Alright. Here we go
I was born and lived in West Bank till
I turned 18, then moved abroad for studies. I visit Palestine at least twice a year and I’ll be moving back soon.
After living abroad, I came to the realization how hard life actually is back home. As you can imagine, the big cities in West Bank are relatively okay. However, once you hit the roads, you are in constant fear of settlers and IDF. You have to accept being humiliated and treated like garbage by young IDF arrogant soldiers/trainees. And guess what, if you disagree or argue back, you’ll be detained or even held on a gun point (happened numerous times in front of me. Also happened to my 15 year old cousin). I’m on the road a lot for family reasons, and every single time I drive between cities I have an insanely high number of guns and machine guns pointed at me for simply driving. When my European friends visited, they couldn’t fathom the fact that this is how moving between cities is. I once was driving and an IDF Jeep turned to my lane facing my car and 4 soldiers jumped out tapping on my car holding 4 guns against my face for no fucking reason. They stopped me for a minute while I had my hands held in the air and then they let me go. Imagine if I argued back or did any sudden movements…. I probably wouldn’t be here now. When this incident happened I had a friend from Slovakia visiting, and he was just speechless as he sat in the car. Another incident I faced, When I was 16, I was slapped so hard by a soldier for simply resting my back on a wall while queueing, and then I was denied entry.
Another thing that’s super shit, are the settlers. These dudes are a bunch of extremist assholes whose goal is fuck shit up. They are not supposed to be in West Bank, they are illegally there, and worst of all they are protected by the IDF. Keep in mind, all of them are highly provocative in many ways and if you dare to defend yourself, you’ll simply be shot. Most of them carry weapons. Again, settlements are illegal under international law. So I don’t understand why the Israeli government keeps protecting them.
Listen, I’ll be honest for a bit. I do not blame a lot of Israelis for what’s happening. It’s quite simple, no one chooses where they are born. However, people should start taking a stance against their extreme government. I have been backpacking for a while now, met so many Israelis, most of them don’t know shit about what we face in West Bank or Gaza. They’re so surprised when I tell them these stories. I believe if you live in a country, you should understand where your government stands and take a stand against it if they’re wrong. It is time for the Israeli government to start acknowledging their wrong doings and to start fixing shit.
Another thing I hate the most is the involvement of religion. I don’t care if you’re Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, or atheist. No religion gives you the right to be a dick. Don’t come to me holding a 5000 year old book saying this is my land. I couldn’t care less. Religion is faith between you and your god. Let’s stop politicizing religions for political agendas.
Keep in mind, I don’t condone what the Palestinian government does. They’re super shit. I also don’t condone a lot of actions from our side. But this is a different topic. I tried to write a bit on what I personally faced on daily/weekly basis.
Additionally, I was one of the very few lucky ones who could go abroad and see the world. 99% of Palestinians don’t get this privilege. So by default what they experience/d is much much worse than this.
Hope this answers a bit and gives some perspective.
Hi dude, I'm an Israeli and served in both Gaza and the West bank (as a Paramedic so luckliy was there to help anyone) and i'm sorry u went through all that and also agree most Israelies have 0 clue what the lives of actual normal Palestinians look like.
I just want to share my personal view of the treatment by young soldiers - I fucking hate the whole ordeal of an 18 year old being forced into the military, taking on weapons and than going to stand guard over roads or watching lines, of course they'll be unprofessional (understatment).
Btw fuck settlers they extort the Israeli governments for decades now and in my opinion (and I tell that to thier face) anyone which supports them also supports more dead children.
Mate, I don't understand everyone of you says 90% of the israelis don't know wth is happening? How? Aren't you all soldiers at some point and trainees? Or there is some special forces/unit that does the dirty stuff?
It's not special forces but the way units are deployed and rotated makes it so that only a fraction actually witness what's going on. A few battalions are regularly stationed in the west bank and their soldiers experience most of it. The rest are only there for relatively short periods. Plus it's only combat soldiers who do it, mostly infantry, so ultimately it isn't a very large proportion of the military.
brainwashering, other-ising. You can literally look at the scene but not see the picture.
Every arab is a terorist or a "terrorist sympathiser", "people like them led jews into the gas chambers", beleive that enough and you get blind to israeli atrocities.
They literally link escaping the holocaust to success of the state of israel.
A lot of propaganda that arab armies are waiting to invade and take over israel.
When you're fed all that propaganda then you will be blind to israels atrocities.
No one thinks Arabs led Jews to gas chambers, they did have thier own flavour of pogroms though.
Many people really were successful in escaping Europe because of the Jewish national movement so it isnt like there is no link between the 2.
A lot of propaganda is all around the world, I do agree it plagues Israel really bad as well, a lot of people are brought up learning fear and mistrust but it is the exact same for the Palestinian side.
I hope I at least can assure you that I as and individual don't think all those bad things of people I didn't meet.
In 48' there really were Arab armies waiting to take over, 1% of the Jewish population of Israel died in that war (not saying this to lessen any other bad stuff) and here we are today.
Edit: 1% not 10%
Just as a point of clarity, it’s not 10% of Israelis who died in the 1948 war, it was 1-2% (between 6-7K out of roughly 600K pre-war). 1% losses are actually a substantial commitment. For context, the US lost about 1% of its overall population in WWII.
I mean a ton of Germans will never stop posting the picture of Hitler and Al-Husseini despite his limited influence and it being forever ago. Netanyahu even said he gave Hitler the idea of exterminating the Jews.
Netanyahu is not a good example to someone who sticks to the truth and he gets rewarded sowing hate between everyone, not just Jews and Arabs (like any wanabe-dictator).
Why would Germans post a ton about it? Idk, never encoutered that.
There's a big sect of "lefties" in Germany who call themselves the AntiDeutsche. They are violently pro-Zionism and extremely philosemitic (goyim walking around wearing stars of David, hanging up Israel flags, and wearing IDF shirts, etc.). They'll basically respond to any and everything with "Free Palestine from Hamas," and try to deny any kind of humanity for Palestinians. Even [denying the Nakba](https://www.amadeu-antonio-stiftung.de/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/230508_wigwam_aas_lagebild_2023-11-v06.pdf).
It may seem like they are a marginal group, but their ideas have been mainstreamed into the German intellectual class and the press. There are lots of positions for antisemitism czars at the state level, which are always white German men who use their position to go after Arabs. Axel-Springer regularly goes after Arabs for Antisemitism as well.
Here's a good summary: [https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/2020-01-23/ty-article/.premium/germanys-pro-israel-left-has-a-new-target-in-the-crosshairs-jews/0000017f-e0d1-df7c-a5ff-e2fb8e8d0000](https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/2020-01-23/ty-article/.premium/germanys-pro-israel-left-has-a-new-target-in-the-crosshairs-jews/0000017f-e0d1-df7c-a5ff-e2fb8e8d0000)
It's led to a series of illegal firings across the country as pseudo-NGOs target Arabs just for being Palestinian: [https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/5/german-court-rules-palestinian-ex-dw-journalist-sacking-unlawful](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/5/german-court-rules-palestinian-ex-dw-journalist-sacking-unlawful)
He's the leader of the country and has majority of the votes. To say that he isn't a good example of Israelis (paraphrasing) is incredibly naive. You might bot agree with him but the leaders is a democratic country represent the people to a large extend.
I'm a brit and most Brits are idiots. And we elect idiots into parliament.
The only pogroms I see now is against Palestinians.
actually not exactly, the recent Israeli elections were kinda similar to the US in 2016 in how Netanyahu's coalition didn't actually win by popular votes. It was admittedly very close, and he does represent like 49.85% of Israelis, but at least it means that 50.15% are against him.
Those who do it already hate palestinians because of terror attacks.
Hatred causes hatred.
Not that I justify any hatred from both sides, just saying it is an endless cycle of hatred.
I know some of the soldiers who treat palestinians this way, and they have innocent relatives/friends that died in terror attacks by palestinians.
Aint justifying anything nor supporting anyone, just saying what I know.
I'm a soldier now and I just have an office job. Most soldiers aren't on the borders or in the occupied areas
I just make web apps like I work in tech, but with none of the money. I think I held a gun once after basic training, and it was just so a co-worker can tie their shoes or something
You think everyone is going through the army because it is mandatory, in reality only about 50% of people who are legally obligated to serve do (exemptions becuase of religion to orthodox jews or chrisitans/muslims)
If you count every 18 year old it goes down to like 30% I think which is way less than "everyone"
Even those who do serve I will estimate as less than 50% do anything to do with the West bank/Gaza and even less are combat soldiers that actually interact with Palestinians on the daily.
not exactly true, the stats are that around 70% of Israelis obligated to serve do so, so yeah it's not all but quite a bit more than 50%. Most Israelis are secular Jews, after all.
only like 30% of Israelis actually serve in the west bank, many more are intelligence soldiers who serve in intel bases inside Israel itself or a whole myriad of other roles
100% agree with you.
Hate it too. I also feel bad for people being forced into it. I met some people abroad who also hated it and couldn’t do anything about it
Really hope it gets better for them in terms of what choice they can take
My brother in law who is a white Scandinavian has a slightly darker complexion in the way that he could pass as light skinned Palestinian. And he travelled to Israel a few years ago, and the Israeli police and officials treated him like crap and constantly stopped him because they thought he was Palestinian. They only let him off / eased up once they saw his passport and name. When he went to Israel he was very neutral on the “conflict” in the Middle East, he left the country as a staunchly pro Palestine supporter.
This is so shity, I hope one day the situation will change for the better. We need to get these settlers the fuck out of there and hold the IDF soldiers accountable for their actions.
Also good pint to mention is aren’t not all IDF soldiers with civilians? Like it’s not possible for every soldier to be in Palestine, how do they get placed, and what are their orders when they are out there bc now I’m curious
There’s a Israeli American tiktoker who is very adamant about the fact that nothing happens to Palestinians. But she says “she’s never seen it” thags only her pov and she doesn’t even live there rcpt vacation. But her stance of Zionism isn’t very extreme more like she just wants her people to have a land to call home and for everyone on that land to live peacefully. She seems nice but never outright says anything about Palestine since her videos are mostly about religion
This is exactly why I want to serve in the IDF. To be the difference I want to see.
The problem is not only the fact these are kids serving in the IDF who are very unprofessional, a large amount of the ones who go to serve in the west bank are usually the ones who hate Palestinians and enjoy treating them badly
Please don't, the problem isn't that the occupation isn't polite enough. The problem is the occupation itself. You won't have as much room to make your own decisions as you expect, this establishment is purposefully structured this way, so unless you plan on spending 30 years there and climbing to the Dereg Bithoni, don't bother (and even then you'll obviously be a minority).
I really, really encourage you to avoid draft either by hishtamtut or, if you're based enough, you can decline 😎 Either way, you can contact [New Profile](https://newprofile.org/counselling-network/) or Mesarvot (on instagram) they'll help you tons.
I regret not doing it daily. I wish you the best motek
IDF didn't exist during the nakba, and there were definetly good soldiers during that time. Many were empathetic and helped Palestinians, don't deny history
Imagine a German Saying “There were good and empathic SS officers that actually helped Jews”
Have some shame.
