NYC pro-Palestine rally splits Democrats over Israel
A pro-Palestinian rally Sunday in Times Square endorsed by the city chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America ensnared prominent party members amid widespread condemnation of the event.
Gov. Kathy Hochul and other leading Democrats blasted the rally as “abhorrent and morally repugnant” and drew a dividing line with far-left members of the party — including New York Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jamaal Bowman, who denounced the attacks and called for a ceasefire but didn’t take a stand on the rally.
“I condemn Hamas’ attack in the strongest possible terms,” Ocasio-Cortez said in a statement. “No child and family should ever endure this kind of violence and fear, and this violence will not solve the ongoing oppression and occupation in the region. An immediate ceasefire and de-escalation is urgently needed to save lives.”
Very telling that people seem to confuse terrorists mass-murdering civilians with the struggle of the Palestinian people.
Yep and not wanting Palestinians to die anymore means you hate the Jews. The gaslight is spooky.
I agree with the statement that you are making, but, if I may be pedantic for just a moment, the way that your example was worded is not an example of gaslighting; it is actually an example of something called "affirming the disjunct".
I appreciate the identification of the fallacy.
That said, the use of fallacious arguments is the tool by which one gaslights. They aren't mutually exclusive.
When you use fallacies intentionally to convince someone that their basic and true point is wrong... That's a form of gaslight.
The term doesn't need to only apply to relationships. Political gaslights have become increasingly prevalent through social media.
Fair point in that they aren't mutually exclusive, but I would disagree that logical fallacies are then only means used to gaslight. Gaslighting is the action by which an abuser sews doubt in one's own judgement, and beliefs -- that can be done any number of ways.
Gaslighting isn't necessarily attempting to convince someone that what they believe is wrong, it's meant to cause someone to question reality, their own sanity, beliefs, memories, etc. This can of course be used to sway average public opinion in the direction of a desired agenda, but it's not trying to convince change in one's opinion, I would argue.
Oh, for sure. A simple example would be the official denial of a true event's occurence.
This. I'm against Hamas, and I'm also against the current government of Israel. I'm at a point of only caring for civilians of Israel and Palestine after reading up on the history of the conflict. Any one else? They're part of the problem.
Israel's right-wing government is becoming anti-democratic, and their position on settlements is antagonistic.
But Hamas is pro-genocide, happily murders Jewish children, and use their own children as meat shields.
It bothers me that people equate these two.
They aren't the same.
The israeli government also has killed a shit ton of people. There's two villains here and one huge and persistent, the other is resourceful and brutal. They aren't the same but the media is insistent on portraying Hamas as the sole villain here and people are rightful to push back on that narrative.
In fairness, the other doesn't have to be resourceful and brutal. They already have it all. They live in wealth, have the vast majority of land, and just shove these people into tighter cages then wonder why they get more violent.
It's kind of incredible how both Hamas and Likud have escalated and antagonized so much that the PLO now look like the adults in the room by comparison.
Palestinians are desperate and brutally oppressed. Isreal literally wants to genocide them. This situation gives them the excuse they've always wanted. They should take it. Wipe them all out quick instead of the slow concentration of the Gaza strip. I understand that this opinion is brutal, but there's no hope in hell for the Palestinians. The world just doesn't care enough about the poor and marginalized.
All governments engaged in self defense kill people. What's important is to what degree they try to minimize collateral damage, and Israel indisputably takes more steps to minimize civilian casualties than any other fighting force in history.
How much did you get paid to tell that blatant of a lie?
Sure, we can accept that they're not the same. At the same time, no one should support either of them.
It makes zero sense to compare the violence of the occupied with the violence of the occupiers. How many Israelis settled in Palestine because they moved from cities like New York? Do they really have equal share in the conflict when they moved from a place like America to steal land from an olive farmer whose family has been there for thousands of years.
Many people didn't choose to be born in both regions, and many civilians who don't hold those shitty ideals are dead that don't deserve to be. But if there never will be peace, and one group should go to establish peace. It certainly should be the occupiers
What's awful is you see this both with people who dislike Hamas, and with people who support the Palestinians. There's plenty of "um actually" folks I've seen on Lemmy who are putting Hamas in a sympathetic light under the guise of Palestinian liberation. And you need not look far to find people who lump all Palestinians together with those terrorists.
The rally was well intentioned, I hope, but horribly tone deaf. It would've been better to recast it as support for Palestinians and Israeli civilians, given current events, and condemned Hamas for hurting both.
I hate how often nuance is lost, and that you have to very loudly point out the nuance to make sure it's clear, but that's the world we live in. This rally failed to do that.
The rally is exactly what Hamas wants. It's the reason they use human shields.
Agreed actually. It benefits them but hurts Palestinians for the two to be conflated.
You mean like how people confuse Israelis with their government? Both are wrong.
I mean they're the same. Israel created a situation where the only way to struggle against oppression is to mass-murder civilians, so naturally civilians are being mass-murdered.
Edit: Obligatory I don't support the mass-murder of civilians.
Yeah, I mean killing Jewish civilians is the only way! Palestinians have been doing it for decades, and it hasn't ever worked, but it's the only way!
They've tried nothing else, but this is the only way!
Tell me you know nothing about Palestine without telling me you know nothing about Palestine.
