Bill Maher explains the Middle East to Gen Z: Can anyone really dispute the facts?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I see when reading some of you is that you simply can't accept that you were brought up on MSM framing where you never questioned what you were shown. You're so brainwashed into believing nothing happened/happens before there's retaliation against Israel and then every camera light goes on. You tell yourself that because the media isn't showing you the people Israel killed/beat/raped/kidnapped that day, that week, that month, that year and doesn't give them a fleshed out "human interest" narrative the way they do with Israelis, you then just brush away their pain and their humanity, and then conclude that I am tantamount to the literal calls for another Holocaust against Jews as you ignore the *average* Israeli calling for the extermination of Palestinians. I have someone calling me a "demon." This is what US media and the govt overrun with people like Stuart Seldowitz literally in the SD in the Office on Isr-Pal, has wrought. Listen to Matt Miller, he's no different. It's disgraceful how the US is prepared to destroy itself for THIS. Their hypocrisy on full-display for the world to see.

The younger gen. aren't the ones who fell for the Iraq war lies propped up by your precious "respectable" media as you smirk at the thought of them getting their news from social media. They aren't the ones who sat there listening to Neocons with the actual "bloodlust" lie to you and who are now to this day, treated as elder statesmen on that "credible" traditional media you love so much.

My hope is with the younger generation, because unlike you older people, they refuse to turn a blind eye to what Israel has done every single day when the MSM chose to ignore it. They refuse your simplistic belief that "Oct 7" is when this started or you get to ignore what led to it. When you just brush away the president of the US lied to you on day one and claimed he "saw videos of beheaded babies" and the media --rather than investigate the claims-- splash it on your screens all day and guests poisoning the minds of viewers for days/weeks and then are tepid with the retractions, you expect them to go along with how you consume information? They aren't the ones sitting there watching the ADL lie and make it about antisemitism and use Judaism as their cudgel to defend the barbarism of Israel. They aren't the ones who actively attack me for existing and then claim I want Jews dead based on simply telling you how everything actually happened and who brought terrorism and quoting the direct words of Israelis or Zionists, not simply the "far-right." Israelis society is destroying itself and you coddling their depravity, will only hasten their demise. Keep telling yourself it's just some fringe minority in Israel while you then compare me to them. Should really work out well being that myopic in how you think and you read what someone says.

And to the ridiculous comment "I don't have a dog in this fight" that I see blissfully ignorant Americans constantly use but always seem to still believe the lies about Israel always being the victim, I'll say what I did in another post on another thread: Your tax money, your media and your govt's blind fealty from Congress to vetoes at the UN to laws punishing anyone who speaks out, is why you do have a dog in this fight: You created Cujo.

Done with this topic, but I thank Jeff for providing the forum.

You’re not “done with this topic.” Otc, you won’t shut up about it and insist that you - a random poster - know more about the situation than Middle East experts. You do not.

You're right, I'm not done. One more just for you: I'm Palestinian. That you --the actual random poster-- tell me I don't know what I know *first hand* how Israel operates or the lies I know are lies, is *chefskiss*

You'll forgive me if I don't go along with "Middle East experts" like Bill Maher or I'm sure all the ones you're thinking of who happen to be western Zionists. Nothing funnier than being lectured by people who think it's perfectly normal watching roundtables with no actual Middle Eastern people. Nicolle Wallace discussing the Middle East with two "Mideast experts" like: Johnathan Greenblatt and Donny Deutsche.

List your experts who aren't part of "thinktanks" that are clearly pro-Israel. I doubt any are actually Arab and NOT on the payroll. Forget it, because I don;t even care what you think.

Now I am done. Won't even read your reply.

DP

Please reconsider. Voices like yours will be part of the healing process, overcoming the distortions and manipulations that are central to the Zionist movement’s stranglehold of U.S. policy in the region.

The US rightly recognizes that a democratic country that is pro US and also upholds many western values including but not limited to freedom of religion, rights for women, rights for LGTBQ+, rights for racial minorities, is aligned with US interests vs Iran-backed regimes and terrorists groups that dominate the region. That’s not the “Zionists” (Jew haters love wielding that word but it betrays your intent); that is good US foreign policy.

Now sure, you can say Netanyahu isn’t a good guy, agree. But just like I’m not giving up on the US because of Trump and hope our allies won’t either, not going to abandon Israel for what is essentially Iran’s Islamist regime.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I see when reading some of you is that you simply can't accept that you were brought up on MSM framing where you never questioned what you were shown. You're so brainwashed into believing nothing happened/happens before there's retaliation against Israel and then every camera light goes on. You tell yourself that because the media isn't showing you the people Israel killed/beat/raped/kidnapped that day, that week, that month, that year and doesn't give them a fleshed out "human interest" narrative the way they do with Israelis, you then just brush away their pain and their humanity, and then conclude that I am tantamount to the literal calls for another Holocaust against Jews as you ignore the *average* Israeli calling for the extermination of Palestinians. I have someone calling me a "demon." This is what US media and the govt overrun with people like Stuart Seldowitz literally in the SD in the Office on Isr-Pal, has wrought. Listen to Matt Miller, he's no different. It's disgraceful how the US is prepared to destroy itself for THIS. Their hypocrisy on full-display for the world to see.

The younger gen. aren't the ones who fell for the Iraq war lies propped up by your precious "respectable" media as you smirk at the thought of them getting their news from social media. They aren't the ones who sat there listening to Neocons with the actual "bloodlust" lie to you and who are now to this day, treated as elder statesmen on that "credible" traditional media you love so much.

My hope is with the younger generation, because unlike you older people, they refuse to turn a blind eye to what Israel has done every single day when the MSM chose to ignore it. They refuse your simplistic belief that "Oct 7" is when this started or you get to ignore what led to it. When you just brush away the president of the US lied to you on day one and claimed he "saw videos of beheaded babies" and the media --rather than investigate the claims-- splash it on your screens all day and guests poisoning the minds of viewers for days/weeks and then are tepid with the retractions, you expect them to go along with how you consume information? They aren't the ones sitting there watching the ADL lie and make it about antisemitism and use Judaism as their cudgel to defend the barbarism of Israel. They aren't the ones who actively attack me for existing and then claim I want Jews dead based on simply telling you how everything actually happened and who brought terrorism and quoting the direct words of Israelis or Zionists, not simply the "far-right." Israelis society is destroying itself and you coddling their depravity, will only hasten their demise. Keep telling yourself it's just some fringe minority in Israel while you then compare me to them. Should really work out well being that myopic in how you think and you read what someone says.

And to the ridiculous comment "I don't have a dog in this fight" that I see blissfully ignorant Americans constantly use but always seem to still believe the lies about Israel always being the victim, I'll say what I did in another post on another thread: Your tax money, your media and your govt's blind fealty from Congress to vetoes at the UN to laws punishing anyone who speaks out, is why you do have a dog in this fight: You created Cujo.

Done with this topic, but I thank Jeff for providing the forum.

You’re not “done with this topic.” Otc, you won’t shut up about it and insist that you - a random poster - know more about the situation than Middle East experts. You do not.

You're right, I'm not done. One more just for you: I'm Palestinian. That you --the actual random poster-- tell me I don't know what I know *first hand* how Israel operates or the lies I know are lies, is *chefskiss*

You'll forgive me if I don't go along with "Middle East experts" like Bill Maher or I'm sure all the ones you're thinking of who happen to be western Zionists. Nothing funnier than being lectured by people who think it's perfectly normal watching roundtables with no actual Middle Eastern people. Nicolle Wallace discussing the Middle East with two "Mideast experts" like: Johnathan Greenblatt and Donny Deutsche.

List your experts who aren't part of "thinktanks" that are clearly pro-Israel. I doubt any are actually Arab and NOT on the payroll. Forget it, because I don;t even care what you think.

Now I am done. Won't even read your reply.

DP

Please reconsider. Voices like yours will be part of the healing process, overcoming the distortions and manipulations that are central to the Zionist movement’s stranglehold of U.S. policy in the region.

The US rightly recognizes that a democratic country that is pro US and also upholds many western values including but not limited to freedom of religion, rights for women, rights for LGTBQ+, rights for racial minorities, is aligned with US interests vs Iran-backed regimes and terrorists groups that dominate the region. That’s not the “Zionists” (Jew haters love wielding that word but it betrays your intent); that is good US foreign policy.

Now sure, you can say Netanyahu isn’t a good guy, agree. But just like I’m not giving up on the US because of Trump and hope our allies won’t either, not going to abandon Israel for what is essentially Iran’s Islamist regime.

Obviously the U.S. has more than two policy choices in the Middle East, The suggestion that we either have to give full 100% support to Israel or we must align with Iran is ridiculous. At a minimum, the U.S. should follow U.S. law which prohibits supplying weapons to countries that are preventing humanitarian aid to reach victims. Israel is clearly doing that in northern Gaza. As such, the U.S. should follow our own law and immediately halt all weapons deliveries.

Second, the U.S., as a member of the United Nations and a Security Council member, has a responsibility to ensure the safety of of U.N. peacekeeping forces. Israel has repeatedly attacked UNIFIL forces in southern Lebanon, wounding several soldiers. Today Israeli forces invaded a UNIFIL base. The U.S. should stop all support for Israel's invasion of Lebanon until Israel halts its aggression toward the peacekeeping forces.

Third, today Secretary of Defense Austin authorized the deployment of a THAAD missile defense system and a crew of U.S. personnel to man it to Israel. This is the deployment of U.S. forces into a war zone where there is a good chance they will be involved in conflict. This should not be done without Congressional authorization and should not be done at all until Israel adheres to U.S. demands regarding a ceasefire in Gaza, the resumption of humanitarian aid, a ceasefire in Lebanon, and an end to the seize of northern Gaza.

The U.S. relationship with Israel had been one-sided for far too long. It is time for the U.S. to follow its own laws and pursue its own interests.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:Bill Maher is inaccurate in many instances in that video. He makes even basic mistakes. Here are a few:

1) He says that calling Jews "colonizers" is like calling Native Americans "colonizers". Consider your reaction if Native Americans from the South West began taking over Manhattan, creating a new country, and forcing its current residents into exile. Wouldn't you consider them "colonizers"? While it is true that some Jews remained permanently in what is now Israel, the Zionist movement was led by European Jews. At its conception, the Zionist movement was not in agreement about where a Jewish state should be located. Had a Jewish state been established in Uganda, an idea that was actually accepted by the World Jewish Congress in 1903, you would more readily recognize it to as colonization.

2) Maher claims that for 2,000 years nobody was interested in Palestine. This shows complete ignorance. What does Maher think the Crusades were about? Crusaders from Western Europe fought Persians and Kurds from today's Iran (among others) and Maher thinks this demonstrates a lack of interest. During the Ottoman Empire, there were thriving cities and towns in Palestine. Many radical supporters of Israel, including Maher apparently, would have you believe that Palestine was an empty land. That is a rewriting of history that misrepresents the deep ties that Palestinians have to their homeland.

3) Maher suggests that Zionism was a reaction to the Holocaust and that Jews became interested in a Jewish homeland after World War II. In fact, Jews had started emigrating from Europe to Palestine as early as 1882, the time of the First Aliyah. The movement gained momentum prior to World War I. Again, Maher is ignorant of basic history.

4) Maher refers to the killing of 600 protesters in Iran. That, of course, is a terrible thing that I condemn. But it pales in comparison to the number of protesters that has Israel killed. I am not talking about about those killed by Israel in fighting, but the killing of unarmed protesters. By the way, that number includes several Americans just in the last few months.

5) Maher commits a popular and common fallacy of equating opposition to Israel's killing of civilians as support for Hamas or Hezbollah. Pro-Israel individuals routinely say that they oppose Netanyahu but support Israel. That is considered a very acceptable position. Yet, when others say that they support the Palestinian people but oppose Hamas, they are labeled as supporters of terrorism. Those who, like Maher, engage in this sort of demagoguery are not serious and should not be considered serious. The should be considered as the propagandists that they are.

Jeff,

Points 1, 2, and 3 don’t reflect historical facts - and this is exactly what Maher was pointing out.

1. Do you recognize the fact that Jews in Europe arrived in Europe either at the hands of Roman invaders in Judea who captured and enslaved them and in some cases brought their slaves back to Europe and/or Jews fled the Levant because they were being terrorized by Ottoman and then later, and more violently, by Islamic invaders? Jews are native to Israel - they are indigenous to the land - and were forced from it violently. The Jewish diaspora is a result of Jews being forced out of that homeland not because the average middle eastern Jew was yearning for what is now Poland or Germany.

Despite the forced diaspora - which continued through the 20th century as Arab Islamist powers increasingly oppressed Jews all over the Middle East and even conspired with the Nazis in WWII, Jews never left Israel and as a community have been resilient enough to sustain a presence. There were over 600,000 Jews in Israel in 1946.

This is quite different than the strawman you pose of Native Americans from the Southwest retaking Manhattan.

And to this point, Uganda is not equivalent to Israel and that would have been colonialism because, unlike Israel, Jews have no historic connection to Uganda. That’s ultimately why Israel was identified as a Jewish state versus Uganda. Again, Jews are indigenous to Israel, not colonizers.

2. Also, why do you assert that “nobody was interested in Palestine” for 2,000 years. Jews have always been connected to that region - they never left that region. Religiously and in terms of historic connections, Jews have always been “interested” in that area of the Levant. Observant Jews have prayed in the direction of Jerusalem for millennia, it’s integral to Jewish identity. The line from the Passover Sedar - “next year in Jerusalem” is linked back to the 5th Century BCE. Jews have always been interested in Israel.

3. You reference Jews returning to Israel pre WWI …. You do realize that antisemitism in Russia and Eastern Europe surged at this time, right?

You make it seem like Jews woke up in mid-1800s and said, hey, let’s go to Israel. That’s not factual and seems ignorant of historic facts.

Lastly, denial of Jewish indigenous roots in the Middle East and specifically Israel has been part of Arab Islamist propaganda for the 50 years. This propaganda also attempts to wipe out the historical connection of Christians and other religious groups to those lands. It’s not factual - it’s propaganda - and again, part of what Maher was highlighting in his piece.

Not going to even get into 4 and 5 because the false equivalence of the one Jewish state in the world trying to defend itself from Iranian terrorist proxies and the resulting war post 10/7 and the terrorist / repressive regimes that are the Iranian regime and its spinoffs of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis is not worth debating. Again, not reflective of fact, which was Maher’s point to begin with.

