Latest Posts by malificandy - Page 4

Out of curiosity, what does the UN actually gain from keeping the terrorists in power? Obviously antisemitism but way do they materially gain?

Anon, don't be so quick to dismiss antisemitism. It's a really powerful motivator, for some people even more than money, because it is often to connected to a person's views of themselves, their society and the world. As such, antisemitism can be linked to issues of self-worth or hope for the future. And the place where someone's self-worth depends on demonizing Jews, or their future hopes depends on the notion that their society will be so much better, if only a Jewish collective (whether the Jewish religion, race or state) will be dismantled, they are emotionally invested in ways that can be far more crucial to them than money.

So I personally do think that antisemitism played a big role in how the UN has acted regarding Israel for decades.

For example, the UN sets up a special agency to help Koreans in Dec 1950 (UNKRA). By Jul 1958, less than 8 years later and 5 years after a ceasefire was achieved between the two Koreas, the agency was seen as having served its purpose, and was dismantled. Since then, if there are ever Korean refugees still in need of help, it goes through the general UNHCR (established 1951. It replaced the UN's temporary agency IRO, established Dec 1946, which itself took over from UNRRA, established Nov 1943), the UN refugee agency that takes care of ALL refugees in the world... except the Palestinian ones. Their agency (UNPRP) was established by UN resolution 212 in Nov 1948, and later became UNRWA in Dec 1949.

Now, take a second to consider how there was NEVER any UN agency dedicated specifically to help about 1.5 million Jewish Holocaust survivors at the end of WWII, which is May 1945 (with many of them still being murdered after the end of the war, in places like Poland in Jul 1946 or Libya in the Nov 1945 and Jun 1948 pogroms). No special agency for them, no intervention to protect people who had literally been through and somehow survived the worst genocide in human history, and were still being targeted and killed after it was done, even though the UN had a talent for establishing plenty of refugee agencies just fine during those years. But there was a special agency set up for the Arabs in the Land of Israel, even though they were the aggressors in the 1947-1949 Independence War, and it still operates to this day, unlike UNKRA, which was set up later than UNRWA. Why? What reason is there for treating Holocaust victims worse than the Arabs who declared a war of extermination against Jews in Israel? Or for treating Palestinians better than any other group of refugees in the world, even though other groups often need the help much more?

I can only see one thing in common when it comes to all of these illogical, counterintuitive decisions, and that is antisemitism. Dislike the Jews? Deprive them of getting their own agency, even while others get one. Hate the Jews? Dedicate special resources to the refugees who can be used as a political pawn against the Jewish state, while still counting them as refugees even after being resettled with citizenship elsewhere, unlike every other refugees group.

And never forget, the UN's voting "democracy" (where antisemitic abuse is not penalized in votes) IS inherently vulnerable to the tyranny of the majority. There is only one Jewish state at the UN. There is a block of over 20 Arab countries, another of over 50 Muslim ones, and when they're told a lie such as the one invented by Amin al-Husseini in 1929, that the Jews are attacking the al-Aqsa mosque, then it's easy to recruit all of them against Israel without even much effort. Then add countries which have vested interests in keeping the Arab and Muslim countries on their side, or who have issues with the pro-west, pro-democracy countries (and Israel is not only one of them, it is closely allied with the US, which is the leader of that stance) and basically the one Jewish state has close to no chance.

But over the years, in addition to being invested in keeping the issue of the Palestinian refugees going as a tool against Israel, to present the Jewish state as uniquely oppressive, the UN has also become invested in the jobs that the conflict produces for its members. UNRWA alone employees over 30,000 people and is, by the UN's own admission, one of its biggest employers.

On top of that, the UN also has other workers who deal specifically with the conflict (and therefore are employed thanks to it), such as OCHA oPt. OCHA (Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs) is the "humanitarian arm" of the UN and oPt is its branch that takes care specifically of the Palestinians. WHY is there even a need for this, if the Palestinians already have (UNIQUELY!) an entire UN agency dedicate just to them? And then on top of that (yes! A redundancy on top of a redundancy!) they also have a Palestinian branch for the OHCHR (Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights).

