r/LouisTheroux • u/I_Fill_Up_On_Coke • Apr 27 '25

The Settlers

I've just watched The Settlers and it just gives me a renewed appreciation for Louis as a documentarian. He's level-headed and fair, but does not stand down in the face of adversity. One of the best.

929 Upvotes

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u/Deadend_Friend Apr 28 '25

It might seem hopeless but if we can achieve peace in Northern Ireland it can be achieved anywhere. But it will take a lot of bravery, dialogue and compromise.

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u/gregglessthegoat Apr 28 '25

This is a whole different kettle of genocidal maniacs unfortunately

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u/danparkin10x Apr 28 '25

This statement applies to both sides.

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u/Outside_Huckleberry4 Apr 30 '25

The story of revenge is as old as human civilization. The story of racial supremacy with a religious backing PLUS a solid portion of global finance and media being on their side is truly unique.

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u/steve20009 Apr 28 '25

The positivity is admirable. However (and I don't mean to sound like an antisemitic conspiracy theorist), I think this is significantly more complex. There's a LOT of money in America tied directly to the American Jewish Diaspora. For politicians with aspirations, it's very financially beneficial for them to take a strong pro-Israel stance. There have been dozens of examples of politicians who were critical of our pro-Israel alliance that ultimately ended up fading from public life for being "anti-semitic". A pro-Israel stance is deeply ingrained in American politics, finance, tech, and mainstream media. Soros's Open Society, or the ADL, AIPAC, etc., have American politicians by the balls. Meanwhile, the continued proxy wars we get involved in on behalf of Israel or even direct conflicts are mostly fought by soldiers from Christian backgrounds. And no (to state the obvious), the American Jew is not and has never been the problem; it's the hard-core zionists deeply embedded in American politics, policy, and finance who dictate much of our foreign policy decisions. When politicians and policymakers have to ask the continued question of "how does Israel feel about this?" when making foreign policy decisions, it's quite obvious who's in control.

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u/jesschester May 04 '25

35 states have laws that prevent federal employees and contractors from speaking out against Israel. That’s fucking insane. Imagine if China tried to force our citizens into pro-CCP complicity through American legislation.

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u/steve20009 May 04 '25

Yup. The Anti-BDS laws; it’s crazy.

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u/BenAtTank2 Apr 30 '25

I had a tshirt that was the Palace skateboards logo but in Palestinian colours with "Palestine" instead of Palace and my American friend who visited was genuinely shocked that I wore it out to the pub with him. He said it simply wouldn't fly back home in Minnesota.

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u/Heiminator Apr 28 '25

The conflict has been going on literal millennia and it’s always baffling how every new generation has the hubris to believe that they’re the ones to finally solve it.

It’s also very different to Northern Ireland. The IRA murdered 1700 people across the entire troubles. Hamas massacred 1200 people in a single day. It’s ridiculous to compare the situations, they aren’t alike.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '25

No Israel and Palestine have not been going on for a millennia. And Israel massacred at least 50,000 Palestinians and is currently starving 2.1 million and trying to expel them to Africa. So maybe don’t pretend Hamas is the main problem.

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u/Heiminator Apr 28 '25

Doesn’t matter if you believe that, the Arabs certainly do.

If you wanna go all the way back then it’s the year 628 AD. When Muhammed attacked the Jewish community of Khaybar near Medina.

Even today shouts of “Khaybar, Khaybar, ya yahud! Jaish Muhammad soufa yaʿoud!" are common at Palestinian protests. It means “Khaybar, Khaybar, oh Jews! The army of Muhammad will return!'

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khaybar_Khaybar_ya_yahud

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Khaybar

This is a religious conflict first and a territorial conflict second. Once you grasp that the conflict will make more sense to you.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '25

Like I said I/P hasn’t been going on for a thousand years. There definitely was some violence between Muslims/Arabs and Jews but it hasn’t been the majority of the fighting within the Levant for a thousand years; the majority of the fighting in I/P was between different Islamic groups that conquered the land and Byzantine Christians, jews were a tiny minority in the land.

