Madkal posted:

...the last time the let a literal Nazi into the country was to execute him unless you think Israel was secretly pretty chill with Eichmann too.

khanna.house.gov - Tue, 27 Mar 2018 posted:

A little-noticed provision in the 2,232-page government spending bill passed last week bans U.S. arms from going to a controversial ultranationalist militia in Ukraine that has openly accepted neo-Nazis into its ranks.

House-passed spending bills for the past three years have included a ban on U.S. aid to Ukraine from going to the Azov Battalion, but the provision was stripped out before final passage each year.

This year, though, the $1.3 trillion omnibus spending bill signed into law last week stipulates that "none of the funds made available by this act may be used to provide arms, training or other assistance to the Azov Battalion."

"White supremacy and neo-Nazism are unacceptable and have no place in our world," Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), an outspoken critic of providing lethal aid to Ukraine, said in a statement to The Hill on Tuesday. "I am very pleased that the recently passed omnibus prevents the U.S. from providing arms and training assistance to the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion fighting in Ukraine."

The United States has been aiding and training Ukrainian forces in their fight against Russian-backed separatists since 2014, and recently expanded that aid to include arms. The omnibus includes about $620.7 million in aid for Ukraine, including $420.7 million in State Department and foreign operations funds and $200 million in Pentagon funds.

The Azov Battalion was founded in 2014, and its first commander was Andriy Biletsky, who previously headed the neo-Nazi group Patriot of Ukraine. Several members of the militia, which has been integrated into the Ukrainian National Guard, are self-avowed neo-Nazis.

But a spokesman for the group has defended it, telling USA Today in 2015 that only 10 to 20 percent of recruits are neo-Nazis and that those people do not represent the official ideology of Azov.

It's unclear how much, if anything, from the United States has gone to Azov in the past.

"The State Department should pressure Kiev to dissociate itself with this group and investigate whether any of our weapons or training have already been provided to them," Khanna said in his statement. "This is just one of many reasons why lawmakers should be concerned about channeling huge amounts of weapons into this volatile conflict zone."

Last year, online posts by the militia's news service showed members testing U.S.-made grenade launchers at a firing range. The posts have since been deleted, and the Ukrainian National Guard insisted in a January statement that the grenade launchers were not in Azov's possession.

U.S. officials have said vetting required under the so-called Leahy Law already prevents the United States from aiding Azov. The Leahy Law bans U.S. aid from going to groups when the "secretary of State has credible information that such unit has committed a gross violation of human rights."

But proponents of a ban specific to Azov say the Leahy Law did not preclude it from getting aid, since the secretary of State has never made such a determination about the group.

DeadlyMuffin posted:

This claim is only true if the genocide claim is based on the deaths at the hospital, but it isn't. As Atahualpa pointed out it's based on far more than that, but you seem to be ignoring that.

It's not at all contradictory for Israel to be committing genocide and for the deaths at the hospital to be exaggerated (I'm not saying they are).

Wait... what? I knew he was a piece of poo poo but this is a wild claim.

www.france24.com - Wed, 21 Oct 2015 posted:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has come under fire after suggesting that a World War II-era Palestinian leader convinced the Nazis to adopt their Final Solution to exterminate European Jews.

Netanyahu told a group of Jewish leaders on Tuesday that the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Nazi sympathizer Haj Amin al-Husseini, convinced Hitler to destroy the Jews.

"Hitler didn't want to exterminate the Jews at the time, he wanted to expel the Jews," Netanyahu said. When Hitler asked al-Husseini what to do, Netanyahu said he replied: "Burn them."

Opposition leaders have slammed Netanyahu's comments as a gross distortion of history and an incitement to hatred against Palestinians, coming in the midst of a wave of violent unrest and Israeli-Palestinian tensions.

"This is a dangerous historical distortion and I demand Netanyahu correct it immediately as it minimizes the Holocaust, Nazism and… Hitler's part in our people's terrible disaster," Zionist Union leader Isaac Herzog wrote on his Facebook page.

"This is a great shame, a prime minister of the Jewish state at the service of Holocaust-deniers – this is a first," said Itzik Shmuli, an MP for Herzog’s opposition party. "This isn't the first time Netanyahu distorts historical facts, but a lie of this magnitude is the first."

