Gaza Debate Goes Virtual

Ian Lamont writes "The war of words over the conflict in Gaza has moved from the real world to the Internet. Besides a furious stream of mini-debates on Twitter between supporters of and critics of Israel's military actions, there have also been demonstrations in Second Life at an Israel-themed sim and a collection of Facebook applications, including 'QassamCount' and 'Stop Israel's war crimes in Gaza.' Another project — 'mapping the war in Gaza' — was launched by Al Jazeera and takes user-submitted reports, tweets, and Microsoft Virtual Earth to track the number of casualties and other developments." In addition to this, the series of website defacements we discussed a few days ago has now extended to sites controlled by NATO and the US Army.

Comments

Second life sim

[Anonymous Coward]

there have also been demonstrations in Second Life at an Israel-themed sim

...and it's only a matter of time until the virtual Islamic trolls fire virtual rockets and bomb their virtual busses while cowardly hiding amongst virtual women and children.

Re:Second life sim

[h4rm0ny]

You got to admit though, it's a lot easier to play the victim when you're starving, walled into a tiny area and can only defend themselves with scraps of old military hardware and bits of rubble against a rich country armed with the latest in US air power that assassinates their democratically elected leaders.

Just saying, you know? ;)

Re:Second life sim

[h4rm0ny]

Israel left Gaza three and a half years ago. Other than providing them with fuel, water, and electricity (for FREE) Israel has had no involvement with Gaza, other than retaliating for rocket strikes. Until two weeks ago, that retaliation was usually limited to simply withholding the free fuel, water, and electricity.

If this is so, then why has the Israeli military deliberately targeted Gaza's power infrastructure, blowing up local power stations and stopping aid packages providing food and medicine? You make it sound as though Israel generously supports a destitute population, but in fact, they artificially limit how many supplies are allowed in, US soldiers are stationed in Egypt to keep its border with Gaza sealed after an incident a couple of years ago where local people opened it and Palestinians nipped across to buy groceries, fuel, concrete mix (believe it or not), etc. before returning. Their retaliation was not "simply withholding free fuel, water and electricity" but also food and preventing the importing of non-free supplies, even free aid from other countries, with the use of force.

correction

[alcmaeon]

I should have said "virtual Zionists" instead of "virtual Jews" since a lot of Jews, including Israeli ones, have courageously condemned Israel's actions.

Israel, the Jewish state, wants to conflate itself with all Jews, and obfuscate the reality, but the fact is, it doesn't speak for all Jews anymore than Saudi Arabia speaks for all Muslims.

Re:correction

[burris]

Would it kill the Egyptians to open the Gaza gate and let some aid and supplies through? Well no, it wouldn't, but it might cost them some favours from the US government.

As Egypt has consistently pointed out, Gaza is occupied by Israel so it's up to Israel whether the border is opened. Ignoring Israel would jeopardize the peace they have found with them.

Re:correction

[Duhavid]

"Pst. The original zionists got the entire province of palestine for themselves from someone who was generally referred to as "the caliph". There was no conquest involved."

Define "original zionist". And who is this "caliph", and what authority did he have to give the land, and what were the terms? And what happened after?

"Pst. There is no such thing as "muslim land". The only land that was peacefully converted to islam is a tiny part of 1 city : medina. All the rest was conquered. That would be "muslim-occupied land"."

    If "peacefully converted" is a part of "being" a nation, then there also is no such thing as "American land". England and Germany would also suffer on this point, IIRC. I would imagine many lands around the world would also.

"Pst. Let's drive muslims out of every piece of berber land (most of southern sahara). Christian land (north africa, egypt, Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia) and out of Hindu Land (Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, ...)"

And then drive the Berbers out in favor of those who were there before. Likewise the Christians and others you mentioned. Add to that driving the Americans out in favor of the Mexicans and "American Indians", followed closely by driving the Mexicans back to Spain and other points elsewhere. Here:

Loop
For each nation/state/territory
    find people who lived in that land before current occupiers, drive out the occupiers in favor of the others.
Repeat until no one left.

"Let's be fair, and reject conquest. Let's drive all muslims into one neighboorhood of the only voluntary muslim neighboorhood."

    And Israel then should reject conquest and give back the lands gained in the 67 conflict. And maybe the lands they gained by terrorist actions since WWII.

"Let's end the muslim occupation of northern africa ! Let's END islam in Africa, in the middle east and in Asia."

    Why just muslim? Why end islam? How are you going to do that?

"Because that would be "just", ending occupation."

    Only ending occupation for muslims? Is it only "just" to end muslim occupation? Not others?

