Whatever it was, I probably Britta'd it. ✡️

[spanishsongs]

A new initiative recently launched by Palestinian peace activists called the "Realign for Palestine" project. Please consider supporting them. The leader of this initiative, Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, has been doing amazing work in this space.

Professor Dajani is one of the members, and he's a personal hero of mine. He took the first ever group of Palestinian students to Auschwitz and then someone tried to assassinate him.

Realign for Palestine — End the violence. Start the future.

[ignorethisatyourperil]

[theres-a-hole-in-my-wall]

Also, a lot of these westerners (especially Americans) can't conceive a history that's longer than 3 generations.

[spanishsongs]

"Here’s the crazy thing about the pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian debate in the U.S. A perfectly reasonable political stance like Elhanan’s below, one held by many others in Israel, especially on the left, could and should be supported by pro-Palestinian activists here in the U.S., but it isn’t because it accepts the idea of Israelis and Palestinians co-existing.

Instead, the radicalized American left now rejects pragmatic politics that doesn’t challenge Zionism or the legitimacy of Israel and doesn’t partake of pseudo-intellectual academic shibboleths like anti-Zionism, anti-colonialism, settler-colonialism, or “Jewish supremacy.” They reject real-world solutions in favor of the fantasies of U.S. podcasters and professors with no actual stake in the game. It’s crazy.

And as a result, Israel’s supporters have to spend most of their time and energy combatting the nihilistic and hateful politics of anti-Zionism and delegitimization rather than focusing on sensible politics, peacemaking, bridge-building, and coming up with political solutions that might actually work."

[spanishsongs]

British Muslims hear you. The silence on antisemitism is deafening

This was just published in the Times. Re-posting the entire letter section in full as it's well worth reading.

"We as British Muslims hear you. Antisemitism in the UK has worsened dramatically since October 7, 2023. On one side, the drumbeat has been raucous and relentless; on the other, the response has been weak and underwhelming. This cannot go on.

Melvin Cravitz and Adrian Daulby were killed last October while attending a synagogue in Manchester on Yom Kippur simply for being Jewish. Jewish communal buildings and assets have been attacked in a pattern of sustained menace. Synagogues and ambulances have been firebombed. Jews have been violently attacked on our streets.

The scale and intensity of attacks against the British Jewish community is horrifying. But so is the silence and lack of condemnation. After the shocking murder of George Floyd in the US, widespread protests and solidary demonstrations occurred across our own country. Hundreds of thousands participated in more than 260 towns and cities. Yet when our own fellow citizens, colleagues and friends are attacked, murdered and intimidated, no such solidarity is offered. This only adds to the anxiety and fear of our Jewish neighbours.

No other community endures the indignity of private security outside almost all of its communal buildings, places of worship or, perhaps most appallingly, schools. It is unconscionable and intolerable. These attacks on Jews also undermine our collective social values and the contract which underwrites our society. Indeed, the Jewish experience provides a great example for our own community of successful integration: loyal, committed, but also distinct.

There will not be a quick or easy solution to this — as much as we would like one.

To start, we need to face uncomfortable realities. It is tempting to explain away the current crisis as an aberration inflamed by the privations of current conflicts in the Middle East. That belies the facts.

The existence of antisemitic hate among the far right and far left cannot be disputed. Neither can the hate from some of our fellow co-religionists. Evidence has repeatedly shown how those involved in acts of Islamist terrorism and violence also harbour hatred for Jews. Malik Faisal Akram, who flew from Blackburn to the United States in 2022, took four people hostage at a synagogue in Texas. A few years earlier, one of the most prolific online supporters of Isis, operating under the name “Lone Mujahid”, spent weeks calling for attacks on synagogues, Jewish businesses, schools and communal events across Britain.

These are just two examples in a long and shameful list. The status quo cannot go on and will need all of us to both challenge and change such hatred wherever it exists in our communities.

Government must lead the way. They should close the gaps in legislation which permit glorification of terrorism and incite hatred as identified in the official report Operating with Impunity. The criminal justice system needs to adopt a swifter response towards those breaking existing laws. Social media companies should adopt a zero-tolerance policy against antisemitism and enforce their existing standards which too frequently does not occur. Priority for interfaith and cohesion projects should be given to those skilled and able to encourage dialogue where anger and hatred exists.