Arab Joint List leader Ayman Odeh said Netanyahu "is rewriting history in order to incite against the Palestinian people”. He added: “The victims of the Nazi monster, among them millions of Jews, have become cheap propaganda in the service of peace rejectionism.”

Israeli daily Haaretz reports that Netanyahu made a similar claim in 2012, when he told Israeli lawmakers that the former Grand Mufti was “one of the leading architects” of the Holocaust, in which more than five million Jews were murdered.

Fringe historians have made the suggestion in the past, but it has been rejected by established scholars.

"To say that the Mufti was the first to mention to Hitler the idea to kill or burn the Jews is not correct," Dina Porat, a professor at Tel Aviv University and the chief historian of Yad Vashem, Israel's Holocaust museum, told Israel Radio on Wednesday.

"The idea to rid the world of the Jews was a central theme in Hitler's ideology a long, long time before he met the mufti," she said.

Porat and others pointed out that the murder of the Jews began in June 1941. Even if the Mufti wanted the Final Solution to be expanded, he was not the one who came up with the idea.

"For somebody who knows something about history and grew up in the house of historian Professor Benzion Netanyahu, he should know well," Porat said of the prime minister. "But in my humble opinion, to say that the mufti gave Hitler the idea is wrong."

(FRANCE 24 with AP, REUTERS)

Nebalebadingdong posted:

no?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapons_and_Israel

Rebel Blob posted:

Here are declassified documents from the LBJ, Nixon, and Ford administrations on the US government's knowledge of Israeli nuclear weapons program. The result of research published in that notorious conspiracy theory rag, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

To sum up the situation in two parts:

Kagrenak posted:

If you consider the belief of everyone who studies nuclear weapons, along with a ton of supporting physical and circumstantial evidence which details the progress of their program and supporting infrastructure to be an unproven conspiracy theory then yes

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00963402.2021.2014239

e: didn't see this before posting. Also sorry my tone was a little much I think.

Raenir Salazar posted:

Wait, do you mean the southern border today? Can you explain? I understand that the situation at the border is pretty bad in terms of human rights, but to some extent this is a consequence of the general principle of any nation enforcing its borders against unauthorized entry. I'm not sure how with this context that this makes the US not a democracy?

I feel like I addressed this in my original post, there's no definition of democracy that suggests democracies don't invade other countries; or do bad or otherwise heinous acts in its self interests. Nations are nations, nations are under at least some common and mainstream international relations paradigms, self-interested and amoral actors first and foremost; which means consequently if its in its interest, it will do bad things.

Do you have an example of a country you would consider to be under your definition to be a democracy which presumably doesn't do self-interested amoral acts? A nation that doesn't but could if it wanted to would be the most relevant, not a microstate for example.

That doesn't follow, I don't think we'll find that any democracy exists if the definition relies on "doesn't do bad things to people somewhere".

Woah woah, back up a minute. Please reread my previous posts; Its okay to go to war with a democracy. You know what I'm disagreeing with, and we can leave it there.

I think everyone is allowed to have an opinion, but I think it shouldn't be surprising that depending on the tone and substance of the opinion, and in the details it advocates for, that people might disagree with some versions of how a sentiment is argued for, but not others.

I don't disagree fundamentally, or think its immoral if in some circumstance where push comes to show, that's what it takes. I just don't agree that's what it takes, and we don't need to twist words about this.

I think regardless of what the situation on the ground is, this is not how a lot of jews see it, and not how a lot of other people re: liberals see it. I don't think it actually is controversial to say that over the long period of history that the best way to keep a culture "safe", a language "safe" is having your own nation. Its where the phrase "a language is a dialect with an army" comes from; and why the 19th century nationalist movements originated from. The Slavs in the Balkans didn't feel safe, free, or secure living under Austrian or Ottoman rule, and turned to Russia and other nations for help constantly striving for independence.