Re:correction

[Admiral Ag]

You conveniently forgot the ethnic cleansing (your post below is complete BS). You conveniently forgot that the Jews were far less than a majority of the population of Palestine and only owned a very small portion of the land, and yet were given 55% of the territory of Palestine in the partition.

You conveniently forgot the fact that there were very few Jews in Palestine circa 1920 and the only reason there were more in 1948 was the fact that the colonial authority was letting them in en masse against the wishes of the locals. And there's the Jewish terrorism and collusion with the British in the 30s to suppress the Arab revolt (a revolt caused by the fact that the British were selling out their country from under them to a bunch of foreigners).

Neither side covered itself in glory at the time, and nor have they since. That does not change the fact that the Arabs were treated shabbily so that Europeans could recompense Jews for a crime that Europeans committed.

Israeli historians have been writing about this for 20 years. It's not like we all don't know. Frankly, the majority of informed people are sick to death of hearing the bullshit that people like you spout.

Look, it is extremely unlikely, even given the truth about the past, that any eventual settlement will constitute a full right of return for the Arabs to their lands (and they are theirs under any reasonable interpretation of history). Given that fact, there is no point bullshitting about the crime committed against the Arabs of Palestine. It was horrific and were it to happen today, condemnation would likely be universal.

The past has very little to contribute to the solution of current problems, which is basically two giant refugee camps of insanely pissed people with very limited life prospects that nobody wants, and who aren't going away. As every sane person knows, we have the best shot of solving it with a two state solution based on the 1967 borders (with some land swaps). It might not work, but it's the best chance there is.

Whining about whose fault it was half a century ago is in practical terms of only academic interest. As it happens, you are wrong, but it doesn't matter anyway, because it has little to do with solving the problem.

Well this should be straigtforward...

[feepness]

Since my side is completely blameless and your side is the obvious aggressor.

No actually it isn't

[GuloGulo]

"You got to admit though, it's a lot easier to play the victim when you're starving, walled into a tiny area and can only defend themselves with scraps of old military hardware and bits of rubble against a rich country armed with the latest in US air power that assassinates their democratically elected leaders."

What are they "defending themselves" from? Oh right, retaliation from their rocket attacks.

It's a lot harder to play the victim when you chose the path of violence in the first place.

Imagine how this conflict would go if the Palestinian's weren't so cowardly and instead used non-violent protests. You know, like Gandhi.

Nah, that kind of stuff never works.

 

Re:No actually it isn't

[burris]

So the occupation, colonization, and annexation aren't violent? There's a reason why colonizing land you occupy is forbidden by the 4th Geneva convention, it's because it amounts to ethnic cleansing.

Re:No actually it isn't

[value_added]

There's a reason why colonizing land you occupy is forbidden by the 4th Geneva convention, it's because it amounts to ethnic cleansing.

Ethnic cleansing is only one of three choices, and the least attractive. The other two are establishing a single state (and giving the Palestinians the right to vote), and apartheid (or, if your prefer gentler language, establishing permanent ghettos).

The first won't happen because the Israelis know full well that in a democracy, the majority Palestians would vote them all out of power. That leaves the second, which is just as good given that the settlement activity accelerating since the end of 1967 war has already created de facto ghettos. The irony with the ghetto strategy, of course, is that the Palestinians' economic condition is nearly the same as black Africa, and their daily hardships are not unlike those suffered by South Africans once upon a time not too long ago. For those who don't remember, the South African "terrorists" eventually took power.

Israel lost the moral high ground long ago, so Israel is there for the Israelis to lose. That would happen sooner than later if the US would get out of the way, but given the decades-long monotony of public discourse on the subject ("Israel can do no wrong"), it's doubtful that the impetus for change will come from these shores.

Re:One state solution

[burris]

Why is evacuation of Israeli colonies in the West Bank unrealistic? Israel evacuated their colonies in Gaza, they can do it in the West Bank. The settlements would be good partial reparation to the Palestinians. It's not like Israel and the colonists didn't know that what they were doing was illegal and wrong.

Otherwise, I'm right with you on the one state solution. Don't forget a constitution that's the supreme law of the land (along with treaties) that guarantees equal rights for all persons.

Re:Israel's right to exist

[burris]

States don't have rights, only persons have rights. Instead, States have powers that they justly derive from the people. States also exist or not at the whims of the people. Sometimes the people have a revolution, found a new state and the old state is wiped off the map.

Did Apartheid South Africa have a right to exist?

Israel's right to exist?

[ZekoMal]

Why does it have a right to exist? I understand perfectly well that the good ol' Bible tells us Israel ought exist, but it didn't exist for a while because everyone sacked the place and took it as their own. We didn't bring back Rome Israel or Persia Israel; we brought back the first Israel, for the 'league of nations' opted to do it. After the first World War. Now, I'm not that good with math...but from the end of the reign of a Judaism country to World War 1....gonna guess other people lived there.