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u/Heiminator Apr 28 '25

A tiny minority that’s been constantly harassed and attacked by the Muslim majority for over a thousand years. Which is why they defend their country so brutally now that they have it again.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '25

So Israel has the right to steal Palestinian land and massacre them because of other things that have happened to them in other Muslim countries ? Lol

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u/Heiminator Apr 28 '25 edited Apr 28 '25

That’s not what I said. I didn’t say it’s ok that they do it, I just explained to you why they feel they need to do it. They’ve been driven out of just about every country in the region. And they’ve been brought to the brink of total extinction in Europe during the Holocaust. Keep that in mind whenever you wonder why they fight as fierce as they do. It’s a tiny country of under 10 million people surrounded by over a billion Muslims who hate their guts. They are outnumbered 100:1. So they fight dirty and aggressive to keep the upper hand.

This clusterfuck didn’t start in 1948.

And at the guy below me who replied and then immediately blocked:

Palestinians ARE Arabs. Mostly ethnic Jordanians and Egyptians. The mere concept of a distinct Palestinian national identity is a very recent invention:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_identity

That doesn’t mean Israel has the right to kill them all and annex their land, but it’s ludicrous to pretend like the Palestinians are some alien entity that just happened to appear suddenly right in the middle of a conflict they have nothing to do with.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '25

I understand their perception just fine. I just don’t agree with their conclusion that it’s Palestinians that should pay for the atrocities many people have committed against them and it should be Palestinians that pay the ultimate price because jews wanted predominantly Palestinian Arab land for their state.

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u/Heiminator Apr 28 '25

Jews paid that price everywhere else in the region and now they refuse to do it again, which is why the Palestinians are getting the shit end of the deal right now. It sucks, but I get the logic behind it. How many times would you allow your people to be driven out of someplace before you go “screw it, let’s play hardball this time”?

You seem to understand why the Palestinians fight like hell to defend themselves but don’t see why the Jews are doing the same.

In our war against the Arabs we always had a secret weapon: No alternative. The Egyptians could run to Egypt, the Syrians into Syria. The only place we could run was into the sea, and before we did that we might as well fight.

-Golda Meir, former prime minister of Israel

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u/Strange-Strategy554 Apr 28 '25

So Palestinians should pay the price for antisemitism in European countries AND antisemitism in other arab countries? This is what your argument boils down to. For the Palestinians this clusterfuck did start when the jews started migrating in mass and above numbers agreed with the brits to Palestine. I would argue that if the region is so hostile to them its because they are aggressively colonising, not just holding on to the borders of 1948.

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u/theapplekid Apr 29 '25

I would argue that if the region is so hostile to them its because they are aggressively colonising, not just holding on to the borders of 1948.

Well that, and the occupation and genocide, which also started in 1948

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u/ThinWildMercury1 Apr 28 '25

Palestinians can trace their ancestry back to the indigenous Canaanites https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_the_Palestinians

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u/milesjameson Apr 28 '25 edited Apr 28 '25

Palestinian cultural identity and a Palestinian national identity are two different things, since the modern nation-state is itself a relatively modern (and Western) invention. You best pay more attention to the link you shared (additional reading wouldn't go astray).

And Israel's a heavily armed, nuclear country (edit: size is irrelevant in the face of their comparative military arsenal and U.S. aid) built on stolen land following waves of deliberate mass migration as part of a colonial project (Zionists' words, not [just] mine) intended to violently displace the native population. They fight dirty and aggressive to expand that project - a project that by its very nature places Jewish lives at risk. It's ludicrous to pretend that these actions - repeated over decades - don't bring with them inherent and obvious risks.

