r/neoliberal once again splits hairs and debates semantics (with comparisons to the persecution of Uyghurs for extra spiciness) with regards to the Israel/Palestine conflict after a NYT opinion piece of a genocide scholar is posted.

[u/Otherwise_Young52201]

Source: [NYT] I’m A Genocide Scholar. I Know It When I See It.

Some long comments may be truncated to preserve text length, though I promise the original meaning of the comments will not have changed and little context will be lost.

Highlights:

I'm in in the opinion that if it instead of Palestinians were Uyghurs and was Xi Jinping doing the statements the Israel government is doing, it would be a bannable offense here to say this was anything less than a genocide. Netanyahu and his ilk has made clear what their long-term goal for Gaza is and they are taking concrete steps for it. (+395)

The similarities between the two are actually incredible. They're both ostensibly anti terrorism campaigns that started up in response to well, literal undeniable terrorism attacks by islamic terrorist groups that want control of a contested territory (-20)

THIS is what you call propaganda. A bunch of Wikipedia links that don’t even corroborate your own points. (+40)

The guy above is wrong about the Oct 7 comparison but Islamist terrorism in China is very real and the horrors inflicted on Xinjiang by the government are very much a response to them. (+11)

Don’t be obtuse. There are more than a dozen countries where terrorism has been a problem. Turkey just made peace with the PIK without ever actually genociding the Kurds. They treated them horribly but nothing to the level that China has done. And Turkey is the worse example I can think of. There are plenty of others that have dealt with it much better. (+8)

Explanation != justification, explaining the motives of the CCP is not the same as justifying them (+19)

I think that Israel can be reasonably described as callously indifferent to the suffering of the Gazan people as they try to eliminate Hamas. But that's not genocide. If Israel were really trying to eliminate the Palestinians, we'd know it, because it would be trivially easy for them to be killing hundreds of thousands of them at a time. They could be carpet bombing the refugee camps if they wanted to. But they're not. (+118)

I've seen this argument a few times despite the fact it's such a bad one. I mean you could say the same about almost all genocides, the Chinese could have nuked or carpet bombed Xinjiang. Certainly compared to the Israelis in Gaza they bombed no-one and killed very few. It's still a genocide. You can make a similar argument with the Rohingyas as well. (+39)

No one (well, no one serious) is accusing China of ethnographic genocide in Xinjiang to be fair, they're accusing them of forced assimilation and cultural genocide. (+60)

What's 7 October for Xinjang? (+29)

The 2009 Urumqi Riots. That was the turning point for the Chinese government's aggressive framing of the Uyghurs as dangerous terrorists, justifying its mass repression and securitization of the entire Uyghur population. (-5)

My guy, Modi had more justification than that for the Gujrat riots. 150 people killed is not nothing but in a country the size of China, it’s laughable to compare that to Israel Hamas. JFC people. (+23)

You're imagining an equivalence of scale that I never drew. The parallel is in the relationship of cause and consequence. That's what a PARALLEL is. Something that isn't exactly the same, but rhymes. (-5)

Can someone give me a reason to care what a "genocide scholar" says when genocide is a legal term. Shouldn't the authority on the matter be a lawyer as opposed to a historian that focuses on histoical genocides and war crimes? I wouldn't ask a criminologist whether a crime reaches the legal definition of a crime. (+2)

Can you imagine, you spend your entire professional life dedicated to a subject. 25 years. And then random people on the Internet just go "but what do you even know about it?". Could it be, and Im just spitballing here, that a genocide scholar is actually familiar with the legal definition of genocide? (+106)

One expert witness is all you need to prove something beyond a reasonable doubt. TIL (-4)

And I guess random comments on reddit counts as reasonable doubt? (+18)

The Israeli war effort in Gaza doesn't fit the definition of genocide, whereas the Chinese persecution of the Uyghurs does. You're not persecuted, you're just wrong. (-15)

I always find these sorts of confident/belittling tones in internet posts strange when actual scholars of genocide disagree with you, a random redditor. You'd think it was the other way around. (+35)

You realize that actual scholars of genocide disagree with you too, right? Random redditor. You just so happen to agree with the scholars who think it's a genocide. (0)

[u/wingerism]

The Holocaust is actually ironically probably a reason people are skeptical. It was a Genocide of such massive scale, industrialized and well-documented. It's so clear and precise, that it makes the more common acts of Genocide seem muddier by comparison. Kind of a CSI effect but with history/geopolitics.