Having so many employees dedicated to this specific conflict does make the UN financially invested in keeping it from being resolved. Also, it's probably easier to get donations for the UN when talking about this falsely over-hyped conflict (here's a recent example, a report shows there's no famine in Gaza, the UN has known this and kept it quiet), especially when the hype is fed by so many antisemites happy to spread libels about the Jewish state. Some of the antisemites are likely very rich and happy to donate to any organization targeting Israel (I can even name some very wealthy governments happy to continuously donate to the UN and UNRWA, when they're also known for their antisemism, like financially sponsoring known antisemitic professors at US universities).

I do think the antisemitism is what enabled the creation of the financial aspect to the UN's anti-Israel bias, and interest in preserving the conflict, but now I'll mention one more factor. It's also one that IMO was preceded by the antisemitism and financial interest, but now it adds its own fuel to the fire. Since 2007, when Hamas violently took over Gaza, in order to keep its programs running there, the UN has been collaborating with Hamas. Because that's what happens in an actual dictatorship, which has absolute power over its people, and doesn't allow for any civilian liberties. If you wanna run a UN agency in North Korea, you will HAVE to collaborate with Kim Jong Un's dictatorial regime. And if you want to run a UN agency in Gaza post Jun 2007, you will HAVE to collaborate with Hamas. So that's exactly what the UN has been doing in Gaza. In doing so, it has been collaborating with a genocidal, antisemitic, radical Islamist, terrorist organization. And as has allowed Israel to enter Gaza and gather evidence, we have more and more proof that the UN is complicit in Hamas' crimes. That is NOT something the UN wants the world to realize. So it's trying its best to stop Israel from fighting in Gaza, to prevent the gathering of further evidence, at the same time that the UN is doing its best to screw over Israel's credibility. If the UN can vilify the best witness against it, who will believe the evidence about its complicity anyway?

I hope that helps answer the question!

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

In world affairs, the strategy of “just pretend it isn’t happening” has an extremely poor track record. Nor is it true that, as the chief of medicine on Scrubs once put it, “if you don’t look for a mistake, you can’t find one.”

Now that the world has been forced to admit that there is no famine in Gaza, it has been made clear that Israel is letting plenty of food aid into the strip. Which means it’s time to admit something is happening to that food, and it isn’t Israel’s fault. From the Wall Street Journal:

Officials from the United Nations, the largest distributor of aid in Gaza, say that people are looting trucks when they reach Gaza, making it unsafe for their employees to deliver aid. By midafternoon on Monday, no U.N. trucks arrived to pick up aid from the Kerem Shalom crossing, where on Sunday Israel began a daily pause to fighting from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. along a key north-south road used to deliver aid throughout much of Gaza. The Israeli military said 21 other trucks picked up supplies on Sunday. “We need to keep people safe,” said Scott Anderson, the Gaza-based director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, a key group tasked with managing aid distribution in the Strip. An official with the World Food Program, another U.N. agency that delivers aid to Gaza, also cited looting en route to WFP warehouses as hindering deliveries.

So UN trucks are allowed into Gaza, it’s just that the UN drivers don’t want to go because they fear Palestinian violence.

Read more: Here

I believe one of the most telling signs of how bad blatant antisemitism has gotten, is that diaspora Jews are terrified for Israeli Jews, while Israeli Jews are terrified for diaspora Jews.

Here's the latest example of why I, as an Israeli Jew, in the middle of a multi-front war, am terrified for my siblings abroad...

Two vids that I combined into one, because Tumblr's a dick to posts with multiple ones:

What makes this of particular concern is the fact that this is a man who's supposed to be combating antisemitism, but instead he's perpetuating it, while actively denying Jews some of the few tools that are meant to protect marginalized communities...