We also call upon Muslim communal and religious leadership to be more robust in challenging antisemitism whenever and wherever it appears in our communities, as with any form of racism. To openly support those Muslims who are working to strengthen Jewish engagement but find themselves intimidated by other Muslims who are hostile to such important work. To demonstrate how Islam’s rich tradition encourages dialogue and bridge-building, as opposed to bridge-burning advocated by those who despise Jews.

We say to our Jewish friends and neighbours: we see you, we hear you and we are with you. We see the community attacked, targeted and intimidated. As your fellow citizens, we stand with you against the antisemitic hate you face. We stand with you not just for you — though you have our unqualified support — but also to save our democracy whose values and system are under assault from the same dark forces which target you."

Dame Sara Khan, former counterextremism commissioner Dr Shiraz Maher, reader in non-state actors, department of war studies, King’s College London Shabir Randeree, chairman, DCD London & Mutual plc Sheikh Dr Usama Hasan, Islamic scholar and theologian Rashad Ali, senior fellow, Institute of Strategic Dialogue Imam Asim Hafiz, Iman and chaplain Iman Atta, director, Tell Mama Oz Katerji, Ukraine correspondent, TVP World Fiyaz Mughal, founder, Muslims Against Antisemitism Jas Ahmad, associate professor, Middlesex University Dr Salah al-Ansari, associate editor, Manchester Journal of Transnational Islamic Law and Practice Mohammed Amin

Anti-racism campaigners ‘must do more to stop antisemitism’

A group of Muslim academics, community leaders and counterextremism experts condemn the ‘weak and underwhelming’ response to the surge in Je

[spanishsongs]

if anti-zionism isn't antisemitism, how come the only hockey players I ever see accused of being zionists are the Hughes brothers and Zeev Buium, who are Jewish. I think we all acknowledge that hockey players have a lot of the same politics, so why aren't any of the non-jewish players ever accused of being zionists...

[wherever-you-are-is-your-derech]

Watched this amazing interview with Dara Horn and Haviv Rettig Gur on antisemitism, and at the end (1:01:34) she drops her definition of antisemitism. It's been rewiring my brain and now I want to interject in all sorts of conversations with it.

We do not teach it as this is a social prejudice/bigotry... we teach it as a lie that people use to gain or maintain power. And the lie is always the same. The lie is: Jews are the obstacle to what you value most. And the only thing that changes in different historical settings is what you value most.

The whole conversation is recommendable, but if you only watch ~5 minutes, watch from 56:58 onward, IMO.

[amieruby]

Jewish queer people deserve to be safe in queer spaces.

[smsomah]

Jewish women. Todra Valley; Tinghir. Morocco, 1934-1947. Jean Besancenot

[insert-some-url]

I think one of the main reasons it’s so hard to talk to leftists as an Iranian is that the whole concept of loving your country is alien to them. They are so consumed by their hatred of their governments that their willing to side with anyone who pretends to be against western countries even if that’s a terrorist regime like islamic republic

[spanishsongs]

I noticed that this is also a huge problem when it comes to racism within the progressive left. They can't understand that a lot of Black Americans are mainstream Democrats because they also see problems with America, but they still love their country, and want to better it. They don't want to burn it to the ground. The progressive left can't handle it, and calls them uneducated for not supporting Bernie.

Meanwhile, Gallup did research on political typologies and found that the progressive left was "the only majority White, non-Hispanic Democratic-oriented political typology group."

Meanwhile, "Democratic Mainstays make up a larger share of the Democratic coalition than any other group. Older than other Democratic-oriented groups, they also have the highest share of Black non-Hispanic adults of any political typology group, and six-in-ten are women.

The progressive left is white privilege in action.

[amillionmagpies]

Btw, that idea that privilege makes you morally evil and suffering makes you morally good is just repackaged versions of the Christian concepts of the evils of luxury and the holiness of martyrdom. Hope this helps!

[disfiguredgrace]

look pitt fans if you want to draw robby in a biblical context, you have no excuse for it being a christian one. look at these:

these are some illustrations by ephraim moshe lilien, who was an acclaimed art nouveau pioneer. recreate these pieces with robby as their central figure, please, and try to learn about the themes they’re depicting before you do.