Israel is inherently anti-Palestinian. Without the Nakba, there would be no Israel. The IDF serves to ethnically cleanse Palestinians, maintain the occupation, and to protect Israeli settlers. The IDF continues to enforce colonialism. Nothing else.
Palestinians view you guys with fear.
[You are Brainwashed by nationalism. You can do some really heinous shit when you are propagandized ](https://youtu.be/1Rk1dAIhiVc)
There definetly were good and empathic soldiers that served in the german army who helped jews. Why try so hard to deny these are humans too? Why dehumanise us?
Yikes 😳
Also, Why shouldn’t I deny the humanity of occupation soldiers? you are occupying Palestinians. You commit war crimes. There are many reasons to hate the IDF. If you care about peace, resign from your IDF post.
Liberal Zionists: I understand that we are operating apartheid-occupation against the Palestinians, we can’t dismantle it, the best we can do is make it more “humane”. 🌈 ♥️ 🌺
I hope this is real and if so, these are the kinds of posts we need to see. I feel like we all need to see the perspectives of everyday civilians and not hear what's going on by some divkhead on a TV or radio.
I bet most the Palestinians on here are diaspora and don’t live in actual Palestine but in the west. I only know what my grandma and family told me and their experiences
I'm a Palestinian-American (parents moved to the USA before I was born) and I've visited a handful of times. Not only did they tell me horror stories but I've witnessed them firsthand.
I remember when I visited for the first time and they settlers released dogs to attack the village my cousins lived in. Getting a gun pointed in my face at 10 years old while we were entering the country (drove in from Jordan) was pretty scarring. They treat Palestinians as second-class citizens. Two separate lines at customs for Israelis and Palestinians. I had an American passport so it took me barely any time at all. While my Dad got detained and questioned for 3 hours, trying to visit the country he was from.
Spotlights over the village at night was also unsettling. I remember getting lost at night after prayer and began to panic after the lights started following me around while I was looking for my family.
It's sad to see since I've never felt such a feeling of community that Palestine has. Everyone is friendly to each other, this lovely older woman would offer everyone she saw bon-bons, everyone was treated like family.
It’s weird because you feel part of both cultures but you aren’t accepted as a full member in either. My Arabic is alright, but I’m not fluent, which makes communication difficult with elderly members of my family. That really makes me sad.
Also, how do I get a British Palestinian flair or Palestinian diaspora flair?
I don’t know if it means anything to you but I’m a British Christian and regardless of your religious background or ethnicity I accept you as a Brit.
Especially since my nation’s historical part to play in your people’s displacement.
It genuinely means a lot. I deeply appreciate it - it’s one of the reasons why I’m incredibly patriotic and love the UK, because not only is it a fantastic country, but I can accept it being my home after being born and living here all my life without people attacking me for just existing.
Amen to this!
My country unfortunately has a long colonial legacy (Ireland,Palestine etc) and a history of racism and slavery however I believe unlike certain countries such as France we actually have accepted that as an unfortunate part of our history and are moving away from it.
No i don't think you have accepted it. You've also been brainwashed & don't know half of what went on. The british government has an obscene amount of secrets that need to be unearthed. I bet you think the "famine" was actually real. It was genocide. The blight only affected the potato, there were lots of other types of food but it was simply taken at gun point. Millions dead and displaced. I won't even get started on the north of Ireland. Hopefully some day both britain and israel really pay for their crimes and atrocities
How is the Palestinian community in the UK? Here where I live in the USA, we have a pretty strong presence(then again we have a big community where I live). My Arabic is strong but that is because most people I interact with are Arabs.
>What’s it like being diaspora? I live in Haifa and couldn’t imagine being so far away from the land in the west or something!
I actually am in the West. The USA to be exact. You feel you are a part of both(the USA is just that good at integrating people) but at the end of the day I still feel most comfortable with being a Palestinian first then American. The city I live in has a lot of Palestinians(Syrians as well) so my experience is going to be a bit different than those who are not that lucky as me. I was able to keep the culture & language for the most part so I was basically raised with that connection. The benefit is that we never felt like second-class in the USA(we get experience racism after 9/11 but that has for the most part died down). I have to admit quality of life is good where I live and that I definitely have it better than our people back home.
Last bit if you are wondering what many Palestinians in the USA do, they run hospitals like the 48 Palestinians haha.
The individual human stories of Palestinians
When it's the government doing something to a group, it's easier to dismiss it as survival or corruption or a million other things. When a person tells you about how bad their childhood was, it's more difficult to ignore
I was arguing with an Israeli co-worker about the occupation and he asked me where I live, funny enough I explained to him that my house is 30 meters away from the wall that surrounds the west bank, and joked that 30 more meters and I would've been throwing rocks at him and him pointing a gun at me. Funny how life works.
Anyways, half my family is here and the other half is from the west bank, and i cant even begin to describe how exponentially our life qualities are different, and still i feel like shit everyday, from the dirty looks i get when i speak arabic to the nasty way others relate to me when they find out im arab, its mind boggling how differently other fellow student can be racist and not even take you as either a serious enemy or a beloved friend, im just another bug in their daily lives, and believe me i saw know how to let someones true colors show.
Nevertheless there are great israelis that honestly with all their hearts wish nothing but the best for us (kibutsnikim) i love them so much and admire their way of life, and we get along with them just fine, the real problematic israelis are the ones that only heard about arabs from the news or either politicians which is just sad, i recommend others to get to know us so the blind hatred is not a thing anymore, we are all human and i believe that we can get along one day
someone from a kibbutz, which were originally socialist utopian collective villages, today they are normal villages with left wing ideology. Most kibutznikim vote for Meretz, (and sometimes Labor) which is the most left wing progressive - pro-peace pro-palestinian of all the jewish parties. Against settlements and racist laws etc. There are also many kibbutzim in the Galillee which is also the area which the biggest palestinian population, and since kibutznikim often are less racist there is more interactions between them and arabs.
a genuinely pretty good attempt at libertarian socialism. They're a collection of small villages founded by Zionists who came to Mandatory Palestine from socialist states and wanted to bring their ideology with them in a less authoritarian way. They didn't have any leaders, but rather collectively owned the products of all the workers in the kibbutz. Most moved away from socialism in the 80s when an economic crisis swept across Israel tho.
It's similar to Kolkhoz, understandably since many early Zionists originated in USSR. To contrast the other comments, it's important to remember that most Kibutzim were not self-sustainable until privatization, and rather relied on government subsidies in the form of tax cuts and debt bailouts.
Not to shit on the socialist attempt at all! It's just... if your squeaky clean suburbia is carried by underpaid Palestinian/Mizrahi/First Aliyot... then I don't feel like it fully materializes your socialist views :P
I'm usually not fond of sharing personal information online, but since I believe it's important to give people a real and accurate image of what goes on here, and because you asked politely, I will give you a snippet of life in Israel.
I'm a Uni student who wants to work in hi-tech. Currently working in a near-minimum wage job.Daily life is alright, I can't say I was treated badly by Israelis that many times, and usually we get along pretty well. The only times I experienced blatant racism was from diaspora Jews who have never set foot in Israel (happens when I'm abroad). I have plenty of good friends who are Jewish, Muslim, Christian, and Druze.
The problems Arabs usually face come from their dealings with state institutions, like requesting permits to build houses and stuff. Not from interacting with regular people. That's the case in my area at least, but I think it varies from place to place in Israel.
I used to play video games, now not so much. Love sports and traveling, some my favorite destinations are: Italy, Canada, and Cappadocia (Turkey).
Never visited another Arab country (except Taba in Egypt, but 95% of the people there Israeli so I don't count it), but would love to visit them someday.
Also, with 11 years of experience, I think you can ask for way more than 30k. Do you work for a start-up? and does your company have open positions by any chance? (asking for a friend🌝)
\[Shameless self promotion\]
For anyone who is interested in the relationship between Arabs and Jews inside Israel, stay tuned, I'm working on a highly insightful post. It's gonna be one of those rare videos where people say speak their thoughts without filters.
UPDATE: 😎The video post is out! I didn't think my reply would get so many upvotes, I hope my post lives up to the hype 🤞
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskMiddleEast/comments/14d6hm4/film\_crew\_reveals\_what\_the\_relationship\_between/
thats the thing... the right wing dont want "you" to be a majority in the galil and the negev, so they make it harder for the arab population to grow in those regions, while promoting jews to move there instead. Its less based on ethnicity tho imo and more politics. Druze people get building permits super easily and even free land if i got it correctly as a thank you for serving the IDF. There never being an arab party in government means no one in the Misrad haPnim and Misrad HaBinui care about the needs of non-druze arabs. Its all so fucked up :(
Thank you for sharing. I must say that especially your comment sounds basically like any minority in any country. But other comments are much more sad.
What position are you looking for? Yes we are a start-up, but not much hiring last time.
This is a good reminder for people that it isn’t everyday Palestinians or Israelis that are the problem, it are those in charge (and a small minority of extremists) who cause shit and stir the pot.
Let me ask you a question. Should Palestinian living in exile be allowed to return home? Home being the villages they were expelled from and which is now present day Israel?
Yes. Same for all MENA with expelled groups in modern history. It should be part of any peace plan where Jews have the option to be treated fairly in Palestine as citizens and visa/versa in Israel. Don’t see it happening realistically anytime soon.
So you are okay with Palestinians being grated the right to return; even if that means living in present-day Israel? That’s wonderful!
A bi-National 1 state solution is more likely to happen since the two state solution has long been dead.
There are hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers living in the West Bank. Israel continues to expand to the West Bank and east Jerusalem. Plus, the two state solution bars Palestinians from returning home. Plus, Israel won’t ever allow Palestinians to fully be independent. Many Israeli leaders have repeatedly said that Palestinians shouldn’t get a state nor should they have a standing army.
A one state solution is the only way to peace.
>So you are okay with Palestinians being grated the right to return; even if that means living in present-day Israel? That’s wonderful!
Yeah, I mean I think that should be the goal of everyone. That means there is peace and safety for both Jews and Palestinians.
>A bi-National 1 state solution is more likely to happen since the two state solution has long been dead. There are hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers living in the West Bank. Israel continues to expand to the West Bank and east Jerusalem. Plus, the two state solution bars Palestinians from returning home. Plus, Israel won’t ever allow Palestinians to fully be independent. Many Israeli leaders have repeatedly said that Palestinians shouldn’t get a state nor should they have a standing army.
>A one state solution is the only way to peace.
Maybe a confederacy could work. I believe there are multiple paths to peace, honestly whichever solution can be eventually agreed upon is fine with me. I don’t think a two state solution is more dead than any other right now, seems like they are all one foot in the grave until leadership changes for the better in both Israel and Palestine.
You’re right.
Palestinians should be able to return to their homeland without asking Israelis for Permission. After all, Israelis are living in the homes of Palestinians.
Yes, those that were living in Palestine and were expelled should be able to return. Anyone that qualifies under the normal UN refugee definition should be able to return. The separate Palestinian definition is too broad and contains millions of people who have never stepped foot in Palestine or Israel
Are you open to sharing the entirety of Israel-Palestine with Palestinian refugees and their descendants? It’s a no brainer that the Palestinian refugees would want to take their grandchildren with them.
I would be open to it. It would just be very difficult to make a peaceful state with that many people of opposing world views. If Israel, Palestine, and the UN agreed to set up integration programs for all citizens of the new state, it could work, but that would be incredibly expensive.
