The rhetoric around this conflict from you and Freddy are examples of bringing more heat than light to the debate, though obviously each of you comes from a radically different point of view.
So Freddy's position boils down: whenever Israel uses military force to neutralize a threat to its country, its a war crime. Israel should become a secular liberal democracy in which palestinians and jews live in harmony and Israel is no longer a jewish nation state. How that would work and how this won't result in the killing of all the jews is unclear. there's underpants gnome theory to the whole thing.
Your position boils down to: kill them all, if necessary. Drop the bombs. Reduce their cities to rubble. Obliterate hamas takes moral priority over all other moral priorities. If this means a million Palestinian children die, so be it. It's hamas fault for being in a civilian population, so israel has zero moral culpability when waging this war even though most of the people that die are civilians many of them kids. Anyone who has humanitarian concerns about how this war is waged or argue for restraint that increases the risk to israeli soliders lives s obviously an anti-semite that wants all the jews to die.
I wish folks would actually clearly articulate outcomes they are trying to achieve, consequences that will arise from them, and moral lines they wouldn't cross for their side. For example, consider Richard Hanania, whose ethnically Palestinian christian. He's been admirably straight forward about his position and the consequences: Israel should ethnically cleanse Gaza.
I have come to some conclusions about much of historical anti-Semitism and current anti-Semitism; some of the conclusions are not novel to me, some are a bit new.
Let's posit, first, that by identifying Jews as a group, a diverse group is lumped together. Some are more vulnerable than others, they fit into society differently, but they are being treated as a group with a name.
Historically, many of the behaviors attributed as negative to 'Jews' - including the tight-knit rapacious moneylender stereotypes - are actually representative of 'Anywheres' and could have been applied to a number of other high-status groups which were for various reasons more difficult to critique. Some Jews really did embody this type, but many did not. Local 'Somewhere' leaders benefited from a negative focus on Jews by blame-shifting and virtue-signaling, including demagogery.
A new class of Anywheres aligned themselves with 'sophistication' and 'liberal ideals' against the 'Somewheres' and in defense of the Jews/against anti-Semitism. This started in the 1800s and built over time.
Meanwhile, particularly in Israel, Jews who were 'Somewheres' had a 'Somewhere' to attempt to govern, and behaved in ways that are labelled 'conservative' by the Anywheres in a derogatory tone. They attracted the admiration of other Somewheres, leading to the apparent paradox of Israel being strongly supported by American Evangelicals.
The progressives [even or especially the liberal American Jews] cannot abide the American or European Somewheres; they weren't on the same side even immediately post 9/11, when the progressives immediately opposed 'vengeance' [and nationalism, etc]. Progressives would champion the Palestinians as their chosen victim to defend, virtue-signal around, instead of 'Zionists.'
Thoughts? Does this capture the phenomenology and explain some seeming contradictions?
Serious question: do you think there should be laws of war that cover _jus in bello_ as well as _jus ad bellum _?
If so, any nation that follows those laws will inevitably sometimes have to sacrifice its own soldiers to reduce the killing of civilians on the enemy side. Insisting that Israel follow those laws does not seem to me anti-Semitic *if* you would insist the same of any other combatant, regardless of your view of the justice of their cause.
Now maybe you think people aren't being consistent in that way, or that they are misinterpreting what the laws of war require (I thought David French had a pretty good explainer on that in the NYT a week or two ago). Or maybe you think there shouldn't be any _jus in bello_ restrictions for anyone, because morally the lives of soldiers fighting in a just cause should be valued above the lives of even children on the other side. But it's worth being specific.
Interesting. The international community has produced the population of Gaza, with its "47.3%" under-18 population - so this is kind of perfect. The result was not merely an overwhelming demographic advantage, but a strategic one. David French must be pleased at having so mighty a pen. No wonder there is little attention paid to the role of Hamas in keeping the population hemmed in there.
I should add that I do understand it is frustrating to feel pressured to obey laws of war when fighting an enemy which does not give a fig for those laws and which is unlikely to respond to any such pressure. But a law that can be escaped by pointing to an enemy's violation is no law at all.
Someone I respect (but haven't met), strongly opposed to Hamas and supportive of Israel, wrote on X that Israel's "bombing has diminishing returns. The civilian suffering it causes will start outweighing the military gains."
I replied, in part, "Outweigh in what sense? Who (to extend the metaphor) holds the scales?"