Israel might be doing a bad job keeping jews safe, just as how Japan ultimately did a very bad job at keeping Japanese people safe during WW2; but I don't think it can at all be disputed that the fact that Japan has a country, but the Ainu don't, makes a big difference; would you really suggest that if Hakkaido was a independent Ainu state, that their culture wouldn't be considerably better off? Or Okinawans? Jews are moderately safer now than they've historically have been in Europe, the US, and Canada (but not Russia?); but we shouldn't pretend that it isn't because of the world having a collective "wtf" moment and ignore the centuries of pograms and oppression jews faced prior to WW2; where I'm not sure how you can argue that having an independent country where they could escape to wouldn't have been overwhelmingly better than any alternative on the table at the time circa 1920. Millions would've lived if they had.

And I don't agree that "safe haven for jews" constitutionally mandated means "jewish supremacist ethnostate" . I point to Quebec here, which has "distinct society" for the protection of the french language and culture in its constitution that it gets to have completely separate and actually gets to override the canadian constitution most of the time. You can have a ethnic group have gauranteed legal protections without it being an ethnostate.

Rebel Blob posted:

Freedom House's report on Isreal starts with this note:

Their reports on the West Bank and Gaza specifically mention Isreal as a contributing factor to why these two territories are "Not Free." The unequal status of Israelis against Palestinians in the West Bank is specifically highlighted.

It isn't a matter of ""doing bad things to people somewhere." The West Bank is actively being colonized by Israeli settlements, where settlers have full rights as Israeli citizens while dispossessed Palestinians have essentially no rights. Israel doesn't recognize the rights of Palestinians even if they do travel into Israel; it isn't a matter of borders but a permanent system of status. Israelis have rights, either inside Isreal or the West Bank, while the rights of Palestinians are likewise restricted regardless on what side of the border they are on.

hooman posted:

It is an interesting question because I don't know how much can you whittle down the voting members of a state while still calling it democratic.

Does anyone know what the minimum percentage with the right to vote would be for a state to count as a democracy?

386-SX 25Mhz VGA posted:

FFS how is this relevant to anything? If you have a point, would you just come out and say it? Things like this make this thread suck

www.taiwannews.com.tw - Tue, 19 Mar 2024 posted:

## Foreign ministry says funds for medical teams, not military

Haim Bibas, the head of the Federation of Local Authorities Israel, shakes hands with Ya-ping Lee (李雅萍), the head of Taiwan's mission in Israel, i...

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan’s representative office in Tel Aviv has donated NT$15.9 million (US$500,000) to local government agencies in Israel.

The Federation of Local Authorities in Israel posted a message of thanks to the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Tel Aviv for the donation on Thursday (March 14). Taiwan’s representative office replied with a post that said it was glad a partnership had begun, and that it looked forward to more exchanges soon.

Taiwan’s foreign ministry told Taiwan News the donation would be used to sponsor medical emergency response patrol teams in 12 Israeli cities. The ministry said the teams will be staffed by volunteers, and organized by the federation to whom the money was given.

The ministry said the items donated include communications and medical supplies, and that the funds will not be used to support military operations in Gaza. The foreign ministry also said it hopes Israel and Palestinian authorities will continue to pursue a ceasefire in line with previous efforts.

The donation comes as Israel faces the weakening of typically rock-solid support from the U.S. over the ongoing military campaign in Gaza that has left more than 30,000 Palestinians dead. Children are estimated to account for more than 40% of those killed.

Multiple protests have occurred in Taiwan calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, and accusing the Israeli government of committing genocide against Palestinians. Despite the protests, Taiwan's support for Israel has remained strong since the surprise Hamas attack that killed more than 1,100 Israelis and foreign nationals last October.

Israel has denied genocidal intent against Palestinians in the United Nations International Court of Justice (ICJ). In defense of genocide claims brought by South Africa, Israel argued that the war in Gaza is one of defense, and is against the Palestinian military group Hamas, not the Palestinian people.

When ruling on the case in late January, the ICJ called on Israel and its military “to take all measures within its power” to prevent acts of genocide. It stopped short of calling for the ceasefire that was requested by South Africa's legal team.

Esran posted:

Thanks, but I don't think I want to be IK'ing this thread. Is it normal to appoint people IK without asking first?