IDK if it's of any comfort, but diaspora Jews, you are NOT alone. We see you, we hear what you're going through, we care. We wish we could do more for you, but you are NEVER alone. <3

Sending you all the love from Israel, be strong! xoxox

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

The last Jews of Bukhara, Uzbekistan, 2019, photographed by Bruno Zanzottera

Located along the Silk Roads and the edges of several former empires, the city of Bukhara has been home to a big and unique Jewish community for over two millennia - one of the most ancient ethnic groups in all of Central Asia. Historically they spoke Bukhori a Judeo-Tajik dialect. In the 1970s, Jews began to leave the Soviet Union, including Uzbekistan, and the synagogues as well as other Jewish institutions were closed by the Communist government. In Bukhara, the community has declined significantly: if in the past it consisted of 46,000 people, now there are just over 100 Jews. Those remaining want to make sure that their history, language and traditions do not get lost.

Every once in a while, the magnitude of the Hamas massacre hits me all over again.

I'm not sure most people get it even now.

In absolute numbers, it is one of the three deadliest terrorist attacks in human history (second or third worst, depends on which estimates you trust for the Camp Speicher massacre), but if we take it in relation to the size of the population in the attacked country (which we should, because terrorism by its very nation seeks to victimizes through psychological trauma the entire target population, and not just those who were physically affected during the attack), then what Hamas did IS the single deadliest terrorist attack in the entirety of human history.

But it's even more than that.

Never, in any other attack, have the terrorists taken over as much land as Hamas did on Oct 7. ENTIRE TOWNS were under complete control of the terrorists, some for SEVERAL DAYS (I specifically remember watching a report on one town, where combat with the terrorists was still taking place on Oct 11, meaning on day 5 of this terrorist invasion into Israel). ENTIRE TOWNS WERE OCCUPIED. BY TERRORISTS. There's not a single Hollywood action movie dealing with such a scenario, because NOTHING OF THIS SCALE HAS EVER HAPPENED BEFORE. Imagine waking up and hearing in real time that the northern half of the American states Washington, Idaho and Montana has been taken by terrorists, who are driving through the streets freely, as they murder, pillage, rape, torture, maim, burn and kidnap people, and almost no one's there to stop them.

And then imagine the world expecting the US government to just... let the terrorists retreat to the other side of an international border in the north, after having murdered over 40,400 American, most of which are civilians, almost 183,000 more injured, and while taking with them across the border over 8,450 American hostages, to God knows what awful fate, for how long, or if they will even ever come back alive. Entire communities and regions would be devastated, without knowing if they'd be able to rebuild. The total would be more than 230,000 Americans directly impacted (I've adapted the real numbers from Oct 7 to the size of the American population... Remember the horrendous 9/11 attack, which saw 2,977 victims killed and a few thousands more injured, and think of what would be the emotional punch of over 230,000 direct victims).

Imagine expecting the US to let that go, and allow those terrorists to continue existing and ruling the land on its northern border. Imagine expecting the US to do so while this terrorist organization openly declares that it will repeat this large scale massacre whenever possible, until the entire country is destroyed.

And please don't come at me with "Fine, Israel can react, but not like this." Unless you have the military expertise to explain exactly how Israel can protect its people from this attack ever being repeated, and to free all our hostages, without civilian casualties (despite Hamas intentionally using them as human shields, and even directly causing Gazan deaths), unless you can translate the vague "not like this" into something practical, some actual guidelines on how this urban war could have been fought differently, even though there's no historical precedent to support that this is possible, "not like this" is just wishful thinking at the expense of the safety and right to live of Israelis.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

BOOK RIOT

Hoopla, Overdrive/Libby Now Banned for Those Under 18 in Mississippi

Public libraries in Mississippi have cut off access to digital platforms like Overdrive and Hoopla to those under 18.