I don't know if you realize, but you are mostly agreeing with me. I was not the one who said that nobody was interested in Palestine for 2000 years. That was Maher. You must not have watched the video. I pointed out that he was wrong and, in fact, there was considerable interest. You seem to agree that there was interest. Your justifications for Jews moving to Palestine may be correct, but, again, only reinforce my point that Jews were moving to Israel before World War II, a claim Maher made and of which you would be aware if you had bothered to watch the video. So, I guess, thanks for mostly agreeing with my points about Maher being wrong. Who says people with different opinions can't find common ground?

Jeff, You are being entirely too kind to someone who believes the Ottomans existed before Islam.

You are referring to me. I didn’t say Ottomans existed before Islam. What I referenced was that as the Ottoman’s grip on the region receded starting in the early 1800s, Islamist Arabs proceeded to overtake lands and communities where Jews and conducted multiple massacres on the Jews - not just in Israel but throughout the Middle East. These were initiated to rid the area of Jewish populations. This affected Christian and other non-Muslim populations, too. This terror led to Jews fleeing the region.

Yes, before this we have Islamist imperialists, Romans, and Babylonians, among others. Lots of terror. None of it conducive to Jews sticking around.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:Bill Maher is inaccurate in many instances in that video. He makes even basic mistakes. Here are a few:

1) He says that calling Jews "colonizers" is like calling Native Americans "colonizers". Consider your reaction if Native Americans from the South West began taking over Manhattan, creating a new country, and forcing its current residents into exile. Wouldn't you consider them "colonizers"? While it is true that some Jews remained permanently in what is now Israel, the Zionist movement was led by European Jews. At its conception, the Zionist movement was not in agreement about where a Jewish state should be located. Had a Jewish state been established in Uganda, an idea that was actually accepted by the World Jewish Congress in 1903, you would more readily recognize it to as colonization.

2) Maher claims that for 2,000 years nobody was interested in Palestine. This shows complete ignorance. What does Maher think the Crusades were about? Crusaders from Western Europe fought Persians and Kurds from today's Iran (among others) and Maher thinks this demonstrates a lack of interest. During the Ottoman Empire, there were thriving cities and towns in Palestine. Many radical supporters of Israel, including Maher apparently, would have you believe that Palestine was an empty land. That is a rewriting of history that misrepresents the deep ties that Palestinians have to their homeland.

3) Maher suggests that Zionism was a reaction to the Holocaust and that Jews became interested in a Jewish homeland after World War II. In fact, Jews had started emigrating from Europe to Palestine as early as 1882, the time of the First Aliyah. The movement gained momentum prior to World War I. Again, Maher is ignorant of basic history.

4) Maher refers to the killing of 600 protesters in Iran. That, of course, is a terrible thing that I condemn. But it pales in comparison to the number of protesters that has Israel killed. I am not talking about about those killed by Israel in fighting, but the killing of unarmed protesters. By the way, that number includes several Americans just in the last few months.

5) Maher commits a popular and common fallacy of equating opposition to Israel's killing of civilians as support for Hamas or Hezbollah. Pro-Israel individuals routinely say that they oppose Netanyahu but support Israel. That is considered a very acceptable position. Yet, when others say that they support the Palestinian people but oppose Hamas, they are labeled as supporters of terrorism. Those who, like Maher, engage in this sort of demagoguery are not serious and should not be considered serious. The should be considered as the propagandists that they are.

Jeff,

Points 1, 2, and 3 don’t reflect historical facts - and this is exactly what Maher was pointing out.

1. Do you recognize the fact that Jews in Europe arrived in Europe either at the hands of Roman invaders in Judea who captured and enslaved them and in some cases brought their slaves back to Europe and/or Jews fled the Levant because they were being terrorized by Ottoman and then later, and more violently, by Islamic invaders? Jews are native to Israel - they are indigenous to the land - and were forced from it violently. The Jewish diaspora is a result of Jews being forced out of that homeland not because the average middle eastern Jew was yearning for what is now Poland or Germany.

Despite the forced diaspora - which continued through the 20th century as Arab Islamist powers increasingly oppressed Jews all over the Middle East and even conspired with the Nazis in WWII, Jews never left Israel and as a community have been resilient enough to sustain a presence. There were over 600,000 Jews in Israel in 1946.

This is quite different than the strawman you pose of Native Americans from the Southwest retaking Manhattan.

And to this point, Uganda is not equivalent to Israel and that would have been colonialism because, unlike Israel, Jews have no historic connection to Uganda. That’s ultimately why Israel was identified as a Jewish state versus Uganda. Again, Jews are indigenous to Israel, not colonizers.

2. Also, why do you assert that “nobody was interested in Palestine” for 2,000 years. Jews have always been connected to that region - they never left that region. Religiously and in terms of historic connections, Jews have always been “interested” in that area of the Levant. Observant Jews have prayed in the direction of Jerusalem for millennia, it’s integral to Jewish identity. The line from the Passover Sedar - “next year in Jerusalem” is linked back to the 5th Century BCE. Jews have always been interested in Israel.

3. You reference Jews returning to Israel pre WWI …. You do realize that antisemitism in Russia and Eastern Europe surged at this time, right?

You make it seem like Jews woke up in mid-1800s and said, hey, let’s go to Israel. That’s not factual and seems ignorant of historic facts.

Lastly, denial of Jewish indigenous roots in the Middle East and specifically Israel has been part of Arab Islamist propaganda for the 50 years. This propaganda also attempts to wipe out the historical connection of Christians and other religious groups to those lands. It’s not factual - it’s propaganda - and again, part of what Maher was highlighting in his piece.

Not going to even get into 4 and 5 because the false equivalence of the one Jewish state in the world trying to defend itself from Iranian terrorist proxies and the resulting war post 10/7 and the terrorist / repressive regimes that are the Iranian regime and its spinoffs of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis is not worth debating. Again, not reflective of fact, which was Maher’s point to begin with.

I don't know if you realize, but you are mostly agreeing with me. I was not the one who said that nobody was interested in Palestine for 2000 years. That was Maher. You must not have watched the video. I pointed out that he was wrong and, in fact, there was considerable interest. You seem to agree that there was interest. Your justifications for Jews moving to Palestine may be correct, but, again, only reinforce my point that Jews were moving to Israel before World War II, a claim Maher made and of which you would be aware if you had bothered to watch the video. So, I guess, thanks for mostly agreeing with my points about Maher being wrong. Who says people with different opinions can't find common ground?

Jeff, You are being entirely too kind to someone who believes the Ottomans existed before Islam.

You are referring to me. I didn’t say Ottomans existed before Islam. What I referenced was that as the Ottoman’s grip on the region receded starting in the early 1800s, Islamist Arabs proceeded to overtake lands and communities where Jews and conducted multiple massacres on the Jews - not just in Israel but throughout the Middle East. These were initiated to rid the area of Jewish populations. This affected Christian and other non-Muslim populations, too. This terror led to Jews fleeing the region.

Yes, before this we have Islamist imperialists, Romans, and Babylonians, among others. Lots of terror. None of it conducive to Jews sticking around.

Exactly what "multiple massacres" were conducted in the 1800s that lead to Jews fleeing the region?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I see when reading some of you is that you simply can't accept that you were brought up on MSM framing where you never questioned what you were shown. You're so brainwashed into believing nothing happened/happens before there's retaliation against Israel and then every camera light goes on. You tell yourself that because the media isn't showing you the people Israel killed/beat/raped/kidnapped that day, that week, that month, that year and doesn't give them a fleshed out "human interest" narrative the way they do with Israelis, you then just brush away their pain and their humanity, and then conclude that I am tantamount to the literal calls for another Holocaust against Jews as you ignore the *average* Israeli calling for the extermination of Palestinians. I have someone calling me a "demon." This is what US media and the govt overrun with people like Stuart Seldowitz literally in the SD in the Office on Isr-Pal, has wrought. Listen to Matt Miller, he's no different. It's disgraceful how the US is prepared to destroy itself for THIS. Their hypocrisy on full-display for the world to see.

The younger gen. aren't the ones who fell for the Iraq war lies propped up by your precious "respectable" media as you smirk at the thought of them getting their news from social media. They aren't the ones who sat there listening to Neocons with the actual "bloodlust" lie to you and who are now to this day, treated as elder statesmen on that "credible" traditional media you love so much.

My hope is with the younger generation, because unlike you older people, they refuse to turn a blind eye to what Israel has done every single day when the MSM chose to ignore it. They refuse your simplistic belief that "Oct 7" is when this started or you get to ignore what led to it. When you just brush away the president of the US lied to you on day one and claimed he "saw videos of beheaded babies" and the media --rather than investigate the claims-- splash it on your screens all day and guests poisoning the minds of viewers for days/weeks and then are tepid with the retractions, you expect them to go along with how you consume information? They aren't the ones sitting there watching the ADL lie and make it about antisemitism and use Judaism as their cudgel to defend the barbarism of Israel. They aren't the ones who actively attack me for existing and then claim I want Jews dead based on simply telling you how everything actually happened and who brought terrorism and quoting the direct words of Israelis or Zionists, not simply the "far-right." Israelis society is destroying itself and you coddling their depravity, will only hasten their demise. Keep telling yourself it's just some fringe minority in Israel while you then compare me to them. Should really work out well being that myopic in how you think and you read what someone says.

And to the ridiculous comment "I don't have a dog in this fight" that I see blissfully ignorant Americans constantly use but always seem to still believe the lies about Israel always being the victim, I'll say what I did in another post on another thread: Your tax money, your media and your govt's blind fealty from Congress to vetoes at the UN to laws punishing anyone who speaks out, is why you do have a dog in this fight: You created Cujo.

Done with this topic, but I thank Jeff for providing the forum.

You’re not “done with this topic.” Otc, you won’t shut up about it and insist that you - a random poster - know more about the situation than Middle East experts. You do not.

You're right, I'm not done. One more just for you: I'm Palestinian. That you --the actual random poster-- tell me I don't know what I know *first hand* how Israel operates or the lies I know are lies, is *chefskiss*

You'll forgive me if I don't go along with "Middle East experts" like Bill Maher or I'm sure all the ones you're thinking of who happen to be western Zionists. Nothing funnier than being lectured by people who think it's perfectly normal watching roundtables with no actual Middle Eastern people. Nicolle Wallace discussing the Middle East with two "Mideast experts" like: Johnathan Greenblatt and Donny Deutsche.

List your experts who aren't part of "thinktanks" that are clearly pro-Israel. I doubt any are actually Arab and NOT on the payroll. Forget it, because I don;t even care what you think.

Now I am done. Won't even read your reply.

DP

Please reconsider. Voices like yours will be part of the healing process, overcoming the distortions and manipulations that are central to the Zionist movement’s stranglehold of U.S. policy in the region.

The US rightly recognizes that a democratic country that is pro US and also upholds many western values including but not limited to freedom of religion, rights for women, rights for LGTBQ+, rights for racial minorities, is aligned with US interests vs Iran-backed regimes and terrorists groups that dominate the region. That’s not the “Zionists” (Jew haters love wielding that word but it betrays your intent); that is good US foreign policy.

Now sure, you can say Netanyahu isn’t a good guy, agree. But just like I’m not giving up on the US because of Trump and hope our allies won’t either, not going to abandon Israel for what is essentially Iran’s Islamist regime.

Israel does not respect the lives of non Jews nor does Israel uphold Western Values because they do not believe in Western Values. The West has no common value/interst with Israel. Israel view 98% of the US population as cattle. The interest of the US aligned with oil production countries in the Middle East not Israel. Israel is a little unimportant country that mean nothing to the US.

Just because you Zionist label people you oppress, kill and steal land from terrorists does not make them terrorists. Israel is a terrorist state.

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:Bill Maher is inaccurate in many instances in that video. He makes even basic mistakes. Here are a few:

1) He says that calling Jews "colonizers" is like calling Native Americans "colonizers". Consider your reaction if Native Americans from the South West began taking over Manhattan, creating a new country, and forcing its current residents into exile. Wouldn't you consider them "colonizers"? While it is true that some Jews remained permanently in what is now Israel, the Zionist movement was led by European Jews. At its conception, the Zionist movement was not in agreement about where a Jewish state should be located. Had a Jewish state been established in Uganda, an idea that was actually accepted by the World Jewish Congress in 1903, you would more readily recognize it to as colonization.

2) Maher claims that for 2,000 years nobody was interested in Palestine. This shows complete ignorance. What does Maher think the Crusades were about? Crusaders from Western Europe fought Persians and Kurds from today's Iran (among others) and Maher thinks this demonstrates a lack of interest. During the Ottoman Empire, there were thriving cities and towns in Palestine. Many radical supporters of Israel, including Maher apparently, would have you believe that Palestine was an empty land. That is a rewriting of history that misrepresents the deep ties that Palestinians have to their homeland.

3) Maher suggests that Zionism was a reaction to the Holocaust and that Jews became interested in a Jewish homeland after World War II. In fact, Jews had started emigrating from Europe to Palestine as early as 1882, the time of the First Aliyah. The movement gained momentum prior to World War I. Again, Maher is ignorant of basic history.

4) Maher refers to the killing of 600 protesters in Iran. That, of course, is a terrible thing that I condemn. But it pales in comparison to the number of protesters that has Israel killed. I am not talking about about those killed by Israel in fighting, but the killing of unarmed protesters. By the way, that number includes several Americans just in the last few months.

5) Maher commits a popular and common fallacy of equating opposition to Israel's killing of civilians as support for Hamas or Hezbollah. Pro-Israel individuals routinely say that they oppose Netanyahu but support Israel. That is considered a very acceptable position. Yet, when others say that they support the Palestinian people but oppose Hamas, they are labeled as supporters of terrorism. Those who, like Maher, engage in this sort of demagoguery are not serious and should not be considered serious. The should be considered as the propagandists that they are.

Jeff,

Points 1, 2, and 3 don’t reflect historical facts - and this is exactly what Maher was pointing out.

1. Do you recognize the fact that Jews in Europe arrived in Europe either at the hands of Roman invaders in Judea who captured and enslaved them and in some cases brought their slaves back to Europe and/or Jews fled the Levant because they were being terrorized by Ottoman and then later, and more violently, by Islamic invaders? Jews are native to Israel - they are indigenous to the land - and were forced from it violently. The Jewish diaspora is a result of Jews being forced out of that homeland not because the average middle eastern Jew was yearning for what is now Poland or Germany.