To give you a faaaaint idea of what I'm hinting at. Imagine if the US wasn't in the UN, and the UN decided that Native Americans needed their land back. So, they gave them the entire east coast of the US, to be their land. They were given basically whatever they wanted, and they began to push the US citizens gradually to the west, claiming various areas that are more desirable than others (IE, they take Yellowstone national park, leave us Death valley). They are far richer than the US citizens, and have far more support (although Canada and Mexico support the US citizens, lets just say the UN has marked them as third world terrorists). So, let's say that the US citizens scrap together some money, and a small group that want to win back their land, bomb the native Americans. The retaliation? The natives start bombing the civilians that didn't have a thing to do with it. They keep bombing, despite the UN telling them to stop.

Seems like a stretch.

Of course, I don't see why Israel was reinstated. People lived there after the Israelites got wiped out, and then the rest of the world told the Palestinians (arguably not the same exact people who did this), were told to shove over.

I'll probably get modded troll though...it's very mean and uncool to be pro-Palestine civilians. Nope, if you think Israel is wrong, you are a pro-terrorist.

Re:Israel's right to exist?

[jjohnson]

You're massively underinformed about the history of that specific region and the formation of Israel. Rather than type it up here, I'll refer you to Wikipedia for the (very contentious) history of Palestine, which gives a reasonably balanced view.

I'll address your analogy, though: Israel's right to exist is inherent in the same right to exist that most nations have. They have successfully defended their territory in three wars (and it's in those wars that were launched against them that they expanded their territory). It's not noble, it's not morally right (or wrong), it's just how most nations come into existence and stay there. The U.S. was founded by settlers who moved in on the natives, took over their land, and used force to marginalize them on reserves. If, by your argument, you're saying that Israel has no "right to exist", then neither does the U.S.

As a general matter of history, the early 20th century was dominated by the idea that every distinct people should have a homeland. Much of the border drawing following WWI was done with that in mind, and Zionism is only the most successful of a wide variety of ethno-nationalist movements from the early 20th century, largely because they were able to defend themselves in those three wars.

Re:Why is it always violence?

[Anonymous Coward]

When was the last time the Palestinians tried non-violent protests?

Non-violent demonstrations happen all the time (but they don't get much press in the USA). The kind of "non-violent" civil disobedience that Gandhi used just gets people arrested by the Israeli military (and very few people in the USA even notice).

So, actually, the Palestinians are trying both violent and non-violent approaches (and neither has had much success) - but it's the violent approaches that you hear about in the USA because it allows Israel to justify what it's doing to the Palestinians.

Re:Here's the bottom line

[copponex]

This is not a matter of multiple world views, all jostling for an equal share of turf and air time. This is militant, murderous thugs (Hamas) willing to kill anybody in order to prevent a modern, civil, democratic society from taking shape in their neighborhood.

It's quite a bit more complicated than that. I'm going to avoid the point-counterpoint monotony, but in general, the problem with your viewpoint is that you assume that Hamas is the will of the Palestinian people, which is true only in the current circumstance.

For instance, you could reason that all Japanese are murderous bastards for what they did to the Chinese in the 1930s. But that is not the will of the Japanese people, nor is the rise of Mexican drug gangs the will of the Mexican people, nor was the rise of the Nazi party the will of the German people.

Hamas was voted into power because the Palestinians had given up on diplomacy, because Israel refuses to work for peace. Israel refuses to work for peace because if there is an establishment of a Palestinian state, three things are probable. One is that they will not be able to seize any more land that they want to have. Two is that they won't get all of Jerusalem. Three is that eventually, and I'm talking in a hundred years, the Israeli state would cease to exist due to immigration and the natural progression of democratic demands for freedom from religion. Israel is "officially" Jewish, officially for one ethnic group and one religion, and the only state in the world with such a status. It's likely that under normal democratic functions, this will disappear, and that is something unacceptable to the hard liners who are currently running the country.

Blaming the Palestinians for voting Hamas in is like blaming the Black community for forming the Black Panthers. After your home has been taken, after your friends have been killed indiscriminately, after you see your children grow up in total poverty, after being under a foreign occupier's iron grip for sixty years, a society becomes quite damaged. But this is the goal for the occupier. As Ben-Gurion said, he hoped time would heal his wounds. He hoped the world would excuse Israel for the heinous acts it has committed to get what it wants, however much you agree with their goals.

All Israel is doing in Gaza right now is guaranteeing there is no peace, because peace means the end of their acquisition of Palestinian property. They destroyed Lebanon, they got Hezbollah. They destroyed the PLO, they got Hamas. These are predictable outcomes, and the planners of Israel are not stupid.