I never want to hear conservatives go on about repressive censorship in China, North Korea, and Iran ever again

i’m really upset by the amount of goyim that have the desire to convert but are ardently ‘antizionist’ to the point of excluding any perceived zionists.

i love when people convert. member of the tribe! many of my irl friends and mutuals are jews that converted!!

but it breaks my heart that there are people out there that want to cherry pick their own idea of my religion and people.

i didn’t get to choose. i was born into jewishness with family already in israel. israel as a concept is intertwined with my literal existence, every prayer i learned from birth is in hebrew, the shema begins with a call for israel, my uncle is an israeli rabbi, and i go by my hebrew name with a lot of my family and shul.

at this point in time, zionism is agreeing that the jewish people have a right to self determination in their ancestral land. which is israel. it is still the very same israel my family has been yearning for since before it was ever renamed to Palestine.

please don’t expect to come into my home, decide it’s also yours, then pretend like i don’t exist because i don’t fit your idea of it.

if you refuse to listen to all jews, you will never be one of us.

Above image is a pride flag with every color band represented by a NASA image. White is Earth clouds, pink is aurora, blue is the Sun in a specific wavelength, brown is Jupiter clouds, black is the Hubble deep field, red is the top of sprites, orange is a Mars crater, yellow is the surface of Io, green is a lake with algae, blue is Neptune, and purple is the Crab Nebula in a specific wavelength.

I hate to break it to you kids, but honey bees are invasive. They were brought to NA, they don't belong here. We don't need to save honey bees, we need to save our NATIVE bees. But native bees don't produce a humans commodity.

Scientific American

The Problem with Honey Bees

They’re important for agriculture, but they’re not so good for the environment

vegans making honey a bee labour issue is the funniest thing imaginable because like, you picked the one animal that has already unionised

Facing The Facts: Resources on the Armenian Genocide

Frequently Asked Questions About Armenian Genocide

Sample Archival Documents on the Armenian Genocide: U.S. Archives

Sample Archival Documents on the Armenian Genocide: British Archives

Map of the 1915 Armenian Genocide in the Turkish Empire

Talaat Pasha's Official Orders Regarding the Armenian Massacres, March 1915-January 1916

The Massacre of the Armenians (”Ambassador Morgenthau describes the forced evacuation of one group of Armenians from their homeland to the Syrian desert.”)

American Documents

British Documents

Russian Documents

French Documents

Austrian Documents

Public Lectures

Eye Witnesses

The Turkish Woman

That is all right, but who killed hundred of thousands Armenians?

Einar af Wirsen

The Story of Anna Hedwig Bull, an Estonian Missionary of the Armenian Genocide.

"That's How It Was"

ARAB EYEWITNESS FAYEZ ALGHUSSEIN ABOUT THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

Report by an Eye-Witness, Lieutenant Sayied Ahmed Moukhtar Baas

Letters of Turkish doctors addressed to the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Turkey

Martyred Armenia: Eyewitness account of the Armenian genocide by Faiz El-Ghusein a Turkish official

PHOTO COLLECTION OF ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

I genuinely believe that a lot of the reason that the American left is so ineffectual and self-sabotaging is because of how deeply and unrepentantly calvinist it is.

🌈Just a reminder to be super normal about people being visibly Jewish at Pride events (or anywhere, actually). You cannot tell anything about their views on the war just by knowing that they're Jewish.

Most Jews I know are feeling extremely unsafe right now, even if they are very vocal supporters of Palestine, and if you care about inclusion, diversity, justice, and peace then it is in the interest of your own values to make them feel safe and welcomed right now too.

And before people go feral in the comments- you can both care about Palestine AND take tangible actions to make Jews know feel safe in your community. You do not have to think those sufferings are equal to address both. Frankly, Im willing to say that the stance of "But Palestine has it worse therefore Im justified in not caring about/perpetuating fear for Jews" is actually someone who is excited about what they see as a free pass to be antisemitic and you SHOULD call them out. 🌈

CNN

Why OpenAI should fear a Scarlett Johansson lawsuit | CNN Business

Could Scarlett Johansson sue OpenAI for creating a voice assistant that sounds like the actor’s performance in the 2013 film “Her,” about a

So ... one of the interesting things in this article is that there's already legal precedent in Johansson's favour here. Apparently, Bette Midler turned down an offer to do a Ford ad, and they got one of her backup singers, and the likeness was so close that a fair few people came to Midler and said they thought she'd done it.