I believe that Mr. Kling has correctly identified the adjudicants.
In your recent Re-evaluations post you made the same call for an overhaul of American education system because of its ideological blight. It seems to be a central problem. I have a hard time picturing how to accomplish such reform. Essentially, you’re asking, and I agree, that curriculum be de-politicized. Could a neutral, bipartisan committee oversee development of this curricula? Could guidelines on the difference between teaching students how to think critically about political and societal issues versus promoting a particular ideology be established and enforced? And how about the NEA? I doubt any action ever be taken without some draconian enforcement and would appreciate an essay, or pointer, from you about how the overhaul could be accomplished.
Judging by historical example, the rejection of attacks on civilians is unrealistic. Forcing the foe to defend its civilian population and logistics base has always been an important strategy, from the Black Prince riding chevauchee in France to Sherman and Sheridan in 1864. This is, of course, a major reason war is so horrible.
A question for those criticizing Israel: I have been told (don't know where to verify) that, by 1944, half the gun barrels possessed by Germany were pointed at the sky, due to Allied bombing. Would the critics argue that the bombing was illegal and that the guns should have been pointed at the Red Army instead?
Holding people responsible for the actions of their government can indeed present moral dilemmas, but it is difficult to see how the foes/victims of such governments can survive if they do not do so.
Great note. It is US support which most guarantees Israel’s acceptance as a modern, democratic “Western” country, at least pretty close.
Bibi and all Israeli hawks know that they will have to sacrifice some Israeli soldiers to protect Gazans, especially the women and children.
I think their PR could be improved, but have too many different ideas to mention yet, tho they should be constantly asking critics “how can we defeat Hamas?” Not so much to get ideas, but to note that their aim is to defeat Hamas with fewest casualties, but to defeat them.
Calls for cease-fire now are thus calls to protect Hamas.
Reminds me of ‘91 Desert Storm to defeat Saddam after his attack on Kuwait, followed by US winning battles (thanks, Collin Powell), but then allowing him to remain leader, to then violate so often the conditions he had promised to obey. He claimed victory, and since he survived, he did win.
If Hamas remains in control of Gaza, they win. Instead, Israel should defeat Hamas and retake control of Gaza. To liberate the (many? Few?) Palestinians who want peace with Jews and a better life.
I certainly agree with you that "it might require the liberal world to take some uncomfortably illiberal steps to incapacitate..." As a centrist Democrat, it grieves me to recognize that few if any Democratic presidents after FDR, Truman and (at times) JFK have recognized the wisdom of your observation. Same with Democratic U.S. Senators post Henry Jackson and (at times) Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Well, yes for Joe Lieberman (back when he was a Democrat)
I have a suspicion that the focus is on killing hostages if rescuing them is impossible. I think it would be too unbearable to contemplate some of these Jewish children being raised as Palestinians, not aware of their true identity and that they were kidnapped. Killing them might be more compassionate.
I'm just speculating - I have no real insight. It just seems like the idea of a Jewish baby taken hostage and then raised to be Palestinian and fight in the next Intifada is too debilitating to the national psyche. Probably too upsetting to the parents of the child. More compassionate if the child dies (in my opinion).
I don't think Hamas wants to kill hostages - if they wanted that they would do it already. They are much too valuable to kill them if instead you can trade them for Palestinian fighters who are in Israeli prisons. Or for loot.
One of the most important take-always from _Crisis and Leviathan_ by Robert Higgs is: “another crisis will come, and when it does…”
I then like to remind myself of the stories from that book about the ratchet effect, but then I jump into creative, planning mode so that even though the size and scope of government may increase for some, I don’t necessarily need to let it increase for me. I can exit. I can opt-out. I can move. I can move away from the moderates.
Thus the creative person reads _Crisis and Leviathan_ and asks, when that crisis comes what choices will we have available, and what planning and preparation will we have done for that day?
The most important planning for such crises is: where should I live, what should I know and what I should do for work? I would suggest that the more dependent we are on these moderates the worse off we are in times of crisis. We never want to be stuck in a situation where we are dying to please the moderates or dependent on them for our protection.
Re: "I do not think that we can rationalize sending soldiers to die in an attempt to save hostages."
Arnold, Is your point that any attempt to save hostages would most likely amount to an unsuccessful mission, with pointless casualties among Israeli soldiers? Or do you mean that even a mission that probably would succeed in liberating hostages cannot be justified if it likely would require sacrifice of any number of Israeli soldiers?