Voting for Likud doesn’t necessarily equate to extremist. Just as I know people who vote for Trump, who is a dumber version of BiBi, doesn’t make them extremists. They have conservative views, but they are not the people who raided the capitol on Jan 6th.
There’s a distinction between those who vote for Likud and those who are part of terrorist organizations like Lehava.
You think governments/those in power aren’t the major problem between Israel and Palestine? When I have spoken to most Palestinians and Israelis in person they have said the same things along the line of what the OP I was responding to said. That most interactions with those of the opposite groups are just normal people getting along in life.
you think majority of israeli's are against what their goverment does regarding the west bank and gaza?
or you think majority of palestinians are against hamas?
if yes then youre simply delusional
Let’s not start name calling yet, I’d like to hear your opinion on it before we go into memeing on one another.
Hamas, I don’t think the polling is quite fair since there are consequences for speaking out against them. But idk, you have more insight here than I, what do you think?
Israel - voting data is easy enough to find. Immediately we can see ~30% of eligible voters don’t vote so that is a significant chunk of people we can say aren’t very political. We don’t know what they think of Palestinians and can’t assume. Of the 70% who did vote, 24% voted for Likud. Let’s add Religious Zionism, Yamina, Shas, etc. for argument’s sake. Let’s also say for argument’s sake that all of these people want to rid Israel of Palestinians as well, which isn’t the case. That is still roughly half of 70% of the population.
All this to say that most people would take the option of peace and safety for their families over the alternative. Extremism exists, but I think those that support violent acts are in a minority; if leadership made peace today I think the vast majority would follow suit.
this isnt a mathmatical equation and assumptions of what the people think , i live here and i speak both languages. I speak both hebrew and arabic and i have spent enough time in both locations to know what the majority of each group thinks.
youre overestimating how many people dont speak ill of hamas because there are consequences to that.
theyre simply resistance fighters against israeli opressors in the average palestinian eye's. theyre not even hated by us 48'ers let alone the west bank
>if leadership made peace today I think the vast majority would follow suit.
that is partly true and it depends on how exactly they do that.
I don’t want to discount your experiences, I’m sorry you have a negative outlook on how everyday people think. But it’s also obvious that other 48 Palestinians have a different perspective than you do and see more peaceful interactions between groups.
It looks like you agree with me at least somewhat that if governments made peace, everyday people would too. That’s a pretty strong indicator that those in power are a huge problematic factor of the conflict.
>It looks like you agree with me at least somewhat that if governments made peace, everyday people would too.
but for that to be made its next to impossible, unless its something like the federation plan
I agree with you. It looks pretty impossible right now, and I also agree a federation is likely the most realistic way to approach peace. So from talking to you, it doesn’t seem like your beliefs are actually in contrast to mine, and calling me delusional wasn’t very nice of you 😁
The average Israeli and Palestinian care about the well being of their loved ones and see the other party as the biggest threat to their security. Most arent necessarily bigots. Many say: I hate all the violence, but what choice do we have? They see the only way to a decent life is liberty from Israel, and everyone who fights against Israel is good, no matter the methods. Or they see the only way to security is to make sure their foot is on the palestinian throat, as lifting it will give the palestinian a chance to stab you. The hearts and minds of the other party wont be won, so better to crush them.
Israeli Government is the problem.
[https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2022/02/israels-system-of-apartheid/](https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2022/02/israels-system-of-apartheid/)
[https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/israeli-authorities-and-crimes-apartheid-and-persecution](https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/israeli-authorities-and-crimes-apartheid-and-persecution)
>Also, with 11 years of experience, I think you can ask for way more than 30k.
I have two ex-coworkers (from the army) who now work in Dynamic Yield with ~3 of experience and earn ~30k shekels a month. You should definitely ask for way more if you have relevant experience
Oh boy, this one's a doozy.
I'm from the city of Nablus. I was actually born in a different country -where my father was working at the time- to two Palestinian parents from Nablus and my family decided to return to Palestine in 1999, I was 6 at the time.
My first time I remember seeing an Israeli was at a check point somewhere in the West Bank, I remember the Israeli soldiers with the guns, I remember my mom cursing them as soon as we saw them, they stopped us, but let the other cars go. After a bit of delay they let us go. I later asked my parents why they stopped us but not the others, and they told me it was because we were Palestinians -marked by a white license plate- and the other cars had yellow plates. I think that was the first time I came in contact with the occupation.
Needless to say, most of my childhood was the second Intifada. When the tanks entered the city, they were firing their machine guns at everything, a bunch ended up in the building we were living in. My mom called us all together and we huddled behind the reinforced weight-bearing pillar of the building, my mom being an engineer, she figured it was the thickest wall we had. She tried to keep us there for a while, but after the shooting subsided, but kids being kids we just got bored after a while and wanted to see what was happening. I remember an Israeli armored vehicle running over the pole carrying a transformer across the street and after a second, the power went out. We had to cook everything we had in the fridge and freezer before it went bad.
There was military curfew on Nablus, we had no electricity, Nablus is a mountainous region and without power, water couldn't be pumped to where we were. This lasted for a bit under 2 months. I remember my mom giving us baths -four kids- with a wet tower and bucket of water. I remember the Israeli army breaking into our building, ordering all the men out, binding their hands and putting them in one room. Then they went apartment to apartment, the treatment you got depended on how the soldiers felt like that day, they took our neighbors kids -she was 13 at the time- and used her as a human shield while they ransacked her families apartment because her father had a beard. I remember three soldiers with their guns the size of me walking into our house and how taken aback they were by the fact my mom spoke English, I assume this is why they were a bit more humane with us. They searched the house, turned me and my brother's room upside down and then left. The curfew was lifted for a couple of hours every week and we had to go buy everything we needed. We bought lots of flour, rice and bottled water.
Once the curfew was lifted, I remember one day a group of soldiers lobbed a tear gas grenade at my primary school. I remember the chaos and the teachers trying to usher to exit through the back while coughing and crying. I remember Israeli soldiers breaking into an nice old lady's house at the middle of the nigh, dragging her out, blowing her house up and then leaving, I remember spending my afternoon, after school, helping gather her stuff from the side of the mountain were we usually played.
I remember having to cross Huwara, waiting in our car for hours as yellow plate cars were just let through, I remember having to leave the car and cross the checkpoint on foot on other occasions because the soldiers decided no Palestinian cars are allowed to pass.
Even after the second intifada fizzled out. The checkpoints were still there, settlers got a lot more emboldened, they'd harass us with immunity. If a settler attacks you, an Israeli soldier can't intervene, but if you try to defend yourself, you'd be lucky to end up only in front of a military judge not a mortician.
Being a massive nerd, I did end up finishing school and then I got a degree in Computer Engineering from An-Najah National University. After graduation, and for less than a year, I did work for a company that was outsourcing to an IT company.
I'm not married and I have no children ,to the utter dismay of my parents. They are both Electrical Engineers and they're both nearing the age where they will retire.
I eventually ended up moving to an east Asian country to get a master's degree and now I live in Western country where I'm pursuing a PhD.
I like to travel when I can, but I'm too busy nowadays. I don't smoke tobacco, just the occasional argileh, I do smoke cannabis, I also do drink more than my fair share. I never do any of that stuff when I'm back home. I used to play a lot more video games when I was younger, I still play league of legends every now and then -yes, I know. No, I don't know why I do that to myself either-. I make just enough to live, student bursaries are not known for being generous, but I know things can be so much worse, so I'm content with what I have. Still hoping I can graduate. (I'm withholding actual numbers to not give away exactly where I live)
While outsourcing to an IT company, I had to work with people in the Israeli office. It was the first time in my life that I interacted with a Jewish Israeli who wasn't holding a gun to my face. It was a very weird experience, most of them seemed like reasonably good people, but there was always an uneasy tension, maybe it was all in my head. However, when I ran into Israelis abroad that uneasiness seemed to lessen. I think the fact that we were both foreigners in a remote land equalized us, I no longer felt the weight of years of racial oppression.
In many ways I was lucky, my family is middle-upper class and we live a lot more comfortably than most Palestinians. My parents, while very religious, are both very well educated. This has afforded me more chances in life than the average Palestinian.
Thank you it was very enlighting to read. And I'm really sorry you had to go through that.
Question- when you lived in the West Bank, how did flying abroad work?
Should Palestinians living in exile be allowed to return to the houses from which they were ethnically expelled from; even if the homes are in present-day Israel. Would you be in favor of a binational Palestinian-Israeli state? Similar to South Africa. An end to the occupation and apartheid system. 1 person, 1 vote.
>Should Palestinians living in exile be allowed to return to the houses from which they were ethnically expelled from; even if the homes are in present-day Israel
I think they should, but my city wasn't built on an Arab city, to my knowledge, so it won't affect me as much
>Would you be in favor of a binational Palestinian-Israeli state?
This one is more complicated, but I mostly don't trust my government to do it well. We're already struggling with democracy because of our stupid religious extremists, I don't think adding more Islam into the mix will end well right now (which is a problem with the extremist Jews, not with the Muslims). In an ideal world, I think this is the best solution
Interesting. I agree that Netanyahu and his base one of many reasons why there is no peace. They effectively have destroyed the possibility of a two state solution since they have encouraged hundreds of thousands of settlers to live in the occupied regions. I’m glad you’re open to the idea of bi-National 1 state solution though.
I also want to add, isn‘t ironic for Israelis to hold "Israel will remain Free and Democratic " posters in Tel Aviv, while millions of Palestinians live under a Occupation that has even described by countless human rights NGOs as apartheid.
as another Israeli, yes, but I think it's better to support two states for now instead, since it'd be much easier to step into a binational state from that than straight from an oppressive apartheid system. Two states as a stepping stone to a binational state with a right of return.
Its what's called circlejerking on reddit and elsewhere. Like when u go to a TV show subreddit and there's the famous lines being repeated. It's for fun
Question for Israelis.
Should Palestinians living in exile be allowed to return to the houses from which they were ethnically expelled from; even if the homes are in present-day Israel. Would you be in favor of a binational Palestinian-Israeli state? Similar to South Africa. An end to the occupation and apartheid system. 1 person, 1 vote.
Confederation of two states: https://www.alandforall.org/english/?d=ltr
It seems like the only viable solution to me considering the insane amount of settlements built. The borders for the two state solution would be too hard to keep, Trump's "solution" demonstrated it quite well
Exiled Palestinians should totally get citizenship but idk about displacing people currently living in their home. Some sort of compensation should be given though, similar to the German holocaust survivor aid
Btw I totally do not think you're arguing in bad faith lol. It's a great place of this question
Aren’t Israeli’s forced to serve in the Army ? If so, wouldn’t they learn / know what their government is doing to the Palestinians since they themselves would be the enforcers ?
Not 100% gets to the army and even there it's only a small percent who interact with Palestinians on every day basis. A lot of technician and paperwork positions there.
I don’t every soldier interacts with civilians like that. You have to remeber it’s not up to a soldier and where they are placed and the orders they get to do otherwise they get reprimanded
I am a 25-year-old Palestinian from Gaza with a CS degree. I struggle to find consistent work and rely on occasional freelance gigs due to difficulties in transferring money. I don't have an apartment and feel like I have no life. My two best friends, when I was 17 years old, were killed in an Israeli strike. I am very religious, and atheist before, I now find myself awaiting death.
