The pro-Israel information war • Hacker News Board

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#371

Post by samatman » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:10 PM UTC

sertbdfgbnfgsd wrote: post #27

jdross wrote: post #7

Pro-Palestinian views outrank Pro-Israeli online by around 36 to 1 on TikTok and 8 to 1 on other online platforms. https://twitter.com/antgoldbloom/status/1721561226151612602 If anything the skew within the platforms is to prioritize pro-palestinian views https://twitter.com/committeeonccp/status/173279243496103143... It also seems like these platforms create (rather than support) anti-Israeli views: https://twitter.…

> Pro-Palestinian views outrank Pro-Israeli online by around 36 to 1 on TikTok and 8 to 1 on other online platforms. > If anything the skew within the platforms is to prioritize pro-palestinian views. That platforms prioritize one over the other is just one possible explanation. An alternative explanation is that more people already have those views. And it's dishonest to present one explanation and omit the other. N…

A platform with a proprietary algorithm which ranks and boosts content does not get the benefit of doubt.

They are per se responsible for what people see. If pro-Palestinian views are on TikTok at 36:1, that's what TikTok wants, they could easily promote content at a different ratio.

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#372

Post by kromem » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:10 PM UTC

Scubabear68 wrote: post #91

I have no skin in this game. What I have seen is a confusion (perhaps intentional) between anti-semitism, and protesting Israel’s behavior since the Hamas attack in October. Criticizing Israel’s response is not anti-Semitism- it is literally just criticizing the response.

While that is definitely true and an important distinction, I will say that unfortunately all too often as discussions on the topic deepen there's a troubling correlation between the most vocal voices engaged in criticizing Israel and legit antisemitism views creeping in.

Which isn't a one sided phenomenon. The reverse is true as well, where often the most vocal voices rationalizing Israel's actions and behavior around civilian casualties often have anti-Muslim perspectives crop up as back and forth conversation goes on.

One of the litmus tests I've noticed is the capacity to acknowledge and condemn the civilian suffering of both sides. The commenters who recognize and condemn both the Oct 7th terrorist attack and the targeting or indiscriminate killing of civilians in the response to it tend to be rational and level headed driven by humanitarian concerns.

Those who only recognize the suffering of one side and dismiss, dehumanize, or rationalize the suffering of the other side - or worst of all propagandize the denial of it's occurrence or scope - tend to quickly fall into revealing rather abhorrent views with a mere scratching of the surface.

Not everyone who criticizes Israel is antisemitic nor everyone who criticizes Hamas is anti-Muslim, but many who are antisemitic or anti-Muslim seem keen to defend their respective side of the conflict quite emphatically and unilaterally.

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#373

Post by wolverine876 » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:10 PM UTC

dijit wrote: post #352

wolverine876 wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> chants like "from the river to the sea" (meaning destroying Jewish country) What is the truth of that? I've seen Israeli advocates make that claim and many repeat it. I've also seen an explainer in legitimate source (maybe the NY Times?) say that it means both Palestinians and Jews should be free. Does anyone have some actual, authoritative information? Something from before October 7th might be good. > saying Isra…

River to the Sea has clear meaning regarding the establishment of palestine and the eradication of israel. You can draw a very neat line between the number of jews currently permitted to live peacefully in palestine vs the number of muslims living within israel. its not complicated, confusing, unclear or opaque. River to the Sea means to end the israeli state, and the end of that does not have a happy ending for any…

I understand the claim about that interpretation. Repeating it doesn't help; we got it. If you know of evidence that that's the understanding among Palestinians, that would be great.

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#374

Post by jltsiren » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:12 PM UTC

givemeethekeys wrote: post #288

rcpt wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is something particularly grating about how Israel acts with impunity on the world stage yet continues to receive unfaltering support from the US government. They secretly introduced nuclear weapons into the Middle East and refused to sign any of the treaties which are responsible for humanities current existence. According to Snowden the NSA provides them with whatever data they'd like, even that on Americans,…

What would you do if you were running the show in Israel? You’re responsible for a group of people that none of your neighbors want, even if they are the same race, ethnicity and religion, and those people have an ongoing campaign to push you out, which has been unsuccessful for as long as it has been going on. Oh yeah, their population is now many multiples higher than when all this started.

The literal answer is that I would resign and move to another country. Given that I've moved to another country a few times already, I'm fairly sure I would do that in the situation you describe.

Answering more to the spirit of the question: I believe that the situation between Israel and Palestinians is broken and can't be fixed until something unexpected happens. Neither side has an acceptable way forward.

As a rule of thumb, people who talk about right and wrong don't want peace. Those concepts are far more useful for justifying wars than ending them. Peace is achieved by compromises that make both parties lose interest in the war. There was a genuine desire for peace in the 90s, but it failed, because nobody could find an acceptable compromise. The leaders of both parties realized that the sacrifices required to make the compromise acceptable to the other side were worse than status quo.

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#375

Post by mkoubaa » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:12 PM UTC

rushingcreek wrote: post #29

master_crab wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anti-semitism in and of itself is unequivocally wrong. But conflating anti-Israeli views with anti-Semitic views does a disservice to Jews and Palestinians alike.