Despite the forced diaspora - which continued through the 20th century as Arab Islamist powers increasingly oppressed Jews all over the Middle East and even conspired with the Nazis in WWII, Jews never left Israel and as a community have been resilient enough to sustain a presence. There were over 600,000 Jews in Israel in 1946.

This is quite different than the strawman you pose of Native Americans from the Southwest retaking Manhattan.

And to this point, Uganda is not equivalent to Israel and that would have been colonialism because, unlike Israel, Jews have no historic connection to Uganda. That’s ultimately why Israel was identified as a Jewish state versus Uganda. Again, Jews are indigenous to Israel, not colonizers.

2. Also, why do you assert that “nobody was interested in Palestine” for 2,000 years. Jews have always been connected to that region - they never left that region. Religiously and in terms of historic connections, Jews have always been “interested” in that area of the Levant. Observant Jews have prayed in the direction of Jerusalem for millennia, it’s integral to Jewish identity. The line from the Passover Sedar - “next year in Jerusalem” is linked back to the 5th Century BCE. Jews have always been interested in Israel.

3. You reference Jews returning to Israel pre WWI …. You do realize that antisemitism in Russia and Eastern Europe surged at this time, right?

You make it seem like Jews woke up in mid-1800s and said, hey, let’s go to Israel. That’s not factual and seems ignorant of historic facts.

Lastly, denial of Jewish indigenous roots in the Middle East and specifically Israel has been part of Arab Islamist propaganda for the 50 years. This propaganda also attempts to wipe out the historical connection of Christians and other religious groups to those lands. It’s not factual - it’s propaganda - and again, part of what Maher was highlighting in his piece.

Not going to even get into 4 and 5 because the false equivalence of the one Jewish state in the world trying to defend itself from Iranian terrorist proxies and the resulting war post 10/7 and the terrorist / repressive regimes that are the Iranian regime and its spinoffs of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis is not worth debating. Again, not reflective of fact, which was Maher’s point to begin with.

I don't know if you realize, but you are mostly agreeing with me. I was not the one who said that nobody was interested in Palestine for 2000 years. That was Maher. You must not have watched the video. I pointed out that he was wrong and, in fact, there was considerable interest. You seem to agree that there was interest. Your justifications for Jews moving to Palestine may be correct, but, again, only reinforce my point that Jews were moving to Israel before World War II, a claim Maher made and of which you would be aware if you had bothered to watch the video. So, I guess, thanks for mostly agreeing with my points about Maher being wrong. Who says people with different opinions can't find common ground?

Jeff, You are being entirely too kind to someone who believes the Ottomans existed before Islam.

You are referring to me. I didn’t say Ottomans existed before Islam. What I referenced was that as the Ottoman’s grip on the region receded starting in the early 1800s, Islamist Arabs proceeded to overtake lands and communities where Jews and conducted multiple massacres on the Jews - not just in Israel but throughout the Middle East. These were initiated to rid the area of Jewish populations. This affected Christian and other non-Muslim populations, too. This terror led to Jews fleeing the region.

Yes, before this we have Islamist imperialists, Romans, and Babylonians, among others. Lots of terror. None of it conducive to Jews sticking around.

Exactly what "multiple massacres" were conducted in the 1800s that lead to Jews fleeing the region?

There’s many. This is well documented and certainly predates the 1800s but here’s an abbreviated list of some of the most notable since that date and highlights the oppression that was happening in and around the Levant and extending across North Africa where millennia-old Jewish communities were repressed, synagogues destroyed, and Jews killed. Jews don’t leave in entirely but their numbers decline precipitously as they flee. As Ottomon power recedes in 1800s, Arab Islamic powers continue and arguably exacerbate the violence against these communities.

Again, not a complete list - this could go back a few centuries.

▪ 1805: 1st pogrom in Ottoman Algeria against the Jews of Algiers after a famine. French
consul Dubois-Thainville saves 200 Jews by sheltering them in his consulate.
▪ 1805: exile of Jews from Algiers to Tunis and Livorno
▪ 1805, the leader of the Jewish Nation of Algiers, Naphthalie Busnach, is killed while riots ravage the neighborhoods.
▪ 1806: expulsion by fatwa of the Jews of Sali in Morocco
▪ 1806: ban on Moroccan Jews wearing Western clothing
▪ 1806: the janissaries of the dey of Algiers massacre and pillage in the Jewish quarter
▪ 1807: expulsion of Jews from Tetouan
▪ 1808: 1st massacres in the Mellah ghetto, North Africa
▪ 1815, the chief rabbi of Algiers, Isaac Aboulker, is beheaded during a riot.
▪ 1815: the Jews of Algiers are forced to fight against an invasion of locusts
▪ 1815: 2nd pogrom of Algiers, Ottoman Algeria
▪ 1816: in Algeria, ban on carrying weapons for Jews and Christians
▪ 1820: Massacres of Sahalu Lobiant, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1828 : pogrom de Baghdad, Iraq ottoman
▪ 1830: 3rd pogrom of Algeria, Ottoman Algeria
▪ 1830: start of the persecution of Jews in Persia, caused by the Russian advance in the Caucasus
▪ 1830: ethnic cleansing of Jews in Tabriz, Iran
▪ 1834: 2nd pogrom of Hebron, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1834 : Pogrom de Safed, Palestine ottomane
▪ 1838: Druze attack in Safed, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1839: Massacre of the Mashadi Jews, Iran
▪ 1839: forced conversion of surviving Jews from Mashadi
▪ 1839: campaign of forced conversions of Iranian Jews
▪ 1840: persecution of the Jews of Damascus; ritual murder case
▪ 1840: forced conversion of the Jews of Mashadi
▪ 1841: massive murders of Jews in Morocco; the sultan is obliged to consider the Jews as his personal property, which helps to protect them
▪ 1840: Damascus, ritual murders (French Muslims and Christians kidnapped, tortured and killed Jewish children for entertainment), Ottoman Syria
▪ 1844: 1st Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1847: Dayr al-Qamar Pogrom, Liban ottoman
▪ 1847: ethnic cleansing of Jews in Jerusalem, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1848: 1st pogrom of Damascus, Syria
▪ 1848: total disappearance of the Jews of Mashhad
▪ 1850: 1st pogrom of Aleppo, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1854: anti-Jewish pogrom in Demnate, Morocco
▪ 1857: beheading in Tunis of the Jewish coachman Batou Sfez, accused of blasphemy, while he was drunk
▪ 1860: 2nd pogrom of Damascus, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1862: 1st pogrom of Beirut, Ottoman Lebanon
▪ 1866 : pogrom at Kuzguncuk, Turquie Ottomane
▪ 1867: Barfurush massacre, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1868: Eyub Pogrom, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1869: Massacre of Tunis, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1869: Massacre of Sfax, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1864–1880: Marrakech massacre, Morocco
▪ 1870: 2nd Alexandria massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1870: 1st pogrom in Istanbul, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1871: 1st Damanhur massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1872: Massacres in Edirne, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1872: 1st pogrom of Izmir, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1873: 2nd massacre of Damanhur, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Izmir, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Istanbul, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Beirut, Ottoman Lebanon
▪ 1875: 2 pogroms in Aleppo, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1875: Massacre on the island of Djerba, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1877 : 3e massacre de Damanhur, Egypte ottomane
▪ 1877: Pogrom of Mansura, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1882: Massacre of Homs, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1882: 3rd massacre of Alexandria, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1889: after the funeral of a rabbi, deemed too discreet, the Jewish cemetery of Baghdad was confiscated
▪ 1889: looting of the Jewish quarter of Baghdad
▪ 1890: 2nd Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1890, 3e pogrom de Damas, Syrie ottomane
▪ 1891: 4th massacre of Damanahur, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1897: murders in Tripoli, Ottoman Libya
▪ 1903&1907: Taza & Settat, pogroms, Morocco
▪ 1890: Massacres of Tunis, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1901–1902: 3rd Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1901–1907: 4th Alexandria massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1903: 1st Port Said massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1903–1940: Pogroms of Taza and Settat, Morocco
▪ 1904: massacre of Jews in Yemen
▪ 1907: Casablanca, pogrom, Morocco
▪ 1908: 2nd Port Said massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1909: comment from the British vice-consul of Mosul: “The attitude of Muslims towards Christians and Jews is that of a master towards his slaves.”
▪ 1910: blood libel of Shiraz
▪ 1911: Shiraz pogrom
▪ 1912: 4th Fez, Pogrom, Morocco
▪ 1914: expulsion of Jews from Palestine old enough to bear arms by the Ottomans
▪ 1917: Jewish Inquisition of Baghdadi, Ottoman Empire
▪ 1918–1948: adoption of a law prohibiting the raising of a Jewish orphan, Yemen
▪ 1920: Irbid massacres: British mandate in Palestine
▪ 1920–1930: Arab riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1921: 1st Jaffa riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1922: Massacres of Djerba, Tunisia
▪ 1922: law of forced conversion of orphans in Yemen, concerning Jews including as adults
▪ 1927: 60 Jews killed by Arabs in the Mellah of Casablanca Morocco
▪ 1928: Massacres of Ikhwan, in Egypt and under British mandate in Palestine.
▪ 1928: Jewish orphans sold into slavery and forced to convert to Islam by the Muslim Brotherhood, Yemen
▪ 1929: anti-Jewish riots, British mandate: in August 1929, the Jews demanded the construction of the Western Wall; pogroms in Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed. To stop the violence, the British reject this request
▪ 1929: 3rd Hebron Pogrom under British Mandate Palestine.
▪ 1929 3e pogrom de Safed, mandate britannique Palestine.
▪ 1933: 2nd Jaffa riots, British mandate in Palestine.
▪ 1934: Anti-Jewish pogrom in Constantine Algeria. 200 Jewish stores were raided, the total material damage was estimated at more than 150 million francs. It also sent a quarter of Constantine’s Jewish population into poverty.
▪ 1934: Pogroms in Thrace, Türkiye
▪ 1934: 1st massacres in Farhud, Iraq
▪ 1936: 3rd Jaffa riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1936: 2e massacre of Farhud, Irak
▪ 1938: boycott of Jews in Egypt
▪ 1939: discovery of 3 bombs in synagogues in Cairo
▪ 1941 : 3e massacre de Farhud, Iraq
▪ 1941: persecution of Jews in Libya
▪ 1941: massacre of Jews in Baghdad, with the support of the authorities: approx. 170 dead
▪ 1942: collaboration of the mufti with the Nazis. Plays a role in the final solution
▪ 1942: Struma disaster, Türkiye
▪ 1942: Nile Delta pogroms, Egypt
▪ 1938–1945: Arab collaboration with the Nazis
▪ 1942: discriminatory tax law of Varlik Vergisi in Turkey against Jews and Christians
▪ 1942: looting of Jewish property in Benghazi and deportation to the desert
▪ 1944: attack on the Jewish quarter of Damascus
▪ 1945: anti-Jewish and anti-Christian riots in Egypt; churches and synagogues destroyed
▪ 1945: 4th Cairo massacre, Egypt
▪ 1945: Pogrom of Tripoli, Libya
▪ 1947: segregation measures against Jews in Egypt
▪ 1947: pogrom in Libya; approx. 130 dead
▪ 1947 : Pogroms d’Aden au Yemen
▪ 1947: 3rd pogrom d’Alep, Syrie
▪ 1948: “emptying” of the Jewish quarter of Damascus, Syria

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:Bill Maher is inaccurate in many instances in that video. He makes even basic mistakes. Here are a few:

1) He says that calling Jews "colonizers" is like calling Native Americans "colonizers". Consider your reaction if Native Americans from the South West began taking over Manhattan, creating a new country, and forcing its current residents into exile. Wouldn't you consider them "colonizers"? While it is true that some Jews remained permanently in what is now Israel, the Zionist movement was led by European Jews. At its conception, the Zionist movement was not in agreement about where a Jewish state should be located. Had a Jewish state been established in Uganda, an idea that was actually accepted by the World Jewish Congress in 1903, you would more readily recognize it to as colonization.

2) Maher claims that for 2,000 years nobody was interested in Palestine. This shows complete ignorance. What does Maher think the Crusades were about? Crusaders from Western Europe fought Persians and Kurds from today's Iran (among others) and Maher thinks this demonstrates a lack of interest. During the Ottoman Empire, there were thriving cities and towns in Palestine. Many radical supporters of Israel, including Maher apparently, would have you believe that Palestine was an empty land. That is a rewriting of history that misrepresents the deep ties that Palestinians have to their homeland.

3) Maher suggests that Zionism was a reaction to the Holocaust and that Jews became interested in a Jewish homeland after World War II. In fact, Jews had started emigrating from Europe to Palestine as early as 1882, the time of the First Aliyah. The movement gained momentum prior to World War I. Again, Maher is ignorant of basic history.

4) Maher refers to the killing of 600 protesters in Iran. That, of course, is a terrible thing that I condemn. But it pales in comparison to the number of protesters that has Israel killed. I am not talking about about those killed by Israel in fighting, but the killing of unarmed protesters. By the way, that number includes several Americans just in the last few months.

5) Maher commits a popular and common fallacy of equating opposition to Israel's killing of civilians as support for Hamas or Hezbollah. Pro-Israel individuals routinely say that they oppose Netanyahu but support Israel. That is considered a very acceptable position. Yet, when others say that they support the Palestinian people but oppose Hamas, they are labeled as supporters of terrorism. Those who, like Maher, engage in this sort of demagoguery are not serious and should not be considered serious. The should be considered as the propagandists that they are.

Jeff,

Points 1, 2, and 3 don’t reflect historical facts - and this is exactly what Maher was pointing out.

1. Do you recognize the fact that Jews in Europe arrived in Europe either at the hands of Roman invaders in Judea who captured and enslaved them and in some cases brought their slaves back to Europe and/or Jews fled the Levant because they were being terrorized by Ottoman and then later, and more violently, by Islamic invaders? Jews are native to Israel - they are indigenous to the land - and were forced from it violently. The Jewish diaspora is a result of Jews being forced out of that homeland not because the average middle eastern Jew was yearning for what is now Poland or Germany.

Despite the forced diaspora - which continued through the 20th century as Arab Islamist powers increasingly oppressed Jews all over the Middle East and even conspired with the Nazis in WWII, Jews never left Israel and as a community have been resilient enough to sustain a presence. There were over 600,000 Jews in Israel in 1946.

This is quite different than the strawman you pose of Native Americans from the Southwest retaking Manhattan.

