Re: <nettime> silence on Palestine?

[Andrew Ross via nettime-l <nettime-l@lists.nettime.org>]

I could not agree less. A war of genocidal intent and proportions is going
on, and Nettimers are told to stay in their lane?

The reason I started this thread is that I have been nourished over the
years by this list's fluidity---contributors have offered insights and
knowledge on a wide range of topics and political events far beyond
Nettime's "lane." People with expansive minds, after all, do not think in
single issue ways. I noted that Palestine, as a topic, was conspicuously
absent, as Ted subsequently confirmed. But my initial question was directed
at the collective wisdom of those who know a thing or two about online
behavior. And what ensued was a classic example of online trolling, where
indeed a lone voice tried to channel discussion by introducing Zionist
talking points and misinformation that consumed a lot of energy. So, if
nothing else, this has been an Internet case-study, and it is all too
familiar to anyone who engages in debate (and direct action) about
Palestine in the public sphere. For those who are not familiar with those
tactics, welcome to that world. It is not a domain of "historical
tit-for-tat," it is an* information war*, with profound asymmetries that
has resulted in the crushing disparity between the over-resourced intent of
the major colonial powers, former and current, and the vast majority of the
world's population who, by any measure, support the Palestinian cause.

That said, there are surely many things to be said from the perspective of
the Nettime lane. On the topic of Israeli informants that Michael raised in
passing, I have heard that military laptops were among the items seized by
Hamas soldiers. They contained information about Israeli spies in Gaza, and
presumably the West Bank too. Whether this information has been shared with
the PA is less easy to predict. Whether the PA would do anything with
the information is also not a straightforward issue.

ar/

https://andrewtross.com



On Tue, Oct 17, 2023 at 6:39 AM Tobias Mueller via nettime-l <
nettime-l@lists.nettime.org> wrote:

