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Force and diplomacy must always go hand in hand.
Few people today know that Mandela was a paramilitary leader; he understood the limits of violence in securing the freedom of Black South Africans.
Hamas ****** up. Yes, more Palestinians than Israelis have died and will continue to die, but yesterday showed that they're not the organization that will lead Palestine to freedom and international recognition as a state.
Israeli soldiers were literally revolting against the extremist aspirations of the BIbi government. Why give him the gift of external aggression instead of using his unpopularity to further discredit the colonization of Palestinian territories?
That was a stupid move. I don't even know if we could argue today that Hamas' main objective is Palestinian freedom.
Almost a year ago, I posted the above in the Politics thread.
Today, the political leadership of Hamas is dead, the military leadership is in hiding, Hezbollah has been decimated, and Palestinians have lost all the diplomatic and military leverage they could have used to influence negotiations for a future state. They are now at the mercy of Israel, other Arab leaders (who are glad to see Iran and her proxies weakened, and who probably put the prospect of that happening above the Palestinian cause), and the UN.
And just in case my post gets misinterpreted here, this isn't a celebratory post; these are just observations from someone who doesn't know **** about politics...
They got Rappaport running their X account??
Plans are dependent on circumstances, and circumstances are not set in stone. That's the part you're not getting.This has been the plan FOR DECADES
Mandela never attacked civilian infrastructure; his targets were the Apartheid security apparatus. He also renounced violence while he was incarcerated at Robben Island. A lot of people wanted him to do the same thing Mugabe did in Zimbabwe (drive out the Afrikaners); instead, he established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to allow all South Africans to have a fresh start.Mandela embraced armed struggle to end the racist system of apartheid. Many believe apartheid would have endured much longer if he hadn’t rebelled and overturned the ANC’s long-standing nonviolence policy back in the 60s.
Have they?The Palestinians have committed to peace and also non-violence resistance and have done peace talks. What was the outcome? Didn't the PLO renounce to degrade and demilitarize and got co-opted by Israel?
This is Israel that's the brain child of a European settler colonial project and outpost that's backed by the West/US and armed as a nuclear power and to the teeth bent on destruction and genocide to expand their reach, take lands and resources and remain the superpower in the region.
Plans are dependent on circumstances, and circumstances are not set in stone. That's the part you're not getting.
Hamas ****** up because they gave Israel a very good excuse to enter Gaza long after they had left. Expecting Israelis to just sit back and issue statements after that attack, considering how their previous responses have been for much less, is just delusional. None of this is hard to grasp because Israelis have been predictable and non-ambiguous about their stance on external aggressions.
Furthermore, Hamas took the focus of Israeli society away from the PM they were angry about and his right-wing coalition and redirected it towards the Palestinian people. On Oct 8th, they were encouraging Hezbollah to attack Northern Israel, which never happened. They miscalculated by emboldening an unpopular leader, and they miscalculated by trusting the capabilities of allies who turned out to be paper monsters. The only thing left that could help Palestinians now is hoping that Israel will be made a pariah state by the international community, and that remains to be seen because of who Israel is allied with.
Mandela never attacked civilian infrastructure; his targets were the Apartheid security apparatus. He also renounced violence while he was incarcerated at Robben Island. A lot of people wanted him to do the same thing Mugabe did in Zimbabwe (drive out the Afrikaners); instead, he established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to allow all South Africans to have a fresh start.
Have they?
Arafat was always very wishy-washy about the position of the PLO on the existence of Israel, which is the main contention of this conflict. Arafat famously refused to continue the Camp David talks, partly because he was afraid of being killed by other Palestinian factions for being the guy who gave up on part of Mandatory Palestine.
The fundamental disagreement I have with this line of thinking - specifically the characterization of Israel as an outpost of the West - is, it assumes that Israel doesn't have its own ambitions, irrespective of what the US wants. Israel is not a vassal state of Western nations. Their goals are at odds with the preferred outcome of the State department, and they've been pretty blatant about ignoring American requests when it comes to conducting their war. Now, I've gone at length on why I think the US is still supporting Israel, and these are considerations that fall outside of realm of morals. And if I had to guess, an invasion of Lebanon would probably make the US take a stronger stance against Israel, but not before the UK/EU joins the other nations that are already condemning them.
Hamas were not just going to sit back
Western logic: Colonization is violent and we're allowed to blow up, plunder, and genocide our way through, but decolonization must be completely non-violent.
As for Mandela...Let's remember Mandela was once considered a criminal by South Africa's government and labeled a communist and terrorist in the eyes of the United States, where he remained on a terrorism watch list until 2008. ANC’s armed wing was linked to several high-profile bombings that killed South African civilians throughout the 1980s, prompting some among the country’s white minority to blame the “terrorist” Mandela.
Military leaders have written at length about ego and pride and how they are poor reasons to dive into battle.
You have a fundamental misunderstanding of how and why decolonization happens: colonization stops when it becomes too costly to maintain. It's the story of France in Indochina, Algeria, and in Haiti (which led to the Louisiana purchase and the widespread decolonization of French Africa); more recently, it's the history of the US in Afghanistan (regime change could be seen as a colonial project as well, in the sense that an external power decides to modify the internal structure of a society to its liking).
Mandela's non-violent movement made Apartheid too costly to maintain: the South African government started banning from the country white South Africans critical of the system (look up Andre Brink); their teams were banned from international competitions and trade with most nations. Exiled South Africans led boycott movements in western countries to exercise pressure on the Apartheid regime. Even the US begrudgingly abided by this state of affairs (at least in public). And the difference between the ANC and Hamas/PLO/PIJ is, the South African government couldn't point to an Iron Dome and the ANC rockets it intercepted.
How has armed resistance made Israeli occupation too costly to maintain? How has it motivated US support for Israel to decrease? If you ask me, the opposite has happened: every rocket launched is an excuse for them to ask the West more money in the name of security, and jeopardizing the security of Jewish people is a historical mistake that most western governments won't commit for a long time.