And to this point, Uganda is not equivalent to Israel and that would have been colonialism because, unlike Israel, Jews have no historic connection to Uganda. That’s ultimately why Israel was identified as a Jewish state versus Uganda. Again, Jews are indigenous to Israel, not colonizers.

2. Also, why do you assert that “nobody was interested in Palestine” for 2,000 years. Jews have always been connected to that region - they never left that region. Religiously and in terms of historic connections, Jews have always been “interested” in that area of the Levant. Observant Jews have prayed in the direction of Jerusalem for millennia, it’s integral to Jewish identity. The line from the Passover Sedar - “next year in Jerusalem” is linked back to the 5th Century BCE. Jews have always been interested in Israel.

3. You reference Jews returning to Israel pre WWI …. You do realize that antisemitism in Russia and Eastern Europe surged at this time, right?

You make it seem like Jews woke up in mid-1800s and said, hey, let’s go to Israel. That’s not factual and seems ignorant of historic facts.

Lastly, denial of Jewish indigenous roots in the Middle East and specifically Israel has been part of Arab Islamist propaganda for the 50 years. This propaganda also attempts to wipe out the historical connection of Christians and other religious groups to those lands. It’s not factual - it’s propaganda - and again, part of what Maher was highlighting in his piece.

Not going to even get into 4 and 5 because the false equivalence of the one Jewish state in the world trying to defend itself from Iranian terrorist proxies and the resulting war post 10/7 and the terrorist / repressive regimes that are the Iranian regime and its spinoffs of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis is not worth debating. Again, not reflective of fact, which was Maher’s point to begin with.

I don't know if you realize, but you are mostly agreeing with me. I was not the one who said that nobody was interested in Palestine for 2000 years. That was Maher. You must not have watched the video. I pointed out that he was wrong and, in fact, there was considerable interest. You seem to agree that there was interest. Your justifications for Jews moving to Palestine may be correct, but, again, only reinforce my point that Jews were moving to Israel before World War II, a claim Maher made and of which you would be aware if you had bothered to watch the video. So, I guess, thanks for mostly agreeing with my points about Maher being wrong. Who says people with different opinions can't find common ground?

Jeff, You are being entirely too kind to someone who believes the Ottomans existed before Islam.

You are referring to me. I didn’t say Ottomans existed before Islam. What I referenced was that as the Ottoman’s grip on the region receded starting in the early 1800s, Islamist Arabs proceeded to overtake lands and communities where Jews and conducted multiple massacres on the Jews - not just in Israel but throughout the Middle East. These were initiated to rid the area of Jewish populations. This affected Christian and other non-Muslim populations, too. This terror led to Jews fleeing the region.

Yes, before this we have Islamist imperialists, Romans, and Babylonians, among others. Lots of terror. None of it conducive to Jews sticking around.

Exactly what "multiple massacres" were conducted in the 1800s that lead to Jews fleeing the region?

There’s many. This is well documented and certainly predates the 1800s but here’s an abbreviated list of some of the most notable since that date and highlights the oppression that was happening in and around the Levant and extending across North Africa where millennia-old Jewish communities were repressed, synagogues destroyed, and Jews killed. Jews don’t leave in entirely but their numbers decline precipitously as they flee. As Ottomon power recedes in 1800s, Arab Islamic powers continue and arguably exacerbate the violence against these communities.

Again, not a complete list - this could go back a few centuries.

▪ 1805: 1st pogrom in Ottoman Algeria against the Jews of Algiers after a famine. French
consul Dubois-Thainville saves 200 Jews by sheltering them in his consulate.
▪ 1805: exile of Jews from Algiers to Tunis and Livorno
▪ 1805, the leader of the Jewish Nation of Algiers, Naphthalie Busnach, is killed while riots ravage the neighborhoods.
▪ 1806: expulsion by fatwa of the Jews of Sali in Morocco
▪ 1806: ban on Moroccan Jews wearing Western clothing
▪ 1806: the janissaries of the dey of Algiers massacre and pillage in the Jewish quarter
▪ 1807: expulsion of Jews from Tetouan
▪ 1808: 1st massacres in the Mellah ghetto, North Africa
▪ 1815, the chief rabbi of Algiers, Isaac Aboulker, is beheaded during a riot.
▪ 1815: the Jews of Algiers are forced to fight against an invasion of locusts
▪ 1815: 2nd pogrom of Algiers, Ottoman Algeria
▪ 1816: in Algeria, ban on carrying weapons for Jews and Christians
▪ 1820: Massacres of Sahalu Lobiant, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1828 : pogrom de Baghdad, Iraq ottoman
▪ 1830: 3rd pogrom of Algeria, Ottoman Algeria
▪ 1830: start of the persecution of Jews in Persia, caused by the Russian advance in the Caucasus
▪ 1830: ethnic cleansing of Jews in Tabriz, Iran
▪ 1834: 2nd pogrom of Hebron, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1834 : Pogrom de Safed, Palestine ottomane
▪ 1838: Druze attack in Safed, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1839: Massacre of the Mashadi Jews, Iran
▪ 1839: forced conversion of surviving Jews from Mashadi
▪ 1839: campaign of forced conversions of Iranian Jews
▪ 1840: persecution of the Jews of Damascus; ritual murder case
▪ 1840: forced conversion of the Jews of Mashadi
▪ 1841: massive murders of Jews in Morocco; the sultan is obliged to consider the Jews as his personal property, which helps to protect them
▪ 1840: Damascus, ritual murders (French Muslims and Christians kidnapped, tortured and killed Jewish children for entertainment), Ottoman Syria
▪ 1844: 1st Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1847: Dayr al-Qamar Pogrom, Liban ottoman
▪ 1847: ethnic cleansing of Jews in Jerusalem, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1848: 1st pogrom of Damascus, Syria
▪ 1848: total disappearance of the Jews of Mashhad
▪ 1850: 1st pogrom of Aleppo, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1854: anti-Jewish pogrom in Demnate, Morocco
▪ 1857: beheading in Tunis of the Jewish coachman Batou Sfez, accused of blasphemy, while he was drunk
▪ 1860: 2nd pogrom of Damascus, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1862: 1st pogrom of Beirut, Ottoman Lebanon
▪ 1866 : pogrom at Kuzguncuk, Turquie Ottomane
▪ 1867: Barfurush massacre, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1868: Eyub Pogrom, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1869: Massacre of Tunis, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1869: Massacre of Sfax, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1864–1880: Marrakech massacre, Morocco
▪ 1870: 2nd Alexandria massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1870: 1st pogrom in Istanbul, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1871: 1st Damanhur massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1872: Massacres in Edirne, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1872: 1st pogrom of Izmir, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1873: 2nd massacre of Damanhur, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Izmir, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Istanbul, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Beirut, Ottoman Lebanon
▪ 1875: 2 pogroms in Aleppo, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1875: Massacre on the island of Djerba, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1877 : 3e massacre de Damanhur, Egypte ottomane
▪ 1877: Pogrom of Mansura, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1882: Massacre of Homs, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1882: 3rd massacre of Alexandria, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1889: after the funeral of a rabbi, deemed too discreet, the Jewish cemetery of Baghdad was confiscated
▪ 1889: looting of the Jewish quarter of Baghdad
▪ 1890: 2nd Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1890, 3e pogrom de Damas, Syrie ottomane
▪ 1891: 4th massacre of Damanahur, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1897: murders in Tripoli, Ottoman Libya
▪ 1903&1907: Taza & Settat, pogroms, Morocco
▪ 1890: Massacres of Tunis, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1901–1902: 3rd Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1901–1907: 4th Alexandria massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1903: 1st Port Said massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1903–1940: Pogroms of Taza and Settat, Morocco
▪ 1904: massacre of Jews in Yemen
▪ 1907: Casablanca, pogrom, Morocco
▪ 1908: 2nd Port Said massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1909: comment from the British vice-consul of Mosul: “The attitude of Muslims towards Christians and Jews is that of a master towards his slaves.”
▪ 1910: blood libel of Shiraz
▪ 1911: Shiraz pogrom
▪ 1912: 4th Fez, Pogrom, Morocco
▪ 1914: expulsion of Jews from Palestine old enough to bear arms by the Ottomans
▪ 1917: Jewish Inquisition of Baghdadi, Ottoman Empire
▪ 1918–1948: adoption of a law prohibiting the raising of a Jewish orphan, Yemen
▪ 1920: Irbid massacres: British mandate in Palestine
▪ 1920–1930: Arab riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1921: 1st Jaffa riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1922: Massacres of Djerba, Tunisia
▪ 1922: law of forced conversion of orphans in Yemen, concerning Jews including as adults
▪ 1927: 60 Jews killed by Arabs in the Mellah of Casablanca Morocco
▪ 1928: Massacres of Ikhwan, in Egypt and under British mandate in Palestine.
▪ 1928: Jewish orphans sold into slavery and forced to convert to Islam by the Muslim Brotherhood, Yemen
▪ 1929: anti-Jewish riots, British mandate: in August 1929, the Jews demanded the construction of the Western Wall; pogroms in Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed. To stop the violence, the British reject this request
▪ 1929: 3rd Hebron Pogrom under British Mandate Palestine.
▪ 1929 3e pogrom de Safed, mandate britannique Palestine.
▪ 1933: 2nd Jaffa riots, British mandate in Palestine.
▪ 1934: Anti-Jewish pogrom in Constantine Algeria. 200 Jewish stores were raided, the total material damage was estimated at more than 150 million francs. It also sent a quarter of Constantine’s Jewish population into poverty.
▪ 1934: Pogroms in Thrace, Türkiye
▪ 1934: 1st massacres in Farhud, Iraq
▪ 1936: 3rd Jaffa riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1936: 2e massacre of Farhud, Irak
▪ 1938: boycott of Jews in Egypt
▪ 1939: discovery of 3 bombs in synagogues in Cairo
▪ 1941 : 3e massacre de Farhud, Iraq
▪ 1941: persecution of Jews in Libya
▪ 1941: massacre of Jews in Baghdad, with the support of the authorities: approx. 170 dead
▪ 1942: collaboration of the mufti with the Nazis. Plays a role in the final solution
▪ 1942: Struma disaster, Türkiye
▪ 1942: Nile Delta pogroms, Egypt
▪ 1938–1945: Arab collaboration with the Nazis
▪ 1942: discriminatory tax law of Varlik Vergisi in Turkey against Jews and Christians
▪ 1942: looting of Jewish property in Benghazi and deportation to the desert
▪ 1944: attack on the Jewish quarter of Damascus
▪ 1945: anti-Jewish and anti-Christian riots in Egypt; churches and synagogues destroyed
▪ 1945: 4th Cairo massacre, Egypt
▪ 1945: Pogrom of Tripoli, Libya
▪ 1947: segregation measures against Jews in Egypt
▪ 1947: pogrom in Libya; approx. 130 dead
▪ 1947 : Pogroms d’Aden au Yemen
▪ 1947: 3rd pogrom d’Alep, Syrie
▪ 1948: “emptying” of the Jewish quarter of Damascus, Syria

Good lawyer trick of burying me in documentation. Obviously I am not going to go through that entire list but from a brief scan, very few are actual massacres that led to Jews fleeing the region. Some of those are one person or even no people being killed. Hardly massacres. I am eager to see how "ban on carrying weapons for Jews and Christians" meets the definition of "massacre" and led to Jews fleeing the region.

Any time you want to engage seriously instead of BSing, let me know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just had a chance to watch this and have a few questions to those who believe it presents facts:

1) do you accept that people of both Jewish and Palestinian descent share common ancestry from the Caanites who lived in the region prior to both the Jewish and Islamic faiths existed? If not, who you think that the ancestors of Palestinians are from”invaders”?

2) if you accept the U.N. designation of Israel’s borders when it was created, why do you not accept the current UN mandated border for the state of Israel.

Because that’s what it is to be a Zionist. Arrogantly picking and choosing what suits them.

You can apparently be an atheist who suddenly picks and chooses parts of the Bible you agree with and ignore the rest. And more audaciously, ignoring life before the Bible or religion; that’s some chutzpah from an atheist.

That’s why Maher has always been pathetic and a clown along with the countless other high profile atheists who all seem to be rabid Zionists as well. When people say he mocks all religions, that’s bullsh*t. He specifically mocks only the Jews who follow the Torah and say Israel is not even supposed to be created until the Messiah comes.

People need to really question their own intelligence if they thought this stupid segment sans any actual debate (like every single time he bloviates on this topic) was “fact-based.”

You are a perfect example of someone who doesn't want peace in Israel/Palestine. People who think like you have rejected peace again and again over the last 50+ years. And it comes from your societal norms. Where is Palestine's Gandhi or MLK? Do you have any peacemakers?

NP. Palestinians don’t need to kiss your ass. The nerve of you. Personally, I have no horse in this race, and I wish both Israeli and Palestinians would ride off into the sunset, but the idea that Palestinians owe you peacemaking is bananas. You stole their land and are committing genocide against them. The only they owe you is the same in return.

The Palestinians could live in a peaceful prosperous nation if only they didn't listen to people like you. There certainly are far right extremists on the Israelis side, just like the far right Arab extremists like you. This is a battle between far right extremist warmongers. I wish there were actual gen Z on this thread to witness that.

Israel has never once adopted a peaceful posture toward the indigenous people they violently displaced to create their nation state, including before 1948.

Not once.

The Jews living there - the indigenous people - were not displaced. Arab / Palestinians are not indigenous. Your post proves Maher’s point at how basic history has been systematically and intentionally revised by Hamas and Hezbollah and other Iran-backed groups and then spit out to Tik Tok users as “history”. Unfortunately, people like you are t educated enough about the Middle East to know better.

They also seem to know nothing about Israel’s founding, the two state offer that would have established a Palestinian state (refused because Palestinians wanted to be rid of the Jews). Again, just proves Maher’s point.

The Jews living there couldn’t prove indigeneity based on genetic testing if their lives depended on it. That’s why genetic testing is so controversial in Israel, it’s why only Askenazi Jews (the Jews with the most dubious genetic ties to the region) have exclusively held the PM post throughout the state’s existence, and it’s why your argument that the actual indigenous people are not even actual people is so disgusting.

And for the record, the entire region rejected the partition because it so laughably favored a bunch of violent, criminal immigrants from Eastern Europe over the people who had lived on the land for millennia. Probably people like your grandparents, I’d guess, if you had an ounce of honesty coursing through your own non-indigenous blood.