> Thank you, Michael, could not agree more.
>
> As to why the Hamas attack was able to circumvent intel and military
> comms, the NYT started this conversation soon after. This gift link <
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.nytimes.com_2023_10_10_world_middleeast_israel-2Dgaza-2Dsecurity-2Dfailure.html-3Funlocked-5Farticle-5Fcode-3DwcY43-2DncWyN-2DQuRJowivaTCkZtjDfY-5F-2DgVhWYmHS2eEm0Hic9LPkKqElj7g3nfouu7nneXo2rHF-2Dk2Q-5FBzyq0sYmDxSHGLwgOyX7EjP92bdqRZD4zn-5FT9MMEKcUhKeVc-2Dx3HBxRtW9kWNi5-5FNZTuTqHTR5LPlkwEYvCStrz-5Fk0i9-2DlXT3UamwnF1qQYz6yz6IFS0fAXHJXHZZso0agfk9SFENOJ2yD-2Dld5G2A9pgWIJkkqIRRV3WsdqapB-5FVwilSUOj4Y7A1oeAldSvXb1wjsDL25dsIgAta0dcf2l1iMqpGUuEHWJnTdSTlZI9oG0gqahd-5Fu8aFe6TAJN-5FN7HF0TYaHetFZRrfejKR2r8xcnw-26smid-3Durl-2Dshare&d=DwIGaQ&c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&r=VxUJd2kne_uY2sRiyg_Suu9sS1Wa74w5LlTXho-T2RQ&m=60NHHkXarVRtqNBD1RATzFn6CIcoPJSYhhiEAPH1fb8uoUpTm40SK1lUoTs349gE&s=Uz54JYxGBtjrtyO-cVqSTbX7xqWQijnd5AiKyQATNc4&e=
> > should work w/out paywall.
>
> Best,
> Tobi
>
> > Am 17.10.2023 um 12:31 schrieb Michael Guggenheim via nettime-l <
> nettime-l@lists.nettime.org>:
> >
> > Hi all,
> >
> > I am deeply frustrated by the whole discussion. I am coming to Nettime
> because I like to listen to a group of people who have expertise in
> internet/tech/media, not for rehashing generic political discussions that I
> can have in the news or on social media.
> >
> > As for the nettime angle: What happened in Israel/Palestine is notable
> because the Israel/Gaza border is one of the most technologized and
> surveilled border in the world. Supposedly Israel has spies all over Gaza
> and supposedly they are very good at forcing petty criminals into spies.
> And yet, the attacks did take the IDF by surprise and yet it took the IDF a
> long time to reach the places of the massacres. How was this possible? What
> does it tell us about the border technology, about Hamas, about the Israeli
> security state? What good is the Israeli tech industry, if all their
> Pegasus and other trojans did not manage to intercept the plans of Hamas?
> Did Hamas plan this without computers and smartphones? Or did they manage
> to keep the spyware off the phones and computers of hundreds of their
> people?
> >
> > If there was “silence on Palestine” I was hoping to hear from some of
> the people with knowledge of the situation to hear some context to how the
> above could happen. What does it mean for the future of the conflict? What
> will follow from this in the medium term for the conflict, once the
> slaughter is over? Will the border become even harder? But how and with
> what consequences?
> >
> > Instead we got into a historical tit-for-tat  and who started first and
> who is worse. If anyone is interested, there are plenty of relevant books
> on the history of the conflict and we all know that neither the Hamas
> attacks nor the answer of the IDF have improved the situation, quite to the
> contrary. We also know that neither Hamas nor the current Israeli
> government are actors who have a serious interest in bringing peace, and
> rehashing historical tit-for-tat on nettime will do very little to bring
> leftist actors together to help solve the situation (if that matters at
> all).
> >
> > I am extremely grateful for David Opp pointing to a land for all, a
> proposal whose existence speaks insistently against historical tit-for-tat
> and whose proponents demonstrate that it is possible to move away from
> historical accounting.
> >
> > But please, can we hear the wisdom of Nettime too?
> >
> > best
> > Michael
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On 17 Oct 2023, at 04:16, Keith Sanborn via nettime-l <
> nettime-l@lists.nettime.org> wrote:
> >
> > To clarify: there is no direct reporting of such incidents, though one
> report suggests they may have taken place in one locality.
> >
> > What they do say is that police forces are ramping up their presence in
> France, Germany and Austria because of the perceived possibility of
> anti-semitic attacks in connection with Palestinian rallies.
> >
> > Checked out Rahul’s references. I guess the bot he is or is using isn’t
> too good of a reader in English German or French. None of them say what he
> purports them to say.
> >
> > I suggest we waste no more time with this entity which has no presence
> on the net, has never, to my recollection, posted previously on other
> topics, and is wasting value intellectual bandwidth on this list.
> >
> > Keith
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> On Oct 16, 2023, at 5:44 PM, Brian Holmes via nettime-l <
> nettime-l@lists.nettime.org> wrote:
> >>
> >> Rahul, first of all, I too am thankful that we can actually discuss
> these
> >> issues on nettime, because in the world at large, the space for
> discussion
> >> is narrow, while the space for bitter animosity seems almost infinite.
> >>
> >> As stated in an earlier post, I think we are before a tragic situation
> >> which ensnares all participants in a trap not of their own making. This
> is
> >> why I don't justify one population over the other in this conflict. To
> me,
> >> what would be important is not that one side wins. What's important is
> to
> >> get out of the trap.
> >>
> >> Anyway, there is a point which needs to be clarified. I think we all
> >> understand that under the norms of international law, Hamas is a
> terrorist
> >> organization, whereas the IDF upholds, or at least claims to uphold, the
> >> humanitarian rules of military engagement.
> >>
> >> However, the analysis of the people who disagree with you - including
> >> myself on this point - is that since 1987 at least, the
> disproportionality
> >> of Palestinian deaths compared to Israeli deaths indicates a failure of
> >> humanitarian law as applied by the IDF. In the previous conflicts
> involving
> >> Gaza, the Palestinian death toll is on the order of twenty times
> higher, at
> >> least. This is due to the vast inequality in terms of weaponry,
> >> institutional structure, international support and logistical resources
> -
> >> exactly the inequality that has made it possible for Israel to hold two
> >> million people in an open-air prison, and to pursue the takeover of
> >> Palestinian land on the West Bank. It is impossible to see the
> humanitarian
> >> character of military operations that result in such large numbers of
> >> civilian deaths.
> >>
> >> The disproportion is well known and can be seen in the chart on this
> page:
> >>
> >>
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__today.lorientlejour.com_article_1352614_how-2Dmany-2Dpeople-2Dhas-2Dthe-2Dhamas-2Disrael-2Dwar-2Dkilled-2Dso-2Dfar.html&d=DwIGaQ&c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&r=VxUJd2kne_uY2sRiyg_Suu9sS1Wa74w5LlTXho-T2RQ&m=60NHHkXarVRtqNBD1RATzFn6CIcoPJSYhhiEAPH1fb8uoUpTm40SK1lUoTs349gE&s=SlwiEqFVc6nlEjqCM9V-shKrketqCIVAw88AG7BOh60&e=
> >>
> >> A humanitarian law that allows a country to slaughter civilians at that
> >> level of disproportionality appears first of all to contradict its own
> >> tenets, and more importantly, it looks like a transparently false
> >> justification for violent domination. Already in the current conflict,
> we
> >> are seeing twice as many Palestinian deaths. If the number rises to ten
> or
> >> twenty times as many, the trap will be complete. Not only the Arab world
> >> will look on Israel and the US as mortal enemies, but the entire Global
> >> South will come to see the Western alliance system as a hypocritical
> force
> >> of bloodthirsty domination. And so we will fight wars until the flames
> of
> >> climate change consume us.
> >>
> >> Despite the grief and rage, Israel should exercise restraint now, before
> >> the situation becomes terminally polarized. As the more powerful party,
> the
> >> country should analyze its own role in producing the conflict - just as
> the
> >> US should have done after 9/11. Not to do so is a failure on every
> level,
> >> including that of military strategy. Netanyahu's government is directly
> to
> >> blame for this strategic failure, and it looks very likely that he will
> be
> >> blamed for it by a majority of Israelis. Supporting them does not imply
> >> anti-Semitism, nor even less, justification of Hamas. It's just being
> >> against the war party.
> >>
> >> Anyway, in terms of the discussion here, I wanted to clarify what looks
> to
> >> me like a fundamental point of disagreement.
> >>
> >> best, Brian
> >> --
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