13th May 2024, 8:39 PM
(13th May 2024, 7:35 AM)Weltall Wrote: It's hard for me to see this latest round of Israel/Palestine bloodshed as anything but just the most recent episode of a long-running series. Their fathers were killing each other. Their grandfathers were killing each other. Their great-grandfathers were killing each other. Neither side seems interested in tolerating the existence of the other.
The only side I'm taking in this is, I'm on the side of all the people caught up in this bullshit against their wills, who are too old, too young, too sick or too poor to escape, and who never wanted any violence done to their neighbors. Picking sides between Hamas and the IDF seems like choosing my favorite kidney stone.
In domestic political terms, this conflict was the best thing that ever happened to the Republicans. Joe Biden is in a position where a lot of people will be angry with him, no matter which move he makes, and anyone who decides not to vote for Joe is, essentially, a net positive vote for Donald Trump, who will gleefully make the entire situation much worse, right away.
That "kidney stone" comment really describes my position. It's so annoying trying to explain my position on Israel's military efforts and have to say, repeatedly "yes, yes I condemn Hamas already". I'm fully in favor, should this be what Israel chooses to do, of a campaign of "realigning" Hamas via targeted clandestine assassination of their leadership. The public at large in Israel? I have nothing against them, nor do I have anything against Palastinians at large. So, my side is "end the killing". Some would claim they want to end the killing as in reaching the end of a book, by "getting all the killing over with". That... isn't my position.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)