@timbray He's right that Israel's extreme right is approaching fascism (or is already there), and the rest of the country seems to be pulled in that direction.
But the comparison with the Wehrmacht is deeply flawed, because Jews did not slaughter thousands of Germans or swear to obliterate Germany from the map.
The central problem is this: how can Israelis make peace with Palestinians if every time they grant them some freedom, a significant number of them uses this freedom to attack Israel?
@cbreuel
> how can Israelis make peace with Palestinians if every time they grant them some freedom, a significant number of them uses this freedom to attack Israel?
Try giving some stolen land back and allowing them to have a first-class state of their own with a viable economy? Crazy talk, I know. Because it would involve making some settlers unhappy and that could never be allowed to happen.
@timbray That's exactly what they tried in Gaza, and we can all see the results
@timbray Just to make it clear, I'm not defending settlers, they are part of the problem and all settlements should be dismantled.
But also, I don't think "stolen" is a helpful characterization in this case, because basically all nation-states incorporated some "stolen" land at some point.
@cbreuel I dunno, I live on stolen land in Canada and it causes all sorts of problems (albeit much less ghastly than those in IsraPal). Facing up to facts is helpful, I think.
@timbray I agree that facing facts is helpful, and Israelis probably need more of that. But all nations have violent histories, which they embellish, romanticize and hide to some extent. The problem for Israel is that they missed the historical window in which it was normal to do that kind of thing.
What I'm trying to say is: framing the conflict in moral terms can be helpful at the level of individual actions, but not at the historical/political level.