Opinion piece: Why Israel wants to erase context and history in the war on Gaza

[radicalleft]

https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/11/5/why-israel-wants-to-erase-context-and-history-in-the-war-on-gaza

On October 24, a statement by United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres caused a sharp reaction by Israel. While addressing the UN Security Council, the UN chief said that while he condemned in the strongest terms the massacre committed by Hamas on October 7, he wished to remind the world that it did not take place in a vacuum. He explained that one cannot dissociate 56 years of occupation from our engagement with the tragedy that unfolded on that day.

The Israeli government was quick to condemn the statement. Israeli officials demanded Guterres’s resignation, claiming that he supported Hamas and justified the massacre it carried out. The Israeli media also jumped on the bandwagon, asserting among other things that the UN chief “has demonstrated a stunning degree of moral bankruptcy”.

snip

This reaction suggests that a new type of allegation of anti-Semitism may now be on the table. Until October 7, Israel had pushed for the definition of anti-Semitism to be expanded to include criticism of the Israeli state and questioning the moral basis of Zionism. Now, contextualising and historicising what is going on could also trigger an accusation of anti-Semitism.

The dehistoricisation of these events aids Israel and governments in the West in pursuing policies they shunned in the past due to either ethical, tactical, or strategic considerations.

[Big Blue Marble]

1. Removing a people's history

is another aspect of ethic cleansing and making them disappear.

The only narrative that is approved by Israel is theirs.

[Beastly Boy]

2. What a croc of crap masquerading as historical analysis!

Turns out that the murderous terrorist slaughter of civilians is a mere pretext for so many interests to commit so many affronts to the murderers! The european countries were just waiting for the pretext to violate democratic freedoms, Israel was just waiting for the pretext to expand the definition of antisemitism (as if the existing definition was not damning enough on antisemites) and pursue genocidal policies that it never had any interest in pursuing before, and the US was just itching to re-establish their presence in the Middle East (WTF, do Saudi bases not count as US presence in the ME?)

Oh, and the history to be contextualized only begins towards the end of 19th century and doesn't include the origins of Zionism, pogroms prior to WW1, concentration camps during WW2, the UN recognition of Israel and a mass exile of 900,000 Jews from an alphabet's full of Arab countries between 1950 and 1980 and annexaction of the West Bank by Jordan and Gaza by Egypt, among other inconvenient historical facts. No disregarding any historical context here at all!

I can't believe people get paid for this nonsense.

[flashman13]

4. You really should brush up on your Middle East history.

[Beastly Boy]

5. Tell me qbout it! Where do you want to start?

[flashman13]

3. I suggest everyone read the complete Al Jazeera article. It provides

a very good thumbnail history of the last 150 years of involvement between Palestinians and Jews/Israelis. As I have tried to explain multiple times, October 7, 2023 is only a single atrocity in an unending string of atrocities committed by both sides in a conflict that has been going on for the last 100 years. The last real chance at peace died in 1995 with the murder of Yitzhak Rabin by a religious nut. Now Israel is governed by religious nuts and a narcissistic, corrupt Prime Minister. And no - I have no solution to end this horrific blood feud.

[burrowowl]

6. Yes, the article is vert wroth reading!