You might wanna look up the Oslo peace process (which, by the way, came after the first intifada).
I mean Israel funded Hamas specifically to weaken the PLO; they've proven time and time again that they don't want peace.
The Oslo peace Accords that Palestinians walked away from and immediately started a famously cruel wave of terrorist attacks? Those Oslo Accords?
Yes, the Oslo Accords where Israel refused to even let Palestinians have a military.
Truly, shocking. I wonder why they wouldn't have been comfortable with that. It just confounds the mind.
And?
The Allies wouldn't let post-wwii Germany have a military either.
You don't let the people who tried to kill you build an army in peace time only to grow powerful enough to kill you.
The Palestinian refugees only exist because the countries that they used to belong to try to invade and destroy Israel.
See, that's what I was talking about. Israel doesn't want Palestinians to have an actual, functional state. They proved that time and time again.
What was in the Oslo peace process that Gaza doesn't have?
No no, the peace process failed. What Gaza has now (which isn't a lot considering... y'know) is a result of the Second Intifada that came after.
What they have is because of a good faith effort by Israeli's left wing parties to broker a "prove-it" peace deal in Gaza. In Gaza, they gave up every single demand that Palestine had for the West Bank as a whole as a way to prove domestically that such an outcome would lead to peace.
So tell me, what did Palestine demand in the Oslo Accords that they didn't get in the Gaza deal?
So first, I can't actually find anything about that deal. Also one of Palestine's demands was sovereignty over the entire West Bank and Gaza strip, which is obviously not what's happening now, off the top of my head.
What do you mean you can't find anything about that deal! Did you Google it, the info is easily findable.
They got it over the Gaza strip!
The 2004 deal was orchestrated by the left wing coalition I'm Israel. They said if we go down the path of the Oslo Accords, down a 2 state solution path, there will be peace. Gaza was their way to prove it.
The second infintada was an objective failure for Gaza. It's what caused their border with Egypt to be closed, and the Blockade to be put in place. It stopped millions of cross border employees from the West Bank and Gaza which further impoverished the Palestinian people. It's led to a whole generation of Israeli school children with PTSD from constant rocket attacks who will likely never support Pro-Palestinian policies. It's also marked the turning point in US polling where the majority of Americans. Additionally, because both Democrat Bill Clinton (Oslo Accords, that Palestine pulled out of) and Republican George Bush (Gaza Strip Deal) had invested significant political capital on pushing Israel to accept concessions in return for peace it also marked the beginning of an era in American politics where no Palestinian leader could be seen as trustworthy, and since then no President or party has made peace between Israel and Palestine a focus of their administrations.
Oh you're talking about the disengagement? If so I can't find any info about a deal; it was a unilateral Israeli decision, and I suggest you read about the reason it was proposed because it's... Not because they discovered a sudden love for peace and democracy.
The terrorism that followed convinced the American body-politic that Palestine couldn't be negotiated with and public support for Israel has remained aajority opinion in the US ever since.
Is that accurate in Gaza? Gaza has the 1967 borders, broad fiscal and in kind aid built in. Political autonomy, a foreign, non-Israeli border and zero settlements with existing settlers being forced at gunpoint to leave almost 20 years ago.
Gaza could easily "struggle" by building an actual democratic society, wealthy enough to fund a legitimate war against Israel. Instead it chooses to fund it's multimillionaire leaders and their foreign mansions and spend whatever it can on weapons of war and enslaving it's neighbors.
They're also subjected to a blockade that's turning the country into an open-air prison.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockade\_of\_the\_Gaza\_Strip#Limitation\_of\_basic\_goods
There's more reasons for Gazans to fight Israel, but the elephant in the room is the blockade. It's legitimately impossible to build a functional state under these conditions no matter how much democracy you have (though the lack of democracy probably isn't helping).
And now you see why. With the aid that did get through instead of improving the lives of it's citizens, Hamas choose to invest in a strike force and rockets to attack and enslaved Israelis.
They also have a border with Egypt that's closed, not by Israel but by Egypt because of their countries actions.
Hamas isn't meeting Israel on an open field or even targeting military and logistical sites (roads, bridges, airports etc....) in a guerilla campaign. Their raiding Israel for slaves, and raping and killing the captives like it's 2000 years ago.
Nothing I can imagine, Hamas could have chosen to do could justify the blockade and Israel's past actions more than what they did.
I mean they're not exactly getting money that can be invested; they're getting resources. I don't know what rockets are made of so I don't know if it's coming from foreign aid, but given that Israel bans any and all "double-use" aid I don't see that being possible.
Yeah that's just indefensible.
Metal and/or PVC pipes and concrete or cement with a variety of common construction explosives or common chemicals used as rocket fuel. A.K.A the supplies needed to build homes add baisc plumbing and build irrigation networks for desert farming.
Read through this thread, it's being defended.
AFAIK these things aren't entering through the blockade anyway.
Those are probably the communists so I guess they'll defend anything.
Not right now, but they were largely being let in after inspection before. A few years ago Hamas started policing internal terrorists that would independently launch rockets at Israel. In exchange Israel loosened the rules to allow more goods in quicker through the blockade. At the time it was seen as a sign that maybe Moderates had gained power in Hamas and peace could be possible.