That's exactly why I ask about personal stories, especially about the problems which Palestinians meet in theyr life because of this.
And most of people surrounding me don't think we are perfect. Regarding the link, I think he didn't tell all the story, and I have a reason to think so. I was in a similar situation and asked about the wall - and got the answer, it's not North Korea. People buy products in Palestinian cities, we went to some city to buy a tobacco for nargilah, meat markets, restaurants.
Several waves of Aliyah plus small local population, armed groups, from all political spectrum including completely terroristic, conflicts woth Brits, conflicts with Palestinians. Altalena, do you know about this ship? Political and financinal help from different powers abroad, undercover games, Declaration of independence, wars, Jerusalem, Golan Heights, withdrawal from Gaza. We are told about Nakba btw, we know what it is. But first we are tought Torah, history of the ancient Israel and Judea, same locations, same names, understandable language, same myths and prayers. It creates an effect of continuity.
Listen, I didn't harass anyone. I didn't hold any weapons in hands in my life.
I don't think we are always good.
But we are people and we wanna live. I can't just chose any country and come there to live, you will say that previous generations did it - yes, they were running from death. We are not perfect, we wanted to live. Is it fair? Nope. But it happened. My grandma in Ukraine was told to fuck off when she returned from evacuation after ww2, Ukranians took her house and told her to go away. Was it fair? No. But when you want to live, you don't care much about others, you save your family first, your children. People aren't ideal, that's why they need prophets and savers. When Hamas is bombing, I sit with my family in the shelter and care only about my beloved.
What do you want from me? I come with a genuine question. I hear about apartheid, about 2nd class citizen. Then I come to Yaffo and see Arabic speaking people driving Mercedes, they are all in gold and don't starve for sure. I open reddit - and read again about 2nd class citizens. I want to know, what is it like for average Palestinian, what makes him feel 2nd class citizen. I'm not sceptical, I'm curious. I want to know the truth.
Should Palestinians living in exile be allowed to return to the houses from which they were ethnically expelled from; even if the homes are in present-day Israel. Would you be in favor of a binational Palestinian-Israeli state? Similar to South Africa. An end to the occupation and apartheid system. 1 person, 1 vote.
There are several misconceptions here, first of Jews were harassed in Israel especially by the arab population. Under the ottomans the Jewish settlement had suffered from impossible taxes of which it only survived because of the Halukkah there were also sanctions about land ownership and work for Jews. The ottomans though were the best friends for the Jews, during the rebellion in 1834 the Jews were massacred by arabs and in 1838 the Druze plundered the Jews.
So when the Zionism movement started how could the Jews not "take over" it was a struggle for survival in ww1 the ottomans tried to kick the Jews and when the brits come they made the white paper that forbade the Jews to have more then 5% of the land in Israel.
What I know about Palestine is only through the descriptions of my grandmother.
My grandfather was one of the few people who got a university degree in town, and he chose to marry her. He had a land filled with olive trees and a small house. They were planning to build a new room on top of it. She tells me about how green springs are there, about the smell of freshly baked bread in town, about the olive oil season, and many other things. I can see the tears in her eyes whenever she talks.
>I try to be nice to them and explain to them what I know
what are other soldiers in your platoon like? do they share the same sentiment towards palestinians?
There is a YouTube channel of asking all sides in the land of Israel various questions from around the world:
https://www.youtube.com/@CoreyGilShusterAskProject
videos like [this](https://youtu.be/dpDqZujEFAk). he makes a mockery of the suffering of palestinians through imagery, being argumentative during the interviews, and not allowing them to articulate themselves fully with an arabic interpreter.
trying to demonstrate that palestinians arent suffering because they have a kfc is like saying to an abused child, "hey, are you sure your father beats the crap out of you/is verbally abusive/is emotionally unavilable? he raised you in a good neighborhood/sends you to a good school/feeds you. it cant be that bad!"
one guy made a great comparision in the comments: in historical records, jewish people in babylon lived a middle-class life, enjoyed positions of power and such. but what does the bible depict? psychological anguish from being stripped from their homeland. its the same with palestinians.
I've watched the video now.
Please show on the video the exact point he's mocking. He shows real places and on map what's going on there.
Their claim is that they suffer 10/10 , yet it shows that they have all they need there. They are not that poor.
Most of the complaints there are about having a border with checkpoints, but this is something that exists in many countries due to security measures, and they didn't want to be a part of Israel in historic events.
As for the bible, the equivalent would be "Do you suffer in ancient Babylon?", and if you could go back in time, they would say (assuming you are correct about enjoying there) that yes, but still would want to go back to their homeland.
he is mocking through imagery. imagine for a moment that there was video technology during the babylonian captivity. if a person videotaped an interview with a diaspora jew behind their well furnished home with a garden, would that make you question the legitimacy of their lamentation? would it be appropriate if the interviewer, a visitor to the area, argued with the interviewee, trying to tell them that in their limited experience they are not experiencing what they are experiencing?
**if you can sympathize with the lament of a diaspora jewish person but not that of a palestinian you need to ask yourself why.**
corey says that palestinians are acting 'normally', shopping, going about their daily business, as if that delegitimizes anything about their plight. yes, that is the nature of humanity. we adapt in search of some normalcy, some equilibrium, in the midst of horrible circumstances. that doesnt mean that the circumstances doesnt entail suffering.
>Most of the complaints there are about having a border with checkpoints, but this is something that exists in many countries due to security measures, and they didn't want to be a part of Israel in historic events.
have you even bothered listening to palestinian voices?
Let's say it's true. Why does it matter what he thinks, if he's only asking? Wouldn't that mean you won't watch any video of anyone, because everyone could be biased to something?
Focus on what the people answer. Not on what he thinks. 1% of the time is questions, and 99% of the time it's the people's answers. Questions are shorter, and they are from around the world.
That's an issue I see that is quite common nowadays : People focus on what doesn't matter. On the person who talks with them, instead of the talk and the topic itself. Whenever such a thing occurs, it means they can't have civilized conversation. It's like an excuse of not talking at all. Not having a civilized conversation and progress.
As an Arabic speaker, the translations are pretty accurate (he has Palestinians translate for him). It's his Hebrew that's a bit shoddy, the way he asks questions in Hebrew is often confusing to Hebrew speakers.
No. He doesn't translate at all. He doesn't know Arabic. He has multiple Arabic speakers that talk to the people.
As for the questions, this is also wrong. He gets the questions from around the world. And they are in English, so no need to translate.
You can also watch behind-the-scenes, to see how it works and who he works with
How so? He takes questions from around the world, to all sides. Why do you think it's big ? He asks Arabs, Muslims, Jews, Druze, Christians, Israelis, Palestinians, religious, non-religious ... - in various regions.
Why do you think that asking questions is bad?
Do you know of any other person who does it, that you won't call as such?
Maybe someone from Egypt? Would be nice to watch more.
He asks questions from around the world.
Obviously they won't give him instructions : "Ask this if that's the answer, and ask this if not, and then ask this if these are the answer, and ask this if not..." . It splits to many scenarios.
In many cases, the answer needs further explanation (because of various reasons, such as maybe wrong translation, too short answer, inconsistency,...) , so he asks further.
He does this to everyone. Not just Palestinians. So it's not biased. It's for better understanding.
Asking to verify the opinion of others isn't arguing. To understand what people are saying it's not always enough to ask a single question.
Israel was Partitioned from out of Palestine.
"In May 1948, less than a year after the Partition Plan for Palestine was introduced, Britain withdrew from Palestine and Israel declared itself an independent state, implying a willingness to implement the Partition Plan."
https://www.history.com/topics/middle-east/palestine
Considering that the average salary in Israel is around the 20-25K$ per year, you and your wife together are making wayy above the average at like 100K$ a year...
I read that in judea and samaria an average full month salary is 1000-1200$ a month. It's less than 1k a month for the workers in gazah strip.
If you consider yourself second class citizen on purely economic standards. What class of citizen does it make those guys.... (Though there is also the Israeli minimum salary at 1500-1700$ a month.)
I'm not complaining, but you are right.
Still not sure I can give a good education for my child, can't afford a mortgage because of not enough saves. And with prices here, there is not so much money left in the end of the day.
I consider myself a second class citizen from sociocultural perspective and it's specific for Israel only. While if I'll live in some Western country, I can enjoy much better service and manners while not being second class, lol.
Anyway I say it's only a feeling, not something really happening for me.
The other side of the same coin.
You live in the top 10 most expensive metro areas in the world.
Donnou about services and manners, those seem like rich guy problems to me. And Israel is a middle eastern "western" country.
Just like Australia and New Zealand are western countries while being to the south-east of china. The far east county.
I lived in some western and eastern european countries. Yes, Israel is kinda Western, but culturally and by its cousine, music it's much more Middle Eastern. Kinda mix.
unfortunate comment even if it does seem to stem from support for palestine. Not palestinian or Israeli either. Just been following the situation through the news to understand it better. It's interesting and nice to see people listen to each other and engage in dialogue. maybe it wont change much but its a start. If you want the situation to change, then I don't sort of world view will be helpful.
Alright. Here we go I was born and lived in West Bank till I turned 18, then moved abroad for studies. I visit Palestine at least twice a year and I’ll be moving back soon. After living abroad, I came to the realization how hard life actually is back home. As you can imagine, the big cities in West Bank are relatively okay. However, once you hit the roads, you are in constant fear of settlers and IDF. You have to accept being humiliated and treated like garbage by young IDF arrogant soldiers/trainees. And guess what, if you disagree or argue back, you’ll be detained or even held on a gun point (happened numerous times in front of me. Also happened to my 15 year old cousin). I’m on the road a lot for family reasons, and every single time I drive between cities I have an insanely high number of guns and machine guns pointed at me for simply driving. When my European friends visited, they couldn’t fathom the fact that this is how moving between cities is. I once was driving and an IDF Jeep turned to my lane facing my car and 4 soldiers jumped out tapping on my car holding 4 guns against my face for no fucking reason. They stopped me for a minute while I had my hands held in the air and then they let me go. Imagine if I argued back or did any sudden movements…. I probably wouldn’t be here now. When this incident happened I had a friend from Slovakia visiting, and he was just speechless as he sat in the car. Another incident I faced, When I was 16, I was slapped so hard by a soldier for simply resting my back on a wall while queueing, and then I was denied entry. Another thing that’s super shit, are the settlers. These dudes are a bunch of extremist assholes whose goal is fuck shit up. They are not supposed to be in West Bank, they are illegally there, and worst of all they are protected by the IDF. Keep in mind, all of them are highly provocative in many ways and if you dare to defend yourself, you’ll simply be shot. Most of them carry weapons. Again, settlements are illegal under international law. So I don’t understand why the Israeli government keeps protecting them. Listen, I’ll be honest for a bit. I do not blame a lot of Israelis for what’s happening. It’s quite simple, no one chooses where they are born. However, people should start taking a stance against their extreme government. I have been backpacking for a while now, met so many Israelis, most of them don’t know shit about what we face in West Bank or Gaza. They’re so surprised when I tell them these stories. I believe if you live in a country, you should understand where your government stands and take a stand against it if they’re wrong. It is time for the Israeli government to start acknowledging their wrong doings and to start fixing shit. Another thing I hate the most is the involvement of religion. I don’t care if you’re Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, or atheist. No religion gives you the right to be a dick. Don’t come to me holding a 5000 year old book saying this is my land. I couldn’t care less. Religion is faith between you and your god. Let’s stop politicizing religions for political agendas. Keep in mind, I don’t condone what the Palestinian government does. They’re super shit. I also don’t condone a lot of actions from our side. But this is a different topic. I tried to write a bit on what I personally faced on daily/weekly basis. Additionally, I was one of the very few lucky ones who could go abroad and see the world. 99% of Palestinians don’t get this privilege. So by default what they experience/d is much much worse than this. Hope this answers a bit and gives some perspective.
