#erasing Israel

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Daniel Ben-Ami

A man goes into a store to buy a can of Pepsi. The proceeds of the sale go through a chain of cash-thumbing, financial intermediaries. Eventually the money is handed over to someone to pay for the manufacture of a missile. The missile is fitted on to a combat aircraft, which closes in on its target. Eventually the missile locks on to a (presumably) Palestinian child. As it explodes, the word ‘boycott’ flashes up on screen.

This video, distributed on X by Palestine Online, is just one of countless anti-Israel clips on social media. But it bears closer examination as it helps to illustrate the nature of contemporary anti-Semitism. Here, as in many other cases today, Jews are not overtly identified. There is not even an explicit mention of Israel. Instead, the video assumes the target viewer will recognise the not-so-subtle anti-Semitic pointers, such as references to financial speculation and the age-old ‘blood libel’ of child murder. Not identifying Jews directly also gives some degree of deniability to anyone who wants to claim they are not anti-Semitic.

That’s not to downplay the existence of overt anti-Semitism. This has increased dramatically since 7 October. In the past few days alone, an Orthodox Jewish man has been stabbed in Zurich while another was beaten outside a Paris synagogue. But a great deal of Jew hatred still tends to take a disguised form.

Its most common manifestation, as the ‘boycott’ Pepsi video indicates, is an animus towards Israel. An animus that long predates its current war with Hamas. In the warped view of anti-Israel activists, Israel is the epitome of evil. It is said to be manipulating finance for its own ends and slaughtering children. Supposedly, it is a ‘genocidal’, ‘apartheid’ state – morally charged terms that tend not to be applied to other nations.

Seeing Israel as evil incarnate, today’s anti-Israel activists target its every manifestation. They try to cancel Israeli dance companies in New York. They demand Israel’s expulsion from the Eurovision song contest. And they attempt to banish it from the Olympics and the football World Cup. In short, they seek to erase Israel from the world. That is the true meaning of today’s boycott campaigns. To purge the world of any Israeli presence. To eradicate any signs of Israeli culture.

[ace-hell]

Oh this makes me so fucking mad

So SO fucking mad

You mean israelites, hebrews ffs you mean CANAANITES

THERE WEREN'T PALESTINIANS 3,000 YEARS AGO

THERE WERE JEWISH KINGDOMS

If the tatreez originated 3,000 fucking years ago it makes it jewish, israelite. NOT palestinian

This horrendous cultural and historical erasure of a whole ass ethnic group is absolutely sickening

This accepted activity of rewriting and changing jewish history is so fucking disgusting

This is the kinda shit that makes it so hard for me to feel sympathy and accept the modern palestinian identity

ITS NORMAL FOR NEW IDENTITIES TO EMERGE AND BE BORN, BUT ITS NOT OK TO CHANGE HISTORY SO IT'LL LOOK LIKE YOU HAVE AN ANCIENT AND NATIVE IDENTITY!

I Just fucking hope for the sun to blow us all up soon ffs

[loki-god-of-mischief-13]

My parents just told me that Marvel is removing Sabra’s Israeli roots.

The article talks about this but they constantly whitewash Jewish characters, ignoring that the original creators were Jewish. Sabra is a Hebrew name, not a Russian name. Sabra is a metaphor for Jews born in Israel. Plus don’t the Russians also have other characters. I know there’s a war on but if any other minority had their character whitewashed there would be more outrage. Also Russia is currently in a war, one that they started.

[steveyockey]

I think more than the message that “Zionism is NOT Judaism” which is true but rings hollow to me I would like to see people embracing the fact that Zionism directly contradicts many Jewish values and that anti-Zionist Jews see their faith as inherently connected to their activism against the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. I was taught to be anti-Zionist largely by Jewish friends and comrades and I continue to lean on them for guidance and clarity as they bravely stand against the propaganda their institutions foisted on them from the moment they were born. In return I work to fulfill the promise that I will make them feel safe in any place, not just the occupied land they were raised to see as the only home where they would not face anti-Semitism. the fight for a free Palestine and the fight for a world where Jewish people can exist without fear are intrinsically linked and must be pursued together

[the-library-alcove]

With the way that some Leftists seem to conceptualize international politics, history, and race relations, I'm honestly waiting for someone to attempt to take the stance that Genghis Khan didn't kill all of those people and forge his empire. Why? Because as a Mongolian he was a Person Of Color, and everyone knows that POC can only ever be the victims of colonization and imperialism, never the perpetrators.