Tom Waits? Same deal, but with Frito-Lay. The Midler precedent was cited.

This? When you add Altman's going on and on about creating the real-life version of an AI that Johansson played in Her on former-Twitter for weeks before it came out? He's going to get eaten alive in court.

Altman has fucked up. He said the quiet part loud. He put the spotlight on it in the worst possible way ... well, for the industries that want to skim people's voices to not pay voice actors etc, anyway. Because not only is it just going to be ... well, slop, honestly, but it's turned a spotlight on not only the issues with AI voices, but also the Midler precedent. Now just about anyone whose voice is approximated by an AI can cite the Midler precedent.

I'm never sure what to make of Johansson from one bit of star gossip to the next, but this time? SUE HIM INTO A FUCKING CRATER, SCARJO.

For the Nonnie who asked me to share some of the response to the performative "all eyes on Rafah" campaign, I hope it's okay if I add to the two images you sent me, and turn to the people sharing that AI generated image...

If all eyes are on Rafah, are you seeing Hamas' abuse, torture and even killing of its own Gazan civilians?

("Resistance is justified when people are occupied!" Cool cool, but what kind of a "resistance" attacks its own people?)

If all eyes are on Rafah, where were your eyes on Oct 7?

If all eyes are on Rafah, 'coz Gazan kids being burned alive (by Hamas, even though Israel got falsely blamed for it) is so unacceptable, then where were your eyes when our kids were burned alive by Hamas? In the pic: 2 years old Omer Siman Tov, who was deliberately burned alive by Hamas terrorists together with his entire family, his parents and two older sisters, in their own home.

If all eyes are on Rafah, do you see Kfir Bibas, kidnapped at the age of 9 months together with both his parents and his 4 years old brother Ariel? Kfir is the youngest hostage in the world ever (second youngest ever was Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr., who was kidnapped at 20 months old in 1932).

If all eyes are on Rafah, are you seeing our other molested hostages?

If all eyes are on Rafah, are you seeing Hamas' rocket launchers which continuously operate and target our civilians from there? (note the dates vary from Dec 7, 2023 to May 26, 2024)

If all eyes are on Rafah, where the IDF did strike and kill two senior Hamas leaders, Yassin Rabia and Khaled Najjar, near (but not at) a shelter tent camp, are you seeing that Hamas deliberately chooses to risk its own civilians by having its leaders carry out consultation meetings so close to regular people?

If all eyes are on Rafah, why did you see the rescue of two of our elderly hostages (and the killing of the terrorists who tried to prevent the success of this operation) as a massacre? And why did you claim this was Israel invading Rafah back on Feb 12 already, when the actual ground operation in that city only started in May?

If all eyes are on Rafah because you care about the Palestinians so much, where were your eyes when Palestinians were endangered and killed by fellow Arabs?

If all eyes are on Rafah, where almost a million people have been evacuated by May 20 already, then whose eyes are on Sudan, Congo, Yemen, Syria, Iran, Ukraine among other places, where the murders of hundreds of thousands in each (and altogether, millions) is being carried on unchallenged? Where are the campaigns for the people whose slaughter you can't weaponize against the Jewish state?

If you shared that graphic, but didn't do anything about any of the other things listed in this post, you don't actually care. You just want to seem as if you do.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

pro-AI in the sense of "they taught a bread scanning computer to recognize cancer cells" etc etc

against AI in the sense of "we stole artwork from hundreds to thousands of artists, didn't credit them and didn't financially compensate them"

An incomplete "there's a good chance the icon you love and support is a Zionist" list

🌟 Raphael Lemkin, a Jewish Holocaust survivor, whose family was murdered during it. Lemkin is responsible for coining the term "genocide," and for every legal provision that exists today against it. His work against genocide was inspired by his Zionism.