FlamingLiberal posted:

It doesn't seem like there is anything concrete yet. Some House Dems (including Nancy Pelosi) sent a letter to the WH saying that the government needs to start withholding offensive arms transfers to Israel. As far as I know, the WH has not changed any of their stances.

https://twitter.com/RepMarkPocan/status/1776365525985042443

www.state.gov - Mon, 01 Apr 2024 posted:

QUESTION: Just to follow up, a 2,000-pound bomb is self-defensive, in your opinion?

MR MILLER: It is a – so they need to have the ability to defend themself against a very well-armed adversary – like I said, Iran; Hizballah, which has thousands and thousands of fighters and quite sophisticated materiel and quite sophisticated weaponry, as we’ve seen them deploy – excuse me – against Israel in the last few days. So yes, they do need the modern military equipment to defend themselves against those adversaries.

QUESTION: Yeah, but that was in Gaza, or beginning in Gaza.

MR MILLER: And we have made clear to them that when – that whatever weapon they use in Gaza, be it a bomb, be it a tank round, be it anything, that we expect them to use those weapons in full compliance with international humanitarian law, and we have said it – we have had very frank conversations with them about the fact that far too many civilians have died through their operations and that they need to do better in taking into account the need to minimize civilian harm. And we’ll continue to do that.

…

QUESTION: Okay. Let me ask you something. You talked about the 2,000-pound bombs and so on. You think that it is really wise to send it at this time when this far, in this battle or this war, it has only been used in Gaza? I mean, I know you say that Israel is surrounded by people that wish it (inaudible) and so on. But in fact, it’s surrounded by Egypt, with very good relations with Israel; it’s surrounded by Jordan, with good relations with Israel; it’s surrounded by Syria, that is obviously embroiled in its own civil war and can’t even defend itself against attacks, as we have seen today. So quite the contrary, it’s – Israel is surrounding Hamas, and it’s using these weapons to do that. And in fact, I mean, the F-35, to the best of my knowledge – I could be wrong – has only been used in combat against the people of Gaza.

So how could you justify sending all these weapons when you have the most hapless people probably on Earth, destroyed moving from one place to another and so on, and you send these weapons to sort of just finish the job or continue the job? I don’t know.

MR MILLER: So —

QUESTION: What logic is there in sending in sending those weapons?

MR MILLER: So the logic is exactly what I outlined a moment ago. Despite the fact that Israel has a – has diplomatic relations with Egypt and Jordan, it does not change the fact that Hizballah is parked on its northern border and is sworn to the destruction of Israel. It does not change the fact that Iran – no, not exactly, not right on its border, but well within striking distance – is committed to the destruction of Israel and continues to fund proxies committed to the destruction of Israel.

So yes, Israel faces incredibly serious threats not just from Hamas – although Hamas is clearly one, as we saw on October 7th – but from other adversaries that it needs our assistance to continue to defend itself against.

mrfart posted:

Yeah, you can use postimages 'temporarily',
until something better comes along.
Someone wrote an ios shortcut for it:
https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/05a19d6803b444a98e1f5577e693d9d1

Majorian posted:

Some good news, for a change. LOL at this part of the Axios piece:

Please, by all means, Bibi, act against these moves. Isolate yourself even further.

Professor Beetus posted:

Not that it's anything new but poisoning that well is certainly disastrous for keeping people from falling into disinfo, rage bait, and conspiratorial thinking. You know, the same things that drive people into the arms of actual anti-Semitic hate groups, elder protocols of Zion poo poo. Seeding misery for Jews in general to serve the interests of genocide, it's utterly repulsive.

quote:

Additionally, well poisoning was one of the three gravest antisemitic accusations made against Jews during the pre-modern period (the other two being host desecration and blood libel)

Professor Beetus posted:

poo poo, thanks for pointing that out, I had no idea. It's putting poo poo in the sandwich I guess, p much same concept.

the idf posted:

The IDF has approved collaborative efforts for the new @CENTCOM led Joint Logistics Over-the-Shore (JLOTS) initiative in coordination with @cogatonline.

Our troops will operate to provide security and logistics support for the JLOTS initiative, which includes the establishment of a temporary floating pier to deliver humanitarian aid from the sea into Gaza.

This is one of many humanitarian aid efforts demonstrating the IDF's commitment to working with the international community to ensure the continuous entry of humanitarian aid to Gazans.