[barib-yariel]

me after bradley smith from Oregon tells me "go back to your country"

[arsenicflame]

i think the reason izzy can be so blasé about his relationship with ed is not because hes taken to blaming a shark instead, but because hes actually already done a lot of the processing in the previous episode.

hes mourned his leg, hes had his drunk crying rants. hes gone through the five stages of grief. and then? the crew reaches out to him, offers him their support. they make him a new leg, they nominate him their new figurehead. when he stands there on the prow of the ship, leg on, letter in hand, thats his acceptance, thats his moving on.

[kittykatchao]

This only exists to draw attention to Palestine from various fandoms. Hope it works.

[news4dzhozhar]

[cree-n-jewish-thoughts]

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A post shared by Daniel-Ryan Spaulding (@danielryanspaulding)

But antisemitism isn't real. People would rather have us die and support terroism than support us.

Pro-palestian people are this new generations nazis.

THIS IS INSANITY PEOPLE!!!

When you erase the past, this is what happens.

[ace-hell]

Why is it israelis and not israelites?

I saw and still see pro palestinians bringing up this up as a way to show that we are "not the real israelites" or that it means that we are not really indigenous to the land and i have a few things to say about that

1. The name israel itself IS indigenous, not only is that an aramaic name- an actual indigenous language to the land- it is also the father of the 12 jewish tribes, it means "the one who fight for god" or "god preserves" whereas the name palestine... not only does it NOT comes from an indigenous language but its an ACTUAL insult in every original scripts (philistine- a person with no culture or appreciation for art. Plishtim- invadors) or straight up has nothing to do with native or Palestinian identity(greeks who called themselves "peaple of the sea). So calling israel "israhell" while forcing the palestinian name is one of the most bigoted thing one can do

2. Maybe, and just maybe, people were NOT speaking English in the mIDDLE EAST THREE THOUSAND YEARS AGO??? In hebrew AND in aramaic we don't have the word "israelite" we refer to ourselves as "hebrews", "the israeli nation" or "the sons of israel" in fact, if im not wrong, we DO refer to ourselves as "israelis" when talking about ancient times. Taking israelite vs israeli as an argument is so stupid its feels like watching americans calling africa a country or italy a continent ENGLISH IS NOT OUR NATIVE LANGUAGE SO TAKING IT AS AN EXAMPLE IS USELESS

3. When we DO talk in English we say "israelis" bc there are a lot of NON jews living in israel who are citizens and also part of the modern israeli identity, in fact, they help us built it whether its by being doctors, serving the IDF or by having a simple shawarma stand. By refering to everyone as "israelis" and not "israelites and goyim" we include them with us as one big family and its kind of a symbol of how israel value democracy in the whole "israel a jewish DEMOCRATIC country".

So.. There it is, hope that helps to NOT erase indigenous identity and forcing arabic identity as a native one👍🏻

[bitchofdarkness]

When I saw an insta reel about it earlier today, I thought it wasn't true.......

But then I looked it up myself and Google Maps erased Palestine and put the Israel stamp on it. That's ...I don't know what to say to be honest....disgusting is one word for it. But also revealing where Google stands in the war, if that wasn't clear before...

Like, you can check for yourself, but when I searched for Palestine (and it doesn't matter if I search in english or german btw- same result) this is what came up:

First they erase the people, then the name of their country. Shame on every government complicit to this. If you believe you can just take something away from someone else and make it yours, you're a thief and nothing else-- killing for it makes you a murderer.

Every Israeli taking land away from Palestinians has blood on their hands. You're no better than Hitler and your ancestors hate you.

[madeoftwinklingstars]

i’m not going to deny (as a jew) that there is anti-semitism in the pro-palestine movement. however. there is also antisemitism in the zionist movement. there is antisemitism everywhere. but that doesn’t mean we should not support palestine.

[royalberryriku]

The more I learn about the history of the middle east in general, the more I realise that the "Israel-Palestine conflict" is actually just a group killing their own fellow shared ethnic group who are "too brown".

