UN members walk out en-masse in protest against Netanyahu address

wurzelgummidge@lemmy.world to World News@lemmy.world – 862 points – UN members walk out en-masse in protest against Netanyahu address
middleeasteye.net

Diplomats walk out on Israeli prime minister’s speech at UN to protest against devastating war on Gaza and latest attacks on Lebanon

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He is such a fucking scumbag. Fuck him and fuck the rest of Israel.

Fuck the USA, and every country too chicken shit to oppose a criminally corrupt sociopath committing war crimes to delay his own imminent corruption trial and imprisonment.

Fuck the USA government, you mean. I only live here, and all I get to do is choose between the lesser of two evils every 4 years. What a nightmare.

If you think you only get a choice once every four years, that's part of the problem. There's elections every single year, many of which you have more choice and more power over.

Maybe if people showed up to vote more than once every four years we'd actually see some effective change.

The US election system is set up for the rich and powerful to stay in charge. It's ridiculous that there's effectively only two parties, and it's ridiculous that a single person, the president, holds so much power. No accountability. Their system needs an entire overhaul, IMO:

Compulsory voting Ease of access for voting Preferential voting Lower bar for running, meaning every citizen has the opportunity to run

The president sure gets the credit for a lot of things (the president signed this into law, the president enacted this policy) but in reality Congress makes most of that a reality.

There is also accountability... but only if the congress acts on it. Which is where that whole "vote more than once every four years" thing comes in. Congress has power... we just have not elected people who use that power responsibly.

We've also managed to wedge ourselves into a situation where Congress can't handle anything controversial. The closest we came in recent years was the (relatively timid) ACA, and that barely passed after an unpopular war and the 2008 economic crash.

The US election system is set up for the rich and powerful to stay in charge. It’s ridiculous that there’s effectively only two parties, and it’s ridiculous that a single person, the president, holds so much power. No accountability. Their system needs an entire overhaul, IMO:

so then go and push/vote for voting reform, federally and more importantly at a state level, shit like IRV is very much within reach.

I always hear people bitching about the "no choice" of voting, but they never seem to be around during the primaries, when they could make a difference.

Elections that can affect things on a national level are still only once every two years. I vote in every election but going off on people who vote for but doing it often enough is just stupid.

Yes, but those state and local elections have an effect both on how your state and local area does... as well as how those national elections are held. They are far more important than you give them credit for.

Don't downplay them just because they don't get national coverage, especially when they're going to have significantly more impact on your daily life.

Well yeah, obviously. If you blamed the entire population for its governments actions then every human alive is guilty.

Fuck the US government, and everyone who supports their crimes.

All candidates steer clear away from condemning Israel because they know they’ll lose votes if they do. Sounds like this one is on the people.

wait ok, i'm confused why do we hate the US government? Is it because it's doing global geopolitics shit? Like what's the motive for caring about this, as opposed to like, stopping world hunger.

Like the motive for the latter is obvious, but i don't really see the motive for the former. It just seems like yelling at a vast brick wall for no reason.

As an American I can assure you that there's no shortage of reasons to hate our government. Don't sweat it, just pile on all the reasons you want.

i mean yeah but like, what the fuck is the point? I hate a lot of things for stupid reasons, i feel like as far as the government goes, that's something that i have a pretty direct involvement with that i can pretty directly influence change with. What's the point being mad about it when i could be doing something about it instead?

I hate a lot of things for stupid reasons

I had to check to see if I was about to reply to myself.

based. You and me my friend, we think alike, which is probably not great, but hey the law of RNG strikes again!

I can tell you why I’m mad.

Because I want these atrocities to stop. And you know what I’m not given? That option. Trump has been a scourge to Palestinians and the Middle East as a whole, but Kamala Harris is spewing the same violent, bullshit rhetoric as the very man who was walked out on, that this thread is about.

Where is my option to vote for the end of this suffering?

And that’s just the topic of today. I could go on and on about how the the constitution allows for slavery as we speak, and it’s the reason we have so many prisoners per capita. Or how Hitler idolized America for its genocide of the native Americans and chattel slavery. Or how women were only allowed to have bank accounts in the last 50 years. Or the many, many governments we have overthrown or couped, only to install disgusting violent monsters who commit atrocity after atrocity. Or how we created ISIS and Al Quada. I could go on forever.

There are plenty of reasons to hate the US Government.

why do we hate the us government

uhhhh where do you wanna start. I mean pick a year between 1776 and now. Pick a month, probably.

Looking at the protests against him in Israel I think many if not most Israelis don't want this campaign of violence. For many years I've felt sorry for all the civilians in that area, because they are trying to live their lives and extremist assholes on all sides keep killing them.