Save the “not even Jewish!” response …
immigrants

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:Bill Maher is inaccurate in many instances in that video. He makes even basic mistakes. Here are a few:

1) He says that calling Jews "colonizers" is like calling Native Americans "colonizers". Consider your reaction if Native Americans from the South West began taking over Manhattan, creating a new country, and forcing its current residents into exile. Wouldn't you consider them "colonizers"? While it is true that some Jews remained permanently in what is now Israel, the Zionist movement was led by European Jews. At its conception, the Zionist movement was not in agreement about where a Jewish state should be located. Had a Jewish state been established in Uganda, an idea that was actually accepted by the World Jewish Congress in 1903, you would more readily recognize it to as colonization.

2) Maher claims that for 2,000 years nobody was interested in Palestine. This shows complete ignorance. What does Maher think the Crusades were about? Crusaders from Western Europe fought Persians and Kurds from today's Iran (among others) and Maher thinks this demonstrates a lack of interest. During the Ottoman Empire, there were thriving cities and towns in Palestine. Many radical supporters of Israel, including Maher apparently, would have you believe that Palestine was an empty land. That is a rewriting of history that misrepresents the deep ties that Palestinians have to their homeland.

3) Maher suggests that Zionism was a reaction to the Holocaust and that Jews became interested in a Jewish homeland after World War II. In fact, Jews had started emigrating from Europe to Palestine as early as 1882, the time of the First Aliyah. The movement gained momentum prior to World War I. Again, Maher is ignorant of basic history.

4) Maher refers to the killing of 600 protesters in Iran. That, of course, is a terrible thing that I condemn. But it pales in comparison to the number of protesters that has Israel killed. I am not talking about about those killed by Israel in fighting, but the killing of unarmed protesters. By the way, that number includes several Americans just in the last few months.

5) Maher commits a popular and common fallacy of equating opposition to Israel's killing of civilians as support for Hamas or Hezbollah. Pro-Israel individuals routinely say that they oppose Netanyahu but support Israel. That is considered a very acceptable position. Yet, when others say that they support the Palestinian people but oppose Hamas, they are labeled as supporters of terrorism. Those who, like Maher, engage in this sort of demagoguery are not serious and should not be considered serious. The should be considered as the propagandists that they are.

Jeff,

Points 1, 2, and 3 don’t reflect historical facts - and this is exactly what Maher was pointing out.

1. Do you recognize the fact that Jews in Europe arrived in Europe either at the hands of Roman invaders in Judea who captured and enslaved them and in some cases brought their slaves back to Europe and/or Jews fled the Levant because they were being terrorized by Ottoman and then later, and more violently, by Islamic invaders? Jews are native to Israel - they are indigenous to the land - and were forced from it violently. The Jewish diaspora is a result of Jews being forced out of that homeland not because the average middle eastern Jew was yearning for what is now Poland or Germany.

Despite the forced diaspora - which continued through the 20th century as Arab Islamist powers increasingly oppressed Jews all over the Middle East and even conspired with the Nazis in WWII, Jews never left Israel and as a community have been resilient enough to sustain a presence. There were over 600,000 Jews in Israel in 1946.

This is quite different than the strawman you pose of Native Americans from the Southwest retaking Manhattan.

And to this point, Uganda is not equivalent to Israel and that would have been colonialism because, unlike Israel, Jews have no historic connection to Uganda. That’s ultimately why Israel was identified as a Jewish state versus Uganda. Again, Jews are indigenous to Israel, not colonizers.

2. Also, why do you assert that “nobody was interested in Palestine” for 2,000 years. Jews have always been connected to that region - they never left that region. Religiously and in terms of historic connections, Jews have always been “interested” in that area of the Levant. Observant Jews have prayed in the direction of Jerusalem for millennia, it’s integral to Jewish identity. The line from the Passover Sedar - “next year in Jerusalem” is linked back to the 5th Century BCE. Jews have always been interested in Israel.

3. You reference Jews returning to Israel pre WWI …. You do realize that antisemitism in Russia and Eastern Europe surged at this time, right?

You make it seem like Jews woke up in mid-1800s and said, hey, let’s go to Israel. That’s not factual and seems ignorant of historic facts.

Lastly, denial of Jewish indigenous roots in the Middle East and specifically Israel has been part of Arab Islamist propaganda for the 50 years. This propaganda also attempts to wipe out the historical connection of Christians and other religious groups to those lands. It’s not factual - it’s propaganda - and again, part of what Maher was highlighting in his piece.

Not going to even get into 4 and 5 because the false equivalence of the one Jewish state in the world trying to defend itself from Iranian terrorist proxies and the resulting war post 10/7 and the terrorist / repressive regimes that are the Iranian regime and its spinoffs of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis is not worth debating. Again, not reflective of fact, which was Maher’s point to begin with.

I don't know if you realize, but you are mostly agreeing with me. I was not the one who said that nobody was interested in Palestine for 2000 years. That was Maher. You must not have watched the video. I pointed out that he was wrong and, in fact, there was considerable interest. You seem to agree that there was interest. Your justifications for Jews moving to Palestine may be correct, but, again, only reinforce my point that Jews were moving to Israel before World War II, a claim Maher made and of which you would be aware if you had bothered to watch the video. So, I guess, thanks for mostly agreeing with my points about Maher being wrong. Who says people with different opinions can't find common ground?

Jeff, You are being entirely too kind to someone who believes the Ottomans existed before Islam.

You are referring to me. I didn’t say Ottomans existed before Islam. What I referenced was that as the Ottoman’s grip on the region receded starting in the early 1800s, Islamist Arabs proceeded to overtake lands and communities where Jews and conducted multiple massacres on the Jews - not just in Israel but throughout the Middle East. These were initiated to rid the area of Jewish populations. This affected Christian and other non-Muslim populations, too. This terror led to Jews fleeing the region.

Yes, before this we have Islamist imperialists, Romans, and Babylonians, among others. Lots of terror. None of it conducive to Jews sticking around.

Exactly what "multiple massacres" were conducted in the 1800s that lead to Jews fleeing the region?

There’s many. This is well documented and certainly predates the 1800s but here’s an abbreviated list of some of the most notable since that date and highlights the oppression that was happening in and around the Levant and extending across North Africa where millennia-old Jewish communities were repressed, synagogues destroyed, and Jews killed. Jews don’t leave in entirely but their numbers decline precipitously as they flee. As Ottomon power recedes in 1800s, Arab Islamic powers continue and arguably exacerbate the violence against these communities.

Again, not a complete list - this could go back a few centuries.

▪ 1805: 1st pogrom in Ottoman Algeria against the Jews of Algiers after a famine. French
consul Dubois-Thainville saves 200 Jews by sheltering them in his consulate.
▪ 1805: exile of Jews from Algiers to Tunis and Livorno
▪ 1805, the leader of the Jewish Nation of Algiers, Naphthalie Busnach, is killed while riots ravage the neighborhoods.
▪ 1806: expulsion by fatwa of the Jews of Sali in Morocco
▪ 1806: ban on Moroccan Jews wearing Western clothing
▪ 1806: the janissaries of the dey of Algiers massacre and pillage in the Jewish quarter
▪ 1807: expulsion of Jews from Tetouan
▪ 1808: 1st massacres in the Mellah ghetto, North Africa
▪ 1815, the chief rabbi of Algiers, Isaac Aboulker, is beheaded during a riot.
▪ 1815: the Jews of Algiers are forced to fight against an invasion of locusts
▪ 1815: 2nd pogrom of Algiers, Ottoman Algeria
▪ 1816: in Algeria, ban on carrying weapons for Jews and Christians
▪ 1820: Massacres of Sahalu Lobiant, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1828 : pogrom de Baghdad, Iraq ottoman
▪ 1830: 3rd pogrom of Algeria, Ottoman Algeria
▪ 1830: start of the persecution of Jews in Persia, caused by the Russian advance in the Caucasus
▪ 1830: ethnic cleansing of Jews in Tabriz, Iran
▪ 1834: 2nd pogrom of Hebron, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1834 : Pogrom de Safed, Palestine ottomane
▪ 1838: Druze attack in Safed, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1839: Massacre of the Mashadi Jews, Iran
▪ 1839: forced conversion of surviving Jews from Mashadi
▪ 1839: campaign of forced conversions of Iranian Jews
▪ 1840: persecution of the Jews of Damascus; ritual murder case
▪ 1840: forced conversion of the Jews of Mashadi
▪ 1841: massive murders of Jews in Morocco; the sultan is obliged to consider the Jews as his personal property, which helps to protect them
▪ 1840: Damascus, ritual murders (French Muslims and Christians kidnapped, tortured and killed Jewish children for entertainment), Ottoman Syria
▪ 1844: 1st Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1847: Dayr al-Qamar Pogrom, Liban ottoman
▪ 1847: ethnic cleansing of Jews in Jerusalem, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1848: 1st pogrom of Damascus, Syria
▪ 1848: total disappearance of the Jews of Mashhad
▪ 1850: 1st pogrom of Aleppo, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1854: anti-Jewish pogrom in Demnate, Morocco
▪ 1857: beheading in Tunis of the Jewish coachman Batou Sfez, accused of blasphemy, while he was drunk
▪ 1860: 2nd pogrom of Damascus, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1862: 1st pogrom of Beirut, Ottoman Lebanon
▪ 1866 : pogrom at Kuzguncuk, Turquie Ottomane
▪ 1867: Barfurush massacre, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1868: Eyub Pogrom, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1869: Massacre of Tunis, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1869: Massacre of Sfax, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1864–1880: Marrakech massacre, Morocco
▪ 1870: 2nd Alexandria massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1870: 1st pogrom in Istanbul, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1871: 1st Damanhur massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1872: Massacres in Edirne, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1872: 1st pogrom of Izmir, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1873: 2nd massacre of Damanhur, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Izmir, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Istanbul, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Beirut, Ottoman Lebanon
▪ 1875: 2 pogroms in Aleppo, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1875: Massacre on the island of Djerba, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1877 : 3e massacre de Damanhur, Egypte ottomane
▪ 1877: Pogrom of Mansura, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1882: Massacre of Homs, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1882: 3rd massacre of Alexandria, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1889: after the funeral of a rabbi, deemed too discreet, the Jewish cemetery of Baghdad was confiscated
▪ 1889: looting of the Jewish quarter of Baghdad
▪ 1890: 2nd Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1890, 3e pogrom de Damas, Syrie ottomane
▪ 1891: 4th massacre of Damanahur, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1897: murders in Tripoli, Ottoman Libya
▪ 1903&1907: Taza & Settat, pogroms, Morocco
▪ 1890: Massacres of Tunis, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1901–1902: 3rd Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1901–1907: 4th Alexandria massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1903: 1st Port Said massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1903–1940: Pogroms of Taza and Settat, Morocco
▪ 1904: massacre of Jews in Yemen
▪ 1907: Casablanca, pogrom, Morocco
▪ 1908: 2nd Port Said massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1909: comment from the British vice-consul of Mosul: “The attitude of Muslims towards Christians and Jews is that of a master towards his slaves.”
▪ 1910: blood libel of Shiraz
▪ 1911: Shiraz pogrom
▪ 1912: 4th Fez, Pogrom, Morocco
▪ 1914: expulsion of Jews from Palestine old enough to bear arms by the Ottomans
▪ 1917: Jewish Inquisition of Baghdadi, Ottoman Empire
▪ 1918–1948: adoption of a law prohibiting the raising of a Jewish orphan, Yemen
▪ 1920: Irbid massacres: British mandate in Palestine
▪ 1920–1930: Arab riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1921: 1st Jaffa riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1922: Massacres of Djerba, Tunisia
▪ 1922: law of forced conversion of orphans in Yemen, concerning Jews including as adults
▪ 1927: 60 Jews killed by Arabs in the Mellah of Casablanca Morocco
▪ 1928: Massacres of Ikhwan, in Egypt and under British mandate in Palestine.
▪ 1928: Jewish orphans sold into slavery and forced to convert to Islam by the Muslim Brotherhood, Yemen
▪ 1929: anti-Jewish riots, British mandate: in August 1929, the Jews demanded the construction of the Western Wall; pogroms in Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed. To stop the violence, the British reject this request
▪ 1929: 3rd Hebron Pogrom under British Mandate Palestine.
▪ 1929 3e pogrom de Safed, mandate britannique Palestine.
▪ 1933: 2nd Jaffa riots, British mandate in Palestine.
▪ 1934: Anti-Jewish pogrom in Constantine Algeria. 200 Jewish stores were raided, the total material damage was estimated at more than 150 million francs. It also sent a quarter of Constantine’s Jewish population into poverty.
▪ 1934: Pogroms in Thrace, Türkiye
▪ 1934: 1st massacres in Farhud, Iraq
▪ 1936: 3rd Jaffa riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1936: 2e massacre of Farhud, Irak
▪ 1938: boycott of Jews in Egypt
▪ 1939: discovery of 3 bombs in synagogues in Cairo
▪ 1941 : 3e massacre de Farhud, Iraq
▪ 1941: persecution of Jews in Libya
▪ 1941: massacre of Jews in Baghdad, with the support of the authorities: approx. 170 dead
▪ 1942: collaboration of the mufti with the Nazis. Plays a role in the final solution
▪ 1942: Struma disaster, Türkiye
▪ 1942: Nile Delta pogroms, Egypt
▪ 1938–1945: Arab collaboration with the Nazis
▪ 1942: discriminatory tax law of Varlik Vergisi in Turkey against Jews and Christians
▪ 1942: looting of Jewish property in Benghazi and deportation to the desert
▪ 1944: attack on the Jewish quarter of Damascus
▪ 1945: anti-Jewish and anti-Christian riots in Egypt; churches and synagogues destroyed
▪ 1945: 4th Cairo massacre, Egypt
▪ 1945: Pogrom of Tripoli, Libya
▪ 1947: segregation measures against Jews in Egypt
▪ 1947: pogrom in Libya; approx. 130 dead
▪ 1947 : Pogroms d’Aden au Yemen
▪ 1947: 3rd pogrom d’Alep, Syrie
▪ 1948: “emptying” of the Jewish quarter of Damascus, Syria

Good lawyer trick of burying me in documentation. Obviously I am not going to go through that entire list but from a brief scan, very few are actual massacres that led to Jews fleeing the region. Some of those are one person or even no people being killed. Hardly massacres. I am eager to see how "ban on carrying weapons for Jews and Christians" meets the definition of "massacre" and led to Jews fleeing the region.

Any time you want to engage seriously instead of BSing, let me know.