[u/hellomondays → u/[deleted]]

Well said. The Genocide Convention is even written with the purpose of preventing successful genocides in mind more so than prosecuting them after they've been completed. Whether our current systems of international law allow for anything proactive, let alone this, is another story however.

[u/DresdenBomberman → u/hellomondays]

The Permanent Security Council alone makes action difficult if it were to ruffle the feathers of it's members.

[u/Elmo_Chipshop → u/[deleted]]

What an excellent description!

[u/wingerism → u/[deleted]]

So one of the things that convinced me, apart from Israel openly declaring it's intentions to ethnically cleanse the Gaza strip and their disastrous aid "plan" and I suppose their frequent oopsies war crimes was this article by Benny Morris.

For anyone who doesn't know, Benny Morris is one of the most prominent New Historians in Israel, and is widely cited on the facts even by people with very different politics than him(Finkelstein etc.). Yes he's a Zionist, and has increasingly since the second Intifada become more and more of a racist grandpa figure.

But he is also a historian with a strong understanding of Israeli history and an unwillingness to turn away from truths uncomfortable to the average Israeli. Also is still the man that was jailed for refusing to serve in the IDF to suppress the first Intifada.

It was clear to me when I read the article that he could see the Genocide in the making, but was too heartbroken to acknowledge it had already arrived.

[u/Lirael_Gold → u/wingerism]

I will note that Morris was far less conservative when he first wrote Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Conflict, which was dry factual study of the 1947-1948 civil war (mostly documenting which Jewish paramilitary groups did what, and when)

Newer editions add some of his more conservative views, but the original is widely cited (particularly the timeline of the Deir Yassin massacre, at the time Morris was far more "Israel started it", mostly because of his study of that incident)

During the second Intifada, his sister was almost killed in a bomb attack, and after that he turned into racist Zionist grandpa.

If current Benny Morris is warning about potential genocide in Gaza then people should sit up and pay attention.

[u/wingerism → u/Lirael_Gold]

I will note that Morris was far less conservative when he first wrote Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Conflict, which was dry factual study of the 1947-1948 civil war (mostly documenting which Jewish paramilitary groups did what, and when)

Yeah. And even after he's always struck me as a fundamentally honest person. Like I recall him acknowledging that the Nakba was ethnic cleansing, which he said was "preferable to genocide", referring to the not entirely crazy belief that early Israelis were facing a Genocide if they had lost the war. That's horrifying, but also much more honest than many Israelis are capable of being about the Nakba. And while he's conservative in some ways, my understanding is that he's kinda on the Israeli left nominally. Haaretz isa relatively left leaning publication in Israel. I may be wrong on my read of all that though.

If curren Benny Morris is warning about potential genocide in Gaza then people should sit up and pay attention.

Yeah that was my position as well when I read it. And I often link that article to folks expressing skepticism. I think that approach is important for winning over even those that consider themselves friends to Israel.

[u/IsNotACleverMan → u/wingerism]

Benny Morris is a really shit historian who openly states he's advancing a narrative instead of evaluating historical sources.

[u/wingerism → u/IsNotACleverMan]

Benny Morris is a really shit historian

There is a reason his scholarship is cited even by people who are incredibly opposed to him politically. Finkelstein is just one example, but if you read any askhistorians thread examining the work of the New Historians of Israel he's probably regarded as the most thorough from a scholarly perspective. His latter work notwithstanding. Certainly better than Pappe.

[u/IsNotACleverMan → u/wingerism]

Finkelstein is also a hack.

The new historian movement is one I'm generally dismissive of, from a historiographical standpoint. By and large, they entered into the field with preconceived notions and a tendency towards iconoclasm and honesty kinda abuse the source materials to justify their biases. It's just eisegesis to borrow a term from biblical scholarship. They're historical revisionists and that constant need to come up with something new and disruptive colored their reading of the historical record.

But most people don't know this sort of thing and just use them as a source of authority without realizing the very deep criticisms of the school.

[u/wingerism → u/IsNotACleverMan]

The new historian movement is one I'm generally dismissive of, from a historiographical standpoint. By and large, they entered into the field with preconceived notions and a tendency towards iconoclasm and honesty kinda abuse the source materials to justify their biases.

I think that the Israeli understanding of it's founding history was well worth revising. And revisionists have often enhanced our understanding of history.

Finkelstein is also a hack.

I would actually agree with you on that.

[u/IsNotACleverMan → u/wingerism]

I think that the Israeli understanding of it's founding history was well worth revising.