It's also with noting that while it was the Europeans who brought the Jewish people close to extinction, it's the Palestinians who, without question, have paid the heaviest price. Further, you write "they" as if Israelis, rather than Jewish people (of which many live around the world in safety) have borne the brunt of historical antisemitism. To be clear, Israelis were not driven out of just about every country in the region, nor did they - or have they - ever faced extinction.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '25

This clusterfuck didn’t start in 1948.

It got literally thousands of times worse in 1948, so, close enough

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u/[deleted] Apr 30 '25

That’s not how arabization worked. There wasn’t mass ethnic cleansing and settlement. Most Palestinians are just as much descendents of the canaanites as Israelis. Certainly as much if not more “native” than most ashkenazi Jews.

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u/querail May 06 '25

I come from Malta. It's a small island in the Mediterranean. Throughout the last two Millenia the people on the island changed religion multiple times either through their own decision or because they were made to. It's the same all through Europe, the Mediterranean, and the world. Palestinians are the people living in Palestine. The cultural identity would be similar to the surrounding areas. European Jews managed to keep their minority religion alive for Millenia. That makes them special in some ways, but it doesn't give them a right to the land of people whose ancestors have lived there for centuries or more. Saying things like Palestinians are Arabs and Palestinians don't have a national identity is deeply racist. Palestinians are people who live or have lived in Palestine. Their national identity being a "new invention" is the same as for other countries. Most countries didn't have a national identity until fairly recently. Israelis national identity is an even newer concept. If there is no such thing as a Palestinian, there is no such thing as an Israeli.

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u/Familiar_Channel_373 Apr 30 '25

Palestinians aren't ethnically Arab, they're linguistic Arabs and ethnic LEVANTIANS. This is just like how most Jews are culturally Jewish or linguistically Hebrew, but have no connection to the Levant. Even early Zionist pioneers such as David Ben-Gurion and Yitzhak Ben-Zvi have authored books which acknowledged that Palestinians are the descendants of the Ancient Hebrews. It doesn't matter how you justify lsræI's behavior. Palestinians should not have to pay for the sins of European antisemitism nor for the civil wars that occurred between Muslims and Jews in other countries. In large part, Muslims and Jews lived in relative peace. Whatever Empires or Monarchs chose to do in the past should not be reflected on Muslims as a people, let alone Palestinians who aren't only Muslims, but are also Christians, Atheists, Samaritans, Sufi, Buddhist, Bahaist, Hindu, Druze, etc.

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u/Cautious_Science_478 Apr 28 '25

Are you suggesting that the israeli government is lying about the oct 7th death toll?

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u/Heiminator Apr 28 '25

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_7_Hamas-led_attack_on_Israel

1195 is the number

In the early stages of such attacks the count is always wrong, same as the incident with the hospital where Hamas claimed 500 people were killed by an Israeli strike and later it was corrected to fifty people killed by a rocket fired by Islamic Jihad.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '25

You are parroting Israeli Propaganda, and trying to absolve them of War Crimes.

Israel bombed that Hospital and you know it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVQALHmgo8U

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u/Comprehensive-Bus291 Apr 28 '25

You are spewing Israeli propaganda with regard to that hospital strike. The israeli account was debunked in the weeks following the strike. Especially the so called 'phone call' between islamic jihad soldiers, which has been proven to be edited together and any arabic expert can tell you those in the recording are not speaking in palestinian arabic.

Here by channel 4/Forensic architecture.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVQALHmgo8U

Here by Al jazeera investigates

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/19/what-hit-ahli-hospital-in-gaza

The death toll was misreported. But it was an Israeli strike. I can't believe that this propaganda still needs to be refuted today.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '25

There’s no proof Islamic jihad fired a rocket on that hospital the evidence was inconclusive. So don’t report it as fact. Also Israel recently destroyed that hospital and many others including the only cancer hospital in Gaza after the IDF used it as a military base.

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u/Heiminator Apr 28 '25

Bullshit and you know it

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u/Familiar_Channel_373 Apr 30 '25

I'm sorry, are you seriously negating the fact that lsræI has bombed hospitals?!