🌟 Martin Luther King, Jr., who did not only support Israel and its right to security, a fellow participant at a dinner with MLK shortly before his assassination quotes him as having stopped a student attacking Zionism, and replied, "When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You’re talking antisemitism." He also encouraged Americans in 1967 to support the Jewish state, as Egypt blockaded the Straits of Tiran, endangering Israeli citizens by cutting the country off from its oil supply.

🌟 Emma Lazarus, a Jewish American poet, whose words ("Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breath free") are engraved on the Statue of Liberty's pedestal, after they helped raise the money needed for its completion. Drawing from the value of Jewish solidarity, she also wrote, "Until we are all free, we are none of us free," adopted as a slogan by intersectionality (while many in the movement exclude Jews from it). She was a great supporter of establishing a state for Jews in the Jewish homeland, having argued for this idea years before the word "Zionist" was even coined.

🌟 The 14th Dalai Lama, the leader of the fight against the occupation of Tibet, who was invited in 1994 to Israel, at a time when China's communist regime did its best to prevent his visits anywhere in the world, and who came to Israel more than once, talking about the 2000 years long Zionism of Jewish culture in exile as an inspiration and role model for Tibetans. "Among Tibetan refugees, we are always saying to ourselves that we must learn the Jewish secret to keep our traditions, in some cases under hostile circumstances."

🌟 Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who spoke more than once about how her pursuit of justice is a continuation of that very same thing in Jewish tradition. She had repeatedly referred to American Zionist Jews as sources of inspiration. For example, in 2018, during her fifth visit to Israel, in a speech she gave when receiving the Genesis Award, she mentioned two such women, Emma Lazarus and Henrietta Szold.

🌟 Nelson Mandela had an ambivalent view of Israel, but repeatedly recognized its right to exist, which makes him a Zionist, he also called upon Arab states to do the same, and was favorable towards the Zionist Jews who supported him during his underground days. Mandela being critical of Israel and still a Zionist is an apt reminder that criticizing the Jewish state and opposing its very existence are NOT the same thing, and only one's antisemitic.

🌟 Felix Salten, the Jewish author of Bambi (the book Disney's movie is based on). The tale was originally a metaphor for Jews suffering antisemitism, something Salten personally had to cope with. He was also an ardent Zionist, feeling the self-liberation at the core of this ideology suited his idea of how to deal with Jew hatred.

🌟 Sun Yat-Sen, who helped end the rule of China's last imperial dynasty, was its first provisional president, and is nowadays honored as an important Chinese leader in both China and Taiwan (sometimes referred to as "Father of the Chinese Nation"). He was an enthusiastic supporter of Zionism. Among other instances of expressing that, he wrote in a 1920 letter to a leader of the Jewish community in Shang Hai about Zionism that it is, "one of the greatest movements of the present time. All lovers of Democracy cannot help but support wholeheartedly and welcome with enthusiasm the movement to restore your wonderful and historic nation, which has contributed so much to the civilization of the world and which rightfully deserves an honorable place in the family of nations."

🌟 Magnus Hirschfeld, a gay Jewish sexologist, nicknamed among other things "The Einstein of Sex" and "The Father of Gay Liberation," because his medical and scientific work on human sexuality, as well as social advocacy for women's, gay and trans rights, was nothing short of pioneering. He was persecuted by the Nazis to the point where he died in exile. They broke into his institute of sexual research, where the world's first clinic performing sex reassignments surgeries was located, and burned down the institute's library. Hirschfeld had attended a Zionist conference following the Balfor Declaration of 1917, and his work on sexual liberation found inspiration in young socialist Jewish Zionist workers he met during a visit to the Land of Israel in 1931-2.

🌟 Marcia Langton, a professor and prominent Aboriginal rights activist from Australia, who has been leading the fight against racism and for her community. She spoke out against the hijacking of native rights movements by terrorist sympathizers and antisemites, and has clearly stood against all loss of life, including that of Israelis.