The protests aren't against his policy of genocide in Palestine.

They are against his government in general and started before his campaign of terror and I have seen no poll that would suggest sudden approval. So we can safely assume the protesters include that in their disapproval of him and his government of fascist cunts.

The protests happened after but they don't seem to advocate a change in that campaign of terror, just different people carrying it out. The far right dominates Israeli politics and it's all about which flavor of far right is preferred.

There were protests even before October, because a large portion of Israelis hates that government.

But, again, not for the treatment of Palestinians.

What is your point? That all Israelis fully support the wholesale slaughter the IDF is committing? It seems so weird and pointless to continue to argue about this.

I responded to someone claiming that there have been protests against this campaign of violence. It's useful to know where everybody stands to know who would be willing to move toward peace.

including scores of women and children

This always assumes that there are no civilian men. I get that men are the ones usually conscripted, but... that's always seemed weird to me.

It makes for a more defensible argument. No sane person is going to argue that a 4 year old child is an enemy combatant. But a 20 year old male? It's easy to argue they could have been an enemy combatant and so maybe the numbers are inflated. Saying 1000 people can be interpreted as 999 enemies and only 1 civilian casualty. Saying 1000 women and children is usually interpreted as 1000 innocent lives lost.

Yeah, that's true, but super fucked that women get the innocence of children and men are assumed to be not innocent in any situation.

Life is harsh when you're a guy.

But a 20 year old male? It’s easy to argue they could have been an enemy combatan

The age old problem of "excess males" solved by declaring open season on anyone with facial hair.

Call to emotion, nothing else. Women and children "sounds" worse than "people" dying.

I mean, a score is 20. I think that means they've killed two thousand scores of people. "Scores of women and children" doesn't really do that justice.

If he is still able to speak and be heard, then they arent loud enough. Every single person in that room needs to be screaming to demand his immediate arrest.

Good point, them leaving says I don’t want to be involved not that I want to stop the injustice.

It's the only way they can express their revulsion at Israel, and the US who constantly block anything else they might try

This might matter in ten years if Netanyahu hangs.

why isn't he arrested already? I wish I had similar privileges, where I could break laws (thst don't violate human rights ofc.), make a shitload of money and travel the world freely.

Now if they would actually take action.

Don't worry, they'll pass another strongly worded resolution.

Which the USA will find a way to veto or Israel will continue to ignore it.

The latter. The US only has a veto in the Security Council. Though even that isn't entirely unconditional. Recently it abstained on a vote about a cease fire resolution, leading to much entitled complaining from Israel.

We've always been good at walking away, closing our ears, turning a blind eye…

Cool, but did you stop giving money and weapons yet? No? Then your statement is as effective as "thoughts and prayers."

The UN definitely has its problems but I'm not going to blame UN global representatives for the US paving the unilateral support for the genocidal terrorist nation state of Israel.

The UN does not supply arms to Israel. The UN has passed many resolutions condemning Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians, going back decades. They have literally already done everything the UN can do, many times over. They weren’t a governing body with binding powers over where the US sends arms, or who France chooses to support.

So I’d have to say that your comment is less effective than their walkout, because it isn’t even properly informed.

Bro do you even know what the UN is?

Thoughts and prayers for the world?

The primary purpose of the United Nations (UN) is to maintain international peace and security. It aims to take effective collective measures to prevent and remove threats to peace, suppress acts of aggression, and settle international disputes peacefully, in accordance with principles of justice and international law.

brother AI is a solution to "solve all of your business problems with your business and elevate your business to a level above all other businesses" are you unironically reading marketing speak this straight?

The veto power in the UN makes it not functional. When China, Russia, France, The United Kingdom, or the United States veto something it's done, without debate or "peaceful resolution."

Veto power in the UN.

US using it's veto power 34 times against ending the war in Gaza.

Russia using it's veto power against using war in Ukraine.

When the big kids in the playground can do everything they want there is no space for debate or peaceful resolution, everyone else just shows up.

People are indoctrinated to believe that because votes are involved the process is somehow magically subject to meaningful reform and input from the masses.

A process where people were meaningfully enfranchised wouldn't need to rely on something so abstract as votes. Voting is a process by which people are convinced to trade in their actual power in exchange for a piece of paper.

Thanks for this, that's a fantastic way to phrase it.

Thanks, I don't think it's worded quite right though, because "in exchange for" implies the vote itself does something. The reality is that people are convinced to give away their power because they believe in the piece of paper.

The oiece of paper itself is almost worthless.

I only say that because I'm sure someone will want to split hairs over it.