this creates the next great tragedy. When it happens i'll be saying they helped create it, and all these people with moral outrage will be saying 'oh how can you say that'. I'll be sitting here having to talk to people trying to delude themselves that they had no hand or choice in it in, like it all just happened to them. And BTW a recent poll. Yes if Israel bomb someone, they don't like them, and join any group resisting them. Why is this a surprise to so many posters here?

Nothing is redundant. I like to think people only reply if they want to, everyone has agency in their actions. I have never replied to someone calling a population a cancer. Nor see this level of justification (from several viewpoints) for slaughter outside of a book or movie. It's honestly a learning experience.

I will try and engage this part of you instead. This military action will do the opposite. I repeat, it erodes international support by its unilateral nature and its direct targeting of civilians. Its aggressive response against a similar culture turns the countries in the immediate vicinity further hostile. It generates hundreds of thousands more militia fighters ready to attack Israel. It will legitimize Hamas again in many quarters. It legitimacies this level of response against Israel (and sadly other countries), it actually provides a stepping stone for the next level of response against Israel. America is moving isolationist. They are likely in the Middle East to be replaced or at least rivaled effectively by BRICS. Iran does not like Israel. There is a fair chance that Israel will find less support as a result of this atrocity being committed, and given America's pull towards isolationism, could see themselves undermined significantly. Yemen is being quite smart targeting naval trade. As this area specifically is where China will rival America soon, the ability to project naval power in the coming decades. So Israel could well see itself starved of what it needs to function as one example. It will undoubtedly see more terrorist attacks as a result of this as another example. Sanctions keep coming from different countries, which I should also show as an example.

This part of you is psychopathic.

1) In wartime flyers acting as discarded pieces of paper are not very effective, often ignored being considered enemy propaganda. 2) Simply false. The response was almost immediate. I was watching airstrikes happen. 3) They had no time at all, they were immediately being bombed. The first people knew about it they were under fire. Not long after that north gaza was cut off and surrounded. You couldn't pay me to walk that blockade now. Even at the start have to be brave to walk out in the open under fire, watching people die around you, and walking to where? A place with no certainty of anything when you get there. Not to mention, nobody in that region trusts anyone. For all they knew they would be walking to their deaths, many did. 4) The lack of food, water, and shelter, There is nowhere near enough. Also, the UN shelters keep getting hit to kill one guy, out of 30. Because Israel is dumb. There is no other way to say it, the way they are doing all this is ineffective, their leadership is short-sighted, and not very intelligent as to the long-term consequences of acting with this severity unilaterally. I heard someone who was pro israel turn around and say their leader should be shot today. That's the change that's happened internationally. They want to act alone, they'll be alone. 5) It's about 80 journalists who have been killed, but yeah people who speak out also. It was recently reported an elderly lady was killed by a sniper for saying she was older than Israel, as an example. The individual accounts, your feelings on killing people you don't like (which is concerning you'd state that) and specific details are less important than the fact civilians or the press are considered legitimate targets. Israel is acting as a terrorist state. By supporting them, America is acting as a state sponsor of terrorism. 6) In wartime, outside voices help moderate the response naturally. Unilateral action with silenced dissent from the people with the most emotional investment, leads to an extended period of suffering for all involved. Banning anyone. When this first broke I couldn't say a word against this on the major media platforms, it took a lot of pressure to get that reversed. They were pushing a bill in the US to make anti-Zionism anti-Semitic, I don't know the status of that effort. It's incredibly easy to get your video pulled from youtube if don't walk on eggshells. They've been arresting people protesting in America, we get more leeway in the UK because we are not as far down the fascist rabbit hole yet. The whole point of collective voices or diplomacy for example is to stop states going too far. Israel has gone too far. Targeting civilians on mass to cause terror. which is the definition of terrorism, and America is sponsoring it. Both Hamas and Israel are a reflection of each other. Its given me a good view that the American government is hardly better than Russia, just in a different geological position.

There is never not a self-bias. You are yourself, you have a bias.

Communicating to who? People who had their communications cut? How long does it take to move a million people south down a couple of roads under fire? What about all the people that can't move? Screw them right? What about the people when they get south, sit them in a desert right, let them starve, screw them. Blow anyone up that says a bad word about you? Can't have that. Ban me if I say what I really feel right on a communication platform? Criminalize an opposing view that would moderate the response. Israel has flattened almost the entire north from hospitals to schools. Taken no other approach other than bomb, bomb, bomb. Used the most extreme option first, with no sense at all. I conclude the propaganda and self-delusion here is unreal.