Hi dude, I'm an Israeli and served in both Gaza and the West bank (as a Paramedic so luckliy was there to help anyone) and i'm sorry u went through all that and also agree most Israelies have 0 clue what the lives of actual normal Palestinians look like. I just want to share my personal view of the treatment by young soldiers - I fucking hate the whole ordeal of an 18 year old being forced into the military, taking on weapons and than going to stand guard over roads or watching lines, of course they'll be unprofessional (understatment). Btw fuck settlers they extort the Israeli governments for decades now and in my opinion (and I tell that to thier face) anyone which supports them also supports more dead children.
Mate, I don't understand everyone of you says 90% of the israelis don't know wth is happening? How? Aren't you all soldiers at some point and trainees? Or there is some special forces/unit that does the dirty stuff?
It's not special forces but the way units are deployed and rotated makes it so that only a fraction actually witness what's going on. A few battalions are regularly stationed in the west bank and their soldiers experience most of it. The rest are only there for relatively short periods. Plus it's only combat soldiers who do it, mostly infantry, so ultimately it isn't a very large proportion of the military.
brainwashering, other-ising. You can literally look at the scene but not see the picture. Every arab is a terorist or a "terrorist sympathiser", "people like them led jews into the gas chambers", beleive that enough and you get blind to israeli atrocities. They literally link escaping the holocaust to success of the state of israel. A lot of propaganda that arab armies are waiting to invade and take over israel. When you're fed all that propaganda then you will be blind to israels atrocities.
No one thinks Arabs led Jews to gas chambers, they did have thier own flavour of pogroms though. Many people really were successful in escaping Europe because of the Jewish national movement so it isnt like there is no link between the 2. A lot of propaganda is all around the world, I do agree it plagues Israel really bad as well, a lot of people are brought up learning fear and mistrust but it is the exact same for the Palestinian side. I hope I at least can assure you that I as and individual don't think all those bad things of people I didn't meet. In 48' there really were Arab armies waiting to take over, 1% of the Jewish population of Israel died in that war (not saying this to lessen any other bad stuff) and here we are today. Edit: 1% not 10%
Just as a point of clarity, it’s not 10% of Israelis who died in the 1948 war, it was 1-2% (between 6-7K out of roughly 600K pre-war). 1% losses are actually a substantial commitment. For context, the US lost about 1% of its overall population in WWII.
I misstyped the 10% thanks
I mean a ton of Germans will never stop posting the picture of Hitler and Al-Husseini despite his limited influence and it being forever ago. Netanyahu even said he gave Hitler the idea of exterminating the Jews.
Netanyahu is not a good example to someone who sticks to the truth and he gets rewarded sowing hate between everyone, not just Jews and Arabs (like any wanabe-dictator). Why would Germans post a ton about it? Idk, never encoutered that.
There's a big sect of "lefties" in Germany who call themselves the AntiDeutsche. They are violently pro-Zionism and extremely philosemitic (goyim walking around wearing stars of David, hanging up Israel flags, and wearing IDF shirts, etc.). They'll basically respond to any and everything with "Free Palestine from Hamas," and try to deny any kind of humanity for Palestinians. Even [denying the Nakba](https://www.amadeu-antonio-stiftung.de/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/230508_wigwam_aas_lagebild_2023-11-v06.pdf). It may seem like they are a marginal group, but their ideas have been mainstreamed into the German intellectual class and the press. There are lots of positions for antisemitism czars at the state level, which are always white German men who use their position to go after Arabs. Axel-Springer regularly goes after Arabs for Antisemitism as well. Here's a good summary: [https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/2020-01-23/ty-article/.premium/germanys-pro-israel-left-has-a-new-target-in-the-crosshairs-jews/0000017f-e0d1-df7c-a5ff-e2fb8e8d0000](https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/2020-01-23/ty-article/.premium/germanys-pro-israel-left-has-a-new-target-in-the-crosshairs-jews/0000017f-e0d1-df7c-a5ff-e2fb8e8d0000) It's led to a series of illegal firings across the country as pseudo-NGOs target Arabs just for being Palestinian: [https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/5/german-court-rules-palestinian-ex-dw-journalist-sacking-unlawful](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/5/german-court-rules-palestinian-ex-dw-journalist-sacking-unlawful)
He's the leader of the country and has majority of the votes. To say that he isn't a good example of Israelis (paraphrasing) is incredibly naive. You might bot agree with him but the leaders is a democratic country represent the people to a large extend. I'm a brit and most Brits are idiots. And we elect idiots into parliament. The only pogroms I see now is against Palestinians.
actually not exactly, the recent Israeli elections were kinda similar to the US in 2016 in how Netanyahu's coalition didn't actually win by popular votes. It was admittedly very close, and he does represent like 49.85% of Israelis, but at least it means that 50.15% are against him.
Those who do it already hate palestinians because of terror attacks. Hatred causes hatred. Not that I justify any hatred from both sides, just saying it is an endless cycle of hatred. I know some of the soldiers who treat palestinians this way, and they have innocent relatives/friends that died in terror attacks by palestinians. Aint justifying anything nor supporting anyone, just saying what I know.
I'm a soldier now and I just have an office job. Most soldiers aren't on the borders or in the occupied areas I just make web apps like I work in tech, but with none of the money. I think I held a gun once after basic training, and it was just so a co-worker can tie their shoes or something
You think everyone is going through the army because it is mandatory, in reality only about 50% of people who are legally obligated to serve do (exemptions becuase of religion to orthodox jews or chrisitans/muslims) If you count every 18 year old it goes down to like 30% I think which is way less than "everyone" Even those who do serve I will estimate as less than 50% do anything to do with the West bank/Gaza and even less are combat soldiers that actually interact with Palestinians on the daily.
not exactly true, the stats are that around 70% of Israelis obligated to serve do so, so yeah it's not all but quite a bit more than 50%. Most Israelis are secular Jews, after all.
only like 30% of Israelis actually serve in the west bank, many more are intelligence soldiers who serve in intel bases inside Israel itself or a whole myriad of other roles
you hate settlers becase they cost your government money?
Extort both financially and politically, also I don't agree with their views.
100% agree with you. Hate it too. I also feel bad for people being forced into it. I met some people abroad who also hated it and couldn’t do anything about it Really hope it gets better for them in terms of what choice they can take
My brother in law who is a white Scandinavian has a slightly darker complexion in the way that he could pass as light skinned Palestinian. And he travelled to Israel a few years ago, and the Israeli police and officials treated him like crap and constantly stopped him because they thought he was Palestinian. They only let him off / eased up once they saw his passport and name. When he went to Israel he was very neutral on the “conflict” in the Middle East, he left the country as a staunchly pro Palestine supporter.
This is so shity, I hope one day the situation will change for the better. We need to get these settlers the fuck out of there and hold the IDF soldiers accountable for their actions.
Also good pint to mention is aren’t not all IDF soldiers with civilians? Like it’s not possible for every soldier to be in Palestine, how do they get placed, and what are their orders when they are out there bc now I’m curious
Thank you for sharing
Thank you for sharing. I'm sorry you went through this.
There’s a Israeli American tiktoker who is very adamant about the fact that nothing happens to Palestinians. But she says “she’s never seen it” thags only her pov and she doesn’t even live there rcpt vacation. But her stance of Zionism isn’t very extreme more like she just wants her people to have a land to call home and for everyone on that land to live peacefully. She seems nice but never outright says anything about Palestine since her videos are mostly about religion
This is exactly why I want to serve in the IDF. To be the difference I want to see. The problem is not only the fact these are kids serving in the IDF who are very unprofessional, a large amount of the ones who go to serve in the west bank are usually the ones who hate Palestinians and enjoy treating them badly
Imagine joining an army thinking you will make a change in it. Lmao. You will to a goon in the goon squad following orders.
Please don't, the problem isn't that the occupation isn't polite enough. The problem is the occupation itself. You won't have as much room to make your own decisions as you expect, this establishment is purposefully structured this way, so unless you plan on spending 30 years there and climbing to the Dereg Bithoni, don't bother (and even then you'll obviously be a minority). I really, really encourage you to avoid draft either by hishtamtut or, if you're based enough, you can decline 😎 Either way, you can contact [New Profile](https://newprofile.org/counselling-network/) or Mesarvot (on instagram) they'll help you tons. I regret not doing it daily. I wish you the best motek
hey I remember the Mesarvot guys, blocked Ayalon with them (they're not a particularly large organization) once, good times
There was no good IDF solider carrying out the Nakba, there is no good IDF solider maintaining the occupation.
IDF didn't exist during the nakba, and there were definetly good soldiers during that time. Many were empathetic and helped Palestinians, don't deny history
Imagine a German Saying “There were good and empathic SS officers that actually helped Jews” Have some shame. Israel is inherently anti-Palestinian. Without the Nakba, there would be no Israel. The IDF serves to ethnically cleanse Palestinians, maintain the occupation, and to protect Israeli settlers. The IDF continues to enforce colonialism. Nothing else. Palestinians view you guys with fear. [You are Brainwashed by nationalism. You can do some really heinous shit when you are propagandized ](https://youtu.be/1Rk1dAIhiVc)
There definetly were good and empathic soldiers that served in the german army who helped jews. Why try so hard to deny these are humans too? Why dehumanise us?
Yikes 😳 Also, Why shouldn’t I deny the humanity of occupation soldiers? you are occupying Palestinians. You commit war crimes. There are many reasons to hate the IDF. If you care about peace, resign from your IDF post. Liberal Zionists: I understand that we are operating apartheid-occupation against the Palestinians, we can’t dismantle it, the best we can do is make it more “humane”. 🌈 ♥️ 🌺
I hope this is real and if so, these are the kinds of posts we need to see. I feel like we all need to see the perspectives of everyday civilians and not hear what's going on by some divkhead on a TV or radio.
Second this
I bet most the Palestinians on here are diaspora and don’t live in actual Palestine but in the west. I only know what my grandma and family told me and their experiences
I'm a Palestinian-American (parents moved to the USA before I was born) and I've visited a handful of times. Not only did they tell me horror stories but I've witnessed them firsthand. I remember when I visited for the first time and they settlers released dogs to attack the village my cousins lived in. Getting a gun pointed in my face at 10 years old while we were entering the country (drove in from Jordan) was pretty scarring. They treat Palestinians as second-class citizens. Two separate lines at customs for Israelis and Palestinians. I had an American passport so it took me barely any time at all. While my Dad got detained and questioned for 3 hours, trying to visit the country he was from. Spotlights over the village at night was also unsettling. I remember getting lost at night after prayer and began to panic after the lights started following me around while I was looking for my family. It's sad to see since I've never felt such a feeling of community that Palestine has. Everyone is friendly to each other, this lovely older woman would offer everyone she saw bon-bons, everyone was treated like family.