Hebrews and Arabs both originate from Phoenicians, aka "Abraham's descendents" according to their respective oral stories and passed on histories. They are from the same place and people. However, there is a narrative that twists this and claims that Arabs were "always an outside force that invaded", when the various groups within that ethnicity always had their share of cooperation and conflict in various stages of history. Just like, say, the various groups in France. They were of the same group and no particular ethnicity had no more of a "claim" to the land than the other, they just had their beef and eventually integrated.

So when I see "but the Arabs are colonisers" I can't help but ask; what is a colonisers to you? Seriously. If colonisation means "any conflict in the past between a shared group from the same place" every single group would be colonisers. There's no such thing as "an innocent conflict" where atrocities weren't committed by either side. So please get that out of your head if you want to say "but the Arabs did X, Y, Z to the Hebrews so it's colonisation and they don't belong in A, B or C areas". That's just not how colonisation works. It's like calling TERF or cis a slur when they're not. Conflict between the same people from the same area is, yeah, a conflict hit not colonisation. However, a people who are from a completely different place who want to erase an ethnic group and take over their culture, erase their history and get rid of their physical features? Yeah, that's what colonisation is. It's genocide with the aim to erase a specific group or culture and take it and the land over. For example, the British in the Middle East.

The problem with calling Arabs "colonisers" is not only is it completely historically wrong, they're from the same place and have the same origins as the Hebrews, but they (like Palestinian Jews) have been their since before the British came. Compared to European Jews who came later on after having lived in Europe (and became European as that is genuinely a part of their culture and ethnicity as well and shouldn't be erased or forgotten, that's also cultural erasure of Germanic, Polish, etc traditions passed on) and, sure, do have origins there *as well* but it needs to be understood that they, specifically Zionists, are a part of the British colonial project aimed at killing *both* Arabs and Jews. The point isn't to help Jews against a colonisers from the first few centuries (sorry to tell you everyone, but no, the Ottoman Empire, Baylon and the Pharaohs literally do not exist anymore, like how Italy isn't the Roman Empire by default because that's where Rome is), but a group of people who've just been living there for the past few centuries and generations who just want to live. The problem is, they haven't been allowed that and propaganda keeps being pushed that completely jumps around historical facts like, for example, Jews (ethnically speaking) were not always Jews but the Ancient Hebrews, aka, Phoenicians, aka where Arabs came from ethically. They are the same people, just who moved to different areas and developed different cultures and languages. Sort of like, you know, every other nation with specific dialects for specific regions and different cultures and folk stories depending on where you go.

The point is, so much of Jewish history is actively being erased to "protect the Jews" by...commuting cultural genocide of the Jews and Arabs. It ignores the actual impact of Nazism within Israel's formation and history, how much it influenced policy, how Jews who were "too visibly Phoenicians" aka appeared too Jewish or arabic or middle eastern in appearance were deemed as "weaker" and "lesser" for my surviving the holocaust and used as a reason to deny rights to both Jews and Arabs who were too visibly Semitic. It ignores how antisemetic Israel is towards Jewishness and how utterly antisemetic Islamophobia is because they are literally from the same origin and, yes, hatred and fear of one does carry into hatred and fear of the other. So much of the propaganda and denialism of history happening right now is a direct response to dear and hatred of "big noses", "brown skin" and people deemed as too middle eastern because they, just like in World War II, World War I and beforehand, antisemetism is the backbone of British imperialism and conquest of the middle east (yes, this also means a targeting of Arabs and Jews as people who look a specific way). And yes I'm annoyed and yes this is a ramble that's probably not very coherent, but damn I'm so sick and tired of misinformation and the twisting of everything to suit this narrative of "Arabs versus Jews" as if they aren't both just Semites who are being collectively oppressed, erased and reinvented by the west to suit western ends.

[pinkfey]

i often think about how liberals water down leftist terminology to make it more palatable for conservatives. “abolish the police” became “defund the police” and both historically and now “from the river to the sea, palestine will be free” is too “radical” of a statement because it leaves no room for their two-state solution.

[igottatho]

Based young man (with a lovely NY accent) showing us historical maps which identify the Arab country P A L E S T I N E.