Personally I’d be sceptical. But the devil will be in the detail. Assuming that the Israelis come out on top (whatever that means) in Gaza then they’ll be faced with the problem of governing 2 million essentially destitute people. Would things be better* if the west left them to do that on their own or if it joined them to ‘help’ ?
*What does ‘better’ mean ? Better for whom ? Better in the shorter or the longer term ? Better for our consciences ? Better than letting others fill the vacuum ? Would our presence help ensure that Israel behaves better, or would it end up forcing us to oppress the Palestinians alongside them ?
Israel has allies because it knows their dirty little secrets.
[tin foil hat] The sceptic in me could think that Israel wants the US & UK in Gaza so that when the inevitable accidental shooting or war crime happens they can cover it up and use it as blackmail for continued support. [/tin foil hat]
I’ve been unable to shake the uncomfortable feeling for a while now that, if you are a person of Arabic descent, you do need to be killed by a very specific group of people for anyone to care. In fairness, I have seen a protest on behalf of Kurds. Everyone on the protest was Kurdish and they wouldn’t have filled a pub.
Lol, well never happen. Blue helmets maybe, but even then there would need to be an agreement between the Palestinian authority ( whoever that would be) and Israel. To put it simply, a peacekeeping UN force needs an agreed peace to monitor. Monitor is also key, rarely do they fight to enforce.
Any other peacelkeeping force will just be seen as targets.
The only long term peaceful end to this is a negociated settlement that both parties agree on. Best of luck with that.
I put it to you that half a million dead in less than a decade might be a inadequately defined by ‘sometimes.’ It rather underlines that you don’t seem to feel those ones matter as much. People tend to be blown apart in much the same way regardless of whether the source of the detonation was US derived targeted munition or Russian sourced 152mm shell.
I’m an actively terrible person. I read Josephus a quarter of a century ago, came to the bleak conclusion that the entire region is irrevocably fucked and has been for over two thousand years and stopped caring. I don’t protest, sign petitions or stick shit on my social media and I never will and I’m entirely comfortable with that. From my hell adjacent viewpoint though, I do watch the framing of people that do profess to care being- at best- uneven.
What we’re the terms of that ceasefire other than a massive outbreak of international virtue signalling? What were we taking about, a 2 week ceasefire? Longer? I wonder how many of those countries would put boots on the ground to enforce it as you could bet that one of the conditions would be that Hamas could not resupply weapons nor enter N Gaza.
I note that the demands for a ceasefire have not achieved a ceasefire. I doubt that would change if the UK moved into the demanding camp. It very well might change if the US moved, and really meant it, but they aren’t going to.
Demands are one thing but in the end you can get what you want by speaking softly. Just as long as you’re also carrying a big stick.
This is not specifically directed at you Chris but more to anyone who cares to respond:
The left cares deeply about the Palestinian cause and manages to get tens if not hundreds of thousands of people onto our streets and those of many western cities in response to the plight and suffering of the Palestinians.
On the face of it they appear to care a lot less about the plight of the Kurds, the Uighurs or the Rohinga all of whom have suffered tremendously in recent years.
If it is not anti-semitism that is motivating the protests why are the left not regularly flooding our streets in support of these other oppressed peoples?
Please be clear I am not labelling the left as anti-semites but I can see why others are looking at these facts and may be coming to that conclusion. Any thoughts on why the left is obsessed with Israel/Palestine and doesn’t appear to give a flying fuck about the ongoing oppression of other Muslim peoples?
Could it also be because there is such vehement support for the oppressor from most western states?
Taking the Kurds for example, there isn’t that support in the west for Russia.
Could another factor be that they feel there might be some chance of influencing the outcome in the Middle East (I fear they’re wrong, but all the same …) ? Perhaps they also feel the state of Israel is exerting influence in the UK which needs to be countered by voters here (close to Andrew’s point) ?
People care - if they care at-all - about whatever the media shoves under their nose. They care for a well-documented span of time, and then they stop, never to care again.
Israel/Palestine would be ignored just as readily as all of the other atrocities were it not for the fact that somehow Israel wields influence in the US and UK FAR out of all proportion to its economic significance. How that is, somewhat baffles me…
As with Ukraine, the situation does have the potential to spark much wider conflict, which certainly fosters greater engagement.
No one in the west ever gave so much as a picoshit about the 30 million that Stalin murdered or starved; no-one today pauses for so much as a nanosecond before buying this year’s iphone made in a cuntry that has imprisoned 1.5 million Uyghurs for daring to have a slightly different culture. We don’t like things we can’t spell…
I’d not be too hard on the don’t-cares, humans are instinctively tribal animals: me, Me, ME > My family > My village > Don’tgiveafuckistan. We’re not born caring.
I’m guessing here but could it be (possibly unconscious) guilt over their refusal to take significant numbers of Jewish refugees especially once the true horrors and extent of the Holocaust emerged post-war.
Thanks to all for your replies to my question re the left. I knew I could count on the collective wisdom of AA to supply plausible reasons.
This would be a measured and logical approach (Which I agree with) I’m sadly reminded there are two types of people for whom this doesn’t wash:
People who are indoctrinated sufficiently to ‘believe’ what they are doing is the will of God.
Psychopaths, that is to say people who are completely devoid of ‘care’ or fear of consequence.
Unfortunately the middle east appears to have an ample and ingrained quota of both.
Should this be the case, it would matter little if: Einstein, Buddha, Mother Teresa or Stronzetto were in negotiations with both sides; they will remain entrenched due to points 1&2 bolstered and blinded by generational hatred. I’m not pretending to have a solution here, if you disarmed the region an element of the populous would stab each other with spoons.
It seems the ongoing conflict drives greater attention and passion than other atrocitiesdue to the media’s insistence to keep it on and in the agenda.
