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How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

reuters.com

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Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#241

Post by aguaviva »

tptacek wrote: post #235
dtornabene wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In no way does Hezbollah "occupy" Lebanon. It is drawn entirely from Lebanese society. Truly a bizarre thing to keep repeating so stridently! Its also absurd to deny the literal origins of the group, as a militia that was attempting to defend southern Lebanon from an actual occupation? This isn't hidden, there are shelves of books in english on the origins of Hezbollah? The first sentence of the second paragraph of t…

Hey! I'm glad to see you. Hezbollah was a Khomeinist response to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. If you want to argue that Israel bears some responsibility for the destabilization of Lebanon, I won't argue. But it was trained and guided by the IRGC from its inception; the modern incarnation of Hezbollah is directed by the IRGC Quds Force. If you want to argue that the two organizations (QF and Hezbollah) are separab…

Hezbollah was a Khomeinist response to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

This "response" being armed resistance to that invasion, specifically. Eventually not only forcing the latter's withdrawal, but handing it a decisive strategic defeat (from which it is still licking its wounds). As a neat little side bonus, the US was forced to leave with its tail between its legs as well.

Which makes it not only a you-know-what movement - but (by the end of that conflict at least) a very successful one at that.

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#242

Post by hmcq6 »

edanm wrote: post #238
hmcq6 wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Occupation is not tautological to colonization but occupation can be the first step to colonization. > You said that a two state solution (which Palestinians so far have never agreed to) is just a continuation of colonization. It is a continuation of the colonization. It is also something the Palestinians *have* agreed to, that's what the Oslo Accords are. > On September 13, 1993, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin…

> I'm fine with a 2 state solution if that's what the Palestinans want. My issue is that Israel is unlikely to follow the rules given their current behavior so why not just make it 1 state with equal rights? Is that really so scary? Equal rights? YES! I don't know how else to say this. Giving equal rights which would effectively double the voting base with people who fundamentally oppose many things you think are imp…

> YES! I don't know how else to say this. Giving equal rights which would effectively double the voting base with people who fundamentally oppose many things you think are important is terrifying. Again, if you were LGBTQ in Israel, and I told you we're bringing in 100% more voters who mostly think homosexuality is a sin and could now vote to make it illegal, wouldn't you think it's a bad idea?

Eww don't pinkwash genocide. Those beepers didn't discriminate between LGBTQ+ targets and neither did the mass starvation campaign (https://www.btselem.org/publications/202404_manufacturing_fa...).

It's wild to imply Israelis are great to the gay community. It's clear Israel is fine with discrimination.

> Forty-eight percent of Israeli Jews said they agreed with the statement that Arabs should be expelled or transferred from Israel, where they make up 19 percent of the population of 8.4 million.

> In addition, about 8 in 10 Arabs complained of heavy discrimination in Israeli society against Muslims, the largest religious minority, while 79 percent of Jews questioned said Jewish citizens deserved preferential treatment.

https://www.reuters.com/article/world/about-half-of-israeli-...

And don't forget that I cited to you how Israel did eugenics on the Ethiopian Jewish community until at least 2013.

> And that's the best case scenario. The worst case scenario is that the the new state acts like every other state that has a Jewish minority, and eventually decides to kill the Jews. Made even more likely given the years of animosity between the two peoples.

That is just mass hysteria. There are many diaspora Jews who feel safe where they currently live and acting like all Jews think Israel is the only safe place for them is actual antisemitism. Jews are not a monolith.

> You are again and again asking if it's really so bad to do something that 99% of people, including almost all peace activists, say will end in the destruction of the Jews in Israel

A ceasefire? I just told you hours ago that the first thing I really care about is a ceasefire.

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#243

Post by aguaviva »

tptacek wrote: post #237
dtornabene wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you going to respond to my point about the "occupy" "fact" or...not? Plenty of resistance groups are trained by other state (and non-state) powers who have an interest in their success? Vietnam comes to mind! I don't know, maybe you would, but I'd be pretty shocked if you described the North Vietnamese army as "occupying" ....North Vietnam. Similar dynamics apply across pretty much any ideological axis you could…

To the extent that it is the dominant military power in Lebanon and it is directed by a foreign power, while enjoying something like 8% public support outside the Shia minority in Lebanon, I do feel comfortable referring to it as an occupying power. The Syria thing is not a small deal. I feel like if I have a stake in any part of these cursed threads, it's the notion that just because you oppose Israel --- a deeply p…

To the extent that it is the dominant military power in Lebanon and it is directed by a foreign power, while enjoying something like 8% public support outside the Shia minority in Lebanon, I do feel comfortable referring to it as an occupying power.