I’m not burying you in documentation. There are bullet points. You could not be bothered to read a list of pogroms and massacres - all labeled as such.

Moreover, amid what you see as trivial points of oppression are massacres are where Jews were killed by dozens or hundreds. Their communities gutted and/or demolished. Synagogues destroyed. These resulted in Jews fleeing these countries.

Go Google any one of these to learn more. This is history not trickery. Weird that’s your response to what are well known facets to anyone who studied Middle East history and the history of Jews in it is to say it’s BS.

As anyone who has studied this knows - and certainly Jews in these areas know - that these events of violence and repression led to the extinction of Jewish communities throughout the region. Jews were either killed or they left. There were thriving communities in Syria, Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco. They are essentially gone now.

This is important because it also underscores that oppression and violence against Jews in the region didn’t start with the creation of the state of Israel.

Again, back to the genesis of this thread: people have little understanding of Middle East history and even less about the history of Jews in it.

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I see when reading some of you is that you simply can't accept that you were brought up on MSM framing where you never questioned what you were shown. You're so brainwashed into believing nothing happened/happens before there's retaliation against Israel and then every camera light goes on. You tell yourself that because the media isn't showing you the people Israel killed/beat/raped/kidnapped that day, that week, that month, that year and doesn't give them a fleshed out "human interest" narrative the way they do with Israelis, you then just brush away their pain and their humanity, and then conclude that I am tantamount to the literal calls for another Holocaust against Jews as you ignore the *average* Israeli calling for the extermination of Palestinians. I have someone calling me a "demon." This is what US media and the govt overrun with people like Stuart Seldowitz literally in the SD in the Office on Isr-Pal, has wrought. Listen to Matt Miller, he's no different. It's disgraceful how the US is prepared to destroy itself for THIS. Their hypocrisy on full-display for the world to see.

The younger gen. aren't the ones who fell for the Iraq war lies propped up by your precious "respectable" media as you smirk at the thought of them getting their news from social media. They aren't the ones who sat there listening to Neocons with the actual "bloodlust" lie to you and who are now to this day, treated as elder statesmen on that "credible" traditional media you love so much.

My hope is with the younger generation, because unlike you older people, they refuse to turn a blind eye to what Israel has done every single day when the MSM chose to ignore it. They refuse your simplistic belief that "Oct 7" is when this started or you get to ignore what led to it. When you just brush away the president of the US lied to you on day one and claimed he "saw videos of beheaded babies" and the media --rather than investigate the claims-- splash it on your screens all day and guests poisoning the minds of viewers for days/weeks and then are tepid with the retractions, you expect them to go along with how you consume information? They aren't the ones sitting there watching the ADL lie and make it about antisemitism and use Judaism as their cudgel to defend the barbarism of Israel. They aren't the ones who actively attack me for existing and then claim I want Jews dead based on simply telling you how everything actually happened and who brought terrorism and quoting the direct words of Israelis or Zionists, not simply the "far-right." Israelis society is destroying itself and you coddling their depravity, will only hasten their demise. Keep telling yourself it's just some fringe minority in Israel while you then compare me to them. Should really work out well being that myopic in how you think and you read what someone says.

And to the ridiculous comment "I don't have a dog in this fight" that I see blissfully ignorant Americans constantly use but always seem to still believe the lies about Israel always being the victim, I'll say what I did in another post on another thread: Your tax money, your media and your govt's blind fealty from Congress to vetoes at the UN to laws punishing anyone who speaks out, is why you do have a dog in this fight: You created Cujo.

Done with this topic, but I thank Jeff for providing the forum.

You’re not “done with this topic.” Otc, you won’t shut up about it and insist that you - a random poster - know more about the situation than Middle East experts. You do not.

You're right, I'm not done. One more just for you: I'm Palestinian. That you --the actual random poster-- tell me I don't know what I know *first hand* how Israel operates or the lies I know are lies, is *chefskiss*

You'll forgive me if I don't go along with "Middle East experts" like Bill Maher or I'm sure all the ones you're thinking of who happen to be western Zionists. Nothing funnier than being lectured by people who think it's perfectly normal watching roundtables with no actual Middle Eastern people. Nicolle Wallace discussing the Middle East with two "Mideast experts" like: Johnathan Greenblatt and Donny Deutsche.

List your experts who aren't part of "thinktanks" that are clearly pro-Israel. I doubt any are actually Arab and NOT on the payroll. Forget it, because I don;t even care what you think.

Now I am done. Won't even read your reply.

DP

Please reconsider. Voices like yours will be part of the healing process, overcoming the distortions and manipulations that are central to the Zionist movement’s stranglehold of U.S. policy in the region.

The US rightly recognizes that a democratic country that is pro US and also upholds many western values including but not limited to freedom of religion, rights for women, rights for LGTBQ+, rights for racial minorities, is aligned with US interests vs Iran-backed regimes and terrorists groups that dominate the region. That’s not the “Zionists” (Jew haters love wielding that word but it betrays your intent); that is good US foreign policy.

Now sure, you can say Netanyahu isn’t a good guy, agree. But just like I’m not giving up on the US because of Trump and hope our allies won’t either, not going to abandon Israel for what is essentially Iran’s Islamist regime.

Obviously the U.S. has more than two policy choices in the Middle East, The suggestion that we either have to give full 100% support to Israel or we must align with Iran is ridiculous. At a minimum, the U.S. should follow U.S. law which prohibits supplying weapons to countries that are preventing humanitarian aid to reach victims. Israel is clearly doing that in northern Gaza. As such, the U.S. should follow our own law and immediately halt all weapons deliveries.

Second, the U.S., as a member of the United Nations and a Security Council member, has a responsibility to ensure the safety of of U.N. peacekeeping forces. Israel has repeatedly attacked UNIFIL forces in southern Lebanon, wounding several soldiers. Today Israeli forces invaded a UNIFIL base. The U.S. should stop all support for Israel's invasion of Lebanon until Israel halts its aggression toward the peacekeeping forces.

Third, today Secretary of Defense Austin authorized the deployment of a THAAD missile defense system and a crew of U.S. personnel to man it to Israel. This is the deployment of U.S. forces into a war zone where there is a good chance they will be involved in conflict. This should not be done without Congressional authorization and should not be done at all until Israel adheres to U.S. demands regarding a ceasefire in Gaza, the resumption of humanitarian aid, a ceasefire in Lebanon, and an end to the seize of northern Gaza.

The U.S. relationship with Israel had been one-sided for far too long. It is time for the U.S. to follow its own laws and pursue its own interests.

Thank god there are voices better than mine to swat deceptive posts like the PP’s drivel into the dustbin of history. Appreciate this so much, the unraveling of years of fake news justification for America’s support of Israel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just had a chance to watch this and have a few questions to those who believe it presents facts:

1) do you accept that people of both Jewish and Palestinian descent share common ancestry from the Caanites who lived in the region prior to both the Jewish and Islamic faiths existed? If not, who you think that the ancestors of Palestinians are from”invaders”?

2) if you accept the U.N. designation of Israel’s borders when it was created, why do you not accept the current UN mandated border for the state of Israel.

Because that’s what it is to be a Zionist. Arrogantly picking and choosing what suits them.

You can apparently be an atheist who suddenly picks and chooses parts of the Bible you agree with and ignore the rest. And more audaciously, ignoring life before the Bible or religion; that’s some chutzpah from an atheist.

That’s why Maher has always been pathetic and a clown along with the countless other high profile atheists who all seem to be rabid Zionists as well. When people say he mocks all religions, that’s bullsh*t. He specifically mocks only the Jews who follow the Torah and say Israel is not even supposed to be created until the Messiah comes.

People need to really question their own intelligence if they thought this stupid segment sans any actual debate (like every single time he bloviates on this topic) was “fact-based.”

You are a perfect example of someone who doesn't want peace in Israel/Palestine. People who think like you have rejected peace again and again over the last 50+ years. And it comes from your societal norms. Where is Palestine's Gandhi or MLK? Do you have any peacemakers?

NP. Palestinians don’t need to kiss your ass. The nerve of you. Personally, I have no horse in this race, and I wish both Israeli and Palestinians would ride off into the sunset, but the idea that Palestinians owe you peacemaking is bananas. You stole their land and are committing genocide against them. The only they owe you is the same in return.

The Palestinians could live in a peaceful prosperous nation if only they didn't listen to people like you. There certainly are far right extremists on the Israelis side, just like the far right Arab extremists like you. This is a battle between far right extremist warmongers. I wish there were actual gen Z on this thread to witness that.

Israel has never once adopted a peaceful posture toward the indigenous people they violently displaced to create their nation state, including before 1948.

Not once.

The Jews living there - the indigenous people - were not displaced. Arab / Palestinians are not indigenous. Your post proves Maher’s point at how basic history has been systematically and intentionally revised by Hamas and Hezbollah and other Iran-backed groups and then spit out to Tik Tok users as “history”. Unfortunately, people like you are t educated enough about the Middle East to know better.

They also seem to know nothing about Israel’s founding, the two state offer that would have established a Palestinian state (refused because Palestinians wanted to be rid of the Jews). Again, just proves Maher’s point.

The Jews living there couldn’t prove indigeneity based on genetic testing if their lives depended on it. That’s why genetic testing is so controversial in Israel, it’s why only Askenazi Jews (the Jews with the most dubious genetic ties to the region) have exclusively held the PM post throughout the state’s existence, and it’s why your argument that the actual indigenous people are not even actual people is so disgusting.

And for the record, the entire region rejected the partition because it so laughably favored a bunch of violent, criminal immigrants from Eastern Europe over the people who had lived on the land for millennia. Probably people like your grandparents, I’d guess, if you had an ounce of honesty coursing through your own non-indigenous blood.

Save the “not even Jewish!” response …
immigrants

I’ll admit I can decipher your word salad but even if you discount Ashkenazi Jews as indigenous (I don’t, you do), more than half of Jews in Israel are Sephardi and Mizrahi. Also Jews lived in the region and have lived in the region before any Arab, or Muslim, or the group referred to as Palestinian. Jews never left the Levant despite oppression and massacres.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I see when reading some of you is that you simply can't accept that you were brought up on MSM framing where you never questioned what you were shown. You're so brainwashed into believing nothing happened/happens before there's retaliation against Israel and then every camera light goes on. You tell yourself that because the media isn't showing you the people Israel killed/beat/raped/kidnapped that day, that week, that month, that year and doesn't give them a fleshed out "human interest" narrative the way they do with Israelis, you then just brush away their pain and their humanity, and then conclude that I am tantamount to the literal calls for another Holocaust against Jews as you ignore the *average* Israeli calling for the extermination of Palestinians. I have someone calling me a "demon." This is what US media and the govt overrun with people like Stuart Seldowitz literally in the SD in the Office on Isr-Pal, has wrought. Listen to Matt Miller, he's no different. It's disgraceful how the US is prepared to destroy itself for THIS. Their hypocrisy on full-display for the world to see.

The younger gen. aren't the ones who fell for the Iraq war lies propped up by your precious "respectable" media as you smirk at the thought of them getting their news from social media. They aren't the ones who sat there listening to Neocons with the actual "bloodlust" lie to you and who are now to this day, treated as elder statesmen on that "credible" traditional media you love so much.

My hope is with the younger generation, because unlike you older people, they refuse to turn a blind eye to what Israel has done every single day when the MSM chose to ignore it. They refuse your simplistic belief that "Oct 7" is when this started or you get to ignore what led to it. When you just brush away the president of the US lied to you on day one and claimed he "saw videos of beheaded babies" and the media --rather than investigate the claims-- splash it on your screens all day and guests poisoning the minds of viewers for days/weeks and then are tepid with the retractions, you expect them to go along with how you consume information? They aren't the ones sitting there watching the ADL lie and make it about antisemitism and use Judaism as their cudgel to defend the barbarism of Israel. They aren't the ones who actively attack me for existing and then claim I want Jews dead based on simply telling you how everything actually happened and who brought terrorism and quoting the direct words of Israelis or Zionists, not simply the "far-right." Israelis society is destroying itself and you coddling their depravity, will only hasten their demise. Keep telling yourself it's just some fringe minority in Israel while you then compare me to them. Should really work out well being that myopic in how you think and you read what someone says.

And to the ridiculous comment "I don't have a dog in this fight" that I see blissfully ignorant Americans constantly use but always seem to still believe the lies about Israel always being the victim, I'll say what I did in another post on another thread: Your tax money, your media and your govt's blind fealty from Congress to vetoes at the UN to laws punishing anyone who speaks out, is why you do have a dog in this fight: You created Cujo.

Done with this topic, but I thank Jeff for providing the forum.

You’re not “done with this topic.” Otc, you won’t shut up about it and insist that you - a random poster - know more about the situation than Middle East experts. You do not.

You're right, I'm not done. One more just for you: I'm Palestinian. That you --the actual random poster-- tell me I don't know what I know *first hand* how Israel operates or the lies I know are lies, is *chefskiss*

You'll forgive me if I don't go along with "Middle East experts" like Bill Maher or I'm sure all the ones you're thinking of who happen to be western Zionists. Nothing funnier than being lectured by people who think it's perfectly normal watching roundtables with no actual Middle Eastern people. Nicolle Wallace discussing the Middle East with two "Mideast experts" like: Johnathan Greenblatt and Donny Deutsche.

List your experts who aren't part of "thinktanks" that are clearly pro-Israel. I doubt any are actually Arab and NOT on the payroll. Forget it, because I don;t even care what you think.

Now I am done. Won't even read your reply.

DP

Please reconsider. Voices like yours will be part of the healing process, overcoming the distortions and manipulations that are central to the Zionist movement’s stranglehold of U.S. policy in the region.

The US rightly recognizes that a democratic country that is pro US and also upholds many western values including but not limited to freedom of religion, rights for women, rights for LGTBQ+, rights for racial minorities, is aligned with US interests vs Iran-backed regimes and terrorists groups that dominate the region. That’s not the “Zionists” (Jew haters love wielding that word but it betrays your intent); that is good US foreign policy.

Now sure, you can say Netanyahu isn’t a good guy, agree. But just like I’m not giving up on the US because of Trump and hope our allies won’t either, not going to abandon Israel for what is essentially Iran’s Islamist regime.

You call Israel democratic with a straight face or nah?