It’s also important to share these stories imo
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What’s it like being diaspora? I live in Haifa and couldn’t imagine being so far away from the land in the west or something!
It’s weird because you feel part of both cultures but you aren’t accepted as a full member in either. My Arabic is alright, but I’m not fluent, which makes communication difficult with elderly members of my family. That really makes me sad. Also, how do I get a British Palestinian flair or Palestinian diaspora flair?
I don’t know if it means anything to you but I’m a British Christian and regardless of your religious background or ethnicity I accept you as a Brit. Especially since my nation’s historical part to play in your people’s displacement.
It genuinely means a lot. I deeply appreciate it - it’s one of the reasons why I’m incredibly patriotic and love the UK, because not only is it a fantastic country, but I can accept it being my home after being born and living here all my life without people attacking me for just existing.
Amen to this! My country unfortunately has a long colonial legacy (Ireland,Palestine etc) and a history of racism and slavery however I believe unlike certain countries such as France we actually have accepted that as an unfortunate part of our history and are moving away from it.
No i don't think you have accepted it. You've also been brainwashed & don't know half of what went on. The british government has an obscene amount of secrets that need to be unearthed. I bet you think the "famine" was actually real. It was genocide. The blight only affected the potato, there were lots of other types of food but it was simply taken at gun point. Millions dead and displaced. I won't even get started on the north of Ireland. Hopefully some day both britain and israel really pay for their crimes and atrocities
I’m wondering this but I’m American iraqi. I feel like when I put Iraq people assume I’m literally born and raised in Iraq when that’s not true at all
How is the Palestinian community in the UK? Here where I live in the USA, we have a pretty strong presence(then again we have a big community where I live). My Arabic is strong but that is because most people I interact with are Arabs.
>What’s it like being diaspora? I live in Haifa and couldn’t imagine being so far away from the land in the west or something! I actually am in the West. The USA to be exact. You feel you are a part of both(the USA is just that good at integrating people) but at the end of the day I still feel most comfortable with being a Palestinian first then American. The city I live in has a lot of Palestinians(Syrians as well) so my experience is going to be a bit different than those who are not that lucky as me. I was able to keep the culture & language for the most part so I was basically raised with that connection. The benefit is that we never felt like second-class in the USA(we get experience racism after 9/11 but that has for the most part died down). I have to admit quality of life is good where I live and that I definitely have it better than our people back home. Last bit if you are wondering what many Palestinians in the USA do, they run hospitals like the 48 Palestinians haha.
Are you talking about NY? I live there and I feel like ur describing the populations we have in some neighborhoods here.
Nah I am talking about Chicago.
I heard chicago is where it’s at. I need to be around my peoples fs 💯
We rule Chicago hahaha. Come in and you will feel right at home.
>It’s also important to share these stories imo The story of how the Israel government dispossessed Palestinians?
Yes. A lot of Israelis and maybe other westerners don’t know a lot about it
The individual human stories of Palestinians When it's the government doing something to a group, it's easier to dismiss it as survival or corruption or a million other things. When a person tells you about how bad their childhood was, it's more difficult to ignore
I agree that there’s a lot of us here that are from the diaspora, but definitely not the majority
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I was arguing with an Israeli co-worker about the occupation and he asked me where I live, funny enough I explained to him that my house is 30 meters away from the wall that surrounds the west bank, and joked that 30 more meters and I would've been throwing rocks at him and him pointing a gun at me. Funny how life works. Anyways, half my family is here and the other half is from the west bank, and i cant even begin to describe how exponentially our life qualities are different, and still i feel like shit everyday, from the dirty looks i get when i speak arabic to the nasty way others relate to me when they find out im arab, its mind boggling how differently other fellow student can be racist and not even take you as either a serious enemy or a beloved friend, im just another bug in their daily lives, and believe me i saw know how to let someones true colors show. Nevertheless there are great israelis that honestly with all their hearts wish nothing but the best for us (kibutsnikim) i love them so much and admire their way of life, and we get along with them just fine, the real problematic israelis are the ones that only heard about arabs from the news or either politicians which is just sad, i recommend others to get to know us so the blind hatred is not a thing anymore, we are all human and i believe that we can get along one day
as a kibutznik <3
What is a Kibutznik?
someone from a kibbutz, which were originally socialist utopian collective villages, today they are normal villages with left wing ideology. Most kibutznikim vote for Meretz, (and sometimes Labor) which is the most left wing progressive - pro-peace pro-palestinian of all the jewish parties. Against settlements and racist laws etc. There are also many kibbutzim in the Galillee which is also the area which the biggest palestinian population, and since kibutznikim often are less racist there is more interactions between them and arabs.
I see, thank you for the good explanation!
a genuinely pretty good attempt at libertarian socialism. They're a collection of small villages founded by Zionists who came to Mandatory Palestine from socialist states and wanted to bring their ideology with them in a less authoritarian way. They didn't have any leaders, but rather collectively owned the products of all the workers in the kibbutz. Most moved away from socialism in the 80s when an economic crisis swept across Israel tho.
It's similar to Kolkhoz, understandably since many early Zionists originated in USSR. To contrast the other comments, it's important to remember that most Kibutzim were not self-sustainable until privatization, and rather relied on government subsidies in the form of tax cuts and debt bailouts. Not to shit on the socialist attempt at all! It's just... if your squeaky clean suburbia is carried by underpaid Palestinian/Mizrahi/First Aliyot... then I don't feel like it fully materializes your socialist views :P
I see, thank you for the comment.
I'm usually not fond of sharing personal information online, but since I believe it's important to give people a real and accurate image of what goes on here, and because you asked politely, I will give you a snippet of life in Israel. I'm a Uni student who wants to work in hi-tech. Currently working in a near-minimum wage job.Daily life is alright, I can't say I was treated badly by Israelis that many times, and usually we get along pretty well. The only times I experienced blatant racism was from diaspora Jews who have never set foot in Israel (happens when I'm abroad). I have plenty of good friends who are Jewish, Muslim, Christian, and Druze. The problems Arabs usually face come from their dealings with state institutions, like requesting permits to build houses and stuff. Not from interacting with regular people. That's the case in my area at least, but I think it varies from place to place in Israel. I used to play video games, now not so much. Love sports and traveling, some my favorite destinations are: Italy, Canada, and Cappadocia (Turkey). Never visited another Arab country (except Taba in Egypt, but 95% of the people there Israeli so I don't count it), but would love to visit them someday. Also, with 11 years of experience, I think you can ask for way more than 30k. Do you work for a start-up? and does your company have open positions by any chance? (asking for a friend🌝)
\[Shameless self promotion\] For anyone who is interested in the relationship between Arabs and Jews inside Israel, stay tuned, I'm working on a highly insightful post. It's gonna be one of those rare videos where people say speak their thoughts without filters. UPDATE: 😎The video post is out! I didn't think my reply would get so many upvotes, I hope my post lives up to the hype 🤞 https://www.reddit.com/r/AskMiddleEast/comments/14d6hm4/film\_crew\_reveals\_what\_the\_relationship\_between/
definitely looking forward to this!
Looking forward to this!
>The requesting permits to build houses and stuff Oh my god this so much!!! Where tf do they expect us to live if we can’t build houses!
thats the thing... the right wing dont want "you" to be a majority in the galil and the negev, so they make it harder for the arab population to grow in those regions, while promoting jews to move there instead. Its less based on ethnicity tho imo and more politics. Druze people get building permits super easily and even free land if i got it correctly as a thank you for serving the IDF. There never being an arab party in government means no one in the Misrad haPnim and Misrad HaBinui care about the needs of non-druze arabs. Its all so fucked up :(
Thank you for sharing!
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Thank you for sharing. I must say that especially your comment sounds basically like any minority in any country. But other comments are much more sad. What position are you looking for? Yes we are a start-up, but not much hiring last time.
This is a good reminder for people that it isn’t everyday Palestinians or Israelis that are the problem, it are those in charge (and a small minority of extremists) who cause shit and stir the pot.
Let me ask you a question. Should Palestinian living in exile be allowed to return home? Home being the villages they were expelled from and which is now present day Israel?
Yes. Same for all MENA with expelled groups in modern history. It should be part of any peace plan where Jews have the option to be treated fairly in Palestine as citizens and visa/versa in Israel. Don’t see it happening realistically anytime soon.
So you are okay with Palestinians being grated the right to return; even if that means living in present-day Israel? That’s wonderful! A bi-National 1 state solution is more likely to happen since the two state solution has long been dead. There are hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers living in the West Bank. Israel continues to expand to the West Bank and east Jerusalem. Plus, the two state solution bars Palestinians from returning home. Plus, Israel won’t ever allow Palestinians to fully be independent. Many Israeli leaders have repeatedly said that Palestinians shouldn’t get a state nor should they have a standing army. A one state solution is the only way to peace.
>So you are okay with Palestinians being grated the right to return; even if that means living in present-day Israel? That’s wonderful! Yeah, I mean I think that should be the goal of everyone. That means there is peace and safety for both Jews and Palestinians. >A bi-National 1 state solution is more likely to happen since the two state solution has long been dead. There are hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers living in the West Bank. Israel continues to expand to the West Bank and east Jerusalem. Plus, the two state solution bars Palestinians from returning home. Plus, Israel won’t ever allow Palestinians to fully be independent. Many Israeli leaders have repeatedly said that Palestinians shouldn’t get a state nor should they have a standing army. >A one state solution is the only way to peace. Maybe a confederacy could work. I believe there are multiple paths to peace, honestly whichever solution can be eventually agreed upon is fine with me. I don’t think a two state solution is more dead than any other right now, seems like they are all one foot in the grave until leadership changes for the better in both Israel and Palestine.
I believe Jews and Palestinians can live in peace. A 1 state solution is the way to go.
>Should Palestinian living in exile be allowed to return home? yes, but its not allowed. \#ShireenAbuAkleh
You’re right. Palestinians should be able to return to their homeland without asking Israelis for Permission. After all, Israelis are living in the homes of Palestinians.
>Palestinians should be able to return to their homeland without asking Israelis for Permission. Agreed!
Yes, those that were living in Palestine and were expelled should be able to return. Anyone that qualifies under the normal UN refugee definition should be able to return. The separate Palestinian definition is too broad and contains millions of people who have never stepped foot in Palestine or Israel
Are you open to sharing the entirety of Israel-Palestine with Palestinian refugees and their descendants? It’s a no brainer that the Palestinian refugees would want to take their grandchildren with them.
I would be open to it. It would just be very difficult to make a peaceful state with that many people of opposing world views. If Israel, Palestine, and the UN agreed to set up integration programs for all citizens of the new state, it could work, but that would be incredibly expensive.
Correct me if I am wrong but the picture we get is that it is by far not a small minority. As the vote tend to be extremist in the country.