🌟 Felix Zandman, a Holocaust survivor whose work on resistors is integrated into many smartphones, laptops, cars, satellites, hospital ventilators (saving many Covid patients), airplanes and more. Whenever the anti-Israel crowd is scrolling social media on their phones, they're enjoying the work of a Zionist, who enthusiastically supported the State of Israel, and even introduced an important improvement to the Israeli Merkava tank, which has likely saved many Israeli lives, Jewish and non-Jewish alike, and others like him, since Israel's high tech is considered only second to Silicon Valley (going back to at least the 1990's). If they truly wish to boycott everything that's been "contaminated" by Zionism, they should probably just boycott technology.

🌟 Rosa Parks, an African American leader of the civil rights movement (and someone who personally demonstrated how one can resist without turning violent). She was one of 200 notable black American leaders who publicly organized to express their support and respect of Zionism as the Jewish right to self-determination, and Israel as the manifestation of that right.

-> Like I said, this is VERY incomplete, even just in terms of how the overwhelming majority of Jews are Zionist, and have been since the inception of Judaism, which is itself Zionist. Over the years, this led to many non-Jewish human and native rights champions to be supportive of Zionism, too. Take note of who is being vilified, when the term "Zionist" is ignorantly used as if it means anything other than belief in the equal right of Jews to liberation and self-determination in the Jewish ancestral land. Especially when it is used as being inherently evil.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

"I'd rather beg for forgiveness than beg for my life."

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

Just tossing this here so non-jewish mutuals/followers are aware, since I think this isn't as well known: Jewish Voice for Peace is as representative of jews as Autism Speaks is of autistic people. That is to say - not at all.

To clarify, I do not disagree with the idea of jews fighting for.. well, peace. I am a big supporter of organizations like Standing Together which pushes for exactly that. The issue is that JVP just makes shit up, often misrepresents or totally messes up jewish tradition (like the time when they misspelled every single hebrew word on their passover plate), and is generally such a car crash that it would be a bad idea to take their comments on judaism at face value.

US Ivy League colleges proudly present: people who don't know shit, but won't take the time to learn and care about the harm they cause Jewish people.

The thing I keep coming back to, with all the *gestures expansively* is that real life doesn't have peaceful epilogues.

Every single win has to be defended. Forever. I'm sorry. It sucks. The Nazis lost until they stopped losing. The US had abortion rights, and then 50 years later it didn't. Empires fall, and then they invade other countries again. Oppressive regimes are overthrown and replaced with other oppressive regimes. You will never finish the work etc etc etc. Which is why it's so fucking important to be able to acknowledge and celebrate progress, when it happens. The people who came before you didn't put in all that work for nothing, and you aren't, either. You can't save it all for the Ultimate Victory because there is never going to be an Ultimate Victory. There's no such thing as a time when everything is good, and ours shall not be the commune of Heaven.

When a ceremonial monarch who largely didn't do anything died, tumblr cheered about it because she symbolised colonialism and imperialism. Not because of anything she personally did, but because of her *symbolism*.

When someone dies who personally presided over mass executions of political dissidents, oversaw as a political leader massive repression of women, religious minorities and ethnic minorities and helped organise genocide and civil war throughout the Middle East, only Iranian and Jewish tumblrs are saying anything.

Skewed priorities much?

Another Jew on here commented that people were going onto Wikipedia and removing references to certain people's Jewishness, and I just saw for myself that this is true. As a Jew and a fan of old movies and history, I was looking up a list of Jewish actors on Wikipedia. I saw Tina Louise (you know, from Gilligan's Island) pop up. So I popped over to her actual page on Wikipedia. And there were zero references to her being Jewish. So I hopped on over to the Wayback Machine (bless you, Internet Archive) and put in the URL for her Wikipedia page. And wouldn't ya know it: before 10/7, there were at least 3 to 5 references to her Jewishness at any given time on her Wikipedia page. Wtf is happening.