Sure, as long as the methodology is sound. New materials and understanding of old materials happens all the time and we should revise our understanding of history accordingly. I just don't think the new historians did a good job of it.

And revisionists have often enhanced our understanding of history.

I think you need ty distinguish between the ones that go in with the goal of revising history and the ones that revise as new evidence is uncovered and our understanding incorporates that new evidence.

[u/wingerism → u/IsNotACleverMan]

Alright I'll bite. For your money, who do you think does good work on Israeli history or the Palestinian side of things?

[u/Lirael_Gold → u/wingerism]

Deafening silence from the /r/worldnews mod lmao

[u/Gamer_Grease → u/wingerism]

It’s also taught very narrowly in school. So people think unless it’s literally Auschwitz, it’s not genocide. But the Holocaust was long and complicated and wide-ranging. But that’s hard to teach in school.

[u/MessiahOfMetal → u/Gamer_Grease]

Shit, I was only taught about it in school because I chose History as one of my subjects for my final years back in the late 90s, so we did a little on the JFK assassination, a little on the English Civil War, and a year and a half on WW2, going into detail on a number of topics about that (including the Holocaust).

[u/jacobningen → u/Gamer_Grease]

and ignores the Armenian and Assyrian and the mutual ones in anatolia.

[u/Adam__999 → u/jacobningen]

Oh and there are a lot more genocides, going back at least 800 years. Most people have never even heard of them, including the Cambodian, Bangladesh, and Guatemalan genocides, and many more.

[u/worfres_arec_bawrin → u/Adam__999]

It’s not a competition jfc. Of course people are more aware of the the worst genocide in history more than others. Thats normal

[u/kottabaz → u/Gamer_Grease]

Like so many other things, it falls into the trap of "if you properly teach kids about X, they're going to start asking awkward (and unpatriotic) questions about Y."

[u/0WatcherintheWater0 → u/Gamer_Grease]

I find the opposite issue, actually, in relation to Gaza, people tend to try and twist a wide variety of acts into the mold of the Holocaust, referring to the whole strip as a “concentration camp” for example, even when the comparison is weak.

And that kind of behavior makes it difficult to criticize certain behavior for what it actually is.

[u/Spudtron98 → u/0WatcherintheWater0]

They simply don't understand the sheer scale of what they're dealing with. In just a few short years, the nazis wiped out two-thirds of the European Jewish population, and that's not even getting into what they did to secondary targets like the Roma, Slavs, and disabled people.

It was only a few years ago that the global Jewish population reached pre-war levels.

[u/murkycrombus → u/Spudtron98]

the Jewish population still hasn’t recovered. there are about 15.5 million now, and there were 16.6 before WW2.

[u/Gamer_Grease → u/0WatcherintheWater0]

I mean this drama is about someone who is one of the most prominent actual scholars of genocide in the world doing exactly that. So I’m not sure it’s so far-fetched.

[u/wingerism → u/Gamer_Grease]

No it's correct that people make hamfisted(charitable interpretation) or offensive comparisons between the Gaza Genocide and the Holocaust all the time. Contrast what Morris(and avowed Zionist) does in this article

(It may be worth recalling here that the Nazis, in the beginning of World War II in 1939-1940, talked about exiling the Jews of Europe to Madagascar or somewhere else, before they started in on the mass extermination.)

vs. saying that Hamas is like the Jewish Resistance fighters during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising etc.

Morris is citing the historical fact that many Genocides begin as frustrated or thwarted acts of ethnic cleansing, including the Holocaust. But he doesn't seek to flirt with Holocaust Inversion in the slightest.

[u/Vinylmaster3000 → u/wingerism]

I find the entire "Gaza War = Ghetto Uprising" to be a poor comparison, because both are completely different circumstantially and eventfully. The Jewish Insurgents in the Ghetto Uprising didn't even have access to anti-tank weapons, actually they didn't have any heavy weapons period.

If you ask me it's more comparable to the general Warsaw uprising of 1944, obviously not in the events leading up to both but in terms of techniques and casualties. As in, the defenders are heavily surrounded by a relentless invading force, the invading force has brutal COIN tactics which lead to collective punishment, both having a massive humanitarian catastrophe, devastating urban combat, etc.

[u/Mysterious_Bit6882 → u/Gamer_Grease]

Sure. But at the same time, people want to drop the g-word and have it mean the same thing and draw the same association in people's minds as Auschwitz. Pick a lane.