(art titles, from right to left: abraham; kishinev martyrs; jacob and the angel; samson and the lion; the dybbuk)

[spanishsongs]

I can't believe I need to say this, but Israelis are allowed to exist. You're allowed to be from Israel. Like what are we doing here people...

[spanishsongs]

"What is happening now in left and progressive spaces quietly reverses that progress. It teaches people, often without realizing it, that some identities can be treated as morally contingent. It reshapes how people think about other groups. It lowers the threshold for dehumanization. It makes it easier, over time, to more broadly justify dismissing suffering, othering, acts of discrimination anywhere it becomes politically inconvenient.

That is exactly how prejudice evolves itself into something systemic. By changing the rules of who is allowed to be seen clearly. And this is where it becomes personal.

Most people reading this do not think of themselves as antisemitic. They would never use a slur. They would never straight out and openly deny someone’s humanity. But that is not how this shows up anymore. It shows up in smaller decisions we make as progressive and left leaders these days. In what we excuse. In what we scroll past. In which deaths feel complicated instead of tragic and unacceptable. In whether we instinctively see a person or a position when we hear the word “Zionist” or “anti-Zionist.”

You can oppose Israeli policy. You can reject Zionism. You can defend it. None of those positions require you to sort Jews, Israelis, Palestinians, Arabs or Muslims into categories that determine whether they deserve empathy. If your framework depends on deciding which Jews are acceptable and which are not, or which civilians matter and which do not, then the issue is not that your politics are controversial. It is that your reasoning has already crossed a line that civil rights traditions were meant to prevent. The civil rights standard was never agreement. It was consistency. No collective guilt. No dehumanization. No conditional empathy.

We already know how to apply these principles. We are watching what happens when we fail to. The only question is whether we are willing to apply them when it challenges our own assumptions. Because if we cannot, then all we have really done is learn how to recognize injustice selectively.

And selective justice is not justice for all."

The Return of the “Good Jew” and the “Bad Jew”

How We Learned to Sort Jews Into “Acceptable” and “Unacceptable” Again and Why No One Wants to Admit It

[scrollfordonuts]

2017: "Don't 'All Lives Matter' minority causes, it dilutes the message, and prevents change." The focus is only on the specific minority group we're discussing.

2026: Every cause must be taken over by discussions of Palestine. All groups must focus solely on Palestine diluting the original intent of the group, and harming minorities. This is good actually.

[mossadspypigeon]

the anti ice protests being taken over by people with literal hamas flags lmao

[turbomitzvah]

I regret to inform you nothing was "taken over," they were always the same people

[mossadspypigeon]

you speak nothing but facts

[evilguacamole]

The munitions and tactics used against the American people were first used against the Palestinians. The surveillance technology like Palantir was tested on Palestinians and funded by Epstien's buddies in Israeli politics. Palestine is America's military testing ground. Israel requires this to continue because it's their entire economy.

Zionism is antisemitism.

[engin-program]

Ever caught yourself saying "the Ukraine" or "Kiev"?

These aren't just pronunciation tweaks. Every time we use russified versions of Ukrainian words, we're accidentally echoing centuries of colonial erasure. Language is identity and Ukraine's identity deserves to be pronounced correctly.

Ready to level up your Ukrainian and support Ukraine at the same time? Join ENGin: Speak Ukrainian to learn the language with a native professional teacher while making genuine connections. Because the best way to honor a language is to actually speak it.

[thebrightestwitchofherage]

The word diaspora

I know it’s old news, but people *are* actually editing Wikipedia pages about Judaism & Israel???

I googled the word “diaspora” since I couldn’t recall the exact meaning in Greek, and the Wikipedia page is scrubbed of Jews. Only Palestinians are mentioned in relation to Israel.

Despite the first suggested questions & articles are about the Jewish diaspora. (Even if my location/ algorithm changes the results, it would still be high up there…).

No wonder people are so ignorant about this conflict. You can’t erase history

[iswearbyalltheflowers]

[spanishsongs]

everyone is trying so hard to say that Hatzalah is for everyone (which is great) but even if they were just for the Jewish community, you still can't set their ambulances on fire.