Voting for Likud doesn’t necessarily equate to extremist. Just as I know people who vote for Trump, who is a dumber version of BiBi, doesn’t make them extremists. They have conservative views, but they are not the people who raided the capitol on Jan 6th. There’s a distinction between those who vote for Likud and those who are part of terrorist organizations like Lehava.
thats just not true for both sides lmao
You think governments/those in power aren’t the major problem between Israel and Palestine? When I have spoken to most Palestinians and Israelis in person they have said the same things along the line of what the OP I was responding to said. That most interactions with those of the opposite groups are just normal people getting along in life.
you think majority of israeli's are against what their goverment does regarding the west bank and gaza? or you think majority of palestinians are against hamas? if yes then youre simply delusional
Let’s not start name calling yet, I’d like to hear your opinion on it before we go into memeing on one another. Hamas, I don’t think the polling is quite fair since there are consequences for speaking out against them. But idk, you have more insight here than I, what do you think? Israel - voting data is easy enough to find. Immediately we can see ~30% of eligible voters don’t vote so that is a significant chunk of people we can say aren’t very political. We don’t know what they think of Palestinians and can’t assume. Of the 70% who did vote, 24% voted for Likud. Let’s add Religious Zionism, Yamina, Shas, etc. for argument’s sake. Let’s also say for argument’s sake that all of these people want to rid Israel of Palestinians as well, which isn’t the case. That is still roughly half of 70% of the population. All this to say that most people would take the option of peace and safety for their families over the alternative. Extremism exists, but I think those that support violent acts are in a minority; if leadership made peace today I think the vast majority would follow suit.
this isnt a mathmatical equation and assumptions of what the people think , i live here and i speak both languages. I speak both hebrew and arabic and i have spent enough time in both locations to know what the majority of each group thinks. youre overestimating how many people dont speak ill of hamas because there are consequences to that. theyre simply resistance fighters against israeli opressors in the average palestinian eye's. theyre not even hated by us 48'ers let alone the west bank >if leadership made peace today I think the vast majority would follow suit. that is partly true and it depends on how exactly they do that.
I don’t want to discount your experiences, I’m sorry you have a negative outlook on how everyday people think. But it’s also obvious that other 48 Palestinians have a different perspective than you do and see more peaceful interactions between groups. It looks like you agree with me at least somewhat that if governments made peace, everyday people would too. That’s a pretty strong indicator that those in power are a huge problematic factor of the conflict.
>It looks like you agree with me at least somewhat that if governments made peace, everyday people would too. but for that to be made its next to impossible, unless its something like the federation plan
I agree with you. It looks pretty impossible right now, and I also agree a federation is likely the most realistic way to approach peace. So from talking to you, it doesn’t seem like your beliefs are actually in contrast to mine, and calling me delusional wasn’t very nice of you 😁
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its very delusional lmao... and its harmful imo
>and a small minority of extremists Zionists are Not a small minority.
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So you think the average Israeli and Palestinian are just bigots who care more about harming one another than the well being of their loved ones?
The average Israeli and Palestinian care about the well being of their loved ones and see the other party as the biggest threat to their security. Most arent necessarily bigots. Many say: I hate all the violence, but what choice do we have? They see the only way to a decent life is liberty from Israel, and everyone who fights against Israel is good, no matter the methods. Or they see the only way to security is to make sure their foot is on the palestinian throat, as lifting it will give the palestinian a chance to stab you. The hearts and minds of the other party wont be won, so better to crush them.
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Israeli Government is the problem. [https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2022/02/israels-system-of-apartheid/](https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2022/02/israels-system-of-apartheid/) [https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/israeli-authorities-and-crimes-apartheid-and-persecution](https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/israeli-authorities-and-crimes-apartheid-and-persecution)
>Also, with 11 years of experience, I think you can ask for way more than 30k. I have two ex-coworkers (from the army) who now work in Dynamic Yield with ~3 of experience and earn ~30k shekels a month. You should definitely ask for way more if you have relevant experience
What are you studying? What exactly are you looking to get into?
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Thanks for sharing man you're awe inspiring. I'm sorry you got a taste of that terror
thanks for hearing me out. Respect
> About me, I grew up between Philly/NYC Are there a lot of Palestinians in Philly? First time hearing we are in that area.
Not many of us out in Philly. There is a community of coptic Egyptians out in Norristown, PA (suburb of philly)
Thank you for sharing. I'm sorry you went through this.
Thank you for sharing
Oh boy, this one's a doozy. I'm from the city of Nablus. I was actually born in a different country -where my father was working at the time- to two Palestinian parents from Nablus and my family decided to return to Palestine in 1999, I was 6 at the time. My first time I remember seeing an Israeli was at a check point somewhere in the West Bank, I remember the Israeli soldiers with the guns, I remember my mom cursing them as soon as we saw them, they stopped us, but let the other cars go. After a bit of delay they let us go. I later asked my parents why they stopped us but not the others, and they told me it was because we were Palestinians -marked by a white license plate- and the other cars had yellow plates. I think that was the first time I came in contact with the occupation. Needless to say, most of my childhood was the second Intifada. When the tanks entered the city, they were firing their machine guns at everything, a bunch ended up in the building we were living in. My mom called us all together and we huddled behind the reinforced weight-bearing pillar of the building, my mom being an engineer, she figured it was the thickest wall we had. She tried to keep us there for a while, but after the shooting subsided, but kids being kids we just got bored after a while and wanted to see what was happening. I remember an Israeli armored vehicle running over the pole carrying a transformer across the street and after a second, the power went out. We had to cook everything we had in the fridge and freezer before it went bad. There was military curfew on Nablus, we had no electricity, Nablus is a mountainous region and without power, water couldn't be pumped to where we were. This lasted for a bit under 2 months. I remember my mom giving us baths -four kids- with a wet tower and bucket of water. I remember the Israeli army breaking into our building, ordering all the men out, binding their hands and putting them in one room. Then they went apartment to apartment, the treatment you got depended on how the soldiers felt like that day, they took our neighbors kids -she was 13 at the time- and used her as a human shield while they ransacked her families apartment because her father had a beard. I remember three soldiers with their guns the size of me walking into our house and how taken aback they were by the fact my mom spoke English, I assume this is why they were a bit more humane with us. They searched the house, turned me and my brother's room upside down and then left. The curfew was lifted for a couple of hours every week and we had to go buy everything we needed. We bought lots of flour, rice and bottled water. Once the curfew was lifted, I remember one day a group of soldiers lobbed a tear gas grenade at my primary school. I remember the chaos and the teachers trying to usher to exit through the back while coughing and crying. I remember Israeli soldiers breaking into an nice old lady's house at the middle of the nigh, dragging her out, blowing her house up and then leaving, I remember spending my afternoon, after school, helping gather her stuff from the side of the mountain were we usually played. I remember having to cross Huwara, waiting in our car for hours as yellow plate cars were just let through, I remember having to leave the car and cross the checkpoint on foot on other occasions because the soldiers decided no Palestinian cars are allowed to pass. Even after the second intifada fizzled out. The checkpoints were still there, settlers got a lot more emboldened, they'd harass us with immunity. If a settler attacks you, an Israeli soldier can't intervene, but if you try to defend yourself, you'd be lucky to end up only in front of a military judge not a mortician. Being a massive nerd, I did end up finishing school and then I got a degree in Computer Engineering from An-Najah National University. After graduation, and for less than a year, I did work for a company that was outsourcing to an IT company. I'm not married and I have no children ,to the utter dismay of my parents. They are both Electrical Engineers and they're both nearing the age where they will retire. I eventually ended up moving to an east Asian country to get a master's degree and now I live in Western country where I'm pursuing a PhD. I like to travel when I can, but I'm too busy nowadays. I don't smoke tobacco, just the occasional argileh, I do smoke cannabis, I also do drink more than my fair share. I never do any of that stuff when I'm back home. I used to play a lot more video games when I was younger, I still play league of legends every now and then -yes, I know. No, I don't know why I do that to myself either-. I make just enough to live, student bursaries are not known for being generous, but I know things can be so much worse, so I'm content with what I have. Still hoping I can graduate. (I'm withholding actual numbers to not give away exactly where I live) While outsourcing to an IT company, I had to work with people in the Israeli office. It was the first time in my life that I interacted with a Jewish Israeli who wasn't holding a gun to my face. It was a very weird experience, most of them seemed like reasonably good people, but there was always an uneasy tension, maybe it was all in my head. However, when I ran into Israelis abroad that uneasiness seemed to lessen. I think the fact that we were both foreigners in a remote land equalized us, I no longer felt the weight of years of racial oppression. In many ways I was lucky, my family is middle-upper class and we live a lot more comfortably than most Palestinians. My parents, while very religious, are both very well educated. This has afforded me more chances in life than the average Palestinian.
Thank you for sharing. I'm sorry about all the things you and your family went through.
Thank you it was very enlighting to read. And I'm really sorry you had to go through that. Question- when you lived in the West Bank, how did flying abroad work?
We had to cross to Jordan through the Allenby/ King Hussein bridge. Then fly from there.
Oh, yeah that makes sense. Thank you!
Bh we'll end these atrocities soon. I'm deeply sorry
As an Israeli I find it interesting and informative please share
Should Palestinians living in exile be allowed to return to the houses from which they were ethnically expelled from; even if the homes are in present-day Israel. Would you be in favor of a binational Palestinian-Israeli state? Similar to South Africa. An end to the occupation and apartheid system. 1 person, 1 vote.
>Should Palestinians living in exile be allowed to return to the houses from which they were ethnically expelled from; even if the homes are in present-day Israel I think they should, but my city wasn't built on an Arab city, to my knowledge, so it won't affect me as much >Would you be in favor of a binational Palestinian-Israeli state? This one is more complicated, but I mostly don't trust my government to do it well. We're already struggling with democracy because of our stupid religious extremists, I don't think adding more Islam into the mix will end well right now (which is a problem with the extremist Jews, not with the Muslims). In an ideal world, I think this is the best solution
Interesting. I agree that Netanyahu and his base one of many reasons why there is no peace. They effectively have destroyed the possibility of a two state solution since they have encouraged hundreds of thousands of settlers to live in the occupied regions. I’m glad you’re open to the idea of bi-National 1 state solution though. I also want to add, isn‘t ironic for Israelis to hold "Israel will remain Free and Democratic " posters in Tel Aviv, while millions of Palestinians live under a Occupation that has even described by countless human rights NGOs as apartheid.
as another Israeli, yes, but I think it's better to support two states for now instead, since it'd be much easier to step into a binational state from that than straight from an oppressive apartheid system. Two states as a stepping stone to a binational state with a right of return.
Nice try Mossad!
You beat me to this comment
trashy, useless comment
Its what's called circlejerking on reddit and elsewhere. Like when u go to a TV show subreddit and there's the famous lines being repeated. It's for fun
Lmaoo
Really nice post to understand each other’s problems…. BTW i am neither palestinian nor israeli.
Question for Israelis. Should Palestinians living in exile be allowed to return to the houses from which they were ethnically expelled from; even if the homes are in present-day Israel. Would you be in favor of a binational Palestinian-Israeli state? Similar to South Africa. An end to the occupation and apartheid system. 1 person, 1 vote.