I agree it is an unfortunate language shift to call a "moderate" one who takes a slanted, rather contorted view of a problem - or even a largely fanciful one such as David French does in other contexts, e.g. gun violence or the sexualization of childhood - and then propounds a "moderate" response to it.
Note that this derives its effectiveness in part from the idiot wing of the right, who do something rather different. So, for instance, the nutty ideologues in the GOP choose to pretend environmentalism *is and only is* Greta Thunberg, is anti-capitalist (rather than the greatest idea generated during America's most purely capitalist period); or they cynically (stupidly? - I don't know what we're dealing in terms of mental bandwidth) identify it with those who write clickbait pieces about how climate change drives some unrelated thing, it's hard on lgbtq or something. They never mention the people who are doing the work of plant and animal species preservation, or open space protection so that America continues to look, and be, a bit like the America they claim specifically to love - instead of like - well, the degraded Anywhere it is becoming. They never mention the people who have seen to it that there are enough ducks to shoot and still some free-flowing rivers in which to fly fish. They never mention the people trying to keep copper mines out of actual wilderness.
Of course, your truly moderate GOPers, typically from a different class, want to fly fish and take their kids to national parks and hiking in national forests and want to see wildlife flourish. But their voice is so much smaller, even if their votes are occasionally crucial.
But then, the nutters' response to their overheated imaginings is not moderate or even pretend-moderate. They joke about wanting animals to go extinct (LIZARD Act), they propose to overturn the ESA, they want to roll back air and water quality efforts. They look at some people in the West who have sweetheart leases on public land who lose a single digit number of sheep, and they say, well, we must now kill all the wolves. And nevermind capitalism or where it may be leading - renewables are an industry that must be killed with fire.
Of course, those who align with these idiocrats are creating that space the left exploits, to offer their anodyne, "moderate-sounding" non-solutions to anything - or solutions that serve the status quo.
The rhetoric around this conflict from you and Freddy are examples of bringing more heat than light to the debate, though obviously each of you comes from a radically different point of view.
So Freddy's position boils down: whenever Israel uses military force to neutralize a threat to its country, its a war crime. Israel should become a secular liberal democracy in which palestinians and jews live in harmony and Israel is no longer a jewish nation state. How that would work and how this won't result in the killing of all the jews is unclear. there's underpants gnome theory to the whole thing.
Your position boils down to: kill them all, if necessary. Drop the bombs. Reduce their cities to rubble. Obliterate hamas takes moral priority over all other moral priorities. If this means a million Palestinian children die, so be it. It's hamas fault for being in a civilian population, so israel has zero moral culpability when waging this war even though most of the people that die are civilians many of them kids. Anyone who has humanitarian concerns about how this war is waged or argue for restraint that increases the risk to israeli soliders lives s obviously an anti-semite that wants all the jews to die.
I wish folks would actually clearly articulate outcomes they are trying to achieve, consequences that will arise from them, and moral lines they wouldn't cross for their side. For example, consider Richard Hanania, whose ethnically Palestinian christian. He's been admirably straight forward about his position and the consequences: Israel should ethnically cleanse Gaza.
Arnold;
I have come to some conclusions about much of historical anti-Semitism and current anti-Semitism; some of the conclusions are not novel to me, some are a bit new.
Let's posit, first, that by identifying Jews as a group, a diverse group is lumped together. Some are more vulnerable than others, they fit into society differently, but they are being treated as a group with a name.
Historically, many of the behaviors attributed as negative to 'Jews' - including the tight-knit rapacious moneylender stereotypes - are actually representative of 'Anywheres' and could have been applied to a number of other high-status groups which were for various reasons more difficult to critique. Some Jews really did embody this type, but many did not. Local 'Somewhere' leaders benefited from a negative focus on Jews by blame-shifting and virtue-signaling, including demagogery.
A new class of Anywheres aligned themselves with 'sophistication' and 'liberal ideals' against the 'Somewheres' and in defense of the Jews/against anti-Semitism. This started in the 1800s and built over time.
Meanwhile, particularly in Israel, Jews who were 'Somewheres' had a 'Somewhere' to attempt to govern, and behaved in ways that are labelled 'conservative' by the Anywheres in a derogatory tone. They attracted the admiration of other Somewheres, leading to the apparent paradox of Israel being strongly supported by American Evangelicals.