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:Bill Maher is inaccurate in many instances in that video. He makes even basic mistakes. Here are a few:

1) He says that calling Jews "colonizers" is like calling Native Americans "colonizers". Consider your reaction if Native Americans from the South West began taking over Manhattan, creating a new country, and forcing its current residents into exile. Wouldn't you consider them "colonizers"? While it is true that some Jews remained permanently in what is now Israel, the Zionist movement was led by European Jews. At its conception, the Zionist movement was not in agreement about where a Jewish state should be located. Had a Jewish state been established in Uganda, an idea that was actually accepted by the World Jewish Congress in 1903, you would more readily recognize it to as colonization.

2) Maher claims that for 2,000 years nobody was interested in Palestine. This shows complete ignorance. What does Maher think the Crusades were about? Crusaders from Western Europe fought Persians and Kurds from today's Iran (among others) and Maher thinks this demonstrates a lack of interest. During the Ottoman Empire, there were thriving cities and towns in Palestine. Many radical supporters of Israel, including Maher apparently, would have you believe that Palestine was an empty land. That is a rewriting of history that misrepresents the deep ties that Palestinians have to their homeland.

3) Maher suggests that Zionism was a reaction to the Holocaust and that Jews became interested in a Jewish homeland after World War II. In fact, Jews had started emigrating from Europe to Palestine as early as 1882, the time of the First Aliyah. The movement gained momentum prior to World War I. Again, Maher is ignorant of basic history.

4) Maher refers to the killing of 600 protesters in Iran. That, of course, is a terrible thing that I condemn. But it pales in comparison to the number of protesters that has Israel killed. I am not talking about about those killed by Israel in fighting, but the killing of unarmed protesters. By the way, that number includes several Americans just in the last few months.

5) Maher commits a popular and common fallacy of equating opposition to Israel's killing of civilians as support for Hamas or Hezbollah. Pro-Israel individuals routinely say that they oppose Netanyahu but support Israel. That is considered a very acceptable position. Yet, when others say that they support the Palestinian people but oppose Hamas, they are labeled as supporters of terrorism. Those who, like Maher, engage in this sort of demagoguery are not serious and should not be considered serious. The should be considered as the propagandists that they are.

Jeff,

Points 1, 2, and 3 don’t reflect historical facts - and this is exactly what Maher was pointing out.

1. Do you recognize the fact that Jews in Europe arrived in Europe either at the hands of Roman invaders in Judea who captured and enslaved them and in some cases brought their slaves back to Europe and/or Jews fled the Levant because they were being terrorized by Ottoman and then later, and more violently, by Islamic invaders? Jews are native to Israel - they are indigenous to the land - and were forced from it violently. The Jewish diaspora is a result of Jews being forced out of that homeland not because the average middle eastern Jew was yearning for what is now Poland or Germany.

Despite the forced diaspora - which continued through the 20th century as Arab Islamist powers increasingly oppressed Jews all over the Middle East and even conspired with the Nazis in WWII, Jews never left Israel and as a community have been resilient enough to sustain a presence. There were over 600,000 Jews in Israel in 1946.

This is quite different than the strawman you pose of Native Americans from the Southwest retaking Manhattan.

And to this point, Uganda is not equivalent to Israel and that would have been colonialism because, unlike Israel, Jews have no historic connection to Uganda. That’s ultimately why Israel was identified as a Jewish state versus Uganda. Again, Jews are indigenous to Israel, not colonizers.

2. Also, why do you assert that “nobody was interested in Palestine” for 2,000 years. Jews have always been connected to that region - they never left that region. Religiously and in terms of historic connections, Jews have always been “interested” in that area of the Levant. Observant Jews have prayed in the direction of Jerusalem for millennia, it’s integral to Jewish identity. The line from the Passover Sedar - “next year in Jerusalem” is linked back to the 5th Century BCE. Jews have always been interested in Israel.

3. You reference Jews returning to Israel pre WWI …. You do realize that antisemitism in Russia and Eastern Europe surged at this time, right?

You make it seem like Jews woke up in mid-1800s and said, hey, let’s go to Israel. That’s not factual and seems ignorant of historic facts.

Lastly, denial of Jewish indigenous roots in the Middle East and specifically Israel has been part of Arab Islamist propaganda for the 50 years. This propaganda also attempts to wipe out the historical connection of Christians and other religious groups to those lands. It’s not factual - it’s propaganda - and again, part of what Maher was highlighting in his piece.

Not going to even get into 4 and 5 because the false equivalence of the one Jewish state in the world trying to defend itself from Iranian terrorist proxies and the resulting war post 10/7 and the terrorist / repressive regimes that are the Iranian regime and its spinoffs of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis is not worth debating. Again, not reflective of fact, which was Maher’s point to begin with.

I don't know if you realize, but you are mostly agreeing with me. I was not the one who said that nobody was interested in Palestine for 2000 years. That was Maher. You must not have watched the video. I pointed out that he was wrong and, in fact, there was considerable interest. You seem to agree that there was interest. Your justifications for Jews moving to Palestine may be correct, but, again, only reinforce my point that Jews were moving to Israel before World War II, a claim Maher made and of which you would be aware if you had bothered to watch the video. So, I guess, thanks for mostly agreeing with my points about Maher being wrong. Who says people with different opinions can't find common ground?

Jeff, You are being entirely too kind to someone who believes the Ottomans existed before Islam.

You are referring to me. I didn’t say Ottomans existed before Islam. What I referenced was that as the Ottoman’s grip on the region receded starting in the early 1800s, Islamist Arabs proceeded to overtake lands and communities where Jews and conducted multiple massacres on the Jews - not just in Israel but throughout the Middle East. These were initiated to rid the area of Jewish populations. This affected Christian and other non-Muslim populations, too. This terror led to Jews fleeing the region.

Yes, before this we have Islamist imperialists, Romans, and Babylonians, among others. Lots of terror. None of it conducive to Jews sticking around.

Exactly what "multiple massacres" were conducted in the 1800s that lead to Jews fleeing the region?

There’s many. This is well documented and certainly predates the 1800s but here’s an abbreviated list of some of the most notable since that date and highlights the oppression that was happening in and around the Levant and extending across North Africa where millennia-old Jewish communities were repressed, synagogues destroyed, and Jews killed. Jews don’t leave in entirely but their numbers decline precipitously as they flee. As Ottomon power recedes in 1800s, Arab Islamic powers continue and arguably exacerbate the violence against these communities.

Again, not a complete list - this could go back a few centuries.

▪ 1805: 1st pogrom in Ottoman Algeria against the Jews of Algiers after a famine. French
consul Dubois-Thainville saves 200 Jews by sheltering them in his consulate.
▪ 1805: exile of Jews from Algiers to Tunis and Livorno
▪ 1805, the leader of the Jewish Nation of Algiers, Naphthalie Busnach, is killed while riots ravage the neighborhoods.
▪ 1806: expulsion by fatwa of the Jews of Sali in Morocco
▪ 1806: ban on Moroccan Jews wearing Western clothing
▪ 1806: the janissaries of the dey of Algiers massacre and pillage in the Jewish quarter
▪ 1807: expulsion of Jews from Tetouan
▪ 1808: 1st massacres in the Mellah ghetto, North Africa
▪ 1815, the chief rabbi of Algiers, Isaac Aboulker, is beheaded during a riot.
▪ 1815: the Jews of Algiers are forced to fight against an invasion of locusts
▪ 1815: 2nd pogrom of Algiers, Ottoman Algeria
▪ 1816: in Algeria, ban on carrying weapons for Jews and Christians
▪ 1820: Massacres of Sahalu Lobiant, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1828 : pogrom de Baghdad, Iraq ottoman
▪ 1830: 3rd pogrom of Algeria, Ottoman Algeria
▪ 1830: start of the persecution of Jews in Persia, caused by the Russian advance in the Caucasus
▪ 1830: ethnic cleansing of Jews in Tabriz, Iran
▪ 1834: 2nd pogrom of Hebron, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1834 : Pogrom de Safed, Palestine ottomane
▪ 1838: Druze attack in Safed, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1839: Massacre of the Mashadi Jews, Iran
▪ 1839: forced conversion of surviving Jews from Mashadi
▪ 1839: campaign of forced conversions of Iranian Jews
▪ 1840: persecution of the Jews of Damascus; ritual murder case
▪ 1840: forced conversion of the Jews of Mashadi
▪ 1841: massive murders of Jews in Morocco; the sultan is obliged to consider the Jews as his personal property, which helps to protect them
▪ 1840: Damascus, ritual murders (French Muslims and Christians kidnapped, tortured and killed Jewish children for entertainment), Ottoman Syria
▪ 1844: 1st Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1847: Dayr al-Qamar Pogrom, Liban ottoman
▪ 1847: ethnic cleansing of Jews in Jerusalem, Ottoman Palestine
▪ 1848: 1st pogrom of Damascus, Syria
▪ 1848: total disappearance of the Jews of Mashhad
▪ 1850: 1st pogrom of Aleppo, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1854: anti-Jewish pogrom in Demnate, Morocco
▪ 1857: beheading in Tunis of the Jewish coachman Batou Sfez, accused of blasphemy, while he was drunk
▪ 1860: 2nd pogrom of Damascus, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1862: 1st pogrom of Beirut, Ottoman Lebanon
▪ 1866 : pogrom at Kuzguncuk, Turquie Ottomane
▪ 1867: Barfurush massacre, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1868: Eyub Pogrom, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1869: Massacre of Tunis, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1869: Massacre of Sfax, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1864–1880: Marrakech massacre, Morocco
▪ 1870: 2nd Alexandria massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1870: 1st pogrom in Istanbul, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1871: 1st Damanhur massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1872: Massacres in Edirne, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1872: 1st pogrom of Izmir, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1873: 2nd massacre of Damanhur, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Izmir, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Istanbul, Ottoman Türkiye
▪ 1874: 2nd pogrom of Beirut, Ottoman Lebanon
▪ 1875: 2 pogroms in Aleppo, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1875: Massacre on the island of Djerba, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1877 : 3e massacre de Damanhur, Egypte ottomane
▪ 1877: Pogrom of Mansura, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1882: Massacre of Homs, Ottoman Syria
▪ 1882: 3rd massacre of Alexandria, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1889: after the funeral of a rabbi, deemed too discreet, the Jewish cemetery of Baghdad was confiscated
▪ 1889: looting of the Jewish quarter of Baghdad
▪ 1890: 2nd Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1890, 3e pogrom de Damas, Syrie ottomane
▪ 1891: 4th massacre of Damanahur, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1897: murders in Tripoli, Ottoman Libya
▪ 1903&1907: Taza & Settat, pogroms, Morocco
▪ 1890: Massacres of Tunis, Ottoman Tunisia
▪ 1901–1902: 3rd Cairo massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1901–1907: 4th Alexandria massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1903: 1st Port Said massacres, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1903–1940: Pogroms of Taza and Settat, Morocco
▪ 1904: massacre of Jews in Yemen
▪ 1907: Casablanca, pogrom, Morocco
▪ 1908: 2nd Port Said massacre, Ottoman Egypt
▪ 1909: comment from the British vice-consul of Mosul: “The attitude of Muslims towards Christians and Jews is that of a master towards his slaves.”
▪ 1910: blood libel of Shiraz
▪ 1911: Shiraz pogrom
▪ 1912: 4th Fez, Pogrom, Morocco
▪ 1914: expulsion of Jews from Palestine old enough to bear arms by the Ottomans
▪ 1917: Jewish Inquisition of Baghdadi, Ottoman Empire
▪ 1918–1948: adoption of a law prohibiting the raising of a Jewish orphan, Yemen
▪ 1920: Irbid massacres: British mandate in Palestine
▪ 1920–1930: Arab riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1921: 1st Jaffa riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1922: Massacres of Djerba, Tunisia
▪ 1922: law of forced conversion of orphans in Yemen, concerning Jews including as adults
▪ 1927: 60 Jews killed by Arabs in the Mellah of Casablanca Morocco
▪ 1928: Massacres of Ikhwan, in Egypt and under British mandate in Palestine.
▪ 1928: Jewish orphans sold into slavery and forced to convert to Islam by the Muslim Brotherhood, Yemen
▪ 1929: anti-Jewish riots, British mandate: in August 1929, the Jews demanded the construction of the Western Wall; pogroms in Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed. To stop the violence, the British reject this request
▪ 1929: 3rd Hebron Pogrom under British Mandate Palestine.
▪ 1929 3e pogrom de Safed, mandate britannique Palestine.
▪ 1933: 2nd Jaffa riots, British mandate in Palestine.
▪ 1934: Anti-Jewish pogrom in Constantine Algeria. 200 Jewish stores were raided, the total material damage was estimated at more than 150 million francs. It also sent a quarter of Constantine’s Jewish population into poverty.
▪ 1934: Pogroms in Thrace, Türkiye
▪ 1934: 1st massacres in Farhud, Iraq
▪ 1936: 3rd Jaffa riots, British Mandate Palestine
▪ 1936: 2e massacre of Farhud, Irak
▪ 1938: boycott of Jews in Egypt
▪ 1939: discovery of 3 bombs in synagogues in Cairo
▪ 1941 : 3e massacre de Farhud, Iraq
▪ 1941: persecution of Jews in Libya
▪ 1941: massacre of Jews in Baghdad, with the support of the authorities: approx. 170 dead
▪ 1942: collaboration of the mufti with the Nazis. Plays a role in the final solution
▪ 1942: Struma disaster, Türkiye
▪ 1942: Nile Delta pogroms, Egypt
▪ 1938–1945: Arab collaboration with the Nazis
▪ 1942: discriminatory tax law of Varlik Vergisi in Turkey against Jews and Christians
▪ 1942: looting of Jewish property in Benghazi and deportation to the desert
▪ 1944: attack on the Jewish quarter of Damascus
▪ 1945: anti-Jewish and anti-Christian riots in Egypt; churches and synagogues destroyed
▪ 1945: 4th Cairo massacre, Egypt
▪ 1945: Pogrom of Tripoli, Libya
▪ 1947: segregation measures against Jews in Egypt
▪ 1947: pogrom in Libya; approx. 130 dead
▪ 1947 : Pogroms d’Aden au Yemen
▪ 1947: 3rd pogrom d’Alep, Syrie
▪ 1948: “emptying” of the Jewish quarter of Damascus, Syria

Good lawyer trick of burying me in documentation. Obviously I am not going to go through that entire list but from a brief scan, very few are actual massacres that led to Jews fleeing the region. Some of those are one person or even no people being killed. Hardly massacres. I am eager to see how "ban on carrying weapons for Jews and Christians" meets the definition of "massacre" and led to Jews fleeing the region.