Except that extent is tempered greatly by Hezbollah's broader social and political significance (providing government services in some areas, and being a leading party in the previous ruling coalition). Also, if we go by its standing in the polls, its support clocks in at 18.56 percent, and its broader coalition block came in with an additional 20 percent (which has quite a different ring from the "8 percent outside of the Shia majority" figure you were touting).

Point being - it's not simply a proxy of Iran, and (since the definition of a "military occupier", going by Wikipedia, explicitly requires a foreign power as a referent) that's where the assertion "Hezbollah occupies Lebanon" starts to lose structural coherence.

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#244

Post by edanm »

ta20240528 wrote: post #240
edanm wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm fine with a 2 state solution if that's what the Palestinans want. My issue is that Israel is unlikely to follow the rules given their current behavior so why not just make it 1 state with equal rights? Is that really so scary? Equal rights? YES! I don't know how else to say this. Giving equal rights which would effectively double the voting base with people who fundamentally oppose many things you think are imp…

> basically a two-state solution A genuine second state? One with its own defence force, choice of allies, no blockades, selection of weapons (all the way up the periodic table), etc. I.e. one with the same rights as Israel's citizens grant themselves, or a crippled bantustan? Because equal is equal.

Yes, of course I think they should have their own state like any other state. That's what a two state solution means.

I think there will need to be some security guarantees to prevent it from turning out similarly to Gaza. I have no idea what that should look like, from either side's perspective - but that's part of the negotiations for actually making the two states.

And I'm sure there will have to be similar security guarantees from the Israeli side, so Israel doesn't just decide after two weeks to invade because of a random terror attack.

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#245

Post by edanm »

hmcq6 wrote: post #242
edanm wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm fine with a 2 state solution if that's what the Palestinans want. My issue is that Israel is unlikely to follow the rules given their current behavior so why not just make it 1 state with equal rights? Is that really so scary? Equal rights? YES! I don't know how else to say this. Giving equal rights which would effectively double the voting base with people who fundamentally oppose many things you think are imp…

> YES! I don't know how else to say this. Giving equal rights which would effectively double the voting base with people who fundamentally oppose many things you think are important is terrifying. Again, if you were LGBTQ in Israel, and I told you we're bringing in 100% more voters who mostly think homosexuality is a sin and could now vote to make it illegal, wouldn't you think it's a bad idea? Eww don't pinkwash gen…

> Eww don't pinkwash genocide.

You're just not responding to anything I actually said or anything I actually believe.

You asked why not give Palestinians "equal rights", meaning make them citizens of Israel with voting rights. I answered with why I think this would effectively roll back many liberal values of Israel, including LGBT rights, not to mention be an enormous risk for Jewish Israelis.

That has nothing to do with pinkwashing anything, I didn't say anything about the war (or what you call "the genocide"). You just haven't responded to my point, at all.

> It's wild to imply Israelis are great to the gay community.

The areas under full Israeli control are great for the gay community. Not perfect, and some areas of Israel are better than others, but far better than many countries.

It seems like in your zeal to only say bad things about Israel you refuse to actually see reality as it is.

> And don't forget that I cited to you how Israel did eugenics on the Ethiopian Jewish community until at least 2013.

I didn't forget, but I don't know anything about this topic at all and didn't have time to look into it. I don't comment on things I know nothing about, no matter what "side" it's on.

> That is just mass hysteria. There are many diaspora Jews who feel safe where they currently live and acting like all Jews think Israel is the only safe place for them is actual antisemitism. Jews are not a monolith.

Ok I was speaking with some hyperbole, but historically, except for the last 80 years, Jews have been discriminated against, killed or kicked out of most countries of which they are minorities.

Anyway, I just don't understand what is your actual view about the world, other than "Israel bad".

What do you think would happen if 7 million Palestinians become citizens of Israel and are granted the vote? What does that state look like in twenty years? That's what you're advocating, I want to understand what you think would happen.

> A ceasefire? I just told you hours ago that the first thing I really care about is a ceasefire.

Look, I'm in favor of a ceasefire. You are too.

I'm in favor of arriving at a peaceful solution that both sides are OK with. You are too.

The main thing I was pushing back on in my comment, was the idea of a one-state solution being anything other than ridiculous, whether in the guise of a new state, or by just "giving Palestinians equal rights" in Israel as it exists.

If you want to push for peace - it's worth advocating for things that a) have some chance of happening, and b) would not lead immediately to a situation that is 100x worse for everyone involved. That's why I advocate a two-state solution, as does almost anyone else seriously involved in pushing for peace.