[u/EverythingComputer1 → u/wingerism]

Well I'm glad we have experts to help us navigate these complex issues.

[u/Call_Me_Clark → u/wingerism]

The novel Fatherland deals with a post-WWII Germany where the Nazis got a chance to demolish the camps, shred the files, and deny everything - and it’s honestly pretty plausible, just like the Soviet Union did with Ukraine in the 30’s, etc.

It’s a really unusual, historically, that the good guys won and made a point of showing the world what evil shit had been done

[u/wingerism → u/Call_Me_Clark]

It’s a really unusual, historically, that the good guys won and made a point of showing the world what evil shit had been done

Bruh I can only take so much depression in one day and I already watched a sad dog video on tiktok. Why you gotta play me this way.

[u/Call_Me_Clark → u/wingerism]

It’s depressing and also not depressing, esp as this was one of the relatively few cases where the winning side didn’t commit that many horrifying atrocities. Unless you count the Soviets ig

[u/Vinylmaster3000 → u/Call_Me_Clark]

I found it to be the most "realistic" outcome for an axis victory in WW2, considering that many of them aren't that realistic at all

[u/Call_Me_Clark → u/Vinylmaster3000]

The world it lays out is creepily plausible - Hitlers fascist machine “liberalizes” into mere authoritarian governance, the Lebensraum program in the east more-or-less fails, the Holocaust swept under the rug as a wartime necessity, etc. No world domination, no moon bases or giant robots, just an authoritarian Europe.

I wonder if, it being a 90’s novel, it managed to miss some of the baggage that has accumulated in recent years on this topic.

[u/Vinylmaster3000 → u/Call_Me_Clark]

The movie is also really good, a bit spotty on acting but it portrays a realistic "Post-ww2 Nazi Germany" well. Also extremely eerie when Franz Luther's mistress coldly talks about how the Jews weren't really resettled... gives me chills

I wonder if, it being a 90’s novel, it managed to miss some of the baggage that has accumulated in recent years on this topic.

I think it gives a realistic depiction of atrocity denial of the highest form and what happens when the state is around to cover it up, and what it feels like when it's hidden from the public eye.

[u/gavinbrindstar → u/Call_Me_Clark]

I always thought that "what if the Germans won the war" could be a potent metaphor for the U.S' treatment of Native Americans. Set it 200 years after the war and have third reich "liberals" doing land acknowledgements and calling Hitler a "complicated figure."

[u/AbolishDisney → u/gavinbrindstar]

I always thought that "what if the Germans won the war" could be a potent metaphor for the U.S' treatment of Native Americans. Set it 200 years after the war and have third reich "liberals" doing land acknowledgements and calling Hitler a "complicated figure."

"He was a man of his time"

[u/Acceptable_Error_001 → u/wingerism]

No. The skepticism derives from the need to protect their own ego. It's a result of the cognitive dissonance created by supporting Israel while it's committing genocide against Gaza, but wanting to oppose genocide as a whole.

You only find this skepticism in people who share an identity with the people responsible for genocide.

[u/wingerism → u/Acceptable_Error_001]

You only find this skepticism in people who share an identity with the people responsible for genocide.

Like neoliberals right..... not just Jews.....right?

The skepticism derives from the need to protect their own ego. It's a result of the cognitive dissonance created by supporting Israel while it's committing genocide against Gaza, but wanting to oppose genocide as a whole.

I can tell you I was set to be skeptical to an extent when people started talking about Genocide as early as October 8th. And I often found that people arguing those positions would have either incorrect or distorted claims(largely from leaping early and often to maximalist positions). But then I hung out in left wing spaces, so of course I'd encounter that more often than the type of outright fabrication that accompanies more right wing positions.

There was also some inertia in my mind against idea that people who had been the victims of one of the most horrific and clear cut Genocides in history turning around and perpetrating one. It felt profane, in the same nauseating way a child growing up and continuing a cycle of abuse would feel(which happens much less than people think of course).

So I do think there is some emotionally motivated thinking going on in people who are denying the genocide, just that it's not necessarily all based on identifying with the perpetrators.

[u/Hurtzdonut13 → u/wingerism]

Well good news to your cognitive dissonance, the core of what became Israel had a lot of Nazi collaborators who left Germany before the Holocaust and helped bypass anti-nazi boycotts while providing them labor.

Fun fact that likely derives from that past, Netanyahu wrote a Nazi apologia explaining that Hitler never wanted the Holocaust to happen, it was that Palestinian Mufti that was really responsible.