The progressives [even or especially the liberal American Jews] cannot abide the American or European Somewheres; they weren't on the same side even immediately post 9/11, when the progressives immediately opposed 'vengeance' [and nationalism, etc]. Progressives would champion the Palestinians as their chosen victim to defend, virtue-signal around, instead of 'Zionists.'
Thoughts? Does this capture the phenomenology and explain some seeming contradictions?
Aligns with the theory of middleman minorities
Re: "perhaps [liberal moderates] will join in the battle to restore intellectual rigor and merit to American education."
Perhaps put your hopes in the null hypothesis, which is more realistic than the political turn that you imagine.
Serious question: do you think there should be laws of war that cover _jus in bello_ as well as _jus ad bellum _?
If so, any nation that follows those laws will inevitably sometimes have to sacrifice its own soldiers to reduce the killing of civilians on the enemy side. Insisting that Israel follow those laws does not seem to me anti-Semitic *if* you would insist the same of any other combatant, regardless of your view of the justice of their cause.
Now maybe you think people aren't being consistent in that way, or that they are misinterpreting what the laws of war require (I thought David French had a pretty good explainer on that in the NYT a week or two ago). Or maybe you think there shouldn't be any _jus in bello_ restrictions for anyone, because morally the lives of soldiers fighting in a just cause should be valued above the lives of even children on the other side. But it's worth being specific.
Interesting. The international community has produced the population of Gaza, with its "47.3%" under-18 population - so this is kind of perfect. The result was not merely an overwhelming demographic advantage, but a strategic one. David French must be pleased at having so mighty a pen. No wonder there is little attention paid to the role of Hamas in keeping the population hemmed in there.
I should add that I do understand it is frustrating to feel pressured to obey laws of war when fighting an enemy which does not give a fig for those laws and which is unlikely to respond to any such pressure. But a law that can be escaped by pointing to an enemy's violation is no law at all.
The first several paragraphs are searing.
Someone I respect (but haven't met), strongly opposed to Hamas and supportive of Israel, wrote on X that Israel's "bombing has diminishing returns. The civilian suffering it causes will start outweighing the military gains."
I replied, in part, "Outweigh in what sense? Who (to extend the metaphor) holds the scales?"
I believe that Mr. Kling has correctly identified the adjudicants.
In your recent Re-evaluations post you made the same call for an overhaul of American education system because of its ideological blight. It seems to be a central problem. I have a hard time picturing how to accomplish such reform. Essentially, you’re asking, and I agree, that curriculum be de-politicized. Could a neutral, bipartisan committee oversee development of this curricula? Could guidelines on the difference between teaching students how to think critically about political and societal issues versus promoting a particular ideology be established and enforced? And how about the NEA? I doubt any action ever be taken without some draconian enforcement and would appreciate an essay, or pointer, from you about how the overhaul could be accomplished.
Judging by historical example, the rejection of attacks on civilians is unrealistic. Forcing the foe to defend its civilian population and logistics base has always been an important strategy, from the Black Prince riding chevauchee in France to Sherman and Sheridan in 1864. This is, of course, a major reason war is so horrible.
A question for those criticizing Israel: I have been told (don't know where to verify) that, by 1944, half the gun barrels possessed by Germany were pointed at the sky, due to Allied bombing. Would the critics argue that the bombing was illegal and that the guns should have been pointed at the Red Army instead?
Holding people responsible for the actions of their government can indeed present moral dilemmas, but it is difficult to see how the foes/victims of such governments can survive if they do not do so.
Great note. It is US support which most guarantees Israel’s acceptance as a modern, democratic “Western” country, at least pretty close.
Bibi and all Israeli hawks know that they will have to sacrifice some Israeli soldiers to protect Gazans, especially the women and children.
I think their PR could be improved, but have too many different ideas to mention yet, tho they should be constantly asking critics “how can we defeat Hamas?” Not so much to get ideas, but to note that their aim is to defeat Hamas with fewest casualties, but to defeat them.
Calls for cease-fire now are thus calls to protect Hamas.
Reminds me of ‘91 Desert Storm to defeat Saddam after his attack on Kuwait, followed by US winning battles (thanks, Collin Powell), but then allowing him to remain leader, to then violate so often the conditions he had promised to obey. He claimed victory, and since he survived, he did win.
If Hamas remains in control of Gaza, they win. Instead, Israel should defeat Hamas and retake control of Gaza. To liberate the (many? Few?) Palestinians who want peace with Jews and a better life.