Any time you want to engage seriously instead of BSing, let me know.

I’m not burying you in documentation. There are bullet points. You could not be bothered to read a list of pogroms and massacres - all labeled as such.

Moreover, amid what you see as trivial points of oppression are massacres are where Jews were killed by dozens or hundreds. Their communities gutted and/or demolished. Synagogues destroyed. These resulted in Jews fleeing these countries.

Go Google any one of these to learn more. This is history not trickery. Weird that’s your response to what are well known facets to anyone who studied Middle East history and the history of Jews in it is to say it’s BS.

As anyone who has studied this knows - and certainly Jews in these areas know - that these events of violence and repression led to the extinction of Jewish communities throughout the region. Jews were either killed or they left. There were thriving communities in Syria, Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco. They are essentially gone now.

This is important because it also underscores that oppression and violence against Jews in the region didn’t start with the creation of the state of Israel.

Again, back to the genesis of this thread: people have little understanding of Middle East history and even less about the history of Jews in it.

No I am not going to spend days Googling a list that is probably over 100 items long and mostly consisting of incidences that don't consist of massacres. I wish that I was surprised that you would consider "ban on carrying weapons for Jews and Christians" to be a "pogrom or massacre". But, sadly, that's bout what should be expected. Did you even read your own list? Here is another of your massacres: "ban on Moroccan Jews wearing Western clothing". I wonder how many Jews fled the region because of that? You provided a list that is not mean to be examined rather than a list that was supposed to actually provide evidence.

Yes, it is no surprise that people are misinformed when they are told that a ban on clothing is a pogrom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I see when reading some of you is that you simply can't accept that you were brought up on MSM framing where you never questioned what you were shown. You're so brainwashed into believing nothing happened/happens before there's retaliation against Israel and then every camera light goes on. You tell yourself that because the media isn't showing you the people Israel killed/beat/raped/kidnapped that day, that week, that month, that year and doesn't give them a fleshed out "human interest" narrative the way they do with Israelis, you then just brush away their pain and their humanity, and then conclude that I am tantamount to the literal calls for another Holocaust against Jews as you ignore the *average* Israeli calling for the extermination of Palestinians. I have someone calling me a "demon." This is what US media and the govt overrun with people like Stuart Seldowitz literally in the SD in the Office on Isr-Pal, has wrought. Listen to Matt Miller, he's no different. It's disgraceful how the US is prepared to destroy itself for THIS. Their hypocrisy on full-display for the world to see.

The younger gen. aren't the ones who fell for the Iraq war lies propped up by your precious "respectable" media as you smirk at the thought of them getting their news from social media. They aren't the ones who sat there listening to Neocons with the actual "bloodlust" lie to you and who are now to this day, treated as elder statesmen on that "credible" traditional media you love so much.

My hope is with the younger generation, because unlike you older people, they refuse to turn a blind eye to what Israel has done every single day when the MSM chose to ignore it. They refuse your simplistic belief that "Oct 7" is when this started or you get to ignore what led to it. When you just brush away the president of the US lied to you on day one and claimed he "saw videos of beheaded babies" and the media --rather than investigate the claims-- splash it on your screens all day and guests poisoning the minds of viewers for days/weeks and then are tepid with the retractions, you expect them to go along with how you consume information? They aren't the ones sitting there watching the ADL lie and make it about antisemitism and use Judaism as their cudgel to defend the barbarism of Israel. They aren't the ones who actively attack me for existing and then claim I want Jews dead based on simply telling you how everything actually happened and who brought terrorism and quoting the direct words of Israelis or Zionists, not simply the "far-right." Israelis society is destroying itself and you coddling their depravity, will only hasten their demise. Keep telling yourself it's just some fringe minority in Israel while you then compare me to them. Should really work out well being that myopic in how you think and you read what someone says.

And to the ridiculous comment "I don't have a dog in this fight" that I see blissfully ignorant Americans constantly use but always seem to still believe the lies about Israel always being the victim, I'll say what I did in another post on another thread: Your tax money, your media and your govt's blind fealty from Congress to vetoes at the UN to laws punishing anyone who speaks out, is why you do have a dog in this fight: You created Cujo.

Done with this topic, but I thank Jeff for providing the forum.

You’re not “done with this topic.” Otc, you won’t shut up about it and insist that you - a random poster - know more about the situation than Middle East experts. You do not.

You're right, I'm not done. One more just for you: I'm Palestinian. That you --the actual random poster-- tell me I don't know what I know *first hand* how Israel operates or the lies I know are lies, is *chefskiss*

You'll forgive me if I don't go along with "Middle East experts" like Bill Maher or I'm sure all the ones you're thinking of who happen to be western Zionists. Nothing funnier than being lectured by people who think it's perfectly normal watching roundtables with no actual Middle Eastern people. Nicolle Wallace discussing the Middle East with two "Mideast experts" like: Johnathan Greenblatt and Donny Deutsche.

List your experts who aren't part of "thinktanks" that are clearly pro-Israel. I doubt any are actually Arab and NOT on the payroll. Forget it, because I don;t even care what you think.

Now I am done. Won't even read your reply.

DP

Please reconsider. Voices like yours will be part of the healing process, overcoming the distortions and manipulations that are central to the Zionist movement’s stranglehold of U.S. policy in the region.

The US rightly recognizes that a democratic country that is pro US and also upholds many western values including but not limited to freedom of religion, rights for women, rights for LGTBQ+, rights for racial minorities, is aligned with US interests vs Iran-backed regimes and terrorists groups that dominate the region. That’s not the “Zionists” (Jew haters love wielding that word but it betrays your intent); that is good US foreign policy.

Now sure, you can say Netanyahu isn’t a good guy, agree. But just like I’m not giving up on the US because of Trump and hope our allies won’t either, not going to abandon Israel for what is essentially Iran’s Islamist regime.

Obviously the U.S. has more than two policy choices in the Middle East, The suggestion that we either have to give full 100% support to Israel or we must align with Iran is ridiculous. At a minimum, the U.S. should follow U.S. law which prohibits supplying weapons to countries that are preventing humanitarian aid to reach victims. Israel is clearly doing that in northern Gaza. As such, the U.S. should follow our own law and immediately halt all weapons deliveries.

Second, the U.S., as a member of the United Nations and a Security Council member, has a responsibility to ensure the safety of of U.N. peacekeeping forces. Israel has repeatedly attacked UNIFIL forces in southern Lebanon, wounding several soldiers. Today Israeli forces invaded a UNIFIL base. The U.S. should stop all support for Israel's invasion of Lebanon until Israel halts its aggression toward the peacekeeping forces.

Third, today Secretary of Defense Austin authorized the deployment of a THAAD missile defense system and a crew of U.S. personnel to man it to Israel. This is the deployment of U.S. forces into a war zone where there is a good chance they will be involved in conflict. This should not be done without Congressional authorization and should not be done at all until Israel adheres to U.S. demands regarding a ceasefire in Gaza, the resumption of humanitarian aid, a ceasefire in Lebanon, and an end to the seize of northern Gaza.

The U.S. relationship with Israel had been one-sided for far too long. It is time for the U.S. to follow its own laws and pursue its own interests.

Thank god there are voices better than mine to swat deceptive posts like the PP’s drivel into the dustbin of history. Appreciate this so much, the unraveling of years of fake news justification for America’s support of Israel.

There’s nothing in my post that was fake news - and please be explicit if you’re going to say that. I may have a differing perspective but that doesn’t make the facts of the situation “fake”.

As to Jeff’s post, yes, agree that the US should condition military aid. Humanitarian aid is impacted by Hamas’ continued attacks in Israel.
And Israel is entering into Lebanon to address Hezbollah that is embedded and attacking from that area. This is a two-sided war between Israel and the defacto regime (Iranian proxy), Hezbollah. Hezbollah has been attacking Israel since October 8. Any other nation in the world would seek to eradicate the threat of rockets continually fired into its space. Israel is not different in this regard.

Same with Gaza. You have a very active Hamas presence intent on continuing conflict. A ceasefire takes two.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I see when reading some of you is that you simply can't accept that you were brought up on MSM framing where you never questioned what you were shown. You're so brainwashed into believing nothing happened/happens before there's retaliation against Israel and then every camera light goes on. You tell yourself that because the media isn't showing you the people Israel killed/beat/raped/kidnapped that day, that week, that month, that year and doesn't give them a fleshed out "human interest" narrative the way they do with Israelis, you then just brush away their pain and their humanity, and then conclude that I am tantamount to the literal calls for another Holocaust against Jews as you ignore the *average* Israeli calling for the extermination of Palestinians. I have someone calling me a "demon." This is what US media and the govt overrun with people like Stuart Seldowitz literally in the SD in the Office on Isr-Pal, has wrought. Listen to Matt Miller, he's no different. It's disgraceful how the US is prepared to destroy itself for THIS. Their hypocrisy on full-display for the world to see.

The younger gen. aren't the ones who fell for the Iraq war lies propped up by your precious "respectable" media as you smirk at the thought of them getting their news from social media. They aren't the ones who sat there listening to Neocons with the actual "bloodlust" lie to you and who are now to this day, treated as elder statesmen on that "credible" traditional media you love so much.

My hope is with the younger generation, because unlike you older people, they refuse to turn a blind eye to what Israel has done every single day when the MSM chose to ignore it. They refuse your simplistic belief that "Oct 7" is when this started or you get to ignore what led to it. When you just brush away the president of the US lied to you on day one and claimed he "saw videos of beheaded babies" and the media --rather than investigate the claims-- splash it on your screens all day and guests poisoning the minds of viewers for days/weeks and then are tepid with the retractions, you expect them to go along with how you consume information? They aren't the ones sitting there watching the ADL lie and make it about antisemitism and use Judaism as their cudgel to defend the barbarism of Israel. They aren't the ones who actively attack me for existing and then claim I want Jews dead based on simply telling you how everything actually happened and who brought terrorism and quoting the direct words of Israelis or Zionists, not simply the "far-right." Israelis society is destroying itself and you coddling their depravity, will only hasten their demise. Keep telling yourself it's just some fringe minority in Israel while you then compare me to them. Should really work out well being that myopic in how you think and you read what someone says.

And to the ridiculous comment "I don't have a dog in this fight" that I see blissfully ignorant Americans constantly use but always seem to still believe the lies about Israel always being the victim, I'll say what I did in another post on another thread: Your tax money, your media and your govt's blind fealty from Congress to vetoes at the UN to laws punishing anyone who speaks out, is why you do have a dog in this fight: You created Cujo.

Done with this topic, but I thank Jeff for providing the forum.

You’re not “done with this topic.” Otc, you won’t shut up about it and insist that you - a random poster - know more about the situation than Middle East experts. You do not.

You're right, I'm not done. One more just for you: I'm Palestinian. That you --the actual random poster-- tell me I don't know what I know *first hand* how Israel operates or the lies I know are lies, is *chefskiss*

You'll forgive me if I don't go along with "Middle East experts" like Bill Maher or I'm sure all the ones you're thinking of who happen to be western Zionists. Nothing funnier than being lectured by people who think it's perfectly normal watching roundtables with no actual Middle Eastern people. Nicolle Wallace discussing the Middle East with two "Mideast experts" like: Johnathan Greenblatt and Donny Deutsche.

List your experts who aren't part of "thinktanks" that are clearly pro-Israel. I doubt any are actually Arab and NOT on the payroll. Forget it, because I don;t even care what you think.

Now I am done. Won't even read your reply.

DP

Please reconsider. Voices like yours will be part of the healing process, overcoming the distortions and manipulations that are central to the Zionist movement’s stranglehold of U.S. policy in the region.

The US rightly recognizes that a democratic country that is pro US and also upholds many western values including but not limited to freedom of religion, rights for women, rights for LGTBQ+, rights for racial minorities, is aligned with US interests vs Iran-backed regimes and terrorists groups that dominate the region. That’s not the “Zionists” (Jew haters love wielding that word but it betrays your intent); that is good US foreign policy.

Now sure, you can say Netanyahu isn’t a good guy, agree. But just like I’m not giving up on the US because of Trump and hope our allies won’t either, not going to abandon Israel for what is essentially Iran’s Islamist regime.

Obviously the U.S. has more than two policy choices in the Middle East, The suggestion that we either have to give full 100% support to Israel or we must align with Iran is ridiculous. At a minimum, the U.S. should follow U.S. law which prohibits supplying weapons to countries that are preventing humanitarian aid to reach victims. Israel is clearly doing that in northern Gaza. As such, the U.S. should follow our own law and immediately halt all weapons deliveries.

Second, the U.S., as a member of the United Nations and a Security Council member, has a responsibility to ensure the safety of of U.N. peacekeeping forces. Israel has repeatedly attacked UNIFIL forces in southern Lebanon, wounding several soldiers. Today Israeli forces invaded a UNIFIL base. The U.S. should stop all support for Israel's invasion of Lebanon until Israel halts its aggression toward the peacekeeping forces.

Third, today Secretary of Defense Austin authorized the deployment of a THAAD missile defense system and a crew of U.S. personnel to man it to Israel. This is the deployment of U.S. forces into a war zone where there is a good chance they will be involved in conflict. This should not be done without Congressional authorization and should not be done at all until Israel adheres to U.S. demands regarding a ceasefire in Gaza, the resumption of humanitarian aid, a ceasefire in Lebanon, and an end to the seize of northern Gaza.

The U.S. relationship with Israel had been one-sided for far too long. It is time for the U.S. to follow its own laws and pursue its own interests.

Thank god there are voices better than mine to swat deceptive posts like the PP’s drivel into the dustbin of history. Appreciate this so much, the unraveling of years of fake news justification for America’s support of Israel.

There’s nothing in my post that was fake news - and please be explicit if you’re going to say that. I may have a differing perspective but that doesn’t make the facts of the situation “fake”.

As to Jeff’s post, yes, agree that the US should condition military aid. Humanitarian aid is impacted by Hamas’ continued attacks in Israel.
And Israel is entering into Lebanon to address Hezbollah that is embedded and attacking from that area. This is a two-sided war between Israel and the defacto regime (Iranian proxy), Hezbollah. Hezbollah has been attacking Israel since October 8. Any other nation in the world would seek to eradicate the threat of rockets continually fired into its space. Israel is not different in this regard.

Same with Gaza. You have a very active Hamas presence intent on continuing conflict. A ceasefire takes two.

I assume from this response that you support the ethnic cleansing of northern Gaza and the Israeli attacks on UNIFIL? Because all you did was provide justifications for those activities.