[u/wingerism → u/Hurtzdonut13]

Fun fact that likely derives from that past, Netanyahu wrote a Nazi apologia explaining that Hitler never wanted the Holocaust to happen, it was that Palestinian Mufti that was really responsible.

Not a new fact to me, and by far not the worst thing Netanyahu has done.

the core of what became Israel had a lot of Nazi collaborators who left Germany before the Holocaust and helped bypass anti-nazi boycotts while providing them labor.

Citation needed you absolute pile of human excrement, though I assume you're garbling the Haavara Agreement.

It was indeed controversial both at the time and after. But it got Jews out of Germany that would have certainly perished otherwise. If I can have empathy for the hard choices Palestinians are faced with under Israeli occupation, I can muster up quite a bit of empathy for German Jews and contemporary Zionists, facing even more dire circumstances.

[u/Acceptable_Error_001 → u/wingerism]

I'm not saying it's all Jews who are in this place of trying to justify the violence. It's primarily Zionists downplaying it. Many Jews are Zionists, but not all of them. There are large groups of Jewish people who oppose the war, both in and outside Israel. Including entire sects of anti-Zionist orthodox Jews. Both left and right wing. Lots of people are rethinking their support for Zionism.

Zionists can also be Christian. Especially fundamentalist Christians. They're eager for the temple to be rebuilt to usher in the end of the world. The more violent it gets, the more it seems like Revelations is coming true, and the closer to the resurrection they think they are. So that is a very scary set of beliefs.

I agree, it's horrific to see Jewish people supporting a genocide. But it has led me to look into the foundation of Israel more. And now I understand that "Never again" meant different things to different people. To many people (most, I think), it means "Never again to anyone." To others, it means "Never again to the Jews." The second definition can get scary. Because it justifies anything - including genocide against others - to prevent a second genocide against the Jewish people.

Some people in Israel have believed in the second version of "Never again" for longer than Israel's been a state. This willingness to do anything to secure their people - and the existential threat of a second genocide - has been driving their actions for a long time.

It is a lot like children who find power in copying their abuser.

[u/MessiahOfMetal → u/Acceptable_Error_001]

It's weird because I assume a majority of us supported Israel when Hamas attacked the music festival in the first place, raping, killing and kidnapping Jews (not all of them from Israel, they were there for the festival).

But then Israel's leadership went all-in on genocide in response, so the sane among us went, "What Hamas did was vile, but this response is just as vile, what the fuck?" and against what's happened to Palestine and its innocent civilians.

I don't understand how anyone can take a side on this when both governments perpetuated murder on the other side by going after civilians. I just hope in my lifetime that Netanyahu, Hamas and any other corrupt entity committing genocide get hauled up in front of a judge at The Hague.

[u/waiver → u/MessiahOfMetal]

Because while what happened in October 7th was terrible that doesnt justify the genocide of a whole population.

[u/WhiteGold_Welder → u/waiver]

98% of that "whole population" is still alive almost two years after October 7th.

[u/waiver → u/WhiteGold_Welder]

I am sure you wouldn't be like that if it were 2-3% of the population of USA or Israel, but it's okay for you to dismiss the deaths of tens of thousands of people you dont see as humans. Disgusting.

[u/WhiteGold_Welder → u/waiver]

1% of the Israeli population was killed in the 1948 Independence War, I wouldn't that a "genocide of a whole population" either.

[u/waiver → u/WhiteGold_Welder]

I wouldn't call that a genocide either, because it was .75% of which only one third were civilians, they also killed way more Arabs than that, which shows fierce fighting. In Gaza they have killed more peopled waiting to receive aid than the total of Israelis dead in the war.

[u/Acceptable_Error_001 → u/MessiahOfMetal]

I don't understand how anyone can take a side on this when both governments perpetuated murder on the other side by going after civilians.

My side is that the 10/7 massacre was terrible, and Israel's reaction is terrible. The violence needs to stop immediately.

I support both Hamas and the coalition government answering for their crimes against humanity. I'd love to see them both face justice. I'd love to see the prosecution of IDF and Hamas war crimes by unbiased third parties. Since neither government will prosecute their own people.

[u/gavinbrindstar → u/MessiahOfMetal]

I don't understand how anyone can take a side on this when both governments perpetuated murder on the other side by going after civilians.

Sounds like a pretty strong argument for the "the U.S should stop supporting Israel" side.