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#246

Post by afiori »

edanm wrote: post #180
afiori wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> withdrew all settlements and military presence from Gaza, supposedly giving them what they wanted - no more settlements. No settlements != No occupation

OK. Can we agree that withdrawing all settlements and the military means less occupation than before? I think the basic logic of "we're doing a move that gives them, at least directionaly, what they say they want, and they use it to wage even more war" is the guiding logic here, whether you call it occupation or not.

> Can we agree that withdrawing all settlements and the military means less occupation than before?

Yes.

> "we're doing a move that gives them, at least directionaly, what they say they want, and they use it to wage even more war"

I think that the part where snipers spent year gloating about how many kids they shot in the head and knees might have worked against that.

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#247

Post by tim333 »

runarberg wrote: post #229
tptacek wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Syrian state ran out of ordinary munitions during the civil war, but so desired to ethnically cleanse Sunni Palestinian refugee camps that they improvised by packing metal oil drums with high explosives, nails, scrap, and bearings, and then dropping them from helicopters onto the camps. There's video footage. Soldiers in the helicopters have to light fuses on them by hand, like 1920s silent film villains. They ad…

If you can find a genocide in post WW2 history that didn’t result in the failure of the perpetrators state, that only refutes the absolute strongest version of my claim. However that doesn’t refute my general claim that Genocidal states do in fact tend to dissolve over the following decades, and that history has examples of apartheid states—even heavily armed ones—dissolving into a single state democracy of all its p…

Assuming it is genocidal. You classic genocide is rounding up people and killing them all, eg the Nazis on the jews. Israel's approach has been to let the Gazans get on with things with their population growing from 1.1m in 2000 to 2.04m in 2024 then being attacked and and killing 0.04m fighting back to get their hostages. If they are doing a genocide I'm not sure they are doing it right.

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#248

Post by [deleted] »

edanm wrote: post #238
hmcq6 wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Occupation is not tautological to colonization but occupation can be the first step to colonization. > You said that a two state solution (which Palestinians so far have never agreed to) is just a continuation of colonization. It is a continuation of the colonization. It is also something the Palestinians *have* agreed to, that's what the Oslo Accords are. > On September 13, 1993, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin…

> I'm fine with a 2 state solution if that's what the Palestinans want. My issue is that Israel is unlikely to follow the rules given their current behavior so why not just make it 1 state with equal rights? Is that really so scary? Equal rights? YES! I don't know how else to say this. Giving equal rights which would effectively double the voting base with people who fundamentally oppose many things you think are imp…

[deleted]

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#249

Post by aguaviva »

tim333 wrote: post #247
runarberg wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can find a genocide in post WW2 history that didn’t result in the failure of the perpetrators state, that only refutes the absolute strongest version of my claim. However that doesn’t refute my general claim that Genocidal states do in fact tend to dissolve over the following decades, and that history has examples of apartheid states—even heavily armed ones—dissolving into a single state democracy of all its p…

Assuming it is genocidal. You classic genocide is rounding up people and killing them all, eg the Nazis on the jews. Israel's approach has been to let the Gazans get on with things with their population growing from 1.1m in 2000 to 2.04m in 2024 then being attacked and and killing 0.04m fighting back to get their hostages. If they are doing a genocide I'm not sure they are doing it right.

However if the goal is to create conditions favorable to what they coldly refer to as "voluntary population transfer", i.e. ethnic cleansing very much in the classical definition -- they they're doing a masterful job indeed:

https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-in-talks-with-congo-and...

Re: How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

#250

Post by ASalazarMX »

xpl wrote: post #137
gamblor956 wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there is a declared state of war between two countries, than someone else doing what Israel did to Hezbollah would be considered a valid act of war. The problem is that Israel and Hezbollah are currently in a state of informal hostilities but are not in a state of declared war. That distinction matters at the international level. In the case of Gaza, Israel and Hamas were in a truce, until Hamas unilaterally broke…

Nations do not declare wars anymore, because wars are illegal since WW2. Quoting Wikipedia: > Since 1945, developments in international law such as the United Nations Charter, which prohibits both the threat and the use of force in international conflicts, have made declarations of war largely obsolete in international relations So since then, wars are now called "counter-terrorist operations", "peace enforcement ope…

The UN is more of a forum for continued international dialogue despite international political status (and for supporting the agendas of the world super powers), and less of a world government. Its resolutions are more flexible than a Cirque du Soleil performer, and yet I think the world is a bit better with its existence.
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