Over the first four days of Israel-Hamas prisoner exchange, Israel arrests 133 Palestinians while releasing 150.
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But the worry for Palestinian prisoners does not end after their release. The majority of those freed are usually rearrested by Israeli forces in the days, weeks, months and years after their release.
Dozens of those who were arrested in a 2011 Israel-Hamas prisoner exchange were rearrested and had their sentences reinstated.
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Many of the women and children released during the truce have testified to the abuse they experienced in Israeli prisons.
Several videos have also emerged in recent weeks of Israeli soldiers beating, stepping on, abusing and humiliating detained Palestinians who have been blindfolded, cuffed and stripped either partially or entirely. Many social media users said the scenes brought back memories of the torture tactics used by United States forces in Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison in 2003.
Well, is the poster up there saying that all Israelis are terrorists?
Conversely, what would saying “Palestine is the terrorist of the human race imply?” That some Palestinians are terrorists? That many Palestinians are terrorists? That all Palestinians are terrorists?
I think describing Israel as a terrorist state because it uses terrorist tactics is totally valid.
I’m not defending the tactics used by the Israeli military.
At the same time, they’re using tactics that are pretty similar to the tactics used by the United States in Iraq and in Afghanistan - yet even back then, despite all the opposition took America’s military interventions, we didn’t see people around the world claim that America was committing genocide or that America was s terrorist state.
Yet those labels are constantly applied to Israel.
Why do you think there’s this difference?
Just because no one said that about America doesn’t mean this one isn’t genocide. Just because one nation got away with it in the past does not make this any less genocide than it is.
Most likely the difference is political. No one could stand in the face of the US when it bombed Iraq, but it’s 2023 now and we know better. It took decades to build a strong case against genocide in Israel. It’s not a word people toss around lightly.
That’s right.
However, if incredibly different standards are being used depending on the nation in question, that certainly raises suspicions that people are not actually criticizing the act (a military intervention to combat a terrorist organization), but rather the nation itself.
If two countries can have the exact same experience (a terrorist attack that killed hundreds of its citizens), react to that in the exact same way (a military intervention determined to root out there terrorist organization at any cost, willingly accepting that thousands of civilians are being killed as “collateral damage”), but one gets accused of committing genocide while the other one gets celebrated (remember “Mission Accomplished” or the spontaneous celebrations when bin Laden was killed?), doesn’t that warrant the question why identical actions get treated so differently?
America occupied Iraq and Afghanistan for decades. Why wasn’t the same “strong case” never built against America? Why are people accusing Israel of genocide for killing thousands, but nobody has ever bothered accusing America of genocide for causing the deaths of hundreds of thousands?
You say that America is to powerful, that nobody could stand in it’s way - but that shouldn’t have stopped human rights organizations from saying that America is committing genocide, that shouldn’t have stopped the UN from accusing America of genocide, that shouldn’t have stopped people to demonstrate in the streets with Iraqi or Afghan flags demanding “free Afghanistan.”
Why did none of that happen?
I don’t know, what do you think?
Because Israel always gets held to a different standard.
Now the question is: why is that?
No idea. You tell me 🙄
Nah, you have a brain, you know why.
Well one thing that differentiates is how spread out ethnic Jewish people are, like there are almost as many Jewish people in the US as there are in Isreal, no other ethnicity is spread like that AFAIK.
Sure. Equating Israel with all Jews is just as wrong as equating the state of Israel with all those living within it.
Kay? Somegeek didn’t equate israel with all jews, or all those living within it?
And I never said that, either. I was asking whether or not somegeek was equating Israel with all Israelis, since they didn’t make a distinction (e.g. by saying “the state of Israel” or “the IDF” or “the Netanyahu administration”).
Seems fair in light of the broad statement made by somegeek.
I disagree, I believe it’s understood in common parlance. I hate “Iran” not the majority of its peoples but the government that rules it. I’ve been saying fuck Israel, I have no issues with the majority of Israelis and since for some reason it needs to be said now, I certainly don’t have issues with Jewish people because they are Jewish.
Would you apply those same standards to Gaza?
Would you say you hate “Gaza” if you hated the government that rules it, but not the millions of Palestinians living there?
Would you say “fuck Gaza” if you had no issues with the majority of Palestinians?
Because to me, it just seems that people apply wildly different standards. People seem to explain “here is my standard” when talking about one side, and then they absolutely refuse to adhere to their own standard when talking about the other side.
Saying Fuck Gaza is like saying fuck Wyoming, so sure why not? We say fuck Texas, or fuck Florida all the time. Saying fuck Palestine would be the equivalent to Saying fuck Israel. And yes people DO apply different standards. Welcome to being human. Not everything I’d black and white. Biases exists I’m. Not sure why this is apparently taking you by surprise. Let’s get Israel out of occupied Gaza, and then we can criticize the Palestinian governments lack of care for its people? Same with Ukraine, I fully support Ukraine, is their government without faults? No, but they’re kind of being attacked right now, so critizing them for doing XYZ or not doing XYZ while being bombed is pretty fucking stupid.
The West Bank is ruled by Fatah. Gaza is ruled by Hamas, partly because after Israel withdrew from Gaza, removed all Israeli settlers in Gaza, tore down illegal Israeli settlements and handed over other Israeli infrastructure to the Palestinians, Hamas got into power and never held elections again. Oh, and they also murdered Fatah members and instituted a de facto dictatorship.
So it makes sense to look at Gaza separately from the West Bank.
Well, all right then: are you okay with people saying 'Fuck Palestine" if they just dislike Hamas?