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Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

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Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#141

Post by Protostome »

foota wrote: post #114
Protostome wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jews didn't invade Israel, that's the only difference. Israel accepted the 1947 partition of the land, while the arabs rejected it. That led to a war, in which the arabs lost. They went all in and lost. One can only imagine what would have happened to the jews in Israel if they would have won.

Why should they have accepted it? It was their territory, was it not?

No it wasn't.

The territory was under the British control and before that was under Ottoman rule for several hundreds of years.

Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#142

Post by joelbluminator »

clavicat wrote: post #88
voz_ wrote: post #50

Israel is a wonderful country. Scientifically advanced, progressively minded, a bastion of secularism, LGBT rights, and western ideals. The world is, sadly, obsessed with them. I'd love a real explanation why they get so much undue attention given how they behave towards their enemies. Israel drops leaflets before bombing so civilians can clear out. When Hamas stores weapons in schools and Hospitals, Israel exercises…

Notice how your defenses of Israel are identical to the colonial regimes of old. We’re progressive and secular and advanced and humane, not like those terrorist savages who attack us for no reason. The rhetoric is indistinguishable from that of the French justifying their hold on Algeria, or the Japanese over Korea, or the white settler regimes of Africa, or China over the Uighers. If you need it spelt out for you, i…

It's not exactly like the French and Algeria - Israelis don't really have anywhere to "go back to" as opposed to the French.

Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#143

Post by candiodari »

rafi25 wrote: post #138
mclightning wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying Israelites that relocated to Israel today are ethnogenetically closer to the region than the Arabs that lived there? I would suspect most of the Israelites that moved there are actually western/european descent, whereas I would not be surprised if a lot of the Arabs there had actual ancient Jewish genes. All that aside, are we really discussing who can claim ownership to a land based on ancient history…

Actually, most Israelies came from Arab countries. The rest are from Asia (Russia) and east Europe. Less than 5% are from Western countries.

And most Palestinians are recent (2-3 generations at most) immigrants into Palestine. They also mostly come from Arab countries.

Ethnically there is no real difference, to the point that a disguised Jew or Muslim, provided they know the other language well, can blend in without any problem, even for longer periods. Which is a big problem for catching terrorists.

And it's even the case that when it comes to habits, even religious habits, there's a lot shared between Jews and Muslims that does not actually date back to ancient Judaism or come from Islam, but are for example not-that-old Iraki or Yemeni customs.

Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#144

Post by joelbluminator »

foota wrote: post #114
Protostome wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jews didn't invade Israel, that's the only difference. Israel accepted the 1947 partition of the land, while the arabs rejected it. That led to a war, in which the arabs lost. They went all in and lost. One can only imagine what would have happened to the jews in Israel if they would have won.

Why should they have accepted it? It was their territory, was it not?

They should have accepted it to spare 70 years of suffering on both sides, that's why mainly. Unless they had a really good feeling they were going to win it was sheer stupidity.

Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#145

Post by joelbluminator »

DeWilde wrote: post #66
voz_ wrote: post #50

Israel is a wonderful country. Scientifically advanced, progressively minded, a bastion of secularism, LGBT rights, and western ideals. The world is, sadly, obsessed with them. I'd love a real explanation why they get so much undue attention given how they behave towards their enemies. Israel drops leaflets before bombing so civilians can clear out. When Hamas stores weapons in schools and Hospitals, Israel exercises…

That is all true, of all the countries in the ME Israel is probably one of the few that I would live in. However, most of the criticism, at least the one that isn't "kill the Jews" type, comes from Israel's occupation of the West Bank and the apartheid-like conditions that are there. There you can't talk about Hamas and the rockets killing children because there are none as Israel is in full control of the area.

I oppose the settlements completely but the military hold on the West Bank isn't evil or irrational. We need to be honest - the chances of the PLO to survive without being overrun by Hamas are very slim without Israeli presence and assistance. Having another Hamas state in the West Bank is a very very bad development that Israel wants to avoid. And yes, the settlers are taking advantage of this dynamic to keep trying to realize their crazy dream - a dream most Israelis have zero empathy for.

Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#146

Post by candiodari »

Protostome wrote: post #141
foota wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should they have accepted it? It was their territory, was it not?

No it wasn't. The territory was under the British control and before that was under Ottoman rule for several hundreds of years.

