25 Comments
Oct 10, 2023Liked by Gerald Posner

Thank you for this and for your strong concluding statement for those cheering on barbarism to unfollow you.

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Oct 10, 2023Liked by Gerald Posner

Saw videos of pro-terrorists doing the same in Florida. In a few weeks or months, when the hostilities subside and the recriminations begin, progressives will be telling us that we did not see pro-Hamas people cheering the massacre and handing out sweets and to claim that we did is racist and xenophobic.

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It is reasonable to discuss ways in which mistakes have been made in the past, and how to create a home land for Palestinians and improve their lives. However, when they elect governments that focus on the elimination of others rather than on governing and improving the lives of their people, they refuse to accept any compromise or two state solution, and they engage in constant religious and ethnic violence, it’s hard not to say that they bear some responsibility for their situation. Regardless, it is inconceivable to me that someone can equate “they aren’t giving us the land we want” with mass, indiscriminate slaughter of civilians, including small children, reveling in that slaughter, and having a stated goal of killing an entire country of people. There is no universe in which the first justifies the second. I am sickened that so many people somehow think this is ok, and I worry about where the world is headed

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While I agree with you, I also think you have to look at the glimmers and the fightbacks.

For example, Rachel Reeves who is very powerful in the Labour party, (Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer) stood up on Monday and told people basically if they could not condemn Hamas wholeheartedly, they had no place in the Labour party and they needed to get out. The Labour Party stands with Israel. Reeves runs the Labour Friends of Israel. It is v much a sea change from a few years ago when Corbyn ran the Labour party. Corbyn of course was thrown out as he refused to accept the findings of the commission into anti-Semitism within the Labour party.

Suella Braverman the current Home Secretary has urged British police to treat pro Palestinian chants as a hate crime (Hamas is a proscribed terrorist group in the UK which means Hamas means anyone can be prosecuted for supporting it, belonging to it, wearing clothing or carrying articles in public that raise “reasonable suspicion” they are a member of it, or publishing an image on an article such as a flag or logo in the same circumstances.) She wants to the police to go further and to consider if certain chants are in fact violent expressions of hate. She has told police to consider the context and act accordingly. The prime minister Rishi Sunak has also said that the police have been given clear guidance to clamp down on anyone supporting Hamas. The foreign secretary James Cleverly told the BBC on air that they needed to reconsider not using the word 'terrorist' in relation to Hamas.

I understand from the news that Australia considers any further demonstrations to be unauthorised.

My only hope is that the scales will continue to fall from people's eyes and they will see Hamas for what they are -- terrorists who ill-serve the people they proport to defend. I pray that the Palestinian people get far better leaders in the future -- ones who actually care about their welfare instead of revenge and hatred because then and only then will true peace be achieved. And the world, under the guise of the UN did declare in 1947 that a 2 state partition was the best way forward, and in 1949 admitted Israel as a full member. Israel has a right and a duty to defend itself. To say otherwise is to be an apologist and an appeaser for and of terror.

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author

Very well said, thank you for taking the time for the good background and spot on commentary

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Also if you wish to know more about what it means when the UK says that Hamas is a proscribed terrorist organization -- this is a ready reckoner including the penalties for being a supporter of such an organization in the UK.

https://open.substack.com/pub/rozenberg/p/police-must-stop-terror-supporters?r=8gufl&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

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Oct 11, 2023Liked by Gerald Posner

Thanks for being a voice of reason in these crazy times.

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This is why I don't subscribe to the Magic Dirt Theory of Immigration.

Read this woman's opinion on the atrocities. I refer to Najma Sharif.

https://www.thefp.com/p/this-is-what-decolonization-looks

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Oct 10, 2023Liked by Gerald Posner

Thank you for this text. I’ve been watching for years with sadness what’s going on in Gaza and Israel (where I have friends), and how terrorists on both sides have been sowing fear, hatred and death for the sake of what they deem important to them, with the rest of us mostly ignoring it unless something like the present mass murder by Hamas occurs. There is no excuse to any of it. That’s a shame to see how greed, hatred and delusion govern this planet in general, wherever you look... Hatred always brings more hatred... But the times they are a changing (though slowly)!

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Oct 10, 2023Liked by Gerald Posner

As distressing as that incident in Sydney was, thank you for bringing it to my attention.

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Hatred is the poison of the world.

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Thank you so much for this article, and for the last paragraph in particular. Powerful words that should resonate with each and every one of us.

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Oct 11, 2023Liked by Gerald Posner

I just happened to come across your Substack - words matter to me, your words mattered to me and you’re now one of my people.

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author

thank you - welcome

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Oct 11, 2023Liked by Gerald Posner

I hope the Israelis are smart enough to avoid a ground war in Gaza. Cut their food, water, electricity, communications and imports of everything else. Tell the people of Gaza that that remains until they get all hostages back safely along with the leadership of Hamas. Then sit and wait.

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For your information, the french government has forbidden all of these types of marches until then. They fear violence & more tensions in our country because of the domestic Islamic terrorism issues we’ve been experiencing here.

Thank you for your work ;-)

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An ultimatum to agree with you or unsubscribe?

Bad idea for a writer.

I’ll choose the latter.

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Do you hold Israel AT ALL responsible? Not "totally"? But "at all"?

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Israel treats Hamas as if they are dangerous criminals who are out to kill Israelis and who need to be kept out of Israel to keep people safe. I kinda feel like they just proved Israel’s point.

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Of course Israel has responsibility. Gaza really is an open air prison. With prison rules I’m sure. Even in the US, prisons are animal factories. You can’t expect anything to emerge from that situation but more efficient criminals and killers. But after Hamas did what they did, prison rules apply. In prison you have to to physically fight for the right to own anything. Even your own body. Israelis will now do what must be done. If you do nothing. If you do not hunt down and put an end to these people then they will be back to rape and kill when you are not looking. Hamas knew the rules. They made the choice. You don’t get to play the (human) race card after that.

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"I am extremely sorry for all those who die, as in all wars.

I am sorry even for the deaths of individual Israeli soldiers, and more so for all the innocents who died and are now dying.

But I will not condemn Hamas.

For this I do not even need to delve into the backstory of Hamas’ initial sponsoring by Israel to split Fatah. They have grown well past that.

I do not condemn Hamas because the resistance of the Palestinian people is a reflex response to their slow genocide.

Yes, it is an inchoate and violent response. Of course, I wish it did not have innocent victims.

The people I do condemn are the political class internationally who, with one voice, put out statements supporting “Israel’s right to self-defence.” A right they grant to the oppressor but deny to the oppressed.

Those are the people who need to be condemned."

- Craig Murray

https://open.substack.com/pub/savageminds/p/now-we-have-your-attention?r=1knk1l&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

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