I certainly agree with you that "it might require the liberal world to take some uncomfortably illiberal steps to incapacitate..." As a centrist Democrat, it grieves me to recognize that few if any Democratic presidents after FDR, Truman and (at times) JFK have recognized the wisdom of your observation. Same with Democratic U.S. Senators post Henry Jackson and (at times) Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Well, yes for Joe Lieberman (back when he was a Democrat)
Well said - thanks for a great piece.
I have a suspicion that the focus is on killing hostages if rescuing them is impossible. I think it would be too unbearable to contemplate some of these Jewish children being raised as Palestinians, not aware of their true identity and that they were kidnapped. Killing them might be more compassionate.
This idea, better to kill the baby Jews rather than have them raised as Palestinians, is a huge surprise to me.
It seems to me one Israeli focus is Not total attack partly because they do Not want Hamas to kill the hostages, especially the babies.
Israel should be collecting DNA samples of all Palestinians, for future ID purposes, but also to discover any such baby theft.
I'm just speculating - I have no real insight. It just seems like the idea of a Jewish baby taken hostage and then raised to be Palestinian and fight in the next Intifada is too debilitating to the national psyche. Probably too upsetting to the parents of the child. More compassionate if the child dies (in my opinion).
I don't think Hamas wants to kill hostages - if they wanted that they would do it already. They are much too valuable to kill them if instead you can trade them for Palestinian fighters who are in Israeli prisons. Or for loot.
One of the most important take-always from _Crisis and Leviathan_ by Robert Higgs is: “another crisis will come, and when it does…”
I then like to remind myself of the stories from that book about the ratchet effect, but then I jump into creative, planning mode so that even though the size and scope of government may increase for some, I don’t necessarily need to let it increase for me. I can exit. I can opt-out. I can move. I can move away from the moderates.
Thus the creative person reads _Crisis and Leviathan_ and asks, when that crisis comes what choices will we have available, and what planning and preparation will we have done for that day?
The most important planning for such crises is: where should I live, what should I know and what I should do for work? I would suggest that the more dependent we are on these moderates the worse off we are in times of crisis. We never want to be stuck in a situation where we are dying to please the moderates or dependent on them for our protection.
Re: "I do not think that we can rationalize sending soldiers to die in an attempt to save hostages."
Arnold, Is your point that any attempt to save hostages would most likely amount to an unsuccessful mission, with pointless casualties among Israeli soldiers? Or do you mean that even a mission that probably would succeed in liberating hostages cannot be justified if it likely would require sacrifice of any number of Israeli soldiers?
The first
I agree it is an unfortunate language shift to call a "moderate" one who takes a slanted, rather contorted view of a problem - or even a largely fanciful one such as David French does in other contexts, e.g. gun violence or the sexualization of childhood - and then propounds a "moderate" response to it.
Note that this derives its effectiveness in part from the idiot wing of the right, who do something rather different. So, for instance, the nutty ideologues in the GOP choose to pretend environmentalism *is and only is* Greta Thunberg, is anti-capitalist (rather than the greatest idea generated during America's most purely capitalist period); or they cynically (stupidly? - I don't know what we're dealing in terms of mental bandwidth) identify it with those who write clickbait pieces about how climate change drives some unrelated thing, it's hard on lgbtq or something. They never mention the people who are doing the work of plant and animal species preservation, or open space protection so that America continues to look, and be, a bit like the America they claim specifically to love - instead of like - well, the degraded Anywhere it is becoming. They never mention the people who have seen to it that there are enough ducks to shoot and still some free-flowing rivers in which to fly fish. They never mention the people trying to keep copper mines out of actual wilderness.
Of course, your truly moderate GOPers, typically from a different class, want to fly fish and take their kids to national parks and hiking in national forests and want to see wildlife flourish. But their voice is so much smaller, even if their votes are occasionally crucial.
But then, the nutters' response to their overheated imaginings is not moderate or even pretend-moderate. They joke about wanting animals to go extinct (LIZARD Act), they propose to overturn the ESA, they want to roll back air and water quality efforts. They look at some people in the West who have sweetheart leases on public land who lose a single digit number of sheep, and they say, well, we must now kill all the wolves. And nevermind capitalism or where it may be leading - renewables are an industry that must be killed with fire.
Of course, those who align with these idiocrats are creating that space the left exploits, to offer their anodyne, "moderate-sounding" non-solutions to anything - or solutions that serve the status quo.