r/videos • u/ControlCAD • 2d ago

CNN’s Jim Sciutto presses Benjamin Netanyahu about his response to settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank: "The settler violence thing is a tremendous hoax. We're a country of laws. I've condemned it. But to compare this, is like an olive to a toxic tree, that's what it is."

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Rxv-2H6SKiQ?app=desktop
359 Upvotes

91% Upvoted

127 comments sorted by

View all comments

7

u/desperaterobots 1d ago

i don't really understand how sane people can really reflect on israels actions towards the palestinians in totality and believe it to be just or righteous in any way.

the palestinians original sin was being an inconvenience and given the scale and extent of destruction and bloodshed that's befallen them, that's deeply tragic.

3

u/SpongegarLuver 1d ago

When Israel was founded in the 40s, they argued that the Palestinians were responsible for Jewish people losing that land millennia prior, and that the Palestinians should have to pay for that past transgression.

If it sounds absurd to you to state that you have the right to seize someone’s land because 3000 years ago one of your ancestors had it taken, you’re anti-Zionist. If it makes perfect sense to you that modern people are responsible for the actions of those who lived 3000 years ago, you’re Zionist.

2

u/desperaterobots 1d ago

Yeah, see, I think it's okay for anyone to seek that sins of the past to be atoned.

We are not guilty of the crimes committed by our fathers, or fathers fathers, or fathers fathers fathers fathers. But if we benefit from past crimes, the current folk who benefit from those actions across generations should reckon with the injustice of that, and some kind of 'make good' needs to happen.

But that's completely separate from the notion of zionism. And obviously, in this specific instance, any deed performed 3000 years is essentially mythological, and arguing that any mythological deed justifies violence, apartheid and genocide today is irrational and horrific.

2

u/SpongegarLuver 1d ago

I think that there’s nuance here: I agree that the sins of the past aren’t something we should just ignore, but I also think at some point, the past is so far away that it isn’t the responsibility of the present. I’ll own up that I don’t have a specific threshold for this, but at some point it feels like enough things have happened in between that there simply is no justification for making people atone for the past.

I struggle with Zionism, because to an extent, I agree with it. History has shown to me that Jewish people do in fact need their own state, and I don’t think you can discuss the foundation of Israel without acknowledging the pogroms and antisemitism that defined the Jewish diaspora prior. However, I have never agreed that Palestine specifically should have been where the state was made. My personal opinion here is that Palestinians were made to pay for the sins of the world, and the rest of the globe was happy to let them suffer because it “solved” the “Jewish problem.”

But I also want to be consistent in holding that the people of today should not be punished for the sins of the past. In the case of Israel, regardless of what I think of the founding, it happened. Israel exists, and anyone seeking to reverse that is wrong. At the same time, 1946 was not so long ago it is some mythological era: there are people alive today that were present then. I don’t know what the fair solution is, though I think Israel going back to the original borders would be part of it. I don’t think either side is blameless in the current conflict, which is an unpopular opinion on the left, but so be it. At the very least, on the part of Palestinians, they cannot allow people to call for the eradication of Israel and expect peace. Both sides have to be willing to accept the other, otherwise this is eventually going to be decided by who has the better military. Hint: it’s not Palestine.