this post was submitted on 08 May 2024
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A serious red line has been crossed: America’s democratic freedoms, expansive on paper, will simply not tolerate serious dissent on the U.S.–Israel relationship. As criticisms of Israel have become more mainstream, the attempt to shut them down entirely has become more extreme.

In pursuit of this blank-check relationship with an Israeli government that is becoming ever-more intransigent with each passing year, pro-Israel forces in the U.S. are attacking our own democratic freedoms in order to suppress public outcry about apartheid and potential genocide 6,000 miles away. And, if the recent campus crackdowns are any indication, these forces are winning their battle.

With tens of thousands of Palestinians left dead and the Israeli assault on Gaza ongoing, the U.S. protests targeting university ties with Israel over the last month — voluble and outspoken — have been overwhelmingly nonviolent.

Yet these nonviolent protests have met with the full brutal force of the U.S. security state. Dispersing the protest encampments, police have viciously beaten protesters, fired rubber bullets, and enveloped students in dense clouds of tear gas.

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[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 year ago (4 children)

What a photo. A guy clad head to toe in black squared up with a club in front of the ruins of a protest, the only color in his uniform a big gold star and an American flag.

Why do they have flags on their uniform? Is someone going to mistake which country they're in? Are they soldiers at war? Bringing righteous patriotism into a career that mostly attacks US citizens is a really chilling idea.

Cops don't have any direct association with America as a whole. They're a civilian organization employed and directed by local officials. I believe those are California Highway Patrol officers. If they absolutely have to wear a flag, they can have a bear.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The flag is being used as a symbol of government authority. Governments are big on symbols (YT link) because they work.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

It seems they are utilizing it the way people on the right do. If you are queer for instance and you come across a gathering where a bunch of people are flying the stars and stripes you remove yourself from that situation because those people are almost always not safe. Those people have used it as a symbol of fear and intimidation wrapped up cloak of patriot rhetoric for a good decade now.

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Gee, who could have predicted electing someone that spent 50 fucking years loudly declaring that there is absolutely nothing that would ever make him support Israel any less....

Biden talking about current protestors sounds a hell of a lot like trump talking about BLM tho

[–] [email protected] 65 points 1 year ago (3 children)

“Dissent is essential for democracy,” Biden said at the White House. “But dissent must never lead to disorder.”

"Can't you just shoot them, just shoot them in the legs or something?"

Yup. Indistinguishable.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

“There’s the right to protest, but not the right to cause chaos,” Mr. Biden said into cameras in his first personal remarks on the campus fray in 10 days. “People have the right to get an education, the right to get a degree, the right to walk across the campus safely without fear of being attacked.” Antisemitism, he added, “has no place” in America.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/02/us/politics/biden-campus-protests.html

It's peaceful protests to get him to stop funding a genocide, and he's saying the protestors are the violent ones...

Like, you realize racists said the same thing about MLK and the civil rights movement?

Biden was friends with most of those senators. When he talks about the "good ole days" he's talking about hanging out with Strom Thurmond and fighting school integration.

This is who he's always been.

If protests arent inconvenient, how is it going to work?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

He’s not talking about peaceful protest there. He’s clearly addressing attacks on Jewish people. In case you’re not aware, antisemitism is prejudice against Jews, prejudice against Israel is nationalism. I know Netanyahu likes to conflate the two, but Biden knows the difference.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 1 year ago (2 children)

He’s clearly addressing attacks on Jewish people.

But those haven't been happening...

And cops are getting violent with all of them. Even the protestors who are also Jewish and carrying signs saying so.

This isn't a religious thing. It's a genocide thing.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (8 children)

That’s outrageously incorrect. We’re not talking about attacking pro-Israel protesters, or attacks by pro-Palestinian protesters. We’re talking about people ignorantly attacking Jewish students simply because they’re Jewish. They’re being attacked verbally and physically, receiving harassing emails, and being doxxed for being Jewish.

Antisemitism in the US is up 400% since October. College students across the nation have been targeted.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-antisemitic-incidents-up-about-400-since-israel-hamas-war-began-report-says-2023-10-25/

https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/29/business/antisemitism-college-harvard-upenn/index.html

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/73-jewish-college-students-experienced-seen-antisemitism-start-school-rcna127014

https://www.timesofisrael.com/us-jewish-students-say-pro-israel-violence-at-ucla-protest-camp-undercuts-advocacy/

This isn’t a religious thing. It’s a genocide thing.

That’s exactly the ignorance that is causing the problem. Jewish is both an ethnicity as well as a religion. That’s why antisemitism is uniquely different, it’s both religious persecution and racism. You should be more informed or you may unintentionally promote hate.

Jews are not committing genocide. Israel is.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

The ADL has defined anti-Zionism to be antisemitic, so of course they will say antisemitism has rocketed. I don't doubt that there has been some increase in antisemitism, which is awful, to be clear. But when there are such widespread, deliberate efforts to muddy the waters by conflating anti-Israel sentiment with anti-semitism, the accusation loses its power. And that conflation happens in the articles you posted.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago

Well, cops have beaten the shit out of a lot of Jewish students, so there definitely have been attacks on Jewish people. Don't think that's what Biden was referencing though.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Have you seen any videos of people attacking Jewish people?

If it’s that prevalent then there must be hundreds of such videos.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

The articles I shared above have first hand accounts as well as statistics. Most of the attacks are verbal, some physical, harassing emails, and doxxing. Are you suggesting it’s not happening without video?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Im suggesting it’s not happening at a level which would be more than 1% of protesters.

Verbal isn’t worth shit. People have something to gain by lying.

How come we can find videos of people peacefully protesting but all this violence seems to be done off camera?

Are you suggesting that the protesters actually hate Jews and they don’t care about Palestinians?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Not at all. I’m stating, as well as the articles I’ve provided, that there are people that confuse Israel with Jews, and then attack Jews out of ignorance. That’s what Biden is speaking against.

You’re taking the criticism personally, but it’s not directed at all protestors. It’s directed at the ones that can’t discern the difference between protests and attacks, or Israel and Jews. It’s that simple.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

And would you like to put a percentage on the protesters with ill intent?

To me it seems like an insignificant amount, and perhaps we should be focusing on the people with a good message and not focus on the few assholes.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

coming from a true democratic country is kinda sad read this, just accepting the lesser evil of the two options, both paid by billions dollar companies, and still calling itself democratic

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

It's still a republic with democratic features.

Those features involve lots of money.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

“But dissent must never lead to disorder.”

Let me translate that for those who don't understand liberal pretend-democracy schtick.

"We will tolerate dissent as long as it doesn't threaten the status quo with actual change - if it does, we sicc our pet fascists on you."

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago

Of course the US will have democracy, it's just that poor people having it would be bad for the US

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

You know what they say... fascism is just colonialism coming home to roost.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Israel itself means little to the US. It's merely the conduit through which the US Geo-political power gets channeled through in the Middle East at the moment. The moment that Israel become more burden than value, they will be dropped and abandoned like many of nations/regions across the planet.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's not even it though. The US has so many military bases around the world that Israel is hardly worth maintaining a presence in, much less giving them billions in aid a year. I don't think the US even used Israel for any significant staging for the gulf war and they were all but involved.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (3 children)

It is still the focal point of US presence in the middle east for all the surrounding nations. Israel is synonymous with US power in the region.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

It’s merely the conduit through which the US Geo-political power gets channeled through in the Middle East at the moment.

Well... there's always Saudi Arabia - another shining example of "succesful" US foreign policy.

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