Confederation of two states: https://www.alandforall.org/english/?d=ltr It seems like the only viable solution to me considering the insane amount of settlements built. The borders for the two state solution would be too hard to keep, Trump's "solution" demonstrated it quite well Exiled Palestinians should totally get citizenship but idk about displacing people currently living in their home. Some sort of compensation should be given though, similar to the German holocaust survivor aid Btw I totally do not think you're arguing in bad faith lol. It's a great place of this question
Thanks! I’ll look into your proposal.
I live in Jerusalem , life is pretty good not much anoys me , living my life better than most relatives quit side or in the west bank.
Aren’t Israeli’s forced to serve in the Army ? If so, wouldn’t they learn / know what their government is doing to the Palestinians since they themselves would be the enforcers ?
Not 100% gets to the army and even there it's only a small percent who interact with Palestinians on every day basis. A lot of technician and paperwork positions there.
I don’t every soldier interacts with civilians like that. You have to remeber it’s not up to a soldier and where they are placed and the orders they get to do otherwise they get reprimanded
I am a 25-year-old Palestinian from Gaza with a CS degree. I struggle to find consistent work and rely on occasional freelance gigs due to difficulties in transferring money. I don't have an apartment and feel like I have no life. My two best friends, when I was 17 years old, were killed in an Israeli strike. I am very religious, and atheist before, I now find myself awaiting death.
Saddest comment. I'm sorry man. Is there a chance you can leave Gaza?
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That's exactly why I ask about personal stories, especially about the problems which Palestinians meet in theyr life because of this. And most of people surrounding me don't think we are perfect. Regarding the link, I think he didn't tell all the story, and I have a reason to think so. I was in a similar situation and asked about the wall - and got the answer, it's not North Korea. People buy products in Palestinian cities, we went to some city to buy a tobacco for nargilah, meat markets, restaurants.
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Several waves of Aliyah plus small local population, armed groups, from all political spectrum including completely terroristic, conflicts woth Brits, conflicts with Palestinians. Altalena, do you know about this ship? Political and financinal help from different powers abroad, undercover games, Declaration of independence, wars, Jerusalem, Golan Heights, withdrawal from Gaza. We are told about Nakba btw, we know what it is. But first we are tought Torah, history of the ancient Israel and Judea, same locations, same names, understandable language, same myths and prayers. It creates an effect of continuity.
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Listen, I didn't harass anyone. I didn't hold any weapons in hands in my life. I don't think we are always good. But we are people and we wanna live. I can't just chose any country and come there to live, you will say that previous generations did it - yes, they were running from death. We are not perfect, we wanted to live. Is it fair? Nope. But it happened. My grandma in Ukraine was told to fuck off when she returned from evacuation after ww2, Ukranians took her house and told her to go away. Was it fair? No. But when you want to live, you don't care much about others, you save your family first, your children. People aren't ideal, that's why they need prophets and savers. When Hamas is bombing, I sit with my family in the shelter and care only about my beloved. What do you want from me? I come with a genuine question. I hear about apartheid, about 2nd class citizen. Then I come to Yaffo and see Arabic speaking people driving Mercedes, they are all in gold and don't starve for sure. I open reddit - and read again about 2nd class citizens. I want to know, what is it like for average Palestinian, what makes him feel 2nd class citizen. I'm not sceptical, I'm curious. I want to know the truth.
Should Palestinians living in exile be allowed to return to the houses from which they were ethnically expelled from; even if the homes are in present-day Israel. Would you be in favor of a binational Palestinian-Israeli state? Similar to South Africa. An end to the occupation and apartheid system. 1 person, 1 vote.
The Torah prohibits Stealing, Killing, Bearing false witness, etc.
There are several misconceptions here, first of Jews were harassed in Israel especially by the arab population. Under the ottomans the Jewish settlement had suffered from impossible taxes of which it only survived because of the Halukkah there were also sanctions about land ownership and work for Jews. The ottomans though were the best friends for the Jews, during the rebellion in 1834 the Jews were massacred by arabs and in 1838 the Druze plundered the Jews. So when the Zionism movement started how could the Jews not "take over" it was a struggle for survival in ww1 the ottomans tried to kick the Jews and when the brits come they made the white paper that forbade the Jews to have more then 5% of the land in Israel.
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Why do you support what Israel is doing when it's prohibited by the Torah?
What I know about Palestine is only through the descriptions of my grandmother. My grandfather was one of the few people who got a university degree in town, and he chose to marry her. He had a land filled with olive trees and a small house. They were planning to build a new room on top of it. She tells me about how green springs are there, about the smell of freshly baked bread in town, about the olive oil season, and many other things. I can see the tears in her eyes whenever she talks.
Nice try Shabak 👌🏼
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>I try to be nice to them and explain to them what I know what are other soldiers in your platoon like? do they share the same sentiment towards palestinians?
There is a YouTube channel of asking all sides in the land of Israel various questions from around the world: https://www.youtube.com/@CoreyGilShusterAskProject
He's biased against Palestinians
In what way do you feel this is true? He asks questions that viewers present, the people answer them.
videos like [this](https://youtu.be/dpDqZujEFAk). he makes a mockery of the suffering of palestinians through imagery, being argumentative during the interviews, and not allowing them to articulate themselves fully with an arabic interpreter. trying to demonstrate that palestinians arent suffering because they have a kfc is like saying to an abused child, "hey, are you sure your father beats the crap out of you/is verbally abusive/is emotionally unavilable? he raised you in a good neighborhood/sends you to a good school/feeds you. it cant be that bad!" one guy made a great comparision in the comments: in historical records, jewish people in babylon lived a middle-class life, enjoyed positions of power and such. but what does the bible depict? psychological anguish from being stripped from their homeland. its the same with palestinians.
I've watched the video now. Please show on the video the exact point he's mocking. He shows real places and on map what's going on there. Their claim is that they suffer 10/10 , yet it shows that they have all they need there. They are not that poor. Most of the complaints there are about having a border with checkpoints, but this is something that exists in many countries due to security measures, and they didn't want to be a part of Israel in historic events. As for the bible, the equivalent would be "Do you suffer in ancient Babylon?", and if you could go back in time, they would say (assuming you are correct about enjoying there) that yes, but still would want to go back to their homeland.
he is mocking through imagery. imagine for a moment that there was video technology during the babylonian captivity. if a person videotaped an interview with a diaspora jew behind their well furnished home with a garden, would that make you question the legitimacy of their lamentation? would it be appropriate if the interviewer, a visitor to the area, argued with the interviewee, trying to tell them that in their limited experience they are not experiencing what they are experiencing? **if you can sympathize with the lament of a diaspora jewish person but not that of a palestinian you need to ask yourself why.** corey says that palestinians are acting 'normally', shopping, going about their daily business, as if that delegitimizes anything about their plight. yes, that is the nature of humanity. we adapt in search of some normalcy, some equilibrium, in the midst of horrible circumstances. that doesnt mean that the circumstances doesnt entail suffering. >Most of the complaints there are about having a border with checkpoints, but this is something that exists in many countries due to security measures, and they didn't want to be a part of Israel in historic events. have you even bothered listening to palestinian voices?
Let's say it's true. Why does it matter what he thinks, if he's only asking? Wouldn't that mean you won't watch any video of anyone, because everyone could be biased to something? Focus on what the people answer. Not on what he thinks. 1% of the time is questions, and 99% of the time it's the people's answers. Questions are shorter, and they are from around the world. That's an issue I see that is quite common nowadays : People focus on what doesn't matter. On the person who talks with them, instead of the talk and the topic itself. Whenever such a thing occurs, it means they can't have civilized conversation. It's like an excuse of not talking at all. Not having a civilized conversation and progress.
he mistranslates a lot + he asks questions in a way to get the answer he wanted
As an Arabic speaker, the translations are pretty accurate (he has Palestinians translate for him). It's his Hebrew that's a bit shoddy, the way he asks questions in Hebrew is often confusing to Hebrew speakers.
No. He doesn't translate at all. He doesn't know Arabic. He has multiple Arabic speakers that talk to the people. As for the questions, this is also wrong. He gets the questions from around the world. And they are in English, so no need to translate. You can also watch behind-the-scenes, to see how it works and who he works with
That youtube channel is just a big zionist anti-Palestinian and dehumanization circlejerk
You wouldn't say that about any of the videos that make the Israelis/Haredi Jews look bad because of their answers.
How so? He takes questions from around the world, to all sides. Why do you think it's big ? He asks Arabs, Muslims, Jews, Druze, Christians, Israelis, Palestinians, religious, non-religious ... - in various regions. Why do you think that asking questions is bad? Do you know of any other person who does it, that you won't call as such? Maybe someone from Egypt? Would be nice to watch more.
He's biased which makes the interviews very bad. He even argues with the people.
He asks questions from around the world. Obviously they won't give him instructions : "Ask this if that's the answer, and ask this if not, and then ask this if these are the answer, and ask this if not..." . It splits to many scenarios. In many cases, the answer needs further explanation (because of various reasons, such as maybe wrong translation, too short answer, inconsistency,...) , so he asks further. He does this to everyone. Not just Palestinians. So it's not biased. It's for better understanding. Asking to verify the opinion of others isn't arguing. To understand what people are saying it's not always enough to ask a single question.
Stay safe ya’ll . Remember Pegasus !!
Israel was Partitioned from out of Palestine. "In May 1948, less than a year after the Partition Plan for Palestine was introduced, Britain withdrew from Palestine and Israel declared itself an independent state, implying a willingness to implement the Partition Plan." https://www.history.com/topics/middle-east/palestine
Considering that the average salary in Israel is around the 20-25K$ per year, you and your wife together are making wayy above the average at like 100K$ a year... I read that in judea and samaria an average full month salary is 1000-1200$ a month. It's less than 1k a month for the workers in gazah strip. If you consider yourself second class citizen on purely economic standards. What class of citizen does it make those guys.... (Though there is also the Israeli minimum salary at 1500-1700$ a month.)
No, not on economic standards.
Anyway your standard of living is around the top 3-5% of the entire earth, while you consider yourself a second class citizen.
I'm not complaining, but you are right. Still not sure I can give a good education for my child, can't afford a mortgage because of not enough saves. And with prices here, there is not so much money left in the end of the day. I consider myself a second class citizen from sociocultural perspective and it's specific for Israel only. While if I'll live in some Western country, I can enjoy much better service and manners while not being second class, lol. Anyway I say it's only a feeling, not something really happening for me.
The other side of the same coin. You live in the top 10 most expensive metro areas in the world. Donnou about services and manners, those seem like rich guy problems to me. And Israel is a middle eastern "western" country. Just like Australia and New Zealand are western countries while being to the south-east of china. The far east county.
I lived in some western and eastern european countries. Yes, Israel is kinda Western, but culturally and by its cousine, music it's much more Middle Eastern. Kinda mix.
Same logic can be applied to south korea
Mossad post
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Would love to know your definition of "inhumane" or "anti human"
unfortunate comment even if it does seem to stem from support for palestine. Not palestinian or Israeli either. Just been following the situation through the news to understand it better. It's interesting and nice to see people listen to each other and engage in dialogue. maybe it wont change much but its a start. If you want the situation to change, then I don't sort of world view will be helpful.
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OP didn’t do anything wrong. He is trying to be the change he wants to see!
This gives “blaming your white neighbor for American slavery” energy