It’s obviously true that criticism of Israel isn’t inherently antisemitic. But that’s also a convenient excuse used by people who are actually antisemitic. Both of these things can be true at once.

Suppose they are both true, what does this imply? That it's fair to suspect people of racism because someone else hypothetically uses an excuse?

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#376

Post by sudosysgen » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:12 PM UTC

dijit wrote: post #333

cies wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> equally abohorrent Comparing it to the Ukraine's invasion and we can see this is so much more "invasive". There's a literal wall around 2M ppl with little agency, while most of them are refugees from the other side of the wall. To methis is one of the most abohorrent conflicts in earth in this day and age. Given South Africa is no longer segregated, and Rwanda reconciled. I'd be interested to hear what's equally ab…

Gaza borders Egypt and the West Bank borders Jordan. If they are blockaded by the country that they cant get along with then it is at least partially on Egypt and Jordan that they are given no way out.

Israel has a secret* agreement with Egypt which it made Egypt sign as a condition for not occupying the border between Gaza and Egypt, which stipulates what Egypt can and can't let through the border.

*The existence of the agreement is not secret, but the contents are.

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#377

Post by dijit » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:12 PM UTC

underlipton wrote: post #322

ReptileMan wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Criticizing Israel’s response is not anti-Semitism- it is literally just criticizing the response. Okay - then what should be Israel's response? For me what they are doing is the bare minimum with the minimum casualties from the options they have. Hamas is Gaza's government. Hamas has intertwined the civilian and the military infrastructure. Hamas has made sure that the civilian Palestinians will suffer if you targe…

>Okay - then what should be Israel's response? The same response I have concluded should have been the US' response to 9/11: turn the other cheek, and invest heavily in reconciling with "enemy" forces while rebuilding "enemy" infrastructure and institutions, while dealing with individual bad actors on a case-by-case basis as a matter of legal (rather than martial) procedure. And I'm not joking. I feel bad for Israeli…

1) thats politically a dead end,

nobody will immediately make friends after a massacre and mass rape. Especially after decades of tensions and double especially when the muslim world once descended on Israel at once.

2) Quiet reminder that there are 1B followers of Islam and there has always been a wish (especially from Iran) to end the existence of Israel: the Palestinian people are unfortunately a pawn in that game. - Winning over the palestinians wont actually win you over anything. Instead you will have terrorist attacks by “palestinians” until the tensions are stoked again.

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#378

Post by senderista » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:13 PM UTC

I'm not trying to deflect, but I do find it interesting that just 2 months ago, >100K Armenians were permanently displaced from their homes in Nagorno-Karabakh where they've lived for literally millenia, and I saw essentially no coverage of this in Western media (in contrast, it was all over Russian media, possibly because Armenia is a historical ally of Russia and a lot of Russians are frustrated that Russia and the CSTO did basically nothing to prevent this ethnic cleansing). The Armenian-American community is rather large (>500K) but apparently nowhere near as influential as the Jewish-American community.

There are many other recent instances of ethnic cleansing that nobody seems to care about. The number of ethnic Germans who were permanently expelled from their homes in Europe and the USSR (at about the same time as Palestinians) exceeds the number of Palestinian refugees by more than an order of magnitude (10-12M, with at least 500K dead), making it the largest ethnic cleansing in modern history, but this episode is basically forgotten (presumably because sympathy for Germans was rather scarce after WW2). The hundreds of thousands of Turks and Greeks who were mutually expelled from their homes after WW2 will never get to return either. Nor will all the ethnic minorities in the former Yugoslavia who were "cleansed" from their historic homelands. So my question is, given that ethnic cleansings are not uncommon in the recent past, and that the Palestinian Nakba is not even close to the worst case, why is it basically the only one that anyone seems to care about?

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#379

Post by aprilthird2021 » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:13 PM UTC

robertoandred wrote: post #319

Scubabear68 wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not holding them to a higher standard. Imagine if you will someone going to start large scale bombing NYC. Or London. Or Rome. The Hamas attack was unprecedented and horrific. I don’t know that it justifies declaring all out war on and entire city. I can say that without being anti-Semitic.

You don't think the Hamas attack was a declaration of war?

Isn't blockading people and food and goods and putting the entire population of Gaza on a "starvation plus" diet and constantly and blatantly violating int'l law to throw West Bank Palestinians off their land further and further while laughing about it publicly a declaration of war?

When Palestinians protested nonviolently at the gates of Gaza and were shot to death, was that an act of war?

When Israeli West Bank settlers burned a home in Duma with a family still inside and laughed about the small child who burned alive their and taunted onlookers, was that an act of war?

Re: The pro-Israel information war

#380

Post by skybrian » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 10:14 PM UTC

Despite all this, as a casual observer, my general impression is Israel has done terribly at making the case for war, and specifically the kind of war their military seems to be carrying out.

The most relevant comparison seems to be with the Russians. Russia has no credibility in the West and Israel is rapidly losing any they had, at least with younger people. My general impression is of a Russian-level intensity of destruction, too.

But perhaps these impressions are wrong. I would normally assume the Israelis aren’t complete idiots. I’d like to read a “steelman” case for this military campaign, if anyone knows of one. Why are these impressions misleading? What’s really going on?

(Yes, a major difference is that this is a counter-attack, but beyond that?)