Discendo Vox posted:

Here's the source ABC News report:
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/biden-sanction-israeli-military-units-accused-human-rights/story?id=109651562

Here's the excluded explanatory material:

Fidelitious posted:

en.wikipedia.org posted:

In March 2024, on the eve of Ramadan, King and his wife Rai King formally converted to Islam from Christianity in the presence of Palestinian-American imam Omar Suleiman.[98]

quote:

### Claimed involvement in release of Israeli hostages by Hamas

Following the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, King posted on social media claiming that he had worked "behind the scenes" with Hamas and Qatar to help secure the release of two Israeli-American hostages: 17-year-old Natalie Raanan and her 59-year-old mother Judith Tai Raanan.[93][8][94] The family of these hostages, however, said that King had "lied" and "fabricated his involvement."[8][9][10]

In December 2023, King's account on Instagram was deactivated by Meta, which he claimed was due to his pro-Palestinian posts during the Israel–Hamas war.[10]

selec posted:

https://x.com/rtiron/status/1785331988485833154

Looks like nobody's keeping another Liberty incident off their bingo card.

nypost.com - Tue, 30 Apr 2024 posted:

WASHINGTON – Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told House lawmakers Tuesday that US forces helping to construct a floating humanitarian pier along the Gaza Strip’s coast may return fire if attacked from the Hamas-run Palestinian enclave — causing an uproar among both Democrats and Republicans.

Last month, President Biden ordered the Army to build the $320 million “Joint Logistics Over The Shore” jetty system, meant to ease the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza by sea as Israel’s war against Hamas nears the seven-month mark.

When asked by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) about the possibility of US forces coming under fire from land, Austin acknowledged to the House Armed Services Committee: “That’s possible, yes.”

“So if someone from land, and Gaza, shoots at our service members who are on the $320 million pier that we’re building, you’re telling me our service members can shoot back?” Gaetz asked.

“They have the right to return fire to protect themselves,” the Pentagon chief affirmed.

Later, in a tense exchange, Gaetz reminded Austin that “President Biden told the country that we weren’t going to have boots on the ground in Gaza.”

“We won’t,” Austin shot back.

“But you guys parse the distinction between – like when Americans think boots on the ground, they think Americans in harm’s way or engaged actively in a conflict,” the Republican said.

“You guys seem to be sort of saying that boots on a pier, connected to the ground, connected to service members shooting into Gaza doesn’t count as boots on the ground.”

When Austin confirmed that notion, Gaetz responded: “I think you’re gonna find the American people have a different perspective on that.”

Hamas officials have made public threats against any outside forces approaching the region. Khalil al-Hayya, a senior official of the jihadist group, recently threatened that it would attack Israeli or other forces who may be stationed around the pier.

“We categorically reject any non-Palestinian presence in Gaza, whether at sea or on land, and we will deal with any military force present in these places, Israeli or otherwise … as an occupying power,” he said.

Gaetz said Austin’s admission that a firefight could break out was a “very telling moment.”

“You’ve said something that’s quite possible,” the Floridian said. “Shots from Gaza, on our service members, and then the response – our armed service members shooting live fire into Gaza – that is a possible outcome here so that we can become the Port Authority and run this pier.“

“If we’re gonna have people shooting into Gaza,” Gaetz concluded, “we [Congress] probably should have a vote on that pursuant to our war powers.”

Democrats also raised questions about the potential implications of a Hamas attack on US troops on the pier, though the party has generally been more enthusiastic about delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza.

Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) questioned Austin about whether putting US forces under threat of attack could provoke a wider conflict after the defense secretary said the “Israelis will provide additional security in the area.”

“As many as 1,000 US uniformed officers are going to be involved in setting up here; a smaller number will be resident there,” she said. “If we are shot at – if more artillery is shot at us – who is responding and with what operating procedures is that military responding?”

Austin declined to detail how the Israel Defense Forces would respond to attacks on US troops, but Slotkin posited that an uncontrolled Israeli retaliation for such a move could exacerbate the onslaught on Gaza.

“I just think given the differences I think we have with the Israelis on civilian casualties,” she said, “we better get right clear about what the response is going to be when we are shot at, since I don’t think many Americans feel that it reflects the same values that we have here.”