Yes but Ottoman rule should be understood to span many ethnic and religious groups. There was no "Ottoman people", the way you have, say, Germans. The Jews were there under Ottoman rule, for example (in fact the Ottoman sultan gave them independence in trade for a lot of money). So while there are long-time-there Palestinian bedouins, there are also Jewish bedouins, and even smaller groups like Druze or even Catholics. There were many semi-states under the Ottoman empire that have since warred and lost or gained territory. The British attempted to keep Ottoman governmental structures largely in place, and they failed badly.

Turkey was conquered by the Turks, from Greeks, Armenians, and various smaller groups. Big parts of it not that long ago (~1 century). Somalia was conquered from Ethiopia. Pakistan from India. Bangladesh from Pakistan. Hell, Northern Iraq was conquered from the Kurds ... by Arab Nazi's. Seriously. History can be funny at times.

Most of these conquests are younger than Israel is. Why don't we see people follow Indian demands for re-annexation (and religious suppression) of Pakistan? Pakistan demands the same of Bangladesh (and yes religious suppression. "There are no sects in Islam" is part of Islamic doctrine. There are no splits in Sunni Islam, but somehow Pakistan and Bangladesh don't belong to the same Sunni Islam ... and are hundreds of millions of believers each).

Ethiopia wants to re-annex Somalia (and restore religions to where they were 100 years ago), and so on. Hell, there exist Indian extremists that would like to see Indonesia annexed too. Oh, and unlike the Israel-Palestine conflict, India and Pakistan are threatening to nuke each other. And China is now threatening them too, also with nukes, so there's plenty of new trouble brewing in that neighbourhood. And we haven't even mentioned China ...

Is anyone seriously suggesting undoing the conquests? For one thing that would be extremely impractical and a massive operation, even if they would cooperate (and I guarantee there'll be war in every case).

Why is this conflict so important? Compared to the India-Pakistan issue, it doesn't affect very many people (Israel and Palestine, even together, are at best the population of a medium US city, India-Pakistan-Bangladesh is 4-5 times the size of the entire US)

But I think I do see some factors. Israel-Palestine is so very, very small that it is actually conceivable that the west actually does something about it. India-Pakistan? We have zero chance to play a meaningful role there. Also the Israeli consider themselves part of the West, so they actually want the approval of the rest of the West.

Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#147

Post by joelbluminator »

clavicat wrote: post #93
b112 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But unlike every other nation on Earth, they took over land belonging to others! In case people don't notice, that's extreme sarcasm. Every nation on Earth has taken over others, just look at the native peoples of every country in North and South America, of Nordic Countries, Australia. Look at how Europe's borders were re-written 1000 times. Africa. The Middle East. If the beef is (and it seems to be for some) that…

And yet, if another country invaded your country and tried to take your land, you’d think it an injustice, no? Or would you be telling yourself that it’s no big deal, after all, our ancestors took this land from some forgotten people as well?

Do you see it as a grave injustice when Syrian or other Muslim refugees settle Europe? I mean they do sway the demography quite a bit in certain places.

Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#148

Post by joelbluminator »

excuseme wrote: post #80
voz_ wrote: post #50

Israel is a wonderful country. Scientifically advanced, progressively minded, a bastion of secularism, LGBT rights, and western ideals. The world is, sadly, obsessed with them. I'd love a real explanation why they get so much undue attention given how they behave towards their enemies. Israel drops leaflets before bombing so civilians can clear out. When Hamas stores weapons in schools and Hospitals, Israel exercises…

Have you ever asked yourself how Israel started to exist in the first place? Do you know how many Palestinians were killed and how many others become refugees until this day (since 1948) living in refugee camps in the West bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria? Rockets? Do you know that the Palestinians have been fighting since 1948 and for decades their only weapon was rocks? yes rocks. Did you ask yourself, why are the P…

Not that many Palestinian were killed in the forming of Israel, at least compared to many other civil wars we can compare to. The Yeshuv lost 1% of it's population during the war btw so it wasn't one sided at all. Many Palestinians simply fled so the potential for violence wasn't that high.

Re: Google Employees Oppose Company's Cooperation with Israel

#150

Post by joelbluminator »

bobbybabylon wrote: post #40
_3u10 wrote: post #6

It’s hard to think of a country in the Middle East with more rights and freedoms or a better human rights record. I know I’ll get a lot of downvotes for saying that, but what I’d like is an objective measure on which another country in the area beats Israel

Saying that your country has the best human rights record in the Middle East is like saying your country is the richest in Africa. Just because it is true doesn't mean it is good.

Where do you live? I just wonder real hard how the Danes/Canadians/Americans would have fared if they were in Israel's shoes. Considering history I'd say no that great. It's much easier to virtue signal from your comfy neighborhood in Western country X though, where your biggest enemies are Republicans.
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